Catch-Up

We are entering the busy, busy, busy season at work ... now until Xmas. Yikes!

I admit, I have been cheating on knitting this month. Shamelessly. Learning to sew has been far less frustrating than learning to knit, but I'm still not great at it. Mr. Fury ordered this as my Xmas present. Honestly, the reason I want to sew is so I will have adorable garments to coordinate with my knitting. Those fetching little tops and eyelet dresses and whatnot in all the books ... I do not own those things and I don't know where to buy them. Hence, the sewing.

The result of this sewing is some serious, hardcore UFO action. Endpaper Mitt #2 and the cardigan are languishing. (The cardigan? I am not knitting a bulky-weight sweater again.) I started the Yo! Drop It! scarf with my souvenir yarn from DC, so I'd have something to knit on the way to Dallas last weekend. I did realize I need a more diverse array of "indoor" scarves -- ones that I can wear indoors. That means lace!

Tonight I went to a Ravelry meetup at the Knitting Nest. It was awesome! I met some really cool people and won a super cool skein of sari silk in the White Elephant. (I was sneaky. I quietly kept it in my lap wrapped in its tissue paper so nobody else would take it.) I've never used sari silk before -- it is stunning. The depth of colors, the texture ... wow. While I was there, I bought a skein of Lorna's Laces sportweight and Malabrigio laceweight for imaginary indoor scarves I will make someday. Everyone was funny and clever and it was a great time.

We are about to get a serious cold front tomorrow night. Finally, weather for my Clapotis!!

In other random news: Mr. Fury and I celebrated four years of marriage yesterday. He puts up with a lot of "yarn-related nonsense" and I love him for it (and many other reasons!). :-)

Sew What?

So it turns out that the sewing machine works best if you have the presser foot DOWN and the feed dogs UP. Who'd've thunk it? I've been successfully sewing semi-straight lines on scrap fabric today. The zigzag stitch makes me happy.

This foray into sewing has led to a revelation: learning to knit changed the way I learn everything. It wasn't until my third attempt that I was able to figure it out. What made the difference was stick-to-it-tiveness. I really, really, really wanted to knit. Once I decided to do it, it wasn't even about the process or the finished product or anything besides not getting beaten by this stupid needlework that four-year-old Scandinavian children can do in their SLEEP.

And man, did I make mistakes. It probably took about 200 attempts before I was able to knit a full row -- and that's with dropped stitches, accidental YOs, and whatnot. But I once it clicked, it really clicked. It was the same with crochet. And I'm hoping it's the same with sewing.

So I'm keeping all this in mind as I slowly figure out the sewing machine on my kitchen table. It still sort of blows my mind that I will be stitching together pattern pieces, instead of creating the fabric, loop by loop. What a crazy shortcut to a finished garment!

Progress

Last night I finished the body of my short-sleeved cardigan. It is longer than I expected it to be, but I'm not surprised. I'm going to do the button bands before the sleeves; hopefully I will have enough yarn to lengthen them. If not, it isn't the end of the world, but it would be nice.

Today I went out to my mom's house to get her sewing machine ... I've always sort of wanted to learn how to sew, but was never motivated enough to learn. Obviously my mom won't be using the machine for awhile, so she said I could borrow it. So far I haven't done much except a few test lines on scraps to make sure the machine works. I am really, really bad at sewing thus far. :-) Then again, I was really, really bad at knitting four years ago, and it didn't take long for me to get better.

Boo!

Wow, what a Halloween! Our costume this year was post-nuclear-apocalpyse goat-demons. Horns, ears, hooves -- the works! I'll link to more photos when I have them. And that's the fishnet scarf I made few days ago to match the outfit.

(Secretly, I knew in my heart that I was a cashmere post-nuclear-apocalypse goat-demon. Would a cashmere post-nuclear-apocalypse goat-demon wear a nylon boucle scarf?)

It was a chaotic, exciting, bittersweet, amazing show. I love Halloween.

Happy Halloween!!

My favorite holiday is here!

