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2008 Knit-alongs

How long before I succumb?

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Friday, October 31, 2008

Finished Project #1 for today (and #43 for the month, thank you very much -- yes, I counted each Stitch Challenge square separately):

This is the Cool Hemp Ponchette from Lanaknits Designs, knit with Hemp for Knitting allhemp6.  The first attempt was too small (or you would have seen it earlier).  I took out the bind off row yesterday and worked four more repeats, and this time it's just right.  I haven't actually sewn the ends in yet because I was pretty darned sure I was going to have to tear it out and make something else with the yarn.  Click on that link to see how the models are wearing this item.  I could not get it to look the least bit like that (or to be the least bit comfortable) until I threw it on Sheila Dummy as you see it above.  Then I put it back on myself in approximately the same way ("V" in the front, rather than on the shoulder) and it looked much, much better.  So I'll weave in the ends and call it done.

Finished Projects #2 and #3 for today:

We were empty nesters this Halloween.  Neither child went with me to get pumpkins, only one child drew a jack-o-lantern face for me but then left for a friend's house before the knife hit the target, and although the other one requested roasted pumpkin seeds, he didn't stick around either.  Both are spending the night elsewhere.  There weren't even very many trick-or-treaters, even though it was a gloriously warm night (a nice surprise after the chilly day yesterday).  Want some candy?  We've got a ton left over.

And finally, after a little setback:

Finished Project #4 for today:

I'm so proud!

And with that -- I am OUT OF HERE!!

Sarah

Thursday, October 30, 2008

21 degrees? 

That's just rude.

Remember this project from way back in March? 

It's Nancy Bush's Ene's Scarf, from Scarf Style.  Mine looks larger than the one in the book (i.e., more shawl than scarf), but one of the reasons I'm on a shawl kick is that gauge isn't as crucial for a shawl as it is for a sweater.  Okay, it CAN be, but it doesn't HAVE to be.

I was holding together a strand of wool and a strand of silk, both hand dyed by Nancy McRay of Woven Art, and everything was looking lovely.

The stitches were cast on with a double strand along the two diagonal "sides" of the shawl, then each row was decreased down until I ended with just a few stitches at the center of the top edge.  I ran out of one of the strands before reaching that point, however, and decided to cut off the original border and use that yarn to finish the body of the shawl.  That worked just fine.  I had originally intended to knit a new border out of a complementary yarn and graft it into place, but after the realization of just how many stitches I would be grafting hit, I chose to start with the stitches along the edge and to work a new border outward. 

I've lost track of just how many attempts I made at this.  I think for the first one I blindly increased where the chart decreased and decreased where the chart increased, which (of course) didn't work at all.  I then tried to work the chart upside down, but that didn't work either.  I tried rewriting the stitch pattern once or twice, but eventually realized that I wasn't making any progress.  The main problem was that the pattern was scalloping along the edge that was supposed to be straight. 

Was I stupid?  What wasn't I seeing?

I took the shawl-in-progress to Knitting Camp, where I attempted to pick the brains of the great minds gathered there.  Meg Swansen, Cheryl Oberle, Bridget Rorem, and Marilyn van Keppel, to name just a few.  How do I turn this border pattern upside down, I asked?  They were all stumped.  Thank goodness -- it wasn't just me!  It was determined that I should continue on, and that I would be able to block the scallops into shape.  I was advised to bind off with Elizabeth Zimmermann's sewn bind off.

At Stitches Midwest I had the opportunity to meet Nancy Bush and to tell her about my dilemma.  You can't work the border backwards, she said, because it will scallop the wrong way.  And you must cast on at the outer edge with a double strand, to provide the weight needed there.

Thank you, Nancy Bush!

Upon returning home (and after purchasing a beautiful, coordinating shawl pin), I determined that my first plan had been the correct one, and that I would have to knit the border separately and graft the damn thing into place.

And so I did.

End of story.

Did I put you to sleep?

