theraineysisters knitting and so much more

February 28, 2007

From Sally — No Need for Knitting Police

Filed under: Feather and Fan Shawl,Uncategorized — Sally @ 1:59 pm

Guilt will work just fine, thank you.

Late last night, I reached a psychological low point with my Feather & Fan Shawl. I had about six or seven rows left to knit when I got a delightful thought: why not just stop where I was? Instead of knitting the last four-row repeat, why not make the repeat I was just finishing be the last one? The number of stitches would be the same and it wouldn’t make all that much difference in the final size. I could be casting off — I could be finished. It was decided. That left me two rows to knit. I knit one of those two last night and woke up this morning with one to go.

I couldn’t do it. I changed my mind and I’m partway through the last and final repeat now.

Why couldn’t I do it? It’s not as if I don’t alter virtually every pattern I knit. I feel no compunction about doing that. I think, if I’m honest, it’s because I had dutifully been checking off each row on my chart and I just couldn’t leave those last few rows unchecked. It’s as simple as that.

I have four rows left to knit now. I think, in the long run, I’ll be happier.

February 26, 2007

From Sally — Eris Cardigan

Filed under: Eris Cardigan,Uncategorized — Sally @ 9:37 pm

I finished the collar and even remembered to take a slightly out-of-focus picture of it before picking up the stitches for the body. Please don’t judge the poor little collar too harshly — this is “raw” unblocked knitting.

The pin you see in the middle marks where my provisional cast on was. I think it will look better once it’s blocked and fussed with, but I don’t think the transition looks too bad. I know I will prefer how it looks half-a-stitch off than how it would look with a seam.

In an effort to catch up with my sister, I’ve done a fair amount of knitting today. I’ve picked up all of the stitches for the body and will finish the short row section tonight (before my obligatory row of the grey behemoth).

 

From Susan: Should I get pissy that Surly’s looks better or just keep knitting away?  I guess I’ll have to keep knitting, as it is the one thing that keeps me sane…

I am working diligently on my two projects.  I take Eris with me so I can work on mindless stockinette — I have about four inches past the underarm.  This is one of those projects that will be a bit of a crapshoot — it LOOKS like it will fit:

ErisCollarbolero001.jpg

The beauty of top down knitting!

I have also been knitting on Oregon.  I work on it at home and now have about 9″ done on the second sleeve — woo hoo!!  I would post a picture of it, but an old one will do:

Sleeve.jpg

We’ll pretend!  I’m not quite this far yet, but you get the idea ;)  I actually am really enjoying the sleeve and I NEVER enjoy doing sleeves!!

I am (of course) daydreaming about the next BIG THING, which will be the Large Collar Bohus.  That is what keeps me plugging — thinking about the NEXT one!

February 24, 2007

From Sally — Berry Cluster Pullover

It’s so hard to take good photographs of knitted garments. Susan and I would each like to have a half-mannequin, so that we could get decent pictures. If we lived closer, we could invest in a really good one and share it. But we don’t, and I haven’t had the time to look around to see if I can find one. So, in order to show you photographs of the finished Berry Cluster Pullover, I tried:

1. Hanging it up. It looks okay, but not great.

2. Draping it over a chair. Just no.

3. I flirted, ever so briefly, with modeling it myself. It fits nicely, but I just wasn’t of a mood. So, I asked my twenty-year-old daughter if she would model it for me. She said yes, but I knew the fit would not be quite right. She’s very slender, and her shoulders aren’t as broad as mine. (I said shoulders. Shoulders, people.) It fits me better than it fits her, but I don’t have the cute stomach. So it’s a tradeoff. (And I should have had her change into a smoother under garment. See, we need a mannequin.)

Here is a detail of the hem so you can see the pearls.

In other knitting news, I did start Eris. I have half of the collar knitted. Like Susan, I started with a provisional cast on (the white row you see at the wide end) and my next step will be to pick up those stitches and start knitting in the opposite direction.

I’m knitting my Eris using Ultra Alpaca, which I described here (you’ll need to scroll down a little bit). I think this yarn will be perfect for this project and I am loving how it knits up. It looks rather sad here but I’ve stretched with my fingers and I know it will look much better once it’s been blocked.

Alison — I know you’re concerned about the lightness of the cash soft you’re using. I think you’ll be okay; I might worry a little whether that yarn will pill because it is so soft. That’s the one little concern I would have and some of that depends upon how hard you are on your sweaters.

As for the grey behemoth — my Feather & Fan shawl — I’m still plugging along. Twelve rows left. It will get finished soon.

PS — For Wendy O:

SublimeLaceTam001.jpg

And from the book:

BerryClusterPullover.jpg

From Susan — Buried by Tomorrow!

Filed under: Uncategorized — lv2knit @ 11:33 am

They say we’re getting a foot of snow today: ack! 

PS (1 hour later) — it has started!

