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Tag: Inkling

by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting, Little one, Uncategorized 2 Comments

About a decade ago I knit a green night cap (it was vaguely supposed to be based on Links hat from The Legend of Zelda, but I was winging the pattern whilst taking turns playing the game, so take that as you will)

Anyhow, I have thick hair, so in the winter months after I’ve washed it at night, I pop on my hat and go to bed (yes, I know going to bed with wet hair is supposed to give you a cold, no, it doesn’t actually give you one and no, I won’t hairdryer it as the only times I tried took an hour and it was still damp in places).

This past winter, Felix had taken to stealing my hat when she had her hair washed, and I would steal it back when I washed mine. A few weeks ago she pointed at a t-shirt Engel was wearing and stated ”I want a red night hat like that!’

The t-shirt happened to be a Wychwood brewery Hobgoblin T-shirt (the classic ‘lagerboy’ one).

After we explained that the red hat was a hobgoblin hat, it was agreed that she would return my green one in exchange for her own hobgoblin hat.

Its a bit big, but she’ll grow into it (I know I generally don’t post photos with people in, but I wanted to get one showing the drape and Felix refused to let me put it on anything else!). Made using the free pattern Oblio’s Cap by Emily Anna Bingham – very easy pattern to follow, and a pretty quick, simple knit all things considered.

Which is good, as Engel has pointed out that there are more Hobgoblin beers, in fact, the King-goblin would suit him, and wouldn’t Inkling look adorable in the IPA Hobgoblin hat?…

Guess what my next knits are?

As an aside, last May I posted that I had discovered some Tribbles in my wool stash, and despite attempts of extermination, found more not once, but twice!

Well, sadly, the originally caught specimens are showing their age, and one has also passed on through the wooly gates…so I went to see if there were any survivors lurking in the wool stash…

Yep. Found six more!

Till next week!

Wool count:

Starting total – 622

Wool used – 43 (1 since last post)
Wool bought – 6
Wool given – 5
Wool gifted – 0

Total – 587

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting, Little one 2 Comments

Inkling turned one on Friday, and I can honestly say I have no idea where the year has gone. I swear time moves faster the older you get!

We had a BBQ for him on Saturday (Hungry Caterpiller themed due to Inkling being nicknamed as such due to his bottomless appetite- he actually gets separated at nursery from the others during meal times as he steals the other kids food!) and it was great – gorgeous weather, tasty food, and great company. Unfortunately, not everyone could make it (to be fair, most had good excuses, like being in Australia, looking at you Rabbie!)

Something that has changed since I was little, is that kids get party bags when they go to someone’s party, and on this note, it was decided that since Inkling was a kid, there needed to be party bags.

But adults don’t need bubble wands and sweeties (ok, they do, but that’s not the point!) and with the Hungry Caterpillar theme…

A caterpillar! Based on the free pattern Easter Egg Toys by Kimberly Chapman.

And for the bag, a cocoon! Based on my own free pattern! Just reduced by a third in size.

And a beautiful butterfly to finish it off! Based on the pattern Common Blue Butterfly by Lesley Stanfield from her book ‘100 Flowers to Knit & Crochet’.

I, umm, did make too many though…oh well! They looked cute strung up with some ivy Felix helped make!

Wool count:

Starting total – 622

Wool used – 42 (5 since last post)
Wool bought – 6
Wool given – 5
Wool gifted – 0

Total – 588

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting, Little one, Uncategorized 1 Comment

Its a very short, slightly belated post today. Yesterday I was at a very good friends wedding, it was an amazing day and beautiful hardly describes it. The venue, the bride, the vows, the food…all beautiful.

And of course, Inkling had to fit the part! At the very last minute I decided he needed a little bow tie to go with his waistcoat:

Based on the free pattern Erika’s Knit Bow by loareknits – its super quick, super simple and super adorable.

The other thing to note, and I shouldn’t have been surprised really seeing as the friend who got married is the friend who requested several cthulhus and matching dice bags, but I bumped into a few Americans who, after spotting Inkling cuddling his knitted cthulhu, exclaimed ‘your the lady that knit the cthulhus!’

I love it when things like that happen! (I had been busy admiring the detail in one of the girls knitted shawls prior to this, still debating what pattern was used…pretty sure it was a Birch Leaf motif…)

Anyhow! Two big projects on the go, very nearly finished one and almost finished the other so hopefully you’ll see those next week!

Oh, ended up buying wool this week as I didn’t have enough in a colour I needed. I could not for the life of me get hold of said colour in straight up acrylic and DK weight (kids toy, gotta be sturdy and machine washable) and it took five shops (two of them large craft stores) to find what I needed! ‘Sadly’ it only came in packs of two, oh well!

