AnotherPurl :: a knitter's life

rip! reknit

I have this gorgeous skein of sock yarn from Woolcott (image snagged from the blog, saved to my server), but I apparently couldn't pick the right pattern for it.

I started off with a simple 60 stitch 2x2 rib, but then I decided I wanted a pattern.  Bad idea.  Apparently most of the sock patterns I liked would involve a special cast on, a different ribbing pattern, a completely different stitch count, or were for worsted weight or DK instead of sock yarn.  Well, I solved that by ripping out the 2x2 rib and recasting on for the Mock Cable Socks. 

I got halfway through the first repeat of the pattern and decided that I didn't like how it looked.  I'm pretty sure that I should have been doing my M1 as purl stitches, and so I had these odd ridges where briefly there was some garter stitch.  It's a very odd look over just one stitch in a sock.  Last night while watching Moulin Rouge (well, listening... that movie is like very odd crack or something... especially Like a Virgin) I ripped it all out again and went back to flipping through 25 Favorite Socks, of which I'm really interested in about 10.

I started over and am about halfway through the initial ribbing on the cuff for a pair of Retro Rib socks.  I feel like the last person in blogdom to have made a pair of these (almost: over 800 pairs on Ravelry).  The only way I could feel more like the last person ever is if I were making the Embossed Leaves.  That will happen as soon as I find an appropriate color/weight yarn in my stash certainly. 

This is, of course, a long winded way of saying that I managed to knit last night.  Not only did I manage to knit, I managed to knit on what I said I would knit on.  If I keep this up, I might actually finish another project this month!  [Or maybe not... there are only 9 days left to finish something!]

running through the blanket

Today my friend and I went on our long run starting from Harvard Square.  It was a pretty good run - on target for my half marathon pace - though wet.  The air was so full of humidity that even my short jog to the MBTA left me dripping sweat. 

Most of our run was along the Charles River, which theoretically cooled us off a bit.  On our way back to Harvard Square along the Boston bank of the Charles, I am pretty sure I saw a cormorant.  Of course, I don't run with my camera (and it now occurs to me that I did have my phone.  doh.), so here is an image from Lonetown Woods (the author takes a lot of beautiful bird photography, so if you want to see more hawks and sea birds and even vultures, please go look).

Next week's long run is supposed to be 8 miles, and will hopefully not be quite so muggy.  I also hope that it isn't in Harvard Square, because the Square is full of temptation.  There is Beadworks (though I normally go to Lush Beads), and Lush, and ice cream and coffee.  There is also Woolcott.  Sean, the owner of Woolcott, has started offering his own hand dyed yarn, which I first saw on Queer Joe's blog a few weeks ago.  The colors that Joe bought were super saturated jewel tones, which I love (love, love).  Each of the colors however are once offs.  Sean only makes a few skeins of each color.

Those were gone, but there were still some really pretty colors.  I bought a skein (and they wound it for me at the shop, so I could start right away) of Melon Cooler and some size 0 needles to make sure that they fit my feet.

No pictures of the Melon Cooler, but picture a bright spring green with golden streaks and little dots of red.  It is a beautfiul color, and I'll have pictures in the next couple of days. 

Now it is time to finish getting ready.  I want to visit my fishies at the Aquarium and watch the new Star Trek movie (again). 

from the guild

Yesterday was the last Common Cod meeting of the year (the year runs from September to July with meetings on the odd numbered months).  Barbara Parry was talking about color inspiration and bit into the technicalities of how she visually selects colors from her environment.  It was much like a woolly Georgia O'Keeffe.  Barbara takes pictures of the world around her, mostly on her farm, and then crops them and blows up elements and selects colors from that section.  It's a gross oversimplification of her technique. 

Afterwards, she was signing books and selling yarn.  I'd done the koolaid and the wilton dying before, but I don't really have the space to do dying on a regular basis or the desire to get even a few large cheap pots (so I can keep dying separate from cooking).  The only dye method that she mentioned that was really interesting to me is solar dying, and I can try that when summer really gets here with some good sized mason jars.

I bought yarn.  Her yarn line, Foxfire Fiber, is super duper soft.  She has two (to me) main color groups: pastels and the richer, more saturated jewel tones. 

