I finally posted the pattern for my little felted purse and matching card holder. Check it out!
Category: Knitting
Memorial Day Knitting
I did get some knitting done while sitting at the parade yesterday.
Here’s the Monkey sock:
When we got home, I cast on for Isaac’s Halloween costume.
Yes, you read that right and yes, that is Red Heart Yarn. You see, Isaac wants to be a bat again this year and the bat costume I sewed for him 2 Halloweens ago a)does not fit him well and b)looks very ratty from almost constant wear. Since I don’t sew anymore, I figured why not knit a costume? I bought 5 huge skeins of Red Heart super saver (on sale $1.99 each) which should be MORE than enough to knit him a hat with ears and a batty-looking cape. Cool, huh? I should also have enough yarn to make a matching costume for E.
I know, I’m a geek.
A Letter
My Dearest Monkey socks,
I could never stay mad at you for long. Your beautiful Tofutsies yarn in colorway 728 and delightful Cookie-designed lace are too delicious for me to resist. I’m so glad we made up. Even though I had to rip back your perfectly turned heel, attractive stockinette heel flap, and one repeat of the lace pattern, I still adore you. Thank you for being so forgiving of me. I know that our bond will be ever greater.
Love,
Your Knitter
Untitled
The Monkey socks are on a time-out.
I made a mistake and am now faced with either tinking back all of the gusset stitches and (possibly) re-doing the entire heel flap or living with break in the pattern repeat across the top of the foot. I am annoyed and I can’t decide, so I put the project on a time-out.
The Booga Bag is finished. Photo in the Gallery.
I have the best sister in the world.
Here’s what she gave me for my birthday.
I am so blessed to have a sister who gets me. Thanks again, Rachel!
Finally, the big news in our family as of Friday is that we got a Wii. Normally a new game system in our house would be quite unremarkable and not at all worth mentioning on a blog which is supposed to be devoted to knitting. However, check out this game that came as part of the bundle:
Everything except the person riding that cow is textured to look like knitting. How cool is that?
Taking Care of Business
I’m actually getting knitting work done. Here is the Booga Bag:
It’s officially off the needles, but I haven’t felted it yet, so I’m not counting it as a FO. It’s in the laundry pile and will be felted tomorrow.
Here are the Monkey Socks when I started them a couple of days ago:
And here they are tonight:
I’ve started the heel flap and will probably finish the first sock this weekend. This is an awesome pattern. If you haven’t knit these up yet… Go. Go now and knit one up. I’ll wait. … … See? Isn’t is awesome? The pattern repeat looks very intricate, but it’s actually very simple. Thank you thank you thank you Cookie A. I love it.
I’ve also done another swatch for TKGA and reknit one of them. Photos of those to follow at a later time.
Lastly, we’ve had Doozer for almost 2 weeks now and he ROCKS. He fits in so well with our family, it’s like we’ve always had him.
Cool, right?
Some Progress…
…is being made in the realm of knitting. Here is the Booga Bag.
Here is a shopping bag.
They are coming along nicely.
Saturday was the CT Sheep and Wool Festival, hosted by the CT Sheep Breeders Association. I took the boys up and we all had a grand time. Here is I-5 posing with the UConn Flock–all there to receive their springtime hair cuts.
There were dozens of vendors selling everything from fleeces to yarns and everything in between so the shopping was pretty good. I scored some loot.
And so did the boys.
There were workshops and many, many more fiber-bearing creatures were on display or for sale. Isaac’s favorites were these.
I liked these.
They also had sheep dog trials and demos and Ox cart rides
(another favorite of Isaac’s).
There was Celtic music and food (lamb, of course) and people knitting in the pavilion outside, or trying out their new drop spindles at lunch. And spinners. I almost forgot the spinners, as if that were possible. The place was lousy with spinners. It was awesome. I can’t wait for Rhinebeck.
Progress
It has been a while since my last post and I think I ought to take care of that, even though there isn’t much to post about.
As far as my knitting life goes, I’m just about done with Isaac’s Ribwarmer.
