Sew what?

Last Christmas my parents gave me a sewing machine. I had done some sewing back in high school but nothing recently. I find it a little harder to get around to sewing because I don't have a place where I can leave my machine set-up. I have to get it all out and put it on the kitchen table when I do want to sew. So, a mere 6 months after getting the machine I finished my first real project. It's a quilted table runner which I machine quilted. I think it turned out pretty good for a first shot at machine quilting (or any kind of quilting for that matter)




What else is new since I last blogged... Hmm... I have a big scary job interview next week which would mean a huge promotion and pay raise. And umm.. oh yeah there's this little trinket....




!!!!

The wedding is tentatively set for October 2010. Not a whole lot of planning is done other than that yet, but I think we lots of time. I hope we have lots of time.

Visitting Pierre

A couple weeks ago I stopped in to Love, me and picked up this super cool Pierre Trudeau change purse, because what could be better than Pierre Trudeau on a change purse?!? Also, if you've never been into Love, me you simply must go. It is a shop which carries all hand made goodies. It's like Etsy minus the shipping charges.

I just spent the week in the Ottawa area, going to a wedding and spending time with my sister. Here is the PT change purse posing with the plaque of one of his governments. I think it was his first one.





Now here is the man himself:

Another FO

Here is a little item that I finished back in March sometime. It is the Lace Capelet by Mary Heather from Ravelry - a free download for members. I used one skein of Fiddlesticks Lace sensation and in less than two weeks I got this cute little cape! The only thing I changed was to add an extra repeat at the top and I may have used smaller needles than the pattern called for.


In other news, work is extremely busy right now, I have been dragging around a cold, and I was told the other day that I could not have a credit card for purchasing because having a woman's name on a credit card could be confusing. Oh, yes. I love my job.

Coming out of hibernation.

Spring is on it's way and I have finally come out of hibernation. I spend this winter staying in, keeping myself busy with books, video games, learning to sew and of course - knitting!

First up, the pinwheel baby blankie for my second neice who is due in July. I used 3 skeins of Estelle Cloud Cotton and a free pattern that can be found on Ravelry.

Second, the Lucy Neatby Spindrift Scarf. I worked on this over Christmas vacation as a good travel project. It's a very fun pattern once you get the hang of it and it really stretches the yarn out. I used about 75 grams of sock yarn and got a scarf that is over 8 feet long.

I wanted to start a project to use up all those little sock yarn scraps after seeing YesIknit's lovely sock memories blanket. I am using the Mason Dixen How to log cabin instructions and a very tacky combination of sock yarn. It's really quite hideous.

I have made my triumphant return to blogging, now maybe soon I will venture out the house.

A very late Christmas post

I'm way behind on my blogging.

I only knit one Christmas gift this year, because this one was so much work!My mom had no idea it was coming though and was totally surprised when she opened it.

The details are:
Katherine Hepburn Cardigan by Kathy Zimmerman, published in Lace Style.
Knitpicks Shine Sport in Harbour on 2.75 mm needles.
It took almost 4 months of fairly monogamous knitting and there was a lot of finishing, but it turned out really well.

2008 FO List

I didn't make a fancy picture of them all, but here is a list of my 2008 FO's. Not too shabby if I do say so myself.

- 4 scarves
- 1 shrug
- 2 hats
- 2 vests
- 1 camisole
- 1 cardigan
- 1 pullover
- 4 pairs of socks (adult)
- 1 pair of baby socks
- 1 baby hat
- 1 baby sweater
- 2 stoles
- 1 cowl

Wishing you all a productive 2009.

Socktopus!

The winter knitty is now up! I like Socktopus!

I have been a delinquent blogger. Just to catch you all up, I spend the first week in October in Sydney, NS on a course and then spent mid October to mid November on the Hudson. Since I got back I have been catching up on domestic type stuff and performing my Christmas elf duties. I have no knitting projects to post right now because I had the crazy idea of taking on a big project as a Christmas gift. Chritmas is two weeks away and I still have half a sleeve, button band, and all finishing to do! Eek!

