Closing up Shop

I started this blog to track my knitting projects and now that I can do that on Ravelry, I'm going to close down the blog. Look for me on Ravelry at Librarianknitter. I'll leave you with this picture of the Valentine's Day chocolate I bought my husband. Only in fishing-obsessed Central PA . . .

Trellis Love

Behold, the finished Trellis for the "nephew formerly known as Tiny G," who's not-so-tiny anymore.

I'm so happy with how this turned out. I love the Knitpicks Shine (worsted), and the pattern was challenging enough to keep me interested but quick enough to finish in time for xmas. The package goes out today, including knitting supplies for my sister-in-law who's caught the knitting bug.

My goal over the break is to catch up on my hibernating projects (the hedgerow socks, the daisy afghan, and the Jamieson's stole). We're driving to western NY for the holidays and then taking a quick trip to Jacksonville/St. Mary's Georgia (cheapest warm place we could to fly to from State College). I should have plenty of knitting time.

Happy Holidays!

Year without a Santa Claus

Greetings from Heat Miser/Cold Miser Central. It's that time of year when we harken back to Christmas Specials of yesteryear, and I couldn't resiste posting this pic from Halloween 2004 (we're supposed to be the Miser couple).

As for knitting content, there's not much. I've been knitting like crazy, but don't have many pics to show for it. My daisy afghan squares are sewn together but now I have to weave in all of the ends and decide how to do a border with only two small skeins of leftover yarn. I started the Trellis sweater for our new nephew who's only 7 months old, but is a BIG BABY (in a healthy, totally appropriate way). I'm making the middle size, which will probably be too big, but I'd rather have it too big than too small.

The Kauni cardigan is done and blocked and just needs to have buttons sewn on, (or, as they say here in central PA, "needs sewn", as in the kitchen "needs sweeped") but I'm so disgusted that it's too small that I'm trying to avoid it. If it fits my mom she's getting it for Christmas. I still don't know what happened. The size I made had a 55 cm chest width on the pattern, which, according to Google, 55 centimeters = 21.6535433 inches. 21.6 doubled equals 43.2 circumference, which should have been plenty big. I got guage so I thought I was fine. But, even after blocking, I only got a 20 inch chest width, and 40 inches around is very different from 43.2 inches around. I could wear it open, but I went to all that work to make a cardigan that now I can't wear buttoned. Seems stupid.

On the bright side, I made two quick, fun hats over the Thanksgiving holiday. They're the Chicabean pattern by Rogue. They're great for using up sweater leftovers. I like the second one better, but I screwed up and knit the first row instead of doing ribbing, so that's why the edge curls a little bit.

Another hat

I love this hat pattern. Here's one I whipped up over the weekend to bring to Knoxville for T-day. It should fit our 6 month old nephew. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

Hat Frenzy

I indulged in a major hat-knitting frenzy this past weekend. I discovered that the Yarn Harlot's unorginal hat pattern works great for handspun. I had a few small skeins lying around in my stash, so I got the ball winder going and ended up knitting 4 hats. The problem with the ease and speed of these hats is that it started to create an unrealistic urge to make them for all of my family for Christmas. I haven't done xmas knitting for the past few years because I get too stressed out about it, and no one has remarked on it so I think I'm better off knitting on my own schedule.

I'm planning to keep one of the teal hats for myself, bring one to my sister-in-law as a hostess present for Thanksgiving, and give the other two to charity.

Brian and I had a lovely day on Sunday. We scored at the Woolrich Outlet's 25% off everything sale, then we had 75 cent drafts and chicken wings in the middle of nowhere at the "Venture Inn," and then we made a vain attempt to walk it off on the Pine Creek Rail Trail. We met through a hiking club but our hiking has been recently curtailed by Brian's grad work and my long commute. It was great to get back outside!

Updates

My husband's back from his European adventure, so I have access to our digital camera once again. I did some fast travel knitting this past weekend. My library is participating in The Big Read next Spring, so I went to Minneapolis for orientation. On the way I finished my version of Calorimetry from Knitty:

I like how it turned out. I hope it will stay on my head. I should be able to find a fun button in my stash.

I also finished my first Hedgerow sock and started on the second. These socks, as simple as they are, are taking me forever. I don't think I'll make another pair. I guess I'm not enjoying switching knits and purls every two rows. I can't get into a groove.

Brian was a good husband and brought me chocolate from Switzerland. He also brought me a knitting book in Italian, which was very sweet. He always complains that he never knows what to get me for presents, which I think is crazy since he's known me for 6 years, but he did a good job this time.

The Kauni is almost done. I sewed in one sleeve this morning and still have to sew in the second one and tack down the cut edges. I'm not happy with how my buttonbands and neck edging turned out, so I may rip them out and redo them. I have plenty of yarn left over. I'm regretting not making the large size. I think I'll be able to wear the sweater, but I thought that the medium would be more roomy, based on the sizing. Below, you can see what happens when you do the checkerboard ribbing back and forth instead of in the round. The last two stitches on the neck ribbing flattened out and look weird (click the photo to see what I mean). I was going to try to live with it, but I don't like the buttonbands either, so I think I'll rip out and start over.

Daisies, Kauni, and Finlandia

I finished knitting all of the borders for the daisy afghan. I'm happy with how it turned out. Now I just need to sew all of the squares together.

I think I'm going to put that off for a while because I want to keep working on the Kauni sweater. If I'm really lucky maybe I can get it done in time for Rhinebeck. yeah, right. Here's a recent pic of the color combos. I LOVE these colors.


And here's a gratuitous Finland cruise shot because I had to find a pic for an online course I'm taking, and decided to use this one. Behind me are the crazy Finns getting drunk at 9:00 am and celebrating the brief sunny summer season.