Finished!

Today I finished the Oriel Lace Blouse! Whooo Hooo! I'm going to wear it to church tomorrow. It looks great if I say so myself!

I had it done except for the placket and buttons for several weeks. I even got the sleeves done and sewn in a couple of weeks ago. In fact, I was working on them when I lost my cat. He sat with me while I sewed them in. On 8/7 I had the back door open because it was so hot. I heard the dog chase him, but I thought he went upstairs. When I went to bed I noticed that he was missing, but he always shows up in the front yard, so I didn't worry. The next day he didn't show up and I got concerned. The dog looked so guilty when I asked him about the cat. After a few days I made up missing cat flyers and took them around the neighborhood. A few hours later I got a call from our neighbor 2 doors down and she said,"I've seen your cat. He's in Buellton." I said, "excuse me?" Buellton is 130 miles away from my house. Turns out he had gotten into the storage compartment of thier camper and rode all the way up there with them. He jumped out and scared them to death when they opened the door. They tried to get him back and he hung around for a couple of days, but wouldn't come to them. I called the animal shelter, but they haven't seen him. Every couple of days I check www.petharbor.com, but he doesn't show up. We went to Buellton the next weekend, but didn't find him. We left missing cat flyers around, but haven't heard anything yet. I really, really miss him.

Finished Another! Yesterday I had to take my mom to the doctor and the grocery store. It's warm out but when we go to the grocery store I always freeze. I was looking for something to wear and remembered that a couple of summers ago I made a sweater out of a heavy cotton yarn. I ran out before I made the sleeves so I wore it without them as a tank. Turns out the cotton was so hot I didn't wear it much after that. I did go back to the store to get more yarn and finished the sleeves but I never set them in. When I decided to wear it I found the sleeves and decided to sew them in. Yay! Another sweater done!

Front Back It's funny, now that I'm more experienced I noticed all the imperfections in it. It looks ok. It's a little loose, but that's perfect since I overdid it on the carbs this week. It was great for the frigid grocery store. And Yet Another! Today was the day for finishing. I finished my Coupling socks too! I had them done for a couple of days except for the bind off. I did the same bind off that I used for RPM. See the post below. I love them! I'd wear them tomorrow too, but they don't exactly go with the blouse. Oh well, I'll definitely wear them in Amsterdam.

We are going to Amsterdam in a couple of weeks. DH is working, but I'm going to hang out with the boss's wife. I'm looking forward to it. Hope I can find a yarn shoppe! Currently On The Needles The latest project is a wrap. I call it my Simple Sideways Wrap. I got the yarn last week at Unwind. They gave me a pattern for a wrap they have in the shop, but when I got home and cast on it wasn't what I remembered. I fooled around a little and came up with a pattern of my own. It is knit, left leaning decrease, knit, yo. I say "left leaning" because I knit combination and for me it's k2tog, but if you were to do that with western style knitting it looks different. So If you want it to look like mine you'd have to ssk. Or you can slant it the other direction. I think you'd start with the yo, but I haven't tried it myself yet. I started a cozy for my Zen with this pattern and the sock yarn from coupling. It's a yarn called "Maizy" and it is made from corn fiber. The only thing I don't like is that it was spun in Taiwan. Why did they have to do that? I believe that Crystal Palace Yarns is an American company. I guess it's cheaper, but is transporting the fiber back and forth worth the savings? I remember when things used to have a made in USA label on them. Now you don't see that much if at all. My next quest will be to find fiber that is manufactuered in the US.

Drinkin' And Knittin'

Remember how I thought it looked so much better after I changed all the purls to knits?

Well, I wasn’t happy with that either so I frogged the panel down to where you start adding stitches again and really worked on replacing them with the pattern. The stitches look all wonky now because I used a size 0 needle to redo them and I just found two dropped stitches. Ya know, it ain’t easy to repair dropped stitches in lace. They are probably about, oh, 20 rows or so down. They aren’t even in the place I repaired. I’m thinking that was the other night when we had wine with dinner. Caution, don’t drink and knit lace!!!

I’m about ready to tear my hair out with this! I got to thinking that I probably increased the body the same way I tried to do the sleeves. Maybe I can just make a couple of wine cozies out of them...

I was wondering how others work on their blogs. Mine seems to go in fits and starts. Sometimes I have the words and no pictures, and other times I don't know what to say. At the moment I'm blown away. I went looking for inspiration at Grumperina's blog and this is what I found. She's married! Woah. That is so cool. I haven't checked in on her blog for a while and, well, I never suspected. Anyway, congrats! I took some pics of the repair I'm doing to the sleeves of the lace blouse.

Before and After

I think it looks better after. I wouldn't be comfortable with the pattern interrupted under my armpits. Just a little distracting, I think. I ended up just knitting all the way. There didn't seem to be room for the purls to show up except to continue up the center of the pattern. Ahh, now that the holiday rush is over I can concentrate on getting my own stuff done again. Mmmmm, more socks perhaps? I got this yummy yarn just before the holidays and I can't wait to start something.

