Monday Night: Hot, Muggy, and Moving On

Ok, so the sparkly wrap belt thing was a complete disaster. I'm just going to pretend I never even knit that thing. I've given it to my little sister for her dress up clothes and whatever, although, it barely even fits her. Speaking of my little sister though, we were sitting and watching Harry Potter in my room and I was knitting, and she pulled out my stitch n bitch book, asked if she could borrow some knitting needles and yarn and taught herself how to knit. She asked me for help a couple of times, but pretty much she did it on her own. It was a proud big sister moment let me tell you. I'll post pictures of her scarf later, along with my new project which is a travel pillow. I figure it will come in handy when we go to Seattle for my cousin's wedding.. that will be a loooooong flight.

So I just made an important realization with this shiny wrap thing I'm making. The yarn I'm using and the yarn is calls for in the pattern, while they look an awful lot alike.. have totally different gauges.

Lion Brand Trellis is 15 sts/4 in with size 15 needles...

Mosaic FX is 5 sts/1 in using size 8 needles...

I'm using size 13 needles... which might explain why this looks like a giant honking mess..

Oops and oh well... i'm 2/3 of the way done now... I'm not ripping back at this point. It will be what it will be. This still counts as me using up my stash yarn.

Tuesday Night: Slowly working through the stash...

What a productive day! In addition to going to class and learning about deaf-blindness... Rachel and I found a new knitting store in Lakewood... it was like I died and went to knitting heaven. There was So. Much. Yarn.

The most important thing is that they had the right color of plymoth encore for Rachel to finish her project. While I ogled all the beautiful yarn in the shop.. I resolved myself to using up more of my stash so I could buy new yarn for a new project guilt free.

I have this Mosaic FX yarn that I liked because it was shiny. (I'm an Irish dancer.. we like shiny things...) I bought it when another yarn store around here went out of business.. and I had no idea what to do with it.. After flipping through my Spring 2006 issue of Knit.1 magazine for the 18 billionth time.. I ran across this

So I'm giving it a go... we'll see how this works out exactly.. as it calls for size 17 needles.. and I don't have them. And I'm feeling cheap.. so I don't want to buy them, so I'll work with what I've got. I have 19, and I have 13.. I tried knitting it on the 19.. and it just looked like a mess... so this is what it looks like on the 13's.

So... cross your fingers.. knock on wood.. and hopefully this will fit me. If it doesn't I guess I have one of two options...

1.) Lose more weight

2.) Give it to my sister

We'll see what happens when it's finished.

Sunday Evening: Camera Happy

Sooooo.. I've been saying for awhile that I need to do something about the junk yarn problem that I have... I have a lot of junky acrylic yarn, and a have a lot of little bits of nice yarn. So I needed a project that would:

a. Be entertaining

b. Use up my little scraps of yarn

The end result? Catwarming Set from Stitch n Bitch Nation. My Friend Katie from sign class has a cat, so I had someone to gift them to (since I have no pets of my own right now... *tear*) I think they turned out rather cute, particularly the blue one which is my favorite. The funniest part of the whole thing? My mom likes them too.. she wants a set to hang over her rearview mirror.. so she can have fuzzy mice.. instead of fuzzy dice.

Ahhhhh my mom... living proof that there are people out there crazier than I ;) But I am amused by her suggestion... so I will oblige. I have some grey fuzzy-ish yarn... so maybe grey and blue mice? What do we all think?

Friday Afternoon: Melting

This either says something about my sanity (or lack there of) or my sincere and devoted love of knitting. Folks, it is 90 degrees outside, we don't have air conditioning, and I've just gathered all my knitting projects to take pictures of them. Nothing like pulling out that long cardigan sweater when all you really want to do is jump into the next nearest tub of ice. :)


But I digress... Here is (for the most part) the collection of knitted works I've done over the last 3 years.


My first forray into the realm of knitting was this scarf with pockets. A lovely diversion while I spent my first year in hades- i mean - The University of Findlay.


It's not perfect, but I like it. It's warm. And it has pockets, which is great because I am always forgetting gloves.


After a few various scarves for other people, I was brave enough to try somthing that involved increasing and decreasing stitches.






The pattern was Unbiased from Knitty. I was feeling somewhat confident at this point. (Some might even say overconfident) When I was struck with a brilliant idea. "Hey, why don't I substitute the sari yarn for 100% wool, and felt the purse!" And I did this with absolutely no concept of gague and what happens to wool when you felt it. The result is that, in the middle, the purse is only 5 inches long.. aaaand i can't really use it as is or things will fall out of it. I keep swearing up and down that I'm gonna sew a zipper in there so I might actually be able to use it. Hmmm.. maybe I'll do that this weekend

I heart Harry Potter Scarves
I've made three of these. One for my cousin, and another for her friend, and this one here is my sister's... which I may have stolen a couple times this last winter.


What!? She wasn't going to wear it, her new Northface coat was pink.. and she was in a match-ey phase.



That being said I may make myself one before this next winter.





Bag one having been a bust... I decided to try again, but this time no pattern. By this time I had my own copy of Stitch n' Bitch and had careully read the section on gague. Thus I designed this rectangle with a seed stitch border.




This purse actually gets used quite a bit, particularly when I'm at school cause I can wear it and my backpack and keep my hands free. Also a fun purse for St. Patricks Day.


I have lovingly dubbed this The Sweater of Death. From Knit.1 magazine.. god only knows which issue.. All I know is I had to ask Rachel about 18 billion times for a new photocopy of the pattern cause I kept losing it.


It took me 2 1/2 years to finish the dang thing.... and I've learned two important things:
1.) always swatch
2.) I hate homespun


I need to do some adjusting and tailoring cause it's kind of ... huge... but believe me, when it's all finished I will wear that thing forever next winter.




Armwarmers for my sister :)



This is Fetching from knitty.com.



Very easy knitting therapy. I love cables.

Armwarmers for my Mom.

The basic pattern is the Hurry Up Spring Armwarmers from SnB Nation. But I substituted the tree branch thing for another cable pattern I found in Cables Untangled by Melissa Leapman









I think that's pretty much it! I don't know what I want to do next.. I kind of want to make a new sweater... maybe the Fairly Easy Fair Isle from SnB Nation. I've never done colorwork, and it intrigues me. But also, Rachel and I have both been dying to try socks... and we were thinking of having a sock knit-along. Or maybe I'll do both :) Alright.. I'm off to go pick up my sister from her friend's house.



~Michelle



p.s. Yessss! It's grey and overcast, and I do believe I detect a distant roll of thunder... Come on rain!!!

Thursday Evening: Time for Something New....

After Rachel's marvelous suggestion, I'm starting a knitting blog. Yay knitting! I shall collect pictures of the projects I've done so far (that I still have around here..) and post them here. :)

I'm itching to start a new project though anything that would involve a substantial investment in yarn may have to wait till the last tuition payment is made for the summer. What I ought to do is whittle down my stash a bit. However... most of the yarn in my stash is either: 1.) not good 2.) not inspiring me 3.) is not good and not inspiring me.

ah well.. c'est la vie

Time to go tune in to the game (Go Cavs!)

I'll post more later. :)