Arms of an Indian God

Oh man, do I not enjoy knitting gloves.

I love wearing them and I love looking at them, but actually making them comes in pretty low on the list of activities I enjoy and actively seek out.

A few years back I got pretty desperate for PROPER fingerless gloves, so I broke and made myself some.

Warm hands? YES PLEASE!

Purple possum-merino goodness.

If they're so pretty and snuggly warm, why do I dislike making them? BEHOLD THE REASON:

Successful juggling of all the needles and stitch holders requires that you posses approximately the same number of arms as the average Hindu deity.

Yeah, seems legit.

Did you know that threading the on-hold stitches onto a circular needle makes thing much easier?

I do now -.-;

These are Glamour Nana's Wintertime Driving Gloves, in the same Corridale she used to make herself a cardigan. There wasn't quite enough there is grey possum/merino to pad it out.

I really shouldn't watch Doctor Who while knitting.  Fingers are different lengths, silly Topaz!

Have a wonderful crafternoon!

~Topaz

Where's My Room?

Another instalment of last year's Christmas crafty-gifts for people.

I missed both my nieces' birthdays last year, so they got two gifts each when I saw then on Christmas day for the family foodathon.

To prevent fights I try to get them each something similar-but-different for Christmas an something completely different for birthdays.

Christmas 2012's offering was a painted nameplate to hang on the door to their room or put up over their beds if they felt so inclined.

I have no idea what they're into at the moment and personally dislike stereotypical pink-and-girly stuff so I inflicted some horrible attempts at nature scenes on them ^.^;

When they're older they'll get my not-child-friendly and slightly creepy faeries. Until then: Something less likely to cause nightmares.

Mountains and trees for Hope, seaside and sunshine for Lockee.

I used bog-standard stationary store acrylics on some pre-made wooden cutouts. The colours came up nicely and the wood was very smooth and easy to paint.

Since I'm not the greatest painter in the world I hope they liked them anyway. It's the thought that counts, right?

Happy crafting!

~Topaz

Goodbye Nana

Nana Munro died last Thursday.

Her funeral was on Monday.

I'll never know what she thought of her socks, but at least she got them.

Goodbye Nana. Thank you so much for everything you did for me.

I'll love you and miss you for as long as I live.

~Topaz

Did I Just Break Physics?

Dad is one of those people who are difficult to knit for.

Aren't most guys?

He's fairly easy to buy for, but I honestly haven't had much time to go poke around in the shops thanks to extra shifts at work.

Thankfully Cat Bordhi came to my rescue, with her wonderful Moebius cast-on tutorial:

Dad is obsessed with motorbikes, his beloved Harley Dyna has pride of place in the garage. Colours were most definitely NOT an issue: H-D Brand colours of Black and Orange in Ashford's Tekapo 8ply. Very warm and very thick for maximum wind-breakage if he ever deigns to wear it on the bike.

Oh yes, I punned that!

Due to time constraints the scarf came out a bit on the narrow side, but that's not much of a problem since it's supposed to loop around the neck twice.

What I like about Moebii is that you don't have to worry about them blowing away if an end comes untucked or the problem of doing head-checks with a ton of bulky fabric jammed just inside the neck of your jacket.

I'm quite ridiculously proud of myself, even though knitting it felt like I was somehow breaking physics. It is darn weird to knit an object whose shape you can't hold in your head.

The usual colourwork problem of having to designate a "Right side" and "Wrong side" for your work was completely eliminated by this type of object only having ONE side. Trying to work out how you would go about giving it a right side ad a wrong side to look all neat and pretty nearly made my head explode.

My brain is obviously made for strictly Euclidean physics -.-;

Happy knitting!

~Topaz

Adventure in Bad Planning

This week I have been attempting to make birthday gifts.

Key word: Attempting.

So far they've all been an utter bust.

The first failed gift was a hot water bottle cover for a nephew who has recently moved back to a Dunedin winter after a year in the sunny North Island. I've never really bothered with gauge swatches before, but since I was working with an unfamiliar pattern and some unidentifiable acrylic from my stash. I figured that I had better try swatching it up to make sure I had the right gauge.

Five changes in needle size later and it's still too big! Laurie got a bag of shiny new colouring gear and assorted  stationary for his first week at school, while the hot water bottle cover remains unfinished and in dire need of girth reduction.

Sigh.

Gift two is intended for Dad's birthday next Wednesday. I figured a nice, quick garter-stitch Möbius/Moebius scarf would appeal to a fifty-something sometimes-nerd.

What nerd WOULDN'T want a monosurface knitted object for their birthday??

But. . .  I screwed up again.

I didn't check the length of circular needle required to knit a Moebius before going to get the yarn.

*Facedesk*

I already have a circular needle of the appropriate diameter for the yarn, but it's less than half the length required to properly knit a Moebius. I could probably use it if I could break the laws of physics, but alas I'm not that awesome.

As I work weekends, I'm going to be unable to get into Knitworld to purchase a long enough needle before Monday, which would give me about a day total of knitting time to it finished around work.

