Lickety Knit

Moving!

2005-05-22T09:39:00.000-05:00

This blog has moved to www.licketyknit.com. You should be redirected there automatically. If not, click the link above. Please update your bookmarks!

Where has my knitting time gone??

2005-05-18T12:04:00.000-05:00

My knitting time has evaporated of late. I'm not sure how it happened. I'm not that busy at work, and my social schedule hasn't exactly exploded. I have been devoting time to some other hobbies (photography, setting up my new blog) and to non-hobby necessities (yardwork, gardening), and I guess that has been cutting into my knitting time more than I realized. I have been knitting a couple rows here and there on the Crayon baby blanket, which is coming out wonderfully (easy pattern, but the yarn is knitting a perfect baby-blanket fabric), and I'll try to post a picture of that soon.

My photography class ends a week from today, and the next one doesn't start until the end of June, plus work switches to summer hours (8-4) after Memorial Day, which should all add up to increased knitting time. I hope I hope I hope. I miss it!

Oh, speaking of my new blog, I expect to be moving Lickety Knit to a new cyberlocation within the next couple weeks. I have also started a less knitting-specific blog, www.shinygreenapple.com, which will eventually encorporate all my many interests (including knitting) into one spot. The new Lickety Knit will still be pure, unadulterated knitting, though! I'll keep you posted.

New yarn, new projects

2005-05-09T18:50:00.000-05:00

I received a shipment from Knitpicks today, and while the price is right, I'm not in love with the colors. Here is the yarn I will be using for my next baby blanket project (I hope to have one Project Linus project going all the time). It is really, really pink. But some people genuinely love pink, so I have to imagine someone will get use out of it. The yarn is machine wash and dryable, which is nice.

UPDATE: Turns out this yarn is great. It knits up in to a wonderfully soft fabric, perfect for baby stuff. Very light, too. And I decided that althought he pink is a bit brighter than I might have chosen, it's very cheery -- and it's likely that the kiddo who winds up with this blanket won't be in the cheeriest place in life. So I've gone from uncertain to very happy with it in the course of one evening and 2 inches of knitting..

I also got some Wool of the Andes (standard 100% Peruvian wool) that seems to be nice quality, but the off-white color I ordered has so much yellow in it that it's frankly ugly and therefore not usable for my project (Chicknit's Ribby Cardi). I bought the off-white as the main body color and then ordered two options for the sleeve color. I like the colors of the two sleeve options, but they don't go well at all with the sickly yellow main color. I'm sure I'll find some other use for it, but it's rather disappointing.

Finished Object: Basketweave Baby Blanket

2005-05-09T18:49:00.000-05:00

Pattern: Basketweave baby blanket from Knitting for Baby
Yarn: Berrocco Lullaby in Little Boy Blue
Notes: This is my first project for Project Linus, and overall I'm pleased with it. I wound up not loving the yarn, but it is nice and soft, and not bad at all for containing no natural fibers.

Introducing my photoblog

2005-05-05T23:06:00.000-05:00

I have started a photoblog so that I won't keep cluttering up this blog with non-knitting-related photos. Each hobby deserves its own corner of cyberspace, I say. Its (pretty stupid) temporary name is Clickety, and you can visit it here.

Finished Object: Opera Scarf

2005-05-03T06:34:00.000-05:00

Pattern: Opera Scarf from Blue Sky Alpacas
Yarn: GGH Mystik in salmon
Notes: You get an attractive, interesting fabric given how easy the pattern is. I was frustrated by my inability to keep the edges neat, though. Next time I would probably try to give the yarn a little tug after the first stitch of each row. I did that sometimes but wasn't consistent about it.

I may never wear it, so if anyone sees the picture and loves it, let me know and I'll mail it to you.

Watermelon baby sundress

2005-05-01T17:50:00.000-05:00

Well, let's start with the positive. I love these colors, and I love the ribbon yarn for baby clothing. It's knitting quickly and cutely.

However, my sizing fears have have been realized. It is now evident that no human baby could wear this. A human-shaped doll, perhaps, but I definitely didn't take up this hobby to make doll clothes. Clothes for hypothetical babies, sure, but not doll clothes.

