Monthly Archives: February 2011

A cavalcade of FOs

Posted on February 24, 2011 | 17 comments

This past weekend was Crafty Mom weekend at the beach. This was the 10th year for some of us, and it was highly productive for me.

I finished my Heather Hoodie. It’s not blocked yet, but I love it already. It’s big, squishy and warm. And it weighs a ton. It has 9.5 skeins of Brown Sheep Lamb’s Pride Bulky, which means 950 grams, or 33.25 ounces, or nearly two pounds…

…but it doesn’t feel that heavy when I put it on. Working on the button bands was making my hands tired, with all the hood and front stitches crammed on a 26 inch needle.

I started the button band with a full skein of yarn, and this is all I had left when the bands (including around the hood) were done.

This sweater was supposed to be a vest, but I wanted sleeves. I changed the straight armholes for a modified drop shoulder, indenting about 2 inches at the underarm. After seaming the shoulders, I picked up stitches at the sleeve cap for no-sew set-in sleeves and knit them flat to the wrist. I’m happy with the result.

What else did I work on? I finished my Athena with my leftover Chroma Worsted. I think this one is for me…finally!

I finished a cowl in Dream in Color Classy, the color is Deep Sea Flower. I can’t really show it to you yet; I was re-knitting a new design that’s going…somewhere.

I took pictures of an FO in this pretty Pico Accuardi Dyeworks Worsted; the color is Rodgie’s Midnight Dancing. I can’t show you the FO of that, either, but here’s the wrong side so you can admire the yarn.

And I started a new project for Sock Summit, but there’s no picture yet. Mostly I was just trying to get it started. I’m using Knitted Wit‘s Bling yarn, the bluer one on the left.

But enough about me. Carole made a necklace that everyone wanted, so she made a bunch!

And of course the view was spectacular. I woke up on Saturday morning, and where the sun had set the night before, there was a pink orb over the horizon. It was a perfect moon set.

Twin Rocks was pretty as always. They remind me of a sea serpent.

Although it’s trying to be spring here, there was snow on the hills, and it’s snowing tonight, too.

I could watch the sea and the sky forever. Always changing, but constantly lovely.

How was your weekend?

17 Comments

Posted in Knit, pattern design, travel

Tagged Athena entrelac, crafty moms, heather hoodie

Podcast: Entrelac. Forecast: Sunny

Posted on February 18, 2011 | 3 comments

I’m on the Knit Picks podcast, Entrelac-tastic! Stacey asked if I’d be a part of an entrelac episode, and I was happy to say yes. The episode begins with an interview with Rosemary Drysdale, author of Entrelac: The Essential Guide to Interlace Knitting, which I reviewed here. The episode also has an interview with in-house designer Kerin, and a review of Gwen Bortner’s book, Entree to Entrelac.

It was fun to chat with Stacey in my current role as entrelac evangelist. She asked me how I started designing, and I gave a roundabout answer, but the real answer is this. Sometimes I want to knit something, and can’t find a pattern that’s exactly what I want. So I have to come up with a way to match the picture in my head. It’s that simple.

Knit Picks is giving away a copy of Rosemary Drysdale’s book. Leave a comment on their blog to enter!

The funny thing about this interview is that Stacey and I live in the same city, but I was a continent away when I spoke with her. Another college visit, this time to University of Central Florida in Orlando. This is a huge school, 46,000 undergrad. But the 1700 student Honors College appears to be stellar; we were quite won over by the director’s presentation.

The teams are called the Knights; the school logo is Pegasus. There are a lot of constellation names on this campus (Gemini, Apollo, Orion), which makes sense because the school started out as Florida Technological University, a support system for the nearby Kennedy Space Center. The campus is laid out in concentric circles, with the student union at the center, classroom buildings on the next circle, housing at the outer edge. It feels a little theme-parkish (very Orlando!), but it makes perfect sense to keep traffic out of the main pedestrian campus.

