A Whole Heck of a Lot

I should just post when I feel like it, even if it's only been like 3 days since my last post. If I had done that, I wouldn't be more than two weeks behind in posting now. Oh well, I've got lots to show for it anyways. And I believe I did say before that when school started the update schedule would be out the window.

Dad's blanket is coming along

In Progress: I'm not sure if I've mentioned this to you before, but my main WIP right now is another pom-pom blanket. This one is done in the outdoors colourway, and is a late birthday present for my dad. I warned him that it'd be late... besides, it's too hot to really use it right now anyways. I'm working on the 4th of 8 balls, so I'm thinking it should be done sometime this weekend, depending on how class goes. 
I also started a little gifty for my mom, as a kind of office-warming gift. She's starting a new job soon, and moving to a tiny new office. So she'll be getting a teeny tiny knitted island! It's from the Teeny-Tiny Mochimochi book by Anna Hrachovec. So far I'm only done the water, but once I pick it up again it should go pretty fast. I also plan to add a tiny mermaid to go with the island before she starts the job.

Finished Objects: In progress may not be very exciting, but this section is. First off there's my Charade socks I was working on before. I used only 49 g of yarn, so I've still got about half a ball for another pair. I'm starting to consider trying a new type of heel for my socks, maybe a normal double-stitch short row, instead of doing two of the first half of it. They fit really well, but tend to slip down a tiny bit on my heel, although that may not actually be a problem. I guess I'm just feeling that it's time to branch out a bit on my sock heels.

Next up, there's my first pair of fingerless mitts! My step-sister, Brittany, is coming home for our cousin's wedding in August, and I haven't knit her anything before. I was thinking of what I could make her... not a toy because her dog might eat it, and I don't know if she'd wear a hat. Fingerless gloves though, I could see her wearing. So I used some Caron Simply Soft from my stash in dark country blue, and made her a pair of the Dashing fingerless gloves. They're like the more masculine version of Fetching, and I prefer them (I think she would too). I shortened them in a few areas, mainly by cutting down the ribbing before and after the cabled section. The thumb gusset was a new experience for me, and somewhat enlightening for me about after-thought heels.
For future fingerless mitts, I will do them 2aat. I was going to with this pair, but the cast-on was too fiddly. Looking back at it, I think an easier work around would be to cast on all of the stitches for the first one, and put half of them on a spare needle, rather than cast the other half on at the end. I kept twisting the second half, or at least it seemed that way.

I also mentioned the Teeny-Tiny Mochimochi book earlier... the island is not my first teeny-tiny project! I made a teeny-tiny computer, since I'm now a computer science major, and a teeny-tiny, chocolate cupcake for my grandma. The cupcake is a sort of late birthday thing. They're both made on 2.5 mm dpns, and made of Knit Picks Palette. The only issue I had was that my dpns are 5" long, which is just the right length where they poke into my palm painfully while knitting. While knitting straight at least, I've been able to avoid the pain by throwing a point protector on the end of the dpn; it made knitting it so much faster!

Stash: This time, my stash isn't so much future knitting, as I haven't picked a pattern out for this yarn yet... it's sock yarn, all I can say is that it will become socks! More yarn I got in Florida, at Hobby Lobby. It's a variety of Red Heart that we don't have here, Heart & Sole, made up of 70% wool and 30% nylon, with aloe. The colourway is called green envy, and from what I can see, it's a self-striping in a similar way to how the green mix in my Superba Bamboo does. It feels nice and soft, and the aloe seems nice too, although I'm sure that probably goes away after a washing.

Catch Up: Finally, we've come to the point in this section where the first socks come into it. On the Bernat forums, there was a KAL for knitting a pair of cuff-down socks on dpns using Bernat Sox yarn. I just so happened to find a ball on sale at Zellers in the camouflage colourway, so I decided to knit my first pair of socks! The pattern had you measure the length of your foot to determine the size. Now, my feet are pretty big, and decently wide. I wear a men's size 9.5 shoe (women's 10.5-11.5 depending on make/width), and men's in particular because (at least in Puma's), the men's width default is D, whereas the women's width is B. So according to this pattern, the length of my foot called for a large size sock. So I cast on and made my first pair! The videos from Shandeh on the forum were indispensable! I still refer to them for some techniques that I don't use often, like joining in the round and doing kitchener stitch.
My first sock fit pretty well. There was a little sag on the back of my ankle, and it was a little loose around, but pretty comfy otherwise. I cast on pretty soon after for my second sock. And then I got second sock syndrome (SSS). A month or so later, I got sick and had to stay home from school for a few days. While laying in bed, I finished my second sock. I must have gotten used to the dpns or something, because my gauge became much larger! The second sock was comparatively huge, both in length and circumference. But it was done, and I was glad of that!

