Crunch Time

It’s been crunch time around here, design-wise, which means everything else has been taking a backseat. The KC spring issue is scheduled to go live next week, and I’ve been frantically adjusting layout and photography, all at the same time as creating a brochure for the first ever Knitcircus retreat. It’s exciting, but definitely time-consuming. It’s nice to be busy, though. I’m pretty excited about this issue, I think it’s looking really beautiful. I’ve got all kinds of ideas for other work, that I’m looking forward to pursuing once this stuff is public consumption. Patterns, type explorations, posters, fabric (!!), screen printed shirts, a prickly pear creative website. Plus I’m trying to move the blog. Crazy.

At the same time, I’m having the hardest time focusing lately. I’ve got so many ideas running around in my head, not to mention my desk, that I flit amongst them, and they keep me up at night. I had a dream this morning about a man at my door with an axe. Perhaps my psyche is ready to go on strike.

So here’s a sneak peek into the magazine. I had the opportunity to shoot all of the photography for this issue, which is super exciting for me. I heard that Jared Flood thought that my photo of those shelter mitts was beautiful! I got to stretch my legs a little on that Yarn Stylist illustration for an essay.

And I promise I’ll talk about those macarons later. Pinky Swear.

Plus the brochure, which I can’t wait to see printed!

Busy, busy.

Design, Knitcircus, Photography

January 26, 2011

6 Comments

Instant Gratification

Sometimes you just need a project that will go quickly, and give you what you need without too much fuss. And that was just what I needed after the baking and wrapping and traveling and partying of the holiday season. And boy was this ever quick. My friend Jaala was so kind as to gift me a bunch of pink Rowan Big Wool that she’d started a sweater with quite awhile ago, and then abandoned because she realized that big bulky wool wasn’t something she was ever going to wear. So it came to live with me. About 5 skeins of it. I didn’t have quite enough to make some giant thing with it, but I found the perfect project for how much I had in the Modern Garden Cardigan. I originally found this super cute one, knit in the same yarn, and was instantly sold.

I borrowed some size 15 needles from a friend, and set to work, finishing the body in 4 days. 4 days! It was staggering how fast this yarn knit. Then I stalled for a couple of days while I looked for another set of 15s to work the arms. Once I gave in and bought a pair, I was finished in just over a week more. It was such a nice contrast to the other sweater I’m working on in DK weight on 6s, which is much slower going.

I modified the pattern just slightly in the same ways as did the knitter who inspired me to make this, knitting the short rows into the stockinette instead of the garter collar, and knitting rows 13 and 14 twice in the yoke section for extra length. In the end I didn’t really need that extra length, as the armpits are now a bit too long, but it’s not a big enough deal to feel the need to fix. My buttonholes are all over the map, since while I was busy knitting super fast, I totally forgot to count my rows. I eventually moved the bottom button up an inch for aesthetics, since I’ll never button that one anyway. I knit the size small, as the sweater is meant to be worn with a good amount of negative ease.

I love this sweater. My only qualm is that the shaping in the leaves at the hips (plus the bulky yarn) sort of accentuates my extra curves there, and the leaves don’t lie all that flat, but I still feel that this sweater is pretty flattering nonetheless. If I made it again I might try to modify the lace pattern in the bottom section to be a bit trimmer, and maybe add a couple of stitches to the ends of the arms and then decrease them into the lace, as they are pretty tight. I even love the pink, even though I probably wouldn’t have chosen it on my own, I love it anyway. Thank you, Jaala, for the opportunity to make this! Click over to ravelry for more pictures, if’n you like.

