WIP: Such a slacker

I haven’t been posting much on either blog of late, partly due to internet connection problems and partly because I used to write most of them during my lunch hour at work and instead I go out for a walk in a futile attempt to shift the blubber around my midriff  (muffin tops ? hell I’ve got a whole brioche sticking out the top of my trousers !).

Anyway I’ve  been using the time in the evenings at home that I used to waste noodling around on the internet to try and finish some of the WIP’s (trying so hard to be disciplined and not start anything new). So I have 2 Jenny Chant scarves now finished, (ends weaved in etc) in vertical and horizontal scarves respectively.

I also have made inroads into the cotton hoodie that I am knitting for Spider. It’s the Waves hoodie by Sasha Kagan from The Knitter magazine. I changed it to shades of blue plus lilac as I didn’ like the colours used on the one shown in the magazine. I will admit that the lilac doesn’t work where it is and if I were to do it again – which I won’t as it’s a very annoying jumper to knit – I would change the order.

Anyway, this is what the pattern looks like

Being good

I have spent most of the last 3 days concentrating on making Mum’s birthday present and I think I’m on target for having it finished by her actual birthday, at least I will now I’ve got the bits I need to finish it off, having dragged my family remorselessly around various shops in Leamington Spa looking for it.

One of the side benefits of  yesterdays shopping trip was that I finally discovered the whereabouts of  “Web of Wool”, who kindly pointed me in the direction of the shop that I actually needed. As a “thank you” I bought a pair of short 3.75mm. I decided that it was pointless trying to continue with just 1 pair when I have so many things on the go. It also got me wondering as to why I have struggled on for over 20 years with such long needles when I actually prefer knitting with short ones.

I also purchased some sock yarn. Its plain. It’s black. OK it’s slightly silky but I wanted to have a go at making socks for socks sake without being in awe of the self striping properties of the yarn. You see I really really don’t understand this handknitted sock obsession – I have always suspected that getting a pair of handknitted socks as a christmas present would be my idea of a present from hell…but since these pages are about changing habits and attitudes of a life time I think I should at least give socks a try.

But time for some discipline. I am not allowed to start the socks until I have reduced the WIPs to a more manageable level so I’m back on the scarves. I have another metre to go on Jenny Chant II and I have already finished my section of the latest travelling scarf.  Tillymint sent some stretchy shiny purple yarn with her section so all I had to do was think of a stitch, which wasn’t hard as the yarn was calling to me that it wanted to pretend to be webbing. I will do a seperate post in about 2 months time with all the travelling scarfs, I don’t want to spoil anyones fun by putting them up here now.

Once the JC scarf is finished I have some hats to sort out. The biggest dillema is what to do with “Rosie” which is the cotton hat that came out far too large. Actually that seems to be a common problem for me as the charity sailors hat came out far too large too.

Scarves, scarves, scarves…

Over the bank holiday weekend I was a little “one track” and was concentrating mainly on finishing off the Jenny Chant Scarf which has been lurking at the bottom of my “work basket” – I basically had to ban myself from thinking about any of the things I’d rather be knitting (or thinking about knitting following a birthday visit to IKnit, London) and just channel all my energies into this one scarf.

Now it’s not the scarf’s fault, it’s me.  Admittedly I hate knitting large amounts of rib especially with 3.75mm needles as it grows so slowly but the real problem is my aversion to pink…at least that’s what I thought, but when I did finally stop knitting (It wasn’t 2 metres long but when I weighed it in the kitchen it weighed 150g which was the main criteria for the scarf, 3 balls of 50g) I thought well lets try and get all this out the way in one go and made a start on the second scarf (I’d bought 3 balls of 100g), only this time with horizontal stripes.

This second scarf isn’t too bad and I can only put it down to the fact that I changed the order of the stripes – this scarf, once you get over the pinkness, the ribness and the 3.75mmness isn’t quite such a nightmare to knit – I’ve had to put it on hold though as I only have 1 pair of 3.75mm and they were needed for something else, which is slightly more urgent as children grow quickly and you can’t take ages when making something you want them to have more than a months worth of wear out of.

The bank holiday weekend was also the first posting date of a “Travelling Scarf” group which I had joined on Ravelry so I was firstly busy chasing around the countryside trying to find a postbox that would give my scarf a fighting chance of getting where it needed to be on tuesday morning and then secondly playing around with various ideas for my contribution to the scarf I had received that morning.

The idea of a travelling scarf is that each of you knits a section of scarf and then posts it to one of the other members of the group (same one each time), you then knit a section of scarf for all the scarves you get sent until you receive your scarf back again.

There are no other real rules other than that, although some people ask for particular colours or types of yarn or other criteria. Mine is a word association theme, the idea is that the person knits whatever comes into their heads on seeing the last section of scarf, does not have to be a word such as this one, you could interpret it by colour or by stitch or whatever…you can also lie about what comes into your head !

I was lucky in my first contribution as Karyann sent yarn along with her scarf so all I had to do was think what stitch I wanted to do.

Karyann’s starter is on the left here, my section of “DNA” is on the right, knitted on 4mm which seemed to match the tension of the starter square, sort of, possibly should have used 3.75mm but as mentioned before I only have 1 set.

The final scarf was a last minute present for a friend of my (the Fish Hat in March was for her son). Now the problem with knitting for people in May is that you can’t really give them winter woollies and when I think of this friend I think of chocolate brown alpaca, soft and lovely and lots of cables – not practical as a may birthday present – so instead I’ve gone for something colourful and light which can be used in the evening to brighten a black dress (a sort of shawlette) or used as a scarf in September when it starts getting chilly again.

Pattern: Whisp from Knitty

Needles: 5mm

Yarn: Laines du Nord Kiddy Print

New: Fishnet Lace ( a new stitch to me)

I ran out of yarn towards the end so it is not as large as the original and I decided against adding the buttons – it seems to have been well received…

June’s knitting will mainly be trying to finish off a cotton hoodie for Spider before he grows too big for it, this is a very slow knit as it involves  colours and is on 3.75mm, but apart from getting the order of the colours wrong I am quite pleased with how this one is working out.

Knitting for Charity

It is perhaps unfair to blame either Spider or John Lewis for the fact I’ve gone back to the needles. I think it possibly started at Christmas and then a conversation with some work colleagues got me thinking again…and by the time I went looking for tiger wool in John Lewis I was probably just looking for an excuse.

 

At  Christmas my Mum gave me several balls of Snowflake Chunky and a pattern for a cat tea cosy. I’d asked for a tea cosy for Christmas – she decided I could knit one – I hadn’t told her I’d hung up my needles…I spent several days stroking the yarn, and decided that OK, one last item after I’d finished the 3 unfinished items that survived the destash.

 

Then at work one Friday lunchtime we were noodling around the internet trying to find a cause that we could make cakes for – we like cake competitions at work, any excuse for a bake off. One colleague Portia (we’re lawyers and she has a name that sounds like a race car anyway) discovered an organisation that raised money for Sailors…and to cut a long story short something on their website led me to trying to prove to them that you could knit a hat in an evening.

 

One evening later I had an incredibly large red hat…and the start of a need to knit…at the same time as I picked up the red yarn for the hat I’d picked up 3 balls of pink wool as I’d also, whilst noodling on the internet I’d come across the Jenny Chant appeal – so I made a start on a 2 metre pink scarf.

 

I learned 2 important things from this charity knitting

 

1)                  I probably should do tension squares more often, especially if substituting yarn

2)                  If you are knitting for charity and money is raised by selling the object then the item should be beautiful and something people actually want to buy…and if its being given for people to wear then it should be something they want to wear.