Adventures in Knitting DIY Toys, Pt 3!

Pattern Minders this time!

I kept seeing these on Etsy when I was browsing for other knitting ideas, but didn't find any directions on a Google search. I wanted the style where the magnets sandwich the page and keep in place that way. So much neater and more secure than Post-Its! Since I couldn't find directions from someone else, these instructions are entirely what I've figured out based on looking at pictures. I am proud of myself, even though this is really a simple pattern to figure out. :)

Supplies:

• Magnets
• Pretty Ribbon
• Superglue

I used 1/2 inch x 4 inch magnet strips from Wal-Mart. You get a bunch of them in packs for a dollar, so you've got plenty to play with. The other benefit to this particular magnet is that 4 inch strips work beautifully for 8.5 inch wide paper.

I found ribbon spools on sale at Michael's, but really any ribbon that you like will work. The ones I used first were a navy and gold celestial pattern, and a old font with "Remember" on it. I know that one is 'supposed' to be a scrapbooking ribbon, but I thought it was just too perfect for a pattern minder :)

The magnets I had were 1/2 inch wide, so they worked beautifully with the 5/8 inch wide ribbon. I think I would have had a little more trouble lining the ribbon and magnet up evenly if they had been exactly the same size.

There's really nothing to these, so here we go!

Directions:

Decide what size pattern minder you want to make. With the 4 inch lengths of magnet, you can easily make different sizes. Beyond multiples of 4 in the magnets, any other adjustments can be made in the amount of ribbon between sections of magnet. I wanted pattern minders for standard 8.5 inch sheet patterns, so that's what I was working with.

Cut a length of ribbon to the size you want. For my pattern minders, I cut lengths of ribbon of 20 1/2 inches. This makes them actually wider than 8.5 inches, but the little bit of extra ribbon acts as a bookmark as well, so I can find my pattern again when I close the book.

Leave a length of ribbon on each end to overlap the end of the magnet. I had about 1 1/2 inch of ribbon overlapping at each end. Besides making the end a little neater, this tucks the end of the ribbon out of the way and secures it, cutting down on fraying.

Overall, the lengths of ribbon total as follows:

1.5 + 8 + 1.5 + 8 + 1.5 = 20.5 inches
(overlap + magnets + ribbon at the fold around the page + magnets + overlap = total length)

Superglue the magnets in place. I know these particular magnets have a sticky side for attaching whatever to them, but I found that the glue wasn't quite strong enough for the use I was putting it to. Enter the superglue!

While supergluing it all down, make sure to glue between the magnet strips as well as to attach the ribbon. This makes joins the magnets together and makes it a single 8 inch stretch of magnet, instead of two 4 inch sections side by side. Cuts down on the wear as you're using it, since it's not folding and pulling at that midpoint.

Make sure all 4 magnets are glued into place. Let dry. I used small binder clips to keep the magnets secure as they were drying.

Ta da! I told you they were simple :)

I did find one example online, on Seabreeze Spinners. This one though, isn't what I was looking for. Very useful, but not all my patterns are copied out on loose sheets, and this style pattern minder wouldn't work as well with books. I also like my projects to be portable, even those with involved charts, and the white board isn't as portable. Still, if I get into very involved projects that I don't want to carry around or which have bigger charts, this is a pretty good idea. It's also nice that the "minder bar" is a ruler, so you can always check measurements easily.

Back down to San Diego!

So, to escape the cold front (read: wind storm) that rolled through the High Desert, and to escape post in general and get away to civilization, we took the weekend as an excuse to scamper down to San Diego. A perfect afternoon to hit up Sea World! So much fun. I hadn't been to a Sea World park since we lived in Orlando when I was a kid.

First stop - feeding time at the otter area. The California otters get treats which the keepers call otter pops. Shrimp and shellfish and fish bits, put into a plastic tube, filled with water and frozen. Otter pops! The otters have to bang the tubes to get the treats out, so it simulates the natural behavior of cracking open shells. But, the plastic tube is a lot gentler on the habitat than actual shells. We learned that at the Monterey aquarium - using real shells scratches up the tank badly enough that you can't even see in anymore! We were lucky because this one otter brought her snack over to the corner right against the window to bang on it. We could see her pounding away to get her treat out - so cute!

