Camp Loopy 2012 Project 2

 

This morning is the start of Camp Loopy Project 2.  We have until July 27 to finish the project, it must use at least 800 yards, and the project has to have at least one color from our flag.  (Do you know how many countries use Red, White, and/or Blue in their flag?)  I'm using Spud and Chloe Fine in Redhot (it's a true, bright red) and I'll be making the Emelie Cardigan.  I'll be making it in the longest length.  I've found buttons for it and I swatched last week so as soon as I get a few minutes to myself later today, I'll be casting on!

Finishing

I was sick over the weekend so all I did was sit in bed and knit.  This meant two things:  I got a lot of knitting done, and the house looks like a bomb went off in it.  On the knitting front, I finished up Aurentium Blossom and it is ready to block.  I also finished up my Rocky Coast Cardigan and it is ready to block.  There will be blocking over the next few days!

On the other topic, Mickael, Caleb and the fuzzy boys seem to have gone feral.  I think Caleb stayed in pajamas for three days and I'm not asking what he ate (he's healthy, he's not hungery so he did eat something).  Logan tried to help me feel better, or he was trying to get me out of bed so I could enforce some order on things.  Max discovered toilet paper on the roll.  For a few weeks now Max has been stealing toilet paper that isn't on the roll thingy (he carries it like a retriever), but over the weekend, he discovered that it's just as much fun in a different way to play with it while it's on the roll thingy.  I've got to get this stopped or we're going to have to figure out some new way to manage toilet paper in this house - BYOTP?

So over the next few days I'll be slowly putting the house back together, but tomorrow I get to cast on for Camp Loopy Project 2!

Aurantium Blossom

I've just counted and I have 24 more rows (including the bind off row) to go!  If I can keep Max from "helping" me (with his mouth, on the yarn), I shouldn't have any trouble getting this finished.  When Logan was a baby and first became part of our family, he liked to help me with the tensioning of the yarn.  I would sit on the floor and knit so he could cuddle up and periodically my yarn would feel wet.  I'd look down and sure enough, he was holding it in his mouth - the strand of yarn between the yarn ball and my hand.  Since he's a retriever, he was holding it very gently and a little bit of dog spit isn't going to hurt superwash wool anyway.  Max on the other hand, isn't a retriever - he's a predator and he is trying to kill the yarn.  He's grabbed it and run a couple of times and you don't run under the bed with something to wind it nicely and hold it delicately.  The problem is, I'm trying to teach him that he can sit in my lap when I knit as long as he doesn't try to kill/steal/eat/disembowel the yarn and either the 11 month old kitten brain doesn't have the maturity level to sit still and cuddle and ignore yarn, or we're getting our messages crossed.  When I set this out to photograph this morning, I felt Max wiggle between me and the project bag and when I looked down, he was attacking the yarn.  I love Madelinetosh too, but let's not get carried away!

Have a great weekend and I hope your yarn stays safe!

Front Bands

 

I decided to go ahead and whip through the front bands of the Rocky Coast before getting back to the Aurentium Blossom, so now all I have left are the sleeves.  I tried it on (again) after finishing the bands and this is going to be a great, oversized, warm cardigan.  Now I just have to hope that Winter shows up this year (it didn't last year) so I can wear it!

Aurantium Blossom

 

I'm basically through with the star stitches now and I'm ready to start the border!  It's a wide border and anyone who's knit a triangle shawl can tell you, each row is longer than the last, so don't get too excited.  On the other hand, I should be able to get this finished up in plenty of time before June is over.  Can you believe we're almost done with June?  I mean the year is almost half way over!

One week from today I'll start my second Camp Loopy project and then a few days later, I'll start the July Knit Something of the Month project.  I picked up buttons for my Camp Loopy project yesterday and got the pattern put into Knit Companion.  I'll show you what it is next week!  I've got to get my July project into Knit Companion and I'd like to get my Ravelympics (Knitting Olympics) pattern in as well before too much longer.  So I guess my goal for the next few days will be to finish the June project (Aurantium Blossom) and get ready to go on my upcoming projects.

