Knit One Quilt Too

Lucky me!

I just got home to a fabulous prize in the mail.  A few weeks ago, through the grapevine, I heard about a blog contest at Hither and Yarn.  For the contest you had to donate to one of four charities and then be entered to win a skein of yarn.  I chose to donate to Knitters for Knockers- a team doing a Komen Race for the Cure in Richmond, VA.  Well, when Cathy let me know I was a winner I was thrilled! I wasn't expecting all the other goodies, but just look at what Cathy sent! The beautiful Doctors without Borders colorway of sport weight sock yarn from The Unique Sheep, lavendar soap, a nifty little notebook, shea butter, caramel popcorn, chocolate covered cherries and a bar of Green & Black's chocolate!  I think she has my number.  Cathy even sent one of her moo cards!  I have a few that I made, but have never gotten one from someone else.  Thank you so much, Cathy!  I'll put the yarn to good use and the goodies will disappear quickly I'm sure.  Be sure to check out Cathy's blog, there are all sorts of neat things to read about there.  I'm heading to Portland for a week tomorrow, so don't expect me back til late next week.  Have a great Memorial Day weekend!

Amy & Sue & a couple of knits

It's been another busy week here!  On Monday night Chloe and I went to see Amy Butler (on the left with Valerie Wells) talk about her new book, patterns, paper goods and how she got where she is today.  It was very interesting to hear her story.  Chloe was impressed and really wanted her book, so we got that.  Amy was a delightfully warm person as well.  We were tnrilled to find out that the proceeds from the tickets for her talk were donated to the local Spay and Neuter Project- quite a worthy cause!

On Tuesday and Wednesday I got to attend a workshop with Sue Spargo.  What a treat that was!  Sue is so creative and her quilts are full of things to notice.

The best thing about the class was all the tips about embellishing.  We tried couching and various types of embroidery stitches.  It's amazing the difference between a block that's not embellished and one that is.  This next one is one that Sue is working on now.  I like the bright colors!

I had never worked with cotton and wool together so that was a new experience.  I like the variety you get working this way.

Sue's new Folk Art quilt is a favorite of mine for the animals. 

Sue is also currently working on this amazing quilt inspired by her African childhood.

Even though the class was for the Flower Bed design, I couldn't help sneaking in a horse block!  Here are the class blocks. 

If you ever have the chance to see Sue's work in person, it really is worth it.  These photos don't do them justice. 

I have been knitting a bit.  I managed to finish these socks which are not for me, and so don't fit me for a modelled shot.  This is a mishmash of sock parts from Cat's new sock book.  They are knit top down with the sky architecture.  They are made with Lorna's Laces Sock Yarn and Louet Gems (both doubled) on size 4 addis.

Finally, a hat made with Lorna's Laces Shepherd worsted in the leftover bin.  This is the Live Dangerously, Don't Swatch hat.  I added the purl ridge to give it some definition and it has the Half Linen stitch near the bottom.  It's finished off with i Cord.  This hat is knit top down.  It would probably fit a toddler, but since I don't have one I'm not sure who it would fit. This will probably go in the charity pile.

This weekend we are off to Kahneeta to camp and swim.  It's supposed to be in the 90's tomorrow and the 80's over the weekend.  Should be fun!  I'll check in next week before I leave again.

Mother's Day Surprise

Happy Mother's Day!  We had a delightful day with my parents.  We had a delicious brunch made by Chloe and my dad.  Then we played Pictionary and Trivial Pursuit.  The guys won the first one, the gals won the second!  Up above is the Kiri Shawl, finally blocked and presented to my mom for Mother's Day.  I'm glad to see this one finished because the knitting was done last summer!  Remember that? 

And now, because I know there are a few who are curious, I'm finally ready to reveal my new, short, short haircut.  I've actually had one haircut since my hair started growing out.  It's coming in rather unevenly, so I had to have a cut just to make it less shaggy.  I like having short hair right now, though would like it to be a little less boyish.  I haven't had short hair since I was a baby, so this takes some getting used to!

