kmkat and her kneedles

Commenters, step forward!

My stats say that this blog gets 75 - 100 page views every day. But I get five comments per post, tops. Perhaps it's my subject matter? On the rare occasional that I blog about knitting, the comment count rises a bit.

Okay, let's talk knitting.

Back in the summer, when I got really, really, really sick of knitting fingerless gloves, I cast on a couple other projects. One is now finished, the other still OTN. We'll talk about that one another day.

Pattern: Multigrain.
Yarn: Shibui Knits Pebble (light fingering: 48% silk, 36% merino, 16% cashmere), Shibui Knits Silk Cloud (laceweight; 60% mohair, 40% silk), and Shibui Knits Cima (laceweight; 70% alpaca, 30% merino).
Needles: US#6

I saw this pattern in an email from the Yarnery, a LYS in St Paul, and it grabbed me. The pattern is nothing special -- cast on 70 st holding two strands of laceweight together and work seed stitch until forever. 

But the yarn! the yarn! The Silk Cloud is similar to Kid Silk Haze but much softer, more like angora. The Cima is lovely stuff, too; the Pebble, meh. Section one is two strands of Pebble, section two is one strand of Pebble held together with one strand of Cima, section three is two strands of Cima, section four is one strand of Cima held together with one strand of Silk Cloud. And so on, seven sections in all.

When I started this it was going to be for me, but somewhere along in the process I decided that it will be a Christmas present for Elder Son's next-door neighbor who has been so very helpful and friendly to him and to us. 

That is the good news. Now for the bad.

As the project went on... and on... and on, I started to screw up the seed stitch. One mistake every 12" or so was okay, it wasn't that noticeable, yada yada. But then the mistakes started happening more often until it was nearly impossible to ignore them.

Then I bound off. 

 
Please excuse my feeble attempt to combine the two photos.
It was impossible to get back far enough to get the entire scarf
in one shot without climbing into the laundry sink.

Yes, one end flares a bit, although perhaps not quite as much as it looks like here.

The error I want to call to your attention is at the bottom of the scarf. Each section should be ten inches (that's 25 cm for those of you counting anywhere else in the world), and each of the first five sections are, indeed, ten inches long. 

Section six and seven, not so much.

 

And then there are all those seed stitch errors. Happily, they are in the last two sections -- the ones I will have to frog and reknit.

I am not going to point them out. Just know that most of those irregularities
will not block out. Because they are seed stitch errors.. 

 

What was I thinking? I remember carefully measuring every section as I went along. Early onset Alzheimers, I guess...

It was 20 40 years ago today!

(Listen to it twice. PRESTO! 40 years.)

 

So we celebrated. I got out our wedding album, and we and Younger Son looked at the pictures of the day. Then we listened to Billy Idol singing White Wedding while we ate our pancakes and bacon.

In the 20 seconds it took me to get the wedding album, Ser Percy found my yarn.

That's most of two skeins of Shibui Silk Cloud; 60/40 mohair/silk. 
 Have you ever untangled Kid Silk Haze? This is the same, only silkier.

I am making a Multigrain scarf* as a Christmas present for Elder Son's next-door neighbor, who has been such a good friend and helper and welcomer to him in Sioux Falls. (I almost said "elderly neighbor", but then I remembered that she is only a couple years older than I. Oops.)

 

We cover the entire spectrum of music.

 

 

* I just rechecked the pattern. I think I may have only gotten 2 skeins of Pebble instead of 4 as required. Another order going in. Damn. 

What did you knit on your road trip, Kat™?

I started the Ann Arbor/New York trip with:

• a second sock OTN:
• the linen stitch scarf OTN:
• a cake of yarn for a second cowl like this one.

In a fit of unbridled optimism I also brought along the Fairfield sweater, which had been in time out for a week or two due to its sleeves nasty state of not having enough stitches at the beginning of the armhole shaping. And I also brought along yarn for another pair of socks -- just in case of being stranded on a desert island.

