Girl on the Rocks

Reflections on a month of Socks October 31, 2006

Oh socktober, you were over too quickly for me. i discovered that in a month of dedicated sock knitting, I can make *gasp* ONE pair of socks. I am wearing them today to see out the month in style. You already met them a few days ago… here they are again.

I made a rather timid attempt at a second pair of socks using my leftover yarn…

A baby sock! So far i only have 1.5 baby socks finished, so maybe I will get the rest done at knitting tonight. to reiterate some of my knitting philosophy for any new readers

Babies: Not so much.
Knitting for Babies: awesome.

Baby projects are tiny and always cute (well, almost always) and usually pretty quick. I am a huge fan of baby socks because it lets you try out different sock knitting techniques (toes, heels, bind-offs) rather quickly since they are pretty small. I am writing up this pattern as I go and hopefully people will be able to use it to try out knitting a toe-up sock. stay tuned.

Here are a couple of socktober highlights that I want to link to for future reference.

• Stretchy Bind-off by Grumperina – This is fantastic for toe-up socks. It is by far the best thing i have found so far. and easy to memorize. B- you have to try it.
• Short row heels with wrapped stitches – Buried in this tutorial is the reason why the left and right side sides of short row heels with wrapped stitches look different. and how to fix it. when i understand, you’ll see it in action here
• Picot Edging for toe-up socks – Completely tested and verified with math, the best way to put a picot edging on a pair of toe up socks.

i am off to spend the last hours of Socktober in a bar with my knitting friends and others. I might get that second baby sock done, but probably I will just ruin it while knitting under the influence. Happy Halloween!

Tiny completed objects July 29, 2006

While at work i found myself with an hour to waste and I was desperate to make something. I found some acrylic yarn in my office and a crochet hook in my pencil cup, and i whipped up this little guy…

photo courtesy of teapotgirl

he is a little amigurumi droplet. we thought he looked like melted mochi so we put him in the mochi tray. I am also working on crocheting some bacon – you can see it in the foreground.

I also whipped up a prototype baby beanie that is supposed to look like a buckeye. The pattern needs some improving, so i will probably give it another try.

i will be sending it off to my cousin for his new baby that is due in a few weeks.

I have also made some progress on the the only big knitting project that I am working on right now, the clapotis. I have 3 dropped rows!

and finally, the results of my solar dyeing adventure

whew! That is some bright green.

Two Finished Baby Items June 16, 2006

This past weekend I wanted to make a small, but staisfying project. The poppysocks have looked too daunting lately. So I decided to make pair of baby socks.

Pattern: from 50 Baby Bootees to Knit
Yarn: Schachenmayer Micro that i bought from Elann a long time ago.

But wait, it gets cuter….

Pattern: I didn’t use a pattern, but I was inspired by the bibs from Mason-Dixon Knitting that i have seen everyone making, so i just made up something similar. I made the strap button on the front so that it is a feature of the bib. i also tried my first crochet picot edging. i just made it up as I went along.
Yarn: Mission Falls 1824 Cotton in color 105

I got the buttons at the thrift store for 5 cents each. I will miss them when they are gone.

One baby sock complete April 25, 2005

I finished one of the baby socks featured in this month’s Interweave
Knits. It is made out of Cherry Tree Hill supersock yarn. I think the cables are pretty noticeable, and it is pretty cute, but it will certainly look better with a baby foot in it. This was my first short row toe, and i think what they called a ‘decorative zig-zag’ seam was actually a 3 needle bind off (which would be my first). During the making of this innocent looking sock, i broke two #1 DPN’s. I have a few spares since i lost one a little while ago and had to buy another set. But, I have decided to try making socks on two circular needles. this pretty much guarantees that the second sock will be a different size, but hey,
it won’t be the first
time….

