Woolgathering Dot Net

Last night's SNB NY meeting was pretty fantastic. They were about 15 of us in total, all knitting away. This group is definitely younger and more daring in their knits than my Wednesday group. I'm not sure if I'll be able to come every week, but perhaps every other week I can make it. This is definitely a great place to get new, no fear knit ideas. Plus, the Space Untitled is pretty fantastic. I ordered an apple juice, freshly squeezed and wonderful with "apple foam".

I got to see Katie (from Little Italy) there, along with a few others from Sunday's Critter Knitter Knit-Out. Deb arrived and took pictures of us knitting away. When I talked to her, towards the end of the evening, she told me that the tea cozy was no more and, instead, she needed the front of a sweater. It is being made in Black Wool-Ease with a few rows of red right about at the beginning of armhole shaping. It needs to be done in a week! Eeks! But, I think I can do it. I just had to put various projects on hold and focus on this one. I cast on last night and I'm off to a running start.

It's called "Flame Sweater" according to the pattern, medium size. Definitely not a tea cozy. Hee hee. The wool is bouncy and soft, enjoyable to knit with (especially with this cool spell we're currently having). I made gauge easily on US8s. Katie is going to make the back and a third party is making the sleeves.

I'm done with the front of the Flame Sweater! That was a very fast knit, and I didn't even go crazy about knitting it. It pretty much finished itself.

I took pictures of the whole piece, but I decided to only put up a closeup of it. It's hard to take a good photograph of black and red yarn! It will hopefully make its way into Stitch'N Bitch Nation and will be far better photographed than I can make it.

Plus, it's not blocked yet and none of the ends are woven in. I followed Veronik Avery's fantastic advice to not measure and use row count instead, based on your gauge. It turned out perfect! Huzzah! I did have to change one thing: the pattern at one point calls for 26 repeats of a pattern to get it down to 38 stitches. I discovered that it only took 25 repeats to get it down to 38 (which is how it would work mathematically as well based on the pattern decreases). I haven't heard back yet from Deb, but I think if I need to rip it back, it won't be too much of a problem.

It's sort of fun to be a production knitter!

Tonight, I went to hear David Sedaris speak at the Union Square Barnes & Noble. He was funny (as one would expect), but he didn't look like I pictured him. Then again, I always pictured him as a cartoon character (a la Lisa Simpson substituting what Yeardly Smith looks like in real life) because of his voice.

Afterwards, I dragged Mike to a quick sandwich and then down to the New York Stitch'N Bitch to drop off the front of the Flame Sweater. I also picked up this:

More yarn! Deb asked and I volunteered to knit the sleeves. She didn't have the pattern, but I should expect it over the next few days. Some intarsia and duplicate stitching. Fun fun fun!

My intarsia is terrible. Actually, that's not true. My intarsia is fine; it's my stranding that is terrible. I make it way too tight when the bridge is more than four stitches and it leads to quite a bit of puckering. I've done the left sleeve (sans the yellow duplicate stitching) and the intarsia for the right. Last night, I decided to do a small section of black with intarsia (instead of stranding) to see how it would come along. In general, such a small section of black would have the yarn carried over, but I was desperate to try to improve the work. It turned out pretty good! So, my intarsia good, my stranding bad. I hope that with my future experiments in fair isle will improve it.

This afternoon, I went into the city early to show Deb my progress so far with the intarsia for the flame sweater. The BUST offices were very nice and I got to see a group of very cool and interesting women. It looks like a place I'd like to work at someday. She looked at my work and said that it didn't look too bad, especially when steamed flat. She showed me the original and its bell-shaped sleeves and maroon-instead-of-red flame. I think the new sleeve shape and color improve the sweater. I can picture a beefcake of a guy wearing it.

I told Deb that I should be done by Thursday and I hope we'll make plans to meet so I can give her the completed sleeves. Then it's back to Salt Peanuts to finish those sleeves! Just call me the sleeve-lady.

I finished the duplicate stitching for the flame sweater today.

Woo hoo!

