Category: YARN

Autumn wreath

 

This year, for the first time, I had plans in decorating our front porch. Since we moved to our place a few years ago, I have dreamed of flower baskets hanging outdoor, seasonal wreaths and various decorations. Sadly, none of this has been possible to date; our front porch is literally falling off. So, last summer we finally made the decision to get a builder in September to fix it. Needless to say, that September became mid October, and that has now become mid November. But last week, in the middle of a DIY withdrawal, I made a simple and small autumnal wreath which will be hang outside to inaugurate our new entrance, once is ready. 

I used a small wicker wreath as a base, about 25cm, and covered it with a burnt orange wool yarn. I then sew some felted ball in various colours, but you can easily use a glue gun. I didn’t really follow a pattern, just made decisions on colour and position as I sew along. I then made a hook on the top using some matching yarn and did a little testing, to see where it would sit best on our door. But for the time being is hanging in our living room, out of reach from my little who’s obsessed with felted balls!

2012 plan

Not much of a plan this year! The Moleskine diary arrived early January and it took me almost a month to write a post about this year goals and plans…not a good start I would say. I’m still adjusting to my new family life and oh boy if it’s hard! But I have good intentions to slowly fit my old daily routine into it, at least until I got back to work after the summer. The plan is going to be a mix of DIY projects and things I’ve been meaning to do for a long time. So here it is:



Finish the Striped Baby Blanket

This is an ongoing project which I started back in October 2011 (you can read about it here and here). Half way through the project I realised I had to buy more yarn to make it the size I wanted, so ended up using three 50g balls for each colour. I’m taking notes of how many stripes I’m knitting in each colour and if does turn out well  I’m planning to post a tutorial on Ravelry.
Learn how to use my camera properly
G bought me this camera (Canon Powershot SX120 IS) for my birthday a couple of years ago and still haven’t managed to learn how to use the manual settings! Since I take rubbish photos all the time, I thought it would be nice to have some nice pics of my little one for a change taken with a real camer rather than the camera phone.

Buy few, but good!
This will be my 2012 mission, no more shopping spree to Primark (…not that I’ll have the time to do it anymore) or “I’m buying this because it’s on sale”! After the arrival of a certain someone, I had to make space for all of her things. While tidying up I realise I collected a lot of rubbish during the past years, and not just clothes! so for this year I’m planning to buy only things that I really need and not just because they are on sale or don’t cost much. I’m also planning to buy more quality, handmade things, things that will last and that don’t bore you after a while. LESS IS BEST will be the motto!

Striped baby blanket – Update

DIY Project 5 – Update
It was in the ‘maybe’ to do list for October, but it quickly became top of the list. As it started to get chilly and dark early in the evening I felt like I needed some kind of activity to do snuggled up on the couch under a throw in front of the tv. And there it was knitting a striped blanket working in garter stitch.
I’m using a very easy pattern of 3 rows, and multiple of 3, changing the colour as I feel like….no plans, just what I think it works best next. 
So far, so good, except some initial mistakes…..
//the first one row of orange yarn was not supposed to be there, but let’s pretend it was done on purpose.
//I slowly mastered the art of adding a new yarn to the work, meaning the passage from one colour to another for the first few colours was not done properly.
The only problem so far…I might run out of yarn sooner than expected!

October Plan // DIY Projects

Last day of September today, so I thought I get better organised for the coming month! It will be a busy month….finishing off house renovation, attend antenatal classes and a lot of other things that have been on my ‘to do list’ for months now!
But I’ve set two goals I want to achieve by the end of the month:
DIY Project 1 
I’ve been thinking about a large canvas painting to hang on our bedroom wall for about a year, but couldn’t make up my mind on the subject. I knew I wanted to use acrylics to do it, as I wanted it to be big and narrow, and I didn’t feel very confident in using watercolours for doing big washes. So inspiration stroke a few days ago while flipping through The Watercolour Expert, from the Royal Watercolour Society in London (a gift I received from my colleagues when I left my previous job). I came across a painting from David Whitaker called Sunrise – Sunset and I felt in love.
Sunrise – Sunset, Watercolours (49 x 97 cm)
The painting look simple, it’s just a set of stripes with colours ranging from blues/purples to oranges/yellows. But if you look close enough, each stripe actually has most of the colours in it, so it’s not just a matter of painting each of them using only one colour as I thought at first!
Anyway, I’ve decided that I’ll give it a go…it will be my art project for this month. Got a big size canvas (40 x 120 cm) half price from Surbiton Arts, acrylic paints and a roll of narrow paper tape.
I hope that this is all I need!
Forgot to mention that I have never used acrylics before….maybe some tests before starting would be a good idea!
DIY Project 2
For the second project I got inspired by one of the books I got from the library a while ago (post here). It’s a felted bowl, an orange one for our living room to start with, which I will probably use as a keys or jewellery bowl. If it goes down well I’m planning to do a few more as Christmas presents. 
It’s quite easy to knit (instructions to follow soon), but still not sure if I can do it without a circular needle just stitching the ends together before felting! I will give it a go as it is, and see what results I get!

At the library

Could not get around the fact that yesterday the public library was closed (on Wednesdays!) so I spent the day thinking about all the books I was going to look for today.
I only spent about 1 hour there, sitting on a comfy couch, in silence, flicking through about 15 books, looking for ideas and inspiration.
Came back home with only four, as more would have been too heavy to carry. Moving from top left clockwise:
  • baby knits for beginners, by Debbie Bliss
  • Knit, Purl, Save the World – knit and crochet projects fro eco-friendly stitchers, by Vickie Howell & Adrienne Armstrong
  • One skein – 30 quick projects to knit and crochet, by Leigh Radford
  • The Knitter’s Year – 52 simple seasonal knits, by Debbie Bliss
The projects look gorgeous and simple…let’s see what I can make out of them!