Tag Archives: yarn chicken

Cheating at Yarn Chicken

Can I just say, a yarn scale is one of the best knitting tools you can have.

I just finished knitting In Threes, one of my favorite baby knits. I can knit the smallest size with one skein of Malabrigo Rios. I don’t remember the name of this colorway; it was in my stash. Lots of pinks and oranges.

As I was approaching the bottom garter stitch edge, I started weighing my yarn. It was taking 3 grams for every two rows, or 1.5 grams per row. I figured out how many rows I would need to finish following the instructions (6 rows garter plus 2 rows stockinette, plus bind off which I always equate to two rows, so 10 rows total). That meant that I would need 15 grams to finish, whenever I left off from the stockinette body. I could see that I’d have to short the body a little, knitting 2 rows fewer than what would get me to the preferred length, in order to have 15 grams left for the finishing. No big deal.

Yarn scale and 1.8 grams of leftover yarn

After binding off, this is all I had left. Not enough for 2 rows of stockinette (the ones I skipped), which would have used 3 grams. If I had knit 2 more rows of stockinette, I would have had to rip back. Nope. I WIN! (Also, this picture is more representative of the true color of the yarn.)

speckled buttons

These are the sweet buttons I bought from Tracy at Hap Bee at Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival. I love how they’re just enough color to show up, but not take away from all the different colors in the Malabrigo yarn.

buttons on a baby sweater

Now to get this off to the sweet recipient!

Knitting, tinking, knitting Stardust Nebula

it shawlette standing in a knit art installation by Sarah Divi
Posing at Sarah Divi’s art installation at VKLive

I finished my current design project in a hurry so I could wear it at VogueKnitting Live last weekend. But I had 15 g of my pooling yarn left, and I still needed to make a video tutorial on how to make the assigned pooling stars, and the shawlette needs re-blocking anyway so I can take product photos…

so I tinked the bind off and the last couple rows, and put it back on the needles. I added 18 more rows at the wide end, about 3 inches longer and 1.5 inches wider, unblocked.

tiny ball of yarn on scale, weighing 0.5 grams

Yarn chicken is so much better when you have a scale to keep track. I won!

two cats on a bed, with knitting

I had great helpers. Caturday knitting in bed is great, even when it’s work!

Video tutorial is done. Shawlette is blocking, again. Pattern has gone to tech editor and test knitters. It’s still called Stardust Nebula for now. We shall see. If you’d like to be the first to know when this pattern is published, sign up for my newsletter here!

In the meantime, here are a couple book recommendations from me. I like to read while I knit; I can control the pace, unlike television. I usually read fiction, but the last two books have been nonfiction. First off, The Wide, Wide Sea by Hampton Sides. It’s the story of Captain James Cook’s final journey from England to the South Seas to Alaska to the South Seas again. I knew he died at Kealakekua Bay on the Big Island of Hawaii, but this filled it all in for me.

Captain Cook monument at Kealakekua

We were at Kealakekua Bay last month. I didn’t want to hike 2 miles down and 2 miles back up (you can also get there by boat), so I settled for seeing it across the bay from Hikiau Heiau at Nāpo’opo’o Beach, a place that Cook had visited (and been mistaken for a god). Apparently he was mortal, after all.

The other book is The Art Thief by Michael Finkel. It’s the story of Stéphane Breitwieser, who stole more than 300 artworks from museums and churches across western Europe in the 1990’s and early 2000’s. Fascinating true crime.

What are you reading and knitting? January is flying by!

Adventures in Yarn Chicken

A short story. Place your bets!

yarn chicken redux

I needed 2 more rows, and a bind off. What do you think?

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yarn chicken no

Close, so close! If this piece were just for me, I’d use a piece of another yarn to finish. But this is a piece for a pattern, and “get some other yarn that matches and finish binding off” is not a good instruction line.

yarn chicken do over

So this happened. I do this, so you don’t have to. You’re welcome.

New math happening now. Should be a piece of cake!

So, so close, yarn chicken!

19 said yes, 19 said no. Ever the optimist, I forged on. And this is how close I got:

pdxknitterati yarn chicken

I made it! With 3 inches to spare. Just enough to sew in the end. It wasn’t really high stakes, because I would have just moved to the next color a little early, but I love a good game of yarn chicken. At least when I WIN.

Speaking of win, I did the random number thingy with the yes voters, and the winner is the 5th yes, Lindarumsey. I’m sending her an email to figure out what to send her, yarn, pattern, or other. Thanks to all for playing, and congrats to Linda!

Congrats also to pdxknitter, who won her own game of yarn chicken with 18 inches to spare. Woot! And sending good vibes to the Yarn Harlot, who is playing a much higher stakes game of yarn chicken

A little game of Yarn Chicken (contest), classes

Edited to add: Contest closed! See next post for the results and winner.

I’m playing a little game of yarn chicken. Do you think there’s enough yarn left for me to get 1050 stitches? Yes or no. Leave a comment, and I’ll do a random drawing from the correct answers when I find out. Winner gets something fun from my stash!

yarn chicken pdxknitterati

Yarn chicken is always more fun with wine, yes?

In other news, I’m teaching three classes at Twisted next week: Monday Cast On, Bind Off, Saturday Tink Drop Frog and Blocking. I know it’s summer and you’re not sure you want to be playing with wool, but we have air conditioning! Sign up now and make it happen!