art equals happy.

A scan from today.

Just some bits and bobs I sent off in the mail to a dear old friend of mine who lives in the redwoods in california. That's a little wonky watercoloured moon, a crocheted doily coaster and a little instax of me and mum we took today. [:
Hopefully this will brighten up her week!
Kimxo
(p.s. my instax is a LomoLca back, so that's why the black vignetting round the edges! <3)

The day I taught Emma how to crochet.

Emma was just a friend of a friend when she came over for the first time, wanting to learn knitting or crochet. It's great when you stumble upon someone who you 'click' with, and feel comfortable around. [: Emma is a sweetie pie, and I started her off on granny squares, because they are super versatile and fun, and satisfying! And after you've made a few, you can sew them together to make a whole range of stuff.When I teach friends, I try to start them off on chunkier wool, because it's easier to handle. She caught on really quickly and since then (december 2010) and now she's made a bunch of stuff, learnt how to knit, purl and even do some colour work. Amazing.Hope you're having a good week! Have you been knitting/crochetting, or do you find it more of a winter thing?? Kimxo

Budapest Labels. :: Camberwell BA

In November 2010, we (part of my class) went to Budapest as part of the BA Illustration course. [: It was rather a lot of fun! I haven't blogged much about it, mainly because I don't really know where to start! haha. So- Let's begin here. With the drinks labels I collected in my sketchbook.I really just fancied some of the beer bottle labels, and there was a rather a good amount of drinking going on by my fellow classmates. [: It was so nice to come into a warm pub/restaurant/bar/cafe and recover from the biting cold.I like how some of them are ripped, and some are in tact. Some have older graphics, some new. Please ignore that horrific drawing of a lady with blue hair up there. haha. I was tired!
Budapest was very inspiring. Do you keep a sketchbook when you travel?
kimxo 

grandma sock. :: Knitting.

This week, Mum has been here helping me get things ready for Renegade. It's been nice. I've also been struggling a bit with the pain in my legs, so it's nice to have some company when I need to rest.I started a new sock this week. It's for my grandma, and it's different to the other things I've been knitting recently. I'm using a ball of wool I bought a while ago that's got beautiful stripes in it, and I've been doing a made-up textured rib that was inspired by something I saw in a sock book.I started it on Monday, and it's going so fast! I'm totally addicted to chasing myself to see what the colours are going to do next. [: I've finished the heel already and working on the foot- i've swapped to smaller needles for the instep, but I'm keeping the rib along the top, so it's a bit more fancy. I hope my Grandma likes them.Negs love cuddling up next to us my big bed, or watching us from the armchair while we sit and knit and listen to stories while we rest. <3

June Sponsoring!

One of the things I love about the blog community is that we are all keen to share our findings and thoughts and beautiful photographs. [: As I was going through all the lovely e-mails that were sent to me by readers asking about guest posting, I found several wonderful blogs I'd never seen before. <3 Thank you to everyone who is working hard on posts, and will be supporting my blog in that way while I'm away next month. Love you all so much!

I've been sponsoring two lovely blogs this month, and if you're coming from there, Hello and Welcome! First off, Scissor Quirk! I love her colours and her illustrations and lovely self. And secondly, Love, Elycia! I love her outfits, her cats, her etsy shop and her cute self!I'll be changing my banner and posting more about the socks that are featured in my ad in July. [:
Have a good weekend!
kimxo 

My Spinning Wheel. :: Knitting.

I know these are just instagram photos, but I haven't done a proper shoot with this lovely lady yet- and I wanted to introduce her. [: She is an Ashford Traditional spinning wheel and I bought her on ebay. It belonged to someone's grandmother but hadn't been used since she'd gotten too old to spin. I was very happy to take over the responsibility of caring for this much-loved contraption.As I'm relatively new to spinning, I wasn't sure if it was the smartest thing to do- plunging straight in and buying a wheel, considering I live in a small flat. But it's wonderful. I use it nearly everyday and not only is it small enough to put in front of my favourite arm chair, but it gives my legs a bit of exercise.Plus, the shape of it is so pleasing. [: A pair of hand carders came with the wheel so I've been having fun experimenting and... I can say for certain now- getting some skeins ready to sell!! :D I'm really excited to offer a bit of handspun wool, because each process is so magical to me! It seems I can never settle on one thing. haha!
Hope you have a wonderful Friday,
kimxo 

I mean, it must be high or low. :: Clobber.

... And nothing to get hung about...Every other weekend or so, Mum comes to spend Friday at my house, and then we journey down to their house, about 1.5 hours out of London on Friday evening. It's one of my favourite days because me and my mum are kind of more like best friends than mother and daughter- and I love spending the weekend in their new house out a but more in the country. They have these HUGE doors in the living room which looks out onto their enclosed garden, which is beautiful- especially with the flowers and the birds. It was raining all of Saturday, so we took these in front of the doors. [: So much light!I scored this shirt from the guys section of a charity shop. [: We always pass loads of them but last weekend was the first time we weren't running late, haha! So we did a little crawl and found some good stuff. I always love looking at the guys shirts, I'd happily live in this sort of outfit everyday!Outfit details:
Shirt: Thifted.
Jeggings: H&M
Socks: Handknitted.
These were the first socks I ever knitted, and they are probably my favourite! haha. I'll do another post about them later, but I totally dig the choice to do mix&match heels and toes. hehe!p.s. Negs comes with us too. [: she doesn't like the car rides much in the box, but will happily sit on my lap if I let her. Simple pleasures. Plus she loves having more room to run around at the folks' and more feet to sleep by.

p.p.s. I rarely wear my hair like this- usually when I'm bumming around & it's hot. [: 

Love you dad!

It's Father's Day for us English folk today, so I'm just popping in to say 'hi' and that we are most probably spending the day drinking tea and playing cards and goofing around.
I'd have to say my Dad is the best, but I'm a bit biased. [:
bug hugs. kxo 

Negative in May.

Having a sweet cat as a companion invariably means lots of pictures of the cutie pie! Here are some snaps (just taken with my iPhone) of our adventures. Negs loves to cuddle up when she's tired or lazy. [:Kimxo

Prick Your Finger peeks!

This month, I've been doing some Art Directing and Photographing for the lovely ladies at Prick Your Finger. [: We're still working hard on it- but here are a few peeks of the updates that they've made already!We love coming up with fun ways to photograph the great yarns, These are some of my photos that are up on the website, of the beautiful but rough carpet yarns (which are for sale online now!!). They are super great for outerwear or sculptural knitting- and totally unique!
If you have a poke around, you might be able to spot a couple of my photographs (the bicycle ones.. hint hint!) that are filtering on there.
I'm so excited to share with you the rest, as they go up (and the outtakes too, when it's all finished!!!)
Have a good weekend, folks!
kimxo