skein

Not much knitting done these past three evenings

This is it.

There's this danger time,when I am between projects, when I get sucked into ravelry and my stash.  I have spent the past three evenings trying to start a wip!

This is some variegated sock yarn, too variegated to show up patterns, and also no nylon (I gave up knitting socks without nylon several years ago, was fed up with them wearing out however tightly I knit).   It has been wound up and restarted several times.  I was convinced it was to be a pair of crocheted mitts, but after several attempts I have had to give up.  Small hook  + variegated yarn = impossible crochet.  

In the end I've gone for a very simple knitting pattern - koigu wristers.  It won't matter if there are splotches of colour! 

My plain sock is not frogged, just on hold.  I'm thinking of reusing the yarn as a pair of mitts.  I'll leave it alone this weekend and see how I feel about it next week. 

On my ravelry searches I've become a little obsessed with crocheted mitts.  I have no idea which is a good or bad crcohet pattern, so I've just been looking at popular ones which appeal to me.  I cast on (now what is the word in crochet?) my first pair last ngiht,b ut think they will be abandoned, not stretchy enough (it's wool cotton).  I stil have the bag of dk yarns out thoguh, might start another pair over our long weekend!

In the process of hunting for mitts, I've found some rather lovely shawls.  In the hope that this is a skill I can master I've ordered some cheap tunisian crochet hooks.   I have one in my stash, and that's a knitpro one with a long cable, so if I do take to it I can tunisian crochet a blanket!  I know it's been around for years, but the only crochet I did in the seventies were long sleeveless waistcoats make out of granny squares!

 

Look what I won!

As a member of Sock Knitters Anonymous (SKA on ravelry) and as someone who posted cast on and cast off posts for one of the monthly challenges, I was eligible for  a prize.  And I won one!  (I never win anything). 

It arrived a week later, all the way from Maryland, courtesy of SheilaR (on ravelry).  I could choose a yarn from her Etsy shop, and chose a colour called Strawberry Fields,  guess I am going through a pink/red phase!  

 

Wool and stitch markers. how lovely! 

As for knitting, I've been working solely on Ormond, hoping that I won't run out of yarn. I have just over three balls of wool left, with two sleeves, a left front, half a right front and back neckband to knit.  I want all fingers collectively crosses, please!!

Where did the weekend go? And let's talk about stash organisation

The sum total of knitting done this weekend?

 

 That's just over an inch of garment, and a few rows of new sock. All from Sunday afternoon!

Saturday I had a late start, stayed in bed reading till 9.30am.  Up, showered, breakfasted, pottered till 11am.   Then I thought it would be a good idea to venture into the stash.  I needed to cast on the third garment for IntSweMoDo and had no idea which one to do next.

 Should I go for a thick winter yarn? This past week has been mild, and until Friday I toyed with the idea of starting summer knitting.  Friday was a bit cooler, and I very nearly took home the  Lopi which lives in the office.  I didn't, decided that possibly an early Spring garment might be better - after all, I'll probably finish it at the end of March, when the weather ought to be warmer.

My stash is 'sort of' organised.  I have culled so much of it in the past three years (at least five large black binbags have been sold, swapped or gone to the charity shop) and I've been in several kals involving lots of shawls and garments.

I have boxes and vacuum packs and toy bins. 

Box 1 - german sock yarns (those that are mw and usually can be dried) for gifts, mainly.

Box 2 - Lorna's Laces Shepherd sock and Fleece Artist sock yarn

Box 3 - Those skeins of sock yarns without nylon.  I now use this for hands, head and shoulders.  Not feet, it wears out too quickly.

Box 4 - Laceweight yarns

Box 5 - Non laceweight yarns suitable for lace or shawl knitting - these are the yarns which are not sold as sock yarns, usually very luxurious fibres and possibly sparkly.  From 4ply to aran weight.

Box 6 - Marion Foale 3ply merino (Yvonne, what did you do with yours???), Debbie Bliss baby cashmerino and some chickadee.

Box 7 - a large box, full of miscellaneous 4ply odd balls, quite a lot of shetland and 21st century yarns.  All great for mitten knitting.

Bin 1 - winter wool packs for garments - chunchy (a few!) and aran

Bin 2 - winter oddballs in heavier weights with the a few Jamieson's thick jumper kits which iddn't fit into bin 1

Bin 3 - wool packs in dk, sport and 4ply.

Bin 4 - lighter weight odd balls for transeasonal accessories.  And about four cones of Kauni!

