KarenJoSeattle

Nesting With my Yarn

Let me tell you something that does not work. Linen stitch does not resist the pull of a cat's claws. At least it doesn't at the gauge I knit it in my cats' throw.

Well, at least now that I've accepted that, I don't need to finish crocheting a crab-stitch edge all the way around and back. But I do need to find where I stashed the poor thing a few months ago when I was cleaning up for company so I can use it in one of the cat beds (thus no photos of the issues). They do love it, so the project was worth it. Or will be once I find it.

For the new ottoman throw I'm going to try double stranding this Silk Mountain by Noro (nice FO photos in that link to the Noro site) in a seed stitch. I know the seed stitch won't show very well in the boucle, but I've found the stitch fairly good at resisting and hiding cat pulls on other projects. And I like to knit seed stitch. I knit continental, i.e. I pick, so I can get a nice rhythm going.

I think I may take this to California when we go down for the holidays. I always need a lot of semi-mindless knitting then. We go for six weeks.

But for now I'll just enjoy and decorate with the unknit yarn for a bit. It fits in well with the other things. And it wasn't much less costly.

Since Last We Met

I've been absent from the blog for a couple three days.

In that time I have had a 2-hour phone conversation with my Mom about home plans, exchanged several e-mails with realtors in two states plus innumerable with my Mom and various siblings, met with a realtor here at our island place who told us we should get our house on the market by the first (yes, of February) to beat the spring rush while the market here is still good but we do need, among other things, to replace the floor in the basement hall and bathroom first, forgot to take my 'A' photo while on the island, arranged for a contractor to fix the broken pipe there this week, found the battery in the Land Rover (needed now to move some stuff into storage to prep the house for sale) died again and vowed to sell the thing soon, had the house cleaners first say they couldn't come to the city place for two weeks then call and say someone canceled and they could come in two hours (ah, life is hard, isn't it, but we weren't completely unpacked and needed to meet the realtor), attended a Knitting Guild board meeting, learned how to put together the Guild newsletter file, discovered I'd left a set of symphony tickets off my calendar and had to fiddle the time for the newsletter, arranged a key for the California realtor to get into that house so he can price and list it (that's two houses on the market at once for those who are still with me and counting), sent long e-mails to contractor and window washer/pressure washer and garden help guy, scheduled and unscheduled tea with a friend I haven't seen for 2 months and now may not see for another 2 months, and got my hair cut noticeably shorter which sometime seems good and, then again, not.

Oh, and I finally cast off this friggin' hat. The cat's still weirded out by the road trip back to Seattle and constant in-and-out of humans since. She follows me around demanding a lap NOW and is jealous of the attention the finished hat gets. So, you get the photos you get.

And I'm going to bed. Plus I'm so looking forward to my appointment with my aesthetician tomorrow when I can relax and the world goes away for a while.

Sometimes life is too good. I'm really not complaining, despite how it may sound. I'm just tired.

May you live in interesting times.

PS Welcome RobinH to the world of blogs. Then note the blog roll that includes just me and The Yarn Harlot. Made my day.

A Tisket a Tasket...

...Two kitties in a basket. 

Today I went to the second class on two socks at once on a magic loop. We turned the heels. I had a couple of anomalies in numbers of stitches and where they were, but could manipulate things so they worked. I need to do another pair of these soon so I remember the techniques.

We made a Dutch heel. After building a gusset by increasing with make 1s, a few stitches in the middle are used to knit a flap. Pick up stitches around the flap and decrease the gusset back down.

I found the construction interesting. The heel turn makes little pleats.

My foot came out a hair longer than I expected based on trying on while knitting up to the heel. As a result, the heel doesn't lie flat against my foot. Since I planned these as Pilates Lesson socks rather than shoe-and-sock socks they'll be fine. The next pair I'll need to be more conservative in my length estimates. 

I'll take nice pictures of the figure 8 cast-on when I do it again. The ones on line don't have some of the details I was looking for.

I'll use this class pattern for house socks in some off-white Rowan Wool Silk I have. The pattern involves less yarn torture than the others I've done and I don't think this yarn will stand up to much.

Another shot of cute. Is this actually comfortable? They spent hours there.

Whole Lotta Swatchin' Goin' On

The sun shone today. Winnie took advantage by sleeping in sunny spots all day. Heat loving cats in Seattle quickly learn to exploit any sunshine.

