Happy Canada Day!

Don't ya think? =)

No knitting progress here. It's too damned hot to knit.

Do you believe....

....in the Curse of the Love Sweater? Well, I clearly must not, cuz look what I made!



Two Baby Bobbi Bears, one for baby cousin Jayson (the blue one), and one for grownup Jason (the brown one), both of whom have birthdays this month. Aren't they adorable? Cutest bear pattern ever.

I actually did ponder the Curse for a few minutes before ordering the yarn for both projects, but decided not to worry about it because a)it's a bear, not an entire sweater (please ignore the fact that I've never actually made a sweater), and b)if I'm knitting two it must dilute out the effect somewhat, right? Not to mention that c)I live a charmed life and I laugh in the face of curses. =P

Some things I learned while knitting the bears:

1) Stuffed animal patterns aren't as scary as they seem.
2) Large double pointed needles (US9) can get unwieldy.
3) And they can hurt if you accidentally poke yourself with one.
4) Blue Sky Alpacas cotton (dyed and organic) is very soft and yummy yarn.
5) How to duplicate stitch.
6) Be generous with the stuffing.
7) The only stuffing worth using is Cluster Fill. It feels like slippery little polyester balls, and it is magical. Regular polyester filling will make your stuffed thing all lumpy and gross. I now worship at the altar of Cluster Fill.

Stripey socks

In the interests of eating up some of the sock yarn that I've got stashed away, I started on a new pair of socks last night. In the interests of not being bored with yet another pair of toe-up-socks-with-short-row-toes-and-heels (although I've only knit 2 pairs of those -- so I can't really claim boredom, can I?), I decided to knit these socks top-down. Oooh, I know, how wild and crazy can we get, huh? =P

The main reason for knitting these socks top-down was so I could learn the tubular cast-on. With help from my mom and some pictures with confusing Chinese descriptions and the usually-incomprehensible-to-me Knitter's Handbook, I think I'm starting to get the hang of it. Here's the practice cast-on:



It's sort of hard to see, but notice the ribby-looking cast-on edge. And here is the sock-in-progress, reclining in my Easter-basket-turned-sock-basket. I think I switched the knits and purls around when I joined in the round though, but I'm just going to leave it like that because it still looks better than my usual cast-on edge. And there's still sock #2 to practice on besides. =)



Oh, and the yarn is Regia Ringel, colour 5048, clown. =)

Long awaited update

Wow, I've been a terrible blogger (and knitter) recently. I wish I could say something like "oh, I've been absent because big and exciting things are happening in my life", but the truth is simply that I've just been lazy. =P In any case, here are a couple of things that have been on the knitting agenda as of late:

Fun with socks! Toe-up socks in Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock, the Somerset colourway (notice the fun pink!).



A while back I bought a bunch of Berroco Softwist on sale, and it's been languishing in my closet ever since. Since I need a new "big" project and I'd rather knit lace than something useful like, say, a sweater, I started an Evening in Eden shawl a couple of days ago. I've done one pattern repeat so far, and I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it at this point. The yarn is the right weight for the pattern, and it's a pretty colour and is slightly shimmery, and it has a springy quality that reminds me of Koigu Kersti, but I'm not sure it's 100% right for this shawl. Then again I'm not used to knitting lace using worsted weight yarn, so maybe it would look thick and heavy no matter what yarn I used.



Lastly, a mom-endorsed yarn purchase, more Malabrigo in the Loro Barranquero colourway, for a fun scarf and possibly also a hat. Aren't the colours pretty?



One more thing, I think I'm going to put myself on another yarn diet (in addition to the donut and semi-ice cream diets I'm on) for the month of June. The stash, it overfloweth. I haven't shown you the sock yarn I bought off eBay, because I forgot to take pictures. But I have lots more Lorna's Laces waiting to be knit up. =)

P.S. I hate Blogger, it's driving me up the wall. It took me ages to get this post to format correctly. Argh!

Not sure about the gauge

Okay...so I started the scarf using US8's. I'm wondering if I picked a needle size a bit too big, but the yarn I got didn't recommend a size, and it's about the same as the Elizabeth Lavoy. I was worried about using something too smallbecause there's only 25 stitches, and I didn't want the scarf to be too narrow.

Here's a picture of what I've got so far.

Hmmm...acutally, when I look at it in the photo, it looks more or less okay. I was worried that the needle size was too big and that you couldn't see the pattern. What do you guys think? Think it's okay as it is? I don't want to keep going if I'm just going to frog it and start over again on smaller needles. Right now, I'm leaning on the side of just keeping it.

But let me tell you, it's awesome knitting with this stuff. When it's all knitted up, it's SOOO soft and silky. I totally recommend getting some!

Gift bag!

Okay...I have to say that this is probably a speed record for me. The Alpaca Silk is definitely very nice to knit with. Plus, I learned the three-needle bind off for this project too. It's not hard, but I still feel a small sense of accomplishment anyway. It makes very nice seams indeed. I think the part that was the most frustrating for me was the fringe. Probably took me about as long to knit the whole i-cord as it did to put the fringe on one end and wrap the tassle. Actually, it was the wrapping that was the most frustrating. I wanted to have a third hand when I was doing it! ^_^

Next, on to the scarf. Oh! What size needles did you use for yours?

Finally, some photos

Okay...I finally have photos to show!

Here's the shawl.

I had a tough time blocking it actually, because it was so darn big. The kitty in the picture gives you an idea of the scale ^_^ Here's an up close shot of the lace pattern

(stupid me...I should've taken the towel away for the zoomed out shot...I only needed it for the zoomed in shot, after all...*sigh*)

I also decided what to make for my friend Minako. I'm gonna make one of the drawstring pouches from 'Last Minute Gifts'. I got some light pink Blue Sky Alpaca Silk for it.


And I'm also going to make her the 'Branching Out' scarf out of this yarn

It's from Fleece Artist, and it's 100% silk. I'm hoping that it'll be a nice scarf that she can use during more than one season. I was debating getting kidsilk for it, but in the end I wanted something a little heavier.