This 'N That

On the knitting front:
The new felted bag pattern I am working on has been knit and felted, and has told me what revisions need to be made. Starting it over tomorrow when I get more yarn. It's pretty cute!

It is knit with the new Karaoke yarn from South West Trading Company. It's 50% wool and 50% soy silk. It's great to knit with, and felts up nicely. Gives off a fair amount of fuzz in the process, but produces a nice felted fabric. It's a bit on the soft side, like Noro Kureyon, so I wouldn't use it for something that is going to get a lot of wear and tear, but for a small bag I think it will work out just fine.

Of course the pattern can be knit with 100% wool also. I need to knit up a sample in wool so I can see what the difference in size/shape might be. Look for the pattern soon on my sidebar.


I thought my favorite yarn was Noro Blossom, but now I'm thinking alpaca is neck and neck with the Blossom....I knit with alpaca for the first time when I did a moebious scarf from Cat Bordhi's A Second Treasury of Magical Knitting. I picked up the book at Threadbear when I was there and finally decided it was time to do more than drool over the awesome projects in this book. I taught myself the moebious cast on (first time, thanks to great instructions and photos...thanks Cat!) and found that yes, it is truly magical. The first hour or so I just kept commenting to myself "This is SOOO cool!" If you haven't yet experienced the magical moebious knitting, you really should do so. It's mind bending!

Anyway, the alpaca moebious is lovely...needs blocking before a photo, and will be the store sample. I will be teaching the moebious cast on in a class in the fall.
I think Mike will be getting a lovely moebious scarf for ice fishing this winter. I love how it can cover your neck and head with no ends flapping around.



Nature News:
The fountain that Mike gave me for Mother's Day is now home to a bunch of tadpoles. I am surprised that a frog could get in my fountain to lay eggs, but I guess she did. I won't be turning it on any time soon....don't want to send the little swimmers for a ride through the pump!

My garden is going positively bonkers. The zucchini is growing on average of 6" overnight. We are on a twice-daily picking schedule so as to not grow any baseball bat (or bigger) zucchinis. I have been making pickles every single day. Between Sunday morning and Monday afternoon I made 12 qts. 38 pickles were picked in that time. Sunday we picked our first cucumber. Yesterday? 10 more. I am giving produce away by the bagful. I gave 2 bags to the lady who delivered my flowers yesterday, another bag to my SIL when she picked up her kids an hour later, and another bag to Jake's friend's mom this morning. It's craziness! From 4 plants each! Heaven help me when the hundreds of tomatoes that are weighing down the vines start ripening ALL AT ONCE! (I did overplant the tomatoes....but how can you turn down 30 heirloom tomato plants in lots of different varieties, for free? You can't. You put them in the ground and are happy for whatever delicious, delightful tasty treats are bestowed upon you.) The extra hot/humid weather this summer is really doing wonders for these plants, I tell you. The corn that is growing in the farmer's field behind our house is bigger than I've EVER seen it grow.

Off to watch Big Brother.....I really like Kaysar...can't wait to see how his nominations affect the house. And I really liked Eric, for the first show. After that, more and more I thought he was a jerk with WAY too much testosterone shooting through his veins. WHOA! Take it easy, guy!

TTFN!

Exciting news!

Tonight I got the email I've been hoping for....the pattern I submitted for Knitty's fall issue has been accepted! WOO HOO! I am having a hard time believing it....I didn't want to get my hopes up too high, but on the other hand I thought it had a good chance of at least catching Amy's eye, if nothing else. I suppose it's not written in stone yet, but the email said:
"You're in! Congratulations!" so I'm taking that as a YES!

I'm not giving away any details ahead of time, but look for "Bloom" in the next issue of Knitty. (OMG!)

UPDATE: My loving, thoughtful hubby had a beautiful bouquet of flowers sent to me today. When I told him the news last night, I didn't think he "got" how much this meant to me, but he must've been down-playing it so the flowers today would be more of a surprise. What a sweetie....

Pinky the Bear

On Tuesday I knit this bear from a Fiber Trends pattern. It was a pretty quick knit, and I was just crossing my fingers that it would felt nicely. I am planning on teaching this class for beginners, as a way for them to learn to read a pattern, learn 2 different ways of increasing and 2 different decreases. Also short row shaping with wrap & turn.

Felting is so amazing. This 'not so cute' garter stitch bear leaves a little to be desired, huh? But look how cute Pinky Bear is now!
I did needle-felting to put her face on tonight at the BeeGees meeting.

The color in the "before" photo is more accurate. I just took the "after" photo tonight in low light. I used Plymouth Galway and it took just about 1 skein. I had a very tiny little ball left after sewing up the seams.

I'm playing around with the new feature on Blogger that lets you add photos and trying to get the hang of it. I am going to love this feature....going through Hello was always somewhat of a pain. I'm glad to be able to just insert the pix right into the blogger post, and have a choice of size and position. Yeah!

Knitting Matters

My friend Kim has recently created a new website that is dedicated to providing knitters with lots of information in one place. She is continually working on this new site and I thought you might like to check it out. Let her know how she's doing! Here's the link: Knitting Matters.

Kim also has recently self-published a couple of really cute knitting patterns. Check them out while you're there!

Something Blue

I wish I had a closeup shot of the lace garter I knit for Kim for the wedding. However, I finished it only the day before and gave it to her in a rush. I can still get a picture at some point (they didn't do the garter toss, so this can become an heirloom, and I'm hoping at some point a grandchild of mine will wear it too) I knit it using this pattern .

However, I ended up using a size 1 needle because it took me about 20 minutes to do 2 rows using the 000 needles that I had, and I knew I could never get it done in time that way! I couldn't get the darned needles through those tiny little stitches! And knitting with cotton thread was not my favorite thing in the world, let me tell you. I did my best not to curse, and tried to remember to knit each stitch with love love love.

I ended up not doing the seam binding casing on the back....I just doubled some elastic thread and wove it through the middle and adjusted it to the tightness she wanted, then wove the blue ribbons through the eyelets and tied a bow.

She still needed "something old" so into the bow I tied a gold charm of mine that I've had since high school that says "Live, Love, Laugh".

p.s. that's my niece Melissa, and my mom, checking it out

Karaoke

Ooooh La La! Today while I was working, the man in brown brought a box from South West Trading Company bearing their new yarn, Karaoke. We got 5 colors of this wonderful, self-striping, soy silk/wool blend. I can't wait to do something with it! It's loverly. You can see some write-ups and samples of it knit up here (Black Dog) and here (My Threaded Bliss). It's so soft....

yummmmmmmy...............

Pink Shrug

Today's FO is this pink shrug that I started a few weeks ago. It's a pattern I found online that I tweaked a bit (don't I always?) It was supposed to be knit cuff to cuff (but that would make the cuffs different...it's feather and fan pattern and one cuff would be backwards) It was also supposed to be knit flat and then seamed up from the wrists. I don't THINK so....in the round, if you please! (but flat in the middle, of course)

Anyway, here it is, being modeled by the lovely Kaitlyn (middle child) after being grafted together up the middle. I don't know if I am going to give it to Kim as planned, or keep it for myself. I think it may be a bit big for her (but just right for me ...tee hee...)

UPDATE: I have finally found the link for this pattern again. You can get it (and 2 other vintage Mary Maxim Patterns) here. This shrug is Style B.

My changes:
Knit cuff and sleeve in the round for a total of about 12 or 13" then knit flat until piece is 24". Repeat for other side, and use Kitchener stitch to graft together in the middle. This makes a 3/4 length sleeve....just knit each piece longer if you want longer sleeves.