knitting progress and the Grab Bag Challenge

As is my usual custom, I sew during the day and knit in the evenings when WM and I watch television. I also got plenty of knitting time on two train trips in late September/early October – one of nine hours to collect DD and the Grandboys for the conference; the other (of eight hours) after spending a few days with DD and the Grandboys at the house my sister had rented for two weeks for her annual vacation.

I seem to be making fairly good progress – but that’s probably because I’m knitting relatively simple and smallish things in order to use up the yarn in my 'grab bags' as well as my two tubs of sock yarn!

Socks for Someone #5, started on 1 July, were finally finished (grafted and ends sewn in) on 9 September. They are made from Moda Vera Noir “Pink Mix” using my generic sock knitting pattern for women on 2.25 (US 1) double pointed needles. Unfortunately, I don’t seem to have a photo of the finished socks.

Socks for Someone #6 were cast on 5 September and the knitting was finished 9 October. The grafting was done a few days later when I had time to do it during daylight hours. The yarn is Moda Vera Noir “Olive Mix”; pattern and needles as above. These socks were a bit on the small side so I will make the next pair slightly bigger.
 
Socks for Someone #7 were started on 10 October. I am knitting them in Moda Vera Noir, colour-way ‘Laguna’. I have not knitted this colour before and was looking forward to seeing how it knits up. Overall, it’s a lovely shade of green, more like the first photo than the second.
 

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Now, on to my Grab Bag Challenge – in which I grab a pre-packaged bag of yarn, find a pattern that works with that weight and amount of yarn and knit! Each of the “grab bags” contains smallish amounts of yarns that were donated to me. My challenge is that I have to use all (or close to it) of the yarn contained in the first bag I grab. I’m not allowed to read the labels or swap for another bag unless I don't have the appropriate needles available!

The first of the Grab Bag Challenges I have to show you is a shawl I have called “Taupe Buffalo”. This is because it was knitted in Lincoln Yarn Buffalo, colour-way Taupe. The “Lincoln Yarn Company” is now defunct as far as I can tell from my internet searches. The balls  of the yarn were labelled “1 oz” – the Australian wool industry has used the metric system since 1971 so that makes the yarn more than forty years old!

I managed to get eleven repeats of the pattern from the amount of yarn I had.

The original pattern, Springtime Bandit by Kate Gagnon Osborn (Ravelry link), had only four repeats of the pattern so mine is considerably larger, a great winter shawl for an average-sized woman. I didn’t have enough yarn to finish the edging as in the original pattern. I should have done one less repeat of the body pattern but misread the instructions – then didn't feel inclined to rip out the last twelve rows! It looks okay and the unknown recipient won’t know the difference – I’m sure the fact that it’s keeping her warm will be far more important!

My next Grab Bag Challenge project was a scarf which I called “Courtelle Garden”, because the yarn consisted of 63 grams of Patons Courtelle 5ply (sport) which is 100% acrylic but quite soft. It’s a pretty colour that cried out to be knitted into a light and lacy scarf. Thepattern for the Plymouth Vizions Garden Scarf by Nancy Queen (Ravelry link) seemed right for the job given that Vizions (by Plymouth Yarn) is predominately man-made, being 68% rayon, 3% nylon and 29% linen. Below is a detail photo; the photo of the whole scarf didn’t work!
 
This was followed by two more shawls, both knitted from a now-discontinued yarn bought long ago from K-Mart: a soft DK weight blend of 70% wool and 30% nylon, called “SportsKnit”.

The first was made from two balls of neutral colours using the Hippy Hippy Shawl pattern (Ravelry link) by Gabrielle Vézina on 4mm (US 6) needles. I had intended to use all four balls of yarn but realised that I didn’t need to; the shawl was quite big enough in just two balls. If I had known that at the beginning, I would have knitted this by changing colours after every two rows. As it is, I don’t like it so I think I’ll over-dye it. What do you think?
 
