Sometimes sizing mojo deserts me

Updated to add: This post made my lovely commenter think she had offended me. :( She totally did not, I was really just using what she said as an excuse to poke fun at myself and how my projects don't always work out as planned - something which I'm sure has happened to all of us! I'm very, very sorry to have made her feel like she needed to apologize to me - this is clearly a valuable lesson for me to learn about blogging and responding to comments. I've edited things so that hopefully I don't sound offended; and instead sound amused at my own knitting vagaries, which is what I meant to be.

On Ravelry, one of my readers was lovely enough to comment on the cardigan I tried to make for DD2, but actually ended up fitting DD1. She light-heartedly observed that this "hey, it doesn't fit" phenomenon seems to happen to me quite a bit. This reminded me that sometimes the size of things doesn't always turn out properly, you know?

For instance, my dad's Morgan hat for Christmas?

I tried to finish it recently and found that somehow, although I had been following the large instructions, it had come out way too small. No clue how that happened, since it was sized just right when I made it last year for DD2's teacher. As far as I can tell, the only way to fix it is to rip the whole thing back and start again, probably with larger needles this time. (And I'm almost certainly going to run out of yarn the second time around, but I should be able to get around that by knitting the part that folds under out of sight in a different colour of the same yarn.)

My Ljod cardigan turned out too big for me:

DH's 50th birthday present was far too massive:

This Sourpatch vest ended up fitting DD1 instead of DD2 as originally intended:

These mittens for BIL#2 are pretty damn huge:

This much-anticipated Fjalar sweater for myself doesn't really fit right in the proper places, plus I made the sleeves too short:

I meant for this to be a beret and failed miserably (I have since figured out beret physics, though, yay):

These socks have never fit me properly, I think I made the feet too short:

This tabard keeps falling off my shoulders:

These mittens never got past this point as it was clear they were going to be far too huge:

This sweater for DH totally fooled me - I started out making a medium, then the ribbing made me think it was going to be too small, so I ripped it back and did it in large instead, and guess what? Too big, of course!

And then, worst of all, my first adult sweater for DH, which ended up coming down to about his knees:

I can't be alone here, right? :) Do you have any projects with sizing woes?

I've been remiss

But I'm back. Today: Christmas knitting! Which is pretty much all I've been doing lately.

Double-knitted mittens for BIL#2

I ended up not using Cascade 220 after all. I just wasn't happy with the colour combinations I was able to come up with. I should hasten to add that this doesn't mean my LYS doesn't have a good selection of Cascade 220 colours - quite the contrary - it's just that no two of them put together were quite what I was looking for. So instead I went with some Diamond Tempo. It's still worsted weight, still with wool content, and the shop had two colours that were perfect for what I wanted, and it's machine washable and dryable to boot, so that's a bonus.

These ended up taking way longer than I thought they would because, frankly, I kept screwing up. Especially on the 2x2 ribbing. Normally, with stocking stitch double knitting, it doesn't matter if the strands twist a bit as you go. But when you're doing double-knitted ribbing (which incidentally I was really proud of myself for figuring out how to do), any twisting shows up in the work - which I discovered, again and again and frickin' AGAIN, to my great displeasure. I lost count of the number of times I had to rip my work out.

However, knitting frustration aside, it all worked out quite well. Here's the first mitten just started:


Here's the first mitten completed with all the ends still hanging out:


And here's the finished product, from both sides:




I'm quite happy. I think they're very handsome.

However, if you're looking at these shots and thinking maybe one mitten looks larger than the other? Sadly, you're right. Most of the first mitten was done with both yarns being worked continentally. But I was having such a devil of a time with yarns twisting at the cuff of the second mitten, so I finally switched to one-yarn-in-each-hand to eliminate the problem, and never looked back. Unfortunately, this had a side effect of a tighter gauge on the second mitten, and it's slightly smaller. Oh, well. It's not hugely noticeable, especially once they're being worn.

