Lots of Knitting!

 Hi all -

I've been knitting up a storm lately, so I have a lot to share! We actually got down to freezing at my home last night, so I might get to enjoy more of my knitted items soon. Fall is in the air, but I'm sure the dog days of summer will be back soon!

For my birthday month, I really concentrated on finishing my Birthday Bliss shawl designed by Amy Gunderson. I was excited to get it finished before the end of August! Here is the finished shawl:

Birthday Bliss

I should block it, but I can still use it as a large scarf if I never get around to that. I hate blocking, especially large items like this! But blocking really does make the lace shine and will get rid of some of the rolling that I'm getting on one end.

Finishing my birthday shawl inspired me to start a new project. (I don't need to start any new projects, but have to follow the mojo....) A lot of the projects that I get as kits, like this shawl, come with lots of small balls of yarn and end up with lots of small leftovers:

Project Leftovers

All of these leftovers were starting to bother me, so I decided to start knitting a Habitation Throw designed by Helen Stewart. This is an easy-to-knit pattern that allows you to throw in whatever spare pieces of yarn you have. Here is where I am so far:

Habitation Throw

I'm really enjoying seeing some of the scraps disappear, although the pile doesn't seem to get any smaller. The pattern has you connect the pieces of yarn using a technique called the "magic knot." I found that some of the yarn I had couldn't handle the magic loop, so I've switched to just holding the old and new yarn together for 10-20 stitches when I am transitioning between yarns. This will save me from having to weave in a million ends when I'm finished with the throw and isn't noticeable in the stitching. The yarns that I had the trouble with were what are called "singles". These are single-ply yarns without any twist. Although they are strong when pulling on the yarn, I found that yarn would easily break when I put a tight knot in it. If I were using all plied yarns, I would probably stick with the magic loop technique since it allows you to get all but a couple of inches of each yarn into the blanket.

 Another project I worked on is the Laxo Worsted hat designed by Laura Nelkin:

Laxo Worsted

This hat knits up quickly and is very warm with the fold-over brim. The faux cables look fancy, but they are very easy to do and don't require a cable needle.

I also picked up and made some progress on my Hring Scarf, also designed by Laura Nelkin:

Hring Scarf

I have a love/hate relationship with this scarf. I think the pattern is beautiful and the yarn is soft and feels wonderful once it's knit up. However, I find the yarn a bear to work with. The yarn has an uneven consistency (that is, it's thicker in some places and thinner in others) and it has what I would call slugs throughout. It also kind of sticks to itself when knit together. When you add my tight knitting style to the inconsistencies and the stickiness, you get knitting that is very hard to read (when looking at the stitches I've made, it's hard to tell which stitch is of which type) and very hard to unknit. So mistakes are hard to fix. So, I'm actually thinking of punting this project. I just can't decide if the final product is worth the trouble. I'll put it aside for a while again before making the final decision.

In place of working on the Hring Scarf, I started working on the Otayski headband designed by Laura Nelkin:

Otayski

I'm enjoying working on this much more! The yarn feels so good in my hands and you can read every stitch you make! This month is Laura's K(n)it-along where you can win prizes for working on her kits, of which I have plenty! So I wanted to join in and make some progress.

I've also made some good progress on my After the Storm Cardigan designed by Kelly Fowler. You can actually tell that it's a sweater now:

After the Storm Cardigan

I've connect the fronts to the back under the arms, so am now just knitting back and forth for the body. This is a lot of knitting because I'm a larger person and this sweater is designed to be worn with 12" of positive ease. That means that you make the size of sweater that is 12" larger around than your measurements. That's a lot of knitting with fingering weight yarn! But this yarn is really soft and beautiful and I'm loving it! It's from Crafty That Way and is dyed to order. I'm finding that the color matches perfectly between skeins so I don't have to alternate skeins or do anything to hide transitions between skeins. And the brown is a beautiful, rich milk chocolate color that I'm loving! It may take me a while to finish this sweater, but I know already that I'm going to love it when it's done!

Finally, my Habitation Throw inspired me to do some more work on my Witchful Thinking cowl designed by Amy Gunderson.

Witchful Thinking

 This is another one of those advent calendar type projects that gives you a little ball of yarn or a prize each day. This was from Halloween last year and I got busy and put it aside. I decided that I wanted to finish this up and throw the leftover yarn in the pile for my throw (or for another throw down the road).

So, you can see I've got plenty keeping me busy! I hope everyone is enjoying the end of summer and the start of fall!

Nancy

I'm 60!

 Hi all -

It's been a long and busy year, and I'm finally getting around to writing another blog post. It's been a very busy year. Our little company was acquired by Google on Dec 1 and I've spent a lot of this time working every spare hour to get our system to run in their cloud. I got the initial work done in mid-June so have had more time for other stuff this summer. But I never got around to writing about any of it, so decided that I should write today since it's my 60th birthday. Boy, does time fly!

