Currently, I’ve got the following on my needles: Rambling Rows using Hazel Knits Artisan Sock Yarn (just because I am masochistic enough), the Kusha Kusha Scarf using Habu Wool and Silk/Stainless Steel Yarn, the Red Sox Redux Sock (the original just wasn’t working out for the both of us…sometimes it is better to recognize a bad yarn relationship and move on), and the Burridge Lake Aran Afghan using Red Heart by the pound (which has surprisingly good stitch definition…eventhough I feel like I am knitting with plastic).

These are the projects I’ve got lined up next: Ysolda’s Otto using Karabella Superwash Merino for my cousin’s B-day, EZ’s Tomten Jacket using Merino 5 for the boss man’s baby boy (he has commissioned me for another baby sweater…but he still owes me some pics of the first one I knit), the Mirage Pullover for Moi using Classic Elite’s Classic Silk, the Hemlock Ring Blanket using some Brooks Farm Four Play, and some socks thrown in there. As far as socks go, I’d like to complete my no-show lace socks, then I want to cast on for some Cookie A. socks out of her new book, Sock Innovation. Over the year, I’ve procured quite a bit of sock yarn…that I intended to knit socks from…damn second sock syndrome…I’ve got to get over it and just continue on with the damn socks. They seem like a great thing to knit when you are knitting the first one, then I get reservations about knitting the second. At Cookie A.’s Book Signing, she told me it didn’t matter if socks matched…its perfectly fine and acceptable to wear two single socks. There is a truth to that, but that might mean I will never get to the second sock with that philosophy…but it might just be ok.

The most recent yarn I’ve fallen head over heals for into a bad yarn obsession is Pagewood Farms sock yarns. They are sooo yummy and so squishy! Its hard to just walk out of the store with just one skein of sock yarn. My most favorite yarn store is Bobbin’s Nest Studio in Santa Clara, CA. If you are ever here, you must stop by this yarn store…plenty of beautiful yarns all arranged just so. Since I last posted, I moved North…so this is my LYS and a great LYS it is.

Projects that have recently come off my needles are Laura Chau’s Roam Jacket from Knitty.com and the February Lady Sweater. This year, I knit a lot of Ysolda’s Sophie bunnies for the various little girls in my life. I also knitted the Biker Boy sweater for my hubby. I know I have knitted a lot more than just this…but it is getting late and my brain won’t remember right now. I guess I will just have to update most of the pages and that way people can see for themselves.

That about sums up my year long blogging hiatus…but not a knitting hiatus. Hopefully, I will be showing off more pretty soon. Rambling Rows is very close to being off the needles…maybe another week or two before its done.

 I decided to make a New Years Resolution to start more projects at once, so I can move in between them and parallelize my knitting a bit.  So far, so good.  I managed to start and almost complete Danica on a road trip up North.  I started Roam from Knitty Fall 2007, which is an endless sea of seed stitch, hence the need for more projects to jump to and fro from.  It really is turning out quite lovely…I chose to double strand laceweight yarn and the result is a beautiful limited pooling in the yarn and a lighter in weight fabric…I have to remember this trick when I want to knit something light weight that won’t feel like a sack of potatos when you put it on.

I’ve also started and almost finished (by tonight it will be finished) Penny from Knitty’s Fall 2003 issue.  Its a wonderful pattern so far, although if you intend to knit this as well, be sure to email Corinne for the latest version, as it has the errata corrected in it.  Miss BB will love it when its done.  She needs new sweaters and more sweaters very soon, because very soon, Miss BB and the rest of my family will be living in a much colder climate than we are used to.  On the same idea of keeping the family warm in the new diggs, I’ve ordered yarn and swatched for Biker Boy in the new Stitch N’ Bitch: Son of Stitch N’ Bitch.  I have not started knitting it, because I’m waiting for my new Harmony Options Needle set to arrive, because I currently don’t have the right circular needle for the job.

 Last but not least, I’ve gotten about halfway through my first official crochet project, an Irish Crochet Pin Cushion.  I saw the photo of it and couldn’t think of not attempting it.  Since I am a beginner, there isn’t anything in that pattern I haven’t done, except crochet with such a fine hook and thread.  Its taking as long as the pattern said it would and soon I will have a pin cushion that I so desperately need for all my blocking pins that I have….I probably don’t really need the pin cushion, but I’m telling myself that so that I have an excuse to crochet it!  Then I may have to make a few others for the rest of my crafty family.

