A Little Sweater!

Finally a knitting FO!

For the last few months I've been itching to knit an adult sized sweater (my first) and I've been scouring my books/magazines and websites trying to find a pattern. The urge was getting pretty strong and I hadn't found a pattern that was going to satisfy what I wanted to make so I decided to knit a baby sweater. I decided on the Placket-Neck Pullover from Last Minute Knitted Gifts.

(Harry Potter book shown for scale)

First the bad news: It didn't satisfy my urge to knit an adult sized sweater lol
Otherwise, I'm pretty happy with how this little sweater turned out. It's my first completed non BSJ sweater (I have a partial Trellis in the depths of the packrat room) and I really enjoyed knitting it. It was quick enough that I didn't get second sleeve syndrome (hah!) and it was easy enough to do while not having to focus 200% of my attention on it (hello Trellis!). I didn't have enough of the yellow yarn so that's why I put the pink trim - which was a good idea at the time - y'know until I got to the placket part and had to intarsia from both ends of the ball.

Specs:
Pattern: Placket-Neck Pullover (0-6months), Last Minute Knitted Gifts
Yarn: Knit Picks Shine Sport in Butter and Blush
Needles: Size 6 or 7
Mods: Added a second colour and changed the length. I used the lengths for the 1-2 years version because the 0-6 month measurements looked like it was going to make a short, fat sweater.
I have no real baby to compare this sweater to so I have no idea what size of baby it will fit or if the mods I made would make a sweater dress for said baby or not. If anything, the arms are probably a pinch too long. Oh well!

So, being as unsatisfied as I am, I cast on for another one of these sweaters last night! I'm making the 1-2 years size now.


Temperature: -8C
Sunrise: 9:12am
Sunset: 7:01pm

In Which I Throw My Knitting Across the Room... And Then My Brain Explodes....

A few weeks ago a co-worker (whom I greatly dislike) told me she had a pattern book for some hats and was wondering if I could knit her one. I told her to bring the book and I'd see what I could do. So she brought over the Paton's booklet "Where Did You Get That Hat!" (which I happen to own anyway). She picked out TWO hats the red beret on the front and the main cover image. I basically told her that I'd only knit one and I was only going to knit the red one. I ended up making it in black because I don't have any red yarn that was suitable...

This hat has been one pain in the arse after another!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I told the co-worker that I'd be able to knit her hat after the craft fair but I managed to find some spare time before-hand and got 90% of it done by then. On the last day of the craft fair (2 minutes before we're supposed to pack up) she comes by with a ball of yarn (a lady at the CF was selling her home-spun) and asked me how much of it I'd need to knit her hat. So I told her that I'd already started. THEN she decides that I should knit her TWO hats of doom! I leveled with her and told her I HATED knitting the Hat of Doom and there would be NO WAY I'd make another... Her reply? "Maybe I'll twist your arm and get you to make me another" - aksdflkajs!!!
She walked away and I thought that was the end of it... NO! She came back and starts talking to me about the Hat of Doom and I had to try to explain to her that knitting something you hate takes ALL the fun out of it (combined with hating the person makes for a pretty miserable experience).
The Hat of Doom is a shitty hat to knit and I disliked every.single.stitch.... Dislikeing something in such a way doesn't really lend itself to making you want to mass produce them! You know what she finally said to me? "Oh, I get it, you hate knitting hats" *cough* She totally didn't get that I didn't like knitting this SPECIFIC hat. My reply? "Yes, you're right. I hate knitting hats."

*blinks*


Temperature: -25C
Sunrise: n/a
Sunset: n/a

Thrummed Mittens Term Position: Now until June...

I finished my thrummed mittens last night! I hate to say that I'm relieved to have them finished because that might sound like I didn't enjoy knitting them - I did. I just lost the momentum after the first one and it was hard to get that back and get the second one done. Once I started, it was quick (I'm sure I could've finished it in an evening but it took me a few hours over two days - The longest part was making all my little thrums).

The mittens are more even than they look in the picture!

I'm not 100% sure what I want to work on next... I have a sock that's partially started from my Whitehorse trip... But then my knitted Nativity that needs some attention... I'd love to have the Nativity done by this Christmas (totally possible if I work at it) so I should maybe get some work done on it.

