finished object report: fox scarf

Behold, Gabriel's 2012* winter scarf:

The pattern is here (with a semi-wonky English translation at the bottom) and here's my project page on Ravelry. I made some modifications based on projects other people had done. Knitted with yarn from my stash. 

Grown-ups love it. Gabriel is less enthused. Let's just say there's a reason I made him a scarf that effectively cannot be pulled off by tiny toddler hands.

Welcome to our den, little fox!

*selected, knitted, and finished in January 2013

progress report: grey cabled cardigan

I just downloaded the blogger app for my iPhone and I thought this would be a good opportunity to test it out.

Here's a picture of the little gray cardigan that I'm in the process of knitting for Gabriel. It's knitted from the top down with raglan sleeves. Once I finish knitting the body, I'll add long sleeves. I'll probably do about three more inches on the body before adding a little hem.

I carry this little project with me in my purse to pull out when I have a few minutes here and there. I also worked on it during Adult Education at church the other day and I only got a couple of hairy eyeballs. I'd really like to have it done by Thanksgiving, which would be easy for a normal knitter but for a single mom of a baby may be a little ambitious. We'll see!

Gabriel's Sunnyside Cardigan

See my ravelry page for the project here.

Etsy shop is back up!

Guess what!

Well, if you read the title of this post at any point in time, you already know. But ANYWAY.

I've restocked my Etsy shop. Go have a look! And tell me what you think.

No, seriously.

There's got to be something better than 'handmade cozies for heart and home.' That needs a little help. But it's a start.

Custom orders! I love them! You want some socks, right?

Anyway. Etsy shop. Go. Now. Please.

Company Girl Coffee 2.19.10

 

It's Friday! Time for another Company Girl Coffee. I've got a nice mug of green/white/peach tea (it's REALLY GOOD, I promise) and there's snow on the ground and the dogs are going crazy. A proper Denver morning in February, if you ask me.

Eli says a proper morning begins at 10am, no more of this 5am business.

This has been kind of an interesting week, what with Lent beginning and all. Brian has been ordained for all of 3.5 months and on Tuesday he went and got himself his first collared clergy shirt to wear to the Ash Wednesday service. YOW. I'm still getting used to this Pastor's Wife (PW) thing, but seeing him in the same shirt the 4 (four!) pastors at my home church wore every single day was a little...odd.

I've thought more about Lent this year than I have in years past. Growing up, I went to a Lutheran church that wasn't exactly oppressive, but very steeped in doctrine and kind of strong-willed in a socially conservative way. In other words, there was a definite right and wrong way to live. And one of the right things to do was give up something - something significant - for Lent. You weren't bad if you opted out, but you were very very good if you opted in. The problem was, I don't remember receiving much info on why we were making a sacrifice. I got that Jesus fasted for 40 days (and the guy who actually fasted for Lent became a small-time celebrity of sorts) so we should give up something too, but I didn't learn much beyond that. Lent in my childhood was essentially a competition to see who could 'give up' the best.

It should be no surprise, then, to learn that when I went to college (and started going to a very different kind of church) I never really 'did' Lent. Now, at age 26, I am finally a part of a doctrine-oriented church again, and I have come back to the practice of Lent. I hope to learn more about this part of our spiritual journey - really experience it the way we are intended. If you know of any great reads on Lent, or fasting in general, I would love to hear them in the comments!

We have had an extraordinarily busy week for us, with meetings and activities every night Sunday-Thursday...and then watching the Olympics after that keeps us up even later. (We don't have a DVR.) I am tired; Brian is exhausted.

Tonight, we sleep.

Rory says sleep is for the weak and that she would much rather be chewing on this blanket here. Because that's what is supposed to be going on at 6am on a Friday.

A couple knitting updates:

I realized sometime in the past week that the fun stripey socks I'd begun required more yarn than I had for the project. So...I've finished one of those and I have found some more of the yarn second-hand (it's discontinued). I'm hoping to get that yarn before the end of Feb, so I can finish up this second sock and have some fun new foot-sweaters.

In the meantime, I decided to start a shawl I've had my eye on for many months. It's more or less a triangle shape, knitted in three 'stages' of sorts. I've finished the first stage and I'm in the transition part to the second stage. This is my first real actual lace project with real actual lace-sized yarn. I'm pretty stoked about it. I might be able to finish by the end of the month, but it might take me a little longer than that. We'll see.

Beginning stages of lace. It's much bigger now.

So tell me, what are you up to this weekend?

true confessions

It's Friday morning! Time for another Company Girl Coffee. Welcome!