But all is not lost. I think if I frogged back to the second-to-last skirt decrease and began the bodice there, it would make the skirt shorter and the bodice wider, allowing it to fit, you know, a preemie during her first week of life. Snugly. I'm going to give it a try. Here's a more straighforward photo so you can see what I mean about the proportions. I would frog back about 6 or 7 rows and start the bodice again.

A nice look at the texture of the ribbon yarn:

Secret pal gifties!

2005-04-29T19:55:00.000-05:00

I arrived home today knowing I was in for a treat (my secret pal tipped me off -- she has tracking information and saw that the package had been delivered), but I didn't realize how much of a treat. The unassuming manilla envelope I found on my doorstep contained:

1) A funny card with a nice long message
2) Two delectable-looking chocolate bars from her (approximate) home city of Seattle (cool!) that I will devour the minute Passover is over
3) A fantastic book of knitting patterns for children -- every pattern is adorable and classic and not at all cheesy (my typical complaint with kid pattern books). It has a sort of New England beachy theme, I'd say, which is perfect! I love it and want to knit about 20 things from it.
4) Two balls of Debbie Bliss alpaca silk. That's what the label says, anyway. I actually have a hard time believing that it's anything other than a cumulus cloud that has been spun into yarn and died a rich, luscious purple. This stuff is unbelievable. I am thrilled. She also very considerately included a scarf pattern I might want to use the yarn on. However, I think I shall just slowly accumulate a huge stash of this stuff and then sleep in a big pile of it.

I'm off to post on the Knittyboard secret pal thread, but in case my SP sees this first, thank you thank you thank you thank you! You have wonderful taste and I am blown away by your generosity.

By the way, I'm coming to Seattle in August...perhaps we could meet up if I guess your identity by then! (Or I'll have to wander through the streets calling "Secret paaaaaal? Secret PAAAAAALLLLL!!!" until you are so mortified that you identify yourself so I'll shut up.)

Here, by the way, is a more straightforward picture of my loot:

My first foray into designing

2005-04-29T08:09:00.000-05:00

I am designing a baby sundress. I don't really like to accumulate a stash, so when I finish projects I look for something to do with the leftover yarn right away (my recent opera scarf is a good example). For some reason I decided that a cute little infant tank sundress would be a good way to use up the ribbon yarn. This is the approximate extent of my planning for this garment:

96 st --> 48 st / dec 6 st. 8 times ev. 6 rows?

Then I just launched in. I don't yet have enough done to know whether I'm setting myself up for severe disillusionment.

My main problem is that I don't have a good sense of the approximate size and shape of babies, and I don't know ANYONE with a baby girl. (It disappoints me that society is still at a point where the moms I know, progressive as they are, would probably be hesitant to let me try my sundress on their sons just for sizing purposes.) The secondary problem is that even if I did have a way to obtain baby measurements, recent evidence has demonstrated that gauge on Deco Ribbon yarn is not a straightforward size indicator. So, I resort to guessing. The nice thing about babies is that they are sort of blob shaped and pretty much anything will fit them at one point or another.

Pictures this weekend of my progress (with my new digital camera, due to arrive today!).

X-back (take two) is finished!

2005-04-25T20:06:00.000-05:00

I X-pected not to have any time this weekend to work on the X-back, so you can imagine my X-citement when I found some X-tra time and X-pediently went to work it. When it was finished, I tried it on, not knowing quite what to X-pect. I looked in the mirror. "It fits!" I X-claimed.

Turned out I was correct -- negative ease was key with the Deco Ribbon. In fact, when I was knitting it I was sure it would wind up WAY too small, but it seems to have worked out well. If you can forgive the (X-traordinarily) crappy quality of these pictures, you can see how it fits.

From the back. The rolls of shoulder fat are mostly the unfortunate result of the lighting.

Massive frogging

2005-04-20T07:55:00.000-05:00

For those non-knitter readers of my blog who aren't familiar with the term "frogging," a quick explanation: it means ripping out massive amounts - sometimes all - of your knitting project. The reason? "Rip it, rip it," is reminiscent of the sound we assign to the croak of a frog. (This is distinct from tinking, which is undoing one stitch at a time by knitting backwards -- "tink" is "knit" backwards.) "Frogging" usage examples: "I had to frog all the way back to the waist decreases," "I frogged the whole thing because it turned out too big."

