FO Friday: Tauremorna Mitts

When I first started knitting, I thought fingerless gloves were one of the dumbest things ever.


I didn't understand why anyone would want a pair of gloves that doesn't cover their fingers. I live in Wisconsin, I understand cold temperatures and dressing for the weather, fingers are the part of the hand that get cold first. It didn't make sense to me.






Then I gave in and made a pair, just to see what the fuss was all about.







And I got it.




First, fingerless gloves are warmer than I thought. Not Wisconsin winter warm, warmer than I would have guessed. My understanding is that it has something to do with keeping your pulse points warm, but I'm not expert on that. They are perfect for the spring and fall months when it isn't warm enough for gloves or mittens, but still chilly on your bare hands.




The utility of having your fingers free should not be underestimated. Among other things, it is virtually impossible to securely fasten a carseat while wearing mittens.  For the super cold winter weather, I also have a pair of flippy top mittens for the same purpose.


I discovered another great use for fingerless gloves at work. They are fantastic to have for when the office is chilly. They keep your fingers warm while still allowing you to do everything you need to do to get work done. I keep my Zombie Doomsday mitts at my desk for that exact reason. They work so fantastically well, that my friend decided that she needed a pair, too.


If you know me at all, you know that I only knit for a select group of people. As one of my friends, and fellow knitters, likes to say


"Knitting for others is like sex, if I like you enough, it will be free. If I don't, you can't pay me enough to do it."


While the list of people isn't the same, I think that sums up the sentiment quite well.


Anyways, the friend that requested the mitts passed my requirements, and I agreed to make her a pair of fingerless gloves. The end result being these:

The pattern is called Tauremorna Mitts and they are knit in Malabrigo Yarn Mechita. Mechita is a Merino wool, so it is soft and squishy, and this color, English Rose, is tonal shades of pink. The design itself has a cable design on the top. All the cables are just a single stitch wide and done without a needle. They were an enjoyable knit, didn't take too long to complete, and probably only used about 1/2 of the 420 yard skein.

They were received with the proper accolades and a couple of days later, my friend sent me this:

So at least I know they are being used and appreciated.

WIP Wednesday: Hyperion Pullover

At this moment, I don't have much on the needles for Work In Progress (WIP) Wednesday. I have several projects in the hopper that I'm getting ready to cast on, but the only active project is the Hyperion Pullover. However, I haven't progressed beyond the first sleeve. As of last night, I had about 3 inches done, but then decided that it looked too big and ripped it out to start over.

I am excited to make this sweater, I haven't made one in a long time. The construction is different from a lot of knitted sweater, you cast on for the cuff of one sleeve and work the yolk across to the other sleeve. After that is done, you pick up stitches around the bottom to finish the body of the sweater. As much as I hate picking up stitches, it will be an interesting challenge.

I'm knitting it in Comfy Fingering weight yarn from Knit Picks. It is a Pima cotton and acrylic blend, perfect for warm weather. The color is blackberry, a lovely dark purple.

Because this project is barely started, I only have pictures of cast on stitches and some yarn.

The mess of yarn is from frogging the last attempt at this sweater.

Hopefully, my lack of other projects will allow me to focus my energy on this project to get it completed fairly quickly.

WIP Wednesday: Bigger on the Inside

By now it is no secret, I love my iPad. For day to day use, it has replaced my laptop (though I still need the laptop for a couple of things, including printing). When I first got my iPad, I purchased a couple of accessories to ensure that it was protected (especially after the nasty screen-cracking-even-when-in-a-case incident with my Kindle…I’m still pissed about that). I bought one of those bendy magnetic covers that also props it up in a couple of different positions and a back rubber shell. I went all out and got the back piece that is designed to absorb shock when dropped (something I’m very likely to do) and holds the iPad on the hood of a car when driving 45 mph (something I’m not really likely to do, but good to know just the same). I figured that eventually, I would also get a sleeve for it, something I could pull over the two covers for that added layer of protection, especially when tossing it into a bag. But I wanted to take my time and be sure I found the prefect sleeve for my iPad.


Because I’m me, my first thought was to knit a sleeve, an idea I took and ran with. While browsing Ravelry, it hit me, a TARDIS themed cover would be absolutely perfect.

For those of you not in the know, TARDIS stands for time and relative dimension in space, and is the time machine/spaceship of a certain time traveling alien known as The Doctor. And if you are still unsure what I’m talking about, watch Dr. Who. Anyways, the TARDIS, because of a problem with the Chameleon Circuit (seriously, just watch the show) looks like a blue police box, the kind that were common in England once upon a time. And the TARDIS is bigger on the inside.

Now, my iPad is not very big, but inside it contains games, videos, documents, apps, music, photos, knitting patterns, and the entire internet. Clearly, it too is bigger on the inside. a TARDIS sleeve would be the perfect companion to my iPad.