Promptly after finishing the Emma Jacket aka most hellacious pattern to follow ever…I started Snow White.  Firstly, I love this pattern, despite the mountains of 2X2 rib.  It is cleverly designed and the pattern gets an A+ in the easy to follow / presentation area.  Consequently, I’ve had no room to bitch about it on this blog…because it is a delightful pattern to follow.  Even better, she adds these little comments into the pattern, so when you get finished with a part…say binding off…where you are wondering if that last stitch on your right needle is to be bound off or knit in pattern with the four stitches on the left needle…she explains exactly what to do, so there is no question on what is to be done.  A designer that writes patterns answering knitterly questions on the way!   Hooray!  Seriously, this was just the break I needed after the jacket.

 So, I’m knitting along on Snow White, ever so delightly when finally my copy of Son of Stitch ‘n Bitch: 45 Projects to Knit and Crochet for Men arrives in the mail from Barnes and Noble.  Instantly, I go through it and mentally note which patterns Mikey might want me to knit.  Then I have him look through the patterns and find that about one or two projects on my mental list are things he’d want me to knit, but other things I thought he wouldn’t like, he wants as well.

So, I ordered some extremely discounted yarn for the Biker Boy Sweater…that will be a Xmas gift, if I finish it in time…which I think I can do.  Then we went to Velona’s Needlework so I could get the yarn for the Wheel on Fire steering wheel cover, which I intend on finishing soon, sometime before Xmas, because he wants to use it NOW!  I already started Wheel on Fire, hopefully I can get some pictures up soon for this blog and for Ravelry…seems no one has a picture of one yet.

As for the Gray Flannel Purse, I haven’t done anything with it.  I decided that the yarn that I was substituting at first for running out of yarn, really didn’t float my boat, it doesn’t look as good as I thought it would.  So, I bought a new Cascade 220 heather in a darker heather from Knit Affair (since the original color was out when I went back to the store).  I feel better about having a darker colored purse flap rather than a lighter colored purse flap.  I don’t know why, but its easier on my eyes.  I haven’t made the progress on it that I wanted to, because I’m loving knitting Snow White too much.  I figure I’ll have a new purse by Xmas at the rate I’m going with it.

I’ve also decided that I am probably going to frog the red sox sock and reknit it, along with the second sock…because I’ll feel better about it…too many flaws.  I’m also thinking about using a different sock yarn…a yarn with some elastic in it, because it doesn’t stay up on Mikey’s foot anyhow.  Also knowing what I know now about knitting, I should have knit the sock with some negative ease…a concept I didn’t quite understand when knitting that first sock. 

 In my year of relearning to knit and more importantly learning how to knit things to fit, I’ve learned a lot about how garments are constructed and what kinds of fibers work better than others on certain objects.  Its not enough to say you know how to knit…anyone can knit, it really is quite easy…but can they knit something someone would wear?  And what is the point of buying nice yarn to knit something that will never be worn?  I don’t know about you, but I hate knitting scarves…so, I’ve been taking the time to learn what faux pas I’ve made in my knitting so that someday I can frog all the things I will never wear and make more garments that I will wear and my family will wear.  I think thats a safe assertion to make.

Anyhow, I survived the steeking stage of this pattern and now I am on to finishing the seed stitch lapels. The seed stitch isn’t going as slowly as I thought, but the lapels are taking up about just as much knitting as the body section of the pattern, which I really didn’t think about before starting this project.

Remember how I said that I reread each section 10 times so I could get it right….well, I still didn’t get it right on the lapels and had to rip back and start all over. Apparently, my I-cord detail before the seed stitch was inside out because I started on the opposite side I was supposed to start on…so after I ripped back, I just decided to purl instead of knit for that part. All is well now. I have started the increasing on the second lapel, so hopefully that part will be done by the weekend and I’ll be able to add the final I-cord accent to it and I can wash and block the damn jacket. It seems like it has taken forever to knit. Quite possibly because I had to visit the frog pond on more than a few occassions, which is not entirely my fault.

