Clogs of 2012

I made three pairs of clogs in 2012, a pair for myself, Lee, and my sister who asked me for some. Lee and I wore through ours in Japan, so threw them away when we moved. Our current place has all hardwood floors and no rugs, so new slippers were a must when the weather began to cool! I love the

Mine, very similar to my old ones but pink instead of red (and a rather bad picture):

Pattern: Fiber Trends Felted Clogs (Ravelry, mine)

Yarn: Patons Classic Wool in Plum Heather and Lion Brand Fisherman's Wool in Nature's Brown

Needles: US13/9.0mm

Timeframe: September 18 - 30, 2012

Mods: I use Judy's Magic Cast-On to start the soles because I hate seaming.

Problems: None, love this pattern!

Lee's (also not a great picture), colors chosen based on what stash I had available:

 

 

Pattern: Fiber Trends Felted Clogs (Ravelry, mine)

Yarn: Knit Picks Wool of the Andes and Japanese wool in Black, Patons Classic Wool in three blues for the cuff and sole.

Needles: US13/9.0mm

Timeframe: October 9 - 27, 2012

Mods: I use Judy's Magic Cast-On to start the soles because I hate seaming.

Problems: I ran out of both of the original colors and had to use some other black and blue yarns from the stash to finish. He doesn't mind, and I got to use up more stash, so I'm not complaining!

My sister's (also a bad picture), in the requested Barney the Dinosaur colors (though I think the green is a bit bright). In retrospect, I should have needle felted three green dots onto the purple for more Barney-ness:

Pattern: Fiber Trends Felted Clogs (Ravelry, mine)

Yarn: Patons Classic Merino in Royal Purple and Leaf Green

Needles: US13/9.0mm

Timeframe: November 21 - 30, 2012

Mods: I use Judy's Magic Cast-On to start the soles because I hate seaming.

Problems: None, except that I wanted to finish them by Thanksgiving but forgot to start them until, oh, the day before.

Biscornu

Last time I talked about the pincushion I received from a swap. This time, now that my partner has her biscornu, I'm going to show of the one that I made! I made a handheld one, roughly the size of a typical tomato pincushion so my swap partner could use it as a pincushion rather than earrings or a scissors fob or something like that. Biscornu earrings are adorable, and I may have to make myself a pair someday!

For my partner, I chose an Ink Circles design for the bottom and a Day of the Dead free pattern I found for the top, adding some flowers to fill out the stitchable area. I dyed the Aida cloth with tea so the white skulls would stand out against it, and then stitched the two designs:

Obligatory backside pictures because I love them so much:

I followed a tutorial through Own Two Hands when putting the biscornu together. Next I outlined them so they had the same number of backstitches around for seaming. I also added some scrap fabric for stability and to be sure the stuffing doesn't come out too easily:

Finally, I seamed and stuffed it, adding buttons to the center of each design to pull in the middle so it is in fact a pincushion and not somewhat spherical:

Top view, biscornu'd:

Bottom view, biscornu'd:

I am so very pleased with how it turned out! I'm currently on a cross-stitch kick and want to STITCH ALL THE THINGS! but I have some knits I need to finish due to deadlines, some others that I really want to wear, and cross stitches don't count in the Harry Potter House Cup. I'm trying to earn ALL THE POINTS there - maybe next month I'll have something I can use a cross-stitch piece for.

Sigh. So many things to craft, so little time!

Swap!

I participated in a biscornu swap through a Ravelry group I joined. A biscornu is a small ornamental pincushion usually made with two squares sewn together to make an 8-sided shape. They are typically cross stitched (or embroidered, or done with blackwork, or stitched in some other way) and there are a LOT of patterns and tutorials on the web so you can make your own. I got an excellent green pincushion with lovely beads accenting the edges (and bonus cat!):

Top View:

It shall live on my bookshelf and probably be the repository for cross stitching needles. I know I had a bunch of them somewhere before, but I have no idea where they went! I typically get kits and each kit comes with a needle. I've lost some but have completed enough kits that I should have a pile of needles, rather than one per current WIP and two extras. Very curious.

My swap partner also tossed in the extra beads and some yarn - this will definitely become a pair of earrings and a bracelet!

I am very happy with what I got, and I hope my swapee is as happy with what I sent. What did I send? Stay tuned to find out!

The Only Chemistry I Understand

I was always pretty bad at Chemistry. Some parts were okay, like how the electrons filled the shells and chemical reaction equations, but for the most part, I hate Chemistry and it hates me. However, baking and candy-making are full of Chemistry, and I can do those!

This Christmas I'm with the in-laws in the northeast US, first time since we got married that Lee and I have been with family for the holidays. We had Thanksgiving with my family, and I made chocolate pudding and lemon meringue pies, and now we're with his family and have a longer time for break. I also didn't have the time to make Christmas presents like I usually do for everyone, and I didn't have time to make pasta for them like I did for my family either, so I'm making a LOT of candy here as the majority of my holiday contribution.

We've got:

English toffee. I do half milk/half dark chocolate, and the Hershey's chips I got this time just didn't set right, and then when I put them into a colder place, they both bloomed so it doesn't look so great. Still tastes fine though!

