What's on Your Needles Wednesday #9

After posting last week I was surprised I got the WOYNW number right. I totally guessed. So, I am still working on my socks (grape twist), knitting a pair of a man in my life tbd later(could be Craig, could be Dad, suppose it could even be Cory). Yesterday finished up a cute slouchy beanie in an ivory Caron Simply Soft for my niece, Kassie. She doesn't read my blog, so I am safe talking about it. The pattern is from day nine of Caron's 12 days of Christmas. Each day for 12 days they sent a new pattern for gifting. I usually only like about half of them. Lots of hats and scarfs. I know everyone isn't like me, so I really don't give a lot of hats and scarves. I on the other hand love them, and could probably wear a different one every day. My husband and kids could too. Kassie loves fashion, and loves slouchy beanies. I knit her a cute cabled one for her birthday in hot pink simply soft. My sister suggested this one be more neutral so she could wear it with more. I LOVE how it turned out. My only dislike was the pattern was written to be knit flat and seamed. I believe things that are round like socks and hats, should be knit in the round. No problem right, just knit it in the round. Well, maybe I have mentioned before when it comes to knitting I don't like to think. If a pattern needs to be manipulated much, forget about. I know it is probably simple and I wouldn't have to think much, but I think it should have originally been written different. I liked the hat, as did my girls. I will probably knit it again, this time in the round and will have to think. UGH! So having finished the hat, I was prepared to start on a hat for one of my nephews, I grabbed some yarn and went to my bag for the size 8 circular and dpns I bought a week or so ago. They weren't there. Neither were the denim sewing machine needles I bought. I have now torn my house apart looking for them, and have even gone through the trash. YUCK! They are no where to be found. I am sick to my stomache. Money is TIGHT for us this year. Two house payments for 4 months and me not working are killing our bank balance. I can't afford to go buy these needles again, but as I need them to make my Christmas presents and save some money, I have no choice. DRAT, DRAT, DOUBLE DRAT!!! The next thing I need to work on(other than the hats with the missing needles) requires the denim needles, or wool yarn that is in the garage. It is COLD here. Clear and cold. Okay, so maybe 46 isn't cold, but when you have been in the 60-70's it is. I don't want to go out there and find it. Yes, this is me whinning. I know it isn't attractive, but I really don't care right now. I will try to add a picture of the slouchy hat when my daughter gets home. TTFN, Miki

What's on Your Needles Wednesday #8?

I have no idea what number WOYNW this is. I am still working on gifts so I really can't share. I have made a little progress on my socks, but not enough to need to take a picture. Everything else is top secret! Wish I could share, but I want it all to be a surprise. Monday was my 40th birthday. I was blessed with facebook notes, calls and cards from friends and family. It was a nice day. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving. I am thankful for the health of my family, that my husband has a job, that our house in Richmond has finally rented, and so many other things. We will be spending the day with Gwen's boyfriends family. We haven't had Thanksgiving with anyone else since we moved 7 years ago, so this should be interesting. We were told we didn't need to bring anything, but Jacque was having none of that. She insisted on making cranberry sauce and pink salad. She really wanted to make pumpkin rolls, but I was able to talk her out of it. We will make them for Christmas, or maybe just later this week. I did however, make 2 loaves of Snickerdoodle bread. Thanks Daysha and Val! It smelled wonderful cooking, and hopefully tastes good too. If you want the pumpkin dinner roll recipe, clink on the link. For the snickerdoodle bread one...here you go. ‎2 1/2 cups FLOUR 2 teaspoons BAKING POWDER 1/2 teaspoon SALT 2 teaspoons CINNAMON 1 cup BUTTER, softened 2 cups SUGAR 3 EGGS 2 teaspoons VANILLA 1 cup SOUR CREAM 1 (10 oz.) pkg. CINNAMON CHIPS 1 Tablespoons FLOUR 2 Tablespoons TURBINADO SUGAR (aka Sugar In the Raw) 2 teaspoons CINNAMON Preheat oven to 350°. Grease loaf pans (I used 2 full-size, but you can also do this as 4 or 5 mini loaves.) Combine flour and baking powder in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, beat together butter, 2 cups of sugar, salt and cinnamon. Add eggs, beat well. Add vanilla and sour cream; mix well to combine. Stir in flour mixture until just combined. Coat the cinnamon chips with the 1 Tablespoons of flour and stir into the batter. Divide the batter between the greased pans. In a small bowl, combine the turbinado sugar and cinnamon. Sprinkle this mixture over each loaf. Bake 35-40 minutes for mini loaves and 60-70 minutes for full-size loaves, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Remove from oven and let cool 10 minutes before removing from the pan. TTFN, Miki

