cashmere blend

Running, Malabrigo, and other things

2009-03-15T14:11:00.004-05:00

I keep describing my 5k as insane and awesome at the same time. I woke up Sunday morning and looked out the window... it was snowing. Hard.
Now, I expected pretty chilly weather but I was not expecting snow at all. I still went for it. ^_^
It wasn't as bad as I thought it could be; once I got running I warmed up pretty quickly. The snow was falling in my favorite type: big, puffy, drifty, clusters. The only things I really had to contend with was the strong gusts of wind (usually blowing against me), the slippery ground from the snow, and potholes ... covered by snow. But, overall it was an awesome experience--like running in a snow globe.

Maybe this wasn't the best idea but I signed up for an 8k coming up on the 29th. I barely made it through the 5k... I don't know if I'll be ready for an extra 2 miles in 2 more weeks. o_O

So, it's March. For the Malabrigo Junkies group on Ravelry, March means casting on projects in Malabrigo's Merino Wosted.
It's Malabrigo March!
I didn't Cast On anything on the 1st. I had a few ideas in mind but nothing really set. I didn't pick out yarn or finalize any patterns... I was being a bad Junkie. After a few days I pushed forward and got the pattern, some new Malabrigo, and finally CO the Dr. G's Memory Vest. It's a really awesome design and in order to get the pattern you need to make a donation towards Alzheimer's research. It's an awesome way to give.

I haven't done cables in a while so this is fun and refreshing. The cables are small enough that you can do them without a cable needle and once you work through an entire repeat of the center tree chart you'll probably have the pattern memorized. It's not moving as fast as I'd like... but, I spend an average of only 1 or 2 hours a night working on it.

I'm also planning on Casting On for a Brioche Stitch scarf... I just need to decide on my colors.

I received the Malabrigo March prizes straight from Tobias and Antonio of Malabrigo. Here are some pictures:

This is their new line Dos in Caribeano.

This is an un-labeled orange in Merino Worsted. I'd say it's very similar to their Apricot colorway.

We finally have some beautiful weather here... I can't decide whether to run outside or go to the Sunday knitting group. Hmm...

Knit hard!

Fitness Goal

2009-02-09T12:45:00.004-06:00

I don't knit as much as I used to. I still knit some every week but it's not enough to keep up a regular knitting blog so I think I'll start transitioning cashmere blend into a more... all around blog. =)

I've had personal blogs in the past but they have all retired. I actually love going back and reading what I had been doing with my life so I'll definitely be picking up the blogging again.

Lately I've become very ... intent on becoming healthy.

I've probably told this story before and I seriously tell it every time I talk about weight loss but back in high school I weighed an enormous 110 lbs. Enormous. hahaha, I was a stick. I used to actually pray to be fat so all the working out I was doing in gym class and as a swimmer would have actually have purpose: burning fat.
In college I stopped working out regularly and I would brag about how I could eat anything and not gain weight. And I would prove it by ordering and eating extra food.
It all came around and bit me in the behind.

I hit my highest weight about 6 months ago at 185. According to the BMI I was walking the line between simply over weight and obese. Yikes.
I managed to get it down a bit to 181.. just by becoming a bit more active... but, it was pretty much stuck at 181.

On December 28th, as sort of a pre-New Year's Resolution, I decided to start counting calories. I've never counted before... so I downloaded a cool little app on my iPod Touch and it's really been helping. So, a little over a month later I'm down 11 lbs! That's completely diet.
I have a 5k coming up on March 1st so I've started incorporating running again and hopefully that running will speed up the weight loss.

My current goals:
Lose about 2 lbs per week
Gain muscle
Hit my goal weight (145) by mid-April
Run the entire 5k on March 1st (I've done previous 5ks but always run/walk them)
Run the entire 8k at the end of March
Do an indoor Triathlon in July

That's a basic summary of where I'm at right now. Last week I only lost 1 lb so I'll have to crank it up a bit this week. Running should help.

On the subject of knitting... I was looking through a few projects on the Guy Knitters group on Ravelry and they always re-inspire me to push hard at finishing stuff. =) I have 2 sweaters on the needles, 1 waiting to be Cast On, yarn for 2 afghans, and a ton of other skeins waiting patiently to turn into something.

I'm working on the sleeve for my blue sweater. I'm hoping to finish tonight at Knitting Group and then Casting On for the 2nd sleeve and hopefully finishing it by next week so I can Cast On for the collar and assemble.

It's starting to get warm already so this might have to wait until next year for me to wear.

Long Time, No Blog

2009-02-05T10:29:00.003-06:00

I'm back... not sure for how long though. But, I'm re-inspired to become a regular blogger once again.

I haven't knit much since my last post. The grey/burgundy cardigan is still in the works. Technically it's on hold. The sleeves turned out really wide and ... billowy almost. They're like wings. I'm considering ripping back some inches and re-knitting them narrower but, I'm not a good ripper. hahaha. The girls in my Monday night group keep telling me to bring it in and they'll do the dirty work... so, I'll probably end up doing that.

I'm working on another sweater, however. It's coming out pretty well.

That's the front. It's a pretty deep V but it actually gets a very awesome looking scarf collar. I'm working on a sleeve right now. I adapted the pattern so I could knit it in the round instead of flat... and I wasn't about to do 2 sleeves on 2 circs so I'm doing 1 at a time with DPNs. ... I love my DPNs.

I've also become obsessed with making stitch markers. I joined a swap through Ravelry and decided my partner was going to get a set. I did a search for a bead store in my area, found one, drove there, and picked up some fresh water pearls and a few Swarovski crystals. I originally planned to pay Nina and/or Ivi to do the actual making... but then I thought I could probably do it myself... so, drove over to Joann's and picked up the whole aisle of pliers and got to work. Out of the 9 I purchased I actually only needed 3. Go figure. But, I examined a few of the stitch markers I already owned and was able to construct my own set of stitch markers.

I already sent my partner her set... but this is a set I made for myself. I found Swarovski pearls... very inexpensive but they look great. Also found some magnetic beads made of Hematite... and, those are my manly stitch markers. =)

They stick together! Yay magnets!
I can't stop making them! Not counting the magnetic markers, and the markers for my swap partner... I've made 4 other sets and I'm working on another 2. o_O
I should probably start selling them?

Right Front (among other things)

2008-09-23T09:39:00.003-05:00

The Right Front of my cardigan is looking pretty awesome. Didn't get a chance to snap any pictures but I'm really digging the construction. It's very different from anything else I've knitted. But, who knows, maybe all cardigans are built similarly?

The "cool" parts are the button band and the pocket. When I first read through the pattern I was bit surprised at how tedious all of it sounded, but, now I'm glad I'll be able to learn new techniques.
So, with the button band... I knit about an inch at the bottom of the Right Front (and even made a button hole!) and then they had me put 12 stitches onto a holder and continue knitting the body. Once it's finished you'll pick up the live stitches and knit the button band while sewing it to the body. CrAzY! ... but awesome. The button band becomes the collar so I'll be knitting it up and attaching it around the neckline. Is that insane or what? ... I guess the "or what" would be that most cardigans are constructed the same way.

The pocket is another nifty little trick. Basically they had me knit a flat stockinette square. Once I got to the pocket hole on the Right Front I put 32 stitches from the RF onto a holder and knit the 32 stitches of the St st square in their place. Once I finish the RF I'll pick up those stitches and do a few rows of color, bind off, flip it over, and sew down the 3 remaining sides of the pocket. Tedious but AWESOME! =)

Enough of this cardigan construction excitement... how about a nice, simple, cotton dishcloth:

I keep feeling like I blogged about this already. Hmm.
Well, during the whole Log Cabin Blanket there was a point when it became to heavy and ungainly to carry around to my knitting groups so one day I showed up to Monday night with nothing. I had been wanting to do a wash cloth for a while so I picked up some cotton (forgot what it was called, but it's really nice) and a pair of needles and cranked out a wash cloth.

It's just some seed stitch and stockinette. I love seed stitch.

Knit hard. =)

Tastes like Cotton

2008-09-22T09:57:00.003-05:00

I gained 6 lbs over the weekend. Yikes. I was surprised 'cause I kept pretty active all weekend... I did, however, indulge a bit on the eating side on Saturday and Sunday. Oops.

Well, I have more pictures for you. =)
I mentioned before that Deb @ Fishbed was having a Summer sale which mainly consisted of cotton yarns. I really don't use much cotton in my knitting. I did that one Coachella top in cotton but that was the only thing. .... actually... now that I think of it... those crochet bookmarks could be cotton. Hmm. I'll have to check.

Anyway, I was at her store for hours trying to decide what to buy. I could have skipped out on buying anything since I had no pattern or project ideas in mind but it was a sale! ... It wasn't just a sale it was a damn good sale. The yarn was 40% off!

I spent my whole afternoon there. I got in around 10:30 and stayed until 4:15 (with a lunchbreak in between).
I ended up buying this awesome cotton from Araucania.

I originally was drawn to the variegated. The colors looked so smooth. So, I grabbed a couple skeins and pondered for a while and decided on a granny square afghan. I figured I'd throw in a few other colors so my first instinct was to grab some browns or blues. Unfortunately none of the browns and blues in the Ulmo worked with the yarn I had. On a whim, I grabbed a skein of the purple and it just worked.

I played around with colors a bit more and decided I needed a 3rd... so, picked up a skein of red and it balanced everything out.

I still haven't decided on the exact squares I'm going to use. I 'swatched' the variegated in the traditional granny square and I'm kinda digging it. There's another square I want to try out where the only open spaces are the corners of each 'round' so you create an X of open spaces rather than a checkery-grid thing. I'd rather have the variegated be the more.. dominant color so I think the more solid X square would work best and then I'd use the traditional granny square for the solids. We'll see. =)

Knit (and crochet) hard!

Pictures for the last post

2008-09-19T15:03:00.000-05:00

I took pictures this morning (at the cost of being quite late for work).
I'm actually still at work so for now I'll just share my sweater.

Mmm, RYC Cashsoft. It was one of the first 'nice' yarns I ever purchased. I loooooved it back then and I still love it today. It's really soft and it has an almost silky feel... plus it's machine washable. Go figure.

I finished the back last night. I had hoped to finish it earlier but I encountered a few setbacks.

1) I got engrossed in Stargate SG-1. I think for each sweater I'll watch a new TV series. I've never seen Stargate so I started from the beginning and I've been using it as a knitting aid.
After shaping the armholes I needed about 9.5 inches of ribbing. After watching a good third of the first season I realized that I had 12 inches of ribbing. Oops. I considered ripping back but instead chose to meticulously tink.

2) During the 9.5 inches of ribbing a ball had run out and so I joined a new one. On my return row I knit one of the tails that crossed my needle and resultingly increased one of the 7 stitch rib columns to 8 stitches. I didn't realize it until I had reached the top and was doing shoulder shaping and couldn't figure out why my 2 shoulders weren't decreasing symmetrically. o_O So, I ended up ripping back about 5 inches.

3) I shaped the first shoulder completely wrong. For some reason I was decreasing at the beginning and end of each row... I was actually only supposed to be decreasing at the neck side. I bound off the shoulder and realized my count was all off so I ripped back and realized where I had gone wrong.

So, that's the back. =) I was going to Cast On for the Right Front last night but decided to knock out early. I will be casting on tonight though. Hopefully all the mistakes I've made in the back have fulfilled the karmic error quota and the rest of my pieces will flow a bit more smoothly.

Update?

2008-09-16T12:25:00.003-05:00

I haven't had a chance to take pictures but I have some new projects and yarns going on. I thought I'd share.

On the needles:
I have this awesome cardigan from Knitting for Him. It's mainly grey with a dull lime-green edge. I ended up using an eggplant-ish color for the edge. Totally digging it. I'm about 3/4 finished with the back.

Did I mention my insane idea to attempt a sweater a month? So far it's looking pretty doable. Actually... I still have 2 fronts and 2 sleeves to go. Hmm... and of course the whole putting together of. Yikes. I think I'll try to finish the back tonight so I can get started on the rest.
The sleeves are done flat and then seamed... but I'm thinking of doing them in the round... 2 at a time. Is that crazy? I'd imagine the pattern wouldn't be too hard to adjust, and I have about 20 rows of 2 round things at one time (on one circ!) under my belt. Hmmm... although... 2 flat pieces at the same time would be super easy... I'd just have to seam later. Well, I'll look into it and let you know what I decide.

I have yarn for...
I bought a bunch of chunky wool for my October sweater... which will be the sweater-a-long I'm doing with Nina, Ivi, and Amy7. The pattern for that is from this little pamphlet I bought from Wool & Co. It has an awesome collar.

Deb @ Fishbed had a big cotton sale... so I bought a ton of Arucania cotton in 2 solids and 1 variegated to crochet an afghan. I'm gonna be doing two or three types of really basic granny squares and putting them together. I still have to work out exactly how this will be assembled (e.g. can I connect a square to another as I'm working on it? ... can you do a square from outside in? etc).

For November, I found a cool Fair Isle sweater in a magazine... I think I might do it... just to be able to conquer Fair Isle and stranding... I have a feeling that it might actually take me more than a month to do a sweater like that though. We'll see.

Last night at knitting Deb got in this knitting magazine from Europe. It had about 8 sweater patterns for men (and 2 scarves!). So, I think one of the cabled sweaters will be for December.

So.. yeah, those are my projects right now. I also need to finish Amy7's grass, my double knit mittens, and an Irish Hiking Scarf. I think my enormous pile of hibernating UFO's will be frogged before the end of the year so I can move on with my life and not feel any project guilt. =) I actually have a Malabrigo sweater in that group that might end up being my January sweater.

Hopefully I'll have pictures for my next update!
Knit hard!

Forever!

2008-08-29T10:18:00.003-05:00

I haven't blogged in FOREVER!
I'm still alive and still knitting. Definitely not to the capacity that I used to. I was cranking out projects like there was no tomorrow... but, now I have a job and not a whole bunch of free time.

So, my project of the summer was the Modern Log Cabin Blanket from Mason Dixon Knitting. It was calling to me and I answered. It seriously took me all summer.

These pictures are before the blanket was completely finished. I was half-way through the red block on the right. I actually ran out of yarn before finishing the red. I think I got 40 ridges instead of 66.
The blanket is gonna be for my bedroom and I actually don't have any red so I wanted to keep red to a minimum and ... running out of yarn ended up being a good thing.

The final block would be at the bottom of the blanket. You'll have to imagine it for now until I get pictures. =)
It's actually a 2 color block so you work a bit of Intarsia. The final block took 5 whole seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer to complete. Granted, I wasn't knitting 100% through each episode... and I'll admit that sometimes I'd knit 1 row and quit... but, I worked through 5 whole seasons of DVDs to knit that last block.
Similar to the red block I ran out of yarn less than halfway through. I needed 99 ridges but ended up with like... 45. o_O The size of the resulting blocks is kinda distracting to me... it doesn't really balance out, but, overall it still looks nice. I can't wait to start using it for my bed.

I'll try to get a picture of the completed blanket ASAP. I even gave it a single crochet border!

In other news, I'm in this baking phase of my life. I'd like to expand this blog beyond knitting and incorporate baking and possibly the social aspects of my life.

Knit hard? =)

Yarny Prizes including Superwash Malabrigo Sock Yarn!

2008-03-26T16:03:00.004-05:00

The prizes for Malabrigo March came in last week. Tobias and I had agreed on 20 skeins of their soon-to-be new Superwash Merino wool and 10 skeins of their fairly new Silky Merino. Aren't they generous? They seemed willing to donate more but 30 skeins is about all I can handle at the moment in terms of organizing and mailing. Plus, many of the Junkies were donating prizes as well. =)

20 skeins of Superwash yarn! Isn't that insane? I've never even knit a complete pair of socks yet... but, having Malabrigo sock yarn is definitely inspiring me to do it. Here are a few closeups as well:

The yarn is so new that the colors aren't even named yet!
Want some Silky Merino action too?

Yum!
The 30 skeins were not all that I found in the bag however...

They included 4 skeins of their limited edition Organic Cotton! I love the natural colors they used for this yarn. I haven't done much cotton knitting, but, of course, since Malabrigo has cotton yarn I might as well start. ^_^

A few days after receiving my package I found another notice on my door left by DHL. The tag said that the package couldn't be delivered w/o my signature... and that it was from Uruguay. I figured they were confused but the notice came again the next day, so, I called and it turned out that there was another box waiting for me. I went to pick it up after work and it definitely was from Uruguay.
I could already sense Malabrigo as I opened the box. It was packed with more skeins of yarn! Another batch of sock yarn, 5 3-skein packs of unnamed worsted yarn (which I later found out was from a new dyeing technique), and 3 full packages of their Merino Worsted in 3 colors... Hongos, Purple-Lime, and one I don't remember.

The first thing I did when I got home was send a message to Tobias to see if it was a mistake... but, it wasn't. He said that Antonio actually 'smuggled' the extra skeins of yarn for me to do what I choose. I decided that I'll be saving these for future Malabrigo celebrations. =)

I'll take pictures of this new batch of yarn soon!
For now, enjoy a bit more yarn pr0n:

Yum. =)

Lightbulb!

2008-03-16T22:27:00.003-05:00

I changed out the light bulbs in my bedroom today.
A few months ago I was listening to this guy talk about going green and one of his ideas that really hit me was switching out the typical incandescent bulbs for florescent. Mainly the idea was that they save energy and many of them are made now to mimic actual daylight. So, the next day I bought bulbs, and, me being me didn't actually change them until months later... two days ago actually. The result is tRiPpY. It's almost a very cold, stark, padded room in a hospital feel.
During the day though, when the sun is at the right point I'll flip on my lights and it'll get brighter but I won't notice any change in color... it's almost like the bulbs add to the sun. But, yeah, at night, which is when I mainly use the lights, it's weiiiiird. I feel good about saving energy though, AND the bulbs are supposedly able to last 5 years. Definitely a good thing.

This is my Koolhaas. I cast on for Malabrigo March in Paris Night. The pattern is easy, and quite easy to memorize, but, I've had to purchase whole new sets of needles. My Clovers were just too blunt to work the tight cable stitches and to constantly knit into the back. Luckily Wool & Co had great 16" Addi Naturas available so I first bought a set of 4's... and then after realizing my Clover 6 wasn't sharp enough bought a set of 6's in Addi. Hopefully my DPNs will cut it once I start decreasing.

Sorry about the blurriness in the picture too. The sun was going down when I took this and I just couldn't get enough light to make my camera focus on the dark color of the yarn. So.. yeah, don't look too closely and don't blow it up. ^_^

Still here!

2008-03-12T16:50:00.002-05:00

I'm still here! I'm back from my very long 'hiatus'. That was almost 3 months of not posting! Working a 40+ hour week is really draining. I'm back though with a goal to post at least once a week. I'm thinking Sundays will become my official posting day.

A lot has been happening in my knitting life. Well, sort of. My main project since the last time I posted was the Uncle Argyle Scarf from Son of a Stitch & Bitch. I love how it turned out but knitting it was a long process. I almost quit until a random comment made towards Ivi resulted in a race between Nina and I to finish our longest projects. My argyle scarf and her yellow sweater. Who knows how far along I'd be if home made ice cream wasn't on the line. =)

Here are 2 pictures. One from the start and one at the end.

Twenty three whole pattern repeats = Fourty six argyle 'diamonds'!

Here are a few more Finished Objects:

My first Shifting Sands in Malabrigo

A buttoned neckwarmer for Idyl in cashmere

A scarf for Jazz in alpaca

A Noro Striped Scarf!

There are others but I think I've posted enough pictures. ^_^ You can find the rest on my Ravelry. I'm "simplethings" by the way.

In related news, in the Malabrigo Junkies group we're having Malabrigo March. Basically, there are loads of KALs and contests going on--the only requirement is that you use Malabrigo yarn. =) Many people were generous enough to provide a few prizes, Tobias (from Malabrigo) came through again and is donating 20+ skeins of their soon to be coming superwash sock yarn. I think I might just have to become a sock knitter and knit myself an actual pair. =)
Feel free to join the celebrations on Ravelry.

I'll have to spend some time now to read through my bloglines and catch up on everyone.

New Year!

2007-12-31T14:43:00.001-06:00

Once again it's been a while since my last update. Working full time really takes up a lot of my hours. I have a few purple-ish things to share:

A few weeks back I shared the story of my sad sock knitting experiences. I made a plea to fellow knitters for a pair of socks in exchange for a scarf. Two awesome bloggers came to the rescue: Eikon and Charles.

Eikon and I exchanged our knitted items the week before Christmas. I knit him a Shifting Sands scarf in Malabrigo (sorry, no picture!) and he knit me a pair of purple socks in Araucania's sock yarn.

They're awesome! ... and, miracle of miracles (to me at least), they're the same size! They also fit me perfectly and are quite warm, so, now I have a great pair of socks to keep my feet comfortable this winter. Having this pair has actually inspired me to attempt socks once again, but, we'll see.

Charles and I will be exchanging knit-goods soon! =)
I had a bit of a purple... problem this Christmas. My cousins and I do a grab bag for Christmas now and since I only have one cousin to purchase/make gifts for I'm more than willing to knit something up.
I originally planned to knit a scarf. Because I think scarves are such a useful and basic accessory. Well, I got my job and my knitting time was severely decreased and as Christmas came closer I realized that I would only have enough time for a hat.

I had been eyeing this cool hat in a men's issue of Knit.1. It had ribs going in different ways and a brim. Tehcnically, for a guy, but, I thought it would be great on a girl too.

I ended up using some of that Vanna White yarn because I wanted something washable, thick, relatively soft, and durable. Knitting it up moved a bit slow, but, I was at a good pace.

So, I finally knit up all the pieces and began the seaming process... I got the edges done and I tried the hat on and it was HUGE. Now, I have a big head... when a hat says "one size fits all" it means it won't fit me. But, this hat... it was large. I thought maybe I could take in the seams a bit more so I pulled in a good half an inch on both sides and it was STILL too big.

It looks cool in this picture, but, in reality it's horrible.
I decided it was time to go to plan B... I actually didn't have a plan B so in a fit of terror I searched the internet for a quick hat and decided I would just do a simple hat in the round. A good 4 inches of ribbing on the bottom and stockinette all the way up through the decreases.
I ended up loosely following Crazy Aunt Purl's Brangelina Hat.

The hat was finished in time, unfortunately I didn't have the opportunity to take a picture before it was gifted. I actually double stranded Vanna's yarn to get a nice, chunky gauge. For added... 'fun' I added other shades of purple into the mix... so, one strand of the original purple and the second strand was a different shade. It turned out pretty cool looking and it ended up fitting her.

I also started on the Half-Pipe hat from Son of a Stitch and Bitch:

I actually finished it, but, I'll provide you with more details on that next time because this is the Purple post... and that lovely grey, camel yarn hat is not purple. ^_^

busy!

2007-12-17T22:53:00.002-06:00

Yikes. I went from posting every single day to posting never. A large portion of this lack of posting is that I finally have a full time job. Since it is winter the days are super short and there isn't enough light for me to snap some pictures, but, things have been moving along.

After the whole month of crazy blogging and casting on new projects I think I had a momentary knitting burn out. But, I'm back on the ball (of yarn). I'll attribute this knitting revival to Knitting Groups and to Ben who encourage me to attend. ... I've become quite the... stitch and bitch man whore.

Friday I drove straight from work to The Gifted Purl. ... well, I stopped at Starbucks along the way. There were A LOT of people. At least 20 and a few in&outs. I started off as the only guy, but was later joined by a new guy who was learning to knit that night. Good crowd, lots of food, and very lively. We sat in a large sort-of circle and there was much knitting going on. I probably arrived there around 6:30 and stayed until almost 11! Needless to say, I got a lot of knitting done. The people there were really supportive so it was cool. Definitely something I'd attend again.

