Selfish

knitting, that is.  Something just for me.

A group I belong to on Ravelry is having a KAL (knit-a-long).  It's to knit a sweater/large garment of your choice in Vintage Purls yarn.  A good friend of mine was kind enough to gift me a large skein of lovely lace weight yarn specifically for this KAL.  After a lot of Ravelry searching, (then Google searching to be able to find somewhere to actually buy the magazine the pattern comes in, which was sold out everywhere I looked, until I found you could purchase and download a digital copy from the publishers) I've chosen to do the Geodesic Cardigan.

This will be the first real* garment I've knitted for myself.  It should make a change from all the kid knits I do.  And I'm looking forward to just following a pattern as a break from all the calculating involved in creating my own.  I do really hope the style suits me...




*real - meaning one that will be used.  I have actually knitted myself a jersey before, but it made me look awful so lived in a box forever after.  Chunky yarn and rib does not suit someone that is of 'average' (meaning short and chunky) build.
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Do you Swatch?

I don't.  Never have done.

I find it a complete waste of time to knit a square (that will be undone to not waste yarn) only to measure it.  And, anyway, it depends on how you stretch the square as to whether you get guage*.

I always get guage.


I had to do some swatching for my next design idea.  Normally, I just calculate my numbers based on the recommended needle and stitch per inch given on the yarn label (my knitting tension is usually exactly that).  But the yarn I plan to use has a recommended range instead of one exact number.  So, I had to find out how many stitches per inch to base my calculations on by swatching.

For this design, I'm also doing some lacework and had to swatch that too.  But I didn't mind that as much because I did have to decide on how exactly I wanted the lace design to look.

So now to crunch some numbers so I can start knitting!

This is (hopefully) going to be a summer top for BigMiss.  I'll be on the lookout for test knitters when I've done the calculations and knit the prototype.




*For those non-knitters, guage is how many stitches per inch you knit at - sometimes called tension. It differs depending on the combination of thickness of the yarn and the size of the needles used. All knitting patterns give the guage that it was calculated at and you need to knit at that same guage or a garment won't end up the size it should be. You can change needle size to get guage if you're a tight or loose knitter. A swatch is the name given to the practise square you knit.
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My Creative Space

It's been a while since I last joined in on this...

Here's what I've been up to recently (just finished yesterday)

A flash new bag to put my bigger knitting projects in when I drag them out and about on my travels.

See, it fits things in very comfortably.  And you can see the neat inside pocket that I made to fit my notebook perfectly and with a pencil slot, too (saves having to dig around the bottom of the bag for the lost pencil!)  There's another pocket on the other side for any other extras, as well.

This is the first sewing I've done for myself in ages (usually it's all for the girls).  I used this bag pattern for it.

Check out what others are up to over at Kirsty's...
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Too Busy...

I think I'm not a very good blogger.

I've been meaning to spend some time on here to update the background and things for Spring.  But it's already five days into Spring and I haven't yet.

I've been meaning to update on here about all the things I've been making and getting up to in general.  But I've been too busy doing to blog.

So, the background update will have to wait as that takes a good amount of un-interrupted time to set all my widgets etc up and I will just give a quick run down of the main things I've been up to.  (Really, if I just spent five minutes once a week to blog the things that I plan in my head, I wouldn't feel like it was such a big deal.)


First up, I finished my first pair of socks for myself. 

These are my Theodora's.  Knit in the Vintage Purls' colourway 'Empress' (her pattern also).  Unfortunately, this is one of the colourways that was affected by the non-superwash disaster experienced at Vintage Purls so they've gone a bit fluffy with wear.


The other knitting project I've been working on has been my new pattern, Elisaac.

I offered to knit something for a friend's twin boys.  I wanted something modern and easy.  I think v-neck's always look great on little boys and I love thick & thin stripes.  This design is completely seamless and worked top-down.  The collar is not worked later by picking up stitches - it's worked first and the body is worked down from it.  I've incoropated the stripes into the instructions, but it works the same without them.  I'ts designed to be worked in 8ply/DK yarn (the one above was knit with WOOLganics DK in Gondwana, Gaia and Deep Earth in size 12mths - modelled on my nephew who was not long awake and un-impressed) and to fit from 3mths-10years (chest measument 40.5cm/16"-71cm/28").  This pattern will, hopefully, be up for sale on Ravelry by October.  I'm on the lookout for testers at the moment.  If anyone's interested, email me for details.

I'm halfway through the second one, but ran out of wool.  I'm just waiting for my order to arrive to finish it, so started on the first embellishment I was planning.

