hello pineapples

Etsy Time and other news

Hooray me! I managed to list something on Etsy! My shop has been empty lately. I decided to focus on selling monkeys through Love, Me, rather than Etsy. But since money is tight at Chez Pineapples, I thought I'd try to get my act together and sell what I do have made (only two sock creatures). Hopefully I'll manage to make a few more things to add to my listings.

In other news...

Sock monkeys will be at the Telethon on Sunday! My friend J.Lau (it's my nickname for her, sounds like J.Lo) got the socks last night (apparently stripes aren't popular this year. And Hannah Montana really doesn't work well for sock monkeys). We're going to try to put together the pieces tomorrow and Saturday. And there is always a possibility that the monkeys will be spotted on TV. You never can tell.

Still no socks in the mail box. There was a package in my box yesterday and I got excited for a moment, but alas! Not socks. It's funny. Normally I'd be excited about unexpected packages arriving, but since I was hoping for the death knell, I was a little let down when I saw it was not my socks. Instead it was this:





Yes, that is Shakespeare as a rubber duck. To be specific, he's the Shakespeare CelebriDuck.

And if you think that it is odd for us to receive that in the mail, you should see what the Downstairses gave us for Christmas:



Seriously! It's the Pope John Paul II CelebriDuck! (Hard to explain, but friends sometimes buy us stuff having to do with the late Pope...we both grew up Catholic, so I think that is where our fascination with him comes from. The comic book we were given a few years ago is a riot).

We now have an accidental collection of CelebriDucks. The sender of Shakespeare has never met, nor heard of, the Downstairses, so this was not a plan. And while we enjoy them and think they're pretty funny, I hope this does not become a trend. Because I still hadn't figured out where to put our Pope Duck, let alone two CelebriDucks. (Also, what an odd idea...making celebrity inspired rubber ducks. They sort of creep me out, since they have people faces with duck bills in the middle of them).

Posted byHello Pineapples! on Thursday, May 29, 2008 0 comments  

filed under: etsy, in the mail, sock creatures, sock monkeys, sock wars iii

No Socks in my mailbox!

Sock Wars update: still alive! Amazing!

My assassin's assassin is now dead (giving my assassin more time to knit). I guess this buys me more time. Interestingly enough, a bunch of people below my target (her target and then some) are all dead. So I imagine that my target is a fast knitter and I'm helping her win the game. I think I will have to e-mail her soon, to reassure her that I am indeed still in the game and that she's just a lucky sock warrior.

Speaking of socks, I may have to consider throwing in the towel if I'm not soon assassinated. This weekend is the IWK Telethon and for the past couple of years, I've been volunteering to help kids make their own sock monkeys. The IWK is the children's hospital for the Maritimes and I'm part of a section of groups that provide activities for the kids. There's usually Michael's Crafts doing foam crafts and the Discovery Centre doing sciencey stuff.

Each year I get a little wiser and try to get more and more of the sewing done before the Telethon. The first year that I was there, I had the kids sewing the whole monkey themselves! Aside from some monkeys with stuffing coming out of their limbs, the kids were able to do the sewing, but I was completely overwhelmed - I ended up doing most of the sewing for kids. I had one friend with me and one or two of the ladies from Michael's abandoned their table to help. It was madness! Last year was better, but this year I'm going to make sure that all they have to do is stuff, do a quick whip stitch over the hole and then give it some buttons. And since I want to get this monkey prep work done before Sunday, I will need to either quit the sock war or put my socks on hold until next week. I'll probably put it on hold; I suck at quitting things.

I had brought two sample monkeys with me last year to the telethon and someone from the Michael's booth actually bought one! Seeing as I wasn't there for the sales, that monkey money went back to the IWK.

And on the topic of socks and monkey money: I also need to get some monkeys to Love, Me. I have a few started, but haven't had the chance to work on them because of the quilt and sock wars. And most unfortunately, the darling Mrs. Downstairs moved out of town and now I have no one to help me with some of the sewing. She would help me by doing up their legs and arms on the sewing machine. Although, I suppose, even if she didn't move, she kind of has her hands full with a one month old. Baby Downstairs is not quite ready to sit idly by while her mom is at the sewing machine. I guess this means I've got to get over my fear of sewing machines and either (a) figure my machine out, or (b) sell my machine and get a simpler one (with drop in bobbin).

