Something for a Piratess

I had to make this scarf simply because Fiona's friend has a very piratey outfit with velveteen pants in a rust color with a band of satin along the side seams. Knitted out of Knitpicks Suri, it is a wonderful alpaca blend that is warm and fluffy, and reminded me of a pirate's ruffly shirt. It used not even a whole skein, so I have another skein and a bit to make something else out of. I may repeat this scarf with the ruffle and all, but without the dropped stitch ladders.

I had to do a provisional cast-on for this scarf, which was the most complicated part. The rest was easy peasy.

Manos Cotton Stria = Soft

Oh my gosh, this cotton is so soft. I love Manos kettle-dyed wool, but this is the first time I've tried the cotton. I bought just one hank of this summery blue and knitted it up into a little baby cap. The yarn softened up as I knit it, resulting in a perfect summer fabric. I also loved the knubby texture of the yarn. I had enough left over for some matching booties, which I'll work on next, and I'll definitely buy more of this, maybe for a small sweater.

I also got a delivery from Knitpicks today, so the world is my knitting oyster right now!! I've already cast on for a ruffled scarf and will start a baby sweater for my niece next.

In the middle of all of this, I'm having trouble dealing with my book club book. We're reading Shantaram, which is basically a doorstop with words. I'm about a quarter through the nearly 1000 pages now, all very descriptive, language-y pages. Don't get me wrong - this guy's a great writer and the story is is fascinating, but 1000 pages of what is basically assigned reading (since it's BOOK CLUB) sort of chafes. And it eats into my knitting time!!

Something Blue....

To break up the monotony of my colors, something blue. This is a little capelet from Scarf Style, made with short row shaping. I had to learn to do some crochet for the border! Anyway, Fiona wanted this because it is a little superhero-ish. It's super cute over a little tank top. The flash made the yarn look a little shinier than it is in real life, but it is a silk/wool blend so it does have a little sheen. It's soft and silky to the touch, too.

From the Toe Up or the Cuff Down?

I decided to try cuff-down socks for a change...this is my first pair, in mini size for a baby. I think the proportion is a little strange because I decided to make the foot fairly short, but it'll do. I bound the toe with a kitchener stitch on four stitches; next time I'll probably let the toe be a little wider before I graft. As it is the toes are a little pointy, giving them an Ali Baba feel. I'm definitely going to try this technique on a larger pair, though. It was kind of cool doing the double knitting on the heel flap, so that was something new too.

One thing - since I'm using odds and ends of yarn it's starting to look like everything I make is the same color. Guess I'll have to branch out into more blues and greens pretty soon.

Warm Hands, Warm Heart

Today I finished the second mitten in this pair for Mary. She loves them! The pattern is pretty standard, and the yarn is one of the Sock Garden colorways from Knitpicks. It's a nice merino, not too heavy since it's sock yarn - perfect for chilly mornings without being cumbersome. Now I'm working on a tam to match.

Meetings!

Here's what I've figured out - if I've got something on fairly good-size needles, like 5s or 6s, with a worsted weight yarn and going along in stockinette, I can knit during a meeting without really looking at what I'm doing. And if the project's small enough, I can even finish it by the time we adjourn.

New Year, New Knitting

After considerable downtime off the computer, I'm back to the routine. And of course, I've been knitting! Santa brought some cool yarn and new needles and I cast on for a new scarf for myself - Misty Garden from Scarf Style. It's somewhere in the middle right now, but every couple of days I add a few rows. I have KADD (Knitting Attention Deficit Disorder) so I have to do lots of small projects while working on anything larger than a 6x6" surface area. The scarf will be done by the time it gets cold around here (June). Here in January it's been hot anyway.

