Oompa Toy Winner

I used random.org to pick the winner of this giveaway and out of the 17 valid entries the winner of the Oompa toy,  Lacing Shoe from Bajo is #1 Suzi!

Her comment was:

My toy comment is that my dream toy from Oompa would be the Green Toy House with Furniture!
HOW ADORABLE is that house?? All that little tiny stuff! And it's GREEN! With wind turbines!
Yep, thats my dream toy.
thanx,
suziblues2000@yahoo.com

Congratulations and thank you to all of you that entered to win. 

Itty-Bitty Update

So I haven´t been very good at my itty-bitty knitting the last week. I guess I took a tiny brake.

I finished the wrap me up puppy #1 with his blanket. This puppy was made with left over yarn
I started on wrap me up puppy #2. He needs a blanket which is almost half way finished. This puppy was made with donated yarn.
After this I will only have 9 toys left to make of the 27 to make from Itty-Bitty Toys by Susan B Anderson! Looks like I am right on track to finish the book by February 2011.

I worked on my Big Montana Tunic I´ve finished the main piece and I´m working on the cowl. I can´t wait to have it finished. It´s getting chilly in the mornings and at night.

I realized that I need to make M some stroller socks and O needs a hat. So that will be next weeks plan.

I took one of my dormant projects that I had almost finished but, the pattern was in Norwegen and I had made a mistake and I didn´t know how to fix it because I couldn´t understand the pattern,  I unraveled the whole thing. It was knit from the bottom up and now I´m knitting it my way from the top down. It is for M. A cute sheep sweater.  Looking forward to finishing it.

I knit a little on my Cedar Leaf Shawlette.

I also knit up this shawl but I´m about 3-5 skeins short of finishing it. Maybe I will get the yarn to finish it for my birthday. It's the simple yet effective shawl and it's free on ravelry.com. It's knit up with Noro in several different colors.

I also started a scrappy blanket. It´s fun. I had a while bunch of yarn that was too short to make anything really with and I had cut all of these odds and ends off of the princess and the pea stuff so I decided to knot them together and make something from it but what? I took up the crotchet hook and  started hooking. I´m going to leave the ends hanging out as part of its charm but each one of these ends has a story. They each have something to say to me when I look at them. It´s everything from super expensive yarn to cheep cotton. Maybe I will just keep making it till it becomes a bed cover for me in my old age remembering all the things I made.

I´ve got a pattern floating around my head and I need to knit it up and write it up so that I can move on. All I can do is think about it and how great it will be when I have finished it. It would be awesome knit up in soft alpaca/merino blend but all I have is some Cascade eco. But it will work. Nice and warm. Just a little scratchy. Maybe in the next month I can have it finished and share it with you.

I got some yarn this week.
The skeins that are not wound are going as prizes so keep your eyes peeled for a giveaway as soon as I have finished the toys that I am making with the wound skeins.

Then there are these.They will become a toy.

 Then some photos from my life.

This is my work space when it comes to blogging and knitting and designing.

 The best hubby and kids a mom could ask for.

 He use to only take up one cushion on the couch. Now he is about to spill over to the 3rd.

 My little boy is potty training. But slowly.

My bread decided to spill out the side since I cut the slits in the top too early

New Sponsor! Brown Sheep!

Hello everybody. Sorry for the delay. I know I promised this Tuesday but life happened and here we are. To make up for this I am going to keep this giveaway open til Monday the 4th of October.
Brown Sheep were great enough to donate the yarn I needed to make the Princess and the Pea from the book Itty-Bitty Toys by Susan B Anderson. There are a lot of colors in this toy and I got to knit with a lot of Brown Sheep's Worsted weight Lambs Pride . It is a 85% wool and 15% Mohair blend. I really enjoyed working with this yarn. It was perfect for this toy, making it very classic looking with a woolly feel.  I would not use this yarn as a close to skin choice, but with its nice shine, I would love to make a jacket out of this yarn or a purse or a blanket. It keeps it's shape pretty well and I'm sure it is very sturdy, so great as an outer fabric for both toys and clothes. They have so many colors to pick from that it was hard to pick only 8 colors to make this toy. I would love to try some of there other yarns like their cotton wool blends.
For this toy I used:
M-171 Fresh Moss
M-183 Rosado Rose
M-57 Brite Blue
M-22 Autom Harvest (orange)
M-140 Aran (Natural color)
M-11 White Frost
M-175 Bronze Patine
M-07 Sable (Darker brown)
If you have been following my blog you may remember me talking about it taking me a while to get the mattresses finished. I love making toys because of their shaping and how it keeps me on my toes. Well the mattresses were not quite like that. There was no shaping. Just knitting back and forth. The doll on the other hand I finished in one day with her dress and everything. She is lovely. But the mattresses were something that I had to force myself to finish. I didn't make all 11. My boys just use them as tossing objects and I really didn't need any more stuff around that they can toss. I made 8 and I may make the extra 3 later once I've gotten over the 8 that I have already made. I did make an extra pea because the mattresses couldn't really balance on top of the pea pod.