I found a pattern through Ravelry, and made a few modifications to make it work for me. I’m making it out of Comfy yarn from Knit Picks. I’m up to the windows on it now, which is pretty good, considering I cast on Saturday and had to rip it out once.

Posted with Blogsy

It's Going to Be a Great Day!

There are few better ways to start a Saturday than to find a box from Knitpicks waiting on my front porch. Contents include some Wool of the Andes Tonal in Gypsy Queen (red) for the Milk Run Shawl (Rav. Link) and some Comfy Worsted in Celestial (blue), white, and black for a Tardis iPad sleeve, and my replacement needle tips in size 8.

Life is good.

 

Long Overdue Sheepcote Photos

Okay, so I finished this sweater way back in March.

I just never got around to posting the pictures of it, which have been sitting on my camera since March. But here they are now. Late winter/early spring was a bit of a blah time for me, but hopefully spring and summer will renew my interest in both knitting and blogging and get me back on track with some other things as well.

Anyways, I am vey happy with the way the sweater turned out. It could have been a size smaller, but it is still very cute and wearable. There is something satisfying about finishing projects and about being able to say, "Thanks, I made it," to compliments.

I have two sweaters currently on the needles. The much anticipated February Lady Sweater is about halfway done. However, it is on pause as I race to finish another cardigan, the Teal Top-Down Cardigan (in yellow) for a wedding in the beginning of June. I also have the Citron shawl on the needles, but I'm waiting for another ball of yarn to arrive in order to finish it.

Hopefully, updates n those projects won't be so delayed.

 

Project Talk: Some Assembly Required

As a process knitter, I’m not a huge fan of finishing work. Why waste the time doing silly things like blocking, weaving in ends, and sewing seams when you could be actually knitting. I would think finding the motivation to finish would be easier for project orientated knitters, as it is a vital step in having a completed project (but seeing as I’m not a project orientated knitter, I cannot be sure. Anybody want to verify?).



Spatterdash Mitts, Done!

Thankfully, most of the projects I choose to work on don’t require too much in the way of finishing work. There are exceptions, the Carry-All Tote and Hey Teach! cardigan being the freshest ones in my mind. Thankfully, the Spatterdash fingerless gloves from Knitty.com didn’t require all that much finishing work. Just the usual blocking, weaving a couple of ends, two seams, and some buttons.  Okay, not some buttons, many buttons, a lot of buttons, 14 buttons per glove.

Definently worth the finishing.

But the end result is worth it. They turned out beautifully! The yarn is Imagination Hand-painted Sock yarn from KnitPicks.com in the colorway Wicked Witch, and it is amazing! I’m not a huge fan of it for socks, I have trouble with shrinkage and felting (I line dry, but machine wash, which might be part most of the problem), but the colors are amazing and the yarn comes out so soft after blocking! I think I’ll stick to using it for non-sock accessories. Stroll, also from Knit Picks, is my absolute favorite for socks, just in case anyone was wondering.

Sheepcote sleeves and start of the main body.

In other project news, I’ve completed the second sleeve and cast of for the body of the Sheepcote pullover, from the Twist Collective and am on the leg of the second of my Surfin’ Peacock socks, so I’m making progress, little by little. Once finished with the Peacock socks, I’ll be (hopefully) testing my Packer Sock pattern and after Sheepcote, I am absolutely, no excuses, finally getting to the February Lady sweater.

And a side note about the sleeves of the Sheepcote, the are 3/4 length sleeves on a yolked sweater. So I know that they look short and chunky, but I've tried them on and they are going to work out great for the sweater.

Adventures in Pattern Writing: Episode 3, Perfectionism Rears Its Ugly Head (Again)

I'm what you might call a selective perfectionist. Some things I can just slap together and not care, but when it comes to knitting, I'll redo, redo, redo until I'm happy with the results.

While this tendency can product some particularly excellent results, but it also has been the cause of massive amounts of frustration, and copious amounts of inappropriate, foul, colorful language.

After finally conquering inserting my charts from Microsoft Excel into Word, I started working on importing all of the heel charts (numbers 0 to 9) into the pattern. Then I looked at my Matthews jersey, hanging on the drying rack, I looked at the 52, I looked at the charts for the 5 and 2, I looked back at the 52, back at the charts. They didn't look the same.

Sure, the 5 and 2 I charted looked like a 5 and a 2, but not like the ones on the jersey. The numbers on the jersey were, blockier, had more straight edges. At that point, I already knew what was coming, but I fought it for awhile. Maybe it was the jersey's problem, not mine. I decided to compare the numbers on my Rodgers jersey (yes, mom, MY Rodgers jersey). Again, my charted 1 and 2 looked like a 1 and a 2, but not like the ones on the jersey. Crap.