The socks now reside at my dad's house, where they get some use as socks he wears around the house. His feet are just a little bigger than mine, so the smaller sock fits fine, and the bigger one isn't as loose on him. 
From this first pair experience, I decided to (eventually) go with magic loop, because I don't like dpns very much, and kept getting ladders with them. I'd had to shift the stitches around each round to get rid of the ladders. I also decided to do future socks 2aat because 1) my gauge changed from sock 1 to 2, and 2) it was a pain in the ass to count the rounds for the length of the first sock, to make sure they'd be the same length. And lastly, I decided on toe-up so that I could measure both the circumference/fit on my foot as I went, and start the heel when it was right for my foot. No more following stitch counts in patterns, and no more picking up stitches for a heel flap. 
Now, this method has somewhat stunted me, in that some patterns are so heavily patterned (cabled), that you have to follow the amount of stitches pretty closely, and I don't know the "size" of my foot enough to judge what would fit. For now I've mostly just chosen patterns that consist of a certain stitch pattern, or one that has grey areas where more or less can be added at the sides. I will cross the heavily patterned socks bridge when I get to it!

Other: Just a quick 'other' today. Here's the video I mentioned for kitchener stitch. If you go to the youtube site of the video, on the right, most of her other videos from that KAL are listed. They can be a huge help for new sock knitters, and good refreshers too. Like I said, she has a joining in the round video that is also excellent!

An FO For You

In Progress: Two WIPs for you today, both of which I mentioned last time. First is my Charade socks in blue mix. I'd thought that it was variegated, however it's actually self-striping, like the green mix! I like it though, and some of the blues are just gorgeous! As far as the yarn with this pattern, it's great, I don't think there's much that wouldn't work with this pattern. The stripes don't match, and they're actually in the opposite order on each foot, because I'm working with yarn from both ends of the original ball; I don't mind at all.
While I was winding the yarn into two balls and admiring the colours, I did get a bit of an unwelcome surprise, when I ran into a random join 10 g into it. The joined yarn didn't match, so I just cut the 10 g ball off and set it aside; I figure that I'll just join it in on the second pair I make from this yarn. Maybe I can get it to match too.
I did my sock math last night for the heel and gusset, and I was surprised to find that my row gauge is the same on this pair as my last pair (same needle)... until I remembered that row gauge doesn't change like stitch gauge. Remembering that in the future should make the sock math a bit easier. Just a few more inches to go before the gusset!

The other WIP is my Annis shawl. I cast on yesterday morning, with the twisted loop. It was very fast to cast on all 363 stitches, but I made it way to tight, and couldn't even move the stitches back onto the needles for unraveling. I had to undo each stitch by hand from the wire of my circulars. Two hours had passed now. Next I tried a knitted cast on using a crochet hook (I used my 6.5 mm needles and 5 mm hook), where you chain one between each stitch on the needle. It was a little fiddly at first, and much slower going, but very worth it in the end! It is definitely stretchy enough for me to make points when I block it; the pattern has already formed little points. I did a straight purl row after the cast on with the 6.5 mm needles, and then switched to 6 mm needles for the chart. I'll have to see when this is done, but right now I think if  I were to make this again (with similar yarn), I would use 5.5 mm needles. However, I still like how it's turned out so far, and I do want it to be a little larger. I also don't know if the larger needle for that cast on was totally necessary, it's pretty stretchy!
I am using Toho 6/0 beads I got from Michael's, in blue rainbow and matte blue/green. The blue/green ones are between yo's that make a ladder-y thing, and the rainbows are on the s2kp decreases to the points and where the nupps would be. I'd originally planned this the other way around, but consideration and conference on the matter with my mom and grandma convinced me to switch it, and I'm glad I did! I'm also adding the beads on the purl rows before I purl the stitches, which is new to me. Previously I added the beads on the knit side after I knit the stitch. I think they end up looking similar, but I did see a comparison once that showed that adding on the purl side makes it neater within stockinette, and I figured that I should become comfortable adding them this way as well. 
Currently, I'm done 6 rows of the chart, so I've still got 12 more to go. 

Finished Object: When I hit the button to compose this post, I had no FO's to show this week. But then I started thinking about the penguin, which has been waiting for more than a week now for his flippers and feet, so I sewed him all up and took some pictures. Now I have an FO to show you, and I no longer have to worry about the poor little guy languishing in my project bag as an amputee. Man, he is so cute, I kinda want to keep him myself! But I have enough little knitted things of my own, and I know he'll be appreciated with my aunt. Until we go visit though, he can hang out on my bed with the other knitted critters, rather than in the closet with the macarons.

