8-Bit Clue 3

 I zoomed through this clue.  The game appears to be Space Invaders.  Knitting isn’t as smooth as I worked like, but the floats are getting looser.

My overly enhanced stash got some additions.  Eternity Ranch Knits is going out of business so I did my bit to help them out.

Note that despite the horrors that USPS is going through, they delivered the yarn a day earlier that it was supposed to arrive.  Well done.

8-Bit Clue 2

 I swatched.  I washed and blocked the swatch.  I got gauge in both directions.  Still, my sleeve has fewer rows in it than the instructions call for.  I am going to live with it.  It is a tiny bit snug but other knitters report that it loosens up after washing.  I think if I had gone with the sleeve for my body size it would have been way too big.

Now it is back to the easier of the two pair of shark socks.  If I get bored (more like when I get bored),   I have a choice.  It will be the Emberly hat or socks knit from the yarn with the yak fiber in it.  What an exciting life.

Indie Untangled

 Indie Untangled is something I happened upon during my National Park obsession.  They continue to offer yarn from various dyers on that theme, but also other things.

I am in their Where We Knit yarn club.  This month we are knitting on a camping trip in the Pacific Northwest.  The yarn’s from the Earl Grey Fiber Co. and the pattern is a hat by Vanessa Smith.

Indie Untangled is doing a virtual trunk show in October.  There will be shopping, of course.  There will be interactive Zoom classes, a bingo game, and other events.  $5 will get you a general admission ticket to a special section of their website that will be set up for the event.  One thing I thought was especially nice is that those folks whose finances can’t stretch to an event like this can apply for a scholarship.  Six people  will be able to take a class, get some shopping cash, and other goodies.  

 I have preordered a big bunch of mini skeins that are being offered from various sellers.  It is a bit of an indulgence, but since the show’s right after my birthday I decided it would be a fun present.  In the meantime, I will be hunting for fun mini skein patterns.

Mail Call

SpaceCadet’s July Yarn Alliance shipment has landed.  I haven’t been a part of the Alliance for several years.  This selection is quite different from the yarns I remembered.  I am a fan of MCN (Merino/cashmere/nylon)for socks.  This yarn is a more exotic cousin, MYN (the Y is for yak!).  I will be using this really soon.  The natural yak wool is the little patch of gray.  The thing in front is a cute little needle sizer.

I managed to go several weeks without giving in to temptations from Jimmy Beans.  Then a Shark Week kit appeared.  It is a mittens/mitts pattern by Spillyjane.  I don’t need hand coverings but I am a fan of Jane’s work.  I also have this thing about Shark Week socks.  I plan to do the kit as socks.

8-Bit clue 1

The sleeve for the body size I plan to do was huge.  I decided I couldn’t live with it and started over with the next smaller sleeve.  They get attached at the yoke.  Hopefully they can be worked into the pattern okay.  It was worth starting over.  I did a better job with the little boxes at the top.  Everything isn’t as smooth as I would like it to be, but it is much improved.

The game for this clue was Tetris.  I figured it out all by myself.  That is unlikely to continue through the whole sweater.

8-Bit Swatch

I did the swatch for my 8-Bit sweater.  The pattern allowed for the swatch yardage.  I felt better about using the yarn for it, knowing that I probably won’t be in desperate need of a few yards at the end of the sweater.  It was also a chance to see how different techniques look.  I decided to do big areas of single colors each with a single ball of yarn.  It is a royal pain to weave ends in, but worth it in improved appearance.  

The new version of Blogger is not playing nice with my pictures.  Let’s see if I can prove that I did the swatch.

A bit bigger than I expected, but it counts as a success.  The light color is peachy pink in real life.

Moon sweater is done!  But not blocked yet, big surprise.

All Together sweater needs one sleeve and the neckband.  I wanted to use a lighter pink, but nothing I had contrasted with the dark well enough.  Maybe I can get a shot of it.

Sweaters

The moon sweater is almost done.  I am so over it that it will probably take another two years to do 3 stupid inches of sleeve ribbing.

