You Just Gotta Keep Knittin'

Brain Storm

2012-01-28T15:38:00.000-08:00

Better than a brain freeze, I suppose.

So, I took this photo of ice-coated chicken wire during the storm on my birthday:

Looks much prettier large and on black over at flickr!

One of my "artistic" shots, the kind that drives my husband nuts-- nothing's in focus. Can't tell what it is. The subject is not dead center... a "flickr" photo which I saved and uploaded yesterday for "Fence Friday" (it immediately went Explore, which is kind of cool, but completely unrelated to the story). I also posted it on my Facebook page, where a friend commented that it looks like something I would make... queue brain storm!

I spent the rest of my day at work yesterday thinking about a cardigan knit in bramble stitch. The minute I walked in the door at home, I broke out my stitch pattern book, balled up a skein of mega soft & drapey Berroco Ultra Alpaca in a light heathered gray color, searched for the cardigan silhouette I had in mind, and cast on for a gauge swatch.

I finished the swatches today at knitting meetup:

Oh, I know. I can already hear you asking... "But Michelle, don't you already have three unfinished sweaters on the needles?"

Yup. And now I'm going to have four! What's your point?

Udate: Uh, make that five. I forgot about one. G'Night...

On Birthdays

2012-01-25T18:45:00.000-08:00

I'm not going to claim that I've even come close yet to wrapping my brain around the fact that I just turned 45. F-o-r-t-y F-i-v-e. The combination of those two numbers together weighs me down with thoughts of "middle aged" and "over the hill" and "way too old to even fake it any more". Maybe it's just me, but it's a heavy number. It even sounds weighty, solid: say it... F-o-r-t-y F-i-v-e... See? Me no likey. On the other hand, there is nothing more deserving of derision in my book than a woman who refuses to age with grace & acceptance. So here I am. Aging gracefully... dammit.

One positive element I'm starting to notice about being here, though, is the increasing (okay frantic) desire to embrace what I love and, conversely, cast off with wild abandon what I don't. Luckily, that is the exact direction in which I am in the process of taking my life, and although it will a bit more time to be in a position to fully embrace "the vision", I'm glad to be well on my way down the road toward it.

My birthday gift to myself.

Haha. I started this post thinking I would share the little knitting bits I gifted myself for my birthday, but now here we are, smack in the middle of contemplating life choices. Told you 45 is heavy. Anyway... as most of you know, I very much love and admire the designer Wendy Bernard, so I finally broke down and purchased Custom Knits 2. One of the things I need to get a better handle on with knitting pattern design is sizing, and specifically, the math involved in raglan designs . I'm hoping this book will help with that. And because you always have to buy enough from Knit Picks to get that free shipping, I also threw in a sampler set of their interchangeable needles and a ball of the Sugarbunny yarn. I have gobs of the Harmonies, which I love, but I alway seem to be short of 24" cords, and I thought it might be fun to try the acrylic tips just to see what they're like. The yarn is 80% Merino & 20% Angora and soft as, well, bunnies. Seriously. Just this side of cashmere soft! A scarf or cowl for myself, maybe, well see.

Truth is it will probably sit in my stash forever before I figure out what it wants to be, but it will be there waiting fore me. Maybe I'll find it when I'm 65 and laugh at the 45 year old me, freaking out over how old I thought I was! Such is life, right?

Right.

Disaster, Disaster, Who Wants a Disaster?

2012-01-23T22:01:00.000-08:00

We seem to have enough to go around here. Luckily not major ones, but still lots to chatter on about. That? That is one of the many small trees, tree tops and large branches that are currently blanketing our back yard in wake of the ice storm that ushered in my 45th birthday! That's right folks, I welcomed the (hopefully) second half of my life by sitting in a dark house knitting by the dim light of the window and listening to the sickening sound of trees breaking under the weight of ice and snow, hoping that nothing big would hit the house. That's the bad news. The good news is that nothing hit the house, the worst we have to deal with is an unbelievable amount of cleanup, the unexpected three days off was a really nice bonus, and all the chickens came through unscathed.

As for the knitting, it was the usual story. I knit a gauge swatch, optimistically guesstimated based on the swatch, and jumped in with both feet. I knit for three days and got past the yoke and into the third stripe (I'm knitting Paulie, in case you're just tuning in), before deciding to A. try it on, and B. check my gauge in "real time", thus ushering in disaster #2. I think it's time for me to face the ugly truth: my purling is irredeemably loose. Like college freshman away from home for the first time loose. I mean really, if I can't face the truth now, when will I face it? It's time to adopt a new wrong side technique: knitting backwards.

Feels just like starting over... because I did!

I've toyed around with knitting backwards before, but after years of struggling with loose gauge because of my purls, I decided to rip out everything on this sweater and restart at the beginning with a new swatch, committed to this new technique... and here's what I discovered: by knitting backwards instead of purling, I hit gauge. Spot on. With the recommended needle size. Bam.

Lesson learned, and hopefully future knitting disasters averted. I don't remember which book it is that urges knitters not to lie to themselves when counting stitches on a swatch-- probably one of the Zimmerman books-- sounds like her, right? Be brutally honest with your gauge, my friends. Brutal honesty is kinder than ripping out the 20% you've completed of a fingering weight long sleeve cardigan!

Some time this week when I have time to get to it, I will post a video to show you what knitting backwards looks like-- it's pretty slick. Imagine never having to look at the wrong side of stockinette again! Just imagine.

And with that, I will leave you with a pretty picture... because even disasters have a sensitive side:

Gosh...

2012-01-11T22:21:00.000-08:00

...do I know anyone who might like these? Anyone at all?

This is Polly & Kate from Dollytime on Etsy. A couple of years back I knit a bunny for Jorie's Easter basket. At the time, she didn't pay much attention to it, but lately she's rediscovered it and has taken to packing it around with her and asking me questions about it:

"Why did you knit a bunny for me, mama?"

"Because I love you and I wanted you to have a squishy bunny."

"But why did it need to be squishy, mama?"

"So you could hug it."

(hugging the bunny) "I love my bunny, mama. Thank you for knitting it for me."

So flippin' SWEET!!!

Only three months until some little princess's birthday!

I'm thinking maybe these dollies for my dolly...

Next Up at SOBO

2012-01-09T18:05:00.000-08:00

In case you didn't know, Sherrill & I run a little group over at Ravelry for knitters who obsessively knit vests and cardigans-- Sleeves Off & Buttons On. We'll be running a KAL from January 15th through March 31st for the Paulie cardigan:

(lots more photos & projects on Ravelry, of course!)

Guess what yarn I will be using? In case anyone remembers that insane Fair Isle jacket I thought I might knit & purchased all the yarn for last year? Yeah, that! Haha! How I ever thought for a moment that I could find the time in my crazy life to concentrate on something that complicated, I'll never know-- wishful thinking or insane fugue state, take your pick. Thank goodness yarn is versatile.

Light gray Paulie with dark purple stripes, you'll be sweater number four for 2012! With any luck, they will all be knit up and ready to wear by 2013! (Yeah, yeah... save your snarky comments, my friends!)

Can Spring Be Far Behind?

2012-01-08T11:38:00.000-08:00

O, wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
~Percy Bysshe Shelley

Well, Mr. Shelley, one can only hope.

Yesterday I started on a little spring project for my girl using the Girlie Girl dress pattern-- a tunic top in impossibly sunny colors. It will have flutter sleeves edged with the feather & fan lace pattern. These variations are included in the pattern, but nobody has knit it up yet, so I thought maybe I should.

The girl is quite excited.

She does love a pretty thing to wear!

Pattern Bundles

2012-01-07T12:21:00.000-08:00

Happy Saturday! Wanted to mention that I recently bundled some of my knitting patterns together for reduced prices. The Granola Girl Bundle, in particular, is a great combo, as those two patterns together can outfit a girl with little tops, dresses, shorts, pantaloons & pants in many, many combinations! Click on either one of the pictures below to got to Ravelry for lots more info!

Thanks for stopping by!

$9.50

$11.50

Adorable Orange Girlie Girl!

2012-01-04T17:50:00.000-08:00

I've been spending a bit of time lately adding some pattern bundles to my Ravelry store & just generally cleaning things up & taking a look at completed projects & such. Today I ran across the cutest version of my Girlie Girl dress knit by Carmi-L!

See? I would never think to knit this in a solid color, but I just love the sunny orange combined with the aqua tie. Simply adorable!

Now that the holidays are over and the Northwest winter grays have really set in for the long haul, a project like this in warm, summer colors may be just the thing!

Happy knitting, my friends!

Come visit me on Ravelry to see all of my patterns, more pictures & completed projects.

Knitting Everest or... I Must Have Lost My Mind!

2011-01-19T19:04:00.000-08:00

Bought this Book:

Discovered this Pattern:

Bought this Yarn:

Knit this Much So Far:

Yup. I've completely lost my mind. Must be the age... I turned 44 today!

If you care to keep up, Rav page here. I will also be posting monthly updates on Sherrill's podcast, The Belle of The Ball.

Cheers!

Another Snow Day Accomplishment!

2010-11-28T19:58:00.000-08:00

We should have nine days off school for Thanksgiving more often; I've been very productive! Today I completely finished & was able to model my new skirt for photos:

I am so, so pleased with how this turned out! I know I will wear it often, and I'm pretty sure I will be knitting another soon. The pattern is The Little Flirt Skirt, and it calls for Cascade 220, which is what I used.

Next up? I think I've finally found a sweater that my 6 skeins of Dream In Color Classy wants to be. This is my third try with this yarn, including a completed sweater that was frogged and a stalled Amelia Cardigan. So far, so good on this pattern, the Tea Leaves Cardigan. Here's a detail shot of the yoke, which I have now finished along with the short rows I added to the back:

The only problem with all this productive knitting you may ask? Well, the snow is melted & it's back to work for me tomorrow! I guess it just couldn't last forever. Come on snow!!! ;)

Sweater Babes

2010-11-22T15:08:00.000-08:00

Cobblestone Pullover by Jarod Flood:

Pose: Take the picture, woman!

Pose: Squirrel?!

Pose: I'm Superman!

Started: January 1, 2009

Finished: November 10, 2010

Lucy's Sweater improvised by me:

Started: November 22, 2010

Finished: November 22, 2010

Well, hello, strangers!

2010-11-15T18:59:00.000-08:00

It's getting to be the time of year when I really start questioning my commitment to the whole working outside the home routine. Truly, a cozy fire, clean folded laundry put away in actual drawers, and steady progress on my knitting projects would be a fine change about now. I have five days home coming up shortly, however, so hopefully I can settle in for some fire/laundry/knitting time very, very soon!

Last weekend I was miraculously able to escape with my knitting buddies for a field trip to Port Gamble, where we parked ourselves for hours of knitting at The Artful Ewe-- the most picturesque & cozy (there's that word again!), and inviting yarn/fiber shop I have ever encountered! I immediately regretted not bringing my camera-- but the pictures in my mind will remain until we visit again. What a lovely, lovely day!

Since the kiddos were at grandma's & I was able to knit pretty much uninterrupted for many hours straight, I finished two projects that have been hanging around unfinished for awhile: the girlie's Swing Thing, and the man's Cobblestone Pullover. The swing coat had only been on the needles since the spring, but, oh my, the man's sweater was going on two years! It is like a huge weight off to be finished with that project, although I'm sure the man is a little disappointed that his favorite jibe has been taken off the table ("It sure is cold. It sure would be nice if I had a sweater to wear!) The best part is that it actually fits him! It's blocking & very slowly drying in the cool of the garage, but the girlie's sweater coat is completely done & ready to wear:

It is knit from Peace Fleece-- Antarctic White, Perestroika Pink, and a skein of artisan dyed that I've had in my stash since the boy was just a baby (he's 5 now and would probably not deign to wear wool pants, even if I wanted to knit a pair that large!). After I completed it, I washed it in the washer & dried it in the dryer to felt it somewhat (as much as Peace Fleece felts, that is). It is fuzzy & warm and, well, cozy! Cherry wood buttons from South4th Woodcraft... in case you're in need of buttons or beautiful shawl pins.

