Needles & hooks

And now for something a little different…

A friend sent me this link of knitting art. It’s both cartoonish and unsettling. Kind of like Itchy and Scratchy from The Simpsons.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Me, I’m still giggling.

Comments: 5 — Posted under: Almost Random

Microfocus/Macrovision

When you’re actively knitting a project, you’re often just focused on the stitches right in front of you. Do you have to knit? Do you have to purl? Are you making a cable? What does the chart say? How many stitches did you do in this section?

So, sometimes, it’s quite a surprise to take a step back and look at the fabric you’re creating.

Tonight I got to the point where I’m working the sleeve caps for Zig Zag. I moved them to separate needles to work indepedently because magic loop doesn’t work so well for knitting two items flat. And I finished one off. And that’s when I took a really good look at it.

Look at the pretty zig zag eyelets. Look at those nice even cables. Wow, this is going to be a neat sweater.

Unfortunately, that observation was quickly followed by “Hey, wait, that cable’s twisted wrong a few rows back”. 10 minutes to unravel those stitches and fix it. Then “Oh no, a zig zag eyelet is misplaced 30 rows back” (if you look really closely at the bottom of the center zig zag, you can see it). *sigh* I’ll have to fix that tomorrow. Then, “Oh crap! Two eyelets are misplaced in separate columns about 2/3s down the sleeve!”. A few moments of wondering whether I should really bother to fix it were quickly follwed by knowing that every time I wore it, I would stare at my sleeves and feel annoyed. I guess some quality time with the crochet hook is in my future.

Until then, I’m going to pet my purple Art Yarns Merino a little more. *whimper*

Comments: 0 — Posted under: Zig Zag, Knitting

You may have noticed, I have a thing about purple

Admitting it is the first step. Buying more yarn is the second.

I read about Art Yarns Handpaint Stripes early last week and took a look around for some swatches. Much like my immediate love for Mermaid, I saw color 138 and wanted it. I justified satisfying my lust by deciding that it would be a good yarn to test out my pattern for the yet-to-be-named twisty scarf I designed.

Today, this arrived:

It’s just as gorgeous as it was on the sales page. And it’s very, very soft. I keep petting it. And I keep looking at it and thinking that it’s pretty enough just as it is. Part of me just wants to keep the skein around and never make anything out of it. Part of me wants to buy a lot more and make all of my wardrobe out of it.

I’m going to be patient. I’ll keep working on Zig Zag. I might let myself wind it into a ball in a day or so. And then I’ll try to distract myself with Mermaid. Really.

Comments: 2 — Posted under: Knitting

Ta-Da!

I have a new site design. That was one of my primary goals when choosing WordPress, and I spent all evening yesterday tweaking things just right. Of course, I still have to go through and update all of my static pages (patterns and project notes) to match, but it’s getting there. So come take a look.

In knitting news, I put an inch or so more on the sleeves for Zig Zag. Making steady progress there.

As for Mermaid, I’m working on the spreadsheet that will list the pattern directions row-by-row. I’m past the first armhole gusset, which was the most challenging what with decreasing and short rows and trying to match the stitch count. I think I’ll try to get to the middle of the back and then make it available for people as a work in progress. Once I get that finished, I’ll do some calculations and see what size I want to make. Clearly, the Large will be too large, but I’m starting to worry about the Medium as well.

Don’t forget about the Name That Scarf Contest!

Comments: 1 — Posted under: Knitting, Almost Random

Name That Scarf Contest

I’m writing up the pattern for this scarf and I need a name:

So I’m turning to all of you.

E-mail me your suggestions by midnight, Feb 2. If I choose your name, you will get to choose from the fabulous yarn prizes below. And to encourage the non-fiberphiles who read my blog, if I choose your name and you don’t want yarn, I’ll send you chocolate instead. As a second prize, I’ll draw a name from everyone who enters and they will get the remaining yarn.

The Prizes:

1 ball of Opal Mosaik Sock Yarn in purples. One ball is enough to make a pair of socks or gloves:

2 balls of Blue Sky Alpaca, sportweight, 120yds/ball in bright royal blue (perhaps not quite as bright as the photo). Very soft. The two balls are different dye lots, but they look identical to me under my OttLite:

People, put your thinking caps on!

