As 2010 is drawing to a close...

...I thought I should post a little update of what I'm up to. Right now, I am studying - or trying to study! - for an exam I'm sitting in a few months' time. It's make or break time, and I'm really hoping it'll be the former, so I will keep this post short and sweet, so that I can get back to studying!

I started knitting the vintage top from issue 47 of Knit Today before I went on my Hawai'i trip at the start of December (details about that will have to be in a later post, I'm afraid!) and took it out again on Boxing Day to work on, while everyone else was out at the shops, battling it out with other crazy bargain hunters (I don't go Boxing Day shopping as a rule, because I don't like being pushed and shoved, and having my toes treaded upon). I am very bad at keeping focused, when it comes to studying from books, and recently read the intro of Knit Fix in which the author writes that she picked up knitting to keep herself from looking at her watch all the time in meetings. Hoping this could work for me, I have been knitting intermittently, and I'm halfway done with the back piece of the garment already! Ahem, not much progress with the studying though..

The garment is categorised in the magazine as an intermediate knit, but it's really quite simple (yay, I'm an intermediate knitter! :D) and pretty straightforward, with no shaping required at all so far. Initially I was going to buy a green alpaca yarn to knit with, like the one used in the pattern, but in a different brand, but I couldn't get past the only shade of green that was available - a gross bright moss green. I ended up using the deep magenta Patons Zhivago yarn from my yarn stash, which I had initially bought to knit a shrug from one of the Patons Zhivago knitting books I have. I didn't really realise it's almost the same shade of magenta that I bought in the Patons Mist for that other shrug I posted a picture of! I'm not a particularly big fan of magenta, so I'm not quite sure why I chose the colour. Maybe it looked good with the lighting at the shop at the time. Or maybe it was because it's the colour used to knit the garments in the pattern books. Yeah, that's probably it actually.

I also recently purchased the deluxe set of KnitPro interchangeable Symfonie wood knitting needles online, as well as the Patons Serenity DK yarn needed to knit the pretty pink daisy sweater from an issue of Let's Knit. I haven't received either parcels yet, but I'm really excited! No doubt I'm going to be very distracted from my studies though! :P

Anyway, back to my essays!

Summer is only 3 days away... really??

It seems like not too long ago when I was flipping through my stash of knitting magazines, trying to pick out Spring patterns to knit. Fast forward to the present, and Summer is just around the corner! And Spring knits? Well, only if you count the projects I've already talked about in past posts. One of them was a tabbard-style top - the knitting's completed, but it's still waiting for the 12 large buttons (yes, that's right, TWELVE!) to be bought and attached to fully finish it off. I'd like to think that the addition of the buttons will be enough to make the top more fitting, so that there is more shape to it (coz tabbard style really = 2 rectangles sewn together at the edges); but I don't know... I don't even know if it's worth spending the money on the buttons for a project that I probably won't end up wearing. Plain big black buttons are about $5 for 3 buttons or so, so it's not cheap. But I guess I spent a lot on the yarn already (Debbie Bliss Donegal Luxury Tweed: 15% angora/85% wool), and as they say, if you're gonna get your hair wet, you might as well go swimming. It's not high on my list of priorities at the moment though.

You might recall that I was also working on a 3/4 sleeve V-neck top with Sublime Bamboo and Pearls. I have actually been trying to finish that one lately, and have gotten as far as finishing knitting all the pieces, bar the bow feature, which I am knitting at the moment, and which can wait until everything is assembled anyway, and even finished the neck edging. I stopped working on it after that though, because to my horror, I found that picking up the stitches at the very edge led to unsightly little holes along the neck edging, where the stitches were picked up. This is the first time something like this has happened, (but do note that I haven't done too many full garments in the past) so I'm not sure if it's just because of the drapey nature of the slick yarn, the thinness of the yarn, or whatever else. I could go through sewing the holes up with the same yarn, but that's so much effort, and I guess I'm just too disheartened by it to be honest, to go on. Oh well, since Summer is fast approaching, I probably won't be able to wear it anyway. So I think I'll leave it until the end of Summer, to prepare it for Autumn wear.

