Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Every girl needs a little luxury

It's been a while since I blogged about an FO; knit-wise, I've been feeling really unproductive. I'm hoping to change that in the next couple months, but we'll see how things actually go. In any case, I do have one FO to talk about here, and two more saved up that I can talk about as soon as I get the photos off my camera.

Way, way back when, Adrienne and I took a trip to Romni Wool. By way back, I really do mean years ago. At that time, I bought myself a skein, just one because it was expensive, of Handmaiden 8-ply Cashmere. Lovely, lovely stuff. However, because it was only a single skein, there wasn't much I could make with it, and so it sat in my stash for a long time. I would go and admire it every so often, but it waited until I could figure out a project for it.

Fast forward to about 5 years later, and I finally came up with something! This project came about as I was finding the weather getting cooler as I would take my baby out for walks with me. On short jaunts around the neighbourhood, I often like to carry him in a front-pack carrier. As fall set in, I was finding my neck getting cold, yet unable to wear scarves as they would get in my baby's face as I carried him. My solution?

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A small little neck warmer of my own design using a diagonal cluster lace stitch. Nothing fancy at all, but a nice little bit of luxury to keep me warm. I was a little short on the yardage, so I just added a little Noro Silk Garden to the end to finish things off; not the most elegant solution, I suppose, but it works for me. The alternating button colours worked so much better in my head, and I even liked the way it looked when I lay it out. But once they were sewn on and actually worn, I have to admit that I didn't really love it - I think it would look better if all the buttons were brown. Still, I started wearing it as the need for warmth was more pressing than my concern about button colour, and I soon became too lazy to change the buttons. I used it for a lot of autumn, but now that winter has set in, I'm back to my usual scarves.

On the same day that I finished that neck warmer, I also baked some goodies.
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Cashmere and chocolate cupcakes - a winning combination. Well, unless you got the chocolate cupcakes all smeared in your cashmere, but I think you all know what I mean.

Up next: A little something for my little monkey.

3 comments:

Adrienne said...

I remember that trip! Man, that truly was ages ago. I'm glad you finally found a project for the cashmere, it's too pretty to be marinating in the stash! I can see that the brown buttons do blend in a bit better with the yarn, but I think the alternating colours work too. And the FO is awesomely functional, which is the most important part. :)

Yay cupcakes! I had chocolate cupcakes yesterday too. :)

Karen said...

My cupcakes were hardly as fancy as yours though :) How do you get the Nutella in the middle?

Adrienne said...

Oh, haha, I filled them with Nutella after baking them by cutting out a little cone from the top, lopping off the tip of the cone, filling the hole left behind halfway with Nutella, then sticking the top back on before frosting the whole thing. Does that make sense?

I've discovered through several experiments that adding Nutella to things pre-baking always results in a loss of awesome Nutella flavour. Of course it will taste chocolatey, but not like *Nutella*, and therefore vaguely disappointing.