A Quick Father's Day Update

A short post today, I think, just to mark the progress of one project and the beginning of another.

The Ruffled Triangle Scarf is really such a sweet pattern. I am truly enjoying knitting this little shawlette, and the drape created by the boucle yarn and the short-row ruffles is just luscious. I'm about 3/4 of the way done, and I've hardly used any of the yarn in my stash, so I'll be able to do at least a couple more after this.

I noticed that several of the knitters on Ravelry who also made this scarf tried different methods of transitioning the point between the increase and the decrease, so I may experiment a bit when I make this pattern again. For this one, I did a simple row even to create the "center".

However, I've had to put a hold on finishing right away, as I'm in gift mode with a deadline approaching quickly. I finally found what I think is the perfect project for the Classic Elite Summer Sox yarn. Remember Ocala Beach?

I have joined another group on Ravelry after subscribing to a terrific blog called A Yarn Loving Mama. I've enjoyed reading Tanya's posts, and she recently announced a Knit-Along for a pair of socks, so I peeked in. And what do you think I found there but the perfect project. I've never done a knit-along before, but I'm excited to connect with other knitters and share my progress and my questions, while learning from their clever ideas. The pattern is called Hermoine's Everyday Socks, and it's a free offering by Erica Leuder from her Dreams in Fiber blog.

I've decided to make the socks from the toe up, two-at-a-time, using the Magic Loop method. I love making socks this way. I love that the gusset is so easy and there's no picking up stitches. I love that the toe is so smooth and there is no grafting. I love that I can make them identical. I love that when I'm done, I'm done.

And I think they're so cute when the toe starts taking shape!

So, there's Project 14. And this will completely eliminate these two balls of yarn from my stash.

Two balls among what seems like millions of yards of yarn. <sigh> But I will not despise the day of small beginnings. One step at a time, and I'll get there....eventually. :)

Summer Has Begun

It's hard to believe almost a month has gone by since I last posted. Lots of busyness happening in our lives, though not much of it was fiber-related. However, I did get a chance to fit in a few new projects.

In early May, I discovered a wonderful thing. There are many creative folks out there designing knit and crochet projects that need folks like me who aren't so creative to test their designs and patterns for them. I am all on board with this, since I am an editor by nature and always find those little mistakes that can undo a beautiful project. I have often contacted designers and publishers to notify them of errors in the pattern, so I appreciate when a designer takes the time to have his/her pattern tested by others. I admire creative people, but they aren't often quite so picky about the little details as I am.

Anyway, my discovery and, subsequently, Project 11. On Ravelry, groups have begun popping up calling for pattern testers, and that got my attention. So I waited until I knew I'd have a little time to take on a small project and then found one that I thought I could tackle. The Surfer Boy Wallet by Michelle B. over at MyDailyFiber was a cute billfold-type item made with crochet cotton. I have TONS of this stuff, so I thought it would help with the destashing while giving me an opportunity to work with a designer. I checked out her other patterns and loved what I saw, so I raised my hand...and she picked me! Yay!

I used two different color threads: navy blue and a red/white/blue ombre.

Both of these threads are size 10, and the pattern called for a size 8 steel crochet hook. The project worked up very easily, and the small single crochets quickly created a stiff, dense fabric. I used the blue for the main color and the ombre for the card pocket.

Here's the finished product:

It holds bills and credit cards, but not coins, and can get wet with no issues. It's machine washable, and you just lay it open flat to dry. Thanks, Michelle, for giving me the chance! It was a pleasure to work with you!

After all that small crochet work, I was ready to knit again. I looked in my stash and found a large bag of red boucle called Marks & Kattens Freesia.

I think I found this yarn at Goodwill many moons ago, and just put it with the rest of the stash, waiting for the right project and then forgetting about it. It's a cotton/acrylic blend, and it's a true boucle, something you can't easily find anymore.

So I began my search (thank you, again, Ravelry) and even added the term "boucle" and, lo and behold, I found the perfect project. Janis Abel created a sweet little shawlette using a rayon boucle called the Ruffled Triangle Scarf. Although it was her first attempt a writing a pattern, she did a bang-up job of carefully explaining her short-row technique (which I love, by the way, as it requires no wraps). Because you use the short rows to create the ruffle, it takes longer than your average scarf or shawlette, but I love the results and am enjoying the process.

The combination of the boucle yarn and the short-row ruffles creates a gorgeous drape. I can't wait to finish this! And I believe I have enough yarn to make two!

And since I tend to have more than one project going, and since I found something groovy project that Leisure Arts posted on Facebook, and since my sister has now taken up crocheting and we like to do stuff together (is that enough excuse?), I started another project while the shawlette above is still in progress.