The All Together sweater is fun now and what I am actively working on.  The initial yarn choices did not work and resulted in many hours in the frog pond.  It was so bad that I zoomed through the sleeves of the moon sweater rather than unravel any more.  Then the sweaters swapped places on the boredom list. The good news was that the moon sweater had a whole skein of yellow left over that should work with All Together.

I had some unexpected money arrive so I am using a little bit of it for another sweater.  It is the 8-Bit sweater from Lattes and Llamas.  I think the inspiration is early computer games.  The pattern comes out in 12 weekly installments starting next month.  The yarn should arrive tomorrow.  Stay tuned, I plan to actually swatch!

Fun with masks

Surprise, I got tired of working on the blanket.  The directions are a little tricky until one learns to follow them.  Then there are more ends to weave in than I cared to have to deal with.  I will get back to it at some point.

About the same time that blanket fatigue set in, a robo call came from the county I live in.  It would appear that the COVID 19 numbers are getting worse here. It is recommended that we not go out unless it is absolutely necessary and masks should be worn if we do.  I was already painfully aware that many of the individuals in charge of things cannot distinguish between science and politics.  If even these people are telling us this, things are not good.  I am unlikely to do anything that requires a mask, but better safe than sorry.  I went with a Doctor Who theme.

There are pink Daleks, the Paternoster Gang, and exploding TARDIS.

It will be back to sweaters now.  The yarn I needed to to the sleeves of one sweater should arrive tomorrow.  I will tie one of my masks on and hike up to the mailbox.

Fingering weight?

Here are two skeins of yarn that arrived this week.

It isn’t obvious in the picture, but the top skein is larger than the bottom skein.  The top is 425 yards and 100 grams.  The bottom is 415 yards and 100 grams.  They are both fingering.  It is just sort of strange.  They are clearly different thicknesses.

The top one is Splendiferous from The Dyeing Arts.  The colorway is Exterminate.  It is part of a Doctor Who club.  A few other goodies came with it including a Dalek stitch marker.  I got a K-9 marker in a previous shipment.  That marker was sitting in a little dish that holds knitting odds and ends.  One night I turned off the lamp and there was a glow coming from the dish.  The darn stitch marker glows in the dark!  I love things that do that.

The bottom one is from The Wandering Flock and is called Ombre Skies.  I don’t remember what motivated me to get it, but I like it.  It reminds me a bit of Hedgehog Fibres singles.

I did frog the tiger socks, I haven’t started the masks yet, and the new sweater is in time out.  There is no problem with the sweater other than having to knit several inches of stockinette before the colorwork starts.  I am working on the Safe in the City blanket.  It is going to be a bigger project than I anticipated.  Gee, Paula, what gave you the idea that something called a blanket wouldn’t be a big project?  D’oh!

Works sort of in progress

Both of the hat kits are done but they need blocking.  So do two sweaters.

Ixchel sweater body has been re-reknit.  The sleeves may or may not have enough yarn to be done.  I decided to be safe and order another skein of yarn.  The yarn isn’t available yet.

I started another sweater.  I knit this much stockinette and got bored.  The interesting stuff comes after about 9 inches.  This is too much when I am going through a short attention span phase.

I started some socks with this tiger stripe yarn I just had to buy.  The stripes don’t look remotely like the ones on the box.  The feet are too big (totally my fault).  They are inching toward the frog pond.

The shark sock kit has about 2 inches done on one foot.  The construction is fairly elaborate.  The sharks are in time out.

The Safe in the City Blanket caught my eye.  The designer said it was done with worsted weight leftovers.  I decided to try it using fingering weight held double.  It will force me to tidy up my stash to find the nearly 20 skeins that are needed.  We shall see how soon that happens.  Expect much complaining about ends that have to be woven in.

I may throw in the towel on all of this stuff for the moment.  I know where to find some fun fabric.  If I can locate some elastic, I will make some masks until my attitude adjusts itself.

Kits plus one

Yesterday was a good mail day.  I got the latest Knitting Our National Parks yarn from Indie Untangled.