Stash/Future Knitting: When I first joined Ravelry, I saw the Haruni shawl. I saw this shawl, and I told myself that one day I would have the knitting skills to make it. So while we were in Florida, and I had all sorts of LYS's on my list to go to, I helped myself shop a bit beforehand by writing out things I wanted to knit, seeing what people made them in, and what yardages/how many skeins they needed to do it. Haruni was one of the first items on my list. I got my first Dream In Color yarn, and it's Smooshy with Cashmere, two skeins for my Haruni. The colour is called Global Mix. Looking at it in the skein it looks almost too variegated to be made into a lace shawl like that, but I looked at it knit up on Ravelry, and it knits up as a tonal yarn. It's just so soft and luxurious and smooshy!

It's so smooshy!

Catch Up: I live in Canada, and it gets cold. I live near the Great Lakes, and it gets wet and cold. For the really windy, cold times, covering your face is a good idea, and besides a balaclava, I wasn't sure how the best way to accomplish this was. Then I found cowls. I still can't really keep it up over my mouth and nose, if I want to be able to see where I'm going (my breath fogs up my glasses!), but it doesn't bulk up your coat like a scarf, and is easier to pull up over your face if needed. I made two, in Lion Brand Wool-Ease Thick and Quick, one for myself in the fig colourway (and matching, lighter buttons), and one for my grandma in sky blue with brown buttons. I made mine a little larger around for my thicker hair, and I added matching ribbing to the top, so I needed just over one ball's worth. For my grandma's, I'd forgotten that I increased the stitch count, so her's used less than one ball. Luckily she has very short hair, and is all around smaller than I am, so it fits her perfectly! I can't take all the credit for these cowls, though, as my mom very kindly sewed the buttons on for me. 

I also crocheted some little things around this time, about November last year. I made some poppies for Remembrance Day. We used safety pins to secure them on, which means you won't lose the poppy after a day of wearing it, and they can be re-worn in following years! I also made up a few of the red parts separately, as my cat's love of the poppies you get around that time of year also extends to the ones I made! For the commercial poppies, I usually take out the black felt part and the pin (of course!) and let him have the red part. Now that I know he loves the red poppy I make too, he can have them year-round!

Other: I really want to get back to working on my Annis, so this section will be short. However, this is a knitting tip that I found online that has become invaluable. In knitting, at various times, you'll come across instructions to slip stitches. This may be for a slip-stitch pattern, or part of the instruction to s2kp (slip 2, knit 1, and pass the slipped stitches over) or other similar decreases, or even in some short-row techniques. When I first came across the instruction, the pattern specified purl-wise or knit-wise. It didn't take long though for me to run into patterns where this wasn't specified. I googled which way I should slip the stitch, and most of what I found was for a specific application or the answer was debated. Then I found this simple rule of thumb which I will share with you now:

When it's part of a decrease, slip it knit-wise; if not, slip it purl-wise.

(Unless otherwise stated in the pattern!)

This little tidbit has not yet led me astray, and I continue to refer back to it in my mind when any question of which way I should be slipping the stitch comes up. The idea behind it is that when you're slipping for, say, a slip-stitch pattern, you don't want to twist the stitch, so you slip it purl-wise. For decreases you want to slip them knit-wise, and you're decreasing them away anyways. 

Well, I'm going to go work on that shawl. 
I won't be posting again until next weekend, so let me just say:
Happy Canada Day to my countrymen, and happy Independence Day to my American neighbours to the south!

And as always, Happy Crafting to all!

I've Been Busy

In Progress: I've got one WIP at the moment, although I plan to finish it today, and that is a knitted penguin for my aunt, who's favourite animals are... penguins. We're supposed to go visit them this weekend, however as of right now, the plan is on shaky grounds, and it appears that the trip will be postponed to who knows when. I've used Bernat Super Value for the black parts of the penguin, Caron Simply Soft in sunshine for the
yellowy parts, and what I believe is also some Caron Simply Soft for the white belly; it was a random, unmarked ball of white acrylic I had with other left overs, but oddly enough had never marked down on my yarn sheet (all the other balls of leftovers have their locations written down). The construction is interesting, although maybe a little more involved than it needed to be, but I think it mainly avoids more sewing, which is good. The tail is very cute! Take a look for yourself. The flippers and feet are done, but have yet to be attached, and I had to add an artsy effect to the photo for the eyes to show up well. They're 6 mm safety eyes.

Finished Objects: First off, the Olive Branch shawl blocked out very nicely, and was very well received! I gave the recipient the left over yarn as well, because she's decided to pick up knitting again!
I also finished the Freya shawl, with only 2 g of yarn left over! I have thus far opted not to block it, as the composition is 80% acrylic, and I really like the flirty ruffle along the bottom, and I'm worried that blocking it may remove that. Who knows though, I may block it some day.

French macarons, yum!

