While I can easily resist adorable babies, resisting cute baby knitting patterns is much more challenging. Alas, my babies are much too old for quick knit sweaters and accessories. However, there are knit worthy parents on whom I would love to shower sweet baby knits.
This week, I stumbled across two patterns that were quickly added to my Ravelrybaby and toddler bundle: an Icelandic cardi by Hélène Magnússon called Gilipeysa and Baby Duck Booties by Meagan Anderson.
Hélène Magnússon’s Gilipeysa
Meagan Anderson’s adorable duck booties
Are you on Ravelry? If so, are we friends? I’m Ciaobella and you can see the rest of the favorites in my Babies & Toddlers bundle.
A photo posted by Alanna Nelson (@tactiletravels) on
I return to Master Knitter corrections.
Miki hat top view
Next up: the revised fair isle hat. My first pattern had errors, for sure. The reviewers did not feel that my pattern reflected traditional fair isle motifs and was too snug of a fit.
Miki fair isle watch cap
This time, I’m citing peeries from Michael Pearson’s Traditional Knitting and making the hat in 2 sizes (for those of us who prefer a snug fit while shoveling).
All was well with the Mikidue pattern until I ran out of orange yarn with merely 6 stitches left in the peerie. Ack.
Of course, this particular shade of Cascade 200 Superwash is discontinued. Where would we be without the internet? The up side is that I can work one last tiny peerie of orange for the crown.
The orange yarn will hopefully arrive this week. Perhaps these corrections may be posted before Thanksgiving? I’d better get knitting!
As an art quilter, collecting and admiring art quilts comes part and parcel with the passion. This fall, I vowed to support the Studio Art Quilt Associates Auction for 2015. With 358 members submitting work, this is a mind boggling bounty of techniques and voices expressed in 12″ x 12″ quilts.
With my small, defined budget, my bidding opportunities meant I could participate toward the end of the week’s bidding. On the other hand, the selection of beautiful quilts that I could get with my small, defined budget was bountiful!
Last week, the latest addition to my art quilt collection arrived:
Dawn Allen’s 3 D art quilt is now mine! Dawn is a fellow Massachusetts/Rhode Island Studio Art Quilt Associate member. Hurray!
You can run on down to the Fuller Craft Museum to see another Dawn Allen quilt through January, 2016.
Ok, maybe not millions but certainly dozens of knit mittens. Hyperbole may be my middle name…..
My upcoming mittenggeddon began bubbling in the spring. Lost gloves, worn out mittens and well worn hand warmers meant knitting for hands should be on the horizon. While air conditioners buzzed in August, thanks to Ravelry’s library search, I discovered patterns I already owned and didn’t even remember! Do you keep track of your patterns in Ravelry? This nice video gives you the low down on how useful it is.
But back to warm hands during New England winters… Using the search option in my Ravelry library, more than three dozen patterns for hands were available. Personally, my wussy hands need some type of cold weather protection any time the weather gets below 60 F (15C). As such, I need at least 4 different kinds of hand coverings to get to spring again.
Cedar Shake mitts by Juju Vail and Susan Cropper
Last fall, I brought home the Cedar Shakes pattern after visiting London’s lovely Loop . With one hand warmer finished, I figured this was the first project to finish. However, this knitting project loved Shanti Retreat so much, it rummaged up the karma to stay behind (or was I silly enough to leave it under the bed?). So do I cast on another pair from stash or do I make another pair of Eric’s Glovelets?
One of many pairs of Eric’s Glovelets I’ve made
I first saw Jodi Colella whipping up a pair of Eric’s Glovelets in perhaps 2008. Normally, I make mine without the palm finishing, which makes them reversible and quicker to knit. I love its little mock cable.
The Peppermint Lounge Mittens have an interesting construction and are knit on straight needles. While white mittens have no space in my life, I think these would be a great early or late winter mitten to whip out of worsted weight remnants.
