Tag Archives: cross-stitch

WIPS and soon-to-be cast-ons: with bonus cross-stitch!

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I started the New Year with 3 WIP knitting projects and 2 more ready to cast on.

WIPs

  • A Homespun House Cozy Comfort throw – this has been in process for awhile now but it’s a blanket, so those usually take me years. I started this last January or February with minis from my A Homespun House Advent calendar held double with Purl Soho line weight merino (yes this was a splurge but it was so worth it). This is my mindless TV knitting and I actually worked on it a lot over the holiday break. It’s knitting up squashy and soft and I love seeing how each mini-skein’s colorway blends or stands out with the prior one.
  • Clinton Hill Cashmere’s Bandit Cowl in their bespoke cashmere DK in the Forest colorway. This yarn is knitting nirvana and this is a small indulgence project. I keep this one in my purse or in the car as it is extremely portable “waiting” knitting for when the kid is off doing something and I’m the chauffeur waiting to drive her home.
  • The Secret Garden knitted dishcloth from the Kitchen Sink Shop. At some point, she released a free dishcloth pattern every month. I went back and tried to find them all on Ravelry but could only find a few that were still free, and this is one of them. I’m just using cheap cotton from the craft store in a navy blue and this will probably be gift knitting in a package of little things for my bestie. It’s a little rough to work on cotton after the cloudy softness of line weight merino and bespoke cashmere but it’s a fun knit and the pattern emerges in a very satisfying way.

Ready to Cast On

  • Road Trippin’ Hat – a free pattern by one of my favorite knitting vloggers, Christina Lundborg of ‘Chelsea Yarns’. I need to use up some of my seemingly bottomless stash of fun sock yarn so I picked a skein of Targhee Sock by Oink Pigments (“Smoky Purl”) that I bought at the Quarter Stitch yarn shop in New Orleans and I’ll be holding it double with a Chelsea Yarns Luxe Mohair (“London Fog”).
  • When I took my crochet class last fall at Spun in Ann Arbor, most of my classmates were already knitters so there were some pretty cool handknits being worn. One of my classmates had a careless yet absolutely elegant little triangle scarf / shawl made, she said, from a set of Harry Potter minis in a pattern she couldn’t remember. I was instantaneously envious and needed it in my life. I got myself a Christmas Advent set with this in mind, picking Six & Seven Fiber’s Literary Women 8-skein fingering weight mini set, and with 5 selected colors I’ll be casting on the Mini Solutions Scarf by Kelene Kinnersly Designs very soon (I’ve selected Amy Tan, Toni Morrison, Mary Shelley, Celie, and Louisa May Alcott for my colors!).

Cross- Stitch

I started cross-stitching a couple of years ago and am still plugging away periodically on a seasons sampler, although I haven’t picked it up in awhile. Since October I’ve almost exclusively been working on this Jacob Marley piece by Lindsay Swearingen of ‘Tusk and Cardinal’. The only thing I do more slowly than knit is cross-stitch, and I think it’s pretty funny that this is exactly half-done. The chart prints out half and half on two separate pages and I only printed one page to start with. Then, over the holidays, our printer ran out of ink so I couldn’t print the second half until quite recently. But it’s been fun to fold it over and see how it will look when it’s finished.

LIndsey Swearingen is worth checking out on IG if you’re a cross-stitcher and her book “Creepy Cross-Stitch” is full of fantastically gothic and elegant pieces that I would love to have on my office walls.

I’m being pretty lazy and not linking these projects and patterns, but they’re (mostly) all on Ravelry or for purchase from the yarn web page (as is the case with the Clinton Hill project). I also update my own Ravelry project pages (I’m sixtenpine over there) fairly regularly as things come off the needles or start taking shape, so please check me out if you are looking for more specific information like pattern links, yarn sizes, and notes. I hope you are all starting off your New Year with some fun and satisfying projects. I look forward to revisiting these pieces and providing status updates of my tortoise-speed progress! xo

soggy tissues and sneezing on the cat

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Well friends, the last two weeks of April definitely challenged me. It was the most important time of year for my work goals & performance indicators, and it was (and continues to be) intense for the kiddo. Her schedule is full of daily track practice, weekly track meets, and theater rehearsals. All of which requires planning for transit, the appropriate nutrition, and very different sets of attire. This in addition to the usual schedule of work, remote and office days, school, regular appointments and meal planning. How do people have more than one active child and stay on top of it all?

After several hours last week at a particularly windy and frigid track meet – ankle deep in mud – I succumbed to the head cold that had been lingering in the wings waiting for a stage cue. The meet itself was well worth the discomfort- the kiddo’s stepmom and I were the only family members in attendance due to schedule conflicts. K and I get along well and I really enjoy her company and commitment to the kiddo. We watched the kid compete in shotput (where she placed first) and the 200-meter (where she took 4 seconds off her practice time). A successful outcome considering it was her first ever track meet!

And I always love that my goth kid is instantly recognizable in a sea of lookalike kids in hoodies and sweats. My kid will be the one warming up between events in a John Bender flannel, skeleton pajamas and a skull blanket.

My subsequent illness turned into a painful sinus infection and really kiboshed the weekend plans. I ran the kid to theater rehearsal and then went straight to Urgent Care. My Urgent Care is the best – I don’t even think they really care if I’m sick. I tell them “I have xx”, they take my blood pressure and look in my throat, prescribe horse pill antibiotics to my pharmacy of choice and I am merrily on my way. I spent the rest of the weekend in bed with Pot Roast. She is a constant nursemaid despite generally preferring Brandon and despising the explosive sneezing that has accompanied my illness. Maybe she just knew that in my weakened state, I could be easily dispatched with a soft paw on my jugular.

Other than sleeping, I plodded along with “Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone”, the most recent Diana Gabaldon Outlander contribution. 39% in and my quick review: so far it’s not as interesting as her earlier efforts. (Spoiler: someone HAS already been eaten by a bear and that was kind of a high point. And there are a lot of the usual interjections of “Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ” from sassy Claire and sexy Jamie grinding out “Och Sassenach ye drive me mad” which make it a fine book for a sick day.)

I don’t have a finished object to show (I’m close!) so I’ll update you on my crafting with progress on my current cross-stitch.

Hope everyone is well and happy. I’m girding my loins for another intense week and hopefully less sneezing.