Trish Knits.com

Tag: Yarn

February Lady–Again

On Wednesday I received some new yarn in the mail. Ok, I know, this isn’t exactly earth-shattering news around here, but, look how pretty it is!

Purple Yarn!

It’s Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Worsted in the colorway, “Purple Club.” Of course I’m just a wee bit partial to purple. And this yarn is not disappointing me! It’s the first time I’ve ever had any Lorna’s Laces yarn. People say that the colors are really beautiful. And you know what? They’re right. This yarn is so gorgeous and so soft, that I knew I could not just let it languish in my stash. So, yesterday, I started this:

February Lady Sweater–Beginnings

It’s another February Lady Sweater. Ok, I know I never finished my other one that I started last Spring. But, truth be told, as much as I thought I would love the yarn for that one, it feels good in my fingers, but I didn’t really like working with it. Plus it’s a lighter weight yarn and the progress was painfully slow. And for an ADD-knitter like me, that is a recipe for disaster. I probably will finish it someday, because I do love the color, but I think I want to do the purple one first. The purple one is thicker yarn, so it’s going faster already, and well, it’s… purple. ‘Nuff said.

Also with the blue one I honestly think I should visit the frog pond and start over. It was my first time trying buttonholes, and I didn’t like the way they turned out. Thankfully, Amy from Knitting Help.com has a fabulous YouTube video buttonhole tutorial which I watched about 5 times before work this morning, and then I did my buttonhole with no problems. I’m sharing the video here, so I can use it as a reference for myself for when I get to the next buttonhole in a couple days:

I know my sweater doesn’t look like much yet but this is only one day’s worth of work and it is already progressed much further than it would have in the same amount of time with the other yarn. I’m enjoying it.

I have hope. Maybe 2010 will be the Year of the Sweater.

February 19, 2010
Knit Happy!

It’s late, especially today, but I just wanted to share this before bed:

Knit Happy mug

I got this adorable mug from Knitting Today earlier this week. In fact, I got several of them. They come in six colors, and of course I picked purple to show you. I don’t plan on using the mug for tea; I plan on keeping one on my desk at home, one on my desk at work, and giving the other three as gifts. The little sheep is adorable, and I love the saying on the front, “Knit Happy.”

The ironic thing is that I don’t feel like I’ve been knitting happy at all lately. I’m surrounded by yarn and a plethora of patterns and books, and everything is all neat and organized and I can actually see what I’ve got now. Except that now that it’s all neatly put away it’s like I don’t want to touch it. I wish I could just dump all my yarn out all around me and go diving for something fun. While I’m great at making the kind of mess something like that would involve, I’m not so good at putting it all away without help. So in the boxes it stays, and at times I think I forget what I have.

Maybe I should bite the bullet and go to my trusty box of Cascade 220, and ball up some yarn and knit a hat. Hats used to make me knit happy. But you know what? I haven’t made a hat in a looong time. Maybe that’s the cure. The hat I’m dying to make most is Vivian, by Lisa Cruse. The showier, the better. Big hat, huge flowers.

Or, cables? I have a fabulous pattern for a cabled scarf that came with some cashmere I bought at the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival. The cable pattern looks pretty complex, so I told myself I should practice it on something else before tackling the cashmere.

Or, Girasole? I know I mention that project a lot. But one advantage to that one is that the alpaca yarn I have for it is right behind me in my active projects bin, waiting. Maybe I should just cast on for that.

Tomorrow is an interim meeting of my knitting group. Our official meeting isn’t until September 12, but lots of folks have been itching to get together and knit. I’m going, and I guess I better decide by tomorrow what I’m going to knit.

Wish me luck deciding! I’ll check back in tomorrow.

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August 28, 2009
Whole Lotta Yarn!

Call me nuts, but there was a HUGE honkin’ box from Knit Picks on my porch today, and THIS is what was inside:

Big pile o’ yarn

That’s what 72 balls of yarn looks like, people. SEVENTY-TWO. Am I crazy? Waaaaaait. Don’t answer that.

Knit Picks introduced a bunch of new colors in their Palette line, and what can I say? I’m a sucker for having lots of yarn in many colors. The thing is, when I nonchalantly clicked to order two balls of nearly every new color, I had NO IDEA, and I really mean that, NO IDEA how much yarn I was actually buying.

My name is Trish D. and I am a yarnaholic.

Except I don’t want to be cured.

Squee! This winter I AM going to learn how to do colorwork. I want to make tams. And selbuvotter mittens. And lots of other colorful things. Now I have a whole crayon box full of colors to play with.

Did I NEED more yarn?

Define need.

I’m gonna go roll in it a while before I go to sleep.

