Psychobunny

Hey, knitting going on!

I cast on for Grandma's birthday socks. There is no question that she gets socks because she didn't get them for Christmas again and was not happy.

I also whipped up a quick infinity scarf for Mom because she likes them and will be in Oregon's wine country in a few months with her friends so I think she could use it. I believe this is a Rowan yarn but I've had it for years. It is a lovely, loosely spun creamy white with a strand of ribbon running through it. The ribbon goes from light blue to navy. I think it will be really pretty with Mom's long silver hair. This is just a simple seed stitch and I just kept going until I ran out of yarn.

The lighting is terrible in this picture because it is such a grey, dark day. Even for Oregon it is grey and rainy. (better color representation here)

I have so much yarn stash and I really want to embark on a reduction project. Weed out the clothes, shoes, books, etc. But this should include my yarn which is overflowing one closet, the tops of bookcases, under the desk, and on and on. I think, at the very least, I will try to eat up those onesie twosie skeins I accumulated with the idea that I would do a hat or scarf. If I do one of those a month and give it away to someone, it chips away at it a little. I still need to do a major purge.

This Saturday I'm going to haul it all out of all the nooks and crannies and halve it (at the very LEAST). I'll take a picture of the before to blow your mind and then I'll start posting it on Ravalry and eBay. Probably should have done this in the Fall...

Gratuitous greyhound picture to distract from my hoarding project. I piled up the dog beds to vacuum and my old girl, Sapphire (who turned 15 last month) managed to get up there and claim the pile as her own. Pretty good considering her shakey hind end!

Posted by TheBunny at 06:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I realized that I didn't share a couple of projects that turned out nicely. Can't have that!

I knit another Noro Scarf for a friend who wanted it in more boy colors. So I went with colors I consider very Pacific Northwest. He says I got the colors right. I just love how it turned out.

I have been wanting to try a hemlock ring blanket and a co-worker is having a little girl so I lept at the chance to knit one for her. The pattern is fancy and I didn't really want a fancy blanket. So I tried to offset it with the bold, childish color choices.

This is left over Lion Brand Microspun which I hate to knit with but makes up a nice final product. The colors are periwinkle and gold. I love the colors and I love the pattern but I'm not a big fan of the two together.

I need to start thinking about Christmas. I'm really trying to save money and I'd love to be debt-free at some point so the strategizing must begin.

I'm leaning towards dishcloths. I have a friend who makes soap. Maybe we can swap goods.

Posted by TheBunny at 06:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Over Thanksgiving someone dragged me into the Gap. Right on the front table I saw this scarf.

It caught my attention because it is a multi-directional scarf like I have made a thousand times. Except the ones I was looking at were horrendous materials and quality. Truly ghastly. And it was priced at around $40 (who is always trying to tell us we can buy things cheaper than we can knit them?). Mine would cost about the same for the materials but I'm using a hand-dyed Japanese wool that is beautiful and beautifully made.

The topper is when you look at their website they have it listed as a crocheted scarf when it is actually a garter stitch scarf. Whatevs Gap.

Posted by TheBunny at 04:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Quick! Catch up.

We've had a little weather. Just a little. The day we were supposed to have freezing rain we could only come up with this:

Some little itty bitty icicles. Not enough for drama. I did manage to do a little slide into an intersection. But I managed to turn into it so it was more like I ran a stop sign than anything.

I found a whole KAL for the chevron scarf I've been knitting. Which is when I found out I probably don't have enough yarn. So I found another lone skein I've been saving because it is pretty and it has similar properties. But I couldn't quite bring myself to rip it all out (for some reason this thing is taking forever and it hurts my hands).

However, when I got ambitious and gathered a portion of my sock yarn to wind (yes, just a portion, have I ever acted like I didn't have a problem?),

I thought I might try using some skeins I've been hoarding here just because they are beautiful. I couldn't bring myself to put them on my feet (I'm telling you, I should marry this yarn I love it so much). I want to be able to look at the colors all the time so a scarf is a pretty good solution.

Socks that Rock. The purply one is a rare gem so you can't get it. I just lucked out because I was a member of the sock club. The other was also a sock club sample that should be available this year. Silkie Walking on the Wild Tide. So I tried using these two skeins for a stripey effect and it works really well. And even though this version is knit on smaller needles, my hands don't hurt me near as much so it must be that alpca I'm using on the first one. The only thing slowing this scarf down is that I have to keep stopping to admire the results.

Mmm...purply.

I'll be lucky if I can blog with any regularity because we have a big implementation at work which means having to do actual WORK at work. Jeez, that really cuts down on blogging time.

What a nuisance.

Posted by TheBunny at 10:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

At the last minute, there was a reprieve for the entralac scarf. True to form for someone with an out of control stash, I found more skeins of this yarn! I'm not even sure I bought it all at the same time or if I just liked it enough to buy it two different times. The dye lots match so I have chugged along.

I did have one disappointing moment when the yarn did this:

Ugh. I haven't seen one of those again though so I guess I can't moan too much about it.

