pinku

Knitting Round-up for 2006

February saw my first big FO of the year - Forecast by Stephanie Japel

Review: Success at last! I love this sweater and wear it OFTEN (isn't that a nice change). The Rowan Cork has held up beautifully and is so warm and soft - it's SO sad that it has been discontinued. I'll be taking this to the snow to wear this weekend. I feel a little sad looking at this photo because the yellow button at the very bottom was lost very soon after this photo. Silly me didn't sew them on properly the first time. They are vintage and I don't have a replacement.

Full post can be found here.

April saw the completion of my Sockapaloooza socks - Pomatomus from Knitty

Review: After a few false starts with this pattern, I loved knitting these socks and I think they came out pretty good. I hope my sockapaloooza pal likes them.

Full post can be found here.

June saw Ms Marigold bloom. Pattern by the ladies at Zephyr Style.

Review: I also had a few false starts with this top. I hadn't knit with Rowan Calmer before and didn't realize just how stretchy it is. I really love this vest though and although I had to make a few changes to the pattern, it turned out pretty cute. I wore this top quite a few times to work over the summer/autumn season.

Full post can be found here.

In July I finally finished my counterfeit crochet Louis Vuitton belt.

Review: This was a really different but fun project to participate in. It was fun to crochet without a pattern and kind of make it up as I went along. I still really want to complete a matching bag as I have all of the yarn prepared - it is definitely on the project list for 2007.

Full post can be found here.

In August I finished a very appropriate summer top using washi/nylon yarn and pattern from Avril.

Review: Wow it took a while to get used to knitting with such a strange yarn - not the most fun I've ever had knitting but I actually really like the way it turned out. This has been worn both to work and on the weekends.

Full post can be found here.

In October, Florence was finally finished. I used Jaeger Pure Cotton (discontinued) and a pattern from Rowan 35.

Review: Considering that I started knitting this top in October 2005, I really didn't think that it would ever get finished. I'm pretty proud of the fact that I pulled it out of its dark storage location and finished promptly within a couple of weeks from within that time. This is the most complicated top I've knit to date. It involved my very first fairaisle, lots of lace with shaping, button bands, a collar and set-in sleeves. I really love the way it turned out. It's kind of heavy because it's cotton but because of this it hangs nicely and it feels vintage-y and pretty special. This top has been worn more than a few times. The only problem is though that it has to be teamed with high-waisted skirts or pants, of which I don't have many.

Full post can be found here.

My Rebecca cardigan was finished in November. It is a Kim Hargreaves set using Rowan Big Wool.

Review: This cardigan was a super quick knit and is very, very warm and soft. But it is bulky and the yarn pills (to the point of felting) almost immediately. It was a tad expensive, but I love the colour and the warmth. It has already got a lot of use this season, but I have to wear it with a bigger spring coat as it won't fit under any of my winter coats!!! I probably won't use Big Wool again for anything other than a hat or bag.

Full post can be found here.

My Jaywalkers finally got finished in November after running out of the beautiful Socks that Rock yarn that was gifted to me by Stephanie.

Review: Even though I miscalculated and ran out of yarn, I still love these socks to bit. Look at those pretty colours - Steph did a great job of selecting this colourway just for me. Look, is there really anything better than wearing a pair of handknit wool socks and boots on a cold winter's day!!!

Full post can be found here.

SO overall 2006 has been a pretty good knitting year. I only knit two pairs of socks though and I would definitely like to knit more next year. There are many other items that I finished knitting this year that haven't made it on to the blog - mainly because of my laziness. I might still get around to it you know. I did finish a pair of knee high slippers and a fair isle hat among a bunch of other hats and slippers!! I already have an extensive TO-KNIT list for 2007 and I've got a project planned to start knitting over the new year. Good times! Good times!

Wishing everyone a wonderful and happy new year from the Bendall-Mok clan!!! See you in 2007!!!

love kat, daz, sugar and loretta OOXX

Happy Holidays!!

Wow Christmas is done for another year. Hope you all had a relaxing and fun day. We had a great day that consisted of spending time with friends, talking with family on the phone, opening presents, drinking champagne and eating croissants with new and old friends, baking, baking and more baking and then finally some relaxing, eating, drinking and we also watched Dolly in 9 to 5. It was a great day all round and a big thank you goes to our sweet hosts C&J&R.

my sweet sugar wrapped up and ready to go for a family portrait shoot

C&J looking festive in their cracker hats

And the newest, cutest addition to C&J's household is a lovely kitten, Rio, who here is enjoying a stretch by the heater.

daz and tyler and lots of delicious food

a special cuddle

You can see the rest of our xmas 2006 photos here.

