Broadway Show

Today was a weird day at the museum. I applied makeup on turtle fossils so that it will photograph better. After finishing the photoshoot with the supermodel fossil, I took away makeup by applying deep cleansing lotion on it.

Joe, my fellow colleague asked me whether or not I had plans, I thought I should go see a Broadway show.

Whilst knitting on Marie's scarf in the subway, I really decided to go see a Broadway show. Instead of taking the bus, I went out to the BIG SCARY Times Square.

"Times Square is dangerous!" "Don't walk there alone at night!" that's what my mom told me.

.....but I lived in dangerous and scary Baltimore for 2 years, and I lived to tell the tale. I can pretend to look and act tough when needed.

So I proceeded straight to 8th Avenue and 47th St. to get a discounted ticket

to

go

see...

The Little Mermaid!

Wow wow it was SOOOO GOOOD! There were certainly moms my age, and they were as pumped as their daughters. Wow it was really great! I'm inspired to go see more...when I get more funding from my jobs.

I keep meeting famous people!

Yesterday I discovered that there is another yarn store near the museum. I checked out Annie & Co. on Madison on Sunday, and was quite pleased with it.

Knitty City has late hours on Wednesdays and Thursdays, so I can stop by after work, and knit and meet some knitters in New York! How perfect.

And! They were going to have Kay Gardiner and Ann Shayne speak about the new book! Whoa! And I never meet famous people. The closest I got was when my buddy sold a shirt to Joey from NSYNC. I'm showing age.

I absolutely loved their projects. I'm definitely making the coat and maybe even the rug they are holding....after I finish the scarf, socks, and the vest.

The people I met here were REALLY nice. I really liked their yarn selection too. I wish I can finish the darn scarf, socks, and the vest so I can start making cool things I saw in the store.

And the lovely Mason Dixon ladies signed my new book, and one of them even went to write "turtle fossils 4ever" :)

I'm really excited!!

The Yarn Harlot!

I like New York. How about you? I like it, how about you?

There seems to be lots of stuff going on here. I mean LOTS. I was cruising around on ravelry and discovered that the Yarn Harlot aka Stephanie Pearl-McPhee

is coming to sign books and say hello! I never meet famous people!

I invited my fellow medical illustrator to be inspired to knit. She sure was inspired to get one of the copies of the book.

And look! She even held my orange sock in progress, and thought it was real nice! Yaaaay!! I got to hold onto her thick warm sock!

Now I have a signed copy of her latest book! See that in my hand?

Hat 3 is done!

Hat 3 is done! Now I have to find a post office....

AMNH

This museum is BIG. I found my way all right. It even has its own metro stop...ahem the subway.

People kept telling me how there were going to be elephants when I first go in, but instead I was greeted by dinosaurs. A Brontosaur and an allosaur to be exact. Cool!

It's a really beautiful and HUGE museum. I hope I can find my way around. :)

Central Park Grandess

Central Park is big.  Once you get in, you can't really get out.  To me, it's not really that "nature"-y.  

I guess I have been spoiled by looking/fighting/appreciating Georgia nature.  Heck, I had to climb down a big steep hill with rocks, trees, and slippery moss in order to teach at UGA.  

It is pretty though.  I especially liked these open areas with a little view of the city:

Please don't ask me where I took them.  They are in Central Park.  I don't know...near the museum?  

I wanted to go to this yarn store on the "other side" of the park, but I couldn't for about half an hour because I was trying to get out of the park.  The park is intense in a way that it has layers of fences.  I can probably climb over them no problem, but there are signs saying one cannot cross them.  hmmm

Off to New York!

Here we go!  If I can make it there, I'll make it everywhere, come on come through, New York, New York!

So I get on my flight and begin my *first* knitting to be done in New York:

Pattern:  Overdue Hat aka My Knitty Haven by My Knitty Haven

Yarn: Lion Brand Woo-Ease

Needles: US 6 12" circulars

Size: L

Made for: The Great Hat Race Sudden Death

I'm surprised I'm in the semi-finals.  That means if I finish this I'll at least get second place. 

Great Hat Race Round 2

Since the Great Hat Race coincided with Hat Attack, there are only three players including myself.  Hmm, maybe I'll win something this time!

Asher inherited this acrylic yarn from his lab, so I used most of it in order to create this little hat:

Pattern: Butterfly Baby Hat by Melisa Darniedar

Yarn: Mystery 100% Acrylic yarn

Needles: US 5 circular 12"

Size: Medium

Oh yes!!!! My mom made these cats for me for my birthday!  Both Asher and myself are really excited and play with them almost daily.  They are so photogenic and cute!!