My duplicate stitching isn't too bad and it went really fast; it felt just like cross stitching. There were some bits where the yarn was loose, which causes the duplicate stitching to look loose. I tried to tighten them as best as I could to make it look as even as I could. From about five feet away, I think it looks pretty good.

Now, back to my regularly scheduled Salt Peanuts!

I'm trying not to think about Fiona. So, what better way to distract myself than become a production knitter!

Deb Stoller emailed me with images of the Flame Sweater on a model. She'd pieced it together and corrected an error in the cuffs (the pattern I had didn't indicate a switch from the CC to MC). It looks lovely! I'll not post pictures: I figure everyone can see the completed work when it comes out in the book. She also has about a week and a half to get all the projects together and has asked me for help. I agreed and today I went to the city to pick up what needed to be done:

*An extremely colorful striped poncho needs to be shortened. After much mulling it over with Deb, we decided that I would remove the orange-white-red rows at the bottom and about four rows of the pink above that. I would then reknit the white back in and do one row of red before binding off with the red.
* Two "honeycomb" hats need to have bees sewn on it.
* A knitted butterfly (with crochet edges) needs to be removed from a grey chenile scarf and knitted on a cream chenile one.
* The handles of a bag with an intarsia smoker needs to be knitted, sewn in, and the bag needs to be finished with a lining (never lined anything before... very exciting).
* Two amazing furry hats need to be frogged quite a way (24 rows) to remove an increase that isn't necessary. Then I'll knit it back up.

I walked over to KnitNY afterwards, to pick up some appropriate needles (a large US10 circular for the poncho and a large US6 circular for my Charlotte). When I walked in, a very cute knitter complimented me on my bag and we started talking. Her name is Melissa of Recycle This! and she makes bags out of plastic! She was very cool, down from Albany to see the Phish concert, and a fairly new knitter like myself. We talked for some time about knitting and our projects until her friend arrived and I needed to get motoring back to NJ.

When I was on the train home, I started working on the poncho and frogged up to the pink. By the end of the evening, I had this:

One down, four to go! I had to frog my work once: I only removed three rows instead of four for the pink, so I had to go back and redo it. The pattern is quite easy and I think Ella would love it, if I showed it to her.

I'll work on the projects tomorrow and I hope to do most of them so that I have a majority of the weekend to work on the furry hats. They will be the hardest, since it'll be like unravelling some hardcore fun fur. Plus, the yarn is double stranded, so I think picking through it will be difficult. We'll see. I remain optimistic.

Plus, I hope that this temporary avoidance will make me more eager to get back to my own projects. Crossing fingers!

After I finished the poncho, I was roaring to go today. I managed to:

Finish sewing in the bees to the two honeycomb hats.


I think I like the orange hat better, since I associate orange traditionally with beehives. Plus, the bees are really cute. I wish there was more bees on the hat; the design calls for only seven bees, but I think there should be atleast twice that number to get the full effect from all sides.

Sewed the blue butterfly onto the cream scarf.

Very pretty! I think I will make one for myself, but not in chenile. It will be a wonderful cotton/wool blend for a warm but versatile spring scarf.

Finished one handle of the bag and started on the second. I'm still awaiting instructions on how far from the bag edges I'll place the handles.

Frogged one of the fluffy hats (the white, thus easier, one) most of the way and picked up the stitches. Now I'm untinking, hopefully to the point where there are only 48 or 50 stitches and knitting the 24ish rows back up. This yarn is fabulous to touch and knit with and the hats are adoribly cute. I think I might make one for myself!

So, lots of excitement and my frogged yarn has taken over the living room. I need to make sure I fit in everything I have to do this weekend. Not just the knitting projects, but I've got an assignment due on Sunday for my Flash class. Whee!

I've completed the two hats.

I have a love/hate relationship with this yarn, ggh's Lara. It's warm and fuzzy and extremely touchable... 100% wool! But, it's hard to undo, really difficult to actually see the stitches, and requires some serious brushing to look fuzzy and furry; the strands are so long that they get wrapped into the stitches and need to be combed out.

I managed to do what I needed to do and they are done!

