Knitpicking

Wordless WIP-ing

2012-01-25T17:31:00.003-06:00

I'm going to be a tease today, kittens. Sorry about that; it's another test knit.

WIP-it Wednesday...

2012-01-18T11:05:00.004-06:00

The, "What the hell is that doing back on needles?!" edition.

Kittens, this is my project for today.

For those of you who have been following me for at least 3 years, I bet it looks familiar. More than a year ago--maybe even two at this point--my mother told me that my brother's hat had formed a small hole on top and it looked like some of the stitches had wiggled loose. It sounded like the end had come loose and it was slowly unraveling, a fairly easy fix. It didn't help that he decided to wear it until the hole was large enough that his head was getting cold. When my mother and grandmother came to visit last month, she finally brought it down, and kittens, what I saw baffled me:

The end was still securely held in the last stitch, not woven in anymore, but not loose either. Random intervals of stitches, some 3-4 rounds down, had come undone. I looked at the long floats between loose stitches and couldn't find broken plies or anything other logical reason why this happened. After pondering the problem for awhile, I chalked it up to black magic. Magic most evil and foul.

I didn't have any black yarn to fix it at the time, so I stuck it away safely and put out an ISO request for a few yards so I could fix the hat. I decided not to worry about figuring it out until the yarn for it arrived. Two days ago that happened, and today I decided to tackle the hat project. So far it's taken more than an hour to get the stitches back onto needles and drop down 2 rounds. I'm still trying to make sense of what happened as well as remember back 3 years in time and figure out what my super unhelpful project notes mean. "This pattern must have errata somewhere…in the book it says one skein of each color will make the hat, I couldn’t get anywhere near the L size with one skein of the main color. The hat is a bit big on me, so hopefully, it will fit my brother."

Of course, I did not leave myself any sort of note as to how I altered the pattern to make the hat work with the amount of yarn I had...but I do vaguely recall having to cut a few rounds out of the hat and being irritated that it seemed short and squat. I'm hoping to find a row or two that I can clearly read and then rework the decrease rounds with a few more thrown in for more height.

And then I'm weaving in a good 6" tail so that sucker never comes loose again. This mending thing is the pits.

EDIT: Oh, even better, kittens. Now I AM finding sections where all but one plie is broken and can not be easily fixed. I'm going to mark them and partially felt the sections to try and give them some stability again. I think I'm going to knit my brother a new hat for his birthday or Giftmas this year.

Milestones

2012-01-15T12:31:00.004-06:00

Ooh, two days in a row of blog posts! I hope this doesn't set too high of a bar for the rest of the year. :) Anywho, I wanted to ask all of you kittens out there a question about later this year. But first, I'll set this up for you:

You see, July 2012 is going to be a pretty big year for both this blog and myself. 2O July I am turning 3O. Yes, 3O. A big adult number. Getting older doesn't bother me per se, but the expectations that come with my aging do. (I'm not sure this blog is quite the place for this, but I have been playing with the idea of making this blog more multi-purpose in the hopes that I'll update more.) Things about me and my personality that were seen as quirks are going to become less tolerable to those that think I should hurry up and grow up already. Most people are not willing to accept that Adults--especially not MOTHERS *pearl clutch*--can dye their hair mermaid colors, which I'm rather fond of doing.

Please excuse the web cam picture.

What growing up really means is debatable, but most days I feel like Allie from Hyperbole and a Half. I'm still waiting for my trophy for the days I've managed to be a full grown up; the rest of the time I'm wondering how other people manage to Do All The Things and not putz away their time on the internet.

Story of my life right there.

Back on track.... 26 July is this blog's 5th anniversary. See where I began? I like numbers that are multiples of 5, and 5 years seems to be an acceptable milestone.

So I got to thinking: should I do something for my upcoming birthday/blog-iversary? I know I have a handful of regular readers, so I thought I'd ask you if there's anything you'd like to see me do that month. Giveaway? Special posts? Silly contest of some sort? Something else?

???

Help me kittens, you're my only hope.

How about a few FOs, kittens?

2012-01-14T15:21:00.005-06:00

I've been taken down with the Cold Plague of DOOM part 3™ and feeling pretty wore down, but I wanted to post up a few FO pictures and keep up with blogging. (Seriously, I've been ill since Giftmas or the day after with no breaks in between. Just as I'm recovering from one cold another moves right on in. The first was awful, the second really mild, and now this third one is pretty cruddy again. I'll eventually be healthy again someday...right?) In 2012 I'd like to get back to a couple of posts a week plus my end of the month and quarter posts. I'd also like to get better about being on top of current FOs rather than blogging them 6+ months later. Health and luck permitting, I should be able to do this.

*knocks on wood*

Anywho, let's move into Fall 2011 and what all I worked on at the time....

Halloween was fun again this year. The Girl re-used her Hello Kitty hat with a new dress and tights and was perfectly happy with that as her costume. The Boy had a more specific request: he wanted to be Raccoon Mario for Halloween. Honestly, it would have been more cost effective to just buy a cheap, poorly made costume, but I was having none of it. So I went through the trouble and cost of finding overalls for a non-toddler boy--this is absurdly difficult and rather pricey, FYI, kittens--then I had to find a plain red long sleeve shirt, again, not the easiest thing to do...amazingly Walmart and Target do not carry these things for the over-5T boy. The hat I found from an Ebay store and that was the easiest piece to source. The Mario 'stache is just some cheap black felt I had lying around and I free form cut it and stuck in on with scotch tape. Classy. Then, I bought some Knit Picks Swish bulky in brown and black and went to work knitting the raccoon components. It's difficult to see the ears since the hat is a bit too large, and I didn't think to place anything in them to make them stand up.

But look at that tail! Too cute. The Boy was so excited that during his school costume parade he kept hopping and leaping. He really got into it. I'm sure his teacher didn't like me too much that day.

After that, I finally went to work on a mini monkey for The Husband, who was rather insistent that he needed one.

This resulted in M-800. While trying to pick out the color for the eyes, we both decided that we liked one of each; it made the monkey look like The Terminator and thus, the name. This guy was a pretty straight forward and drama free knit; but I did run out of yarn for the tail and half of a leg. Thankfully, Jill was able to help me out and sent me a few grams so I could finish. The Husband seems pretty pleased with his monkey, and we even gave the little guy a job this year....

He kept watch over us from our Giftmas tree.

That almost wraps up 2012's FOs, kittens! It should hopefully be only one more post and I'm mostly up-to-date. I hope you're all feeling better than I am today. ♥

What is this?

2012-01-11T20:49:00.003-06:00

O hai thar, WIP-it Wednesday! It's been a while since I've seen you.

I've been working on quite a few things this month, but a couple are a test knit so I'm keeping those fairly under wraps at the moment. Before starting on my next installment for that project, I decided to cast on some socks for myself and try to bang them out pretty quickly. I had no desire to finish the rainbow socks yet (this is why I knit 2-at-a-time whenever possible), so I cast on with this insanely pink Bugga I've had marinating in my stash for 11 months. Can you believe I bought a sweater quantity's worth of it?! I'm not sure what I was thinking, so now I'm looking for ways to use it all. I think I may gothify one skein along with some other yarn I have sitting in stash that would improve with some black stripes. I just need to find the motivation to reskein it for dyeing.

Not much to show off, but I am actually knitting, kittens. It's been awhile. :)

Crafting Intentions: 2012

2012-01-10T13:40:00.003-06:00

So, I never got around to blogging about intentions/resolutions at New Year's, did I, kittens? The truth is, I haven't put as much thought into them this year since I was so side tracked and ill last year, but the ones I made for 2011 were pretty good. I'm still working around some of those health issues, but in general, I'm feeling much better and having more good days than bad ones now. I'm not sure I want to make too many goals, just in case I have a relapse or life decides to mess with my crafting in some other way. (Car accidents, I'm looking at you. Stay. Away.)

In 2012 I'd like to:

♥ Knit 6 pairs of socks

♥ Attempt IntSweMoDo again, though realistically, I'll probably finish 4-6 sweaters, not 12.

♥ Finish The Boy's knit blanket, it's still stagnated at 1/3 of the way done.

♥ Finish quilting my bed quilt; it's sitting at 40% quilted.

♥ Save any yarn purchasing for Rhinebeck. (zOMG, you guys, I haven't even blogged about how I'm moving later this year [AGAIN] and where yet. That's for another post.)

♥ Continue my efforts to fit my yarn all back into my under-bed tote. I'm pretty close minus my son's blanket yarn. Two sweater quantities would definitely do it.

How about you, kittens? Have you made any 2012 crafting resolutions or are you pretty relaxed about that sort of thing?

December 2011: Wrap-Up

2011-12-31T19:32:00.003-06:00

Here it is, kittens. The last yardage tally for 2011. These are some of the only posts I managed to keep up this year.

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds

February: 762 yds

March: 1189 yds
April: 1083 yds

May: 849 yds

June: 487 yds

July: 222 yds

August: 687 yds
September: 405 yds

October: 436yds

November: 216yds

December: 813 yds

Year to date: 8,220 yds or 4.67 miles

All-in-all, not a bad way to end things. See you all next year! ;D

2011 Stash Down: Final Post

2011-12-29T22:07:00.003-06:00

Well, kittens. There's definitely no more yarn to be out these next two days, and there's no yarn coming in. May as well wrap the year up, eh?

2011 Stashdown Q1:

Yardage In: 15,254

Yardage Out: 1,737

Net Stash Change: +13,517

Ratio (yds out/in): .114

2011 Stashdown Q2:

Yardage In: 880

Yardage Out: 4,286

Net Stash Change: -3,406

Ratio (yds out/in): 4.87

2011 Stashdown Q3:

Yardage In: 1,975

Yardage Out: 2,125

Net Stash Change: -150

Ratio (yds out/in): 1.08

2011 Stashdown Q4:

Yardage In: 1,728

Yardage Out: 2,388

Net Stash Change: -660

Ratio (yds out/in): 1.38

2011 totals:

Yardage In: 19,837

Yardage Out: 10,536

Net Stash Change: +9,3011

Ratio (yds out/in): .531

So yes, my stash did increase in size. (The vast majority of it yarn for a blanket I haven't finished yet, but have knit 1/3 of the way through...I can't wait to see that number as stash out next year.) But despite the large amount of yardage in Q1, I did really well every other quarter...even though really low productivity tried to thwart my efforts. And considering all of that, the ratio is not bad at all.

As we're always telling newer members in the Stashdown group, this is a process. It doesn't work overnight and it takes time to change habits. I've been pretty pleased to see the changes in my purchasing habits since starting Stashdown in 2010. Let's compare some numbers. (The first number is my 2010 yardage in while the second is my 2011 yardage in.)

Q1: 6,681 vs. 15,254 (There's that blanket yardage. :P )

Q2: 7,014 vs. 880

Q3: 7,591 vs. 1,975

Q4: 19,553 vs. 1,728

I'm really happy with where I am purchasing wise, but 2011 was a bad year for productivity. I'm hoping 2012 will change that and I'll be seriously in the green. I should finally reach my original goal of fitting all of my stash into that under-bed tote! Some people may find the fact that it's taken over 2 years to reach this goal a bit depressing, but I'm OK with it. All of the changes I've made to my behavior will allow me to maintain a perfect-for-me sized stash in the future.

How about you, kittens? Was 2011 good to you and your goals?

I promised FOs, right?

2011-12-05T11:50:00.006-06:00

Well kittens, I'm going to try and post some up even if I have little to say about them. (That's the problem with not blogging right away; you forget everything.) I've spent a lot of this year knitting toys and small items...which are not my favorite thing to knit. And yet, it seems to be just about all I've managed to get done this year besides a pair of socks. 2011 has been a rather awful year for crafting. :P

This trio was finished in early July and finally went off to live with Laurie's family in early October. I am a huge flake; it's just how I am. I always bite off more than I can chew and then get bogged down in wanting to do things perfectly which causes me to get nothing done at times. I'm glad they're finally in their new home. :)

I've posted the Angry Birds pattern before, and last I heard, the woman who wrote the patterns was contacted by the game company to cease and desist selling them. It's a shame.

The stegosaurus is a pattern from here (Ravel it). I wish I could remember more about it. I decided to use inexpensive felt for the scales instead of knitting them. I took inspiration from this project and plan to copy it for myself some day.

The owl pattern is a bit special to me since my friend Rachel designed it for her own daughter. Rachel is a friend I made back at our last duty station, and I wish we could have had a bit more time to play together. She does not have a blog, but she does have an Etsy shop if you're looking for cute embellished hats, and you can find the owl pattern on Ravelry. It's very well-written and easy to understand; she did a great job with it. Did I mention it's free to boot? You can use any weight yarn you want to achieve the size owl you desire. If you have anyone to knit a baby gift for, or children on your list for the winter holidays, I highly recommend this one.

This little guy is another present, this time for a friend of The Boy. He was invited to his first ever birthday party in September, and I wanted to send him with something unique to give to his friend. (She loved it, btw.) So in a very short time (4 days), I whipped this up to send with him. I was literally finishing it about the time the party was supposed to start, so I never did get a decent picture of it. (This one came from my camera phone.)

Susan is very inspirational to me, and I got the idea for a mini Jerry after seeing her adorable one. (Seriously, check out her entire Ravelry project page; she does some amazing work.) I used leftovers from my first rainbow stripey sock and a little Knit Picks palette and that was it. Little monkeys are kind of futzy, but oh so cute.

I think that's enough for now. I'll try to post again shortly with some more FOs. I'm hoping 2012 will be a better year in general, and I'll get back to posting more regularly. I hope 2011 has been treating all of you kittens well!

