A hat in a night

Sep13

The other day I saw a post on Instagram calling for hat and mitten donations for asylum-seekers in Maine, and I knew I had to send a few things. I even knew which yarn to use: I had some Cascade Superwash Aran in green, tan, and brown. I’m pretty sure the only reason I bought it in the first place is because it was on sale. It’s very nice yarn, just not my colors. It’s thick and warm, soft for kids, and easy to take care of. Plus it knits up quick: I made this in one evening after work.

This one is child-sized, which made it quicker too, and a very simple ribbed pattern. But it’ll be stretchy and forgiving, and I hope it keeps a little head warm this winter!

I’ve already got a second one done, a little smaller and in the brown, and I’ve got a few balls of leftovers that I’m hoping to make into simple mittens. But first, I discovered a partial skein of hot pink KnitPicks Brava Bulky in my stash that will make a great hat too. It’s a pretty small ball, though, so it’ll probably become a baby hat.

Happy Friday, friends! I hope you have a wonderful weekend awaiting you!

Here’s a sock

Sep11

Somehow I finished a sock yesterday. It’s one of my new yarns, the Mudpunch self-striping, and apparently I find the colors addictive.

I got carried away and made the foot just a tiny bit too long, but it’s comfy. The second sock is already begun and hopefully it goes as quickly as this one did!

Fixing Stitches

Sep10

Sometimes we knitters make mistakes in our projects. When that happens, we have to decide if we can live with it, or if we want to fix it. Many fixes seem rather scary at first, so newer knitters can be shy about diving right in to tinking or picking up dropped stitches. I have a knitter friend who is like that, and I get to feel smart and clever by helping her! Today she had a blanket where she’d purled two stitches that were supposed to be knit. Oops.

They were several rows back, so she was asking what her options were to fix it. I told her the easiest way would be to knit to the stitches and drop down to the errors, then pick the stitches back up with a crochet hook. That seemed scary to her, so I offered to do it. I made sure to text her a scary progress picture.

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Not only were the stitches wrong, but somehow an extra stitch had been added at that same point, so I pulled those unnecessary stitches out, and then pulled out the next row down to the other purl stitch.

Then I used my little hook to pull that stitch up to the top and bam, it was done! There was some extra play in the yarn because of those stitches I pulled out, but that should all even out with the first wash.

This was one of the easiest fixes, honestly. Bulky yarn that is just sticky enough that the stitches don’t come out too easily, and plain stockinette stitches. Next time I’ll make her do it herself, or else how will she learn??

Finished Faery Socks

Sep8

After casting on so many new things last weekend, this weekend I was good and finished one of my older WIPs. I had a second sock that was mid-foot, so I pulled it out during the women’s tennis final last night and sped through to the toe, then finished the toe this morning. I’m delighted to have a pair of new socks for the fall weather that is sure to be coming soon!

fullsizeoutput_2348 You might notice that they don’t match exactly. I made extra-long green cuffs (a full 2″) and when I got to the heel of the second sock, I was afraid I wouldn’t have enough of the green left for both the heel and toe. I wanted a green toe more than I wanted a green heel, so that’s what I did and since Perfectionist Bonny and Knitter Bonny apparently live in two different worlds, I don’t care a bit. I ended up with 2.5 grams of the green left over; I wonder if that would have been enough after all?

I don’t usually wash my socks before wearing them, but I think I should for these. If you look closely at the needles, especially that bottom one, you’ll see a slight dark green tinge. I’m wondering if I’ll end up with green feet if I don’t get some of that excess dye out!

Pattern: Vanilla Latte Socks (modified slightly)

Yarn: Apothefaery Fabrications Middle of the Road Sock, color

Darn that job

Sep7

Don’t you hate it when work gets in the way of your fun stuff? This week has been too busy, and I haven’t had the mental energy to put much toward knitting or blogging or cool things like that. But I’m going to change that today! It’s a cool, sunny morning, so I’m outside with a cup of tea and a couple of dogs and I’m going to clear my head of work.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I HAVE been knitting; I’ve just been working on projects that don’t make me think too much. My Mudpunch sock has gotten the most time, which is why I’m a good way into the foot.

This is the Twizzler socks pattern and I like it a lot, but I also like how this stripe pattern works up in plain stockinette. I almost wish I’d done a vanilla sock. (I also wish I’d taken the time to get a better photo, now that I see this one here. Oops.)

My other project this week has been my Estonian lace cowl. I worked on this while I was watching the US Open, but only during the less critical matches, i.e. not Rafa Nadal. My skein was smaller than the designer’s, so I cast on fewer stitches for a cozier cowl. I might not get the full three repeats of the lace pattern but I’m not bothered. I’ll just go until I can’t go anymore.

And today is Duncan’s Gotcha Day! We’ve had him for two years now and can’t imagine life without him. He’s the husband’s favorite as well as the boy’s favorite, and he’s such a sweet snuggler. I’m just really glad he stopped destroying things as he got older!

Happy weekend, friends!

Pride in the Name of Love

Sep3

Back in June, I impulsively bought yarn after seeing a photo on Instagram. I mean, heck, it might have happened more than once, but today is about just one of those purchases. This yarn was a special collaboration between Three Irish Girls yarn and Eat.Sleep.Knit in recognition of Pride month, all of which I loved. But it was also rainbow colors with PURPLE. Well. Take my money immediately, right? It took me a couple of months but I recently finished the Taina shawl I made with it, and it’s just as gorgeous knit up as it was in a skein.

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The yarn was their Adorn Luxe base, which has 15% nylon, which means I *could* have made socks, but this yarn was way too pretty to go on my feet. It was heavenly to knit with, soft and supple, and it blocked into such a wonderful drape. Can’t wait to wear this little beauty!

