Picture Day

Warm Sipalu Bag (front)




Cool Strapless (so far) Sipalu Bag



Starmore ~ Virtual Yarns
Leo Scarf Kit, Patterns and Books
Glenesk Sweater Kit





Knit Picks Kits: Red Aguona Laptop Bag and Andean Chulla Hat
& New KP Tools




Wollmeise Sock Club




My Kindle 2

Ups and Down

Life has so many peaks and valleys. Monday was a very deep valley. Three women who are all like sisters to me each lost members of their families. A Mother An Aunt and A Cousin. Every four hours I was receiving news of their loss. It was a very hard day and evening. My best friend was losing her third Aunt this year - devastating.

Most of us crafters make things for different reasons, many of us find great comfort in the sound of knitting needles clicking, the fluid motion of chains sliding off and on a hook, the satisfaction of centering wordart just right on a page, finally finishing the top of a quilt. None of the ladies I spoke of above are crafters or have the types of hobbies or pasttimes that offer comfort. So me, my Mom and my Sister are here to listen to hug and to bring food and prayers.

On the up side, it was Sister's and Girlfriends day and I sent the usual chain-email and got lots of them back. The snail mail I have received this week has been outstanding and mostly International. I received copies of Tudor Roses and Scandinavian Knitwear. My Wollmeise Sock Club Spring package came. My first Virtual Yarns order came, the yarns for the Leo scarf are gorgeous. The book, The Collector's Item is comparable to Tudor Roses. The photography and patterns are stunning. Apparently the rumors are true, several colorways of the 2 ply yarns offered by Virtual Yarns and the kits that contain them are being discontinued in the very near future. Some colors have already been depleted. Whew, no buyers/knitters remorse this time. I ordered what I really loved before it was gone forever.

Life is too short. . .

I bought a Kindle 2 solely because it can read the book to me when I need to stop reading the text myself. I can try new authors without having their books sitting on my shelf if I end up not liking them. And, lets face it I am out of space for books, DVDS and yarn - go figure. SO being able to have 20,000 books on a single little handheld works for me.

I have had to stop reading some, actually most of the forums on Ravelry. There is so much drama going on in some of them I think folks have completely forgotten it's a KNITTING and CROCHETING community. I miss the days when it first started and all we ever talked about was YARN and patterns, and knitting and crocheting. Now it's just too much off topic chatter and personal information. Many have forsaken their blogs and put all their business on Ravelry. So since I go there to obsess with others about needlecrafting ONLY, I have just removed all but four of the forums from my list. This is my forum for the personal stuff, with lots of the needlecrafting obsession thrown in.

Almost There

I have completed the Sipalu bag in the cool color palette (alternate charts). I have to knit the I cord strap then block it. I am going to do the linings when I finish all 4 bags in the set. I cast on and knit the side panel, welting and first round of the first bag in the warm color palette. There are some really interesting colors in this sampler. The side panel pattern is more distinctive, it has more contrast. The welting is starting to really bother my wrist. Holding the two needles together to knit a stitch from each, without any other stitches falling off is - well frankly, a pain. The end result is worth it though.

I am almost ready to start my Glenesk Sweater swatch; Chart B 6x6". I did all of the preparation for starting the sweater. I reproduced the charts in excel so I could color code them and made up a color sample chart, with bits of each yarn. Once I started winding the yarn into balls I realized that there are some colors that are very close so I will need to be extra careful when starting a new ball. There has been a lot of talk on Ravelry about the non-tagged hanks of yarn. I used my electric ball winder and wound up a ball of each color. I weighed each ball on a digital scale. I am keeping track of how many grams I have of each colorway. Several people ran out of yarn from their kits. I tackled this problem in a couple of different ways. I created the chart to track colors by weight. I ordered more kits with similar colors in them. There will be some overlapping, hopefully it will all even out and I won't run short on any of my projects.

Starmore acquisitions:
I bit the bullet and bought a copy of Tudor Roses and Scandinavian Knitwear by Alice Starmore.
I bought the yarn kit from Virtual Yarns to make the Lismore sweater in the Celtic Collection.
I ordered the Leo Scarf kit, and Jade Starmore's book A Collector's Item.
I ordered the Seaweed Wrap in Crotal mostly to be entered into the contest on the web site.

