Lots has changed in the last month! I'm free from school, leaving me plenty of time to knit until my hands fall off this summer, and I have started a Youtube channel! I recently posted the video about my newest project, what I am casually calling The Dandelion Cardigan. I've been interested in making videos since I was little when I made videos with my sister, and after having Youtube channels on and off in the last 5 years, I picked up the hobby again to showcase my interest in knitting. My inspiration for knitting has always come from amazing knitters making videos about their projects, and I thought I should give it a try. I was, however, faced with a few challenges this time around, having almost lost all of the footage from the whole month I was recording the process for, thanks to a malfunctioning device. I can't comprehend how so many of these creators make such high quality, structured videos. They also manage to knit a million things a month and have so much content to show for it, while I took a month to make a single cardigan. Nonetheless, I'm going to keep making videos, whether anyone watches or not, because it's so cool to have a record of the progress I've made in knitting as I continue to improve.

I'm back to talk about my latest knitting endeavours. I'm aware that it's been a month, but my excuse is that I was subjected to an endless string of isolations from school and was really not feeling so creative... Thankfully, I've gotten back into things, but not before going through mistake after mistake on my projects this past week. I tried making a tank top in the round, but when I added straps (overestimating the width of my shoulders), they were too par apart. My solution: Cut the yarn of the straps to unravel them and restart. To my dismay, the straps were somehow connected to the body in a way I didn't anticipate, and the body itself started to unravel. At this point my patience had run short, so I stuffed it in my dresser and haven't looked at it in a week. On to the next thing, though! I learned cables this morning, which is something I've put off or a while since they look so intimidating, but to my surprise it was SUPER EASY. If you're a beginner and you're daunted by cables, don't worry! I found a very helpful video you can watch and learn from by HookedOnTilly. Check it out in the link below!

It's already April! As much as I hate April Fools Day as an international event, I'm elated to be one step closer to the summer time, where the prospect of a Covid vaccine is more welcome than any vaccine I've ever had to get. Unfortunately, we're not quite there yet, especially here in Canada where we've only had a little over 650k people fully vaccinated. A marker of where we stand currently is the fact that on Tuesday the 23rd of March, I was put into isolation from coming in contact with someone at school. Of course, I was greatly disappointed that my plans for taking walks outside with friends over spring break were foiled. I would have to watch the spring weather arrive outside with no opportunity to enjoy it (even after 2 negative tests, I have to stay inside). The first thing I thought to do was knit. I would have 14 days stuck inside my house, so what better activity to occupy myself with than knitting. I went on to make two new projects in the first week of isolation: A rainbow cardigan and some green knitted shorts. Both of these projects were done without a pattern, so that I could explore the process that goes into creating something without guidelines. I ended up doing it very unprofessionally, but it's a start. The cardigan was a bit small, so it's more of a 'wear-it-around-your-arms' kind of statement. The shorts were loose at the top so I sewed a piece of yarn under the knit part of the waistband. Both these results were at least a lot better than I expected, but next time I'll do some research on techniques. 

A great video popped up in my recommended section about knitting a sweater without a pattern by The Snugglery. It looks like a good place to start!

I've been engaging a lot more on my Instagram account with more knitters and watching different knitting Youtubers. I recently joined @typicalbliss on Instagram/ Tiffany Liew on Youtube's discord server, and I've been able to chat with other knitters to decipher patterns and share our WIPs! I also watch her stream on Twitch and knit with everyone on there, which really makes me feel like knitting has given me a whole new world of talented people to explore and connect with. I've been so inspired recently, and I'm finally at a point where I can knit sweaters and more complicated stuff. That means I can see myself knitting the things these skilled knitters are making, and I really feel like I'm discovering all these different things that I'm capable of! Today, I finished my second sweater ever, a green mock turtleneck sweater, and I learned the mattress stitch to give it a nice finish. Next, I'm starting a WAK kit with a white wraparound sweater using the Bling Bling Yarn. I'm so excited to see where my knitting journey takes me!

I faced my first big knitting screw- up a few days ago, and it was VERY frustrating. I'd never made a mistake on such a big project before, and it was just so upsetting to work so hard on something just to find out you read over the pattern too fast. Thankfully, the mistakes were salvageable, since it only meant a super long sweater and some missing stitches. I had to decide whether to keep going with the same mistakes or unravel two weeks worth of knitting. I've honestly gotten tired of calling things 'Test Projects' and discrediting all that knitting as just a try at something good. Maybe it doesn't have to be a failure, though. I now have something that's unique to me instead of the same as everyone else who tried that pattern. I decided to keep knitting with the same mistakes. If I had decided to frog the project, I wouldn't count that as a failure either, it's just a decision about how you want all your effort to turn out. 

If there's one thing to learn from this, it's that there's no shame in making knitting mistakes. There's always a solution!

I don't know about you, but in Canada where I live, it's still very cold (meaning -30 degree celcuis weather last week). That means I'm still enjoying the frequent warm cup of tea or latte. Being 15, I have also begun to experience a new independance, though, thanks to COVID, not as much as I would have liked. I'm around the city a lot for school, and with this independance comes a raise in allowance, which results in the plentiful indulgence of bags of candy and chips and baked goods and hot drinks. I usually get my more- than- weekly latte from Tim Hortons, so today when I bought Starbucks, I realised how much everyone must be SPENDING. 5 whole dollars for a grande latte. Almost 5 for a measly tall one.  I thought to myself, this is ridiculous! There must be a better way!

