When did that happen?

I noticed yesterday that it’s kind of close to being the end of January. This stunning realization came to me as I reminded myself to call my dad for his birthday, which happens to be at the end of January every year. This weekend I made some rather impressive progress on my Fuse cardigan, despite the fact that I was increasing by two stitches every other row, and by the time I got to the separation of the front and back each row took me about five minutes to complete. And after having let my two sleeves sit for a few days at the suggested length I decided that they needed at least two more inches. Either I have longer arms than is normal, or it stems from having a severe aversion to sleeves that are not long enough to be pulled down to cover my whole hand. I’m going to ignore my child-like habits and pretend that the pattern assumes you want sleeves that end an inch above your wrist. Like my mom does.

And in news relating to the remaining 36 hours of January, I put down the cardigan to work on the January socks – with my super-awesome late-christmas-present Signature Stiletto double point needles! I’ve only knit with them for a little while, but they are beautiful to work with. As promised, they have a sharper tip than any of my other needles and I’ve found that the knitting slides on them nicely. Also, I think the aspect that I love the most so far is that they are much lighter than my knitpicks dpns. It’s particularly nice at the beginning of a project where normally the weight of the needles makes it more difficult to hold onto everything comfortably. Really though, the best thing about these needles is that they make me feel super cool – look, they’re red!

Wish me luck in finishing a huge mens sock in less than two days!

Happy Knitting!

The Wonderful Awesomeness of Knitting for Oneself

Finally! It feels like I have been knitting mens fingerless gloves for forever, but as soon as the holiday rush was over I was able to sit down and make something for myself. And let me tell you, it is way more satisfying than selling something on Etsy. Christmas with my family was great and all, but really I’m just excited about having new gloves and a cowl.

The cowl was completed in two days with Classic Elite Inca Alpaca. The pattern was taken from a scarf I made several years ago, with a bit of tweaking. Although I had to figure out how to do the pattern for this twice. I made a swatch and got it right on the first try, while I was looking at my old scarf, then when I actually cast on I was on the train without the old scarf nearby and clearly hadn’t written down sufficient instructions.  All in all the cowl was a great quick knit and it’s super cute! It will be great to have at work, where the temperature is always colder than I’d like. And the other great thing about this cowl is that it will match with most everything. It’s actually a nice green, although it looks brown in some light.

I also got around to making myself a new pair of Gabriella glittens, in a stunning Tosh colorway – Malachite, which bled all over my hands as I was knitting them (hence their nice long Soak Wash soak in the tub). These gloves are everything I wanted with this pattern, and I can’t believe I waited this long to make a pair for myself with the final published pattern. They fit a lot better than my first draft and I’m hoping that they won’t pill like the merino-bamboo did.

Still on the list is my entrelac hat, but with the weather so cold recently I might make my next hat project more practical than stylish.

And of course, my sister’s completed Christmas socks. My sister really liked them and I think they turned out great! I definitely haven’t converted to doing socks two-at-a-time toe-up with the magic-loop, it’s definitely a pain to have to switch where the needles are each time, but for getting socks done? It’s definitely the way to go. It completely eliminates second socks syndrome and lets you decide exactly how long you want the leg without worrying that you’ll run out of yarn. But for now, I’ll stick to my trusty double points.

Happy Knitting!

Mouse!

I believe this is the cutest mouse I have ever seen! It’s really quite amazing to make something so small in such a short amount of time. Hopefully I’ll make a few more of these soon before I forget the pattern. Everything worked out on the first try except for the ears, which Ty described as dumbo ears of the first take. Unfortunately I didn’t have any catnip lying around, but maybe next time!

And here’s the underside!

And here’s Ty playing with Socks, not with my little mouse though!

Good luck to everyone on their holiday knitting! I better get going on mine!

Happy Knitting!

Whoops!

Well I was going to post about the thing that I’m currently knitting, which is a thing not for Etsy, but for Christmas present. And then I realized that it was a Christmas present, and it is not yet Christmas. So I’ll talk about something else until I can show off the awesome thing that I am making for a person for Christmas, which I kind of want to keep for myself because it’s squishy and soft.

My other exciting news this week is that I switched from men’s gloves for Etsy to women’s colorwork gloves, because I realized I only had one left in the shop. I’m planning on making more Gabriella gloves for the shop, but I’m waiting for my metal dpns from a certain, which are a lot nicer to work on with the tight gauge.

And I have to make a mouse ornament for Alex’s Christmas party on Sunday. Complete with catnip. Which I will put high in the tree. *Bwahaha*

Happy Knitting!

And here’s a cat.

Plans

Because it’s been a bit crazy on my Etsy shop, I’m still trying to catch up, which means that all I’ve knit for the last two weeks has been men’s fingerless gloves. And don’t get me wrong, those gloves are pretty awesome, and the fact that I can whip out three pairs in a week without having to skip work is pretty awesome too. But to be honest, I’m a little tired of knitting stuff for other people, and of not starting all of these new design projects that have popped into my head. So after Christmas my plan is this: knit stuff for me!! (and try to put something new on Etsy at least once every other week).

For these: I have an infinity scarf planned.

For these: an entrelac hat.

And this: finally a new pair of Gabriella gloves, with the gorgeous Tosh DK

All for me! Who could’ve guessed knitters were actually capable of knitting for themselves? Now if only it were January…

Happy Knitting!