To get back into things, I worked on a lot of small projects. I started with the Rosemary Cowl by Alison Green:

Rosemary Cowl

Then I made the Permafrost Cowl by Rachel Brockman, which is shaped to protect your skin where your coat opens:

Permafrost Cowl

Permafrost Cowl

I had a lot of yarn left over from the Permafrost Cowl, so I decided to make a Fernhill Hat by Kate Gagnon Osborn:

Fernhill Hat

Fernhill Hat

I also made the Bridgette by Jane Richmond:

Bridgette

I made these Mosaic Dish Towels by Universal Yarns:

Mosaic Dish Towels

and made an extra towel with the remaining yarn:

I made these Colorful Cloths by Amy Gunderson:

Colorful Cloths

and made a couple of extra dishcloths with the leftovers:

I made the Embark Shawlette by Becky Dahlberg:

Embark Shawlette

Embark Shawlette

I made the Orchid Cowl by Jo Strong:

Orchid Cowl Detail

Orchid Cowl

All of these projects were from the Jimmy Beans Wool Accessory Club. I really enjoy this club because you get a new, fairly small project each month with interesting patterns and a variety of wool. You also get similar knit and crochet patterns each month. So far I'm just doing the knit projects, but I do want to learn to crochet, too.

I also started knitting the Flowla shawl by Laura Nelkin. The is the July Lola's Choice project. Laura decided to do a mini mystery knit-along for this project: the pattern was divided into 4 parts and we received a new part each week. I finished the first two parts:

Flowla

After that, I got a bit bored with this pattern and got tired of knitting with cotton yarn, which has no give. So I started working on my After the Storm Cardigan by Kelly Fowler:

After the Storm Cardigan

It's hard to tell, but this is the upper back of the cardigan. The pattern has narrow stripes of color, and, if you look closely, you can see that I just finished my first stripe, which is purple.

Finally, a couple of years ago I purchased the Birthday Box from Jimmy Beans Wool. This is like an advent calendar for your birthday month. I thought my 60th birthday was the perfect time to work on this! This is the box:

Every day you get a little surprise or a small ball of yarn to create the accompanying shawl project:

The project is the Birthday Bliss shawl by Amy Gunderson. There are knit and crochet versions of the pattern and I'm working on the knit version. So far, I've kept up to date and here is yesterday's progress:

Birthday Bliss

Birthday Bliss Day 11 Close-up

That's all of the knitting I've been doing. It looks like a lot, but the projects were small it's been a while.

Some of you are probably also wondering about Lance. He continues to do well. Amazingly, he's somewhere around 15.5 to 16 years old now! He has DM (degenerative myelopathy), so he has a lot of trouble getting around, but he can still walk, although he looks a bit drunk and sometimes needs help getting up. Otherwise, he's amazingly healthy and seems happy and comfortable. He gets acupuncture every other week to help him keep going. It's nice because his vet does the acupuncture, so we also talk about all aspects of his health while we're there. It really eases my mind knowing that he's getting such great care!!

That's it for now. I hope everyone is having a great summer!!

Nancy

Been A Long Time!

 Hi all -

I apologize for another long silence. Life has been busy and I just started working for a different company so some things had to fall off of my plate. I've continued to work on things, but it's been a bit slower. And I'll be going to Kansas City again in another week or so to help my sister through replacing her other knee. I'll be there for another 5 weeks, so I probably won't post again until I get back. So, let's get to it.....

In my previous post, I had finished knitting my Halloween advent calendar hat, All Treats, No Tricks designed by Amy Gunderson. At that point I was waiting for the perfect pom-pom to come back into stock. It reappeared and I was able to snag one, so here is the finished hat with the perfect pom-pom:

All Treats, No Tricks

The colors aren't great in the picture, but the pom-pom is black with bright pops of color and really is perfect for this hat!

I also knit another hat since my last post. This one is the Boulder Beanie, also designed by Amy Gunderson:

Boulder Beanie

This was the September 2021 Jimmy Beans Wool Accessory Club project. It was a lot of fun since it had both stranded colorwork and baubles, done a different way from other patterns I've tried. And, again, I found the perfect pom-pom to top it off. I really love this hat!

I found I was enjoying whipping out some smaller projects, so I pulled out the January 2021 JBW Accessory Club project. This one was the Rosemary Cowl designed by Alison Green:

Rosemary Cowl

This picture is prior to blocking. The cowl is blocking now so it will be cleaner when that is done.

In the interest of making progress on some of the WIPs (works-in-progress) that I have sitting around, I pulled out my Aquifer scarf designed by Laura Nelkin:

 

Aquifer

This is another really interesting knit and it is turning out so soft that I can't wait to finish it!

