Owl puffs

I found the cutest knitting pattern on ravelry last night for these little knitted owls - owl puffs. They are so incredibly cute. I had a slightly crazy idea of decorating my Christmas tree this year with a whole lot of them, so I've cast on my first...in hot pink!

Back in June I did Belinda Too's sock knitting class at Handmade. We practiced by making super tiny socks and I still have the pattern lying around so I might whip up some of those as well for the tree.

Is anyone else thinking of Christmas already? It's still a way off but as I intend to do handmade presents for everyone this year I'm going to make a start this week.

Random cookies and a parliament of owls

Work tonight seemed to go on forever. That's what happens when you've had barely any sleep and then go straight to your job from a three hour exam. I am exhausted! 

The highlight of my shift was sitting down with a nice cup of tea and bikkies, homebaked by my flatmate. She unexpectedly popped into work bearing gingerbread cookies. They weren't just any gingerbread either. We only own one cookie cutter and it's in the shape of a dog. That could get kind of boring so she cut out shapes herself with a knife. Mine were an owl (I love owls - actually I got a new owl doorstop the other day, I'll post a picture below because he's too cute!) and a ninja bread man doing kung fu type moves. Of course I didn't have my camera on me to take photos and they were too tempting not to eat them right away. 

 The owl on the left is from the little gift shop out the back of Empire Cinema in Island Bay. Apparently a group of local mums have been making them to raise money for their daughters' school trip to Europe. I couldn't go home without him. 

The wee owl on the right I got from a craft market in Hamilton. I also have owl pyjamas, a hat and hot water bottle cover. I foresee more owls in my future as the owl cable is my favourite knitting design - owl coffee mug cosy, owl fingerless mittens, and perhaps one day this beautiful owl sweater...

Charity knitting: penguin jackets

Here's a charity knitting project with a difference. The call's gone out for knitted penguin jackets to keep little blue penguins caught up in the oil spill warm and snug, and to keep them from preening themselves.

Here's the link - http://felt.co.nz/blog/2011/10/knitting-for-penguins-caught-in-rena-oil-spill/

Apparently it only takes about an hour to whip up (maybe a little longer if you are a slow knitter like me!), is ridiculously cute and one way your average mumsie can do something to help.

Kitties and kiddies

Why get your own cat when you can borrow your neighbour's?

And why have your own baby when you can borrow someone else's for cuddles?

Awwwwwwww....

Do you like baby's hat? It's this pattern (in Shepherd merino) and one of the first things I ever knitted.

In front of the telly, knitting

Just a quick post because it's impossible to knit and type at the same time (which is just cruel, really). I'm part way through a baby beanie that I really want to have finished by tomorrow as I'm going to see the little girl it's destined for this week and want to take the present along with me.

A while back I found a ball of pink Zealana cashmere merino in the sale basket at Nancy's for only $5. It was such a bargain and is so incredibly soft. That became a pair of booties and there was a little leftover so I knitted a flower to attach to the hat I'm making right now (in Naturally 100% merino, gray). Hopefully it will all come together and look as cute as I imagined it in my head.

I'm a little sad tonight as my favourite show just wrapped up it's first season :-( Does anyone else watch Nothing Trivial? I love how many really great TV programs have come out of NZ in the past few years (though I'm not going to lie, I'll watch anything starring Shane Cortese). Speaking of kiwi shows, Go Girls must be due to start up again soon; nothing better than sitting in front of something good on the telly with some knitting and a cup of tea (or tequila and orange as it was this evening...).

A photo I took of the man himself at the premiere of
The Lovely Bones a couple of years ago...

A square for Christchurch

Just because I have a million and one projects on the go already, doesn't mean I can't cast on another, right?!

I'm about to start knitting a square. Oooh a square - how exciting does that sound? Well this one square is going to be part of a cosy big enough to cover a SHIPPING CONTAINER which makes it just a little bit more bad ass. 

Down in Christchurch they've had to put a line of shipping containers at the bottom of a hillside to protect people and property from further rockfall due to the earthquakes. Some clever person saw these in all their ugliness and though, hey why don't we jazz it up a bit and knit it a cosy?. As far as ideas go, I think this one is pretty darn awesome. 

They need squares of any pattern and colour - they just have to be 30x30cm. The details are on their Facebook page. (Hopefully that link works - otherwise just search container love on Facebook). 

Right I'd better get cracking if I want to get this square started before I have to hit the hay.

Postcard from Wellington: Te Papa Tongarewa

Well there is a new exhibition at Te Papa and it is AWESOME! 

I was lucky enough to head along for free the other night after going to a (also free) lecture series where I learnt all about chicken DNA and all sorts of other interesting things linking Polynesians to South America - in a 'they sailed there in their boats, dropping off some chooks and bringing back a few baskets of kumara' kind of way. So interesting. I'll see if I can find a link to post to some of the research being done; it's been on the news a bit recently. It's a new frontier of Pacific research which was what the themes of the lectures were all about. 

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/06/070604-chickens.html

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/03/people-pacific/matisoo-ask-expert

http://honolulu.hawaii.edu/hawaiian/voyaging/pvs/rapanui/mapuche.html

Anyway the Oceania exhibition is wonderful. The pieces on display are beautiful, interesting, amazing, thought-provoking (in a how-the-heck-do-they-weave-that-massive-ie-toga-1mm-thin sense)..... 

