1.23.11

Flat Stanley is visiting. He will be having tea and meeting a dog later today. If you do not know about the Flat Stanley project, you can click on the link above. Pictures to follow!

1.22.11

Nantucket basket making today! I have always wanted to take a Nantucket class. Probably because I always wanted to own a Nantucket basket but never could afford to buy one.

I expect we are making the very simplest of the round variety today.

Even years ago as a child, the one I wanted was an oval lidded purse with seashell design. Everywhere I saw Nantucket baskets (EVEN on Nantucket), the seashell lidded purse was easily twice as much as I could part with. There were some tiny round ones I could have bought, in the Carribean Islands, and they LOOKed authentic, but I never would settle for less than what I wanted when buying baskets. I will not mind making a basket of any size--I will not mind making one of any kind! But to think that today I will begin to learn a new style is pretty exciting.

1.21.11

I am taking basketry classes again and really enjoying it. There will be no silk knitting, though, if my hands get rough. I have a finished small basket from earlier this week which I will photograph when the sun comes up.

We had snow last night but my favorite weather website indicates no more snow until maybe Monday or Tuesday. I expect there will be soup in my near future.

 

Well. The sun DID come up and here is my finished napkin basket. I hope to attend a private class tomorrow. Thursdays are classes designed for seniors. My Thursday teacher invited me to attend a class he teaches at his place of business. I hope I will soon have pictures to show.

1.20.11

I finished Purl Ridge and "blocked" it with this unusual invention. I turned it every 20 minutes or so and it came out without any creases.

This was fun to knit but I think I would use more stitches if I used the same weight yarn.

Malabrigo Silky Wool is listed as a DK weight. I got about 4.5 stitches per inch so next time with DK, I will cast on about 250, maybe 275.

Here it is all ready to wear.

This one is finished, also and on its way to the Gift Box.

1.19.11

I finished two pieces yesterday, the one scarf/cowl from the Chinchilla and the Malabrigo Silky Merino scarf in the Purl Ridge design. My purl ridges had a happy accident. I was knitting in semi-darkness and lost count of the rows before a new purl ridge was to occur. I didn't want to take it out so I just made a few more knit rows each time before the next purl ridge. I have a unique drying method for it, too.

1.18.11

Still working on getting the Stash-O-Meter just the way I want it. I am having some effects from the prescription company I use not delivering my prescriptions. Nothing life threatening, but very annoying and sometimes uncomfortable. Also, I have over-used my wrists. I need to give them a rest but there is so much to knit.

1.17.11

Freezing rain forecast for tomorrow. I guess I had better knit something warm to wear--or at least cover my lap! I am working on a REAL pattern now that my experiment has proven successful. Although the Ear-Warming Headband is a v-e-r-r-r-y easy knit and just right for beginners,  I hope to finish the work on a pattern for some mitts.  I wear mitts almost every morning during computer time but the pairs I have are alpaca or JASPER. They are warm, but very fuzzed  and do not look as good as they did.  I am currently knitting a pair in a new (to me and my LYS) yarn called TONIC by JojoLand. as a pattern experiment. As soon as the pattern is ready I will post the link. And, of course, plenty of pictures.

In the meantime, I continue on my BONEYARD shawl,  the PURL RIDGE scarf I just cast on Friday, and my LAVA FLOW cowl has taken a back seat for awhile. All are free patterns, but you have to belong to Ravelry to access Lava Flow, so I did not put a link here. If you are "on Ravelry" you will know how to find this pattern.  If you are not, you will have to wait until I am finished with mine and then you will be able to admire it and tell me how much you love it.

I find I keep returning to knit my Boneyard shawl because I am using my favorite needles--Lantern Moon, size 8. Then I move to the mitts--Lantern Moon size 5 DPNs. I think I just discovered the key to finishing projects that are already on the needles: switch everything over to LANTERN MOON NEEDLES! Better than chocolate.

1.16.11

I do not know what it is going to be. There are 880 yards of it and it is coming to me in the next day or so. It is Madeline Tosh Merino Light which allowed me to get free shipping on a yarny-birthday gift from my second brother's family--you know, the hat family from Christmas Eve.

The yarn that needed me to buy this lovely lichen colorway to the right is intended for a pattern I have had in my collection for almost seven years, I think.  It is from NeedleBeetle and is designed by Brenda Zuk. If you know me at all, you know one of my passions is sea shells. In fact, at one point I considered being a malacologist. When I saw the pattern for the Scallop Sea Shawl, I knew I wanted to make it.

Let me be honest with you and tell you I do not really enjoy knitting lace. I appreciate it and understand the hard work behind it. I even find some of it pretty. I have been tempted a few times to make something with little narrow yarn on hopelessly big needles that turns out full of holes (my impression of lace and lace making) but my holes never end up where they should be because I CAN NOT COUNT.  Well, I can, but I have to do it over and over again until I give up because I NEVER get it right. So why did I decide to get 2467 yards of this

to cast on that?

 Well, it looked like it might be intuitive like cables are.

 After you get going on cables, they seem to tell you when they are right and when they are wrong.

 Like basket-making. We will see.

1.15.11

Spent all day Thursday writing a pattern, converting it to PDF and learning how to make it available here and possibly on Ravelry.  Let us see if it will work.
EAR-WARMING HEADBAND
(by PurlButtons)

1.15.11.2

This is Malabrigo Silky Wool.  I have two skeins of it. It is being turned into a Stephen West Design Purl Ridge Scarf for me. It is luxurious and elegant and a pleasure to make. I do not know which pleases me more, the lovely yarn or the ingenious construction of the scarf.

