May

I was working diligently on the Opulence cardi, finished the hem, and started on the sleeves, but was tired of washing red from my nails, so I took a break for a week and whipped out project 4 of 12 - trying out Handmaiden Mini Maiden in Color Sangria - a red-orange, with hints of pink and orange that turn up in sunlight. Fascinating to knit the curves but a bit disappointing when you find you have to turn it upside down. Also, discovered that binding off loosely in a straight line is a different story altogether when binding off on the hypotenuse of a triangle. A bit of puckering that goes away when I drape in on my easy chair - might work draped over a shoulder this way-



Here's the back -



People raved to me about this yarn, and while it is soft (merino-silk 50-50),it doesn't seem as lofy or soft as one of the MCN yarns, or camelspin.

Opulence and Spring

18" in on front.
Yarn is Sundara Aran Silky Merino in Ruby Port - lovely silk-merino.

This pic doesn't do the color justice, as I took the pic in my mirror to show the fit so far.



This color shows the rich ruby red, and the curves at the waist:



-Only drawback is the yarn bleeds as I'm knitting. I'm pretty used to washing my hands after each round of knitting. This was the first color is Sundara's Year in Color Limited edition only available for a year, before she changed her mind and brough it back as a Permanent Colorway. Gorgeous and opulent.

Also working on my Spring Damselfly socks, Cat Bordhi Style - toe up and knitted to the heel, then, to open up and knit the cuff last. too bad I don't have more hands.

Here's the toe -


and what I've knit so far -


Knit in Sweet Georgia Cashluxe Fine in Peashoot

Currently working on two knitting projects - socks with Sweet Georgia Cashluxe Fine in Peashoot - I know, green again, but spring is finally here, sunny weather and sometimes warm.



The pattern is from the Art & Sole Collection by Janel Laidman...a lovely damselfy (like a dragonfly) graces the cuff. Knitting using Cat Bordhi's method and re-fitting with a new template. After cutting a first template, I realized that the template wasn't the width or length of my foot, so I've re-cut it and now, it's much better. I am at the point of decreasing for the heel, so hopefully get to the interesting pattern knitting soon.

Also working on the Opulence Raglan from Wendy Bernard. This is a elbow-length pullover with a cable running down the front. I'm finally busting my stash and using Sundara ASM Ruby Port which I brought when Sundara first introduced her "Year in Color" November or December 2009. The colors were supposed to be not repeatable for at least a year. Now, she's buckled and it has become a permanent colorway available regularly. I love knitting with the aran silky merino base, but it's a deep red which bleeds off on my hands as I knit. I'm getting used to having inky fingers again (a throwback to my rubberstamping days). I'm on the 2nd ball and in some plain rows at my waist before increasing.

It's a hard color to photograph - like opulent red with bits of black -

March 2011 - A bit of green

I wrapped up three projects in March -

Snug Flaming Red Hat using Ursa's Mama Quilla Worsted (Gaia's Colours) in Brigid a bright flaming red. This yarn is similar in weight to Malabrigo Worsted, but not as soft, and not nearly as elastic. It seemed like the pattern also lent itself with its twisted stitches to a tight knit.



Green Leaves Shawl - saroyan, a free pattern where lovely curly leaves knit as you go. Yarn is Sanguin Gryphon Bugga in Signatus Lacewing colorway - a lovely green with bits of blue in it. Really very soft yarn and a lovely knit.

Here it is from my back -


and in detail...



Last but not least - this Sweet Mezquita Shawl - pattern from Zen Yarn Garden, and a sweet soft knit in Sweet Georgia Cashluxe Fine in Tourmaline - also green, but a brighter louder green -





The icing on the cake - Roxanne Yuen of Zen Yarn Garden has included my project picture (above) on the project. It was the first time I blocked using the Anti-Fatigue mats from Wal-mart, pinned to a towel on top of the mats. Blocked and set overnight. Lovely points and turned out beautifully.

Breathing new life...

...into my knitting. I've decided to go with the flow..if I feel like casting on, I'm casting on. Forget monogamous knitting. done that, it doesn't work for me. If a project gets snagged, I find myself dipping into the doldrums and not inspired. i'm back to knitting multiple projects to keep my interest.

other than leaves which I was bringing for knit night knitting - I started this Sweet Mezquita Shawl - looks like leaves..and another green (although the yarn looks blue in the skein) very much an electric green-blue - it's Sweet Georgia Cashluxe Fine in Tourmaline, and it is very luxurious to knit with.

Can you tell ?

I'm hankering for summer - makin' some leaves - and as some say, I have my "knitting mojo" back.



