Ms. Knits

Moving day!

2006-05-02T23:04:00.000-07:00

I've moved to a new home on the web.

Please come visit me over at On Pins & Needles!

See you there!

The socks are in the mail!

2006-05-02T08:41:00.000-07:00

I bet you've heard that line before, right? But really, they are. And I'm looking forward to getting my Sockapaloooza socks in a few days (hopefully!) too. I left it really open ended for my sock pal - no special requests at all - so I'm excited to see what arrives in my sock package.

On another note, you've all read about my many frustrations with Blogger. So, last night, I played around with Wordpress and my new domain. I've still got some work to do on it, but I'm hoping this is my LAST Blogger post. I may not post for a while, just to make this my last Blogger post!

For those of you who have used wordpress/themes/plugins before, I could sure use some tips... I'm muddling my way through everything, and haven't had any problems yet, but would appreciate any advice you're willing to share! What plugins do you recommend using? Any good image and/or gallery plugins? Tips for modifying themes? Is there a good basic primer on PHP that would be useful? (is that even necessary?) Any other advice?

Weekend? What weekend?

2006-04-30T19:37:00.000-07:00

Where do the weekends go to? I had grand plans for everything I would get done this weekend, but didn't quite accomplish what I wanted.

Plans:
- Finish sewing Weekender bag
- Finish knitting front of Salina sweater
- Plant tomato plants
- Plant flowers in back yard
- Go for a bike ride
- Set up new blog site

What really happened:
- Went for a bike ride (ow, sore rear end!)
- Took a nap
- Had friends over for an impromptu barbecue
- Knit a few rows on Salina
- Went shopping for summer clothes
- Pruned hedges
- Took another nap (anyone see a pattern here?)
- Laundry

I guess I got a lot done, and definitely had a good weekend, but I didn't make any crafty progress to speak of.

Just in time for the end of April's Project Spectrum, here are some poppy pictures that I took along the bike trail on Saturday morning. Enjoy!

Testing...1...2...3...

2006-04-27T08:02:00.000-07:00

Move along, nothing new here. Just a test post to see if Bloglines fixed my feed. I have my doubts...

Backyard Leaves, among the backyard leaves

2006-04-25T10:01:00.000-07:00

My wisteria tree is so pretty this time of year, I couldn't resist using it as the backdrop for my completed Backyard Leaves scarf.

I finished the scarf on Sunday evening, sewed the two halves together, and weaved in the ends. This project went really fast - one week from start to finish! Why can't every project be like this? I plan to give the scarf a light steam blocking before sending it off to the recipient, then it's time to start finishing my other projects before I become tempted to start something new.

Backyard Leaves in Review:
Pattern: Backyard Leaves from Scarf Style
Yarn: Karabella Aurora 8, in Periwinkle (24) [I think that's the right color]
Needles: Lantern Moon Rosewood, size 8, because I wanted to knit this on short straight needles, and those are the only ones I own!
Modifications: None
Thoughts: Have I mentioned that I adore this pattern? So simple, yet not at all boring to knit, and the end result is fabulous. The 20 row repeat isn't exactly memorizeable, although I only had to refer to the chart on a few of the rows that didn't intuitively follow the rest of the pattern (the two or three rows following the leaf tips)

Stitch & Ride

2006-04-24T09:57:00.000-07:00

Caitlyn & I (and a bunch of fun ladies from the knitting guild, including Beth, who helped set up the trip and took some great pictures) made a trip on the Amtrak Stitch & Ride train to the Knit & Crochet show on Saturday.

Here's Caitlyn working on her sock - the lucky girl won a great door prize on the train!

And these are the fun gals who shared a table with us in the knitting car. They were both working on neat beaded Koigu purses. So pretty!

I worked on the Backyard Leaves scarf on the train. Note to self: charts + train + crazy chatting knitters = much frogging. Oh well, it was fun anyway. And you see that little spot of pink behind my right shoulder? It's Nancie!

Yes, that's right, I got to meet the author of my favorite knitting book (which also happens to be the most useful knitting book that I own) - Nancie Wiseman!

Unfortunately, neither Caitlyn or I took pictures at the knit show itself, even after we each mentioned several times that we should take pictures! I'd be a horrible photojournalist. You'll just have to imagine a big room in a convention center filled with yarn and fibery goodness everywhere. And knitters. Lots and lots of knitters.

The show was great, but I didn't have much luck finding patterns. I was hoping to find a lace pattern that hasn't already been knit to death, but patterns were in short supply at the show.

There was one beautiful display of Russian Lace shawls (yeah, yeah - no pictures... sorry), but they were all for sale, and the booth didn't have any patterns available. I did manage to find some very pretty yarn for my next lace project from a different vendor.

As far as I can tell, this yarn isn't available anywhere except for from Yarn Place, and it doesn't even show up on their website. It is a gorgeous deep red tencel/merino blend, and I would guess that it is cobweb weight or maybe even finer (no gauge is given on the yarn band). Seriously, it is a very fine yarn. Smaller than some thread that I've used. There are 3000 yards of yarn in this 4 oz. hank! 3000! Crazy.

How long do you suppose it will take me to make a lace shawl on tiny (00? 0? 1?) needles with 3000 yards of yarn? I'm guessing a reeeeeallly long time. Any ideas for patterns? I love Eunny's Print O'The Wave stole- and this is enough yarn to make 4 of those! Yikes!

Random Thoughts on a Thursday

2006-04-20T08:04:00.000-07:00

- Finished the first half of Backyard Leaves last night. Dang, that is a neat pattern. I could knit leaf repeats all day long. No time for pictures though.

- The Knit & Crochet Show is in Oakland this weekend & Amtrak is sponsoring a Stitch & Ride train to get there. Sounds like a lot of fun, and I'm a big fan of taking the train into the Bay Area. Still can't decide whether I should go or not. I'm thinking probably... especially if it is going to rain again this weekend.

- Still haven't had a chance to work on the Weekender any more. Why is it that I seem to have less time now that I'm at home than I did when I was in school? Must get out the sewing machine again soon.

- Had a knitting lunch with Lynette on Tuesday. Very cool to have another knitter at work to meet up with occasionally. And it doesn't hurt that she is a way awesome person either! So glad I've gotten to know her.

- SnB tonight - I remembered this time! :-) Caitlyn & Ruth, I'll see you there!

- UPS: HATE THEM. They lost my bridesmaid dress for my sister's wedding this summer. Really. Lost. Technically, they claim to have delivered it. Left it by the front door, they said. Right. No dress by the front door. Neighbors didn't see anything. My guess is that someone walking down the street saw the UPS guy leave and decided to see what he left. Why on earth would you leave a package insured for $200 by someone's front door without getting a signature? WHY??? Thankfully I was able to order a replacement dress that will arrive before the wedding (barely), but it will cost me about $75 more than the original dress to have it rushed. And this, after the curtain debacle. Suffice it to say, I will NEVER willingly partake of UPS's "services" again.

- Off to work, to my spacious (ha!) new cubicle. It is taking some time to get used to the cube world after being in an office for 3.5 years.

Off on a tangent

2006-04-17T09:15:00.000-07:00

Just when I think I have a plan to finish all of the projects I've started on, something new comes up. I've been making good progress on the front of Salina, working my way through the foot of Jaywalker #1, and pining for the long neglected Snowflake. But, a week ago, a friend did something really nice for me, and in lieu of payment, she said that she'd love it if I would knit her a scarf. Something blue, she said.

I've been eyeing the Backyard Leaves pattern for a while, and thought it would be the perfect thing - simple, elegant, and pretty. So, on Saturday I bought some gorgeous blue yarn (Karabella Aurora 8), and started knitting.

I've got 8 repeats done so far, 14 or so left to go. After a slow start, I've got the hang of the pattern now and am flying through it. I've read rave reviews of the pattern in blogland, and I have to say, I agree. This pattern is brilliant. The edging is by far the best scarf edging I've ever seen, and the leaf pattern is amazing in its simple beauty.

Was anyone else a bit freaked out when they started knitting this pattern though? Cast on 10 stitches? That couldn't be nearly enough! And the chart looked a bit foreboding too. But, lo & behold, everything worked out perfectly.

I'm going to be working on this scarf until I have it done, then back to finishing up my other projects.

Let the Weekend(er) begin!

2006-04-06T11:19:00.000-07:00

Sewing is not like knitting. It can (and does!) take forever for me to knit something, but it doesn't bother me much, because for me, knitting is more about the process. Don't get me wrong, I love the end result, but I mostly knit because it is relaxing.

Sewing, on the other hand, is all about the end result. It kills me to have a pile of fabric pieces cut and ready to be sewn together, and not have time to sit down and finish the project. Also, sewing? Not terribly relaxing, as evidenced by the choice words that escaped my mouth several times last night. But, I still love to sew. I think for me it is the challenge of creating a three dimensional object out of yards of fabric by cutting it into different shapes and putting the pieces together.

So, last night I hauled the sewing machine out and started putting the pieces of the weekender bag together.

I only had a few hours to work on it, and didn't get very far. I completed the two large pocket panels and all the cording I'll need for the rest of the bag. This is going to be one loooong project. Every piece needs to be pinned, basted, and sewn multiple times (once to apply cording, once to apply the heavyweight Timtex lining, and once to apply the fabric lining). Just applying the cording to the top of the pocket required about 6 passes of the sewing machine (plus one more the time I messed up and had to rip).

Yep, this is going to take a while. I guess I just have to live with it, and get used to hauling out my sewing machine a few nights a week until the project is done.

Next up, handles and the large front and back panel. Wheee!

Sockapaloooza Socks - Done!

2006-04-05T09:32:00.000-07:00

Presenting the Elongated Corded Rib socks!

All ready to be sent off to their rightful owner, just as soon as May rolls around. I'm a little sad to have to send these off, because I really like how they turned out. The yarn, the pattern, the lovely proportionate short row heel - these may be my favorite socks that I've knit so far. But, I know I have to give them up. And, they are a bit big for me, so no use keeping them for myself! I'm reminded of something that Ashley said during her quest to create the perfect sockapalooza socks for her pal - "it is a good rule of thumb for gifts in general, not just socks: give something that the recipient will love, but that you are also a teeny bit sad to part with." So true!

Sock Details:

Yarn: Louet Sales Gems Opal Sport Weight in Neptune (2 skeins)
Pattern: Elongated Corded Rib pattern, from Sensational Knitted Socks (my new favorite sock book)
Needles: Size 3, 8" metal dpns
Modifications: Replaced flap heel with short row heel
Thoughts: Love the yarn, love knitting socks on size 3 needles (bless you, my sock pal, for not requesting socks knit on size 0 needles!), love the pattern, love the book. Can't wait to see how my sock pal likes them!

And, on another note, thank you for all the kind words and thoughts about Todd. Thankfully, he's doing much better after a couple of days of rest. He's gotten some of his memory back (still can't remember skiing at all), and is back at work today. I'll be keeping a close eye on him for the next few months to make sure there is nothing unusual happening, and before we go skiing again next winter, we will definitely be purchasing ski helmets.

It was the best of weekends, it was the worst of weekends...

2006-04-02T22:49:00.000-07:00

What a weekend! Lots going on, knitting and not. Forgive me if this post seems somewhat random... I need to learn to post more frequently with less stuff in each post.

First, a HUGE thank you to all those who suggested new names for my blog! I got some awesome ideas, and had a hard time choosing the winner.

[drum roll please...]

And the winner is... Cathi of In The Pink, with her suggestion of "On Pins and Needles." The name works perfectly for a (mostly) knitting and sewing themed blog, and, ironically, also describes my state of mind as I await my bar results. I'm hoping the state of mind thing is only temporary though!

I'll be working on getting my new site up over the next couple of months - stay tuned!

In other weekend news, my Sockapaloooza socks are now finished! They are happily blocking away right now. I'll get a nice picture of them when they are dry.

There was another trip to the fabric store over the weekend too. After reading and rereading the Weekender bag pattern, and much fondling of the gorgeous Amy Butler fabric that I purchased, I decided that my decision to ignore the pattern instructions and buy lightweight fabric was very unwise. So, I found some nice heavy home decorating cotton in a mod black and tan print with a coordinating black "O" print lining.

It isn't as springy as the floral fabric, but the pseudo-geometric print is very me. The AB fabric will be put to good use as a Madison bag instead. That pattern is much more suitable for a lightweight fabric.

Of course, I couldn't resist getting started. After nearly 4 hours of pattern layout and cutting, and approximately 60 pattern pieces later (I kid you not), here's what I've got...

Fun, eh? Just wait until I start sewing it up!

We also headed up to Northstar at Tahoe to ski today. The day started out great... got to the mountain just before 10, hardly any lift lines, got in a couple green runs to warm up, headed off to do a couple of blue runs, and went back to the green run so we could meet our friends at the bottom of the chair lift. A great start to the day. Then, about halfway down a really easy run, Todd crashed - a bad, scary crash (two full flips). And for no apparent reason - we were going a reasonable speed on an easy run, and there were no other people or trees around. I was terrified that he had broken bones, or worse. But, after resting for a minute, he got up and skiied the rest of the way down the run.

After we finished the run, I thought he should probably rest for a while, so we headed to the lodge and sat down. While we were resting, he started acting really out of character - he kept asking me what had happened, and he couldn't remember where we were or how we got there, or that we had driven up to the mountain with another couple. At first, I thought he was playing a late April Fool's joke on me, but he was completely serious. We sat a while longer and had lunch, and by the time lunch was over, I knew something was really wrong - he was really quiet and seemed confused about everything. We took the gondola down the mountain to the first aid station to see the doctor. The entire way there, Todd kept asking me where we were going, and why he needed to see a doctor. By that point, I was really scared that he had a serious head injury from the crash. The doctor was able to see him right away, and said that he had a very bad concussion, and had no short term memory capability, and that we'd have to stay in the clinic for monitoring until he started to recover from the concussion, or if that didn't happen, we'd have to go to a local ER to get CT scans done in case there was internal bleeding in his head. I don't think I've every been so worried - head injuries are very scary.

The next few hours were awful. He didn't understand what he was doing in the clinic, and kept asking where we were and what had happened. Finally, he started to remember a few little things, like the doctor's name. What a relief! Late in the afternoon, the doctor discharged him because he was improving, but said that it would take a while for a full recovery, and that there was still a possibility that he could get worse.

So, right now we're home, and thankfully Todd is doing better (not great, but better). We're both pretty shaken by the whole incident. Todd will probably never remember the moments before the accident or the following several hours, and he's still confused about why he had such a bad crash on such an easy run. He's also trying to remember the past few days, which seem to have been lost, at least temporarily. The whole incident was very frightening, and I can't even put into words how happy I am that it wasn't any worse. We are very, very fortunate.

Why a scale is sometimes a good thing

2006-03-29T07:50:00.000-08:00

On Sunday, I finished the first of the Sockapaloooza socks. I was hoping (unrealistically) to get two socks out of one skein of the Opal Louet Gems yarn - after all, in the latest issue of Interweave Knits, the lacy anklet pattern only uses one skein for a pair of socks! Nevermind that these aren't anklets, aren't really lacy, and most importantly, are about two sizes bigger than the Interweave pattern. Ah, optimism - one day it will be my downfall.

Fortunately I was able to determine that I was running short on yarn before I started the second sock. Read it and weep:

Yeah, I was a little off on my yarn estimate! Thankfully I was able to get another skein of the same yarn to start sock #2. I'm hoping to be done with it by the weekend.

There's another sewing project on deck too - Amy Butler's Weekender Travel Bag. I wasn't able to find her Sunbloom fabric anywhere, but a local quilting store carries some of her Charm line, so I'm using a lighter weight cotton with heavier interfacing. Hopefully it will work!

I also got Amy's Madison bag pattern - it reminds me of the Zelda knitting bag, which I adore but can't bring myself to buy. So, I'll make one instead!

Keep those blog name suggestions coming! I've abandoned the Domestic Adventures idea ("sounds like a parenting blog" "sounds kind of kinky" "I just hate that name"), and have gotten some other great names. Get your entry in by Friday for a chance to win some yarn!

Help Wanted! Yarn Reward!

2006-03-28T07:54:00.000-08:00

Blogging is really no fun when your blog host is always having issues, you can't upload pictures, and you have to hit the publish post button approximately 43 times before the post really does upload. I'm FED UP with Blogger!

So, here's the deal... I've been messing around with WordPress a bit, and am ready to move to a different site. But, I also plan to change the theme of my blog a bit. I've been doing slightly less knitting lately, and more of other crafty/domestic projects, like sewing, cooking, and home decorating, and come spring, I'll also be doing some gardening.

This is where I need your help - I need a new blog name that is more suitable for including all of my hobbies, preferably something with an available .com or .net URL. After hours of thinking about it, I was only able to come up with one name that I kind of like: Domestic Adventures.

I'd like your input on the name, so I'm having a little contest. Here's what you have to do:

By 5pm PST on Friday, March 31, Send me an e-mail with:

1. A new and improved blog name for me

AND/OR

2. A note telling me whether you love or hate the name "Domestic Adventures"

On Friday night, I will choose a blog name. If I pick your suggested name, I'll be sending you some sock yarn! If I decide to use my own suggestion based on the comments, I'll pick a random person from all those who sent e-mails to receive the yarn. Got it? Good!

A picture of my skirt

2006-03-23T07:51:00.000-08:00

As requested by Lynette... a modeled picture of the skirt I sewed.

I'm pretty pleased overall with how the skirt turned out. I learned a few new things, including how to do an invisible zipper, lining, and an invisible hem with my sewing machine. I'm not super excited about the fabric, but it is very professional looking. It will be great for the 3 times a year I have to dress up at work. :)

I also created an invisible zipper tutorial for Sew I Knit, which I'm going to post here as well. You know, just in case any of you knitters decide to take up sewing, and need to learn how to sew an invisible zipper!

The sock gets a new heel and goes to an airshow

2006-03-20T08:22:00.000-08:00

First, the new and improved short row heel for the sockapaloooza sock:

Yes, the flap heel has been frogged. In its place, a new, more proportional short row heel. Not only does this heel look better, I have a feeling it will fit better too.

The sock had quite an adventurous weekend as well. Most of the heel/foot knitting was done in the car on Saturday, as we were sitting in traffic trying to get to the California Capital Airshow. It took us an hour and a half to go about 2 miles! Finally, we gave up, and postponed our trip to the airshow until Sunday. Having learned our lesson, we took the light rail and bus on Sunday. Much easier than fighting traffic!

The sock (and I) got to see some pretty cool planes. Very little knitting got done at the airshow though. I was too busy marveling at the performances and all the amazing aircraft. Between Todd and I, we ended up with over 400 pictures from the airshow... a few of my favorites are below.

The sock and a fighter jet

The sock and a WW2 war bird

A war bird in flight

A biplane

Simulated Blackhawk rescue

The Blue Angels

A C5 Galaxy cargo plane - this thing is HUGE!

Attack of the monster heel!

2006-03-17T13:26:00.000-08:00

The Sockapaloooza sock knitting has begun! The socks are the Elongated Corded Rib pattern from Sensational Knitted Socks, knit with Louet Gems Opal in a pretty sky blue color.