I bought this yarn, sort of: I actually got the wool-alpaca blend, which is a much fuller color than the cormo-silk blend at the right.  Without the silk, the yarn doesn't have the sheen and just soaks up the color.  i have 4 skeins of loon, a rich teal blue-green.

I'm thinking of making a cropped vest, like the Portland Tweed Vest.  My 4 skeins have a slightly larger yardage than the yarn called for, but are fairly close to the same yarn weight. 

In completely unrelated news, I got home to find out that I had rehung the bag with my cross-stitch in it, so Saru-chan did not get an opportunity during the day to snag the nearly finished project.  Must finish the stitching first, before starting anything else!

making of a craft room

Or in my case a craft closet.

I started off with the best of intentions.  We have a guest room with a large, deep closet.  Most of my craft stuff is in that closet, but like many things in our new house it is apparent that I was pretty good about cramming things into the darnedest spaces and so not quite all of my craft stuff fits in the closet (and the bottom 3-4 drawers of the dresser with most of my yarn).

Some of this is due to organization.  There simply isn't any.  I don't have the energy or inclination to cook dinner and organize my craft stuff when I get home from work, and I haven't had an iota of time on the weekends (my fault - Chronically Overscheduled could be my middle name).  I'm trying to decide how to organize the rest of my cross-stitch and move enough of the random project bags into an organized area that I can do things like get to the sewing machine or the loom without taking a 100 pieces of yarn and paper and what have you and moving them only to need to do the same thing to put the sewing machine or loom back.

Each set of shelves is two shelves tall (IIRC), and the two opposite the door are the skinny ones that you can knock off if you hit your head on them.  Ask me how I know.

The other shelves are deeper and much sturdier (my little line drawing is definitely not to scale).  The filing cabinet fits under one (that side has a pole for hangers, because it is a closet after all), and the other is deep enough to fit a white drawer and shelf affair (like this one only with a drawer on top and cheaper).  I have my craft stuff in a disorganized array on most of the shelves minus the lego shelf.  I also have a huge duffle bag full of fabric on the floor.  There really isn't any room to move around and do anything in there, and there really won't be until I get stuff organized.

Any tips for your favorite yarn and craft organization schemes?  I have soap and candle making stuff (not much), cross-stitch (a ton), yarn (ditto), and fabric.  There are other odds and ends in there as well for the moment, but I'd love to get a start on things. 

And the filing cabinet is at least in part for my cross-stitch.  It's what I bought it for when I was still a single chick living in Somerville.  The boxes of cross-stitch patterns, kits and supplies are patiently waiting for me to recreate my file structure for all of them.  I know this won't happen this weekend with family visiting, but it would be nice to get to the end of July and not shudder each time I walk into the room.

the white rabbit

I fell down the rabbit hole yesterday when the copy of Crochet Me I borrowed from the library decided it was buning a hole in my backpack.  So, after work I walked to Windsor Button and picked up the most affordable yarn I could to make the Icelandic Turtleneck (turns out that yarn is Berroco Comfort Baby).  I bought what I needed for the sweater and then 3 skeins of the Tahki Cotton Classic for the potholder swap.  I'm hoping to narrow down what I want to do for the potholder swap in the spaces between shows.

Of course, this means I have started two new projects in as many weeks and will probably start another one in my copious free time this weekend.  I really like how Delphine is coming out, but I didn't bring it with me yesterday and my stitchy fingers went right back to stash land.  Ignoring an imminent move, I'm apparently not bright enough to realize that I need to buy less stuff.  Whoops!

Complaints Time (you might want to just move along)
I'm tired and cranky despite the happiness of the stash, though I know it is a fleeting pain.  My back is covered with makeup I can't quite wash off, which is good for the show because it makes my prep less.  Of course, it makes my back itchy.  Less the tattoo goop and morethat I can't get it all off.  I love doing shows, but the lack of sleep turns me into a muddle-minded mess.  Thank goodness I can sleep in a bit in the morning, so I can regain some perspective!

almost 3 hours (not 7 days and 7 nights)

So, my last post was #666, so in honor of that one of the cheesiest metal videos I've ever enjoyed watching:

Last night I put aside my knitting as the orders I placed at both Webs and Halcyon Yarns had arrived.  I made my dinner and pulled my loom (still pictureless, because I am lame) off of the shelf and set up the warp.  It took me almost 3 hours to warp even though I was only doing something that was 70 warp threads wide.  Practice.  I know it won't be that slow next time.  I even started doing some of the weaving and put the header on and about an inch or so of weaving before I noticed that it was about midnight, when all good little ladies should be in bed.

