handmade by stefanie

First, I got the news that The Sanguine Gryphon (as we know them) will be no more .  I was really glad I was sitting down for that one, because I didn't see it coming!  It sounds like each person will be engaging in their own yarny pursuits, so it's not like they're lost and gone forever, but it's still pretty crazy news. I really enjoyed working with them when I designed the Heliotrope Stockings , so I'm hoping I'll have the opportunity to work with these fine people in some capacity.  At any rate, I wish them both the best! Apparently, there was an oil spill in New Zealand.  Either I'm just living under a rock, or has the US media been too busy avoiding coverage on Occupy Wall Street and other various important news items?  Why does my phone's news ticker always tell me what Lindsay Lohan is doing or who got kicked off of Dancing with the Stars?  Google, you've got some s'plaining to do! But as I was saying....there was an oil spill and no...

Foliage Hat: I have the worst poker face. One week down, three to go! Malabrigo Stockpile is off to a great start - I've already completed two projects and cast on for two more!  My non-stockpile projects aren't feeling terribly neglected, either (well, I still need to start the sleeves for Tyler's sweater, but I'm pretty sure that will happen sometime this week, if not this weekend).   Here's the lowdown: 1.  Foliage Hat - Malabrigo Worsted in Vaa (to replace the one I lost a few years ago) Finished! 2.  Madison Hand Warmers - Malabrigo Worsted in Vaa (to match hat) Finished! 3.  Metheglin Cowl - Malabrigo Rios in Solis and whatever odds and sods I have sitting around in Worsted , Twist or Rios ! Madison Mitts at twilight. 4.  Robin's Egg Blue Hat - Malabrigo Chunky in Charrua (my favorite color!) In Progress 5.  Travel Shawl - Malabrigo Sock in Aguas In Progress 6.  Button Bunnies - a ginormous version in Malabr...

Hooray!  Sad Sack September is almost over!  I can't think of a better way of celebrating than caving in to my startitis and casting on for lots of small (and not-so-small) projects using yarn I shopped from my stash.  That might be the silver lining to this whole dead car debaucle/smashed laptop screen ridiculousness - rediscovering the joy of shopping my own stash!  I have some amazing yarns that need to see the light of day, beginning with my mmmmmmmMalabrigo. A month's worth of knitting? So here's my list of projects I'd like to complete for this month's Malabrigo Stockpile event - ALL of the yarn is from my stash.  It's an ambitious list, for sure, but I'll be happy if I complete only half of this list!  1.  Foliage Hat - Malabrigo Worsted in Vaa (to replace the one I lost a few years ago) 2.  Madison Hand Warmers - Malabrigo Worsted in Vaa (to match hat) 3.  Metheglin Cowl - Malabrigo Rios in Solis and whatever odds and s...

Early Monday morning, clue #4 arrived in my inbox, and of course I downloaded and printed it out as soon as I woke up!  I've been anxiously awaiting the arrival of this final clue so I could guesstimate whether or not I had enough yarn for a larger size. On the plus side, if I only have enough yarn to make the smallest size, I can get to working on Clue #4 right away and, barring some unforseen circumstance (as they would say on Seinfeld ), finish my project by the end of the month.  While I would really like to have a big 'ol scarfy-shawl to wrap up in this fall, I don't relish the fact that I would have to return to Clue #3 and do even MORE knitting before I can move on to the last clue.  It's a necessary evil, I suppose!  It would also increase the probability that I would not finish this project in time (i.e. by the end of August).  I can accept that - I have no illusions that I'd win a prize in the midst of this KAL, though I certainly wouldn't protest...

I'll try not to be mushy, but it just so happens that today is our six-year wedding anniversary (side note: we've been together for 11 years total!  I can't believe it either!).  How does one find the perfect gift that conveys exactly how you feel?  It can be a tricky business.  This is probably the part where I say something super cheesy about making him something from the heart - and I do tend to knit lots of gifts for Tyler, and they are from the heart, it's just that....we're not terribly traditional people (I did insist on having the wedding march played on kazoo in our backyard, poolside wedding).  Our collective idea of a 'gift from the heart' is usually a record (him) or a knitted creature (me).  If we overspend, it's because there were too many covetable records at Reckless (that could be either of us!), or someone (not me) wanted to get a gift certificate to Nina so I could get a sweater's worth of yarn.  No expensive jewelry, swanky din...

Things are happening!  Yes they are!  It's been yet another whirlwind week - trips to the vet, a yarn party, a late night out last night seeing the Dum Dum Girls @ the Empty Bottle - and somehow, between all that and working two jobs, I've managed to get a few projects off the needles and start just as many to replace them.  It's all about priorities, right?! I need to block this finished piece, but I'm just so thrilled with how it turned out, I want to share it!   Robin, of course, wanted in on the action - since the couch is his new favorite hangout, I guess he was equally excited to have something new and soft to snuggle up to. Pattern:  September Pillow by Pam Allen Yarn:  Quince & Co. Osprey in Peacock I can't think of a time in recent OR ancient history that I've made a project using the exact yarn and color combination specified in a pattern.  This might be an historic first for me, but it was a total fluke.  Tyler bought me thes...