[FYI - SKS is a wonderful book with dozens of neat sock patterns that will work for almost any yarn gauge, color (solid/stripe/variegated), sock knitting technique (4 or 5 DPN, 2 circs, magic loop), and foot size.]

The only problem is the heel of the sock... is it just me or is this an unnaturally large heel? To give you an idea of the actual sock size, the dpns are about 8 inches long.

I realize that the ribbing pulls in quite a bit on the leg and the foot of the sock, so that may be affecting the scale of things a little, but the heel just looks completely out of proportion to the rest of the sock right now. I don't quite understand, because my gauge is right on, and I've followed the pattern exactly. But the heel just looks enormous and out of place to me. Unfortunately, my sock pal's feet are a couple of sizes larger than my feet, so I can't get a good idea of how these will fit her by trying them on myself. The sock isn't overly huge on me, and the ribbing allows for a little leeway in fit, but I'm still worried that my pal will end up with baggy heeled socks. Not good!

I'm debating whether I should rip the heel and use a short row heel instead. If anyone has thoughts or suggestions, please let me know!

I'm really enjoying this pattern. I love how the ribbing looks when it is slightly stretched, and I'm hoping that because the ribbing is stretchy it will fit the recipient perfectly. This is also a very simple stitch pattern - a 4 stitch, 8 row repeat, and only two of the eight rows deviate from 2x2 ribbing. Total mindless knitting, yet still quite pretty! Love it!

The most difficult part of the sock so far was picking up stitches around the heel flap. You can see in the top picture that there is a 3-st garter stitch border on the heel flap. I had a bit of a tough time figuring out how to pick up stitches on the edge of the garter stitch. If you do it wrong, you end up with big gaping holes at the edge of the heel flap! My heel flap preference is a slipped stitch edging, which makes it much easier to know where to pick up the stitches, and is virtually hole-proof.

In a funk...

2006-03-13T08:23:00.000-08:00

I thought that once I was done with school and back into a regular routine, I'd be able to post a little more regularly. So far, that hasn't been the case though. I'm having a hard time adjusting to "real life" - I feel like I have 3 1/2 years of life to catch up on, including projects around the house, hobbies, friends, and generally relaxing.

So far my catching up has mostly included catching up on sleep, TV shows, and housework. I've also taken up a new-old hobby -- sewing! I sewed a lot of my own clothes when I was a teenager, but hadn't touched my sewing machine for years until about a week ago. Thanks to Sew-I-Knit, I've rediscovered my very first fiber obsession, and have a brand new skirt to show for it.

McCall's 3341, View C
Fully lined, with an invisible zipper and invisible hem

There hasn't been a lot of knitting around here lately, but I'll save what little there has been for another post.

Life before knitting

2006-03-05T20:39:00.000-08:00

Anyone else notice that their life has changed since they started knitting?

The thing that I've noticed most is that my shopping style has changed significantly. I am a shopper. I love clothes, and I love shopping for clothes. A typical before-knitting shopping trip would go something like this: Go to the mall. Stop at Macy's, Nordstroms, Ann Taylor, Gap, Banana Republic, etc. Adore the cute clothes. Try on said clothes. Maybe buy a few things (or, more than a few!).

Since I began to knit, my shopping trips have been reduced significantly in both frequency and scope. Even more interestingly, the way I shop has changed. I no longer browse idly through the stores. Now, I make a beeline for the sweaters and look at the style, the shaping, the construction, and the yarn.

Case in point: I recently went to the Eddie Bauer outlet store with Todd. He had some things he wanted to get, and I didn't even bother looking at the women's clothing. Instead, a sweater on the sale rack in the men's section caught my eye. The yarn looked soft and comfy and tweedy. I envisioned the sweater becoming a different sweater - a sweater for me! A cabled sweater, perhaps my own design. (hey, a girl can dream!) So, I bought the sweater JUST FOR THE YARN. Is that wrong? For $10, I got enough yarn for a sweater, or maybe two.

Today, I started frogging the sweater. This is only the back of it... I still need to finish the front and sleeves.

Thankfully, I had a couple of new tools to help me out. Check out my brand-spanking new homemade niddy-noddys...

These were super easy to make - just buy a 1 1/8" dowel and a 1/2" dowel, cut the dowels to whatever length you want, and drill 1/2" holes in either end of the thick dowel and slide the smaller dowels through.

Post-Vacation update

2006-03-03T14:42:00.000-08:00

Day 1 - Arrive at the Village at Squaw. It's starting to snow! Woohoo! Wait a minute... it's starting to rain. Yuck. Well, at least we're in the mountains. It will definitely snow tonight, and we'll have great snow for skiing.

View from the balcony

Day 2 - It's still raining. #*&@ rain! I thought we were in the mountains. You can't ski in the rain. Grrr. Good thing I brought my knitting.

Day 3 - Finally, glorious snow! But the winds are gusting at 100mph over the ridges and most of the mountain is closed. Off to Homewood, where the winds are (supposedly) not as bad. The slopes aren't groomed, and we end up skiing in a foot or more of "sierra cement" - heavy, wet snow. After two runs, our legs hurt so much that we decided to call it a day.

How are you supposed to turn in this stuff?

Day 4 - A perfect, beautiful day on the mountain. The first day on this vacation that I didn't knit a stitch.

A gorgeous mountain morning

At the top of the Gold Coast lift

Day 5 - Must. Ski. More. Crappy weather again, but the lifts are running, so we head up the mountain to get in a few more runs.

Day 6 - Time to head back to reality. I did manage to get some knitting done on this trip during all of the crappy weather... a bit more of Salina (no pictures - it looks the same as before, only longer!), and part of a Jaywalker for me.

An almost Jaywalker

Back in action!

2006-02-25T10:15:00.000-08:00

Whew! What a miserable couple of weeks it has been. But, I am elated to have it behind me, and now comes the torturous three month wait for my results. I have no idea how I did on the exam, but I honestly did the best I could, which, really, is all I could ask for.

Yesterday was the first day in nearly four years that I didn't have to think about law or worry about studying. Boy, was it a good feeling! And, to make the day even better, it was Todd's birthday. To celebrate, I scheduled an introductory pilot lesson for him as a birthday gift. He's been tossing around the idea of getting his pilot's license for a while now, and since I'm finally done with school, I figured it is now his turn to go off and make his dreams happen.

Here are some pictures of the flight. I got to ride along (!) in the back seat of the plane. Other than the take-off and landing, Todd flew the plane pretty much the whole time we were in the air, with the instructor telling him exactly what to do. Crazy!

I also managed to get a little knitting done (very little!) during study breaks the past two weeks. I forgave the Claudia socks and finished sock number two.

These socks are so soft! I highly recommend Claudia Handpainted sock yarn for those of you who like variegated yarns. It is soft, and lovely to knit with. If you don't mind a little freaky pooling, it is luscious stuff. I won't be using it again though, because I cannot get past the fact that two socks will inevitably pool differently and end up not matching. It drives me nuts! No more variegated sock yarn for me, other than the yarn already in my stash. Self-striping and solid colored yarns are the only sock yarns for me!

I treated myself to a bunch more sock yarn yesterday - including some for my Sockapaloooza pal - several skeins of Opal Gems merino in different solid colors. I haven't picked out a pattern yet, but I'm pretty sure I'll be using one of the stitch patterns from the Sensational Knitted Socks book.

I haven't made much more progress on Salina. I cast on for the front, and knit the waistband plus the decrease section.

I think this will be my one of my red projects for Lolly's Project Spectrum. I'm also going to knit a pair of socks out of the pretty pink and brown yarn that Dani gifted me during the Knitter's Review Secret Pal exchange.

We're heading off on our post-bar vacation tomorrow. Initially, we were planning on flying to Vancouver for a week, but due to astronomically priced plane tickets, we scaled down the trip and decided to drive up to Lake Tahoe and ski at Squaw Valley for 6 days instead. I'm looking forward to a fun week of skiing, knitting, and relaxing!

Oh, and I can't forget to say thanks to everyone for the yarn suggestions after my last post! Everyone's ideas were really helpful, and at some point I want to try all of the yarns you mentioned. And, I might actually be able to do so, since now I have ALL this extra time on my hands. :)

Sock yarn suggestions?

2006-02-07T07:35:00.000-08:00

Does anyone have any suggestions for a sport weight (or heavier) yarn that would be good for socks? My sock pal has requested thick socks, and most of my sock knitting thusfar has been with sock-weight yarns on size 1 needles... Thanks in advance for the tips.

Not much else going on for knitting these days. I'm in the final stretch of my bar preparation. The test is in exactly 2 weeks. (YIKES!) Suffice it to say, I will be relieved when it is done and I can have my life back again.

Until then, I'm going dark. Wish me luck on the test, and I'll be back on the 24th.

Swatching

2006-01-26T10:45:00.000-08:00

It all started with a swatch, really. You see, I had this yarn. Lovely, red yarn. And I was tired of knitting with tiny dpns. And the socks were turning out to be different colors, which was making me very unhappy. And, truth be told, I cannot focus on anything for more than, oh, 5 minutes these days.

And so, this lovely little swatch of cranberry Dale Sisik -

Suddenly became this -

Why, it's a nearly finished Salina back! Bet you didn't see that coming. Me either. I don't imagine this sweater will be finished anytime soon, but I'm plugging away at a few rows each day. At least until I decide to forgive the Claudia socks for being different colors and pick up sock #2 again.

Sockapaloooza!

2006-01-23T21:47:00.000-08:00

My first ever Sockapaloooza! I can't wait! Sign-ups open until midnight Tuesday - head over and check it out if you are interested...

Aw, crap.

2006-01-20T12:12:00.000-08:00

Apparently, after my recent rant about all the trouble I had getting a box picked up by UPS, this site is now the 2nd hit for the google search "how to get UPS call tag".

So, all you people who arrived here looking for help getting call tags - sorry I'm of no help, but best of luck to you. You're going to need it.

4 Things

2006-01-18T18:08:00.000-08:00

Stephanie tagged me for this meme, and I will gladly oblige! Anything to take my mind off of 17th century common law for a few minutes...

4 jobs you've had in your life:
1. Waitress at a pizza restaurant (Happy Joe's for the Midwesterners out there - best taco pizza anywhere!)
2. Subway Sandwich Artist
3. Outside Plant Engineer (person who draws schematics showing where phone lines need to be laid)
4. Technical Marketing Engineer

4 movies you could watch over and over:
1. Pirates of the Carribean
2. Love Actually
3. Monsters Inc.
4. Any of the Disney classics (anything pre-Little Mermaid... I can't stand the recent Disney movies)

4 places you've lived:
1. On a farm in rural North Dakota
2. Golden, Colorado
3. Albuquerque, New Mexico
4. Citrus Heights, California

4 tv shows you love to watch:
1. 24
2. Desperate Housewives
3. Survivor
4. Law & Order

4 places you've been on vacation:
1. Kauai, HI
2. Disneyland
3. Mendocino, CA
4. Lake Tahoe

4 websites you visit daily:
1. Bloglines
2. NewYorkTimes.com
3. gmail.com
4. My company's intranet homepage

4 of your favorite foods:
1. Filet Mignon (or any kind of steak will do, as long as it is not overcooked)
2. Chocolate of all kinds
3. Green vegetables
4. Cheeseburger & Fries

4 places you'd rather be right now:
1. At work (how wrong is that? work should not make my top 4 list, but I'm in my office having just finished taking a 3 hour long practice test. see what bar studying has done to me? i'm losing my mind!)
2. Skiing
3. Downstairs on the couch, knitting in front of the fireplace
4. At a nice restaurant, eating dinner. Perhaps some filet mignon & green beans, with chocolate mousse for dessert. :)

Ruth, Lynette, Dani, and Brynne - If you want to do this, feel free... if not, no worries. And apologies if any of you have already been tagged, I've been remiss on keeping up on all my favorite blogs.

Curtains

2006-01-16T13:30:00.000-08:00

On Saturday, I met up with Caitlyn, Lynette, and Ruth at Frog Pond Knits to knit and visit. Bad blogger that I am, I did not take any pictures, and so I have no documentary evidence that the event occurred. It was a fun break from my studies, and nice to see everyone again. I also witnessed the completion of Ruth's first sock - yay, Ruth!

Ruth & Caitlyn also surprised me with a very sweet card congratulating me on finishing school, and (as if that weren't enough), a gift certificate for yarn! Thanks so much girls, you have no idea how much your thoughtfulness and encouragement means to me!

Caitlyn asked if I ever got the rest of my curtain order... indeed, I did, just last Thursday. I had no idea that curtains could involve so much drama. To make a long story short, I had to make a change to the order after it was placed (due to insufficient product knowledge of the person who took my order), so my curtain and valence panels ended up with the wrong rings on them. Dealing with the return was a complete nightmare, and UPS is a bunch of bumbling idiots.

(this post got a lot longer than I thought it would... scroll to the bottom for the pictures if you don't want to hear my rant about UPS)

Here is a conversation that I had with UPS about a dozen times in the last three months:

"Hello, I'm calling because company X issued call tags to get a box returned to them, and it hasn't been picked up yet. The number of the tags is Z123456. Can you help me?"

"Let me look that up in our system. Oh, we can't pick up the box because your address is not in our system."

"Well, that is the correct address, and the exact location is near cross streets X & Y, can you make a note of that and have someone come out to pick up the box?"

"You'll have to call Company X and have them issue a new call tag and indicate the cross streets in the comments of the call tag, as this call tag is no longer valid."

Then, I'd call Company X:

"Hello, I'm calling regarding order XYZ. You sent out call tags, but UPS can't figure out where my house is. Can you make a note of the cross streets on the call tags and reissue them for me please?"

"That should be easy enough. I'll have to send a request to the factory and have them issue the new tags. It will take them 3 business days to get back to me."

"Can you confirm that they can make a note on the tags with my location?"

"Let me check. No, there is no space on the form for comments. We'll just have to use your address."

"That won't work, UPS doesn't have my address in their system."

"Didn't UPS deliver the box to you in the first place?"

"Yes, they did. I'm confused why they can't find it now too. Clearly they are idiots. Can you just find some way to make a note of my cross streets on the call tags? Or can I just send it back myself and have you credit my account?"

"We can't let you send it back, we'll just have to issue the tags again."

"Fine, thanks for your help."

And then more calls to UPS. And more calls to Company X. Dozens more calls. Dozens. All the same. Finally, one evening in December, a UPS truck stopped by to deliver an unrelated christmas package. I tore through the house, out the front door, and chased the driver down as he was getting back into his truck.

"Excuse me sir, is this your regular delivery route?"

"No, why?"

"How did you find my house? I know this street is not in your map system."

"Oh, I live in this area. I know every place around here."

"Well, I've been having some problems getting a driver to come out and pick up a box that needs to be returned to Company X. Supposedly no one can come out because my address is not 'in the system.' UPS customer service has not been very helpful either. Do you know if there is anything I can do to get my address in the system?"

Long pause.

"Ok, I'm *really* not supposed to do this, but call this number, and tell them you need to get a new address input into the navigational mapping system. Try to sound like you know what you are talking about. If they question you, tell them you used to work here, or that you know someone who used to work here who gave you the number. I didn't give you this number, OK? Maybe wait a day or so to call too, so they won't trace it back to me."

Whoa. This must be an important number. Note to self - file this one away for safekeeping.

"Wow, thank you! This is very helpful. Have a great Christmas!"

I was a bit nervous about calling the number, given the apparent secrecy, but I did, and shortly after, someone FINALLY made it out to pick up the box so the curtains could be sent back to get the proper curtain rings sewn on - nearly three months after the call tags were originally issued. Thank goodness for the friendly UPS man who gave me the secret number, or I would still be cursing both UPS and Company X.

And without further ado, here are the curtains that finally arrived on Thursday:

All in all, I'm very pleased with the way they turned out. I adore this fabric, and the curtains and valences add a lot of character to the family room.

Fun, and not so fun

2006-01-05T14:26:00.000-08:00

Fun:

Claudia's Handpainted yarn in the Santa Fe colorway.

Claudia's is good stuff... very soft, and the way the colors stripe/pool is very agreeable to me. The darker blues and yellows sort of swirl and spiral around the lighter reddish/adobe colors. The photo doesn't really do it justice.

I've decided to stick with sock knitting until after the bar exam - they are quick, giving a sense of accomplishment (not getting any of that from studying... might as well get it from knitting), and it is easy to work just a few rows at a time during my study breaks.

Not so fun:

This is what I do in between my brief sock knitting breaks. Just so you know what you are looking at, there are about two dozen outlines, three (or four?) thousand multiple choice questions, and two hundred essay questions in these books that I have to read, memorize, practice, and study over the next six weeks or so. I should probably get to it!

A quick question - We are planning a trip to Vancouver after I take the bar. If anyone has been there and has hotel or activity recommendations, please let me know!

Irish Hiking Scarf

2005-12-29T16:30:00.000-08:00

I guess I was further along on the Irish Hiking Scarf than I thought I was. When I took it out today, I held it up, and it was close to 72" long (maybe a little longer). So, I bound off and wove in the ends. I decided not to block it because it is nice and soft and squishy right now - the cables really pop.

Specs:
Pattern - Modified Irish hiking scarf. I didn't do the garter stitch edging, and instead did a 3 stitch stockinette edge, slipping the first stitch on each row. It made a nice smooth edge, just what I wanted. Also, I started and ended the cables earlier, which gave sort of a wavy effect on the ends of the scarf (the ribbing look of the original pattern didn't quite do it for me).
Yarn - Louisa Harding Kashmir Aran in a pinky lavender color. Soft and pretty. The yarn is a joy to knit, but I'm a little confused by its construction. It isn't plied - it seems to be a single ply of yarn woven (crocheted with chain stitch?) in a fine tube (you can see close up pics of the yarn at the link above) It gives a little different look/feel to the finished product than using a plied yarn.
Needles - Lantern Moon Ebony straight needles, size 8. The first time I've used straight needles in months, and the first time I've used wooden needles (as opposed to bamboo). And, surprisingly, I enjoyed it. I may have to start collecting a set of lantern moon needles now.
Notes - A fast (considering my limited knitting time) and fun knit. Hopefully it will be well received.

KR Secret Pal Revealed - Part 2 (or, a very belated thank you!)

2005-12-28T21:15:00.000-08:00

This post is LONG overdue, as I opened the package over a week ago, but I have to say a great big, belated THANK YOU to the most awesome, generous, wonderful secret pal ever - Dani, of Yea, I Knit! As it turns out, Dani and I were each other's secret pals for the Knitter's Review bimonthly secret pal exchange! So, not only was Dani a gracious recipient of my gifts, she also did an amazing job of treating me to fun surprises every two months. Each package she sent was so thoughtful, I honestly could not have asked for a better secret pal.

My final reveal gift was amazing - two skeins of self-striping Lana Grossa sock yarn, one of wool in lovely shades of dark pinks and browns, and one of cotton (the same cotton as my stripey socks) in a fun sherbet colorway. As if that wasn't enough yarn, she also sent a bag (yes, an entire bag of 10 skeins, over 1000M!) of True Blue Cotton Denim Yarn in a cream color.

Um, Dani, when am I supposed to knit all of this up???