I also plan to finish up the Gray Flannel purse…why I stopped the production on that is because simply, I ran out of yarn. It seems that you need two balls of Cascade 220, not one, like the pattern calls for. Although I did a bit of substituting for the yarns I was to carry with the Cascade 220 so, I’ll give it the benefit of the doubt. I’m hoping I can stop by the LYS sometime tomorrow so I can get that last ball, so I can finish this project this weekend as well. I am eager to finish my first felting project.

Then I think I will be on to knit Snow White. That pattern has been calling me for months! Its time to give it a go…eventhough I should probably start on Tubey first, since that yarn has been sitting in my stash longer than the Snow White yarn and is not packaged as tightly and neatly as the Snow White yarn is. At any rate, I’ve got atleast a week to him and haw about it until I have to make my decision on what to knit next. Maybe I will attempt to knit them simultaneously. Then my couch would erupt in yarn twice as much as it has been…which would make the hubby batty…it could be fun, it could be disasterous!

Steeks are when you knit extra stitches in a row with the intention of cutting a vertical line between the middle stiches. So, after you knit to the amount desired, you secure the steek stitches in either one of three ways (hand sewing, machine sewing, or crocheting) on either side of the steek stitch that you are going to cut through. I used the crochet steeking method, because I don’t own a sewing machine and my hand knitting is terrible. The beautiful thing about steeking is that it leaves this clean straight edge to work with and makes things look more tailored and finished than having knitted and sewn seams. Yesterday, I cut my steek and if I had taken that bet with my coworker, I would have won 5 bucks, because the crocheted steeks held perfectly. If you want to see more about steeks, I suggest Eunny Jang’s Steeking Chronicles, she has a number of different methods you can use for steeking. After reading those chronicles, you have much more confidence about cutting into that labor of love you’ve been knitting.

Another technique that I chose to learn in this pattern, although it didn’t require this technique to complete this pattern is double knitting. I mentioned briefly in a previous post that I double knitted my sleeves. Quite frankly, I get second sock and second sleeve syndrome and I really detest knitting the same thing twice…it just makes things boring. I have never learned the magic loop method, but I have been quite intrigued over double knitting lately. So, what better time to learn than now? I used a tutorial over at Knitty that explained how to do double knitting and more importantly how to use the technique to knit two objects instead of one thick reversible stockinette object.

Here is what my sleeves looked like while knitting them:

Looks just like I only have one sleeve on the needle…tricky!

But, when I take a break and make sure I haven’t crossed any stitches (which I did cross stitches a couple of times, but still this was pretty good considering it was my first shot at this technique), this is what the “single” sleeve looks like.

The sleeve is over on the right and now you can see two sleeves with the same apex. On the left is the body of the jacket, before joining the sleeves and before steeking…one big tube!

So, the double knitting thing was pretty cool. I didn’t get my single sleeve syndrome and my knitting moved along. My next step on this Emma Jacket is to knit the lapels. Hopefully, that goes quickly, its seed stitch, so it won’t go as fast as stockinette would, but it will introduce an interesting texture into the garment and that was the part that attracted me the most about the look of this jacket. The second thing that attracted me to this jacket was the yarn…KnitPicks Shamrock. From a distance, this jacket will look dark brown in color, but when right up-close and personal, you’ll see specks of colors of blue, white, and orange. The yarn has a hand-dyed, color changing ply mixed in with the solid brown plies. So, it introduces an interesting dimension to the garment.

This pattern gave me quite a few headaches in the beginning and every step I encounter, I reread about 10 times before moving forward, just so I can avoid any headaches. So, if you plan to pursue this pattern, take note and read very carefully.

This pattern gave me very little hastle to knit. At first I had read the pattern wrong on a couple of rows after the spiral part was done and had to rip back pretty far back to correct it. But then I realized what I did wrong, and it was my mistake not the patterns. Anyhow, its a great addition to our furniture in our living room. I chose to knit this doily because it looked a lot different from most doilies I saw and kind of reminded me of seashells because of the spiral pattern. Hence it would fit right in at home, since we have so many seashell things in our apartment…went with the theme. I plan to knit a couple more of these to go on the other end tables and a little table in our apartment.

