Sunday Knitting

Way back when Barack Obama was president,* I started a sweater. That was in May of 2016. It is not insignificant that we had just gotten a dog the previous August, because my knitting has slowed down considerably since then. Time is a factor, sure, but the larger impediment to knitting these days is having a grabby many-toothed beast at my side at all times, wanting to know what the hell that thing in my hands is and needed to both smell and taste it. So these days, I need to steal away and do my knitting alone behind closed doors, usually while listening to podcasts or audiobooks rather than my old way of knitting while watching tv. This is all to say that it has taken me almost 2.5 years to knit this goddamn sweater.

And yes, the sweater is lying on the floor for these photos because if I were to wait until a good time to get modeled photos it would probably be another six months. The weather has been crappy, I don't have a picturesque background nearby, and my skin is a mess. So this is what you're getting.

I can tell you that the sweater fits okay, though it's a bit long and hugs my butt in a way that's not exactly flattering. But usually they end up stretching a bit width-wide, which shortens it length-wise so the final verdict on fit isn't in quite yet.

It came out pretty well, I think. It's a bit rumpled in the photos. I blocked it out all nicely, but then it was folded up and even shoved in a suitcase for a trip to Maine and back without even being taken out. I haven't worn it yet, I don't know why.

I picked this pattern because I love the interesting textures in ganseys, but this had the added challenge of a hood and a front pocket. I've been down that road before with my Rogue Sweater (pic to the right because it was pre-blog and I had photos on flick that now aren't showing up. Honestly I forgot I even had a flickr account.) I love the idea of a hoodie more than I love an actual hoodie. They look great, but are impractical to wear with a coat because what do you do with the hood? It always seems to get in the way. that's an awful lot of work to put into something that isn't practical.

However, I'm happy to say that both the hood and front pocket came out pretty well. The pocket is formed in a rather complicated way, and I had to go back and rip it out and re-do it because I attached in such a way that it didn't lie flat. I'm glad I took the time to fix it because I would not have been able to live with it like that. That was a hard lesson I've learn from the past - a lesson learned, in fact, from the above pictured Rogue. There's a cable pattern going around the hood, joining on the front neckline and I made a major mistake in the cable that is front and center on the sweater. I still wear it (I wore it a couple of days ago, in fact) but I see it EVERY TIME and it makes me so annoyed. But that was one of my first sweaters and remains one of the most complicated and I didn't know how to go back and fix it and then be able to continue without losing count of all the things I was doing at one time.

How did this turn into a post about a different sweater?

Here's a closer photo of the patterns on the front.

Oh, you'll notice it has a couple of buttonholes but no buttons. Well. For this I would have wanted buttons in the same color as the yarn, but how would I go about finding buttons in that exact shade of mustard yellow? I have no idea, but I'm sure I'd never actually button the neck so I decided not to even bother trying. I made buttonholes in case I ever changed my mind.

So there you go: my first finished knitted thing in quite a while. You know, I actually also recently finished a pair of socks and even took photos, but socks don't really need an entire post so I'll put those in my monthly wrap-up, which will come (hopefully) in less than a week.


*How I long for those days. 

Sunday Knitting

I have not done one of these posts in forever because I haven't been knitting very much and my progress is so slow there's not often anything to show. But today! Today I have an exciting update on the sweater I've been knitting since the spring of 2016.

I have finished the hood!

And that's not all. I also had to go around and pick up stitches and knit the trim.

It gets a little fiddly at the end, because you have to sew down the edges at the bottom, crossing a bit like so:

I seriously don't know why I bothered with the button holes as I don't have buttons. I'd only want ones that match the yarn color and I have no idea how I'd find buttons that match exactly, especially considering I'd have to order them online. But also maybe it should have buttons to make the neckline look right? I didn't think to try it on after I made the edging so I don't know.

This is supposed to be the end of the project, except I went out of order and now I have to make sleeves. Two of them. So expect photos of this finished project sometime in 2019. (I wish I was kidding.)

