Back to School U neck vest is done!!

Yesterday I finally finished my back to school u neck vest from the Fitted Knits book. I wanted to look back to see how long it actually did take me and found my blog post dated Nov. 13 2007. So...it didn't quite take a year. ;-) This has been quite a year for me - there hasn't been a lot of knitting or crafting time until recently and it was with a real sense of gratitude that I finished off this vest. I am so pleased to have time and energy to devote to handcrafting again.

Somehow it seems that all of a sudden it is November and I am realizing that I would like to get going on making gifts for our family for the upcoming holiday season. I don't want to leave everything until the last minute...I want to enjoy the process. I'll have to put my thinking cap on (or browse some blogs) to come up with some new gift ideas, my family is all stocked up on felted slippers (my favourite thing to make the last two years). I know what I am making for E thanks to Knitting Iris' post about knitted chainmail. Many people will be getting handmade shopping bags - produce bags and big shopping totes - made out of re-purposed fabric. Hmmm, I guess it is time to get going on some projects and see what other ideas we can come across.

Worldwide Knit in Public Day

Just heard about this on Ravelry. Saturday June 14th. How about it, girls?

Holding hands mittens

Finished at last! I have been letting these languish in the knitting bag, but the deadline was looming so I had to finish them. I have tossed these into the washer this morning and am hoping that a good tumble in the dryer will soften up the acrylic.

Note to self: only knit with yarn I love.

Floppy Rabbit

I made this Floppy Rabbit today for a friend’s 1 year old twins. I bought the Bernat Soy yarn with the intention of knitting two Tomtens (see photo at the bottom of this post). Well, only one was knitted in time for the children’s birthday, so I decided to make this toy with the three colours I had left. It was inspired by a rabbit that my sister was given as a child - I still remember it - I loved its long legs.

I didn’t start with full skeins, but I expect you could knit this with one skein each of the oatmeal, seasalt and celery. Or just make it all one colour.

I used Keyplate #2 on my Bond Classic knitting machine. I made it up as I went, with no gauge swatches or measuring, so feel free to adapt it as you wish. My toy measures about 27 inches tall. The arms seem just right, being about the length of the body, and the legs are extra long, on purpose.

Body

E-wrap cast on 50 in blue, hang hem
Knit 35 rows blue
Knit 25 rows green
Bind off (I used the 'sewn with a darning needle' method)

Head

E-wrap cast on 40 in white, hang hem
Knit 40 rows white
Bind off

Ears (make 2)
(with hindsight, these could have been bigger, or you could make 4 and sew them together in pairs to stop them from curling in)

E-wrap cast on 4 in white
Knit 2 rows, add weight (I use a bulldog clip with a magnet attached for such a small piece of work)
*Carriage on right, push a needle out to working position on carriage side, knit a row (one stitch increased)
Carriage on left, push a needle out to working position on carriage side, knit a row (6 stitches)
Knit 2 rows
Repeat last four rows (from *) until there are 14 sts, ending with the two even rows.
Knit 14 rows straight.
**Carriage on right, transfer the stitch on the right end to the needle on the left, knit a row (one stitch decreased)
Carriage on left, transfer the stitch at the far left to the needle on the right, knit a row (12 stitches left)
Knit 2 rows
Repeat last four rows (from **) until there are 4 sts left.
Bind off.

Arms (make 2)

E-wrap cast on 20 in white, hang hem
Knit 10 rows white (for “paws”)
Knit 40 rows green
Bind off

Legs (make 2)

E-wrap cast on 30 in blue, hang hem
Knit 90 rows blue
Knit 7 rows white (for “shoes”)
Bind off

Sew around all pieces, stuffing gently as you go. I made sure my seams were on the centre back of the head and body and the underside of the limbs. When sewing up the head and body, I rounded the corners a little. Sew the head and limbs to the body, and the ears to the head. Embroider features.

The completed Tomten jacket ------------->

Seems like I just can't shut up today!

Third post today!

