woohoo!

So many things to be excited about!!

1) Someone from MAP Magazine in Germany requested the use of the image below for an article she's writing!



2) I have finished the Rhode Island Red Sox!!!



I really really liked this yarn and the weight (medium). I realized, however, that the toes of my socks should generally be a bit bigger. Especially after I had followed the directions incorrectly. I thought that I should have been kitchener stitching 32 stitches together, instead i was supposed to be kitchener stitching 16 stitches together (16 on each needle vs 16 altogether). So a new goal is to actually follow the directions when I get to the toe of a sock.

3) I started a Clapotis out of some Sweet Georgia that Blogless RUTH and I got at the same time at the Point. I don't have any photos of it yet because I put it on the backburner almost as soon as I've started (Ruth and I have an understanding).

4) Why did I put it on the backburner? I saw Coachella on the summer Knitty. At first I just saw it and realized that I had enough Berroco Touche in a nice red color to knit it with. Then, late thursday night/ early Friday morning, I decided that I'm going to Burning Man. Burning Man is a giant art festival thingey held in a desert in Nevada for a week. Obviously, knits are needed. Bright, summery, light, tank tops for a hot, Hot, HOT desert. I've even already started it:



5) I went out with Blogless RUTH and Ravi on Friday. I ended up coming back with too much yarn, and fabric!!


The mint Koigu was 40% off because there was only one left. It's going to turn into a pair of anklets. The yellow is destined to be the spiral knee socks from the Summer 07 issue of Interweave Knits.


You see, Ravi and I were only going to help Blogless Ruth pick out fabrics/colors for her quilting project at Purl Patchwork. I don't even have a sewing machine so I figured this would be safe. NOT SO! I found this mushroom fabric and simply HAD TO HAVE IT! When I go to Cape Cod to visit my grandparents, my grandmother's going to help me do the simple A line skirt pattern.

6) I got my Ravelry invite today!! I haven't started even setting up my profile or anything like that yet, but I'm really excited about it!! When I get it together, I'll let you all know!!

Satuday Knits Live

One of the reasons I love working at a book publishing company is because I can do all sorts of random things. Today, for instance, there was a softy workshop. You see, Penguin is publishing this adorable book called Sock and Glove. So, I know this is a knitting blog, but the book's not about knitting gloves and socks. It's about making adorableness from pre-made socks and gloves! From 12:30 to 2pm a bunch of us crafty people gathered in a conference room on the 9th floor and just sewed and stuffed and tied and oohed and aahed and "hello my new friend"ed! I came home with a new friend:



Saturday is so named because I accidentally sewed his head on crooked and his arms are pointing so that he looks like he's dancing a la John Trovolta in Saturday Night Live. This thing was extremely easy to put together!!

Also, look, Saturday Knits....LIVE!

Represent @ BEA

Yup! That's me from the Yarn Harlot's autograph line. My sock, frolicking with her sock. She was brilliant as usual, she recognized my Roundabout Leaf Tank from Knitting Nature.

This was the second time I got the chance to go to BEA, and I have to say I liked it a lot more than the first time. The first time I was completely overwhelmed. It is quite overwhelming when you realize just how much there is there. But if you go through the show methodically, it's not so bad. The best part about the show (besides meeting the Yarn Harlot, Debbie Stoller, Kay and Ann, God, a guy wearing a giant name-tag that said his name was Scott, and neo-nazi authors - no, I'm not kidding on that one - of course) is getting to see what all the other publishers have going on for the fall. Here's a quick run down by publisher. I wish I had cover art because some of these are beautiful, but alas, since these titles don't pub until the fall, I've got nothing.

WORKMAN

Workman publishes Debbie Stoller and Workman's imprint Storey Publishing, you'll have heard of from the Yarn Harlot. I missed picking up one of their fall catalogs (cause I can be a dope sometimes), but I did pick up a sell piece for Debbie's new book coming out.
Son of Stitch'n Bitch, like always, looks stunningly hip and awesome. I wish this had been around when I was looking for sweater patterns for my brother. This seems to be in this new trend of publishing patterns for men. I'd say DK (my company!) started the most recent burst of men's knitting pattern books with Knitting With Balls by Michael Delveccio. And includes the titles (I'm not linking to them all because I'm lazy): Men who Knit and the Dogs that Love Them and Never Knit Your Man a Sweater. This book will do really well because Debbie Stoller's amazing and the style of the patterns in her book is usually pretty hip and classic at the same time.

