You're probably thinking, "Roving? You just started knitting seriously just before Halloween, surely you don't know how to spin already?" And you'd be right. Nope, dunno how to spin. Do I want to try? Yeah, I do now. Will it be any time soon? Nope, probably not. Am I worried? Nope. I like to just look at this stuff and touch it and pet it, and yes, I shall call it George.
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The yarn is Lion Brand Landscapes and I have 2 balls of it. I just love how it's looking in this stitch pattern!
And I was even sitting on the futon to the left of them when I caught it. I was even able to run upstairs, grab the camera (I had left it there after unloading the last set of pics to it) and get all the way back down the stairs to start snapping. Do you believe it? I didn't. I got that one right away. They looked at me with absolutely no interest.
I got closer.
Aww. You see, that spot used to belong to Morris. (The grumpy old man in the back - doesn't he look like Walter Matthau?) Then Ripple, the bratty cat in the front, decided it was pretty comfy. Morris just let him take it, and would either sleep on the back of the couch or on the floor. I just hated that for him. Mo-Mo is like, 15 years old. Ripple is 6. Ripple can handle the floor. Heck, there's a nice big spot on the futon next to me that he can have. In fact, that's where he was sleeping before he appropriated Mo's spot. But every now and again, they share. And I caught 'em!
In other news, thought I'd post some pics of my WIPs. Here's the Aihblinn:
I just joined the 2nd ball of yarn. I'm a bit worried that it might now start to pool a bit. I didn't think to join it at the same point in variegation as I left off. I'm a fan of the russian join, it's saves me ends to weave in later. But I really should have matched it up better. Damn. I've only done one row since joining, so I may yet do that if it doesn't start to vary more. But it's pretty.
And here's the beginnings of my Clapotis:
I think I'm about ready for section 3 where I can have all sorts of fun dropping stitches. I might just do a couple more increase sections first though. At least one anyway. It is supposed to be a shawl. Eventually.
I also started the reverse bloom washcloth from Weekend Knitting in Crystal Palace Cotton Chenille. I'm doing it in a pretty lavendar color for my mother's birthday in February. I have 3 petals done. I haven't decided what I'll be working on at my Stitch n Bitch tonight, but more than likely, a bit of each.
I finished my Voodoo wristwarmers just in time for work tomorrow! This will be the perfect opportunity to poke fun at my boss for how friggin' cold he keeps the office. Don't think I won't bust these out in July either! I have to run my heater year round because it's so cold. I love these! I do plan on making the fingerless gloves from Weekend Knitting as well. I want to have some fitted fingerholes. I was going to try that with these, but I'm not ready to tweak a pattern quite that much yet. But I'm very happy with these fuzzy ones.
This is the Holey Moley Scarf from Creative Knitting Magazine (January '06) I made for my pet sitter as a thank you. I was so close to finishing it in time to give it to her along with payment for watching the kitties. Oh well, I washed it and blocked it and got all the fringe done. I'm not terribly impressed with the pattern, I do find that it puckers the scarf a bit. If there were an additional row of knitting in between the cast off and cast on rows for the holes, I don't think it would pucker as much, but I'm not sure how you'd accomplish that. You'd have to do two extra rows and turn your work for each little section - total pain in the ass. But the finished object is cute.
I get to keep this one.
The next is the enhancement to my stash that I brought back from NY with me. Note the wonder that is the space bag.
Before:
After:
My space bag spilleth over.
Here's a close-up of the 2 dozen (!) skeins of Lion Jiffy my mother gave me. It was at one time intended to be an afghan. I don't do afghans. So now I have to figure out what to make with all this yarn. Might be good for a practice sweater, or 4.
This is the awesome yarn that came with the white cabled knitting bag my sister got me from Anthropologie. It came with a scarf pattern, but I'm not sure that's what I want to do with this. So many possibilities...
And this is some of the other yarn that was magically sucked into that space bag as well. This brings it to 36 skeins in one bag! I have to say, Joann's has some really nice, yummy yarn. I wish I had a Joann's here in Charlotte rather than Michaels. The selection is so much better, even for a craft store in a bumfuck north, left of the middle of nowhere town, it's a better selection than all the Michaels here in Charlotte combined.
