Miscrossed cables

Last night at Stitch and Bitch, there was Vogue Knitting magazine on the table. I thought it must be the new spring issue. As the night progressed KS (owner of magazine) said something about not noticing the mistake for 5 years even though it is right there. She motioned to the magazine. I looked closer it is the Spring/Summer 2002 issue. Look at the left boob.


How many people did that photo get by with that mismatched cable on the front. If it was noticed during the photo shoot they would have put a brooch or positioned her arms differently over the mistake.
Just thought I would share since I know some people have had problems with mismatched cables lately. I think this puts it in perspective how they sometimes are not visible. The only reason KS noticed the mistake as she was told about it.

There was a race

So I started the Clapotis last week. I knew that I didn't have enough yarn for the pattern as written but the plan is to make a scarf not a wrap. Sounds good.So I cast on and increased to 58 stitches - a nice wide width (about 15" or 38cm). I had a mini debate at 52 stitches whether to do one more set of increases or leave it as it was. I thought the wider width would be nice.
Clapotis is a fast knit, and the yarn is beautiful and soft making this project just zoom along. My goal after knitting awhile was to get 10 repeats of the straight section, then assess the yarn amounts and start decreasing accordingly. At 10 repeats I thought maybe I could get 11 repeats. That quickly turned false. Ripped back accordingly and started the decrease section after 10 repeats. After knitting on the decreases, I started to get worried this is taking more yarn than I thought.

Here is the final state of Clapotis 14 stitches left - no yarn. (the colour is more accurate in the first photo)
Shit shit shit.

I don't want to make the scarf any shorter than it already is. I am not someone that needs a long scarf, but 110 cm (45") is about as short as I want to go. So, it needs to be narrower which I am fine with, I knew that I probably should have made it narrower when I was deciding on the width. Out it comes.
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Finished Trellis

I have been owing you a photo of Trellis for awhile now, but I had a good reason. The knitting was done before Christmas, but there was a situation. When there was three rows left. Keeper decided to help me out. He grabbed it from my knitting bag when I was out, brought the knitting downstairs and at some point got it tangled so he chewed a hole in the middle.
Yes screaming and crying occurred when I came home. After letting it marinate for awhile.
I removed the damaged repeat from the middle. I let it marinate in this way for awhile since I decided that I wasn't going to get it done for Christmas without losing my sanity. Until this past week and I grafted the two sides together.


Needles: 3mm
Yarn: Misti Alpaca laceweight in Forest Green 1 skein
Pattern: Trellis Scarf from IK Spring 2006 by Evelyn A. Clark
Size: 168 cm x 23 cm (about 66"x 9")
Notes: I needed to use markers for each pattern repeat for a good chunk of the scarf. It was painful at first because they moved so often but it was worth the time.


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Knitcycle

Yarn Monkey is full of good ideas for the online knitting community. Her newest idea is a knitting freecycle Knitcycle organized on yahoo groups. She has also started a new tournament Knit Off, which is similar to sock madness but I don't know what YarnMonkey will have you knit in the tournament. I will not be participating in either tournament but will be interested in watching the posts on Knitcycle.

On Monday while I was out shoveling the snow, I was enjoying shoveling it being winter and all. That length of warm weather at the beginning of the month was depressing. However, I am starting to think that having a couple of days off from shoveling would be nice. The only day in the past week that I have not shoveled was Sunday. I think that was because I spent the day at my parent’s cottage on Lake Erie as opposed to being at home. We are not getting snow everyday but when it doesn’t snow I either have to go out and shovel what A) I missed the day before and has now become ice/slush and will freeze to ice in the evening or B) powdered snow the wind has blown in.

The knitting on the last Christmas gift is done. I just have a seam to sew and through them in the washer for a cycle or three. I would show you a picture but see my rant below.

For my next knitting project I am thinking of knitting Clapotis (did I really need to link to that) from some beautiful Brooks Farm 4 play silk wool blend. I only have one luscious skein, so I know it will be skinnier than the pattern calls for, but I think it will make a nice scarf instead of a wrap. I know almost everyone has made this pattern before so is there anything I should watch out for or just start knitting merrily away.

Comments from last time: Wow I had no idea that everyone just blatantly ignores the Koigu handwash instructions and throws them in the machine. Mine have since gone into the washing machine (without protection) and have come out fine. They are on my feet again.

I don’t actually know when I am going to get this posted as blogger is being an ass. In the past couple of weeks I have seen that Error 502 message from Google way to often. They are apparently doing maintenance now. They seem to always be doing maintenance.
The posting area has changed and there is no buttons for adding photos or links, to see a preview. All that good stuff you want in a blog editor.

Oh - I just had a http post error - not supported by this url. UM this is how I always post.

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A trip to the washer

The other day Claudia mentioned taking her husband's koigu socks out of the washing machine. What! She machine washed Koigu! I asked her about, and she replied she has never had a problem although they get a little fuzzy. Well I sort of tried it the other day. I put the Pomatomus in the lingerie bag and into the washer*. The result:


No guarantees on your socks. I may even get bold and try it outside of the bag. I am not going to try the merino that the FHS and Denmark socks are made of since it is very fuzzy and there were two parts in the ball that were almost felted together already.

