Seed stitch washcloth

Okay guys. I have about two inches done and here is the secret.

Stitch markers.

During your knit 6 rows, put stitch markers as follows: 3 (knit border); 7 (k1p1 rib); 6 moss - 1ea across, 2 rows of each); 7; 6; 7; 6; 7; 6; 7; 3.

The pattern instructions are written for sets of 13 [(k1, p1) 6 times, p1] or [(p1, k1) 3 times, p1, (p1, k1) 3 times]. Just don't worry about the instructions fitting 6 and 7, they won't always but they will ALWAYS fit the 13 (a 6 plus a 7).

Even mom says it looks like the book picture.

I need a second opinion

I'm trying to start the moss stitch washcloth (the last one) and I cannot get it to do what it's supposed to do. I'm sure there is an error in the pattern because surely I couldn't keep making the same mistake over and over. Someone try it and see if they can figure it out, please?

Cool Project

Check out this link - it's a lap blanket a guy designed based on an old doily pattern. He used big yarn so it's not a fine lace pattern - in other words, it looks as good as lace but won't take as long. I think it would make a great baby blanket if you made it just a bit smaller and since it's feather and fan, you could make it as big or small as you wanted too. (it's about halfway down the page)

http://brooklyntweed.blogspot.com/

The Children Are Home Again

Steve came home Wednesday evening from a business trip to Savanah - he brought gifts. Maddie is home from a four day outdoor education trip. She first went rafting down the Nantahala River and then spent 3 days camping in North Carolina and learning about stuff. She finally came home this afternoon. Her cat was very happy to have her home; he missed her terribly.

Not Knitting

but cute . . . .

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Did You Know?

That if you click on a picture, it gives you the larger version?

Fishy purse . . . .or Fish Bowl Purse

I made this fish purse or fish bowl purse for a friend who sent me a full sized (like 3 feet tall and in a really big pot of dirt) passion flower thru the mail. Must have cost her a fortune. I love the fish swimming around their bowl - they are all beads just placed in straight stitch. It was easy and quick to make. The pattern came from this year's pattern a day knitting calendar.

Caught another fish . . . . .

Have a friend who has grandchildren and he needed a bribe for someone, so I made him this:

My Washcloth pile so far . . . .

Haven't finsished them all and need to make two substitutes as there are two I just don't want to do. I cannot make the squares on basketweave come out straight - they turn into triangles - so I just don't want to do it. I'll pick one of the other patterns we found to replace it.

Hard at work

Here I am hard at work on the big yellow afghan. In the background is the yarn for Travis' truck sweater and the yarn for other projects.

My gorgeous sweater

Here is the finished sweater that my most favourite daughter made me as a birthday present. It was only 26 days late. And I had to buy the buttons myself. But she did try.

Big Yellow Afghan

Here is the finished big yellow afghan.

Finally Finished

Finished the frog, the owl and from our project, the garter ridge.

Dena has not done any of her washcloths, which probably explains why she hasn't posted.

A School of Felted Fish . . . .

You guys didn't wanna make them and I don't use a pattern . . . . . so no two are alike. Two of them still need the girls to needle felt their faces.

Finished Objects

Finally finished the sweater . . . . she loves it but I will never make this pattern again (this is at least the third one I've made cuz the girls love this pattern).

Stupid girl!

Well, when I first started to order the needles, I was thinking of ordering the options and the Harmony. I decided I couldn't afford both, so I figured since I have tons of addi's I'd just get the Harmony needles.

The package came today and the size 1, 2 & 3's I ordered in the Harmony's were in there, but the set I ordered was the Nickel Options, NOT the wood Harmony set. I really can't afford both, so now I have to send it back and wait another week for it to get back and another week for them to send the woods ones out. Maybe I'll just send it back and get a refund and skip the wood ones.

Got some books

One of these I found at the book store and the other two are the ones I ordered from the local yarn shop. I haven't really gone thru any of them, or Two end Knitting. But the Traditional Scandinavian Knitting looks good. And the Viking Knitting really, really looks like a very cool book. . . . . .

Presents for you . . . . . .

I went to the yarn store today because I decided that one skein of the cotolino wasn't quite going to be enough for a washcloth, or if it was enough was just barely going to be enough. So I went to get some more. While I was there, I got presents for you . . . . but the ornament kits weren't there yet, so I didn't get them. I'll mail this stuff when they show up - need to re-email Arlene.

This is kinda cool!

I am always looking for stupid simple ways to count rows in a pattern. I don't know why, but the mechanical row counters are just not something I would even consider. Steffie and I made a great bead row counter - you move a bead from one end to the other each row. And I bought one of those beaded bracelet row counters which is very neat, but I don't do bracelets. This is simple and you can make one to go on each thing you've got in progress and it costs nothing. See what you think . . . . .


http://martianmischief.blogspot.com/2006/04/i-make-my-own-row-counters_28.html

Finished . . . . .

with absolutely nothing at all! I need more time to knit. If I quit doing things like housework, laundry and gardening I might have time to finish something. But where I'm really going to gain back an awful lot of time is by getting rid of the children. They take up so much of my time it's just not funny. I spend most of my day doing unimportant things like feeding them, dressing them, making sure they get everything ready for school, packing lunches for them, taking them to school and then doing the things that need to be done while they are at school so they can continue to be my children. And then in the afternoons. . . . . that's when they really mess up my schedule . . . . hours and hours of doing things for them and with them - taking them here and there, waiting for them here and there, making sure they do their stupid homework (I finished school and shouldn't have to do homework anymore).

I think I'll just sell them so I can finish my knitting.

And to make matters worse, my knitting needles haven't shipped yet. Georgiana promised me that they would go out first thing in the morning, but I'm not prepared to believe her just because she said it. And I still haven't gotten the books from either amazon or Scotland - in fact, I haven't gotten the ones I ordered at the local yarn shop.