Brown sheep were nice enough to answer some of my questions about their business and product.


What is Brown Sheep and how did the business get started? Brown Sheep Co. was started by Harlan Brown in 1980. Harlan and his wife, Janet purchased their first spinning equipment from a mill in South Carolina. With a spinning frame, set of pin drafters, other miscellaneous equipment, and a bunch of determination they set out to make quality, USA made yarn. The business is still completely family owned and managed in Western Nebraska.

Who is in charge of the fiber combinations and the color choices and where dose that person or persons get their inspiration? Once the mill was up and running, Harlan set out to create different lines of yarns with different blends. Today the mill produces a variety of fiber blends with the most famous being Lamb's Pride which is a blend of wool (85%) and mohair (15%). Brown Sheep Co. also produces several cotton/wool blends, sock yarn, and of course 100% wool lines, to name a few. Color choices are made on a yearly basis. Some colors remain the same every year and others come and go based on demand. Peggy Jo Wells, part-owner of the company is the mastermind behind the color choices.

Who are some of your favorite designers? Our designers include but are not limited to creative minds such as Lorna Misner, Vicki Square, Melissa Leapman, Joanna Benson and Ann Young.

Anything that you can clue us in on what to expect to see from you in the near future? Any new and amazing fiber combinations, colors or designs that you are busting at the seams to share with us? We're bursting at the seams with new and exciting developments but as with all good secrets, we cannot disclose them yet! Be sure to return to our website (www.brownsheep.com), Facebook and Twitter often for updates! We will be launching our new website very soon and we are very excited about it! 

They also just started their blog where you can follow them for more info.


 Brown Sheep were nice enough to offer 4 skeins of what ever yarn you like. You read that right. 4 SKEINS! Just go to their site and looke for your favorite yarn or yarns and color or colors and post it here and you could be the lucky one that gets their choice of yarn.

Here are the rules:
1. Go to the website and find 4 skeins of yarn you would like and what color. Come back and leave a comment with contact info.
2. Become a follower or sign up for my feed via e-mail at the bottom of the page then come back and leave a comment with contact info
3. Tweet about this giveaway with a link to this site and then come back and leave your twitter id.
4. Put up a blog post about this giveaway and come back with the link to it and contact info.

Yes there are 4 chances to win if you follow the rules. Remember that you have to come back and comment for each entry but if you forgot to put contact info then your entry is invalid. If you forgot to add something please delete your first entry before you enter your correction. 
I'm sorry, but you have to live in North America or know someone in North America that is willing to receive this and send it to you, to be eligible to win this prize.
Giveaway will be open til Sunday the 3rd of October 2010 at midnight.  Winner will be announced on the following Monday.

Late Itty Bitty Update

Hello everybody!

Sorry about how late this is coming out. I've done some finishing of UFOs (unfinished objects).
I finished the Shalom,

my french press slippers,
the Kilkenny baby hat and I also knitted up some booties to go with the baby present.


I also knit some on my Cedar Leaf Shawlette.

Since I finished so many UFOs I let myself cast on One new project. It's a quick knit. it's the Big Montana Tunic and I've been eyeballing this one since I got the magazine last fall. It was always out of my price range but then I realized that I could double up Cascade Ecological at only 15 dollars for a 250 gr. skein of bulky weight. That's 478 yards. I have about 2 and a third of a skein. It might not be enough though. We will see. I don't mind buying one more for this one. I think I will use it quite a bit. I love the big cowl on it.
I finished the princess and the pea. I promise that the giveaway for that will be tomorrow.
I'm looking forward to reveling this one. O really likes the doll but she is not allowed to wear the dress. As soon as he finds her he rips her dress off. I guess that is a boy for you. I have a suspicion that when I let them play with the mattresses that they will become tossing toys for my boys.   At least they will have fun with them.
I have a few more sponsors in the works. I'm sure you guys will go mad for these yarns. I can't wait to review them but it's all hush hush until it is time to show off the toy.
I did get some yarn in the mail last week.

