Elina in the wonderland of knit and crochet.

I've been thinking about knitting and crocheting a lot lately. It's more fascinating the more you learn about it! For instance, all these terms in English - single, double, bobble crochet, garter, stockinette and rib stitch - sound so cool and complicated. I still mix them up, I keep forgetting which is which, but I like them all. Why do some people not like purling? Unless your knitting style is very tight and the yarn is very fuzzy or just a biatch, I don't see how it's any less fun than knitting.

I've been pondering which I like more, knitting or crocheting. Knitting is definitely harder: I always drop stitches and don't know how to pick them up right, I increase stiches or decrease them unintentionally, or something else always happens. If all goes well, though, it's worth all the fiddling.

With crocheting it's hard to drop stitches, but it may be fiddly if you tend to crochet too tight. Especially with bulky yarn it truly demands attention to the work. If the yarn and the hook are just right, however, it's such a pleasure to crochet away while watching tv or even reading.

There are so many methods, too, to both knitting and crocheting. Different ways of casting on your loops, making a slip knot, crocheting from under different loops of a stitch...! I still don't know which side of a crochet work is supposed to be the right side and which the "purl" side. It makes me wonder who had so much time in their hands that they invented all that.

I also realized recently why there are so many different sizes of needles and hooks. Before I knew anything about knitting or crocheting, I was completely confused with all that variety. But now my collection of hooks and needles is starting to look moderately impressive! Thick needles and hooks have their appeal because I've grown fond of bulky yarn. Circular needles are one thing I haven't tried yet, in fact I'm not sure which kind of project would require them.

I remember back when Amoena got interested in crocheting and later knitting, I couldn't really understand the whole world of the craft. I could understand that she liked the colours of the yarns and making something by hand, but I had no idea how rewarding it would be to make something with your own hands. It's so cool to start thinking of a project, then finding a good pattern and realizing it. There's something very creative about it, because once you understand why things are done a certain way, you can deviate from the patterns according to your own taste and your needle/hook and yarn stash.

Once I noticed that I can really knit and crochet, at least decently, I've been flooded with ideas about what I want to do. I wonder if I'll ever run out of ideas for projects. At times I get an overload of crocheting/knitting, so I take a break, but I always go back to it after a couple of days at most. Even when I have to frog a project, I'm not discouraged to go on. I just unravel my work as necessary and get right back to it. I'm resilient like that with many other things as well because I don't like admitting defeat. I'm completely hooked to my new hobby!

Newness.

Mum visited last week and we went winter coat/jacket shopping. Behold the results.

A jacket with nice fringes on the collar, and a minibelt to tie it. I'm going to add more buttons as soon as I figure out how to use my sewing machine. I want to be able to wrap it tighter around my body when it gets colder so the wind can't get in.


And a bright red winter coat with black buttons and a high collar that you could button up. Those two buttons on the collar sleeve were originally on the other side, so they would be visible when you button up the collar. There were two versions of the coat in the shop (H&M): one with the buttons on the inside, one with the buttons on the outside - depending on if you like to button up the collar, or leave it down and wear a scarf instead. The point is to keep the black buttons visible. I had to get the wrong version for my taste though and sew the buttons on the other side. The colour is truly lovely!


I love having two very different coats/jackets. The shorter will be good for warmer winter days; the red and long coat will be warm in colder days. I also got a Sexy Librarian skirt to go with the shorter jacket. It's too warm if the temperature is anything above 0 celsius, so it's a true winter skirt!

(No, that's not my cellphone in the corner..)

Now that it's colder, I've also started using the boots I bought in Liverpool in the summer, when I attended the Corpus Linguistics conference there. They have 5cm heels and they're really comfortable!

Mum had also bought me a tri-layered sports underwear set to keep me warm in the winter when I go jogging.

It's not the sexiest outfit to wear, but it's warm and dry. It's actually very difficult to dress right for jogging in the winter if you don't have this kind of functional sports wear with special qualities.