I was working on this at my grandparent's anniversary weekend when my Aunt, the intended recipient, saw it and started oooing and awing over it. I hadn't told her that I was making it for her so it was a nice affirmation. She said they are still scraping frost off their windows (she lives in England) so it may get some use this year yet.

That is...if I keep working on it. I'm going to Sock Camp in a couple weeks and one of the things we are supposed to do is bring something we knit that we are proud of. I give away almost everything so I don't have anything to bring. I have some lovely things I'm working on (the entralac scarf, the mitered squares) but they aren't challenging knitting so I'm not "proud" of them.

Shoot, can I finish a lace cardigan in two weeks?

Posted by TheBunny at 06:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I thought I had better share this little lovely before it gets ripped out. Yep, as lovely as it is, and as fun as it has been to make, I am going to rip it out. Turns out entralac takes a lot of yarn. This is almost an entire skein and I only have two so unless I want a nice three foot scarf (blocked) then I had better find a new yarn for this pattern and a new pattern for this yarn.

Oh, and what is the yarn and pattern? The yarn is Nashua Wooly Stripes in Jewel. It is a loosely spun wool but it is pretty soft and the color is amazing. The pattern is our beloved Danica. It is a great looking scarf and fun to knit. Not nearly as complicated as it seems like it would be and the difficulty level is tangy but it isn't tangy at all. I think the biggest challenge is keeping track of where you are in the pattern. Nothing a post it can't fix.

I've been going on and on about the mitered squares and promising that I'll share. I'm certain everyone is desperately checking to see WHEN I will finally share a picture. I don't want to keep you in suspense any longer.

Here they are just thrown down on the floor with little rhyme or reason.

With the exception of one square, they are all Noro Kuryeon or Silk Garden which even though they have different weights are still making the same size square. Fingers crossed that won't change dramatically when they are blocked. I don't think this is how I would arrange them but you can still appreciate the loveliness in each. I think I might actually arrange them in these squares and by shade. The dark squares around the outside and work my way in so that the lightest (or brightest or greatest contrast) are on the inside.

They are a lot of fun to make because they are fairly mindless and I just get to enjoy the color transitions. It should be a pretty dramatic and spectacular blanket in the end. The ladies would be proud...

Posted by TheBunny at 11:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Tonight was the first night in a while where I didn't have to work when I got home from work. No, it isn't the new job overwhelming me. The new job is actually going very well. I am really liking the work and there are just enough things "broken" that I can implement change. I'm a happy woman.

No, this work is the work I was doing in between permanent gigs. I was doing contract work for a local university and it really doesn't take much of my time so I'm trying to keep it up until my contract runs out so I'll have some extra money for a house down payment. The challenge is that right before the semester starts I get swamped so now I'm feeling the pain of two jobs. Just keep reminding me of the extra paycheck.

I'm doing a little knitting. I should be doing more since two things are Christmas presents and I need to get them out doncha know. But I keep getting distracted.

This weekend, when I could take a break from job #2 I made a new dog coat for Sapphire. And it is so cute! You will have to just trust me because I can't find the cord for my digital camera anywhere.

I also took some pictures of the challenges I was facing with one of my knitting projects. I'm doing the braided scarf that was on the last Vogue Knitting. It is gorgeous! But I wasn't really happy with making it the way the pattern instructed. So, brace yourself, I have been changing things a bit.

The pattern calls for knitting the border in the round and then splitting up the stitches so you are knitting 6 strands in the round up from the border. Yeah, that didn't go over too big with me. What a mess.

So I've been monkeying around with this. I think there is a better, and well, more funner, way to make this thing. the trouble is that you have to make 6 strands. That is a lot. In fact, this thing is taking a lot of yarn in general. But it seems to be all worth it every time I take a peek at progress.

Oh, you want to see progress? Well, I broke my resolve to not buy anything new this year faster than any respectable person should break a resolve. But Costco had a great camera for a great price and I've been really wanting a camera that is smaller because I will haul it around more and I want to do that 365 pictures/a picture a day this year, blah blah blah.

Anyway, new camera, my daily pictures hopelessly mixed up on both cameras but at least on the new camera I have a picture of what I'm doing to the scarf.

I decided it was not fun nor interesting to mindlessly knit 6 strands in the round and I didn't like the gaping holes that resulted from the way they "grew" up from the edge. So I'm doing the strand separately. I did a provisional caston and I'm working a K1, S1 to create the magic tube.

Everyone may already know about this but when I made the angora baby booties from Last Minute Knits I thought it was the coolest trick ever! You K1, S1 this little square and then at the end you split up the Ks and Ss on two needles and pull them apart. Voila! the st stitch is inside and looks beautiful! You just turn the tube inside out.

I really enjoy the K1, S1. It is just mindless enough it is relaxing but it is a little more than just K so I'm entertained. I know I'll be bitching and complaining by the time I get to number 6 strand. In fact, don't put any money down on my getting it done. I have the attention span of a caffinated greyhound. It is possible this gift will never happen.

But in the meantime I'm enjoying myself and I feel like such a rebel!

Rowr.

Posted by TheBunny at 09:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)