Fuchsia Lace

I finally took my scarf off the blocking pad...and here it is! I'm very pleased with how this came out, and I have to say I'm rather proud of it. :o)





It blocked nicely too. Here you can see the scalloped edges, which is a feature I love about it. And the blocking helped the scallops at the ends, which didn't naturally want to scallop as much.



Specs on this project:

Pattern: Fuchsia Lace Scarves, Trailing Lace version, by Eugen K. Beugler (from Fibertrends)
Size: blocked size 48" x 6"
Needles used: Size 7
Yarn: Debbie Bliss Baby Cashmerino
Color: dark pink (#007)
Amount used: 2 balls
Started: 6/30/06
Finished: 4/14/08
Notes: I made this a little shorter probably than intended, but I think it works as a shorter scarf.

Flower Power...finally

So, guess what I finally dug out?



Yup! My Flower Power STR from the August Rockin' Sock Club kit from last year. I've been seeing these socks all over the 'net and have been wanting to start these forever. I love the colors together...even though I'm not totally crazy about the browns in there. But I realize that I need to branch out from my usual pinks and purples and blues, and this particular combination really appeals to me. Not that I'm a "flower power" 70's type of person, I just like the colors. :)

So this morning when Moose woke me up super early (he was licking the dresser and the hardwood floors...what is UP with that?!) and I couldn't fall back to sleep, I got up and started knitting.



I actually finished the whole lace cuff part. I like it!



I'm debating whether or not I am going to block the cuff at this point...is there a lot of merit to it? Anyone who's made these have any opinion on that?

Well, that's about it from here for now...until later! :o)

Nano cozy

Look at me, two posts in one day! ;o)

I just moments ago finished my little iPod cozy...I had been trying to find just the right button (something fun and pink) but then decided just to use a random one I found in my sewing box. I'd found some neat ones at the store but they were too big...they were round in a 3-dimensional way...I wanted something flat for when I stuff this in my purse.

Anyway, here it is:







Specs on this project:
Pattern: my own
Needles used: size 2 DPNs
Yarn: Socks That Rock Lightweight (Blue Moon Fiber Arts)
Color: Firebird
Amount used: leftovers from a pair of socks
Started: 4/15/08
Finished: 4/26/08

I know I'll get a lot of use out of this!

Catching up

Hi! Settle in...this will be a long one! ;o) There will be lots of photos though, I promise.

I finally have a little breathing room and a chance to catch up, both here on the blog and in my house. It's been a busy few weeks with each weekend taken up by lots of house chores, and I honestly haven't had the energy for a real blog post! I discovered I can email posts to blogger (which are those photoless ones you've been seeing) which is handy since now I cannot access blogger from work... :( This has kept me from keeping up on reading and commenting on other blogs too...I usually like to do that during my lunch break but now I really can't.

Anyway, I've been keeping busy with house chores. We did a lot of mulching last weekend, and I found some rocks to make a border for this little flower bed, in which the tulips have bloomed beautifully! Here they are the day we did the mulching:



And here they are now, in full bloom:







Here is another photo from our yard, some Bleeding Hearts that came up:



Oh, and remember a while back I told you about my white kitty, Pamuk? Well, after he died we buried him in the back yard and then to mark the place, we got this stepping stone kit where you mix this bag of concrete and then place pieces of glass and make a pretty mosaic. The kit came with the pieces of colored glass, and then I found a little packet of heart-shaped tiles which I added. :) So this is what we made for my Pamuk, a white heart for my white kitty (and little pink hearts for his pink nose!):



I love it. :o)

Anyway, back to other things...this is how I've spent some of my evenings since it's been so nice out lately:



It is fabulous!! I love spring!

I also like to watch a soap opera and have discovered I can watch it online on our laptop...gotta love wireless!! So some evenings I sit out on the deck with my knitting and the computer. This is how I like relax in the evenings. :o)

Also, thanks for all the sympathy re: no knitting needles in the courtroom. However, this turned into a non-issue as I didn't have to go either day! Yay! I really didn't want to go at all, so I was very happy to learn that when I called each night.

So...moving on to knitting! Since I've actually been finishing projects and/or close to doing so, that doesn't lend itself to having things to just grab and knit, most things are currently requiring other work. So started (and then quickly finished) a little project that I could just grab and work on.





This is just a fun little accessory scarf to wear with pink or green, fun for summer. I love little scarves like this. It is garter stitch on size 13 needles, 12 sts cast on.