The challenge in this has been that EZ’s original directions are for a kind of one-size-fits-most-adults in a worsted weight yarn. I’m knitting for a 5-year-old in a chunky acrylic (ick) blend. It’s been a great project, though, and I can’t wait to knit about 500 of these for Christmas gifts. Let me tell you, if you have not done one of these, run to the bookstore and pick up Elizabeth Zimmermann’s Knitting Workshop. This is the most amazing pattern and has really changed my perspective on the applications of knitting. Thank you to the Yarn Harlot for alerting me to the joys of knitting with EZ! I can’t wait to do a Baby Surprise Jacket (where knitting meets origami).
I have completed the first swatch for the TKGA Master Knitter Program and I am having second thoughts about jumping into this. I do not enjoy swatching and am feeling very intimidated about doing the required research paper. Granted, it only needs to be two pages long but I am doubting my ability to go on for two pages about the care and blocking of knits. Also, I have only done one swatch (and it’s not perfect) and the others are ahead of me. Maybe I will do another swatch today.
On to things other than knitting… I discovered the World Handwriting Contest today. (The website is dreadful, but the contest sounds like a lot of fun.) I really want to enter, but am not sure if I have time to practice. I loved practicing handwriting in grade school. I remember spending almost the entire summer between third and fourth grades practicing cursive writing. The way the graphite from my pencil would flow out onto the page into beautifully connected letters and words was so relaxing and almost hypnotic. It seemed like I’d write and write for hours.
Finally, today is Easter. Here are the boys hunting for eggs in the living room:
And look, here they are playing NICELY with each other for a change:
This lasted for all of thirty seconds; thank God I got a picture. I would have thought I imagined it otherwise. They have been fighting almost continually for the past week and I am starting to loose my mind.
Happy Easter everyone, and Happy Knitting!
Update 4/9/07: I finished the ribwarmer last night. Check out the gallery for pictures!
Best Birthday Present Ever
My birthday presents arrived today (a month and a half early). I’m starting to wonder if this knitting-geek thing has gone too far.
Behold my wooden swift:
Gaze upon my new wool winder:
Attend, ye, my perfect center-pull yarn cakes:
I’m going to go root through the rest of my stash and see if there is anything else that needs winding. Then I’m going to go get the dental floss. I wonder if I can use it for speaker wire?
Purling idiot, that’s me!
I have to frog E’s sweater and start over because a) I don’t think I need to cast on as many extra stitches in the armhole–the armhole is ginormous, and b) not only are my purl stitches are WAY bigger than my knit stitches, but they also slant to one side.
I didn’t realize how bad this was until I started the sleeve.
Unlike the body of the sweater, the sleeve is knit in the round (knitting only, no purling). Pictures do not do justice to the beautiful and orderly way the stitches of the sleeve line up. I cannot illustrate their perfect tension, their glorious evenness, in digital still-life. Neither can I accurately portray the hideous misshapenness of the purls in the body of the sweater or how they moan and lean and, yes, even drool. My purl stitches are idiotic. The progress on the sleeve is beautiful. The rest is ass. No, it’s worse than ass. It’s ball-sack. It’s hairy, stinky ball-sack and I have to frog it.
I checked knittinghelp.com to try and figure out what I’m doing wrong. Guess what–I have been purling through the back loop. This has caused every purl stitch I’ve ever done–every single one since the day I started knitting–to lean, to drool, and to essentially look like ball-sack in every single project I have ever made that required purl stitches.
I want to scream.
But, at least I now know. Also, I believe purling the right way will allow me to go faster.
I think I’ll scream anyway.
Knitting Geek
I am such a knitting geek! So much so that it was hard to resist the Knitting Geek Code from Knitty. What kind of knitting geek? Check out my code block:
—————BEGINNING KNITTER’S GEEK CODE BLOCK————
Version 1.1
KCR+++ Exp+ SPM++ KP++ AddiT> !Syn Nov- Cot Wool+++ Lux> Stash Scale+ Fin Ent? FI? Text !Lace Felt !DPN ML+++>$ GuageW(F) EZ+ FO++ WIP Blog AltSP>
—————-END——————————————————–
Knitting Interrupted 
You must be logged in to post a comment.