in use

These are the wildly red-orange fingerless mitts I made for Justin in Pittsburgh. He sent me of photo of them in use! yay!

working girl!

On Tuesday I actually started a new job and so far they haven’t decided I’m not the one.  It’s at a newspaper not far from where I went to university, so I’m familiar with the area and the drive.  Unfortunately/fortunately it’s just part-time.  On one hand I still have my afternoons free to do “stuff”, but I don’t make enough to really support myself without acquiring a second job.  If I was doing better on Etsy that might help, but I’m not so it’s pointless to be wistful.

So, I suppose I could blame the new job for my lack of posting.  I have been knitting lately.  Recently I had two big pairs of fingerless mitts to make – one for my sister’s fella and one for a friend of mine.  The latter has an interesting style that does not conform to the rules by which men dress themselves, so I took it as an opportunity to use that incredibly bright orange yarn I dyed last week.  I threw in a few spots of green too.  He says he likes them!

Not sure what’s next on my list.

yarn towers!

A few weeks ago I brought home some giant aran sweaters from the thrift store for recycling.  I’m always claiming that I want to do more colorwork, so I thought this would be a good/cheap way of acquiring yarn to dye.  Rich assisted in the disassembly by ripping the pieces once I separated them. Then I reskeined them for washing, splicing some of the smaller balls together.

Next I dyed them!  I wanted semi-solid colors and I tried to hit every note on the rainbow, so I wouldn’t end up with five balls of green and no red.  Two of them were dyed with koolaid – the second from the bottom on the far right was achieved with lots of orange (it’s hard to see).  I’m quite anxious to start playing around, although I’m not entirely sure what I’ll be making!

P.S. How does one go about creating a color palette? I’ve realized that when I dye things, they don’t really go together.  Like the yarn above, some of them do NOT mix well.  Suggestions?

love that cuddly stuff

This weekend I’m going to our annual Winter Revel – “our” being the shire of Rivenvale. Each January we get together for an evening of dancing and eating. Last year we started to have a silent auction as a fundraiser. It makes sense on multiple levels. Either you have gobs of gear you are wanting to unload or you are a craftsperson with looking to share your talents.

Of course I decided to contribute some yarn, but I couldn’t find anything appropriate in my stash. It couldn’t be dyed with chemical dyes or some huge and unruly bulky novelty yarn. So I dug out some of my favorite locks from Sage, a BFL/Border Leicester cross. Flicked the ends, spun them long-draw and here is the delicate end result. I’m almost hoping no one wants it.

“Nut-Brown Ale” 3 ounce, 150 yards

Also started a new pair of fingerless mitts. My sister’s boyfriend requested these for a very specific job. He uses some sort of electronic drawing pad that makes his hand very hot and sweaty. He was hoping to have these mittens to prevent the sweat from going all over. After nearly completing one, I realized perhaps wool was not the best choice. However, wool can have an insulating effect and does not necessarily mean it will cause him to sweat more. We’ll see what happens, eh?

last minute photos

Of last minute gifts! At least Rich’s hat got done relatively early. I worked on it the weekend I was in Cleveland with Cosy. Originally I had gone through my stash and was going to make it green and brown. Then I realized those are two colors he cannot see very well (they look very similar, I guess). So instead I made an emergency trip to Hobby Lobby, since I have no yarn shop, and bought the yarn right in front of him. I think it was store brand. He seems to be pleased regardless of my struggles.

For my Florida sister, I made this little zippered pouch. It’s from Weekend Knitting; the pattern is the Felted Stash Accessories Bag by Leigh Radford. I used stash yarn, mostly Brown Sheep Company Lamb’s Pride, which has always been a favorite yarn of mine. When I first saw it in my first real yarn shop, I fell in love with their colors. Ever since I’ve loved singles.

Putting the zipper into this was a challenge. In fact, my mother did it on Christmas Eve. I had never done it before and neither had she. Maybe in the future I will attempt a zipper again, but with fabric, not felt.

in the meantime

I will apologize in advance for the absence of photos, but as school is again back in session, I do not have time or daylight hours during which I can take pictures.  However, I have been knitting.

The wedding gift potholders are completed.  They need to be dry by Friday so I can give them to my dad to take to Florida.  I finished knitting the second one during Anthropology of Religion last night.  Then, after dinner and dishes, I felted them.  Overall they felted evenly, although they are more rectangular than square and the edges are rippled.  I have experienced rippling in the past, so if anyone has any suggestions, please let me know.  Over night I left the portable sewing machine on top of the potholders in hopes of flattening them.  It was mildly successful.  Felting is fun in that everything just mooshes together.  There is a long forgotten felted bowl that I started knitting in June and now I think perhaps I will toss it in the washer to get it finished.

This morning I ripped out the decreases in the crown of Richard’s colorwork cap.  For some reason it came out an inch shorter than I’d planned and it rides up on his head.  I took pleasure in doing a split-splice (while waiting for class to start) to join the old yarn and the new. Colorwork is one of my primary new interests.  Christabel has been an incredible inspiration to me.  Every day I open her blog there is a new piece to dazzle my eyes.  Also, Cosy and I have been talking about colorwork and she sent me a link to Knitting in Color.  It definitely looks like something I need to spend some time browsing. 

hat on head

Finished Rich’s cap this morning. It came in really handy last night at the Greenwich Meantime New Year’s Eve party as a way to keep me from eating more. Unfortunately and mysteriously, it ended up just a little bit shorter than I was going for. But it still fits. Now that he has TWO hats, he’s not sure which to wear. I told him that one is heavier and for colder weather, and the other, lighter one is for just cool weather. Tonight he wore them both at the same time. I also told him he’s going to end up with a lot more than just two hats if he sticks around!

Today I started another Wormhead’s Rollin’ Beret for a woman at church. The situation amuses me on several levels. First of all, she’s a knitter. She has given my mom several scarves. However, whenever she sees me knitting, she just raves about my extreme competence at being able to knit such things as hats and socks. I always tell her that she could do it too, but she says no. Alright, not everyone wants to get into increases and decreases. The other thing that I find a curiosity and a challenge is her disinterest in wool. When I suggested making it in wool, I could tell she bristled at the idea. After giving it some thought, I decided on Lion Brand, as they have fairly decent acrylics and I’ve successfully used their yarn before. How does a knitter of natural fibers accept – rather than try to impress her own high praise of wool – that there are folks out there who are perfectly happy with acrylic??