If I'm lucky, the man will cooperate for some sweater pics later this week. In the meantime, Happy Knitting!

Adorable Variation

2010-10-04T19:18:00.000-07:00

My dear friend Cat sent me some pics today of a rainbow striped version of the Girlie Girl dress she knit up for one of the sweet girlie girls in her life.

Pretty darned adorable, if you ask me!

Who Knew?!

2010-09-15T16:52:00.000-07:00

You all knew, didn't you?! You were just keeping the information from me for my own good, right? You must have known about this completely awesome concept ...

Yarn Support!!!

See this:

My Pea Patch Diaper Soaker pattern has been approved for Knit Picks' Independent Designer Program. They asked me what yarn I thought might work best for the pattern, and I told them the hand dyed bulky with a coordinating solid for the waist and leg ribbing would be really pretty. Today I came home to a box filled with SIX skeins of beautiful yarn to "try out."

OMG... my new business venture makes boxes of free yarn appear on my doorstep. I can see why no one was sharing this small detail with me. Well, I can't fault you for trying, but the gig's up, folks. Sorry!

Now, is there anything you want to tell me about
needle support?!

Kids + knitting left out + Mom at work = Disaster!

Whining

2010-08-31T23:21:00.000-07:00

You know what I dislike most about working? It cuts into my knitting time. Seriously. And while I could probably pull it off, I doubt that my principal would appreciate me working on projects while teaching. Can't you just picture it? "Hold that thought about symbolism, Joey, I just dropped a stitch!"

I've knit at red lights while driving. At the movies. Waiting at the doctor's office. Okay, okay, I probably won't try knitting while teaching. Sigh.

/whine

Here's a pic of some yummy baby llama yarn my friend Bri had with her when she came to visit the other day. Not my yarn, but the colors were so pretty & the yarn was so soft, I had to take a picture of it anyway! :) When did that harvest gold/puke green color start to look refreshing again? Weird how that happens. I guess once the Goodwill clears out all of the curtains & fridges in that color it becomes magically renewed? It's a mystery.

Happy Knitting!

So, in Case You Haven't Noticed...

2010-08-30T09:03:00.000-07:00

Look Ma, I'm past the waist shaping... again! *

I've kind of been creeping back over here since announcing my grand retirement from blogland oh so many.... month ago. What have I been doing with my off-line time? Well, I'm sure you can guess! You may call it knitting and designing; I call it planning for my early retirement! Yup. The man has finally set a firm deadline for when I can gracefully exit from my day job-- two years. Two years, people! That's a veritable blink of an eye in my profession! I can already taste it... nummy (as Sherrill would say!)

Anyway, now that I've successfully survived the self-publishing process and found a skilled & experienced patternist to work with me in my designing endeavors, I am just buzzing with ideas! At this point, my plan is to use this blog to share some of those ideas along the way & to offer my creations as they become ready. Bottom line: more knitting/designing content, less life blather & other bloggish type filler.

Hope you'll stick around & drop me a comment now & then!

*In progress: A long cardigan for what could be a long winter! (Knit Picks City Tweed HW in Snowshoe)

Interview with Me!

2010-08-22T18:45:00.000-07:00

I’m such a celebrity, ha! My dear knitting friend & fellow Grahamite, Sherrill, interviewed me for her podcast this week. In the interview I talk about discovering the difference between a tech editor & a patternist & the awesome free testing resources available on Ravelry, among other newbie designer bits. If you’re so inclined, have a listen. :)

Another baby/children's knitting pattern will be up & running soon. Here's a sneak peak:

A Year for Pickles

2010-06-28T08:48:00.000-07:00

This entry is cross-posted at The Living Senses for week four of Heather's Go Local! series for 2010.

I finally got around to sorting through the storage box of snapshots that I've been storing in the garage for years. Among the jumbled bits of my life ranging from the 1970's to the early 2000's, when we finally purchased our first digital camera, I found one of the many, many notes & letters that my grandmother sent to me through the years. This one is dated August 24 and mentions a visit from me and my oldest son's father, but does not mention my son, so it must be from before he was born-- 1993 or so. In it, my grandmother writes, Getting ready to pick cucumbers before they get too humungous. So pickling is in my future-- today or tomorrow.

Me, my oldest son (now 15), and my grandfather digging potatoes in his garden.

When I was eight or so, my grandparents moved from a neighborhood in Seattle, where they had a small vegetable garden, to a five acre piece of land directly across the road from Sequim Bay in Blynn, Washington, where they tended two large gardens, a small collection of fruit trees, a greenhouse, and kept goats and chickens.

My head is filled with many vivid memories of dinners made entirely of local goodies-- decadent crab salads with just-picked lettuce, tomatoes & peppers from the greenhouse, fresh cracked Dungeness crab harvested from the local bay by my grandfather, barbecued salmon or halibut, also fresh caught with his boat, steamed new potatoes & sweet baby peas from the garden, strawberry shortcake for dessert made from the sweetest, most delectable berries picked just that day from the front yard plot.

Picking raspberries in my grandparent's garden with my oldest son.

I never thought to ask my grandparents why they grew so much food so abundantly, what, exactly, inspired them to create their own mini-farm after living in the city for so many years, but their bounty filled both my parent's and my pantry for years, as going for a visit always meant coming home with bags full of food-- frozen peas & corn & green beans, hunks of fresh caught fish frozen in blocks of ice, fresh eggs, jams made from home grown berries & fruits, and always, jars & jars of grandma's dill pickles.

We all relied on those pickles being in the kitchen. Chopped up, they were a crucial ingredient in our tuna sandwiches, our pickle & cheese sandwiches, sliced on hamburgers, absolutely essential to our potato salad, the tiny ones saved and put out on the table to eat during special occasion dinners. The tiny ones my grandfather deigned to leave the house, that is; he kept the tiniest of tiny pickles for his own stash!

As a little girl, I would fish pickles out of the jar that was always in the fridge, wrap one in a paper towel, and eat it out of hand as a snack, one after the other. My grandmother often referred to me as "the pickle face kid". My older son did much the same when he was a little boy. For at least 20 years, my grandmother supplied us all with unending jars of dill pickles, often growing all of the cucumbers in her garden, except for those years when the weather gods drove her to the local farmers to fill the rows of quart jars that always lined her pantry shelves.

The original pickle maker!

I am the pickle maker now, although no one expects me to supply an entire extended family with salty cucumbers the entire year through. Looking back on it, it must have been a tremendous amount of work (although I hope not a burden!) to keep us all supplied. I only remember helping a couple of times with the production-- pickle season coming, as it does, in the early fall when I would have been starting a new school year, preoccupied with school clothes shopping and the like.

But I learned enough in those few sessions, and from looking on over the years, to still hear my grandmother's voice while I pack jars with obstreperous cukes, put the large ones at the bottom and the smaller ones at the top, doing my best to pack 'em in there, putting together a compact puzzle of rubbery fruits that do not want to bend to the shape of the inflexible glass jars. Boiling the brine & pouring it into the spaces left between. Screwing on the caps, but not too tight, finger tight, and submerging them into the boiling water. I think about my grandmother and her garden and all of the wonderful, fresh food she bestowed upon her family, handing over her love in armfuls of produce in doubled up brown paper bags, in jars and in freezer bags, and in never ending quarts of amazing sour, spicy pickles. I think about my grandmother, while I wait for the lids to pop, sealing tight.

I opened up our last jar of pickles that I put up a couple of years ago yesterday. This year will be a year for pickles. Here is our recipe:

(the numbers in parentheses indicate the amounts for a triple batch)

Knitting Updates & Cece for My Mom!

2010-06-23T10:36:00.000-07:00

Hello. I've been mostly working on organizing my stash this week (yes, it's taken the entire week!), and I'll be sharing details about that project tomorrow, but I have made some progress on my two knitting projects, Splash! and Swing Thing.

During last week's knitting meetup, I managed to finish the back of Splash! On Swing Thing, I'm up to the place where I can slip the sleeve stitches to scrap yarn.

I've been practicing a new technique on Swing Thing, knitting backwards! I'm very excited about learning to do this, as it completely eliminates the need to purl! Also, my tension is much more even knitting backwards compared to turning and purling across. So glad I decided to try it! Want to see how it's done? Here's a video:

Amazingly cool, right?

Also, I want to share some possible upcoming projects. Recently I purchased a Berroco pattern booklet. I've never bought one or really even wanted one before, but I'm sure you'll understand why I practically broke my fingers making sure this issue (#303) was in the mail to me!

Puleez... Little girl, tweedy yarn, seamless patterns, rubber boots & chickens! For pete's sake, you think your life is unique & then a knitting pattern booklet goes and makes it obvious that you're just a demographic. Ah, well, it's a happy niche to be living in, anyway.

Oh, and there's some patterns for mama in there to. This one's my favorite:

Did I mention that the yarn in these patterns, Remix, is all recycled fiber? Yeah... Okay. I'll wrap it up. I know you probably have some shopping to do now!

Here's the yarn.

Here's the booklet!

* * * *
ETA: Oh crap! I just realized I forgot to share pics of my mom wearing CeCe! It fit her perfectly & she seems to love it. Enjoy:

This was her reaction when I mentioned that she looks more & more like grandma every year! Heh.

Peace Fleece Soaker Kits and Naturally Dyed Yarn Now Available!

2010-06-17T17:19:00.000-07:00

I didn't even know these were up yet, but someone on Ravelry posted about them and I received one of those, "are your ears burning?" messages. Check it out. Yes, that is my Pea Patch Soaker pattern (which I edited and updated with their tech editor's help) being offered in their kits! Kinda cool, n'est pas?

I love Peace Fleece, and I'm so honored that they asked to used my pattern. The naturally dyed yarn looks delicious, don't you think?

Gauge... or Making a Monkey out of Me

2010-06-02T08:39:00.000-07:00

image from We Heart It

My goodness. Is it really Wednesday already?! Eek. Not that I'm complaining. The faster the next two weeks go, the better, as far as I (and every other ~~ring master~~ teacher on the face of the earth) am concerned. Ever been in a classroom full of teenagers mere days before summer commences? Imagine a... cage full of crazed monkeys. On meth. Now toss in lots of impulsive profanity. And hormones. Yeah... fun times.

I realized yesterday that I failed to mention that I've been knitting this really beautiful short sleeved lace cardigan for my mom! Silly me! How could I do that? Well, I didn't realize I was knitting it for my mom until I finished sewing all the seams, weaving in all the stray ends, soaking it, and blocking it. Then I measured across the chest. 48". Yup. It's for my mom. Who knew?!

I, honestly, have no idea how this happened. I knit a gauge swatch and seemed to get a reasonable proximity to gauge. I knit the 38" size. I used size 5 needles, a full two sizes down from what is recommended for the yarn. I even used a lighter weight yarn than the pattern calls for! I know I followed the pattern exactly. You don't have much choice, as the lace won't work out right if you don't.

The only conclusion that I can come to is that the universe wanted me to knit a nice sweater for my dear mother. So there you have it. It is done. Love you mom! I'll be sure to post some nice FO shots when I give it to her.

Moving on... I am consoling myself by knitting an adorable sweater coat for the girlie. I've had Swing Thing in my favorites list for about two years now, and I suddenly decided that I must cast on for it a couple of days ago. Of course I'm knitting it from Peace Fleece; it's comforting to work with & the gauge never surprises me (and, it's the recommenced yarn!).

