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

This is Halloween, this is Halloween, Halloween, Halloween, Halloween!

Can you tell I like Halloween?

I’ve had a lot of fun this week, Felix is now at the right age where she can get stuck into various crafts and make decorations and actually feel part of the whole celebration process. We’ve both also done a fair bit of baking – she wanted to carve pumpkins and I refuse to let food go to waste, so there was pumpkin shaped pumpkin bread rolls and sugar free pumpkin cupcakes (for Engel) and I still have more than half a kilo left of pumpkin puree still…

We all went and did the Manchester Halloweekend trick or treat trail, meeting count Dracula, bride of Frankenstein, a witch, a mummy and a skeleton juggling pineapples…? There was also a haunted maze and giant tentacles on top of the House of Fraser – a few of my gaming friends came along as well and we spent far too much time pretending to pass/fail sanity checks against the eldritch horror breaking free into our realm…

So much fun.

But also a lot of knitting. Again, a few little projects and one big project, which is still ongoing as it’s boring and I keep getting distracted by little projects…

Halloween themed first!

Felix was dressed as a vampire (again) this year, wearing an awesome costume her aunty made her, but Felix wanted Daddy’s toy cat (they have a time share on him, much to Engel’s bemusement) to dress up as a vampire to. So without further ado:

Phineas in his matching vampire costume. It’s a little jumper and separate cloak. During my photoshoot with Phineas, Ziggy decided to join in…

So Count Phineas took revenge:

I have far too much fun…no pattern for this one as I just winged it in the needles.

In other knitting news, there have been babies, so there have been little knitted presents!

This is made using the free pattern Polar Bear by The Knit Cafe Toronto – only I did a mummy and baby brown bear…this was for in laws friends newest grandson.

Then there’s this little fishy, another free pattern – Frida the Fish / Francis the Fish by Lion Brand Yarn – which I’ve now made for the fourth time.

And for the older brother, Pokemon Poke Ball Knit Hat by Vicki Mann (free pattern) curiously, Skully modelled a different pokeball hat in the same post as the previous goldfish given above, funny coincidence!

Alright, that’s all for the post today. Hope to get a good push on the big project done and finally get it off the needles! Let’s see how long it takes for me to procrastinate and/or get distracted…

Starting total – 650

Wool used – 134 (3 this post!)
Wool bought – 49
Wool given – 135
Wool gifted – 59

Total – 637 (Will I get below 600 this year?)

P.S. in other news Engel has taken up brewing and is trying to convince me to knit some fermentation vessel cosies, it may be sleep deprivation, or the sheer lack of interest in my other project, but they sound tempting. I could knit them to look like little wooden barrels, or have cute little motifs knitted into them…

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Gaming, Knitting 1 Comment

There used to be only 151 Pokémon, now, there are 802 Pokémon in total, (without including Mega Evolutions and Alola Forms, which are variations of existing Pokémon).

I’m not surprised to say the least, it’s a fun, catchy anime that has had generations of kids worldwide hooked. For me, it was the first gen, the original red, blue and yellow games.

And now, my nephew is hooked also. As I said in my previous post, I was going to make him a Pokémon themed scarf as I had made a Pusheen scarf for my neice.

When I mentioned this to Engel, and showed him the few patterns available!! online – pikachu or pokeball themed – he immediately told me to make a gyarados scarf (one of the original 151 Pokémon) as it had a long snake like body so would lend well to the shape of a scarf.

There weren’t any patterns available so once again, I cracked out the paper and pencils and got to work making my own pattern. I’m not publishing it as I somewhat doubt anyone else is going to be mad enough to make one! (There’s 34 pieces to it!) If I’m wrong, tell me!

Without further ado: Gyrados!

That’s all for this post, I have both a small project and a large project on the needles, so hopefully I’ll have one finished for next week!

Wool count

Starting total – 650

Wool used – 125 (8 since last post!)
Wool bought – 42
Wool given – 135
Wool gifted – 59

Total – 639

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

So, let’s show off the only thing I have to show this week: Butterflies!

For these guys, I used the free pattern: Metamorphosis part II – the Butterfly by ChemKnits. You’ll notice that each of these, unlike the other Hungry Caterpillar set items, are all different. I had three different wools I could use for the wings, so decided to make one butterfly per different wool. (I couldn’t decide basically). Then did body colour to match. My favourite is the left one, though Engel likes the one on the right! Felix settled on the middle one as it was the first one to be made.