So I'm using the very yarn that's in the book because I love the colorway. It's Jo Sharp rare comfort kid mohair, I think in rosebud, in a feather and fan pattern - it's totally cool when you hold it up to the light so the pattern really shows through. I got about 22 inches into the scarf before I read about a phenomenon called "pooling," so there are some place where the colorway kind of clumps, but I'm not going to worry about it. Since finding out about pooling I've read that you can switch skeins every couple of rows to avoid that (but then you've got a trillion loose ends to weave in - what a nightmare!). I'm just going to chalk it up to learning as I go and once I wrap the thing around my neck nobody will notice.

Probably Another Ornament

A couple of weeks ago I walked into my sister's office and showed her this little preemie sock. She promptly whipped it out of my hand and put it on her tiny Christmas tree, where it stayed until I took it back two days ago. Now I'm decided whether to knit the pair, or just add on a tiny cord and hang it on the tree. The yarn was fun - it's Sock Garden from one of my favorite online stores, Knitpicks.com. They have nice quality yarn at very reasonable prices.

Car Knitting

Guess where we were yesterday:

Yep, that's right - the happiest place on earth. No, not the Free Luxury Yarn Boutique. Anyway, I still couldn't touch that angora bootie, and I needed a project for the car, so instead I finished up the the flower washcloth from Weekend Knits.

Now, I'm not sure if I'd ever use something like this. I don't like anything I have to wash too often!! But I've heard other people swear by the feel of these babies on their faces. I'm going to wrap it up with some nice soap for somebody and hope they like a handmade gift!

Kicking My Bootie

My second angora bootie is still kicking my butt hard. I had to set it down for a day, just to remind myself that knitting is supposed to be relaxing. As the holidays approach, everything else is proceeding at a hectic pace, so if the knitting is driving me crazy, why am I doing it? Plus, some projects just have to be difficult, no matter how easy they SHOULD be.

I've started a chenille washcloth - not sure if anyone would ever use it, but I'm enjoying knitting it and using the Crystal Palace cotton chenille, which I though I would hate. It's actually a relief to knit something unhairy right now. And in the meantime, I can always look at some of my finished projects, like these little booties & hat.

What Kind of Knitting Needles Are You?

You are "turbo" charged.

I took this quiz over here at http://quizilla.com/users/larissmix/
quizzes/What%20kind%20of%20knitting%20needles%20are%20you%3F/

Apparently I'm turbo charged. Anyway, I spent part of yesterday evening frogging back my second angora bootie - argh. I dropped a stitch, which I hardly ever do - but there it was!! I tried grabbing it up but the little hairs on the angora made it impossible, so I had to frog, frog, frog. Now I feel like it's cursed so I'm having a hard time picking it up again. Sigh.

Holiday Hangover

Doesn't it look like some tiny person got drunk and fell out of their sweater on my tree? I'm thinking maybe I should get hangers for these. Or maybe it's just the closeup photo, because they actually look fine when viewed from a distance. But in the picture it looks like I need to call CSI.

Finished one angora bootie yesterday, should finish the other one today, and then maybe I'll knit something BIG! Or at least bigger than a bootie! The angora is going slow because of all the little hairs - I can't speed knit because I'm afraid of splitting the yarn - but the yarn is gorgeous and the finished product is really nice.

How Cute are These?

I'm having a lot of fun with the patterns in 50 Baby Booties to Knit.... These look like little espadrilles to me, made in the same yarn as the socks below. The color pattern is so different in this garter stitch, though - I really like how it striped. I'm working on a pair of angora ones that are similar but have a little tie to keep them on better, which is more practical for sure.

No Knitting for Me

Today, sadly, was a non-knitting day, so I'm just making myself happy by looking at these tiny socks (I tied them together so you can see an extraneous thread.). There just wasn't time, we had to trim the trees, we had errands to run, etc. And tomorrow's not looking too good for knitting either, and I'm 90% done with my latest bootie creation. Don't you hate it when you're almost done with a project and stuff keeps getting in the way?

