My Manic World

End of October

2011-10-31T07:15:00.000-07:00

Linen Stitch Scarf - ~~In Progress, about 25% done.~~ Done!
Man Beanie Hat (for Warren) - Garter Stripe Beanie w/Brown Sheep sport (finally getting to use these, 3..? years after buying them!) for the garter part and the brown New Zealand vintage wool for MC; Last minute decision to do the "Turn a Square" hat instead. Still using the vintage NZ wool (it's got mohair in it as well, I forgot!), but for stripe colors I'm using WOTA in "carrot" and Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride in "autumn gold". I started this on Saturday (two days ago) and I'm about 50% done. Done!
Commissioned Linen Stitch Scarf - Using three colors of Ultra Alpaca. I'm forcing myself to slog through this, and am now about 45% done.
Alpaca Mittens (for mom) - ~~Dashing? or Fetching? with the white/purple alpaca from Elann.com. These need to be done by the time she gets here a week before Thanksgiving.~~ Ended up using the Nalu Mitts pattern (free on Rav!) and LOVED it. Started and finished these already, and I even wore them to work today. So lovely! Ended up using the Elann Alpaca in a soft cream color. Done!
Alpaca Mittens (for me) - Susie's Reading Mitts? I ordered some Ultra Alpaca in two shades of green for these and want to make some simple stripey mitts. Back to the drawing board I guess.
Market Bag - Everlasting Bagstopper (IV!), they actually opened a Hobby Lobby in my city (the closest previously was about 2000mi away), and Hobby Lobby has the best. cotton. yarn. ever. So I picked up a new skein to make this with.. I just need to finish that stupid scarf first so I can use my size 10 circs.
Linen Stitch Scarf (for me) - unsure of yarn.. this will need to be planned out later. I want it to be colorful! I am definitely going to try to use up all my Ultra Alpaca left overs.. as I'll have variegated gray, regular gray, black, navy blue, and two shades of green. Think I'll also pull out my leftovers baggie and see what else is in there..

October Update

2011-10-12T07:32:00.000-07:00

~~Linen Stitch Scarf - In Progress, about 25% done.~~ Done!
Man Beanie Hat (for Warren) - Garter Stripe Beanie w/Brown Sheep sport (finally getting to use these, 3..? years after buying them!) for the garter part and the brown New Zealand vintage wool for MC; Last minute decision to do the "Turn a Square" hat instead. Still using the vintage NZ wool (it's got mohair in it as well, I forgot!), but for stripe colors I'm using WOTA in "carrot" and Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride in "autumn gold". I started this on Saturday (two days ago) and I'm about 50% done. Done!
Commissioned Linen Stitch Scarf - ugh. So, my first linen stitch scarf was so awesome that I got about a DOZEN requests to make more, but one person offered to pay me to do it. Alright. So now I'm working on that, and while I'm not super-stoked about making other people stuff, I get a small amount of yarn and cash out of the deal. Using three colors of Ultra Alpaca. Started this a few days ago and I'm about 15% done.
Alpaca Mittens (for mom) - Dashing? or Fetching? with the white/purple alpaca from Elann.com. These need to be done by the time she gets here a week before Thanksgiving.
Alpaca Mittens (for me) - Susie's Reading Mitts. I was going to use KP Andean Silk for this but I really am not liking that. Back to the drawing board.
Market Bag (for Magen) - Everlasting Bagstopper (IV!) w/whatever cotton I have laying around.. I think I have a skein or two of KP CotLin and some random Omega Sinfonia/Plymouth Fantasy.. If possible I'd like to have this done for Christmas.
Linen Stitch Scarf (for me), unsure of yarn.. this will need to be planned out later. I want it to be colorful!

Update

2011-10-03T07:36:00.000-07:00

A small update, as I don't have a lot of time to write at the moment.

~~Linen Stitch Scarf - In Progress, about 25% done.~~ Done!
Man Beanie Hat (for Warren) - ~~Garter Stripe Beanie w/Brown Sheep sport (finally getting to use these, 3..? years after buying them!) for the garter part and the brown New Zealand vintage wool for MC;~~ Last minute decision to do the "Turn a Square" hat instead. Still using the vintage NZ wool (it's got mohair in it as well, I forgot!), but for stripe colors I'm using WOTA in "carrot" and Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride in "autumn gold". I started this on Saturday (two days ago) and I'm about 50% done.
Alpaca Mittens (for me) - Susie's Reading Mitts w/KP Andean Silk (I have four skeins, three colors, and it looks like it will take me about a skein and a half.. so I'll need to figure that out..)
Alpaca Mittens (for mom) - Dashing? or Fetching? with the white/purple alpaca from Elann.com
Market Bag (for Magen) - Everlasting Bagstopper (IV!) w/whatever cotton I have laying around.. I think I have a skein or two of KP CotLin and some random Omega Sinfonia/Plymouth Fantasy..
Linen Stitch Scarf (for me), unsure of yarn.. this will need to be planned out later. I want it to be colorful!

Rest of the Year

2011-09-06T11:08:00.000-07:00

I never update this blog anymore. I'm still knitting (not nearly as much as I used to, but w/e). I need a priority list of things to work on in the soon to be future.

Linen Stitch Scarf - In Progress, about 25% done.
Alpaca Mittens (for me) - Susie's Reading Mitts w/KP Andean Silk (I have four skeins, three colors, and it looks like it will take me about a skein and a half.. so I'll need to figure that out..)
Alpaca Mittens (for mom) - Dashing? or Fetching? with the white/purple alpaca from Elann.com
Man Beanie Hat (for Warren) - Garter Stripe Beanie w/Brown Sheep sport (finally getting to use these, 3..? years after buying them!) for the garter part and the brown New Zealand vintage wool for MC
Market Bag (for Magen) - Everlasting Bagstopper (IV!) w/whatever cotton I have laying around.. I think I have a skein or two of KP CotLin and some random Omega Sinfonia/Plymouth Fantasy..
Linen Stitch Scarf (for me), unsure of yarn.. this will need to be planned out later. I want it to be colorful!

I think I have all of the yarn for all of these, but I MAY need to pick up some new yarn for my mittens. I'd like to get these all done by the end of the year, it seems doable.

Hikes

2011-04-22T13:04:00.001-07:00

Off Mtn Loop/Arlington area:
Barclay Lake
Beaver Lake
Old Sauk River Trail
Monte Cristo Ghost Town
Lime Kiln Trail
Sunset Mine

North/Mt Baker area:
Rockport Park
Baker Lake
Cedar Creek-Cedar Falls
Diobsud Creek.. unpublished in any guide books, it's a secret hike!
Horseshoe Bend

Nearby Hikes/mostly off 90:
Cougar Mountain
Otter Falls and Lipsy Lake
Franklin Falls
CCC Road
Lunds Gulch Park (Lynnwood)
Soaring Eagle Regional Park (Sammamish)

Deception Pass/Anacortes area:
Goose Rock (near Deception Pass)
Hoypus Point (near Deception Pass)
Little Cranberry Lake (Anacortes)
Camano Island State Park
Cama Beach State Park (next to Camano Island St Park)

Ocean hikes:
Rialto Beach/Hole in the wall
Shi Shi Beach

Trail conditions

2009: A Knitting Year In Review

2010-01-09T11:48:00.000-08:00

It is such a beautiful day in Seattle today! Sunny and in the 50s, no rain or clouds even in sight. Now let's just hope this continues.. even though it won't. Ah, optimism. I had a really interesting 2009 in the knitting world. I learned a lot of new things, including learning how to knit socks (!!!), which was a 3 time broken Knitting Year Resolution. I have a lot more confidence in my abilities these days, but have to remind myself to be patient and not rush things along, this is something I still fail at regularly. Anyway, let's review my 2009 knitting goals:

1) Knit myself a scarf, hat and gloves before winter
So.. this one is complicated. I did indeed make myself a pair of gloves and a cowl this year, no hat.. but the gloves weren't even made until December, after our record low cold snap. We can call it even.
2) Knit 10000 yds of yarn
I fully believe I WOULD have hit this goal if it werent for the move this year. But alas, I ended up the year with a wee bit under 8000 yards this year (more on that later).
3) Do not buy yarn "just to buy yarn". If I make a purchase, it needs to have a project lined up.
This is in conjunction with the cold sheeping goal, just amended. At first I said no new yarn at all! But then realized that forcing myself into that box of restraint was making me want to buy stuff all the time out of rebellion. So I said, I can buy yarn, but it needs to have a project in mind. Sure enough, since I amended that goal, I only made one yarn purchase (in 9 months). That one yarn purchase was for my gloves that I knit in December, and literally the day I got the yarn, I started work on them. Now, let's look at knit totals.

January: 1230 yards
February: 1070 yards
March: 1120 yards
April: 1695 yards
November: 744 yards
December: 1984 yards
2009: 7843 yards, or 22449 feet OR a little over 4.3 miles!

Like I said, not the 10,000 yards I was going for, but normal knitting months September and October were ruined due to the move.. so we'll try that goal this year again. Either way, I'm really proud of how much I knit because over 4.3 miles is quite a feat in one year! BTW, as it stands, 3300 yards of that is tied up in the Log Cabin Afghan of DOOM. I don't know whether that makes me happy or want to punch myself in the face. Overall, I'd say that 2009 was a successful year in knitting. There are certainly things I would have liked to do better, but that's what THIS year is for, right? I've given it a lot of thought and here are my 2010 knitting goals...

2010 Year Long Goals:
- Knit myself a hat before winter.
- Knit a pair of socks every month (every month that I'm actively knitting, that is -- I do tend to take summers off).
- Knit 10,000 yards.
- Continue to not buy yarn "just to buy yarn". If I make a purchase, it needs to have an intended project.

A small thing regarding the last goal, I recently organized every last bit of yarn that I have and realized I have next to no cotton. I do have several market bags lined up as projects in the next few months, so I have been actively looking for the right kind of cotton to purchase for them. I've been looking for nearly 3 weeks and haven't found anything that I like.. so I feel like this may be a long, on-going process. LOL. I also try to set myself small monthly goals, and have a few for this month already.

