Catch Up

I've been trying to get my life back under control since New Year's. My family life has calmed down and I'm finally back on track with my degree, so I'll try to also get this blog back up and running.

So, quick rundown of the last... gosh, has it really been 5 months?

First of all, my biggest accomplishments, especially stash-wise: three blankets.

Finally, finally my Log Cabin Blanket	Actually managed to use up most of my left-over sock yarn in a crochet afghan
~280,000 stitches, ~6,000 yards of yarn, 1.5 years to finish	~4,700 yards, less than a month to finish
Hemlock Ring Blanket, which I still have to block properly, I just don't have enough space here
less than 1,000 yards, a month to finish

For winter I needed a warm set of accessories. Five things made out of four skeins of Malabrigo Worsted in Azul Profundo. Very useful when I have to go grocery shopping on my bike.

Coronet Headband	Evangeline Fingerless Gloves
Simple ribbed gloves	Here and There Cables
Calorimetry

At first I only wanted to have cabled things in this set, but then the ribbed gloves were the most sensible thing to knit and the Calorimetry followed since I still had enough yarn. I really like that all of those match in colour, if not in pattern and they have been really useful. Especially the scarf is incredibly warm (even though I left out one repeat) and the Calorimetry has been getting *a lot* of use.

I've also knit four pairs of socks, but since I can't show my favourite pair yet (it was a test knit for Sock Madness), I'll just skip those here. One thing I want to show, however, is my French Market Bag. I have been meaning to knit this since I saw the pattern in Knitty and finally realised that my New Lanark Aran would be perfect for this. The bag has now become my to-knit-soon yarn bag.



If you'd like to have more information on the projects I mentioned here, or would like to see what else I have knit, I did keep up with my Ravelry page despite my hiatus here.

February and March

February was a bad month for knitting. I had exams in the middle of the month and just didn't get a lot of knitting done before. And since then I've knit quite a bit, but not enough to make up for the first 20 days. However, March should be much better since I'm on holiday and have time to knit. :)

(1) finish Ella
not done
I did a couple more repeats (no photos, sorry) and I'm almost to the decrease rows on the right side panel.

(2) finish Bellatrix
Done!

I started these before Momma Monkey died and felt a bit weird about finishing them afterwards, but then I realized what better way to honour the memory of a designer than by knitting her designs?

And the design is lovely. It looks a bit sloppy on my sock blockers, but on my feet they are great! :) A nice pattern for socks to just wear on those stay-at-home days. And I'm all geeked out about the fact that I knit the pattern in a colourway called Slytherin. So perfect.

(3) 2 more squares for the Log Cabin Blanket
Got 1 done and started another, which gets me to...

5 / 35 squares. 14% done!

(4) finish Felted Tote
finished knitting it and it's in the waching machine as I'm writing. I'm anxious if it works. *bites nails*
Here's the finished bag, with a DVD box for scale.


ETA: Just got it out of the machine and it looks like a success! But it's incredible how much it has shrunk. I can't imagine what the original tote was like which is knit with only 1/3 of the yarn I used.

Another pic while blocking with the DVD box for size comparison. The largest side is just a bit bigger than the DVD box.

(5) start Child's French Sock
Done! In fact, I got the whole first sock done. The yarn is Wollmeise sock yarn in Wilder Mohn (poppy), which is just an incredible yarn. It's so soft and squishy and it comes in 150g skeins, so I don't have to worry about running out of yarn even though this is the first sock I've knit top down in probably a year and a half?


(6) start Candle Flame Shawl
Done, but didn't get very far. I started it in some lace weight from Elann, but it was too thin for my taste. I think this'd be much nicer in some fingering weight or a slightly heavier lace weight, like Malabrigo Lace. For now I returned it to my queue and I'm focussing on other things.