So...I'm exhausted. How about you? This week has been really draggy for me - one of those weeks when I feel like I'm moving underwater or something. My capacity this morning for intelligent, cohesive thought is somewhat limited. What follows is, essentially, a bullet-point list of what runs through my mind as I reflect on the past several days. Like stream of consciousness, but easier to read because it's punctuated.


Our Christmas tree, which has been bare for several days now, finally left our house last night. There is a trail of dried up pine needles showing the way to the car. You can sweep sidewalks, but you can't sweep gravel...

The puppy has decided that maybe she doesn't need to be housetrained after all.

Brian is almost off for his first of 3 weekends away, and I am dreading all that time alone with the dogs going to miss him.

I did all of the Small Things this week. Actually, I've done all of them this month. I'm pretty proud of that. This week's big task was setting up a housekeeping schedule. And I'm happy with mine. With the Small Things every day, the schedule to give me some overall structure, and the Flylady missions, I think I'm pretty well set up in the 'get stuff done around the house' category.

I am currently reading People of the Book. I have been reading it for more than a week, and I'm only about 120 pages in. I love it, but for some reason it is very slow reading for me.

I also finished a pair of socks and started a second. These are for a barter exchange with my college roommate - she bought tickets to a football game for us, and I am in return knitting her two pairs of socks. (I won't mention here that the game was in September and I am just now finishing the first pair. What can I say - I guess I was a little busy in the past few months.) I really liked the first pair I made, but it was a pretty challenging pattern. This second pattern is not as challenging, but the socks are man-socks so they'll be much bigger than I'm used to. The yarn colorway is called Ripe Banana and I love it - it is various shades of yellow with the occasional brown speck.

This weekend: I am looking forward to some down time - lots of knitting and lots of reading. I am also looking forward to some solid hours of making progress in the unpacking and getting settled departments. I don't know about you, but I've got a 2-foot stack of things to be filed/sorted/listed on eBay.

We'll see who wins - the grasshopper or the ant.


I might also let the dogs sleep on the bed with me.


How was your week? Do you have any plans for the weekend, fun or otherwise?

emergency knitting

Knitterly fans of Gilmore Girls might remember the episode of the knit-a-thon to save the bridge in Stars Hollow.  Lorelei wore a (totally rad) Knit Or Die shirt.  I recently had a Knit Or Die moment, myself.

It'd been weeks - WEEKS - since I'd been able to do any real crafting, any knitting or sewing whatsoever.  And after spending a week-plus with nothing but boxes and an ornery papillon to keep me company, I had a moment of desperation.  I needed to knit, and I needed to knit right then.

So did I turn to the pillows I've been working on since June, for a friend?  Even though they are entirely done and only need a pillow form and some seaming?  No.  Did I turn to the two pairs of socks for a different friend, a bartering agreement in which she bought me two football tickets in exchange for two pairs of socks?  No.

I needed something easy, and I needed something mindless.  It was time for a dish rag.  Here's an early progress shot:

This is my first time using a grand old dishrag pattern.  It's called Grandmother's Favorite (Ravelry Link) and I'm pretty sure it's been a dishrag standard for eons.  The yarn is a Japanese yarn that our cousins, currently stationed in Okinawa, sent me many moons ago - as best I can tell from the label, it's acrylic and has antibacterial properties.  I call the colorway 'fabulously orange.' I came across it today while unpacking, and I decided that it was time.

I consider knitting a part of my homemaking.  If I'm not knitting something for sale, I am knitting something to be used or to be given as a gift.  I used to feel guilty when ignoring the giant to-do list in lieu of some knitting, but not anymore.  I like to think of it as growth.

What do you do when you need a break from the world for a little while?






. 

a recap and a capelet

Last time I updated on my knitting, I was finishing up a bag, plugging away on a bath mat, and looking forward to some socks.

The bag has been knitted, blocked, and adorned with buttons.  I haven't done the lining yet, because NEXT week is my sewing week.  Or something like that. 

Bath mat is done, but smallish because I decided I hated it and didn't want to see it every day, so it is now lining the dog crate.  This might actually be something I try to develop as an addition to my Etsy shop, and/or maybe do in support of the Papillon rescue I work with.  It really does make for a squishy comfy mat that would be great for crates because it's also 100% cotton and can be washed in the machine.  

I managed to finish both pairs of socks without losing my mind.  That ended up being 3 pairs of socks in about 4 weeks, which made me feel a little bit like I was going crazy for all the sockliness, but after NOT working on socks for about ...oh....3 days, I've already started plotting my next pair.  They really are super handy!