It is called Rialto Beach and is one of my favorite blends (Merino/cashmere/nylon).  The dyer is McMullin Fiber Co.

I happened upon Heritage Spinning and Weaving online somewhere.  I am not sure exactly what led me to them.  I enjoy making fair isle style hats so these kits caught my eye.  I am from Michigan originally so the Great Lakes hat looked like something I would like to make

The kits contain Jamieson’s Shetland wool.  I have used that before and like it.  The hat was designed for this year’s Michigan Fiber Festival.  They had a kit for last year’s festival, so I had to get it also.

MDSW goodies

I have all the yarn I ordered from the virtual Maryland Sheep and Wool event.  It was a little bit like actually going, because I ended up with a lot of little bonus things besides the yarn.  There were cards, buttons, a soap sample and several mini skeins.  I decided to go for yarn that was dyed specifically for the event.

From left to right:  Hope Springs from Toad Hollow, May Flowers from Bumblebee Acres,  Purple Joy and Exuberance from Miss Babs,  Dandelions and Daffodils from Cece’s Wool.

From left to right:  Shark Week kit, First Time for Everything from A Hundred Ravens, Power to the Protectors from Avalon Springs.

A sweater story

About two years ago I spotted the Ixchel sweater published in PomPom Quarterly.  I gave it a try.  Halfway down the body I realized it was going to be a bit too small.  My initial enthusiasm disappeared.  The sweater went into hibernation and I moved on to more fun projects.

A couple of months ago I finally exhausted my Ravelry queue.  Trying to restart the sweater with more stitches sounded more interesting.  I jumped right in and suddenly I had a completed sweater.  Well, almost completed.  There were several dozen ends to weave in.  I also was not satisfied with the work in a couple of sections.  I ran low on the main color of yarn toward the end of the sleeves and my changes to accommodate it did not look good.  The cherry on top of this sundae was that the sweater was a bit too big.

Should I frog it and start again?  Should I weave all those stupid ends, block it, and live with it as is?
Time to do something else for awhile.

I grabbed a couple of braids of BFL and hand spun some yarn.  I have an idea for using it, but it will take some more planning before that can start.  I have not had enough energy to do much (sleep problems, not anything viral) so another project was needed.

I knit these socks from a pattern called Hello Sunshine.  I used some recently acquired yarns.  The multicolored is from The Dyeing Arts.  It has metallic threads in it.  The twist is good, it doesn’t split, and the metallic part stays put without ending up all over the place.  The pattern has cables that aren’t actually twisted.  There is enough going on to keep you from getting bored, while being easy enough to memorize.

Then there’s the sweater.  Remember the sweater?  This was a blog post about the sweater.  Midway through the socks an email appeared.  The Ixchel sweater pattern has been updated to increase the size range.  I gave it some thought and decided to try again with the updated pattern.  I am going to order an additional skein of the main color just in case I need it.  The yarn is slightly more semisolid than solid, so it should blend in okay.

My next project is frogging and swatching.

(Virtual) Maryland Sheep and Wool

I always wanted to visit Maryland Sheep and Wool, but didn’t think I would ever get to do it.  This year’s festival has gone virtual because of that stupid virus.  I have been visiting the MDSW marketplace and having a good time.  I bought a show mug and T-shirt because I would’ve done that in person.  I have plans for ordering some yarn, hopefully some show exclusive colorways.

My big find was a kit for some socks that I never thought I would get to do.  It is the shark week socks by the late Tsarina of Tsocks.  She passed away several years ago.  A company called BeadBiz is offering some of her kits under the name Art for your Feet.

In between virtual shopping trips, I am working on my Ixchel sweater.  It was frogged and put in time out almost two years ago.  I figured out how to increase the size without making too much of a mess of the pattern.  There are several zillion loose ends to adjust and secure which will improve the appearance.

