Summer KAL Frogs: the winners

If you have participated in the summer KAL and have posted a picture of your finished frog, see details at this original blog post:  Summer KAL Frogs you are a winner.

You have won a pattern of your choice from my pattern collections. 

To receive the pattern you have few options, send me a message via the contact form on my website

Stana's Critters Etc

or contact me on Ravelry in my group: Stana's Critters Etc

I will either email you the pattern or gift it to you if you prefer to have it in your Ravelry library.

I hope that you all had some fun creating these little critters. I have enjoyed seeing the pictures.

The rest of this month is not happening anything organized. At the moment I am still learning all about my new website and getting ready for my first newsletter, which should be coming out at the beginning of next month, to sign up for it go to my website:

Stana's Critters Etc

There are so many exciting new patterns that will be coming out sometime over the next few months, either published by third parties or as an independent work, and I hope that you will like them when they will be available. In the meantime enjoy the rest of the summer (in the Northern Hemisphere) or winter (if you are in the Southern Hemisphere) and keep on crafting, one stitch at time. 

Thank you for visiting and reading.

Summer KAL - Frogs

 

This month I am hosting a KAL with a theme of frogs. 

If you make any frog based on one of my frog themed knitting patterns like

Chadwick and Igor

Fred

Frog Bag

Frog Mask

Toadie

and post a photo either on Ravelry in the thread in my group Stana's Critters Etc or on Instagram and tag me with @stanascrittersetc or @stanascritters or use hashtag #stanascrittersetc or #stanascritters you will be eligible to participate in a giveaway with prizes to win (patterns, e-books). 

Details for the giveaway:

1. Knit a frog and post a picture and tag me. 

2. Deadline for the post July 31st 2021

3. Winners will be announced here on my blog.

Have fun knitting.

Around the World Stitch -a-long and some other Work in progress.

 

I took this picture the last time I was traveling by airplane. It has been in the summer of 2019 and I was returning home from visiting my family in Europe. It seems like a lifetime ago. I do not know if and when I will be able to visit my mom again. I hope that it will be this year, but who knows what is still ahead of us. I have realized that these days I travel a lot in my dreams. I am visiting places that are close to my heart.

 

Somehow I have stumbled upon an event named Around the world stitch-a-long. It is an independent knitwear designers knit a long and it is happening all around the world. I am a bit late talking about it here as the fun already started on February 15th. But the whole thing is running through March 28th so there is still plenty of time to participate and win some prizes.

The event is filled with knitting, crocheting, games, and variety of prizes. In the group on Ravelry the chat is filled with traditions, recipes and chat with people from all around the world. 

Here is the link to the group on Ravelry: Around the World Stitch-a-long   

and here is the link to the big bundle of participating designers also from all around the world: Participating designers 

also the event is hosted on Instagram Around the World SAL

One of the participating designers and organizers is Ranee Mueller from Arabian Knits. I had a pleasure get to know her a bit through this Interview with a designer  I did two years ago. 

Join us for this fun event and learn about the other participating designers. In a way it's like traveling to far away places and learn something about people from those different places. 

 In December 2020, after I published Paw Print Heart knitting pattern I announced that for every purchased pattern in the month of December I will donate $1 to our local animal shelter. In December I have sold  9 patterns for the Paw Print Heart. I decided to donate $1 for all of my patterns sold in December. That was 35 patterns and therefore $35. I have rounded that up to $50 and made a check and dropped it at the local animal shelter. 

In December I was approached by a Canadian yarn website and asked if they can sell my knitting pattern for Rockefeller, the owl on their website. 

Here is the link to the pattern on the Canadian Yarn website: Link here

 

Thank you for reading and visiting. 

Keep on knitting, one stitch at time.....

 

Knitting Pattern for Meg and School of Fish

 With a bit of unexpected delays Meg, the megalodon shark is in the hands of its recipient. For a privacy reason I will not post the picture of the recipient but let me tell you that Meg is bigger than its owner. 

Meg, the megalodon shark is about 56" (142 cm) long. 

