August 29, 2003
Friday
In anticipation of finishing my Color & Cable vest, I called my "local" yarn shop in Plano, TX...it's called Woolie Ewe and I sure wish I lived closer to that yarn shop! I'll need size 5 in 16" when I get to the finishing point...
They're going to order a Skacel bamboo needle in size 1 (2.5mm) as well... it'll be about 2 weeks... it'll be for a top in Lea 8 Linen yarn, although I'm thinking of trying to see if I can still use my size 3 needle if I add one more strand to the mess... our scanner isn't working, otherwise I'd scan the swatch, but the section I knit with the size 3 needle looks too loose & the section I knit with the size 1 addi turbo needle looks fine... I don't think I could stand to do an entire project with addi turbos though... too slippery for me!
SO I'll play with adding another strand & see what happens.
Got a bit done on the color & cable left front yesterday... will do a bit more later. I spent a lot of time today trying to track down Crystal Palace needles, but everyone seems to want an arm & a leg for shipping. Maybe my tune would change if I start carrying needles...
The boys don't have school on Monday, if it's cool enough (below 90) maybe we'll tie dye that day...
Just a reminder: if anyone is interested in any of the tornadowood.com sale items, this is the last weekend of the sale:
little stick, hockey stick & big stick inkle looms 20% off
JaggerSpun yarns 10% off
SpinCraft patterns (buy 3 get 1 free instead of the usual buy 4 get 1 free)
Have a wonderful Labor Day weekend!
August 27, 2003
Wednesday
A few days ago, I finished knitting the first section of the back of the Color & Cable vest, from the neck to the armholes...a couple of days ago, I picked up the left shoulder & did the short rows & now I'm working my way down the left front... once that is done, I will pick up & work on the right front & then join the front & back & start working in the round to the bottom.
I really like this pattern because before you have a chance to start getting bored with a section, something new happens!
I also finished Harrison's flannel strip blanket. I took a couple of photos of it on the loom (but have not uploaded them), took the blanket off the loom, it's not too heavy & not too dense, so should be comfortable riding back & forth in Harrison's backpack every day... before I take any off-loom photos of it, I want to put on an edging... probably either a crocheted edge or simple stitching just to give it a bit of contrast & extra support... then I'll try washing it.
No photos today, but I wanted to post something since it has been awhile!
Yarns & looms & patterns are still on sale at our website, http://tornadowood.com, so c'mon over & look around...
August 20, 2003
Ever see a gopher go for a gopher?
That's what my dad used to say...
In our case, ever see a cat go fer a gopher? Or I should say drag in a gopher... FOUR days in a row, she brought in an animal... at first we thought it was a small rat until Gary realized the tail was wrong.. 2nd day it was a blue jay... and yesterday & this morning it was a gopher... Gary said that today's prey was still alive when brought in... (sigh). Littleface is SOOOOOO proud of herself that she has to bring it in for us to see.
This morning, she caught her prey a bit earlier, so the older 3 were able to see it before they took off for the school bus... I was getting them ready & Gary was trying to get a little more sleep when LF came in...
Should we start worrying about species extinction if she keeps up her daily record of catches? If she catches something tomorrow, I'll try to get a picture for y'all.
Square Loom Weaving
Amy asked a couple of questions about my flannel strip weaving in the last entry's comments: "What width are your strips and could you explain how to do a slip join."
I tear the strips approximatly 1 inch wide... I don't cut, I just tear until I reach the end of the fabric...the lengths vary...
To make a strip join, I cut a 1" slit near the end of each strip... I feed the "old" end (the one already attached to the weaving) into the new strip of fabric & then I feed the new end into the old end...then I pull until the slits meet...
Old into new... new into old...
it makes a nice join, not as dense as a knot... a sewn join is supposed to work also, but this is quicker & easier & allows me to add a new color anytime I want to... the technique is explained in a book I have called Twined Rag Rugs, by Bobbie Irwin...
Got a few rows done on the Color & Cable vest over the last few days & am ALMOST ready to start working on the fronts.
Today I wound up the yarn for the sleeves for my Shapely Smooch... hopefully I'll actually start on the sleeves in the next couple of days so that I can say "finished"!
The boys haven't been knitting very much, Micah has been doing a row here & a row there on his sweater. Evan doesn't have anything in progress right now, so I guess he is in between projects. I'm very glad that he finally "grokked" knitting.
