Month: September 2009

Veyla – Cuff Done

Veyla
So, I started some fingerless mittens that I will make for xmas presents for my girly-girl friends & family. Here’s a picture of the first cuff. It took me about 6 tries to get the flow of the leaf pattern, but once I got it, it was a breeze. And the progress went so fast. I’ve been too afraid to pick up the sweater again until I have a chance to be fully awake, without any distractions so that I can avoid making mistakes again.

Also, if any of you are into quilting, my friend Marisa at QuiltOkatu is giving away a free spot in an online quilting class that her friend puts together. If you leave a comment on her blog, you might win!

An Exercise in Futility

I worked from home today and took my lunch hour to work on my sweater. I found a mistake, well, two to be exact, and decided it would be a good idea to try to fix them today at home with no one around to distract me.

Here’s the mistake – the decreases are about 3 off.
Vivian Yoke Mistake

I dropped a few stitches all the way down to where the sleeve joins the body:
Tinked back to sleeve join

Messy, but I’m gonna give it a shot… here’s the first row, looks good so far!
Worked the first row

then I found this giant hole – not so good:
What's this giant hole?

If I just pull this loop, the whole thing tightens up and looks great, but there’s all this extra yarn…
If I just pull this tight, it looks ok

I decided to keep going in hopes that it would just work itself out.
Did a few more rows

It was looking great, but that extra yarn was bugging me, plus there were other areas that were getting way to tight… so I decided to drop a few other stitches on the sleeve and see if I could rework those to make them more even.
Tinked a few more sts

No luck, it looked worse than if I had left it. I decided to rip the whole yoke out and start over from the point of attaching the sleeves to the body. So, I basically wasted my whole lunch hour which was such a bummer.

But, just as I had decided that I had to pull everything out the doorbell rang. Surprise! It was a new knitting bag that Paul bought for me for our anniversary. It’s a Tom Bihn bag that he designed especially for knitters. He worked with folks from knitty.com to find out what they needed. It’s super awesome.

So, I put everything neatly away and will start fresh another time with lessons learned. I also found out from the ravelry forums why I had made the mistakes I made. I was an error in the pattern. Now I know and I can do it right this time 🙂

Here’s the bag:
TomBihn Bag!

TomBihn Bag!

TomBihn Bag!

It’s Yoke Time!

Vivian Yoke Time

I finished the right sleeve this weekend, realized I had one extra cable in the left sleeve and ripped that out and fixed it too. I followed the directions and carefully attached the sleeves. On to the yoke and then the hood, the trickiest parts. I hope I’m doing it right. I can’t believe how fast this project has gone thus far. It’s been fairly straight forward until now. Can I finish it before I start the Mystery Bag KAL #2 on Oct 1st? Yikes!

Yarn was in the mail!

She-Knits Mystery KAL #2

So, my next big project after Vivian is going to be this She-Knits Mystery Bag Knit-a-Long (KAL). I got my yarn in the mail today and I’m thrilled, it’s going to be gorgeous! It’s a mystery because we don’t know what the pattern is going to be. We get our first few instructions on October 1st. The only thing I know is that the design was nature inpsired – oh and it will be felted. This will be my first felted project. Can’t wait! That means I have to put the gas on to finish Vivian if possible before the 1st – probably won’t happen, but I’ll have fun trying 🙂

Yarn Details –
Cascade Yarns 128 Bulky, 100% Peruvian Highland Wool:
2 – Gray 8401

2 Tan 8012
2 Dark Green with flecks of brown 9338
Cascade Yarns Eco Alpaca, 100% Undyed Baby Alpaca:
1 Brown, Cream, Gray intertwined 1528

Finished the Left Sleeve!

I finished the left sleeve already – YAY 🙂 I stayed up late last night knitting it while watching the Biggest Loser. Oh man, the stories of these contestants are SO sad this year. Tears were streaming down my face as I watched. Very motivating though. I’m not overweight, but I am complete mush right now, no muscle tone to speak of. I used to be pretty active, hiking, and playing volleyball a few times a week, but ever since I dislocated my knee for the second time I’ve been a lump, spending all my free time sitting and knitting. I sit all day at work too. The only actively moving time I have is when I’m chasing my 2 year old around the house. I wonder if I could knit while riding a stationary bike… I’m so addicted to knitting that the thought of taking 30m to 1h of free time away from knitting is really difficult. I downloaded iFitness for my iPod touch last night after the show in hopes that it will helpe me start working out again (sans my knitting needles). I REALLY need to gain strength in my left quad and gluts so that I can play volleyball again and not hurt my knee again!!

I am excited that the good TV shows are starting up again. This week I’ll be tuning in to So You Think You Can Dance, The Office, Parks and Recreation, and Project Runway (or I’ll be recording them at least so that I can watch after my little one goes to sleep). That’s a heck of a lot of TV time… I’ll definitely be knitting or working out while watching. Somehow knitting justifies the mindless time sync of watching TV.

Started the Vivian sleeves

front of vivian WIP

front

Back of Vivian WIP

back

I’m in love with this sweater. So far it’s been my absolute favorite project. I bought a bunch of new patterns from Ysolda Teague that I can’t wait to knit as well. She just came out with the Vine Yoke sweater which is beautiful and very interesting because it’s knit up sideways. She put together a package called “Whimsical Little Knits 2” that are quick to knit and gorgeous – and whimsical of course. They will make beautiful Christmas presents!!

long cuff of vivian

The sleeves are extra long with room for the palm of the hand.

I also bought a very cute little print that I found on Etsy because I couldn’t help it. Check out Laura Gregg’s work. I ordered the Knitting Nerd. It’s a purple, girl bat, knitting… what more could I want.

I just might have to change my Ravelry name to something like Knitting Nerd… maybe I’ll steal an idea from my friend Marisa (QuiltOkatu) and call myself KnitOkatu (I’m probably spelling that wrong)! HAHA. Ok, I wouldn’t really do that… but, maybe nerd in another language. How do you say nerd in Italian?