This is what I've done so far, but might have to undo it.  It's a tractor, if you can't tell.  I think it seems a little lost against the stripes as just an outline, so will be doing it in duplicate stitch (stitching over each knit stitch to create a solid-coloured design) to make it more bold.

I also need some black wool to do the wheels in.  As I don't have any black wool, I'm planning on trying my hand at dyeing.  BigMiss is doing a school project on wool at the moment and I was hoping to try some wool dyeing with her as part of it also.  This could be a disaster, but as long as we have fun then it's all good!
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I Went Shopping!


After a trip to Levin (which really is a long drive from Masterton) I came home with this purchase of t-shirt fabric.  I don't think I'll be needing to buy the girls any tops for a while.  The pile on the left is cottons, the middle pile is merino and the right pile is cotton sweatshirting.  Now to spend some time perusing my pattern books and sorting out the tension on my overlocker...

(Levin was a detour on a shopping trip to Palmerston North with my SIL.  I came home with a little pile of nice new clothes too, which has been so desperately needed since before last winter.)
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Only 10 more days to go!

Until our internet is back to normal speed that is.

I should be grateful, really, as I've spent less time than usual on the net since it's been so labouriously slow.  But I've wanted to post about all the crafting I've been up to but can't bring myself to spend half a day waiting for pictures to upload.

Today is normally my child-free day (morning) but as my normal work days over the last two weeks have been interrupted by poor sick kiddies I'm spending it at work doing a little catch-up.  And as I can connect up my laptop to the internet at normal speed while I'm here, I thought I'd also have a quick catch-up on what I've been making lately...

First up, I've been doing a test crochet for a lovely designer on Ravelry for a cute skirt pattern.  I just finished weaving in the ends yesterday and took a few pictures to put up on my Projects Page:


This pattern is Coconut Ice due for release next month.  I made it longer than the pattern says so it sits at MiddleMiss' knees.  It's made in BWM Cotton 8ply in colours Teal and White.


Next up, I've been sewing a bit also.  My step-dad's father passed away from cancer recently and Mum & P visited us over the weekend of his funeral.  They bought a big box of clothes with them to sort through and put in the clothing bins and there was a fair amount of good quality woollen clothing that I had to keep.  There were two knitted cardigans that looked hardly worn - great for unpicking.  There were three heavy-weight jersey-type fabric cardigans that would turn into nice warm winter jerseys or jackets for the girls and there were two pairs of wool-mix dress pants.

So, two pairs of this (one a slightly darker brown than the other):

Turned into this:

A very nice dress for BigMiss who has been asking for a dress for the last two years!  She likes it a lot, though I can't say the same for J - he thinks it looks like it's got a hoop in the hem when she wears it.  I'm making a nice pink top to go with it so I'll get a modelled photo when I've done that too and you can give your opinion.

A close-up of the flower detail:
I couldn't buy anything decent to embellish it with so I just made a crochet flower and put beads at the centre.


The only other things I've been up to lately have been design/knit work on my own patterns some more.  I finished the Amelia dress and am yet to write up the pattern for it.  I've knit a little of (and frogged) the jersey for the prem twins, but have worked out all the grading for the pattern so just have to re-knit it and write the pattern as I go and it'll be ready for testing.

Here's a sneak peek at the Amelia Dress:
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Go Slow

So my Mum came and visited for the weekend.  And she had to download her iTunes while she was here (she'd been missing them and thought it was a good time to catch up?  or something?)  Which took quite a while (most of the evening and still going when we'd gone to bed - but I didn't realise any of this until the next day).

The next morning I checked my email hoping for the pattern from Knitsch and got an email from Xtra saying I'd used up 80% of my broadband allocation for the month.  Then the very next email is from Xtra also, telling me I'd used it all up.

(Apparently, Mum just assumed we had unlimited internet - or something.  She didn't actually ask.)

Now, in the four (or more?) years that we've had broadband we have never used our limit.  Even when they upgraded us from 1GB to 3GB/month.  The closest we'd ever come was actually just last week when I got the first '80% used' email in our internet-use history.

That email had come on the first day of the next billing month I noticed (when I logged in and looked up our internet-use stats).  Which is why I realised immediately with the next emails that our quota was up only one week into the new month!

So, now my internet speed has been reduced down to dial-up speed.  It really sucks.  And I have to put up with it for another three weeks until the end of the billing month.  Hopefully I won't be charged for any extra use over our allowance (so says the website info).  I'll will be passing on the bill if I do!

(So my blog posting will probably be less and maybe not with pictures for the next few weeks.  Just in case you're wondering.  Though my posting is not exactly predictable and regular.  So you might not miss me anyway.)
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