The second is made from cream and gorgeous blue yarns using the Zebre Striped Shawl pattern (Ravelry link) by Brenda Lavell. Unfortunately, I forgot to switch my needles to 5mm (US 8) before starting this shawl so the fabric does not drape as much as I would like. I finished knitting this shawl while I was holidaying at Scott's Head, with my sister, mother, niece, niece’s partner, nephew, DD and the Grandboys. (I didn't take any photos because I didn’t have a camera with me and my iPad didn't have enough storage space at the time)!

With both of these shawls, I just kept knitting till I ran out of yarn! Because they are ‘donation’ shawls, they will fit someone!

The next ‘grab bag’ I drew had 3 x 100g skeins of Panda Soft Crinkles, a now-discontinued 100% acrylic 12ply (bulky) yarn.

I decided to knit the Weekend Hoodie (Ravelry link), a free pattern from Lion Brand Yarn. It’s the first time I’ve knitted a sweater in pieces in a very long time! Ah well, it’ll give me a chance to practise mattress stitching the seams and three-needle bind off on the shoulders! One thing’s for sure, it is not a weekend project unless one knits all weekend and does nothing else. I’m knitting mine child size and only completed the back during the weekend with evening and travel knitting! The front took me another three evenings! I’m obviously a slow knitter! The crinkly yarn doesn’t do much for my tension either!

That’s it for my bi-monthly report. The good thing about knitting is that I can take it anywhere with me (unlike my sewing machine). Since WM and I will be away for most of the next two weeks, it’s very likely there’ll be quite a bit of knitting happening; especially given that we will be travelling over 1600 kilometres (1000 miles) while our dearest friends, visiting my mum, then DD and Family.

Tomorrow, WM and I are off on the first leg of our vacation at three different locations around the state. We are travelling by train to Kempsey where we will be met by our dear friend and transported to their acreage near the town of Bellbrook, population 356!

I’m off to pack; I need clothes, toiletries, books, iPad, chargers and stitch-related items: knitting -- Socks for Someone #7 and Crinkles Hoodie – and my Dutch Cap Hexies (English Paper Piecing); seen in this post (scroll down).

See you in November!

Grab Bag Challenge and other knitting

warning: a long, yarn-related post; no fabric here, sorry!
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I had intended to get this post up ten days ago but I needed photos… then DD and the GrandBoys made a surprise visit. Needless to say, I didn’t give much thought to posting anything on my blog!

Despite the fact that I had been in a groove with my sewing over the previous few weeks, I had also completed a fair bit of knitting. My most recent post regarding knitting (as opposed to yarn) was in mid-June so I’m going to talk about all my projects since then; whether completed or in progress.

At the end of June I tutored two workshops: one on stranded colour knitting, the other on slipped stitch knitting so there were a few samples that needed to be knitted.

I’ve already showed you the two slipped stitch scarves in this post, so here are some other slipped-stitch patterns: a slipped stitch beanie and a sample slipped-stitch square that could be used in an afghan/blanket:

    

For the stranded colour workshop I knitted two hats; the second shows a traditional Norwegian motif I found on the internet.I couldn't get it on my head so I had to put my hands inside it for the photo – it’s not really that shape!.

 

I finished Socks for Someone #4 and cast on Socks For Someone #5; I’ve finished the first sock, except for the grafting of the toe and the sewing-in of ends, and am on the foot (cuff down) of the second. The socks are my own basic sock pattern for women; 64 stitches knitted on 2.25mm needles.

In mid-July, I tutored a workshop on shadow (aka “illusion”) knitting. I didn’t have my scarf finished in time for the workshop, although I did take it along as a work in progress. That scarf is now finished and is seen here pinned out for blocking. The pattern is Counterpoint Scarf, by Jennifer Crawford; free to Ravelry members. The yarn is discontinued: Moda Vera Cynthia (brown) and Moda Vera Jaclyn (cream) – both DK weight, 50% acrylic/tencel. I chose brown and cream because I didn’t have any black 8ply (DK) yarn that was the same brand as any white yarn and it seemed important to have two strands that knitted up to the same gauge. All experienced knitters know that all DK weight yarns are not created equal!