I arrived home with a finished pair of socks (just in time; the trip lasted longer than I had packed for and I wore these socks IMMEDIATELY), a finished linen stitch scarf, a finished cowl, and a good start on a third cowl, using the yarn I had brought along for socks.

The finished socks:

 

Oh, dear. Let's play a rousing game of "Find The Dropped Stitch", shall we?

Must fix.

Yarn: Lang Jawolle Color Superwash, color 8288, about 1.5 skeins, acquired in a destash from Lorette. Contrasting heels and toes are some unknown superwash contributed when I begged for sock yarn for my afghan.
Pattern: Plain vanilla, using, as always, Wendy's Generic Toe-Up Sock Pattern; 60 st.
Needles: Knitters Pride Karbonz circs. Feet, US#0; legs, US#1.5. 

 

The linen stitch scarf, unblocked:

Remember how I mentioned that two-stitch patterns give me fits? Here is the linen stitch scarf with visible errors highlighted. You can be sure there are other oddities hidden in the folds. I am relying on the trotting galloping horse theory of errors.

 

Yarns: Lang Jawolle Superwash Solids, oxford gray (83.0003) and light gray (83.0085); Marks & Kattens Fame Trend, color 662.
Pattern: Linen Stitch Scarf by Matthew Hesson-McGinnes. There are any number of patterns for this scarf. I picked this one because 1, it didn't have fringe, and B, it was free.
Needle: Knit Picks Options Interchangeable Rainbow Wood, US#9. I think these needles had a different name when I bought them.
Notes: The pattern calls for a US#8 needle, but I preferred the fabric I got when using the US#9. Knitter's choice. Also, bigger needle = less knitting = sooner done.

 

Cowl The Second:

Yarn: Lisa Souza Sock! Merino; colorway Appaloosa. Searching the blog reveals that I never told you about this yarn. This was a special colorway being sold as an online fundraiser for an equine rescue organization. As a member of board of my local humane society AND a knitter, how could I NOT buy a skein?
Pattern: Willow Cowl.
Needle: Signature US#5.
Notes: After wearing Cowl The First so much this past winter I decided I wanted the next one to fit a bit more snugly. I did some extra decreases in the stockinette sections on this one, but I overdid it. Cowl The Second may be a little too snug for indoor wear. It will be perfect to wear instead of a scarf when the temp is <0˚F.

 

Cowl The Third:

Yarn:  Schachenmayr Nomotta Regia Linien Color.
Pattern: Willow Cowl.
Needle: Signature US#5.
Notes: I followed the pattern on this one.

Question: Why did I change my mind and make a cowl from this yarn, which had been destined to be a pair of socks? 
Answer: I was working on Cowl The Second one day on the trip when we were chatting with Smokey's cousin and her husband. She asked about my knitting. As we all know, anyone who expresses any interest in an objet d'knit is fair game. This cowl is for her. 

I did not touch the Fairfield sweater on the entire trip. It is still in time out, although I have figured out my next step.

Tomorrow we see what I started (and finished!) since we got home.

WIP Wednesday.

Here we have the linen stitch scarf as it existed on Monday afternoon. You may be surprised at how little it has grown since last you gazed upon it. This is because I frogged the @#^#$% thing and started over. Multiple times. I'm pretty sure what we have here is what will become -- someday -- the finished product.

I can knit complicated cables and I have knit a lace shawl [pretty much] to perfection. But give me a two-stitch pattern and it gives me fits. *K1 sl1* and repeat from * across? *K2tog YO* (ditto)? I can screw those up seven ways to Sunday.

I think the problem is that the stitch almost mindless, the key word here being "almost". My needles are flying while I am binge-watching House on Netflix as I did last weekend (more on that later), and bango! Suddenly the stitches are not lining up the way they ought. What has helped on this iteration is leaving all the markers on the needle. Every 20 stitches I have a badly needed reality check.

* * * * *

You may remember I mentioned that Yarnover was last weekend. Tragically, I caught the cold that Younger Son had generously shared with Smokey, and I felt way too wretched to venture out in public, not to mention I would have been sharing my disgusting germs with a couple hundred knitters and other fiber folk. So I spent the weekend alternately sleeping and grumping and binge-watching the aftermentioned House. 