Yesterday's knitting went pretty well. We had a LOT of scarves already done, even though we can keep going through January. It did look like a yarn monster threw up a bunch of Lion Homespun though... I showed some of the women how to make the easy booties, so we'll hopefully have a bunch to give away next month.

Knitztravaganza!

Today our mother-daughter group is getting together for a giant knitfest. We did this last year, too - a bunch of women from the no home-ec generation and their teenage daughters from the totally digital generation, about 120 people total, will all be asking the same question: How do you cast on? They can be taught to knit, no problem; most of them learned last year and some of them really loved it. But for most it's the age-old problem that will evolve into another problem in about a month: How do you bind off?

The knitting itself is easy to do - I taught little Mary last year with the following mantra (I know there are cuter rhymes for learning out there, but this was from my own feeble brain):

You poke it, you wrap it
You flip it, you slip it

Ad infinitum. Notice it doesn't say anywhere, "You make crazy increases in random places so your knitting is twice as wide as when it started," but that seems to be the knitter's rite of passage - the unintentional trapezoid.

Anyway, we are knitting scarves for seniors, very fun, and we are also knitting baby items for teen moms, most around the age of our own daughters. Hence my baby bootie binge.

The booties pictured are from - seriously - the easiest. pattern. ever. It's straight knitting on two needles, one row of eyelets, and bam! You got yourself a bootie. You can find the pattern here: http://www.geocities.com/lindaslists/knitbooties.htm - and you can practically get one done at a long stoplight.

Pixie Hat

I love this hat design from Knitwit. I made it in purple last year but this one is better - so cute in red! Mary loves it; she wears it with her hot pink bathing suit and raspberry fleece robe before swim practice. It's quite a sight!

Today I visited my LYS for a pair of #2 needles - amazing how, out of the million and one pairs of needles I have, I never have the right size late at night when I *need* to start a new project. I left with the #2s, a couple of other sizes just in case, several new skeins of yarn so my stash won't get lonely, etc. Why do I love yarn so? I love how it looks, how it feels. I've got to have more, all the time!! I swear, yarn is like crack for me.

Tiny Sweaters

Because I have a need for quick results. These are tiny sweaters for the Christmas tree from Weekend Knits, a book I love. I've made several pairs of the fingerless mitts from this book as well, and everyone loves them. For the sweaters, I've used little bits of leftover yarn; for the mitts I like using chunky Baby Alpaca - so soft!! I'm in the middle of making my husband a pair so he can wear them and still use his keyboard, but I'm about to start from scratch on them since I waaaay overestimated how big to make the first one! Part of the need for quick results = reluctance to gauge.

Hats!

A couple of weeks ago I was knitting a hat every day or so....baby hats, big hats, you name it. I just love them, and I love how quickly they go on circular needles and the pattern made by the decreases:



This purple hat came from the Knit Hats! book.



I love making rollbrim hats, too - just follow a recipe and voila! A hat! The problem, of course, is that I live where hats are unnecessary. Other than sun hats and ball caps, there just isn't a need for a hat here unless there's a trip to the mountains involved. But I still love them and I still knit them.

Finished Some Baby Socks

As part of a charity knitting project, I've been knitting booties, baby hats, and now little socks. They're cute, they knit up quickly, they're fun to do in crazy sorty of non-traditionally baby colors, and they use up leftover yarn (although you know I've had to buy yarn for this anyway!). Anyway, I've learned to knit a sock because of this project. I'm knitting them toe-up, and I'm not too sure that the short rows are looking all that good (the wrapped stitch part) but it's been a lot of fun. Here's a picture of my latest pair; this is just the first sock but I did the other one last night.

Not Another Knitting Blog....

Okay, so I had to do it. Where else can I post pictures of all my creations? Right now I'm just setting up, but shortly - pictures of my knitty little knits. To start, here's a closeup of my multidirectional scarf, done in Noro Silk Garden. The colors are so gorgeous. You knit, and like magic, you get these triangles. Don't ask me how it works, but it does.