First, I'm going to whine about my day, hobbling around like an old lady. I woke up at about 4.30 this morning with a pain in my back, and whatever position I tried to lie in, it hurt. I have had to miss Taekwon-do tonight and have been moving slowly all day, occasionally wincing at the recurring pain. I assume I strained something while trampolining with the boys on Tuesday - and for some reason it took until Thursday to make itself known!

Hopefully, it will be better soon.


I cleaned out the small freezer above the fridge yesterday - THAT job was way overdue. Once I'd emptied it and given it a good scrub, I only put back the stuff I really wanted to keep. Some old tomato soup went into the compost bucket along with some 5 year old habanero peppers and some commercial sweetcorn which we never eat. I put three bags (about 9lbs) of homegrown prune plums into a large bowl to defrost, and this morning I made them into two plum crumbles. Good breakfast food!


And I am delighted to announce that my Sunrise Circle Jacket is 100% finished - not just the knitting, but the buttons too. I found some lovely glass buttons at my LYS the other day and I can now wear the jacket. Yippee!

Sock is growing

I am really pleased with the fit of this sock. (My husband commented that it will be very difficult to walk in with all those spikes - ho ho - what a joker!) It is growing faster than I expected, considering how tiny the stitches are, and how infrequently I am working on it.

Are you going to turn your lights off tonight for Earth Hour? People around the world are joining together to turn their lights off between 8 and 9pm this evening to save energy. Wouldn't it be great if companies were to do it too - just think of all those office buildings that have lights burning all night long!

Socks and pie

I managed to stay awake late last night and squeeze in some knitting time, something which has been sadly neglected in the last few days.

I made a reasonable amount of progress on the leg of the sock (considering there are 8 stitches and 10 rows to the inch)! After the first couple of inches, I changed to stockinette - there was no way I was going to knit 6 inches of Knit 2, Purl 2 rib!

R and I went for a long walk this afternoon as he had the day off work. We walked down the hill from our house to a Regional Park which runs along the lake. It slopes from high above the lake down to a beach, so we walked a loop, along a high trail to one end, along the lakeside trail to the other end, then up and along another high trail to get back to where we started from. I wish I had taken the camera - the views were blogworthy! Blue sky, blue lake, clouds and rainfall visible in the distance. The wind was cold and I was glad I took a jacket, though predictably I had to shed my hoody half way around as I was too hot. It was all uphill back home.

This pie was our dessert tonight. I made pizza for the men in the family - I just had salad, but I was not bothered about missing out on pizza when I knew I had this to look forward to. The pie is 100% raw. I made it by soaking for a few hours 2 cups of raw almonds and 2 cups of raisins in separate bowls. I defrosted some frozen berries - a mixture of blueberries, raspberries and blackberries. I drained the nuts and raisins and put the almonds in the food processor first. Chopped them up as finely as I could. Added the raisins and chopped and mixed them in. Tipped the whole lot into a glass dish and pressed it down with my hands, making a depression in the centre. I mixed a little raw agave syrup in with the berries, then poured them into the centre.

Much easier than a baked pie and way healthier.

A bit of knitting

I took one pair of size 10 (6mm) knitting needles and one skein of Lion Brand Homespun with me on my road trip this week. I didn't cast on right away - I wanted to pace myself over the three days so I didn't run out of knitting! After the first couple of hours of driving, I started this - a scarf for my dad's birthday.

It's a stitch from a stitch dictionary - can't remember which one - called Cartridge Belt Rib. It's not really ribbing, but it has some good texture and doesn't curl. You need a multiple of 4 stitches plus 3 - I'm using 31 stitches. It's a two-row pattern. The first row is (K3, slip 1 with yarn in front) across to the last 3 stitches, K3. The second row is K1 (slip 1 wyif, K3) to the last 2 stitches, slip 1, K1. So the slip stitches are staggered on the back and front and it looks very clever even though you're only knitting, no purling.

I completed 23 inches of the scarf by the time I arrived home. I think it really needs to be at least 36 inches but I'm not sure whether the skein will last that long. I may have to buy another.

