Exploring.

My parents spontaneously booked a summer cottage in the north of Denmark and invited me to come along. It was a week full of adventures, beach walks, knitting, baking and snuggling up in front of the fireplace. The weather was everything from sunny and warm to gray and rainy - perfect mixture of cozy afternoons at the cottage and long adventures in the countryside. Waking up to the screaming of seagulls and wearing rain boots made me miss Vancouver. The cottage was comfy and the portrait of the old lady knitting happily made me smile every time I entered the living room.

But it's good to be home again and finally have some time to catch up on all the stuff I've been wanting to do for weeks... like sharing all those 52 knits projects I've knitted up lately!

Fall... finally!

I admit that I don't complain when summer ends. Of course I love the heat and sunshine and all the outdoor stuff but let's face it, fall is by far the best season. Sweaters, boots, hot tea, hats and many cozy evenings by the fire place. It's been rather quiet around here lately. Sorry about that. I could use an extra 5 hours every day. But oh well, only one more week of full time work and then I'll have a couple days off in October before school starts. There'll definitely be many cozy evenings spent in my comfy chair, knitting.
This season I'm most looking forward to baking lots of apple pies (there's a huge apple tree in my garden with delicious apples!), cozy evenings spent with friends knitting and the mandatory fall walks. Also, some craft shows and the famous book fair in Frankfurt. And it's time to make some personal craft projects to decorate my new space. So many ideas, so little time...

52 Knits // Leaf Lace Shawl

Pattern: Leaf Lace Shawl by Cayli Harris

Yarn Used: One skein Zitron Filigran (100% Merino)

Needles: 3.5mm circular needles

Modifications: None

Note: This shawl took me only a little over a year. Hah! Let's be honest here, knitting the same pattern repeat over and over and over again is awfully boring. After several looong breaks, changing the needles at least five times to use them for other projects and switching to different cords whenever I needed the length of cord it was currently on and lots of complaining to my fellow knit friends about the extent to which I'm bored by this project, I finally made it through!

I love love love the result and I've worn the scarf several times. The sudden change of color of the yarn isn't too distracting when wearing the scarf. The yarn itself is wonderfully soft and was fun to work with - except the one little undyed part in the middle.

This project taught me one lesson - to never ever even think about knitting a blanket. It would be sheer torture to myself (and all my friends and family) to be working on the same boring pattern for years. I'm really grateful for the cute granny square blanket I thrifted in Victoria - it wouldn't have been fun to crochet 80+ granny squares. I admire all people who have to patience to knit/crochet blankets and other items that take months/years to finish.

around here

Life finally seems to get back to normal around here. I work from 7am to 6pm every day, which doesn't leave much time for the fun stuff in life when the evenings are spent cleaning, cooking, grocery shopping and renovating at my parent's house. I wouldn't mind spending an entire day in bed, catching up on all the TV series I used to love watching and having a fun knitting project to keep me company.

I finally had some time (and daylight!) to take some pictures of some of the knitted stuff I finished in the past weeks. I promise to write a couple posts this weekend to finally share what I've been up to. Let's just say it involved more lace yarn that I had wished for, a new book I've been wanting to read since the day it was published (anyone else here who's a fan of the 'tales of the city' books? They're amazing, you should go and read them. Like...now.), lots of playing around with my KitchenAid and being on TV.

See you soon!

Patience

Please excuse the silence around here lately - I still don't have internet access at my new apartment. Hopefully the technician will get it up and running by next Wednesday. In the meantime I spend the evenings knitting, re-watching The Office for the gazillion's time and enjoying the last summer nights outside. I love summer but I can't wait for fall to arrive!

Anyone else craving long walks, cozy evenings at home with lots of time for crafts and of course lots of apple pie and tea?

life lately

After several stressful weeks months, life has finally calmed down a little. I'm at my parent's for a couple of days cat sitting while they're on vacation. I haven't had much time to decorate my apartment yet but as soon as it looks home-y I'll show you a couple of pictures.

Today I realized that I haven't had a chance to pick up my camera for days weeks, so I took some quick shots of our cats while they were soaking up the last bits of sunshine in our backyard. I'm gonna miss these two cuties badly but I'm starting to look into adopting a kitten - an apartment/house without a cat simply doesn't feel like home to me. I wish I could take my cat with me but it would break his heart not to be able to go outside anymore - and not having another cat to chase.

I'll be back soon with something crafty to make up for the past months of knitting abstinence.

Life Is Good

- bought an AWESOME sewing machine. It's pure love. I can't wait for the weekend when I get to sew a cute project or two :)
- lots of baking going on here. Yumm!
- homegrown zucchini and basil. So good!!
- hunting for a cute lamp shade knitting pattern. I wanna restyle this simple lamp and turn it into something lacy and stylish!

Sorry for being so quiet lately, but life has been full of time-consuming surprises lately. It's been exhausting, but good.