WIP Wednesday: A normal number of projects

You know it is bad when your husband starts teasing you about the number of projects on the needles.

The dear sweet lovable one was right, I don't like having that many at the same time.

So, after catching a case of spring induced cast on all of the things, I started knocking out projects. I won't talk about these today, but the handspun hat is done, along with the stripey Noro cowl. Stay tuned for Friday!

So that leaves 2 things. The Evenstar Shawl, and the Cranberry Biscotti Socks.

On the Evenstar front I did another 2 1/2 repeats Monday night. Sleep deprivation meant that nothing was happening on Tuesday, so here is where I stand.

I am at the 40% mark on the border. It makes for boring blogging to say the least. I just need to keep working on it every night. I am not starting other projects because I am still working on this one.

The socks are getting far more love. Last week homework wasn't assigned in my one class, so I got 8-10 hours of my life back. Most of those were spent knitting these socks.

With all of the thunderstorms this week, it seems like mission impossible to get a good photo in daylight. With how much I have been working, daylight also seems to be in short supply.

Of course with that said, I am working on my set of blog entries for next week, which is a pretty big project in and of itself. As I mentioned earlier I am taking part in the 4th Annual Knit and Crochet Blog Week. Since I know I can have trouble putting out 2 posts a week, much less daily, I am doing my homework.

Please check out the other WIP Wednesday bloggers here.

That's all for now, take care guys

Molly : )

Joy and Smiles Episode 19: Our Slow Progress

In this episode, it seems like our projects taking forever to get finished.



Take care guys!

Molly : )

Easing in a Sweater Sleeve

Occasionally when you have a pile of pieces, you realize that some of these are not like the others. And unfortunately you need to sew these things together, even though they obviously do not fit.

This is where the skill of easing in can be a great help.

The key points are:
1.) Know your end points
2.) Don't be afraid of tying everything down
3.) Knits stretch

Before you start easing in the sleeves, sew everything else. Sleeves go in last. You will have a wonky shape if you try to put in the sleeves before  you sew the shoulders, and before you sew the side seams. This is because the shoulders and armpits are the key places for the fit of the sweater.

Here is the problem. You knit the body, and the sleeves, and you go to put them together and they are nothing alike. Sure, the top connects with the top and the bottom with the bottom, but nothing in the middle seems to work.

Sure, you can smoosh them together, but it is pretty obvious that you will need more skill than that.

So you lay the pieces out and decide where the most important joins are. In this case it is the arm pit and the shoulder. If you want additional guidance tying additional places is a good plan. like the middle. Here I chose not to, because it gave me more room to ease in. Also note that these points match the body with no stretching at all. This implies that they do actually fit together even if it does not seem like that right now.

When you are making the pieces, leave nice long tails so you can use them to sew. Using the tails reduces the number of ends you will need to weave in and reduces bulk in key areas, like the shoulder. I used the tail from the sleeve to start sewing, so I am slightly offset from the tie I placed at the top of the shoulder. That is fine, in fact that is why I placed a tie there in the first place.

In this sweater I was told to use whip stitch. Normally patterns call for mattress stitch. Unless another stitch is explicitly called for, mattress stitch should be your default choice.

As I go, I lift and rearrange the sweater and verify that I have approximately the same number of stitches on the top and bottom pieces. If one is getting ahead of the other, I will choose to sew the next stitch instead of the current to gently reduce the number of extra, or sew into one stitch twice to increase.

In the photo above I am transitioning from sewing side stitches to sewing the bound off edges again.

Here the sleeve is about halfway done.It is a bit hard to tell in this photo, but there is not significant distortion between the back which is sewed down (inside shown) and the front which is not. The back is stretched in comparison to the front, but this is fine.

When you get to the shoulder, ball you hand into a fist and use your wrist to hold the sleeve up. This provides a good base to sew the most important part of the sleeve in. It helps to have the shoulder filled out because it is easier to sew when it is in the shape it is going to be when you are done.

Once you reach your tie, untie the waste yarn and continue sewing around the sleeve. Try to avoid breaking the yarn at the shoulder. It is easier to weave in the ends where the weight of the sweater is not hanging.

Ta da! The sleeves are attached, they look good, and most importantly, they look nothing like the funny shaped pieces we started with. I hope this tutorial helps. Please leave any suggestions you have in the comments. I am more than happy to edit and expand.

Take care guys,

Molly : )

Progress on all Fronts

Hi everyone!

I am excited about a couple of things coming up in the next few weeks.

