Finished Knitting My First Sweater!

Hello Friends,

I hope you are doing well. I have exciting news to share today... I am now finished knitting the sweater! I am so excited to be done and happy with how it turned out. I finished weaving in the ends today and then it was done. It was so amazing to be holding a sweater in front of me with nothing else to do to finish it. I started knitting the sweater last year in December and first started with the back piece, then front, then sleeves, then blocked the pieces, then sewed the shoulders and sleeves and sides together, then knit the neck edging, weaved in the ends, and here we are! all finished now. Below are some photos taken today wearing the finished sweater. Thanks to my boyfriend for taking the photos!

Sweater details:
Pattern: 3timesChic found on Knitty.com
Yarn: Lion Brand Homespun - clouds
Needles: #10/6mm needles (for front and back pieces), #8/5 mm circular needles (for sleeves and neck edging)
Size: Large
Duration of project: December 2016-November 2017
Pieces knitted: 4
Skeins used: 5 1/4 (required 6 for large)
Ravelry notes: click here

 I really liked the 3timesChic sweater pattern. I found it on Knitty.com and it was good for me as a beginner at knitting sweaters. The instructions were easy to follow, and I think that knitting piece by piece worked well for me and I did not get overwhelmed. It is also good because as much as I like knitting in the round, the whole pattern required flat knitting which is easier for beginner knitters, so it makes it a perfect first sweater project.

If you would like to see more posts about the sweater and the process of knitting the sweater, please click here. The blog posts are not in order when you click the link, so you may need to click "older posts" at the bottom to see more if you would like to read them all.

Photos of sweater pieces in order of completion:

First I finished the back piece

Then the front piece

Then the two sleeve pieces

All the pieces finished and ready for blocking

I blocked the front and back pieces, the sleeves were already the right size so I did not block them

Sewing the pieces together

Knitting the neck edging

Thank you for visiting my blog today and seeing my first knitted sweater project. I am looking forward to knitting more sweaters! I want to try to knit a sweater top down with minimal sewing of the seams in the future. If you would like to keep updated on when I post, please follow me on Bloglovin', Google Followers, or you can subscribe by email at the top right of the blog.

Have a great day!

Fall Craft Show, Knitting Progress, and Reading On

Hello Friends,

I hope you are doing well. I had a wonderful weekend, spending time with my family and my boyfriend's family. Yesterday, I went to the Milton Farm Craft Show that they put on every year. There were so many wonderful things to look at and this year I bought a couple lovely things. I bought a ceramic berry bowl for my boyfriend's stepmother for her birthday. I also purchased some beautiful, soft alpaca sock yarn from Alpaca Time. I am so excited to get started on knitting socks with this yarn. My sister who crochets, also purchased some yarn to crochet a hat. It was an exciting find for us. I loved our trip there this year and looking forward to going to more upcoming craft fairs in the Winter hopefully.

Yarn I purchased from Alpaca Time at the craft show

Just a few of the many stalls set up at the show

Me with some craft show finds

In knitting, I have been working on knitting up the first stocking as part of the project for this Christmas to have handknit stockings for my boyfriend and I. I am using the Jumbo Christmas Stockings pattern on Ravelry. It is a fun, fast knit and I love working with big, chunky needles and thick yarn around this time of the year when it is getting a bit cooler. I am liking the way the stocking is looking so far, except I added an extra row in by accident right after working on the gusset but I think it isn't too noticeable.

 The sweater is still in a standstill and I must work on taking the seam out on the left sleeve and redoing it. I definitely want my next sweater not to include sewing pieces together at the end as many people have said it is more enjoyable that way.

I am still reading the book Love the Wine You're With by Kim Gruenenfelder. I am liking it but haven't been setting aside time to read due to being distracted by school starting up again and different things. I will try to read a little bit each day so I can enjoy the book. I have also still been reading The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo. I am on the chapter about paper and have been going through paper of mine and find that the book is helping so much to help me toss more things than I have before because we really hold onto things we don't need thinking we'll read it one day when we never do. I am looking forward to reading the rest of the book and working through all of the items and having less stuff around. 

