the loaves and the fishes

By some small miracle I had enough yarn to finish the mittens!

I was seriously worried and you can see by the small amount that was left I had good reason to be.

To celebrate I made a few knit candycane ornaments to hang on the tree and give to a few friends. They were so fun to make, super quick  and simple. A perfect project to fit in between all the Christmas gift knitting I have planned.  Once I take a picture I will post up the pattern on how to make them.

Winter is just the best, I am loving all these dark cold nights that I have to cuddle up on my couch with a hot chocolate, a good movie and my yarn and needles.



PANIC!!!!!

"The happiness of Miss Smith was quite equal to her intentions. Miss Woodhouse was so great a personage in Highbury, that the prospect of the introduction had given as much panic as pleasure; but the humble, grateful little girl went off with highly gratified feelings, delighted with the affability with which Miss Woodhouse had treated her all the evening, and actually shaken hands with her at last!"

That quote is a little long I know but I dont have time to search for a better one. I am experiencing the same feelings as Miss Harriet Smith was at that moment in the story. 

PLEASURE  because I am almost finished knitting a pair of mittens for a Christmas present

and

PANIC because I am looking at the tiny amount of yarn that I have left and am worried it is not enough to finish the job!

AHHHHhhhHHhhhhhhHhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!

The pattern said one skein of yarn would be enough, and I only used a teeny tiny bit of it earlier to make some doggie legwarmers for my sister-in-law's miniature pincher, but seriously could the pattern be that accurate!!!!!

Fingers crossed it's not.....

SMITTEN WITH MITTENS!

Mittens are the best thing ever to knit!!!! Seriously I want to make everyone I know mittens, if you are expecting a Christmas gift from me this year prepare yourself... there is a good chance it will be mittens!

Whoever thought knitting people scarves was a good idea?!?

Here are some reasons why knitting mittens is the bomb diggity:

1)  you can finish a really cute pair in ONE WEEK!!! Which is very important to me since it seems like every scarf I knit ends up being a ridiculously epic long project.

2) They are far more useful than a scarf, think about it. If you are freezing in your car in the morning are you more concerned about wrapping a scarf around your neck or putting mittens on so you can touch your steering wheel without you fingers turning into popsicles.

3) Mittens look really professional, making them is sweet because people think you put in SO much time and effort to make them when really it was WAY less time that it would have taken to make anything else.

4) They also look way harder to make than they really are, thereby making you look like a super skilled knitter.

5)  You can sing the song "Three little kittens, lost their mittens..." while you are knitting!

MITTENS ROCK, GO MAKE SOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

and if you want a super easy and beautiful pattern I recommend the basic cabled mittens pattern that a friend of mine found on ravlery.

Inspiration!

The power of doing anything with quickness is always prized much by the possessor, and often without any attention to the imperfection of the performance." - Pride and Predjudice

I visited a craft fair at a local elementary school this past weekend to check out the fun Christmas crafts and goodies they were showing. I also planned to check out the tables selling knitting wares, to see if my knitting club could hold our own in the craft fair circuit. What I found was quite suprizing to me, there were three tables selling knit/crocheted stuff and they were all rather...blah. That is not to say they weren't nice, everything was carefully made with nice yarns and such... but it was all rather plain. Not one scarf I saw had any pattern to it, it was all just straight knitting. I was thoroughly inspired by their lack of inspiration!

It seemed like most stuff was knit in a span of one month, all basic and straight, with larger gauged yarn that knits up quicker. Probably they only decided to do the craft fair a month or two before it was to happen, so they went for quantity instead of originality.

I am quite confident the twisted stitchers (my knitting club) will be able to do really well next winter, especially since we have a game plan and will start at the begining of the year, making a few cute things every month that we would sell at our table. Who knows, maybe we will start our own little etsy shop too! and we can make signs and pass out business cards with our shop site on them, this is going to be fun! A perfect project to start the new year with!

crochet shmochet

Victory is MINE! 

I have conquered the crocheted flower baby hat that was an utter and absolute fail when I tried it the first time. Having my Hello Kitty project finished sucessfully gave me new hope. I tried this hat again and a strange thing happened, all the parts that were terribly confusing to me were now simple as cake. (I refuse to use the saying 'simple as pie'... pies are really hard for me to make!)

All I needed was a few weeks immersed in the language of crochet and now it all makes sense.

Also I have a link to a video that you HAVE to watch, it is for Jane Austen's Fight Club and it's AWESOME!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2PM0om2El8

and here is my beauty, I made for my friends new little girl: