The Colour Knitting Disaster

Hey, I have an idea! Why not jump straight in the deep end and learn colour knitting with a somewhat challenging owl mitten project? And how about not finding out exactly what a thumb gusset means before starting to follow the chart, surely that's a good idea too?

Try #1

So yeah, this is how far I got. It's not a completely horrible mess, but it is lumpy as hell, what with all the too tight floats at the backside. So I am secretly pleased that I totally ignored the instructions of starting to add stitches for the thumb gusset straight away... This way I had an excuse (or a reason even) to rip away and start again. 

I also spent half the night scouring YouTube and all kinds of knitting related sites to try and find out what I could do to stop the ugly puckering. No instant help was found, other than remembering to stretch out the stitches on the needles all the time (or trying to learn how to have one yarn on the right hand, English style, so that the tensions of the two yarns would be more even. After half an hour of trying to get at least some kind of tension going with my right hand and failing miserably, I gave up). I also found this video of a new type of way to hold the yarns in your left hand but couldn't for the life of me understand how she twists the yarn over in the beginning. 2 am might have had something do with the lack of brain function, so maybe I'll try again today.

Meanwhile, if anyone has good tips to share on how to achieve a perfectly smooth and lovely surface when colour knitting, please please please let me know! The owls and I would be ever grateful! //

Kannattaa aloittaa kirjoneulonnan opettelu vähän hankalanpuoleisesta mallista ja jättää tsekkaamatta miten mallin mukainen peukku tehdään. Purkuhommiksi meni... mutta onni onnettomuudessa sentään: ärsytti tuo jäljen epätasaisuus muutenkin. On muuten vaikeeta yrittää saada niitä lankajuoksuja olemaan tarpeeks löysät ettei menis ihan kuprulle tuo neulos! Jos on jollain hyviä vinkkejä tähän niin otetaan ilolla vastaan...

With love, Lilje

The Malaysian Yarn Hunt

Pheew, I'm finally back on Koh Phangan! The holiday wasn't very restful as first my boyfriend got the nasty bug and then I had some stomach-problems of my own, but at least I got some shopping done in Kuala Lumpur. I also froze my ass off watching Hobbit in an ice box cold cinema, but that's another story... The idea was to buy yarn for Horatio and Oren owl mittens and dropped stitch mitts from Knitscene accessories plus needles to do the State street cowl. Of course I didn't find exactly what I was looking for as the yarn weights were different (and the colours were pretty blah as well, to be frank), but let's see what I come up with with the ones I found. Have to try and get the tension/gauge right this time!

The Maycraft shop that I mentioned in this post turned out not to be the heaven I was expecting, but a tiny little place deep in the suburbs of Kuala Lumpur (pretty much like the one I visited last time). So the trip wasn't really worth the price and effort of the taxi ride, as there is a perfecly ok little crafts shop just next to the hotel we were staying at (and which I still had to go to, as the Maycraft shop didn't have thick enough needles that I needed for the cowl). But now there is yarn and needles. The only thing missing is a ruler, so that I could measure the gauge swatch correctly. The only ruler I have is printed behind a yarn wrap, that is currenlty sitting in storage here on Koh Phangan (oh the joys of moving house). I will hopefully get it tomorrow, as we managed to get such a shitty motorbike for today that we're sure it'll explode if we try to make the trip to the other side of the island.... Or then I'll just go and buy a ruler from the town. It costs like nothing, I'm just making excuses. Can I play the jetlag card if the time difference between KL and here is only one hour? Maybe this is just dehydration from all the a/c we've had. Pheew! What I need is a good night's sleep. Tomorrow, I promise I'll start making the gauge swatches! I'll keep you posted.