Posted byHello Pineapples! on Tuesday, May 27, 2008 0 comments  

filed under: sock monkeys, sock wars iii, socks

Free Pattern Friday Sunday Night

Friday didn't happen as I was off bbq'ing with friends in the North End. Lots of red wine and cake and this hilarious game called What? (try googling that...almost impossible to find it that way. Far too vague a search). All in all, a really nice night out with some of my super friends. Saturday was no go on the free pattern as the Downstairses needed help cleaning up their apartment. We got them all cleaned up and out the door and off to the airport by late afternoon. Now I am downstairs-neighbour-less, which is really quite sad. They've been there for three years and the two years prior to that, it was home of the Gerkins. Now it is sad and empty.

So, what have I got for you today? Well, I've found a lovely blog birthday contest (found via Average Jane Crafter) that is not only offering up a fantastic prize, but everyone who posts gets a PDF copy of an applique and embroidery pattern.



Isn't it lovely? I'm looking forward to trying it out as embroidery. Ever since my visit to California, I've had pretty little birds on the brain. So many colourful little birds hang out around my parents' house. Like this little guy, who was one of the regulars at the feeder:



Of course, all embroidery must wait because....I'm still alive in Sock Wars III!! Seriously. WTF? My assassin must be as slow as me at this game. I've turned the heel and knit through the gusset, but then had to frog 'er back to the heel - I was a few stitches too many when I finished the gusset. I spent this evening trying to get stitches dropped in the frogging process back onto the needles. Unfortunately, the end of the TV season means the end of something to watch while I work on projects. I'm surprised I managed to keep focused on my knitting, I was rolling my eyes that much during The Forgotten that it was hard to know if I dropped a stitch or not.

I'm pretty sure I've screwed up the pattern. I'm one of the 8-stitch repeat people in the pattern and it appears that the 9-stitch repeat is the way to go. Oops. They still look pretty enough. And it seems that there is no official ruling from the Supreme Commander as to whether one is right and one is wrong. *la sigh*. I'm kind of hoping that tomorrow will bring me a pair of socks and my death in this game.

Now, off to bed with me! I meant to be in bed an hour ago!

Posted byHello Pineapples! on Monday, May 26, 2008 0 comments  

filed under: blogs, embroidery, free pattern friday, frogging, sock wars iii

Free Pattern Fridays: Under the sea..

It's been a week since Sock Wars III started and I am miraculously still alive. My hopes are not up for being a terribly successful assassin, seeing as I've barely managed to knit the cuff of the sock. I have frogged the frakking thing too many times to count. I've really been struggling with the patten for the leg of the sock and screw it up just about everytime. I'm hoping that after trolling through the Sock Wars forums, I've figured out how to get it right (although, no clue as to what I've been doing wrong. And don't even get me started on the teeny needles and skinny yarn).

Despite my distaste for skinny yarn in general, I am impressed with the choice of yarn for this year's war: Tofutsies by Southwest Trading Company. The crazy thing about this yarn is that it includes chitin as part of the fibre, which means it is made from crab and shrimp shells! WTF? (Apparently this stuff makes it naturally anti-bacterial).

Since there are sea creatures used in creating the yarn, and there is a local environmental group, along with a favourite yarn store, working on a project called Stitchin' Fish, which is a knitted/crocheted sea floor (similar to that of the Institute for Figuring's hyperbolic coral garden), I thought I'd find some patterns that would help to create the sea creatures on their wish list. While both The EAC and The Loop's blog do offer you free patterns, I've decided to hunt down a few with the magic of google.

If you've been following along at home, you may be familiar with my posts about octopuses, crochet octopuses, and other sea creatures to knit. Sea creatures are something I really dig when they are made of yarn.


So here are the patterns:
A Coral Reef from Lion Brand. The only trouble with Lion Brand is that you have to sign up in order to access the free patterns.


Hyperbolic knitting. And from the same person, a copy of the pattern to make a small jellyfish (a Christmas ornament, but totally do-able as a small submission to Stitchin' Fish). Or there is the jellyfish made from recycled grocery bags, which is an awesome way to get a few plastic bags out of the system.

Finally, there is the sea anemone.

As soon as I finish these socks/get assassinated, I'm starting in on some deep sea knitting.

Posted byHello Pineapples! on Friday, May 16, 2008 1 comments  

filed under: crochet, free pattern friday, good ideas, knit, sock wars iii

Free Pattern Fridays: Get your stitch on

After weeks without free patterns, I'm offering up a few sites with some nifty embroidery transfers and tutorials:

The transfers

Floresita has a blog devoted to her vintage transfers. I'm of two minds when it comes to vintage transfers - some are the kind of kitsch I love, but many take that step beyond kitsch and into the land of hokey. But to each their own. What I do like about these transfers is that Floresita occasionally photoshops them up to make them awesome, like the Saucepan Sabotage transfer:



Awesome, non? (you can get the full size transfer here)

Some of the finer embroidery bloggers have pooled together their vintage transfers in the flickr pool, Hoop Love. With 645 pictures in the pool, I'm sure one of them will fit your embroidery needs.