Also included in the package were some cute pins, two "C" notepads and a knitting themed notepad, a christmas decoration, some yummy scented soaps, and the coolest thing of all - Annie Modesitt's book "Knitting Millinery", which has patterns for 5 knit old-fashioned wire brimmed hats... very intriguing. That's one of the best things about secret pals - they send you fun things that you'd never have found on your own!

And, so concludes my secret pal experience. I had a lot of fun participating - both on the giving end and the receiving end - and am thrilled to have "met" Dani, an awesome gal whom I will likely remain friends with for a long time to come. In fact, my KR secret pal experience was so great, I think I'll conclude my participation in secret pal exchanges with that, and go out on a high note.

In other news, I haven't accomplished much knitting, and am still plugging away at the Irish Hiking scarf that is now a belated christmas gift for a good friend. Thankfully she's going through the same bar prep trauma that I am, so she understands my tardiness with her gift! I've been in classes most of the day on 8 out of the last 11 days, which is ironically more than I had class when I was in school. Homework takes up the majority of each evening, although I try to knit or read a chapter or two of a good book for a few minutes every night. (Carl Hiaasen is my favorite mindless, easy-read author of late - definitely check out Skinny Dip if you haven't already... it's hilarious!)

Done!

2005-12-15T00:11:00.000-08:00

WOOHOO! Happy Dance! No more law school for me! Now I just need to pack up the few things I have left in my rental place, and head for home. YAY!!! No more nasty commute. No more being away from home 5 days a week. No more forgetting which city my shoes are in. No more forgetting which city my knitting is in! No more hauling 50lbs of books around every day. And most importantly, no more spending 6-9pm every night of the week in classes. Yeah, I still have the bar to study for, which tempers the excitement a little, but at least I will be home, at last!

24 hours and counting...

2005-12-13T20:49:00.000-08:00

24 hours until I'm done with law school. Wow. I kind of thought that this day would never come. I'm guessing that tomorrow will be the longest day ever, which is good, because I need every second I can get to finish studying for my Criminal Procedure exam tomorrow night. :)

Answer to a Frieda question, and a random row counting tip

2005-12-09T23:05:00.000-08:00

Rebecca left a comment on one of my Frieda posts today asking a pattern question:

"I couldn't understand part of the instructions, would appreciate if you can help me out. On the back, after the ribs are knitted, when the increase starts, I can't quite figure out what the book means by 'Cont in st st, inc in this way at each end of 5 foll 6th rows', can you explain what the '5 foll 6th row' mean? thanks again. "

Since Blogger comments are lame and give me no way to contact my commenters (sorry commenters!), I thought I'd post a response and hope that Rebecca sees it.

These instructions were not exactly clear to me the first time I read them either. What it really means is increase every 6th row, for a total of five more increase rows. Note that this means five increase rows in addition to the first increase row you have already knit.

So, here's what you have:

Row 1: First increase row (Right Side) [this is the first increase row in the instructions]
Row 2: Purl straight (Wrong Side)
Row 3: Knit straight (RS)
Row 4: Purl straight (WS)
Row 5: Knit straight (RS)
Row 6: Purl straight (WS)
Row 7: Increase row (RS) [1 of 5 additional increase rows]
Rows 8-12: Knit straight on RS rows, Purl straight on WS rows
Row 13: Increase row (RS) [2 of 5 additional increase rows]
Rows 14-18: Knit straight on RS rows, Purl straight on WS rows
Row 19: Increase row (RS) [3 of 5 additional increase rows]

Continue in this way until you have completed all 5 additional increase rows for a total of six increase rows. Count your stitches to make sure you have the right number when you get to the end of the increase section!

Here's a trick I use to keep track of the number of rows between increases so that I'm not constantly counting to keep track of what row I'm on... On the second stitch (or any stitch will do) of each increase row, I wrap a spare piece of contrasting yarn around one of the stitches to mark the row. I do this by holding the yarn in front of my knitting, passing the yarn between the needles from front to back before the stitch I want to wrap, knitting the stitch, and bringing the yarn between the needles back to the front of the work before knitting the next stitch.

I don't have a camera to show how to do this, but you can see my handy method of row counting in this picture:

It's kind of hard to tell, but each zig-zag of the contrast yarn marks a 4 row repeat for my Tivoli decreases. This is a lot easier than having to actually find your increases/decreases and count all of your rows as you work!

Rebecca, if you read this, please let me know if it helped. And commenters - I'd be happy to e-mail responses to comments, but Blogger won't let me... so sorry! If you leave your e-mail address in the comment itself (not in the field in the comment form), I'll be able to respond to your comment personally.

Ode to procrastination

2005-12-08T14:58:00.000-08:00

Because I don't particularly feel like studying for my exam tomorrow, you get to read this...

TEN random things you might not know about me.
1. My name is Cyndi, not Cynthia or Cindy. (creative parents - gotta love 'em!)
2. I prefer even numbers. I'm pretty extreme about it. I don't know what I would do if I ever got a license plate number that was odd. I'd have to buy a new car. My house number is odd, but I took that into consideration when we bought the house and I've come to terms with it.
3. I eat my pancakes with butter (no syrup), french toast with maple syrup, and waffles with blueberry or strawberry syrup
4. I stink at trivial pursuit because I don't know anything about sports, history, or pop culture. The only pie piece I ever get is science/technology.
5. I played the lead role in my elementary school musical when I was in 4th grade. That is the only time I have ever sung in public. I think I only got the part because I had all the lines memorized before the auditions.
6. I love doing brainteasers and puzzles, especially ones that involve math or logic
7. I've eaten duck tongue (yuck) & frog legs (yum)
8. I've taken classes in Spanish (2 years), Russian (2 years), and Indonesian (1 semester), but sadly am not fluent in any of them
9. My first car was an orange 1980 Buick Century. My friends nicknamed it "the Pimpmobile." It was a great car. Ugly, though. When I graduated from college, my sister inherited it from me.
10. The first time I ever went in the ocean I got caught in a riptide and almost drowned off of Kuta Beach in Bali. I ended up over 1km from the shore and was rescued by two surfers from Indonesia and one surfer from Australia.

NINE places I’ve visited:
1. Indonesia (Sumatra, Java, Bali)
2. Malaysia
3. Singapore
4. Seoul, South Korea (and the DMZ)
5. Taipei, Taiwan
6. Tokyo, Japan
7. Hong Kong
8. Shenzhen, China
9. Israel

EIGHT Ways to Win My Heart:
1. Cook me dinner. And clean up afterward.
2. Compliment me
3. Take me shopping
4. Be patient with me
5. Sing me a silly song
6. Scratch my leg with your paw and look up at me with your big puppy dog eyes, begging to be petted. (yeah, you've got to be a dog for this one)
7. Remember my particular breakfast requirements
8. Chocolate. Or flowers. Or both. :)

SEVEN Things I Want to Do Before I Die:
1. Become fluent in another language
2. Learn to play the piano
3. Travel to Europe and Australia and around the US
4. Live on an acreage in the country
5. Learn how to use my camera properly (i.e. not in auto mode all the time!)
6. Learn to SCUBA dive
7. Compete in a triathlon

SIX Things I'm Afraid Of:
1. Failing
2. Spiders
3. Woodticks
4. Having surgery of any kind
5. Being pregnant/experiencing childbirth
6. Needles

FIVE Things I Don't like:
1. Bad drivers
2. My toenails
3. Going shopping for jeans
4. Living 12 feet from my next door neighbor
5. Being stressed all the time

FOUR Ways to Turn Me Off:
1. Don’t be accountable for your actions
2. Talk down to me/assume that I'm stupid because I'm a girl
3. Be lazy
4. Be irresponsible

THREE Things I do Everyday:
1. Straighten my hair
2. Check my e-mail
3. Count the months/weeks/days/hours/minutes until I'm done with school and can move back home (8 days!!!!!!)

TWO Things that make me happy:
1. Finishing something that I've set out to do
2. Cuddling with my husband and/or my dogs

ONE Thing on my mind right now:
1. Why the heck did I take a Family Law class this semester? What a dumb idea. What was I thinking? My final is in 27 hours. I have no idea how I'm going to pass. I should probably start studying.

Stressed

2005-12-05T23:48:00.000-08:00

Thank goodness for knitting. Once again finals are quickly approaching, and once again I'm in a foul mood. I stayed at work until after 10pm tonight to study and was super cranky when I finally got home. So I pulled out my knitting and worked on Irish Hiking Scarf v2.o (pinkish lavender Louisa Harding yarn - it's lovely, and very soft) while listening to some music. I spent about an hour and a half on it trying to relax (it helped a little), and now I need to get to bed, but for some reason I can't sleep. I can't stop thinking about finals, and I don't know why. I'm not super nervous about them this semester, it is just a royal pain in the rear to have them hanging over my head.

The more I think about finals, the more upset I get that I even have to take them. After all, I've been doing this law school thing for three and a half years now, and I'm pretty sure I get it. The odds that I'll do poorly on an exam are pretty slim (although, I shouldn't speak too soon, considering the limited number of times I've opened some of my books this semester). And even if I DO do poorly, I can get straight Cs or even a C- or two and still graduate in the top 10% of my class, which doesn't mean anything to anyone anyway. But they won't just give you bad grades if you ask (I did), you actually have to take the stinking exams to make sure you really deserve them. Grrr. What a waste of time.

What I really need is time to finish up a few loose ends at work, do some Christmas shopping, and take a mental vacation before I start studying for the real thing. You know, that silly little test that the former dean of Stanford law school who just happens to be one of the country's most renowned Constitutional law scholars failed. Granted, she admittedly didn't study, but still, how can the bar *not* admit her? Is there any concern at all that she is not competent to practice law in California? Because surely if she had been able to recite the Rule Against Perpetuities (or some other obscure and trivial point of law totally unrelated to her practice) she would be a better and more competent lawyer. Right. Things like this really make me doubt our entire legal system. Maybe someday I'll come back and read this post and decide to try to do something about it. There has to be a better way to administer both law school and the legal profession as a whole.

Anyway, that's enough of a rant for today. I know school will be over soon (10 days!!!!!!), I just have to suck it up and get it over with, and I can totally do that. Now, if I can just get some sleep...

Good news!

2005-12-02T17:01:00.000-08:00

I passed! Woohoo! Now, time to start studying for law school exams. The fun never ends around here.

Knitter's Review Secret Pals Revealed - Part 1

2005-12-01T10:06:00.000-08:00

Drumroll, please....

The person to whom I was fortunate enough to be a Knitter's Review bi-monthly secret pal was Dani (Yea, I Knit). Whoever matched us up initially did a great job, and I had a fabulous time being her pal. Go check out her blog, her fabulous knitting, and her yummy recipes (seriously, I made this bread - yum!!!). And if you stop by, wish her a happy birthday too!

Part 2 coming soon!

Oh, and please send prayers/positive vibes/happy thoughts/etc. my way tomorrow. I'll be spending the entire day taking the patent bar exam, and am quite nervous about it, to say the least.

Not feeling the love

2005-11-29T07:25:00.000-08:00

Knitting has not been going very well lately. I've been trying to knit a little every day (when I say a little, I mean like a few rows, just to relax), but I'm just not feeling the love for anything that's on my needles these days. I started a modified Irish Hiking scarf on Sunday night with some Cascade 220 from my stash (it's a very small stash, and this was the only aran weight yarn I had). I'm thinking 220 is not the best yarn for this scarf. It's knitting up a little stiff and scratchier than I'd like for something around my neck. It looks good though. Sigh.

Verdict: Rip it, buy some softer yarn, and knit myself a quick scarf. [hey there, you other Irish Hiking Scarf knitters - what yarn did you use? what would be a good soft yarn for this scarf?]

Oh, and is it just me, or does this pattern look VERY similar to these Gap scarves? I'm pretty sure the Irish Hiking Scarf came first. Hmmmm...

Then there are my Koigu socks. Ever since I got this yarn, I've been dying to knit some socks with it. So I started. And then restarted. And restarted again. And here's where I'm at. I'm just not feeling it with these either. This pattern doesn't show off the yarn very well, and I'm really not enjoying working with the Brittany birch needles. They're really too short and fiddly. I much prefer sock knitting with the long, metal Addi dpns that Lynette gave me a while back. Although I've been wanting to try Magic Loop for socks. I have a size 1 32" Addi circ... will 32" work for magic loop?

Verdict: Rip it, use my never-fail stockinette sock pattern.

And then there's this bag, the Gallery Bag from Bags, A Knitter's Dozen. I started this a while ago. I love the colors, enjoy the pattern, but knitting from three balls of yarn at once is driving me nutso. The twisty silk is making me a little crazy too. And I'm not sure that I'll love the bag when its done. It might be a little too hip for me.

Verdict: Keep knitting, if I don't love it I can gift it to someone whose style is better suited for the bag.

Finally, poor neglected Snowflake. This is the only one of the projects I love unconditionally, but also the one that overwhelms me the most right now. It isn't a super fast knit, but it is fairly easy, and I've memorized the pattern already. It's just that after I get the back done, I still have to knit the front, sleeves, and collar. This is just not going to happen until March.

Verdict: Love it, keeping it, probably not working on it for a while - or should I? After all, it's about the only thing in my life not making me crazy right now.

Baby blanket and baby hat

2005-11-19T08:42:00.000-08:00

Finally, the baby blanket is done! It turned out well, don't you think?

And, because I had a whole skein of Encore left over, I decided to make a coordinating hat.

Baby blanket review:
Yarn - Plymouth Encore, 4 skeins (800 yards), color 793
Pattern - My own
Highlights - My first design
Lowlights - Boy, was this boring! (but, good to work on while listening to study materials on the iPod)

Here's the pattern for anyone who is interested:

Baby's First Blocks Blanket
Cast on 150 stitches using size 9 needles and worsted weight yarn. Gauge is not critical.

Rows 1-10: Knit

Pattern 1:
Rows 11-24: K5, *K10, P10* Repeat to last five stitches, K5. (14 rows total for pattern 1)

Pattern 2:
Row 25: K5, *[P1,K1] five times, K10* Repeat to last five stitches, K5
Row 26: K5, *P10, [K1,P1] five times* Repeat to last five stitches, K5
Repeat rows 25 & 26 6 more times (14 rows total for pattern 2).

Repeat pattern 1 and pattern 2 each 6 more times. Blanket will be 14 blocks by 14 blocks.

Knit 10 more rows in garter stitch. Cast off.

**Edited to fix a minor mistake in the pattern**

Life, by the numbers

2005-11-16T07:26:00.000-08:00

2 - days of classes left in law school
6 - classes to attend total
3 - final exams before December 15
7 - rows left on the never-ending baby blanket (thanks to my trusty iPod, who played me some patent bar review materials while I knit.)
30 - days until I move home for good
15 - days until I take the patent bar
2 - big projects to finish at work before Thanksgiving
0 - number of hours I have studied for my law classes in the last two weeks
95 - approximate number of days until the bar exam
1 - girl who occassionally wonders why she started all of this in the first place

2 - times I've cast on for Koigu socks this week
2 - times I've ripped said socks
44 - number of stitches cast on size 1 needles for Crusoe socks, also number of stitches to cast on size 1 needles to make socks sized for a 5 year old

72 - number of stitches cast on for a ribbed sock instead of the Crusoe sock
64 - number of stitches I know is the right number to fit my foot
5 - number of DPNs in my hands when I fell asleep last night. ouch.
24 - hours of sales at Macy's in the next two days
0 - hours available to go shopping in the next three months
9 - number of items ordered from Gap.com during class last week
2 - number of items that Gap actually shipped to me because the rest were out of stock (inventory management, anyone?)
1 - friend who I taught some knitting basics after class last Tuesday and last night, and who is now working on her first sweater!

A little knitting

2005-11-07T08:13:00.000-08:00

This weekend, for the first time in two weeks, I had a chance to do a bit of knitting. I did 20 rows on the baby blanket, and started a purse from Bags: A Knitter's Dozen. Because, you know, I really need *another* project right now with all the other stuff I've got going on. I started it because what I really need right now is a quick project. Something I can finish and look at and say "hey, I actually finished something!" I'm hoping this purse is that project. I think it's about a third done after just a few hours of knitting, so the rest of it should go pretty quickly.

No knitting this week - I'm planning on some 12+ hour days in the office, plus school/studying. Ugh. Hopefully Friday comes soon... we are going to see Rob Thomas on Friday night. I love having things to look forward to when my week is otherwise looking miserable.

Have a great week!

So long, farewell...

2005-10-24T18:46:00.000-07:00

As it turns out, my knitting/blogging hiatus is going to begin a little sooner than I thought. I got a letter in the mail today saying that my application to take the patent bar exam has been approved. I'll be taking the exam in early December, before my finals and my state bar prep classes begin. No more knitting (or at least very limited knitting) for me for quite some time... must pass all of these exams, and the patent bar is a doozy.

The timing is very bad - I received my Dale order from Bea Ellis last Thursday (2 days after I placed the order... what fabulous service!), and I'm dying to start on Gerbera. And after looking through Dale #126, I found enough projects to keep me busy for years, provided the whole fair isle thing goes smoothly. Here's are some of the fabulous sweaters I'd love to make...

With that, a temporary goodbye... If you want to e-mail me, distractions are ~~welcome~~ invited. I can be reached at cyndilu2 at gmail dot you-know-what. I may post intermittently either to vent to you wonderfully supportive folks on the internets (likely), or if I actually finish a knitted item (less likely). No promises though. I'll be back in full knitting force in March!

Coolest ball winder EVER!

2005-10-21T13:42:00.000-07:00

A ball winder made from Lego blocks! How cool is that? Now, off to find some Legos...

Link found courtesy of Boing Boing, where craftiness meets geekiness on a fairly regular basis.

Next!

2005-10-19T06:02:00.000-07:00

Here's what's coming up next for me in the next few months of knitting:

1. Finish Snowflake
2. Finish the never-ending baby blanket (it would be finished in about 8 hours if I ever sat down and worked on it.) Baby blankets are just not exciting for me. Although, I am more than a little intrigued by this fascinating beauty of a blanket underway by Grumperina. I'm not ready to attempt this until I have endless hours of uninterrupted knitting time - this is clearly not something that should be undertaken when you can only manage to knit for a couple of hours a few days each week, which seems to be all the time I usually have. So, this is not going on my to-do list quite yet.

Those two projects ought to take me right up to Thanksgiving. And then, I think I am going to have to take a brief knitting (and blogging) hiatus. Maybe I'll only work on socks or something, because I don't think I can quit cold turkey. But I have to cut back significantly, because sometime in November, life is going to start kicking my butt for a few months. In December, I've got my last set of law school finals. I'm not super thrilled about the finals themselves, but there are not words to describe how happy I am to be done with law school. There are, however, words to describe how I feel about the next big exam that I have to take - the CA bar exam. Terrified. Completely freaked out. ~~Worried~~ Convinced that I will be one of the nearly 2/3 of exam takers who fail. So anyway, that's going to be fun. Everyone says to just follow the plan that the bar prep course lays out, and that's what I plan to do. Unfortunately, the prep courses don't allot for knitting time. Bummer. Just a heads up - you all may want to avoid me from mid-December until March, because I'm pretty sure that I'll be generally unpleasant and cranky.

