Gift Knitting 2

Despite the lack of evidence herein, I have been knitting. My Christmas knitting list is moving along nicely, with present #1 complete. See?

The guesses I had last week were socks, and Vintage Purls yarn. You guys know me too well   All that remains to be seen is a) who gets them b) the colours and c) the pattern.

With these done it was time to cast on for more gifts. So that is what I did.

The colours of this yarn are unbelievably gorgeous.  It was so tempting to leave them in just so you could enjoy them. But alas, once I started down this road, I feel duty bound to continue along it. And in that spirit, I also cast on this.

I am aiming to have the bulk of this knit by the time I start my marking contract next week.  Knitting time will be somewhat limited after that, right up until we go for our Christmas holiday.  So, I’d better head off and let those needles fly.

 

I’ve been…

Time traveling lately.

 

Given that I’m not a science-fiction fan, I find the concept of time travel as presented in these novels as quite acceptable. And it makes me question my statement that I prefer my books believeable.  Especially when you consider how many cars Stephanie Plum has blown up or destroyed over the years… I think I prefer my fiction to have the ring of truth to it. But, I don’t think that it’s likely I will start avoiding standing stones at certain times of the year, or accepting explanations from stark naked men I see on the street that blame time travel for their condition…

My lovely sisters read Diana Gabaldon’s novels before I did – in fact I read the first of them about 5 years ago now, and took a small stack with me when I travelled away on a school camp, thus infecting a colleage with the desire to read them too.  Yes, I have to confess, it was the teacher reading by torchlight after hours on that camp. And, given we were sleeping on a marae, I was setting a very bad example for the girls as we all slept together on matresses in one big room. 

An Echo in the Bone is vintage Gabaldon. Nothing unexpected about this novel – it has strong plot lines, multiple stories happening at once, and a assumption that you remember who each character is without going over and over their histories (unlike some other authors I could name).  There is war, time travel, twists and turns, losses and gains, a stranger or two, and of course some interesting medical treatments.  I enjoyed this book – it’s not a fast read at all, it took me over a week to read, but coming home to familiar characters who are treated with respect by an author is always fun.

Audrey Niffenigger’s The Time Traveller’s Wife has recently been made into a movie, so in the hopes I might get to see it, I re-read this too.  Chances are I won’t get to = I think the last ‘grown up movie’ I saw might have been the recent(ish) adaptation of Pride and Prejudice – before Miss 3 was born!!  Somehow movie-going has slipped off the agenda over the years.  It’s nice to re-read a book several years after you last read it, so that you can’t remember all the intricacies of the storyline.  This is a delight to read, an amazing first novel, and I am hoping to put Niiffenigger’s new novel on my Christmas wish-list, with the confirmation that she is a solid writer – it’s not just about the story. I love the structure of this novel, the gradual unfolding of information to the reader, and to each of the characters too.  It’s funny how you can want to stay up at night to read, when you already know how  the book ends. But I wanted to, and I did.  Lots of fun – I highly recommend it.

Stay tuned for more things that I’ve been doing – I have to distract you all from asking how my knitting is going!!

New ideas

Old technology can be a wonderful thing, or so I am discovering. My friend Neak has a long-term loan of a knitting machine and she has been experimenting with it to make sock blanks.

Sock blanks?

Well, a sock blank is a knitted rectangle of undyed yarn, which is then dyed in a pattern or stripes. Why would you do this? A blank has two strands knitted together, so when it is knitted up – two socks at a time – the end result is a matching pair of socks. So, this idea is one for the matchy-matchy amongst us. 

One of the best bits about Neak’s experiments (well, two best bits) is that she knitted her blanks up out of lovely Vintage Purls sock yarn – and you’ve heard me rave about the quality of this yarn before… and, secondly, she knit up enough to sell some too

With all this gift knitting I am doing, these are going to stay undyed for the time being while I formulate some ideas.  But I am excited about the possibilities – these were an amazing buy.  If you crave some sock blank goodness, you can check out Neak’s blog here, with her contact details. Go the knitting machine!

And, while I am on the subject of cool new yarny ideas, it looks like NZ is going to soon have its own yarn sampler boxes available.   

Here’s what the organiser has to say:

Blendy’s NZ Yarn Sampler Boxes are like a mini craft fair – you get a little bit of everything that knitters would enjoy, such as yarn, fibre, stitch markers, buttons, embellishments, gift cards, delicious treats – all made by fantastic (mostly) NZ creatives. I want to share my love of supporting the amazing crafts New Zealanders make with the rest of the world. There will also be a few amazing international samples, because we love them too.

What’s in the Box?

Each box will have around 15 different amazing samples for you to try – including an exciting array of New Zealand yarn, and some international yarn (because we love specialty yarns from all over the world), and some beautiful knitting-related embellishments and treats from local NZ crafters. Not all boxes will be the same – it’s a surprise!