STEWART TABORI AND CHANG

My issues with Melanie Falick aside, I really enjoyed the Harry N Abrams booth. Only problem was that the knitting books always seemed to be right behind where a meeting was taking place. The third time i dropped by, I said screw it, and wandered back (respectfully of course) anyway. I was handsomely rewarded.

KnitKnit: Profiles + Projects from Knitting's New Wave by Sabrina Gschwandtner looks to be totally awesome. A verifiable who's who of push-the-envelope knitters. I only saw a few spreads in a dummy book, but I sooo can't wait to see it!

Knitspeak by Andrea Berman Price (seriously, what's up with the compound word titles here?) seems to be a ultimate guide to pattern reading. At 4 5/8" by 6 1/2", it's sized to fit in a knitting bag on the go for when you're stuck on the tarmac with no idea of what a sskpssoktyi (slip slip knit pass slipped stitch over and knit till you're insane - I just made that up, not bad is it?) could possibly mean.

On the short list, they've also got a book on knitting scarves (My hatred for knitting scarves is a topic for another post), knitting classic styled patterns and Last Minute Patchwork and Quilted Gifts by (guess who!?) Joelle Hoverson. If I ever get a sewing machine, quilting is SOOO next up!

INTERWEAVE

Interweave is obviously awesome (someone please remind me to renew my subscription before it runs out with the fall issue) because they perpetually have their finger on the knitting world's pulse. They've got quite a few books coming out this fall that look hot.

The Best of Interweave Knits is edited by Ann Budd, so you know it should be good. The best patterns, and articles are reprinted here in one tome, which is pretty awesome. My BEA cohort suggested they come up with a pattern index or something similar for their magazines and sell that as well. The woman responded quite well to it. Time will tell.

Knitting Little Luxuries by Louisa Harding also looked pretty cute. I'm sooo not a girly girl, but the items I saw from this really struck me as pretty. Four chapters show Details as luxury, Urban luxury, Feminine luxury, and Warmth as luxury. Looks like some of the projects might be good for a little stash busting too!

The shortlist at the Interweave booth includes Kimono Style, Bag Style (which looked REALLY good! Johanna and I got to see a preliminary copy of spreads and got kinda excited. I don't even like using knitted bags!), and Folk Style (which seemed a lot less folky to me than I generally consider folk, but whatever).

WATSON-GUPTILL

I've no idea what these folks even publish. I just saw yarn on a cover out of the corner of my eye and hurried to the booth to check out the title. There's a couple interesting ones here...Vintage Crochet (which looked good even for a non-crocheter like myself!) and Super Stitches Knitting which is basically a stitch dictionary it looks like.

WILEY

Didn't see a whole lot going on there, but definitely check out Find Your Style and Knit It Too by Sharon Turner, if only for the pattern my Smittin w/Knittin friend conjured up!

I'm sure you can tell it was quite the exhausting show...and that's only the KNITTING/CRAFT section I looked at!! There were quite a few other books (novels etc) there that caught my eye, some I even managed to drag a copy home with me. Maybe I'll share, if you're good!!

To tide you over

I have a couple posts on the way...

1) Why you should photocopy your patterns and put them in page protectors when you schlepp them around with you.
2) Interesting upcoming craft books I found at BEA
3) Re-Meeting Stephanie Pearl-McPhee at BEA (proof! here!)

But firstly, I have to commend my roommate Ann for taking a fabulous photo of the first completed sock of my new pair:


I'm calling this my Rhode Island Red Sock (when they're both complete, it'll be Rhode Island Red Sox!)

The pattern is the Cable Rib Socks from Favorite Socks. I'm knitting it with some Socks That Rock in colorway Rhode Island Red. Ravi wanted to know what weight it is - it's medium weight. If you recall, Kim from Some Bunny's Love sent this to me in a nice care package with some nifty needles and some coffee syrup. (Kim, I'm STILL waiting for an integral part of your care package to arrive...when it does...woa boy, watch out!)

I LOVE THIS YARN. It's up there on my top two sock yarns. Tied for first place with Mountain Colors Bear feet. It's just so easy to work with and pools so beautifully. I've had issues in the past with variegated yarn pooling in very odd forms (for reference, see the River Rapids Socks or the first pair of Jaywalkers, so it's nice to finally get a yarn that when it pools, doesn't pool in a horrible way. The fact that it's great to work with, AND it pools nicely, for me, that is what makes it a great sock yarn.

