They call me Mr. Pitiful

I may have only one eye and no hands, but I'm the first ever needle-felting project my creator has made, so cut me some slack, will ya..


I was inspired by Katri's imaginative creations from felt (space aliens, animals, heavenly creatures and what-have-you).

I guess I could be called also Mr Applehead... oh, shoot.

I made it!

..and yes indeed, here she is:

My variation of 'Little Birds' (by Ysolda Teague, in Twist Collective, Fall '08) - made with Pirkka-yarn and 2.5mm circs.

It fits perrrrfectly, I love it!

What do you think? :)

Want to hear the good news or the bad news first?

OK.

Bad news is that Miss Polly seems to have decided that it's officially winter, and she can start her beauty sleep as of now. All flowers have dropped, and she looks quite pale and withered..









Poor thing.


The good news is that my variation of 'Little Birds' is finally all off the needles, soaked and now drying up at the balcony, basking in the lovely late-Autumn sun and +20 degrees celcius. I think I'm in love.... just wait until I get the buttons and few other details done...

The plot thickens, said Charles Dickens...

...here are the buttons I found - perfect for 'Little Birds', eh?

More soon....

N. Scissorhands at work

Warning to all with a delicate disposition - the material shown below contains some gory details of a seemingly innocent Sunday afternoon turned into a full-blown massacre.

First, the weapon and the helpless victim:

Then suddenly, there's no turning back - the awful deed has been started, the inevitable is going to happen...

But, faster than you'd think, it's all over. The front of the cardigan is split into two, and the Sunday calm sets on the house again.

Is it just me, or is it hot in here?

With this heavy-duty wrist/arm + neck warmer combo you are for sure set to face the winter winds.

Plus, they are good when you decide to practise your camouflaging skills in the woods. Maybe to be combined with those green knitted shorts, what?

They practically knit themselves from thick Chilean 100% wool (sorry, lost the band already...could be Araucan) and 5mm needles. Boy, it was a task to knit again with straight needles, after knitting for so long with circulars only..
Buttons were found from the bottom of the button barrel.

Basic, rough, fast, big and practical. And yes, a bit itchy. To make me scratchy.

Now, back to the finer things in life.....

Somewhere between..

...finished and ready:


Here she is, posing to you casually on a piano - my version of 'Little Birds', almost done. The Abominable Steek is still to be cut, and buttons to be found and purchased. And then of course washing and blocking. But, I consider this stage an accomplishement already, I've made it so far!


Some things which I forgot to show you before - mementos from my trip to Tokyo.. As already seen from other blogs, the Japanese knitting scene is quite lively and original. Or what do you think of this combination?


Knit your own shorts! To match with your cardi!

This teddy bear can really blow your mind, man... talk about psychedelic furs!

Also, knowing how to knit your own underwear can come handy someday - especially here in the Northern hemisphere:

But there are also nice, clean-cut and very much for every-day use garments:



Now, the only challenge is to learn to decipher the patterns. One of these days!

It's here!

It is done!

'Little Birds' has reached the form where the body and the sleeves have become one. Pictures will follow later.. This is what was left after the millions (it really felt like it) of yarn ends were finished:

This is a new acquantaince, a Debbie Bliss knitting magazine (a 'subsidiary' of Vogue Knitting, apparently). Whole mag gives out the appearance of cool, calm and soft - and there are even some patterns which are pretty interesting, or what do you say about these?


(I wonder why she looks like she's having high fever, or is thinking real hard of something not related to knits at all... you just want to way: pull yourself together, young lady, and concentrate!)

I like gray, so maybe one of these will turn up on my needles someday..

Also, the new Fall/08 Knitty issue is there, go see! These bobbles look nice.. and again gray...

*Sigh*

Oh, the joy of finishing yarn ends..

Well, that's the price you pay for knitting fair isle, and not bothering to running the yarns from one motif to another.. This here is the jumble of two sleeves + one body. I'm comforting myself with the thought that the main job is now already done for 'Little Birds' - and looking forward to that fine moment of combining these pieces together and pushing ahead for the shoulders and finally necline.. yeay....

On the other hand, one could be making fabulous sweaters with the top-down technique, with few or no loose ends to finish, as Wendy from 'Knit and Tonic' does in her great new book ("Custom Knits" by Wendy Bernard) - like this:

Or like this:


Or how about this

Or this?!?? (don't it just make you want to cry..)

Well, this little piggy (with her fingers deep in unfinished yarn ends..) will certainly start leafing the pages of this book after the fair isle feast is finalized. It's good to know that there are things to look forward to!

Froggy went a courtin'

This lovely teal-coloured (my camera doesn't think so, but it's teal allright) yarn (Debbie Bliss 'Cashmerino DK') will get a new life soon.



This is what it used to be:


(From Debbie Bliss "Cashmerino DK" collection, 2006) I loved knitting with this yarn, since it's very soft and feels nice, but somehow this cardigan turned out too tight (when buttoned up, it really didn't look that nice on me) and the collar didn't stay in it's place too well. So not much wearing time for this one - better to recycle then! So yesterday I frogged and frogged, and then soaked with Soak, and now the yarn is drying up, ready to be re-wound again.

This is what it's going to be in it's next life:


(Phildar / Autumn '08, "Gilet" wrap-around sweater) I like the shape and simplicity of this design - and the idea that you can wear a long-sleeved tee under it, varying the effect of the knit with different coloured shirts. It's not such a heavy sweatery kind of knit, but more of a vest - still warm, though.

But hey, first things first - I need to finish 'Little Birds' before starting this one... I promise I will..

A Stranger in a Strange Land..

..was how I felt when I bought my first beading magazine a while back. It's a whole new world which I've never been too familiar with. I understand that for some people this is just as familiar as our beloved knittings patterns:





And that for some people, thinking/buying/dreaming/fantasizing/imagining beads is just as tantalizing as yarns are for us:




But hey, there's something familiar here - I can see a crochet hook involved! Maybe there's something to be learned and applied to knitting also from this craft... hmm, that wakes up my imagination...

But do I really need/have time for another obsession?!

Also, yesterday I unfortunately got my hands on the latest Moda magazine (Finnish knitting/sewing magazine). It's just soooooo depressing - no inspirational patterns at all. But hey, they did mention Kaffe Fassett and Noro yarns, so I guess they are on the right tracks...

I don't know how I managed to live at all when I was only using this magazine as my source of knitting patterns (before I found out about the wonderful world of internet knitting community and foreign magazines). Harsh criticism, but it's a question of taste. Granted, they do have a couple of nice patterns for autumn coats for sewing - maybe this would be something to try..