On Sunday I drove over to Wool & Co. I hadn't been there for a while and I needed to grab a few yarny gifts for some people. My other LYS's didn't carry the yarn I was looking for, and, sadly neither did Wool & Co. But, while I was there I ran into Ben who suggested I stay for the knitting group. So, I did.
The Wool & Co. group was significantly smaller. It consisted of me, Ben, another guy at the group for his first time, an older woman, Anna Lisa who was running the store at the time, and her roommate's daughter. I spent a good 2 and a half hours there. It was quieter, but, still a cool experience. Plus, Wool & Co. has a huge yarn selection so there's a good amount of eye candy... I think it keeps us well insulated too. ^_^

Today, I drove straight to the Fishbed Knitting Emporium after work... well, technically I stopped at Barnes & Noble and got Starbucks coffee and a book... Deb was there and I bought some yarn and a magazine subscription and she walked me to the basement and introduced me to the girls. There were 5 there at the time. I was a little afraid at first, but, they turned out to be all really friendly and funny. As the night went on more and more women started piling in... we had a good 12 or more there. We mostly sat around a table so it made the experience more intimate, in a sense, and it was much easier to hear everyone's stories. It was cool. I also ran into DeannaC from Ravelry. I saw her walking down the stairs and I was thinking to myself, "she looks familiar."
Another woman in the group was actually at the Purl's knitting night and was like, "I saw you on Friday!"
So my first idea was that Deanna had been at Friday's group... but she came up to me and was like, "You're simplethings from Ravelry, right?" and then I realized where I had seen her. She also mentioned to me that she was pretty sure she saw my picture on the Panopticon's blog. He was doing the 1000 knitters project and he had been selling a few items... one was a knitting bag with a pictures of about 30 random knitters and I happened to be one of them. So, I got home and of course I ordered one. ^_^

Well... hopefully I'll find time, and daylight, to take a few pictures. I have a ton of Christmas gifts that need to be knitted up. Hopefully I'll set aside more time in these next few days to get more done. For the most part there won't be anymore knitting group meetings until after Christmas... so, I'll have to really focus and knit hard.

ravelry tea swap goodness

2007-12-07T16:49:00.000-06:00

I received my Tea Swap box from my once secret swapper Chelle aka nosheep4chelle on Ravelry.
The box actually came in yesterday but I guess I wasn't home when Sonia, our delivery person, brought it to the house so she left a note that said to pick it up at the post office after 8:30 on the 7th. It was about 4:00pm on the 6th and I rushed over to the post office (because it closed at 4:30) and, while standing in line, realized that today wasn't the 7th... I checked anyway and my other favorite postal worker said that Sonia had not come in yet and I'd have to pick up my package tomorrow.
So, tomorrow is actually today and I woke up all early and picked it up. ^_^

A pretty blue theme straight from Canada.
A few things were wrapped and a few others were not. The unwrapped items include two tins of tea from T in Garden Party and Vanilla Bean. They both smell delicious and come in really awesome cannisters. After this post I'll be putting the kettle on. =)

I also got two boxes of Bacetti. I love these! I love chocolate and I LOVE hazlenuts. This is the best of both worlds. ^_^

On the yarny side of the package I have 2 skeins of SWTC Soysilk. Which, interestingly enough, happened to be the same yarn I sent to my swap partner. =) I was tempted to buy some for myself but decided against it in order to save money... luckily I did because now I have some for my own!

I unwrapped all the other packages and here's what I found:

Some Lush bath bombs! Yay! Chelle had obviously been doing an awesome job of keeping an eye on my blog because I'm totally going through a Lush phase right now.

On the bath theme I also received some almond handmade soap:

And finally the last two things, which are easily the coolest things ever:

This is a bag of flower tea from Steeps Tea. Basically it's a hand tied ball of tea that blossoms when you begin steeping. I've been eyeing these for a while and now I can finally try them! I'll have to get a glass teapot though for the full effect. I saw an awesome set on-line that I might just have to purchase. I'll definitely take pictures once I brew it.

Last, and definitely not least, is a gorgeous skein of Hand Maiden Sea Silk! I have been coveting this yarn for a while now. It was totally out of my budget so I just gazed at it from a far... but, now it's in my hands and I'm blissfully happy. I originally wanted to make that Montego Bay Scarf that had been going around, but, now I'd rather make something for myself. Any ideas? Yum. =)

Big thanks to Chelle who did an awesome job choosing gifts! Now it's time to have a cup.

Almost done with number one!

2007-12-03T07:50:00.001-06:00

I'm almost at the halfway point with my first mitten. It is taking looooooong. No major mistakes though, and my double knitting skills are definitely improving.

Aside from a simple 3x3 check this mitten is my first... foray into the world of color work. As well as my first attempt at designing color work. ... I swear it looked better on my Excel spreadsheet. o_O
Maybe it'll make more sense once I add the thumb and finish the rest of the body.

Yum. Don't the insides look all soft and warm? Mmmmalabrigo. =)
The brown stitch markers are the ones from EarthChick. They look almost like wooden beads. The pearly one on the left I purchased from Zero's etsy shop a while back.
Right now the brown markers are placed where the thumb should be coming out from and the white signifies the start of the main color work pattern. I decided that the back of the hand would have all the design and the palm would be very simple. I hope I calculated the stitches correctly.

I'm estimating another two days of good, hard knitting to finish this first mitten. And maybe the 2nd will go faster. Sort of like when you're driving to a place you've never been to--it seems like it takes forever to get there, but, when you drive back home it seems like the distance was cut in half. =)

On a completely unrelated topic... I've mastered the art of sounding awake when a phone call takes me out of a deep slumber. ^_^ It spares me the shame of people knowing that I actually wake up a 1pm. ... oops. I always thought the only person I wouldn't be able to trick was my mother, but, this morning she gave me a random wake up call and her first words after hello were, "I'm glad to hear you're already awake."
The only things that give me away are my one word answers, my excessive agreeableness, and the fact that I barely remember the call once I fall back asleep and wake up again. Most of the time I'll have to call the person back when I'm actually awake and have a real conversation with them. I've left a notepad by the bed though to jot things down during these dream-like phone calls. This doesn't always help though... I seem to write down really random words that obviously mean a lot while I'm on the phone but mean nothing to me when I wake up. For example, some of the words on my notepad are: period, kitten, olive garden, embarrassed, violin!!, general. Hmmmm.

Knit hard(er). =)

NaBloPoMo Recap

2007-11-30T11:40:00.000-06:00

Today is the last day of NaBloPoMo. I successfully blogged once every day during November. It was a cool experience. I was hoping my writing skills would get better... maybe I'd sound more fluid and more intelligent... but, I don't think that happened. What I did gain from daily blogging was a better sense of time management, planning, and organizing. I had to make sure to set aside time every day to post a few words and I'm glad I managed to do it--even when situations were a bit difficult.

For my final post of November I have a sort of ... rebirth? ^_^
I frogged my Scrunchable Scarf in the Whale's Road color way. For some reason the way it was knitting up just wasn't as pleasant as I had hoped. In the Malabrigo Junkies group on Ravelry I had a random drawing--the way you enter was by answering 3 'questions'. One of them was to talk about a Malabrigo project (not one of your own) that you thought was awesome. Some people mentioned the drop stitch scarf, so, I checked it out and it turned out I had added to my favorites a few weeks back.
I decided Whale's Road would become the drop stitch scarf. Here's how it looks so far:

I don't know if I like this manifestation more than the Scrunchable Scarf or less... I think Whale's Road looks best in hank form. o_O
The pattern gives a really cool effect... but, the single ply-ness of Malabrigo is actually unwinding and 'blossoming' in the dropped sections. It's getting all poofy and separated... I don't know if I like the look of it.

I think I'll knit a few more repeats and see if it starts growing on me.

Congratulations to all the successful NaBloPoMo Bloggers! I plan to NOT blog tomorrow. =)

A tree

2007-11-29T21:34:00.001-06:00

The house is in the slow process of becoming decorated for Christmas. The tree is up and trimmed, for the most part. It's in need of a topper though--probably a star. There's also a thick gold ribbon swirling around the tree candy cane style... I ran out before I got to the bottom so I'll have to find another roll.

My knitting pace has decreased severely... I might just have to purchase gifts this year. o_O Beau, the Olive colored sweater in Malabrigo has been on hiatus for a while now. He was originally supposed to be the sweater I would wear for Thanksgiving, but, when I realized it wasn't going to happen I said he would be the sweater for Christmas... that's looking a bit iffy right now as well. I need to pull him out of his useless hibernation and get those needles clicking.

Speaking of hibernation... my body is in store-the-fat-just-in-case-we-get-snowed-in mode. It's not pretty. I think I'll have to hit that treadmill pretty hard. x_X I am already 4 lbs over my self-imposed weight limit. Right at this moment in time I've weighed the most I've ever weighed in my whole life. ... yikes. I guess a bit of running at the gym will keep me warm. =)

Knit (and run) hard!

Mmmmittens

2007-11-28T16:25:00.000-06:00

I started on my pair of double knitted mittens. It's my own design so I'm assuming there will be much trial and error. I'm only about half way up the cuff and already I think I might have to frog... the cuff seems a bit too wide.

The outside is Cascade 220 Tweed and the inside is Malabrigo worsted in Glazed Carrot. Yum. I tend to knit tighter on DPNs and ... I'm definitely knitting tighter here.. so tight that my fingers are sore. I feel like I've been knitting forever (I knit through The Waitress, an episode of: The Simpsons, Family Guy, and King of the Hill) and I only have these ~2 inches. o_O Double knitting is insane!

I'm planning a bit of colorwork once I get up to the main body of the mitten... I don't really know what I'd do though. My first idea was to have it look like the thrummed mittens... because those were my original inspiration for these mittens... but, I think I'd like something cooler. I plan to keep most of the outside in tweed and have the orange just be a pop of an accent color. I was thinking either diamonds or crosses with the middles left out. I guess I'll decide when I get to that part.

It's almost December... I really need to put more work towards my Christmas Gifts. o_O... yikes.

I see a lot of sleepless nights in the near future if I don't knit hard.

Another 25!

2007-11-27T21:45:00.000-06:00

I really have nothing to blog about today. I'm so glad the month is almost over.. and thank goodness for memes. ^_^

Presenting: 26-50.

26. I can only read music. I don't have any talent in the direction of playing by ear or composing.

27. My favorite author is Oscar Wilde.

28. My favorite 'word' is iambic pentameter.

29. I used to be bone thin... and then college came along...

30. I like my bed made in a certain way and I like to be surrounded by pillows.

31. At most, it'll take me 10 minutes to fall asleep once I get in bed. This 'skill' developed right before I got into college.

32. Sometimes I'm not sure if I'm a night person or a morning person. I definitely like to stay up late and sleep in... but at the same time I love the newness of morning. I think I'd prefer to stay awake all night and leave my house once the sun comes up.

33. I'm a Virgo. I generally don't believe in Horoscopes but I've run into a few birth charts that have been spot on.

34. Most people who know me think I'm extremely creative and very artsy-craftsy... I am.. but only to a certain extent... a fairly low certain extent.

35. I moisturize my hands and arms daily.

36. I wear my contacts for extended periods of time.... unhealthily long periods of time.

37. I never wanted a tattoo until I became a knitter. I would always say, "I could never decide on something to have on my body for the rest of my life." But now I can.

38. On average I type about 90 wpm.

39. I love singing, I can sing in tune, and I can even follow a harmony but, I do not have a singing voice what so ever.

40. I consider myself a Gamer. I love RPGs.

41. My preferred genre of movie is action. Especially when the main character is a woman who kicks ass.

42. I think that's why one of my all-time favorite TV series is Buffy.

43. I love the flavor onions bring to a dish... but I cannot stand to eat them.

44. It's the same with tomatoes. I enjoy pasta sauces, pizza, and ketchup... but if it's chunky pasta sauce or pizza with actual tomatoes on it... it's over.

45. I eat salsa weird. It brings together my two love/hate foods... so, I generally just dip my chip and pick up the 'juices' rather than scoop.

46. Me and cilantro are not friends. His flavor is just too explosive, distinct, and overpowering.

47. I prefer knitting with animal fibers... soft animal fibers.

48. I prefer knitting with straight needles.

49. I prefer knitting with wooden needles. A nice merino wool knit with wooden straights = bliss.

50. I'm obviously a process knitter.

Ta-da! Maybe something better tomorrow. =)

Some stuff...

2007-11-26T21:34:00.000-06:00

For some reason I really don't want to blog today... but I must.
Let's see... I'm finally packing up my swap partner's package today. I'll be sending it out tomorrow morning. Hopefully it gets there in good time.
I also bought a stack of padded envelopes in order to mail out all the Silky Merino awards from Malabrigo Cast On Week. I didn't realize that sending out this yarn would be costing me quite a large sum of money... oops. One of the international winners offered to pay for her shipping. Isn't that a nice gesture? =)

I didn't mention this in my last blog but that's my current notebook. I like to write things down... not necessarily useful things... but, I just like the actual process of writing. A lot of pages consist of me just writing out a page in a magazine or the ingredients in a bar of chocolate... or making random lists. I just like to write non-creatively. Having a cool ass notebook around (as well as awesome pens) makes this easier. I do have some useful information in there. Like when I was doing the Knitter's Tea Swap 4 I had a list of things that I had purchased and was considering purchasing for Suzie's package. I make a lot of knitting notes in there as well. And then when I'm hanging out with friends I have them write mini journal entries. =) It's a nice all-around stack of paper.

In the picture the notebook is open to my Christmas list. You can sort of make out a "7, 8, 9, 11"... those are the needle sizes of Lantern Moons I want. ^_^

I've been tagged for the 8 things again... except when I did it I listed 7. I've been wanting to do the 100 things meme so, I think I'll start that off today... in installments of 25. ^_^ I guess they'll make good fodder for the rest of NaBloPoMo.

1. I'm left handed with some things and right handed with others. For the most part my left hand writes, eats, and talks on the phone. I think my right hand does pretty much everything else.

2. I think I adapt easily. I'd actually attribute a portion of this adaptability to being left handed in a right handed dominant world. A south paw really needs to go against his initial desires to make things work properly.

3. I'm afraid of heights. x_X I push myself once in a while in hopes of conquering the fear... like looking over ledges or standing near windows in high rise buildings... it doesn't work.

4. I LOVE espresso drinks. Originally because of the ambiance of coffee places. Now they're a comfort drink and somewhat inspire me to be creative.

5. Despite my love for espresso I actually don't like coffee flavored anything. Candy, cookies, ice cream, etc.

6. I also love tea. This has also grown from a sense of ambiance and serenity.

7. In highschool I was a swimmer. I always swam backstroke and in freestyle relays I always swam anchor. I used to get offended that the coach always made me swim last. It wasn't until later that I found out I was put last because I was a strong swimmer.

8. I quit swimming after my 2nd year because I thought it was "too hard".

9. I'm a knitter. ^_^

10. In highschool I was the editor for the school's Literary Magazine. I loved writing and reading... that has since changed.

11. I don't keep in contact with any of the friends I had before college.

12. I'm an introvert. High energy crowds drain me--I need my alone time to recharge.

13. I don't mind doing things alone. You can always find me eating at restaurants, visiting museums, shopping, etc. all by myself.

14. While I don't mind being alone, I do love doing things with people I care for.

15. I'm very generous. This doesn't go along with my current income however. o_O

16. I have a tendency to block out negative feelings, sad things, and memories that make me uncomfortable... As a result I believe that I'm satisfied with my life and that I'm quite happy. Once in a while I'll read an older entry in a journal and realize that sometimes I'm far from content.

17. I'm really intelligent (I consistently score fairly high on IQ tests) but I don't make good use of this gift.

18. One of the main reasons is because I'm a HUGE procrastinator.

19. I love Coke.

20. I prefer Coke from fountains first, then cans, followed by 2 liters, and last the small plastic bottles. Sometimes fountain Coke sucks, but, when I have a good one it's REAL good. The smaller plastic bottles are the worst. I'm not sure where glass fits in because I haven't had many Cokes from glass bottles... but, I'm pretty sure they would rank higher than the small plastic bottles.

21. I love photography. I didn't always though. I had taken a class in highschool and thought it was alright. It wasn't until college that I realized not everyone can take decent photographs. So, I began to treasure this skill.

22. My phone is the Sidekick ii and it is easily one of the best phones I've owned. Its life is coming to an end soon and I'm not sure what phone I should get to replace it.

23. I can play the guitar. My parents taught me the basics and from then on I was self-taught.

24. I can play the piano... thanks to 4 years of lessons.

25. I can play the violin... I took a whopping 9 years of lessons and out of these 3 instruments, I suck most at violin.

I've written up to 72... and I think that's as far as I can go. o_O Hopefully I'll come up with more random tidbits to reach 100.

In other news, why can't I find the NutRageous candy bar in stores anymore? It was my favorite!

To the NaBloPoMo participants: blog hard the rest of the week!
And, as usual, to the knitters: knit hard!

does crochet thread count as yarn?

2007-11-25T14:20:00.000-06:00

Here are my fiber-related purchases from Black Friday:

This is a ball of Royale Classic Crochet Thread. It's a cool variegated color. And, as you can see it's already being used for a bookmark. I think the hook I'm using is a little on the big side though, so, I'll have to go smaller.

Another ball of the crochet thread, but this one is in burgundy. And it too is being used for a bookmark. That bookmark pattern is the only thing I like to crochet. =) This is a 1.25mm hook.. and I think it works the best for this project.

This is a smaller ball. I think it's un-dyed. This too will be turned into a bookmark. (Can you guess what the majority of my Christmas presents will consist of?) ^_^
I could be all luxurious and crochet them all out of Malabrigo lace... but, my previous Malabrigo bookmarks turned out too flimsy. I demand stiffness in my bookmarks. Any attempts to spray starch the Malabrigo lace left me with a fuzzy, sticky, mess. ... I think this cotton thread will work much better.

I grabbed these 2 skeins of Patons SWS. Haven't tried soy yet and this seemed like the best entrance into the world of alternate fibers. =) I have no idea what I'll make with these though... and ideas? It doesn't seem like I get much yardage, so, at the moment it looks like a scarf is out of the question... plus I have like 7 scarves OTN right now and adding another one would make me VERY unhappy. ^_^ Maybe a pair of wrist warmers? We shall see.

This wasn't from Black Friday but I figured I should take a picture of it anyway. This was a birthday present from my friend Idyl (pronounced 'ideal'). I had been eyeing this calendar a few weeks back--good thing I didn't buy it. =)

Finally, another picture of Shifting Sands. The excessive white sections of the 2nd skein of yarn are starting to show. The yellow/gold hues are the same but now there are many lines of white... it's kind of an obvious change. o_O I'll keep going though. I have a bit of the 1st skein left over so maybe I'll add it in every so often to decrease the speckled look.

Hope you enjoyed this dose of yarny goodness.
I think now is time for a power nap. =)

Knit hard!

Pieces of me?

2007-11-24T19:06:00.000-06:00

I don't really post many pictures of myself so I thought I'd share a few. Also, I needed to blog for NaBloPoMo and I'm out of material. Now you can say hi if you see me at a yarn store. =)

^{Me, Anne, and Kevin. For a few semesters we started a 'band' of sorts. We called ourselves "Acholyte Trio". ... don't ask.}

^{Kevin, Lora, Carlo, and Me. This was during a photoshoot of Carlo. We got majorly rained on. Fun times.}

^{Pillow fight! This was us dressed up for an Alumni Banquet we were going to.}

^{Me, Lora (fave!), and the other Kevin. This is at Millenium Park in Chicago. We had just left the Art Institute and were sitting at this little "watering hole" to cool off.}

^{Joe, Anne, Lora, and Me. This is @ Oakbrook Mall. Anne, Lora, and I had an outing and Joe just happened to be there.}

So, that's me and a bit of insight into my odd life. Now you can recognize me if you're ever in the Chicago area or in a yarn store or a some yarny conference. =)
I'll try to get some knitting pictures together for tomorrow's post. Only 6 more days of November left and I'll be free from the everyday blog obligation. ^_^

Knit hard!

Black Friday

2007-11-23T16:46:00.000-06:00

This year was a crazy one. I decided I wouldn't sleep last night after Thanksgiving dinner. The stores were opening early and I needed to bust some doors.
At 12:30am I was in line at the mall near my house. It was opening at 1. Last year I missed out on all the opening festivities so I swore that I would get my VIP pass and coupon book this time around. I reached my goal but it was pretty useless. There was free samples of Pepsi and the coupon book was actually just a listing of all the sales that were going on pre-11am. I browsed a but and fought through crowds and entered a few raffles, but, all I ended up purchasing was a gift for one of my cousins.
At 2:10am I left the mall and went across the street to wait in line at Best Buy. According to the weather application on my phone it was a cold 24 degrees. For those of you who haven't done Black Friday at stores like Best Buy it's not just a rush-in-free-for-all... it's actually quite organized. You wait in line and at 3:00am they start handing out tickets for their limited supply door busters. They walk down the line and ask if people need a ticket. People had been camping out since midnight... and I mean camping out... so I was pretty far back in the line. The employees will hand out the tickets starting at the front of the line and they stop when they run out of tickets. I was hoping I'd be able to get what I came there for... which was a 42" plasma TV, a TomTom GPS system, a Sony laptop, and an e-Machine. Finally at 4:00am I had a ticket for the plasma and the GPS. The laptop tickets didn't make it to my section of the line and I hadn't heard about the e-Machine... so, I left. I drove home and dropped off the tickets for my parents. With the ticket you're guaranteed the item as long as you pick it up before 9:00am. Best Buy still technically wouldn't open their doors until 5:00am and I wasn't about to wait another hour.
So, dropped them off, and drove out to the outlet mall about 15 minutes from my home. My cousin had been working since 12:00am--the time the outlet mall opened. I stopped in to visit her at Banana Republic which was having a 40% off sale. I picked out about $250 worth of clothes and she offered to buy them for me with her employee discount which would be an extra 30% off. I ended up only paying $110. Good deal. =)
Left the outlet mall and headed off to Michael's to use a 25% off coupon. I had been hoping to get my hands on some Lion Brand Cashmere Blend... but, they didn't carry any. So, I ended up getting some crochet thread (I'm gonna be churning out those bookmarks this Christmas) and I decided to try some Paton's SWS. I had been seeing and hearing a lot about it so I allowed it to jump into my basket. ^_^
It was now about 6:30am so I went home, dropped all my purchases on the floor and crashed into bed.

That was Black Friday 2007. =)

Knit hard!

A Thanksgiving story

2007-11-22T12:11:00.000-06:00

I love all the cold weather holidays. For me they're always very family-oriented. Both of my parents came from very large families, my mother has 8 siblings and my father has 6. This meant celebrations like Thanksgiving were always big events. Every year my family would actually attend 3 separate parties, one for my mom's family, one for my dad's family, and one with friends.
One of the things I looked forward to every year was going to the party on my dad's side of the family. My grandmother made the best stuffing and she would only make it on Thanksgiving. It went perfect with the turkey and the mashed potatoes and gravy. It was bread-y and herb-y and just delicious and her own secret recipe.

One year, my dad's family decided to do a non-traditional Thanksgiving and ditched the turkey and cranberry sauce and all the fixings... including my beloved stuffing. My grandmother knew how much I loved it so the next week she invited me over and made it for me.
I never asked her for the stuffing recipe nor did I ever ask her to teach me how to make it because like many great cooks (and she definitely was a great cook) it was all up in her head without exact measurements... she just knows how much of each ingredient goes into each dish.
It was common knowledge in our family to never give our grandmother a cookbook and never ask her for a recipe. Giving her a cookbook was the ultimate offense--basically, to her, it meant that we thought she wasn't a good enough cook and needed guidance. The recipes, on the other hand, without knowing the exact measurements came out like: "Mix some water with a lot of flour and a little salt and herbs and bake until done."