The yarn I'm using for the yoke was hand dyed by Alphabette Zoope in the Beach Pebbles colorway. The body of the sweater will be knit in Antarctic White, which is basically undyed Peace Fleece, and I will be doing the yoke embellishments and the monkey's fist buttons & loops in Perastroika (hot) Pink. I love all these colors together, and I'm hoping it ends up looking funky & cute, not too busy. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

I'm also hoping that I'm not unknowingly knitting a sweater coat for my sister or something, but who really knows. I'm sure my sister would be thrilled!

Random Bits of the Day

2010-05-19T12:55:00.000-07:00

CeCe, this little lace cardigan I'm working on will have short sleeves. That means that once I knit it up to the armholes, I will just have little bitty sleeves to knit & attach to the body and the yoke to finish. Yay! I suddenly realized this while driving home today. Random, I know.

The kids at my school are a pain in my ass much of the time & their low test scores may eventually cost me my job, but it's still fun to listen to them read their poetry. They've been learning about similes and metaphors over the last few weeks & they are having so much fun using (and abusing!) their new-found word skills in poetry. Sure, I've heard one too many not in the least subtle odes to "Mary Jane," but at least they're having fun with words. My favorite lines from the day:

My heart is like stone,
but beneath the rough edges
it is as brittle as glass.
It breaks at a touch.

That no-knead bread recipe? It is so amazing! Somehow I fell out of the habit of making this, but our 4th loaf in four days is in the oven right now & the boys have been scarfing it down with wild abandon.

Homemade bread is really good dipped in homemade baked beans. Here's my favorite recipe: All Day Boston Baked Beans. If it seems that I've suddenly been cooking a lot lately, you're correct. Actually, the pasta attachments for the Kitchenaid stand mixer are starting to call to me like a siren's song. Anyone have these? What do you think?

I could spend ALL of my disposable income on Etsy. I recently discovered my new favorite jewelry artist, nekedesigns & I have to restrain myself from buying new bobbles daily.

Here's me today in a pair of her earrings:

Holy white hair, Batman!

And here's the name necklace I picked out for baby girl's upcoming birthday. 14 inches with a 2" expander, so she can wear it forever, if she wants to.

And finally, a little knitting humor:I LOVE this!

Ciao.

Tangent

2010-05-12T13:01:00.000-07:00

Yeah... this is not a re-cast on of the Vine Yoke Cardigan, the sweater for the current SOBO KAL, which I realized was turning out way too big and had to be frogged. Neither is this Buttercup, which I mentioned as my next project a post or so ago. This is CeCe by Chick Knits! You know, knitting is the one area of my life where I do not have to make carefully orchestrated plans two weeks ahead based on everyone else's schedules, and where I do not even have to follow the plans I made with my own danged self if I don't feel like it.

A couple of days ago I felt a sudden desire for a short sleeve, lace cardigan. Then I remembered I have a whole bag of Rowan Cashcotton that Sherrill gave me last year, so I knit a gauge swatch, and viola, a new project is on the needles. I'm even learning how to not feel guilty about frogging projects for which the passion has waned. Life is short. Yarn can be reused.

So far so good. We'll see how I feel about this lace once I've dropped a few yo's on the purl side. Wish me luck!

P.S. Why yes, that is my new baby in the background! Ah, love...

Knit and Crochet Week: Day 7

2010-05-02T09:27:00.000-07:00

*If you would like to enter my Favorite Things Giveaway for a chance to win a skein of O-Wool Balance, one of my favorite yarns featured below, click on the button at the top of the page! *

* * * * *

Anyone who is a regular around her already knows what my first yarn choice for today's topic is going to be.... drum roll, please....

Peace Fleece. Love the colors, both cheery & earthy. Love the wooliness. Love how the mohair blooms after it's washed. Love how it wears like iron & barely even pills or felts. Love the price. Love the company. Even love the smell & the little bits of vegetable matter in it that reminds me of where it came from! If you want to see all my posts that mention Peace Fleece or show FO's using this yarn, click here.

The two variegated skeins are hand dyed. The three skeins on the bottom from the left are Samantha/Katya Pink, Siberian Midnight, and Georgia Rose.

My love must have radiated out into the universe or something, because Peace Fleece has asked me to allow them to use my diaper soaker pattern in a kit that is now in the final stages of production. Did I mention that the kit will include an exclusive line of naturally dyed yarn? Love.

My second choice of favorite yarn is O-Wool. I've knit projects with the classic worsted wool, which is both hefty & soft and does not pill... at all, and Balance, which is 50/50 wool & cotton. I love them both for completely different reasons.

The wool is substantial and warm and comes in beautiful, saturated colors. The boy's snowflake hat is knit from this yarn. Over the year & a half he's been wearing it, it has not pilled, felted, stretched out, faded, or done anything except look almost exactly as it did the day it came off my needles.

Balance on the left.
Classic worsted on the right.

I've also knit a hat from the Balance, and while it did stretch substantially over time, but the trade off was a soft, breathable, spring-weight hat that always looked fittingly "granola" with its slubs of cotton and rustic vibe. Washing and reshaping helped the hat regain its shape somewhat. I also used this yarn to knit the girlie's Leaf Yoke Cardigan, and it turned out beautifully in this yarn.

I guess my only reservation about O-Wool is that it's so doggone expensive! Since it's organic, this is to be expected, but still. I like to cruise yarn that people have for sale on Ravelry. I've found some great deals that way, and I've also received several skeins as gifts. If it's in your budget, I would definitely recommend this yarn!

* * * * *

Wow, it's been some week, huh?! And, I made it! Participating in the first Knit and Crochet Blog Week has been a blast! The topics were engaging & fun to write about; hopefully I made the best of each. I know I put a lot more effort into my posts during the course of this event, which is probably why I'm also happy that is is only a one week affair. Phew. Now I hope you'll pardon me while we return to my usual ramblings and semi-inspired commentary.

The best thing about this week is that I've gotten a chance to meet some new blog friends, and my readership has jumped as well. Thank you to everyone who has visited & commented this week, new friends and, not necessarily old, but experienced, friends alike!

Knit and Crochet Week: Day 6

2010-05-01T07:08:00.000-07:00

When you have long haired little boy, hats are your friends. They are a no-drama alternative to a brush & a pony when you don't have 20 minutes to waste getting a boy into the car or when you just cannot face the screaming & the tears.

Following is a short list of the boy's favorite hat buddies over the years. There have been others, but these were the ones he loved (and still loves) the best:

The Peace Fleece beanie. Knit November 2007. Since deemed "too scratchy" (*sob*) and subsequently retired. I've written about this hat's journey before.

The spring-weight beanie. Knit February 2008 from O-Wool Balance. This hat was a favorite for over a year. The yarn is lovely & soft & breathable, but it does stretch a bit over time. Sometimes we called this his "rasta hat" because it started to look so droopy in the back after awhile.

The best loved snowflake hat. Knit November 2008 from O-Wool worsted this time, this ear flap hat has been the favorite hat for a year & a half and shows no signs of being overtaken. I've knit other hats for the boy since then, but this is the one he wants to wear, rain or shine!

Santa Train, December 2009

Papa's birthday dinner, March 2010

This is an fantastic pattern btw, which I've written about & knit several times before. It works by plugging in your stitch & row gauge, and the generator creates a unique pattern based on your numbers. It is also knit in one piece using short rows-- my favorite kind of knitting!

Since the boy says he is never cutting his hair (and never moving out of mama & papa's house... this he informed me of last night), I imagine there will be many more hats coming off my needles in the years to come.

knitcroblo6

Knit and Crochet Week: Day 5

2010-04-30T08:05:00.000-07:00

I've knit in the car, perched on a stool in my kitchen, standing up, lounging on the couch, and propped up in my hospital bed after the girlie was born, but my favorite place to knit is in my 1940's era upholstered rocking chair.

Shortly after we moved here. The little boy was one or so, and the older boy was eleven! See the knitting bag & the basket of yarn in the background?

My mom & I found this chair at a barn sale in Oregon back in the summer of... 1991? I remember she got kind of cranky about the whole affair because we tried to put it in the trunk of her new red Volvo, and when it wouldn't really fit, I still wanted to bring it home. We bungeed the trunk closed & she fretted about her precious car getting scratched or scraped up all the way home (love you, ma)!

Me and the girlie shortly after returning from the hospital. We spent a lot of time in my chair sleeping, nursing, and recovering from her entrance into the world. She's wearing one of the baby hats I knit for her while waiting for the big day!

It was only five or so years ago that I could finally afford to have it reupholstered-- until then the seat was sunken, the looped, mauve pink fabric was worn through in spots, and it squeaked something terrible when you rocked in it. Now it has newer fabric, the seat has been plumped up, and it still squeaks like the devil!

Here's the little stinker 9 months or so later using my chair to pull up to standing.

I've rocked two babies to sleep to that incessant creak, and sometimes now the two of them will cuddle up in it & sit together peacefully, but mostly they fight over who gets to claim it & try to both fit in next to me while I'm sitting there. You see it's not just my knitting chair; it's everyone's favorite chair!

The kiddos and their cousin last Christmas. My chair & knitting corner are back there on the right.

I have a lamp clipped on to the shelf next to it so I can see my stitches while I'm working on projects, and all of my knitting needles & books are right there on the bookshelf within reach, but the man still sometimes tries to lay claim to my chair by settling down & using my lamp to read his newspaper!

The girlie (and her knit bunny) resting in my chair the evening after visiting the E.R. for her broken collar bone.

So there you have it. The story of "my" knitting chair. I hope you enjoyed reading it. Thanks for stopping by!

knitcroblo5

Knit and Crochet Week: Day 4

2010-04-29T07:52:00.000-07:00

A related skill or craft I would like to learn. Well, I've already written about color work, so let me show you what I know about crochet:

Oh, and there's this:

And this:

And how could we forget this?

Do you see a trend here in my hooking skillz? Yup. Shell stitch edging and crochet chain about sum it up.

What's stopping me from crocheting the likes of this? Well, it took me almost five years to acquire the knitting skills I have now, and I already feel like I don't have enough time to knit the things I want to knit. If I devote a bunch more time to learning to crochet, then that's even less time for knitting! Plus... crochet uses so much yarn!

But as Dear Abby once inquired of someone who wrote in asking if they should start medical school at the age of 42... if you don't start now, where will you be in four years?

Right here, my friends, with my shell stitch and my crochet chain, that's where.

knitcroblo4

Knit and Crochet Week: Day 3

2010-04-28T09:29:00.000-07:00

Knitters whose work I admire... isn't that the purpose of Ravelry? To suck hours & hours from my life admiring the work of others? Okay, so here goes another hour...

Although I admire many, many knitters on Ravelry whom I do not actually know in that thing we call "real life", I do know one who impresses the bejeebuz out of me whom I have the pleasure of chatting with on a semi-regular basis. Face to face chatting. Like, at the same table! She comes to our local knitting group (at least she does when her hubby has not just come home from deployment!), and many, many times she has pulled projects out of her bag to show that just cause everyone to stop, sit back, and admire. With mouth wide open & some kind of sound like, "Oooooh... aaaahhh..." issuing forth. This person is Marian, aka prelapsaria on Ravelry. (Side note-- I am an English teacher. I can figure out any vanity license plate or username known to man. I cannot figure out your Rav name, woman! What does it mean???)*

That's her self-designed cupcake scarf she's munchin' on there.

Not only is Marian skilled with the needles beyond reasonable-ness, she designs many of her own projects. See, that's the kicker. Not only can she execute a man-sized sweater knit with dk yarn in a week, she can also chart out and then knit intricate color work designs...

Suprise sweater for her husband.

not to mention little lace & cable tops & dresses that she then models for her project pages (with her hip, neat, kid-less abode as the perfect backdrop I might add)...

Grape Knee-High

(fav'd 85 times)

Sigh... were any of us really ever that young and that thin?

Estonian Lace Tank Dress

(fav'd 291 times)

A couple of meetups back she pulled this thing out of her tote that turned out to be the cutest little pineapple bag...