November 2011 Wrap-up

2011-12-01T11:55:00.002-06:00

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds

February: 762 yds

March: 1189 yds
April: 1083 yds

May: 849 yds

June: 487 yds

July: 222 yds

August: 687 yds
September: 405 yds

October: 436yds

November: 216yds

Year to date: 7,407 yds or 4.21 miles

Kittens, those of you on social networking sites with me already know that November was an awful month for our household. On Veteran's Day, we were in a fairly serious car wreck, and while I did not have to be hospitalized for my injuries, I've been spending most of my time recovering. I hit my tailbone pretty good and sitting down for any length of time was just not an option for awhile. We're all OK and the other driver is too, but it really should be no surprise that I wasn't able to be as productive as I wanted. This also means I haven't been able to edit some photos of recent FOs, and I hope to have those coming in the next month. (I'm just glad that I didn't attempt to do the November blog-a-day challenge this year!)

I hope all of you have been doing well and are gearing up for a merry holiday season. ♥

October 2011 Wrap-up

2011-10-31T21:51:00.002-05:00

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds

February: 762 yds

March: 1189 yds
April: 1083 yds

May: 849 yds

June: 487 yds

July: 222 yds

August: 687 yds
September: 405 yds

October: 436yds

Year to date: 7,191 yds or 4.09 miles

Kittens, things have been crazy around here so blogging has taken a back burner until things get back to normal...though, it's been a very long time since that's happened. The Mister's schooling continues to get more involved and time consuming, leading me to more escapist uses of my time. I'm playing more social games now than I ever have before. At least I can control my pixel lives.

I had another month of nothing but toy knitting (and not daily at that), so it's not surprising that my numbers are still quite low. Someday, I'll break free from the toys and move onto higher yardage, less fiddly projects again. And once I take some pictures, I'll try to blog about an FO or two to break up the boring yardage tallies.

2011 Stash Down: Q3

2011-10-01T09:25:00.002-05:00

2011 Stashdown Q1:

Yardage In: 15,254

Yardage Out: 1,737

Net Stash Change: +13,517

Ratio (yds out/in): .114

2011 Stashdown Q2:

Yardage In: 880

Yardage Out: 4,286

Net Stash Change: -3,406

Ratio (yds out/in): 4.87

2011 Stashdown Q3:

Yardage In: 1,975

Yardage Out: 2,125

Net Stash Change: -150

Ratio (yds out/in): 1.08

2011 totals so far:

Yardage In: 18,109

Yardage Out: 8,148

Net Stash Change: +9,961

Ratio (yds out/in): .450

So here we are at the end of Quarter 3, kittens. Where has 2011 gone?!

I had a pretty good Quarter 3 and remained, for the most part, stash neutral. There is one item that came in that I haven't counted yet (a kit), since I'm not sure I'm keeping it; I bought it for the pattern, not for the yarn. The colors are not 100% what I'd want for the project when I do decide to make it. If I do decide to keep the yarn, I'll be adding it into Quarter 4. I suspect I'll break it open and keep the few colors I like and then destash the rest, but who knows? Maybe I'll find a use for the other colors and I can use them up quickly to make up for the hit.

I was rather pleased that this quarter almost all of my stash out came from actual knitting rather than getting rid of yarn. I'm pretty happy with what I have in general and I'm looking forward to using it.

I am hoping for a larger yardage out number for Quarter 4 to help counteract the blanket yardage that came in during Quarter 1, but I'm not sure I have that much knit in me. I will be starting off with quite a few baby gifts/toy knits, and if I'm focused, I could finish those quickly and get the ball rolling. I do have hopes that I may knit another sweater this quarter, and that I'll finish my current pair of socks and maybe another in the next few months. So who knows? It could go pretty well. And at some point I want to pick back up the blanket o' doom I'm knitting for my son. Now that the weather is consistently staying under 90º, it shouldn't be so unbearable to have all of that wool in my lap.

What about you, kittens? Do you have any plans for autumn knitting?

September 2011 Wrap-up

2011-09-30T08:36:00.002-05:00

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds

February: 762 yds

March: 1189 yds
April: 1083 yds

May: 849 yds

June: 487 yds

July: 222 yds

August: 687 yds
September: 405 yds

Year to date: 6,755 yds or 3.84 miles

It felt like I knit quite a bit more than this all month, but much of it was sock and small-scale project yardage which can be hard-earned. Even though I'm a little disappointed with how low the number is, I'm rather pleased with how much I managed to get done: 1.5 pairs of socks, a small monkey, and the component of my son's Halloween costume. Onto October!

So. An FO update.

2011-09-18T17:32:00.006-05:00

I hear that knitters--myself included--still sometimes actually finish projects they've been working on. Quarter 3 2011 is quickly coming to a close and so far, I have 2 FOs to show for it.

Rumor has it that they also still post regularly in their blogs. What a novel idea.

Pattern: Atelier (Ravel it)

Needles: US size 7

Yarn: Sundara Sport Merino- Storm Studies #148

This is the big one, Kittens. (And the one I had hoped to get better pictures of, but The Mister is still grumpy with me since the last photo session, so I'm afraid it may never happen.) Cast on in mid-April, I thought I might never finish this sweater. When it went into hibernation for almost 2 months due to a loss of will to knit, I thought it was a goner. Usually hibernation is the kiss of death for my projects. But, I pulled this back out on 31 July and knit until 16 August.

Overall, I'm pretty happy with it. My biggest nitpick about this sweater is that I liked the fit much better at my pre-blocking gauge than the pattern gauge I ended up with. Reading some other Ravelers' project notes, I was not the only person to encounter this: it would seem the pattern has some unmentioned positive ease built into it. Had I known, I probably would have gone down another size for the back and the front panels. There is a lot more positive ease in this knit than I am used to, and I'm rather self conscious about too much ease across the back of my knits. I tend to feel sloppy if the back has enough room that a small child could climb in with me.

Contrary to my previous experience with this yarn, it had quite a bit of vertical growth during the blocking process, which also threw me for a loop. I had expected a little in the front garter ridges, but there was a noticeable length difference post blocking. My other nitpick is related to the first: after growth, the front garter ridges hit lower than I had been expecting and I think this adds to the impression that the knit is too big for me. It's still a good sweater, but a bit more casual than I had wanted. It should work out nicely for the winter with long sleeve shirt underneath.

The pattern is very clear and well written--the only problem being the unmentioned positive ease--and I will definitely knit it again.

So, that's my one sweater so far for 2011. I had originally hoped to knit 4 over the course of the year, but at this point, I'd be tickled pink to finish a second.

However.

I'm not in a sweater knitting mood at this moment in time and instead have gotten back into socks....

Ah, stripey socks, how I love you!

I'm currently working on a toe-up "pattern" for all of my self-stripers. Plain stockinette can be dull at times, even with the thrill of the next coming stripe, so I threw in a cable on each side to add to the interesting knitting factor. I didn't need to make these anklets, but I had been convinced they were not going to be wide enough to climb up my leg, so I lopped them off early. Turns out, I could have easily knit another 1.5-2" of leg.

Ages ago--back during last November's blog-a-thon topic suggestion post--Ms. Katie asked me to review some yarn, my Twisted Limone in particular. Well, I can say that I'm rather pleased with how this yarn knit up and turned out. (I have yet to find how it will wear and I can comment on that later. ) I had not worked with a 100% BFL yarn to date, but I will definitely do it again. It has a nice tight twist that reminds me somewhat of Wollmeise. It does not have so many plies that it feels cotton-y, but it definitely has a more "firm" feel to it than merino based yarn I've used in the past. As you can see, kittens, it has lovely stitch definition. The cables pop right out at you. The dye job on this is lovely. Even with two complementary colors, there is no over-lap producing icky brown. No real white spots to speak of, either. Karen is quite a talented lady and if you all are so lucky as to catch one of her Saturday updates, I would definitely encourage you to do so! I was fortunate enough to hear rumblings of her before she took off in popularity and had a custom order made. I still have two more colorways to try out!

This first pair is pretty good, but I've changed up a few things on the next pair I'm knitting. Oh yes, there is already another pair on needles and the first sock is nearing completion.

What is better than a toe-up, self-striping sock with cable details...?

A rainbow self-striping, toe-up sock with cable details! And ribbing.

I Love this, even though the KP Felici is fuzzy and difficult to take pictures of. But you already know how I feel about Felici, kittens.

August 2011 Wrap-Up

2011-08-31T17:43:00.002-05:00

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds

February: 762 yds

March: 1189 yds
April: 1083 yds

May: 849 yds

June: 487 yds

July: 222 yds

August: 687 yds

Year to date: 6,350 yds or 3.61 miles

Not stellar yardage by any means, but I'm pretty happy that my pace has noticeably picked up after my slump. If the weather ever cools, maybe it will pick up some more.

...

2011-08-26T14:48:00.004-05:00

Kittens, I have been an awful blogger this month, despite having content to write about. I'm currently waiting on some better pictures to share of a project, but for now, I'll share 2 new WIPs with you. Not on Wednesday, because I was too busy then. The Mister's schedule is making things difficult, and I've been sucked into a silly (and frankly, pointless) island resort game as a diversion.

BUT. I've actually been knitting while wasting my time building my pixel empire.

Are you all Puffing yet?

I'm currently at a halt on this while I figure out where I want to go. I do not quite want to make it a blanket, not stuffed like it is. I am torn between a pillow, and some sort of crazy, awesome chair cover. I think my brain has been eaten and I've lost my mind. That seems to be the theme for this month.

The only real difference I've made from the pattern is that I'm picking up stitches to connect as I go, rather than tie all of my hexipuffs together at the end. (This genius idea came from Ravelry's CrochetAmy.) It's pretty quick and smooooth. I have big plans to knit this pattern more than once.

While I figure out what to do with that project...look at what else I cast on:

It's a sock. I haven't worked on any of these since the beginning of the calendar year. Toe-up. Self-striping. Cable rib detail on the sides. So much to love here.

So what about you, kittens? Have you been getting any yarn-y crafting done over the summer? Surely some of you live in climates where it's not baking hot and the thought of wool in your lap doesn't make your skin itch? I'll be stuck in summer's clutches for another 6 weeks or so, but I'm definitely dreaming of cooler autumn weather.

WIP-it "Wednesday": 32 of 52

2011-08-03T10:04:00.004-05:00

Wow. It's been awhile since I've done a WIP post, kittens. So long I had to pull up a 2011 calendar online and count out which one today is.

Today's pictures are not that great. They're taken with my cell phone and pretty blurry. I hadn't realized how crappy and sensitive my camera is; it can take some lovely pictures in natural light, but apparently hates my bathroom.

As mentioned in a recent blog post, I finally picked my cardigan back up. Last night I reached the point where I will alternate skeins before starting the next. I am pleased to say that I have two full skeins left and it's looking like I can definitely make the cardigan long enough. With pockets. This is great. Sadly, the internet can not properly communicate my happy tone.

I plan to go just a tiny bit longer before starting the pockets (6-12 more rows for up to 1.5" more) and then I'll know for sure. I have yet to err on the side of making a top too long, and I'm aiming for a longer cardigan, so this should hopefully get me there.

I'm even daring to be optimistic enough that I may have enough yarn left over to undo the sleeve bind offs and make them a wee bit longer. I can live with them at this length, but even a few more rows would have been preferable. I doubt I'll have enough yarn to get an extra 1"-2" in each sleeve, but that's life. If I can avoid having to pester the one other owner of this colorway, I'll take it as-is.

July 2011 Wrap-Up

2011-08-01T00:11:00.003-05:00

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds
February: 762 yds

March: 1189 yds
April: 1083 yds

May: 849 yds

June: 487 yds

July: 222 yds

Year to date: 5,663 yds or 3.22 miles

Oh, kittens. July ended up being not-so-good for knitting after all, but you already knew that with the lack of blog posts, didn't you?

It turns out that knitting a worsted weight garter stitch blanket large enough to cover a queen sized bed just hasn't been my thing lately. My goal (for the second month in a row) was to finish the bottom chocolate brown stripe: ~2.5 skeins of yarn. I knit up the half a skein and just enough of the next to finish my row. At this rate, I will definitely not finish the blanket before our next move. I might get it done in time for Giftmas 2012.

However. The last few days I've been getting back into my cardigan, which I haven't touched in two months. I still need to see if I'm going to make it with the amount of yarn I have: fear of not having enough has definitely held me back. I've been in a place where I just didn't want to know or deal with it, so it was easier just to shelf the project and distract myself with other things.

My goal for the year was to knit up 4 sweater quantities of yarn. This is still the first. Heading into August. I've destashed quite a bit of yarn the last couple of months, so room will not be an issue. It's just been...demoralizing as a sweater knitter to have no desire to knit sweaters. I think the bad start to the year with the green tweed one set the tone, unfortunately.

At this point, I'm not sure I want to bother making any goals for August. While the list is a nice visual reminder, it does not give me the drive needed to create anything.

Farmer's Wife QAL: Week 5

2011-07-31T19:02:00.004-05:00

Well, I managed to eek out one more week's worth of blocks, kittens. So while I did not catch up a bit with the QAL, I didn't fall too much farther behind, either. I'd call that a mostly win.

Block 9: Box

This one was pretty nice to me, except one HST that just would not line up properly. I went to fix it and realized today that my fix actually didn't do what it was supposed to...and I trimmed it up so I sort of have to live with it this way. OH WELL. I'm calling this one done, and I'll worry about the new problem I created for myself when it's time to piece the top.

Have I mentioned how much I love fussy cutting? Or this pony fabric? I love them both, and I'm hoping to feature ponies in future blocks. If perfectly honest, I love all of the fabrics in this block.

Block 10: Bowtie

Easiest. Block. Ever. I love it for this quality and how striking the result is. I spent quite a bit of time deciding what fabrics I would use when this block came up.