I did one project before I jumped into this.  A woman on Ravelry made a blanket pattern called Safe at Home.  I liked it but did not want to buy a bunch of worsted weight or commit to yet another blanket.  I had a pillow form and more than enough fingering weight, so I made a pillow.  I think it is cute.

Back to the sweater and PBS.  Bob Ross painting happy little clouds always cheers me up.

Can of Koigu

Clever packaging?  Check
Yarn I like?  check
Quarterly credit at Jimmy Beans?  Check

This is a Koigu Paint Can in the Troll Valley collection.  Most of the other colorways sold out before I snagged this one or I would’ve been tempted to get more.  There are 5 mini skeins.

K-9

A few good things have come out of this virus mess, especially for Doctor Who fans.  There have been watch-alongs of favorite episodes.  These have included Tweets from past cast members and new mini episodes written by past show runners.  I loved the one by Steven Moffat that featured Strax.  The most recent, by Russell T. Davies, really got to me.  The actress who played my favorite companion, Elisabeth Sladen, passed away nine years ago.  This left a big gap in her character’s story.  The mini episode described Sarah Jane Smith’s memorial service.  We found out what happened to a number of characters who were suddenly left in limbo when The Sarah Jane Adventures ended.

Among the original Doctor Who characters to appear was my second favorite companion, Ace.  No longer a teenager with a backpack full of Nitro-9, she has reverted to her real name, Dorothy.  We discover that Dorothy now is the keeper of the little tin dog, K-9.  It is silly to admit, but this made me happy.

What the h*ck does all of this have to do with yarn?  I saw the episode over the weekend.  Today (Monday) my Doctor Who club yarn came from The Dyeing Arts.  Colorway is K-9.

Acadia National Park...

...was the inspiration for the latest Must Stash kit.  I visited it in late October of 1992 which doesn’t seem as long ago as it actually is.  Yarn and candles and stitch markers and sock soap and a patch for my favorite yarn tote and more.  Yay!

I have pretty much cleared out my Ravelry queue, which is a dangerous thing.  I have reverted to my old sock knitting habits.  I have one pair in the works and KAL pair that starts in a couple of days.  That one will use some of my Must Stash stash which is a good thing the way it has been piling up.

The project after that might be a sweater that’s been in time out for at least a year.  It needs to be a little bit larger.  This requires doing a new graph for the yoke.  It is a bit complex and I am a bit lazy.

If I keep the sweater in time out, I will probably do the Safe At Home blanket.  The goal is to work from stash, and if there’s anything I do have it is stash.

Yikes, stripes!

I bailed on the brioche class after the second lesson.  I can’t begin to guess what my problem is with this technique.  I am filing it with calculus as two things my brain refuses to grasp.

There is good news, though.  I finished my Birdsong sweater.  There will be a picture as soon as I get around to blocking it.

Things are tough for yarn companies these days.  Shows are being cancelled left and right.  I made an effort to help Must Stash a little by ordering this self stripey goodness.

That’s Exploding Rainbow, Pippi, The Doctor, and Lavender Apple Blossom.  The colors are really nice.  They are pretty as skeins but downright irresistible when you see swatches of the stripes.

I took some time out to stitch this.  The quote is from GR Mom of the Golden Ratio, if you are familiar with them.  It is silly, but why not?

Lockdown Brioche

It has been a fun couple of weeks here.  My broadband went out.  With no phone or internet, there was no way to contact my service provider to get it fixed.  I wrote a note to one of my neighbors and he called it in for me.  What a nice man!  All is well now.  I got a cheap cell phone so I have some way of handling the situation should something similar happen again.  Why didn’t I have one before now?  The service was not very good here in the past.  I was throwing money at something I didn’t use.  I have learned the hard way that sometimes you need to do that just in case.

No internet meant I had no access to any of my project patterns.  I was finally forced to finish the body of the sweater I was working on.  Then I knit a pair of socks from a book pattern.  No internet also meant no podcasts, no BritBox, and no PBS Passport.  I pulled out my Gilmore Girls DVDs and spent many happy hours in Stars Hollow.

