Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Monday, October 29, 2007

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!

Saturday, October 27, 2007

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.

Basket weave place mats

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 for me

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.

Loot 2

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.

Orange Wool!!

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!

Johnanna Tries to teach us 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

buttons!


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

Roving 2

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

Mohair sheep


And I saw a really elaborate Mohair Throw:

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!!!

NYSNB Rhinebeck 2007

Sunday, October 07, 2007

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...

Berkshire Pullover almost done!

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?

berkshire pullover sleeve cuff detail

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

Finished Jack Sparrow's 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.

started Monkey

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.