In which she fidgets.

I am a knitting slut. No, really. I don't have a monogamous needle in my stash. Even though I'm actively working on Jeanie, the Hemlock Ring Blanket, and a simple ribbed scarf (not to mention all the ignored projects that are monopolizing needles...), I decided I need something I can wear to Stitches West. There's no way Jeanie will be done by then, and the Hemlock Ring is a bit heavy and awkward for a shawl...

Hence, Norah Gaughan's Medallion Shawl (shown in lavender).



It'll be a quick knit (knock on wood), portable so I can take it to school and on the road, and a stashbuster to boot; I picked up the yarn last summer in Fort Bragg. The pattern calls for a 16" circular needle, but I'll definitely need to work it on DPNs - I can't deal with that short of a circular once you start decreasing. I'm also going to need a template to block the hexagons.. As you can see, it's a bit wonky when I do it by the seat of my pants!

As a sidenote, the yarn I'm using is Zitron Campus. It's a discontinued fingering-weight yarn, and it subs just fine for the DK-weight Ultra Alpaca Light called for in the pattern. I wasn't sure it was going to block out, but once soaked it didn't need any coaxing to reach 8" point-to-point.

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In which she drops a link.

I think I've found an update client that will make posting easier.. we'll see how well it works. ;)

For those of you on the bandwagon, I'm on Ravelry as FaireGoddess. My notebook there is much more up-to-date in regards to my knitting exploits, so I suggest you check it out. :)

In which the blog lives up to its name.

So. Socks. They suck. Or maybe I suck, and I just happen to be fighting a sock at the moment.

The yarn I'm fighting is Wildfoote yarn in the Mums colorway. I really love the color, and it's held up well so far to all the ripping. ;)



The first attempt was using size 1 dpns and Wendy's Toe-Up method. The whole provisional cast-on and short row thing Did Not Work for me, so I ripped it out, retried the same toe, then ripped again. The yarn and needles sat in their project bag for a couple months. Then..

Then, Interweave Knits Summer came out, and lo, there was a toe-up method that made sense to me. I cast on with size 2 dpns (because my gauge was too tiny on the 1's ugh, even though the fabric was nicer on the 1's), and it was going well.



The fit was promising.



And headway was made.



And then I spotted a dropped stitch a couple rows down. I spent a good fifteen minutes trying to fix it at BobaKnit, but it wasn't working. Having a crochet hook handy would have been helpful. :) But then I counted my stitches... and hooooo boy was I off. At that point I snapped a picture and ripped because, really, I didn't feel like fighting with it anymore.

So now, I'm back to just a skein of yarn. Alas. :( At least I'm making progress on the Binary scarf!

In which she starts again.

Sigh. I knew I was going to frog it the moment I realized I was messing up (and then I re-re-re-read the instructions, and I was messing up a lot worse than I thought!), but that doesn't make it any easier to do! I put in a safety line, but I haven't done that before, and was going through ribbing, so it wasn't helpful beyond telling me to slow down the frogging process when I got close.



Back down to the ribbing, sigh.. I was at row 20 of the cabling before I frogged, and now I'm back up to row 6.



I think the travelling cables are looking better (since I'm following the pattern!), but I can't really tell yet. Hopefully they'll be fine, as I don't want to have to frog the whole thing again. >___>

On an unrelated note, Jenni linked me to Craftster, which I hadn't seen before. Oooo inspiration! But Lindsay, you need to get better at reading patterns before you start making up your own.. !!

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In which there are three kinds of people.

Nezumi's on hold for a bit, so I thought I'd share progress on my Binary scarf. This is what it looked like on December 15:



Exactly four months later, this is the progress on April 15:



I'm on character row 27. The pattern says to switch directions after row 30, but knowing that my favorite scarves are significantly longer than that, I'll extend the pattern until it feels like it's suitably long.. Hopefully not too much longer, as it takes half an hour to do a row. XD My favorite part, though, is the wrong side:



All that neat, even color stranding just makes me happy inside. :) Really though, I love colorwork, and I've got my eye on some Fair Isle after I finish this guy. That's at least a couple months off, though. ;)

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In which things go horribly wrong.

OH NOES, FAIL. I just realized I've been working the travelling cables wrong on Nezumi (it's supposed to be c1 ktbl, but I was doing c1 k, but still doing k tbl on the non-cabled rows), but I'm already half done and I don't want to frog back to the top of the ribbing, but the cables are really horribly wonky and I should redo them. See?



SIGH. I'll see how I feel in a couple days.. but I'll probably wind up frogging it all. Good thing I wasn't planning on gifting it for a few months yet.. >____>

And to make me feel better, here's a FO. ;)


Pattern: Fetching from Knitty
Yarn: Patons Classic Merino Wool in Cream
Needles: US7 DPN
Modifications: Worked thumb over 8 stitches instead of 7; no picot edging; last row before bind-off knit as [k1, k2tog, k1, p1] to fight the flaring out that others have reported
Started: March 2007
Completed: April 2007

They got their trial run today, and kept my hands extremely toasty (if mildly scratchy at times). They're not as soft and comfy as my alpaca mitts, but they should be more durable and therefore stand up to the rigors of retail. XD Now I just have to finish the bright yellow Dashing pair..

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In which things get colorful.

Because it's currently spring break, and because my sewing space is the shared living room and I don't feel like spending time with my roommate, I've been knitting! It's small, portable, (mostly) mindless, and doesn't involve interaction with others. ;)



This is Nezumi, in bright purple Wool-Ease. When I saw this pattern I immediately thought of Alisa (on the left) from my ren faire guild, so this will be for her. (The bright purple is because she got fabulous purple striped socks last year.. that she realized after the fact were Royal Purple and therefore couldn't be worn. XD) Of course, I probably won't give it to her until faire starts again, and since that isn't till the end of August, I shouldn't be working on this now.. but it's fun! And it's cabled!And it's really going incredibly fast, actually... I've got two skeins, so I'm thinking a pair of matching gloves/fingerless mitts with one of the cable motifs pulled from the hat.

With this hat, I'm experimenting with cabling without a cable needle. The cable fronts are much easier than the cable backs, but I can manage the c1b without a needle. The c2b's, on the other hand, elude me, so I still have to keep a cable needle on hand. Woe!

Also, I've been inspired by all the lovely stitch markers on etsy, but being a poor student I can't afford an awesome set. (See: Wool-Ease. XD) So I took some toggle clasps, jump rings, and nifty glass beads to make some of my own:



A lemon on the left, and a bunch of grapes on the right. The grapes are a lot more purple when they're not against purple! yarn, I swear. I'm really digging these, but the danglies get in the way when I'm slipping them, as they tend to sit on the back but I pass them to the front. Haven't quite figured out a way to slip them over smoothly, yet...

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