Not one but two new projects

There I was, with the shawl - blanket off the needles, and really only a sock and a hat on the go ..., which seemed to few a number to keep busy with, so I did what any responsible knitter would do. I dug through my project queue on Ravelry, I cross referenced what I liked with my stash - because the project needs the right yarn to pattern match before it is ready for any serious casting on. And I checked my Diary, yup - it was KSG (Knitters Study Group weekend), which meant that there would be a group session, this time on Double knitting. Now Double knitting has several meanings, here in New Zealand it is the common term for a yarn that Americans would consider between Sport and Aran, we call it Dk for short and it is usually knit on 4mm to 5.5mm needles (Ymmv). But to those more worldly about knitting, double knitting also refers to a method of knitting that knits up a fabric that is essentially two layers of knitting sandwiched together. That kind of double knitting was the focus of Saturdays class. Now double knitting has a reputation for being fiddly, and with any thing fiddly there is always the risk that the technique may just prove to be to awkward to make the effort worthwhile. With that in mind I decided that I needed a 'go-to' mindless stash busting project on the go as well, just in case. Result was last Thursday I started two new projects, you know - just to be safe, just in case I was left with nothing to knit on (as well as the two projects already on the needles).


Some time ago I participated in a Scrappy swap. I'm a little fuzzy on the reasons for such a thing other than fun and meeting people and sharing, but the process seems to be sign up, send away a set amount of fibre, and in return get the same weight of fibre back made up from small portion of what each person sent in. End result is that one has 100g plus of spin-able fibre made up from small amounts of lots of different fibers. I guess the more coordinated scrappy swaps have themes, but the sheer randomness of the colours and fibres in a the swap I was part of were challenging - in a good way. Once the yarn was spun I set it aside wondering what sort of project it would become. Whenever I visited my yarn stash that yarn reminded me it was there - waiting to become something. Then a passing comment from one of the cubs sparked an idea, as they watched Yo-yo sleep on Bears jersey they wondered out loud if I had ever knit anything for Yo-yo. Bingo! The scrappy swap yarn was destined to become a cat-nap-mat for her. I even had the perfect pattern queued, Ten stitch twist by Frankie Brown.
The reverse side looks like this, I'm slipping the first stitch on the return row so there is a neat chain spiral on the reverse of mine. When I pick up the edge stitches I knit through both of the loops, which makes the chain even more noticeable. So far Yo-yo has sat under this as I knit it, watched me pull the yarn past her ears and into stitches, and perched beside it as a I photographed it, but seems not to know it is for her.

My double knitting project was selected before Saturdays session, as double knitting is a technique I have played with before. In my queue I found Yuma Double Knitting mittens by Alexandra Miedmayer. I didn't queue them because they were double knit, but for another reason. The feature I loved the most about these mittens was the way the colour faded from one to another as the mitten was knit, I also loved the idea of customizing it with Owls, Flowers, Bears or the standard running sled dogs. I didn't have high hopes for this project, honestly I thought it would be a starter and then set aside for more achievable and interesting projects, after all there are only 16 projects listed on Ravelry and only three are tagged as finished! I went with the Bears, but no as of yet the mittens are not for Bear.

I love this, I find it fairly easy to knit once I am in the rhythm of slipping both yarns so they ride between the layers. I had worried about the chart .. but I'm developing the skills to relate what I see as alternating pink and chocolate stitches on my needles to the single layer chart with half that number of stitches in front of me. The best bit is when I turn them inside out ... I get a negative image of the pattern ... in this case a coconut ice polar bear on a chocolate background. I just noticed that one of the dots is missing in the decorative round under the Bear! - odd what shows up in photos sometimes.

The yarn is VP Vintage sock, a limited run non superwash yarn from 2010, perfect for stranded colour work. What I think of as Chocolate is in reality 'Top Soil', and what has become to me 'Coconut ice' is in fact 'Now we are Two'. The original names of the yarn were fine until I started to knit the two together and all I could think of was sugary pinky white coconut ice with one side dipped in chocolate. The pattern is very well written, with lovely clear photos, and instructions on the fiddlier aspects of double knitting ... and following those instructions results in lovely increases shaping the thumb gusset.

There I am then, with four projects on the needles, a Tam, socks, mittens and a cat-nap-mat, plus the neverending fish blanket. That feels about the right number, plenty of choice and I should be good for a bit more knitting before I have to stop and select a new project to settle in with. And I'll leave with a photo showing the blocked edge of the shawl/blanket. The lace opened up nicely and held its structure well ..... I'm pleased with it, and perhaps something lacy might be amongst the next few projects?

