Josh and I made cupcakes yesterday…there isn’t anything sexier than a man scooping cupcake batter

how ’bout an update, you say? well i’ve still been working away on many knitting projects. christmas gifts were great, i made my nanna some leg warmers because she says she can never seem to keep her calves warm. i also made my sister some potholders because whenever josh and i are cooking at her house we have to use her dish towels to get things out of the oven! 

i’ve also been starting some embroidery for the first time..and i really like it! so far i’ve only done two projects, the first of which i won’t show because it’s pretty lame but this is the second one

it’s an M for maines..which will someday be my last name i really like embroidery because i feel like it’s more of an instant gratification than knitting. i’ve been in a real “crafty” mood lately..and i think it’s because i’ve been on winter break and whenever i’m out of school this whirlwind of craft ideas come swooping in once all the school crap is out of the way. this is my last semester of school (gasp!), which means my last few days of ever having school breaks, and i think my brain has been put into overdrive trying to get all of my ideas out while there’s still time. yeah i know i’ll have time for crafts even with a job and all but i think i’m psyching myself out a bit :/ 

anyway, i thought i’d post some of my photos that i’ve been taking lately with my diana!

josh and i were invited to show our photos in a photo show that’s coming up on february 7th at harrison st cafe, and we’re really excited! this is both of our first shows so we’re psyched to see how it turns out, and if anything sells!

josh and my parents bought me a diana f+ camera for my birthday! i’m super excited! lomography has recently peaked josh and my interests and since josh is the silly person that he is, he bought one for himself too! gotta love that. my birthday isn’t until sunday the 28th but of course josh went ahead and gave it to me early a few weeks ago…he can never keep secrets.

i’ve never had a non-digital camera before so i’m trying to get used to not being able to shoot 500 pictures and not have to worry about running out of film. i’ve been kind of hesitant about taking pictures because i don’t want to “waste” the film, but at the same time i realize that that goes against the whole idea of lomography and capturing life without thinking too much about it too much. so yeah, i’m trying though! of course josh is geeking out with it and learning about all the cool mods you can do with them..and since they’re so cheap i’m hoping we can start a collection of lomo camera..how sweet would that be?

the first night we went out on my scooter and took some pictures and experimented with the different settings. we had a lot of fun, but the pictures came out wayyyyy under-exposed. josh said he read somewhere that if you get 1 or 2 good shots out of your first roll of film then you’re ahead of the game. it takes a lot of experimenting to get it right. so we tried buying 400 speed film and went out again, during the day this time, and took pictures of some stuff as we walked around campus. we just got the film back and it came out MUCH better!!! totally awesome…and as soon as we figure out how to fix our scanner i’ll upload them on here. until then..here’s some other people’s photos that have been taken with the diana f+

yeahhhhhh super awesome

i just finished my first hat! i learned a LOT with this project: knit in the round, decrease, AND how to switch to double point needles. i was really freaking out about having to switch from the circular needles to the double point needles once the stitches starting getting tight on the circular needles..but i found this post on the blog woolly lambmoths and it was realllly helpful. you should have seen josh’s face when he looked up from across the desk and saw me mid-way through switching the stitches over to the dpns with the circular needles hanging from my almost finished hat. the process looked kind of like this:

..only with a hat stuck in the middle of all of it. anyone else remember that game, pick up sticks? man i loved that game.

i also learned how to make a sweet pom pom!

i used some of each color of the yarn to make the pom pom and while i usually don’t like hats with pom poms, i think this one looks pretty cute. 

before i started the hat i measured my head in order to make the right size. the number i came up with was halfway between the measurement for the men’s hat and the women’s hat, but the pattern said to go with the smaller measurement if that’s the case. so i went with the women’s sized hat. the finished hat is too big for my head…well it fits but i’d like it to be a little snugger, especially since when you wear hats like this after a while it most likely will stretch. so i let josh try it on since he has the mother of all heads..and it was even a bit big on him! next time i’ll make it smaller, but i’m glad i learned this using cheap yarn and not the expensive stuff i wanted to buy to make it. 

all in all i’m excited because now that i know how to knit in the round i can move on to bigger and better things..like leg warmers!! gloves! or more hats i suppose.