Anyway, a lot of my projects will likely be on hold until I can start them in March... I'll be making the Sitcom Chic cardi for sure, and probably a few pairs of socks. I also want to try my hand at Fair Isle at some point next spring. I love the Dale Gerbera sweater - I'll definitely be making this one eventually.

There you have it - my upcoming projects, knitting and not. Sounds fun, eh?

Edited to add: It's a good thing I made this list and got to thinking about my future projects... turns out the Dale Sisik yarn for Gerbera is being discontinued! Bea Ellis has the yarn at 40% off. So, I ordered the yarn for the charcoal/pewter sweater, along with Book #126 for the pattern. Such a shame that this project will have to wait until next March. Sigh.

Pumpkins and Alpacas

2005-10-16T18:07:00.000-07:00

Wow - thanks so much for all of the overwhelming compliments on Frieda! I really appreciate all of your kind words!

What could make for a more fun Sunday afternoon than pumpkins and alpacas? We set out on Sunday afternoon on our annual pumpkin hunting expedition in search of the perfect carving pumpkins for Halloween. [yes, we are serious about our pumpkins around here.] We bypassed the Amador county pumpkin patch where we usually stop, and ended up here - at a pick-it-yourself pumpkin patch! It was quite an exciting find, considering we were just driving down a random road enjoying the scenery of the foothills when we saw the signs.

We had a great time wandering through the field in search of the perfect pumpkin.

And speaking of pumpkins - did you see the fall knitty surprise? I LOVE these cute little felted pumpkins!

I also saw my first fall foliage of the season at the pumpkin patch. I love fall!

After leaving the pumpkin patch, we could either turn right and go back the way we came, or turn left and take a more circuitous route home. Guess which one we chose? Yep - left! And a few miles down the road I saw a sign for an alpaca ranch as we drove by it. But, Todd made a quick u-turn, and we stopped and visited the friendly alpacas at Retiredice Alpacas. Paige, the owner, was super nice and gave us a most awesome and informative tour of the barn and pasture.

Here are just a few of the 40 alpacas that we saw:

Thre were quite a few female alpacas with babies. Aren't these two cute?

Paige even brought one of the babies over for us to see up close. So adorable!

And, after visiting the alpacas, I couldn't resist a trip to the gift shop to buy this lovely yarn. 280 yards of pure alpaca, from one of Paige's alpacas.

She didn't spin this herself (one of her friends spins it for her), but is learning to spin and weave. Is 280 yards enough to make a pair of knit gloves? What does one knit with 280 yards of alpaca? Maybe a cabled scarf? You know, because I need so many warm scarves for our frigid CA winters. Ha! Any other ideas? I can always call her up and get more yarn from this alpaca... hmmm....

After our wonderful day trip out to the country, I'm now trying to figure out how we can buy an acreage somewhere rural, raise alpacas, and have a big pumpkin patch and maybe a vineyard. Maybe someday.

Tomorrow I'll answer Jeanie's question - now that Frieda's over, what's up next?

PS - a shout out to my awesome secret pal (Knitter's Review SP) - she sent me a fabulous package with lots of fun halloween candy (pumpkin peeps - neato!), cookies and some glow-in-the dark vampire fangs. Any guesses as to why there are no pictures? :-)

Presenting... Frieda!

2005-10-16T17:27:00.000-07:00

Frieda, she is done! Well, nearly done. There are approximately 5,132 ends left to weave in. And I've already woven in about 254 ends. Seriously.

If it wasn't Sunday night already, I would take Nancy Wiseman's advice and sit down with a glass of wine and finish weaving in the ends. (that's the best knitting advice I've ever read in a book!)

I finally got around to finishing the seaming (2nd sleeve and both side seams) on Saturday afternoon. I can honestly say that I LOVE seaming! It is the neatest thing to see the pieces that you've knit come together as a sweater, and it goes so much faster than the actual knitting. If anyone has any seaming they need done, let me know... Will seam for yarn! :)

Anyway, here's the finished Frieda photos, with the loose ends strategically stuffed inside the sleeves and collar. I am beyond thrilled with this sweater. It turned out absolutely perfectly. Now, if the weather would just cooperate so I can actually wear it.

Here's a front view of the sweater -

And a side view showing the sleeve a little better -

Frieda Notes ---

Pattern:
Frieda, from the Debbie Bliss Alpaca Silk book, in the 36" size. The pattern was fairly well written. My only real complaint is the lack of schematics. It would have been nice to know all of the dimensions when blocking, but my guestimations worked fairly well.

Needles:
Size 6 and 8 Addi Turbos, 32" - Love 'em!

Yarn: Debbie Bliss Alpaca Silk in Rose. I bought one more skein than the pattern called for, and am very glad I did! I probably used 1/4 skein more than the pattern called for, most likely because of the pattern modifications that I did.

Pattern modifications:
I knit the cables into sleeves rather than attaching them later as called for in the pattern. Also, I did two fewer increases in the sleeves and added 8 rows (approx. 1") to each sleeve.

Highlights:
- My first sweater! (ok folks, I'm running out of firsts here... guess I'm moving beyond being a newbie knitter!)
- I learned how to cable, and attempted cabling without a cable needle. I ended up using a cable needle, because an 8 stitch wide cable is slightly unwieldy without a cable needle.
- Finishing - love it! Must knit more sweaters so I can put them together!
- Love the yarn, love the pattern, love the finished sweater - what more could I ask for?

Lowlights:
- Each ball of yarn only has about 70 yards of yarn on it. I knit through a ball of yarn in 1-2 hours. This made for lots of loose ends to weave in at the end (see above)
- The ribbed collar took forever and was by far the least fun part of the sweater to knit.

What I would do differently next time: Nothing, really. I'm very happy with this sweater! If I made another one, I'd probably try a different yarn - something a little less pricey.

A sleeve and a collar

2005-10-13T07:52:00.000-07:00

Pictures of my first ever set in sleeve!

The sleeve fit into the body perfectly, and seaming it was - dare I say - fun! Here's a close-up of the seam. Believe it or not, this is my first ever seam... the other tops and felted bags I've knit have been in the round with no seaming.

And I finally finished the not-so-fun part of Frieda - the 9.5" ribbed collar. After trying it on, I think I could have gotten away with knitting it slightly shorter, but it's fine at this length. I used the knit two/purl two sewn bindoff from the Vogue book (I think this is the same as a tubular bindoff, but not sure). I started out doing the bindoff a little loosely, so the back doesn't look quite as neat as the front. I was trying to make sure that the collar would fit over my head! :)

Tonight - setting in the second sleeve and sewing the side seams, hopefully.

Snowflake

2005-10-11T00:43:00.000-07:00

First things first - I'm already tired of calling this sweater "Rebecca Sweater With Embroidered Yoke", and the acronym "RSWEY" doesn't do much for me either. [all of the Rebecca sweaters have really long and mostly lame names... what's up with that?]

Therefore, I hereby declare this sweater "Snowflake"! Why Snowflake? Well, the embroidery on the front kind of looks like snowflakes. Never mind the fact that they have four points instead of six. Who's counting?!?

Now for the drama...

While Frieda was blocking last night I decided to start working on Snowflake. Now, this pattern is a German pattern (translated/written in English), and all of the measurements are in metric units. [Note: you can download the FREE pattern here.]

Metric to English conversions are not exactly rocket science (or is it?), and having taken a bizillion or so (ok, more like 6) advanced math classes in college and graduating with an engineering degree, I should be able to figure this metric stuff out, right? Not so much.

After a few hours of knitting, this is what I had... 20cm of ribbing, followed by nearly an entire repeat of the cable pattern stitch.

Here's a close up shot of the cable pattern. Starting it was a real pain, due to the carefully placed increases, but once I got going it was really fun and easily memorized. I have to thank Grumperina for the wonderful tutorial she posted on cabling without a cable needle - this is an AWESOME technique, and makes cabling super fast and easy. Head over and check it out when you get a chance... very clever!

After I got to this point, I set aside my knitting to watch Desperate Housewives - one of the few shows that I watch sans knitting. While I was watching TV, a thought occurred to me... 20cm IS NOT EQUAL TO FOUR INCHES, it is equal to EIGHT inches. I only knit four inches of ribbing before starting the cable pattern. Oy. Bonus points for you if you took a look at the picture above and said "that's NOT 20 cm!" I'm not sure if I wasn't thinking straight, or if I was just eager to put an end to the ribbing and get to work on the fun stuff. Either way - I was not happy to realize my conversion error... what was I thinking? From now on, I'm just going to start measuring and thinking in metric units when I'm working on a metric pattern!

I restrained myself from frogging and adding to the ribbing last night. I figured nothing good could come of it.

Tonight, I frogged. Ouch.

Then I finished knitting the ribbing. It really is 20cm long now. Check the measuring tape for yourself. :)

I'm on serious 2x2 ribbing overload right now between Frieda's collar and the bottom edge of Snowflake. But now I'm done with the back ribbing and can start on the fun stuff tomorrow. (cables - woohoo!)

Speaking of Frieda, I used a three needle bindoff to seam the shoulders today, and got about 3" of ribbing done on the collar. Only 6.5" to go. Argh. Incidentally - I'm using magic loop to knit the collar. It's my first time using magic loop, and it is a lot easier than I expected! I'll have to try it for socks sometime.

Mail Call

2005-10-10T07:22:00.000-07:00

The last week has been a miserable one for me - I've been sick since last Tuesday. Didn't work on Wednesday or Thursday, felt a little better on Friday, and then was down for the count pretty much all weekend. The upside is that I've been home for nearly a week now, which has been nice. And look what arrived in the mail for me last week...
A package from Germany! It's the GGH Davos I ordered from Rikes Wollmaus for the Rebecca Embroidered Yoke Sweater.

I couldn't find this yarn anywhere in the US - online or locally, so I decided to be brave and order from a foreign online retailer. Boy did I get lucky! This is a terrific place to order yarn that you can't find in the US. First of all, the yarn itself cost about 40% less than it would have cost to special order it from somewhere locally. When I e-mailed them to ask about the yarn and overseas shipping, they were very responsive and helpful. The only downside was shipping. I had the package shipped parcel post for about $10, and it took just over a month to arrive. I could have paid $26 for priority mail, but I couldn't justify paying half of the yarn cost in shipping.

Here's a closeup of the yarn. For lack of a better word, this yarn is very squishy. It's not the softest yarn I've ever used, and after knitting with the alpaca silk, it feels a little like knitting with twine (ok, so anything would feel like twine after knitting with alpaca silk - that's not really a fair comparison). But wow, this yarn is squishy. I started knitting the sweater, and already there is drama. I'll post pictures and an update after work today.
Finally, here's the current status of Frieda. She got blocked yesterday, and is now drying. Not sure when she'll be dry, but I'm excited to start putting her all together! Hopefully by next weekend I'll have finished my very first sweater.

Dog Days

2005-10-03T22:08:00.000-07:00

This weekend was all about the dogs. Saturday we spent the afternoon with them in the second of six dog training classes. They know the basics already, but we're working on consistency and socialization with other dogs. Sunday afternoon we had a doggy play date at the dog park with Sassy, a schipperke from class. Sassy had the dog park thing down pat - she had a great time running with the other dogs. Newton and Mac didn't quite get it though... Mac spent the afternoon running around getting love from the other dog owners, while Newton tried to avoid a pug/chihuaha mix that would not leave him alone, if you know what I mean.

With all of the doggie doings, I didn't have much time at all to knit on Frieda. I got a few more rows done on the first sleeve, but that's about it. I'm in no hurry to finish though, as the weather is still too warm for sweaters anyway. Hello, Mother Nature? It's October! Enough of this 85 degree stuff - bring on the cool weather!

On Saturday night, we went to see "A History of Violence." We chose the movie based solely on the preview (it looked decent), and the fact that Viggo and Ed Harris were in it. How bad can a movie starring Viggo and Ed be? Um, really, really bad. If you've seen the previews, you've seen all of the good parts of the movie. Everything they didn't include in the previews is truly awful. I have never seen so much graphic violence, gratuitous sex, and blatantly unnecessary product placement in one movie. The sad thing is that the movie could have been quite good - it had a lot of potential, and for the most part I enjoyed the first half of the movie. The second half went downhill quickly though - with enough blood and gore to make me cover my eyes half the time. And, there was an ENTIRE scene (a bar scene between the main character and a seedy mobster) that had to have been included in the movie soley for product placement: "After you finish up that beer, I'll take you over to Richie's in the Escalade." What?? In the Escalade? What does that have to do with anything? But, without this scene, there was no way the Escalade would have made it into the movie. Ah, gotta love commercialism!

On a brighter note, here's picture of the boys from March 2004 - aren't they cute?

House stuff

2005-10-02T11:08:00.000-07:00

For the last couple of months, I've been spending a good portion of every weekend trying to pick out paint for the dining room and fabric for curtains and other upholstery. Here's what we've got so far -

The dining room is no longer all beige! After painting more sample colors on the wall than I can count, I finally found one that we both agreed on. Todd did most of the painting, and it turned out great. A tip to anyone who wants a red wall - use a coat or two tinted primer before painting... it really helps!

Here's the dining room from another angle - you can see a pile of fabric swatches on the table... at some point we're going to order an upholstered cushion, pillows, and curtains for the window bench seat. I also want to find a nice piece of art to hang on the wall behind the table.

And last, but not least, we ordered curtains and valences for the kitchen and family room. So far we've only gotten the valence for the kitchen. I love this fabric! The hardware for the family room should be arriving soon, along with the curtains (same fabric, different style), but there was a mistake on the curtain order, so we'll have to return them and wait a few more weeks for curtains with the right rings. A little frustrating, but I'm just happy to finally have curtains arriving soon!

Edited to add a link to a close-up picture of the fabric (it's hard to get a good picture of a backlit window!). Also, the paint is close to a darker/deeper shade of true red. It is a custom mixed version of "Heirloom Red" from Lowe's (we had Kelley Moore mix a flat version for us, because we didn't want the satin/semi-gloss version from Lowe's).

Lessons

2005-09-29T23:07:00.000-07:00

It is a good thing you all gave me such good ideas for beginner projects - turns out 3 more of my friends from law school want to learn to knit. So, next Wednesday five of us are going to get together and I'm going to attempt to show three of them the basics of casting on and the knit stitch (keyword = attempt). I'm going to try to remember to bring some of my mid-size straight needles and some leftover cascade 220 with me next week so they don't have to go out and buy anything to get started.

Tonight was my weekly after class girl's night out, and eventually our conversation got around to knitting (thus the upcoming knit night). My friend who I mentioned before who is a beginning knitter asked me if I used "the turbo needles." Apparently she uses Addis and loves them. One of the non-knitters was a bit confused by the turbo needle reference, and said "whoa - I thought knitting was supposed to be relaxing - why would you want to use something called a 'turbo' needle - sounds a little intense!" Ha! It is much more intense when you're trying to scoot dozens of tight stitches across a bamboo (or otherwise high friction) needle. I'm guessing she'll understand after trying it out next week!

If you have any other tips for teaching people how to knit, please let me know! This will be a first for me.

Brief update

2005-09-28T22:52:00.000-07:00

Thanks for all of your wonderful compliments on Frieda - I can't wait to finish her up soon! I'll have another Frieda update after the weekend.

Not much new in knitting this week. I finished two more repeats of the long-overdue baby blanket, and am now officially half done. (note that the blanket is overdue, not the baby - the baby, at two months old, is well on his way to becoming a toddler already!)

[yawn] I'm super tired - drove up to San Francisco after work for a business dinner thing, and now I need to get some sleep... goodnight!

Frieda-licious!

2005-09-26T07:55:00.000-07:00

As promised, here are some pictures of Frieda. This weekend I managed to finish the front of the sweater. I also started on the first sleeve (not shown - I stayed up kind of late last night, and didn't take any pictures of it). I cannot believe how fast this sweater is knitting up! I'm guessing that I'll have both sleeves finished next weekend (and maybe the collar), and will plan to seam everything together the following weekend.

The front looks tiny compared to the back. But, the edges are rolled under a fair amount (on both pieces), and when gently stretched, it is the perfect size.

The back neck is rolling quite a bit - I didn't bind off because I'm going to use a 3-needle bindoff at the shoulder seams.

When I finished the front, I forgot about the 3-needle bindoff that I was planning, and accidentally bound off the shoulder stitches - oops! Luckily the bindoff will be easy to undo.

Check out these cables - I'm so amazed that *I* knit these!

I decided to knit the sleeves (not pictured) all in one piece, rather than following the pattern. The overwhelming consensus is that knitting the sleeves as directed will lead to a drafty sweater. For those of you who are working on Frieda (or will be shortly), here's how I'm knitting the sleeves:

Cast on 42 (per instructions)
Knit ribbing as directed
Row 1: Knit 14, Purl 2, Knit 10, Purl 2, Knit 14 (right side)
Row 2: Knit and purl stitches as they lie
Row 3: Knit 14, Purl 2, Slip 2 st to cable needle (hold behind knitting), Knit 4; from cable needle: K1, M1, K1, M1; Knit 4, P2, K14
Continue per pattern instructions. Cable follows sweater cable pattern, increases/decreases follow sleeve instructions. (don't forget to increase on both sides of the sleeve!) Don't knit the first stitch on the wrong side like the directions say - that stitch is on the edge that would be sewed to the cable, if you were sewing the cable in last.

Also, I discovered that I'm going to have to lengthen the sleeves. The pattern says the sleeves are only 17 3/4" long - for ALL sizes of this sweater. My arms are closer to 20" long! I'm not sure who wears a size M sweater and has arms that short - certainly not me! When I get to the knit even section of the pattern, I'm going to add a couple of inches before decreasing. I'll figure out the math for the exact number of rows when I get there!

Discovering the joy that is Cotton Ease

2005-09-25T17:45:00.000-07:00

Thanks to my Secret Pal, I finally get to knit with the famed and elusive Cotton Ease! Check out the latest package she sent me:

6 skeins of pretty blue Cotton Ease (one of the only CE colors that I think I would actually wear), some cute kniterly notecards, AND the best part - she sent the pattern for Knitty's Sitcom Chic, and the perfect amount of yarn to knit the sweater! I love Sitcom Chic - it is definitely my style of sweater. I'm picturing the sweater with a pair of black slacks and a white tank or camisole underneath. Cute!

This will be the next project on my list after I finish Frieda and the Rebecca sweater. I probably won't get to it until March, but it will be perfect springtime knitting.

I bet you're wondering where my pictures of Frieda are... well, I've gotten a lot of knitting done this weekend (not as much as I'd like, but still a decent amount), and have taken some pictures. I'll post them tomorrow.

The perfect second project?

2005-09-23T07:23:00.000-07:00

Last night after class, I got together with some of my girlfriends from school - one of whom was inspired to take up knitting after she saw me wearing "My So Called Scarf" to class last winter. She and I spent a few minutes talking about knitting, and she mentioned that all she knows how to knit right now is a rectangle, and she's tired of making scarves. Sounds like me about a year ago!

I'm going to look through all of my "beginner" knitting materials (books, etc) and see if there's anything that would be good to give to her to get her started on increases and decreases. I'd like to recommend an interesting (but straightforward) project to her so she can learn some other basic knitting skills.