Take care, it is daylight savings here, autumn so we 'gained' an extra hour sleep last night, making today feel all relaxed, a nice place to be on a Sunday.

na Stella

September 2010 to now ... is only seven months

Seven months, my first 'shawl - blanket' lace edged thing is finished in only seven months. Knit in 2 ply lace weight, and nearly 1.2m across each edge .. I have been calling it a blanket, but in truth I plan to use it more as a shawl. Folded from corner to corner and wrapped around my shoulders if I feel a chill. So Sunday night I cast off, and finished the shawl, Tuesday night I wove in the ends and blocked it ..... .. then I finished the first of the stripy socks.

First up the shawl, finished but not yet blocked. At this stage the center section seemed to bulge out, it seemed looser and larger than the edge. I kept telling myself that it would block out ... but .... you know, blocking improves lace amazingly but it won't cure mistakes.

Here is the shawl/blanket blocking, I pinned it out, and then went around the sides twice more just tweaking them out a little further until the middle was flat. I also threaded rods through the eyelets in the center section to straighten it up as the sides were bowing out.

I had used a Russian graft to join the two ends of the lace boarder, and had decided to offset the beginning and end to part way along one side. I cast on for the side-ways lace edge using just simple twisted e-loops, and then when I had knit around to meet up with the cast on I picked up loops along the cast on edge to match the number of stitches on the last row. I was really really happy that my maths all worked out, working 2 extra repeats around each corner seemed enough to stretch around the corners, and the repeats fitted into the edge stitches neatly. The Russian graft is a little heavier than the surrounding lace, but in use it is hard to find. I had to work my way around the edge twice to find it for this photograph.

This was the best part, as I was working towards the end my remaining yarn diminished. I hoped I would have enough but I wasn't sure. Turns out I did ... but not much extra. Whew! Plan B was to order another ball (plus a few more for another project .... because you know if I was going to have to pay shipping .. I may as well get more than one)

So with the shawl/blanket blocking across the living room floor, I turned to the sock. Tonight I'll cast on the toes of sock number two ... and plan the next project. That is always the fun part, sifting through the queue of things I want to make, and muddling around in the stash, and short listing and short listing and then finally deciding and casting on.

What fun - but for now I'm off to unpin the blocked knitting and see how it drapes, there might even be a twirl with it around my shoulders. Of course the mornings have been a tad chilly but today we have full sun and it is warm and hot - not really shawl wearing weather.

Finishing is as much fun as finishing, and the knitting bit in the middle is pretty good to.

na Stella

Frogging ...

I've been frogging, but not yarn, and not even knitting, the blanket is only one corner from completion and so has been my most active project this week, and the sock ... well it was abandoned during a lace talk earlier this week, really abandoned .. mid round even ... so needs some knitting time.


Yesterday I headed of to run errands, weekend non-workday errands. You know a, new laundry basket to hold dirty washing in the bathroom, a new seal for the stove top coffee pot, the potatoes that we had forgot to pick up at the supermarket, the paint for elder cubs kit set model plane that he ordered a few weeks ago, find something for lunch while I was out. Usual Saturday stuff, and in Total Food Equipment while buying the coffee seal I found frog cookie cutters. Not only that but frogs like I some times use to decorate things I make, knitknitfrog kinda frogs! I had to take one home ... and make bread frogs. Now I will admit sometimes I am one of 'those-parents', the kind that does things that take longer, involve more work, but should be healthier. My cubs would love me to buy flavored crackers and savory biscuits, Arnott's Shapes and their ilk.My cubs tell me with angelic faces that all the other kids have them in their lunch boxes, and they would like them too. But as the daughter of a health food nut, and sometime hippie (my mother who went way too far when she to mashed her potatoes with their skins on --uggh!!) I just shudder at the list of ingredients that are identified by numbers and codes. So I compromise ... I make bread dough (in the machine), roll it out thin and cut out shapes with cookie cutters. Some weeks we have teddy bears, other weeks gingerbread man and woman shapes, or flowers, or hearts, and since Christmas we have had ninjabread men*, all cooked from plain bread dough. Today we have several dozen frogs ...... I feel this might be ever so slightly Harry Potterish, perhaps it is too much. These bread shapes are brushed with milk or olive oil, and sprinkled with salt, or smoked paprika or cheese .. depending on my pantry, requests and mood, then baked on a pizza stone for 10 minutes. Once cooled they are frozen, and tossed frozen into lunch boxes each morning, with fruit, something vegy, a muffin, and whatever else is on hand to complete a lunch. By lunchtime they are thawed and fresh not stale. Yes I could default to sandwiches, but ... that involves stocking the fridge, and takes time each morning, and often they come home uneaten even when the cub itself prepared it! Making these is part of my weekend ritual, a batch of bread dough takes me 15 minutes to roll out and cut, and then its just a matter of rotating each batch through the oven to cook, whilst I do something else (knit, spin, dream, drink coffee, surf the knitterverse and online pen community forums ....). Most week days Bear and I even fill a wee box each of whatever shapes we have in the freezer to complete our lunches.