One of the projects that had been fully completed and had worked out nicely was the bell-sleeved cropped cardigan by Jenny Watson, pictured below:

Project: Short-sleeeved cropped cardigan
Source: Noro Flowers Book 4 by Jenny Watson

Yarn: Noro Silk Garden Lite

Overall, I quite like the look of the cardy - it's different, it's funky.. I was rather pleasantly surprised that it fit quite well too. But - there is always a but, isn't there? - I don't like how the edges flick up a bit. I'm not sure if blocking would have helped, but, not being the most patient person in the world, I couldn't be bothered. Also, I don't like how the flaring of the lower bodice is so pronounced on the sides. Maybe it would look nicer if less stitches were cast on, and if there were no decreases made at both the end sections, so that the sides would sit flatter and not puff out so much. If you keep your arms down, it looks fine, but once you lift them up, poof! When I took the cardy into a haberdashery store to find buttons to match, the shop assistants asked, "Is it for a boy or a girl?". HA! They liked it, but were very surprised when I told them it was a woman's fit. In my quest for buttons to magically transform the garment into a 'younger-looking piece' (I was told by some people that the colour of the yarn made the garment look 'old'!) I ended up finding bright coloured 'gelato' yellow-orange-green buttons to use. I think they fit the bill, don't you think?

Feels like a bird trapped in a cage. Hanging from a high tree branch. With its wings clipped off.

...is it a good thing or just plain cruel to unlock the cage door, when, even if released, the bird cannot fly away? To watch others fly freely around, having complete control of their own lives; knowing there is so much out there to see and do, while also knowing this will never be possible for oneself is almost too much to bear. Happiness will only ever be a dream. Could you blame me for being bitter and resentful?

Food, glorious food!

I made myself Eggs Benedict for brekky this morning. I don't know why I've never made this at home before, because it's not hard to whack together, and it tastes so much better than what you get at a lot of cafes. I went to a cafe with a friend the other week, which I had read some good reviews about, and was shocked when my caesar salad arrived - the poached egg was unrecognisable. It was basically an egg yolk with a thin layer of rubbery-looking egg white twisted around it. The salad was like, almost $20 by the way, so you'd think they'd atleast get a poached egg right. Oh well, atleast I know it's not frozen from a packet (I was told that one of the popular local cafe chains use ready-made poached eggs - how lazy can people get?!). But anyway, back to my eggs benedict! - the recipe says to make the hollandaise sauce in the food processor, but because my kitchen is tiny and cluttered, my food processor and blender is stored in the garage, which I'm sure you'd agree is too much of an effort to lug to the kitchen when a single recipe calls for it (okay, PLUS I'm too lazy to manouver heavy things around). So anyway, I thought it would be the same if I used my electric hand-held beaters to do the job. My goodness! I beated the mixture for aaaaages! I thought the sauce would never thicken up! It did eventually, but it was rather thick, and was probably more like super soft lemon and herbed butter than hollandaise sauce! It still tasted alright though. I wonder what I did wrong? In the old days, people didn't have food processors and made all their sauces by hand, so surely it's do-able!


I love poached eggs, because it's easier to achieve an oozy egg yolk than with other cooking methods. This dish, by the way, is a recipe by Bill, from his latest cookbook! Same with the roasted tomatoes (which is featured in his previous books), which I always make, because they're sooooo juicy and yum!

This arvo, I tried making macarons. I've made macaroons before with success (in that I achieved the characteristic 'feet', or pied. This time, however, I followed a recipe from a macaron book to the T, and didn't manage to get any 'feet' on any of the macarons! :'( I don't know if it's because of the extra mixing, what the author calls 'macaronnage', which may have toughened/dried the mixture, or because I left the circles of batter for too long to dry before baking them. Or I guess it could also be because I didn't use 2 identical baking trays, one on top of the other, to bake them... They ended up hollow in the middle, but they still tasted good! I was out of butter, so I made a chocolate ganache to sandwich them together instead of buttercream.

I sprinkled cacao nibs on a few of them just to try it out. The cacao nibs taste quite unpleasant raw, but after toasting in the oven, they're actually quite palatable, and I love the extra crunch it imparts! And let's not forget how good these are for us! An excuse (though probably a bad one) to eat more sweet almond biscuits! haha!

They may not look like the proper things, but they're still quite tasty! So tasty that before I knew it, I had overindulged. I felt really guilty when I looked at the two cooling racks, and saw that it had like only a quarter of the batch left!

While I'm talking about baking, here's what I made yesterday:

Chocolate chip and pecan cookies (also from Bill's Basics by Bill), and...

Iced Cinnamon Snail Rolls (from Bill's Sydney Food). The cookies are delish! I've never made cookies so crisp before! Yum! But these are best eaten on the day of baking - I stored these in an airtight container, but when I tried one today, it was not quite as crispy as it was the day before. Definitely a recipe I will use again though! The buns tasted quite good yesterday - moist, soft, sweet and sticky. Not quite the same story today though. But I guess that's the same for most baked goods. My dad said that he microwaved a bun today for lunch and said it tasted really good. I wonder if this will still be the case tomorrow...