The Original Five

I wasn't ready to face reality just quite yet, though. Clearly, I must own two faulty jerseys, so I dug out Husband's jersey, and the dog's jersey. Nope, the numbers were consistent from jersey to jersey and not the same as the ones on my socks.

Once again, I fought the inevitable. It wasn't really going to matter, I told myself. No one is going to look at the numbers on the heels of these socks and point out that they are not shaped exactly like the numbers on the players' jerseys. What kind of person notices that sort of thing? Most likely no one would ever know, and if they know, it is even more likely that no one would ever care.

Edited Five

Except for me. I would know. And I cared. And I knew what I had to do.

I printed out ten blank heel charts. Then I went to the Packer's website to find pictures of jerseys, and I recharted all of the numbers. And the process started all over again, hand drawing, charting in Excel, cutting and pasting (using Paste Special, at least I remember that) into Word.

And, I'm glad I did it. Otherwise it would have bothered me, and I would have ended up doing it at some point anyway. We all know I'm crazy like that.

In other news, the knitting on the Spatterdash fingerless gloves is done and I was lucky enough to find buttons for them. I just need to block, weave in ends, and assemble. Yay!

Adventures in Pattern Writing: Episode 2, Cue the Panic

Who'd of guessed that these socks
would cause so much trouble?

If you follow my blog regularly, or if you browse back through some past posts, you know that last July, I designed and made a pair of Green Bay Packer socks for her birthday. Ever since they came off the needles, I have been meaning to transfer the pattern from scribbled notes and crude graphs into an actual pattern, usuable by someone not residing inside my head.


Last November, I finally took the time to convert the graphs from paper and pencil drawings to an Excel spreadsheet. I then converted one of the graphs into jpeg form, to make it easier to insert into my finished pattern. and promptly allowed myself to become distracted by something else (I'm hoping it was at least something shiney).


About a month ago, during a very slow day at the Motor bank, while my co-worker was shopping online, I took my notes and typed them into an almost readable format. And by "almost" I mean, the basic instructions typed into a Word document with notes like "insert instructions for heel  here," "probably should figure out the actual stitches and rows per inch," "Chart A to go here," and "find a better way to word this" scattered throughout the pattern. At least I had all the pattern pieces were saved now.


Or so I thought.


The other day, I sat down to finally try to put all the pieces together, and went to pull up my charts. They weren't on my laptop, or my desktop, or my thumb drive, or my other thumb drive.


Cue the panic. I wasn't even sure if I still had the paper verisions. Was I going to have to start all over on these charts. I mined through my previous posts to see if maybe, just maybe, I had posted all of the charts on my blog.




The one chart I could find.

 Nope. Just the heel chart. Okay, well, at least I had a method to retrieve the heel chart. That was something. Then it occured to me, last fall there was a stretch of time when the screen of my laptop was out of commission, and I used my old laptop. Maybe, possibly, hopefully the charts were saved on there.


So, I dug out the old laptop, and the charger and let the machine charge while I went into work. I got home, booted up the machine, and, thankfully, the Excel file with the charts was safely saved.


Thank you. But the fun wasn't over yet.


I only had the files saved as Excel sheets, and inserted them directly into the Word document using copy and paste was creating all sorts of trouble for me, charts extending over several pages, distortions. And of course, for the life of me, I couldn't remember how I did the last time.


After some research (and cursing), I did figure it out. I think I actually used a different method this time, but seeing as it worked just fine, I'm not going to fret about it. The charts, in both Excel and picture format are now safely stored on my laptop, and my desktop, and both my thumb drives.


And, in case future me ever desperately returns to this post, wondering how I managed to convert the stupid Excel cells into a much more Word (and pattern) friendly image, here's what I did:


From Excel, highlight the cells you need and click copy.


Go into the Word document, select Edit, and choose the "Paste Special..." option. This gives you the choice if you want to paste the chart as an Excel spreadsheet or as an image (or some other ones). So simple, why on Earth did this cause me so much stress?


Now, future self, go buy me a beer for all the stress and time I just saved you. And stay tuned for Episode Three of Adventures in Pattern Writing, where I attempt to put everything together.

Project Talk: I'm Going to Go Ahead and Blame the Weather

Cubist Socks-Done!

The weather around here has been absolutely ridiculous, it is early January the temperature is going to be almost 50 today. Global warming, the beginning of the apocalypse, forewarning of the impending zombie uprising, or freak weather abnormality? It is hard to say. Most of the people who come into the bank seem to be enjoying this freakish weather, but I am not most people. I love winter, I want to look out my window and see snow drifts, icicles, and frost; not brown wilted plants and dreary gray skies.

Because of the unusual weather (or not…most likely not, but hey, we all need something to blame), my knitting funk has continued. I’m doing better than I was, but I was focusing almost exclusively on the Cubist Socks. As of Monday, I have these socks completely done and off the needles. Which, of course meant that I had to base my outfit choice for Tuesday solely on the new socks.

