Yay!

Phew! Well, I finally got CS3! THANKS RAVI!!! I'd link to your blog but it hasn't been updated since like March.

So now I actually have photos of what I've been doing! Unfortunately, no sooner did I get CS3 (THANK YOU RAVI!!), did I find this wicked awesome site called Picnik. You can do all sorts of stuff to your photos there. Crop them, adjust them, etc. It integrates into Flickr too, which is HOT. And you can save photos straight to Flickr using that. Which is also hot. So go check it out.

Anyway. So I completed some projects. I still haven't managed to find time to get a photo of the skating sweater on me. And currently it's drying from being blocked. I got a lot of comments on it when I wore it a couple weeks ago. Someone at work, before I could even say I knit it, commented that she really liked it. It's really my first successful sweater.

I also completed one of my Monkey Socks. But I don't have a photo of that. And I just took a photo of it! I knit it out of Great Adirondak's Silky Sock in the Antique color way. I love how the yarn isn't really pooling at all. Check it out:


Surprisingly, I was patient with this sock, so it actually fits. I usually get so excited to kitchener stitch that a lot of times I knit my socks too short. This one I didn't. I just have to make sure I don't knit the second one short either and I"ll be good to go. I've started on the second sock, but I'm kinda putting it on hold until I finish Ann's Midnight Dot Mittens.

I've started these mittens three times. It's kinda gotten to the point where if this next shot doesn't work, I kinda want to give up and hire someone to knit them for me.

Look what else I finished:


Bess and Jeff's place mats!!! I haven't had a chance to pass them on to the recipients, but I did have a chance to take some glamor shots as you can see. There's more on Ravelry and Flickr.

Additionally, I knit a hat. You see, my old Sparkle hat from SNB was the first hat I really knit for myself. So it has some sort of sentimental value. This was before I realized the wonder of pattern erratas. I used the wrong size needles for the top of the hat (even though they were the needles used according to the pattern), and so the hat didn't really fit right. It's been a long time. That hat has started to look kinda shoddy. Looking felted even. So last year I bought some paiettes (don't even ask where, I've no idea, somewhere on 6th ave in the upper 30s) with the notion of knitting a new Sparkle hat. I had to dig for them, but I finally found them, punched holes in them, and the next night set to knitting the hat. It took me one night to do (I finished it shortly after Bleach ended on Adult Swim on a Wednesday night). And so I present to you, Sparkle Hat 2.0:


Nope, a photo can't get more myspace than that! I've gotten several comments about it. The manager at the Point laughed at me. But the best was some guy on the subway platform at Pacific Street. He came up to me and said "I noticed your hat from several pillars away. I just wanted to say that I like it and it's very festive." I smiled at him and thanked him. And then he disappeared.

This is important. I didn't say "oh thank you I knit it myself in a night" like I usually do. I just thanked him. It was significantly easier than telling someone, "no really, it's easy." or "yeah, I probably could sell them, but I don't feel like it." Why is it that people want me to be a sweatshop? Really?!

On a completely separate note, I thought I'd share some resources I've recently stumbled upon outside of Ravelry.

Knit Map is awesome. You plug in your zip code and they find knitting stores around you. I'm still not sure it's really complete. I did a search for Staten Island and it said that there weren't any there. I'm sure there has to be at least one knitting store on SI.
knitblog.com has a whole index of where to find pattern errata for several different books.

There was another cool thing, but I've completely forgotten it. Anyway...isn't that enough!?

Where Have I Been? What Have I Done?

Oh where to start? November first Ruth and I went to Anthropologie (yes, that Anthropologie) to meet Wenlan Chia, author of Twinkle's Big City Knits. I went partially for the free yarn (Anthropologie had it set up as a workshop where participants would make either a scarf of an ornament according to skill level), but mostly to meet Wenlan (I seem to be good at meeting knitting book authors!) and to ask her what the hell was going on with her sizing.

I thought I wrote some sort of review about the book, but I can't seem to find it in my archives. I thought it was rather scathing towards the inhuman sizes she has. I was confused. She came over to Ruth and I (who were obviously the most advanced knitters in the workshop) and we asked her" dude, WTF?! (but nicer obviously) She replied that because her garments are knitted on huge needles and the yarn is like roving, her garments stretch like mad and also, that they're built with quite a bit of negative ease to be form fitting.