Specs on this project:
Pattern: Garter stitch, cast on 12 sts
Needles used: Size 13
Yarn: Karnak by Filati FF
Color: 3008 (pinks and green)
Amount used: 1 ball (103 yds)
Started: 4/21/08
Finished: 4/24/08

So as I mentioned, my other projects were mostly done and waiting for action other than knitting. My Fuchsia Lace Scarf was waiting to be blocked and I finally got around to that this morning. Here it is blocking:



Here you can really see the wavy pattern:





I'll have to get a good outdoors photo of it when it's done. I managed to get a few extra inches out of it by blocking...it measured 41" x 4" before blocking and 48" x 6" after. I hope it holds most of its shape when dry and unpinned. I tried to accentuate the little scalloped edges I love about it.

I still haven't gotten around to stitching up bear parts...that's something that will require me sitting at the kitchen counter island and no Moose around. I'll do a bear post soon!

The other thing I started on a whim and have almost finished except for a button is a little iPod Nano cozy. I carry it around in my purse and use it in my car so I wanted to have some protection for it, but since the iPod is pink (PINK!) and I love it, I didn't want to hide it in one of those cases you can get for it. I also knew I wanted to knit something with my leftover Firebird since it went well with it, and also I was working on the Firebird/Solstice Slip socks at the time when my sweet husband gave me the iPod for my birthday. So it all made sense in my head. ;o)



Anyway, I just did a little swatch to check my gauge and then cast on in the round and knit until the little case was the height of my iPod. Then I cast off half of the stitches and began decreasing in garter stitch to make a little flap. As I said I still need to find a button and then I'll finish it off.

Today was also knitting hand wash day...I admit I got a little behind on my sock washing, but I got caught up today!



Here's how I dry them...I also get to dry the towel this way too, and catch any errant drips if they get away from me.

Okay...thanks to those of you who made it to the end of this catch-up post! I'll try to be better about posting more frequently! :o)

Bummer

Tonight I have to call in to see if I have to report for jury duty tomorrow, and then again tomorrow night for the next day.

I was just reading my county's website FAQs for jury duty and came across this...note the words I have bolded below:

 

 

Q. Will I have to go through any security measures when I enter the Courthouse?

A:  Yes, all persons entering the Courthouse are subject to a security search and will be required to pass through a metal detector. Please do not bring any sharp objects with you, for example: scissors, pen knives, and knitting needles when reporting for Jury Service.

 

:o(

 

Good thing I'm reading a good book!

Staying put

Thanks to all who have voiced their opinions on the Blogger vs. WordPress issue!  I appreciate the comments.  However, I think for now I am going to stay put here at blogger.  Even though I like the comment-email feature, blog stats and ability to create separate pages over at WordPress, I think to make matters easier I will stay here for now.  One thing I do like about Blogger is the ability to use email to create posts.  Now that I know how to do it, it might help make me post a little more often!  ;o)

 

So, moving on!

 

This is another non-knitting post, I'm afraid.  I didn't do much knitting over the weekend because we were super busy with house chores.  Saturday--all day--was spent mulching our flowerbeds.  Boy was THAT a lot of work!!  We have quite a few flowerbeds, apparently!!  I am still achy from that.  Yesterday was spent cleaning the house and preparing for an impromptu informal dinner party so that too was shot for knitting and relaxing time.  Oh well. 

 

The weather was gorgeous though and our tulips came out during the day while we were out mulching!  It was neat to almost watch their progress every time I came around the house to where they were.  We mulched that flowerbed and I found some stones in the corner of the back yarn with which I made a nice little edging to my flowerbed.  I'll post a photo soon.  We even got to eat outside both Friday and Saturday nights and that is one of my favorite things to do when the weather's nice.

 

Knitting-wise I worked a little on my Pink Flamingo sock #2 and I also managed to get up to the attic and dig out my fiberfill stuffing and black felt for the bear nose so I can continue to work on my Brown Bear (Whidbey).  I finished all of the knitting portion so now it's down to sewing and stuffing!

 

Hopefully I'll be back soon with some more knitting content!

Is this thing on?

Yup, apparently so. That worked! Okay, so, I can email posts in if I want. Good to know.

So anyway, sorry about that, back to regular things now. Well, sort of. This isn't really a knitting related post, but I hope you'll stay for a moment! See, I am trying to decide if I want to move my blog over to WordPress. I actually started one over there just to be able to fiddle around with it and see what it's like.