January 2010 Goals:
- Finish afghan of DOOM (note: I have somewhere between 800-1500 yards left on this, soooo.. this may be a lofty goal)
- Knit wine bottle cozy for dinner party
- Make myself a hat
- Finish Spring Socks that I started last month

Hopefully in a few days I'll have some progress photos or something to share!

The Julie Room

2009-12-28T09:58:00.000-08:00

So over Christmas break (my whole four days off, woo?) I decided to paint and organize our guest bedroom aka The Julie Room (it's a long story). Since it's basically all I worked on for three days straight, I thought I would share some photos. First, the before...

And then, the after!

Yes, that is my entire stash of yarn and fabric, all fitting into a spot designated for it, instead of half in an organizer, half in a bag in a corner. I learned a few things while I was doing this room, first and foremost.. I truly underestimated my stash. I thought out of all groups (wool/animal fibers, acrylic, natural fibers, sock yarn, dyeable), the least amount of any was sock yarn. Umm.. no, not so much. In that white organizer (first photo in the "after" series) the sock yarn is that entire top shelf. If you're looking at it saying "that's not so much", keep in mind that the white organizer is three feet deep and it's FULL behind that front layer. I could knit nothing other than socks for all of 2010 and I guarantee I'd still have yarn left next year. It was a real wake up call for me, and as beautiful as sock yarn is, I'm happy not to be adding those numbers.

Other things I learned: how to use drywall screws, how to hang a real curtain rod (not just one made of aluminum that snaps into the wall) and very importantly.. that even purple paint scrubs off of wood floors with a little soap and water. I'm immensley proud of my room that I did all by myself, and really couldn't have asked for a better result.

I will be updating hopefully in the next few days with a 2009 year in knitting wrap up, as well as 2010 knitting goals. But for now, I'm going to lay down, my whole body feels put together wrong and it's time to get some rest.

Warmest Mittens

2009-12-21T11:19:00.000-08:00

Happy first day of Winter, all! I'm definitely in full on nesting/hibernation mode these days. On Friday we went to Ikea and spent about $160 on a new bookcase, some curtains, and a bunch of picture frames. On Saturday we went to Target to get some more picture frames and also picked up another small book case. After unloading all of our books into the two new book cases.. we still have nearly an entire box of paperbacks waiting for a home. Ugh. When the hell did we get so many books? We have FOUR bookcases and apparently thats not enough room. I'm considering going through them on my break this weekend to sort out what can go into storage or different rooms. I'd like all my knitting books in the craft room (aka our guest bedroom). They could just go in a floating shelf in there or something.

Other then putting together everything and shopping, I baked for half the day on Saturday. Oh man. I made 2 huge batches of rice krispie bars, one with butterscotch and one with reese's peanut butter and some chocolate too. I also made a double batch of Russian teacakes and had my first attempt at buckeyes (basically peanut butter dipped in chocolate). Everything turned out awesome, except the buckeyes. I don't know if it was the recipe or if I did it wrong, but eh.. they're not my favorite. Also, I did get a fair amount of knitting done this weekend. I've been making steady progression the Log Cabin Afghan of DOOM, and am almost ready for another log. I've averaging half a log a night from about an hour of knitting. It will DEFINITELY not be done this year, but I'm hoping maybe by the end of January it will be. Realistically I have about 1100 yards left to knit on it at the bare minimum, possibly more. I'll take another progress picture in a week or two.

One thing I did do this weekend was make myself a pair of mittens. This was one of my 2009 knitting resolutions/goals, and I started and completed it on 12/20. Way to go, procrastination! Also, it figures that I make them when its 40+ degrees out, instead of a few weeks ago when it was record lows for a week straight. Ah well. After a very extensive search and a tough decision, I used the Warmest Mittens pattern. I used about 130 yards of two different colors of Plymouth Baby Alpaca (worsted). The cuff was knit on size 3 needles (my ribbing always runs HUGE) and the body was knit on size 6 needles partially because I'm a very tight knitter, and partially because I didn't have size 5 needles LOL.

The first mitten knit up perfectly, but the second.. well.. I was watching the Vikings game, and .. we lost. And my already tight-knitting got even tighter as the game went on, and thus, the mitten is a wee bit smaller. But, luckily I have small hands and both fit me well.

After adding another 130 yards to December totals, it brings my December yardage up to 1360 yards and my 2009 yardage to 7219 yards. Not too bad, and really it's a few hundred more yards then that, I just haven't added up the progress yardage for the afghan in a few weeks. My 2009 goal was to break 10000 yards, and while that definitely isn't going to happen, I feel like breaking 8000 is still a possibility.

The Worst Hat I've Ever Made (and other stuff!)

2009-12-14T19:51:00.000-08:00

I've been knitting for a month past eight years. My first project ever, a scarf, was a behemoth. It started out, on size 10.5 aluminum needles, with 30 cast on stitches. I stopped knitting it a few days later because after a foot in length, it had doubled in size. It turns out I was mistaking the first stitch of every row for two stitches, and I learned from it and moved on and although I haven't loved everything I've ever made, I would say that everything I've made since then has been something I've enjoyed making, wearing or gifting. I can also say that I've learned a lesson from almost everything I've knit, which can really console a person when their finished project isn't quite as intended.

However, I cast on for a hat this summer that is now officially The Worst Hat I've Ever Made. Seriously. I broke the two cardinal rules of knitting (well the only two I have, I guess.. I really like to wing this shit most of the time).

#1: Disregard what people say they want if it's too specific and they aren't in a position to know what the hell they're talking about. For example if someone says I WANT A RED AND HOT PINK STRIPED FLOOR LENGTH DRESS MADE FROM CRUSHED VELVET! I'm sure they *do* want that, but as a creative person, as a designer, we know better. We interpret their idea and make it into something that doesn't collapse into a ball of suck.
#2: Take your time, don't be impatient, even if something feels like it's never going to end, just suck it up and do it. I've fallen victim to this before when I made my mother a beautiful cream colored Irish Hiking Scarf that was only 30" long. I called it a "scarflette" and put a broach on it. She promptly gave it to the dog (I'm completely serious).

So, like I was saying, I broke the only two rules I ever even follow in knitting with this hat. The recipient said they wanted something with a loose gauge, to which I responded that normally with bigger/looser gauge items (that aren't lace shawls) you use a chunky yarn and go up a needle size. The problem with this is that I was making this hat from stash (remember I'm cold sheeping!) and I don't HAVE any chunky yarn. Okay, I said I'll do it with worsted weight and just on a little bit bigger needle (10! when normally I would have used.. 6 or 7? I should have seen the warning signs..). I did a seed stitch band, then knit for about 3.5 inches before starting crown decreases, but by that time.. the damage was done. This was supposed to be made for an adult male with a fairly largish head (24-25").. the gauge was so loose that unstretched it is more like 27", stretched is 30"+. Anyway, so I already knew by this point that it was way.too.big but I told myself JUST FINISH IT and started the decreasing, without any real plan (normally I do a k6, k2tog row, then a knit row, then a k5, k2tog row, then a knit row, etc, and NORMALLY it turns out beautifully). But I was so mad at this hat already that I just started doing random decreases. Oh! It looks like there hasn't been a decrease for a few inches, lets throw one in! Two decrease rows next to each other? Sure! Gah. Okay. It's just bad.

What makes it worse is that I have nothing to learn from this. I'm going to frog this hat because looking at it makes me want to hurt people, and there is absolutely no way I would give someone a knitted garment that is in this condition. I'm going to frog this hat, and I don't want to remake it so badly that I'm considering just forgetting the whole thing and telling the recipient that I don't have time to do it. Which, isn't untrue by any means, I still haven't gotten around to making myself a hat or gloves set (one of my knitting goals for 2009, and something I've desperately needed the last few weeks). For right now, the hat is going in the knitting room, inside of a bag where it will lay out of my sight until I know what to do with it. It will be frogged, and I probably will redo it, but it's not something I can even think about doing right now. Sigh.

In other news: there has been actual productive knitting lately. In November I knit 744 yards, which isn't a whole lot, but considering I took a week long vacation and was working close to 200 hours, I think I did alright. In November I made a lot of progress on the Log Cabin Afghan of DOOM! and also made these two little Zune cozies. One for me and one for my work friend, mine is red and his is black, they're both Zune 120G. I used Noro Kureyon in colorway 90 on size 8 bamboo DPNs. Each cozy used up about 30 yards, and only took around 2 hours from start to finish.

So far this month, I've finished one sock, technically finished the UGH WORST HAT EVER, and have made a lot more progress on the afghan of DOOM! Right now I'm sitting a little over 1200 yards, but the month is not even half over and football playoffs haven't even started. This sock is Premier Yarns Serenity in Thyme, and is part wool, part bamboo and of course part nylon. The jury is out yet, as the yarn itself is really quite thin and I ended up with several breaks in the finished product before I even put it on my foot for the first time. I'll give it the benefit of the doubt though until the other sock is finished. The pattern is just my personal adaptation from Silver's Sock Class (mostly made a little smaller to fit tighter around the arch of the foot).

This is a current picture of the blanket, you can see I just cast on for another row (at the bottom). I would be over the moon if I could finish that blanket this month, but I don't believe it's in the cards. I want to finish the pair of socks, and also FINALLY make myself a hat and glove set. I have some ridiculously gorgeous and plush Plymouth Baby Alpaca (worsted) set aside in lt blue (to match my cowl) and charcoal. I haven't decided on a pattern or anything, but I need to get this done. It was so cold this last week that we set all time low temperature records here for 4 consecutive days. Better yet, during those four days, the pipes in my attic froze and then exploded and now we're looking at the better part of $5000+ in damage. Technically $3200 was the plumber alone (to insulate and replace the burst pipes). We have top of the line 3/4" thick copper pipes in our entire house, but the ice ripped a gash 3" wide through that pipe, and now all of the insulation in the attic and the living room ceiling need to be replaced. There was 1.5" of water on the floor, after it crashed through the ceiling. It was the most stressful night of my life, without question, and I'm thankful for some old xanax I had laying around or I might have had a nervous breakdown and died right there on the living room floor. Hahah. Well, thank god for home owners insurance, right?

Now that it's taken me an hour to write this, I need to go to bed. Hahah. No progress on the blanket tonight!