The next few FO's are some things I hadn't even mentioned on the blog yet. They're 3 crocheted macarons (the French kind). The family we may go see were just in Paris over Christmas, and gave me some good ideas for my own trip in May, such as suggesting that I try macarons (I'd wanted to anyways!), since my cousin adored them. So since my aunt who loves penguins is getting a penguin, I made my cousin and other aunt each macarons! I changed up the pattern slightly, but I've already written all of that out on the project page. I also crocheted one that followed the pattern for myself ;) I used just some left over Bernat Satin in maitai and banana, and some Caron Simply Soft in pistachio and soft pink.
My last FO this week is the socks that I'd just cast on before my last post. I finished them 2 nights ago, with only 1 g left of my yarn. I didn't think that I'd like the pattern as much as I do. I believe this may become my go-to sock pattern for using up amounts of sock yarn that are too small for a normal pair. They are super comfortable, and fit really well, even without any ribbing. And the yarn is super soft- I definitely need to get more of that next time I'm near a Hobby Lobby!

Stash/Future Knitting: I had all of the yarns I wanted to share here lined up in a certain order to talk about, however I think it'd be better to deviate slightly to talk about my more immediate future knitting when the opportunity arises. 

Blue Mix colourway

I love knitting socks, I think I've mentioned that before. So with my current socks finished, and thinking that I'd have a nice long car ride through which to work on more, I've already planned but not started my next pair of socks. I decided on the sock pattern Charade (it's a free pattern on Ravelry, as are almost all of the things I make), and then by looking through the finished Charade socks, picked out my yarn. I'll be using my Rico Design Superba Bamboo in the blue mix colourway. I ordered it, along with some other sock yarns, from an online retailer called Deramores. They're based in the UK, but you can change the prices to CAD or USD, and have very decent shipping rates to Canada.

Green Mix colourway

In that order, I also got the same yarn in the green mix colourway. Where the blue is a variegated yarn with a slight striping-feel to it, the green is more of a striping yarn, where you sometimes get an almost jacquard pattern as some of the stripes (you know what I mean, I hope). The yarn is 50% merino, 25% bamboo and 25% nylon. It comes in a 100 g ball, so I will have to wind it into two 50 g balls for my TAAT (two at a time) socks. When I do wind one ball into two for this kind of thing, I wind them as two center-pull balls, and leave the outside strands of each attached to each other, in case for some reason one sock uses more, or I didn't get them as evenly measured as I'd hoped. I did the same thing for another pair, and it was good, as I have enough for only 1 sock left, and have the option of making a pair of mis-matched socks without needing to join in the second ball because they're still attached. Case in point, for the socks I just finished, I'd started with two 50 g balls, and finished one of them well before the other, so I joined the other end of the second ball on that sock and continued on until it was almost all gone.

My next future knitting/stash is some yarn that I got while on vacation in Europe. It's madelinetosh tosh sock in the Baltic colourway, which I got for a much higher price than it would have been here, but oh well, it was vacation yarn! I plan to make an

madelinetosh tosh sock

Annis shawl with it and some 6/0 Toho beads I got at Michael's. The Annis shawl is made from the bottom up, a technique I haven't yet tried, and has nupps. I'll be replacing the nupps with some matte blue/green beads, and possibly also putting those beads down the points. I've also got clear/rainbow beads for use on the center of these 'ladder' type things you get from yo's and decreases. Originally this shawl had no deadline, but now I've realized that the dress I plan to wear to my cousin's wedding in August is black, white and blue, so I can wear the Annis!

Catch Up: The next project I have for this section is a present that I crocheted for one of my oldest friends, who also happens to crochet (I didn't find out until after I'd learned how), hadn't yet joined Ravelry, and is working on her Master's degree in Chemistry. So when I saw this pattern, I knew I had to make it for her: it's an Erlenmeyer flask! I made it with Bernat Handicrafter in hot pink because I know she likes pink, and the same yarn in white for the stem. I'd seen others add some stuffing to the outside for a smoke effect, but with kitty cats around, that's probably too much of a temptation for them. The construction of it is very clever, and if you look down the stem of the glass, you can see the pink 'liquid' inside. I found some of those decorative glass balls in an old vase, and put some on the bottom inside for weight, so it'd stand on it's own. I really love the measurements on the side of the flask, and how I did the mouth, but the eye's were really tricky for me since they were curved. I found a video on youtube that helped a bit, but it was a learning curve for sure, and embroidering features like that continues to be a bit of an issue for me. 