And speaking of being worn...they're freakin' huge. Even the smaller one. However, my reasoning is that the guy lives in Ottawa, where winters are very, very cold. Big mittens will be an advantage, as he can wear them over other mittens. Yes. That was the plan all along, doncha know.

(Oh, crap. I just noticed a pattern error on the right-hand mitt on the black-cuff side. #$@*@(#!%.)

Scarf for BIL#1

A few weeks ago, BIL#1 started hinting very strongly that he lost his long scarf last winter, and he loved that scarf, and wouldn't it be nice if he had another one, nudge, nudge.

Now, I knit for people when the spirit moves me, and don't generally appreciate or respond to such overt "gimme" requests. However, it occurred to me that DD1 has recently gotten very enthusiastic about knitting, and to have an actual project to do would probably really help her out and give her a great sense of accomplishment. So I asked her if she was keen on knitting her uncle a scarf. She was indeed, as long as I was willing to help (I am), so I picked up three balls of Bernat Roving (which in hindsight was an incredibly dumb move since a loosely spun yarn is not an easy task for any new knitter, let alone a six-year-old) in a really nice cobalt colour, and right now we're working on the cast-on.

I suspect I'll be doing most of the work here. But with 7mm needles and a bulky weight yarn, I probably won't mind too much.

I've also nixed some of the projects I was thinking about for this Christmas:

• Barbie wardrobe for DD1: DH ended up really wanting to get her something particular for Christmas, which means I will be giving her the present he was going to give her, which means this planned gift is now unnecessary. Given my workload between now and Christmas, it's also kind of nice that I don't have to worry about this. I'll probably save it for her birthday.
  
  
• Ragna sweater for my brother: I'm never going to get this finished in time anyway, and we found some really awesome gifts for him this year, so the pressure's off to make the sweater.

Next task: Find purple cotton fingering weight yarn for DD1's teacher's challah cover! So far I've had no luck at my LYS or Zellers, so I might try Michaels. Failing that, I'll see what I can find at Lettuce Knit, which I'm hoping to get to this Wednesday evening.

I know you don't want to hear it...

Christmas is coming.

(Of course, I'm right in the middle of getting the house clean for Thanksgiving, and sewing up the cloak for DD1's Red Riding Hood costume for Hallowe'en, but nevertheless...Christmas is coming.)

Now, I don't celebrate Christmas in the religious sense. I celebrate it in the gift-giving, seeing-family, eating-a-lovely-meal, celebrating-the-end-of-another-year, trying-to-find-something-to-get-happy-about-in-the-middle-of-all-the-snow sort of sense. The gift-giving is especially fun for me, even though I do most of the thinking-up of gift ideas, buying stuff, knitting gifts, and wrapping presents around here. (If you read just a soupçon of bitterness into that, you would be correct.) So yes, it's stressful...but it's also a lot of fun. I've got some gift plans this year that I'm quite excited about, and quite an ambitious knitting to-do list.

In a moment, I will reveal this list, but first, I want to make sure no one is reading it who shouldn't. So, a short quiz...

1. Are you a descendant of my parents and/or my husband's parents?
2. Do you provide care or education for any of my children?
3. Are you cared for by my children's daycare provider? (That includes her kids!)

If you answered 'yes' to any of these questions, then for heaven's sake, get your nosy eyes off the blog this minute!

Ahem.

So, the list...

Mi escuelita for Devangi

This is coming along really nicely. Both sleeves are done and attached to the body, and I'm decreasing for the raglan shaping.



I am nervous that I'm going to run out of yarn, though.

Cotton wool socks for Mom

These have not seen any work for I can't remember how long. I've been at the done-first-sock-started-second-sock stage for...oooh...ugh. Over a year, I'm guessing. But I'm hoping to be able to find the motivation to pick it back up and finish it off in time for Christmas.

