Weirdest thing I’ve ever knit. And turkey.

So a few weeks ago I had someone contact me on Etsy about making gloves for their father, who smokes cigars, and would benefit from a pair of these, but with the colorwork pattern that I’ve used with other fingerless gloves. Now I have to say, these are probably the weirdest gloves I’ve ever knit. Doing the colorwork for the fingers made them extra pretty, but a real pain. I think my biggest issue with them though, was that I don’t like smoking, and I don’t like people who do. And not just cigarettes, but cigars, hooka, pot, I don’t care – if it involves inhaling smoke, people who do it aren’t very bright. But all in all, these are rather gorgeous gloves, if I do say so myself!

Now onto turkey! Thanksgiving this year was our first holiday that we got to host, which is appropriate that it was also our first holiday as a married couple. Ty went way overboard with the cooking, making about 10 pound more turkey than needed, and about 5 pounds of extra potatoes. The only downside is that I’ve been eating Thanksgiving dinner for a week now.

We managed to cram seven people into our apartment and around our table, with only one person not sitting on a real chair, Bonnie got the lounger. There was plenty of wine, and as previously stated, way too much food, so I call that a successful holiday. And now I think Ty is addicted to hosting holiday. Mostly because it means he gets to control everything, and perhaps just a little because he gets to cook.

And here’s a super pretty picture of moss. Cause it was there. And yelling at me each time I went change the laundry. So I obliged and photographed it.

In the meantime. I’ve been knitting lots of men’s fingerless gloves for Etsy. Who knew they made such good presents for men. Oh, I guess all the people on Etsy did. Now I need to catch up!

Happy Knitting!

WIP?

When does a sweater become a work in progress? When the yarn is bought? When the idea forms? When you actually cast on?

The Berocco Vintage that I bought for my birthday has sitting patiently in a box waiting for me to get my act together. However, the first swatch I made has been sitting on the coffee table yelling at me every time I’m knitting something else. The swatch was beautiful, I loved the color pattern and the combination. Just one problem, there was no way it’d be workable flat, which was my one and only plan for this sweater. So it was back to the drawing board. I’ve been sketching different ideas that could be worked flat and none of them seemed like what I wanted out of a colorwork border for a cardigan. Finally, I was flipping through my colorwork stitch dictionary, ravelry, and a pattern book and I found something that would work. Curlicues!

So I think that’s what I’m going to stick with. But now I have to make sure I sit down and sketch/calculate out the whole sweater before I start. Seriously, it’s going to happen this time.

Good thing I have about twenty other projects to finish before I can work on this sweater. Because that will definitely stop me. Yup.

Happy Knitting!

Finally Fall in DC – now where’s my hat?

These last few weeks have been full of knitting, and a few FOs, but it seems that a few things on my to do list have managed to escape my attention, again. My redo of Peacock Feathers is finished, but to be honest, I’m not as happy with them as I’d like to be, at least if I’m going to go through the trouble of re-editing the pdf and taking better pictures. Fortunately I have another skein of that same purple knitpicks stroll, so I’ll try again. The socks will go up on Etsy, just as soon as I do the finishing for them, and figure out how I’m going to do the pictures.

Speaking of pictures, I recently received probably the best hand-me-down I’ve ever gotten (and I’m the youngest of three), my dad’s old DSLR camera! I’m still figuring out how to use it, both the physical buttons and what actually makes a good picture. Etsy has some nice tutorials on small object photography, which kind of overlaps with what I want, but I’ll need more info on photographing hats/gloves/etc. The other issue that comes up with finally getting a nice camera, is the issue of a model. I’d much rather be in charge of what the photo looks like, which means I have to be behind the camera, not wearing my knits. And as much of a good sport Ty is about modeling the men’s stuff, I think he, and my customers, would draw the line at him modeling the women’s items. But I guess that’s what friends are for… *cough* Ashley *cough*

My autumnal colorwork fingerless mitts are finally progressing, after having the issue of being way too annoying to carry all those skeins around with me. Once I realized that I should therefore work on those while I’m home, instead of more transportable projects, I found myself almost finished. I’ll have to remind myself when I’m done, however, that because of all those color changes they’ll need some serious blocking.

