05.31.05
Posted in Finished Objects at 9:57 pm by Rachel
Pattern: A combination of my own design and the garter-stitch cloche in Knitting for Baby
Yarn: Two skeins of Debbie Bliss alpaca silk from my secret pal
Notes: I really like how the design came out, but I did a poor job of estimating the sizing. I could have added an inch or two so that the hat would actually come down to cover my ears. However, I like how it looks and think it would be a good November/March transition hat. Either that or an oversized kippah.
This photo shows pretty clearly how short it is from crown to brim. Oops.
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Posted in Works in Progress at 8:30 pm by Rachel
I flew through the kitty bed this weekend and finished the flat bottom part (doesn’t look flat here, but trust me) just as I finished my ball of yarn. I’ve ordered more of the yarn and will probably knit the sides with two strands held together to give it extra stiffness. I totally loved knitting this and plan to make at least one more very soon. Willow is indicating her approval of this project, as well as her impatience for me to finish it:
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05.26.05
Posted in Works in Progress at 9:49 am by Rachel
I came home from my photography class at 10 p.m. last night intending to go straight to bed, but the beautiful merino wool from my SP was calling to me, so I thought I’d cast on for the kitty bed. Then I thought I’d knit just a few rounds. Then a few rounds became 20. Then at 11:30 I finally dragged myself off to bed. (It took that long because 9 stitches on 3 largish DPNs is more awkward to handle than you might imagine.) I really didn’t want to stop — I just love working with this wonderful wool! I also am loving the needles. They’re birch, not bamboo as reported in my post yesterday, and they’re light, strong, and a little slicker than bamboo. I do adore my Denises, but sometimes it’s really a pleasure to go back to wood.
Anyway, I can’t wait to get home tonight to get back to it. I may have to make more than one of these. Lucky kitties!
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05.25.05
Posted in Knitty Secret Pal, Yarn and Tools at 12:52 pm by Rachel
It was like Christmas morning at my house yesterday after I came home from work. I knew I would find my second Secret Pal package waiting for me, but I had no idea what I was in for. I’m still in utter shock. I mean, not only were the gifts outrageously generous, but it was like I’d gone and picked them all out myself! For a moment my mind got all kooky and I started thinking that perhaps my secret pal is myself in the future, sending gifts to the me of the past. Sounds like an interesting plot for a light science fiction story, doesn’t it? Anyway, my point is that the gifts were dead on. I think my secret pal is inside my head.
To start with, I opened the Fed Ex box and slid out…a bag. Like, a real bag. Not a plastic bag, or a paper bag, but a really nice black, zippered, handled bag that is so versatile that it could be used for anything (but guess what I’m going to use it for?).
I opened the bag and reached in. The first thing I touched was a HUGE skein of amazing, beautiful, subtly variegated blue/gray wool. From Italy. I am not making it up when I say I’ve really been wanting to work with yarn just like this for a while now.
Once I could finally tear my eyes and fingers away from the wool, I quickly became overwhelmed by the amazing array of goodies in the bag. First, a skein of eyelash yarn in blue and green. Super soft and fluffy. Seeing this right after the wool made me instantly think “kitty bed!” And what do you know? I pull out a copy of the pattern for a kitty bed. But there was also a pattern for the wonderful Booga Bag, which of course threw me into a fit of indecision. I think I’m going to go with the kitty bed this time, but I’m still wavering. The wool would work wonderfully with both patterns.
Know what else would work wonderfully with both patterns? The three sets of knitting needles my Secret Pal sent. Two sets of double-pointed (how did she know I really needed to increase my DPN collection?) and a set of circulars, all in bamboo — my favorite kind of needles! At this point I was truly beside myself.
But there’s more. A skein of Mission Falls 1824 cotton, which I adore (and am devastated that it’s discontinued). I immediately thought “baby hat.” Well, out of the bag comes the beautiful book Last Minute Knitted Gifts with a page bookmarked — a page with a pattern for a baby hat made with Mission Falls 1824 Cotton! Does anyone else find this eerie? (It goes without saying that there are many other fantastic patterns in that book, which has been on my wish list for a while.)
My readers must be thinking, there can’t be any more, can there? I mean, there just can’t possibly be any more.
Guess what folks, there’s more.
A set of darning needles, which will come in quite handy since the ones I have weren’t really meant for knitting projects.
Two chocolate bars from the same place as last time; I am salivating just typing about them.
A Dan Brown CD audio book — I have been dying to get an audio book to listen to while I knit! My mom has been doing this quite a bit recently and I have been thinking I need to follow her lead. My SP made that mighty easy!
I have been saving the best for last. I don’t know where my SP found such a perfect gift for me: RED SOX POINT PROTECTORS. Yes. Point protectors. Which I needed. But these are in the shape of red socks. As in, the World Champion Boston Red Sox. At this point I was completely delirious.
Secret Pal, thank you so, so much. You have no idea how much you absolutely made my week. All day today I’ve been thinking about your wonderful gifts and my fingers have just itched to get home to start playing with/eating/listening to my many new toys. I’m really floored by your generosity.