A few days ago, I tried the savoury version of Bill's scone recipe - cheese and chive scones. They didn't rise as high as the plain ones, maybe because of the cheese content..? They would have probably tasted nicer had I buttered them with salted butter, instead of unsalted, since the scone batter does not use any salt at all. Maybe next time I could try sprinkling some Maldon salt flakes to the tops before baking, to enhance the flavour.

Enough about cooking, here's an update on my knitting projs!

I went to a yarn sale the other day and bought the following:

Actually with the Patons Sorrento, I only bought the mauve coloured balls - the others I bought some time ago. I bought the mauve, because I thought it would also make a nice Spring/Summer scarf, which is what I intend to make the other colours into. I was never big on accessories, but there's always a time to start. The other yarn is to make 2 garments from the Patons Mist pattern book.

I actually made this bolero in black, to match a dress I wore to a friend's wedding in September this year. Because it's a midnight black though, you can't really see the lace pattern, which is a shame, since that's the part you have to really keep focus on when knitting! So I've decided I will knit it again in the colour used in the book - deep magenta. It's not a colour I am particularly fond of, but it works very well with this bolero. One of the haberdashery shops I went to a few months ago had this same bolero displayed on a manequin in the shop's front display window, in this same colour, and it looked fab. That was probably when I decided to get the pattern book and knit that bolero. Anyway, here's some pics of the bolero I made. The length seems a bit different from in the book - I wonder if it's because they knitted at a looser tension than me... or maybe it's to do with how they slip-stitched the collar on? I thought about maybe knitting at a looser tension for my next bolero, but since the sleeves fit perfectly, if I do that the sleeves might end up too baggy. Oh the dilemma.

The white yarn is to knit this other pattern at a later stage. Maybe closer to Autumn next year. I seem to wear a lot of black, so the white would be a nice contrast.

"Skin care routine? Um yeah, every few months" :P

So after going to the book-signing, I decided that since I was out, I should look for a facial exfoliator, coz my skin is looking really bleh. I remember having heard good things about Dermalogica before, so I thought I'd check out their products. Unfortunately, the assistant there was new to the products and wasn't very confident when I told her that my skin is rather sensitive. So instead of waiting for another person to arrive to do what she called 'facial mapping', I decided to stick with the brand of the 3-step I have at home, which haven't given me any allergic reactions - Shiseido.

I am a total sucker for add-on sales. I know that's what they're trying to do, since I've been in retail before, but I still allow myself to get talked into buying stuff anyway. I think part of me just feels bad if I don't buy a product after the sales person has given so much information about it. So somehow, I ended up leaving the counter $190 poorer.

Tonight I tried out my now-5-step skin routine. I was told the use of the Bio-Performance exfoliating pad would see instant improvement. Alas, I felt like I was just wiping my face with a wet cotton makeup pad: no difference. A little red, if anything. Hopefully by the end of the 8 week treatment course, I will actually see results. The Skincare Moisture Recharge eye cream hasn't caused any reaction thus far; time will tell if it's doing anything.

What skincare products do you use?

More cookbook signings

MasterChef Australia's judges, Gary Mehigan and George Calombaris, released a cookbook together this year, called Your Place or Mine?. I went to their book signing today and met the chefs themselves! Gary is definitely my favourite of the two :) The queue was crazy long. It wasn't that bad when I went to Bill's the other day; but then again, that day, it was raining really hard. And I guess media exposure, especially one involving a nationally popular TV show, with ratings going through the roof, does make you more well-known. For me though, Bill, Nigella, and Jamie O will always be at the top of my list of favourites.


I haven't attempted any of the recipes in this book yet, but I've flipped through it, and there are quite a few scrumptious looking dishes that I'd definitely like to try out!

I'll be going to Gary's restaurant, Fenix, to have lunch in several weeks' time, so I'm really looking forward to that! I still haven't decided whether or not I should book to eat at Jamie's Fifteen. While I love Jamie's work, I just can't get out of my head that episode of his TV show, where one of the training cooks at his London Fifteen restaurant dropped a meat pattie, or meat of some sort, on the floor, and picked it back up again to use. I've heard about things like that happening in fast food places, but for the price you pay at a restaurant like Fifteen, you don't really want to have that image at the back of your mind while eating. hmmm To go or not to go; that is the question.

Scones for tea!

Today I tried 2 recipes from Bill's Basics: scones for afternoon tea, and the butterscotch madeleines for tonight's dessert.

I found 2 brand new patty cake pans and madeleine moulds, still wrapped in plastic, which I bought ages ago, in a storage box in the kitchen. I'm so glad I was able to find madeleine pans with a non-stick coating, because the mini madeleine pan I used some time ago, which isn't non-stick, still has cake bits stuck fast to it, I'm sure.

