I know, I know
Yeah. I know I dropped off the face of the earth again. I started a new job (Yay, job!) and have been busy trying to adjust to working out of the house again. The result was that I have not done much knitting, and have done even less talking about it. We're also moving into a bigger, better apartment this weekend, so I have even less time than normal. When I return, I need to talk about - the finished Swallowtail shawl (I may wait until after it is blocked)
- the Simple Yet Effective Shawl being knit up in my Firefly handspun and a heathered-black Cascade 220
- the Pomotomus socks, in Jojoland Melody
- Progress on the Sock Blanket of Doom, which is up to a bit less than 50 squares so far
I also need to start working on the patterns for my Mary Shelley costume, since I have not even touched that in about two months and Halloween is getting closer every day. So, I will be back later. I promise. Note: I did not promise when "later" would be.
What to do?
So, I was working on the Swallowtail Shawl today. I am on the third row of charts 3C and 3D, which is to say that I am in the second section of the lace-with-nupps. I was purling back across last time and noticed that on the first row of nupps, approximately twelve rows of 200+ stitches ago, I didn't catch all five of the stitches I am supposed to be purling together for one of the nupps. The last knit stitch is just sort of hanging out back there, caught in place because of the tension on the stitch and the grippiness of the yarn.
I could rip back to there, because I was smart and put in a lifeline right before I started on that section of pattern.
Or, I could take a piece of similarly-colored yarn when I am done with the rest of this project, tie a couple of knots and conceal the ends in the nupp itself, making this the perfect crime.
That latter option sounds more my style.
Although it occurs to me that I have now told the internet about my nefarious plan, making it less perfect.
Oops.
Warming Up, part 2
Posted by Elizabeth on 03-18-2009 at 11:47 am Oh, indecision. I can't decide what to do about my next big knitting project. I am tired of knitting nupps for the Swallowtail Shawl. Rather than working on that or figuring out what to do about the Frog Tree Alpaca in my stash, I have been knitting squares for WarmUpAmerica. Today I finished a set of 7 blocks, which means I have done enough for one row on an afghan based on their pattern. One of the yarn stores in town is acting as a drop point for the squares to either send them in as a big batch or to assemble the squares themselves. I don't know which. I think I will check by with them in the next couple of days to see what they do with the squares. Depending on their answer, I might have an assembly project going soon. There will probably be a second set of seven begun soon, but I think I will have to make some decisions on what is getting trashed or not before I have enough spare yarn to knit another whole set.
The Gauntlet has been thrown
...and I am already planning for Halloween. My father-in-law is planning a giant Halloween party, reminiscent of his family's Halloween parties of old (that involved, among other things, seances with the table on hydraulics and grave-digging that involved people crawling into buried caskets through carefully concealed tunnels). His theme is "classic" horror. He suggested that the Husband and I might go as Mary Shelly and Bram Stoker. Well. I can't really turn that down, now can I? Eight months should be enough to put together two costumes... right? Pay no attention to the monstrosity behind the curtain.
It works!
I have hit a milestone! I finished the fourteenth repeat on the budding lace chart for the Swallowtail shawl! I get to start the third chart next! The pattern is still working really well. I have the right stitch count, and I (finally) memorized the pattern at about repeat 10. Because that does me so much good now. It even ended up having the right number of stitches and everything. Also, I have run through the whole color pattern for the yarn, and managed to get a picture that shows the colors fairly accurately. It may look like a pile of crap, but at least it's a pile of crap that has some pretty colors in it. The brown looks all out of place and weird, but I'll let it slide for contrast. The question now is, do I do the nupps, or do I use beads, or do I leave them out entirely? I want to have something there, so leaving them out entirely is less something I want to try. However, I would have to put a lot of beads on to make the pattern work and I don't have any beads that would work, which would mean an expensive trip to a craft store. This yarn, too, would make beads difficult because it is so thick-and-thin. Any beads I picked would either be comically large on the thin portions or be too small to use on the thicker parts. Which means, I guess, that I get to try my hand at p5tog. We'll see how this goes. I think I will wait to start the next chart until I catch up on sleep from the weekend, though.
Noro Swallowtail
Posted by Elizabeth on 03-04-2009 at 11:48 am This is probably the most exciting thing I am working on right now, which is why I have saved it for the last. Pattern: Swallowtail Shawl by Evelyn ClarkYarn: Noro Kureyon Sock, color no. S40 This photo was taken after working six repeats of the budding lace pattern. First, lets talk about the pattern. I have the download from Evelyn Clark's website, so I don't know how it looked in Interweave Knits when it was originally published. The version of the pattern up for download, however, is fabulous. The charts are easy to read (though I did start out following the written-out instructions for the first two pattern repeats). So far I have finished six of fourteen repeats of the budding lace pattern. This is not going to be a big shawl, but then, I intend it for spring and fall wear more than for winter. Now, let's talk about the yarn. As far as I know, no one picks Noro for how soft it is. I have a purse knit from Silk Garden that really is almost too scratchy to wear when it is hot outside because the strap sits on my neck. This is also really thick-and-thin, mostly because of the twist I think. Some parts are very tightly spun, and two chunks that I have run across so far were pretty much un-spun pencil roving. I ended up sort of felting the bits together to keep them from pulling apart, which evened out the size a bit and probably did a lot to keep the yarn from pulling apart at those places. Now, the colors? The colors are amazing, like usual. With one exception, as usual. Someone on the internet (I can't remember who) several years ago said that they love Noro colors, but there is always one that doesn't quite look right with the rest of the skein. With this colorway, and with the one I used for my purse, it's brown. I do not see why they stuck a brown with bits of orange in with the blues and greens and purples of the rest of the skein, but they did. I love the other colors enough to let the brown slide. Well, that and I'm too lazy to try to cut out the brown bits and splice the yarn back together. Overall verdict on the yarn is that it makes a pretty shawl (with a weird brown color), but there is no way I personally would knit socks out of it.