Finally, I bought myself two skeins of the new Teetee Pallas yarn because the colours were so pretty. I thought I would make a Baktus scarf from them, but I'm not sure yet. I wasn't actually supposed to buy any yarn, but since I met Heidi that day and we both love knitting and yarn, we ended up going through all yarn shops in Tampere! That's a bad, bad combination if you're trying not to buy yarn..

I started a new crochet project last night (as if I need more of them), a vertical stripe scarf, and I'm going to use the Red Heart Lisa yarns I bought in the summer, plus some oddball skeins of Novita 7 Veljestä and Gjestal Superwash Sport. Here are the colours:

(The red skein is just about to fall off the picture, that's why it's blurry..)

I'm going to make fairly thin stripes. I started by crocheting a long chain of chain stitches, then I started working back with single crochet. I left long loops at both ends to make a fringe. I'm excited about this because I was able to figure out how to make the scarf all by myself! It may sound very simple to someone who's been crocheting and knitting for a long time, but for a newbie like me it's very cool. Besides, I used to think of myself as completely hopeless with handcrafts, so this is definitely exciting.

I've noticed that my personality applies to my knitting and crocheting style as well. As usual, I like to start several projects before I've even finished the last ones! I am strongly determined to finish them all, I just don't know when...

My current projects are the following:

1) My first mittens, the second one of which should be unraveled and started all over again with a bigger needle! You can guess why it's still unfinished..

2) The hexagon blanket for mum. I'm in the process of making double crochets around the rim with white yarn. Then I have to cut the darning ends on the other side a little shorter and tuck them inside so it won't unravel. Boring, but I'm making progress slowly.

3) A regular scarf which I figured would look good with my new jacket, because my old scarves don't have suitable colours. But I managed to eff it up already! It's simple knit-purl-knit-purl, but it went awry still! I was angry and I didn't unravel the wrong parts, so it's less than pretty now. I'll finish it anyway and use it myself, it's not like I'm going to stare at it when I'm outdoors.

4) Pikachu, whose head I started to crochet and while I was at it, I realized there are three different ways of crocheting!! I have to start from scratch again, but I didn't get very far.

I'd also like to knit socks for my best cousin from the light blue Isoveli skein that I have. I hate the colour myself, but my cousin likes it a lot. I'm not sure if I can do it in time for Christmas, though. For my second best cousin, I'd like to knit mittens from my extra two skeins of fuchsia/purple Gjestal Superwash Sport yarn, because I think she might like that colour. Originally I bought that yarn for the hexagon blanket, but the colour didn't fit with the others.

I'm also thinking of making third scarf from Novita Kaarna, because it's so soft and bulky. It's also expensive and I have enough projects already, so I think I'll leave it till later.

On a final note, please note that I added links to my Ravelry projects on both my blogs with a little help from Amoena and JR. Looks so nice!

What's happening in Elina's world.

Chapter 1

I visited Amoena last week, as she already announced in her blog. I wanted to finally meet her new boyfriend J.R. (not so new anymore) and her new puppy, Papu (aww!).

Amoena and J.R. were really cute and funny together, and I totally fell in love with Papu. She was a little wary and shy at first and barked at any movement that I made. But by the evening, she let me touch her already and accepted me as her new friend. The next day we were on super-cuddly terms. I love dogs that like cuddling.

She was so beautiful, I didn't quite expect that. Miniature pinschers are now at the top of my potential candidate list for a dog breed, if I'm ever going to get a dog. Papu was very energetic and athletic and nimble. If she got excited, she just bounced around the apartment on sofas and chairs. She can also jump very high. Isn't that cool?

I can still see her soulful eyes and ears in my mind. But I'll have to be careful when choosing my own, as Amoena demonstrated to me that not all miniature pinschers are as pretty as Papu.

Chapter 2

Yesterday I finally met Deniselle. I've known of her for about six months now, through her blogs and Twitter. It's a fun story how I "found" her.

Once upon a time during my Christmas break, I was searching for Gaius Baltar fanfiction stories on Google. Gaius is a character from the scifi tv series Battlestar Galactica (probably the best of any tv you'll ever see). It was difficult to find any good ones, but I stumbled upon Deniselle's blog post where she gave her critique on some stories. Her writing style was so intelligent and analytical that I was hooked. Moreover, it was fuel for my James Callis-mania which had waned a little at that point.