Mica's taking a little nap before bedtime.

Sarah

Wednesday, October 29, 2008

I had to wait for my turn at the desktop computer this evening.

Technically, this next project is still waiting for a little further blocking, but if I take a picture from waaaaaaay back here, you almost can't tell:

This is the completed (except for a little further blocking) table runner for my Introduction to Double Knitting class.  Here's the other side:

Same!  But different! 

The yarn is Euroflax Originals from Louet, in gray and grey.  It's been machine washed once, which is why it's a little wonky, and the finished project is so close to what I was trying to achieve that it's a little scary.  In a good way!

I got my copy of M'lou Baber's Double Knitting:  Reversible Two-Color Designs in the mail yesterday.  I've given it a quick flip through, and wow!  I'm looking forward to spending a lot more time with it this weekend.

Until tomorrow, here are some words to live by:

When life gives you a house full of monkeys . . .

 . . . make banana bread!

Sarah

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

I have to tell ya, I'm getting a little tired of this blogging every day thing.  I'm just saying, is all.

I'm out of hats and socks and sweaters and scarves to show you, but I do have a few of these:

When I got back from Meg Swansen's Knitting Camp this year I was, as usual, very inspired.  There are always amazing shawls to see.  There are always amazing knitters to mingle with.  There are always amazing yarns to admire. 

I've finally been bitten by the shawl bug.  I've known it was coming, because I've been hoarding lace weight yarns for a couple of years now.  I purchased a bag of laceweight unspun Icelandic wool at Knitting Camp a number of years ago, and it's been simmering in my stash ever since.  Inspired by a Habu lecture about one year ago, I purchased a couple of hanks of a (non-Habu) silk/polyester nubbly blend to be used as a ruffly edging on something, somewhere, sometime.  It was added to the stash, waiting for the right project to come along.

Perusing someone's blog (somewhere, sometime), I came across a link to this beauty.  It started as the Wool Peddler's Shawl from Cheryl Oberle's Folk Shawls book, and ended with a wide, slow (if a ruffle can be slow) ruffle.  

Cheryl Oberle was at Knitting Camp this year.  I adore Folk Shawls.  I was in a shawl mood.  The unspun Icelandic and the nubbly silk/polyester came immediately to mind. 

They made this:

I can't remember -- it's either one or two balls of the wool (I think it was just one -- I still have a ton left) and I used the full two hanks of the nubbly stuff.

I really like it.

What do you think?

Sarah

Monday, October 27, 2008

The last hat in the parade:

Another Knots and Spirals Hat, with the colors flipped, and since I didn't think I would have enough yarn left to make the same size hat, I took out a pattern repeat (so it's REALLY tight on Hedda's adult-sized noggin).  I ran out of the green with one row to go, so I took out a bit -- can you tell that the top two-color stripe is one row shorter than the bottom two-color stripe? 

Now that I've pointed it out you can!

I looked for a random photo to add to today's post, but came up with diddly squat.  I counted on my fingers from 27 to 31, and I think I have enough projects to finish out the month, with one to spare.  So, you get a bonus finished project today!  Aren't you lucky? 

And aren't these pretty?

They're the RPM Socks, designed by Aija Goto, from the Summer 2006 issue of knitty.  I purchased a ball of Noro Kureyon Sock yarn earlier this summer, and looked through Ravelry to see what other people had been making with theirs.  I narrowed my choices down to this design or the Kaibashira Socks by Chrissy Gardiner.  I went with RPM (obviously), and I'm glad I did.  I love the way the pattern looks with the looooooong color repeat. 

My first sock of the two (um . . . that was the one on the left) made me unhappy for two reasons.  The first reason was because of the sudden shift from pale gray to darkest black on the front of the sock, where I stopped working in the round to make the heel and then started working in the round again afterward.  I decided I could live with that issue, so I didn't fix it.  What I couldn't live with was that there was a knot in the red-violety section of the foot, which I untied and spit spliced, but the knot brought together the two different red-violety sections from the color repeat, so that sock finished out with gray and black, and only had green up at the cuff.  Know what I mean?  No photos, of course.  Only finished projects this month -- no in-progress shots!