My next project was a bit intimidating for me, and I took three breaks along the way before certain finishing touches. It was my first hat, the Kittyville Hat pattern. Most of it was actually completed in July (although I don't think it was mentioned on the blog), but it wasn't fully done until September. I used the Bernat Super Value in black (some of the leftovers of which were used on the penguin) and it was my first time using a circular needle (16" Chiaogoo bamboo) for circular knitting, or any circular knitting for that matter, as I finished the hat part before I'd even started the hamsterbean. Once I cast on and joined in the round, it was pretty easy. My first break happened before I added the ear flaps and I-cord tassels. During this break it became pretty intimidating, but I pushed through and picked it back up, and it was fine! When it was time to add the ears I took another break, as you did so by picking up stitches along the top of the hat. I'd picked up stitches before, but not along a flat fabric before... but again, once I did them, it wasn't too hard. Finally, I wasn't even sure if I'd add the pom-poms at the ends of the tassels. Most of the tutorials I'd seen had used cardboard or actual special plastic cut-outs for forming them, and it all seemed too complicated. I didn't add them until I was on Facebook and saw a video from Bernat about making pom-poms with only your hands, yarn and scissors. I haven't had an occasion to make any more, but if/when I do, I will be referring back to that video.
In the end, I finished the hat in time for winter, and I love it. I wear it about half the time I wear a hat (I've got one other I usually alternate it with).

Baltic madelinetosh wound on my nostepinne

Other: You'll notice that the yarn I plan to make my Annis shawl with is in a skein. I've used fancier yarns from skeins before (3 times so far), but it's always been wound into a ball for me at the store. Now you can wind for yourself at home with a ball winder and swift, just like at the store, but I don't have a job and would rather spend money on yarn that fork over more than $60 for a ball winder. So I got a nostepinne. I've wound balls of yarn by hand before, once I got one into a cake, but it's almost always a ball, and usually a bit hard to get it even because you have to turn the yarn on your fingers. With the nostepinne, you turn it, something you can't do with your hand. It's also super easy to make center-pull cakes on. The one I got was handmade, and cost about $10 from Etsy. It's a very nice walnut wood, with notches for fastening the center-pull strand to the top or bottom. If you go on google, there's all sorts of videos for making yarn cakes on them, and using alternative materials as nostepinnes, such as the tubes from paper towel rolls and toilet paper rolls, dowels, or PVC pipes.
When I first got my nostepinne, I practiced by winding center-pull cakes out of leftover balls of acrylic. It's pretty fun to do! Then a few days ago, I wound up the yarn for the Annis on my nostepinne. In my opinion, it looks just as good as something you'd get from a ball winder. 

Quite a lot to mention today, but I did go almost 2 weeks without an update. I'll try to be a little more punctual next time, but we did have some flood-related havoc to occupy my time.

The Almost FO

I've been a bit of an obsessive knitter this week, putting huge amounts of time into the Olive Branch shawl and only that. I also had a bit of a plan for how I'd go through my catch up projects, but now I think I want to skip ahead a bit, because it'd be relevant to what I want to talk about in the 'Other' section today. 

In Progress: I'm still working on the Freya shawl, but like I said in the introduction, I've been really focused on the Olive Branch, so Freya hasn't seen much action since my last post. 

Walk Away Bamboo in Tango

Last night, I cast on for a new project, a pair of socks for myself! I'm using a small bit of Yarn Bee Walk Away Bamboo in the tango colourway, which is a fun mix of blue, pink, orange and lime green with a white strand throughout lending some extra interest to the mix. The yarn is a light fingering according to Ravelry, and composed of 45% bamboo, 40% wool and 15% nylon- it's very soft! I haven't yet covered my sock knitting adventures and how my preferences came about, but I'm knitting these toe-up, two at a time with magic loop on a 47", 2.75 mm Chiaogoo Red Lace circular. I started out planning to make the Mouches pattern, as it is meant to be a small ankle sock and has lace, but I was worried that my ~180 yards just wouldn't make it, so I switched to a pattern that I'd been eyeing that was meant to use only one 50 g ball of sock yarn, and make an even lacier ankle sock. I have about 39 g of a 50 g ball of sock yarn to work with. There are a few reasons that I cast these on now, even knowing that I want to finish the Freya shawl soon. The first is that today (June 8) is world wide knit in public day (WWKIP Day), and I thought we'd be going to a park opening/BBQ today and wanted something a bit more portable and easier than the Freya shawl to bring with me (but I ended up staying home with my mom waiting for our new stove to arrive). The second reason is that the June challenge in the 13 socks in 2013 group involves knitting with fun, springy, variegated yarn, and an option is making them for yourself too, and I've been wanting to use up the rest of this yarn for a little while. It's nice to use some of your yarn, but I get extra satisfaction from setting it as used up in my stash on Ravelry, since so few of my yarn has actually been fully used up! (Still only 5 yarns in the used up tab).

Finish(ing) Object: You may have noticed the absence of the Olive Branch shawl in the In Progress section, and that would be because it is off the needles and currently blocking! I got it off the needles and onto the blocking mats last night, and it feels mostly dry now, but I figured it can't hurt to leave it on there for a few more hours to make sure it's completely dry. I'm also happy to report that none of the dye came out in the water while it was soaking. Here it is pinned out, you may notice a white thread along the top: that is my cheap blocking wire alternative, neutral crochet cotton my grandma grabbed me for free at a destash at the local senior's center. You've just got to make sure that it's threaded through before soaking (luckily I read that tip before attempting this method).