The new car is working out pretty good too. It does all kinds of neat little things. For instance, to keep your headlights clear it sprays them with washer fluid every fifth time you spray your front windshield with fluid. If you are using your windshield wipers then stop at a light, it automatically reduces your wipers to intermittent mode to save energy. I'm also discovering that the 6-speed tiptronic (sport mode) automatic is fun.

No explanation needed

2007 VW Rabbit

Mine.

Out to sea again

Later on this week I am setting sail on the CCGS Hudson  for a month of playing Ship's technician. I think the plan is to go work in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  I still have a lot to do before I go, like restocking parts on the ship, a few little equipment problems to fix, and of course, packing my knitting for the month! I am hoping to make a dent in the Christmas knitting as it will be almost Christmas time when I return.  I am not really looking forward to this trip, but it will fund my stash nicely.

Have a good month, everyone!

Pacafiesta 2008

This is my first Pacafiesta. It was a little smaller than what I was expecting, but there was still lots of yummy yarn and cute Alpacas.


I came home with two skeins of sea silk from the Black Lamb. They are based in Ontario and use the same supplier as the Fleece Artist so they have a lot of the same yarns. The woman sounded slightly bitter over this and pointed out that she used that supplier first.



These two skeins are from a handsome Alpaca named Winston! He lives in New Brunswick. I had to have it because of my sister's dog who is also named Winston and is quite lovable. Winston the Alpaca seemed much less needy then the canine who bears the same name.



The lovely ladies from the Loop had a booth set up where I saw this and fell in love with it even though I do not spin. It came home with me.



And so did this. Now I just have to figure out how to work it. Morgan suggested that vertically challenged folks should wear high heels to spin. Finally I have a use for those painful high heeled boots I bought at Also years ago.


And finally, an FO! Dovetail Pullover by Kathy Zimmerman from Spring 2008 Interweave Knits. It was done in 5 skeins of Cascade 220 Superwash that I got at the Loop last winter. The sleeves are kinda big and I have not blocked or washed it yet so I am thinking it will all be a little big. I think it will still be quite cozy though.

Eye Candy

As we are all working through our Monday blahs, here's some eye candy to get you through your day. I got this when I went to Have a Yarn back in August. It was days after returning from sea so I had some cash to burn and needed to cure my weeks of yarn withdrawal. Have a Yarn has so much Fleece Artist! There is a whole room of it!

First up, Hand Maiden Lace Silk. I don't think I own anything this colour, but this one spoke to me. I saw a yarn the spoke to me once and I did not buy it. This was over a year ago and it haunts me still to this day.



Secondly, Hand Maiden Camelspin. It's soft, it's red. 'Nuff said.



I also got a Perl Grey pin which seems to have gone missing right now. It is a seahorse. Maybe it went for a swim.

Weekend house guest

I was planning a quiet weekend of catching up on the house work and some errands when I ran into an old friend downtown who somehow managed to talk me into having him over for the weekend. I reluctantly agreed as he can be a bit dramatic and needy sometimes.

After a nice little lunch with Mrs.Happy and her Mr. on Spring Garden Henry helped me pick out a new hat looked around some other shops and went for some groceries at Pete's.

One of my errands today was doing something I have been wanting to do for a long time. I went to Lily's on Dresden Row and got a proper fitting bra, or I should say, I invested in a proper fitting bra because it better last 20 years. The staff is lovely there, they really know their stuff and they have sizes for everybody. The price tags are pretty high but I have to say, this feels like nothing I have ever worn before.

Time to go. Henry is going to curl up and watch some Battlestar Galactica with me tonight.

Flu season is on it's way

I just ordered these...

Shrug

Retro Redux Shrug from Lace Style, originally uploaded by leclerc_jk.

Another FO...
Retro Redux Shrug from Lace Style in Rowan Cashsoft Aran that I got on sale.
This knitted up so quick! It took about two weeks. I think I'd like to do another someday.