The pattern is Saroyan, free and an enjoyable knit so far.
The yarn is Sanguin Gryphon Bugga in color Signatus Lacewing. Lovely.

Here's the inspiration for some summer sun...

Restarted Kelmscott

I finally sat down the other night and ripped back the 2" on my left and right fronts of the Kelmscott. Actually, I unknit the 10 or so rows in lace, as the yarn is very sticky and would not have been fun to frog. I did it while watching a movie - Despicable Me! - a light hearted cartoon - very fun and entertaining. It made the unknitting go faster.

I'm not happy with any of the pattern designers for the patterns I'm currently knitting. Very vague instructions - oops did you want detailed instructions for that ?
The kelmscott requires that you decrease at the neck in pattern as you bind off for the armhole - fortunately, any weird goof ups on my part should hopefully be hidden by the ginormous collar that fans out on the shoulder area.

Also started ysolda's snapdragon mitts. The chart looks straightforward and I'm knitting in a yummy superwash worsted yarn from Ursa's Gaia's Colours, but somehow my mind's on other things.

Work's been a bear, most recently the last 3 weeks have been frantic and lots of work to do. I don't enjoy sw support and that's mostly what I'm doing these days..kind of sucks the life out of you. Luckily, I still have my sense of humor, and I'm trying to remember to have compassion for myself....on all fronts.

I think somehow my subconscious is reminding me to get my to do list done. since it's been so busy with work, the time has just flown by since January. I realized in February, that I'd stopped living outside of work, and so now, I'm leaving work at work on the weekends and limiting talking about it all. Out of sight, out of mind is just best.

I want to go back to just enjoying knitting without the bar so officially I'm taking myself off the "12 in 2011" bandwagon, and trying to go back to just knitting for me.
I want to knit with soft yarn and be inspired about what I make, without being frustrated with pattern design errors and feeling pressured to reach some artifical bar that I've set on myself - there, I said it.

I'm changing back to just knitting for me.

Almost March

Somehow I managed to set the bar too high. The items I queued all have some design flaw or too many errata. I've started to swatch several projects and I guess I'll just have to claw back the idea that I would do "12 in 2011" and just try to knit what I can for myself this year. That was the intention of the group anyway, not to churn our small and easy projects to say you knit 12 projects. Last year, I made 18 I think and that was just from going from project to project.

The other thing is knitting time. I'm pretty much exhausted from work these days so I don't take as much time to knit as I used to. Gone are the days of knitting each night. I'm lucky if I manage to knit twice a week at knit nights, and then, my brain is so fried that I don't think I end up knitting much. Mostly, I've been just trying to knit swatches since my first "easy" project ended up with such a horrible row gauge. Usually this isn't a problem if the pattern knits to a certain length, but watershed did not, so now I have to do the math.

Also, it's been terribly cold here the last week or so, dropped down to 26F yesterday. 26! It's almost March- really, tuesday evening was hovering around 0 (32F) and I could see my breath, yet I forgot to salt my walk. Wednesday morning, there was about 4 or 5" of snow on my car. I've shovelled, and now, Saturday (actually, even yesterday) most of the major roads are clear, just my little side road and cul de sac, we didn't shovel, so there's a bit of ice on top - yay, my car gets to go skating!

Seems like the westcoast as a whole is getting a beating. so, it's not just us. sigh. global warming.

3 weeks in...

Jumped in with both feet to 12 in 2011 - so far, a bit of a bumpy ride. What do you think of my well-intended yarn diet, claim diet, and being on a budget? sound good ? Yes, so far, so good. I found a new WM friend and introduced her to knit night and we did a trade. so, I'm ok on that front. As for the knitting part, it's a bit challenging so far, since I can't seem to make "easy-looking" projects easily.

I started the Watershed Cardi in a lovely teal silk-merino from my stash. Gorgeous.
Can't knit the 8-line lace chart worth a darn. This after having done 60 rows of lace, on 2 fronts. unbelievable. I'm making my own pattern, and adjusting the one I have (ahem, pretty usual for me, most of the time).

I started looking at the rest of my 12 in 2011 - next up is Silk Garden T. Actually made of bamboo and designed with 0 to negative ease. Challenging to pick a size, as I don't want to knit and have to re-knit if it doesn't fit. Lots of people going down a size beyond their bust. The difference in sizes is 4". Beautiful graphics on the pattern - definitey inspiring and look easy, we'll see. I'm thinking bsa alpaca silk, so looks like I'll have to Swatch!