Joining along with Frontier Dreams for Crafting On, AsKatKnits for Unwraveled Wednesday, and The Little Room of Rachell for Yarning Along. 

Thank you so much for visiting my blog today! If you would like to keep updated on when I post, please follow me on Bloglovin', Google Followers, or you can subscribe by email at the top right corner for updates to your email. 

Have a great day!

Sewing the Seams of My First Knitted Sweater

Hello Friends,

I hope you are all doing well. I have been away for a little while because I have exams this week for my office administration program. I just had my accounting exam yesterday which I had been studying non-stop for a few days and I think it went pretty well. Tomorrow I have the project management exam, wish me luck!

I got a little bit of work done on my sweater on Saturday and was sewing in the seams on the shoulders, and one of the sleeves. I looked up the order of how to seam and this seems to be the best way to do shoulders, then sleeves, then the sides afterwards which makes sense because you can go up the side then right up to the end of the sleeve to close the sleeve afterwards.

I started with the shoulders and did a mattress stitch to sew up the seams, this was a little bit tricky because the stitches were going in the other direction so I just put the needle horizontally across the stitches.I then moved onto the sleeve and spread out the sweater to see how the top of the sleeve would fit into the piece once the shoulders were sewed together. I then began doing the mattress stitch to sew the seams together and this worked well as well. I will finish up sewing the sweater, then talk about how sewing the sides went and post some photos of the sweater next week! I am so excited to be done and have my first knitted sweater. Looking at the photo, I think I will take some of the seam apart of the sleeve and try to have the lines in the sleeve going down the middle, I can see it is a little off center. The sleeve at the top of the photo is not sewed in yet.

The sock is coming a long too, it is getting a bit longer and I am enjoying knitting the simple sock pattern by Patons called Spiral Socks.

I am still reading Into the Water by Paula Hawkins and I am so interested in what will happen next. It really keeps you on the edge of your seat just like Girl on the Train did, and you start to feel like you are understanding the characters and that they all have some secret motives and you are trying to figure out what they are.

Joining along with The Little Room of Rachell for Yarning Along, Frontier Dreams for Crafting On, and AsKatKnits for Unraveled Wednesday

Thank you for visiting my blog today and I hope you come back to visit! if you liked this post and would like to keep updated on when I post new entries, please follow me on Bloglovin' and Google Followers.

Have a good day!

My First Time Blocking a Knitted Piece for the Sweater

Hello Friends,

I hope you are doing well.  Today I went to Michael's craft store and bought some yarn and needles for a project I will share with you soon, and then to Walmart to buy some more pins for blocking. They did not carry them at this location, so I bought some dress pins and they worked well along with the fork pins I had purchased already. I will definitely be buying more blocking pins in the future. I blocked my first knitted piece and it took quite awhile because I was just getting used to placing the pins and making sure they stayed in place and made sure the tension was good and even throughout the piece. It required cold blocking by spraying the piece once it was pinned down to the desired measurements. I pinned it all down, then used a spray bottle and sprayed cold water on the piece. I was not sure how much to spray so I kept going until it was all damp.  Now it is sitting in my living room drying on the foam mats.

After pinning the sweater and spraying the piece

 First, I pinned the bottom of the piece to be 24 inches across, I had to stretch it quite a bit. I did not have to stretch it up as much it was already pretty close to the measurement because I knit a little extra so it would be longer.

It is hard to see, but the photo is of the pins up the side of the piece

Before blocking the piece

After the piece is pinned and sprayed 

I will be sharing how all the pieces turned out in an upcoming post. I will post some before and after shots to show the difference blocking makes.

I went to Michael's today and they had a clearance sale on these Loops & Threads skeins and I scooped them up for $4 each. I was looking for white and red super bulky yarn for a project so I was very happy. I bought the US 15 bamboo needles for the project and the Patons Kroy socks yarn for the next pair of socks I will start knitting soon.