Finished Object Wedgewood Blouse!!! (part 2)

So I finished it, and I blocked it.



That's a horrible photo of me because I look wide and my boobs are somehow at different levels (bra finding is on the agenda for this weekend). I should mention, that neither of these aspects are the fault of the fabulous photographer Ms. Needleworks, herself.

Personally, I think the neckline comes up way too high. I also think the sleeves are too tight, and it should be longer. You might noticed this as being generally too small. In fact, I'm realizing that I knit the pattern at least one size too small. Most of the patterns I've knit from Norah Gaughn's book I've had to make a bit smaller, so I thought I'd just start at the smaller size with this one and that it'd all work out. Nope. We'll see how much wear I get out of it. It was really fun to knit, and if i get the capital, I'd love to try knitting it again in the right size. If I really never wear it, it might end up with my roommate.

Knitting this project did teach me one thing, however, it requires visuals, and flickr just went down, so you're all going to have to learn my lesson either the hard way, or when I update tomorrow.

Finished Object Wedgewood Blouse!!!

Alright, I know, where have I been?

Well, a couple weeks ago I bought a Wii. Since then, I've been playing it quite a bit. Actually, I've been playing Galaga quite a bit more than anything else. You see, you can also download old school Nintendo games on the Wii.

Add to the novelty of the Wii the belly dancing that I restarted, and there's not much time for knitting around these parts! I had a performance last night at the McBurney YMCA. It was so much fun and I was shocked to realize that I was barely nervous at all. Blogless Johanna, Mary and Claudine all witnessed it so they know I'm not lying!! Mary even has photos on Flickr! Like this one:



In knitting news, I finished the Wedgewood Blouse!! All the ends are woven in, I just have to block it.


That's right, the girl that doesn't block anything's going to block the Wedgewood Blouse. You see, I knit it a bit too small I think. And the top, the part with the cables and all that is a bit too tight. I'm hoping that a good soak and a long pinned block will help stretch it out large enough to fit me. :-/

I Should Never Have Jinxed Myself

You'll note, of course, the orange waste yarn keeping the underarm stitches live (thank you blogless Suzi!). You'll also notice that the pattern says to BIND OFF 14 stitches. Yeah. If there's a way to f*** up a pattern, I'll find it. It's not a big deal though, I'll just bind off with new yarn and then sew the underarm seams. Other than that it's going well.


This was taken earlier this week once I had connected the sleeves and started in on the yoke. I've never done a sweater for myself, and so I've never done a yoke, but I like the way it makes it look rather seamless. I just started in on the pattern of the project which is interestingly constructed and a pleasant interruption from reverse stockinette!

On a different note, for Christmas about three years (one of my first projects!), I was planning on knitting a pair of argyle slippers for my mother from Weekend Knitting. A knitting store in North Kingston, RI told me I couldn't knit them, that they were too advanced for me since they had all those colors to them, and wouldn't I like to try something more one color and easier? No, damn you. I didn't ask if I could knit them, I asked you to help me find yarn. (Sorry for that tangent. I just strongly believe that what you *can* knit is highly dependent on how badly you want to knit it.) I showed her though! They were knit completely! However, there's a TON of finishing, and I just decided that there was no way in hell I'd be doing that.

To "replace" this missed gift, I'm going to attempt to knit the MUCH simpler slippers from Berroco pictured on the right. It's a free pattern. They're going to be knit out of a nice grey Berroco Suede (the recommended yarn).

I got a pair of really cute buttons to fasten them with on the side. These are probably also going to be late for Mother's Day, but I think I get points for thinking of her for more than just one day. Also, maybe it will get the rest of my family off my back regarding those embarrassing non gifted slippers.

In other news, I received the latest copy of IK (Summer 07). I'm somewhat confused why the summer issue has wool wintery hats in it. In general I found a lot of the patterns to be quite not summery, though there were a few things I'd love to make (like that one shoulder number with the scarf by Kate Gilbert!) Also, in my wanderings this week, I found a couple of interesting KALs I think I'll join - both for IK publications.

• Interweave Knits KAL


• Favorite Socks KAL


• List of 2007 Knit Alongs!

That last one is ESPECIALLY handy and will more than likely be making an appearance in the sidebar!