Goldfishluv

My in-laws all got Christmas wreaths this year. I’d made one for my parents last year and it was a fairly easy conquest, this year, however, was a different story. I had a really hard time finding nice pine cones.  The ones I was finding were all mildewy and even after a good wash and dry they would still mold in the box. Eventually I found the mother load of nice ones and had enough for three wreaths.

The process for prepping the cones can be long and pokey but it’s worth it. I soak the cones in my kitchen sink with really hot water and a form of detergent. This year I used Fantastic and bleach and it worked well. Soaking them in detergent helps to prevent mold and gets rid of all the creepy crawlies in the cones. Next, I cover cookie sheets with tin foil and lay the wet cones on the sheets with plenty of space between them to open up. I set the oven at about 200C and let the cones warm up. Pine cones operate with humidity so don’t fret if you’re looking for cones and they’re all closed up. It’s because the humidity in the air is too great and it’s not optimal conditions for the cones to release their seeds. Warming them up in the oven helps them open up as well as letting them sit out in your warm house for a few days. I find that in the oven the bottom scales will open right away but as you get close to the point it takes a little  more coaxing. There’s a reason patience and pine cones start with the same letter.

I rotate the cones ever couple of hours, be careful not to leave them in the oven too long because they will get a little black. The sent of sweet pine resin alone is worth the work.

The one I made for my parents was just plain cones, this year I decided to jazz them up a little and took a trip to my amazing local dollar store. I glued on all the cones first, if you like puzzles you will love this project. Try your best not to get any kind of pattern going, just fit them together as best as possible. Oh and lots for hot glue. With patience and perseverance you will get amazing holiday wreaths.

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I think Christmas stockings were one of my favorite things about Christmas. My parents allowed us to only open our stockings without them on Christmas morning so, no matter how early we were up, we were allowed to dig in to our stockings. There was always a Mandarin orange in the toe of the stocking and tons of puzzles, little books and cute toys to keep us busy while my parents slept.

Now that I don’t live with my parents I still wanted to keep the tradition so I set to knitting stockings for Batman and I. Unfortunately, I’d taken on too many projects that needed to be done for Christmas so this one didn’t get done until after and I still have to make myself one. Next year, we’ll continue the tradition.

I used Valley Yarns Spotten Christmas Stocking pattern but modified it a bit by using Lion Brand Thick and Quick yarn, 7.0mm and 6.5mm double pointed needles. These materials make a nice large stocking but not overly huge. The first think Mr. Kent did when I gave it to him was kick off his slipper and try it on. He has about size 9.5 feet and it was just a tad too big for him.

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On Saturday I took the car in to be serviced. The repairs were going to take a couple hours so I headed over to the coffee shop to have a nice cup of tea and work on my knitting project. So I ordered my tea and sat down in one of the over-stuffed, leather chairs in the corner, pulled out the mittens I’ve been working on and set to knitting. That’s when the gentleman beside me piped up, “you’re too young to be doing that!”. In the back of my mind I was a little offended, when is it too young to learn a valuable, tactile skill that improves motor skills and can foster literacy and social skills??! Instead of being abrupt I told him he would be surprised to know that there is a whole community of young fiber artists and all he’d have to do was a little internet research to discover the going-ons in the knitting world. I went on to back my argument with a segment from CBC radio where they interviewed a photographer with one of the only dark rooms left on the lower mainland. The photographer went on to say that more and more high school aged people were coming in to use his dark room because they are tired of sitting in front of a computer, fiddling with photoshop. They’re craving the hands-on aspect of the craft and the magic of having an image appear before their eyes.

I  believe that society, with economic times and growing technology, has come full circle and we are getting back to out roots and the basics for survival. People want to know how it’s made and want to try to make it.

What do you think? Is there a “too young”?

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Working out of town really cuts into one’s social life. I basically leave the house at quarter after six and am home again at 4ish, where two of those hours are spent driving and the other 8 are with 12-14 year olds who’s hormones are raging and their favorite past time is testing limits and pushing buttons. Needless to say, I’m exhausted at the end of the day… All I want to do is come home, eat something delicious that doesn’t take all night to make, knit and watch Fringe (a very entertaining, sci fi mystery about an FBI agent trying to solve messed up science mysteries. If you like CSI, you’ll LOVE fringe).

But that still doesn’t leave much time for a social life. This is where I reiterate that I LOVE RAVELRY.  I joined the local knit group on ravelry where I found women my age who also love to knit, we coordinated an evening where we meet at the local pub, drink beer (or pomegranate ciders), eat, knit and visit. We are inspired by others ideas and projects and the conversation is never boring.

I look forward to my weekly Stitch n’ Bitch! See you Wednesday Ladies!

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#4

I tried very hard to make all my gifts this year, and if I couldn’t make them myself, they were made by someone else.