Ever since Book 3 came out, I've been wanting to make an inverse version of my Kitchy Pleated Bag - and at last I've crossed that off my knitting to-do list.  The actual knitting part of the project only took a day and a half - so if you're looking for a fast project for a certain upcoming event next month, perhaps you might want to give this one a try!  (Which reminds me - be on the lookout for a Junkies-only discount on all the patterns in my Ravelry shop in honor of Malabrigo March) Pattern:  Kitchy Pleated Bag by yours truly - available only in Malabrigo Book 3 Yarn:  Malabrigo Chunky in Charrua (MC) and Frank Ochre (CC) Buttons:  Found Buttons - part of my Etsy shop   Bamboo Handles:  The Milliner's Daughter - Etsy shop Other notes:  If you choose to use a darker color (such as Charrua) as the MC on this bag, don't forget that darker-colored yarns felt more (and faster!) than lighter-colored yarns.  I actually did forget ...

Now that we have a comfy new couch, it's time to accessorize....which of course means knitting some enormous monsters to stand (or sit) guard!  This yarn is one of the first purchases I made when I started working at Lorna's Laces - a few skeins of Revelation that had attempted to be Aslan, gone horribly awry - but once dipped in some Carol Green, an unfortunate turn of events was magically transformed into some awesomely variegated yarn...which is how a lot of my "one-of-a-kind" stash was born.  Pattern:  Iris the Gourmet Monster by Rebecca Danger Yarn:  Lorna's Laces Revelation - custom  color (in the neighborhood of Carol Green) Needles:  US #9 Original Date of Queue:  2/17/10 What should I name this big squishy bugaboo?!?

Tuesday night It's been a pretty weird week in Chicago - I can't think of any time I've witnessed such snowy madness (unless you count any time it snowed in Portland, where even an inch could shut the entire city down).  Luckily I have plenty of yarn on hand in the event of a snowpocalypse, and our new couch was delivered the day before.  That's pretty lucky!  Just this week alone, I think we've gotten our money's worth as we've clocked some serious couch-breaking-in hours.  I had a lot of non-knitting to-do's to acccomplish earlier in the week, but I did manage to finish a new work hat for Tyler - his only cotton hat for work has seen better days.  This was a nice fast-knitting little hat, and it fits him perfectly!  Pattern:  Boarder's Beanie by Lauren Sanchez Original Date of Queue:  June 19, 2008 Yarn:  Knit Picks Simply Cotton Worsted in Envy Heather Our street, Wednesday afternoon On Wednesday I finished the Stephe...

Today's post will be filled with FO's I've been meaning to share with my dear readers for quite some time.  Hope you're sitting down for this! I realized there are some projects I made for holiday gifts that were never shared here as FOs, only WIPs.  The first among these would be the crazy rainbow socks I knitted for my husband, Tyler, who made one casual off-hand remark about wanting some crazy-colored socks and then promptly forgot about it.  Of course, I didn't, and immediately ran out to purchase the brightest skein of sock yarn I could find.  Yarn:  Zauberball Crazy Pattern:  Tsunami by Judy Sumner from Knitted Socks East & West I also knit my grandmother a pair of socks every year for Christmas.  She loves them because not only are they unique and knit with love (awww!), but they also don't compress on her ankles the way store-bought socks do, so they are infinitely more comfortable for her to wear.  You may recall seeing thes...

Over the weekend, I was contacted by Stephen West regarding errata in the Lakedale Shawl pattern from Malabrigo Book 3 - as you can see, one side of this scarf is in broken rib, and one side is in seed stitch rib.  Apparently there were some pattern repeats missing from the book (the book has a 4-row repeat, but it should really be an 8-row repeat), causing the entire pattern to be in broken rib (I think I messed up an increase or two early on, resulting in the harlequin effect which is probably not evident in the squonchy* photo to the right).  Since this scarf is just for me, and I wasn't entirely sure it wasn't my operator error, I decided to press on instead of frog and begin again - plus, part of me was also curious whether or not I would have the correct stitch count by the time I reached the colorwork scallops.  Somehow I did, but instead of having 115 stitches on either side of the stitch markers, I had 116 stitches on the side with the seed stitch rib and 114 st...

In this, the third year of tagging projects 'destashXX' (XX being the last two digits of whatever year it happens to be) in order to see how much knitting can be done from one's stash, I would like to suggest a synergistic movement for the masses - allow me to invite you to the party that is De-Queue '11! The rules:  Anything you've queued prior to this year is game.  Tag your qualifying projects with 'queue11' - and for added fun, write the original date of queue in the project notes.  For the sake of anthropology, take stock right now and make a note of how many pages and projects you have in your queue before you begin this effort (feel free to leave said info as a comment here!  I love a wildly unscientific experiment!). Now, I've seen some people on Ravelry with some truly staggering and impressive queues.  When you've got double-digits happening, you don't mess around (or, perhaps, you just queue any project that you think is cool, rega...