Stash: I've already talking about my Yarn Bee Walk Away Bamboo in the In Progress section, but I just wanted to mention that I got that yarn, along with many others and my first LYS yarn on our trip to Florida this past December, since we don't have Hobby Lobby in Canada.

Luxury Sock in Crocuses

While in Florida, I also got some Loops & Threads Luxury Sock in the crocuses colourway. We have the same yarn at the Michael's here, but it was at least $2 per ball cheaper in the USA (from $8/50 g ball to at least $6, although I don't remember for sure), so I finally got some. I believe it will be self-striping which should be fun, and it's pretty soft (although a bit more 'wooly' feeling than the Walk Away Bamboo), with a composition of 60% merino, 30% nylon and 10% cashmere. I have no idea what pattern(s) I'll be using with this yarn, but it'll be something that goes well with the self-striping nature of it.

Catch Up: I've decided against going out of order for now, so the next two projects I completed were both crocheted! The first was a pattern I'd had my eye on for a while, and decided to make so that I could wear it for handing out candy on Hallowe'en: a brain slug from Futurama! The Bernat Supersaver that I bought specifically for the green colour of the slug was pretty rough on my fingers (mainly the ones holding the project while I speared it with the hook), but I finished it pretty quickly. The antennae stay up for a little bit, but gravity eventually weighs them down, and I added a small crocheted square to the bottom of the slug, so that a headband can be slipped through for wearing it on my head (it worked great for Hallowe'en, and I got a few comments on it too!), but also removed for just displaying the brain slug. 
My other project was a request from my step dad, for another crocheted coaster, similar to the others I'd made, but that wouldn't let condensation from glasses seep through to the table. So using a technique I got from making teething biscuits before, I made two of the circular coasters, and then slip-stitched them together around the outside. I also used a nicer yarn, Bernat Handicrafter in the Neptune colourway, and gave the coaster to him for his birthday. When I first slip-stitched the two coasters together, it was cupped up a little, but most of that went away after a night under my laptop.

Other: I haven't really talked about knitting socks, but I've completed 5 pairs of toe-up socks so far, and I've consistently had a small problem with Judy's magic cast-on. Don't get me wrong, I love this cast on! It's very easy and makes a great looking toe. My problem is that the first stitch on the bottom needle (opposite the slip knot) is always very large and loose on the next round. I always end up taking the yarn tail at the toe and using it to firm up that one loose stitch. So for the socks I cast on last night, once I finally figured out my issue (I kept getting huge, loose toes, and then realized after attempt 5 or so that I was using a 4 mm needle rather than 2.75 mm), I decided to try to fix the loose stitch while knitting. First I tried making that loop really tight, but that did nothing since I always make all the loops as tight as possible. Next, when I came up to knitting it, I knit it normally, and then pulled the yarn over from the back, over the top of the needle to the front, and then in back again (under the needle, ready to knit again), which pulled that large stitch over the new one, and left me with 2 bars on the needle where normally one would be. This was intentional though, and on the next round, I knit both of those bars together. And you know what, there's no loose stitch to need to try to tighten later! It looks a little different on the toe if you really examine it, but there's no gap or anything, and it probably stands out more because of the different colours in the yarn. If my explanation of what I didn't isn't painting a clear picture, it's pretty much like making a double stitch for the yo-yo or German short-row heel, but instead of leaving the yarn in front to purl, I took it all the way around to the back again. In the future, I'll definitely be using this little trick for the loose stitch, although I may try the Turkish cast on at some point, as I keep seeing it mentioned.

That's all for now, I want to get back to my socks and get through the toe increases (one of the more tedious parts in my opinion).
Happy Crafting!

Weighing the Possibilities

It's only been a few days since my last post, but I've got a lot of things to catch up on, and I said I'd post pictures of my two WIP shawls.

1/2 done Freya

In Progress: I started the Freya shawl a few days before I got the yarn for the Olive Branch. I've made some progress since these photos were taken, both projects now have only a small bit of yarn left from the first balls.

Olive Branch

The Freya shawl pattern was adapted from a circular doily pattern, and has a new element to shawl knitting for me: working the pattern on the wrong side as well as the right side. About half of the purl rows involve making a center double decrease or purl yo's (I had to youtube it).
For the Olive Branch shawl, I've finished the 4th repeat of chart one, and I'm halfway done the first repeat of chart two. I hope that there's enough yarn for 2 repeats of chart two... weighing the yarn will be required.

