A Very Harry Christmas

Hey y'all! With Christmas only a couple of days away, I thought I'd share a little project I made for my friend Ale. Ale and I originally met on Instagram and quickly bonded over our mutual love of both sewing and Harry Potter; we finally met in real life when I taught at Sewing Summit last year. Last Christmas we decided to exchange HP themed Christmas pillows and so (as Ale dubs it) "A Very Harry Christmas" was born! I never had the chance to share the pillow I made for Ale, but since Christmas is here again, I figured now is a great time!

This picture was totally stolen from Ale since apparently I no longer have the pictures I took (they were on my phone that died). I used the same sketchy applique method that I outline in this tutorial; most of the pieces were traced onto fusible web using templates (like the letters), but some of the smaller bits (the socks, the snitch, etc) were drawn freehand. Like the Lumos/Nox mini I made, this pillow was also quilted with the Deathly Hallows.

This is one of the only photos I have from when I was working on the pillow, but you can see the applique method a bit better. Most of the fabrics used come from Bonnie and Camille's Vintage Modern collection and the pillow is finished with an envelope-style back.

In the spirit of the holidays, here is the Christmukkah card that Alex and I made and sent out.

Since I forgot to take pictures before mailing all of the cards, I totally stole this one from my friend Tracey. Hmmm, I starting to detect a theme here... reminder to self: take your own pictures.

I hope that you all have a lovely holiday season and get the chance to relax a bit. I'm uber-excited to have some time off work so that I can get down to the business of sewing - woot!

One can never have enough socks. -Albus Dumbledore

Hey y'all! How's it going? just a quick reminder that the giveaway I'm hosting is ending tomorrow, so if you want to enter, be sure to hop on over soon!

Everyone knows I love socks - I have in the past written a whole post just about socks. This post is, once again, all about socks! They are my most favourite thing to knit and I love wearing. In the original sock post, I mentioned that I wanted to knit a whole bunch of socks based on some of the Harry Potter inspired sock patterns freely available on Ravelry. Well, I've now completed two pairs!

These are my most recently completed pair - they're called the Moody Stockings and the pattern was designed by Erica Lueder. These are my favourite socks to date - I am in love! The pattern is gansey-inspired and, as the designer notes in the pattern, they require "constant vigilance!" (that's an HP-reference just in case you've never read the books).

I used Shibui Knits Sock in Sand which I bought at Eat, Sleep, Knit and 2.25mm needles. I just bought these sock blockers and frankly, I really dislike them. They are far too thin and flimsy. I have my eye on a wooden pair that I really like but the shipping to Canada is crazy.

I knit these socks for Alex as a Hanukkah gift, and boy, let me tell you, they took much longer to complete than socks for my feet since they're much bigger! These are based on the Phineas pattern by Rosemary Waits. While the pattern includes the charts for making the socks "man-sized", it did not include any information for turning the heel at this size. Luckily the number of stitches matched the number of stitches in a pattern from Wendy Johnson's Toe-Up Socks for Every Body and I was able to use her instructions.

This picture shows the colour and variegation of the yarn much better. For these I used Raventwist Starri in Night Rider and the same 2.25mm needles.

I case you've never read Harry Potter (or you're a little rusty), the Moody Stockings are named after Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody, retired Auror and member of the Order of the Phoenix. The Phineas socks are named after Phineas Nigellus Black, great-great-grandfather of Sirius Black and former Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry (the least popular head of the school ever).

I am so going to knit more Harry Potter inspired socks - they are just so fun!!

"I? I see myself holding a pair of thick, woolen socks." Harry stared. 

"One can never have enough socks," said Dumbledore. 

"Another Christmas has come and gone and I didn't get a single pair. 

People will insist on giving me books." -Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

Awesome Gifty Goodness!

Hey y'all! In my last post, I mentioned that my lovely friend Amanda had sent me a couple of presents in the mail before I sent her the Lumos/Nox mini quilt - I thought I'd share those awesome presents with you today!

So, here's what happened: Amanda pretty much decided that I wasn't allowed to buy the black Harry Potter screen print from her Etsy shop! I really wanted to pay her for it (since her stuff is super-awesome) but she said that I wasn't allowed and that she was just going to send it to me - I couldn't even get around her because she refused to set up Canadian shipping for me. Cheeky lady! Imagine my surprise when it arrived along with one of Amanda's Knight Bus totes!