That last one is what I did last night with the Ribbon X-Back. Although I knit to gauge and the measurements seemed technically correct, apparently some yarn needs "negative ease" -- that is, it has to be stretched out (by the wearer's body) to fit correctly, so you knit it smaller than your actual measurements. That seems to be the case with the Crystal Palace Deco Ribbon. So now I'm knitting it much, much smaller, sort of on a wing and a prayer, and hoping it comes out a lot better. Stay tuned.

P.S. I was impressed by how maturely I handled the frogging of an entire project. The silver lining is that it's rather cathartic to rip out knitting. There's something vaguely satisfying about it.

More random stuff

2005-04-19T14:20:00.000-05:00

Look, laptops with transparent screens!

Okay, not really. Just my most recent assignment for my photo class. Actually, the assignment was to make some sort of complicated representational alternate reality blah blah blah I couldn't really follow, so instead I used photoshop to make it look kind of like my laptop has a transparent screen. Why not? I would have preferred to have been knitting, though.

Note: There are people who do this much better and much more impressively than I do here, because they don't use photoshop -- they take a photo, make it their background, and then photograph that. I tried to do that, but gave up quickly. Haaaaard!

Opera scarf

2005-04-18T21:15:00.000-05:00

This is the "opera scarf" that I'm making with the leftover Honeymoon Cami yarn. It's really easy to make (sl 1, yo, k2tog over and over again on both sides), but I'm disappointed by how uneven my edges are. I know blocking will help with that a little, but still, I wish they weren't such a mess.

A good mindless project to use up extra yarn.

Fun stuff

2005-04-15T11:40:00.000-05:00

A post over on Peatbogfaery's blog led me to this enjoyable time waster: www.typogenerator.com. You enter text and then it searches the internet for images based on that text, applies all sorts of weird effects to them, and then randomly lays out both images and text. Rather addictive. Here are some of my favorites based on - what else? - Lickety Knit.

2005-04-13T14:02:00.000-05:00

Not knitting related. Just a photo I took this morning that I thought was cool.

Ribbon X-Back!

2005-04-13T08:34:00.000-05:00

The lighting is perhaps overly dramatic for these 3 inches of knitting, but it was early morning and that's what the sun was doing. Anyway, I am very, very excited about this pattern; it's knitting up quickly and is a lot of fun. The ribbon yarn is interesting to work with -- very different (and not in a bad way). I just hope I ordered enough of it.

In other news, I washed and blocked my honeymoon cami and could not believe what a difference it made! My stitches are now much smoother, and the sheen and drape are unbelievable. I can't wait to wear it! I'll be sure to model it soon and do an official "finished object" post about it.

I am using the leftover Mystik yarn from the HC to make a warm-weather dressy scarf that may or may not ever be useful to anyone. We'll see.

Knittins and Kittens: A photo series

2005-04-10T00:26:00.001-05:00

Click photos for larger versions, if you think you can stand the cuteness!

Waaay past my bedtime...

2005-04-06T22:41:00.000-05:00

I stayed up too late in a knitting frenzy finishing my Honeymoon Cami! To my utter disbelief, it actually fit when I tried it on! Although it has more than a few mistakes, and the stockinette stitches are uneven, and the ends aren't woven in yet, it's mine mine mine, the first adult clothing item I've ever knit and only the second thing I've ever made for myself. I'm so excited! More tomorrow (including a post over on the knitalong and probably gratuitous additional pictures)!

(Note: When I imagined the moment of completion, I did not expect to look like death warmed over. Please excuse my appearance in that photo. Focus on the cami.)

(Second note: You can see in the back of the picture an open box on the table. That's the yarn for my next project, a sweater for my husband, which just arrived today. Perfect timing!)

Knittyboard Secret Pal

2005-04-04T12:20:00.000-05:00

Over on the Knittyboards, volunteer members periodically arrange "Secret Pal" exchanges, in which board members are assigned "pals" to send several small gifts to over the course of three months. This is the first time I have participated, and I'm very excited! In order to help participants tailor their gifts to their pals' likes and dislikes, we all fill out extensive questionnaires. I'm jumping on Amy's and Alesia's bandwagon and posting mine here for the boundless interest of the knitblogging public.

