Yarn Along - Baby Blanket Progress

Well June has been a crazy month this year.  The husband took a 17-day motorcycle trip across the country with my dad, then three days after they got home I left for a five-day church conference.  (You can read all about the motorcycle trip on my dad's blog In Search of the Weird.  They found some.)  I've been trying to catch up on a lot of things and re-establish some order and routine around here.

I finished the first baby blanket of the year on June 1, right on schedule.

This is my second time making the Mitered Crosses Blanket from Kay of Mason-Dixon Knitting.  I still really like this pattern, and would like to do another variation of it.  Also, I love it when I can knit a whole blanket from the stash.

I love the look of i-cord edging.  It takes forever, but it isn't hard and is so worth it.

This blanket is for a baby I wouldn't "normally" knit a blanket for.  Blankets are usually limited to nieces and nephews, especially since there are so many of them.  But I felt moved to make a blanket for her, I had an idea, I had the yarn, and I make the silly knitting rules anyway, so I did.  I'm not sure yet if this will wait around until her first birthday (when I usually gift blankets), or if I'll give it when the weather starts to turn cold.

During this crazy month of June I've been working away on Nephew E's blanket.  Rendition #4 of the Tell Me A Story blanket.  All 42 squares are done now, and I've started in on edging them.

 Actually at some point during the church conference I lost count and ended up with an extra square.  Whoops.  I'm trying not to look at all the ends already in that picture.  So that's more than half done, running a bit ahead of schedule.

As far as reading goes, there hasn't been much of it with all the other things going on this month.  I do have My Grandmother's Knitting by Larissa Brown out from the library.  It's a great book with stories from some well-known designers.  They tell stories of the knitter who first introduced them to knitting, or the one who really inspired them.  Then they share patterns inspired by these (usually) family members.  I have it more for the stories than the patterns right now, but both are quite good.
Check out Ginny's Yarn Along for more books and knitting.

More to come from me, hopefully soon.  Washcloths are on schedule, and I'm working to finish another Christmas stocking this week.  I need to show you the most recent finished baby sweater, and there's been one more birth this month, so one more sweater to start, too.

Yarn Along: New Baby Blanket

I'm joining in Ginny's Yarn Along again this week.  Check out her blog for lots of links to lots of great projects and books.

I haven't finished anything recently, but that hasn't stopped me from starting the next baby blanket.  This one is for Nephew E.

I've knit this same pattern, Tell Me A Story, three times before: Nephew S (in the pre-blog, pre-Ravelry days), Nephew R, and Nephew O.  This time I'm using Plymouth Encore Worsted yarn, and this is the first time I've used grey as the neutral color instead of cream.  Six squares done so far, out of 42.
This blanket has been accepted as my Defense Against the Dark Arts OWL in the HPKCHC. Stranded back-and-forth knitting, fourth time through a big project, and all the ends to weave in -- I think any one of those elements would have qualified this project for "Practice Repelling the Cruciatus Curse."  But it's not that bad, and while I'm still knitting the squares, it makes good portable knitting.  Staying on schedule with this is taking almost all of my usual knitting time.

For reading, I recently started Ireland's Pirate Queen:  The True Story of Grace O'Malley by Anne Chambers.  My dad picked this up for my husband, but he left it on the dining room table one day too long and I'm reading it before him now.  This is the kind of non-fiction my dad and I absolutely love.  It sounds like Granuaile was a truly amazing woman.  I can't wait to read the rest of this, and I hope to get to go visit the O'Malley lands sometime in the next few years.

2013 Washcloths - May Edition

May's washcloth is complete, for a total of six so far this year.  Ten more to go.  Made once again with the spring-green color of Nashua Handknits Creative Focus Cotton (same as the January washcloth), this pattern is called Tulip Lace, from May 2nd on the perpetual calendar.  There's just a tiny ball of green left, so I think there'll be a random multi-color Nashua washcloth sometime this year.

I'm turning this in for my Transfiguration "homework" in the HPKCHC.  The assignment was to make a fish or flower or something with a fish or flower motif.  Perpetual calendar came up with Tulip Lace on May 2nd and Fish-tail Lace on May 3rd.  I thought this green yarn would be just right for the greenery around a bunch of tulips, so I picked flowers.  Ta-da.

