Helm's Deep Inspired Jumper

So anyone who's seen Lord of the Rings will know what this refers to. Helms Deep is nearly lost, the Uruk-Hai are breaking into the keep and Aragorn convinces King Theoden to make one last charge. Then to the background of a powerful wailing soundtrack Theoden says "The Horn of Helm Hammerhand shall sound in the deep... one last time!" Just typing that gave me goosebumps, I am such a nerd :).
Anyway, who wouldn't want a jumper to celebrate this moment?

Here I am in the finished jumper. It's not my most flattering colour but I made it for my twin sister so it doesn't matter what it looks like on me :). That is a joke, kinda, but we're not identical and she does actually look a lot better in green than me.

I used the same basic jumper pattern that I make most of my jumpers with, details can be found here. And just in case anyone wants to make a Helm Hammerhand jumper here is the chart I used, designed by my own fair hand. The bulk of the jumper was knitted in Aran but I didn't want to buy new wool just for one tiny dwarf beard so all the other colours were knitted with doubled over DK yarn. It makes those sections slightly thicker but I don't think it really notices/matters.

Colours needed: Black, Grey, Orange, and Pink

Forget boring things like graphs and spreadsheets, knitting patterns is what excel is truly designed for.
As always let me know if you have any questions.

Forth Eorlingas!

 Note: I know it's summer and not really the time of year for jumpers but firstly, I made this some time ago and have only just got round to writing about it and secondly, I live in England so you're only ever a day or two away from jumper wearing weather.

Lord of the Rings Book Necklace

So I am a terrible person. I should be revising negation and articles and why you don't make the verb agree if it takes avoir in the passé composé unless the object pronoun comes before the auxiliary *groans*. But instead I've watched the whole of season 1 of Teen Wolf (deceptively terrible title, it was actually quite good) and made this...

Just to clarify, I made the book not the Evenstar, that "was a gift". It was very simple, just thick drawing paper, a little bit of cardboard, a biro and some coloured pencils. Of course if you're not artistically inclined you could always print of a mini book cover instead but I think doing it yourself is nicer (and they charge a lot for coloured printing in the library, plus I'd have to walk there).

For the pages I used nine rectangles of cartridge paper, folded in half and glued together, definitely do any drawing or writing you want on them first. For the cover you will need a bigger rectangle of paper folded in three (not equal bits, it should be; almost half the rectangle, fold line, little bit, fold line, almost half the rectangle) with a thin strip of cardboard glued down the middle section. I selotaped the eyepin to the cardboard and then superglued the book pages on top. I also glued the back page to the cover for extra security.

Red Biro over coloured pencil was surprisingly effective.

I filled the pages with a variety of things, the One Ring poem, a slightly awful tiny drawing of Gandalf, a bit of tengwar, normal stuff :) and unlike the Winchester journal, this isn't a mini prop replica so you can write or draw whatever you want inside it. Favourite quotes, a homage to Orlando Bloom's wig, the options are endless.

So you can compare it to the genuine article.

The final thing to do was to attach  a jump ring and put it on the necklace.
And there you have it. Have fun :)
Namaarie.