I ordered the Henry VIII kit in small and x-large because there is very little ease in the finished sweater and it is a pullover. For some reason their designs taper down to a narrow waist. My mid section goes out not in - so I know I will need to adjust the pattern. This is the kit I was most worried about not have enough yarn for so I just ordered two. The pattern is in Tudor Roses and errata and an update is included with the kit. This pattern exemplifies why I am endeavoring to be a skilled Fair Isle Knitter. It looks like fine Tapestry. It does not look like something a mere mortal can knit. I must have one and so far I have not found any volunteers to knit it for me. :D

What prompted this flurry of buying, RUMORS!!! There is a buzz going around that many Starmore kits and colorways are going to be discontinued very soon on the Virtual Yarns site. Also, the exchange rate is pretty good right now.

I ordered two books by Toshiyuki Shimada from the YesAsia.com site; Knit Concerto and New Style of Heirloom Knitting. His patterns are amazing, although they are only available in Japanese. There are many screen shots of the photos inside the books and the charts on various websites, I feel confident I can get through the patterns. I have a Cousin who has spoken fluent Japanese since Junior High - I can enlist her aid if needed. There are photos of finished items on Ravelry that made my mouth water. Marsha White, The Needle Arts Book Shop has a superb article available online titled For the Adventurous Knitter Interpreting Japanese Knitting Patterns. It is excellent. I have learned a little German during Knit Alongs, maybe now I can pick up some Gaelic and Japanese.

What else did I buy? A car for my Mom a Honda Accord EX 2006 and a Dell Slim Tower Desktop Computer for my Sister. Why - because I love them and they needed them. I paid the balance on our June Birthday Cruise. If you know of any cozy used bookstores or yarn shops in any of these ports please send me an e-mail. Ooo, and I also love crab and lobster, so any restaurants for lunch would be great too.

Baltimore, Maryland (06/19 & 06/27)
Rockland, Maine (06/21)
Saint John, New Brunswick (06/22)
Halifax, Nova Scotia (06/23)
Bar Harbor, Maine (06/24)
Boston, Massachusetts (06/25)

It is too late and dark to take pictures. . . . coming soon.

Troop 1390

On My Honor I will try to do my duty to God and my country to help other people at all times and obey the Girl Scout laws. It's amazing what I store in memory. Every Thursday at 2 pm at St. Peter's on 19th Avenue my Troop #1390 met. I won a trip to camp for selling the most cookies when I was 10 years old. And I have 26 girl scout badges on my sash.

How many boxes of Girl Scout Cookies did you buy this year? I bought two, Shortbreads and Samoa's. I stayed away from the Thin Mints because I just inhale those. Unfortunately, it's true what everyone says, they are not good anymore.

They don't taste anything like the cookies I sold, you get two rows less for $2.00 more. Sad turn of events. The skills and sense of community I got from Girl Scouts is priceless though. My Troop leaders were CREATIVE. Mrs. Brotten took us to a Hockey game. Mrs. Salens taught us acrylic, watercolor and oil painting. Mrs. Baer (Mother of the President of the SF Giants, Larry Baer) took us to the Circus at the Cow Palace. We also had camping trips to learn to swim, start fires, ride horses and make smores. Our troop was active and well run. I hope the Brownie I bought my cookies from gets half as much out of her experience as I did. I can be counted on to be prepared, I always have a safety pin, bandaid, vaseline, alcohol, aspirin, water, kleenex, small flashlight, swiss army knife, emery board, bobby pins and rubberbands. I have replaced personal time with charitable donations though. My Parents taught me to be honest, trustworthy and dependable, which also helped me be a good Girl Scout.

I think I'll buy a box of Thin Mints, just to check the current quality.