I made the plain, sweet version of the scones, and had them with strawberry jam and double thick cream. And let's face it - anything with cream is good.

I think these are the puffiest scones I've ever made; this is definitely a much improved version of the scone recipe in one of his older books. They are delish served warm straight from the oven.

The butterscotch madeleines were soft and light in texture. I used glucose syrup instead of golden syrup, as I didn't have any of the latter in the pantry. I don't know what I'm doing wrong, but the golden skin on the indentation side always sticks to the pan, so you can't really see the design on the biscuits. Maybe I should slather on heaps of butter to grease the pans next time, and see if that makes a difference...


Cake + icing sugar + cream = :)

Bill's Basics

I went to a Bill Granger instore book signing today, and got his latest cookbook, Bill's Basics, autographed. I love how he writes a message in the books he signs as well :) He is such a smiley, friendly and down-to-earth guy - on top of being tall and handsome, of course! I think I was in so much awe in his presence (always happens when I'm meeting a celeb) that I couldn't think of much to say. Only when I left the place did I come up with questions I would have liked to ask, for eg., "What's your favourite recipe out of all your books?" and "When are you going to open a Bills in this city?".

I am encouraged by his message to work through every recipe in this book, as well as his other ones. I've already picked out his scones recipe from the latest book to make for breakfast tomorrow morning. Or would scones with strawberry preserve and double thick cream be too indulgent for breakfast? Perhaps I should save it for afternoon tea? hmm I guess I'll have to wake up early tomorrow morning to decide!

My WIP

I finished knitting the back of the cardy night before last, and am now working on one of the front pieces (pictured). I'm not sure I like the yellow in the colour mix, and would've liked more pink. I guess it doesn't look too bad. I'm actually a bit concerned about the size of the garment, because the bodice part of the back piece looks rather narrow... I chose to knit the smallest size, because I'm usually an XS, but looking at the actual measurements listed for the size now, I'm not sure it will be big enough for a comfortable fit, especially if I wear something underneath..... oh well, I've gone too far to go back now. Fingers crossed that it will stretch to fit.

hmm I wonder if I should start a Spring/Summer knit now, since I probably won't get any use out of this cardy until next Autumn :P It's going to get sooo much hotter by the time I finish knitting it. See, I told you I get easily distracted. What should I do???

I'm really excited that I'll be seeing Bill Granger for the first time in person tomorrow :D I have already accepted the fact that there is no way I can carry ALL my copies of his books to the book signing, but I still haven't quite figured out which ones I should take along. It seems like such a shame to not get them all autographed when I have this opportunity, which doesn't always come. Maybe I should take the newest book and one of my older favourites? Sigh. What a dilemma.

Maybe I should just get back to my knitting - busy hands keep the mind from idle thoughts; that's why girls back in the day were made to do needlework and knitting in their spare time, right? :P

What? Mid-Spring already?!

As meaningful as Spring is - beginning of new life, etc etc - I can never cease to find things to complain about it: the large amount of weed springing up everywhere (however pretty the blooms may be); all the insects coming out of hibernation *shudder*; the dry, hot weather (if you close the windows at night, it's stuffy and hot; if you open them, the insects come in and bite you - so you can't sleep well either way.. and it's way to early in the warmer part of the year to turn on the aircon 24/7)...

I am usually only an Autumn-Winter knitter, but after having copious amounts of free time this past year to discover and become addicted to knitting magazines that the Newsagencies import from the UK, I have become more serious about this hobby of mine, such that I have decided to try to become an all-seasons knitter :D How could I not, with so many Spring/Summer knitting patterns to inspire me?

When I saw a catalogue advertising a yarn sale at one of the only few yarn stockists in my area, I had to go. Although the shop doesn't stock most of the yarn brands used in the patterns (as ever is the case), I figured I could find some substitutes. So there I was walking through each and every aisle, with my list of yarn types and tension details in hand, and I could hardly find any close matches. Summer yarns? The only 2 types of cotton/bamboo yarns available (yes, only TWO brands!) weren't even on sale! Thank goodness the yarn substitute that is recommended for 2 of the knitting patterns - Patons Smoothie DK - was available. A closer look at the labels, however, indicated that for one of the only 2 colours available that weren't ugly, the dye lots were all different, save for 2 balls. Someone walking past the yarn section says to her friend, "This place has WAY too much yarn". Oh, really now?