1.) I am starting an internship in Albuquerque. I might even learn how to spell that name.

2.) I am making samples to take with me, hopefully before I leave.

3.) I am participating in the 4th Annual Knit and Crochet Blog Week

4.) I have a nearly finished tutorial on how to ease a sleeve in a sweater.

So between now and mid-May there is a ton that needs to happen. I am not sure how this will affect my blogging habits. It might mean I write posts in advance.

Evenstar is slowly moving forward. I am at 21 border repeats, so more than 1/3 of the way there.

My pictures today do the shawl a great injustice.It is opening up beautifully from it's formerly 24 in circumference to whatever size it is going to be when it is done.

I am still trucking on the Indefinite Stripes Cowl. I forgot to take a picture after I sewed the ends together. I am knitting a simple k1p1 border to use up the remaining natural/earthy colored yarn.

To fight the boredom, I am reading a book at the same time. Since there are so many stitches it is making it look stripey since the color repeats are about as long as the circle.

I hope the border will really highlight the fact that this is a single sided object.

I had 37 grams left over, and I am going to knit until it is all gone. I have been checking how much I use per row, so when I am down to 6 grams I will bind off and call this puppy over. This is supposed to be for the Knit Girllls long cowl KAL. I think it ended already. Whatever, this will be perfect for next winter.

I started a new project while I was waiting for some needles to borrow for the cowl.

The leg quite possibly flew off my needles Monday. The pattern is Cranberry Biscotti, and it is a 3 color slipped stitch stripe. I am using Squoosh for the main color, and Lorna's Laces for the contrast colors. It all just glomped into this fetching combination of blues, purples, yellows and greens.

 




















I am really enjoying my scrap sock quest. I had pulled these colors out last month because I thought they might go together. It has been interesting to see how the combination is so much different than the sum.

Department of Stashquistions:

This week I bought some fiber to continue my quest to grok spinning. I had been looking at Gnomespun for some time, so I finally just bit the bullet and bought fiber. I got 8oz of combed Shetland top in the sapphire surprise colorway. It arrived in a bulging soft mailer. I can't believe he managed to cram that much fiber into that small of a space. I probably won't start spinning for a few days, since it is slowing down my evenstar progress. I just want to practice spinning thinner and get enough yardage for a proper project.

I think that is all for now. Take care guys!

Molly : )

FO Friday: Fiber Optic Gradient

This Monday, the snow was very obliging of a little photo shoot. I finished my third spinning project, the fiber optic gradient in the rouge-purple-cerulean colorway.

There is just something magical about yarn in fresh snow. For once I could get a color accurate shot (yay spring!).

I was hoping for a fingering weight but I got something closer to a worsted. There a chunky bits from where I finally figured out how to draft, and there are wicked thin bits where I plyed my later work on my later work.

The process of finishing this yarn was a bit of an epic. Here is where I was Friday afternoon (in a mad scheme to post this last week)

I decided after all to 2 ply, and keep the gradient like I originally planned. When I ran out of the first single I would ply the rest from the end of the second single.

After I finished the singles I let the last one rest. Unfortunately the other one had been resting for weeks on end. The residual twist was so much weaker, than I had to ply this sucker pretty hard to get the amount of glomping together that I wanted. To ply until the yarn no longer twisted on itself resulted in a really under plied yarn. My instincts were correct. Once I washed and thwaked I had one quarter twist to none in my skein. Before I had three twists.

I plied from 6pm to 11pm, and I was still in rouge by the time I went to bed.

I woke up at 10 and resumed plying. I was able to go until 2-3 before the hook striped out of the spindle. Defeated I wound the plied yarn onto a handy dandy paper towel roll. Later that afternoon I got toothpicks from the store, filled the hole with wood glue, followed by a broken toothpick, and then I had to wait 24 hours.

I could not wait 24 hours. My enabler, Jen, told me I could use it as a bottom whorl. So I went online, found a tutorial for setting up bottom whorl spindles, and I wound the yarn back on. I plied through a movie, and still I was not yet done.

Sunday morning I finally finished. So I wound it onto my niddy noddy, and took some pictures.

233 yd of a worsted weight. Obviously a little thick in places. What I like the most was that because my spinning was not super consistent, it made for a more gentle gradient from rouge to purple, and purple to blue. You can see it really well on the niddy noddy. I can't wait to knit this up. I am making a hat.

The blue I plied back on itself was 40 yds so there really wasn't a huge length mismatch between my singles. That was 16 g.

I wonder what my next braid will be. Hmmmm. You have as much of a clue as I do.

