September and August Finished Objects

Finished Objects!

Scollay Cardigan by Karie Westermann

Love love love love this cardigan! I knit it in the suggested wool, New Lanark Mill DK which is wool tweed with silk slubs, in the colour Milano (I keep forgetting if it's Milano or Verona - both are lovely, I got the pinker one). I knit the XL size, my gauge was a tiny bit larger than the pattern recommends which I accounted for in the length but not the width as I wanted a smidge more room than the XL but not as much as the XXL. I also knit the sleeves flat, rather than have to figure out if my gauge was different in the round (hint, it almost always is). I bought several sets of buttons trying to find the right ones for the cardigan. One set was the right colour but the wrong size and the others were all the right size but the shade of pink. I picked coconut flowers that had been glazed pink on the front and attached them wrong side up so the pink is against the wool. It works surprisingly well.

Full Hap by Gudrun Johnston

I finished this back in July before the end of the Hapalong (hap knit-a-long) but it was a gift so I couldn't share a picture. I bought the pattern along with the craftsy class and I loved everything about it. I loved participating in the Hapalong, I loved watching the craftsy class and listening to Ms Johnston - it was very soothing and interesting if that makes sense, and I loved knitting the pattern and seeing all the different colour combinations people came up with. Three of my colours are from Judith Glue a little tourist tat shop in town except instead of tat they largely stock things made in Orkney. The yellow, green, and light blue were each £10 and described only as "100g 100% lambswool". The blue is mystery wool from my stash, described only as "£4.00" on what looks like a charity shop tag. The bright blue was heavier than the others, but worked well enough and, I think, largely made the shawl. I'm sad to say that I don't have a great feeling that the woman I gifted the shawl to will love it in the way we hope any knitted gift will be loved, but such is the nature of life, right?

I'm using the three Orkney colours to knit a half hap in between other projects (it started as my travel project to Amsterdam but despite the four hour delay leaving, I only got about 20 sts knit the whole trip). The half-hap is so much faster to knit than the full size one that I'm ready to accuse everyone who knit one in the KAL of cheating or witch craft or something. I'm on the edging now and I've decided to knit back and forth, rather than turn it around every 8-15 stitches. It's not really fast yet, but it may get there as my left to right knitting improves. I may have enough wool left over to knit another half hap with the third colour as the centre.

Brainless by Yarnissima

These are "brainless" socks, one of my two default toe-up sock patterns, in a cotton-blend Opal sock yarn. I started them before Easter and finished them in time for Autumn. That's how long it takes me to knit a pair of socks, for a value of knitting that mostly involves knitting while following Little Djinn around the floral hall. I'm proud of myself for getting the stripes to match up, though I seem to have done the heels differently and the second way doesn't fit as well. Also, the stripes somehow got off on the second cuff. I don't care enough to redo them. I wore them yesterday when it was really hot (20C/70F) and my feet were too hot even with the cotton, so I doubt I'll bother with cotton blend wool socks again, especially as I didn't really like any of the colours, these are just the ones I disliked the least.

The good news is that, while I was knitting these, I found out that my favourite yarn dyer uses Opal's regular sock yarn as the base of one of her sock yarns so I can get the wool I like in colours I love instead of just being okay with!

Fudge by Barbara Prime

Fudge the Dog was a kit from Knit Now magazine and as soon as it arrived in late May Little Djinn insisted I knit it. I mentioned her a few months ago, but I don't think I ever posted a picture, so here she is in all her glory. The kit included the yarn and eyes and Little Djinn loves her. The current issue of Knit Now magazine has a kit for Puss in Boots by the same designer so if you think she's cute you can knit something very similar and get a very nice magazine not very much. I knit everything but Fudge's body in the round instead of flat to save seaming up, and as Puss doesn't have the spots I'll probably knit her entirely in the round.

Mithral Hat by Carol Feller

In preparation for her next pullover KAL, Carol Feller released a hat pattern using the same stitch pattern which was a bonus pattern for buying the pullover pattern in advance and can be used as a swatch for the sweater. High from the yarn fumes after finishing my Scollay, I bought the pattern and ordered the yarn (also discounted in September from Purlescence) and quickly knit it up. Then I blocked it and realized it's a disaster, so I frogged it (the knitters out there all gasped in shared pain at frogging a brushed yarn) and re-knit it on larger needles. I just cast off the second attempt today, blocked it over a balloon in front of the space heater, and took a picture. I still need to measure to get my gauge so I'll be ready when the first part of instructions (it's not really a "clue" when we know what the finished garment will look like) are released tomorrow. And, yes, Mithral is a LotR reference.