Fast forward to maybe my Junior year of College. It was November and Kevin and I were either attending a Thanksgiving party on campus or throwing one of our own... but, we both were cooking some food. He decided on stuffing and I told him about my grandmother's delicious version and how I needed to have it every year. He told me he was going to make it from a box and that he thought I would enjoy the boxed brand as well. I doubted it.
So, we make our food and have our party and I take a scoop of stuffing onto my plate. It had a similar look and consistency to my grandmother's with all the crumbly bread bits and herbs. I took a bite and pleased said, "This tastes like my grandmother's stuffing!" Kevin laughed and I continued eating.
A few days later, I was at my dad's party and there on the table was my beloved food. I looked at it closely and it actually looked exactly like the version Kevin made. "Weird" I thought to myself.
I tasted it... and it tasted like it always did and it also tasted like Kevin's. Flustered, I made my way into the kitchen, marched over to my grandmother and confronted her, "How do you make your stuffing?"
She looked at me and said, "I thought you knew... I always made it from the box." And she pointed to the stove and sitting there was the same box of stuffing Kevin had introduced me to.
She shrugged and added, "All I have to do is add water."

Happy Thanksgiving! =)

Still dark and cloudy

2007-11-21T16:23:00.000-06:00

I forced my camera to take pictures today. He wasn't happy about it. The sky is still dark and completely overcast. We were supposed to get snow today but no sign of it yet. Definitely a lot of rain though.
I tried to get a few self-portraits of myself in my new Ravelry beta t-shirt but those turned out the worst. I'll try again when we get some sun.
I DID manage to get a few shots of the WIPs that I'm actually... wip-ing. ^_^ And also the yarn I bought the other day.

Let's start off with my current favorite: Shifting Sands.

Can you sense the darkness? hehehe. I had to push my table right up next to the biggest window in the room and pump up my ISO. Then I made sure to take at least 5 shots from each angle and hope that at least one of them turned out in focus. I ended up with about 3 out of 40 that turned out okay. Ahh, darkness... the enemy of the photographer.
I started my 2nd ball of Malabrigo--you probably noticed the lack of the cake's gaping void. Some yards before the 1st ball ended I started alternating skeins every 2 rows to add a transition just in case the two skeins were different colors. Luckily they're quite similar. The biggest difference seems to be that the white sections are slightly longer on this 2nd ball (about 5 stitches worth whereas ball #1 had 2-3). No big worry though.
You may have also noticed that the yarn is chilling on my Hemlock Ring. It makes a cool background. For some reason I'm unable to successfully use a round blanket. I think I need to find myself a similarly-awesome square/rectangle shape.

This is the diagonal knot stitch scarf. It's coming along slowly. I still can't get the purl side to work smoothly. It reminds me of my struggles with the purl side of My So Called Scarf. I managed to work through that and actually find a good rhythm so hopefully I'll be able to find a similar rhythm with this. On a positive note, I now memorize the pattern... not that it's much to memorize, but, every little bit helps. =)

I don't know how my camera does it but these colors are really close to the true colors of the actual yarn despite the overwhelming darkness. I had to ditch the Hemlock Ring for these pictures because the overall hues of the yarn were so dark the camera wouldn't even focus. So, I needed a brighter background to ... help it along. These are 2 skeins of Noviembre, a very fitting autumn color way. One skein will be a prize for the Malabrigo Cast On Week and the other will be going to a secret swap partner. ;)

These two yarns will soon become a pair of double knit mittens. I tried to develop a technique to get ribbing double-knit style.. but, it didn't work. I'll have to figure something out. I'm also unsure about how decreases/increases will work... but, I'll tackle that challenge when it comes time.

The orange skein is Malabrigo: Glazed Carrot. Delicious. =) My favorite color is orange... but, for some reason orange yarns never call out to me. The other day Mr. Glazed Carrot screamed "mittens" so I bought him.
The 2nd skein is Cascade 220 Tweed. He looks nice. Hopefully they become friends and work together in my mittens.

That's all for today. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving! Hopefully I'll have time to post. Oh! I recently received a HUGE influx of visitors to my blog... I'm curious about where they all came from... but, more on that next time.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Regular.

2007-11-20T19:28:00.001-06:00

I love having "regular" status at shops I visit.
At Starbucks or Caribou, for example, the moment the barista sees me walk into the door they'll start making my drink. It's helpful when I'm in a hurry. ^_^ In the Starbucks I frequent I've received many free drinks as well. If you were to go in and order a vanilla latte and they were like, "Oh, we're out of vanilla." Then you would switch your drink around. If you ordered your vanilla latte and paid, and then they realized they didn't have anymore vanilla as they were making it then they might refund you and give you a substitute drink for free or give you a voucher for a free drink in the future.
Since they know that I ALWAYS get the same thing if ever they run out of one of the ingredients they always give me the substitute drink for free. I think that's some dedication and great customer service. ^_^

Another place I'm usually recognized is LYS's. I think I have a tendency to stand out among the regular knitting population so, regular status @ LYSs is often achieved.

The most recent place I've become a regular is at this Chinese restaurant about 20 minutes away from my house. Next door is a 24 hour Starbucks that I religiously visit and that's how I discovered this place.
The first few times I went there I wasn't too impressed with what I ordered. One day I decided to try their crab rangoons and they were delicious. So, I'd go there often and get a dish with a crab rangoon appetizer and a can of coke.
Now, after I order my food the manager always adds a can of coke and asks if I want crab rangoon. I thought this was the epitome of being known at a restaurant, but, now when I sit down she'll only give me my coke without a cup of ice because she noticed that I drink out of the can. And then I don't eat my crab rangoon with sweet and sour sauce so she stopped bringing that out as well.
During my most recent visit I ordered a beef with vegetables dish. I'm not a big fan of most vegetables so I tend to mainly eat the meat. When my plate came out the huge mass of vegetables were replaced with only a few greens and carrots and the meat was doubled. I love great service and being a regular. ^_^

On a related topic... sort of... , my "imaginary friend" Danielle and I were talking about high school physical education. We mentioned the swimming unit and I asked her if the girls are forced to swim when umm... Aunt Flo was visiting.
She said no.. and the way they communicated this to their male gym teacher was by going up to him and saying, "Regular." And then they would be excused from swimming. I thought that was cute and funny. Needless to say, Kevin and I had a field day with the term. Unfortunately, the jokes ended up being quite inappropriate so I won't be sharing them today.

Today ended up really dark, foggy, and stormy so no pictures. Hopefully tomorrow will be better and I can share my new yarn, progress pictures of my current WIPs and maybe my Ravelry beta t-shirt. =)

Knit hard! Only 10 days of straight blogging left!

Oops, I did it again.

2007-11-19T19:50:00.001-06:00

I bought more yarn today. I know I shouldn't have... but... I had a purpose! I was buying yarn for my swap partner. I don't think she reads my blog... and if she does she won't technically know that I'm her partner... so I can tell you that I got some luscious Malabrigo and some bamboo yarn. =) Pictures will be coming soon.

In other news, my pretty babies will be all gone soon:

They're waiting, all lined up, for their owners to choose them. I can't believe how successful Malabrigo Cast On Week was... and, I think I'll be living off this high for a while. I actually bought some Malaboo-boo (as Danielle refers to it) for myself today for a pair of mittens I have plans for. It'll be my 2nd attempt at designing a pattern.

I officially have way too many projects on the needles. According to my Ravelry notebook I have 10 WIPs. That's definitely too many. And I REALLY want to get to work on these mittens... I should really finish up a project. I forgot how much time goes into making a scarf. It's simple, but, it's long and time consuming and VERY repetitive. Possibly more time than a pair of socks?

=)

Speaking of socks... I'd like to make a trade with someone... a sock knitter, to be exact. I was walking around the house a few days ago and my feet were cold. Of course the first thing that came to my mind were wool socks, but alas, I do not own any. All my previous attempts have provided dysfunctional pairs so I'd like to trade someone a scarf for a pair of socks. Anyone willing to take me up on this offer? The scarf will be out of Malabrigo (unless you'd like something else), 2 skeins even! You can choose the pattern and color if you desire, or, I could surprise you with something. I'm excellent and knitting flat things!
I'm also a men's US size 9-9.5. ^_^
I'd love to trade soon, before Christmas even. I guess this is not really the time to be asking since knitters' needles are generally booked until after Christmas... but, I want some socks! I might just cave in and make another sad, sad attempt. Or, God forbid, I'll buy a pair from Walmart. o_O ... you don't want me to buy socks from Walmart, right?
I could try to knit 2 at the same time.. and that would ensure that 1) I don't suffer from SSS and 2) They end up the same size... but, me and magic loop have not yet been acquainted. And wouldn't a little gift exchange be fun?

If anyone would like to take me up on my offer let me know. =)

For now, knit hard!

Cabled DS Lite Case

2007-11-18T18:13:00.000-06:00

People have been asking me for the pattern I used for my DS cases. It was my own pattern and I never really got around to writing it out until maybe a month ago. As I was figuring out what I did I decided I'd like to add a flap to the top as a closure to make sure the DS stayed in its lovely case. Sadly, I couldn't come up with one I loved so I'll just have to share the basic sock pattern for now. I don't think I'll have time to really develop a decent flap until after the holidays. Enjoy!

Cabled DS Lite Case

Yarn: Malabrigo worsted
Needles: 4 DPNs in US 8
Gauge: ... umm.... ^_^

Key:
CF3: Slip next 3 sts onto cable needle purl wise and hold cable needle in front of work, K3, P1, K3 off the cable needle

Pattern Round
Needle 1: K2, P1, K3, P1, K3, P1
Needle 2: K2, P1, K3, P1, K3, P1, K2, P1
Needle 3: K3, P1, K3, P1, K2, P1, K3, P1, K3, P1
The condensed version: [K2, P1, (K3, P1)x2]x4

Cable Round
Needle 1: K2, P1, CF3, P1
Needle 2: K2, P1, CF3, P1, K2, P1
Needle 3: CF3, P1, K2, P1, CF3, P1
The condensed version: [K2, P1, (CF3, P1)x2]x4

The Pattern:
CO 44 stitches divide on to 3 DPNs
1st needle: 11 sts
2nd needle: 14 sts
3rd needle: 19 sts
The stitches are divided this way to allow for easier cabling. Feel free to divide the needles as you see appropriate.

Join into a circle and begin pattern:
Rounds 1 & 2: Pattern Round

Main cable pattern:
Rounds 3 - 8: Pattern Round
Round 9: Cable Round
Repeat rounds 3-9 four more times.

Round 38-43: Pattern Round
Round 44: Knit

Divide stitches evenly onto two needles and graft shut.
Weave in ends.

I find that if you turn your DS case completely inside out and pull out the grafted corners as far as they can go and then flip it right side out it'll leave you with nicely shaped corners.

A flap can be added by picking up stitches along the CO edge.

The original green DS case I made actually had an even 3x1 ribbing. I found that it was too loose so I tightened up some areas and that's how I came up with the crazy 2x1, (3x1)² ribbing.

Progress Report

2007-11-17T18:43:00.000-06:00

Just a few pictures to share!
The other night I cast on for an Irish Hiking Scarf in the pretty Indigo that I received from EarthChick. In true Malabrigo form, the skeins had significant color differences. My friend Kevin, who is not a knitter, but, hangs out with me a lot looked at the skeins and said, "They're different colors." And then he looked at the tag and added, "But they're from the same dye lot."
Funny how friends and family pick up on the lingo even when they have absolutely no desire to knit (I've tried to teach him twice!).
I'm working from both skeins at one time, alternating every two rows. It's creating subtle striping, but, I think overall it looks pretty cool.

I also decided that I would knit this whole scarf Continental. I'm mainly an English knitter and started to develop my Continental style while knitting the Exchequered scarf, but, I figured I could fine tune it.
It's sort of frustrating. I really have to focus and force myself to not switch to English, but, I'm doing it. =)

Shifting Sands has been moving along quite nicely as well.

It's strange but the scarf/pattern looks 100% better in photos. I'm almost finished with my first skein... It doesn't feel like it's a good length for half a scarf. o_O I'm hoping that I had used a bit of this first skein for something else and that my 2nd skein will have more yarn. I can't really think of what else I would have used it for... but... umm, let's hope for the best. ^_^

You can see the gaping hole that used to hold the yarn. It's magic! The yarn just turns into this really weird scarf. =)
There's also a jar of honey in the background from my Knitter's Tea Swap partner Suzie. It's delicious and wanted to be in the photoshoot 'cause he matched the colors of the scarf.

I've extended the Malabrigo Cast On Week cut off for Sunday afternoon/evening. So, hopefully people upload a few more projects. I actually have one more project I want to add, but, we'll see if I get around to it.
Now that I have like... 10 WIPs it's time to go into knitting hibernation and try to finish at least one.

Knit hard!

ETA: I totally just tripped myself out. hahahaha. For a fun time look at the middle picture and scroll up and down and up and down. It looks like it's moving or zooming in and out. TRIPPY! o_O

Success!

2007-11-16T16:16:00.001-06:00

Malabrigo Cast On Week was a success! ... for now. =)
When I originally started the event we needed over 200 projects to beat out Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock Multi. We had a good 350 members so I figured if each one did one project then we'd get it for sure.
After my original posting I only had about 40 people replying with interest... but, I decided to go for it anyway.
So, the gap has been closed and it was easily over 200 projects added. While I'd like to completely contribute the success of Cast On Week to the Malabrigo Junkies I actually think the constant influx of new members adding their projects to Ravelry helped give us the boost that we needed.
I should've taken note of the original numbers. But, Lorna's Laces was growing as well, so, not only did we have to deal with the original 200 projects but also the regular additions of projects to competitor's yarn totals. We did good. =)
Now the goal for the remaining day and a half is to give Malabrigo worsted a sizable lead over Lorna's Laces so that there is no chance of them passing us up.
I'm somewhat afraid that after the end of the week there will be a decline in the usage of Malabrigo... because people really CO everything they could handle and afford... but, we'll see. I still have 3 more projects to add!

... I just read through those few paragraphs and it comes out really... fragmented. hahaha. Today is not a great day for blogging. I think I need a nap! =)

Knit & Blog hard (after a good powernap)!

Meme?

2007-11-15T18:40:00.000-06:00

Here's the 3 things meme. I 'borrowed' it from SavingNine. =)

Three Things
Three things that scare me:
Heights!
Tiny things that jump or move quickly
The idea of moths invading my stash

Three people who make me laugh:
Kevin
Danielle
Myself

Three Things I love:
Induldging
Quality
Alone time

Three Things I hate:
Crappy drivers (gonna agree with SavingNine on this one)
Psychologically scary things
Closed minds

Three things I don't understand:
Everything beyond a basic-intermediate level
Fire-what is it?!
Water-these things seem so... arbitrary but when I think about them they don't make sense

Three things on my desk:
Yarn. Malabrigo and some alpaca to be exact.
Coffee. Grande soy with whip cinnamon dolce latte
A thermos half filled with tea from this morning

Three things I'm doing right now:
... this
Drinking coffee?
I agree with SavingNine--this is a dumb question

Three things I want to do before I die:
Own a condo
Get into the best shape of my life
Become semi-famous

Three things I can do:
Knit!
Listen
Type relatively fast

Three ways to describe my personality:
Introverted
Naughty
Sense-of-humor-ed. o_O

Three things I can't do:
Talk to strangers with any sort of charm or finesse
Gymnastics
Dance and look good doing it

That was surprisingly difficult.
So, me knitting the Shifting Sands scarf is REALLY weird. My hands memorize the pattern more than my brain does. I actually couldn't write out the pattern for you if you asked but for some reason my hands know what to do. Knitting it actually makes my brain tired because I'm constantly trying to figure out if what my hands are doing is correct... but I really can't wrap my brain around it. It's weird and exhausting. Almost makes me not want to knit the scarf even though I can... and easily.

I took a bath yesterday and it was goooooooood. I broke out the trusty space heater to warm things up (because nobody likes to get out of the bath/shower into cold air) and... it was good. I didn't even do my usual prep. It was just the tub, a Lush bath bomb, and two episodes of How I Met Your Mother.
I just wish I had a bigger bath tub... At certain times during the bath I like to be completely covered by water, as a result there are all sorts of contorting going on. You should see me. ... actually... maybe you shouldn't. ^_^

Malabrigo is only about 26 projects away from passing up Lorna's Laces. Hopefully we have at least that many more people cast on. =)

Malabrigo Cast On Week

2007-11-14T16:48:00.000-06:00

I have a few projects to share with you. They are all Malabrigo Worsted and they all were Cast On this week for Malabrigo Cast On Week. =) I plan to start maybe 2 or 3 more projects. x_X

The first is a 2nd Scrunchable Scarf in Whale's Road:

I started this on Sunday evening. I know for sure that the Scrunchable Scarf is a great pattern because I've knitted it before... but, I dunno about how well it's working with this yarn. I loved the color in hank form, and it was equally stunning wound up in a cake... but... now I don't know... I think I'll keep working it to see how it turns out.

I think the first image shows truer colors.
I slipped on the stitch markers I received from EarthChick for picture purposes. This scarf really doesn't need any stitch markers and requires very little memorization.

My next project I started last night. It's Shifting Sands in Amber Gold.

I'm currently loving it. Ever since I saw brooklyntweed's version I've been considering knitting it up. The amount of cables were always daunting though... and I had previously tried the cables-without-a-cable-needle technique but it would not work out for me.
The Amber Gold had been ... reincarnating itself every so often because I love the color... sadly, nothing ever really fit the bill... I figured the color was similar to sand (and similar to brooklyntweed's) so I should go for it during this Malabrigo Cast On Week.

This time I was able to learn with assistance from Grumperina's instructions as well as the videos at knittinghelp.com. It made all the difference and now this scarf is a breeze. I've already memorized the pattern and I'm really enjoying knitting it.
It looks like it would make an awesome place mat.

I messed up on the first two repeats. The 2nd row of cables I was actually knitting two in front when I should only have been knitting one. It's okay though... it's a design feature. ^_^

My third project I started just about an hour ago. It's the Diagonal Knot Stitch Scarf from SavingNine in Azul Bolita.

This blue is SO radioactive. It like... glows. The scarf is a bit thin for my tastes so I think this will end up as a gift. I actually already have the perfect recipient in mind. ^_^
The pattern is pretty simple, although the purl three is quite difficult for me. It might be because I'm using super blunt wood needles. I think I'll have to switch to sharper aluminum because it's quite the struggle. Overall, though, I'm pretty happy with how it's turning out.

Those are my projects so far. I feel an Irish Hiking Scarf in the works as well as a pair of mittens... I NEED Malabrigo Cast On Week to be a success. We're only ~40 projects away from being the 8th most popular yarn on Ravelry!

Knit hard!

A bit of Yarn P0rn to help you get through your day

2007-11-13T19:27:00.000-06:00

The oh-so-irresistible Silky Merino came in on Monday. I have a habit of not showing extreme emotions like rage and excitement... I'm usually really good at keeping them in check. The excitement almost consumed me but I managed to hold it in and in doing so almost passed out from giddiness. I should let it out one of these days. ^_^

Immediately after opening the bag I dumped it out on my bed to feel it. I then proceeded to look at each hank and note the color names. And then I piled it back together and had the strongest desire to jump into it. I, as usual, held back and decided it was time for a photoshoot.

Come over and jump in, the water is silky smooth!

Oh how I wish I could keep it all... just to look at and touch and admire. I really have no idea what I would make with any of it... probably a nice sized swatch to keep in my pocket to fondle and appreciate. Sadly, ... and happily, it'll be going to winners of various contests and things during Malabrigo Cast On Week. It's not too late to join! So, if you want your chance at some of this delicious Silky Merino then Cast On a few projects in Malabrigo worsted and post in the Malabrigo Junkies group.

My mercurial desire to organize, order and inventory lead to this:

Oh yarn... I seriously think yarn is my favorite part of knitting... hmmm.
Well, I need to Cast On a few more Malabrigo projects this week so I'll leave you with a few more pictures.
Haven't hard coded a table in a while. Enjoy this one:

Row 1: Burgundy, Raspberry, Camote
Row 2: Sand, Spring Warter, Sunny Lime
Row 3: Ankara Green, Celeste, Turquoise
Row 4: Green Gray, Azul Azul, Light Hiacynt
Row 5: Bahia

Delicious, no?

A fun start to Malabrigo Cast On Week

2007-11-12T13:16:00.000-06:00

I received a package from EarthChick on Saturday. She had a contest on her blog a little while ago and I had won. ^_^
Here's what I got:

Two skeins of Malabrigo in Indigo. Mmmmmm. It came just in time for Malabrigo Cast On Week. ^_^ I think it will soon turn into an Irish Hiking Scarf.

I also received these hand made beauties:

Stitch Markers! =) They're so beautiful. I actually used them right when I opened the box. The mittens I was working on required 2 stitch markers and I figured that I might as well break them in. Sadly, I wasn't able to take any pictures of them in use... so, instead, I CO for a new Scrunchable Scarf in Malabrigo for Malabrigo Cast On Week and I slipped the markers into my work, just so I could get a picture of them "in use."

They actually came with a tiny jewelery bag as well:

I was on a picture taking binge this morning. ^_^ I'll give more on my Malabrigo projects throughout the week. I also found out on Sunday that I received my Ravelry beta T-shirt as well, so, pics of that soon to come.

Blog hard!

Warm Woolly Mittens

2007-11-11T20:33:00.000-06:00

Miraculously, I managed to finish the pair of mittens in time.
The first, original mitten was knit over 3 days. Before I actually finished it Danielle had tried it on and found it was too big for her. So, frogged, and started a new one yesterday as Danielle started on her scarf. It took me about 3 and a half hours to knit the real first mitten. Not too bad, I guess. The second one took me a lot longer. o_O It was fairly late in the evening when I started the next mitten and feelings of exhaustion had set in. We had just eaten a huge meal at Chili's and not only did it give us food coma, but we were also uncomfortably full. To make matters worse I was having this really in-depth conversation with Danielle about certain... promiscuous phases I went through during college. The intensity of the feelings and emotions I had were channeled into my mitten in the form of regular mistakes requiring regular tink-ing and ripping. Normally, I'd just leave small mistakes alone and just continue, but, I was knitting two of something that had to be the same, so, it required that I follow the instructions the exact same way I had done it before. .... Maybe this is why I can't knit socks?
Well, it got pretty late and Danielle needed to drive about an hour back home, so, we said our good byes. I had about a third of my 2nd mitten complete while Danielle had less than half of her scarf finished. Would we be able to finish by 10:30am tomorrow in time for the surprise party?
I sat down at my laptop at around 1:20 and started knitting. I stopped every few rounds to check on my e-mail and Ravelry. o_O At about 2:15 I realized I had not completed much so I went to abc.com and caught up on Grey's Anatomy and Ugly Betty. The familiar feelings of watching my stories, sitting, and knitting made things go much faster. I had already reached the main body which was simply stockinette in the round.
At about 4:20am I weaved in the last end. My stitches had turned out really uneven so I decided I'd give it a wash. I filled up the sink with water and a few squirts of Soak and left the mittens in there for a good 15 minutes. At this point I was head bobbing trying to stay awake.
After the Soak I squeezed, rolled, and laid them out to dry. Everything was as it should be.

My phone alarm was set for 9:00am. It beeped on time and in a foggy, half-awake, dream I grabbed my phone, pressed many buttons, and reset my alarm for a 10 minute snooze.
I set it wrong because I woke up again and checked the time... it was 10:00am.
I immediately jumped out of bed and grabbed the mittens. ...
They were STILL WET! In a panic, and knowing this was the stupidest idea ever, I threw them in the dryer.
I showered and got ready all the while praying that my mittens wouldn't felt. ... Luckily, they didn't, I had enough sense to put the temperature on low. The mittens did shrink a little... which was great because it looked like I had knit the mittens too long. So, aside from my being very, very late for a surprise party (I ended up getting there at around 12:30), everything turned out well.