Barbie wardrobe for DD1

I've got several items that I'm hoping to finish. On the needles right now is Rhonda Gehringer's Summer Sorbet Dress for Barbie, in white. I'm going to make the skirt fuller and longer than the instructions say to, because I think DD1 would like something that could pass as a wedding gown. So far, we have this:



Other Barbie garments I'm hoping to finish include Judy Gibson's Barbie's Basic Tube Dress; Isabelle Dutailly's Robe tube arc-en-ciel pour Barbie (Barbie's rainbow tube dress); the long coat from Elaine Phillips's Barbie Elegant 2-Piece Suit; and Silvana Catallo's Gilet Big Jem (something for Ken).

Socks for DD2

It's not tremendously vital that I manage to finish these, but I thought it would be nice. For one thing, with the cold weather coming, I'm feeling a deeply parental responsibility to keep my children's extremities as warm as possible. And for another thing, toddler-size socks are super easy to make out of the yarn left over from making adult-size socks, which I have rather a lot of, so I wouldn't need to go out and buy any new yarn. Also, small socks are fast and cute.

Socks for Dad

My dad is pretty hard to come up with gift ideas for; at least, gift ideas that I can actually afford. (Ideas would come thick and fast if my budget were big enough to buy fancy camera doodads and gadgets, for example.) But I know he loves my hand-made socks. I'm thinking about Alice Bell's "Bakerloo" pattern, which is a sideways sock pattern that can apparently be done up to look like the keys of a piano. My dad's unpursued career dream was to become a concert pianist, and he adores classical music, so I think this would be much appreciated.

Double-knitted mitts for BIL#2

BIL#2 has recently moved to Ottawa. It gets cold in Ottawa, and I want to make sure he is warm. Last year I knitted him a hat, so this year it's going to be mitts. I will be using Marcia Lewandowski's Houndstooth Double Knit Mittens pattern from her book, "Folk Mittens" (although it can also apparently be found in Interweave Knits Winter 1997 issue). I'll probably use Cascade 220 - I'll get two masculine colours which vary slightly so that the pattern is understated. DH agrees with me that this is a great idea, so this project is a must-finish.

Ragna sweater for my brother

Finishing this in time for Christmas would mean one less gift idea I'd have to come up with for my brother. (He's tough to buy for.) Unfortunately, I have no idea how I'll manage to finish in time. If memory serves, I've finished the back and am close to finishing the front, but there has been a serious screwup and my row count is totally off. Getting back into it is going to be a challenge, to say nothing of the fact that I still have to do both sleeves and all the making up. We'll just have to wait and see on this one.

Challah cover for DD1's teacher

DD1's teacher has a Jewish surname and took the day off on Yom Kippur, so I'm guessing a challah cover will be a nice gift for her. Judith Goodman Johnson's Challah Cover [scroll down to find it] pattern is really beautiful - I particularly like how the cabled braid around the edge mirrors the shaping of the bread. :) I will be changing up the wording, though, so that it doesn't look quite so "busy". Probably a nice, simple "Shabbat Shalom" (in Hebrew, of course) will work well.

DD1, who has been enjoying the role of "spy", informs me that her teacher's favourite colour is purple. So I will pick up some nice purple cotton fingering weight sometime fairly soon.

Ljod for moi

I'm toying with the notion of trying to finish this in time for Christmas as a gift for my husband. Yes, it would be a cardigan for me to wear, but it's very shape-accentuating, so really it would be for him, if you know what I mean. :) However, the odds of me actually being able to finish it in time on top of everything else I need to do are pretty much zero, so I suspect this will end up being an anniversary present or something.

Tree skirt for our tree

Right now we have just some green cloth to cover up the plastic legs of our Christmas tree. It works okay, but a knitted tree skirt - such as the gorgeous cabled one by Teva Durham in "Handknit Holidays" - would be scads better. Will I have time? Probably not, but it's worth putting on the list of things to attempt, anyway.

Wish me luck. Maybe elves will show up and help me...