When I mentioned to YS what I had been watching, he looked askance.

"Can't you sum up the plot of that show in a four-panel cartoon?" he asked.

He may be right, but it wasn't until episode 10 or 11 that I felt the writers were slipping a little. Besides, Hugh Laurie is a fabulous actor, and I found myself admiring Dr. Cuddy, the female director of medicine. She continually spars with House but respects him for his abilities. Don't know how far I will go with the series, but it certainly kept my mind off my miseries last weekend.

Springing Sunday.

As usual, first you get the mutterings.

1. Steady :: boyfriend.
2. Sleep :: deprived.
3. Thumb :: and forefinger.
4. Straighten :: up.
5. Wake up! :: NO!
6. Diminish ::  -ing returns.
7. Scarred :: for life.
8. Horn :: of plenty.
9. Pace :: car.
10. Correspondence :: writing.

* * * * *

As you may remember, earlier this week we got a foot (12"! 30cm!) of snow. Today the temp is 70℉ (21℃). Ah, spring in The North. Will we get another dump of snow? I say no. Let's hope I am right. 

photo credit: Bill Gracey via photopin cc

On Friday I saw two wood ducks on the lake. In all my life I don't think I have ever seen one in the wild, although I have seen dozens, if not hundreds, of wood duck houses erected by hopeful bird enthusiasts. They are a beautiful bird, as you can see in the photo. Sadly, this pair seemed to be transiting on their way north, gone the next day.

Beside the wood ducks, there have been Canada geese (many, many) and trumpeter swans (two) (the ones in the photo below may not be trumpeters because Wikipedia informs me that the latter generally swim with a straight neck; a lake neighbor more knowledgeable than I identified the ones on our lake as trumpeters),

photo credit: Peter aka anemoneprojectors - camera busted! via photopin cc

and coots (aka mud hens).

photo credit: TexasEagle via photopin cc 

No loons yet.

* * * * *

Remember the 600 stitches I cast on for the linen stitch scarf, then ripped out because the colors did not have enough contrast? And re-cast on 600 stitches with completely different yarns? I knat and knat upon them for a couple weeks, but last night I screwed up an entire row. The thought of tinking that row set me back a bit; upon further reflection -- and realizing just how long that scarf was going to be, somewhere between nine and eleven feet (2.7 and 3.3 meters), just as a commenter remarked a few posts ago -- I decided the best thing to do would be to frog it and start over again with fewer stitches.

While I was at it, I rewound the three yarns into new cakes. I love doing that. I will rewind center-pull balls/skeins into cakes just because I like them. We takes our fun where we finds it.

Today I re-cast on, 420 stitches this time, and I am halfway through the first row. My knitterly friends have rescheduled our linen stitch scarf tutorial for next Friday. I should have an inch or two of progress to show by then.

Netflix has provided me with some excellent knitting viewing:  The Inexplicable Universe with Neil DeGrasse Tyson. Because the presentation is 95% NDT talking, with very few visuals, it is perfect for knitting. The subject matter so far, astrophysics and cosmology and relativity and quantum physics and string theory, has always fascinated me, even though it is beyond my understanding*. I love this stuff the same way Smokey loves the Sunday morning talking heads shows and the PBS nightly news hour.

* In the words of John von Neumann, "In mathematics** you don't understand things. You just get used to them." So true.***

** And quantum physics.

*** While googling to be sure I had that quotation correct, I found this. (Scroll down to the Foot Shooting Agreement.)

Sunday as usual.

1. Shame :: anguish.
2. Business :: as usual.
3. Cats :: yes!
4. Green :: Green Party.
5. Politics :: sooo tired of.
6. Boston :: driving.
7. Healthy :: as a horse.
8. Pint :: ale.
9. Owner :: car.
10. Sorrow :: sad.