I'm almost done getting ready -- just taking a few minutes to chill out before my ride gets here. We worked very hard on our costumes this year, and I can't wait to see what people think.

Happy Halloween, everybody!

Three Days ...

It's crazy ... I slept 10 hours both Friday and Saturday nights, and I'm still exhausted! October is just a crazy month. We are almost done with our Halloween costumes for the big show. It's very exciting!

Yesterday I whipped up a simple scarf to go with my costume. I used one skein of Moda Dea Cheerio and just fishnet-stitched until I ran out of yarn. The idea was for it to look sort of uneven and distressed -- the yarn worked well. I'll post an "action shot" of it with my whole outfit after Halloween.

I think I need to make more "indoor" scarves. It's finally gotten a bit chilly here in Texas, and I find myself wearing openwork scarves in the office all day. Good, good stuff. I think I will use that lone skein of souvenier yarn from DC to that end.

The first Endpaper Mitt blocked beautifully. I will focus on the second one after Halloween.

Stranded

Last night while watching Freaks, I finished the main part of my first Endpaper mitt. This morning I wove in the ends and did the thumb ribbing. Right now it's soaking in a Eucalan bath; this is my first time using Eucalan, which is appropriate since this is a project of many firsts. Usually when I make a pair of something, I block them together, but I'm very anxious to see the finished product.

My tubular bind-off does not look so hot. But it's the first time I've ever done it, so I am cutting myself some slack. The tubular cast-on, on the other hand, is absolutely beautiful. The three should-be-gray-but-are-pink stitches are barely visible; I haven't decided if I will fix them or not.

I didn't have a ton of time to work on them this week, which is probably why it took so long to complete this first one. The color pattern makes sense to me now, though -- so the second one should go faster.

If I make a second pair, which is highly likely, I may shorten the palm a bit. These are a little longer than most of the armwarmers I've made, so I don't know if the extra fabric around the fingers will bother me or not. Usually at the office I wear my Fetching mitts. We'll see. I do like how narrow and flat they are, and the double-stranding makes them so very warm.

Tonight we are performing at the Goodwill Halloween ball. Should be fun and interesting.

We Interrupt This Cardigan ...

I ended up getting two skeins of Baby Ull for the Endpaper Mitts -- baby pink and a deep charcoal gray. I couldn't find anything that looked just right with the alpaca. I also got a wee single-use packet of lavender wool wash (I've wanted to try it) and some Brittany 3 mm needles.

I wasn't really planning to work on the Endpaper Mitts, not with the cardian hanging out on my desk, waiting. But I just wanted to try a little bit, to see how it went. So yeah ... now I'm done with the ribbing and two of the three straight section repeats on Mitt #1. I didn't bother with the Italian tubular cast-on; I just used the regular tubular cast-on instead. Wow! What a lovely result. My tension is a bit uneven in places, but a good blocking will help -- besides, it's my first stranded colorwork, I'm going to cut myself some slack. So far I've made two mistakes (pink stitches that should be gray). I figure that's where the miracle of duplicate stitch comes in, huh? :-)

There is lots of random junk to do today. I spent a good part of yesterday running around, so I am not crazy about doing it all again. Bah. But yesterday there was the yarn store and a veggie chili dog and an evening at the Cheerleader Mansion to work on Halloween stuff ... so it was a good day.

Good News!

I do not have lupus! My lab work came back normal except for a low white blood cell count, which sort of left me scratching my head. Anyway, if I get the butterfly rash again, I will get re-tested by a different doctor; other than that, I'm done with the lupus saga.

I made it to the bottom ribbing on my cardigan. I think I have about 30 rows left of ribbing, then the bottom detail. It's not nearly as fitted as the other items I've made from Fitted Knits, but I knew that going in -- I knit the 34" size as written without sizing it down. This was probably the best choice, as something very clingy in bulky yarn wouldn't have been so flattering. :-) I am going to see how it works to lengthen the sleeves, but may end up abandoning that plan.

