FO: Honey Cowl

I can’t find one of my FOs from the past few months. It is the purple cotton poncho that I was knitting last year during NaBloPoMo. I will keep looking for it, but in the meanwhile here is another FO I just finished today made with the same yarn.

finished honey cowl

I started this in the summer to have a simple knit to work on during my summer trip. I have knit several Honey Cowls and I highly recommend the pattern!

Hopefully, I will find the poncho. Clearly, I haven’t been wearing it but maybe it is time to start doing so!

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FO: Knitted Knockers

I’m going to try to post about the few things I’ve finished since I last posted. I am not sure I have pictures of everything, but I will try.

First up: Knitted Knockers!

At Stitches West this year I stopped in the Knitted Knockers booth and picked up three shades of Cascade Ultra Pima (the yarn they recommend) as well as donating a couple more skeins. Knitted Knockers are exactly what they sound like: a knitted breast prothesis for breast cancer survivors. Apparently the cotton is light and breathable and the way you knit them allows for adjustments in size if needed. I knit several sizes in each of the colors I got.

knockers come in many colors

These are not stuffed because I am going to mail them back for distribution and this way they will be easier to mail. They were quite fun to knit, actually, and I would consider picking up more yarn to make more. If you’re looking for a quick charity knit, I highly recommend this one!

honey cowl is finished!

My first finished project since September!

I love it!

Yes, really, even though I am not smiling at all. It took all day to dry and now it’s late and I’m tired.

This yarn came from a friend’s haul at Goodwill and I have three more skeins of it. I need to figure out what the rest of it will become. I do have my next project all picked out. It’s a log cabin baby blanket in a fuzzy, soft cotton yarn. I have high hopes for it.

finished scarf

Three years ago, I knit my mother a shawlette for her birthday. I made it from Rowan Summer Tweed and while I was knitting it, I noticed it had an odd smell. Silk sometimes does. I figured that it would go away when I washed and blocked it. It never really did. Mom liked the color and the shawlette but finally admitted that it was hard to wear because the smell was unpleasant.

Last week, I decided to replace that shawl with one knit from some silk yarn that my friend Kate was destashing that I took. I’m not sure what the yarn is but it’s a fairly heavy (aran to bulky) loosely plied silk…with no smell! I chose the scroll lace scarf pattern from Ysolda Teague’s Whimsical Little Knits 2. I didn’t think I’d have it done in a week but, with a little help from the hair dryer, it was washed and blocked this morning and ready for her birthday!

She said she loved it and sent me a modeled shot.

It’s pretty warm, considering how small it is. I hope it keeps her shoulders warm when she needs just that.

Happy Birthday, Mom!

NaBloPoMo Day 25: stripe-tacular

I wish I could show you a better modeled shot of the hat I finished it but I washed it last night and it is still not dry. It’s gotten cool here which means that it’s damp and, apparently, nothing dries. Even though it’s wet, I can show you the jogless color changes.

I tried a new method for them this time. I usually knit around one row in the new color and then knit into the stitch below for the first stitch of the second round. That method requires that you have two rows of each color, though, and this hat has some single row stripes. I did a search, though, and found this method on TECHknitting. Instead of knitting into the stitch below you slip the first stitch on the row after you change color, even if that next row is another color. The slipped stitch then moves from being the first stitch of the round to the last, so you remove your marker, slip the stitch, and then replace the marker. It’s not totally invisible but it’s pretty good.

Speaking of stripes, I have a new stripey project.

It’s the Not So Baby Yoda Sweater. I love baby sweaters because they are so fast! I started this last night and that picture shows a sleeve and a third, or so. I am hoping to finish the second sleeve tonight so I can start on the fronts. No fancy techniques for this sweater, just adorable baby-sized stripey goodness.

NaBloPoMo Day 24: finished hat

I finished a hat.

Sorry for the terrible picture. I will get a better one tomorrow. I want to photograph the jogless stripes because the new way I found to do it even works with 1-row stripes! Very cool.

Now, my older son is having a friend sleepover for the first time so I need to go to bed early in case when they wake up at the crack of dawn.

knitted underpants?

Last night at knitting I was working on the back of my Conic sweater, which was almost done. I spread it out on the table to admire it and Jill wondered what part of the sweater it was, because it doesn’t look like a sweater part normally does.

I told her it was the middle of the back and then folded it lengthwise and said, jokingly, that it was a sleeve. Then I folded it the other way and discovered something slightly disturbing.

It appears that I am knitting underpants…

I better block it and start picking up the arm stitches quickly!

Also, since I last posted I have finished a bunny buddy.

(Someone had a baby, so you had to know I’d be knitting one of these.)

And a pair of fingerless mitts for a friend’s newly adopted daughter.

I didn’t think an 11-year-old would want a bunny. I have a second ball of that yarn and I’m very tempted to knit her a hat to go with the mitts. I better hurry because these things are cotton and she lives in Minnesota and it’s probably already too cold for cotton mitts and hats there! Maybe she can wear them inside.

finished, at last!

I know some of you won’t believe this (Jen C, I’m looking at you!) but my double knit, 67 rows of non-repeating colorwork cowl is done. Totally and completely. The top has been kitchenered, the ends tucked inside, and it was even blocked. Amazing. Let’s start with the finished photos for you to ooh and aah over.

The pink side.

The brown side (the one I think I will keep facing out.

A quick modeled shot. This thing is warm!