Inspiration, Knitting, Photography

January 17, 2011

13 Comments

Listing to the left

two logos designed
addy entries printed
one sweater finished
migrating the blog pretty soon
but not 100% happy with the way it looks yet
hardly any photos taken
buckling down on designing a website for prickly pear creative
overwhelmed
this week

and yet
it feels like I haven’t done enough
it always feels like that
sometimes I feel like I can’t get my balance, or my breath

Design, illustration, Inspiration

January 13, 2011

3 Comments

Sausage Party

We rung in the new year with sausage. Sounds strange, huh? Nate’s been talking about making venison brats for, like, 3 years or something, so this year I told him to Just Do It. And it took HOURS. Many many hours. So many hours that we started on new year’s day, but had to put the operation on hold to go to a rose bowl party (which involved quite a few kinds of alcohol that I didn’t recognize, and various odd hats, and was a ton more fun than I even imagined that it would be), and then resumed with a bit of a hangover the following day. It was all kind of hilarious, though, because 24 pounds of meat in any size kitchen is quite a lot, and it just feels as though there is meat everywhere. That 24 pounds of meat turned into 107 delicious bratwurst, though, plus a few patties that we cooked and ate right on the spot, for testing purposes, and a handful of reject sausages that were stubby. It was pretty darn fun, though, in that time- and energy-sucking way that making bread or beer or sweaters is fun. And we’ve now got all kinds of ideas about how to improve the process, and experiment with flavors, next year.

Speaking of making crazy stuff, check out this post about making vinegar! I’m so inspired.

Cooking, Inspiration, Photography

January 4, 2011

11 Comments

Like a breath of fresh air

I hate this time of year, and yet I love it at the same time. It’s cold, and the light is gray and blue, it seems as though winter will still go on forever, there’s the hullabaloo and stress of the holidays. It’s just always rough on me, and I always wish I could run away to Italy or the Carribean and live there.

But then I remember to go back and look through the year in pictures in my flickr stream, and I remember how much good there was, and how much good there is sure to be in the next year, too. Because it’s a year. Anything could happen. I forgot about a lot of those things in the most immediate part of my memory, but I took their picture, and I’m so glad for that. It feels so good to remember. And to feel those accomplishments again, the travel, the friends and family, the pets, the ocean, the finished projects. It just feels good.

Happy New Year, ya’ll. I hope 2011 is full of surprises and awe for all of you. Thanks so much for visiting here, and commenting, and hanging with me. Here’s to looking forward. And here’s to champagne.

Creativity, Inspiration

December 31, 2010

6 Comments

Drinking too much of Christmas

So it’s over, for another year. The twinkle lights (although they stay up through new years in this house, just because they make me happy), the cookies, the wrapping, the giving, the unwrapping, the laughing. Well, hopefully the laughing isn’t over. There’s still some peppermint bark and a piece of pumpkin pie in the fridge, but probably not for much longer. It was a full season of cooking and cleaning and glowing and moving and sitting. I ate many cookies and probably screwed up my blood sugar balance. Drank too much, too. Went to my aunt and uncle’s farm and took pictures of the horses and sat in the hot tub and made my sore throat worse. And now I’m home and watching a cat sit on the warm radiator looking at the tree, and still trying to figure out what my routine really is these days.

I made myself a beer cozy awhile ago from a pretty simple pattern, but being the kind of paranoid and clumsy drinker that I am, I always felt like I was about to lose my beer out the bottom of the cozy, since it was open on the bottom to slide over the top of the bottle. I knew I wanted to try to modify the pattern to be more like those beer coozies that the bottle slides in the top. But I figured I’d have to learn how to crochet for the bottom of the cozy. So I did. And the Beer Sweater was born. I altered the pattern to be knit top down, with the neck knit back and forth so that it would open far enough to slide the beer bottle in through the top. Then it is joined and worked in the round for the remainder of the bottle, bound off, and the bottom is crocheted from the outer edge to the middle in a circle. I added a big button and a crocheted loop for closure at the top. I gifted a couple of these for Christmas to my beer-drinking aunt and uncle, and they got lots of love.