Super late What's on your needles, and some other stuff

I know once again my weekly knitting post is late. But it is late because I have been busy knitting. I am still working on those grape twist socks for me. It is really slow going. Not sure why. Maybe its the pattern, which isn't too complex. Maybe it's the needles, size 1 bamboo. I guess it could be the yarn. That being the case, I have moved onto other projects so I can finish up Christmas gifts. That being said, I cant really share what I am working on because I don't know who in my family is going to read this. I will say that some of what I have knit is fun and silly, and make not even be given as gifts. Some are firsts for me. I will share more about this later. Others are basic and I know will be loved. The best part is that I am stash busting. The worst part, a recurring theme, not having the right size needles. Seriously!!! I actually bought 3 new pairs of needles this week. UGH!!! I have looked at my needle chart and I am pretty close to owning every size, except the longer cable needles. If you are friends or family that still need to get me a birthday or Christmas gift, you can't go wrong with knitting needles. I would also love yarn from, or a gift certificate to knitivity I'm not picky about color. I seem to like everything he dyes. This is one of the reasons my stash is so large. Onto the other stuff. I had planned on writing a few different things, and now I have no idea what they were. Ooops. Monday I turn 40. I am feeling ok about this. Ask me on Monday or even Tuesday and my answer might be different. I am pretty much happy with my life. I love my husband and kids and feel I am where I am supposed to be. Couldnt ask for much more except maybe a job and I know that will come. Tomorrow we head to Richmond for some business stuff and a party for me. I am so excited to see my friends! I really need to get out more here. The last few days I haven't felt so good. Can't really put my finger on it aside from really bad reflux. Keep you up all night bad. Nothing is different, just reflux and stomache pain that medication isn't helping. This has left me tired and not wanting to do anything. I have worked out once this week. I did yoga. It felt great and I had every intention of doing it again, but I haven't. The day isn't over yet. On a good note, despite my not forcing myself to work out, I am still loosing weight. Still slowly. I guess that is just how I do it. Works for me, but I like to see results super quick! I will say I have lost 16lbs since August. I am wearing pants 2 sizes smaller and other than this stomache thing, feel better. My goal is to lost at least another 14-25. I think that is a good weight for me. I was happy at that weight and liked how my clothes fit. We will see how that works out. I will say though, that I don't have many pants that fit me now, and some of what I do have, hopefully won't fit for much longer. This sucks, because I don't want to buy in between clothes. I imagine I will be hitting some thrift stores soon. Well, I guess that is all I have to write for now. I do want to add that last week when writing my blog, my husband ask if anyone read it, or if it was just a sort of therapy for me. I have looked at my stats and see I am getting page views. They are mainly for Jacques adobe diorama. If you read this, could you please leave a comment. I would love to know who is reading, and if you have any suggestions to make it better, or add more readers. TTFN, Miki

What's on your needles Wednesday #7

I have had a lot on my mind lately and have really wanted to blog, but none of it pertains to knitting, and while I do usually add other stuff it involves my kids and some personal trials we are working through as a family and I didn't feel comfortable sharing with everyone. Please pray for us that we find the wisdom to help them make the right choices.

