I think I did ok... Bye 2008

A quick summary on 2008 in pictures of finished objects



30 finished knitted and crocheted objects of various shapes, colours and sizes. My first adult sweater, and proof that I now know the right and wrong end of a crochet needle. A self published pattern and some stuff I made up myself. I don't think that's half bad.

Hoping 2009 will prove just as good a knitting year as 2008, for everybody.

I've got a basket full of unfinished objects, and babies are going to be popping out among family and friends next year too (I know this for a fact!) I know my first finished object of 2009 will be gray, buttoned and wooly. I cast on yesterday and already have a pocket and sleeve done.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Single pointed bamboo sticks

Just to prove to anyone happening by that I am still around, though I seem to have completely lost my knitting and blogging mojo. I've not blogged, far less knit anything in weeks.

I'm still using bamboo when it matters though:



...and handknits too!

This years x-mas turned out a whole lot different than we thought it would be. It's been a bit stressful, not the calm and peaceful, long, at home x-mas vacation I thought I was going to have. Things are starting to get better and look normal now. I'm still looking at three somewhat stressful January weeks, then I hope I can get back to my old knitting, couch potato self in not too long. (and there will be a new couch, thanks to mom+dad+santa:)

Happy new year all!

I should have blogged a week ago. Also, I'm a nosy little person

Shetland triangle shawl is absolutely and completely finished. In fact it's been done so long it's freshly blocked state is starting to pass too. I'm a bit disappointed in that actually. Must be the stubbornness of the Evilla. I forgive it. It's gorgeous anyway.





Taking pictures of the blocking "in progress" reminded me of something I really like as an added bonus when reading knitting blogs. Sometimes, when people present their finished knits and it's not something that is modelled, or when they are so eager to show off their most recent lace that they cannot wait for it to be completely dry and unpinned; you get a sneak peak into their house as well. Amazing knitters, who usually give us exellent pictures of finished knitting in the prettiest set ups give us a glimpse of what goes on behind the scenes of a knitting blog.

I'm sure you know what I mean...
(pictures chosen from a flickr search at random)

When blocking my Evilla shawl the guest bed, that I normally block things on, was occupied. So I set out to block in on the living room floor instead (dangerous thing that, with a 6 year old in the house). When I looked through the gazillion pictures I'd taken of the blocking prosess I realised I'd done it myself.

So here it is, a sneak peek into my living room.



Emergency lengthening of blocking surface is a pink place mat that P bought. I'm still baffled by the fact that I have a man who buys pink stuff for his own house. Then there's the cardigan on the piano stool, it's been hanging there since summer. I plan to make said cardigan into a cover for the stool. The piano, no one in this house knows how to play it. Pictured above the piano are pictures from West Virginia, painted by "dad" (P's distant relative and stand-in dad from his year in WV in 1992). Also in the picture is a variety of fruit and booze and my all time favourite plastic flowers (ick). Also, I can now see that my curtains must have shrunk a bit the last time I washed them.

So, what's your favourite blocking photo?

Home stretch

Shetland triangle shawl #2 is nearly done.



I can definately see the end of what was a 170 gram skein of Evilla lace yarn.

I'm so looking forward to blocking this shaw. The stiff Evilla is really giving the work in progress that "egg carton lace" look on the wrong side.



And the right side reminds me of waves on a stormy sea.



Two more nights of knitting and I think this baby is done.

My new best friend

I'm so happy with this, I keep it by my side in the sofa instead of my loved ones... It's so soft, and shiny, and warm!



How could i not love this? It's silk, merino and purple, three of the best things in my world. (Ravelrized)

I've started a sibling for it that's a bit "rougher around the edges". Blue and gray Evilla Artyarn. Now there's a scratchy surprice. It does not feel so bad in the skein, but knitting with it is very twine like. I hope it softens up considerably when it's washed. Why else would so many people claim to love this yarn?

I've been working on the second shawl like a crazy person. There is just too much happening at work these days and I definately feel like I need all the "knitting yoga" and "stitch mantras" I can get when I come home.
(I can spell Martti Ahtisaari without using a cheat sheet already. Crazy, I never thought I'd be able to do that.) Busy work days is also why I've not been blogging as much as I'd like recently. All will be better after December 10th!

