Blah Blah Blah 2011 Blah Blah Blah 2012

2011 was a major year for me when it comes to crafting.  Because my life was frogged in January when my husband and I filed for divorce I've been working hard all year long at creating a new one.

A major part of that was the opportunity to spend part of the year with Anzula, and getting to experience a yarn pilgrimage to Ohio for the TNNA Marketplace, stopping at LYS's along the way. I also go to travel to Portland for Sock Summit.  This shifted my whole yarn perspective and, well, lets just say I won't be buying Vanna's Choice anymore.  I also finally learned to knit thanks to Sabrina, owner of Anzula, teaching me while it was my turn to rest from driving duties on the road.  That's right.  She taught me while SHE was driving.  Mad skills!

Another piece was having to recreate my living space into one that reflected my style without leaning too heavily on the themes that my ex and I had already established.  I was back in my house for 7 months before I really started making it my own and infusing my own style into the things I hated about it before.

I figured I'd share a list of my favorite things I discovered this year and then give a quick run down of things I'm stoked to the point of falling apart over for next year!

1. Fancy Tiger Crafts in Devner CO.

When the ladies of Fancy Tiger walked into the Anzula booth at TNNA I suspected it would be love.  They looked so... cool.  Then when we stopped by their store on our way home (we planned our trek through Denver just to accommodate visiting their shop!) I knew it was love.  It's cute, but edgy.  You're surrounded by bright colors, delicious textures and it's just so... cool.  And if you look at their Facebook, their pictures look straight out of the liner notes or tour diary of a riot grrrl band.  But they're still knitters and crafters and loveable as heck.  I follow their blog because it always keeps my creativity on it's toes.  I'm still trying to think up excuses to go to Denver just so I can visit again.

2. Spray Painting Ugly Shit.

 There have been several things in my house (most notably, my Christmas tree) that have been attacked by spray paint this year.   My theory is that my home should be as fabulous and fun as I am. I am taking this very seriously.

3. Twinkie Chan

Okay, I've been long-obsessed with her, but her book Crochet Goodies for Fashion Foodies didn't get into my hot little hands until this Summer.  And it made my Summer, and then the stuff I made this Summer made my winter warmer.

I plan on making every one of these items.

4. Anzula's Cricket

A girl can only handle pretty yarn every day so much before she has to do something about it.  I made a pumpkin hat using Cricket-a sport weight yarn... get it!  Cricket is (sort of) a sport! The pun alone is worth is, but HOLY CRAP, that touch of cashmere in there with the superwash merino and nylon makes this irresistible.  Sproingy, soft and gorgeously colored. 

5. Knitcircus Magazine

I'm not gonna lie, one of the highlights of both the TNNA trip and Sock Summit was getting to know Knitcircus editor Jaala Spiro.  She's fun, quirky and her magazine, blog and podcast totally rock.  Something I didn't know before this summer was just how tight knit (heh) the knitting community was.  I kind of fell in love with that side of the industry, and that community feel is totally apparent in Knitcircus.  Plus, the blog has tons of giveaways and there are always great non-knitting things too like... oh you know... cookie recipes (!) and it's just fun.  Like knitting should be!

In 2012 I'm looking forward to...

My first Knit Along making the Beekeeper's Quilt at The Knit Addiction.

Making something in Anzula's Coco colorway.  It's the most gorgeous brown I've ever seen in my life.  I don't usually care for brown, but Coco makes a good case for neutrals!

Finally finishing my Kusha Kusha scarf, my first project!  I have about 110 rows to go!

Here's to all of the discoveries I'll make next year!

Dead in 60 Stitches, a scarf

In early October, feeling pretty self assured thanks to a bitchin' new hairstyle, I sent what I thought was a clever plea for a t-shirt to a local gent who has a pretty rad podcast called Dead in 60 Years.

Really, I just thought he was cute.

Anyway, I got my Di60Y shirt, which I pimped out with some badass embroidery, and now Greg is my awesome bandmate and we have a freakin fabulous youtube show Kim&Greg and I'm pretty sure I have a friend for life in him. He's always so good at easing my insecurities and encouraging my best bad behavior- hey we're in a band, that's what bandmates do! When everyone else is telling me to tone down the silliness Greg is usually egging me on to take my antics to new levels of absurdity. So I wanted to make him something special.  It's been a long time since I've had a good, like, really good creative outlet. 


The Pattern:
None.  Well, I made it up.  So I guess it's not none.  I printed out Di60Y, their little skull guy logo, and a bunch of other crap, made patterns for everything on graph paper, started and frogged the motheruffcker about 4 times and then settled on large block letters because I just couldn't get the level of detail I wanted in the skull in a grid as small as a scarf.  Their logo would look awesome on an afghan.  Too bad I just don't like him enough for that.
Anyway, Tapestry Crochet is really fun and it's super easy to convert logos and basic images into a crochet pattern.  It's how I taught myself to crochet- Check out my Pirate Afghan that I made as my first project. All it took was print outs of historical pirate flags and some graph paper.  Point is, this is easy and fun and looks pretty cool.  It just sometimes takes a few tries to get just right.

