I don’t care
Posted by: Kelsey on: July 25, 2009
I don’t care that it’s a quarter to 3am.
I don’t care that I need to get up at a decent hour tomorrow.
I don’t care that it’s pointless posting a 5 sentence blog update.
I just designed two new bags.
I will be posting two original patterns before this summer is over, and I just thought I’d share it.
Plus I am REALLY freaking excited! XD
Beginning the Knit List
Posted by: Kelsey on: July 22, 2009
I began the Knit List yesterday… Kind of by accident.
I found a pattern for a cute bag called the Traveling Vines iCozy, it’s a cozy for an iPod. It’s done in this cute lace pattern, and after remembering about my Knit List, it seemed like a good start. It was small too, so I figured I could check “Something Lace” off the List (for the time being; I’d find something larger later, for my pride an actual challenge).
And I’ll admit, starting the iCozy, I was thinking, “Oh yeah, this should be a breeze as long as I follow the pattern. No sweat, no sir-ey.”
Huh. Yeah, I was wrong.
I ran into a few problems right away, without even realizing it. First, my gauge was off. The pattern calls for US 3 needles, and some scrap sock yarn. Okay, so I have US 3 needles and some sock yarn. Well, apparently, I didn’t have the right sock yarn. Instead of getting the 5 stitches (garter st) to an inch, I was getting 7 stitches. Making my iCozy an inch and half smaller. I figured something must’ve been wrong, and that I’d stetch it while blocking, no biggie.
But then, I realized another mistake: the pattern calls for a ”yf” several times a row, and silly me, I got yarn forward confused with yarn over. Meaning, instead of getting the big gaping holes like the picture showed, I got these tiny ones, making it even smaller. After I realized this, cursing heavily, I ripped the thing apart (I had done two of the four pattern repeats at this point) and swatched, deciding to double the yarn, making it closer to gauge; thankfully, it worked. Happy, I casted back on and continued knitting till about two in the morning, getting two and a half pattern repeats done. I marked the row I stopped at with a big star on the paper, and went to bed.
Then this afternoon, I start again and somehow, I have an extra stitch. I ripped back, reknit the row, still an extra stitch. I ripped back two more rows, still an extra stitch. Rip back three rows, still an EXTRA FREAKING STITCH.
Then I frogged the whole thing, and casted on a scarf for my friends birthday:
Nice colors, no?
Tu parle Francais?
Posted by: Kelsey on: July 21, 2009
Non, je suis ne parle pas Francais. Je est tres mauvais en Francais.
I’d feel really lucky if I spelled all that^^ correctly.
My limited French knowlege (limited as in one Semester of French I in school this year) is really rusty, and I’ve been majorly neglecting my French summer work. Because of scheduling conflicts (I won’t go into all the boring details), I’m supposed to be Independant Studying French II this summer, by myself. All alone. And, if you can’t tell already, I’m a habitual procrastinator. I just grabbed the big packet about twenty minutes ago, after taking a break from my summer reading (Native Speaker, by Chang-Rae Lee, at the moment) and finally flipped through it a bit.
Six chapters, plus vocab and exam review (the packets are thicker than they look in the picture, trust me). Holy. Crap. And, the one thing is, I have no freaking clue how I’m going to teach all of this to myself. Like, I’m not a memorizing kind of person, I learn by doing, activities, repetition over and over and over. So my only options are notecards, and.. I don’t know what else. Maybe I can Google some internet French-learning games. I know they have them out there; we played some of them during classtime. Or Podcasts too.. hmm..
Ahh, okay. So back to the knitting aspect of my Knitting Blog.
I got back from the lake last night –earlier than the rest of my family, as I had to work :( –and I forgot to post the pictures of my cousin’s birthday present. But, as I didn’t forgot take just a plain, close up picture of the cover, I’ll just post some pictures from the Present-Opening part of the evening.
For your knowledge: My cousin Katie’s 18th birthday is today (Happy Birthday!) but we celebrated Sunday night with a dinner at Nagoya, this Japanese grill in Port Clinton, where they do all the cooking right in front of you, with the fire tricks, catching chicken in your mouth, and what-not. And afterwards, my Uncle (Katie’s Dad) wanted to make a special toast to Katie’s 18th birthday, stealing an idea from another guy in my park. They’re called 43’s.
