Finished!! Nina's "Olinda"

Finally!! I can share the photos of finished "Olinda" today. I added many more buttons and made the sleeves much longer than the original design. That was Nina's requests. Somehow she likes long long sleeves for her cardigans and sweaters. It seems we endured through the coldest time of the year. I see grey sky that looks almost crying today but it is OVER 50°F (unbelievable!!!). Yesterday was a little cooler but a super bright beautiful day. I am so happy to see the thick snow melting and water dripping from the icicles. Meanwhile I am hoping to have some more  slightly cold days so Nina can enjoy wearing her new cardigan. My Ravelry project page is here.

Nina can pose like a model in such a fancy clothing and she can fly like an agile Ninja as well!

I love love love this smile. Happy knitting!!

Knitting

I had been knitting this cardigan for Nina since September last year. I'm shocked to know that it took  five whole months!! I allowed this project to go slow because I had several deadlines and so many other things to do (as always) . Even so, five months is too long.  Finally it's finished last week! I still need to block this lovely piece though, I am so happy about the look of this cardigan. I used this beautiful pattern Olinda by Georgie Hallam. My project page in Ravelry is here. I should have filled all the information in the project page about the yarn I used and other stuff. I will try to fill it and update the photos of finished piece soon. This seems complicated at first glance. But actually it is not. The twisted patten is made by repeating a simple stitches which is not hard to memorize. Well, you may need patience to finish since the cardigan is covered with this twisted pattern all over. For me, it was fun to see it growing little by little. Now I need to decide what project I am going to knit from now. Knitting is addictive. Once you start, it is hard to quit. I want to knit a Spring garment for myself. It is also a very fun time to surf around looking for a pattern to knit for next.

This cardigan was top-down and sleeves are knitted continuously from the york. As the piece grows longer it gets heavier. It is tiresome to hold and rotate that heavy body as you knit sleeves. So I kept the body part in my reversible Azuma-Bukuro (Japanese traditional tote bag) . It made my work much easier. This bag is very handy and versatile. I also use this as a project bag. I hope I can write the tutorial of how to make this tote bag soon.

Currently I am working on writing a new scarf knitting pattern. I will share the completed free pattern of this lacy scarf pretty soon. I know that Spring is just around the corner in some regions in the US. So maybe it will be too late for some of you. But I hope about a half of you are still in the middle of Winter just like I am. And many many people in the Southern Hemisphere are just started thinking about knitting a scarf or two before the cold weather will arrive. This pattern requires only a few stitches. If you are looking for an easy scarf pattern, please stay tuned.

Happy knitting! Please have a wonderful afternoon.

Work in Progress

Just a quick WIP post with photos for now.

These puffy flowers eat yarns pretty much. The texture of soft baby yarns makes me smile (^^).

Working on several different fabric manipulation. This is Canadian / North American smocking.

I am knitting this cardigan pattern (Olinda by Georgie Hallam) for Nina. Also an adult cardigan for myself is on my needles. For mine I have lace weight. The pattern is more complicated than Nina's. So I think I am going to finish this first. Lace pattern is really fun to knit. Though I sometimes miss just simple stocking stitches, or garter stitches which I can knit watching my favorite dramas or movies.

Thank you for reading. Hope you all have a good weekend. Happy handmade!!

Japanese Magazine "Knit Marche vol.18"

Japanese knitting and crocheting magazine "Knit Marche" vol.18" is now on the market. I am writing two pages serial articles in this magazine titled "手芸家のアメリカ暮らし / Designer's life in America". In this issue I wrote about sock knitting with circular needles. It is always hard to put many ideas together in only two pages. I tried to make it more intelligible with some photos and my own illustrations. I hope that will interest many new sock knitters in Japan and bring them simple pleasures of sock knitting.

There are many cute designs and patterns in the issue. You can see photos of items in this issue here.

Catching up

Hello Folks! So so so long time no seeing you! How have your Summer (and Winter) been? Some of you maybe are questioning if I have been sick or there was some big drama going on in my life. And I cannot keep my blog anymore? No need to worry! I am still here being fine (except for my chronic migraine) and so are my family members.

Oh my....... a whole month of July is missing on this blog! I've been so busy for so many reasons since the last post. I have to make it up so today's post will be all about catching up. I'll try to go through just briefly but it might be boring for some people who expect only crafty stories. For those readers, please just skip reading this. The next post would be something crafty. I'll try.