It's Fall!

2009-09-28T14:46:00.000-07:00

It's fall! It's fall, I'm so happy it's fall. I love Seattle summers, but what I love more are Seattle fall days. Where the air is crisp but only to the point where your fingertips and nose tingle a little.. where all the leaves are falling and it smells like Halloween. Mmmmm.. I love Seattle falls! One MORE thing I love about the fall: it's time to get back to work knitting! I crave wool and warmth and can spend an entire 12 hours on Saturday laying in bed knitting.

These are the things I plan to do:
- finish Casey's bunny hat, currently at 50%
- make progress on the log cabin of DOOM blanket (note: I did NOT say finish, I said PROGRESS)
- make myself gloves
- make myself a hat
- make myself socks (slipped ring stitch pattern?)
- whip out some leg warmers for Mandy (Mosey? or maybe just an improvised pattern.. I dunno yet)

Since the last time I wrote, we bought a house and moved (just a week ago, actually), so everything is kind of all over the place and these past few months have been crazy busy with packing, moving, financial bullshit, etc. But the house is BEAUTIFUL and I am officially already planning my garden to plant in the spring (I'm thinking lots of tomatoes, peas, strawberries, raspberries, jalapenos, spinach, carrots, some kind of beans, would potatoes be too ambitious?). I haven't had my own garden in about 10+ years, so I want to take it easy, but I'm already getting really amped for planting and growing and CANNING next fall. I've been debating starting a seed garden in Feb/March or just buying live starters. Seeds are obviously much cheaper, but, again it's been awhile since I've done a seed garden. Hmmm. Any words of wisdom would be greatly appreciated.

Weekend Roundup OF DOOM!

2009-04-12T19:11:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy weekend. I started (and made decent progress on) the Log Cabin Afghan of DOOM, as well as watched a few movies (ala Netflix) and caught up with a lot of shows on the DVR. One thing I dislike about having both Netflix and DVR is that I feel like I need to dedicate time to watching both.. and feel guilty if I don't. It's weird. Anywho.

This is an afghan square (10X10") I did for a charity blanket on Ravelry. It will be seamed up and auctioned off, the proceeds are going to Doctors Without Borders. I viewed an inprogress photo of the blanket (without my square, as I only sent it off on Friday), and it's really awesome looking so far. Anyway, this square was roughly another 80 yards, bringing my March total to 340 yards.

Up next is FINALLY an update about the first felted project (Angela's Fabulous Felted Bag). I felted it last month, but it didn't felt all the way.. so I researched a little about the felting process and discovered that my warm/warm cycle was probably to blame. It literally spent 2+ hours felting that first run. I threw it in a pillow sack and let it go for 1 full cycle (about 20 minutes) on hot/cold, and voila! Felted bag! I am very happy with the finished results, but I might give it away as a gift or something.. as I just don't really use bags that often.

And last, but not least, is the first mention (and photo) of the Log Cabin Afghan of DOOM! I started this on Friday night and this was my progress through last night. I finished up the brown square but I need 1-2 more "warm" colors, so I went to JoAnn today .. but since it's Easter, they were closed. Ah well, I think my fingers could use a break. I have been keeping tally of the yardage knit up with every piece so far and at the end of the month I'll add it all up and put it toward this month's yards. This piece (pictured above) is already something like 17X17" and about 350 yards (IIRC), so I'm making good progress with it. I'd REALLY like for this to be done by the time my parents come out next month, but we'll see.

FO Catchup

2009-04-10T09:38:00.000-07:00

BIG UPDATE ENTRY! I've been so ridiculously busy with work, social engagements and knitting that I haven't had time to do a proper update in quite awhile, so this is my catchup!

Let's get right into it.. first up we have my newest cowl (The Quickie Cowl), made from my favorite yarn (Plymouth Baby Alpaca Grande). Wearing it feels like wearing a warm cloud around my neck. It's so amazing I never want to take it off. It figures that I literally finished it on the first 70 degree day we've had in Seattle since September 2008, but, what are you gonna do, right? This took almost an entire skein, only about 2 yards left after seaming, so we're calling it an even 110yds (for April's numbers).

Next up is some more afghan squares, except these are only 6x6", each one was made from some spare Wool-ease I had laying around, and they're going to be made into a charity blanket for a little boy. Each square took about 50yds of yarn. I just love these! These little guys are totaling 150 more yards, bringing my April total to 260 yards.

The next few objects were completed in March (and already counted in March's totals). Starting out with the GORGEOUS Crosswalker socks. If you would recall, I dyed this yarn way back in February for Julie (a custom request), to be made into these. All finished, they are ridiculously comfortable, warm and fit PERFECTLY. I did not want to give them away, but, so it is. I know that I'll be making a pair for myself in the near future :)

The one thing I realized, finally, is that I'm going to HAVE to do 1X1 ribbing from now on. For some reason, my 2X2 ribs are just way too loose on all my socks.

Last, but certainly not least, more band cuffs! When I sent the last 4 to Julie, they got a lot of attention and I had a lot of requests to make more. I whipped these four up in about an hour one night. Ideally, I would have preferred to not use the same "base" colors as the last set, but I didn't want to buy yarn for them (because they use a very small amount and that's silly..), so I used up what I had. On the plus side, I got rid of the tan partial. The person I made these for got them last week and absolutely loves them and has even asked me how she could start knitting too. Haha.

I do have a few more things knit up already (I said I was busy!) but don't have photos uploaded, so for now, this is all I have. I'm still working on the felted bag, and cast on last night for the Log Cabin Afghan of DOOM. Wish me luck.

April Goals

2009-04-01T10:07:00.000-07:00

I have too much to write a real update about. The semi-felted bag (still waiting to be re-felted.. maybe tonight), Julie's crosswalker socks (finished last night at 1115pm, squeaking in under the March wire).. but I'm at work, and have no access to photos, so for now, I'm writing my March recap and April goals.

In March I completed the following projects:
- 8 Band Cuffs (four in each size)
- 1 pair of Crosswalkers
- 3 10X10" squares for KYS projects
- 1 Angela's Fabulous Felted Bag

Which equals out to be 1120 yards, which brings the YTD total to 3420 yards. I lost track of how many skeins I've used (somewhere between 7-10, but I don't care at this point). Now to revisit goals..

March Goals:
- ~~Finish Julie's socks (crosswalkers)~~
- ~~Knit at least 1 charity item~~
- ~~Knit at least 1 thing for myself~~
- Start log cabin afghan OF DOOM

2009 goals:
- Knit myself a scarf, hat and gloves before winter
- Knit 10000 yds of yarn
- Do not buy any new yarn except under certain conditions (running out of yarn during a project, having an emergency of sorts where I NEED a certain kind of yarn), going forward, except in April at the alpaca farm and once this summer/fall.

Let's see how I did. I finished Julie's socks, knit several charity items, knit the felted bag for myself.. I ran out of time to start the afghan though. My year-long goals were a little less successful.. I still need to start knitting myself winter warmables, but I plan on doing that this month (as I have 4 luscious skeins of Plymouth Baby Alpaca Grande coming my way, enough for a hat and cowl/scarf). I am well on my way to 10000 yards. I semi-failed at this whole not-buying yarn thing. I bought yarn to complete the log-cabin afghan.. so I don't know if that counts. I'm going to be using a ton that's already in stash (8-10 skeins), and I bought 4-5 new skeins. Whatever. I think that I need to change that goal anyway, because I don't have an issue with buying yarn, just buying it when I have no intentions of using it. In that regard, I have gotten 100% better. Everything I buy these days, I think to myself "am I REALLY going to use this? what could it be used for?" and if I can't think of something it could be used for, I just don't get it. I've caught myself a lot of times buying yarn just to buy it (it's so pretty!), but no longer. Now to set my April goals...

April Goals:
- Knit at least 1 charity item (this won't be a problem, as I have 5 already started).
- Start log cabin afghan of DOOM
- Knit 1 item for myself
- Knit 1 pair of socks

2009 goals:
- Knit myself a scarf, hat and gloves before winter
- Knit 10000 yds of yarn
- Do not buy yarn "just to buy yarn". If I make a purchase, it needs to have a project lined up.

Felted Bag, Afghans, More Sewing...

2009-03-26T20:33:00.000-07:00

The end of the month is quickly approaching. I've gotten quite a bit of knitting done, but I've also been sidelined the last few days due to dental surgery. I got several old fillings replaced, which requires them to cut away part of my gums so they can go underneath of the gum level with the filling, etc.. mainly, it's gross, bloody and painful. I've just been taking a lot of extra strength tylenol and trying to sleep a lot. Which, you can imagine, cuts into my knitting time a considerable amount. This is in addition to my normal, end of the month stress levels due to work.. and ugh.. nothing is getting done around here. Anyway! I finished another afghan square, my first ever felted bag (oooo) and did some more sewing.

This is the pre-felted bag, done with a pattern named "Angela's Fabulous Felted Bag". It suggested using 600yds of a super bulky yarn, but I used some Cascade 220 I had, one skein in "highland green" and one in "oyster". I ended up using almost every bit of the green, but had about 50 or so yards left of the oyster. Overall I used about 375-380 yds for this project. I have since felted it, but, it needs to be refelted this weekend, since I only apparently felted 3/4 of it. Ugh. Will repost once it's done, because it really needs its own entry.

Another afghan square, the blue is really a lot deeper, but, meh. I finished it at like 10pm and wanted to just take a photo. This was about 80 yds.

And look, more sewing! I made two of these little DPN holders (in addition to 4 bags with the same material), and I'd like to make 1-2 more. They're really cute and convenient, and as the collection of my sock size dpns is growing, I'm running out of room in the big holder for it all.

I'm going to try to finish up my second Crosswalker sock by the end of the weekend, and if I focus, that will be easily done. I'm casting on tonight, wish me luck with that :-p. With my current projects finished, I have used 900yds in March, bringing my YTD total to 3200yds.

Sewing

2009-03-21T17:32:00.000-07:00

I made some knitting project bags last night. I've been itching to sew lately, just too lazy to do it. I love how they turned out, and I love the fabric (bought off the remnant table at JoAnn). So while I'm still knitting my to-be-felted bag (still.. it's going to be huge!), I made a lot of progress on these. All three only took me about 3 hours, and it only took that long, because I screwed up the first one and had to rip stitches out and resew it all. Each bag is roughly 8" deep by 12" wide, making it great for a smaller project, socks, gloves, whatnot.