as mentioned before, the next project on my journey to knitting enough of the basics before i can have enough confidence to start a sweater is…. knitting in the round! i chose a hat pattern from the “last-minute knitted gifts” book i have. the pattern is called kim’s hats and what’s cool about it is there’s like 5 different variations for the hat, and that’s good because i’m a firm believer in slightly altering something and saying it’s completely different than the first. 

i’m using some acrylic yarn that i have a decent sized stash of. i thought i’d practice with the cheap stuff in case i guff it all up..which i have already. HA. i have 2 holes from those damn accidental yarn overs (i told you they weren’t my friend) but i figure i’ll cover it with a button or something. plus this is my first hat so i kind of expected there to be some fumbles. exhibit a:

see..damn holes. but yeah. first hat though, right? also..see that pretty obvious line from where i started each new row? is that supposed to be like that?? that’s the one thing i hated about the crocheted hats i made, there was always this line from where each row started. i think for this one it was because the rim of the hat is k1 row p1 row, so i guess there’s gonna be a visible transition. hmm. oh well. i’m gonna keep working on it and hopefully i’ll have a finished hat to post about soon!

so..i think one of my problems with starting new hobbies/crafts and things is that i’m usually impatient about taking it slow and learning to walk before i run, so to speak, but i’m trying to do it right with knitting. my first project was a scarf. second project? ipod cozy. i thought i’d try something a little more advanced, and this particular pattern combined stockinette and seed stitch, plus i had to sew the pieces together to finish it…so yeah. a little more complicated than a scarf, but not as hard as a sweater (which is what i realllly want to do damnit). but this ipod cozy only took me a few hours and it turned out really cute and soft since i used 100% bamboo yarn

the button is actually a really awesome green color but it didn’t really capture it too well in the photo. as much as i like the way it turned out, after being thrown around in my purse and in my car for a few weeks it’s already starting to curl at the corners and stuff. meh. oh well. 

so after the ipod cozy i thought the next step would be to learn how to increase. i chose to make a kerchief using some more of my bamboo yarn only in a green color for the most of it and since i ran out of yarn a few rows before it was done i trimmed it with the purple from the ipod cozy. this came from the book “last minute knitted gifts” and it was under the section called “less than two hour gifts,” yet this kerchief took me days. a week actually. i didn’t think i was a slow knitter, but i must be if this took me that much longer than expected. but frankly i think 1 week is still a pretty good amount of time for the finished piece. it’s gorgeous. it’s all garter stitch but i learned how to increase by kf&b. it took me a while to figure out how the hell i was supposed to knit into the front and the back of the stitch but once i did i was like woohooooo and i was on my way. 

i’m really happy with what i’ve been able to finish only about a month into my knitting adventures. i made a pact with myself that i would only work on one project at a time. when i used to crochet i had (and still have) 3 or 4 projects that i would be working on but never really finished any of them. i really don’t like that habit and i want to break it with my knitting. so far i’ve stuck with it, and now that i finished my kerchief i thought the next step would be to learn how to knit in the round. so i chose a hat pattern from one my books and had at it. so far i have 4 rows and it’s really not that hard, yet. i’m dreading when i get to the point in the pattern where it says “switch to double-pointed needles.”  whaa? i guess i’ll cross that bridge when i get there.

a few weeks ago josh and i sat down with a “i taught myself how to knit” book that my grandmother gave me (it’s gotta be from the 70’s) and we taught ourselves how to knit. it was a pretty super amazing sight, the two of us sitting in bed with propped pillows, cheap acrylic yarn, fumbling with large needles, and an occasional “yesssss” after completing a successful row of stitches. i had been crocheting for a few months, and at first i was like oh god two sticks ahhh but then, suddenly, i got it. the first couple little squares i made had like 25 holes in them (the accidental yarn over is not my friend) but then once i started to concentrate a bit more on what i was doing, no more holes! 

i bought the ever popular stitch n’ bitch book and thought i’d try the “ribbed for her pleasure” scarf. it was a simple k2p2 pattern that was super easy and pretty hard to mess up. i chose a green color (zombie green, as josh and i like to call it) and finished the scarf in about a week. i think it turned out great too! i only made a few mistakes towards the beginning of the scarf but it’s pretty unnoticeable. it was a great first project. i decided to give it to josh because he looks great in zombie green (as does olly, if you didn’t already notice) and because i love him