Pattern: Warm Woolly Mittens by Theresa Gaffey
Yarn: Catalina (Alpaca & Silk), 1 skein
Needles: US 4 & 6
Size made: Adult Small

The mittens were still wet in these pictures. I had snapped a few shots before I tossed them in the dryer. ^_^

I think it's time for me to pull Beau out of hibernation. I REALLY wanted to wear him during Thanksgiving, but, that's not looking like it'll happen.
On the plus side, I've decided to attempt to knit both of the sleeves at the same time on 1 circular. Mmm, acquiring new techniques... fun. =)

For those of you who love Malabrigo... and are on Ravelry... Cast On some Malabrigo projects this week using their awesome worsted yarn and then upload them to your notebook, leave a post on the Malabrigo Junkies message board and possibly win a prize! It could even be a skein (or two) of the soon-to-be-new Malabrigo Silk Wool!

a quickie!

2007-11-10T22:35:00.001-06:00

Prodigy student Danielle came over today for a hardcore knitting session. One of our friends' birthday is tomorrow (I think I mentioned this) and we both had major knitting to do. I had finished most of one mitten.. and Danielle tried it on and it was too big for her... the recipient is significantly smaller than Danielle so I had to frog and reknit.
Danielle decided to start a scarf with alternating colors. At one point Danielle realized that she could cut the original color from the scarf after she had attached the second. She picked up the scissors and snipped the yarn and was like, "Oh shoot. I cut it too short."
I looked at her and thought to myself, "that should be easy to fix."
Then she looked at her knitting again and realized that she actually snipped the new color yarn. o_O Good times.
More to blog about tomorrow.

Knit hard cause we are.

My stories

2007-11-09T22:20:00.000-06:00

I've mentioned this before: most my knitting is done sitting in front of my laptop watching my stories. Once in a while, after a trip to Blockbuster, I'll pop in a good movie, but, for the most part I catch up on TV shows.
Here's my show list for this season (in no particular order):

weeds
top model
house
dexter
the office
avatar
bones
beauty and the geek
pushing daisies
ugly betty
grey's anatomy
prison break
heroes
chuck
extreme makeover home edition
30 rock
how i met your mother

Those are a lot of hours in the day spent in front of my laptop. One thing I'm thankful for is that most networks now broadcast their shows on-line. ABC and NBC are on top of their game and have the newest episodes on-line the next day. Fox and the new CW, however, can take more than a week for some programs.

I love that, for the most part, I can knit without looking. Complex lace patterns are obviously out of the question, but, that's how I get most of my knitting done.
I feel like I should review all the shows, but, ... it's getting late... and I just remembered that Son of a Stitch & Bitch is out and I need my copy. Let's hope the bookstore is still open!

Blog hard!

Update: The bookstore was open but they didn't have the book out. I asked them when they'd get it... and they found out that they did receive it but it was in the back still wrapped up on one of those huge trays... and they wouldn't open it up and get it for me! I was pretty angry and sad at the same time because everyone else has been getting their book.
I almost drove out to McDonald's to eat my feelings, but, the fog of wrath cleared from my vision thanks to Fiona Apple's awesome cover of Sally's Song from Nightmare Before Christmas... and I was once again rational. ^_^ I'll just get it tomorrow at a different bookstore.

Fall forward?

2007-11-08T18:24:00.000-06:00

I've been trying to add Haloscan to my blog, but, I've been getting weird results. One method really seemed to work fine except it wouldn't show any of my blogger comments... and that's kinda sad. So, I'll be fiddling around with it a bit more in the future.

How about another photography post?
Last time we left off with "Cloning"... cloning lead to some other interesting editing journeys. Here's one of my favorites:

This was actually a test. I had seen someone do something similar so I wanted to see if I could do it, so, on a random day I asked Lora to lie down on the floor with my laptop and that's what I came up with. ^_^ It's basically a lot of layers and "cloning" of things.

From there I started focusing more on portraits with a little something extra. Here are two similar pictures.

Both of these were actually taken in the shower. Kevin wanted to have a photoshoot in the shower with water running so I agreed and we tested some things out. I had hung this sheer black fabric on the shower wall, brought in a lamp and started shooting. I used the flash and it managed to freeze the water droplets coming from the shower head. This actually wasn't at all what I was going for, but, I think it turned out better than anything I could have thought of. My friend Minnie ended up really liking Kevin's pictures and asked for a similar shoot. The major difference in her images is that I hung up orange fabric behind the sheer black.

Heather regularly posed for my camera (whole other story on the camera!). She was always up for a shoot and seemed to enjoy it. I believe this outfit is from India, it was specially ordered for her by the mother of one of her friends... I think. This image was taken in the corner of my living room. I pinned fabric to the walls and took pictures. It looks like there's so much more going on, but, that's all it was. ^_^

Now I shall bombard you with pictures!

This is Thea. Same corner, different fabrics hanging in the background. ^_^

Same corner, different fabrics, and added a couch. This is Precious.

Same corner, no fabric. And Benny. =)

Same corner... just kidding. ^_^ Now I'm on location. This is Maria and her boyfriend laying in the grass.

In the forest with Michelle!

This is Paul. He had actually done some modeling with other photographers in the past.

So, there's a deeper view into my pre-yarn obsession photography. This every day blogging is a lot easier than I thought it would be. Speaking of yarn, my mittens are working out pretty well. I definitely think I can finish by Sunday.

In somewhat related news, the main clock in my bedroom hasn't... "fallen back" yet. It totally trips me out. It's awesome. hahahaha A minute ago I was thinking to myself, "I'll blog for a quick 20 minutes and I'll have time to make it to the restaurant before it closes."
So, I blog away, finish the main portion, check the time and I was all, "I just spent an hour and a half blogging! Now I won't be able to eat! Time flies when I'm on-line..." ... and then after I had run to the fridge to see if I had any edible leftovers, I realize that the clocks in the kitchen say that I still have a good hour. Oh, daylight savings. How fun you are. =)

2 Days of yarn in a row?!

2007-11-07T17:09:00.000-06:00

I panicked a little this morning. I woke up relatively early ... technically 8:45am which is relatively early to my usual 12:00pm. Since I was up so early I decided I'd take a trip to McDonald's for their breakfast menu. I'm not a big fan of McDonald's except when it comes to the Sausage McMuffin with Egg. Mmm. As I was sitting there enjoying my sandwich I suddenly realized that I have a birthday party to go to on Sunday and I have no gift. I decided I'd knit the recipient a pair of mittens, so I drove over to the other LYS: The Gifted Purl and bought a bit of yarn and a pattern for mittens eye had been eyeing. She had knitted up a sample pair in angora and they were completely luxurious. I opted for a nice, pale shade of green (the recipient's favorite color) in an alpaca/silk blend and... I actually haven't started.

Isn't that some luscious yarn? ... Mittens are fast, right? I know I've been able to whip up a pair of Dashing in 3 days, so, mittens can't be THAT different. I mean, it's shorter on the arm and longer in the hand. Basically the same thing... right? ... RIGHT?! Well... hopefully I finish by Sunday.

This doesn't seem to be the true color of the yarn. It's a bit greener in real life. Hmm.

In other news, I solicited donations from Malabrigo. o_O ... ^_^ I told Tobias (from Malabrigo) all about Malabrigo Cast On Week and how beneficial it would be. He agreed to donate some yarn-ish prizes in the form of preview skeins of their new Silky Wool. I'd like to thank college (and Kevin) for my awesome solicitation letter writing skills. See, I actually learned something in college that I didn't know back in high school--it was NOT a waste of thousands of dollars and 6 years of my life! ^_^ I'd also like to thank Tobias for being so cool.

Here are a few current shots of my Exchequered scarf which is coming together oh-so-slowly.

Not much of a difference from last time, right? I keep telling people to knit hard, but, in reality I'm actually knitting pretty soft. I would like to say that I love double knitting. If I've been having a down day and need to feel better about myself I whip out Exchequered and watch myself knit a few rows all the while telling myself how cool I am that I'm knitting with two colors in two styles at the same time. ^_^ ... the things we need to get through a tough day.

That's all for today. I'm assuming tomorrow will be back to the "about me" entries because I need to go on a yarn diet.

Knit (and blog) hard!

Back to knitting!

2007-11-06T20:02:00.000-06:00

It's been a while since my last yarny pictures. ... right? I have some now though. =)

This evening we will start out with my Coach knock-off scarf.

Recap...
Yarn: Misti Alpaca Chunky in 3 lovely colors, 1 skein each
Pattern: Misty Chunky Ribs & Ruffles, sans ruffles.
Needles: Size 13 Clovers
CO: 27... I think
Finished Length: ~91 inches

I ended up wearing it today. ^_^ While it shed profusely as I knit it, wearing it was a different story. The scarf seemed like it would just explode into millions of separate fibers at the slightest gust of wind, but, it stayed in tact and I have zero alpaca hairs on my sweater. Strange how that works. The scarf itself though is getting a bit fuzzy, but, it still looks good. My biggest worry now is that the ribbing won't hold (alpaca is definitely not the most elastic yarn) and I'll end up with a fairly flat scarf. I guess it would still be pretty cool though.
Overall, this isn't exactly the Coach scarf I saw... although my memories have since clouded over and I swear my exact Coach knock-off was hanging on the rack "on sale" for $200+ at the Coach outlet... Hmm. Yeah, next time the medium brown will be more camel and I'll use cashmere. ^_^ For now, I'm quite satisfied.

My second bit of yarny goodness is my Beau sweater in Malabrigo Olive.

I'm still working on the first piece... the back. The ribbing is actually making it pinch in a lot, which shouldn't be a problem once I block and seam it to the front. I feel like it's taking forever though. I'm almost through 2 balls of Malabrigo and I only purchased 7. Let's hope it's enough.

It becomes more and more difficult for me to work on the sweater. I usually knit at night, in front of my laptop while catching up on my shows... I'll definitely have to blog about my shows 'cause there are A LOT. So, I'll knit a few rows on my sweater as the show starts, and then I'll just put it down and finish the rest of 40 minutes without knitting. I think part of the problem with the sweater is that, me, being the stubborn straight-needle-only knitter that I am decided to pick up the longest needles I could find... and, now they just get in the way. This makes knitting quite the chore. I may have to switch to circulars for the front and see if that makes me knit harder. I'm also still quite worried that my gauge is all off, but, we shall see.

On Ravelry I started a "Malabrigo Junkies" group... I think I mentioned this already. Well, to build community and camaraderie I held a little contest with Malabrigo as prizes. Basically you just had to tell the story of how you met Malabrigo and that entered you into the random drawing. Originally I planned to award the winners with Mmmm from my stash, but, things changed, and I hadn't bought yarn in like over a week so I drove over to Fishbed and purchased some.

This is for the 1st prize winner. One of her favorite colors was hot pink--she mentioned that in in her profile--another great use for Ravelry. I figured Shocking Pink would be a great choice.

For 2nd prize we have a skein of Verde Adriana. It's strange that I ended up choosing colors I've already knit with. ^_^ During my browsing the awesome owner of the Fishbed Knitting mentioned that she had a few more bags of Malabrigo that she had not yet put out (she just moved into a new store). I went through them and came upon this beauty:

Mmm. Whale's Road. A fairly variegated blue. I love it. This was originally going to be the color going to the 1st prize winner... but, I couldn't resist it. Of course, I have no patterns in mind, but, I love it just the same.

I have new yarn!

2007-11-05T20:34:00.000-06:00

I bought some new yarn today from the Fishbed. Some of it is actually going to the winners of a small contest I had in the Malabrigo Junkies group on Ravelry. I hope they like the colors I picked out for them.
Last night, after failing to knit more than 4 rows on my Beau sweater I switched projects and jumped on my Coach knock-off again. I finished it! It's already showing signs of non-elasticity. =( Pure alpaca is unbelievably soft but I think I'll have to switch to something with a bit of wool to help it keep its shape.

Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures. By the time I got home the sun was setting, so, I'll try to shoot a few tomorrow. Who knows, maybe I'll finish another project tonight. ^_^

In other news, I hate change. Well... change as in coins. I hate carrying it in my pocket and having it weigh me down, I hate having it jingle as I walk, and... I just don't like it. Whenever I get home I empty out my pockets and dump my change into the plastic lid of one of those 100 blank CD stacks. You know what I'm talking about? I just turn it upside down and it makes a great bowl. Well... I had two of the lids overflowing with change so I decided it was time to trade.
A while back during my Freshmen year of college (it seems like all these entries flashback to my University years) I kept my change in this plastic cup they were giving away at a bookstore. At the end of the first semester it was about 3/4 full so I figured I'd get a few dollars for pizza and call it a night. I went to the bank, poured it into a Coinstar and out came a receipt for $78! It was a shock, and, I figured that I'd save my change in similar fashions for the rest of my life.
By now I'd imagine that I'm a pretty good at judging change-in-a-cup to dollar ratios and I estimated I'd have about $300 in change. Well, got to the bank and it was only $210. Still a good amount, but, I had high hopes for that extra $300. ^_^

Day 5! Only 25 more to go. =)
Blog hard!

Champagne kisses hold me in your lap of Luxury

2007-11-04T19:47:00.000-06:00

Nothing new on the knitting circuit. For some reason this sweater makes me not want to knit. I don't know what's wrong. I'm not sure if my gauge is off... I think that might be part of the reason I'm not knitting hard. I don't want to use up this great Malabrigo to create a sweater that won't fit me... I'm not exactly sure at what point in the knitting of the sweater will I know if it's too big or too small, but, I'll try to keep chugging along. Maybe I'll finish one of my many other WIP's.

Today's topic is how I like the finer things in life. ^_^ We'll be focusing on baths.

For most of my life I've been attracted to quality items. Like with tea, a box of Generic teabags weren't enough for me... I wanted beautiful loose leaf. Why go to McDonald's when I can get a real and really good burger from the pub across the street? I think knitting fits into this as well. Not only do I crave the natural, soft fibers, I also crave handmade things. I love specialty stores, I'd much rather shop at a "mom and pop" than a Target. When someone asks me where I can get a good pie I want to say, "this local bakery" instead of "the bakery section at WalMart."

This... "attitude" has trickled down to bath time. As a kid, taking bubble baths was a time for playing and pretending and as I got older (and taller) I grew out of baths and the bathtub. I figured, if I couldn't lay down in the tub and stretch my legs then there was no point in filling it with water and bubbles.
During my Senior year of College my neighbors Lora and Kevin and I all of a sudden went through this bath phase. I think Lora started it. Baths to her were not a time for fun and games or sinking battleships... they served as a way to relax and de-stress after finals or a bad week. She told us how great they could be and so we tried them. ... This reminds me of that one Friends episode with Chandler and Monica. ^_^
Our school was pretty much in a large cornfield and the only shopping options working for a College student budget happened to be the super WalMart. We bought some bubble bath and went on our way.
The apartment we had at school was set up perfectly. Each bedroom in a unit had its own bathroom. Awesome, right? And the building we were living in was still very new and as a result our bathrooms were super clean (which I think is essential for taking a bath).
That first bath was surprisingly great. I was sitting in maybe my 4th bath that week when it dawned on me that companies actually make bath products tailored to the sole purpose of relaxing. After that I ditched my bottle of Mr. Bubble, went to Walmart and started purchasing bath salts and oils. Later I bought an inflatable bath pillow. During my baths I started lighting candles to "set the mood" and I would set up my laptop on the toilet so I could watch a movie while laying in the tub. Kevin found this plastic gadget that fit over the "emergency drain" so that you could raise the water level and submerge yourself deeper. It was pure bliss.
After those two happy years we changed apartments. Kevin, Lora, and I became roommates and we ended up having a place with only 1 bathroom so bath time stopped. When I moved back home after college I knew bath time wouldn't start up again because we had been living in our house for 20+ years and the bathroom wasn't as clean as it used to be... and it seemed like no matter how hard we scrubbed we wouldn't be able to get it back to how it started.
My family somewhat recently moved into a brand new house and the bathroom is immaculate. ^_^ It wasn't until last week that I realized bath time could start once again. I ended up going to Lush at the mall and buying a few bath bombs... it was time for bliss once again.

Last week I took my first bath in years. I used a bath bomb from Lush, I brewed myself a thermos of tea (Arabian Night from TeaGschwender), my swap partner Suzie had given me this bar of Lavender soap which I gladly took to the tub, I had my laptop in there with a new episode of How I Met Your Mother, lit a few candles, and relaxed. It was awesome. So, I'm once again taking regular baths... which actually make up for this crazy 2-shower-a-day obsession that recently had been taking over my life.
I got a bit congested a few weeks ago and was feeling a cold coming on and my body craved the warmth of a hot shower... and so I began showering in the morning and at night... a few times I showered 3 times a day... it was weird and probably pumped up the water bill. x_X The sickness went away for a week but the extra showers didn't. Tangent. ^_^

If it's been a while since your last bath, I suggest you treat yourself to one tonight. Lush bath bombs are awesome, the first one I used smelled great and had a little fortune inside after it all dissolved. Bring in your laptop too, or some mood music or a good book. If you can't find the little gadget that fits over the "emergency drain" I found that a sheet of Glad Press & Seal works.. just make sure you put it on while the tub is completely dry. If you don't know what the emergency drain is... it usually is a metal circle on the wall of the tub underneath the faucet and above the actual drain. Before College bath time I thought it was some sort of access hole to fix pipes or something. I guess its purpose is to prevent the tub from running over. Light a few candles too, the "mood lighting" surprisingly works wonders in helping you achieve an overall sense of relaxation. I've been tempted to take my knitting to the bath... but, it doesn't seem like the best idea. Take some tea though... or a martini. ^_^ Whatever helps you get through your day.

Let me know how it goes. =)

Blog hard!

Tea time

2007-11-03T15:08:00.000-05:00

Let me tell you about my Tea obsession.

Right now, tea is a significant part of my life. It hasn't always been though. As a child my mom would only give me tea if I was sick, especially when I had a cough or sore throat. The tea would come from a bag and she would load it with honey and lemon juice. We have this family recipe for a soup/porridge deal that, to this day, I refer to as "sick soup" because I always requested it when I had a cold or the flu. Tea was the same, I called it the "sick drink" because those were the only times I would have a cup.

During my Freshman year of College we had these oddly budgeted meal plans that left me with over $25 at the end of the week which I'd have to spend on snacks, drinks, and junk food because the remainder didn't rollover to the next week. One day, during a bout of whatever was going around at the time, I decided I needed some tea. I went down to the Residence Hall convenience store and spent the rest of my meal money on tea bags. Needless to say, I had a lot.
I made myself a cup... which consisted of pouring bottled water into a mug and microwaving it and then a good 5 minute steep with one of a myriad of flavors followed by a 3 generous squirts of honey. It was surprisingly good and for some reason it was unlike anything I ever had during my childhood. I loved it.
There began a 2 month addiction to tea. And then one day I just stopped.

Fast forward about 4 years later. My mom brought my to Argyle in Chicago. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the city, Argyle is actually a street in Chicago which is home to a Vietnamese community. So, when one says, Argyle they are referring to Vietnamese town.
She took me to lunch at this one restaurant and when we sat down they brought us tea. I took a sip and it was bliss. It was the best jasmine flavored tea I ever had. I decided to start up again, so, I bought a few tea bags and had my way with them.

It wasn't long until my addiction subsided once more. I went tea-less for half a year until I was watching Oprah and she had mentioned that every day she has tea and it had become somewhat of a peaceful, calming ceremony for her. She had her favorite cup, and a beautiful teapot, and she would drink her tea religiously. Oprah inspired me, yet again.

It was around Christmas now of 2006, and I decided that I needed a beautiful teapot to make tea drinking my ceremony. My cousins and I were trying something new that year. There are 17 of us and having to purchase gifts for each and every relative is quite a strain on the wallet. The eldest 12 of us decided on doing a Secret Santa type gift swap and I put a "manly teapot" on my list.
I received one (thanks Jenny!) and figured I might as well spend a few extra bucks on some good quality, loose leaf (meaning not in a tea bag) tea as well. I ended up finding a great tea shop near my house and I've been on a tea jag since then.

I'm quite partial to flavored green teas. Green tea with Jasmine is a staple, but, I also love other fruitier flavors. I found this great white tea with freeze dried strawberries. Delicious! I've just recently started drinking some black teas. There's this awesome Almond Cookie flavor that is soooo soothing. Also a baked apple pie tea that taste like a good apple cider.

These are my current loose leaf tea resources.

TeaGschwender: This shop is near my house. It's only locations are in Europe (mainly Germany) and Illinois. My favorite teas here are Father Morgana (Green), Arabian Night (Green & Black), Strawberry White, and their Jasmine Phoenix Pearls. They also have a great menu of food items in case you'd like to dine.
SereneTeaz: This is a significantly smaller shop with only one location. They allow you to try samples of any of their teas and offer little glass sniffing jars so you can browse on your own. I've only tried a few of their selections but my favorites are Almond Cookie and Angel's Kiss.
Teavana: Teavana is found in many locations throughout the US. Something about their teas comes off really artificial and chemical-tasting to me. But, they have great blend ideas in-store. I recently tried their Jasmine Phoenix Pearls with a bit of fruity Rooibus tea and it was delicious. I regularly purchase Teavana's Rock Sugar for flavoring my teas. I used to be strictly honey, but, when you're drinking something with very delicate flavors like green or white tea, the honey completely overpowers any subtleties. I find the rock sugar works best. Honey with black teas works beautifully, however.

So, that's my tea life. Of course, my favorite thing to do while drinking tea is knit. ^_^ See you tomorrow.

Blog hard!

Send in the Clones

2007-11-02T11:53:00.000-05:00

Day 2!

I use Flickr to host my photos. Almost 2 years ago I had this on-line printing place called Qoop create a book of my pictures through Flickr. It turned out really cool. My boss at the time gave me money to print her a book since she was such a fan. Two years later I finally printed her a copy. It arrived two days ago. o_O I actually printed her a book around the same time she gave me the money but my family was moving at the time so I didn't have the time to drive back to the University to deliver it. After the move the book was lost in one of hundreds of boxes. It wasn't until half a year later that I found the book buried inside a box. It was pretty beat up; pages bent, cover torn, etc. So, I figured I'd get her a new copy... and, yeah, so, last week was when I finally did it. It looks better than my original book. I may just have to make a new one for myself. Let me tell you about my photography.

During my ..... 2nd Senior year of College I picked up photography as a hobby. I had seen someone edit a photo in such a way that there were actually two of him in the same image. I figured it couldn't be too hard so I made an attempt. It worked, and, I began having my friends pose for me and I would duplicate them in the picture. I called it "Cloning."

This Cloning technique lead to other types of photography... but, today's post will focus on this first phase of my picture taking journey.

That's my friend Lora. This image was one of the first clones I did. I didn't have a tripod at the time so I'd have to find a solid surface to set the camera. This lead to some really interesting perspectives and angles.

A new mutation of Cloning became this multi-personality phase. I figured, if I can clone someone... I might as well clone them as two different aspects of themselves. That's Shane.

This was another interesting manifestation. My friend Idyl posed for this image.

One of the final phases of Cloning. This is Anne. I ended up really liking this image so I made a whole series of people lying on the ground in these odd patterns. This first one of Anne ended up remaining my favorite.

I would hardly call this Cloning, but, it has some of the same feel and principles. It's Lora again in what we called her Pink Photo shoot. She was actually my roommate during my half of a 3rd Senior year so we ended up doing many photo projects together. =)

So, that's a glimpse of a portion of my photography hobby. From Cloning I moved on to different types of portraits (which I'll cover in a later post) and then, after leaving College and my pool of models I re-aimed my passion towards still life... in the form of yarn and knitting. ^_^

Blog hard?

NaBloPoMo

2007-11-01T23:22:00.001-05:00

After learning about NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) through Saving Nine I decided to take the plunge. Here's post number 1! I almost missed the deadline for today (it's 11:19 PM)! o_O
The idea is, that throughout the month of November you have to blog every single day. So, 30 straight days of blogging. I'm pretty sure I can do it. My only worries are:

Since this is mainly a knitting blog I might not always have enough material for a post. I've decided that this month, things will start getting a bit more personal... as in my personal and social life.
We regularly have internet outages here in BuFu. The area around us is still developing (quite rapidly, I might say) and there tends to be constant wire cutting and sewer digging and power outting.