Speaking of the dreaded "C" word... I have NO idea what I want to do for gifts this year... I toyed around with making stuff but I have NO idea what to make everyone... I guess I should figure that out ASAP!

We got a tonne of snow overnight! Usually the snow is good because that means all the mud is gone but that's not really the case - there's still mud around hiding under all the wet snow... I got totally covered in mud yesterday trying to wipe the truck off - grr! Maybe before it gets too cold I'll try to wash the truck...

Temperature: -1C (feels like -5C)
Sunrise: 8:58am
Sunset: 8:27pm

Whoops!

I didn't realise it had been so long since I updated!
Well, since the last time I wrote, Finnegan has come home from the vet (two and a half weeks home and still not blocked!) and is still recovering. I'd say he's about 90% back to how he was before. My brother has made the quickest cross country drive ever (it took them just over a week to get from here to southern Ontario and that's with 4 days visiting family) AND got engaged! And I've finished two pairs of socks and started on a pair of thrummed mittens!

My brother, Cristine and her dad driving away

Finnegan (the fur is taking a while to grow back).

Afterthought heel socks in Knit Picks Felici - Coney Island and OnLine Tropic.

On Friday I'm going on a road trip with some friends to Whitehorse (we'll get back on Tuesday). We want to stock up on some supplies before winter sets in and prices go up like crazy and I also need to pick up some special cat food for Finnegan (one of the friends has a cat that had the same problems as Finnegan and she needs cat food too). I'm thinking of joining the women's hockey team in town (Tuesday nights - one of my days off!) so I'm going to pick up some gear when I'm down. I'm really excited about this trip since I've never been to Whitehorse before and the furthest I've been down the road is the Arctic Circle sign. The Dempster is supposed to be really nice in fall too so I'll have my camera for lots of pictures.


Temperature: +3C
Sunrise: 7:46am
Sunset: 9:53pm

In Knitting News...

Well since I don't have good news to share with you (I don't really even have terrible news either) I figured I'd better post about that bear I mentioned a while a go. He's very small - maybe 4 or 5" sitting. I thread jointed his arms and legs so he can sort of stand but I think he looks better sitting.

Pattern: Oliver from The Knitted Teddy Bear by Sandra Polley
Yarn: Elann Peruvian Highland Wool
Needles: 3.25mm


I'm in the process of doing another one with the knit side out but that might be put aside because I have a sudden urge to make myself some mittens (debating fingerless mittens or full on gloves... Haven't really decided yet).


In kitty news, Finnegan is still at the vet... He's very slowly getting better - we're basically waiting for the pH of his urine to be more acidic to dissolve the last of the crystal chunks. The amount of large crystals has decreased but it only takes one to block him back up. We're hoping a special food will be in for him in the next day or two because that should really get things going. He'll be home very soon if the food is in and I'm not really 100% sure what will happen if the food isn't here by tomorrow. It's been rough waiting and thinking about those tough decisions.


Temperature: +7C
Sunrise: 6:28am
Sunset: 11:12pm

Knitting & Berries

Finished the Emily doll I started at the beginning of the month. I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out. I would've gotten it finished sooner but I didn't have a chance to knit at the arts festival like I thought I would (wayyyyy too many people coming by to talk and there were a few sections I had to keep count of rows/stitches/etc).

I forgot that I didn't post the sweater that I made for Glen's sister's new baby! I made a BSJ and some booties. They really liked them and I can't wait to get a picture of baby Jai in his new sweater!

I've been taking so many pictures this month that my July folder is getting angry with me every time I open it (all my pictures are hyper-sorted too so it's not like it's ALL the pictures I've taken in July - it's my July 2008 Arctic Pictures folder that's getting grouchy!).
We went out on Tuesday and took some Cloudberry/Aqpik/Bake Apple pictures for a top secret project. Here's one of the pictures I took:

I know a lot of people really love these little berries but I think I'm missing what makes them so good. The few I had were good at first but had a really gross taste after the initial taste wore off :-/ bleh... But they're kind of pretty and they're hard to find (no one will tell you where they pick berries!) so it's kind of worth being massacred by mosquitoes to take pictures of them.