February 23, 2007

From Susan — Alone Time

Filed under: Back Story — lv2knit @ 10:30 pm

Wow — what a gift.  Everyone is off doing their thing and I am alone, knitting and watching movies.  It does not get any better than this!  I don’t hate my family — no, really, I don’t!  I just crave my alone time, and it is a rare and precious thing.  Merci!!

From Susan — Sorry, Kim

Filed under: Eris Cardigan — lv2knit @ 9:25 am

Sorry about Meredith, Kim — she lived!  I told you they would never kill off the show’s namesake.  My daughter and I were both disappointed with the writing the last few shows.  Shondra must be paying too much attention to a possible spin off with Addison.  I’ll give them another chance, though….

I’ve been working on Eris.  Here is the back.  The picture is from my scanner so the color is more accurate.

ErisCollarback.jpg

I am 2″ past the point where you divide the body from the sleeves — woo hoo!  AND, with the beauty of top down knitting, I tried on the little puppy and it appears to fit. 

Sally and I are making a few alterations to the pattern.  One of these can be seen here.  Jenna had a built-in stockinette edge along BOTH edges of the collar.  I left the one on the inner collar off so I could pick up later and do an applied i-cord edge.  The advantage is that you can guarantee that the edge will be the exact size you need, and after trying it on, I will need to tighten up that edge quite a bit*.  I did this in the Rogue Hoodie as well, because I had seen too many of them (on blogs) that had a floppy edge along the hood.  Doing the collar this way would interfere with the cabled detail at the center fronts — I opted to finish the hem like the pullover so as not to accentuate my tummy.  Let’s face it.  I do not need a big arrow pointing out the fact that I have a too-big tummy.  I prefer camo, thank you very much.  Sally does not have this problem, but does prefer the look of the pullover anyway.

I went to knitting last night and had a blast.  What a crew!  After a week of computer torture training, I needed a break.  We have a “celebrity” that joins our group on occasion and has been there the last couple of Thursdays: it’s author Monica Ferris.  She has written a number of books, but several are knitting-related murder mysteries that take place in a fictional knitting shop in Excelsior, Minnesota.  She has mentioned some of our knitting peeps in her books, so it’s kind of fun.

*Jenna does include short rows to make the inner edge smaller.

PS — to Connie: Sally is planning to start hers today.

February 20, 2007

From Susan — Now I Feel Totally Guilty

Filed under: Eris Cardigan — lv2knit @ 6:41 pm

Honest, she said I could start!!  I needed a stockinette project and I had to get past the collar to get to the stockinette portion!  I really wasn’t trying to leave Sally in my wake.   This has happened before (in both directions) so I should have known better…

I have made some progress on my Eris: I did rip out the body once and started over, but it is progressing okay now.  I did not like the way my short rows OR my increases were looking, so that’s why I started over.  I think I’m now doing Japanese short rows (or at least what I call Japanese short rows!).  And I am doing the “yarnover make ones” that I developed for Sunrise Circle.  I think it works better because the increased sts are only 2 sts apart — they pulled up the other sts too much and did not look very nice.  I’ll show a picture when I have a bit more progress.

I have been enduring “special computer training” the past two days.  We start promptly at 7 am for four days straight.  My friend, Susan, and I are taking it at the same time.  One day I’m face down and the next day she is.  Tomorrow we’ll probably BOTH be comatose.  It is really a grind.  I have not been able to knit much because I am so exhausted when I get home. 

RE: Eris — In response to Wendy: I would call this sweater advanced, because of the elaborate cabling, short rows and unusual construction.  I have read several blogs where they said they started this project, but not so many that finished!  That could be said of a lot of projects, but I do consider it a red flag.  Sally and I have decided not to be deterred by the success or lack thereof of others — we’re not scared off by extreme knitting, baby!!  Let ‘er roll! 😉

PS to Wendy O — I think Rogue seemed easier because its construction is more straight forward — at least until you get to the hood itself.  There are some interesting things going on there!  It was easier to get started so that’s why I ended up doing the Rogue for my Knitting Olympics Challenge last year (I finished it in 12 days — no cleaning, cooking or housework of any kind was goin’ on during the “Olympics,” let me tell you).  The hood has some fantastic cabling and if you are intimidated by grafting, you could do a 3-needle bind off. 

The instructions for Eris are 40 pages — though that includes both a pullover and cardigan version — and her charts are done in large print.  I am doing the short row shaping where the cable section attaches to the body and the directions are 5 pages long!  She is VERY detailed, to the point that it seems excessive.  To her credit, she says she is detailed to help avoid confusion.

From Sally — Already Behind

Well, I’m already behind in our knitalong since I a) haven’t started and b) find the mere task of printing out the 8000 pages of directions and figuring out which ones to follow exhausting. I shall do so, though, before she gets any farther ahead.