So, I bought her book that night, along with enough yarn for the Skating Sweater from it. Anthropologie was selling Twinkle for $10 a skein! and 15% off of that because we were there for the workshop, so I'm sure you understand that I just had to! Curiosity got the better of me, and I started knitting it the next day once I found size 19 24" circiulars (Thanks Purl Soho!). After just a week, I was here:



Since then, it's been completed. I actually wore it Thanksgiving Day. The sleeve seams are a bit bulky, but nothing I can't get used to. And it fits pretty well. I'm not really sure if it looks alright, since I didn't get a chance to get a photo of me in it. I kinda wish it were a repeat or two longer and of the 6 or so skeins i bought, I have three left over.

I seem to be on a big needle spree what with the Berkshire Pullover and now this. I knit a hat out of one of the skeins, but I don't like it, it's too short (probably that I can just never get her row gauge). But I've also been working on a set of four placemats for friends who got married last May (hey1 I've got a year after the wedding!). I've finished all of them, I just have to weave in the ends and slap some made by tags on em.

I was sick last week, and cuing projects to Ravelry like mad. I bought the new Rowan book (there's LOTS of great stuff in there!) and kinda can't wait to finish up the projects i'm currently working on in favor of some new ones. Next up on the docket is going to be the Tangled Yoke Cardigan from the Fall IK. I started swatching, but I haven't measured yet at all.

I'll probably bring the placemats to SNB tomorrow so I can weave in the ends. And I've made quite a bit of progress on my monkey socks as well. I'm knitting it in Great Adirondack's Silky Sock in the Antique colorway. It's really great yarn to work with. Up there on my top five sock yarns I'd say.

So, I upgraded to Leopard, but the problem I'm having is that only photoshop's CS3 program works, which means my Photoshop 6.0 or 7.0 or whatever was obsolete. Also, I can't seem to get iPhoto to work either (probably because it's not part of iLife 08). So i found CS3, but I need a good Leopard hack for CS3 to get it to work, so if anyone's got that, drop me an email or something. My friend had one, but it doesn't work for Leopard I guess. We did try that screen sharing thing through ichat and it was pretty nifty. Thing is, I don't really want to put up any photos I haven't changed the contrast/ color on. I think mostly because my camera sucks and I always end up with photos that look like crap if they haven't been balanced.

Anyway, I'm still getting over this cold, so I really need to get to bed. Sorry for the virtually pictureless post.

I know I need to update for real, but...

This is just too cute...



If you want to order the book, it's being published by Simon and Schuster on December 26th. You can click on the image to be driven to S&S's book page.

HOW adorable!!??

Don't have enough $$ for an iPhone?

Knit yourself one!

Passionknitly: Now in Sepia Tone!

Generally, if Beth makes massive sweeping changes to her blog, it's time for me to update my aesthetic. I kid, but really, it was time for a fall/winter revamp. I've been feeling rather sepia toned lately, so this is what I came up with. Whaddya think?

I even (finally) updated to the new blogger format. This is actually going to make it much easier to manage the sidebars. Do I think tehy're going to be updated more foten? Probably not, but it's worth a shot!

Also, CONGRATS to the RED SOX!!! Now that the world series is over, i can go back to my regular schedule of knitting in front of Adult Swim and Boston Legal! That might even mean that there could be more blogging on the way!

RHINEBECK Recap

I have quite a bit of work to do, don't I? God, what happened to October!? I think I'm so swept up in my BOSOX playing in the world series and RHINEBECK.

So I fixed the Berkshire pullover, but I don't have any new photos of it. I assure you it's done though. I started it three times in three different sizes. I did each sleeve twice - one because I cast on too few stitches the first time, and the other because my row gauge was a bit off. And I undid the neck and re-did it so it was in the middle of the sweater instead of off to the side.

The monkey socks are pretty much the same as they were when I showed them to you in the beginning of the month. I haven't done anything with them because I've been working on placemats for friends who got married in May. I realize I have a year after the wedding to get them done, but I'd really rather get them done sooner rather than later. My conscience was getting to me, so I started them.


I'm knitting four of them out of King Tut Cotton on size five Denises. One's done, one's almost done, and then I'll only have two more to knit. They're taking me about a week each to complete, which means I knit faster than I thought I did. :)

But what you really want is a RHINEBECK recap right?
Our NYC SNB gals holed up at Blogless Jill's parents' summer home for the weekend where we battled fruit flies, watched Hitchcock movies and knit our hearts out. THANKS TO JILL'S MOM FOR LETTING US STAY THERE!!!!