I’m learning from past experiences, and decided to frog and reknit the Spatterdash fingerless gloves using a size bigger needle. I've roughly gotten to the point where I was when I decided to frog, so they are moving along well now. And, I finally got a picture that almost accurately represents the colors in the yarn.

Close Up of Spatterdash

I still haven’t even cast on for the second sleeve of the Sheepcote sweater (or taken the first sleeve off of the needles for that matter). I don’t know if there is an actual reason besides my laser like focus on the socks. I have discovered, however, that both Ms. Bode and Ms. Lily are big fans of the yarn I’m using for this sweater (Valley Superwash Merino, I’m a big fan too, it is super soft) and are willing to climb things and dig in baskets to obtain said yarn. That is going to make completing the sweater very interesting.

Today, I also spent some time on Ravelry and decided on the next pattern and yarn combination for socks. I'm going to knit Brainless (rav. link) by Yarnissima, I'm knitting them out of Knit Picks Essential (now called Stroll) in the colorway called Peacock Multi, a combination of purples, blues, and greens. Hopefully the yarn/pattern combination works out.

According to the weather reports, things should be returning to normal (or at least closer to normal) over the next couple of days, so I'm going to run out of excuses for not knitting. That should mean more pictures of finished products up here soon!

In other news, the new job is still going well. I’m feeling more and more comfortable, and have to ask less and less questions about how to do things. I’ve actually engaged co-workers in conversations (or at least attempted to, small talk is nowhere near a strength for me), which is a pretty big step considering my chronic, acute shyness, and have still managed to avoid letting them know that I have the sense of humor the your average fourteen year old boy, or a massive fear of birds. But we all know I can’t keep that one hidden forever, at some point, my true colors always show.

Project Talk: In a Slump

Lately I’ve been feeling rather blah about my knitting. Well, actually to be fair, I’ve been feeling rather blah about a lot of things, which just so happens to include my knitting. Not sure if it’s holiday stress, weather, the fact that I’ve been sick, or something else, but things are just very blah.
Usually for the holiday season, I plan on knitting an impossible combination of gifts and decorations. This year? Zero, zilch, nada. I thought about knitting something for my mom, but never got beyond the idea in my head. (Sorry, mom, maybe for mother’s day, or your birthday, or next year)
There’s nothing wrong with the projects that are on my needles. In fact, I’m pretty happy with the projects. I’m hoping that over the next few days, an increase in family time equals an increase in knitting time, the trip to Lambeau field not only provides several more hours of knitting time, but also serves to inspire me to translate a couple of football related ideas from my head to actual knit goods (or just to paper, before the ideas leave my brain for that matter) and writing about the projects serves to inspire me to pick up the needles and knit more.

So here’s what is on my  needles right now:
  
Socks, of course. Currently, I’m working on Cookie A’s design, Cubist socks. As the name implies, it has a geometric pattern that resembles cubes. I’m knitting them out of Malabrigo sock yarn in the colorway Abril, which is some beautiful shades of purple. The pattern looked a little intimidating at first, but really isn’t too bad. I’ve gotten past the gusset decreases for the first sock.

Spatterdash Fingerless Gloves. I’ll admit it, I’ve become a convert to fingerless gloves. At first, I thought they were useless, but after making a pair, I’m hooked. I had a beautiful pair of End Paper Mitts, but they are now happily on the hands of a friend, so I needed another pair. This pattern, Spatterdash found on knitty.com, combines buttons and ruffles, so I can’t go wrong. I’m using Knit Picks Imagination sock yarn in the colorway Wicked Witch for those. The green in the yarn looks like it will match my winter coat beautifully, so I’m happy so far. I am a little concerned that the gloves might be too small, and I might need to start over with a bigger needle, but I really need to get more done before making that decision (Yes, I know, this is usually a recipe for me griping in a couple of weeks wondering why I didn’t just rip out and start over when I first suspected they might be too small, but this pattern for gloves is different than any I’ve done before, so I’m honestly not sure).

Sheepcote Pullover. This one started out as a love story. I saw it in the Twist Collective and had to buy the pattern, immediately went out to find suitable yarn and couldn’t wait to get started. It immediately jumped ahead of the February Lady Sweater, which has been next up forever (but things seem to keep budging ahead in line…I really need to do something about that). So I casted on, over a month ago, and have completed one sleeve. I still like it, and I’m not sure what the actual problem is. Maybe it is that sleeves just aren’t that fun and things will get better once I get to the actual body of the sweater, either way, progress has been slow.

Of course, there are some perpetual works in progress out there on the needles. The Scrap Sock Yarn blanket, which may very well never be finished, and the Yggdrasil Afghan; which, without a deadline, just gets neglected. I might buckle down and make it my Wednesday night project to work on while husband is away at Lions and basketball.

