Month: November 2011

Posted in Current Projects

Scarf of DOOOOM and Other WIPs

Posted on by mslindz

Since finishing the two pairs of socks, I’ve been fighting the urge to cast on something new. I have at least 3 projects in mind that I’d like to start, possibly more if I thought about it longer!

Thankfully, seeing how far along I am on my current projects and seeing how fast they’re moving along has kept me from starting anything new before finishing something up. As luck would have it, I was able to finish up one of the three projects I had on the needles yesterday.

Matt's Scarf
Matt’s Scarf

This project has been on the needles since 2009. I started this scarf for Matt in the winter of 2009 and it kept getting put aside for other things. It’s finally DONE! I hope to take a better picture of it soon for a FO post. So incredibly happy to have this project off the needles!

Matt and his scarf
Matt and his new scarf!

Finishing those two pairs of socks I has allowed me to pick up the Embossed Leaves socks again. The pattern repeat was easy enough to memorize and is just enough to keep me interested without being bored. I finished the heel flap and I’m now working on the foot of the first sock. The yarn I’m using is Alchemy Juniper, which I’ve not used before. It’s really squishy and nice to work with. This is one of the yarns I got in The Loopy Ewe Sock Club in 2010. Nice to be knitting up some of the older things in my stash!

Embossed Leaves
Embossed Leaves

The other project on my needles is probably the least interesting to look at. It’s a black cardigan. The pattern I’m knitting is Estelle Cardigan, which is a pretty simple cardigan with a feather and fan edging around the collar, cuffs, and bottom of the sweater with ribbing at the waist. I think it will be very wearable, but really just not that interesting to see! Plus, black is sort of hard to photograph and hides any of the details in pictures, so it ends up looking like a blob of black instead. Ah well. I think the yarn is pretty nice to work with. Matt thinks it’s too rough and not soft enough – what a yarn snob I’ve turned him into!! Hehehe 🙂

Estelle Cardigan
Estelle Cardigan

I debated starting another pair of stripey socks to work on after finishing Matt’s scarf. There’s a lot of holiday parties coming up this month and a plain sock that I don’t have to think much about seems like just the right thing to have to work on. I took a look at my stash and decided to cast on a pair of house socks for Matt. I picked up a skein of MadeleineTosh Sport at Lambikins Hideaway the last time I was there. At the time, I had just finished a pair of socks for myself out of this yarn and enjoyed working with it, so I thought I’d knit him up a pair. I used a US 1.5 (2.50mm) needle for my socks with this yarn, but I thought that was a little on the tight side (though, personally I like my socks with a bit tighter fabric). For his, I decided to go up to a US 2.5 (3.0 mm). I didn’t have a plan when I cast on aside from making it a 50 stitch sock. Once I finished the toe, I played around with different stitches until I decided I liked the look of 3 x 2 rib best. It’s working up really fast! I’ve already knit 5″ of it.

Matt's House Socks
Matt’s House Socks

What are you working on this week? Something new? Holiday gifts?

Posted in Completed Projects

Two FO Monday

Posted on by mslindz

Hope all my American friends had a good Thanksgiving! Ours was surprisingly not stressful for a chance since we only did one dinner with this year with Matt’s family and my family came over for dessert later on. I am so thankful for all I have in my life these days. I’ve come a long way from where I was and I couldn’t have done it without the support of my friends, family, and Matt who puts up with me, loves me, and supports me the most through everything. 🙂

The holiday Thursday allowed me to take 4 days off work and I got quite a bit of knitting done! I finished TWO pairs of socks. Both socks were picked up from about halfway through the foot and completed on Thursday and Saturday. It feels great to get two projects off the needles!

First I finished the Lace and Cables socks.

Lace and Cables Socks
Lace and Cables Socks

Pattern: Lace and Cables Socks by Wendy D. Johnson (My Ravelry project page.)
Started: October 31, 2011
Completed: November 24, 2011
Yarn: Tempted Good Grrl, colorway Pocket Full of Posies
Needle: US 1 (2.25mm) Knit Picks nickel circular
Notes: No modifications to the pattern. Knit the smallest size. Knit 8 of the center lace repeats before the cuff. These were knit to participate in the SSK KAL and my first time using Tempted yarns. Very nice to work with!

After those were off the needles, I couldn’t decide on what to work on, so I picked up my plain stripey socks. Before I knew it, I was through the heel and working on the leg. Figured I may as well finish them up too!

