Waiting for snowflakes

It's been a pretty unsnowy season this year. Not what I was expecting when we moved to Truckee, the 5th snowiest city in the US. I've been watching the crazy weather in all the other places I've lived, and have been pretty glad to not be dealing with their winter - I'm looking at you Ohio! We have some snow forecast this week and next, so I'm really hoping that it comes this time! The dog and I need more snow to jump around in. The snow that is outside, while still very deep, is old and gross now.

The migraine that started last Thursday when I was driving seems to have broken finally. I got a fever in my sleep two nights in a row, which only leads to more tossing and turning and bad sleep. I slept for about 18 hours on Friday/Saturday. I was exhausted, but even when I woke up, I was still exhausted. Migraine sleep sucks. I never really fall all the way asleep. It's like my body keeps tense and always bracing for the next wave of pain. 

I've been reading A Life in Stitches. It's very good. I'm enjoying the way she writes about knitting and her cat. I'm not a cat person, but Digit sounds like the best cat ever. I've never read her blog Yarn-A-Go-Go, but it's being added to my blog roll now! Her stories about being cold all the time and just knitting, knitting, knitting really inspired me. I am a cold person and don't seem to own enough sweaters! I'm not really sure how that is possible when I have been knitting since 2001, but whatever... We won't talk about the 4 or 5 in pieces, half-knit and scattered all over the stash... Shh...

I cast on for Cadence last night. I got the yarn (Sirdar Denim Chunky) at Saver's for $5 a few years ago. I think there were 7 or 8 balls originally. I used some for a hat and really enjoyed the feel of the yarn. I'm hoping I can get through this one quickly! Everyone on Ravelry seems to enjoy knitting it.

Buzz.

I'm a very busy little bee right now. I am getting ready to make a long list of all my to-knit items. It's getting longer everyday! Today, I received a few requests for custom items. That's nice!

I'm almost done with the scarf I've been working on for a friend. She ordered something a while ago and I sent her a test knit hat from my pile. She liked it, so she asked for a matching scarf. I knit the hat a really long time ago (I basically did it to learn how to do slip stitch faux cables), so I couldn't remember exactly how I had done it. I looked at a few pictures I had of it and was able to guess what I had done 4 years ago.

I originally had the cables running up each row except the ends. It looked very nice, but after about the 18th inch, it started rolling in on itself. I decided the easiest thing to do was to drop the stitches from the 3rd row in on each side to see how it stopped the rolling, that helped, but it needed a little more, so I did 5th row in as well.  I really love the way the plain rows make the cable rows pop.

I'm looking forward to knitting another copy of this. I have some really nice dark olive green/brown Cascade tweed. It's good stuff. I made a great scarf out of it last year. Knitting it again will help with writing out the pattern since my brain can't really seem to translate my scribbled knitting notes into something that anyone else could ever read. It's like I've never read a pattern before when I try to write my own out!! I'm just going to have to sit down with my big file and study how they are written.

I've been planning a hat using the small cables too. I am leaning towards a sock weight yarn since I have so much of that in the stash. I think the variegated yarn will really look nice.

End of May roundup

I was just commenting on a friend's blog and realized how many WIPs I have. Not that this is anything new, but it's something that always annoys me, and I continue to do it!

1st - Hey, Teach! I knit this SO fast and have not touched it since April 25th. No reason for that, just sheer laziness about not wanting to do shaping. And the shaping isn't even that hard!! I have the sleeves done to the caps, the fronts do to the sleeve shaping, and the back is completely done. It would take a long movie to finish the knitting. Then it needs to be seamed and blocked before the button band is added.

2nd - Dandy Neckerchief This honestly could be anywhere between 70-995 complete. I can pick how large I want it to be and since I haven't decided yet, I haven't worked on it! Stupid. This is another thing I could easily finish in a night if I just made my mind up about the size. I'll have enough of the yarn left for matching mittens and probably a hat.

3rd - Pole I only have the sleeves left. Those haven't been started yet because I want to add some short rows to the caps so the fit is more appealing. This is a few hours work of work, but it's still sitting there, waiting to be finished. The body has been done since May 15th. I really would like to finish this before June 1, but I don't know if that will happen given my work schedule and some work I need to get done for a class.