Temperature: +16C
Sunrise: 4:31am
Sunset: 1:23am

Baby Surprise Jackets

I finished my third BSJ over the weekend and have already started a fourth (addictive little things!). I'm making a few sizes since you never know when something like this could come in handy (and I have no idea what size children are! ie: I can't look at one of these sweaters and say "oh! That will fit a ___ year/month old").

The green one is by far the biggest one I've knit so far (I was starting to think I could wear it as a shrug!) and the pink one is the smallest. I don't really have a lot of experience with newborn babies so I don't know if the pink sweater would actually fit a baby or if it's too small... I have a doll that my mum made and it's wearing an outfit I wore when I was a few months old and, the sweater fit the doll so I'm thinking as long as the baby isn't 10lbs it'll probably fit (I was a smallish baby at 6lbs 6ish oz).

I'm going out of town at the end of the week (another medical trip!) so I'm trying to decide what projects I should take with me. I might have my fourth BSJ done by the time I leave so I could either start another one and bring it or bring something completely different (felted slippers, the socks I've been working on, ???)... Ahhh decisions!
I'm trying to decide if I want to take knitting with me on the plane. I've never had problems before but I don't really fancy losing a set of KP Options tips when I go through security in Yellowknife and Edmonton.
I'm extending my trip so I can go down to Saskatchewan and see my mum. I haven't seen her since last year when we got back from Australia. Since she lives so close to the US (75km to the border) we're thinking of taking a day trip into Montana (either Havre or Great Falls). I'm going to take my camera and my laptop so I should have time to update my blog while I'm gone (we don't really have any concrete plans - I'll be there from the 18th-26th).


Temperature: +3C (feels like -1C)
Sunrise: 4:47am
Sunset: 12:57am

Knitting Content (and lots of it!)

Well, I've been a bit busy on the knitting front again. About a week or so ago I got a big box from Knit Picks with my order of "Bare" yarn (in fingering and worsted weight). I planned to dye up some yarn for my Secret Pal (and mys
elf). I got four skeins done and now I have to decide whether I want to send all four to her or not - I'm thinking I will since I have plenty of yarn left to dye. All that's left is to think of names for the yarns - I already have all my little tags printed out!

I also have quite a few pairs of slippers knit up (four to be exact!). I'm in the process of embellishing them so I'll post them as they're completely finished. Right now I have one pair finished. I've been wanting to do embroidery on my felted things for a really long time now so I had a look around Ravelry to see if anyone had done something similar. I found some really awesome FO's out there. This first pair is just an experiment to see how my free-hand embroidery skills are (I've only done cross stitch before). I'm actually really pleased with how they turned out.

I bought two sets of shoe stretchers (women's size 5-8 and women's size 9-11) and they have totally changed my slipper blocking! I used to stuff them full of shopping bags and put elastics around them to keep their shape then, a few weeks ago I made duct tape forms of my feet (stuffed them with shopping bags) but those didn't work as well and didn't keep their shape when stuffed into a stubborn slipper.
Shoe stretchers are BRILLIANT. The little black slippers went from a women's size 8ish (maybe even smaller, they wouldn't fit properly onto my size 9 feet) to a comfortable size 9 - the heel is in the proper spot, my toes aren't stretching out the ends - AWESOME! I'm blocking a pair of felted clogs that got very small in only one run-through in the washer. With my incredible shoe stretchers, they've gone from being teeny-tiny to adult size. Can you tell I'm totally impressed? They give the slippers/clogs a really nice shape to them too.

My next big excitement is about the BSJ (baby surprise jacket). I got the pattern from a lovely lady on Knitty quite a while ago and for the life of me couldn't wrap my head around it (I'm not so good at reading a pattern and then knowing in my head what it should look like). I have to say, I was really embarrassed I couldn't figure this pattern out. Anyway, I bought the BSJ video done by Meg Swansen and I totally got how to knit it. I ended up doing a "trail run" and using some scrap kitchen cotton and it took me about 12hrs. I'm totally impressed with this pattern and how it turned out that I think this might become my default baby sweater pattern - I love the fact that you only have to sew two seams and it's all in one piece (hello my languishing trellis baby sweater I'm looking at you!).

Anyway! That's my big update for now! Anyone with good ideas for spring-y names for that yarn, leave a comment!

