Three things

First things first. I can now finally blog about this project:





Two knitting friends are both pregnant (and are due pretty close to one another), and the various knitting circles all banded together to make them collective baby blankets. We threw them a lovely BBQ lunch baby shower this past weekend, where they got to have all the fun of arranging the blanket squares and none of the stress of seaming. Two of the more motivated knitters (myself not included) made adorable matching cardigans out of the blanket leftovers.



I got put unofficially in charge of the seaming, since I wrote up the pattern we used for the squares. It's not difficult to figure out, just garter stitch mitered squares. The only difference is that most of the patterns out there are written so that you start by casting on a small number of stitches and increasing out, while the pattern we used starts with a large circular cast on and then decreases as you go in. I'll be writing up the pattern and posting it for free on Ravelry later in June.

I'd like to say that I haven't been posting because I've been working on this secret project, but it wouldn't be true. I have been working on the secret project, but that's not really why I haven't been posting. I haven't been posting because the end of this semester has been utterly brutal. Brutal hours, brutal workload, brutal anticipation over the fall schedule, brutal on my coworkers, brutal on me. Things have mostly settled down (and I still have a job come August), but I've had what feels like about 48 hours to catch my breath. I managed to have one lazy weekend morning:



and then it was finals week, and second finals week (I know. I had two finals weeks this spring. Like I said, brutal), and then Memorial Day weekend and far-flung friends in from out of town, and then we had to drop the cat off at the in-laws' place. In the meantime I somehow managed to spin some yarn (Polwarth dyed by Dicentra Designs):



and knit a pair of socks (Toe-up Jaywalkers in Sheepaints Sock'n Go in the Wunsch Brunnen colorway.



I'm very glad to use up this yarn, because it is from truly deep in the stash (circa 2008 I think?). Plus, I'll be able to wear the socks this week while we're camping in Yellowstone. It's supposed to be cold there... so I'll be knitting hats on the car trip out there.

What's Been Keeping Me?

A little of this:



A little of that:



All with the help of my lovely (and toothy) assistant:



My spring break came and went, and when it was over all I had to show for my efforts were a quilt top, a receipt for a walking foot for my friend's sewing machine, and some missing cash. Oh, and some really adorable navy blue backing fabric from another local fabric store, Peapod Fabrics. It's the one with the owls on it, fourth from the top in the second photo.

Between Peapod and Verb, I have two shop owners flashing really great fabric selections at me on both sides of the Bay. Peapod recently changed to a new space (just like Verb!) in a location that is conveniently located across the street from my favorite laudromat¹ and one of the cafes in my top-five list. I didn't know that the store had a blog, and so a few months ago when I walked past their old location and saw the windows boarded up, I was crestfallen. I didn't know they were simply moving, but I got all the giddy excitement of realizing that the shop had moved (not closed) while doing the laundry a few weeks ago. Since then, it's only been a matter of time before I found an excuse to start a fabric stash support the local business.

Just like when I started knitting, I've been approaching this whole quilting thing by assuming that it's not very hard to do, and that any mistakes I make won't be too hard to fix along the way. I think one gets more enjoyment out of tackling a big project early on when one is not turning oneself into a nervous wreck worrying about screwing it up. So when I forgot to wash all my fat quarters before cutting? I decided it wasn't a big deal, and washed the pieced top with the backing and border fabric before cutting or adding the borders. The edges of the quilt top frayed, and I trimmed them. No sweat there, although the husbeast practically had a heart attack at the matted mess of frayed strings I blithely cut off the seams.

A bigger mistake was that I didn't read through all those library books I checked out before making the backing, so I cut and sewed the backing to be exactly the same size as the quilt top. Whoopsie! Of course it makes sense to me now that you'd want to have an extra few inches around the edges in case things shift around during the quilting process. My solution is to trim an inch or two off the six-inch outer border before quilting. Seems like my mistakes are mostly going to result in my quilt being slightly smaller than the finished dimensions of the pattern.



Another change I think I'm going to make to the quilt is to skip the applique part. I actually love the way the quilt looks without appliqued flowers on it, so it's going to be left as-is. There are two really great things about this quilt: First, I'll probably have a finished quilt (or at least a quilted-but-still-needs-binding quilt) before the summer. Second, I'm getting very inspired to start seaming the mitered square blocks into strips.

Speaking of blankets, did everyone see Mason-Dixon Knitting's Mitered Crosses Blanket pattern? Yeah, I'm already plotting another one. I've got four skeins of Noro Kureyon in some insanely vivid rainbow colors waiting for their destiny, and I'm thinking ivory Cascade Ecological Wool for the borders. I'm blanket-obsessed over here.