And that wasn't all, there's the yarn for the Voodoo wristwarmers I started while home:
The yarn for the Holey Moley Scarf I picked up for $2 a skein:
And finally, the yarn I treated myself to last night while visiting my favorite LYS,
Charlotte Yarn.
The Lamb's Pride will be for a pair of Fuzzy Feet. The Anny Blatt was on sale, 40% off, so I thought it might be a good yarn for a first pair of socks after trying out the fuzzy feet. The lavendar stuff in front is cotton chenille and will be for a flower facecloth from Weekend Knitting. And then I had to add on to my double pointed needle collection. I really enjoy working with them, I thought it would be hard, but it's very satisfying. So, there we are! Please, if you have any suggestions for the Lion Jiffy, please, please, please let me know.
I made them from the pattern in Creative Knitting magazine's holiday edition. They're the same yarn (Sugar 'n Cream) and pattern, one's just wet. Funny how water totally changes the character of a yarn? I had to make my mom get the first one wet. I told her it wasn't a doily, it's meant to get wet and be used. She also tried saying her scarf and hat were for "special occasions" i.e. they're staying in the box for eternity because she's afraid to wear them. I said just because it's handknit doesn't mean you shouldn't wear it. I made them to be worn so go ahead already! Funny, she's the one that taught me to knit in the first place.
This is the panta I made my mother this weekend, inspired by Zibibbo's recent blog post.
It turned out beautifully. It's made from Joann's Sensations Angel Hair yarn. It took me a little less than two evenings to make on size 5 needles. I'm planning on making one for me, altered to include a couple cables rather than raised ribs.
Currently I have 2 WIPs. I'm working on some Voodoo Wristwarmers for me, wrestling with double pointed needles. And I frogged the beginnings of the wimple I was making for my friend. The pattern just wasn't turning out the way I envisioned so I'm using the pattern for an Aibhlinn and plan on altering the bottom of it to flare out over the shoulders like the wimple pattern I have does. So we'll see. My mom about had a heart attack when I ripped out what I had done. But it's looking much better now.
My very wonderful sister who got my name for Christmas, got me this wonderful knitting bag. It's gorgeous! Love it, love it, love it. Here's a pic of the bag itself.
I love the cable in the middle. It has a pair of bamboo needles inside and a bamboo crochet hook as well! I had no idea they made bamboo crochet hooks. I can't wait to start using it once I get back to Charlotte and away from all the snowy wetness.
Here's hoping everyone had as great a Christmas as I did!
The Christmas knitting is done! Yeah, I know, I still have my Uncle's scarf to do. But that will take me all of an hour tonight so I'm calling it done. The hat and scarf is for my mother. She picked out the fuzzy yarn (I'm trying to block it from my memory so I can't remember what brand it is) and I paired it with Wool-ease in black for the matching hat. The hat was made from Ann Budd's Handy Book of Patterns and the scarf from a Lion Brand pattern I can't seem to find anymore on their website. It's a simple keyhole scarf done in seed stitch. I hope she likes it.
The kid's scarves and the cowl for my cousin I winged. No pattern! Wee! On scarves, I mixed fun fur with homespun so it was still warm, yet fun. I tried a bell shape on the purple garter stitch one, it coulda turned out better, but I'm happy overall. The other one looks so pretty, the pic doesn't do it justice. It's just a straight garter stitch. The cowl is from Paton's Bohemian. It started out in a 4x4 rib and progressed to 3x3 then finally 2x2. It looks pretty cool. And I like the button too. It feels so soft around the neck. I hope she likes it. I know it borders on the "You Knit What?", in fact, they all do. But hey, I figure at the very least, they can use them for dress-up. The kids are young.