In this post, I talked about how much yarn I have. I managed to find storage for most of it, except for the “Grab Bags”. There were too many of them to fit in the space I had allocated, so knitting through those has become my priority knitting. I can’t believe my first project for the “Grab Bag Challenge” was completed last December!

I remember that, for the next project, I grabbed a bag of yarn and intended to knit a prayer shawl for the person who donated quite most of my ‘grab bag’ contents. However, the prayer shawl was a lace pattern and I had to set it aside even before I cast on; i usually knit in front of the television, and that just wasn’t TV knitting! When we moved that bag of yarn disappeared into the pile of grab bags during packing; one day it’ll turn up and I’ll be able to knit that shawl.

In the meantime, I have knitted two hats from a pattern called Bubble Gum which is available for free on Ravelry. I think I would have called the pattern “Bee Hive” or “Honey Pot” because it reminds me of a green ceramic honey pot we had when I was a child (not that it ever had honey in it)! My two hats don’t look as nice as the ones on the Ravelry page, perhaps they’ll look better after blocking or with a head in them! I've only shown one, they are basically identical – knitted from the same no-longer-available yarn from K-Mart called Triplequick, a 12 ply (bulky) yarn which I knitted on 6mm needles. It was, indeed, a quick pattern to knit and I completed the two hats, including sewing in ends, over three evenings.

I started knitting a scarf/shawlette from a simple (free from Ravelry) pattern called Forget Me Not using a discontinued yarn called Lambswool 80 (80% wool, 20% nylon) by Patons Australia. In the comments section of my Ravelry projects page I wrote: “life is too short to knit with yarn which feels like string! Even acrylic feels softer in the hand than this yarn so it has been frogged and the yarn has been given to the op shop (thrift store).” The project was aptly named Yarn Shouldn’t Feel Like String but, unfortunately, I forgot to take photos of the yarn before I gave it away!

Then came another hat when I grabbed a bag containing 3 skeins of Sirda Octo, an 8ply (DK)  blend of 80% wool and 20% nylon. I have never successfully knitted a beret; I always seem to have too many rounds and get a lump in the middle where it should lie flat. I had hoped this one would be different; it’s a very pretty lace pattern and the decreases are included in the pattern. But I should have looked at the pictures of the Elfunny Beret on Ravelry more carefully: it had a deliberate ‘lump’ in the centre, accented by doing extra rows! I had to remove the extra rows and add a couple of extra rounds of decreases to make it work. Here it is blocking with the dinner plate still inside! Unfortunately, it’s supposed to be adult size but there's no way I can get it on my medium-size head! Ah well, someone will live it, I’m sure.

WM grabbed the next bag (my current knitting project, along with Socks for Someone #5): it contained 329g of yarn called Lincoln Buffalo Wool. The only additional information on the label was that it was mothproofed* pure wool, 6ply (a heavy sportweight or light DK), colour 488, Taupe. No needle size was recommended. I couldn’t find any information online about this yarn specifically or the yarn company in general. It may have been mothproofed forty years ago but I have had to deal with quite a lot of insect damage as I knitted which has left me with lots of ends to sew in! I know it is more than forty years old: the Australian wool industry adopted the metric scheme in 1971 and these balls were labelled “1 oz”!

I decided this time to knit something where gauge was not so crucial and finally settled on  a pattern of a triangular scarf or shawlette called Springtime Bandit. The original pattern was knitted in 10ply (Aran) but I have seen it knitted in 4ply (sock) so it’s obviously very versatile. I didn’t know how far 329g of yarn would go; 8ply wool yarn usually contains about 200m to every 100g so this could be as much as 650m. If it’s a lighter weight than 8ply, it may go even further! The designer, Kate Gagnon Osborn, recommends four pattern repeats; I have done twelve and still have four skeins for the edging!