I did most of my buying the first day. I fought my way in and found some appropriate STR, then I stood in a line about three booths long to pay. This is what I came out with:


STR Medium weight yarn in Carbon Dating color-way.

After wandering around a bit, I also found some nice roving. I looked at it. I felt it. I coveted it. I bought it.


I'm not sure what it is, but I suspect it's some sort of silk/merino blend. It was way cheaper than buying yarn! I was surprised. After that, Michelle was kind enough to wander around with me a bit to find a nice drop spindle.

I met up with a lot of awesome bloggers and folks on Ravelry. Met a bunch of people I probably wouldn't have been able to if I hadn't done the Rhinebeck Blogger Bingo.

Later on that day, I found some fabulous wool to knit the Spiral Pullover in.


Doesn't look like much does it? It's only about 1500 yards of Falkland Wool I got from Ellen's 1/2 Pint farm!

That evening, Blogless Johanna taught some of us how to crochet!


I think I actually got it!

So we went to bed, and woke up the next day ready to head back to the Sheep and Wool Festival. This time, I decided I wanted to focus on the animals. After buying a few buttons from Briar Rose Fibers



I managed to find a bit more roving that struck my fancy


This stuff isn't as slippery as the other roving I bought, so I'm hoping it will be easier to learn with.

We went to the Alpaca and Llama jumping contest, then pet some of the sheep



And I saw a really elaborate Mohair Throw:


psst! That's a real mohair goat!

We wandered on over to the author tent to see if I could get the Yarn Harlot to sign Claudine's copy of her newest book. I had a moment of weakness. I don't have much more room for books on my Knitting shelf. In fact, I would say I have NO MORE room for books anywhere in my apartment. I still collect them though, and so, obviously, I had to buy Clara Parkes' new book The Knitter's Book of Yarn. I also had to have her sign this book.

All in all, I'd say it was a pretty successful trip. there was apple crisp and apple ceider consumed. Famous bloggers like Kate Gilbert and January One were noticed. People seemed to have a fun time, and I walked away with some awesome yarn. For a weekend in which i probably had about the the maturity of a six year old, I'd like to thank my fellow SNBers for letting me be the goofy comic relief of the weekend! <3 you gals!!!

Berkshire Trading Socks and Shania Twain's Sweater

It's kinda odd...I feel like now that all my stuff is on ravelry, I don't have as much of a reason to keep on top of the progress of my projects on my blog. Maybe it's just because I haven't felt much like writing either. Regardless, there's a lot more knitting stuff out there than I thought there was! Only thing is that when I take so long to post, I end up with these huge posts. Please forgive the verbosity!

The tattoo is almost completely healed and it looks GREAT!

I'm almost done with the second sleeve of the Berkshire Pullover as can be evidenced by the photo below...


I just have to do three more repeats of the decreasing pattern to get the sleeve
done, then sew down the cuff of the sleeve and the sweater.

Speaking of cuffs of the sweater, what do you think of this?


I'm not too fond of how the cuff is rolling up like that, but I'm not sure if that's something that will flatten out if I block it. The photo of the sweater has flat cuffs (both sleeve cuffs and the bottom cuff of the sweater), which is interesting because the sweater is knit in stockinette. I would like to maintain that look, so what I decided to do was to knit a couple extra rows, and purl a turning row. Then afterwards, to sew the cuff down. I tried to do this on the first sleeve, but I'm not sure it turned out ok. I'm afraid that the yarn is too bulky to do this method with. What do you folks think?

In other project related news, I finished the Jack Sparrows Favorite Socks


They were made out of Koigu on size 2 addis and will now reside with my roommate.

So to make up for the fact that I needed another sock going (have to have something to do while waiting for things!) I started a Monkey Sock.


I'm also knitting it on a pair of size two addis, but this time it's being knit out of Great Adirondack's Silky Sock in colorway Antique. I really love the feel of the yarn, and I have a feeling that it's going to end up being a strong pair. I'm feeling they could probably be smaller, but I think it'll be ok.

---

In completely other news, my friend, after seeing the video for Forever and For Always by Shania Twain, decided his wife needed the sweater in the video. He actually asked me to knit it, for her, and I might actually do it, if I can figure it out. Probably even just for the challenge of it. Here's the video:



Hope that works for you. So I've googled to see if anyone on craftster or anywhere else has already figured this out with no success. Basically, what I think is that the cuffs are knitted. Then, there's a front piece that's knitted from picked up stitches from the cuffs. After that, I'd say there's a piece that's knitted for the back and sewed to the front piece around the bust to make it shirt like. It'd be much thinner than the front piece, and it'd have to be twisted as well.

