January

I am at home, spending some days of vacation I have left from last year.
It is winter, with some snow and temperature below 0. I needed this, after last year's spring-like winter.

During daytime I am playing with the kids, we go out, I cook a bit, and I enjoy it.
In the evenings (after the small one is sleeping, if we succeed to put him to bed) I am knitting and enjoy the lights of the Christmas-tree (we still have it, and it will stay this week).

I have knit a scarf for myself. It is finished, but I do not have a photo of it while wearing it.

Then I made wristlets for Klári (finished, but no photo).
Then mittens for Poppy (he had 2 pairs, but the cuff was too short, so they kept falling).

And after knitting so much with acrylic I craved the touch of merino, and when Klári asked for a scarf I took some remaining of handdyed by Buci and bamboo knitting needles, and now I am knitting and knitting and it feels oh so good.

We went for a walk in the woods on Sunday.

I know now why I tend to be bored by this kind of winter after Christmas: I miss the light. I love winter, I love gray, but I miss the sparkling lights.

We enjoyed the walk though, we pulled the kids on the sleigh and they were running a bit in the snow.
We will go to the countryside tomorrow. We hope for a bit more snow and temperatures below freezing, so we will go outside and enjoy nature.
I keep planning my yarn-related adventures for this year
I saw a pullover. Crocheted, but I just fell in love. So much, that I already made a swatch for it.

I will have one.
B. wants socks. He will have a pair for his size 45 feet. Speaking of socks: a good friend of ours still haven't got nothing handmade by me. So he will have his first pair of my handknitted socks for his birthday (in October).
And I have a huge quantity of acrylic yarns, I got them from a colleague. I think a part of them will become a crochet blanket. The yarns are thinner, but I will make a smaller blanket for summertime, for Klári. She would love it, I know.
And now back to my coffee and knitting needles in the morning calmness (Poppy came here and he is sleeping by my side now)...

Beginning of October

About a week ago the walnut-trees started to change color. At first they switched to light green, but now they turned to yellow.

Yesterday it was warm and sunny, the morning promised a good day,

so we went to the country-house for some garden-cooking.

The children had fun in the garden, I had some time to check the signs of autumn.

We took some photos of Poppyseed wearing his new hat (with shorts).

I like it.

It is my design, for the love of broken seed stitch. I like the earflaps, the pompom - and the gorgeous color of it. Thy green yarn was hand-dyed by my friend Bucilla. It is the leftover of my Eve-gloves.

The natural-color yarn is Drops Baby Merino, all is knitted on 2.5 mm needles. It was a quick project, finished just in time for the gray and cold days.
Today it is raining.

Colorful

Before I had my daughter my relationship with colors was really strict. My palette had colors like green, dark blue, naturals (cream, white, beige, brown), but I was afraid of pink, purple, yellow or any other vivid color. Since then a lot has changed. For example I really want to knit a colorful striped pullover, and a few days ago I wrote about that terracotta yarn which will be a pullover. For me. One day.
For the princess I am knitting colorful stuff regularly, for the last time a shawl.

Its story begun in Spetember 2012, when Bucika dyed a roving for me, on which I started the spinning.
A big part of it became a usable yarn, but not for the project I imagined (I wanted a hat, but the yarn seemed too thin). So, for quite a while it stood in my handspun yarn box, waiting for the right project. That is how this shawl was born.
Initially I wanted some lacy edging, but the whole stuff  was like a sunset,

so I skipped this, and made a simple crescent shawl in garter stitch.

I love its colors.

In the yarn there are only few portions where the two plies are the same color, but in the knitted piece it seems like a uni-color thing. (oh, and the yarn looks completely different than I would have guessed from the roving)

Klárika loves it. It is true, the shawl-season is over, but there will be autumns-winters in the future. And it will cheer up our days.

Finding my pace

It seems that we will go back to normal sooner than I imagined. Poppyseed had slept practically all night, he woke up at 5:13, when I usually wake up myself. He did this at his almost two moths age what his sister never did until the age of 2 years, or more (still there are nights when she wakes up *). Then he fell asleep again and he is sleeping at this time. (Klári never fell back asleep when there was light in the morning).
There is no child like this. I hope he will keep this good sleeping habit.
I should start to deal with my diastasis recti. The last days I read a lot about it, and I found out, that there are some exercises that are forbidden (crunches, sit-ups, etc), which could strain organs outside the abdominal wall. But there are several exercises which are recommended even after a C-section. The doctor allowed me also to get on the stationary bike. But this will be possible only after we finish the adult-puzzle we have in the house (an Ikea sofa in pieces, and next week the bed for the kids will arrive, that one also in pieces).
I casted-on a shawl. Probably for Klári, but she told me yesterday that she does not like shawls, anyhow this is an issue we will discuss when I will have the finished item. I will knit it as big as the yarn allows it, if she does not like it I will take it.

