Christmas gifts

When I was a kid, I was never really one for handmade gifts, giving or receiving them. I tried to be polite about it, but the scarves and hats were scratchy or didn't fit well, and the gloves were simply a pain. I HATED all those pieces of thread inside. they caught on everything - my fingers, any jewelry I was wearing (rare though it was), band-aids....

So what am I doing?

Knitting presents for my niece and nephew. Duh!

The difference is - first off, I checked first with my 8yo nephew and let him pick out the stuffie he wanted, and he has seen a bit of the progress on it. (pics of that will come later) As for my 4yo niece? Well, first I was going to make her some stackable cats, cuz she loves cats, Then I was going to make her the chicken-and-egg, because i loved dolls that inversed like that when i was little. She may still get that one for Easter.

But then i remembered this pattern.

And it can be dressed up later....

Dang. i may need to make MYSELF one of these!

Here is how far I am so far:

a win/lose situation

Well, I signed up for quidditch last term. They divided us into 7-player teams and made us come up with background and goals for charity knitting. Our team ("team Chance") chose to knit 3 items each, for a total of 21 items. We could each donate to the charity of our choice. We had 2 1/2 months to knit our 3 items; the term started Sept 1 and ended yesterday, but we had to have our pictures in to our Seeker in mid-Nov.

I originally chose Knit for Kids, an organization that sends knitted sweaters to children in need both internationally and here in america. The pattern was dead-easy and came in sized from toddler to pre-teen.

then i encountered a long string of setbacks. the first project, easy as it was, took 2 weeks to knit the first half of the toddler sized sweater. oops! so i abandoned that project (although i plan to finish the sweater sometime) and cast about for smaller endeavors.

At the beginning of October, i decided to knit newborn caps, as one of my teammates had done that and had already finished 3. So i ordered appropriate weight yarn and needles and got to work....only to discover that i had chosen a really complex pattern that did not knit up easily - and worse yet, you couldn't even tell when i was finished that i had done anything fancy to it at all. (see the preemie cap in the middle) that little preemie cap took me over 2 weeks to make. So I abandoned that pattern in favor of a different one. Unfortunately, the next one i chose also was time/labor intensive, as it called for 3 colors of yarn in a dropstitch pattern. the result (the larger striped one on the right) looks AWESOME and it is stretchy, thanks to some better sock yarn. But between the flu and the length of time it took to knit that, it was now well into November and i still had one more hat to do.

the third pattern i chose turned out to be the simplest of all and the fastest to make. the hat also probably will be the easiest for newborns to wear, it is soft and stretchy without being binding. i love the vertical stitch pattern it made like lazy wide ribs. (see hat on the left.)

i finished it....just before thanksgiving. if i had been able to take its pic and post before i left for my folks, MAYBE i could have helped my team. as it was, today was the first day i could even upload the pics i took at mom and dad's, where this shot was taken. So - EPIC fail for my quidditch team. I am so embarrassed i haven't even been on ravelry to see what happened with them.

also, i don't yet know where i am going to donate these caps. i haven't gotten organized enough to call the local children's hospitals and i didn't find anywhere online that looked like a good, legit prospect.

anyone know of a place that might want 3 cleveland-colored newborn hats?

snagged a half-price book

you know, as much as i love the process of crochet, as often as not, crochet produces what i would consider sad results. i have tried to outrun that reality by turning to amigurumi or hiding the crochet stitches in more complicated combos like the scallop, but then i found a felted crochet book and my little snakey-heart leaped!

felting ERASES crochet sadness by blurring it into chenille. this book had simple projects that looked so soft and velvety, so fuzzy and simple, i ran out and bought some nice new wool and started a sample square last night. :D

so, put felting on the list along with the beading thing.

FACT: i need more knit-lunches per week!

--

oh, btw...enjoy this.

i need this skill!

i didn't make this...but i like this necklace.
i think i might need to try some bead crochet...and soon!

i am back to working on this scarf.

firenze - classic sagittarius!