4th - Eskimo This poor thing hasn't been touched since fall! I flew through the back and the first half of the front panels, but then I left for Christmas break and didn't want to take it with. After Christmas, there were just too many new things to knit! Part of my slowness is also due to the fact that I've almost had to redesign the entire sweater since I'm using such an odd yarn.

5th - A hooded scarf This is for my friend's mom. Unfortunately, there aren't any great patterns that I've found for this item. I'm sort of making it up as I go using ideas from two different patterns. We'll see how that goes.

Written out it seems like a manageable amount of work, but also a lot of work at the same time! I also have to make the Hexacomb cardigan to wear to a wedding on June 10th. I might not be able to accomplish that, but I'm going to try. Which means I really should go dig for my contrast yarn... I thought it was in the in-apartment stash, but I can't find it anywhere.

I have finished a few things lately:

My 7th hat for 11 hats in 2011 -  Lotus hat

This was NOT a fun knit, but that's down to the yarn I used and my inability to count. 

My 8th hat for 11 hats in 2011 - Appalachia 
It was a really fun knit and the decreases on the crown are really cleverly done.

Oops...

I started another sweater.


I'm mad at my FLS which is about 2 hours work away from being done, but I'm still angry at it and can't really work on it right now even though it somehow keeps creeping onto the middle of my couch overnight.

My Eskimo got a whole bunch of love and attention in November and is embarrassingly close to being mostly done too, but I haven't touched it yet this year. Well, I did shove the rest of the yarn into the bag when I stash sorted earlier this year, but I don't think that really counts for much. It's such a fast knit with that giant yarn and giant needles, but I'm a lazy ass, so I haven't done anything with it in ages. I suspect that my urge to knit it will return when it's 104 degrees outside, or whenever I rescue my bike from it's winter storage place behind my couch. The Eskimo and it's bag of wonders are currently living on my bike.

So instead of working on either of those or finishing the Lotus hat, I decided that I needed to cast on another sweater. (The Pole doesn't count yet. I just did the back section to make sure my yarn/gauge was right. There's an official KAL in my knitting group that kicks off in about 2 weeks.) Granted, it's a sweater that's been in my queue almost as long as I've been on Ravelry (my Ravelversary is coming up soon, I shall try not to forget it again this year!) and the year I'm using has been in the stash since 2007 as well... But since I'm a spaz and tend to buy yarn, print the patterns, and then never actually pair the two together to MAKE the sweater, I still had both floating around. Since I'm planning a big move in August and would rather pack boxes full of sweaters, hats, and other knitted items than yarn, I'm really trying to get some FOs in the bag this year.

I was also peer-pressured by Lauren. Okay, not really, the sweater was already on my to-knit list for the year and I had thought seriously about starting in March or April.



It's going quite fast. I took it to a movie preview thing on Thursday and got the back done up to the ribbing on the waist during that. I'd never knit in the movies before, but since we had to be there for a while before the movie started, I thought I'd give it a go. Emily brought her green thing along, and we both knit away for a long time. The girl sitting next to Emily asked if we'd keep knitting once the lights went down which was kind of funny. I didn't really think that people around us might find two young women knitting in a theatre while waiting for a stoner comedy to start odd or different... But then again, I've been knitting for almost 10 years and don't really notice it when other people are doing it in non-knitty places. I could keep knitting in the dark, since I was just doing row after row of stockinette. I basically just went until my hands got sore, which turned out to be exactly the right length. Go me! I did the shaping and the ribbing once I got home and was going to start the lace portion on top, but then realized my pattern had printed without the lace chart. I'm still clueless how that happened, but it's a happy accident because I was able to print the chart on a sheet by itself and was able to make it quite large, so I can read it much easier. In the meantime, since getting the printer attached to the computer can sometimes be annoying, I cast on for the fronts and did a few inches of those.

I got through the first repeat of the chart last night. It was one of those lessons for me where I just had to breathe and trust that the chart, the designer, and the 2003 people who have knit it are smarter than me. It all worked out fine, in fact, the only part that I messed up and had to redo was something that I just miscounted. I'm hoping I can get another big chunk on of it done today. I do have some actual school work to do, but I can probably knit at my desk and get a few rows in here and there.