KNITTING & FIBERS:
1. What is your current skill level? Intermediate (more or less, depending on the day)
2. What are your favorite fiber colors? Neutrals/earth tones; rich, muted colors.
3. Are there any fiber colors you absolutely do notlike? If so which? I do not care for variegated yarns (unless it’s very subtle), neon colors, or extremely bright colors.
4. What are your favorite fibers? Mostly “classics.” Naturals over acrylics, mostly, though of course there are exceptions. Super soft is always a bonus!
5. Do you have any unwelcome fibers (stuff you just don't need more of or like)? Novelty yarn, yarn where two threads/colors/fibers are very obviously mixed together (like a tweed), very bulky yarn.
6. What is your Dream Yarn? Soft, strong, luxurious to touch. Nothing flashy or trendy.
7. How do you feel about novelty fibers (both the yarns and the items made with them)? Oops, should have read ahead before answering above. I am not interested in novelty fibers or items made from these fibers.
8. What is the next thing you want to learn (techniques, etc.) on the needles? I just finished my first cable sweater and would like to do more cabling. I also really want to make a man’s sweater.
9. What item(s) do you knit the most? Baby sweaters, but I really want to be doing more adult clothing.

WANTS & NOTS:
10. Allergies: Do you have any food, fiber, smoke, pet allergies your SP should be aware of? I can smell smoke in anything (that has been near smoke, that is) and can’t stand it. Other than that, just penicillin and shellfish, allergy-wise. But I sort of doubt that info will be particularly relevant.
11. Do you have an Amazon.com or knitpicks.com wishlist you'd like to share with your SP? http://tinyurl.com/6js4e (That link should work for my Amazon wish list.)
12. What is on your "cool stuff" wishlist (knitting or not)? Pretty, frivolous stitch markers; an under-bed storage something or other (my stash, while not comparable to lots of people’s, is growing rapidly), a small bag to carry individual projects on planes, etc., double-pointed needles in various sizes.
13. What about stuff you don't need at all? Knitting-wise? Uhhh…my hobby only recently became a full-scale obsession, so there’s not much I’m maxed-out on yet.
14. Do you have hobbies other than knitting (tv, sports, collectibles, fave things)? The Boston Red Sox, photography, the Sims, my husband.
15. Books you would like (knitting or not): Many, many knitting books. I sort of want the Stitch and Bitch books, just because they seem to be instant “classics,” but I’m interested in a number of things. A stitch dictionary would be really cool. Or one of those books with small projects like “Weekend Knits” or “Last Minute Knitted Gifts” or what have you. Also magazines – I only subscribe to Interweave Knits.
16. For those of you who live outside the US, is there anything you'd like that you can't get your hands on? N/A
17. In the event your SP lives outside the the US, is there a particular yarn, etc. you can't find in the US? Hmm. I don’t know enough about yarn outside the US to answer this. I’d certainly be open to something I couldn’t get here! An issue of a knitting magazine not sold in the U.S. might be cool, too.

FAVORITES: Who/What is your favorite...
Chocolate: Any sampler box that comes with a map
Muppet: Rolf, the piano-playing dog (mostly because I love his “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” with John Denver on the “Christmas Together” album)
Flower: Blue hydrangea
Ice Cream flavor: Ben and Jerry’s sweet cream and cookies
Fragrance: Soapy clean; lavender
Shoes to wear: Well-worn sandals
Type of garden: Languid, overgrown, in full bloom
Animal: In person? My cat. As a zoo exhibit? Penguins.
Beverage: Cream soda

