MOONSTITCHES

rainy season - つゆ (tsuyu)

Lots of rain, slowly drying laundry, ajisai (hydrangea), Calpis and first kakigori (shaved ice). And new rubber boots.
Time for expeditions and twirling around.

A no-pattern skirt with a little saddle yoke (thanks Sooz!)and elastic, finished in no time, and a new cardigan that took forever. Started some time earlier this year and was almost done before the move.
When I picked it up again only one front part had to be knit but I had a hard time remembering what I did exactly with the first front... the pattern is to be found here and sized for up to 24 months. I modified it a bit to make up for a larger size and different gauge. I haven't taken notes though and can't say anything about it now. Only that Dagny fell into a muddy puddle that day two weeks ago and the cardigan had to be washed, ending up even larger after drying.

I used yarn I had on stash, but I didn't have enough of the off-white for the band and had to distract from its different colour there by using two additional contrasting yarns (red and blue). That worked well and I even like it better this way.
The yarn is Munsell King from Yuzawaya, nothing fancy but really soft. I don't expect it to be looking well for too long though, too bad because this cardigan will be fitting for quite some years.

To see the skirt better, two pictures from yesterday:

Thank you so much for the craft room love and have a good day everyone!

My room...

must wait.

Hi, I said I'd be back with the photos of my room but I thought it would be a nice exercise to get back to more frequent blogging by showing you more of that everyday not so exciting that's going on in this house instead.
Early afternoon means snack time here in Japan and of course that darling girl of mine expects something sweet to be presented on that occasion... today's oyatsu (snack) was homemade mochi with a blend of kinako and two kinds of sugar, emphasis on the kinako (soybean flour).

And there was some knitting on the table, too. I started making a simple cardigan for me in Beaverslide Fisherman Weight (old 2-ply), Granite, lovelovelove that yarn.
This year's summer is strange. So slowly getting warmer, often still chilly enough to wear cardigans or woolen sweaters, even during the day... a bit odd. Maybe it's only here in my area? I think I have a good chance to wear my new cardigan before next autumn, when I am hurrying a bit with the knitting.
However, now it's time to go to bed.
Bye!

A replacement for the hat Dagny lost in Tokyo a few weeks ago. Took a while because the first attempt was too big and ended up on my head. Robin by Kim Hargreaves (pattern in Thrown Together), but knit in the round because I found the seam on the back a little odd. Number of stitches and rounds modified because of different gauge and children's size. Colour murasaki (purple/ violet), Dagny's current favourite. Initially thought to be purple and brown only, but I ran out of yarn and added the violet yarn I had at home, too. I am knitting from stash only these days...getting lighter... :)
But I think the violet is making a nice accent. Better to be seen here.

The next quilt photos are up. This batch includes a number of photos I took to show Dagny, like this and that. Both quilts made by children.
Also in this batch some traditional quilts, some naive, some very colourful and also a few cute ones. Taupe, too.

Off to prepare lunch... bye!

Today I told a friend I would not quite feel like myself because I hadn't been knitting for weeks. It's almost a month now... not good. There was a little bit of sewing recently but that was happening so quickly, I barely can remember sitting in front of my sewing machines.
Real life has taken over, keeping us busy at the moment, but it will be for good, so much I can tell you already.

Take care!

Yesterday I said I had been knitting on the train... I am inbetween real knitting projects and have been making a quick hat (Simple Pleasures Hat, no photos yet), just to not do nothing when having time and not being free to start something real. Actually I must do some sewing these days, because my girl needs new clothes. I know, I know, I have been saying so quite a few times and tend to not do exactly what I am proclaiming here on my blog... but this time I really have to do something about the situation in her closet.
So, sewing it will be for a while.

A happy Monday to you!

Garbage, brought out on the wrong pick-up day, not being collected, seal to declare it had been rejected, case handled by dustman #6.

And because it's Saint Nicholas Day... I hope you didn't forget to put out the boots yesterday and found them generously filled this morning!
Froehlichen Nikolaus Euch daheim!

And thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou..... for the many dear comments on my hat! Some of your compliments were so lovely, I had to take a look on my beret if you really could have meant this very one... We have been out all day long today, so I couldn't write to any of you yet. Thanks Nicole for the safety pin idea for the pompom, I will hesitate no longer!

Have a wonderful weekend!

