December is here

Hi, hello out there. It had warmed up into the 70's since our first freezing temperatures and cooled back down in a matter of hours this morning. I'm hanging out in an old house from the 1940's with a room full of poinsettias, Ready to welcome December here.

I cooked for the first time for thanksgiving this year, a corn casserole and green bean casserole that I took to thanksgiving with my coworkers. The hit dish of the evening was german style red cabbage, sweet and tangy with cloves and other spices that make it smell like this time of year, warm and good. 

I've been knitting more this year since my friend Julie started a weekly knitting group. I'm working in my fifth pair of adult socks, a finished a pair of mittens yesterday and got inspired to make baby socks like the ones I saw on the Wiksten blog. Something about cold weather makes me eager to knit, I guess because it's the time when you can use what you make, it being cold and all.

 Last month I took a ceramics class, I'm in love with clay. Still a bit of a novice at glazing but I made a bunch of beads, a few spoons & a small planter intended for a succulent or cactus. I was so happy to hear about the class. I'd looked into finding a ceramics class within an hour if where I live to no avail. Then this summer we starting going to the gathering and one of the ladies who was there that night owns one of those pottery painting places and was offering a free ceramics class at the Methodist church downtown. Thanks God! I can't wait to start going by her place and making more stuff since she charges by the item to fire stuff, I don't need to wait till I own a kiln. 

studio & watermelon necklace

So here are my first attempts at using the digital camera my studio mate lent me. Some pictures of my space and some things I've made recently. The watermelon necklace I finished this afternoon. The idea for it came to me in a light bulb moment, inspiration from God. I love it, it's so cute. I'm going to make knitting patterns for other fruit as well. I bought some yellow and brown yarn today for just that. I added a little stuffing so that it keeps it's shape and I think adds to it's cuteness. 

Baby knitting for friend

Just finished this project last night. An original, geometric & native American inspired design. Knitted "Moccasin" baby booties with a purl triangle trim around cuff that wraps around ankle with two Chinese knot closures to secure in place with some knitted fringe. I originally (first time I made this bootie design) used tie closures where you tie bows but the Chinese knot seems more practical. Thanks God. The hat I made with a lined rim and matching triangle detail. I love how they turned out.

knitting project bag

102_1963, originally uploaded by lilah_ward.

I haven't sewn anything in a while because I need to get my serger and better sewing machine fixed and need to get over wanting to be perfect the first time by being meticulous and if I can't serge it it shouldn't stop me from creating so I designed something new. I haven't designed something new in a loner while than i haven't sewn and realized that that part of by brain had been sleeping so it was hard to visualize how to sew my creation at first trying to get all seam between outer and inner fabric. So I ended up drawing the steps instead of just explaining in words like usual. Here is the finished product of the first prototype. Just a plain bag to hold your current or on hold knitting projects. I notice that if I leave my project around and not up high and in a bag of some sort that the cats with chew on the needles, play with the yarn eventually sliding the stitches off the needles. So here is my solution. On the inside is a piece of ribbon sewn to the inside to slide circular needles through to keep the stitches on the needles and a little button hole at the top back side to stick straight needles through so that they don't poke a hole through the bag. the top of the bag folds over and both layers have button holes to button close with a cute fabric covered button.

knitting book idea

I have a goal now that for a few years now I’ve been contemplating but never actually started the process. The interest and idea and inspiration have always been there but just since I quit working for a moment which was only made possible by my loving husband fully inspired by the way God created marriage to mirror Jesus love for us. Ephesians 5:25 “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her”. Well I have the inspiration to make a knitting pattern book. Still in the coming up with knitting patterns faze. I don’t know if it will ever be published or how to go about that, but for now I’m just enjoying the process of making new patterns. How God the creator of all things gave us the joy of creating still blows me away. All I really know is I want it to glorify God as our attempt in everything we do should be. So, if it ever gets published either by a publishing company or by me making hand bound books God has inspired me to give the proceeds to a Christian organization. So far I’m thinking either my church which is doing a lot of work in Austin, Austin Ridge Bible Church or supporting individual missionaries or maybe to foot the bill of me making homemade baked goods and buying needed supplies and Bibles for the giant homeless population in Austin who I feel a calling towards. So this is one of my dreams / prayer requests. All of the patterns I've made so far are under the Lilah Shepherd's Designs at the top right of the page, newest patterns at the top. Thanks for reading.