Finished Bag Back

I completed the back of the Sipalu Bag last night. This bag has an old world tapestry charm. That is one of the the things that has always attracted me to Fair Isle Knitting, it looks like something from another century if done well. I recently purchased a couple of colorwork/stranded knitting books and was disappointed that there were no fair isle patterns. Real fair isle blends your colors and there is a background and forground pattern. The patterns in the books I bought are almost mosaic. There are two colors per row, but no blending rows. I am going to cast on a Sipalu Bag in the Warm Palette after I pick up the 320 stitches around the top of the bag tonight. Luckily I received my replacement 47 inch 3mm/US 2.5 needles from Knit Picks yesterday. Those folks are so wonderful. I don't know if I mentioned that one of my new needles had a broken tip. One e-mail and a new one was rushed out to me - and I don't think it has anything to do with the fact that I spend 10% of my paycheck with them every month ;D They are nice to everybody!

I cannot wait to work with the warm palette colors and see how they blend. Kerin wrote a magnificent pattern for the yarn samplers. I am going to knit the primary pattern this time. Eventually I will knit all four bags. The Aguona laptop bag is very bright. I don't think I was expecting the white to be so dominant. It felt more blue in the photos. It is a little strange switching between the two projects. Knitting with Telemark on size US 4 after working with Palette on size US 2.5 takes some adjusting.

The Kenobi Jacket is still on the needles, I have not frogged it yet.

I watched The Sorcerer's Stone while finishing the back of the bag last night. I kind of miss Harry, Hermione and the Weasleys. If any of you know of another series of books like HP that I might enjoy please leave a comment.

Aguona Laptop Bag

I cast on and knit the first 16 rounds of the Aguona Laptop Bag. I still cannot visualize where the steeking will come in. I have not purchased the zipper yet, but since there are over 70 rounds left to knit, I will worry about that later. This is another stranded colorwork practice project. I am aiming at April 1st as the cast on date for my Starmore Glenesk Sweater. I think my floats are pretty even now and I am definitely in the groove reading the charts.

Cool Sipalu Inside and Out

INSIDE

OUTSIDE

INSIDE

OUTSIDE

Loving It

I finished the front panel of the Sipalu Bag in the Cool (Alternate) Color Palette. OMG I absolutely love it. I will upload pictures when I get home. I just had to pick up the 240 provisionally cast on stitches last night and knit a row. I will complete the welt tonight and get started on the back panel. The coolest thing is that each row is shorter than the last so just as you start seeing the pattern develop the knitting goes faster and faster. Before you know it you are finished. There are very few ends to weave in because you only join new colors in one place, about every 6th row - there are only 40 rows in the panel. It has only taken me a few days to knit this bag - just think if I had not had to rip out 10 rows and pick up that 240 stitches again . . . . . moving on. I cannot wait to cast on another bag. I am not sure if I want to stick with the Cool Palette and knit the primary charts or if I want to switch to the Warm Palette. The biggest question is what the heck am I going to do with all this yarn? This bag uses very little yarn, I have not made a dent in it. Maybe I will cast on the laptop bag too. My poor WIP projects, they are being neglected again. I have scheduled another 4 day weekend in March, I will have to focus on my socks and scarves that weekend. I am also flirting with the idea of frogging the Kenobi Jacket. Hmm, we'll see.

Jade Starmore Glenesk Sweater kit. I have a new Ravelry friend who is also planning on knitting this sweater. She has some WIPS to finish and she wants to do a couple of practice projects too before casting on the sweater. We should be starting at just about the same time. I don't know about her, but I spent a small fortune on the kit and I wanted to make sure my stranding was near-to-perfect before delving into my Hebridean yarns.

There should be a Wollmeise Sock Club shipment on the horizon. I wonder what the colors will be. I am designing something in the gorgeous blue yarns I bought from the other German based dyer, Kristen. I cannot wait to see what her yarn looks like knit up.

I'd rather be knitting

Horrific

Horrific - that's a good word for it, I had a horrific knitting weekend.

Practice #4
I got lots of practice casting on using the invisible/provisional cast on. Luckily I had viewed Lucy Neatby's DVD and used her crochet onto the knitting needle provisional cast on. It is much better than the first method I tried. I had to rip out a whole portion of the bag so I got to cast on 80 stitches with this new method TWICE.