The dolphins had great viewing windows at their tank, and were very interested in the people watching them too. And one, I swear, had a sense of humor! There were signs all over the dolphin viewing areas saying not to reach over the wall (i.e. into the tank). One dumb teenage chose to ignore the signs and start to reach over. This dolphin below splashed him! And then had this smile on its face - I swear he was laughing!

The Shamu show is required viewing at Sea World, isn't it? The parks have reduced in-water parts of the acts, since the trainer at the FL park died a few months ago, but these are still impressive animals to watch. I was excited too - got some nice pictures. The whales are so big that their jumps are not too fast for my camera's shutter speed (unlike the penguins!). Means I can actually catch pictures mid-jump, not the splash afterward :)

And of course we had to visit the penguin exhibit! So, there I am with the Magellanic penguins outside (the ones that live in South AMerica, not Antarctica). And with a cute little toy too. Sea World has all the dolls for sale, of course - Barbie as a trainer, Barbie as an Arctic Explorer, etc. This one was a little friend of the 'main dolls' and we just got such a kick out of it. She had a long reddish-brown braid, freckles, and what was her animal friend? The penguin! Too funny :)

I remember feeding the stingrays when we were little in Orlando, but I hadn't ever fed the pinnipeds before (seals and sea lions for those of you less science-dork than I). Zach and I split the tray of fish between us to feed them. So much fun! Yes, I am a giant little kid at parks like this :)

We had truly gorgeous weather while we were there. Flowers in bloom, light breeze, comfortable in jeans and a t-shirt.... lovely. We don't really get "spring" as such in the desert, so we enjoyed it a lot in San Diego. The sunshine was beautiful, but the breeze was enough to keep us off the water rides. Would have been a LOT chillier if we'd have been damp! And the sunshine made for some lovely pictures - I particularly liked the belugas. Since their tank is outside (unlike at the GA Aquarium), the sunshine created some wonderful patterns on them as they swam.

All in all, a lovely quick weekend trip. The only downside to the whole weekend? Finding out our favorite little pizza place in San Diego closed!! They actually made real garlic knots, but it looks like their building changed management, because the whole building was empty. Very upsetting :( Still, being in a city again means tons of eating options again, so we still enjoyed our dinner out, just minus the garlic knots. I swear, we're gonna be at a city again when we leave this post and not know what to do with ourselves, so many regular dining options!

For you Anne!

Gotta love LOLCats! Yes, the grammar and spelling gets irritating sometimes, but the fact remains, they find some funny kitty pictures :)

Review: The Departed

So, we didn't plan it this way, but seeing Shutter Island recently and getting The Departed this weekend from Netflix, means that I have back-to-back Scorsese-DiCaprio movies to chatter about! So, here you go, part 2 of the unintentional series: The Departed. Maybe we should do The Aviator next? :)

Plot: Set in Boston, a mobster rat in the state troopers and a police rat in the mob play back and forth trying to find and eliminate each other. Twists, crosses, double crosses and bloody endings abound.

Phenomenal cast. Matt Damon is a likeably arrogant ass. I think that's really the only way I can describe him. Mark Wahlberg (with a baaaad haircut) is funny, in a very dark way. One of those characters who are so foul-mouthed, so wrapped in their own world and own way of doing things, that it's amusing in some sort of way. I dunno. Maybe I'm the only one who thinks that, but I was amused. And Leonardo DiCaprio adds this to the list of movies proving to people my age that he is more than Romeo or Jack (from Titanic). He was very good, very believable cracking under the strain. I think I need to add Blood Diamond to the queue now, and see his performance there too. Jack Nicholson is great, cast as the aging, powerful, slightly paranoid, crime boss. He's one of those actors that's just so good as the slightly crazy, powerful type. Martin Sheen and Alec Baldwin deserve mentions too, as supporting cast members. Very well done, both of them, but in smaller roles they got overshadowed by the others.

Direction: Scorsese definitely earned his Oscar here. Great job. 'Nuff said. Everyone keeps comparing it to Goodfellas, Scorsese's other key mob movie, which (surprisingly) I haven't seen yet. As much as I liked this one, I think I'll have to bump Goodfellas up a little higher on the queue.

I know the plot is nothing original - cops 'n' robbers, and the movie specifically is a remake from a Hong Kong film Mou gaan dou (Infernal Affairs). The writing though is very well done. It's very effective, with some very effective lines, and very believable characters. And the writing is very funny too, in a dark sort of way. Not that it's a comedy or even close - just some darkly comedic writing at times. And (being of Irish heritage) I liked some of the Irish jokes in there too.