I snapped this pic of myself with my tote the day after it arrived (and yes, that is the bathroom at work)! I love my little tote! The purple ink used to screen print the Knight Bus has a sparkle to it and is so pretty - it's also lined with fabric from an HP sheet set. If you like this little beauty, Amanda has another for sale in her shop along with a bunch of other super-geeky funness including some Doctor Who drawstring pouches and individual screen prints on fabric - there are usually more screen prints but she just sold a whole bunch of stuff including some awesome zipper pouches. You should definitely check out her sold items to get a feel for her handmade items.

I stole this shot from Amanda's Instagram (with permission of course) of the Lumos/Nox quilt up on her wall! I love the wall it's on and the fact that it's paired up with Superman (who, if you didn't know, is my favourite superhero). P.S. I am also on Instagram and my username is KayePrince, just in case you wanted to know, y'know.

Next up, I've got a brand-new, long-awaited, much-requested tutorial for y'all! A hint: I made the original quilt over four years ago, but have continued to get requests for a pattern or tutorial over the years. I'm not even kidding, even though it is four years old, in the past month or so alone I have had at least four different people ask about it. So, I figured why not?! The tutorial is done other than getting a shot of the quilt top - which I will do once it stops raining (seriously, stop raining!!).

Lumos/Nox

Hey y'all! Some of you may know that I am a bit of a Harry Potter fan (and I know that I'm not alone). My dear lovely friend Amanda is too and when her birthday rolled around I knew that I needed to make her an HP-themed present.

Originally, my only two ideas were Harry Potter and mini quilt. I started thinking about the spells in the books, then I remembered Elizabeth's Refrigerator Magnets alphabet pattern (which I also used here), and then I spotted all of the wonderful scraps of Constellations I had left over from making Orion.

In case you don't know, Lumos is the spell used to illuminate a wand's tip (like a flashlight) and Nox is the counter-spell that turns that lights off. For the Lumos portion of the quilt I used the light blue fabric to reflect the casting of light, and for the Nox portion I used black fabric to reflect that that the wand light was out.

I love Lizzy's Constellations line so much - it is just too too perfect! I still have some scraps left and I might just need to hoard them for awhile.

When it came to quilting this little guy, I knew that I wanted to put some sort of picture from the series into it. Originally I was going to do a lightning bolt that echoed out, but while looking at various symbols associated with Harry Potter, I spotted the sign of the Deathly Hallows and knew that it was just perfect! I traced the single symbol out using a washable pen and then echoed around it used the width of my walking foot as the measure.

I used fabric from The Ghastlies for the back which I not only thought worked well, but was also my little ode to Severus Snape. The binding is Sketch in Mist.

I'm happy to say that this mini arrived at Amanda's house last week (only a little bit late for her birthday) and is now up on her wall. It was pretty hard for me to give this little guy up because I really love the way that it turned out, but I knew that Amanda would appreciate it and she sent me some pretty awesome goodies recently too including a handmade Harry Potter tote - I'll have to share that one soon!

Are you a Harry Potter fan? If so, which is your favourite book and/or scene? I might just need to make myself a little HP mini and could use some inspiration!

Socks, one of my favourite things!

Last night I commented to Alex's youngest nephew that socks are one of my favourite things, to which he promptly replied "no, they're not!" (which in turn caused Alex and I to start singing These Are a Few of My Favourite Things while chasing him around the house). But really, they are. Ask Alex. Or my Mum. I have all different kinds - plain ones, colourful ones, wool ones, cotton ones, fleece ones, and, of course, hand-knit ones. So far I have knit three pairs of socks (one chunky and two fingering weight) and am working on my fourth pair now.

This will become a pair of Hermione's Everyday Socks and I'm loving them already! I modified the pattern to be toe-up rather than cuff-down: I cast on 28 stitches using Judy's Magic Cast On, increased two stitches on each needle every other row for a total of 56 stitches, and I'm reversing the chart so that I work from rows 4 to 1. The yarn is Fibranatura Yummy which has, unfortunately, been discontinued.

Working on these socks reminded me that I haven't shared these socks that I finished a while ago.

These are my By the Sea socks in Madelinetosh Sock in Iceburg (this colour is discontinued I think). The sock pattern is actually available for free on Wendy Johnson's site and is called Seaweed but I renamed them because of the the names of both the pattern and the yarn colourway.

This yarn is so hard to photograph - it's a really nice blue in real life. I actually have a lot of completed knitting that I've never shared on the blog (including my first adult-sized cardigan) because it's hard getting a picture of myself wearing it all - socks are much easier!

In case you didn't already know, I'm a little bit of a closet Potter head and I have plans to turn all of Erica Leuder's Harry Potter themed (free) sock patterns into toe-up socks for me! I cannot wait for my Hermione socks to be done!