I started the stashbust with a Calorimetry, which used up the remains of some Artesano Aran in green and maroon. It’s a little big and I didn’t think the colour change out too well, so there’s no photo for the blog, but you can see it on its Rav project page. I am mostly just happy with something that keeps my ears warm and used up some odds and ends.

The next stash bust was this, a Hap Blanket from Ysolda’s Whimsical Little Knits, which rejoices under the project name of The Hogswatch Hap.

It originally started life off as a Hemlock Ring Blanket but I stuffed up the feather and fan and decided to just frog the whole thing. I only had the one colour with me because I was working on it at my parents’ this Christmas, so it became a single colour hap. I absolutely love it! It did get a little awkward to knit once the edging was started but the end result is large enough, delightfully warm (I am sitting under it as I type) and used up a significant chunk of my stash, consisting as it does, of 7.5 balls of DROPS Alaska. It’s definitely on my list to knit again, this time with a contrasting colour.

And excitingly and also, more on the WIP finishing resolution than the stashbusting, I finally stopped sulking about the sleeves on my Cherry – er, round about August I knitted them and discovered that one was about an inch and a half shorter than the other, cue some knitterly sulking and the project being stuffed in a bag – cast on for sleeve attempt number three (the return of the electric boogaloo…) and ended up with a matching pair. Now all I need to do is sew it up, pick up the buttonband and collar and I might actually get to wear the damn thing for this spring/summer! Miracles may never cease, I tell you.

So, so far, so good and I’m determined to carry on with my stash knitting. So, here is a short list of things I am going to knit and the yarn from the stash that matches. (all links are Ravelry)

• Erika Knight’s Lace Top in pale blue Kidsilk Haze
• North Sea Shawl by Cheryl Oberle in DiC Baby in either Forest or Mystic
• Eunny Jang’s Endpaper mitts in two of the many colours of Sheldridge Farm’s sock yarn I own
• Featherweight Cardigan by Hannah Fettig in DiC Baby, whichever colourway doesn’t become the North Sea Shawl.

This is not the full list of course but I’m slowly working through my queue and rearranging/assigning yarns. I’m looking forward to making a dent in both the stash and my long list of queued patterns.

The Apple is going to be pair of socks, although I haven’t decided which pattern yet and the Cornflower and Robin’s Egg is going to be whatever colour-work item I decide to do. Right now I am contemplating Endpaper mitts but there’s a beret I quite fancy as well. We shall have to see!

And because we briefly had sun today, I took some photos of the February Lady Sweater now that it is finally at a stage where it’s not a crumpled mass on my needles. It’s going quite well. I’m planning to knit about another inch of the lace on the body and then switch to the sleeves as I don’t want to leave them till the end. I might modify them to be a bit more tapered but will need to go have a poke about on Rav and see what others have done before I do that.

I really like the lace pattern – the first row went a bit wrong but the next round has clicked it into place and now I can watch tv while I knit it and I’m def. going to knit the actual baby version for my wee cousin when I’m done with this one. That kid is going to drown in hand knitted clothes, if I have anything to do with it.

Yes, quite.

First up: Finished Objects!

It’s a cardi for my wee cousin, Annabell. It’s the snappily named ‘Design C’ from the Sirdar Baby Bamboo pattern book and is knitted in the Baby bamboo (lovely yarn, btw) in green. I actually started it and finished it a couple months ago but I kept delaying on the sewing up because I am) a lazy and b) I fear sewing up. But, it is amazing what you’ll do with the help of the Daleks of Procrastination and if it is going to fit her, I need to get it to her soon. I opted not do the daisy stitching in the end. [Ravelry]

I’ve had a skein of random variegated cotton lurking in my stash for aaaages, so I cast on yesterday and turned it into a couple of dishcloths. There are actually two but I haven’t bothered photographing the second one as it is pretty much identical. They’re both the basket weave stitch cloths from Star Athena’s Back to School, without the text. I look forward to trying them out. [Ravelry]

Behold! A new WIP:

Because I don’t still have a ton of Hogswatch knitting to do and my Cheshire Cat stole on the needles, I cast on for Alison Hansel’s Leftovers, on the justification that it would shrink my stash a bit and I could do with a knitted vest to wear over my work shirts at the moment. Yes, witness my justification!

It’s going well so far – after a few hiccups vis-a-vis the number of cast on stitches and my inability to count stitches made from doubled yarn accurately – and I am now happily playing with the stripe pattern. I’m mostly winging it. It’ll all be fiiiine! [Ravelry]

I will…write my thesis. Somewhere in all this. Yes. *looks shifty*

Current project, a mystery knit along from a pattern by Knitting Delight, currently available for free from the yahoogroup or here for the ravelry. The pattern is nicely charted, clear to read and no mistakes.

It’s knit sideways so casting on is a little harsh. I’m managing to keep up with the clues, just, but that’s going to get more awkward as it gets bigger and not so easy to stick in my bag. There are 17 repeats in a row, so I’m deeply grateful for stitchmarkers that help me tell when I’m going incredibly wrong. Finishing 2 stitches early on a repeat is rarely a good sign.

I also ended up getting some addi lace needles. The regular addi needles were awful to use with this– just too blunt with yarn that fine.

I was having severe problems with muscle-memory on the last few rows of this round. Even with patterns with rows that don’t repeat, there are still certain tendencies– yok2tog on that side, yossk on the other side- and habits of the pattern. Normally, it’s good to get a feel of these, but the last few rows broke the established tendencies and were asymmetric on the repeats , like it’d be yo,k3, yo s1-k2tog-psso on one half, then yossk,k2, yo, 2tog on the other half.

I’m pretty curious what the next section’s going to be like, even if my poor wrists are less than keen on starting it.