So that’s what is on my needles, hopefully I will be able to report some actual progress sometime soon!

Adventures in Pattern Writing: Episode 1, Chart It!

Last summer, I tried my hand at designing a pair of socks. They were Green Bay Packer Socks knit for my mother's birthday. While there are several things that I would change about them, overall I considered the whole undertaking to be a success. The socks were such a huge hit with my mom, she has already requested more!


However, despite the socks being such a huge hit, I still haven't gotten around to actually writing down the pattern (though I have gotten several requests for it). My notes and hand drawn charts were placed in a pile and left to sit.


Today, I noticed that the pieces of my pattern notes were getting scattered around the house, and I realized that it would be only a matter of time before either the whole pattern or several key pieces were destroyed or go missing. I came to the decision that I needed to sit down and actually write out the pattern.


Now, because on good days, I have the attention span of a gnat, I know that the best way to take on any large project is to take little baby steps. To decide on where to start, I considered what would be the biggest pain to reverse engineer in the event that pieces of the pattern are lost or destroyed? With that question, the answer was clear, the charts.


On these particular socks, there are several pieces that I charted out, the Go Pack Go band around the top of the leg, the numbers on the heel flaps, and the large G on the top of the foot. 


First, I did a little research on the easiest way to make charts on the computer. After looking at several methods, I decided to use Microsoft Excel for charts. It is easier to add and delete rows using Excel, and the charts can then be cut and pasted into Microsoft Word when I start on the final pattern. The next step will be converting the Word document into a pdf file (there's probably no real need for this, I just prefer my patterns in pdf form), but that can't be too hard, right?


Now, non-knitters may not know this, but knit stitches are slightly wider than they are tall (if you look at the pictures really closely and know what you are looking for, you can see this), so I needed figure out what sizes to use for the cells. I ended up making the cells 15 pixels wide by 10 pixels tall, giving me a 3:2 ratio, which should work pretty well. After re-sizing the cells, I then turned on the border for each cell and was ready to start charting.


I started with the leg band, mainly because that was the one chart I didn't want to make any changes to. It went pretty quickly, so I was able to move onto the chart for the top of the foot. I knew I wanted to make the G look a little less jagged around the edges and a little more symmetrical. I started with the original chart in the spreadsheet, and made changes, square by square until I was happy with the result. 

The original heels needed some more work.

The heel flaps made me a little more nervous, as I was making big changes to that piece of the sock. I wanted to switch from a heel flap to a short row heel, which would change the entire shape of the available stitches from a rectangle to a triangle (upside down triangle, in case you are trying to picture it). Like with the top of the foot, I figured the best thing to do would be to block out my available stitches.


From that point, I decided what size to make the numbers. During this process, I had to consider the triangular shape I was working in, and the fact the the numbers on the original ended up being too low. 

One of the revamped heel charts.

I ended up settling on 8 squares wide by 14 squares high (though I will actually have to knit another pair to be sure that this size will work).  I took these figures and went back to my paper and pencil. It took awhile until I was happy with the way the numbers looked, but it was worth it to get the finished charts saved in Excel.


There is still lots more work to do to get the pattern written. Plus, after writing the entire pattern, I want to make another pair, following the revamped pattern to see how those turn out. But I am really hoping that at some point I will be able to post an entire knitting pattern on this sight for others to use. 

626? A Bit of a Lofty Goal

It's not really a secret, I'm a big fan of Ravelry, a website geared toward knitters and crocheters. It is a giant database of patterns, has a ton of information on yarns, provides a place to show off finished products, allows you to keep track of your yarn stash, and has very active forums, with groups geared toward not only tips and tricks for fiber artists, but also just about any topic imaginable. I'm continually amazed at just how much time I can spend browsing around on Ravelry. 

It seems that the pattern database and queue feature is where I tend to get in a little bit over my head.There are multiple ways you can search or browse patterns on Ravelry. You can search by pattern type, availability (free, online, in my collection of knitting books, in other print sources, etc.), by yarn types or weight, project type, intended age, the list goes on and on. When you find a pattern that you like, there is an option to add it to your queue, your personal list of patterns that you are planning on. or would like to knit. I've spent many hours looking through patterns and adding them to my queue. Currently, my list spans over 20 pages and contains 626 items.

In considering the size of my list, combined with the fact that the rate of adding new patterns to the list is exceeding by far the rate of finishing projects and starting new ones, this is going to be a never ending list. Clearly, I need to either knit faster, or add less patterns to the list.