I have made a new hat for me. A Selbu Modern. Which means I can join the choir now and jubilate that I actually did my first stranded knitting - isn't it great how one pretty, little pattern can convince so many to try Fair Isle for the first time?!
The inspiration for my colours came from our many trips to Enoshima (little island nearby) this summer. I think I never got around blogging about it, or at least showing some pictures... well, here are a few.
I like living here, close enough to the city, yet not too far from neither the mountains nor the sea. So much to do and to see, easy to get anywhere by train. If only there was more time!

So much for my inspiration.
What I had in mind was making a Selbu Modern with the pattern not showing very prominently. Like being washed out or faded. So I chose the variegated blue-green Koigu KPPPM (529) and a 4-ply wool yarn from Hamanaka, Junmou chu-bosu in a sand/ linen shade (3).

The knitting progressed very slowly, maybe due to the double pointed needles I used. Next time I will try using a circular needle, see how that works for me.
Being afraid of ending up with a very wobbly looking and too tight hat, I knitted rather loosely. The result was an almost too big beret. Blocking it over a 10" plate made it look awful, so I steamed it vigorously, took a clothes peg, grabbed the final stitches in the middle of the beret and let it dry hanging in the sun. Much better.

It does look as I had hoped for and it also fits. And I love that it's so warm without being bulky. And the yarn doesn't itch at all. Great, because this is my first hat that won't make me scratch my forehead all the time. I still wonder if I should add a pompom...

Anyway, a nice pattern and a very rewarding result.

Later back with today's number! Until then!

It worked, that quick posting between two trays of cookies. Your great support did the rest. More than that. Thank you all!!! I was so willing to get back into the game, photos of my latest cardigan ready for being uploaded on Flickr, when I noticed the Flickr page wouldn't load... I tried ravelry, which not appeared either... our internet connection had just ceased to be. We were disconnected for almost 24 hours. What a bad timing.

But here we are again, so let me show you my Forecast, which I named Cardinal when I started knitting it with a very red yarn, renamed Mole, when I found a new wool (Puppy, British Eroika)to make it, and which I call now Traditionell (traditional), which was the comment on it when I asked my husband how he found it. Between us, I think he went for the rather neutral and descriptive comment traditionell just in the manner of "how do you like the meal?" - "It's interesting.". To be safe. Besides that, I also think the word pretty much fits to name this cardigan. So not cool or modern at all... All these bobbles!

I said, if bobbles, then bobbles it shall be, and did 5 stitch bobbles, using this great tutorial. I like how they turned out, but they only looked like this after the blocking (soaking in water, drying flat, no pins). Also I liked the rather roomy character of the original sleeve design, so I did a lot of pattern repeats (edit: instead of beginning the ribbing earlier to make them more fitting) there, and I started with the border even a bit further down as I wanted to let my hands be partly covered by the sleeves.

I took the photos on two different days, one was very sunny, why the colours are really off in the photos from that day, sorry for that.

To keep track of where I am in the pattern chart I found out this serves me well:

A pin which I insert into the paper right next to the row I have just finished. At first I thought of marking the rows with a pencil, but that would have become quite confusing after a couple of repeats.

The body I lengthened, too, by adding one pattern repeat and slightly longer ribbing. To find out which length I was happy with, while knitting I checked in the back if there was already enough fabric to achieve a certain blousiness, which I liked the cardigan to have. The fact I let disappear one stitch in the middle section did do no harm, luckily.

I know we all are alike, collecting items, like trims, fabrics or buttons, waiting for the perfect pattern or piece to use them... so you might understand that I was really excited about putting these buttons to good use, which I found almost two years ago in Sapporo (Hokkaido), in a fantastic thrift store we stumbled upon when walking around town in a snow storm. Actually the first aluminum buttons I ever saw. Quite simple and just perfect to set a contrast to that abundance of bobbles, I think.

Recently I had been out, shopping for wool, when a kind fellow knitter which I encountered in an aisle of Yuzawaya started talking to me. And asked if she may inspect the cardigan I wore... in such cases it always just happens all so quick, that I could not protest when she reached into the inside of my cardigan, to see how I attached the buttons... which led her to giving me the advice to back my buttons with small ones to prevent that certain pulling of the thread and button... and I did :)
And it really is better this way.

Details as the knitted size which is M and first appeared to be too small but turned out fine, or  about the process of making, go here (for those of you who are on ravelry more photos on Flickr, just click on the first photo in this post to get into the right corner of my photostream.

Off to bed now, guess you are tired after reading this posting, too ;)
Thanks for doing so.

Bye!

