Solving Problems One Skein At A Time

Those of you who have followed the blog may remember the time that I had some yarnesia. I did renew my pledge not to buy more yarn before my birthday. But I have a confession to make. I did buy more yarn before my birthday and I just couldn't bring myself to admitting it until now. A shipment of Tosh came in and I may have bought a sweater's worth in the Tosh DK. Two skeins in Dustbowl and six skeins in Cove for anyone who is wondering. I plan on using it for a sweater design. I'm not really well versed in sweater design, so I'm trading some photo lessons for sweater making lessons.

But I noticed that I wasn't terribly enthusiastic about my design idea. It wasn't the design. It wasn't the yarn. It was that the design was a bit too complicated to be a "first sweater design." I solved that problem though. I bought more yarn for my first sweater design. It is much simpler and I'm pretty excited about it. I hope it turns out as well as the swatches are indicating. 

The yarn is Cascade's Eco Cloud in 1801, 1809, and 1810.

Velomeisters

The Velomeisters pattern has been released! Just in time for spring biking weather.

I've been working on getting this pattern out for awhile. But I'm happy to show them to the world now. These were fun to knit and are fun to wear.

If you happen to be interested in purchasing the pattern, I have it up on bear-ears.com, ravelry, and craftsy.

Edit: I forgot to share why I called the socks Velomeisters. Velo is French for bicycle and meister is German for master. I thought "bikemaster" was a pretty cool name. I had to mix the languages though. Fahrradmeister or Maître De Vélo looked a little less awesome to me.

Zissou

Revenge is mine. I finished a hat and taught my socks a lesson. The toe cooperated and I have started the second sock. This hat was a request by one of the guys that serves my knit night group. He wanted a Zissou hat with a yellow "Z" on the brim.

The hat is made of Plymouth Worsted Merino Superwash in color 3 and a little bit of Cascade Heritage in color 5644. The hat is just a simple 1x1 rib and the Z was crocheted on. I think there is a name for what I did. Maybe the crab stitch? I'm quite pleased with the corners of the Z. They pulled funny, so I added an extra slip stitch to help define the sharp corners of the Z.

Revenge Cast-On

I feel like I've knit a whole bunch more than I have to show. It seems with most of my designs, I spend more time ripping than knitting. With any other knit, I don't mind adding and subtracting stitches when something doesn't come out right. But as a designer, I have to make sure the miscounts are my own fault, not a pattern issue. So after ripping out this toe several times, I decided to take revenge on it...

By casting on for two hats. (As if one wasn't enough) That will show that stupid toe who's boss.

Me. That's who.

Does anyone else out there "revenge cast-on" or "revenge start-a-new-project"? I'd love to hear about it.

Giraffe Hat Kits

I have some fun news to share. It has been in the works for awhile, but Green Planet Yarn is now carrying my Giraffe Hat pattern in kits. Each kit has enough yarn for either the baby or adult hat (not both) and a pattern. And it costs less to buy a kit than to buy the yarn and pattern separately. Much less.

My favorite part is hearing people pass by the display and say,"How cute!" 

Fast Flyer

When I was at Stitches I asked the people at Carolina Homespun what spindle would be the best to make lace since I had no luck with my wheel. I was asked something that made me realize I'm a bit of an idiot I have a lot to learn. "Have you used your fast flyer?" I made some stupid excuse that the fast flyer scared me or something... but really I'd forgotten I even had one. So I popped it onto my wheel last night and instantly I was making lace.

I'd been saving my second Moonrover Mystery Batt for a special occasion. Learning to make lace seemed like a perfect time to break it out. (I did test out my abilities on some other roving to make sure I could do it) So I'm halfway through the 2oz of fiber.

But that isn't the best part. While I was digging through all my spinning stuff looking for the fast flyer, I found an unopened box. And in it was a jumbo plying bobbin. I didn't even know this came with the wheel! It was like my birthday all over. I wish I'd known about it when I was making beehive yarn. It would have made life so much more fun. But now I can go nuts with the beehive sizing!

I'm A Timelord

I haven't had a FO to show you guys in awhile. Not that I haven't finished things, but a fair number of finished things are for the book or other secret things. Anyways, I finally finished my own pair of TARDIS socks. The last pair I made was before I understood much about sock sizing and whatnot, so my Dad got them. But this pair is mine!

I did make some adjustments to the pattern. I put in a short row heel and did some extra decreasing. The specifics are on my ravelry project page. I might have to watch some Dr. Who now.