Oh, come on! Stand still already...

50 pictures taken, 3 ended up being reasonably unfuzzy and useable.

Point one: I really need a new camera
Point two: How do I explain to her that she is way cuter standing still than jumping and squirming all over the place?

The chullo took one evening to crochet, and a week to photograph. Go figure...

(It's the Seija hat again, same as in this post, but with very different yarn and hook. M has been using it every day at school for the past week. She loves it:)
Ravelrized

The colour of baby...

... poop!



The general idea and construction of this scarf is good (I know a couple of things I'll change if I ever do this again). The yarn is not the worst kind of yarn either. The colour though... Eeeeewwwwww!

I managed to hook my way through one and a half skein of this. I do not know one person who would look good in this colour. I'm thinking a statue would look ok in it though (a nice contrast to their often greenish brown bronze colour) so it goes into my pile of By:garn knit tagging stuff.

If you cannot see the horridness of this colour it's probably the pink border around the picture tiles that throws it all off. You can click your way on to my flickr to see it without the pink. If you still think you'd love this colour please let me know and I'll send you the remaining yarn if you like.

Tiny. Happy.

Another easy one from Happy Hooker. It's the hat from the Sejia set in that book. Super simple, super fast. Gosh, I love that. The fact that it's baby stuff is a bonus.

In fact, I made two hats. In two days. I just could not stop myself.



And now, a small warning: winter is coming, daylight is scarse and pictures on this blog are going to more or less suck for the next 5 months. There, I said it. I'll try not to mention it again and start loving the top of my washing machine.

Baby steps, big baby steps

I thought baby steps were small and took a long time... I never imagined that in under two weeks after picking up a hook properly for the first time I would have two very nice finished objects. Seems like when I start hooking* something I just keep going until I'm done. That's why I have two big(ish) finished objects in just over a week.

First there was a blanket:



The last time I blogged that thing was just a small strip under all the other squares. It is now a very hairy and well loved tv-watching-on-saturday-mornings blanket for M.

Then I immidiately started a hat.



It's the Anarchy Irony hat from Happy Hooker. Also very well received by M.

Petter must have tried it on in secret, because he told me last night it fit him perfectly and he wants one too. "Hopefully in another yarn and colour" was my only response. Off course I'll make him a hat if he asks me to! After all he stayed home and washed all the windows while M and I were out snapping pictures of the beanie and enjoyed ourselves.

I've heard last night that two of my cousins are expecting in April and May. Already; one crochet baby hat in the making.

OMG, I cant stop!

(*somehow the c-word and I don't mix well. I don't like pronouncing it and typin it always comes out as crotch first)

Hooked

I have not touched my knitting in a week! I've been paying very close attention to other stuff instead... The happy hooker Debbie Stoller.



That's how much skill I've managed to aquire in a weeks time. Single crochet (white square), half double and double crocet (green boring looking square), bobble stitch (red square) granny squares (small and green) and shell stitches (edge on white square and that very fuzzy thing at the bottom).

I think I'm in love with shell stitches. I've already used up one and a half very big ball of mohair yarn in shell stitch. I'm making a doll/daughter blanket/lapghan thingy out of four balls of self striping Lithuanian mohair yarn. I really like how it's turning out. The colours turn out random in a whole different way than it would in knitting. I'm not really fond of knitting with mohair, but I can crochet with it for hours on end. Nor do I like knitting with cotton much, but I do see it has it's uses in crochet. My hands don't hurt one bit. Not as it usually does when I've been working with cotton.

I'm seing "non-knittable" yarns disappearing from my stash and into a higher form of being this way. I'm a happy hooker too;)

I'm getting sucked in

I can feel it....



I've had this very strong urge to master the art of Granny Squares for months. Yesterday I sat myself down and tackled single crochet. Just that simple step led me to correct a number of mistakes I have been making on those seldom occations with hook in hand. Today I'll tackle double crochet I hope.

Curiosity killed the ca... yarn?

This summer I got a Knit Picks Sock Blank in a swap on Ravelry. Monday I got this sudden urge to dye it right now!

