Happy Birthday Stella!

Stella, beautiful daughter of my friends Zita & Henri, turned 1 yesterday. She's an amazingly cute little munchkin and to celebrate her first year I knitted her a version of Anouk, designed by one of my favorite designers, Kate Gilbert.

I knitted it up from a bit of Sizzle remainders and bought two extra colors of scheepjes/ Isis to match. It's a shiny 100% cotton and a think I used less than one skein of blue, less than one skein of green and about 1/2 a skein of light yellow. (one skein = 50 grams/ 100m) It's knitted on #4 (mm) needles. I decided to skip the pockets and make it colorful, but basic. I liked knitting it so much that it inspired me to design more kids stuff. I have, it's on paper, not in knitting. But I'll keep you posted on that new endeavor. I decided on the flowery buttons. The buttons ánd the dress were luckily (phew, phew...) greatly appreciated by Stella her parents. I love knitting gifts and giving them away! (duh, Sas, you're supposed to give gifts away...)

'I'm likin' this! Definitely likin' this!'

'Wait, hold on, hold your horses, there's more...!'

front

back

'I'm a model, you know what I mean and I do my little roll on the catwalk...'

'People, I'm tellin' ya, this garment is just perfect to play in, it moves, it never clinches and it stretches while you stretch!'
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And now... for your knitting entertainment... watch this video! Great music, great video! (metal note, buy cd!) and then this one, a great Finnish animation on how knitting gets obsessive... (don't I know it...)

She's Coming... She's Actually Coming!!

I can not believe it, but it's true... Debbie Stoller is going to be in Rotterdam in november! World champion speed knitting Miriam Tegels is also going to be there. I've occasionally stumbled upon her work online and I must say, if anything, I'm intrigued! Lots of knitting, chatting, yarn, coffee and workshops. The people of Stitch 'n Bitch Holland organized a fun-tastic day!! Let it be known to the world!!

On knitting...
I'm knitting, I am... It's just too many things that have all progressed too little, not photo-fahig and then there's one FO, but it's a present and I can't show you yet.
Oh wait... I do have a question for you:



Which button should I use?
This is a close-up of the present, I'm crossing my fingers the recipient's mother won't be checking out my site until sunday... at least I'm not giving away much.
It's for a wee girl! It has 4 buttons, semi-visible and one button visible.
I cannot say more. I dare not say more.
(I photoshopped the yellow to make it look more like it is in real life, you can tell from the top right corner of the yellow part, but still, pretty proud of myself, hehe)

I started on Ubernatural in a bright green cotton. I found the yarn for 1 euro a skein and couldn't resist it. I like the way that works. Find cheap yarn, find free pattern, e presto: cheap-o-sweater-o!
If you're a big girl you can knit a sweater for about 8 euros, if you're smaller, it'll cost about 6. That's amazing isn't it? Thing is offcourse, I had to buy the needles. With all the trazillion needles I've collected over the last couple of years, thése I didn't have...
Ok, so you have a great and cheap project... but then there's the details. I know, you can't fuss over the details for a mere 8 euros (+ 9 for needle), but still. So you fuss over it and at the same time find yourself some excuses:
- Big girls in big knits don't go well together usually --> (but this cotton is soooo supple, it will work, it will)
- The green is véry green... don't get me wrong, green is my fav color, in all it's shades, but on me, in a big knit sweater? I'm 31 in 20 days... which is off course no excuse whatsoever, I'm just not convinced.

this is how green it is:


(random picture)
--> (I'm sure it'll look great with a black undershirt, that will tone it down. Maybe with my white and green converse(s), it might be a look, it might work.)

I could always knit it for someone else, in fact I already have someone in mind, in fact I might have told her my problem and thought out loud about maybe making it for her (I really need a 'thought muter'; I keep saying things out loud that should stay in my brain) I do want to make it for her, I really do, but at the same time I just really want to know if I'm right about all this and try it on myself first.

So that's how that works in my head. And so I decided to knit it, in my size, see how it works out and go from there. Mir, I'll make you something else soon, really! :-/
I started two days ago, I swear the dog gone thing is haunted...or something. I frogged the first 3 rows about 6 times, the pattern wasn't right. I'm arrogant like that, if it doesn't work, it's the pattern. Never mind that the designer, Stephanie Jaspel, knits like wizard and wrote books about it. I'm telling you, it's not right... So what I do, I knit it as I think it should be. And, for now, it works. But then I fuck up (pretty sure I don't have kids reading this, if I do: sorry!) the whole raglan, holed sleeve thing... And then I go from arrogant to naive; I'm sure it's ok, I'll just have to keep on knitting, it just lóóks funny at this point. So I keep knitting. After some 10+ rows (of 70+ stitches!) I have to face the facts: it's not right! It is sucking big time, it is sucking like an industrial vacuum cleaner. I have to not touch the darn thing and get my mind to settle before I decide to take a picture of this mongrul to show you. But then again, I really don't want to do anything, I get distracted eventually and so I forget to take the picture and frog it and now I have nothing to show you... You'll have to imagine it, it looked like a piece of green punker panty hose with ripped holes.

Yesterday while shopping for buttons I was also on the lookout for the big buttons I need for the sweater. I really want it to be green buttons, so they wont stick out too much. Or maybe see-through. Surely, after walking some km's looking for them in 4 different stores, the best ones were in the first one....

I'm hoping I'll develop a better relationship with this one soon...

What the h#ll is a Clapotis?

It's done! It's finally done! My Clapotis is yarn no more!
And here it is, in all it's glory and splender (or is it splendor...?):





I was too lazy to get out of my PJ's for the 'shoot', so you'll have to imagine the glamour. . .

I used Katia's Jamaica which is a 100% cotton yarn. It's increadibly soft and it knits like a dream. Good stuff!

By the way, although the whole knitting community has probably knit it (including my good friend Drea Renee) I never read the meaning of the word anywhere. It took some serious googling, but this is what it means (and it makes a lot of sence), it's french for: a similar wavy appearance or motion, eg in material, hair, etc. ...

If I ever achieve anything in my knitting 'carreer' I hope that one day I'll design a piece like Kate Gilbert did with Clapotis. Make a mark, leave a ripple in the water as it were.... (oh pleaeaease Sas, come off it, you twit!!)

ps
I also finished a present for a wee girl, but you'll have to wait a couple of weeks before I can show you, I finshed early for once...

I'm here, I'm here!

I just didn't get round to posting... what with the new job and all. Which is by the way a combination of a much missed job as well as the -same old- same old- problems and challenges. Working 3 days a week is definately agreeing with me, I love to have more time to myself, the lack of money, well... I'll just have to get used to that part. So I've been away. Away to a tropical island. And it was... tropical!

There was lots of this:


Some of this:

(the bikini by the way, got destroyed in the washing machine at home... a sign maybe...?)

I went with these:

and saw this:


I visited this:



(Las Palmas)

I was there to visit and catch up with her:


I hardly did any of this:


But I did saw these!!:

(and two whales, which was rare and amazing, they were as close to the boat as this dolphin is, but I ran out of shots and didn't want to spoil the moment by deleting pictures from my camera. I decided to live the moment and experience it. I did; I got water, blown out by the whale, on my face, it was a-ma-zing!! My fellow boatsmen were going to send me their pictures but they never did...)

And then I returned,

happy, with a (well protected) tan. All caught up with the lastest stories and some adventures richer. My hands and feet mani-ed and pedi-ed and ready to squeeze and hug Boyfriend Dear back at home.