Needlecrafter.com also has a great selection of transfers, many of them vintage and a lot of those seem to be from old Vogart collections. I haven't looked closely enough to know for sure, but you may find some overlap in Vogart transfers within the various vintage transfer sites. Needlecrafter also offers an insane glossary of stitches, as well as articles, links, and more. Even if the vintage stuff isn't your style, there is probably something useful at Needlecrafter.


the tutorials

Found this tutorial for Japanese Sashiko embroidery via a post on Feeling Stitchy. The Purl Bee claims that Sashiko only looks difficult. I'll have to wait and see about that - it does seem to require some special materials.

the not so free

These patterns by Peapies aren't free, but they're so darn cute that I have to share them:



There's a good chance I'll be purchasing at least one of those designs in the near future.

the inspiration

In need of some embroidered inspiration? Then check out Feeling Stitchy's flickr pool. There is some amazing work to behold in that pool.

and finally...
the just plain old awesome

Have I mentioned Feeling Stitchy before now? It's a recent find for me and I might be in blog love. They have a number of fantastic tutorials, including one on needles - something I could use since I (a) haven't a clue about which needle to use when; and (b) I broke a needle while working on my quilt the other evening (snapped in half!). And if that weren't awesome enough, they also have the Crafty Blog School tutorials. That's one I'm intrigued by since I'm still new to the world of blogging (unless you count my time on LiveJournal a few years ago...but that didn't have much of a focus).

Purl Bee, the blog of Purl Soho, is another great stitchy crafty resource. I was excited to see that the most recent post is on thimbles. It's a bit of serendipity for me, seeing as it was only yesterday that I was complaining to le husband about needing either a callous or a thimble for my thumb (a thimble would be preferable). That pain in the thumb is from holding onto the needle and trying to pull it through the fabric; I also need one for pushing the needle through or for general poke protection.

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So that's it for today. Happy Weekend and happy crafting! I picked up my tofutsies yarn from The Loop (one of my LYS) today. Why the tofutsies? For Sock Wars III! My dossier arrived via e-mail at noon and I've got to get my knit on tout de suite. The only trouble is: I detest working with eensy needles. Even 4mm needles are small by my standards and this stuff (like a lot of sock yarn) calls for 2.75mm needles. Teeny needles and dainty yarn will be my undoing in this war. Regardless, I will be giving it the old college try.

Posted byHello Pineapples! on Saturday, May 10, 2008 0 comments  

filed under: embroidery, free pattern friday, patterns, sock wars iii, yarn

Live in Fear - Kill or be Killed: Sock Wars III

Oh yes! I have registered for Sock Wars III!

I hadn't heard of Sock Wars until my dad sent me a newspaper clipping about it. So when I saw that Sock Wars III is starting, I immediately knew that I had to sign up.

For anyone not clear on the concept of Sock Wars: on a given date you are emailed your "top secret dossier" which contains your target and a sock pattern. Your goal is to get your socks finished (they are your "weapon") and in the mail before you receive a pair from your own assassin. If I receive socks from my assassin before I finish knitting my own, then I am killed. Your death by knitting must be declared on the website. The target who is killed must send their unfinished work and contact info of their target to their assassin. This gives the assassin another chance to kill off yet another knitter. It is all very violent and fun sounding.

I'm going to have to step up my game when it comes to sock knitting. I've been working on the same pair for almost four years now! Although, to be fair, it's a project that I pick up for a bit and then put down for a year or so. When I recently picked them up to turn the heel, I realised that the last time I had worked on them was when we went camping on McNabs Island for our first anniversary - there was a map still in the bag with my yarn and half a sock.

I have knitted a pair of socks before, and they did turn out nicely, but I forgot to take a picture of them and they were a gift. That was my only attempt at socks. Part of my problem with socks is that I keep using this pretty Regia sock yarn that magically knits up a pattern (how do they do it?). As pretty as it is, it's quite dainty and requires bitsy dpns (maybe a 2.5mm?). My knitting style is more along the lines of chunky yarns and big needles. I was frustrated when I knit a blanket of 4mm addi turbos, so the idea of knitting on anything smaller than 4mm drives me crazy.

I have a feeling that I'll be using as chunky a yarn as possible for sock wars...either that or I've got zero chance of survival. I don't imagine I'll win, I'm just not that fast nor that dedicated, but I want to at least give it the old college try. I'd hate to send my socks on to my assassin with only a row or two done on one sock.

Posted byHello Pineapples! on Friday, March 21, 2008 2 comments  

filed under: knit, sock wars iii