Froggy

So I ripped out the body of my sweater again. The rib stitch was too loose and looked bad. If it stretched at all there would be lines down me, if it didn't stretch then there wasn't too much point. So I undid it. Started fresh again (the pick up and knit is much easier after 6 times) Thankfully, this is a faster stitch. I'm already back to the length I ripped out yesterday! Now on to the adventure of doing the rest of the body

What starts with the Oscars and ends with St. Patricks day?

A baby jackets! A friend of mine challenged my to knit something during the oscars. I started thinking of hats, then got reminded that yet another co-worker just had a baby. And babies are small, perfect oscar event. Although I did start during the oscars (and maybe a bit before) I didn't finish, wasn't close. Its done now though, right before St. Patty's day, which is perfect because its green. I was trying to help work down the stash, but that didn't work. I ran out of yarn on the second sleeve so I had to buy more yarn...boo. Definatly not a yarn stash reduction (doesn't help that I went to a yarn shop in Boulder and bought some amazing alpaca)

But the jacket is now finished, being blocked, and should be ready for gift giving on Monday!

Pick up and knit...yeah right

Yeah, I met the deadline but traveling did not go so well. I did the first pick up and knit (you read it right... first...) and I didn't like it, so I undid that and tried again. It turned out okay, but there was no more time before my flight so I decided to knit as long as I could on the plane. Didn't look the greatest but I had blocking hopes. Then during the first night at the hotel, disaster struck. As I was moving my yarn around, the link between my two loops came loose and in the middle of my work was now a bunch of dropped stitches. Something like 20-30 of them came off. Well the lighting, the tools, and my mood were not well suited to fixing it there are the hotel. (The messy pick up and knit didn't make me want to keep going either) So I frogged it. Then I did 2 more pick up and knits before I left for the airport, didn't like them and didn't feel well so I just slept on the plane. Today (after fighting a really bad head cold) finally felt well enough to start knitting again. I finally did a pick up and knit that I don't hate, and started doing some knitting. Only have about 5 rows done, and its time to do some cleaning, but the progress looks hopeful. We'll see where I am in a week or so.

Met the Deadline

I'm heading to the airport in a few hours... aside from not forgetting anything in my frantic packing the biggest thing on my mind was knitting. As you probably know I've been working on the sleeves of my sweater, well the next step is a bit more involved. I have to measure, mark spots, cast on and pick up and knit a bunch of stitches. Not really something I can afford to do on a plane or in an airport. So I had a personal goal: Finish the sleeves and cast on the body before leaving for the airport. Well this morning I finished the sleeves!

I am basically finished packing so I have 2 hours to cast on and get ready. Hopefully I'll make it. On the sleeves the most exciting thing is the technique I learned while reading my color book. When working with stripes especailly in the round, you get a noticable jog where the color starts and ends (see the left picture below) but if you knit one round in the new color, then slip the first stitch, this border gets blurred and much more seamless (see photo to the right).  I was a little skeptical that something so simple could really help, but there it is! There's some stuff you can do when weaving in the ends, but that's for another day. Not gonna try and get that all done before my flight. Now on to the body!

Olympic Goodness

One of the many things that's great about the olympics is lots of sports to entertain me as I knit away. Sleeve 1 is complete, finished it this afternoon. Removed the crochet cast on and have started the second sleeve. What I find hard or at least time consuming about the first sleeve is the constant measuring (or in my case trying on). Every hour or so I need to get into a tank top and try on the sleeve. Today it got to a point where the length seemed questionable. Sometimes it seemed too big, others it seemed too small. So I pinned the other side and put both arms through, and determined that the length was well done. Binded off and moving on.

In other related news....I'm a yarn-a-holic. I saw a pattern today, couldn't resist. (I was doing so well too, knitting down the stash, not buying any more yarn) but this pattern caught my eye... I'm gonna make some blue bears. And there's nothing you can do to stop me!

Stripes

In between cleaning, watching the olympics (sadly I am not on a team for the Ravolympics, but I don't have enough time for it anyways), playing in the snow, and catching up on my sleep. I am almost finished with the first sleeve. The stripes are all finished and now I just have to finish knitting the red to the desired length. All in all I am pretty pleased with the stripes. The jog is showing and I found a way to stop that from happening in my color book, but alas it's too late for this sleeve. Maybe the next one or the body I will attempt the knitting "fix".

Trying it on With Lilu

Close-up of colored Stripes

Color time!

It has come time to choose colors! It's been a while since I have done color work that wasn't hard christmas stockings or self striping yarns. (Another reason why I chose this sweater) One thing I want is to go with warm colors, I have lots of blues and blacks in my wardrobe. So I selected a burgundy red for the main color (lowest color, lower right) Then for the stripes I've added a burnt copper color, a goldenrod color and a slighly creamy white. These will be the stripes on the sleves and main body. The question now is what order and what ratio. The fun begins!

Destressify

Things have been very busy and stressful for a little while now. It's effecting my sleep, my brain just can't relax. Of course this is one of the reasons that I started knitting in the first place, all those years ago. And today it's snowing, I'm cleaning up a bit here and there, waiting for the time to come for me to turn on the superbowl and eat nachos. Therefore I have selected a new project and have started knitting away. I'm calling it a Valentine's Sweater. Mainly because its red and I'm starting it a week before valenties day, but that's pretty much it. It's a pattern from knitty, Tubey to be precise. The main color will be a deep burgundy red, with gold, copper, and creme stripes (perhaps not as big as the pattern shows, but something nice).

The funny thing is that like most knitters I understand the importance of knitting a swatch (a test piece to make sure everything will be the right size in the end) but I never knit a swatch. Well this time I did...then got completely confused on the measurments for the pattern. I think I was measured incorrectly, but still nothing really makes a whole lot of sense. So I took an average and I'm going to try it on as I go to make sure everything fits well together. That's the goal anyway, never done that before. So here I sit, knitting away, watching movies, running dishes and a load of laundry. Happy Sunday everyone!