theraineysisters knitting and so much more

I recently finished my version of Andrea Mowry’s Comfort Fade Cardigan.  Am I the last knitter to make something she designed?  I may be.

My cardigan is not faded.  I fell in love with a beautiful yarn from Biscotte called DK Pure.  It’s 90% merino and 10% silk in the color way Fleur de Cerisier.  (Click to open their photo which is what seduced me in the first place.)  Fleur de Cerisier means cherry blossom.  I miss my beautiful DC cherry trees so I loved the name.  Knitted up, the fabric reminds me of melted strawberry ice cream — another of my loves.

I didn’t make too many changes to the sweater — just a few modifications to the numbers to create a custom size.  This poor cardigan was put in hibernation I don’t know how many times, though.  I can’t even remember when I started it!  When I ran across it a week or two ago I realized I had last put it down with only about six inches left on the second sleeve.  Crazy.  I rescued it and finished it off.  Loki had helped in the meantime by eating the page with my pattern notes.  Bad dog!!!

I’m very happy with how the sweater turned out despite all of my self created delays.  It would have made a beautiful summer cardigan if I’d gotten my act together, but now it will have to cheer me up through the long coming winter.  Not great photos, but I am having foot surgery tomorrow and am too frantically busy getting organized to take better ones.  Wish me luck!  (And right now I’m craving some strawberry ice cream!)

We are ecstatic!!

When I wrote about my friend Pam, I looked high and low for a picture.  Another peep from our knitting group shared this wonderful picture!!  That is me sitting to her left!  This shows her wonderful smile.

Minnesotans must now vote in person from today forward.  Your vote may not be counted unless you drop off your ballot in person NOW or vote in person.  Voter suppression is very real.  Make sure your voice is heard!!

PS to JennR:  We try to stay apolitical on our blog, but I guess I’ll tread into those waters very briefly.  I am not alone in saying voter suppression is real.  It is rampant.

It is suppression to change rules in midstream.  To say that ballots postmarked on election day were to be counted and now may not be counted.  It is suppression to throw multiple wrenches into the postal service to slow down mail delivery, on purpose.  It is suppression to rail against the validity of our voting process and mail in voting (while doing it yourself) in order to sow doubt in the minds of the electorate about the reliability of the outcome.  It is suppression to use the courts to fight against counting votes.  It is suppression to limit polling places so people have to wait hours to vote, in a pandemic — talk about a barrier!

But people are voting, that’s for sure.  I hope their votes are counted.

Wee and FREE!  I just posted a new, free pattern on Ravelry for these lil cuties.  Pattern is called Wee Pumpkins.

They are 3 1/2″ wide by 2″ wide.  Take very little time to make!

PS – the large pumpkin was purchased at Target.

First of all, I would like to thank everyone for the kind words about my friend, Pam.  Means a lot!!

I just finished Riverfront, a unique and fun scarf project, designed by my friend Scott Rohr (co-owner of The Yarnery).  The scarf was part of the ongoing Progressive East End Project (aka PEEP) hosted by yarn shops on the east side of the Twin Cities.  In typical times, people would travel from shop to shop to gather the yarn for the project.  This year, they had to do things differently, and did a multi-clue virtual KAL.  Each shop put together a kit and made the announcement – BOOM!  Kits sold out immediately.  But, I snagged a Yarnery kit.  Yay!  You can knit this without a kit.  It takes one large skein (~80 grams)and 6 minis of 20 grams each, in sockweight.  The kit used Malabrigo Sock.

I of course used my No End Stripes techniques and only had the bind off tail to weave in.  I did full Russian joins when the color transitions were high contrast and simple splicing when the changes were less abrupt.

Riverfront shows the undulating profile of the river that runs through the Twin Cities., the mighty Mississippi.  At least I assume that’s the river that inspired Scott!!  This blocking picture shows the scarf in its entirety:

Yep, it’s all short rows!  Simple garter stitch W&T short rows.