Anyway, after I had finished the second sock and could see what the whole color repeat looked like, I tore back the toe of the first sock and re-knit it as it should have been.

I like these socks.  The jury is still out on the yarn.  I haven't worn them yet, or washed them.  I didn't particularly care for the yarn while I was knitting with it, but the visual effect is so stunning that it was probably worth the hassle.

The only change I think I would make to the pattern next time would be to try decreasing one stitch after the ribbing so I could just work the pattern mindlessly around and around and around without re-setting it at the beginning of each row.  It was written for a nine stitch repeat that jogs over one stitch each row.  I think I would try using a multiple of 9 minus 1 (you know how that works) so I wouldn't have to worry about the jog -- it would just happen.

So.

Two projects in one day, and I've now exhausted my hats and socks for the month.  What's left?  You'll have to wait and see!

Sarah

Sunday, October 26, 2008

Another hairy pink hat?

No, that's a hairy pink bird, silly!

Today's hat was knit using my Knots and Spirals pattern, knit in a thinner yarn and without the doodads at the top:

Anyone who has taken my Continental Knitting class will recognize this pattern.

The yarn used here is Mission Falls 136 Merino Superwash -- a newer, thinner version of their 1824 wool, with 136 yards per 50 grams instead of 1824's 85 yards per 50 grams.  Nice!  It makes a slightly smaller hat than the worsted weight version, but it still fit Hedda, although a little snugly.  It went toward the U of M/MSU challenge, which ended yesterday when MSU whupped U of M (Go Spartans!).

A couple of Guild meetings ago, during show and tell, I was introduced to a variation of my hat pattern:

Aren't those cool?  Very peace-y.  A wonderful use of Fair Isle!

Remember my motto:

World peace, one knitter at a time!

Sarah

Saturday, October 25, 2008

And the Parade of Hats resumes!  Strike up the band!  Oh -- that was last week.

I finished the second hairy pink hat this morning, and since the deadline was looming for handing it in for the U of M/MSU challenge I hurriedly did a weird-o overcast stitch to hold the fold in place:

Doesn't look quite as cute as it did without the weird-o overcast stitch, but it serves the purpose while remaining stretchy.  These hats, along with the (non pink, non hairy) one I'll show you tomorrow, made it to Woven Art in time for the deadline.  I've got one more hat I'm finishing tonight (hopefully) that will still go in the donation pile even though I didn't finish it in time for the deadline. 

I taught my Cut and Paste class at Woven Art today as a warm-up for Stitches East in Baltimore, which takes place in two more weeks.  My students were brilliant, which is always a good thing, and I only found one minor thing to tweak in the notes, so I think I'm all set!  Tomorrow is part two of the warm up:  A Well Executed Sleeve.  I'll also be teaching Preventing/Fixing Mistakes in Baltimore, but there's no need for a practice round since I teach that one so often already that I could probably do it in my sleep!  Hmm.  That might be the final frontier of multi-tasking:  working and sleeping at the same time.  I'll have to look into that.

Look!  The Wienermobile!

I'm trying, but I just can't come up with a clever (family safe) caption for this photo, except to say:

May all your wieners be mobile!

Sarah

Friday, October 24, 2008

The Parade of Hats is still interrupted, because I got distracted yet again.  I was invited to partake of a whole ocean's worth of sushi this afternoon, followed by an invitation for an entire pasture's worth of cheese this evening.  Yum!  And there was singing and general merriment!  Yay!  And I met new people, some of whom turned out to be friends of friends!  It's a small world after all!