We sidetracked to a yarn shop in the Vancouver area. It was Wool and Wicker in Stevestown, a lovely place of small stores and nice housing, right on the ocean. The shop was divided into two parts - in one, the yarns were sorted by manufacturer, and in the other the yarns were sorted by colour. If I wasn't picky about my fibres (avoiding wool/silk) it would be a great adventure choosing lots of different yarns in similar colours and making a scarf with multiple strands.

I decided on three skeins of Berroco Comfort Sock yarn, which is 50% nylon, 50% acrylic, so should make for some hardwearing socks. It's a typical sock weight, recommended needle size 3.25mm, and whilst the label indicates 7.5 stitches to the inch, my little gauge swatch gave me 8! I'm used to making socks with elann esprit on 4mm needles, casting on 48 stitches for a sock for myself. I have already cast on for a sock with the yarn in the middle, and I'm using 64 stitches.

It was so nice to sleep in my own bed last night and I was sufficiently sleep-deprived from my night on the floor at the aquarium to sleep in until 10.40 this morning! And the kids weren't up yet either.

A quick scarf

A quick post about a quick scarf.....I am buzzing about doing piles of laundry and getting some stuff done in readiness for our few days away, so I really shouldn't spend too long on the computer!

I bought the yarn in the morning, made a gauge swatch on the Bond when I got home, and made the scarf in the evening. I decided to knit it at a looser gauge than usual - keyplate 3 rather than 2 for this yarn - as I liked the drape and I knew that I would be folding it double and seaming it along its length so it would be plenty warm enough.

I sewed it up with the reverse stockinette on the outside and crocheted across each end to close it up.

I went outside to photograph the scarf this morning - unfortunately it wasn't sunny but I'm sure you can still appreciate the colours in the yarn.

Now I really must go and clean bathrooms, check the dryer, wash lots of lettuce and bag it so it's easy for my husband to grab when he gets home from work while I'm away, and make some soup for him and eldest son to eat for dinner one night. I've made cookies, vegan mayonnaise and packed some things already, and the kids have some clothes packed in their backpacks too. One boy left to bath, once I've attacked his hair with the scissors.

Almost FO, yarn and beads

I'm pleased to announce that the Sunrise Circle Jacket is done! Well, except for some buttons, which I haven't bought yet. But the knitting is finished, and it took me the whole of Friday evening to sew it all together, snug in front of a wood fire. I would love to wear this to Vancouver on Monday, but it really should be properly finished first.

A friend of mine is driving us to Vancouver so we (two mums and three kids) can enjoy a sleepover at the Aquarium with a group of about 35 homeschoolers on Wednesday night. We're going on Monday, though, so she can spend some time with her mum, and we're all staying at her mum's house for a couple of nights.

I decided, as knitters do (any excuse for knitting), that a thank you gift for her mum was necessary, so of course a visit to a yarn shop was then essential! I went out early today, before the kids were up, and I arrived so early that it wasn't even open yet. So I just HAD to divert to Michaels, where I picked up some beads and earring hoops and posts (this wasn't an impulse buy, I had been planning to buy these for some time - honest).

I also bought a skein of Homespun - I think the colour is called Edward - very masculine charcoal shades. It will work well for a scarf for my dad. I don't know if he wears scarves, but maybe if he has one this winter, he will wear it, don't you think?

I plan to use something called Cartridge Belt Rib, which is a stitch I used for a scarf for myself a couple of years ago. It's not really rib, it's a combination of knit and slip stitches, but it looks good and doesn't curl. I thought it would make a good airplane project, but do you really think I can resist knitting this before May? No, I don't think so. In fact, it might just get knitted this week as I'll be a passenger in my friend's car for at least 10 hours.

When I finally reached the yarn store, I bought three skeins of the James C Brett Marble DK, which I'm still in love with, in Moss, which is mostly green with some pink and other colours twisted in. I have the rest of today (Saturday) and Sunday to whip up a scarf on the Bond - it'll just be a plain scarf, knitted twice the width so I can sew it into a tube. I envisage having the reverse stockinette stitch side showing, as the colours always look better on the "bumpy" side.