¹Trust me, when you live in a large city you acquire things like a favorite laundromat.

Forward Momentum

So I spent about a month putting off the next step in finishing the never-ending blanket project (shocking, I know). I told myself I was just waiting for a convenient time. A time when I wouldn't feel so bad about keeping the cat locked in or out of the bedroom. A time when I wasn't exhausted from work. A time when I felt like it.

Really, I think I was just waiting to finish something. In addition to neglecting the blanket, I've also suspected myself of neglecting the spinning wheel. After nearly giving myself a heart attack about renewing my subscription to the Hello Yarn fiber club, I immediately threw December's color, Minerals on Shetland wool, on the wheel.



It took a little time to get comfortable spinning this fiber. I've not spun a great deal of Shetland, and at first I was underspinning the singles and getting lots of breaks. I was much happier with my yarn once I saw it plied together.



Once that was off the wheel, I still didn't feel like looking at the blanket. So I thought then that maybe I needed to have another project on the go. I can't think of a logical reason why this would be so; it might have simply been a case of startitis. But I did start something:



The yarn is A Verb for Keeping Warm Toasted (their new worsted base, debuted at Stitches) in Nugget and Thai Iced Tea. The pattern is Flocked Mittens from Hello Yarn. Just like all her lined mitten patterns, these are going to wear like iron. I'm knitting worsted-weight yarn on US size 2 needles!

Last night, I finally got a little bored with petting the spinning fiber stash and knitting the mittens. So I got out the mitered squares, and started arranging.



I apologize for the truly awful photograph. It was dark and raining last night, but I couldn't waste the impulse by not taking a picture. I spent about two hours swapping squares, trying to balance out lights and darks, areas of high contrast with areas of low contrast, green bits with purple bits, and trying to find a good place to put that darned orange square. I'm not 100% satisfied with this layout, but it's pretty close. I like the four center squares, they're some of my favorites. I like having the four corners of the blanket anchored with dark bits. I spent a lot of time getting the squares oriented correctly to eliminate strong vertical or horizontal lines in the blanket. The blanket probably only needs a few changes, and one last check in daylight, before I can start the second stage of seaming. After I seam it, I can start weaving in ends.

Oh.

Ends.

I think I need to lie down.

Smith! (Or, my continuing obsession with Ysolda)

Okay, so I entered Ysolda's Hedgehog contest. This morning I opened my email to find that I got the right number of hedgehogs!!!

And then I realized (belatedly) that I already own a copy of the adorable Smith pattern, since it's part of the Whimsical Little Knits 2 collection. So I've decided to pass the good karma along, and give away my own copy of the Smith pattern. Share the love, right? Here's the contest:

What pattern did I use to knit my wedding shawl (the white shawl in Ysolda's hedgehog contest blog post)? Leave a comment with your answer!

Multiple correct answers will be decided by random number generator, and I'll close the contest at 9:30AM tomorrow (PST).

Yet Another Verb Event

Dear Kristine,

Did you know you have the most amazing yarn shop ever? I love it so much, it sometimes makes me sad that I live on the other side of the bay. I know that lately I've only been there during some truly momentous events, and I should come by when the shop is a little quieter so we can catch up properly. But your events are always spectacular. There's usually great food, and last night was no exception.



The cookies were delicious and adorable, and I MUST find out where the heart-shaped mini brie came from.



But, this time you've gone too far by carrying artisan chocolate in the store.



And you've had some truly amazing guests, too:



Of course, they always seem to adore Cleo. I'm sure the feeling is mutual.



Do you know what really made my heart soar last night? It wasn't finding the little mini hedgehog from Ysolda's post (that post, by the way, mentions a fun contest and features a beautiful photo of a beautiful white beaded wedding shawl with said hedgehog perched on it).



It wasn't stuffing myself full of delicious food and good beer (beer with sheep on the label, no less!).



It wasn't even talking with you or Frecklegirl/Jess about the sense of community that you have worked so hard to build through events like these, and the brilliant Ravelry Stitches West passport/scavenger hunt of 2008. It was watching the community grow, one knitter at a time:



He's not picking out yarn for me, he's contemplating yarn for himself. That was the best part, the part that made this knitter's heart soar on Valentine's Day.

Love,

Starryknit

P.S. You can bet that I will be back this weekend looking for one of those rare skeins of yarn you have with a label signed by Ysolda. The obsession is not over!

