The One About Inori

Just popping in to update a little on our lives

MY UPDATES:
I have received great encouragement from fellow Ravelry mates and will be writing up a PDF pattern for the scarf . Stay tuned for it! Many have even volunteered to test knit prior to the release to check for mistakes! I’m so touched by their kind gestures.

I’d probably work on it over the weekend.

SUNSHINE UPDATES:
Three days ago, I left the room I was in with Sunshine to get something from the living room. She called me, “Mummy?” and I replied, “Yes?” and she called me again. 3 times. And I replied, “Yes?” each time.

Then, she said, “I miss you…”

AWWWWWWWW! That was sooo sweet!!!!!!!

She’s been saying that a lot nowadays. And been asking for hugs more now.

Today, Nad turned off the fan and she walked into the room and casually pointed to the fan and asked him, “You off?”.

I burst into laughter while Nad replied, “Yes I did!”

That was SOOOO random and unexpected from her!

She’s also been trying to sing the ending part of the Alphabet song. She only gets as far as, “Now I know my……….. now I know my……… now I know my……..”

She also sings, “Row row row your poot…” and she breaks into laughter because she thinks ‘poot’ is funny.

She enjoys pulling her alphabets out of the bag and reads them out. She can name most of the alphabets and even can say some of the words that it begins with! (Ie, she would pull out ‘D’ and say, “D!” and then say “Dog!”)

The other day, she showed me an ‘X’ and she said, “Y!”. I told her that is not ‘Y’ but ‘X’. She then pinched the bottom part of the ‘X’ together and proudly showed it to me, now that it looked like a ‘Y’.

“Y!!!!”

Cheeky girl!!!!!

She’s also interested in the planets and the sun and the moon. We have the solar system as our desktop wallpaper and she happily points out, “Jupiter!” and “Mars!” and “Moon!” and “Sun!!!”

She can’t really pronounce the rest yet.

What else is she in to nowadays? Hmm… shapes. She can name triangle (“Triang”) and square, circle, moon (crescent), star (“tar!”), pentagon (funny she can pronounce ‘pentagon’ but not ‘star’?).

She knows colours like Orange, Yellow, Blue, Red and Green.

She can count from 1 to 10 and can say out the numbers at random when she’s being shown too.

Yep. We are proud of our little girl. I hope she continues to enjoy her learning.

CHUBBS UPDATES:
I’m feeling the weight more and more now and there is a significant slow down in my walking pace. Getting harder to get comfy in bed as well.

He still moves around but is not as violent as before so I take it as a sign that he’s coming soon!

Debra is offering chocolate to people who guess his birth date right. Hahaha. But I’m not allowed to participate. Boo.

NAD UPDATES:
Nothing. He’s a boring person.

I leave you with this video. This is why everyone should knit/ crochet/ sew!!!!!

…………. first time I wrote a knitting pattern, I mean.

SUNSHINE’S HONEYCOMB SCARF!

Name of project: Honeycomb scarf (My own creation!)

Yarn: Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino

Needles: Knitpicks 3.75mm

Cast on date: I can’t remember. Beginning of April 2009

Cast off date: I took 2 days to knit this.

I am thinking of writing the pattern and posting it in PDF format. What do you think?

Do you think anyone would be interested in this scarf? *Unsure*

The postman came today as I was putting Sunshine to bed for her nap. I almost snatched the parcel out of the postman’s hands in excitement!

The parcel felt very hot. I think it was because it had been in the post van since morning. It’s supposed to be Autumn now but the afternoons can still get to be rather warm.

I ripped the package open and squealed in delight. Yes I know. I’ve been squealing a lot lately, haven’t I? Like a pig.

Please pardon the extremely blue shot. Lol. I kinda did it on purpose because I love blue.

I got a bag that is in:

• PERFECT COLOURS
• PERFECT SIZE
• PERFECT POCKETS

My partner, Jen, had put together such a thoughtful package and I’m so touched!

I love the notions pouch/ pencil case and will be transferring my knitting accessories into it…..err as soon as I clear the junk out from the old pouch.

I’m already using the bag. I brought it to church this evening and in the car, I kept admiring the fabric, the neon green thread she used to sew the handles with, the pockets…… I love the bag!

I actually dumped my old bag – a freebie from a magazine, right after I transferred my knitting projects and wallet/ coin purse/ pens/ etc into the new bag. I hated the old bag and only used it because I thought I would be sewing one for myself soon and that bag will be a temporary one. I procrastinated for 4 months. Up till now, I still have not sewed my bag. -___-

I hated the temporary bag because it had no pockets. Whenever my mobile phone rings, I can’t get it out in time because it’s lost in the abyss. Then when I need to open the door/ drive, I can’t find my keys. Sometimes I’m alone with Sunshine and digging for keys while carrying her in the parking lot isn’t the easiest thing to do.