They’re teeny-tiny little plastic beer mugs, about the size of small shot glass, filled with some kind of liqour and topped with whipped cream. Adorable, right? Utterly disgusting, in my underage opinion, but still unbelievably cute!
So then, we did the whole present shah-bang on the beach, complete with cute little stories about how Katie (who was born four-months premature) was born, her different surgeries, how my mother gave blood for Katie twice within two weeks, not knowing she was pregnant with me at the time and almost killing me, you know, good, wholesome stories. She got some good stuff, and then I gave her my gift:
Wait for it…
Can you see it?
She liked it! :)
I did it on straight needles with some black stash yarn, then did the white pieces seperately and just sewed them on there with a tapestry needle. The tricky part was, because I added the white accent to the top of it, I had to make it look cute with the color work, so I crocheted around the inside of the opening, into the black stitches from the color change, and it made it really stiff, which I liked, and better looking. If anyone is interested, I can post the pattern, just comment and let me know :) (Or comment just for the heck of it too! Haha.)
But yeah, so there’s the picture of it. Nothing incredibly spectacular, I’m just seriously trying to avoid summer reading kind of proud of how well she liked it. She put it on her phone immediately, and kept it on there the entire next day, taking it on and off when she texted. It made me happy :)
But now I have to go because I’m going to an early dinner with a friend before work Native Speaker is calling my name.
Au ravoir.
PS. Thanks Sarah for the correction of my French :)
And so I shall create..
Posted by: Kelsey on: July 20, 2009
A Knit List.
To keep track of my new goal to not be a substandard knitter anymore, I’m going to track my goals on the Widget to the right —>
Happy Birth, Knit List :)
And so I feel pathetic.
Posted by: Kelsey on: July 20, 2009
I feel like such a faker/wanna-be/poser knitter.
I knit my cousin this cute little phone cover for her Birthday, kind of tweeking a cover I saw on Ravelry. It came out super cute, and she really liked it, so I was completely happy. And because of tiny things like these, I’ve been contemplating starting my own fiber-artsy business somehow this year. I mean, my main life goal is to open up my own yarn store, so this seems like it would be a step in the right direction. And so I’ve been kind of brainstorming, trying to figure out the best way to do it, you know. Spit-balling ideas and what not: what to sell, how to sell it, where, Etsy or not, etc, etc. And a moment ago, after stumbling across a very offical-looking blog, where the blogger herself tossed around fiber-shop ideas, I was finally forced to face something I have been denying for a long time:
My knitting skills are not very good.
… Yeah, I know. Digest that for a moment.
I mean, really. If you look at it, and see what I’ve knit, what I’ve attempted and epically failed to knit, you’ll see I’m really not that great. I’ve never done a full pair of socks –I’ve done one sock, then lost the modifications I made to the pattern so I can’t properly match the second sock ot the first… and gave up. I’ve tried and failed at a sweater –screwed up the back of it, gave up, and used the wool to felt something… that turned out awful. My second felting project failed –came out super ugly and gross. And I’ve done lots of little things — sushi, strawberries, an apple and lime, an elephant, scarves, one sock, tiny bags. But nothing fantastic.
And heck, I’ve frogged my Grandma’s Square afghan, and it’s sitting in pieces in my closet, and my Longhorn Afghan has failed, because I ran out of yarn and so it sits dormant in my closet as well.
But the thing is, with knitting, I know the only solution to this obstacle is simple: Knit more. (Duh)
And so I place a vow, right here and now , for my one lone reader everyone to see, to do better. I want to knit a sweater, a pair of socks, something lace, something felted properly, and mittens, to say the least. I want to try harder to increase my abilities, so that I can actually deserve the awe my family looks at me with when they look at my wimpy, poorly done trinket-FO’s. And I hope I succeed.
Ah.
So now that my dramatic moment of promise is over with, I leave you all with one parting comment: If anyone has any ideas for an online yarn store, please feel free to comment and let me know. I’m desperate =[
um… who’re you again?
