The Kind of Music You Hold Hands to.

We saw Craig Cardiff play the Company House.

My roommate suggested I get the bf to take me to the show last night because the music is romantic. I hadn't heard him or heard of him, so we listened to some of his songs while studying yesterday afternoon.

And we did go to the show. We watched from the corner of the room furthest from the bar and the stage, under a light illuminating a painting of a rooster. Our corner wasn't crowded, though every inch of floorspace around the stage was. And there were no empty seats in the house:

My Little Cosmonaut

I love our dog. But, and I know the bf would disagree, I think we need some help training her. I find her jump-on-you-and-lick-your-face hugs to be quite charming, but I know strangers and roommates do not. I would also like to keep her from running after buses. And wiggling out of her chest harness.

Midway Point Celebration

I saw a This Ilk necklace at Love, Me boutique in Halifax that I loved equally as much as the This Ilk birthday earrings I found for Suze. So, after exams, I came up with a reason to buy it; congratulations me, you're halfway through law school.

Waking Up To A Winged Animal Flying Into The Sun

A NSCAD alum (and former instructor!) herself, Ro brought me to a Seeds Gallery show during one of her visits to Halifax. The Seeds Gallery is a showroom space on the NSCAD campus that sells student and alumni art. There was a painting on tile that I really wanted, but couldn't afford, and an embroidered piece that I really wanted, and could afford.

The embroidered piece is by Amy Belanger and hangs on my bedroom wall.

Handknits for my Beautiful Little Sister

In 2005 - A 2x2 rib scarf made from a hank of hand-dyed wool I found at Urban Yarns in Vancouver (I was knitting her a reversible cable scarf with wool she'd given me, but I ran out of wool at about 36 inches).

In 2007 - The second pair of Pearl's Topless Mittens I'd ever made (I had enough wool, once I frogged the reversible scarf). For cdc, for shoulder season dog-walking.


In 2009 - I knit Bella Mitts for three of my favourite ladies. I knit a mohair plum coloured pair as a Christmas gift for cdc.

[cdc also obliged my request for photos of her handknits, because I didn't photograph what I'd made her, either.]

Grove Mittens for Katie

These are the mittens I made Katie. I knit rows during study breaks, hidden away in a library carrel.

They're meant to keep her hands warm while walking dogs, shovelling snow, or while riding her bike during the winter months.

Pattern here: http://brooklyntweed.blogspot.com/2009/08/made-in-brooklyn-accessories.html

Guillaume Sweater

He noticed my knitting basket the first time he came to my house. He knew his grandmother loved him, he told me, because when he was little, she knit him sweaters (we've revisited that conversation several times since, and it eventually came out that the sweaters were too itchy to wear.) And I realised I loved him when, among other indicators, I found myself wanting to knit him a sweater, too.

I had two patterns in mind and consulted in secret with our mutual male friends and with his mother (who is also a knitter). I found the wool at Romni Wools during the end-of-September bff reunion weekend in Toronto. The Romni ladies helped me figure out how much wool to buy (the pattern recommended 10 balls of out-of-production wool) and helped me find a non-itchy fiber. Suze helped me pick out an appropriate colour of wool.

Every Friday afternoon; evenings spent watching Gossip Girl or Mad Men; a post-exam weekend on the couch; and finally the sweater was knit. I blocked it with a dry iron and a wet sheet late the night before my roommate Aurelie and I made the holiday drive back to Ontario, pressing each piece between pulling clothes and other sundries out of my drawers and cupboards. I started seaming it while listening to CBC overnight and finished it by the time we hit New Brunswick. I was in the passenger seat and held it up to show Aurelie. As I did so, this strange feeling come over me - an indescribable feeling - because this was the first sweater I'd ever knit and I very surprisingly enjoyed all of it. Tearing it apart because I thought it was going to be too small; hours of stockinette; too scared to check my gauge (which I did do, and which was bang on); worrying it was going to be too big; seaming.

He thanked me. He wore it. He thanked me later that day and again since. He wore it again.

So a sweater was the right gift, superstition or no. Also, he looks incredibly handsome in a handknit.

Bella Mitts for my BFF

Having seen me knitting the Kelsey-bound Bella mitts this past summer (during an unseasonably cold and rainy weekend we had planned to spend wine-touring the Niagara region), Suze asked whether I might make her a pair for Christmas.

"Of course," I answered, "what colour?"

One long trip to Romni Wools in Toronto, and several colour consultation cellphone photos later, I had 200g/200m of wool in mustard (I have about 60g/60m left). It took a car drive from Montreal to Halifax to knit the left mitt. I started the right mitt on a labour day weekend away and finished it up during an afternoon with my knitting group later in September.

This was the first Christmas handknit I finished and Christmas was still over three months away. And so I stored them in a box in my closet; an end of September bff reunion and Suze's November birthday passed, and still I waited to give them to her. Then December came. Exams ended. A long drive back to Ontario was survived. Suze visited me at my parents' house on the 26th, and five minutes once in the door we exchanged gifts. And as the friend she is, she didn't take the mitts off for the better part of her overnight visit.

She also sent me photos of the mitts almost immediately after I asked for them, because I'd forgotten to take any myself.

Bowtie: or, how to throw your boyfriend off the scent of a handknit sweater

One weekend last spring, my roommate came home from her family's farmhouse with an armload of old knitting magazines. We spent Sunday afternoon looking at the patterns, but then stacked them under the coffee table and spent the rest of the semester focused on studying. At some point during the summer, I started thinking about the patterns in the books. And I formed the bold and ridiculous idea to risk the knitters superstition and knit my boyfriend a sweater for Christmas.
Because I needed to know what size would fit, I first tried tracing out a sweater he owned. I eventually thought better of relying on my quick highlighter-on-newspaper job and asked if I could take his measurements. I told him it was for a bowtie and vest combo I was going to make him. I have no idea if he believed me, but he didn't ask any questions. And I did end up making him a bowtie for his birthday, to match a shirt I bought to match the sweater.

Bowtie-making is seriously quick and easy work.

Bowtie pattern: http://www.burdastyle.com/projects/david
Bowtie tying instructions: http://josephhall.org/nqb2/media/bow_tie.jpg