this week’s awesome finds

Home­made reed dif­fuser, eas­i­er to make than I thought! Did­n’t know that one could even use bam­boo skew­ers for this. From Make & Takes.

I like tiny stud ear­rings, and these heart-shaped ones are just love­ly. From Fall for DIY.

I often see cof­fee pots at thrift stores and won­dered what they can be used for. Now I know — a ter­rar­i­um! Though last time I tried grow­ing air plants it did­n’t work out so well, they just shriv­eled up and died. How I could kill an air plant that only requires air to live I don’t real­ly know. But any­way, this cof­fee pot ter­rar­i­um from A Charm­ing Project is brilliant!

I must share this, because I <3 Choco­cat :D Pat­tern from Sabri­na’s Cro­chet.

I do like cats very much, and this is SO cute! The pat­tern is in French but Google Trans­late does a pret­ty good job. From La Souris aux Petits Doigts.

This tunic might be my next project :D Looks fan­tas­tic with the var­ie­gat­ed yarn. From Red Heart.

Add some sub­tle cute­ness to any out­fit with this donut ring, spot­ted on Dream a Lit­tle Big­ger.

Love this stitch pat­tern, might make a cozy sweater too. Pat­tern from Slugs on the Refrig­er­a­tor.

And final­ly, if you like The Grand Budapest Hotel as much as I do (and if you haven’t seen it, I high­ly rec­om­mend!), and if you like to bake, you might enjoy mak­ing these pas­tries from the film! Video recipe spot­ted on Make.

Hap­py Wednes­day, everyone!

 

silverwoods

 

Photo 2015-02-11, 8 01 11 PM

This is a remake of this cro­cheted sweater that I made a long time ago. I had been wear­ing it less and less fre­quent­ly ever since some­one com­ment­ed that it looked like an armor :S (I think it was meant to be a com­pli­ment) so I fig­ure I’d unrav­el it and make it into some­thing with a more soft­ened look.

I tried mak­ing the beau­ti­ful Feb­ru­ary Lady Cardi­gan a while ago but was­n’t suc­cess­ful. But I real­ly like the lace pat­tern in the cardi­gan, so I tried to adapt the pat­tern into some­thing that I could man­age (i.e. with­out hav­ing to knit in the round).

And this was the result! The bulky lace reminds me of trees in the winter.

Photo 2015-02-09, 9 29 02 PM

 

It has a bit of a cowl neck. Or one could roll down the col­lar for a more sculp­tur­al look.

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(It’s been dif­fi­cult to take good pic­tures in the apart­ment in the win­ter when there’s no day­light left when I come home from work, so I put this black & white fil­ter on and hoped that it comes across sort of stylish…)

Any­way, here’s my pat­tern adap­ta­tion of Eliz­a­beth Zim­mer­man­n’s Feb­ru­ary Baby Sweater, in the mid­dle of Feb­ru­ary :D It’s a very quick make. Took me sev­er­al week­ends while watch­ing Har­ry Pot­ter movies.

What I used: 

Approx. 700 yards of Patons Shet­land Chunky, in grey. (my sweater is kind of a cropped style, but if I had more yarn I’d prob­a­bly make it longer)

7mm and 6.5mm needles

Stitch mark­ers or pins

Nee­dle for sewing

Fin­ished size: bust 38″ / length 17″ / arm open­ing cir­cum­fer­ence 14″ / neck open­ing cir­cum­fer­ence 18″ (Size eas­i­ly mod­i­fi­able. Sug­ges­tions for mod­i­fy­ing size in pat­tern below.)

What I did:

This sweater is knit­ted flat. The front and back are knit­ted in one piece with some stitch­es bound off and then cast back on to cre­ate neck open­ing. Then stitch­es are picked up along the sides to knit the arm bands. The sides are then seamed. And final­ly the col­lar is knitted.

**************

Gull Lace pat­tern, from Eliz­a­beth Zim­mer­man­n’s Knit­ter’s Almanac, with slight mod­i­fi­ca­tion (I just added a knit stitch in the begin­ning and end of each row):

Rows 1 and 3 (WS): k1, p to last st, k1

Rows 2 (RS): k1, *k1, k2tog, YO, k1, YO, ssk, k1* rep from * to * till last st, k1

Row 4 (RS): k1, *k2tog, YO, k3, YO, ssk* rep from * to * till last st, k1

**************

Body:

With larg­er nee­dle, CO 58.

(The Gull Lace pat­tern is worked over a mul­ti­ple of 7 stitch­es, so to make a larg­er size, one can add mul­ti­ple of 7 stitch­es from num­ber of CO. One pat­tern repeat or 7 stitch­es = 2.25″)

Knit 9 rows.

Begin Gull Lace pat­tern rows 1–4. Repeat Rows 1–4 until piece is 17 inch­es from begin­ning, or desired length. End with row 1 or 3.

Next row (neck open­ing): work 15 st in pat­tern, BO 28 st, work remain­ing 15 st in pattern.

(If you have added more stitch­es in the begin­ning, you can per­haps divide the shoulder/neck/shoulder stitch­es as follows:
Added 7 stitch­es ‑ work 15 st in pat­tern, BO 35, work 15 st in pattern
Added 14 stitch­es — work 22 st in pat­tern, BO 28, work 22 st in pattern
Added 21 stitch­es — work 22 st in pat­tern, BO 35, work 22 st in pattern)

Next row: k1, p14, CO 28, p14, k1. (or adjust num­ber of stitch­es as list­ed above)

Con­tin­ue in pat­tern until piece is 17 inch­es from neck open­ing, or same length as the oth­er side, end with row 1 or 3.