Project 13: Floppy Brimmed Hat. Two of my stash items, given to me several years back by my friend Keo (you've got to check out her amazing blog here), along with two ENORMOUS bags of yarn and crochet thread were two spools of J&P Coats Crochet Nylon. These are worsted-weight nylon cords that are strong and stiff, perfect for outdoor-type items. I had one new spool in beige,

and one in a very pale green that was started, but then rewound. Here's a photo of it after I finished the hat, though the green color is not quite true:

The hat called for 2 spools of cord, so I decided to use both of these and break up the colors. While very stiff, it crocheted with no problems, although weaving in is something of a challenge. Nevertheless, I got it finished just today, and present to you now my Summer Beach Hat, or what I like to call "How to Hide from the Sun and Everything Else"

Yes, I'm in there somewhere and, no, it doesn't matter which direction I'm facing, it would look like this. I take it the designer has a slightly larger head than I. Actually, I may pull out the last three rows on the brim and just leave a single row of the green for piping. Then I may be able to see out of it. :)

Breaking out the knitting machine

A wonderful resource has been lying in a box under my bed for the last three years: my knitting machine. I purchased it a little over three years ago, set it up, starting learning how to operate the thing, made one shawl, and then had to pack it up in preparation for a move that took over a year to occur. And it's been in that box all this time. With a little nudge from my husband (who cleared off his desk for me to set it up - thank you, Bob!), it has emerged from the dust bunnies and has now taken up residence in my bedroom, waiting to zip up some fab creations.

In preparation for it's use, I've gone back to some of my stash items, such as the pale yellow and pale pink 100% silk yarns harvested from two J. Jill sweaters I purchased at a yard sale for 75 cents each. Remember these?

They are ideal for my Studio/Singer/Silver Reed SK-700 standard gauge machine. They're either heavy lace or sock weight, and there's plenty of yardage. Just how much yardage, though, was in question. In addition, they still are very wavy from being unraveled. So, I decided to quit putting off the inevitable and start preparing these beauties for their makeover.

First, I needed to get them straightened out. I dug out my long-forgotten niddy-noddy and got to work. I also got to use my beautiful but neglected yarn bowl!

Starting with the pink yarn, I used the niddy-noddy to transform the little "cakes" of yarn into hanks, measuring them as I went along.

After noting the yardage for each hank,

I gave each a dunking into some cool water and then hung them with some weight to straighten them out.

And now they look like this!

Success!

Step 1 accomplished. Tomorrow I'll wind them back into cakes to prepare them for use on the knitting machine and I'll settle on some patterns to try. It's so exciting!



Collar done - finally!

At long last, I finished the Irish Lace Collar.

It turned out larger than I thought it would be, but I really love it. This has been a true educational project for me in learning to interpret vaguely-written patterns and trying to understand the intention of the designer. It took me longer than I would have wished, but it was totally worth it.

Here's a closeup of one of the scalloped areas:

I blocked it last night and persuaded all those little triple picots to behave themselves and line up straight.

So, that's Project #3 finally done.

Last week, I also started and finished Project #10, my first chemo cap to donate to Crochet for Cancer. It allowed me to use up some of the ivory colored eyelash yarn, as well as take up some more of the ivory Silk-Bamboo. The original pattern is called Faux Fur by Nancy Brown and I found it in the book 100 Hats to Knit & Crochet. I like to call it my Phyllis Diller Hat:

Now, I'm off to have fun at The Knitting Closet! Be back later for more destashing projects.

Getting back to my stash

With all the projects I had going, it's been a while since I've checked into my stash to continue logging. So yesterday I dove in again. I thought I had recorded all my commercial yarns, but I found two more that had slipped by me.

First up is about a half skein of Bernat Alpaca Natural Blends in a color called Tundra.

One-and-a-half skeins of this bulky yarn was used to make a cute slouchy hat for my daughter back in February, and I have this half-skein leftover. Haven't decided yet what I'll do with it.

Next up is a lovely 3-ply 100% alpaca handspun yarn that I purchased when we lived in Connecticut. It was my first purchase of handspun from a local fair, shortly after I began my fiber fanaticism.

 

 

The color is hard to make out in this photo, but is' a soft, heathery oatmeal color, achieved by plying 3 different colored singles: natural (off white), dark brown, and a fawn color. I made a scarf for my husband with the bulk of it, and have about 267 yards of this remaining. Again, no ideas yet, but at least it's measured and logged. :)

Reaching deep into one of my stash bins, I pulled out a couple of bags with yarns from unraveled sweaters. I absolutely love obtaining yarn this way. Both of these sweaters were FREE from the "clothing closet" event a local church puts on about three times a year. I bring them our hand-me-down clothes, and then I "shop" for used garments for our family.

For the past several years, this has been a wonderful way to harvest free yarn, as well. I'd look for sweaters made from fabulous fibers that either had holes or stains in the garment, and then I'd take them to see if the yarn was salvageable. Sometimes, the garments were not fully finished, and once the seams were ripped, I was left with a mess of short pieces of yarn. That was disappointing (though it provided us with free stuffing for my daughter's handmade pillows!)