In the picture above she is trying to snack on one of our wooden stools. But then she changed her mind and went after the school of fish.

The knitting pattern is a whimsical play on a food chain. Fish eats fish, eats another fish, and another and they all end up eaten by the ultimate predator Meg, the megalodon fish. 

The pattern is available to purchase in my Ravelry store:

Stana's Critters Etc

or you can purchase it by clicking on this button:

Soon the pattern will be also available on Lovecraft website in my Stana's Critters Etc, and in my Stana's Critters Etc PayHip store

In the meantime you can join our KAL in my Ravelry group and you can purchase the pattern for $1 until the end of Sunday, September 6th Eastern US Time Zone when using the coupon code Meg 

After that the  price will go up by $1 every 24 hours until it reach the full price. 

Thank you for visiting.

Work in progress

 In my last blog post I wrote about my current knitting project, which I named "Food Chain". The name is probably going to change when I create the final pattern, which I really hope will be rather sooner than later. But life tends to happen and plans get change.

Last week we lost power for 6 days. I tend to refer to those days as camping in our house, as it does remind me of the times when we would go on camping adventures with no running water, no electricity, no fridge and no cooked meals. I have to say I enjoyed camping as a child, but as an adult I got used to the idea of having a flushing toilet and ability to wash my hands or even have a hot shower at home. 

In the days without electricity I had more time to knit and I have made quite a progress on the final "fish" in my "Food Chain". I started with an idea and a sketch, and an older knitting pattern of mine for Shirley, the shark. 

Before we lost electricity I have made the inside of the mouth and teeth. I started to work on the body, not knowing how big it will be. 

The picture above is from the day of the storm, before we lost electricity.

As the days without electricity continued I made quite a progress.

Then at some point I realized that I have actually created a megalodon shark, in comparison with the other fish in the food chain. I am almost finished with the knitting, even though I had to frog and reknit the tail and dorsal fin as I didn't like the size and shaping of the first attempts. Since we have electricity I switched on my computer and started to write the pattern. The first part is much easier as the fish were previously published in two of my patterns (see the links bellow), but the megalodon shark has to be retyped from my hand written notebook, and edited. That part will take a bit longer. 

Odie, the sea otter (the smallest fish)

One fish, two fish, three fish (the other three fish)

This food chain is going to be our KAL for the next few weeks/months. I opened the thread in my group on Ravelry if you are there please join us. Otherwise you can always share pictures on Instagram  by adding the hashtag #stanascritters or #stanascrittersetc  

Just so you can see how big the megalodon shark is turning out to be, here is a picture of our 75 pounds (34 kilograms) T-Bone with the shark. The tail is still missing in this picture.

Thank you for visiting, 

Summer 2020

As the pandemic continues its rampage through the world I am trying to adjust to what is happening around me in the real world and online as well. 

Under a normal circumstances I would be visiting my mom and friends in Europe. I would be sitting on my mom's balcony and knit, while the two of us would be talking. I would call my friends from the time I lived in Europe. We would get together and sit on a sidewalk in one of those little cafés, catching up on our lives. 

I miss that this year. 

But, whenever I am away I wonder what it would be like to spend the summer at home. This year is the year I can experience that. I am spending my summer at home. I have the time to watch my garden grow. I get to enjoy fresh berries and incorporate vegetables from our garden into our meals. It is exciting to sneak in a kale and create meatballs that turns green and cause raised eyebrows and musings about "What is wrong with those meatballs?", "Why are they green?". 

And a huge bonus is that I get to talk to my mom on daily basis on Skype. I love it. I know it is not as seeing her in person, but it is a joy to be able to talk to her. 

Aside from working on few knitting patterns that will be published in the future by a third party I also get to work on some fun knitting projects. 

Remember my pattern for One fish, two fish, three fish?

Blog post about it

I am revisiting the pattern and have fun with creating more fish and play with the idea of a food chain and who gets to eat who. I will be posting an updated pattern for this fun food chain sometime next week or so and if you are on Ravelry and a member of my group you can join the Knit-a-long hosted in my group. Otherwise the pattern will be available on Lovecraft, Ravelry. 

