see mi knit

The dragon, it roars!

The back:

As you can see, I ran out of green for the hoodie so I had to improvise. My roommate assured me that it was still "wayyy cute". 

Pattern:  Baby Dragon Hoodie
Yarn: Berocco Lullaby (2 skeins green, 3 skeins blue)
Needles: 7 for trim, 9 for body

The pattern was really easy, even with hardly any directions (all charted).   The yarn was horrible to work with!  Marnie warns that it snags but snag is an understatement.  This yarn even catches on carpet!  It is also splitty and sort of ribbony so it's hard to get an even stitch. In addition, I made the spots using duplicate stitch and it was really hard to cover the blue stitches with the green stitches, creating a mottled effect on the spots.  I will call this a feature of the sweater.  In conclusion, I will never work with Lullaby again.  HOWEVER, it creates a very soft fabric, which is nice for babies.

Lessons learned from the Olympics:

• I can do it if I put my back into it
• Time limits are not for me. I think it makes me create a sub-quality product in exchange for meeting a deadline.
• I candooit

I'm so glad I didn't choose an adult size sweater.

And look, finally Bliss gets its moment!

Pattern: Twisted Rib
Yarn: Esprit Puzzle in Denim
Needles: US1s (Crystal Palace, Brittanys, and Susan Bates Silvalumes) dpns

The yarn was all right. Cheap.  I'm glad I chose this pattern because it helped make it more "squashy" feeling.  I used a bunch of different dpn's for experimental factor and it didn't make much of a difference to the final product.

Onward, to more fun socks!

10 hours today at Kris' place for a marathon Knitting Olympics.  Quite productive, but dude, 10 hours!  I hope I didn't overstay my welcome.  Everyone else left around 4 but I was determined to get most of the sweater done before leaving (I'll update the guestlist after I figure out everyone's blog link.)

How is that a baby sweater has so many darned ends to weave in?!  Luckily Lani gave full moral support:

And after a lot of swearing, pizza, wine and figure skating, I now have the majority of the sweater done!

Now all that is left to dragon-ify (dragonize? undergo dragonification?) it is to add some ears, spots, spikes and the buttons.

But not tonight.  Lani knows exactly how I feel.

Olympics Update

I RAN OUT OF BLUE YARN.
The contingency plan is to create the hood in the opposite colors (green with blue trim). I think it'll work out ok even though it will look like a Frankenstein dragon made up of other dragons and mashed together with Dr. Frankenstein biting her fingernails in the corner.

Bliss Update

Socks are done!  I'm waiting for a sunny day to take the pictures since they were supposed to remind me of blue skies.  It's the least I can do for them.  Poor socks. So unloved. Why so unloved? Because for the last hour on those socks I was just itching to get started on these lurvely skeins from Stitches:

Claudia's Handpainted in Sante Fe. Yum.

These are going to be very plainly made so as to really let the colors take the stage.  I've selected the Slipped Stitch Rib socks from Sensational Knitted Socks.  Fab book by the way, I've spotted several that I want to make.

Needle Search Update

I've settled on some Susan Bates Silvalume US1s.  I switched to those halfway through Bliss.  I know, switching between wood and metal needles halfway through a project could be frowned upon, possibly creating all sorts of gauge wonkiness, but like I said, Bliss was so unloved I didn't mind using it as a guinea pig.  In the end, the socks fit and look fine and I have favorite dpn's.  I adore the metal dpn's!  I'm going to eventually acquire some Inox's because the Susan Bates are 7", which feel a tad too long for me and the Inox's come in 6"s.  Thanks for the tip, Cynthia!

Hourglass Update

There are knitters out there that you just want to worship the ground they walk on.  They are so meticulous, so neat, so creative, that you really wish reading their blog had some sort of osmosis power to give you some of their SKILLZ.  (You know, how like in college you'd take a nap with your head on your Chem book hoping all that information would somehow magically ingrain itself in your brain but really all you ended up with was some drool on your notes?)

Anyway, I am not one of those knitters.  After ripping back the yoke on Hourglass about 7 times (NO JOKE) I finally get this brilliant stroke of genius to refer back to the pattern and it looks like I've conveniently forgotten to decrease in the back of the sweater while also decreasing the front.

So what type of knitter am I? I'm the type that makes you feel good about yourself as a knitter because hey, at least you know how to read.

It is now a battle of the wills. This. Sweater. Will. Get. Done.

