Andrea: January 2008 Archives
Posted on 01/28/2008 by Andrea
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Knitting
Yo, Mom, could you think of something to post here so that we can get my silly face off the top of this website?
Geez.
I haven't posted in a while because I haven't knit much of anything. This weekend I worked on unknitting. I ripped out an entire sleeve of the St. Mawes sweater of doom.
, originally uploaded by AMK.Indy was extremely helpful throughout the process. Indy has developed a lust for Rowan All Seasons Cotton that rivals my own. I, however, do not actually try to consume the yarn as Indy does, though I have been known to describe it as "delicious".
In fact, a few weeks ago Indy did consume a very large strand of this particular yarn (a 10-ply, no less). Brad and I watched and waited nervously for the next few days to see if we were going to have to bring him into the vet for an emergency surgery. But he continued on as normal. Actually, he was even a bit more purr-ful and happy than normal (probably because of all the extra attention we were giving him, trying to figure out if his insides were tied up in 10-ply knots). We dutifully checked the litterbox every day to see if there was any evidence there. Nothing. As the days dragged on we had to ask ourselves if he was digesting the yarn or knitting a little mitten with it, which he would eventually poop out.
So. Moral(s) of the story? You never know when a story will veer off into the topic of poop; my cat isn't to be trusted with expensive Rowan yarns; and, judging from my track record with this sweater, neither am I!
Posted on 01/25/2008 by Andrea
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Yarnography
I've had this yarn in my stash for several years. It came from a yarn swap with an online friend. I have a couple of skeins of the same yarn in a green colorway and I've always thought I could do something fun with combining these yarns, but I've never gotten around to it. It's such a pretty yarn I just kind of want to stare at it in skein-form and not even necessarily knit it.
And just for fun, here's an accidental picture of the same yarn. I like how it looks like a painting.
Any suggestions for what to do with three skeins of Brown Sheep Handpaint Originals, two green and one blue?
Posted on 01/24/2008 by Andrea
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Random Thoughts
I know nobody really wants to hear about the weather, but come on! It was 15 degrees below zero when I left the house this morning! A few cold days are fine by me, but this cold snap is getting wearisome. But I do think the cold weather can create some beautiful moments. This morning, I saw something like this on the way to work:
It's a sun dog. The one I saw (unfortunately, I couldn't stop to get a picture; this is a picture from someone on Flickr) had two really bright, clear, big rainbows on either side of the sun. The sky was perfectly clear and blue. It was amazing. I guess I can put up with such a bloody cold morning, if I can get a chance to see something like that.
All this cold weather is making me think I need to get going on felting those Fiber Trends felted clogs. They've been sitting there for several weeks, all pretty and knitted and ready to take a dip in the washing machine, but I've been obsessed with a gift I've been making and haven't taken much time for anything else. Maybe tonight. (The gift is finished, but I'm not going to post about it until after it's been received by my friend). I do know I've gotta take a trip to the post office today!
Posted on 01/21/2008 by Andrea
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Knitting, Tips
People say it's a good thing to make mistakes. Making mistakes allows us to learn, builds character, yadda yadda.
Those people are crazy.
I was too demoralized to mention it at the time, but when I was trying to finish Brad's St. Mawes sweater just before Christmas, I ran into a monumental knitting disaster.
This may be difficult to see, but it's a hole in the sweater. You see, I realized after I sewed the front and back together, knitted on the collar, and sewed on one of the sleeves, that I had knitted the sleeves FOUR INCHES too long. In the process of trying to remove the seamed sleeve, I accidentally CUT a stitch in the front of the sweater.
Let me pause here while we all finish gasping in horror.
Okay, I'm recovered now.
Like I said, I was too demoralized to face this. I put the sweater away for a month and finally got up the nerve to bring it back out and figure out what to do about this problem. The answer was simpler than I had even hoped. There's a very clearly photographed example in Knitty of how to fix this type of problem: Knitty: Repairs 101. You basically undo the knitting horizontally until you have weave-in-able ends and use a new piece of yarn to graft the stitches together, much like a kitchener stitch.