Getting Back in the Groove

I've been kind of stuck this week, crafting-wise. Not stuck in a rut. In order to be stuck in a rut you have to be actively working on something, which does not describe me over the past five days. I've been struck with knitting ennui since Tuesday, when I was purusing my recently completed projects on Ravelry trying to figure out what kind of knitting I was missing in my life. I realized that last month I knit three Ysolda patterns in 21 days. That seems a little crazy, but I guess it just means that the two Whimsical Little Knits booklets really do live up to their names. After my Ysolda fever passed, I had a birthday gift to knit up. I can say that finishing a chunky wool hat that covers the ears and has a cute pompom is very treacherous when out with a bunch of people in weather like this (near South Lake Tahoe):



because all your friends will want to steal the hat. Also, you will be very tempted to wear the hat yourself while waiting for your friends to tow your car out to the plowed road:



Fortunately, the hat made its way safely back to its intended recipient. I actually finished the hat before the car trip home. It's been a while since I ran out of knitting on a long drive, and it turns out my default mode is to nap (with my mouth very attractively half-open and drooling every so slightly, according to the husbeast).

I'd been doing a good job of seaming one block of mitered squares a day, until this past week when I haven't finished one. If I'd kept up with the pace I would be finished with the blocks today, but instead I have five left. I'm trying to take this as a sign that I've had a very busy week at work, rather than as a sign that I should have stopped knitting with 30 blocks for a 5x6 blanket instead of a 6x6 blanket.

After hitting the boring wall with the squares and finishing the hat, I feel like this week I was really out of the knitting groove. The prospect of seaming more squares just seemed too boring (says the whiny 13-year-old in my brain), and I didn't have anything big going on the needles. A few big projects that I'd been putting off didn't sounds so appealing anymore, and I'm trying to not make any big yarn purchases before Stitches West.

Then it happened. Yesterday morning, I was lazily surfing the internet looking at yarn. I popped over to Hello Yarn to stare at the sold out spinning fiber colors, and saw that the next installment of fiber club had sold out as well. I suddenly couldn't remember when I had renewed my subscription, so I went over to check my email for the receipt. None was there.

Okay, maybe I just deleted the receipt instead of archiving it. I go check the bank funds, searching through the last six weeks of activity looking for the withdrawal. Still nothing, so I think maybe I put it on the credit card and go check there. STILL NOTHING. Now I am starting to panic a little bit. I start to think, "Is it possible that I forgot to renew?" No way. Not the Hello Yarn Fiber Club. That would just be the worst possible end to the week craft-wise. First I lose my knitting mojo, then I fall off the seaming wagon, and then I lose my spot in the fiber club. And worse, because this club is so popular, I probably would never be able to get back in after letting my subscription lapse.

As I'm explaining this to the husbeast, I go to check one last place where a record of my renewal might be stored: Paypal. I click through to see three months of history, and there's the renewal, purchased three days after I got the email saying that renewals were available. All of a sudden, the pieces fall into place. The withdrawal didn't show up in my bank or credit card because I already had the funds in Paypal. I still must have deleted the purchase receipt email, but I'm safe.

Basking in the intense wave of relief, I immediately pulled out the spinning wheel and start in on this:



simultaneously thanking the Universe for getting me back into a crafting groove and cursing it for doing so in such a mean way. But just in case, today I'm going to seam a couple of squares.

Ysolda at Verb

Before I go into the details, let me just say that Friday's event was like getting a second Christmas this year. I met up with a few knitter friends, and we all talked about how the weather was lovely for this time of year, but not so great for showing off knitwear. Having planned on wearing a hat, scarf, and mitts, I resigned myself to putting my hat on once we got to the store.



What I didn't realize until we arrived was that not only were we getting a talk by Ysolda, we were also getting a mini trunk show! She had brought with her several sweaters from her upcoming book.







We arrived early enough to purchase copies of Whimsical Little Knits 1 and 2 and Cookie's new book Knit.Sock.Love. and find seats (I saved my seat with Nathaniel).

The shop was really packed! Ysolda talked about how she got started designing, how she got the idea to do the Whimsical Little Knits collections, and how she designed and did the size grading for the sweaters in her new book Little Red in the City.



She also encouraged us to try on the sweaters, which I definitely did after the Q&A portion of the talk ended and we got our books signed. Ysolda made my inscription out to both myself and Nathaniel:



and later on when the signing was mostly finished, Ysolda herself showed me how to alter the Melia sweater to fit better.



I went home and immediately preordered the new book (you get a very handy info sheet with yarn specifications for all the sizes of every pattern for planning purposes). And just like the Whimsical Little Knits books, I want to knit just about every pattern.

Like I said, second Christmas.