Wednesday, March 29, 2006

Kids, Kats, Knits

Frank and RickyFish took the opportunity to steal a few bites from the food container after I had just poured the new bag in and before I could shut the door of the bin. They looked so cute I let them nibble a bit while I got the camera.
I also realize how much bigger Frank is than RickyFish! who is a delicate little lady.








I knit these toddler socks of Knitpicks parade yarn. The yarn was left over from my hat and mittens and I didn't bother matching stripes. I think they are quite cute even if they don't match. They'll go in my charity box for CIC. Last year I didn't send any and felt bad about it, so this year I have at least one pair!








Karim's mom sent a photo of him exploring the taste of dirt! She said he was so quiet that she knew he was into something he shouldn't be! Don't we all remember that phase!















This is Karim's sweater blocked and drying. Next step is to sew together. I never feel like I do a really good job on this part.

Thursday, March 23, 2006

Pet the yarn or pet the cat?



Frank was a little jealous of the attention I was paying to the STR Club package.! The yarn is so soft and pretty! I have had to have great will power. I had to finish the charity socks on the size 2 needles 1st AND I had to finish the chainmail hood and sleeves. I allowed myself to wind up the ball yesterday. Ran out of yarn for sleeves tonight, and ordered more. Was extremely fortunate to find this yarn for $3.97 instead of the $11.25 the theatre paid for it! Even with shipping the 2 skeins came to $6.48 each, still a savings. So...tonight I get to cast on my club socks! Yay me! Had an unexpected 2 hrs free at studio tonight so ran home to have a dinner with hubby...but he had a meeting, so I'm eating rerun goolash at the computer. oh well.

and the best news? DD's car is nearly finished (3 weeks now!) (got told today that brakes were metal on metal sigh...) so I will have MY CAR back by Monday and I can put my bumpersticker on it!

yeah....too cool...I know I'm weird, but hey....

Sunday, March 19, 2006

STR socks :Laurens Lace Ladder




Yarn: Socks that Rock, 1 skein

Color: Rose Quartz

Needles: 1.5 Crystal Palace DP

Stitches: 48, 10 rows ribbing

Pattern:

Row 1:Knit 3, yo, slip 1, K2tog, pass slip stitch over, yo Repeat to end

Row 2: knit

Repeat for 12 patterns.

Knit 6 rows plain.

I wanted yarn to show so did heelflap in stockinette with 3 garter stitches on either side.

My total leg cuff to end of 6th row plain knit is 3.5 inches, total foot lenght is 5.5 inches.

Lace ladder pattern adapted from Jeanie Townsends Ruffles and Lace pattern .

Saturday, March 11, 2006

New Hat for Felicity


Made Felicity this cute hat from leftovers from the Chunky Cable Purse. I like this yarn alot, it feels really nice to knit with. I think I have enough left to make another one, just hate all those little balls of yarn lying around being wasted.

Panicked myself the othernight, thought I had stopped the back of Karims sweater 3" too short. Re-read pattern in am, highlighting all relevant () items in yellow, and I was fine. Finished front last night, kept reminding myself, just follow the pattern, it will all work out okay, because the neckline just seemed really off... total 79 stitches, used 19 for the stage left side (right as you look at it) of shoulders/neck, put 26 on holder and used the remainder for the stageright side....but, I think I get how it works...has to do with the button band thingy.

Have been assigned to knit a cowl and sleeves for Lion in Winter to resemble chainmail. No twine and paint for these people, gave me 4 $11.00 skeins of this metallic stuff towork with! Swatched 4 needle sizes, think the 13 is the best but will show it to "boss" to make sure she's happy.

Off to KC today for a DMA workshop. Tap teacher, Germaine Jackson, knits socks too! Big dilemmna last night as I tried to decide which socks to wear with my tapshoes....decided on the Opal Tigers. Now, isn't that silly? Hubby was going to go with me, but something important blew up at hospital and even though it's a bio-med item, he has to stay in town and deal with it because "bio-med don't do weekends.", so our mini-vacation is not going to happen. sigh..

Wednesday, March 08, 2006

FO's!