I'm nearly there on the blanket edge, one corner left. I'm not calculating repeats to go and ticking them off ... because if I did it would automatically end up miscalculated and somehow slow the whole process. Part of me wishes that I had knit this with a darker grey or black even instead of the blue ... but it is too late to turn back now. The blue works ... but perhaps it is not as 'sophisticated' as I would want it to be. Live and learn .... and I like it enough to keep and use it.

Wednesday I went to a talk by a visiting expert on lace. Rosemary Shepherd spoke about lace in fashion the first 300 years. I loved her talk and learned a lot bout how lace was valued and used and gendered and perceived differently at different times in history. I took my knitting but the lecture theater was very dark, with the dark grey yarn and 3x2 rib ... well I had to abandon knitting and just listen and learn. I've been so busy on the blanket lace edge I haven't even returned to finish the round of magic loop I started ..... oh well .. it will keep, possibly tonight I might finish the rib and start its pair.

Take care
eat frogs
na Stella

*Last weekend we even used those Ninjabread cutters to cut out toast sliced bread into shapes to make french toast, and over breakfast we decided that these must be Foreign legion solders, what other explanation could account for Ninja trained warriors made in french toast, served with maple syrup .. and it all got a little complicated on the nationality front.

Around and around and around ...

is my knit path this week, everything seems to be about going around. The blanket continues to have its edge added, one repeat at a time, corner by corner. The sock grows, the stripes have come to an end and now there is just the rib and then the second sock. And the weekend was long and good ... Bear is pink, which is still a nice surprise to see, and as a family we headed away for a long lunch and a spot of relaxation inland and along the way there was a pen find and a gift.

Here is the blanket in its most recent form, the edging is I think over half way done. At some point over the past few days I knit past the join from one 25g skein to another, but silly me, I forgot to make note of where the join is. In hindsight I hope that point was more than half way around the blanket ... just so I will have enough blue yarn to complete the edging.

The sock grew and is now nearly done, all that remains is to work the ribbing at the top, weave in ends and make a pair. Kathy suggested I invest in stealth needles, and make something of a stealth sock ... and I am sorely tempted. The Blackthorne needles have caught my eye before as have the Celtic Swan Stirling silver ones. Oh is it both wonderful and terrible to be tempted by so many nice knitting tools, and I really love that there is such choice ... one day, I tell myself, one day.

Monday was a 'non-work' day, Otago Anniversary day, so both Bear, the cubs and I had a long weekend. Bear suggested we head inland to Ranfurly for a lunch and bit of antiquing .... and the day was lovely. Along the way Bear spotted this pen, a Conway Stewart in Blue ... with a 14ct gold nib. A little reserach tells us it is late 1940's to mid 1950,s and it will need a little work (the nib split is a tad open and the sac that hold the ink is old and brittle). those are easy things to arrange ... and Bear knowing my penchant for things blue bought it for me. Amongst pen collectors this kind of find is called in-the-wild, I've been wondering what the knitters equivalent is ..... the potential of stash being spotted in-the-wild seems less likely. Karma follows, today Bear received a gift of a pen from his sister, a lovely modern gold Targa Sheaffer 1005, that her husband R had been gifted when he retired. R is not into fountain pens and so when Bears sister shared Bears hand written letter with him, R dug out the unused pen and passed on to Bear knowing he would use it. Lovely sometimes how the world works. Being nice begets being nice.


It is Tuesday, my 'long-day, Tuesdays my teaching starts at 9am and finishes at 5:30pm, then I go home, ...and now I'm fully done ... the dishes are cleared and away .. and its time to knit.

na Stella

Look - a new project!

Yes, about time, I finally started something new. There are of course at least two things unfinished on the needles, but that didn't stop me from adding a third. And this one is a sock, yes, finally a sock on the go. I have had a funny 'empty' feeling about my knitting, and finally it clicked, I had no socks on the go. Well that was easy to sort.