Oh! As of today I've been in Inuvik for 5 years! Whoa!

Temperature: -13C
Sunrise: 6:58am
Sunset: 10:52pm

Guinness & a Hat!

Finally got a bit of knitting done! I have 3 "work" projects on the go right now. I started a baby blanket for Glen's sister but I've been really dizzy lately and looking at it was making my dizziness (& nausea!) worse. So I decided to knit up a few hats since they're quick and are hopefully something I can knit without feeling too sick.

Pattern: No pattern, cast on 92 stitches and went from there
Needles: 4.0, 16" circ
Yarn: Kool-Aid dyed Classic Elite Attitude. I don't know how much of the colour is going to stay since it's cotton & silk. It seems the silk really picked the colour up so it's like a muted colour with bright sort of streaks in it. The colour started to spiral but then stopped a few inches in (I think because I attempted to change to stst and then had to rip it back. My gauge must have changed).
Notes: The hat is a little short so who ever gets it will have to have a small head or not care if the hat doesn't cover all of their ears.

And in other news, I tried my first Guinness tonight. I'm NOT a beer person but I really liked the Guinness. It has a more mellow taste and it's not fizzy (I think part of the reason I don't like beer is because it's too fizzy). I couldn't drink a whole can of it (no pub here to have a proper one) but I think I'd be able to in the future.

Temperature: -29C
Sunrise: 8:37am
Sunset: 9:24pm

Another FO!

I'm on a roll!
I finished my earflap hat yesterday and got some pictures of me wearing it today. I wanted to get a shot too of how frosty my eyelashes get just from the walk home from the post office (less than a 10 minute walk). It wasn't as cold here as it has been for the last couple of weeks so my eyelashes aren't as frosty as they normally are. I know I look a bit dorky but at least my ears won't get frostbite and I won't have to keep taking my massive mitts off to tug my toque down all the time. (sidenote: My parka makes me look HUGE... I'm really not that big...)

Pattern: Official Kittyville Hat (no cat ears or devil horns)
Yarn: Bernat Big Value
Needles: Size 7, 16" circular and size 8 DPNs
Interesting tidbit: I bought the yarn in the summer a number of years ago and it happened to match my parka perfectly. I've been meaning to make some sort of winter accessory for ages.

When the weather gets cold again I'm going to see if I can get an even frostier picture than that.

Temperature: -26C (windchill -35C)
Sunrise: 10:28am
Sunset: 5:49pm

New socks in less than a week!

I just finished a pair of self-striping socks for me!
I did the heel flap experiment and it all turned out! No pooling!! Once again, I made them "identical" for the hell of it. The only thing different again is the colour on the ends of the toes.
I think I'm going to take a break from socks and knit a few hats now... I have a Jayne hat to make for Glen's brother (just waiting on yellow yarn) and I desperately need an ear flap hat for myself. I have a really nice black cabled hat that I made but for some reason it doesn't like to stay over my ears. So I think a modified Kittyville hat is in my future. Off to dig in my stash I guess (which btw, I think I might be having a huge destash coming up... We're running into visa/immigration issues with Glen and are getting papers ready for my eventual exit to Australia so, if and when we do go only my "special" fibres will be joining us over there...) Stay tuned!!

Temperature: -37C
Sunrise: 10:41am
Sunset: 5:36pm

Self-striping short-row heel socks!

My first pair of self-striping, short-row heel socks are done and in the mail!
I got them finished on Saturday and they are virtually identical. The only thing is that the end colour for the toes is longer on one sock. I normally don't go to the extra trouble to make two socks exactly the same colour-wise but I thought I might as well since they striped so nice. It also helped with not having to do a lot of measuring haha.
Like I said in my previous post, I'm not as thrilled with the heel as I thought I would be which makes the whole thing a little disappointing for me. The heel seemed to want to sit more towards the bottom of my heel rather than towards the back of it. Since I'm new at this short-row heel thing I don't know if this is a matter of fit, pattern, my foot, or if this is just the nature of the heel.
They're going to my mum (like A LOT of my "first tries" do) so we'll see how they fit her (her foot is a touch wider and shorter so I think they might fit her better).
I've started a heel-flap sock with the same yarn so I'll see how the stripes work out for them. I'm not too concerned if the stripes are a little thinner for a few rounds around the instep as long as the colour doesn't pool (yuck!)


