Adventures in Knitting

The Way of the Frog

2007-10-20T19:53:00.000-05:00

I finished the Monkster Sweater from one of my many balls of acrylic. Attaching the sleeves was like a kind of torture. I'm still not convinced that I did it the right way. No one will know that there was a big gaping hole under each arm that I was forced to sew closed with scrap yarn. To be honest I don't think an adult sized sweater will ever come off my needles. After the first sweater I knitted another one that I think turned out so much better than the first one. Reason being... I ripped it out so many times to fix the mistakes I made that it had no choice but to look better. I ripped stitches out so many times that I started to think this is the way of the frog lol. I'll add pictures another day...

First attempt:

I could have sworn I had finished pics. Must still be on camera. *crosses fingers*

Do they play with it?

2007-10-10T17:27:00.000-05:00

I finished the eggroll cat toy and gave it to my cats. They didn't show much interest when I did. I could be that I gave it to them right after a meal. I don't know. I've heard tales that they play with it, meow over it even. But I've only witnessed some interest in the toy once. I nearly fell over when I saw Mittens clawing it. I guess if they are playing with the thing it won't take long for it to follow in the footsteps of the poor turtle that no longer looks like a turtle.

When my mom first saw it she thought it was a knitted bone. lol.

The Poor Turtle

2007-09-26T06:55:00.000-05:00

This is the turtle that Lei crocheted for my cats.

Before:

After:

Egg Roll kittie toy and bears sweater

2007-09-24T20:25:00.000-05:00

Well i'm almost finished knitting my 2 cats 1 kittie toy. I found the pattern on the knitty ages ago.. started it and then put it aside. I got a little tired of the hp scarf so this was a nice short diversion. I'll have to take a picture of it when i'm done. I know I'll probably have to make another right away. One day when I'm not feeling lazy i'll have to put the pictures of the crocheted turtle Lei made for them. Omg it was so cute and clean. I took a picture of it a couple of months ago.. I didn't want to touch the nasty looking little thing. I would throw it away but its almost the only toy that Sweetpea plays with.

I also started a sweater for one of the abandoned build-a-bears that Lei rescued from the thrift store. The bear had no name and so when we went to the bab store last friday the bear which I decided was going to be a boy got a name, Gizmo. Well seeing as i'm broke and cheap right now I didn't buy the poor thing any clothes. I decided I would find some patterns for knitted bab clothes. So far i've only found a sweater. I started making it the other day. So far its only one sleeve. My first sweater and its for a stuffed bear. But it gives me a chance to get rid of abit of acrylic yarn.

I'll be knitting this forever

2007-09-14T20:56:00.001-05:00

Omg I feel as if i've been knitting this scarf forever. I think i'm nearing the end of it. It looks so much better in pictures than to the naked eye. I don't know how that is possible but thats how it is. I took pictures and was like wow look how nice this thing looks and the I looked at the scarf and all I could think was that it looked abit ratty compared to the pictures. I don't think my color changes are going any better. My technique sucks and i'm afraid that the scarf is going to fall apart after I use it abit lol. It might not but its a fear I have.
I need to get a size 7 circular needle thats 12" long I wanted bamboo but was rudely (well not rudely) told that the smallest circular in size 7 I could get would be the 16" which I already have in my needle collection. *sighs*. Plus it will cost me $14.95 well I don't want to pay that much unless I can't find something cheaper. I can't decide if I want to do the mittens or the hat first, but it won't be much of a decision if I don't get the circular needle this weekend because I think I can have the scarf done by the end of next week. I think. So I guess it will be the mittens first then the hat.

2007-08-30T19:53:00.000-05:00

Well the scarf is coming along nicely accept for one thing. Small little mistakes that I keep missing as I go but see when I'm like 20 rows away from it. I hope I can stop these cause its starting to get maddening. I refuse to rip that many rows out just for a mistake... 2 to 4 rows I'll consider but more than that and I keep going. What makes it so bad is I'll wear my mistake ridden hp & the poa scarf. I think I'll try a Hufflepuff themed scarf next year to see if I can do color changes so that they look better.

