April 11, 2007

make it clap?


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 4th 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.

clapotis4
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. =)

clapotis3
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.

dsbamboo1


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.

dsbamboo2


Knit hard!

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Thanks for the comment on my stitch markers on my blog. You should really write up your pattern for the DS lite case and submit it to either knitty or magknits.

Let me know your favorite color and I'll make you a set of stitch markers to use. YOu can privately send me your address so I can mail them to you when I'm done.

amy said...

Hey there... you know, you're an amazing knitter. I'm seriously impressed. You say in your profile that *one day* you'd like to knit a sweater, but honestly, it'd be a piece of cake for you.

Have you felted much? I don't mean to tell you anything you already know, so forgive me if I do. I'm just asking because while sometimes lightly felting an item can snug it to just the right size, it might not be the right option for your DS Lite case. Felting usually shrinks the item more from top to bottom than sideways. So you might find that your case is shorter but no narrower (in addition, of course, to blurring the beautiful pattern you've knitted into it.)

I tried felting a sweater I knitted a long time ago, because it was just way too huge, but ended up with a short, wide, stiff, horrible thing that needs to be turned into a cushion.

Keep up the great knitting!
-amy

earthchick said...

Cute stuff!