Here it is. No I'm not telling you what it is yet. Not till the unveiling. Is it a toy or a new pattern? Who knows?
There will be yarn for you tomorrow I promise.


I am very proud of my effort yesterday. I put together 2 shelving units to replace my old shelf that I kept my knitting and knitting related stuff in. It was more work than I thought it would be. It took me all yesterday to get the shelves together, to empty and organize the things from the old shelf and to get everything back up again.

Before

After

Hubby thinks our living room now looks like a yarn store. I love it. My creative space is perfect now.



















Enjoy your knitting and here are a few photos of the boys and my life.






I´ve been baking bread from scratch lately.

Lacing Shoe from Bajo Review & Giveaway

Hello dear readers. Sorry for the absence this week but I have had one of those weeks where I have been catching up on housework and other family matters.

Today I am doing a review of the Lacing Shoe from Bajo provited to me by Oompa.com.

Since I work a lot with yarn and needles my 2 and a half year old of course becomes very interested in what I am working on. I didn´t know what to do for him since I really didn´t want yarn all over the house. When I saw this toy I thought that it is perfect. Something to hand him while I am working. The string is long enough where he can pretend to knit with it but short enough to keep him out of trouble. He also loves that there are wheels on the bottom of it. He can drive it around when he gets bored with the string and needle part of it. The pros for me are that it is made with wood and that it is made in Europe and not Asia and that it is a learning toy. He can make a mess of the string and then figure out how to untangle the thing on his own now. The only thing that I would like to change about it is the fact that there is no way to attach the string to the front of it and drag it around. The string does come off and you can start sewing anywhere which is great but I would have liked to be able to attach it to the front of the toy to be able to drag it around as well.

Thank you Oompa.com for helping me distract my toddler so that I get some peace and quite to work on my knitting.

Oompa is the place to go to get toys that are made in the US or Europe and are safe for your children. They have loads of learning toys and other great buys for your little one to love and cherish and then their little one to love and cherish after that.

“Oompa Toys, founded in 2004, was a family held California corporation. In May of 2007 I moved both the company and my family to Madison, WI. Oompa Toys continues to carry a wonderful, ever expanding mix of wooden toys, baby toys, soft dolls, play food, ball tracks, play mats and other beautiful, high quality wooden toys. We offer fair and competitive prices and strive for 100% customer satisfaction.”


When I go to the Oompa website I loose track of time and place and I daydream of my children playing with this and that that I can find on their website. I love that I know that the people that made the toys are getting fare wages and are working under safe conditions.

OK on to what you have been waiting for. The GIVEAWAY! You too, can get one of these lacing shoe toys for your little one.

Here are the rules:
1. Go to the website and find what your dream toy would be from there. Come back and leave a comment with contact info.
2. Become a follower or sign up for my feed via e-mail at the bottom of the page then come back and leave a comment with contact info
3. Tweet about this giveaway with a link to this site and then come back and leave your twitter id.
4. Put up a blog post about this giveaway and come back with the link to it and contact info.

Yes there are 4 chances to win if you follow the rules. Remember that you have to come back and comment for each entry but if you forgot to put contact info then your entry is invalid. If you forgot to add something please delete your first entry before you enter your correction. 
I'm sorry, but you have to live in North America or know someone in North America that is willing to receive this and send it to you, to be eligible to win this prize.
Giveaway will be open til Saturday the 25th of September 2010 at midnight.  Winner will be announced on Monday.

Itty-Bitty Update.

This week has been interesting. Sorry for the delay in my itty-bitty update. I have been busy with the long weekend and 2 kids with colds. Don't worry I do have some yarn goodness to show you. I haven't been lazy on that front.

This is how my princess and the pea is coming alone. Slow but coming along. I've finished half the mattresses now. I do need to buy the stuffing for them though. My knitting through the Itty-Bitty Toys book is coming right a long.