Sunday Knitting

I'm in Maine for my family's late Thanksgiving this weekend, and I finished the body of my sweater.

It looks terribly rumpled and there are loose ends everywhere, but you get the idea.

I'm very happy to be this close to finishing this seemingly endless project! I mean, it's not that close really, I've got two sleeves and a hood to knit now.

I tried it on to make sure the armholes were large enough and they seem fine. The sweater itself is a bit long, but I find that they tend to stretch horizontally which makes them a little shorter, so it should be fine. And if it's not fine, at least it will be finished and I can move on to something else.

Sunday Knitting

I have finished a thing! A pair of things!

And here's a close up (with a bit of dog hair, sorry.)

This is my first sunday knitting post since January when I finished my last pair of socks. I'm not even sure when I started these because I neglected to add the project in Ravelry (which I sadly have not been using, and I really need to rectify this), but I assume it was not long after finishing the last pair.

The pattern is from Sensational Knitted Socks. The yarn I think is Rowan Fine Art, at least that's one of the 3 yarn labels I found in my project bag. (The others are Regia which I'm pretty sure this isn't, and the Kettle Dyed yarn I bought in PA in the colorway Buggy Top, which I distinctly remember being grey.)

I think I mentioned at one point that I cut back on knitting and yoga months ago because of wrist pain, and I only started doing both again fairly recently. I also hadn't been watching much TV because TV and knitting go hand in hand for me, so I started both again at the same time. I've started watching Doctor Who again, which I gave up after a few Peter Capaldi episodes, but now I'm (re)committed to it.

Next up, I reeeally need to rip back my East Neuk Hoodie to, oh, about the spot it was at in this photo, and a little more actually, because I think I should have attached the pocket earlier. I don't even remember how far past that point I got because it's literally been months since I've looked at it. I'd love to just ignore it and start another pair of socks, but I feel strongly that I need to deal with this mess before moving on. Wish me luck.

Sunday Knitting

Just some socks.

I haven't been knitting much lately, as evidenced by these socks I began eleven months ago. Partly that's because of the dog, who enjoys grabbing at my projects as I'm knitting and will only settle for, at the very least, closely inspecting it. It's hard to work under those circumstances. The other extenuating factor is that in the last few months I've had a lot of wrist pain and gave up on both knitting and yoga. But I've started knitting again because I want to take advantage of the fact that the dog is away at boarding while we have renovations being done on our house. It's going ok and I don't think it's bothering my wrists. I think yoga was the real culprit. (Those instructors really love having you remain in some variation of downward-facing dog for half the class, and I don't know why. Plenty of other poses to choose from.)

Anyhow, I have a new pair of socks. The days have been very gray so I wasn't able to get a very well lit photo. But they feel quite nice, which is what's important. I used some Regia yarn I had hanging around and the Garter Rib pattern from Sensational Knitted Socks.

Now I'm hoping to focus on my East Neuk Hoodie which has also been in progress for many months.

Sunday Knitting

Remember that sweater I started way back in the spring? Maybe not because I also barely remember it and I am the one making it. I haven't been knitting AT ALL recently for various reasons: my dog really enjoys supervising and she is what you would call a micromanager; I've been more interested in reading than watching shows and I can't read and knit at the same time; I started meditating and also running, which are two more things I'm cramming into my days. Also, I am recently obsessed with hand-lettering, which seems to be an offshoot of bullet-journaling, and now am trying to find a few minutes every day for lettering/doodling/drawing.

Anyhow, this fall I went on an annual family vacation and took my knitting with me and actually got something done!