I soaked the blank in water for about 10 minutes while I dug through my yarn chest for my KoolAid. I added Cherry KA to one small pot and Blue Berries KA to another. Then I gently squeezed water from the blank, folded it twice and tied it all off on the middle with some string. All this happened quick and with a minimum of thinking behind it. I just wanted to see the pretty colours on my yarn. I dunked and swished one half of the Blanks-bundle in the blue KA while gently heating the water close to boiling temperature, then when the water was clear I turned the yarn over and repeated with the red (holding the hot blue part in a plastic bag and barbecue mitten, not easy.) Then I hung the whole thing to dry. Today when I got home from work it was finally dry.



(click to see big)

Conclusion? I need to plan these things better and make myself take more time. It's not half bad though, considering the KoolAid did not penetrate the yarn completely in a lot of places. At least I did not get a lot of red penetrating the blue and making "ick" on my yarn. (You'd think it would make purple. It doesn't.)

I'll have to knit this up soon. I'm very courious about what kind of socks this will make too... I will not be able to decide if I love or hate it until I see it knit up I think.

No way is this attractive, charming, bewitching and enchanting!

(Be glad this is a small picture or you'd probably faint. Click to embiggen if you dare...)

The GGH people describe this yarn as "An abundance of color
A yarn like a gigolo: attractive, charming, bewitching and enchanting".
I've knit up a whole ball of it and I'd say it's abrasive, chafing, banned (from my stash) and extra-ugly.

50 grams 80 meters, yet I thought it would never end... It's the strangest thing I've ever knit with. Though it's a tape yarn with no apparent loose bits it was for some reason beyond my imagination splitty. The texture is very similar to a pot scrubber or exfoliating glove. My index finger is very smooth today after having 80 metres of Gigolo passed over it last night. The colours are bad and the black and glitter make it worse. It's also in some very weird way very stretchy. I don't know where that comes from at all. (If you click that yarn link up there you'll see it lookded oddly pretty in the ball, wich by the way was a total cheat since the core is a bigass cardboard roll.)

My stash is very relieved to be rid of this abomination. That patch of horridness will become "knit in art form" through By:Garn. It will probably survive anything and everything except sissors.

How I came to knit this up? Theresa found it rummageing through my stash yesterday and we got to talking about the kitches and nasties that can fester in a girls stash. We wondered at great lenght about who could possibly be buying these kinds of things. What kind of knitter would actually use this. I have a hunch it's the same people who wear gold lamè blouses...

It'll be a long time before I say a bad word about yarn ever again. Few things can compare tho the nastiness of this.

(My first yarn review on this blog I think. What do you think? I should lighten up a bit for the next one maybe? Gimme some wool!)

Yay for yarn

I went to one of my LYSes for their first S'n'B today.

Not the biggest attendance, but that meant more yarn to fondle for those of us that showed up.



LYS girl and Hespetre's sister unpacking her new shipment of Rowan yarns. Looking very happy sneaky indeed.



Yum!

I came home with 7 balls of Rowan Felted Tweed in a pretty blue colour and 4 balls of Rowan Cocoon in a yummy gray, all at a very friendly 30% discount. I have plans for both and will most likely cast on sooner than I should.
(The way to never finish anything: keep casting on stuff like there is no tomorrow)

Hope to see more people there next time Sømsenteret has a knit night!

For my norwegian readers

Tror ikke det er ofte jeg er politisk her, men dette er for aktuelt og "hodet på spikeren" til at jeg lar sjansen gå fra meg.

Kjære biskop Kvarme!

Takk for kampen for den rette tro og at homofilt samliv ikke er forenelig med Bibelen og kristendommen! Det står jo klart i 3. Mosebok 18/22 at homoseksualitet er en vederstyggelighet...så det er jo ikke noe å snakke om!

Men nå trenger jeg noen råd om hvordan jeg skal leve etter Guds bud:

1. Hver gang jeg brenner en okse som et offer, vet jeg at dette gir en duft som velbehager Herren( 3.Mosebok 1/9). Problemet er naboene!
De er ikke like begistret over eimen av brent okse.

2. Jeg ønsker å selge datteren min som slave(2. Mosebok 21/7).
Med det prisnivået vi har i dag - hva mener dere er rett pris for henne?