I had a little crush on Deniselle the blogger. I like her sense of self-irony and crazy humour. She also writes very long posts, but it doesn't matter because there is nothing redundant. I may not be able to read whole books, but I like reading thoughtful blogs.

So we had a fun afternoon, ate at McDonald's and had coffee and tea at Coffee House, then visited some bookstores just so we didn't have to walk outside in the rain. She physically assaulted me and harassed me sexually, but I survived. We started planning our own religion centring on Jamus, the holy duality of James Callis and his spiritual incarnation in us (or something like that). We'll build an altar for him and share his love through hugs.

I'm kidding, of course. In reality, we talked about business meetings, world politics and economy, human rights and the finesses of translating.

So it was good that we finally met. I'm much more bold now about meeting new people.

Chapter 3

I also have some new hobbies. I bought a quality badminton racket from sale on Budgetsport and I've played twice already, according to the real rules! I found my badminton buddy online, which is a little random, but if it works, to heck with it. The same guy also carried my new sofa 1,5 stories on his own to my apartment! I can see he's muscular, but that was a Supermanly feat to perform.

I've also been seeing Frenchie's Finnish girlfriend, whom I briefly met last summer. She was very nice and funny and I think she likes my company too. She will move to Hämeenlinna soon, but she will probably still visit Tampere occasionally. The Frenchie isn't very excited though that we like to gossip about his peculiarities when we meet up, but it's his fault - shouldn't have introduced us if he's so afraid for his privacy. Guys are too paranoid about their privacy in any case. It's healthy if you're a politician or a celebrity or a king or whatever, but nobody cares about a nobody.

There's also this girl from Tampere, about 2km from my place, who added me on her MSN upon seeing my penpal advertisement. Turns out she's also from Hollola and we went to the same high schools at the same time! I hope to meet her too at some point. She likes to knit, which brings me to my next bit of news from Elina's world.

Chapter 4

I didn't just sit around and chat at Amoena's. She taught me how to knit and purl again! I knew how to do that a long time ago, but I never got beyond knitting scarves, which I never even finished. I feel more determined now to finish whatever I start. Besides, now there's Youtube and Google, unlike in the times of yore when I started out on knitting the first time. I also plan to learn crocheting, which according to Amoena is easier than knitting. We'll see.

I finished my very first mitten in two days, barely stopping to say "mhmhm" when Amoena told me she would take Papu for a walk again. And here's the result!

The photo is a little blurry but the mitten looks nice live, trust me. I like the colour, it ranges from pink to fuchsia. I knitted it very tight with bulky yarn so it was a bit hard, but I made it through. I always tend to knit too tight. My right ring finger still has a small spot with no sense of touch, since it was completely numb during the weekend. Knitting is dangerous, kids! Especially to people with Raynaud's syndrome.

Epilogue

I still haven't written all those papers I should in order to graduate. There's always tomorrow, and then there's next week. What's the hurry anyway? I like lounging and being lazy and enjoying life and people. I don't feel so good about neglecting my painting hobby, so I plan to enroll to a painting course at Työväenopisto in Tampere (a workers' institute).

It costs 44e, which isn't too bad. I want to get some feedback from a real teacher and learn the proper basic techniques. I will probably refuse to use local colours, but that doesn't mean I can't plan my colour usage more carefully to attain some special effects. I'll never achieve that on my own, due to my incredible impatience and short attention span.

I'll also take some language courses at the Uni, since this is my last chance to learn languages for free. No one will know if I graduate in the middle, because I don't plan to take the tests anyway. I don't need the credits or grades, I just want to educate myself. Languages don't really take that much effort from me.

I'll take up spoken French, advanced basics in German, and Italian reading comprehension. I also thought about English speech practise because I'd like to more fluent. I'm confident and satisfied with my writing skills in English, but my speech skills could use some extra practise.

Well, I think I've spelled out the essence of my life of lately. I still plan to discuss my experience with Windows 7, no worries. I'll probably be back to my blogging routine when the summer ends, since I'll want a diversion from the ever-increasingly depressing weather.