storm clouds are comin'

hello! it's really me this time! and i finally finished something! my non-knitting run is still going pretty strong...i'm knitting, just not very much. i think the tide is turning though...i hope so. i miss finishing things, and i have several nice things that are nearly done if i just got a little bit of inspiration.


i cast on for this project right after lolly posted pictures of her completed storm cloud shawlette, because i instantly knew that i wanted to use the alchemy temple yarn that i won last year in the knitters for obama raffle to make one of my own. i felt like it would be a really good match for the yarn, and would allow this variegated yarn to "behave" how i wanted...i always struggle with what to do with variegateds, because i often thing they muddy up a pattern and just look too busy knitted up (though they're so pretty in the skein!), but i thought it might work here.

this was just the easy, mindless knitting i needed! it knit up quickly over a week, and was soon off the needles. i really love this little shawl! the little ruffle is so sweet, and the colors look rich and peacock-ish. this one is going to be a gift, i think, but i will definitely be making another one for myself with a lingering skein of sundara sport merino. it's the perfect project for one or two skeins of really beautiful yarn.

pattern: storm cloud shawlette
yarn: alchemy temple, almost two skeins exactly
needles: size 8
mods: none!

i actually do have other finished things to show, but they are also gifts, so i probably need to wait until they arrive with the recipients before i show those off. soon though!

My Visit with Matthew (and Megan and Greta)

*edit* this is what i get for leaving myself logged into blogger when i go visit my brother, i guess. i was going to delete it, but i decided to leave it because it made me laugh, and because i've been so lazy about blogging lately. a fake post from someone else is better than no posts from me....right?!

This past weekend I drove to Vancouver to visit my brother Matthew, his wife Megan, and their new baby Greta! Greta is too cute. Megan was great. But what I was the most impressed with was how amazing my brother Matthew is. Not only is he handsome and fit, but he is so smart, caring, and insightful. I have decided that from now on, I will only knit for him. I am going to start a sweater for him now so that it will be ready for him when the fall comes. He's so great!

confession time

i have a confession to make. with the exception of this evening, when i went to knit night, i haven't knit in a week! not even on the weekend! this just never happens. i'm either stuck or bored with all of my current projects, and what's more, i've been busy with things like yoga and gardening, and just hanging outside in the glorious sunshine we had this weekend. i don't think i've ever had a knitting rut like this before! hopefully it will all be over soon. in the mean time, i don't have much of interest to show here.

i can show the awesome package that jodi sent me last week, though. about a year ago, i signed up for jodi's pay-it-forward deal. the idea was that jodi would send me something in the next year, and in exchange, i would send something to three others, and so on and so on. well, i have another confession to make: i think my year is just about up and i haven't sent my packages off yet! all three are underway though. so kate, karen, and shannon? i'm sorry! just hold tight and i will get them to you very soon.

but let's not focus on my shortcomings...let's focus on the cool stuff jodi sent me! i got a beautiful, squishy spring scarf (which i have already worn tons, and my knitting group loved it!), some gorgeous alpaca/merino sock yarn from the plucky knitter, and some cute sheepy soap (which smells just like snowcake, from lush, one of my favorite soaps ever). and some tea, which is already gone, so i can't show you that. anyway, it was a lovely, lovely thing to receive last week, so thank you so much jodi.

that's all i got for now...hopefully i'll be back soon with something other than excuses!

happy things

things that are putting a smile on my face these days:

• the fact that i FINALLY got a p-patch (or community garden plot, for those not in seattle). i've been on the waiting list for two years now, and i finally, finally got a plot. at my first-choice garden, too, two blocks from my house. i've been lustily browsing through seed catalogs the past few days, planning and scheming for a bountiful garden this summer.
• my knitting group's yarn swap that we had last weekend. i offloaded some odds and ends i didn't want anymore, and came home instead with a skein of handspun (love!), a cone of harrisville shetland wool, some vintage mohair/wool blend, some peace fleece, and a few other good things. new-to-me yarn! for free!
• cherry blossoms in bloom on my street. though our winter was pretty mild this year, i have been craving spring more than usual. it's finally here!
• this story.
• this place. and another one opening soon in my own neighborhood!
• and finally...these happy, crazy socks! i started these all the way back in july 2008, and they have been my background knitting project since then...the one i turn to when i'm in between projects, or when i just needed something easy. i finally pushed myself to just finish them, and though they are a little loud, they are certainly cheerful.