Speaking of theme parks, we had an extra day in Orlando, so we went to Epcot. It was ok, but I’m not much of a theme park person.

This fellow came to lunch.

Here are a couple other birds; I made them in a needle-felting class last week. My friend Carole signed us up for this class at Collage as a Christmas present. It was great!

I’m scheduled to teach at Twisted next Thursday evening; coincidentally, it’s entrelac! We’ll be doing my Infinity Entrelac Infinity Scarf, and the Lacy Entrelac Infinity Scarf will be a bonus option included in the pattern that comes with the class. If you want to learn a spiffy provisional cast on and the basics of entrelac, this class is for you! You can even learn to purl back backwards (without turning your work). Contact Twisted to register.

3 Comments

Posted in Blogging, Knit, pattern design

Tagged entrelac, knit picks, needle felting, orlando, podcast

Lacy Entrelac

Posted on February 11, 2011 | 18 comments

When I saw the new Chroma yarns from Knit Picks, I knew that it would be perfect for entrelac. It’s a 70/30 merino/nylon single ply yarn with a very long, slow color repeat. It comes in 16 color combinations; this one is called Midwinter.

I liked the look of this yarn so much that I designed a simpler version of my Infinity Entrelac Infinity Scarf for Chroma Worsted. It’s big, soft and squishy, and I absolutely love it.

This is my new Lacy Entrelac Infinity Scarf, and the pattern is now available for purchase through the Knit Picks Independent Designer Program. It’s priced at $3.99.

I’ve also added instructions for this lace as a bonus to the original Infinity pattern. If you purchased Infinity online, you should have received a message that the pattern has been updated.

I had some Chroma Worsted left over, so I am knitting Athena again. I’ve knit so many of these, but they’ve all gone out as gifts. Maybe this one will be mine?

Oh, one more thing: I’m having a drawing for some greeting cards and tape measures over at the Lantern Moon blog. Stop on by for a chance to win!

18 Comments

Posted in Knit, pattern design

Tagged chroma, Knit, knitpicks idp

Potpourri post

Posted on February 4, 2011 | 11 comments

A little of this, a little of that.

We’re in college visit season, as you could see from my last post. We have another trip coming up, to another warm place. I think theTeen wants to escape the rain!

Too bad theTeen no longer knits. He used to knit, a long time ago. He even knit one red worm. (Naomi Dagen Bloom’s worm; she used to live in NYC, as did we, and now she blogs here in PDX as A Little Red Hen. Small world!) Anyway, I found out about this scholarship opportunity recently.

Five $3,000 scholarships are now available to hardworking students who can knit or crochet (that’s $15,000 total)! Jimmy Beans Wool has teamed up with many people in the fiber arts industry to provide the Beans For Brains Scholarship for deserving knitters and crocheters! This merit-based award is for students who will be attending an accredited institution in the Fall of 2011. You can get more information and an application by visiting the Beans For Brains Scholarship page (the deadline for submissions is April 1st). Not attending college but know someone who is or will be? Spread the word and help the next generation of fiber artists fund their dreams of higher education!

Maybe I should get him started again. I’m a knitting evangelist! What else? I finished the project I was working on at last week’s knit nite, but I’ll blog about it next week. This week? I finished the first sleeve on my Heather Hoodie cardi, and started the second. It goes really quickly, when I actually knit on it!

Oh, you want to see the *knitting*?

I also started on a project for Sock Summit. I’m using Knitted Wit’s lovely Bling (sparkly) yarn; she dyed both of these for me and I am having a hard time choosing which color to knit first! I think I’ll eventually use both of these, separately. The one on the left has blue overtones, and the one on the right is more gray.

My tiny start here isn’t quite what I want, so this will get ripped out and I’ll start again. This is my favorite part of designing: the dreaming about what it’s going to be, and starting and re-starting until it matches the dream. Frustrating sometimes, but that’s okay.

What are you knitting now?

11 Comments

Posted in Knit, pattern design

Tagged heather hoodie, Knit, scholarship, sock summit