Future Knitters

I just found these pictures I took about a month ago (yeah, that's how much I orginize my photos - don't ask about developing).



At least they are showing interest.

Instead of blogging about yesterday's knitting

Very fitting, don't you think?

What kind of knitting needles are you?

You are interchangeable.Fun, free, and into everything, you've got every eventuality covered and every opportunity just has to be taken. Every fiber is wonderful, and every day is a new beginning. You are good at so many things, it's amazing, but you can easily lose your place and forget to show up. They have row counters for people like you!
Take this quiz!








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The new needle set

Ok, I figured it out. There is a little hole that goes through the cable part on both sides. I remember there being a little metal object in the set (along with some stuff I wasn't going to use anyways, some stoppers. That little object fits perfectly in the little hole and the needles tighten up nicely and I have no more problems with the needles loosening up. I wish they had a directions to go with the set. I was having problems also with figuring out the pouches. What goes into what. They had cables and needles but then 3 different sizes of pouches. I guess you can have it any way you want but it would be nice to know what the pouches were intented for.

What's going on?

I have startitis. I just can't stop starting new projects. I started two more on Monday and I haven't even finished the other two I started the other day.

I've been trying the new needles. I love how they are fast and pointy. The only problem I've been having is that the needles tend to un-screw. Does anyone know how to avoid that?

Needles!

I got my birthday present from my mom in the mail today. It was KnitPicks Options. I'm so excited about this and glad. I had to cancel at least one project because the needles I got were bad quality (the yarn snagged too much) and now I have fast, sharp-pointed needles for about everything I need and if I do need different needle sizes it is cheap to get them.

Log-ing on

My 60" Addi Turbo came in the mail yesterday so I revisited the Log Cabin blanket. I hadn't worked on it for about a week or ever since it became as long as my needle. It's nice working on the Log Cabin.

I haven't been doing much this week actually. The other day I even went to sleep before Kamilla (age 3 - she was not alone, just if anyone is wondering). The day before that I had actually been working on photos and not knitting/stitching. I've also been revisiting cross stitchin/embroidery projects at bit but I've been lacy with the camera.

I did put a lot of cross stitch photos on my flickr. My dad got me a pro flickr account for my birthday, he he. What a great idea. I mean, I'm all the way on the other side of the world. It's not as if he could have wrapped something in and sent it. My mom also got me something that is still on it's way - knitting related. It's sooooooo cooooool. I can't wait to share it with you guys. I just don't want to jinx it and talk about it before it comes.

Projects multiplying

Yesterday (Monday) I started two projects. They are both small. That's all I have to say for myself. He he. One is the petal bib from One Skein. I got some Rowan Handknit Cotton in San Francisco on Sunday and it knits up beautifully for this pattern.

As I was knitting it I decided to make a market bag for my mother-in-law. She goes to the farmer's market any change she gets so I hope she can use it. I'm planning to make this a christmas present. The bag is crocheted and comes on a Sugar'n'cream ballband. The pattern is also available on their website, all you have to do is to register (it's free).

That's not all because on Sunday I started a project as well. I also finished one so I don't know if it counts, he he. I had only a little bit left on the 10th Mason Dixon ballband washrag and I finished it on the train to San Francisco (I went to celebrate my birthay - without kids, I wrote about it on my weblog/diary but in Icelandic, I went to couple of museums (Exploratorium and de Young) and the Greenwich yarn store, met up with a friend, had the best burrito in town and went back home, almost got kicked out of the train - but otherwise an quiet day) and started a new one.

The log cabin blanket is on a unscheduled leave. I order 60" (150 cm) circular needle in order to continue and it is on it's way.

Logging on

I'm finishing the 5th round of the log cabin. I love to knit this. Now I know why people become so obsessed with log-cabin knitting. It's instant gratifications since you finish each patch relatively quickly (although it takes longer each round) and then you get to choose a new color so it is creative all the way (not just in the beginning).