The way I see it, there are a lot of pros and cons on both sides for both Blogger and WordPress. The two main pros for WordPress are that the comments have email (so I can respond to people) and it also has blog stats. It also seems pretty user-friendly when it comes to editing. It is not, however, very customizable. I mean, I was able to choose just about all the colors and formatting here...you can change fonts and colors and all that stuff on Blogger, but not WordPress. But I guess I have to ask myself if that really bothers me?

The comments do seem to appear quickly and easily on WP. It all just seems sort of more...streamlined to me. I also like that you can have separate pages for "about me" info and such. (You'll see I added one for WIPs and completed projects.) The sidebar is VERY fiddly for updating, but, I think that using those easily editable pages for things I update frequently instead is definitely the way to go...easier in fact than the sidebar in Blogger. So in WP, I would likely just add buttons and such in the sidebar and then leave that alone. The downside is that my sidebar would not feature my WIPs, but, that's probably just fine.

I'm sort of leaning towards the switch, although now that I just learned that I can email posts successfully to Blogger, well...hmm. I know WordPress doesn't have that feature.

Now here's a quick question for you, my readers, if you'll kindly oblige: I'm sure you all read a lot of blogs, some on Blogger, some on WordPress, others elsewhere. Does anyone have any preference from a blog-reading perspective for one or the other? Just curious.

Okay, here's the blog I set up over at WordPress: http://theknittingmoose.wordpress.com/ And yeah, that's another bonus...I managed to snag "theknittingmoose" as my login and url!! ;o)

Test Post

Hi!  Is this working?  I am emailing this post.  No need to respond, unless you want to!  :o)

Bear bits and other stuff

Okay, so this is going to be a sort of half-effort post, and I apologize for that. :) But it's almost time for bed and I just want to get this out there!

I have now finished the front, back and two arms of my Whidbey the Bear, and I'm still loving the project. I'm not completing this at any great rate of speed but I'm enjoying it, and as I've mentioned before, it's not a high-speed knit anyway.



Okay, so, I apologize for the awful photos. It's really hard to photograph this stuff. You also can't really see the magic in the stitches of the arms due to all the fuzz, but it's very well-designed and the arrangement of increases and decreases have created perfect little bear arms. hee!



Next I'll get to the legs, and then the knitting portion of the bear will be complete. :o)

~ ~ ~

I haven't been knitting a ton, but I have been working a bit more on my Fuchsia Lace scarf. It is a really fun knit but I'm definitely at the point where I'm just ready for it to be done, so I have been plugging away at it, especially as I am now seeing a possible light at the end of the tunnel. I am almost at the end of the second ball of yarn (of three) and am contemplating calling it quits at that point.

~ ~ ~

Well...I started drafting this post earlier and now...the scarf is done! Well, I cast off anyway. I still need to block it, so I'm not calling it really done until then. I need to dig out my foam pads and T-pins. More photos to follow, but here it is now:


(Yup, more awful photos...I'll do better when it's really done!)

It's definitely not a super long scarf, but, I think it's okay. It's not the long, drapey type of scarf anyway. I'll post more photos as soon as I get to the blocking.

Let's see...what else is new? Oh--check out my find at Staples...a mini calculator for my knitting bag:



Cute, no? And, of course, it's pink. ;o)

That's it for now!

Bits and pieces

I had a really fun yarn shop experience the other day. I decided to stop in to my most local shop (I am lucky as I have a few to choose from) after work last week to see if they carried the Berroco Chinchilla that the Whidbey bear pattern called for.

I wandered in and the lady whom I know to be the owner greeted me enthusiastically. She and another lady were sitting at a high-top table knitting and gabbing. (I believe the other lady works there too...what a sweet job! Not only do you get to play with yarn, you also get to knit!) Anyway, she asked if I needed anything and I just said that I'd like to look around, and she welcomed me to do so. So I wandered around and tried to find their Berroco stash (while stopping to pet a few other skeins along the way, of course). I did find their Berroco but no Chinchilla. Then the store owner wandered over so I asked about the yarn.

She said that she did not carry it and unfortunately would not be able to special order any as I only needed two skeins. I understood this and so we set about finding a suitable replacement.

She suggested a few different ones and then came across this stuff called Gedifra Serano (if you scroll down to the bottom of that page there's a photo of the detail--click for big too). It was so delightfully soft it was just calling out to be made into a bear.