I don't know where to start. So I just tell you the story following my July calender. As soon as the new month of July started the big storm hit our region. It came in the night before the first day of the month and we lost the power. And that wasn't only thing we lost that day. So many trees in the town have knocked down. Our favorite big tree as well. Actually the tree didn't fall but had a major damage. Many of you might remember seeing this sugar maple tree in my older posts. The tree had a perfect broccoli-like shape for kids climbing up and hanging ropes and a swing. Thank goodness, it didn't hit the house but now the tree lost that perfect shape. Half of the broccoli is missing. It won't cover my front door with its nice cool shade anymore. I am so sad that the tree looks miserably off balance. It would take decades to grow those big limbs back if it is possible.

 

We call this "Nina's tree". Nina is much more optimistic about this disaster than I am.

Half of the "broccoli" is missing.

Our backyard got damaged too. A couple of tall trees fell from the neighbor's yard. The little bridge is back in place now.

This is one of our neighbors' house across the street. fortunately the house didn't get any major damage.

We were planning to finish lots of home improvements by middle of July. Because we had my family came to visit us from Japan!! Surprisingly, it was the first time that my family visits us since we moved to the US about nine years ago! So that was very important event for us that we wanted to welcome them in our home nicely finished. But everything got behind of our schedule because of the storm. (there were a several more reasons but I cannot even remember anymore!) Then just in time, we made it and finally had a great week with my family. (I will write about the week with my family sometime later. That post will be a nice little travel guide of South Bend and Michiana area.)

My dad, sister, brother-in-law and niece. In front of the beautiful historical building "Tippecanoe Place" in South Bend.

Nina wanted me to make another doll which just looks like hers for her cousin Momo (she is Nina's best friend) to play together. So I finished another adorable doll a couple days before Momo's arrival. (Hope I could write about that later too.)

Also, I had a deadline for writing an essay for a magazine. I wrote two pages of the article, knitted three pairs of socks and took many many pictures for this work. I was going to finish it before the arrival of my family but like as most of the time, my editor needed something more for the pages so I needed to work for some more hours when I have the guests in my house. (Now, it's over!!! It always makes me feel funtastic when I realize that I don't have any deadlines ahead!)

On the same day when my family left to Japan (it was a sad day!) we had my husband's brother and his wife came to visit the family in Michiana and they stayed in our home for three nights. There was no interval between two groups of the guests. I wish I had more time to tidy up the house before the second guests' arrival. But anyways I am glad we made it at long last and it went pretty well.

Meanwhile, I had to prepare stuff for the workshop which was scheduled right after that. This time I was going to teach basket making. when I have a class, I prepare materials ( I need to have everything divided for each students to make the class as efficient as possible because I usually don't have less time than I need) , tools and the original instruction written and drawn by myself. I had six wonderful participants in the class and we surely had a good time making and chatting. I am going to write about this too. And also this class gave me an idea that I should write tutorials of several different basket making I have ever done.

The samples I made for the class.

Wonderful participants working in the beautiful vintage boutique "Junk Evolution"!

I brought many many colors of threads. Looking at different color combinations was very interesting to me.

Finally this long story gets to the final chapter. Unbelievably it became August. I could have peaceful days from now on, I thought.......

Last Saturday, there was an auction in the neighborhood so we went. Tim got a bunch of tools and I luckily was able to bid off the stuff I wanted.

It was a set of Fiesta dinner ware on the end of the long table in the picture below.

They are in the color called periwinkle. I believe they are vintage but am not sure. If there is someone knows vintage Fiesta very well please let me know about these. I checked the prices of all of these online and I found that I payed only about 20% of the market price in total. "this must be my very lucky day!"....... I thought.

 

In the afternoon of that day, we had Nina's friends came over to our house. They were going to play in the basement. THE BASEMENT which we just refinished a couple weeks ago to welcome the family. Kids turned on the light switch of the basement. Then they yelled.

"Mr.Tim! You have your basement FLOODED!!!"

Oh man, wasn't it my lucky day? We had about 80% of the basement floor covered with about 1/2" of water. It was from my old washing machine which came with the house. The whole drain water came out the broken hose (or something). If you have had a flood in your home you would know how much that make you down! We had three floods in our basement including this. We are pretty much experienced. (which I don't want to be experienced at all.) But still..... it dragged us down.

Well, now the basement is dry but you can imagine how hard my husband and I had to work on it. It ruined our rest of the weekend, of course. And I am still way behind on my schedule of everything.

That is the story about why I could not update blog so long. I am sorry about that but I think now you understand the situation and even be moved with sympathy. (Because you are so nice! Ha-ha-ha.) I am hoping our rest of the month will go well and I'll feel lucky again. Well, I think I am generally lucky person because my family is healthy and you are here to read my story.

Thank you so much for reading such a long clumsy post. Hope you have a great week!