The outside, pretty fabric!
The inside of one, each inside looked different.
All three togetherAnd of course, a puppy.

Wrist Cuffs & Afghan Squares

2009-03-15T19:25:00.001-07:00

Another short update. This weekend has been great for knitting, as the weather outside has been awful and leaving me wanting to spend all day in bed. I finished up another project for Julie, some sweatbands/wrist cuffs for her upcoming half marathon. These were made using up some scraps from a project I made for her a LONG time ago (keyhole scarf and convertible mitts), in KP's Shine (sport).

I made four, two of the single pattern and two of the double, and it only took me about an hour and a half total. Definitely not bad! I really liked how they turned out, and I really liked the pattern in general.. I think these would be great for a teenager in some funky colors. Overall, I'm estimating that these four wrist bands took up about 100yds of yarn.

This was the second afghan square completed for a KYS group project. It's the colors of the Russian flag, using spare acrylics/wool-ease that I had laying around. The woman we're making it for has adopted children from Russia, and when I first "met" her, we spent a lot of time talking about the Motherland and sharing photos.. so I thought it would be fun to make her an ode to that. Another 80 or so yards used up on this one, too, woot!

I also cast on today for my first felted project, a bag that I'm looking forward to. I will post photos when I have more then just the bottom of it done, hah. I'm anticipating it going quickly, because it seems like after knitting primarily socks for two months, EVERYTHING is going quickly.

These few projects bring my March totals to 440 yards, and my YTD totals to 2740yds. Awesome! The felted project will give me another 400+ yards, and I'm hoping to finish the second sock (of Julie's sock), which should tip me over 1000 yards for this month. Hopefully I can get through all of this by then :)

Crosswalkers & Afghans

2009-03-14T17:26:00.000-07:00

Just a quick update, as I have a ton of knitting I need to accomplish this weekend if I ever want to make progress with my projects.

First of all, I finished the first JULIE sock. It's the Crosswalkers pattern, using my own hand dyed yarn. It took FOREVER (or so it feels), on those teeny tiny little needles (even by sock standards), but it turned out really awesome. The only thing I"m not happy with is the cuff. It's standard 2x2 ribbing, but it's loose, really loose. I have noticed this with all my socks, so I'm considering trying out a 1x1 ribbing on my next pair to see if that helps the issue. I hand dyed 440 yards of yarn for this project, but am not going to use anywhere close to that, it seems. As best as I can figure, I used about 180yds on this one sock.

Secondly, I have been participating in a group afghan activity to help out someone in our group that is having some medical issues. I would say that it's also a good stashbusting project (which it is), but with the giant-log-cabin-afghan-of-doom looming on the horizon, I am clinging onto all of my acrylics. More about that later. Here is the first square, seamed up and ready to go!

It's from an improvised mitered pattern which consists of CO2 stitches, then increase 2st, every other row. It ends up looking like: kx,kfb,slip marker,kfb,kx.. but it's great because you never decrease (your "working" row is actually two sides), and you just bind off when it's the desired size. I'm using about 80 yards of yarn with each of these squares, and have the second one (and probably final for me) on the needles right now.

Both of these FOs bring my March total up to 260 yards, that brings my YTD total up to 2560.. and I used up another ball of yarn completely, which increase my YTD deduction to 6 full skeins (I think?). As for now, I'm going to head out and try to finish knitting up this square.

Revisions

2009-03-10T12:01:00.001-07:00

My knitting objectives for this month have changed slightly. I'm still working on Julie's socks, however she has put in a request for several wrist bands to use while running. I found a really cool pattern (for free, woot), and I'm going to whip up a few this week for her and get them sent out. She's running a half marathon in a few weeks from now and will need them by then, so they are needing to be done ASAP. As a result, I'm finishing up the sock I'm working on (still the first, ugh) and going to put off the second sock for right now while I complete the wrist bands.

After that, hopefully by this weekend, I'm going to cast on for a KAL with a group on Ravelry, for my first felted project. At this point, I think I've decided on Angela's Fabulous Felted Bag, but haven't decided on what yarn to use yet. I have some Cascade 220 in a bright kelly green and "oyster", a creamy-grayish color.. the contract would be really pretty I think. But I also have some Brown Sheep Top of the Lamb in a sky blue and tealy-blue, which would also look nice. Hmmm.. can't decide. :)

AFTER THAT, hopefully by the weekend of the 20th, I want to finish Julie's other sock, start on something for myself (a hat? mitts? I'm not in a scarf mood right now). By the end of the month, I'm hoping to finish all of these projects, and start one more... a log cabin afghan.

I recently borrowed Mason-Dixon knitting from my local library. As I was browsing through it, my husband, who generally dislikes knit items and refuses to let me make anything for him (other than the one pair of socks I made last month), STOPPED me when I got to the page with the log cabin aghans and told me he wanted one. FOr a second I thought he was kidding, but it turns out he's not.. he actually wants one. Knitting an afghan has been a goal of mine for some time, but I feel that an afghan should truly be made up of leftover bits and pieces. When people purposely buy yarn for afghans, it doesn't feel the same to me as one made up of half a skein here, and 40 yds there, etc. My problem is that I'm currently in a cold sheep pattern, and although I have quite a bit of odd-ball stash that I would like to use up, I certainly do not have anywhere near enough for an afghan. This weekend I'm going to go through my stash and put all of my oddballs and left overs into a bag and evaluate from there what I can do. Just mentally going through my inventory, I think I'd have enough for MOST of the blanket, say 75-80% of it, I even have a TON of creamy-white that I could use as a main color (of sorts) for part of it. But I'm considering buying a few skeins of Caron Simply Soft in a dark color to tie the other half of it altogether. I'm thinking half in darks, half in lights, with the creamy-white being the MC for the light side and the simply soft being the MC for the dark side.. HMM! Like I said, I'll have to take inventory of what I have first and see if this is going to be feasible at this point. I certainly have enough projects for right now that I don't NEED to cast on for this, but the more my DH was pushing for it, the more I wanted to do it. Partially because I would really love a blanket like that, partially because I wanted to make one anyway and partially because he never asks for anything from me and it feels special to me to be able to make something for him.

We'll see. I have plenty of time to decide about the afghan.. it's going to take me awhile to get through all of this :)

Everlasting Bagstopper

2009-03-02T18:55:00.000-08:00

As previously stated, I eeked in a finish to my Everlasting Bagstopper on the last day of the month, to bring my monthly yarn total to 1070 yards, and my 2009 total to 2300 yards. Woo! I love, love, LOVE this bag too! It makes me yearn for spring and the farmers market and fresh fruit stands and raspberries the size of my thumb. Mmmm.

The bag was knit with KP's CotLin (70% cotton, 30% linen), and took up about 1.75 skeins of the brown and about 3/4 of one skein of the green, totalling about 300 yards. I did not have a net deduction from my stash in February, for previously stated reasons (my sock yarn binge at the beginning of the month), but I'm very committed for the rest of March. I have one exception for the month of April, when I visit the local Alpaca farm, but other than that I'm staying clean from buying anything unless absolutely 100% necessary. I've discovered that since my yarn binge last month, I have ran out of room in my stash area. I'm considering taking half of my sewing stash area, that is currently unused, and putting my knitting stuff in it just to get it out of the way. I currently have a giant bag sitting inside my laundry hamper that is full of yarn.

Anyway, I am currently knitting a pair of Crosswalker socks for Julie, out of the hand dyed stuff I whipped up last month. The colors are turning out awesome so far, and I'm really happy with it. I am hoping to finish these up within a week or so, but on size 2 needles, they're slow going. Plus I'm constantly afraid that I'm going to snap the needles in half. So tiny.

March Goals

2009-03-01T11:06:00.000-08:00

Well I have pictures of new FOs to share, but since I don't have them uploaded right now, I'll post this for the time being. First are my February goals, revisited.

February goals:
- ~~Dye worsted weight yarn (220 yds), in green/blue/purple -- should be doing this tonight~~
- ~~Finish Scott's socks, 1 down and 1 to go~~
- Start (and finish) Julie's socks

2009 goals:
- Knit myself a scarf, hat and gloves before winter
- Knit 10000 yds of yarn
- Do not buy any new yarn except under certain conditions (running out of yarn during a project, having an emergency of sorts where I NEED a certain kind of yarn), going forward, except in April at the alpaca farm and once this summer/fall.

I did dye the yarn I needed to, I did finish Scott's socks, I did CO Julie's socks, but got sidetracked making an Everlasting Bagstopper instead. As far as year-long goals, well.. I have some work to do. I haven't started with knitting myself anything for next winter.. and I bought yarn this week. After a trip to my LYS, I spent nearly an hour in there petting everything and walked out with a single skein of Crystal Palace Fizz, for kitchy x-mas trees. A pattern that I found recently and want to make this year. I still feel like my commitment is strong, because although I was SEVERELY tempted to buy a lot more yarn (it was pay day, afterall), I bought only what I knew I was going to use, with a pattern in mind.

My February yardage ended up at 1070 yards, which brings my 2009 total to 2300 yards! If I continue with this pace, I will not only hit my 2009 goal for 10,000 yards, but beat it by a significant margin. Yay! :) In February I knit:

- 1 cowl (Cherry Garcia)
- my first pair of socks!
- 2 dishcloths
- a pair of house socks for hubby
- 1 market bag (Everlasting Bagstopper)

Here are my March goals that I will revisit at the end of the month.

March Goals:
- Finish Julie's socks
- Complete at least 1 charity item
- Knit at least one thing for myself

2009 goals:
- Knit myself a scarf, hat and gloves before winter
- Knit 10000 yds of yarn
- Do not buy any new yarn except under certain conditions (running out of yarn during a project, having an emergency of sorts where I NEED a certain kind of yarn), going forward, except in April at the alpaca farm and once this summer/fall.

First dyeing attempts and man socks!