Hi you all! Back again. Mails aren't bounced anymore, it all was a question of treating the Mac the same way as I treat my craft room... luckily a good clean up works wonders. For two days I thought I had wiped out all 31.931 of my photos (you know, once in a mood to really declutter...) but that worry wasn't necessary after all. Hooray. I wonder though if I should slow down and take less pictures, most of the time I don't get around blogging about the things I think I'd like to share with you anyway...

I will make it quick today because it's late and I have a bit of a cold and might want to turn in earlier than my usual 2 am.

I have a weakness for batwinged garments. Always had. So when I discovered Phildar in August (of course via ravelry!) and saw their Autumn/ Winter collection had a few batwing sleeved sweaters in it, I ordered it right away.
It took a while until I could start working on this model. And knitting it went rather slowly as working with the Hamanaka Sonomono Loop (ravelry link) needed some practice... all those loops, not seeing what stitches one has done... but last I finally finished it. Without a front pocket, longer and a collar that turned out looking differently although having the right size... I guess my yarn is just softer. I could redo it but I am fine with how it looks now. Also I have started to work on the Forecast already... no looking back.

The yarn is great. I worried it could be too fancy but it is organic wool which makes being a novelty yarn less scary, I think. Also it is very soft and warm (40 % Alpaca), the knitted fabric has nice drape and is thick and cozy. I love my new, winged sweater! A simple piece to throw on.

Two points I'd like to mention regarding the yarn: The balls, although being of the same lot (no dye lot since the yarn is of natural colour), can vary greatly. Make sure to alter two strands of the yarn over a few rows when changing balls. And last, one ball doesn't take you far. There are only 38 m in one ball and they are pretty quickly eaten up. Boxy batwing sweater... surely not the best choice for a rather pricey yarn. Anyway. A nice sweater.

Hope you are all well!
Take care!

Impulse purchase that turned into impatient knitting because my affection for the yarn decreased quickly.
Fortunately this shawl doesn't take much time because Feather and Fan is really a lovely pattern with a nice rhythm to it and the instructions by Sarah Bradberry are easy to follow. So the shawl got finished in ten days instead of turning into an unhappy unfinished piece.

It looks decent. Like a triangular feather and fan shawl, knitted from Noro Kureyon Sock. The self striping character of the yarn is fine for the pattern, I won't complain about that this time. And I do not complain about everything many others said about the yarn.
There was only one knot in my skein, it didn't break and I love the thin and thick which makes a pretty, rustic looking fabric.
I had no problems with unspinning the yarn while knitting of which I read a lot. What I did experience was the tendency to kink up on itself but I do not know if this is caused by being overspun or by the way the 1 ply yarn is being unwound from the skein. But I wouldn't say the kinking up was of great annoyance, just a little inconvenient. So, no problem with knitting Noro Kureyon Sock.

However... the produced fabric doesn't feel good to me. And I don't complain about itching, which I wouldn't mind, not even on my skin. The shawl in fact doesn't itch, especially not after being washed.
What I don't like is that the fabric feels quite dead. I love natural fibers and think that while the 30 % of nylon might add to the durability of the yarn, they might also take away a lot of liveliness from it. It doesn't even smell! An unsensual knit. Too bad.
But it is over and after all I got a new shawl and I will wear it anyway.

Have a lovely weekend!

PS: There might be a problem with my mail server. A new spam filter was installed recently and it seems mails to me are often being bounced back to the sender. I will try to do something about this.

A Hat For The Child

A replacement for the hat Dagny lost in Tokyo a few weeks ago. Took a while because the first attempt was too big and ended up on my head. Robin by Kim Hargreaves (pattern in Thrown Together), but knit in the round because I found the seam on the back a little odd. Number of stitches and rounds modified because of different gauge and children's size. Colour murasaki (purple/ violet), Dagny's current favourite. Initially thought to be purple and brown only, but I ran out of yarn and added the violet yarn I had at home, too. I am knitting from stash only these days...getting lighter... :)
But I think the violet is making a nice accent. Better to be seen here.

The next quilt photos are up. This batch includes a number of photos I took to show Dagny, like this and that. Both quilts made by children.
Also in this batch some traditional quilts, some naive, some very colourful and also a few cute ones. Taupe, too.

Off to prepare lunch... bye!

counting again, 30

Today I told a friend I would not quite feel like myself because I hadn't been knitting for weeks. It's almost a month now... not good. There was a little bit of sewing recently but that was happening so quickly, I barely can remember sitting in front of my sewing machines.
Real life has taken over, keeping us busy at the moment, but it will be for good, so much I can tell you already.