Knit 9 rows, BO.

Arm bands/sleeves:

On the side seam, find the mid point that divides front and back. Mark this point with stitch mark­er or pin. Mea­sure 7″ (or length as desired) down the side seam from the mid point, mark this point. Mea­sure 7″ (or same length as the oth­er side) up the side seam from the mid point, mark this point. Remove mark­er at mid point.

With small­er nee­dles and right side fac­ing, pick up 44 stitch­es even­ly along side seam from mark­er to mark­er (or more stitch­es if added more length; gen­er­al­ly 1 stitch per row). Knit 6 rows, BO. Repeat on the oth­er arm.

Sew side seams from under­arm to bot­tom of sweater.

Col­lar:

With small­er nee­dles and right side fac­ing, pick up stitch­es even­ly around neck open­ing. Knit every row until col­lar is 3.5″ tall (or desired length). BO, weave in ends.

(One could use cir­cu­lar nee­dle or DPNs and knit in the round. I’m not real­ly good at knit­ting in the round, but I inher­it­ed these flex­i­ble nee­dles from my mom, so the col­lar is knit­ted back and forth and then seamed. Does­n’t look as great as if it were knit­ted in the round, but it worked out :D)

Photo 2015-02-07, 11 45 09 PM

 

This was a fun knit! And a cozy lay­er­ing piece for Feb­ru­ary :D

Hope every­one has a good week!

 

finally!

I actu­al­ly fin­ished mak­ing this in the SUMMER. Just nev­er got around to tak­ing a prop­er pho­to of it. The won­der­ful and very gen­er­ous Amy sent me yarn in the mail to test out her Love-Me-Knot cowl pat­tern. And final­ly! Here it is :D

Photo 2015-02-11, 8 18 42 PM

I did­n’t make it as long as the pat­tern calls for and added a twist before join­ing at the end, so it’s kind of a mobius shawlette. I love the drape and the for­est colours in the yarn. I also real­ly like the love knot stitch. I find it very med­i­ta­tive, more so than any oth­er cro­chet or knit­ting stitch.

I very much enjoyed the pat­tern (and the yarn!), thanks so much again Amy!

Hope every­one has a love­ly week­end! :D

ode to hedwig

Photo 2015-02-07, 3 35 57 PM

Ode to Hed­wig, Har­ry Pot­ter’s very loy­al owl friend, and a token of thanks to Mike’s very kind co-work­er, who lent us the entire Har­ry Pot­ter DVD series over the past month :) because we had nev­er watched or read the series before.

I first start­ed fol­low­ing this owl pat­tern, but then the yarn I had was a lot heav­ier than what the pat­tern calls for, and I would end up with an owl much larg­er than I want­ed, so then I just made up my own stitch count and incor­po­rat­ed grey feath­er pat­tern and added wings. But the over­all struc­ture is still adapt­ed from the orig­i­nal owl pattern.

I also did­n’t have safe­ty eyes, and not sure where I can buy them in the city (does any­one who lives/works in Toron­to know where they’re sold?)… I think the stacked but­tons look alright, but safe­ty eyes would def­i­nite­ly look nicer.

Here’s the back of the owl. It has a bit of a tail. And my hand is there for scale.

Photo 2015-02-07, 3 37 59 PM

It’s a very quick make, the entire owl is just 10 rounds (plus wings). So I thought I’d share my pat­tern adap­ta­tions in case any­one wants to make a quick owl :)

What I used:

A bit of bulky weight yarn in white and grey

4mm hook

But­tons or safe­ty eyes

Sport or DK weight yarn in black for embroi­der­ing beak

Nee­dle and thread for sewing and embroidering

Poly­fil or yarn ends for stuffing

What I did:

*Don’t join at the end of each round.

Rnd 1: With white, 6 sc in mag­ic ring.

Rnd 2: 2 sc in each sc around (12 sc).

Rnd 3–4: sc in each sc around (12 sc).

Rnd 5: [2 sc tog, sc in next sc] 4 times (8 sc).

Rnd 6: [2 sc in next sc, sc in next sc] 4 times (12 sc).

Rnd 7: sc in next 3 sc in white, attach grey, [sc in grey, sc in white] 3 times, sc in next 3 sc in white (12 sc).

Rnd 8: sc in next 4 sc in white, [sc in grey, sc in white] 2 times, fas­ten off grey, sc in next 4 sc in white (12 sc).

Rnd 9: Con­tin­u­ing in white, sc in each sc around (12 sc).

Round 10: [hdc, dc, hdc] in next sc, 2 sc tog 5 times, sl st in next sc, leav­ing a long tail, fas­ten off.

Stuff owl. Using nee­dle, weave yarn tail through the base of the hdc-dc-hdc clut­ter and in each of the remain­ing 5 sc, pull tight and fas­ten off.

The wings are the same as those in my Tiny Wings bird pat­tern.

With white, 4 sc in mag­ic ring, ch 2, work 2 dc tog by work­ing 1 dc in mag­ic ring and 1 dc in first sc, fas­ten off, leav­ing long tail for sewing when fin­ish­ing one of the wings. Weave in ends.

Sew eyes, embroi­der beak, and sew wings on owl.

And tiny Hed­wig is ready for action :D

Photo 2015-02-07, 3 39 49 PM

 

Hoot! Have a love­ly week, every­one! :D