KnitSchtick Colorblock Workshop!

Oh Please!!!  Make it stop!

As if I don't have enough projects in the works...

I get this email this morning from KnitSchtick:

Cat Eyes shaped Sunglasses, and Color Blocking is what’s IN for Spring!

10 JANUARY 2012 NO COMMENT

Complimentary Color Block Workshop, Saturday, January, 28th, 10:30am to 12:30pm.

We can’t help you with the glasses, but we can with the color blocking! Join us , and design your own Spring Scarf. You” ll be sooooooo tres sheep! Call now to reserve your spot at the table. Please note, the scarf in the picture is not finished.

And you know I wanna go!

You know how much I love my stripes AND I LOVE colorblocking!

UGH.

Let's see... Let's put this into perspective here.

Here are the things I'm currently working on or have in line to work on next:

My Kate Shawl (Which I'm ALMOST done with)!

The Yarn Lady Asymmetrical Vest (that I'm ALMOST done with!)

There's the Blue Sky Baby Bobbi Bear that I started to make for our little peanut (last year!)

Did I mention the Twinkle Moonlight Picnic Wrap that I bought yarn for and have in line to make?

And I also bought a pattern (and YARN!) for this too cute Wainright B sweater from Berroco!

Oh and... not to mention the socks I want to make everyone for Christmas 2012!

Good God, am I having ADD or what?! 

There's just tooooooo many good things out there to make!

Well... at least I have no shortage of ideas.

:)

What do you think? 

Stick to what I'm doing?

or sign up for this fabulous colorblock workshop?

hee....

0:-)

Yarn on the House - Susan B. Anderson YouTube Interview!

Well... as you know, we don't have TV.

Besides watching Hulu and Netflix (streaming), I also love to watch YouTube!

So I was so excited last night to find these YouTube interviews with Susan B. Anderson of Spud & Chloe!

I love love love reading her blog as well as the Spud & Chloe blog. 

I check them daily!

I wasn't familiar with Yarn on the House 'til last night and I love the idea of these knitter interviews!

Brilliant!

Here is her interview with Susan B. Anderson!

I hope Yarn on the House makes more videos!

I love 'em!

:)

Lion Brand Think Pink! Yarns for October

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month and the Lion blog has posted a nice chart of their different yarns in various pinks.

I love the Cotton-Ease Berry color.

I always supposed Breast Cancer Awareness 'cause I love pink and every year I'd look forward to October when all the fun pink lipsticks would come out from Stila and Estee Lauder.

Unfortunately, as the years have gone by, I've started to be affected by this awful cancer personally.

Earlier this year, I lost an old friend to cancer.

My sister-in-law's sister battled breast cancer this year and my BFF has to be checked every 3 months from here on out due to some silly tumors in her breasts.

It's just too much and it really bums me out.

:-/

Anyway, I didn't mean to become such a Debbie Downer.

I love all this pink yarn and if there are 2 things I can do well...

It's knit and shop. 

And if both of those happen to support Breast Cancer Awareness, then I will do my part and shop!

:)

VK Live! (LA) - Trendsetters Fashion Show

I was able to catch the Trendsetter Yarns fashion show between my classes and it was reallly nice!

I'm not familiar with the Trendsetter yarns at all but from what I could see, they seem nice and luxurious!

Here's a few of the things that I liked (and the few pics that came out ok.) 

:)

Keep in mind, this is pre-photography class!   :)

Love this rectangle cardi!

There is a specific name for this stitch and for the life of me, I can't remember what it's called.  But it's nice.

Kudos to the announcer (who's in the left towards the back, in this photo above). 

During his podium talk of each sweater, the Ferraris were leaving the convention they'd been attending and they were revving their engines soooooo loud and doing big burn-outs!

The announcer handled the loudness well and did a great job of making it funny.

:)

VK Live! (LA) - Photography for Knitters with Amy Swenson

My 2nd class for the day was with Amy Swenson of Indi Girl!

Amy is a knitting and crochet designer as well as photographer extraordinaire AND a software engineer (which El Hub focused and fixated on ALL the rest of the day as he is a programmer!).

Automatically, she was tops in his book 'cause she's a software engineer.  Nevermind that she's a fabulous designer and takes amazing photos...

ANYWAY!

 This was a nice sized class and I'm amazed more people didn't take this class.

With all the Ravelry posters and bloggers out there, we all need to improve our crafting photography skills!

 Amy's class was great but thing I loved most about it was that it was Hands On!

We got to go outside and try to photograph our works or works in progress so we could get feedback and help from Amy.

Afterward, we came back and shared/discussed what we learned.

Four gals in the class grouped together and really took off with what they learned!  They took some amazing photos that I would have believed to be professional. 

They were great!

I only had my swatch to photograph plus the yarn I received in Josh Bennett's class so that's what I have to show you.

I'll show you pictures that I took before getting feedback from Amy. 

If you've been following my blog at all, you know that my pics skills can use some upgrading!

Pre-feedback:

Bad...

Bad...

Then after feedback...

Better, huh?

Not bad!

:)

I really learned a lot from Amy (so expect to see some fancy photos on here from now on)!

:)

I know this is going to sound so dumb but, it's even the little things like taking your work outside to photograph, that I never even thought to do!

I always just plop by Finished Object on the kitchen table and take a few pictures to post!

Sure it may give a fair representation of what the Finished Object is but...

is it exciting to look at!