I'm comming up against one problem. I'm running out of space on my needles. I figure I have perhaps one round left until I have to get longer needles. I'm using 32" circular (80cm) and I have to find longer ones. I saw 40" (100 cm) needles online. Maybe they will do. I don't know how big the blanket is going to end up. I think they have bigger ones. I'll have to find out.

Log cabin, part II

.. in which I hope to be able to show you my progress photo.

I better start with the photo.



This photo was taken couple of days ago and I've already done bunch more. I've knit 4 rounds but in the photo I had only knit 3.

I have been stitching a little. I actually finished Woodland Grace. See:



I can't believe I actually finished a stitching project! This little piece took a loooonnnng time to finish.

Last Sunday (it's already Saturday - this is how slow of a blogger I am) I went to a knitting meeting at the library. I forgot all about it but fortunately I saved it in my phone so it reminded me. It was a lot of fun. I haven't seen other knitters at all since I came here. We were making doilies/dish rags but I didn't bring the correct yarn. For some reasons I brought wool! I was in a hurry going there so I just grabed anything. I have a drawer full of kitchen cotton and I grab the wool! Crikey! (yes I am a Steve Irwin fan)

Log cabin

At last I started the log cabin. The weather is getting colder so now I can start knitting with wool again. In the summer it was just too hot. I remember when Brenda started doing her series of sense of place. I didn't really know what she meant. I thought she meant designing influenced from the landscape around you. But now I'm slowly going through these episodes and I can see that she meant how what we knit is influenced by where we are.

This became obvious for me this summer. I'm used to knitting with wool and nothing but wool but in 40°C+ it is not possible, not even at night. So I started knitting small pieces in cotton. Now I can knit with wool again and I started a log cabin blanket. I can see why people love it so much and become obsessed. I reckon it will be more tiresome as the blanket gets bigger but at the moment I'm just enjoying it tremendously. It is a project that you can work on without having to think too much. You just knit. This makes it a perfect project to grab when you get some time to knit but can't really sit down and concentrate on it. I take it outside while I'm watching the kids in the backyard or if they are quiet for a while.

I knew I couldn't finish. I'll post this now and post the picture later.

... and now, more photos.

I hope now I can blog. I've been trying for about a week. Not that there is a problem with blogger. I just haven't made the time to do it. I haven't been on the computer and when I've had time to blog I've actually rather just knit. My knitting time has been cut a little short due to the girls not going to sleep when they are supposed to.

Without further ado, I'll start the photo show. First up are couple of wash cloths, nr. 8 and nr. 9.



Nr. 10 is well on it's way. I've been wandering what I should do with all my wash cloths and I decided to give them away as presents. Not the first one though. That one's for me no matter what! (I'm not even using it). I gave some to few friends of mine that are expecting a baby this fall. Usually I don't know anyone that's pregnant but then all of a sudden 4 women I know are. I also sent them bibs, mostly knitted, for their babies.

I have a photo of my knitted baby dress I made but since it is going to be a gift I'm only giving it as a link. The mom can then decide for herself if she wants to see it beforehand or not. My niece is also getting a bib, but that will not be a part of the Christmas present. I want to knit another one of those bibs in denim. It's a fun and quick knit but not easy.

Another fun, quick (but not as quick) but hard knit was the Lacanau slippers (which I'm wearing as I write this).



I have to go now. I'll catch up with you later but in the meantime check out the video I posted below.

The Last knit

What not to knit to!

If you need to get some knitting done, like due to a dead-line. Do not, I repeat, NOT watch Arrested Development. I got the first season on DVD and it is just not possible to knit and watch that show at the same time. It's jus too funny and too addictive.

For the last couple of nights, I've sat in front of the computer and watched these shows, holding my knitting. Just holding it. Yesterday I figured I could work on these garter stitch scarf I'm doing for my 4 yo. niece (her birthday is comming up). It's knit with novelty yarn and is impossible to fix once you make a mistake. Of course I made a mistake and then screwed it up even more when I tried to fix it and eventually gave up and started over. That was almost a skein worth of knitting my friends, and I already started over once because I felt it was to wide.