I guess that's not much to worry about.
Well, already, on the first day of NaBloPoMo I don't have any knitting related things to share. All my focus has been on my Beau sweater and it's surprisingly NOT growing. For some reason I'll knit two rows and put it down without actually realizing I've stopped. I think I need some filler projects.

I've actually made a list of things to blog about when I don't have any knitting. It's a pretty cool list and I think it offers an interesting insight to my life outside of yarn.

For November, blog hard! =)

If you wanna be my sweater, you gotta get with my gauge

2007-10-25T01:08:00.000-05:00

I received the 2nd part of the Knitter's Tea Swap package today from Suzie. I was actually stalking the mail carrier through my bedroom window. It looks out directly towards the mailbox so I just sat on the computer all day watching and waiting to see if the driver had a package. And she did! The moment I saw it I rushed downstairs to meet her. I ripped open the box and ran to the nearest window to take pictures.

Here's what it contained:

At first I started to carefully unwrap everything... but, my patience didn't last and I end up tearing off the wrapping paper:

Starting in the back left, there's a pack of chocolate covered honey cakes from Kika's Treats, a cup from Wishbone, a card, a jar of honey from Marshall's Farm, a jar of nectarine conserves from Frog Hollow Farm, a bar of lavender aromatherapy soap from Beeswork, 2 chocolate bars from Charles Chocolates, a bag of sea salt from the Philippines, and a rocky road chocolate from Droga. All of them (minus the salt) were the local items for the swap. She totally spoiled me. ^_^

This was one of the coolest things from the package:

At first glance it looks like a plastic cup... The cheap ones you buy for parties... but, it's actually ceramic! So cool! =)

I think these will be the first things I try. Mmmmmmmm.

Thank you Suzie!

In other news, my Grass has been coming along quite... interestingly. I knitted up 3 so far, in Malabrigo. I got a bit impatient so I decided to felt the 3 the same night I finished them. My washer is a front loader so I decided to hand felt them. Didn't take too long and my arms definitely got a good workout.

The worst part was putting the first Grass together. I ended up buying some embroidery floss in multiple greens and black for the eyes. I started seaming one side of the bright green Grass together when I checked the instructions and learned I was supposed to do the eyes first. I have no embroidery experience whatsoever... it was very experimental. But, I was able to make fairly circle-ish eyes... and then proceeded to messily mattress stitch the edges and stuff with poly-fil.
I thought I had the eyes perfect, but, after stuffing the position of the eyes distorted a bit and now the Grass looks a little odd... but, I learn from my mistakes and I was able to do really nice eyes and mattress stitch a much cleaner edge for the 2nd grass.

I forgot to take pictures of this with my previous post. I started this a week or so ago... it's a 2nd Anthropologie-inspired Shrug/Capelet. I'm using Rowan Little Big Wool...and... it seems like I didn't purchase enough. So, it's kinda been sitting half-underneath my bed begging for a frog. But, we'll see. Maybe if I can get my hands on more of the Little Big Wool then I will continue.

Last night, after spending the previous night knitting gauge swatches and calculating sizes, I finally Cast On for Beau from Rowan's Vintage Style book.

I had bought a sweater's worth of Malabrigo in September and I figured that this would be an awesome use for it. Sadly, I couldn't get gauge with my mmmMalabrigo,... and I didn't want to go higher than a US 9 for fear of getting lacey-like holes. So, I calculated that if I Cast On the amount for the XXL, I'll actually end up with a size between a Small and a Medium. I guess we'll have to wait and see how accurate my calculations and gauge measuring skills are.

I almost bought a pair of Lantern Moon needles today for my sweater... but I ran out of time and ended up getting a long pair of bamboo Clovers... I feel a bit unfulfilled because I love Lantern Moon and nothing compares, but, I'll live. =)

Whip out your tape measures and knit hard!

Craving some Lantern Moon needles

2007-10-22T23:28:00.000-05:00

I don't own too many knitting books. And, surprisingly, most of my books are the non-pattern type books. I guess I really enjoy the knitting stories. One of my more recent purchases was the Rowan Knitting for Him book. I was just browsing Barnes & Noble the other day and saw the book, realized I had never seen it before, so, I went all impulsive and bought it.

So many beautiful sweater and cardigan patterns. There are at least 3 I'd like to attempt... except... they're all made with Cashsoft and other relatively expensive DK weight yarn. Anyone know of a good workhorse-ish substitute? I'm thinking a DK Malabrigo or Cascade 220. Something of decent quality with good yardage per dollar.
I suppose I could attempt the sweaters with Malabrigo and smaller needles, but, I don't want the fabric to be too dense. Maybe I'll swatch it up.

Stopped by Joann's with Danielle and Kevin the other week. I ran into some of Vanna's yarn. The colors just called out to me, and the yarn was surprisingly soft, so I bought a few skeins. I have no idea what I'll be doing with them... but, the colors go well together and they were on sale.

Another yarn I purchased recently is the Dream in Color yarn. I had been hearing a lot about it and it's totally distributed from here in Illinois, so, I figured I'd try it. I ended up getting 2 hanks, one for me in the Strange Harvest colorway and one for my swap partner Suzie in a green colorway.

It's REALLY soft. I'm excited to try it out, but, have to find a good pattern first.

I'm coming VERY close to finishing my Coach knock-off scarf. Danielle and Kevin came to "Jilberr" on Thursday and I spent some time weaving in ends. It was tiring and tedious, but not as tiring and tedious as I imagined it would be. I'm glad it's over though. I plan to do one more block of each color before I finish. There's still a good amount of yarn left over so I was considering making the scarf longer, but, it's tortured me enough. ^_^

People have been leaving me some great comments. A big thank you for those! Some people have been asking questions about projects and such... I don't actually have the skills needed to reply to these questions. There are a lot of blogs that I comment on and receive a response through e-mail. I don't really know how to go about doing that, so, from this post on, I'll be answering questions from the previous post in the new post. I feel bad for leaving people hanging. =)

Knit hard!

I have a lot of green yarn

2007-10-20T16:59:00.000-05:00

I received my Knitter's Tea Swap package yesterday! My partner Suzie got her box at the same time. Swaps are so much fun. ^_^ I'll definitely have to find more to join. Here's what I got:

On the left is a card, there are two cans of loose tea, one green and one white, a pack of tea bags, a box of almond biscotti, two skeins of Noro Kochoran, a bag of Haribo Gold Bears (my absolute favorite gummy bear!), and a bar of Rutger's Chocolate with hazelnuts. There's actually more to come!

I've never tried Kochoran so I'm excited to see it knitted up. It's a blend of Wool, Silk, and Angora--SO soft! I had to keep fighting the urge to eat the chocolate and the bears before the photoshoot. The teas weren't so lucky. I had to bust them open and take a whiff mere seconds after I opened the package.

I've been suffering from a bout of Startitis. After finishing so many objects over the past few weeks I realized that I needed more fun on the needles. Here's what I've been working on:

Exchequered is from Knitty. It's a double knit scarf and it's really awesome to work. I think I blogged about this earlier. But, basically you're knitting two pieces of fabric at the same time, back to back, with some color work going on--each side is a negative of the other. I've been knitting the scarf with one color in my right hand (English style) and the other color in my left hand (Continental style). I feel so capital K.

I've been using Cascade 220 for it. I only purchased one skein in each color... I hope I have enough to make a decent length.

This is Danica from Knitty. Yet another scarf. ^_^ It's an Entrelac pattern in Malabrigo. I'm surprised at how cool the resulting fabric looks but how "easy" it is to make it. Easy, however, doesn't include the insane amount of ends I'll have to be weaving in. o_O

I think blocking will definitely help the scarf look its best... hopefully it'll help out the wrong side as well. The back just looks like a mess. =( I'm considering possibly knitting another one and then seaming them together... but, it's been growing a bit slowly, so, ... I think I'll have to rely on a good block.

These are leftover green-ish yarns that I'll be using for Grass from Mochimochi Land. These will be the first... "useless" items I'll be making, but, they're so cute ... and I have a lot of left over green, feltable yarn.

There are 4 balls of Malabrigo Worsted, some RYC Cashsoft, Elsebeth Lavold's Silky Tweed, this Licorice yarn from Joann's (I'm not sure if this is feltable), and Catalina Alpaca. It'll be a whole family of grass.

That's how it's looking so far.
Knit hard(er)!

Click it good!

2007-10-17T02:18:00.001-05:00

Haven't had a chance to take good pictures this past week. There have been many cloudy and busy days. Not that I have things to take pictures of... o_O

My October "resolution", I've decided, is to make links in my posts. I always mention patterns and websites and blogs but I never turn the words into links. So, that's what I'll be doing from now on, and, today we'll start with a very link-y post.

My current obsession is the Knitter's Tea Swap. I've watched so many bloggers join swaps, send great gifts, and receive great gifts but for some reason I've always been too self conscious to join. But, after seeing some random blogger post about this Knitter's Tea Swap I decided to bite the bullet and take part.

It's the 4th installment of this swap and my partner is none other than the KTS4 coordinator: Suzie. I've been having the greatest time shopping for her and putting together the package. I'm hoping to send it out tomorrow. ^_^

I'm gonna give you a few of my favorite knitting blogs. Definitely check them out. Not only are they some of my favorites, but, according to my tracker, the following blogs give me the most traffic. =) I thought I'd try to return the favor.

Yarn Ball Boogie - he has such cool designs, always uses great colors in his knitting, and takes awesome pictures. He's also been on Knitty Gritty!
Númenna - Nan Annûn - he's a traveler who currently blogs from Germany. This guy also takes great pictures and has a great eye for color. He's been spinning a lot recently... and he's also part of the Knitters Uncensored podcast.
Earth Chick Knits - she not only knits, but sews, cooks, and does a myriad of other things too. Her blog is not only a knitting blog, it's a personal blog with lots of great stories and pictures.
Charles' Life Knitting - he teaches a dyeing class at a yarn store and regularly reviews books and new yarn.

The blogs I have listed on the right side on the page are also many that I enjoy reading.
I recently found out about Bloglines. I wish I knew about it sooner. Now, finally, all my favorite blogs are all organized and easy to scan through to check out new posts. For the past however-long I've just clicked on the links I have on my page, and then I'd leave a comment, press the back button a few times, and then click the next link down the line. I'm happy that I am now more technologically advanced.
I've been on a blog-adding binge lately. It's refreshing to find new knitters. Even more recently I signed up for Google's Reader which is essentially the same thing. I'm not too fond of the layout, but, I figure that since I already have a G-mail account I might as well switch over. I'm still trying to weigh my options. ^_^

I don't think I've blogged about Ravelry yet. If you're not on it, or at least on the waiting list, then it is definitely time to queue yourself up. It is such a well organized and useful website. I no longer have to do crazy tedious searches on Google, or blog hop for hours to find useful pattern notes... now they're all gathered together into an easily navigated collection. I seriously check it out daily... sometimes just to see all my projects lined up so neatly. ^_^
Speaking of Ravelry and new knitters... my knitting student prodigy, Danielle, finally received her invite. You may remember her from previous posts featuring her handmade knitting monkeys:

She's been uploading her yarny projects onto the site these past few days. Check her out!

That's all I have for now. I'm hoping for a nice sunny day tomorrow so I can snap a few pictures of my recent SEXual encounters and my one or two WIPs.

I'll be sweeping the clouds away.
Knit hard!

If only yarn grew on trees

2007-10-10T00:17:00.000-05:00

Kevin came over today and helped me out with a yarny photo shoot. He acted as the Art Director. We ended up shooting outside and came up with this 'yarn-grows-on-trees' deal. More on this later.

I finished my Hemlock Ring Blanket last night. The BO edging was pretty complicated at first and moved slowly. I ended up only adding one more pattern repeat than brooklyntweed's version. I might have been able to finish one more, but, I wasn't gonna push it. I ended up with a diameter of a good 54 inches. Blocking this project made me realize that 1) I need a pin cushion and 2) I need to work on my blocking skills 3) Regular measuring is a good thing.

I'll probably end up taking another set of pictures of the blanket because the grass really made the blanket all lumpy. It's really quite a work of art when the Hemlock Ring is at its flattest.
I tried throwing it on the couches throughout the house... sadly it didn't really go with any of the decor. It works well in the color scheme of my bedroom, so, there it will stay.

Blocked the Branching Out scarf the other day. Maybe I mentioned this? I brought it along so it could have its time in front of the lens. I think I may actually have to re-block this. I didn't stretch it out wide enough. The leaves that are connected to the center column are somewhat smooshed against it. I'd like them to separate more.

The texture of the scarf completely changed after I blocked it. It felt like thin, fragile paper. A really cool transformation. I hope the recipient enjoys the scarf as much as I enjoyed creating it.

I e-mailed briarrosefibers.net last week asking about their Buff Beauty yarn. I had used it previously and did not do the yarn justice so I wanted to get my hands on more. The yarn was never restocked on their website so I asked about it and luckily they had a handful of hanks they were about to sell at a fair. I managed to save two of them:

Delicious stuff. This batch doesn't seem as plump as the last hank I had, but, it's still super thick and in beautiful colors.
You may have noticed a few more balls of yarn hanging in the tree.

The turquoise is Cascade 220. It's a replacement for the darker blue I plan to use on my Exchequered scarf.
The grey yarn is Catalina Super Chunky. A soft alpaca (that hopefully doesn't shed) which will soon be transformed into a scarf for a friend.
Ahh, I love that I technically only have 1 real WIP now. Can't wait to start more.

Let's grow some yarn
and knit hard. =)

Pears

2007-10-03T00:25:00.000-05:00

Just a few WIP's to share:

That's Branching Out. It's still waiting to be blocked. I had planned to do it tonight, but, I'm feeling a bit lethargic, so, I'll save it for tomorrow. The whole time I was knitting it I had been stretching it out to see that the leaves were fully forming and that I wasn't making mistakes. Without being blocked, it looks pretty decent. I can't wait to see the finished-finished piece though.

Another glimpse of my Coach knock-off. The colors have been growing on me. They remind me of this one ice cream I had. Like... 5 chocolate ice cream or something. It's surprisingly quite long and I'll only need a few more sections in order to complete it. I'm not looking forward to weaving in the ends though. There are a lot of them.

This is my Hemlock Ring Blanket. I'm on row 70 and it's pretty big. The pattern is easy to follow for the most part, but, the endless rounds of plain stockinette are killing me. I haven't switched to brooklyntweed's chart yet. I understand how it works, but, this line-by-line thing is more comfortable for me. And once you do one repeat in the feather/fan section it's pretty easy to memorize.

I feel like I'm just not knitting fast enough. I've hired two friends "r" & "b" to help me out.

r & b are two felt monkeys made by my friend (and knitting student prodigy) Danielle. She hand crafted them for my birthday. ^_^

As you can see, they are quite busy. I have many more rows and endless rounds of stockinette to complete.

I'll leave you with one last image:

That is the current prototype of my DS Lite case pattern. I'm not too fond of the flap so I may have to rethink it. And, originally I planned to use snaps with a non-functional button on top... but, I feel like the constant snapping may damage the DS. I ended up using EZ's after thought buttonhole. She actually asks you to snip a thread in your knitting and unravel it from the middle. It was a mess. Me + knitted items + scissors = disaster. o_O Hopefully I'll come up with a decent flap soon so I can share my pattern with everyone.

I'll need to hire more monkeys to help me with my Christmas knitting.
Knit hard!

Fishbed and chips

2007-09-29T20:47:00.000-05:00

Found a yarn store near my house. My actual LYS is The Gifted Purl. It's right on the west bank of the Fox River (as in Prison Break's penitentiary). If you cross the bridge over the river and walk about 3 blocks north there's another yarn store. It never showed up on Google searches so it was totally under my yarn store radar. I finally heard about it in the Chicago Knitter's group on Ravelry, so, I checked it out.
It's called Fishbed Knitting Emporium. It's a surprisingly large space with much yarn, including my coveted Malabrigo. I went in just to browse, but, I always feel the need to make at least one purchase. While I was wandering I ran into Cascade's Ecological Wool. I thought to myself, "this looks familiar..." The price and yardage were a good deal but I couldn't figure out what I'd do with it. And then I realized where I had seen it... If you don't know about the umm... 'significance' of Ecological Wool, it's time to read more blogs. ^_^ Even though I originally had no desire to ride the wave, I decided I'd hop on the bandwagon because it was so soft and so cheap, and I brought a hank up to the register along with this beauty:

It's Mirasol Sulka. A Merino, Alpaca, Silk blend. So delicious. I have no idea what it's going to be, but, I love the color, like dark denim.

Back to my Ecological story. I set it on the counter and the owner asked what the yarn was for. I was like, "A.. umm... small ..... blanket."
And then she said something along the lines of, "There's a guy who blogs and he designed a lap blanket off of a doily using this yarn."
Shocked, I stammered, "That's what I bought this for!"
I love that the store is Internet savvy. I asked her if she knew about the yardage, she wasn't sure so we decided to look it up. Good stuff. I ended up buying 2 skeins, in a nice, natural oatmeal-ish color.

I'm slowly falling out of love with Alpaca. (The horror!) I've been knitting with the Misti Alpaca Chunky and it's so soft and lofty, a dream to work with... but it's REALLY shedding. There are hairs floating in the air and tiny hairballs stuck to my clothes and rolling around my room. The worst part is noticing something in my mouth, reaching in and finding Alpaca fiber. It's CRAZY. I've felt this weird lump in my stomach for the past few days, like gas that won't pass o_O and all I keep thinking is: an Alpaca-hair bezoar.

I finished knitting the Branching Out scarf last night, it's currently awaiting blocking. It was such a relief. The scarf has been a WIP for a while now, and, I finally sat down and made myself finish it. Like a huge weight was lifted off my shoulders. And, despite have a few more UFO's I decided to start the Exchequered scarf.

I watched the knittinghelp.com Double Knitting video a few times and decided I was ready. It started with a cable cast on... that sucked until I realized that I had to knit REALLY loose. I figured I'd first try one color in my left, Continental style, and the second color in my right hand, English style. This was working out with only slight awkwardness. I'm not much of a Continental knitter, and, I actually have not yet purled Continental style, but, knitting was working out really well. After two rows I changed it up a bit and did two colors on my right hand since that's my style. =) It was definitely moving faster, but, for some reason I couldn't keep good tension on the yarn that wasn't around my index finger so I switched back to double handed. Watching my hands looks really complicated and cool.
After 2 more rows I noticed that my two colors weren't very... contrast-y. So, I'm gonna put it on hold and see if I can find either a lighter blue or a lighter brown. Preferably a lighter brown 'cause the blue I have is so vibrant and perfect.

I'm gonna take a break from my Coach knock off due to the mythical bezoar forming in my stomach. Leaving me with... starting the Hemlock Ring. Hahaha. I'm afraid my ball winder won't be able to handle the 400+ yards.

Wind it up!
and knit hard. ;)

On collecting

2007-09-28T00:39:00.000-05:00

I love visiting LYS's. It's my goal to visit each one in Illinois. Or, all of them North of 80 and as far West as Dekalb. Here is my current list:

The Gifted Purl - West Dundee
I'd Rather Be Knitting - Long Grove
Knitche - Downer's Grove
Wool & Co. - Geneva
Needle Things - St. Charles
Village Yarn Shop (Closed) - Geneva
Loopy Yarns - Chicago
Three Bags Full - Northbrook
Village Knit Whiz - Glenview
Fringe - Aurora
Close Knit - Evanston
Chicago Fabric, Yarn and Button - Chicago
Nina - Chicago
Lizzie's - Wheaton
Never Enough Knitting - Wheaton

The last two were added today. Never Enough is a fairly small store with a relatively small selection, but, a huge amount of patterns, and they also seemed to carry many quilting supplies. Lizzie's is just two blocks down the street and it's a significantly larger store with a really huge, well organized, selection. They're all put into black shelves, the smaller ones in perfect little cubby holes. At first the black shelves were a bit daunting and depressing, but, they REALLY make the yarn jump out at you, and it all looks so clean.

From Lizzie's I bought this:

It was a brand I hadn't seen before and the colors really jumped out at me. Currently, no plans for this pretty yarn.

From Never Enough I bought these:

and:

Two hanks of my usual go-to yarn: Cascade 220. There were others that were calling out to me, but, sadly they didn't come in colors I wanted. Cascade comes in pretty much EVERY color so I was able to find a match. With these I plan to knit Exchequered which brings me to my next subject.

I think I'm a "collector" of knitting. Not only do I want to collect the experiences of visiting every yarn store in Northern Illinois but I also want to have every knitting skill and technique under my belt. I also have fleeting fantasies of using every brand of yarn... but, that's a bit of an enormous and rather daunting task.
I've purchased the yarn to knit Eunny's End Paper Mitts in order to get color work down, or at least Stranding/Fair Isle. Exchequered will conquer Double Knitting.
I made a list the other day of skills I still need to attempt and master. There were a lot. Some of the techniques I'd like to try sooner (rather than later) include Magic Loop, Entrelac, and Beaded Knitting. Two socks at the same time calls out to me, but, I hate knitting socks. Bobbles and Intarsia, on the other hand, are skills that I'd need to learn but seriously have no desire to--they are at the bottom of my list.

I've been working on writing out the pattern for my DS Lite case, more details on that in my next blog.

I want to be a Master Knitter!
Knit hard!

This butter is really yellow

2007-09-25T03:22:00.001-05:00

I seem to be on some sort of blogging binge. I just can't stop updating! =) Hopefully this trend continues.

As promised, I have some pictures to share. First, here's my fairly large Malabrigo purchase from Loopy.

Like little bundles of love. On the subject of love, I LOVE the color. It's called Olive. Very fitting.
Oh, Malabrigo. I e-mailed them the other day. I started this group on Ravelry called Malabrigo Junkies. We were discussing our favorite colors (Charrua!) and someone mentioned Little Lovely. I have not had the pleasure of meeting Ms. Lovely but she seemed to be quite coveted. The possibility of her being retired came up--a member may have read it somewhere I think, so, to finalize the matter I e-mailed the people up in Malabrigo land and asked them about their color cycle and retirees. (I also oh-so-shamelessly promoted Malabrigo Junkies). I got a reply in two days from Tobias who said that they've only retired a few colors and that Little Lovely (as well as Charrua) were still on the color card. He also mentioned that he'd be happy to link our group to the malabrigoyarn.com website. Mmm.
Just for that we'll celebrate with another picture of this delicious yarn:

I'm really churning out those bookmarks. They're really quick and easy. They'll probably serve as backup Christmas gifts.
The pattern calls for a 1.25mm crochet hook, but, unfortunately the store I bought the Malabrigo lace from had a 2.5 as their smallest. I purchased it anyway. On my way home I stopped at a Hobby Lobby and picked up a 2.0mm and a 1.5mm. 1.25 Just seemed to small for Malabrigo's thick&thin-ness. It turned out that the 1.5 was too small, I couldn't even hook the yarn. The 2.0 worked but the resulting bookmark ended up tight and lost a lot of stitch definition after I ironed it. I tried the 2.5mm and it worked perfectly.

Yay, tassels.
Crochet is surprisingly easy (and fast!) once you get a good feel for how to angle the hook. My tension is still a bit all over the place, but, I think it's becoming steadier as I continue to pop out these bookmarks. I love that there's only one live stitch, it's easy to drop it and pick it back up again. In knitting, when my needle falls out, I stop breathing and move as slowly as possible as not to disturb the now live stitches who's seemingly only desire is to drop. And then painstakingly re-inserting my needle, making sure each stitch is facing the correct direction. Tedious!
While, I AM growing a certain fondness towards the hook, I will always prefer the knitted fabric to the crocheted.

My sweater finally dried. My room is no longer filled with the odd scent of wet wool. The sweater though smells sweet and natural. I actually don't smell the Soak on it at all--I may not have used enough. The directions say one cap-full for every gallon... I soaked my sweater in my bathtub... how many gallons is that? I naively guessed 2 gallons because I ended up only using 2 cap fulls. ^_^ Oops?
Mr. Seamless Hybrid wasn't dry before my photoshoot, so, I'll have to take pictures of him another day.