Off to get some belated breakfast now and make sure the kids are getting ready to go the library.

Oh yes, and I nearly forgot - raw scores for the last four days - 87%, 86%, 80%, 87%. Not sure how easy it will be to maintain my willpower while I'm out of town, and I certainly won't be keeping score!

Slow and, ahem, steady wins the race?

Just so my friends don't completely give up on me as a knitter. Here is a picture of a project of mine.

Here's my excuse as to why these socks are taking so long. :-) I wanted to do the heel and toe with a double strand of yarn and I wanted the second strand to be a solid colour. Since I am only using thrifted yarn, I had to dye the white yarn to match. Yes, that sounds like quite a reasonable excuse, doesn't it? Now, that I no longer have an excuse I guess that means that they socks should be done post-haste.

Tomten is done

Phew! The Tomten Jacket is done.....except for a fastening on the front.

I decided to put my Sunrise Circle Jacket aside and get this finished. It only needed a sleeve. I found a window of opportunity yesterday afternoon, and then again in the evening at "knitting night" at a friend's house, and then I stayed up until after midnight crocheting along the front edges to neaten things off and disguise the strands on one edge where I carried the two colours up the side.

The Bernat Soy is OK to knit with, but a bit slippery especially on the aluminum needles, and I think I may have to block the jacket in the hope it'll even out my knitting. All this garter stitch did become a little tedious so I don't think I'll be making a second jacket after all.

I have three balls of the same yarn in blue, which I think I'll try knitting up on my Bond for a faster result.

After I finished the knitting on the Tomten last night,
I picked up the hand-holding mitten which has also been
languishing and completed a few more rounds.

STILL another individual mitten to knit.

I shall have to take this project to the arena today - that'll be another hour or so worked on it while the kids are skating and then I'll go back to the Sunrise.


Raw Score:
Tuesday 85%
Wednesday 83%
Thursday 85%
meeting my goal of minimum 80%
:o)

Guess who's coming to town!

My raw percentages for the last few days were 75, 68, 68 and 79%. I want to state publicly that I am going to aim for 80% or better from now on, as that is more likely to keep me on track!

Why is that we can let the pounds creep on for 3 months but we want them off again in 3 days?

To change the subject completely, I had a newsletter in my email inbox today from my local yarn store. In April, Cat Bordhi is going to be leading two all-day classes, one for socks and one for moebius knitting. I have booked myself in for the moebius knitting class - I am treating myself from my "birthday money" (thanks mum).

This lady is an absolute genius in knitting design so I am looking forward to meeting her very much. Now I have to think about what yarn I am going to use for the class project. Decisions, decisions!

V neck vest is finished

The vest is finished! This is me attempting to take a photo of myself in the bathroom mirror.

I made this on my Bond knitting machine, with handknit ribbing around the edges. I used Red Heart Soft Touch in brown, teal, white and wine red.

I intended it to be snugger than this, but it fits OK as it is. I picked up three white T shirts at Value Village a few weeks ago that will work well with it, though I was hoping for a collared shirt. Oh well, maybe on my next thrifting trip...

V neck vest

Unlike Heather, when I had a spare hour today, I headed down to my sewing room to get going on the machine-knitted V neck vest.


The back was finished a few days ago and has been "relaxing" (when you take it off the machine it's stretched out and needs to shrink a little). The bottom part of the front was done, but I needed to finish the V neck shaping. I'm very pleased that today I finished both sides of the V neck and have left the "live" stitches on spare yarn so I can do a three needle bind off at the shoulders.


It seems like it's been ages since I actually completed a project (having four on the go at once may have something to do with that)!

Using four colours meant that occasionally they became a little tangled and the yarn didn't flow as freely as it should have - in the photo below I am pointing to a white row which is definitely tighter than the others.


When the front piece has had a few days to relax, I'll sew the back and front together, pick up stitches around the neck, armholes and waist, and knit a few rows of ribbing with the brown yarn to finish it off.

Raw Score:
Wednesday 82%
Thursday 37% (oops)

Happy knitting day

I was a happy camper the other night, staying up until 1am to finish one of the pieces on my Sunrise Circle Jacket.