As my take-with-me project I started a second pair of men’s fingerless gloves, which I think are probably my favorite thing on the needles now. Partly because the Rowan Felted Tweed is so nice, but mostly because they knit up so quickly! I started to realize that although I had a thing or two for men on my Etsy shop, more is definitely necessary before the holidays. Because seriously, what exactly are you supposed to get your husband? And if I have that problem, and I’m a knitter, I’m sure that the non-knitters have that issue too. Women are easy to shop for, and even if you get something they don’t like, they know how to lie. Men? Not so much.

Tomorrow I’ll be heading off to Philadelphia for a work retreat/3-day seminar, which means that I’ll have quite a bit of travel time to knit, and hopefully get these four Etsy projects ready for pictures over the weekend. Maybe I’ll start Ty’s next pair of socks on the train, is October 26th too late to enter Socktoberfest?

Happy Knitting!

Ho Hum

I don’t have pretty pictures of my sweater dress, because I’m a little lazier than I thought. It was great to wear it on Friday though, even though my leggings didn’t quite want to stay up properly. My only complaints about it, which is why I decided before I finished that I wouldn’t be publishing this version of the pattern, is that the sleeves are too short and skinny, and the raglan decreases/neck wasn’t quite right. But it was still nice and comfy and warm, and definitely something I’ll be making again soon.

I also do not have pictures from Sunday, when we went to the Maryland Renaissance Festival for my birthday, which was super awesome! I haven’t been to a Renaissance Festival in so long, but we spent plenty of time there checking out all the shops, watching glass blowing and jousting, drinking beer (Sam Adams, not period beer thankfully), and pointing out all the people in awesome/risque/not-period costumes. Unfortunately we were a little to old to have a free pony ride, and the elephant rides were too expensive to be worth it. But Kim got an awesome ceramic mug that I’m super jealous of, and Ashley gave me a pretty flowery ring for my birthday.

My haul from Looped on Saturday is enough to keep me busy for quite a while. I gave in and bought enough Berocco Vintage for a cardigan, in a wonderful mustard yellow. My current plan is to do some cute colorwork along the edges, so at the cuff, the bottom of the cardigan, and the shoulders. The thing is, that beautiful color pattern below isn’t able to be knit flat, the different strands would end up on the wrong side, and as Vintage is (thankfully) machine washable, I can’t just knit it in the round and do steeks instead. So alas, I will have to create a new color pattern that can be worked flat.

But in the meantime, what I should really be working on is my pattern re-vamp list. First on my list is probably Working Diamonds, which I will cast on for (ok, maybe I’ll do a swatch first) just as soon as I finish a few other things. Right now there are three projects traveling with me in my bag, Ty’s Jaywalker socks, the Peacock Feather socks, and Ty’s man-version of Gabriella (Gabe?), which I cast on for on Saturday and made almost an entire glove in one day. Just as soon as Ty’s stuff is done I can focus on patterns. Maybe tonight I’ll finally put up a test pattern for Katherine, although it is my birthday, so maybe not.

I also bought some nice gray and purple Rowan Creative Focus that I’ve been eyeing for a while at Looped to make (another) slouchy colorwork hat. And with all the freezing-ness at work I’ve been dreaming of a big cozy cowl to keep me warm. But unfortunately I don’t have infinite time, so we’ll see which of these ideas ever make it into yarn form. Hopefully all of them, but I’m not holding my breath.

Happy Knitting!

Pictures!

So I finally got some pictures of my recent completed projects. The gloves that I’m now on my third pair of I should really type up a pattern for and make some more maybe to sell on Etsy. They’re really nice gloves, and in both Knitpicks palette and stroll they’re super warm and comfortable.

These are mine that I made over Christmas break. Made with Navy and Blush KnitPicks Palette yarn.

These are Alex’s, which I finished last week. Made with Mermaid and Sprinkle Heather KnitPicks Stroll yarn.

These are Will’s, in progress. Made with Dusk and Navy KnitPicks Stroll yarn.

Now onto other projects:

Ashley’s awesome hat that I made for her this weekend. She loves the colors, and I really liked how the combination of colorwork on the bottom and cabling on the top worked out. I’ve never mixed the two in one project before, it’s definitely something to experiment with.

Ty’s completed socks!!! I’ve finally finished and taken pictures of them, and they turned out awesome. Now the only thing left is to email my grandmother and thank her for the wonderful yarn.

Alright, that’s it for now. Back to being a lazy bum for me. Knit on, my awesome readers!