My second project (after many scarves) was a ribbed hat from the Yarn Girl's Guide to Simple Knits, and my third project was the felted sheep tote. These were both good projects to learn new techniques, and weren't overwhelming to me.

What was your second project? Your third?

A brief history of me

2005-09-21T17:03:00.000-07:00

Tagged by Lynette:

TEN YEARS AGO: Sophomore year of college – took lots of fun classes like Statics, Calculus III, Physics II Electricity & Magnetism, Intro to Engineering, and Engineering Practices. Lived in the sorority house with a girl who was a good friend, but a bad roommate (and consequently, not so much of a good friend after a while). Worked two jobs: Subway sandwich artist and circulation desk assistant at the university library. Strangely, I don’t remember much of anything fun from 10 years ago – I was too busy either working or studying.

FIVE YEARS AGO: Newly married and a new homeowner. Worked as an applications engineer for the same company I'm with now, and traveled all over the world for work (Tawain, Japan, China, Israel). Started thinking that I didn’t want to be an engineer for the rest of my life. Had a cat (who I miss a lot), and really wanted to get a dog.

ONE YEAR AGO: Just coming off of my Kauai vacation high – the first “real” vacation that we’ve been on since we got married. [by “real vacation” I mean we actually got on an airplane together and flew somewhere other than to see family] Starting my third part-time year of law school and beginning to see a light at the end of the tunnel. I was a super newbie knitter, and soon would discover the wonders of the LYS and non-acrylic yarn.

FIVE SNACKS:
Anything chocolate
Sour cream & onion potato chips
Kettle Corn style popcorn at the local movie theater
Chips & salsa
Ben & Jerry's New York Super Fudge Chunk ice cream

FIVE SONGS I KNOW ALL THE WORDS TO:
Not sure there are any. I love music, but am NOT a singer (in public or private), and therefore rarely commit the words from songs I like to memory. The only songs I can think of lyrics for are “Manic Monday” by The Bangles and “I Think We’re Alone Now” by Tiffany – and I haven’t heard these songs for 15+ years. Embarrassing.

FIVE THINGS I WOULD DO WITH $100 MILLION:
Buy an acreage somewhere rural - in the mountains or near the ocean - and build a house.
Take a year long trip around the world
Invest
Start a business
Donate to charity

FIVE PLACES TO RUN AWAY TO:
Bali, Indonesia
Kauai, Hawaii
Aspen (or actually, anywhere in the Colorado Rockies)
Mendocino, California
Mt. Shasta/McCloud, California

FIVE THINGS I WOULD NEVER WEAR:
Midriff baring shirts
Leather pants
A poncho
Sweatpants in public (especially those hideous velour tracksuit-type outfits that are so popular now)
Blue eyeshadow/eyeliner

FIVE FAVORITE TV SHOWS:
24
Desperate Housewives
Survivor
Prison Break
Anything on HGTV

FIVE BIGGEST JOYS:
Todd
Newton & Mac
Achieving a goal that I’ve set for myself
Having time to myself to relax and do whatever I want – knit, read, nap, exercise, whatever.
Knowing that in three months I’ll be done with school and my crazy commuting life, and will actually get to live in and enjoy my house for the first time in three and a half years

FIVE FAVORITE TOYS:
my iPod(s)
my TSX (ok, it’s a car and not a toy – but it is so much fun to drive!)
the DVR (wish it was a Tivo though, but alas, Tivo can't record HD)
my long neglected sewing machine
my mountain bike (also much neglected)

I think I've seen this just about everywhere... Stephanie and Ruth, if you haven't done it yet, consider yourselves tagged! I'll also tag my SP5 pal, Susan, and the person to whom I was a pal, Gabrielle.

Quick update

2005-09-19T21:11:00.000-07:00

1. I remembered to bring my knitting to school/work with me this week - yay me! (that doesn't mean that I have time to knit, but somehow I'm comforted just having it here... you know, in case I get a free minute at some point)

2. I'm moving right along on Frieda - finished the back and worked the first cable repeat on the front over the weekend. I tried to cable without a cable needle, but it didn't work out very well with a 4 stitch wide cable (the cables are 12 stitches wide, with 4 stitches crossing over at a time). The stitches even seemed a little tight to knit off of the cable needle. The cables look good, but they feel awkward to knit. Any cable experts out there have cabling tips?

3. We finally picked a paint color for the dining room last weekend. I had a color custom mixed by Kelly Moore to get a flat finish in a color I picked out at Lowe's that was only available in satin finish. Next weekend: painting! (hopefully...)

4. I'm on call tomorrow in class. And I haven't read the assignment yet. And it is almost 9:30 pm. And I've been up since 4:45 AM. [yawn! I sure hope the cases are interesting!]

5. Fred (my iPod) has a new companion... Wilma - a Shuffle that I won from LexisNexis. Wilma was waiting for me when I got home from work last Friday. She will be great for taking on my runs when I have to do laps around the track and for when I go to the gym. I'm still lusting after a new nano, but how many iPods does a girl need?

That is all. Have a good week!

Oops, I did it again!

2005-09-12T23:16:00.000-07:00

I forgot my knitting bag at home this morning. For the second week in a row. I didn't realize it until it was too late to turn around and get it. Maybe someone is trying to send me a message that I should be studying more (or knitting less?).

The weekend in knitting

2005-09-11T21:57:00.000-07:00

I had a very knitty weekend this weekend (and amazingly did a lot of other things too!). Saturday morning I met up with Catilyn to knit. She was working on a beautiful purple short row scarf, and I managed to finish up the toe of my stripey socks.

Ta da!
And here are the socks being modeled - they fit really well! These socks are my own pattern - nothing special really... just cast on 64 stitches, knit an inch and a half of 1x1 ribbing, then knit the rest of the sock. The only thing that bugs me is that even though both socks are exactly the same size, one sock has a bit of green and white at the toe, and the other one is tan at the toe. Caitlyn pointed out that it won't matter, because my toes will be in shoes anyway... good point!
Friday night after I got home, I picked up my yarn for Frieda. I knit and blocked my swatch on Friday, and my gauge was right on, so I cast on for Frieda on Saturday afternoon. I've already knitted the back of the sweater up to the armhole shaping. I really haven't spent that much time knitting this weekend either - this project is going to go really fast!
A couple of notes on this project so far: First, I love this yarn. It is so soft, and gets a nice, fuzzy sheen after blocking. Second, I need to learn to follow directions. When I cast on, I thought "Hmmm, that's odd, the pattern says the first row is a right side row, but the back of the cast on is ugly for the right side - I'd better fix that." Yeah, not so much. Turns out for 2x2 ribbing, the back of the cast on looks much more finished. I ripped back about 6 rows and started over. When I finished the ribbing, I was so happy to be done that I just kept right on going in stockinette. With size 6 needles. Doh! I was supposed to switch to 8s. Time to rip back 6 more rows. On to the armhole shaping (not shown in the picture)... I miscounted and did one decrease too few. You guessed it... 6 more rows of ripping back. Now I've got 39 simple rows of stockinette to finish for the back. I'm leaving that until next weekend though. Frieda is going to be my weekend project from now on. (yes, it will be hard to leave her tomorrow!)

This afternoon, we cleaned out our closet and unpacked a few more boxes from our move a year and a half ago. In one of the boxes, we found 3 scarves that I knitted when I started knitting about two years ago. I'll have to take pictures of them and post them to share the horror with you. They are all knit from Lion Homespun in plain garter stitch. I must have knit 6 or 8 Homespun scarves during the first year I knit. Wow - has my taste in yarn changed! I'm not sure what to do with these scarves... I think I'll see if I can donate them somewhere.

A sad school story...

2005-09-08T21:51:00.000-07:00

Background: One of the classes I am taking this semester is Criminal Procedure. It's kind of an interesting class, but not an area of law that particularly fascinates me.

Sad story: Since I left my knitting at home this week (and I'm down at school - still kicking myself for not grabbing my knitting bag on Tuesday morning), I don't have any way to decompress after 4 hours of class in the evening. When I got home after class tonight (not home-home, but to the place I stay while I'm at school), I sat down to eat and turned on the Tivo. There was an episode of Law & Order on, so I decided to watch it. [this is only the THIRD episode of law & order that I've watched in my life... hard to believe, isn't it?] Anyway, at one point during the show, the detectives had a valid search warrant to search a woman's house and also to search a gray Mercedes that a parking attendant saw her driving the day of the crime. As it turned out, the car at the woman's home was actually a silver BMW - not the same kind of car specified on the warrant. One detective (older guy) wanted to search the car immediately anyway, and his partner (younger guy) was on the phone to get the judge to approve a search for the silver BMW instead of the gray Mercedes. I was practically shouting at the TV - "No, don't do the search without getting the warrant fixed - if you do, the evidence can't be used in the prosecution's case in chief under the exclusionary rule!" The detective on the phone was saying basically the same thing to the senior detective, and the response of the senior detective was: "So that's what they teach you when you go to law school at night?" HA!

Ok, my life is sad. Sad, sad, sad. The upside is that I am actually learning stuff. The downside is that I'm yelling at fictional characters on a fictional TV show trying to explain the exclusionary rule to them. This is not a good way to relax in the evening. I really must remember to bring my knitting next week!

Nothing new this week

2005-09-07T20:16:00.000-07:00

I've really got nothing knit-related to say this week... The only knitting I've done in the last week is a few more rounds on my stripey sock. I'm now at the toe, so should have them finished up by this weekend, and will post pictures then. I didn't make it to the LYS to pick up my Frieda yarn over the weekend, because I got the store hours confused. Oops! I'll be heading over there next weekend for sure!

We made slight painting progress over the weekend. The two green blobs are now gone, and now there is a pretty red blob instead. I think I'm getting close to finding the color for my wall, BUT this particular paint is only available in satin finish and not flat. The windows in the room reflect too much light off the wall to use a satin finish, so next weekend we'll be visiting a few more paint stores to find a similar color that comes in interior flat.

The post-holiday week started out somewhat badly for me, with a dentist appointment (two replacement fillings, ugh), a not-so-good really long drive to the south bay including a run-in with one of California's finest, and 4 hours of class. After yesterday, I really needed to sit and knit. BUT, I left my knitting at home on Tuesday morning, so no knitting until the weekend for me. Grrrr. I was thinking that it would be good to leave my knitting home so I could focus on school for the week, but I'm not going to be doing that again. Now, back to the books.

Bliss-ful

2005-09-01T18:12:00.000-07:00

Just got a message from the LYS... the Debbie Bliss Alpaca Silk I ordered several months ago to make Frieda came in today. Woohoo! Now I just have to find some time to go pick it up and start knitting my first sweater.

On a more somber note, please do what you can to help out the people who have been affected by the hurricane and subsequent tragedies - donate, pray, etc. A couple of knit bloggers have started a blog to facilitate donations from fellow knitters.

Decorating Madness (or, just plain madness)

2005-08-29T20:41:00.000-07:00

Once again, my weekend was filled with non-knitting adventures. At 9pm on Friday, I decided that one wall in the dining room needed to be painted. A different color than beige. Maybe green or red. Immediately. And since Friday night is the best time to go to Lowe's (really, it is - there's no one there!), we headed out to get some paint chips. 30 minutes and three dozen or so paint chips later, we were home choosing a color for the wall. 45 minutes later, I was back at Lowe's picking up a quart of paint to test on the wall. I painted a big dark green (Amazon Silt, actually) blob on the wall before going to bed. Amazon Silt was not the right color for the wall - it looked weird in anything but natural daylight. More sorting through paint chips on Saturday morning... off to buy another quart of paint, this time in Olive 5... more painting - green blob #2. While blob #2 dried, I went to an eye doctor appointment and decided to stop at the home fabric store on my way back - just to make sure that fabrics exist that will coordinate with one of the two green paint blobs on my wall. Three hours later, I'm still at the fabric store... there are NO fabrics that go well with the green (sorry, that's a lie... there are plenty of very ugly fabrics that will go with the green), but LOTS of pretty ones that go with various shades of red... Hmmm... I can't paint the wall green if there are no pretty green fabrics that go well with my other furniture. Guess we're going to go with red! But what shade of red? The fabric store lady recommended buying my fabric first and pick out a paint color later. Unfortunately fabric will take a long time to order and will cost $$$, and paint is quick & easy. For now, I'm stuck with a partly beige wall and two big ugly unmatching green blobs right behind my dining room table. Nice. Now I have to figure out what to do... repaint that same exciting beige color over the green blobs, or order an upholstered window seat cushion, curtain panels, and 5 or 6 throw pillows. Stay tuned...

On Saturday afternoon, I received my final package from my SP5 Secret Pal. Gabrielle was my pal, and she did a great job of spoiling me. As it turns out, Gabrielle is a student too, and she's also in her last semester of school - yay! Unfortunately I have no pictures (yes, I've been a slacker in the photo department lately), but she sent me a wonderful package of goodies. I got my first ever pretty stitch markers - usually I use the plain Clover brand pink & blue plastic ones. I can't wait to use the ones that she made me. They are a beautiful purple color, and there's a special dangly one to mark the beginning of the row. I can't wait to use them! She also included a pretty pink sparkly necklace and some tasty chocolates. And my favorite part of the package was the yarn... three (3!!!!) balls of Rowan Calmer in Drift (#460, a beautiful soft off-white color) in a pretty gold bag. My very first Rowan! How exciting! Thanks Gabrielle!

Now the dilemma... what to knit with the 3 balls of Calmer? I've been coveting Audrey for a while, but that would require 4 more balls of yarn, and I'm not sure that Drift is the right color for my Audrey. Plus, I've already got 2 sweaters in the queue (if I ever get my yarn... but that's a post for another day). I'm thinking a shrug might be the perfect project for this yarn - perhaps the Mia shrug?

Sunday was another fun-filled day. I gave up on the dining room on Saturday, and didn't want to think about it on Sunday, so we went to the state fair. The fair was fun, but would have been better if it weren't so darn hot outside. We saw a bunch of neat exhibits, including a few knitted items. I was surprised there weren't more knit things, and more crafty things in general. There was only one small building with quilts, knit & crochet, sewing, needlepoint, and other fiber/fabric arts displayed.

My favorite part of the fair is always the farm animals, and this year was no exception. I love seeing all of the animals, and could spend hours wandering the barns. This year, we saw goats (and baby goats!), cows and calves (one that was less than an hour old!), sheep and lambs, horses, pigs, and piglets. It made me want to move back to a farm so I can have my own animals. Someday...

Not much knitting

2005-08-22T20:12:00.000-07:00

Now that I'm back in school (have I mentioned yet that it is my last semester?!!!), I'm once again struggling to find time to knit. I'm still chugging away on stripey sock #2, with no exciting progress to report... imagine sock #1, knit up to the heel flap (sorry, that will have to do... no camera this week).

Saturday, I woke up, did my 3 mile jog/walk, and spent what seemed like forever reading my assignments for next week. I really despise that all of my professors this semester call on people randomly. I feel like I need to memorize the most minute and insignificant details of each case that I read so I won't look like an idiot in class. After studying (and taking a nap), Todd and I decided to go to a movie. We ended up seeing The 40 Year Old Virgin after debating between that and March of the Penguins. I was very wary about going to see it, but it was surprisingly funny. There were definitely some parts of the movie that were a little over the top, but it ended up being better (and funnier) than I expected.

On Sunday, I ran in the morning again, and then we headed to Marin to visit family. I got in a couple of hours of knitting on the sock during the drive. While we were there, my sister-in-law's neighbor was having a purse party... you know, where they sell knock-offs of name brand purses. I managed to find two really cute purses there. I feel a little weird having bought a "fake" purse though. Supposedly there is nothing illegal about it (at least that's what the little placard on the table said), but it doesn't seem quite right. I'm not the type to spend $800+ on a purse, and I really don't care what logo is on it - I just thought that the purses were really cute, and decent quality for about the same price as a department store's off-brand leather purse. Oh well, at least I got two cute purses!

Fit to Knit is here!

2005-08-20T10:49:00.000-07:00

FYI - I've launched the Fit to Knit blog. If you're interested in joining the group, please read this post, and send me an e-mail at cyndilu2 at gmail dotcom. (leaving a note in the comments won't work... I can't respond to my Blogger comments unless I have your e-mail address)

Fall sweaters

2005-08-17T20:25:00.000-07:00

It seems to be the time of year when everyone is finishing up their summer knitting (socks, lace) and picking out fall projects. I'm no exception. My fall knitting list is very short - there are only two must knit projects, both for me... Frieda from Debbie Bliss's Alpaca Silk book, and the Rebecca Embroidered Yoke sweater, which is a FREE (!!!) pattern from the latest issue of Rebecca. [BIG thanks to Stephanie for finding the pattern!]

Both of these sweaters have been on my mind since March, but I wanted to wait until fall to knit them. Now that it is time to start, I have both patterns, but no yarn... and it appears I will not have yarn anytime soon. I've ordered the yarn for Frieda, but apparently there is a shortage of pink Alpaca Silk, and I'm not sure when I'll get it. And I can't find the yarn for the Rebecca sweater anywhere... the pattern calls for GGH Davos, which I want to use. But apparently there are no yarn stores in CA that carry Davos. And I've only found it online in one place. Has anyone used Davos before? Where do you buy it? Should I try to find a substitute?

Thanks everyone for your encouragement on my running program! I went for my second run (well, jog/walk!) tonight, and it was great. Tonight on my run I was thinking about those of you who've expressed an interest in starting your own running program... what would you think about starting a knitting runner's group blog - sort of like a knit along? Blogger makes it really easy to post to a group blog, and it would be a great way for all of us to track our progress and encourage each other. We could call it "Fit to Knit" or something equally cheesy. :) Let me know what you think.

Finally, to Angela who left me a comment - I can't e-mail you because Blogger doesn't let me respond to comments by e-mail. (grrr!) Are you the Angela I met at SnB at the Naked Lounge in July (when I was knitting Tivoli)? Just checking!

Off to read my assignments for class tomorrow... bleh.

A new project

2005-08-15T22:13:00.000-07:00

Today I started a new project of sorts. I began a running program.

I've never been terribly athletic, but I decided to try running about two years ago. After a few months of running consistently, I worked my way up to a 5k. I was thrilled that I could actually run that far, and was in fairly good shape because of it. Then life got in the way, and I stopped running and working out in general. I've been feeling a little down about myself lately (how do my clothes continue to shrink while just hanging in the closet?), so I decided that the best solution would be to start running again. So, today was the day. After work I went to my favorite park trail and started my training. And it felt really good! There's something about running outside that really clears my head.

This isn't going to turn into a running blog by any means, but I do plan to post updates here occassionally, mostly just to keep myself honest and accountable.

Nothing new on the knitting front - just a few more rows of the sock. And guess what? ...it looks the same as the first sock!

"Well, if your foot was more like the Wicked Witch of the West's foot..."

2005-08-14T15:34:00.000-07:00

"...or, maybe if you had one great big pointy middle toe. But seriously, isn't there some way you can make the toe look less pointy? What if you ended it a few rows earlier?"

