hmm

Last night, I finished binding off my Dad's latest Serious Scarf.  It's got a huge cable in the center, whose pattern I was completely unable to memorize.  Made the knitting take forever.  Y'know, when I wasn't ripping it back to fix the fact that I can't count...

It's been a really long time coming, and I feel badly for that.  It was definitely not brainless knitting, but I'm excited that it's done and that I'll be blocking it today if I can find it....  I know, how could I lose it I only finished it last night?  Here's a hint:

Guess who else wants one?

when it goes awry

So, this weekend I made the kind of cabling mistake made better than famous by a Vogue Knitting magazine in the past.  Personally, I treasure that VK.  It lets us know that everyone makes mistakes.  Even the most awesome of designers, and most awesome of knitters can make random cable mix-ups.

I didn't have the heart to photograph the mistake.  It  might not have been that obvious to the person I was making the item for... but it would have been obvious to me and I love them too much to give them something I would cringe to see them wear.

So, instead I started this little project:

Yes.  6 inches of thick cable painstakingly ripped back to the error.

There are lots of blog posts out there on how to fix this kind of error.  Eloquent ones, with awesome shots (that aren't using Quince & CO's peacoat color to illustrate) so I didn't spend the time to record the process.

But here is how the fix ended up:

Very lightened, obviously.

You can see the little tension differences, but those will block out when it gets it's wet-blocking.

I understand that some of my favorite bloggers are also having difficult times.  In their honor, I am sharing my favorite cookie recipe.

Grammie Rowe's Refrigerator Cookies
1 1/2 cups sifted flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
3/4 tsp salt

-----------
1/2 cup vegetable shortening (or butter)
1 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
2 tsp vanilla

Sift first 5 dry ingredients together.  In separate bowl, cream shortening and sugars until fluffy.  To the sugar/shortening mix, add eggs and vanilla.  Beat well.  When well mixed, add dry ingredients and mix.

This makes a stiff dough.  In a length of waxed paper, make a low and long "loaf" of the dough (roughly 1/2-3/4 inch deep by 2 inches wide by cookie sheet long).  Refrigerate the dough a minimum of 2 hours. 

Slice dough and bake on cookie sheet at 350 degrees for ~ 8 minutes.

Enjoy!!

better late than under the weather

Today, I had the distinct pleasure of giving my Dad his first Serious Scarf.  It ended up being a little bit bigger than he had asked for, but he was pleased enough with it to offer to model it outright.  I didn't even have to ask.

The photos are going to be a little off because I was on uneven ground, as was he, and the background is misleading due to the interesting architeture of the backyard vs the house there.  Plus it was waaaay too cold for me to want him outside long, even with the wool to wrap in.

This photo is a fair idea of how the simple pattern repeat looks overall

A little more red than real life, but not too bad color wise.

This shows the length.  It was way too cold to have him out without a jacket... or cardigan maybe....

But I think that this photo pretty well sums it up

In his chair in front of the bookshelf, menaced by my youngest.

My Mom calls it a half an afghan, and it is actually not a bad description.  It's for those times when you don't want a whole cover up, but you want a bit of extra snuggly warmth.  He seemed really pleased, and I'm already contemplating his next one in peacoat blue.

This would be the other thing that made taking pictures difficult.

I'd be mad, but he's cute.  He gets away with a lot for that grin.

I'm looking forward to tomorrow!  Tonight is the last night to enter the giveaway.  I unfortunately found out that I am stuck in training all morning every morning this week so the winners will be posted after I get home (around 3PM Eastern).  I apologize for the lag, but I know there's no way I can possibly get the post done before I drive to work, attend the training, and then drive back.  I work out of a home office right now, and sometime later I'll get into what I had to do in order to get the ability to do that.  But at the moment, I'm just sadly contemplating the lost knitting time.

Until tomorrow!

It's Enormous

So, last night I finished the knitting on my Father's Serious Scarf.  This morning, I measured it before soaking it... and it was 72 inches unblocked.   Aha, hahaha.  Perhaps 7 skeins would have been enough.

Anyway, it's currently blocking across my oldest's bed.

It reminds me of chain link fence.

Here, you can see the edging.  Simple seed stitch, but I think it works with the scarf well.

simple, sturdy

Apparently, my husband is contemplating how to get one of his own.  I am reserving judgement until I see my Dad with it, but as far as the spousal unit is concerned this is a success. 

So, it started out 72 inches long... and it's so long it is about 2 feet longer than the king sized bed as it blocks.  No wonder this sucker was so heavy when I bound off the edge.  I hope to get a picture when I give it to Dad, but we'll see what he's willing to put up with.