i wanted to use every last inch of this yarn, so these socks are pretty tall. i did calf-increases, but they are still a tiny bit snug--definitely still wearable. and i'm so pleased with my matchy stripes!

yarn: vesper wee skeins kit
needle: size 1.5, magic looped and knit two at a time (my first time trying this technique, but not my last!)
pattern: really, none. i knit these toe-up, and just kind of winged it. i referred to various online sources for how to do the short-row heel, but i don't remember what they were. i know, lame.

hope you're enjoying your spring (or fall, for those in the southern hemisphere)!

you're a woman, you love to weave*

i can't believe i haven't blogged in almost a month! i just haven't felt like it lately, despite having quite a few little projects to blog about. but i'm back now, and i'll try to catch up!

i think i mentioned a while back that i bought a cricket loom. well, after a couple of false starts and frustrating hours trying to warp it, i finally figured things out. and i'm really enjoying it! i've made two scarves so far, and i've learned a ton. the learning curve with weaving seems to be pretty quick...by the end of my first scarf i felt really comfortable, and the second one looks miles better than the first. and it's so fast! each scarf took about five hours total, including warping up the loom. not bad!

here's the first one. it is, i believe, 'warp faced,' meaning my up-and-down yarn is longer looking than the weft, or side-to-side, yarn. or something like that. i used up some leftover sock yarn from my chevron scarf, two shades of socks that rock (farmhouse and watermelon tourmaline, if you're keeping track). i figured that those two crazy, disparate colorways looked nice in the chevron scarf, so it might work here too. one thing i love about weaving is how well it works with variegated yarns. i had kind of sworn off buying variegateds some time ago, because i hate pooling, but this has me reconsidering that policy. anyway, for a first project, i think it turned out pretty well. it's more of a scarflet though...i severely underestimated how long to make the warp!

and here is my second scarf! i'm calling it the arizona scarf, because the colors of this yarn really remind me of my home state. the yarn is hello yarn sock yarn, in the nymph colorway, and this skein of yarn is one of the reasons i decided to learn to weave. i just knew it would look really cool as a woven fabric, and i was right!

it looks like a sort of free-form plaid, doesn't it? this one also turned out a little short (i think i've figured out how to correctly calculate my warp length now though, so hopefully i'm done making stumpy scarves), but it's a MUCH more even weave, and my selvedges turned out pretty tidy. i'm so proud of this one!

weaving is so much fun, and i love that i can crank out a scarf in just a few hours. you will definitely be seeing more weaving from me in the future!

*i love this.

fruits of my labor

wow...it has been an exhausting couple of weeks, culminating in an even more exhausting weekend. my brother and sister-in-law are expecting their first baby (i get to be an aunt!) in about six weeks, and i hosted one shower at my house for friends, and helped host a second shower for family members at my mom's house. two showers in one weekend--i think that is officially my limit! the above pink cookies were my first attempt at french macarons (well, actually third attempt. the first two batches failed!). these were cherry vanilla, and were a hit! i might be a little obsessed with these now.

before all the cleaning and baking, i first did some crafting for the baby. my main gift was an apple-themed baby quilt, which i hand quilted. the fabric was green and yellow apples on one side, and red and white polka dots on the back. it turned out really cute, but alas, i didn't get a proper picture of it before i gifted it. have i mentioned that i hate quilting? i think i am officially retiring from it after this one, which i finished at midnight the night before the shower. i don't think i've felt that kind of relief in a loooooooong time.