Wool count:

Starting total – 622

Wool used – 36 (3 since last post)
Wool bought – 6 (2 since last post)
Wool given – 5
Wool gifted – 0

Total – 594 (Net loss of 1)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Gaming, Knitting, Little one 1 Comment

Belated Easter post, apologies! I was visiting the family up North and we had an absolute ball (Rabbie documented it over at her blog) but when we got back it was straight in to work and gaming prep and time ran away from me!

I do have two completed knits to show you though from then:

I did indeed make Mr McGregor’s sack, as suggested last post, and it was quite fun putting all the bunnies and the lettuce inside it!

And I also whipped up a Baby Bunny Hat (free pattern by Rebecca Lennox) so that Inkling could join in with the festivities. He is definitely bunny mad and squeals when he sees them!

There’s been no new completed knits really since then!

As I said above, I’ve been preparing another game, this time it’s Achtung Cthulhu! In case you haven’t guessed by now, I really enjoy running games in the Cthulhu universe, and Achtung Cthulhu! is set during WW2 and I’ll say now that it doesn’t disappoint.

Though there have been half a dozen instances of people wanting weapons that don’t actually exist just yet…and we’ve only played about three hours!

Till next week where I should hopefully have more to show you!

Wool count:

Starting total – 622

Wool used – 33 (2 since last post)
Wool bought – 4
Wool given – 5
Wool gifted – 0

Total – 595

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting, Little one, Patterns 1 Comment

I’ll start with a recap: my mum works with autistic children and she finds having physical props helps with learning and development.

I’ve made The Hungry Caterpillar, The Stubborn Goat, Elmer and friends and now…

Flopsy’s bunnies!

The bunny pattern is based on the free pattern Square bunny by Annette of Lebenslustiger.com – with paws and little kerchiefs. (I’ve made these before, here and here, as always, a brilliant, quick pattern!)

The story these guys are from is ‘The tale of Flopsys bunnies‘ by Beatrix Potter. It’s a cute story, though be warned, lettuce is soporific!

…

I need to make a lettuce.

After searching online, I couldn’t find a lettuce pattern. Nothing. So I did the next best thing – I made up my own pattern!

If anyone else is ever possessed with the burning desire to also knit a lettuce, the pattern is available for free on my ‘Free Patterns‘ page, or you can just click this link here…

Flopsy’s bunnies certainly seem to enjoy eating it!

Hmm…I think thats everything I need to make to tell “The Tale of Flopsy’s Bunnies” , unless, you know, the kids might want to put the bunnies into a sack like Mr McGregor did.

…

I’m just going to dig out some brown wool and my knitting needles…

As an aside: I made an extra two bunnies as my little ones both fell in love with them. Felix kept ‘relocating’ the finished bunnies to ‘bunny town’ which appears to have mystical magical properties that allows it to change size and location every time you look away…and Inkling is just crazy about bunnies. He squeals when he sees them…

These are the extra bunnies, you may have noticed that they all have scarves of different colours – this is so that each one can have its own little personality, and in the case of the extra two, can be clearly identified as ‘the one that can be chewed on, and the one to keep away from Inkling’…

I think that’s all for this week – and to be honest, that was quite a lot! Bunnies, bunnies and more bunnies, a new free knitting pattern and even a heads up on my current knitting project! What else could too that?

The wool count because…drum roll…I finally have less than 600 balls of wool!

And here’s the count to prove it!

Wool count:

Starting total – 622

Wool used – 31 (5 this week!)
Wool bought – 4
Wool given – 5
Wool gifted – 0

Total – 597

I am so ridiculously pleased with myself right now!!!!

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Gaming, Knitting, Little one, Motorbike 1 Comment

I’m sure most of the world knows this but the UK was not by both ‘The Beast from the East’ and Storm Emma this past week. Unlike my family up North, we only got a few inches of snow over the course of the week – enough to stop Engel going to work on the motorbike (he did manage to ride in it the first three days, but after a lucky miss, I insisted he didn’t try again) but not enough to stop me going back to work.

Sigh.

It wasn’t a bad first week of work, but I was ready to go home, curl up in a blanket with a hot water bottle and a stack of chocolate and not leave my nest for the immediate future…

Felix did however have a ball – she got to make snow cats and finally have that snowball fight she spent all winter asking for. Inkling in the other hand… yeah… he’s not a fan of this strange, cold, wet, white stuff!

The weather aside (I am a true Brit and can discuss the weather for several hours, it’s a cultural thing) I have two completed projects to share this week!

