M's Owl

I haven't been doing a lot of knitting.  I've been pretty busy with work and moving to a new house.  I've just been totally exhausted most of the time.  We got hit by the "Perfect Storm" this week, so I took the time to get some knitting done this weekend and the past two days.

This weekend, I managed to get an owl done for a family friend.   M. was in a car accident and was hurt pretty badly.  I made the owl to keep her company at the rehab facility where she's going for physical rehab. Here's the owl:

Motivation, but no luck.

I have not been having good luck knitting lately.  I still haven't finished all the pieces for my alien pattern,  having pretty much lost the mojo on that for the moment.  I have two failed projects within the week, as well.  First, I worked on my Bella Botanica for 3 weeks.  Everything was going beautifully, I'd finished the number of repeats of chart 1, having no problems at all with the chart/stitch count, until I started chart 2.  Somehow, I was about 10 stitches short for the left side of the shawl.  How does that happen without my noticing????  Seriously.  So that's been frogged, and is living in a project bag for the moment.

Then I started a Artemis Cowl, which I was calling Ice Cream Cowl because I'm using Manos del Uruguay Silk Blend in Spumoni, which reminds me of Neopolitan ice cream.  I did okay on the slip stitch border, until I started the pattern and was....5 stitches short?  I triple counted the cast on!!!  Whatever; I suck at math.  I restarted.  Found a factory knot in my yarn!! in which they apparently knotted together 2 different dye lots of Spumoni together.  The pink was more saturated after the knot, there was more of the "vanilla" color, and there was actually the occasional green showing up.  I decided I didn't care, and kept going.  Halfway through the third repeat, I unconciously decided to stop doing the plain knit row, and start decreasing on half of the cowl, throwing off my decreases completely, and since it was fun time lace, not complicated, but still lace, and we're talking about 60 stitches off over 6 rows, I had to frog.  Joy. 

New Pattern in the Works

I'm working on a new pattern that I'll be releasing in the future, for free, of course.  I got a lovely yarn in the mail the other day that I decided was perfect for my new design idea.  It will be another toy with nothing too complicated as far as construction goes.  I've finished with the main part of the body, and now I'm working on the other parts.  Can't wait until it is finished!  Hopefully I will be able to find some test knitters to try it out.

Monsta Party!

Yesterday, my mom and I babysat my nephew.  He's a totally adorable 5 year old kid who, predictably, is totally unpredictable.  Friday happened to be a totally awesome day for him at our house.  He got here at 10, and went outside for a while, until my mom got too hot (myself being too lamed up with the fun breathing problems to go outside), and they came back in.  Of course he needed something to do, so out came the monsters.

I have this insane pile of monsters/animals sitting on the tv stand.  There are about 10 of them living up there, and when the nephew comes, he has to play with them.  All of them.  So he gets them all, and piles them on the couch, and does whatever he does when they hang out together.  When his mom came to get him, I asked him to clean up.  This was his version of cleaning up:

I don't know what I like more about this picture, the dragon looking like he's yelling "Don't come it!", the monkey looking like she's had waaaaaaaaay too much to drink, or all of the others lounging there like they won't be able to get up for the next ten years.  Thanks, buddy.

 

Latest Critters

Monster knitting is what happens when you have asthma, allergies you can't take meds for until you've been retested, and 95+ weather.  Mostly I've been feeling too much like crap to move off the couch.  Yeah.

My swap partner received her monster, so I can finally post some pictures:

He's a rockin' rockstar!!  I made the necklace with shells I picked up on vacation.  His vest is felt with eyelash sewn around the edges.  His body is one strand of orange yarn, and his head is orange yarn and pink fun fur held together.  I love him!

I also made a dragon this week.  Sparky:

His eyes are felt, and his wings are two pieces of felt sewn together with embroidery floss.  The spines on the tail/back are Lorna's Laces Zombie BBQ yarn.  The main color is Shibui Merino Worsted in Chinese Red.  He is so cute; I just love the expression on his face, and how he looks like he wants to give everyone a great big hug.

Shawls and Monsters

I didn't get a chance to knit a lot during May and the first part of June.  Now that summer vacation hit early this year, I've been catching up on some major knitting projects.  The two projects I did manage to get done during May are 2 shawls, Summer Flies and Damson. 
Summer Flies is a semi-circular shawl I knitted in Malabrigo Cotton, a beautiful organic cotton yarn in a worsted weight.  I like the color shift from a natural cotton color to gray within the yarn.  It used up most of the yardage.

Damson is a small shawl with faroese-type shaping so it stays put when you wear it.  I did mine in Malabrigo Sock, colorway Persia, and the edging is done in KnitPicks Stroll, color black.  Even though I was supposed to be able to do it with one skein, I ran out of yarn and had to edge in black.  Still, I think it turned out pretty well. 

I managed to get some monster knitting done, too.  One of them I still can't post, until I'm sure my swap partner received her package.  The other monster I did was my cute little Stealth Murray, who I'm giving to a family friend tonight.  He's made of awesome camo colors, with tan and black eyes, a purple mouth.  I love the crazy expression on his face.

New Pattern Available

I just made my Squiggy pattern available to download on Ravelry!  Happy Knitting!!!!!!