When I got back online, Social Distancing had become a thing.  I consider myself very lucky because it is a lot like how I function in non virus times.  My sympathies go out to people who are out of work and those whose businesses have been disrupted.  I am spending more on yarn than I usually would.  Shipping is slower than usual (as everyone probably knows), so pictures will appear when the yarn does.

With more people off of work, there have been more knitalongs popping up.  I decided to join one called Lockdown Brioche School.  I wanted to try my hand at brioche so this seemed like a good idea.  This is partway through the first lesson.  It isn’t perfect, but I think I am catching on.

I will be working on it while I watch Rose in a little while.  It is the first episode in the Doctor Who relaunch fifteen years ago.  Knit along, watch along, Tweet along.  It is good to be back online.

Grab bag

Between Jimmy Beans and Must Stash emails, my stash is getting some totally unnecessary enhancement.  I haven’t done the Must Stash thing yet.  There’s another national parks kit coming up and it is one I have visited (Acadia), so you can do the math.

As for Jimmy Beans, they had a grab bag with Madelinetosh yarn which I like.  I chose the pinks and purples bag and was happy with what I got.

The yarns are all one of a kind colorways of Tosh Merino Light.  The bag was the yellow thing in the back, a Namaste Snap bag.  The brown thing is a notebook with dotted pages.  It is handy if you find it necessary to graph out patterns.  The box with the pink and purple things in it are blocking pins.  They have a row of pins about 1/4 inch apart.  It looks like it will make blocking much easier.

Wibbly Wobbly yarn clubs

I have been working on finishing projects, with varying degrees of success.  The National Park project is nearly done.  It involves an old but rarely used chair that several felines decided was a scratching post.  I will post more when it is complete.

The bird sweater is taking forever.  I am only about 5 inches below the arms.  It is insane.  I measured it, knit for an hour, and measured again.  No freaking difference!  It drives me to working on little projects instead, like these Catchalls.  They cover little glass yogurt jars and are decorated with some buttons I picked up at a flea market in Paris.

I have managed to not start more socks.  The goal is no more than one pair per month.  It is an Olympics year, so I will be doing Tour de Sock.  The rule is suspended for that.

With most of the paths to fiber mischief blocked, it should not be surprising that I joined two yarn clubs.  I discovered Indie Untangled while hunting for national parks yarns.  It is doing the Where We Knit yarn club.  Designers and indie dyers are paired for each shipment.  Wobble Gobble is the dyer and the colorway is Frozen Magic.

The pattern was pretty but it was a cowl and I don’t do cowls.

The other club is (big surprise) the Doctor Who themed Wibbly Wobbly Timey Wimey club from The Dyeing Arts.  The colorway is The Doctor’s Wife.  There are tiny silver sparkles throughout the yarn.   It definitely wants to be used for something where it can catch the light.

First new yarn of the decade

I finished the last two pair of patchwork socks.  I am officially over my infatuation with the pattern.  I might do a simplified version of them next time I want to fool around with some of the self striping stash.

I have been mostly burned out on the Dolores kits.  The patterns have been cute but the yarn has frequently been not fun to work with.  I discovered that some of the patterns from discontinued kits are available from WEBS.  I have three of them in my Rav queue.  Don’t tell Dolores.  She really wants wear something besides her holiday sweater.

I managed to make it halfway through January before some new yarn successfully called to me.  The dyer is Yarn Baby and she lives in my old stomping grounds.  The Colorado flag made me a bit homesick.  I got over that fast by remembering the magic word Snow.  Do not like.  I bought it, though.

She had a mystery yarn sale, with odd skeins at a good price.  You could even indicate color likes or dislikes.  I was happy with my mystery skein called Sour.

Knittish New Year

I jumped right into 2020 with my Birdsong sweater.

As soon as the bird part was done, I got bored.  I zipped through a pair of Patchwork socks.  They look odd and are too thick to wear with any of my shoes.  They are also warm, fit well, and are lots of  fun to knit.  I am going to go cast on another pair.

That’s the front of both socks, by the way.  Not exactly obvious, is it?