to go with the apple quilt, though, i made a matching apple hat--a much more pleasant, and quick, experience. so cute! i love this hat (i kind of want a red one for myself!). you can also see the quilt in the background here.

pattern: apple of our eye
yarn: debblie bliss cashmerino aran, almost one whole ball of the light green, and just a tiny amount for the leave. i used some scrap brown yarn for the stem
needle: size six and size 8

i can't wait to see my little niece wearing this!

the baby showers weren't my only excitement this weekend...my friend and i hit up target on friday for the release of the orla kiely collection. i had been eagerly awaiting this day more than i care to admit...and i may have bought a lot of stuff. this isn't all of what i bought, but isn't it cute! i'm a sucker for those pears.

rubber hubby*

this winter, i've been cold. really, really cold! we've had less rain than normal, but the good thing about the rain and clouds here in seattle is that they kind of act like a blanket over the whole city. it's actually pretty nice. so less clouds, paired with no functioning heater in our bedroom, means that i get pretty chilly at night. my husband is no help...he always has freezing cold hands and feet, so he actually makes things worse. i decided that what i absolutely needed was a hot water bottle. requires no electricity, is easy to use, and will never, ever be mean and torture me with its cold feet...my perfect solution. and what does my new hot water bottle need but its own little sweater!


i found a free pattern on ravelry, and chose some pretty kool-aid dyed yarn that jenna gave me for my birthday two birthdays ago. i held the yarn double to achieve the called-for chunky yarn, but knew almost immediately that i was going to run out. i also immediately decided to make a lot of changes to the pattern, namely not doing a ribbon/eyelet at the top, and instead doing a button band at the bottom. i knit until i ran out of the pink stuff, then switched to a sort-of matching browny purple cascade 220, which is obviously lighter weight, but it didn't really matter, since i ended the cables with the pink and started up in seed stitch. i can't tell if it looks weird like that or not, but overall i am happy with the end result.


and guess what? this thing really does keep you warm! and wool feels so much nicer against the skin than rubber, so this is one project that is very useful and will be very much appreciated for winters to come.

*while working on this at knit night a week or so ago, amelia informed me that in australia, a hot water bottle is referred to as a rubber hubby. i found that kind of hilarious, so that's what i'll call it from now on too.

pattern: toasty hot water bottle cosy (links to PDF)
yarn: mystery sport-weight wool, dyed with grape kool-aid (and still faintly grape scented!), two skeins held double, plus about a quarter of a skein of cascade 220
needles: size 8
mods: omitted eyelet row, added a seed stitch button band, made six button holes at end, and did not close up the end with the three-needle bind-off as called for.

blog, i missed you!

i'm back! i have a computer at home again, and can upload photos. i'm like a new woman. actually, it was kind of nice not having the computer at home, especially on weekends. whole days went by where i didn't check my email...and it was good! but still, i'm glad to have what my husband deemed the "fourth member of our family" back.

so...what did i do while i was gone? well, not much. i feel like i go through this phase every january where i'm just really overwhelmed by my desire to make EVERYTHING, all at once. i start tons of projects, and none of them really stick. i just want to finish something, finish everything. it doesn't work so well. so i'm plugging along on my garter yoke cardigan, which i haven't even posted a picture of yet. it's looking really beautiful, and i'm past the waist shaping, so it should be done fairly soon. i'm also working on some smaller projects, plus some deadline baby shower knitting and sewing. hopefully at least some of this stuff will be ready to show off soon.


but first...i absolutely had to make something from this book. i got it with some christmas money, and i immediately fell in love with pretty much every project in the book. i found a blank canvas bag at the thrift store, so the patchwork pocket bag got to be my first project from the book. and it turned out really, really cute, if i do say so myself.

it was a total pain to use the seam ripper to remove the canvas straps (and i stabbed myself once, and bled all over the bag. nice!). but the rest was a piece of cake...definitely my kind of sewing project. i made it one lazy sunday evening, and then hand stitched the pocket onto the bag the next evening. i used a lot of fabric scraps that i had lying around, so the actual out-of-pocket costs for this project was the dollar for the bag. not bad! i will definitely be making more things from this book.

back soon with some knitting! though...i should warn you...something arrived in the mail today to further distract me from my many works in progress. i got one of these!