2009-02-22T14:34:00.000-08:00

I have a few things to share today, as I've been keeping myself fairly busy with all things related to fiber. I've picked up a bit of crud (a cold, flu? who knows) and have been feeling out of it, but trying to keep my mind focused so I don't let it creep in. It's been sunny here and we're getting those lovely February previews of spring before it goes grey and rainy for another four months.

Last week I tried my first attempts at dyeing yarn and so far, so good! These are what I've been doing this past week...

440yds of sock yard, specially requested by Julie..

this one feels very springy to me!

this is 220 yards of sock yarn that I had originally just wanted to dye a dark blue.. but the color failed the first time around, so I overdyed half with bright red and got a red ranging from a deep merlot to normal bright red.

In addition to that, I've also been knitting quite a bit. I finished my socks (previous entry), then started on a pair for Scott. I finished those last night and he has been wearing them almost constantly since (I guess I did okay!). He has GIANT feet, so they look a little longer then I was expecting, but oh well.

He has size 12.5 feet, so I made these to fit size 13.5, they're supposed to be "house socks", so big and comfy and squishy. They're made out of Woolease (from stash) in an olive green and black. They took up 260 yds of yarn, bringing my monthly total to 770 yards (boo!), and 2009 total to 2000 yards (yay!). If I can get Julie's socks done by next weekend, that will get me another 300 yards or so, which I would like. We'll see. :)

Goals

2009-02-17T12:44:00.000-08:00

After previously committing to certain knitting goals both on this journal, and to myself, I have thus far failed them miserably. I was attempting to go "cold sheep", and not buy any new yarn from Jan 1 to April when I visit our local alpaca farm. That was before I knit socks. I broke down last week and bought 30+ skeins of sock yarn, which threw my goal in the garbage. However, today I'm recommitting to my goals and actually setting them, instead of just throwing the idea about. I'm going to try really hard to follow these.

February goals:
- Dye worsted weight yarn (220 yds), in green/blue/purple -- should be doing this tonight
- Finish Scott's socks, 1 down and 1 to go
- Start (and finish) Julie's socks

2009 goals:
- Knit myself a scarf, hat and gloves before winter
- Knit 10000 yds of yarn
- Do not buy any new yarn except under certain conditions (running out of yarn during a project, having an emergency of sorts where I NEED a certain kind of yarn), going forward, except in April at the alpaca farm and once this summer/fall.

I should have my February goals done by early next week (hopefully). I'm interested to knit with my hand dyed yarn and see how it comes out. If my math is correct, it SHOULD be self striping every two rounds or so. I did a test swatch and it came out like that, but we'll see, I guess. I will attempt to update this goal list every month and keep it current. So that's it for now :)

MY FIRST SOCKS!

2009-02-15T15:00:00.001-08:00

I'm in the middle of dyeing sock yarn for Julie's soon-to-be-socks, so I don't have a lot of time, but wanted to share my first socks!

They were done in KP Simple Stripes, and only took about 300 yards (which brings my February totals up to 510 yards and my yearly total to 1740, woot!). I followed an online tutorial to help me get through the pattern. I also started some house socks for my husband last night, but they aren't in sock yarn, they're made with Wool-Ease (in dk green and black) and will run about 260 yards for a pair. He has large feet. ANYWAY! Yay, socks! :) I'm hooked.

Dishcloths

2009-02-05T11:23:00.000-08:00

I completed my second dishcloth last night. I had some kitchen cotton laying around so I decided to whip a set up.. I've never knit dishcloths before, but I used the "Grandmother's Favorite" pattern, which was insanely easy, and each one took about 2-3 hours from cast on to bind off.

Two clothes took up almost an entire skein of yarn, I have about 10 yards left over.. so not a whole lot. Scott was actually kind of excited to have home made dishcloths around, so I'm sure I'll make more in the future. This project brought my February total of yarn used up to 210 yards (in five days!) and my year to date total to 1440 yards. Woohoo!

Puppy Day Cowl

2009-02-02T19:45:00.000-08:00

Wait no longer, for it is the Puppy Day Cowl! It is from the pattern named "Cherry Garcia", and I love.love.love it. It's made from Manos del Uruguay 100% wool, and is absolutely the loveliest yarn I've ever knit with. I have about 50 yards left over and have no idea what to do with it that would be good enough to honor this gorgeous yarn. Sigh.

That's all I have for now. I'm casting on some cute dishcloths tonight, just going to make a few to get rid of some of the kitchen cotton I have laying around. So far in February I've used 110 yards of yarn!

January

2009-02-01T22:50:00.000-08:00

I need to write a detailed post with photos of my beautiful Puppy Day Cowl, but that will have to wait because bed time is fast approaching. In the month of January I did the following:

- 1 pair of mittens
- 3 hats (for charity)
- 7 toe covers

Which totaled about 1230 yards. I only actually used up one skein of yarn, but the yardage itself I was quite proud of! I'm interested to see how much I actually knit in a year, and am aiming for 10 miles.. which if I continue at this pace, is definitely achievable! To knit 10 miles, I have to knit about 1500 yards a month on average. Hmm. For February, I already have 80 yards done, and am hoping to finish a few more things for myself (namely a hat and some fingerless mitts) and make a scarf for my mom out of some gorgeous Ella Rae Shibu that I got in a trade recently. I also want to make a few more charity hats and use up some of the really soft Bernat Satin hanging out in my stash.

Toe Covers, Finished!

2009-01-29T19:14:00.000-08:00

I finally finished all seven of the toe covers (for casts), for my MIL. Yay! I actually finished yesterday and sent them out today Priority, so hopefully she gets them in the next few days. We sent her some beautiful purple flowers earlier this week and she got them on Monday or Tuesday, and said she loved them... so that's good. Each of these toe covers were double stranded worsted weight yarn on size 8 needles, so they're thick and warm. Also, each took up 90 yards of yarn due to the double stranding. That means my current yarn total is up to 1230 yards for 2009 used. Woohoo!

I'm casting on tonight my next project, and it's going to be for me. A cowl made with the gorgeous Manos dark blue yarn I recently got through a trade. It's beautiful and I love it already. It's also the first thing I've knit for myself since I really started knitting, so I'm anticipating it a lot. I've made so much for others these years, and nothing for me. Boo to that! I may try to adapt the pattern to be in-the-round because I don't currently have any 10.5 needles and dislike using circs as regular needles.. plus it's less finishing to do this way.. haha. The pattern seems to be easily adapted, hmm.. the worst that happens is that it's a little different looking then the pattern. But who cares? It's MY cowl! We'll see. I might try it out and frog it if it's really awful looking, otherwise I'll stop tomorrow and get some new needles.

One last note before I head off to knit.. today is the one year anniversary of the day we adopted Kira. I can't imagine what my life would be like without her, and don't even want to try. I love you, Kira!

Cast Covers & Stash Knit Down 2009

2009-01-24T20:36:00.000-08:00

I'm still making cast covers for my dear MIL. I have four done and have started on the fifth. Since they are double stranded, it's turning into a nice little stashbuster project (in addition to helping warm some cold toes!). I've decided to keep count of my yardage this year, just out of curiosity mainly (btw, so far I'm at ~980 yards). Inspired by the stash-knit-down groups on Ravelry, and my husband's complaints, AND running out of room in my stash area.. I'm going to attempt to not buy any yarn. I think this is a good idea. My goal is to not BUY any yarn until April, when I go visit my favorite local alpaca farm and pick up some of their amazingly gorgeous (and soft and warm, my god) hand spun yarn. Until then I can trade for things, and can only buy if I run out of a specific yarn for a project (or if an emergency comes up where I need to knit something ASAP and nothing I have will work.. though, I have a ton of different yarn so I don't know why that would happen). As my birthday is coming up (in like what, 6 weeks?), gifts do not count!

So there it is. No yarn until April. At that point I'll evalutate my stash and my current level of activity and go from there. Anyway.. some pictures of the already finished cast covers. I'm going to knit as many as I can by EOD Tuesday and send them out on Wednesday afternoon (it's the first day I'll have time to go to the PO). These are based on a free pattern but heavily improvised (what else is new). Basically, CO 46 stitches, k1p1 for an inch, then just knit for 3.5", then start decreases (k6, k2tog until end of round, knit the whole next round, k5, k2tog, etc.. it's my "standard" decrease for items in the round). After decreases I usually have around 16 stitches left and I just graft them together (like a sock) with a needle. They're very quick and easy to make, I just hope they fit her foot and keep her warm!

I figured I'd end with a photo of Kira. This is what she does everytime I start knitting. Sleeps between my legs. Sigh. So cute.

Hats and Casts

2009-01-22T19:40:00.000-08:00

I don't really have a whole lot of time to spend updating, but wanted to share some finished objects. First off, the hat I was working on, in Bernat Satin (Denim Heather, I believe) with 2X2 false cable rib. It turned out beautifully and I'm jealous of the woman that will end up its' owner.

Secondly, I've been busy this week making a half million toe covers (for casts) for my dear MIL, who slipped on some ice and fractured her ankle. I've already completely two (in two days) and I'm working on my third right now. I'm double stranding whatever soft, machine washable, acrylics I have lying around and luckily I have 6-7 skeins in her favorite colors. I'll take pictures when I am finished, which I'm hoping to do by Sunday night. But for now, I'm off! :)

More Charity Hats

2009-01-17T18:23:00.000-08:00

I finally sent my mother and father their belated Christmas package. Inside were various things (a painting I got from the peninsula of a native american hummingbird, chocolates from a local chocolatier, a can of tuna, $70 worth of bath bombs from LUSH!).. INCLUDING my heathered grey alpaca convertible mitts (see prior entries). My mom really loved them, but the best rave came a few days later.. she said she's been wearing them everyday, and loves to wear them at work where it's a little drafty. Since they're convertible, she can just pull back the flaps and type all day while keeping her hands nice and toasty warm. She called me excitedly a few days ago to tell me that all of her coworkers are insanely jealous over her gloves and have been asking on a daily basis where she got them from. When she told them that I knit them for her they were all in disbelief and asked for me to knit THEM gloves too! Haha, no such luck for them.. but the stroke of ego was nice. Although I've knit for.. 8 or so years? I lost count. I think I've really become .. good, only lately.. in the past year or so. I understand how to knit, why things look the way they do, how to create patterns on the fly, etc. I finally understand knitting, so I've gotten much better and faster at it. It's nice!