Still, I managed to return home with a bagful of yarn, enough to knit 3 garments that will be perfect for the warm months ahead. I'm using all my willpower to control myself from exercising my common practice of abandoning old projects to start new ones. I am easily distracted like that, hence my many UFOs. Some say "better one completed project than several on the needles" and others say "it's good to have several projects on the go, so you won't get bored". Both sound reasonable, but, no, this time I have to finish the project at hand first. My current project is a cute, feminine cardy from Noro Flowers by Jenny Watson.



It's so hard to tell with Noro yarns what the colour mix will end up like, even with the sample strips. The yarn that I bought for this project is Noro Silk Garden Lite, shade 2026. The grey/black features more heavily that I had thought it would, so I'm not sure if it will overshadow the young, light, flirty, girlyness of the style. We shall see.

Meanwhile, my goal of the week is to make atleast one recipe from each of Bill Granger's cookbooks (I've got them all, bar one, which should be arriving at my doorstep any day now). Sadly, I haven't made much progress. I did, however, make his famous scrambled eggs for breakfast and his coconut bread for lunch today (both from Bill's Sydney Food)! While I can't say I've mastered his egg-cooking technique (it still doesn't taste like his eggs at Bills), the coconut bread turned out surprisingly moist and delish, especially with a generous dusting of vanilla icing sugar! If there's any left by tomorrow (there's less than half a loaf left now), I'll try it toasted and smeared with unsalted butter, on top of dusting with icing sugar, as recommended in the book.

Tension, tension, tension.

Ok, so it seems that I will postpone my plan of intensive baking and continue with my knitting (just had another flip through my knitting magazines and was struck anew by the attractive and (supposedly) simple Spring knits!). I'm about to start knitting Laura Cruickshank's Paige top - tabard-style top - from issue 29 of Let's Knit, and this time, I decided I will knit a tension square :P I've always been under the impression that my tension is a bit on the loose side, but it seems, from this tension square, that it's the other way round. The dimensions I get, when flattening the square out as much as I can, is about 9.5cm x 9.5cm, instead of the requisite 10 x 10! There are perceivable gaps between the stitches as is - though I guess it could be because the yarn is a bit slubby - so I don't know how holey the fabric will be with an even looser tension! Oh well, we'll see I guess! I wonder if the wrong horizontal dimensions to my Bergere de France knit is due to too-tight-a tension...

I am resisting the urge to purchase more yarn to knit Sian Brown's Spring cropped top from issue 46 of Knit Today. I love the lemon colour of the modelled top, so I think I will stick with that colour when I order the yarn. It's so sunshiney and looks like the perfect Spring top! In Summer, one could wear this without layering too. The leaf lace pattern neckline in Sian Brown's Leaf Lace Top looks very pretty too, but I'm not sure about the shape of it or the cropped length. I think it would look nice with a normal-to-slightly long length, worn with a fashion belt. If cinching at the waist was intended, I'd emphasise that more, or else it would look like an edge pattern that's travelled too far up. I'll have to think about this one.

I'm off to find yarn sources!

I think it's cake timeee

I just ordered 3 books - and yes, all 3 are cookbooks! I've pre-ordered 'Jamie's 30-minute Meals' by Jamie Oliver (bless him and his wonderful food revolution work) and 'Kitchen: Recipes from the heart of the home' by Nigella Lawson. I had fully intended the third purchase to be for 'Knit Fix', which was recommended by a Knitting Daily newsletter, but I ended up getting side-tracked with the cookbooks and getting Rose Levy Beranbaum's second cake book, 'Heavenly Cakes', instead. Incidentally, this book was also voted 'Best Cookbook of the Year 2010' by the International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP) (her first cake book, 'The Cake Bible', which I also have, won the award in 1988).

I remember seeing her new cookbook at an interstate bookshop last year some time, but figuring it would probably just be an updated version of The Cake Bible, and keeping in mind my already over-stuffed suitcase, I decided to leave it, as I was sure it would become available at my local bookshops. I found out tonight though, upon reading about the book, that although it does feature an occasional repeat of a previously published recipe, all in all it is supposedly a book of modern cake recipes. Another reservation I had in getting another of her books is my extreme dislike for imperial measurements and temperatures in fahrenheit, which most, if not all, books published in the USA tend to use. I am a metric measures girl. Cup and spoon measurements is tolerable, but American measures just tick me off, because I have to whip out the calculator to convert measurements for every ingredient (and oven temp); not to mention, I can't remember the equivalent measures for the life of me!