Venus In Furs Socks
Venus in Furs

Pattern: Plain, toe-up 60 stitch sock (My Ravelry project page.)
Started: September 17, 2011
Completed: November 26, 2011
Yarn: Knitterly Things Vesper Sock, Venus in Furs
Needle: US 0 (2.0mm) Knit Picks nickel circular
Notes: My standard toe-up sock with slip stitch heel. These socks were one of my “ready to go” projects to grab for knitting in public, so they didn’t get knit on a whole lot. Picked these up on Nov. 25th and worked the remainder of the foot, the increases for the heel, the heel and the leg. Next day I knit the cuff. They go fast when I actually work on them!

Shockingly, this means I now only have three projects on the needles. I debated starting something new, but decided I should really get that scarf done for Matt. I worked on it this past weekend and when I tried it out on him found that I’m not that far from being done (FINALLY!). Hoping to get that scarf off the needles soon. Nothing like seeing that a project is nearly finished to motivate you to work on it! 🙂

Posted in Completed Projects, Current Projects

Rikke Hat, Sweater Fail, and Other Projects

Posted on by mslindz

Wow, where has November gone? I can hardly believe it’s almost Thanksgiving. I’ve had the best of intentions to blog over the last almost 3 weeks. Things have been busy lately. It doesn’t help that the sun going down so early now or that the weather has been rainy and dreary making it difficult to take decent pictures. Despite all the busy and lack of photographic evidence, I’ve been knitting things. In fact I started and finished a project since I last posted!

After some issues with another project (which I’ll get to in a minute), I needed something that was almost-instant gratification and fairly simple. I happened to see this hat pattern on Ravelry and immediately knew that I needed to make one out of the Malabrigo Rios I had.

Rikke Hat (Front)
Rikke Hat – Front

Pattern: Rikke Hat by Sarah Young (My Ravelry project page.)
Started: November 11, 2011
Completed: November 13, 2011
Yarn: Malabrigo Rios, colorway Solis, 1 skein
Needle: US 4 and 7, bamboo circular
Notes: This is a free pattern that can be found here. I ended up using a yard or so from the leftovers from the first skein of this that I had for the last 2 rows of the hat plus bind off. Simple pattern that makes a great, squishy hat!

Rikke Hat (Side)
Rikke Hat – Side

It is November and it is NaKniSweMo. Do you recall me talking about a sweater I planned to knit this month? Yeah… about that… I ran into a problem. It’s small. REALLY small. I had a feeling it might be a bit on the small side from the gauge being off, but I thought the changes I planned on making would allow it to still fit well even if it was a bit snug. After finishing the right and left fronts, I tried it on and it just felt incredibly small. Way smaller then I’d want it to be for a cardigan I want to wear over other layers. I haven’t frogged it yet because part of me thinks I should just finish it, wash it and see how it turns out. However there’s a secondary issue. The second skein is quite a bit lighter in color from the first and other two skeins. Guess where I joined the second skein and there’s a pretty distinct line! The bust. Right around the largest part of the bust even. Yep. So, it’s sitting in time out for now while I debate what to do. Thoughts or ideas what to do?

Metro
Metro

Since that didn’t really work out, I went back to working on my Lace and Cables socks for the SSK KAL. I finished the first sock last Monday. Not the best picture as it was taken in the car on the way to take Matt to the airport last week, but hey, it’s a picture of my progress! I’ve finished two of the lace repeats on the second sock. It goes pretty quickly, so I’m sure I’ll be able to finish it this week I have some time off this week because of the Thanksgiving holiday.

Lace and Cables Sock
Lace and Cables Sock

Last week, while Matt was out of town doing some training for work, I spent a lot of my free time cleaning and organizing parts of our house that we usually ignore: the spare room that has boxes of things that don’t have a place to go and the basement that holds both things that have no place to go and things that are only used occasionally. Much of this stuff needed to be sorted through, thrown out, and given away, so while he was away, I focused on taking care of these two areas of the house. I’m pleased to say I made huge progress on both! I think there’s probably a little room for improvement in the spare room, but that can’t happen until we have some sort of storage solution for it. Overall, I’m really happy with getting rid of a lot stuff and having a better idea of what we have.

As a reward for getting all that done, I cast on for a sweater: Estelle. I picked up yarn for this sweater after seeing a sample at Lambikins Hideaway. The sample was knit out of a different yarn, but this yarn was near where I saw the sample and was really reasonably priced. If I’m remembering correctly from what the shop employee said, this yarn was something that was custom spun for the shop quite some time ago (I think before owners changed). The yarn is Yarn Source Sol, 100% wool, and 220 yards for $4.50. They didn’t have a huge selection of colors, but since I’ve been wanting a black cardigan for a while, I figured this was the perfect opportunity to knit myself one.

Yarn Source Sol
Yarn Source Sol

When I got home and looked up the pattern, I found it was already in my queue. No wonder I liked it!