I've been working on more charity hats, but as you recall from the last few posts, hit a snag when my dog decided to eat my skein of yarn. I ended up detangling what I could (about 3/4 of it) and just throwing the rest. Since then I've made good progress and am hoping to finish tonight (if I don't get too distracted on Ravelry.. or looking at rental listings on CL, we're moving soon, nooo!!). I recently got some Manos through a swap online and already have a pattern ready to go for it, I want to knit with it sooo badly. Anyway, wanted to share some progress shots.

Man this is an awful picture of me..

It's Bernat Satin yarn (again), in "denim heather", I believe. The pattern is just improved 2X2 ribs with a false cable. The false cable was being a giant pain in the ass to start with, as I've only seen it demonstrated once for about 5 seconds (a few months ago, no less).. and couldn't find any instructions on the internet of how to do it. It was trial and error, but once I figured it out, it turned out to be pretty awesome looking! For the record, all it is is knitting into the second stitch, then the first, then pulling both off the needle. It sounds more complex than it is, really.

Below is another photo of my completely charity hat in a chocolate brown Bernat Satin (with strips of TLC Amore in lt green). It was sunny today for the first time in three months, so I wanted to take photos that were a little nicer than the flash ones I already have.

And of course, no entry is complete without a picture of Kira. She was LOVING the sun and soaking every last bit of it up all day long. In the summer she will literally lay in the sun from 8AM-10PM and sleep.. she just loves it. Cute little puppy girl :)

Dog Bed II & Charity Hat Progress

2009-01-11T21:54:00.001-08:00

Since I got my sewing machine in November, and made my first dog bed (as shown in previous posts), my husband has been telling me I should make a sort-of dog bed for our puppy's kennel. She doesn't spend much time in there, usually one of us is always at home, but she loves to lay in there and takes naps. Considering how much she LOVES fleece (seriously, she goes nuts over it), I finally decided to buckle down and sew a sort-of dog bed for her. At first I was just going to sew a nice fleece cover for the plastic liner pad that was in there, but then my husband suggested sewing a pillow, stuffing it, then sewing a liner for the pillow. Geez. I'm not a factory! Anyway, after some consideration, I figured his idea was best.. it would be soft, warm, cushy.. and I could remove the cover if she got it dirty and wash it (always a good idea with dog beds!).

I pulled out a box of my scrap fabric remnants and got enough fabric together to make a patchwork pillow (measuring 24"X19" when fully stuffed and finished) and a lovely, soft, fleece cover (measuring 25"X22"). The fleece cover was purposely left longer because I was going to sew the ends over to create a smooth hem.. but as I was attempting to finish it, all hell broke loose on my sewing machine and it refused to sew ANYMORE. I don't know what the issue was/is, most likely tension related, but it is still a new machine and I don't know the ins-and-outs of it yet. Either way, I figured, it's a fucking dog bed, does she really care if I sew her a smooth hem? Not likely. So voila! Dog bed part deux!

The pillow that's inside the cover

The other side of the pillow...

One side of the cover (with flash!)

The other side of the pillow (notice UNHEMMED EDGES!), no flash.. so the colors are a little more true.

The finished product, inside her kennel.

She investigated it a bit, sniffing and walking around on it before running off to play with the cat. I have no worries though, because I know how much she loves fleece, and I know she'll get a lot of use out of it in the future. Further more, I was very happy with how it turned out. My husband was even impressed at my work (it was a v. simply project, but he doesn't know that!), and commented that he loved it. The absolute only thing I would change, if I could change something, would be the unhemmed edge. And really, like I said, it's not a big deal at all.

In other news, I still haven't made any god damn progress on my second charity hat. It's been stuck at about an inch and a half since Monday due to the dog eating the yarn. I've spent countless hours trying to untangle it, and getting nowhere. Even my husband, who is awesome at helping me unravel things because he has PATIENCE, has given up. I don't know what to do. I might end up cutting my losses and throwing it away. The yarn is a 'cheap' acrylic.. just Bernat Satin.. and only cost me $1.50, but it's more the point of the matter. I HATE wasting things, even $1.50 yarn! I'll give it another go this week, but if I can't make anymore progress, it's going in the garbage and I'll then have to make an emergency trip to JoAnn to replace said yarn. Sad times.

Kittyville Hat

2009-01-08T10:16:00.000-08:00

I made the Kittyville hat several years ago, for my dear friend Amanda, but never finished it (the ears). So last night, I decided to finish it. Ta-da! Kittyville hat ala Mindy.

Other than that, I've been working on my second chemo-cap, but progress has completely halted to a stand still because the dog got into the yarn (again) and made it such a mess that I've been untangling for THREE DAYS and not making any progress. Fuck. I really wanted to get it done, but I don't know if that's going to happen anytime soon.

That is a picture of what SOME of the mess looked like. Yeah. Anyhow. That's about all for now.

More Charity Hats

2009-01-05T19:55:00.000-08:00

First things first. An update to my hat that has been chronicled in several posts before.. I finished last week. The results:

The picture sucks, it's actually very pretty!

Since finding and joining Ravelry, I've become a woman obsessed! I literally cannot say enough great things about the site as a whole. One of the groups that I frequent decided to do a charity hat knit for a hospice-type home in Monterey. The main group of people that are there are cancer patients.. so we're making chemo caps. I cast on for my first cap on New Years Day and finished today (four days, woo!). Here are the results:

View from the top

Moi!

It's based on your based roll-brim pattern, I didn't use any pattern (as per the norm) and just winged it. I'm very, very happy with the results. The yarn is a new yarn to me, as well. Nothing special really, just some Bernat Satin (in mocha) and TLC Amore (the green). Bernat Satin is like heaven and I'm sure whoever gets this hat will be happy with it! I know I would. I've already started my next one, which I think I'm going to try some new techniques with. We'll see. Julie comes in tomorrow and I can barely contain my excitement. However this means my crafting/sewing/knitting will be minimal for the next week or so. I'll see if I can't finish my next hat in the time that she's here. We'll see!

Knitting Bag/Bag V1.0

2008-12-30T21:17:00.000-08:00

I finished my bag prototype! Yay! This bag was mainly made so I could test out a pattern I saw online. I didn't follow the pattern, just took it as inspiration really. I definitely see room for improvement, so we'll call this Mindy's bag v1.0. I have included several photos of both the progress and the finished product.

The outside

The inside lining

The outside fabric (goldish material) is something my mother picked out and asked me to sew her larger, reusable grocery totes with it. It's heavy, almost an upholestry thickness. The cute blue planet fabric on the inside is just a cotton that I had a half yard of or so hanging out from one of the remnant bags I got. I literally had JUST enough for the lining, and enough scraps to barely fill my hand (and I have v. small hands). The handles are the goldish fabric again, backed with black fleece for stability AND strength. Plus it's comfy to hold.

Stuffed with knitting projects. Note: you can turn the handles down to the sides for better access.

All done, view of the lining.

The finished product is about 9" wide laying flat and the actual bag portion is about 12" deep. It's bigger then I was intending to go with for my first prototype, but big enough for a medium sized knitting project or even two or three smaller ones. I fit two adult sized hats on the needles plus the skeins of yarn attached to them, in the bag without any problem and still had a little room left over.

Honestly, I like it, but I don't know how long I'm going to hold on to it. I may try to trade it on Ravelry for something else, because I'm going to be making many of these while I develop a good bag pattern. We'll see. Either way, for a first attempt, I'm very happy with it! :) As for the hats that were stuffed inside.. I'm ALMOST done. I am planning on cleaning up some sewing mess and then finishing up one hat before the night is over. It is doable, and needs to be done, because I have a lot of projects ready to go.

Charity Hats

2008-12-28T14:47:00.000-08:00

Made some more progress on my charity hats. It's almost to the start of the crown decreases and even though I've had to frog this first hat TWICE, it's knitting up super fast. Hats: instant gratification. I wanted to do a few more for the local homeless shelter, but have signed up to do chemo hats for one of my online groups (on Ravelry!) and am kind of anxious to start on those. I have a few other WIPs or things I'm waiting on yarn for to start.. but making hats and charity knitting in general is always a good thing. Not only am I having fun knitting, but someone will enjoy what I'm doing. Anyway! Some WIP pictures on my first hat.

Last night...

This morning, added in a second color during the football game (go Vikes!)

I also got a package from my parents yesteryay. The most anticipated package in the history of the world, I'm sure, as it was TEN DAYS LATE. Thanks, Fedex. It was full of fabric and remnants and fun little extras, as well as a quilt that I'm 90% finished with. I am literally 6" of fabric on the bottom away from having both the front and back finished, with two sides already sewed together. I don't know what the hell I'm going to fill it with, maybe just quilt batting from the LQS, as I don't have any on hand.. but then I'm going to have to quilt it myself, argh. I also got stuff from the parents to make them some reusable grocery bags. It's absolutely hideous fabric, but should make some decently strong bags.. so that's also on the slate to start and finish.

Today I ventured outside, and it's worth noting, because it's the first time I drove anywhere in almost two full weeks. The streets are actually pretty clear and I shouldn't have any problem getting to work tomorrow (we'll see). This week is only four days of work, but the first three will be steeped in overtime, because I have a metric ton of work to do. Next week I took vacation because Julie will be coming (yay! I'm so, so SO excited) so I'm only working on Monday. It looks like I'll have plenty of time to knit and sew and get some stuff done. It's a good thing too, as I just bought 15 or so skeins of Patons SWS on sale today at Michaels (for $1.50 a piece, holy crap!).

Kira.. she was being feisty.

FO: Convertible Gloves & Snowmen

2008-12-26T11:31:00.000-08:00

Finished! Finally! Yesterday after cooking all day, I decided that it was time to finish these gloves once and for all. I love them, and will be sad to send them away, but they've been such a giant pain that I'm not too sad, y'know? After frogging back and reknitting and having yarn issues (thanks to the dog).. ugh. Add this to the pile of stuff I have to send out next week. That is, if I can make it to the stupid post office. I'm on day 9 of being snowed in. We have ventured outside, but it was awful and I ended up a blithering mess of anxiety because the roads are so terrible. ANYWAY.. on with the photos!