I’m currently working on the cocoon, though I’m having to make up my own pattern for this one, if it turns out well I’ll post it online. Hopefully it will at least meet the demands set by my three (four in just over three weeks!) year old gremlin…

That’s all for now, there’s a cold going through the house so I’m going to make lemon tea and curl up in a blanket nest and relish the few hours of quiet I have before bed…

Wool count:

Starting total – 650

Wool used – 89 (9 since last post!)
Wool bought – 33
Wool given – 131
Wool gifted – 59

Total – 666 (Mwahahah!!!!!)

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Cats, Gaming, Knitting, Little one 3 Comments

Hi all! Been enjoying my bank holiday weekend by doing more birthday stuff! Meeting up with some friends and gaming with other friends as well, even managed to sneak in a trip to my LYS and found a ball of wool that was whispering…just one! And once I get through my queue of knits I know exactly what it’s going to be!

Now if only I could say the same for the rest of the wool I have…

On that note, on to my finished knitting! Still ploughing on with the Hungry Caterpillar sets, and this week I have made:

Muffins! Ok, they’re really actually a modified version of the free pattern: Divine Cupcakes by Maiya Becker – I worked K2P2 rib on the cake bottom to make the cupcake wrapper (increasing an extra two sts in the base to do so) then doubled the number of knit rows called for in the frosting to make it taller.

Oddly enough, I really wanted to make these so was glad to finally get them on the needles! I worked the free pattern: knitted watermelon by Elaine Simper double stranded to give a more textured/mottled appearance particularly in the watermelon flesh.

Oops, appears Ziggy decided to photobomb me here! (Actually that reminds me of an amusing fact, one of the reasons we got Ziggy was Engel wanted a boy kitty. Took Ziggy to the vets to be vaccinated and the vet rather worriedly informed me, in a hushed voice so Felix wouldn’t overhear, that she was very sorry but he was a she. I couldn’t stop laughing for nearly 20 minutes…)

Anyhow.

And on Sunday he ate through a nice big leaf. Again, double stranded for more colour variation and I used the free cloth pattern: Leaf Cloth Trio by Theresa L. Jones, I used Leaf 3 as I like that it both curved and had veins.

When I was working on the leaves, Felix asked me yet again to knit the caterpillar egg from the beginning of the book, to which it responded that no, it would be so small it would be lost instantly. She then countered my argument by stating the egg could be sewn onto its own little leaf, then it won’t get lost.

I worry that she’s out smarting me and she’s not even four. Not that it’s difficult to do that, but still.

So without further ado:

A little egg on a little leaf. The leaf is made using yet another free pattern: Woodland Wreath, Leaves by Frankie Brown. The egg is simply a little bobble I knitted up and sewn on afterwards.

Alright, that’s enough typing for now, I have butterflies, cocoons and fish to get knitting.

Wool count:

Starting total – 650

Wool used – 80 (7 since last post)
Wool bought – 34
Wool given – 131
Wool gifted – 59

Total – 675

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting 1 Comment

Lollipops:

The pattern is ‘Lollipop’ by Sarah Keen from her book 100 Little Knitted Projects

Cherry Pie

These where made with the free pattern: Piece O’ Cherry Pie by Jennifer Tallapaneni

Sausages

These where made with the free pattern: Very Vegan Sausages by Emily Anna Bingham.

In knitting news, I was given Engels grandmother’s (Felix and Inklings Great Grandma) old knitting stash. Once I sifted through it and split the useable from the mohair (allergic) I was left with eighty 10-50g balls of wool. Yes. Eighty.

There goes the wool count again.

I was also given two lovely balls of alpaca wool for my birthday, I feel no guilt as in my mind they’re already knitted into toy alpacas! I will have my own herd of alpacas! They will be miniature and cuddly and require no feeding or cleaning, but I shall have a herd of them!

Mwahahah!!!!!!

You may have guessed that it’s been a long weekend of celebrating, it’s been behind awesome and I may be shattered, but worth it!

Till next week (hopefully I’ll have another productive week of knitting to show you!)

Wool count:

Starting total – 650

Wool used – 73 (6 since last post)
Wool bought – 33
Wool given – 131
Wool gifted – 59

Total – 682

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Cats, Knitting, Uncategorized 1 Comment

First of all, apologies on missing my blog post last week – been having lots of family down visiting, and also a new addition!

Everyone, meet Ziggy:

 

Now onto the knitted food!

Oranges:

Pattern used was Advent Tree: Tangerine by Alan Dart. (Knitting 15 of those was a challenge in staying awake!)