Happy New Year!

I know it doesn't look like I've done much lately, but believe me, I have. Christmas was super busy knitting socks for MIL, a scarf for my mom (on Christmas Day!) I finished the sweater for my SIL. Really it had been done since July, but I never bought the buttons. So I was sewing those on the week before Christmas.

Since Christmas I have almost finished another scarf. Nothing too fancy. I had the yarn left over from the "Homeless Scarf Project" that our church did this year. The yarn is Lion Brand Homespun. I have mostly shunned the fiber available at stores like Michael's but I am discovering that even Lion Brand is producing some nice product. Homespun is all poly/acrylic, but very soft. Unfortunately it ravels a lot. I made tassels for my mom's scarf and it is now getting fiber all over her. Oops. I don't think she minds. She was telling my MIL that she wanted me to knit her something. This was while I was in the kitchen hiding away trying to finish her scarf! I was late on this project because I started MIL's socks 2 weeks before Christmas and there was more knitting than I thought. They were actually a full size sock, but the picture has the cuff rolled. I thought the cuff was just decorative. I hope they are not itchy. I made them from a Lana Grossa sock yarn that I found in Texas. It seemed soft when I bought it, but after working with it for a while it felt somewhat itchy. I also made them rather large because she complained that she can't find socks that fit her. Well, I hope these do. I haven't heard anything about them yet. I'm sure I will. I have also gone back to my Oriel Lace Blouse. I'm working on the sleeves and am almost to the sleeve cap. There's something I want to change though. The place where you add on stitches I have used purl stitches and it looks funky to me. So I think I am going to switch all these stitches to what the pattern should be other than increases and decreases. Knits for the knit rows and purls for the purl rows. Hopefully it will blend a little better then. I got a new camera for Christmas. Now I just got to upload the pics! Pictures uploaded 1/6/08

Tomorrow Never Comes...

Boy, I must have been tired. Seems like I had a Rip Van Winkle moment. I never posted the picture of the baby pants,

aren't they cute?!?

I never came back and told you about my Oriel Lace Blouse.

Damnit, Jim, I'm a knitter not a blogger!

Just kidding. I apologize. Can't say I won't do it again. I am a SHE and time just seems to get away from me. Even now I should be working, but here I am trying to catch up with my blog because it has been weighing heavily on my mind since I discovered that I just wasted a whole bunch of time on the sleeves of my blouse. I was thinking this morning as I finished up the last two rows that I might just get this done in time to wear when I go to Texas next time, the home of this beautiful silk yarn. We'll see if that actually happens now. :( I read the instructions wrong. They say"Work center 61 sts according to Oriel chart, working the next 54 rows..." There is no period there after 54 rows. AAAAHHHHHHHH! I worked to 54 rows and guess what the rest of the sentence says? "...changing needle sized as foll: 16 rows with size 7, 16 rows with size 6, 14 rows with size 5, and 8 rows with size 3, ending with chart Row 26. A frogging I will go... 38 rows worth x 2!!!! (I'm working both sleeves at one time in the round. A thrill seeker, I know.)

This really sucks, but I love knitting so much I don't really mind. My DH thinks I'm nuts. I was so mad that I wanted to fix it right then, but alas, I have to get some actual work done. What really makes me mad is that I started with the sleeves and decided I didn't like they way they were coming out, but it gave me a chance to get used to the yarn and get a swatch going. The sleeves are the hardest part of this project and I think I might rewrite the instructions or put a big flag on them saying "beware" if I ever try this again. All in all it is coming along beautifully. I can't wait to get it done. But in the meantime I have to finish a Christmas present and make some scarves for my church's outreach.

Summer Knittin' & I'm Havin' a Blast

I couldn't wait to finish the socks so I could get started on this:

Kind of hard to tell yet, but it is the Oriel Lace Blouse from Interweave Knits Summer '07. I'm modifying again. This time I am knitting the body in one piece in the round.

I started a sleeve and wasn't happy with the way it looked. I think it was because I was having trouble getting used to the fiber. It is 100% Silk Tussah from TexScape Fibers. It is another yarn from Rosewood in Boerne (pronounced Bernie) Texas. The colorway was so beautiful, I couldn't resist, and the price was right too. Just $15.00 a skein. I figured 3 skeins will do it - 500 yd/skein.

Anyway, the fiber is a bit uneven. Some parts are very thin, and others are kind of fat and fuzzy. Almost like it wasn't spun evenly. It looks pretty in pattern this so far. I wasn't happy with the sleeve because there are many needle changes starting with a large needle at the wrist to create a bell shape. I love the idea, and I think it will look beautiful once I have worked with the pattern a while.