As well as these I have vacuum or packmate bags - one has my sock yarns with nylon (but not German), others are for Wollmeise, Koigu, baby (that's oddballs suitable for babies, nice colours, m/w), more aran weight oddballs for winter accessories, Felted Tweed.

There's a suicase on the top of the wardrobe full of thick yarns - though it's been a few years since I opened it!  I kow there's some unpsun Icelandic in there, not sure what else!

Summer stash (cottons and very summery type yarns) are vacuum packed and stored away until the Spring. 

Work stash is much diminished, it's now contained in one pack,  much of it is Lopi and some Magpie.

Anyway this stash diving on Saturday lasted from 11am to 6pm!  I started sorting out some of the bins, as I tend to dump yarns in one of them instead of putting it away in its box. No rush, I love a good rummage in the stash! 

I had a shortlist for the next garment.

Debbie Bliss Rialto dk

Jaeger EFM dk

Elann Peruvian Highland Sport in red or aubergine.

After shortlisting, I went onto ravelry for inspiration. This took me from 6-11pm (with an interlude to cook and eat!)  I wanted to knit from both yarn and pattern stash.

I finally settled ont he Rialto, and Monday Morning.  Swatched. Just before bed I had a look at the pack of Rialto as I had a sneaking suspicion the two extra balls had gone AWOL.  And yes, they are AWOL!  I cannot knit a garment from 10 balls.  Until I find the extra yarn it's down to one of my two other yarns. 

I've setted for the Elann sportweight in aubergine.  And Deco.  Coincidentally the slipped stitch pattern is the same as on the Monday Morning cardigan, just with less sts inbetween the slipped ones.

So far so good, though I'm a bit concerned that it might be on the snug side.  I can't tell at the moment, and trying to measure such a narrow strip is difficult, it's a bit stretchy!  The swatch was fine ... bt my swatches sometimes lie! This isn't going to be a fast project on 3mm needles, either! 

Fingers crossed that I am now set for IntSweMoDo2012, garment #3.  Oh, and the other new project is just a pair of plain socks for my brother. 

My stash tally for February was -2510 yards!  I didn't buy one single yard of yarn.  Not that I'm going on a yarn diet or anything so drastic; just trying to use up some stash.

February knitting and March knitting goals

I didn't quite manage my February goals, but it was a shorter month!

Blog:

1) My last pair of mittens for NaKniMitMo12.  They're Polska.  Done here!

2) Urban Troubadour shoulder wrap.  Done!  

3) Hexipuffs!  Fail!  A miserable three completed all month.  Think I've lost the will to knit these.

Start and Finish:

4) My second garment for IntSweMoDo12.  Done! It's Acer.

5) A hat.  I have a kit.  Done!

6) Another hat.  Done!  It's a Noro hat and Mr C has adopted it.

7) Some fingerless mitts. Fail!  I have cast on though.

8) Some socks.  Done, the ghastly socks for Mr C.

Start:

9) Some more socks. Done!  I'm about halfway through the foot of the first sock.

 Overall, pleased.

Now for March.  It's going to be more of the same, I think.  Keeping up with the 12 knits for head, feet, hand, body and Other!

Blog:

1) My Hall of Fire tam, which needs a good blocking. 

Finish:

2) My pink socks for SKA. These will be the second pair for the year, but the others were super thick (aran weight) and went quickly.

3) The fingeerless mitts I;ve only just  started in February. I'm using remnants from the Urban Troubadour (and possibly the Hall of Fire Tam)   Making up the pattern as I go. My fourth pair this year, so I'm ahead on the knits for hands!

Start and finish:

4) My third garment for IntSweMoDo2012.  I have NO idea which one I'll knit. I fancy some lighter weight yarn though, and am looking at the dk wieght stash.  Is it too early to think of a summery colour??

5) My third pair of socks.  These will be plain ones.

6)  My third hat.  I fancy the new crocheted hat that Woollywormhead is bringing out this month.

7) My second Other.  I hae no idea what to knit yet, but I have had emails from baby Polly's babushka in Moscow asking if I might like to knit something else. I am waiting to find out what they would like!

8) My third Other.  Not a clue what to knit, yet.

I am having a rest from Hexipuffs.  I've gone off knitting them.  I will concentrate on the other knitting goals for March.   What's frustrating is that I usually haul some of the stash out on the weekend before the start of the new month, just to dip in and see what I might want to knit with.  This month I haven't, and I shall have to wait until Saturday to stash dive. I get in too late, and am too tired to do much more than cook, eat and do a little knitting on workday evenings.  This is good. it means I can dedicate tonight and tomorrow to these pink socks and (possibly) the new fingerless mitts!