Chocolate cake (with a cherry on top)

Used free knitting pattern Let Them Knit Cake by Hannah Kaminsky, and Cherry by Linda Dawkins. (I used fuzzy wool for the frosting, to give it a bit more texture)

Ice cream

Used free pattern Scooped by Marcie Nishioka (Felix decided she didn’t want a pink one like in the book, and instead wanted her favourite ice cream flavour – mint choc chip!)

Pickles (yes, really, pickles)

Used free pattern Fuzzy Short Row Pickle by Ana Clerc (I was amazed this pattern existed, but apparently it’s a German tradition to hide them in Christmas trees…?)

Swiss cheese slice

Very heavily modified the free pattern Swiss Cheese Scarf by Winnie Shih (My mods have been noted down on the project page on my Ravelry account)

Phew, lots of knitting! And still lots more to do to finish the Hungry Caterpillar sets…

In other news, been doing a massive clean up before the next round of family fun! There was a very near disaster though with Engel hoovering…much like the one documented here:

True story…killed the hoover too…but I got my wool back!

Man these comics are old…now I feel old…oh well! Back to knitting, it’s salami next.

Wool count:

Starting total – 650

Wool used – 67 (2 since last post)
Wool bought – 33
Wool given – 49
Wool gifted – 59

Total – 606

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

Let’s start with a story. Every time we go into Manchester, Engel likes to check out the gaming shop (so do I for Call of Cthulhu RPG expansions) and if Felix is good, she gets a dice for her dice bag.

For some time, Felix has called this shop “The Tentacle Shop” as it has a plushie tentacle. A month or so ago we went and, horror of all horrors, the tentacle was gone. Even though it wasn’t for sale, it had been sold (some people are very pushy) and Felix was devastated.

Felix informed us (and the shop) that there would be tentacles – she was going to make some and so was mummy. I shrugged it off (my to knit list is ridiculous right now). She did indeed make a tentacle herself out of paper mâché and pompoms and was very pleased and I figured that was that.

Then, the day before Free RPG day, she asked me where the knitted one was as she wanted to take it to the tentacle shop and give them it as it can’t be the tentacle shop without one.

Cue mad panic cast on, and with an hour to spare:

Its based on the free pattern Gripping by Hunter Hammersen, I added little bobbles for the suckers.

The tentacle was given to the tentacle shop, Felix got her dice, we got free RPGs, everyone was happy.

Then Felix asked where her tentacles where.

Sigh.

But I have had fun with them…

Maybe a bit too much!

Wool count!

Starting total – 650

Wool used – 59 (3 since last post – lots of partial balls used)
Wool bought – 33
Wool given – 49
Wool gifted – 59

Total – 614

 

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

I can’t believe it’s been three weeks already, since my last post, since Inkling arrived, and that it’s taken so long to finish my current knitting project!

That said, this project rapidly grew in number…let me start from the beginning.

We got a fishtank, last summer, and it’s essentially cat TV, the cats will watch it for hours, and Felix kept dragging blankets off the sofa to sit next to the cats to also watch the fish tank…so I decided the fishtank needed a mat in front of it.

The ‘Kitty Placemat’ in ‘Kitty Knits: Projects for Cats and their People’ by Donna Druchunas to be precise, just bigger. (I’ve used the fish motif before) Showed it to Engel who pointed out that the actual cat bowls could do with little matching mats as well, with spares so they can get washed.

So I went from one, to five. Engel pointed out the fishtank should have a spare as well (fishtank mat is twice the size of placemat)

So one to six, ok. He then pointed out that when we get cat number 3 (Salem was his cat, and he wants his own little cat buddy again) it’ll need a placement and a spare.

So that’s one to eight.

Eight! And I agreed! Clearly baby brain got the best of me!

Look awesome though, don’t they?

Now onto the next project! Which will be getting fitted in between feeds, sleep deprivation, energetic three year old, demanding newborn, housework, arts and crafts, cooking, baking…

I can see where those three weeks went…

Wool count!

Starting total – 650

Wool used – 50 (2 since last post – it was only the edging I had left to do when Inkling arrived!)
Wool bought – 33
Wool given – 49
Wool gifted – 59

Total – 623

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

Hi all,

As promised, a bit more of an explanation as to my last post.

When Felix was born, there was complications. Lots. End result, emergency c-section. With Inkling, because of prior complications, we knew he would have to be a planned c-section.

Due to complications during my pregnancy the consultants decided that Inkling​ wouldn’t be removed at the previously planned 39 weeks, but two weeks early, with less than a weeks notice and some horrible, horrible steroid shots…

Ok…problem. Engels parents who were going to look after Felix for us, where on holiday that week. My family are 300 miles away and have their own commitments.