Yay! Done! On another note, I love.love.LOVE this yarn, it's from a local farm called Alpacas of Misty Ridge and incredibly soft and warm and a dream to work with. I usually venture over there once every year, so I might pick some more up. For one skein, about 300yds, it was $24, but well worth every penny. I have enough left over that I think I'm going to try to make a "matching" headband (panta-style). Maybe. I'm considering it.

What I'm working on now is finishing up some hats for a local homeless shelter. I've been trying to find one for the past month, but it's a lot more difficult then it should be, IMO. I've asked some local knitting groups if they know of any, so hopefully I can get a lead from there. In the meantime I'm knitting the hats because it's cold outside and whenever I do finally get around to finding an organization to give them to, I know they'll be put to good use. I'm about 25% done with my first hat, which I just started working on last night. I don't have a good WIP picture yet, but I'll try to take one today. I'm just working it in 4X4 ribs and will crown decrease on the pearl sections when I get there. I've never tried a pattern like that before, so we'll see how it works out.

In the past week and a half we've gotten about two feet of snow, so yesterday we decided to go in the backyard and make a snowman! So Happy Holidays to everyone, enjoy our snowman. :) In the meantime I'm going to make some lunch and keep on knitting. It's good knitting weather and I have lots of good movies to watch. Later!

Puppy Bed and Mitten Update

2008-12-20T22:56:00.000-08:00

Just wanted to do a small update with some progress shots. I've been expecting a large package from my mother for the past few days now, filled to the brim with fabric, remnant bags and an almost completed quilt top that I started making when I was 18 and abandoned when I moved out a few months later. Unfortunately, due to the insane and record breaking snow storms we've been having here in the Seattle area, I'm stuck waiting.. and waiting.. and waiting some more. I've been completely demotivated to do anything because I've been so hyped about getting this package. Ugh! Especially because I haven't worked or even left the house at all since Wednesday. It's been that bad. Most of the past few days have been spent like this. Next to the fire watching TV. Can't complain too much about that!

I was finishing up the pair of gloves I wrote about in the last entry (they are for my mom), but was so unsatisfied with part of them that I frogged about 1/4 of the whole project and am redoing it. I like the result this time around.. it fits much better and looks much better. They're not going to be perfect, and honestly, I've had to come to terms with my perfectionist ways when it comes to crafting. There is ALWAYS going to be something I could have done better or different, you know? Beside, if people wanted identicle perfectly shaped and perfectly made items they'd buy them from a mass-produced store. Handmade IS handmade.

Some photos of the progress after frogging it.

I thought I would share some photos of a finished object I did about two weeks ago. I bought a metric ton of fleece (okay more like 12 of so yards) during a big sale at my local fabric store and some of that was allocated to making my puppy a soft little bed. The funniest and best part about making it was that she knew the whole time I was making it that it was for her. I had to hand stitch the last little part of it closed and as I was doing it, she was laying on it. Wouldn't even let me finish! Anyway, she LOVES IT and will lay in it all day and all night long. It's made completely out of fleece, both the inner part and the outer "tube" are fleece stuffed with a polyfill stuffing. At the time I made it, the inner part (the laying part) was about 16" across, but it has stretched out a little with use and now is about 18" across in the laying area.

An action shot. I actually just trying to take pictures of it and she HAD TO lay down in it.

Alpaca yarn is smelly...

2008-12-14T11:05:00.000-08:00

No finished products to show off this time. That doesn't mean I haven't been working hard. I've been cranking out some convertible mitts for my mom all this week (I finished one in April and then forgot about the project). The mittens themselves are gorgeous. They're made from my own pattern (woo!) in this beautiful, BEAUTIFUL alpaca wool that I bought from a local farm. It's super soft, not itchy, and amazing. The problem is that since it's real (and fresh) alpaca wool that hasn't been processed or anything.. it smells yummy. To dogs, that is.

The mitts in question, see how close I was to being done?!

It smells like an alpaca, and last night as I was mere minutes (okay about 30 minutes) from finishing I took a break and the dog broke into my room and decided to take my beautiful ball of alpaca wool and do this to it.

It ended up taking both my husband and myself the rest of the night, about six hours, to untangle this mess. I lost a good amount of yarn (maybe 3-5 yds) of stuff that had to be cut off of it, and instead of being connected in one big ball, I have NINE small balls of yarn. I'm angry about it, because she's done this before (only with this yarn), and it made me lose a lot of time that could have been spent working on other things. I'm trying to get my Etsy store up and running with some new items.. but issues like this happening are not helping.

In other news, I cast on (to my beautiful Addi turbos, mmmm) my most hated yarn ever. I promised some hats and scarves to some local homeless charities (it's cold out!), and I have a ton of this yarn in my stash that I will never, ever use because I hate it. It's warm and comfortable, I just dislike working with it.. but I figured I can suck it up for the cause.

And last but not least.. when I sell handmade stuff or even swap with people, I always tell them that I'm from a household (smoke free) with animals. Cats and dogs. All of my crafting items are stored in a room by themselves, in these nifty little cabinets, but that sometimes no matter what I do there will be hair on them. This picture was taken by my husband last night when I was asleep and I think it's the perfect example of my point. She somehow got into the room and was sleeping on a bin of fabric. Sigh. Stella.

Hopefully I'll be able to update sometime later this week with some finished products.

Knitting Needle Roll

2008-12-07T14:08:00.000-08:00

Wow, okay, so I haven't posted in a long, long time. I've made lots of stuff the past few years, but haven't felt like documenting any of it (I fail at blogging, I guess). But my husband recently bought me a sewing machine and I've been sewing up a storm. I feel the need to show off my most recent FO, because I'm very proud of it and happy with the results.

It took me from the first cut of fabric until it was finished about a total of 8 hours. Three of those hours were spent ripping seams that I accidentally sewed, but who is counting, right? I loosely used the pattern that can be found here: http://alexandrasknits.blogspot.com/2006/01/tutorial-alexandras-needle-case.html, but made a fair amount of variations on it. The pattern itself was the best I found and was SUPER easy to follow (a definite plus for someone who is really rusty with their sewing machine skills, or just starting out), so I'm very thankful for that. The fabric itself all came from JoAnn online and was on super sale for only $1.99/yard (down from $4.99-$6.99/yard), and I like it a lot. Very easy to use, doesn't shred or pull or anything.. it was all around a great project. If I ever do make another one of these, I'm definitely going to make the flap a bit longer, it's too short IMO, the pattern calls for 6", but I would recommend making it 7-8" to guarantee coverage on that second row.

Anyway, here are some pictures, enjoy! :)

Piecing it together...

Almost there, finishing up the inside.

The outside, finished.

Close up of the outside edge

Closeup of the inside, flap and stitching

The inside of it, finished, woo!

All rolled up...

Putting the needles in..

And of course Kira wants to try to help..

Twisty Turns, mitts, and Windy City

2006-06-15T20:12:00.000-07:00

Talk about an exhausting couple of months, and the best part is that none of this will slow down for quite awhile now. Sarcasm. Well, I've been knitting up a storm the past few weeks, but now I'm at the point where I don't know what to knit. Scratch that, I have a lot I want to knit but since I'm moving in a week (or so?) I am trying to pick a project that is going to take me awhile, until I get all of my knitting stuff back. I was thinking a sweater or a shrug but am somewhat hesitant.

I finished my Twisty Turns finally. I actually had the entire thing accomplished by the end of April, but couldn't bring myself to seam it all together until last week. After seaming, it looks amazing and I am very proud. I know that my mother will love it. Also, I knit the Windy City scarf (from SnB) and matching convertible mittens (my own improv, and my first pair of mittens) for a friend. Enjoys some photos!

Twisty Turns, as modeled by my friend, it's Knit Pick's Andean Silk in color "olive". So soft. So warm. I'm in love.

My own design for convertible mitts (that turned out pretty good!), made from Knit Pick's Shine, in tan, turquiose, and cream.

Windy City Scarf (from SnB), in Knit Pick's Shine, cream, tan, and turquiose.

Well that should be all for now. I might be MIA for a month or two until the move settles, and we find a place to live, but I'll be sure to update when I have some time! Later.

Updates on Twisty Turns

2006-04-17T15:03:00.000-07:00

I've been working a fair amount on my current WIP, Twisty Turns. It's an endurance challenge, really, and definitely the largest project I've done to date (even beating out the wonky pinwheel blanket). It's 48 stitches per row and, by the end, 615 rows long. I have about 330 rows done as of now and just wanted to show my current progress. It seems I couldn't get a good natural light photo, so I had to take it with flash, and it seems to make the color look weird on the close up. Anyway here we go.

Obviously, that's the whole thing so far (about five feet long) and then close up. It's a pretty easy pattern once you get it going (my first attempt on cable cast ons, it went beautifully!), but I'm excited for it to be done. It's for my mother, and it needs to be finished by the time I see her (about three weeks from now), so I've got a lot to do in that time.

But that's all for now! I have a lot to do today, just wanted to update. Later.

Twisty Turns

2006-03-19T20:18:00.000-08:00

I didn't get too far on the cable I was working on in Korea. I did do some of it, but mainly it was just for practice and I think I have it down now. Knowing how easy cables actually are and how complex they look, I'm going to try to find a pattern soon to display them in, but I already have a few projects lined up that I need to finish first. And speaking of new projects, I got a huge bundle of yarn in the mail yesterday and promptly started my long-awaited Twisty Turns (from Wrap Style). This is a stock photo, I'm doing mine in green (Knit Pick's Andean Silk in "Leaf").

I'm supposedly making it for my mother, but we'll see if it ever actually gets to her. Hah. So far it's going along well. It was my first time doing cable cast ons, and they look pretty nice. Also my first time slipping stitches, but so far so good with both of those. The finished product is about 92" long (before assembling it) so I'm sure it's going to take awhile, but the pattern is interesting enough to keep me held, and repetitive enough to not mess me up constantly. After I'm finished with that I'm starting a scarf and hat set out of Knit Pick's shine colors. I bought a pretty new addi circ just for it. Also, on the slate somewhere are socks. The yarn is here but no needles, those are going to be an online purchase because my LYS had none small enough in the length that I needed, but those would have been put off anyway since I'm very excited to be doing the wrap/shawl thingy.

