blue
Blue flower
Ahhhhhh July. The warm weather, the sun, the luscious green leaves, the flowers, the… forest fire warnings? The mosquitos? Ok, let’s move on. Amidst the quarantine and the COVID-19 pandemic, the weather here this summer has been exceptionally warm and beautiful so far, which made me want to create this little flowery piece of summer here.
This dress was made using the Vogue pattern 8667, a very simple straight forward dress that was just perfect for this light and airy flowery piece of cream and blue fabric I’ve had in stash for the longest time.
I chose view C, with the A-line pleated skirt, the short sleeves and no collar. I did end up having to make a few modifications to the pattern though, so let me run you through these very quickly.
First of all, I had bought this pattern ages ago, and noticed that the sizes included in the pattern were 16-24. Now that I’ve lost a lot of weight, I more would’ve needed something around size 14 or a little bit below, so I had to adjust the pattern accordingly. I did my best and I think it turned ou pretty good, but I did have to pinch up around the collar as I thought the neck opening was still a bit too large after a sewing it up. I think it actually adds some charm to the dress though, so I guess it’s kind of a happy mistake!
The other major modification that I made was on the skirt. I didn’t have quite enough fabric for the two-piece pleated skirt but still wanted an A-line instead of a straight skirt, so I used the lining piece to cut the front fabric instead of the pieces that were provided in the pattern for the pleats. I wish I would’ve had enough fabric to make the pleated version, but I still really love this dress and I think the basic A-line skirt also works very well.
The entire thing was lined to perfection with a dusty blue cotton, and I added a simple little sash in the same solid blue fabric to break up the business of the pattern. I have so much love for this dress you guys, I know for sure I will be wearing the hell out of it!
What have you guys been up to so far this summer?
Winterlight
Life is cold… SO COLD! *tears*
Guys, temperatures here in Quebec have been dropping as fast as the daylight hours have been shrinking, winter has been slowly creeping in as we’ve experienced the first snow falls of the season.
Amidst it all, the only that’s been able to provide me any sort of comfort is a cozy knit curled up with a blanket on the couch, so today I would like to show you one of my latest FOs, a Winterlight shawl by Meg Gadsbey made with The Blue Brick‘s Killarney Sock gradient yarn in the “Waterfall” colorway.
This shawl was a very fast knit because the pattern is so cleverly designed to provide interesting and varied sections with minimal effort by maximizing the use of the simple knit stitch. Most rows of this pattern are actually just plain knitted, making this pattern extremely easy to memorize and very fast to knit. It’s also a great pattern to show off a gradient or a hand spun, so I am sure that I will make many more of this in the future.
I added a few plain rows at the end since I had a bit more yarn that what was needed, but I basically just followed the pattern the entire way through. There’s no need to fix something that’s already perfect! As usual all the info and yardage can be found on my project page, so take a look there if you’re interested.
Thank you all for reading, and I’ll see you again in a couple weeks for a little travel update 🙂
Camilla love
I’ve been wanting to make myself a Camilla Pullover from Carrie Bostick Hoge for the longest time, but it seems like I always had too many things on the needles or couldn’t find the right timing. Let me tell you folks, it finally happened in February. Yes, I now have made myself a gorgeously fuzzy, fun and comfortable Camilla Pullover out of some Patons Classic Wool Roving yarn in the Low Tide colorway. Yay!
Let me tell you guys though that although I loved every stitch of this beauty, I struggled quite a bit throughout the process, and for all the wrong reasons, too.
The story starts back in 2013 when I bought 4 skeins of this yarn, not knowing yet what I wanted to do with it. A little while after, I fell madly in love with this gorgeous, gorgeous Camilla pullover pattern and thought it would be a match made in heaven with the yarn I had so I got really excited, until I realized I didn’t have enough yardage to do it. I tried convincing myself for months (if not years) that I could simply make the pattern work with a different yarn (after all it was not even the right weight!) but I simply couldn’t get it out of my head – I’m stubborn like that sometimes.
I looked at every local yarn store but couldn’t find the same yarn in this color anymore, the only option was to purchase it online on Joann’s website. So after a little while, since that project had been haunting me for a long time, I decided to finally order a couple skeins of it so I could reach the required yardage and start the project. Since it’s a commercially produced yarn, I was sort of hoping the color would be a close match to the one I had in stash because there was just no way I could find skeins of the same dyelot, but when I got them, I realized the new skeins were significantly lighter than the ones I had. Sigh.
Now had I been wiser (or just less eager to start), I simply could have waited to get the new skeins to start and then alternate old and new skeins throughout to make the color difference disappear – but I totally didn’t do that. I was so excited about the project that I started it before receiving the extra skeins, and was already almost almost at the armpits when I got them. I didn’t want to frog the entire thing so I did what I could, and when you look up close, you can notice that the body is darker, the sleeves are lighter, and the yoke is somewhat of a hybrid of the two. Oops.
All in all, I don’t really mind it so much and it surely won’t prevent me from wearing the heck out of it for the remainder of the cold season, but lesson learned, folks! I’ll be more careful from now on to avoid this kind of (totally preventable) issue. Had anything similar ever happened to anyone of you guys?
No, I’m not dead
Hey Sweeties! Long time no blog!
I feel like I have been neglecting you guys this summer, and I do not like that! My summer has probably been what everybody else’s summer has been – filled with food and fun and sun and trips and things! Although I have not really taken time to blog, I have been spending an awful lot of time knitting – and it shows, because I am now almost done with my Bluesand Cardigan.
I’m quite happy to show you this today as this is the first time I have ever used one of my handspun yarns (even though I have been spinning for over a year – I know, shame on me!) and I think the solid yarn I chose for the body really complements the colorful handspun perfectly. I’m so happy! 🙂
Also, I must say this pattern made me realize I still have a lot of things to learn when it comes to knitting, as this cardigan has proven to be quite the challenge. Don’t get me wrong, this pattern is amazingly well explained, clear and precise, with so many diagrams and figures it really makes me wonder how much time actually went into making this pattern. But the construction of this cardigan is just so cleaver, I know it’s something I definitely would not have been able to come up with on my own. Seriously, I understand now why so many people are in love with this cardigan (and other rililie patterns) – t’s brilliantly designed with a lot of cute and interesting details and a simple yet unique construction that really makes this pattern stand out. I am in love!
What about you guys, have you ever been so smitten by a pattern that you just wanted to keep on knittin’?
Sea Breeze released!
Good morning fellas!
Just a little heads up to let you know that my Sea Breeze sweater pattern has been released yesterday, woohoo! It’s available on Ravelry, go check it out! 🙂 
FO Friday!
Heyho crafties!
Just a short post to share with you guys my latest FO, a cutesy easy shawl started on September 27th, 2014 and finished on January 14th, 2015. It is my second FO of the year, W00T!! The pattern is called “Bamboo wedding shawl“, from Purl Soho, and the yarn I used is Cascade Heritage in the color Como Blue. I used a size 4mm needle instead of the 3.25mm needle the pattern called for because I have knitted with Cascade Heritage on 3.25mm needles before, and I just knew I wanted this shawl to be more airy and supple than that.
It is the second time I have knitted this pattern, the first time was a little over a year ago as a Christmas present for my mom. It was before I started blogging so there is no photo of it anywhere here, but here’s one just for the heck of it 🙂
As you can see it’s very thick, very wide, full of mistakes and not very long to boot. It was also my very first lace project, and I must say I made a lot of progress since then. The pattern that seemed so complicated to me at first now feels so easy and relaxing to knit now, and the result looks so much better too. Ah, the miracles of time!
Crafty Effie 