Another day of knitting

2007-08-26T20:53:00.000-05:00

Well I'm almost at my third set of color changes and they are looking abit better now thank goodness. I could have sworn I bought more of the fog color (silver or more apt a very light grey) I only have two balls of it. I hope thats enough. I think it will be enough. If its not enough i'm out of luck because knitpicks doesn't sell that color anymore... or I could always trade Lei for something I guess but if she is still anything like me aka a yarn hog I won't be getting a thing. hahaha I think I'm abit better about sharing yarn, at least I think I am.

Its been a year...

2007-08-24T22:21:00.000-05:00

Wow its been over a year since I knitted anything at all. Yesterday I picked up my hp scarf to be and started knitting. I think well I hope that I'll keep it up this time around. I've just gotten past the first series of color changes, i'm not entired pleased with how they look but hey I haven't knitted in a long time so hopefully as I do more color changes they will look better. *Crosses Fingers*

Knitting again

2006-08-31T17:26:00.000-05:00

I finally started to knit again. I promised myself that I'd be more productive so I've been doing alot of different things mostly dealing with origami stars, roses, and so on. I happened to talk to the pastor at my church and now I'm doing cupcake hats for the upcoming november fall festival. So I picked up my knitting needles two days ago, got going pretty well with the ribbing part. Then!! I forgot how to do the nubbles. So I took all night last night trying to figure it out and today it worked. Yay!! Hopefully I'll be able to make 6 cupcake hats for the festival.

I also realized that since my last trip, I quit knitting and put away all my stuff. Now my dpns that I desparately need for finishing the hats.

Knitting again?

2006-07-05T19:42:00.000-05:00

I think i'll start knitting again. I haven't picked up my needles in about a month now. What happened you ask? I got sick now i'm just about in the knitting mood again so what will I start knitting? No clue. I'll find some small project to get myself started again.

The Will to Knit

2006-06-15T13:26:00.000-05:00

I don't know what happened but the will to knit has left me... I just look at it now. I'm gonna have to force myself to start again. I spent all this money and i'm not about to waste it. I think I might just need to get out more than I have been lately.

Fill my heart with something else...

2006-06-12T23:27:00.000-05:00

So lately I haven't updated. There's just been so much going on in my life at the moment that it just seems like knitting would just make me concentrate on what I don't want to. My HP scarf now doesn't have an owner anymore. I don't know what to do with it so until I personally decide where it shall live I won't be working on it.

Here I fill my heart with hobbies, fill my time with things my mother says is useless.

These two sets are made for misaki. She needs cheering up too.

These two sets are the ones I'm planning to sell on ebay sometime soon, unless someone here wants to buy them. ^-^

I figured like having lots of stitch markers. Most of my sets are at least 10 pieces, because really what if you have 2 or 3 and you lose one? I've lost one of the pink ones that I made a while ago on my vacation and that bummed me out for a bit. But good thing I had 5 left. I really like the Good Luck set, really we all need a bit of luck while we knit may it be from the evil 'ripit' curse or the 'dropstitch' spell. I'm pretty happy with how they turned out. All the stitch markers are on my size 8 bamboo circular needles. Oh did I forget to mention that my "crystal palace" bamboo needles turned BLUE!!

My heart's just not in it...

2006-06-08T23:13:00.000-05:00

I'm finally back from my trip. It was bittersweet to say the least. I worked on my HP scarf on the way there, while I was there, and frogged it on the way back. Funny huh? My heart just isn't in it right now. I'm not sure if its the color changes that put me off or just something deeper than that. I haven't put anything on my needles since I got back from my little vacation. I don't even know when I'll put something back on, hopefully soon.

R.I.P.

2006-06-06T22:24:00.000-05:00

Well its time to acknowledge defeat. These color changes have defeated me and I'll have to frog the entire hp poa scarf and start it over again. The poor thing never had a chance. So in a little while i'll be frogging all my work and starting over again.

Nothing to report here... move along

2006-05-27T22:31:00.000-05:00

Your Brain's Pattern

You have a dreamy mind, full of fancy and fantasy.
You have the ability to stay forever entertained with your thoughts.
People may say you're hard to read, but that's because you're so internally focused.
But when you do share what you're thinking, people are impressed with your imagination.

What Pattern Is Your Brain?