The first gifts I made were tiny jars of mint tea for the teachers and staff at the school where I work. Last March we moved into a new home. It’s a beautiful house that was built in the 70’s that is huge and energy inefficient but we love living here. One reason I love it here is the yard. Right outside my kitchen door is a large patch of spearmint. In the summer is wonderful to have the mint right there, many-a-mojito was consumed in the scorching summer heat.

And in the fall, the vigorously growing mint was turned into tea. I chopped all the mint down in September, from what I’ve read it’s best to cut the mint right before it’s about to bloom. I washed and spun the mint and hung it upside down in our storage room to dry. It’s best to dry mint in a warm, well ventilated, dark place. Light can degrade the mint and therefore in the dark is best. Once it was all dry, about a week later, I stripped the leaves off the twigs and stored it in plastic containers.

The dollar store by my work is amazing, there I found cute little jars, two for a $1.25 and some Christmas ribbon. I had gift tag and snowflake punches from last year, I found them on ebay. Gotta love ebay.

Here is the final product;

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I think I’ll start with mittens.

Last April, after finishing my practicum, I took a knitting class at a local yarn shop. I had been in University for the past 7 years so to go from learning every day to nothing I needed something to fill the time and that’s when I discovered my passion for fiber art. I’d been crocheting since I was very young, my Grandma taught me how to make butterfly fridge magnets and I was “hooked”.

So I took knitting classes and loved them, I actually can’t stop thinking about knitting. I’m addicted to Ravelry, the patterns section of Etsy and the public library for patterns and tips. So for Christmas I decided to make knitted gifts. Most of those gifts turned out to be mittens;

These mittens were for my girlfriend in England. She was so excited to get them, she said she put off buying a pair because she had good feeling I was making her some for Christmas. She was right.

These were for my girlfriend in on the coast. I started a pattern that was for two needles on four needles so I had to switch patterns and make some adjustments to make them work. They turned out a little big but are still adorable. The snowflake is embroidered on.

These Bella mittens are for my youngest cousin. She loves Twilight and her favorite color is royal blue. This was the first project I did with cabeling and they turned out perfect. So perfect that I wanted to keep them for myself.

This pair I made for my brother. He lives in Edmonton and needed a pair of manily mitts. His only comment was that the thumbs were a little tight and they're not appropriate for snowball fights but overall he was happy to receive them.

Here are the patterns:

Owl Mittens

Snowflake Mittens – you need to log on to Ravelry for this one, it’s free and AMAZING!

Bella’s Mittens

Man’s Mittens -  this pattern is in a book I got at the public library called “The Knitting Experience: Book 2, the Purl Stitch”  The patterns in it are kind of dated but this mitten pattern is very good.

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#2

This holiday seasons I was spoiled rotten. I’m not much for the gift giving at the holidays, I’m more of a birthday person, where we celebrate the individual, but this Christmas was a good one.  My finace got my a new laptop that I love, it’s a Lenovo Ideapad and it’s awesome. I’ve already gone through etsy and am thinking of purchasing a vinyl decal to put on it. These are the two I came up with:

copyright heckfire

copyright bubbaanddoodle

My awesome brother got me an ipod touch. I freakin’ love it! I was looking for some sort of PDA that would sync with google calendar so I wouldn’t have to buy anymore paper day planners to keep myself organized.  Not only does it do just that there are tons of other free applications that are extremely useful.  There’s an app for etsy and facebook, there’s also apps for knitting to help you keep track of your stash, rows and stitches on projects. There’s a yardage calculator app for sewing, the possibilities go on and on! I’m pretty much glued to the thing.

My finace is a huge computer geek and I am very thankful for him. Only hours after receiving my ipod, he had it programmed to control the home automation in our house. I can turn lights on and off from it, boot up our home theater system, browse movies and T.V. shows, select music to play. Amazing, sometimes I feel like I’m living with Bruce Wayne. If any of you have techy partners at home, my fiance, a.k.a. Batman, blogs about his technological endeavors at blog.mybarachois.com.

Other great gifts I love and love the people who gave them to me; Magic Bullet blender, Lulu sweatshirt, new drinking glasses, sushi set, cutlery, moose hide slippers, beautiful calendars of France, a GPS watch for my walks with Otto. And it wasn’t only me who got awesome gifts, pretty much everyone in the family did well, which brought us to postulate the reason why. My Mom and I concluded that perhaps it’s too often that Christmas comes (we haven’t done gifts the past couple years) and that gift giving should only happen every three years.

It’s just a thought, we all know the holidays are not about the material gifts but the gifts we cherish in our loved ones. It’s about visiting with family, being joyous, celebrating good fortune and giving to the less fortunate, and above all, love.

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season.

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