I like the white hat. Even though I'm not sure if it matches anything in my wardrobe (although it could be a nice compliment to my fuzzy funky black dress coat), it's something that I would like to wear on those warm nights. I even like the pompom tie-ends.

The brown hat has bear ears! So cute!

I've finished sewing the bottom of the red bag together and the two handles, but I'm unclear on how I should sew in the handles... or sew the top edge down for that matter. I'm seeing Deb tomorrow and she'll show me what needs to be done.

Today was a pretty hectic day. My cousin, Kim B, is done with finals and I promised her that I'd get her knitting pretty hardcore once she has the time for it. I knew that I'd be going into the city to see Deb, so I took her along for a quick stop to Seaport Yarns.

Deb told me to unravel the top of the bag, purl a row, and knit three rows of stockinette. The purl row would provide a natural bend in the stitching, so it will be easy to sew it down. Plus, she also provided me with new yarn:

So soft! It's ggh Soft-Kid: 70% Super Kid Mohair, 25% Nylon, and 5% Wool. I'm making the front and sleeves of a sweater with a Union Jack on the cover. Woo hoo! I can't wait.

I brought Kim to Seaport Yarn and bought her six skeins of Debbie Bliss Merino Aran: three balls in two different colors for two kitty hats she's going to tackle. One for her, one for her sister. I told her to do her sister's hat first, so she can get all of her mistakes out of the way on the first hat so hers would be perfect. Hee hee. I got her some Addi Turbos and Britany DPNs in appropriate sizes for the hat as well. I wouldn't be surprised if she's done with it by next week; she's quite fast.

We caught a lot of traffic on the way home, so I wasn't able to show her how to cast off. But, we made plans to meet again tomorrow and I'd show her then.

I spent the evening working on the bag untit I had to do the sewing-up part. I tried, but I could see the pucking from the opposite side and it looked awful. I'll be seeing Deb again tomorrow and she indicated she should help me with it further.

This afternoon, I went to see Kim B and showed her how to cast off while watching the theatrical version of Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. She picked it up pretty quickly. We even started her new hat. Seed stitch! In the round! Fun!

Another trek into the city. This time, I got to get more knitting fun!

* I got the brown and white hats back. My cast-off was way too tight (although I really tried to keep it loose); I need to redo them with a much larger needle.
* I got an uber-cute baby sweater that I need to get snaps and sew them in.
* I got a swatch of sweater that I need to buy a matching button. Hot pink. Whee!

I also got a really great sewing lesson and I think I've got all the knowledge I need to finish the bag.

On my way home, I stopped by Treasure Island, Michael's, and the Rag Shop in search for the proper notions. Other than snaps, I found nothing good. Rats.

I finished the red bag, except for the lining which I still need to purchase (tomorrow!). You can kind of tell which handle end I did first and which I did last: the quality difference is noticable. I also unravelled the brown hat and I casted off with US15s instead of US10.5s. I think it's nice and loose now. I've been instructed not to weave in the ends until the hats get the ok.

I haven't started with the Union Jack sweater yet. No instructions.

On the belief that my little New Jersey town has Everything, I looked up some sewing stores in my town. I decided that "I've Got a Notion" could be right up my alley. I was right. There, I picked up some black lining for the bag and pink buttons for the sweater.

I think they look about right. I was trying to get a match with the hot pink, but all the buttons that matched the bright hot pink were pearly or too fancy. I matched a lot of buttons to the light pink in the swatch, but Deb indicated that she wanted something darker. The buttons I picked are plain and in between the bright pink and the dark pink.

This evening, I hand-sewed the lining into the bag. It looks pretty good! I'm actually pretty proud of the work I did on it. It's something that I hadn't done before and I enjoyed it. I'm looking forward to getting a sewing machine (my birthday present from mama, hopefully) and doing more sewing.

I also sewed the snaps into the baby cardigan at Knit Wits (the local needlework group; most members knit but I've also seen some fabulous needlepoint and quilting and sewing from group members). I received the sleeves for the Soft-Kid sweater (titled "London Calling") today and cast them on. Whee!

