that time of the year again

as usual when christmas comes around, i look around and say to myself "i can't believe another year has passed." this year went by especially fast and it's really crazy to think that 2011 is just around the corner. i feel like i was pretty productive this year. my friends and i make a goodreads group called 52 in 52 to encourage ourselves to read more. i surprised myself by reading close to 100 books this year (compared to the 52 i managed last year). this has a lot to do with my friend and i discovering the awesomeness that are romance novels and especially paranormal romance novels. you end up reading them really fast and there's usually a series of books. we've come across a lot of good books this year as well as some duds, but that's to be expected. i have been knitting and buying less yarn though i want to knit more next year.

i think my knitting goals next year will be socks, sweaters and colorwork. i am working on a fair isle hat right now and i am skeptical about how it will turn out but i want to see it through to the end.

i also baked a lot this year and want to continue the trend. i received the awesome fat witch brownie book for christmas and i want to make everything in it. this might be the year of the brownie. other than that i just plan to take it easy in 2011. hopefully take a vacation and just enjoy myself. what are your new years resolutions?

time sure flies

i can't believe i haven't posted since may. i know i'm not the best blogger in the world but that's pretty bad, even for me. the summer seems to have flown by and fall is once again upon us. we're having some kind of horrible heat wave in l.a. though so it feel more like july than almost october. i've knit very little in the past week or so because the heat just takes all the concentration out of me and the idea of hot wool in my lap isn't very appealing.

i am starting a challenge though in the coming months. my friend and i want to knit all or almost all of the projects from ysolda teague's whimsical little knits 2. more updates once i start. that's all for now and i promise to try and post again soon. below is a pic of a heart shaped apple fruit - because it's cute and because i like posts with pictures. bye for now!

the end

watched the lost finale tonight and thought it was fantastic. such a poetic end to a great show. there were some iffy moments here and there but overall the series was pretty amazing. i will miss you, lost. thanks for 6 great years.

every day is a holiday

hello! summer is upon us and i am loving the warmer weather. it's just great to be outdoors when the sun is shining. last weekend i went away for the weekend to san diego. i love going down there and really don't do it enough. we were only there for a day and a half really but it was just enough time to get some time on the beach and some good food. on the way back to la we stopped by the carlsbad flower fields, which i have never been to before. they had fields and fields of gorgeous ranunculus blooms.

love love love. and just so you don't think i haven't been knitting, here is a hat i finished for my brother made of malabrigo worsted (my fave) in sfo sky.

not very exciting but a good basic guy hat. i am off to arizona this weekend and hope to get a chance to go to a yarn shop out there. i haven't bought any yarn in a long time. i've been trying to save money and use the stash. but souvenir yarn doesn't count, right? i hope the flowers are blooming where you are!

a little update

it's me again. yes, i can't believe it either. not much has been going on lately. i've really been trying to work on some wips and finish some projects. i finally picked up my february lady sweater that i started last february. it's been languishing for awhile. i am not really sure why. i was halfway through the first sleeve that last time i put it down. now i am about 1/3 of the way through the second sleeve. after that i just weave in ends and block it. it is a bit short right now, but i think i anticipated it growing when i blocked it. the shoulders looks kinda wide, which worries me, but i am going to go ahead and see what happens. no progress pics right now but i'll try to get some when it's blocking.

i did manage to finish a small project. for easter, some of the ladies at work decided to do a secret easter basket swap. i pulled one of my good friends who also happens to be a knitter. even though i only had a week, i decided to cast on for a hat for her easter basket. results are below.

this is the hermione hat pattern (link)(rav link) i had to tweak the pattern a bit. the last time i knit it i used sport weight yarn, which worked out perfect sizing wife. the worsted malabrigo was a bit trickier. i ended up cutting out at least one of the pattern repeats because it was getting too long. and this is malabrigo merino worsted in cinnabar, which is really lovely color. sort of a warm, rusty orange that is the perfect fall color. it was a big hit with my friend.

