Update

I've just updated an older post with some pictures, so check it out. Yo.

Hurrah and the like!

After about two months and numerous side-tracking, Marilyn's Saints-inspired Fetching are finally done! Photos of all our FO's will be up soon, my camera has been acting a right fool lately.

Next project on the list is another comissioned piece - Mardi Gras Apple Hats for Lejeune's (a lady I work with) two one-year olds (twins!). They're going to be purple w/gold leaves and gold w/purple leaves, and green stems on both. Mardi Gras colors!

I also FINISHED MONKEY! I am terribly excited about this, and they are sooooooo comfy and neat. I also finally figured out what "pooling" is, and that it happened on my first sock. But I'm cool with that, as it actually looks neat, IMHO. :D

OK, photos soon and now back to studio work!

PHOTOS NOW!!!


On the left you can see the pooling that happened on my first sock, as opposed to the neat stripes on the second. MEH. Such is life. I actually had no idea that this was bad, until the internet informed me. D:

Next up is a close up of the nifty lacy pattern. Please ignore my flash, as these photos were photoed in the nighttime in my room. This is the second sock that I did, so the pattern was fun and easy by then and not the craptastic mess the two and a half repetitions the first one sports.

Better pictures of them on my feet coming soon. I already wore them to work and they're dirty now, so they need a nice wash.

Knitting Fun!

After days of checking my mailbox anxiously every hour or so, our order from Knit Picks finally arrived! We definitely stocked up, and mostly for some sock knitting, it appears.

I'm particularly excited about the Bare yarn I got to dye. I've never dyed yarn before, but I think that'll be on the agenda for Saturday.
Also, I'm planning on trying some socks. I got a set of US2 double points, that are pretty much the cutest thing I've ever seen.
I decided that ambrrr's Monkey turned out so beautifully, that I'm going to try the same pattern for my first socks. I got two different sock yarns that might receive the honor of being made into Monkey: Memories in Pansy and Gossamer in Leprechaun.
I bought some Palette in Hyacinth with no purpose, because I thought it was pretty. Hopefully I'll be inspired soon.

In The Picture to the left:
Top: 3 hanks of Bare
Middle: 2 balls of Palette
Bottom: Gossamer, Memroies, and the cutest needles ever.

Ambrrr's acquisitions on the right:
Top: Black and orange Palette
Middle: Green Palette
Bottom: Gossamer in Leprechaun
Very bottom: US3 clover dpns

Onto my current projects:

The Gryffindor scarf is coming along very well. I'm onto the 8th or 9th stripe I believe. It's sitting all the way across the room in a bag, so I can't see it, otherwise I might be slightly more precise in this description.

My mom's shawl is not progressing at all, and I'm pretty sure she won't be getting it in time for her birthday, unless I sit down and work on it for about nine straight days. Maybe a mother's day gift?

I finished Karissa's calorimetry that matches her birthday mittens. I haven't sent it to her yet, as I've been trying to wait and take some pictures, and I should probably write a letter to accompany it.
Update> I finally got pictures. This is me modeling the calorimetry in, perhaps, the worst picture of me that has ever existed.My aunt called me the other day and asked me to make her a calorimetry, also. I was wearing mine when I saw her a few weeks ago, and she really liked it, so hopefully I'll get one done in the next couple of weeks. I'll have to check my stash and see if I have any black yarn, otherwise there might be an excursion to my favorite local yarn store in the near future.

I had some other topsecret knitting missions I was hoping to finish for some upcoming birthdays, but I'm not sure that'll be possible any more. I'm kind of sad, but it's hard to knit something secretly, especially if I want to finish it soon. I might try though. We'll see.

Other exciting knitting acquisitions happened on my drive back to school. In Dallas, I stumbled upon the knitting store I look for everytime I'm there, and I manage to always forget what street it's on. It's a really fantastic store, and I picked up some really gorgeous Andes wool. I feel ridiculous because I bought two very, very similar yarns, but they were so gorgeous I couldn't choose. Colors 17 and 18. I think I want to make at least one calorimetry out of some of the yarn. Actually, the day I went into the Woolie Ewe, I was wearing my calorimetry becuase I'd been driving all day adn it was cold out, and people in the store really liked it, and were complimenting me and asking questions. It was a great feeling. I need to wear handknits into yarn stores way more often.