ezra

God is amazing how he inspires me to create, the creator himself. I hadn't really designed anything since the spring and all of the sudden here's one of my new designs. All of the praise goes to Him. I wasn't sure how it would turn out at first, but it came out awesome. Inspired by a vintage 30's sweater where the entire body of the sweater was a diagonal stitch. It took me 5 trys to get the opposite diagonal for the right arm. I made a variation of the herringbone rib stitch found in the vogue knitting stitchionary volume one for the right diagonal stitch that makes up the body of the arm warmer. Worked from arm up to fingers. First worked flat and joined to work in round after buttons. The thumb gusset has yarn overs at the beg. and end of the gusset area that makes eyelets around the thumb. The way the thumb is made leaves no holes which i find annoying in other patterns. Up the side of the left side (or the outside of the left arm) is a triangle pattern made up of diagonals from a series of knit, purl, knit, purl sts that are 2 stitch cables. The tip of the hand has cables with a row of 2 bobbles between each 2 cables. The lack of increases for the arm make the warmer fitted which I really like. I love the color and the yarn: Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool Color: 15. brick yellow. Unfortunately the color was recently discontinued. But i love the yarn texture and how it knits so much the dog sweater I'm knitting for my new puppy Lola is the same yarn in Color: 064 fire red.

I'm back

Hello all,

a lot has happened since March. I now reside in my States capital, Austin. The land of outdoor living, the vegan option, breweries inside of BBQ joints, LOTS of food choices, small venue shows, the option to see practacally any music group that tours, vinyl, disc golf courses, plant stores, coffee shops, and enough yarn stores to make me jump up and down like I downed 2 pots of coffee.

knitting i've finished: the Tuck vest sweater, another cloche hat, 6 neck warmers, one prototype hat; & started knitting: another prototype hat, another neck warmer, my forest arm warmer pattern.

sewn: butterick 5994 pattern cut to be a shirt, one wallet, new look 6705 (which I would not reckamend, simmilar to the built by wendy patterns the arm holes are too small and high which makes the front of the blouse pucker out), autamen cover, back cusion for an overstuffed chair, 1 curtain.

Crafted: 15 Boutonnieres from scratch made up of fabric buttons, fabric leaves & fabric yoyos; 13 hair pieces consisting of 3 mini fabric yoyos on a bobby pin; fabric roses with 3 double sided fabric petals & more fabric buttons all for my best friends wedding; a puppy/cat bed from half of a vintage suitcase and 4 wooden legs from a hardware store with a pillow in a vintage pillowcase for cusioning.

Arts: Drawings: guache, watercolor & ink: 2 small paintings on wood & 2 on aquaboard, 1 (18" x 24") large face series, 7 (5.5" x 8.5") medium faces series, 5 (4" x 5.5") small faces series, 4 (4" x 5.5") character faces series, 6 (2 med, 4 small) house series, 2 (4" x 5.5") forest series; ink: (6" x 8"): 20 house series, 4 forest series, 1 character face series; pencil: (6" x 8") 7 abstract series.

We have some new additions to our family a 10 gallon aquarium full of fish and live plants, Isabella a cat and Lola our 9 weeks old hound dog mix we adopted from Canine and Cats (CNC) rescue organization. If you are interested in adopting a dog, they post up in front of Petco on brodie lane and another organization Austin Pets Alive posts up in front of Petsmart also on brodie lane.

I've also ventured into organic gardening, eco-friendly cleaning and felt hat making.

An eco-friendly tip to cleaning up dog pee or poo from rug:

what you need:
spray bottle of vinegar
baking soda
salt
paper towels
wash rag
samll container for a bowl 1/3 filled with water
scrub brush that fits into the small container

What to do:
Pour some salt onto the Pee (only for pee)
Pick up poo; for pee pick up pee and salt with paper towels
spray vinegar onto area of rug
sprinkle some baking soda onto area of rug
take your scrub brush from the water bowl and scrub area
(you can repeat the vinegar and baking soda steps as needed)
then rub area dry with wash cloth

Ruffled Neck Kercheif

Here is my finished "Ruffled Neck Kerchief" from boutique knits. I really loved this pattern, it made me love chevron lace.

