Cat Bordhi + Cast On Podcast + Caffeine = Inspiration

It's been an interesting day.

When I went to work this morning, I had a killer headache, so I took some medicine. Medicine with about as much caffeine as a cup of coffee.

This was a risk, as I am very sensitive to caffeine. If I eat too many m&m's, I will get a caffeine buzz for a little while, then get tired, restless and be unable to relax.

To help me feel better, and since I'm lucky enough to be able to listen to music at work, I turned on the new episode of Cast On. And Cat Bordhi was the guest. If Cat Bordhi is the mad scientist of knitting design, then Brenda Dayne is the Kung Fu master of podcasting.

With this perfect storm of energizing forces and creative genius, I had quite the rush of designing inspiration at work. A few new design ideas came to me, and I had a couple of break throughs in some of the older ideas I've had bouncing in my head.

I couldn't justify sketching at the office, let alone play with yarn. Believe it or not, I was actively working. Frustrating!

And even if I could have sketched, I don't have an organized way to keep track of these ideas. Even more frustrating!

So I'm starting a design journal.

And yes, I'm talking about designing, which isn't something I've ever really talked about here. Recently I've been almost exclusively using other people's patterns, perhaps playing with yarn choices. But I would like to start designing more of my own projects. They may not necessarily be published, but if they are, I have some ideas, especially for online publishing. Think of a sweater pattern in a worksheet, where you input your gauge and desired dimensions, and customized instructions are automatically calculated. No math or spreadsheet prowess necessary. If you can type in a few numbers, and hit print, you have your very own custom pattern.

Also, I've been making progress on the Ravelympics project.



This is how it looks right now. I'm not going to post every day's progress picture, because they all look pretty similar. They can be seen at my Flickr page

This energy has made me overly optimistic about what I can accomplish this evening. My to do list is ridiculous! I just hope I don't crash.

More Knitting Olympics Progress

It's not yet afghan sized, but it's getting there.

Day 2



Day 3



As you can see, Indy clearly approves.

Ravelympics Day 1

Here are the results of day one of my Ravelympics project.



I didn't take a picture on 8/8/08 because I didn't get home till midnight that night, and I was dead tired. We knitters know how to party.

I've found that, for now, this project is relatively portable. I'm sure once it gets bigger that will change.

Getting Ready for the Knitting Olympics

This year for our anniversary, Nerdy Husband and I decided to get ourselves presents. He got a Playstation 3. I got these



I ordered the swift and ball winder online from Hank's in Gainesville, and on the day it arrived, I walked in to find this.



It was wrapped in Christmas-y gift wrap and came with a very funny card. It just got better. When I unwrapped it, I found a note written on the side from the awesome ladies at the yarn store.



A ball winder and swift. Good thing too, because I had to wind all this.



into this




That's 24 different shades of Cascade 220. What am I going to do with it? I'm basically copying Brouhaha's Curve of Pursuit. It's gorgeous, and my afghan is as much inspired by her work as it from the pattern from Wooly Thoughts.

That being said, no, I'm not going to knit an entire afghan in 17 days. My goals are to knit every day (which I normally don't do) and make an average of 1 square a day, or 17 squares total over the course of the games. I also want to take a picture of my progress every day.

Although I think I may be crazy to knit a worsted weight 100% wool afghan in August in Florida.

Catch Up Post: Random Baby Stuff

So, in early spring this year, there was a small baby boom in the people around me. People at work, ladies at the knitting group, and even our neighbors were popping out babies. Must be something in the water.

Of course, these new arrivals mean: baby gifts. I made a few.

First, three different burp cloths. The pattern is the Baby Genius Burp Cloth, from Mason Dixon Knitting. The yarn is various shades of Peaches n Cream. I used size 4 needles to get a really tight fabric. These are very pretty and absorbent.







Next, some booties.

The "Free Baby Mary Jane" pattern by Lucie worked in Lane Cervina Madrid Solid gives these







So cute and interesting construction.

I also used the Jimmy's Baby Bootie Set pattern, and the same yarn, to make these.



Also cute, but in my opinion this yarn has a bit too much definition for the pattern. It looks a little wonky.

And lastly, a Baby Bib o' Love (again from Mason Dixon Knitting, and in Peaches n' Cream).



I paired up these gifts (everyone got two), and got some takeout containers from Micheals.