Temperature: -33C
Sunrise: 11:04am
Sunset: 5:14pm

(we're gaining 4 minutes in the morning and 4 minutes in the evening per day).

Santa is Done!!

FINISHED!!!! That's all I have to say right now.

Christmas Knitting Update!

I finally got around to taking pictures of the two finished stockings. When I dig out my Christmas decorations this year I'll get a better picture of the other ones (if I dig all that stuff out now I might be tempted to decorate and it's still far too early). The light is getting funny and there's a pretty fine line in which I'm going to be able to get decent shots of things. We only have one major window in the house (two smaller ones on an awkward angle and then three small bathroom sort of windows) so that definitely limits where I can take pictures...

Here's the customized detail on each of them:

I used a pattern that had a repeating motif along where the name bands are, took that out and replaced it with the person's name, a little customized picture/motif and the year. I used the Knit Visualizer program and besides having to work everything upside down it was so easy to use. I wouldn't have had the patience if I had to do this all with graph paper. I think my favourite motif is my step dad's I put in an igloo and an inukshuk since he spent time up here in Inuvik and he's the reason we all came up here. I'm quite happy with all the other ones though. Some are modified from 1000 great knitting motifs and others are straight from there.

Last but not least, my Santa progress as of yesterday afternoon. I got his eyes, nose, beard and moustache sewn on last night and he's looking more and more how he should. The arms are done and stuffed but I have to wait until the jacket skirt is on before I can put those on... Then the hat, cuff/boot trimmings and the holly and I'm done! This pattern is great - no errors so far and things are pretty straight forward there's nothing that's vague or confusing (unlike some patterns I've tried to knit before) and so it's great for me to knit at work or just sitting around watching TV. Not a lot of concentration or huge stitch amounts to worry about (I've hit the largest amount so far at 96 across).

Temperature: -26C
Sunrise: 12:15
Sunset: 13:07

Bit of an update

Opps... I'm getting behind in what was supposed to be a regularly updated blog. I can't really pinpoint what's gotten in the way of me doing this. Nothing major has changed in the way of work or at home lounging around. I guess I just never think to type out a few words when I'm sitting here bored (maybe some of it has to do with the fact that I'd always like to include pictures of interesting things or pictures of finished knitted things and of course that isn't always possible).

On the knitting front, I've purchased four Jean Greenhowe knitting books and knitting some of the cute things in those books have been my primary focus as was finished the last two Christmas stockings that were starting to haunt me in my dreams. I can very proudly say that everyone in my immediate family (Glen, Marc, Cristine, Mum and Ted - oh and me too) all have beautiful, custom hand knit Christmas stockings. I only managed 4¾ stockings before Christmas last year so I really had to finish my mum's and Ted's before this season. I was mostly done with my mum's so I couldn't do anything with it saying 2006 on it so just for continuity's sake I knit Ted's with 2006 on it too... It seemed sort of rude if everyone had a 2006 stocking and he was the only one that had one saying 2007 (it would've also meant me redoing patterns and graphs that I'd already printed out). Anyway, I'm extremely proud of them and I'll be taking some pictures of them tomorrow (work has been getting in the way of me having actual time to do things before 11pm).

About the Jean Greenhowe stuff, I've knit four of her "Little Darlings" 3 of them are mostly finished. Now that I'm finished the stockings I'm making her Santa Claus. I'm so excited about this pattern. So far I've knit the legs and have done about 15 rounds after joining them together. It's going along quick and unless I hit some sort of knitting roadblock this should be done in no time. I'd love to get a nativity done too before Christmas. For some reason I don't get the multi-piece dread every time I look at her patterns (like I do with most of the toys in the books I have). I just realised that I haven't taken a picture of the third doll she's not 100% finished yet so when she gets a shirt and some shoe/sock things I'll take a picture.




