Isn't this the best print ever? I found it with other irresistable prints, cut into one meter bundles at my local craft shop. It's nothing fancy but they sure do have some wonderful stuff sometimes. I was there to pick up buttons for my sesame sweater which is completely finished, but I am not happy with the way they look. I think I need to redo the button bands on smaller needles for a firmer, more finished look. So forget I even mentioned that. I am on a tight budget these days but somehow I managed to rack up enough stamps on my members card to get this for free. Woohoo!

I'm currently trying to work up the perfect pattern for this great fabric so that I don't waste a single scrap. Luckily, I have far too many bags of my own so I can measure, compare, and create what will hopefully be the best bag ever (not like I have high expectations or anything though). I'll be heading off to the big city this weekend to find the zipper and notions that I need and then I ought to be able to crank it out at "work" next week before spring vacation comes to an end.

I have still been knitting, too, but it's the same old stuff that I've been doing for a while so it seems a bit lackluster to post about. It's the end of the school year in Japan, so there is lots of change going on. I found out that one of my favorite coworkers, who I made my standup comedy debut with onstage this year, is being moved to a different place so that has been a huge disappointment. Of course, I have a great job with a lot of perks, but it was a little hard to keep that in perspective and my mom nearly convinced me to come home! But everything is back to normal-ish, the string end-of-the-year work drinking parties is winding down, and soon I should have a little more time at home (or jetting off somewhere on the train) to make more fun progress. And Mum, even though I'm not coming home, I will iron my Totoro banner and hang it soon, I swear.

Posted by Molly at 09:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Today I found a hole in my sock in the middle of the closing ceremony for this school year. Considering that the teachers were just standing around in their socks, I was kind of embarrassed. Spent a lot of the time trying to hide it under my (luckily!) long pant leg. Ended up taking things into my own hands when I got home though and managed to turn everything around. I know, another crazy Friday night!

*This post, and the fact that I have finished a sock in less than one week, is coming to you thanks to Kat and her Veronica Mars DVDs. I'm hooked.

Posted by Molly at 09:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Today is a national holiday, so instead of staying in all day and knitting I went to a nearby shrine to see these beautiful plum blossoms (shidare ume) that were in full bloom. I thought I had missed the peak, so it was a nice surprise to hear people saying that they thought this was the best day of the season for the blossoms. They were just beautiful. I didn't even have to wear a jacket so I'm really ready to believe that spring is here.

I'm also very happy that I can indeed still turn a heel, gussets and all, without my short-row cop out method. I am a little concerned about the snugness of the sock, though. It's kind of like an ankle brace, so maybe it will be good for sports? I'm hoping that the koigu will stretch out and instead of turning slouchy they will be just perfect. We'll see!

Now, for the lay on the couch and knit part of my holiday.

Posted by Molly at 05:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

This SIlk Garden laceweight yarn really made my day when I found it in Kyoto last fall. The color transitions are great and it is making a fun mini-clapotis. If it's the perfect length and has no visible flaws, I might be able to gift it to a friend. The only problem is that I think it will coordinate oh-so-nicely with my apple green Chuck Taylors.

**This is a great CD that I have been listening to a lot lately. That and Mozart for the Mind, which I consider an investment in my own brainpower. hehe.

Posted by Molly at 10:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Check it out! I bet you thought I wasn't going to finish this oddball mitten glitten. Wanting to get this ugly thing out of my projects basket as quickly as possible, I persevered last night and this morning making sure that it (and the acocmpanying bajillion balls of wool) were permanently retired from the WIP basket. But hey, I wasn't totally crazy. In my mind, it was going to end up looking like this!) What a good feeling! Even though there were some rather ugly parts to this mitten glitten, it is still my first multi-colored accomplishment, so I wasn't going to let it slip through the cracks. It will hopefully serve as a nice model for better mittens in the future. Although it's not getting a mate, I did turn it into something very useful. Wondering what that extra finger is for?

I have a faulty tea kettle so when I boil water, steam escapes through the top making the handle and little finger loop way too hot to touch. Until now I've employed a precarious towel setup that I feared would one day lead to me lighting the towel on fire. So voila, a new mitt glitten for the kitchen. Although I doubt there are many more freezing nights this year, I'm sure I'll be back to boiling a gallon of water every night before I know it. No more steam burns for my poor, sensitive fingers.

It sure did feel good to finish that!

I also managed to finally block up the final bits of my jailbreak sweater. I'm so close I can almost taste it! I meant to go shopping for buttons today but the rain persuaded me to leave the biking around town until tomorrow. Which left me with time for one last thing...