I leave you with a photo I found on the computer.  These are two cute cardigans I knitted a looonng time ago. These girls are now 25 and 22!

The bottle green cardigan was a favourite of mine.  Pingouin yarn and pattern book was from Ries Wools in Holborn and was knitted for the older girl, poor youngest got the hand-me-downs!  I can't remember the stranded jumper pattern, though I can rememer knitting it. I suspect it's a Rowan pattern.

 

 

Knitting Doldrums

I seem to be making no progress at all on any of my WIPs at the moment.  

Out of the four on the needles:

Boreal is knitted, and needs finishing. No knitting to be done on this one.

Swedish Fish mittens are abandoned. I didn't like my fish, think I prefer darker fish and possibly just one colour.  So no knitting here either (but will be restarted, possibly not as mittens but as fingerless mitts)

Beekeeper's Quilt is also on hold.  I've been knitting remnants of Lrona's Laces and felling fine about htem.  Then I thought I'd try a hexipuff in this Easyknits Little Guys. loved it, but they are bigger hexipuffs.   Seemed like a grat idea to make a beekeeper's quilt out of this yarn (and it might be warmer).  I've knitted nine now, but am having second thoughts (!)  Though I love them, I would have to buy more yarn to make a blanket.   I wanted this to be knitted from sock yarn remnants or sock yarn in stash, so I'm thinking of going back to the original hexipuffs and just working on these,  This weekend I'll get them out and have another look.  So no knitting here either!

Urban Troubadour is not abandoned, but I'm keeping the boring ribbed section for February!

Leaving my newest MIP, Polska!  I cast on on Sunday using Wollmeise. 

Wednesday night I was nearly finished with mitten #1, and took a long look at my mitten. 

This is a regular pattern, and with regular patterns I like symmetry.   The mitten is a 10 st repeat, but the pattern is worked over 72 and not 70 sts.  There's an odd 2 sts of the pattern at the beginning of the round which means that the pattern is offset by two stitches.  I hadn't really noticed it much (though didn't like the way that the pattern was broken off at the end/beg of the round) but as I neared the point of the mittens it was much more obvious.  Not so much here, I've frogged a few rows, but the white circles are offset to the left.

Perfectionist I am not.  This time though it was worth restarting!  My circles were also not quite right,  I think it's because I was twisting strands every 4th stitch, if necessary and this is distorign the top row of the circle.  I may be wrong but will see in the new MIP.  Otherwise it is manually tweaking this errant stitch so it's more obvious!

So bye-bye mitten. 

The mods I'm making with this one:

* working the pattern over 70 stitches instead of 72, so it's just one continuous pattern with no interruptions

* on the first pattern row I'm omitting the white top of the circles and leving these as blue,

* when I get to the dreaded working with three colours pattern I shall turn the mitten inside out and loosen up a bit. Although the first mitten fits, if I pull the knitting it is noticeably tighter on that central pattern.

So, for one weekend day and four evenings I have this progress photo.  In fact last night I spent the whole evening trying (and failing) to rewind the cream Wollmeise.  I am left with a tangled mess.

Here's hoping I get these finished. I so wanted to knit four pairs this month but shall stick at three. Instead, over the weekend, I shall hunt out yarn for the next garment, and rummage through the sock stash for sock inspiration.

Choosing a sweater pattern

With Boreal off the needles, albeit not quite finished yet, it's time to think of the next sweater for IntSweMoDo12.

Usually I have a good idea of what I want to knit next.  As I'm getting close to finishing one garment I start planning the next.   Not this time though.  Mittens have been on my mind this month.

My decision procress this time around:

1) out of stash

2) and aran weight

3) on to flickr and ravelry, to see (roughly, as it's not up to date) what aran weight woolly yarns are in my stash.

4) Shortlist of yarn I fancy for the next one:

    Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran in olive

    Kelso Tweed in dark olive, plus one skein of red

    New Lanark aran in bramble

with the Cashmerino being the oldest in stash and  New Lanark the youngest.

I have more but have excluded the Jamieson kits, the Noro and some Jaeger (not enough yarn, should've bought more in the sales!)

Now to find a patttern.

5) ravelry to the rescue.  I have books but looking through them all would take me forever.  Best to look online.

I choose the following search options.

Cardigan, knitting, adult, weight (aran),  yardage and tension.  I don't mind purchasing an individual pattern, otherwise it's from magazines or books I already own.  No room on the bookcases for more books!

