A kind of antidote.

So, I was knitting and knitting on the ubiquitous Y-chromosome-approved hunter green wool boring to knit (but fast) straight-forward Cobblestone Pullover. As you might have read (because my bitterness sometimes seeps out), I had knit the whole thing and it was WAY too big for its intended.



I mean look at this, the first attempt being worn by Obie Boy. Yikes.






It would have fit Poem-Man, the father (pictured right), but not Obie-boy, the son, who is a runner and has no body fat (hence the need for a sweater).

But now I've finished the sweater, but Obie-boy is at pre-semester x-country camp at college, so I'll mail it off with the hope that it fits and keeps him warm. I really shouldn't complain. He's wonderful young man and when I offered (somewhat sheepishly and skeptically) to make him a sweater (I mean, I'm not his mom, after all.), he got kind of excited (well, in his way), saying, "I was jealous of all the the warm-looking hand-knit sweaters that my roommate's Mom had made for him, and now I'll have a sweater." Aww...

Pattern: The ubiquitous Cobblestone.
Yarn: Cascade 220 Superwash, 5.25 skeins
Yarn enabler: Webs,
Needles: Size 5 Knitpicks Harmony Circulars
Time I spent knitting this when I should have been knitting it right: Ok, the first time was from July 26-August 7th. (I knit almost an entire sleeve during Mamma Mia!). The second time took from August 16-August 20. Ok, I didn't really rip the sleeves all the way out and spent a lot of time watching the river and waterfalls from the Brooklyn Promenade.


Anyway, I needed an antidote to all this boringly manly, dark green austerity of a sweater. My girly, summery responses are as follows:






I heart my completed Ravelympics sweater (Go Team SitnKnit NYC!) in a big way, especially considering my initial displeasure with the splitty yarn. I solved the splittiness issue, to some extent, by doubling the yarn, thus allowing for bigger needles, faster knitting, and an entirely different pattern from the project for which it was intended. I basically knit this sweater in between version 1 and version 2 of the Cobblestone.

Ah, I should mention that I totally changed the lace pattern from what is in the pattern since I was going to run into the same problem I whined about before. It is the perfect weight--airy but substantial, soft on the skin. What's not to love about silk and bamboo!


Pattern: Hey, Teach
Yarn: Elann's Soie Bamboo in Voile Pink, about 2.75 cones. April 2008
Needles: Size 5 Knitpicks Harmony Circulars
Time I spent knitting this while shamelessly being moved to tears by the Olympics: 8 Days. (See, it's all about the Chinese love of the number 8--cast on at 8 am on 8.08.08 and finished in 8 days!)

Speaking of "TEACH," my summer vacation ends in Sept when we all go back to school. My endless mornings/days/evenings of knitting will end, so I'm casting on more girly, summery, colorful projects like crazy, see--



Details to follow--probably after I come back from Rehoboth Beach. Yeah, BABY!

Because one can't knit ALL the time...

I got a little tired of knitting. I know--call me crazy. Here's the story: I finished a Cobblestone Sweater in about 13 days--just in time to start a new sweater of Ravelympics. Unfortunately, the Cobblestone ended up being two sizes too big, so I ripped it out. You know of course, that means that it could have taken me even LESS time to knit the damn thing in the first place. Argh. So I got tired of knitting--I could not face miles of dark green Cascade 220 superwash stockinette. So sue me.

So instead I went to my new fiber addiction--dyeing yarn. Lookie Lookie!

"Buttered Sunshine" in worsted weight: "Too Blue for Skool" in sockweight:"Last Daffodil" in sockweight:
I've added Arteco Spectrum Gel Food Coloring to my arsenal of Lemon-Lime, Pineapple, Mango, Lemon, Ice Blue Raspberry, and maybe some other flavors of Kool-Aid. I better start to want to know rather than just accumulate self-dyed yarn.

Got any ideas for what to make out of this yarn? Oh--and if I ever do get all my knitting mojo back I could use these that I made this morning in my summer vacation stupor:

But I did cast on for my Ravelympics sweater at 8 am on 8-8-08! And I'm just about done. Not sick of it--I am loving it! Here's a pic for now--more when I am actually all done. I even bought the buttons and everything--

Forging new paths.

Phew...I'm just about done with 2007 endless project #2. (This being 2007-endless-#1).

Just some buttons, button bands, and button holes to go. I think my Mom is gonna LOVE it.

So--just when I've knit as much as I think I can knit:

1) I tried some crochet. Not a bad effort. The pattern didn't come charted, and I don't know how to read crochet, so there are some mistakes, But I don't care. It's a cute pattern, the SWTC Bamboo yarn was left over from some other project, and--GET THIS--my picture got picked to be the identifying picture for the Crocus Scarf pattern on Ravelry.

May I humbly say that that is the FOURTH picture of mine being used on Ravelry as the featured pic for a pattern. Am I famous yet?

Pattern: Crocus Scarf from Knitting Daily

Yarn: SWTC Bamboo in Fiery Red--bought it in the Summer '06 from someone on E-bay.
Crocheted on: Size 3 Boye crochet hook

Time spent crocheting when I shouldabeen knitting: 1 week

2) I started a second Clapotis. Why? Well, because it was there. I need another scarf like a hole in the head. But I had this lovely Wollmeise Sock Yarn that I couldn't bear to knit for something I would wear on my feet. And I liked the intense, crazy colorway "Suzanne" enough that I wanted something simple to show it off. AND-- I fear I may have lost the first Clapotis I made. Dang. Lastly, I can knit a clapotis in about a week---or at least I did so the first time.

3) I threw a knitting shower! Woo hoo! I've never thrown a baby shower before, much less one that became a Brooklyn yarn crawl. Such fun. And here's the little jumper I knit for Tawana's knitter-in-utero.

Pattern: Brittany Jumper from Minnowknits
Yarn: Cotton Fleece in "Wisteria"

Yarn Enabler: Knit-a-way

Knit on: Size 6 Knitpicks needle
Time spent hiding my knitting from Tawana: 2 weeks

4) I knit some with boys, men, ya know, people who bear that ole Y-chromosome. Really. This PH Knitting group meets in the neighborhood over from me in Brooklyn, is run by a man, and when we met at Freddy's on Sunday, there were four women and THREE men. Poem-man might actually get jealous...

5) I am humbled in my knitting after reading this obituary in today's Times.

I definitely have NOT knit all I can!

Unfold your feathers!

I've been working on a secret "secret" project which I finished this week and maybe I'll blog about that later. In the meantime, I've cast on a lace project. I'm thinking that the allure of having these beauties in my stash ready to cast on may spur me on to finish this lace cardigan.

Can you see the peacock feathers in the lace or will you have to wait for the magic of blocking?

This lace seems to go both fast and slow. This is a eight-row pattern, but really it's a four-row pattern that repeats with the second four rows starting from a different point. Within the true four-row pattern only one row creates the lace--the other three are basically stockinette. Gotta love it! The nice tourist on the subway was amazed that I could knit lace without looking at what I was knitting and I was too uppity to do anything else but smile without mentioning that I was on a plain ole purl row. I'm not a nice girl...

What also adds to the slow-fast condundrum is that the directions have me knitting the fronts and the backs of the cardigan all at once with a split for armholes, etc. to happen later on. So it's a million stitches, but I'll have the whole body done together--like two socks at one time! On the other hand, this is 100% mercerized cotton--shiny, hardy, lovely, but COTTON. Not that much of a joy to knit.