Does that seem right from what you can see? seems like a rather bulky yarn with a 1x1 slip stitch rib or something.

Fresh Ink!

by Agustin at Sacred Tattoo on B'way in NYC. It's about 1-1/2" x 2" on the inside of my left wrist.

It's so rad! It looks 20x better than the cartoony drawing I was working from! Thanks so much to the NYC SNB gals to helped to make it possible!!! Hope you kids like it!!

Why my SNB is the best out there

I love my SNB guys and gals. Seriously, they're amazing.

Tuesday night Adina Klein (I have no idea how to spell that, my issue of VK is in the other room, and the VK website is down) came to our SNB and did a bit of a run through of what's in this issue of the magazine. A few of us got to try on some stuff. Here's a quick look:


Jessaymn models one of the 25th anniversary scarves (I think this is actually the cover project)


Isn't she fabulous!!?? We even managed to get one of our other fancy gals to try on a little glitter!



I tried on a DKNY ski sweater that I've decided I must knit. Excuse the squinty face, but its really a happy squinty face!!



It was so very comfortable, oversized, and knit with Lions Brand Cashmere Blend. I"m not a huge Lions Brand fan...but this yarn was SUPER comfortable, SUPER warm and just super all around. Really made me change what I think about Lions Brand, and if I can't find anything suitable at Rhinebeck to knit this sweater out of, I might even buy some Lions Brand Cashmere Blend for it!

After the VK showcase, we all chatted. There were so many SNBers there! Michelle came for the night, and we've been seeing less and less of Heather! It was awesome to see everyone! On monday, in a fit of excitement I emailed my SNB gals that I'm getting that knitting tattoo I've been talking about for months! I made the appointment for Saturday and decided it was going to be an early birthday gift for myself. Well, on tuesday they all got together and decided to buy my tattoo for me!!! Now, not only will the tattoo have the meaning of my passion for knitting, but it will also be a constant reminder of my SNB gals and how much they all mean to me!!! How awesome are these folks!?!? Seriously, I know I've thanked you all a million times, but I love you all thank you so much!!!

Here's a shot of the card they all signed (isn't it just adorable and awesome!!??) alongside a nifty coin bank my roommate picked up at a quirky store in Jersey.


The smaller print on the tin says "Is wool your dirty little secret too?" There's a woman on the side saying "I need half a gram of wool and quick! I'm starting to come down..." and there's a warning on the other side that "sharing knitting needles can be hazardous to your health" It's so awesome!

Getting back to the tattoo: when I got to the studio on Monday, the dude took a quick glance at the pages of my notebook and said "oh, a knitting tattoo!" There wasn't even really all that much knitting related on it, just a few sketches of balls of yarn, but it was a good sign. When we were talking about when to do it, he suggested a day, i was busy, I suggested a day, he was busy, and then I was like, "well...the weekend after that I'm actually headed to a knitting thing, so it can't be then" and he was like, "well, you've got to get it done before then!" I'm so excited and curious to see what he did with the drawing I gave him. I'll be sure to post photos as soon as I get them!

I had to rip back the Berkshire pullover twice, so I'm on attempt number three. The first one was way too small, the second one was way too big, and this one looks rather on target.

Jack Sparrow's Favorite Socks are about halfway through the faire Isle on the second sock. It hasn't been knitted as much because of the Berkshire pullover. They're so close to completion and will probably be done sometime next weekend.

Overheard In A Yarn shop continues... It's only been around for a week and it seems to be getting a decent number of hits a day. I didn't post tonight cause I've been working on this blog and to be frank, I didn't get any submissions to use. I realize that I seriously need to get the point out. Kimmy mentioned that I should get a contest of some sort. I should find some local or smallish yarn company trying to get its start, get them to donate a prize or two and get the word out. I'm, frankly, thinking this could be a great opportunity to get a good banner and button...I just need to do a bit of research, which I'll do when I get down to it, but I've got a lot of stuff going on, what with the birthday and going to Rhode Island and all that jazz. Looking for smaller yarn folk might be kinda fun though!