Well I'm still sort of working on my HP PoA scarf... but I've been sick for the past week and haven't knitted a thing and can't say that I've had any desire to do so. I had a reaction to one of the meds the doctor prescribed to me and I ended up calling up and complaining that I couldn't take the side effects from another. I've gone broke paying for meds *cries*. So I wasn't all that eager to try another med but so far so good no side effects or nasty reactions to it. I must say however that I haven't slept so much since I was in the hospital totally drugged up. Let's see for 3 days I've been sleeping like a seasoned pro. I think tomorrow will be more of the same actually since I'm still feeling funky not as funky as before but funky all the same. So once I'm feeling back to my old self I'll get back to my next set of color changes. If this scarf is done by winter I'll count myself lucky.

thou shalt not cut thy yarn short....

2006-05-26T21:49:00.000-05:00

I did the stupidest thing yesterday. Before I frogged the scarf I don't know what came over me and told me to cut the gray yarn, but I did. I thought I left a pretty long tail to weave in for later, of course this is me. So I'm knitting up the HP scarf again, doing the color change according to the "said blog" and realized nope I can't do it like her.

1. I don't understand what she is talking about.
2. I'm too tired to try and figure it out.

So I winged it. I knitted the CC for one round, looked at the previous stitch to see if there was a jog or not. If there was a jog I knitted that one stitch again to bring it up to the same lenght as the current color. Then I placed that stitch back on the left hook and continued knitting like there was never any problem to begin with. The jog is gone on the first color change. Yayness! The second color change went pretty well until I noticed that there was 5 stitches left and no more gray yarn. OMFG! I knitted too loosely or some crap. So I was contemplating frogging it and reknitting but then I looked at my wonderful color changed and decided I'll do the next mind numbing thing.... tighting 3 rows of stitches to make myself have more yarn... So needless to say the second row isnt as pretty as the first, but at least I didn't have to frog it again.

The picture is pretty bad because the circular needles didnt want to lay down, I'm tired and decided this is what you get to see. :D

Spill the beads....

2006-05-26T06:21:00.000-05:00

I was sitting here for hours trying to figure out the best way to fix my HP scarf so that I can be happy with it. I read up on a few blogs about color changes and realized yeah I'm screwed if I don't fix it now when I haven't gone "too" far into the project. So I sat for 5 minutes and frogged like I've never frogged before. I'm still not too confident about the color change but I'll get to working on it in a bit.

So feelings kinda blue about having to frog, I stumbled on a website that had pretty stitch markers. Then I realized "ee" I have all the supplies already. For being one to pick up hobbies and drop them like a rock, I tend to have alot of stuff laying around. So I pulled out my jewelry making supplies, almost thought that I had no crimp beads left... but then realized they were sitting right in front of my face. *gasp* I'm so blind sometimes.

Five minutes into setting up I opened a tube of white and purple seed beads. Thinking nothing of it I placed it on my pc desk and continued to assemble my first stitch marker. The next thing I realize is that I'm swinging my arms across my desk to grab a pair of scissors just to realize that I've knocked over the entire tube of beads. "NOOOOOO!" Amazngly enough I only lost 1/4 of the beads and managed to put together some pretty spiffy stitch markers. Now I just have to go buy more supplies and maybe misaki will get a set for um... *thinks of a holiday* .... Father's day. Yes thats a good holiday for a gift.

Harry's horror....

2006-05-25T23:02:00.000-05:00

Ok I know that Harry wasn't part of ravenclaw but he would have been scared anyways. I really need to get a second pair of #8 circulars, 12". Since I had to pull the ones I have away from several projects multiple times to get things done. As you can see with my past few posts that the cupcake hats won the deadly battle of knits.

Now that my cupcake fetish is calmed down the HP scarf is back on the circular needles, I've just completed my first set of color change. I don't think I've done very well with it but hopefully a few more color changes and I'll be a pro. :D So far things are looking ok. The wool still feels like butter. :D

The more I look at the color change the more I feel like ripping it out.. T_T At least the gray part is the only part I cut.. The blue is still a solid piece. *sighs* I'll sleep it over and decide if I'll frog it. Or maybe someone could post a comment with any tips on how I should do color change, I'll be very very appreciative.

...with a cherry on top..