Psychapple!

"Where'd you find the pattern for that?!" we all exclaimed. Her response? "Oh, I just kind of made it up." She always says this. I just made it up as I went along. And she says it sincerely, humbly, her awe shucks tone suggesting, "Really, it's no big deal; anyone could do it!", which about sends the rest of us marching with out projects & our needles to the nearest dumpster worthy of them. But we love her anyway, because she is also the sweetest, smiliest, giggliest knitter in the group.

So here's to you, Marian. Please spell my name right when you autograph your book of amazing knitting patterns someday (Yes, that means start taking notes, missy!).

Chainmail Cropped Cardi

(fav'd 149 times)

*ETA: Thanks, AndiPants! Obviously I'm a little lacking in the area of Bible studies.

knitcroblo3

Knit and Crochet Week: Day 2

2010-04-27T08:32:00.000-07:00

The topic today is patterns that we aspire to knit someday. I've put together a collection from my Ravelry favorites that all have one skill in common: color work! I've altered patterns & designed my own, I've knit cables & bobbles many times, but stranded color work is still the skill I have not yet mastered. I've played around with it in a few baby hats, but when I've tried larger projects, the tension gets me every time. Someday, though, someday I will be able to knit these sweaters:

The Red Hot Knitter's Vintage Star Cardigan
This one is particulary impressive to me, as she modified a vintage pattern so that this sweater was knit all in one piece from the top down. Be still my heart!

Paper Dolls by Kate Davis
Yes, I am 43. Yes, I would wear this! Swoon.

Neiman by Ann Weaver
From Knitty. I'm not alone on this one... it's in 1,482 queues!

Kessanlin's Stormie
This project has been fav'd 159 times. Kessalin's work is gorgeous. So is her photography. And... she looks to weigh about a buck and a half, so everything looks stunning on her!

Sheep Yoke Baby Cardigan by aivap15
Weep. This pattern only goes up to size 24 mos, so if I ever do knit it for the girlie, I will not only be tackling fair isle and intarsia, I will also be sizing up the pattern! Think she'll wear this in junior high?!

Velveeta's Tenderness
Rowan. Martin Storey. Intarsia. Need I say more?

I know what I need to take on these skills-- practice, practice & more practice. A quiet room and hours to myself wouldn't hurt either... so get back to me when I'm about 72!

knitcroblo2

Knit and Crochet Week: Day 1

2010-04-26T08:35:00.000-07:00

Hello knitters! As it happens, I have already written about how & why I learned to knit here on my blog-- my story is always available at the top of the page and includes some knitting resources I find valuable as well as a link to the ever popular Pea Patch Diaper Soaker pattern.

I humbly submit to you, my knitting story. Thanks for visiting!

knitcroblo1

Strawberry Fields Forever

2010-04-14T09:19:00.000-07:00

Home sick today-- cold + insomnia = sick day.

I was tooling around in my blog reader this morning, waiting for confirmation that my classes would be covered today, and came across this post. What a poignant story she discovered with that photo! I was going to participate in the challenge, but after spending a little time on flickr using the search year 1976, I came up against the issue I've always had with flickr & the reason I have all of my photos set to private. It feels creepy to go sifting through someone else's old family photos. When I first moved all of my digital pics from my computer to flickr, messages started arriving in my inbox with comments from random people. One girl wanted permission to post pictures of my babies on her blog. Uh, no. Now, I realize that anything I post on line is pretty much public property once it's up, but it just feels really weird to me to have all of my personal pictures-- naked kids in the wading pool... me getting a belly cast... etc.-- out there for the whole world to rifle through and comment on. It's just me, I know.

But, in looking through other people's faded & yellowed snapshots from 1976, I realized that I would rather post a personal picture from that time. This little snapshot brings back so many memories for me. This must have been December 1974 or 1975, as my brother was not in the picture. He was born in August of 1976. My parents were still together (did anyone's marriage survive the '70's?!). They divorced in 1978, I believe. My father is on the far left & my mother is next to him. Sitting on the floor is my grandfather (a "hippie" logger!), and my grandmother is sitting next to me on the couch. She died in 1994 of ovarian cancer at what seems more and more every day like the shockingly young age of 64. We all still miss her terribly and keep her hand stitched quilts around us to remember her by.

My memories from childhood are kind of like this photo-- fuzzy & fading & framed in a warm glow. Life was sweet. I was the only grandchild for many years, and was spoiled wonderfully. It was Christmas and the men wore big boots & drank Rainier or Oly Beer in amber glass bottles. The women wore their hair straight & long & drank sweet wine from frosted glasses. Macrame & crochet were cool, man. All my hopes & dreams could be found between the pages of the Sears & Roebuck Christmas Wish Book. My whole life stretched out ahead of me & I didn't have a care in the world. It's pretty amazing how children manage to kind of skim above the bad stuff, 'cause I know now there must have been lots of bad stuff going on, both in the world and in our family. But to a little girl with long blond hair, buck teeth and bell bottom jeans, the whole world was strawberry fields forever!

Easter Baskets? Check!

2010-04-04T01:03:00.000-07:00

It's 1 am. Grumpasaurus ("Grumpalus", as the man likes to call him), is finished! The girlie's bunny is naked, but I did remember to put a tail on her at least! A dress can come later. To all my crunchy friends: shield your eyes! Commercial cartoon products and refined sugar (and I think a couple of plastic doodads made in-- eek-- China!) ahead. Forgive me. Hopefully the hand knit toys & the natural baskets & paper grass I reuse year after year will help mitigate the offenses.

Anyway, without further sarcasm, may I present Monsieur Grumpalus:

And a two basket shot for the full effect:

Amazing how a couple of Easter baskets can so perfectly capture the personalities of the recipients. Heh.

Now, off to bed with me. I have a ham to get in the oven in the morning!

Pretty Sweet

2010-03-30T09:08:00.001-07:00

Did I mention that it's spring break this week? I love staying home. The pace is so relaxed. I have the time & the energy to keep things picked up around here, to plan meals, to bake.... to stay up until midnight and finish bunnies. She still needs a name and a dress & bloomers, but I'm putting her aside for now so I can knit the boy's Grumpasaurus. If I don't get the bunny's outfit finished, it's not a tragedy. She's pretty cute naked, don't you think? She turned out very floppy & huggable, and much cuter than I feared she might while I was working on the pieces.

Olive? Lupine? Hmmm... what do you think?

Bunny Love

2010-03-09T08:47:00.000-08:00

Project for a birthday girl's Easter basket:I chose this one because of the dress-- she will be light gray with a cotton candy pink & pale gray striped dress & black shoes. Click on the pic to go to Mary Jane's Tea Room on Etsy.

At Long Last-- Sweater Pics!

2010-02-27T15:08:00.000-08:00

Sherrill was kind enough to put up with my modeling today & take some shots of my latest sweater. I've worn it quite a lot already, and you can see the pills fuzzing up if you look close. Nonetheless, I'm happy with the way this one turned out, especially happy with the top down, "set in" sleeves-- a technique I imagine I will be using a lot from here on out!The yarn is Knit Picks' Wool of the Andes Kettle Dyed that I snagged on sale for $1.99/skein or something like that. A little bit of annoying pooling/striping going on, but not enough to not be able to get over it for that price!

Right now I'm on the home stretch with the man's Cobblestone Pullover, which is a miracle! I cast on for it January 2009, and this is my third try to get it right. Hopefully it will fit this time. As for me, I'm ready to knit something spring-y, and I've have yarn for this sweater, Buttercup, sitting in my stash waiting since last summer to be knit up. Cute, right?! The yarn I will probably use is a linen & silk blend in a pale mossy green color.

Oh, and, yes, I am blogging on my NEW COMPUTER!!! It is so awesome. I cannot even tell you! I love it so very much!!! Everything works. Everything is seamless. Everything is fast & clean & it's sleek and, oh, I just love it so! The Snow Leopard operating system is just dreamy-- Apple has outdone themselves this time. The whole system has been whittled down to one elegant presentation. The doc contains the finder, system preferences, dashboard, trash, any applications you want to put there and two folders-- applications & documents. That's it. So clean. So elegant. No redundancy or confusion or disorder. I will never, ever, ever, ever, buy a windows machine again. Ever.

Evah.

Knit Hats & Fun with Rubber Boots

2010-02-15T15:51:00.000-08:00

I'm a pretty serious homebody during the winter. Even when it's sunny out, I'm hard pressed to drag myself outside until it's really and truly spring. I finally went out and cleaned up the greenhouse today. Now that baby girl is walking well enough to trapse around the backyard, she had a blast getting dirty. So glad I saved all the rubber boots that the boy grew out of! Here are some pics from the day. Remember the allegedly "scratchy" rainbow hat from Christmas? Baby girl wore it today-- the perfect accessory to go with hand me down jeans, a bunny hoodie & camoflage boots!

This is a blast mama! You should definitely take me out here more often!

The boy coming to join in the muddy fun:

And my favorite shot from today:

After all this, baby girl was ready for a warm bath & a nap! And, yes, I also trimmed her bangs. ;)

Brutal

2010-01-06T13:16:00.000-08:00

The week after Christmas break, that is. I'm draggin' butt over here. I have some funky sinus thing still hanging on from before vacation, I need to lose about 10 lbs (I make great Christmas cookies and I love egg nog), and the weather is dark, cold and very, very wet up at this end of the woods.

It doesn't help that I get to have conversations like this with kids on a daily basis:

"You're cool, Ms. G. I like you."
"Why on earth do you like me, Cameron?"
"You don't bitch and nag at us. Other teachers are like 'bitch, bitch, nag, nag' non-stop. You're just chill. I mean, we ain't gonna learn, shit anyway, so they should just quit bitching and leave us alone, you know?" At which point he turned to his neighbor who high-fived him.

Wow. Makes me feel all misty-eyed and full of hope about my profession. Yes sir, Mr. Principal, they are all going to college. You bet. I'll get right on that.

Really, these next two months-- January & February-- make me want to just curl up in bed and sleep until the sun comes back. And... I'm turning 43 next weekend. Overall, I'm fine with it, I've even made the radical decision to stop dying my hair and embrace whatever my true color is now-- so far it looks like it will be almost entirely white around my face, graduating to darkish brown with some stray strands of white-- but I'm really hoping this sluggish, creeping exhaustion with a dollop of squishy and absent-mindedness is not a permanent condition that comes with age. Oh, and I seem to have developed a trick thumb joint that swells up when I knit too much. G-r-e-a-t.

Seriously. I need a vacation and a pedicure and an exercise routine and a housekeeper. And an occasional nanny. And a hired 20 year old to keep the man happy... HA! I realized today that I was just about the same age when baby girl was born as my grandmother was when I was born. That set me back a few steps. I already identify with my grandmother more than anyone else in my life, and now I realize that I have become her... raising a little girl much as she helped raise me. Crazy. I wish more than almost anything else that my granmother's memory had not been ravaged by dementia so that she could know my little girl. I know she would have wanted to know her, and it's painful to think that she never will. But I also know that I was luckier than many. She was a tremendous part of my life for many, many years, and what she taught me made me who I am today and who I will be to my daughter, and you just can't ask for much more than that. Well, you can ask... but you get what you get.
Anyway, I'm glad it's Friday. I have cute pics of the kids from Christmas that I need to download and tweak a bit. Maybe I'll get to it this weekend.

As Promised

2009-12-22T13:14:00.000-08:00

Pics of the baby girl's little dolly & purse:
This was super fun to make-- I've always loved De's dolls, which are all variations on the Raggedy Ann theme. They're just so insanely adorable, and I finally have a semi-legit excuse to buy the patterns & make them! I say semi-legit because baby girl is only 20 months & this little dolly will probably sit on a shelf most of the time, otherwise it will end up on the floor in a pile with all of her other well-worn poppets. She loves to carry things around in purses, though, so I could not resist this pattern. I highly recommend these patterns, though. I was very happy with the instructions, and I'm pretty darned happy with the results as well.