Some people said they ran out of some colors.  I was worried about the purple, so I substituted Abril for the Dewberry in the kit.  I would have had enough, but I’m a tight knitter.  After blocking, the scarf is very soft and drapey — perfect against the skin!  Today it is 25 degrees so I think I’ll get some use out of it!!

PS to Amy:  I have thought the same thing about kits, but didn’t worry about this one because it would be easy to substitute from stash if need be.  With sweaters, I try to order extra yarn because I have to lengthen everything.

A dear peep from my Thursday knitting group has succumbed to a long battle with cancer.  She kept up her spirits and her infectious smile through it all.  She never focused on her illness or negativity.  With the pandemic, we started weekly Zoom calls which she attended until the last few weeks.  Our worst fears were realized — her journey ended two weeks ago today.  This past year, Pam was knitting up a storm — many beautiful items to leave as a legacy to family and friends.  Our group is so much smaller with her passing.

I’ve heard from a lot of friends asking whether we’ve been affected by the fires in northern Colorado, so I thought I’d write a brief update.

There are multiple fires in Colorado right now, but three of them affect us:  Cameron Peak, Cal-Wood, and Left Hand Canyon.

The Cameron Peak fire is not particularly close to Boulder.  It’s due west of Fort Collins, which is an hour drive.  However, it’s a monster — the biggest fire in Colorado history.   It’s been burning for about two months and still only 50-60% contained last I heard.  The smoke from this fire has often blanketed Boulder as well as much of northern Colorado.  On Friday, I took this photo out of my living room window in the middle of the afternoon.    The smoke from Cameron Peak was the worst it has ever been.  The second photo was taken from the same window today at about the same time.   See?  I’m supposed to be able to see the foothills from my window.  And, no, there was no filter used in that smoke photo.  The sky was that color; in fact, it looked worse in real life.

The good news for us is that the Cameron Peak fire is an hour away.  Unfortunately, on Saturday a new wildfire started much closer to Boulder.  Around 12:30 or 1:00 I saw a few puffs of fresh black smoke out my window as I looked north.  I could tell it had to be a new fire — it was too close to be from Cameron Peak.

Within a very short period of time,  it looked like this:

This was the Cal-Wood fire, which exploded down the foothills — it burned almost 9000 acres and 25-30 homes in a matter of a few hours.  Tanker planes and helicopters flew back and forth over our house all Saturday afternoon and evening.  After it grew dark, we could see flames in the distance from our house and from various roads and vantage points in North Boulder.

Just now, another tanker plane flew overhead.  Those guys are amazing — they disappear into the smoke and swirling winds.  Over and over.  Having this fire blow up so close to Boulder city limits was unnerving.  I was so touched at how the community pulled together to help:  offering to rescue livestock, provide pasturage, trailer horses, and shelter strangers.

Last but not least, on Sunday, another smaller fire started up in Left Hand canyon.  Firefighters threw everything they had at it right away and it has stayed under 300 acres.  Thank goodness for lighter winds and a bit of drizzle in this terrible drought we’ve been in.

Cal-Wood is now about 15% contained.  It’s approximately 4 or 5 miles north of us, but they’ve controlled the southern edge so we feel secure.

Bottom line:  We are safe.  We are humbled and grateful.  We are on guard.  And some of us are knitting.

I’ve been working for the last couple of days on Beyul designed by Justyna Lorkowska.  I’m not too far along but I’m enjoying knitting with it.  The pattern is extremely clear and well thought out.  I bought the yarn at my one and only Rhinebeck — Susan and I were planning to go again this year but we all know how that turned out.  Bittersweet to pick it up the weekend Rhinebeck was supposed to take place.  The yarn is Miss Babs Yowza in the color Tulipa.

The back as I work down to the bottom of the armhole.

How long could it possibly take to knit a cap sleeve slightly cropped sweater with color work in the yoke?  A very long time if you go by my Lovebirds sweater.  Of course, knitting the yoke 2 1/2 times didn’t help!  Here’s the saga of my Lovebirds.