The Yarn:
Because Greg is kind of a big deal in Fresno (Just, you know, never as big a deal as me.  Duh.) I wanted to crochet as locally as possible.  I shopped at Knit Addiction in Clovis and picked up some Geek Chic Minion Sock in the colorway Neville Longbottom, a yarn that is hand dyed locally in Sanger.  This 80% superwash wool, 20% nylon yarn is absolutely gorgeous, super soft and has the added bonus of being perfect in a scarf for a Harry Potter enthusiast.  This was the main color for the scarf, and it developed this amazing almost velvety texture as it crocheted up with the way the variegated  browns and teals played together.  Everytime I was out and about crocheting I had people approaching me telling me how beautiful the yarn was.  Uh, duh.

For the contrast in the lettering I went with Anzula's Sebastian in Au Natural.  Anzula is another local hand dyed yarn company, and I've been in love with this lovely 70% Merino, 30% sea cell fingering weight yarn since the first time my fingers brushed against it.  Soft, silky and a wonderful twist,  Sebastian was everything I'd dreamed it would be! 

Since I hadn't been able to use the skull in the crochet pattern I decided to do one final embellishment, a shrinky-dink button.  I traced the reveresed image and colored it in with a blue colored pencil, punched holes in it and popped that sucker in the oven.  Done and done!

 

Thanks Greg for being an awesome friend! Hope now you're a cozier and warmer awesome friend!

http://www.deadin60years.com
http://www.ravelry.com/projects/KimBurly/dead-in-60-stitches

I'll Have Blue Christmas

Before you read anything, make sure this song is playing.  Thanks.

Okay, now that we have the business of soundtrack out of the way, I present to you my OMGWTF Christmas Tree Experiment Extravaganza!

This is my first Christmas as a single lady in a long time.  I've never lived alone for the holidays.  I mean, sure I have my kids, but they don't really make a lot of the decorating decisions.  (But if they did oh man I'd be all over that!  Kids have vision!)  I wanted to find a way to make my Burly's First Christmas special.  I've been working my ass off to personalize my home and suit it to my tastes, declaring independence from beige and all that jazz.  I figured why not do the same with my Christmas tree?

So I lugged it out of the rafters...

What an abomination.

I wanted it turquoise or teal or something like that.

Unfortch, I underestimated the spray paint needed and ran out halfway through.

But I was enamored with the "Robin's Egg Blue" of it, so off to the craft store for the second time on Black Friday I went.  

5 cans of paint later, this proved to be a less than economical way of making Christmas less boring and more Burly- I probably could have bought a blue fucking tree at Target or something.  But it's the transformation that counts.  Plus, the can of silver glitter that I coated the bastard with when it was done was pretty badass.

But then tragedy struck!  The base broke!  It was on it's side for a few weeks because I'm as lazy as I am crafty so it had dead leaves all in it and it was a real piece of work.  And I had no clue how to keep it upright. 

But my dad fixed it with some heavy metal *Bill and Ted air guitar with me* and a post that went though the base of the tree.  Except it was then too tall for my house:

 While all of this confusion was happening about my tree's stand I came upon a box of keys in my garage.

Um, hello, can you say ornaments?!  Some jewelry wire was all i needed for a fun garland that'll probably make its way into my office after the season's over.

So here it is in all it's glory.  It's not perfect, I should have gone a shade bluer on it, but I like it just the same.  It's Christmas on my own terms.  Christmas without compromise.  And so on.

I couldn't be happier with my blue, blue Christmas.

Sweet as Pumpkin Pie

My beautiful ladyfriend Aurora Lady has this thing about pumpkins.  She loves them.  Lots.  So when she asked me to make a pumpkin hat for her to wear this fall I was all over it.

The Pattern:
Textured Slouchy Beanie by Rachel Choi

The Yarn:
Anzula Cricket in Arizona
Anzula Sebastian in Clay 
Sirdar Snuggly Baby Bamboo DK in Green


I love patterns where I learn a new stitch.  I'm admittedly more of a freestyle crocheter and only recently have been making myself follow patterns, so the Fpdc was a real treat to learn. Front Post Double Crochet is what made the ribbing possible, giving the pumpkin it's pumpkiny look.

As always, Anzula did not disappoint.  So amazingly soft with it's superwash merino/cashmere/nylon blend (80/10/10) Cricket is the deliciously plumper sister of Squishy, and has a really delightfully springy twist.  I'm pretty sure it's my favorite of the Anzula yarns.  Plus, Arizona is a perfect colorway for autumn crochet.

For the stem I used both Sebastian in Clay and Baby Bamboo in Green to give it a more natural pumpkin stem look and of course made some cute sproingy tendrils!

I think it's safe to say that Aurora is the cutest little Punkinhead ever! 

Art by Aurora Lady. Duh. You should buy some. Of her art. Duh.
These photos on here are totally yoinked from her blog, too.

My first Knitastrophy

Okay, so it's not an actual knitastrophe. 