So - be aware.

Put your title here.

I have to correct myself. In the last post I said that I had already started washcloth nr. 8. The fact is that I had already started nr. 9 and finished nr. 8. I just forgot about it. I finished nr. 9 yesterday but have to weave in the ends for those two before I take pictures.

I am also far gone with my slippers or sandals. If you put sole underneath you can use them as sandals. I think that's pretty neat. But I think I have to go with slippers for now. I'm done with one and have just a tiny little bit of knitting left on the other one. The make-up of the slipper is a little pain. Just because it is a lot different than I'm used to. Let me just say that the cross pattern on the top is not solely a decorative option.

Recently I got great news. One of my dearest and oldest friends is having a baby. I can't wait to knit for her baby all the little baby things I've wanted to knit but not had a reason. My youngest is already 1 1/4 and too big for these little baby things. I wish I had all these ideas and patterns handy when I was pregnant with her but I don't even think I was really knitting at that point. I think I was mainly cross stitching then. I already started the Mason-Dixon Kimono. The only thing that stops me is that I lost my tape measurer. I can't believe I haven't lost it few times before. My kids were playing with it and then I took it away from them so I wouldn't loose it. Now I can't figure out where I put it. I guess I should have let them play with it after all :o

Aren't you glad to see me again?

Finally I make time to blog. I uploaded pictures onto my Pbase.com account ages ago but I haven't got around to post them before. In my defence, my brothers are visiting and we are going all over the place and hanging out in the evenings so my knitting time has been limited. I can inform you, however, that I started a new project. It should be a fast knit and these slippers look luxurious to me. I couldn't get the yarn it calls for (elann.com had it but only in 2 color that didn't compliment each other) so I got another yarn from knitpicks.com. It's supposed to be made with 100% silk, which I think would be heavenly on your feet. This yarn I got is part silk, part alpaca and part merino and it's buttery soft. But maybe pure silk would be sturdier. I want to make them in the right yarn as well. I think the pattern concept is brilliant (with the i-cords determining fit) and we'll see how well I like the pattern afterwards. I'm pretty sure this is my first Knitty project! It's about time, eh! I started it on the recommended needles (4.5 mm) and it looked kind of small and I realized that the gauge was way off. So I tried 5 mm and it was still too small so now I'm using 5.5 mm and they are giving me 17 sts to 10 cm instead of 16 but I'm going to stick with them (plus I have kind of small feet). I swatch as I go along. You start with the sole from toe to heel and I started and then used the beginning of the actual knitting as my swatch.

So, where are those photos I took way back - I hope I have them all :) They can be found in my album as well.



The first is of the 7th washcloth (I don't think I haven't started nr. 8). The second is of a bib I made some time ago. I found this daisy patch that was perfect for the bib and matches the button. Then there is a collective picture of three more MD bibs.

The winds are shifting

or something like that.

I actually stitch today! I started on the border of Woodland Grace, while the girls were sleeping today and while watching Bridget Jones: Edge of Reason for the first time as well. So I didn't get as much done as I could have but nonetheless, this is a big step. I haven't stitch since on the Grace (or anything) since April. Since the beginning of the year I have only worked on the Grace and the French Village.

I've been feeling the stitching comming over me lately. I've been reading stitching blogs with a renewed interest and looking at Mirabilia and Teresa Wentzler pieces with envy. I don't own any Mirabilia designs, except for Crescent Dreams (very fitting because the street I live on it called Crescent Drive), but I have couple of TW's designs, Celestial Dragon and Egyptian Sampler.

The other day, while I was shopping at JoAnn's, I even saw a small design that I WANTED to buy. I didn't buy it but it was the first time in a long time I even wanted to by a stitching kit.