Rocky Coast Cardigan

 

This is turning out to be a really fast knit!  I've finished the body (minus the front bands) of my Rocky Coast Cardigan.  I think I'll go ahead and do the front bands next, before the sleeves, so when I try it on to check sleeve length, it will hang right, which is always helpful.  I can't believe how fast this is working up.  I mean I  know it's very similar to the Featherweight cardigan (just in a different gauge obviously), and those knit up quickly, but this is just flying off the needles.  (Just in case you're curious why the ribbing looks a little wonky, this yarn was frogged from another sweater and I never washed it, so it's still doing the ramen noodle thing.  I'll wash the whole sweater when it's done and the yarn will settle down and bloom and soften then.)

Logan thanks everyone for the Happy Birthday comments.  I read them to him this morning and he wagged his appreciation (or he was wagging for bacon from his Daddy, it's hard to tell).

Happy Birthday!

 

Happy Birthday Little Logan!  Today you are two years old which means you've been part of our family for just over a year and a half.  When you came to live with us we had big holes in our hearts after losing Ramius and Finn.  You settled right in and your sweet cuddly nature helped us heal.  You've shown us some amazing counter surfing skills (you're much better about staying down now, or at least not counter surfing when I'm watching).  You are always up for a good cuddle, no matter what else you were doing when we yell, "Cuddle Time!" You steal socks from the laundry like no dog I've ever seen before (and you don't even care if I see you doing it).  Last Fall you got a kitten who not only tastes good, he's brave and fierce and protects you when you are not.  You know how to get all the neighbor dogs in trouble by standing by the fence until they bark, but you don't say anything, you just wag your tail while their people parents fuss at them for barking.  You aren't particularly brave, but I will always protect you from scary things like Grandmommy's cats, balloons, and piano teachers.  You amaze and inspire me with your constant, unwavering optimism - you are sure the next sandwich/piece of bacon/hot dog/bowl of popcorn is yours.  And when we eat it and don't give you any, you just go chase the cat, knowing that next time we fix one of these, it will surely be yours then.  You're always happy in the morning and you always stand up to give me a good night kiss and tuck me in at night.  You are my Sweet Marshmallow of Love and I'm so glad you're my dog.

Fridays are for Crochet

Moving along on the Neat Ripple.  I've just started what will be the double row of this blue. (It's Fathom, if you're interested.  The blue below it is Ink.)  I think I have four more colors to go after this blue and then I will be at the halfway point.  All the yarn will go back into the bag for a second round to finish up the blanket.  I don't think I'll do an exact copy of the first half for the second half, I'll probably try to keep it random looking so it doesn't look like it has a repeat.  That's the plan for now at least.

Have a great weekend!

Rocky Coast Cardigan

 

The Rocky Coast Cardigan is moving along nicely.  I've separated the sleeve stitches from the body and I'm working my way down.  Knitting at this gauge, everything flies off the needles, which is nice since I've been knitting so much in fingering weight.  Not that I mind fingering weight, it's perfect for this climate.  Sometimes it's nice to knit with a heavy worsted weight though - even though the weather window I have for wearing such a thing isn't very long here in Texas.

June Knit Something of the Month

 

I've started the second stitch pattern for my Aurentium Blossom Shawl.  I also got the first picture this week without a fur ball in it.  (They were wrestling with each other instead of "helping"me this morning.)  This is an interesting pattern (interesting in a good way) because it uses Star Stitches, which for some reason, I'm thinking are Estonian.  They aren't hard to do (as long as you count) and they do look really interesting all blocked out.  Unfortunately, they don't look all that interesting unblocked, so you'll have to trust me here.

A New Cardigan

 

Since I finished Color Affection, I decided to start a new cardigan.  I felt like I needed another project while I work on my June Knit Something of the Month and crochet my Neat Ripple.  I didn't feel like making hexipuffs (I need to get some more stuffing for the puff bucket), so I decided to make a cardigan.  Since I have a few weeks before Camp Loopy Project 2 starts, I wanted something fast that wouldn't require too much thought and I wanted it in larger yarn so I could get it done quickly.

This is the Rocky Coast Cardigan by Hannah Fettig.  It's very similar in construction to the Featherweight Cardigan she designed, only with a textured stitch pattern and in a much heavier gauge.  Since I've made three Featherweights, I figured this should go pretty quickly.  It is!  I'm using Peace Fleece Worsted in the Sam-Kat pink (really a burgundy red).  This is the yarn that I reclaimed when I frogged my October Frost cardigan.  It's working perfectly to gauge and I think this style will be much more wearable for me.

Color Affection - Done!