Michael's haul 

I enjoyed my first time blocking a knitted piece. It took a lot of focus and attention to detail. It is very important to have a lot of time to work on blocking a piece, because it took me longer than I expected it to. I am looking forward to seeing how all the pieces turn out after they are blocked, and how it looks once I seam all the pieces together and have a sweater.

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Hope you have a great day!

Sweater Pieces Knitted and What I Am Reading

Hello Friends,

I hope you are all doing well. Yesterday I went with my dad to Evergreen Brick Works for a second time this summer to ride our bikes on the trails. We were cycling for quite awhile and I was getting pretty tired, but it was such a good workout. I was happy the weather was so nice yesterday too, it was sunny all day and warm. Today we are expecting some showers soon, and maybe a thunderstorm.

I finished knitting the second sleeve for the sweater! so now I am finished all the pieces for my 3timesChic sweater.  It feels great to be done knitting all the pieces.  Next, I will have to cold block all the pieces and then seam them together. I still need to pick up some blocking materials like the blocking mats, the T-pins, and maybe the wire. I might buy them online because I looked at Michael's and did not see the pins or wire, and the blocking mats were very expensive for just one 12 inch square piece.

Top and left pieces: sleeves, middle:front piece, and right: back piece 

I had finished the kerchief and was so excited until I realized it was a little small for my liking, so I had to take a few rows out and I am adding another stockinette section. I have been working away at this lately and I am almost finished knitting the kerchief.  I am knitting a scarf with last Saturday's stitch pattern: chevron lace. I continued knitting and it will be a lighter scarf to wear closer to the fall. I love how it is turning out.

I am still reading Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy by Helen Fielding and Into the Water by Paula Hawkins. They are both so good in different ways and if I am in the mood for a light, fun read then I will pick up Bridget Jones, and if I want a more serious, dark, mystery, then I pick up Into the Water.

Scarf using lace chevron stitch pattern and kerchief

Speaking of books, I saw this cute "Little Free Library" box while on a walk last week and had to snap a photo of it. I didn't grab a book this time, because I already have enough on the go right now. I might pick one up while on another walk soon. Do you use a little free library in your neighborhood?

Little Free Library box

At a park nearby, I could sit here all day and look at this view

Joining along with Frontier Dreams for Crafting On and The Little Room of Rachell for Yarning Along.

Thank you for visiting my blog today! I appreciate the time you take to visit me and I love reading all of your comments. You can follow me on Bloglovin' and Google Followers to be updated on when I post blog entries.

I hope you have a great day!

Trip to Montreal, Sweater Sleeve Progress, and Reading On

Hi Friends,

I hope you are doing well. I had a busy weekend going to Montreal with my family to visit friends and family friends. I grew up in Montreal, Quebec and moved to Ontario when I was fifteen so we have a lot of good memories in Quebec. We went to downtown Montreal where I met up with my friend I have had since elementary school and it was so nice catching up with him. Then the next day we went to a barbecue hosted by my parent's friends and we had a great time with lots of food. We had to get La Belle Province hot dogs and poutine for lunch which is a tradition of ours. The trip was amazing as always, the weather was rainy and gloomy most of the time but we made the most of it and I love our tradition of going to visit in the summer. We got back on Sunday night and I have been getting back into the swing of things here. I finally bought one of the Starbucks "you are here" mugs while in Montreal. I have been using it everyday since I got back, it looks small but it is wide and hold a lot of coffee.

We went to Old Montreal on Saturday morning which is so beautiful with its old buildings, cafes and stores. It was raining that morning but we had our umbrellas and just walked around mostly, popping into a few stores.

In Old Montreal

Knitting
I have been knitting more of the 3timesChic sweater sleeve. I have knitted 17.5 inches now I am onto the decreasing part of the sleeve. I am looking forward to being done the sleeve then can move onto sewing the pieces together.