You can check out the blog here for more information.  These are apparently due for sale in January.  I’m not sure if Santa will have yarn in his sack for me or not – I might be replete for yarn by January!

Gift Knitting

The past few years, my sisters and I have exchanged handmade gifts for Christmas. It is a lovely compromise in terms of continuing to give each other gifts without the pressure of shopping attached. It has been a pleasure to give and recieve gifts made with love.  Of course this presents somewhat of a problem for me this year – I am busy knitting away, but all three of my sisters stop by my blog… so if I show the gifts, then their surprises are ruined. If I don’t, this becomes a very boring knitting blog for the next month or so.

So, for today, a compromise.

This is what I am working on

I do have a few plans to make little bits and pieces for my two girlies as well – and since they don’t read the blog, those will be safe to share.

I should have known better

And in fact I did know better. Yes, I knit something in totally the wrong yarn, with predictable effects.

I came across a brand new free pattern on Ravelry on the weekend – a gorgeous wee shrug for toddlers. Knit in a lacey pattern on big needles, it seemed a perfect fast knit that would be ideal for our current changable weather.

This is the pattern version

Gorgeous, eh!

And here’s mine…

Where did the lace go? Oh, its hidden in all those variegations. Which I *knew* would happen.

So, why did I knit this? Well, I made the mistake of letting Miss 3 chose the  yarn. Sigh.  She likes it.

But it is a wee bit tight – I had to upsize the pattern to fit her and it needs to be a bit wider, so I need to rip the edging out, undo the sleeves a bit, and redo the edging. It is less than an hour’s work, but it can wait for another day. Tonight I am working on Christmas knitting.

 

Creative Time?

With my exam over, you might be excused for imagining me taking things easy today while the girls were in daycare. No, instead I got busy in the kitchen with sandpaper and paint, scraping down windowsills and doorframes and then painting them back up again. I hardly had time to sit down all day! When I did, I managed to finish up a few more WIP bags.

These ones are all for rehoming so I can reallocate any funds earnt to my stash improvement fund Yes, these are up for grabs. I have listed them for sale on a forum I’m on and the yellow/blue one has gone, and one of the yellow paisley ones is gone too. But, the others are available. So, if you’ve got $15 burning a hole in your pocket, I’m a very worthy cause.

Heehee. 

But seriously, if you want one, if you leave a comment I can email you… don’t write your email in the message because I can email from the WordPress sign in thingy – it’s clever like that.

I am hoping to get a stack more painting done tomorrow, but I will try to sneak in some knitting time as well. And maybe a few minutes on the sewing machine too – yep, I’ve got more WIP bags cut out.

Oh, and if any sisters like these, please say so, because Christmas pressies are still in the formative stages…

In love with lace weight

Last week I cast on for another Whisper cardigan. You might recall I knit one earlier in the year, just in time for weather too cold to wear it. In the last few weeks it has been getting some use, and this reminded me that I had bought some yarn for a second attempt at the pattern. The deliciously smooshy Malabrigo Lace Yarn. 

I have to confess that I had no idea how this would knit up, or I would never had let this languish in my stash through the winter. Who would have imagined the beautiful cuddly depth of this yarn?  Not me anyway. Knit on 4.5mm needles, the fabric this produces is so incredibly soft I had to pass it around knitting group the other night to let everyone else have  a pat. I fear my developing yarn snobbery may rub off on them eventually.

But this has got me thinking several things.

a) Is all lace weight yarn as delicious? This is the only one I’ve tried. I may need to try more!

b) This is the recommended yarn for the pattern. I liked the version I did earlier in the year. But I *love* this sooo much more. So, am I missing out on this in-love experience for all the patterns I knit? The range of yarn available in New Zealand is increasing all the time, and thanks to the dollar’s recent rise overseas yarn isn’t too bad, but I do prefer to shop local and support LYS when I can too.   I might have to reconsider impluse buys though, especially on sales, if they aren’t going to do justice to a pattern.

I am taking this knitting on this cardigan slowly – I have masses of Christmas knitting and other projects to do, but when I need  a simple knit with delicious yarn, this will be my project of choice.

FO: Bloom

Miss 1 looks lovely in her new wee top. And so does Miss 3. (Yes, she was willing to try this on. Go figure.)