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August 7, 2009
Back to Everyday Knitting…

…On what turned out to be a most unusual day. It seems hard or somehow inappropriate to even talk about my mundane knitting when there was such a horrific accident on our Metro system today. I am not the most praying person, but I am indeed praying for all of the victims and their families this day.

But, on to the knitting, even with my heavy heart. I realized earlier today that it’s been a while since I’ve updated Jen’s Hello Kitty Scarf. A solid 6 weeks of knitting, and this is what I’ve got:

Pink scarf in progress

It’s probably close to three feet long now. I figure I’ll knit until almost the end of the ball, then fringe. So it will be however long it is. Thankfully, Jen is small and so it doesn’t need to be hugely long. But it will, I am convinced, be quite long enough.

And ok, here’s a yarny confession:

Purple Yarny Goodness

Yes, I hit the Knit Picks yarn sale last week. I got 22 balls of Andean Treasure yarn, with which I am going to make Ysolda Teague’s Coraline Sweater. I met Ysolda at Maryland Sheep and Wool this year and she was wearing that very sweater. I was smitten! And totally thrilled when she said she had made the pattern in larger sizes. Wow.

Then today? I ordered small quantities of brightly colored sock yarn for another birthday card project. I’ll be rushing. Shhh… it’s a secret.

Oh, and Jon and Kate? I’m so over them now. So sad for the kids.

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June 22, 2009
FO Report: Halloween Scarf

Halloween scarf completed

Project Name: Halloween Scarf
Source: http://circe.canalblog.com/archives/2009/04/23/index.html
Yarn Used: Various, but featuring Vitreous Humor, by Insubordiknit
Needle Size: 13, for the eyeball yarn
Date Started: June 2, 2009
Date Completed: June 9, 2009

Notes: I knit most of this scarf on my Singer Cord Knitter, so each cord went fairly quickly. The eyeball yarn cord was knit by hand on size 13 needles. I actually have a little bit left over so I’m trying to decide what to do with it. I think I’ll keep it for decoration. I braided most of the cords loosely and tacked them together a little bit but I did not tack down the eyeball cord in case I ever want to recycle it for another scarf. I’ll try to get a photo of my daughter wearing it tomorrow. It looks much better on a person than on a chair!

Yarn Yummies

Look what I got in the mail yesterday!

Cascade Eco Alpaca

It’s Cascade Eco Alpaca which I purchased from The Loopy Ewe for 20% off. Sheri is hosting a knitalong for Jared Flood’s Girasole pattern, and well, I had to jump on the bandwagon! The knitalong is supposed to run through October 1, but I doubt I will finish in time. But, wow, the yarn is SO soft and SO yummy… I had to jump at the chance to get some at a discounted price. Oh wow, even though I know I can’t start my blanket just yet, I really want to! I can’t wait to have that yarn in my fingers. Yummy!

Well, I guess I better get to bed before I turn into a pumpkin… just wanted to share the day’s knitting news with people who I know would understand and share my joy. I’m sure most of you know what it’s like to live with people who love you but only tolerate your knitting? That’s what it’s like for me most of the time. Nobody here shares my excitement over the softest yarn ever or the joy of a completed project. (Though I do think my daughter is coveting a skein of the Eco Alpaca at the moment–guess I’d better be sure to count them before casting on for my project!) So, thank you for reading and sharing in the moments with me. It’s great having a community of knitters to share these little things with.

Until next time…

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June 9, 2009
Crankin’ Out the Cords

I’ve been busy cranking out the i-cords with my handy dandy cord knitter machine:

two i-cords next to balls of yarn

The two cords that I have made so far were done with Rowan Wool Cotton and Cascade 220. Now I’m wondering if I should try it tomorrow with my Noro Kureyon yarn. Should I dare? If so, I’ll let you know how it goes.

This machine works well, if you use it very slowly and make sure you push the errant stitches down on the hooks so they’re below the latches as the next bit of yarn is being caught in the hooks. And I find I have to put my hand down on the base to hold it steady as I crank because the suction cups don’t stick well on my table. Your mileage may vary on that. I definitely need to use the weight to hold the cord down as it comes out the bottom. That helps a lot. So I alternate between using my thumb to push the stitches down as it goes round and round (I only need to do this every four or five stitches) and placing my palm on the base of the machine as I crank.

The second cord went way faster than the first. The first one took all evening to get the rhythm of the thing. The second took just under two hours. So, despite its quirks, I say this thing is a success. For me at least, the not-speed-knitter, it was way faster than doing it by hand. So, yay! Only the fattest cords will be done by hand. So this project will go very fast. That, my friends, is a very good thing.

A Beautiful Little Song

Someone on Ravelry posted this little song on YouTube on Monday. I heard it yesterday for the first time and it just about brought me to tears. Have a listen:

See? I told you so.

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June 3, 2009