I ended up picking out 3 completely different ones the day of.

It's funny how that works sometimes.

Farmer's Wife QAL: Week 4

2011-07-29T09:50:00.003-05:00

Kittens! I did not fall off the planet and die after the first week of July. Instead, my projects continued to be a pain in my behind, and my crafting drive is still very low. It's making for very little actually getting done.

BUT.

I did finally finish "week" 4 of my Farmer's Wife QAL. So, here they are:

Man. There's a lot to say about these...mostly just that first block.

Block 7: Birds in the Air

This block kicked my ass. Several times. If I had not decided to cut into some of my precious Flea Market Fancy stash for it, I would have chucked the thing and just recut and went from there. But no, I used special fabric and ended up: sewing, ripping, resewing, reripping, and then fiddly sewing it back together a final time. There are over 10 hours' worth of labor in that first block. It's not perfect, but it is exponentially better than it looked the first 2 go 'rounds.

The FMF held up pretty well to the abuse, but the cheapie Jo-Anns purple did not. The edges started to fray on most of the pieces in spite of my careful handling and gentleness. As a result, the block looks wonky (it's not) and that weird "wrinkle" in the upper left square? It's where I actually had to sew more purple to it to give the thread something to hold onto other than frayed edge. I probably should have recut that particular triangle.

Birds in the Air took me weeks to get done and to my satisfaction. Such a bummer, but at least I can live with it as-is now.

Block 8: Bouquet

This block, on the other hand, went together in under an hour and didn't give me any trouble. The hardest part was deciding which fabrics to use. No drama. No pain. Went right together. One point is slightly off, and I'm not sweating it.

(And I'm not sure what happened with my photos today. No, there is not a wrinkle in the Pip's section of the block.)

Anywho! Week 5's blocks look pretty easy and I may try to finish them up before July comes to a close.

What about you, kittens? What have you been making?

Farmer's Wife QAL: Week 3

2011-07-06T10:58:00.004-05:00

Yes, it's been 3 weeks since "week" 2, but I'm trying to do 2 blocks per "week" and blog them. Obviously, I'll be playing a little catch up this month and hope to close that gap between myself and the rest of the group, who should all be posting their week 6 blocks starting today. If I can manage 3 blocks per real time week, I should be pretty much caught up before the month is done.

Anywho, onto the blocks!

Block 6: Big Dipper

Truly, I should subtitle this week, "Pain in the Ass week," because each of these blocks gave me some trouble. My Big Dipper block is looking pretty good now (only one intersection is a bit off, and it's not terrible), but don't let that fool you. I had to rip and resew this block together 4 times before I was able to get most of the points to match up. When I was cutting out the templates for this one, I was a bit sloppy and some of the end pieces were just the tiniest bit smaller than others. It turns out, this made for some finagling of seams and effort to get things to line up. As I mentioned before, the main reason I took on this project was to conquer my hatred of templates and prove to myself that I can be careful and produce nice results. I do not have to be a hare when it comes to finishing up projects.

Block 3: Basket

This is the block I mentioned in one of my last posts. I had these insane, grand plans to flip the orientation of the block to match the way I plan to piece the top. It turns out my abysmal geometry skills got the better of me so I changed tactics: instead, I chose a cricket fabric and chose to have the basket spilling them out.

This block went together pretty quickly, except for the handle. That is where the PITA element of this one came in. The book gives two options for the handle; you can choose to cut a bias strip and hand applique it down, or one for machine applique was provided. When it comes to applique, I'm very opinionated. Machine sewing it down was out. Decorative stitching? Out. It had to be a hidden seam and tidy. It turns out, I can not curve and sew down a bias strip to save my life and in a bit of a huff, I ripped it off and formulated a new plan. After calling my mother and verifying what I wanted to do, it turns out she has the same issues and resolved them the same way: I transferred the shape of the machine applique piece to freezer paper, ironed it onto the wrong side of my fabric, cut it out with an allowance to turn down all around, removed the paper as I basted the piece, pinned it, and sewed it down that way. When I was finished, I removed all of the basting stitches. VOILA! The handle is the correct shape and size, and it didn't cause weird, messy puckering of the under fabric.

The only thing about this block that makes me a bit sad is that it is noticeably smaller than my other 5 blocks. I suspect that when it comes time to set it into sashing, I'll be getting creative with the seam allowance to try and keep all of my points and as much size to the block as I can.

Also, having worked with two of my Spoonflower quilter's cottons now, I can say this: this particular fabric they offer is not worth the premium price. Even after pre-washing, it has a very stiff, cheap feel to it. I've also noticed that it continues to show pin holes long after the pins are removed. I still plan to buy from Spoonflower, but I think next time, I'll try a different fabric option and see if I like it better.

July 2011 To Do

2011-07-03T15:39:00.002-05:00

This list is almost identical to June's thanks to my illness. Hopefully, I can cross more things off this time!

June 2011 Wrap-up

2011-06-30T09:30:00.003-05:00

Another month, another yardage tally.

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds
February: 762yds

March: 1189yds
April: 1083yds

May: 849yds

June: 487yds

Year to date: 5,441 yds or 3.09 miles

As you can see, kittens, productivity was way down this month. On the evening of my last real blog post (16 June), I fell ill with a nasty GI virus that has been making its rounds on the base here. Until last evening, I was still sick with it. 14 days of horrible, persistent sick. This means that I effectively lost half of my work days this month and accomplished very little in the time. That considered, I think I did OK. I'm finally on the mend for real and am hoping to play some catch up with my crafts in July.

2011 Stash Down: Q2

2011-06-30T09:11:00.002-05:00

Bet you thought I dropped off the planet, didn't you, kittens? I live, but that's for another post. Today is about the end of Q2 Stash Down.

2011 Stashdown Q1:

Yardage In: 15,254

Yardage Out: 1,737

Net Stash Change: +13,517

Ratio (yds out/in): .114

2011 Stashdown Q2:

Yardage In: 880

Yardage Out: 4,286

Net Stash Change: -3,406

Ratio (yds out/in): 4.87

2011 totals so far:

Yardage In: 16,134

Yardage Out: 6,023

Net Stash Change: +10,111

Ratio (yds out/in): .373

I had a much better quarter and am very pleased with the result. I didn't finish any large projects--just toys again. Most of my yardage out came from detachment from my stash and allowing myself to sell some that I'm honestly not going to use anytime soon. It's quite freeing to not feel so emotionally beholden to all of it. This has been an on-going process in my life: learning to let go of things and not buy more than I need or can use.

I am hoping to have at least a sweater project out for Q3 and maybe a couple other things. If I can keep up this momentum in Q3 and Q4, I'm hoping to end up, at the very least, stash neutral. To me, that's a pretty big deal.

To any of you out there also stashing down, how is it going?

Farmer's Wife QAL: Week 2

2011-06-16T16:55:00.005-05:00

A couple more blocks have been finished for the Farmer's Wife QAL, just in time for the week 3 posts to start going up. (I'm already half done with week 3, but slicing my finger while cleaning my food processor has slowed me down a bit today.)

Block 4: Basket Weave

I skipped Block 3 for the time being, due to indecision about what fabric to use. I'm sure my intention to flip it from an on-point block to a straight on one isn't helping either. I plan to get to it shortly. Instead, I got started on Block 4.

For this block, I did the math and skipped the templates. I used a little Flea Market Fancy, and some Heather Ross for Spoonflower. I think the clothespin people are darling.

Block 5: Bat Wing

This block caused me some trouble. Apparently I couldn't figure out how to piece the side triangle blocks and kept insisting on trying to make them taller. Once I found some forum posts about this block online and noticed something that was different from my piecing, I accidentally stumbled upon my solution. I just couldn't see it, otherwise. Once I had the correct side of the triangles on the center one, it was easy peasy. I used some Amy Butler fabric and the dot is from Sherbert Pips.

So far, this is looking pretty scrappy, but I'm trying to go with it. Each block definitely looks like it belongs to a different quilt than what I'm working on. I find it really interesting that as a knitter I do not collect single skeins and have issues using them up because I can't find a project. As a quilter, however, I purchase a lot of random stuff and it can be difficult to pull them all together. I'm sure by the time I get to 50/100/whatever blocks, it will have a more cohesive look to it due to color repetitions.

Farmer's Wife QAL: Week 1

2011-06-12T16:49:00.005-05:00

Due to having to wait for my book, I joined the Farmer's Wife Quilt-a-Long a bit late in the game. Week 3 is about to begin, so I'm working on catching up this week. My book arrived yesterday. Last night I set to work, and I completed week 1's blocks. I'm trying to work in order and not skip any; we'll see how I do. I'm also not sure if I'll be a Farmer's Wife or maybe a Farmer's Girlfriend and make a smaller quilt.

I didn't originally intend to join this QAL; when Amanda announced the project, I went to check it out and wrinkled my nose in distaste. I can ignore the superficial dressing of many things: quilts are not one of them. One look at the fabric in the quilt blocks and I couldn't envision them any other way. I saw a kind of drab, old looking quilt. Really not my thing. I'm a bad person; I know. *wink*

But then she and Angela posted their blocks and BAM! I was smitten and wanted to play. BAD. The blocks were so fresh and fun in bold,modern prints...some of which I have in stash too. I ordered the book immediately and then waited for almost 2 weeks for it to make its way here. Now it is and I'm slowly reading the letters that inspired the blocks chosen...and calming myself down about working with templates. Things have gone very wrong in the past thanks to them and it's hard not to think about that when working.

Block 1: Attic Windows

My first attempt at this block didn't end quite how I wanted. The colors were more demure than I had intended, and I wasn't digging the block as it looked in the layout. A bit of a bummer after taking the time to fussy cut that lil' pony to be on point like the quilt is laid out. It was good practice, and I'm going to try and use this block in something else...maybe a project bag?

So I tried again.

I like this one quite a bit better, though I was nervous making my fabric selections. I was afraid they might be a bit much, but they're growing on me. On this one, I not only fussy cut the ponies, but also the cherry blossoms from the Amy Butler print.

Block 2: Autumn Tints.

Block 2 was much easier for me to execute, even if it isn't at all autumnal. I've been learning that I really enjoy fussy cutting, but I'm afraid I may be overdoing it a bit. I plan to keep doing it, regardless. Template cutting for the block seemed unnecessary, so I did the math and rotary cut it instead. I rather like those crazy colored, grumpy owls.

Now, onto Week 2's blocks!

Birdie Stitches: April 2011-June 2011

2011-06-06T22:15:00.004-05:00

Yeeeeaaaah. I got a little behind on stitching and documenting this one, kittens. 2 of the 3 blocks had to be heavily altered...a.k.a: drawn from scratch. I finally played catch up last night and today.

April's block is one of the two that I drew up on my own. I even stuck a little Totoro in there for The Girl. As soon as I saw the next month's block, I knew my theme would work out just fine.

Yes. May Flowers. I changed very little in this block and was super happy with the composition and concept. The Girl absolutely LOVES this block.

And then June happened. While I like the idea of the text somewhere on the quilt, it felt really out of place with the other blocks to date. Thanks to Katie's suggestion, I had a theme for the block and worked on it today. It turned out OK. It's not my favorite block, but it works.

But yay! I'm caught up on Birdie Stitches until July.

Something New to Try...

2011-06-06T21:41:00.003-05:00

I have so many projects going on these days that it's becoming difficult to keep track of them all...and I'm looking to add a new Quilt-a-long as soon as the pattern book arrives! I realized that it is time to start making a crafting To Do list.

This is what I came up with last night for June. Most of the goals are pretty unambitious, but I like to set myself up to feel good and motivated rather than demoralized when I realize I can't gain 5 extra hours a day to do it all.

I'm not sure if I'll post up the initial list at the beginning of the month and update at the end or what I'll do. I plan to add to it as a month goes on and items get checked off.

May 2011 Wrap-Up

2011-05-31T23:36:00.003-05:00

It's hard to believe, kittens, but May is already gone. (Well, it will be in ~ 20 minutes Chez Knitpicky.) Time to see how I did with using up some yarn.

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds
February: 762yds

March: 1189yds
April: 1083yds

May: 849yds

Year to date: 4,954 yds or 2.81 miles

I wasn't really focused on knitting or crocheting this month. I actually did a bit better than I feared. The "lack" of yardage is mostly due to the fact that I knit very little on The Boy's blanket: with The Mister in basic flight, he's unavailable every night of the week and sometimes on weekends if the load is heavier. This means we've spent very little time watching movies or shows together, and that in turn means I've had very little time to work on the blanket. And thus is life. I'm really not a big TV watcher unless he's around to spend time with me. Hopefully, June will be a little kinder to me...even if the weather is already disgusting.

So...what does one do after she learns how to make a pouch...?

2011-05-31T18:25:00.007-05:00

This kitten here goes completely insane. She drafts a pattern from scratch, learns a new quilting technique and then spends most of the day working on it.

My arm, it is wore out from all the back patting I've done since about 10pm yesterday.

There are so many of my favorite things in this pouch. I'm not even sure where to start.

The interior fabric?

The bunny?

No, I believe my favorite part is right here: a sweet running pony 1" square surrounded by an equally sweet wonky star and then outlined with some twee embroidery. The cute, it just killed me.

I didn't actually follow the tutorial, just looked at the pictures to get an idea of what I was supposed to be doing.

I think I "done good."

A crazy part of me either wants to write up a pattern, or try making more and selling them. I'm not sure, though. This pouch has about 6 hours of work in it, and I'm pretty sure charging minimum wage plus materials it could be a hard sell. Would someone actually pay $50 + shipping for a Kindle cozy? Even one was intricate and sweet as this? And would it be fair to myself to sell my work/time for minimum wage?