2006-05-25T21:42:00.000-05:00

Alright, I've been busting my butt making these little hats for the past few days. I'll tell you this I don't know how I've lived before circular needles. Amazing eh? It seems like yesterday I was pulling hair and screaming about circular needles. I'm content now... Ella's cupcake hat is finished. I'm contemplating putting sprinkles on it but I've been so lazy. XD

So, I decided that I wanted sprinkles on this hat as well since I've become a crazy sprinkle w*ore. So here I am putting on the sprinkles and talking to misaki on the phone. The next thing I know I look down and I've almost turned my entire hat into a huge sprinkle.. (whoopsies) After taking off a few sprinkles its ok now.

I love the top view of the hat, its so pretty... lets not talk about the mistakes I made in hat #2. DPNS = bad for me.. XD

Lucy's Hat....

2006-05-23T21:53:00.000-05:00

So I planned to make two cupcake hats besides the first one which I've already given to Nani, my neice. Here's the second one.

Its been resized because I'm paranoid that she wont fit the original sized hat even though I'm sure she would have. Instead of casting on 80 I casted on 88. Not too big of a deal eh? I actually fit this one compared to the last one I knitted. I'm thinking of taking my hp scarf off the circular needles because knitting with dpns is hell on wheels. Well not that bad, its just that I knit faster and more evenly with the circulars.. Who would have thunk it eh?

Frog it city

2006-05-20T21:32:00.000-05:00

The joys of knitting something only to notice a problem 10 rounds down. Thats what happened to me lastnight. I ended up frogging 10 rounds finding one problem spot that I didn't see on the way down. Once I got down to the trouble spot I saw there was no problem only a little extra piece attached to the yarn. So except for the one problem which was like only 3 rounds down I frogged all that for nothing. Could have cried cause I dropped stitches and had to deal with weaved in ends. So I won't be weaving anything in until i'm finished with the scarf... I learned my lesson the unpleasant way. Last but not least my b-day pressie and i've used them already when I accidently dropped 2 stitches while frogging last night. So now i'm happily knitting again. I should work on the other scarf I started too. Only I have to actually think while knitting it so its going to be slow going as I just want to mindlessly knit.

It finally came...

2006-05-18T13:53:00.000-05:00

After a long pain staking wait our knit pick yarn finally came yesterday. Free shipping is a great thing but next time I buy something I'm not going to anticipate its arrival. Since Saki and I pooled our money together and purchased a bunch of wool it went to her house. Every day she'd run down and look for it and nothing. Yesterday I get a yim saying "Guess whats at the postoffice?" Thats all she needed to say for a nice little visit from me. *big grin* I headed up to school to enroll for my evil accounting class and Saki met me there with a plastic baggie full of our yarn. Um, I guess free shipping kinda means that the packaging is lacking in desire as well. We headed to Knitorious to pick up a set of dpns for myself and for Saki. Then headed home to cuddle with all the new yarn. So here's my share of the yarn...

Of course this means that the new cupcake hat that I started on the size 8 circular needles are going to be evicted from its home and sent to live with the oh so nice bamboo dpns. At first I didn't know what I was doing and put the stitches on 4 needles. It was a bit dangerous but worked. Then I found out that it should be 3 needles with stitches 1 without. Which makes more sense but still is a bit akward. So now this is what my cupcake hat looks like...

On to the main project that is curling like crazy. My precious HP scarf. The colors that are being used is Winter Night and Fog. The wool when I first touched it felt a little like what I've been using "acrylic" but the more I knit the more it just glides along. Amazingly smooth, amazingly great, oh I just love this wool...

It finally came!!! Yummy Yarn

2006-05-18T12:39:00.000-05:00

Finally after almost 2 weeks our yarn arrived. Omg the joys of knitting with this wool. I'm loving it. It feels soft and silky in my hands. I now understand why knitters call yarn "Yummy". This yarn is yummy. I'll definitely order more. I can't wait until I can afford to try different types of yarn.

I'm so happy i'm finally working on my HP PoA Scarf its Ravenclaws house colors or as close as I could get with knitpicks yarns. I got enough yarn *crosses fingers* for my scarf, hat and mittens. I'm used to circulars now so I can happily knit using them now. I don't know if this is normal but this scarf really curls on circulars. But who cares about curling when this yarn knits up so nicely. I certainly hope blocking gets rid of the curls.

Yummies...

2006-05-17T01:06:00.000-05:00

I finally got done with my first cupcake hat. Its actually chocolate with vanilla frosting sprinkled with chocolate confetti.. Ooh its so cute. Now I have to find a child to wear it and photograph it for reference. Since I realized I can do this in about a day or two I can start making a massive amount of them for the children I know. :D Maybe some for donations as well. :D

And ye shall inherit the earth....