Here's what my dolly was doing while I sewed:Papa was so taken with her poof of hair sticking up while she napped that he had to take this picture. She's such a good little sleeper. I'm used to the boy, who took short naps if we were lucky & usually woke up pissed off & terminally whiny as soon as you tried to move away from him & get something done. As you can see, the pigtails are now a daily routine-- just part of getting dressed in the morning.

Finally, here's the mittens I started on Saturday & finished yesterday (Monday). These are Bella's Mittens, which almost 3,000 Ravelers have knit, based on the ones worn by Bella in the Twilight movie. As some of you know, I tried to read that wretched book at the beginning of last summer & was unable to finish it. The mittens are fantastic, though, and the pattern is very well-written. I loved knitting them & now want a pair for myself!

The yarn is a skein of locally spun & naturally dyed lamb's wool & kid mohair that I purchased at this year's Puyallup Spring Fair. It'sa called Moclips. It's a nice sturdy yarn that reminds me a lot of Peace Fleece, only it's softer. What I didn't like, though, is how much granulated dye sifted out of it when I wound it and then even more that scattered everywhere as I knit with it. That was kind of yucky. The gray is just some Cascade sock yarn I thought was pretty with the magenta. The pattern calls for bulky, which I don't usually have around, but doubling up these yarns got me pretty close & also made for an interesting marled look, I think. These are soaking right now & the water is positively red! Is this normal for naturally dyed yarn? I don't know if were going to get any more weather that would justify a pair of these for me, but they were so much fun to knit, I'll probably make a pair anyway! The banana is a joke. You'll just have to go check out the original pattern pics to get it.

Okay, that's it for now. I have cookies to bake!

Turkey Sandwiches & Santa Hats

2009-11-29T18:20:00.000-08:00

Of all of the yummy things to eat between Thanksgiving and New Years, this is one of my absolute favorites: bread, mayonaise, leftover turkey, leftover stuffing, whole cranberry sauce, bread. Yum! I ate this yesterday while watching our first round of A Christmas Story (ever notice how many knit items there are in that movie? Lots!) and knitting a Santa hat for the man. The boy keeps asking how many more days until we get a tree (six), and I keep wondering how we're going to keep said tree safe from that acrobatic monkey you see there posing as a beautiful little girl!The hat request came on Friday, I cast on Saturday, and it was ready for him to wear to work tonight, which is Sunday. Yes, I'm a fast knitter when I want to be.

Cue the music...

Santa baby, slip some cashmere under the tree, for me.
I've been an awful good girl.
Santa baby, and hurry down the chimney tonight!

FO: Midnight Forecast

2009-10-16T16:57:00.000-07:00

You already know I love Peace Fleece. My Forecast is knit up in the color Siberian Midnight. It's a navy blue tweed with flecks of black, royal blue, brown, cream & just an occasional speck of red. It's lovely and complex. It's also pretty cool that when I realized that this sweater was blocking out too wide across the chest, I was able to throw it in the dryer and shrink it up just a little without worrying that it would come out small enough to fit one of the hens. This yarn is sturdy & soft, spongy & durable, and very, very warm! There are three new colors out this season & that Baba's Sienna is really calling to me!

The buttons are a mismatched navy blue assortment from my horde of vintage buttons. This sweater is still a tad wider than I was planning, but overall, a good knit.

Off to enjoy a birthday party for the stepson. Happy Friday!

ETA: I think I'm going to wet down the bottom half of this cardigan and stretch it out some... it's looking just a wee little bit more cropped than I had intended. Oh, and the stepson loved his Ukulele. :)

Honored

2009-09-18T15:48:00.000-07:00

This letter was sitting in my inbox when I arrived home from work today:

Dear Michelle, Hello from Peace Fleece. Are you out there? We've heard that our yarn works well for baby soakers and we'd like to encourage customers to try making some Peace Fleece soakers using your very cute, and well tested pattern. Is there any way we could copy your pattern and either give it to our customers free with the purchase of our yarns, or give you $1.00 everytime we send out the pattern. Or whatever arrangement you feel comfortable with. Hoping to hear from you.

Best regards,
Marty Tracy Co-owner Peace Fleece
Porter, Maine

How cool is that? :D

The boy, what seems like eons ago, in a pair of Peace Feece longies.

72% Cocoa Cardigan Done!

2009-08-13T12:12:00.000-07:00

I started this cardi, the Favorite Cardigan from Custom Knits, back in November '08. It hibernated at the bottom of the knitting bag through the the holiday season & then through spring until I finally picked it up again during our trip to Kalaloch this year. I'm very happy to have it finished, as it's a very wearable little piece. This is a pre-blocking, self-taken pic, but it'll have to do for now. I'll have some better pics taken & give more details after it dries. Now, back to my Orchid Square Root... but I need to cast on for another cardi soon!

Back from the Beach with Sweater Pics to Share

2009-08-07T19:07:00.000-07:00

After a week of ungodly, scorching hot weather, a cool, overcast stay at on the ocean shore was a welcome relief! It was actually cool enough a couple of the days to wear my new sweater for real, and this knit is the perfect choice as a top layer; it turned out both cuddly & roomy-- I'm sure I'll be wearing it a bunch this fall. Without further ado, may I present my Heatwave Handspun Garter Yoke Cardigan:I should have been a fashion model, right?! HA! My stepmom, who took these shots, really wants me to knit her this sweater. I guess since I finished this one in eight days, I can have another finished by Christmas. It will be fun to pick out a different skein of handspun for her sweater-- I have a completely different color scheme in mind. The buttons are a custom order from South4th's Etsy Shop.

I had lots of time to knit while staying at Kalaloch, and I got all the way past the sleeves on my Orchid Square Root, even though I had to rip it back twice-- once for my mistake & once to correct some weirdness in the pattern (the k2tog's on the puff sleeves are asymmetrical-- shifted toward the front on one side & toward the back on the other). When I finally tried it on, though, I realized that my gauge swatch had once again LIED! My cute sweater was rockin' 4.5 sts/inch instead of the 5 in my swatch. Sh*t!!! Way too big. Crap, crap, crap. Anyway, I'm going to have to rip it all out and start over on smaller needle.s. While I work up to facing that task, I've been finishing up my Favorite Cardigan from Custom Knits that I started awhile back. Here I am in the obligatory knitting on the beach with a beer shot:

And with cute baby girl:

Cute baby girl posing with beach toys:

And with Grandpa (in case you weren't sure who I look like!):

The man & the boy not wanting his picture taken:

And talking about when he's bigger and can drive to the toy store (The boy, I mean. The man's got that skill down cold.):And, finally, the big boys-- "the beach smells like death" boy & the one who lives to dig holes in the sand on the beach once a year:
Another year down & another vacation over... only three weeks until school starts up again, now. Must knit faster!

It's Amazing How Much You Can Actually Knit in One Day

2009-07-25T08:50:00.000-07:00

When you pretty much ignore everything else!

I did manage to cook a roast with mashed potatoes, gravy & peas & carrots from the garden, but the dishes are still sitting in the sink this morning. This sweater is my attempt to move on from that vest (I dare not speak its name). Going swimmingly so far. This is the Garter Yoke Cardigan by Melissa, who writes the blog Knitting School Dropout. Everyone and their dog (and I!) had her sweater fav'd long before there was a pattern available. Sure, I could have figured the sweater out myself, since it's a pretty staight forward top down design, but I was delighted when Knit1 published the instructions, since I had not, of course, figured it out myself.

Anyway, Sherrill's handspun bfl for the yoke. It only took about half the skein. The body is from my stash-- Cascade 220. If I keep up a decent pace, I should have time to start on the other projects I have planned (Buttercup & Rusted Root, to name two). Yes, I have the yarn. Yes, they are both top down. It's good to be the queen. :)

FO: Leaf Yoke Cardigan

2009-07-24T08:44:00.000-07:00

Baby girl's favorite toy right now is a big plastic rake. She uses it to balance herself while she practices her newly-acquired walking skills. I took about 50 shots of her in her new sweater this morning, toddling around the kitchen with her rake. The yarn is O-Wool Balance in Rose Quartz. The pattern was a joy to knit-- the yoke was fun, with new increases & decreases & my first bobbles, which I loved! This is a seamless sweater, knit from the top down. I knit the 6-12 month size, but as you can see, this pattern runs pretty large. This should fit her for at least a year, and if I feel motivated, I could always pick out the bottom & arms to make it longer. One word of warning: use a firm cast on for the neck, as it looks prone to stretching out. If I were to knit this again, I would probably not knit the neck ribbing as part of the yoke, but go back and pick up stitches for it later. Never mind, though, it turned out pretty cute, I think. In other knitting news, I have one side seam to finish up on my vest... yes, that (damned) vest. I've tried it on a couple of times, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to hate the way it fits. Too tight around the waist & not enough room up top for the boobage. After all that, I may be frogging it anyway...

Sherrill, please don't kill me! Listen! I have this great idea for a yoke cardigan using that beautiful bfl yarn you spun for me last winter! See, it matches perfectly with the Cascade 220 in my stash that I was going to use for that February Lady Sweater we never finished! See:

Every Big Girl Needs a Floppy Crocheted Sun Hat!

2009-04-06T17:22:00.001-07:00

It was baby girl's birthday on Saturday-- Sunday we had a little party for her, complete with messy cupcakes, a million pictures, and the cutest crocheted sun hat from auntie Sherrill! Of course she's at the age where anything on the head results in much fussing and frenzied grabbing to remove said object, but we managed to get some cute shots when she was distracted enough to not notice the hat for a minute.

Awww. Happy Birthday, miss missy!

Little Knits

2009-03-22T10:12:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite things about being able to knit it that I can make little gifts quickly. A colleague's wife is about ready to have a baby girl, so last night while my own babies were sleeping, I knit up my favorite hat for a baby girl-- the Umbrella Lace Hat from One Skein. Such a nice alternative to the at best functional & at worst ugly hats they give you in the hospital. It was kind of bitter sweet to knit this pattern again. The last time I did, I was anxiously awaiting my own baby girl, who is now just about ready to turn one year old! How fast they grow. Here's my baby in one of her hats at a day old...

and Friday night..

Surprise Baby Jacket Finished!

2009-03-01T09:11:00.000-08:00

It's taken me an embarrassingly long time to finish up this little sweater, I know. I sewed on the buttons & attached the final round of i-cord on the sleeve during our knitting meetup yesterday. I knit this exactly per EZ's directions, although I know there are pages and pages of alterations people have made & posted on Ravelry. I wanted to knit it up once before worrying about what to change. If I do knit it again, I will lengthen the sleeves & shorten the body. Without a doubt, though, this is an ingeniously constructed garment. I cannot imagine how she puzzled this one out. I think I failed the spacial section of that test-- you know the one where you have to fold pieces of paper in your head & figure out what it will look like when it's all folded up... or follow the pullies in different directions & say what direction the rope will go in after all the twists & turns? That test. Makes my head hurt just remembering trying to figure out that section of the test... some test we took in high school. Probably an I.Q. test! HA! Anyway, baby girl sort of cooperated this moning for a little photo session. She's starting to get little curls at the back of her head-- *smile*.

And another pic for good measure:

In further knitting news, I managed to get to Lamb's Ear yesterday & spend some of my Christmas gift certificate on five balls of Rowan Cashsoft DK in color 504, Glacier, for my Wicked Eyelet Vest-- started swatching last night while watching Bill Maher's Religulous (Learning fun new stitches with this one!). Oh, you didn't know I'm a flaming lefty pinko atheist? Ayup. I won't bite. Promise. The swatch is in pattern, which always trips me out-- how am I supposed to count stitches in a pattern? Do I count the stitches in a row with the eyelets or without? I wish designers would just do their swatches in stockinette & make everyone's lives just a little bit easier. I'm actually hoping my gauge is a little loose, though, as I'm knitting the one for a 35" chest & I'm more like a 38", but all of my vests have stretched considerably with wear & I want this one to be fitted. So, I'm swatching on 6's & this yarn has a slightly larger gauge than the cashmere (Yeah... RIGHT!) that it calls for, so I should be good.