Recently I have opened a store on Payhip where you can purchase some of my patterns. I am slowly adding more patterns to that store, so check it out. Payhip store

Thank you for visiting.

Leonard and Lola, toy mystery KAL

As I mentioned in my previous post, the new toy mystery KAL is about to start.

Leonard and Lola

Leonard and Lola is the new toy mystery KAL, starting with clue one this week. The pattern will be released in four clues with the final pattern available June 9th.
Pictured is the yarn I used for Leonard. I have used Knitpicks Palette, fingering yarn held double. I will be using slightly different yarn (worsted Cascade 220 Superwash) for Lola. I have already knitted another sample about a year ago for a colleague from work. For her sample I used some random worsted weight yarn from my stash, held double to make the toy a bit larger.

More details and the pattern to download is here:
Leonard and Lola

Don't forget to join my group on Ravelry where you can find the coupon code and where you can participate in posting the work in progress pictures and chat with fellow knitters.
Stana's Critters Etc group

In my small stay at home world I continued on my baking adventures path. I baked my tried and successful recipes, some comfort food, and I tried few new thing. After many years of being asked to try and make the sourdough bread I have gone down the rabbit hole of sourdough baking. It is a challenge and I am not sure how successful I have been. I followed the book The Bread Baker's Apprentice  by Peter Reinhart and started my sourdough adventure last Monday morning with the Day one for Seed Culture, I continued with the Barm and yesterday evening we had the first sourdough bread. The sourdough bread didn't rise as much as my usual bread I bake using the commercial yeast, but it tasted good. I guess I just have to continue and I am sure with time and practice the bread will be better and better. Just like with knitting. My first attempts were so much different from what I am knitting these days. And it also took practice and perseverance.

Baking Week VII

 In my collage picture are: My first sourdough breads, Linzer cookies, Bread, Bread (I baked another), Focaccia (This time I added few thing on top to make it more interesting), Bundt Cake, Tortillas (my first time making them from scratch, they taste different from the store bought tortillas, and they were harder to use for Fajitas, but still tasted good), Ginger Bread (my mom's recipe, fast, easy and good tasting), and my Monday adventure of starting the sourdough seed culture, my bread (I baked it three times this week) and our comfort food of Chocolate Brownies (it's so good to bite into a warm, and soft chocolate brownie).

This week proved to be challenging for our garden. Last week we planted two Pear trees, Blueberry, Currant, and Raspberry bushes, and then this weekend we had a freezing temperatures overnight and it snowed. We will not know if the trees will make it through this temperature change and produce some fruit or not until late in the season.

Pear tree bloom

We also had our first crop of the season. We seeded the radishes early in March, in our new cold frame, and now they are maturing, and are ready to be picked and eaten.

Radishes

Yesterday, on my walk with our dog through the neighborhood I looked up and saw for a brief moment this wonderful heart shaped cloud.

Heart shaped cloud

I see this as a sign of hope, that we as humans will make it through this pandemic and learn to be better and kinder to each other and to the Earth especially.

Thank you for visiting.

Work in progress...

Fox Pillow

Over the past week I have been taking pictures of my dog with the Fox pillow. Apparently it is his favorite pillow to sleep on.  It is quite entertaining to watch him sleep. And yeas I have been stuck in the house for about a month, so my entertainment is rather limited.....but I am not complaining. We are still alive, and breathing. Life is good.

Fox Pillow 

I also baked and cooked a lot. Normally I don't have that much time to cook or bake, but life is rather strange these days and I do enjoy the process of baking, or cooking. Though I dislike to clean up all those dishes afterwards. Pictured here are: Apple Strudel, Carrot Cake (we have a birthday to celebrate), potato pancakes, cinnamon buns with maple frosting, bread, Bundt cake, my mom's version of crepes, bread (I baked it twice this week).

week of baking III

Also, there is a storm coming our way and we might loose power and internet for few days. I guess we might be camping at home for our spring break.  If we loose the power I will not be able to update the second clue on time, therefore I have updated the pattern earlier.
For a moment we already lost the power. It came back, but who knows for how long. Stay safe, and have fun knitting.