Because it had been SO LONG since I had anything that I was really eager to/getting paid to knit, I had this weird moment of knitters block.  I had tons of projects in the queue, but I couldn't get inspired to cast on any of them.  That, lemme tell ya, was weird.  After a day or two of hemming and hawing, I settled on the New Vintage Capelet, published in Spun Magazine and now available online here.  Mine is going to be AWESOME.  I'm knitting it from Lion-Brand Cotton Ease, which is a decidedly mediocre cotton-acrylic mix and can be found at most of the big-box craft shops like Michaels and AC Moore.  The colorway is Lake, which is a nice cloudy greyish blue.  I'm also planning to skip the giant collar.  I picked up this yarn sometime last year when it was on sale, and I paid with a gift card.  Sweet.  

Seeing as my stash is not all that big, this is going to be a great stash-buster and I'm looking forward to wearing it...hopefully before it turns April!

Seeing as I started it 2 days ago, I'm not very far along.  And seeing as it's cold and rainy out, the photo is less-than-good.  But you probably could have guessed that.

a knitting bag, a bath mat, and some would-be socks

HOKAY.  SO.  I've been doing some knitting lately.  And it's been awesome.  Kinda.

I finished knitting up the knitting bag.  (knitting knitting knitting can I say knitting one more time).  All that's left is figuring out how to line it with the material from my former 'knitting bag' aka repurposed cotton bag previously containing jersey sheets.

The yarn is called Little Lola, by Schafer Yarn Co.   This colorway is a really pretty greyish blue, with some slight and subtle variegation - more blue than the photo shows, and it's all much darker too.  (The lighting in my house is awful, and it's not much better outside, what with all of winter showing up here at the beginning of March and all. )  This is the GOOD kind of variegation.

This second photo shows it more accurately, although it's not as glossy as the flash makes it seem.

The pattern is Square Cake, from Knitty.  I may also sew some buttons in the diamond pattern like one of the pattern examples.  Who knows!!  

I'm almost done with the new bath mat.  It's called Absorba and it's from the first Mason-Dixon knitting book (a fantastic book of patterns, by the way).  The yarn is 100% cotton made by PIsgah Yarns, a good ol' North Carolina company.  It's pretty commonly available - I got mine at the Wal-Mart.  This is an example of the BAD kind of variegation.  I have learned that I like much more subtle shifts in color.  

Y'all haven't seen my bathroom, maybe I'll post photos once it's in its place.

Up next: SOCKS! for some really sweet girls

Caps for Sale!

So after I finished the everlasting blanket of fuzzy glory, I set about smaller projects.  

I worked up a couple of hats for an order.  

I made a pair of socks for myself.

Now I've started a 'knitting bag' - meant for carrying around smaller projects.  I'll post progress updates as they are warranted.  I expect a couple more orders soon, though, so I don't expect to be monogamous to this project in the interest of making money.

As always, please get in touch if you'd like to commission a piece.

Blanket's done! What's next?

Ladies and gentlemen, I am proud to present to you my new pride and joy, that afghan!!

It's done.  I love it.  Soft, squishy, warm without being too heavy.  There's nothing more to say.

(If you've read the last entry, you know I was debating whether to charge on through and finish it, which I expected to take forever, or to keep dawdling on it and do smaller projects in the meantime.  After much consideration, I decided to just go for it and finish.  And THEN I did some measurements, and realized I was   a l m o s t d o n e   with it, so of course the choice was obvious.)

Here are the specifics:  Knit Picks Mix&Mingle kit in the Emerald Isles colorway; pattern is Knit Picks Colorful Waves Throw.  Neither the kit nor the throw seem to be available anymore.

the everlasting knitted gobstopper of a blanket

(A disclaimer:  my apologies for the awful photos.  My head is exploding from sinus pressure and there isn't any good lighting to be found, anyway.)

I've already mentioned before that I am a monogamous knitter - meaning that I only like to have one project going at a time.

I don't like the multi-directional pull that I feel when I am working on more than one project - I feel as though I'm overcommitted and always behind...meaning, I would be done with this scarf already if I hadn't started that pair of socks, how much progress could I have made on this sweater if I didn't work on that hat for a while, blah blah.  

With that said, I have a confession: I have been working on one project, on and off, for 2 years. This project has been cast aside for many smaller projects. I have NOT been monogamous to this project.  It's been in and out of 'hibernation' - meaning, in one of those plastic square sacks that sheet sets come in - since October of 2006 or thereabouts.

