CAL and Handspun Cowl Pattern

First, I'd like to share that I'm starting my very first CAL (crochet-a-long). Moogly Blog did this last year, however I didn't participate. I'm super excited to be starting it this year, and have already finished the first square "Tamara's Kismet." Basically, you get a new (free!) pattern for a 12 inch square every two weeks. At the end of November (24 squares) you'll have enough to make an afghan, using December to join/finish. I think this might be a commitment I can handle! :D I peeked through some of the finished ones from 2014, and really liked one someone did that was a totally mono-tone off-white. Inspired by her, I started with this yellow baby yarn. (I accidentally purchased a pound of this stuff, not realizing it was the wrong shade of yellow!) I'm also considering doing a second square in a multicolor palate, if I choose to do so, I'll share photos here. :) You may notice, I did add an extra hdc edge that wasn't in the pattern, my square was just shy of the 12 inch specification and the hdc add just the right amount! :)

Also, I finally finished working on a cowl I've been picturing since probably last August. I knew I wanted a cowl that was gray with a pop of another color. After lots of deliberation, I finally arrived at a hot pink color and my good friend kindly dyed wool for me using 'flamingo.' I've been spinning every since to prepare for the cowl, changing my mind on how it would look throughout, until I finally decided I was ready! Wouldn't you know it, with all that deliberation and planning time, once I finally made a choice, I jumped right into it without taking photos, measuring yardage, or anything! Darn my enthusiasm! The yarn is all wool, both are two ply and I think they are a bulky weight yarn. The middle is a 'candy cane' 2 play using solid pink and the naturally variegated gray. The outer colors are also two ply using the same naturally variegated gray. It's a VERY simple pattern, and more than likely this already exists elsewhere, but I hope you enjoy it. :)

A note about the i-cord. As you may imagine, my handspun yarn is often limited in yardage. I did have more, however it was a slightly different shade of gray and I tried very hard to limit the yardage so I didn't have to use this. For that reason, 3 i-cords were knitted and used to join the cowl. The i-cords sit on the back of your neck, and are nearly invisible if your hair is down. I originally did this to save yarn, however once I finally to to wear it, I realized that it also keeps my neck from being too hot and the wool from being too bulky in that area. (Remember, I live in Florida) :D I liked it so much, I'm definitely considering doing it on the next cowl I make. If you don't care for that look, simply make the knitted portion longer and join the edges together.

Supplies:
Bulky yarn, roughly 200-300 yds.
US size 10 knitting needles
Cable needle
Tapestry Needle
Double point needles to make an i-cord.

Construction:
I made the center section first, then picked up stitches along the edge and used a garter stitch to widen the cowl. The i-cords followed and were attached with a tapestry needle.

Middle:
Cast on 12 sts.
(Please note, I don't mention it in the pattern, but I do slip the first stitch of EVERY row to create a tight edge.)
Rows 1-4: knit in st. stitch
Row 5: (RS). k2, place 4 on cable needle, k4, k4 from cable needle, k2 remaining 2.
Repeat rows 1-5 until cowl reaches desired length. (Mine was about 20 inches or 17-18 'repeats'

Edges:
Pick up and knit stitches along the 'long' edge of the middle section. Work in garter stitch until cowl reaches the desired width. (Mine was roughly 2 inches, close to the width of the pink section.)

i-Cord Back:
Using the dpns, knit 3 i-cords 8 inches long, each.

Finishing: Use the i-cords to join the edges of the cowl. Weave in ends (I know, I didn't do this in the photos) and you're finished! Hope you enjoy!

~Farm Girl Teacher

Christmas Vacation

I promise this will be my last Christmas post, can you tell what my favorite holiday is? :) Between last minute projects and the usual holiday hustle and bustle I've been slacking off on my blogging lately.

I am a very intense photographer! :)

Anyway, I want to share with you the fun we've had on the our family vacation! My family and I have season passes to the Biltmore Estate in North Carolina and we've been having a wonderful time! Today is our last day here and I'm totally going to do the annoying tourist thing and show you a thousand vacations pics. Sorry! :)

Biltmore Estate
This is one of my favorites, and also the longest. I understand if you glaze over it. :)

What a front yard! Normally the trees in the center aren't there, they're part of their giant Christmas display.