Anywho! I had an awesome Memorial Day here, kittens. I hope you all had a good one.

It's not a Wednesday....

2011-05-30T08:45:00.005-05:00

But I'm blogging today anyway! Happy Memorial Day to the American kittens out there. I've actually been a bit busy the last few days, as my friends on Facebook got to preview last night.

Pattern: Pencil Pouch Tutorial

I spent a little over 5 hours Saturday night and about an hour yesterday morning working on these pouches. I wanted to make gifts for The Boy's teachers for making his first school experience such a positive one. I will be stuffing these with chocolate and putting little notes in them; for his teacher and her assistant, I also plan to add small gift cards.

I have had so many scraps sitting around from recent projects that I didn't have to wash up anything new to make these. It felt good to clear out some left overs, even if it was such a small amount. They won't quite hold an unsharpened pencil, but any instrument shorter than that fits in just fine.

The Boy approves.

WIP-it Wednesday: 21 of 52

2011-05-25T10:24:00.004-05:00

Kittens! I'm managing to blog today. Two Wednesdays in a row; haven't done that in awhile. You see, after last week's post, a fire lit under my butt, and I started working faster on my cardigan so I could get an idea if I need to try and acquire another skein of my yarn or not. The jury is still out as I finish up skein 03 of 06. (I currently have 4-6 more rows worth of yarn in the skein.)

From the back, it's looking good, nothing to worry about. I could have lifted the waist band up even higher to fit better with my natural waist, but as it was, I cut over an inch from the pattern right there.

The worrying part is here:

Even though the sweater is wide enough to not burst out of it, I'm still busty enough that the front is riding much higher than the back of the sweater. Once I block the sweater and the upper garter ridges relax, it will help with the problem. I know that's partially what is going on right now and why it's riding up. I'm seriously considering and debating adding darts to the front sides to give them a bit of extra length.

But this eats up more yarn...which I'm not sure I can spare at this point in time.

I originally thought that making it through half of my yarn would give me a better idea of if I had enough. Now, I'm convinced that I need to knit up skein 04 and see how far that one takes me to get a better idea. It's definitely going to be close if I decide to make this a longer sweater, add darts to lengthen the front, and keep the pockets in. I really want all of these things, but having a limited edition colorway with only 10 skeins in existence makes it tricky. I've managed to locate 3 of 4 sister skeins to mine. However, I really do not want to have to bother someone else for one of them if I can help it.

So, knit skein 04 first, then see how I'm doing from there. I keep hoping that perhaps mine are a bit higher in yardage than marked, and I'll eek through this. Sundara is known for underestimating the yardage of her skeins to avoid disgruntled customers.

WIP-it "Wednesday": 2O of 52

2011-05-19T19:19:00.005-05:00

Kittens, I fear that I may be skipping quite a few WIP-it Wednesday posts. At the rate I'm currently knitting, there are not enough changes from week-to-week to keep things interesting. I'm not sewing or doing any other crafting at a fast enough rate either. Things are pretty slow here and my motivation has been lacking. 2011 is looking to be stressful for me 'til the end, so I suspect this will be normal.

Anywho, not to be too much of a Debbie Downer here, but I did want to address that really quick. When one has readers, no matter how many, she feels a need to explain absences. Blogging is a really interesting thing in that way. It's done primarily for one's self--for me it is, anyway--but there are others who read the content, making it almost like a letter or conversation. Thus, the apologies for not blogging more often.

But I digress.

It took almost 2 full weeks, but I finally made enough progress on one of my projects to show it off again.

My cardigan is slowly coming along, but I'm really happy with it so far. It now has both sleeves, and I've started into the body. A couple of things about it have made me nervous; the first was quieted today. It does indeed appear to be wide enough in the front that I will not be bursting out. Yay!

Before I move along to the second concern, aren't those garter ridges a lovely detail? Along with all of the stress I have this year, I'm also without The Mister, which means I'm lacking a photographer the majority of the time. He's not physically gone, but he may as well be. He spends all the time he can locked in our bedroom with background noise to drown everyone else out while he studies. And studies. And studies some more. (Some people like to talk about how the military is full of stupid, unintelligent people: this could not be farther from the truth. Most jobs require a level of intelligence and competence that surpasses being "a grunt." Being a helicopter pilot not only requires being in peak physical condition above and beyond, one has to be really sharp and able to learn/memorize quickly as well. Now you know. I digress, yet again....)

Back to the knitting stuff.

The second worry I'm still on the fence about. I have 6 skeins of the Sundara sport merino I'm using for this project. At this pictured point, I've used up 2 and started into the third. Is anyone else starting to feel nervous for me yet based on that bit of information? I'm starting to think I may have to give up the pockets which are a feature of this design, which would make me sad. I'm hoping that my obnoxiously short torso will save the day and I may be able to eek pockets out of what I have.

Only time will tell. And at this rate, it's going to be a substantial amount of time....

Oooh, an FO!

2011-05-08T14:13:00.004-05:00

Kittens, it's been awhile since I've had one of these. It seems that this year, all I can finish are toys. (Interestingly, these are my least favorite thing to knit/make. Love the look of them; hate making them.)

On Wednesday, I started and finished this Angry Birds Finch for my little guy. He's been having a difficult time adjusting to his father's new class schedule, so I wanted to do something nice for him. He's been super excited and the first couple of mornings, I woke up to Angry Birds battles in my bedroom. Now, he wants even more birds and more piggies to vanquish. He'll get them...in time.

The pattern designer has a full pattern line of the Birds now. I would highly recommend these; they're very well written and clear.

WIP-it Wednesday: 18 of 52

2011-05-04T15:41:00.003-05:00

I'm back this week, kittens! I finally made some noticeable progress on one of my projects, so I have something to blog. You know... other then assure you that I'm working even if I've been really quiet and not showing off many pictures.

After my last sweater project turned out so abysmally, I allowed myself a pattern purchase and immediate cast on of another to ease my pain. Nothing hurts me more than a project that needs to be frogged; I hate wasted time and effort. (Hey, at least I do not knit the whole thing trusting my gauge and try it on at the end!)

This is some lovely Sundara Sport that I have had marinating in my stash for about 6 months now. It's definitely not the oldest yarn I have sitting in there, but it is one that I've had a hard time picking a project for. For some reason, I remembered it as being darker then it is; I seem to recall that while I liked it, I didn't really love it when it first arrived. Maybe it just looked like a darker grey in November then it does now?

This project has been on needles since mid-April. I'm moving at a snail's pace on it, but I'm OK with that. 2011 is all about taking things slow. I've been working with an unfamiliar construction type--the technical aspects are easy peasy--and sleeves are always a concern for me. I ended up making a decision to alter the pattern and fit 8 additional sleeve stitches into the top of the sleeve as I worked. (No math involved, just winged it.) I am so glad that I did and how they're spaced. Even before blocking and the growing this superwash merino will do, they fit perfectly. With growth, I'm expecting about a couple inches of ease to be added in, making them a close fitting, but looser-than-my-usual-preference sleeve. Even if for once my knitting doesn't grow like past experience has taught me, it fits! So...WOOT.

I'm about to take a quick break for a project I'm making The Boy. Then, I'll be right back on the next sleeve and getting this sweater moving!

April 2011 Wrap-up

2011-05-01T01:23:00.002-05:00

End of the month, kittens. Here we go again!

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds
February: 762yds

March: 1189yds
April: 1083yds

Year to date: 4,105 yds or 2.33 miles

Not bad considering it feels like I got nothing done this month.

I skipped the last WIP-it Wednesday because there was no discernible progress in any of my projects. Why bore my small audience with the same pictures as the week before? I can assure you, kittens, that I am making progress, as my yardage numbers show. I managed to finish O4 of the O7 skeins of chocolate brown yarn in the bottom stripe of the never-ending blanket for The Boy. In May, I will finish that stripe. In the sweater project I cast on late in the month, I've finished the yoke and am moving onto the sleeves this next month. I even managed to have a single FO for April, a monkey for my daughter. (The Boy now wants one of his own, and I'll try to knit that sometime in May as well.)

I'm rather pleased that my average is better than 1,OOO yards per month, which is my low monthly goal for 2O11. After 2O1O and popping out a mile per month--damn near close, anyway!--I really needed a break. I'm not going to lie to you, kittens, I've needed it. 2O11 has been rather stressful and many things require my attention that have not in the past. I'm hoping to come through this experience a little more adult than I have been. With the third decade of my life wrapping up, I suppose it's time to get serious about that whole "adult" thing.

Thank you to those of you that read this little blog of mine. Here's to a productive May!

WIP-it Wednesday: 16 of 52

2011-04-21T13:27:00.003-05:00

Err..."Wednesday," more appropriately. Didn't have the time to blog yesterday, I'm afraid, so we'll pretend this one was on time.

First, the Wide Stripes blanket. It's hard to tell, but it is making slow progress. I now have 03 of 07 chocolate skeins knit up in the bottom stripe. For sure, I'll be finished with it by the end of next month, then I can unravel the provisional cast-on and work my way up the rest of the blanket. I'm still hoping to finish it this calendar year. (At the rate of 03 skeins/month, I should be done in December.)

Next is a sweater cast on. This one isn't too interesting yet, so I really do not have much to say about it. I'm taking things slow since I'm having to alter as I go. I do not want another mess like the last sweater I had on needles.

WIP-it Wednesday: 15 of 52

2011-04-13T12:19:00.004-05:00

Kittens, last week you were guessing what I was up to. About 20 minutes ago, I finished it.

I believe it was my friend Katie who guessed I was making a monkey. Susan guessed it was a monster and she wouldn't be far off: he's a pattern from Rebecca Danger who *is* the "monster lady."

I had been planning to make this little guy as part of a set to send off to live with someone else, but then...it happened.

Danger! Danger! Someone seems to have fallen for the monkey.

"Mama! You no take my monkey!"

Well played, little girl, well played. It's OK, I wasn't feeling much like gift knitting anyway.

He's even started settling in and making friends.

Keyka Lou Bucket Bag

2011-04-08T19:15:00.006-05:00

Kittens, I have been a ball of anxiety lately and yesterday, I reached the point that I had to DO SOMETHING, or I just may die. Seriously.

I needed something quick and would yield a finished object in little time.

I needed something that would use pre-existing supplies and not cost too much for a pattern.

I needed something different then I've worked on before.

And most importantly, it had to be something useful...and to my taste.

I set my mind to sew myself a new bag, and for a long time I've been eying Keyka Lou's designs. (It just so happens that she's having an anniversary sale right now if you're in the market for a new bag as well.) I've had this inexpensive brown corduroy sitting in stash for forever now; I honestly have no idea when I bought it or why I did. It's always been there. After assessing that I had just under a half yard of the fabric, I decided to make a Bucket Bag. I bought the pattern, printed it out to the correct size, and then played around a bit with what I had in stash until I was happy.

Overall, I'm pretty pleased with the results. The only way I could be any more happy would be if I had enough corduroy for the front pocket to be brown as well. Everything in this project--minus the corduroy-- is a leftover from one of my current projects, and it uses this adorable fabric I reclaimed from a Gymboree shirt I bought for The Girl and she never had a chance to wear. Who doesn't love ponies on some level or another?

Ponies. ♥

I've never sewn a bag before, and I'm sure I've denigrated my own sewing skills enough on this blog to paint the picture that I'm not a very experienced sewer. If I haven't, let me say it loud and clear: I AM NOT A VERY EXPERIENCED OR CAREFUL SEWER. My work is sloppy, and the eagle eyed out there will be able to see spots that I fudged or didn't get things quite right.

Overall, I'd say I did a pretty good job.

And for as much as I hate to get bogged down in putzy details, I really enjoy top stitching.

Even for someone like me, this pattern was pretty easy to follow and produced a pleasing result. I had a couple of places that I became stuck, but after reading through a few times and looking more closely at the provided pictures, I figured it out and was able to move along. I want to say this bag took 4-5 hours from beginning to end.

I definitely recommend these for anyone.

WIP-it Wednesday: 14 of 52

2011-04-06T22:44:00.003-05:00

Wordless. (It's just easier that way, kittens.)

2011 Stash Down: Q1

2011-03-31T14:00:00.002-05:00

2011 Stashdown Q1:

Yardage In: 15,254

Yardage Out: 1,737

Net Stash Change: +13,517

Ratio (yds out/in): .114

2011 totals so far:

Yardage In: 15,254

Yardage Out: 1,737

Net Stash Change: +13,517

Ratio (yds out/in): .114

Kittens, this is not how one does Stashdown. I am not the best role model...this quarter, anyway. Blanket quantities in + almost no finished objects = in the red. Despite this, I'm feeling pretty positive in terms of Q2, where I have no plans to do extra yarn buying and I'm determined to finish something larger then a pair of socks or some small toys. With my knitting/crocheting mojo picking back up, this should be able to happen. By the end of 2011, I should be in the green for the year.

And really, I better be. We'll be moving around that time and I really do not want to keep track of multiple containers of yarn.

For those of you out there who are also working on stash maintenance and reduction, how are you doing? Better then I am, I hope.

March 2011 Wrap-up

2011-03-31T13:45:00.002-05:00

It's that time again, kittens....

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds
February: 762yds

March: 1189yds

Year to date: 3,022 yds or 1.72 miles

Another month has come and gone and I managed to knit more then 1,000yds this month; my average is still intact! So that's pretty cool. I'm also sad that 600yds of this year's work will be ripped out, but I'm not worried about that with my tallies. When I'm tracking with the Snob Group that sort of thing counts, but not in my own little kangaroo court. And really, isn't that the one that matters?

I'm hoping April will be a bit better and maybe with some FOs to show for it.

