Out of the Running

Thank you, thank you to all of you who voted for my friend, Tracy.  Unfortunately, she had to withdraw her project due to a mix up.  As I understand it, once you posted your project there wasn't supposed to be any "chatting" until after the voting.  The time was based on Irish time.  Tracy updated her post to include more information and the moderator said it qualified as "chatting".  I don't get that, but here's the kicker, based on Irish time, she was still before the deadline!  Despite pointing it out, she still had to withdraw. In any event, both Tracy and I are grateful for those of you who tried to help her out!

On another subject, Knit Picks and I are on the outs.  They gave me a really hard time about an order I placed before Christmas.  I'll spare you the details, but it did take them six weeks to credit my account.  Then, of course, there was the fiasco with the stolen credit card information.  I didn't want to wait and see if I was one of the unfortunate ones, so I cancelled my credit card.  While I didn't have any suspicious activity, I did place an order during the time period.  Better to be safe than sorry.  If all this wasn't bad enough, I'm thoroughly disappointed with some socks I knit with their Stroll yarn.  There's a neat hat pattern on Ravelry called Dustland Hat .  I haven't knit the hat yet, but I thought it would also make nice socks.

See?  Nice huh.  I love green and had high hopes.  Well, while they might look nice from a distance, up close they're horrid.  The yarn pilled and fuzzed like crazy.

They look like they've been through the wash a few times and they were spanking new!

You can barely see the stitch detail.  Jack still liked them, but then again, he doesn't really care too much what he has on his feet!

I'm not anxious to use this yarn again anytime soon.  I have a ton of it too.  I guess it's true that you get what you pay for.  I know I won't be paying for this again any time soon!

Lucky Me!

I have been so fortunate to meet some really lovely people both through my blog and through Ravelry.  One of them is my pal, Christi, from Texas.  A couple of weeks ago, I was surprised to get a package in the mail from her.  I just couldn't imagine what she could be sending me.

Look at this gorgeous set of handwarmers and matching cowl.  Christi knows how much I love green and so she knit this beautiful set for me.  Not only that, but she also spun the yarn herself!  I couldn't believe my eyes.  I'm not used to anyone making things for me. She made this as a thank you for something I did for her awhile ago.  Something I didn't expect any thanks for, so needless to say, I was just overwhelmed.  I wish you could all slip your hands into the mitts and feel how soft and cozy they are.  I'm truly touched by Christi's generous gesture of friendship.  As I said, lucky me!

On another note, I'm going to shamelessly ask you to help me help out another friend.  Tracy lives in Arizona and has had some major health difficulties in the last few years.  She's entered a contest on Ravelry and I would love it if you would all vote for her project.  I think it's one of the nicest ones in the contest and it would be just so terrific if she could win.  All you have to do it go to Ravelry and vote.  Here's a link to the voting: St. Patrick's Day Celebrations  Click on "love" and that's it! You can read Tracy's touching story.  tracyvw is her Ravelry name and her project is post # 6.  A beautiful Irish scarf.

Isn't it lovely?  So I urge you, if you've ever knit one of my patterns, this is your chance to "pay" me back by helping Tracy out.  I sure hope she wins and I thank each and every one of you!!

A Cheep Set

I finally got around to writing up the pattern for the chicken that I used in Ruthie's Farm. Wow, I can't believe that it's been almost a year since I posted it!  In any event, I couldn't do a blanket without chickens since there are several that reside at her home (and one really mean rooster).  The boys have named all the chickens and they do tend to get annoyed with me when I forget their names! Fortunately, they're all different breeds, so I do have a little help in identifying them.

I'm not sure what breed this chicken is though.  It's definitely a new variety!

The patterns are both available in pdf formats and are listed in the side bar.  Or, you can click here for the bib or click here for the cloth.

You can name the chickens yourself, however, Gaffy, Cadbury, and Blackstar are already taken.

Olearia

Before I share the saga of my latest project with you, I just want to address the comment that was left for me a few days ago.  It was brought to my attention by Kerry that, apparently, one of you (maybe more for all I know), has been selling my patterns.  I can't believe that someone would take advantage of me in that way, but then again, there are a lot of low lives out there.  I especially feel sorry for anyone who was gullible enough to purchase one.  All I will say is that it's a round world and what goes around comes around.  I'm sure you'll be punished in good time.