RORSCHACH, ETC:
19. If you were candy would you be sweet, sour, or cinnamon? Hmm. I’m trying to think of a candy that is mostly sweet but with a sour coating. Sour Patch Kids? Ech, not what I want associated with me. Okay, so let’s just say 75% sweet, 25% sour.
20. If you were a fruit which would you be? A green apple. Classic, tart, preppy.
21. Are you a Java Junkie? No. You should see me after one cup of coffee. And by that I mean, you really shouldn’t see me. It’s not fun.
22. Your birthday, in case it falls during the swap and your SP wants to send you a card: February 19. I don’t even think my half birthday will fall during the swap. Maybe my quarter birthday? Yes, I will be 27.25 on May 19. Woohoo!
23. Do you have a personal mantra? No, but I’m about to make one up for the purpose of this question. Wait, I take that back. I just googled “personal mantras” to borrow someone else’s, and apparently they’re supposed to be kept secret. So yes, I have one, but I’m not telling.
24. How do you really feel about socks? How do I really feel? I had no idea this was something people weren’t forthcoming about. I am generally in favor of socks, but I stick with the basic solids. Nothing too crazy. Although my first-ever knitting project was socks, I no longer have much interest in making them.
25. What is your shoe size? 7.5
26. What kind of music (and/or which artists) do you listen to when you are happy? I almost always listen to my complete music collection on shuffle on my iPod. Favorites include the Dixie Chicks, Crowded House, Lisa Loeb, Simon and Garfunkel, Moxy Fruvous, and cheesy Broadway musical soundtracks. I’m pretty flexible us long as it’s not uber-poppy or too loud and screamy.
27. Rate yourself on a girly/fruh fruh factor from 1 - 10: If 1 is Janeane Garofalo and 10 is Barbie, probably a 3.
28. What languages do you speak (besides English)? Fairly bad French and quickly diminishing American Sign Language.
29. If you could have any "super power," what would it be? For practicality, teleportation. For luxury, the power to slow time (while still moving at a normal speed myself) – I’d like to make Saturday mornings last forever. But the good old classic – flying – is mighty, mighty tempting.
30. You're given $10,000 for traveling. Where do you go and why? Australia/New Zealand. Because that’s where I really want to go but without free money it’s pretty much beyond my means right now. I am dying to see that part of the world (and I wanted to go before LOTR made New Zealand trendy).

The Greatest Gift of All

2005-04-01T09:32:00.000-05:00

I have recently discovered that my dear sainted sister-in-law (and, let's be honest, mentor and spiritual guide) has learned of my obsession with knitting. And although her tone, when she emailed my husband about it, seemed at first glance to be mocking, I could easily read between the lines to sense the hurt she was feeling that I'd never knit HER anything.

Well, I couldn't let things remain in that state. Immediately I put aside all my other, suddenly unimportant, knitting projects and began to search for the knitted gift that would be worthy of Rachel Sr., this noble woman - indeed this angel - who has played such a significant role in my life. But WHAT?

The nice women over at the Knitty Boards helped me locate a number of extra-special patterns (particular credit goes to Stitchy McYarnPants). Since the warm weather is coming (we're told), it seemed most appropriate to make something light and skimpy and summery. This was the frontrunner for a while:

But a bathing suit cover-up seemed as though it would have limited use (though there's no denying it could have doubled as a bath mat during non-bathing-suit weather), and I knew that Rachel Sr. would be so touched by my thoughtful handmade gift that she'd want the flexibility to wear it more often and to any public place. With that in mind, I selected these lovely shorts:

Nice (though doesn't the one on the right look kind of well-endowed in the crotch, for a girl?), but would she feel shortchanged to receive such a small item? I mean, really small? Wouldn't she want something that I really invested a lot of time into? Yes, I thought. Yes, she would.

After an exhaustive search (including a brief consideration of making this to brighten up her D.C. basement apartment and to provide her with a reminder of me that she'd see every day), I settled on this perfect project. It combines the skimpiness of the shorts with the full-size project of the cover up. Oh man, Rachel Sr. is going to look goooood in these:

"Urban Cowgirl" describes Rachel Sr. perfectly! She grew up in the wilds of St. Louis and now lives a crazy urban life in Howard Fineman's basement! Oh, and, wait! Wait until you see the back:

Pockets with hearts on them!! I mean, that is just so her! I can't wait to get started. She's just going to love me soooooo much! Watch here for progress!

EARRAGHUGHHFFBTPPBT!