Today is the grand opening of the Knitting Nest. It's actually been open for a few weeks, but the party is today. I am going to drop by and get a skein of fingering weight. I've had a skein of beautiful pink alpaca from Shannon in my stash, waiting for a special project. And after months of seeing them and going "meh," I've suddenly realized that I need to make Eunny Jang's Endpaper Mitts. I've done colorwork in swatches but never a full pattern. I also don't knit in such a tiny gauge very often, so it will be a good exercise.

Manic Monday

For whatever reason, I am just not paying attention to my knitting these days -- hence all the ripping back I've been doing. I realized today that I was doing decreases on every RS row for the cardigan waist, when it really should've just been on rows 2, 6, and 10. Whoops. At least it's not much to frog, just a few rows. It would've been more, except I ran out of yarn waiting at the doctor. (I used the time to weave in the ends.)

Today has been a wash so far. I got up, went to the doctor, saw him, and waited around for a looooooong time to get blood drawn. We should know more later this week; there's still a chance I have lupus, but if I do, it's mild. After that I ran to Costco to have them patch my tire (I ran over a nail or something). The estimate for the wait was almost two hours ... but, it needed to be done. So I spent a looooooooong time at Costco. Then it turned out they couldn't patch it, so I needed a whole new tire -- by then I was very crabby and exhausted and extremely sick of Costco. But they got the new tire done in 10 minutes, at least. And their service is always very friendly.

I got some pretty sweet buttons for the cardigan this afternoon -- which also gave me an excuse to play with the macro setting on my camera. The little banner part says "honor."

Alas, not much time for knitting tonight ... we have some guys from Ireland filming us for a documentary. Which means I need to go get pretty. Bah!

Zzzzz....

Thursday I went to the doctor because I am starting to get the same rash on my face that I had in DC. Apparently it is something called a butterfly rash, and it's one indication of lupus. I meet a few of the other diagnostic criteria, so I am going to a different doctor on Monday morning to get things checked out. It's probably nothing, but it seems like the sort of thing I should know for sure.

I keep making stupid knitting mistakes. Right now I am working on the short-sleeved cardigan with ribbing from Fitted Knits. What bothers me is that I can't figure out how to fix some weird bungle I made with an increase a few rows ago. I tried to rip back to before it, but the mistake seems to have magically remained. Gah. I may just frog it all the way back to the stupid collar and start over. At this rate, it's going to take me all month to make one simple big-gauge cardigan! I'll just blame that on the lupus that I probably don't have. ;-)

Edited to add: Screw it, I'm ripping it back and starting from the top with the increase rows. I will enjoy re-knitting it more than I will enjoy tinkering around with the bungled stitches.

Ballet T-Shirt

Pattern: Ballet T-Shirt
Source: Loop-d-Loop by Teva Durham
Yarn: Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece
Size: Women's Small/Medium

I wanted to a closer fit through the body and a longer length than the pattern gave. So after the decrease row, I knit even to round 58; that was my first increase round. I knit three even, did another increase round, and knit three more rounds even before binding off.

Clapotis

As promised ...

Pattern: Clapotis

Source: Knitty.com

Yarn: Knit Picks Andean Silk, 8 balls

Size: As written

Love, love, love love!! This is so soft and warm and drapey ... it's fabulous. I'm so happy I made this. :-)

Wait, It's Done?

How is September over already? I swear time is going by faster as I get older.

The ballet t-shirt was a fast knit ... I cast on Friday at 10 p.m., and was weaving in ends by 10 p.m. Saturday. Sweet! I really was not expecting it to be so fast. Since I have Mr. Fury at my disposal, I'll have him take some pics for me. I also finished weaving in the ends on my Andean Silk Clapotis this morning, so there will finally be a FO post for that one.

The baby shower was fun despite my lack of knitted gifts. (I brought a homemade dessert so I think that helped to temper it a bit in my mind.)

My pompom love continues unabated. I don't really want them on anything I'm wearing, but I do have a weird desire to festoon inanimate objects with them. Maybe I can get away with some pink pompoms on the scooter after Mr. Fury leaves town ...

September was a good month for knitting. Five finished projects, including the full-size Clappy. Not too shabby.