That's what Todd said after analyzing my completed stripey sock. And I have to say, I agree with him. I'm not a huge fan of the toe on this sock, and I even ended the toe with more stitches on my needles than most patterns recommend. Is this the way all top-down sock toes look?

It looks a lot better from the side.

And it actually fits my non-pointy foot. Overall I'm really happy with this sock. I started the second sock on Saturday, while knitting with Lynette, Lori, Violet, and Kaedean at FrogPond. I haven't made much progress on the second sock yet, I was too worried about getting the stripes to match up exactly. I think that Lynette & Lori thought I was crazy for casting on twice to make sure I had the same amount of tan in the top stripes of both socks, but I had to do it. I am such a perfectionist when it comes to my knitting. (and guess what Todd said when I showed him the second sock that I started... "are you sure the stripes going to match?" How funny! We think so much alike!)

While knitting, Lori told us about a sale at another local knitting store - 40% off all yarn! It's not a store I've shopped at for a while (the selection there is always iffy), but it is only a few blocks away from my house, so I stopped by on my way home from FrogPond to check out the sale. Guess what I found? A single skein of Celtic Green Cascade 220! Just what I needed to finish Sophie:

Here's a picture of Sophie with the sock for scale. It never fails to amaze me how much felting shrinks knitting. The finished bag is probably 1/4 to 1/3 the size of the original knitted bag. Now I have to find a magnetic snap to sew in, and I may put a lining in the bag eventually too.

At the 40% off sale, I couldn't resist buying a few more skeins of yarn. I found two self-striping skeins of Opal that I can't wait to get started on. (have I mentioned that I'm addicted to self-striping sock yarns?) I also found a single, lone skein of Cherry Tree Hill supersock in the Birches colorway (front right). At 40% off, it was actually reasonably priced. And I bought 4 more skeins of Cascade 220, two in a red color with blue-ish flecks, and two in a coordinating blue color - destined to become a felted bag of my own design.

And now, a confession: I wanted to buy more yarn at the sale, but I couldn't. I am not physically capable of buying yarn simply to add to my (nearly non-existent) yarn stash. I found a single skein of Manos in solid black, and at 40% off, it would have been a steal, but I couldn't buy it - what would I knit with it? 3 skeins of Rowan Wool Cotton in blue - another bargain, same story... what to knit? It would be tragic for me to own yarn with no purpose - it makes me very uneasy. The only yarn that I'm comfortable buying freely is sock yarn. This will always become socks, and a sock will always use the same, predetermined amount of sock yarn. Other projects aren't as easy to estimate. When I get yarn from a secret pal, I almost immediately have to find a project for the yarn, even if I don't knit the project immediately. All of my yarn is slated for projects. Is this weird? Does anyone else treat yarn like this?

If you are completely comfortable freely adding yarn to your stash, and you live in the Sacramento area, you should definitely hit this sale - a wide variety of yarn (most in limited quantities - tons of Cascade 220 though!) at great prices. The lady at the store said the sale would be going on for about two more weeks.

One sock down...

2005-08-10T23:23:00.000-07:00

My first stripey sock is done! And it fits! But I have no pictures yet, so this is a pretty anticlimatic post. Sorry about that. I'll have to take some pictures when I'm home this weekend. This sock was my first attempt at Kitchner stitch, and as would be my luck I happened to be on the green/white variegated section of yarn at the toe. It's really hard to do kitchner with multi-colored yarn because it's hard to see where the yarn is going. The toe turned out OK (I think!), but I'm not sure that I did the toe grafting quite right. It might be right, but it's hard to tell with the color variations. Maybe the next sock will be better. I should probably try kitchner on a swatch with larger gauge, using solid color yarn so I can see what I'm doing and actually understand how it works.

I got the cutest e-card from my SP5 secret pal tonight - it had a picture of a miniature schnauzer on it, and he looked just like my dog, Newton! So cute! Thanks Secret Pal! Just for fun, here's a picture of my dogs from two years ago, when Mac was a puppy.

Speaking of secret pals, I need to put together my last SP5 package and get it sent off by the end of the month... hmmm... I don't have a plan for this package yet, but I have a few ideas. Time to go shopping!

Books vs. Yarn

2005-08-09T22:26:00.000-07:00

School starts on Monday, so I bought my books yesterday... I'm planning to read all of my assignments this semester. Really. For $455, I'd better do a lot of reading! And that's for only three classes! Just think of all the yarn I could buy with $455... sigh.

I'm actually kind of excited to start school this semester, because it is my LAST semester! And, I only have classes on Tuesday and Thursday evenings from 4-9pm, which leaves Wednesday nights free to go Commuknity and knit. And, did I mention, it is my last semester!!! [can you tell that I'm excited to be done?]

Not much news on the knitting front - just a few more stripes completed on the socks. I should be able to start the toe tomorrow, and maybe even get it done. I discovered that I need to invest in a smaller crochet hook - my smallest is too big to use with sock yarn, and I had a terrible time trying to fix a dropped stitch. I ended up dropping a dozen stitches down 5 or 6 rows and reknitting them on smaller dpns. Luckily it worked, or I would have had quite a mess on my hands!

Stripey Sock

2005-08-08T08:48:00.000-07:00

This weekend was a fairly productive knitting weekend for me. On Saturday, I went to the Folsom knitting group, and had a great time knitting with Lynette and the other knitters who were there. I worked on my boring baby blanket for a couple of hours there, and managed to finish another repeat. Only 8 more repeats to go. Ugh!

Speaking of Lynette, here's what I started knitting on Saturday night with the lovely sock yarn she gave me from her trip to Germany:

I think I have a new addiction - self-striping sock yarn! I could not put this sock down after I started it. Well, I take that back... after the third time I started it I couldn't put it down. The first two times, I attempted to knit a toe-up sock using the method described in Simple Socks. The book got rave reviews on Amazon, but for some reason, I just didn't get it. I think it is because there are not nearly enough photos (none!) or drawings (very few, with little accompanying descriptive text). After two unsuccessful attempts, I put away the book. I'm a little upset about it, because I can usually figure out just about anything from a book - that's how I learned nearly everything I know about knitting. And I feel like I understand the fundamentals of sock knitting too. I should be able to follow the instructions in this book, but that's not the case. I'll have to try again another time.

I couldn't find another sock pattern that I liked, so I decided to make up my own pattern instead. This is actually a modified version of the ribbed sock pattern from the Vogue Socks 2 book. Well, I'm really only using the heel & gusset from that pattern. I just figured out my gauge (7.5 st/in), calculated the number of stitches to fit the circumference of my foot (64), and started knitting. It seems to fit so far!

Lynette also gave me the needles that I'm using: 2.5mm Addi metal dpns, 20cm long (nearly 8"!). At first I was wary about using such long dpns, but I actually prefer them to shorter ones. These are long enough so that the ends of the needles aren't constantly poking my hands while I try to knit. I love them! The stitches slide so nicely compared to the bamboo dpns I've used before. Does anyone sell these in the US?

My favorite thing about these socks so far - the 1x1 rib cuff! Check out this cuff - the ribbing is 1x1 perfection. All of the ribs are straight, with even stitches and no awkward looking stitches anywhere.

Look at the last sock I used 1x1 ribbing on... see how uneven the stitches are compared to the striped sock? It is hard to tell in the picture, but trust me - it's bad! The ribbing on the sock on the left frustrated me so much that I didn't even finish the sock, because I knew I wouldn't wear something that I wasn't happy with. But now I've mastered 1x1 ribbing! Woohoo!

Want to know my secret? It's a little trick I picked up from Nona. When knitting ribbing, on the first purl stitch after a knit stitch, always wrap the yarn the opposite way you usually would. If you always wrap your yarn counterclockwise, then you should wrap the first purl stitch after a knit stitch clockwise, or vice-versa. This will mount the stitch on your needle backwards, so on the next round, you will have to purl (or knit) the stitch through the back loop, or else you will get a twisted stitch.

So, for my sock with 1x1 ribbing knit in the round, I did this:
Row 1: *K1 (wrap counterclockwise like normal), P1 (wrap clockwise)* repeat to end of row.
Row 2 and on: *K1 (wrap counterclockwise like normal), P1TBL (wrap clockwise)* repeat to end of row.

For wider ribbing, the only purl stitch that you would need to wrap the opposite way is the one immediately following the last knit stitch. This is also the only one that you will have to purl through the back loop on subsequent rows.

Vacation Pictures

2005-08-07T09:16:00.000-07:00

What I knit (almost!) on my vacation:

I was able to buy more of the Lorna's Laces and finished the Clapotis. It turned out really well. It's going to be my office wrap for when the AC is too cold! I haven't found the right dye lot of the Cascade 220 to finish Sophie yet. :(

Here's a close-up of the Clapotis. This yarn is the most wonderful yarn I've ever knit. If I could only knit one yarn forever, this would be it. It is so soft - like heaven on a skein!

Here's a picture of me with two of my sisters.

Here is me (pink dress) with all of my siblings - yes, there are 7 of us! It was really fun to see them all again.

The wedding - I can't believe my little brother got married!

My favorite thing about being home - no traffic! Except the farm machinery. :) This guy probably thought I was nuts taking his picture while driving down the road.

Sunset at the lake near Todd's parent's house.

Fields of corn.

One of the neatest things I saw on my vacation was this beautiful crocheted bedspread made by my mother-in-law's grandmother. It was probably made in the early 1900s sometime. It appears to be made up of hundreds of small crocheted hexagons sewn together to give the appearance of flowers. Does anyone have any idea where I could find a similar pattern? I'm not sure I'm up to undertaking a project like this right now, but I think it would be really neat to do someday.

The Un-Vacation

2005-08-04T13:28:00.000-07:00

I'm back from vacation... or, at least I'm back to my regularly scheduled life. I'm not so sure I'd call the last two weeks a vacation, as it was just about the most exhausting two weeks I've had in a long time. We spent a week visiting my family in northeastern North Dakota, then drove to northwestern Iowa to spend a week with Todd's family. It was our first trip back home to visit our families in four years, so we had lots of people to see, places to go, and things to do. We went to my brother's wedding (very nice), met a niece and nephew that we hadn't met before (both adorable), visited with old friends from high school, and drove everywhere from Grand Forks to Des Moines to see aunts, uncles, parents, grandparents, brothers, sisters, cousins, etc.

All in all, it was a good trip. Part of me wanted to stay there, where life is much simpler, traffic is quite pleasant, and houses are actually affordable. But, now it's back to reality. Bleh!

I managed to finish Harry Potter on the trip, and I did a lot of knitting too. I knit 95% of a Clapotis scarf/shawl (wasn't planning to make one of those, but after seeing the beautiful one that Violet was working on for a Frog Pond Knits store sample, I decided that it would be a perfect travel knitting project) and 95% of a Sophie felted bag.

95%!?!?!? On two projects? What's up with that? Are there just to many fabulously exciting things going on in the midwest to distract me from the last few rows of my knitting? Nope... I ran out of yarn - ON BOTH PROJECTS! That made me VERY cranky.

I kind of expected to run out on Sophie, because I went up one needle size to an 11 instead of a 10.5. I deliberately chose the 11s because I like the way Cascade 220 felts when knit more loosely. And, it was really close - I only need to knit 4 more rows, plus the i-cord handles. Not really a big deal to buy more yarn for this bag, since I can always use a nearly-whole skein of 220 to make something felted.

I am pretty dang peeved about running out of yarn for the Clapotis, though. I used the yarn called for in the pattern (Lorna's Laces Lion & Lamb - this is fabulous, luxurious yarn!), with the correct gauge called for by the pattern (and coincidentally the same needle size), and ran out with THREE pattern repeats left +5 rows - 41 whole rows!! What the heck happened to all of my yarn? Why did I run out on this? I have no idea. But now I have to go buy an entire skein of L&L for about 20 or 30 yards of yarn. Grrrr. And I have no idea what to do with the rest of the skein... I guess I'll just have to make a gift scarf with it. At least I love knitting with the L&L. [After doing a Google search, I see I'm not the only knitter who ran out of L&L on Clapotis - why hasn't this pattern been updated to reflect the actual amount of yarn used?]

Does anyone happen to have a partial skein of either Cascade 220 Celtic Green (color no. 9410, lot 8198) or Lorna's Laces Lion & Lamb Lakeview (color no. 504, lot 7896) that they'd like to sell or trade? Otherwise, I'll just have to head back to the yarn store to buy another skein of each.

This post is getting longer than I'd planned, but I have to thank Lynette for the lovely package she sent me. She sent me some beautiful sock yarn in pretty fall shades, a set of 2.5mm dpns, and some chocolates - all from her recent vacation to Europe, for getting the correct answers in her contest. Thanks Lynette! I haven't used needles that small before, and am looking forward to trying them with the yarn you sent!

I've got lots of pictures to share, but those will have to wait until tomorrow.

Two more days...

2005-07-20T07:39:00.000-07:00

Until vacation! Woohoo! Of course, that means that this week has been twice as busy as usual, trying to get everything taken care of at work and finishing up my final papers for school (one of which is in a very sad state right now). This all adds up to very long hours of work and no time at all for things like knitting, so I have no knitting progress to report.

I do have a knitting question for you though - what project(s) are good for travel?

I'd love to take my leaf lace, but I fear that I'd end up messing it up completely unless I can give it 100% of my attention. That's not going to happen on a plane, in a car, or when I'm around any one of the dozens of family members that we will be visiting over the next two weeks. It may be best to leave the lace at home.

Socks might be good, but DPNs are kind of fiddly to work with. This may be a good time to invest in the magic loop book! And, I have lots and lots of sock yarn that needs to be knit into socks.

Any other thoughts?

I probably won't be posting again until I get back... until then, happy knitting!

A little bit of everything

2005-07-17T10:55:00.000-07:00

There's lots of stuff I've been meaning to post about lately, just haven't had the time (see yesterday's to do list... note that working on the leaf lace shawl was NOT anywhere on my to do list!!)

First of all, a big thank you to my SP5 secret pal! I got a wonderful package in the mail from her...
A pretty pink Lantern Moon bag, a pink sparkly coin purse, chocolate flavored lip balm (yum!) and a skein of Koigu KPPM in beautiful shades of purple! Thanks Secret Pal! I think I'm going to find a coordinating skein of purple sock yarn and make some socks with lighter or darker purple toes and heels and use the variegated KPPM yarn for the foot of the sock.

I've also been plugging away at the baby blanket... here's a picture of where I'm at with it. The color is kind of washed out, but it is a nice light baby blue color. It is a fast knit on size 9s, but I'm just not motivated to work on it since it has been so hot here (105+ degrees).

Since I haven't been wanting to work on the heavy, warm baby blanket, I decided to start the lace leaf shawl instead. I'm using Skacel Merino Lace yarn. Knitting with the merino lace is like knitting with thread! This is my first foray into laceweight yarn, and although it was hard to get used to, I think I'm figuring out how to deal with it. I do have a little trouble getting the yarn over the needle joins... too bad the join isn't more like the Addis. But there is NO way I could use Addis on this project... I'd have stitches sliding off the needles all over the place!

So far I have the first chart plus 1 of 18 repeats of the second chart completed. The ball of yarn in the picture looks pretty small, but that is 1375 yards (!!!) of yarn. Enough for the entire shawl and then some.

Here's a close-up... The pattern doesn't show up very well right now. I'm sure that blocking will work wonders for this project.

Not sure when I'll get to reading Harry Potter... probably not until next weekend. I'm dying to read it, but I know if I pick it up, I won't put it down until I'm done - not a good thing when I've got a ton of school work, work work, and house work to do.

Have a good week!

Completed Tivoli

2005-07-17T10:43:00.000-07:00

Here it is!

About:
Pattern: Tivoli by Grumperina, 36" size
Yarn: Katia Pisco
Needles: Clover Bamboo circular, size 5

Highlights:
- Superfast knitting! It took me just over a week from start to finish.
- Neat, well-written top down pattern
- Able to use yarn from my stash

Lowlights:
- Not sure I chose the best yarn for the project. I have a love/hate relationship with the Katia Pisco... it knits up into a nice fabric, but on size 5 needles the fabric is fairly bulky and firm. I think I would be happier with a fabric that had more drape.
- Slight rolling at the hem, even after blocking. I don't mind it - it just gives the top a more casual look.

Tips/Tricks:
This is a really versatile pattern. I adjusted the decreases/increases (more of them, more frequently to make the fit better. I'm happy with the way the sizing turned out.

What I would do differently next time: Use a different yarn.

A dilemma...

2005-07-16T13:12:00.000-07:00

Things to do today: (in no particular order)
1. Write final patent for patent prosecution class, due by Thursday
2. Write final paper for international IP treaties class, due by Thursday
3. Read Harry Potter book (delivered by mail a few minutes ago!!)
4. Post pictures of finished Tivoli & baby blanket progress
5. Work on baby blanket

What I have done so far today:
1. Get a facial
2. Finished first chart (30 rows) of leaf lace shawl

Anyone see a problem here? Yikes!

Big boring baby blanket

2005-07-13T23:01:00.000-07:00

That's what I've been working on this week... that is, when I get a few minutes in the evening to sit down and knit a few rows. I really need to get the blanket done soon, because knitting a baby blanket is not terribly interesting. And, this is the 2nd light blue project in a row for me - too much blue! I'm dying to start in on the green laceweight yarn that I bought to start the lace leaf shawl so I can try out my new Bryspuns. Not until I finish this blanket though!

I made up my own pattern for the blanket, based on a stitch pattern from the Big Book of Knitting Stitch Patterns. It is looking pretty good so far - it is a simple block pattern of alternating stockinette, reverse stockinette, and seed stitch blocks with a garter stitch border. I'll post pictures when I have more time, and plan to make the pattern available here as soon as I finish knitting it.

Happy knitting!

Tivoli done, but no pictures

2005-07-11T19:01:00.000-07:00

I finished and blocked Tivoli yesterday, but no pictures today... I got up too darn early this morning, and completely forgot to check and see if it was dry before I left for work. I'll have to post pictures and my project summary for Tivoli when I go home later this week. I'm very happy with the way it turned out.

Even though I am dying to start a new project, I'm going to finish the baby blanket that I started a while ago. The friend I was knitting it for had her baby yesterday, so I'm a bit behind schedule on the gift. Better get busy on that!

My commute this morning was hellish (nothing new there), and I have to rant briefly (or not so briefly) about crazy bad drivers. What is up with people who insist on multitasking while driving? This morning I spent nearly 30 minutes in heavy traffic (10-55 MPH, bumper to bumper in 5 lanes) behind a woman who was applying her makeup (all of it - foundation, powder, blush, eyeshadow/liner, eyelash curling (!!!), mascara, etc) and fixing her hair, while looking into a rearview mirror that was adjusted so that she could see herself (nevermind about needing to see traffic around you!). It wasn't like we were just sitting on the road stopped either - traffic was moving, albeit slowly at times. I don't get it. Clearly this woman has never taken a physics class, or she would realize that her makeup tool of choice would end up in her eyeball or another equally undesirable place if she were to, say, rear-end someone!

OK, end of rant. Whew. Just had to get that off my chest. Tell me - what is the craziest thing you've seen someone doing while driving? I once saw a man driving down the expressway while eating from a chinese takout box with chopsticks!