As for the knitting, I have been working on a few things. First, I knit this awesome hat. The pattern is called simply, Men's ski hat. It is designed by Irina Dmitrieva. I prefer to call it Crazy Celtic Cables. I knit it for my hubby. I used some Caron Simply Soft in grey that I had in my stash. I LOVE how it turned out. Once I am pretty much done stash busting, I will probably knit one for myself in a winter white. I found some alpaca silk that I think would be perfect. I found this pattern on Ravelry and bought it there too. The pattern is not to tricky. I finished in about 2 days, and that was time I devoted to concentrated knitting. I saved the veg out stuff for wash cloths.



I am now once again stash busting. I am knitting a pair of socks for me. I am using some yummy Crystal Palace Panda Silk that my bff bought for me. The color is #4006, which is a pretty variegated purple. This pattern was also found on Ravelry. It is by Rachel M. Blaine and is called Redvine/Blackjack. I am knitting the redvine version. This pattern is pretty easy. It however has been challenging for me as it uses a picot edge cast on that I had not previously done. Also it is knit on size one needles. I normally knit my socks on a size 2. For whatever reason it just feels like I am knitting with toothpicks. Of course it doesn't help that the needles are bamboo also. I am making pretty good progress, but it is slower going than normal. For example it took me about 45 minutes to cast on. Ugh! The edge is pretty though. I can't wait till these are finished and I can wear them.


I have also been working on another beard hat. This time for Craig. I increased the edges a bit as I didn't like the fit of the first one. Also, he wanted it furry, so I added a strand of fun fur. Let me just say that this easy pattern is made harder when you can't see the stitches because of the not so fun fur. This is why, this is not done yet. I am also trying to figure out a way (possibly tiny buttons- thanks Sarah) to make it detachable. He wants it on his new ski hat, but I like the idea of being able to remove it. TTFN!

What's on your needles Wednesday #6

Here it is Wednesday again. I started another dish/wash cloth yesterday. It is actually called a spa cloth. I like the sound of that SO much better. It has a diamond pattern with eyelets in it. The odd thing is, I am on row two, I think I have made yet another mistake, and will need to rip it out again. I think this is the 3rd or 4th time I have frogged it. I am beginning to think I am not going to knit this.

Yesterday I went through all my knitting magazines. I looked at all the patterns and had to decide if they were ones I would ever knit or not. I think I got rid of about 1/4 of the magazines. I few of them, there were one or two patterns I might knit, so I just tore those out. No sense keeping the whole magazine right?

I spent most of last week, or at least it seems I did, on a simple crocheted beanie and beard for Cory. The first hat I made was so small. I used the right yarn, and the right hook. I don't know what the problem was, maybe I just hold my tension way to tight. I decided to go up 2 hook sizes. This hat is much better, but I wish it was a couple of rows longer. Plus, I guess I am just used to knit fabric. I don't care for the openness of the crochet. I can see where there are times it would be nice, but knitting makes a much more solid fabric. I still need to attach the beard, so once again no pictures. I really need to get caught up on pictures!

Gwen has decided she wants leg warmers. Lord knows this is not something I will buy, when I know I can make them. I looked up some patterns on Ravelry, and ask her last night what kind she wanted. Her answer was, "there is more than one kind?" Really, yes of course there is. She didn't look over the pictures, so I guess that is a project that we will be putting off.

I also pulled out a few mitten patterns yesterday. I think this is something I would like to try. Might be kind of fun. I just hope I don't get second mitten syndrome.

Another funny/odd thing I noticed yesterday when going through the magazines, I don't have the right yarn for the projects I want to do. Remember last week when I said I never seemed to have the right needles from my projects even though I have TONS of needles. Well, I also have TONS of yarn. Most of what I have is worsted. It is either wool, or acrylic. I also have a large box of sock yarn. Then I have miscellaneous yarns. I probably have 4-5 Rubbermaid tubs of yarn. However, yesterday it sure seemed like everything I looked at needed bulky yarns. Hats, mittens, sweaters, scarves, everything. Here I am trying to purge yarn, and would need to buy new yarn to knit what I want to. I do know that I could hold two strands together, but that gives a bit of a different look and requires me to think more(remember there are 2 strands for each stitch). I will probably just keep trying to figure out what to knit with what I have got. TTFN