WIP-it Wednesday: 13 of 52

2011-03-30T18:43:00.004-05:00

Oh, kittens. Before I get down to my knitting update and what is annoying me, I'll start with my quilting which is behaving just fine.

First is my Birdie Stitches block for this month.

I ended up altering the embroidery to jazz it up a bit. It didn't really scream, "March!" as it had been. This is the first time I've changed anything, and I'm hoping I'll like April as-is. This is also the first time I've taken so long to get my block done for the month. The reason for this is two-fold. One, I decided to stop giving myself eye strain and ordered some white transfer paper which took a while to arrive. Two, with The Mister gone the first 2/3 of the month, I didn't feel much like embroidering. Sharp needles and frayed nerves due to crazy children just do not mix well. But hey it's done.

And I even have the first three months sewn together. I'm keeping up with piecing-as-I-go!

Next up...

My Star-y Log Cabin quilt. I didn't work on it much this month, but it's coming along nicely. I didn't cut any points off of my sawtooth stars. I'm super proud of myself for that! I'm still debating what size this will be, since a few of my seams are very thin and I'm unsure this can take the wear and tear of being a normal blanket. I'm not sold on the idea of it as a wall hanging though, either. I've never been big on decorative quilts in my own home. I'll figure it out at some point, I'm sure.

And now onto my knitting.

SIGH

Last week without the sleeves, my sweater was looking pretty good. But I started to feel nervous when trying it on. It kept nagging at me and that nervousness turned to agitation.

Is it obvious here yet? As you can see from that little bit of my mouth, I'm not pleased. Can you see how the shoulder seams are outside of where my shoulders are? That it wants to hang off because it's wide in the neck? Maybe you notice that I'm wearing a long sleeve shirt under this and it's still doing that....

No?

How about now? (And please pardon my hair. The humidity is making it curl and look dirty. My skin can not take these constant humidity and temperature changes. Makes it CRAZAY.)

I started cursing up a blue streak when I was editing these photos and realized just how much too big this sweater is. Here, I had been thinking it was just a bit too big in between the shoulders in the back, and now I realize it's too big everywhere but maybe not the bicep and across the chest.

This is what I get for going up a size from what I usually knit. Even though I have a 45.5" bust, I usually knit a 38"-40" size. Those measurements work best for my torso and I edit the bust and arms from there. This one is a 43". I wasn't familiar with the construction and didn't want to mess around too much this time around. I did mess with the arm depth measurement. As written, it was supposed to be just shy of 9", and I stopped at about 8.5". As you can see, I should have stopped much sooner. Probably at about 8". My arm pit is NOT down by the bottom of my breast. Had I gone the full 9", it would have hit my waist, high though it may be.

BALLS.

I often get frustrated with how patterns are scaled. The assumption is that as one gets wider, all of the measurements should be scaled up proportionately, even vertical ones. To make a pattern my size, it's often assumed that I'm at least 4" taller then I am. It would be even more if I went by my actual bust measurement--those often assume I'm pushing the 6' mark. (Let's not even go into the bust measurement that most often corresponds with my bicep measurement.) Someone on Ravelry had commented that she had worked in the industry--retail clothing, not patterns--and that for sizing they scaled it up so the different sizes nest like Matroyshka dolls. Rather then call in a second, larger model to base the plus sized pieces off of, they continued to scale up. It's not uncommon for me to try on pants and the crotch is about to my knees.

Pattern scaling seems to work much this same way. Just make the arm hole .25" to .5" deeper for each size up you go! Height makes the arm bigger because it's adding stitches to the count....right? WRONG. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Anywho, this problem is common enough that Ysolda's new book has extensive sizing information in it. I remember participating in a survey she did asking for bust size, bicep width, and a measurement to determine the vertical depth of your armpit. She wanted to figure out what kind of alteration information would be most helpful and not surprisingly, there are a lot of large chested, big armed women out there who do not need 9" deep armholes and are not 6' tall. GO FIGURE.

(The book is not yet released but is reported to be pushing well-over 200 pages. She wasn't kidding when she said she wanted to cover the subject in-depth. I'm really looking forward to it and pre-ordered first chance I got!)

While this is exciting, it's little consolation for my current sweater which will need to be frogged all the way back to the saddles. Those are just fine; everything else is too big. Please feel free to chime in and tell me to get it over with.

WIP-it Wednesday: 12 of 52

2011-03-23T19:00:00.003-05:00

Kittens! Knitting! Sweater! Working at a decent pace! How many exclamation points are needed to show just how excited I am about this?

This week I actually have decent pictures to show off. (We managed to eek them out mere minutes before the sun disappeared for the day. I was knitting like a fiend to get to the end of my skein so we could take them.)

In the past week, I've managed to knit double the yardage I already finished on this sweater. It's coming along quickly now that I'm able to try it on and confirm that it's OK. Knitters who swatch and then knit without ever trying something on confuse me a lot. I don't know if I'll ever "get" that mentality. Maybe I take for granted the fact that my body requires so many different pattern sizes to make something fit that I have to try all of my sweaters on and make sure they're working. I can never just Trust The Swatch.

This was supposed to be a test knit, and I meant to finish it in a timely manner, but thanks to The Girl, it had to be put on hold for over a month. She stole and hid all of my interchangeable connector parts and none of my cables were large enough to try this on. So it sat for awhile until I had the funds to reorder my parts from Knit Picks. Then I had to wait for them to arrive. By the time they made it here I had fallen into knitting ennui and moved onto quilting to distract myself. It wasn't until last week that I finally felt like picking this back up and getting to work. (And of course, once the new parts arrived, my old ones immediately surfaced.)

The pattern has since been released for sale, and I would recommend it. The construction is not difficult at all and the saddle shoulder construction is a nice change from raglan sweaters. It's still seamless with no fussy sewing in of sleeves. Hopefully, I'll have a more in-depth FO post for this soon as well as a review for the yarn. I have...interesting things to say about it.

A Peek at my Bed Quilt Progress

2011-03-17T20:18:00.002-05:00

This is how I spent last night: sandwiching our bed quilt.

It took about twice as long as I thought it would, and I had forgotten how hard on the body it is to work with such a large piece. My knees and back where really unhappy with me last night by the time this was finished.

And this is how I'll be spending today and tonight. Honestly, quite a few more, "today and tonights," will be spent like this. I'm quilting these lines close together, about 3 per inch. It's a pretty neat textural effect so far.

WIP-it Wednesday: 11 of 52

2011-03-16T23:28:00.002-05:00

Slow going and hard-earned progress on this knitting WIP. When I originally calculated the size, I believe I said this is ~95" across. It's a lot of knitting per row, kittens. A lot of knitting. So far I've used 1 skein of the bright green, 2 of the bright blue, and now I'm starting a section that is 7 skeins of the chocolate brown. Once that is complete, I've finished the bottom of the blanket, and I can unravel the provisional cast-on and work my way up the top. I'll be about 1/3 of the way done at that point.

I should finish by the end of the year.

I hope.

...

I think I can safely say that WIP shots of this project are not going to be all that exciting until I get back to working smaller stripes on the top half of the blanket. But fear not! I've finally pulled out another project, and I'm hoping to make some progress on it by next Wednesday. (My photographer is finally coming home Sunday afternoon and hopefully he'll feel up to assisting me get a decent shot of it. ♥)

I should have some more quilting/sewing posts coming up soon as well.

WIP-it Wednesday: 10 of 52

2011-03-09T17:20:00.003-06:00

Kittens, we have gone almost 1/3 of the way through March, and I haven't blogged once. Not once. I suppose I could explain myself but eh, that's not all that much fun to read about, is it? You do not come here to read about what's going on and why I haven't been doing anything; you come here to read about what I have been working on.

There hasn't been much, but I do have a couple of things to share. (And I've decided to get over my reluctance to mix knits with sewing, so hopefully I'll post more often as I finish up the sewing/quilting projects.)

The first items up are technically FOs, but I just finished them today, so I'm including them as WIPS. (What? Have you seen me blog an FO this year?!)

Who is that amazing masked bird?

Angry Birds love has hit this house and hard. Even though he's not allowed to play it on our phones, The Boy is obsessed with the game and has taken to setting up his own scenarios to play out.

I decided that maybe it was time to make him some plush characters to toss around instead. Now that I've finished these two, he's been bombarding me with requests for every other bird. The designer of this pattern has already made patterns for the others, minus one bird. The cardinal happens to be a free Ravelry download. I'm the world's slowest crocheter, and I still managed to pop both of these out in under 2 days.

And if anyone is wondering, no, there are not any masked birds in the game. I ran out of Cherry cotton-ease and had to find a way to make it stretch to get a second bird done. The Boy thinks it's pretty cool and is convinced it's from the actual game, so who am I to argue with him?

It feels really good to finish up a yarn-y project; I'm hoping to maybe focus on getting some others off of needles in the near-ish future as well.

I've been making slow but sure progress on my bed quilt. Minor things keep going wrong and slowing me down. When this happens, I stop and work on something else for awhile instead. I'm hoping to get moving on this again tonight and at the least, fix a mistake that has kept me from sandwiching this.

What about you, kittens? Are you working on much or has February/March been slow crafting time for you as well? Maybe your energies are focused elsewhere instead?

February 2011 wrap-up

2011-02-28T21:53:00.002-06:00

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds
February: 762yds

Year to date: 1,833 yds or 1.04 miles

Weeell, kittens. Considering I didn't start actually knitting this month until about 10 days ago, that's not such a bad number. As some of my sewing projects wind down, I'm hoping to have more time--and desire--to knit again. If not, a fun new toy arrived for me and I'm raring to go to learn to use it!

FO: Super Sekret Mug Rug

2011-02-24T09:43:00.003-06:00

Now that I know this has made its way to the intended recipient--the lovely and Ritzy Experimental Katie-- I can blog about it a bit.

Kittens, I made a mug rug. A mini quilt meant to hold your cuppa... and maybe a treat or two. There's an entire group dedicated to swapping them over on Flickr, and after staring at one after another gorgeous mug rug, I decided to take a crack at it. Since Katie's birthday was coming up around that time--and I just happened to be working on a quilt with purple (one of her favorite colors)--I went to work.

These are a great way to use up little bits and pieces of scraps. I decided to make mine with a mini Courthouse block (not surprising considering I've made so many lately...) and a garden gnome, since Katie is so fond of them. It's actually quite different then I originally envisioned, but I had to change plans as I went. This project was a definite learning experience. (And in case anyone is wondering, yes, the hat is made of some felted knitting. That was the first knitting I had done all month. It's Malabrigo but SHHHH! Don't tell the bat squad, OK?)

Binding something this small proved to be a bit tricky, but thanks to this tutorial, I made it through OK.

I'm pretty sure there will be more of these in my future.

WIP-it Wednesday: 08 of 52

2011-02-23T20:35:00.001-06:00

Took a little break there, kittens, but I seem to be back onto knitting for the time being.

Blankets!

Tickles and Teases

2011-02-20T20:30:00.003-06:00

Kittens, it's getting there. All the blocks are completed. I've decided on the layout. All I have left to do is piece the top, decide on the backing, and quilt/finish. This weekend has been quite productive.

Block 8

2011-02-17T22:20:00.004-06:00

There is still very little to blog, kittens, but fear not! Today, a huge box from Jimmy Beans Wool arrived at my house, and I can continue on The Boy's king-sized blanket. There will be knitting. Oh yes, there will be knitting. And I *did* start a project the other day...another blanket inspired by this one. Kittens, I am all about blankets right now and seem to be flipping the bird to sweaters and socks. It's going to be all blankets, all the time around here. Knit blankets. Quilted blankets. Blankets for The Girl. Blankets for The Boy. Blankets for our bed. A very special blanket just for me.

Blankets. Yes.

(Since my Knitpicks interchangeable replacement parts also arrived, I can finally continue on the sweater I was test knitting as well. I'm sure I would have been done by now, had I not been sidelined by The Girl and her obsession with hiding all of my things. For being only 2 and so small, she sure does make a lot of trouble.)

Anywho.

As the title says, I managed to finish Courthouse block 08 of 11 that I need for our new bed quilt. If all goes well, I may be able to wrap these up over the weekend, but we shall see. The last of some other fabric needed arrived today for that and I can start piecing the top as soon as all of the blocks are finished. Yay!

Block 7

2011-02-10T20:09:00.004-06:00

Right at the end of January, I finished up this 7th quilt block and then stopped while I considered what I really wanted to do with our bed quilt.

You see, kittens, that nagging feeling I often get was starting to roar at me. I really liked the blocks I've been making, but I wasn't digging the pattern they came from. This is not the fault of the pattern, but rather, my inability to notice that the retro starburst panels used were not random as I had remembered; they were actually in a symmetrical pattern in the middle of the quilt. Once I realized this--but not before I spent many days vainly hoping I'd find more panels for sale--and started to play with my own quilt's layout, I realized there was no way to make the quilt look like anything but an after thought. And really, who wants to put something on her bed that looks like she gave little-to-no thought to it?

It just wouldn't do.

So I took a couple of days off to regroup before deciding where to go next. I ended up spending an entire evening carefully drawing and redrawing--to scale--different layouts for my quilt top until I came upon one that struck my fancy and was the clear winner.

No, I'm not sharing it yet. It's going to be a surprise. But needless to say, this quilt should finish up much more quickly, and hopefully, it will have a much more modern and purposeful feel to it.

Birdie Stitches: February 2011

2011-02-10T19:57:00.003-06:00

I have quite a bit of catching up to do, kittens! Last week, a stomach bug tore through my house and brought everything to a stand still. We still have some stragglers for full recovery, but at least we're starting to do things again that do not involve lying on the couch and napping.

Right before the bug hit, I was about to write a couple of quilting blog posts that had to be delayed. I'm going to try and get them both out tonight.