It's a blanket, made from a bunch of different yarns. I love it! I like the design, I like the mix of textures and the colors, I like that it is intended to be my special blanket, made out of my own love for myself.  Back when I was nursing a broken heart, I needed something like this project to work on every day, to encourage myself and work love and healing into every stitch.  Original estimations indicated that I would finish it right around the time I expected my broken heart to be mended.

So much for that!

I have dealt with an inordinate amount of guilt over not finishing this afghan.  But it's just so big! And it's been two years, and judging from my yarn supply, I'm only barely more than halfway done! Working on this blanket, though enjoyable, feels like I'm going 35 in a 65 zone (right lane, of course) and everyone is zipping right on by.

I am in the process of deciding what my strategy for finishing this project should be. I can put the pedal to the metal and vow not to work on anything else until I've finished it, and work on it steadily for the next couple of months, or I can continue to take up smaller projects while I finish it, thereby dragging the process out even longer. Now that it's so big, it's not really portable, which is another factor, because when I'm not knitting on the go, I feel like I'm wasting time. 

And so, I deliberate.  And in the meantime, I knit.

Do you ever feel unfinished-project guilt?

I talk about knitting in this one.

This blog contains a lot about my daily life and how I like to wade through it. One of the things that I do the most, though, is rarely featured here - other than on my sidebars. It's my knitting.

Did you even know I'm a knitter? Well, I am. And I have been for a couple of years now.

I'm a little bit slow, and not as prolific as a lot of knitters, but I do love it. I miss knitting if a day goes by when I don't pick up the needles.

One of the things about me is that I am a 'monogamous knitter' - which means I only like to have one project going at a time. The vast majority of knitters, however, are polygamous. They've got a PILE of things in various stages of completion - we call these works in progress, or WIPs. But not me. I move through it slowly, so only like to have one thing clamoring for my attention at any given moment.

Unless it really is a HUGE thing, or a really really complicated thing, in which case I will sometimes take on smaller, more portable, more TV-watching appropriate projects. You can't really take a giant afghan on an air plane or to a doctor's office without getting all kinds of funny looks, after all.

There are all kinds of other ways to categorize knitters, too. There are different ways of holding the yarn when you're using it, for example. There are those who like the yarn to come from the outside of the ball and others like it to come from the inside. Some folks group up by the types of fibers they like (or refuse) to use. And then there are product knitters vs. process knitters - people who like to knit for the knitting, and people who like to knit for the stuff it gets them.

I do not know if I am a product knitter or a process knitter. I really love the process, it's true. But it's hard for me to knit something just for the sake of knitting it. I am NOT one of those knitters who has a stack of lovely knitted things that will make a perfect gift for somebody someday. I have to know the intended purpose of the item before I make it, or else I won't get motivated to make it.

I'm not as prolific as I'd like to be, because I don't have a lot of spare time, and what little spare time I do have gets carved up between responsibilities (like laundry) and other fun stuff (like reading and watching Clean House). I've cranked out a few pretty cool things so far, though. I'm wearing some fingerless gloves I made over Memorial Day weekend, for example. I take a mesh knitted bag to the market and grocery stores. I just finished a beautiful shawl that will be so nice to wear when spring comes back around. I keep my chapstick and other little doodads in a felted bowl on my dresser. And as soon as it gets to be scarf weather, I'll be wearing this super cool chevron scarf that I worked on this summer.

Knitting is probably the only thing in my life that is pure contentment and satisfaction. It fulfills me more than anything else. I wish I could knit full-time, and maybe someday I'll be able to. It might actually be a passion of mine - but I don't think I've ever really had a passion so I have trouble identifying something as one.

I don't know why I've neglected to display this side of my real life on the blog. My goal is to change this, starting this week.  So get ready for some fiber, the old-fashioned way!

confession

As a knitter, and as a blogger, I am bound by some invisible universal law to be enthralled with three of the most popular knitting blogs out there.  And yet, I couldn't be less interested.

I'm bad.  Very bad.  Perhaps a disgrace.

I find Wendy boring.  The Yarn Harlot is sometimes entertaining when she's not on book tour.  And even "Saint Brenda" loses my attention from time to time.

I guess my real issue is that I care more about knowing the people who are knitting the socks and the shawls and the impossibly complicated colorwork sweater, than I care about the actual items themselves.  I like having a window into someone else's life - someone that I might be friends with in real life, or maybe just know about.

That's why I love to read Crazy Aunt Purl and XRK.

