You'd never know Christmas was coming

...Because I've been doing almost zero Christmas knitting. Seriously. How stupid is this of me? I mean, I got a great head start earlier in the year, but now there are fewer than two months to go and there's still a pile of work to do. Here's my list:

Family, STOP READING NOW, DAMMIT.

• DH: maybe some socks. Status: Not even on the radar yet, but I think I know which yarn to use.
• DD2: also maybe some socks. Status: I at least know which yarn I want to use.
• MIL: Lliclla wrap. Status: Still have to block it.
• Mom: two pairs of socks. Status: pair #1 has one sock down but the second one barely started; pair #2 I've still got about a third of the way to go before I finish the first sock.
• Dad: Probably socks (geez, do you sense a theme?), maybe two pairs. Status: I need to buy the yarn.
• Brother: Ragna sweater. (Thank heavens; something which isn't socks.) Status: Haven't even finished one side of the damn thing yet; I'm probably totally screwed.

On the upside, though, I'm doing well with the baby gifts. However, I would like to warn everyone I know who's of procreating age that if anybody else announces any babies which are due before December, you're getting store-bought stuff from me, and that's final.

Log Cabin for baby Miller

Finito!



I really like it. I'm thrilled that I finally figured out how to do the spirals thing with the log cabin technique; I'm thrilled that I found more of the yarn in the basement just as I hoped I would; I'm thrilled that I managed to find a really good edging motif that struck exactly the right balance between the need for baby frills and the geometric square-ish nature of the blanket itself (#278 from Lesley Stanfield's "The New Knitting Stitch Library", in case you're curious); and I'm thrilled that it took me less than two weeks to do (let's hear it for bulky yarn and thick needles).

What I also found thrilling about this project - but not thrilling in a good way - was how little of the yarn I had left when I finished. Here is all that's remaining of the three different colours I used, with my hand included for scale:



Yeah. Cutting it damn fine, I was, particularly with the solid purple. I don't mind telling you that when I rounded the corner right before the final long edge (with another corner and a teeny bit of edge to go after that long edge was done) and looked at how much purple was left, I got really, really scared. You know that thing in knitting where you start getting really nervous about whether you've got enough to finish your project, and as you keep going, you vascillate wildly between "yes! I think there's enough!" and "no! I'm totally doomed!"? That was me all over for the final stretch, baby. Fortunately, it all worked out in the end.

I'm going to have to ask my mom whether I should send it off to my cousin myself, or - if it turns out that my parents are also sending along a gift, which I certainly expect is the case - whether I should give it to my mom so she can mail both gifts in a single package.

P.S. to Glyn, if you're reading this? Yes, it's for your sister - please keep it secret!

Turquoise socks for DD1

I'm still working here and there on the first sock. It's very tall...but still not tall enough. DD1 likes her socks extremely long, like up to her knees, so it's taking me a while. I'm doing the leg in 1x1 ribbing to boot, so you can imagine how scintillating I find it. (The plunking sound you just heard is the drip-drip-dripping of my sarcasm.)

Log Cabin

This also got a bit of time since my last blog entry - nothing spectactular, nothing to merit a new photo - but still, progress is progress.

Ragna

As I'm now starting to feel the first faint stirrings of panic about Christmas, I figured I should stop procrastinating on this one. Alas, I think I've so far managed to do only about one more row. Sad. Also, I can't find the book with the pattern.

No big deal, you might say, with almost two months to go? Like hell. The boy is not tiny and it's cables...all over the sweater.

I'm so screwed.

Idea for baby garment

Usually my design ideas come from wanting to do specific designish stuff. But this design idea comes from a very specific yarn (On Your Toes Bamboo), in two very specific colours (which I'm not going to reveal here just yet). From there, the motif (which you'll also have to wait for) just suggested itself to me, and now I'm trying to think of what kind of baby garment I should apply it to. Ideally, I'd like a blanket, but for that I'd need to buy a lot more of the yarn than I really have the budget for. Maybe a sleep sack. I'm not sure. Stay tuned, I'm hoping it will turn out to be excruciatingly precious.