Spinning

I've thought how cool it would be to own sheep or an alpaca and raise them for their wool and have off and on thought of spinning my own yarn, inspired by the artisan yarns spun by local spinners you can find at local yarn stores. They just have so much more depth to them than more processed yarn & have this magical air around them that seems to whisper to you stories as if they are glass slippers. You know someone picked these colors and worked on their technique of spinning worked with the fiber maybe hand painting it and then after choosing the weight of yarn spun up one unique skein of yarn available to you if you could only afford it. Well I'm not in the boat of people who will spend over $100 for 400 yds of yarn. I love finding yarn for under $10 probably from my background of Michaels, Hob Lob & Wal-Mart. For a very special skein though I've spent up to "cough" $21 "cough".

So a couple of weeks ago after visiting the Austin yarn stores for a week I felt the urge one day that I wanted to spin. I'd eyed the wool but just in passing. I was there for the yarn. It looked interesting some of the fiber braided some of it wrapped into what looked like woolen watermelons some in bags. There were lots of colors, mesh bins and drawers full. (I'm refering to Hill country Weavers) Different types and of course prices. And little ol' me not quite knowing how much an oz of wool roving would be bought 4oz of turmeric, white and brown in basic sliver wool. Ok, so that is a lot of wool. The ladies at the yarn store warned me 2oz is enough to start out with of each color. But that is ok; I plan on spinning it all. I also got a basic small wooden drop spindle and after searching you tube I learned the basics from Megan and started spinning. I spun and spun deciding I liked the top whorl method and rolling it down my right leg (twisting the fibers clockwise) while sitting and while spinning in the car (in the passenger seat) I spun the dowel part with my fingers.

So far all I have to show are my first two days work. I don't seem to be a very fast spinner, but that is ok. I love how the first two came out. After I had spun them I wrapped them around a chair back and tied some extra string around the yarn in 2 places making a hank. Then I boiled the hank. I didn't realize it was going to smell like sheep. After removing it from the pot I extracted the extra water with a towel and shimmied it back around the chair back (this part was hard) and if I couldn't I untied it and wrapped it around anew. A mostly let it air dry using a hair dryer some because I was ancy to hold it and say it was finished. Now I can say I'm a spinner, yay. It is exhilarating learning something new related to something you really love, knitting.

Kniting Needle Preference

My favorites are bamboo and wood knitting needles. I only have birch wood needles so far though so I'm not sure the difference in knitting with them if any noticeable difference would occur. I like them because they are light and the feel of them, they don’t get cold like metal needles. I like metal needles for just throwing into my bag because they bend instead of break. I’m always a little worried when I put my wooden needles in my bag. Circular needles are good when you are going to be sitting close to other people. Long straight needles keep on hitting and poking the people beside you. Circular needles are good for traveling also. I prefer shorter 10” needles to the 14” long ones, unless that is what you need for a pattern.

acorn hat pattern

I plan on making this pattern available to be bought at a later time, but before I do I want some people to knit and critique the pattern (for design and the written pattern itself
) for me and in exchange the pattern will be free for them. If you are interested in following through this proccess reply to this post or message me on ravlery. 2 Spots still available as of 2/14/09.

DFW Fiber Fest

This sounds pretty cool, vendors and classes.

DFW Fiber Fest is a yearly event that occurs in April in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area. It is dedicated to offering classes from both nationally known and local teachers in crocheting, dyeing, hand knitting, machine knitting, spinning, weaving, and other fiber arts. Other related topics such as button-making, colour choices, are also offered.

For 2009, DFW FiberFest is held on Friday - Sunday, April 24-26, 2009

at theAddison Conference Center

15650 Addison Road

Addison, Texas 75001

Map Website

ravelry group
dfwfiberfest

How to knit a ruffle

Ruffles are usually something you want to add to something. It tends to look better that way. Rather than just going into a ruffle pattern instead of Binding Off and then picking up the stitches and making the ruffle pattern.

There are some different ways to pick up and knit stitches. One way is to tie the yarn you are going to make the ruffle with to the tail yarn that is the left over from the Casting On at the beginning. And using a crochet hook, I tend to use a size 5/H, pick up the yarn (you are using for the ruffle) with the hook and pull through last loop of every row along that edge. You want to pull the loops through so that they come out on the top. You can then slip the loops off of the crochet hook and onto your knitting needle.

1. pick up the number of stitches divisible by 4.


2. Purl


3. Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 3, [Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 2] 4 times, Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 3


4. knit the knit stitches, purl the purl stitches and the new stitches (make 1).


5. Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 4, [Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 3] 4 times, Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 4


6. repeat row 3


7. Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 5, [Purl2, Make 1, Knit 4] 4 times, Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 5


8. repeat row 3


9. Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 6, [Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 5] 4 times, Purl 2, Make 1, Knit 6 [You can continue to make the ruffle wider just increase one after every purl stitch on the right side and repeat row 3 for every wrong side]


10. Bind off stitches in the pattern (meaning bind off knit stitches as knit stitches and purl stitches as purl stitches. (ruffle instructions from "boutique knits")

Make 1(M1) can be interchanges with Yarn overs (Yo) instead either way it makes a ruffle.

M1 (Make 1): Lift the yarn lying between the stitch just worked and the next stitch and place it on the left hand needle, then knit (from learn2knit.co.uk )

YO (Yarn Over): When working on the knit side of Stockinette Stitch hold the yarn at the back of the work. Pull the yarn forward between he two needles and over the right needle to the back of the work. Knit the next stitch. (from knit 911. com )

Sylvi by Mari Muinonen

I bought my first PDF knitted pattern today. I think it is beautiful. It is called Sylvi by Mari Muinonen located on the website twist collective. It is $7 but I thought it was worth it, since I like it so much. I was thinking of making it in purple, yellow, or blue.

drinking lots of tea

On my fifth cup of tea the boiling water reminded me that I wanted to try and shrink my acorn hat. So I filled a sauce pot with water till it began to boil I placed the hat in the pot poking it under the boiling water with tongs. I let it soak for 4min. I poured out the water in the sink and with the tongs I placed the hat on a folded in half towel waiting on the floor. It was still steaming, so carefully I laid the scalloped edging out flat. The hat didn't seam to have shrunk much. I think it got larger... So I'm filling up my spaghetti pot this time, the sauce pot seamed to be a little small. Ok so I let the hat boil in the pot for 20 minutes. It didn't shrink at all. I guess Lion Brand fishermen's wool doesn't shrink. Well now I know. This time when I poured out the hot water in the sink. I have a double sink, so I poured out the water in one and had dilled up the other side with cold water. And placed the hat into the cold water after pouring the water out. I squeezed the water out being sure not to rink it out & then hung it up to dry. When searching for info on shrinking knits I found this wool crafting.

I added the acorn rib pattern around the edge. I decreased the rim from 106 to 81 stitches. And now it is a dread hat.

More wash rags

the rainbow one is diagonal eyelet brocade, blue & green is the fan stitch, the large orange yellow & white one is chevron lace, the top orange yellow is the moss stitch and the left orange yellow is sugar cubes.
The chevron lace pattern I found in the book boutique knits and the rest in the book Vogue Knitting Stitchionary

TMNT Masks

(finished knitting)

(after crochet eyes)

(before crochet eyes)

I know some boys who love the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and after being on a knitting frenzy lately. I came up with this.

Knit in stockinet with the eye section knit open like a rectangle to go back crochet around the eye opening to make it two holes & with the ends of the mask decreased to make an angle to mimic the rolling up of a bandana like the TMNT use for their eye masks.

Knit with Lion Brand Wool Yarn in colors Pumpkin & Purple
Needle Size US6(purple) and US8(orange)

Here is the free pattern:
row 1-7 (bottom half), 8-12 (left side of eyes), 13-17 (right side of eyes), 18-24 (top half)

1. CO 162
2. P
3. K1, K2tog, knit to last 3 stitches, ssk, K1
4. p
5. K1, K2tog, knit to last 3 stitches, ssk, K1
6. P
7. K1, K2tog, K 63, BO 27, K 63, ssk, K1
8. (left side of eyes (BO stitches) on mask) P till BO
9. K to last 3 stitches, ssk, K1
10. P till BO
11. K to last 3 stitches, ssk, K1
12. P till BO, CO 27, cut yarn leaving a 6 inch tail
13. (right side of eyes (BO stitches) on mask) P
14. K1, K2tog, K till BO
15. P till end
16. K1, K2tog, K till BO
17. P till end
18. K1, K2tog, K to last 3 stitches, ssk, K1
19. P
20. K1, K2tog, K to last 3 stitches, ssk, K1
21. P
22. K1, K2tog, K to last 3 stitches, ssk, K1
23. P
24. (Bind Off Row)K1, K2tog, psso, continue to BO till last 3 stitches, ssk, psso, K1, psso, cut yarn, tie off

