The Cat Hat, FO from First S&B Book

Here it is, the cat hat in hot pink Blue Sky Alpacas Organic Cotton from the generous and driven keohinani of Aloha and Oreos modeled by the ancient and weathered Daruma doll of my childhood. The hat disquises the fact that he has a concussion and the wish associated with this doll is long forgotten.



In the last hurrah of Project Sprectrum Yellow/Orange month I found this yellow "rose" on my neigborhood walk. I don't think it is rose as it has a milky sap.

Can't think of a catchy title, must be Monday.

The orange variety of this orchid thrives in my patio. The red does fairly well, and the purple not at all. It plants it self all over the place and really doesn't need any soil, just something to anchor it. I can count on this to have a few flowers almost everyday of the year.

For lack of FOs to show, here is my handkerchief doll home from the office posing with the pineapple blossum. I found her in an shop marked down as her spool hands were no longer holding her original package. I became obsessed about making some myself and started collecting handkerchiefs. The label on her arm says Heartstrings. There is a phone number, but I never called it. I also never made any dolls as I had some guilt about copying it and also there is a hole cut in the handkerchief, which I just could not bring myself to do. And that's my story ,and I'm sticking to it.
Last year was a very good pineapple year, and I had six which all tasted yummy. This one has the prettiest flower. It's a hybrid.

After seeing all the wonderful lace everyone is knitting, I dug my UFO, The Pacific Northwest Shawl out of the closet. I have knit and un-knit the last panel "trees" three times already. At least the musty closet smell has waned a bit. Currently the project is in negative status. Sigh. It will be a miracle if it looks like the picture.
For comic relief I'm knitting the cat hat from the first S&B book in the hot pink cotton I swapped keohinani for. It needs ears yet.

BPT, the underarm

Here is the underarm of BPT at the request of Knitting Spaz
The labels in my picture are a bit garbled. The "sleeve" labels refer to the front and back raglan which have cables running along them. The cables also run down the side seam of the body and along the underarem. The very center is where stitches get picked up when starting to knit the sleeve. I wasn't exactly sure how my rows to count up before the twist but all in all I liked the result.

A bit of yellow a bit of blue and green

The second spray of my orchid plant opened up and is much more glorious then the first. And here is Daisy drying. I am packing up my craft room to have it remodeled and can't find a single button. Wow, a reason to shop:)


I still need a zipper for my BPT, too.

Meanwhile, my order from Four Seasons Knitting Products came. Lovely, lovely, squishy Koigu. I'm in love! (and so is Totoro!) I wanted a solid for Cascading Leaves. And the blue? I just had to have it. I got a bit of a scare on my first time ordering from Four Seasons when I didn't hear from them, but the owner was away! She even expedited the shipping for me when she returned.


I experimented with cel phone picture sent to Flickr. Ain't technology grand? It's a good example of why more pixels are better! I had to adjust the color since the flower was a very yellow hibiscus.


I miss decorating Easter Eggs with the kids, since they are kids no more. Have a nice Sunday everyone, on this the last of the "chocolate" holidays until Halloween!

Ooh I almost forgot. My mini sushi stitch markers from Amyville arrived. I ordered them after mkcarroll illustrious designer of The Womb showed me hers. They are just so cute!

April Project Spectrum, Bpt Update

Thanks to all who left comments on my Blogiversary.




Here is the sorry state of my April Project Spectrum yarn stash, unless I want to count a couple of leftovers. The Softball cotton was purchased on sale at Liberty House, Ala Moana, which dates this yarn circa 1979. I made several tops from this yarn in different colors and they wore well. I'm not sure what I will make with this yellow, but I have some black, too, so it sure sounds like Bumble Bee something. Boy I miss Liberty House. I spent many a hour browsing the yarn department years ago petting all that sock yarn.



Huckleberry Farms, a local grocer, had some really nice butternut squash. It looked so nice and yellow with carrots in this very hot squash curry. I think I'll try Ms. Lolly's butternut squash soup next time.

And look, The hood of a nearly finished Bpt!! Here it is drying. Let's see, since the ambient humidity today is 50-100%, it could take up to 3 days to dry, if I'm lucky. Then I have to measure and find a zipper to install. I enjoyed knitting this sweater and only had an urge to bolt 1/2 through sleeve one. Cascade 220 Superwash was a joy to knit with in color 828 on size 8 aluminum needles. I could not get a decent picture of the color. Once again I knit a sweater with a very "comfortable" fit. I have short arms and was not able to make all the decreases before I had to stop. If I knit it again, I'll decrease every 5 rows. It is really cool the way the cables come together and split in the armhole. I tried the 3 needle cast off on the hood, but undid it and grafted instead as some others recommended and liked it much better.

I got my first squeeze of Knit Picks in person, thanks to Chris. Feels very nice:) Now, what to knit next?

I made One Year!

I began blogging exactly one year ago on April Fool's Day. Is there a hidden message in there somewhere?
I started blogging during a down time for me...lot's of issues in my life and in desparation decided to blog my way out of it! A lot of my angst got posted in my first blog and the craft blog split off. The first blog is pretty much just an occasional movie review and whine but remains open for any future hills and valleys.
Along the way, I have met some wonderful "imaginary" friends, as twosheep calls them, and some real ones at the Aloha knitters. I've gotten much inspiration from the talented and creative people out there, not just in knitting and crafts, but in life and love, too!
A big ALOHA! to all the wonderful blog sisters out there for sharing their talents and kind words. And, thanks also bloglines and blogger.com for enabling me to connect with them and of course the Internet, still the most amazing invention in my time.


This orchid bloomed in time for Project Spectrum yellow and orange. It is delicate and not a long lasting flower, but when well cared for it can make several sprays at once and the glory makes up for the brief show.