So let me introduce my new sock project, first I had to dive back into my stash and find yarn suitable. I located this one, Noir Superwash Sock from Vintage Purls. But there was a nagging thought, Noir was so dark that any textural pattern would be as good as invisible ... part of me thought that would be cool. I could call it Stealth and knit in all sorts of code ... or sneaky clever sock things and then I had a reality check that this was a sock, for a boy-cub, not an uber clever design or art project, a sock destined for pre-teen feet. More than that I realized that that I had a lace project on the needles with 'quite a bit to go' before it was chart-free, and a colour work project also that required a chart. I needed a simple sock. So I frolicked around the left over sock yarns and found these three that seem to complimented Noir well.

And I kept it simple, stripes in set of three rounds, toe up, Judy's magic cast on, increase until it fits ... then knit, then start a gusset. The loose idea in my head was to transition stripes from the green, to the varigated forest to the brown yarn. I have between 4 and 8 grams of each for each sock, I've weighed them and divided each ball of yarn into half. In my imagination it works. Quite frankly I'm impressed with how far 7g of green yarn stretches when knit into a 72 stitch sock.

I've worked my way to another corner of the Shetland yarn blanket, that is now two corners done, well technically one and a half corners as I've only worked half of this one. Progress is slow but steady.

I'd love to knit this again in a single colour, the bands of colour really show up the changes in the lace patterns and I wonder what would be the effect if the colour didn't change. Of course if I was to knit it again I'd have to add a wee bit more interest into the center of the blanket, just to ward of the boredom ... I begin to see how over time those amazing lace shawls and blankets and wraps evolved.
take care
Something smells good, so probably time to check the kitchen and set the table .. or call the cubs to earn their keep and do that for me.

take care
na Stella

Turning corners

This post is all about turning corners, S had a bonny bouncy baby boy (bbbb!), which is a new direction in her life so the secret project the local knitters had tag-teamed on was handed over, Bear had an angiogram and an angioplasty .. so has turned another corner, while that was happening I sat in the hospital and waited for him to return from theater, to wake up and be healthy and pink again and turned the lace corner on my Shetland yarn blanket. Lastly Dave's Mechanical Pencil blog turned 5 .. which is a grand age for any one let alone a blog, and seems I am the lucky recipient of a birthday give away.



So there is the revealing of a completed project, the baby blanket, Sleepy Monkey blanket by Mary Ann Stephens. Morag dyed yarn for this based on Sharons yarn buying history ... and knit the Monkey side, I knit the donuts and steeked both sides, Ana knit the Border (twice as it is two thickness for much of it before joining into a garter stitch band), Jenni knit a monkey to match and Ngaire knit it some lederhosen with a Monkey motif. Karen made the most wonderful card .... and S .. well she made baby Thomas.




Then there is the lace boarder, which had to go around a corner. This isn't something I'd done before. Oh I'd mitred many a corner but never with lace. Sharon Miller in Heirloom knitting suggested just increasing the number of repeats upto and just after the corner .. which was what she said traditional lace knitters often did. Sounded good, so I worked the sideways lace edging with a w&t instead of a ssk every other row that ended at the blanket. ... It worked!
this is the corner I worked while Bear turned his own corner in the cardiac ward. Its now 5:40 pm and I'm off to pick him up at 6pm ... 10 years ago when he had his first stent this was overnight surgery .. now it is a day procedure. I feel like one of those 'old people' who say things about how amazing modern medicine is .. but it just is amazing what can be done now - the stent is medicated!


And lastly yesterday when I got home there was a package waiting for me, Sheaffer 'P' erasers, which are a perfect replacement for the eraser in a Parker 51 pencil. So I changed erasers, removing the 50 year old hard dry pink one .. except I removed the white eraser from the Sheaffer ring and inserted it into the original Parker 51 eraser ring. About then I checked my email and found I'd won a rather generous spending spree at Cult Pens .... Dave suggested I leave a comment on his blog along the lines of 'Who hoo', I wasn't sure I was a Whoo Hoo kinda blogger .. I thought I was more of a 'thank you nicely' kind of blogger, but the more I think about the potential of geeky pencil spending .. the more I understand the concept of Who Hoo.....

take care - we will be resting up here taking it easy ... and I'm off to get Bear, which is a good sign.
na Stella

Recovery ....

Todays post is about recovery, both completed and expected. First up the Balletomane surgery was deemed ok by the the knitter whos work it was. K did admit in the comments to giggling hysterically, but reassured me that it was successful. Then the replacement blanket is back to where it was before I frogged it - and reworked the last two pattern repeats. Then there is an expected recovery on the horizon, I'll explain.


First up the recovered grafted Balletomane, there were two grafted seams, each with a face and reverse side. That meant four finished sides to look at.