Beanies and their longer cousin slouchies don't do anything for me, but the hat has already been claimed by my little knitwear model (protip: don't hire a model who wants to do a photo-shoot whilst bouncing on the bed unless you have a much better camera than the one in my phone).

Wow, It's September Already

Wow, it's September already! and the last few days of September at that :-/ I had that horrific realization (wait, it's September already? the 27th? how did that happen?) at work yesterday and my only explanation is that time stopped for me back in mid August when we moved house. That's was about as un-stressful as such a thing can be (we hired movers to pack and move us, we stayed at a hotel whilst it was happening, the weather was perfect) and then after half a week to get settled, we went to Amsterdam for 2 nights so Chris could attend a conference, which could have been better (four hour delay leaving, Little Djinn was only kept from hysteria taking off and landing by having me lean over and cuddle her the whole time, Chris walked out on his conference halfway through the first day, Little Djinn wanted to be carried the entire time and by the end of the trip my wrists were burning agony at all times). The following week, September, my mother arrived for a three week visit. Phew.

The best news is that Little Djinn got on wonderfully with Grandma. About five minutes after G'ma arrived, they were cuddled on the sofa together reading stories and G'ma is now a favourite. Yesterday, Little Djinn told Daddy that she needed to use my pad to see (skype) G'ma and ask her to come sit at the table and play. When we Skyped on Sunday she climbed up on my lap and said, "It's Grandmama! We miss you Grandmama!" which was made all us adults die of cute.

The move went smoothly enough, and we were largely unpacked inside the house before we even left for Amsterdam. The garage is another story: we don't talk about the cave of boxes-ahem, the garage. Oliver and Libby (Oviler and Libbily to Little Djinn) spent the move and Amsterdam trip at Kitten Summer Camp and spent the first few days (Libby) / weeks (Oliver) slinking about the house skittishly but now run around like mad (confident) things. Oliver spends most of his time in my side of the closet (I put his cat bed in there after the first few days) or under the quilt on our bed. At the old house he stayed in the closet in the nursery, so this is his normal. Libby sleeps on our bed.

Little Djinn has all the words and pretty complex sentences. This morning Daddy asked her if she'd like some juice and she told him "No, I'm eating a bikkie. Afterwards, please." She's a lot better about eating "real" food, but still prefers to be fed, and most of the time you have to follow her around popping food in her mouth to get her to eat. Left to her own devices she just gets really really hungry and falls apart, she doesn't think to eat. She's also completely not interested in potty training, though she no longer stars screaming if you suggest some day she might pee in a potty so that's progress, right?

Playdough is still a big part of our lives, but cars are probably the favourite toy right now and colouring is on the rise. We went to a birthday party for a friend, T, who will be moving to England soon (nooo!) and Little Djinn was only happy when hiding in the masterbedroom with as many cars as she could carry. There were 10 or so toddlers at the party and Little Djinn ran away from all of them. One in particular kept taking things from her, and the one time we got together with a friend since then Little Djinn literally ran screaming from her. Socializing, not going so great. We didn't sign up for any classes or activities this past session with how much we had going on, but the next set of sessions start *cough* this week so we'll get to try again.

We love living in the new house. It's very beautiful up here, next to the woods, and we have red squirrels in our garden. Chris and I have both expressed surprise that we haven't missed looking out at the river. Our across the street neighbour is a family I know from PEEP and baby massage, way back when, with two boys, a two year old and a two month old.

July WIPs

Here are the things I am currently working on:

"Wee Melia" by Ysolda Teague in RipplesCrafts Merino DK "Gunther's Seat"

I bought the wool for this at the Highland Wool Festival in Dingwall in May. Helen pulled out the colour to show me as soon as I walked into her booth, then clinched the deal by having a shop sample knit up in warm gold for Little Djinn to try on. It's like she knows me or something. I cast it on as soon as we got home, but Little Djinn spotted the then-latest issue of Knit Now magazine that arrived that morning with a kit to knit a little doggy and she insisted I knit that post haste. Wee Melia was ignored for the Hapalong and MKAL but I have a few days before the Scollay-along starts so maybe I can finish the hood.

"Brainless Socks" by Yarnissima in Opal Cotton Premium "Ozean"

I started these back before Easter time. They're 30% cotton which will make them better for warm spring days although it's July and I'm either wearing my wool socks or going barefoot with a lot more of the former. This is my walking around project and I am almost done with the gusset increases on the second sock. Let's all please take a moment to admire the fact that my stripes line up. Mad skills, yo. Obviously this could all go to pot when I turn the heel.