Sweater sleeve in progress

 I took apart a few rows of the kerchief after I finished it last week because I decided it was too short for me and I would not wear it if it did not stretch out like 20 inches when it was blocked. It was actually 20 inches too narrow when it was finished and I don't think blocking could stretch it to the measurements it is supposed to be at 53 inches as it was 35 inches. It was hard to take it apart especially after posting about being done, but I will be happier in the long run by knitting an extra stockinette section which is 21 rows, we'll see how the measurements are once I finish those.

Reading
I read so much of Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy on our trip to Montreal and got through a lot of it. I am loving the humor in the book and how she is going about starting to date again it is so funny and I can remember how dating used to be a headache at times wondering if they liked me or if I was doing something right or wrong. This book has got all of that and her learning to use twitter and trying to get followers is hilarious and I can relate to trying to get more followers through social media and my blog. Today I decided I will get started on reading "Into the Water" by Paula Hawkins because I left Bridget Jones in my parent's car so I have an excuse to start reading it!

This week I will focus on knitting the sleeve and finishing it, finishing the kerchief, and buying some yarn to start knitting socks. I still want to choose a sock pattern on Ravelry so I will also choose one to get started on the socks soon. I will be focusing on blocking the pieces next week so I am excited for that, then I will be sewing the sweater pieces together maybe in a couple of weeks.

Joining along with Frontier Dreams for Crafting On and The Little Room of Rachell for Yarning Along. 

Thank you so much for visiting my blog, if you would like to keep updated on my blog posts, then please follow me through Bloglovin' and Google Followers!

Have a great day!

Finished Kerchief, Sleeve in Progress, and a New Plant

Hello Friends,

I hope you are doing well. Over the weekend I went to visit my family and we had a lovely time doing some wedding preparations like trying on some dresses, and discussing the plans for the big day and going over budget. I am excited for my little sister, she and her fiance are perfect for each other and have been together for a long time now. I look forward to more planning for the big day. I am her Maid of Honor so I will be taking on planning the bridal shower and bachelorette party next year which will be fun.

 Today I finished knitting the Age of Brass and Steam Kerchief. I did a loose bind off and I was so happy with how it turned out. I will be blocking it soon, hopefully next week. I still need to buy the rubber mats and the T-Pins needed to block knitted items. I will have to really stretch it out when I block it, because it is not very wide, so I will be blocking it aggressively. Then I will hopefully be able to pull it around my neck more and wrap it around more than it does right now.

Age of  Brass and Steam Kerchief finished

 For the sleeve, I have been knitting it more frequently and am finished the increases and now I am just knitting until it measure 17.5 inches. It is turning out well, and I am looking forward to being done so I can block the pieces and then sew them together and finally have a finished sweater.

My mom gave me this Philodendron in this cute pot this weekend. She had cut part of her own Philodendron and placed it in water so it could grow roots, then she put it into the soil in this pot for me to take home. I think it is doing well so far and I can't wait to see how big it grows.

Reading
I am still reading Bridget Jone's Mad About the Boy by Helen Fielding. I love the main character Bridget, she is so relatable and funny. I am more interested in the character now and will probably read quickly and finish it soon. I bought the book "Into the Water" by Paula Hawkins and I am looking forward to reading it after I am finished reading Bridget Jones.

Joining along with Frontier Dreams for Crafting On and The Little Room of Rachell for Yarning Along. 

Thank you for visiting my blog and if you would like to follow me and keep updated on when I post, you can follow me through Bloglovin' and Google Followers.

Have a great day!

Knitting the Last Piece of the Sweater, Kerchief, and Reading On

Hello Friends,

I hope you are doing well. It has been so humid and hot the past few days that it has been a struggle. My boyfriend and I are in an apartment with no air conditioning and we are finding the humidity difficult to deal with. We have a plug in air conditioner/fan that has a dehumidifier but we didn't have the cord for it to drain the water so we got one last night and we were amazed how much water it collected.