Ok, I think that's all for now. Sorry about the length, but I can't contain my excitement!
<3 onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm9YpoupN6BeImskNXGSlEHMS7owOeUze-rVFBjRbYwMtYKq6g_mjKgYwIqv_-SNW6htaSPq1bkB3vQnGZPPnCZS3LuwbM5pK0EaKTv9Fnqbmh7HbuR5yMnfZ83LhM7thOg_V_brYtL8U/s1600-h/birthday+hat2.jpg">

Note to self:

Anna's Fetching Gloves: 1 Green and 1 Orange in Palette, with one green glove w/ orange star and one orange glove w/ green star.

WORD.

Sock Madness!

I HAVE FINISHED ONE SOCK!! Hahaahaha! Ambrrr wins again!

So yeah, one sock of Monkey down, one more to go. I'm so mexcited about this, I've already picked out the pattern of my next sock: Lickety Split. And I'm definitely going for KnitPicks' Palette, which is dirt cheap and has a nice color wheel. I'm also thinking I'll boost the needle size on LS up to a US3, since I already knit a pretty tight gauge. Oh, the wonderful world of socks. Let's see how long I am enamored of you. :D

<3 Ambrrr

PS Uhlissa WHY DID YOU USE PATON'S SWS?! For shame! But Lordy your Caliometry looks nice. Also, I think you might have used Natural Geranium.

New Rule, Finished Object and other Fun

New Rule: I will buy no more yarn until I finish at least one of the following projects:
1. Mom's shawl
2. Gryffindor Scarf
3. Hufflepuff Scarf
Thank you. It seems I've gotten a little bit (and by that I mean RIDICULOUSLY) addicted to buying yarn. Unfortunately, I don't knit nearly quickly enough to make my buying habit acceptable.
My yarn box is overflowing, and now every bag, box, object-shaped-in-a-way-in-which-to-hold-things in my room is now full of yarn.
I'm not exactly upset, just broke.
Well, anyways, on to the knitting update.
I should be working on my Gryffindor scarf, becuase I'm making it for someone who's going to pay me. So of course I'm only on the third stripe. 3rd of 19. And barely on the 3rd stripe, at that. I promise I'm going to sit down and work on it.
The past few days, I've been working only half days because I'll get to work and they run out of things to have me do. It's been nice. Yesterday this enabled me to buy too much yarn, and knit my calorimetry. Because I'm an absolute poser, I used the same yarn that ambrrr did. Paton's SWS. Mine's pink. See:

I don't remember which color exactly though. The yarn was a little bit splitty, but I really liked working with it, and I love the texture. I'm going to have to look into more soy/wool blend yarns. This is a silly picture that I took in the mirror, but if you look closely you can see the back of my calorimetry and my crazy hair. Don't pay too much attention, becuase I haven't sewn on a button yet, and I just tied the tails together to temporarily keep it on my head:
Other than my lovely calorimetry, I started a shawl for my mom two days ago. A month or two ago she had mentioned something about a shawl, and the other day I was at Hobby Lobby,and some really beautiful yarn was on sale, so I decided to see if I can whip up a shawl before my mom's birthday next month. I've used one skein thus far, and have knit about 8 inches.
Ignore my toes. I think it's a lot wider than I had planned, which is unnecessary as my mommy is a pretty tiny person. It's going to be awfully cozy, and she lives in a ridiculously cold climate, so hopefully it'll be practical.
I'm using a fan and feather lace pattern, that I found at Knitpicks.
It's hard to see the pattern because the yarn is fuzzy, but if you look closely, it's there.

That's pretty much what's been going on in my knitting life. I'm headed back to the couch to work on the shawl and watch some Law and Order (my other passion in life).
catch ya later.
<3 uhlissa

What fresh hell is this?

So I suck. A lot. At everything. But since this is the BH 'n P KS, let's talk about how I suck at knitting.

I'm trying (key word: trying) to work on Monkey, but it is killing me. I have no idea how to go about knitting a yarn over. In fact, I just realized I've been doing them wrong.

OK, let's start from the very beginning (a very good place to start..... and now the Sound of Music is in my head.):

Today I received my KnitPicks purchase: two skeins of Memories in Yukon and Clover US no2 needles. THEY ARE TINY. Oh, arthritis!! Anyway, I got super excited and tried to wind one of them into a ball...... cut to four hours later and me throwing the gnarled remains of probably 30 ft of yarn against the wall. I'll bring it back to Tulane, maybe Dani can salvage it. Anywhoo I've got (hopefully) enough for one sock. And I'll hold off on winding that other one. D:

So now that I've got (some) yarn and my needles, I go for it. I tried long-tail cast on, then cable cast on, and finally went back to long-tail. I realized that I seriously hate casting on. Finally got it loose enough to knit but tight enough not to look stupid.