The first three looked absolutly fine, the graft matched the garter stitch nicely.

See - even the neck edge which is i-cord blended in invisibly.

But the fourth side, well .... I grafted it three times, and each time there was a section that just refused to blend in smoothly. It was because of the short rows .. and while I attempted to work the rows so they were as they should be .. this one just wasn't as nice to look at as the others. But the good news is that because of the way Balletomane is constructed .. well there is no inside or outside until the sleeves are picked up and knit, so this can just become the inside.

I have been knitting on the last of the continuous round of lace on the blanket, in preparation for the last colour change and working lace sideways to form the last band. Every time I dumped my lace on the chest which serves as a table in the family room .. . the detritus of my knitting struck me as a kind of knitters still life. Here is a sample, there is an 'advanced spinning group' newsletter, the knitting in progress, a tape measure and chart on a chart keeper, cup mats to protect the wood and a game. Shaun the Sheep ... Bear bought for the cubs because it has his current favorite cartoon character in it, the Sheep - Shaun. This sheep comes from one of the early Wallace and Gromit moves - A close shave, which was based around knitting wool shortages and has a still motion dog slightly smarter than his owner - whats not to like.


So with that done and returned, I was able to turn to the Shetland yarn blanket, and I finally am back to where I was when I decided the colour bands were in the wrong order and frogged it. That time Yo-yo seemed to confirm my thoughts, she did not look impressed. This time as I laid out the blanket for a photo .. Yo-yo was there again. She wouldn't budge, so ended up in the corner of the photo. That would be the black fuzzy bit on the lower right.



Truly that cat would not budge, just sat and looked on as I arranged the blanket so the white center and grey bands could be clearly seen. I trust the lace points will block out and open up more when this is done. My plan is to work an extra repeat of the lace around each corner, or two if needed to gain the length needed to fit around the corner. And the odd red 'thing' dangling from her neck? Well it is her collar which has come slightly undone, I do apologize for not tidying up my cat before her photo was captured.

And I really don't know if Yo-yo approves of the change or not ... what do you think?
Take care
na Stella

Oh... ... .. .. . .

I don't have the right words, yesterday I was at work, teaching and there was an earthquake. On the fourth floor we felt it, the curtains swayed, computer chairs moved, we waited a while and then when the shaking continued for what seemed like ages, we left the building. We were not alone, the entire building emptied ... and after a while, when it was calm we returned to class. Latter there was a smaller aftershock, we all froze again but this time it was shorter and milder. Class finished and as staff and students mingled and got on with socializing and networking, and checked news .. I learned of the Christchurch quake. I taught the second stream of students that afternoon, some one set up a tv on the second floor and students who wanted to catch the news went and watched. It was all very sobering. Very early on the images and reports showed significant buildings downed, and people hurt. Three of my students, first years, away from home and in their first week of study decided to share a ride 'home' to Christchurch, I didn't want to stop them, how could I?

All afternoon the updates came, via emails, and links to news sites, and conversations with people who had news. My class finished at 5:30 and I went home, where we had a message from relatives that my brother and his wife were ok, latter I had a text from them - they were safe, had no power and water but were home, and together. Bear has relatives in Christchurch, we have not heard about them, a half sister and an aunt. Both have kin closer than us, family nearer .. we we are waiting and trusting ... it is all we can do. Today I was to have lunch with a friend from primary school, she was visiting from Christchurch with her two girls. Yesterday afternoon she cut short her trip and headed home, unable to make contact with her husband - I've not heard from her, she will be busy, this is their third big quake in six month, and I know she is tired and jumpy about quakes.

Today things were quiet, the news is at once both sad and filled with hope, there are hundreds of skilled people helping, the volunteers and offers of assistance are incredible. Governments from neighboring and more distant countries have sent and are sending planes and people, their help will be invaluable.

Last night I sat I sat, and knit, not a lot, I really didn't have the mind for it, just a little, and I thought that it was just as well the stitch repeat is only 12 stitches. I was distracted enough that remembering 12 stitches at a time was about all I was up for.

take care ... there are lots of sites with more information, and places where one can offer help, I won't link, you can all google.

na Stella

Two Hundred and Fifty Six stitches on each of four sides

results in a mighty long round of lace. I have avoided calculating exactly how many stitches a round has, a sort of knitterly avoidance, but I do realise that is why on an average nights knitting I will only 'work-around' the blanket four or five times. So today, there is more of the blankets slow progress, a simple low tech solution to a mistake that I just kept making, a finished project(yay!), and even more pens. Those things are absolutely as addictive as stashing fibre and yarn and patterns and books.