Presenting... Making it yourself! There's a recipe I really love from an Instagram post that tastes just like a storebought drink linked below! The recipe is for a plant- based gingerbread latte, but since I live in a household with non- vegan ingredients, I just used those. Respect to you if you don't though! I also love to make a cup of tea and simply add frothed milk and maple syrup to it to make it a latte, if you'd like to wing it! 

I was looking all over the internet for inspiration as to what to knit next a few days ago (I settled on a turtleneck sweater), and I realised that for a beginner, it's pretty darn difficult. Obviously you want to be able to make these intricate things you see on Instagram and you want to chose a pattern to follow, but sometimes it's intimidating seeing all those abbreviations and specific instructions. I settled on a pattern after scouring knitting websites as my first big project following a written pattern. There were a lot of places I checked first, though, that were really good for getting me thinking of what styles and colours and patterns I wanted to explore, so I'm going to list a few places to check:

1. Knitting Youtube videos- I like to find ones of people walking through the process, just to see what they're doing, and get inspired

2. Knitting Instagram- I follow a lot of talented knitters on Instagram, so I find that just scrolling through my feed provides me with a lot to consider (Yarn size, colours, etc.)

3. Pinterest- This one is probably a little obvious, but looking through any knitting related posts you can find is really helpful!

4. Knitting magazines- I love this way of finding new things to make because you can just flip through the pages and check the pattern right away to see if it's doable. There's also something very satisfying about having the physical photos and patterns right there.

A little over a year ago, I tried to make some mittens without a pattern, and only the guidance of my friend. At that point I didn't even understand ribbing and ended up with a glove with only room for 3 fingers. Now, I decided to go for it again and I am happy to say I did it! I was scared to try mittens again for so long but I just followed an easy pattern and found myself totally capable of it. A lot of it is thanks to this giant knitting book I got for Christmas last year called The Knitting Book. I learned lots of new abbreviations and techniques from this book and thought I would share with you in case you did't know about it. Here's a link to the book on Amazon:

Since I've been on a bit of a baking craze during the pandemic, I decided to experiment with my own touches on my favourite recpies (if you don't know, I've been using the Jenna Rae Cakes and Sweet Treats cookbook multiple times a week). Using the vanilla cupcakes recipe, I decided to add some crushed cinnamon hearts for a Valentine's day twist on it, and I'm here to report the results!

When the cupcakes had only been out of the oven for a short while, and I had just iced them, the cinnamon hearts baked inside stuck to the wrapper a LOT, and the ones on top were way too crunchy to easily bite into. The next day, though, the hearts on the inside stopped sticking to the wrapper and the ones on top had softened so that you wouldn't have to worry about breaking a tooth when you enjoyed a cupcake. 

If you want to try this Valentine's twist on vanilla cupcakes (even though it's not February 14th anymore), just find a simple cupcake recipe and crush some cinnamon hearts to put inside and on top. This is one case when it tastes better when it's not fresh out of the oven.

I decided to look on Youtube for some Valentine's hearts to knit, and I found an awesome and EXTREMELY helpful video by StudioKnit. It was easy to follow and I made the cutest heart stuffy in under an hour. This is perfect for a little Valentine's gift, and I learned some new stitches that I hadn't bothered to look up before, like SSK and got a refresher on KFB. Here's a picture of mine, and the tutorial video below!

If you're anything like me, in times of stress, knitting is the best way to relax. Usually the most calming way to knit is just a square of a simple pattern. Here are my favourite ones to do:

Seed Stitch

Even number of sts

Row 1: K1 p1 (rep)

Row 2: P1 k1 (rep

Rep rows 1 and 2

Moss Stitch

Odd number of sts

Row 1: K1 p1 to last stitch k1

Row 2: P1 k1 to last stitch p1

Row 3: same as row 2

Row 4: same as row 1

Rep to make pattern

Garter Stitch

Knit them all! This is the one that takes the least energy for me so I can think about other things and reflect.

Hey guys! I've been using Youtube a lot to improve my knitting, in fact, I followed a video to make my first sweater. Patterns still scare me a bit, so if you're in the same boat, you can look at some of these videos to learn new techniques. These are some of the videos I learned from:

Longtail Cast On for Beginners (I learned this cast on method from the beginner sweater video, but this is a more in depth walk- through if you're having trouble)

How To Cast Off Knitting Stitches In 5 Steps Casting off was the first thing I learned without my friend showing me. I used one of Studio Knit's Youtube videos and got the hang of it quickly.

Simple Knit Sweater - start to finish! Last week, I made my first sweater following this video. I don't think the purchasable pattern is still available (I couldn't find it), but the size she made in the video (medium) worked for me. The body of the sweater is a bit short, so I added 20 rows, which was still almost too short. Feel free to add a few rows to the body and the sleeves. In this video you can learn lots of different things, like longtail cast on, sewing in your ends, sewing pieces together, and using a crochet hook to add necklines or embellishments to your knitting. Very helpful!