A finish and a Journey

I finished the Sunrise Circle Jacket. Or at least as finished as it’s going to be in awhile. Right now, It’s only got two buttons/button loops, but in a few months, I’ll change that. I’m in the process of losing weight and I don’t want to add the other buttons until I’m closer to my goal weight/the fit I want. And this isn’t a silly little diet/fad or what not. I’ve actually lost 7 or 8 pounds (imprecise scale) so far… anyway… Yay for this sweater!

Oh, yea, there was supposed to be a great story with this post. Ummm ok. Here goes:

There once was this knitter (me) who knit an awesome sweater in like 8 days (seen above). She seamed this sweater, promptly tried it on and thought it was too small. Specifically, she was concerned about the stretching in the arms. Frustrated, she decided to continue the sweater and then give said sweater to her younger sister for her upcoming birthday. Generous yes, but what can you do?

A few days later, this knitter brought her sweater to her fantastic knitting group. She explained her concerns and the gifting decision, something she was obviously sad to admit to have to do. Finally, she tried on the sweater and became overwhelmed with the overwhelming chorus of – “oh, you should keep it!” “I think it fits just fine” and “I’m sure blocking will help.” Our knitter left this knitting group torn between the trust of this group, and the love of her sister.

A week later, her sister came for a birthday visit. The knitter kindly and nonchalantly (noncommittally might be a better word) asked her sister to try on the partly-hemmed sweater. And to her disgust, the purply color clashed with her sister’s skin tone like no other color known to man.

Rejoice! The sweater remains with the knitter (and blocked to a much better fit).

(You can see the details on the Ravelry page.)  OH.  And I have another FO – but I’m not going to blog it until I get some photos next weekend.

Peak-a-Blue

This is definitely the MOST bad-ass thing I’ve ever knit. Check it out:

This was the first pattern in… the history of me knitting that was worth lining. If I was going to do this, I was going to do this right. And oh, how right it turned out! The knitting itself was pretty fun… the pattern grows in a real cool progression, so it’s a really fun knit. I had to re-knit the gusset (after going 1/2 way and realizing that the stitch count was supposed to increase a bit – oops!) and while it’s shorter than the pattern calls for, it’s perfectly functional. And check out the inside…

I love it, love it, love it. I’m going out to dinner tonight and I cannot wait to bring this and get tons of compliments! You’ll notice that this bag has a nice inside… and a zipper…

Yea, I bought a sewing machine. I know, I know, kind of an expensive impulse buy – but I had some extra christmas money and its one of those things that a crafter should have… and it’s the reason why I haven’t done the steeking thing (which is the one remaining knitting technique I haven’t done – that I can think of anyway).

I had some trouble with getting the sewing machine going. I kept getting the bobbin thread stuck. Luckily one of the RAs I work with has LOTS of experience with a sewing machine and since she owed me, she helped me out. I even sewed the zipper to the knit piece! I’m like a sewing fool now 🙂

I know you probably want some more details, but I wanted to give you another photo to drool at.

Pattern: Brea Bag a free pattern from Berroco
Designer: Norah Gaughan
Yarn: 2 hand dyed skeins of Lion Brand Lion Wool
Needles: US 7
Lining: An old skirt that I had from a few years ago
Strap: Thiefed from old Target handbag
Button: From the stash! yay for buttons!
Pattern Mods: The gusset was worked 1 stitch narrower and shorter than the pattern called for
Time: Cast-on Wednesday, Bind off and other finishing done by 4 am last night (yea, I know that was pretty late… I’ll pay for that later, I’m sure).

Want one more photo? OK!

…it’s like I’m nesting…

After knitting a TON of Christmas gifts for people (and looking at 2 other gifts I need to work on), I didn’t really want to do anything except knit stuff for myself. And since I have an apartment and all, I was feeling all domestic. See for your self. (By the way, these were all finished yesterday.)

First up, was a swiffer cozy – a la Green Mountain Mama.

I asked for a swiffer for Christmas specifically so that I could make this cozy. It has buttons! It’s environmentally friendly! It’s a twist on the Mason Dixon Ballband Dishcloth! It’s a recipe for success! I raveled it here….

The best part is that it works! Want proof?

The next thing I made was to solve a problem… when I wash dishes, I tend to get water everywhere. And by everywhere I mean… everywhere. The problem is that when my counter gets all full of water, it pools and then drains right at my feet. Obviously, this sucks. So, I had to make a rug!

Isn’t it great? Want to know how to make one of your very own?

1. Get a pair of US 19 circular needles in long (mine were 35 inches).
2. Collect a bunch of crap yarn that you don’t know what to do with (all feltable, no superwash for you) in colors that seem to go together.
3. Cast on 65 ish stitches.
4. Knit until you almost run out of yarn, then cast off.
5. Throw in the washing machine until desired size is reached.

Easy huh? I know! And look how great it turned out:

I’m really serious about the crap yarn part. Want to know what went in mine? (I had 6 strings going.)

• 3 balls of what remained of a sweater’s worth of brown Paton’s Merino Classic. (I broke it up to knit my dad some brown slippers for Christmas). This was the base – I had two strings of this in the blanket – but since I didn’t have 4 balls, which would have been ideal, that third ball was spun into 2 smaller balls with some random bits of other browns mixed in.
• A big skein of random bits of matching-ish crap tied together to stripe: 3 different partial balls of knitpicks browns, about 6 yards total of yellow (split into 3 different pieces), about 6 yards of orange, and 110 yards of black.
• a skein of knitpicks dye your own merino sock yarn – that I’d dyed into a variegated skein of blues.
• A skein of knitpicks shadow laceweight in a maroon color balled together with a skein of alpaca laceweight (also knitpicks) in an oatmeal color.
• A skein of Blackberry Ridge Woollen Mill lace weight (75% wool, 25% silk) in a green almost tweedy color. This was gifted to me by a secret pal…

I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. Next up, some curtain tiebacks. I was inspired by a pattern in Suss Cousin’s Home knits. As you can see, the ones in her book are super cute, and have a button!

So I was inspired to make my own… I used some Berrocco Suede and look what I came up with:

I’m thrilled with the results. I got exactly two out of one ball. I LOVE how they look. They’re all elegant and functional and …. perfect. I’m sure that I’ll be able to use them for a long time. And I think the button choice is perfect.

So look at that! Three items, for me, well, my apartment anyway. It’s almost like I’m nesting or something. Next up… a baby sweater!  NO… I’m not pregnant.  The baby sweater is for my boss. And the nesting thing is just cause they were things I needed.

Buttons!

Remember those slippers that I knit a while ago?

These ones?

Since I’m up, I just wanted to share the mods that I made, per my knitting group’s fantastic advice:

Don’t they look just perfect now?  These buttons came from a good friend – someone who makes me feel much like these slippers do (warm and comfortable).