Lotus

I've been working on the Lotus Hat out of some hated, loathed, detested yarn. It's a pity that I hate the yarn so much because it's gorgeous, but I've tried knitting with it several times, and it never ends well. It's 3 strands with 2 very thin strands (one of mohair) wrapped around a ribbon. It's so very pretty, but so hard to knit with. The strands stray from each other, the ribbon splits, it's just not good stuff to work with.



I was chugging along nicely through the hat. I added an extra repeat of the first chart because I wanted it to cover my ears. I measured it against another hat, but was still concerned it would run a bit small. I decided to just go for it because I assumed the hat would block out a bit to open the lace and it's stretchy. I started on the second chart, the one for the crown and the interesting decreases that make a pretty pattern on top, and was getting through it quite well. In the beginning of the 8th row, I noticed my stitch count was suddenly off one stitch. Not sure how or when it happened, so I had to pull back the entire top section. I'm in the midst of picking them back up now, which is an annoying process.

Duh

Oops, forgot that I didn't blog after I finished my sweater!

It doesn't quite fit. The sleeves are PERFECT, I'm so glad I did them in garter. They have a nice range of motion and are just a tiny bit swingy at the ends. I didn't add any shaping to them at all.

There is an issue with the fit across the bust. Imagine that. My button holes just cannot take it. It just will not button and look decent.

I pulled out the BO edge at the bottom and dropped dropped the 4 stitches across that made up the buttonholes. I'm very slowly picking them back up. So I'll have no buttonholes once I finish that. (I totally just typed "butthole." Thank you, red squiggly line for pointing that one out.) I'm going to figure out some sort of loops on the edge. That should add the extra inch I need for it to actually close. If not, the whole thing can be frogged.

That could have been worse.

I finished the body of my FLS last night around midnight. It's happily folded up in my chair until I can get the time to start on the first sleeve. My goal is to have those finished within a week, but we'll see.

I have no time to knit tonight because I have to take a midterm... In fact, I should be doing that right now, but I'm considering this a warm up activity to get my brain working a little bit and get some concentration for more than 5 seconds at a time. I've been sleeping so poorly the last week and a half, so my body is all out of whack.

I stopped by Joann's on my way home and picked out some buttons. I didn't have the sweater with me, but I knew how many button holes I had since I'd counted them last night. I found some really pretty silver and black buttons that bring out the darker tones in the yarn. No pictures right now, I'll get some tomorrow when I can go outside and get decent, normal looking pictures in daylight. Also, that time thingie... Must get to my midterm now, wish me luck.

I've hit the wall of lace.

I'm getting really bored knitting my FLS. It's just been inch after inch of lace and it's not very exciting or fast. The purl rows are even more slow because of the YOs from the knit side. I'm just ready to get the body done and move along to the arms and finish this thing!

I'm really worried about the fit across the chest. I've read a lot of comments about having issues with that, so we'll see. I've been trying it on as I go, but it's difficult to tell before it's blocked out. I don't want to finish the whole thing just to have a sweater that won't button closed. I might put a lifeline in it today and try it on again to see if I can get a better idea.

ETA: Okay, I stuck it on some waste yarn tonight because I'm the kind of knitter who will just stop knitting if I think something is weird or wrong or won't fit. It fits, but just barely... Here's to really hoping that blocking opens it up a lot.

FLS

I was supposed to start this sweater last year around this time... but never got around to doing anything except salvaging the yarn. It's from a very large Men's J.Crew jumper that was very square and boxy, but such a lovely color. Purple, plus, grey, white, black all heathered together. So nice!



I made a failed attempt to start in October, but I had an old copy of the pattern and could never really get the yoke started because the pattern made NO sense. I put it on my project cards for the year, not really expecting to start it any time soon... But on February 1st, startitis struck and I wanted to knit something, but couldn't decide. I shuffled my cards and got the FLS. I wasn't super thrilled considering I had had so man difficulties getting started the first time, but I sat down and started again... And no luck...

Finally, I figured out I had an old copy. I downloaded the new one, loaded it on my kindle and also printed it out and I was ready!