Handedness: right or left
I think I'm ready to say that Reuven is left handed... he may be ambidextrous, but when he scribbles, he often has his crayon or pencil or marker in his left hand, but every so often he uses his right hand. Time will tell! If he is left handed, we'll have a 50% righthanded & 50% left handed family...the twins & I are right handed & Gary & the younger two left (unless Reuven turns out to be a righty or even ambidextrous)... we'll see! With Evan & Harrison, it was obvious almost immediately, but not so with Micah & Reuven... I find this whole thing fascinating...
Whenever possible, I adapt things so that Harrison can learn/do things left handed, but if I can't figure out how, I just show him how I do stuff & let him modify it. we haven't really gotten to that point yet... it turned out to be easier to teach him not to write everything backwards: for a while he would write his name backwards until one day I told him "Just put the pencil on the same side of the paper that you write with" and since then the only time he's tried writing backwards was when he started in the middle of the page...
Gary is not much help with the left/right bit although he admits that things are kind of more difficult because the world is so right hand oriented: he ties his shoelaces the way right handed folks do, but his left hand does most of the work. Gary learned to do a lot of things right handed...
We used to have a doctor who is left handed & he said he learned to do surgery right handed because that is how his stuff was set up when he was learning...
OH yeah, Gary builds left handed inkle looms as well as right...I think it makes warping easier for the lefties, other than that, no difference since you weave from left to right & right to left.
Harrison is the only one in his class who is left handed...we found that out on the first day of school by looking around the room to see which hand kids had their crayons in...
Enough for now! Enjoy my typos & enjoy your day, everyone!
August 16, 2003
First week of school (half week, anyway)
Well, the kids are back at school & Harrison started Kindergarten on Wednesday. He'd been looking forward to it for a long time & suddenly it's HERE... I would tell him "you start Kindergarten in 2 months" and he would say "tomorrow???" and I'd say "no, not tomorrow, it's a lot longer than that".. eventually he'll get a better feeling for days & time...
On Monday, we went to orientation & Harrison has the same teacher Micah had for Kindergarten...poor kid looked a bit petrified, told me he was scared & was obsessing about it a bit for the next 2 days. On Wednesday, when I brought him to school, I told him the names of the other children at his table & his teacher gave him a nametag... one little girl at his table's name is Micah... I wonder if his teacher did that on purpose, knowing that Harrison has a brother named Micah?
On Tuesday or Wednesday, after bugging him for 3 years, Gary FINALLY finished making my square loom... I wanted to try making some blankets with it using flannel strips. I started one a couple of days ago and after getting half the pegs filled, I realized "I don't have to make this with knots, I can use the slit join".... I took the piece off the loom, saw that the resulting weave was too dense...took the strips apart & started over, weaving a little more spread the strips rather than packing them tight... I was using the continuous weave until it was about 30" wide & now I'm weaving back & forth. If this works out well as a blanket, Harrison will have a 6 sided blanket for his naptime blanket.. hopefully it won't turn out too heavy, we'll see! He has to carry it back & forth each day...
Here's a photo of the blanket in progress:
And here is a photo of one of the fabrics used as strips for this blanket:
It won't take long to finish, I may do a few rows over the weekend, or I may wait until the boys are back at school, we'll see! I hope it doesn't turn out too heavy, if it does, we'll use this as a sort of rug & I'll make another & spread the fabric even wider apart next time & skip more pegs, or maybe make the strips a little narrower.
I didn't get much knitting done, between back-to-school stuff & working on this blanket, but yesterday I had hoped to do several rows of the color & cable vest on the way to the synagogue for services, but I only had a little bit of the turquoise yarn left of the first ball & forgot to pack a spare! ARRRRRRRRRRRGH! I KNEW I was getting low on yarn, but forgot since I had not worked on this vest in a few days... At least I had the Cabin Fever tank to work on, so got about a round done on it...
I hope everyone affected by this week's blackout is safe & cool!
August 10, 2003
Buck & Copper
I went outside to visit with Buck & Copper earlier & they were both hanging out at the pond. Buck was right at the edge of the pond & Copper was in the water... I took photos:
Copper was in the water chomping on water lilies:
Buck came right up to me & stuck his face in my face... I stepped away a few feet to get this photo:
Then I pet him some more... Sweet!
A little later, the boys told me that Copper was no longer in the water...