i also made this for my mom for easter.

it's one of those loop bow-tie scarves. the woman who works at the market at home has a bunch of them in different colors and my mom mentioned that she wanted one. picked up this skein of malabrigo (can you tell that i love malabrigo?) on super sale in february. this isn't my favorite colorway of theirs but it's not so bad knit up. i can't for the life of me remember the name of this colorway. if anybody out there does, let me know.

the fun this i get to do this weekend is go to san diego. driving down with a couple of friends for a much needed break. i really can't wait. hope you all have a fabulous week!

random post

i know it's been awhile since i had a real blog post. life's just been busy. i was feeling a bit poopy last month but things are looking up. i've still been knitting a lot. buying less yarn and trying to use up my stash. i'll try to post again soon with more updates. until then, a few pics that were taken recently.


dyeing easter eggs


homemade cream cheese frosting


best birthday present wrapping ever

finish line

just a quick post today about an fo. i joined the ravelympics this year (my first year) on team sunshine (www.sunshineyarns.com) i wanted to use the ravelypmics as motivation to finish up a few wips that have been languishing in my knitting bag. so far i have 1 down and 1 to go.

above are my finished gryffindor stripe socks in sunshine yarns' self-striping soft sock yarn. i started the socks last year but kind of fell off after the middle of the second sock. it was silly really since it only took me about 3 days to finish them once i actually started working on them. i used a simple sock pattern on ravelry and kept track of the stipes on the first socks so i could match the second.

next on the wip list is the lace ribbon scarf i started in sunshine yarns' vampire colorway. it just got tedious after awhile so i stopped but i really want to finish it. we'll see if i can make it before the olympics end.

as for today, i am hoping for a lazy sunday. it is supposed to rain so i might run out to enjoy the air for a bit before it starts to pour. what are you doing this weekend?

rain, rain, rain

a pretty unimaginative title for my post but it's all i can think of as i sit here on the couch and listen to the rain falling outside. la has been hit with a lot of rain this season and a lot of people are quite confused by it. i, for one, enjoy the rain and am happy when it does so for more than just a day. as my friends at work can attest, this was quite possibly the longest week EVER. but the weekend is finally here and i plan on sleeping, knitting and reading as much as possible. knitting has been a little slow going lately. i have a bad case of startitis but i am trying to finish up old projects as much as possible. i have been doing some charity knitting lately and managed to finish a bulky knit hat this week.

my friend is modeling the hat here for me. i loved that her red scarf matched the hat so well. this was an improvised pattern. just co 72 stitches with a size 9 needle with some bulky single-ply yarn. it's a k2p2 pattern all the way to the top. i actually have a ton of this yarn leftover from a thrift store vest i frogged a few years ago. it's a little rough but i figured it would be good for outerwear. this one is for my friend's skid row charity organization and i hope to make a few more hats to donate before the end of the month.

the other exciting news this week is that lost is back! yes, i am still confused about what's going on, but that's the fun of lost. i love it and am looking forward to seeing how the end all comes about. to commemorate the event, we had a lost party complete with spam musubi (a hawaiian fae) and lost cupcakes.

spam musubi

lost cupcakes

the cupcakes came out a lot messier than planned but i still think they're cool. the planes are twinkies with graham cracker wings.

this weekend is also super bowl weekend which means it's time for the unwind super bowl sale! my friends and i will be getting in line early to camp out in front of the store. come join us if you dare brave the cold morning air. hope you all have a great weekend!

sunny day

happy new year, everyone! i can't believe we are already in the second week of january. i really wanted to post a big post with a wrap up of last year, but i think that may not happen. and does anyone know how to make those collages from flickr that other bloggers do so they an show off their fo's of the year? i can't figure it our for the life of me. anyway, i hope you are all off to a great start this year. i didn't do a ton of christmas knitting but i did a little. i tend to save my knitting gifts for family members and a few friends who i know appreciate knitted gifts. the worst thing is knitting something for someone and getting the "oh, thanks" look of a person who doesn't know how to appreciate a handmade gift.