Idea for something cabled

I got hit by an idea for a cable motif this week, charted it up and swatched it out in some acrylic sportweight. It's not looking too bad, I think I can make it work. I'm thinking about using it on a baby jacket.

And finally, two more neat things before I sign off for another week or so. Firstly, I wanted to give a nod to Carrie K, who left an awesomely quotable sentence in her comments for my last blog entry. Here it is: "Sometimes the Knitting Goddesses just want us to swatch fruitlessly."

Doncha love it?

The second thing has to do with the piece I wrote for the Cast On podcast, which I mentioned a few months ago. My revision was accepted, and tonight I sent my recording off to Brenda. If she deems it to be up to snuff, you'll hear my voice doing the piece. If not, you'll hear somebody else doing it. Either way, I'm not quite sure when it's going to air, but hopefully sometime soon. I'm pretty darn nervous about the whole thing and I hope you like it...assuming you listen to Cast On...which you totally should, because Brenda puts out a great show.

I'd like to thank the Academy...

Kathy, who goes to (and now works at!) my LYS has given me an "I Love Your Blog Award"!

Isn't that lovely of her? And she's a really good knitter, too, go check out her blog.

The rules for receiving this award are:

1. Post this award on your blog.
2. Add a link to the person who awarded you.
3. Nominate at least 4 other bloggers, and add their links as well.
4. Leave a comment at the new recipients' blogs, so they can pass it on.

And so, I give you:

• Rick Mercer's blog
• A Little Pregnant
• Navelgazing Midwife (warning: photo in header is not work-safe)
• Crazy Aunt Purl

Yep, not a whole lotta knitting content in there, but they are certainly blogs that I love. I am, however, too shy to do #4 on the list. To distract you from my failure to follow the rules, I present...much knitting progress!

Anouk for baby Mendez

Done! And IloveitIloveitIloveit, it's really sweet. I especially like how all the pastel colours work together.

Double-faced bib

This is also finished and it looks amazing, if I do say so myself. Alas, that's all I can tell you. I'm hoping to publish the pattern, so you won't get a picture; and the mother-to-be reads this blog, so you won't get details on who she is or what the bib looks like or much of anything else, either. Sorry. I know, I know, the secrecy thing blows.

Stretchy socks for Mom

I finally got the cast-on done properly and got going. I'm almost finished sock #1, but the foot seems way too small. I'm not sure how this happened, because the toe looks like it turned out as long as it was supposed to be, and, accordingly, I started the toe when the foot was as long as it was supposed to be, given how long the toe was supposed to be, and yet somehow the two lengths didn't work out to a nine-inch foot. I've lost count of how many times I've checked that my math was right (7 5/8 inches of pre-toe foot plus 1 3/8 inches of toe should equal 9 total inches of foot), so that's not the problem.

At this point I am studiously avoiding trying to find out what the problem is, because I'm sure the solution is going to be ripping back and knitting more foot. Or snipping the foot open and adding more length before grafting the foot back together. Either way, grumbling will be involved and I'm not ready to go there yet.

St. Brigid wrap for moi

This project right here pretty much sums up me as a knitter.

About two weeks ago, the chill of autumn began making its way into the weather, and I was completely unprepared because I haven't got a transitional (read: spring/autumn) jacket. In the interests of saving money, and because I am trying to snazz up my wardrobe wherever possible, I decided that knitting myself a wrap was in order, using the shape of the Chunky Highland Wool Wrap but something else for the actual pattern.

I've been drooling for some time over the cables in the St. Brigid sweater pattern by a certain Outer Hebridean designer whose name dare not cross my keyboard. :) So I redacted them, put 'em together in such a way as I thought would give me an 18-inch width, and got going, using some royal purple Emu Superwash DK that I had 7 balls of in my stash thanks to a Knitters Attic sale last year.

Unfortunately, once the first ball ran out I only had about five inches done...