2005-03-31T09:11:00.000-05:00

Last night I worked on the Honeymoon Cami for about 3 hours. You may notice, however (because you pay very close attention to these things), that my progress bar has not ticked up one whit. What possible explanation could there be for that? you ask yourself. Well, I was going along my knitty way, having split the work to form the v-neck and v-back, merrily decreasing at each side every other row, and then something happened and it all went to hell. Problem is -- and this is the most frustrating part -- I'm not sure what the something was, except all of a sudden the v-neck stitches were all unraveling. So I had to rip out to exactly where I'd started that evening and spend an hour and a half getting the stitches back on the needle. They dropped down so quickly, so I was grabbing them 2, 3, 4 rows down the work, anywhere I could. I had to focus a huge portion of my energy on NOT SCREAMING as I painstakingly fixed each split stitch, each twisted stitch, each dropped stitch. So with all that work, I'm successfully right back where I was at this time yesterday.

Since I'm not really sure what I did wrong, I will be threading a piece of spare yarn through the stitches at my current location so that should this unknown problem arise again, I will be in better shape to recapture my stitches after frogging to the spare yarn. I'm hoping that will be insurance against it happening again, because what fun could it be for the knitting gods to try to torment me after I've taken such a precaution? (That is NOT a challenge, knitting gods.)

More yarn on the way!

2005-03-29T10:05:00.000-05:00

For a while I was entertaining the notion of making the Anniversary Sweater from Knitty for my husband or some other deserving man in my life. It sort of got pushed to the back burner in my mind, but today I found the yarn called for in the pattern (Katia Pisco, a cotton/linen/acrylic blend) at Elann.com for 55 percent off! I got 21 balls (2000 yards) for $50! I couldn't pass up a deal like that, so I will stash it away somewhere and pull it out when the time is right.

My husband is rolling his eyes really, really hard right now, because I wasn't supposed to buy yarn for more projects until I finish off the ones I already have. He's going to have to learn that it doesn't work that way -- it's all about the stash. Am I right, knitters? Back me up here!

Sheepishly posted HMC progress

2005-03-28T22:27:00.000-05:00

I'm not exactly proud of this, what with the terribly uneven stitches and the truly craptastic increases and decreases, but here is where I am on the Honeymooon Cami. I am just about ready to start the V-neck. I have knit the last zillion or so rows on the verge of frogging the whole thing and starting over, but I can never quite bring myself to do it.

Know who's great?

2005-03-28T13:50:00.000-05:00

My husband. He made me those cool little status bars over to the right. I know there are flash versions of them floating around out there, but they require uploading and linking to a file, and he said he could make them to stand alone in the HTML of my blog template. Lo and behold, 15 minutes later I had them! Isn't he the best and the smartest and the most handsome? (That last one isn't directly relevant, but it's true.)

Now I just need to start a whole bunch of new projects so I can have more status bars! (I have exercised a lot of will power in not doing so recently.)

If anyone else is interested in the HTML for the status bars, I'm happy to share.

Honeymoon Cami progress

2005-03-25T09:21:00.000-05:00

Things are coming along on the Honeymoon Cami. I finished the waist shaping last night (the stockinette looks more even in real life than in this picture -- circular needles don't really allow flat, smooth sections to photograph). Unfortunately, SOMEWHERE I accidentally decreased an extra stitch (I'm fairly sure I didn't drop one -- I have looked very carefully), and I can't decide whether to rip out until I find it or just increase at a seam and hope it's inconspicuous.

Tonight I'm going, for the second time, to the Providence Stitch and Bitch. Then tomorrow I'm getting together with the friend who originally taught me to knit some five years ago and we're going to spend the day knitting, baking, talking, walking, etc. How womanly and domestic. I can't wait! So expect substantial knitting progress by Monday.

HMC update

2005-03-22T11:23:00.000-05:00

Current status of my Honeymoon Cami. It has taken me two days to do six rows of the twisted eyelet rib, largely because the yarn is very difficult to work with. Easy to split, and unforgiving when it does. There has been much heartache so far, but I expect things to ease up when I get into the stockinette section.

Weekend arrivals!