Panic. Panic. Panic.

Time to bank in on the good favours of others!

Thankfully, two people really helped us out, and as thank you gifts (and severe nerves/nesting energy) I whipped up these guys:

‘Octopus’ by Hansi Singh from her book ‘Amigurimi Knits’, you may recall this is the pattern used for Inklings first knitted toy – the blue ringed octopus.

Seemed fitting, and they went down a treat, as did the Thank you cards Felix made, and cat pompom keyrings she made (though Engel had to get the glue gun out once she was in bed as PVA does not hold pompoms together at all…)

And that’s the story, in a nut shell, not much on the details but some things are best left unshared!

Inkling is doing really well by the way, and we’re all happy at home, though very tired!

In other knitting news, I have a large project still on the needles but progress…yeah…that’s down to a crawl…ah well, I have an adorable, happy, whole little family to enjoy in, I think I’ll just go and enjoy them some more before I pick the needles back up…

On that note, blog posts for the foreseeable future are probably gonna be sporadic, will try to keep to my every Sunday update, but I make no promises.

Wool count!

Starting total – 650

Wool used – 48 (5 this week! Don’t expect to see so many used again any time soon!)
Wool bought – 33
Wool given – 49
Wool gifted – 59

Total – 625

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by RoxyPosted on Posted in Knitting, Little one, Uncategorized, Updates 4 Comments

Happy local yarn shop day! And happy free comic book day! I did both, so I have a stack of free comics to peruse and there may have been some wool purchased…but it’s part of a karmic balance I did earlier on!

However, let us first start with the cake part of this post:

Engel is diabetic, so can’t have sugar and we’ve explained this to Felix a few times now, but the other night, after eating all her dinner, she got a post dinner treat, as did Engel and I.

She then clicked that we were all eating the same thing, to which we explained that this was sugar free, therefore daddy could have it too. This led on to explaining about ‘special chocolate’ and ‘special jelly’ etc (in this instance, it was sugar free jelly)

So Felix asked about special cake, to which we had to then explain it was hard to buy as not many companies made it, and fewer shops stocked such items.

After thinking for a bit, Felix asked me if we could make one. So we did. (Not the ‘now’ she demanded which was ten minutes before bed, but one was made at seven the following morning!)

Cake recipe used: sugar free spiced carrot cake

Frosting used: sugar free butter cream icing

I have it on good authority that it was very tasty, Engel is currently hoarding it like a dragon with a stack of treasure…

Alright, on to the tribbles part of the post!

Over the years, I’ve compared my wool stash to tribbles a few times, even made some comics about it:

Just realised that these are over five years old…I don’t draw anymore, but if you want to look at more terrible but amusing doodles of mine they’re on my extinct Deviantart drawing account (I have two, one for knitting and one for drawing)

Anyhow…I joined a stash busting group on Ravelry, joked about my wool/tribbles collection, decided to pattern search tribble (why not) and discovered Tribble by Abigail – 1870pearl. Its a knitted scrubber. Here’s mine:

So seeing as I’m sure my wool stash is actually part tribble, I figured I’d make a tribble out of it and, if it proved useful, I’d make a small hoard.

If it’s a wash out (ha, see what I did there?) Then I’d throw it in the washing machine and Felix can have it for her toy kitchen.

Win-win!

They bred.

So, those wool purchased and karmic wool stash switch I mentioned at the start of the blog?

I had Sisterix over for a play date (her terror is a year older than Felix, so they had a ball, and we had a wooly playdate too, and both the other halves talked computers, so they had fun. Three playdates in all!) I had a good look at her stash a few weeks ago, and a demonstration of her knitting machine, and a look at all her crocheted toys!

I adore her crocheted Vlad the bat! (Pattern is lalylala VLAD the vampire bat by Lydia Tresselt)

So this time, she got to look at my stash and…well, with the size of it, we didn’t get much further than that. After a bit of thought, I pointed her in the direction of my cotton which I barely/rarely use and my good stash karma began!

It made me laugh, her partner kept asking how much swag she was bringing back. First one carrier bag, then another and then I just went and got a giant IKEA bag. I think he may have been a little speechless by the point…

Now after my little trip out today, my karma balance stands at being ten less balls than I started. I gave up 43, and came home with 33. And seeing the deals that were available, I could easily have walked away with three times that…

So, wool count!

Starting total – 650

Wool used – 41 (2 this week!)
Wool bought – 33
Wool given – 49
Wool gifted – 59

Total – 632

I’m never going to get to 600 at this rate…ah well, I’ll console myself by cuddling my new wool purchases!

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