For the Kelso I want a plainish cardigan as any texture will get lost in the tweediness.  Yardage is a bit short, around 1500 yards at a tension of 15-16sts.  Nothing too summery, this is very much a cold weather yarn, both in colour and woolliness. 

Kelso favourites. Acer is leading.

Acer by Kirsten Kapur (though I might have been swayed by the lovely green!)

KPS neck down cardigan.

New Lanark:

Central Park Hoodie

Top Down Raglan Cardigan

Cashmerino Aran.  One contender, something I've liked for ages, and I see is now free from the Patons website,  Must Have Cardigan.

 Now there may be additions!  Looking at this list, after a month of stranded knitted it looks as if Im going for simple st st or simple cables.   Which one I choose depends on whether or not I can locate the stashed yarn!  I believe it's in a yarn bin next to my wardrobe ...

2012 New Year Resolutions

Happy New Year! 

I can't believe another year has passed and we're now into 2012. Because of all the Olympic build up, I feel that 2012 is already familiar.  

I didn't do too well with last year's resolutions, but I'm someone who loves lists and challenges.  I'm wiping the slate clean and starting afresh!

 

We'll skim over 2011 ...

1) knit from stash as much as possible, I'm not going cold sheep for the whole year though, but will try to limit what I buy to immediate projects. and not to increase the stash. Hmmm so-so.  I have knitted from stash quite a lot, but did increase it somewhat too.  Can't see a difference in the stash in 2011!

2) start a knitting piggy bank  well this was not a success!  i did quite well for the first three months, and then it tailed off.   Still have the money though.

3) log the stash,  Another failure!  Again, the first three months went quite well, but then I decided it wasn't worth doing.  It was eating into valuable knitting time!  I think I will have to let this go. I will never log the stash!

4) Knit from  pattern stash.  I think not.  I did knit a few patterns from books, but thdre's so many new patterns coming along.  I love ravelry downloads.  Patterns are always there in ravelry, and I can download them ot my phone when I want to knit them. 

5) fingerless gloves - 11 in 2011. at   Fingerless Gloves Fanatics  No no no!  I failed in this quest, managed only six pairs.

6) shawls 11 in 2011 at    11 shawls in 2011.  A complete success!  This really is the only resolution i manged to keep!.  

 

So.. ONTO 2012 resolutions.

Let's talk about KALs.  Ravelry is a huge temptress.  I want to join every kal going.  But I'm resisting.  I have not searched the groups for 2012 kals (yet).  I will do a few 12 in 12 though. 

1) 12 garments in 2012.  Am I mad?  Yes, I believe so!  I gave this one a miss last year but still managed to knit four garments.  I'm going to drop out of fthe shawls kal and do this one instead.   The  mission is to finish 12 garments, so my Christmas jumper counts and is garment #1/ IntSweMoDo2012.  Count me in!

2) 12 knits for hands.  This can be gloves, mitts, or mittens.  I aim to use stash yarn.

3) 12 knits for feet.  More stash yarn.

4) 12 knits for heads.  Now this will be for children's heads too, I can't see me needing 12 adult hats!

5) 12 Other Things.  Could be baby, shawl, scarves, cowls, silly ornaments.  I want my total up to 61 this year!

6) Beekeepers Quilt will be finished.  It's not something that I've been concentrating on, but I would like to get this done in 2012. I have lots of little skeins and odd balls to use up!

7) Stash busting.  Again.  This time I'm going to try to get the odd ball/remnants stash under control  I shall use this for the smaller projects    such as hands and feet. and most of the hats I will knit.   And I'm going to commit to using stash yarn for at least eight of the garments I knit. 

Seven resolutions this year, one up on last year, but I think) quite do-able, as long as I don't get tied up with time consuming knitting.

 

 

A year of knitting in 2011

This year I've managed to finish 58 projects.   My ravelry link is here. 

 Baby and child:  4 baby cardigans, 2 baby hats, 2 pairs of bootees. 1 child hat, 1 child cardigan and 1 pair of socks.  Loved knitting Pepper and Small Things. 

Garments: 4 

   
 

I really love Chickadee and Cria.  My Kim Hargreaves Cameo was bloody horrible and has been frogged.   Heather has not been worn yet, it's not been cold enough!

 Blanket: 1 and it's lovely.  I do have Beekeepers on the go, but seems to have stalled a bit.

 

Hands: 2 pairs of gloves,  5 pairs of mittens, 6 pairs of fingerless mitts.  Favourite are my Blue Hands gloves,  Everyone loves these, I'm always getting comments when I wear them.

 

Shawls: 11.  I like a lot of these, for lots of different reasons. 