1 inch of twisted rib knit later... I begin the lace pattern. .... I have never knit lace before. How hard can it be? TERRIBLE. THAT'S HOW HARD IT CAN BE. :C

I'm giving it a rest for tonight (it's only 4am!), and I'll look fresh at it in the morning. God, what possessed me to do this? I'd rather cast on the 120 sts for Caliometry again. DDD:

<3 Ambrrr

First Completed Project of 2007!

So, I didn't realize it until I tried to title this post, but this is my first completed project of 2007. That's pretty neat, right? Well, anyways, my friend Karissa's birthday is tomorrow and I wanted to make her something, so clearly mittens were the correct choice. I used the same pattern as I used to make my mom's christmas mittens. I changed a few things, such as the color of Mission Falls 1824 Wool (I really didn't consciously decide to use the same type of yarn, I just like it a lot), and made fewer, larger cables.Here are a few pictures. The color is unfortunately way off. In reality, these mittens are a gorgeous dark blue.

I'm pretty pleased with the outcome, and hopefully Karissa will like them too. I think this project only took me two evenings, which is pretty nice and only a little more than a skein of yarn. I hate making pairs of things though, becuase after the first one's done, I just want to be finished. I'm toying with the idea of making a pair of striped mittens from the wool left over from this pair and the pair I made my mom. I think the colors would be complimentary, and I really like working with the yarn. I know I need to get to work on my Gryffindor scarf, but I bought a lot of cheap yarn yesterday at Hobby Lobby, and I've decided I want to make calorimetry. I actually picked up several yarns that I think would work well. We'll see how I feel when I go upstairs and take stock of my stash and re-organize my yarn box.

<3uhlissa

New Years Knitting Resolutions

Happy 2007!
I came home from school with big goals for the knitting part of my life. I've recently realized that most of them won't be achieved. It's not for lack of motivation or desire, but simply time. I've been travelling a lot, and unfortunately cannot drive and knit simultaneously. And now that I'm home, I'm working full time, and there's already a list two pages long of other things I need to accomplish before I go back to scool in less than two weeks. So, I've decided to make knitting resolutions. Goals for the whole year, not confined to a few particular weeks. In no particular order, the goals are:

- knit a sweater (perhaps from this awesome book called Vintage Knits that I picked up on my recent trip to Dallas.)There are several gorgeous sweaters to choose from

- knit something with the lace skills I recently taught myself

- sell a piece of my knitted work. this will be accomplished if I finish the Harry Potter scarf I just started for my brother's friend

-finish at least 1/2 of the projects that are sitting in various stages of partial completion in my knitting box. this would entail just sitting down and finishing four or five simple scarves, I believe. Here are some of the scarves I've started that I located earlier:

- make something as cool as Ambrrr's doggie sweater, without making a sweater for any of my dogs, as they are all large and would look ridiculous in sweaters

- donate at least 3 scarves to Stitches of Hope, an organization that gives hand knit scarves to cancer patients in our university's hospital. Here's an article about the group

I think that's all for now. I think those are reasonable goals, which can absolutely be completed within the next 12 months without getting too much in the way of my academic career.

And now an update of the current knitting situation:
1. My Hufflepuff scarf has been put on hold about a 1/5 of the way done to focus on the Gryffindor scarf that I've been commissioned to produce.

2. The Gryffindor scarf was begun this weekend, after the most ridiculous quest ever to find the right shade of red yarn. It's only a few stripes long, but it's looking good. Like my Hufflepuff scarf, it's being knit flat in stockingnette, and will be sewn up and have tassles (my favorite part of scarf knitting!) added.

3. I have a good friend who's birthday is next week. I'm considering whipping up some mittens over the next couple of days. I think she'd enjoy them, as it's damn cold here (well, compared to New Orleans), and I recently taught her to knit.

4. I have had one wristwarmer sitting around completed for over a month now. Maybe I'll get around to making the other one. it's based off fetching, but I made various parts of it longer and added more repitions of cables.

<3uhlissa