Stash: Since I've already mentioned these two shawls, I'm going to talk about the yarns that they're made from. Olive Branch is made of Malabrigo Arroyo in the aguas colourway. I hadn't worked with Malabrigo before, but so far I've enjoyed this yarn. There've been no problems with the yarn (joins, breaks, knots), and the slight variegation in the colour is fun, I especially enjoy the darkest green parts. Arroyo is 100% superwash merino in a sport weight, so it's not the smoothest thing running over my finger, but it's not nearly as bad as some cheap acrylics I've used. My only complaint is that I should have 200 g in two balls, and only ended up with 195 g, but at least it's only 5 g.
Freya is made with Patons Lace in the sachet colourway. I bought this yarn last year when I came across it at Michael's, since it was the first lace yarn I'd seed there. The yarn is 80% acrylic, 10% wool and 10% mohair, hence the somewhat fuzzy appearance (it's much fuzzier in person). Ravelry classifies it as a light fingering weight. I mentioned in my last post that I was shorted 23 g of yarn in one of these balls, which alone would be enough to stop me from buying more. However, I have another bone to pick with this yarn. As I was getting near the end of the first ball, I came to a knot in the yarn, where the colour switched from white to dark purple! I had to cut the yarn, and then wind it myself into a ball, because the outside of the ball would match okay with the white (it was white, starting the transition to light green), but the mohair made the strand on the outside get tangled on the ball when I tried to use it. While winding it, I got to a weak part that snapped, so add two more ends to weave in there. I wonder if maybe the other ball is so light because there isn't an extra bit tied on to it. At least the yarn feels okay, and it should block out well because of the 20% animal fiber content. 

Catch Up: Between finishing the my crocheted star baby blanket and finishing my summer flies shawl, I started and finished two small projects. The first was improvised to be functional. The light pulley in our office is pretty short, so I took some white cotton yarn and learned how to make an I-cord from youtube. When I got to the end, I decided to take some multicoloured Handicrafter yarn and crochet a little flower onto the bottom. The I-cord stretches a little when you use it, but it makes turning the light on and off with the pulley much easier. 
Around this time, I was contemplating making a pair of socks. I'd found a 100 g ball of Bernat Sox on sale at Zellers, had the dpns (only 4, I now prefer 5), and there were some good instructional videos on the Bernat Forums for a Sox knit along. But before I jumped in with that whole new concept, I wanted to try knitting in the round first. I'd had the hamsterbean pattern in my favourites for a little while, and remembered the description said that it'd be good for learning/practicing knitting in the round... so I grabbed some leftover lagoon Bernat Satin from my afghan and got started. On the first go I didn't join the round properly, and I think I got the yarn a little messed up with the multiple needles, however I got it okay on the second attempt. I didn't have any safety eyes, so I embroidered them on with some leftover black yarn from my summerflies shawl. While doing the second eye, a stray piece of the yarn fell over it's head, and I thought 'gee, that looks like the strap of an eyepatch...' and thus the Dread Pirate Hamsterbean was born! He was pretty fun to make, and a good introduction to knitting in the round.

Other: I mentioned earlier that I'd be weighing my yarn often for the Olive Branch shawl. Let me say, I love being able to weigh my yarn! I found a small Starfrit scale on sale for $10 at Canadian Tire and bought it. Once I had it, I went through my whole stash, adding amounts used to completed projects, etc. I found out that some of my estimates had been very close, and others not so much. Now I've come to realize that I'm quite the data nerd. I've got all of my yarn photographed and on Ravelry with colourway, dye lot, where it was bought and when it was bought. I've got all of my projects with when they were started and finished. Not only did I weigh all of my yarn, but I made a yarn excel sheet where I keep track of all of my yarn and the current weight of each (since Ravelry sometimes isn't precise). However, even if you aren't a data nerd like me, it can be very useful to weigh your yarn to know, say, how much you have left for choosing what to make with the leftovers, or knowing when to finish a toe-up sock, or for tracking how much yarn is being used towards the end of a shawl to decide how many more rows to go. Also, for some things on Ravelry, it's good to know how much you've used, like test knitting, or some contests; for the 12 shawls forever, there's a certain minimum yardage amount. I know that there are some other ways of doing that, but a scale can certainly be a cheap option, and very convenient for measuring while you're in the middle of a project.

Well, I'm going to go work on that Olive Branch shawl,
Happy Crafting!

And We're Back

Well, I kept up with the knitting, but not with the posting.
I've recently been watching some knitting-related podcasts, and I like some of the segments in particular, so I thought that I may adopt some of them for catching up on my yarrny blog. The segments are: In Progress, FOs, Stash, Catch Up, and then Other. 

