November » 2009 » Untangling Knots

Moustache Necklace

My friend had a moustache party so I threw together this bad boy.

For those of you that have ‘stache envy, here is a quick explanation of what I did.

Materials:
Aran weight yarn. I used Vanna’s Choice
2 Coordinating Pipe Cleaners
A chain that was long enough to fit over my head
2 8mm rings
3.75 mm needles.

Cast on two stitches.
Row 1: Knit
All even rows: Purl
Row 3: Knit 1, Make 1, Knit 1
Row 5: Knit 1, Make 1, Knit 1, Make 1, Knit 1
Row 7: (Knit 1, Make 1,) 4 times, Knit 1
Row 9: Knit all stitches
Row 11: Knit all stitches
Row 13: Knit two together 4 times, Knit 1
Row 15: Knit two together, Knit 1, Knit two together
Row 17: Knit
Row 19: Repeat Row 5
Row 21: Repeat Row 7
Row 23: Knit all stitches
Row 25: Knit all stitches
Row 27: Repeat Row 13
Row 29: Repeat Row 15
Row 31: Knit two together, knit 1
Row 33: BO

Weave in ends. Weave the first pipe cleaner through the edge stitches of the top of the moustache. I wove through every other stitch. Weave the second pipe cleaner through the edge stitches of the bottom of the moustache. Adjust the piper cleaner so a few inches of the ends are sticking out from each side. Twist the top and bottom piper cleaners together at each side. Trim ends so that they are the same length if necessary. Curl the pipe cleaners at the sides. Adjust the pipe cleaners so that the moustache is shaped the way you want it. Open the rings and put them on the ends of the chain and around the top pipe cleaner, near the tallest point of the moustache. Bend the rings shut and the moustache necklace is complete!

You can wear it around your neck and just hold it up when you get the urge to have a moustache or, for long term wear, you can hook the chain over your ears. The moustache will stay in place, hands free.

Here’s the ‘stache in action. The party wasn’t too bad, but I lost my student ID there. Oops. And as an aside, check out my hair! I’m working on my pin curling skills. I found this blog, Beatury is a Thing of the Past, that has diagrams and tips on how to do older hair styles. Last time I pin curled my hair, I didn’t think at all about the directions I set the curls in. It didn’t really matter because I was just curling my hair to tease it but this time I paid attention to the direction. It really makes a difference. I didn’t think about taking a picture specifially of my hair, but you can sort of see it better here. My hair turned out pretty good, but the rain ruined it really quickly. That’s life.

Knitsperation

A variety of things inspire me to knit and my actual knitting.

1. The weather. This is one of those stupidly obvious things but bad weather makes me want to knit. It inspires my actual knitting as well because, when it comes down to it, most knitting is warm and woolly and good for crappy weather. I took this picture last weekend. There was wind, rain, down pour, hail, down hail…

2. Blogs. There are two sorts of blogs that inspire my knitting. Knitting blogs and fashion blogs. Knitting blogs give me new ideas for stuff like construction, yarn and stitches. They’re also a good way to find new patterns to try. Fashion blogs give me design ideas. I like to read knitting blogs by people who knit things that I might knit. The fashion blogs I read tend to feature vintage clothes. Here are a few of my favorites.

Knitting:
Ysolda
Turtlegirl’s Bloggy Thing
Reckless Glue
Kniteroo!

Fashion:
Elinkan
Sally Jane Vintage
Niotillfem
The Freelancer’s Fashion Blog

3. Murder Mysteries. I can’t really explain this one except for the fact that most of the murder mystery movies and television shows that I watch take place between the 1920s and 1960s and have fabulous costumes. Here are my favorites in no particular order.

A&E’s Nero Wolfe
Agatha Christie’s Poirot
The Mrs. Bradley Mysteries

4. Yarn. Another duh. Yarn kind of just tells you what it wants to be. Not all yarn works for all projects. You have to listen to it. I’m still working on that skill.

Cream Puff

Sorry about the lack of real updates. I’ve been feeling crappy which means that I haven’t been feeling too photogenic. That means not a lot of blogging but lots of knitting. Today I was feeling better so… On to the knits! This is a hat I made. My friend in our Uni knitting group was working with some brushed alpaca and I got really bad yarn envy. I bought myself some and knit this hat.

I’m on a bit of a cream kick. I’ve been working with lots of cream yarn and I bought some cream tights. I knit this with some Plymouth Yarn Brushed Alpaca and Plymouth Yarn Baby Alpaca D.K. Sooooooo damn soft.

I didn’t follow a pattern. It’s just your basic beret but I love this hat. I want eight billion more in every color imaginable.

Halloween!

Halloween is one of my favorite holidays. It’s fun and way less stressful than most holidays. I always watch lots of B-horror movies and Tim Burton movies. This year I also baked a pie. My friend Sarah made the cup cakes.

My costumes in the last few years have been more makeup orientated than clothes. This year I was a zombie. I was going to be a doll but that costume would be too warm if we went to a party.

Dress – My Mom, Belt – Kmart

I went all out with my makeup and teased my hair. I put my hair in pin curls earlier so it had more texture to it. That really helped with the teasing. I did my friend Kevin’s makeup as well.

Here are some close ups of my gorey makeup:

Click to make them larger. I’m overly proud of that bruise on my neck because it looked so real in person.