See? All better:
The only real problem I ran into was that this hole occurred in the second-to-the-edge stitch, so I didn't have a long end on that side to weave in. Here was my solution:
I tied a new piece of yarn to the short end using as tight of a square knot as I could manage. I plan on weaving the knotted end into the sleeve seam.
All's well that ends well. Now I just have to take care of that small problem of the extra eight inches of sleeve.
Posted on 01/18/2008 by Andrea
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Yarnography
I bought myself a little present this week: a Canon speedlight 430EX. A flash for my DSLR camera. I know there's a lot of dissing out there of flash photography, but when you get the flash up off the camera, suddenly all sorts of photography possibilities arise. Bouncing light off a wall or ceiling allows you to simulate a real light source, not a glaring burst of light coming directly from the camera.
Turns out, I'm not the only person out there who loves to take pictures of yarn. There's a Yarnographers group on Ravelry, complete with lessons to help people learn how to take better pictures of their yarn.
I'm so excited to see what I can do with my new camera equipment. I plan on posting some yarnography every Friday.
Posted on 01/17/2008 by Andrea
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Spinning
I'm stuck in sort of an endless loop of perfectionism in my knitting/spinning lately. I have a love-hate relationship with perfectionism, and it's because I'm also kind of an impatient person. I want to figure out how to do something perfectly, but I don't want it to take forever. In the past, I've let impatience win out and ended up making a bunch of stuff I wasn't too happy with. Lately, I've been letting perfectionism take over, which means it's hard to finish anything.
I need balance!
This is what I'm currently working with, and it's destined to become a scarf for a friend of mine. She saw the singles I was spinning in this colorway and loved it and wanted a scarf. I started to have some very specific ideas of what sort of scarf would be perfect for this person, and that's what led me down the path of perfectionism. I've never spun anything with a knitting project in mind. I've always just spun yarn and then figured out what to do with it. So this adds a whole new realm in which I can be a perfectionist and take forever to accomplish anything.
I plied the singles I had spun. They weren't right. I wanted longer, slower color changes. I wanted a thinner yarn, yet still soft and lofty. I then spun and plied four different versions. Navajo plying gave me the types of color changes I wanted, but it used up the singles so fast that the color changes were distinct, but very short.
I finally settled on splitting my rovings in half lengthwise and labeling the other half of each one that I used to spin my first single, so that I could spin a second bobbin using other halves of the rovings in the same order. I added very little twist, creating a fluffy, squishy yarn. The colors lined up surprisingly well when I plied them together.
So now I've been knitting and reknitting swatch after swatch trying to come up with the perfect pattern that will be just right for my friend. I've come up with about five different scarf patterns that might be right for some other yarn or some other person, but I think I FINALLY hit on the right one, last night.
Creating this scarf is taking way longer than it really needs to. But it's satisfying to have a vision and try to create something that's right for a particular person or a particular situation. The key is to be able to realize when it's good enough or it will never get done.
My latest swatch has promise, but I made it a little too narrow. I think it's safe to say this will be the last time I'll have to rip this out and start over. Stay tuned....
Posted on 01/15/2008 by Andrea
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Knitting, Tips
In the last episode of Cast On, Brenda mentioned that she loves the Fiber Trends felted clogs, but she hates knitting them because it's so easy to get lost in the pattern.
I kind of feel the same way, but I love them enough that I know I'll be making lots of them in my time. They'll make great gifts. In the process of knitting these, I've come up with a triumvirate of tools for not losing my place in this rather convoluted (but completely genius) pattern. In case they're helpful for anyone else, I thought I'd share them here. Basically, it involves documenting in the pattern and in your knitting where you are at any given time. Doing it this way, I was able to knit the soles of these clogs without ever having to rip back ONE stitch.
1. A Post-It Note.
The Post-It Note marks the section you're currently knitting. I line it up so that the left-hand side of the paper aligns with the first stitch in the section I'm working and the sticky side is just above the line I'm looking at.