Project Update: 

I've finished the first one of the Endpaper Mitts by Eunny Jang. They are a pretty simple project, but have given me the opportunity to learn some new techniques. I've learned a new method of both casting on and binding off ribbing, the tubular cast-on and tubular bind-off (or Kitchener rib bind-off). And, I always enjoy the chance to do some color work. The picture quality is not good, it was taken in poor lighting, but the combination of the brown and orange looks really good in real life. (and I probably owe a special thank you to Lily, who allowed me to set the mitt on her back while photographing it)

Lucky Socks 13-0 Baby!



A seeminly typical pair of socks

This weekend was the first Packer/Viking game of the season. Because it was in Minnesota, our token Viking fan friend, Terry was allowed to host it. After work, I was changing and noticed that my socks were still wet (after being washed out in the sink the night before, but that's another ball of wax). I certainly wasn't going to wear wet socks, and I never tumble dry hand knit socks, so I did the next logical thing, put them in the oven to dry.


Yup, in the oven, at 350, for about five minutes per side.


Now that may seem like a lot of work just for a pair of socks, but these are no ordinary socks. These are lucky, seemingly magical Green Bay Packers socks. On game days, I get facebook messages from friends and family to ensure that they are on my feet.


I thought some of those friends and family might be unfamiliar with the humble beginnings of the lucky socks.


They weren't intended to be anything special. The yarn wasn't bought with the Packers in mind, it is Knit Picks Stroll, in a colorway called Turtle Multi, which they don't even make anymore and isn't even that good of a representation of Green Bay's team colors. The pattern is Nagini (named after Lord Voldemort's snake companion) by Monkey Toes. A pattern named after a snake seemed appropriate for a variegated green with a little yellow colorway. In short, they were just another pair of socks.


I was working on them during a Packer game last season, and my mom made an offhand comment that they would make good Packer socks. Figuring shades of green and yellow were close enough, I finished them and wore them to the next game. The Packers were playing the Giants and needed to win the next two games to make the playoffs.


They won the game. As a result, I wore the socks for the next game, and the Packers won. I kept wearing the socks on game day and the Packers kept winning, six games in a row, through the playoffs, to the Superbowl. The socks were deemed lucky and safely tucked away until football started up once again.

The non-oven drying method.

I didn't break out the lucky socks until the regular season started up again. But the pattern continued, when the socks were on, the Packers won. Going into the bye week, my socks have seen 13 Packer victories, and 0 Packer losses. I'm not sure how they manage it, but the facts are in.


Skeptics may say that I should not wear the socks one game day and test the theory. However, I cannot imagine that there is a true Packer fan in the world willing to take that chance. My husband certainly isn't, he was the one that insisted I wear wool socks in 70 plus degrees.


Now, if only I could get the socks on the Packer's payroll. League minimum would be just fine, they don't need a fancy contract or a signing bonus. Anyone have the number?

Go Pack!

Project Talk: Toasty Toes

Over the summer, husband and I replaced the carpet in our living/dining room area with wood laminate flooring. It really changed the whole look of the room (for the better). But about a week ago, I discovered an unforeseen consequence of removing carpet. 

Finished product!

Cold floors. Fall weather has arrived in Wisconsin, bringing chilly temperatures. Couple that with my determination not to turn on the heat in this house until November 1 (though the last two days, my resolve has been wavering a bit), and you have a need for slippers. 


Last fall, I bought a pair of suede soles for slippers, purchased a pattern, and then failed to ever get around to making the slippers. However, last Wednesday morning, I came down to make coffee, and the need for slippers became apparent. I combated my cold feet the way that is obvious only to knitters, I cast on for the slippers.


Thankfully, it didn't take too terribly long to get the slippers off of the needles. There are meant to be felted so in this first picture, they are very big and floppy. 

Big and floppy, not unlike clown shoes!

The slippers are knit out of Knit Picks Wool of the Andes in Cherry Blossom, with two strand held together. The cuffs are made from two different scrap wools that I had lying around the house (one leftover from the Carry All Tote and the other from Husband's Hunting Socks), a strand of each held together. 


The pattern itself is Felted Clogs from Fibertrends. It is a basic pattern with lots of options for customization and for different sizes, making it well worth the $8.00 price tag (which barely counts in this case since I bought the pattern last winter).

No more clown shoes!

After felting in hot water and agitation, I shaped the slippers on my feet and then stuffed them with plastic bags to hold the shape while they dried. 


Now, here's something you might not know, felted slippers take forever to dry. I felted them Sunday afternoon, and on Tuesday night they were finally dry enough for the next step, attaching the soles.


I sewed on the soles with the project yarn, but it wasn't as easy as I first anticipated. It involved a lot of stretching and squishing to make the sole and slipper the same size. I still think they might be cuter without the soles.

However, function sometimes does actually trump cuteness, even in my world, and the soles are needed to both extend wear of the slippers and to keep me from slipping and injuring myself (felted slippers are slippery otherwise).