The Biltmore Estate was built by George Vanderbilt, grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt. He teamed up with architect Richard Morris Hunt and landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted to create the home that continues to hold the title of Largest Privately Owned Home in America! The house was opened to the public originally during the Great Depression to draw tourists into the Asheville area. It is currently run by George's great grandson and his family. They have continued to restore many of the 250 rooms and several are open to tour. Unfortunately, we aren't allowed to take pictures inside the house as it damages the delicate materials so you're going to have to suffer through a thousand shots of the outside. :)

Beautiful clear skies today! The ponds to the left are part of the water gardens or Italian Garden, they actually had chunks of ice on top! The original plans for this house show a much smaller home, however Richard Morris Hunt suggested that a large house was necessary in order to stay proportionate to the Blue Ridge Mountain backdrop. 

All of these photos were taken from a beautiful retaining wall. The ramp to the upper level lawn has low level steps in the middle, but smooth ramps on the outside. This design allowed a horse to travel up the middle, while the carriage he pulls rides on the smooth outer ramps. I love some 19th century technology! :)

We traveled up the path to do a bit of exploring before it was time for our tour. This lamp post reminded me so much of the one from Narnia! :) lol

This is the statue of Diana, I love the house peeking through the treeline. The surrounding forest is part of the Pisgah National Forest. A beautiful landscape that may not exist had Vanderbilt not intervened. When he purchased the land for his estate, most of it had been clear-cut and over-farmed, however he worked hand in hand with landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted to rejuvenate the tired land. Many actually credit them as the fathers of modern forestry!

I don't know why but this is one of my favorite pictures. It was very chilly while we were there! Does my scarf look familiar? :)

We also took some wonderful photos from the roof while on the Architect's tour. This is one of my favorite tours and I highly recommend it!

This is part of the stonework over the front door. The details added by Vanderbilt and Hunt are incredible! Plus, each shingle was added individually.

This view shows the Bachelor's Wing of the house as well as a portion of the beautiful stable.

 Many of the windows have additional stonework details framing them, so beautiful! This view, taken from a veranda, reminds me of Notre Dame.

Look, even George used chevron! He's my kind of guy! :)

 The Grand Staircase is one of my favorite architectural features of the house. It has no visible means of support rather the stairs hold each other up. In addition to the intricate carving, it also features two French saints. One is the saint of architecture, the other is Joan of Arc.

This is the wing that contains many of the guest rooms. This view was taken from the top of the Grand Staircase.

I love the roof of the winter garden! I could definitely spend some time here!

Even the spires had beautiful decorations! You can see the family's religious inspirations throughout the estate. There are several crosses decorating the roof as well as carvings in and around the house. The Vanderbilts and their architect Richard Morris Hunt also designed All Souls Cathedral in Biltmore Village.

The stone carvers were allowed a bit more creative freedom on the back veranda. These statues are off the guest balcony and are much more 'risque' for their time. To the right (not in the shot) is one with a likeness of Richard Morris Hunt, the architect, who appears to be scratching his head. Perhaps thinking, "What in the world?!?" Who doesn't love architect humor?

The Biltmore is often called 'An English lady in a French dress' because the interior is heavily inspired by European estates, while the outside is very reminiscent of French Chateaus. This can be seen in the number of gargoyles and grotesques that decorate the house, ward off evil spirits, and previously helped provide drainage. These two are the most photographed on the estate, the one on top is a bear with a honey pot, how cute is that?
Okay, I'm done with Biltmore now, I promise. :)

North Carolina
Us Floridians are not used to the chilly weather up north! (yes, this is 'up north' for us) It's barely dropped below 70 lately in Florida, but during the day here it hovered in the 30's and 40's and dropped into the 20's at night! Crazy!

Look Ma, there's frost on the leaf and the sun is out!

Leaves actually fell off the trees around here, amazing! It's actually crazy how different the mountains look once the trees lose their leaves.