With love, Lilje

The Meme

Sorry English speakers, this meme is in Finnish so I'm also answering the questions in Finnish. //

Hahaa, eka postaus suomeksi! On ollut vähän hankalaa yrittää päättää, millä kielellä tätä blogia oikeen naputtelisi... kavereita kun on monen kielisiä, asun Saksassa, joten pitäs jotenkin ehkä englanniksi kirjoittaa. Lisäksi on tosi kivakin kirjottaa enkuksi, siinä tulee jotenkin ajateltua asioita eri kantilta eikä vaan mulautettua kaikkea ruudulle ajatuksenvirtana. Olenkin nyt pähkäiltyäni päättänyt, että ehkä pitänee kirjoittaa molemmilla kielillä :)

Harakanlauluja-blogissa oltiin vastattu hauskankuuloiseen meemiin, ja koska Minna ei ketään erityisesti jatkohaastanut, päätin ottaa ohjat omiin käsiin. Oon lapsesta asti tykännyt kaiken maailman ystäväkirjoista ja slämäreistä ja mitä niitä nyt oli, missä piti vastailla kaikenmoisiin outoihin kysymyksiin. Tässä siis oma rivini. Haastaa voisin vaikka Hupsistarallaan Norsiksen, "eilenteinin", Herkun ja koukun tytöt, Leipovan Lunnin, Neulovan Nartun, Peruspöperölän Virpin ja Muita ihania -Tiinan. Ei nyt hullukaan yhtätoista jaksa haastaa! Ja siis toim. huom, haastetta ei ole pakko ottaa vastaan jos ei halua. Menen myös siitä mistä aita on matalin, eli samoilla kysymyksillä kuin Harakanlaulujaisissa:

1. Miksi aloitit bloggaamisen?

Blogeja on ollut jo useampia tähän mennessä, mutta jotenkin ne ei vaan ole ottaneet tuulta alleen. Päätin nyt vielä ottaa yhden uusintaerän, jossa olisi koko elämä samassa paketissa: leipomukset, neulomukset ja muut kuulumiset (jossain määrin). Olisi niin kiva saada tästä arkisto omista tekemisistä, kun ei sitä kuitenkaan viikon päästä enää muista yhtään mistään mitään.

2. Horoskooppimerkkisi?

Vaaka, eli puntaroi järjen lähtöön saakka kaikkia mahdollisia vaihtoehtoja. Mitään ei voi koskaan päättää äkkiä. Jos pitää valita, valitsen yleensä molemmat.

3. Minkälainen mielentila sinulla on juuri nyt?

Koti-ikäväinen. Reissu on ollut opettavainen ja talven pakeneminen loistoidea, mutta nyt alkaa jo riittää. Tahtoo kotiin, omaan keittiöön ja omaan sänkyyn, omien kavereiden luokse.

4. Onnellisin muistosi?

Apua, ei tämmösiä voi tietää! Laitetaan vaikka äkkiseltään nyt se, kun tuli päivä jolloin elämä Berliinissä alkoi rullata ja huomasi, että tykkää siitä kaupungista niinkuin karhu puolukoista (eli siis paljon). Oli voittajafiilis.

5. Lempikukkasi?

Muistan ehkä neljän kukan nimet niin laitanpa ne: orkidea, ruusu, lilja, tulppaani. Kaikki kukat on ihania, en vaan oo millään lailla kukkatietäjä niin nimet ei pysy päässä.

6. Haaveidesi aamupala?

Kaikenmoisten mahaongelmien ja niistä johtuvien pakkonirsoilujen vuoksi vastaan, että hyvä valikoima ihania, vehnättömiä leipiä, paljon eri juustoja, tahnoja ja hilloja niiden kanssa. Iso vati tuoreita hedelmiä. Edelleenkin vehnättömiä mutta kuitenkin syntisen hyviä keksejä ja kakkuja. Tiramisua. Suklaamoussea. Smoothiebaari. Ja muut juomassa kahvia niin voin haistella sen tuoksua. Mmmm!

7. Oletko puutarhaihminen ja miksi?

Haluaisin kovasti olla, mutta mies vetää tässä pidemmän korren. On ihana suunnitella kasvattavansa kaikenlaista ja niinhän sitä tehdäänkin, mutta sitten kun hommat alkaa mennä ns. mehtään eli lehdet kellastua, kukat kuihtua ja mitä näitä ongelmia nyt onkaan, niin aika tassut tervassa siinä on. Eli avuton, siis. Haaveilen silti puutarhapläntistä jonne voisi istuttaa kaikenlaista, unohtaa merkata rivit ja kitkeä sitten versot rikkaruohoina. Niin siinä kuitenkin kävis.