Great Hat Race hat #1 done

Here is the hat #1 from Great Hat race!

Yarn: Ella Rae Amity in #37 Orange

Needles: #8 Circular and dpn

Off to the post office tomorrow!

The Great Hat Race

I'm going to be a part of the Great Hat Race.  It's knitting hats for charity, and also fun with prizes and meeting other great knitters.  

The first round starts tomorrow!  Yay, can't wait!

My hand dyed camera sock!

Here are the circumstances:

A: Work has been slow this week

B: I discovered a small scratch on my ridiculously awesome camera

C: I had hand-dyed sock yarn that wanted me to knit it up for a taste

A+B+C= camera sock!

After knitting Perpensockular!  by nonaknits, I have been the master of grafting.  So, I made a small opening for the strap to come out of the bottom of my camera sock.  

Here is the pattern if you're interested in your very own camera sock of your own!

***Pattern starts here***

Yarn: any sock yarn that will give you 7-8 sts/inch or 7-8 sts/2.5cm (about 30 yards?)

Suggested yarn: KnitPicks Bare-Superwash Merino/Nylon Fingering weight (462 yds/100g)

Needles: #2US or 2.75mm dpn OR one circular for magic loop

Gauge: 7-8sts/inch or 7-8sts/2.5cm

Notions: ruler and grafting needle

1. measure the dimensions of your camera : width(sideways), height(vertical), depth.  

     Example: (mine was w=10.0cm;  h=5.5cm;  d=2.0cm)

      note: Since cameras are made in metric countries, it may be easier to do the calculations in the metrics.  Your call.

2. Calculate 2h+2d 

     Example:   2(5.5)+2(2.0)=15.0 -> this is your overall width (how many sts to cast on)

3.  Calculate w+d 

     Example: 10.0+2.0=12.0 -> this is your overall length (how many rows to knit)

4. Multiply your total from #2 by 3.  

     Example: 15.0 x 3=45

5.  If your total was an odd number, subtract 1 and CO that amount.  

CO 44 (that took forever!)

Join, take care not to twist; 1x1 rib for 10rows in round

switch to stockinette and knit in round until your piece measures to your number from #3 (12.0cm)

Here is the fun grafting:

Divide your stitches evenly on 2 dpns (22 sts on each needle)

Graft until 2 sts from middle (graft 9).  DON'T CUT YARN

BO next 4 sts on front needle DON'T CUT YARN

Slip next 4 sts on back needle to holder

Graft the remaining sts together(graft 9).  Weave in ends.

Take a short piece of yarn and BO 4 sts on needle holder.  Weave in ends.

Admire your work!

Leave your mark at Loveyarns!

The best local yarn store in the world, Lovelyarns, is having a multi-knitter afghan project for the store.  Sue asked for a 6" x 6" square that represented each of the knitters who come and hang out at her lovely shop.  

I figured since I make toys all the time, I would make something to that effect:

However, I am quite lazy to calculate my own patterns, so I looked for a design that kind of suited me.  Here is the happy sun pattern from knitting-and.com.  I used my Cascade 220 (my favorite yarn) and happy face.  

There it is on the wall!  Yay, I feel special!!!

2/42

Now I'm hooked.  Here is another leftover yarn square from my lovely gloves I made 2 years ago.  

1/42

I had to leave the apartment today for about an hour.  My landlord is showing the apartment to a prospective tenant.  

I had just received a copy of Knitalong: Celebrating the Tradition of Knitting together by Larissa Brown and Martin Brown.  

What a brilliant little book!  I want to make everything from it.  I even wanted to knit an afghan.  I swore never to knit such a dull thing. 

But this one was different.  It was a quilt made by using leftover sock yarn.  I have those!

So:  Here's my square 1:

Not Bad for First Time

On Sunday we thought it would be nice to try a little yarn dying using food coloring and vinegar:

We had two skeins of natural colored superwash wool: one skein worsted weight and one skein fingering weight. The worsted weight wool is going to be a beanie and the fingering is going to be...socks.

We had some trouble finding boxes of food coloring. Finally we found a box of four bottles at Kroger. Our aim was to mix 1tsp of food coloring for every 1 tablespoon of vinegar.

Since we are total beginners, we started out with 1/2 tsp of red, 10 drops of blue and 4 drops of green. That totaled to about 1 tsp. We added 1 tbs of vinegar and about 1 cup of water.

To see how dark the food coloring was, we dipped little bits of paper towel into the dye mixture and checked how the dye was looking.

We were aiming for wine-red, so we added a little green to mute the color. Yay color theory.