Once you're finished working a small section (e.g., a bunch of M1s or a section of knitting before a wrap-and-turn), move the Post-It note so the left-hand side of it now aligns with the next unworked stitch you'll be working. ALSO, before beginning to knit that next section, you'll now need your cable needle:
2. A Cable Needle.
Once you move the Post-It to its new location, you want to mark in your knitting the last stitch you just worked. I stick a cable needle through the stitch I just finished working and also through the knitting below (just to keep it secure). This is your lifeline. You know that all the knitting up until this cable needle followed the pattern and you don't have to worry about it anymore. If your next task is to knit 24 stitches, for example, it'll be really easy to make sure you've actually knitted 24 because the cable needle should be back at the 25th stitch. It'll also be hard to forget where you are in the printed pattern because that Post-It note is sitting there telling you what do to next.
Here's a close-up of what I'm talking about:
(You could also use any movable stitch marker or safety pin. I used safety pins at first, but I found the cable needle was the fastest and easiest, because you can slip it in and out easily without having to open it.)
3. Some Hershey Kisses.
Hershey Kisses, safety pins, bottles of beer. Anything that you have several of and doesn't move of its own volition (I was going to say cats, but that wouldn't work). I used Hershey Kisses because they were the only thing I had seven of that were easily within arms reach. Plus then you can have a built-in reward when you're done knitting.
The Hershey Kisses are for those times in the pattern where it'll say something like (M1, K2) seven times. You don't really need the Hershey Kisses, but if you really want to be foolproof about knitting this pattern, it's just easiest to have seven items handy and move them one pile to the next as you finish each (M1, K2).
And that's it!
If you do these three things together, you'll actually be able to knit Felted Clogs even if you're not in a soundproof room, even if you're absorbed in watching that episode of Buffy, the Vampire Slayer where the girl's mom who really wanted to relive her cheerleading glory days switched bodies with her daughter and then started sabotaging the other cheerleaders using voodoo. This complicated pattern will actually start to resemble relaxing and relatively mindless knitting. I swear.
And for anyone else who's knitted these, let me know if you have any other tricks for getting through this pattern! I plan to knit lots more of these in the future.
Posted on 01/14/2008 by Andrea
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Finished Objects, Knitting
Pattern: Retro Redux Shrug from the book Lace Style (Ravelry Link)
Yarn: di.Ve' Autunno. I think this was a great yarn to use for this particular project. It's so soft against the skin and the color changes are subtle and lovely. It's just a single ply of yarn that puffs up if given space, but compacts down if using a smaller needle, so it was perfectly adaptable to all the needle sizes I used, from 7 to 10.
Modifications: I made the medium size, but used one smaller needle size all the way through. Somehow, it came out perfectly.
Made for: I had a wedding and a fancy holiday party both in January, and knew I'd probably be cold during both events. I didn't finish it in time for the wedding, but the fancy holiday party is this weekend, so I'll be able to wear it for that.
Overall thoughts: I love this pattern. It's easy to knit, a very simple brioche lace. You almost couldn't invent a simpler lace pattern. And there's no shaping. You just use successively larger needles as you knit the thing. This would be a perfect project for someone who's new to lace and may be intimidated by it. But even for someone who's not intimidated by lace, it's still fun to knit. This was my most satisfying knitting project in recent memory.
Posted on 01/11/2008 by Andrea
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Knitting
Heh... now that I've gotten your attention! I thought today's Knitting Daily newsletter was quite interesting. They did a survey about what men like in a handknitted sweater, and published the results today:
The Perfect Men's Sweater is a long-sleeved pullover (80%), without a hood (64%). It is dark in color (90%), preferably solid blue (82%). It has minimal texture (68%), although something subtle, such as a bit of ribbing, is acceptable (58%).
Hmmm... sounds almost exactly like the St. Mawes sweater I'm making for Brad!
Yes, I really will finish it before the end of the winter. I will!
I stayed home sick today... a mild fever and sniffles and sinus congestion and now a cough. It's amazing how fast a cold can hit you. I don't even feel up for knitting or spinning. Bleh.
Posted on 01/10/2008 by Andrea
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Knitting
Lucky me - I have the day off today to spend with my sister, who is in town this week. This morning I'm just sitting at home doing a little work until she's ready to get together. We'll probably go thrifting. While we're out, if I can find some sweaters with nice yarns maybe I'll buy a few to rip apart and reuse the yarn. Because I am most definitely in new project mode.