Yummy soft! I'm loving this yarn!

In Praise of...

2009-02-15T18:38:00.000-08:00

attached i-cord. I l-u-u-u-r-v-e attached i-cord. It's easy, fun, and puts a beautifully finished edge on anything to which it is applied. Right now I'm knitting it on to the Surprise Baby Jacket as a final touch while I wait for the wood buttons from Etsy to show up. The last time I used this finishing technique was when I knit Sheldon the Turtle over a year ago, so I did need a refresher to get back on the i-cord pony, so I used this tutorial. I'm not even really sure how much baby girl will wear this piece, but I had to make one just to see how it all goes together. My first project that was truly more about process than product. Now, back to the i-cord.

My Garter Stitch Might Be Tragic!

2009-01-25T14:19:00.000-08:00

I finally got a chance to sit down and start watching my Knitting Workshop dvd last night. Miraculously, both little ones were out cold by 8:15, and there I was with uninterrupted time on my hands. So while the stepson watched Heavy Metal 2000 on the tv, I sat with my laptop & my Cobblestone Pullover & was introduced to this delightful woman in person for the first time. I'm sure the teenager thought I had thorougly gone 'round the bend when I laughed out loud while watching a knitting dvd, but Ms. Zimmermann was one cheeky dame! Count me as yet another instant EZ devotee-- her sense of humor and no nonsense instructions had me at "hello " (first & LAST Jerry McGuire reference ever, I promise!). In the very first episode she goes off talking about twisted stitches and how some people's garter stitch is "tragic" and says that when that happens, "there's no one who can help you." I was dyin'!I almost finished with the second episode, during which EZ discusses gauge, calling 3 sts/inch "sleazy", and then finishing off with, "Maybe you like sleazy sweaters. They're very fashionable right now." HA!

So, in honor of my newly adopted knitting grandmother/guru, I cast on for the Baby Surpise Jacket today in 3-ply 100 Purewool. I bought two skeins of this colorway, "Nostalgia," and a coordinating solid skein before baby girl was born, thinking I might knit up some longies & a matching sweater, but I haven't been feeling the diapering wool love lately, so I'm re-purposing the yarn. I'll knit the optional i-cord edging in the solid color, and I'll probably knit the hood as well.

How many of the EZ books and dvd's that I don't already own do I now have on my Amazon wishlist? All of 'em. Here it is barely the end of January, folks, and I'm already looking for loopholes in my Knitting from the Shelf resolution!

Wait, listen... maybe the problem is I just don't have the right books. Yeah, that's it! The right books. I need to refine my book collection, see? Don't you see?

Hello?

...why are you backing away?

Chooks in the Yard

2009-01-09T15:54:00.000-08:00

Rhonda over at down---to---earth is hosting a kitchen table discussion this weekend about keeping chickens. Here is my contribution:

Growing up, my grandparents always kept chickens, and having chickens of my own always seemed like a lovely, even idyllic, idea. Like most people, though, I lived in apartments and rented houses when I was younger, and keeping poultry really wasn't possible. Nevertheless, I still fantasized about having my own chickens. Sometime during the 90's, Organic Gardening Magazine did a cover story on chickens, and I must have read that article a dozen times over the years. Finally, decades later, I live in a home where I can have my chickens.

The purchase of my first set of chicks from the feed store not so coincidentally happened the spring the man & I had been trying unsuccessfully to get pregnant one more time, so raising those babies was a real joy for me. If you think human babies grow fast, just wait until you raise some chicks! You bring them home when they are about 2 days old and they are cute little fluff balls that suddenly fall asleep where they stand, their little beaks dropping to the floor as they snooze . Within days, though, they start to grow wing feathers & then tail feathers & in just a few short weeks, they go from looking like dandelion fluff to scraggly mini-hens.

I don't recall exactly how old they were when I put the girls into their coop for the first time, but I do remember being nervous about "my babies" all by themselves out there in the wilds of the back yard. We all adjusted quickly, though, and at about the same time that summer they began to lay their first eggs, the man and I discovered that we would be welcoming one last child into our family.

We've had our flock of 8 hens (2 Buff Orpingtons, 2 Barred Rocks, 2 Partridge Rocks, 2 Black Australorps) for almost two years now & unless I'm shooing them off the deck so they won't dig in my potted herbs, watching them scratch about in the yard through my kitchen window still fills me with happy contentment. Rhonda and many others have written extensive guides for how to keep & care for chickens, so I thought I would list some of the joys & of realities of keeping a flock in a backyard environment.

The Upside

Chickens are beautiful, funny, endearing creatures. If you grew up with them around, seeing them perform their endless scratch and peck ritual will make you feel happy inside and like your home is home.
The eggs they provide are of far superior quality than the ones available at the grocery store. The yolks will be richer in color, and the whites will be firmer. Depending on the breed of bird, your eggs may be quite a bit larger than those typically sold in the stores.
Keeping your own chickens, like growing a garden or purchasing meat from a local farmer, is one more way to opt out of the evils of factory farming and all of the literal and psychic poisons it produces. Just a little research on how those poor wretched animals are treated could easily put you off of eggs (or meat) for life.
People you know-- at work, neighbors, friends, family-- will be beyond pleased to receive the gift of home grown eggs. They will even offer to pay you for them. Put this to good use and work out a bartering system. We trade our extra eggs for honey.
Just like food grown in your own garden, preparing a meal that includes eggs from your own chickens just makes you feel good-- less dependent, more self-sufficient, and more connected to the realities of food & where it comes from.
If you have children, they will enjoy all of these benefits, too, but will also like having chickens because they are fun to watch (and chase, sometimes). Some chickens are quite friendly, especially if they were hand-raised, and will let you pick them up and pet them. Chickens are just plain entertaining. I dare any child not to laugh when a flock of chickens swarms the deck to gobble down the dogs' food!
Older children, like our two teen boys, can take on much of the responsibility of caring for chickens-- checking their food & water daily & collecting eggs (oh, and cleaning out the coop!). How many teens really know-- really know-- where an egg comes from? My older boy saw a chicken lay her egg one day up close & personal. A little dose of reality in their increasingly virtual world is a good thing, in my opinion.
Chickens are like compost machines. You put in kitchen scraps & garden castoffs that might normally go into the garbage, and they produce ...
Fertilizer, and lots of it! All those smelly fir shavings from the coop go into my compost pile to make black gold for my garden.

The Realities

Don't let the idyllic image fool you-- chickens are messy animals. For the first year, we let our eight hens free range in our backyard. Our lot is 1/2 acre & the backyard is a good half of that or more. We have left it mostly in its natural state, with evergreen trees and native underbrush and only small patches of unmanicured grass. In other words, I wasn't too concerned about the chickens scratching up my prize roses or anything. However, after a year they had nearly devastated the yard-- they dug holes for dust bathing, scratched up almost all the grass & greenery looking for food, and there was chicken... manure... everywhere-- in the grass, on the picnic table & benches, on the deck, etc. It was not a pretty picture. It got to the point where my then two year old boy would respond to anything yucky with, "Ew, chicken poo!" I finally said enough & we put a fence up so we could keep them in a run while the yard recovered. Now we let them out into the yard to free range about once a week. I love seeing them in the yard. I don't love picking "Ew, chicken poo" out of the soles of my sandals!
Along the same lines, chickens make an insane mess of their coop. It will need to be cleaned out frequently, especially during the rainy season, if you have one, as the litter will never dry out completely and wet chicken litter smells to high heaven.
Sometimes chickens eat eggs. Sometimes they get over it. Sometimes you just have to live with losing an egg now & then.
We have been lucky, as our dogs-- a daschund/chihuahua mix and a shepherd mix-- get along fine with the chickens & they can all run around the backyard together with no problems. Your neighbors' dogs, though, or resident coyotes, raccoons, foxes, etc, do pose a significant threat to your birds. I don't recall where I read it, but someone once characterized chickens as "food on legs". They don't have many defenses & are prized dinner for many predators. "Chicken wire" will keep your chickens in, but will not keep anything that wants to eat them out. Be prepared to build a substantial enclosure to keep them safe.
We live in an area that is designated as rural and farmland. Even so, we live in a subdivision of residential homes. People in the neighborhood are pretty casual and no one has said anything negative to us about our chooks-- probably because everyone lives far enough apart that they are not bothering anyone, and we only have hens. If you live in a community with strongly enforced covenants or small lots, do your research before bringing chickens into your yard, and consider talking to your neighbors first.
Even though they will keep eating as much as always, your hens will slow down & even cease egg production during molting, during very cold spells of weather, and as they age. We keep a light in their coop year 'round, which helps, but the eggs are still feast or famine, much like a garden. I hate buying eggs from the store, but occasionally it is still necessary. We haven't decided what we will do when the girls become too old to lay dependably. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
Finally, keeping chickens is not cheap. I've never done the math, but I'm pretty sure that the 80 lb bags of feed & bales of fir shavings, not to mention the lumber & fencing that went into their coop & yard, cost significantly more than the eggs our chickens produce are worth. Especially if they are not free-ranging, chickens eat a stunning amount of crumble, and the smaller your flock, the less cost-effective the whole endeavor becomes.

The Bottom Line
I love having chickens. They are an extension of our garden, adding life and productivity to the little slice of earth that is our yard. They are a small but reassuring insurance policy against our dependence on the consumer marketplace for food. They are funny and sweet and entertaining to watch. They are, however, also animals that require a significant investment of work, money and time. I am happy that my baby girl will be growing up with chickens in the yard so that she will carry on the picture in her mind of how a few hens pecking & scratching beneath the fir trees means home.

Yarn Cabinet!

2008-12-17T14:26:00.001-08:00

You know, I think the joke's on us. Ikea is taking over the world. After hauling it from Seattle, setting it up & getting a good look at it, we're pretty sure my yarn cabinet is from Ikea. Ha. No matter, we still bought it second-hand & I like it very much. The verdict on space? There's not much left. It's a good fit, though. It looks really nice on the landing, and all my scraps fit in the basket up on the top.

Merry Christmas to ME!

More Hat Pics...

2008-11-17T14:39:00.000-08:00

Here are the two boys I knit ear flap hats for wearing their new toppers:

That's My Christmas Hat?

2008-11-16T21:16:00.000-08:00

The only thing that keeps one from throttling a three year old is their cuteness. Somehow, it always seems to pop up out of nowhere and melt your heart, and, simultaneously, save them from a dreadful fate at the hands of a frazzled parent who's up to her ears in legos, Barney & temper tantrums. Anyway, before I even cast on for this hat, it got dubbed My Christmas Hat by the boy, who is suddenly very excited about Christmas.

This was going to be fair isle & I even got all the way through the chat before I realized how impossible thick three layers of worsted weight O-Wool Classic would be, so I pulled it all out and spent much of today cursing embroidery. It turned out cute, though, I think. I'm tellin' ya, that ear flap hat pattern generator is the shiznit. What a fun little knit! I'm kind of hoping the older boy will decide it's just dorky enough to be cool so I have an excuse to knit another one!