Anyway, I desperately need submissions, so keep your ears open, blog about it etc. Submissions can be sent to overheardinayarnsop(at)gmail(dot)com. It's really only going to be as awesome as the submissions allow, and there's only so many times I can post crazy hearings or - worse - my own mutterings at The Point before I even end up getting bored!

New Project!!

Of the interweb variety! Check it out!

Overheard In A Yarn Shop

Button to come...pretty much everything to come, but it's there!

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Note to self:
Berkshire Pullover, take out neckline, and un-cast off 2 columns around neck. When casting off neckline, use the sewn bind off (Knitting Without Tears). Completely frog Berkshire Pullover and re-knit in much larger size for sweatshirt like feel. This sweater, upon further reflection needs way POSITIVE ease, not negative ease. I still think I'll be able to finish it before Rhinebeck though.

I have much to report on

Where have I been?


Burning Man. I've been at Burning Man. So, sorry for not posting, but I really had a good time. To check out the photos I took while I was there go here.

I did manage to finish one of my Jack Sparrows favorite socks while I was waiting for the plane. Here's a photo of it not so finished:


Quite bright eh? But I really like them that way. The fair isle isn't really that bad if you twist the color you're not using every time you switch colors or after every 3 or four stitches. I think you have to wrap it more because it's in a circle. I'm sorta hoping to get the other one done before National Talk Like A Pirate Day (September 19th).

So before I went away, at the last minute, I put Icarus out to block.


And when I came back, all I wanted to do was flop on my bed. Until, that is, I saw the beautiful Icarus lying there!





It came out more beautifully than I thought it would!

Currently, the only projects I have going on are the Jack Sparrow's Favorite Socks and the Berkshire Pullover from Weekend Knitting. I know what you're thinking...it's a Melanie Falick book and you suck at knitting Melanie Falick patterns! Well, not this time! I picked the easiest sweater pattern in the whole damn book. It's seriously knitting for 16 inches, dividing front and back, and then picking up stitches for the sleeves. There's seriously no way I can bork this. I've already finished half of the body.


I'm knitting it with some Morehouse Farm Bulky that I picked up last year at Rhinebeck. I figured that I should probably use at least a little bit of the small amount of Rhinebeck yarn I got last year before I get there this year!

I've also started in on that top down shrug I want to design/knit. I havne't made much headway in it though because I'm really trying to do more mindless knitting (for once!). I'll proabably come back to it a little later when I want a bit more of a challenge.

In preparation for Rhinebeck, I culled my stash quite a bit for the yarn swap today. I'll post on that separately later this week. Stay tuned...

New projects!

So much has been going on! I went to Cape Cod last weekend to visit my grandparents. My grandma is the reason I started knitting. She knit me this awesome poncho and I couldn't figure out how it worked, so I started trying to figure it out. Do you want to see how awesome my grandma is? This is what she's in the process of knitting:


She bought the yarn from Knit Picks and it came with a pattern for a vest that was on the cover of the magazine. She's never done steeks before, so she's kinda nervous about that, but it looks absolutely beautiful (and crazy!).

While I was there, I asked her to help me out a bit. I found some adorable fabric at Purl Patchwork a few months ago. I've never sewed before, so I wanted to sew something simple (I chose a skirt) and I knew my grandmother knows how to sew (she's made a lot of quilts). So it took us just a few hours to whip up this little number:


I LOVE how it came out! I love the mushrooms, the style, all of it! Do you want to see the invisible zipper?


I totally feel like I need a sewing machine now and I want to do like all these projects and everything. I loved how instantly it gratified my need for an FO, and how it's like...(this is going to sound stupid) real clothes!!!

Pretty much all I did while I was on that little mini vaca was knit. I mostly knit the clapotis, which is now finished. Here's a still WIP shot. I have to block it still.


My grandparents live on a lake...which is what that is in the background there (not sky). I'm taking Friday off of work, but hopefully, I'll already be packed by then so I can just set to blocking things. First on the blocking table is Icarus. I'll be making my bed before I go and then I'll soak and pin Icarus out to block. When I get back from BM, She should be wearable!

I think I'm going to steam block the clap, because, let's be honest here kids, I don't really care if the clap is perfect or not.

