Thursday, December 30, 2010

The End-of-Year at Woolie Ewe

The Woolie Ewe is a yarn shop in Plano that I found just before Xmas. The store is, to put it mildly, amazing. Granted, I haven't been to a whole lot of yarn stores, but this one seems enormous to me. Maybe there's just a much bigger crowd of people that knit than I was aware of :). Anyway, this place is huge, and caries an incredible variety of yarns. Call me impressed.

Well this week was their annual end-of-year sale. Monday had 2 brands of yarn on sale, Tuesday 1 big brand, Wednesday everything 33%, and today - everything 30-75% off. Unfortunately, their hours are like 10-6, so making it up to Plano from downtime before 6 once I get off is pretty much impossible. So I'd written off my chance at taking advantage of their sale except through online shopping (and I'm not knowledgeable enough about yarn yet to feel safe buying online).

But then - the weirdest of coincidences happened. (Note - I am telling this story completely backwards on this blog, because well - the focus is the yarn sale, not the catastrophe that led to my being able to attend that sale. I plan to go into more detail about the catastrophe in another blog.) Last night, I went to get my hair cut. And I mean *really* cut. My hair was to my lower back - i wanted it at the bottom of my neck. So yeah - it was a huge deal. Well anyway, long story short - the resulting cut was *terrible*. I hated it. I cried for a good half hour when I got home. The lady did at least promise to fix it if I came back the next day. By the end of the night, I'd figured out a way or two that at least made it...workable. But I still didn't like parts of it. And was still planning on going back. But I thought I'd at least be able to stand it for one day of work.

Then I get up this morning. Stare at myself in the mirror. Try a billion different ways to make my hair look good again. Yeaaaaaah, not so much. I'm almost in tears again. I call in to work, claim some sort of personal emergency... I'm just not about to go feel crappy about myself all day at work when I can be working to fixing this..mess...that my hair is in. Go to Wal-mart, buy some hair dye to re-dye it back to the color I'd had it in a couple months ago, spend an hour dying. Make my appointment for later today to get it re-cut. And put off the highlighting till after its re-styled. Sigh. So much work just to fix what should have been done the right way the first time. If only the stylist had listened to me and not believed she knew better.

So I'm finished up with my preparation errands/tasks and done eating lunch by about 1. Then I remember... holy shit! The huge yarn sale is today!!! And I CAN GO!! So I run into the bathroom to try one more time to find a way to live with my hair so I can be seen in public. After a few more minutes of playing - I actually did find one way to pull back the offensive bangs so that the chunky mess actually was well hidden (yay!) and was within minutes out the door and in my car.

I actually did pretty well at the Woolie Ewe. I did spend something over $100.. (but I did save over $75!) but seeing as one of my Xmas gifts was.. just money.. where better to use it than on building up my stash for future projects I want to work on ^_^. I got a stash of shiny cotton (or linen, can't remember which) for this scarf I want to do. I got a stash of this pretty variegated blue-purple wool for a lace-t-shirt i want. I got a variegated purple/white/stuff fingerweight for a hat for mom. And I got a pretty burgandy for a cardigan I want to make. All of it is really really pretty. I can't wait to get started on any of it.

I'll post pictures later this evening of the yarn I got. Once I get my hair fixed.

Monday, December 27, 2010

Hats Hats and More Hats! (Oh, and gloves)

So luckily, my husband did not totally scoff at my new hobby. Instead, he was the first person to ask me to make him something. And totally got me all excited that he wanted something I could make for him!! I know I was all aglow with the prospect. So.. I went about hunting down a pattern that matched what type of hat he was wanting. Came up with this. 'Cept hubby likes dark colors. So I told him to go buy me some alpaca yarn from Michaels on his lunch break. He brought home a slate gray and a plum purple. If I can give him a brand, I suppose he can buy his own yarn. Yay.

I followed the pattern exactly, but the result was just not quite long enough for what hubby was wanting. In fact, it didn't come out looking anything like the pattern. Much shorter... it really didn't floop down to the bottom of the neck hardly.









So then I give it a second try, since I still had yarn left over (did send hubby back for another skein of the purple, though I didn't end up using it in the end). This was my first crack at altering a pattern to match what I wanted.. rather than what the pattern offered. By this point I felt like I understood the way knitting a pattern worked that I felt confident I could alter it to my own needs. This pattern was also pretty easy in that it just had a very gradual decrease through the hat, and I just made the decrease even more gradual than it was originally. And the result was perfect. Hubby has worn it every time its cold outside since I finished it. He loves it. And I'm very happy to see him wearing it!!


So then a friend of ours asks for a hat for a new character he is playing -- he needs a kufi. At first I'm like "of course!" Then I go looking up patterns -- and they are all crochet!! I know how to *knit* not *crochet*. So I tell him it'll be a little while..cuz I will have to learn how to crochet first. Well, turns out crocheting is easy. I think it took me all of a week if that to complete that hat. So there went my first go at crochet - and it came out really well. Looks like I'm on a roll!




Then, over thanksgiving, my dad asks for a hat! I even take him shopping to pick out yarn and colors. He was really simple with that - maroon and white...and acrylic please, so he can have the vibrant maroon color. Works for me. So we buy him the yarn, and I get to work. This hat took me a little longer than it should have, because I kept changing my mind how I wanted it to look. The pattern called for a self-striping yarn for the accent stripes, so that the stripes didn't look too striking against the main color. Of course, I didn't get a self-striping yarn.. and following the pattern exactly made it waaaay too patterned and structured. So I played a bit with the color changes and made it a bit more intesesting, and I'm really happy with the resulting color looks. Unfortunately, I think the hat is just a bit big. It was huge on me, and just a bit big on him. But it will definitely cover his ears that way. Just need to figure out why the final project came out so much larger than the picture/pattern suggested it would. Think it was the acrylic?