Cake truffles/balls (original), All Recipes version here. I baked this white cake, made the traditional Joy of Cooking frosting, and dipped them into milk, dark, and white chocolate. For the frosting, I used 1/3 cup of shortening, 2/3 cup of powdered/confectioner/icing sugar, 1/4 tsp of vanilla and 1/4 tsp of another flavor, a generous splash of milk (1 Tb?), and then enough additional sugar to give it a good consistency and flavor. I made two frosting recipes, one with peppermint and one with almond as the other flavoring, and crumbled half of the cake into one and half of the cake into the other. The milk chocolate didn't set correctly this time either, even using the 1 Tb shortening per 1 cup of chips, so I think I may skip the Hershey's chips in the future. The dark chocolate did set this time, and the white chocolate set beautifully. I sprinkled some powdered candy canes on the mint-flavored ones to differentiate them, and I think it's quite cute! They aren't beautiful circular truffles, but that shouldn't affect the taste one bit.

Caramels. This recipe worked beautifully, the only problem I had was that the paper stuck to both batches. Quite annoying; I tossed some chunks after scraping most of the paper off of most of it.

Peppermint marshmallows. I love, love, love these in hot cocoa!

Caramel covered marshmallows. I made vanilla marshmallows, then coated them in caramel, then scraped the 100% stuck-on paper from the caramel with a knife. The vanilla marshmallows are amazing, I highly, highly recommend making them if you want to try making some marshmallows. Luckily, the caramel only covered roughly half of the marshmallows so the rest of it is available for eating, hot chocolate, and these:

Chocolate covered marshmallows. I used some of both types of marshmallow and coated them in milk and dark chocolate, sprinkling the peppermint ones with the candy cane powder again. The dark chocolate ran out with two marshmallows to go, so there are two white chocolate peppermint ones as well.


I'm pleased with how well everything turned out, even if the chocolate didn't always set right and I had to wrestle with the paper on the caramel. Overall, I am very happy with the holiday spread!

Christmas Cross Stich

I made this one as a gift for my husband. Not sure if he'll like it and put it by his desk at home or at work or if we'll end up putting it in the bathroom or something, but I think it's excellent!

16ct Aida with some leftover "wine" floss from a kit I had and DMC Antique Effects in E3685 (burgundy) and E310 (black). Credit for the idea and design goes to beefranck on Flickr. I saw the original version while looking through subversive cross stitches and knew I must make one! I just changed out the horses to something I liked better, using Pic2Pat to create a chart from a vector image of the Ferrari horse logo. I do think that the smaller version on linen is much nicer than the larger version I've made, but I'm not unhappy with mine either. Backside glamor shot:

Hooray for finishing things!

Baby Gifts!

I have a niece on the way, so of course, baby gifts had to be made!

We've got a baby dress that is more of a shirt, due to using a too-small needle and having not enough yarn:

Pattern: Little Sister's Dress (Ravelry mine)

Yarn: Louet Gems in Burgundy and Old Gold

Needles: US1.5/2.5mm

Timeframe: November 28 - December 26, 2012

Mods: 2-color version, shorter and without bottom ribs due to lack of yarn.

Problems: None aside from lack of yarn and boneheaded needle choice.

A baby blanket:

For this blanket, my mom picked out a pattern for the blanket and I used stash yarn. I'm not too pleased with the softness factor and should have gone up a hook size or two to help with the softness/drape, but oh well, I wasn't about to rip it out and start back over when I realized!

Pattern: Baby's Best Bumpy Blanket (Ravelry mine)

Yarn: Caron One Pound in Cream

Hook: USI/5.5mm

Timeframe: December 19 - 25, 2012

Mods: None.

Problems: None, unless you count wishing I'd used a different hook size.

I thought it looked a bit naked and unfinished without a border of some sort, so chose another stash yarn and searched through Ravelry and the internet at large for crochet borders.

Pattern: Lacy Vs Edging (Ravelry mine)

Yarn: Caron One Pound in Leaf Green

Hook: USI/5.5mm
Timeframe: December 25, 2012
Mods: None, except that it's written explicitly for one blanket pattern and I used it on another, so my stitch counts were different.
Problems: None!

And a hat, but that one can't be shown off yet. I wanted to make bootees too, but I managed to get a cold that knocked me off my feet for a couple of days and didn't get there. Oh well, dress, blanket, and hat are still a good pile of gifts!

2013 Goals

I'm still getting the hang of this grad school thing. I have few, simple (I hope) goals for this year.

1. Get projects down to single digits and keep them there.
2. Reduce stash down to under 6/30/2012 levels, i.e. lower than it's been since I started charting.
3. Finish any and all gifts I want to make on time.
4. Participate in the Harry Potter Knitting and Crochet House Cup all three terms.
5. Finish everything I start in 2013.

I'm fairly certain that #4 is in the bag; it just needs me to remember to sign up for it and to start and finish a project nine months out of the year. Totally do-able. As for the rest? We'll see.

Happy 2013!

Photo taken by Tom Magliery