* * * * *

Elder Son had his last day of medical school on Friday. This was a red-letter day, one he has been waiting for for a l-o-n-g time. Finally he can escape the Evil Upper East Side Medical School Dedicated To Wealth And Prestige. When he went to retrieve his car from a friend's apartment parking lot in Jersey where it had been stored for two months, he found it had a flat tire. 3am call to me, asking for Smokey's phone number at work: always call Dad for car advice. He had planned to drive into Manhattan during the wee hours so as to avoid traffic as he picked up his stuff from the dorm. Didn't happen. He did manage to have the car towed to a tire place, get the tire fixed, drive into Manhattan with somewhat less traffic than on a weekday, get his stuff, and escape, all without any tickets or accidents. He is now back in Ann Arbor and is finishing his grad school thesis.

Graduation ceremonies for med school and grad school are both in early May. Which means, for us... road trip!

* * * * *

Younger Son is back from Las Vegas and here for the weekend. Ser Percy was very glad to see him. I haven't seen that dog's tail wag that fast ever before. The reunion reminded us of YouTube videos of returning vets being reunited with their dogs.

YS said that, yes, he did gamble while in LV -- one dollar into a slot machine. "I lost the whole thing!" he reported.

* * * * *

Both the back and sleeves of Fairfield are done to the armhole shaping. I haven't had the undisturbed time to knit that that will require so I started a mindless project.

The first six rows of a linen stitch scarf.

The knit get-together that would have taught three of us how to make a linen stitch scarf got postponed until later this month because of a blizzard. I had cast on the 600 st required for a long narrow scarf and had knit the first three rows from the pattern before the blizzard, but I decided my colors did not contrast enough with each other (yellow, pale blue, and pale green -- Easter egg colors). So I frogged and restarted yesterday with different colors. The new one will be a regular riot of color -- NOT! -- dark gray, light gray, and this:

Marks & Katten Fame.

of which I used the first half of the skein in my Daybreak scarf:

Right now I seem to be in the blackish part of the skein so it doesn't show up well, but that will change. Aside: 600 stitches takes a lot of yarn. This scarf may be narrower than I expected..

 

Mondays are for blocking. And scarves.

Actually, last Tuesday was for blocking. But who's counting?

You have seen both of these before. The scarf at left is for the Red Scarf Project. The one at right is for me and has a sort-of matching hat (same yarn, totally different pattern stitch). The reason you are seeing them again is because the blue one looks so much different after being blocked (lace is like that) and the red one just happened to wander by.

 
Posed shots. Aren't they sweet?

 

Speaking of scarves, here's a little project I sneaked in a couple weeks ago.

 

Even log-carved bears can get chilly.

Next up, a Christmas scarf for the little bear. I have an El Cheapo purchased fair isle scarf that he will wear in January. He'll probably need one with stranded hearts for Valentine's Day. And another striped one for Easter. I'm hoping I can skip Memorial Day, the Fourth of July, and Labor Day, but one never knows about the weather this far north.

And speaking of blocking, here are what I use: welding wires.

Smokey picked them up for me at some tool/handyperson place in Minneapolis for under $5, far less than you would pay for *real* blocking wires. I bet if you brought this picture to a hardware place they'd know what you want. There would be the inevitable eye-rollling, but we are knitters, we are used to that, right?

Summer knitting, cont., aka FO Friday.

Before I went into the hospital I decided I needed to take along some comfort knitting. My other projects were all at a stage where they required thought and/or concentration -- not suitable for hospital knitting under the infuence of painkillers. I scrounged in the stash and decided to make a scarf for the Red Scarf Project.

Ta-da!

I was using up odd balls of yarn left over from previous projects. Ravelry-ed here. But that edging was a challenge. It came about because I was not satisfied with how the ends were woven in... and there were a LOT of ends. A black edging would cover them and also enhance the stained glass effect.

First, I did an attached i-cord. Somehow I had it in my head that attached i-cord covers the edge. Nope, it just sits on one side on top of the edge. No go, rip.

