Oops, I made a change

Okay I know I said I was going to knit the Little Arrowhead stole in my last blog, but things change and I found a pattern that better showcased the yarn. I found this pattern from the Knitty web site. The pattern is Wisp. When I first saw it I wasn't very impressed by it, but later on I when I looked again I realized it was perfect for the yarn. It was super easy to knit and I memorized the pattern fairly quickly. Here's a close-up of the stitched and buttons for Wisp.


Malorie is modeling the piece for me. It's a little too big for her now, but I made it for my sister in Nevada and in about 2 more years Malorie will be as big as her aunt! What I like about this piece is it's variations. It can be a poncho, cowl, scarf and a hood. The pattern shows how to do all these options. I knitted it a little shorter than the finished length the pattern has it at 50 inches after blocking, and mine is 44 inches. It blocked quickly and I am very proud of the piece. Now, I'll mail it and hopefully it will brighten my sister's day!!

Stoles and soapboxes

I've finally started my next project. I'm making the Arrowhead Stole from Interweave Knits. It knits up fairly quickly and only has 4 rows to memorize. I'm using my Aarlan Venice for it. I think that it will knit up quickly. It all ready shows the interesting color variants in the yarn with just 8 rows. The scary thing for me is that I'm laying in bed last night realizing that the arrow point will only go one way. Then I start thinking, it would look a whole lot better if you could make the arrow points switch in the middle of the stole. I figured if I reverse the row pattern I should get the arrow pattern facing the other way. Is this a sign that I'm getting too involved in my knitting? I keep wanting to change patterns that are perfectly fine.

I showed some relatives Malorie's backpack. They really liked it and were impressed that I took so much time to make a backpack that will be dirty by the end of the year. If they only knew that it took me just about 2 weeks and the joy of making something outweighs the practically of a piece.(Which by the way, a backpack is a pretty useful piece. IMHO) Not everything that you knit must be a cashmere, alpaca, mohair sweater that will only see the light of day once a month, if even that much. Thank you for letting me ramble about knitting for the masses and I'll get off my soapbox now.

The BAG is finished

I'm done with Malorie's school bag. It didn't take me too long to finish, even with the modifications that were made. It went from a messenger bag to a drawstring back pack. The SUPERNEWBIE support board at Knitty helped me so much with making the drawstring holes. I didn't think that I'd have to ask how to make holes, but I did. Malorie is pleased with the results and has already used it. She said it worked great. I lined the bag with some fabric that I had and it should last her for at least this school year.

Now, I'm still figuring out what to do next with my 3 skeins of Aarlan yarn. I googled it last night and found out that the yarn is from the 80's. So it'll be my first time knitting with "vintage" yarn.

My first foray into design (sort of)

I'm still working on Malorie's school bag, but I'm tweaking the design. The pattern calls for a lot of extra knitting to make it a messenger bag, so I decided to cut back on one of the repeats and turn it into a drawstring bag. Malorie likes the idea and now I'll have enough yarn to finish it. I'm about three-quarters of the way done. I have about 15 days to finish it, which should be enough time. I've been knitting away at swimming lessons. It's a great place to knit, the kids are getting worn out and I can knit without any at home distractions.

I've started cables and I am surviving

Cable knitting has always scared me. I couldn't understand how to hold stitches back and work around them. Even watching episodes of Knitty Gritty still couldn't encourage me. But I found a pattern for Malorie's bag and it has cables. The Sweater Bag uses cables, but now that I've done socks I'm not so scared. What's the worst thing that will happen? That's right, I'll have to rip it out. No big deal, I've had to do it already. I'm getting fairly good at not losing stitches when I am frogging. I think I should be able to finish this project by the end of the month. It moves along fairly quickly. I'm using some really old Red Heart yarn (from my neighbor, see last post). It's not what the pattern calls for, but it's what I've got and I fairly close to gauge.

Monkeys done and now onto the next project

Okay, I have finally finished the Monkey socks! The second sock looks a whole lot better than the first one I did. My tension is better and my stitches are neater. When I blocked the socks you could tell the difference in size. There's about an eighth of an inch in size difference. That's okay though, I'm still going to wear them. At least I can say I've knitted socks. I think I may do some more later on, but for right now I need to get started on Malorie's school bag. School is just a month away (YEAH!!) and I found some yarn that I think will work for her bag.

My wonderful neighbor asked me the other day if I needed anything from garage sales. She loves to go look through other people's junk. I told her not really, but if she found any yarn, I would take it. Well 2 days ago she comes over with 3 grocery bags full of yarn. Granted most of it is synthetic, but there were 3 beautiful gray skeins of a wool/mohair mix. (I can't wait to use those beauties!) She had gone to visit her mother in assisted living and told her about the neighbor girl who is knitting. Her mother had her pull out the bags of yarn. She gave me all of it for free. I don't know where I'll use it all, but most of it is really quite nice. Malorie saw the yarn and picked out what she wanted from these bags to make her school bag. The only problem is that the yarn won't felt, but I think I can work around that. I guess I'll take a little from various bag patterns and put them together. The worst I can do is rip, rip and rip.

EEE, OOO, EEE (My monkey impression)

I'm almost done with my monkeys. Too bad they don't look as nice as everyone else's I see on the Internet. I just don't know if it is my yarn choice or my gauge. (That ugly "G" word rears it's ugly head again.) I'm starting to think about what next to knit. I need to make Malorie's bag, but I'm just not really feeling the urge to do it. Maybe I'll be inspired to do it once I've blocked the socks. These have been a great summer knit. I don't have tons of heavy fabric laying on me while I knit. I think that's why I'm dreading the bag. Next time I blog I'll have the socks done and pix up for viewing.