I'll leave you with Branching Out. This scarf has been waiting patiently underneath my desk for me to finish the sweater. He's finally getting some pattern repeats knitted and is looking good, albeit a bit oatmeal-y.

I'm giving tassels a chance.
Knit hard!

A sweater in less than a month

2007-09-24T03:25:00.000-05:00

The sweater is ALMOST finished. Today I finished basting the neck hem and weaving in all the ends. I gave it a soak with Soak and blocked it. Blocking is magic, it really evened out all my weird stitches and made the fabric lie really flat. Certain aspects of my sweater are a bit scary though.

The sleeves are too long. Which, isn't too bad, I suppose.
The bottom edge is flaring out. Even though I put in decreases in the hem it's still flaring out a bit, I think I'll have to run some elastic through the bottom to keep it in check.
I'm not fond of the shoulders. They're a bit big and oddly shaped. Maybe now that everything is blocked it'll fit me better.

So, now I'm just waiting for it to be dry. I definitely plan to give the hems a good pressing with a hot iron. They're a bit thick and could use some flattening out. I can't wait to start my next one.

Speaking of next one... I hit up Loopy on Thursday with prodigy student Danielle and my cousin Ryan (who I recently taught the basics of knitting). My birthday was September 3rd and my friend Kevin generously gave me a $50 gift certificate to Loopy. It was time to spend it. My first grab was a pair of Lantern Moon needles. I love them. And after more searching there were no yarns that were calling out to me. I decided I'd just grab a hank of Malabrigo (my usual go-to purchase) ... and then I thought to myself, "I have $50 to spend solely on yarn..."
I ended up ditching the needles and buying 7 beautiful skeins of Malabrigo in the Olive colorway. Sweater number two, coming up! =) Pictures of my mountain of Mmm soon. I'm still deliberating on a pattern.

I've been craving the Malabrigo lace. Danielle got a free mini-hank of it from the Malabrigo booth at Stitches Midwest and I've been coveting ever since. I never bought it though because I really have no desire to knit lace... but, I ran into this awesome fan bookmark pattern for crochet a while ago... I decided this would be the perfect project for some lacey Malabrigo. I drove 20 minutes to Wool & Co. Got myself some lace and a tiny crochet hook and I was on my way.

It's in the Polar Morn color way. So soft and delicious. The fan pattern is pretty easy too. I'm totally cranking them out now. Pictures of these will be up soon as well.

Had my first yarn dyeing experience the other day. After the trip to Loopy, Danielle and I spent a few hours knitting. I was working on a bookmark and my Coach knock-off scarf (see below) and she decided to knit a cupcake. She chose yellow for the cake part and white for the frosting. The pattern included a cherry on top but she had no red yarn, so, we decided to dye a bit of the white yarn with food coloring.
Overall it worked. We based it on some of the theory I picked up through reading about knitting. Our process was putting water in a pot and boiling it. Adding plenty of red food coloring and a drop of blue... and then cooking the yarn. After a quick check on-line we realized vinegar was an essential ingredient so we added a splash during cool down. After a good rinse we hung it to dry for like... 10 minutes... Danielle couldn't wait so we ended up taking a blowdryer to it. In another 10 minutes it was completely dry.
Good times.

Here's my Coach knock-off scarf, btw.

The Alpaca is SO soft and great to work with. Sadly, though, the colors just aren't doing it for me. I really wanted the middle brown to be more of a tan or camel color. I guess it works though, and, who can really argue with Misti Alpaca Chunky. SO SOFT!

I'll have to stop myself from starting my 2nd sweater and get to work on Christmas gifts. I've already been getting requests. x_X
I'll have pictures next time of my completed Seamless Hybrid Sweater and the really cool fan bookmarks.

Blocking is magic.
Knit hard!

Hems and stubborn Cast On edges

2007-09-20T00:42:00.000-05:00

On the continuing saga that is my sweater...
Last night I ripped back the neck. Using good old knittinghelp.com I stuck a few dpns a few rows below the hem turn. Picking out my previous basting was fairly easy and it frogged quite nicely to the row that my dpns were sitting in. Ahh, I love when knitting works out perfectly. I then proceeded to put my turn in right away so the neck would be a bit shorter than before, and then I knit about 3/4 of an inch for the hem. Haven't basted yet, though.

Inserting my needles into a 'target' row were really easy so I decided it was time to tackle the bottom of the body... the dreaded Cast On edge. I picked up stitches two rows above the ribbing. Once everything was secure I pulled out my tiny little embroidery scissors and just began cutting off the the CO. I figured I didn't need to be careful so I probably cut into a row or two as well. In my head it all made sense; I'd find a row that was still in tact and pull the yarn and it would all unravel... but in reality this did not happen.
"That's odd", I thought to myself. So, I cut off another row... still no luck. I figured I could just wiggle all the stitches and make them drop to my destination row. This was working but, for some crazy reason only every other stitch was drop-able.
At this point I started freaking out. I was pulling, madly, at the cut up ribbing, violently dropping any stitches that were willing. It suddenly dawned on me that maybe cutting my sweater wasn't such a good idea.

^{walking in a spider web}

About half an hour later all possible unraveling was done. I was left with this crazy spider web of yarn that did not want to undo itself. And here I've been for the past year and a half thinking my scarf would fall apart into a tangle of yarn on a whim if I didn't weave in my Cast On tail well enough. Trust me, it will not fall apart.
I finally realized that I would have to spend the rest of the night undoing each stitch individually until I hit my destination row, so, I set about that horrible, horrible task.

After more than 2 hours the task was complete. There was much snipping and untangling but, I reached my previously inserted needle with no stitches lost. I counted all 200 of them twice. =)

On the left, with the wooden dpns, is the neck which ripped back oh-so-smoothly. On the right is my Boye interchangeable circular holding on to the stitches that were hell.
I plan to reknit the bottom 2 inches tonight, turn, and add an orange hem. If I'm not tired I'll baste and then tomorrow I'll weave in all the ends hiding in the body. And finally, I'll be done.

Actually, I'll have to block the sweater and then I'll be really done. Speaking of blocking, after a previous disaster with laundry detergent and Malabrigo, I decided to invest in some Soak wool wash.

I considered buying Eucalan but these looked so much more hip. Packaging definitely affects my shopping. I'm happy about the scents, they're not too strong and none of them smell excessively fake or chemical-based. They're surprisingly sophisticated. Well, maybe not the citrus flavor... hahaha, I totally get dish soap from it.

Here's to even stitches. ^_^
Knit hard!

sweater, why must you be so difficult? play nice!

2007-09-17T18:54:00.001-05:00

Oh, sweater. I finished the shoulders and the neck back on Saturday. I tried it on and it fit pretty well. Since then I've been working on all of the finishing. So far I've put in EZ's phony seams on the arms and grafted the under arms to the body. I added a hem on one wrist and started on the other.

^{orange hems!}

I decided I'd just go with st st and a hem for the neck, I basted it down last night when I realized I didn't decrease after the turn. o_O Now it flares out so I'm definitely going to have to rip back a few rows and re-knit.

^{neck! fix yourself!}

I hope to be done in a few more days.

On Saturday I went to the Renegade street fair with Danielle and Moy. Right when we got in I saw two huge knitting needles in the window of a store. It was Nina. I've read a few reviews from local knitters about Nina and they turned out to be pretty accurate. The store is definitely not your grandmother's knitting shop. It's very clean and modern. They yarn is well laid out and organized. It's small, but, uses its space well. A few reviews mentioned that staff was a bit snobby but I had fine service. As a guy, when I'm in a new yarn store I usually hear, "Are you purchasing a gift?" or "Who are you buying yarn for?" But, here at Nina I was asked, "What will you be knitting?" Good stuff.
I ended up buying two balls of Rowan's Little Big Wool. It was on sale. =)

I think I'll be knitting a better Anthropologie-inspired Capelet.
The fair was cool, not really what I expected. I was thinking the crowd would be similar to the crowd at the Midwest Fiber and Folk Fair... or even Stitches Midwest, but, the shoppers here were younger, more diverse, and in equal amounts of men and women. Very cool. Sadly, my only purchases were a few pins/buttons made of cloth.

The rest of Saturday consisted of hours upon hours of knitting with Danielle and Moy. I was finishing up my shoulders and neck, Danielle was working on a test mitten, and Moy was working on an adult-sized baby booty for herself. ^_^ I love yarn.

So, last week I mentioned my hunt for Hand Maiden Sea Silk. I brought Kevin along with me to Knitche, the yarn store/coffee shop, and I found it... sadly, this beautiful, unique sea silk was almost $40! Definitely out of my budget at the moment. I did end up getting my hands on some Malabrigo.

That color is Shocking Pink, soon to be a DS Lite case for Anne and Lora.

This one is actually Malabrigo Gruesa. A thick and thin yarn. I have mixed feelings towards thick and thin yarn but for some reason this one called out to me. It said, "We can make cables look really funky!" Because it actually spoke words I decided to buy it. Soon it will be a DS Lite case for Sunmi. ^_^ Hmm, I think I'll have to publish my pattern somewhere.

Mmm, this was an impulse buy. I can't resist the colors! This one is Mariposa. It's mainly spring and sea greens mixed with yellow-ish greens and dashes of light blue, purples and browns. I think Mariposa will be sitting in my stash for now until I come up with something awesome to knit her into.

Now it's back to my sweater.
Knit hard!

finally, a dream

2007-09-12T13:29:00.000-05:00

I had a knitting-related dream last night. I think it was a quickie. In my dream the sweater I'm currently working on was finished, it ended up being a raglan sweater, very baseball style with blue sleeves and shoulders and a heather grey body. I was really excited that it was finished so I started examining it to make sure there were no mistakes. As I was looking I realized that everything was slightly off center, like my pieces twisted slightly clockwise as I was working up. I figured a little stretch, prodding, and blocking could fix it... but then I noticed that it had knitted up WAY too small for me. I remember thinking that I had Cast On 200 stitches for the body (which I actually did) and if that wasn't enough then I definitely would need more yarn than I had purchased. There were many fleeting thoughts on solutions and problems, the main one being finding the same dye lot and trying to remember the LYS I bought the original yarn from. It was a very disappointing feeling, that after all this time and hard work my sweater would only fit a toddler. I remember trying to stretch out the body and trying to fit myself into it... and, that was all.

In real life, I've joined the three pieces of my sweater together on one needle and I've been working around. I should be getting to the shoulders soon. I keep messing up on the decreases o_O. Being very anti-frog, I've decided to just sneak a few k2together's in my non-decrease rounds. Hopefully it will all work out.

I've been wanting to get my hands on some Hand Maiden Sea Silk. The concept of the yarn is very interesting and it looks like fun to knit with. I found a store about 45 minutes away that sells it, I may head down there tomorrow or Friday.

Here's a scarf I made a few weeks ago from that really plump Briar Rose yarn.

I love the colors, and how great a simple garter stitch looks... but, I think the suggested needle size was all wrong for this yarn. The resulting fabric is really stiff, everything great about the yarn is gone because of the tight stitches. As I was knitting I switched to one size larger, but, that still wasn't enough. And sadly, I don't plan on frogging it. I do hope I run into a Briar Rose booth again so I can get another hank of Buff Beauty and really make it work.

I'm also looking forward to the new Stitch & Bitch book: Son of a. I really want to see what patterns she has collected and what information and stories she has to share. I own Stitch & Bitch Nation, and, while none of the patterns really appeal to me, I love reading everything else.

Knit hard. =)

still on the seamless hybrid

2007-09-07T00:04:00.000-05:00

That Elizabeth Zimmermann. I really dig her writing voice and how her 'patterns' are witty explanations. Reading the pattern is like reading a good story. The only downside to her style is that she'll often refer to a previous passage in the book so there's a lot of flipping back and forth to be done--bookmarks come in handy.

I'm really digging the idea of a seamless sweater... I HATE sewing seams.
So, that's the body on the top and one sleeve on the bottom. I'm moving along surprisingly fast. I'm having a slight dilemma though. I CO for the body a bit too tightly... and then I was having the hardest time comprehending EZ's directions for adding a hem so I went ahead and did a 2x2 rib in order to stop curl-age. Now that I'm done with the body I hate the rib and my CO edge just doesn't stretch enough.

I feel like cutting will be involved. o_O I've never undone the bottom of my work, so, it's looking a bit scary.

I'm imagining that I'll have to insert a life line or a needle in a row above the ribbing... and then take my scissors to the CO edge and hope for good unraveling... does that sound about right?
I re-read her section on hems and now it makes much more sense.
I hope to finish the first sleeve tonight... and then maybe make an attempt at fixing the body tomorrow. Everything is moving pretty fast. =) I thought it would take me months to finish a sweater.

I have a few snapshots of my Anthropologie-inspired Capelet and circular shrug. I had my friends Lora and Anne try them on the other day. Sorry about the crappy quality... it was night time and I had to use the dreaded, unflattering flash. ^_^

Ahh, circular shrug. I guess the "hypothetical" size I made was a nice choice because it fit Lora nicely as well as a handful of my other friends and cousins. I think I'll have to knit another one as a Christmas gift... and allow it to suck out more life from me.

This capelet ended up pretty crappily. Mainly regarding the YOs. I missed a few and ... misplaced a few. o_O It fits though, and it looks halfway decent. I originally aimed to give it to Lora, but, it's such crap that I'd rather knit her a new one. For now Anne is modeling it. =)

That's all for now. Wish me luck on my CO edge cutting adventure.
Knit hard!

just a touch of love

2007-08-31T03:23:00.002-05:00

I finally learned how to crochet a few weeks ago. Well... I technically learned a while ago, but it felt so wrong and so difficult. This time I was determined to feel the speed of crochet, so, I watched endless streams of videos on youtube and finally made my first granny square. Good stuff. The motion of hooking yarn and pulling it through is so comforting to me. Like I need to do this. Like I've been waiting all my life to pull yarn through loops with a hook. It's crazy. LUCKILY, I am not fond at all of the crocheted fabric, so, it looks like it'll be knitting for me (although I've been having these reoccurring thoughts of a crocheted throw blanket for my bed x_X).

I figure, if I just keep crocheting around.. it'll end up big enough to cover my bed?
In related news, crocheting takes up WAY too much yarn. I had to change the way I held the yarn because it needed to more freely flow through my fingers, any tension at all just messes it all up. o_O

Hmm, I finished my circular shrug. I'm still trying to find someone who can fit it so I can take a few pictures. ^_^ Hopefully I'll get one of my cousins to try it on come Sunday.

I CO for my sweater as well. My very first sweater. =) I had knit a gauge swatch and calculated how many I'd have to CO for like a month before I actually went ahead and started it. So far it's been moving pretty slowly... but quickly. In a matter of two days I had gone through my first skein of yarn (Cascade 220, btw) and my sweater only measured a bit over 6 inches. o_O So, my yarn is knitting up fast, but, I'm just not getting much length. The endless stockinette hasn't driven me insane yet, it's actually quite relaxing. I think my Harry Potter scarf could've easily been a sweater's amount of stockinette, and that only drove me crazy near the end where I rushed to finish. I'm just hoping to finish the sweater before it starts getting chilly.

The yarn is a little grey here... in real life it has a deeper blue color. So, it's a nice medium grey-blue. Good stuff.
Hmmm, my other WIP include the Branching Out Scarf which I rarely work on. I made a mistake the other day but luckily I had a life line so it's all fixed minus a pattern repeat and a half. The Noro scarf has seen even less knitting time, but, it'll probably end up as my travel WIP once the sweater starts getting heftier. And... that's about all. =)

Knit hard!

my stash my stash my stash, my lovely yarny stash

2007-08-22T04:03:00.000-05:00

check it out.

Stitches Midwest turned out to be... interesting. SO many stores and SO MUCH YARN. Quite overwhelming. Luckily, with the help of ravelry.com I was able to create a list of projects I wanted to knit in the future. My list included the pattern-suggested yarn as well as alternative yarns that other knitters used. Oh ravelry, so helpful.
I brought my friend Danielle along. Out of the 3 people I've taught to knit she's the only one who stuck with it. She already conquered cables and knitting in the round... it took me over 6 months to get that far... I guess she's a really good student... or I'm just an awesome teacher. LoL.

Tangent. ... So... here's what I managed to find:

Mmm, silky wool. I brought my Branching Out scarf as my WIP to Stitches... I was really enjoying knitting it at the time (right now it's been waiting for me to finish my circular shrug--see below). I had already decided it would make an awesome gift so I decided to grab another ball so I could make another. I think the second one will be for my mom.

This yarn is a long story. =)
At the end of last winter I was at Coach with my best friend Lora. They had these beautiful cashmere blend scarves for sale. Sale to them was still over $200. x_X I decided, that I would find similar colors and a similar cashmere yarn and knit them for myself.
Finding both the same colors and yarn proved to be difficult... it wasn't until Stitches that I saw 3 of the almost perfect color ways. They weren't cashmere though... they happened to be 100% alpaca. We passed up the table and I kept them in the back of my mind. Finally, on our semi-second round of the market I decided to buy them. 100% alpaca is cRaZy soft... of course, not as orgasmic as cashmere, but, would definitely make a great scarf. So, here's to my Coach knock-off.

Mmm, sock yarn. ... I hate knitting socks. =( After my 3 separate attempts I still don't have a pair of socks that fit or match. Luckily, this skein of Lorna's Lace is for Eunny Jang's Endpaper Mitts. I've been eye-ing them ever since I fell into the world of knitting blogs. It'll be my first color work project, and, I'm quite excited. I, strangely, ended up with a very similar color choice to her original pair...

I just love the blue-brown combo.
Well, those were my purchases from this year's Stitches Midwest. I'm already looking forward to next year. Sadly, we didn't win any prizes, but, Danielle got a free mini-hank of Malabrigo lace weight. mmmm. I ended up getting my picture taken for The Panopticon's 1000 Knitter's Project--and I'm knitter 100!
We also felt some buttery soft cashmere... sadly the small skein was $46. Definitely out of my budget. It was so soft we went back after our initial round through the market to get a second touch. ^_^

I'll leave you with one last picture.
Danielle and I decided to do our own mini knit-along. We chose the Circular Shrug pattern, and, we've been working hardcore on it since we started. So hardcore, in fact, that we both claim the project is sucking the life out of us. Hopefully it'll be done soon so she can wear it and I can take pictures and gift it.

Knit hard!

branching out

2007-08-10T16:07:00.000-05:00

I've been trying to find something 'nice' to knit for my old boss--the one who taught me the ways of knitting. I was considering another Clapotis... but, I don't really remember enjoying the process very much. o_O I've been eye-ing the Branching Out scarf for a while and on Ravelry.com it's one of the most knitted projects, so, I decided to go for it. I ended up going with the recommended Silky Wool.

It's such a complex pattern. I've even learned 3 new decreases. Branching Out is also my first lace pattern. I think I remember reading something from the Yarn Harlot about a lace project she as knitting... and how it started off as something really messy and how she regretted knitting it... but then once she blocked it then the magic started. That's sort of how my project is looking right now. I can definitely see the leafy pattern, but, blocking will DEFINITELY make this look better. I can't wait to finish. ^_^

This lace knitting takes up 100% of my concentration... so I can't knit while "watching my stories" like I can with most of my other projects. I decided that I needed a mindless WIP to have while traveling and sitting in front of some DVDs. That project ended up being a second Noro striped scarf.

It's still so magical to me... all the colors and the transitioning. Hahahaha. I was working on it yesterday and I ran into a few rows where both of the balls turned into brown-ish colors. o_O I didn't know what to do... I was considering cutting out the brown section on one ball, but, I really have difficulties ripping or frogging.. so, I just let it go. Hopefully the beauty of the rest of the scarf will drown out this one muddy patch.

I also wanted to share one of my only purchases from the Fiber Arts Fair thing from a few weeks ago. I ended up getting a skein of Briar Rose - Buff Beauty. It's a THICK single ply yarn. I seriously have to force myself not to try to take a bite out of it. o_O it's so springy and delicious.

I decided to knit a length-wise scarf with it. The recommended needles are a 13... but, after my first row I found it to be too tight. The resulting fabric was quite stiff, so, I switched to a 15. Of course, I didn't restart.. I just kinda switched right in the middle of my 2nd row. o_O But, you know me. I'm a bit afraid that my scarf won't be thick enough now... but, we'll see.

I'll be going to Stitches Midwest on Sunday. Just for the market... no classes for me. I'm gonna take a guess and say I'll be the only shaved-bald Asian/Filipino boy there, if you see me say hi! =) I'm not sure which project I'll be bringing to work on... I'm leaning towards the Noro scarf though.

mmm, knitting

2007-07-29T23:05:00.000-05:00

I knit up the Anthropologie-Inspired Capelet the other week. It was really quick, took about 3-4 days at about 2-3 hours a day. I used a yarn from Joann's Bellezza Collection. Starts with a "D"... very thick and soft. I didn't really have anyone in mind for the capelet, I just wanted to prove to myself that I could knit an actual garment--something that wasn't a scarf, hat, or accessory. I had my friend Lora try it on the other day and it fit fairly well so she will be the recipient once I wash and block it.

I originally began knitting with wooden straight needles (my favorite) but they soon became too full to hold all the stitches, so, I switched to my next longer needles which were aluminum. These were just toooo slippery for the yarn and it made knitting a bit of a challenge, but, in the end it was a fairly easy project.

That's my Tenorikuma... his name is Latte. Obviously an attention whore. A friend was telling me about a new Sanrio character months ago who supposedly was related to coffee (knowing how hard of a coffee addict I am). I finally hit up Gurnee Mills and stopped into the Sanrio store and fond the Tenorikuma... who supposedly work in coffee shops. The "leader" is Latte... who has a heart in his ear to distinguish him from the rest. Of course, I had to buy him.

On the subject of purchases... I FINALLY bought an interchangeable needle set. I'm so stubborn. I always said to myself that I wouldn't buy one because I love my wooden needles AND I prefer straights over circulars... but, in order to knit my current WIP I needed a size 9 circular with a relatively short cable. Of course none of the 4 stores I went to had any so I binged and bought a Boye set.

I'm surprisingly REALLY happy with my purchase. They are unbelievably useful and I feel like I'll never have to buy needles again ... well, except for maybe completing a set of DPNs. The case is great too, very not-girly which many knitting related supplies tend to lean toward... and it's all small and compact and well organized. I love it. =)

My current WIP is Coachella from knitty.com. It's part of my growth towards a full-on sweater. I actually feel like I'm ready to knit one. Ouuuu, big step. Coachella has been a breeze, a VERY easy to follow pattern. I've been working on it for maybe 5 days now with Lion Brand Cotton Ease. I'll hopefully be finished knitting by tomorrow or the day after.

The Cotton-Ease is interesting to work with. The yarn itself is very firm and thick and it holds stitch definition quite well. The drape seems to be a bit on the stiff side for a top, but, I'd actually like to see the garment on a person and then judge the drape for real.
I had this hat from H&M that I LOVE and I've been wanting to try to knit it, but I've never been able to find the right yarn. This Cotton-Ease is the perfect match. =)

^{get out of the way!}

That's how it's going. So, I still have to share my trip to the Folk and Fiber Arts Fair thingie from the other weekend and my collection of DS Lite cases. ^_^
Knit hard!

potter-crazed

2007-07-25T22:02:00.001-05:00

I managed to finish my Harry Potter scarf in time for the movie. I spent Monday and Tuesday frantically knitting, trying to surpass my one-stripe-a-day record. Tuesday night I passed out, exhausted with one and a half stripes remaining. I finished these on Wednesday morning, spent two hours weaving in ends o_O and tossed it in the washer.
I blocked it for a few hours and once I felt it was holding its shape I threw it in the dryer for a quick spin. I then began the surprisingly painful task of tassels. I pulled the last one through minutes before I had to leave for the movie, but, my scarf was done. It's seriously one of the best things I've knitted.