2006-05-16T22:05:00.001-05:00

Its always sad when someone passes on. I didn't know the lady that did and I don't think my sister even knew her very well, but her daughter was giving away all her stuff. My sister figured that no one really was going to use the knitting supplies so she brought them home for me. I've already loved on all of them. Named them all "my prickly".. ok maybe I didn't go that far. Surely they will be kept up and cared for with deepest regards. Here's a picture of the needles. The picture includes straight needles ranging from sizes 1-18, some dpns, and I forgot to put in the circular needles. Some of them were mine to begin with. (one set 5-13 straight needles)

On to the other news. I've managed to figure out circular needles. The reason why I felt so stupid before is that I was using a 29 inch long needle. Guess the saying.. bigger is better isn't true in this case. So I've been working on my lovely cupcake hat that I've sniped from chile con yarne. I've read lots of complaints about the nubbles and at first I was pretty scared of them. But I'll tell you after making 39 nubbles then realizing that I've magically lost one and having to frog the project and starting the nubbles over again has made me quite fond of them. Oh the nubbles, how wonderfully cute they make the hat. I'm not completely done with it yet.

Waiting....

2006-05-13T08:08:00.000-05:00

Well it was only yesterday that I learned how slow Knitpicks is when it comes to free shipping. The tracking number I got for SmartPost doesn't work so who knows where my package is... I certainly don't. *Sighs* It'll probably take all 14 days then some to get our yarn. Considering how slow and slightly incompetent the post office is in this area. O yeah I live in what I consider a big city but that means nothing. I can be getting a package that will fit in my mailbox with room to spare and they will make me come in to the post office to pick it up or they will tell me something was delivered to me and its still in the back. Maybe I should have future mail from Knitpicks go to Lei's house or just pay for shipping next time (although I must say I don't see that happening). So while I wait I guess I can find some other short project to do.

Yay ... Wool and its almost summer too!

2006-05-08T19:16:00.000-05:00

Yay Lei and I just ordered our first non-acrylic yarn ... wool from Knitpicks. Can't wait for it to come. I'll be starting on my HP Azkaban Scarf soon. Hopefully I won't lose interest while knitting it up since its so big. I hope I'll be done with my scarf, hat and mittens by winter. I'm so glad to be done with my current project... yeah its a scarf. I figured I want to get rid of the acrylic stash I have behind me so I'm pretty much going to knit up anything like looks halfway cute and is in range of my skill level.

I don't know what i'm going to do now so i'll be on the lookout for a quick knitting project. Maybe another scarf I've still got plenty of this color yarn left. *Sighs* I wonder if i'll ever be rid of it.

The plight of the circular needles...

2006-05-01T20:49:00.000-05:00

Circular needles are going to be the death of me.

I know it shouldn't be hard to use. One lady told me that circular needles are just straight needles connected together. Um.. that's not too helpful. So here I am trying to cast onto the circular needle. I have no problems with that, I've even managed to keep the stitches nice even and not twisted. But of course while I was trying to figure out how to use the circular needles I look down and my stitches are twisted in a bunch. I think that maybe if I sit down with someone who knows how the heck it works and see them doing it my brain might comprehend the process.. XD

So on the needles at the moment, (technically I just pulled all the yarn off, but its going back on soon) my cupcake hat.

Cables... Kitties... Cables

2006-05-01T14:41:00.000-05:00

Well I don't know which of them did it but one of my cats got a skein of the very cheap yarn that I said I was going to donate the other day. It was my own fault cause I left it where they could see it. I went to the grocery store and when I got back it was laying on the floor like a used up catnip toy. When I looked at the cats they did their best oscar winning performances of angels including the halos to show innocence. So I'll have to be alot more vigilant in the future about where I lay my yarn cheap or not.

Yay i'm teaching myself how to do cables and so far i've done two swatches. One is a simple 4-stitch cable and the other is a braid cable and they look ok whew. I'm always a little nervous about how something is going to look when its my first time doing it.

Deciding what to do next

2006-04-28T10:31:00.000-05:00

I'm trying to figure out what to do with all this acrylic yarn I have. I want to order some wool blends but really can't justify it until I get most of this yarn I have already knitted into something. I could donate some of the cheaper yarn to the Salvation Army.