first up is a scarf that i made for my mom. this delicious malabrigo was originally given to me by my friend but, when my mom saw me working on this scarf at thanksgiving, she professed her love of this shade of yellow. how can i resist the cutest mom on the planet? i don't. i started this ages ago but only finished it a few weeks ago.


pattern: scrunchable scarf (link) (rav link)
yarn: 1.5 skeins malabrigo merino worsted in sauterne
needles: us 8 or 9 ( i can't remember which but 8 and 9 are my scarf needles)
notes: not much to say except that i looove malabrigo. i actually ended up having 2 very different skeins of mal for this and so about a third of the scarf has more variegation than the rest of it, but that's mal for you and it's ok with me.

next up is a lucky 7 hat

pattern: lucky 7 hat (link) (rav link)
yarn: leftover mal from the scarf (you can see where it gets stripey because i was alternating
skeins)
needles: us 5
notes: the hat was a bit small but i think that's just cause i should have gone up a needle size. i blocked it a bit longer/bigger though and it's fine now. very easy pattern and i liked that the cables went all the way to the end of the pattern. you can see the cool crown here.

see, so pretty? well that's all i have for you today. off to brunch with friends. i hope you are all having a fun, lazy weekend.

holiday cheer

merry christmas! this is the little tree that i brought to my parents house this weekend. we got decorations last night at the drugstore. not much of a selection but i still think it's cute. hope you have a safe and happy holiday!

catching up

wow it's been ages since i last blogged. summer just flew by and it's already december. unfortunately southern california hasn't gotten the memo yet and we've been having really warm weather. a lot has happened over the last few months including a trip to france, 3 weddings (one of which was my brother's in hawaii) and a medical scare with my dad. i do want to catch up on all of it one day soon. i have lots of pictures from france and hawaii that i want to share.

for now i am just trying to get going with all of the holiday knitting i have to do. crossing my fingers that i can finish it all before christmas. i'll try to post again soon. hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season!

a bit absent

not much has been going on. i've just been enjoying the summer. hope you have been, too.

weekends are for everyone

we've started summer hours at work, which means that we can leave early on friday's through the summer. it makes such a huge difference in my outlook of the week just knowing that i get to go home early on friday. we're having a bit of june gloom in los angeles, but i don't mind. the grey skies and drizzly weather are perfect for curling up with a good book or some knitting (knitting pictures to come in the next post).

the sun did manage to peek out for a little while today during my friend's housewarming party. she has a whole room in the house just for her yarn and craft projects. i didn't take a picture of it, but trust me, it's awesome.

tomorrow i hope to do a bit of cleaning and organizing. i also have a date to go to the movies to see drag me to hell. i like scary movies and i hear this one is pretty good. might try to get in one more movie tomorrow as well but we'll see what happens. i leave you with one of the jumping pics i took at the party today (don't you just love the continuous shot button on digital cameras?). have a great weekend!

summer comes

summer is right around the corner here in sunny los angeles. the sun has been shining and it's been hot, hot, hot. luckily i was able to stay pretty cool this weekend and had some fun while doing it. saturday, my friend m and i decided to go to the strawberry festival up in oxnard. i'd never even heard of it before last week but it's been going on for a long time. unfortunately i think everyone else had the same idea as us or at least were heading up to the northern beaches to beat the heat and it took us almost exactly 2 hours to get there in gridlock traffic. there were a couple of times where i wanted to scream and pull my hair out but we managed to get there finally. the festival was a lot bigger than i thought it would be but i was actually disappointed in the strawberry-ness of it. i kinda felt like it was a big fair that just happened to have a strawberry corner. i imagined vendors making all kinds of imaginative strawberry dishes and cute, strawberry themed toys and knicknacks. there were lots of vendors but they were selling random items like name art, dragonfly pins, and handmade purses. where were the strawberries? we did manage to seek out all of the strawberry items. below check out some of what we ate and saw.