Saving graces:  Alpaca is delicious on Addi Turbos.  Cute stitch markers (from Stitches) are little lights at the end of at tunnel row of stockinette.

And finally:
1) Stay tuned for super secret project! It will be fun times.
2) Come join us for Marathon Olympics Knitting on Saturday.

The crash that comes after a drug induced euphoria is almost too much to bear.

I am of course, talking about returning from Stitches West.

Kris is undertaking the admirable task of recapping the trip day by day.  I wouldn't want to steal her thunder (Friends reference anyone?) so I'll let her do that. NO, I'm not just being uber lazy...

In brief:

• FUN fun funnnnnn! I think this may be an annual thing.
• It's amazing how much you can learn in a real class with an instructor, despite the plethora of books, internet tutorials, and magazines at our disposal.
• Art Fibers - I don't know what to say about that amazing place. It's like that guy in high school that no one really paid attention to at first glance, but if you take like 5 minutes to get to know him you find that's he's actually quite attractive and interesting but still no one notices and then years later they know him as Jake Gyllenhaal and you can be like, "Yeah, I did him. It ruled."
• Jake Gyllenhaal = The Hotness. Humina. Humina.
• You need to be Marisa's friend because she buys as much yarn for other people as she does for herself.
• If you go to Pasta Pomadoro get the Salmon Spaghetti. Don't be fooled by the word "healthy" it's really yummy.

• Commuknity - cutest yarn store I've ever been to hands down.  loveitloveitloveit.

• We are a klassy folk:

I decided to save stash pictures for display when I undertake projects with them.  This way I don't have to take out all my organized yarn againy.  Uh no, I'm not just trying to obfuscate how much I really bought this weekend.

Olympics update:
Major pieces are blocking.

Not really necessary but I think it will make seaming easier.  Am about to start on hoody part and spots and ears.

Hourglass update:
Nothing really to report except that I am going with the majority on the decision about the hems. I'm going to turn them over as directed.  The attempt at getting the upper body decreases right is scheduled for tonight.

Bliss socks update:
Done with the first one, more than halfway done on the second.  I feel bad for them.  Clearly they are not going to be well loved because their existence is getting in the way of much more delicious sock yarn. (oh and so much delicious sock yarn has been acquired as of late!)

Anyway, I have a public cry for help.  I hate my Brittany DPN's.  The bendiness and stickiness can not be abided.  Stickiness may be good sometime in the distant future when I make teflon socks but for the immediate future, they suck.  My Crystal Palaces are great but they're disfigured. I will get another set of those, but while I'm at it, I'm on a quest for metal dpn's. 

I want them to be 5-6 inches in length. I do not want stab-myself-in-the-eye-lengths.  So far Addis, Inox, and Susan Bates all fail this requirement clocking in at around 7-8 inches.  Besides, at that length I think they'll be bendy and like I said, icks to the bendy.  Is there an obvious reason why metal dpns are at this longer length?

If there is a good reason I'll bite the bullet but can you tell me if the Susan Bates is just as good as the Addis?  If so then I can just get the sock set and save an oodle of money.

Finally an Olympics update!
Current progress:

I'm a little antsy of the yarn situation.  See that there blue skein?  I have one more for the sleeves and hood.  That's it.  Looks like it may be a photo-finish, folks.

Now, an Hourglass update.  I tried doing a double decrease and I selected the Vertical Double decrease. However, the left sleeve join was beautiful and the right sleeve join was... not so much.  So ONCE AGAIN I will have to rip back and I'll try the normal Double Decrease (ssk, k1, k2tog).  For those of you keeping track, this will be like the 4th time I'm ripping back.  I think.  Ok I'm not really keeping track either.

But I have a question!  I had knit the edges in a contrasting color but because I didn't really understand the pattern as a whole, I didn't knit enough of it.  I only knit to the turning row, when I should have gone for another inch beyond that (because the finishing requires turning the hem on itself).  However, I refuse to knit down because my morale is already quite low with this sweater.  So I have two options.

Option one:

Make it a rolled hem.  But see the right side? That's how it is if I don't hold it down with my fingers. I'm thinking blocking will keep it the way it is on the left side, but I'm not sure.

Option two:

Is to Proceed as Directed.  It will produce a smaller contrasting hem but I think I like it.

I could try Option 1 and if blocking doesn't solve it, go with option two.  But to think that I may not be finished after blocking is psychologically numbing.  What do you think?