But anyway, I found out about Ms Beranbaum's blog and how she has video clips showing techniques and things, as well as 2 blogs that do a Rose version of a 'Julia and Julia' thing (ie working through the whole cookbook, and posting results and pictures along the way), and I thought, hey, with these websites to help me along and gauge/compare the success of my attempts, this could potentially work out! hm I should probably start by digging out my copy of The Cake Bible and working through those first. Converting everything is going to be a beast of a job, but I guess since I spent the money, I'm going to make this work. Maybe it's not so bad to start a cookalong type blog either - that way, I'll be forcing myself to try and learn new things, which will surely benefit me. I guess my knitting will have to be given a rest for now! (I have, by the way, finished knitting the back piece of the aforementioned Bergere de France top, and am currently knitting the sleeves.)

Thursday musings

I'm knitting an AIS in ruby red Patons Zhivago right now. When I'm in need of an 'anything' yarn - a random yarn that I pick to try out a pattern - I almost always turn to Zhivago. I really like how it's so soft and the tencel in it gives it a nice lustre. I do feel though that because of it's squishiness, my tension sometimes goes a bit funny. Looking at what I've knitted so far, the stitches don't look very even. hmm am I just not controlling the tension well enough? I do use the wrap-around-pinky technique to help control tension. Where am I going wrong? Instead of undoing the whole thing and knitting it up again (which I have done, let's see, at least twice now :( ) I'm just going to leave it and try to turn a blind eye to it. What else can I do? I started knitting my leg warmers as well this morning, but I've put that to the side, because I got bored knitting double rib, and looking at my uneven stitches magnified, as the yarn is quite a chunky one. I'll post pics up of this problem of mine, when I get a chance. When will things go my way?

I'd really like to learn how to knit with circular needles and dpns, since most patterns for jumpers and socks use these needles. I've bought both types of needles in a few different sizes already, but fear of the unknown holds me back. Since a few of the patterns in my Bergere de France Origin pattern book only requires straight needles though, I will stick with the familiar straight needles until Spring comes.

The revenge of the tension square...

I've finally gotten around to uploading a photo of the Anthro-inspired scarflet I knitted for mum in Katia Dulce yarn (50% wool/50% acrylic). As the scarf made with the 10 ply BFL ply yarn just fits around the neck, I decided to increase the length of the second scarf by a few centimetres, because the Katia yarn is chunkier. You can probably tell by the photo that it's quite a snug fit. Mum loves it.

A current work in progress is the Bergere de France Origin' Collection #1 Bambou 03 pattern - a 3/4 sleeve V-neck top with a pretty bow and pleat feature. As the name suggests, the pattern was designed to be made with Origin' Bambou yarn. Instead, however, I've decided to substitute this with Sublime's Bamboo and Pearls DK yarn, as I really, really wanted to try out this yarn. Being quite lazy and used to not having to knit tension squares for smaller projects, I didn't bother with the tension square. As a result, measuring what I've knitted of the back piece now, the vertical dimensions are correct, but the horizontal dimensions are out by about...5cm (I know, I know, I totally should have seen it coming). Judging from the picture in the pattern though, it's not meant to be tight-fitting; in fact, on the model, it's quite loose around the arms and shoulders. I am hoping this means that by reducing the horizontal dimensions, I'll actually achieve a well-fitting garment *fingers crossed*. This is also the first large-sized project I'm attempting, (normally I choose small projects like beanies, shrugs, scarves..) so if this works out, maybe I'll have a new knitting direction.

I've recently added more yarn to my stash. I bought the Debbie Bliss Luxury Donegal Tweed online to knit a tabard-style top that I saw in a knitting magazine. The rest of the yarn was bought at a yarn sale at a local homewares/craft store. The plan is to use the red Patons Zhivago to knit another Anthro scarflet; ditto for the mint Moda Vera Chantilly (yes, I like it that much); the Cleckheaton Studio Mohair is for Louisa Harding's Juliet Scarf (it's 8 ply, but hopefully it will still be ok!); and the Cleckheaton Nautico is going to be used to knit leg warmers from the pattern book of the same name, by Jo Sharp. With only one month left of Winter, I've got to knit fast!

Indulging too much in my hobby? Maybe.

Project: Slouchy Hat

Yarn: Evoke Blue-faced Leicester 10ply/Lightweight aran in Rosa

Pattern Source: Bernat

I literally just finished knitting a matching beanie for my scarflet, using a Bernat pattern. I really like the pattern created by the cabling. It's probably one of the coolest looking beanie designs I've come across that use straight needles; unfortunately, most probably because I didn't use the specified yarn, the beanie actually turned out a bit smaller than average... :'( I guess I'll just have to give it to someone else.

Also on my needles at the mo, is another Anthro-inspired scarflet for my mum. This time, I'm knitting it in Katia Dulce in brown (col 11). I tried to post a pic up, but for some reason I'm only able to add photos to the top of the post. Weird.