So to accomplish all of this crazy multi coloured knitting, and fueled by a discontinued colours sale, I have two quite large boxes Peruvian Highland Wool from Elann.com sitting in my living room (to add to the quite large collection I have so far). This is by far my favourite yarn for almost everything so I don't think it'll be to hard to go through all of it. All the stuff on the couch is what I've gotten in the last month and then the stuff in the zippered bag on top is what I had to begin with (it used to be sitting nicely by colour in there but we've been rearranging the house and it's gotten tossed around a bit). Also note Glen in the background pretending to ignore me taking pictures of my yarn.


I think that's about it for now. Definitely trying to take pictures of the stockings tomorrow if I get a chance and if there's some sun.

Sunrise: 11:47am
Sunset: 3:32pm

Craft-o-rama

The last week and a half has been really hectic. Our annual arts festival was happening and I spent a lot of time there this year (I unfortunately didn't have anything there - I kick myself every year that I don't get some stuff together). We spent almost every afternoon there with work and then I took three workshops. A porcupine quill earring workshop, a fabric basket workshop and a birchbark basket workshop. I think this is one of the first years that I'm actually sad that the festival is over. I had a lot of fun there this year and got to see some old artist friends (the guy that did the painting of my photographs was there) and meet some new ones. I also got some good info that will help my own art along (re: packaging).


The porcupine quill earrings was the first workshop I did. I wasn't sure exactly what I was getting into - ie: style of earring wise. But I thought it sounded cool and I'd never worked with porcupine quills (actually, I'd never even seen them in real life). The girl that put the workshop on was really nice. She's taking some sort of textile arts course at Uni. so we chatted about dyeing things. She dyes her own quills so that was pretty cool. We got to choose between blue, natural or green quills and then pick our beads to match. The whole workshop was a lot of fun and went by really quickly (started at 1:00 and finshed at 2:30)

The next workshop I did was fabric basket making. A lady in town had made and embellished all sorts of fabric baskets and had them in this years festival. They were really neat and I was really excited when I read that she was doing a workshop - I was also really curious on the construction of them. We got to pick our fabric and thread and basically pick the size of our basket (the size is just a matter of how big you make the bottom and how tall the sides are). Getting started was a little tricky - I think you just have to get over your fear that the sewing machine will break from sewing something other than fabric. Basically you wrap strips of fabric around braided cotton (or polypropylene) rope, coil it then zigzag stitch the coils together. After doing all that kool aid dying my gears started turning when I saw the rope came in cotton - you could dye that and sew it instead of using fabric and then I thought that instead of putting sides on the baskets you could just make large discs and use them as rugs. I've already make another basket since the course and I've started on an
experimental piece.


The last workshop I did was the birchbark basket workshop. It was probably the one I was most interested in since I've seen the baskets at festivals (and stores) and they're extremely expensive (so the $40 fee was a steal). Well, I have a whole new appreciation for the time and effort that goes into making them. We started our workshop at 1:00 and didn't finish until 7:30 that night. I think the only flaw in the workshop was the fact that we had TOO much choice. We should've only been able to make one size and then have a choice of say 3 patterns to put on (they're embroidered with porcupine quills). And it probably would've helped if the pieces for all the baskets were cut out beforehand. The only reason I'm mentioning this is because the workshops are supposed to only run from 1-4 (5 for late). I was supposed to be working that day (start at 3) but my boss knew I'd show up after I was done - the residents were at the festival that day watching a movie which was supposed to finish about the time I was. Luckily one of my neighbours took the workshop too so we sat together and chatted. Besides it taking a crazy
amount of time, it was a lot of fun and something I'd do again
now that I'm prepared for how long it takes.


And now for the non-Arts festival related crafting, I finished a knitted hat out of my dyed yarn. The colours in the picture don't really do it justice (it flows a lot better there's a bit more pink it in) but I'm really happy with how it turned out. I'm mostly happy with the fact I didn't get an ugly pooling mess (it started to pool a little bit at the top but it's really only noticeable in the picture). I'm just about done another dyed hat - the one that my brother's girlfriend helped with and I'm SO excited to post about this one. It's turning out so neat. After that I'm hoping to tackle the baby surprise jacket. That's knitting-wise anyway... There's sooooooo many things I want to make (quilts, baskets, quill work, dyeing) and I just don't have enough time. I definitely need to think of a way to be able to craft full time.

Anyway! I think that's all from me for now!

Sunrise: 5:08am
Sunset: 12:47am

Temperature: 11C (overcast)