Rambling Roses Design

I cannot believe I haven’t shared details of this finished sweater yet! I guess since it’s been put away with the rest of our winter stuff, it was out-of-sight out-of-mind.

This pattern is Twigs and Willows from Alana Dakos’ book Botanical Knits. I really enjoyed knitting the yoke on this sweater with the cabled leaves and vine motif. The pattern for the yoke is written as well as charted. For this garment, I used Cascade 220 in a heathered green.

If you’ve been following my blog a while, you know that as much as I love seamless knits, I really don’t mind seaming sweater pieces together while finishing. Be warned that this is a seamed pattern.

The sweater is slightly cropped with an extra long ribbed bottom edge. I love how the pattern incorporates waist shaping into the ribbed hem.

The bulk of this cardigan is done in plain stockinette, so, it’s a relatively quick knit (says she who took almost a year from cast on to blog post, hah!)

Twigs and Willows (Ravelry)
Pattern: Twigs and Willows by Alana Dakos published in Botanical Knits
Yarn: Cascade 220 Heathers in colorway Turtle
Needles: Sizes US 6, 7 / 4, 4.5 mm

I’ve got a tweedy shawl on the needles even though it’s the wrong season to be knitting something this warm and wooly! I will never learn!!

Posted by Preeti & filed under Cardigans, Finished Knits. This post has 8 comments.

Ah, June’s here already. As cliché as it sounds, where has the time gone!! Last month was busy and this month is promising to be even more so. Vineet and I went away for a few days to San Francisco. It was wonderful and we loved the city.

The sights were amazing and both of us being foodies, we thoroughly enjoyed many culinary delights. So. Much. Eating!!! San Francisco is all hills, most of them face-plant steep!

Look at the street above the bridge… yeah, steep!!

The smelly but adorable residents of Pier 39 🙂

My FitBit recorded over achiever step counts each day, woot, woot! Until… I stubbed my toe on an uneven flagstone. It hurt a bit but wasn’t too bad. Then, I stubbed it again. Ouch! That hurt, big time!! Serves me right for wearing my Chucks instead of sensible walking shoes!

This happened on day 3 of our vacation and we had two more days to go. I spent the next couple days popping Advil and saying, “aw, aw, aw!” the whole time. That didn’t stop us from continuing to explore the city. Even walking down Lombard Street!

We wanted to bike across The Golden Gate Bridge. However, better judgement prevailed and we opted to take the shuttle instead… good idea!

By the time we got back home to Vancouver, my entire foot looked like it was stung by a bee and hurt like the dickens.

Off to the doctor I went and my fears were confirmed – I had broken my toe!!! But you know how it is with toes, only time can heal the break. No cast or crutches (which I am quite thankful for). Plenty of ice and rest was the only remedy. I’m still hobbling about but definitely on the road to recovery.

Memories of San Fran will always make me chuckle and next time we go, we will bring warm jackets :: man, is it ever windy and cold there. Also, I’ll most definitely be wearing sensible shoes 😉

Posted by Preeti & filed under Travel. This post has 4 comments.

I’ve got a finished sweater for show-and-tell today! This sweater turned out pretty cute and I think that the wearer is uber cute! Of course, I’m the biased mama 😉

With this sweater, I knit a few rows here and there until I was on the last sleeve and I could taste finishing victory! It took about 6 months to complete and another few weeks to find the ribbon for the front closure. I got it all done in time for Mother’s Day when we gals dressed up to go to brunch 🙂

The sweater is quite girly with the ruffled edges, which on a 6-year-old is fine. If I were to upsize it for an older girl, I would skip the ruffled sleeve edges and opt for a simple rib instead.

The pattern is called Saffron and is part of the Spice Girls series. It is well written in true Elena fashion with plenty of tips and notes. The sizes run from 12 months all the way up to 18 years. The front closure can be customized, the pattern provides a couple of options to do that.