I love the wool that Jen dyed up for me. Don’t the colours just scream “JOLENE!”??

I think I will make some cute booties from the blue merino and maybe a beanie or scarf with the thicker one.
I don’t know! So many possibilities! Yummy yummy wool!

I forgot to mention, Jen has an online store here, selling hand knitted baby stuff as well as hand dyed wool!

(Oops, I just popped over to her website and added something to my cart…. BIG OOPS! It’s all your fault!)

The bag is VERY sturdy. Jen used a material called Buckram to reinforce it. It’s like interfacing but multiply the hardness by 100. Okay I’m exaggerating but I think my sewing machine will protest if I used it to sew through Buckram!

She also sent me chocolate which is in my tummy now. Nyahh nyahh nyahhh~

I’m so spoilt by my latest two swap pals and my faith in swaps has been renewed!!!!

I’ll end my post with pictures of Sunshine – I caught her doing this this afternoon:

She was lining the oranges up in a line and COUNTING them!

“One, twoo, three, four, five!” she said to herself.

She can pronounce ‘three’ better than me! I sometimes say ‘tree’ out of sheer laziness but she pronounces the ‘th’ sound perfectly. Sounds like “Shree”.

I also love the way she says ‘Seven’. It sounds like ‘Sheafen’. Hahahhaa.

Okay, off to bed.

I will blog about the scarf I designed and knitted for Sunshine soon. Maybe tomorrow.

PS: The soap I wrote about in the previous entry? It’s usable! I don’t have to throw it away!

I made more soap last night!

I unmolded it this evening. This is a castile shampoo bar. Castile soap is made from Olive Oil (and it’s damn expensive to make!!!!!!).

This is it all cut up into sample sized blocks. I made this batch with Goats Milk. It smells heavenly!

Next, a secret soap bar.

The colours were perfect! This is the first time I’m working with colours and the subtle swirls were exactly what I want.

HOWEVER………………………….

See the tiny white specks? Those are tiny little air bubbles.
I’ve read up different books and different websites and they are all so contradictory! Some say that the bubbles will be caustic and best to discard. Some say it’s only aesthetic.
Sigh.

I’ve emailed someone for help and hope and hope and hope and hope that the soap is usable! Otherwise I would have to dump it and it’s my FAVOURITEST batch yet! It smells heavenly and looks so good!!!!!!!

What a huge learning curve in making soap!

I’m going to end the post with a re-constructed sewing project.

A TABLECLOTH!!!!!!

This was how my dining table looked like.

Red is not my favourite colour.

We had a shower curtain that became toooo grubby and dirty at the bottom. So we bought a new one and dumped the old one.

The next day, I picked the old shower curtain out of the bin and decided to snip off the dirty bottom, washed it and put it aside to be used for sewing projects.

I collected more scraps of cloth and managed to put this together:

(spot the baby)

Yay! Blue table cloth with orange and blue edges!

The cloth was hard to sew, though, due to the nature of the fabric. It was slippery and the machine didn’t handle it very well. Therefore the cloth had very very very bad stitches. A lot of thread gathered on the underside and I can’t be bothered to re-stitch it. Just remember when you come to dinner, don’t look at the underside of the cloth. In fact, don’t scrutinize the cloth at all. Thank you very much.

I’ve decided to merge 3 entries into one! Hence the title.

2 days ago I received a Platinum Express Post package. My Ravelry Australian Knitters Favourite Colour Swap had arrived!

I took a look at the return address on the parcel and recognised it immediately. My spoiler was none other than my spoilee! We got twinned up! Hahahaha. I sent the purple package to her and she sent a blue package to me!

I tore open the satchel and this is what I found:

I was soooo excited! I squealed (and Nad was amused) and didn’t know which one to open first!

I opened the package that was labeled, “To amuse your daughter” first and burst out laughing! Shan, my spoiler, knitted a BANANA for Sunshine!

Sunshine saw the knitted toy and exclaimed “Vanana! VANANA!!!”

She’s got a weird expression on her face.

The skin is removable too! And needless to say, Sunshine prefers the banana ‘naked’. Every time I stuff it back into the skin, she peels it off again.

I have decided to stitch the banana to the skin as the banana alone looks somewhat.. err.. obscene. I don’t want guests to come over and wonder WHAT we give our kids to play with, you know? Just in case….

To sum up my package, I got:

• A very cute Banana knitted toy for Sunshine (which is stripped of it’s skin right now)
• A ball of Heirloom Baby wool (Sooo soft!)
• A ball of laceweight CASHMERE (I LOVE IT)
• A cowl knitted from the Cashmere wool. (My very first cowl!!!!)
• A sheepy retractable measuring tape (I have one that looks similar but it’s head fell off and I’ve yet to sew it back on. Now I have another!!! Yay!!!)
• A beanie, a pair of socks and a pair of matching mittens for soon-to-be-born Chubbs! Sooo cute!
• 2 sachets of Lavender scenters which are already in my stash, doing their job! They smell heavenly!!! I love the smell!!!