In the languishing pile we have "Harringbone Rib Socks" by Kristi Schueler in RipplesCrafts BFL Sock "Ola"

These are for Chris and, yes, he picked the colour. The pattern is a two row repeat and I keep forgetting which row I'm on, usually mid row. The yarn is also really skinny, making progress almost as slow when I work on them as when I don't. They're not watching Telly knitting, which is currently as much attention as I can spare a knitting project. I'm on the second sock so I really don't want to frog them and start over with a different pattern :-/

"Terry's Pullover" by Carol Feller in Jamieson & Smith Aran "Olive"

This one keeps losing out to shinier projects. I knit to the armholes and started on the sleeves before admitting my fabric would stop bullets and it would never fit. I frogged it, went up on both the needles and pattern, and started again. I started with the sleeves, two at a time, to check my gauge, and then couldn't find them when it was time to join them to the body so I figured I'd graft them on at the end, which is where I am now. The first sleeve went on easy enough, but the second on wasn't lining up for the 2x2 rib racing stripes. After two days of trying I put it in time out and there it sits. 

Meanwhile I am swatching for the Scollay-along. I usually have to go down on the needles so I started with 3.75mm needles and my unblocked swatch is 20x28 with a blocked target of 22x30 so I'm close. I'm swatching on the recommended 4.0mm needles as well and I'll block them at the same time to see what I get. CO is Sunday, which is a work day for me.

KAL Fever

I am a sucker for a Knit-Along, when someone organizes a group of people to all knit the same thing, which is probably why I'm doing two right now with another prepped to start when they're completed.

Back in April Louise Scollay (of the Knit British podcast - confession, I don't actually listen as podcasts don't work for me, but I read her blog and follow her on Twitter) organized a Hapalong in appreciation of traditional Shetland shawls/blankets. I actually knit one before, for Little Djinn, before I knew the history or design. I wasn't sure I even wanted to knit another hap or which one I would knit - a traditional work-a-day one like Gundrun Johnson (Shetland Trader)'s Hansel or a modern interpretation like Kate Davies Hap for Harriet (though I knew I don't have the bandwidth for a stunning lacy christening shawl in single ply and dripping with lace). But by the time the KAL kicked off I'd seen so many beautiful patterns and colour combinations that I simply couldn't resist. Gundrun's craftsy class and pattern for Hansel were on sale at the time, so I pulled some two-ply odds and ends from my stash left over from a fair-isle hat kit and cast on a mini hap. Except I didn't have enough for the main colour so I bought a 100g skein from Judith Glue, which is a lot of wool for a little project. I'm not a huge fan of video tutorials in the same way that podcasts don't work for me, but I found Gundrun's to be very soothing and I'd watch it again just to have her gently nattering on in the background whilst I knit. (I'm really really bad at paying attention to the content of what people are saying; invariably I try to open a book to read at the same time which works with music but not so much spoken word).  My little shawl was a delight to knit so I bought some more coordinating colours and started a full-size version, which is still in progress because I put it down to cast on Gundrun's Mystery KAL, a knit-along where you know what kind and how much wool to buy and, in this case, that it would be a shawl, but not what the finished object would look like. 

A new clue was released each week in June with four clues in total and while I was about a week behind for the whole thing, I now have a stunning shawl to show for it. I used Old Maiden Aunt's sparkle sock yarn in Twu Wuv, Berry Good, and Bramble for an ombré effect. I was betting that the MKAL would count as a hap for the Hapalong and fortunately I was right so it counts for both. I've picked up my Hansel again and was only a few rows from the edge so I'm on the (slow) home stretch. Amusingly, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee (Yarn Harlot, a woman who is about as famous as a knitter can be) is currently knitting a hap - though I don't believe she's used the word - for a niece or nephew who is minutes from meeting the world and she's blogging the frustration of committing to a knit on edging (mine is 9-18 stitches per row, two rows bind off one stitch around the border. Hers looks wider, and we won't know until she blocks it but I'm guessing hers hap will be at least two feet wider, corner to corner, than mine) on a deadline.

For our anniversary, Chris gave me the wool for my next KAL, the Scollay cardigan designed by Karie Westermann (Karie Bookish) for Louise Scollay, co-hosted by her at Knit British and Isla of the British Yarn Shop. This one starts when the Hapalong ends, and I started swatching last weekend.

Sheep Carousel: St-eek!

Another photo tutorial of me trying new things, this time it's steeking!