I ordered Knitting Little Luxuries by Louisa Harding the other day, so hopefully I will get it next week! There is a problem though - I've tried looking through so many online yarn shops for Louisa Harding's line of yarns, but very few stock them, and those that do don't stock a large range. I still haven't been able to find a reputable online store that sells Kimono Angora, which is what I need to knit the Juliet scarf in the book I ordered. Her Spring/Summer pattern book, Belle, is also on my wishlist, but because of the yarn sourcing problem, I might have to give it a miss.

Another completed project!

Project: Anthro-inspired Scarflet
Yarn: Evoke Blue-Faced Leicester 10ply/lightweight aran in Rosa
Pattern source: Kim Seio (Ravelry)

I just finished knitting up the Anthro-inspired scarflet by Kim Seio. Isn't it so cute? I added an oversized flower-shaped, coconut-shell-textured button to it too, which I think adds to the cute factor. I actually quite like the pattern on the reverse side better than the front, and wouldn't mind wearing it as the right side. The edges are curled though, which is a problem. I have read on some other knitters' blogs that they block this scarf... I've never blocked anything before (well, none of my previous projects required blocking), so maybe I should skip this. It wasn't in the pattern anyway. (I wonder if I can just squish it between 2 books or something for a while :P)

I should probably mention that the BFL yarn I used ended up to be pretty nice to work with, and knitted up into quite a soft fabric, which feels nice against the skin. The colour - gentle pink and brown hues - is quite pretty also. It's going into my list of favourite colourways for sure. Oh, and you can see my first attempt at a centre pull ball in the picture as well :) It sure does it's job well, so thanks to whoever came up with this ball-winding method.

Tangled up!

I decided today that I was going to start knitting my Anthro-inspired scarflet. Partway through unravelling my new skein of BFL yarn and winding it around my hand into a ball, I decided that it didn't seem like it was the correct way to do it. This is only my second time working with yarn in a skein (the first time being the pink lace-weight yarn - and you can see from the picture in my last post how that turned out!), so I don't really know what I'm doing. So I hopped onto my laptop and did some Googling. Of course, I found out that I was indeed doing it wrongly, and consequently had to unwind my ugly deformed ball of yarn. Anddd now I have a pile of tangled loose yarn in front of me that I have to form a centre pull ball out of. Wish me luck.

Yarn, glorious yarn!

I received the yarn that I ordered online from The Yarn Cafe this afternoon. It's a hand-dyed Bluefaced Leicester yarn (lightweight aran/10 ply) in Rosa ($20/100g). With this yarn, I'm going to try my hand at making the Anthro-inspired Scarflet by Kim Seio (Ravelry). There's a group on Ravelry that focuses on knits inspired by Anthropologie - an online store that sells womens clothes, accessories, bags, and homewares. This brand seems to be pretty popular among knitters, although I had not actually heard of it until I came across this scarf pattern.

The lovely yarn shown above is another purchase I made from the same shop a few weeks ago at a textile arts festival. This one - also hand-dyed - is called 'Drift' and is composed of 20% bamboo/80% superwash merino 4ply, in Raspberry ($24/100g). I actually like the look and feel of this yarn much more than the BFL. I guess that's the problem with buying yarn online - you don't get to touch the product and see it up close, so you don't know if it's the thing you have in mind, until you actually receive it. Locally, there are no specialty yarn shops available that I know of, so I have no choice really.

For the record, this year's textiles expo is the thing that got me into hand-dyed yarns. Hand-dyed yarns are much more expensive than commercial yarn, but I appreciate how each skein is unique, so no one can ever have the exact same shade of colour as you. Also, if you're going to spend time and effort knitting up something, you might as well make it that little bit extra special.

At the expo, I also bought a skein of Haiku, a lace-weight yarn made of 40% silk/60% mohair in Evening Pink, by Alchemy Yarns of Transformation ($30/25g). I bought this with the intention of knitting the lace scarf the stall displayed. When I tried making it, however, the number of stitches stated in the pattern didn't produce the right width measurement. I tried knitting with VERY loose tension, but even then, it didn't look right, and the loose tension made the design look really gappy and unattractive. As such, I decided to unravel what I'd knitted, having to cut off long lengths of yarn that were too hard to untangle, in the process. And now it's just sitting in a bag, waiting for inspiration to kick in.