Out of season knitting

Hello! Did you have a beautiful Mother's day? I did have a good one. My daughter secretly made a treat for me in the closed kitchen after the dinner. It was a (fancy wine) glass of soda float! It made my day of course, even though that was so very sweet and the soda was cloudy with melted frozen yogurt bubbles. Hope all the Moms and Daughters spent a good time and realized their bonds again.

I finally finished the French Cancan shawl! You can find the pattern here on Ravelry and my project page is here. (You need to sign in to see the project pages.) The finished shawl is a bit small so I would consider this item as a scarf. In the pattern, there is a suggestion and a how-to for making it larger as an option. However I like the result and I would love to make another one larger in a  different color. Only if I had free time to do that. Probably not. Since I have more shawl patterns to knit in my wish list!! That is a happy thing to have so many things which I love to do in my to-do list, right?

 

And there is another project on my circular needles.It is going to be fun.

 Thank you for reading, and please have a wonderful week. Happy knitting! OXOX

Shawl knitting and Terrarium class

This beautiful shawl is on my needles now. This is the first time for me to knit a shawl in English written pattern.

 I have not been a shawl person until last fall. I got Shingles in my left shoulder in last October. One Saturday morning I found some small blisters in my shoulder. I instinctively thought that this must be Shingles. So I went to the urgent care but I couldn't get a correct diagnosis.  After all I was diagnosed with Shingles by my own physician on Monday. Since then I almost always have miner pain from my left neck to arm. I wish I could have gotten an immediate treatment at the urgent care. If I could have, I probably have recovered completely... I mean without any pain as a hangover from Shingles. If you have some symptoms look like Shingles, just go to see your doctor immediately. Delay in treatment will cause remaining pain in your nerve long time.
Anyway! I wanted to say I started use scarves and shawls since then because I need to keep my shoulder warm to prevent the pain. The misdiagnosis was not a good experience at all but knitting a shawl for myself is very enjoyable. And the pattern is not hard to knit but very interesting!

I learned "shawl cast on" for the first time. I haven't heard of it in Japan. I wonder this is a common technique among shawl knitters.

Using cable needles. Shape the shawl body first then continuously add the edging with a pretty lace & cable braid pattern.

I am almost there! I cannot wait to finish and use it!

*********

I took a terrarium making class at Junk Evolution. Playing with plants and soil felt good. We planted succulents in glass containers and added some ornaments like pine cones, twigs, butterflies and so on.

The process was very simple and easy. I put this on the breakfast table in my kitchen. I think I will make a couple more for a bathroom and a bedroom.

I hope you enjoyed it and please have a  great weekend. Happy Friday!!

Hello again! / Loom knitting

Hello again folks! I've been taking break from blogging too long. After the long long severe Winter, I decided to spend more time on cleaning and reorganizing our home this Spring. Then Spring break began soon. My husband went out of country to meet his brother in Amsterdam for about a week. So I got pretty busy to spend time with my daughter while he was gone. Finding kids' activities, taking her to play dates and having her friends come over to our place, etc. Meanwhile, the weather finally have been getting nicer and warmer. Now It's the time to start yard work. Mostly cleaning the patio and around the house yet. Soon, I will be going to start planting.

I didn't spend much time to make stuff, but you know that I cannot live so long without making something! Also I am always ready to learn something new. I started to study a new technique recently. That is "Loom knitting". This has been in my mind awhile and I've been curious about the technique and what I can do with those looms. I watched a bunch of Youtube videos of how-to loom knit. Got out the circular knitting loom set which I gave to my daughter last Christmas. Then I tried things I learned from the videos.

I was more interested in double knitting than single knitting so I ran to Michaels to get some long knitting looms.  I am not going to talk about stitches and details here today. Just tell you that Circular looms can only do single knitting and you will need Long looms to do double knitting as far as I know. This is what I purchased. Martha Stewart Crafts "Knit & Weave Loom Kit".

I will write my review about this product sometime later, but anyways, I knitted a scarf with this loom using the very basic twisted stockinet stitch.

It took me a little while to get used to stitching. But once I got the hang of it, it went so quick and was fun! The fabric it makes is fairly thick but very soft since the stitches are quite loose.

I finished this scarf in one day! Spent one ball of Lion Brand "Vanna's Choice".

 

I am going to make some more small items for practice with different stitches.  I have a feeling that this tool and technique have lots of possibilities. When using thick sturdy yarns it will make very firm fabric which is good for bags and home goods. With soft thinner yarns it will make nice scarves and shrugs. I found the way to make large blankets and that technique seemed very interesting. 

If you are a loom knitter and you have something to share with us, please leave a comment. If you know any good patterns for loom knitting please let me know! 

Thank you so much, and I hope you all have a wonderful Easter weekend!! Happy loom knitting!