Sugared Pompa

I am not done all of my catching up yet, but thought I would pause here to post about a recent FO.
Pompa by Ann Hanson
This is a quick lace knit. The pattern is very intuitive and is easy to memorize. The result though is lovely. The columns of bars are created with YOs, instead of dropped stitches as in Clapotis, so if your yarn is sticky(mohair anyone) it won't be a problem.

The yarn I used is Sugar Rush by Queensland collection. This yarn is made from sugar cane and has a sheen to it. At 125m/50g it is a dense yarn for a sport weight yarn. I wanted a pattern that would be able to handle the weight and I think this project does it. I used most of two skeins (knots near the edges and wanted to finish a pattern repeat). This gave me a scarf that is 15cm x 134 cm. I thought that 4 repeats across would be too wide and I was happy with the size this gave me.


I also got some blocking wires which I will be using more of in the future. Lace blocking is much easier - especially if you want those straight edges.
Complete Rav details here

Update

Just a quick post to show a recent picture of NB in his Tomten jacket.





He was not in the mood to stay still.

Charts.

It is hard to write a dishcloth project up into a blog post but here it goes. Evelyn Clark, the designer of the Flower Basket shawl, designed a dishcloth pattern with a greyhound on it, a few days after seeing the pattern, a request went out for donations for a Greyhound raffle fundraiser. I of course put the two together and volunteered to knit some for charity.

I downloaded the pattern, looked at it and there was no chart. It was written out line by line. I thought about it and went, this isn't going to work I need a chart - isn't that funny how we get set in our ways. However, thanks to Ravelry I had come across a link to a chart generator, I went and dug up the post and checked out the links, created my chart.

After making the chart I proceeded to make 6 dishcloths, not being a big dishcloth knitter I didn't realize how little time it takes to knit these, and ran out of yarn while I was on vacation - so what is a knitter to do but to make an intarsia dish cloth with some of the leftovers.

If you ever need to generate a chart, this is the one I used
Chart Gen.
However, I have also found these tools but have not fully tested them out: Jacqui's Knitting Chart Maker, Chart-A-Rama, and Knit Pro 2.0. Chart Gen, Chart Maker and Chart-A-Rama all translate written instructions into a chart - each one has a slightly different input mechanism and format that it wants. Knit Pro takes a jpg or gif and turns it into a chart (I have not used this site). However I may in the future.

When I was working on the Serenity socks, I went back to Chart Gen and charted the instructions for the leaf on the heel.

More FO or Catch Up Part II

So after I posted the finished socks last week, I thought I should update my side bar with the information that I was currently working on. I realized that those three items listed as my WIP were finished and I didn't even mention they were done, they had been done for so long.
First up,
Tomten Jacket by EZ.

This jacket is part of what made EZ such a great designer. I finished this jacket back in April, it fit NB then and here it is the October and it still fits him - although differently.
This was the first time I had used Shelridge Farms yarn (the blue) and I loved it, it was soft on the hands and holds up great to the washing machine. The black is Merino et Soie and is also a great DK weight yarn. This sweater has gotten lots of wear and will continue to get more wear during the fall.

Next up was the decision to finish the Bianca jacket. I went with the dark brown buttons with flex of gold. I have worn this jacket a few times and I think I will wear it some more know that fall is here.







The Celtic Vest barely got started in the last blog session and now it is done and has been worn. I couldn't figure out the cast on - which turned out to be the long tail cast on but using two balls of yarn instead of a long tail. Easy to figure out once I got past that. This was a quick knit but I wish that I had knit it longer - hard to judge with a sideways knit when the instructions state it will grow with blocking.

Socks II

So to finish playing catch up on finished socks .

In June I wanted you to use some of my Sockotta yarn to knit socks, this would be vacation/beach knitting and working on wool in July was not on my list as good plans (as it turns out I could have done it for most of this July).

In the skein this yarn I didn't think it was very busy so I choose Cachoeira from Knitty as a pattern. It had been on my queue so why not. After doing a pattern repeat I realized why not, it is very hard to see the pattern. After the heel turn I switched to stockinette and then the socks just flew off the needles. The pattern was great just not a match to the yarn. If I wasn't away I probably would have switched patterns or took more time to choose the initial pattern. Oh well, the socks are comfy. More details on Rav


The last pair of socks in this FO parade is the Jayne's Serenity Socks. These started as a sock blank that I dyed at WWKIP day in New Hamburg. The base yarn is Shelridge Farms Soft Touch. It was fun to see how the transitions occurred in the sock compared to the blank. I think the next blank I will do I will make the stripes more on a diagonal so there is a more subtle graduation. I was happy with the dye job overall.

The pattern I used for these socks is Serenity by Nikki Van De Car, there was a few confusing bits but that was easily straightened out. I enjoyed the cabling, and had the large cables cross in opposite directions on each sock - well except where they were miscrossed. Those got left in as nothing is for sure in the 'Verse.

I had some yarn left over which went into little socks for NB. He loves bare feet though so it will be fun getting a picture of those socks. I mostly let him have bare feet unless we are going out in the cold.