End of June catch-up

I've been taking a bit of a break from knitting. Or more like I've been getting back to the knitting without much of the blogging. But I guess I haven't had much to say about the projects I've been working on. But I have managed to finish some things even though I've been doing my best to enjoy the green that we're having.

First is this lovely and as such unblogged sweater that I finished back in April. I fully intend to get a complete set of matching buttons that work properly and take some modelled shots. For the record I believe I knit this sweater twice. I haven't knit enough successful sweaters to understand how to modify a pattern to fit myself properly. Theories and planning are great, but I need to see how the thing works before I know how to tweak it. Often in the knitting is where I see how it needs to be fixed. I'm cool with it.

The yarn was originally intended to be a Juliet, but after knitting that a couple of times I realised it's really not a great sweater design for my body type. As soon as I saw this pattern on Knitty I knew this yarn would be perfect, even if it is the same colour as in the pattern. But as I'm an avid t-shirt wearer, wasn't sold on the large open neckline. The first version of this sweater was knit with Elizabeth Zimmerman saddle shoulder shaping rather than the raglan as in the pattern. I thought a squarer shoulder would suit me better in addition to the smaller neckline. Well the shoulders were way too square, I decided I wanted buttons all the way up the front and full immersion blocking didn't quite live up to my optimistic gauge swatch. Oh and the nice little 1x1 twisted rib waist section didn't hit me in the waist so ended up looking silly.


So for the re-knit, I used the stitch counts for one size, based the length measurements off myself in the mirror. I know, the planning has you do that to start with. And I started the neckline according to the measurements for the smallest size. When changing for complete button band, I found that 10 rows wasn't quite enough space between. Instead of ripping back, I opted to group the button holes.

Summer stitch-up

I took a bit of a break from knitting and started a quilt. I've never made a quilt before but was so taken with the hexagons that I decided to jump straight into the quilting thing with a technique that requires such patience and work. It's been coming along quite nicely for the amount of time that I've spent working on the quilt.

I was a little discouraged with how visible the stitching is in some areas but I'm not going to stress myself out too much as I really haven't done any hand sewing since I was a kid and even then wasn't much of an expert. Also looking at some other's quilts it looks like I could space out the stitches a bit more and maybe switch to a non-white thread.

But I really enjoy how lovely and pressed the back of the quilt turns out as it slowly grows.

Sock Club pile up

This should come as no surprise but I'm experiencing a sock club yarn pile up these days. It seems that getting a skein of sock yarn a month is too much for me to handle. But then I went and signed up for ANOTHER sock club and things really went out the window. Or rather stacked up on my coffee table just staring at me. Taunting me. When are you going to knit me? What pattern are you going to use? You know another skein is soon to be on it's way. What are you gonna do then huh? Add another skein to the pile?

Well I've decided that at least having a pattern in mind for each skein will take the pressure off. It should at least keep the taunting to a minimum.

I had the thought to make Beaudelaire from this chocolatey skein:


But for the remaining two skeins, inspiration has yet to strike.

Any one have any ideas?

And I'm done!

I started these potholders last Sunday after signing up for the swap. Two days later and I'm already done my homework: 5 potholders in the same pattern. It's the perfect project. All the satisfaction of crocheting blocks for a blanket, without having to make 200 blocks which is quite the test for any attention span. I browsed all the crochet potholder links suggested on the swap's blog sidebar and narrowed it down to a few possibilities. My favourite being the pattern I chose. Though the pattern calls it daisy, it's definitely a star.

An afternoon of raiding my stash for suitable yarns yielded several contenders for this project. The major players came down to worsted weight cotton combination and the Briggs & Little/handspun combination. After working one potholder, I was sold on using the handspun.

I did find it surprising that I had enough of the handspun for 5 potholders. I even have a couple of the mini-balls left over! I think I'm going to make some of these for myself. I really love how the handspun is featured in this pattern. The crochet hides the inconsistencies in my early handspun. The barberpole effect from the two ply also looks great here though it's really not something I enjoyed when I spun this yarn.

This is one of my most photographed projects. I really like how pre-blocked these look like starfish. And everytime I took pictures, I wanted close ups of each potholder. I just can't get enough of the handspun squishy star goodness.

Pattern: Daisy Hot Plate Mat & Pot Holders
Materials: Briggs & Little Heritage natural and BFL Handspun
Start Date: March 22, 2009
End Date: March 24, 2009

Hooked on crochet

It seems to be rather fashionable of late to be all about crochet. And this time I'm firmly a part of the trend. I can't get enough of the hook. I've got it so bad that I've been working on crochet blocks while eating my breakfast in the morning. I can often be found with a hook and project crumpled up in my bag walking around Montreal. I don't necessarily work on the project when I'm out and about, but it's comforting to know that it's there.

The Hexagonal Blanket is not enough for me. I need MORE crochet projects! I have to crochet ALL the time! More more MORE!