I finished it with only half an hour to spare. The seams look kinda crappy, but that's ok because I looked and looked for a good way to join reverse stockinette and couldn't find it and winged it. I got a ton of compliments on it and plenty of requests for the pattern. One lady at the party even said she'd pay $300 for it in a boutique and that I should sell them! Ha! I say, "Learn to knit". But hey, it felt great. Even the experienced knitter's there were amazed I did it in a little less than a week. I'm so glad I didn't end up meeting my friend for lunch saturday because I wouldn't have finished it if we did. Yay! I can't wait to make another one, this time I'll do the arms in the round and instead of bobbles, I'll do loops. And I only used 4 skeins instead of the 5 the pattern called for. Probably because I did the russian join to connect new skeins. But also, I think the pattern writer included an extra row of bobbles in hers that weren't written into the pattern. Oh well.
I think I can, I think I can, I think I can...
When I test fit it, it's about a third of the way down my other arm. Between tonight and tomorrow, I think I'll be wearing it by 7pm for the party. I do have to meet a friend for lunch tomorrow, and it's about an hour there and an hour back so hopefully I can get a lot of it done tonight before I go to bed. The bobble section took me about 4 hours-ish so I need to give myself at least that much time tomorrow to do it.
Oh, and there's my dinky little tree. It's about 2 feet tall. I've had it for about 5 years now, and last year was the first year I had to use any of the spare lights. Well, about an hour after I took this photo, the bottom half went out and I'm completely out of spare bulbs. Fabulous. And they're the little round kind too. Maybe I'll wait until after I get back from NY and buy me a new tree in the post-holiday sales.
All day yesterday all you'd hear on the news is that there was ice on the way. A couple years ago we had a pretty bad ice storm that basically shut down the city for a couple days. So it's understood that they'd warn us all about the potential for another one. I didn't think much of it though, watching the news. It didn't look like my area where I live and work would be terribly affected. And when I woke up and looked out at the dark parking lot, I could see it was raining and I saw puddles on the asphalt, so I thought there was no ice. Then I walked outside to get in my car to leave. Boy was I wrong. My car was covered in a sheet of ice. It took me 20 minutes just to defrost the windshield enough to be able to scrape off the layer of ice. The drive was fine though. I don't cross any bridges or overpasses so it wasn't a problem. There were accidents all over the city though.
On another note, I gave Jimmy his scarf last night (figuring he might need it today) and it ended up just the right length. He's happy, and I'm happy. Whee!
I also finally put up my dinky tree last night (pics later) even though I'll only enjoy it a week before I leave for NY. But it's nice to be in the spirit and not look like a scrooge.
Bobblicious is coming along nicely. I've just started the 3rd of 6 skeins of yarn. After I fringe the HP scarf tonight, I hope to get a lot more of it done. Saturday is approaching quickly!
And hey, check out my new sleek blogger template. Like it?
I think it's almost done. I've done 9 repeats of the trapped bar, and am nearly done the final MC repeat. It's long. It's plenty long I believe. I know others have stopped at the 9 repeat mark, and I didn't think that would be long enough, but now that I'm there. I think it's long enough. But I don't want to chance waiting for me to finish with the fringe and the blocking and finishing to ship my Nephew's gift. So this is what went in his package along with a book.
On the finished object front, I got my cousin's scarves almost done! I have the two kid's scarves finished and am halfway through my cousin's. I've decided to make her a cowl. I'm winging it, but I think it'll turn out pretty cool. Pics of all three when the cowl is done.
Oh, in the pic above, the bottom box says this:
"It's knit in a tube so it looks the same from both sides. That's 90 stitches per row in that tube. There is supposed to be 880 rows in the pattern. I've done 603. That's 54,270 stitches out of 79,200. That's love. Don't worry, I'm not going to do all 13 repeats of the pattern. You'd be stepping on it. Even when you reach 6 feet."
Heh, think he'll appreciate it?
It's done, it's done, it's done! Hooray!
I'm at a lose for any other words, I'm sure you'll understand. I've been working all day on this thing to finish off the last 16 inches. I've washed it, and it's blocking now as we speak. The cats are quite pissed off about it too. I've put it in the only place I can cat proof in this apartment. My office. Hey, it's got a door.
The pic on the right is more for proof than detail. I got a detailed one for ya below.
Pattern: 
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