May 17th through the 20th, Churchmouse Yarns and Teas hosts Sally Melville in 7 workshops over 4 days. I signed up for all of them.

This evening I sat down and knitted up all the homework swatches.

I rarely procrastinate on this kind of thing -- on other kinds of things, yes, but not on class swatches. Still, even for me this is working way ahead.

The fact is, I head out of state on the 8th and will fly back for the 4 days of these classes.

I've wanted to take classes from Sally for years. She's a professor who studies methods of learning and has a reputation as an excellent teacher. I come from a family of teachers.

Also, I think of these classes as reward for and part of my return to knitting after more than a year (maybe two) away.

I'm so excited.

These swatches also got me thinking about my swatching style. I'm a swatcher. I'll write more about my thoughts on this tomorrow.

What's Wrong With This Picture?

This is the first sweater I knit.

Does your first sweater count if you haven't actually ever finished it?  If you carefully folded it, placed it on a shelf, and forgot you hadn't finished it?

Technically, the first sweater I started to knit was one from Very Easy, Very Vogue with a body made from 4 vertical rectangles in 2 colors. I'd knitted simple things 25 years before in high school and college.All I'd made since were swatches for the beginning  class I took to relearn. My gauge changed as I got more practiced over the course of the first rectangle. Mine was trapezoidal.

A year and another Beginning Knitting class later, I made this version of the cover sweater from the Vogue book. I changed the yarn to Sirdar Denim Aran. I changed the neck. And I changed the neck. And I thought about changing the neck again. Instead I folded it and placed it on a shelf -- six years ago.

I'm sure I intended to designate that shelf as the to-be-finished shelf. It was a very small shelf in a corner of a closet. This sweater filled it.

So, yesterday I went looking for the scarf that was my first lace project but never got blocked. I looked in some well organized though neglected stash areas and came across this sweater.

All it needs is those ends at the neck sewn in -- assuming the neck is done.

It's a bit big. I've lost weight. But I intended it as a comfy around-the-house sweater, so big's okay. The yarn's a good one for a Seattle Spring.

And I like the neck.

Talitha did not like the interuption from my scarf search.

Winnie did not like Talitha getting all the attention.

I've now finished my first sweater.

(The throw is Lopi in Stitch #9 from Lesley Stanfild's New Knitting Stitch Library.)

Short Row Magic

Ta da! It's a foot. Accompanied by my clingy but well-behaved knitting partner, Winnie.

 

This is my second pair of socks and the first toe-up pair I've done. I'm using Wendy Johnson's pattern, with the help of her short row toe tutorial from Knitty. The Knitty piece was also helpful when working the heel as that's also short-rowed in this pattern.

I'm using Mission Falls 1824 wool on US4s at 5 1/2 sts to the inch. I've ribbed the top of the foot and am ready to start ribbing the leg. This is the style and weight my spousal-equivalent likes in his socks.

I'm not sure I got all of the wraps and turns done and picked up correctly in the heel.I had some trouble seeing and picking up the double wraps. Used a crochet hook most of the time to get the wraps onto the needle.

When I was done with the heel I ended up picking up 3 stitches on each side in the gap as I started back around the whole foot. I did one repeat of K2tog on each round as I did Grumperina's two inch trick of knitting a bit more plain stockinette to make the heel look tall enough. Made kind of a mini-gusset. Still, I have one small hole.

I got the measurements figured out for my cardigan, but I'm concentrating on the socks for my knitting time. I'm taking a class at So Much Yarn starting this Sunday. It's 2 socks at once, toe-up, on Magic loop. I think it will help to have a bit more basic sock experience going into that.

Happy Birthday to Me!

    Welcome to my new blog; my birthday present to me.

    Here's the requisite cat picture. That's Ocicats Winnie (short for Windwalker) and Talitha.

   My knitting took a time out for about a year and a half while I took some courses both for what I do and what I want to do. Mainly I learned whatever I do, it must include knitting.

   So, I jumped back in both feet first. Stashes and WIPs (lots of WIPs) have been sorted, papers filed (why does knitting generate so much paper?), and 2 1/2-year-old first socks finished.

   This blog continues the momentum from the two quarters of Nonfiction Writing I just finished. My instructor writes a blog - cancer not knitting, though she does knit - and encouraged me when I asked about blogging. I promise not to hold it against her when the photos won't post or trolls show up.

   These are the projects currently at the front of the queue. I'll talk more about them later.