Yarn store heaven!

2005-07-09T16:50:00.000-07:00

While running errands today I stopped by Violet's new store, Frog Pond Knits, which opened yesterday. Look what I happened across... Bryspun circular needles!

Woohoo! Just last weekend I called every knitting store in the Sacramento area to try to find these, with no luck. I bought the 29" length in sizes 5-9, which I figured are probably the most common sizes for lace knitting. I also bought the Fiber Trends Leaf Lace Shawl pattern and some laceweight yarn to knit it. Not sure when I'll get started on that, but knowing myself and my lack of restraint when it comes to yarn and new projects, it will probably be soon!

I'm nearing completion of Tivoli... only about 5 rounds left to knit. I'll finish and block it tonight and try to post some pictures tomorrow. What a fast, fun project!

I took some pictures of various flowers and bees in my garden yesterday and put them up on Flikr. Click the picture for a slideshow.

And the winner of the idiot contest is...

2005-07-05T18:47:00.000-07:00

Me! Yep, I'm an idiot. Why, you ask? Well, I got up at 4:45am this morning to go to work. When I drove into the parking lot at the office, I noticed that there were only a handful of cars there. I thought that was a little odd, considering there are usually dozens cars in the lot and it's almost impossible to find a parking space most days. So, I looked at my trusty badge calendar attachment, and noticed that today, Tuesday, July 5th is a COMPANY HOLIDAY! Yes, that's right, a holiday! I got up at 4:45 to drive two and a half hours to work on a day that I didn't even have to work. Since I had plenty to do (and then some), I spent the day at work anyway, and ended up getting quite a lot done. I'm pretty bummed about it though - with a little advance knowledge and some planning, I could have stayed home today and spent some quality time with yarn and my dogs and my husband. Grrr. Guess I should look at the calendar more often!

Over the weekend, I managed to get through about half of the Tivoli decreases.

I'm modifying the decrease/increase portion of the pattern slightly, to compensate for my row gauge being slightly larger than the pattern calls for, and also to make the waist slightly smaller. I'm using the 36" pattern, which is written for a 33" waist, but I'm shooting for a 30-31" waist so it fits me better, and so I don't end up looking preggers.

In case you're wondering, the dark blue yarn on the lower left of the shirt is my version of a row counter. I wind a spare piece of contrasting yarn around a stitch on every decrease row so I can easily count the number of rows between decrease rows (3) and how many decreases I have total (3 so far).

Fit to be Dyed

2005-07-03T11:59:00.000-07:00

I present to you: A kool-aid yarn dyeing photo tutorial. Special thanks to my secret pal for providing the yarn!

To start my dyeing project, I headed to Google to find some information on using kool aid to dye yarn. I found good articles on Knitters Review and Knitty, but neither covered exactly what I wanted to do... make a self striping yarn. So, I took the instructions and modified them slightly to (hopefully) accomplish what I wanted in the least messy way possible.

In order to get my yarn in long enough lengths to dye large sections at a time, I wound it around the backs of two chairs placed about 7-8 feet apart. I then used small pieces of yarn to loosely tie the wound yarn together in about 6 places (approximately every 2-3 feet). Be sure to tie loosely, or you'll end up with a tye-dyed effect when you dye the yarn because the dye won't absorb evenly under the ties (ask me how I know). Using the ties is critical, or you'll end up with a tangled mess of yarn. After tying off the yarn, I soaked it in warm water for about a half hour.

Here's a picture of the Kool-Aid flavors I bought: Cherry, Orange, Pink Lemonade, Lemonade, Green Apple, Lemon Lime, Berry Blue, and Grape. I didn't end up using the orange, but I used all of the other packets!

I decided that the stovetop method would work best for dyeing, because I wanted long strips of color and didn't want to worry about getting dye all over my kitchen and white tile/grout countertips. Here's the setup that I came up with in order to dye multiple colors in one pot. I used a large stainless steel roasting pan filled about half full of water over two burners on the stove. In the roaster, I placed a small stainless steel bowl and a small pyrex bowl that fit next to each other. I used these bowls because they were the only ones I had that fit in the roaster together. I put my first dye color (cherry) in one bowl.

My very unscientific dye formula: 4 packets Kool Aid, 2/3 bowl of water (leaving room for yarn) and a dash of vinegar (probably a couple tablespoons).

I heated up the dye and water to near boiling and placed about 1/3 of the yarn in the red dye and the remaining yarn in the clear water of the 2nd bowl.

After the red yarn had absorbed all of the dye from the water and the water was clear, I used stainless steel tongs to gently pull the red yarn out of the dye water and placed it in the clean water in the roasting pan next two the two bowls. I then removed the dye bowl using tongs and an oven mitt, filled it with Grape kool-aid dye and put it back in the roaster. After the dye warmed up, I transferred about half of the remaining yarn from the clear water into the dye bowl using the tongs.

I then mixed my last dye color (Pink Lemonade) in a glass and poured it into the clear bowl, mixing gently to ensure even dye distribution. I kept the water very hot (near boiling) the entire time.

After the pink & purple dye had completely absorbed, I gently removed the yarn from the water with tongs and placed it on a plate to cool slightly. I then put it in a large bowl of warm water and rinsed it until the water was clear. The water was pretty clear after the first rinse, but I rinsed it a couple of times just to be sure.

Here's the pink/purple/red yarn drying on a chair on my patio. Looks good so far!

I used the same process for the next yarn, but with four colors instead of three: Lemonade, Green Apple, Berry Blue, and Lemon Lime. I wasn't really happy with the way the green apple turned out - it was a little too pastel looking.

Here's all of the yarn, drying in the sunshine.

Finally dry yarn!

And here it is wound into two 440-yard center pull balls.

All in all, I like the way my yarn turned out, but will have to see how it looks when I start knitting it into socks. I considered knitting a few rows of a sock with the yarn before I dyed it, ripping it out to see how much yarn was used, and using maths to calculate how long each strip of color should be to give me stripes of optimal width. Instead, I decided to just have fun with it. I think this should give me nice stripes and no pooling, but I'll have to knit it up to see.

After seeing what the color combinations look like, there are a few other combos that I'd try next time - Pink Lemonade with Green Apple (pastel pink & green stripes), and Lemonade, Green Apple, and Orange+Lemonade (pastel sherbet stripe). Also, I noticed that the Kool Aid flavors that are cloudy (lemonade, pink lemonade, green apple) make much more muted/pastel colors than the flavors that are clear (lemon lime, grape, cherry, berry blue, orange).

The verdict - Dyeing yarn with kool aid is fun! Try it yourself! It's going to take me forever to knit up all 880 yards though!

Secret Pal Strikes Again!

2005-07-01T11:42:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a busy, busy day! I worked through lunch, until about 2:45pm, then got in the car to make the long drive home, so I could telecommute today and have a long 4 day weekend at home. The drive was awful - I narrowly avoided getting tangled up in a 3 car accident that was two cars in front of me [if I had been tailgating, I would likely not have been so fortunate... remember, always keep a safe distance between you and the car in front of you!], and I got home shortly after 6pm.

Then it was off to my very first Sacramento SnB night. I have been wanting to attend for months, and was finally able to fit it in to my schedule. I'm so glad I did! It was a blast. I got to see Caitlyn again, for the first time in months, and I met a LOT of awesome gals who were working on some really neat things (including Ruth, who also has a blog, and Christy, who lives really close to me!) - it was inspiring! I wish I had my camera there to take pictures. Unfortunately I won't be able to attend SnB regularly until March. (darn law school, getting in the way of my life again!) Oh, and I got a few rows of Tivoli done at SnB too. :)

When I got home, I tore open the package that had arrived from my KR Secret Pal, and she did an awesome job once again. Check out all this great stuff...

New Zealand Wool, relaxing on the couch.

Look closer - Isn't it great? It is just screaming out to be knit into something with cables. Scarf + hat? Cabled purse/clutch? Small cabled purse plus scarf? There's a lot of yarn here, I think I'll be able to make a couple of things - yay!

The whole package - notice the NZ wool, now in a ginormous center pull skein. I did that almost immediately after opening the package - I couldn't keep my hands off of it! I would have knit a swatch immediately, except it was really late by that time. It's killing me to have to work today rather than play with my new yarn. And look at the other goodies... KnitPicks dye your own merino (fun with koolaid, coming soon to Ms. Knits!), gorgeous Cherry Tree Hill Zebra Caribe cotton blend yarn in beautiful earthy shades of rust, blue, and brown (lace scarf? shawl? hmmm... must surf for patterns!), a fun book of knitting anecdotes, a cute purse notepad, a neat little sock coin purse, and a little tube of hand lotion.

Thanks Secret Pal!! I love everything!

Back to work... have a great day!

The end, and a beginning

2005-06-27T17:37:00.002-07:00

Thanks to everyone for your kind words and compliments about the shawl! If I can do it, anyone can! Here's one last shawl picture, of me modeling the shawl after blocking. Blocking definitely made a difference. What looked like a pink, fuzzy blob with a bunch of twisty nubs around the edge turned into a beautiful shawl after blocking. Even the picots look nice!

So, what's next for me? Well, I could finish the seed stitch shell. Or, work on the baby blanket that I started for my friend who is due in three weeks. Or, I could start a new project. Yep, a new project! Sorry SSS. Sorry blankie. You'll have to wait.

I decided to start Tivoli for a few reasons. First, and most importantly, it is 99% stockinette stitch, with a few increases and decreases to keep me from getting completely bored. I've said before that I'm not a huge fan of miles and miles of stockinette, but working on the shawl gave me a new appreciation for the simple side of knitting. Second, Stephanie made one that looked really cute, and she made it sound like a really fun, quick project - just what I need right now. Third, I had some yarn that would work perfectly - the blue Katia Pisco that was originally destined for a 2nd SSS - no matter how well the first SSS turns out, there's no way I'm making another one... seed stitch, bleh. And finally, Kathy's patterns are fun to knit! (and I'm going to find buttons for my iPod cozy that I made from her pattern, and get it finished one of these days!)

So far, so good on Tivoli! I didn't spend a lot of time knitting this weekend, but managed to get just below the arm opening.

What's that I see? A mistake... ugh. I messed up on the cast on under the arm, and dropped a stitch. I thought I could pick it up without a problem, but I guess not. I'll have to rip out the last two rows and give the cast on another shot.

Any fellow Tivoli knitters have tips on how to keep the neckline from rolling? Will it be better after blocking?

Completed Paisley Lace Shawl

2005-06-24T21:15:00.000-07:00

First, pictures!

Unblocked shawl, approximately 30"x30", note the freaky looking picots. It took me nearly 6 hours to knit all of those silly things!

Unblocked corner detail. Pretty messy looking. I sure hope that whole blocking thing works!

Blocking! Blocked to 42"x42", with a whole lot of T-pins - 200, to be exact! Newton likes how it turned out. :)

Blocking detail - corner and one side. I love this blocking board!

Paisley Lace Shawl Notes ---

Pattern: Paisley Lace Shawl, by Evelyn A. Clark, Interweave Knits, Spring 2005. The pattern was very well written, very clear, and had no mistakes. I found I didn't have to use as many sets of needles as recommended by the pattern.

Needles: Size 5, 7" Clover bamboo DPNs (first 6 or 7 rounds), size 5 Addi Turbo circular 32" (remainder of the shawl), size 7 Bryspun straight (bindoff)

Yarn: Frog Tree 100% Alpaca Wool, fingering weight, color #95, 215 yards, 4 complete skeins used (only a few yards left over). (Substituted for 1125 yds Jaggerspun Zephyr) This 2 ply yarn is super soft, and knits up nicely. I didn't have any problems with splitting. My only complaint is that each skein had a couple of areas in the yarn where there were slubs or thick-ish areas. One skein had a ply that was broken and knotted on one place, while the other ply was continuous. These small flaws in the yarn are not noticeable in the finished shawl.

Highlights:
- My first lace project! Lace is quite addictive, I really enjoyed knitting this shawl, and will likely do more lace knitting in the future.
- I learned Emily Ocker's Circular Beginning for the cast on - it worked well.
- I learned how to knit from a chart (a simple chart, but a chart nonetheless).
- I figured out how to fix a missed yarn-over on a subsequent row (see previous yarn-over tutorial)
- I learned how to do a picot edging (see lowlights), and think it is a nice edge for the shawl. To get the picots to look right, I purchased a pair of Bryspun needles 2 sizes larger than what I was using for the shawl, and used a Bryspun for my right needle while casting off. It allowed me to do a loose cast off while still maintaining an even stitch tension.
- There are NO mistakes in the finished shawl! (yes, I'm a knitting perfectionist)
- I got to finally use my birthday present - the blocking board - yay!
- Quality bonding time spent with Todd while blocking - he helped me pin all of the picots down... what a guy!

Lowlights:
- The beginning of the shawl knit up deceivingly quickly. It took me longer to bind off than it took me to knit the first 8 pattern repeats! I guess that's what happens when you increase 8 stitches every other round!
- Addi turbos are NOT the best needles to use for lace. The tips are not pointy enough. The Bryspun straights, on the other hand, had wonderfully pointy tips. I think the Bryspuns (circulars) would be great for lace.
- The picot edging was tedious and looked really weird when I knit it. I think (hope!) it will look fine after blocking.

Tips/Tricks:
The placement of stitch markers as written in the pattern is awkward because you have to move the marker every time you increase. I used Clover Locking Stich Markers (orange and green, you can see them in one of the pre-blocking pictures), and locked one around the corner stitch at each corner at the beginning of each repeat. Then I could see where my increases needed to go (before and after the corner stitch), and I unclipped the markers and moved them up for each repeat. I did not use stitch markers to mark each pattern repeat, as the pattern is simple to see visually. I did, however, use a stitch marker in the middle of each side of the shawl when I got to the border chart. The stitch marker identified the middle of the pattern, and the left and right sides of the marker are mirror images of each other.

What I would do differently next time: I think this would be great as a triangular shawl. If I knit another one (quite possible, as it would be nice to have a shawl to keep in my office), I'll try to convert it to a triangle. It would use half the yarn, take half the time, and require half the picots, AND there would be no purling required!

It is late

2005-06-24T00:05:00.000-07:00

But I am done! Done with the shawl! And tired. Very tired. Going to bed now. Pictures will have to wait until I get home tomorrow night.

(it turned out great, by the way! i love it! can't wait to block it and see what it looks like!)

Picot boo!

2005-06-23T00:44:00.001-07:00

Getting closer... I have just under 1/8 of the bind-off completed. The little picot trim thingys are a pain in the rear to knit consistently without getting loose, loopy stitches. I've been redoing about every other one to get them to look nice and mostly even. Hopefully they will behave a little better after blocking!

Here's a close-up...

Come back later tonight (probably much later!) for a finished shawl and complete project details.

On the home stretch

2005-06-21T07:22:00.000-07:00

Almost finished the paisley lace shawl last night - if I hadn't fallen asleep at 10:00, I think I would have finished it. Only two rows to go (a purl row and a knit row), then the bind-off (the picot edge frightens me slightly). Not sure if I'll get any knitting done tonight or tomorrow night because of school, but it WILL be finished by Thursday and blocking on Friday night. More later... for now I'm off to work. Have a great week!

The shawl that never ends...

2005-06-16T18:58:00.000-07:00

Why do I feel like I've been working on this shawl forever? When everyone else in blogland is completing much more complicated shawls in a matter of days, I'm still plugging away at the paisley lace after what seems like months. It has gotten so bad that now whenever I pick up the shawl to start knitting, I start humming:

This is the shawl that never ends,
It just goes on and on my friends,
One day I started knitting it, not knowing what it was,
And I'll continue knitting it, forever, just because... this is the shawl that never ends!

Ack! And then I can't get that stupid stupid tune out of my head!

But I think I have figured out one problem that is slowing me down: Addi turbos are not meant for lace knitting. The tips are just not quite pointy enough for fingering weight yarn. I love how the purl rows go fairly quickly, but a single SSK takes me maybe 30 seconds to do, because I spend so much time trying to get the tip of the left needle through both loops of yarn. I'm going to have to do some research and figure out what type of needles are better for lace.

In other news, it is a rainy, crappy day today. And the bad weather is supposed to continue into the weekend. And I am THRILLED!!! Why, you ask? Because we were supposed to go on a camping trip that I was really not looking forward to... a camping trip with couple friends and their children, to a campground made especially for RVs. The horror - camping with RVs! That's just wrong. BUT, the couple who reserved the campsite have decided to cancel the trip because they don't want to be camping with their kids in the rain. Woohoo!!! My whole entire weekend is now FREE! Maybe now I can finish that dang shawl...

The Mystery Stitch

2005-06-14T20:28:00.000-07:00

The mystery is solved!

I e-mailed the woman who made the yarn, who just happens to be the woman who knit the scarves (Maria, of Fiber Elements). She e-mailed me back right away with all of the information I need to make the scarf! How nice is that?!? (Thanks, Maria!) It turns out the main stitch is a simple P2tog/YO stitch (there's a little more to it than that, but I don't want to give out her pattern without permission). I would never have guessed that just from looking at the scarf.

It just so happens that Maria's studio is in Fairfield, CA (also known as the city of the perpetual traffic jam - seriously, they need to get a sign made that says "Welcome to Fairfield, Prepare to Stop"). I drive right by her studio every time I drive to/from school. She also offers knitting classes in various Bay Area cities occassionally. I'm going to have to try to make it to one sometime. And the next time I'm stuck in traffic before I get to the 680/80 ramp in Fairfield, I'm going to exit from the freeway and take a detour by her studio!

I decided to wind the recycled silk into balls last night (I couldn't resist - new yarn, must touch!). It is so pretty. I even got a pleasant surprise when I removed the paper label... on the reverse side of the label, it said that the label is free of trees, acid, and chlorine, and made from 100% Kenaf, an annual, rapidly growing plant. How cool is that? I'm not a huge environmentalist, but I think every little bit helps and prefer to be environmentally friendly if possible. I didn't even know Kenaf existed before last night!

I'm back!

2005-06-13T18:47:00.001-07:00

Back from vacation - and with lots of pictures... [warning: long post ahead!]

First off - the knitting! As I anticipated, I got precious little knitting done on our trip. In fact, the only knitting I did was in the car on the way to Mt. Shasta and back, plus about a round and a half that I managed to sneak in between other activities. I managed about 7 rounds on the shawl. Here's where I'm at with it now. I'm less than 20 rows from finishing, but it is going slowly.

Somehow I managed to lose my crochet hook somewhere along the way, so on the trip back home I didn't work on the shawl at all. Note to lace knitters: the crochet hook is your friend! I can't count the times that I've dropped a stitch (or two!) or made a mistake that was fixable only by my trusty crochet hook. I figured I would only be tempting fate to work on the shawl without it, so I pulled some blue Katia Pisco out of my bag and swatched it to see if it would work for Grumperina's Tivoli Tee . With size 6 needles, my column gauge was right on (19 st/4 in), but the row gauge was not even close (32 rows/5 in vs. 32 rows/4 in). I don't think this will be a problem, but I may have to rework some of the increase/decrease placements. Math = fun!