***

While we were busy mixing colors, the yarn waited patiently in the pot. We did not add any vinegar to the water mixture. The water in the pot is slowly getting warm to prepare the yarn for the dye. When the water is steaming but not bubbling, we got the dye ready to go.

Happy mixing dye! mmm food coloring tastes like easter eggs!

And here is the moment we have been waiting for! Ready to pour in the dye!

We were AMAZED to see how quickly the dye was sucked into the yarn! Now the yarn had areas with really dark colors and areas with no color at all! Yikes!

We quickly mixed 1 full tsp of red, 20 drops of blue and 8 drops of green. The we mixed that with 2 tbs of vinegar. This time, we slowly poured in the dye a little at a time...

Aaaah that's better. The red is like a blackberry red. We let the yarn simmer in the pot, covered for about 30 minutes. We then let it cool to room temperature and gave it a good rinse.

The yarn color looked darker when it was wet!

And here it is, all dry and ready to be knit!

Not bad for first time!

*****

For the fingering weight yarn, we used a different method: massaging dye into yarn with fingers and cooking it in the oven for 2 hours. Unfortunately we don't have too many pictures from that session (it was not as messy as you would think). Here are some pictures:

Yellow: 1/2tsp yellow; 3 drops blue

Blue: 1/2tsp blue; 10 drops green

Green: 1/2 tsp green; 5 drops green

I added about 4 1/2 tbs vinegar for the entire skein (100g)

It was a really fun experience! I would definitely like to try again soon! But first, I must find out how they knit up!

Puppy

It definitely has been too warm around here to knit. But, since a friend of mine just had shoulder surgery and thought that she might need a little companion, I made her a little puppy.

The pattern is from Jean Greenhowe's knitted animals. This is my second project from hers. Both this one and the previous penguin ended up plumper and goofy looking compared to the photos. Oh well. I guess your personality shows up in your creations.

Ice Queen hearts!!

ice queen wip 3
Originally uploaded by ikumi_knits

I am knitting a lovely ice queen for my mom! This is my first beaded mohair lace knitting to warm myself up for knitted shawls.

My photos are not so good as it could, since I am never knitting during the daylight hours although we are past the equinox.



I am making version A which is the garter stitch version with more beads. I got a beautiful ball of Kid Merino from the lovely yarn store. yay!

List of things to knit after thesis

I have been buried in thesis ever since I made that cute pink mouse. Here is the list of things that I want to finish/knit after all this is done:


Cable poncho from Vogue Knitting on the Go: need to knit the second panel
Alpaca cardigan: Made the original yoke pattern, so need to knit that up
Gifts for all who helped me with thesis work: toys! cake! knitted cake!
Icarus shawl OR Silver Belle. They will probably take me the same amount of time to make these.
Vest for Dad: Argyle classic
Ice Queen for Mom: for chilly california nights
Legwarmers for sister: I suppose her legs get cold in Georgia

TWO MORE WEEKS!

Certificate of Excellence

One of my illustrations will be hanging in Illustrators Club annual exhibit! It's the flounder piece, you can see it on my portfolio website here. Quite exciting!

Sheldon!

My toy knitting bug is back to get me! I am almost done with the body and the limbs of sheldon the turtle. He's going to be geeked out by me. ha ha ha!!

Also, I just purchased another knitted toys book from Indiana. I should have asked Robin the french horn player to get it for me. :)

Cutest!

I got the Dickensian Mice pattern sent from California. funny, it's a British design, but I ordered it from the west coast. I used Worsted weight yarn like everything else I use, and it turned out great! She's a pinkish kind, but there will be many more to come. 

The techniques used in making Kate the Cat (opens in new window) has been really helpful when it comes to sewing the arms and jogless stripes. I'm glad I made Kate, and hope that Kate won't eat Perla (the mouse in question). It is definitely recommended!

Now the plan is to make a gentleman mouse (Mr. Culpepper, Esq.) and start a cute mouse colony!

Woo hoo!

Cute, isn't she?  Her little feet are adorable!

Molecular graphics and web site!

Yay molecular graphics and the website is done!

www.ikumi-kayama.com


Now I can focus on 3D animation and thesis...and knitting on the bus. Woo hoo!

Oops

I was writing out my hat pattern for one of the fellow ravelers, and somehow I managed to post the pattern in the "new designers" page. AH! I felt really bad as to I had the link all messed up, linking to my ancient page that doesn't work.

After 1.5 hours of freaking out, researching CNAME, DNS switch, I'm really sorry for those who were nice enough to check out my pattern only to be greeted by question marks.

Check out my pattern!

http://homepage.mac.com/ikumikayama/Personal23.html

it's finally functional. thank goodness.