The pattern was just my cup of tea too: simple but not completely mindless, forgiving of mistakes if you make a section too long or too short, and lots of squishy garter stitch. It’s a long, narrow shawl — more of a scarf, which is what I prefer. I wish I’d bought a sweater quantity, but alas, I just got the one skein. If you want your own purple Pride yarn, there is some DK still available…unless I snatch it up for a sweater, that is!

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Fall = Knit all the things

Sep2

I love summer and I don’t really want it to end, but I’m also kind of happy that it’s almost sweater weather! At the very least, it’s knit-a-sweater-weather. Yesterday I decided I needed to double my WIPs so I cast on three new projects, and yes, one of them is a sweater. And before you ask, yes, I am swatching before I cast on the sweater itself. I knit a proper swatch on circular needles so I can accurately measure my in-the-round gauge, since I know that it differs from my flat-knitting gauge enough to affect size.

I decided I’m going to use five skeins of purples to make a Faded Boxy sweater. I’m not exactly sure how I’ll decide when to fade the colors, but I might just take the length of the body and divide it by five. Wouldn’t that work? Or wait, should it be 10, since I’ll have 10 sections (Color A, Color A & B, Color B etc)? Yes, maybe that would work. I just want to make sure I have enough yarn to fade the sleeves too. I know there are other Faded Boxy projects on Ravelry, so I’ll have some reference points to help. It’ll be fine. The real question is how long it will take me to get bored of miles of stockinette in fingering weight yarn!

I’m starting my Fade with the gray/purple variegated on the far right in that photo, and the swatch has been washed and is currently drying. The middle purple/gray is from Herd of Cats, a Colorado dyer. It’s a worsted merino that is going to become an Estonian Lace Medallion cowl. The ~~non-purple~~ blue/white is a color called Rocky Mountain High from Andromeda Socks, and I’m trying the Chevron Socks pattern to see if it creates a subtle mountain look. Now I have a wide variety of knitting to carry me through the second week of the US Open!

For my U.S. friends: enjoy the Labor Day holiday today!

Time for a reset

Sep1

Maybe it’s the change of seasons, but I’m feeling the urge to take a deep breath and reassess some stuff. I’ve been disengaged a bit from work lately for a few reasons, and I want to refocus and start pushing myself again. But I’m also wanting to re-engage with my knitting. It hasn’t felt as rewarding as usual this summer, and I want to get back to finding the joy again. Right now, that means the urge to cast on all the pretty new projects!

One of them was supposed to be that June Lake top. But the one person telling me to swatch, swatch, always swatch, was right, not that it’s much of a surprise. I went up one needle size and two pattern sizes, got my first textured panel done, measured the length, and it STILL wasn’t as long as I need it to be. Assuming I were to stick with the size 5 needles, I calculated my gauge and how many stitches I’d need to cast on to get the size I want, and my concern is that I won’t have enough yarn. SO. That project is in hibernation while I decide what I want to do. I’d still really like to make a sleeveless top, but I’m not sure I can get the size I need with just two skeins.

Instead I cast on for a new sock! I wound my brand-new Mudpunch self-striping yarn and after seeing Mildly Granola’s Twizzler socks, decided to make my own. I’m loving how they look!

But I want more new projects! I’ve got a selection of purple yarns that would make a fantastic fade, and I’m debating between a Find Your Fade and some kind of fade sweater. I think I’m leaning toward a sweater, but I need to check patterns and gauge (again, argh) before I decide. And I’m feeling the itch for some squishy worsted too, so I might need to cast on a new cowl soon too.

Now, all you swatchers, help me out: when you’re planning for a sweater in the round, do you swatch with the exact needles you’d be using (i.e. 32″ or 40″ circs)? I see the logic in it, but it would make for a huge swatch! Or do you use the same material of needles (i.e. bamboo or metal) but smaller circumference?

Yarn is my therapy

Aug29

I haven’t decided for sure if it’s a good thing or a bad thing that I have a perfectly lovely yarn store less than 10 minutes from work. Maybe it’s both. Today it was a good thing, as I needed a bit of yarn therapy. Spoiler: I found it.

Both are sock yarns, one by Mudpunch and the other from Goosey Fibers. I’m totally casting on the Mudpunch self-striping tonight!

Sock it to me Monday

Aug26

Today’s theme comes to you from Mildly Granola, who started a Sock it to me Monday thing a while back. I like it, and it works because today’s knitting is…a sock! I’m back working on my Apothefaery socks, and I’ve made it a good way through the leg.

However, the reason I’m back on my sock is because that dad-blasted gosh-dang sweater project I told you about yesterday is not going well. I swatched using size 4, 16″ bamboo circular needles. I assumed that would be close enough to what I would really be using, which are size 4, 40″ metal ChiaoGoo circulars. I knit the first 28-row patterned band and measured it, and the length was NOT half of what I would need for the bust measurement, let alone what I’d need for the bottom hem. (It’s A-line, knit from the bottom, so it should start with the widest point and narrow slightly.) I’m sure you can imagine the words that came out of my mouth at that point. There was no way to make that 28-row, 17″ long strip work as half my hem, so it got frogged and that project is in time-out until I figure out my next step.

What went wrong? Well, I was using metal instead of bamboo. I was knitting flat instead of in the round, but in the past my flat knitting has been looser than in the round, not tighter. So, I don’t even know. Now I can swatch again with the 4s to double check myself, and/or swatch with size 5 circular needles. Or I have a couple options for winging it: go up two sizes with the current needle, or go up one needle size and one pattern size. I’m kind of inclined to wing it a little bit, because the patterned band is really not that different than a swatch, and if it works, I’ll have a good start toward the sweater. What do you think: swatch or wing it??

Also, it’s International Dog Day! That’s a day I can celebrate!