Warming Up
In an effort to make some more room in the milk crate that is my stash (the yarn all fits in there now, but there isn't room for any more), I am going through some of my old yarn and knitting squares for the WarmUpAmerica Foundation. Both are done in some Caron Simply Soft that I had laying around. I think it originally had a project, but that I gave up on that project before I even really got it started. Since WarmUpAmerica actually specifically requests acrylic, I figured the yarn would suit the project quite well. The top square was also the test for learning how to cable without a cable needle. I used the instructions found here. I will be making a few more of these to clear out other bits of acrylic that have been hanging around. They go very quickly, they work well if you want to try out stitch patterns, they can be mindless if you want them to be, and they go to a worthy cause. What isn't to love?
A different kind of heart
Posted by Elizabeth on 03-02-2009 at 10:40 am So, last year, I brought you these. This February, the red, heart (not Red Heart) knitting took a slightly different turn. (Yes, I know it isn't February anymore. I had to frog this thing three times before it worked right).
Harry Potter Scarf Redux
The last Harry Potter Prisoner of Azkaban Scarf! It is done! (Actually, it was done a couple of weeks ago, but I haven't had a good opportunity to take photos in a while). Isn't that a big pile of scarf? Now, having knit several of these scarves, I have a handy stash of tips for knitting them, which I will now share with you. 1. Use two circular needles. Yes, two. Not one, unless you are doing magic loop. Knitting this scarf in the round is one of the more problematic bits that I had to deal with because as you knit, the whole scarf twists up on you and wants to rotate the other direction. This means every few rows you have to untwist the whole thing and, if you are so inclined, twist it the other direction so that you get to wait longer before untwisting again. If you knit it on two circs, though, with half the stitches on each needle, then you can flip it back and forth as though it were knit flat and avoid this whole issue. It also helps for keeping the yarn from tangling around the scarf, especially if you are carrying the yarn up while you are knitting the stripes. 2. Use yarn you like to work with. The first couple of incarnations of this scarf were knit in acrylic. It was mostly okay acrylic and knit up fairly soft, but it was squeaky to knit with and kind of bothered me after a while. The second two have been done in Cascade 220, which is so much nicer to knit with in my opinion. When I got tired of working on the scarf, it was not because of the yarn this time around. 3. If you are using Cascade 220, get four skeins of the main color and one of the coordinating color. Yeah, this one was a mistake on my part. I was knitting the Atypically Knit pattern, but was pulling the yardage requirements from the Charmed Knits pattern (Amazon link), which is not knit in the round and so uses less yarn. The two Ravenclaw scarves have three-fewer repeats than the Gryffindor scarves. They are still plenty long, but I did have a lot of the contrasting color left over after the first scarf. 4. Don't worry about gauge. I was getting four stitches to the inch for all three scarves on the needles called for in the pattern. The scarf that I messed up on was spot on for gauge on needles two sizes smaller than called for, and it seemed like it was working up really tightly and was kind of hard on my hands. Knit what feels comfortable, and you will be more likely to keep knitting for the eight feet (minimum) of scarf required. If you are concerned about the width of the scarf, decrease the number of cast-on stitches and go with it. 5. Use a sewn bind-off, like the one shown here. I know it says to use the 3-needle bind-off off in the instructions, and I have done it that way before on the previous Ravenclaw scarf. However, that end of the scarf ended up being stretched out a bit and did not look quite right. You have to match up the end you started on anyway, so it really isn't that much more trouble to have to match up the bind-off end as well. This scarf has a sewn bind-off at the end, and as you can see in the photos the ends are nearly identical. 6. If you get bored with stockinette, build breaks into your knitting time. These scarves get really, really dull after a while. With this last one, I made a deal with myself. When I finished a skein of the main color, I could stop entirely and knit either a quick project or small section on a larger project. I don't even remember what it was that I knit for the break projects anymore, but it did help and broke up the knitting fairly well. I think this post is long enough on its own now. New and more interesting projects will be up tomorrow.
Monkies, scarves, and stars!
I finished the Monkey socks! Really, I finished them last week but today was the first time I had a good opportunity to get a picture. The colors are really a tiny bit darker than that, and the little bits of blue do not seem to show up at all, but other than that it's a good color shot. Mostly I am still happy with the colors, but I wish the top sock had not had such bad pooling on the foot. I ended up with a slightly-larger-than-golf-ball-sized bit of left-over, and the knots and slubs I had on the first sock were non-existant on the second one. Overall, I love them. The fit is absolutely fabulous. The pattern in the cuff ends up working kind of like two-way ribbing, so it doesn't bag but kind of scrunches down to a comfortable position. And now, an action shot! That is the view out my living room window. The closer building is another apartment complex and the far building is a frat house. Friday nights get a little noisy around here, but the view during the day is pretty. The next project I have started is the fourth (and final) Harry Potter Prisoner of Azkaban scarf, in the Ravenclaw book colors. Really, I love the way these scarves work when they are finished, but meanwhile it's miles of stockinette in the round. I am nearly done with the first skein of navy, though, and then I am allowing myself one quick project to sort of break up the scarf. It will probably end up being the Small Star Cushion (Ravelry link), but with fewer stitches initially and in worsted-weight yarn. The cat, you see, has decided that tiny stuffed knitted items are great toys, and I like knitting them anyway. Plus, if I knit it in the leftover gold from the Gryffindor scarves, then it will match the hearts I knit last year. Then I will have a set of Star and Heart Buddies from Care Bears Movie II, which was an integral part of my childhood. You may all laugh now. I know I think it's hilarious.
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