Sock on the go

What was I doing in the past 2 week on the knitting side ? Since we had temperature over 40 Celsius for many and many days I thought about knitting wool socks was just the perfect thing to do. After all, when it's so hot outside I can only think about frilly night and a good pair of knitted socks while watching a movie with a hot chocolate...

So I wound my Kangaroo dyer yarn in the color Mango Reprise that I bought last summer(right one skein on the picture), I found my 2.5mm dpn and I searched my queue on Ravelry to find a pattern to please my mind, my hands and later on...my feet. And looking to my work so far, I must say happy feet!

I choose the pattern Shur'tugal by Alice Yu to begin my first pair of sock since a very long time, actually if you remember my last one were my Bellatrix socks in mid-January. Just before I change all my life ... so I was kind of worried to knit socks again but everything is alright fortunately for me !

I cast on for those little one on August 13Th and I don't knit a lot these days so my progress aren't the one I am used to. But on August 15Th I went to my nephew birthday to Boisbriand and came back in the same day so a lot of road knitting was done on that day. My BF was more than happy to drive my car on the way back anyway !!

Those socks are kind of slow knitting and I love seeing the hand painted colors swirl around the sock, some may call it bad pooling but I love it and since they are for me anyway it doesn't matter !!! So far I am almost done with the feet and I will toes soon now on my first one... the last picture was taken a few days ago.

The best story about me knitting this pair of sock happens yesterday after work. I was at my head office for the afternoon and I went out of my meeting at 4:30 just on time to hit the traffic and with all the workers coming out of office plus the work on the roads of Quebec, it took me one hour to make a simple 12-15 minutes trip back at home... So at some point I was completely stopped for 2 or 3 traffic lights and I don't my car these day (yes again BF is driving my car but that's another story) and the one I am renting is automatic so I pulled my knitting and I had time to knit 5 rows of my sock before being able to move again !!! The man in the car probably thought that I am a bit crazy but at least I didn't spent 15 minutes of life in a negative feeling about traffic but I enjoyed a good moment of car knitting... ;)

I must now begin Christmas knitting also so I will finish sock #1 and then I will knit a Christmas gift and then I will be allowed to finish my pair of sock. I think I will have a lot of Christmas knitting this year.... the best moment to start is probably as soon as possible.

Last FO, non knitting but still crafty !!

My last FO is absolutely non knitting but I wanted to share because maybe it can help someone that want to transform old furniture from "bof" to "vavavoum!!"

I bought those old furniture because I had not enough storage in my bedroom but I did not wanted to send too much money on it. I also wish to have something unique and special in my bedroom. It also have the second usage of decoration now, I will tell you how I made my way through this weird idea I had of using wallpaper to cover old furnitures and gave them a second life...

First here the before pictures of the small one, pretty ugly uh ?

The bigger one was as ugly but just bigger and ugliest in the same time... lol...fortunately I had them for a cheap price from a coworker ;). I bought a roll of pre-glued wallpaper and spray paint in a silver color for place I do not want to cover with wallpaper. I begun to check on the smaller one the size of paper needed and I cutted and glued the first section as I would have done on a wall. I also make sure there was no air under the paper and cutted excess paper with a cutter.


Here you can see that I choose a paper very forgetful so I don't have to match perfectly to make the project look gorgeous, which is good because I would still be there trying to match and glue the whole thing...Halfway done on the little one and I gain experience and also discovered that I need to had more glue to solidify my work. So I went out to buy "No more nails" glue and I lifted the corners and had glue under them.

It is very important to let the paper dry fully before to glue with the second glue or that makes a weird look under the paper and you have to redo the whole thing anyway.



I was pretty exhausted at the end of my project, I spent almost 8 hours on and off of it to make myself a very cool product of which I am very proud ! It was worth the work and for sure if I ever do something like that again I will know how to this time and spend less time thinking about how to and more time doing it !!

Almost done, only the door still drying.

Small one all completed

The bigger one finally complete with doors on

It's important to work on your ideas and now, I am so proud of my work, that I will maybe transform my next TV table too..... to be continued....

SOAB5 : my box is here !!!!

I just receive my box from Robyn yesterday... I was not home when the mailman came so I had to wait and I could only gets it by the end of the afternoon and as soon as I saw the "Robyn nest" tag as the return address.... I was confirmed in my idea that you were my spoiler for the swap Robyn !!!! I knew it from the very first email... and I am SO happy with what you sent me, I am spoiled totally! I may sleep with the yarn if that wasn't so hot these days (36 degrees today if you want to know).

So here are the very cool goodies I received from Robyn aka knitpurlmama on Ravelry and this time we had a color theme and I said green like Happy forest green colorway in Dream in color smoochy... you can say you are a true knitter when your favorite color is a yarn colorway !!!

First of all before the parcel itself she sent me 6 patterns in my wish list !!! Yes 6 and she even gave me the opportunity to also give me one of her own design (link to her shop : Robyn's nest btw because she deserve a little publicity please visit her shop).