First is the second block in my Birdie Stitches embroider/quilt along. I actually finished this before the 4th and it's just been sitting around waiting to be photographed ever since. This month, Ms. Birdie apparently finds a mister. The Girl is quite excited about her quilt and happily squeaks about it every chance she gets. I wish she'd get this excited when I knit her things.

My guess is that March's block will feature clover...though, maybe a lion and a lamb? I have to admit that, in my mind, March is one of the more fun months, since it's not as predictable what the theme could be. Hopefully before the next block releases, I'll have some of the top piecing finished. I finally found where I stashed the medium gray Kona I'm using for the top and I can get to work cutting it for the sashing.

I'm itching to be productive and moving again after more then a week of nothing!

WIP-it Wednesday: 05 of 52

2011-02-02T23:14:00.002-06:00

I am so boring this year, kittens! I'm amazed you're sticking around to read my blog.

So little has happened since last week that I didn't take pictures of my knitting WIPs. Really, how different is an additional inch of garter stitch/stockinette to a project?! I am working, but very slowly. Someday, I'll be interesting again; I promise.

January 2011

2011-01-31T16:30:00.002-06:00

Yes, kittens, I will continue to track yardage in 2011.

The year is off to a decent start. I had an unofficial, unambitious goal of knitting 1,000yds in January. I managed to meet it and exceed it by 70yds. Considering all of the sewing, baking, and other things going on here, that's not too shabby. True, it's low for me (my average month seems to be about 1400yds), but it's not so low that I feel like I got nothing done.

I think 1,000yds a month may be my goal post for every month in 2011. Once I start crocheting again, that number will be blasted out of the water. For months where I'm only knitting, it's enough to move on projects while still doing other things I enjoy. I'm not sure if this is that "balance" thing I'm striving for, but it seems to be closer. It's felt nice to be able to work on different things, and I'm even starting to work reading back into the rotation. I definitely haven't been stressed out about knitting at all this month; that may be a first in a long time.

Yardage Totals 2011

January: 1071 yds

Year to date: 1,071 yds or O.61 miles

Asking for opinions...

2011-01-27T19:11:00.004-06:00

Kittens, I *think* I know what direction I'm taking this, but I'd like a second opinion(s) on the matter:

This is for one of the WIPs I teased you with yesterday. In our home, the vote is now at 2-to-1, with The Boy agreeing with me which direction to take his blanket. Have I even blogged about it? Well, you may recognize that bright yellow-green. The rest of the palette has been picked out, but the question is which blue to use?

Here is the inspiration blanket from Land of Nod.

Berroco Vintage (which I'm using) has colors that match up really well with the greens, brown, and orange, but none of the blues are quite the same as the one in the bed spread.

If this were your blanket kitten, which blue would you choose?

Block 6

2011-01-26T21:43:00.007-06:00

Ooh, see that, kittens? I barely get a knitting post out and BAM! Quilting posts again. I'm tricksy like that.

This is block 06 of 27. Now that I have a much stronger sense of direction for the colors, these are getting easier to piece, and I'm enjoying the process more. I finished this one last night and then proceeded onto a new project...Block 02, revisited.

Kittens, if you can recall, Block 02 looked like this...

and I was very unhappy with it. When I first dreamt up this quilt, I wanted to use a very slightly green-blue with bright red. And for some reason, that idea never left me. I washed up my red and green-blue fabrics, cut a couple, and tried to work them into this quilt. You gotta keep 'em separated. For real. These colors did not mix nicely and fought for the block. Sections went nicely together, but that was as good as it got.

This one was the worst offender of the two I was going to just "chuck." And by chuck, I mean use for something else. I didn't want to lose the segments that I liked, but trying to figure out how to deal with them was giving me a headache. Because you see, kittens, I suffer from this chronic condition called, "laziness." Anytime a project requires a lot of tedious picking out and repinning of seams--or you know, pinning them in the first place--I tend to scoff at the idea and drop it. I hate losing work I've already done. I have started to take baby steps in the right direction. This last week I've been seen ripping out a seam here or there and redoing it...or taking extra care to pin pieces together and ensure they won't be moving while I sew. But redo a whole block? That's just crazy talk.

But then I had an idea. An awful, putzy idea. What if I didn't rip out the entire block? What if I...

grafted new pieces on top of the old? And sewed them along the lines I'll later use to quilt the block?!

!!!

This is either genius, or a whole new level of avoidance and laziness. I'm not sure which yet.

Regardless, it worked after some fussiness, and I decided to make over the other two strips that weren't jiving with the way I wanted these blocks to look.

So much better. See how much happier the left side of that block is? This was the point where I went to bed in the wee hours of this morning, but by early this afternoon...

The whole thing was complete.

I'll be honest: this still isn't my favorite block of the ones I've completed. But it is so. much. better. then it was before I made the fixes to it.

Block 03 will also be getting a minor face lift after I decide what fabric to graft on. I think it should be OK with replacing just the middle square.

WIP-it Wednesday: 04 of 52

2011-01-26T21:28:00.004-06:00

I may subtitle this, "The Boring Edition." Because seriously, none of my knits have progressed to the point that they're exciting to look at. But they *do* exist, and I shall prove it to you. (I know, it was a dirty trick to take a knitting blog and suddenly throw a bunch of quilt blocks at you! ♥ I swear, I'm still knitting.)

Ooh, thrilling.

I'll end up blogging this one in more detail in the near future. As you can see, kittens, there's a provisional cast on...and a lot of garter stitch. 95" worth of garter stitch, if my math isn't telling dirty lies. Once this bit is knit, I'll have my yardage numbers to run with and get the other colors ordered.

All in due time though.

This one isn't the easiest to make out. Dark tweedy goodness is hiding the shaping I'm putting in. This is a test knit for fallmasche on Ravelry.

Block 5

2011-01-24T22:45:00.004-06:00

Kittens, I hope to finish piecing the blocks for the top of this quilt before I start piecing for an e-course I'm taking in February and March. The Mister will be off doing some unpleasant training during that time, so I figured it would be best to keep myself as busy as possible; I hate having too many WIPs at the same time though.

( I apologize for the color quality on these latest pictures; I can not get the hang of Photoshop Elements, and I'm waiting on getting my usual program re-installed. So if you're looking at the same fabric and how different it is from picture to picture, well...I'm trying. :P )

Weekend WIPing: Block 4

2011-01-23T14:20:00.003-06:00

Kittens, there hasn't been a ton of crafting going on this week. However, I did manage to sew one more block of our bed quilt (04 of 27 needed unless I can find another "cheat" block or 3), and I did manage to piece together the other 11 blocks that will be embroidered during my Block of the Month project.

They aren't really all that interesting though. I pieced every one of them exactly the same so I could do faster, chain piecing. It took less then 3 hours to finish and press them all. For the most part, they're nice and neat. Minus 2 perfect ones, they're all slightly off (2-3 corners match up, but the other 1-2 don't), but I was expecting that. Most of this fabric was bought ages ago from Jo-Anns or other cheapy places. So it has a lower thread count and doesn't hold shape very nicely. I'm just hoping they won't unravel and pop seams like our "Frankenquilt." Kittens, in all things the quality of your materials really does matter. Just sayin'.

Here's block 4 of our new bed quilt. I can't decide if this one or block 1 is my favorite so far. This one is definitely the color scheme I want to stick with for the rest of the blocks. Looking back at block 1, it is as well. Orange, aqua, brown, and grey with cream and white seems to be the winner.

As I get closer to the finish, I'll decide if I want to keep the two blocks I used some of the red in or if I'll rip them apart....maybe make pillows with them? Who knows. They're not terrible by any means, just the red is incongruous with what I'm going for. I guess it will depend on what I have leftover how they look together when I go to piece the top.

WIP-it Wednesday: 03 of 52

2011-01-19T19:28:00.003-06:00

Kittens, you've probably already noticed that there isn't a photo in this week's WIP post. The answer is quite simple: I've had several mis-starts this week. They all ended with frogging. In the wee hours of this morning, I cast on one project and knit...one row. Nothing exciting to look at. Then, I was sent a pattern I'm test knitting, so I'm off to cast that one on.

I am working, just have nothing to show for it at the moment.

Birdie Stitches: January 2011

2011-01-16T11:39:00.003-06:00

In an earlier post, I had mentioned in passing that I was considering joining a quilting/embroidering block of the month project. Friday, I decided it was a great idea and got started. I'm working on this for The Girl and using up some very old stash of purple, orchid, and pink fabrics. (Some of them have been marinating in my tote for over a decade.) I also pulled out some Kona I had purchased for a skirt pattern and never got around to making. Stashbuster!

I haven't done a lot of embroidery to date, so I'm pleased with how it's turning out. I'm going to make all 12 blocks exactly like this one in terms of the patchwork border. I also plan to enlarge the quilt; as written, it will be big enough for snuggling under, but not quite big enough for The Girl's bed. (She's still in a toddler bed but is insistent that she needs a big girl bed and yesterday.) It will not require drastic resizing to make it work for a full size bed, so I'm sure I'll figure it out by the time the last block is done in December.

This is something new for me. When it comes to crafting and creating, I tend to be more of a Hare then a Tortoise. Anything longer term then 4-5 weeks loses my interest and I feel like it's stagnated. If something takes a long time, I worry that it's a sign that I'm no good at it, and I may as well give up. I'm not going to win or be the best. (This could lead into an interesting discussion about having my childhood [and honestly, most children's upbringing] focused on achievement rather then persistence and hard work, but that may not be a topic for this blog. It's definitely something I'm flipping with my own children and how I raise them.)

So here it is! Block 01 of 12. You'll be seeing one from me each month, kittens, as well as the finished quilt in the winter.

WIP-it Wednesday: 02 of 52

2011-01-12T16:08:00.003-06:00

It's already been a week, kittens. This is what I have on needles:

I'm in the mood to knit toys...for now. Not much else going on, just getting ready to start a second quilt/embroidery project. It's a Block of the Month and simple, so I thought I'd give it a go.

Blocks 2 &3

2011-01-09T09:43:00.004-06:00

Hey, kittens. I hope you all are enjoying your weekend. I finished the socks I've been knitting and working on quilt blocks. I've been doing both at a pretty leisurely pace. :P

Each block has elements I really like it in...and things I'm not so hot about. A good chunk of the problem is that I have very few truly dark or light valued fabrics, so it's been challenging to make this quilt. I'm definitely learning lessons on planning and fabric buying. (I'm also seeing why quilters have such large stashes. I have a large sized tote full of fabric and this has been difficult.)

While a bit more random then I'd like, I'm feeling pretty good about this so far. So I'll keep on truckin'.

Fabric Friday

2011-01-07T13:37:00.005-06:00

One of my goals for the year is to finally make a new bed quilt for The Mister and me.

I originally planned to make a pattern out of Material Obsession and fell in love with "Retro Starburst." (Anyone who knows me well enough to know of my love affair with mid-century modern--starbursts in particular--should not be surprised by this.) This was about 3 years ago, back in the days before I knew about popular (out of print) quilting fabric lines, and little did I know, I fell in love with one in that pattern. After correspondence with the author of the book (who owns a quilt shop in Australia by the same name), I was informed of the name of my material obsession (oh kittens, I can't help myself sometimes): Flea Market Fancy by Denise Schmidt. This would be the place to cue the Audience Groan.

I'm no stranger to hard-to-find, hard-to-buy objects, but FMF was too much for me. I tried to find it everywhere. Random Google searches. Etsy. Ebay. Over the course of three years, I've managed to purchase some of the less desirable fabrics, and even lucked out in a score of the large scale, blue and red floral, but I was never able to get all of the line I would have liked. I became bitter and decided to move on, dumping the pattern after a substitute line didn't strike my fancy as I had hoped. (Deer Valley (in azure) by Joel Dewberry, if anyone is curious. The colors were just too subdued and while pretty, I really wanted the vibrant colors of the FMF.) I dumped it even though I had gone through the pains of purchasing some of the Prints Charming starburst blocks from Material Obsession and having them shipped here.

So I tried to work with Deer Valley and could never seem to find the right pattern for it. Eventually, I started purchasing random fabrics I thought would coordinate, but almost always, they just didn't. It really is a hard line to match, except with other Dewberry lines and SURPRISE! Those are popular and hard to find as well.

While my mother was visiting in July and August, I decided to give Unfurnished a whirl. Sadly, it's poorly written and gave me a hard time. Shockingly, it also gave my mother, who is a veteran sewer and quilter, a headache trying to figure it out. After a good day of trying to make sense of the directions, she helped me alter the size and we got the fabric prepped to go. As soon as she left, my enthusiasm for the project went that way as well. It just wasn't...right. So I packed up the fabric and my machine. I wallowed in my sewing angst for awhile.

Then two nights ago, I was up late and decided I was going to pick a pattern and get working on it. What did I decide on?

Retro Starburst. Why did I ever deviate from this? So now I've prepped more fabric and pieced together the first block.

I'm rather happy with it. Since it is rotary cut, the book has it set up to mass produce and sew together, but I'm not as confident with sewing and quilting as I am with knitting. So I decided to take this slow and after each fabric addition, I've placed the block next to every fabric I have and hand-picked the next one to be sewn on. It took about 3 hours to get this all cut, sewn and pressed. Not too bad, considering it's a little bigger then 18.5" square.

The first block contains a few lines that I'm not sure who designed them, but there's a little FMF in there, some Amy Butler, and some Joel Dewberry.

Here's to the next block!

WIP-it Wednesday: 01 of 52

2011-01-05T16:40:00.004-06:00

One of my unofficial goals is to blog my works-in-progress every single Wednesday this year. Doing a little research, I found that 2011 has exactly 52 Wednesdays in it. So let's get started, shall we?