Here is one horribly crappy picture. I really need to take an individual picture of the point protectors, which must be seen by all and worshipped. Readers will also be seeing photos of these wonderful gifts being transformed into finished objects. (Oh, by the way SP, I’m just about ready to start using the Debbie Bliss alpaca silk for a project rather than just snuggling up to it in bed every night. Okay, I don’t really do that, but not because I don’t want to.)
Thank you a million times over!
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Posted in Finished Objects at 12:52 pm by Rachel
Pattern: I made it up as I went along
Yarn: Crystal Palace Deco Ribbon in celery stripe and pink satin
Notes: While my first self-designed object does have some flaws, I am pretty happy with how it came out. It is actually quite a bit cuter in person than it is in the photograph here. The final test will be trying it on an actual baby, so if anyone has one they’d like to lend me for a few minutes, I’d appreciate it. It’s possible that it will a) only fit severely misshapen babies, but they need clothes too, you know, or b) be too small to fit any baby, which means I will have to start a new line of in-utero knitted clothing. “Make sure Junior looks her best for the ultrasound!” I’ll advertise.
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05.22.05
Posted in Works in Progress at 10:59 am by Rachel
I’ve been making slow but steady progress on my current Project Linus blanket during free moments in the past couple weeks. It’s a very easy pattern, perfect to pick up for a few minutes before bed or while watching a little TV. The fabric is so incredibly soft. I’m very happy with how it’s coming out and will probably order more Knitpicks Crayon to make another one when I’ve finished this one. Here’s the eyelet detail:
In other news, I had another hugely annoying setback with the baby sundress. I frogged back past the last set of increases and it looked like that was going to fix my bizarre shaping issues. I think it would have, too, if hadn’t reknit it with needles four sizes smaller than the ones I’d been using previously. I have no idea how that happened. So, once again, it wound up way too small. I’m going to frog back to the exact same place and do it once more, and if it goes wrong this time, it was never meant to be.
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05.21.05
Posted in General at 6:00 pm by Rachel
I hope you like the new home of Lickety Knit. I wanted more flexibility than Blogger could offer me, so I enlisted the help of my handsome and intelligent husband and created a new blog using WordPress. With any luck I have successfully transferred over all the content from my old Blogger blog, but you can expect some tweaks in the coming days as I work out all the kinks. Please feel free to let me know if you see something that you think needs fixing.
Thanks for visiting! (Extra thanks if you bookmark me!)
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05.18.05
Posted in General at 1:04 pm by Rachel
My knitting time has evaporated of late. I’m not sure how it happened. I’m not that busy at work, and my social schedule hasn’t exactly exploded. I have been devoting time to some other hobbies (photography, setting up my new blog) and to non-hobby necessities (yardwork, gardening), and I guess that has been cutting into my knitting time more than I realized. I have been knitting a couple rows here and there on the Crayon baby blanket, which is coming out wonderfully (easy pattern, but the yarn is knitting a perfect baby-blanket fabric), and I’ll try to post a picture of that soon.
My photography class ends a week from today, and the next one doesn’t start until the end of June, plus work switches to summer hours (8-4) after Memorial Day, which should all add up to increased knitting time. I hope I hope I hope. I miss it!
Oh, speaking of my new blog, I expect to be moving Lickety Knit to a new cyberlocation within the next couple weeks. I have also started a less knitting-specific blog, www.shinygreenapple.com, which will eventually encorporate all my many interests (including knitting) into one spot. The new Lickety Knit will still be pure, unadulterated knitting, though! I’ll keep you posted.
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05.09.05
Posted in Yarn and Tools at 7:50 pm by Rachel
I received a shipment from Knitpicks today, and while the price is right, I’m not in love with the colors. Here is the yarn I will be using for my next baby blanket project (I hope to have one Project Linus project going all the time). It is really, really pink. But some people genuinely love pink, so I have to imagine someone will get use out of it. The yarn is machine wash and dryable, which is nice.
UPDATE: Turns out this yarn is great. It knits up in to a wonderfully soft fabric, perfect for baby stuff. Very light, too. And I decided that althought he pink is a bit brighter than I might have chosen, it’s very cheery — and it’s likely that the kiddo who winds up with this blanket won’t be in the cheeriest place in life. So I’ve gone from uncertain to very happy with it in the course of one evening and 2 inches of knitting..
I also got some Wool of the Andes (standard 100% Peruvian wool) that seems to be nice quality, but the off-white color I ordered has so much yellow in it that it’s frankly ugly and therefore not usable for my project (Chicknit’s Ribby Cardi). I bought the off-white as the main body color and then ordered two options for the sleeve color. I like the colors of the two sleeve options, but they don’t go well at all with the sickly yellow main color. I’m sure I’ll find some other use for it, but it’s rather disappointing.
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Posted in Finished Objects at 7:49 pm by Rachel
Pattern: Basketweave baby blanket from Knitting for Baby
Yarn: Berrocco Lullaby in Little Boy Blue
Notes: This is my first project for Project Linus, and overall I’m pleased with it. I wound up not loving the yarn, but it is nice and soft, and not bad at all for containing no natural fibers.
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