Its hard to believe that I once could halfway crochet but I could. I have this sortof scarf... ok it wasn't going to be a scarf but it will be now. I'll try to hide my bad edges with a fringe but I don't think it'll hide anything so i'll give it a try anyhow. But for now I've decided I need to learn how to do cables before I tackle my Hermione Cable and Bobble Hat. I'll have to get some cable needles but i'll see if I can cheat for now and use a chopstick or something... i'll have to check to see what size all the ones i have are.

I'm going to subscribe to my first knitting magazine ever knit.l so I hope it'll be worth it. I'll subscribe to others in a few months cause they are pricey and I figure thats yarn I could be buying.

It fits now... thats a good thing right?

2006-04-25T13:37:00.000-05:00

Well I finally made myself re-knit that hat. It fits now. But I won't be the one wearing it. Its an unattractive thing, and it has nothing to do with my knitting skills or lack thereof. For some reason my sewing it up when it gets down to the garter stitch is very iffy. I'm not sure where exactly to do the sewing up at that point. I'll have to find a book or go online looking for how to do it. Now for the mittens It should be an educating experience... well to see if the pattern will be for a 8 month-old baby or for an adult like the picture shows. I'll have to remember not to make hats that look like this in the future. I tried it on and took picture and the picture wasn't flattering in the least... here's a link to another view of the winter hat. After the mittens I'll have to find another project that doesn't scream i'm never going to wear this so why knit it.

Omg the dang mittens are just as small as the hat. I've arrived at the gusset and i've realized that I nor anyone I know will be able to get their hands in this mitten. I'm not sure how to make this thing bigger either. What to do?

A palm in the hand...

2006-04-21T15:52:00.000-05:00

I started on this project a day ago and finished today. I was getting tired of having my palm pilot actually be a "palm" toy. I hate to shove it in my pocket and most times I don't wear a jacket so I'm stuck holding to my palm or shoving it in my big school bag. So I thought why not use this nice blue metalic thread type thing that I've had forever and make a purse for my darling palm? The first problem I ran into was this material. It is evil, just rub your skin off rough type stuff. The second problem was also material. I ran out of blue, but that problem was easily solved by changing to a green. I think thats the end of the problems. I did a regular garter stitch all the way through because I liked the way the metalic layed out and the cord is just a normal chain made with a crochet hook.

Yayness, I can do other things now without worrying about either dropping the palm to exercise or just drop excercising. ^_^ I don't think that the pictures does it justice, its much much prettier in person since the metalic parts catch the light so nicely.

The Head Hugger from Hell...

2006-04-18T16:20:00.000-05:00

Ok, if you haven't realized yet you'll realize this one fact now. Misaki and I almost always go shopping together (knitting supplies only I remind you). So here's a project that misaki has been mumbling about.

I've finished with it a few days ago but haven't had the motivation to photograph or blog about it until I noticed Misaki complaining about it. It turned out really small. YES really small. I fit it but if left on longer than 5 minutes I'm sure the blood circulation to my brain would be cut off. So needless to say this shall be a gift for a small child. *loves children* Not only that it took me more than 1 ball of yarn to complete the hat. The kit came with 5 balls of yarn for a pair of mittens, 1 hat, 1 scarf. I plan on not doing the mittens since I don't know anyone on earth (besides misaki) who'd wear mittens. ^^;;

The needle that came with the set is a size 13. It's massive compaired with what I've been working with before but amazingly enough it was pretty comfortable to work with. As soon as I decide how I'm going to do the scarf since I shall not be using the pattern they gave I'll start knitting that up.

Knitting Kit

2006-04-18T13:30:00.000-05:00

How do I begin? I knitted that swatch and all that from one of the knitting kits I bought on clearance and that turned out ok. Then I started work on the hat. That seemed to be going ok until I got to the last row of the hat and realized that this hat that is pictured on a grown woman in the picture on the package doesn't look big enough in reality to fit a 3 year old child. I haven't even sewn the thing together yet. *Sighs* What am I supposed to do with it... I could frog it and sacrifice either the mittens or the scarf so that I can have an adult sized hat. The woman in the picture must be a umm how do I say this politely? A female Oompa Loompa or an exceptionally thin/short human. I guess i can say by to the scarf since I wanted to learn how to do mittens. I'll have to take a picture of this hat later today and scan the picture on the package.