Posted by: Kelsey on: July 19, 2009
I’m bacccckkkkkkkkk :)
Now, I know I’ve been a bad blogger. Heck, I AM a bad blogger altogether, admitedly. But you see, I have reasons behind my failure in the blogging world. It’s called A Boring Life… or Busy Life. Whichever you prefer :)
And you see, the biggest symptom of my Boring/Busy Life is Blogging Binges. And what happens during these Blogging Binges is that I suddenly remember that I do, in fact, have a knitting blog (Shocker!) and it needs updated. When this happens, I will rush to my laptop and post immediately, weather I really have anything to post about or not. Then, over the course of the next few days, I will begin a different post every day, saving it to the Draft folder each time. And why do I do this, you ask? I can answer you simply: I have nothing of interest to say.
And becase my camera is just about as useful as canvas and watercolors for taking pictures, I hardly ever have pictures to post, which, in a knitting blog, is very important (as you all know). Meaning I never blog because I feel a post without pictures is a post wasted, honestly… Well.. except this one.
But yeah, so now that you know WHY I don’t blog.. I thought I’d quickly update you on my life, and post a few pictures that I spent a half hour taking yesterday.
I’ve been juggling all my activities this summer so far (yes, even in during the summer, somehow I still find some school activites to be apart of). I’ve had rehearsals for Marching Band (I’m Section-Leader, aka Miss Bossypants In Charge of 18 Trumpet Players This Fall), summer reading, and I’ve been working too, making my free time seem like Zero. I didn’t knit AT ALL in the month of June.
Yeah, I’ve been THAT busy.
But besides that, I went to the premiere of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince at midnight on Tuesday night with some friends. I wanted to dress up, but was coming straight from work, so instead I did this:
It’s a Gryffindor scarf :) Knit with Red Heart scarlet and yellow yarn, on a circular needle so there’s no WS. Took FOREVER (in my opinion) but it looked good. I finished it about 20 minutes before I had to leave for work on Tuesday, and wore it before we went into the theater for the movie. Ironically, it was like 80 degrees in the theater, and I was sweating bullets in my jeans and Cold Stone t-shirt, so the scarf stayed on my lap the whole time. Three of my friends plus Boyfriend went all-out dressed up for the movie, one as a Hogwart’s student (Girl #2, we decided haha), one went as the Professor that taught Divination (spelling?) that I’m afraid to try to spell out her name, Boyfriend’s little sister went as Bellatrix Lestrange, and Boyfriend was Ron Weasely.
So basically, our group was a sight to see, haha.
But yeah, the movie was kind of a dissappointment in my opinon. (For those who have seen it: They blew up the Burro? REALLY? And Harry and Ginny’s fake romance throughout the whole movie? WRONG WRONG WRONG! And how in the hecks could they cut out the pivital fight scene AND Dumbledore’s funeral?? Lavender Brown was really funny, but Harry and Ginny’s kiss in the Room of Requirement? WRONG!) If you didn’t pay attention the books, I’d say it was a good movie, but I pay attention the books, so see above for my feelings on the film.
But that’s another rant to finish at another time, I suppose.
And.. well, I guess just for the heck of it, I can show you this
two tiny turtles I knitted AWHILE ago. The bigger one is out of some Sugar and Creme yarn, and the smaller one is a bit of the Felici Self-Striping Knitpicks sock yarn I bought awhile ago. The purple-small one is seriously the size of a quarter, it’s SOOO tiny :) I love them!
Oh, and speaking of sock yarn, I went to a LYS around Eastor (can’t remember if I posted about this…) and got some sock yarn (the brand escapes me at this moment) in a navy blue and some in pink, and found the Super Simple Sock pattern, and I’m beginning the ever so epic Second Sock Attempt.
But.. because I already failed a little baby bit before I even started (oh shucks, that’s not like me AT ALL), I didn’t really buy enough yarn for this pattern. I’m like 75 or so yards short, but I figure if I don’t do the whole five inches after the cuff but before the heel and I’ll be okay. I don’t really like high-socks anyways, so it’s not really so much of a sacrifice anyways. But now my big challenge is figuring out a color pattern with the two colors that looks good, because I need every bit of yarn I can get, so it has to be really even. I’m trying very hard to be creative with it, and I’ve already frogged a finished cuff twice because I changed my mind. I’m trying again tomorrow, and hopefully this one sticks. I don’t wanna have to frog it again.