When I picked up my knitting that evening, I was so close to finishing the left front that I just had to get to the bind off.

Then of course I wanted to make sure that the back and front pieces were going to go together properly, so I had to finish the last few rows of the back. I had left them because I was agonising about whether the back was going to be too long for me, and wondering whether I should be knitting the front in a smaller size, yada yada.

I laid the pieces out flat on the floor and they are looking good!

Here --------------> the two raglan edges are butted up against each other. Above I have laid the front on top of the back and folded the sleeve so I could measure the length of the sleeve from neck to wrist.

The sleeve may be a little longer than I'd like, even though I omitted the 1.5 inches of straight knitting that the pattern instructions stated after the sleeve shaping was finished. I won't really know until it's all sewn together.

I have cast on for the right sleeve and I'm looking forward to getting this finished soon.

Raw Score:
Wednesday 70%
Thursday 86%
Friday 83%

Naff* knitting patterns

This is a comment that I left on Interweave Knits' online customer comment form last week:

"I was just looking through my Winter 2007 issue again.
I have a comment to make about two of the sweater patterns - the Bon Bon
Pullover and the Citrus Yoke Pullover. Both of these sweaters have
funnel necks. Now, it always seems to me that funnel necks are a bit of
a cheat - they are a good way to avoid shaping especially if you have a
complex pattern. But they NEVER fit well - you always get that bulge
just below the front neck that looks awful. If you can't get the models
to look good in these sweaters, then I can't see anyone else looking
good in them either. I'd like to see more beautifully designed and
well-fitting garments rather than see you waste your magazine space on
the funnel neck sort of design."

Nothing like a bit of feedback to help them with future issues, eh!

Knitting magazines are a mixed bag...I subscribe to Knitter's and Interweave, and I love getting them in the mail (shame they only come four times a year). They are full of photos of yummy yarns, knitting lessons, articles, patterns - though sometimes the patterns make me think, "Now who would actually WEAR that?" Obviously the designer thinks it's great, and the pattern will have been through a selection process by the editorial staff, and I know everyone has different tastes. But I still raise my eyebrows at some of the styles, especially in Vogue Knitting (you'd definitely have to be a stick-thin young model on the cutting edge of fashion to wear some of those designs).

Anyway, I did receive a reply today:

"Dear Nicola,

Thank you for taking the time to write us with your comments. We
appreciate your feedback.

I will be sure to pass on your suggestions to our editorial staff.

Best regards,

Debbie Blair
Knits Editorial Assistant"

I don't know if my comments will influence future decisions as to what Interweave includes in their magazine, but at least I've given them my opinion.

*Oh yes, if you're wondering what "naff" means, here's a link (I can't believe I found it on Wikipedia)!!!

Some things I've learned this week

1. When making bread, don't make so much at once that it exceeds the capacity of your largest mixing bowl!

Yesterday, I decided that it would be a good use of my time to make a double (8 loaf) batch of my usual bread recipe. I worked out that I could fill both shelves of my oven to the max with one lasagna pan, 2 small loaf pans and 4 large loaf pans.

I dumped a hell of a lot of flour into my huge stainless steel mixing bowl - then I added the rest of the ingredients. Let's just say that when I was adding the water, I was in danger of overflowing onto the worktop every time I stirred. However, it got worse when I tried to mix all of the water in and knead it. Waaaaaay too much dough - what a workout. I ended up having to split it into smaller dough balls to knead it. I did eventually wrestle it all back into the bowl for rising, and it all worked out in the end.

Note to self: stick to smaller quantities of dough.

2. The more I learn, the more I realise that I need to learn.

For example, in my Taekwondo classes this week, our 5th Dan instructor has been doing some back-to-the-basics instruction on very simple techniques, but I realised that I need to do some tweaking in some areas to really get my patterns to look good.