8. Mitä olisit harrastanut lapsena, jos nyt voisit päättää?

Ainoana lapsena olin aika herkullisessa asemassa, kun sain kokeilla vaikka mitä. Olin kuvataidekerhossa, soitin pianoa, kokeilin telinevoimistelua ja jalkapalloa, pelasin jonkin aikaa pesäpalloa. Ratsastus kuitenkin on se, joka jäi mukaan. Jos voisin nyt päättä, niin olisin halunnut partioon. Sinne mua ei ikinä kuskattu enkä tajunnut itse pyytää. Se ois varmaan ollu hauskaa, ja siitä ois ollu hyötyä. Saattaisin nyt osata esim. sytyttää nuotion (mitä en todellakaan osaa).

 

9. Rakkain esineesi?

Lapsuudenaikaiset pehmolelut: possu nimeltä Töpseli ja lumileopardi (eli leijona, sama asiahan se, eh?) Leo leijona. Kuvaa ette nyt saa, kun raukat ovat aika kaukana, odottelemassa emännän paluuta. Töpselillä on mahassa pussi, jossa se kuljettaa poikasiaan. Näistä on kuitenkin varmaan puolet kadonnut, kun yliopistoaikoina kavereideni lempileikki oli Töpselin porsaiden piilotus erinäisiin paikkoihin... kaikki eivät koskaan löytäneet takaisin :(

 

10. Oletko aamu- vai iltaihminen?

Jaa-a. Aamuisin en pääse ylös, mutta jos pakotan itseni esim. tallireissun takia, on ihan mahtavaa, miten pitkälle päivästä riittää. Iltaihminen haluaisn olla myös, mutta silloin alkaa nukuttaa. Olen siis öö päiväihminen? :)

11. Mikä on parasta jokaisessa vuodenajassa?

Kesä: Lämpö (toivottavasti) ja sateenjälkeiset tuoksut. Puistopiknikit. Se, ettei tartte miettiä, mitä pitää laittaa päälle kun lähtee ulos, vaan voi vaan T-paidassa hilpaista.
Syksy: Kuulaat ja kirkkaat päivät. Ruska. Sohvannurkkaan käpertyminen. Punaviinin kulutuksen kasvu.
Talvi: Joulu. Laskettelu- ja mökkireissut. En ole muuten talvi-ihminen, kylmyys ja pimeys on hanurista. Siksi olenkin nyt tropiikissa...
Kevät: Ensimmäiset kukat. Silmut puissa. Eka minirusketus. Vappu ja Baumblütenfest, jossa tarjoillaan kotitekoisia hedelmä- ja marjaviinejä (hyviä, ei kiljua).

Tässäpä nämä. Kiitti ja kuitti!

With love, Lilje

The Cotton Yarn

As the socks of doom (well, they weren't that bad) are now done, it's time to start thinking of a new project. The only yarn that I have left is the Novita Hanko cotton yarn, that I have almost three skeins of.

Yesterday I browsed Ravelry like mad, trying to figure out what to make. I really wanted to make some kind of a small bolero/shrug to take with me on the psy trance festivals next summer but I quickly noticed that the bolero would turn out gnome sized with only (almost) three skeins of this bulky stuff. So, change of plan.

Socks? Naah, I just did a pair. Scarf? Naah, too boring. A cowl? Hey, there's an idea! There were a couple of candidates, but this one crossed the finish line first. So, Kuala Lumpur and your lovely yarn shop, get ready, because my shopping list just grew with a couple of needles!

Have you made any cool projects with cotton yarn? :)

With love, Lilje

The Night At The Doctor's

So yes, holiday. Bali is lovely, and Ubud, the place we're staying at, even lovelier. Like last time. But it is the rainy season. It seems that we've been spoilt rotten on our little Thai island that has seen such a small amount of downppo. It's supposed to be monsoon there as well, but it has rained, like seriously rained, only a couple of days during our whole stay there.