Swatch making

2006-04-16T07:50:00.000-05:00

I started knitting up a swatch for a hat, mitten and scarf kit that I bought not to long ago. The thing came with these hidious looking sequins (so cheap looking) so I think i'm going to leave them off. So after I check the gauge of it I'll start work on them. Not like i'm actually moving to do anything right now.

Finally finished

2006-04-11T22:01:00.000-05:00

Well I finally finished it. Actually the second legwarmer is sewn up so much better than the first. But it doesn't matter since its my first finished knitted piece i'll just glad its done and looks decent. One thing is obvious to me now... I must work on how I hold the yarn because I can see how it affected the look of the two pieces. I think tomorrow I'll see where I am with the purple monster and start work on it again *sighs*. My heart just isn't with it anymore but I don't want it in my bag looking at me all the time.

Lazy knitting day

2006-04-10T19:02:00.000-05:00

I've finished knitting my leg warmers ... i've even sewn one up. It looks dodgy on half of it and i'm to lazy to take it out and do it again cause i've already ripped that part out like 3 times. So its gonna stay that way the rest of it looks fine. The second leg warmer should be easier since I sort of know what i'm doing now. I haven't done a lick of knitting today cause i've been messing around on the pc and talking on the phone. I'll probably sew up the second one tonight and be done with it. I hate to say this but if they fall apart I won't be in the least surprised, good thing I have a ball of yarn left just in case that happens.

Mission 1 Complete...

2006-04-09T15:59:00.000-05:00

Yay! I finally finished my project today. I actually would have finished last night if I wasn't so tired. So today I sat down and ignored my family to finish the very few last rows. Here it is. It didn't turn out exactly like I wanted to but its still cute. I bought 4 rolls of bernat satin for this project and I have a roll +some left. I really could have made it longer. Maybe if I ever decide to make a second pair I'll alter the pattern a bit.

So here's a few pictures... I should have found my chunky shoes it would have served a better then the ones I'm wearing. Oh well. ^__^ Maybe when I get thinner.. I'll throw together a nice Japanese-ish school uniform. :P

Anime-ish?

2006-04-08T10:42:00.000-05:00

Alright my first big knitting project that came from a free pattern. It's almost done yay! Past few weeks have been majorly busy and I've been neglecting my knitting. Bad me. I've learned a few things about myself through knitting. You're probably wondering what in the world I could have learned about myself in just a few weeks that I haven't known before.

1. I'm addicted to yarn.
2. Even though I'm addicted, I know how to put down the needle. An example would be, the other night I was knitting my loose socks (I know they are legwarmers) and I wanted to knit a few more rows.... Just a few more rows. The next thing I remember is throwing the needle and waking up in the morning. XD
3. Time is too precious to waste so knit. I knit waiting for the bus, on the bus, between classes, anywhere I can squeeze in a few rows.
4. I can multi-task. I may not be able to walk and chew gum at the same time but I've mastered walking while dragging my roll along bookbag and knitting all at the same time. Sometime's I amaze myself.

Woohoo internet access

2006-04-06T19:34:00.000-05:00

The people who work at my isp aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer. Since when does getting a new phone number constitute totally cutting off my dsl and deleting my email account. Then they couldn't figure out what the hell they did. But finally someone figured it out and fixed it... i'm still not satisfied but there isn't anything I can do. On that note I pretty much finished one leg warmer since I couldn't get online. I'm working on the second leg warmer with alot less enthusiasm. But i'll get there. Then i'll get back to the purple monster and the poncho. Why am I knitting all this winter time stuff? Not a clue... i'll have to find a summertime project, only by time i'm finished knitting it winter will be here again. I really need a life internet and knitting omg warmer weather has to arrive soon so I can get out.

A few days ago I went to the store and they had knitting kits on clearance so I got one of each... now I'm rolling the yarn and sticking it all in ziplock bags and throwing it in my stash bag. I'll get to it eventually. My little sweetpea had to walk her little self in here while I was rolling yarn and well I must say I don't trust her one little bit she's been eyeballing my yarn and my stash bag since I started knitting. She goes as far as to look me straight in the face and put her two little paws right on the bag as if she is about to hop right in and experience kitty heaven. So I have to be on my guard cause I know if i'm not she's gonna reek havoc.