Pitfall #5
My join got twisted not once but TWICE. The 80 stitches which are cast on to make the fourth side of the bag are very flimsy and twisted around the needle. Instead of watching Deadwood I should have been watching my knitting. I had to rip out 10 rows (x 320 stitches per row - you do the math) and do that dang provisional cast on again.

Pitfall #6
I bought a new circular needle with a longer cable and it was broken. I will have to return it to Knit Picks. That turned out not to be a problem because each row of the front panel decreases by 8 stitches each round and I actually needed a SHORTER cable not a longer cable. I could not visualize how the stitches were decreasing until I got past the 10 rows - AGAIN. With no twist in the round the bag panel lays flat and it is easy to see how the sides will meet.

The bag is smaller than I expected. I may try to recreate this pattern with a worsted weight yarn and larger needles so I have a larger bag. I hope the laptop bag is bigger. Even with all of the pitfalls this is a very easy fast pattern to knit. I look forward to making the other three bags, they will make perfect gifts.

I know I finished the hat in my WIPs list more than a week ago, but I like the little red hat icon so I am going to leave it on the sidebar for awhile.

My Sister offered to transport me to Stitches West. Isn't that sweet? She does no crafting whatsoever but when she read there was going to be more needles and yarn in one place than there has ever been before she thought I might want to be there. I don't think she was thinking about more socks, hats or scarves - no of course not. But I don't want to go. I have a cruise and family reunion coming up back-to-back and I just bought a car. SO, I will knit from stash. Besides I happen to think I already have more needles and yarn than has ever been seen in one place ;-D

Progress and Practice

I made some progress on my Black Dimple Scarf. I completed 10 4-row repeats while watching the first 2 DVDs from Bones Season 3.
Knit Picks Dimple Shale Scarf in Karabella Aurora 8

I knit a Funky Eclectic Fake Fair Isle Hat in a couple of days. I like the effect and it was another opportunity to practice stranded knitting - this time in the round. My floats and tension are much better with flat stranded knitting. I will need to cast on the laptop bag which is knitted in the round and steeked. I still cannot figure out where or why the laptop bag is steeked though. More on that later.


Noro Kureyon colorway 143A and Knit Picks 100% Merino in Coal. No knots in the Noro, but some twigs.


Hope y'all had a good Valentine's and President's Day. You would think someone with the last name LOVE would be more into V-Day, but since I worked for American Greetings Card Co, the commercialization of many holidays has really dulled my senses.

Kreative Blogger Award

Thank you CiCi for nominating me for a Kreativ Blogger Award. I was surprised and happy to receive it too. I still feel like a blog rookie sometimes so I appreciate your vote and interest.

Here are the rules for the nominees:
1. Copy the award to your site.
2. Link to the person from whom you received the award.
3. Nominate 8 other bloggers.
4. Link to those on your blog.
5. Leave a message on the blogs you nominated.

Okay .... and the winners are..... drum roll please...........You inspire me to continue knitting and blogging.


Adrienne
Venka
Izzy
Carrie
Phyllis
Shawnee
Penny
Erica

I Slipped

I cast on another new hat. Well, it was an accident actually. I logged into Ravelry to update my projects list because I finished my Black Ribbed Scarf. And while I was in there I decided to take a look-see at the hat patterns, hoping to find a good match for my scarf. One thing led to another, or should I say one pattern led to another and I came across the Funky Eclectic Fake Fair Isle hat made from Noro Kureyon and any solid worsted yarn. I have a metric B*tt load of Noro because after completing two shrugs in knotty nasty twiggy Kureyon, I swore off the stuff. Unfortunately I had purchased a sweaters worth for a project. The hat requires a single skein, SO, I cast on and knit the first 16 rounds of the pattern while watching Lost. Casting on yet another project is bad enough, but it's not the worst - I went back into Ravelry this morning to move the hat from my queue to my projects and a couple of queue spaces above it are not one - but three ribbed hats. Right. Now I remember what I went into Ravelry for in the first place - yes, 16 rounds later. I tell you I have the attention span of a . . . well, of a crafter.