The pocket is a little bit wonky, I fear, but it is HARD to figure out exactly where to join the top. You don't want to stretch it or leave it too loose, but finding just the right spot seems almost impossible. And there's no way to fix it later so you're kind of stuck. Anyhow I am convinced it will be ok. It's hard to tell from the photo, but I'm a couple of inches past the top of the pocket. I knit an inch or so on vacation and when I returned I wanted to keep up the momentum so one afternoon I put on some Netflix and took my chances with the dog. She sniffed a little and quickly lost interest, and hopefully that disinterest will be maintained. 

It's been difficult finding the time for this. So many things have fallen by the wayside now that we have a dog, and I also just can't maintain many hobbies and interests all at once. Work has been super busy which means I don't have reading time during my lunch break (because I don't take real lunch breaks, or I use them to do errands), and sometimes I'm too tired for certain things once I get home, walk the dog, entertain the dog, then have dinner. Why is adulting so hard?

I have some random days off between now and the end of the year because we can't roll over our vacation and of course everyone else is also trying to use their time so every now and then I'll take off a random Tuesday (like election day next week!) I want to do some knitting on these days. Currently I'm watching Miss Fisher's Mysteries, which I love - I really want to be Phryne Fisher when I grow up (though I think she is younger than me, so that is weird). But what else should I be watching? Tell me the awesome shows that are on Netflix that I have been missing!

Sunday Knitting

It has been a loooong time since I've posted anything about knitting. It's actually been quite a long time since I've really done any knitting, but then I started watching tv again. I picked up my East Neuk Hoodie while watching season 1 of The Returned, though it was a bit tricky since that show is subtitled. But once I moved to the new season of Orange is the New Black, things have really got moving. I've even taken it on the bus a few times, though it's getting unwieldy.

Have I told you about the East Neuk Hoodie? I don't think I have. I mentioned it briefly at the end of my last knitting post, which was way back in February. It's from the Fall 2014 issue of Knitscene, which had a whole section on modern ganseys. I love a gansey, and the one of the cover kind of stole my heart. It's a hoodie with a front pocket, and I've just finished the pocket.

The one in the issue was made in purple, and you know I love purple, but I was determined to make this in mustard yellow from the first moment that I saw it. Finding just the right shade was not easy (especially since my go-to yarn store closed down a couple of years ago) but I went to the one remaining yarn store in my area and looked at all the yellows until I found just the right shade. Of course they didn't have enough of it for my sweater. So one of the employees tried to talk me into a lesser mustard yellow until I finally asked if they could just order me some more of this one. They did, and it was a good choice. 

Knitting sweaters seems very unpleasant for summer, but I have air conditioning and I really want to be able to wear this in the fall. Here's hoping I can keep up the pace! Once I finish OITNB I might need a new show to watch in order to keep up the knitting so please give me your recommendations!

Sunday Knitting

I finished the Arrow Socks over a week ago, but the pictures from last weekend were terrible and I needed to redo them during the week. Luckily, I was home on vacation all week so I was able to take pictures during the day.

Here's one of them on.

The Arrow Socks pattern is from Sensational Knitted Socks by Charlene Schurch, and I bought the yarn in Lancaster, PA when I was there a couple of years ago. The colorway is called Buggy Top. I used size 0 needles, as I generally do. I wore these socks already and they were nice and warm and comfy and I'm pretty happy with them. I also like the way the light gray striped as I was knitting. Plus they're a sensible color so I'm likely to wear them more than I wear, say, my bright orange socks. (I usually wear them under tall boots. Nobody needs to know.)

Since I'm on vacation this week I've had time to do more knitting and you'll be thrilled to learn that I started.....another pair of gray socks. I'm sorry. It really makes for boring blog fodder. But I've also restarted my East Neuk Hoodie in a shade of mustard yellow that I really like so that's is exciting. I hope to post an update with pictures sometime soon!

Sunday Knitting

Hi, wow, it's been a long time since I posted about knitting! For quite a while I was doing very little of it, but recently I've been powering through a pair of socks.

These are the Arrow Socks from Sensational Knitted Socks, and the yarn is Kettle Dyed Socks in the colorway Buggy Top, which I bought at Lancaster Yarns a couple of years ago when I was visiting Amish country in Pennsylvania.