So in my box I had a lovely card she wrote to me, 2 pencils, assorted teas, gum, lipstick, mints, candies, healthy snack (fruit to go that did not make it to picture), individual sachet of lemonade and so cool notions : 2 labels that says "my own design", 3.25mm bamboo DPN, 2.5mm 32'' circular (!!!), bamboo cables needles and a mini bamboo crochet hook.

Handmade stitch markers in green colorway and also some in gold color, they are butterfly so my knitting will fly off the needles so fast now ;) and also 2 pairs of lovely handmade earrings, wow and you know how much I love earrings !!! A green pair on the upright and a pair of scrabble one with the "S" of Sophie, so original. I will wear those this week at office :) there will be comments from coworkers for sure...hihi!

And yummy, yummy yarn goodness....... Zen Garden Bling Yarn in Olive twist color and it's sparkly !!! The yarn really wear it's name well there are little bling bling in the yarn and that will be a lovely and washable pair of sock for me soon !

Robyn I only have a few words to say to you, first I love you, you are an awesome spoiler and I can't say how much I wish to thank you. You made my day by sending me some patterns I wanted for a long time and then the parcel itself is beyond expectation : thank you so much you made that swap over the top !!!

Great Saturday....

Simple story of my super awesome Saturday, on August 8Th....

First of all I went to vieux port de Quebec ta take a walk on the morning and we visited "Plein Art" an exposition of handmade stuff from people around Quebec and I got a lot of compliment on my Shalom sweater.... ;)

So we spent a great morning walking around and going to the market buying some local stuff and also tasting fresh jam and blueberry chocolate !!! Look on the next picture the pretty little hat I found at Plein Art, I love it so much !

Then on the early evening we head to l'Ange-Gardien to join the group of aventurers to go on the fireworks at the Montmorency waterfalls using kayks ....We even had dinner on water !!! So cool I can tell to eat watching the sun falling down into the water....


I took a few pictures of the spot where we stopped to eat, enjoy the view....

and then the bouquet final, the Grands feux loto-quebec from the water.... I had a fantastic day !

FO : Foliage for a swap

Yes another one FO, I am on fire these days... LOL I had to make a handmade item for a swap I am involved in. So here it is Foliage from knitty, fall 2007 in bulky version.

Specs.

Pattern : Foliage by Emilee Mooney, Knitty fall 2007

Needles : 6.5mm and 5.5 mm

Yarn : Knitpick Wool of the Andes bulky, about half a skein in color wine

Time : about 3 hours, yes really !

Mods : none, I knit it straight on Friday afternoon

I really like the rustic feeling of this hat if I don't block and when you wear it all the lace pattern opens up like a fantastic surprise... I don't think I will block and I will let my spoilee decide if she want to block or not one day. I will for sure make a hat for me now after one for the Man and one for a secret spoilee, when it's going to be for me ? Next one for sure !

Modeled by me and the the pretty red flowers matching... ;)

FO : KOOLHASS for the Man

Yes not even a WIP post about this one since it was so fast and fun to knit !!! I just hope that 5993 stitches isn't enough to call the "sweater curse" lol... Here are the spec of my new creation ...

Pattern : Koolhass by Jared Flood

Close-up of the lattice pattern

Yarn: Vermont Organic Fiber company O-Wool Classic 2
(it is supposed to be a fingering weight but it's more a dk in my hands)

Needles : 4mm and 5mm

Size : Man size

Mods : none, was way too cool the way it is already !!!


Enjoyment factor : HIGH !!! I may knit myself one too before winter :) and I think the Man also enjoyed it next winter ! :)

Fo : Shalom cardigan revisited

Sometime you look at a pattern on Ravelry and he speaks to you and Shalom Cardigan told me, I want to be a sweater !!! I told, speak... not it yells at me to do it that way only... so I listened and I was knitting all the way down to the end of it. Here is how I did it my own way.

First of all as it's an FO post, the specs of my little baby :

Pattern : Shalom Cardigan by Meghan McFarlane

Yarn : Cascade Eco + in color Baked apple that I bought at kitknit last year. I used about 90% of the skein and I still need to figure out was to do with the leftovers.

Needles : 6.5 mm circular needles

Time : Cast on July 20th at night and Cast off on August 1st in the early morning

Mods : I did knit the yoke as intended by the pattern it's after that it comes interesting for us fellow knitters...I did not wanted to have any sewing involved after the knitting so I knit in the round after the yoke adding one stitch in the middle and using it as the middle of the round. I used the leaf pattern of hapichick as Nordly did (Ravelry nickname). Then after it was long enough I had another stitch and 5 rows of twisted ribs and I cast off using EZ sewn cast off and voila !!! I have a new sweater and it's 27 degrees outside, very practical ;). I did plan some buttonholes but finally I like it better without buttons.

Happy one with a new cool sweater !