Finished Objects

I got the scarf finished and blocked and am very happy with how it came out. The recipient should get it in the mail today so I'm excited to hear if she likes it. After that I knitted a pair of baby booties that look like Converse sneakers for my step-granddaughter. I also knit my first pair of socks! I'm so pleased to have found a pattern and method I can understand. I have tried numerous times to knit with double pointed needles and never have quite got it. These are knit on one long circular needle. Not the prettiest pair as I did them with some leftover yarn from another project, but these were great practice to learn the basics of sock construction. Can't wait to start on my first non-practice pair!

Now if only I could figure out how to organize my photos on this blog... for some reason it uploaded them in reverse order and won't let me rearrange nor mix the text in with the pictures.

Happy and sad finish

One of my friends of facebook posted a pay-it-forward 2011 idea and I loved it! It said the first 5 people to leave a comment to the status would receive a handmade gift from the poster at some time in 2011. The catch was that if you left a comment, you also had to post the idea and make handmade gifts for others. I loved this idea so I commented and posted. I only got three comments, so I decided to do a knitted project for each one of them and I didn't mind if they were time consuming ones.

I've had this gorgeous brown alpaca yarn, my first "fancy yarn" purchase (read = not an acrylic bought at Wal-mart or Michael's) and I have wanted to knit the Lace Ribbon Scarf from knitty.com with it. I had tried to make this scarf a few times, but with no success. I'd never done any lace and had a hard time keeping track of the stitches. It hibernated for about 2 years and then I just frogged what I had. Too many mistakes to keep on going.

I knit a few clapotis in the meantime and felt my knitting skills were a bit better. I also fell in love with using a spreadsheet to help me visualize and keep track of my rows and stitches, so I made one for the lace ribbon pattern. This made all the difference in the world. Studying the pattern to make the spreadsheet helped me to understand what the pattern was about. I had a few more boo-boos and bad cast ons, but eventually got it right.

I'm a super slow knitter, but I just finished the knitting on this scarf today and I'm so excited. I moved to a much warmer climate since I purchased the yarn for this and near the beginning of the project I decided it was the perfect color for one of my pay-it-forward recipients. I just have to block it this weekend and send it off. I'm both happy and sad about it. I have loved everything about this project. The yarn was so nice to work with and after a few repeats of the pattern I found the rhythm of it quite soothing. Challenging, but do-able. I'm happy to have completed it, but sad that it's done too because I don't get to work on it some more.

It would have been nice to have one more skein of the yarn to make the scarf a bit longer, but I'm hoping in the blocking it will stretch a bit.

Above is a picture of what it looked like before blocking and I'll be sure to post another picture after blocking.

Moving on

So I finished my test and now I am working on catching up with things that have been left undone. But to celebrate, I may have had to add to my stash. My stash isn't very big and I want to keep it that way, but I couldn't resist some closeouts from WEBS.

The larger skeins are lace weight, 100% fine merino wool. It has 1375 yards! I couldn't resist because I have been wanting to try my hand at knitting a shawl and figured these would give me enough yardage to complete one. I just found the Weekend Shawl and purchased the pattern so one of these will be transformed into that in the near future.

The smaller skeins are an alpaca and silk blend that I could not resist. It is so soft and I know it's going to be a scarf but I'm not sure which one just yet. Yarn happiness!

Supposed to be studying...

I'm taking the bar exam here in Louisian in two weeks but I'm taking a study break. By clicking link after link from one knitting blog to the next I saw this cute baby turban and I think I have to knit it! I have a one month old step-granddaughter and if I did this in a light purple I think she would look just adorable in it! I can't wait for this test to be over so I can get back to my knitting.

Introduction and explanation

Welcome! Thanks for stopping by for a read. I'm a self-taught knitter of just over 10 years who has recently become obsessed. Knitting has been a constant through the past 10 years to help me adjust to transitions in my life and I now am reaching a transition point in my knitting.

I first started knitting when I moved from the northeast to the midwest on my own to attend graduate school. I found it a good way to pass lonely hours and to create some things just to prove that my hands could. When I was first learning I would often call one of my grandmothers who would always be willing to give me advice and even offered to fix a mistake I had made if I just sent her the piece I was working on. Her advice to me was that Red Heart Yarn was the best because you could find it at Wal-Mart and there were no dye lots on most of their yarn. For a good bit of my time knitting I stuck with that advice.

When I moved back to the northeast to attend law school I got the itch to knit more because of the cold and snowy Connecticut winters and because it helped me to de-stress from school. I started looking at yarns at different stores, like Michael's and A.C. Moore and discovered that there is more to knitting than just Red Heart! I fell in love with self-striping yarn and started thinking maybe I could knit with a wool blend instead of just acrylic.

When I started finding knitting podcasts on itunes and then started listening to them, I discovered a whole world of knitting that I didn't know existed! I had really only been knitting scarf and baby blankets and decided to try something a little more complicated than just a knit-purl only pattern. My sister and I took on the idea to make an afghan for my mother that had a simple cable pattern in it and used more than one color - both things I had never attempted. I loved it! I couldn't believe I could figure it out and make it look like the pamphlet!

When I moved yet again, it was to a town with a yarn shop and I went to visit. I had joined Ravelry and had found a bunch of patterns I wanted to try. I fell in love with Clapotis and decided to knit one for all my sisters. I bought my very first Noro and my very first alpaca, that I just needed to find the right pattern for.

Now, I am in the last place I plan on moving to and I have 5 clapotis under my belt, a tiny stash and more than one project on my needles. I have recently decided I want to knit socks (even though I have tried to in the past on double pointed needles and have had no success) and am determined to learn to do it on a circular needle. I am attempting my first lace pattern with that beautiful alpaca yarn I bought two years ago. I also have a gorgeous skein of lace weight merino wool purchased at a farmers market and I finally found the perfect pattern to knit with it.

That's where I am for now. I've been having a good time figuring out the scarf I'm working on and have been talking my fiancee's ear off about it. I decided to start the blog to share my excitement with other knitters and to give his ear a break. He is very supportive, however. He remembers that the thingy I just finished knitting is a clapotis, not just a scarf. He know that the yarn I'm using is alpaca, not just yarn. He knows I'm going to find something to knit for him even though he protests this is Louisiana and everything I knit is too warm for the climate, even if it's a Saints colors beer coozie. He also knows that if we ever win the lottery, he can retire, but I will be opening a yarn shop here in town.

Happy knitting.