Am I unusual?  Or do you too find yourself drawn to the kid in the corner and find the popular folks uninteresting, your area of interest being what it may?

major yarn itch

Lately I've had a major urge to buy yarn. No particular reason, other than finding several new and old projects that I really want to get underway. Everything is so tempting!

I have a small stash of natural fibers and a medium stash of acrylics, most of which are years old. I've offered to do a bunch of knitting for the rescue - some dog blankets to send to new adoptions and some sweaters etc. to try to sell online and at various functions. I decided to do some initial stash-busting and I took out a few balls of some really chunky yarn. I made Eli a small blanket from this yarn once, and he seemed to like it, so I figured it'd be a good way to knock out 3 big balls and move on to greener, less squeaky pastures.

My initial plan of action is to alternate projects - one for the dogs, one for humans. I altered this plan a little bit because right now I'm in the middle of 'two for the dogs' because it'd just be easier to bust out these two blankets from these three balls. So now that I'm about halfway done with the second blanket, I'm thinking ahead as to what comes next. I've got it down to two choices.

One is a 'market bag' - I recently acquired via a yarn swap a skein of 'second time cotton' - a recycled yarn generated from cast-offs in 'the fashion industry,' whatever that is. It's a great thing, I think - might as well take scraps and work them together into something useful. This is something knitters love, after all. It'd be a relatively quick knit - three or four hours worth. I could work on it on and off for a week and have it done, or bust it out over a weekend, no sweat.

The other is a black short-sleeve cardigan. I actually legitimately need one of these things. It'll take a while to make, though. I ordered the yarn for it online from a discount yarn site - 6 balls of yarn for about $18, including shipping. Not bad for a much-needed cardi. I couldn't buy it for less. It'll be a significant time investment, though - and I haven't made anything like it before so it might take me a while to work on it. I'm torn between working on a dog sweater first (learning about piecing and buttons and assembling sweater parts) - or heck, finishing this ugly sweater I began in February - and my general excitement for working on the project.

Decisions! Wants vs. needs! Planning vs. caprice!

knitting the moderne

Since taking the new job, my knitting moved to the back-burner. The sweater I spent most of winter on has been hibernating for a couple of months - it has a front, a back, and about half a sleeve done. I lost interest and it's been neglected long enough to start making me feel guilty. And because I am a self-proclaimed monogamous knitter, I didn't want to start a new project until I finished this one first. HELLO, perfectionism! You are my unfinished object list's best friend!

I had to break the monogamy rule, though. Good reason, though! I got hired! Paid to knit! What could possibly be better??

Actually, getting paid to eat really good chocolate would be better. BUT, I digress.

My super rockstar friend and former coworker Lisa commissioned a baby blanket. She wanted 'lots of blues' and machine washability. She may or may not have also wanted to show up everyone else with a hand-made specially designed item...but who am I to surmise her thoughts?

We hemmed and hawed over patterns, and with me being a perfectionist and all, I was afraid to make a decision even though she said numerous times to make a decision. I finally found a pattern I could really get behind...and voila!

I was particularly stoked about this pattern for a number of reasons - could incorporate lots of blues, was mostly garter stitch (read: mind-numbingly easy) so it would be good for multitasking, included three new techniques for me to learn.

The church ladies were so excited to see a young'un knitting, and I'd take it to church every week and work on it in Sunday School and the non-interactive parts of the service, and they'd ask about the progress and ask to see it, blah blah. I had to do lots of reassuring/clearing up misunderstandings, and proclaim loudly that it was NOT for me NO I AM NOT A MOMMY YET no babies here PLEASE HIRE ME....et cetera.

I am now working up the nerve to invest in some stash-diving and work up a few (more) things to list on my someday-to-open Etsy shop. Love Etsy.

What do YOU think of the Moderne Baby Blanket?

time for a trip!

I've been thinking for many days now about what kind of knitting I want to take on my upcoming trip to the Poconos. I'm hoping to finish up this life-long sweater project that I've been somewhat working on for months. I reached into my stash and started the project in Feb, and then kept getting other high-priority projects that interfered with me finishing it. So now that the knitting horizon is clear, I'm actually TIRED of this one and can only think of what ELSE I want to be working on. I've got 1.5 sleeves and some seams left to go, and then I can get on with some monogamous knitting glory.

PS, one of the projects I want to take is going to involve some yarn made from banana fibers. BANANA, how cool is that?? It's a deep royal blue lumpy shiny yarn and I'm stoked to use it. I think I'm going to make either a big loopy stash-bag or a nice shawl from it.

Bananas!!