Take care!

counting again, 8

Yesterday I said I had been knitting on the train... I am inbetween real knitting projects and have been making a quick hat (Simple Pleasures Hat, no photos yet), just to not do nothing when having time and not being free to start something real. Actually I must do some sewing these days, because my girl needs new clothes. I know, I know, I have been saying so quite a few times and tend to not do exactly what I am proclaiming here on my blog... but this time I really have to do something about the situation in her closet.
So, sewing it will be for a while.

A happy Monday to you!

counting again, 6

Garbage, brought out on the wrong pick-up day, not being collected, seal to declare it had been rejected, case handled by dustman #6.

And because it's Saint Nicholas Day... I hope you didn't forget to put out the boots yesterday and found them generously filled this morning!
Froehlichen Nikolaus Euch daheim!

And thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou..... for the many dear comments on my hat! Some of your compliments were so lovely, I had to take a look on my beret if you really could have meant this very one... We have been out all day long today, so I couldn't write to any of you yet. Thanks Nicole for the safety pin idea for the pompom, I will hesitate no longer!

Have a wonderful weekend!

Am Meer - At the Sea

I have made a new hat for me. A Selbu Modern. Which means I can join the choir now and jubilate that I actually did my first stranded knitting - isn't it great how one pretty, little pattern can convince so many to try Fair Isle for the first time?!
The inspiration for my colours came from our many trips to Enoshima (little island nearby) this summer. I think I never got around blogging about it, or at least showing some pictures... well, here are a few.
I like living here, close enough to the city, yet not too far from neither the mountains nor the sea. So much to do and to see, easy to get anywhere by train. If only there was more time!

So much for my inspiration.
What I had in mind was making a Selbu Modern with the pattern not showing very prominently. Like being washed out or faded. So I chose the variegated blue-green Koigu KPPPM (529) and a 4-ply wool yarn from Hamanaka, Junmou chu-bosu in a sand/ linen shade (3).

The knitting progressed very slowly, maybe due to the double pointed needles I used. Next time I will try using a circular needle, see how that works for me.
Being afraid of ending up with a very wobbly looking and too tight hat, I knitted rather loosely. The result was an almost too big beret. Blocking it over a 10" plate made it look awful, so I steamed it vigorously, took a clothes peg, grabbed the final stitches in the middle of the beret and let it dry hanging in the sun. Much better.

It does look as I had hoped for and it also fits. And I love that it's so warm without being bulky. And the yarn doesn't itch at all. Great, because this is my first hat that won't make me scratch my forehead all the time. I still wonder if I should add a pompom...

Anyway, a nice pattern and a very rewarding result.

Later back with today's number! Until then!

Finally

It worked, that quick posting between two trays of cookies. Your great support did the rest. More than that. Thank you all!!! I was so willing to get back into the game, photos of my latest cardigan ready for being uploaded on Flickr, when I noticed the Flickr page wouldn't load... I tried ravelry, which not appeared either... our internet connection had just ceased to be. We were disconnected for almost 24 hours. What a bad timing.

But here we are again, so let me show you my Forecast, which I named Cardinal when I started knitting it with a very red yarn, renamed Mole, when I found a new wool (Puppy, British Eroika)to make it, and which I call now Traditionell (traditional), which was the comment on it when I asked my husband how he found it. Between us, I think he went for the rather neutral and descriptive comment traditionell just in the manner of "how do you like the meal?" - "It's interesting.". To be safe. Besides that, I also think the word pretty much fits to name this cardigan. So not cool or modern at all... All these bobbles!

I said, if bobbles, then bobbles it shall be, and did 5 stitch bobbles, using this great tutorial. I like how they turned out, but they only looked like this after the blocking (soaking in water, drying flat, no pins). Also I liked the rather roomy character of the original sleeve design, so I did a lot of pattern repeats (edit: instead of beginning the ribbing earlier to make them more fitting) there, and I started with the border even a bit further down as I wanted to let my hands be partly covered by the sleeves.

I took the photos on two different days, one was very sunny, why the colours are really off in the photos from that day, sorry for that.

To keep track of where I am in the pattern chart I found out this serves me well:

A pin which I insert into the paper right next to the row I have just finished. At first I thought of marking the rows with a pencil, but that would have become quite confusing after a couple of repeats.

The body I lengthened, too, by adding one pattern repeat and slightly longer ribbing. To find out which length I was happy with, while knitting I checked in the back if there was already enough fabric to achieve a certain blousiness, which I liked the cardigan to have. The fact I let disappear one stitch in the middle section did do no harm, luckily.