I got through the yoke fairly easily until the YO round. I didn't get them spaced in a way I really liked the first time, so I pulled out the row and re-did the numbers so I could spread them out in a better way. (All the details are on my project page on Ravelry)

The next hard part was getting the lace to fit well. I had done the sleeves in a normal raglan fashion, measuring as I went to make sure they would fit around my arm, but when I got to the right size for my arm, I didn't have the right number of stitches to spread the lace evenly over 7 stitches minus the 16 for the edge. I couldn't really figure out how to fix this. I eventually just pulled back the first repeat of lace that I had done and a few rows of the garter stitch, and magically had a number that worked! I ended up with 270 sts. I have 56 sts across my sleeve, 72 across the back, and 43 on each front. (43-8 for the button band is 35). It worked out perfectly and made my life so much easier.



I'm just going through all the lace repeats now. I'm in the middle of my 6th repeat. I'll be adding buttonholes all the way down too. I just don't want a boob tent sweater, which is what this one will do with the buttons as they are now.

CPH update

I just finished the hood of my CPH. It looks adorable and a little elfin (pointy).

I just have some sleeves, pockets, and the button band to work on now. The sleeves should go relatively quickly since I can do them at the same time and the pockets will be very, very fast since they are so little. The button band should be too awful either since it's just ribbing. Picking up the stitches will be annoying, but that will be the worst part. Luckily, I can work on each leftover bit on it's own so I won't get too bored doing one thing for hours on end.

Oh, and I want this! It's so adorable and knit geeky!

August is for WIPs

I'm trying to clean out the hidden WIPs stashed all over the place. Mainly just because I actually want to have some nice new sweaters for the fall!

I dug a scarf that's been languishing since last fall. It's just a simple 1x1 rib out of some gorgeous Knit Picks Shamrock. I had 6 balls in 3 different colors, so I'm doing just big blocks of color. I'm on the final color now, a lovely green. It vaguely looks like the Irish flag, with a coppery brown/gold at one end, cream in the middle, and the green at the other end. I worked on it for about 3 hours on Sunday night and almost finished up one ball, I'm hoping that a few more episodes of So You Think You Can Dance and Deadliest Catch will give me a chance to finish it up.

I've been working on a simple shrug this summer, but due to a size 8 needle and the miles of stockinette, it's taking a while. I'm one skein in now and it's already getting quite heavy. But at about $8 for the finished project that can just be tossed on whenever, I think I can make due.

I also dug out my CPH. I had some issues back in May when I was working on it. I failed to measure where to start my armhole for the left front, and was about an inch off, so I had to frog about 6 or 7 inches and try again. I sort of forgot that I needed to give it some attention, but I pulled it off the top of bookshelf yesterday and gave it some time. I finished up the piece and was able to seam it to the back piece today. I have the first few inches of the right front done (simple ribbing - I did both sides at the same time to ensure the same length), so I'm hoping to get a big chunk of that knocked out this evening while I watch Big Brother and Shark Week stuff.

:\

I'm supposed to be working on a paper that's due tomorrow at 2pm. I'm not getting much done. I also have 4 other papers to finish by Friday at 3. Yippee. I could have had these done or at least mostly done by now, but what fun would that be.

I haven't been knitting much except dishcloths. They're a good mindless knit during my down time. I did work on my CPH left front on Sunday for a bit. It's up to the arm hole decreases now. I'm hoping that I can spend some time on it this weekend and get that side of the front totally done. It goes really fast when I work on it... Amazing how that happens. I'm hoping to get the entire sweater done before Maymester is over. I think I should have a decent amount of time after class every day to get some nice, real knitting done. I'd like to get the Eskimo done in that time as well. It would be nice to have both of those off of my WIP list.

I'm trying to find a nice pattern for a grocery bag for my mom. She mentioned a while ago that she wanted one, and I thought it would make a good Mother's Day gift. I want something easy and in the round. There are just so many to dig through.

CPH and the stupid loose yarn

February 17, 2010 - CPH and the stupid loose yarn
Originally uploaded by Jesmy

I keep getting these really loose stitches from where I switch from knit to purl. I tried finding a solution online with no real luck. Purling through the back loop didn't work. The only thing that seems to be helping at all is pulling my working yarn really tight when I swap over and purl the first two stitches (purl, then tug, purl, then tug). It's better, but still not great.