strawberry nachos - these were probably my favorite thing that we ate. i love anything with cinnamon and sugar.

official strawberry festival merchandise

my strawberry shortcake from the build your own shortcake bar and the tray of strawberries we bought from a local farm.

it was a strawberry filled weekend because on sunday, my friends and i woke up at the crack of dawn to make a trip out to glendora to see the donut man. if you've never had donut man, you're missing out. he makes seasonal fruit filled donuts along with some other super tasty treats at his shop.

here we are at 7:30am. took us over 30 minutes to get there but so worth it.

the maple and chocolate logs are excellent and the crumb cake donut is fantastic as well.

awesome

after our early morning donut run, it was off to my friend k's house for a drinking and knitting. not sure if those two are the best combo, but it sure is a lot of fun. there was snacks and drinking and a little bit of knitting.

that's a new malabrigo scarf i've been working on. it's the scrunchable scarf on ravelry and the color is sauterne, the most lovely, bright yellow. this weekend i am off to northern california for a slew of bridal showers and bachelorette parties. see you all when i get back!

edgar says have a great weekend!

a day of books

this weekend was the annual la festival of books at the ucla campus. i planned a day out with some friends for book shopping, falafel eating and ice cream sandwiches. the weather was lovely this weekend, unlike the usual 100 degree heat wave that book festival usually brings. we had a great time browsing the book vendors and people watching. the festival seemed well attended even though there were some vendors missing (noteably the cook's library and barnes & noble). i got a few good books - a michael chabon collection, the kind one (from book soup) and a patchwork book from kinokuniya.

we came home exhausted, full of good food, and heavy with new books. all in all a great day. i hope your weekend was fabulous as well.

lazy daisy

just spending a quiet evening at home with my new twilight dvd and my february lady sweater. sadly this sweater was actually supposed to be completed in february and i am way behind schedule. maybe watching vampires will give me some superhuman knitting powers. :)

an auspicious day

i have the pleasure of working basically next door to the nbc building in burbank. normally this fact doesn't play much into my everyday life except for dodging the occasional tourist walking against traffic by my parking garage. today was different though because president obama was going to be on leno, meaning he was going to be a mere building away. while we didn't get to go to the taping, we did decide to do a little obama stalking and wait near the back entrance of nbc where guests usually depart from. we actually go there just in time to see his motorcade leaving.

he's in the second car, not the one closest to me. i actually saw him through the window of the car. we waved at him and he smiled and waved back. it was pretty awesome. there wasn't a huge group of people there. i got the feeling that most of the people were people from the surrounding neighborhood or people who worked nearby like us.

this is what we looked like right before he came.

something else also arrived for me today.

it's my new kindle! my friends got together and got me a big ol' gift card to amazon to put towards a kindle and it came today. i'd been curious about them for awhile but i started really wanting one a couple of months ago when i figured out that i could read while knitting. it's a great way to do some knitting and get my reading done. until now i'd either knit and watch tv/movies or not knit and just read. now i can do both. i haven't played with it too much yet but i look forward trying out a pattern in pdf on it. yay for a fun day!

omg

i can't believe that i just saw president obama leaving the tonight show. and he waved at us. awesome.