Tidal Streams

I am way behind on my blogging, but for now a couple FO's to tide you over.

While I was away I did two versions of Ilga Leja's Tidal Streams.  

First, I did the stole version in Estelle Arequipa.  I followed the pattern exactly and used just over one skein.  The deeper colour gives this stole a very different look than the sample on the pattern, so instead of calling this one tidal streams, I call it Lava Streams.  It drapes beautifully because of the bias knitting.

For the second version I did a scarf in Celestial Merino Dream, but I left out the ruffle and instead of only doing the number of repeats suggested in the pattern, I kept knitting until I ran out.  After blocking, my scarf is 80 inches long!  It doesn't have quite the same drape without the ruffle, but I am still pleased with the results. 

Every Technician's Worst Nightmare

After 20 hours of internet downtime, near mutiny from the crew, and being yelled at during breakfast by a scientist, I am pleased to report that the internet is back up.
It is surprising how upset people got considering this ship didn't even have internet until May 2008. Besides, it's not like we ran out of coffee.

100th Post

To celebrate my 100th post I finally added these sweet ravelry progress bars.


In other news, I am 10 days into my 28 days of sea life. The past few days we have had lovely weather and things have been relatively quiet for me, except for the other night when I got a call out after I got out of the shower and was in my pajamas and everything. The MVP (moving vessel profiler) which is quite essential to the survey because it gives an accurate speed of sound at different water depths decided to stop commicating. So there I was on the after deck in my ducky pajamas, steel toed boots, bright orange coat and hard had working on this thing. I wish I had a picture of how ridiculous that must have looked. I have diagnosed the problem even though I have never worked on this thing in my life, and the manual for it is missing! I don't have the parts on board though so I am waiting until we go into a port next week to get them. In the meantime we are using the old school gear for sound velocity.



I have been getting some knitting time in the evenings on my Tidal Streams scarf by Ilga Leja. The yarn is Celestial Merino which was given to me by the lovely ninja. Sorry about the flash but it is hard to ger much natural light through a tiny porthole. There's lots of light up on the bridge, but I don't want to unleash all the crazy on the Captain right now. Being the girl on the crew is strange enough, but being the girl who takes pictures of knitted things would be going to far. Although, I would like to take a picture of a sock in progress once we get to Nain and challenge the Yarn Harlot to get a picture of her travelling sock there!

St. Anthony to Cartwright

Finally, things are starting get back to normal around here. We had a pretty rough start to the trip and had to stay in St. John's for a couple days to fix the ship up before we could sail. After getting away there was a bit of a leak in the Engine room and we had to go into St. Anthony Saturday to get things sorted out. St. Anthony is a cute little spot.

We spent yesterday steaming to Cartwright, Labrador where we will be working for the next few days. It was a bit windy and not very pleasant. I spent the morning curled up in my bunk feeling a little green. (I was not the only one) Today all is well and we are having nice weather as we run our lines off the coast of Cartwright.

The end of another long day

Julie2008 002, originally uploaded by leclerc_jk.

Close to Cape Spear, Newfoundland.

Lava Streams

One of the most stressful things about packing for any trip is deciding which projects to bring and then obsessing about it you have brought enough and if they are appropriate projects for where you are going, etc.   I may be a tad neurotic.  

I decided to do Tidal Streams by Ilga Leja.

It's nice stressfree knitting with an easily memorized pattern.  This stole is knit on the bias to give it lovely drap much like the Clapotis, while sounding less like a disease.  It's coming along so well I have also started a scarf version in Celestial Merino Dream - Aquarius , but I am leaving the ruffle out on this one to sea how it turns out.  

Along with the Scarf and stole I am bringing enough sock yarn for 4 pairs of socks and my Cleopatra wrap that is about half finished. I hope I don't run out. Maybe I will bring some extra dental floss in case I get desperate.

On of the nice things about July...