A different craft

Geninne's Art Blog is one of my favourite blogs, even though it's not about knitting! In August I got very inspired by Geninne's posts about carving your own rubber stamps, and after a small investment in materials I was able to try it today. It was so much fun and I'm happy with my results, which is a bonus!

Here is the first rubber stamp I've ever carved:

And here is a gift card I printed using my new rubber stamp.

Now I can use these on my knitted gifts for people. It's nice to have small accomplishments to take joy from!

Photo shoot

I've finally gotten some pictures of my knitting. The weather has changed to overcast and it does make for very good light for getting accurate yarn colours in photos.

Here are the toe-up socks I knit for David in Toronto. They've been finished for weeks and languishing... I hope they'll forgive me! My excuse will be that it hasn't exactly been wool sock weather in Toronto lately!

Here is another pair of finished socks. These were a fun knit, because the yarn is gorgeous. It's Fleece Artist Nyoni (I think it's been discontinued) that I got at Gina Brown's Yarn in Vancouver. The pattern is one that Dave and I ran across at Lettuce Knit in Toronto. The colours are quite true in the second picture.

Here is my current work-in-progress. It's the shawl I started back in June - Pretty Maids from Knitty. This past summer wasn't very conducive to sustained concentrated knitting, but I've been able to make some real progress on it since the weekend.

 

The yarn I'm using came in three shades, and so I'm planning one more colour change when I get into the last lace pattern.

Surfacing

Well, there goes August and I thought I should get a quick post in before it's gone. It has been a poor month for knitting. On the bright side, I finished the last course I needed to complete my post-baccalaureate diploma in special education. This will, at some point, mean I'll have more time to knit. I won't go into the dark side, but a couple of weeks of August disappeared into it with very few stitches to show for it. Then for the last few days we've been busy with canning and otherwise dealing with the lovely produce we brought back from the Okanagan on Sunday. Tomatoes have been roasted or canned, depending on their variety, peaches have been frozen, and various veggies have been ratatouilled! No pictures, though - I apologize.

I finished the socks for our friend, David, knit from the hand-spun yarn from Quebec. I'll post a picture as soon as I get around to taking one in daylight. I've also gotten to the beginning of the second sock of a pair knit from a yummy Fleece Artist yarn. Again, photos to follow.

For now, I'll leave you with these pictures from the Marché Jean Talon in Montréal. The fruits and veggies are so beautifully displayed there, that quantities of zucchini that would normally frighten me make me want to take their picture instead!

A shawl in a hurry

On Tuesday I decided that I wanted to knit a small shawl for a good friend. Her birthday was yesterday, but I'm seeing her tomorrow, so I figured there was time. I decided to do another Multnomah, like the one I made from the same yarn (in a different colour) a couple of years ago. The yarn is Swiss Mountain Silk Bamboo by Handmaiden, in the Safari colourway.

I was ready to bind off on Thursday morning. Here it is unblocked:

I blocked yesterday - here is a picture of the shawl pinned out:

And here it is all finished:

Socks, mainly

When we were driving through Québec's Eastern Townships a couple of weeks ago we stopped at this old wool mill at Ulverton.

 

Sadly the mill is no longer in operation - it is now a museum. They sell locally produced yarns in the gift shop, though. I bought two skeins of a light worsted weight wool-nylon blend to knit some socks for our friend David in Toronto. He likes heavy socks, and is likely to need them there!

I decided to try going toe-up on these ones, so that I can better gauge yarn consumption on a size-11 foot. I'm kind of making it up as I go along, but I did use Judy's Magic Cast-on, and I haven't quite decided about the heel yet.

Here is a close-up of the yarn:

 

I also finished the Monkey socks a while back, and they finally got their photo opp because they're being gifted this evening.

Have I mentioned how much I enjoy this pattern?

Jet-setting blogger?

I thought I would take the opportunity to blog from an airport, just like the cool kids do! We're waiting in the Montreal airport for our flight home. Today is unbelievably hot here - hottest temperature on record for this day, and perhaps the hottest day in years. With the humidex it's 45°C out there! We've mostly managed to escape the heat today, except for the ten-minute shuttle ride to the airport from the train station in a small bus with no AC - phew! The weather for the rest of our trip has been great though, so no complaints, really.

I wanted to share a cool fibre arts-related story from the bed and breakfast we stayed at a few nights ago. Mme. Lauzier has been taking in guests for 36 years at her beautiful farm outside of Ayer's Cliff in the Eastern Townships.

The farm house

Here is the sunset from the bench swing in the back yard.

After breakfast we started talking about knitting. I showed Mme. Lauzier my sock-in-progress and we exchanged notes on heel construction and how to avoid that 'hole in the corner' when you pick up for the gusset, she took out an amazing piece of weaving to show us. It's been in use for 30 years on the kitchen table and can be machine washed and dried. Can you guess what it's woven from?

 

How about now?

 

She cut dozens of plastic bread bags into continuous strips and grafted them with something resembling a Russian join so that there would be no knots or ends showing. The really cool thing is that she could point to the different coloured stripes and identify the brand of bread!

And here are Mme. Lauzier and I in front of the piano in the sitting room, because "on peut y prendre une belle photo"!

You can't see them, but on the wall beside the piano are family photos - she had 13 kids, she was from a family of 11, and her husband was one of 18!

Greetings from....

Can you guess?

 

So I know I haven't posted in a long time, and all I have to show knitting wise is another sock...

 

 

... but in my defense, it was the end of the school year and I worked every day of the last week, and then we had to get ready to go on our trip. Travel preparations get a little complicated with a diabetic cat, but we made it, and we're having a good time visiting our old friends here.

Yesterday we walked around the city and covered more than 10 km! The day before we checked out Lettuce Knit - the Yarn Harlot's LYS. One of our stops yesterday was at Bookhou, which I had read about on Geninne's blog, and where we got to see this exhibit and buy a few goodies. I felt really lucky to be in Toronto at the right time to see some of Geninne's originals - apparently they are rarely available for sale.

We also stumbled on this really cool yarn shop, Americo Original where they carry their own line of yarns. I got the yarn to make this pattern. It's a beautiful cotton and I got it in a lovely sage green.

We spent the late afternoon on Toronto Island, which was really cool. I've been wanting to see it since I read Atwood's Robber Bride. We had a picnic and a good time was had by all!

To be continued...