It has knitted up like 8ply (DK) on 4.5mm needles. Since I am usually a looser-than-average knitter, it will be interesting to see how it goes after blocking! This is what it looks like so far:

 

I don't’ think I’d describe it as ‘taupe’; its more milk chocolate!

The Grab Bag Challenge is fun; I have no idea what the bag will contain until it is actually in my hands (I’m not allowed to return it to the box, I have to knit it and use up as much of the yarn as possible) the fun part is choosing a pattern that works for the amount of yarn I have (long live Ravelry!) and seeing how it knits up. Most of the bags contain only small amounts so there’ll probably be a lot of hats and/or scarves in my future but that just adds to the fun: small projects are quickly finished then a new bag is selected!

It’s winter: cold and raining here (thank God, we were in a drought and needed rain desperately) so it’s great weather to curl up under a hand-knitted blanket/afghan and knit away!

What are you working on at the moment?

WiPs on Wednesday

Today I am travelling to my mum’s place. She is having the cataract removed from her other eye on Friday and I am going to be with her until Monday. Please pray that it doesn’t rain in or near the township of Moree like it did last year! You may remember that we became trapped by floodwaters for several days in November last year.

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I am slowly working through the long list of WiPs that I published in June and July but the list just seems to get longer as new projects somehow find their way into my craft room! In fact, only two of the seven projects listed here are on that list!

The things that I am concentrating on this month are:

1. The Very Hungry Caterpillar quilt
2. Christmas Tree wall-hanging
3. Cardigan for Me
4. Deb’s Diamond Blanket
5. Merlot Toe Up Sock
6. hexagon project bag
7. Scrappy Rainbow improv quilt

I don’t know if I’ll get any time to work on that last item. Being away from home for nearly a week plus Christmas activities plus family visiting will cut into my crafting time. Some of these items will not be finished in December: this is just my “focus group”!

Very Hungry Caterpillar Quilt
I am making this quilt for my niece who is expecting her first child in March/April. I just have to sew down the binding and add a label and it will be done! I've not labelled my quilts before: tell me please, what does one write on the label when one doesn’t know the name or the sex of the baby, or even which parent’s surname he/she will have? I guess I could just write “Made with love by Great-Aunty Lynne 2012”. Thoughts?

There is no stain on the quilt top – that is the light shining through the dotty fabric on the back. You can see the backing here if you haven’t seen it before.

Christmas Tree Wall-Hanging
It would be really good if I could get this finished and hanging before Christmas. You have seen these three embroideries separately but here they are all together. The one on the right is the one I finished today.


Cardigan for Me
After much deliberation over patterns, I have chosen to knit the Westall Cardigan (Ravelry link) for me! As I said in this post, I had a bit of trouble getting gauge, which is nothing unusual for me. I finally got within half a stitch using 3.00mm needles instead of the recommended 3.5mm. For those who don’t knit, there are a lot of consequences to not getting the gauge right – the size of garment can be dramatically altered and a loosely knitted garment can stretch beyond redemption after being washed. On the other hand, a garment which is knitted too tightly will strain and pull, and the knitted fabric could pill and wear out much more quickly than would otherwise happen. Worst of all, after hours of knitting and tens of thousands of stitches, it might not fit its intended wearer!

This particular pattern has an unusual construction; it is knitted from the top down, back first then both fronts at once; all three pieces are then joined below the armholes and the rest of the garment is knitted in one piece. It has a gorgeous lace pattern which is relatively simple to knit. This is how much I have knitted since I cast on last Tuesday (27 November). I am up to the armhole shaping of the back and will then go back and pick up the stitches for both fronts from the provisional cast on (that light blue yarn at the bottom of the photo).

 Deb’s Diamond Blanket
After taking twelve months to knit the Intarsia Blanket, I have designed my next blanket project. It is called Deb’s Diamond Blanket and was inspired by this string quilt made by my friend Debbie at Stitchin’ Therapy blog.