I have a scarf that needs to be spun and knit for a certain friend in Colorado (and St. Mawes, which we don't talk about), but other than that, my other two projects-in-process are almost done. And I'm starting to get excited about future knitting projects. I want to knit at least one or two sweaters for myself this year... sweaters I will actually wear, as opposed to the sweaters I have knit that sit forlornly in my closet feeling lumpy and rejected.
One thing that I have my eye on is Henley Perfected, from the winter 2007 Interweave Knits (Ravelry link). When I first saw this in the magazine I felt kind of "eh" about it, until I saw Lickety Knit's version. I find myself going back to her entry once in a while and just fantasizing about knitting this for myself. Especially since I just picked up some breathtaking vintage glass beads that I think would look amazing with this.
But first I should use some yarn I already have, I think. And I don't have any yarn to make Henley Perfected. I have Rowan Plaid (a bulky yarn, in beautiful blues and grays) with which I'd kind of like to make Emerald (Ravelry link) -- but I'm not sure I have enough yarn.
I also have a whole bunch of bright orange Valeria di Roma Arena, a cotton yarn somewhere between an Aran weight (which is how Ravelry categorizes it) and a Bulky weight - the gauge listed on the ball band is 15st/4 inches on size 8 needles.
It's not quite as bulky as the Plaid. I have no idea what to do with this. It's a pretty yarn. Hmmm, perhaps Snow White (Ravelry link)would be just the ticket for this yarn? I guess my first step would be to figure out how much of it I actually have.
Anybody have any other ideas for what to do with these two yarns?
Posted on 01/08/2008 by Andrea
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Finished Objects, Knitting
I love me a finished object, don't you? Meet the second biggest pain in my ass (knitting-wise, anyway) lately: the short row felted bag.
Pattern: The Short Row Bag Collection by Diane Sutliff. This pattern comes with several variations; some are knitted sideways to get vertical striping (like this one) and some are knitted vertically. I think this pattern is very clever, although I had a hard time navigating it. There's a whole lot of information in those eight (I think) pages and I tended to get lost. I spent a lot of time scrutinizing the pattern and trying to just understand how it was supposed to work on a basic level. Then I rewrote it out in a way that made more sense to me. Since I was adding short row sections and omitting the base, I kind of had to do that in order to not get lost.
Yarn: The pattern calls for Noro Kureyon, but I wanted to use some Jamieson's DK shetland wool I had in my stash.
I used what I had and bought two new colors (the brighter blue and brighter purple, to go with my sister's bright disposition). I think it was a wash as far as stash usage, because now I have lots of small amounts of many colors left over.
Modifications: Many. I didn't get gauge with the wool I wanted to use so I added a couple of extra stripes to make sure the bag was the width I was going for. That worked out pretty well. I also added a pocket on the inside. I knitted it sideways because the bag was knitted sideways and I wanted it all to felt the same way and sewed it to the inside of the bag before felting. This worked out surprisingly well and is almost undetectable from the outside.
The biggest (and worst) modification was to the bottom. I didn't want to knit a flat bottom like the pattern called for, so I just didn't knit the bottom at all and decided I'd "figure something out" later. I don't recommend this kind of fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants knitting. It works for some people (I'm looking at you, Mom), but so far I've probably had too many problems arise from a lack of planning to make it worth it. I knitted a garter stitch bottom after finishing the whole bag, felted the thing, and then cut the bottom back out of it because it looked so awful. Then Mom (bless her heart) machine-sewed the bottom closed.
Made for: I made this for my sister for Christmas. I had a little bit of extra time to finish it because we weren't celebrating Christmas with her until January 6th, and I used all the available extra time to help undo the problems I'd created for myself.
Overall thoughts: Well, my sister liked it! And that's the main thing. The short row sections were satisfying to make. Instead of working back and forth across the whole row, you just do each little "bubble" separately and then move on to the next and there's something very satisfying about that. It's like working magic, almost. And felting always feels like working magic, although there's also a certain amount of fear involved. If there was one thing I could change, it would have been to have planned for the bottom from the beginning instead of just assuming I'd eventually come up with a plan. Also, I like the distinct solid-colored sections, but I can imagine it would be great fun to knit this with Kureyon and be continually surprised by how the colors came out.