After getting the sole on the first one, things went a little more smoothly with the second one. In addition to the suede sole, which has padding the slippers have a double sole of garter stitch. This makes for a super squishy, comfortable base. The material felted into a nice, thick fabric, which also is proving to be toasty warm. This morning, my feet stayed nice and warm while making coffee and letting the dog out. 

I Just Needed My Size 9 Needles

This afternoon, I was going to start a ghost hat for my niece's Halloween costume. I went upstairs and found my all time favorite hat pattern, Kim's Hat's from Last Minute Knitted Gifts (amazon link). This is a versatile pattern that has instructions for sizes from babies to adults. It is my go-to pattern for hats.

So, I read the pattern and it calls for size 9 needles. Not a problem, I have interchangeable needles, so I just need to dig out my size 9 tips. I store my tips and spare cables, and other knitting supplies in the ottoman in the living room, which I open up only to discover I could lose a cat or a small child in the mess that is inside. And I simply cannot leave it like that.

The simple hat has just added a more complicated facet. I don't have a before picture, and I apologize for that. It was an impressive mess.

Can you even picture this all stuffed in the ottoman?

First thing first, I took everything out of the ottoman. And there was a lot of stuff. Bags of yarn, knitting patterns, knitting books, magazines, various tools, fabric scraps, plastic bags, partially completed projects, and all kinds of other things.

Then the organization started. The first step was easy enough, I took all the yarn upstairs into what can only be called the "Yarn Room" (at some point I'm going to have to organize in there, but not today). Then the magazines and books went upstairs to the bookshelf.

This step was quickly followed by my assigning each of my works in progress (WIP) into its own project bag. Most of the WIPs fit nicely into my small project bags, a couple purchased through Ravelry, a couple from Interweave Knits, and a couple came with other purchases. I needed a bigger bag for a couple of the projects, my scrap sock yarn blanket and my Tree of Life afghan. The scrap sock blanket fit nicely into a bag that came with a set of sheets and the Tree of Life went into a red cloth bag I had lying around. I decided to keep the Scrap Yarn Blanket in the knitting basket by my couch and the Tree of Life blanket would go back into the Ottoman (I need to sit down and figure out where I left off, and the whole project requires concentration, its not something I can just pick up and knit a couple of rows).

Next, I tackled the tangled mess of needles and cables. For sock knitting, I have fixed circulars in the main sizes for socks (US 0, 1, 2, and 3, in case you were wondering) in a variety of materials and from a variety of brands (it has been a long search to find my favorites, but that's another post entirely). For each size, I used a Waste Not Sack, designed to replace plastic baggies, and then used my trusty label maker to label the outside of each bag.

I'm not going to lie, I love my label maker!

Each of the four cloth bags then went into a larger bag. I used one that came with a Clinque bonus, I have so many of those Clinque bags, I could never put them all to use. Then I added my storage case of needle tips into the bag along with the package of spare cables (these were already pretty well organized, but were just floating around in the abyss that was the ottoman). I had discovered three needle sizers while cleaning out the mess, so added one of those to the bag (I only find the stupid things when I don't need them).
The result? All my needles in one place! Which should make it much easier to find the size that I'm looking for (including the elusive size 9's).

Namaste Buddy Case

Next, I tackled the problem of all my knitting tools. In addition to needles, I've acquired a lot of other tools in my knitting career. Some of these, scissors, stitch markers, tape measure, darning needles, etc, are used for almost every project. Others, cable needles, stitch holders, pom pom makers, crochet hooks, are only used for some projects. Also, I had some spares, including extra tape measures, scissors, darning needles to replace the ones I will (inevitably) lose. I decided to store some of the essentials that are used in every project into my Namaste Buddy Case. The Buddy Case has the added advantage of being magnetized, which helps to keep track of some of the smaller items. The other tools, along with the spares, went into my Knit Happy Fold 'n Go Notions Box. Both of these containers now sit on top of the knitting basket next to my spot on the couch, so I can easily grab the tool I need.

Mission Accomplished!

Finally, it was time to put stuff back into the storage ottoman. There was a lot less to put back in! The storage ottoman now contains my needle bag, my yarn swift, my ball winder, yarn scale (to determine how much yarn was used/is leftover) a couple balls of leftover yarn (the stuff I use as big stitch holders and for provisional cast ons), and added my craft box and bead container to the ottoman. There is still room in there, so I probably will eventually put all of my craft supplies in there (in an organized fashion, of course).



Ah, the satisfied feeling of actually accomplishing something!

Project Talk: I Love Deadlines

"I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by."
                                                                                                                    (Douglas Adams)

First and foremost, anyone who is unfamiliar with the genius of British writer Douglas Adams, go and pick up a copy of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and read it.

Do it now. I'll wait.