Other than that, I don't really have any updates. I only really wanted to post and give some sort of status on my knitting! I swear I'm not quitting, even if I am turning into the world's oldest 21 year old as we speak. That's all for now. Later!

2006-02-20T23:43:00.000-08:00

I've been a busy knitter these past few weeks, emphasis on busy, so busy in fact that I haven't had time to post any photos of my WIP or finished objects. So this massive update will serve to that, while I procrastinate packing for my vacation. Yay!

First up, the pinwheel baby blanket, pattern found here, my biggest project to date, no doubt. This thing, when finished, is 34" in diamater, and took me about a solid week of knitting (I didn't count, but probably about 20-25 hours, most of which was done at work or watching the olympics). It was knit entirely on my size 9 24" circs, which by the end, was seriously pushing maximum density. I used approx 300 for the main color (purple) and about 100 yards for the other color, both semi cheap but soft acrylic just from my stash so I don't remember what brand. Anyway, I had really high hopes for this project, and am gifting it to a friend who is due in a few months, but ... I don't know what the hell happened to it. I'm going to try to fix it when I get back, but am running short of ideas how to do such. For the record, this was my first attempt at both seed stitch (the border) and yarn overs. Both were a lot easier than I anticipated, which is never a bad thing.

BLEH!! Anyway, next project. I finally got around to finishing Chantelle's homespun (ew) scarf. It matches the hat I made (look back a few posts) and has mostly been done for a few weeks but I was being lazy about actually finishing it. I didn't get a picture of it before I rolled it up and considering rolling and decorating it takes about 20 minutes, I'm not about to undo it all, but it's about 60" long by about 5" wide and is super soft. That's the thing with homespun, I despise knitting with it but the finished product is always great. Oh well. Here we go.

Last, but certainly not least, I sat down last night with my new knitting book (Wrapstyle, oh how I love thee!) and taught myself how to cable. I'd tried once before and it was a miserable failure, but the instructions in wrapstyle are so easy to follow that it was a piece of cake. I did a braided cable 22 st across, but it turned out awesome. So I decided to grab some left overs and knit up a panta with a cable in it for practice. I just started it tonight and only worked on it for about an hour, but here it is so far. I'm going to take it with me to Korea and hopefully finish it there. Sorry about the flash, it's blinding but it's the best I could do at 11PM.

Alright so that's all for now, I need to finish packing, er.. start packing. Damnit, I suck at this stuff. Okay. Later! :)

Another Panta

2006-02-02T23:35:00.000-08:00

I've been terribly busy in the past few weeks, so my knitting has taken a backseat to a lot of other things. But I'm pushing through with the little spare time that I have, so since my last post I've finished another panta (pictured below), which is a gift (with a matching scarf--not yet completed) for a friend, and I'm about 75% done with two other scarves that I started a few weeks ago. I'm hoping to finish those before I leave for Korea on the 21st.

Made from Moda Dea yarn (color: Rave) on size 5 straight needles. My fingers were almost dead by the end of it, argh!

Anyway, I just wanted to post a photo of my recent panta. I think I'm going to whip another one up in a cream color for my mom who is visiting me right now. But we'll see. And yeah, I'm sorry about the photo, but it's nearly midnight and I am very sleepy. That's all for now! Later!

Panta

2006-01-16T22:32:00.000-08:00

I finished my panta today. Well I finished it last night but did the blocking and sewing today. It turned out really great. There are four increase sections in the pattern but I only did three because I thought it would turn out too wide if I did four, which I was correct about. At the widest point it's about 4-1/2" wide and it's total length after blocking was 19", which was about perfect. My head circumference is about 2" more than that, so it stretches just the perfect amount. I'm extremely happy with the way it was finished. It's made from Knit Pick's Wool of the Andes in Asparagus.

Now I just have to live with that damn fanta song in my head. Fanta fanta dont you wanna fanta fanta. GAH!

More Hats Again (and a new year)

2006-01-03T17:36:00.000-08:00

With a new year come new resolutions, and since this is a knitting blog I thought I would post here, my knitting goals for 2006. It's real simple, as I only have one actual goal (beside the hope that I improve in general..). I want to learn how to knit socks. I don't care if they are deformed and too loose, missing a row of stitches, or just plain ugly, I want to learn how to knit socks. There. It is done!

Anyhow, more finished projects! I finished Scott's hat (previously shown in the post behind this one). I went through the trouble of knitting ear flaps, grafting them to the hat, and then blocking the whole thing (pain in the ass) before Scott told me that he didn't want earflaps. Argh. He's lucky that I like him so much. So I ripped off the earflaps and reknit a 2" strip (22" long) and grafted it to the bottom of the hat. It actually turned out better than I thought. However when the hat is laying flat on a surface the hat looks horrible, so you get to see a photo of yours truly modeling said hat to prove it doesn't suck.

Ugh.. excuse the horrible photo of moi.

The next finished item is one I made for Chantelle, I'm making a matching scarf which I just started yesterday. I'm hoping to get it done by the end of the week and make a fair amount of headway tonight while I recover from the gym. I'm so sore. Oi!

Okay, so I'm off to lay down and enjoy the night. Night :)

More Hats!

2005-12-27T12:57:00.000-08:00

Due to a terribly busy schedule as of late, all my knitting projects have been put on hold, but now that the holiday is over and it's back to life as normal, I'm forging ahead. That is, once I get all my yarn that I ordered! I ordered eight skeins of the andean silk from knit picks to make some pretty new things. On Saturday night, when I got home from work, I found three skeins sitting in my mailbox, so I whipped up a hat for my husband. It turned out beautifully but a little.. short. I'm trying to come up with a way to amend the short-ness of it without ripping it all out and starting over, but this is how the hat looks currently.

I can't wait until I get the rest, it better show up soon! I'm still working on the shawl for my mother, but I'm estimating that it will be done at this progress, in about.. ohh.. two years? I've learned that I despise working on size 17 needles, it's too cumbersome for my little hands. Anyway, this is the final total of all the stuff I'm sending to the RSP. I'm sending the package tomorrow (along with my mix-cds, woot) and hope that it will get there in time. I made the one scarf and the hat and my friend from work made two other scarves (crocheted). Hot. I hope they like it! :)

I'm going to order a massive amount of yarn on Friday from knitpicks, everyone I know wants a hat, geez! I even ordered some for myself (in green/cream/orange colors, pretty fancy) so I'm hoping to actually keep something I knit one of these days. We'll see. That's all for now!

My First Hat

2005-12-17T00:09:00.000-08:00

I finished my first ever hat the other day. It turned out really great, I'm very proud of it. I'm sending it as part of my RSP package, so I hope that some kid enjoys it, I even put a big pom pom on it. It's nice and soft and warm. Now I just want to make one for myself. I bought some yarn off of knitpicks today, stuff that I've been looking at for months but never splurged. Also, I bought some to make Scott a hat with, it should be cute.

I used Woolease in "wheat" color for the main part, but for the gray and orange accents I used some of the cheap mohair I bought from Target a few months ago. So soft!

Other than that, I've just been working a lot, which will continue into the next few days. I knit some fingerless gloves/wrist warmer type things today out of this old-as-hell crappy yarn that Delaine found in the storage closet at work. It's variegated red/white/brown and I think it's pretty, but since I just bought new fingerless gloves, I think I may give these ones to someone, but we'll see. The battery on my digicam is dead so I'll take a photo of them tomorrow.

I think that I need some sleep, so that's all for now. Goodnight!

RSP and More!

2005-12-13T14:58:00.000-08:00

I finished my project for the Red Scarf Project, it turned out okay, but I could have done better if I could have actually thought about what I was doing it before I was doing it. If that makes sense. Anyway, I took some photos and wanted to post them. So here goes.

Nothing special, but I used this pretty Riviera Multi yarn that I bought a few months ago. It's the variegated color, obviously, and it knits up beautifully. However I bought like eighteen skeins of it, so I'm trying to trade some of it. I don't see myself using nearly 2000 yards of it anytime soon. Ah well. The scarf itself is just a mix of knit stich, purl stitch, some ribbing sections, etc. I wanted it to be very patchwork looking and I think I accomplished that. Other than that, I've just been working a lot and trying to finish "The Zombie Survival Guide" by Max Brooks. Excellent book. Oh and I'm making progress on the shawl I'm making for my mother. Here is how it looks so far...

I'm making it in three different sections and then just seaming the edges together. I'm about halfway done with this panel, so *shrugs* it'll get there. I'm not used to working on such big needles (I think these are size 16, I don't want to get up and look..) so it's hindering my process a little. Okay I think that's all for now. Later!

First Post

2005-12-11T18:54:00.000-08:00

Hi, my name is Mindy and this is my blog dedicated to my knitting and well, this is my first post. I figured for my first post I'd show some photos of the things I've been working on the past few months. But before that, I wanted to share a little bit about me. I'm twenty years old and I've lived in Seattle for the past sixteen months after growing up in Minnesota. I've been knitting for a little over three years, but only within the past few months have I started trying to advance past basic knit stitch on scarves. I don't know anybody else that knits so it's hard to learn some of the more difficult techniques and most are just trial and error while teaching myself. Anyway, without further adieu...

This is a scarf I made for my husband and completed in September. Just basic knit stitch in acrylic blue and white yarn. It took me about 20 hours to complete and finished length was about six feet long by six inches wide.

I knit this for my friend Chantelle for a gift. It's just a basic knit stitch, again, made from who-knows-what yarn that I bought two years ago. Finished dimensions are seven feet long by six inches wide. It only took me about twelve hours to finish, it knit up very fast.

So obviously this isn't knitting. I wanted to share a photo of my cat and myself. This is Stella and well, that's a bad photo of me, but I'm Mindy. Stella is crazy and I'm a single parent to her, so we have our issues (like her suddenly catching fleas last month, ech!), but overall she's a great cat. At least, to me she is.

I have a few projects I'm working on for the red scarf project but I currently don't have photos, I'll try to take those tonight or tomorrow. Well that's all for now. Later.