A Klein Bottle hat would also be awesome, but I'd prefer to make something that there is a chance of him actually wearing.

Time to prepare for a marathon knit of non-Euclidean garter-stitch madness.

Good luck for all your gift-intended projects!

~Topaz

Where Did The Time Go?

Wow, it's August already?

And I've been neglecting this blog since WHEN?

Oh my.

Time to make a 2/3rds Year Resolution (New Year's Resolutions are so 1999) to breathe some life back into this poor blog.

Be warned, it'll probably only start staggering around and groaning "Braaaaainsss", but it's better than nothing, right?

I wasn't wasting the time spent absent by not crafting. As soon as the winter's crop of chilblains cleared up enough I finished Mum's Birthday Socks.

Opal's "Fisherman" colourway and the Sunday Swing pattern from Knitty. Have a horrible inside-light photo:

No I didn't block them. I don't know how!

I adore Opal's sock yarns and this colourway is absolutely delightful. It reminds me of a fishing trip out to the Mackenzie Country with Grandpa where we caught ONE salmon in the entire week of sitting beside lakes and canals. Oi!

I'm still a very slow sock knitter, so these were about 1.5 months late ^.^;

All the best gifts are a little late, right?

~Topaz

The Many Stages Of My Mother's Hat

So, for Mother's Day last year I decided to be nice and make my Mum a hat. I figured that winter was just around the corner, and she'd probably need something to keep hear head warm whilst walking the animate mop she calls a dog.

(Mono is a wee white West Highland Terrier. Cute, but a little on the short side for full 'Dog' status in my books)

Mother's Day happens to fall near my paternal Grandmother's birthday, and we were planning on driving up to Christchurch to celebrate with her. My partner was driving, so this guaranteed me five or so hours of uninterrupted knitting time in which to make Mum's hat.

I wasn't entirely sure what colour to make Mum's hat. Naturally all her clothes are different colours, and I didn't want to get something that clashed horribly with 90% of her wardrobe. I found a nice shade of grey to execute the project in, and then I consulted Ravelry for a pretty beanie pattern I could pull off in the car. Something that looked nice, but wasn't too complicated in execution.

I fell in love with this pattern. The decreases are wonderful and make a monotone hat into something a little special.

After disturbing some poor hitchikers with the sight of a young female happily knitting and talking away a long car trip, I presented Mum with her hat.

She liked it! *Smug face*



(That's her 'I like my new hat, but why do you need a photo?' face)

At Nana's party we caught up with one of my many Uncles, who had come over from Australia for the Birthday Festivities. Canterbury is a darn sight cooler in climate than Queensland and my uncle was as bundled up as he could be without getting hassled by his brothers and he STILL looked cold. Mum very kindly leant him her brand new hat for the night, since a grey beanie is a "manly" way of staying warm.

The hat is now in Australia, probably stuffed in the glove box of his massive B-Triple truck.

Mum was a little bit pissed off by this hat-theft, so I offered to make her a replacement hat. Mum agreed, on the condition that SHE got to pick the yarn.

You know what happens when a non-knitter is allowed an unsupervised yarn-buying trip? You get a ball of overpriced, inferior quality wool yarn that has KNOTS halfway through which COMPLETELY CHANGE the colourway and provide a point of potential unravelment during hard wearing.

Oh well, it was a very pretty colourway. I would have been all over it if it was on sale too ^.^;

The placement of the knots in the ball of yarn Mum chose for her hat meant that it was about 5cm too short for Comfortable Ear Coverage, so I picked up around the bottom seam and added on a few extra rows of ribbing with some Barbie-Pink yarn to give it a bit of a boost.




There, now she can walk Mono in stylish comfort. You'll definitely see her coming at the dog park!

~Topaz

Snug As A Bug.

Pretty much described my niece this winter past.

I was totally stumped for a birthday present for her last year. At that point, Hope was in a ZhuZhu-pet phase, and other family members had called dibs on all the easy gift choices *Sigh*

So cue a trip to the yarn section of the Warehouse with her, to pick colours for her very own car-trip blanket.

There was a layer of cunning to that plan. Taking her there pretty much assured that she wouldn't pick one of the many pretty, short-lived and difficult to wash wool blends sold at the yarn shop I frequent. Delicate, expensive yarns and small, active children are not a good mix! I wanted her to pick something she liked, that would survive some fairly rough play and that her Mum could throw in the washing machine with impunity.

Armed with her choices, I sat down to churn out the appropriate number of peggy squares in time for her not-so-surprise present ;)

Voila, the finished blanket!


Not exactly what you'd expect from a kindy-aged girl, is it? I'll definitely get her input on colour choice before making any jerseys for her in future!

Here is a close-up of the seaming. I decided to sew the squares together with the khaki, since it didn't stand out as much as any of the brighter or darker colours would have done.


With any luck it will survive a decent few years of love and abuse. If not, I can always go a second round of blanket making!

Best of luck with your current projects!

~Topaz