More often than not, however, when you get a sweater made with great fibers, it's well constructed too and allows for perfect unraveling. Talk about gratification! I would keep the labels and care instructions, and put all the yarn from one sweater into a single ziplock bag. Unfortunately, I never measured it, so I'm having to do that now. And I can't find my niddy noddy. Phooey. Out comes the yardstick.

Over the years, I've used some of my gleanings for market bags, scrubbies, and even a lovely capelet! There are still bags and bags left in my closet, though, so now is the time to get them all in order.

One bag had a bulky, deep wine-colored tape yarn made with 65% ramie and 35% cotton. The sweater was from The Limited and allegedly handmade.

The color is actually deeper than I could capture today. This flat yarn is strong and sturdy and will work well for things like hobo and market bags. It also reminds me of purple linguini (oops, my Italian is showing). It measured 575 yards, and I've decided to offer it to my crochet class students in the fall.

Another tape yarn was from a J. Jill sweater. It's a smaller (narrow) tape than the purple, and it's made from 77% cotton and 23% nylon, which gives it a nice elasticity.

The color is interesting, too. The tape is primarily a soft, powder blue which is "outlined" in a dark blue, giving the finished product a heathery effect.

I haven't figured the weight yet, so I'm swatching with it before I can find a project for it.

More stash organizing to come, along with a newly discovered opportunity to put a good use to all this yarn! Hooray!

Working in White

Since learning about the Crochet for Cancer project, I'm looking at this challenge and my stash with new eyes, excited to have a worthy purpose for all that yarn instead of just trying to think of projects to get rid of it. A good deal of my yarn is soft and quite suitable, and so I will be knitting hats for some time, I think. :)

In the meantime, I made up a baby cap which I have labeled Project 9: The Little Boy Blue Ribbed Baby Hat, a sweet little pattern by Tonya Wagner over at The Shiznit site. Of course, she did her hat in blue - thus the title - while mine is white, as I am attempting to whittle away at that Cottontots yarn that just never seems to get used up!

I did this cap up for a newborn, and it is so soft! The darning needle beside it is there for size perspective and, as you can see, this is quite a tiny little fellow. I will probably use up the rest of the yellow and white Cottontots by making up as many of these as I can, and then will donate them to Pregnancy Resources, a wonderful organization here in Brevard County for pregnant women in crisis.

And an update on the Irish Lace Collar, the project that seems like it will never be done! After more stitching and ripping, I'm slowly making headway. As the directions suggested, I gave the collar a light pressing to help organize the placement of all those little triple picots and to help them lie flat so I could do the final rows.

This really is a lovely pattern, although it's more like a faux-Irish Lace. A true Irish Lace, I believe, is all about the motifs, which are quite dense and detailed, and then joined in an amazingly creative way on the lace ground. The "crown" design in this piece gives a nod to those detailed motifs, and the triple picots imitate the look of the lace ground.

Remember the trouble I was having with those picots? Well, the whole idea of a right and wrong side and working into the back of those little buggers creates the illusion of the picots being somehow suspended above the lace chains behind them. Very interesting!

It's not a difficult project at all, but between all the other projects I've been juggling and my difficulty in grasping the idea behind how this collar is constructed, this baby has dragged out way too long. I've enjoyed the challenge, but I will be happy when it's done. And I think all of Ireland should be grateful that they didn't have to depend on me to see them through the potato famine. At the rate I'm working, they would have starved. Erin go Braugh!

Baby sweater set complete

I went ahead with my plan to knit up the sweater to match the baby hat I finished for Project 6. The Ripple Eyelet Baby Sweater is so sweet.

The original photo shows a solid color sweater under the garter ridge for the lacy part, and then a coordinating color for the yoke, but I didn't like this color-block idea. In the matching hat, I had done a single white stripe, so I decided I wanted to do white piping on the sweater. It took a little thought, but I love the finished product. The designer, Jeannie Leech, gives instructions for flat or circular sleeves, and since I hate seaming, I opted for the circular. I also chose to omit the ribbed neckline and opted for a garter edging at the neck, in keeping with the garter edging throughout the rest of the sweater. I couldn't be happier with the results.

Now, I'll have a nice gift set for little Jessica. :)

Unbelievably, there is still quite a bit of both colors of this Cottontots yarn left! This yarn just never ends! However, I've figured out what to do with the rest. My LYS, The Knitting Closet in Palm Bay, is sponsoring Crochet for Cancer and serving as a drop-off site for anyone wanting to help knit or crochet caps for anyone - child, teen, or adult - going through chemotherapy. The soft Cottontots yarn would be perfect (as is much of the yarn in my stash!), so I'll be using up as much as I can to make some caps.

If you live in the Brevard County area, please consider knitting or crocheting a chemo cap or two. Even if you don't knit or crochet, you can come into the shop, purchase some yarn, and donate it for one of our knitters to make on your behalf. Instructions are on The Knitting Closet's Facebook page.