Thursday, March 26, 2009

What was I thinking...

when I gave up starting new projects for Lent? This is hard! Oh, wait, that's the whole idea of Lent, isn't it? Well, I made the right decision then. But I can't wait until Easter so I can go back to my old ways.

Here are a couple of my UFO's on which I've made progress. First is the Noro Striped Scarf by Jared Flood that I'm making in Rowan Tapestry.



The picture was taken at about 32" and since then I've added another 5". I'm still working on the first skein of each color. If I finish the second skein of each color, it will be over 70". I probably won't make it that long. This scarf is great for t.v. knitting.

Next, a project that I finished! I started the baby sweater about a year ago. The pattern can be found in Leisure Arts #3202 "Precious Layettes to Knit". It's knit in one piece from the top down and was done except for the last 1 1/2". The yarn is Sirdar Snuggle Fair Isle DK. A friend of Ariane's just had a baby girl so I decided to make her a little layette.



The bonnet and socks weren't started before Lent but since they were part of a layette that needed to be finished, it was okay to make them. I mailed the set out to my daughter yesterday. If you click on the picture to make it bigger, you'll see the cute butterfly buttons.



Once it was finished, I had the urge to start another sweater from the same book but I have to wait a couple of weeks.

I fixed the mistake I made on the Monkey socks but haven't progressed very far on them. They will get finished one of these days.

The little aran sweater I'm testing knitting is progressing slowly. I'm halfway done with the second sleeve. The designer says the rest of the sweater goes quickly once the sleeves are done. I hope she's right. The acres of seed stitch is getting a little boring. This sweater needs to be finished so I can move onto other things.

Sunday, March 08, 2009

Dishcloths, anyone?

In between the projects pictured in my last post, I have been making dishcloths. The two patterns I use the most are Grandmother's Favorite and a garter rib pattern that I adapted from a scarf pattern.

This first one is the Grandmother's Favorite pattern and I made it to send to a missionary family serving in Niger that my church supports. We wanted to send them some handmade things to remind them of home.



The yarn is Lily Sugar 'n Cream in Country Sage Ombre. I used US 8 needles and increased until I reached 54 stitches. I like to make these cloths a little larger than the pattern calls for. I also made a Petal Dishcloth for them but forgot to take a picture before I took it to church.

The next dishcloth is in the garter rib pattern. Using US 8 needles, cast on 39 stitches. Row 1: K2, P2 across to the last 3 stitches. K3. Repeat until it's the length you desire.


This dishcloth went to North Carolina with Alek. Yes, my youngest child decided he needed to move out on his own. This is fine with us but did he have to move 700 miles away? Apparently so. He wanted no snow and warmer temperatures.

The yarn is Lily Sugar 'n Cream Original in Renegade. It's a larger skein than normal. I made him a Grandmother's Favorite cloth using the rest of the skein.

Here is another garter rib cloth. This one is for my daughter, Ariane. She is in the process of buying a house with her boyfriend. The kitchen countertops are a dark red and this was the only skein of cotton I could find in my local JoAnn's Fabrics that had any red in it.



Yarn: Lily Sugar 'n Cream in American Stripes. I'm making a Grandmother's Favorite from the rest of the skein but I don't think I'm going to have enough to finish it. I'll either have to make the decrease half in white or buy another skein of the American Stripes.

I have another garter rib cloth on the needles right now. I'm using up some partial skeins of cotton so these will be Monster cloths.

This last picture is not of a dishcloth. It's the Monkey socks that I mentioned in my last post.



Yarn: Mama Llama Sock II in Venice

I knit a couple of rows and found I have one too many stitches so I have to find the error before I can proceed any further.

And now I have to head up to Alek's room to pack up stuff. He took a good portion of it with him but not everything. So I'm cleaning it out and this room will be a guest/craft room. That's good incentive to clean it out.

Friday, March 06, 2009

It's been a while...

since I've posted here. Sorry about that. Nothing is wrong, I'm just being lazy. Well, lazy about blogging. Not lazy about knitting.

This little baby sweater is one that I'm test knitting for a girl on Ravelry. It's knit in the round from the bottom up. In this picture I have the body done to the arm scythes and one sleeve attached. I'm in the process of knitting the second sleeve which I'll then attach and continue knitting up through the yoke and neck.



It's a fun knit and I don't even mind the miles of seed stitch. Well, except when I goof it up and have to tink back. The yarn is Patons Classic Wool Tweed in Tweed Aran.

Next is a child's cardigan knit from the top down. The pattern is from Knitting Pure and Simple and the yarn is Plymouth Encore Chunky in garnet.



I haven't worked on this in a few weeks but I hope to get back to it once the test knit and a couple of other things are done.

And here we have my version of lined mittens. I'm making them for my husband and he didn't want them attached in any way. So I knit the outer mitten in Malabrigo Worsted "Rich Chocolate" and the inner mitten is made from Plymouth Baby Alpaca DK #208.





These pictures show the first mittens done. The second liner mitten is done, too, but I haven't started the second outer mitten yet. I have to cast on for that pretty quickly if he's going to wear them this winter.

Oh, look, we have another pair of Baby Monkey socks. I used some left over sock yarn to make them. I love making this pattern. It's so quick and easy.


I have a pair of Adult Monkey's started that I'd like to finish for my March Sock of the Month KAL. March is Monkey month.

And it's a good thing that I started this pair of Monkey socks back in June because I can't start any new projects for a while. You see, for the entire season of Lent (45 days), I cannot cast on for a new project. Not for any reason. My pile of UFO's is way out of control and I need to do something about it.

It's okay for me to cast on for the second item in a pair such as Scott's mittens but that's it. I counted up UFO's and here's what I found - 12 pairs of socks, 9 baby sweaters, 3 scarves, 6 dishcloths, 4 hats, 7 pairs of mittens (although I finished one pair), 2 baby blankets, a Clapotis, the top down child's sweater, felted clogs and two of Jean Greenhowe's Rainbow Babies. Well, that's what I remember and what I can see in my various knitting bags. There is a good sized tote full of UFO's that I didn't even open. Some of the above projects are in there but I'm sure there's more. So you see why I needed to do this for Lent. But I'm finding it harder than when I gave up buying any knitting supplies during Lent last year.

I'm going to finish up one of the baby sweaters for the Palm Sunday auction at my church. Last year I made a knit-from-the-top-down sweater that zipped up the back. I have another on in my UFO pile that I started years ago. It will be fairly quick to finish. And I might even try to finish another of the started baby sweaters to donate. We'll see how things go.

So now you're sort of caught up on my knitting life. I'll try not to wait so long between posts.