Eleven Stitches

Red, Red, Red

Red is one of my favorite colors.  And after a skein of Araucania Toconao (Rav) in a gorgeous shade of crimson followed me home from my LYS, I started to realize that I have a fair amount of worsted-weight red yarn.

I've also been thinking about vests recently.  I have knitted several vests, but none of them fit exactly the way I like.  One is too big, one has a neckline I can't make work, one is nice but the straps are too wide. So I really would like to make a simple vest that gets all the measurements right so I can use it as a template for any other vest I make.

I decided to make a red vest, of course!  I'm striping these yarns together, switching them every row.  I'm using the Araucania yarn every other row as the "base" yarn. I thought the resulting fabric would look striped, but the colors are close enough that it looks like a semi-solid instead.

I adore the way this looks (it's even nicer in person, too).  The color just glows!  I also won't have to worry about running out of yarn or matching dye lots.  If it looks like I'm short, I'll just pick up another worsted red to add to the mix.

I've got about five inches of twisted-stitch 1x1 ribbing done so far.  I've never had the patience to make the ribbing on a sweater or vest as deep as I would like, but with this color and these yarns, I'm not complaining.

All sorts of progress

I have a few bits of progress to show you.  First of all, I finished knitting all but the button band and collar of David's sweater.

All I need is a little steeking, and another ball of the brown yarn.  The yarn is on the way, and you know I'm not scared of steeks!

I finished Violette-le-duc, but I'm not sure I like it.  I do love the edging, however.  Its so texturey, and brown + red = great in my (weird math) book.

I also tried mordanting my yarn with alum before some blackberry dyeing, and these are the results.

Clockwise from far left: frozen blackberries with alum, plain, fresh berries with alum, fresh berries alone, and frozen berries alone.

The colors did not significantly darken, but they are both slightly more purple, and the frozen berries produced a brighter color.  I'm still unsure what I want to do, but I have decided against a striped combination of colors.  I knitted up a swatch, and it just didn't grab me.

Since I've finished (or almost finished) up a few projects, I had to cast on something new.  More on that soon!

More Stockinette

I had big plans for this weekend!  My school gives us an extra-extra long weekend for President's Day, and there was a ton of crafty, blog-rich things on my list.  Unfortunately, the series of three colds I've had since New Year's finally delivered a sinus infection that hit me hard on the last afternoon of school. Two subsequent days in bed (or more accurately, in comfy red chair) left me with some knitting progress, but no yarn dyed, no quilt started, and no homemade cinnamon rolls. The photo shoot of my sewn shirts?  Still has not happened.  (The past 3 days have been better, and I am almost ready to show you a freshly-sewn dress. More on that after some hemming takes place.)

Given all of this, maybe it's appropriate that I do have a pair of purse socks to show you.  Purse socks, in my definition, are stockinette socks that live in my handbag and only get knit a few rows at a time.  Often these rows are snuck in during lunch breaks, at the doctor's office, and when I'm too tired to think about knitting anything else.

Yarn: Lovesticks Superwash Merino in Acid Trip, 1 skein
Needles: US 1
TIme to Knit: Dec 25th - Feb 7

This yarn was a lot of fun to knit up.  Ms. Lovesticks does a great job with her self striping yarn.  The blue and pink stripes were each eight rows long, and the acid green was three. The colors have a little semi-solid action going on, and the striping was consistent through both socks. The yarn is quite soft, too!

I really need to start another pair of happy socks!  Because tomorrow, I feel certain that another child will cough on me, and I'll need something to calm me down.

PS.  Thanks for all of the blogiversary love!  Jenni was the randomly selected winner!  Jenni, send me your address if you haven't already.

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Today is my second blogiversary!  I'm so glad to be here, sharing this bit of my life with you. 

Two pairs of socks

And I'm so glad for all of you, for all of your input, advice, exclamations, and encouragement.  Thank you, my friends!

Two sewn shirts

I'll send a random commenter a yummy gift-- the perfect excuse for me to go yarn shopping this weekend!

 
Two sweaters

Take care, and I'll see you again soon,

Kristy

Weekend Planning

Today I knitted part of a sweater, sewed a shirt, baked bread from scratch, and dyed yarn with berries.  It was a fun day, but I'm not certain I'm in the correct century!

Next weekend is a long one for me, and I'm planning to dye the yarn I bought at Rhinebeck last fall.  I was hoping to dye it with blackberries, and I dyed a couple of 10g test skeins today.  I was disappointed that the resulting color is not very saturated.  The colors are both growing on me however, so I'll have to think about what I'm going to do next. Perhaps I'll let them sit in the sun a while and see if the colors fade.

The yarn on the left is dyed with frozen blackberries, and the one on the right is dyed with fresh blackberries.  I'm currently planning to make a short-sleeved, cardiganized version of the Owls sweater with this yarn.

I also ordered some fusticwood chips today while I was frustrated with the above yarn.  They should dye the yarn a nice yellow, but it was kind of fun to dye yarn with food.... What do you think?

I only need the buttons (and buttonholes) to finish up this shirt I made with some sweet fabric.

I'm hoping that by showing it to you now, I'll have it done in time for our classroom's Valentine's Day celebration on Thursday. 

Planning for David's Sweater

Remember this picture?  I needed to figure out a way to incorporate all of the colors David picked out for his sweater and still create a sweater that I liked!  First, I needed to decide whether the stripes would be wide or skinny. 

I definitely liked wide stripes better, and David agreed!  Next up was deciding on the order of the colors.

Here were four possibilities.  I tried to put warm colors next to cool ones.  David liked the first option best, except he wanted the green and fuchsia stripes switched.  After that I just had to take a few measurements and then get started!

 

It is very bright!  In the beginning it looked like a tribute to Mondrian, but the fuchsia changing that a little bit now.  I'm just about finished with the body knitting now, and soon I'll be able to move on to the sleeves.

Wedding Mittens

I'm so glad you approved of the new coat and hat.  I have a third thing to add to the ensemble: a new pair of mittens!

Pattern: Wedding Mittens (Rav) by Jorid Linvick
Yarn: A little bit of Aussi Sock Yarn in Cherry Tomato, Wollmeise 80/20 Twin in Natural, and 1 skein of Claudia's Handpainted Sock Yarn in Argyle Socks
Needles: US 2
Time to Knit: January 27 - 31
Modifications: My fingers turned out to be a little too long for this pattern, so I modified the top of the chart to add in a few more rows.  I also changed the afterthought thumb to a gusseted thumb, which I think fits me much better.

This pattern was a lot of fun to knit.  I have never knitted braids before, so I got to learn something new.  My gauge seems to be slightly different between the first and the second mitten;  the second one is slightly larger.  I'm not sure what happened there since they were only knit a few days apart.

One fun thing about these mittens was that I could modify them to include our initials and wedding date.  It feels so special to have personalized mittens!