But not all the trees are bare! So this is what a coniferous tree in the wild looks like! Like that? I used 'coniferous' just like I learned in ag class! :)

My favorite 'frost' picture was taken by Momma!

Snow Tubing
Unfortunately there wasn't any natural snowfall while we were vacationing, so we found some man-made snow at the tubing section at Wolf Ridge Ski Resort in Mars Hill. This vacation was the first time I've ever seen snow or icicles! Here are a few things I learned: it's WET, it's NOT fluffy, it's very slick, and it IS painful!

Miranda and I decided to brave tubing...

We started by sliding down the big hill and tried to avoid taking out small children.

Seriously, snow hurts! I always thought it was like fluffy balls of cotton...

We were trying to do all the 'traditional' snow things. Like our little snowman? He likes warm hugs ;)

It may look like I'm striking a pose, but I'm seriously just trying to stay on my feet! Again, did NOT realize how slick snow is!

This was also the first snow for my mom and sister. Like their hats? You'll never guess who crocheted those! ;) Miranda's is a camo toboggan that has a little hole in the back for her ponytail to poke out. Momma's is her favorite teal color with a rolled brim and peacock feather accent.

Again, on a mission to do all the 'traditional' snow activities including a snowball fight!

Miranda was able to get in a lot of deadly-good headshots!

Overall we had an awesome day playing in our first-ever snow! :)

Pisgah Forest
As I previously mentioned, Pisgah forest wouldn't exist like it does now if it weren't for Vanderbilts. Vanderbilt once owned nearly all of what is now Pisgah National Forest, including Mt. Pisgah! George and Olmsted helped restore the tired land. Unfortunately following George's death, his widow, Edith, had to made some tough decisions. Property tax laws went into affect in American shortly after his death and they could not afford to run the estate and pay taxes on their massive expanse of land. Edith cut a deal with the government to sell part of the land for $5 an acre (don't worry, she still kept plenty) provided that it became a part of the Pisgah National Forest and remained largely untouched. Thanks to this deal, we now have a beautiful park here, and the land still shows us George's vision. Anyway, one of the beautiful natural sights in the forest is Looking Glass Falls.

Isn't it beautiful? The bottom of the falls was FREEZING but it was still a beautiful sight!

I like peeking at it through the trees. :) We also drove down a scenic parkway in the park. We were hoping to drive the Blue Ridge Parkway, but it was closed.

The view was beautiful, even without clear skies!

Grove Park Inn/Gingerbread Competition
We also make a quick stop at the Grove Park Inn to take a look at the finalists in the annual gingerbread competition. We've been past it before, but had no idea how massive and grandiose it was until we actually went inside!

This is the view from the back veranda...

My favorite gingerbread was part of the teen competition, it's a Mary Poppins themed house! :)

Isn't that awesome? I love the chimney sweeps on the roofline!

Momma's favorite was also part of the teen competition, it's "Christmas Vacation" themed! How awesome is that? I love cousin Eddie's trailer out front and the extension cords running to the side of the house!

I photographed this one to show my students. Just before Christmas break we allowed the children to make their own graham cracker houses and I thought my boys would especially appreciate this Star Wars house! This amazing house was part of the youth division!

And finally, the only adult house I'm going to show you. It's called "Peace on Earth" (I think) and was the grand prize winner. It really is a beautiful and intricate display! (Check it out, you can see my reflection in the background!)

Okay, okay, I promise I'm finally done now. Hope you enjoyed your Christmas! :)

~Farm Girl Teacher

Christmas Gifts Galore

In addition to several specialty orders I've been completing for customers, I crocheted like crazy to finish last minute gifts for family members!

I usually do individual projects for the kids in my family, but this year several of them had mentioned that they liked those hats with the beards and since almost all the kids are boys, I did a few color variations of the same style. Check it out!

I made a grand total of nine toboggan/beards!

This was my largest 'batch.' The beards are all similar colors, a couple have flecks of tan because the store ran out of plain brown. It's actually a neat variation, looks more natural! The hat colors from left to right are, gray, black/brown/gray mix, and camo! The gray actually wound up being my favorite, I think I'll actually go back to purchase some more of that color to do a project for myself.

