Knit vs Crochet

Eh up,

As you know, I knit, that's what I do, mostly machine knitting but some hand knitting too. I love knitting but I love alot of other craftz too. If you've ever read the awesome craft zine SugarPaper that I do with my super crafty pal Seleena you will know there are lots of other crafts i heart too!

One of those is crochet, in some ways i prefer crocheting to hand knitting. It's quicker and great for 3D shapes, one word...amigurumi!

Wanting more crochet info, I purchased an old crochet book from a charity shop today. It is a great find with loads of different techniques and ideas. This picture is my favourite bit in the whole book:

This DUDE is James Walters, the co-author of 'The Crochet Workbook', I love the multitude of colous in this one outfit, and of course, the fact it is 100% crocheted, amazing! If you want to find out more about Mr Walters and about freeform crochet, click the photo for his ace website!

From crochet...to knitting..I also wanted to show you another colourful bit of yarn-craft, the beginnings of my contribution to the 'knit a year' project being run my the UK based knitted Beth Barlow.

This project 'does what it says on the tin', it is a group of people who are all knitting for a year! The idea is to knit a few rows a day for 365 days, I started about 30 days ago and am enjoying it and more impressively, keeping up with it for now! This project is a great chance for me to practice different knitting techniques and an excuse to keep a diary which I haven't done for years! For now... back to the knitting machine.

Crepes, cakes, cats n car boots!

Hello there,

Here is what I've been up to the past few weeks, in pictures...first up, cakes, lemon butterfly buns,yum!

Cats...these are some new products in progress.

Car boot, there is a big car boot every sunday in Chesterfield, I hadn't been for ages and it was a Sunny Sunday so we headed down and got all these treats and more! The 'rainbow' dominoes are my favourite, the more 2 player games in the house the better!

Crepes...a little trip to Paris, I ate lots of delicious food...not 'michelin star french cuisine' I'm not that fancy. Delicious like crepes, brioche, hot chocolatem macaroons, croissants and goats cheese baguettes, c'etait tout delicieux!

Now I'm back home, all inspiro'd from the Sonia Rykiel shops I went to. I was dissapointed by the H&M collection (mostly cos it wasn't designed for anyone with curves,hmph) but that didn't effect my love for the lady's awesome knit skillz. Seeing all her amazing knits has given me the motivation I needed to get my designs going, and to try something new !

Kandy x

I think I'm turning....

....Japanese!!! Last weekend saw lots of making. We did Mothers' day on Saturday so that was spent with Mother and siblings crafting. We needed to do something that my teenage brother would hang around for, he suggested origami, and here's what we made...I really like the little boat, that's the pink thing the bunny is in, we made 2 but my bro decided to see if his would float, it did for about 10 seconds then got water-logged and sank.

I liked the rabbits so much I wanted to make more animals so had a go at the elephant, it's not quite right but I think it resembles an elephant, right?!

Continuing the Japanese theme, on Sunday I decided to make vegetarian sushi with cucumber, asparagus and avocado.

These maki were rolled using baking parchment because the supermarket, (despite being the size of a ferry) has no Japanese section, so no rolling mat for me! But they did have cheap rice crackers so I put these out as an accompaniment along with my attempt at an asparagus and mushroom dish we get at our favourite Japanese restaurant.

And it was all really tasty, any more veggie sudhi filling suggestions are more than welcome! Now time for me to go and find a good lemon cheesecake recipe, again, if you have one, let me know. In other (related) news, one of my students was talking about how he had made a really nice cheesecake, this presence of culinary skill and enthusiasm among 1st year University students is reassuring...they're not ALL living off rustler burgers, phew! The best bit was when his friend asked which cookbook he got it from and he said..'oh, it's off me mam, one of her recipes'!

Kandy x

What I'm up to...

Hi there,
As you can see from my letter...the website is having a little makeover at the moment! Today I have designed (and am halfway through making) a new cushion as part of my 'new stuff' , I also took some photos of things I am excited about. Firstly my new yarns... and my lovely knitting bag complete with kittens! I am excited about these yarns because

a) they're natural not Acrylic

b) they're a bit finer than the other yarn so easier to knit with

c) the colours are lovely

The next thing I am excited about is my sewing corner. I had a move round of my 'Studio' in January and decided I would like to be able to sit by my window when I'm sewing. One 'toy box' type chest, 3 large cushions and a rather 70s bedspread (re-worked into curtains and cushion covers) later and I have a lovely window seat.

In the foreground is the sewing table with my overlocker and sewing machine on! I really like my little sewing corner, it helps that the 'window seat' is also storage for some of my vast amount of STUFF! The best thing of all is that I get to look out the window...

Knitted tree inside the window, real tree outside the window! That's all for today, I am going to finish off my products and take some more photos now.

Kandy

Lolapops' secret crush....

This is a 'shout out' blog to a lovely lady called Kelly who makes jewellery in her spare time. I met Kelly many years ago when she was studying at Nottingham in the same class as my sister at their fashion show, we shared a train journey, then didn't see her until last year at the ace Craft Candy 'Candy floss summer fair' there she was with a stall full of supercool jewellery that made me really excited!

Her designs are gorgeous and very reasonable, like this awesome cat mask brooch, a must for any fans of Ghost World's Enid!

This can be found at her big cartel shop (click on the picture above) along with lots of other ace jewellery, but it doesn't stop there! At the Summer craft fair Kelly and I discovered we had a mutual love for the Twilight Saga...she admitted wanting to make twilight themed jewellery but wasn't sure, I obviously told her she should go for it! Skip to December, post New Moon film release, we see Kelly at Craft Candy's Christmas fair...still no Twilight themed jewellery, I'm all tuts and head shaking! Skip to the end of December, a few days before christmas and I get some post from lolapop..'I haven't ordered anything..this is odd!' Then I open it and a deafening screech ensues, it's only a TEAM JASPER bedge complete with cutout fangs!

Here I am enjoying the brooch at a twilight board game evening, compelete with open fire and candles...and the soundtrack, hardcore! Keep reading, I am getting to the good bit,promise... lolapop's secret stash of Twilight jewellery. WARNING, only for team Edward at the moment, but it's good stuff!

And these are on her etsy shop, a sneaky little side shop with these amazing Vampire goodies! So go and check out her goods, and if you tell enough of your friends, then maybe one day Kelly will get to make jewellery all of the time!

Left to my own devices....

...home alone tonight, I decided it was time to sew all these knitted pieces (that never quite became the finished piece) together!

Another little blanket to add to the big blanket I have been piecing together over the past few years of Knit and Destroy. Here are big blanket and little blanket together on the sofa!

Now it's time for me to get under it and get warm, mmmmm.

SALE! SALE! SALE!

Hello there,

Knit and Destroy is about to have a HUGE makeover, oh yeah! But before I leave you for a while to beaver away at the new look K&D I am giving you all a chance to bag yourself a bargain.

Click on the banner above to ckeck out the online shop where there are some awesome knits at even awesomer prices!!!

More soon, Kandy x