My Shalom is almost finished. I'm finishing the last sleeve and then I just need to weave in ends and sew on buttons. I made half sleeves because I tend to push sleeves up to my elbows. I guess it's my get to work attitude. The Cascade Ecological Wool works very well for this project and I only used less then half of the second skein for the sleeves.It doesn't hurt that each skein is less than 15 dollars and if you made the Shalom with out modification then you would only need one.

I made this in less than 2 days. It's Milo. An Australian design that I found on Ravelry. It's made with CotLin from Knit Picks which makes it warm but not too warm and it's machine washable. A big plus when knitting for newborns. It's for my neighbor down the street. She is having a little girl in October. I'll be making some for my boys in wool and with out the OXOX on it to keep them warm this winter. I love that this can be made into a vest for boys or girls or a little frock for little girls. It's easy to knit so if you are not experianced it is OK all you have to know is how to kit, purl and do a backwards loop cast on to make this. It will be my go to pattern for new babies for now.

I also started on a little hat for that little girl with scraps of yarn that I had laying a round. It's Kilkenny from Wee Woolly Toppers. This one hurt my hands a little as soon as I got to the ribbing at the top. Very cute though. I liked the patterns in the book well enough to buy it. I'll be making hats for my boys out of it this fall. I'm going to make the Cuba for M and the Tubey for O.

I still have a lot of UFOs (unfinished objects) laying around. I still need to finish my Tea Leaf Cardi, my Cedar Leaf Shawlette,  my Citron, My Vetur Lopi sweater, and my French Press Slippers.  Need to get myself organized and finish these UFOs before they finish me. Hopefully by next week I will have at least 3 of my UFOs finished. That would be my Shalom, princess and the pea, and my French Press Slippers.

Last night we shot the video to show how to do the navajo plying method while knitting to help people with using it in my cowl pattern. and hopefully I will have a working video by the end of the week and the pattern for sale both here and on Ravelry.

The URL is changing to this site from icelandicgardener.blogspot.com to knittingwitholof.com I thought it better suited. 

Here are some shots of my boys being boys.

Yes, my 7 month old drives cars around the house and watches *cat* TV out the back door. O is playing on a piece of paper his Aunt Sabrina made with him the last time they saw each other. My husband took these amazing photos of our most important people in our lives.

Malabrigo Yarn and Pattern Giveaway WINNERS!

First I want to say that I am amazed at the amount of  interest in this giveaway. I read every single entry and stumbled on some great blogs while reading what people had to say about this giveaway on their blogs. Thank you everyone for entering to win and to those that follow my blog.

We have our winners picked by Random.ORG
First is #37
suburban prep said... Wow fantastic.
I like the merino worsted in the 275 Noviembre color.

msgb245 at gmail dot com

Second is #75

Li11er said... The Silky Merino in Stonechat is by far my favorite Malabrigo.

However, Lace in Azul Profundo or Sealing Wax has been known to make me weak.

Great interview, thank you so much for sharing.

Ravelry ID: Li11er

li11er@yahoo.com

Third is #124

Kristy G. said... Ooo, I think I can't choose between Code F and Code H colorways!

and Fourth is #185

KatieQ said... I'm thrilled to have found your blog. I am now a subscriber.
katiequilts@gmail.com

Congratulations everyone! I will have your yarn shipped by the end of the week. I can't wait to see what you make with the yarn and if you make my pattern.

Happy Labor Day!

Happy Labor Day everyone. I will be posting my itty-bitty update tomorrow with a giveaway. Today has just flown by so quickly and I'm enjoying my family instead. I will post the winners of last week's giveaway later tonight after the boys have gone to bed.  Thank you everyone for understanding!

Alice in Wonderland Review

I recently realized that I could knit and read on my iPad at the same time. To my excitement I started looking for books to read and found a list of 1001 books you should read before you die. Well I had read a few of them but since I did not go to school here as an adolescent except for a year I am guilty of not having read the classics. I have seen all the movies but not read the books. Well I thought it perfect to start and get cracking on those 1001 books while knitting. Today I was working on those mattresses for the Princess and the Pea and I read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. It was entertaining. I had seen the movies and the cartoons but never read the book. It was a lot shorter then I thought it would be. I really did question, since I don't know the writer Lewis Carroll, if he did drugs or had a mental disorder. No sane man or woman could come up with this with out some sort of help form narcotics. He was apparently known for his nonsense but man. I do recommend the book as a quick read and I've started reading Through the Looking Glass we will see what I think of that.