2005-03-21T23:24:00.000-05:00

The GGH Mystik yarn for my Honeymoon Cami and my Denise Interchangeable Knitting Needles (which come in an adorable case that looks something like a hardcover book -- very nice).

Wheeeeee!

2005-03-21T10:00:00.000-05:00

My Denise Interchangeable Knitting Needles are in my possession! On Saturday morning I got up and, in a preview of what I believed would be the sort of interactions that would be dominating my life for the coming weeks, called the post office and got bounced around from department to department and eventually hung up on. Saturday's mail had already come, so that had made 5 days of no knitting needles since the original delivery attempt. I was mentally preparing myself for the reality of falling hopelessly behind in the Honeymoon Cami Knitalong when...what's that rumbling? Is that a truck coming up the road? Oh, I'm sure it's just a moving van or something. Wait, no, it's a U.S. Mail truck! But the mail already came today?!? Wait...it's stopping...it's stopping in front of our house...the guy is walking toward our door with a small package that looks precisely the right size for a long-awaited set of interchangeable knitting needles...a special delivery just for me!!! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYY!!!

Okay, yes, I am aware that my level of excitement may seem to be out of proportion with this situation, but you have to understand that the backlog of projects that I couldn't start without new needles sizes was like a rushing river pushing against a dam. In this metaphor the dam represents the obstacle presented by my not having my knitting needles. When the dam finally broke (needles arrived), all of a sudden the waters of anticipation rushed over me I was free to start all my wonderful new knitting projects! (NOTE: I promise not to employ any more literary devices in this blog. Clearly I am not trained to handle them.)

So yesterday I finally got to knit numerous gauge swatches for the Honeymoon Cami, fail to get gauge every time, and finally give up and cast on with my best guess anyway. I'm starting over because I got pretty dramatic "ladders" (excess yarn between stitches) at the join on my circular needles on my first couple rows. I'm going to pay more attention to that this time, pulling tighter at that spot and trying a trick I've heard of casting on one extra stitch and then knitting two together the first time around. Pictures soon!

False Hope

2005-03-19T09:56:00.000-05:00

Today I got home and was very, very, very excited and disbelieving to see that my signed delivery slip was no longer on the door and a priority mail package was wedged in the mail slot. Ecstatic (because knitting merchandise can do that, really), I ripped the package open to find...not the knitting needles. Some lovely yarn that I'd forgotten I was expecting, sure, but not the knitting needles, the knitting needles that I NEED to start several projects. That's why they're called NEEDLES. But clearly the post office felt they'd done their job because they'd taken the slip -- the one meant for the other package -- and left this item in return. Sigh. Much hassle is in my future.

To cheer myself up, I will post a picture of the cute baby bucket hat I recently finished from a pattern at Little Turtle Knits with Mission Falls 1824 cotton. I knit the height of the hat shorter than the pattern called for and it still looks a little high for me; I'd decrease that further if I did this pattern again in the future.

Knitting needles lost in the void

2005-03-18T14:22:00.000-05:00

After doing some quick calculations about what it would cost me to buy circular needles in every size and length as I need them over time, I determined it would be prudent to look into an interchangeable needle set. Many of the folks over on the Knitty boards raved about their Denise Interchangeables, so I found some for a good price on e-bay, made PayPal magic happen, and sat back, eagerly anticipating their arrival via USPS Priority Mail.

Monday evening I arrived home from work to find a slip on the door announcing that they'd tried to deliver a package but - lo! - I wasn't home. So I signed the slip where indicated, taped it to the door, and spent what I thought would be my last night with a severe knitting needle shortage.

But then -- nothing on Tuesday. Slip still on the door, no package. Nothing on Wednesday either. So I called the local post office to see if it was waiting there for me (as the slip indicated it would be if I didn't sign it for delivery). After what sounded over the phone like some very non-technological rummaging (they didn't even want my tracking number), I was told they didn't have it and that it was probably with the carrier and I'd get it the next day.

The next day. Nothing. I am now truly desperate to start a new knitting project, but I can't because I don't want to buy the size needles it calls for since I supposedly have a whole set coming. I call the local post office again to no avail and then the main Providence branch. A very nice woman takes all my information, puts me on hold, and then comes back to say she has "walked around the whole building" and doesn't see anything. Umm, okay. I mean, it's true, the package is about the size of a book, so if it had been there, it would have been hard to miss. (Eye roll.) But she was very nice and promised to speak to our carrier and see what he knew.