Go check out the other FO Friday Bloggers. It's fun!

Take care guys

Molly : )

Joy and Smiles Episide 18: Our Indefinite Break

We talk about sewing with knit fabrics, when will spring ever come, our current knitting projects, my stashquisitions and life in general.

Take care guys!

Molly : )

Ninty Degrees of Evenstar: WIPW

I have reached the 14th repeat of the border chart, which means I have cast off 1/4 of my massive circular shawl.


The good news:

I memorized the chart, I don't need the post-it note blinder anymore, which is making everything go much quicker.

The bad news:

It is still so freaking complicated I can't possibly carry it around. So it is on my dining room table, and I turn on my indie rock pandora station and I go to town half a repeat at a time.

My makeshift beading tool broke, but not where I expected it to. I can no longer load 40 beads on at a time. But the crochet hook end I filed in is still working like a champ. Who knew?

My cowl grows ever longer. It has reached the drag on the ground if I am not paying attention stage. I am taking a photo class on craftsy so I tried to apply some of what I have learned so far. Here is where I am so far, or 40 inches long, 7 wide.

This picture is fairly typical, oh crap I am writing a blog post, quick snap one on the table.

This one had more foresight. I took it during daylight. I arranged all of the elements artfully. Everything is in focus. The cowl is skewed to fill the frame

I 

I have taken shots like these before. I was trying to get a sense of depth.

I really like this one. I made it so the yarn was in focus, and the cowl enters focus. It just seems very inviting, like please knit me!

This one is a macro shot on the fabric itself. You can see how textured and nubby and thick and thin this yarn is. I think it gives a sense of how it feels to knit this, since it is basically at the same scale as when you are holding it in your hands.

I have been learning a decent amount, and hopefully I will learn more before the class is over.

In the spinning department, I am still working on my fiber optic gradient. Evenstar has been getting more of my home attention. Not last weekend, but the weekend before I did another quarter. That was a lovely weekend. The only thing on the agenda was knitting a spinning. And I did!

I am almost to the light blue, just a smidge more dark blue to go. I think I am going to 3-ply this, and not even maintain the gradient. There will be plenty of time to learn how to consistently spin thin, and well, this braid represents a decent chunk of learning, and is somewhat chunky in places because of that.

Department of Stashquisitions:

I bought a skein of Wollmeise lace on destash in the Chim Chim Chimney colorway. 

I think it wants to be a cardigan, with closures. I love the crap out of my featherweight, and I feel like this skein is destined to a better version of it. As in a completely different pattern, haha!

I highly encourage you to check out the other WIP Wednesday bloggers. I love linking up with you guys.

That's all for now, take care guys

Molly : )

Joy and Smiles Episode 17: Our Spring Break

This week we talk about yarn bombing, and the journey of the sweater, and dressing our men, along with the usual WIP's FO's and whatnot.

Take care guys!

Molly : )

Joy and Smiles Episode 16: Our New Format

This is the first episode with me as a co-host, I learned a lot! We are posting the videos on both of our blogs. This is the episode from February the 22nd.

FO! Cinch Socks

By the time you receive this transmission they should already be in Canada.

 They don't fit me quite right, but they should work for the recipient.

 Yep I made Cinch for a swap.I will probably make Cinch for myself too.

I danced with 2 partners for the Sock Knitters Do-Si-Do KAL, though I didn't finish by the end of February. I sorta lost my need for speed after March hit. I was close : ) I am really happy I got a chance to knit these.

Having never knit a pay sock pattern before, I was really impressed with all of the information that Krysten (check out her blog) included in the pattern. I ended up only printing half of the 24 pages.

I know the side stripes were meant for scraps, but I decided that the main part could also use up some of my impressive scrap pile. I was 2 yards short with the purple for the toe, so I ripped back the first sock toe every row decreases to make them both match.

Never have I ever knit socks flat, and you know what, it was fun.It might be my love for making socks that are in the neither category when it comes to toe-up vs cuff-down. I am contrary like that.

My other modular knitting projects were actually right side only ones. It might have been a little bit of a stretch, for that KAL.

After knitting these it is easy to see a few places where I could fiddle with the fit. I did add a heel flap and gusset, but I could tweak the circumference with the strips either the contrast or the MC. I might make a pair for me with an even number in the strips instead of an odd to make them a smidge smaller.

In terms of lessons learned, no I can't knit a pair of socks for a deadline 10 days away with only normal knitting time, I didn't leave enough time to get these out the door.

That's all for now, take care guys!

Molly : )