Adrian Bizilia Peppermint Lounge Mittens
A nice pair of gloves looks polished when the occasion requires. I enjoyed knitting Ysolda Teague’s Vintage Buttons Gloves. However, I needed to make the fingers much more fitted than her pattern outlined. This time, let me try Ruth Garcia-Alcantud’s Deux Violettes gloves.
Deux Violettes Gloves by Ruth Garcia-Alcantud
Once winter gets fierce, warmer mittens are required. I’ve completely worn through my pair of Kerri Shanks’ Cozy Lined Mittens. Last time, I lined the mittens with alpaca, which was simply divine. I shouldn’t complain if mittens wear out after years of use. Just knit another one, right?
For shoveling or winter walks, my hub asked for a thick pair of mittens, so I think I’ll buy Aria Reynold’s Roving Lined Mittens. There’s a yummy alpaca yak yarn that just showed up at In Stitches, and this will give me the perfect opportunity to go beyond my stash for mittens.
But thrumming will appear in my winter, I’m sure, so I’m off to download Lynette Meek’s East Coast Mittens, which has a nice thrumming explanation. The mitten pattern also includes a gusset, which is important for a long wearing fit, imho.
Of course, what I really want to knit: a muff. As a tiny tot, my sister and I shared am muff (or did we argue about who would wear it?). Most likely made of bunny hair, it was soft and beautiful. I’d like a soft and beautiful muff, maybe of alpaca yarn. But first, get those hands ready for cold weather!
And the mittengeddon begins! Anyone want to join me in the gathering of mittens?
A flash sale on Southwest Airlines suddenly snapped my long held daydream of visiting a Quilt National exhibit in Athens, OH. Owning several of the exhibit catalogs is never the same as seeing art in person. How I thoroughly treasured my afternoon dose of reality at the Dairy Barn, hanging out with the 84 expressions of art quilting today.
Choosing quilts must have been challenging for the jurors. Quilt National seeks to create a statement of today’s quilting trends; quilts that balance historic roots and yet incorporate new techniques and experimentation. As such, one could easily define this as a quilt exhibit and not a surface design or mixed media exhibit. Rich in message and layers of media, I saw these quilting trends:
Upscaling and recycling: True to a patchwork tradition, many artists used clothing and scraps in their work.
Adobe Photoshop: This software has become the quilter’s favorite. Whether creating images or modifying photographs, digital image manipulation is part of many quilters’ visual vocabulary.
Beyond textiles: From Deidre Adams‘ layers of paper to Wen Redmond‘s metal, to stones and other ephemera become integral to art quilting.
Machine quilting: The norm and not the exception, by longarm or free motion, machine quilting has become the norm. Storytelling through stitching was evident in many works. Hand quilting, what will happen to you?
Machine Embroidery: Creating embroidered texture and images made dramatic statements on many works.
The show was hung well, using a variety of different mechanisms to let the work hang. Lighting was also generous and focused, without being detrimental to the longevity of the work. I walked around the exhibit once, soaking up the different artistic flavors… and the flavors were striking. There was often an enormous shift from one quilt to the next. Certainly the curators spent a lot of time trying to find the right flow.
Next to each quilt, the label stated basic quilt information and a QR code that would take you to the artist’s web site. I appreciated the artists who gave you a landing page with their QN15 image and perhaps a statement about the piece before exploring other aspects of their web site.
The Dairy Barn Quilt National 2015 You Tube Channel gives you a fantastic background for many of the works on display. Throughout the summer, I had viewed videos as they were released. This formed the basis of my second tour of the exhibit, back to visit the quilts I remembered from videos. I toured the exhibit one last time, listening to the artist’s video as I looked at the quilts. Got two minutes? Watch one of their videos… they are well done.
Quilt National closes today, but fortunately you can enjoy their YouTube channel to hear many of the artists speak about their work. If Quilt National 2017 is on your summer travel list, swing over to my travels in Athens, OH blog post for more scoops about enjoying the area as well as the art quilts.