Also looked at a cardi set I've been eyeing for awhile - thinking of making the one in Sensual knits by Connie Chang Chinchio. Unfortunately, this book has a lot of errata, so I went to look at it again, and the pureknits link is dead. Luckily, one of the rav editors has re-posted the link, so I was able to compare the corrections with the chart, and I see (thankfully) that there are pieces of the lace which are obviously missing and just need to be drawn in. So, that project might be back on the plan.

Might just go back to kelmscott to finish that - have the back done, sleeves, done, and left and right fronts waiting to be zipped back 2" each to re-do the decrease at the neck while I bind off for the sleeve.

New Year's Resolutions - 12 in 2011

So my first new year's resolution is to be on a yarn and claim diet, and to this end, I have signed up for:



12 in 2011 is an online rav group focused on working through 12 projects in 2011 (one a month, more if you are so inspired)..wait for it (drum roll please)..From..my..stash.(gulp)

Needless to say, I reorganized my rav q, tagged at least 12 projects, put the patterns in a binder to inspire myself, and cast on a new project yesterday - Watershed a light-weight lace cardi, in sundara aran silky merino. Color is Caribbean - a mix of blue and green together. I have 3 skeins, but expect to use less than 2.



As for the old projects from yesteryear, they're game too.
My Kelmscott Cardi is slightly stalled; have the back and two arms done. Have knit the fronts to the bo, but knit 2" MORE than needed, so I need to rip back about 10-12 rows, and decrease at the neck edge while re-knitting the last 2"; hence starting something new.

Here's to the new year and new knitting projects.

Teapot Cozy Detour

I took a small 2 week detour from Kelmscott to knit a tea cozy. I'd signed up for a tea cozy swap, actually a tea cozy swap in which I'd submitted this picture with dimensions of my mom's teapot. The picture, taken with an iPhone, and added measurements using an iPhone App called "Measures". Unfortunately, the arrows can't be bent, so I couldn't really show the dimension being "around".



In addition, my mom was very specific. She wanted a chocolate brown colored cozy with a hint of red, like a chestnut brown. This being the perfect colour to hide tea if spilled. I figured, since the cozy exchange didn't require knitting specifically, she might get some kind of amazing cozy that I couldn't provide.

For my part, the person I was making the cozy for was indeed suitably vague. "I like all colors", and as for size - "I have a 6" teapot". This seems intuitive at the time of receipt of the e-mail. Only later as I started shaping my kInitted cozy did i realize I had no idea which dimension she was referring to.

Mountain Colors Bearfoot is what I settled on; the yarn, a deep blue with purple bits, superwash wool and nylon. Held double so that I could knit the "Tea Mitten" pattern.
As it turns out, after knitting the ribbed base and beginning to knit for the spout, I didn't understand what the pattern said, and forged on anyway by looking at the picture and improvising. As I knit, I had the sinking feeling that the lady's teapot was smaller than mine, and that sadly, it might be too big. With the deadline looming, and my double stitches snagging, I sped towards the finish line.

In a panic, I decided to purchase an extra sewn cozy at Mattick's Farm. I settled on a lovely flowered option; kicking myself that I'd just spotted the thermal quilting material not a few days before and had tucked away the bag someplace unaccessible, so that sewing one myself became just a small passing thought. Luckily, fortune stepped in an determined that I still had a week to finish. It tooks me only a couple more days to finish the cozy, sew on the buttons, and snap a few pics.

The front:


and I'd knit a tab that swung around back, and settled in place around 2 small turtle-shaped buttons with a blue-purple finish on black:-



The exchange was at the Victoria Handweaving and Sewing Guild Christmas Party. As each teapot was unveiled, I grew more uncomfortable with the tea cozy I'd made. Each one seemed bigger than the last. Large rectangles of padded joy for covering over any sized teapot. Due to a clerical e-mail error of some kind, my gifter turned out to not attend due to sickness, and there was in fact a single cozy left over without a recipient. Sarah, the kind organizer decided I should have one, and so, I opened the bag and behold, a handspun handwoven teapot with sewn cushy insides, suitable to hide the largest of hideous teapots and keep it warm and cozy underneath. Luckily or unluckily the colors chosen were pinks, purples, just my colors...but never could be further from the reddish-brown my mother longed for. In the end, Sarah said we'd work it out later.

My blue tea cozy was suitably homed; luckily, wendy, the recipient claimed to have many teapots, and tested the cozy-ness of mine against a sample pot that Sarah had brought. A hug of reassurance later, I left knowing that it at least fit two teapots, the sample one that Sarah had brought, and my own, suitably tested on.