Mostly I've been knitting on the bus, while listening to the Anne Perry mystery Death of a Stranger. I always want to listen to one of her books in the dead of winter, and they always make me want to knit. I've also been working on these while watching American Horror Story: Freakshow, but I don't spend as much time watching tv. Together, the audio book and the tv show are propelling me quickly through this project so I'm thinking about what's next.

I've got more sock yarn on deck, also gray, which I think I might just work up in a basic 2x2 rib. Boring as far as knitting goes, but good for wearing. I'm also still looking at the East Neuk Hoodie which I began ages ago in an unfortunate shade of goldenrod. I wanted mustard yellow but had to order online so of course it wasn't actually mustard (as I should have guessed from the name of the colorway, but you never know.) A month or so ago I stopped by one of the very few yarn shops that still exist in these parts and found a shade that was much better. They didn't have enough of it but ordered it for me and now it's been sitting in a back upstairs for weeks. I may actually cast on soon.

When I ordered the goldenrod yarn I also ordered, in case the goldenrod wasn't right, some bright orange because surely that would be a great color. I expected it to be tangerine, but it's a little more...neon. Not exactly, but very bright. I'd be willing to wear a sweater made of it if it's the right sweater, so I've been thinking about that as well. I'm picturing something very simple, stockinette or reverse stockinette, maybe a bit oversized with straight hems and cuffs (as opposed to ribbed, is what I mean.) I'm not sure yet.

Meanwhile, what to do with those many skeins of goldenrod yarn? Hmm.

Sunday Knitting

Remember my Thyri Pullover, which I kind of finished back in July, but was a bit too long? And all I needed to do was rip back a bit and re-knit the hem? Five months later, I am finally wearing it.

Very little was involved in finishing it, just a couple of hours of work plus washing and blocking. But I may have mentioned that we got a dog a while ago and she really, really enjoys biting and chewing and tugging on things, especially things made of fabric. The first time she came into the house, she immediately walked over to my knitting basket and grabbed my Thyri in her teeth. So, I didn't really touch the sweater until we sent her off to a board and train facility several weeks ago, where hopefully they're teaching her the value of hand-knit items. (That is what they teach there, right?)

This pattern is from the Winter 2014 issue of Knitscene, and I was immediately drawn to it because of the built-in handwarmers, which unfortunately I didn't get any good photos of. This is probably the best one:

Perfect for my Dickensian workplace.

The neckline is a little wider than I'd like, which you can tell better from the photo below. This is a common problem with many knitting patterns. I mean, sweaters are for winter and winter is cold so I'd like to not have my collarbones exposed. I also have to adjust the sweater a bit when I first put it on because it's a bit tight around the shoulders, pulling the neck even wider. But once I rearrange it to my liking, it seems to stay pretty well.

It's not the most flattering fit, I'll admit, but this sweater is more about the coziness. What really makes it is the yarn: I used the recommended yarn, Madelinetosh Tosh Vintage in the colorway Forestry. It's really gorgeous and feels wonderful too. It's hand-dyed though, which means I had to knit a couple of skeins at a time, moving back between them every couple of rows. This is not only annoying and disrupts the flow of knitting, it created a weird little seam, which is most visible on the back right shoulder.

But that's a fairly minor issue. All in all, I'd call this project a success. This is a sweater I think I'll be reaching for a lot this winter.

Sunday Knitting

I recently finished a baby sweater for a coworker. There was only a small window of time between finishing and wrapping it, and the light was pretty bad during that time, so I apologize for the photo quality. The color is rather washed out, but at least you can get the idea.

I used a pattern called Korrigan, which was originally written in French, but has an English translation. It used some language that was shall we say, non-standard, but I managed to figure it out. I'd caution less-experienced knitters against using this pattern (unless you have someone to help you) because it could lead to frustration and errors.

