Tag: crochet

Natal Anniversary Post

Today’s my birthday, and I tried to do a little early celebrating by splurging at Yarns Unlimited yesterday before my PT appointment.  I got there at 11:15am, which should’ve been perfect, since the store opened at 11am, except…it didn’t.  I got there, and the doors were locked, the security gate was pulled, and all the lights were out.  It was very sad-making, let me tell you.  I’m in a self-imposed yarn embargo, so deciding to buy yarn I didn’t need was a Big Deal, and then it was gone, like smoke.  Phooey.  I’d really wanted that bulky wool, too.

I did, however, finished the shell shawl last night.  Woot!  I have no pictures yet, but soon, I promise.  In the meantime, I’m going to go celebrate my birthday a bit more before dinner with a glass of Irish Mist–mmmm, yummy!

WIP: Shell Shawl

WIP: shell shawlI got started on my latest project this week–the shell shawl from Debbie Stoller’s The Happy Hooker.  (The picture is from early Sunday–I spent most of yesterday on it, so it’s grown quite a bit already.)  It was a little hard to get started–shells and treble stitches are new to me–but once I got into the swing of it, it became easy-peasy (except for the blisters forming on my fingers).  I can even work on it while watching dvds, without losing count.  Woot!  I’m using purple Red Heart, which was a Christmas gift from my friend Tricia last year.  I thought it’d be enough, but as it turns out, I was wrong–looks like I’ll need at least another skein.  I’ve long since thrown the wrapper away, so hopefully dye lot won’t be an issue.

I really like the pattern,  particularly how each row gets quicker, since you’re going top down and therefore decreasing a shell on each pass.  I suspect I’ll be making this shawl again, perhaps with the blue discontinued alpaca from Cascade that I’ve been saving for a special occasion; we’ll see how this one turns out first, though.

Categories
Knitting and Crochet

A WIP, a pic, and an off-topic plug

four green yarns on chopping board
Photo by Surene Palvie on Pexels.com

Sorry for the hiatus, I was at Comic-Con this weekend in San Diego. Such a fun time! Oddly, though, I never saw anyone but myself knitting (or crocheting, for that matter) in the busy hallways of the Convention Center.

I couldn’t bring the log cabin scrap blanket, as it’s getting too big for easy transport, so I grabbed a bag of three balls of Cascade 220 that had already been ziplocked into complementary colors, printed out a copy of the Booga Bag pattern, and threw it all into my suitcase for the trip.

WIP: handbagI didn’t get very far on it–I mostly only knit in the car up and down, and a little between sessions while sitting on the floor of the main lobby–but it was nice to be knitting again after crocheting for so long. I’ll admit I was afraid I’d forget something, but my fingers knew what they were doing as soon as they touched the Addi circs, so much so that I didn’t even have to look down half the time. (This was important when the carsickness hit on the drive back north.) The color is of course slightly off–the green is more of a kelly than the forest that it looks there.

As for finished projects, I was a bad photographer and forgot to photograph the finished blankets for Grace and Noah before I delivered them to their mother on Friday. Suffice to say, they’re adorable with their single crochet borders of pink and green (Noah’s border is pink and Grace’s green, so that they match their sib’s colorway).

That’s all I’ve got for needlework/yarn news.  In off-topic news, check out page 75 of this week’s Entertainment Weekly (the one with The Deathly Hallows on the cover) for a cute write-up of my friend Allyson’s first book, Will the Vampire People Please Leave the Lobby?

Categories
Knitting and Crochet

*tap* *tap* *tap*

[Note: HP7 is mentioned in this post, but there are absolutely no spoilers of any kind.]

Is this thing on?  Whew!  I tried posting yesteday, and I kept getting javascript errors that wouldn’t let me into the post field.  Yikes!  Scary!

WIP: Scrap log cabin blanketSo, as I was going to post yesterday, here is a picture of the log cabin blanket I’ve been making with “scrap” yarn, except that it stopped being scrap yarn when I started buying skeins just for this blanket.  I was working on it yesterday during my “day of processing”–that is, the day after I read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  Some of the blanket’s strips will be getting narrower as I reach the ends of skeins, as happened last night when I reached the end of a blue skein.  Hopefully it’ll all even out in the end.

I haven’t really been working on anything else lately.  I realized yesterday that I miss knitting Booga Bags.  I’d also like to make more of the squares for the Larger than Life bag, but it requires quiet and concentration, which makes it hard to find time to do it.

*sigh*  It’s pathetic, I really should have more to talk about, but really, my head is still trapped in The Deathly Hallows.  So much to contemplate, and revisit, and sort out.  Excellent book, but I’m having a hard time thinking of anything else.

Larger than Life square!

Willow Block, Larger than Life Bag, Interweave CrochetFinally, a picture!  This is the Willow Block square for the Larger than Life Bag, as seen on pages 76-77 of this spring’s Interweave Crochet.  I finished my rereading of the Harry Potter books on Tuesday, enabling me to finally finish this square (that was started weeks ago) last night.  Squee!  It’s not blocked, and I haven’t even weaved in the ends yet, but it’s just so pretty.  I adore the colors, which really can never be fully captured by my Powershot, and look forward to starting the next square.

It was more complicated than anything I’ve done previously, but it wasn’t hard as long as I gave it my full attention.  Thinking back, I think the center circle was the hardest part, since I still suck pretty hard at joining a round.

ION, I worked on my scrap log cabin blanket yesterday, adding another two full blocks (one in red, one in variegated yumminess).  I have it with me today, so I’ll try to take a picture of it at lunch.