Firenze

Firenze is a centaur with white-blond hair, palomino body, and blue eyes (PS15). He trusts humans more than the rest of the centaurs; he let Harry ride on his back in order to bring him to a safe place and helped him understand that Voldemort was lurking in the Forbidden Forest and planning to get the Philosopher's Stone (PS15). At Dumbledore's request, he also agreed to come to Hogwarts and replace Sybill Trelawney as the Divination teacher, an act that caused the other centaurs to consider him a traitor and banish him from their herd. Hagrid stopped the centaurs from killing Firenze, and in exchange, he tried to warn Hagrid that his attempt to teach Grawp was not working (OP27, OP30). Firenze remained at Hogwarts as a Divination teacher, together with Prof. Trelawney, much to the latter's displeasure (OP38). - Anna L. Black, ed. ~ HP Lexicon

here is my amigurumi version of our dear firenze, seen here representing the astrological sun sign of sagittarius (november 22 - december 21) for the HPKCHC divination class assignment. (see earlier post!) not only is firenze a centaur hottie, but he is such a classic sag:

Sagittarius, the ninth Sign of the Zodiac, is the home of the wanderers of the Zodiac. It's not a mindless ramble for these folks, either. Sagittarians are truth-seekers, and the best way for them to do this is to hit the road, talk to others and get some answers. Knowledge is key to these folks, since it fuels their broad-minded approach to life. The Sagittarian-born are keenly interested in philosophy and religion, and they find that these disciplines aid their internal quest. At the end of the day, what Sagittarians want most is to know the meaning of life, and if they accomplish this while feeling free and easy, all the better. ~ astrology.com

this is a smiling firenze on a happy-go-lucky evening, when mars is behind a cloud and his friends are not busy kicking him in the chest.

i actually handed in some homework!

man. the past 2 months have not been my best. i have about had it with real life!

however, i did manage to pull it together long enough to hand in my Transfiguration homework in the HPKCHC for this month. Here's what i posted:

Addreamy of Slytherin here, signing up and turning in my transfiguration homework.

I chose option 2.

2) Taking an object or image from real life and Transfigure it with fiber. This can be done in any way you choose - e.g. spinning yarn to represent the colors of fall, making a knitted version of your cat, making a hat just like one seen on tv (Jayne Hat, anyone?). You are welcome to use a pattern, but you MUST post a picture (or detailed description, if it is from a book) of the object that inspired you - what you are Transfiguring, along with your completed assignment. CLARIFICATION: “Real Life” just means non-knitted. Fictional realms, characters, etc are welcome!

my real life object is a wizard hat. This can best be seen in the following still (I borrowed a muggle camera in order to provide clear evidence that wizard hats are not knit)




I adapted a pattern found in Charmed Knits in order to appropriately clothe Sydney in Hogwarts attire. As you can see, she would now make a good student - or she will in several years. She is only 7 at the moment!



I hope this meets with your approval!

hpkchc update

i have not been around the cup much. in fact, the note i got from my head of house wondering "where are you?"-- i just opened it up tonight and she sent it 2 weeks ago. not sure why the cup was not grabbing my attention like it did the first time around, but the last two weeks? well, they went down the toilet due to the re-org at work.

however, i am working on something now. it is for divination.
can you guess what it is going to be? :D

........

i did not finish the "shiny gold galleons" scarf i was struggling with last month. i used that ribbon i showed you and it did crochet up easy enough, but the sheen pretty much disappeared in the process.


plus...i was running out fast and it was not cheap.

so, i turned to gold cord.


ugh. true, it is shiny as can be, but it is stiff and cruddy for making circles. in the end, i tried just straight chains and intended to coil them up and sew them into flat shiny coins. it looked okay enough...but then time ran out. i threw out all my efforts.

as to crocheting with gold cord?
no.
just no.