That time that I won a Provincial art Award...

Well, okay, so I was 4 months getting to my next post… It’s better than 2 years, right?

Anyway, thought I’d share my Arts and Letters experience from back in April!

Here is a pic of me with my wood-block relief print "Self Portrait as a Garden" at The Rooms Provincial Art Gallery in St. John’s, Newfoundland! I was one of 10 winners in the Senior Visual Arts category in the Newfoundland and Labrador Arts and Letters Awards. The piece was on display at the rooms with the other winners and honorable mentions for 2 weeks. It was really cool to have my work hanging in a real live art gallery! :D

So I sent the piece out in November last year for judging, but they don’t get back to you until February! I was sitting at the Harlow bake-sale table in the crossroads at Grenfell with 2 people from the VA program when I got the call telling me I had won the award, I was so excited! I’ve never won ANYTHING before in my life! The bad thing about it was that they tell you you can’t let it become public knowledge until after the Arts and Letters awards are announced publicly in APRIL! Oh No! 2 months!? But I was allowed to tell my mom and dad and they were so proud! I was bursting with excitement.

So in April we drove out to St. John’s, me, mom, dad and Caleb. It was a really fun trip! We went out from Thursday until Sunday. Mom and I did a tonne of shopping, and I got to hang out with a few friends and we went for lunch with my cousin Maria.

On that Saturday evening we went to the Rooms for the award ceremony. It was really interesting! Some winners in the writing categories performed their works, winners in the music category played their songs, and the second floor gallery was covered in art! The really funny thing was that there were pieces there by some of my friends and acquaintances, but I didn’t even know before seeing them because no one was supposed to tell anyone! Doug Gough won in the Senior Poetry category, and Connor Curtis won in the Junior Musical Composition category. Ruha Thurairatnam and Rene Baldwin got honourable mentions in the Senior Art category and their work was hanging on the walls too! Hooray for knowing such talented and awesome people!

Here is the link to all the 2011 Winners: http://www.tcr.gov.nl.ca/tcr/artsculture/artsandletters/2011/winners_2011.html

And just for fun, here’s a pic of Caleb and my Dad lookin’ all spiffy in front of the big Window in the Rooms that overlooks St. John’s harbour:

:)

Baby shower stuff OR How I made a sweater, and did intarsia all in one week!

My friends Brooke and Pat recently had a baby boy! The baby shower is today so when I got the invite last Tuesday I thought I’d take the opportunity to knit something small and baby-y!

I know when I had my son, Caleb, 8 years ago, that I quickly got sick of all the pastel blue and cutesy-wootsy Winnie-the-Pooh coated baby items I received. Brooke and Pat are a really cool couple, so I want to make something cool for their little one, so I went on the search for patterns.

I found two hat patterns that I thought were pretty neat-o, and I really wanted to try them both, so I decided on two hats, two pairs of matching booties and a hoodie! I made the two hats using the hoodie colour as the contrast colour, so everything is matchy-match and the hats and booties can switch up the look of the hoodie. I chose to knit everything in acrylics, because they’re easier to care for. I remember when my son was a baby, if I couldn’t throw it in the washer, I didn’t want it, plus, lil' baby won't be allergic to acrylics, and they won't make him itchy.

The hoodie pattern can be found at this site: http://fibredaze.blogspot.com/2008/03/baby-hoodie.html

Its the first sweater that I’ve ever completed, so I’m pretty happy with it!

I found a few things in the pattern a little weird, so I changed it ever so slightly to better suit what I wanted, such as adding ribbing to the edges of the hood so that it didn’t roll. I also left out the pocket, cause babies don’t need pockets, holding stuff is what a momma is for!

I didn’t like all the hand-sewing and end-weaving-in that I had to do. In the future I’ll be knitting sweaters in the round, thank-you very much.

By the looks of the finished product I’d say it’s a size 3-6 months, which should be a good size, cause it’s currently COLD here in Newfoundland, and will be until at least June.

Here it is being modeled by Caleb's Cabbage Patch kid.

I used this pattern for the baby booties: http://ooobabyknits.typepad.com/ooo_baby_knits/2005/02/mi...

I highly recommend it! They knit up super fast, and even a beginner shouldn’t have any problem with them.

I used this pattern for the skull and cross-bones hat: http://pippi-ob.livejournal.com/6735.html
It was my first time doing intarsia, and I’m pretty psyched about how it turned out!!!

This is the second hat from this site: http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/skater-baby-brim-hat

I loooooooved knitting this hat! It turned out so well! I’m actually thinking of modifying the design a little to make a bigger version for Caleb, cause it is seriously so cool!