Yarn Along - Scrappy Striped Toddler Socks

Joining Ginny's Yarn Along again this week.  Lots of great knitting and reading ideas over there.

I've been knitting a pair of socks for Lil One out of some sock yarn left over from a pair I made for me and a pair for the husband.  The red-purple-blue stripes on the legs actually made a pair of socks for me and a simple hat for Lil One before I used up the last of it here.  Since I knew I would run out of that, I'm knitting these two-at-a-time so the socks will match.  I don't have a long circular needle in the right size, and I prefer double pointed needles for socks, so I'm using this technique from an old Knitty article to make one sock inside the other on dpns.  The blue-brown-black yarn is the leftover from the husband's favorite pair of socks.  Those were actually the first socks I made two-at-a-time on double points. I think it'll just be enough to finish these socks.  I'm hoping to finish them today and turn them in for Detention points in the HPKCHC.  Gryffindors try to "WIP the First" and turn in a Detention project on the first of every month.

The husband and I have been listening to the final book in Robert Jordan's (help from Brandon Sanderson) Wheel of Time mega-series.  I love these books, and love the audio versions.  We laugh all the way through the Matrim sections.  I may just have to start the series over when we finish this book.

Baby Blanket Squares

Most of my knitting time recently has been going into squares for the first baby blanket of the year.  This is my second time making the Mitered Crosses blanket from Mason-Dixon Knitting, and I still love the pattern.  Instigated by the 2011 tsunami in Japan, proceeds from the sales of this pattern still go to Mercy Corps relief work.
For a baby-sized blanket, I adjust the pattern and do a simple 3x3 square.  That's my 5-inch gauge ruler in the picture for scale.  I'm knitting it entirely out of worsted weight stash, and am pretty thrilled that it looks like I may actually have enough of the cream color.  One more square to go, attaching, weaving of ends, and an applied I-cord border (in the multi-color yarn).  Looks to be on track for finishing by the end of May!

I have once again joined the Harry Potter Knitting and Crochet House Cup group on Ravelry.  I intend that this will distract me from neither my knitting goals nor my blogging.  It did last time, but this time around I feel like I know more about it, and have a plan for incorporating it into my knitting routine.  Hopefully, it will also help me get my ravelry projects page caught up with reality.

New Year, New Knitting

One thing I try to avoid with this blog is apologizing for not blogging.  But after such a long lapse, I want to make an exception:  Yikes that was a long time without blogging.
Late fall seems to be a difficult time of year for me.  I haven't figured it out yet, but at least now I've noticed the pattern.

2012 Recap and 2013 Goals:
I met my washcloth goals for the year - one each month plus one more each quarter, total of 16.  November's was late, but other than that I did well, and I had enough for all my gifting needs.  I will renew this goal for 2013.

There were only four Christmas stockings to make this year, all done on time.  Two of them were a for-pay job.   So far I know of four needed in 2013.  My stocking goal is to do one per quarter.

In the second half of 2012 I was quite into the Harry Potter Knitting & Crochet House Cup group on Ravelry.  It was lots of fun, but somehow seemed to sap my blogging mojo and then my knitting mojo (although it may have simply been whatever-it-was in November that sapped most of that).  I completely missed the sign-ups for winter term (January through March), so I'm sitting out a semester and will see if I want to re-join starting in May.  I don't seem to have the mental energy to categorize my knitting so I can do all I want to in that game.

My main Christmas knitting projects were hats for one of the nieces-and-nephews groups:

(Swirled Ski Caps from the book Knitting for Peace.  Fun and appreciated, but a bit down to the wire, and my homemade cardboard pom-pom maker is now completely worn out)

and a hot water bottle cozy for my mom.

I'm pretty proud of this one.  I used a basic cozy pattern and a snowflake chart pattern and adapted them to fit both each other and the water bottle I bought.

Also coming up in 2013:
I know many people expecting babies in the first part of this year.  So many that I have had to write a list to keep track of them all. So there will be lots of baby-sweater knitting in my immediate future.

I will be going to Rhinebeck!  In October I'll be having a knitting weekend away!  A group of us have rented a house for the weekend of the New York Sheep & Wool Festival.  My goal is to finish the sweater I started for myself on New Year's 2010 in time to wear it to Rhinebeck.

Other big projects include at least three baby blankets for late 2013/early 2014, so I better get an early start on those.