12 months = 1 year

wow, it's 2009. i meant to post this yesterday, but our laptop broke, bringing 2009 in with a bit of a heavy sigh and an unintended trip to best buy, who assure us we should have our computer back in 2-3 weeks. that's a long time! so no pictures here, either. but nevermind, i'm sure we'll survive. afterall, what is work for if not to play around on the internet.

anyway...at the beginning of 2008, i made a list of goals for myself--things i hoped to try out, accomplish, or improve upon in the coming year. here's the original list, and here's how i did!

1. i did take a spanish class, and was somewhat surprised to find that it was actually too easy for me. i took a conversational, speaking-focused class, and i realized that i haven't actually forgotten that much of my four years of high school spanish, at least the vocabulary.

2. i did bake bread in my new dutch oven. i also made stews, pot roast, and other yummy things. i love my dutch oven.

3. i just barely did read 30 books this year. nevermind that a couple were audio books, and a couple were graphic novels, but still. if i could rate it on goodreads, i counted it, and my final number was 30, with a 31st finished up yesterday, just a day too late.

4. i made jam three times this year. the first time was a complete, total failure. the second was technically better, but not great. the third time was a success. i think i've got this down now.

5. i got a book about preserving food, but didn't really progress much further than that.

6. i tried to grow some herbs...they all died. i blame the wimpy summer we had. and i am STILL on the waiting list for a community garden plot. it will be two years this spring that i've been waiting. maybe 2009 will be my lucky year.

7. my most exciting accomplishment...i got a REAL bed and a new, memory foam mattress. our mattress is no longer sitting on the floor. best money we spent all year.

8. i knit one sweater, and one little sweaterlet/shrug thingy.

9. major fail on this one. i barely broke out my sewing machine all year.

10. i creweled! and i loved it.

11. i also quilted. didn't love this quite as much, but at least i tried.

12. eat less sugar...hmm. i had mixed results with this one. i did really well at cutting out some of the sugar-loaded culprits in my diet for a while (hello, yogurt. you have a lot of sugar in you). but now i'm kind of back to where i was before. this is definitely something i want to work on again in 2009. oh sugar...why do you taste so good?

so...not 100% successful, but pretty good. i don't think i have too many goals for 2009, other than the sugar goal. i also want to learn to weave this year, and would like to use some of my stash that's been lingering for a while. other than that, i'm taking it easy on myself this year.

happy new year everyone!

short and sweet

so, i had this lone ball of merino/alpaca blend that i bought in london two years ago. i wanted to do something nice with it, because it's a really lovely yarn that i don't think i can buy here, but i was somewhat limited by just having the one ball. it seems a lot of people have made fetching with this yarn, but i've already knit that pattern three or four times, and i really don't need more fingerless gloves.

(this is a photo of my scarf laying in the snow. did i mentioned we got a LOT of snow last week?)

after a little searching, the anthro-inspired scarflet seemed like a possible match. i saw this project first on jodi's blog, then scattered around ravelry, and it seemed like the solution to all of my problems (or at least the problem of what to do with that ball of yarn!). i cast on one day and finished the next. easy, instant gratification knitting. it required a light steam blocking to get the edges to lay straight, but other than that, i barely wove in the ends before throwing this thing around my neck and wearing it happily (and warmly).

the bonus here is that it really does look like a scarf at anthropologie right now, and that is a major plus in my book (ooh...i got this for christmas. i love it).

pattern: anthro-inspired scarflet (free download on ravelry)
yarn: rooster almerino aran, in colorway "rooster", 1 ball
needle: size 8

that's it! like i said, short and sweet, and now i've finally used that ball of yarn.

comfort and joy

merry christmas everyone!

i decided this year that i wasn't going to go the handknit christmas gift route this year...i tried that last year and nearly killed myself. but i still managed to make a few gifts this year.