Another purchase made that day was a ball of Noro Kureyon Sock Yarn, 70% wool/30% nylon ($24.70/100g). Interestingly, it's a 'sock yarn', but I've just noticed, while reading the ball band, that it's actually a single-ply wool yarn. Why wonder it's so thin! I've tried Noro Silk Garden before as well, and, to be honest, I don't like either very much, the sock one least. Silk Garden would actually be quite a nice yarn to work with, if it wasn't for the fact that it was speckled throughout, from start to finish, with what looked like bits of wood, straw, and some sort of dried spiky weed. What do the manufacturers store their yarn in? A garden shed? Initially I thought that maybe I was just unlucky and selected a bad egg. BUT, I found a similar problem with the Kureyon sock yarn (though the problem was not as bad)! Another let-down with the Kureyon Sock is that it feels very rough, not unlike knitting with brown string. So why did I buy the sock yarn, I hear you ask? For the simple reason that the pattern calls for it. For the above reasons, I've pretty much lost interest in knitting the lace scarf. That, plus I've sort of stuffed up the lace pattern at the beginning :P

I'm surprised that no one else seems to be having any problems with this yarn. Or maybe they don't mind it. Some people like working with fibres that have 'texture', if the oohs and ahhs of admiration coming from the expo stalls featuring Habu textile yarns is anything to go by. Some of these yarns are lovely and a lot of the patterns using them are gorgeous... but stainless steel? Seriously? That's what I call fashion over function (unless you're going to use it in the kitchen).

I bought the above yarn, Bamboo and Pearls DK (70% Bamboo sourced viscose/30% Pearl sourced viscose) - a new 2010 Spring/Summer yarn by Sublime - a few months back, after spotting a gorgeous 3/4 sleeve top with bow feature, in the Bergere de France Origin' pattern book. The original patterns calls for Bergere de France Bambou yarn, but I thought that since the cost of the yarns are similar, I might as well buy one that I've wanted to try for ages (and hopefully it will knit up to the same tension!). How special does PEARL yarn sound? I am a bit obsessed in the allure of pearls, so when I first read about this yarn, I was super excited.

I had a hard time picking out a colour, but I eventually settled with Thai Tea, because I thought it would be nice to knit with a natural looking colour. I sort of wish I had chosen a pink or a purple now. The yarn has a nice sheen to it, and looks like it will knit up with a nice drape. In case you're wondering about the little packet of lollies in the first picture, it came in the parcel with the yarn :P

Recently completed knitting projects

Project: Arm warmers
Yarn: Lincraft Cosy Wool (100% wool)
Pattern source: Lincraft Winter Yarn

I finished knitting these arm warmers yesterday. As you can probably tell by the photo, one arm warmer is a bit darker in colour than the other. This is because I actually started knitting the first arm warmer last year, and when I got around to doing the second arm warmer just recently, I was unable to find more of the same yarn in my stash (although I'm pretty sure I bought enough yarn for both last year!). As such, I had to buy another ball, which is obviously from a different dye lot.
These are pretty warm, and I love how the cuff is flared. My sister did comment, however, that they look a bit like workers gloves! Never mind that she wants me to knit her a pair as well!

Project: Beanie for Him in 1x1 Rib
Yarn: Patons Jet (30% Alpaca/70% Wool) in shade 1
Pattern Source: Patons Beanies in Merino Totem DK & Jet 12 ply

Shown in the picture above is the beanie I recently finished knitting for my dad. This is the most masculine colourway I've worked with so far - it's good to know there are guy-friendly colours available out there, besides your typical solid black, greys, and blues. An easy knit, I finished this beanie in about 2-3 days. The result was a thick, soft beanie.

I've recently also completed a batch of cute-as beanies for the premmies at a local hospital. Hopefully the sizing is okay and the hospital doesn't have any rules about not allowing embellishments on the beanies, etc. It's a bit weird that the hospital foundation's manager wants to meet me, but I guess that way I'll be able to get instant feedback.

An article I read in a knitting magazine a while ago about KasCare's 'Knit-A-Square' project really caught my eye. I'm really interested in contributing to this worthy cause, but I think by the time I get to knitting items for this charity, Winter in South Africa will be over already :P I guess there's no harm in starting now and stocking up on things to ship off next year. Check out the charity's official website at http://www.knit-a-square.com/

Winter for some reason, like Christmas, evokes a feeling of charity in most of us. For me, when the chill sets in, I think about the 'Little Match Girl' story, and am reminded of how many real life children there are out there stricken with poverty, and without clothes to keep them warm through the cold seasons of the year. As I am not financially able to support the needy, I intend to use my hobby of knitting to do so. I encourage all knitters to do the same.

First blog post!

Welcome to my Knitting Tearoom! This is a place dedicated to my love of food, knitting, and other crafts. So sit back, relax, have a cuppa - who knows, maybe you'll be inspired to start a knitting or culinary journey of your own!