* do I need to mention on cold and they did not go in the dryer.
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Another pair of socks

I have finished the Friday Harbour Socks, the original cuff was too tight and I added a koigu ribbing to the top of the sock. I still don't love how these socks fit but they are keeping my feet warm today. The original cuff was a nice design although it was fiddly at first until I realized that the stitch count per a needle changes and you need to account for that. I have noticed that IK has that in an errata.


Needles: 2.25mm - this did not get me recommend gauge so the fit is off
Gauge: 8 spi
Yarn: 2/6 Merino from Knitters Fair
Pattern: Friday Harbour Socks from Knitting on the Road


Last night a storm went through depositing ice pellets/snow through Southern Ontario. True to form Keeper did not want to go out for the morning walk. I finally got him outside and he didn't see any reason to go back inside. So we walked 3km this morning in freezing rain. Oh, have I mentioned that the aforementioned pup has decided that coats are beneath him. When the weather has been cool he won't go outside with it on, but will once it has been taken off him. I always give him the option but he is preferring to be au natural. There was ice on his leash at the end of the walk but it didn't seem to faze him at all. Due to the nature of the snow/ice it was grainy like sand and Keeper thought it was great to run in forgetting that I can't run as fast as he can. After stopping a few times he remembered just to walk with me. We did do some jogging on what of the streets and he was happy, but I had trouble keeping it up for a block.

Jenni has decided to start a knitting blog - so drop over to Knitting Rage and say hi.
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Warm feet

Stephanie was great last night she had everyone at the guild laughing while telling her stories about belong in the niche market of knitting humourist. I let her know that I was one of her stalkers - I have met her now in Maryland, Doylestown, PA and now Waterloo. Sarah was happy to have compelted 50% of her people to meet before she dies list - the only other person on that list is Joss Whedon. Sarah and Vick stayed over last night since the snow was blowing and they didn't feel comfortable driving home on the roads. A fun time was had by all.

Before the holidays I discussed making myself the Fibertrend Felted Clogs but that they were awaiting felting. Here is the finished project.

Yarn: Chaco Worsted Wool in turquoise and navy - purchased at MSW 2005
Needles: 9 mm (US13) circular
Pattern: Fibertrends Felted Clogs in women's medium.

Comments: I did not have a full ball of the navy but was able to compensate with finishing the bottom sole with the turquoise on the second sole. Works fine for me. The one thing about this slipper though is I wish it was just a tad smaller. The slippers were felted through 4 washes on cold and then 2 cycles with hot water. I don't think there was much change between the two hot washes- I may retry at a later time as I like my slipper snug. The slippers these are replacing were probably felted too small but then stretched to my feet while wet (blocked on my feet in front of the fireplace).

I have not been able to knock many miles off this week from the 100 mile challenge since Keeper would prefer to stay snuggled under the blankets then to go outside. (Well who can blame him?) For the time being we are going for one walk a day.


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Knitting Update

I started composing a post on Sunday about the warm weather and how Environment Canada had canceled winter, but some other people did that. Yesterday I wrote most of a post how the weather turned cold finally and it had started to snow. For some reason I didn't post it.

The Denmark socks are done. I only did the cabling on the cuff and like how that feels.

Pattern: Denmark socks from Knitting on the Road
Needles: 2.75 mm Inox DPNs
Yarn: Merino 2/6 purchased from KW Knitters Fair - it was a bargain ball. I don't think that it is going to hold up well to wear. After being worn once there is more wear than my Pomatomas socks.

I guess I will have to have more wool socks so these don't get as worn.

This is the same yarn that I am making the Friday Harbour socks from.
To bring you back to the story, I never checked the gauge when I started the FH socks (I rarely do I figure similar enough yarn/needles and lacy pattern should account for any differences they are socks). I didn't read the pattern carefully enough when it said what needles to use so I used 2.25 mm instead of 2.75 mm (US 1 instead of US2). When I tried them on near the toes the cuff was doable but tight. I decided to finish the one sock, knit other socks then come back to these. I did a provisional cast on and knit the second sock (sans cuff) until I ran out of yarn (I knew this was going to happen) ripped out the first cuff and am finishing the second sock with that yarn. I am going to use this left over Koigu to knit cuffs to the socks.

I started the last of my Christmas knitting


This is Briggs and Little yarn, which I haven't used before. I don't see why it wouldn't felt well, the colour is a deep navy not black.

I need to go walk Keeper, make dinner for TNMA, NR and YP then off to see YH tonight at KW KG.

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Out for a walk

So Rachel has come up with this idea, maybe you have heard of it Run/Walk 100 miles by April 1. I figure that since I walk the dog twice a day it should be no problem. So I signed up. I then went over to a nifty site that uses google maps to track the distance that you travel. I did some mapping - the walk I did this morning and some other iterations of the walks - 1.9 miles (3.0 km). So I should be able to hit 100 miles well before March 1. The only hitch in the plan is if it gets cold, and Keeper refuses to walk. He loves walking so I don't think there will be many days we don't do at least 2 miles. I am going to challenge myself to walk 300 km by April 1.

The other thing that will help in this endeavor is a Christmas present I got - a Garmin etrex Vista handheld GPS unit.


This will be great for some geocaching and seeing how far we go on the hikes. The other night we took it with us while walking Keeper - we had 27 min of stopped time, and 25 min of traveling time. Yep Keeper does like to stop and sniff and can be stubborn if we are not going his way.