Already after this class, I've started looking differently at how I photograph everything.  Not just my knitting.

Amy really taught me how to see things differently compositionally.

If you can, take a look at Amy's patterns and you'll get to see her beautiful designs as well as her photographs.

Thank you, Amy! 

VK Live! (LA) - Custom Knitting Design with Josh Bennett

I took two wonderful classes at VK Live in LA and my first class was at 8 a.m.!

(Zzz...)

I am not a morning person AT ALL but I was up at 5:45a to be out the door by 6:30a and get to Culver City by 7:30a so I could register for my classes!

(I didn't want to be late for school!  :)

Fortunately, a few cups of coffee helped... and this class was AWESOME!

 Our class was taught by Josh Bennett of Boy Meets Purl.  He came from New York for the weekend to teach and he was an excellent teacher!

Our class was three hours long and while that sounds like a long time, it went by sooooo fast!

He took us through the basics of using gauge and body measurements to create a basic sweater pattern!

Now... I'm not gonna lie.  I suck at Math.  :'(

So I was a bit confused throughout the class.

Not because of Josh.  But because I am slow (and I'm not ashamed to say it!).

The class moves fairly quickly, as it should.  I just need to be taught like a kindergardener.

But I still learned sooooooo much!

I learned so many tips and tricks that are priceless and not found in any knitting book.

 I brought all my notes home and El Hub is helping me understand the math better which is great because...

my first project is to make him a basic sweater vest!

(he has been asking me to make him a sweater with a 'computer image' on the front since forever!)

So we'll see how it goes and I'm so excited to try my new design skills!

Josh has a lot of exciting things going on and his story is pretty amazing!  (he's pretty much living my dream life... you know, the one where I live in New York and I knit for career).

Anyway, many of his designs are featured in Vogue Knitting.

He's currently teaming up with Rowan (Per their request!  They sought him out!) and he was sweet enough to share some of their yarn with us!!!

YAY!!!!

If you happen to be in NY for the next VK Live 2012, sign up for his classes!

You will have so much fun AND learn a lot!

Thank you, Josh!

:)

VK Live - Los Angeles!

YAY!

I went to VK Live and it was awesome!!!

I took 2 classes and was able to catch one fashion show!

Here are the separate posts on those:

Custom Knitting Design with Josh Bennett

Photography for Knitters with Amy Swenson

Trendsetters Fashion Show

 

El Hub asked me to tell you 3 things I saw that others might not tell you.

So let's see...

1) There was a Ferrari convention going that same weekend at the Hyatt Century City.  It was the CarWoo! Fog Rally where a TON of fancy-dancy Ferraris met after driving from SF to LA for charity!

2) I saw knitters everywhere!  Sitting!  Standing!  Everyone and everytime was knitting... at ALL times! 

3) Yarn Bombing!

:)

Back in the Saddle...

I know it's been a long time and I'm sorry.

I have been out of sorts these past couple of months and have not been in much of a knitting or blogging mood.

I've been rethinking the whole blog thing for a couple of weeks now.

It's funny how things come in waves or groups.

Within the last 3 weeks, four of the (non-knitting related) blogs that I follow have rethought their blogging focus or have decided to just flat out take a break from their blogging, all for various random different reasons.

I started wondering & got to thinking if the time of the blog was done.

It made sense to me since I've not been in much of a writing mood lately and thought maybe my time had come to an end too...

But I still have things to say and knitting learning to share so I'm sticking around.

Having said that, I'm not knitting anything right now!

But I will.

I'll get back into it and I think I'll start with one of the like 10 UFO's that I need to complete.

:)



Spud & Chloe Heart on a String Hat (without the heart on a string)

Pattern: Spud & Chloe Heart on a String Hat

Yarn:
    * Spud & Chloe Sweater in 7514 (Turtle)
    * Small Balls (Yarn Candy - Pick Up Sticks) in Moss
 
Needles: Size 11 - 16" circular needles

So this one's for my nephew.  He loves his RC Cars (radio controlled cars) and had asked a couple of months ago if I could make him a beanie with "RC" on it.

Unfortunately, my "R" and "C" are a bit further apart than I would have liked...

But hopefully he won't care and he'll like it and wear it!

I really liked this Spud & Chloe Sweater yarn (another excuse to try this yarn!).  It does not shed or get linty.  It's really soft and feels great in the hands!  I'll be curious to hear how it washes.  I should chuck in the washer myself just to see what happens to it but I'd kinda like to just get it off to him. 

They had this yarn (at my LYS) called Small Balls (Yarn Candy) and it was perfect for the letters cause I didn't need much and I didn't wanna buy a whole skein just for 2 letters.

It worked out perfectly and I have quite a bit leftover!  Maybe I'll crochet a flower outta it or something...

Here's what the inside looks like: 

I used graph paper to make my chart out... 

I wish I had made my letters just a lil bit smaller and definitely a bit closer!

Oh well...

Now I know for next time! 

:)

Knitting Today! Magazine January/February 2011 Issue

I had popped in to the bookstore to try & buy the latest issue of Vogue Knitting...

and I saw the latest issue of Knitting Today! instead!

I thought this Camel Cape was cute.

And I LOVE this hat!!!  (I want it for myself!)

But I LOVE love!

Yes... I do still make my Hubby celebrate our 'Monthiversary'!!!

We will be romantic, if it kills us!  :)

Cute!!!

The latest issue of Knitting Today! is out now!