Plan B was to was to pick up stitches all along the long edge, work enough rows of stockinette so it would wrap around the edge, then do a sewn bind-off, somehow attaching the black stockinette to the other side of the scarf. I got to the sewn bind-off part and realized that the "somehow attach to the other side" part was not as simple as I had envisioned. After a frustrating attempt, rip.

Plan C was to pick up stitches all along the long edge, work 2-3 rows of stockinette, do the same thing on the reverse, then attach them to each other with a 3-needle bind-off, thus enclosing the edge in the two strips of stockinette. Repeat on other long edge. I knit the first bit, then started picking up stitches on the reverse.  I don't remember now exactly why I didn't like that, but it was something about how the second batch of picked-up stitches, the ones on the reverse side, didn't look neat enough. Rip.

Plan D was the one I should have tried right away (of course), working a row of single crochet along each long edge. There is a reason that is the commonest edging -- It.Just.Works. Still took me three or four tries, with lots of ripping, to get the tension right. Maybe a G crochet hook would have been better than an F, who knows.

Anyway, it is done and I am pleased with it. So pleased, in fact, that I may make another one to use up other odd balls of yarn. Not sure if I have enough reds left, but I do have lots of blues...

I made a couple other scarves for the RSP but never got around to sending them. Let's take a look, shall we?

 

Yarn: Garnstudio Drops Alpaca (sport weight)
Needle: It was so long ago I don't actually remember. Probably a US#5 or 6.
Pattern: Broken rib. 

 

Yarn: Louet Gems Topaz worsted weight, 100% superwash merino, color 80-2584 burgundy. This yarn is some of the leftovers from my kimono sweater. I used some in the many-reds scarf, above, too.
Needle: US#7
Pattern: Fast Forward by Natalie Servant. I adore her patterns. This is the only one I have made so far, but I have several others waiting in my Ravelry library. There are a lot of Art Deco influences in her design, and that appeals to me.

As soon as I block the many-reds scarf these will be ready to box up and send. Yay, me!

FO Friday.

I finished a hat and scarf set for myself.

Color is off in this photo, but I couldn't fix it without making my desk look even more overgrown with moss than it already is. (see next two photos)

Pattern: Sideways Grande Cloche from Boutique Knits.
Mods: None except that I used a different, slightly heavier, yarn so I cast on 36 st for the body of the hat instead of 42. 
Yarn: Knit Picks Swish Bulky (100% superwash merino) in Aegean; 1 skein exactly. 
Needles: Knit Picks Options, US#10, 9, 8, and 7, as called for in the pattern. I do not understand why the designer had me use four different needle sizes, but whatever. 
 

Scarf is not blocked yet so the lacy pattern is rather...camouflaged.

Pattern: Lace Rib Scarf by Kay Gardiner. I found this one by using Ravelry's advanced pattern search -- which is wizard, btw -- to look for a scarf using bulky yarn. I avoided ribbed ones b/c they draw in  in width, and I didn't want to have to knit the scarf wider then necessary. Lazy efficient, me.
Yarn: (same as above, 2 skeins exactly)
Needles: Knit Picks US#9 because they were handy. Kay used US#10s for the same reason.

This is a more accurate portrayal of the color from the KP website:

This will be a cozy set to wear next winter when the winds howl. Color is gonna be kinda boring next to my brown coat, but whatevs.

Muttering through Mother's Day.

1. 537 :: is more than 400
2. Horizon :: line.
3. Episode :: seizure.
4. Character :: -driven.
5. Crossed :: town bus.
6. Shipping :: charges.
7. Jump :: Whoopee Goldberg.
8. Bowling :: Lebowski.
9. Grumpy :: Old Men.
10. Them :: Us.

 

I celebrated my own Mother's Day yesterday -- spent pretty much the entire day in my recliner reading, watching Netflix, drinking coffee/soda/wine (as the day progressed), and knitting. This is Smokey's weekend to work (always with the night shifts) so when he is home he is tucked up in his bed with two dogs and a cat and a box fan for white noise. Today I might be productive. Hard to say, really. 