first, grrr, a super cute little lion washcloth, for my friend's daughter. i loved making this! it was super fast and easy too, and making the loop stitch was fun. i definitely recommend this as a fun little gift for kids (or adults!). i'll definitely be making more of them.


next, i made a couple of logcabin pillow toys for my cat and my friend's kitten, using scraps of fabric. i stuffed each with copious amounts of catnip, and i can't speak for my friend's cat, penny, but my darling little spike adores this toy. he can't get enough of it! success!


and finally, for my friends and family this year, i made some cranberry apple preserves and cranberry curd. both were so good! i made sure to keep a jar of each for myself!

that's the extent of my handmade holidays this year...modest, but i think successful.

i hope everyone has a lovely holiday tomorrow, if you celebrate. we are totally snowed in here in seattle...we've gotten well over a foot in the past week and a half, which i realize isn't crazy winter weather for most people, but it's enough to shut this hilly, normally non-snowy city down. i'm hoping to dig my car out and be able to safely drive to my mom's tomorrow.

anyway...i just wanted to take this chance to say thank you to everyone who reads and comments on this little blog, and to everyone whose blogs i read and enjoy. i'm grateful to you all, and am glad to have you in my life!

xx
melissa

my new sweater

hello! i've suddenly found myself with lots to blog about, knitting and otherwise, so i should actually be posting more often, at least for the next couple of weeks. today though, i wanted to show off my cute new sweater!


i started elizabeth zimmermann's seamless yoke sweater at the end of august. as i do with most big projects, i worked on it for a while, put it down, and picked it back up later. but finally i finished it last week. this was a sweater that was not technically difficult to knit at all, but it was frustrating. i knit the two sleeves first, using the first as my gauge swatch. when i moved on to the body, i used the gauge i calculated from the sleeve to determine my cast-on number for the pattern. well, i really don't know what happened, but my swatch lied. totally lied! i knit along for about ten inches of the body, and even putting in quite a bit of waist shaping, when i tried it on, it was a good three inches too big. the only thing i can figure is that my knitting relaxed somewhat with the long stretches of stockinette. anyway, i wanted a pretty fitted sweater, so this was disappointing. normally, i am not good about ripping things out and redoing them. if it's a small item, and it's for me, i'm usually happy to live with my mistake. but this time, i felt like not redoing the body would mean i would never wear the sweater. so i knit the body again, and i'm really glad i did. the finished sweater fits me perfectly...almost like it was made for me!


this sweater is really all about the yoke, and i gave what i wanted to do for my yoke some serious thought. i knew i wanted something simple, but not plain. i really loved the color of the yarn (a beautiful blue somewhere between robin's egg and turquoise, with olive and fuschia tweedy flecks), and i kind of wanted that to be the focus. when i saw blueskysun's (rav link) ribbed yoke version of the sweater, i knew i had found my solution. she was kind enough to give me some pointers on how she did her own yoke. i think it's quite genius on her part--the ribbed yoke is very flattering, and hides the yoke decreases very cleverly.

(looky, it snowed!)

overall: i'm very happy with the end result. it's probably my most successful sweater to date, and one i expect to wear a lot.

the details: pattern: elizabeth zimmermann's seamless yoke sweater, from knitting without tears and other books
yarn: peace fleece worsted, in lena's meadow. i used 4.5 skeins to make about a 41" bust size.
needles: size 8

i'm ready to start another sweater now, and it will be none other than melissa's garter yoke cardigan, using some pretty blue/violet beaverslide that i've saved up just for this pattern. i'm so excited!

crewel intentions

oh, the potential for 'crewel' puns is rife, isn't it.

at the beginning of the year, i made of list of goals, or things i wanted to try, in 2008. one of those things was crewel, and i can now check it off the list!


this is 'birthday candles' from the new crewel.