The competition for the Highland Wool Festival in Dingwall weekend before last was a knit or crochet tea/coffee cosy and as I've been meaning to knit Kate Davies' Sheep Carousel I went for it. I used some stash leftover from knitting her Sheep Heid back in 2011 (there's now a kit so you don't have to buy a full skein of every colour). Sheep Carousel involves Fair Isle stranded colourwork, which obviously I'd done before, and two techniques new to me: Latvian Braids and steeking.

It knit up really quickly; the braids made perfect sense and are really cute, and steeking turned out to only be a little bit eek-y:

Unsteeked teapot:

Steek panel:

Crochet reinforcement:

Cutting! Eek!

Neatly bound edges:

Repeat on the other side, then I whip stitched the steek panels to the inside. I didn't bother with ribbon edging as I figured it wouldn't get a lot of use. It didn't fit our tea pots - they have a lip like a jug, not a spout like the pattern assumes, and after a cursory search in local charity shops didn't lead to an appropriate tea pot, I decided to donate it to the silent auction. Chris gave me an automatic teapot for Christmas so I really don't need another one just to model my cosy. And no, I didn't win anything in the contest.

I did see a model a great deal cuter than any teapot whilst there, though: Little Djinn in the RipplesCrafts booth sample of Ysolda's Wee Melia. She didn't want to take it off and give it back, so of course I had to buy enough to make one she can keep in a rich orange (sample is Warm Gold).

Pompoms! DIY Centerpeice

We had a little tea party for two of Little Djinn's friends and their parents Easter weekend and I wanted something for a center-piece on the table so I grabbed some green acrylic yarn that I picked up in my brief crochet period (after I tried to cut off my middle finger and couldn't hold knitting needles) and my trusty (never used) pompom maker and some little Easter-themed figures from the grocery store:

Pompom maker, expanded:

Pompom maker, assuming the position:

Start wrapping yarn around one side:

then wrap around other side:

make sure both sides are wrapped really full:

cut around the side, following the groove:

cut all the strings:

tie a string around the middle:

release the arms:

all four of them:

pop the centers, Pompom!:

Arrange in a pleasing manner:

Pictured in a glass bowl with a small vase of flowers in the middle, on a green washcloth. I made medium and large pompoms until I ran out of yarn, placed them around the inner vase like hills, and placed sheep and bunnies on the pompoms.

A Hat, a Headband, and Another Hat

At the Edinburgh Yarn Festival, one of my only yarn purchases was a skein of Old Maiden Aunt's beautiful Superwash BFL DK in the colour Midnight, which is a lovely tonal dark purple with hints of violet and navy. It's the recommended yarn for Karie Bookish's Baskerville which I've admired since it was released in the OMA accessories yarn club in 2012. I've ordered OMA yarn online (sock yarn back in March of that year and while the colours are lovely they're perhaps not ones I would have picked out in person. Taking pictures of colours is an art, not a science (for example, looking at the website, I would have thought Midnight was a dark blue with purple undertones - it's very much a purple), so I put OMA on the list of "squish in person". I'm so glad I finally got a chance! I cannot say enough nice things about the wool or the colour.

I'm really happy with the hat, too. Tams/berets frame my face and suit me more than beanies, and it was a pleasure to knit. I particularly like how neatly the crown decreases fit with the lace pattern. Little Djinn really likes my hat, too.

Too much. Every time I turn around she's pulling it out of the pram and wandered off with it. This from a child who won't otherwise wear a hat. I should probably accept the inevitable and just knit a second one. The colour on her is the accurate one.

My Baskerville only used about half of the skein so I knit another pattern I had queued for years, Knitted Bliss' Strada Headband. I made mine a little shorter, used a provisional CO, and grafted the ends together to make a loop rather than a button closure. It is perfect for keeping my ears warm around the house or a little bit of warmth (and hair control!) on a warmish spring day. We had a bunch of those back in March when I knit it and not so many since. I still have around 10g of wool left so I added it to my DK toys stash.

Continuing my Karie Bookish love-fest, she released a free hat pattern around Easter, Seaforth. I knit it with some mystery yarn I was given when a friend of a friend decided knitting wasn't the hobby for her and destashed everything. I used just under half the wool and I'm thinking of maybe doing a cowl in the same stitch pattern with the remainders. The hat itself was a fun knit, the ribbing in particularly reminding me of dancing a zweifacher. Alas it's slightly too big for me (a risk when doing a yarn sub, particularly with mystery wool) but I figured if it didn't fit me I would pass it on to someone else,, in this case, Chris who appreciates a warm hat that covers his ears and likes bright colours and patterns.

Little Djinn likes this one, too.