In other news... I frogged my February Lady Sweater. It was a victim of gauge and, honestly, ambivalence. I was marginally excited about it before Wendy's book came out, but now I just want to knit something from that. And my row gauge must have been way off, because when I finally got through my three buttonholes & decided to count stitches & see how close I was to where the pattern said I could move on to the lace, my stitch count was like 5o more than what I should have had!!! 5o. Yeah... something went way wrong there. I feel kind of sheepish, as I'm supposedly leading the KAL for this sweater, but they don't seem to notice & are happily finishing up their FLS's without me. Not sure what I'm going to cast on for next... I'm waiting for 6 skeins of chocolate brown 220, though, and I think Favorite Cardigan is calling my name. :)

Finally, this last pic is not the greatest-- the boy took it & it's a little blurry & I look strained, tired & kind of greasy, but my word, look at my baby girl's eyes! Aren't they just stunning?

The BEST Hat Pattern Evah!

2008-11-10T21:12:00.000-08:00

I'm in the process of knitting a couple of hats for a mama who sewed the most adorable apron for me that I've ever worn. She sent me the yarn & requested ear flap hats. After a short search, I found this site where you put in your gauge & measurements & it adjusts the pattern accordingly. This is without a doubt the coolest construction technique I've used! It's all one piece & the ear flaps are done with short rows. You increase to make a triangle & then decrease back the same way. On the way back, the flaps start folding over on themselves. Then you go back to knitting in the round & after you reach a certain point, you fold the whole thing over and pick up stitches from the cast on edge & knit them with the live stitches, making a beautiful seam on the inside. The whole bottom portion of the hat ends up being double thickness. The boy loves this hat and has requested one for himself. He has the same head size as the recipient, and it fits perfectly! Love it, love it, love it. Isn't it just too cute?!

See, This is Why I Love Top Down!

2008-11-02T16:28:00.000-08:00

I finished Mr. Greenjeans back in August & at the time elbow length sleeves seemed just the thing, and they were perfect for early fall. Now, though, the weather is getting cooler & I decided this weekend to rip the sleeves back & make them longer. Could I have done this with a traditionally pieced together, bottom-up sweater? Well, technically it might be possible, it would definitely have been more trouble than it would be worth. I also think I'm going to rip back the front band past the buttonhole & either remove the button altogether or add another button. The one button just pulls open & looks weird to me, so I don't usually button it. Speaking of buttonholes, I'm just sneaking up to the third one on the FLS. Should be to the lace in the next few days. :) I cannot believe I've had Wendy's book in my possession for over a month & I still haven't had time to cast on for anything! I'm dying to learn the top down set in sleeves. I already know short rows intimately from knitting soakers & longies, so they should be pie for me. Raglans are okay, but I want some non-raglan sweaters, too.

Curses to you evil, time-sucking work, the paid kind and the unpaid kind both! I have sweaters to knit, damnit!

Lake Chelan Greenjeans Complete!

2008-08-16T14:42:00.000-07:00

Baby girl will now take a pumped bottle from papa, so it was time for mama to go find something to do sans kids! So what did I choose? My local knitting meetup, of course! Two hours of uninterrupted knitting & lots of knitting chatter & sharing of projects, stitches, stories & laughter. Don't get me wrong, I love my baby girl to pieces, but being all by myself (with friends) was lovely. Two new people showed up today, and that made it even more special.

Sherrill took pics of me modeling my newly completed Lake Chelan Greenjeans. Yes, that is wine in the background. No, we don't drink it while knitting (mostly it just sits there & tantalizes us while we dutifully drink iced coffee & smoothies... sigh). Anyway, only one of the pics she took managed to make it home safely. Where the other shots went is a complete mystery to me. I swear they were there on my camera when I left the coffee shop, but they were no longer there when I went to download them. Gremlins, I'm tellin' ya!

After knitting this sweater, I have to say it was so easy & such a fun knit I'm kind of sorry it's done! I may end up knitting another version down the road, we'll see. I adore cables, especially when you ditch the cable needle! I see lots more cabling in my future. And, Cascade 220 is everything everyone says it is: soft, easy to work with, beautiful stitch definition, and drop dead gorgeous colors, especially the heathers. Oh, not to mention affordable! I'm sold. Please don't tell me they enslave sheep or torture small children to manufacture it, as I truly love it!

Anyway, the reveal, as they say:

A closeup of the button I found in my stash of vintage buttons:

Here I am cheesing entirely too much for my own good:

Me, looking ever so photogenic, knitting on my sweater at Kalaloch:

Speaking of Kalaloch, my stepmom sent us a cd of pics from the trip.
A few of my favorites:

Lookit that crazy RED hair!!!

My other inexplicable red head being a beach bum:

And enjoying some watermelon:

Beauty, pure & simple.

It's B-a-a-a-a-c-k!!

2008-08-07T17:00:00.000-07:00

And so are we. :) I can confirm what everyone says: Kalaloch is beautiful! Miles & miles of sandy beach to walk, ocean-polished rocks to pick, and many happy campers circling many festive bon fires. We'll definitely be going back next year. We never take vacations, but I think this will be the beginning of an annual event. Thanks again, Dad & Glenda. We wouldn't have gone without your generous gift.

As you can see, I made tremendous progress on my Lake Chelan Greenjeans. I have just bout 2" remaining of the cable & rib pattern & then the sleeves & button band and I'll have my very first cardigan (for me) finished! Yes, I knit it on the beach, and, yes, I got sand in my knitting bag. Considering I chose this yarn because of a family camping trip on Lake Chelan that I remember as a child, I think it's only fitting that I knit so much of this sweater on another family vacation.

Two of the days were sunny & hot, and two of the days were overcast & cool; the weather didn't really matter, though. The sound of the ocean cleared all the crap out of my head & it was wonderful to just get away for a few days. The boy had a glorious time playing baseball on the beach & the baby girl took many cat naps in the Ergo. I came home to the fall issue of IK, collard & cabbage seedlings reaching toward the sun in the kitchen window sill, and carrot seeds I planted, watered in good & covered mulched with straw sprouting up in the garden.

Here's a pic from yesterday: Baby girl with the "tiki hut" the older boy built down on the beach in the background.

I hope everyone is enjoying the waning days of summer!

At long last...

2008-07-12T17:09:00.000-07:00

My Harmony Stripes vest is finished! After all the build up, this is kind of anti-climactic. I mean, after all, it's a vest... not the Taj Mahal. I need to work on the waist shaping, as I don't like how it kind of makes me look all square from the front. I love the striping, though. Considering all the work I put into this, I'd better have something good to say about it!

The older boy took these shots. Yeah. It was HOT today. I was dying in this worsted wool!

LOL. Here's a candid shot of me reacting to the man asking a stupid question. Heh.

Happy Happy, Joy Joy!

2008-07-04T08:01:00.000-07:00

My Harmony Stripes Vest is finally blocking! I am soooooooooooooooooo glad to be finished with this one! I've discovered a couple of truths about knitting a striped garment: 1. Jogless stripes in the round is a lie (as far as I can determine, anyway) 2. Some woven in ends, if you have enough of them, will poke through to the right side 3. Picking up stitches for ribbing in a striped garment is a lot more challenging than picking them up in a solid one-- every little flaw SHOWS & any irregularity in your pick up job seems to have its own built in beacon of light shining on its ugliness. I think I reknit the neck ribbing 5 times before I got it right. Cannot wait until this baby is dry so I can show it off! Now I must get started on Mr. Greenjeans... after all, I am supposed to be leading the KAL! Here's a teaser to hold you over:

Last year the man built a beautiful raised bed garden for me & I cannot tell you how bad I feel that I haven't done anything in that garden except send the older boy up there a couple of times to weed-eat the vegetation that's growing in the paths! The second time he completed the chore this summer, he came back with these, the fruits of my neglect:

And here's my main excuse for not getting up to the garden this year, who just happens to be three moths old today:
Happy Independence Day!

May yours be filled with family, friends, food, fun...
and a little knitting, if you can sneak it in!

Pea Patch Soaker Pattern Is Now Available in Spanish

2008-06-01T11:14:00.000-07:00

With my permission & blessings, Ana has translated the Pea Patch Soaker Pattern & posted the Spanish version on her blog. Thank you Ana, for doing this! I feel honored that anyone wanted the pattern enough to go to the trouble.

Fad-Classic Done!

2008-05-26T13:33:00.000-07:00

Well, except for a few ends to weave in... like the one peeking out from my arm pit in that first shot! Heh. Please pardon the auto-photography. No one else here to take pics. Need to block it & I'm a little concerned about the ribbing at the bottom stretching out. But here's the beauty of a top-down garment: I can always rip it back & reknit it on smaller needles!

All in all, though, I'm pretty damned stoked. My first fitted garment for me! It fits, it doesn't look hideous & it only took me 21 days. Not bad, considering I have two gremlins to take care of & a million other things I could probably be doing (um, like folding the laundry!). Notes about yarn & other specifics are on my Ravelry project page. :) I think this will look really cute over a white button down shirt in the fall. Would have modeled it with one, but it needs to be irone

More Soakers!

2008-05-22T08:18:00.000-07:00

These aren't for baby girl, but for a friend who does not knit (yet, Jill, yet!). She is sewing some diapers for me in trade. I had no notion that the pink one was going to be a watermelon soaker when I started, but the color combination compelled me to add little black "seeds". Of course then the orange soaker looked humdrum in comparison, so I embroidered some flowers here & there. I'm an embroidery newbie, but I'm having fun learning how to embellish. Cute little soakers are certainly the perfect project for embellishments!

For anyone who's new here, this pattern is available right here for free. I was snooping around at who has visited lately, and found a comment yesterday that this is one of the only free soaker patterns that actually fits a baby. Yay!

Still plugging away on Fad-Classic. Um, yeah. Adult sized garments? They take a lot more time to complete than these little tid bits. And it's only a vest, for goodness sake! Wendy popped in to our Ravelry group last night to let us know that her book is coming out on August 20th! The various Knit & Tonic patterns we're knitting are supposed to be completed before the book comes out-- that's the hook! I think I managed to complete two rows last night after the boy went to bed & while baby girl was sleeping peacefully in her new mei tai. Think I'll make it?!

Another Knit Soaker in Action

2008-04-28T11:25:00.000-07:00

Here's the other Pea Patch soaker that I knit before baby girl was here to try them on for size. Fits great, though, and she's grown into her booties, as well. :) Need to knit up another pair of those. I'll be knitting a couple more soakers this week to trade with Jill for some medium sized diapers. Her toddler is a girl & apparently likes to help while she sews rather than seeing mama in the sewing room as the perfect opportunity for a seek & destroy mission! I'll post pics when they're done.

Should have a couple more babies in hats pics to post soon, as I'm sending off two more that I knit today. Learning a lot about stranded color work... like that I really need to carry the main color English & the contrast color Continental-- something about which yarn is on top and which yarn is underneath (still don't quite get that). Whatta pain, though. Like trying to write with my left hand! Glad I'm learning. I really want to be able to say I can do Fair Isle, ya know?

I'll end my short post with a "learning to smile" pic. Baby girl's hair sticks straight up on top & it's just so adorable to me! She's starting to wake up more now & respond a little bit when we talk to her-- so much fun to look forward to as her personality reveals itself. Happy days!

Wool Diaper Covers: A Review

2008-04-24T12:42:00.000-07:00

I'm using mostly wool for cloth diaper covers with baby girl. Thought you might want to know how that's going.

So far my favorite wool is Babylogy! They are fantastic! I especially love the longies, as they can be worn like pants with a tee shirt. They are very, very moisture resistant (well, absorbent, I guess I should say) & can be worn through a day's worth of diaper changes (unless there's a blowout, of course!) . Awesome product!

My 2nd favorite woolies are the ones I knit. The purewool is nice & soft, but is only really good for maybe two diaper changes before it starts to feel damp on the outside. The longies I knit from Peace Fleece are much better, though not nearly as soft, obviously. Today baby girl is wearing the one soaker I knit from BFL & it seems to be a great combination of soft and absorbent. I'm also happy to report that I love the Pea Patch soaker pattern! Good thing, since it's my pattern (right?!). It fits great & looks awfully cute on her. She fell asleep on the changing table today-- perfect opportunity to snap a few soaker shots:
I think I'm going to knit a couple more of the soakers but put long legs on them like the Babylogy ones. She has couple of longies that are knit more like pants & they're cute but don't fit her baby butt as well.