I also took this sample-knitting and Christmas gift-knitting as an opportunity to learn a little about knitting with multiple colors. I started by adding stripes, and then experimented with fair isle, which, admittedly, has some tension issues and isn’t the best example, but it’s my first! And I was so scared of it for so long, that switching colors and running multiple strands along. They look very collegiate, I think, and I could see making more of these with different school or team colors. I also ended up knitting one of these guys too tall, so opted to fold the top down a little, like a collar. It looks so much like a man’s sweater, I thought, that that’s what I ended up calling all of them. Beer Sweaters.

I have found they work best so far with plain old Cascade 220, but you could use whatever worsted weight yarn you have laying around, which is the best part. They don’t take much yarn, can be knit with scraps, in fact, and they knit up fast. I made one with some leftover Noro Kureyon, which I like the color change in, and one with some leftover Peace Fleece from my sweater. Those ones ended up a little bigger due to the weight and gauge of the yarn, but they still have personality. I don’t know a whole lot about writing crochet instructions, so hopefully it makes sense, and if there’s a better way, I’m all ears, please do let me know.

The pattern is available at ravelry.

Inspiration, Knitting, Photography

December 28, 2010

6 Comments

Linda’s Honey Oat Bread (Of Comfort)

I got The Letter of Denial the other day about that job. Boo. Bread is comforting, though.

I had to bulk up our bread supply for the Christmas dinner for 18 that we put on, so I got a little creative with my basic bread recipe. Have I told you about this bread before? Lemme search…can’t find where I have, so I must not. So, this is a recipe given to me by my mom, who was given it by her friend Linda. It’s the only yeasted bread that I can remember my mom ever baking, and it’s still my favorite after trying my hand at a few others. It’s time consuming, it’ll take the whole morning and maybe into the afternoon, but so worth it. This time I added 1/4-1/2 cup of ground flax meal and 1/2 cup of graham flour to the dough, which gave it a nice, interesting burst of flavor, a bit of grainy sweetness to complement the honey and oats, without making it heavy and wheaty. And one loaf I flattened out on a floured counter before putting it in the bread pan, and drizzled on some good olive oil, 4-5 tablespoons of chopped fresh sage, rosemary and parsley, and a bunch of grated cheddar cheese and rolled it up into a loaf. When we tasted it after it came out of the oven, we had a really hard time not eating the whole loaf right then and there in front of the oven, it was that good. Nothing else mattered in that moment but that bread. I’ll definitely be doing that again. And I bet it would be tasty made into cinnamon swirl bread, too, especially with that graham flour addition.

I’m making another batch today, for my-side-of-the-family Christmas.

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Linda’s Honey Oat Bread

1 cup oats
2 cups boiling water
1 tbsp butter

Put oats and butter in a bowl, pour water over. Let sit for 1 hour, covered, to absorb.

1/2 cup honey
1 1/2 tsp salt
2 pkg yeast, dissolved in 1/2 cup warm water (1.5 tbsp or 4.5 tsp)

Add honey, salt, and yeast mixture to oats. Gradually stir in:

4 1/2 cups bread flour (or any combination of wheat/spelt/crazy weird flour to white flour you like. I like to add some ground flax or wheat germ/bran as well.)

Knead on floured surface, may need to add up to 6 cups flour total. Knead, knead, knead until elastic. Let rest in an oiled bowl in a warm place, covered, 1 to 1 1/2 hours. Punch down. (If you’ve used non-instant yeast, let rise again 30-45 minutes. Punch again. If using instant-type yeast, skip this rise and move straight to rise in pans). Divide dough into 2, shape and place in 2 loaf pans. (Feel free to add herbs and cheese or melted butter/cinnamon/sugar to the dough at this point, by rolling out on a floured surface and rolling additions up into dough. Get creative!) Let rise in pans 20-30 minutes, or until they’ve risen a bit, but not gotten too puffy. Score tops of loaves and apply egg wash if desired. Bake at 375 for 35-45 minutes or until loaves sound hollow.

Cooking, Inspiration, Photography

December 23, 2010

7 Comments