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!

Time for Something New

I'm waiting for the additional blocking pins I ordered to arrive before I can begin to block my skirt. In the mean time I have started working on my couch blanket. Its done by making little squares of 6 different colors, totallying 170 squares. So basically it will take me along time (even though the pattern says 40 hours) I've already got 8 squares of the dark brown done. But I think I want to do this during the little breaks in the day and work on something bigger for the most part. I'm thinking its sweater/shirt time again, but I'm not sure. I've had a lot of different ideas floating around and I don't know what to do next. Here's the list:

• Lace Shawl -started it a while back, ripped it out after it didn't do what I thought it should
• Replacement Jacket - this would involve buying more yarn, something I want to avoid, but also something I've wanted to do for a while
• Light Sweater - I'm ready to tackle making another sweater. My first was very heavy, my second I made for my mom, might be time for me to have one again
• Hat and Gloves - Though its getting warmer, its still pretty cold around town.

Oh the decisions. So many things to knit, so little free time

More photos!

 
 Seems like all the baby pictures are coming in at once. This is little Isabella, she's about 3 months. Matt and I got invited to the baby shower, and me being the ambitious, nice, creative knitter that I am, felt that something had to be knit for the shower. I looked around at my Stash and found some nice blue and white colors from the Binary baby blanket. Sat down and knit a little sweater in the round. The sleves looked a bit big and recangular so I went with it being a Kimono. It was super adorable, and now here she is, sporting her lovely had knit items. (Not the best picture of the sweater, but a great one of Isabella).

On other news, I'm almost finished with the skirt I've been working on for probably over a year. It got pushed back for various other projects that had high priority. Sadly, I am not a fearless knitter in this case. The pattern calls for a Picot bind off (its like a scalloped edge) but I fear that between the hours upon hours that it will take to bind it off, and the fact that weird bindoffs never seem to go right for me. I've opted to do a standard bind off. So the skirt will have a flat bottom, who cares, most skirts do. But more on that later. : )

Thing 1 and Thing 2!

I finally have photos of my adorable cousins! (Is that right? I think so...cousin's kids?) Anyway they have grown a great deal and are starting to look a lot like my cousin scott.

Thing 1 is Cordilia, and Thing 2 is Renegade. I really wish I had managed to get the wild and crazy hair hat done, but there was no time. I'll just need some other crazy project for that yarn. A friend suggested that I start putting up all my knitted baby photos in my cube. I've started with these guys, because so many people heard about me working on them. Maybe I'll print the others and have a collection of babies. It'll make me feel old though, like I have tons of grandkids or something. Auntie Katie to the rescue!

Decisions

There are so many knitting projects on the horizon (and with yarn sitting in my study) that it's hard to figure out exactly what to do. I want to start working on my couch blanket because its made from so many smaller squares, that I really should get started. Then there's my skirt, SO close to being finished but still so far away. That will be a nice one to finally check off the list. There's sweaters to be made, gifts to start and complete. And of course, just when I am about to clear out some stash yarn, what happens? I see an adorable project online that requires new yarn :(

This came from knitpicks.com and its basically knitting a whole play set. You make the mat (which it has been pointed out is missing a runway) and then you knit the individual cars, boats, trucks and trains! Its super cute!! I so want one. And I want to make one, but I was so happy that baby stuff was done for a while, and aside from my christmas stocking rampage (more on that later) I haven't had a chance to do anything for me. Or anything adult. So I'm not sure. There's a chance I'll just buy the pattern for future use, and there's a chance that I'll buy everything...woe is me

Styles

Everyone knits a different way. This has been well established. There are people who knit the conventional way, the english way, the backwards english way and who knows what else. Which always makes for interesting times when trying to help someone else out. But somewhere along the way I have developed a way to knit that's different than everyone else....makes it hard to compare notes at times. Most commonly kniters have to turn there work at the end of each row, so long scarfs get twisted and yarn gets tangled (at least it did when I tried this). As the good engineer that I am I sat there and said "this is dumb" and found the way to do it without turning anything. The conciquence of this is having to change the way I read charts and patterns, and of course, most other knitters can't phathom how I do things and refuse to help at times. But I'm happy in my uniqueness, and I love the way I do things, and that's all that matters. The only downside is of course the wonderful "so when you purl this stitch... - I don't purl anything with that stitch...- huh?" but I just have to be quick on my feet and realize what they are talking about, and answer the question correctly after that. :)