knit1frog2

crashed, but recovered!

So remember, I fell off the bike, right?  Yes well...I was knitting along and realized that if I kept knitting with the bigger needle, the socks would be way too loose.  Bugger!  I also came to realize that knitting on said larger needle also meant that I could do more repeats before starting the heel!  Yup, ribbit.  I frogged and added more length to the leg and once I hit the heel, I changed to a smaller needle.

Success!  Not only does the foot fit great since it's smaller/tighter, but knitting the leg portion on the larger needle successfully accommodates my fat athletic legs!!  Woohoo! 

soooo close to the end!
Didn't I say that knitting on the smaller needle gave stripes?! See? It really does!  Yay!

it's like falling off a bike

See, I didn't grow up riding a bicycle like a lot of kids and I didn't learn until later in life.  So for me, that saying "It's like riding a bike!  You don't forget!" doesn't really hit home for me.  Even now when I get on a bike I wonder how far I'll be able to go before wiping out in the gravel.

While knitting away on the Monkeys I knew that at some point I'd have to shake those cobwebs out and try to figure out how to knit those short rows again for the heel.  eep.  Ack.  Could I do it?  Well, check it out...very PG-R (Priscilla Gibson-Roberts) indeed.  It was like falling off a bike!  After the first turn, I was off and moving...the rest...history.


yay!

wind it and they will come

So the yarny goodness that was wound into a cake...has transformed!  Et voila:
 
I must knit both at once.

I am not one who loves knitting socks. Even though they are such a tiny, portable project sometimes the almost endless number of tiny stitches is too much for me to handle.  Especially if they have an intricate pattern.  egad.  How do the rest of you do it?  Keep track of it?  You're in line, knitting away...k3, y0, k2tog...what?  You're ready for me?  crap!  Put knitting down.  Forget where I was.  ribbit!!  And then you risk having to do the whole thing over again?  No thanks.  I will just get them both done at once and never put the knitting down until the end of a row.

I <3 the Monkey sock pattern found here.  I thought that the new yarn would be the perfect candidate!  If you're lucky and have smaller feet, or are knitting for someone with small feet, using US1 makes stripes (yay!) instead of pooling (boo!  As you can see I had to move up to US2.).  I still like the way these look.  I adore orange and I love turquoise blue.  These remind of me of koi for some reason even though I have never seen a turquoise koi.

Want a close up?

Go fish!

madrona 2010

After a couple of uncertainties, a trip to Madrona 2010 was ON!  I went with Knitting in Mind and per usual we had a great ol' time despite the drizzly rain.  (cupcakes, yum!)

I did manage to restrain myself though and as odd as it is that I don't really enjoy knitting socks unless it's for something like Sockapalooza, of course I had to buy something from STR!

RareGems and Space Dust

I already wound SD into a cake and I'd really like to knit a pair of socks for myself for once!!  Keep your fingers crossed!

Habu was on the down low without their signage, but KiM was able to find them and hopefully she'll blog about what treasures she found there!

gettin' a head

While trying to adhere to 2010 ideologies of not buying anything unless it's needed, I came across this today while at the beauty supply (where I did NOT buy one nail polish thankyouverymuch.  This is a far cry from buying six at a time and filling an OPI box.).

I hope this doesn't scare me in the middle
 o' the night!

I've always wanted something to block my hats on, this should work perfectly!  I needed it, right?  Right?!!  Oh and in my defense, it was only $3.98.

freshness

Well, so I tinkered around with different knitting ideas for the Peppermint Dickey and finally came up with this:


It's kind of nice, no?
It's been nice to be knitting again!  It makes wait times non-existent!  Oil change and you want to also check what?  No problem, I'll be here knitting!  The doctor isn't ready for me?  No problem, I'll be here knitting!   yay.  Go theta waves go!

the minty challenge

On xmas day I received an sms...

That reads:  "Please knit me a X-mas dickey with a peppermint twist."

I call that a challenge since he was totally kidding and had no idea that I actually do knit.  (wait. DO I??  It's been soooo long...!!)  And so...the challenge begins...

Beaded Wool! Very curious...

I made a quick trip to Portland Sun/Mon and knew that I had to stop at Knit Purl.  Wheeee! 

A side note, it's been SO long since I've logged in and posted, Typepad looks very different indeed.  All of the files and structures that I had set up...are gone.  Weird.  Photos are still there, but not where I originally put them.  The formatting is odd and switching between Rich Text and HTML makes the screen jump/reposition.  bother.

check in

I've been working away on the TTJ and I'm almost done.  I have to say, the knit of the sweater is so thick that for me, a single thickness buttonband would just not do.  Especially since I knit the sweater a little more form-fitting than the pattern called for and if I want to be able to button the thing, I'm gonna need a bit of reinforcement.

I like crochet bind-off instead of whip stitch.

There you have it.  Oh and a note, there's no way that a single YO would accommodate a 3/4" button with my tension so I went back and did two YOs instead.  Now to move on to the sleeve buttonbands...wheeeee.

two things

One, when you're tired due to lack of sleep things start to get a little weird.  Case in point:  awhile ago the new Bon Appetit magazine came, but I hadn't had a chance to look at it yet.  It was on the sofa next to me and I figured I'd get to it sooner or later.  Until then, I'd knit and work on the Texturized Tweed Jacket (TTJ).  Good.  But um, every time I'd turn the knitting to return the next row, I'd think, "OMG!!  Did I get it in the spaghetti?!!!"  WHAT?  Now why in the world would I place a plate of spaghetti on the sofa next to me, right next to my knitting?  Yeah, I wouldn't.  No one in their right mind would.  But for some reason that's what MY tired mind kept thinking.  Over and over.  Row after row.  I finally had to turn the magazine over.  Like I said, I was getting like 3 hrs of sleep a night and was very stressed.

practice makes perfect...

Two, the collar of this sweater is um...challenging...extremely challenging.  After the 6th time of flubbing it I decided to do some more research and found that Stefanie had put together a tutorial for those of us out there who just aren't as clever as she is.  What I would recommend is to get some practice yarn.  Trust me on this.  No really, do this please.  It's much easier and is less wearing on your good yarn if you practice with the other yarn.  I did this another oh, SIX times, and then went back to my actual sweater.  I'm happy to report that I have a good 2" of the collar completed.  YAY!  I also put padlock stitch markers on my wraps so I could see them more easily and could use the marker to help pull the stitch onto the needle to prepare to knit it!  Hang in there if you're working on this...it WILL come together.

ramen

frick.

Blurg. As I've been saying all along, the sleeves are way too long.  I kept hoping that it would work out, trying it on along the way, but um, no way.  I finished the entire sleeve, but the cuff slit was also about 3" shorter than the pattern thinks it should be. The length overall is WAY off.  To decrease where the pattern called for left the weirdest bulky bit for me right above my elbow.

Ribbit.