One final note to close out 2012:  My brother knows how to shop for a knitter.  He gave me "socks; some assembly required" (yarn, pattern book, and needles), yarn for socks for him, a yarn bowl (!), another set of needles, a yarn travel book, and a "Keep Calm and Carry Yarn" tote bag.

I'm looking forward to a new year of knitting, and of sharing it with this blog!

Olympic Report

My Lil One loves owls; her first favorite clothes were all ones with owls on them.  I love Kate Davies' Owl Sweater pattern - what a great idea to make a cable pattern into characters on a sweater!  Whimsical yet understated.  So I decided back in the spring that I should make the Owlet version of the sweater for Lil One.  Still being somewhat new at this parenting gig I said so in her hearing.  For the next two months every time she came to Knit Night with me, she'd point at the wall of Liberty Wool yarn, look at me, and say "Owl sweater."  So to be certain it would happen, I made the Owlet sweater my Olympic Project.

(It's the project I knit while watching the Olympics, so I'm calling it my Olympic Project.  Valid use of the language.)

The pattern calls for aran yarn, but I got gauge on the first try in the worsted weight Liberty Wool on size 8 needles.  I knit the 24-month size, the largest of the "baby" sizes, and although Lil One turns two in a few weeks, I believe this will fit her all through this coming winter and spring.

I must have been in the zone during the Opening Ceremonies party at my LYS, because I managed to knit more than one whole ball and got nearly to the underarms.  I knit the sleeves at the same time on one long circular needle (which wasn't quite long enough for comfort), then the adorable and easy owl pattern, decreases, ribbing, and Jeny's Surprisingly Stretchy Bind-off.

I think I like the matte buttons with shanks better than the shiny buttons with holes, but my local giant-craft-store didn't have enough of them, so I just used them for the center(ish) owls on the front and back.  Finished sewing on the buttons on Wednesday, August 8, comfortably ahead of schedule.  I submitted the sweater to the Ravellenic Games, earning three medals -- Baby Dressage, Cable Steeplechase, and Sweater Triathlon.  Also submitted to Quiddich in the Harry Potter Knit & Crochet House Cup, but not for real points as I'm still a Not-Quite-First-Year.  I did complete my sorting form this month, so I hope to have a House and start playing "for real" in September.

Overall I'm very happy with this project, and am really looking forward to giving it to the Lil One for her birthday.

2012 Washcloths - 2nd Quarter Report

Washcloth knitting has gone very well in the second quarter of 2012.  I already posted about the April washcloth, and here is the one I finished in May:

This pattern is "chevron rib" and is featured on April 27 in my pattern-a-day calendar.  This washcloth took the longest of any this quarter because it was a long time before I could "read" the knitting in this pattern.  For most of the time I was blindly following the written instructions, but finally I got to the point where I could tell what to do based on the previous row of knitting.  I'm not sure what made this pattern like that, perhaps that I was doing only one repeat, perhaps the narrowness of the ribs.  Anyhow, finally finished.

Next is the extra dishcloth for this quarter, knit in May and a little bit of June.  Again falling back on the Ballband Dishcloth standard, this time with yellow bricks and pastel rainbow mortar.  Whenever Lil One suddenly wants to "help knit" I'll quickly cast on one of these for her to watch a row or two.

 Finally, the June washcloth.  I knit this all in one day in early June, and will be turning it in to the Harry Potter Knitting & Crochet House Cup as my homework for Flying class.  The prompt for Flying this month was about "flying by the seat of your pants" and crafting something such that you didn't know what the finished product would look like during the crafting (or making pants).  I decided to try my hand at making a randomized pattern, so I quickly set a few rules and dove right in.  I started reading the first Harry Potter book, and every time I came to a proper noun I'd make a two-stitch cable.  For people names it would be right-leaning and for place names left-leaning.  I kept a three-stitch and three-row garter border, and cabled on both sides of the knitting.  This washcloth represents most of the first chapter.  If I were to do it again, I think I'd cable one way for first names and the other for last names, dropping the place names because there weren't many of them.
This process made for slow reading but very fast knitting, and what I think will be a very scrubby washcloth.

Yarn Along - Bunny & Mystery

I'm participating in Ginny's Yarn Along again this week.  Check it out to see lots of good ideas for knitting (and crochet) and reading.