 

Reading: 
A few weeks ago I read a piece in The Nation by Deborah Kopaken Kagan about her experiences as a woman author and how she was demeaned by the publishing industry. I was so inspired/enraged by her experience I clicked over to bn.com and bought all four of her books to read on my iPad. (I also clicked over to her website and sent her an email telling her what I did; she emailed back that it made her cry.) Anyhow, I want to recommend her books. She came from an ordinary middle-class background, graduated from Harvard, moved to Paris, worked as a photojournalist covering a lot of gritty stuff (ex., she went into Afghanistan alone during the Soviet-Afghan war), eventually married, had three kids, started to write. The woman has lived more in her 40-odd years than a dozen other other people put together. I highly recommend her books, especially Shutterbabe (memoir) and The Red Book (fiction). Her collection of essays, Hell Is Other Parents, is pretty damned good, too.

Yesterday's book was Odds Against Tomorrow by Nathaniel Rich. I had read the first 60+ pages in fits and starts and was not particularly engaged by it, but yesterday I decided to give it a chance to pull me in. Which it did, in spades. Protagonist is a quant who specializes in the odds of disasters; the 3-person consulting firm he works for makes him rich. Then a real mega-disaster hits New York City -- essentially Hurricane Sandy plus Katrina -- and his life changes. Some of the scenes were lifted straight out of the news stories of Katrina. Good book, four out of five stars.

Last night I startd NOS4A2 by Joe Hill. Creepy as hell, that one. I follow the author on Twitter. He is currently on tour for the book and every day posts photos of readers attempting to kill him in various ways.

 

Knitting:
I am enjoying having several projects to hand at all times. A hat, a pair of socks, the top-down set-in sleeve sweater, a scarf of the same yarn as the hat. They are strewn about my chair in various stages of doneness. When I sit down there is the delicious feeling of What shall I pick up this time? Project monogamy, begone!

Stuff:
Remember the humungous external hard drive? I have moved most of my data files over to it and gone into my most-often used programs to direct them to that drive for files. Two programs have me stumped, though: Excel and iPhoto. I can deal with the former, but iPhoto is being a bugger. I have searched through all its menus and preferences and cannot find a place to tell it where to store its files. My internal 160GB hard drive has 76GB of photos. It would be nice to get them all moved and backed up. All suggestions welcome. (I started to email Younger Son yesterday to ask him but got distracted, had to reboot, lost the email, yada yada. So I'm asking y'all.) 

No photos popped into my head to illustrate today's post. Here, in honor of Mother's Day, is a gratuitous one from 1984 of me being a mom to Elder Son.

Summer knitting.

Note: I found this post in my draft folder, waiting for a picture of the socks. Finally took one.

At the beginning of the summer I came upon a pattern that begged to be made in profusion and sold for benefit of the local humane society, on whose board I sit.

Doggie poo bag dispensers.

Pattern here. Great fun to make and a good use of leftover sock yarn. I made 29, gave one to Matthew and Alex for Ser Percival The Energetic, and we sold...one at the county fair booth. I have hopes for better results at the September dog walk, an annual fund-raiser for the shelter.

Last winter I made myself a Noro hat that I like so well I made a scarf to match. My old Noro scarf was dark, which was fine with my old red coat but too dull with my current dark brown one. This scarf is a bit livelier.

 

The hat and scarf are gone now. A few days ago I got an email asking for something for a silent auction fundraiser for a local candidate whom I support. Not much time to knit right now, so the hat and scarf set went to a good cause. Now I'm wondering if I should recreate them or if I should move on to another scarf and hat for which I have half the yarn I need.

I made a pair of socks.

Please ignore the funny-looking ears on the toes.

Yarn: Online Supersocke Nepal found on eBay.
Pattern: Wendy's Generic Toe-Up Socks.
Needles: Addi US#0 (feet) and US#1 (legs). 

And earlier this month I made baby hats for The Purple Project (or whatever it is called).

1. Valley Yarns Superwash DK in lilac;
2. ditto;
3. ditto with a stripe of Knit Picks Andean Silk; 
4. Lamb's Pride worsted in clematis; 
5. Knit Picks Andean Silk (discontinued) in hyacinth;
6. Knit Picks Swish DK in clematis heather (color discontinued);
7. ditto.