On a happier note, my neighbors across the street have a new baby girl!  The mom went to school with my oldest son and so I've know her for a good many years.  She didn't want to know the sex of the baby ahead of time, so I wasn't able to get started early on a project.  She was born a week before Christmas and even if I wanted to drop everything and knit for her, I just didn't have time.  I started by choosing this gorgeous yarn by Holiday Yarns. I already had a skein of sock yarn in the colorway "Rose Garden", so I thought it would be neat to make a sweater out of some DK weight.  Once I decided on the yarn, I had to choose a pattern.  I found this sweet sweater on Ravelry called "Olearia".  (Olearia is a native Australian flower.)  It was just the weight I needed and I loved the design.  I started it, but after getting about half way with it, I started having second thoughts.  It looked really huge to me.

So, I reluctantly decided to choose another pattern and start over.  Instead of ripping this one out though, I just used the second ball of yarn that I had.  The second attempt was this easy Seamless Yoked Sweater a free pattern on Ravelry.

It was okay, but when I reached the same point as the first sweater, I realized that they were exactly the same size!  I really loved the Olearia, but I thought the ruching was too long.  I decided to go back to the first sweater and rip back the last pattern repeat.  It looked a little more dainty to me.

I really love the way this came out after a rocky start.  The yarn is so soft and after it's washed, it's even nicer.  I wish it wasn't quite so pink, but it's perfect for a little sweetheart.

I couldn't find a hat that I liked, so I made up one!  It's pretty simple.  I cast on 144 stitches and purled one row, knit one row, purled one row, then knit for about four rows.  The next row I knit 2 tog. to get down to 72 stitches.

I then just repeated the purl-knit-purl sequence until I had three ridges and worked one repeat of the pattern.  When the hat was about 3 1/2", I started the decreases.  k6, k2tog, around.  knit one row. k5, k2tog. around. knit one row, etc. until I had a few stitches left to knit a two inch I-cord and then tied it in a knot.  If she's like most babies, she won't keep it on her head anyway.  I like a little brim on a hat and this is just what I had in mind.

I finished up the set with some matching socks.

This is the same colorway, as I said before, only it's in the FlockSock.  This was a little more trial and error.  When I followed the ruching instructions, it was way too puffy, so instead of increasing in every stitch, I just knit one stitch and then increased in the next.

All in all, it's a pretty set.  I don't usually buy baby patterns as I have so many books and leaflets as it is, but this one was just so darn cute.  There are tons of sizes and lots of variations.  Short sleeves, cap sleeves, etc.  It's really well written and there are lots of pictures.  I will say that the ruching is a bit tedious, but the effect is well worth the effort.  I'm sure I'll be making another one of these in some form for my Ruthie.  She's even cuter than the sweater!

Angry Mitts

My grandsons are just crazy about those Angry Birds.  They needed new mittens and the idea of these came to me as I was falling asleep one night!  I've been known to dream about some solution to a knitting dilemma more than once! (My husband even claims that I knit in my sleep!  This is partly true, but what he doesn't see is me ripping out everything that I knit while I was sleeping!)

These are really simple to make.  Use your favorite mitten pattern for worsted weight yarn.  I have an old pattern that was passed down to me by my grandmother, but this free pattern: Classic Mittens is almost identical to mine.

 

Jack seems to prefer the red bird and this was also the easiest to make.

Marty, our four year old,  loves the white bird.  He has one that he carries with him everywhere!  He named it "Whitey".  Pretty, original, eh?  Whitey has his own birthday, his favorite colors, his likes and dislikes. It's like another member of the family.

Mickey likes the blue bird. This one seems to be the least angry of the birds from what I can determine!

 

I surprised the boys with them yesterday and they were a huge hit!  I was half expecting a lecture from Marty about his white mitts as he's an absolute stickler for details, but even he loved them!

If you'd like to make a pair for your own bird lover, I've put the "recipe" in the sidebar under "Miscellaneous" patterns or you can just click here for the pdf file.  You knit your favorite mitten as you normally would until you reach about 1 1/2" from the top.  You break your main color of yarn and join the beak color, knit a couple of rows and decrease as you would for the top of a sock.  The embroidery is done before you close the mittens.  It's really basic.  Just remember that you want a left and a right mitten so be careful which side you're embroidering on!

Now, go slap a pig!

