Finished (at least almost):
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| For the love of Rainbows- shawl |
- Safetytentacles: I have four of these beasties finished. They're crocheted with a 3,5mm hook and made with cotton yarn. I don't know if I've talked about this here already, but the idea of these is that they're for preemie-babies who need to be hooked up in machines. Since babies have an innate need to hold on to things, they tend to grab on to tubes (which of course should be left alone). They're given these tentacle buddies, so they will grab on to the tentacles and the essential tubes will be left alone.
- For the love of Rainbows shawl: This is one of my few completely finished projects. The pattern can be bought on Ravelry, and the design is by Mina Philipp, who has a lovely video podcast. I used a bulkier yarn (Novita 7veljestä, which is an aran-weight yarn, 75% wool / 25% nylon) and 4mm needles. It didn't take me more than maybe a week to knit, but as I hate weaving the ends in, I only got it completely finished right at the end of March. But it's done! And I have used it, even though I felt mad using such a pastell-y colour for it. It's lovely and I'm sure it will se more use next winter.
The nearly-finished objects - Socks for newborns: 3 pairs of these, but they need to be washed and the ends need to be woven in. These are also going to the hospital, to the newborn wing. I'm in a Facebook group that has a contact to the hospital, so I'll be sending the tentacle buddies and socks to her, and she will deliver them to the hospital. The group has the basic instructions for the socks, but I'm kind of fiddling around with a bit of patterning and I make little differences to them, since I can't see myself making huge amounts of socks (even if they're tiny) with the exact same way over and over again. But a good thing to do with leftover yarn, since a pair takes about 25g of Novita Nalle-yarn on 3mm needles.
- Two dishcloths: Really simple pattern for a dishcloth, which can be found on Ravelry for free. The pattern is "Grandma's favourite dishcloth". I've made them slightly bigger, the original pattern goes to 44 stitches and I went up to 52. The yarn is Onion Hemp+Cotton+Modal (which I had left over from a romper-project that's still kind of in progress, so it can be found below...) and 3mm needles.
- Mittens: They're just peeking in the picture on the top-left corner. Those were made with the yarn I had left over from the rainbow shawl. I had almost 100g of both yarns, so first I decided to make mittens, and -since after the mittens there was still plenty left over- a hat from it (the hat is still in progress). Pattern for the mittens is called "Mittens of Northern Ostrobothnia", which is the larger geographical area, where my hometown is located. Pattern is in Finnish, but if you're not new to mittenmaking, the pattern on that page will be plenty, I think. I made a different kind of thumb on it, but I don't know the correct English term for the thumb I used... Anyway, the pattern has you do an afterthought-type of a thumb, but I like the type of thumb better, where you increase stitches to make room for the thumb. I also couldn't be bothered to make the pattern on the thumb, so it's just a plain 1-yarn thumb. The mittens are also kind of negative versions of one another; one mitten is white with the pattern made with the self-striping yarn, and the other is striped with a white pattern.
- Socks for me: The last thing that I have just about done, is a pair of socks for me from leftover yarn. Again, the yarn is Novita Nalle (Nalle = teddybear), but I used smaller needles than I usually do with this yarn. I tried 2,5mm needles, and I rarely use needles this small, because of course your progress is faster with slightly bigger needles. No particular pattern used, but out of sheer boredom in sock-knitting, I used a contrasting colour in the top ribbing , heel and toe (a different colour per sock) and after a long break I tried on some cables. The end result is ...well, nice. Not amazing and the cables have some mistakes, but for the main part, they're ok. And at least they're something different to the basic vanilla-type socks.
Whiew, this is turning out to be a long post, so just quickly and with broad strokes I'll go through what I've got going on in terms of yarn-y things.
In progress:
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| Romper and beasties |
- Safetytentacles: I still have parts for 12 more beasties, but I need to make eyes for them, and they need to be stuffed and sown up.
- Socks for newborns: The next pair of newborn socks is half done. For this pair I've used the pattern from Hermione's everyday Socks-pattern. I have bought a box from the post office and I intend to fill it up with the beasties and socks, after which I'll send it forward. Hopefully I'll get it done before my due date..
- Romper for my own baby: I looked for a pattern for this from Ravelry, but I can't remember anymore what the pattern was and I've adapted it quite a lot along the way. It still needs snap fasteners sown in and some other bits and pieces done, but the main part is about ready. I knitted this at the beginning of January, so I really can't remember the needle size anymore. The yarn was that Onion hemp+something and other I mentioned earlier. It feels a bit rough for now, but I'm hoping that washing it a few times will soften it up some.
- Colour affection by Veera Välimäki: Bought the pattern from Ravelry and I'm currently going strictly according to pattern, so 4mm needles with fingering weight yarn. So far it seems like quite a quick knit, but the pattern has short row shaping, which I've done really rarely, so I'm a bit nervous about that. We'll see what happens...
- Rainbow hat: From the shawl leftover yarns, no particular pattern, but it has some colourwork in it since the point is to have as little leftovers as is humanly possible.
- Leftover-yarn socks: Yes, still more socks to thin my stash down, these ones are colourwork socks made with Novita 7veljestä (7 brothers)-yarn and 3,5mm needles.
- Crochet blanket from bamboo yarn: Originally bought with a scarf-type thing in mind, but I bought 6 balls of the yarn (3 per colour) and after I had used up the first two balls I realized that the yarn wasn't going to be nearly enough, and the bamboo yarn was quite pricy. So the scarf would be really expensive, if I wanted to make it with this yarn, but the yarn itself is really beautiful, so I decided to make a blanket for the baby instead. If it turns out to be too small for that, it can be a cover for the stroller or something.
- Cross-stitch holder for my crochet hooks: I have planned on making some cross-stitch detailing on my wedding-dress so it's a good time to start back up with cross-stitching. I liked doing this when I was younger, but my problem has always been that I don't see the point in making non-funktional things (meaning purely decorative, don't-know-where-this-would-go-type of things), and I couldn't come up with anything to use cross-stitching for. Well, now I have some ideas..
- Poncho-with-sleeves: Wont go into too much detail with this, because I have a strong feeling this will get ripped out soon.
- Highland travel shawl: Another Ravelry pattern, a free one. Inspired by Outlander-series (which I still haven't watched..), made mainly with leftover yarns. Using my Novita Isoveli (Big brother)-yarns for that with 6mm needles. And I don't follow the pattern very strictly, I'm using it more as a guideline.
I'm probably forgetting something (or many things) from the In Progress-list, but as I'm getting a bit embarrassed about how many works in progress I have going on, I'll leave the list for now. I think I'll do this on the first Sunday of the month, though I'm sure I'll mention finished projects more frequently (and probably will leave those ones out of these haul posts...).
How's the diet? I've been so good this week! Haven't bought any new yarn since I visited Titityy and everything that I've started has been from stash-yarn (well... obviously, if I haven't bought anything new..) At the moment the Yarn in - Yarn out-balance is a bit under 600g on the plus side, but considering my yarnsplurge a few weeks back its not that bad of a figure, I think.