There are some projects that are easy and difficult at the same time, for different reasons. This blanket should be fairly easy, and straightforward, the center is garter, the next band is garter, and this band is in a simple 12 stitch lace repeat. All of that is perfectly reasonable to expect to be able to knit without to much in the way of stress or problems. So far I have reknit several sections of this blanket, in the past few days I have reknit the first few rounds of the darker grey band, again and again. For some reason I could not work 12 repeats of the 12 stitch lace repeat into 148 stitches. Simply I would get distracted and put the yarn over in the wrong place, or the decreases in the wrong place ... and I never found out until I was a stitch or seven out at the end. I tried stitch markers, but to place them on meant I had to work a round and slip each into place (I didn't have 48 stitch markers handy that could be clipped on). Eventually I sat and thought, there had to be a quicker and more adjustable way to mark the 12 stitch repeats without having to work a round. I threaded up a needle with a few meters of white yarn, and passed the needle back and forwards between every 12th stitch - it worked. I could easily pull out the yarn if I got to the end and was out by a stitch or two ... and work out which stitches on the previous round were sticking together, and looking like a single stitch.

That little 12 stitch guide was enough to get me started, I was away. Last time I knit this lace band it was in dark blue, and I am liking the more subtle transition from the mid grey to the dark grey. This time I am also remembering to knit the lace as garter stitch - last time I knit every round knit .. and the lace looked good, but different to what was intended. Things are looking good so far ..... fingers (and needles crossed).

The finished project was a wee doily, a lace linen doily that I turned into a ballet bun cover. I try to be a conscientious ballet mum, and send smallest cub along with her hair up ballet style. But those shear hair nets sold to keep buns tidy are frail, and easily torn and never to be found when one needs one. Her hair is so wispy it needs something to contain it. I wanted to make a Lacey bun-cover, and a doily seemed a good pattern. This tuned out larger than I intended, but I was able to thread elastic around one of the middle rounds of eyelet holes, and so create a ruffle (or fluffle as smallest bear calls it) beyond the bun cover.

And a photo being worn, pretty, she describes it as a little hat .. and I'd have to say her teddy bear has been spotted wearing it. An odd look really, a sort of Victorian maids lace cap in pink on a worn much loved teddy bear. I've been having thoughts about it as well. I might have to make one as a rosette to wear, what about double layered in several shades of yarn?

And pens, because a blog post without pens would be really odd now, somehwere along the line I acquired the orange one to the right in this image. I loved the orange one, and remembered Andy's Pens, where he sold me the (in order from right to left), Bright Yellow, Lime Green, Tweed, and Marshmallow versions. These arrived yesterday, and I'm kicking myself for not ordering the Jelly Pink, its all about the name really isn't it? And yes you are right, I don't need so many pens at once, but I think do I need to see them in a display on my desk, in a clear glass vase, to cheer me up. There really is something nice about using nice tools and equipment, and when the nice tools are simple inexpensive pens like this - I feel like I can indulge. I even ordered a turquoise refill from the same place (you didn't need to know that some refills come in Magenta, Turquoise and Purple, as well as boring old blue, blue-black and black did you?).

so I'm off to work my way around several hundred stitches, and stir the celery-bacon & barley soup, and generally settle down for a quiet Sunday evening.

take care
Stella

Knit, frog, knit, tink, knit, frog, knit, frog some more ...

That, my online friends is an accurate report of the weeks knitting. True to the blogs name there has indeed been far more frogging than knitting this week, and yet oddly I felt confident to start a new lace project ... and there was a new Vintage Purls Sock yarn club kit. The important part of that sentence is yarn, as in the club kits are no longer all about sock patterns but have extended excitingly into patterns that can be knit with sock yarn but are not socks. I understand there will be at least one sock pattern .. for the die hard sock knitters in her fan base.

So, today, the frog report, remember when a frog report was a fairly frequent part of every post, and the knit report, the new project introduction, and the planning of the Fair Isle Tam.

Frogging, and sometimes Tinking, was the major knit activity this week. Following last weeks post I did completely frog the blue lace band of the Sheltland yarn blanket, that was the easy task. I frogged straight onto a nostepinne, seemed a sensible move as I planned to knit it straight back up again.

Post frogging, the stitches sat waiting for me to slide them back onto the needle. I do like this shetland yarn, slightly sticky so it behaves it self, no stitches disappearing into themselves and running away.