This sweater pattern can be knitted as a shrug or as a longer cardigan with sleeve length altered accordingly. All in all, Saffron is great value for your money.

I used a stash staple :: Tosh DK and my only modification was that I knit two extra rounds on all the ruffled edges. As always, I went up a needle size throughout. For this garment, I knit the size 6-7.

This sweater has turned out to be Kiki’s favorite item that I’ve knit for her so far. She had a great time posing so, I’ll let the pictures do the talking 🙂

Saffron (Ravelry)
Pattern: Saffron by Elena Nodel
Yarn: Tosh DK in colorway Kelp
Needles: Sizes US 4, 6, 7 / 3.5, 4, 4.5 mm

Then she announced… “Now, I’m done!”

Posted by Preeti & filed under Cardigans, Finished Knits, Kids. This post has 9 comments.

I’ve been pretty unwell for over a week now and it hasn’t been fun. I think I’m finally getting over it and almost feel like myself again! With the whole icky, sicky bug thing, I was prescribed a course of antibiotics. And with that, I had almost every side effect that was listed in the fine print. Yes, groan 🙁

I usually crave chicken soup when I’m sick which I think is a comfort thing. This time, with it being so warm, I wanted cool and tart.

Tart?? I remember the last time I craved tart… mini freak out!! No, I’m not pregnant. Freak out ended, whew!

I blitzed my way through mealtimes with smoothies galore and felt so much better and totally energized.

This one in particular looked so pretty in the jar, that I had to take pictures 🙂 A simple strawberry smoothie is always a winner.

A trick I’ve learned is to freeze bananas before they turn mushy. So, when you’re ready to make your smoothie, just slice your banana in half, the peel comes off pretty easy. Throw it into your blender with the other ingredients and you won’t need ice!

Strawberry Banana Smoothie

1 cup strawberries
1 frozen banana
1/2 cup greek yogurt
1/2 cup milk (I used 2%)
1 tablespoon chia seeds

In a blender, combine all of the ingredients and blend until smooth and creamy. Pour into a glass and top with sliced strawberries.

Cool and Tart… done and done ♡

Posted by Preeti & filed under Food, Rambling. This post has 5 comments.

I’m sure all of us remembers the story of The Princess and the Pea from when we were growing up. I have to confess that I sulk when it comes to sleeping on a lumpy mattress, hotel mattresses that are too soft can feel lumpy sometimes! Vineet always laughs and says that I’m being such a diva, I just chalk it up to old age 😉

On our recent mama-son expedition to Granville Island, I came across a lovely little fabric store called The Cloth Shop. The store is tucked into a corner of the island and filled to the brim with bolts of bright, fun prints and colors – totally my kinda scene! Sometimes this sort of thing can be so difficult because making a choice becomes impossible. That’s when I saw this panel, it was the princess and the pea printed onto fabric*.

The print had colorful mattresses piled high and a bright green pea at the bottom! Of course, there was the princess and her impressive collection of crowns 🙂 The store had a sample of a little girl’s pillowcase using this fabric, cute! I had other plans though.

My 6-year-old, Kiki, loves to read and so we’re at the library a couple times a week. I knew that this panel would be perfect if I used it to make her a book bag.

I used fusible interfacing to give the bag some structure which was a good thing especially for the front pocket. However, that meant that the pocket kept flopping open. Out came the hammer. With a few good whacks to fix a pearl snap fastener into place, the bag was good to go.

Oh yeah, I ran out of fabric for the handles. I remember seeing a different type of handle somewhere on Pinterest (or Flickr?) long loop – short loop – loop them together and voila!

We haven’t filled it here, but this bag is roomy enough to carry an armload of books!

When she took her book bag to the library for the first time, even though she’s read the book before, she insisted on checking out The Princess and the Pea. Quite appropriate!

My favorite fairytale that I loved reading over and over was, Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Do you have a favorite?

* This print is from the Quiet Time collection by Tamara Kate for Michael Miller fabrics.

