theraineysisters knitting and so much more

July 31, 2013

From Sally — What I Made at Camp

Filed under: Updates — surly @ 4:26 pm

As already mentioned, Susan and I attended Meg Swansen’s Knitting Camp earlier this month.  On our way to the wilds of Wisconsin, we stopped at Amazing Threads, one of the yarn stores that Susan frequents.  They had a store sample of a shawl that we both had considered making: Imagine When designed by Joji Locatelli. It’s a simple but elegant shawl, made by combining garter stitch, short rows, and eyelets. The shape lets it sit nicely on the shoulders.

I started it on the way to camp, and finished it right after I got home. After experimenting with some lovely Madelinetosh, I decided to knit it from the same yarn the shop had used: Anzula Dreamy, soft and drapey blend of merino, cashmere, and silk. The store had a proprietary color — Neptune. I hate to be a blind follower, but sometimes it’s the way to go.

In other words, I used the exact same yarn and the same needle size (a U.S. 6, 4.0 mm) as the person who knit the shop sample. Even though I generally knit a little loosely, my shawl didn’t block out to be as large as the sample. It would have been easy to make a larger size by adding stitches and rows in a few key places, and I had plenty of yarn left over. Unfortunately, I didn’t know it was going to be smaller until it was finished. The pattern called for two skeins and I barely dipped into the second one. It’s still a nice size, but I do wish it were a little larger. The shawl still has a fair amount of spring to it, so I might try blocking it again. Le sigh. I might even make a second one in a different yarn.

Below are some not great photos. It’s hard to photograph the shape.

July 22, 2013

From Susan — Capture the Light

Filed under: Updates — lv2knit @ 8:55 pm

Can you capture the light of a firefly?  Can you hold a sunbeam?  YES!  Buy gorgeous yarn!  It is almost impossible to capture the colors in pictures, however.  Here are my skeins of Lost City Silks in Honeydew (green) and Cerillos (aqua) — 1000 yds/90 grams, $60.  Now, go buy your own and see what I mean!

July 19, 2013

From Susan — World Travellers

Filed under: Updates — lv2knit @ 7:28 pm

My DD Elder just returned from South Korea, and Sally and I came back from Knitting Camp in Wis-con-sin (said with emphasis in a nasally Minnesota whine).  That counts (it is part of the world, after all!).

I told my daughter that she HAD to go to a Korean knitting store and get me something with Korean writing on it.

She found Banul:

They seemed to have a lot of cute, knitted toys.

And loved covering the walls with elaborate knitting:

She bought me a Japanese book because the [crocheted] patterns were cuter! 😉

And here is my lovely daughter, proving her knit-worthiness as she models her new Aranami shawl:

I had no idea how to wear it, but she threw it on in a flash with her impeccable fashion sense!

Sally and I had a great time at Meg Swansen’s Knitting Camp 2.75.  It is hard to describe what went on, but generally a lot of “show and tell” as Campers shared their latest projects, general discussion/Q&A about knitting minutiae, and other knitting-related activities.  Linda and Penny were our besties at Camp, and next year I hope that Kim can again come along.

We met Denise, a newbie to Camp, who dyes her own line of yarns.  We were gobsmacked by her laceweight silk yarn ($60/skein, 1000 yds/90 gms) — sold at Lost City Knits.  I am just selfish enough NOT to share the link, except that I already ordered two skeins in the colors of my choice: Honeydew and Cerillos.  I am not very original.  Denise had two shawls knit from the identical  colors and I just had to have them both!  She mentioned that Honeydew was not a big seller, so she designed and knit a shawl in that color.  It was drop dead gorgeous and now awaits her test knitters to finish it up.  Hurry it up, peeps!!

I am working on a couple of projects that will be revealed in the near future and I will share pics of my Lost City Silks when  they arrive!!!

July 7, 2013

From Sally — Reclamation Projects

Filed under: Updates — surly @ 4:08 pm

It’s happened to all of us. (It happens far too often to me.) We finish a project, and we don’t love it the way we had hoped. It may not be a disaster, but it’s not what we wanted and so it gets shoved to the back of a closet to be forgotten. With knitting, that’s really a shame because it can take so long to knit a sweater or shawl or whatever.

One of my most recent meh projects was my Summer Solstice sweater. I liked the pattern and I liked the yarn (Fibre Company’s Arcadia in the color Summer Sweet). I didn’t like the result. I had made it just a little too short (the result of not having purchased enough yarn because when I bought it I wasn’t sure what I wanted to make out of it). A reminder of what it looked like on Lucy:

See? Nothing “wrong” with it at all. But it hit me at unflattering spot and I just felt dowdy in it. Susan kept telling me to fix it. I resisted because to lengthen it required finding yarn in a different dye lot that looked plausible, removing the collar (because it is added last), knitting the additional length, and then reknitting the now even longer collar. Le sigh.

I finally decided to go ahead. I found three skeins of yarn that looked close. To be on the safe side, I chose to reuse the collar yarn for the additional length; I knew that the dye lot difference would be less noticeable if I only knit the collar out of the new yarn. So, I removed the collar, winding it into a hank/skein. I wetted it, and hung it up to dry. (That step was to remove the kinks in the yarn.) Using just that salvaged yarn, I was able to add five inches in length to the sweater. Here is my “new” Summer Solstice. (Forgive the poor quality of the photos; it is SO humid in Washington today that my camera lens kept fogging up when I went outside and it was very difficult to get any pictures.) You can see how much longer it is by looking at the hem in relation to the sleeves, even though I added an inch or so to them, too, as long as I was at it.

I think the difference in dye lots is virtually undetectable. Yay!

My other reclamation project was not a knitting one. A couple of years ago, I purchased a T-shirt meant to be worn as a tunic. I really love the color and the pattern on it, but it was too long. Too short — too long — why can’t anything ever be perfect? I had ordered this online so hadn’t been sure of the length when I bought it. It looked stupid. My sewing machine doesn’t have a serger, and I didn’t feel like spending more $$ on this thing.

Well, the other day I thought I’ll just cut it off and do a decorative hem by hand. It might work. And it did! I used an embroidery stitch in a thread color that I thought would work with the pattern.

Powered by WordPress