Project Talk: It's a Wrap

So, my invisibility wrap has been completed for some time now (done in enough time to wear to the wedding I wanted to). But I've been slacking on getting the photos off of my camera and getting them posted, both on here and on Ravelry. I wish I could say it was because I was super busy doing something super wonderful, but alas, I've pretty much just been lazy (and no, I haven't written up that sock pattern yet, either). Though the past couple of weeks have been a little bit crazy, it is still mostly laziness.

 So here are, as promised, photos of the wrap:



There are a couple from a photo shoot outside, one showing the length, and one showing more detail. Both shot while hanging from my porch railing. I'm still looking for good places to photograph my finished projects.


And a final couple of photos from the wedding, where you can see the wrap in actual action. It was a hit at the wedding. It looked great with the dress and got a ton of compliments. However, the wedding was outdoors, in July, in Wisconsin, and there was no real need for any kind of wrap. Plus the alpaca and silk blend is warmer than I ever thought a thin little thread couple be. This is actually a common mistake for me with lace, I forget, because it is lightweight and full of holes, that it can be warm. And let me assure you, it can be.

One of the few time a pic of my bum will
be posted, believe me.

With the exception of an extra large hole in one column, I am happy with how this piece turned out. At first I was less than pleased with the bead placement. I imagined them more sporadically placed and not in the rows, but I've adjusted to that and moved on. The yarn is beautiful and transitions from light to dark grey and will look great with a variety of colors. The beads add just the right amount of sparkle to the piece. It is big enough to work as a wrap, but also light enough to wear as a scarf. The length is enough to wrap around my neck a couple time or loop around my head and then wrap around my neck like a cowl in the cold. It will be a great addition to my wardrobe and hopefully, get a lot of use.

Process vs. Product

I've said it before, and I'm sure I'll say it again (and again), I'm a process knitter, not a project knitter. From what I've observed about knitting, most knitters fall into one of these two camps, though I think most are unaware that you can categorize knitters into these two types.


For me, it all comes down to a basic difference in knitting philosophy, a different reason for why we knit. I do not knit to make stuff, I knit for the enjoyment of knitting. I enjoy the click of the needles, the feel of the yarn, and the action of manipulating the yarn into little loops. The stuff that is created is an added perk, but not a reason to knit. It is all about the journey, not the final destination.


On the other hand, creating stuff is what it is all about for product knitters. After all knitting is a way to make stuff. I'm not saying that they don't enjoy knitting, it wouldn't make sense to knit if you didn't, but they enjoy the creation of a hand-knit item. The goal is to arrive at the destination. And in my experience, project knitters tend to complete more projects faster than process knitters.


Being a process knitter also explains some of my knitting habits to me. I don't mind having projects that sit on the needles for long periods of time, because it's not about getting the projects done. This is also why I have pieces that are almost finished sitting in a basket because they simply need to be assemble, or have ends woven in. I enjoy the process, but I don't necessarily enjoy the finishing work, and since I'm in no hurry to have a completed item, I don't mind letting the pieces sit. I'm pretty sure this is also why I'm not so good at knitting on a deadline.


However, despite of my love of the process, every once in awhile, a project gets in my head. I'll come across a pattern or design or idea, and it will become an obsession. I will toss everything else aside and focus solely on one project until it is done. It happened with my Llama hat, my Owls Pullover, and my Carry-All Tote.


But this is rare for me, up to today, it had only happened three times in years of knitting. But now, it has happened again. I was browsing patterns in the latest issue of the Twist Collective (an online knitting magazine) and came across a pattern that I knew that I had to knit, the Sheepcote Pullover. I can't explain it, it was love at first sight.


I saw the sweater, followed the link to the pattern, and printed it out. Then I spent time digging through my stash to see if I had yarn that would work (I didn't). Then I spent a good portion of the afternoon going back and forth. Logically, I knew that I should first knit with the yarn I have stored upstairs and not by new yarn. But that would mean putting this sweater on hold. I wrestled with myself for a long time, but finally gave in to my impulse. I ordered the yarn for this sweater. I also know that as soon as the yarn arrives, I will cast on and knit on it obsessively until it is complete. That's what happens.


In the end, it's not so bad. I'll have a new sweater to wear by the time sweater weather hits Wisconsin (probably before). And I fully intend to not buy more yarn before the end of the year. I know I have a good sized stash, and I should be able to knit from it for some time after this project. And I don't feel too bad about giving in to this urge, knowing that it most likely will be a long time before the next one hits (I hope, it hasn't been that long since I finished the Carry-All).


Because I know there is some obsessive knitting looming on the horizon, I am going to be working overtime on the Bridges of Roses socks, I've started on the leg of the first sock, so hopefully I can get it finished (especially as they are a birthday present for my mother-in-law, whose birthday was five days ago). I'd also like to get in some progress on the Mythos Cardigan, so here's hoping that shipping is slow!