My knitted design calls for 112  x 5” (12.5cm) squares which I will join as I go (and sew the ends in – I learnt my lesson from the last blanket). This is how much I have knitted since I started the project on 21 November.  This will be a ten inch square when completed. (3 down, 109 to go!)

 Merlot Toe Up Socks
Neither of my two large knitting projects are ideal for travelling or for knitting in company so I have cast on the second Merlot Sock to take with away with me. I cast on for the first one in September 2011 and would have finished it within a couple of weeks! I wondered why I had put it off for so long but I soon realised while doing Judy’s Magic Cast On on 2.25 (US 1) double-pointed needles -- I don’t like doing this cast on this way. It’s easier on circular needles – but my sock knitting circular needles are otherwise occupied. Obviously I did get it done in the end but it was tricky and annoyingly difficult. Either I’ll use my circulars or stick to cuff down socks for donation knitting in future!

For those who wonder about such things, I am doing 72 stitches and an hourglass heel (from Lynne Vogel's Twisted Sisters' Sock Workbook)

 Hexagon Project Bag
It seems like a long time since I started my Hexagon Project Bag with so much enthusiasm – a quick check of my blog shows that was only September but it feels much longer ago than that. I still need to cut out six pentagons (I didn’t realise that until yesterday) and six half hexagons and tack them down. Yesterday my sewing teacher showed me hoe to join the hexagons so I’ll see how much weight I have in my bag – if I have enough room I can take them as they’ll make a nice change from knitting. There are 36 hexagons in this photo, believe it or not!

Do you like my storage container? For what purpose would one use an old 70’s Tupperware container with a cracked lid if not for craft storage? LOL

The bottom two hexagons are the two my teacher joined as a demonstration.

Scrappy Rainbow Improv Quilt
I have more than enough improv blocks to make a quilt top and have bought some fabric to use as sashing – solids in natural and sand; I can't decide which to use yet till I get the blocks up on the design wall. I enjoy the improv block process so I will be making more I’m sure! They also make a good “leader and ender” project (if I ever remember!).

There are 99 x 6.5” blocks in this pile! I'm not sure where the red ones are hiding!


What are you working on? Do you still have projects you need to finish before Christmas?

Hopefully linking up with WIP Wednesday over at FreshlyPieced blog

one skein challenge revealed

Yesterday at the monthly meeting of our chapter of the Knitters’ Guild of NSW, we had a display of items knitted for the One Skein Challenge – what can be knitted with 100g of yarn or less? Here is a detail of my knitting:
Some of you who are members of Ravelry or who read a lot of knitting blogs may recognise this as the Swallowtail Shawl by Evelyn A. Clark (a free pattern on Ravelry). I deviated from the written pattern by not adding the nupps (a type of small bobble) in the Lily of the Valley pattern (the denser knitting towards the edges of the shawl) and by adding an extra five repeats of the Budding Lace pattern to the body of the shawl.

I knitted it Misti Alpaca – 100% baby alpaca in a hand-painted, lace-weight yarn. It's the first time I've knitted with alpaca and I was a little surprised at its fuzziness. It is very light and very soft. It’s hard to see the colour in my photos but it’s a blend of charcoal and denim-blue. The Misti Alpaca website (from where I copied this photo) says the colorway  is “Ashes”.

When I finished knitting the shawl, I was very disappointed about how small it was but I forgot to allow for the magic of blocking. It is 140cm (4ft 8in) across the top and therefore quite a nice size now!

And I still have 48g of the 100g I started with!

a finish and two WIPs – all knitting

I mentioned in my last post that I had started a new project, even though I had determined back at the beginning of July that there were to be no more new projects until I turned some of my WIPS into FOs. But I needed to purchase some yarn (as mentioned in my last post) to keep working on my Intarsia Blanket. My other UFOs involved stranded colourwork techniques, or working with sock yarn and small needles, neither of which I felt like doing. So I cast on a simple garter stitch shawl in 10ply (worsted weight) bouclé acrylic yarn on 5mm (US 8) needles. This was my progress on Wednesday afternoon.