3. I 3. Mosebok 25/44 står det helt klart at jeg kan eie både mannlige og kvinnelige slaver så lenge de er kjøpt i et naboland. En venn av meg sier dette bare gjelder for svensker, og ikke dansker.
Her trenger jeg litt hjelp - kan jeg eie dansker?

4. Jeg har en nabo som insisterer på at han skal arbeide på sabatten. 2.Mosebok 35/2 er helt tydelig på at han skal drepes.
Er jeg moralsk ansvarlig for å gjøre dette selv? Eller tar kirken seg av dette?

5. En venn av meg mener at selv om det er en vederstyggelighet å spise skalldyr (3. Mosebok 11/10), så er homoseksualitet verre. Jeg er uenig!!
Hvem har rett?

6. I 3. Mosebok 21/20 står det klart at jeg ikke må nærme meg Guds alter dersom jeg ser dårlig. Jeg innrømmer at jeg er nærsynt og bruker briller.
Må synet mitt være helt perfekt eller opererer vi med litt slingringsmonn
her?

7. De fleste av vennene mine går til frisøren. De klipper håret på sidene og tar skjegget i kantene. Dette er tydelig en synd i Følge 3.Mosebok 19/27.
Hvordan bør de straffes?

8. Jeg har lest i 3. Mosebok 11/7-8 at jeg ikke må røre rester av en død gris, fordi det gjør meg uren.
Kan jeg likevel spille fotball dersom jeg har hansker på?

9. Min onkel har gård. Han synder mot 3. Mosebok 19/19 fordi han planter to ulike avlinger på samme jorde. Kona er ikke noe bedre, fordi hun går med klær som er laget av to ulike stofftyper (blanding av bomull og polyester). Han har også den uvanen at han banner mye. Er det virkelig nødvendig at vi samler hele byen for å steine dem(3.Mosebok 24/11-16)?
Er det ikke like greit å brenne de til døde i et familieselskap - slik vi pleier å gjøre med mennesker som ligger med sine slektninger(3. Mosebok 20/14)?

Jeg vet dere har gått i dybden på denne type problemstillinger. Jeg er sikker på at dere kan hjelpe meg. Takk for påminnelsen om at Guds ord er evig og uforanderlig!!

Takk for oppmerksomheten.

Heading into fall

My grapes are almost ripe and my "Grape harvest mittens" are 50% done. Grape harvest time is shortly after the first frost night. Might not be all that long until that happens. Luckily, the second mitten will be done in "no time"

I'm getting ready for colder weather in more than one way.



Very warm funfur and wool hat for M. Just missing the liner and bunny ears!



More mittens for me. Snowdrift mittens, stranded knitting in very old and dry Rauma Finull. I do hope it evens out and softens up after a good wash. This is definately the scratchiest Finull I've touched to this date. It's wool my aunt has stored in her attic for years.

6!

M is 6 today!

We celebrated with her cake of choice



A heap of brownies

and I made a big batch of muffins too



It's nearly all gone now.

I'll be back with knitting content soon. I've made one whole mitten since I last blogged. (could you read that irony?)

Socks, socks and a pffft

Two pairs of socks finished in a week. Both started early this year. Thuja and Yarrow ribbed socks. I'm trying to battle the amount of wips in my basket these days. There's only one unfinished pair of socks in there now, the Falling Leaves socks that I started over 2 years ago. I have 5 lace repeats and the ribbing left on the last sock. For some reason I can't get into this lace pattern like I usually can with a lot of other patterns. The chart has to be within eyesight at all times.

To celebrate the reduction of wips I was planning on starting the Yellow harvest mittens from the latest VK this weekend. That did not happen. For some strange reason I do not own any 5 mm double pointed needles. So there I was with pattern and yarn (Malabrigo in Lacquer red, yum) in hand, and no friggin needles. A bit disappointed is an understatement. Then I thought I'd start the Druid mittens from the same issue instead. I knew I have needles for those. Could not find the blasted yarn. I know I have 6 skeins of some turquise Finull somewhere. But where???

To comfort myself I thought I'd try out something new. Treat myself to a little learning. Domino knitting. What I learned was: I have a short attention span, I find domino knitting boring, I cannot count correctly to 36 twice and I-cord border is boring. With all respect to Vivian Høxbro, this is my last domino potholder.