pie party and a new hobby

i know i always say this but i really can't believe that the weekend is over already. this weekend was a pretty relaxed one for me. no huge plans. on friday night we had tix to the imax screening of watchmen at the burbank 16 (who knew they had imax?). we had at wait in a very long line upstairs and around the corner from the theater. my friends and i were joking that the signs were leading us to imminent death because we had to go down this creepy, narrow hallway that had no escape. we emerged from the line unscathed though and even managed to get good seats in the back. i actually really liked the movie. i had read the book a long time ago and re-read it again recently to prepare myself for the movie. i'd seen footage at comic con last year (which looked awesome) so i was looking forward to this and was trying not to have too many high hopes, lest the movie not meet my expectations. but i was pleasantly surprised that they managed to get almost all of the back story told in a cohesive way and visually it was great looking. patrick wilson was a really good nite owl and jackie earle haley was the perfect rorschach. i must say though that i couldn't tell that our theater was an imax theater. the sound was really good but the picture quality, to me, looked like any other theater. if you're going to see it in imax, i would suggest going to a theater whose imax screen is dedicated solely to imax films instead of one that is only used for imax once in awhile, like the theater we were in.

saturday was also our day for a pie party. i have a few friends who love the tv show pushing daisies as much as i do. we are so, so sad that the show has been cancelled but i am glad that it will live on in dvd and there have been talks of some kind of movie to wrap it all up. so we decided to have a big pie party to celebrate the awesomeness that is the show.

we have blueberry, cherry and chocolate cream pie. i like that we have 3 pies for 5 people. it's a good thing that i decided to bring ice cream instead.

this is my friend's dog edie asking for a slice of pie. sadly, i had to say no.

i also have a bit of a new obsession.

i bought a drop spindle a couple of years ago. it was a part of a learn to spin kit that also included various rovings and a how to spin book. i tried it once or twice right after i bought it but i never really got the hang of it and put it away in a drawer until now. seeing all of the beautiful batts and rovings and spinning wheels at stitches renewed my interest in learning to spin and, last week, i picked up my drop spindle again. the first few times i tried spinning were not so pretty, but i kept practicing and i had a friend at work show what she knew and now i have a lovely little ball of yarn. the yarn in the picture is my second ball. i am trying to spin enough so that i can ply the two together. i bought a couple of really pretty rovings from stitches west and i can't wait to spin them up.

and that was pretty much the weekend for me. what did you do?

yarn overload

well i am back again after a wonderful long weekend visiting my parents and going to my first ever stitches west. my friend laura decided to fly up with me thursday night since we found that southwest still had some awesome plane ticket deals at that last minute. unfortunately she could not stay for the weekend so she just had a super quick 24 hour trip to the bay area. luckily we were able to fill it in with plenty of fun, fiber and food.

we spent the entire day on friday at the marketplace. i opted out of taking any classes this time around just because money was a bit tight. we got there first thing in the morning and had to wait in a bit of a line, even with our prepaid tickets, but it actually went quickly. i made a beeline for the blue moon booth, as rumors on ravelry were that they would sell out of most things pretty quickly. we got there in time to get a good selection of mill ends and rare gems to choose from. i was very frugal though and wanted to stick to my budget so i only got 2 mill ends.



those are my two skeins of socks that rock hanging out while i eat my tasty vietnamese sandwich lunch. it was really fun to see all of the vendors, and be able to touch and see all of the yarns in person. there were many beautiful yarns but i was very good and only bought things that really called to me. everything else i figure i can order online later.



that's most of my haul. includes mill end from blue mooon fiberarts, a skein of pigeonroof studios' superwash sock in delight, pigeonroof roving in chard, 2 skeins of creatively dyed superwash sock in midnight and a skein of woodbrook worsted from creatively dyed in tree. missing is the bmfa mill end of spawn of braun, which is super bright and candy colored. i started swatching it already and just need to find the perfect pattern. also missing is a mixed bag of handspun yarn from pigeonroof studios in purples and pinks, patterns from cocoknits and some hiyahiya needles i got at the urban fauna booth (which had great stuff). oh and stitches refueled my desire to learn how to spin. i have a drop spindle that i haven't picked up in years and i dug it out again. i am going to do a little bit of practicing before i try using some of the really pretty stuff i bought at stitches.

all in all it was a really fun experience and i hope i can make it again next year. now to actually finish some knitting!