As for the Finished Object -- I showed this cowl at the Knitters’ Guild meeting on Saturday. I actually finished knitting it on 24 July but the cast off was too tight so I unpicked it and redid it (a few days later). I finally got around to sewing the ends in at The Guild meeting, just before Show and Tell (one of my favourite parts of the meeting). The photo on the right, which shows the detail of the stitching, is more like the real colour.

The pattern is Cowl de Printemps by Jeni Chase (Ravelry link). The yarn is a sadly discontinued tencel/acrylic blend which is oh-so-soft, perfect for items that will be worn around the neck.

During the Guild meeting, I worked on the Never-ending Intarsia Blanket I started in November last year. It has been knitted on and off, depending on the weather and my mood – each row takes me twenty minutes to knit, that’s an average of just eleven stitches a minute, which is slow for me, but I have to stop to add a new colour at least once (and usually more) each row, plus weave the ends in. Some rows are faster than others, but twenty minutes is average!

When I last showed you the blanket at the beginning of July, it looked like this.

I had added another fifteen rows after this photo was taken but hadn’t taken another photo. Since writing that report on 7th July, I have added a further 206 rows (41,200 stitches) for a total of 414 rows; only 286 rows (or 57,200 stitches) for my target of 700 rows.

Anyway, enough of the statistics, the blanket now looks like this:

As you can see, I really did need to get some more red in there!

It’s the kind of knitting that gets people’s attention, even at a Guild meeting!

vale Robbyn Kenyon

I found out yesterday, through the power of the internet, that knitting designer Robbyn Kenyon passed away in February.

I followed Robbyn’s blog, The Yarnpath, for several years and had communication with Robbyn via email.

In January 2010, Robbyn decided to stop posting to her blog in order to focus on fighting the battle with cancer.

Earlier this year, I knitted a cowl which I called Dragon Skin Cowl.
 
The stitch pattern for the cowl was based on the “Dragon Skin” stitch found in Barbara Walker’s library of stitch patterns. The Alexstraza Cowl (Rav link), which is the pattern I used, was a design by Robbyn Kenyon.

I missed Robbyn’s blog when she closed it down and it saddens me that she had been gone for five months before I knew about it.

In her memory, I think I should cast on another of her designs (Rav link) that will live on after her.

Thank you, Robbyn, for sharing your patterns freely with knitters of the world. And thank you for the joy you brought to the readers of your blog and the people who “attended” her Knitting Chatter sessions on Saturday nights (USA time so I could never get involved).

Though I never knew you personally, and we had lost contact online, I will miss you.

I have not been well

Last Saturday, DD and the Grandsons visited. Both the boys had runny noses, Older Grandson was more obviously sick than Younger Grandson. But that didn’t stop him from getting into his usual mischief (he’s a two year old, very active boy). He was, however, more sooky than usual.

On Sunday night, I didn’t sleep well. My nose kept blocking and I couldn’t stop sneezing. On Monday I blew my nose all day long. By Monday night the cold had infected my sinuses and I thought I had partially inflated balloons inside my face!

As a consequence, not a great deal of anything has gone on here. A lot of time in front of the computer or the television. And a fair amount of time in bed – some of it sleeping, some of it tossing and turning!

During the week I missed two of my favourite monthly activities: a full-body massage and an embroidery class!

I have watched a lot of television, including the movie Finding Neverland, which I recorded when it was on during the day a couple of weeks ago. I have never seen the movie and really enjoyed it. I think Johnny Depp gave a sensitive, understated performance (unlike his characters in Pirates of the Caribbean, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory or Alice in Wonderland where he is completely over the top!). I don’t think I would watch the movie again for a very long time, if at all, because the magic of it would be lost in having seen it before.