January on the 2013 Temperature Scarf

In Progress/WIPs: Right now I've got 3 projects going, although one of them hasn't been touched in a while; that would be my 2013 Temperature Scarf. The Bernat forum KAL/CAL this year has been these scarves, where you keep track of the daily temperatures for an area (I'm doing the high temperatures for where I live), and depending on the temperature, there is a corresponding colour that you knit 2 rows in. Obviously the earliest that the scarf will be done is the beginning of next year, so I've let it sit for a few months; my scarf is a simple garter stitch with a 4 stitch seed stitch edge, the kind of easy stuff best left to school time.  I'm using various yarns from my stash or that I bought for the scarf because I didn't have the colours (orange was very hard to find).
Next up is the Freya shawl. I've had the yarn since last year, and had it paired with this pattern since at least December of last year, since I'd printed it out to bring to Florida with me (I never got to it on that trip). I'm just at the beginning of the 3rd repeat of the main pattern (each repeat doubles the number of pattern sections). I've still got 90 g of yarn left, although it should be like 113 g- I was shorted 23 g of yarn on one of the balls of Patons Lace... I got 62 g when I weighed it at home, and it's supposed to be 85 g! Either way, I plan to keep going until the yarn is gone, and I hope that it makes it at least to the end of the pattern. 
My third WIP is the Olive Branch triangle shawl. This one is for a family friend, who picked out and bought the yarn, Malabrigo Arroyo. It's a sport weight yarn, but I've increased my needle size, and she got two balls, which is more than enough. I'm making it larger than the one used in the example the designer made, which had 3 repeats of chart one and 1 repeat of chart two. I'm currently partway through my 4th and final repeat of chart one. Chart two will get 1-2 repeats (or 1.5 if it works out the way I think it will), and then the edge chart and bind off. 

The Finished Object segment will start when I've finished some of the WIPs I mention here, so nothing yet!

For Stash, I've got quite a lot of yarn since I last updated this blog. I'm a little obsessive about keeping the things I like in order (books --> Goodreads, yarn --> Ravelry), and according to my stash, I've got 147 different types/colours of yarn, and an additional 5 used up. Much of that is cheaper yarn that can be found at big stores like Michael's, but since my trip to Florida in December, I've also gotten some higher end yarn from LYSs. Those and my sock yarns will be some of the first that I'll go through on here. First though, I want to mention a cool find I had. I was going through a drawer in my room, and I came across two balls of teal/purple/lavender/berry worsted, acrylic yarn by Bernat. I looked all over Ravelry and the internet for more information, but didn't find much. It was from an old kit I had about learning to crochet, from when I was much younger. The instructions and hook are long gone, but the best part is the yarn! It's called Bernat Knitting Worsted, and was made in May 1999. According to the ball band each ball is 42.5 g, although mine are 43 and 46 g.

Catch Up is for me to catch up on talking about finished objects from when I stopped updating last August. I figure I'll just continue in order from when I stopped. Today, I'll do the updates for the three projects I had in progress during my last post. 

First up was my crocheted star afghan. I was just working on the border, and I actually completed it later in the day, after my post!

Next, I was talking about the rectangular, red pom-pom blanket that I was making for my mom. It turned out very soft and warm! One issue I had was that some of the balls of yarn I had were actually falling apart between the pom-poms. I used 8 of the 10 balls I had, and I don't really know if the last two are usable, because they were the ones with issues. Also, most of the balls I did use were of different dye lots, which led to inconsistencies in the thickness of the strand between the pom-poms, and the pom-poms themselves. Using the same dye lot doesn't fully protect you from this either, as when I knit another blanket, I had the thickness of the yarn change in the middle of a ball (it was a new strand joined with a knot).
My third project was the summer flies shawl, my first shawl project. It took me what felt like quite a while, especially during the open knotted-work section (a pity because I qutie like the look of that kind of stitch). I did the picot bind-off that the pattern used. It's nice and frilly and probably warm too, although a little bit small. It would probably be a bit larger if I blocked it (although the yarn is 100% acrylic), but I opted not to, as it's pretty cute as it is. I may get to wear it this August to one of my cousin's weddings. I have a pretty blue/black/white dress, and although I've made other shawls, none would really match except this one. I did make it after getting inspiration at a wedding after all.

In Other today, I wanted to talk about an issue I had related to tensioning yarn. Originally, I would hold the strand of yarn in my middle, ring, and pinkie fingers, with the fingers curled up around the yarn against my palm. This did create some pain, and wasn't the best way to hold the yarn. After crocheting for a while, this past December I finally started wrapping the yarn around my pinkie on my right hand while knitting (like I do with my left hand while crocheting). This has now become how I always tension the yarn, however this morning, while working on the Olive Branch shawl, I felt some irritation on my pinkie finger. It seems that I've now developed a nice red ingrown hair right in the middle of where the yarn usually goes on the top of my finger. Ow. I was tensioning the yarn with my ring finger for a bit after that (a little tight), but when I noticed that I was subconsciously switching back to using my pinkie, I decided to take a break, and write this post instead!

I'm going to try to update this at least once a week during the summer. Next time, I'll post pictures of the two shawls I'm working on as well.

Happy Crafting!