Surprisingly, I'm disappointed by the uber-popular pull on style interlock soakers. The Dunk 'n Fluff one had leg holes that were way too wide for the size & the Luxe Baby ones just didn't provide enough wetness protection. I've resold all of them on Spot's Corner without looking back.

I also am not super thrilled with the soaker sacks. They are cute as a button, but they do ride up terribly. A drawstring on the bottom would take care of that. However, I realized that using the sack alone would mean that baby girl's legs would be curled up against a possibly wet diaper & that doesn't seem like a great idea. These sacks might work well for a second layer of wool, although I haven't used them that way yet. I may very well just frog them & reuse the yarn for something more practical.

Haven't tried the Aristocrat soaker yet, as it's pretty large, but I have a hunch it will be like the Babylogy wool. So, bottom line, the machine knit or hand knit woolies are the winners for us. Interlock, not so much. I do have one interlock soaker that is two layers in the body & it should work well... it's a medium, though, so we won't be trying it out for awhile yet.

Adorable Baby in Hand Knits, Take One!

2008-04-19T16:04:00.000-07:00

The longies are still a little long (fancy that!), but baby girl is chunking up fast (9 lbs 1 oz as of her two week ped. appt. yesterday!) & can now fit into her Mossy Jacket & matching hat. The tee shirt is custom dyed & painted to match by Lori at Alphabet Zoope.So, we didn't take her home in her "Coming Home" outfit, but we did take her to Costco!

May All Your Good Yarn Remain Unbroken

2008-04-10T11:22:00.000-07:00

So, these photos are going to show how not Martha Stewart I am, as they reveal the underbelly of my home a bit more than I would usually allow-- you know, piles of random stuff overflowing its container, a patched ceiling, the rail over the sliding glass door that needs dusting, etc. But oh well, sometimes you just have to bare it all to get your point across.

When I came home from having baby girl, I was greeted by this banner-- hand-lettered by the man & colored by the boys. :) It's nine sheets long & reads, "Welcome home mama and baby girl we love y'all." (okay, so the man lived in Kentucky for 6 year & it wore off a little!). Of course, I cried immediately. My man is not one for grand or romantic gestures, so this was a big deal. :)

Here's the kicker, though:

He hung it up with an uncut center pull ball of yarn! I chuckled when I saw that & asked why he did it that way. "I figured you would have killed me for cutting up your good yarn." Too funny!

Today I'm discovering the beauty of the mei tai. It's kind of like having a belly all over again, but at least I can use both my arms & baby girl can sleep! I've never been a big baby carrier user, but I'm thinking I was just using the wrong ones. This rocks! :)

No knitting to report. I'm sure you understand. Day 6 of baby girl's life & I'm sort of dressed & coherent for the most part. I'm thinking about knitting, though. Another hat for the boy... some booties that will actually stay on baby girl's tiny feet... a pair of longies in Chickie Masla to match the Hanna Andersson dress I won for baby girl off Ebay...

Pinwheel Baby Blanket (and new flooring) Done! Oh... and snow?!

2008-03-26T17:10:00.000-07:00

Took me three days to bind this off, but it turned out pretty cute, I think. Used a yarn over ruffle (the spiral ruffle from one of Nikki Epstein's books) and a picot bind off. Here's a close up of the edging:And here's what the blanket looked like five minutes later when I walked back into the front room:Yeah...

See that carpet? It was installed yesterday! It's so pretty & new & CLEAN!!! There's a reason why I never took pics on the old carpet. Lots of reasons, actually. Reasons in the form of many, many stains. House was built in 1984. We moved in a year and half ago or so, but the carpet had been here for the duration. It was beyond disgusting. This year the tax return went to carpet in the front room, tile in front of the fireplace insert & the wood laminate that the man & his buddy will be installing this weekend in the rest of the downstairs. A couple of days ago the man says, "This nesting thing. It ends when the baby's born, right?" M-a-y-b-e.

Here's a shot of the carpet & the tile & the fireplace so you can see how it all goes together... and a corner of my knitting chair. :)And finally, wth?! It's almost April & here's my back deck (and it's still coming down!):

Chicken tracks in the snow. Oy.

And a cardi to match!

2008-03-05T16:01:00.001-08:00

I'm really thinking this is plenty of embellishment, since there's so much more going on with the longies. Yes? No? This is the Mossy Jacket, but I knit it in worsted & just sort of winged it until it looked about the right size. I wanted it a little cropped, too. I'm not sure what I did (that's a lie... I didn't count how many stitches I picked up along one side before going ahead and picking up the other side & finishing the neck band!), but I had to add a little fudge row of stitching along the bottom of the front placket & then block the beejeebuz out of it to get it to match the other side. See that orange flower there? It's hiding the add-on row. C-l-e-v-e-r.

Lori from Alphabet Zoope is going to batik a little tee to go with the set. Still need a hat & booties... I'm stumped on the booties, though! I wanted the green, but it's a pretty heavy weight worsted & all the danged bootie patterns seem to call for dk or fingering. Still looking & contemplating on the footwear. :) I'll wing the hat. Sure, I might have to knit it three times to get it right, but... have I mentioned how much I hate following patterns?!

Coming Home Longies!

2008-03-01T10:13:00.001-08:00

Well?Started the moss stitch cuffs last night while watching Hoffa, so this morning as I was finishing them up, scenes from that movie kept popping up in my head-- not exactly conducive to sweeat thoughts of newborn baby girls! does that happen to you? Whatever I'm watching/listening to as I'm knitting gets infused into the item itself. What a strange phenomenon.

Anyway, I think I'm pretty pleased. :) Next up: matching cardigan!

Knittin', Sewin', Settin' Dates!

2008-02-12T18:57:00.000-08:00

Unless she decides to make a surprise early appearance, which is doubtful, as both of my boys arrived at 40 weeks & 5 days exactly, baby girl now has a birthday! Friday, April 4th! As much as I'm not looking forward to, in my opinion, completely unnecessary surgery, there is something to be said about knowing when she's going to be here. :)

Finished the 2nd soaker. I love the ruffles & I'm thinking about scattering some intarsia hearts here & there & maybe a big 'ol heart on the butt. The color of the aran BFL yarn is lighter than is shows in this pic... the one from my last post is much more accurate-- a medium coralish pink.

Also, here are her first two mama made diapers. Lime colored sherpa outers with natural sherpa inners & some hemp french terry for extra absorbency. See those tags? My friend Cat & I had a little diaper biz for awhile & I still have about 400 of those labels left. Figured, what the heck. Might as well use 'em up! Hee. I've never said never, either. Who knows what the future holds-- maybe Pea Patch Diapers will rise again!

Soaker #1 Complete

2008-01-29T19:04:00.000-08:00

But... went to the doc today & I'm measuring 2 1/2 weeks ahead! Looks like another big baby is coming our way (the boy weighed 11 1/2 lbs!). This is a newborn/small sized Pea Patch Soaker knit in the 1-ply 100purewool-- soft, soft, soft & perfect for a newborn. Happily, I have enough of this same yarn to knit the next size up as well.
Who am I kidding? This teeny one was just a momentary fantasy! Cute, though, ain't it?! :)

Boy's Cardi Complete!

2008-01-15T15:16:00.000-08:00

A nasty flu bug has hit us hard over the last few days-- man, there is nothing more heart-wrenching than your two year old crying for water you know is not going to stay down. :( Anyway, we're on the mend & I had a moment today to take my "artsy fartsy" blog shot of the boy's completed cardigan. It reminds me of a letterman sweater & I have half a mind to duplicate stitch a big initial on the front!

I've started a sheepy sack for the baby girl out of undyed 3-ply 100purewool-- oh boy, nothing makes the impending birth more real than knitting things for her! Crazy. There's some kind of mind trick that goes on during pregnancy. No matter how large your belly gets or how obvious the jabbing feet & knees & head buts to the ribs become, it's still such a completely astonishing event when they hand you that little human being at the end of it all. I'm so happy to be able to do this one last time. As for the 3-ply purewool, I'm loving it! I've knit with the one ply many times, & I'm finding this yarn to be just as soft, but with more "structure" and less immediate & crazy felting. To me there is just nothing sweeter on a newborn than undyed wool with little bits of colored embellishments-- so old fashioned & innocent. Like this:

*Smile*

And... The Man

2008-01-13T16:56:00.000-08:00

IN the Hat:
He is smiling. Can't you tell? Actually, he's watching tv before going to work a 12 hour shift at the hospital. Definitely not as much fun as hacking away at an already dead Rhody with a toy chain saw... wait, he works in the ER, so maybe it's about the same thin! Heh.

Here 'Tis

2008-01-13T09:31:00.000-08:00

The Hat:
The Original:

That's as close as I could come to a machine knit acrylic K-Mart special with hand knitting & the yummy merino yarn I have on hand. This new one, I'm sure, will be much warmer & most definitely softer. Wonder if he's planning to take a chain saw with him on his man weekend, too. ;)

Sweater Blocking Time Warp Phenomenon
Has anyone else noticed that the time it takes for a sweater to dry after blocking is the slowest time that exists in the universe? Someone should fund a study.

A classic & completely predictable quote from the man yesterday as he gazed upon my handiwork lying carefully arranged on a towel atop the dining room table: "Looks kind of scratchy." Sigh...

Sun & Rain
Yesterday it dumped rain most of the day, except for a brief couple of moments in the afternoon when the sun came streaming through the drenched & dripping trees. I took this shot through my open kitchen window. You'll just have to imagine the sound of heavily dripping branches & eaves to get the full effect. Have a glorious Sunday. :)

Well, Knock Me Over with a Feather!

2008-01-06T12:45:00.001-08:00

So last night I was rattling around here muttering to myself about how I didn't have a knitting project to work on & the man pipes up with, "Why don't you knit me a hat?" HUH?! This man never wears hats (or scarves or gloves or any other knitted items. He's a black tee shirt, jeans & biker boots kind of guy). Okay, so he reminds me that he's going on this weekend "men in the woods" thing pretty soon & might need a warm hat while he's pounding his chest & doing fire dances & whatnot. So, I immediately head toward the stash, thinking, "Crap, I don't have any more black peace fleece, I wonder if charcoal grey will be close enough to black to suit him?"

So the next thing I know, he's dragging out his old photo albums & asking, "Can you make me one like this?"

THIS:"Seriously? With green & yellow stripes?"
"Yes.
"And the pom pom on top?"
"Yes. Can you make the pom pom multicolored like that?"
"Uh... yeah."
He then proceeds to point out all of the design details-- the ribbing & the number of narrow stripes & the folded up brim & the sections of solid color to make sure I can do "all that." And last week he ate a bowl of leftover soup. Without prompting. Of his own volition. I'm starting to worry about pod people and alien abductions... this is so out of character. I could hardly breathe while it was happening.

Of course today he is laid up in bed with a stomach flu and a 101.5 degree fever. Maybe that explains this episode. Fever delusions.

He chose purewool in the closest colors I had on hand. I'm relieved about the purewool, as I was anticipating the "scratchy" conversation that might possibly result from a peace fleece hat. As much as I, personally, adore & worship peace fleece, mohair doesn't bother me at all. It makes some people crazy. Purewool is like buttah. (Felts like buttah, too... wait... felts like... um, like... never mind.)

Here's the progress so far on what I'm dubbing the 70's striped nostalgia hat:
I asked him this morning while bringing him orange juice, 7-up and tylenol if he wanted the hat fitted or loose on top like in the picture. "Loose like the picture," he says. :) See why I like to say I have four boys: two sons, a stepson & a husband? Even when all grown up, they are still so much like little boys.