I particularly loved the warrior body armour from Kiribati complete with puffer fish helmet. 

The plan for this weekend is to see the sister exhibition at the City Gallery and perhaps hit the Frank Kitts market if I can keep my wallet in my pocket, and only stroke and fawn over the yarny goodness on display. Actually, probably best to leave my wallet at home. I have no self-restraint when it comes to knitting yarn and way too big of a stash already!

Hmm I believe it's grown since these photos were taken about 6 weeks ago. Whoops! Bring on November and uni-free knitting time.

Off the needles

A glimpse into what this beginner knitter has been making so far this year...

Infinitude scarf and angora 'Hermione' hat

another 'Hermione' hat but in bamboo

Mary Jane slippers that still need to be finished



owl hat



cable baby hats

booties (I've just about finished a 2nd pair in white)

toddler hand warmers and beanie

Right now I'm working on baby socks to finish off a couple of sets (in a hurry - think the babies are due in June argh!) and then I'm going to treat myself to a hat and fingerless gloves. Then it will be more baby knitting with one of my good friends expecting a girl in September (yay - lots of gorgeous girlie patterns and yarns to choose from!).

Hat envy

Do you ever watch a movie or tv programme and find yourself drooling over something a character is wearing? All through Love and Other Drugs all I could think about was how awesome Anne Hathaway's jumpers were (and how awesome Jake Gyllenhaal looked without a shirt too...). I watched No Strings Attached and daydreamed about Natalie Portman's stunning trench. And a couple of weeks ago I watched an episode of Bones and while I should've been swooning over David Boreanaz's strong jaw line and all around handsomeness, instead I was looking at this.

I couldn't find a better picture since I should be walking out the door to work right this instant. It has a ginormous pompom on the back of it. I am completely in love with this hat. A quick search of ravelry and low and behold, the patterns already up - click here.

I'm itching to get home and cast this on.

Postcard from Wellington: Craft 2.0

 So even though Craft 2.0 just celebrated its 5th birthday, I'd never been to it before or even heard about it until recently (it's my sister that's the craft market junkie). It was such a great day out. The stalls were beautifully presented with all sorts of tempting items to buy and engaging people behind them to chat to.

Apart from browsing for cute knicknacks, I was also curious to see what people were charging for baby knits. Low and behold I recognised most of the clothes from my ravelry favourites list, and the exact toddler mitts I made the other week were selling for 12 bucks. Maybe I should start charging...

But the highlight was definately the "jam-off" judged by Al Brown. It was a billington plum jam that won overall (good news because mum has one of those trees!) and a very kiwi winning speech - "full credit to the plums". The rosehip, vodka and quince jelly sounded pretty darn delicious too!

I couldn't leave without buying some yarn (suprise, suprise) so I'm going to make this scarf at some point with a merino-silk blend from Spinning a Yarn. And I have to say, I just read her blog and I am in love with her red mixer! How cute would that look in my kitchen if I had more than half a metre of bench space either side of the sink?!

Postcard from Wellington: Petone

Pommy flatmate enjoying the first
 lot of sun we've had in ages - you can tell it's sunny by the way
her glasses make her look all 'Ben Affleck in that
god awful, monstrosity they called a superhero movie'.

Despite living in Wellington for over 5 years now, today was the first time I've been to Petone proper. Not through Petone, or to Petone beach, or just to Mitre 10 Mega,  but I actually spent the day wandering Jackson Street. Wandering is probably not the right word; making a beeline for Holland Road Yarn Company more like!

I've decided it's best that my visits out there don't become too frequent because with Holland Road and Wanda Harland on the same street, my wallet is going to suffer! Mumsie heaven! Nb: There's also heaps of second hand/antique stores which I didn't check a chance to check out - I mentioned that I was beelining, didn't I?! 

After perusing the yarn (and spending *cough* $40 *cough*), it was time for a tea and scone in the cafe next to the old jail. Some of the buildings are really lovely and there's lots and lots of antique/second hand stores to browse which I didn't get to today(best to save those pennies for Samoa, or for that small inconvenience called 'the rent')

My purchases - the cascade is made in Peru!





Keep calm and pom pom on

Cut out a 'donut' shape from cardboard

Wrap wool around and around

Cut the loops of wool.
Whoops missed a step. Pom pom fail.

Realise you need 2 'donuts'. Wrap wool again.
Cut loops and then tie a piece of yarn around,
in the middle of the 2 'donuts'...

...leaving you with a pom pom and a
string to sew it to the hat with.



Stitch the pom pom to your hat.



The hat pattern can be found here and the fingerless mittens, here.
They are both really simple and knitting in the round on a magic loop. Now I just hope they'll fit their intended recipient and that they are cool enough for a discerning one-year-old gal.

Bonny wee booties

I've been struggling with baby booties on way too small needles with way too thin yarn. It's been a nightmare. So I took a break and used up some of the gorgeous yarn I picked up in Buenos Aires to whip up pair for a workmate's daughter. Didn't they turn out cute? I like them so much I'm thinking of knitting myself a similar, but much larger pair for those cold winter mornings. Adult booties...hell yes!

Here's the pattern link

Warning: the raverly website is highly addictive and may leave you with a knitting 'to do' list that you will be lucky to get through before you are a wrinkly old nana for real. Like Dumbledore, "I do love knitting patterns".

Next up is a hat to hide my soon-to-be-bald noggin.