Weave in ends. Go back and crochet around eye hole & in the middle crochet two stitches on the bottom to two stitches on the top to make the eye opening two eye holes. Also crochet across CO edging because that seems to have come out more loose than the BO edging and will lay more flat on the face if you reinforce it with crocheting. The Lion Brand wool yarn says it is good for felting on the tag. I haven't felted one yet, so I'll post about how felting one turns out when I do so because the pattern wants to roll. I'm also making one with a seed stitch to stop the rolling.

posted on craftster.org

if you make a mask please post a picture of it :)

new book added to my collection

Last night I went to Barnes and Nobles with my mother who was visiting. First thing I did was raid the shelves of the knitting section and sat down with around 10 knitting books and one of their comfy chairs flipping through the pages intently looking at all of the stitch patterns and knitted designs. After putting them back on the shelves choosing three to look through again, to in the end choose one. I decided on “Vogue Knitting Stitchionary Volume One: Knit & Purl” by Trisha Malcolm. I figured I could use this book a lot considering my desire to make my own patterns. I felt honored afterwards because during the outing someone struck up a discussion with me by starting off with asking what the difference between sewing and knitting was and some more unusual conversation and I was able to by God’s grace entirely share with this person The Gospel which in my husbands and my life group (home church) this past week learned means Good News.

the acorn hat

Ok, the brown experiment is now officially a hat, yay. I guess I didn’t really notice till I put it on but the edges are scalloped from the body pattern, sweet. And when I saw it on me in the mirror my first instinct was it looks like an acorn so I lovingly named it that on ravelry. The yarn I used and the needle size made it pretty large on my head. I think I’m still going to add an edge to it as another variation of the hat. I have no idea how to make pdf files, so I’ll have to look into that so I can post the pattern on ravelry. I also want to try to shrink it as much as I can and see how small I can get it. I’m really honored with the four hearts it’s gotten so far on ravelry compared to my other three in total over all my other projects.

Since I finished the first faze of this project for the moment, in researching for my next design project I opened up my newest Anthropologie catalog issue January 2009. And found one of the few knitted items on pg. 43 the withering frost vest. After finding the project that now interests me I set out to find what the stitch pattern is for the vest, searching google, ravelry, and library knitting books with not much luck. My husband and I ending up going to Hastings (a book and AV store) after our home church group where we are going to be going through the book of Mark this semester, anyways at Hastings I found two similar stitches one was in the “forest park dresser scarf” from the book “101 Designer One-Skein Wonders: A world of possibilities inspired by just one skein” by Judith Durant and the other from the pattern “wedding ensemble skirt” from the book “Inspired to Knit: Creating Exquisite Hand Knits” by Michele Rose Orne. I'll post swatches of those two designs later. I think this is going to be an ongoing project.

How to cable knit stitch

Ok, to make the most basic “simple cable” stitch. You will need an extra knitting needle (what I use is an extra knitting needle in the same size of knitting needles that I’m knitting with (small double pointed needles work well for this) or there are cable stitch holders (that when you slip the stitches you put aside in cable stitching onto these and then put back onto your left hand needle (I believe only when right handed) to stitch).

here are some examples of cable stitch holders:

“simple cable” stitch is worked over 6 stitches (which means wherever you want to place the “simple cable” stitch it is going to takes 6 stitches in a row to make) & explained here knitted flat on straight knitting needles (meaning you knit a row moving stitches from the left hand needle to the right hand needle (where the tip of the right hand needle is pointed to the left) and when you are finished knitting the row and all of your stitches are now on the right hand needle you turn the right hand needle like a weathervane now to point to the right and becomes the needle that is now in your left hand ready to be purled)

Row 1: knit 6 stitches
Row 2: purl 6 stitches
Row 3: knit 6 stitches
Row 4: purl 6 stitches
Row 5: slip first 3 stitches on to an extra needle and pull this needle in front of your work so that the 3 stitches on the extra needle are resting in front of your knitting. Then knit next 3 stitches. Now slip the 3 stitches you slipped off onto the extra needle back onto your left hand needle and knit them.
Row 6: Purl 6 stitches

To continue in cable stitch repeat rows 1-6 over and over.

Here are a couple of links if you still need some help with visualizing this process:

dummies.com

videojug.com

for Mia