Another Long Weekend

My first stay-cation this year allowed me to get a lot of knitting and crocheting done. I watched three of my TV series on DVD while working on my projects: The 2008 Idatarod Discovery Channel series, 24 Seasons 4-6, and Bones Seasons 1-2. I still have Season 3 to watch.

My Sipalu bag has required some new skills. At the top is the welting which is like making I-cord in the middle of a piece of knitting. The alternate color palette I am working on does not have enough contrast to make the side panel pattern stand out. But the rest of the bag should be more distinct in the pattern areas. I am looking forward to seeing what develops.



The Candle Flame Scarf is looking great in this Wollmeise. I cannot wait to finish this scarf. My yarn ball is shrinking so I will be done soon.




I did a couple of pattern repeats on the Leafling Socks. I am not sure if they are going to get finished any time soon. I can't work up any enthusiam about them.


I am almost finished with the ribbed scarf. I ended up giving the hat to my Mom, but I will make myself one in wool.



I thought I would give Amigurumi a try. I did not enjoy it. Too much sewing and finishing. Not enough bang for the buck - it takes too long to make one. I will stick to wearables and warmth providers when it comes to crochet.

Sipalu Swatch Practice #3

Practice #3
I have developed a way to easily wrap the non-working color when it is not used for 4-5 stitches. I bring the yarn to the front, as if to purl, knit the stitch in the color being worked, then move the non-working yarn back to the back of the work. This catches and wraps the non-working yarn at the back of the stitch just worked. The chart I am currently working on had a span of 9 stitches in one color, so there would have been a large loop of yarn at the back if the non-working yarn was not wrapped in some way. In previous color stranded projects I would stop the work twist the yarns then continue knitting. This method allows me to continue knitting without stopping the work and re-situating the yarns.

Pitfall #4
I need a longer cable, the pattern called for 16-32 inch circulars. I am using 24 inch and the work is too bunched up. I don't have a US 2/3.00 mm circular though - gee guess I have to go shopping on Knit Picks again 8-] (at least I have satisfied my restriction about not buying any new needles or hooks until I freed at least two from pending projects.)

What, It's February?

February ALREADY??? I would like a rebate on January. I hardly felt it come and go. Speaking of hardly feeling it, I knit two short row hats in just a couple days. They knit up so fast they did not even make it to my WIP list. I started a 4x4 ribbed scarf to go with my hat.


I watched my Fair Isle Without Fear video by Alice Starmore a couple of times. Then I cast on the Knit Picks Sampler pattern, the Sipalu Bag Kit 40060. The bag is a supersized swatch. I am not concerned with a great bag, I am making it for practice and pitfalls.

PITFALL #1 My provisional casting on with yarn is pitiful. I will go back to using an options cable for provisional cast ons.
PITFALL #2 The Palette yarn is splitty and I have to be careful with the yarn I hold in my right hand.
PITFALL #3 Once the yarn ball band is removed it's easy to mix up the colors. I taped a piece of each yarn to it's yarn ball band for reference, and stuck them in the bag with the original copies of the pattern charts.

PRACTICE #1 I discovered I like the purl rows better than the knit side rows.
PRACTICE # 2 I figured out I would need a little snippet of each yarn color to go along with the color charts. Some of the colors are very close and just eyeballing the chart and balls is not going to work.

I started to just make a color stranded swatch with some of my leftover Palette yarns. But this is better. There is enough yarn in each kit to make a couple of bags so I can get in some good practice on this first one, then make the second third and fourth ones with much more skill. I bought two sampler kits, the blues and the autumn color palettes. I love the colors, and the bags that turn out nicely will be great gifts. Once I feel really comfortable with my tension and technique I will cast on the Glenesk sweater.

In reading the instructions it emphasizes blocking the bag over some books and lining the bags so the stranded yarns don't get snagged. I am going to go a step further, I am going to insert plastic canvas frames in each bag. I used to do a lot of plastic canvas needlework and I have many sheets left. I have made several plastic canvas tote bags and they are sturdy and last forever. A plastic canvas frame inside each bag will not only serve as a great blocking tool, but it will also make the bags sturdy and protect the stranded yarns.