When you're a white belt, just starting out, you think you have a steep learning curve. You're struggling to learn all this new stuff and you look at the higher ranking students and think they know it all and it's easy for them. However, it's not, because as you work your way through the "gups" to black belt the expectations are higher and you have more to learn and memorise. As a black stripe, the instructor is looking very closely at my technique, fussing over every little hand and foot angle and speed and force of movement.

Going to classes with a mix of belt levels, I get to review a lot of the earlier material, which is a really good thing.

3. Washing up - I don't actually hate it!

This was a little epiphany this week. I have always said I hate washing dishes, but....I realised this week that I don't. I like the fact that the kitchen looks way better with clear countertops, I like having my hands in hot water when the weather is cold, I love looking out of my kitchen window at the sky and the trees and the snow and the lake while I'm standing there. We have a system now where the boys have to take turns putting away the dishes - of course they're supposed to do it in the evening after I've washed them, but usually it gets done the next day when they have drip-dried. OK, I can handle that.


A little bit of knitting for you today....this is what I achieved yesterday afternoon. Not a whole lot of length, considering this is on the Bond, but I am changing colours nearly every row and I have to keep untangling the strands of yarn and fiddling about with the carriage to change from one colour to the next.

This is going to be a sleeveless sweater vest, I guess you'd call it, with a V neck. My other name for it would be a nerd vest, because that's probably what I'll look like when I wear it! I saw one in the Yarn Girls book, Knits for all Seasons, and they had an excellent schematic in there that meant I could easily work out how to make it on the machine.

I tried a little swatch of their stripe pattern, but didn't like it, so figured out my own. I made it so that I could easily strand the colours up the side, which meant there had to be an even number of rows between stripes of the same colour. It doesn't work all the time, so I have strands coming from the outside AND the inside of the white, but the rest is working out.

You can't really tell what the stripes are going to look like - this is the back of the work - and it's really going to be a surprise for me too because I have to get under the table to try and see how it's going and then the light from the window is shining through the work and I can't get a good idea of how it looks!

I'm knitting this with the same yarn as the shrug - Red Heart Soft Touch - in chocolate, teal, wine and white. The ribbing at the V neck and armholes and waist will be in chocolate. I'll do that by hand.

Well, I think that's just about it for today - I will leave you with my Raw Score for the last couple of days and go and get the kids moving. We're going to the local Art Gallery today for a Printmaking session. I'll see if I can get some good photos to show you later.

Raw Score:
Monday 75%
Tuesday 87%

Ahoy Teddy!

Check out Teddy in his authentic seaman's cap! What better to keep his head warm on those cool nights sailing the Pacific Ocean. In his free time, Teddy is working on a striped sock that he feels really brings out the brown of his nose. Just a couple more inches to go before the heel flap - go Teddy go!!

.

Well, it's not actually Teddy's cap. It's a birthday present for my husband and it fits his head a little better then it does Teddy's. Sort of. I made up the pattern myself and started decreasing when I was getting short of yarn. The decreases are a little funny because of the ribbing (which I have no idea how to decrease and made it up as I went along) and the length is a little funny because it's a little long to wear unfolded and a little short to fold up. Oh well, it's the love that went into it that really matters!

.

**An update on the blocking of my lovely hoodie sweater... I attempted to create my own way of blocking. I figured if I wore the sweater, the bottom hem would naturally unroll because of gravity. I wore it a couple of days last week, tugging at it whenever I remembered and no luck. It still rolls up (but it's very warm and cosy!) It looks like I will have to try the traditional blocking method of wetting and pinning it (sigh) and I had better hurry because I see grass peeking out from under the snow. (Yay!)

Sunrise Circle Jacket - more progress

Following all of my internal dialogue as to gauge and sizing, I optimistically started on the left sleeve/front.



Very nifty shaping. At the same time as you shape the raglan part of the sleeve, you start increasing on one side to form the front of the jacket.


It's getting bigger and the rows are getting longer! I have my fingers crossed that when I finish the first sleeve/front, put it alongside the back and measure everything, I will be happy with it and I can whizz through the right sleeve/front certain that it's going to fit.

Raw Score:
Friday 50% (oops, pizza night)
Saturday 76%
Sunday 75%