But dang, I have about 10 inches left on my 8's with my Kusha Kusha scarf and I want to start on the Madelinetosh Honey Cowl because I found some of the most deliciously autumnal yarn while I was at Knit Culture in LA last week.  And I wanna use my 8's. 

So the dilemma of slipping the needles off with my way the heck basic skills and ruining my Kusha Kusha and my life or knitting like crazy to finish and move on.  Oh my God, I might just have to finish a project before moving onto the next for once. 

I guess we all know what I'll be doing after the kids are in bed tonight. 

The Radiant Radish

I'm a pretty big Beach Boys fan so when I saw this adorable pattern for a baby radish scarf I jumped on the opportunity to create a Radiant Radish for myself.


For those of you who had social lives in high school and didn't sit listening to your dad's Endless Summer on vinyl and certainly didn't read Brian Wilson biographies, the Radiant Radish was the name of Brian Wilson's health food store endeavor. 


This is gonna go great with my pajamas!

And I'll probably be the coolest girl at the farmer's market too!

Actually, do me a favor and listen to this song as you finish reading this.











The pattern: Baby Radish Lariat Scarf by Twinkie Chan
Can be found in:
Twinkie Chan's Crochet Goodies for Fashion Foodies


The Yarn: Ms Gusset Sock Yarn

This was a blast to make.  It was super easy, I did it in an evening. The Ms. Gusset was very nice to work with.  Sproingy.  I am in love with the colors.

You can make multiple radishes and have a big bunch of them hanging around your neck.  I like the silly elegance of the single radish though.

Pink Lemonade, anyone?

I really love that darned little patron saint of crocheted food, Twinkie Chan.  Her work is adorable and fresh and I've lusted after her ebay and etsy forever, but being chronically broke I haven't ever been able to buy more than a refridgerator magnet.  

Until this summer.

I was at Sock Summit working in the Anzula booth and across the aisle I spied Twinkie Chan's book.  I think I squealed. (Can I get a confirmation on that?) All of her genius, but with the fun twist of being able to do it myself?  I almost died.

But I didn't die.  I just bought the book with great haste* and immediately set into making the first project that made me salivate: the Pink Grapefruit Scarf. 

I was graciously offered some odds and ends of the super delightful Anzula Squishy to make this dream come true, so I set in that night using Squishy in the colorways Ducky and Raspberry, with Anzula's Haiku in Au Natural for the sections. 

Scarf is worked in sections so it's really easy to take on the go without lugging the whole project. Downside?  Sewing and weaving in tons and tons and tons of ends.

Because the pattern calls for some seriously chunky ass yarn and Squishy is fingering weight, the citrus slices turned out much smaller than they should have (gauge, what?)  making them more lemony.  And well, I like lemonade even more than grapefruit, so I christened this my pink lemonade scarf.

The pattern was so easy to work off of and Squishy never ever disappoints to the touch so this project was incredibly fun.  Now that the chilly weather is settling in I don't take my scarf off.  No, seriously.  I was at the OBGYN this morning and he asked if I wanted to put it in the pile with my pants.  I declined.  Sometimes a girl just needs a brightly colored superwash merino/cashmere/nylon blend shaped like fruit on her neck, okay?!

Crocheters of the universe- do everyone you know a favor and buy the damn book.  Even if you're not into wearing food, you've gotta have a cousin or a friend who just is dying to have a cupcake hat. 

*"OMIGOD I NEED THIS CAN YOU BREAK A HUNDRED BECAUSE A BALLER LIKE ME ONLY CARRIES THE BENJAMINZ?  THANX!"

First Knitting Project, GO!

Swatchy swatchy!

I've been trying to learn to knit for years, but I always jump back to my comfortable crochet hooks because I can stop my brain and just go, unlike with knitting where I'm reminding myself to "stab it, choke it, drag it" every stitch.  However, working as an assistant to an indie dyer I've been picking up the needles here and there and working slightly more than half-assed at learning to knit.  

I'm a crocheter, that's my thing, but when I first laid eyes on Habu Textiles N-69B 20/1 Copper Bamboo yarn I knew I had to make a project with it, and the project should probably involve my learning the art of knitting

I've been working on my practice swatch (knit on Lantern Moon 7's and using Anzula's Cricket in Hyacinth, a few little treats I got from attending a yarn tasting.) and I finally feel competant enough to maybe (maybe...) take on my very first ever knitting project!  

The Pattern: Kusha Kusha Scarf, graciously blogged on The Purl Bee.

and graciously (and gorgeously) modeled by the hip chicks at Fancy Tiger, one of the coolest LYS's I've ever set foot in!

The Yarn: Habu Textiles N-69B 20/1 Copper Bamboo in Mursaki and Habu Textiles N-75 2/48 Fine Merino in Umber.

Both purchased from Knit Purl in Portland, one in store and one on the internet.

I'm super excited and I can't wait to get myself working on it.  Basically the needles start clicking as soon as I hit "publish" on this post.  Stay tuned!