It's a pretty adorable sweater though, isn't it? The yarn is Breathless from Shalimar Yarns, and it's a blend of merino, silk, and cashmere. The color is just beautiful, and I really do adore the cabling around the yoke of this sweater. It's hand-dyed so it pooled a bit, but I sort of like the effect. I found these plain little white buttons at home, which was lucky, though it took me at least a week to drudge up the wherewithal to sew them on.

If we're lucky, maybe I'll be able to post a modeled photo sometime after the baby arrives.

Sunday Knitting

So I was knitting along on my Thyri pullover, paying more attention to the episodes of Orange is the New Black that I was watching, and suddenly I was at the end and the thing was about four miles long.

Seriously, wtf?

Pretty much the entire torso was a series of decreases and increases, so there was no continuous measuring to see if I had reached the correct length or not. And based on my row gauge, I even slipped in a few extra rows between some of the increases/decreases to make up for it. Not enough to account for this crazy length though. I don't know what happened.

Thank goodness it was knit top down. Tunic is not a good look on me. So I will be ripping back several inches and then re-knitting the hem. 

Here I'm pointing at the spot where I'd like the sweater to stop.

Otherwise, it's an ok sweater. The yarn is lovely, and I like the long sleeves and thumbholes. I wish the sleeves weren't so tight (are other knitters plagued by this problem or are my arms just enormous?) and there's an awkward seam in the yoke that I think is from swapping between one skein of yarn and another (hand-dyed is lovely in theory, but not so much in practice.) This will likely be a cozy lounge-around-the-house sweater rather than a work or socializing type sweater.

I will post again when it is actually finished to my satisfaction.

Sunday Knitting

I started a pair of socks back October and now that I've finished, I realized I haven't even shown you a progress shot since the very beginning. Well, five months later I have a new pair of socks!

It is very difficult to photograph one's own feet.

To be fair, I could have finished them ages ago, but kept setting them aside to wait for a knitting group night because I didn't have another portable project that was easy enough to work on while socializing. Eventually, I said to hell with it and just finished them.

They're pretty snazzy, if I do say so myself.

The pattern is Pharoah's Check from Sensational Knitted Socks. I've been wanting to do one of these mosaic-style colorwork patterns for a while. In fact, I've done very little colorwork which brings me to the weird striping thing on the toes. We need to talk about this.

Do you see how the stripes on the right foot suddenly look more black as we get closer to the toe? There's a definite line of demarcation where the black somehow suddenly pops out.

This has to do with how you hold the two colors of yarn, and which one you bring over/under the other one when you switch. One is always more dominant and you need to make sure it stays consistent. Because I haven't done much colorwork I wasn't really paying attention, although it is something I vaguely know about. I was aware, as I was knitting, that I wasn't consistent, and I knew it would make a difference. But honestly, they're socks, and I don't care a whole lot. It didn't seem worth the trouble of trying to keep track of which color I was bringing over or under which color each time I switched. I don't know if there's a trick to keeping track, and if it applies to all colorwork or just vertical stripes, but I'll certainly figure it out if I plan to do a pattern like this for a hat or a sweater. 

All in all, I think these came out pretty nice. They fit and feel good, and I'm sure I'll get a lot of use out of them.

Sunday Knitting

I've done something extremely reckless.

Last week when I was trapped inside during a blizzard, I ordered a huge shipment of yarn from WEBS - and that is not the reckless part. Yesterday it arrived and I immediately cast on for a sweater, without swatching.

I miss natural light.

This yarn is Madelinetosh Tosh Vintage, and if you are familiar with Madelinetosh you probably understand my urgent need to dive in so irresponsibly. 

This will be a yoked sweater, knit top-down all in one piece. What is difficult about this sort of project is that they are hard to swatch for. It's possible to swatch in the round, but it's not pretty, or accurate. I figured the yoke could be my swatch.

