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By Melissa, January 1, 2010 11:17 pm

What.  A.  Year.

Continue reading '2009'»

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By Melissa, September 27, 2009 12:08 pm

I was finally home during daylight hours today to have The Canadian snap some photos of my finished Vivian…

Continue reading 'Introducing Vivian…'»

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By Melissa, August 30, 2009 5:19 pm

I finished my Monkey Socks a few weeks back and finally got around to blocking them.

They fit wonderfully and will be great to wear once the weather cools off a bit.

(I’ll keep my MN summer for now, thanks!)

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By Melissa, June 27, 2009 11:45 am

A few weeks back I took another fabulous class at The Fiber Studio on making felted table runners (oh crap, Pam just posted the summer class schedule…brb).  As I was laying out my first layer of merino and trying to figure out how I would ever be able to keep a felted table runner kitty hair-free, a thought came to me – what about that giant blank wall hanging out over my newly repositioned couch? Voilà! My runner had just turned into a wall hanging.

Continue reading 'When a table runner becomes a wall hanging…'»

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By Melissa, April 20, 2009 8:28 pm

I finished my first sweater!!

My short sleeved Wicked with no front pocket used just over 2 skeins of Stonehedge Fiber Mill Shepherd’s Wool in Pansy.

I ended up modifying the pattern a lot.  I cast on more for the neckline to get an even repeat of the twisted cables, decreased more over a less amount of rows after the bust increases, increased the hip shaping and added another 2″ the overall length.

It was a great first sweater and I learned a ton.  I’ve since bought The Sweater Workshop by Jacqueline Fee because clearly I’m one of those people who has issues following patterns as written.  Hopefully it will help me learn the best way to make any future mods I might need/want.  Now, what to knit next??

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By Melissa, February 17, 2009 9:57 pm

Well, that took long enough.

Four months later, I finally have a pair.  And you really don’t know how close I was to forever only having one. Because of course, when it takes so long to knit a Second Sock, one is bound to lose the First Sock.  Trust me, The Canadian and I scoured three rooms tonight looking for the First Sock to prove that I actually did finish two.

All in all, I’m quite content with these guys and they’ve taught me a lot – including knitting continental with the smallest needles I’ve ever used yet.  I also learned that knitting with finer yarn on a bumpy bus does crazy things to stitch tension.  But that’s what blocking is for, right?

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By Melissa, February 1, 2009 9:39 pm

I finished the Spiral Cowl late last night.  It rolls a bit, but I still like how it turned out. Celeste does too.

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By Melissa, January 25, 2009 11:43 am

I was so close to finishing my second pair of fingerless gloves tonight, but alas, no such luck.  I still have to finish the last thumb and weave in my ends.  So close!

I probably could have finished earlier if I hadn’t taken time out this afternoon to bust out the sewing machine and whip up a much needed knitting needle case.

It’s already quickly filling up with all the stray needles strewn about this place.  (These are just the ones I’ve found in my living room so far!)  I’m going to try to fit all my DPNs in this one and possibly make a second for my straights and circulars.  I’ll get these needles organized yet!

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By Melissa, January 24, 2009 11:29 am

My good friend rhymeswithfun and I met for dinner last night and exchanged Christmas gifts.  I had a great time planning out her gifts and couldn’t wait to give them to her.  I decided in addition to a requisite cable hat (I seemed to give everyone I know one this year), she also needed some stitch markers for our future Clapotis project and a cool pair of fingerless gloves.  After prowling Ravelry for a few hours (a frequent occurrence these days), I decided upon Rachel Calado’s Symmetrical Braided Gauntlets in Araucania’s Azapa in the sky colorway.

They were a really quick and easy knit and turned out super cute.  The yarn was wonderful to knit with – so much so that I bought some more to knit myself a pair!

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By Melissa, January 4, 2009 12:10 am

Recently I’ve been in to cables.  And by “in to” I mean “obsessed with.”  Five out of the seven hats I gave as Christmas gifts had cables. 

I showed The Madre how to knit cables while I was home and even The Canadian got a cable lesson or two over the holidays.  The Canadian = Total Newbie Knitting Rock Star!!

I did take a break from cables while home in NY to knit a cute little Lacey Neck Warmer for The Madre out of Berroco Pure.  Oh how I love merino!

It was my first foray into lace and while I enjoyed it, I found that I was easily distracted (not difficult considering there were 4 people, 4 cats, 1 spastic dog and an excessive amount of yarn in a relatively small space) and kept messing up the pattern.  Needless to say, everyone around me now knows the meaning of “tink” and “frogging”.

Anyway, I found that if I placed a stitch marker between each pattern repeat, it was easier to keep track of stitches and where I may have forgotten to pass a slipped stitch, done a yarn over, etc.  The Madre and I managed to dig up 5 stitch markers, but that left me using mutilated paper clips for the remaining repeats.  While the paper clips did do the job, I decided “real” stitch markers probably weren’t that difficult to make, so off to the craft store I went to buy a pack of jump rings.  I dug out my old bead collection and wire tools and went to work.

These last few are made from beads that I had made a while back out of fabric and bits of yarn.  Who said stitch markers had to be boring plastic rings??

And stitch markers are also helpful for differentiating cables within a larger pattern pattern.  Like on my latest project – a Viking Bag with cables.  Surprised?  I didn’t think so.