And yes the very final scene (view of Boston rooftops, with a rat walking across the balcony)... well, I agree with the Simpsons' take on it: as Ralph says, the rat "symbolizes obviousness." Not annoyingly ham-handed, but it was on that side of the spectrum. Doesn't ruin my opinion of the movie or anything, but just a little silly.

Oh - warning: STRONG language. According to IMDB trivia on the movie, this is the movie with the most uses of the word "f***" and its derivatives (237) to win the Best Picture Oscar. And no, f*** is not the only curse word they liked. So, if you are sensitive to language, catch this when it comes on TV and the language gets cleaned up a bit. :)

Overall: 5 of 5. Not a 'happy' movie, but very entertaining movie. Deserved the Best Picture Award. Definitely shelf-worthy!

Now here's a cool holiday!

World Penguin Day!

B'doom che! ...or however you spell the pun-punchline-cymbal crash ;)

Get it? Cool Holiday? Hehehe... I love dorky puns.

Anyhoo, yup, April 25, World Penguin Day! Go don a tux (or a Hawaiian shirt), and celebrate by doing something penguinish :) We went to Sea World!

More stitch markers!

Yeah, I'm just enjoying playing with the pretty shinies :) So, here are a few more example sets that I've worked on. I'm getting better at twisting the wire up at the top of the marker. I think that's the hardest part, pressing in the last tail end of the wire to keep it snag-free.

And at Easter, M&Ms came in these cute little bunny boxes. So, now my markers are in a bunny boxes! Yes, silliness, but I like it. I've already told Zach that since I cannot have another living bunny because of his allergies, there will be many examples of other sorts of bunnies making their way into the house. This is just one example.

H is for...

Huddersfield Shawl!

Also know as the Big Purple Wrap.

I did a summer abroad in England when I was in college, spending time in both Huddersfield and Cambridge. Huddersfield, for those who don't know (and I'm sure there are many who don't) is in the Peak District, in West Yorkshire. It's not a small town by any means, but it's not a major city either, mostly a commuter town now, for people working in nearby Manchester or Leeds. For trivia buffs, actor James Mason was born there, and Sir Patrick Stewart was born just outside it in the town of Mirfield. Now you know.

I was there for a couple weeks working in the lab of a professor researching in speleology (the study of caves). Kinda a short-term summer internship. Pretty interesting, really, aside from getting to play underground in another part of the world.

So what does all this have to do with knitting?

Well, the summer that I was over there was right after my junior year in college. At the end of my junior year, I'd been dumped by my long-term boyfriend (a good 3 years long relationship) and was pretty broken up, as one might expect. I'd been knitting like crazy between the end of the school year (when I was dumped) and when I left for the UK. The old "keep your hands busy and your mind won't dwell on it all" tactic. However, I thought that I'd be too busy and wouldn't need to take a project with me, so didn't pack one with me when I went abroad.

But, as busy as I was during the day, there was still plenty of time in the evenings to brood, especially being over there on my own for a few weeks (once I got to Cambridge, I was with a program and had more people to hang out with to distract me). Add to that, I'd been knitting kinda nonstop between the end of the school year and my departure, so I really felt the absence of any project.

Luckily for me, there was a yarn shop in Huddersfield! Just a little tiny market stall in the Marketplace there, but that was enough! I'd already picked up a few knitting books in a used book shop in town, so had a few patterns to choose from, and stopped by the knitting stall for the yarn and needles. Began the project in June that summer and got most of it done by the time I returned home in August. Finally finished it up in September when I was back at school.

For those who are interested, it's Lace Stole pattern in Vogue Knitting's Vogue Knitting on the Go: Vintage Knits. It's Raveled Here.

Oh, and just recently at Stitches, as I was looking for shawl pins for the shrugs and shawls I'm becoming addicted too, I found one that matched the purple wrap perfectly! It's hard to tell in the light of the camera flash, but in regular lighting, the purple beads match the purple yarn wonderfully!

Incidentally, those needles I bought in Huddersfield ended up being some of my favorite needles to work with, and of course, it's not a brand commonly found in the US. Just like the tea I became addicted to. (sigh...)