So, this morning I decided to make mental drafts for the scarves to come.  All plain weave (unless I feel comfortable enough with the plain weave to start adding in the pickup stick), but I have 9 scarves on my plate.  Short scarves, because they are for the show and will be worn under jackets.  Because I feel sorry for the guys, the scarves are all being made with cotton.  Something about the show going up at the beginning of May and the guys in overcoats just brings out the sweats.  It's always warm under the lights anyway, so I am picturing a lot of Final Seal being used to keep the makeup on and their faces as dry as possible.

Tonight, I am planning on making a spring panzanella based on the one at Smitten Kitchen, and then weaving for an hour or two.  It's a good thing my loom folds, because it is going to be my near constant companion in the weeks ahead.  Now just to get my beating technique down so my weft doesn't look so darn uneven!

the knitting factory

My MIL likes giving hand knits to people she knows (generally for baby showers).  But she doesn't knit herself, so she turns to me to make items.  Last time, I made the Hoover blanket, which was a nice pattern and took me about a month to make, and better yet I familiarized myself with the double knitting technique. 

When she called a month or so ago to see if I was willing to make another, she sounded like she wanted another Hoover blanket.  Then she found a store (I believe she said Knit One in PA), and found a pattern booklet.  I have this First Steps Learn to Knit baby pattern booklet (Sirdar booklet 292), and she wants patterns 2, 3 and 5 (or a baby hat, a baby blanket and a jacket).  All done in garter stitch, and the blanket is squares that are either individually seamed (and I hate seaming) or worked into strips and then sewn together.

Now, there is no hard and fast deadline for this project, but I am almost halfway done Henry and the yarn for the Cobblestone Pullover for my hubby arrived last night.  I would rather work on either of those projects, especially the pullover because I'm using Peace Fleece in the Sheplova Mushroom which is just gorgeous, and so much softer than I was expecting. 

The main draw that the baby project has over those is that I don't need to think at all to do them.  All of the projects are based on basic garter stitch squares or rectangles.  The hat is effectively an all garter version of the hat I made for myself earlier this month, so it is a seamed rectangle.  Easy peasy, but still likely to make me fall over with boredom. 

I am thinking of getting one of those book readers (umm, the things that go in the lap), so I can at least read while I do this.  And about that saying no?  I never feel like I can do that.  I blame that guilt cloud that I can see hovering all around me.

a quick bright break

I picked up a skein of Malabrigo on Saturday (it's like knitter's crack or mother's milk or something!), because I wanted to make a hat.

This winter I've been wearing my Emergency Backup Hat, which I made a few years ago out of some green-white-purple variegated Red Heart acryllic yarn.  It had a seam up the back and was long enough that I had to double the area over the ears.  No problem, except I didn't know enough at the time to reverse the seam so it wouldn't show on the outside.  So, every time I wear it I am reminded that I find it ugly and not warm.  I could live with ugly (and do so with better grace now than I did growing up), but I decided I do not need to live with not warm.

I've been knitting the Red Rings pullover from the Fall 2008 KnitScene, and a number of the other projects are growing on me.  One of them was the Double Cap, which is cute with almost cattish peaks and a thick doubled brim to help keep the ears warm.  I was going to knit during hockey, but I left the wrong set of needles in my backpack and knit on the pullover instead (hardly wasted time, just not what I truly wanted to be doing).  I started the ribbing for the cuff on Saturday night just outside of Agganis and finished the hat Sunday evening during one of the football games.  Probably the one where Trufflesburger did a better job than I wanted him to do...

And Monday morning, I wore this cap to my dental appointment and a slew of other places.  I love it.  It is warm and bright and unrepentently cheerful, which is always appreciated during a snowy day.

This hat was pretty quick and it featured something called a fold, which was interesting to work.  Sarah used this on a different hat, and she explained it to me.  It was definitely nice to get to try it in a pattern though. 

At one skein of scrumptiously soft Malabrigo, this was even an affordable hat (I don't want to know what similarly styled hats would cost at a place like Macy's).

