I had to chuckle at this…
I haven’t met too many Opals. I met only one in real life, she happened to work in the same building, when I worked out of the home. I rarely see the name used, so it’s nice to stumble across the name… even if it is in a comic strip. That being said, I do like the fact that my name isn’t common.
Photo Source: Pickles Comic Strip
Resistance was futile, I’m now knitting a Beekepers quilt.
I’ve been trying to fight off working on ‘the quilt’ for several months. I even mentioned that quilt a few months ago. Here’s a quote from that post…
But back to this lovely knitted quilt. It’s made by knitting hundreds of honeycomb shapes aka hexipuffs. I’m planning on making at least a queen size quilt… think about that, I’ll be turning yarn into honeycombs, which will then be joined to create a queen size quilt. That will take some time. This is an item that will be passed onto my daughter. The beauty of it is; she’ll be able to watch some of the process. I plan to start on knitting this quilt this Fall.
To take my mind off that quilt, I’ve done a few more rows of my lacy fern afghan, and while it’s coming along quite nicely, I really wanted to make something that would be thicker and warmer. More like a quilt you know? Well, I’m now knitting a Beekeepers quilt (I’ve also heard it called the hexipuff quilt) and before long I’d knitted 1.5 hexagons.
I wanted to finish the second hexipuff, but it was late and I was extremely tired. So the work in progress puff was tucked into my project bag to be completed sometime today. I’m really enjoying these cute little puffs, so it’s safe to say that I’m officially working on my knitted quilt.
I don’t think I’ll be knitting the lacy fern afghan for a while, the time spent on that will be focused on my knitted quilt.
As usual I’m not following the pattern exactly
To be honest, the pattern is quite easy to figure on your own, in fact I made my own knitted hexagons, squares, circles, and other shapes years before I purchased this pattern. But, I purchased the pattern, since I like supporting other designers. Since most animal fibers make me itch,the yarn used is 100% cotton.
Judging by the hexagon calculator, I’ll need at least 187 348 hexipuffs and 19 half hexipuffs to turn all the little puffs into a quilt, so this project will keep me busy for some time.
I’ve seen a few people comment on why people don’t join the hexagons as they go, and I can’t help but think that perhaps some of them are like myself…. I’ll be using a lot of colors and won’t know how they’ll look together until I’ve finished all the hexagons, so for me (and I imagine others) it makes sense to save the sewing together of all those hexagons (to form a quilt) until the end.
I’m feeling sad that I’ve sworn off my DPNs for a while, but I’m consoling myself by thinking that I’ll have plenty of hexipuffs to make when I lift the DPN restriction. However knitting in the round with my interchangeable circular needles is not bad, and making these tiny hexipuffs gives me the chance to use magic loop every single day.
My daughter loves the hexagons, and so I imagine I’ll be taking a detour to make a miniature beekeepers quilt for her Monster High dolls.
If you want to make your own Beekepers quilt, you can purchase your own pattern at Tiny Owl Knits website for $5.50, but if you’re a Ravelrer why not purchase and download it through Ravelry? In doing so, you can upload the Beekeepers quilt pattern to your queue.
A few moments ago, I stumbled upon this lovely shell counterpane from the 1860s. Many thanks to a fellow ravelrer for commenting about a bedspread that she was knitting, since it’s the only way I discovered this lovely counterpane.
Of course Q of Curls and Q and Nicole of D’Nali came to mind, since I know they enjoy vintage patterns. You can print the updated version of the knitted shell counterpane, download the original knitted counterpane from the 1860s, or do as I did and snag them both. Both versions are now in my crochet and knitted binder.
The good news is, I’m still only using magic loop for all my circular knitting –yes that includes small objects too. My lovely DPNs are calling my name for small circular projects, but thus far I’ve been firm. Thankfully, I have a long term (work in progress) knitting project that has me using magic loop often.
This new project, a knitted quilt, has me doing the make one left (M1L) and make one right (M1R), although simple, the results are lovely.
Magic loop is a process I learned soon after I purchased my first pair of circular needles in May 2012. I received my first pair of circulars from my local craft big box stores (Michaels and AC Moore.) I’ve since moved on to Knit Picks nickel plated interchangeable needles. And while I found I was quite capable of doing magic loop, I always reverted to using my double pointed needles — I love them.
Besides the DPN love, part of my hesitation for doing the magic loop has been tied to the circular cable… I’ve always been concerned that it could cause them to pull apart from the actual needle, but the more I thought about it, I realized I was just making excuses… after all numerous knitters use the magic loop right? They seem to be doing just fine.
I’ve decided to temporarily set aside my beloved double pointed needles — for now. Similar to how I abandoned knitting (for about five months) when I was learning crochet back in December 2011. Currently I don’t know how long they’ll be taking a break, but I know it’ll be a few months at least.