The one with the most work involved was In Dreams, nearly 1500 yards (which in itself is not too bad) and 5000 beads (that was the killer!)

The one which was most fun to knit was the Polka Dot Stole, both for pattern and yarn (Yarn Yard's Leigh) and colour! Though I could easitly mention at least another four or five which were enjoyable knits. 

 Hats and scarves: 2 hats and 2 scarves.  Both scarves were gifts, and one hat was!  Next year I must do more hats....

 

Socks: 13 pairs of socks, 1 pair of felted clogs.  Clogs plus seven pairs of socks were gifts (for men, on the large side).  Only four pairs were textured, the rest were plain. 

 

 This is my favourite post of the year, seeing all the knitting in one place!

 

Have a Happy New Year, everyone! 

 

 

 

 

A quick update

I'm whizzing off to see the family this weekend, and it's going to be a longer than usual one, leaving in a few hours and not returning till Monday, which means I don't have to rush back on Sunday evening after eating a huge roast dinner.   Mr C. is prepared for his boy's weekend, though he's trying hard to conceal his enjoyment at complete control of the remote, the vodka, eating what and when he wants to, and going to bed late (read: falling asleep on the sofa).  He has included in the Ocado order his usual 'treats' - that's chicken drumsticks which he cooks on Friday and eats cold all weekend, with coleslaw, and also black bread to go with the vodka. Very odd idea of treats if you ask me!

I've been deciding what to take with me for this long weekend. Not clothes, knitting!  I'm taking the turquoise Winter's Eve sock, will finish the foot of the first one, some Hexipuffs for the Beekeeper's Quilt,  some yarn to knit a baby cardigan, and have cast on another shawl, Shaelyn!  Will that be enough???

 

Meanwhile I have knitted a baby hat.  My neice is due shortly, and time is running out for me to knit a little baby set, plus extra stuff for big sister.   This is a free ravelry download, in multiple sizing and in three yarn weights, sport, dk, worsted.  It's knitted with short rows  Very cute.  The thing that swung it for me was the ravelry photos of cute babies!  Not a great shot, taken late at night in dim light with mobile, I'll save the good shot for the finished hat!

It's Aviatrix, I see more in the future!  This is just a cream one with blue bits on the ribbing.   I would consider doing the purl ridges in blue next time.  A quick knit, once I stopped pottering around the flat finding other things to sort out!

And Chickadee is nearly done, just needs a good wash to get rid of excess dye.

Again, late night photo, but at least the colour is right in this one!

So, it's shawl, socks and baby knitting for the forseeable future! 

Oh, and a shout - it's fast approaching November, and that means NaBloPoMo again, a daily post for November.  Anyone else thinking of doing this?  I just have to knit faster so I have posts!

 

September knitting and October knitting goals

I've just had to edit the title so it says the correct months!  

 

Not quite, but nearly!

Finish:

1)  Polka Dot Stole.   Done! 

2) Plain Opal Magic socks. Done!  Need to blog them though.  They were finished just in time, on 29th!

3) Gentleman's Lozenge socks from Vintage knits.  Done, and I love them!

4) Chickadee!  Oops.  Not done!  I've been sock knitting instead!

 

Start:

5) Socks for SKA on ravelry. Done!  One sock done, one to go. 

6) My 10th shawl for 11shawls2011.   JUST started, and it's one leaf! More when I manage to do a bit of progress!

7) Something small.   Started and finished, very pleased with this. It's for ravelry group SolidSocks and the colour is red.  Bleeding Hearts

 

So, six out of seven goals met, but not bad! 

I can't really believe that it's October already. 

October goals

Blog:

1) Plain socks for Mr C.  His birthday isn't until October, but I tend to knit these early,  I'll try to get a photo of them on his feet, but he'll have to not look!

Finish:

2) Chickadee.  Yes, must finish this one. I thik wth this warm spell, and the lure of socks, it's been neglected far too long.  We apparantly have snow due this week (from 29 degrees on Friday!) so that might give me a nudge.

3) SKA September socks - one done, one to go.

4) My 10th shawl for 11shawls2011, not even blogged about yet!

Start:

5) My 11th, and final shawl, for 11shawls2011. 

6) SKA October kal. I have resisted looking at the threads for October...

7) SolidSocks for October.  It's purple, I have purple sock yarn!

Lots more knitting to do, and I need to crack on.  My niece is due to delivery my first great nephew in November (she who said after Miss E was born three years ago that she would NEVER give birth again, lol!).  I want to knit baby stuff!