First of all:

Yep, it’s another chunky Wayfarer! (Pattern by Jen Lucas from the book ‘Doomsday Knits: Projects for the Apocalypse and After’) I literally had this on the moment it was cast off the needles! So warm and cosy…

And project number two:

I made one of these for Felix when she was tiny, and it felt fitting to make one for Isaac. I did hers in the colours of the rainbow, but for him, well, it’s a running joke that he is in fact the Hungry Caterpillar! Made using several free patterns – the alphabet series by Frankie Brown on Ravelry.

So aside from the weather, starting back to work and a little bit of knitting, there’s not much else to say at the moment. I’ve started reading through the Achtung Cthulhu rules and setting, so don’t be too surprised if more random lovecraftian things start to crop up!

Oh, and on the Pokémon hand puppet front, both Felix and Engel are trying to convince me to make ALL of them. I will say now that there is no way I’m doing all 800+ of them!!!!

Maybe just a few more favourites…

Wool count:

Starting total – 622

Wool used – 23 (5 this week!)
Wool bought – 4
Wool given – 5
Wool gifted – 0

Total – 605 (So near my 600 ball goal!)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Gaming, Knitting, Little one 1 Comment

And this is why I should never have Engel come up with blog post titles…

Two completed projects this week. Let me start the first with a bit of an explanation…

Engel likes computer games. Loves them really. Especially open world type RPGs. He puts a worrying number of hours into them, just wandering, doing little side quests, pointedly ignoring the actual plot…

Anyhow. One of his most favourite is Fallout (depending on his mood depends on whether it’s Fallout 3 or Fallout 4, but that’s semantics) and watching him play through the nth playthrough of one of those two, I spotted this:

And I commented that wouldn’t it be cute if Inkling had one of those…Engel looked at me, with a look that I know far too well…and so the hunt for a pattern began!

This was made using the free pattern: Mini Knitted Rocket Ship by Ilana R. Marks and although incredibly cute and awesome, needed a few tweaks to get them a bit more like in the game…

Lengthened the centre part of the rocket, added some extra windows and voila! Now I just need to turn them into an actual mobile…when I do, I shall photograph it and let you all know!

The second completed project is no less geeky than the first. Felix was playing with her cat puppet I made forever ago, and it was having a conversation with her cuddly toy Meowth (her favourite Pokémon for those curious). After watching this adorable exchange an idea took route in my mind and refused to shift until it was knitted…

A Meowth hand puppet! I used my own free cat hand puppet pattern and added a number of small additions and a few tweaks and voila! I may publish my notes so that more Meowths can be created to conquer the world! I am also debating knitting a few other Pokémon hand puppets and if I do I’ll probably put all the pattern notes together and post it under one pattern…not sure yet…need to think on it and see if inspiration strikes…

Anyhow! In non knitting news, tomorrow is my first day back at work after maternity leave! Every time I think that I just want to cry…

Updates will probably be a bit patchy for a while until I get back into the swing of things. It currently up for debate as to whether I will actually get more or less knitting time…

Till the next post!

Wool count:

Starting total – 622

Wool used – 18 (2 this week)
Wool bought – 4
Wool given – 5
Wool gifted – 0

Total – 610 (Will we get below 600 this year? It turned out to be an unobtainable goal last year…)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Gaming, Knitting, Little one, Uncategorized 1 Comment

Couldn’t resist that title after making all these:

Yep, that’s another six seatbelt covers! I used the same free pattern as last time: Seat belt snuggles by Chris Behme and the reasoning? Felix complained repeatedly that whenever anyone used the car, they didn’t have a seatbelt cover, and all the seatbelts needed one. After having a few full car loads of people (my car can convert to a seven seater, it’s surprisingly useful) I relented and used up a load of chunky wool scraps, as well as letting Felix loose on the button collection.

However, she also had one special request…

A ‘princess’ seatbelt cover for her best friend, as she needed a special one for her seat in her car! This makes me think of Disney’s Tangled (Rapunzel) for some reason…

Needless to say, I don’t want to knit any more of these any time soon!

So thankfully I have a different, more geeky project on the needles now, but more about that when it’s finished.

In other news, Missy came to visit her cousins! (She also brought her humans Rabbie and Loki) and much fun was had by all! It was a great laugh, lots of adventure and playing games! I will say now though, I was GMing ‘No thank you, Evil’ and as a fairly strict cthulhu GM, it nearly killed me. No death, insanity or destruction! No elder gods to twist mind and reality! No cults to meddle and cause mischief! But, I managed it. Just. Same can’t be said about the players who managed to turn a half hour adventure (if that) into nearly two hours!

Anyhow, enough of that. Been celebrating Chinese New Year this weekend and watched the dragon parade and dancing lions, took part in making paper lanterns and block printing. Felix had an absolute ball, and Inkling…well…he really, really wanted the pom poms on the lions heads…bless, the nice lion let him pet it for a good five minutes…

Alright, enough chatting, I have a load of housework to do, a chocolate cake to eat and some knitting to get cracking on!