I’m so touched by Shan’s effort and time put into this package. She had asked me anonymously at that time, if I wore cowls (I replied that I would like to try one), what Sunshine likes (I replied that she loves to eat bananas but I didn’t expect her to send bananas in the mail. LOL), what accessories I would like for my knitting (I replied that I wouldn’t mind another retractable measuring tape as I have one that I use a lot and it sometimes grows legs and walks about on its own and I can’t find it) and also what I would like for myself (I replied Lavender sachets to put with my stash to keep them smelling good).

Shan went and got me EVERYTHING I asked for. She is so amazing. I feel that my parcel to her is inadequate now!

Here’s how I look wearing the cowl:

No, I’m not about to rob a bank – I wanted to show how intricate these stitches are and if I were the one knitting this, I would have taken a year to complete it!

She got my colours right on the spot! I love the blues…….. And the cashmere…….is…………soooooooo………soft……………..

Oooo.. I can’t stop gushing at the stuff I received.

Okay now as promised, the Goats Milk Soap I made:

This half is scented with Ylang Ylang essential oil, which Nad sniffed and announced that he doesn’t like it. That’s fine, he won’t get to use it then.

And this half, which doesn’t look as pretty as the previous half due to the mould I used (it was an empty soap dispenser container with the top cut off) is unscented but with aloe vera added to it for Lulu’s eczematic skin.

They will be ready to use in 4 weeks time. I hope.

So what’s this “Crafter on a budget” all about?

Well you see, I wanted a wooden mould to make soap with. I am currently using plastic take away containers, empty milk cartons etc as moulds and I wanted something that I can use over and over with slightly larger batches of soap.

I went and searched for wooden moulds online and boy! Each mould costs at least $30 to $40!

I could not justify spending that money, what with the cost of high grade essential oils already burning a hole in my pocket, so I went to get wood from the most famous warehouse here.

The man that helped me cut my wood was very handsome and his accent was a thick European accent. I wished I had asked his name/ number/ etc so I could stalk him.

Nad went with me to choose the wood and we got it cut by a very handsome European man.

Although the sign states that first 2 cuts are free and subsequent cuts are $1 each, the very handsome European man didn’t charge us at all! He even told me to pay for just 2 planks instead of the 3 I took as I didn’t want the off-cuts.

So I got a very good deal! The most expensive item I had to buy was a bottle of wood glue. Thank God I got the glue. If fellow Ravelry mates had not told me to get it, I would have only used nails and that alone would not be enough to keep my moulds sturdy.

Ravelry is amazing! You get great advice for all sorts of things from childbirth to child raising to woodworking and the list goes on! (And most importantly, knitting, yarn and stash enhancement of course!)

I was a happy lark. I got everything for less than $16. And enough wood to make 2 moulds plus one extra base if I wanted to make a bigger mould next time.

This is what I managed to put together this evening:

Hehe. Not bad for someone who has NEVER done woodwork in her entire life before, right? Right? One mould is slightly narrower than the other on purpose.

Before you jump to conclusions that I have added YET another hobby in my already hobby-filled busy life, I must say woodworking isn’t my cup-o-tea at all.

I was swearing (not out loud, of course… only in my head) while trying to put the box together, just as a lady on Ravelry named Lorelle said I would.

Also there will be swearing, blisters, tantrums, but yes you should get a box

I had glue on my hands and shirt. And the damn nails wouldn’t go in straight!

It took me more than an hour to put together what a normal person would do in less than half an hour.

I didn’t take Design and Technology classes in secondary (high) school as my school only offered Home Economics (sewing and cooking) in my year. They added D&T only the year after mine. So yes. I have never hammered nails in wood before.

My hammer also doesn’t have a claw. So I had to use a screwdriver to ‘dig’ the crooked nails and use a pair of pliers to yank the rest of it out of the wood.

Uh huh. I killed those nails. And almost ran out of nails. We don’t keep stock of nails in the house since no one needs any! These nails came free with some Ikea furniture I think.

Nad checked on my progress and when I complained to him about the crooked nails, he told me that I had to whack it hard and firm down into the wood instead of hammering them gently and multiple times. Grrr… he tells me only AFTER I had completed the boxes.

Anyway, lesson learnt. If I do use the extra base to make another mould, I know better. (I hope.)

I might be making more soap today (Sunday) and am looking forward to using my new moulds!

Gee, I really bring ‘homemade’ the whole 9 yards, eh?

I better go sleep now. I’m still having contractions and am getting hungry too. Off to dream of Handsome European Man Nad.