I do not want to complicate it, I think garter stitch is ideal for handspun yarns, I might knit a discrete lace on the edge, though.
It seems that I will be able to comply many plans I have.
Our new life will be good.

* at 2 months she woke up 7-8 times a night, every night, and she kept it like this until she was 8 months, and then until the age of 2 years she woke up 3-4 times a night

Colors of fall

We had a great time here, finally we might become a normal society.
I watched TV and followed the news on Internet much more than in the last 2 years.
And I was knitting and spinning.
Now I have two pairs of socks on needles, far from finishing them, but I have a new yarn.
The fiber is 50% merino, 50% silk. I had some troubles with it, I suppose due to the silk. But I love the result.
The roving was handdyed by my friend, Bucilla (of course).

It was pure autumn.
I made two singles, just by spinning until I got to the half of the roving, and then spinning the other half. It was almost perfect, one of the singles being just about 2 meters longer than the other.
And then the plying. I think plying is the best part in spinning.

This is when the yarn is finished. It is a pleasure to watch how the colors are embracing each other.

The result of these days is 110 grams/425 meters of fingering weight yarn.

It has greens and browns,

but also grays and yellows

- cold and warm colors in a great balance. 
(the light is just awful here, it is foggy and dark and gray...)

Spin to stay sane

I am just spinning. I cannot concentrate on knitting, not even socks, so my spindles are spinning a lot each day. This keeps me sane these crazy days.

Today I might finish the singles of the merino-silk roving I was working on lately. I might even prepare them for plying.

I love the colors...

Socks again

I finished another pair of socks.

And again, 2 at a time, toe up.
But this time I did not enjoyed the process so much, and this is because of the yarn. Not its quality but the type. I used it before, but never by itself, first in a pair of Broken seed stitch socks and then for the Endpaper mitts, and both times the colors were beautifully accentuated by the contrasting solid color yarn. But now, on its own - I do not know. It is a bit too dark. It is a bit too contrasting.
Then I have this issue with the self-striping yarn.
It was a nightmare to find the point on both yarns to have matching stripes on the socks. For the fourth or fifth try I made it.

Then the heel. This yarn has a rhythm which is completely broken by using a few meters for the heel. So, at the gusset there are "missing" stripes.
In rest, it is OK.
I like the pattern. It was easy, but kept me interested. After finishing the socks I found several Mock Cable socks on Ravelry, both cuff-down and toe-up, anyhow, before casting-on I did not look at them.
The yarn is Gründl Marathon Scott, I used 2.5 mm Addi Lace circulars.
These socks took a week, for my 37 size feet, while I had two spinning projects going on.

Both fibers are merino-silk.
Now I should cast-on a new pair of socks, size 45. But I would also like to spin. 

Hat season

With the cooling weather hat season begun.
My head does not change its size (I hope so, anyway), but I had to check if it is very urgent to knit new ones for Klárika.
It is not, as the crochet penguin

the hat knit in Bucilla's handspun

(my design)

and the one in my own handspun still fits her.

(Grumpus hat)

But her hands grew a lot, so she needs new mittens...

End of October

It seems that autumn is on its way to turn into winter. After a weird light autumn we had the first frost of the season.
Last weekend plants that use to have flowers in early summer were is bloom,

and now it is 4 below 0, freezing.
I like autumn. The sign that it is here is that I change a few cups of coffee of my daily dose to tea.
The autumn landscape and colors inspire me.

It is good when I can discover shades of autumn in fiber or yarn.

It feels good to have calm activities like spinning when preparing to winter.
Speaking of preparation, during wintertime we need socks.

So I knit socks.
I like that it is mindless (the mock cable is easy to memorize), the rounds just pass, one after the other. 
And I have lots of plans, both in knitting and spinning for long, dark evenings. Of course, if the princess allows me to knit or spin...

Spinning

I can spin, but I do not call myself a spinner.

But from time to time the spinning bug bites me.
Just like now.