I still must finish sewing the pearls onto the hem of the Berry Cluster Pullover. I have a few ends to weave in as well. Why does that last little bit of finishing seem so boring (and therefore unappealing)? And then there is the Feather & Fan shawl. Sixteen rows. Ack. I feel like Commander Scott heading back from the South Pole and realizing he may not make it.

The good news: I just spent the weekend with two friends. It was Red Cashmere Glovelets girl’s 50th birthday and her husband flew me and another friend, Jody, down to surprise her. Jody has wanted to learn to knit and so this weekend I taught her. She’s a natural! She’s well on her way to knitting her first scarf using a nice variegated yarn. She has mastered knitting and purling. She can already tell when she should knit and purl if she is doing stockinette stitch, can count her rows of garter, and knows almost immediately when she has made a mistake. Her gauge is amazingly even for a newbie and she has even thrown in a few rows of (deliberate) drop stitches here and there. Getting stuck in the airport for five hours yesterday helped her have more time to practice.

She’s already chomping at the bit to buy more yarn and needles.

February 19, 2007

From Susan — New Mini-Knitalong

Filed under: Eris Cardigan — lv2knit @ 12:48 am

Hello, everyone.  The weekend is winding down and so am I. 

Sally and I have been toying with the idea of starting a new project together.  The timing has been tough because we are already hammering away at other things, BUT Sally said I could go ahead and start.  We are doing an Eris Cardigan Mini-Knitalong.  We are calling it a Knitalong because we are starting it together, but it’s “mini” because it’s just the two of us.  If you want to knit along with us and would like us to post pictures and you want to write updates in the comments, that’s fantastic!  However, we just don’t want to manage a true “knitalong.” 

About the Project:
Eris is the fraternal twin of the Rogue Hoodie.  I made Rogue as my Winter Olympics project.  At that time I thought I would do Eris, but got stopped in my tracks when I tried to get started.  I had yarn issues and “getting started” issues, so I switched to Rogue.  Now that I am committed to Eris, I see why I got stuck! 

You start by knitting the collar and then pick up around the outside edge and knit the rest of the raglan sweater from the top down.  I figured that once I got the collar done, the rest would be fairly mindless stockinette — you guessed it: my mindless take-along knitting!!

ErisCollar003.jpg 

Of course the color is not very true — it is a very soft pale green in Cascade 220.  The gauge is 5.5 sts and 8 rows per inch on the collar and 5 sts/7 rows per inch on the body.  You start by casting on at the center back and work the right half first.  Then you are supposed to pick up sts at the back and work the left half.  Sally and I could not figure out why she did not use a provisional cast on, so i did.  I think it looks pretty invisible in this close up:

ErisCollarCloseUpCenterBack.jpg

Yes, the sts are a half stitch off where there is a transition from knit to purl, but I think that is less noticeable than picking up into a cast on edge. 

It is very organic, asymmetrical cabling — quite attractive I think.  Once this dries, I’ll pick up the sts around the collar and hope for the best as far as the rest of the sweater goes.  It could be one of those strange, impossible projects.  Only time will tell.

I spent most of my day at the Mall of America hobnobbing with crafters of the Red Heart Yarn variety.  The Craft Yarn Council of America hosted their own Knit Out event this weekend.  It is designed to get people interested in knitting, crocheting, and buying Red Heart and Lion Brand Yarn.  That said, it was fun and I got some freebies: bamboo knitting needles, a nice crochet hook, a knitting needle gauge and many free patterns — some of which were kind of cute.  Lily Chin was there and other known authors.  She was hawking a crocheting book, so I passed that right by.  I also ran into a few knitting peeps.  My older daughter saw it as an excellent excuse to do some shopping and she made the most of it 😉 !  

A new week starts tomorrow: Happy Monday! If you have it off for Pres’ Day, I am very jealous!

 

 

February 17, 2007

From Susan — Thanks for the Comments…

Filed under: Oregon Cardigan — lv2knit @ 10:37 am

…on my Oregon Sleeve excitement.  Some of you may have wondered why I needed to figure any of this out — doesn’t the pattern lay it all out for you?  It should and Alice does.  She will instruct you to start the armhole steek on Round #x and pick up the sleeve with a certain color to do the patterning.

The problem is if you need to adjust the pattern OR if you are even fussier than AS herself and have a particular way you want it to lay out.  I needed to add 3.5″ to the sleeve length (which I hope is enough, but will also rely on blocking).  Also, AS did not line up the sleeve stripes.  If you don’t start the sleeve at the same round as the body ended, the stripes will not line up.  This may not matter to everyone, but I thought, if I can do it the “right” way, why not? 

I did not get anything done last night — I went to bed before 10 pm and got up after 8 am.  I was so frickin’ tired!  Today I may do a bit more or start something new.  Sometimes the sheer effort of starting a new project will keep me plugging away at the old, boring and familiar.

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