These hats are awesome to make, they are worked up using super bulky/bulky yarn so they work fast and thick and warm. The beards are attached using buttons so they can be adjusted to fit the face of the wearer. The beards can also be taken off altogether so the person can wear it as a plain toboggan when it's not as cold out! 

Typically, we only buy presents for the kids in the extended family, but since the adult in this picture was actually the one who requested these hats, I thought a father/son set was in order! I also made a navy hat for my own father to match his work uniforms, but I somehow forgot to get a picture of it. :( I'll work on it though and see what I can get!

And for the girls in the family...

How cute is this!? I used the same toboggan pattern the boys hats were made from and I whipped up the flower real quick without a pattern. I picked this style just because I thought it was cute but I unintentionally and luckily copied the style and color of the hat her American Girl doll wears! :)

And finally for my boyfriends little sister...

...a ruffle scarf! Yes, I finally jumped on the novelty yarn bandwagon I've been avoiding for years. I'm not going to lie, I'm not usually drawn to these novelty style yarns, but I have been looking for a quick and easy knitting project to teach the kids in Sewing Club and another teacher suggested these scarves. They really are pretty and relatively simple to complete, I'll give more of an update when we start them in sewing club!

 I hope your Christmas was merry and bright! :)

~Farm Girl Teacher

Arm Knitting-The 30 minute scarf!

A scarf in 30 minutes? Definitely possible!

My two favorite models, Cole and Joann! :)

While recently browsing knitting videos on YouTube, I came across a technique called Arm Knitting. This method of knitting requires you to use your arms in place of knitting needles. Naturally, this produces a much different, but interesting effect. Well you know me, I HAD to try this for myself... (:

***I really encourage you to attempt to learn this technique yourself, however if arm knitting just isn't for you, email me about purchasing a handmade scarf at thatfarmgirlteacher@gmail.com. If you live locally purchase two skeins or Bulky or Super Bulky yarn (The label will tell you what size the yarn is) at a Walmart, Michaels, Joann's, Target, or Kmart. Give me the yarn and $10 and I will return a finished scarf to you within two days. ***

This video is the one I used for my own scarves. I've viewed several, and I think she has the clearest instructions and shows the technique from multiple camera angles. I also make mine by casting on 12 sts, however the number of rows varied depending on the look I was going for.

I'm sure you'll notice I was inspired by Audra's pretty red scarf...This burgundy yarn is size Super Bulky (6).

 This was my first scarf, it took about an hour because I was confused by the casting on instructions and going slowly as I was still learning.

I love that belt! I think I've had it since middle school :)

The second I made for my mom using size Bulky (5) yarn. The yarn itself is variegated, I didn't change colors or anything fancy.

She wears all these colors all the time, it looks perfect with so many of her outfits!

Of course once I had one, and my mom had one, my sister asked me where hers was...

The scarf is made from two strands of yarn held together, so she chose to use two separate colors, Super Bulky (6) to match a jacket she likes to wear. This technique would also look awesome in school colors!

And because I just couldn't get enough of this arm knitting business....

This one was a bit shorter than the other and could also be worn without being looped.

I knew when I saw this yarn at Michaels exactly what I wanted to do with it...I originally bought it to attempt an arm knit blanket for my mom for her birthday. (This is a real thing, shared by one of the other YouTubers with an arm knit video) Well it was absolutely HORRIBLE. I think the blanket the other girl made was just a 'look pretty.' You couldn't use it at all because it didn't hold a shape, and anytime I actually tried to cover myself with it, my foot went through one of the many giant holes....I wound up ripping out the yarn and making two scarves, a short one (shown above) for me, and a longer one for mom.

The technique is super easy and doesn't really require any knitting knowledge. Hope you enjoyed!

P.S. Looking back over my previous posts, I can't believe I was actually lacking in projects not long ago...I am now drowning in a crafty to do list! Next time I post something like that, please slap me back into reality! :)

~Farm Girl Teacher