T-Bone working on clue 1 :)

Thank you for visiting.

Toy Mystery KAL Cherie, Stella, or Brooke

Cherie, Stella, or Brooke

Life is strange these days. I hope that this fun toy mystery KAL will give you something else to think about and occupy your hands and mind.
Join us for this fun mystery KAL in my group on Ravelry
Stana's Critters etc

The pattern will be released in three parts, on these dates:
April 8th - first clue
April 15th - second clue
April 22nd - third clue
April 29th - final pattern.

Here is the link to the pattern:

Cherie, Stella, or Brooke

To get the pattern for free, join my group on Ravelry, and use the coupon code Hope during the checkout.  The code is valid during the mystery KAL.

Have fun knitting.

In my last blog post I have posted a collage picture of my baking through this time of distress. I have continued this week with more baking, as always some baking adventures were more successful than others.

Pictured are: Blueberry-lemon bread, rohliky (Czech bread rolls), Herb- cheddar scones, Strudel with cheese filling, corn bread, bread, brownies, apple strudel.
I am not sure what I will bake next week....the options are endless

Life as a work in progress

Usually I try to keep posts on this blog about knitting. Occasionally I write about life.

Scraptastic Cowl

This is one of those posts. I am not a native English speaker. I learned the language at school, and even now so many years after I moved across the ocean to be with the man I fell in love, I still make mistakes when speaking, or writing. I do apologize for them. I try my best.

Over the years I wrote few blog posts about life events, if you wish to explore them read some of them here:
Life tag
Portfolio
Gardening
Why I make

A friend of mine was diagnosed with cancer. This is devastating news to hear. What is even more devastating is the fact that she will be paying for some of her medical bills and she needs to still pay her living bills as well. She has set up a fundraiser to raise money to help her go through this difficult time of her life. I decided to donated all of the money I made from selling my knitting patterns during the month of February. I was hoping for a good month, so I would be able to give her a lot. Unfortunately it has been an average month, see the picture bellow what I have actually made during the month of February.

I hope that by sharing her fundraising page here might bring her some more money to help her through this.
Here is the link to her
Go Fund me page

In my knitting life things are improving. My elbow is much better and I can knit again. I try to work on the Scraptastic Pillow, which apparently is tested by my dog for comfort and usability, even unfinished.

Scraptastic Pillow

Over in my group on Ravelry we have the March KAL, working on Odie, the sea otter. You can join us for the fun.

Odie, the sea otter

Thank you for visiting and reading.

Odie, the sea otter

Odie

In my group on Ravelry Stana's critters etc we always have some sort of KAL. It may be a toy mystery KAL, toy KAL, or technique KAL. Sometimes there is a prize to win, sometimes it is just for the fun of knitting or crocheting.
In November during our Food KAL I offered a prize for the random winner to pick my next toy design. The winner gave me few ideas and then my elbow got injured and I couldn't knit for some time.
Finally after weeks of resting, physical therapy, and such I am back to knitting again.
I kept thinking about the ideas and went back and forth. I made some sketches, and then last weekend I picked up some yarn and started to knit.
The best part of the process is seeing the toy emerge. I usually send pictures to my friends during the work in progress and ask them what they think the toy is. Odie proved to be a challenging one.
The answers were very different.
In any case Odie is a sea otter, and she (or he) needed to have a swim trunk (kind of old fashionable), and of course she (he) needed a snack... a fish.
I will spend next few days typing up the pattern and editing and make it ready to post it on Ravelry for our March KAL.
Join us for the fun.

The link to the pattern:



In the meantime here are some pictures of my work in progress over the past week:

Odie

Odie with T-Bone

Odie with swim trunks

Odie with swim trunks and a fish

Thank you for visiting