Yep, I finally started a jaywalker that fits! I did about 4 tries with Trekking last year only to realise that Trekking is just not made for that pattern. So far this Koigu KPPM (P621) is just what the doctor ordered. And they're project spectrum approved!

Ok, now that I've gotten all that done, I can sit down and crack into the tape of Project Runway that my mom sent this week. I just have to decide what to knit!

Posted by Molly at 07:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)

Progress! Good progress is moving forward on projects that have been around for a while. I finished the button bands on my Sesame sweater so now all it needs is a good blocking and some buttons. Remember that great cropped shrug I was making with the bobble sleeves? Well, I made some SERIOUS progress on that last weekend.

The beautiful fibers and color changes in this Noro Silk Garden laceweight were not meant to be wasted on a one-wear silly cropped sweater. I tore the whole thing out and I was so ready to start again.

It's a mini clapotis! I'm totally winging it and not completely sure that I have quite enough yarn for this, but that's what makes it mini. I really like my red clapotis, but it's a bit hefty for spring. Had a gross stomach flu this week which resulted in lots of time at home in bed, and on the couch, so I actually made some progress on this easy peasy knit. I contemplated how nice it would be to knit one project at a time. The huge chunks of progress seemed so appealing! But then I was forced to pick up my apartment, which forcibly leads to moving yarn around and thinking about what I want to make with it.

Look at this great koigu! I initially ordered it to make the chevron scarf from last-minute knitted gifts when I was in a bit of a headscarf phase. But seriously, if I knit this enormous thing with these four skeins, would I really want to wrap it around my head? Ok yeah, I would. But in public? I'm starting to think that this gorgeous yarn would be better suited to some handknit socks. I have three pairs of handknit socks in heavy circulation these days... and if I use the pink it would be so perfect for Project Spectrum... I could make some jaywalkers now that the internet craze has died down...

I was just thinking. Brainstorming! Then I remembered the Koigu Kersti that I have been moving around and dreaming about for more than a year, not knowing what to do with it. It sure would make a nice bright neckwarmer for cold spring days! Yes, I know that there are probably about 5 more cold spring days in the books, but you never know! I might even have enough free time this weekend to start.

I mean really, did I think I was going to finish that Clapotis anytime soon?

Posted by Molly at 06:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Technology rocks!

Thank you to everyone who helped or at least offered to help me work through my blog questions. I just had to do a little more fiddling and I got things all straightened out.

My internet at home was broken tonight but I got adventurous and tried to fix it--going from moping on the couch and thinking how I could just go to bed early to importing all my old entries from my old blog in about 45 minutes. It was amazingly simple! I decided to look through my old posts a bit and it was like looking back through an old high school yearbook or something. Here are my favorite moments:

My first attempts at lace, or the good old days when I had enough empty space in my apartment to take a blog picture with no clutter blocking the light or crowding the subject.

Maniacally knitting up a skinny scarf for a ball where most people were way too drunk to even notice. I did love that Jetsons-esque hairstyle, though.

Then there was the life-changing Clapotis, which seems to have symbolically marked my transition from knitting awkward ugly things that either didn't fit or were totally impractical to being able to make things that I use and love!

Knitting my favorite socks on the southernmost and the northernmost islands of Japan all in one lucky summer!

..and lots more in the recent past that I'm not feeling nostalgic about yet.

New music!

Has everyone heard about Jack Johnson's new CD? Probably, since I am generally two steps behind when it comes to what is new and cool. But I just got a copy of this today and I'm loving it. Even though it is lullabyes for kids, Jack Johnson is great and he even covers my favorite White Stripes song, We're Going to be Friends (it plays at the beginning of Napoleon Dynamite, I think).

Bright colors!

The last item up for discussion is this Kureyon yarn, color #165, that I picked up in Tokyo a few months ago. My mom and I saw it crocheted up in a chevron scarf and we both thought it would be such a fun project to learn crochet. "You can find an easy crochet chevron pattern anywhere," my mom told me confidently. I quickly bought into that, got the right sized crochet hook and hopped (or rather dragged) home with my new finds. But I can't find a crochet chevron scarf pattern ANYWHERE. Am I missing out on some kind of secret crochet resource or something? I'm starting to think I might have to cave and just knit a scarf with it, so if anyone can point me in the direction of a good pattern (ahem, MUM?) please do.

That's all I've got for good things today. One not so good thing is that I have to be at work in the morning (Saturday). I might have been better off without the internet tonight!

Posted by Molly at 09:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)

Does anyone know if there is an easy way to put my banner image and sidebar into other pages, like the single entries that Bloglines links to or the archives page? I am pretty new at this computer stuff but I'm ready to learn. If anyone can give me tips or point me in the right direction of where I can find help, I'll be very grateful.