Goals for March:
(1) finish Child's French Sock
(2) finish Ella
(3) 4 parts of the centre square of the Log Cabin Blanket (equivalent to 3 squares)
(4) knit So-Called Scarf in Malabrigo
(5) finish RPM socks (yes, I started another pair :), more in the next days)
(6) finish Felted Tote
(7) knit first Estonian Sock
(8) rip back top of Column of Leaves Hat and make longer

January and February

First of all, let's see what happened to the projects I planned to finish during January.

(1) Coronet
Done!

Once I actually sat down and picked up the stitches this was done so quickly. It's very warm and good to have something so bright with current rainy weather. Which brings me to...

(2) Danica
Done!

Haven't managed to get an FO photo yet, but it doesn't look that different since I only added 2 repeats to the length in the photo. It's a bit on the short side, but since I didn't want to buy yet another skein, I decided it's long enough. And it does go round my neck twice, so it's okay. A bit on the scratchy side, since it's not merino wool, but again very warm and colourful.

(3) 2 squares for the Log Cabin Blanket
Done!

Actually finished three squares, all in the lavender/grey combination.

It's just as pretty as the one in the two shades of red and I can't wait to make more.

4 / 35 squares. 12% done!

(4) knit Column of Leaves Hat
Done!

Knitted in worsted weight Malabrigo, I'm not quite sure yet with how this turned out. It could be a bit longer IMO. But the yarn is great and I can't decide what to do with the rest of the skein and the other skein I have in a different colourway.

(5) knit Bellatrix
WIP
I started to knit Bellatrix in Lorna's Laces Black Purl, but compared to the others I've seen on Ravelry, my colourway seems to be a bit darker, so I didn't like the way it looked.

So I frogged and started it in some lighter yarn, fittingly called Slytherin. :)

You can't quite see it on the picture (and the weather it too bad to take a better one), but the dropped stitches make the stripes move in wave form, which I think is very neat.

(6) start Ella
Done!

More than done actually, since I'm more than 50% in, just about in the middle of the first side panel. It takes a bit longer, since I'm using lighter yarn than in the pattern, and so added one repeat to the triangle part and also one repeat to each side panel. With the yarn I have I should be able to make 156 of the water lily leaves (at least they look to me that way) and I'll have to make 155, so keep your fingers crossed that my calculations were right.

(7) block Luna Moth Shawl
Done!

Finally, after 6 months of sitting there unblocked, I blocked it and put it on the wall as decoration since I wouldn't ever wear it and it's not really my Mum's colour. :)

Also, as you can see in the sock picture above, I made myself some very handy sockblockers.

Very easy to make following this tutorial.

So, my February resolutions:
(1) finish Ella
(2) finish Bellatrix
(3) 2 more squares for the Log Cabin Blanket
(4) finish Felted Tote
(5) start Child's French Sock
(6) start Candle Flame Shawl

As always, you can find more specs on all of my projects on my Ravelry page.

Toting Bags

It figures that as soon as I join the SSEC I start knitting basically anything but socks. :)

I've been meaning to try felting fulling for a while and finally found a project that I think I'll actually get use out of. It's the Teeny-Tiny Felted Tote, although mine won't be quite as tiny, because I do want to get some use out of it.



I'm a mix between process and project knitter, so while I do want to try out new techniques, the result also has to be practical for me. And with 3 skeins of SWT Karaoke, compared to one skein of Noro Kureyon, I figure this will be just big enough to work as a small project bag for my desk, so I won't have my knitting lying around all the time. The colour is Wild Cherry and it's a very subtely varigated yarn.

It's knit on 5mm needles and I'm already well into the third skein, so I'm pretty happy with how quickly it's going. It's perfect phone conversation or reading knitting, so I usually get a few rounds done every day.

I also have an incredible itch to start new projects. I got Knitting New Scarves by Lynne Barr a few days ago and am simply itching to try one of those out. I actually have five of them in my Ravelry queue, something that I'm falling more in love with by the day, btw. It finally gives me the feeling that I can actually work through my stash, not only by telling me how much yarn I have (23.1 miles as of November 13th), but also finally is a way for me to see (and therefore use) all the wonderful yarn I have in my stash.