It felt so good to set this project to completed on Ravelry and not have it show up as WIP anymore. To recap, I started this cowl in 2008. I fell in love with the pictures of it on Ravelry and someone else in my knitting group was making it and it seemed like such a good idea. Then I got about 19 rows into the 110 stitches of (as I already said) nonrepeating double knit colorwork and lost my steam. Last November I picked it up again and got down to knitting. A couple of weeks later, the colorwork was finished. I am not sure how long after that all of the knitting was done but it didn’t take long. Then I started doing the kitchener stitch of the 220 stitches at the top… and messed up. Since knitting seems to exacerbate my elbow issues I decided to bring it to knitting night last week as a nonknitting knitting project. I messed up the kitchener again but Veronica showed me how she does it so I could see what I was doing wrong. (Can I just say I haven’t done kitchener stitch in a while? That is my story and I’m sticking to it.)

And now it’s done. Before the mornings are bitter cold. I am really looking forward to wearing it while biking with the kids to school during the cold (for California) winter mornings.

And Jen C and Jen S (who both knit much larger double knit projects than this) you can laugh at me for this taking so long, just do it quietly and where I can’t hear you.

yarmulkes for sale!

Let’s start with apologies: I’m a bad blogger, you know it, I know it, I just don’t do it regularly. Okay, I’m glad I got that off my chest.

Now, what have I been knitting? Not a lot, actually. My husband had a gallstone attack on Mother’s day and I spent that evening with him in the ER, knitting away on my blue Etesian sweater while leaning awkwardly in an ER chair. The next day, my elbow started to hurt. Then I did a bunch of data entry for my job and it hurt more. And my forearm hurt. And… it hasn’t totally gone away. A mom at school who is a doctor told me that she thought it was tennis elbow, I’ve had acupuncture three times for it, which has helped, but it still aches and my forearm muscles are still very tight.

It sucks.

(My husband is fine now, though gall bladder-free and on a doctor ordered low fat diet and kind of sad about that.)

So, I took a break from knitting, mostly. I have been crocheting quite a bit, though.

Dave, from Chub Creek, posted on Twitter that someone should make him a coffee carafe and mug cozy, so I did.

Completely by accident, it arrived just before his birthday. He sent me a thank you Chub Creek mug in return.

Which is enormous. I use it in the morning to pretend I’m drinking giant mugs of coffee, even though I can’t drink real coffee any more because it makes me insane. (It’s hell getting old.)

Next up in the FO parade: little bag for Brenda Dayne‘s A Memorable Yarn project.

I used yarn from Karen’s stash and embroidered a pink K on it since pink was Karen’s favorite color. The Memorable Yarn event that I attended at A Verb for Keeping Warm ended up being held on the anniversary of Karen’s passing, so it was quite appropriate.

Speaking of pink… I finished my impulsively started Annis.

I was knitting it one evening with my knitting friends and I said I didn’t think I’d ever wear this pink shawl with a beaded edge and my friend Teenuh said that she loved it. Her birthday was coming up so… problem solved! And the shawl has a new home with someone who loves pink and sparkly beads. Perfect.

When I was working on Dave’s cozies my younger son commented that he loved that blue color and would I please make him something with it? When I asked what he’d like he decided on a blankie for his stuffed dog, Snowball.

Stuffed dogs are easy to please. My son liked it too.

Last, but not least, my friend Pam’s son is having his bar mitzvah and at some point earlier in the year she mentioned that she might need help making yarmulkes. I decided that knitting them was a) too hard on my elbow and b) too time consuming. After knitting three I settled into crochet and made eight crocheted yarmulkes (plus the three knitted ones).

I stacked them at knit night and it reminded me of Caps for Sale, a book I loved as a child. I’m still thinking that I need to write Yarmulkes for Sale! I just need an illustrator.

Whew. Are you still with me? Good. I have more pictures. This time of yarn that I bought while visiting my brother and his family in NJ. Did you know that in NJ they don’t charge sales tax for yarn because (like clothing) it is an “essential”? A belief that yarn is essential: I like that in a state.

I got some Berroco Origami on sale for a sweater I’ve been wanting to make for two years.

And then I got some single skeins of Rowan Cotton Jeans that were also on sale.

I am not sure what I’ll do with those. I thinking maybe some crochet coasters or something similar.

There was also Rowan Calmer in the sale bin.

The colors are more different than they look in the pictures. I see hats and mitts in that yarn’s future.

I don’t know if anyone stuck with me through this long, picture-heavy post. Maybe if I posted more often I wouldn’t have so many pictures to share at once. Maybe.

quietly knitting away

I have been quiet for the past two months, haven’t I? I have been knitting (and crocheting) away, though. First I made a crocheted basket for my mom for her birthday.

It matches the washcloth/hand towel that I made for her for Christmas. I still haven’t given it to her, though! I need to rectify that.

Next up, a silvery scarf for I am not sure who. For the fun of knitting it, perhaps.

In the same theme, I made an orange Lintilla scarf, unsure if I would actually want to wear it. I didn’t.

I liked knitting it, and I liked the way it turned out but the orange didn’t work on me. Luckily, it worked on Kristi.

Sorry for the blurry faced picture. We were inside, at Stitches West! Speaking of Stitches, I bought some lovely blue Lisa Souza silk at Stitches.

I think it will become a cowl. But first, I am knitting a sweater from Norah Gaughan Vol. 10 called Etesian. I tried on the sample at the WEBS booth at Stitches and fell in love with it. They are now knitting up their garments in size 14 and size 4 so I was able to try on the larger one. I am pleased with this trend and emailed them to tell them so! I’m knitting mine in ArtFibers Chutney, a matte silk yarn. My swatches turned out nicely and I have high hopes for it! I didn’t take a photo of them, so you’ll have to take my word for it.

One last finished object: A binary cable hat.

I knit one of these for Cookie and on the way to Yosemite last week, I decided that I wanted one too. My plan was to knit it in the car and wear it there. Well… I didn’t start it until we got back but I have finished it and wore it this morning for school drop off. (That is when the picture was taken.)

Whew. I guess I have been busy! No time to type more, though, my new sweater project is calling.