Storm roars through

2006-04-03T09:11:00.000-05:00

Two days ago I went to the local craft stores with some friends and couldn't understand my the arthritis in my hands was just losing its mind and going crazy. I was perfectly fine that morning by nightfall my hands felt as if they had been runover by some maniac in a car who then proceeded to backup over them and the next day wasn't any better. So there was no knitting of any kind whatsoever going on for the past two days needless to say. Then last night some really nasty thunderstorms with exceedingly high winds roared through and that explained everything. Today I should be able to work on one or two of my projects. I need to get back to my purple monster so I can at least finish with the second set of balls. Meanwhile i'm still converting patterns I found online into pdf files instead of the bulky html files with their separate folders.

The start of a new addiction...

2006-03-31T21:49:00.000-06:00

It's amazing what idle time can cause a person to think up. My main problem in life, well one of the few, is picking up new hobbies and I've got quite a few of them. The newest of these hobbies is knitting. I've done a handful of crocheting projects before and since my lovely friend has given me a truck load of free patterns that she's picked up from the local craft stores we decided why not start a project together. It also helped that we were in luck of some really soft and pretty NOBO yarn. Did I forget to mention that it was $1? So with an armful of yarn we had to throw ourselves out of the store before we could get ourselves into anymore trouble. With the purple yarn I did manage to make a scarf, but on the start of the second roll the pattern vanished. So I frogged half of the project and decided that its a nice scarf for a child.

A few weeks later, we stumble on another great find. Bernat silk yarn for $1. So I went home with 4 and the dedication of making these cute legwarmers. I'll have to post pictures of it when I'm done with them.

So thats how addictions start.

Free Patterns Bliss

2006-03-31T21:08:00.000-06:00

How did it happen that I've become this free pattern-o-holic. It doesn't even matter if the pattern is for the ugliest thing you've ever seen either. If i'm online and see a free pattern you better believe its saved before I even realize that i've saved it. I'm the same in craft stores if its there I have it. I'll even collect the free patterns for friends. I'm shameless about it really. I plan on buying pattern books eventually but at this point in my knitting life... I couldn't even follow much less read them. I learned to increase this past week and only because one of the patterns that i'm working on called for it. Otherwise I wouldn't have bothered until later. I'm gonna have to start working on the purple monster again or I won't get back to it for awhile.

Project Update

2006-03-30T13:20:00.000-06:00

I haven't worked on my block afghan that I call the purple monster in a few days and its a bit refreshing to get away from it for a little while. One benefit of knitting an afghan when its cold you can sit under it while knitting it... cozy. Before it got this big I had to frog it... I resisted until I could no longer deny it needed to be restarted. I must admit that it photographs better than it looks in reality. It looks all nice and not fuzzy.

How did I end up with three projects going at the same time? O yeah a friend roped me into making leg warmers <--. I think the pattern is wrong cause it gives instructions for a seed stitch not a knit 1 purl 1 rib. It drove me up the wall for awhile then I just did it my way. Its actually going faster than I thought it would and its alot longer than it was earlier this morning. This is only the first one though i'm a little nervous about sewing it together ... I don't sew, period.

I think i'm on the road to becoming an obsessive knitter. Its hard for me to stop. I'll knit into the late hours of the night then wonder why i'm so tired the next day. I think i'm going to have to put myself on a knitting schedule so that I can have some balance.

Purple Monster

2006-03-28T19:28:00.000-06:00

After reading so many different blogs on knitting I decided why not do one myself. So here goes. I'm new to knitting and basically just knit and purl nothing else no increasing no decreasing nothing. For my first project I decided to do this free afghan pattern I got from the stores craft department. Why didn't I choose something simpler like a scarf I don't know and can't even explain my decision. Its not like the instructions are hard are anything like that. Except that it told me I needed circular needles... now as a beginner what am I supposed to do with them? I'll tell you what I did I gave up in frustration. I got in the car drove myself to the store and bought straight needles the same size and pawned off the offending size 13 circulars on a friend who is also learning to knit. So now i'm almost finished with the second pair of balls for the afghan and looking forward to getting to the third and last 2 and finishing. I'll have to take a picture of my medicore work. But I tell you one thing i'll be laying under it every chance I can get because it was made by my own hands.