The final knitting project I'll share today is this year's Craftvent project from Jimmy Beans Wool. As the name implies, the Craftvent project is an Advent Calendar project. They do this every year and this is my third or fourth year participating. This year's project is the Festive Wrap designed by Ambah O'Brien. The project comes packaged in this pretty, sturdy box:

Craftvent Box

Inside the box, there is a drawer for each day:

Inside the Craftvent Box

Most of the drawers hold a small ball of yarn, like we got for day 2:

Craftvent Day 2

Others contain little surprises. So far, we've gotten the needles for knitting the shawl and a nice project bag:

 

 

Craftvent Day 1

Craftvent Day 4

Here's what I've done so far:

Festive Wrap

So far, I'm up-to-date. I hope to knit today's portion tonight.

Finally, I also worked on an embroidery project. This is the Cape Flower Needle Keeper kit designed by Sue Spargo:

Cape Flower Needle Keeper - outside

Cape Flower Needle Keeper - inside

For this project, I started with an organizer made by Yazzii. I then appliqued the felt pieces and did the embroidery on the finished piece. I thought this was an interesting idea and wanted to see how well I liked trying to work the stitching on a finished item, where you have to deal with burying your knots behind the fabric in order to hide them, without poking through to the inside of the organizer. It wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be, but I didn't really enjoy it so I probably won't do another project of this type. Here is a close-up of the applique and stitching:

Cape Flower Needle Keeper

Well, that's all for this post. I hope you enjoyed my projects! I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season!!

Nancy

Fright Club Hat

 Hi all -

Fall is in the air. It's starting to cool off here and the leaves are starting to turn. It's a beautiful time of year! Here is a picture of the aspen grove on my property right now:

The colors are more beautiful than I could capture on my camera! And to show how beautiful my property is, here's one of the boulders framed by a lone aspen tree:

And the beautiful view from my yard, including a bit of the pond across the street and a couple of the ridges just south of me:

I find it all breathtaking! I just wish the pictures could come close to what it looks like in person!

The main thing I've been working on is the smaller Jimmy Beans Wool (JBW) Fright Club project. Every year, JBW puts together a couple of "advent" calendar projects for Halloween that they call their fright club. There is a larger calendar that has 31 little surprises that you can open up each day in October, and there is a smaller project that has 13 little surprises. I usually get both projects because I think they're a lot of fun. Since I have the larger project to do in October, I decided to do the smaller project in September. The smaller project is the All Treats, No Tricks hat designed by Amy Gunderson. The surprises for this club came in cute little boxes:

Fright Club Boxes

Most of the boxes contained little balls of yarn for knitting the hat, but several fun surprises were also mixed in:

Halloween Tag for Hat on Day 4

Halloween Stitch Marker Necklace on Day 7

Candy and Fake Tattoo on Day 10

Finishing Supplies on Day 13

The project is a hat. I chose the bright colorway:

All Treats, No Tricks

This is a stranded colorwork pattern, which isn't my favorite technique but I'm getting better at it. Here's how my stranding looks on the inside:

 

All Treats, No Tricks Inside

It has a cool double brim that has ribbing on the inside to keep the hat secure.

 

All Treats, No Tricks Inside Ribbing

And I put the tag from day 4 on the brim for some extra jazz. I'll probably get a fun fake-fur pom pom to put on the top. Grocery Girls has a black pom pom with multicolored highlights that I think would look really cute. I just have to get around to ordering it (and hope it's in stock).....

The other knitting project I've been working on is my Comfort Fade Cardi designed by Andrea Mowry. I've got the right sleeve finished and am now working on the left sleeve:

Comfort Fade Cardi

After I finish the sleeve, it'll be on to the collar/front band. That part will take a while since it's got a shawl collar, which will be quite a bit of knitting.

I've also been really into hand embroidery lately. I've had my Birds on Parade bag kit, designed by Sue Spargo, sitting around for a while so I decided t finish it up. I had finished the applique and embroidery called for in the pattern a while ago and had decided to add some extra applique and embroidery on the back of the bag since it seemed like a waste to not decorate that space. I just had a little bit more embroider to do on the back, then I was able to sew the pieces together into a bag. Here's the front of the bag from the pattern:

Birds on Parade Front

And here's what I added to the back. It's so hard to decide when to stop with the hand embroidery!

Birds on Parade Back

And, just to be complete, a peek at the inside:

Birds on Parade Inside

I decided to use some of my own fabric for the lining rather than using the fabric that came in the kit because the supplied fabric was directional, but was cut so that it would be sideways inside the bag and that bothered me. I also changed the way the bag was constructed from the directions in the pattern. The pattern directions would have resulted in raw edges inside the bag and I like a clean lining. It was a pain to construct the bag my way because the outside was designed as a single piece, but I figured it out and really like the result.

The other embroidery I've been working on is a pair of pre-marked pillowcases. I picked these up at Joann's as a little prize for myself on my birthday while I was in Kansas City. I'm still working on the first pillowcase:

Retro Cats Pillowcase

It's been kind of fun working on an old-fashioned project and I think it'll be fun to sleep with these!

Nancy