Sunday
We had a kind of sad day yesterday: our neighbors have 3 horses on our property and one of them, Mike, was very old (over 30)...the boys came in and told us that Mike was laying down & could not get up, poor guy kept trying... Gary went over to get our neighbor & she called another friend who either is a vet or works for a vet & they helped him get more comfortable & now the boys are spending some extra time with Buck & Copper to make up for their loss. I think Buck grew up with Mike. Buck is about 20 years old now...
School starts on Wednesday. I'm NOT ready. I'm going to miss Harrison, but I'll try to spend more time at the school, but that might be hard to do with a 2 year old in tow, so we'll see.
We have to go school supply shopping. I guess we can do that tomorrow or Tuesday. You'd think that with one more kid in school, they'd be more expensive, except 3rd graders don't seem to need very much. School supplies for kindergartners through 2nd graders are the worst so far... I haven't decided if I'll give Harrison a choice between a new backpack or a rescue hero & old backback in good shape or just get him a new backpack... he won't be allowed to take toys to school anyway, not until 1st grade...school rule. I don't mind that rule although I sort of wish it was the rule for all grades...it's probably a good thing that they're allowed to bring toys from 1st grade on: I'd hate for the boys not to be allowed to bring their knitting or other projects!
We also have to set up some dyepots for t-shirt, underwear & socks... I have some dyes from dharma trading... I want them all color coded (more the socks & underwear than the others...we may dye the tops in more colors than one, will do those with some rubber bands... never did this before so I'm not sure how to proceed, but I have some dyes that are supposed to be good for cotton...
I have some shawls on ebay now... do a search for "handwoven shawl" (pluralizing shawl won't bring up anything) or do a search on seller patchworkgirl1. I would also be glad to make a custom shawl, and if you have some handspun yarn that you want something done with, either a chunky or bulky yarn or a doubled thinner yarn, I'd be glad to do it.
I've been doing a little here & a little there on the vest/tank, and have finished one full repeat of the cable pattern... I'll show it to you in a couple of days. I also knit a few rounds on Harrison's 2nd sock & only have a few more repeats before I'll leave them both alone until I find out when Crazy Sock day is & then about a week before, hopefully I will have 3 or 4 pairs of socks ready to do toes... I'll put Harrison's socks onto 2 needles so that I can start another pair for one of the twins...I'll use these socks & the Cabin Fever tank top for TV knitting & will work on the color & cable vest when I can pay attention to it...
August 06, 2003
Wednesday Stuff
NEW stuff on the sidebar
There are a couple of new things on the sidebar: one is the link to the Catnip Mouse-A-Thon that Wendy is having for the cat rescue organization she got Lucy from, along with a link to my variation of the catnip mouse pattern (which is also on Wendy's site)... my version uses garter stitch instead of seed stitch on the sides to make it easier for those new to knitting or for those who would like a change of pace.
The other thing I added is a Works in Progress box for me & the kids... eventually I'll put in a completed objects link. I just need to decide how I want to design it... I may just snag the format from the Tornadowood gallery for it for thumbnails & then have each thumbnail open up into a page for each finished item...
The garter stitch variation:
I came up with this version on Monday night when I saw Micah struggling with the knit-purl sequence, wrote it out for him.
Last night, Micah finished one mouse & started another... he LOVES doing the cable part & when he finished the last cable, he was sad about it...then when he finished knitting the mouse, he told me "I finished" with a VERY sad face & I said, "hey, you can start another!" The first one was yellow & now he's doing a white one. Evan is doing a grey one...
Both of the boys had some trouble with doing a yarn over with their purl stitches & Evan managed to come up with a couple of extra stitches but I couldn't find any serious holes (other than what resulted from knitting too loosely)... so I did an extra decrease for him to even things out a bit because he insisted that the pattern had to be followed EXACTLY... 8 year olds can be exTREMELY anal at time: even though *I* fixed the pattern instructions up for them, now that it is printed on paper, it is no longer "MINE" per se, but gospel "must follow this EXACTLY" and pitch a fit if it's not coming out right even if the mistake is theirs...
That said, it's cool teaching them how to knit & I think every time we teach someone else how to knit, it somehow improves our own knitting.
I tried taking pictures of the mice, but the lighting was wrong...I'll try again another time!