One more

Okay, here's the latest pair of socks and then I promise I'll show you some quilting.  These are the Tibetan Socks from Cat Bordhi's, New Pathways for Sock Knitters.  These are made with Trekking XXL and carried double throughout.  They are a quick knit on 44 stitches.  I made them for me, but they came out a bit small.  Luckily, they do fit Chloe, so they are now hers.  I still have enough of the Trekking to do something else so I've already started a pair that I hope will fit me!  They are the Sunrise socks, from the same book, though I made a mistake, so now I'm winging it.  I'll show you those soon! 

Meanwhile, I took some photos of the quilt I've been hand quilting and will post them tomorrow.  I'm actually going to write that post right now because this weekend I'll be gone on a Mom's Weekend Out!  This is a first with my group of homeschooling mom friends here in Bend.  It's going to be cold (darn that mountain weather), but should be tons of fun. 

Sock it to me

I've been on a sock kick lately.  These are made with some Opal sock yarn I bought many years ago.  I liked it at the time, but decided later I just don't like these self striping yarns.  Luckily, Chloe liked it and it's blue, an added bonus. 

I made these with Wendy's toe up sock pattern, which, I'm happy to say, I can now do in my sleep.  This was the take along project to Seattle and they were finished soon after coming home.  Scrabble wondered what all the fuss was about!

Now, I'm on a Cat Bordhi sock kick so you'll be seeing some of those soon.  Don't despair though if you are here for quilts.  I have been hand quilting and will show you that soon!

Wearing o' the green

I managed to finish these, what turned out to be Paddy's Day socks, last night with only a couple of hours to spare.  I hadn't intended them to be for St. Patrick's Day which we don't even celebrate, but it just worked out that way.  These are the plain vanilla, top down sock recipe found in the Yarn Harlot's book, Knitting Rules!, with an eye of partridge heel.  These will be perfect in my Birkies for the coming spring days.

It's the first time I've done this heel and I love the look of it.  I'm still deciding if my favorite sock is top down or toe up though.  I'm going to start another plain vanilla pair and I think I'll do these next ones toe up.

Specs:  Dream in Color Smooshy, colorway Spring Tickle.  64 stitches on 2 size 1 Addi lace circs.  I have a good portion leftover so I wish I'd made these longer.  They are 7 inches to the top of the heel flap, but I could've added a couple of inches to the height.  Smooshy is a superwash merino with 450 yds, very generous for sock yarn.

I've been down with the flu since last Thursday which is why this is all I have to show for myself.  I did get quite bit of reading done, but I'm still too tired to head into the studio for sewing.  I also watched some movies including Rivers and Tides, which came recommended by Kathy at Pink Chalk Studio.  If you've never seen Andy Goldsworthy's work, you have to see this film- awesome!

Nasty flu!  Just when I was planning on celebrating.  Now I can't wait to be all better and really go out somewhere!  Thanks for all the well wishes on completing my radiation.  I'm thrilled to be "on the other side"!

False Spring?

It kinda, sorta feels like spring here, but I just know it's going to be short lived.  We've got days in the 50's and nights in the 20's.  Spring is a long time coming here in the High Desert.  As for me, I'm not taking any chances.  Knitting continues as usual.  I've started several new things.  I took a look at my yarn stash and felt a bit overwhelmed.  Especially with the bin of bits and bobs, the stuff I always say I'll use up some how.  Stash busting, that's what it is!

First I thought I'd use this yarn to make a Thorpe hat.  It actually came out rather big, but I like the pattern and I'm already making a second one.  This is made from some beautiful yarn I got for free at the Blue Moon Sock Camp last year.  There was one point when Tina just had a bunch of small balls of various kinds of yarn on the table and said we could take what we wanted.  I got several balls of this stuff, which was just enough for this hat.  This will be donated to charity at some point.

Here's the second one made with Lorna's Laces Shepherd Worsted.  This is a skein I picked up on sale one time and then realized I didn't like the colorway so much (I seem to do that a lot!).  This one is more like a small child's size so will be a gift or maybe for charity.  I think there will be a stash of hats by the time I'm done!

I've been working on these i-pod cases ever since Chloe got her new one for her birthday.  I was making Ryan one with the Kureyon like Chloe's when he politely informed me that he preferred red and he went and found this beautiful Manos in the stash.  Perfect!  I just need to get these felted.  This is my own pattern.

