Taking The Long Way Home

Not long ago I shared my pattern for the Wavelength Scarf . I love this cozy accessory so much, I think I might need to have one on the sticks at all times. It's such a pretty and functional piece. And making it is easy and meditative, which also translates to mindless and easy to do while watching a movie. This one is in the beautiful, and super soft Willow and Lark "Nest" yarn , made of merino, cashmere, and tencel. This color is Owl Grey. I was going to sell this one, but do you see the tiny mistake I made? I do. And it's enough to make me decide I can just keep it if I want to. I kind of want to. Here's a little video, showing you how I wear this pretty thing. It makes me feel like a pretty thing too.

As decorating luck would have it, the summery, beachy striped throw pillows I chose to go with our new couch when we first moved to Seaside last January do not in any way go with the way I actually decorated our home. We're more bohemian than coastal, more comfortable than cute, and our colors are deeper and richer than the popular whitewashed look we see so much of. I ended up draping throws and kantha quilts over the white couch, but those dumb striped throw pillows were just sitting here mocking my snappy decision making skills. The size and firmness of the pillows is perfect, so I didn't really want to replace them. Covering them was the obvious solution, but I hate to sew, even though I love my great grandmother's black iron Singer in its curved wooden case. It works, but I avoid using it as much as possible, which is most of the time. The solution, of course, was to knit new covers. Our house is starting to look like a herd of creative spiders got loose in her

I used to make lampwork beads. You might already know that. I played with fire and molten glass for 16 years, until the economy and my super powers both seemed to fail me at the same time. Whatever the reasons, I lost that loving feeling, sold my torch, and moved on. I do still have a bit of a bead stash though, and the other day I looked at my box of tiny spacers, and thought, Hey, you guys wanna be stitch markers? You should have heard them hollering yes . I went digging for wire, pliers, cutters, a hammer, and my tiny torch that's better suited for making a creme brulee than jewelry. I made some headpins, added beads, shaped and hammered the loops, and before long, those long-ignored beads transformed into beautiful, functional knitting accessories. I love the segue, though long awaited, from beadmaking to knitting. Now there's a connection I hadn't seen before. I sold all of these very quickly. Not surprisingly, they all went to people who used to buy my beads

I've been knitting fingerless gloves for years. Completely fingerless - as in no little thumb-sleeve either, although I would have liked having the thumbs. Truth is, I was afraid of thumbs, or the making of them in gloves. For some silly reason, I didn't think I could do it. Sheesh. Maybe I should have tried... Well, a new year is a good time to banish old fears. I finally decided it was time to tackle my thumbophobia, and went in search of an easy pattern, which I quickly found at Hand Made Rukodelky . (Thank you!!!) I printed the pattern, gathered my yarn and needles, and had these beauties finished in just a few hours. The pattern was so easy to follow, I actually worked on them mostly in public, and at one point, with beer in the mix too. No problem. The yarn is Noro Kureyon, and all these colors came from just one skein. So much fun. I used a little (9 inch) size 7 circular needle instead of DPNs for the body of the gloves, which for me is a while lot easier th