So, uh, I joined a swap.

And I started a bag.

And yeah. Hopefully that should keep the craving satisfied. At least until I get a chance to cut out all those hexagons.

There's a hex on me

I have a new love affair. Hexagons. They are my shape of the moment. Hex hex hex. I heart the hex. I'm LOVING the simple awesomeness of the Hexagonal Blanket I'm working on. Working with a repeat number of twelve and increases the stitch grouping to make the circle, then alternate a corner with a straight side and wham bam you've got a hex!

A hex on me, originally uploaded by bunnieprops.

1. patchwork detail , 2. Hexagons, 3. 37, 4. Hexagons!, 5. hexagon update, 6. Quilt blocks, 7. My Grannys quilt, 8. Close Up, 9. 8two8 February - Tine's block, 10. Hexagon Doll Quilt, 11. paper piecing grows, 12. Hexagon Patchwork, 13. working on the flower garden, 14. WIP, 15. Hex's, 16. Tablemat, 17. the hexagons are growing..., 18. HPIM5876, 19. hexagons, 20. 11,239

I REALLY want to take my current hex love to the point of obsession. I have in mind to make a hand stitched mini hexagon quilt as recently blogged by Jane Brocket. I found a tutorial on English piecing through Flickr and want to start right away but cutting out a million hexes from my deck of quilter's quarters acquired a few years ago.

I really like the waving lines idea built from the hexagons rather than the more usual hex flowers. Maybe I'll go for more of a random hexagon strategy. Who knows at this point. But I should definitely start cutting out the many many paper templates.

Just in time for spring

This is part two of my mom's Xmas 2007 gift. Part one was the Puffs Beret that I knit over my Christmas holiday 2008. I had pledged to finish her scarf by her birthday, February 29th. I didn't quite make that deadline but finished it soon after. I did procrastinate blocking the scarf, but now I have no excuses. I should mail this sucker straight away before any shred of winter is gone.

I really enjoyed knitting this scarf even if the yarn wasn't forgiving to work with. Backtracking really sucks as the little bits of cashmere fluff stick like a mofo. Paying close attention was also key as this yarn is too fine to tell what's going on by touch. I reduced the border to 3 repeats to keep it more scarf than shawl once finished. But the berries are as written.

Pattern: Scarf with fir cone lace border by Jane Sowerby from Victorian Lace Today
Materials: 1.3 skeins Filatura Di Crosa Superior 12 blue
Start Date: January 22, 2009
End Date: March 8, 2009

Knitting pattern went rather quickly. After knitting the first border in an evening, the center took me a couple of evenings. Then another few for the second border. It did live on my couch halfway finished for a while, but overall quick and enjoyable. It gave me an appetite for some more lace. I'm pretty sure my mom will like the scarf. The beret has gotten nothing but rave reviews so far.

The Hexagonal Crochet Equation

I'm crazy. Or to be more specific, I can tend towards obsessive compulsion when it comes to some crafty projects. Like back when I was obsessed with making little paper stars and cut up the equivalent of a ream of paper and over months and months made thousands in every colour of paper I could find. So it should really be no surprise that I developed a rather complicated production line technique for working on this blanket.

As I was working on the first couple of blocks randomly picking colours for each round I started to think about how many colour combinations I could come up with from all the colours I was using. And if I had paid more attention during grade 12 math, I would have calculated all the permutations and combinations. Instead I decided to start working on the blanket with that methodology.

I grabbed a colour and started making little circles completing rounds one and two of the patterns. I even worked in the ends on each little disc as I worked with the added bonus of not having a million ends to deal with at the end of the project. I made enough discs in each colour to complete the next round with every other colour with my current group of colours. I had 10 colours total, so I made 9 little discs for each one (that's the only thing I remember from math class, one less than total number).

Next I dealt out all the discs into stacks for the rest round, one of each colour for each stack for the round 2 colour and continued on with the crochet factory. More crocheting and then re-dealing for the next round, etc. etc. until all the rounds (and blocks) are completed. Then BOOM 90 blocks are done!

The other cool thing about this blanket is that it's pretty much made with leftover yarn. It started off with the plentiful leftovers from the Jelly Bean Scarf and I spent some time raiding my stash for suitable colour substitutions as the original jelly bean palette runs out. I did spend some time this weekend replenishing the palette with some fresh jelly bean flavours at Effiloché but for the most part it's leftovers.

But the one wrinkle with my insane methodology is that this pattern connects the blocks in the final round. So now I have a whole stack of finished blocks not connected to each other. My preferred look for this blanket is when the blocks sit right next to each other. I did spend some time making a couple rows of connected blocks but it kind of smells having to take out the final round of every other block to connect it to it's neighbors.

Instead of being even MORE crazy and redoing my work, I think I'm going to move forward with the next batch of blocks and connect them to the old blocks when I get to the final round. That was I'll also be able to distribute the original colours with their replacements more evenly over the final blanket.