(Tangent alert:  Husband Number One had an annoying song stuck in his head the other day, which he insisted on singing out loud over and over and over and over again.  I asked him to switch to "It's a Small World After All" instead, which he started to do, and then he stopped and said "Hey!", because that's one of those songs that gets stuck in your head forever, which was my point because then he'd sing THAT song instead of that OTHER song, and while I don't really care for Song Number Two, it was preferable to Song Number One, and, well, yeah.  That's the end of that story.)  (Incidentally, he didn't sing either song after that.  At least not out loud.)

So ANYWAY, despite the fact that I had an exciting, entertaining, fun-filled day, you guys just get this:

It's a boring black cardigan!

You know how you like to knit those fancy schmancy sweaters using really cool yarns and really far out stitch techniques?  And then you never wear them, because you just don't wear those kinds of sweaters?  What you really wear is plain black t-shirts and cardigans?  Right?  Or maybe that's just me.

If you want to wear what you knit, you've got to knit what you wear.

I wear boring black t-shirts and cardigans.

I finished this one last November, except for sewing in the zipper, which I finally did a couple of weeks ago.

And now I have a new favorite sweater!

The yarn is Peace Fleece, and the pattern is (oh, wait, I have to go look it up . . . there it is!) the Neckdown Jacket from Knitting Pure and Simple.  The only changes I made were to increase more slowly along the sleeve (their sleeves are always too short on me) and to do whatever it was that Maureen Mason-Jamieson taught me in the Collar Obedience Training class I took from her three years ago at Stitches Midwest (and that I can never remember but always have to look up) that makes the collar fold over nicely and lie flat.  Which it does on this sweater, as you can see, so I must have done it correctly.

Scarf #3 is off the loom:

A little woobly, but it hasn't had its swish and soak yet, which I've been told is a necessity for woven fabrics.  This picture doesn't do my hard work justice.  I probably spent more time picking out the yarns than I did weaving the actual scarf.  There's a beautiful hand dyed denimy blue bamboo cotton blend for some of the warp and some of the weft.  The rest of the warp is a black hemp yarn, and the rest of the weft is a lighter silvery/denimy silk and linen blend.  I think.  Who knows.  It was a mish mash of fibers, anyway, that turned out to be much more subtle of a color pattern than I thought it would be.  I can NOT predict how yarns are going to play off of each other in a woven fabric AT ALL.  It is NOT like knitted fabric, no matter how much I think it should be.  And that bamboo cotton yarn was kind of sticky, so it was a pain in the BEE-hind to work with (but GORGEOUS -- it would be a DREAM to knit with).

I'm officially retired from weaving until after the holidays (that's CHRISTMAS and NEW YEARS DAY, for you heathens out there) (just kidding, uberimma!).  After that, I might just try again with some texture.  Or I might take piano lessons. Or French.  Can anyone recommend a good conversational French course?  I do NOT need to know how to schedule a meeting or buy some aspirin.  I just want to learn how to SPEAK FRENCH.  Is that too much to ask?

(I'm sorry -- I seem to be speaking in CAPITAL LETTERS today.  I'll be quiet now.)

Sarah

Thursday, October 23, 2008

We interrupt this Parade of Hats (thanks for the phrase, Angelia!) for something else:

A scarfy thing!

This is Caryl's Kerchief, by Marian Nelson.  I made a bunch a couple of years ago for holiday gifts, but hadn't made one for myself.  Now I have, and it's purple, of course!  Yarn is Koigu KPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPM (or whatever).

Check out the sparkle!

Incidentally, I ADORE the bear on Foxyknits' website.  Check him out!

When I took my first two scarves off of the Rigid Heddle loom a couple of weeks ago , I wrapped them around my neck before cutting them apart (they shared a warp, or however you want to say that).  I still haven't cut them apart, because I love how they look, and I've gotten a lot of compliments while wearing them/it around town!

Whether or not I keep them as one scarf or split them into two, I'd better do something SOON because the ends (and the middle) need some kind of finishing before they come completely unwoven!

We now return you to your regularly scheduled Parade of Hats.

Sarah

Please see the Archives for previous entries!