This set went to Deborah from the knitting group (recipient of Super Secret Project #2) who had a baby around Easter time.



These booties (and the pink burp cloth) went to our neighbor. I don't know what colors they like, so I just went with lots of color.



That table is our dining room table. Can you tell that this was during exam season? I wish I could say it wasn't always covered by study materials and/or my sewing machine.

And, for this last set I had no cute takeout container, but I did have a model help me out.



Don't be too hard on Indy, he was having a bad face day. I only did this because he kept getting into the pictures I was trying to take. clicky

In other news, May 19th was a pretty lucky day for me, I passed my exam! Which is good because that one's done, but bad because I have to start studying for my next one, which is a bitch.

Super Secret Group Project #2

Here is Super Secret Group Project #2:



and the other side



It's a baby blanket for Deborah, a member of our group. A bunch of people from our group did individual squares of all different stitch patterns and colors. Most of the squares were knitted, and there was one crocheted square.


We planned on putting together the blanket at one of our meetings, because we didn't think she'd be there. We thought she wouldn't be able to make it, but she showed up!

It was good and bad. Good because we had a chance to get the blanket to her that night, bad because instead of a seaming party, we had a seaming work camp.

So we laid out all of our squares on the table at Panera.



And started seaming. We got most of it done, but at the end of the night, it was still incomplete, and we hadn't even started the border. So I took it home and finished seaming it up.



Then gave it a bath (you can see the vinegar and dish soap).



And wet blocked it.



After it was dry, I crocheted on a border and lightly steam ironed it.

It turned out as a beautiful, cuddly blanket for the new arrival!

Super Secret Gruop Project #1

So, I'm really far behind in my blogging, because this Super Secret Group Project #1 listed here was made and gifted in February, and I've really wanted to share it since. This is just one more reason why our knitting circle is teh roxor.



All this icord was made by the group (hand knit, a little machine knit, and crochet). What could it be for?





Indy wonders why I've once again knit something taller than I am.

Well, it's to make these:



Wait, that doesn't make much sense. Donna, Brenda and Susan, let's try it again!



There we go.

These signs are for Jodi (shown seated)



She ran her first marathon. And to show our support we marathon knitted icord to make some signs which Brenda put them together for us. Jodi thought we were joking when we said we'd be there cheering her on with big signs, and she certainly didn't know we would knit them!

They got a few comments at the race, and they made Jodi do a double take. She saw us, high-fived Donna, who was taking pictures, and kept running. Then, when she was about fifty feet past us she turned around and starting pointing wildly at the signs. We all laughed and told her to keep going, she was doing great, we'd talk about it later.

At our next meeting, we all signed the signs and gave them to Jodi. And she's been displaying them in her house ever since!

And yes, since this is Super Secret Group Project #1, there is a #2. It's in the works right now, and will hopefully be complete and gifted soon. But probably blogged about much later...

Following Trends: Jaywalkers

I had this really original idea of making Jaywalkers in a self striping yarn.



So this is about the billionth pair of Jaywalkers, so I don't feel bad that there aren't many pictures.

This is a Christmas present for my mother-in-law, who received them last weekend. Not that they weren't done by January 1st, but because I wanted to deliver them in person, because I was afraid they wouldn't fit. These socks had very little stretch, so I wouldn't make them as a gift unless I had a model handy. As it was, I had a stand-in at knitting group with the same size shoe who was gracious enough to try them on multiple times (thanks Jen!).

Unfortunately I don't have a stand-in for the gloves I'm making my Dad for last Christmas. They're still in progress because I can only work on them when he's around to try them on to make sure the finger tips are all the right size. Well, he'll probably have a nice pair of think wool gloves for June in Florida.

Nike + iPod = Knit?

My latest project took me about 15 minutes to make, and is about the size of my thumb, but it's one of the things that gets the most use of everything I've made, and it can't really be store bought.

Well, not cheap at least. My husband runs, and he uses the iPod pedometer (http://www.apple.com/ipod/nike/). There is an attachment to the iPod and a sensor that is supposed to go inside of these specially designed Nike running shoes that have a slot for it.



However, Nerdy Husband doesn't like the Nike shoes in that line, so our DIY spirit kicked in and we figured that we'd find some other way of attaching the sensor to the shoe. NH found an article with a hack for it.