On a sad note, I ended up not wearing my scarf. The hardcore fans went at Tuesday, midnight... and none of the people in my packed theater were dressed in any HP garb. I felt a bit embarrassed. PLUS, my scarf is the older movie scarf... hahahaha. Oh well, I'll definitely be modeling it when it gets colder.

On the subject of FO's... I knit a Noro scarf a month or two ago. I saw brooklyntweed knit one and, as usual, I thought it was the coolest thing ever.

The striping and color changing is seriously magic. It was awesome knitting it, but, since I bought the Noro on-line I didn't get a good feel for the colors and I'm not too fond of the different combinations. I definitely plan to try this one again.

Ahh, Noro. This was actually my first experience, and, what a great experience. Well, ... it was surprising how many little twigs and things I found caught in the yarn... and Noro is definitely NOT the softest yarn, but, the colors are phenomenal.

Recently, after being doubly inspired by knitensity (http://knitensity.blogspot.com/) I finished the Anthropologie Inspired wrap/shrug deal... my first ever garment. It was REALLY fast, took about 3 days. AND, yesterday I cast on for Coachella.
Being that I'm not a girl, I'm having difficulties deciding on sizes, but, I have a few friends in mind. =) Pictures to arrive soon. Soon I will conquer the vest and ultimately a sweater.

it's been a while

2007-07-08T20:23:00.000-05:00

It has definitely been a while since I last posted. Summer has been extremely slow. The job hunt has been slow, knitting has been VERY slow, photography has been even slower, and the lack of any activity is now apparent in my blog. Sorry!
Hopefully things will start moving again.

I have much to share, but, for now I'll show you my current and most important WIP.
A Harry Potter scarf!

A few weeks ago I decided I'd knit a Gryffindor scarf for the opening of the new movie. On Saturday I had been working on the scarf for a week and a half and I was exactly half way done with my scarf. Pretty exciting. I checked my calendar and calculated that I had a bit less than a week left: 6 days to be exact to finish my scarf. I'd definitely have to up my pace, but, I figured I could do it.
While surfing the net I ran into an ad for the movie that said it opened on Wednesday the 11th. ... yeah... so, today being Sunday I'm left with only 3 more days to knit the second half, block, and add fringe. I'm a liiiiiitle scared.

I've decided to dedicate the rest of tonight towards knitting the scarf and hopefully I can get about 3-4 stripes done per day. I'd ideally like to finish the knitting by Tuesday so I can block overnight and add tassels on Wednesday before the movie. Hmm. I'll have to hope for the best.

In other news I was tagged for the weird things meme. Here's a quick list of mine:

1. This hasn't happened in a while, but, through most of HS and a few times in college I'll have a day where I have intense urges to make things on my body symmetrical. If I had an itch on my left ear and scratched it, I would have to scratch my right ear as well for balance. If I accidentally hit my left foot on a door frame I'd make sure to hit my right foot as well. It would just go on and on. During these days I'd also have a desire to touch certain points on the line of symmetry of my body. Mainly, the top, center of my head. The point between my nose and lips. My adam's apple. And somewhere near my xyzphoid process. o_O I'm glad those days are over, for the most part.

2. When I'm in bed I can fall asleep within 5-10 minutes. I've had this on-going "story"/"soap opera" in my head since my sophomore year of high school that i relive most nights before I knock out. It's my belief that I've subconsciously associated the fantasy with sleeping. 9 or so years later, all I have to do is pick up where I left off in the story the night before and a few minutes later I'll be asleep. Needless to say, the story doesn't get very far and I have a tendency to repeat part of the previous night's episode.

3. I like to shelter myself. I already know what I don't like and I'll do whatever I can to prevent myself from experiencing it. For example, I used to love getting scared watching horror movies in the theatre. But now, I know that not only will I be scared in the theatre--I'll be scared for at least the next five days. So I've stopped watching scary movies. I'll close my eyes and cover my ears if a preview for a horror film is on TV. If I'm reading a book and it is the least bit spooky I'll stop.
I also don't like to be sad or realize how twisted some people can be... to prevent myself from experiencing/realizing I don't watch the news.
Those are just two of many examples.

4. I don't mind doing things alone and in some cases I'd prefer it that way. I'm always eating alone in restaurants, watching movies alone, going shopping alone. Once in a while it would be nice to do those with someone, but, sometimes no one is available and I'm a big believer of indulging in your desires at the instant you have them. I hate grocery shopping with other people though. hahaha. Especially comparison shoppers. On my list of things I've done alone that actually made me feel lonely or self-conscious (meaning I'd rather not do them again) include going to great america alone AND riding rides, and going to the art institute alone.

5. When I'm nervous or uncomfortable I'll start finger spelling. Sign language, you know? Most of the time I don't even know what I'm spelling until I actually look at my hand or focus on what I'm doing. The word always comes from something I hear--maybe on the radio or in a passing conversation. I never spell words with double letters like "spoon" or "letters" or "moon" etc. unless it's an "L" like "hello". And it's mostly nouns or verbs but never proper nouns (aside from my name which I tend to finger spell even when I'm not nervous).

6. When I write in notebooks I never use the first two pages (sometimes even 3). This started originally from wanting to design a cover page and also form a table of contents after the notebook was filled. When I'm taking notes in a class, if any of the first 3 lines of the page looks messy or ugly or poorly written I'll restart my notes on a new page. If it gets messy further down in the page I ignore it.

7. If I'm eating something small that requires taking bites... like, a chicken nugget I have to finish what I start. If I take a bite out of a nugget put it down and it falls on the floor I have to pick it up and finish it. I freak out if someone else eats something I've taken a bite out of. With something big, like a burger, I can share... but I'd rather the person take a bite from an area that I had not previously taken a bite from. If I'm eating something smaller like, a potato chip, the chip that is in my hand moving towards my mouth must be eaten by me. If it falls in the mud I have to eat it. Crazy? Probably. I actually have an explanation for why I do this... but... explaining it would make me appear even more insane. Has a lot to do with un-fulfillment and mouth shapes.

So.. that's some randomness about me! I'll tag... whoever wants to share some of their craziness. ^_^ Now to my Harry Potter scarf.

recap!

2007-05-01T16:00:00.000-05:00

It's been over a week since my last post. Not too many FO's. I finished one Dashing in Malabrigo. It's part of a set I'm knitting for my cousin.

^{dashing in velvet grapes}

I LOVE Malabrigo. A friend of mine had a birthday party over the weekend. She really liked the pair of Dashing I had so instead of yet another pair I decided to try Fetching. I went to Wool & Co. to get some Debbie Bliss Cashmerino, but, they didn't have any. They did, however, have an ample supply of Malabrigo, so, I bought some in Pink Frost and Verde Adriana. I ended up knitting Fetching in the Pink Frost colorway with a few changes--the main one being I made the gloves significantly longer. Sadly, I was weaving in the ends as we were driving to her house so no pictures. =(

It was really sunny yesterday so I decided to take pictures of yarn I've recently acquired.

I bought this from the JoAnn store near my house during their huge closing sale. It was 50% off. It's Sensations: Bellezza Collection. It's so soft and luscious. I thought it'd make a decent pair of Fetching, but, I'm not sure about the gauge. I only have two balls so I'm a bit limited in what I can create, but, it's wonderful yarn. Wool, nylon, and cotton.

This is Bearfoot sock yarn. I lost the label for it so I went online to look up its information. Turns out you need US 1 or 2 needles. o_O I have no idea what "inspired" me to pick up this yarn, but, I'm very afraid. Four is seriously the smallest size I've used and the smallest size I own. Hmmm. I'll definitely try it, though. I wouldn't want it to go to waste. ^_^

And finally, my Malabrigo. This is my current Malabrigo stash in its entirety. The Verde Adriana is all the way on the left, you can see the leftover Pink Frost in a sad little heap on the right. Slightly above the Pink Frost is Saphire Magenta Gold. SO beautiful. The moment I saw it I had to buy it. I love the really contrast-y variegated colorways. I believe the rest have been featured on my blog at one point or another. =) It's good stuff, that Malabrigo.

There are a few more pictures on my flickr. You can see close ups of Verde Adriana and the Saphire Magenta Gold among other things.

I actually have nothing on my needles right now, but, on my to do list is the other Dashing, and the other sock (it's been so long, I forgot what size needles I used x_X).

Knit hard!

done! =)

2007-04-18T12:18:00.000-05:00

I finally finished! I'm having the hardest time remembering when I started... I know I purchased the yarn on a Monday and started the same night... I just can't remember when that was. Maybe 3 weeks ago? Not too long I suppose. I probably could've made it in less time, but, I didn't really put huge amounts of effort into finishing it.
About finishing--I still need to weave in the ends and block it, so I guess technically I have about 10% left. ^_^

^clapotis!

I've read that some people prefer the unblocked Clapotis. I was going to lean that way but my dropped stitch columns are all creased from originally being knitted. I'd rather have them completely straight. So, I will attempt my first blocking.
I bought a pack of glow in the dark straight pins yesterday. The Joann near my house is having a huge closing sale and these glow in the dark pins were the only pins they had left (aside from the safety variety). Their knitting section is pretty cleaned out. They're just left with really odd sized needles. They have many US 13 and 15 29inch circulars. o_O And a few US 35 and 50. All of the remaining yarn is fun fur and other novelty yarns.
Hmm, back to the pins. I decided to use them for the pictures and I found it surprisingly easy to pin the Clapotis to the carpet. I was always afraid that I'd have to buy one of those expensive blocking boards, but, the carpet works perfectly.

I'm considering knitting one for my mom for mother's day. I'm a little scared that I won't finish in time and I'm also afraid of Clapotis itself. Those straight rows really drive you insane. I originally loved dropping the stitches and unraveling them all the way down. But, it soon became very tedious. They didn't just drop, I had to separate them on each row. I guess I have a tendency to catch a few strands of a ply and knit into them. o_O There was a lot of breaking to be done to simply drop a stitch.

On the subject of Joann's closing. My cousins and I have been working on this scrapbook for our grandma. It's going to be her 80th birthday in 2 weeks. It's more of a family tree in scrapbook form. It's looking pretty good. We meet at Archiver's on Sundays to work on it and whenever I'm there I have a look around and I get so inspired to make a scrapbook of my own.
I bought a ton of supplies from Joann's. I've been there twice and I've easily spent $80 on close out sale items. Good deals. I spent another $25 on papers and things. So, I laid them all out yesterday (I had made a deal with myself: once I finish Clapotis then I can start scrap booking) and I realized that I have no pictures. I don't print any of the pictures I take. So, I ordered $50 worth through flickr.com and, now I'm waiting for them to arrive so I can finally start. ^_^

That's all for now. I'll hopefully find someone to model my completely blocked and finished Clapotis so that it doesn't look so throw-blanket-ish.
Knit hard!

make it clap?

2007-04-11T19:12:00.000-05:00

It started snowing here last night. It made me a little angry, but, at the same time I realized my knitted scarves, hats, and hand warmers will get another week of use. We received about 3 inches out where I live. Three very slushy inches. And it's April.
If this pattern continues then Vanessa Williams will be right--sometimes the snow does come down in June. o_O Too cheesy? Sorry.
I remember a 4^th of July as a kid. My cousins and I were running through the sprinkler in her front yard. It's hot and sunny, and, all of a sudden we get some cloud coverage and we hear thunder. It drizzles a little and we stay out only to be hit by hail 5 minutes later. They were about the size of throat lozenges. Good stuff.

Here are a few pictures of my Clapotis from last week. At this point in the pictures I think I dropped 5 stitches already; purposely of course. I think I'm finally happy with the choice of a solid color. The beautiful Clapoti (plural?) I've seen have been in really great variegated color ways and at first I felt like I might have made a bad choice, but, things are definitely looking better. Cascade 220 is some pretty good yarn.
I took the pictures while I was working on it at a local coffee place: Ravensheart.

^{nice and sunny. but freezing}

It was one of those days where it looked beautiful outside but the temperature was actually like 20 degrees.
When I was working Section 2 of Clapotis I had to break out all my larger sized stitch markers (the project calls for 18 in total). I had my original set from Zero made from beautiful olive green and light turquoise freshwater pearls. They went perfectly with the Clapotis. Sadly, I only had 7. However, I also had my glass bead set from Charles, but I only had 6 of them. I had to bust out with the cheap, thick, plastic Boye set. I used to think they were perfect for knitting since they were large and fit many needle sizes, but, once you start using them for smaller yarn and needles they leave gaps in your work because they're so thick. Of course, I decided to order another set from Zero. I ended up getting markers made of iolite stone and freshwater pearls. On a whim I bought a set of turquoise markers in a smaller size. =)

^{charles' and zero's markers}

Zero ships them out FAST. I received them in 3 days. ^_^
When I'm not working on Clapotis (which is rarely now 'cause I REALLY need to finish) I work on small quick projects. After making my original DS Lite case I decided I need a fancier one.Since the first was just plain stockinette I figured cables would be nice. I bought the Vogue Stitchionary Volume 1 (I LOVE IT) and I used the bamboo pattern from it to make the case. It was a really easy pattern to follow and I started changing it up a little to make the segments less uniform and brick like.

I knit it using Malabrigo in the Lettuce color. Cute? I like it, sadly, it's way too large. I was thinking of felting it just a little to shrink it down a little, but, I'm scared. I might just have to make another one in a smaller, tighter size.

Knit hard!

my sock (again)

2007-04-07T15:19:00.000-05:00

I was looking at my previous post and I realized that it was supposed to be about Calorimetry AND my first sock. Oops. =)

^{sockalicious!}

I've had this half desire to learn to knit socks. I wanted a pair, but, I really wasn't ready to work with such thin yarn. The smallest needle size I've used so far is a 6... well, technically a 4, but it was just an inch of ribbing on Odessa. But, on a recent trip to my LYS I ended up buying sock yarn because they didn't have what I was looking for (Debbie Bliss Cashmerino for a Fetching).
I decided to use Silver's Sock Class because I have heard endless praise. And, it was SO easy.

^{without a partner}

Sadly, I'm already suffering from SSS (second sock syndrome). It's been over two weeks since I knitted the first, and, I just have not had the desire to cast on for its brother. Hopefully once I finish Clapotis my second sock will come around.

Right before starting Clapotis I cast on for a second moss rib stitch scarf. It's looking okay so far. I havn't worked on it in a while, and, the color is pooling a little ... weird, but, it's Malabrigo and I love it.

^{mmmmMalabrigo}

That's about all I have for now. I took pictures of my Clapotis the other day as well as another FO and I hope to upload them to my computer soon. I also hope Clapotis finishes soon. o_O
I decided to spend a straight 3 hours at a local coffee place and just knit. When I knit at home I usually do it in front of the computer or with a DVD playing, and, that definitely makes me slower, so, I decided I'd get some repeats for the straight row section finished. Maybe even just finish the whole 3^rd section. After those 3 hours I only managed to complete 1 and a half repeats. x_X It's insane. I actually timed myself and found that it takes me a little less than 8 minutes to finish a whole row. There are technically only 107 stitches in a row... so, that's about 13 stitches/minute? wow, I'm slow. Well, there's definitely a lot of fussing... sometimes the stitches don't slide up the needle, and then my markers get tangled.. Hmm, I need to speed things up.

Knit hard!

calorimetry and a sock

2007-04-04T10:14:00.000-05:00

Clapotis has taken over my knitting life. The pattern is fairly simple and is made easier with the use of stitch markers, but, it's taking FOREVER. I think I'm almost halfway through. I'm on the 6th repeat of section 3. o_O I've already dropped a few stitches and it looks awesome. Knowing that I'll be dropping stitches in the near future is the only thing keeping me going. Sadly, though, I don't think my stitches are that even.
Did I mention what I'm using to make Clapotis? Well, it's Cascade 220 in this purple heather color. It's not too bad of a yarn and it's not expensive either. Although, WEBS is having a sale and their Cascade is going for $4.98/skein... I paid $7.50/skein. x_X Hopefully I'll have pictures soon.

In other news, I have a picture of the Calorimetry I knitted 2 weeks ago.

^{purple goodness}

This was knit with Malabrigo in the "faulty" Tortuga colorway.

^{hugging some starbucks}

I cast on 88 stitches instead of the recommended 120. People had been saying the finished object was huge and that the pattern stretches a lot... now, it's actually too small. Go figure. I have a feeling I'm a tight knitter because FO's always seem to end up smaller than what I expect. I'll probably make another one with the leftover yarn.

Hope you enjoyed this quick taste of my knitting. ^_^ More to come!

knit hard

dashing number 2

2007-03-28T11:00:00.000-05:00

I really enjoyed my first pair of Dashing so I decided to make another pair. This time I used Lion Brand Cashmere Blend. It turned out much softer and cleaner-looking.

Pretty? I love the color. Sadly, it doesn't work very well with my skin tone. =( Here are a few more pictures of Dashing.

^{my friend lora modeling dashing at work}

I have a few more finished objects to show you and one or two WIPs. I'll save those for another day. =)

Knit hard!

just a quickie

2007-03-22T22:20:00.000-05:00

since my last post i've finished a few more objects. i havn't taken pictures of them, but, i hopefully will get the chance tomorrow.

i've made another pair of Dashing but this time in Lion Brand Cashmere Blend. hmm, cashmere blend? sounds familiar. =)

one of the fastest things i've ever made is Calorimetry. i used Malabrigo in the Tortuga colorway. i looked up "tortuga" and i found it means "tortoise". my Malabrigo is varying shades of a purple-grey color. other skeins of Tortuga had greens in them which makes sense... so, i guess my skein was faulty. =( it looks good though, and it was a SUPER FAST knit. i still need to find a button for the attachment.

i started another moss rib stitch scarf in Malabrigo in the Solymar colorway. so far the color has been pooling weird, but, i'll keep going and hope it looks better.

i've really been at a loss for things to knit. i figured since i've done Dashing twice i might as well try Fetching so i went to my LYS looking for some Debbie Bliss Cashmerino. they had none so i browsed a bit more and finally decided that i would try to knit my first pair of socks. so, bought some superwash wool and i'll be getting started on that project tonight.

hopefully i'll be able to post pictures of my FOs and WIPs soon.

knit hard!

yarny

2007-03-15T22:37:00.000-05:00

Sorry about the lack of updates!

Knitting has been slowing down a little over here. I've decided to stop knitting scarves since the weather is getting warmer. Scarves were such a huge part of my knitting repertoire that now I have nothing to knit.

In my last post I had finished the ski hat with ear flaps. The fit was a little weird and the knitted fabric ended up being really thin so I decided to try again. This time I double stranded the yarn and added a few size changes.

^{new prototype!}

The flaps and the bottom inch and a half are ribbed. I double stranded Malabrigo (in Autumn Forest) and Rowan Yarns Silk Wool (leftover yarn from Odessa).
The middle section was Malabrigo and Wool Pak Yarnz (in Brownstone).
The top was just double stranded Malabrigo.
With all the changes the hat is now much thicker and much more fitted. I'm still not too happy with the ear flaps. No matter how much I adjust them to look more rounded instead of pointed the ribbing just pulls in and messes up the shape.

Because I had no idea what to knit I decided to try a pattern on-line for fingerless gloves. Knitty.com came out with their Spring 2007 issue and it had Dashing, a more male-friendly counterpart for their Fetching pattern.
I'm in love with Malabrigo and so I decided to use it for Dashing. The colorway I chose (Vaa) is a bit dark, and it's quite varigated so I paired it up with Catalina (a silk and wool blend). The Catalina was a solid lighter blue so I figured it would help balance the Malabrigo and help the cables visually pop out.

^dashing!

Dashing turned out pretty well. I had spent a whole night swatching Malabrigo + other yarns and when I finally got to the Catalina I got lazy and decided to just go for it with a size 8 needle. The fit turned out alright but it ended up being about 2~ inches longer than the pattern stated (I even left a few rows out!).
It knit up fairly quickly and it doesn't take much yarn (only about half a skein of Malabrigo!).

^{modeled by my friend kevin}

Isn't Kevin a great model? ^_^
He recently bought a Nintendo DS Lite. It's like the more current version of the Game Boy. He bought a case for it and was a bit disappointed because the case was very thin--not protective at all. So, he asked me to knit one for him.
I looked on-line for a pattern but the only nice one I found required some sort of Turkish Cast On using 2 24 inch circular needles in a size 8. I didn't have two... I didn't even have one... so I decided to create a pattern myself.

^DS!

It's a pretty basic pattern. I just knit two separate rectangles and left them on the needles. I used the 3 needle bind-off to connect the bottoms and then I just seamed up the edges. The yarn is Carron Simply Soft. It's a REALLY soft acrylic but acrylic and I don't really get along. It just seemed to want to stick to my wooden needles. o_O But, I finished and I'm happy with the results.

@nikki: My first Odessa I used Rowan Yarns Cashsoft (142 yards) and it took less than one ball. The second Odessa I increased the pattern a bit (to fit my big head) and used Rowan Yarns Silk Wool which only has 96 yards and I ended up needing about 7 more yards from a second ball to finish.

That's my update for now! Hopefully I'll find more things to knit soon.

a week of FOs

2007-02-27T23:19:00.000-06:00

I've been finishing a lot of my knitting these past few days. Surprisingly.
After finishing the scrunchable scarf last week I picked up the odessa I had CO for a week or so ago. Hats go super fast and I finished it. Unfortunately, like my first odessa, it's STILL too small for me. =(

^{my perfect odessa!}

I have a big head. x_X It has always been relatively large for my body. My cousin who used to babysit us when we were younger used to tell people who teased me that it was because I was very smart and had a big brain. =) I think, for the most part, I've grown into my head, but, when a hat says "one size fits all" it's usually wrong. For this green odessa I actually cast on an extra 10 stitches. Maybe, if I decide to knit it again, I'll add another 10... maybe even 20.

^{i love the greeeeen.}

After finishing Odessa I began extra work on My So Called Scarf. I finished off the rest of the first skein and from there it was a breeze. I wasn't so sure about the colors when I first started knitting. Kevin said they looked like "old lady colors" but, I'm pretty fond of them. I'd definitely like to do it in a lighter colorway, but, I'm quite happy with how it turned out.
Binding off was a bit difficult. I tried a few different combinations because a simple k1, pass previous stitch over bind off made the edge flare out. I ended up doing a k2, pass previous stitch over and it really kept the scarf straight.

^blue!

I think I want to block it. I'm not really sure exactly how to go about doing it though. It's a pretty long scarf and I've never really blocked anything before... but, we'll see.
The wool I used (Manos Del Uruguay) is surprisingly itchy. I've heard washing can soften everything, but, I'm not sure how to go about washing it either. My last washed object (scrunchable scarf) completely deflated and became flat--I would NOT want that to happen with this scarf.

^MSCS!

My cousin IM'd me the other day telling me that she read my blog and really liked my knitting. So, I offered to knit her something and she chose a hat. Specifically, a hat with ear flaps and a pom pom on the top.
A month or so ago I was looking at my little nephew's winter hat. It was a hat with ear flaps and a pom pom. The ear flaps were ribbed and the ribbing continued around for about 2 inches into the main body of the hat. I really liked the look of it so, unable to find a pattern, I altered a basic hat pattern and added ribbing.
I decided it would be best to do a prototype first, so I grabbed a skein of Malabrigo: Autumn Forest and knitted up my hat.

^{my own pattern!}

I feel like it needs a lot of changes. To start off, it's really thin. I think I'll have to double strand the one I make for her.
Second, despite all my calculations for the ribbing, it actually just disappears into the hat. I think I need to incorporate a color change.
I thought the earflaps looked small as I was knitting them, so, I kept adding more rows... after trying it on the earflaps were on my shoulders. x_X Those will definitely be altered.
I didn't make a pom-pom for this prototype, but, I'm assuming it should be relatively easy.
I also wanted to attach i-cord to the earflaps so they could be tied, but, I couldn't figure out how to do it. x_X We'll have to make another attempt soon.
The coolest thing about the hat though, is that I wrote out the pattern and knit it all in one night! Knitting stockinette in the round is awesome and superfast. =)

Knit hard!

oops, i did it again

2007-02-21T20:14:00.000-06:00

i've been telling some friends to deny me if i ask to check out a yarn store. i've been buying too much and i don't knit fast enough to use it.
so, over the weekend i hung out with lora. i havn't told her yet that i need to stop, so, of course i asked her to visit a store with me. i ended up buying 4 skeins of malabrigo in autumn forest and solymar. oops.