(It's actually much more purple than this in real life.)

...and since the wrap as I planned it would require a total of 94 inches, it was pretty clear that my remaining six balls weren't going to cut it.

So I went looking for something else in the stash that I had enough of.

Enter my 19 balls of blue Angora Extra, which I had acquired during a ridiculously good online sale at the studio. This is supposed to be an Aran-weight yarn, although when you feel it it seems like fingering or sport. However, the label says 4 stitches per inch, and I got the distinct impression from reading other people's projects with it on Ravelry that it would "bloom" like crazy...so I assumed it would be Aran-weight, and removed two cabled braids from the pattern I'd worked out.

And oh...my...GAWD. This yarn is AMAAAAZING. It's sooo soft. You know that scene in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, where Ford and Zaphod are admiring the black ship? The dialogue goes something like this:

Ford: And feel this surface!
Zaphod: Yeah...hey, you can't!
Ford: I know, it's just totally frictionless!

That is exactly how it feels when you touch this stuff. It's absolutely gorgeous, I'm completely in love with it. The cables looked awesome knitting with it, too, not too fuzzy at all.

Once I'd knit through the first ball, though, the logic centre of my brain was telling me that I should really confirm that it would indeed bloom as expected. So I did up a swatch and soaked it in Eucalan for about half an hour.

No bloom.

Like, maybe a little bit of horizontal expansion that was really just the cables relaxing out, but the yarn itself bulking up? Nada.

Cursing viciously, I ripped out the whole thing (alas, I did not take a picture before doing this) and re-cast on with enough stitches to put the two missing cable braids back in. I finished two rows, went to bed, and didn't get a chance to work on it for a few days.

During that time, I discovered a spring/autumn jacket in my closet.

It's a gorgeous jacket that I'd forgotten all about...one of my dad's cousins visited us this summer and had bought this jacket for herself as part of her trip (which included some sightseeing in Alaska, I believe). She no longer wanted the jacket and didn't want to haul it back to Australia with her, and so she gave it to me. It's gorgeous, warm, classy, and fits me perfectly, and I love it.

Unfortunately, I'd also forgotten all about it. Had I remembered it, I could have avoided this whole wrap fiasco entirely. However, I am clearly an idiot, and an knitting-enthusastic one at that, and so we have the saga that you have just finished reading.

I don't quite know what I'm going to do with the yarn now. I love it desperately and absolutely want to make something with it (something for me, dammit), but don't know now what it should be.

I guess I'll just have to wait and see what comes to me.

Log Cabin blanket

This is proceeding very nicely indeed and I really like how my little variation on the Log Cabin theme is working out.

Turquoise socks for DD1

Well, with the wrap project scrapped; the Log Cabin project too big to transport (the blanket itself could probably be shoved into my bag, but the balls of yarn are enormous); two other projects finished; and two other projects being assiduously avoided; I needed something else to do. So why not make some socks for my older daughter.

I had some fingering weight acrylic in a greenish turquoise kicking about, probably enough for two pairs, so I started with that. It's going pretty well. I'm using my new sock pattern which I can't wait to have published so that I can link it up to all these damn sock projects I've been doing lately in my Ravelry notebook, and to show you some actual pictures of the socks.

Log Cabin for baby Miller

My parents were over at my place last night (happy birthday, Dad!) and told me the news that one of my second cousins is expecting her first baby. This is extremely good because she has MS, the symptoms of which apparently go away when you're pregnant, which is certainly good news for her right now. She's due in November.

After they left I started thinking about what I could make for her, and - despite having a long list of baby stuff in my queue - I settled on doing another Log Cabin blanket. I'm not sure why...but I'm quite happy with the decision and I like the way it's going so far. I'm using some Patons Knit 'n' Save bulky yarn in my stash. I'm not sure I have enough to make this blanket (I think there's more in the basement, although I haven't found it yet), but as per my usual style, I'm blithely forging on ahead regardless of potential consequences. This should be good for a laugh or two...