Still have two different socks OTN, frogged the cowl and need to cast on a different (easier) one for Alex. And that is what I have been knitting. (I wrote this on September 3. Alex picked out an easier pattern and it is nearly done. Photos soon.)

Knitting! (6)

Younger Son's fiance asked for a cowl.  Not just any cowl, but the Big Herringbone Cowl from the Purl Soho website. (That link worked when I needed the pattern a few weeks ago but doesn't seem to work today. Maybe it will be working by the time this post goes up.)

The image at right is from the Purl Soho site; you will also find it on Ravelry. What is difficult to get from the photo is how soft and thick and squishy and cuddly the cowl is.

The yarn is Blue Sky Alpacas Worsted Hand Dyes in ecru. The name says worsted but I would consider it more of an aran weight. The fiber is 50/50 merino/alpaca and is like buttah through my hands.

Above is the cowl the first day I worked on it. Below is the cowl a few weeks ago. The project is about half done but currently on hiatus while I work on something else. After all, she won't be needing it for... a while.

The stitch pattern is interesting. It makes a herringbone pattern on the right side and a sort of ribbing on the other. Either side could be the right side. It is kind of a tricky stitch, though; when (not if) I make a mistake, I have no idea how to fix it other than rip back. Which I have had to do a couple times.

 

And although the yarn is called worsted and I think it is aran, the pattern calls for -- wait for it --

a size 17 needle!

Such huge needles are not my favorite but the resulting fabric is lovely. This is a fun project.

Knitting! (4)

Fourth: silk Montego Bay scarf.

 

Yarn: Alchemy Silk Purse, 2 skeins. DK, 100% silk single ply.
Needle: KnitPicks US#8 circ.
Pattern: Montego Bay by Amy Singer.

I originally announced that this yarn -- also souvenir yarn purchased at Knitty City last year -- was going to be a trianglular shawlette, but further thought led me to the conclusion that I would get more use from a long rectangular scarf. Several years ago I made a Montego Bay scarf that nearly drove me crazy; I simply could not keep track of the (2-stitch, 2-row!) pattern. But I wanted to conquer that pattern. I needed to conquer that pattern. And I did; this quickly became mindless knitting, so mindless that I could work on it in the evening after working on tax returns for nine or ten hours.

Have worn it multiple times, love it.

Knitting! (2)

Second: Daybreak, last seen here. All done, love it, worn only once. Spring came rather early this year and thus ended wool-scarf-wearing season.

Pattern: Daybreak by Stephen West. Nearly every one of his patterns appeal to me. I love this one so much I am planning a sweater based on it.
Yarn: Most of a skein of Universal Pace sock yarn in linen (06) and half a skein of Marks & Katten sock yarn in color 662.
Needle: Signature circ US#4. 
Mods: The original pattern had the final border done in stockinette interspersed with single rows of garter stitch. It seemed to me that that border might be prone to flip up so I did it entirely in garter, and I quite like the way it turned out.

Knitting!

I started this post with the intention of showing you everything that I had knit since the last time I blogged an FO. Then it occurred to me that each piece deserved its own post; also, that that method would relieve my conscience about not posting more often.

All that unblogged knitting is about to hit the innernets.

First up: I finished this last June.* Two skeins of souvenir Koigu purchased Knitty City last May.

Love it, have worn it multiple times.

Yarn: Koigu KPPPM, 2 skeins, color 720. This colorway has enough colors in it that it can be worn with nearly anything. Except white or beige; then one or the other looks dirty.
Pattern: Baktus.
Needles: US#4 circ.
Mods: None. The pattern is perfect. 

I never bothered to block this, so it is a tiny bit short although still perfectly wearable. Someday...

* Yes, nearly a year ago. ::hangs head in blogger shame::

Kill Bill arrives!

I finished knitting Alex's Kill Bill scarf. (If you are reading this, Alex -- here it is!)

