I'm Close to a Finished Project

Hello everyone, and happy Friday! I am pleased to report that I am almost done with my very own One If By Hook Cardi. Here's what it presently looks like:

 

I completed the sleeves last Sunday, and have attached one of the arms (the one on the right, with the right side of the fabric facing). The one on the left is pinned but still needs to be seamed; then all I'll have to do is work the front and neck bands. And then, of course, search for the all-important perfect buttons.

As you might recall (but if not, you can read my two previous posts about this cardi here), I needed to get some additional yarn for the sleeves. I do like the colorblocked look - it's making the edging rib really stand out.

I hope everyone makes it over to Wisdom Begins in Wonder to find out all the fibery things this Friday. And while we're still So.Incredibly.Waterlogged here in the Pacific Northwest, signs of spring are starting to appear, and I hope spring comes soon to everyone.

Even with crappy cell phone camera, isn't this great?

 

A Little Crochet Preview

To help celebrate National/International Crochet Month, I've got some crochet sneaky peeks to share with you from VK Live, held this past weekend in Bellevue.

All of these designs will be in Vogue Knitting's third (and I hope annual) crochet special edition, which Trisha Malcolm, VK's editor, told me is being finalized as we spoke about it on Saturday. Expect it to hit newstands sometime in May - but here's a little tasty preview:

Add caption

This dress front is amazing. In fact, on both the crochet and knit runways, dresses were hot.



This next summery top looked great over the white tee they had it styled with:

 This was one of my favorite pieces in the entire show - creative and full of texture.

This next top was paired with a sheer blue skirt and green shoes - I wanted the entire outfit:

 



 

Again, another great dress. While I might pick more muted colors (just think of that in neopolitan colors), this dress style is a keeper - it's easy to customize and imminently wearable by most anyone:

 

I absolutely loved this next top - it was worn by the presenter earlier in the day:

 

This next top is also great over a tee-shirt. I believe there are hairpin lace inserts on the sides, for all you hairpin lace fans. (Btw, the model is still in high school - I met her parents in the audience prior to the show and they were, as you can imagine, excited to see their daughter up on the runway.)










And, finally, the end of the show:

Trisha Malcolm was all kinds of excited for this third crochet special edition. With this preview, can you blame her?

All Fiber All The Time

Hello my fibery friends - so sorry I haven't been around for a few Fridays, but what's a designing gal to do? Play with all the fiber, of course! So here's a round-up of news on the Voie de Vie designing front:

Initially, here's the fiber I've been playing with on several recent projects:

 

There was a ton of sunlight when I took this cell phone photo, but the colors are not too washed out. I can also tell you that beads were associated with this project. :)

I absolutely loved working with this 100% flax yarn. It's got a very rustic quality to it and lots of "bite." I definitely will use this yarn again (and aren't the colorways fantastic?).

I cannot wait for everyone to see what I made with all of this loveliness. Despite the high acrylic content (which is saved by the balance of cool cotton in the blend), Berroco Weekend is a dream - it's got great texture and the colors are saturated and gorgeous.

Additionally, this luscious Lion Brand yarn + beads are about to be whipped up into a fun little project for charity - Knitting for Gold, a childhood cancer awareness project. It will be completed for an e-book to be published this coming September (which is, of course, childhood cancer awareness month). All proceeds from the publication will be donated to a charity that specifically does childhood cancer research. Kellie Huffman is the whirlwind behind all this - and her daughter is currently waiting on a heart transplant list. Many knitters and hookers have donated projects to this e-book, and Kellie's receiving great help with publishing this project, most notably from Twist's Kate Gilbert. Stay tuned, because I will be looking for testers once this project is completed.

Finally, earlier this week, I had a wee little surprise hit my inbox - here's the cover of the lastest F+W Media book containing two of my designs! It's slated to hit bookstands everywhere on or about April 16th. All of the projects in this book (and there are a whole lot of them between these covers!) are meant to be made in an afternoon, day, or weekend. I'm pretty excited to receive my copy - who knows, I just might try a new-to-me craft (like, I don't already have enough on my plate).

Now do make certain you head on over to Andrea's blog at Wisdom Begins In Wonder to catch up on the latest doings with everyone else. And I promise I won't be a stranger for so long again.