Rogue's hood is coming along nicely.  This one takes a lot of concentration for me and close attention to the charts, so I work on it sporadically.

I started this EZ February Baby Sweater which I had been thinking of for a while as a good use of this Jaeger Extra Fine Merino.  it's working up beautifully.  I just love EZ's patterns and books.  I also started a Tomten Jacket, but forgot to take photos.

Lastly, here's the plain vanilla sock I've been carrying every where I go.  This is Dream in Color Smooshy.  It's my favorite green color and was an impulse purchase a few weeks ago.  This is a very basic sock on 64 stitches with an eye of partridge heel.  I love how fast these simple socks go.  I've got to stick to simple so I can make a dent in the sock yarn stash!

On a roll

I finished the Noro stripes scarf last week, but finally had a moment to take some photos.  This one only took a week to knit, a record for me!  I don't know what it was, perhaps the fascination with the changing stripes, or the pure mindlessness of the pattern.  Anyway, I really like this one.   

I love how you can take two seemingly mismatched balls of yarn and get something so good looking.  I think this one would look great on men or women even with the pink and green sections.

   

I think there may be more of these in my future.

Many thanks

Thank you so much for the birthday wishes for Chloe.  She had a wonderful day!  Her cake was a joint effort by she and I.  I baked the layers and she decorated with whip cream, strawberries and a dusting of powdered sugar through a cake stencil.  She also made the 15! candles last fall when she was making beeswax candles.

My big surprise for her was this mini quilt showcasing Scrabble.  Better photos to come soon.  I managed to almost finish it on the day of her birthday.  I got it all done, down to the binding.  I still have to add a hanging sleeve and will embellish with beads.  There's a quote there that says, "My goal in life is to be as good a person as my dog thinks I am."  I asked her for her favorte dog quote and had her look at a basket of fabrics and tell me which were her favorites. That's how I got the color combo I knew she would love.  She had no idea what I was making.  Stay tuned for better photos of this quilt!

It's been a crazy week what with selling Campfire candy.  Luckily, Chloe has met her goal of 300 boxes and we have just a few more people who want some.  Thank goodness it's done for another year!  If you've never had to do this before it involves long hours sitting in front of grocery stores waiting to sell candy.  I needed a quick, mindless project and found one when I went to Norma's blog last week and saw her stripey Noro scarf.  I had some Noro Silk Garden hanging about in the stash so I started this last week.  It's already almost done.  I love this pattern originally seen on Brooklyn Tweed, probably the most gorgeous knitting blog out there.  You can take two different balls of Noro that you'd never stick together otherwise and get a really smashing scarf.  A complete scarf photo should be available any day now.

One last thing to show you.  I managed to machine quilt and bind this quilt this morning just in time for quilt guild tonight.  This was available as a kit from the community quilts group in our guild.  My friend, Michelle, offered to piece the top.  Then we basted it together and I did the finishing.  I'm so glad it's done!  And now I'm off to the guild meeting!

   

Argosy Revealed

I finally got to blocking Argosy last night.  What a wonderful knit. I enjoyed the pattern once I got used to it.  Actually a few weeks ago I lost the pattern and had to print it off again.  I found that knitting charts had been added and it was significantly easier to remember the pattern once I had seen it written out in chart form.  This wrap is long!  It's 105" by 15".  If I were to make it again I think I would make it wider and shorter.  The story of how I started this wrap is here.

This is Noro Silk Garden.  I don't think I have the colorway information anymore.  I didn't pay any attention to the way the striping went.  When I came to the end of a ball, I just started another one randomly.

 

So, another big finished object!  I'm making progress here.  The scrap blocks are coming along.  I can't believe how much time it's taken.  I only started last weekend, but I still have strips that haven't been incorporated.  I think by the time I'm done I'll have several quilts out of these!  They'll probably be wall sized or smaller, but still...  I have noticed that I tend to make certain blocks have a color theme, so I think I'll divide them up along color themes somehow.  Also, I got tired of making just crumb style blocks and ended up doing some liberated blocks according to Gwen Marston and Freddy Moran's Collaborative Quilting.  That was lots of fun.  Photos to come soon!