So the version 1.0 was born. It's essentially a tube knit around the sensor. In my infinite wisdom I decided to make in in 2x2 ribbing, out of Lion Brand Microspun. It was ugly, as this was B.S. (Before Socks) and I was unfamiliar with the figure eight cast on, and the yarn and ribbing were bad choices. It was sewn onto the shoe, so in order to take it off, he had to unlace his shoes.



It's pretty wonky, but it's functional. Unfortunately, the sensor is knit into the tube, so when the battery of the sensor died last week, NH asked me to make him another cozy. This led to Version 2.0, which is infinitely better.

MMMmmmm Alpaca

Last weekend I went to the Alpaca Fest with some people from the knitting circle.

We came for the



and stayed for the





I thought that fiber would be the highlight of the show, but those animals are so darn cute, they totally won us over. My main goal was to pet an alpaca. And I did. Here's proof:



There were so many alpaca there. There were chocolate alpaca




and dirty alpaca...




and surfer alpaca...




and emo alpaca...




Some were shy




and others have so much hair they can't see




and many were gorgeous.



This one looks like living, breathing Lorna's Laces or Socks that Rock. This picture doesn't do it justice.


We felt up some fiber




and got tattoos (thanks to Jen, you rock)




and I may or may not have bought some yarn



This is undyed alpaca light weight, from Long Skinny Ranch. It came off the alpaca like that. Amazing.

As amazing as the animals were, we were equally amazed at how nice alpaca people are. The folks at Breath of Heaven Alpaca Ranch were there spreading the good word of alpaca, and our knitting circle will probably be taking a trip out there soon. I got some interviews and clips of alpacas humming for the podcast, and everyone I asked was more than willing to answer questions.

3 a.m. Cable Hat

I just finished the 3 a.m. Cable Hat, the dk weight version.

And I bought a head to show it off. May I present Jayne:



OK, so Jayne has a smallish head, and the hat's a little big. Which is good. At least Jayne can wear my Kittyville Hat and I can wear the cable hat.

See:



Sorry for the poor lighting and bad angle. That is indeed the same hat, NH was just too lazy to stand up when asked to take a picture.

The yarn was Alpaca with a Twist "Highlander" in color 0299, a deep gray with flecks of white and tan. It's warm, soft, and yummy-liscious, and it makes me want to move to a climate where I can wear alpaca on a regular basis. Speaking of which, I finished this hat at knitting group the day after our only coldsnap broke, when we went from a hard freeze to t-shirt weather in less than 48 hours, and it's stayed unseasonably warm.

During that cold snap, on the coldest day of the year, my husband turned to me and said "You know what would be good right now? Some hand knit socks." My husband, who only recently received a hand knit sweater from me. The one who watched me work feverishly to make hand knit socks for his parents' Christmas gifts. The one who I asked a had asked a week before the cold weather broke if he wanted socks and didn't seem too enthused about the idea. I love him, but seriously...

So he's getting a pair of Arrgyle socks to match the pair I'm making myself. The Yarn Harlot's post on her argyles has a lot of information and I'm just going to go for it.

As to whose socks are getting made first, I still haven't decided.

Dishcloth Set for Grandma

So after expressing some optimism that I might actually get all of my holiday knitting done on time in the last post, I totally dropped the ball and ended up only getting 2 of the 4 gifts done on time. In fact, I haven't finished anything since that post.

Here's something that did go out on time, a set of dishcloths for my grandma.



The term set may be a little pretentious for two dishcloths, but they're coordinated. In fact, the patterns for both came from the same book, Mason Dixon Knitting.

First is the Mason Dixon Dishcloth, which has already been posted about. It's yellow Peaches n' Cream.

Next is the ball band dishcloth.



This is the same yellow Sugar n' Cream, along with Peaches n' Cream Baby Ombre. The color pooled in the most awesome way, with diagonal strips of pink, blue and white. It looks great.

Look at the texture (ignore the slightly uneven stitches, this is before washing):



This was well received, and grandma is probably going to use them as decoration. I'm ok with that.

Probably my favorite (and most unexpected gift) this year was this:



Sock yarn from my knitting group. There's a ball of Lana Grossa and some Socks That Rock. STR socks are what's in the cue as soon as I get my MIL's Jaywalkers done.

And for a last little bit of Christmas spirit:



Santa or Hagrid? You decide.