Once upon a time, I had a little idea that combined two things I’m interested in; video games and vintage home furnishings/decor. This idea percolated in my mind for years until Matt gave me all the things I needed to turn my idea into a tangible object.

My Duck Hunt flying ducks have sat finished for a bit over a year now, but didn’t post them because I thought people might think them a bit naff. I’m obviously over that now (it’s my blog dang it, I’ll post what I want to!).

Once the images were scaled, they weren’t difficult to put together. In fact, the trickiest part of the process was making sure all the beads had melted together. I don’t have the best iron which probably didn’t help matters.

Unfortunately my ducks’ current location is flat on a mantlepiece as finding a good way to get them up on the walls has been surprisingly difficult. The ducks are pretty delicate so falling off the walls would not be good at all. Another challenge was finding a spot to take these photos, as it seems the walls here are riddled with picture hooks.

The biggest motivation for posting this project is because its one of those projects that I should have done ages ago, a recurring theme on this blog. This year I’d like to try a few more of those types of projects, ones that don’t necessarily take up that much time, but always get set aside for one reason or another.

There aren’t too many major things to report from round here, so here’s a highlights reel of the minor things I did today.

Baking

Bara Brith via Taste
Mods: omitted the mixed peel, increased the sultanas to a heaped cup, used cinnamon, cardamon and nutmeg rather than mixed spice, used Nuttelex rather than butter (didn’t have butter on hand and was impatient to make the bread), and halved the amount of honey glaze.

The bread looks great (even if I do say so myself) and tastes just as good. Next time I’ll use even less honey on top of the loaf as it’s quite sticky.

In making this bread, it became clear that that bread making and knitting are complementary activities. The long proving and baking times allowed me to get quite a bit of knitting done. Admittedly, I could have been washing dishes as I went, but knitting beats doing the dishes every time.

Sewing

Pincushion (PDF) by Fiona Lech

My goal of properly learning how to sew this year began in earnest today, finishing a project started at Brown Owls last year. It turned out a bit wonky, both in terms of sewing the two circles of fabric together and spacing the red threads to form the pin cushion segments.

Despite its homely appearance, it’s still completely usable and the buttons used on either side match nicely. This project sits firmly in the ‘should have gotten round to this ages ago’ camp, so I’m really happy it’s finished. Now, to find some suitably pretty pins to go with it!

Knitting

Somerset by Melissa Werhle

Not so much knitting, but blocking. This project was started in December and is now nearly finished, but hasn’t been mentioned on here until now. It’s not a project that is meant to be kept secret, nor am I unhappy with it (far from it actually), I just haven’t gotten round to posting anything about it until now.

The yarn I’m using is Cleckheaton Angora Supreme, a yarn discontinued around five years ago. While it’s a lovely warm, soft yarn, it likes to spread the angora love around a bit. Even while pinning it out, quite a few whisps of angora stuck to the mat. Black clothes should be avoided when wearing this, I think.

So there is my scatty, yet productive, Sunday. It felt like I was hopping from project to project with rapid pace throughout the day, but the products of my stop-start labour are quite pleasing. If only all weekends could be so fruitful!

The first finished object for this year, with photos taken with the first of this season’s tomato crop during the first heatwave for the year.

Herringbone Mittens with Poms (PDF) by Elli Stubenrauch
Scraps of Malabrigo Worsted, American Beauty and Lincraft Balmoral Tweed, fawny colour
3.75 mm and 4.00mm needles
Started: December 2009
Finished: January 2010
Modifcations: lengthened hand and thumb sections, left off the pompom
Ravelryed here

To anyone who saw the photos being taken today, they must have wondered what on earth that girl was doing, wearing mittens and toting tomatoes when it’s hot outside. These photos make up for any slippage in our standing around the neighbourhood, right?

Given the weather, it might be surprising to know these mittens were borne out of necessity. It seems I don’t have that much in the way of proper winter clothes, an issue that will become most apparent when we’re in Japan next month (!!!). The mittens, while not solving all the winter wardrobe deficiencies, will hopefully keep the winter chill off my fingers somewhat.

It pleases me greatly that the mittens were made from yarn left over from other projects. I was concerned about whether I’d have enough yarn for the mittens, and whether the yarns would go together, but both concerns were completely ill-founded. There is still some Malabrigo left, and the yarns worked up together really well. Using the Malabrigo at the edge of the cuff might not have been the wisest choice, as I suspect it’ll pill or even felt a bit.

There’s been a noticeable slow down in knitting on account of the warmer weather. So much so that it took a concerted effort to get the thumbs finished and ends woven in and I’ve been contemplating doing some sewing instead of knitting. The horror!

It’s impossible to leave the last finished object for 2009 go unblogged. Victory is finished!

Your Victory Jumper by Home Notes (via the Victoria and Albert Museum)
2.5 balls grey Grignasco Bambi, 1.5 balls royal blue and 0.5 balls cream
2.75 mm and 3.25mm needles
Started: June 2009
Finished: December 2009
Modifcations: lengthened and added another repeat, stitch wise, to the body
Ravelryed here

If you heard strains of The Halleujah Chorus floating on the breeze sometime last Sunday, it was likely coming from me as Victory was unpinned from the blocking board. It was not so much the relief of finishing, but the excitement that she could finally be worn. I already love it to bits.

The lace pattern came out really nice and crisply with the yarn, and although I opted for a non-patriotic colour combination (the pattern was published in England just after VE Day, and recommended the use of blue, red and white yarn), I’m quite pleased with how well the grey, blue and cream worked together.

I found the sleeve’s shoulder cap construction a bit strange, in that there was no cast off at the armpit, just a gentle decrease from there to the top of the shoulder. This did make it a little difficult when seaming but the sleeve and body stripes match up, so I’m happy.

If you are interested in WWII era knitting patterns, it’s worth looking at the collection hosted on the Victoria and Albert Museum’s website. I tend to think Victory is the pick of the bunch, but there are some other nice patterns on there that I’d consider making down the track, once my pattern queue and stash has diminished significantly.