I have done some reading – mostly of knitting reference books or quilting magazines. Last night I began Mao’s Last Dancer. I have not seen the movie and have only read the first two chapters so it’s a bit early to know what I think, although I have to say I really enjoyed the author’s description of his mother’s feelings on her wedding day.

I have snooped around Ravelry and added a couple of real life friends to my Ravelry friends! How extraordinary that they weren't already there – sorry R. and S. I discovered recently that I enjoy reading the notes my friends leave on their project pages – am I too weird?

I have done some knitting almost exclusively on a blanket which I will donate to a local animal shelter. I don't think the yarn is suitable (in colour or texture) for anything else. The yarn is Patons Cedar long discontinued, a pure wool boucle yarn that has no indication on the ball band as to needle size. I contacted a seller on Ebay who had a 1972 pattern for sale (thanks putney32); she says the patterns are knitted on 3.75mm (US 5)  needles which I find quite surprising as it is much thicker than DK yarn due to it's bouclé texture. I am knitting on 4.5mm (US 7) needles and it still gives a rather dense fabric, which is okay for blankets but a bit stiff for a jumper (sweater).
 
I estimate I have about four hours of knitting left to finish the blanket which will be about a metre (40”) square.

Tomorrow I am the tutor for an all-day workshop on knitting socks from the toe up. I was to have given this workshop last September but I was sick and it was postponed. I thought the tutorial notes was ready to go but on Wednesday I decided to completely re-write them for people who prefer stitch by stitch instructions – a most welcome suggestion from D. who reminded me that people would take the notes home but may not look at them for days, weeks or even months! So I have not written a pattern per se, I have written step-by-step notes, a tutorial in words.

I have also added notes for every row of the heel on how many stitches there should be on each needle so that participants will know immediately if they have gone wrong and ask for help then and there! When they are at home, they will only need to correct that row (assuming that they checked their stitch count at the end of the previous row).

The tutorial notes come to fourteen pages – I have written them for people working on 5 dpns, 4 dpns, two circulars or one circular. There are two appendices: one for the cast on and one for the bind off, both being used with permission from their original authors.

Apart from re-writing the notes and emailing back and forth with my two test-knitters/assistants (thanks C. and D.), I have test-knitted a sock using each of the four methods. Top row (left to right): 5dpns, 4dpns; bottom row: 2 circulars, one circular.

Do you know it is really hard to test-knit a pattern? One has to forget what one knows or assumes to be right and actually read the instructions! Who’d a thunk it?

knitting progress

I don't seemed to have achieved much on the sewing/quilting front lately but I have done some knitting.

Last Friday my next-door neighbour had their second child and second son, William, by Caesarean. I was hoping she would have a girl (there are so many pretty things I want to knit) but it was not to be.

Last night I cast on Tate by Melissa Leapman from "Quick Knit Keep Sakes Book 2". I'm using lemon coloured Cleckheaton Fiddle De Dee cotton (discontinued) on 5.00mm (US 8) Knitpicks Harmony needles (borrowed from DD). I haven't given you the Ravelry link because there is no photo there - it seems I am the first knitter on Ravelry to cast on for this pattern! The photo below is copied straight from the book and has been photographed sideways - the cast on edge is to the right of the photo. It is knitted on 151 stitches and has an eight row border of moss (seed) stitch then an "intermediate" lace pattern involving "slip two stitches knitwise, K1, P2SSO". I have done only ten rows so far - I don't know if it was the humidity or my tiredness but I just couldn't seem to knit quickly last night. I have taken no photos of my knitting because who wants to see rows of moss stitch?

In other knitting news, I have finished the body and sleeves of the striped baby jumper. The pattern is Mexicali Baby Ole (Ravelry link) by Mary C. Gildersleeve. It is knitted from the right cuff to the left cuff.The pattern says to block and sew up seams before adding collar - I'm wondering whether to add the collar first: what do you think?