k*a*r*i*s w*o*r*l*d

Look what I finished!

I know I haven't updated in ummm, like 2 months, I won't even go into all my excuses.  More important is the fact that I have been knitting!

Check out Duncan's Baby Sweater:

Next to one of the dozen or so zucchinis that have exploded on our garden.

And Sockapol2za Socks!  My first knitted pair ever.  Sock Pal, I hope you like them.

And drumroll please, I have started my Color on Color Scarf from Scarf Style.  I am just about to start the Fair Isle section #11!  After much gauge angst, I have just decide to keep knitting and love the finished product however big it gets.  Pics of this to come.

stylin'

My babe is so hip...

Modeling her new jumper yesterday.

So cute.  I also finished the back of Sugar n'Spice and cast on for a secret baby b-day present.

excuses, excuses

well, I have been a naughty blogger.  Life has been busy busy the last few weeks.  A visit to Portland and Seattle and family visits to Madison have kept me away from the computer, and my knitting!  Some progress on my travel knitting (Alabama square blanket) was made on our trip.  Photos to come later.  And I finished the yummy baby blanket.  Now I just have to run in the threads, and ship that baby off to little Torin.  Mom helped me with my Cotton Kureyon jumper and it is waiting for me to finish it this weekend. (fingers crossed). 

new projects abound

Little knitting has been done, due to the fact that I have been soooo stuffed up this week.  Before the sick reappeared on Friday night, I did get quite a bit done while hubby was at the hospital working.  Rory and I made a trip to Lakeside Fibers to get out of the house, and I picked up a kit to make a cute baby blanket.  ( At last count I know 10 people who are pregnant!  At least 6 of whom, I will definitely be knitting for!) I got a little start on it later that evening. I have to say I was a little annoyed.  This "Interlacements Alabama Sampler Baby Blanket" kit called for a "size 9, 29" or longer circular needle; or size needed to obtain gauge."  I bought a new Addi turbo circ. for ~$16.00.  Then I get home and ugh, I am totally off gauge.  What is annoying is that said store has a 'no return' policy on needles.  Luckily, I had a set of size 10 1/2, 24" circs which are working out fine.  wheew.

Friday night I also sucked it up, and grafted the little jumper skirt together, all by myself. The yarn ripped 3 times!  I wasn't even pulling on it that hard, I swear.  But I just tyed it off, and kept going.  I decided to use a contrasting color (the turquoise) which looks kind of cool.   Will wait for mom to do the picking up of stitches across the front.  I tried, but it just wasn't working for me.

Lastly, I worked on the Yummy Baby Blanket.  I am into the 4th skein, and still think it is going to be an awesome present.

I still want to pick up some yarn for Sugar 'n Spice #193 QK pattern from Minnowknits, which I picked up a few weeks ago on my coffee/yarn date with Nicole @ The Sow's Ear.  I think I want to knit it up in greens. (Sorry, was unable to find a linkable pic.)

Also, just received a fabulous present from mom in the mail.(She got it from Ruhama's) This bag contains all of the yarn to knit Color on Color from Scarf Style.  This will be my challenge project, with the goal of finishing it for next fall.  I just really fell in love with all the bright colors, and am excited to challenge myself some techniques I haven't done before. I was so excited I lined up all the colors by number to see the pretty palate.

Think I'm overextending myself?  Nah...well, maybe.  I also won an auction on ebay last night for 10 skeins of Noro Silk Garden 87!  Klaralund, here I come!

knitting and frogging, frogging and knitting

I haven't posted in a while, because I don't have all that much to show!  I spent most of last week, trying to make a baby gift from my stash.  First I started a teddy bear pattern with some Berroco Plush,  couldn't get my needles around the inc 1 stitches.  Frustrated, I tried a gauge of some Rowan wool/cotton for another Teddy Bear pattern.  Totally off.  Then I tried another ball of Rowan wool/cotton for a hat, but discover 2/3 of the way through I won't have enough to finish.  Frustrated, because sex of baby is unknown and the only colors I have are green and brown I quit again.  Went back to the Berroco Plush.  Finished the first side of teddy pattern, but on 2nd side, notice that it is totally not matching up with finished side, and decide to quit.  I'll make something when baby is born, and yarn diet is over.

Otherwise, I finished knitting the skirt portion of Rory's Noro jumper, but am procrastinating the grafting to the cast on edge to finish.  I started it, and was ok, with how it was working, and then the yarn just ripped.  I may have mentioned previously that the Cotton Kureyon was ripping apart at some of the color changes, where I guess the yarn was spun tightly enough together (?).  So frustrated with that I put that down. 