1.14.11

Trying to fix the Knit Meter so it reflects yards knitted from the stash. That project is on hold. In the meantime, I designed and wrote my first pattern. It is currently being converted into a PDF. I now have to figure out how to get it on this blog.

1.13.11

It is cold out. It is snowy. I am missing my basket class today. The roads are not plowed where we are. I am probably knitting on my BONEYARD shawl, designed by Stephen West. I had one cranberry hank, two fieldstone hanks and this is as far as I was Wednesday morning:

It is a lovely knit because of the wonderful construction. It fulfills one of my 2011 Resolutions:
USING MY STASH I have homemade bean soup and a wonderful man by my side. Life is good.

1.12.11

This was to be my Christmas Vest. Not yet, I think.  It is Cascade 220 color #9544. I thought it was called Twist but maybe not. The store tag says Midnight Sun.

1.11.11

Hives. I have them.

1.10.11.2

I am in two Knit-A-Longs. One is a KAL for a cowl and the other is for fans of Stephen West Designs. I really like the name of it: SELFISH WESTKNITS KAL.  If you remember, I knit two of his hats in just a couple of days and I  marveled at the construction and thoroughly enjoyed making them. If you do not remember, just click on his name above and let the internet whisk you away to his blog.


The Selfish Kal has a few rules and if followed, participants are eligible to be in a random drawing for one of his books. The project has to be tagged a certain way, the moderator of the thread is to be notified, and of course, the project is to be a WestKnits design. I chose the Boneyard Shawl (go ahead, click the link, you know you want to) after digging through my stash and finding a yarn that spoke to me. I cast on last night and made my usual changes to the pattern to make it suit me and have it going along pretty well. I had some skeins of Harrisville Flax and Wool and I am using Lantern Moon size 8 circulars.  The body of the shawl is in the Fieldstone colorway and the Cranberry is the accented garter ridge. The SELFISH part of the KAL is that with all the holiday knitting, knitters rarely knit for themselves and this is a January-February chance to make up for that.

1.10.11

visited 37 states (74%)
Create your own visited map of The United States

1.9.11

I am still cowling along. The light looks good for pictures so there may be a post #2 today.

1.8.11

I will be knitting all day unless the light is good to take pictures.

1.7.11

The headband worked out great. That means I will probably never be able to duplicate it, but I will try.

I found some nice Cascade Lana D'Oro to try on the Lava Flow cowl Knit Along I joined on Ravelry. I just found a picture of some in a weird heathery teal and color adjusted the image to reflect the emerald tone I am actually planning to use. I could not find a picture of color 1076 which the tag says is Rainforest but looks like emerald to me.

The next knitting I will be doing is finishing the Manly Arm Warmers with the modifications I worked out.

I plan to go to the Knitting store today to meet up with some Ravelry knitters but it has started snowing and I am not sure what the next  hours will bring.

1.6.11

100% Silk Chenille. Fiesta Yarns Chinchilla in the Wild Oak colorway. It has been languishing in my stash and since one of my goals this year is use stash yarn, here is a cowl-to be.

Speaking of goals, here are mine:
1. knit a little each month for the 2011 holidays
2. use stash yarn
3. try every month to finish a project that has been taking up needle space--or at least knit a few more inches onto it.

1.5.11

Remember the post from the day before yesterday? The great little find on Ravelry? I finished my version of it!

 Mine is different and intended to be worn as a headband. I started my assembly in the middle and worked out. I had two sets of live stitches at both ends. I joined the panels one on top of the other, reduced the number of stitches and joined the two ends with a somewhat stretchy (also a little sloppy looking) garter stitch.

I will test wear it tomorrow. I think I might experiment with some embroidery in the center section. It looks like it could be a flower.

Next time I knit this, I will NOT use Cleckheaton Country. It is too splitty and the stitches didn't have the uniformity that a well-spun yarn has. Too bad they did that to perfectly good Australian wool.

I might try this with a sock yarn and a sport yarn. I think that is what the designer used but I used a worsted and size 5 needles.

1.4.11

1.3.11

I ran across something interesting on Ravelry and man-handled it into something I like very much. I will post my version of it in a day or so. I have mine almost finished. I am taking a short break in between rows of the Chinchilla cowl.

I think my unofficial New Year Resolution is making gifts ahead of time, using my stash yarns, and finishing old projects. So far, so good! While waiting for the internet today, I halfway turned a heel on a pair of socks that have been waiting on the needles for some time now. Maybe pictures tomorrow with all that Chinchilla and Windschief 2.

1.2.11

I finished another Windschief yesterday and will add pictures when I get some. In the mean time, I am working on next year's knitted gifts. Not bad for the first two days of 2011. The first on the needles is some Fiesta Chinchilla in the Wild Oak colorway #135. Each skein is 225 yards of  hand-dyed 100% silk chenille. What a luxurious knit this is! Plus, it is from my stash and I paid only half price for it when I purchased it. I have two skeins in the same colorway but different dye lots. If this were any other yarn I would consider switching yarns on every fourth row but I just do not want to deal with two balls of this yarn simultaneously. So the dye lots will just have to be noticeable if I end up using both skeins.

1.1.11