Yarn: Sweet Georgia Tough Love sock yarn, "Kill Bill" colorway (no longer available
Pattern: Cinnamon Grace
Needles: Signature US#3 circ

The pattern was well-written, the knitting was nearly mindless (my favorite kind), the yarn was pleasant, the Signature needle was a dream. All in all, a successful project.

The pattern has the knitter make a slipstitch along the straight edge. Early in the knitting I had trouble keeping track in my mind as to which edge that was, so that straight edge -- the one that does not get a ruffle -- was not as neat it should have been.

The bits sticking out are stitches where I did... something other than what I should have done.

So I got brave and dropped down that edge stitch.

I didn't do it recklessly; first I experimented dropping down just a few rows. When I found it was easy to pick up that edge stitch again, I got braver and dropped down farther (above)

Behold, a neat slip-stitch edge!

Fixing something right at the edge of knitting has always intimidated me. I feel more confident now. 

Minnesotans are crazy. Knitters.

You have got to go see this over on soxanne's blog.

I could show you, but then I'd have to kill you.

Back in the days of novelty yarns, I made a scarf for my SIL. She asked for one in red and purple to wear to her Red Hat meetings.

I obliged.

 

 Did she ever wear it? I don't know (she lives 400+ miles away). Would you?

Thing #4. And the beginnings of Thing #5.

  

Yarn: Noro Silk Garden #271 and 279, about 1/2 skein each.
Needle: US#7. Or maybe it was a #6. Or maybe I did the ribbing on #5 and switched to a #6 or a #7 for the stockinette. Anyone? Bueller?
Pattern: A pastiche of hat patterns. I wanted a hat that got bigger after the ribbing, sort of a slouch/tan. This is that, if I rearrange the slouch -- which is minimal -- after I put it on.

Now I have a sort-of matched set of hat, scarf, and mittens. They are all Noro, just not all the same Noro.

 

 

* * * * *

Matthew requested another hat for himself, this time in charcoal and 2x2 rib. He specifically said, No cables, no cuff, none of that stuff that is such fun for knitters. Sorry. Mom. He also does not care for the lines formed on the crown by columns of decreases, thus, the 2x2 rib that can hide the decreases. I sent him links to about a dozen different superwash merino DK yarns in charcoal. He chose Tanis Yellow Label, a yarn I had never used nor even heard of before I googled.

As soon as I ordered it I started noticing all the Ravelry projects made from it. Once the yarn arrived and I cast on, I learned why it is so popular. Nice stuff! Soft like merino but still with a bit of woolliness. The color is tonal, and it looks GREAT in ribbing -- very 3-dimensional.

What is that gap in the ribbing, you ask?

I could tell you it is for the unicorn horn at Matthew's hairline, but that would be... a lie.

Most of you already know this but just in case somebody doesn't: when knitting in the round, it is NOT necessary to join immediately after the cast on. That way lies madness twists.

Knit back and forth for a few rows, then join. You can easily see how the knitting should be joined and avoid that dreaded twist. Use the tail from the cast on to sew up the little seam; no one will ever notice when the garment is worn.

Observe:

In the case of the hat, above, the viewer will be so distracted by the jog in the stripes (does anyone have a good method for avoiding that job when the stripes are only 2 rows tall?) that they will never notice the seam in the ribbing. In the mittens, I defy you to find the seam.

* * * * *

In other breaking news, I tripped over something invisible in my office last night and fell. My can of soda and bowl of popcoarn went flying, and I smacked my hand on a chair. (I know the thing that I tripped on was invisible because after I got up there was nothing there to see.) No huge damage to myself, and Lucy The Wonder Dog was thrilled that I had thrown an entire bowl of popcorn onto the floor for her, instead of the usual few kernels, but the index, middle, and ring fingers of my right hand were very sore. So sore, in fact, that I could not knit.

Wah! It doesn't look bad -- no swelling, no bruising -- but it is sore.

The next day the fingers were still sore but not enough to prevent knitting, only to make it go a bit more slowly. Yay!

 

Friday fun, with scarves.

Found via zippiknits.