i had embroidered before, but never creweled, and i found that i really enjoyed it. i guess the main difference is the thread you use: with crewel, you use a very rustic wool thread instead of embroidery floss. all of the stitches are otherwise the same. i think the wool thread made all the difference for me, because i vastly preferred this project to other embroidery projects i've undertaken in the past. or maybe i just really love satin stitch, another first for me with this project. anyway, there are several other patterns in the book that i think i might like to try some time, so this probably won't be my last crewel experience. maybe i'll even have a crewel, crewel summer (sorry!).

a closeup:


my french knots are a little wonky, but otherwise i think i did a pretty good job!

i used the recommended appleton crewel wool, but i can't remember which colors i used. i bought some of it here and some of it here.

i was happy enough with the end result to want to display it, so one trip to the thrift store and two coats of paint later, i was able to frame the piece and hang it in this little nook in our kitchen, along with my porcelain quails:


p.s. sorry for the very long absence. life, both good and bad, has been getting in the way the past few weeks. hopefully things will be returning back to normal soon though...

miscellany

bah! it's so easy to get into the habit of not blogging, especially when i feel like i haven't been up to anything too exciting, or feel my knitting progress is slow. but i actually have a couple of small projects that i finished up recently to show off, so i'd better just do it, right?!


first up is the beehive hat i made for a recent charity auction. it's terrible, but i can't even remember what charity it was for! a friend of mine volunteered for the organization, and they do an annual mad hat tea party. she asked some of her crafty friends to submit a 'mad hat.' i don't know how mad this is, but it's cute, and possibly zany, no? what's mad is that my husband actually modeled this for me so i could get a picture!

pattern: bzzz hat for queen bees, from stitch n bitch nation
yarn: brown sheep lamb's pride worsted, 1 skein, in sunburst
buttons and felt from joann's
needles: size 8
mods: none!


next up...some simple mittens for a friend's recent birthday. i wanted to do some pretty, elaborate floral motif embroidery, but it just didn't turn out, so i ended up doing this simple scallopy thing instead. i'm only somewhat pleased with how it turned out, but i like the color combination, and i like the simplicity of the design--it's decorative without being fussy.

pattern: warmest mittens, from knitting pretty (the first knitting book i ever owned!)
yarn: peace fleece, ancient fern, about 1/2 a skein, plus a few yards of turquoise cascade 220
needles: size 4

i really like the dense fabric this pattern creates...they make for very nice, warm mittens!

i am finally, after a few months off, working on my swallowtail shawl again. i finally picked up an addi turbo lace needle, and that was all i needed to get reinspired. so much easier to knit with than my denise needles that i was using! so hopefully i'll have that done soon.

vote!

socktober

so...i don't know if these socks even count for socktober, since i believe i technically finished them the last day of september. but i'm blogging them in october. and i don't have any other sock efforts to show this month, so i guess it will have to do.

these are my woodsman's socks, raveled here. i knit these for my little brother, and they are really, really overdue. like, two years overdue. i promised him hand knit socks for his birthday two birthdays ago (and his birthday is in march!), but ran into some road blocks pretty early on. two in particular: size 13 feet, fingering weight yarn. not happy bed fellows! so finally i got smart and knit these babies in a heavier yarn. i wanted something kind of vintage and rustic looking, and this elizabeth zimmermann patterns fit the bill. in the end, i'm actually really happy with them, and i think my brother is too. and what's even more amazing is that i think i've finally found something to knit for my husband! we've been together over five years and i've never knit him a single thing, but when he tried these on so i could take a picture, he commented on how nice they felt. so i will be making one more giant boy-size pair of socks soon!

pattern: ez's woodsman's socks, from the opinionated knitter
yarn: mission falls 1824 wool, two and a half of the brown, and one of the red
needles: size 7

of even more excitement, seattle is now home to a beard papa's!

kerchief girl

oh how i loved making kate's silk kerchief pattern. i knew the instant i saw it that i needed to make it, and in the exact shades that kate used in her's. can you blame me though? isn't it pretty? i found myself so completely smitten with this combination of colors: rusts and turquoises, charcoals and creams, violets and slate greys...so beautiful!