I was cleaning out my sock drawer and was motivated to take a photo of the 18 pairs of socks I have knit for myself. The white toes are ones that I have reknit the toes rather than let go of the socks. Actually, I just remembered a 19th pair in the to be repaired drawer!


Chunky cable purse actually finished! Several false starts and pattern errors later, I have a purse!

Two of the scarfs from the $1.00 skeins. The bright pink was 1 skein, the other 2 skeins. I don't really wear scarves so may donate these to the Dancers 4 Cancer auction April 23rd.

This morning I noticed that I have dropped an edge stitch on Karims sweater! I have been slipping the 1st stitch and it must have slipped off! It's way down and I really hate the thought of ripping back that many inches on this sweater...sigh...I'm going to try to knit it up, but have my doubts. Damn. 79 stitches on a slippery addi turbo size 1.... I much prefer my Crystal Palace bamboo or even the Clover wood ones. I feel like I'm just crawling on the purl rows.

I was asked yesterday to knit some "chainmail" for our local community theatre. They are supplying the yarn, I have to knit a hood and sleeves. I found patterns for just those items, but the Utah Shakespeare company used #36 twisted nylon cord not yarn, so I guess I'll just have to make guage 2.5 stitches = 1 inch, 3 rows = 1 inch.

Thursday, March 02, 2006

And the answer is.....

The directions are wrong! Seems they left out the "BO" before 8sts from 2nd short side. This was my next gonna try it thing so, tonight I will reknit the bottom flap again. sigh.. Gave my mom the yarn, needles and pattern as a gift, so need to let her know about the error.

Purse help and Stupid Tulips



Can't for the life of me figure out how this purse bottom is supposed to go together. Stitched it together twice and it's just not right. Frustrates me as normally I'm "pattern queen " who can read and understand any pattern! Pattern says:" Begin bag bottom, K1, Loosely BO 8 sts from side, K21 sts across long side and 8 sts from second short side. K across remaining 23sts. Turn and purl across. Work 7 more rows back and forth is st sts for a total of 9 rows. BO loosely, break yarn. Seaming. Using a single strand of yarn, sew flap to bag bottom on 3 open sides. I've sewed the long edge together and then "squared" off the opening. Looked really odd with the other non-cable side piece not squared. So, ripped out seam, and sewed squared off end, then folded and squared off other end, then sewed remaining long seam. Looked odder still. Took those seams out... I'm beginning to think I didn't understand the bag bottom directions, but I did what it said... Help anyone?



















My stupid tulips are all coming up wayyy too soon. It's been an odd and dry winter, and the tulips are confused. I gave up and watered them yesterday since it was 80! My big fear is that when we have our traditional St. Pat's blizzard and ice storm they will get popsiclced. In the grayer picture you can see the retaining wall that's collapsing. Summer project.... sigh....

BTW the sawdust looking stuff is biodegradable Feline Pine kitty litter. Great stuff! Turns into sawdust and you just use it for mulch. It does retain a faint "litterbox" ordor but I think that's actually supposed to be a deterent to some "critters"... anyhow, I like the idea of not filling up the landfill with kitty litter. I'm going to break down and spend the $ for more of the FP litter boxes (the sifting ones at Wal-mart won't work with the product, the spaces are too big. FP boxes are expensive, but the litter is super cheap!)

Finished gusset on STR sock, worked a few rows on Karim's sweater.

Wednesday, March 01, 2006

WIPS 2
















Chunky Cable Purse ready to be seamed. I think I understand how to do it.
$1.00 skein yarn aquistion $11.00 for these pretty skeins. Not sure what I'll do with them other than scarfs. hmmm sugestions anyone?

Must get to actual work today...need to kick my tutu into gear. Since updateing my SBC yahoo browser it's very annoying that it searchs for every damn letter I type. Not so bad on blogger here but on hotmail the message screen jumps all over the place. Wonder if I can disable this function... what's up with searching for links that begin with s .... Stupid updates fixing things that were not broken and causeing other problems.

WIPS


Laurens Lace in STR "Soft Rock" Rose Quartz. An orphan skein from Toni Neil.
US 1.5, 48 stitches, adaptation of Jean Townsends Ruffles and Lace pattern.