After the insanity which was December, I've decided to take things a little easy in January. I'm slowly working on a pair of a-little-too-long-to-be-ankle socks. One is finished and the other is starting to take shape. These should be an FO before next Wednesday.

After that, I'm not 100% sure what I'll be working on. First quarter 2011 is looking to be filled with gift projects, as well as focusing using up some of these left over bits and pieces of yarn. Honestly, I would not be surprised if there is another pair of short socks...or 4. They're quick, mindless, and useful. They'll be a nice break from the projects I'm going to be working on otherwise. (I'm still not sure how I'll be handling those, either. The recipient of some of them is now on Ravelry and may know about this blog. It may be a frustrating few months with only non-descript teasers. Sorry, kittens.)

Knitting/Crafting Intentions: 2011

2011-01-01T20:58:00.003-06:00

Since I'm one to wax romantic about a symbolic fresh start, I like to make a list of the things I didn't do so well with the past year and use that to focus on what I'd like to improve in the next year. I'm very much a "process live-r" and the journey is much more important then where I end up. Becoming is more important then being. Odd, I know. So, I'm all over resolutions/intentions/plans/goals/whatever-you-want-to-call-them.

For knitting--and crafting in general--it's much easier to pinpoint what I'd like to do. A bit less reflection is involved then other parts of my life. For one, I document my crafting life silly with this blog. Join me now while I muddle my way through my goals and how I intend to accomplish them.

♥ Knit mostly from stash and work out the excess.

Up until November 2010, I had already accomplished this for the most part. All of my stash, minus partials and some project cotton, fit into my under-bed storage container. And there was room to spare, kittens. Room to spare! After some project buying and one panic-induced purchase from Knit Picks (how was I to know that the haphazard mark down of colors did not mean they were discontinuing them?!), I have a bit of overflow.

So.

I plan to work primarily from stash and only purchase yarn needed for an immediate project. I'll have my one club skein coming a month, but 400-ish yards of fingering weight doesn't take up all that much room comparatively. The reduction of one sweater quantity will make room for 3-6 skeins of sock yarn.

I also plan to indulge in a special project here or there, as the goal of last year's Stashdown was to get to the point that I could do that...for the most part, I can. Stash should not be something one resents and feels obligations toward.

By the end of 2011, I'm hoping to reduce my current 09 sweater lots to 04. I also hope to crank out some socks this year to help balance out the 12 skeins that will come in through out the year from my club, as well as the one here or there I'm lucky enough to nab in an update.

All of the above really tied into what I consider to be my second sweeping knitting goal:

♥ Allow myself a few immediate cast-on indulgences so I do not feel resentful of existing stash.

Yeah. I kinda covered that already. Whoops?

Moving on.

♥ Avoid poor, impulsive purchases that will have to be destashed later on down the road.

I mostly curbed this in 2010, but the urge to buy all the pretties still hits hard sometimes. Most of them are gorgeous yarn that just will not work for me, no matter how much I love the color. They're impractical for one reason or another, and then I have to end up trying to sell them on Ravelry or give them away.

This mostly happens because I focus on small-lot, hand dyed yarn: even though some are hard to get, they're hardly a scarce resource, and it's silly that the hoarding instinct kicks in, and I want to "catch them all."

The easiest way to avoid this pitfall is to ignore groups on Ravelry that fuel the need for the yarn. The other is to just avoid the dyers' websites.

And finally, the most important sweeping goal:

♥ Sit back, relax, and enjoy all of my pretty yarn while I turn it into gorgeous objects!

It seems simple enough. After the December I just had, I'm really not into yardage grinding in 2011. I will have to stay focused, but eventually, I want to not have to think about these things.

For those of you who are still with me and not staring at the teal deer, here are the few concrete things I want to get done in 2011.

♥ Knit 05-?? sweaters and be left with 04 or fewer lots in my tote.

♥ Use up most-all of my partials or get them out the door. Some have been caked for 3 years, and it's just not good for them.

♥ Knit another 05 pairs of socks.

♥ Sew bean bag chairs for both of my children.

♥ Sew a sewing machine cover.

♥ Sew that new bedquilt for The Mister and I.

♥ Get that gift blanket re-crocheted and out the door in time for the couple's first anniversary.

I think that's about it for concrete goals. Should be an interesting 2011.

2010 Wrap-up

2010-12-31T20:40:00.004-06:00

Last yardage tally for the year, kittens! Woot!

Yardage Totals 2010

January: 1884 yds
February: 2850 yds
March: 2893 yds
April: 777 yds
May: 856 yds

June: 643 yds
July: 751yds

August: 1716yds

September: 3046 yds

October: 1337 yds

November: 1366yds

December: 2698yds

Year to date: 20,817 yds or 11.83 miles

OOOH. I was pretty close to the mile-per-month mark I was aiming for, but didn't quite get there. It's about 3.25 more miles' worth of yarn then I knit in 2009. (And a lot less frogging as well. :] )

I plan to continue tracking my yardage in 2011 and maybe at the end of it, I'll do a 3 year comparison and see if there are any trends to my knitting. I'm pretty sure my numbers will not be quite so high in 2011, and when I share my knitting intentions, that will make more sense. But I have to save something for tomorrow, right?

Now I'm off to watch Voyager with The Mister, work on a sock, and eat some snackies.

Goodbye, 2010

2010-12-31T20:11:00.004-06:00

Kittens, at first, I wanted to do one of those spiffy photo collages of my FOs like all the cool kids are doing, but then I realized that I finished 37 projects this year. 37. The lazy in me does not feel up to resizing and cropping 37 photos to fit into a rectangle.

So instead, let's break them down a bit:

♥ 2 Blankets

♥ 1 Potholder

♥ 1 Cowl

♥ 1 Hoodlet

♥ 9 toys

♥ 6 pairs of socks

♥ 4 hats

♥ 1 shawlette

♥ 10 sweaters

♥ 1 pair of Swiffer covers

♥ 1 pair of fingerless mitts

Of these 37 projects, 2 were frogged and will be remade . 2 were tossed because the yarn was wrecked in my attempts to fix them in unconventional ways to avoid frogging.

My first FO of the year was Liesl.

And my last FO is yet unphotographed as an FO: Woodland Hoodlet.

All in all, it has been a seriously productive year and most of my projects turned out well. Hopefully, 2011 will be even better!

Happy New Year, kittens!

2010 Stashdown: Final Post

2010-12-31T00:09:00.004-06:00

2010 Q1 Stashdown

Yardage in: 6,681
Yardage out: 9,766
Net stash change: -3,085
Ratio (yds out/in): 1.462

2010 Q2 Stashdown

Yardage in: 7,014
Yardage out: 7,498
Net stash change: -484
Ratio (yds out/in): 1.069

2010 Q3 Stashdown

Yardage in: 7,591
Yardage out: 10,588
Net stash change: -2,997
Ratio (yds out/in): 1.395

2010 Q4 Stashdown

Yardage in: 19,553

Yardage out: 11,095

Net Stash change: +8,457

Ratio (yds out/in): .567

2010 Totals so far:

Yardage in: 40,838

Yardage out: 38,947

Net Stash Change: +1,891

Ratio (yds out/in): .954

And there you have it, Kittens. After 3 quarters in the green and slowly chipping away at my stash, I had to make some large purchases --and reclaim a large chunk of that yardage via frogging (think the year's net stash change minus about 200yds)--this quarter. As a result, I'm in the red for the year. Boo. Totals have been edited 18 May 2011 after deciding to go ahead and use an item that was in the frog pile to be reclaimed.

While I'm sad about this, I'm also trying to be positive: my rate of acquirance in 2010 was much slower then 2009. I didn't technically have a StashWIN! sort of year, but I did take the first steps in slowing down the thoughtless buying and became more deliberate in my purchases.

You better believe you'll be seeing more stash tracking in 2011. I'm actually pretty pumped about it. In 2011, that net stash change will be green.

Quickie

2010-12-31T00:05:00.003-06:00

Kittens, I'm going to do my best to do some 2010 wrap-up posts before it ends ~~tomorrow~~ tonight. However, my in-laws are in town and I've been attempting to avoid being rude and hide from them. I might try to make an exception for a short time tomorrow, though, just for you. ♥

You should be seeing at least one post from me but in case I can not get to more, Happy New Year!

WIP it Wednesday

2010-12-28T21:57:00.004-06:00

OK, kittens. It's technically still Tuesday here for another 2 hours, but my in-laws are in town and that means little-to-no computer time during the day. (And by tomorrow, these may both be off needles, and I'd have nothing to share.)

Crochet project. Something small. Still on the fence about it; it's ruffling when it shouldn't be.

Mmmm. Dense cables in bulky weight. Will have quite the yarn write-up for this later on.

Merry Giftmas!

2010-12-25T11:41:00.001-06:00

I hope everyone is having a lovely holiday surrounded by loved ones and some yummy treats! Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Vikings, Day 13

2010-12-20T08:53:00.002-06:00

Kittens, today I will ask that you use your imaginations. I will not be providing a picture. Visualize yesterday's doll, but with two legs. Now you know what I did last night.

In my last post, I forgot to mention the time involved to stuff the body and knit that one leg down to the boot: 2.5 hours. Last night, it took 2 hours to knit the other leg and stuff it. These are a time intensive knit, to be sure. (If anyone is wondering why I'm keeping track, well...I like numbers, and I'm genuinely curious how many hours go into a project like this. People will ask and I want to have a number on hand to quote.)

Based on how long these are taking, working only 2-3 hours a night for the next 4 is not going to cut it. I still have to knit:

* 2 legs for the girl doll and stuff her: ~4.5 hours labor

* 4 horns for the helmets: ~1 hour to knit/ 1 hour to stuff and seam on

* 2 belt ends: ~ 1 hour to knit/ 15 minutes to seam on

* 2 swords: ~2 hours to knit/ 2 hours to stuff/seam/embroider/attach

This list does not include embroidering on the details like the face and shirt laces, nor does it include embroidering on the hair. Off the top of my head, I'm going to guess those tasks will take me another 3-4 hours.

So, let's do the math. I have an estimated 15 hours and 45 minutes worth of labor to do in 4 days. 2 hours a night will not cut it, and I came to this realization last night as I was packing up and stowing the dolls away.

My children are too old to work in front of anymore...so what will I do? The husband should be home every day from now until the end of the year, so I'm going to lock myself in my bedroom for 20-30 minutes at a time and try to steal an extra 2 hours a day to finish the dolls up.

Vikings, Day 12

2010-12-19T20:33:00.001-06:00

They're finally starting to take shape. I'm still seriously nervous about if I can finish in time or not: 5 nights left...including tonight. Eep.

Vikings, Day 11

2010-12-18T15:57:00.002-06:00

Viking underpants! Err...leggings, I suppose would be more correct. Last night, I could have done more knitting. However, someone went to the store specifically for Polyfil and then managed to forget to purchase said Polyfil. Before I can knit any further, these two need to be stuffed. Some of those openings are pretty small....

I have 6 more evenings to work on these, kittens. I'm starting to get nervous and wonder if I was perhaps too optimistic thinking these could be done in the time.

Vikings, Day 10

2010-12-17T21:54:00.002-06:00

If you take Day 9's picture, and imagine that the color stripe in the belt is blue rather then purple, you will know exactly what I worked on last night. ;) It seemed a bit silly to take a photo of the same thing I photographed before. But fear not, kittens! I'll be back with a photo tomorrow.

A Couple Realizations...

2010-12-16T10:11:00.003-06:00

Kittens, two things have come to my attention today.

1) This blog will be 4 in July. It and I share the same birth month and birth week. I will try to do something special for that time. It's not every year your blog turns 4 and you get to celebrate the last year of your 20s.

2) The scarf I was blogging about yesterday? I just noticed that I twisted the stitches. I think I'm going to let it be and it will become a mobius cowl instead. Whoops? (This is the first time I've managed to do that. I can not believe it took me three days to notice it!)

So what about you, kittens? Have you had any realizations today, either pleasant or unpleasant?

Vikings, Day 9

2010-12-16T08:57:00.007-06:00

Another hour, another arm. The second one is a bit funny looking, especially the thumb. Oh well, they're Vikings and I'm sure they break bones and improperly set them all the time.

One Viking down, another to go while I try to figure out the instructions for the legs...I'm having a really rough time visualizing how those are going to knit up.

WIP it Wednesday

2010-12-15T22:52:00.004-06:00

Kittens, it is ~11pm CST. So I made it before Wednesday is over! Last night, I took a break from the Vikings; my hands were due the kindness. So instead I'll leave you with a picture of my new daytime WIP...

An infinity scarf has been cast-on!

Vikings, Day 7

2010-12-14T15:38:00.002-06:00

Little hands are so fiddly. One arm took about 55 minutes to knit. Three more to go.

Vikings, Day 6

2010-12-13T08:27:00.002-06:00

I took it "easy" last night and spent about 65 minutes finishing up the viking girl's tunic. Tonight, I'll start working on the putzy, but fairly quick, limbs. I'll be very glad when this knit is done; my joints are bothering me a bit between the cold and the tightly knit cotton.

Vikings, Day 5

2010-12-12T12:52:00.001-06:00

I put in another 2.5 hours last night, give or take a few minutes. You can finally see a difference in the vikings: the blue one is for The Boy, while the viking for The Girl has a heathered berry colored belt. The belt colors will be seen again in the leggings, which I believe is next up on the pattern. I really dislike knitting limbs, but at least they go quickly.

Vikings, Day 4

2010-12-11T09:35:00.003-06:00

They have upper bodies! This took about 2.5 hours last night, but the end is in sight. Next they need belts and their lower tunics. Then it's onto arms, legs, weapons, and horns for their helms. Then I have to stuff and attach it all. After that, it's the putzy but creative detailing: embroidery for the faces and adding the hair.

