Hand Warmers

Well, right from the start I have to let everyone know that I'm addicted to The Purl Bee. This is the blog run by Purl yarns and Purl Patchwork in Soho, and I stalk it daily for fun new knitting projects and other craft projects from time to time. These handwarmers are a variation on ones that Whitney posted this past December. I was drawn to the length of these handwarmers because I always doubted that the ones that end at the wrist would still keep my arms warm when it's unusually cold (like it gets from time to time here in Georgia). I also liked the idea of having the cuffs a different color than the body, and I chose to accentuate that even more.



For the wedding, one of my dear bridesmaids, Stephanie, gave me a gift she knew I'd really use - yarn. She manages the knit shop in Atlanta - Knitch - in Virginia Highlands. Part of her yarn gift to me were two skeins of red Manos del Uruguay silk blend (merino and silk), and I knew I wanted to save them for something fun like this... no more scarves! The blue skein is Stonehedge Fiber Mill's Shepherd's Wool - another popular one at Knitch - in baby blue. This wool is a lot of bang for your buck, with 250 yards a skein for only $10.50. To top it all, it's ridiculously soft, and anything you make out of it will be your new favorite. As you can tell from the picture, the fine employees at Knitch wound my blue skein for me... while I did my best to wind the red skein around my thumb. The center pull works fine, just not as pristine, I guess.



For the step-by-step instructions for these warmers, you can click here for the project journal on the purl bee. I made a few changes, though. I had just finished knitting some socks for Collin's dad for Christmas on size TWO needles... and even though it was effort well spent, I just wasn't ready to bring out those freaking toothpicks again so soon. I opted for the Brittany birch double points I have in 5's, and altered the pattern from that point. Instead of casting on 60 stitches, I did 42. Instead of splitting for the thumb at 30, of course, I did 21. Instead of adding 19 stitches for the thumb piece, I knitted until I had added 13. Instead of carrying two yarns up the work for the striping, I just did my cuffs in blue and the rest in red. If all of this sounds like jibberish - just print out the pattern from purl and cross out all the numbers and replace them with mine - it'll make perfect sense.



With bigger needles, thicker yarn, and a little less to think about in general, these hand warmers didn't take me hardly any time at all. I didn't quite finish them in time for our 16 degree trips to the gym first thing in the morning, but I hear there's more cold to come in February, right?

Decorating: Bedroom

Since we're in this apartment until April, and no longer, I didn't really want to spend a lot of time and effort decorating as much as I'd like. I had a lot of creative ideas about painting birds on the wall and strange things like that, but not here. Instead, I brought out all of the paint cans that had leftovers from the old apartment, from my exit show, etc, and set to work painting as many walls as I could, as fast as I could, with whatever paint was left.

The happy surprise is that most of our rooms came out looking pretty good. I was looking at our bedroom in particular the other day, and many coincidentally fortunate events led it to actually be my favorite room in the apartment.

The blue is leftover from my exit show - it's a Behr color, "Ice Age," although I'm sure it's been renamed. I am usually a big fan of bright colors and bold statements, but there was something about this blue that drew me in. Most of the time, the wall looks white. There are certain times of the day when the blue reflects the conditions outside to almost glow periwinkle. For two years prior to this, my bedroom was painted bright pumpkin orange, and although it was quite a joy to wake up surrounded by sunshine and energy, I knew I wanted something different moving forward. I like the calm of this room, and the blue makes everything feel a little cleaner... unlike the unmade bed.



These shelves were a steal from Ikea, and I'm sure everyone has seen them before: the Lack collection. We decorated them with whatever we had - most of them wedding presents. The lanterns are actually leftovers from the wedding, bought from the Paper Lantern Store online, and rigged up above our bed because there are no real light fixtures in the room. Fantastic, right?



My mother's good friend from Germany, Jose, got us the amorphous orange vase in this photo. It's actually made of rubber, and you can pick it up gently and then throw it at people if you want to have a good laugh. The white candle is by Caldrea, in the scent ginger pomelo, which is a new favorite. I recommend these candles to everyone! They're not the least expensive, but they're the most delightful. Caldrea actually makes a whole line of aromatherapeutic products for the home, and we have the dish soap for the kitchen in the same scent. You can find them at Paper Affair or Sur La Table. The blue tealight holders were gifts from my Swedish cousins Farshad and Cajsa, and are close to my heart because they are from my favorite - Merimekko!



The metal lanterns are from Perspicasity, an open-air market on the beach in Seaside, FL (where Collin and I went on our honeymoon). The two ceramic flowers - an orange lotus and an aubergine rose - are from one of my other favorite stores, Heliotrope, in Decatur. These two are also tealight holders and were meant to be Christmas presents... but one day I set them up on the shelf and they just looked so good that they never left.

New Sewing Machine

For those of you who know me, you have probably heard me debating and over analyzing my decision to get a new sewing machine. It was supposed to be a wedding present, but I couldn't decide what I wanted, so it turned into a Christmas present.

My real dilemma was between price and function. Every sewing machine will work for some amount of time, and you get what you pay for. Was I interested in buying an okay sewing machine for an okay price? Did I want another bargain that would only last me three years? (Like my previous machine, a Singer that I used so much during its three year run that I actually started to hear the parts falling down inside the casing. Sometimes it clucked like a chicken.) Needless to say, I knew I wanted to go the next step up. What I didn't know was that my father and my husband would encourage me to run up to the top step. And here she is: the top step.



A Janome Memory Craft 6600 Professional. I's made entirely out of metal - not even the casing is plastic. It's not an embroidery machine, but there are some hundred plus embroidery settings, including block and script alphabet sets for monogramming. It came with about ten different feet that do everything: rolled hems, free-arm embroidery, satin stitches, automatic buttonholes. It also came with a knee-lift, and once I find a sewing table to set it up on all the time, I'll install it. I still use the presser foot, because I can't get used to the idea of sewing at the press of a button... at the end of a stitch I freak out about having to push it off, and wish I could just take my foot off the pedal - so that's what I do. All in all, I'm in love.

We bought it from Ashby Sewing Machine Co. in Kennesaw, Georgia. As far as shopping for machines go, I found this place very pleasant, well-equipped with a good price range of machines, and I was impressed with their service. I would recommend it to anyone looking for a new machine.