I've started a couple new projects (OMG this is the longest post ever) - which can be seen from my ravelry page. :) Jack Sparrow's Favorite Socks are on my needles right now. I just started the Fair Isle bits:


I saw the colors together at the store and knew they had to be together. This is my first time doing a toe up sock, and I must say, I like it a lot better than cuff down. I tend to get excited when i get towards the toe, which means I start decreasing too early and all of a sudden I end up with socks that are too small for me. Well, these are bound to fit perfectly as long as the fair isle doesn't end up getting too tight. The yarn is Koigu KPM. I've never used it before, but I must say that I really like working with it. At some point, I'll post a hierarchy of sock yarns. This one's in the top 5 for sure!

IK vs. VK

I got my fall issue of Interweave Knits today. Without having really looked through it in detail, I can say that there are a TON of sweaters in this issue that I really need to knit.
in order of appearance in issue

• Placed Cable Aran (though, I'll probably have to lengthen it)


• Tangled Yoke Cardigan (I think this is the one I most want to knit from the issue)


• Cinnabar Pullover (I love the linen stitch on the cuffs and the high neck will keep me warm this winter!)


• Cobblestone Pullover (you know, for the next time my brother wants a sweater...)


• Sweet Heart Vest (cause I think I'm all about vests this year...)

This is a significant improvement from the last issue (wool hats and aran sweaters in a summer issue!?? what were they thinking!!??), and I'm pretty confident that Eunny's gonna do a great job. Even if I do miss her blog updates. I must also say, that I don't terribly mind the new layout. It makes sense. I just wish they'd go with a sans serif font for everything. I think it'd keep them edgier.

Also, I picked up a copy of the Fall 2007 issue of Vogue Knitting. I'm not a huge Vogue Knitting fan. I think they follow fashion trends too much, which makes their magazines in general too dated. I picked this one up mostly for the articles. There's an interesting one by Lilly Chin on how to knit knits that flatter yourself and another one is an interview with a bunch of knitting "celebrities." There were a couple others, but I haven't gotten to them yet. Anyway, like I did for the Fall 07 IK, I should go over the list of projects in Fall 07 VK that I'm interested in knitting. For some reason, this issue didn't strike me as much as the IK did. Maybe it's just because I'm looking for more stockinette (dude, I've been knitting texture ALL YEAR LONG!)

• 16 Deborah Newton's honeycomb hoodie


• 31 Gayle Bunn's Diamond Cable Tunic


• 34 Susan Haviland's Crossover Neck Pullover (probably the only one here that i feel like I NEED to knit it it and soon!)


• 35 Jenn Jarvis's Hooded Cable Tank

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What are these?!


They're the stitch markers from Icarus!! But...you may ask, why aren't they on the needles with the rest of Icarus?

Well, that's because Icarus is no longer on the needles!!! Here she is looking like a lump of yarn on a table:


Yup, it only took a year to complete her, but she's finally done! I have my knowknits bag back for a new sock project and markers for any other projects (ahem, clapotis) that i might want to work on. She needs to be blocked, but that's going to have to wait until I go to Burning Man when she'll have time to laze about on my bed un-hindered by her human creator.

Well, I'd like to post on what I've started to knit (a pair of pirate socks and a clapotis), but it's going to have to wait because this is the longest week ever and I totally need some shuteye.

Hoping to tide you over for just a little longer...

I'm so almost done with Icarus. I've got three more rows to do before I CO. I haven't taken any photos of it because it seriously looks like just a blue blob of laceweight alpaca. It's extremely soft though. The idea was to complete it before I head to Burning Man on August 24th. That way, it'll have enough time to block on my bed before I come back.

So until then, I've got some more tattoo ideas! I decided the tattoo's going to be my gift to myself for my birthday towards the end of September. Here's all the ideas I had:


Those are all the ideas I sketched up. Two of those really stand out in my mind as to what I want...that random piece of paper over there on the left, the cable that looks like a knit stitch. That's the image I want to go around my left wrist.

If they seriously can't do that (I've been told that it's impossible, but I really don't believe them, below is the other option


I'm toying with the idea of having the banner there or leaving it off, based on the fact that I'm not sure exactly what I want it to say. I want the ball to be a color too, but I'm not sure if I want it to be a red or a purple...maybe even green.

So what do you think?

Protection

This is what happens when you take a magazine around with you everywhere for about a year. If you're a hardcore IK fan, you'll realize that this is the issue with Icarus and the Wedgewood blouse in it. If you're a fan (or let's face it, at this point a casual glancer) of my blog, you'll remember I'm knitting one of these projects, and have finished one of these projects. Icarus is really the reason this issue has traveled with me so much. Even though I copied the charts and was pretty sure of how everything was going to go down, I still felt as though I needed the security the pattern in the magazine afforded (I can be really silly sometimes).