But it was not so simple, I some how snagged one of the corners and could not drop down a few stitches and repair the damage. This was the garter stitch section where I had knit with two yarns to avoid purling, and the corner was where the two yarns were twisted together. Dropping down and picking up and understanding how the yarns worked up the corner, interlaced with each other and then worked away from the corner, well, that was apparently beyond me.

The ten or twelve rows I tried to drop stitches down and knit back up got increasingly more muddily and less like the other corners, the more times I tried, the more of a mess I made, so I frogged back a few more rows, until the corner was neat and started to finish the grey section again. Some times there is nothing else that will work but work it properly.

All that happened before Thursday, so when Thursday night came around, knit night I was at a loss about what to take to knit. I had no made much progress on a chart for my Fair Isle Tam, and I didn't want to risk mucking up the blanket any more. So I did what any sane knitter would do, 15 minutes before being due at knit night ... I opened Ravelry and hunted down a pattern. I wanted to knit a quick lace cover that smallest bear could use to tidy up her ballet bun. I found a Lace Luncheon Mat and printed it and grabbed pink linen and needles as I ran out the door. Appart from the fact it is going to be twice the size I need ... it is a good choice. Now I just need to frog it and knit it on much smaller needles ......

The tam is a knitters study project, and the second and last class is next weekend. That sort of put a little bit of urgency into sorting a chart. Inspired by Kate Davies and Spilly Jane, I am working towards a cute tam, not really fair isle but pretty and pictorial. I've assembled an assortment of knitting motifs from my knit books, and made a start. For now all I'm sure of is that there will be a couple holding hands .. and possibly a cat, or dog, or fox, or hearts .. or something equally twee. And no, they won't be knit in golden yellow, that is just the colour pencil that came to hand. Once I've planned to layout I will play with colours.

And the recent highlight of the stash was the addition of the first of 3 sock yarn kits from Vintage Purls. As usual a lovely colour and an amazing pattern, I might just use that lace to edge the Shetland yarn shawl. And of course there was chocolate, two kinds, dark my favorite and milk which is a favorite for sharing. Yarn, new pattern and lace, it really doesn't take much to brighten my week.

so .. I hope your week past and ahead has significantly less frogging and tinking than mine, and that some one does something nice for you on Valentines ..... there is already a nice pen here for me (more about that next post), and I've been making heart shaped pita breads for the cubs lunch boxes.

na Stella

Mmmmm sometimes the plan works and sometimes the plan needs changing ...

But it isn't always clear at the beginning that the plan isn't going to work, otherwise there would be no need to frog. Today I have something that is now finished and went to plan, albeit at times a very slow movement towards the end, but finished all the same, and something that was planned but perhaps could be better. Then there is the pen update, because pen and ink is almost as good at fibre and stash.

Way back in June I started to knit another large garter stitch blanket, a pattern I had knit before (2008/9). The impetus for this blanket was the yarn, a factory shop sale of very thick almost unspun 6 strands of pencil roving yarn, at a price I could not resisit. Well I did resist .. but a fellow knit nighter splurged and then offloaded when she had second thoughts about adding too much to her own stash. That was way back in September 2009, by June 2010 I was ready to take on another garter stitch project of this scale. Technically the blanket was complete in December of 2010 ... but I had a 'wheel' of white yarn to add an i-cord boarder to it. This past week I did just that, and like most projects, once I sat down to knit it ... well it was only 3 nights knitting! By the third night I had only a little to do.

For the this blanket I picked up to attach the i-cord binding thru both loops of the slipped stitchs that edge the blanket, and that has made the edge more reversible than the previous blankets edge. Like the previous blanket this one is huge, and warm and thick, perhaps thicker as it has not been stretched and blocked, and was immediately claimed by one of the cubs, even though we are in summer. While I don't enjoy knitting these (quite frankly it is boring), I love the result and the scale ....

The other project that I was looking to finish soon is the 'replacement' blanket, the one I started in Shetland to replace the one I mislaid on the plane. The original plan was to knit the centre in white, a band in mid grey, a band in blue with lace, and then cast off with a lace boarder in dark grey. In theory it sounded good, in practice even Yo-yo the house cat has reservations about the results, as do I.

I like the two laces I have chosen, but not the order of the colours .. so after this post I'm going to frog the darker grey and blue sections .... and knit them again. That will also give me a chance to change slightly how I knit the lace in the first lace band. I will reknit it with mid grey, dark grey, and then the blue as an edge .. .which I hope will look like a smoother and more planned transition of colours.

And on the pen front, the pen trays I was waiting on from GoPens arrived yesterday. I had a lot of fun planning how to cut these into exactly the right sizes and shapes to fit into the Bento box. This is where my not-currently-inked pens are stored, the inked ones live in a vintage vase or a pen case in my bag. I think I may need another one of these staking bento boxes for my mechanical pencil collection, have I mentioned I like vintage mechanical pencils as well?, but there is no hurry.