Posted by Preeti & filed under Bags, Fabric, Kids, Sewing, Sewn Finishes. This post has 6 comments.

We’ve just had the hottest day of the year (so far) pass us by. However, today is murky and wet… April showers bring spring flowers and all that jazz, so I’m okay! That hot day just screamed road trip so we decided that it would be the best day to make the short drive south into Washington state and visit the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival. Only thing is that every Pacific Northwesterner had the same idea as us, hah! We realized this when we got off the interstate and onto the Tulip Route, too late to turn around! Anyways… the miles and miles of tulips we saw that day made up for all of the traffic woes and then some!!

Jaw dropping gorgeousness!

The kids didn’t whine once when I asked them repeatedly to say cheese, I’ll take that as a bonus!

They actually had a good time 🙂

About the hat… I took my Wellington hat along knowing that there would be fantastic photo ops. I didn’t account for the heatwave though 😉

This hat uses organically grown cotton yarn dyed by my friend Heidi. She creates magic dyeing a range of vegan yarns in gorgeous colors! The pattern is by the talented Jane Richmond. I bought this pattern and the yarn at Knit City and immediately knew that this would be a perfect marriage.

Of course, I finished knitting this hat when the cold weather had long passed, isn’t that always the case?

The stitch pattern is a lovely, textured honeycomb but there’s no need to use a cable needle… win!

I love the crown on this hat, lots of drama happening there.

For a bit of slouch on this hat, I knit the body longer than the beanie style original.

Wellington (Ravelry)
Pattern: Wellington by Jane Richmond
Yarn: Vegan Yarn Alnilam Worsted in colorway Thrift Shop
Needles: Sizes US 7 / 4.5 mm

Posted by Preeti & filed under Family, Finished Knits, Hats. This post has 8 comments.

When a collection of things are strung together and hung up, it always creates a festive mood. After bunny one and bunny two, I decided that we needed some more festivity and this time I was going for quick.

So, I sewed some buntings! Bunting… such a funny word 🙂

For this bunting (hehe!), I used scrap bits of patterned fabric for the fronts and backed them with a large red and white dot.

Sewn onto a length of ribbon and up this went in Kiki’s room.

For the larger, even quicker version, I used a bigger template and a few charm squares. I left the edges raw on these and didn’t back them with a contrasting fabric either.

I think I’ll hang this above the fireplace in our family room… after she’s done twirling with it, of course!

I have to add that I finished both of these in under an hour with the help of my triangle-sorting assistant who is home from school today. The plumbing at her elementary school is shot and so while they get that fixed, 500 kids are home today with moms scrambling to shuffle schedules!!

Now that we’re set with festive decorations, all we need are some good tunes and maybe some confetti 😉

Posted by Preeti & filed under Sewing, Sewn Finishes. This post has 7 comments.

Time to put away the warm woolies and dig out the gardening tools, spring is here! I’ve made several trips to the garden center this past week. It’s time to brighten things up and usher in some color!

Spring is indoors too with this cute knitted bunny that I recently finished.

It took me a whole day of seaming and stuffing all of the little bunny pieces. I should have followed the instructions and stuffed and seamed as I went along with the knitting. Lesson learned!

Like my first knitted bunny, this one too is knit entirely out of stash bits and pieces.

I used leftover Tosh Pashmina from my Soay cardigan to knit the face, ears and limbs and it does make her look quite different from her BFF. Less fuzzy but just as adorable!

I knit the little dress in the round and so I have a “jog” up the back where the stripes meet. Thankfully, she’s not a vain bunny and so she’s cool with it 😉

That cute little button was just asking to be a part of this dress! It’s an old one from my button stash. Button stashbusting too? Whoa!

Pattern details…

Spring Bunny (Ravelry)
Pattern: Bunny girl in a dotty dress by Julie Williams
Yarn: Stash
Needles: Sizes US 2.5 / 3 mm

Have a lovely, springy weekend all 🙂

Posted by Preeti & filed under Finished Knits, Rambling, Stashbusting, Toys. This post has 8 comments.