PS.) If you look up at the web address bar, the adress for this post is http://blahblahblah…/um-whore-you-again/ <—–hahahaa!
Turtles and Teacups
Posted by: Kelsey on: April 10, 2009
Yesterday, somehow I became infatuated with tiny things. It all started when I was looking up what a “Teacup Yorkie” looked like, because one of my friends told me that her boyfriend is going to buy her one when he leaves for college (he’s going to a school four hours away, and its so she won’t miss him[...?] or something). And I’ve always had a soft spot for Pomeranians, and I made a promise a long time ago that as soon as I could, I was going to get a little tan Pomeranian haha. So last night I discovered that they had Teacup POMERANIANS! And they’re little tiny puppies and I WANT ONE!! And after cooing at pictures of them on Google Images for 45 minutes, I decided that as soon as I graduate college, I’m going to get a tiny cream colored Teacup Pomeranian and name her Purl :) And she’ll be the mascot of my yarn store, and sit on a special little knitted bed in the corner, and people can pet her when they come in the store :)
Yeah, my dreams are kind of weird. Boyfriend, who was on the phone last night the entire time I was looking at the pictures (and I should also mention I was on a major sugar high, as I just just eaten a huge chunk of raw cookie dough lol), listening to me going “AWW!! PUPPY! LOOK AT THE TEENY WEENY PUPPY! AWWWWW PUPPYPUPPYPUPPYPUPPYPUPPY!! I WANNA NAME HIM ELMO.. NO WAIT, A GIRL, ZOEY.. NOO! PURL!! AWWWW!!!” is tempted to have me committed, if my all the sudden obsession with Teacup Pomernaians doesn’t subside.
Following the lead of my obsession with itty bitty things, I made a Micro Turtle last night, with the Lily Sugar’n Cream like it called for, then this morning I made another one with old sock yarn, that’s seriously half the big one’s size– about as big as a quarter! I think I’ll make a few more in different colors, because they only took like an hour, not even, to make :) I need to add to my turtle collection.
So, besides my new obsession with tiny things, I’ve got big plans this weekend: a family trip to Walmart (no, I’m not kidding lol) in a little bit, a birthday party for a friend tonight, then the lake this weekend. I’m excited :) Though this was my way of telling my tiny audience that I won’t be posting.. big shock! Haha.
Caio !
Happy Spring Break!
Posted by: Kelsey on: April 8, 2009
My school decided to go crazy, and our Spring Break is the week BEFORE Easter instead of afterwards, so we’re probably the only school on Springbreak this week. It kind of stinks, but I’ve slept in the past four days so I’m not complaining that much.
Anyways, I’ve been using most of my free time to do things knitting related! I’ve taught my friend Kayla how to knit, and she’s absolutely crazy for it. She keeps sending me picture messages on my phone of her garter stitch scarf, which grows about 6 inches daily. I taught her purl stitch yesterday, and so she’s been practicing that while doing her scarf too. It makes me so happy that she’s so excited to knit, and then again I feel kind of bad for infecting her with the Knitting Craze disease haha. Now she’ll be stuck thinking of yarn and new projects about 23 hours a day, like me haha.
In addition to teaching Kayla, I’ve been knitting rectangles (not squares, rectangles) for the Homemade Afghan Project. I’ve been using the Moss Stitch, so it’s kind of tedious and long, but it’s a double whammy for me: I’m not only donating rectangles for the HAP, but I’m also using it as my National Honor Society service hours as well. I’ve been severely lacking in those because my school schedule is so busy in the Fall and Winter because of Cheerleading, Band, and theater at school, so I’ve planned on making at least ten of these rectangles, which I’m guessing will equal out to ten hours at least, so I can make up some service hours I missed during the beginning of the year.
OH!! Gosh, ADD moment!:
So my 17th birthday was on March 29, and as my birthday present, my parents after I begged and pleaded decided to give me $150.00 of Knitting Money! And this weekend, my family and I, plus Boyfriend are going to our place on Lake Erie for Easter, and there are two yarn stores near my family’s place on Lake Erie, so Boyfriend and I are leaving early on Saturday to stop at the yarn stores so I can turn a chunk of my Knitting Money into yarn! IM SO EXCITED!!! :D I’ve been skimming Ravelry for things I want to knit, so I can already know what I want when I go to the stores, so I’m not just walking around aimlessly admiring everything (which I totally love to do but Boyfriend will be with me so I don’t want to make it too boring for him). So I absolutely cannot wait until Saturday!