Posted on 01/07/2008 by Andrea
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Knitting
All I have to do is sew on some buttons, and I will be done with my very last Christmas knit of 2007. Yeah, it's a bit late, but in defensive of myself, it wasn't due until yesterday. And I wanted to make sure the strap was the right length, so I opted to let her try it on before sewing on the buttons.
We had a belated Christmas gathering yesterday because my sister couldn't get home from Boston for Christmas. We sat in front of the crackling television,
... and we opened Christmas presents. My sister knit gifts for both my mom and me, and we both knit gifts for her. It was handmade fun all around.
On the left are some clogs my sister made. She had seen some clogs with knitted uppers in stores and decided to try to make her own, so she bought some and removed the knitted parts and sewed her own knitted top on in its place. From her own hand-dyed, handspun yarn. I was so flabbergasted, especially since I've been knitting the Fiber Trends Felted Clogs. My first thought was that she'd made some of those and somehow attached them to a real shoe sole. So confused.
So anyway, these are actual real shoes as opposed to slippers, so I'll be able to wear them out, or at home, or wherever. And they have a soft, warm lining to make them extra cozy. I think she won the award for most creative, unexpected gift.
On the right above is my mom with the handknit gift she got from my sister. I won't say more about this project in case Mom wants to post about it herself, but I couldn't help but post this picture because of how happy Mom looks.
I'll post about my gift for my sister later, once I've got the buttons on and I can take some pictures of the finished product. So, with the exception of Brad's St. Mawes (ouch... the pain), that wraps up Christmas knitting of 2007. I'm either going to knit gifts throughout the year or drastically scale back the knitted gifts for '08, I think. Up next on the needles is this:
This is the Retro Redux Shrug from Lace Style. It's a really simple knit that I started at Open Knitting at Double Ewe Yarn and will probably knit at my knitting group with coworkers tomorrow. I can't wait to wear it.
I'm also in the process of designing a scarf to be made from my latest dyed roving. This is a trade with an online friend and the stuff she sent me in trade was so fantastic, I'm really being finicky about making sure the scarf turns out great.
Posted on 01/02/2008 by Andrea
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Knitting
Whoa... how did it get to be 2008?
2007 was a year of lots of ups and downs. One good thing that came of 2007 was my renewed interest in all things knitting, spinning and fiber in general. And this blog. I can only imagine that trend continuing into 2008, as I have more yarn than ever before and more projects that I want to knit. And so much spinning fiber.
Oh so wonderful books I plan to knit from in 2008. I think I'm going to start with the retro shrug from Lace Style, something I can wear to Brad's company's holiday party later in January. I bought this book with the money I got from returning a duplicate Christmas gift, and I can't believe how many of the patterns in here are so great I just want to knit them all right now. Too bad I don't really have any stash yarn that will work with the patterns.
I spent New Year's Day in some knitterly pursuits, both expected and unexpected. I finished everything but the duplicate sole on my second Fiber Trends felted clog (can you tell which one has the second sole and which doesn't? It certainly seems to give the slipper some structure).
I love this project. It looks so impressive, but it knits up so fast. I was able to make almost an entire clog while watching one movie.
And Brad and I stopped in at REI, where I unexpectedly found some perfect containers for my notions bag:
These are plastic Nalgene containers that come in every size and shape known to man. I guess they're supposed to be for camping. I love how sturdy they are and how well the lid snaps on -- no worrying about stitch markers falling out -- and I love that the lid is a clamshell so it stays attached even when the lid is open. And they're clear, so I can see inside. Did I mention they're perfect? (I tried to find a link to these somewhere, but Nalgene's website seems to be down. Boo!).
As we were leaving the store, Brad got a laugh out of the fact that even at REI I was shopping for knitting stuff.
I don't know about you, but I have an optimistic feeling about 2008. There are so many things I want to do, I hardly know where to start. It's a good feeling. A new year is really an arbitrary kind of thing when you think about it, but I love using it as an excuse to feel like I'm getting a fresh start.