I spent the better part of the afternoon and evening in New York City, finishing and knitting away in the BUST offices. What I did:

* Finished up the brown and white hats. My cast-off was good and I weaved in the ends and added the tassels. They are seriously fun hats and I'm really interested in making one for myself.
* Removed the duplicate stitching on the baby cardigan and stitched a new design into place. (For full disclosure purposes, the photograph below is pre-my stitching. The new design is smaller.)

* Deb worked out the "London Calling" sweater pattern and I'm ready to go! She worked it out on knitter's graph paper, which is just brilliant. It reminds me that I need to redo Ron's hat on knitter's graph paper; it will give me a more accurate look at the design so I can compare it with stills from the movie.

"London Calling" an intarsia sweater design. At its worst, I will have to deal with thirteen different yarn sections. Wheeeeeeeee! I'm rather excited about the prospect. I hope to finish the sleeves tomorrow, so I'll have the weekend to work on the sweater front.

My pink buttons were too small at 3/4". They'll need to be upgraded to 1" to fit well with the button holes in the sweater. Rats.

I'm now comin' up for air from working on "London Calling".

I finished the sleeves on Saturday. I didn't get as much knitting done as I wanted, since I had to accompany my relatives to the Montclair Municipal Works compound to dump out some bulky waste that has accumulated from all the construction work they are doing downstairs. Also, my father and cousin wired the house on Saturday, allowing the cable modem to exist downstairs and thus connect the entire house to the Internet. I did manage to buy ten intarsia bobbins in between dump trips. I calculated that working with ten bobbins and three balls of yarn would be appropriate for the project.

Once I finished both sleeves, I cast on for the front of "London Calling", using US15 needles and going down to my US11 circular needle for gauge. I quickly developed the appropriate technique for dealing with the feathery Soft-Kid yarn and thirteen strands:

I would lay out the yarn in a fan-like spread around me. I would always keep the bobbins/balls of yarn in the same position in the spread. When I needed to switch yarns, I would pick up the appropriate bobbin/ball and twist it either over or under the next piece of yarn, returning the bobbin to the same position. This way, I would only be dealing with two pieces of yarn at any one time and the yarn threads wouldn't get tangled. Also, when "turning" my work, I would move myself more than the work, again keeping the threads from tangling. This made the work go relatively quickly.

By this morning, I was already to bust-height (about 2/3 into the design). The pattern called for nine rows of solid red, but after knitting to that point, I realized that it looked too tall and I contacted Deb for clarification. After emailed pictures and phone calls, we reduced the rows to eight and I did a bit of frogging to fix it. I was done by this evening, around 9:30pm, so I'll be going into the city tomorrow to give it to her.

Absolutely fabulous intarsia!

Since the weave is quite open, I couldn't carry any of the yarns behind the work. Thirteen separate pieces of yarn. Fun fun fun!

Weaving in the ends will be a nightmare.

I'm not sure if I'm going to get any more work, but I'm so pleased and happy with what I managed to accomplish. It was challenging, but not too hard that I became frustrated. I would like to knit myself one of these sweaters, except without sleeves, so it would be a cool sleeveless shell that I could wear over a tank top. I bet it would be quite sexy.

Close observers will notice that a number of older entries have been removed from the archives. These are the entries that detail the production knitting I did for Debbie Stoller for Stitch'n Bitch Nation. She's requested that I remove the specifics until the book comes out, which is totally cool with me, so I have honored her request. After its publication, I'll republish those entries as written. I feel this is a comfortable compromise: I do not have to alter my writing and those entries will come back up after the book (and its patterns) are out there.

Y'all will just have to see the finished products when the book comes out. Hee hee! I guarantee that the designs will be fabulous and uber-cool. I'm already itching to make myself a few of the pieces (if just to work with the Soft-Kid and Lana again)! I've heard of a couple more designs that will be in the book (that I didn't work on) and they sound really great too.

Stitch'n Bitch and Stitch'n Bitch Nation. The first taught me how to knit. The second (well, knitting pieces for the second) taught me even more. I highly recommend the first for new knitters looking to pick up good techniques and practices. Start on page one and you can't go wrong!