Somewhere in this massive hat-making period, I decided to pick up a new pattern for fingerless mitts for myself. The original attempt was just too difficult, and in having learned a good deal about yarn differences in the past few months, realized that the original pattern used such a fine yarn that it wouldn't really be all that warm anyway. So I found a new pattern that would take advantage of some awesomely soft yarn I found at a LYS. My first attempt, following the pattern exactly, ended with a glove that was just a little too small for my hand. This was partially due to the fact that I used just the standard bind-off that I had originally learned, which doesn't allow for any stretch whatsoever (in fact I'd done it too tightly, and it closed it up a little extra). In addition to the fact that it went up far enough on my hand as to end on my fingers.. it didn't allow me to flex my fingers at all. So much for that. I had mom try it on over thanksgiving, though, and it fit her just fine and didn't constrict her fingers at all. Mark that up to a gift for her! I started a second glove to try out some alterations to the pattern to make it work for me. I added an increase row in the hand, and used a different bind-off that added a good deal of stretch. Perfect!! So now I had two gloves - one for mom and one for me. Hehe. Then I realized I was giving mom her gloves for christmas. Which meant I had to hurry up and finish her second glove with about one week till Xmas!! Think that was some of the fastest knitting I've done yet. :) At least they came out well enough and they fit her wonderfully.

Next steps - Cabling

After my attempt with the beret, I thought I'd try to learn actual techniques, and work on increasing my skill - while still working on pieces I found pretty. First technique I chose was cabling. And my project was this afghan. Its a very pretty piece, if large, but I thought it'd give me lots of practice. Boy was I right. The pattern has two separate cable sections - one for the x's and o's, and one for the big braid. And while that shouldn't be a big deal, the x's and o's pattern repeat after 16 rows, while the big braid takes 24 rows. Required some serious focusing on my part just to remember what row I was on for each pattern!

That's when I found this iphone app - JKnit! Its a pattern project assistant that lets you input the pattern row by row, and helps you keep track of where you are. By extending the pattern repeats until the two patterns met up again as they did at the start (48 rows later), I was able to track exactly where I was in both patterns as I went row by row. Yay for technology.

So far, I'm almost done with a full set of the double repeat (on the big braid).. something like row 44 ( a little further than this picture shows). At this point, I put the afghan away in favor of starting up smaller projects that would turn into gifts. The afghan is still sitting in the bottom of my project bag waiting for some attention. And I plan to get back to it.. I just keep coming up with new projects I want to work on! But now that the holiday knitted-gifts are out of the way, maybe I can put some more love into this afghan.

Learning to knit

So to give a rundown of where I've come from...

I started knitting in September of 2010. Which, by this point, means I've been knitting for about 4 months. Yep, thats it. Funny thing is, I've absolutely fallen in love with the hobby. I've always been a crafty type, having grown up doing almost every type of needle-art there is at one point or another. I know mom tried to teach me knitting and crocheting at one point, but she was never big in it - and so neither was I. My mom's a quilter, but I never could much get as into that hobby as she had. I loved her work - but sewing with a machine was never my forte. I prefer stuff that is mobile and more of "handwork" than machine sewing. I also very much like having something to do with my hands while I'm watching tv or doing other things that don't require me to do be doing much. I play table-top games with friends quite often, and when you aren't rolling dice - there just isn't much to do other than fiddle with things on the table. So why not put my hands to good use, right? Well sometime in September, some people started chatting over an email list I frequent about knitting - seeking out other knitters. I hadn't ever picked up the hobby, but seeing how many did enjoy it... I thought about trying it out. Perhaps it'd be something I could do while gaming or watching tv..

I started with a scarf, as all newbie knitters do. I learned the knit-garter stitch quickly, and then was ready for more! I must say - www.knittinghelp.com is an awesome website for learning how to knit :D Then I found Ravelry. Zomg. Sooo many patterns. So many yarns. I found a pattern for some fingerless mitts that I just had to try...

[insert screeching halt noise here]

Okay, so turns out those mitts were quite a bit above my beginner skill level. Thin yarn + cabling + lace stitches = difficult for someone who has only so far mastered... the knit stitch. *grin*. So drop the thin yarn (hadn't learned the term "frog" yet!) till I get some more experience.

Picked up a hat pattern that looked really pretty.. This time its a lace pattern through and through. But I didn't really know that at the time, I just thought it was pretty. So I give it a go. I learn what a purl stitch is, as well as a yarn over, a make one, and so on. Yay for knittinghelp.com. I got through a good bit of it, and actually had the triangular lace pattern going well.. and then I got lost. So I ripped out most of the stitches (or I may have started over, i can't remember exactly) and got going again. I had realized about this time that I may be working above my skill level again - but I was just going to finish this thing. It didn't take long before I realized I was off on the pattern again..but I just kept going. I did finish the hat (as you can see in my project page), but it did not come out with the lace pattern looking anything like it was supposed to. Instead its more of just a holey hat. Mom loved it though.. more because I think she didn't know what it was su
pposed to look like..or because she's a mom. Who knows. ((She has since asked me to make her a hat like that.))

Here's the finished beret:




















More to come..

New Knitting Blog

So I decided I wanted to start up a blog to follow along with my knitting. I've grown quite proud of my achievements and growth with my knitting, and figure this can be my way of sharing that :D

I'll give a background post in a few minutes. For now - welcome to Rayyna's Knits.