Here it seems to be another story. And I don't really mind the weather - you can always go and take a 5 h package of wraps, massages, scrubs and whathaveyou in a nice spa somewhere if it's raining cats and dogs. But I do mind, when life decides that holidays are as good a time as any to make my boyfriend start puking his guts out for several hours. Luckily there is a small clinic nearby and we got a drip in him and some meds going. After a fretful night all seems to be in the mend, and were already back "home", looking at the gray sky through the window.

Well, there are still plenty of days left. Things can only get better from this, right? Right? //

Hyvää lomaa täällä, joku karman kosto kai tämä, mies sai tosi äkäisen oksupöpön ja yö vietettiin tippa kädessä klinikalla. Nyt jo parempaan päin. Säät ei nyt suosi myöskään, sadekausi. Sainpahan ostettua potilasta odotellessa uunilämpömittarin ja luettua The Helppiä. Jotain hyvää sentään.


With love, Lilje

The Mismatched Socks

Yay, they are done! Pheew, this was truly a learning experience once again. Although honestly speaking all projects are learning projects as I'm still very much a beginner... But they are done, they are warm and I like them, although there were numerous things that went wrong...

Space-dyed (liukuvärjätty) yarn isn't the best for socks, some say,
but I like the mismatched look. It's like something Pippi Longstocking (Peppi Pitkätossu) would wear :)

So, what did I learn? First, learn how to count tension/gauge (tiheys), girl! How I managed to mess it up so royally, I still don't know. But hey, there's always the next time. Second, with my style of knitting I just cannot have multiple purled (nurjia) stitches in the beginning of the needle. They stretch out beyond recognition, pulling the previous knitted stitch from the previous needle with them. But once you move them to the end of the needle, ta-da, no trouble at all.

Then I also noticed that 3 p 3 k rib (joustinneule) is so not my thing. Well, maybe if the needles had been thinner the rib would have stayed in shape, but even so, better change that to something else the next time I see that in a pattern.

I apparently also cannot count stitches when it comes to doing cables. As you can see from the pictures, nearly all of the motifs are of different size. They were supposed to have 5 rows between all "cables", but some now have four, some five and some might have six. Oh well, wonky is the way to go...

You can also tell the difference between me knitting normally and me trying to really knit super tight to make the socks a bit less big. (Also my shoulders noticed the death grip I had on the needles. Ouch!) There are 12 motifs on each sock but because the sock without the neon green stripe was knit tighter than the one with the stripe, the last motif (that might look like a leaf?) is bigger than in the other one. I don't mind, though :)

The pink stripe in the ankle is almost in the same spot in both of them!

Do you also think when you're knitting the foot of a sock that it's not possible for anyone to have such long feet? :D I always find myself doubting halfway through whether the instructions in the pattern were meant for Goofy, especially with socks that have such a low leg (varsi) as these ones.

Oh, and this is hilarious: After I'd done the second, tight-ass sock and noticed how much nicer the rib looked, I decided to rip the first sock starting from the ankle/cuff. I'm pretty sure that everyone else knows that when you rip the "wrong" way, things get way more complicated. How on earth can the yarn twist and turn in such a way that it's impossible to rip the stitches without pulling the yarn through every single knitted stitch by hand? Is this normal? Or did my socks just have a life of their own? Oh well, I managed to get a couple of rows ripped and knit them then again, tighter. And it did help a bit. But I still think I might need to buy some elastic cord for the leg... And I also came up with a brand new (?) term! If ripping by knitting backwards is called tinking (knitting spelled backwards) and ripping in general is called frogging (frogs say ribbit... get it?) then by ripping "backwards" I just gorfed these socks! Ha! :D

Pattern: DROPS short socks

 Yarn: Drops Big Delight

Needles: 5 mm

 Mood: Yay, they didn't turn out so bad!

In other news: the holiday starts NOW! Tomorrow evening we will be in Ubud, Bali. Stay tuned :) Oh, and for the benefit of some of my Finnish readers, I added some Finnish terms in the mix. I don't know if you need them or not, but the linguist in me always wants to help everyone. Hope that doesn't get everyone even more confused ;)

With love, Lilje

The Waste Yarn Patchwork Project

KotoLiving magazine started an interesting project: to learn new knitting patterns by knitting batches with waste yarn. Two batches with each pattern will make altogether 92 patches, and the instructions for compiling these all into a jacket will be found in the Autumn issue of kotoLiving. I'm not sure about the jacket part of this, but knitting small things and combining them into something new sounded like fun. So, here are the first two, made in moss stitch (seed stitch, helmineule).

