Purple Pants

There is only one body that could possibly fit into these pants. I bet you can guess who that might be. You can't? I will give you a hint. Look at the next picture.

Oh, you still can't figure out who that is? OK. Here is another hint.

Now you know who I'm talking about.

It's Iris, the Gourmet Monster! She looked a little....bare without pants, so I whipped some up for her. I think they are great. To be fair, I was inspired by another Iris Creator, who made a lovely sweater for her Iris. Now Iris can walk around town in style.

Little Red Wren, In Progress

I did take a break to make some purple pants, but other than that, I have been working full steam ahead on this tshirt sweater. It's about 70% done, I think. It's the first time I'm making a garment for a human without a real pattern. This basically means I have to do Math (!) as I knit along. I think it has a forgiving type of structure, so it should allow me to make a few miscalculations in terms of size, but I'll have to wait and see.

And it's also the first time that I'm using this type of construction. Actually, the good thing about this type of construction (mostly top-down, as opposed to bottom-up) is that I can try it on as a go. I think the neck opening might be a bit too small, but that might stretch out when I block it, I think. That top part that you see me wearing was knit side to side: from the end of one sleeve, across the chest, and then to the end of the other sleeve. Then the body of sweater is picked up in a sort of tube and knit down to however long I want it to be. Sounds easy, right? I think it is. I'm just never sure how things will hang/behave when they're done. This yarn has a bit of weight to it, so it will pull everything down a bit**. I have to take that into account when I'm doing The Math, but how much to take into account is up in the air. Now that I think about it, I really don't know why I decided to make something that didn't have a pattern. Usually I like to have every step spelled out for me, otherwise I have very little confidence that it will work out.

**The last sweater I made grew and grew (and grew) when I blocked it, and this has me erring on the small side now, even though I am using totally different yarn. I will have to get some pictures up of that last sweater, I'm just realizing. Hmm.

Sunny
It's been a sunnier winter than our previous 3 winters here -- I've really noticed it. We might have a bit less snow, but I think it's a good trade. I remember the first winter here, it was so very dark and gloomy. I thought, how do Newfoundlanders manage to stay cheerful through this doom and gloom weather? Manitoba winters might have been waaaaay colder, but at least the sun was usually shining. This year has been really sunny, and I'm glad about that.

So I got some sunny coffee cups to celebrate the weather. They are a good size - not so big that the coffee gets cold by the time I finish drinking it, and not so small that I'm getting up and going to refill my cup every few minutes. And also, they look cheerful hanging on the cup hooks that I swore I wouldn't use (too much visual clutter)!

And now that it is almost March, I am allowing myself to look forward to spring!

Our Daily Winter Walk
 

Sad/Happy 
Sad because friends are moving away, happy because we had some very good times with them in the last few years. I know we will be moving soon, too. This has been a good wake-up call for me - to mentally prepare myself for the next move. We have really started to feel at home here, I think. It's been almost 4 years here - it's gone so fast!

p.s. I made this cake for the party, with this frosting and this mousse filling. We also had my first attempt at gluten-free cupcakes (with white chocolate frosting), impossible coconut pie, and our favourite blueberry cheesecake. We also served our first batch of damson liqueur - to a few brave souls...

Red Wren
New project. A short sleeved sweater (t-shirt?) like this one. It's going well so far, and I love looking at the colours as I knit along. The yarn is Hand Maiden Casbah, which is a sock weight. Hand Maiden is a Fleece Artist label - a Canadian company based out of Nova Scotia. They make some beautifully dyed yarns. This colourway is called Sangria. [I find red things very tricky to photograph with our little point-and-click, and I've fiddled with a lot of settings. Just doesn't work out well. In these photographs everything is a bit too blue.]

Meet Iris
  

Now who could have such cute little feet?

Iris, that's who!

Iris is for an equally cute (actually cuter) almost-one-year-old. I hope she'll like her! She was super fun to make.

Paint Chip Sunday

Home is Where the Heart Is

A Monster
 

I've started a new project while I wait for my sweater to finish blocking. This one is a change of pace, and much more colourful. It's a pattern by Rebecca Danger. I really love all her patterns, because they're simple and expressive at the same time. I'm hoping to use up some stash yarn for this one, so it's going to look a bit hodge-podge and random, but I think that's OK. I made the body yesterday and am on to the legs today. It's going really quickly, so hopefully I will have some finished pictures for you soon!