it was an easy pattern, and fairly quick, and i couldn't be happier with the end result. i sewed a little button on one corner, and used one of the yarn overs on the other corner as a button hole, and the result is a little kerchief that has already seen a ton of wear--to an almost embarrassing degree! the girl at the grocery store the other day declared it 'fabulous.' thanks for such a lovely little pattern, kate!



the best part is that i only used about half of each color, so i can make two!

pattern: silk kerchief, by kate gagnon
yarn: noro silk garden sock, in shades 045 and 069
needles: size 3
mods: absolutely none!

back soon with some socktober sock action...

knitters for obama

whew! all done with twilight. life can go on now.

so, this isn't quite knitting content (though i do have an fo to show off later this week...), but sort of knitting related. i've been meaning to blog about it for a week or so now (like i said...life is finally going back to normal...). anyway, a couple of weekends ago, my knitting group put on a knitter's for obama bake sale. it was awesome! we set up camp on a busy street right in the middle of all the bars in our area at around 10 p.m. on a saturday night, and hung out til the bars closed at 2 a.m. we sold a LOT of goodies to drunk people, and ended up raising $400 for the obama campaign. how cool is that?


in other knitting/obama fundraising news, i won a prize in the recent ravelry knitter's for obama fundraising raffle! i won two skeins of alchemy temple in secret agent blue, and some texas-themed stitch markers, which are now officially the most fancy stitch markers i own. also, the funniest. there's an oil rig one, and a cowboy boot! i love it.

anyway, if you're not an obama supporter, feel free to ignore this post, but if you are...have you donated in the new knitter's for obama raffle? there are tons and tons of cool prizes this time around. go do it!

twilight

oh my gosh you guys...i had the best intentions for september...getting my ez socks done and sent off to my brother, getting a good amount of the body done on my seamless yoke sweater, and even making another fun project, but ALL of that has fallen by the wayside since i got sucked (ha!) into the addictive-as-heroin world of the twilight saga. i am NOT proud, but there you go. i'm about a third of the way through the last book, so i hope to regain my life again soon. anyone else out there reading these too? anyone?!

back soon with some actual knitting!

my one-member ez fanclub

thanks, everyone, for all the kind quilt comments! i appreciated them all a lot.

so what have i been doing, knitting-wise? well, i've started two new projects! i haven't forgotten about my other two wip's...the vesper wee skein socks and the swallowtail shawl, but these two new ones were calling out my name. and i should have all four finished in the near future, if my knitting master plan works out (it probably won't, but i always like to have a plan anyway).


it's funny...i just realized that both new projects are elizabeth zimmermann patterns! and i'm really loving both, it should come as no suprise. first up is some woodsman socks, for my brother. i've owed him some handknit socks for over two years now, and have been held up by my terror of knitting size 13 (seriously) mens's socks on tiny needles. so these are fitting the bill nicely: knit on size 7s, in mission falls 1824 wool. it's my first time trying this superwash, and i'm pretty impressed. it's really, really soft, and so far seems to resist pilling. we'll see. i'm down to the heel on the second sock, so these should be done soon!

the second project is one i'm really, really excited about. it's a seamless yoke sweater done in peace fleece, in the lena's meadow color way. i can't get an accurate picture of this color, but it's a beautiful light turquoisey blue, with dark turquoise, purple and olive flecks throughout. i really like how this is knitting up, too. i blocked the first sleeve and it really softens up a lot. i have high hopes for this sweater!

oh! and the yoke! i'm going to try something i saw another person do on ravelry: a ribbed yoke. i didn't want to do any colorwork for this yoke, but i wanted something a little more exciting than a plain yoke. i think this works really well. i am almost done with the second sleeve, but after blocking the first, i got a more accurate sense of what gauge this is knitting up to, and the sleeve seemed a bit big. so i'm going to rip it back a little and do fewer increases. i really want this sweater to fit well and be wearable, so i'm taking no chances.