12.30.2007

is 35 years old "vintage"?

When I visited my mother-in-law in New Zealand in February she let me raid her HUGE box of old patterns. One of the magazines I took from her was an issue of Stitchcraft, published December 1972, the month and year Aidan was born. I liked the idea that she was sitting there, 9 months pregnant, waiting for my husband to be born, flipping through this magazine.

Stichcraft

Maybe she came across this scarf pattern and thought how cute it was, and how she'd like to knit it for herself, but it was summer (seasons reversed down under) and she'd wait a bit, but then her baby was born and she had no time to knit for herself.

Vintage Pattern

Okay, maybe it didn't go down that way, but I think it's a totally cute scarf, so I knit it for her.

Vintage Scarf

Drop Stitch Scarf

I used the last of my Interlacements Oregon Worsted Merino Wool in Tapestry. I LOVE this yarn. Love love. And I love the baby born 35 years ago last week, who's the psycho in the photo above.

12.27.2007

warm and wooly

I finished Aidan's socks! They turned out well. Sooper doopter (as Bickie says) thick and warm.

Comfy Socks

I followed the Comfy Socks pattern pretty closely. To make the yarn bulky enough, I held the Treliske Organic Merino doubled. I made the large size, on size 11 needles (long circular, magic loop) and they fit him pretty well. Funny thing is, he has one foot that's half a size longer than the other, so I knit one half an inch longer. I guess that's one of the benefits of hand knit socks. :) To differentiate them, I double stitched a large L in the bottom of the longer one, which works out well, because it's also his left foot.

Comfy Socks

The one silly mistake I made was that I decided to make the socks ribbed, instead of just stocking stitch all the way. With 28 stitches cast on, I divided with 14 on each half of the magic loop. And I k2, p2 across the first 14, then k2, p2 across the second 14. I didn't even realize until I rearranged the stitches after knitting the heel flap that each set of 14 was beginning and ending with k2, so that I had 2 ribs that were k4. Oops. I'll just pretend I did that on purpose. It was on purpose on the second sock, after all. ;)

12.26.2007

knit like the wind

Coming up to the holidays, I had a lot on my plate. I had to study for a big final exam for one class, and write a 10 page paper, prepare a 5 minute presentation, and finish a take home final exam for another class. So all that left very little time for knitting (and blogging about knitting). But knitting had to be done. I wanted to give Bickie's preschool teachers (all 5 of them) hand knitted end of the year gifts. I'm quite pleased with the resulting collection, though there were a few missteps along the way.
Knit Collection

Top row (left to right) - Fingerless Mitts, Fuzzy Scarf, Cabled Neckwarmer
Bottom row - Boucle Hat, Striped Wooly Hat

The Fingerless Mitts were the most time consuming, partly because I had to rip out to the thumb on one of them. I had thought that my yarn was giving me larger gauge, so I made a smaller thumb hole and thumb. But it ended up much too small. I should have just followed the pattern. Which, BTW, was Dashing from Knitty. So I did follow the pattern for the second one, it turned out perfect, so I ripped back the first one and redid it to pattern specs. One thing I did change from the pattern was the length of the arm. I just shortened it a bunch, mainly to make knitting it quicker. I was short on time.

Fingerless Mittens

I'm really happy with how they turned out in the end, I might actually make myself a pair. They were knit for a guy, and I had my husband and brother both try them on to make sure they'd fit a guy, and they did, but these are my petite lady hands modeling here. They actually fit me pretty good too, though I'd probably knit a smaller size for myself. For these I used the first yarn I ever bought, over 11 years ago, when I had my then-future MIL in New Zealand teach me to knit. It's a totally basic, hard-wearing undyed 100% wool called Thorobred Farms Stormy Ridge Station Triple Knit 12 ply. I bought a whole bunch of it for a sweater, and never finished it. I got halfway up the back and decided it was ugly. So I bound off, felted it, and I think ended up throwing it away. But I still have a whole bunch of this yarn left. I could make 50 pairs of these mitts.

The Fuzzy Scarf was just a made up pattern. I have all this feathery yarn that I got from the 2006 Boston Knit Out for registering my blog with them. A whole bag of it. But I don't know what I'd make out of a whole bag of nylon eyelash yarn. So I knit it with a strand of Jaggerspun Zephyr on size 19 needles. Knit, knit knit. Knit, knit, knit. It became a scarf.

Fuzzy Scarf

Kinda cute, right? I made the ends wider than the middle, because I cast on too many to begin with (20 stitches) and thought it would be too wide, and take too long to knit. Have I mentioned I was in a rush?

For the neckwarmer, I followed this pattern. I really like it, and the Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Superchunky is super soft. The only thing I would change is to make the next one a bit tighter. This is just a bit too loose. So I would take out one repeat of the cable I think.

Cabled Neckwarmer

And then there're the hats. The first one, in Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Astrakhan, is totally cute, right?

Boucle Hat

I copied this idea to do the Tychus pattern from Knitty in this boucle yarn. I took Knerq's suggestion to start with 26 stitches, but it was still too short on me, so I added a garter stitch border, plus a picot cast off. It used almost exactly one ball of the yarn.

Last but not least was the Noro Big Kureyon Hat.

Big Kureyon Hat

I used the Zen String Pro Bono pattern exactly. It ended up a bit short. Or a bit long, depending on how you'd want to wear it. Enough on me for a tiny little rolled edge. But too long to wear down. Oh well. Considering I started and finished it in the 2 and a half hours between dropping Bickie off and picking her up on the last day of school before break (the last chance to give the gifts) I think it's pretty awesome.

So that was my knitting world for a bit. I took a day off, and then started a pair of warm wooly socks for the hubby for xmas. I finished one just in time, so I had something to give him. LOL I'm working on the second now. I show you the pair once I've finished.

12.10.2007

my first (real) socks!

I love socks!

Rio de la Plata Socks

Just finished this, my first pair of real socks. I'm not counting the Class Socks I made months ago. This new pair, are real because they were knit for real, not hypothetical, feet. And they were knit on size 1 needles. That's serious sock knitting.

From Sensational Knitted Socks, the Elongated Corded Rib socks. A 4 stitch pattern. Took me less then 2 weeks to make the pair, which is pretty quick for me. I used Rio de la Plata sock yarn, a merino/nylon blend. It went really well, and I'm looking forward to knitting 4 more pairs. I'm giving all my family socks for Christmas, assuming I can get them done in the next 2 weeks. Wish me luck!