When I bought the yarn, I decided I was going to wait until the socks were done to cast on. After almost a week of hardly any knitting and getting so much accomplished at the house, I made Saturday “knit anything you want” day and cast on for Estelle. I’ve knit to just past where you split for the sleeves. Since my gauge is different then the pattern, I’m knitting the smallest size to get the size I want and it’s moving along quickly. Now to get those socks done so I can get back to it! 🙂

Posted in Completed Projects, Current Projects

NaKniSweMo, Luz Mojito, and SSK KAL

Posted on by mslindz

It’s November and today is the start of NaKnitSweMo! Have you cast on for your sweater yet?

After getting home from Rhinebeck, I started searching for just the right pattern to use for the Twist of Fate Spinnery worsted weight 50 wool/50 alpaca yarn I purchased.

Twist of Fate Spinnery
Twist of Fate Spinnery Wool/Alpaca

I swatched with one sweater in mind, but ultimately decided to knit something different and to knit it for NaKniSweMo. I wanted something that would be great to keep at the office for when it’s freezing and that would use the new knowledge I had from the Fit-to-Flatter class I took. I combed through my queue and all sorts of patterns on Ravelry. Ultimately I decided on Metro. I had the right yardage available, it’d be easy to take on and off at the office, and it would challenge me to use shaping modifications I haven’t used before.

It took a little math since my gauge is different then the pattern, but I’ve decided to knit the smallest size and add in vertical bust darts with the waist shaping increases. I still haven’t quite worked out how to do the bust darts other then a general idea of where I’ll put them. I plan on taking a look over my class materials tonight to plan out exactly how I’ll do that when I get there. I feel pretty confident that I can do this, but I think it’ll be a challenge to make these modifications and trusting that it’ll work. Here’s hoping it all works according to plan!

Now for an FO! 😀 I finished the Luz Mojito socks last Thursday, but didn’t get finished photos of them until the weekend. I love these socks! They are so squishy. I can definitely see myself wearing them around the house this winter to keep my feet extra warm. This is my first time knitting sport weight socks, but I have a feeling it won’t be my last! One skein of yarn was just enough for these for me. I had only a tiny bit left over. If you have larger feet (I wear a US women’s 7 or 7.5) you’ll want more then one skein if you like the leg to be somewhat tall and knit a denser fabric like I did.

Luz Mojito (Front)
Luz Mojito

Pattern: Luz Mojito by Heather Zoppetti (My Ravelry project page.)
Started: October 14, 2011
Completed: October 27, 2011
Yarn: MadelineTosh Tosh Sport, colorway Terra, 1 skein
Needle: US 1.5 (2.50mm) Knit Picks nickel circular
Notes: Followed the pattern as written. Only mod I made was to the toe. I knit as written until there were 16 stitches on each needle left, then decreased every round until 8 stitches were left on each needle, then kitchnered the stitches together. I chose to do these on a US 1.5 instead of a US 2 because of the stitch count. I knew that the stitch count called for in the pattern would be too big on a US 2, so I went for a denser fabric.

Luz Mojito (Heel)
Luz Mojito Socks

Little update about the SSK KAL. When I looked at what I had knit of the Crocus Socks, I didn’t like how the side lace stitches looked. They didn’t look much like the pattern. I figured out that this was because I was knitting the smallest size which wasn’t producing the same look as the medium or large size would. I really like that design element, but knew I couldn’t go up a size and still have socks that would fit, so I decided to pick another pattern. I settled on the Lace and Cables socks instead. It had the same stitch count I knew would fit and from reading over the pattern I knew that none of the design elements would be lost on the smaller size. Ripped back the Crocus Socks and added 10 rows of stockinette before starting the charts (prevents the lace from showing “toe butts” which I’m not fond of). Not much to look at so far, but they’re moving along quickly.

Lace and Cables Sock
Attempt 3: Lace and Cables Socks

Look! I found that other circular! Turns out I’d missed it in my WIP drawer. It was on a project I’d marked as frogged in my Ravelry notebook, but apparently hadn’t actually frogged yet. Oops! I think the sock is going a lot faster now that I’m not using DPNs. Guess I’m a total magic loop convert! Hahaha 🙂

Start anything new or have any plans to? As usual, I’ve got other things I want to start OMGRIGHTNOW and making myself hold off. I have plans to participate in the Solid Socks (Ravelry Group) November KAL, but holding off on casting on until I get at least one of the Lace and Cables socks done. I would like to focus on other WIPs, too, however new things seem to be winning out at the moment! What do you to to help motivate yourself to finish WIPs? I keep trying to make myself work on them, but struggling because they aren’t holding my interest.

Off to start Metro! Happy Knitting/Crocheting!