And now I'm just waiting. For all I know it came today (doubtful), but if it didn't, and they can't find it, I just know it's going to be a long, drawn out process of getting reimbursed and filling out forms and generally doing things that do not involve using my brand new Denise Interchangeable Circular Knitting Needle Set. Grumble.

Archives again...

2005-03-18T10:00:00.000-05:00

Don't worry, there's not THAT much left in the archives, unless I go digging around in the basement for the insanely thick wool socks I made as my very first finished project and the sad misshapen gloves that are my only intentionally unfinished project to date.

This is a photo that doesn't show off very well the Christmas stocking I made for my Dad several years ago. It was an excellent lesson in tension and gauge, in that I did both terribly. I declined to knit a gauge swatch, and the combination of using multiple colors (that is, bringing strands of unused colors along too tightly) and knitting so tightly I had to slide the stitches all the way down to the points of the needles to even be able to work them meant that the body of the stocking didn't have quite the give I was expecting. So I eased up for the rest, maybe a little too much, since the foot/toe turned out HUGE. I mean ridiculously huge. Fortunately the stocking doesn't have to fit anyone (except a pile of small gifts), so my newbie errors didn't result in an unusable project. And my dad loves having the biggest stocking in the family.

This is what the stocking was supposed to look like. If I can find a better photo of my dad's stocking I'll put it up so you can see the difference more clearly.

More Knitting Tools

2005-03-15T19:24:00.000-05:00

An extravagant birthday gift from my wonderful husband -- a knitting needle holder! He got it from the Organized Knitter. I love it!

Opened up. Clearly I have not come close to filling it up yet. You know what that means -- an excuse to buy more needles!

Knitting for Charity

2005-03-15T19:16:00.000-05:00

Current progress on the baby blanket in the works for Project Linus.

Closeup of basketweave

This is my first-ever use of variegated yarn, and I'm not loving it. I mean, I knew I never wanted to use it for clothing (unless the variegation is very very very very very subtle), but I thought for a baby blanket I might give it a try. I do like working with it (it makes it easy to follow my stitches, which has helped me get better at fixing errors and weaving in ends the Knitty way. But I just don't like the way it looks in the finished product. It feels very 70s-ish, though I don't really have enough fashion knowledge to confirm that variegated yarn was popular in the 70s. I guess I just prefer the classic, simple look of single colors. I'd knit this basketweave blanket again, but I'd do it in a solid. And I'm hopeful that the eventual recipient of the blanket feels differently about the yarn than I do.

More from the Archives

2005-03-15T13:39:00.000-05:00

I'm working on getting some photos of more current projects, but for now I'll continue with some from the past. This was my first sweater ever, knitted for our friends' son Charlie. I was happy with how it came out, but I found multi-color knitting very stressful. I finished this sweater about a year and a half ago and I'm only now ready to do the multi-color thing again.

Baby fever + no personal baby plans = lots of baby knitting for others

2005-03-14T17:07:00.000-05:00

A baby sweater I finished for a friend recently. My first cable pattern. I loved cabling! I used Mission Falls 1824 Wool in poppy. You can sort of see the matching hat at the top, too. Both patterns from Knitting for Baby.

Knitting Tools

2005-03-14T15:38:00.000-05:00

My trusty knitting bag, made with Cascade 220 and felted in our not-very-felter-friendly front-load washing machine. It's the diaper bag pattern from Knitting for Baby, but it's doing a nice job holding things other than diapers. I customized it with a bunch of little pockets on the inside for scissors, stitch holders, etc. This is the home base from which all my other knitting projects spring forth.

Knitting Repository

2005-03-14T13:38:00.000-05:00

I have begun this blog for the purpose of cataloging and showing off and basking in my many beloved knitting projects. Expect pictures, musings, and off-topic ramblings. If I can't knit at work, at least I can blog about knitting at work. (That is, I will be at work while blogging about knitting, I won't be blogging about the subject of knitting at work. But you knew that.)