Reading:
 I also had a wonderful weekend spent with my family, and my boyfriend and visiting his family.  I went to visit my boyfriend's mom for her birthday a couple of days ago, and I had a chance to read more of My Not-So Perfect Life by Sophie Kinsella while waiting for the subway and later on that night and yesterday. So far it is very good, and I can tell it will be a fast read for me. I love books that I feel like I can relate to the main character and she is trying to figure out her career and life so I can understand that. I am glad that I am enjoying it so far because as I mentioned in another post, she was one of my favorite authors when I was a teen so I wanted to check out this new book of hers. I have been reading Bridget Jones: Mad about the Boy and that is such a fun read too. I will be finishing these up this week I am sure. Then I will read Into the Water by Paula Hawkins who did an excellent job in her book Girl on the Train, so I have high expectations for her latest book which I am hoping is just as good if not better.

Kerchief and sweater sleeve

Knitting
In knitting, I have been knitting up the second sleeve again. I had gotten stuck for a bit at increasing on the purl side without making a hole in the knitting, and looked at some YouTube videos on how to best do that. Now I am working on it again because I figured it out.  I am looking forward to being done this sleeve because then I will be finished all the knitting for my 3timesChic sweater, my very first sweater. I will be so excited to finally wear it this Winter.
I have been knitting the Age of Brass and Steam Kerchief as well, I had to frog some of it, which is why it is not that much longer since the last post. I frogged it back because I noticed the middle was not lining up right with the first sections and I realized it was because one of my stitch markers had fallen off and I put it in wrong on the opposite side one stitch over so all the work was shifted over after I did that but only realized it after about 5 rows. Oh well, it was annoying at first when I realized I had to frog all my work, but once I accepted that I have to frog it, and picked up all the stitches again it wasn't so bad. I am enjoying knitting it anyways, so it gives me more time to work on it.

I am joining along with Frontier Dreams for Crafting On and The Little Room of Rachell for Yarning Along. If you would like to share what you are working on this week you can link up too!

Thank you for visiting my blog! If you would like to keep updated on when I post new blog entries, please follow me on Bloglovin' and Google Followers!

Hope you have a great day!

Kercief and Sleeve Knitting and a Little Reading

Hello Friends,

I hope you are doing well. It is a gloomy day here in Toronto today, it is so dark as I type! It feels later in the day than almost five. I have been busy today working on an Accounting assignment and also going to be submitting an assignment for Project Management as well. It is a lot of work sometimes all at once and I am all over the place thinking about my courses and thinking of posting to my blog.

I am reading Bridget Jones: Mad about the Boy by Helen Fielding, and it is so funny I am really enjoying it so far! I am also working on finishing the Nest at the same time, plots with the characters are moving along quicker now so it is more interesting to me.

I have been really enjoying knitting the Age of Brass and Steam Kerchief, it is so much fun. I think I will be hooked on knitting shawls after this for sure.  I am knitting the kerchief quicker now as I am getting more familiar to the repetitive pattern ,and it is such a relaxing knit while I am watching shows or podcasts. I love knits like this that I can learn the pattern eventually and just grab the project to go watch something without worrying about looking at the pattern all of the time. 

Bridget Jones book with the Kerchief

The kerchief so far 

I like how the kerchief is looking with using the Loops & Threads Chameleon yarn, I love the gradient effect going on with the change from brown at the beginning to gray, then it will be switching back to brown soon. This makes the kerchief way more interesting to knit and I love how it is looking with the two colors.

Close up of the details in the kerchief, the eyelet stitches are going horizontally across the piece, I love this detail

I am still working on knitting the second sleeve for my 3timesChic sweater, I got caught on increasing on the purl side and making a hole in my yarn and haven't picked it up since. I will give it another go because I did not really have an issue with this on the first sleeve. 

Beginngs of the second sleeve 

I am joining in with Frontier Dreams for her Crafting On link up, and with Rachell at Little Room of Rachell for her Yarning Along link up!  If you would like to post what you are working on this week please join in!

 Thank you so much for visiting my blog! if you would like to keep updated on my posts, you can follow me on Bloglovin' or Google Followers.

Have a great day!