Perhaps, this time, I can actually do both stitching an knitting at the same time? That would be nice, since I have quite a lot of stitching projects to finish but I don't want to give up knitting.

Same ol' same ol' or what?

I've been going to bed early a lot lately so knitting has been scarce.

I did start to make swatches for my eingirni sweater. I plan to make a raglan sweater from 1 ply Icelandic wool. My step-mother and step-sister have made them before. I think I'll do it on 4mm needles and the yarn is steel gray. Very cool.

My Icelandic online knitting group adopted a feature from my stitching group, an UFO day. UFO stands for unfinished object and on an UFO day you take up an project that has been laying on the sidelines and work on it. It gives you motivation to finish projects that have been left behind, sitting at the bottom of the knitting basket.

Today is one of those days (every Thursday is) and I finished couple of bibs and a wash-cloth. This things had been sitting in my knitting canvas bag for couple of weeks now and I finally made time to finish them. I would have taken a picture but couldn't find my camera.

So stay tuned for pictures ;)

Contemplating

My knitting has slowed down a little this week because I've been contemplating (hugleiða, áforma). I've been contemplating on two projects or projects to be. One is the slippers I promised Clint long time ago. While I was on my shopping spree in Europris, I bought bulky wool that looked perfect for felting.

This week I was about to start the slippers when I notice that the wool I bought was a little thicker than the wool it was intended for.

So what to do?

I backed out of the project for the time being and let my brain munch on the problem.

Couple of days later I come down with the solution. I knit the slippers with the intended needles (7mm) instead of what the pattern calles for (5.5 mm) but go down two sizes.

Did someone say swatching?

No way! These are mere slippers we're talking about. If they don't fit Clint, they'll fit someone else, I'm sure.

The other problem comes with photos! It is my varigation on the Log Cabin knitted blanked.



The photo to the left shows the first half of the Tunisian Crochet row, made with afghan hooks (extra long with a stopper on the other end) and a selection of afghan hooks I own (thanks mom).

The photo to the right shows a completed Tunisian Crochet row.

It looks georgeous. At least I think so. So what's the problem?

It curles up a lot so it is not so easy to work with. I think I'll rather do a log cabin with garter stitch (garðarprjón). Furthermore, I have no idea about how to orginize the colors for the blanket. It's made out of leftover yarn from a discontinued granny square blanket and other leftover yarn plus some gray yarn (light to dark gray). The other yarn is reds, blues, greens and yellows (I guess little bit of everything.

I don't know how to organize it. One solution is to have every other row colors and every other gray?

I still like the idea of a tunisian crochet blanket. But maybe rather something like this: MoeZ afghans. Especially baby blankets with cute motives.

What to do? What to do?

I'm a libra. What that means is that I have greatest difficulty making up my mind. I have no idea what I am going to do with these washrags. I am gearing towards giving them as gifts, well most of them.

One thing I really love about them is to mix and match different colors. Especially the bold colors. I could never do that with a garment. I also have quite a few options to choose from. I counted the skeins I had in either Peaches'n creme and Sugar'n Cream, and I have more than 30! My mom bought me most of them when she was here and then I bought some more when Michaels was having a $1/skein sale.

I made yet another one. I present you with Number six:

I'm on fire!

While Ása Sóley slept this morning I knitted a felted bowl from 'One Skein'. That's two designs I've knit from that book and there are more that I wouldn't mind knitting.



My daughter (who is 3*365-4 days old) saw the bowl in it's pre-felted shape and immediately identified it as a hat for her little sister. She was more than willing to model it.

I haven't felted them yet because I am going to knit Clint another slippers and felt it in the same load (I'm soooo frugal). His old ones were worn through. Now we have carpet so it should be easier on the slippers.

The book includes instructions for felting in a top-loading washing machine. I would just have thrown it in with a normal load like I normally do but I'm thinking about trying this. Especially since I don't know top-loading machines at all.

But first, one more ball band dishcloth.