Knit Along: Wednesday 9th November 2011

Not much in the way of reading this week.  I have spent almost all my time trying to get my kids to do their schoolwork.  Which means constant supervision- which means that although knitting might get done, no artwork and no reading (because those take WAY too much concentration!).
On my needles this week is a Christmas stocking for DD.  I was originally going to make ME one, because I dislike the store bought one I have.  The idea of a country style, folk art stocking really appealed to me.
Only once I got my yarn, DD wanted HERS first!
I started out by using some worsted weight yarn- acrylic, so I could wash the stocking.  It was HUGE.  Except to DD who told me it was not big enough -she, apparently, wants it big enough to put a folding scooter in.  At least that is today.  Yesterday it was a trumpet.  The day before it was a recorder...
I am not a huge fan of huge stockings.  My house is small and four of them would just NOT fit.
So instead, I went with my own design, using some of Knit-Picks Palette yarn.

I cast on 96 stitches, joined to knit in the round, and K2, P2 for 1 inch.  Then I knitted  2 rounds before starting the holly chart below.
I have a chart for each of the family member names too- with a slightly more fancy font than you normally find :)
I knit that chart, before knitting 2 rows, then a green diamond pattern, 2 rows, 2 rows in snowman background, then the snowman chart.  When I am finished I shall type up all my instructions for you!

2 of the charts I am using, come from the Little Cotton Rabbit's Mini Christmas Stocking charts.  I highly recommend her stockings and mini bears for Christmas decorations!  Another chart I also got online, but the bird, holly, candy cane, snowman and swirl are all my own.  Not all of them fit ideally into 96- you might have to add a couple of stitches surrounding them- or do as I did and totally forget that and just make a joining pattern on the back.  I will show you that next time- when I hopefully remember to photograph it!

My art has not totally gone.  Apart from knitting charts- I have also been working on this...

A portrait of my son :) in pastel pencils.

P.S. You can click the pictures for more detail.

P.P.S.  See the other yarn along participants over at Ginny's Place :)

Pieces of Art

OOh... blogger has changed on me!
Anyway, I was just stopping by to post a couple of pictures I drew this week.

First up is a place I have drawn before- Cul's Courthouse Grille in Charles City (at the Courthouse), VA.  I decided to use some pastel pencils after watching Colin Bradley's videos on You Tube again.  They are considerably faster to use than coloured pencils, which is always nice when you are short on time.

I have drawn this guy before too.  He is a heron who inhabits a local strip mall property.  Sometimes he lands on the roofs of the shops, other times on cars... but most of the time he is on the rocks around the fish-filled retention pond.  As we walked around it this last weekend, we saw him and I snapped a couple of photos- from which I painted this picture.

I am still very much investigating this medium.  Trying to get the darks as dark as I want them is a little difficult.  I may need to get hold of some of the darker shades of pastel pencil.  And I have yet to find the perfect paper.  Cul's was drawn on Strathmore Pastel Paper- which was not bad, but I did not like the shade I used.  The Heron was drawn on Canson Ingres- but it was a very thin paper and came out with vertical lines after painting.  I really dislike those!  I have another Strathmore paper to try (a darker shade this time) and a Mi-teintes to try too.  We'll see how those go.