Oh and so does the newborn size dolly…

Amazing eh? I think I really confused my husband this afternoon taking these pictures of everyone in the same dress/top. But I just *had* to try out the amazing qualities of the “Bloom” that see it grow with your baby. This is the latest pattern from Aussie designer “Tikki”, and I was eagerly awaiting the pattern, having heard it came in multiple sizes and yarn weights – 4ply, 8ply and 10ply.  I had a ball of 4ply Wool Company yarn in Raspberry that I would be perfect. What I hadn’t realised was that each size has the same number of stitches exactly, it is just be changing needle size and gauge that the sizes varied. Clever, eh.  It  did leave me with a little problem though, as this size is meant to fit newborn to 12 months. But the pattern features Tikki’s daughter Lily who is nearly 4 wearing the 4 ply version, so I figured my petite nearly 17 month old would still get lots of wear out of this. And I think we now know just how much…

Yes, I think it might end up being first up best dressed around our place!

So what are the magic elements to this pattern? It is knit in the round top down, so no seaming The bodice is 1×1 rib which looks so teensy tiny – you can see it doesn’t stretch at all on the newborn dolls. Then there is a lovely increase which sits beautifully over Miss 1’s budda belly, and stretches out flat across Miss 3’s chest.  Clever.  Then the skirt is worked straight in a lace pattern, before heading to a more detailed border. I started to worry about running out of yarn – I had maybe 2-3 metres left when I cast off.

While I enjoyed knitting this, it isn’t an idle knit once the rib is done – I needed to have a good amount of concentration for counting out the lace pattern. Of course I am not a natural lace knitter, so people who love lace will find this a complete doddle. And I cannot recommend this pattern highly enough when you consider it covers age newborn through to approximately 8 years. It would be terrific if you wanted to knit a gift for a girl whose measurements you don’t know, and you are guaranteed that the wearer will get lots of use from it.

Even if they *do* run away from the photoshoot.

Stash additions

I’ve been having a little fun ordering some yarn lately, and I thought I should share some snaps of what landed here yesterday.

This was the reason for my order: I really wanted to buy something to knit the Alpaka Tunic from the latest Interweave Knits magazine. And I thought it would be fun to try alpaca. I’ve only ever knitted a soaker from alpaca before, and this pattern seemed the ideal one to try on. Nothing available at all here in NZ in this weight though, and not at a reasonable price. This is Berocco Ultra Alpaca, a 50% wool 50% alpaca blend. And at 197 metres per 100g ball, at only US $7 per ball plus post, this was cheaper than any other options available. I got it from the lovely WEBS and I am once again delighted with their service. I am surprised that it is as thin as it is – certainly comparable to the weight of some of our supposedly “DK” weight yarn here.  But I adore the colour (Lavender Mix) and am looking foward to knitting it up. Or, rather, stashing it away to knit up once the warm weather passes.

And of course since I was paying postage, I thought I might as well make it worthwhile and order a few more bits’n'pieces. This is Malabrigo Silky Merino in “Dill” which is for a knitted gift I’ve promised to make.

And these are for the stash: one beautiful skein of Dream in Colour Smooshy in “Pansy Golightly” colourway – what divine colours, and two skeins of Araucania Ranco Solid in ‘berry’ and ‘mint’.  I thought these solid colourways would suit some of my lovely Cookie A patterns that really invite a nice solid colourway to show off the cables. 

I am so excited to add (squish, squish) these to my stash – these are just the kind of things I was hoping I would be able to put in there while I was on a buying ban. Of course given the second order I’ve got arriving soon, I will soon not be buying again due to lack of funds. Ah well, it’s fun while the buying lasts, and then the knitting makes the fun last so much longer.

And in other news, my exam is over and it looks like I can still string a sentence together. 3 hours, 4 essays, 17 pages of writing.  Fun.

FO: Tiger Socks

I promised Miss 3 the rest of my orange Vintage Purls sock yarn would become socks for her.  She was a little disappointed that it had to be striped with black to have enough though.  She has said she wants a pair that are “just orange” so my wee excursion into orange socks might have to be repeated some time in the future!

These toddler socks are knit toe up on magic loop, with a gusset heel. I am trying to work up a pattern to share with you, but have a few kinks to work out first – like these are about a centimetre too long. So will keep on it and let you know when I have an ultimate pattern, as these are sooo simple!

One of the ladies at knitting night was asking about stripes last night, so I promised I would show the jogs where I change colour on these socks.

The top sock (right) is where the change over happens, the bottom (left) is the other side of the round. You can see a small jog but not a significant one, in fact it’s almost comparable with where I change needles I think.  I just wrapped the new yarn a couple of times around the old one, until it was fairly tight, and kept going with the new colour. There might be a technical name for this (complete fool’s method?) or not, I’m not sure. But my attempts at jogless jogs resulted in more of a jog so I stuck with this improvised method.

You can see the gusset heel here too – no heel flap, just gusset increases and then short rows. Very quick and satisfying and has resulted in a fairly good fit.

Now I am left contemplating the wee nugget of orange yarn and wondering if I have enough left to make a pair of tiger ears and a tail?