Of course, this is item #3 that I have finished this year, which also makes me feel pretty good.  It's going to take me a bit longer to get the other projects that I'm working on right now into the fresh off the needles state!

January is a good month (so far)

Life has been a busy crazy thing in the past few weeks as we continue to sell our condo in this unfriendly market.  Luckily, it isn't all about the crazy economy.  Friday I went to the first Common Cod Fiber Guild meeting of the year.  Clara Parkes was speaking, which was a lot of fun. 

Here is her formula from the meeting (because it was held at MIT and all):

Stash = (yarn squared / space) to the infinite power.  Just in case it isn't terribly visible from the picture.  Taking a photo of a chalk board isn't terribly easy.

At the meeting I brought my first two completed items of the year to the guild meeting.  They were caps that Guido was collecting for Knit One, Save One.  It was my first time using Rowan Calmer, and it is really nice yarn though it definitely has a learning curve.

Normally I join everyone who is left after the end of the speaking portion of the meeting to knit and kibbutz (a lot more knitting than kibbutzing, because the mix of people changes pretty much every meeting).  This time the demo corner had a weaving demonstration with Carol, using a 4-harness table loom by Leclerc.  After knitting for a bit, I hovered over there while she finished tying off the warp and then we got to try it after she did a little demonstration.  It was a lot of fun!  I did a bit of plain weave and some twill and a bit of herringbone.  The herringbone was especially maddening, because Henry (the scarf that is eating my brain) is a woven herringbone pattern done on the long axis of the scarf.  I could have done a similar pattern with a loom and I would have been done by now.

Carol mentioned the Boston Weaving Guild as a good resource, but the only weaving guild information I could find indicated that the meetings are in Westborough.  While it is under a 2 mile walk from the commuter rail to get to the meeting site, I could never get there on a Wednesday night when the meetings are held.  That's too bad, because it was a lot of fun. 

It is snowing again right now, as I get ready to go to another dental appointment.  So, here is the cap picture to end it today.

I tried taking a picture of the smaller hat on top of a can of soda. Bad idea! Putty color just made it look, umm, a little raunchy if you catch my drift.

one, two, three

I finished the Vortex Street Pullover from Knitting Nature late Saturday, October 18th, just in time to wear it to Rhinebeck.  I've worn it twice since then, which is pretty good for me.  My previous sweaters with the notable exception of Tangled Yoke were all too uncomfortable or loose to wear.  Many of them are still in pieces, because seaming is often the breaking point for me.

I used Woolease from the stash in order to make room for my Rhinebeck goodies.  It made me feel good to get such a chunk of yarn out of the way.  I'll probably make this again with a higher quality yarn (even the Plymouth Encore would be better), because I can't imagine this sweater being wearable except around the house within 2 years. 

I was bad when I made this.  I did no blocking.  I just didn't have time.  With our condo being possibly looked at whenever, I couldn't leave my knitting to block on the rug and I never managed to take up my friend on blocking it at her place.  Simply ran out of time.

The best thing about this project was also the worst.  I had to knit the cabled placket twice.  Just reading the pattern (gauge part) indicated that the placket would be about 3 inches longer than the rest of the piece, so when I had 3 extra inches and 20 rows to go I ripped.  The second attempt was done one needle size down (so I used 5 and 7 for the main piece and 5 and 6 for the middle) and still felt long.  Seaming it in resulted in my winging the last 6 inches or so, and hoping that I wasn't going to have a bump or otherwise unfortunate bulge around the neck.

Well, I sort of do and someday I'll actually give this a real blocking and see if it can go away.  It's relatively subtle and a much less painful flaw than I would have expected given my lack of practice.

Of course, I haven't been doing nothing since then.  I started two projects on the bus ride to the festival and have been working on another one at home, all of which should be done and mailed this week except my travel project (really one of the other two projects should be my travel project).

Having projects with deadlines is not exactly new.  Normally they are internal deadlines, so if I don't make them I don't have someone asking about the project.  The biggest problem with deadline knitting is the roving eye.  I've been looking at lace projects, cable projects, and imagining what yarns I would use for the Wrap Dress from Knit So Fine... it's a good thing I can knit and daydream at the same time or nothing would be getting done!