 

All finished up on my Camp Loopy Project 1!  This is Color Affection, knit in Madelinetosh Tosh Sock in Luster, Cove and Georgia O'Keefe.  I did the edging in Cove instead of Georgia O'Keefe (the pattern called for the edging to be in Georgia O'Keefe), because I was loving Cove.  I'm glad I did it the way I did and I'm very happy with how this turned out.  This was a great project: easy to work and surprisingly fast.  I can definitely see doing this again.  As you can see, it passed it's final quality control inspection too!

Fridays Are For Crochet

 

I am still working on my Neat Ripple blanket.  Now that my Color Affection is done (it's blocking right now), I should get more done on my Neat Ripple.  I'm not to the halfway point yet and I really need to get moving on it, since it's supposed to be a gift later this year.  The greenish brown up near the top is Terrarium and it really reminds me of camo.  Caleb loves camo anything so I might have to make him some other things in this color.  The first time he wore camo pants he had a really great day, so ever since then he's considered camo to be lucky.

Hope you all have a great weekend - camo pants or not!

Color Affection

 

I'm binding off!  It's very exciting to see this coming off the needles.  I'm using a lace bind off* (or what I call a lace bind off - I haven't looked it up to see if that's the real name) to keep the edge stretchy.  There was a comment last time I showed Color Affection about maybe I had misread the short row directions (my short rows didn't seem to reach as far as they're supposed to).  I double checked and yes, I misread.  So my short rows don't go quite as far over as they're meant to, but by the time I discovered my error, I wasn't going back.  It's still a scarfy/shawly shape so it shouldn't be anything anyone who hasn't knit it will notice, and from what I've seen of this design being worn, I don't know it will be possible to tell where the short rows end.  It's so long, everyone seems to wrap it a couple of times anyway.  (That's my story and I'm sticking with it.)  I do appreciate the head's up though so I can do it the way the designer intended next time.  Yes, there will be another of these - this was fun and fast!

Guess what we did yesterday?  Give up?  Caleb and I went roller skating with some of his friends (and their moms)!  I haven't roller skated in over 20 years and this was Caleb's first time.  He did really good and kept getting up every time he'd fall and by the end, he was doing pretty well.  I'm going to take him back soon so he can get more confidence and really get it.  I had forgotten how much fun it was!

*What I call a lace bind off:  K1, *place stitch back on left needle, K2tog tbl, repeat from * to end.
There's nothing "lacy"about it, but it gives you more stretch than a standard bind off, which you need in lace for blocking purposes.

Yesterday

 

Yesterday morning I had 4 pounds of strawberries.  By dinner time last night I had 7 half pints of strawberry jam.  Yum!  This is the second time I've made jam and I felt much more confident in what I was doing this time around.  It also seemed to go faster.  I might try a different fruit next week.  Peaches are in season here now...

June Knit Something of the Month

 

Since it's June now (can you believe it?), I started my June Knit Something of the Month project.  This is the Aurantium Blossom Shawl and I'm using Madelinetosh Tosh Sock in Vermillion (I had one and a partial skein left from Camp Loopy last year when I used this yarn/color in two of the projects).  I've finished the first lace pattern and I'm fixing to start the second one.

Now I've got another project to alternate with the Color Affection!

Color Affection

 

This is the first full week of Summer Vacation and I've got my sidekick back!  I am also to the point in Color Affection that I'm starting the edging.  This means I'm 82% finished.  The edging is supposed to be in the darkest color according to the pattern, but I've decided to use the medium color (Cove - have I mentioned how much I love this color?) for the edging.  If it looks like it needs something else, I can always add another stripe of the darkest color.  (BTW, the top of the shawl is at the bottom of the picture - it's on a small needle and I can't spread it out properly until I bind off.)

I'm off to the grocery store and all the other Monday things that happen around here, but today I don't have to go alone and Caleb pushes the buggy for me!

Color Affection

 

I'm still working along on my Color Affection project.  I am in the third section which uses all three colors in stripes and also has short rows.  Right now it's moving along pretty fast, but that's because the short rows are short.  As I work farther and farther across, the rows will get longer and longer.  I feel like this project is moving along pretty quickly at this point and I love watching the three colors play together.  Here's a close up of the new section and you can see the colors better.

I'll be back Monday with either more of this or my June Knit Something of the month project (which I'll be casing on later today), so next week I should be able to alternate blog projects instead of just talking about one project all week!  I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!