Decisions...

I have been feeling meh about knitting this week. Foliage is on hold because I lost another stitch while knitting the hat body, and I just don't feel like frogging it back. There was some hospital-related stuff I had to deal with over the last several days (everything is fine now), so I won't be able to finish the baby hat before the shower this weekend. I'm really bummed about it, but I don't want to rush through and have it not be perfect. So I will just give it to my friend a bit later.

However, I did come to a conclusion ... the half-finished Turtleneck Tube Vest that's been hibernating since June? I frogged it. If I decide I want it later, I'll make it. But in the meantime, I think I'll use the yarn for the Ballet T-Shirt from Loop-d-Loop.

Mr. Fury is home for the weekend before heading to Vegas for a month, so I need to get some cleaning done tonight!

I Don't Learn

Hubris gets me once again. I finished the crown increases on the Foliage hat for my mom, moved on to the circular needle, and started the first pattern row of the hat body. As I began the last two 8-stitch repeats, I realized I'm off by one stitch. Dammit.

As a lesson to myself (it would've been so sensible to add a lifeline when I knitted onto the circular), I will unknit the entire row, stitch by stitch, until I find the mistake and fix it. And then I will run a lifeline on the row.

I need to clean today but I'm feeling extremely unmotivated. There are also some wee errands to run, and I'm meeting a friend for a tea break later.

My toes are at that really stiff point in the healing process, right before they start peeling. Every time I look down and see them, they make me smile. Hee.

Mmmmm, Cupcake!

I whipped this up over three evenings this week ... it was a smash hit at the baby shower today! The father's nickname is Cupcake, so it was definitely apropos. And there were vanilla cupcakes with pink frosting at the shower, too. :-)

This was my first time ever making a pompom (i.e. I bought the pompom-maker about two hours before the shower started). I can't say I loved the pompom process, but it sure is cute on there. Viva la pom!

Pattern: Cupcake Hat
Source: Chile con Yarne
Yarn: Plymouth Encore Worsted (1 skein pink, 1 skein vanilla, with LOTS left over)
Size: Baby

It's a great pattern, but the decreases seemed a little wonky. I'd probably adjust them if I made this again. Everything else about it is genius!


Before the shower, I went to one of two new LYSes in town, the Knitting Nest. Just to take a little peeksie. It definitely has great potential! I talked to the owner and she is super nice. I didn't get any yarn, but I did get some of those little "knitted by" gift tags. The grand opening party is October 13, so I'll definitely stop by for that.

This Little Piggy

If you think getting good photos of your FOs is hard, try taking a picture of your own toes that doesn't make you look like you have the gout.

The usual fresh-tattoo picture disclaimers apply (re: redness, swelling, shininess from ointment, etc.)

Done, of course, by Hez at Gully Cat.

Yarn and Ink

I put aside Clapotis' many yarn ends in favor of a baby cupcake hat for Saturday. That nubble row was no fun to work, but boy, is it cute!

Tomorrow I am planning on going to Arts & Drafts, which is a craft circle at a local coffeeshop/bar. It's been a long time since I knit socially. :-)

On Friday night I am stopping by the tattoo shop for a quick appointment. I'm getting my toes done with one letter on each: k 2 p 2 k 2 p 2 k 2

I revel in my dorkiness. :-)

One Hand Clapping

I finished knitting Clapotis today ... now all that's left is to weave in the many ends! The thing is huge, but also very soft and warm. Rock! I am not sure when I'll weave in the ends but I've been wearing it around the house anyway. :-)

Went to the LYS today and got some Berroco Chinchilla to make baby hat #1. Oh, dear. It is very hard to work with this stuff. I've set it aside and will revisit it tomorrow; there might have to be a plan B. (Which would be the baby cupcake hat.)

I had an idea for either an anniversary or Xmas present for Mr. Fury, depending on how fast I can get it done ... he will be gone for October, so I'll have some time to work on it freely. I am thinking of doing a shadow knitting project, but the idea of creating my own chart is a little daunting!