Do you have any ongoing patch projects? :)

With love, Lilje

The Paneng Curry

We've been cooking embarrassingly little while we've been staying here in Thailand. Yes yes, we have excuses: the kitchen is tiny, and the mamas down in the village make such good grub for such a small price. But once in a while we crack open the curry paste and whip up a batch of lovely Paneng curry (or the boyfriend does while I chop the veggies and watch...) Here's an especially taste recipe, taken from here.

Do you like your Thai/Asian spicier or non-spicy? I prefer mine with just a little kick, thank you. Not so nice with the water-running-out-of-eyes-and-nose experiences...

Paneng Kai

300 grams of chicken
1 1/2 cups of thick coconut milk
2 tabelspoons of thai chili paste
3 Kaffir lime leaves sliced
6 Thai basil leaves
4 fresh Thai chili peppers sliced (or less if you like yours milder)

veggies (we used eggplant, bell pepper, carrot, broccoli)
1 tabelspoon of Thai fish sauce
1 tablespoon of (mushroom) soya sauce
1 tablespoon of sugar (palm sugar, if available)
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1/2 tablespoon of chicken oxo (or replace with ground stock cubes)

1: Stir 3 tablespoons of the coconut milk & chili paste in a hot sauce pan. (Don't let the coconut milk boil!)

2: Add the chicken and continue to stir for about 5-7 minutes. Add veggies.

3: Add the sugar, and remaining dry ingredients, continue to stir. (Be careful with the oxo. Try adding half and adding the rest at the end of preparation to make the dish suit your taste.)

4: Add the soya sauce, fish sauce, chili peppers.

5: Add the remaining coconut milk and stir.

6: Add Kaffir lime leaves and Thai basil leaves.

7: Once cooked, serve with a side plate of Jasmine rice (and decorate with slices of Kaffir lime leaves).

With love, Lilje

The Bracelet

I got into making knotted bracelets before we left for Thailand, so I took some cord with me on the trip. Needless to stay, it ran out in a couple of weeks. And the street vendors aren't really keen to sell cord and beads as they want you to buy their own bracelets (which are really nice, by the way). There was fortunately one dude who had some leftovers he was willing to part with. Beads? No. Those he needed for himself. But luckily there were some to be found in Kuala Lumpur.

With love, Lilje

The Yarn Fever

31.12 was rainy almost the whole day, but the evening was good enough to go to the beach, set off some lanterns and celebrate the year change. It's hard to believe it's 2013 already! It seems like we came to Thailand only a short while ago, and it's already been 4 months. We're more than halfway through our trip! Yikes...

Because of our tourist visas, we have to do visa runs every two months to get another entry stamped in our visa. This time we're heading to Bali (and KL as transit) and are having a bit of a holiday after the work filled Christmas "holidays".

As the trip draws closer, I find myself drooling over Maycraft website. Just look at this abundance of... everything! It's gonna be one baffled taxi driver who gets to take me there. On our last visit to Kuala Lumpur I visited a small crafts shop which turned out to be pretty hard to find. It'll be interesting to see how many times the driver has to ask for directions this time (despite also having a map)...

So yes, what to buy? On my making list are at least Barbara Gregory's cutesy owl mittens, dropped stitch mitts from Knitscene accessories, The Groke mittens (you know, the misunderstood "bad guy" from the Moomins?). Hmmh this seems to be an awful lot of mittens... Maybe I need to buy yarn for some sock projects as well? As I really need to practice those heels! And I also need a bunch of new needles as I only have the dp 5mm and 6mm in addition to the circular 4,5mm. And some stitch markers! And and... ;) We'll see what I can fit in my backpack as I plan to by some home decor items from Ubud in Bali as well.

Have you made any New Year's resolutions? Or what do you plan to knit this year? :)

With love, Lilje