This photo is from a few days ago... I'm into the armholes now and should be able to get the back done tonight and cast on the fronts. Those should go pretty quickly. I'm glad I went with a US 9 (5.5 mm) needle. It gives the yarn some room to move.

Knitting Olympics

One of my goals for the year is to knit the Central Park Hoodie for the 2010 Knitting Olympics. I cast on tonight while watching the opening ceremonies with a group of Boulder knitters. It was very fun.



I'm about 2.5" in the back. It's just the boring 2x2 ribbing at the bottom, but I'm chugging along through it.

FO & WIP

I finished the Knotty but Nice hat for Ryan last week. It looks great. The cables are a bit tight around the middle, like many of the comments said, but with the blocking and the stretchiness of the yarn, I think it should be fine. It was a really fun knit and the yarn I used (Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece) was really nice to work with. I have almost half the skein left, so I might make myself a pair of fingerless gloves.





I restarted a sweater I started a long time ago. I got the yarn for a steal from Webs. Since it's a bulky yarn on size 13 needles, it's a pretty quick knit. I'm almost done with the back piece. I'm excited to get this done and start wearing it around! I have a feeling this is going to be a favorite item in my closet.

Almanac

I am going to work my way through Elizabeth Zimmerman's Knitter's Almanac. At least, I am going to try. There are some of the patterns that are just not my style at all, so I might substitute similar, but updated patterns in for those months.

The first month I will be doing is August. August's item, well items, are all Christmas decorations. That might be a little odd for August, but I have never knit an EZ pattern before, so this will be an adventure. It's also a good way to use up some scraps and do some small projects while I finish up larger projects that need to get out of the WIP basket.

Anyone want to join in on this little endeavor?

Stitch 'n Twitch

Miles and miles of moss stitch is hard to do. I'm just to the sleeve decreases on my Minimalist Cardigan. It's not too bad of a knit, but I'm not looking forward to the sleeves and front panels. That's a lot of moss stitch. It looks lovely though!!

(Not a recent photo but you get the idea.)

It's a beautiful day.

And I haven't stepped outside yet. I should go take the doggie for a walk.

I'm putting some recycled yarn up on the etsy store this week. I have a lot of it floating around and would really like to see it come to some use. I need to figure out how to weigh it properly.

I'm still working on the lacey thing for Mom and Vince's scarf. I need go to the library tonight and get the Barbara Walker book. I want to knit some new fun hats.

I have a fun little toy all done for the store. He needs some photos taken this evening.

What good little knitters do.

My stash is a mess. Always has been. I'm sure it's better than some people's. I've been pretty good about pairing like yarns in ziploc bags and then shoving them into hiding spots. Most of my stash are orphans though. I don't usually buy yarn with projects in mind - something I'd like to change. I tend to buy things because it's pretty, it feels nice or it's one sale. Maybe all three. So I have a lot of single or double balls. That's the majority of my stash.

I'm trying to be good and match things up with patterns. I freely admit that I would not be doing this it it were not for Ravelry and my new printer. So far I've matched up quite a few things. I've printed patterns and shoved them into the bags along with the yarn. I'm really proud of myself. Now I have an actual working queue. Want to knit a scarf? I have 2 lacey ones waiting. Hat? I've got waiting so far. I should have more in just a little while. Charity knitting? I have a lot of pale pink Cotton-Ease that has been in my stash for about 5 years. I printed off two baby bootie patterns and am looking for those series of hats I queued the other day.

This all started because of my upcoming trip to Ohio. I'm finally off to see a surgeon about my stupid gimpy knee. I will be without the BF, the dog, the internet and the DVR for 2 weeks. I need things to knit.

On the Sesame front - I am having some issues with the sleeves. I want to shorten the sleeves just a bit --- but if I do, the stripes won't match up. Ugh. I guess I just have to deal with long sleeves.

Westward ho!

The sleeves are cast on, knit to about 10 inches and moving along quickly. I need 9 more inches before I can start the cap shaping so I'm hoping to get that done tonight.