Thing was, it's not exactly the same style of yarn...it doesn't have uniform fuzzies...it has a core yarn which then has really soft little bits coming off it, like an eyelash but in a less hairy way and very very soft. Then, every few inches is a little soft tuft of furry stuff. Here is what it looks like as a strand:





Anyway, then the nice LYS owner asked me if I had time and would I like to sit and knit a swatch with it to see if I liked it? I said yes that would be great, so she loaned me some needles and told me to have a seat. So I did! Let me just tell you...I am a shy person who normally will wander into a store, do my looking or shopping, and quietly leave. Even though I would love to create a rapport with people at a LYS, I am normally too shy to do so. But this lady was so friendly and nice that she brought out the less shy side of me. That's what I need, someone friendly and I'm much more comfortable and less shy.

(Speaking of being shy...one day I was at my local Barnes and Noble bookstore and while perusing the knitting books, I noticed a group of knitters in one of the sitting areas! I peeked at them out of the corner of my eye...and a part of me wished I was outgoing enough to just walk up and say hi. But that is SO not me. I made a mental note of what day it was and decided to try and look it up or inquire elsewhere...was it just a casual group get together or a guild meeting or what? I never found anything out but someday I hope to.)

So anyway, back to the LYS...I sat on the stool and chatted with the ladies while I made a big enough swatch of the yarn that I could tell this was going to make a fabulous bear. Not cheap yarn, really, but as I only needed two balls of it I decided that was fine. Plus by this point I really wanted to buy the yarn from her and not the internet.

I took it home and dug right in, and here's the completed bear front, on the stockinette side:



And this is the "back" or the reverse stockinette side:



Once I am done with all the bear parts, I will need to decide which side I want to be on the outside. Since it is stockinette, as I expected most of the fluff and fuzz is ending up on the back side. But seeing as there is no right or wrong as far as front and back go, I will just need to decide which I like better. At first I thought I might want to use the back on the outside, but I'm not really sure yet. That answer will come to me eventually. :)

So far the bear is fun to knit although it isn't exactly what I'd call relaxing, since it's a little hard to see what you're doing, what with all the fuzz. But the pattern is very well-written and clear.

Since I needed a little break from the bear knitting, I finished Pink Flamingo sock #1. I love it! It's definitely a tight sock, but it fits.



So...that's it from here for now. I hope to get back to the bear knitting next, so hopefully I'll have more bear parts to show soon.

Yup, still here

Hi! Still here. Sorry for the long no-post spell. I've just sorta lost my blogging mojo for a bit. This happens to me now and then...but I think I'm not the only one...right? I know I've read some of your blogs and you get this too.

I have been knitting a little, not a whole lot though. Not really sure what's bothering me and making me not want to knit, but again, I suppose we all go through these spells now and then, don't we?

I've been working on my Pink Flamingo sock here and there, and enjoying it. I've done the heel and am cruising on down the foot now. I like it so far...once I get a little further I'll try it on and make sure this is not all for nothing. My last sock attempted at this stitch count and size of yarn was not so successful, but I'm hoping this needle size will do the trick this time.

In yarny news, I forgot to share this little gem I recently, um...*cough* purchased. (The last thing I needed was more sock yarn...but, well, ya know. The wiles of yarn and all that. ;o) Plus, I was supporting a nice little online yarn shop, Sonny and Shear.) So anyway, in addition to all those excuses...I've also never had a skein of Yarntini before! It's so pretty...it's certainly very bright...but pretty!

This color is called Sangria. Yum.





So, that'll be a good summertime sock project yarn, I'd say.

I'm also thinking a bit about other projects...I have some springy-colored yarn I've wanted to make some ankle socks with. I'll post photos soon...but the yarn is Panda Cotton and since they're small balls of yarn, I wanted to do toe-up socks so I don't have to worry about running out of yarn.

As is my usual way, I also wanted to write up a pattern of my own for a basic toe-up sock, and so I'd started the sock a while back and am working on the pattern at the same time. I set it aside when I reached a hiccup, but now I'm inspired by the onset of spring to pick these back up!

This is the yarn...it's NOT a very accurate photo color-wise, but it's all I've got for now. It's called Strawberries and Limes if you care to google for a better photo. (Wait...here ya go.)



It has a bit of elastic in it too. I noticed the yarn was a bit splitty as I knit it, but...the color is so pretty I can live with that!

I was also recently hit with a desire to make Whidbey the Knitted Bear. I've had the pattern for him for some time now, but something made me want to find some yarn for him and start it. We'll see. That project may not materialize right away, especially if I can't find the yarn locally (you know, that whole instant gratification thing). I tend to get a little distracted, in case you haven't noticed. ;)

That's all for now. Back soon with babble about another project I've got brewing.