Bolero

I finished the Ribbed Lace Bolero and I'm not at all satisfied with how it turned out. It's way too big for me. Guess I swatched wrong or measured my shoulder span wrong. It actually fits my brother (yes, I made him try it on) rather well, and he has much broader shoulders than me.
I made it from Schoeller Stahl 100% cotton, and washing it only made it stretch even more. I tried to fix it by sewing it under the armpits, but that made the lace part gather around the sleeves.
Now I'm facing a dilemma - to rip it or just leave it as it is. Right now it doesn't look all that nice. Which is a damn shame, beacuse I love, love that lace pattern. At least that turned out pretty.
Oh well, I won't be wearing it much anyways, the summer is practically over. Guess the decision what to do with it will have to wait till next summer.

Knitting in the car

We took a family trip to the National Park on the river Krka yesterday. I did some knitting while sitting on the back seat. I'm working on the Ribbed Lace Bolero, using worsted green cotton. Now that I look at it, I'm not sure about the color. It's... too green?
Oh, well, I think I'll live. I only need to finish the bolero while it's still hot. Not much point having it around for fall. It's too lacy for the wind and the rain.
Here are some pics of Krka I took yesterday. All the green matches my bolero. Sort of.

For Tori Amos fans

This bag is part two of the gift for my friend Lea, whose birthday is this Sunday. She is a huge Tori Amos fan, so I decided her favorite singer should be the theme for the bag.
I made it from black and white canvas, lined it with white cotton material, added a zippered pocket in the lining, and a zipper to close the bag. The dimensions are 32 x 28 cm, with a 7 cm wide bottom. Took me about 4 hours total to make.
Now for the fun part: The white stripe with the lyrics is just white canvas, and the lyrics are there thanks to the great magic that is Avery Iron-on paper. I copy/pasted random lyrics from various Tori songs, some from the ones my friend told me she loves, and the others that I liked. My favorite song of hers is China, which I'm told "real" Tori fans hate. Oh, well, I had to put it in there. Besides, my friend likes it, and if she's not a real Tori fan, I don't know who is.
Some not so clear pictures of the finished bag:



Fun part number two: I also lined the bag with lyrics. He he, that sounds cool, lined with lyrics. I took a black fabric marker and just wrote lyrics on the lining before sewing it together. It's the entire China and little of Cool on your island on the part with the pocket, and on the right it's Sleeps with butterflies.

Lining pre-sewing and on the finished bag:



If anyone cares, here is the list of all the songs on the front stripe: Bouncing off clouds, 1000 Oceans, China, Northern Lad,Playboy Mommy, Mrs. Jesus, Snow Cherries from France, Bliss, Talula, A sorta fairytale, Silent all these years and Crucify.

Little fabric envelopes

These are little fabric envelopes or wallets or whatevers I finished today. Great for getting rid of scrap fabric and bias tape leftover from past projects.
I sewed them on my mothers machine, a 30 years old Bagat thing. It's definitely stronger than my plastic Toyota sewing machine, but I can't seem to figure out how to work with it. During the making of my envelopes I broke two needles, ran out of thread once and didn't sew a single seam straight. But maybe that's just my crappy sewing when dealing with bias tape.
Two of these (the one with the purple border and the one without the bias tape) are birthday presents for my friends, twin girls. Their birthday is tomorrow, so I guess I finished these in the last minute.
The other two envelopes are just too crappy to be gifts, so I guess they're all mine. I don't mind the wavy stitches.

Sheldon

So Sheldon is completed. This was a fun knit, except for the i-cord border and picking up stitches. That was a pain in the ass. I can't seem to pick up anything using my needles. I had to switch to a crochet hook, and then back to the needles for every single stitch. His head parted a little in, guess I need to pull the yarn tighter when I'm decreasing. Other than that, I'm happy with the way he turned out. Plus I learned how to carry yarn up the sides. New skill, always a bonus.
Here are some more pics, just because I want to show him off ;-)



So that makes one part of the gift for my friend done. According to my entire family, giving someone a knitted turtle for their 24th birthday is lame. I guess I need to craft another something, to go with Sheldon. If only I knew what.

A turtle in the making

So I took a long break from knitting, but now I'm back. My friend's birthday is coming up, and after pondering what to make her, I decided on Sheldon the Turtle from Knitty. Because she once expressed admiration for the turtles. Something along the lines of "Look at the turtles" when we were in the Botanical Garden, looking at, you guessed it - turtles.
OK, so I clearly had no idea what to make for my friend, and browsing through Knitty's old patterns, Sheldon seemed like the best choice. So I went out to buy some green cotton, only to find out that my LYS doesn't carry nice happy turtle colors in cotton. I ended up buying acrylics and CO yesterday.
This is the stage of completion today: one body, stuffed. Four legs, not stuffed. One third of a shell. Lots of yarn tails and tangles all over my bed. What can I tell you, knitting is messy.