Pffft!

Buying 5 mm dpns tomorrow!

Big M

She's a schoolgirl now!

When we visited Rauma Yarns factory outlet this summer I told her I'd knit her a new hat to wear to school this winter. I also told her she could pick her own yarn for it right there and then. We were standing right by all the alpaca yarn, I felt safe.

She picked this:



Lanartus Beo! 100% polyamide...

A bit of quick thinking (gently guiding her towards the gray, away from the screaming red) and picking up some additional yarns...



It'll be a hat, possibly with a scarf attatched to it, and with ears. Bunny or dog, not yet decided.

While I put off starting the hat I'm trying to work as much as possible on this



A top down raglan with small cables on the sleeves and down the front, using the ecological cotton I found on sale earlier this summer. Looks promising, though I find the knitting a bit slow already. I thought I'd be zooooming along, since I'm using larger needles than I normally do. Forgetting that 3.5 mm really is not all that big, and adults are larger than babies. Oh well! At least it will keep me away from the fun fur until M starts asking where her hat is.

The annual power tool shot

Is this girl power?




I always make sure to remember gloves



and ear plugs



The pink wellies are kind of important too...



(Here's last years power tool shot... I need new equipment if I'm going to keep this up. And I hope I am;)


Vroooom....

# 1

I found the buttons!
In fact I found way more buttons than I thought I owned.

So, finally my first BSJ is done.



I'm very happy with how this turned out. I was not sure I'd like knitting this pattern after a failed attempt about a year ago. I started this one armed with more confidence (and counless tips and tricks from Ravelers), and it all worked out. I'm so pleased with the striping and the cuffs look really good too, although I'll change some things there if I chose to do cuffs like those again. It was my first time knitting two colour ribbing, so I can't be too critical of my own work I think.



And after digging through my knitting basket countless times and finally emptying the whole thing I found the metal buttons I wanted for this jacket.



I knew they were somewhere close, because I had my fingers on them earlier this summer, but after searching through my basket 5 times I started worrying I might have put these particular buttons "somewhere safe". There was an added bonus of a much tidier knitting basket*, much forgotten about candy and more buttons that I no longer remember buying.

BSJ #1 on Ravelry.


*not really a basket... I'll have to take a picture of it and all it holds sometime and take proper inventory of it.

Linen and lace?

I know I absolutely love to look at linen in it's natural form.



I've now set myself up to find out if I'll love knitting with linen equally much.



I'm thinking of knitting a shawl with the blue and a curtain with the white.
I've had a stab at knitting with DK weight linen before, and did not enjoy it much. I hope this is better. Or I'll just have to learn to weave or crochet...




I've spent hours today searching for some buttons to finish a BSJ. I saw them just before I went on vacation and now they're nowhere to be found. I need them right now! More on that another day. Button search continues, BSJ is being handed over tomorrow...

Free

Free, originally uploaded by G_u_r_o.

Today was a truly amazing Sunday.

Also, I have not knit for three days. I can not remember the last time that happened.

Ready!

Tomorrow, when I wake up, I'm officially on my first day of summer vacation.

I'm catching the bus from Oslo early afternoon with my brother, a great travel companion. We don't see each other too often so it's good to have a few hours on a bus to catch up on things. We're teaming up with my daugther and man, mom and dad at the inlaws cabin for a day, before heading to Sweden for a wedding. Then slowly but steadily towards the mid west coast of Norway for a good week of relaxing and hopefully hiking in the mountains. I know for a fact internet access is not going to be great, so I take this moment to wish you all a good summer.

I'll be back with knitting and holiday photos in a while.

Blue like summer

On my way to work on Sunday morning. Such a beautiful day, sometimes I have the best way of getting to work there is.




I went home and finished Nottingham (ravelry link). I think the hat looks like the water. Do you see it too?




The cables look good but not great in the variegated yarn. I knew that this yarn wouldn't look do the cables justice, but it's great for the recipient and the intended use I have in mind.

I've already cast on for a second one. Slightly larger, I'm having to play with the pattern and needles a bit. I'm thinking the cables will look a little bit better on one size smaller needles, the ribbing sure does.
Two balls of Bunny Hop out of the stash when I'm done :)