So excuse me while I go and puddle in the frog pond ....
hope your weekend ends smoothly, ready for the week ahead,

na Stella

Sometimes when something is finished ...

I almost can't believe that I made it. Especially when the 'something' is a project that wasn't particularly planed in full before it began. Today there are finished blocking photos of one of those kinds of projects, the Linen basket liner, and I introduce a new project - colour-work. Every time I start knitting colour-work .. I wonder why I don't knit more of it, and this time I'm knitting in Shetland yarn, and I love it, for lots of reason.

First up, the finished Linen Basket liner project, well I'm calling it that but really it will be used to line bowls, the deep pottery kind that I toss warm bread buns and muffins into when serving. Or toast, or croissants, or bagels, or fruit toast ... or, well you know those sorts of bakery things that are best served fresh and warm. I'm so pleased with this, there are a few things that I would change if I was to knit it again, I think the outer pattern of horse-lace really needs another repeat around as it was a bit stretched when I blocked it. Once I started working the edging I was hooked, seeing each repeat cast of another section of the work was addictive. I neglected my other knitting projects (and some household chores) to sit and knit. I took it and its chart to the local school playground while supervising play, I chose meals that were almost instant and had almost no clean up, I made choices that maximized my knitting time - just to have it done. The edging I chose was the Traditional Scalloped Edging from page 54 of Sharon Millers Heirloom Knitting. The middle band was 3 repeats of Horse shoe from page 67 of the same book, but I increased 2 stitches each 'horse-shoe' each repeat to allow for the increasing diameter. That worked really well.

Then I 'threw' it in the washing machine, on a fairly heavy duty wash, this is linen and I know from linen tea towels that linen matures with a few washes. It softens and relaxes and becomes unbelievably nice to handle ... so I made up for the relaxed attitude to housework by tossing in all the dirty washing that needed doing. Then I pined it out, I used a tape measure pined at the center to make sure I was pinning all the points equidistant. I pinned the quarters first, then the midpoints between those, then the midpoints between that, and so on. I left it to dry overnight. I kept finding excuses to walk past the blocking board and admire it, this project impresses me, I love that I have knit it, love I have finished it, love I can use it, and love that I 'made-it-up' rather than worked to a predetermined pattern. At the same time I almost can't believe that the scrunched up bunch of loops on my needles has turned into this.

This morning it was pretty much dry, but I've popped it out in the sun .... just to set and finalize the blocking. Latter I'll carefully remove the pins and polish it with a hot iron. I know linen fabric likes a hot iron polish, so assume that linen knitting would like the same.

With that all done, and blocking I returned to one of my 'other' lace projects, the replacement blanket. This is for me, I suspect it will become a kind of hap-shawl, something to wrap around me when I'm at home and cold. I had frogged the first carefully planned and charted lace and selected another. This lace feels like a better match for the yarn and colour and gauge. I am finding most of my 'lace' in Sharon Miller's book at the moment, this time Center Design of Bead Lozenges from page 55.

And the newest project, is a colourwork tam. I'm working with my little stash of shetland 2 ply that I brought back, and loving it. In New Zealand - home of sheep, it is surprisingly difficult to source yarn for colourwork. In retail shops there is usually a selection including a blue, a red, an orange, a green, a yellow, a pink, a cream, and a white, perhaps sometimes a black or a purple - but pretty much the standard colours that are in 12 set of colouring pencils. To top that off, the most stocked weigh of yarn in shops here is DK, or something between Aran and Worsted - hardly a colourwork wonderland. You can buy a skein at a time .. from Indie dyers, but have to have forsight to collect over time colours that will work together. I lusted after the huge range of shades that was available in ranges specifically designed for colourwork. Then when I got to choose - it was almost too much .. but I'm happy with the colours I brought back and have made a start on a Tam. I-cord followed by corrugated rib with the knits shading from purple to pale grey ... I like it so far. This is part of the Knitters Study Group project, and in 5 weeks I need to have this at the stage of decreasing for the crown ... somehow I don't think that will be a problem.

There are a couple of other abandoned projects, true UFO's lurking in my knit basket. Both of which are going to be frogged this week. The latest Piecework arrived, and I like the Snowflake scarf in that much more than the one I'm knitting so that seems to be a sign to stop knitting something I don't enjoy and start again with something more tempting.

So .. I guess that I should go a bake something to fill my linen basket liner with?
Take care
Stella