Oh, and so I would promise to post pictures of my yummy LYS purchases with I get them, but I myseriously misplaced my camera memory cards. Yes, cardS. So since I suddenly can’t find either one of them, my poor pathetic blog might be even more pictureless than usual, to which I apologize to all three people who may read it everyone. I just started my job at Cold Stone Creamery today, so I’ll have a steady cash flow coming in soon enough and I’ll feel better about going out to get a new memory card before this weekend.
But that’s completely up to if I can even get out to go pick one up, what with my busy schedule of nothingness that is Spring Break :)
Introducing… Timmy!
Posted by: Kelsey on: March 20, 2009
For Valentine’s Day, Boyfriend got me this pathetic little teddy bear attached to a small bag of candy hearts. For some reason, I instantly took a liking to this sad little bear. His eyes are lopsided, his arms don’t go in the same direction thanks to one being laden down with the bag of candy, yet I fell in love with him the second Boyfriend gave him to me.
Timmy’s been chilling out on my bed day and night ever since, sometimes cuddling with me while I sleep if I misplaced Charlie (the stuffed turtle Boyfriend won for me at Cedar Point over the summer). Well, suddenly interested in knitting tiny clothing, and due to the cold weater and Timmy’s naked body, I decided yesterday to knit Timmy a sweater:
Here’s my pattern (SEAMLESS, BTW!), though because each bear’s size and shape is different (duh), only use mine as a guideline:
Timmy Sweater: size 5 DPNs, stash yarn, gauge: 5 stitches 1 inch.
Knitting in the round, CO 45 stitches, knit 2×2 rib stitch for 5 rows. switch to St. st –you might need to increase here, depending on your bear’s body shape. Timmy is pretty flat, so i skipped those– continue in St. st, either measure the length where you want the bottem of the sweater to hit on your bear, or just hold it against the bear to be sure, until right underneath the armpits of your bear.
ARMPITS: At this point, i figured out how wide my bear’s chest and back were, and did the quick math to see how many stitches the armholes had to be. I moved the stitches onto two needles, 22 on the front one, 23 on the back one. at the beginning of the front needle, i CO-ed 7 stitches (the width iwanted my arm hole to be) then knitting it flat, instead of in the round, i did back and forth in St. st for 7 rows (till above my bear’s arm). Then cut the yarn, leaving a tail.
Using new yarn, i COed the first 7 stitches on the back needle, and did the same thing as the front, knitting 7 rows. Then, making the necessary decreases to shape the head-hole for my sweater, i knit around, leaving the huge holes for the arms. I ended up knitting 5 rows, decreasing to make a small enough head-hole, then bound off loosely.
Sleeves: Picking up all the stitches around the arm holes (i did 20, but that was just enough. more, obviously, if you want a baggier sleeve), i continued in St. stitch until i was halfway down the arm, decreased twice on one row, knit 1 row, decreased twice again, 2×2 rib for three rows, then loosely bound off and weaved in all ends. Repeated again for the other sleeve.
and Voila!
i’m actually thankful for OGT’s
Posted by: Kelsey on: March 19, 2009
- In: School
- 2 Comments
Being a Junior in high school, I passed all five of my OGT’s with “Advanced” scores last year as a sophomore, meaning that all this week I have gotten a “half day” of school. When in reality, it’s like a nothing day of school. Everyone comes to school by 7:30, as usual, and then after all four classes, which have now been shortened from 90 minutes to 42 minutes, all Upperclassmen who’ve passed their OGT’s get to leave. So I have gotten out of school at 10:37 allllll this week :)
I’m thoroughly enjoying my extra time, I have to admit. Monday, I went to Panera Bread with my friends, Tuesday, I hung out with Boyfriend, yesterday I hung out with my friends, and today I’m going PROM DRESS SHOPPING!
Mmmm, yes I AM enjoying this :)
So in the air of enjoying my extra time, I shall now be taking a nap until my mother comes home and we go forth to shop for the perfect Prom dress. Hope everyone’s week is going as well as mine! haha