I've mostly been doing the brainless Yummy baby blanket.  I'm almost done with the 3rd (of 5) skein.  It is going to be an awesome baby gift.  So, one success story in the bunch.

Will update with pics later.

 

baby circs

Knitting has been a little slow for the past week.  We have all been sick,and trying to sleep as much as possible.  I did finish these cool Hand/Wrist Warmers, which Chuck referred to as Rocky Balboa gloves....

I've also made some progress on the Yummy Baby Blanket.  I plan to re-start the Cotton Kureyon jumper today.  My hubby says that I need to be on a major yarn diet for at least a month.  So, I am going to try with all my might not to buy new yarn. (Although, I am sooooo tempted to purchase some more Cash Iroha to knit the Hourglass sweater, after knitting my wrist warmers with it.)  I definitely have a few things to keep me busy: Yummy Blanket, Quick Baby Hat (left-over yarn from stash), Baby sweater (recently purchased DB merino aran), and Rory jumper.  If I at least get through those projects, God knows I deserve some yarn for moi.  Until then I will keep my Ebay lurking to a minimum, although I'm not sure what will stop me if WNW posts new Silk Garden  (for Klaralund) or Cash Iroha (for Hourglass) colors.

I belive the word is: frogged

Well, after 3 weeks of work on this little Cotton Kureyon jumper from Noro Kids 2 Cotton Kureyon Collection,  I get to the end of the skirt portion and realize something is amiss.  The last part of the directions calls for you to graft to the cast-on row.  But how to do this I wonder...I have 130 stitches and the cast-on row had 55.

I am a little pissed at myself for this waste of time, but at least I will have enough yarn to make the jumper.  I was getting concerned, because I only had a 1/4 of a skein left when I was finishing the skirt.  I reread and reread the directions, but I guess I just interpreted them incorrectly.  It reads "cast on 55, work stripe pattern as follows: beginning with the 3rd row, decrease 1 st at beg of row and increase 1 st at end of every other row.  Complete 26 stripe patterns [it is a 6 row pattern] : bind off by grafting last row on needles to cast on row."  I took this to mean, decrease on row 3, and then increase one st. at the end of every other row.  NEVER decreasing again.  As I discovered, I guess I was supposed to be decreasing at the beginning of each of the rows that I increased on.  Whoops.  I'll start again this week, at least I can look forward to it going a little faster, and not running out of yarn!

After that debacle,  I decided to work on something a little simpler:

This is going to be the sweetest baby blanket ever.  Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Superchucky is sooooo yummy.  This is the pattern from her book The Cashmere Collection.

super late X-Mas gift

Here is the Noro Transitions hat for my brother Andy. 

I think that the brown tones are going to look really great on him.  Hopefully there will still be some cold days for him to wear it!  It's 50 degrees in Madison today...love it.

almost grrrrr

So, I got Last Minute Knitted Gifts by Joelle Haverson from the library a few weeks ago and decided that it might be fun to make the Hand/Wrist Warmers.  So, I order some black Noro Cash Iroha, thinking, "Small projects, small purchases...good girl".  So the yarn arrives, and I check the pattern for the  needles to use.  2 8" circular needles.  What's the big deal, right?  That shows you how clueless I am.  So I call each of the 3 yarn stores here in Madison that I frequent to figure out where I want to pick up the needles. Opps, silly me, no one carries circular needles smaller than 12".  What the ???  So, the little librarian gets on google and moments later some plastic 8" circulars are on their way.  Maybe I should have read the comments/reviews that readers had posted on Amazon about the book.  Or maybe not, then I might not have some Hand/Wrist Warmers on the way.

Other projects 'on the needles':

Another Transitions hat for my brother Andy. Different Color

Jumper for Rory

Baby Blanket for friend

Found another project I would like to do:

Color on Color Scarf from Scarf Style.   Luckily there is a shop in Milwaukee that is selling a kit with all the yarn.  I think that Mom and I might take a drive over when she comes back in April.

fini

Finished my Gesta vest. I love, love, love the way it turned out.  I'm really glad that I made it because it isn't something I would ordinarily wear, so it really adds a little chic-ness to my usually sweater and jeans uniform.  I will try to take a better picture later, I don't really look so pregnant!

I have also done about 50 rows on the little Cotton Kureyon dress for Rory.  The only problem I am having is that at the color changes sometimes the yarn is not spun together very well and it basically just rips apart.  It is kindof frustrating, but the colors are really nice and bright, and what are you going to do?

Another project I have been slowly working on is organizing my collection of patterns and pattern books.  I have been slowly finding the errata for the books I own, and have started to organize the photocopied patterns I have in binders.