I'm pretty confident that I'll finish these with time to spare. Knock on wood, kittens.

Vikings, Day 3

2010-12-10T14:01:00.002-06:00

So I did not get quite as much time to work on these last night as I would have liked: an hour vs. two to three, as I had hoped. No worries though! Now, they both have faces and tonight, I will start their tunics.

2 for 1

2010-12-09T10:10:00.005-06:00

In a couple of ways, actually. I would like to keep the Viking WIP posts separate from my others, so you get two blog posts from me today, kittens!

The other way, and the subject of this blog, is 2 FOs from 1 pattern. I've been quite busy this month and already have finished 3 objects; 2 of them are fingering weight hats. So without further delay, I bring you...

Pattern: Sockhead Hat (Ravel it)

Needles: US size 2.5

Yarn: Yarntini Self-Striping Merino/Nylon sock - Sunshine Stripe

Yes, the hat I knit for trade with my sister is finished and ready to be sent her way. I'm debating if I have enough yarn left over to knit her a coordinating pair of wrist warmers as well. (I'm thinking the best way to figure it out would be to cast on provisionally, work the hand portion, then unravel the cast on and knit up the wrist/arm.)

I mostly followed the pattern for this. I actually cast on with smaller needles then called for, but I wanted the fabric to be a little on the thicker side rather then overly thin and floppy. My sister lives in WI after all, and even if this isn't a winter hat for her, I'd like it to work for warmer winter days and the spring and fall days when it's still chilly. I used the given numbers for cast-on, knit 4" of the 2x2 ribbing, then increased by 6 stitches for the body--this was an error on my part, as a full repeat is 8 stitches. I didn't knit the body of the hat to 9" like the pattern asks, instead I knit about 7.5" and then began the decreases. I had to fudge the first decrease row and then after that, it matched up as it should. With blocking, this became drapey and slouchy as it aught to.

The Boy is modeling the hat for me in this picture, but it also fits my 22.5" head, though the ribbing is stretched about as far as it will go.

Here he is working on his modeling pout: I find his version amusing. He's a great sport about modeling knits for me and is always excited to do so. He takes posing directions very well for a 4 year old.

Upon finishing my sister's hat, I decided that I needed one...with some modifications, of course.

Needle: US size 2.5

Yarn: Malabrigo Sock- Negro and Gothsocks Asphodel - The Goblin King

...and I needed it to coordinate with my Goblin Gauntlets, as well! So here is my modified sockhead hat. First, I cast on the number given + 8 stitches. Malabrigo sock is on the thin side for fingering, so I knew that if I wanted this to fit well I'd need the extra stitches in the ribbing section. I then knit just a smidge over 2.5" of 2 x 2 ribbing. At this point, I cut my yarn and attached the Asphodel. I had no desire to fold over the brim of the hat, so I knit just a bit less then 6" in length before going to the decrease rounds. From there, everything was easy because I had the correct numbers this time.

The resulting hat looks quite a bit like a beret with snugger ribbing, non?

The hat coordinates beautifully with the mitts without being matchy-matchy. I'm out to buck the stereotype that one will know a knitter by the fact that none of her accessories match. If I had enough yarn to make a cowl, I very likely would. Though now that I give it more thought...I think having one that is all black rather then striped will coordinate just fine.

Vikings, Day 2

2010-12-09T08:57:00.003-06:00

Since I rather miss daily blogging but not having to think of a topic every day, I decided to daily blog the progress on my viking toys. This way, I will keep on track and will hopefully finish well before my 24 December deadline. With 2 hours per night, I have about 32 work hours left to get these little guys finished.

So day 1 finished with a single viking helmet. After about 2.5-ish hours worth of knitting last night, I have two helmets and one viking face. That may not seem like much, but these are very large, I'm discovering. I'll have to post a picture with something for size reference.

So far, the pattern is super easy to follow and other then the bobbles, it's been smooth knitting. Just a bit putzy since I'm working worsted weight yarn on US size 4 needles--taking my gauge into consideration, that's like a more "normal" tensioned knitter working on 2.5s. So yeah, this is some dense fabric, even if it doesn't look it. The pattern was written for non-washable wool, but I think it's working up very well in a 100% cotton.

We'll have to see what tomorrow brings!

WIP it Wednesday

2010-12-08T08:14:00.003-06:00

Ah, kittens! A full week off from blogging. After doing it daily for November, it feels a bit strange not to post daily in December.

I have a couple of WIPs on needles that I can share this week.

First is my Citron. The theme for December is using up leftovers, and I have been busy at it! While this yarn looks very orange in my photo--no sun today so I couldn't get natural light pictures...this is better then it was before I worked on toning it!--it's really the same yarn as my Abalone. So in truth, it's an orange-y pink. So far, this pattern is super easy, but it is starting to get tedious on the ruffled sections where the stitches double for awhile before coming back down in count.

Next up is a project I cast on last night; the yarn finally arrived yesterday so I could get to work. I'm making Viking Dolls for The Boy and The Girl for Giftmas, so I need to work fast and after they go to bed. They're difficult to see--again, due to lack of natural lighting and needing to use the flash--but there are bobbles all around the rim of the helm. Knitting these at such a tight gauge in cotton, my hands were killing me last night by the time I was done. I get to do it again tonight, since I'm working on both dolls at the same time.

I'm hoping to have an FO post for you here in the coming days: I already have a few for the month. Yes kittens, I said a FEW!

WIP it Wednesday

2010-12-01T17:01:00.004-06:00

It just so happens that Wednesday is the first day of the month, so after blogging every day in November, I do not get to take a break until tomorrow. Thankfully, I have WIPs to share, and both are rounding the corner to becoming FOs.

The first is my Garter Yoke cardigan, which I had been hoping to call an FO before November was out.

It didn't quite work out that way, as I have this serious dislike of knitting sleeves. I shocked myself when I made the decision to make them proper, full length ones.

This cardigan is turning out OK so far; I have to wait and see what the yarn does upon blocking. It's coming out a bit smaller then expected--but at proper gauge, so I'm hoping that it will bloom when it hits the water. It fits great across the back, but the sleeves and the front are more snug then I'd like. If I had understood how the construction worked before finishing up the yoke, I would have altered it to have more stitches in the front panels and on the sleeves. The next time I try something like this, I'll definitely keep it in mind. I'm one of those people who can not visualize what I'm doing from reading. I have to jump in, make a mess, and then I learn my lesson and have a light bulb moment. So it may not help me now, but the next time I encounter a yoke like this, I'll have an idea of what to do and how to go backwards to make it fit better for me.

Regardless, it's wearable. Just not as intended. (Not that I put buttons all the way down the placket anyway...I just have 03 on top and decided to stop there.)

And then there's the hat for my sister; it's coming along nicely. You're looking at 4" of ribbing and about 4" of body there, kittens. I have up to 5" more to go before I start the decreases and call it finished.

Hopefully, you'll be seeing a lot of productivity out of me this month: I have lofty goals for yardage output.

November Wrap-up

2010-11-30T10:16:00.003-06:00

Kittens, we have reached the last day of November, and I am so happy that it ends with easiest post (apart from WIP it Wednesdays)!

Yardage Totals 2010

January: 1884 yds
February: 2850 yds
March: 2893 yds
April: 777 yds
May: 856 yds

June: 643 yds
July: 751yds

August: 1716yds

September: 3046 yds

October: 1337 yds

November: 1366yds

Year to date: 18,119 yds or 10.29 miles

I knit slightly more then I did in October, which pleases me. November got off to a very slow start and I was afraid it might be my lowest yield month of the year. Now onto December! In fantasy land, I'll knit the over 3,000yds needed to average 1 mile a month for the year...but realistically, I know that will not happen.

...

2010-11-29T23:24:00.001-06:00

I have nothing today, kittens. Talk amongst yourselves.

Under The Wire

2010-11-28T22:59:00.002-06:00

Kittens, where I live it is still Sunday. As such, I'm making a fluff post today. 28 days of consecutive blog posts have drained me. Some knitting happened today and a little crocheting. Tomorrow, I hope to have something a bit better.

New Cast On

2010-11-27T21:33:00.003-06:00

Some sunshine for my sister, Amy. We're trading services. For my end, this will be a Sockhead Hat. Down the line, I'll update with what I get from her. What's really cool is that the cost of materials and hours of labor for both projects is nearly identical.

Black Friday FO

2010-11-26T09:06:00.005-06:00

Kittens, I hope you all slept in and are avoiding the craziness which is Black Friday shopping today. At Chez Knitpicking, we're doing just that. My morning started with drinking chocolate and writing up a blog post.

This post has been a long time coming...

Yes, kittens, The Dreamy Basic Cardigan has finally been photographed so I can blog it!

Please pardon the squinty smile. We went from foggy and dreary to so sunny my poor eyes could not handle it. I'm very sensitive to sunlight, and you'll find me sporting sunglasses, even on cloudy days.

So what can I say about Dreamy?

The pattern is nothing special, just an improvised top-down raglan cardigan that isn't meant to be closed. (Though it is wide enough that I could close it if I'd like to add some sort of closures.) The lazy part of me is digging this current trend. I'm sure you'll be seeing more cardigans without closures from me in the future. I used the starting numbers from my, "You Down with AOB?", as a jump off point to start the increases. It worked out really well and I'm very pleased with how this fits.

The true star was the yarn: Sundara Sport in an LE colorway I picked up in September 2009. This yarn wasn't what I was expecting when I opened the package, and I had to make peace with it before I could put it to use. At the time I purchased the yarn, the dyer had recently switched over to doing her own photography and photo editing; to put it kindly, there were...issues with photo accuracy. She also wasn't the most gracious about accepting that large numbers of her customer base were complaining about the change and went on the defensive, but that's a story for a different time. When I saw this colorway, Dreams Have Invisible Wings, on the site, it was a bright blue green. You can see highlights of it in the yarn, but it had looked like a consistent semi-solid of that color. Imagine my surprise when I opened my package to find a dark yarn, mostly black with navy and flashes of the bright blue green. This was before Sundara implemented her return policy and I sat there baffled about what to do with such a variegated colorway. I thought about destashing, but after showing off the color on the Ravelry board, most others had the same reaction to it I did.

11 months later, I finally decided to pull it out of my tote and use it for a basic cardigan to show off the colorway. Of course, I alternated skeins to avoid pooling. I probably should have alternated 03 at the same time rather then 02; there is some minor color pooling despite my efforts. Later, I realized that I hadn't left enough of the lighter skeins to go with the darker ones and the ribbing for the sweater is noticeably darker.

As for the yarn itself, I love it. Hate the price tag, but love the yarn base. Out of 05 skeins, there were 02 knots and no schlubby bits. I have two more colorways of this in-stash, and I'm hoping to crack into another after my current project is finished. It's soft and has nice stitch definition from the plying. At the gauge I knit it, it has lovely drape but is still opaque. Good yarn all around. Sundara has recently added a less expensive Sport Merino 2 to her site, but I resisted the temptation to purchase from the first round. When she brings it back, I'll nab some in the future and see how it compares.

Overall, I'm very happy with this knit and I'm looking forward to getting more use out of it when the weather decides to trend cooler again. It was 80º yesterday, kittens. 80.

Happy Thanksgiving

2010-11-25T11:14:00.001-06:00

Hope you're having a good one full of yummy foods, kittens. Will be back to craft blogging tomorrow.

WIP it Wednesday

2010-11-24T10:37:00.003-06:00

Kittens, I almost forgot that today is Wednesday. Good thing though, since I'm currently glaring at the weather and silently chastising it for being so poor for taking photos. (I also hear it is ridiculously humid out there. I think I'll play it safe and stay inside today. ;] )

My garter yoke, it's getting there! I'm about to pick up the stitches for a sleeve and work my way through the question that has been hounding me for the better part of the week: how long will the sleeves be? It's a validly tricky question. On the one hand, it likely will not be freezing cold for much of the winter and I'll get more wear out of this if I keep the sleeves shorter. On the other, this is a nice warm wool, and even with short sleeves, it's likely to be a piece for only the coldest months, so I can ~~cheap out~~ avoid buying a winter coat if I keep the sleeves longer.

I guess I'll see where my whim takes me as I knit the first sleeve....

Foggy Day

2010-11-23T22:50:00.002-06:00

So no pictures. I'm hoping to get them tomorrow.

I'm almost to the end of the body on my Garter Yoke Cardigan and I will start the sleeves tomorrow. The end is near, kittens.

Hope you all had a lovely Tuesday, and it had some sort of fibery/crafty goodness in it.

More Plans...

2010-11-22T14:24:00.002-06:00

have gone awry, due to The Husband's schedule being extended today. So the blog I originally planned to post up will have to wait until tomorrow...if the weather cooperates for pictures. YES, it was going to be an FO post today, kittens. Now, I'm scrambling to figure out what I should write about.

Right now, I haven't got much. But since yarn reviews were one of the suggestions of things I could blog this month, I thought I could share what is my biggest peeve when reading one. Anytime I read a yarn review and the words, "I found it to be splitty/ it's splitty," come onto the screen, I scream a little inside. This may be the single least helpful thing a person can, "contribute." All plied yarn if treated just right will split. Some days, you're the one who does it.

There you go. Short and a little bit cranky.

In The Making

2010-11-21T21:57:00.004-06:00

Monster heads. Not sure how many more components I'll whip up before I start decorating these and assembling them. These are a great way to eat up 7-15 yard scrap pieces.

I'm really pleased with how my crochet is looking so far. These are much more even and nice them some of my previous attempts. Maybe I need to stick to small gauge yarn and hooks in the future. It's really slow going, but it's pretty looking.