It's been a disgusting day.

And I'm never going to finish that stupid sweater for that daughter of mine. Who was it who thought knitting an entire sweater in ribbing would be cute? What idiot decided that the all-but-finished sweater should be ripped out completely just because it was a little tight? The kid doesn't need to breath anymore, she's had plenty of oxygen in her lifetime. And why on earth would anyone knit the stupid thing a second time after it didn't work the first time? It's never going to be finished. I'll still be knitting it when I'm one hundred and twenty three.

Will tomorrow be better?

Oh, and how was your day?

Bad, bad girl!

I have been very busy this morning being a bad girl when I should have been knitting. I have to take the girls out shopping this afternoon (like now), so I will never finish the unfinished sweater (whose idea was it to knit an entire sweater in ribbing anyway?) and get on to finishing the first wash cloth. You guys are gonna finish them all before I finish the first one . . . good thing this is not a race.

So here's all the stuff I bought this morning . . . . bad, bad girl.

I still don't have a regular Options set, but I do have all my addi's. They are great even if you can't change the length. I was going to buy myself a set but decided that I couldn't really afford to. Like I could really afford to buy all this other stuff!!!
Oops! I did it again! M has been wanting a computer game for a long time. She wanted to order it as a download, but I feel safer having a cd since computers tend to die in this house. So I went to amazon and ordered it as a cd - and I ordered Two End Knitting for myself! I'll let you know what nice patterns it has in it for our twined knitting project.

our yarn

This is our yarn. We really like your lime green. The burgundy is my feather and fan and the green is Dena's feather and fan.

Ready to Cast On!

I still have Steffie's sweater on the needles, but as it turns out it is at a place where it needs to be tried on before I can finish it. I worked on it last night and it may already be too long (does her belly button need to show?). I already knit the stupid thing once and had to rip it out. Even tho she tried it on at least 4 times while I was knitting it and swore it fit, it was far to small and tight. I know teenagers like things tight, but I thought it might be important for her to breath while she wore it . . . . .

Here's my yarn and I'm ready to go cast on!!! (The gray looking yarn is actually a lovely sage green and the red is actually burgundy - don't know why I got washout in those two and not the lavender or lime.)

Finished Objects

Had some time yesterday to knit. I finished the baby blanket while waiting for the oil change in the car - used three skeins all up. I could have ended it with slightly less yarn, but didn't see any point in saving the bits. I do have a fourth ball, but it's always good to have some baby yarn on hand for hats and booties for unexpected arrivals. I will take the baby blanket to the school today for the new parents. (Very sad, was supposed to be twins - boy & girl - but the baby girl died.)

I also had a bit more time while I was waiting for the girls - Thursdays are tutoring, flute and, of course, can never pick the actress up till several hours after school. So, even tho the mini sweater was barely begun, I finished it too. It was knit on size 0 needles with regular baby yarn so it was tight knitting and my hands were sore when I finished.

Finally

Our yarn finally got here. Mom has cast on in burgundy the feather and fan pattern. I shall cast on for the feather and fan in Green. Thank you for waiting for us. Hope you read this soon so you don't wait too long. Love ya.

New Fair Isle Book

I went to the book store today and found a new (different, probably not new) Fair Isle book: Fair Isle Knitting by Sarah Don. What's nice about this one is that it gives patterns for simple sweaters - man's pullover, v-neck vest, cardigan, child's cardigan, etc - but it also gives sample fair isle patterns so you can design your own colorwork pattern. One thing I liked about Henry VIII is that it's not the same pattern repeated over and over - it's a series of 5 different patterns across the front of the sweater. I might just design my own fair isle . . . .

And the book wasn't very expensive.

Starting to Knit

I got 8 skeins of Queensland Collection Cotolino 60% cotton/40% linen because there was no linen yarn in my local shop. I got two in a sage green, two in a lime green, two in a red and two lavendar. The yardage is not the same as the Louet that the pattern calls for, but I'm reasonably sure that I can get one cloth out of each skein. I'm going to cast on the first washcloth with the sage green during carpool.

Books We will Need

Looking at the projects we have decided on we will need the following books:
Shadow Knitting	ekh - no	dmr - have	trh - have
Learn to Knit Afghan	ekh - have	dmr - have	trh - have
Knitter's Almanac	ekh - have	dmr - ordered	trh - have
Knitter's Stash	ekh - ????	dmr - ordered	trh - have
Knitting Around	ekh - have	dmr - want	trh - have
Ornamental Knits	ekh - getting	dmr - getting	trh - have
Angels Knitter's Dozen	ekh - have	dmr - have	trh - borrowed
Trad Scand Knitting	ekh - have	dmr - have	trh - ordered
Knitted Shawls Wiseman	ekh - no	dmr - ordered	trh - have
Knitted Shawls Stahman	ekh - no	dmr - have	trh - needs
Two End Knitting	ekh - ordered	dmr - ordered	trh -ordered
Fair Isle Sweater's Simplified	ekh - no	dmr - have	trh - need

Any others????

Project #1

Our first project is 8 Linen Washcloths from the book Knitter's Stash by Nancie Wiseman.

ekh and dmr have chosen to use Cotton Lux by Idena in the following colors: Burgundy, Dark Cornflower blue, Airforce blue, Bright Green, Lemon, School Bus Yellow, Coral, and Light orange.

Starting our Knit-a-Long

It is September first and our knit-a-long starts today.

The first project is Linen Washcloths. EKH and DMR have their yarn ordered but it is coming in from Canada so it might take a little bit for it to get here. THF is getting copies of the patterns for everyone.

So, since we are waiting on yarn and patterns, let's see what's on who's needles.