I am not as good with worsted and heavier yarns.  I have chronic arthritis in my wrists and recurrant tendonitis from my teenage years, so when my knits get to be more than about a pound the knitting is actually painful.  It may be part of why I enjoy lace knitting so well.  I get a lot of mileage out of very little weight.

If you're looking for a fun read, check out this comment!  I giggle and nod every time I read it, and I suspect every knitter goes through something similar while designing. 

This weekend, I'll only be able to post on Sunday.  Saturday, I have a standing engagement (which is surprisingly not knit related).  So I'll catch everyone Sunday afternoon!  Speaking of Sunday, you have until Sunday night at midnight to comment on this post and be entered in the giveaway.  Winners will be announced Monday sometime after 7AM Eastern.

Have fun and knit on!

happy days!

Worsted Weight Serious Scarf, knitting DONE!!!

Status of hands:  sore but operable.

Blocking and end weaving begins tomorrow.

10 days, 2 lost to construction, 2 lost to child stuff.  So roughly 130x8= 1040 yards in 6 days.

Acceptable!

Rejoicing will begin after napping, and pictures will be taken tomorrow.

two posts, two days wheee

Since I know my Dad doesn't read my blog, I'm posting some progress shots of how knitting goes on the serious scarf project.  I know it looks fuscia.  It's a deep royal purple.  Curse you lack of camera skills and lack of editer skills.  Meh, here's the pattern as it knits out anyway:

apparently, you get the closeup first.  You can see how my job has been interrupting my knitting and altering my tension.

luckily, a light blocking will straighten this out and nobody will be the wiser, but you

So, this sucker is about 28 inches wide not blocked, and will pick up a scant couple of inches when blocked so you can see the "openwork" that defines it.  I rather thought chain link fence was a good choice, but we'll see what my Dad thinks of it. 

Man Lace (otherwise known as Serious Scarves) continues apace.  I am about 1/2 way through the yarn we chose for it.  Dad wanted a worsted weight yarn, as he didn't want anything too light, and it had to take a beating.  I'm paraphrasing.

I'm hoping to have it ready for this Saturday, when he comes over to help me, my oldest son, and my brother frame in windows to my covered porch.  It's currently a 3 season porch that allows gale-force winds to freeze my kitchen pipes every winter.  Soon it will be a 3 season porch that BLOCKS gale-force winds in the winter, in the interests of not-frozen pipes. 

I purchased the materials around the time that the mother-in-law incursion/debacle happened in the interests of giving them more space.  We won't be heating it with nobody actively living in it, so it will remain the same use it is now.  I just won't be shoveling snow off of it this year with a little luck.

So this weekend, I will also be taking pictures of our progress so you can see what has taken away from knitting time.  Remember:  document your knitting infidelity well. 

So next up, I have a progress picture on my Mary Mary Quite Contrary shawl.  At least, that's what I'm calling it at the moment.  Luckily, you can read your progress in lace so no matter how many times I put it down I always end up figuring out where I left off.  Just takes a while sometimes.

Very representative of the color of the yarn.  Surprisingly enough.

This is Misti Alpaca Laceweight yarn.  Unsurprisingly, it contains.... Alpaca!  Sorry, I think I've hit goofy hour.  This is the silver blue sister to the yarn I'm giving away in this post.  It's not too late to enter, you have until Nov 14, at which point the winners will be announced. 

Speaking of entering the giveaway, I recently found some quilt-stash fabric that reminds me of the cats in the banner picture at the top of the blog of one of the posters.  Hmm, is that sentence convoluted enough?  Maybe I need more coffee.  I think I still bleed actual blood instead of caffeine, which may be affecting my ability to communicate...  y'know, effectively.

Here's the fabric for reference

I heart this fabric.  I must do, I have 5 yards!

So, I'm thinking I may have to do up something sweet in way of a project bag in this.  It's too cute to ignore.

Finally, in case anyone was curious about how I write my patterns the first time through, I give you the graph paper swatch o doom.  You can even see some of my really bad math if you look closely.  Don't worry, I used the right numbers instead of the crazy ones and that's how Dad's Serious Scarf got started.  The design process is a whole 'nother set of posts, but I figured a little window into the start of the process would be kind of neat.

these are the 'test-drive' of the patterns for THREE different projects.  

Yep, those little sketches are in the midst of transforming into a SUPER ROBOT.... oh wait, wrong show.  Into a stole or three.  Yeah, three sounds about right given what I see there. 

In our next episode, there may or may not be a well deserved (and not at all opinionated ;-) review of Quince and Co yarn.