While in McCloud, we stopped in the Mercantile building, where there was a nifty bookstore. And guess what I found in the bookstore? Yarn! I couldn't resist buying some beautiful recycled silk to make a scarf just like the one I saw in the store. The only problem... I have no idea what stitch pattern was used to make this scarf. The fabric looked solid (not holey) when unstretched (see left and right sides of the picture), but when stretched, it looked like sort of net-like. Does anyone know what stitch this is?

And now, the non-knitting stuff... pictures from our trip. We fit a lot of things into our short 4-day trip... we stayed at two different B&Bs, hiked to four waterfalls, explored McCloud on foot, toured the Lake Shasta Caverns, visited the Sundial Bridge in Redding, took a ton of pictures (I'm determined to learn how to take nice pictures with the D70) and ate lots and lots of yummy food.

We hiked to Lower, Middle, & Upper McCloud Falls, and to Burney Falls. Here's Middle McCloud Falls:

And Burney Falls:

On our way to Burney Falls, we came across a section of the Pacific Crest Trail. It's a long hike to Canada and Mexico from here...

The weather was beautiful during our entire trip, and we got some great views of Mt. Shasta. [We'll be saving that hike for another time! Ha!]

The Sundial Bridge in Redding is absolutely stunning. If you live in (or are visiting) northern CA, it is worth the drive to see it in person. It's definitely the most awesome pedestrian bridge I've ever seen. There's also an arboretum, a pedestrian/bike path, and an exploratorium near the bridge - lots to do.

And finally, a picture of Todd and I on our anniversary - after a long day of hiking. During dinner at the McCloud Hotel, they played the song that was our first dance song at our wedding reception five years ago. It was completely random (they just happened to be playing a lot of Sinatra), and totally made my night!

Now, off to conquer the shawl that never ends...

Have a great week!

No knitting news

2005-06-07T22:27:00.000-07:00

Once again, it's a busy week, with no time for knitting... Yesterday after work, I met up with two of my best friends from school for dinner. We went to the beach in Santa Cruz, and had dinner at a neat restaurant with a great ocean view. Here's a picture of the beach taken from outside the restaurant - so pretty! I love spending time near the ocean, but don't get to the coast as often as I'd like.

Nothing much exciting to report today... work, school, and reading for class have filled every minute. [That's the downside to summer school - when there are only 8 people in the class, you pretty much have to read, because you ARE going to get called on in every class!]

I expect tomorrow to be the same - nothing exciting planned and not a stitch of knitting will get done. Thursday and Friday are vacation days - woohoo! To celebrate our 5 year anniversary (Friday), we're heading up to the Mt. Shasta/Lake Shasta area for a weekend of B&Bs, hiking, sightseeing, and relaxing, and NO computers, e-mail, or TV! Yay! As much as I love (and live) technology, I definitely crave time away from it all occasionally.

I doubt I'll get much progress made on my shawl this weekend, but I'm going to at least plan to work on it in the car. A less complex project might be better for car knitting though... perhaps I'll set aside the shawl and cast on for the front of SSS. Or my next pair of socks. Decisions, decisions!

I'll be back here on Monday with an update... until then, have a great week and a relaxing weekend.

Wishful thinking!

2005-06-05T13:41:00.000-07:00

Just so you know, knitting goes *really* slowly when the rounds are 500+ stitches each! On Friday, I thought "oh, there's only about 40 rows left on the shawl... it will go quickly." Well, I underestimated big time. Now that I'm on the border, which is impossible to memorize, it is going even more slowly! I'll be lucky if I finish it within the next two weeks.

I made it up to Filati yesterday after my trip to the mall. Unfortunately they were a little low on Koigu, with only a few colorways remaining. I did manage to find one that I liked a lot... this fun turquoise & lime mix.

Here's a picture of the yarn basking in the sun, along with a close-up shot that was taken indoors.

Now I just have to find the perfect sock pattern for Koigu. Any thoughts?

TGIF!

2005-06-03T17:29:00.000-07:00

Woohoo - Friday is here! Time to get down to some serious knitting. My knitting style seems to be adjusting for my injured finger, except for the occassional needle getting stuck in my bandage. So, all is not lost for the weekend. It might be wishful thinking, but I'm hoping to finish up the shawl by Sunday night. We'll see about that!

This weekend it's just me and the boys, and I don't have many plans. I need to hit the mall for a quick shopping trip tomorrow, and will possibly pay a visit to one or more yarn stores as well. I got a call from Babetta's last week saying that she got in the Debbie Bliss Alpaca Silk book that I've had my eye on, and she is holding one for me. I also want to take a quick trip up to Filati, since I'll be up near there at the mall anyway. Perhaps I'll find some pretty koigu for my next pair of socks... stay tuned!

There's also a sock workshop on Sunday that I'd like to attend, but I don't have all of the necessary supplies (a really long sock-size circular needle, two circular needles of the same size). I can't justify buying 3 new circular needles just to attend the class, not knowing whether or not I would enjoy the techniques. So, no class for me this time. Oh well, more shawl knitting time!

For those of you who knit while watching TV/movies (usually I do) and who have Comcast cable... have you checked out all the free movies and old TV shows available through the "On Demand" feature? Good stuff! I've been knitting my way through old episodes of Sex and the City and lots of cheesy movies.

Have a great weekend!

Five things...

2005-06-03T13:53:00.000-07:00

I was tagged by Caitlyn for this...

Choose five things from the list below and complete the sentence.

If I could be a scientist
If I could be a farmer, I would have a small farm to grow organic vegetables that have not been genetically modified and would not use herbicides or pesticides. I would also have a few sheep and/or some alpacas so I could try my hand at making my own yarn, and maybe a few head of cattle, just because I like cows.
If I could be a psychologist
If I could be a librarian, I would want to work with elementary school kids to help them develop a love of reading while they are young.
If I could be an inn-keeper, I would have a charming, cozy B&B in cute little town in the countryside. Much like this one, where we are going next weekend. (yay!)
If I could be a professor
If I could be a writer
If I could be a llama-rider
If I could be a bonnie pirate, I would have a green parrot (like Basil!) to sit on my shoulder. I would swagger around my pirate ship saying pirate things like "argh!" and "shiver me timbers" and whatever else it is that pirates say.
If I could be an astronaut, I would want to be part of the first manned mission to Mars.
If I could be a world famous blogger
If I could be a justice on any one court in the world
If I could be married to any current famous political figure

I'm not going to pass this one on, because I think I've seen this on nearly everyone's blog already. If for some reason you haven't done it yet, feel free to take it and drop me a line so I can see your answers.

Change of plans

2005-06-02T21:49:00.000-07:00

I am so bummed! For the last two months I have been planning to attend tonight's local knitting guild meeting, had my schedule all arranged so I could go, and then ended up missing it.

It is usually hard for me to make it to the guild meetings because of my work and school schedules, but I promised several guild members who encouraged me to give the guild another try that I would be attending tonight's meeting. I also told Lynette that I would be there and was really looking forward to meeting both Lynette and Violet. (and seeing the intriguing neckband of Diane in person)

Alas, it was not meant to be. I got on a plane at 3:45 to head home in plenty of time for the meeting, and promptly after the plane was boarded, the lights dimmed and the air circulation turned off. Apparently, something had shut down and prevented the pilots from starting the engines... a "mechanical failure." I hate hearing those words when I am on a plane that is about to take off. Especially when the words "mechanical failure" and "engine" are in the same sentence!

The delay was supposed to be 5-10 minutes, but ended up being much, much longer. Thankfully I had my knitting with me, so I got nearly a whole repeat done on my lace shawl during the delay.

I got some interesting looks from other passengers on the plane as I was knitting. The man seated next to me was most interested:

"Is knitting the new thing to do now?"

"Um, well, I suppose. But it's not really a new thing. What do you mean?"

"Well, all of the women I know are knitting now or learning to knit. I thought that was something that only old ladies and grandmothers did."

"No, not really. Lots of different types of people knit. It is very relaxing actually, and a nice way to pass the time when you're, say, stuck on an airplane with a mechanical failure."

I was really at a loss for words. What do you say when people say things like that?

Anyway, huge apologies to Lynette and to those at the Guild whom I had told that I would be there. My absence was out of my control.

My short break - too short!

2005-05-31T20:47:00.000-07:00

Wow - the week and a half I've had off between spring semester and summer semester went by really quickly! Unfortunately I don't have much knitting progress to show for it. I've been plugging away at the lace shawl, and am now on repeat 12 of 13 before knitting the border. The repeats are going really slowly now that I'm up to over 400 stitches per round. No pictures until it is done, because it looks like a giant pink jellyfish blob right now!

The three day weekend was fairly uneventful. I did some random chores & errands, did some knitting, and took a few naps. Ah, naps! I'd function so much better if I could take a 30 minute nap every day!

On Sunday night my left index finger had a brief run in with the kitchen shears. Ouch! The very tip of my finger got cut pretty badly (not badly enough that I had to go to the ER, thankfully!), and I'll probably have to keep it bandaged for a week or two. I tried knitting with my finger bandaged, and was able to do it, but very slowly. I didn't realize that I pretty much rely on my left index finger to help slide the stitches to the tip of my left needle. I can use my middle finger to do the same thing, but my hand cramps up pretty quickly that way. So, not a lot of knitting will get done for a while. Bummer too, since now most of my evenings are free and I will have all weekend to knit this weekend as DH will be out of town on business. I'm not giving up yet though - maybe I will figure out some way to make it work. Typing is not much fun now either!

Today was my first day back at school. I'm taking two classes this summer, a patent prosecution class on Tuesday night and an international IP treaties/copyright class on Wednesday night. The patent prosecution class should be really easy, since that's what I do every day at work. Maybe I'll even pick up some practical practice tips - wouldn't that be nice! I'm not so sure about the international copyright class... that's definitely something I know nothing about, but might be interesting anyway. I have 20 more pages to read tonight, so I should probably get to it!

Secret Pal 5 Survey

2005-05-31T20:43:00.000-07:00

I've been having such a great time with the KR SP3 program that I thought I'd sign up for SP5 for a summertime secret pal. I haven't been assigned my pal yet, but since it's the end of the month, here's my survey...

1. Are you a yarn snob (do you prefer higher quality and/or natural fibers)? Do you avoid Red Heart and Lion Brand? Or is it all the same to you? I prefer natural fibers - wool, alpaca, cashmere, cotton, and blends of these fibers are wonderful. I also like soft yarns that feel nice when I knit them up. I wouldn't say that I'm a yarn snob though... I learned to knit with Lion Brand Homespun (back when I thought that Michael's qualified as a "yarn store"!), but it's definitely not at the top of my list anymore!

2. Do you spin? Crochet? Spin, no, but it sounds interesting. Crochet, just enough to get me by.

3. Do you have any allergies? (smoke, pets, fibers, perfume, etc.) No allergies, but I don't care for the smell of smoke.

4. How long have you been knitting? Just over a year.

5. Do you have an Amazon or other online wish list? Yes, a general Amazon wishlist with some knitting items and a lot of miscellaneous stuff. I can e-mail it to my pal if she wants.

6. What's your favorite scent? (for candles, bath products etc.) Vanilla, fresh, fruity scents.

7. Do you have a sweet tooth? Oh yeah - chocolate, baby!

8. What other crafts or Do-It-Yourself things do you like to do? I've been known to sew, cross-stitch, and scrapbook in the past, but right now I'm focusing on knitting.

9. What kind of music do you like? Can your computer/stereo play MP3s? (if your buddy wants to make you a CD) I mostly listen to top 40/rock (Maroon 5, Matchbox 20, John Mayer, etc), but also enjoy jazz (Dave Koz, Chris Botti, Miles Davis). MP3s are good - I can put them on my computer and iPod!

10. What's your favorite color? Or--do you have a color family/season/palette you prefer? Any colors you just can't stand? I like pretty much all colors. I've been on a pink kick lately, and a lot of my clothes are red. There are really no colors that I strongly dislike.

11. What is your family situation? Do you have any pets? Married, no kids, two crazy miniature schnauzers.

12. What are your life dreams? (really stretching it here, I know) Finish law school in December and pass the bar exam next February. That's not exactly a life dream, but it is 100% my focus right now.

13. What is/are your favorite yarn/s to knit with? I haven't knit with that many yarns in the short time I've been knitting. So far, my favorites are Manos & Cascade 220. There are a ton of yarns that I've been dying to try... Rowan yarns, and Debbie Bliss yarns especially. Oh, and can't forget Koigu - I'm dying to try Koigu! So far I seem to like anything soft. I'm really not picky!

14. What fibers do you absolutely *not* like? I'm not a big fan of most novelty yarns.

15. What is/are your current knitting obsession/s? My IK Paisley lace shawl!

16. What is/are your favorite item/s to knit? So far I like most everything that I've tried... felted bags, socks, lace. I think I need more experience before I decide on a favorite!

17. What are you knitting right now? A lace shawl, a baby blanket, and a seed stitch shell.

18. What do you think about ponchos? Not a fan. It's just not my style - I think I would look ridiculous wearing one!

19. Do you prefer straight or circular needles? Circular for almost everything, DPNs for socks.

20. Bamboo, aluminum, plastic? Bamboo dpns for socks, Addi Turbos for most everything else. I'd like to try some rosewood needles sometime too.

21. Are you a sock knitter? Yes, if having knit 1 pair (and enjoying it) makes me a sock knitter!

22. How did you learn to knit? My mother-in-law showed me the basics, and the rest I've picked up from reading books.

23. How old is your oldest UFO? About a month and a half... my VK seed stitch shell.

24. What is your favorite animated character or a favorite animal/bird? No favorite animated characters. My favorite animals are my dogs - they totally crack me up!

25. What is your favorite holiday? Christmas

26. Is there anything that you collect? No, unless you count my growing collection of law school casebooks. Oh, and yarn. :)

27. What knitting magazine subscriptions do you have? VK, considering an IK subscription.

28. Any books out there you are dying to get your hands on? None that I can think of... but I'm always looking for a good novel. Finding the time to read it is another story!

Q&A time...

2005-05-25T12:21:00.000-07:00

Stephanie left me some great interview questions... here are my answers:

1. What do you most like about law school? What do you like least?

Surprisingly, I've never really thought about this before. For me, law school is a means to an end - I have to get through it in order to have the job that I want (patent attorney) at the company where I work. There aren't a whole lot of things I like about law school itself. Sometimes the classes are interesting, but I think the thing I like most is the other part-time students. We've all become fairly close over the last three years, and I've made some wonderful friends in school. What do I like least? Where to start… I don't like that it turns me (usually a perfectly logical, rational person) into an emotional raving lunatic twice a year during finals. I don't like that school is so far from home (135 miles, a 2-4 hour drive depending on traffic) and that I am away from my husband, dogs, and home 4-5 days every week. I don't like that 95% of what I've learned in law school will never be used again after I take the bar exam. I could probably go on for a while, but will restrain myself and end there. Even though there are a lot of things I dislike about law school, I'm very excited about the career I will have after I'm done with school and am happy with my decision to go to law school.

2. How did you meet your husband (I'm a sucker for stories like this)?

We were introduced through a mutual friend when we both lived in the Denver area (I was in my last year of undergrad, and he was working full time). We e-mailed and talked on the phone for a week or two before we met in person for our first date. I was in the midst of a busy semester at school at the time, and wasn't all that interested in dating anyone. Luckily for me, he was persistent (very!) in his pursuit, and after my crazy semester was over we were practically inseperable. We got engaged in December 1998 (just over a year after we met), and were married in June 2000.

3. What type of knitting project do you most enjoy?

I especially like projects that teach me something new or projects that challenge me. (socks, felting, lace…)

4. If you could give a new knitter one piece of advise, what would it be?

Don't be a slave to "beginner" patterns - try projects that will teach you new skills even if it looks like something you think you can't do. When I started knitting, I was extremely concerned with a pattern's rating, and was scared to attempt anything but the simplest beginner-rated patterns. I can't count the number of garter stitch scarves that I made. I really didn't start to enjoy knitting until I attempted some more complicated patterns. Once you know the basics (knit/purl/cast on/bind off), you can really knit anything with the help of a good reference book and the internet.

5. What is your all-time favorite project and why?

My felted sheepless sheep tote- I loved this project for so many reasons. It was the first non-scarf project that I completed, and I learned a lot while knitting it - picking up stitches, knitting in the round, yarn overs, dropping stitches (on purpose - scary!) and picking them up two at a time with a crochet hook, icord, and felting. I also loved the yarn - Cascade 220 is fabulous to knit with and felts beautifully with no fuzzies. Finally, I use the bag all the time. It usually carries my current WIP project around the house and on short trips (guild meetings, doctor's office, etc). I will be making another one eventually.

*******************************

Let me know if you'd like to be interviewed... Here are the interview rules:

1. Leave me a comment saying "interview me;"
2. I will respond by asking you 5 questions on my blog. They will be different questions than the ones above;
3. You will update your blog with the answers;
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else;
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them 5 questions.

Paisley Lace Shawl (and a lesson in fixing missed yarn-overs)

2005-05-19T18:08:00.000-07:00

As promised, here are pictures of the IK Paisley Lace Shawl. I'm knitting this with Frog Tree Alpaca, in color #95 on US5 Addi Turbos. I really like the Frog Tree alpaca - it is so soft and fun to knit! I'm planning to wear this shawl to my brother's wedding in July.

The circular shawl blob - you can't see much of the pattern here...

Here's a close-up of the stitch pattern. I think that the pattern will look great after blocking.

The lace pattern is really easy, and it has been a quick knit so far. I am on repeat 8 of 13 now, but the going is slower each round because of the increases. I've found that I really enjoy knitting lace - I think because I'm mathematically minded and I like understanding how varying the number/type of stitches creates patterns.

The pattern is essentially rows of knit, K2tog, and YO stitches alternating with full rows of purl stitches. I've found that when I get in a groove, I sometimes miss a yarn-over after a K2tog, and won't realize it until I knit a full round and get to the point in the purl row where the yarn over should be. This is a problem, because the yarn-overs create the holes in the lace pattern and a missing YO equals a missing hole. (and it also messes up the stitch count!) At first, I would frog a whole row to get back to the place where I missed the yarn over, add the YO, and re-knit. That worked fine until my rows started getting longer, and I was tired of frogging and reknitting. Then I decided to take a look at the knitting to see if I could somehow fix the missing yarn-over without frogging. I ended up figuring out a way to do it! I was totally excited when I figured this out. It is probably nothing new for most lace knitters. Here's what I learned:

This is what yarn-overs normally look like in this pattern. You can see that the lace holes are formed where the YOs are placed.

Here's what happens when I start knitting too quickly and forget a YO. I never find this until one row later...

To fix the missing YO, you have to find the yarn that is lying horizontal between the stitches:

Pick the yarn up as shown. This is just like a M1.

...and place it on the left needle:

Hey, look! A YO!

Now, purl (or knit) the newly formed YO...

And, voila! Lace! No frogging required!

This will only work if you catch the missing YO on the row after the mistake is made.

I hope that was helpful, or at least interesting to you. I'm not an expert at the whole knitting thing yet, but one of the things I like about blogs is seeing how others do things and solve problems. So I thought I would share this in an effort to contribute something meaningful to the knitblog community.