In addition to working on & testing the garter stitch pattern variation with 2 mice, I got a few rows done on the Color & Cable tank...
I'm enjoying the color & Cable pattern... I'm finally starting to "grok" how cables work & which way things lean & when I'm ready to tackle an Aran sweater with more combinations, I won't be afraid!
Here's a picture of the cable:
Next time I'll try taking pictures outside.
I had to include the yarn bob in the photo...I love it! It makes doing color changes SO much easier, and because the yarn bob has a little bit of weight to it, it's easy to disentangle when it wraps around other colors... one of these days I want to do Alice Starmore's Magic Carpet from The Children's Collection.. yarn bobs should make it fun!
August 04, 2003
Color & Cable vest (or tank top) & Kids Knitting
Last Thursday, I started the SpinCraft Color & Cable vest (or tank top)...
Here's a drawing of the vest:
I'm having fun with it...I had to restart it a few times, but finally got the thing working right after about the 3rd or 4th try... the first or second time, I managed to mess up the short rows & somehow managed to have more short row stitches completed on one shoulder than the other... then I wasn't happy with the provisional cast on I was using. I finally got it right....
I've tried several provisional cast on methods for various projects. For this one, I used the one where you knit a couple of rows of stockinette on waste yarn & then change to the working yarn: I wasn't sure how I was going to get the waste yarn out to start the front short of snipping the yarn, so off I went to Google...did a search on "knitting provisional cast on" and found a WONDERFUL site with instructions for doing a provisional cast-on that zips off easily: http://www.pagebypage.com/provisional.htm
This method is SOOOOOOOO much better than the other methods I've tried:
1: when knitting onto waste yarn, I was not able to easily rip the waste stitches out to get at the "bottom" stitches...
2: it's much easier than trying to find the little loop in a crochet chain
3: it's more reliable than using the cast on where you pick up loops back & forth (or over & under) around a single strand of waste yarn... I've never been able to get the stitches cast on evenly using this method...
I'm not saying this new method is **THE** best method, but it's certainly the best method For Me! I wish that method 3 worked well for me since it's the quickest, but I like my cast on loops even...
After giving this a try with 10 stitches to be sure I was doing this correctly, I ripped out what I had started with the waste yarn & cast on my 82 stitches for the back, which would later be picked up at the provisional cast on end for the front meaning I would not have to cast on for the front... I got the short rows done & now I'm just working my way down the back... this is worked from the top down...
This is a fun project & the pattern name only tells part of the story: there's cable & lace & intarsia & fair isle, all in the same garment...
The yarn I'm using is Gedifra Wellness in the color turquoise... the gauge I'm using is 4.75 stitches to the inch, which is a little tighter than the recommended gauge for the yarn, but I like it that way...i'm using purple for one of the companion colors & have not decided if I'm going to use the Topacio variegated for another or not. The photos don't do the turquoise color justice, although the cable photo seems to be the most accurate. I usually prefer yarns with little or no synthetics, but I heard enough raves about this yarn that I decided to give it a try.
Click here to see a photo of the start of my vest
and a closeup of the cable:
and a closeup of Mrs Montegue's lace pattern in between the two cables:
This is a photo of a beautiful completed vest that Connie Delaney (designer of SpinCraft patterns and this wonderful Color & Cable pattern) knit:
If anyone would like to knit-along with me on this pattern, let me know! Either post a comment or tag me, or send me an email at tornadowood@cooke.net I have this pattern available on the tornadowood website & will be adding links on this page for this and other patterns I sell.
Kids Knitting
After I discovered the provisional cast on on the Page by Page of Maui website, I showed Micah how to do the knit-on cast on... well, he did it slightly wrong, but it's almost a variation of the Page by Page method, except it's done entirely with knitting needles & is not set up to be ripped out since the yarn on the first row will be connected to the 2nd... the bottom looks like a crochet chain... what he did was he knit in the back of the stitch without removing the working needle from the cast on needle's loops & just continued making loops... when this cast on is pulled off the needles, you have a crochet chain!
Evan finished his teddy bear sweater... I sewed the seams for him using the invisible seam in the Vogue Ultimate Knitting Book & tucked in the ends...
He hasn't officially started a new project, but he's thinking about making the swatch scarf from Melanie Falick's Kid's Knitting book, but he may decide to do something from one of Betty Lampen's teddy bear pattern books: we have book 1 and 2...
Enjoy your day!