Till next week!

Starting total – 622

Wool used – 16 (5 this week)
Wool bought – 4 (It was snowing, and happened to be the first shop I ducked into for shelter, and they were in the clearance bin, calling my name…)
Wool given – 5 (I mentioned to Engel I only had one ball of black DK wool, he brought home four more for me! And I didn’t even ask him to!)
Wool gifted – 0

Total – 612

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Cats, Gaming, Knitting, Little one 2 Comments

Ignore the title. I may be a little giddy and/or sleep deprived!

But! There is a reason for it!

Here’s the Octopus:

Its a wash cloth for Inkling – using the free pattern: Baby Octopus Cloth by Elaine Fitzpatrick. Believe it or not, this pattern and the wool had been picked out before Inkling was born, I just haven’t gotten round to knitting it until now! He’s been eating finger foods and desperately needed something that could scrub all the food off him in the shower!

And now for the pussy:

Free pattern Attachable Rainbow Kitty Ears by Saphy kun. I spotted these on Ravelry a while ago and knew I had to knit Engel a set, particularly for when he’s playing violent computer games and/or doing online gaming with our friends.

They have been used, not sure if it’s because he can’t get them off the headphones (they do have buttons so can be removed) or if he likes having the cat ears on himself…

Also this week, I finally sorted through my wool stash (this occurs every year or so to some extent) this time I’ve segregated it by colour and each ball is bagged with any matching friends of the same kind and dye lot. The lone balls of wool are put together with the other lone balls of wool of that colour group (so they don’t get sad and lonely) and now I can tell at a glance what wool is best for the size of project I’m doing. This will hopefully get me to focus on using up the odds and ends of my stash! And also future yarn purchases – I know what colours I have lots of, and not so much, so hopefully I’ll buy what I need, not what I want!

I don’t believe that either, but I can hope!

Oh, also, whilst I was sorting my wool out, these scampered out:

Yes. More tribbles. A  red subspecies of the pink mutant variant discovered, only two have been captured and sent for further study up North…

Early post this week as my sister is coming to visit and it’s going to be awesome!!! But before the fun and games start, I need to tidy up all the toys everywhere – it’s amazing how much mess two children, three cats and a husband can make in the blink of an eye…

Starting total – 622

Wool used – 11 (2 this week)
Wool bought – 0
Wool given – 5 (I mentioned to Engel I only had one ball of black DK wool, he brought home four more for me! And I didn’t even ask him to!)
Wool gifted – 0

Total – 613

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting, Little one, Uncategorized, Updates 1 Comment

Let’s start with Biggles.

What does a fictional fighter pilot from the first world war have tondo with knitting we ask? Well…

Our whole little family were at the big local duck pond and, whilst playing in the new play park, Engel spotted a kid (18 month old?) wearing a crocheted aviator hat complete with goggles and immediately demanded that I make one like it for Inkling…

Obviously, knitted rather than crochet!

So after much pattern hunting and googling and thinking and a bit of luck, this happened:

Its based on the free pattern Chemo Earflap Hat by Gabriella Henry, and incorporates another free pattern Knit Sleep Mask by Elizabeth Martin as well as a lot of i-cord…

When put on Inkling, Engels eyes literally lit up and he pointed and went ‘Biggles!’ he has been referring to him as Biggles since, and the aviator hat as ‘Biggles hat’…

All I’ll say on the matter is that Inkling looks adorable in the hat, even more so than Bun-Bun (the toy rabbit).

In other knitting news, I was dropping Felix off at the childminders and spotted that the cot from the dolls house was broken on the side, seeing as I was planning on digging out the glue gun anyway to fix my rabbits paw (it’s a real rabbit foot, but it’s on a pin, not an actual living animal) I offered to fix it and bring it back.

The thing is…I just couldn’t return it with no bedding…

No pattern for this, just rectangles knitted from scraps…the childminders was happy to see it returned with bedding, but I suspect she thinks I’m even more mad than before…

Let’s see…we also celebrated Burns Night this week with our Australian friends and their little one (much fun was had by all, even if I did confused them all with kilts and Scottish poetry) and there was haggis, neeps and tatties and I decided to make a cranachan too – though seeing as Engel has trained Felix to shout ‘release the Cranachan!’ this may not have been such a wise idea…

In return, our Australian friends invited us over for Australia Day where there was lamingtons and pavlova (there was a heated debate over if pavlova was an Aussie or Kiwi invention) and a certain knitted Drop Bear photo bombed all the photos!

It’s been a good, but exhausting week!

Till next post, take care!

Starting total – 622

Wool used – 7 (2 this week)
Wool bought – 0
Wool given – 1
Wool gifted – 0

Total – 616

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