I finished my Spiral Doily from yarnover.net. Its been washed, blocked and doing its job on top of our end table for about a week. I even took a picture, which I will post this weekend with details of the adventure it was, if it kills me.

And now, instead of finishing that second Red Sox sock, I of course picked up another project on my “Future Projects” List. The Emma Jacket from Knit Picks. I am about 65% done with it now, which means I post entirely too slowly for my knitting. Or it means I don’t post enough. But, I do have some beef with this pattern…it only cost me 1.99 for it, so I probably shouldn’t have any gripes…but, it isn’t very clearly written and it took a lot of time on my part to figure out what I was supposed to do, when I was supposed to do it and how the outcome of it would be.

Of course it helped when I figured it was being knit from the bottom up…with every other seamless sweater I’ve knitted, its been top down…had to switch modes there. Once I figured that out it was almost smooth sailing. Then I had to find out on my own after increasing for 2 inches I had to add the first short row, then after I had knit 4 inches total I needed to add the second short row…all the while increasing. Then after I had knitted and increased 6.5 inches of fabric, I was to put the increasing on hold while I did the waist shaping. Then continue on with the increasing until I was done with the increasing.

I started out increasing to the total stitches I needed, then doing short rows and then having a big ‘?’ mark on my face when I got to waist shaping and yeah…total confusion ensued! After some creative math, that took about half a day to do, I figured out how I should have knit it, ripped back almost all the way for the third time (third times a charm) and knit it correctly. What could have prevented this big confusion folks? A simple sentence, something to this affect:

Continue with next steps of the pattern (short rows, etc.) while alternating knit and increase rounds until you have reached the Total Number of Body Stitches.

Would have had that magic light bulb light up in my head if that sentence was there instead of:

Alternate knit and increase rounds until you have reached the Total Number of Body Stitches.

Followed by the instructions for short rows.

Sleeves were uneventful, except for the fact that I decided to venture out and knit both sleeves at the same time, its kind of like double knitting without crossing the yarn to bring the fabric together. So, instead of having a thick sleeve, I have two sleeves knitted at once. You can find a great tutorial in this Knitty article that explains how to do that, thus ending second sock and second sleeve syndrome:

Extreme Knitting: 2 Socks in 1

Pictures were taken of that also and I will be posting about this in a more detailed post this weekend as well.

After the Emma Jacket, its off to do either Snow White or the Gray Flannel bag from “Pursenalities.” Two projects that I am extremely excited to dive into after this jacket is finished. I must say though despite all the beef, this jacket is turning out nicely so far.

Its all knitted up, all stitches grafted in the appropriate places.

When Mikey tried it on…it looked as though the neck was very awkward.  It came up very high on his neck.  I don’t quite get why because I followed the pattern and pattern errata exactly…which required me to frog back at times, because I hadn’t followed part of it right.  I also made sure to take his measurements before starting on the project, so I know I knitted the correct size.

When I got to the neckline, I noticed the stitch count was off, although I checked my stitch count constantly and it even matched up in the parts of the pattern leading up to the neckline…so I’m thinking there is more errata there that hasn’t been discovered yet…either that or I missed something major…both possibilities are very realistic.  Anyhow, when I reached this point, I decided to continue, but for the stitch count I had.  I had two options there, continue on for the stitch count I had or add an extra row that would make me decrease the number of stitches in the front of the vest.  I went with what made sense to me and I probably should have decreased in the first row to get the stitch count I needed.  C’est la vie!

Right now, this vest is sitting on the kitchen table for a little bit, before I muster up the courage to frog the neckline and start over on it.   I don’t like re-knitting stuff and really its not the re-knitting, its the re-grafting of the neckline facing.  The first time, took a lot of patience and concentration and it took a fair amount of time to do since I’m not an expert at it yet.  Don’t get me wrong, I love how the neckline facing looks all done and pretty, its just a lot of work to graft it down.

I have found Cotton Ease really easy to deal with.  I wasn’t sure if I was sold on it when I bought it, but its working quite well.  So its a nice, cheap alternative to other yarns you could use for this pattern.

In the meantime, I’m going to start on this doily pattern, because we need one for one of our side-tables in our living room.  Its time for a side project…and I really don’t want to get started on the other Red Sox sock, cause the first one was really boring to knit.