A Tale of Two Kitties. .or Three

There's a tradition in our family that started back in 1971 with the birth of my niece.  I knit her a Christmas stocking from an old Mary Maxim pattern.  Subsequently, with the addition of each new child to our family, I knit them a stocking as well. (For the record, that totals 21 stockings each with a different design.)  This was Ruthie's first Christmas and so, of course, she had to have a stocking as well.  Sometimes we wait a year to see if there's a special interest, however, it turns out that Ruthie loves kittens!  I do too, but I have a hard time designing them for some reason.  Nevertheless, I came up with this really cute kitten.  At least on paper it was cute.  Something was lost in translating it from the drawing to the graph paper.  I knew it wasn't right, but I kept thinking that it would work out once I knitted it and did a little embroidery here and there.  Wrong.  It was dreadful and here's the proof:

It looks like a wombat. Seriously. What's worse, I ripped it out, reduced the design a bit and reknit it.  It was worse the second time as evidenced by the above picture.  By now, it was almost Christmas and time was ticking down. I can't tell you how much it was bothering me that Ruthie would have such an awful stocking.  Some of you will say "it's not that bad", but it was.  It was bothering me so much that I decided to start all over again with a completely new design.  This time, it actually looked like a cat!  I knew I was on the right track when the gals at physical therapy checked it out and said "oh, it's a kitty!".

Much cuter, don't you think?  I also think it looks a little more "Christmasy".  I managed to finish it on December 23rd.  Just in the "nick" of time!

On another note, before I started with the stockings, I had decided to knit Ruthie her very own cat.  Something she could cuddle and drag around.  I found this really cute pattern on Ravelry called C is for Cat .

The pattern is very well written and has lots of pictures and detailed instructions so it's a snap to make.  I had a lot of fun making it.  I used Lion Brand's Organic Cotton in French Vanilla and Natural. It is so soft and surprisingly easy to knit with.  We all know how tough cotton can sometimes be!

I like the way that the yarn stripes, although it was interesting that one leg had actual stripes and the other had these diagonal blocks.  I tried several times to get them to somewhat match, but for some reason, it just wouldn't work.  In the end, I decided that it just gave the cat some personality.

Ruthie seemed to really like it and immediately started dragging it by it's ear!  That was the whole point, wasn't it!

This tree that the cat is hanging out in was the only tree we had this year!  With a bed in my living room, there was no place to put our usual tree.  Our great neighbors delivered this one to us and we decided that was all we needed!  Of course, it was kind of hard to slip presents under!

Happy New Year!

Wow, by now I'm surprised that any of you are even reading this.  It's been a long time since my last post.  It seems that we've had so much family drama around here lately.  My husband is still recovering nicely from his accident, although not fast enough for him.  I still have to deal with everything around the house, which now includes shoveling snow!  Ugh!  At least he can get himself dressed now (except for one sock), which is a big help!  My dad had major surgery right before Christmas and he's still not home yet.  My brother-in-law fell and broke his hip and had to have it replaced the same day as my dad's surgery!  He's also in rehab but is doing well.  Of course, I also had Christmas to deal with and all that goes along with shopping, wrapping, etc.  Oh, and do you remember that I also have a "regular" job?  Do you feel sorry for me yet?  Well, don't because I'm doing just fine, although my knitting time has been severely limited. 

In any event, to make up for my absence and to hopefully, start this new year off on the right foot, here's a new pattern for you.  I had a young gal contact me on Ravelry and ask for a squirrel.  Well, she didn't exactly ask for it, but she told me how much she was hoping I'd do one.  She's only 13 and is quite the knitter.  I was trying to come up with something new and decided to give it a whirl!  So Charlotte, if you're reading this, here's your squirrel:

My good pal, Tunie, in Australia, test knitted the pattern so I think it should be fine.  I've included a chart with it as well.  The links to the patterns are in the sidebar under the updated patterns.

 

I have to admit that squirrels are not one my favorite creatures.  Those pesky varmints raid my bird feeders to distraction.  They even go into my garage to try and get at the bird seed that I have stored there.  This past summer, I had no less than ten of them in the backyard.  I decided to stop filling the feeders for awhile and let them move on to some other yard!  I miss the birds though, so I'm sure I'll go back to the feeders before too long.

 I have a couple of neat projects to share with you, but for now, I'll just say that I hope everyone has a wonderful new year and I thank you for all your support!