Sometimes we can become set in our ways, but when it comes to trying new things… or improving myself, I’m always open to trying something different.
But this past Saturday, I got to thinking about stepping outside of my comfort zone, and once again I picked up my circular needles, and before long I’d made a knitted tube dress for Purrsephone (doll wearing purple dress and one of my daughter’s Monster High dolls.)
The dress was made using three needle sizes; 11, 6, and 4, and although my gauge was slightly off since it’s been a while since I’ve worked with magic loop by the time I moved on to my next project they were back to the uniform stitches.
Hmm, so what is this? My daughter wants a blocky type amigurumi monster, but we both agreed that it isn’t looking like a monster at the moment. Just some shapeless thing that sprouted an ear. This will be my first amigurumi project that I will knit in the round, the others like the knitted amigurumi snake were seamed.
Last evening I picked up stitches on each side of the ‘ head’ and made ears. They look like pig ears don’t they? The top of the head was cast off using the three needle bind off method. No pattern was used, I’m just playing with stitches/techniques. I’m using size 4 circular knitting needles for this project.
Ideas I have are usually made into a small project first… because of this my daughter has reaped the benefits with many small finished objects; most of my ideas are made into doll items or some type of amigurumi toy before they’re upgraded to children and adult items.
Last Sunday, while on our way to church, my daughter and I saw this lovely visitor hanging out on our front porch.
I suspect this praying mantis had already laid her eggs (to be hatched next year.) She carefully looked us over, and after determining that we weren’t a threat she continued basking in the early sun rays — while my daughter and I hung out with her for a few moments.
Praying mantises are always a welcome sight in our garden, since they hunt and kill insects that would damage our crops.
I love insects, and praying mantis are one of my favorites so I usually try to make time to marvel at how awesome they are whenever I see them.
The females are generally larger than the male, and if the male isn’t careful he’ll become a meal for his cannibalistic companion shortly after mating. Be happy that human mating customs aren’t so deadly.
Our God is great, and has created out some amazing things, take time to enjoy life — it passes by so quickly.
Windows could not complete the installation. To install Windows on this computer, restart the installation.
This is definitely not a message you want to receive when you’re doing a new install…
But it’s what I encountered a few days ago when I chose to reinstall Windows 7 64 without losing my data.
What worked was shutting down the computer, and holding down Alt and F10 as soon as the computers power was back… I kept holding it down those keys until It brought me back to the reinstall menu. Depending on your computer you might have to use a different F key… but it’s worth a shot if it fixes the problem.
Ultimately I had to wipe out all the data since attempting to save the data brought the same error message again. I wasn’t too worried. I always back up my important files to another source (a external hard drive, and something else in my case) and so should you — if you aren’t already.
Photo Source: Orlando Sentinel
If I kept all the crafts I made, you might eventually find me on a show where they help people reclaim their homes, by eliminating their accumulated items.
I create a lot of items with my hands, fortunately I also love to share with others. Shocking I know since I’m a selfish crafter, but as I tell my friends I’m only selfish in that I make what I want, when I want. I do have a fiber worthy list, for people I know, but when it comes to donating to charities… I’m all over that.
I mainly donate to local charities, but I do send items to people in other countries. I crochet bears for The Mother Bear Project. Donated crocheted and knitted bears are distributed to children, with HIV, in third world countries. I’m also a member of my Lutheran churches quilting group the machine sewn quilts we make are sent to the Lutheran World Relief. These lovely quilts are distributed to those in need here in the United States, and also in other countries too.
Hats are my favorite small project to crochet or knit… they tend to work up quickly (unless the pattern is extremely intricate). Recently I started knitting hats for a local hospital. It turns out preemie hats are much appreciated by the families who receive them. I must say, that it felt great reading the responses on my knitted preemie hat posts, and the additional emails from folks who somehow stumbled upon that post. It’s not why I do it though, I don’t need recognition to help those in need.
A few weeks ago, I joined the Chemo Cap Pattern Library on Ravelry, two of my family members lost their battle with cancer within the past five years. I’ll be whipping up stylish hats (for a local hospital) for those cancer patients that have experienced hair loss.
I also joined the For the Children of Pine Ridge Reservation a charity group that donates crocheted and knitted items to Indian children within Oglala, SD. My daughter and I both have Indian heritage, Black, Blackfoot Indian, and Irish from my father’s side, and from my daughte’rs father German, Lumbee Indian, and Irish.
With the amount of patterns I’ve discovered from the Chemo Cap Pattern Library, and the crocheted and knitted books I have, my hooks and needles will be occupied for quite some time.