I think I'm going to have to go up a needle size. I also realized that part of why I swatch isn't so much to get gauge, but to determine how much it may change once I wash the item, so I think I'm going to actually make a swatch now, after the fact, before I make any rash decisions about ripping out and restarting. 

Another interesting bit about this yarn is that it's hand-dyed and there's no dye lot. This means that the skeins aren't all exactly the same, which is why there are two balls of yarn in that photo. With hand-dyed yarn, you need to knit one or two rows (or rounds) from one ball, and then the next one or two from another, alternating to sort of integrate the variations in a way that will appear more natural. One doesn't want half of one sleeve, for instance, to look lighter than the whole rest of the sweater. This was something I had not anticipated when I ordered this yarn, but I'm willing to overlook it, because look at how gorgeous that color is.

Wish me luck. Once I've determined I'm using the right needles I think this project might go quickly. I have fantasies of wearing this sweater this winter, which is utterly ridiculous, unless we have a lot of winter left. Which, sweater aside, I really hope we don't. 

Sunday Knitting

After the disappointment of my failed Pianissimo, I have moved on to a new sweater project. I've long been trying to find a use for some Wool Bam Boo yarn I bought when Windsor Button was closing, and failing to find the right project. This is why I don't buy yarn without knowing what it's for. Usually I choose a pattern I want to make, then find yarn for it. But when my favorite yarn store was closing and selling everything for cheap, I panicked.

Finally I found a pattern called Nympheas, a lovely short-sleeved pullover with a simple lace pattern, and cast on.

So far, so good.

Mind you, I didn't exactly do a proper swatch. I knit a swatch and measured it, but I didn't bother with the whole washing and blocking and measuring again because I did it for Pianissimo and look what that got me. Anyhow, this is a pretty quick project so far and I think I'll be able to tell soon if it's coming out close to the right size or not.

The bottom curled up edge is going to be folded under and hemmed, revealing a picot edge. The lace is a simple pattern, though the decreases have been a challenge. Usually with lace I put stitch markers between the repeats so that if I screw up it's easier to tell where it happened. It also makes it easier to figure out where to start in the pattern once I've decreased stitches at the beginning of the row. However, here the repeats are staggered and don't start at the same point in each row so I can't mark them. I already had to rip back once, but I think I've got the pattern down pretty well now.

I'm also starting to look at more new projects. We're having quite a harsh winter here in the Northeast - in fact, I'm writing this mid-blizzard - and my office has been freezing. (One of my co-workers actually crocheted a whole slew of fingerless mitts to keep at all the service desks for everyone to share.) Usually, my heavier sweaters are reserved for use at home because most buildings I go to in the winter are heated quite generously, but this year something is up with our heat and nobody seems willing to fix it. I've been getting a lot of use out of my heaviest sweaters, but I've only a few of them and they are quite casual. So I'm just going to need to make more.

I realize I won't finish any of them in time to use them this year, and things could totally be different next year, but I've never let reality get in the way of my knitting and I'm not going to start now.

Sunday Knitting

I give up. Everything about Pianissimo is wrong. It's so wrong, and I'm so annoyed about it, I can't even get a decent picture.

Look at it just sitting there, being all the wrong measurements.

It's supposed to be both longer and wider than it is, and no amount of coaxing has helped to get it there. I did manage to stab myself pretty hard with a pin, just to reinforce the pain of this failed project.

The thing is, I did everything right. Before beginning, I made a swatch and washed and blocked it to determine which needles would get me the correct gauge. I measured each part as I went along - and I was sure to take it off the needles to do so, to ensure the accuracy of my measurements. Given all of this careful planning, when I finished it should have all added up to the correct length, because that is how math works. It is not, however, how knitting works.

I knew this pattern was going to be a problem. There are so many different pieces, no way to try them on as you go, and the pattern is something like 18 pages long. (Oh, and there are no page numbers, just to make it more fun.) The first part I knit was the bottom trim, and it looked nothing like the picture in the pattern. I should have stopped right there.