Comments: 9 — Posted under: Knitting, Almost Random

Twists, turns, zigs, zags, charts

My hats and scarf were well-received by my niece. I received many baby kisses all weekend. And apparently, little-kid-length scarves are hard to find. Manufacturers are afraid of strangling liability or something. So I will in fact write up the scarf pattern, I just have to figure out what to call it. I think I will ask all of you for help with that and offer an incentive. I have to dig through my stash to figure out what, so just start thinking. As food for thought, here’s some pictures of Gracie in her new winter fashions:

I also started thinking about the logistics of Mermaid. I bought some double points and I have reclaimed my size 2 40″ Addis. Swatching will start soon. While in the car this weekend, I started reading through the pattern to see what was ahead of me and to figure out what size I want to make. And I discovered that it’s very densely written, referring back to previous sections and including lots of “AT THE SAME TIME”s and very few stitch counts as sanity checks. So I’m working on writing out line-by-line directions in an Excel spreadsheet. I’m somewhere on page 3 right now, in the middle of the armhole gusset and just about to reach my first stitch count, and it looks like it’s going to match! Someone on the knitalong did something similar by hand, and I’m amazed. I don’t know how I’d be able to manage this without copy/paste. Here’s my kit (play spot the photographer!):

Finally, I’ve been making good progress on Zig Zag. I’ve got more than a foot of the sleeves done now. About 40 more rows and I can divide for the sleeve caps. Maybe just about the time I finish that Mermaid spreadsheet. Here’s what the sleeves looked like tonight:

Comments: 1 — Posted under: Zig Zag, Knitting, Mermaid

Hats Ahoy!

I’m heading down to visit my SIL tomorrow, so I had to finish up some of the hats I made for my niece.

Here’s Miss Dashwood from Knitty. I made the largest size and only needed 2 balls of Cashmerino Aran, not 3 as the pattern recommends.

And a close-up:

And, as I mentioned before, I made a smaller Clapotis Cap as well. I used Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Worsted in Uptown. I did one less pattern repeat in Section 3 and reduced the top by 6 stitches. It used 45g of yarn. The remainder I used to knit a matching scarf. Here they both are:

For the scarf, I wanted to show off the variegation of the yarn, and tried a few different stitch patterns before settling on the chevrons I actually used. I’d cast on expecting a flat-ish scarf with diagonal sections. And that’s what it was for the first 20 rows or so:

But then the sides started curling in along my decrease ribs. And as it got longer, a twist developed as well:

So then I decided to finish it off with some fun tassels:

It was quite a surprise how it turned out. And it was easy because it was all flat without anything too fancy. I’ll probably write up the pattern if there’s any interest.

Comments: 5 — Posted under: Clapotis, Knitting

Complete your Clapotis ensemble

Now you can make matching fingerless gloves: Clapomitaines

It’s only in French right now, but English should be coming soon.

Comments: 1 — Posted under: Clapotis, Knitting

More catch-up

Still playing catch-up with the projects I finished for the holidays. Here are a couple of this year’s ornaments. They are cross-stitch with beads on perforated paper from a Mill Hill kit. As before, I bought one and then just bought additional supplies to complete the rest. I ordered additional beads from them to make all 5 and now have tons of left over seed beads.

Here’s two ornaments (can you play, find the photographer?):

Here’s another shot, showing the back of one. In the past, I’ve glued on felt backings, but I always stitch a date and signature and I’ve never been happy with how it looks on felt. This year, I didn’t have much time, so I decided to use some scraps of paper and stitch little tags for the back. I think they turned out much nicer than felt:

Last night, I finished up the scarf for my niece. The chevron pattern I was working on ended up folding over and started twisting. So I used it as a design element and added big tassels at the end. It really turned out better than I was expecting. So I’ll probably write it up. I have a bunch of photos to take tonight, so I’ll show you tomorrow.

I also got back into Zig Zag. After pulling out my knitting and reviewing the pattern and charts, I found a bunch of line-by-line notes on the backs of several of the pages. Then I remembered that I’d listed out for each row my increases and decreases and other changes. It took me a few minutes to count the rows of my sleeves and get situated, but now I don’t have to keep close track to remember where I’m doing things, I’ll just follow the notes I sketched out….nearly a year ago!

Comments: 0 — Posted under: Knitting, Cross-stitch

It’s Here!

My Mermaid kit arrived yesterday. Only 12 balls of yarn, will it ever be enough? And such a fine gauge as well. The pattern specifies 3mm needles and wouldn’t you know, my size 2 Addis are with a friend. And I thought I had some size 3s somewhere, but can’t find them. That’s all moot anyway, as I also don’t have appropriate DPNs. So I’m not casting on tonight.

In fact, I’ve decided that I have to finish up a couple of other things before I’m allowed to do much more than swatch. I’m finishing up the little scarf I’m working on for my niece. A night or two more on that, probably. And I decided that it’s time to finish Zig Zag.

I pulled it out over the weekend and took a look. I’ve got 3-4 inches done on the sleeves, shouldn’t take too much effort to knock it out. Really. Just in case you forgot, this is what it looked like last time I took photos…

Body:

Sleeves (sorry it’s so washed out):

Now let’s see how long my will power endures…

Comments: 3 — Posted under: Uncategorized