I have two more days at work and then I have six days off - woohoo! Daz and I are heading to the snow with our buddies Tyler and Sachika. We are going to soak in as many rotenburo as possible, we are going to ski/snowboard (daz's very first experience) and we are going to drink and eat and be very merry.

New Year's Day this year (1 Jan 2006)

New Year's Day next year - prediction (1 Jan 2007) - um, without the naked guy. I'll be on the girl's side which I hear is bigger!!!! I'm so excited about visiting Maguse Onsen which is pictured below. It looks amazing.

Public Service Announcement

If you are staying in Japan, please remember to go to the ATM and withdraw wads of cash as ATMs are closed for THREE whole days over the new year - when will Japan jump into the 21st century banking age!! HA!

ps I'm going to try and blog both tomorrow and the next day before our big trip. I just did a quick review of my knits in 2006 and it was a pretty successful and productive year. FULL REVIEW TOMORROW!!!

Our first week back

Has involved catching up with our cute pigs. We missed them terribly. A big thank you to C&J for taking care of them and giving them lots of cuddles.

It also involved our first experience with caviar. A few weeks ago I did a favor for someone at work that was travelling to Azerbaijan on a business trip so he brought me back some Azeri caviar. I was scared of those tiny black eggs even though I've eaten plenty of fish eggs here in Japan.

To make a night out of it, we headed to C&J's place for a Russia themed night and man did we feast - Chicken Kiev, creamy cheesey mushrooms, mashed potatos, champagne, caviar, white russians and all the Russian music you can imagine. So we braced ourselves for the caviar tasting and made sure we had some cream cheese on hand (we heard it complements the taste of the caviar). It turns out that we all LOVE caviar. We are totally prepared for high society.

We also spent time enjoying our park and the autumn leaves. It sucks how they've stopped people having fleamarkets on the weekend by the way. Mitaka city - stop trying to take the impromptu fun out of Inokashira Park!!!

oh and here are my jaywalkers! I finished them with a light pink yarn and they are still cute, cute, cute. Not so mutant like at all.

Follow the Yellow Brick Road

One of the highlights of our trip was a visit to Liberal Kansas - it's the nearest big city to Beaver (this means it has a Walmart and is home to three major meatpackers....). I had never been so I suggested to Daz that we visit. I mentioned jokingly that we'll definitely have to visit Dorothy's House while we are there. Then much to my surprise Daz tells me that Dorothy's House really IS in Liberal Kansas. So perfect.

When we turned up we took some photos of me outside the recreation of Dorothy's House and then of us as munchkins, but little did we know that you could not only tour the inside of the house but also the Land of Oz for a mere $5 each. Um yes thank you.

Me and our tour guide, Dorothy

Here's a close-up of those awesome red shoes

And here is Dorothy and Toto inside the Land of Oz exhibition

So if you ever happen to find yourself in Liberal Kansas, here is my recommended guide of things to do.

1. Tour of Dorothy's House and Land of Oz

2. Eat Mexican - there's a massive Latino population because of the meatpacking industry.

3. Visit the Et Cetera thrift store - I bought a ton of stuff there

You can check out all of our photos here.

tens of thousands of miles later

We're back in Tokyo safe and sound. Our trip was awesome - we caught up with so many friends and family members. We managed to spend some quality time with everyone. Thanks to everyone who made this trip so special - Zane and Sarah and the rest of Darin's rellies, Shane, Erin and JD, Jason and his family, BJ, Amy, Hogan, Michael and Allison, and Jim. The weather was fantastic - sunny and warm....until the last day of our trip when the weather turned nasty and the temps dropped more than 20 degrees in one night (from 26 degrees celcius to ZERO). We were planning to visit the Space Center in Houston but we decided to hunker down in our hotel room and do some final shopping nearby....I am so glad we just missed the brunt of the terrible storms hitting the US right now.

I managed to knit two hats and a scarf during the trip. I cast on and finished one of the hats on the flight from Detroit to Tokyo. My hands were aching. I knit Darin's hat on the trip to the US.

We drove a total of 1536 miles (or 2471 kms).

We ate lots and lots of food especially on Thanksgiving. There were leftovers for days.

You can check out all the food we ate here.

We enjoyed the big sky over Oklahoma and some amazing sunsets.

We went to about a million thrift stores and I bought 10 pairs of shoes!!! Only 8 are pictured here because the last two wouldn't fit in our luggage. Not to worry though they only cost me $1 a pair.

There are many more photos to come. Still trying to sort and edit them. We are happy to be back and we even managed to go to our buddy Martine's birthday party only 45 minutes after we had arrived back at our apartment from the airport. Just enough time to shower and change. This photo was taken by Martine herself - we look so tired and jet lagged - happy birthday love!