Knit on!

Posted by Molly at 08:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

I finished my thrummed mittens! This picture was taken shortly after I realized that it's totally impossible to take a picture of both hands using one's teeth.

(This is closest to the real yarn color).

Project specs:
Yarn/Pattern: Fleece Artist Thrum Mittens Kit
Needles: Dpns, size 4
Sheets of lint roller paper used to get stray hairy fleece: 20+

These babies are great! I finished them just in time for the warm spell we are having this week. I'm afraid this "warm spell" just might turn into a warm season, but if I'm lucky I'll get a few more cold spring days so I can wear these before next season. It snowed when my parents were here last year, so you never know! At the very least, I have some rad new mittens to put away for next season that I can pull out in my early November must-cast-on-for-winter-accessories frenzy. I can't believe I'm still going to be in Japan!

The good news is that an emergency shipment of decaf tea and more importantly, sesame buttonband yarn came from the lovely Amy (who posts the best pop culture links--you should check em out). Knit bloggers sure are great for coming to the rescue! I'm feeling like I might not have the chance to wear a wool sweater for a while now that I'm already working up a sweat on my bike ride to school, but if I persevere I might be able to finish it this week. Just need to knit the buttonbands and buy some buttons!

And how could I finish this post without a picture of the inside of my thrums? At first it grossed me out but now I'm rather intrigued by the hair thrums. What a fun project!

Posted by Molly at 08:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)

Final exams are wrapping up which means that my free sewing time is coming to a close! So I really had to finish up these pillowcases which were hanging over my head since I "gave" them as a Christmas present a few months ago. I added a blue strip at the end to give them a little life (inspired by some pillowcases I got from my mom a long time ago) and even without a pattern or any calculated measuring, they turned out great!

I just folded the blue part over so that it covered the raw edge where I joined the two fabrics on the inside. Then I sewed along that seam and it made the inside nice and crisp (blurry shot here). It's such a relief to have these finished and gifted. Definitely not committing to as many homemade gifts this year!

Posted by Molly at 10:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

The good, the bad and the ugly of my first experiment with stranded knitting, Carole style.

The good: I did it!

Click on the photo to see the inside. It's great!

The bad: The beginning/end of each row in the middle of the pattern was a little iffy. A tense night, maybe.

The ugly: I don't know what's worse. All these ends and having no idea how to weave them in or just the awful technicolor yarn. The jury is still out on whether I'll be making another or even finishing this, for that matter.

But I did it!!

Posted by Molly at 08:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

One of the great perks when I go to work (among many others) is that I can use the sewing machines when students are on vacation or taking exams. It's so exciting! Yesterday I whipped up a new drawstring pouch using some Japanese fabric that I bought a while ago. (for a closeup of the print, check this out). I figured it's about time I start using this stuff before I have to think about shipping it home. It was fun and easy to make, and I really love the feeling of feeding fabric through the machine. It's just so much fun to make stuff. The way I see it, a knitter I can never have too many drawstring project bags.

I've got some pillowcases up next on the sewing agenda, but I'm not particularly looking forward to it. It's a belated Christmas gift that I have lost enthusiasm for, but I DID commit to it so I'll do my best. After that, the sky's the limit!
I'm thinking I MIGHT have to invest in a Japanese pattern book or two.

I did also get a start on my Project Spectrum knitting last night. Nothing too exciting just yet, but I hope there'll be time for it to take shape soon!

Posted by Molly at 04:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

As I lay awake in bed tonight, I started to wonder what was keeping me up (I'm an asleep-as-my-head-hits-the-pillow kind of gal) and remembered that today is the beginning of March!* Not only does this mean that I can get rid of my cardboard, milk cartons, plastic bottles and magazines in the special trash this week, but it's the beginning of Project Spectrum! Have you heard the exciting news?

I've been kind of anti-knitalongs lately because I'm trying to avoid unecessary deadlines. But this is something special! I love the idea of choosing a different color each month, and I already have something planned for the pink and red month that I'll start later this week (it's getting a little late). I once told a friend that "I just love colors!" and I don't think he'll ever let me live it down. I don't think it's mockworthy, but true! I'm a sucker for anything that's lined up in color order. Get me in Tokyu Hands and I want one of just about anything bright. I used to love my Benetton store because they organized all the clothes by color. Get the picture? This knitalong was made for me.

To celebrate, I took some pictures of things around my apartment in March colors. It was almost too easy. I look forward to seeing what all the many participants have to contribute. But for now, I'm going to bed.

*Current time: 1:39 am, March 1st.

Posted by Molly at 01:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)