I know we all are alike, collecting items, like trims, fabrics or buttons, waiting for the perfect pattern or piece to use them... so you might understand that I was really excited about putting these buttons to good use, which I found almost two years ago in Sapporo (Hokkaido), in a fantastic thrift store we stumbled upon when walking around town in a snow storm. Actually the first aluminum buttons I ever saw. Quite simple and just perfect to set a contrast to that abundance of bobbles, I think.

Recently I had been out, shopping for wool, when a kind fellow knitter which I encountered in an aisle of Yuzawaya started talking to me. And asked if she may inspect the cardigan I wore... in such cases it always just happens all so quick, that I could not protest when she reached into the inside of my cardigan, to see how I attached the buttons... which led her to giving me the advice to back my buttons with small ones to prevent that certain pulling of the thread and button... and I did :)
And it really is better this way.

Details as the knitted size which is M and first appeared to be too small but turned out fine, or  about the process of making, go here (for those of you who are on ravelry more photos on Flickr, just click on the first photo in this post to get into the right corner of my photostream.

Off to bed now, guess you are tired after reading this posting, too ;)
Thanks for doing so.

Bye!

Loops 'n' Wings

Hi you all! Back again. Mails aren't bounced anymore, it all was a question of treating the Mac the same way as I treat my craft room... luckily a good clean up works wonders. For two days I thought I had wiped out all 31.931 of my photos (you know, once in a mood to really declutter...) but that worry wasn't necessary after all. Hooray. I wonder though if I should slow down and take less pictures, most of the time I don't get around blogging about the things I think I'd like to share with you anyway...

I will make it quick today because it's late and I have a bit of a cold and might want to turn in earlier than my usual 2 am.

I have a weakness for batwinged garments. Always had. So when I discovered Phildar in August (of course via ravelry!) and saw their Autumn/ Winter collection had a few batwing sleeved sweaters in it, I ordered it right away.
It took a while until I could start working on this model. And knitting it went rather slowly as working with the Hamanaka Sonomono Loop (ravelry link) needed some practice... all those loops, not seeing what stitches one has done... but last I finally finished it. Without a front pocket, longer and a collar that turned out looking differently although having the right size... I guess my yarn is just softer. I could redo it but I am fine with how it looks now. Also I have started to work on the Forecast already... no looking back.

The yarn is great. I worried it could be too fancy but it is organic wool which makes being a novelty yarn less scary, I think. Also it is very soft and warm (40 % Alpaca), the knitted fabric has nice drape and is thick and cozy. I love my new, winged sweater! A simple piece to throw on.

Two points I'd like to mention regarding the yarn: The balls, although being of the same lot (no dye lot since the yarn is of natural colour), can vary greatly. Make sure to alter two strands of the yarn over a few rows when changing balls. And last, one ball doesn't take you far. There are only 38 m in one ball and they are pretty quickly eaten up. Boxy batwing sweater... surely not the best choice for a rather pricey yarn. Anyway. A nice sweater.

Hope you are all well!
Take care!

Impulse Purchase

Impulse purchase that turned into impatient knitting because my affection for the yarn decreased quickly.
Fortunately this shawl doesn't take much time because Feather and Fan is really a lovely pattern with a nice rhythm to it and the instructions by Sarah Bradberry are easy to follow. So the shawl got finished in ten days instead of turning into an unhappy unfinished piece.

It looks decent. Like a triangular feather and fan shawl, knitted from Noro Kureyon Sock. The self striping character of the yarn is fine for the pattern, I won't complain about that this time. And I do not complain about everything many others said about the yarn.
There was only one knot in my skein, it didn't break and I love the thin and thick which makes a pretty, rustic looking fabric.
I had no problems with unspinning the yarn while knitting of which I read a lot. What I did experience was the tendency to kink up on itself but I do not know if this is caused by being overspun or by the way the 1 ply yarn is being unwound from the skein. But I wouldn't say the kinking up was of great annoyance, just a little inconvenient. So, no problem with knitting Noro Kureyon Sock.

However... the produced fabric doesn't feel good to me. And I don't complain about itching, which I wouldn't mind, not even on my skin. The shawl in fact doesn't itch, especially not after being washed.
What I don't like is that the fabric feels quite dead. I love natural fibers and think that while the 30 % of nylon might add to the durability of the yarn, they might also take away a lot of liveliness from it. It doesn't even smell! An unsensual knit. Too bad.
But it is over and after all I got a new shawl and I will wear it anyway.

Have a lovely weekend!

PS: There might be a problem with my mail server. A new spam filter was installed recently and it seems mails to me are often being bounced back to the sender. I will try to do something about this.