- WARNING - This blog entry may contain cuteness... and lots of pictures. Consider yourself warned!


Early this year, I picked up knitting as road trip boredom-killer. At first, I was totally frustrated! I learned by watching videos of other knitters demoing different stitches. Every time I'd take a break from one type of stitch and try another I'd have to watch the video again.

Since then, I've become very much addicted to knitting... It's been like therapy. So far I've made a pile of monsters, a monkey, a couple of robots, a few pairs of leg warmers, a hooded scarf, some plain scarves and two pairs of slippers.

I was kind of ashamed of my new hobby at first. Stereotypically, knitters are mostly older women. Whenever I took the bus or train, I'd wish I spent the idle time knitting but I was too embarrassed to do it. Now I just don't care. I knit whenever I can!

If you're on Instagram, you might have seen some of my knit projects already. If not, I finally have a bunch of project pictures gathered to share with you...



nameless little monsters... and wall-e


this is geet. he's a garage monster. (this is why he has a wrench)



meet the lovebots! wall-e feels right at home with these guys.







these two are tony the toy box monster (purple) and hugo the couch potato monster (green)

the monkey doesn't have a name either but he's one of my favourites.

for a while I actually called him suicide monkey because I held his mouth on (before he was finished) with a variety of tapestry needles and it started to resemble piercings. haha


monkey love!


that's the bunch! hope you like them...












other happenings:


-this came in the mail...



I looooove getting mail.




I'm so excited it finally came! I guess I won't be needing to buy yarn for a while...






-I scored these at a japanese store...


daiso is the best! 6.6mm bamboo dpns and 12mm giant hollow plastic needles. $2 each!





-I've been doing a bit of sewing...


knitting needle pouches! made of awesome cork fabric. thank you, mr. rabbit!





-I've got a second monkey in the making...


arms, hands and ear in progress. I already have the body made!





-progress report on the WALL-E costume... (since its that time of year again)


he's cute as ever... but still unfinished. I made him as last year's costume over just a few days and wore it even though all of the details hadn't been finished. After halloween had passed, I wasn't in a huge rush to get it finished... I'm the best procrastinator sometimes. I still plan to finish him up! I've found some schematics that show a ton more detail than I even knew about when I started making him.

side view. he's made of recycled things... almost exclusively cardboard and paperboard. the treads are made of crunched tinfoil spray painted black and mounted on paperboard. I wish I had documented the process.

Hal and the plant... Hal was made out of a contact lens solution bottle that I found on top of our recycling pile. The curve seemed perfect for his body, so I grabbed some wire (for his legs) and just made it up as I went along. I was basing everything on screenshots from the movie.
The plant is made of wire wrapped with green crepe paper. The wire is secured to the bottom of a round bit of cardboard that I glued dirt on top of. I fit that into the top of the shoe and... 'ta daaaa!'

I used my nephew's old baby shoe as the boot. The scale kinda works, I think!






-I love these...


Interchangable circulars. Wood. Ohhhhhh yes! I could care less about the colours, but that's what's available. I love the feel of wooden needles! After you've spent some time knitting, you start to enjoy working with certain materials over others. I'm not a fan of metal knitting needles, but every one is different. They're cold every time you pick them up and they make an awful scraping sound as you knit. Plastic ones feel... well, plasticky. haha. They start to stick in my hands if I've been knitting for a while. The one thing about wooden needles is you have to be really cautious with them. Especially if they're smaller, they could break if you aren't careful with them. If you have the habit of always misplacing a needle as you knit, (a bit harder to do if they're on a cable. hah. there are dpns ands straight ones too) these might not be the kntting needles for you.






-been cooking yummy things...


butternut squash soup and hummus!

this is what I love about fall! mmm...







-I GOT TO STAY IN A REAL TREEHOUSE!



out in squamish valley...

about 50 feet off the ground!



the view.

It was SO COOL! It rained a lot... I loved listening to it all night and saying completely dry. You could hear the salmon run in the nearby river, too! I'll never forget it.


don't look down!

the house below... It's a caboose!

We were going to stay in the treehouse for a second night but it started to pour and over the course of the next day everything got wet inside.

constant downpour.


I love it out there...



(the caboose is still under construction... never mind the toilet out on the deck. )








-hiking adventures with mr. rabbit...




























look, you made it!






until next time,


xx Parker