I saw this pattern on Ravelry and loved the original color way, which you can see here.  I went out and bought the exact same yarn.  (I already knew that I liked knitting with Spincycle’s Dyed in the Wool.)  After knitting most of the yoke — this is a top down sweater — I didn’t love how it looked.  The Sunset Strip color way was simply too yellow for me.  Yellow is one of those colors I just can’t wear easily.

Here’s a photo taken after I had started to rip it out.  I was much further along.  There’s nothing wrong with the color; I just wasn’t happy with it on me.

I put Lovebirds aside for a number of months and then discovered a color of Spincycle — Midsommar — that was similar to Sunset Strip but had more pink than yellow in it.  I wanted the hearts to pop and so I used some Spincycle Dyed in the Wool in the Devilish Grin color for those.  (It was leftover from my knitted clock.

I started over.  I finished the color work.  I separated for the sleeves.  One of the design options for the body of the sweater is to add cables.  As I was about to start the first cable row, I realized that in my size the center cable was not going to line up with the row of hearts that finishes the color work.  Moreover, now that I was looking at it more closely, I realized that none of the motifs lined up down the center as they had on the pattern model.  Was it me?  Had I screwed up?  I looked at some of the other finished sweaters.  No — it wasn’t me.  I had assumed the motifs would line up on all sizes and had been so busy knitting away I hadn’t noticed that they were off.  (I do not have a photo of what the sweater looked like at this point.)

Let me say that there is nothing wrong with the other sweaters I looked at.  The overall pattern is happy and fun and the finished sweaters looked great.  But as longtime readers know, Susan and I are perfectionists.  I wanted my motifs to line up!

I couldn’t bear to start completely over for a third time.  My solution:  rip out to just before I separated for the sleeves, then shift the sleeve placement so that the patterns lined up the way I wanted.  No problem — except that this is a top down sweater that uses short rows to raise the back neck.  If I simply moved the sleeves, I’d end up with the neck short rows draped over one shoulder.

I decided to cut off the yoke above the color work.  I found the new center of the front and placed the sleeves accordingly.  Then I re-knit the short rows and neck ribbing from the bottom up.

The removed original neckline

Checking to see whether the motifs are lining up and the short rows are working

New neckline finished and knitting the body

It worked!

I hope you’re not tired of ganseys and baby knitting because I’ve just finished two projects using Susan’s new gansey hat and sweater patterns.

One of my nieces had a baby girl last February.  I started knitting a dress for her in the winter but didn’t like the yarn and so I put it aside.  I still needed to knit something for her and the Baby Gansey sweater designed by Susan was perfect.

I used BeWoolen’s Merino DK in the Fate color way — a light pink with gray undertones.  For the trim, I used Mrs. Moon’s Plump DK in Earl Grey (leftover in my stash).  I wanted it to be feminine but not overly girly.  Success!  I’ve decided it has a sophisticated Chanel vibe — don’t disabuse me!

I added a bead to each button.

It’s not a challenging knit, but you do need to pay attention to the pattern.  The directions themselves are very clear.

Next up, I wanted to knit a hat for a friend’s new grandson.  By this time, Susan had finished her Gansey Hat for Everyone pattern.  I used the same gray yarn from my stash that I’d used for the sweater trim.  There’s a choice in her pattern of 3 gauges and 8 sizes.  The baby is only two months old, but I decided to go for the 6-12 month size in the 5 stitches to the inch gauge.  The red trim is some Neighborhood Fibre Worsted in the Cooper Circle color that I stole from my stash.

I added an extra pop of color between the patterning and the stockinette.  To do that, I knit a row in the red and then purled a row.  (If you start by purling, you’ll get bumps of the first color which will spoil the look somewhat.)  I used the method recommended by Susan in the pattern for eliminating the jog when using a color — as you can see from the photo of the back, it worked perfectly.

Both presents are winging their way to the recipients as we speak. Whew!