Things that I discovered:
Mum and I pick up stitches differently.
It’s easy to get turned around when something is garter stitch.
Any time you start making something as a present, between the time it takes you to buy the wall and knit juuuuust enough that you’ve really started, someone else will have bought them the same thing in the mean time.
Blankets never end up being the same size as you intended.

This last one was actually a conscious decision. Mum and I decided that instead of being about 5×5 squares, it should be 5×7.5. Ack! Especially since it needs to be pretty much done by tomorrow, since mum and dad are flying over to visit the grandparents. We’re aiming for something that can go around her shoulders, rather than a lap blanket (and that, as a lovingly hand-crafted -just look at all the mistakes! Those really make it unique- it will be be appreciated even though she got given a (fleece) one just recently).

What you can’t really see in these pictures is that the light hits it pretty directionally, so it looks pretty cool from an angle. What you can see are the missing spots in the middle and on the side — those empty triangles on the edges that I need to fill in before they fly off. I’ve done four of eight since Sunday, so it should be possible as long as my wrists don’t give out.

So my current projects are herringbone socks (which look like a pretty good ayof using up the odds and ends of sock wool) and a blanket my mum and I are doing for my grandmother.

Since we don’t live together, we needed a pattern that could be put together easily enough and would be convenient to do on the go and we opted for a domino knit blanket. Step one: explaining what domino knitting was to my mum, how the squares go together and so on.

Domino knitting is pretty basic. You cast on X number of stitches, doing a double decrease (slip 1, k2tog, psso) in the middle of every other row. This pulls the knitting together in the middle, making a square witha spin running diagonally up the middle.

We’re doing garter stitch since it’s forgiving, marginally quicker and is nicely bouncy.

To save on sewing ends in, the diamonds are pretty big.

N= total number of stitches)

Odd rows: slip 1, knit across, purl the last stitch.
Even rows: slip1, knit to (n/2)-5, sl1-k2tog-psso, knit to -1, purl last stitch

We cast on 49 since it’s a nice, easy number to remember (7 squared!), which means
R1: sl1, k47,p1
R2: sl1, k22, sl1-k2tog-psso, k22, p1
R3: sl1, k45, p1
R4: sl1, k21, sl1-k2tog-psso, k21, p1
etc.

To join squares, the easiest way is to put two of them together like diamonds, pick up along the edge of one, and then up the edge of another, and start a new square.

Hopefully, difference in tension should be minimal (they were on the practise squares) and we’ll be able the bits we worked apart together without any problems.

Fingers crossed!

It’s a three hour train trip from London back to the bosom of the family so I cast on for Cookie A’s Monkey and worked my way through the majority of the leg of the first sock before I got distracted by eating, drinking and eating. They’re the first pair of lace socks I’ve attempted and I love them – the pattern is long but easy to memorise and I get a lot more done when I can’t just abandon them mid-repeat.

The yarn is Fyberspates‘ superwash merino that I got when I had a sock club membership and I love the colours, particularly how they come out in this pattern.

2007 is drawing to a close as I type this and my knitting resolution involves posting more and knitting my way through my stash! Hopefully, the two will work together. Here’s to an excellent and FO-filled 2008!

—————-
Now playing: Death Cab for Cutie – The New Year
via FoxyTunes

Anyway, Jam and I now share a flat as well as a blog and our combined yarn stash is mildly horrifying. Whether we make it through this flatshare without strangling each other with yarn will of course, remain to be seen.

Have some photos of knitting related things from my period of silence.

From the top: My current WIP, a pair of Jaywalkers in Colinette Jitterbug (lagoon) for Christmas knitting, a pair of completed Jaywalkers in the lovely merino from White Willow at Etsy (seen in my last post), Hand dyed Merino from Fyberspates that I plan to turn into a pair of Monkey(s) for myself, my shiny swift (purchased shortly after my dire predictions came partly true.) and the WIP photo of the French Fancy (Simply Knitting July ’06) I pretty much finished last summer and then procrastinated on finishing. It’s all finished now and I’m just waiting for photos of the lovely wee one it was knitted for wearing it.

Additionally, I’m now on Ravelry and you can find me there as halcyonday.

Left to Right: Preschool Merino/Nylon sock yarn from the lovely Yarnchef (which came with a beautiful stitchmarker that you can see on the label and a recipe card for minestrone), 200 yards of lace weight pure wool from Shunklies, who is based in the UK and Snapdragon 100% Merino sock yarn (with tiny elephant stitchmarker attached to label) and the lovely retro-style pinup girls sock bag from White Willow (plus, my current wip sock)

There’s was another purchase but I can not say anything about it because it’s going to someone who reads this blog. Mwahaha!

And in other, non-I have no willpower news, I have started my first cuff down sock. It’s…interesting. The heel caused me some considerable problems and I found it very awkward to knit but it’s getting there. It’s using a bit of a skein of Natural Dye studio’s sock yarn that Jam gave me when I first started attempting socks and the pattern is Grumperina’s Jaywalkers. There’s not enough to knit two socks but I’m treating this one as a test run so that’s okay.

Now I’m off to ball up those skeins, so if I never post again, would someone come untangle me? I have a suspicion that a visit to Homebase will be in my future so I can make my own swift.

The fruits of a lazy Sunday afternoon. I have done very little today, other than cook (blueberry pancakes, artichoke and garlic butter), cast on on Cosmicpluto‘s easy top down raglan cardi and knit my way through a rewatching of American Beauty and Garden State (two films that I think share a theme; discovery and change.) I was going to start watching Amelié but then I noticed the time and sadly, it’s Monday tomorrow. Alas!

But at least I have something to knit on my commute.