You might notice that the sock is sitting atop some delicious looking brown yarn. I made it! I think it is my best spinning yet. The roving was merino wool – mohair blend and the color was
called Kona. I got it at Carolina Homespun when i got my wheel. I have a selection of pretty rovings (I think 4 oz each) and i just don’t know what to make out of that much yarn. I spin too thick for socks, and i don’t want to make a hat…. maybe i
will put them all together in a scarf.

And finally, the top-down raglan is progressing nicely. I have already start to think seriously about something cool to do for the ribbing.

recent knitting and spinning April 21, 2005

I have been working on my knitting projects, and spinning some yarn.

Saturday, Gen and Cheryl
came over to do a little spinning. Ingrid was hanging out for a while and sneakily took some action photos of me and Gen spinning away on our matching Lendrums.

We took a break and headed over to solano to check outstash, the new yarn store (where we ran into b!). I visited once already, but was pretty depressed about how i could never afford anything there. The girls really started investigating the yarn selection, and I saw some stuff i liked, so I can maybe imagine buying some thing there. I also saw an Anny Blatt angora scarf kit. Damn. That was some soft, warm stuff. I can’t consciously spend $40 on a scarf that I only kinda liked… I was just totally in love with the fiber.
Some internet research leads me to believe that the ball of angora/wool blend weighs something like 2 ounces and is ~100 yards (or meters – i forget). Can i spin that thinly? Let’s find out!! I think I might order 3 oz of angora, and the
fast flyer for my spinning wheel and see what happens.

You can kinda see an ‘O’ and half of an ‘X’. The best part about these patterns is that 2 of the 5 are available for free
from interweave (pdf download link). So get knitting!

To felt… or better yet not to felt. April 1, 2005

A tale of felting woe. Why is that when we try to make something nice for a baby, things start to go so wrong?
(more…)

The continuing saga of the baby booties… August 5, 2004

i bet you thought you were never going to have to hear about our hideous booties again

you might remember that a little while ago sarah and i knit some really awful booties (you can refresh your memory here). During the baby shower we pulled them out to try and give them to the parents-to-be. everyone got to play the game of figuring out what to do with hideously over- and under-sized baby booties. the best suggestion for the large bootie was to use it as a washcloth-mitt for
washing the babies. My favorite suggestion is this:

A mitten for a hitch hiker. Too perfect.

One baby blanket finished August 2, 2004

We finished the first baby blanket in time for the shower!

It was a close one, I wasn’t sure we would get it finished, but here it is:

That’s the mom-to-be, Emily. I hope she forgives me for the picture of her with her eyes closed, but it is only one i have! The second blanket is practically finished as well.

bad booties March 17, 2004

I hope sarah doest mind that i am including her in this category, but it
needs to be done.

A few weeks ago, Sarah started knitting a pair of baby booties from the Knitting for baby book. Here she is then, happily working away

I also have been working on a pair of booties from the same book, but mine were the “stay on booties” and was very proud that i managed to finish them. During knitting circle i decided to start making another pair. I noticed right away that the yarn was not knitting up to the same gauge as my previous yarn, so i was going to have to not knit as many stitches. Both were 100% cotton baby yarn, and looked the same, but the “Cottontots” was much fatter. We noticed that was what sarah was using also, and might be the reason her bootie was looking a little on the big size.
Long story short: I left out too many stitches and my bootie came out too small – as in too small for a teddy bear. sarah’s bootie came out much too large – as in a slipper for a
schoolchild.
Here is a picture of them with the correctly sized
booties and a dpn for scale.

We had
to come up with what to do with the booties that we had since neither of us
wanted to knit a mate for our horrible creations. Here are a few ideas for what
to do with the large one:

• A slipper for a small child
• Baby’s first christmas stocking
• A bag to hold all of the other booties
• a bag to hold knitting notions

My favorite idea is to use
the two of them together as matching purse + changepurse pair.

Here
is a picture of the big one holding the normal sized booties and the little one
holding knitting notions

Any
ideas?