^mmmmalabrigo

my odessa hat is turning out perfectly. well, it was.
i figured that since the silk wool had less yardage than the recommended cashsoft i would need an extra ball. i "calculated" that once i get to the decreases i should be out of yarn.
i got to the decreases and i still had a good amount left, so, i continued.
not the smartest idea. i noticed that i was quickly running out of yarn but, since i had already started i tried to finish. instead of doing a decrease row followed by a regular-pattern row, i ended up doing consecutive decreases. well, i now need 6 more rows and i've completely run out of yarn. it's $10 for 94~ yards and i seriously only need about 7 of those 94. AND i'm supposed to be saving money. o_O
i was about to cut off my tail end and use it, but, my tail is only about 5 inches long. so, today i gave in and stopped in at my LYS and grabbed the last ball of silk wool in the green color.
i'm gonna have to rip back a few rows... well, i think i'll just tink x_X, but, i guess i'm "safe" now ... i just really didn't want to spend an extra $10 for maybe 7 yards of yarn.

oh well, .. i'm just happy that i havn't made any huge mistakes in this odessa.
here's a picture of the first one, btw.

i had cast on too few stitches in the beginning and didn't realize it until i had finished the ribbing and started the pattern rows. i figured i was too far into the project to frog.
i messed up on the pattern multiple times, and, i didn't really catch the mistakes until a few rows later when i realized my count was off. once again i figured i was too far from the mistake to rip back.
i started my decreases an inch and a half too early because i misread the instructions. and, as usual, i didn't rip back becuase i had already done a few rows of decreases.

so, i'm happy my green odessa is "perfect" right now and hopefully will end up wearable. =)

knit hard!

stitch markers?

2007-02-20T00:43:00.000-06:00

i recently purchased a few sets of hand crafted stitch markers from artists on-line. i'd been using this set of thick plastic stitch markers from boye. they worked fine for large needles and thick yarn, but when i used them for smaller needles they left gaps between my stitches. =( but, now i have replacements that fit better and also look much more beautiful.

the first two sets are from charles. he was selling his stitch markers to help with AIDS/Life-Cycle so i bought them to support. ^_^

^{glass beads!}

he shipped them really fast! and they look and feel really great.

^{i think the blues are my favorite!}

i've been somewhat addicted to etsy.com lately. through flickr i see artists who dye their own wool put up pictures in the "crazy for knitting" group. i followed a few links to their own etsy shops and it's fascinating to see all the different handmade arts and crafts people put up there.
i recently found someone selling stitch markers made of freshwater pearls. i thought they were beautiful and i liked the idea that they were made of something "natural" as opposed to my set of plastic markers. the following are from zer0 markers.

^{pearls in shades of green}

zer0 markers also shipped really fast. they even included two business cards each with a stitch marker attached. the markers weren't as large as i thought they would be, but i think i definitely got what i paid for. ^_^

^colors!

i recently finished my malabrigo scrunchable scarf. i made it for a friend and so i decided to wash it in order to remove the malabrigo-vinegar-smell.
well... the smell disappeared but now the scarf isn't as soft and fluffy. i think i may have washed it wrong? or maybe i smooshed it too much when i dried it in a towel? i dunno... it's a little upsetting, but, at least the colors are still bold and it retained some of its softness.
since i finished a project i decided to continue with my 2nd odessa hat. my first one was a HUGE disaster. i didn't cast on enough stitches, i didn't knit the hat long enough, and i kept making mistakes. o_O, but, with my current hat everything seems to be going smoothly.

^{odessa! and a stitch marker to indicate the rounds}

instead of the recommended cashsoft yarn i'm using rowan yarn: silk wool. it's the same weight but significantly less yardage. i'm almost done with the first ball and i havn't even started the decreases. x_X i'll probably buy another one tomorrow.

^{i think the inside of odessa looks as cool as the outside}

that's all for now! happy knitting.

smoooth

2007-02-14T16:44:00.000-06:00

i wish i could knit faster. i have so much yarn and so many patterns i want to try out, but, i knit too slow. the scrunchable scarf has been a WIP for more than a week now.
i think i need to dedicated time solely to knitting. for some reason i can't just sit and knit... i have to be watching TV or a movie, or maybe reading, or at the very least drinking coffee. hmm. we'll sort this out so i can move on to more projects.

^{scrunchable! almost done.}

my current largest project is My So Called Scarf. i originally bought two skeins of Manos Del Uruguay colorway 118: mulled wine. it was my first encounter with manos at a yarn store and they didn't have a large selection.
when i got home i realized that the two skeins were distinctly different. same colorway but, one was more saturated and the other was lighter and less saturated. so, i figured i'd need to knit from both and alternate skeins every other row.
i ended up pulling the "swapping side" too tight and my scarf started curving and puckering. so, i quit. it wasn't really a color that i would wear... and My So Called Scarf is REALLY hard to frog for some reason. i decided i would get 2 new balls of manos in another colorway.

^{manos, oh, manos}

i visited a new yarn store recently and found a HUGE selection of the varigated manos. i took my time and found 3 colorways i really liked. and then i spent another good 10 minutes comparing skeins to see which colorway had 2 almost identical skeins. i ended up with #110: stellar.
since they were so similar i figured i could knit from one and then attach the second at the end. it's been going pretty good so far, but, just to be safe, i've decided to start knitting from both (the first ball is about half way done).

^stellar!

i've had major difficulties with MSCS. i've probably frogged stellar 4 times already. the edges always turn out wonky for me, nothing smooth and straight. i tried altering the pattern for a selvage edge. basically i added one stitch to each side so i could always slip the first stitch and knit the last. that actually stood out a lot from the pattern so i frogged that. i wanted something that wouldn't be too noticable.

what i FINALLY ended with was slipping the first and last stitch of the knit row. it's working out really well.

i bought stitchionary volume one the other day. i love it. i've been testing out different patterns on my amber gold malabrigo. it's definitly going to be a scarf, but, i havn't really settled on a pattern just yet. i'll keep testing though!
here's the malabrigo in its current condition: a slip stitch pattern (strangely the slip stitch pattern wasn't from stitchionary).

^{i love gold}

so, that's what things are looking like for me right now. i think i'll be able to finish the scrunchable scarf by tonight and i've casted on for another odessa but i promised myself i wouldn't work on it until i finished a project.

moss rib stitch pattern for malabrigo!

2007-02-07T00:14:00.000-06:00

People have been asking for the moss rib stitch pattern for the scarf I made in mmMalabrigo. The scarf was actually shown to me by the not-so-LYS salesperson after I had asked her for recommendations for a pattern in the very varigated charrua colorway. It was actually knit in a darker color of Malabrigo but it still looked very cool. A tag was attached to the scarf so she went to the back and made a copy of the pattern.

I don't really know who the pattern belongs to (although the tag has the name "Kathy" scribbled on the side), but, since it was shared with me for free I'll share it with you! =)

The original pattern called for 2 skeins, but, since I only purchased one I changed the CO number as follows:

moss rib stitch scarf in malabrigo worsted

#10 needles

CO 24 stitches

Row 1: sl1k, k2, *p1, k3* across row to last stich, p1
Row 2: sl1k, k1, *p1, k3* across row to last 2 stitches, p1, k1
Repeat rows 1 & 2 to desired length.

To Bind Off:
With right side facing (Row 1):
BO in pattern but in each "K3" section k2tog once to prevent ruffling of the edge.

So what I did was:
sl1k, k1, ppso (pass previous stitch over), k1, ppso, *p1, ppso, k2tog, ppso, k1, ppso* p1, ppso

If you decide to use 2 skeins the pattern says to CO 32 stitches.

Happy Knitting!

mmmMalabrigo

2007-02-05T23:31:00.000-06:00

i am now officially obsessed with Malabrigo. it comes in such beautiful colors and it's so unbelievably soft. mmmm.

last week i went on a spontaneous trip out to evanston to check out their yarn stores. i brought kevin along with me. after a strange mix-up we got to closeknit and took a look around. i didn't really see anything that was really grabbing me. i wanted something REALLY thick in blues and browns. i had seen a scarf on grey's anatomy that i loved and wanted to make.

sadly, i couldn't find yarn that i wanted so i settled on this blue varigated wool. at this point kevin had become impatient and really wanted to leave. so, i had the hank wound into a nice ball and went to leave.
as i turned around to shut the door behind me i noticed a few skeins of yarn sitting on a table. my eyes moved to the tag and i read malabrigo. i made a grabbing motion towards it but at the next moment kevin pulled me out of the door.

the rest of our time in evanston was spent walking around, eating, and exploring. the whole time i couldn't get malabrigo out of my head. i've read SO much about it and i really wanted to get a feel. so, i finally asked kevin if i could go back. he agreed to wait in the car while i bought my yarn.

there wasn't a lot to choose from. only a few single skeins of random colors. i noticed glazed carrot, sunset, lettuce, and indigo. i went for the glazed carrot. when i got to the front i noticed they had a few more skeins at the counter. i asked if they were for sale and lady said yes and that they had just recieved a new shipment. she went to the back and brought out bags and bags of new malabrigo for me to look at. it was bliss. i ended up buying charrua and vaa.

^{charrua: browns and blues}

^{vaa: blues}

i LOVE them. the yarn store woman also gave me a copy of a pattern for a moss rib stitch scarf. i decided to give it a try. the pattern calls for 2 skeins of malabrigo but i only purchased one in each color. so, instead of CO 32 stitches i did 24. i ended up with a good 63 inches.

^{malabrigo charrua scarf in moss rib!}

i've been watchin the knitting help forums often and they had been recommending the scrunchable scarf pattern to use with malabrigo so i figured i should try it out. a few days later i returned to closeknits in evanston to buy 3 more skeins in tortuga, velvet grapes, and lettuce.

i decided to take another trip to some new yarn stores. i really like to drive out and find shops that carry a decent selection and have great customer service. i've been looking for some manos del uruguay yarn in any of their varigated patterns and i managed to find some. i also found a shop with MORE malabrigo at a cheaper price than i had originally bought it at. so i ended up getting 2 skeins of amber gold. beautiful!

for the scrunchable scarf i ended up using velvet grapes.

^{scrunchable scarf in velvet grapes}

i'm not too fond of the pattern. i definitly like the moss rib stitch more, but this is still pretty decent. i like how it causes the columns of stockinette to tilt a little on their side. but, what i like about the moss rib is that each column of stockinette has a decent amount of space in between, it's even on both sides, and it creates deep channels. here's a close-up.

^{reminds me of pebbles or cobblestone}

well, that's my deal with mmmMalabrigo. if you havn't knit with it yet you should definitely try it.

^{mmmmmmmalabrigo!}

wind it up

2007-01-18T17:17:00.000-06:00

the other night, with a lot of assistance from the knittinghelp.com video, i managed to wind my very first center pull ball.

^{soon to be a scarf}

i've been wanting to knit a hat with ear flaps for a while now. i found a relatively easy pattern on knittinghelp.com and i started it two nights ago. the yarn i used is called Wool Pak Yarns. it's 100% new zealand wool. the label actually had no gauge or needle reccomendations. x_X i had asked the woman working at my LYS and she suggested a size between an 8-10.
i was REALLY excited to knit the hat, but, unfortunately i didn't have a short circular and dpns in any of those sizes... so i used the closest one i had: a size 11.
i figured that if i knit very tight then everything should be fine.
the hat turned out HUGE.

^{my sidekick and the hat for scale purposes}

i finished knitting it last night and decided i would shrink the hat in my sink. i spent the next half hour agitating the piece with my hands in the hot hot hot water. my first experience with felting! it dried pretty quickly, and, the size right now is actually quite nice... but... now the hat is felted and... i sort of don't like it anymore. =( the pattern suggests a crochet border... i think that would help the overall look of the hat, but, i don't know how to crochet. oh well, i'll see what i can do with it soon.

my (current) stash

2007-01-14T21:57:00.000-06:00

here are a few pictures of my recent purchases:

this is an alpaca - silk blend... i think it wants to be a scarf. it's so soft and i love the color. i have a feeling i should've bought more though... it's only about 200 yards.

i... umm... i don't really know what this is. and i'm having major issues with it. i bought it from the yarn.com year-end sale. it looked different in the pictures and it called for a size 9 needle. the actual yarn label asks for a size 4. hmmm. it's all various man-made materials so i'm not sure what i'll be knitting with it. maybe i'll combine it with a more natural yarn.

i love this stuff! ... i'm also imagining a scarf. =) and i'm also feeling like i, maybe, should've purchased more... hmm.

just some colorful ribbon... i honestly have no idea what to do with it. but, it was on sale so i bought it. o_O

varigated yarn! i'm thinking a scarf for this too. hahahahaha. not too sure on the pattern though.

my current stash on the ironing board.

gotta blog

2007-01-10T00:46:00.000-06:00

here's some of my current knitting. hahaha.
due to the ... rush of christmas and the time-consuming nature of knitting... i was unable to take pictures of the 10+ scarves i had knitted. most of the scarves were completed within the same day of seeing the recipient. in the case of the cousin's secret santa... christie was downstairs while i was locked in my room finishing and then wrapping her 2nd scarf. hahaha.

^{i can knit cables!}

i took pictures of all the yarn i've been purchasing... i'll be posting the pictures soon of my stash soon! i recently found the odessa hat pattern. i actually had a ball of the cashsoft dk so... i decided to give it a try. i actually messed up in the beginning. instead of CO 110 i only did 105. the base of the hat is ribbed in groups of 5 (k3, p2) so i didn't notice my mistake until the first row of pattern which works in groups of 10. x_X on my second row i decided to randomly make 5 stitches to fill the void. it definitly messed up the flow from the ribbed edge to the pattern... but, hopefully it will look alright in the end.

^{the starting of a hat}

tastes like... licorice

2006-11-21T23:53:00.000-06:00

thanksgiving kinda ... sprung up on me pretty fast. but, it'll be here in two days. i splurged on yarn AGAIN. i've been keeping my eye out for good sales and now when i see a sale i feel like i HAVE TO make purchases. i need help. hahaha.
went to joann's last night and ended up buying this really cool looking "licorice" yarn.

it was on sale and very appealing to me. i wasn't too sure what exactly was gonna happen with the yarn but, now i think it'll turn into a scarf for joe. hahaha, it's kind of on the verge of excessively funky, so, ... eh, who knows. if he likes it then i'll give it to him. ^_^

^{my first time using seed/moss stitch... and, i really don't know what it looks like 'cause the yarn is so weird}

the bears are so hot now in their 9-1 glory. hahaha. yay bears. kevin and i went to kevin's condo to "watch" the game. we arrived with like.. 5 minutes left. lol. so, we chilled and caught up on the office. sherry made these awesome carrot cake cupcakes. mmmm, and then i got to watch her crochet a little. crocheting looks SO cool, i gotta learn. she's gonna teach me and i'm gonna teach her to knit. fun.

i started knitting the cashsoft yarn. it feels so delicious in my fingers. hahaha, a very.. odd but blissful experience. while i was @ border's with kevin the other day i ran across this pattern for a broken rib knit. it looked cool so i tried it on the cashsoft. it actually cause the sides to roll in. =( so, i unraveled the few inches i had and attempted to adjust the pattern a bit to hopefully reduce curl-age... but, no luck. now the scarf is about 8 or so inches long and it STILL curves, but, i don't have the heart to unravel it and try something else. so, i'll stick with this and try to block it later.

^{merino wool - microfiber - cashmere blend. mmmm.}

i ordered my first yarn from on-line the other week. it came in yesterday. very exciting. hahaha. i saw this pattern on-line for a scarf with kind of a sideways V design on it. the pattern called for this really expensive brand of yarn and... i wasn't about to spend $15+ on one ball. so, during my random surfing i came across yarn.com and they were having a sale of a very similar yarn. and then i bought it. ^_^

^{i love how it changes from thick to thin!}

at joann's yesterday i picked up a set of crochet hooks and these wool needles. the crochet hooks are for if i accidently drop a stitch and the needles are for 'sewing' in the ends of my scarves. so, i finally finished-finished the scarf i made for anne. basically spent like half an hour trying to comb out the tangled "eyelashes" and then a few minutes weaving in the ends. and i ALSO finished the blue scarf with the self-striping yarn.

^{modeled by my friend mochi}

hung out with kevin on saturday and he strangely agreed to go to one of the yarn shops in his town with me. it's called knit whiz. hehehe. the people there were really friendly and they use this system to track your purchases.. so, if you need more of a certain type of yarn they know what it is and also what dye lot it's from. also, they track your needles so that they can let you know if you already own a certain size. ... definitly something i could've used. (i have three sets of 7's!)
while we were there kevin helped me pick out this sexy navy blue yarn. ouuuu... i wonder who it's for.. ^_^

^{100% merino wool}

i am completely obsessed with knitting. i need some knitting/crocheting buddies!

i got the remedy

2006-11-17T06:53:00.000-06:00

i've been wanting to update for a while now, but, i always feel like i need pictures to accompany each blog. sadly, the weather has been pretty crappy and thickly overcast so i didn't really have a chance to take any good pictures. today was a bit different, mostly cloudy, but once in a while the sun would find it's way through. i snapped some shots of my current works-in-progress and a few of my recent yarn purchases. ^_^

this is the blue yarn with the splotches of color in it. i've been knitting a really thin scarf in 1x1 ribbing.

^{i want to run my clippers over it to get rid of those little tiny strands}

i realized earlier that i had not been to borders in a loooong time. it use to be one of my regular nightly stops. but then... i'm not sure what happen. for now i'll blame the sims, heroes v of might and magic, the fall season's tv line-up, and knitting. i made an attempt to go last night but ended up walking in at 10 minutes before closing so i grabbed a coffee and left.
i went tonight and collected a few knitting books to read and bought a gingerbread latte. mmm. (it comes with a mini gingerbread cookie!). as the barista was ringing me up he saw my books and asked if i was paying for them now. i explained that i would just be looking through them. he nodded and then asked if i knew how to knit. and so, we ended up having this whole knitting conversation for like.. 5 minutes and we traded patterns. hahahaha. i'm such an obsessed loser. but, yay, i met a knitter outside of the gifted purl... AND it was a male knitter.

yesterday's purchase from the gifted purl: 2 balls of "cashsoft". it's a blend of merino wool, microfiber, and cashmere. mmmm, so soft. hahaha, and it will soon be turned into a scarf.

^{the tag didn't have a color name, but, it's a very light grey}

i finished watching the lord of the rings trilogy last night. i started on monday night. when i first watched it many years ago i thought i had the jist of what was going on. frodo got the ring and had to destroy it while a war was going on. but there were so many names thrown around that it was kinda hard to follow. not to mention a lot of the humans kinda looked the same with their rather long redish-blondish-light-brownish hair and full-on beard and moustaches. after this recent viewing, though, i feel like i have a much better grasp of middle earth and the conflicts. lord of the rings is a fricken awesome movie. hahahaha. and it makes for good knitting time too.

this tweed is driving me insane. i dont' know what to do with it. i started working this 2x2 rib. i had to make it on the thin side 'cause i only had one skein but now it's just... too thin. and it's chunky-looking and itchy and hard. =( maybe i'll turn it into a set of coasters. o_O

^{a sad attempt at a tweed scarf}

i think my car needs new brake pads. x_X it had been making these squealing noises for the past few months now... and umm, someone once told me that those noises mean that your brake pads need replacing. well, today i discovered that the squealing noises have seemingly died down while in reality they're just being covered up by this scary grinding noise which i'm assuming is the brakes scraping the wheel sans brake pads. yeah, let's fix that tomorrow.

last week i finished anne and kevin's scarves. they're cool. sorta. hahaha. kevin's ended up being really... plain. and i felt bad so i'm making him another one. stripe-y in these hot colors:

and here's a picture of anne's "finished" scarf. i have to like.. comb the mfer out with velcro or something cause most of the furry-fuzziness is caught in the stitches.

i decided that i'll be giving out the scarves and soon as they're done in order for the recipient to maximize usage. hahaha. so, anne, if you're reading this... i have a surprise for you! lol.

that's all for now!

2006-11-10T23:48:00.000-06:00

bought more yarn today. i was feeling like my selection @ michael's was really limited. no really great quality stuff. so, i did a search last night for yarn stores in my area and found one (the gifted purl) just a few miles down the road. managed to free up some time to check it out. it's not a huge store but it's such a ... small, personal shop. right when i got in the owner came up to see if i needed help and asked me about knitting. told her that i was making scarves for friends and that i only recently learned to knit. so, she pointed me towards good scarf-yarn. ^_^ she was really open for questions so i asked her anything that crossed my mind and she had all the answers. awesome store.

i ended up buying two balls of this blue yarn with a few brown/orange sections. it supposedly creates really interesting stripes at random times during the knitting.
i also spotted this really interesting looking dark grey tweed. it has the tiniest flecks of white and red and orange and a little green and light blue in it ... i really should stop buying the grey colors.. but... for some reason they appeal to me the most. i think i'll use the tweed for idyl's scarf. ^_^

here's a picture of my current unused balls.

on the left is the blue with the orange-y sections. the middle is gold lattice. originally i was gonna pair it with the black chenille in the back.. but.. umm... after testing it out it kinda looked really gross... so, no idea what's gonna happen with that. right behind the lattice is the tweed and then the chenille on top of it.

i bought this fluffy white yarn and this light blue "eyelash" yarn and i've been knitting them together for anne's scarf. it's been going fast and i'm over a third done. so, next post i'll take pictures of my work in progress.

^{ouuu, the blue and the tweed.}

as you can tell, knitting has all but consumed me. hopefully i find another obsession soon.

dickie knits!

2006-11-09T01:24:00.000-06:00

i've rediscovered my lost love for knitting and so i'm starting a knitting blog. when i learned last year i actually never created anything functional. my first piece was this blue scarf... it was more of a test piece i suppose, a lot of trying out knits and purls and knit/purl combos. it ended up really ... ugly.
after the blue scarf i found this really fuzzy multi-toned dark yarn and knitted with it in a very well maintained stockinette stitch. i ran out of yarn during the project and couldn't find another ball of the same color and had to end it early. o_O so, i have this... umm, half scarf deal.
the next yarn i got was this simple thin grey color. i decided to go for ribbing and created this knit two - purl two pattern. i was doing really well and then maybe after about knitting a foot of scarf i made a huge mistake. at the time i didn't have surgical repair skills so, i quit.

i think i picked up knitting again maybe 2 and a half weeks ago. my skills have improved after watching on-line demonstrations. good stuff. so, i've decided to knit my close friends scarves this christmas. i'm obviously still stuck at a beginner's basic rectangle level, and, scarves are the only cool thing i can think of to knit that has four right angles.

since today was such a great day i decided to binge on yarn and new needles and to take pictures of my current work.

^{this is the scarf i finished last week. it's a k1p1 ribbing on size 15 needles. scarves are never long enough for me. not that i'm super tall or anything, but, i really like my scarves to hang low after i've wrapped them around my neck. so, i knitted this one extra long.}

^{a close up of the ribbing.}

the next pictures are of the scarf i'm working on for kevin cristi. i dragged him out to michael's so he could pick the yarn he wanted. he asked for a thinner scarf.

^{just a simple garter stitch on size 7 needles.}

^{i call these needles "blue steel". hehehe.}

the next scarf i just started today. for picture purposes. hahaha. i bought this orange yarn the same time i bought the dark grey one for my scarf. i was hoping of using them together in some sort of stripe pattern. but, that ended up being too complicated for my basic skills.

^{this is also a garter stitch. pumpkin colored on size 15 needles.}

^{i love these needles. they're made of bamboo. ouuuuu.}

that's all for now. i bought yarn today for lora's and anne's scarves... but, i'm gonna hold off on casting on until i finish kevin's. =)

anyone wanna knit with me?