TIMBER!!

Here is what the Pumpkin Family woke up to this morning. Yes, that is the garage that the top of the tree is precariously balanced above - a large maple to the right of the garage "caught" the tree.


No knitting today.....I'll be out back with the chainsaw. (Just kidding about the chainsaw. Tree service just arrived - gotta run.)

Supersecret

Below is my latest WIP. I can say no more other than it is being knit with Reynolds Gypsy, a 100% cotton, and the fabric it makes is quite lovely and the color just glows, but man, this stuff is Agony (yes, with a capital A) to knit. An online description of it says "Strongly twisted to minimize splitting". Indeed, in the hank and once wound into a ball it is strongly twisted. However, as soon as it hits the needles it untwists an splits like a... like a.... well, whatever splits easily - a gymnast? You can actually see it untwised in the photo below, in the little laddery section:


*&#@!%^ yarn

My hands, wrists and elbows are aching knitting with this, even on my fabulously springy Denise needles. Luckily it is not a very large project, and will most certainly be done in a few days time. Full photos as well as photos of another completed secret project next week sometime.

A Good Cause

If you have the inclination to help out a good cause - go over to Claudia's blog and sponser her and her hubby doing a ride for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

This is such a devastating and frustrating disease. My mother in law, whom we lost last year at the very young age of 59, due to complications from MS, suffered from this for all the time that I knew her. While great strides have been made in the treatment of this disease, there is still much more to be done. So go on over and help out a fellow knit-blogger.

Rogue progress (update #1)

I am so enjoying knitting this sweater. It is an exquisitely written pattern (and yes, the newly patient PumpkinMama did indeed read all 19 pages through before even casting on) very clear and precise - which I always dig. The body is fun & easy with a roughly 80-stitch strech of stockingette between some snazzy cabling that is well charted and all new to me. [That is, it is fun and easy after one false start: this newly patient knitter did the previously unimaginable - I completely frogged more than 20 pattern rows and 10 hem rows, at about 200 stiches per row after horking up a cable so badly I couldn't see how to tink it, I realized I was also not enamoured with my hem job. It was too tight on #6s and the cast on was too tight as well]

I've just completed the trinity-type-knot cable on the bottom and have a section of skinny twining cable to repeat before the knot gets repeated upside down at the armpit;

Rogue-a-licious

Speaking of Rogue-a-licious - check out this mod someone posted to the Yahoo Group Rogue-Along: tree of life. I'm not so keen on the spider, but the tree is amazing. I plan to keep my Rogue vanilla, but I might have to figure out a way to use the tree chart elsewhere.

Busy weekend

This weekend was a festival of finishing, firsts and fun - I feel so magnificently productive.

Finishing:

Branching Out

Project Specs:
Pattern: Branching Out, Knitty Spring 2005
Yarn: unknown 100% wool from recycled sweater
Needles: Denise #8
Notes: first lace project, and also first "knitting looser" excercise. I would count both as successes!

Firsts: I acutally knit, washed and dried a swatch! What project merited such dicipline from this very undiciplined knitter? Take a look:


squeeee!

I've been dying to make Rogue ever since I saw it. It is exactly my style. I feel ready now. The swatch you see is Cascade 220, color 9338, a nice medium heathery green. After washing and drying this swatch is SPOT ON GAUGE. How cool is that? I even swatched, washed and dried again in the round (as instructed - this piece is knit both round and flat) and again, got gauge. Do you even understand how challenging it is for me to be so methodical and patient? Please don't ask what would have happened if I had not gotten gauge on either swatch and had to re-swatch-wash-dry...would I have remained diciplined? Who knows. Either way, this was a very big step for me. I'm very proud of myself.

Fun:

candy

Hand dyed yarn by me! Both are half skein of LionBrand Fisherman's Wool, left ball is done with Kool Aid (grape, ice blue raspberry and artic green apple) right ball is McCormick food coloring, hand blended til I thought it looked right. This was a fun, messy project. Not quite sure what I'll do with these, maybe socks or some felting project. Its something I've been wanting to try and will do again, maybe with RIT or some other dye, as I didn't get the depth of color I was hoping for.

Aurora

Aurora was seamed and finished yesterday and I wore it to work today. I got many compliments which is always nice.

Unfortunately, it photographs for shit. Here's a body shot, looking like a big gray blob:

full length

And an attempt at a detail shot in the remaining natural light of the day, and me looking like my arm is paralyzed:

detail

I'll try to get better shots in some sunshine later - the ribbing detail is really quite fetching and these are just not doing it any justice.

As you might be able to tell, I bagged out on the crochet neckline. I just couldn't get it to look right, and even tried a picot edging from Knitting on the Edge (which I highly recommend) but it all looked too floppy and wierd, so I just knit 3 rows and bound off. The bind off edge of this tapey yarn is quite nice.

Project Specs:
Pattern: Schachenmayr Aurora Pullover, free from Elann.com
Size: 38-42" ( I should have gone for smaller sizeto get the clingy-look on the model, even though my measurements wouldn't indicate it)
Yarn: Schachenmayr Aurora Color 86, blue granite; just over 12 skeins
Needles: Denise 10.5
Mods: shortened body by 1"; changed left-slant decrease in chart from skpsso to ssk (just looked cleaner); 3 row stockinette neck in lieu of crochet picots.