This yarn is really lovely so I'll have to find another use for it (with or without the part I've already used. I'm not sure if I'll able to salvage it if I try to rip it out.)

In the meantime, socks. Good old socks. I can always depend on you.

Crochet Tuesday

No, this isn't going to be another regular feature, it's just a Sunday Knitting post that's neither on Sunday nor about knitting.

I mentioned last time that I was going to crochet some more dishcloths, and now I have. (Please, try to contain your excitement.)

They are imperfect, to be sure, but I think they'll work. I used a free pattern called Nubbie Scrubbies, which is a very easy pattern of alternated triple and single crochet that makes cute little bobbles. I did manage to accidentally make one of them a little smaller by not chaining enough stitches to begin with. Again, I'm pretty sure it will still work.

Working on these hurt my hands, especially my thumb. I don't know if that's because I'm new to crochet and using different muscles, or if it's because of the kitchen cotton. I know that sometimes knitting with this yarn also makes my hands hurt.

This was a fun project to take on the bus to give me something to do with my hands while listening to podcasts. These dishcloths and Serial will probably be forever intertwined in my head.

Sunday Knitting

Back in early 2009 I received a very pretty set of crocheted dish cloths from my friend, which I posted about here. Here they are again, in case you don't want to click through:

It's just about 6 years later and these guys have seen a lot of dishes. They're all starting to get holes in them so I know it's just a matter of time before I need to replace them.

I happen to have a decent amount of cotton yarn hanging about so I decided to knit a simple dishcloth, which I did a couple of months ago. Then I totally stalled before managing to do the crochet border. So a week or so ago I thought, you know what? It's about time I learned to actually crochet. None of this half-assed business of barely managing to do a shitty-looking border on a knitted thing, I'm going to learn to crochet an actual thing.

I finished the border and then made a single-crochet swatch for practice that happens to be the right size for a dish cloth. Here they are together:

Ok, so I inadvertently decreased a few rows into the yellow crocheted one, but I'm pretty sure it will still wash dishes adequately. My plan was to whip up a few so I'd have a whole bunch to show you. But strangely, just as knitted things won't knit themselves, it seems that crocheted things won't crochet themselves either. One of these days I'm hoping to find some simple-but-varied patterns and make some more.

Then I plan to get really good at it, maybe as good as my coworker who whips up all kinds of fun and fantastical things in no time at all and who, one of these days, I fully expect will crochet a working TARDIS on her lunch break. I suppose it's unlikely I will ever approach her talent, but I hope to at least be able to make an afghan or some amigurumi animals.

Sunday Knitting

I rarely do colorwork so I'm very excited about my new project. Here's a glimpse.

It's actually very easy. The color pattern is created by using slip stitches, so I'm only ever using one color at a time. It creates a very satisfying pattern though, doesn't it?

Sunday Knitting

Here is my finished Huntress Shawl, with its little fox face.

But I'll probably wear it as a scarf, more like this.

This was an easy project that went quickly. You begin with the center panel, and use yarnovers to make the fox head. Then, stitches are picked up on each side and knit toward each end, decreasing until it tapers to just a few stitches before binding off. The Huntress Shawl pattern is from the Fall 2012 issue of Knitscene. The yarn, Cascade 200 Superwash, is just from my stash. I always like working with Cascade of any sort.

I don't recall why I bought this particular yarn, but I rarely buy any without specific plans in mind. Nevertheless, my stash has gotten a little out of hand, mostly just from project leftovers. So yesterday I went through and pulled out enough to fill two large bags and offered it up on Freecycle. What I have left is mostly sock yarn and it's far more manageable. I also found a few things I didn't realize I had, which was especially surprising since I keep a spreadsheet of all my yarn.

I'm still working on Pianissimo, but now I've also started a couple of socks as well. I'll share photos of those soon!