I keep hoping that the recent bout of finish-it-up-itis I've experienced with knitting will spill over into my reading.  I have lots of almost-finished books laying around.  No luck so far though; not a lot of reading has been going on in the past few weeks.

The husband and I did recently finish an audiobook -- Evil Under the Sun A Hercule Poirot mystery by Agatha Christie.  I love Poirot, and this book was read by David Suchet, the actor who played Poirot on the TV show.  I think eventually we'll listen to every unabridged Poirot book read by Suchet.  Very good.

The project pictured above is the body and head of a bunny I'm knitting for Niece K's second birthday.  This is the second project I'm making out of the itty-bitty toys book by Susan B. Anderson.  I remain very pleased with this book.  Yesterday I bought yarn for my third project out of it.   Lil One keeps trying to run off with the parts of this project, too, so I'll have to make something for her soon!

My sister-in-law asked if I could make Niece K some leg warmers, so I improvised some based on the pair I made for Lil One last year.  These will also be part of her birthday present.  Here they are pretending to be adult arm warmers.

I've turned these in to the Harry Potter Knitting & Crochet House Cup to meet the assignment in History of Magic -- craft something FABULOUS to wear to a record company soiree.  We're researching Quibbler articles you see, and never mind.  It really doesn't matter; they just count for points somehow.

Finish all the things and start a game

I finished Dad's vest in time to give it to him on his birthday! and it fits! and he likes it!

My apologies for using so many exclamation points, but this project has been weighing on me for almost three years and now it's done and all is well!  I have to find a new project to promote into the drawer it has been occupying.  Probably this year's Christmas stocking knitting.

Finishing this project, and having been monogamous to it for about three weeks, seems to have inspired me to finish up several other things.

2012 Washcloths May edition:

 Ribbed chevron pattern, April 27 from my pattern-a-day calendar.  This was a hard pattern to "read" - I had to keep the pattern on hand for a long time instead of just being able to follow the knitting.  It used my regular dishcloth yarn of Sugar 'n Cream.
Purse socks:

 Universal toe-up formula with 2x2 ribbed legs.  I started these sometime last fall, which may mean that my purse sock speed is increasing.  My brother gave me the yarn for Christmas a few years ago.  I've already cast on the next pair of purse socks.  These will be top-down and for the husband.  A nice dark green yarn that seems to be a single ply.

Baby socks for the Lil One:

The pattern for these was Toddler Socks from the blog Creating a Family Home.  I used the yarn left over from the pair of socks I knit several years ago to learn the two-at-a-time technique (on dpns).

 I have recently discovered the Harry Potter Knitting and Crochet House Cup group on Ravelry.  I had heard about it in passing before, but this past month I listened to a description of it on an older episode of The Well-Knitted Life podcast, and checked it out.  It's a game where knitters join in, are sorted into houses as in Hogwarts, and earn points for their houses by knitting or crocheting.  Each term is three months long, and each month there are eight classes offered; each class gives a homework assignment, usually with several options.  You have to knit (or crochet) something within that month and make an argument that it meets the homework requirements.  The idea is that each student turns in at least one class assignment per month to qualify to get sorted and keep playing next term.  There are also Quidditch teams, challenges, WIPs can be turned in to detention, and so on and so on.  After getting sucked in and wandering around all the discussion threads and links for quite some time, I joined the group.  Because I joined after term started, I didn't get sorted into a house and my status is "Not Quite a First-Year" -- points I earn don't count toward any house's total, but they could help me earn priority for sorting next term.

It's all very complex, but also a lot of fun.  If you like the Harry Potter stories and might like to use that world as a framework for some knitting challenges, I encourage you to check out the group.  They do a much better job of explaining things than my little outline, and everyone is happy to answer questions and help newbies get started.

So anyhow, I joined and I'm really enjoying it.  I turned in the squishies for the assignment in Care of Magical Creatures.  May's prompt was about studying thestrals and abraxan (two kinds of flying horses), so one of the options was to knit something using a worsted weight "workhorse" yarn.  The squishes were knit out of worsted weight, and I knit them entirely within the month of May, so they qualified.  The toddler socks met the Mini-sock Challenge for Quidditch -- no more than four inches tall and long, and knit between May 18-28 -- so I turned those in as well.

Hopefully this trend of knitting efficiently and finishing things will continue!