You can see the wreckage done to the interiors as well:


Yeah, I bought another copy of the magazine so that later, if I say, want to re-knit the Wedgewood Blouse, I have a working copy of the magazine.

The condition of this magazine inspired me to reorganize. And reorganize I did!

I took all my loose paper patterns out and put them in page protectors. I organized them all fancy like too. There's a tab for Summer, Sweaters, Socks, Kids, Home, Etc. I made it look pretty cool too:


you can't really see the knitting ball/knitting needle stamp there, but it's there and it looks really cool with the rest of it, trust me! It looks all sorts of organized from the shelf, and it actually fits on the shelf!! :)

On the tattoo front, I changed my idea a bit, I decided that I wanted a bracelet more or less of the knit stitch in a column. I brought my idea, along with a swatch (it was a pretty small swatch though, probaly close to 5 stitches to the inch) to NY Adorned on Second avenue. They told me the idea I had wouldn't translate into a good tattoo because the lines I'd want are too close together. I kinda think this is sorta BS since the idea i have is fairly simple. I think if I'd brought a much larger swatch, it might have swayed him. Right now, however, I'm still looking for good ideas, so if you see any hot knitting tattoos, drop me a line!

What do you kids think of this?

That's just about the size i want it to be. It's small enough to be covered by my watch, which is important cause it'll be on my wrist.

The dangers of Ravelry

Not only will Ravelry suck a lot of your time starting it up and getting yourself organized, uploading your books, adding in all your photos for your projects, adding your stash, finding friends on it, etc. But, the friends you find on Ravelry will more than likely add blogs to your list - adding time to your normal blog regiment (not necessarily a negative thing).

Also, if you're like me, you'll be inpsired by tons of other things too...like this for example:


Combining this with watching Miami Ink for two hours on Tuesday, and I'm all sorts of ready for a new one!

Ravelry

I got my invite to Ravelry a couple weeks ago. It's awesome, seriously, I don't mean to brag, but if you're waiting for your invite, just know that it's well worth the wait!

They added a group section to it. I took the liberty of adding the NYC SNB to it, so if you're a member of the NYC SNB and you're on Ravelry already, join here. If you're not a member yet, check it out when you get on, and friend me, PassionKNITly!!

ETA: OMG! There's a Burning Man group on Ravelry!!!

Finished Coachella!

I love the way this turned out! I wore it to lunch today with Stanley and I haven't been able to take it off! It's so comfortable! I used Berroco Touche with size 9 Denises. I ended up taking Mary's suggestion to heart. I really wanted to make sure it'd fit, so what I did was take the way too drapey version, pin it up to get the drape the way I wanted it and then I measured to see what diameter I had to get to. Once I got past the my bust (which I probably should have put in more darts into) I realized that I should increase on the sides more than the pattern required. So i increased a total of 7 or 8 times. It's so soft!

To celebrate, I wandered over to M&J trimmings on Broadway (?) and 37th. I have a capelet shrug I want to make and I wanted to get good buttons. The buttons I bought look like this:



I'm pretty excited about learning how to create that thing in my head. I started reading Knitting from the Top by Barbra Walker today. I'll certainly keep you informed with how that process turns out. Who knows, maybe it'll even be good enough to offer up as a free pattern or something.

The other project I'm working on right now is a Clapotis out of some Sweet Georgia Speeed Demon. Blogless Ruth got the same yarn in the same colorway as I did and we decided to knit it up together. I'm almost done with the increasing rows. The yarn is ok, not amazing or anything, but the colors sure are pretty:

Another project gone awry!

Well, sorry for the boob shot, but anyone have any ideas how to fix this?



You see, the back of it looks great:



After recalculating, it appears as though my gauge was a little off. The gauge swatch I did was done in the round because I thought that the shirt would be done in the round. Well..you see, the top of the shirt is actually done back and forth. And so, my gauge is of .5 - 1 stitch per inch. The pattern's looking for a gauge of 18 stitches and 26 rows for 4". I've got 17 stitches and 24 rows. Theoretically, that should make it shorter, shouldn't it? I even got rid of about four rows but I still need the neckline to come up about four inches at the least.

Should I start it over and try to get the right gauge and hope that evens things out (I'd probably only have to go down one needle size and it knit up pretty quickly), or should I rip it and knit a size or two smaller with the right gauge?

Votes please?!