This post brought to you via iPhoneography 🙂

The kids have been on spring break the past two weeks, so it’s been a wonderful time of relaxing and sleeping in 🙂 Monday, is back to school for one last term which is always the busiest one. This lull before the storm was nice! We went on a mini vacation over the weekend, back to the Okanagan Valley.

The landscape was such a contrast to how we remember it from the summer. Don’t be fooled by that drab exterior, there’s plenty happening below the surface with the orchards and vineyards getting ready to burst into bloom.

Out here by the coast, the early plum blossoms are already displaying their splendor.

Prithvi and I decided that we would be tourists for a day in our city, well not exactly in suburbia where we live, but right downtown. It was so much fun!

First, we took the cute little Aquabus across False Creek to Granville Island.

We walked around the Public Market and worked up quite an appetite for a huge plate of fish and chips.

With happy bellies we visited the various little artisan stores around the island.

One of our favorite stores was Make with its quirky items made using recycled materials. Another one we liked was Ten Thousand Villages. All that walking and browsing made us peckish for some sweet treats so back into the market we went.

So many delicious choices!

It was time to take the Aquabus back and wander down to the Vancouver Art Gallery with a quick detour to the MAC store 😉 Art expedition done, we each grabbed a cup of brew and headed down Robson Street for people-watching, selfie-clicking and window shopping. The light was beginning to fade with the setting sun and of course, we were hungry again, hah! We decided to end the day with dinner at one of our favorite Malaysian restaurants, Banana Leaf.

It was so lovely to spend the day with my son, creating great memories that we will always remember!

#touristinmytown, you’ve got to try it!

Posted by Preeti & filed under Canada, Family, Food, Rambling, Travel, Vacation. This post has 5 comments.

I’ve heard it said that when you don’t know what to blog about, blog anyway. So, here I am blogging anyway 🙂

I’m so thrilled with this kitchen adventure. I found a recipe in an old magazine for lemon curd cheesecake. Just reading the recipe made me drool and so I just had to make it. I went on the hunt for lemon curd and didn’t find any at the store. I did find Ina Garten’s recipe for homemade lemon curd, yummy! The only hard part about making this is the whisking. I convinced Vineet to help me whisk and so we took turns, him whisking and me dunk tasting and then switching roles 🙂

This recipe is a keeper. Even for eating straight out of the dish while it’s cooling (guilty as charged!) or smeared onto warm scones, mmm. Getting back to my cheesecake, I’ve baked it and left it to set in the fridge. I can’t tell you how tempted I’ve been to attack this deliciousness with a spoon. If I give in to temptation, I think the family will notice a big gaping hole in the middle. So, I must resist!

Oh, oh I have to show you what I made a few days ago. But you know me, there’s always a back story…

I have this little pouch with needles, tiny scissors, a tape measure and other bits and bobs. As much as I tried to contain the needles within the plastic-disc-holder-thingy, I would always have a few strays drop out. Every time I reached into the bag I would get stabbed by one of those errant needles. I got to thinking that there must be a better way to contain these without having to use strong language before I used them each time.

What do you know… needlebooks are meant for this very purpose! I looked for a tutorial and found tons, each needlebook was cuter than the next.

I had a hard time deciding but I picked this one because the instructions were very clear and Amy’s stuff is always so charming and adorable.

Here’s my Inspired by Nanacompany Needlebook.

Now all of my needles have a place and there are no more nasty surprises lurking in my pouch. I love my little needlebook, everything that’s scaled down in size is always so much cuter 🙂

Posted by Preeti & filed under Food, Rambling, Sewing, Sewn Finishes. This post has 6 comments.

Twigs And Willows

San Francisco

Saffron In Kelp

Blush And Cream

The Princess And The Pea

Tulips And A Hat

Festive Buntings

Spring Bunny

#touristinmytown

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