I feel like I have so much to say, this time with actual knitting content. Borrowing from Madame Sheepie I bring you a bullet post.

*Sizzle is done and I wore it to work on Monday. I love the shaping in this tank, but followed the pattern rather blindly, not stopping to think about the shape of my body and how cotton stretches horizontally. I really like Wendy’s patterns because they are well written and designed.

Unfortunately, it did not grow as much vertically as I hoped. I feel like I spent a good part of the day tugging on the hem line to ensure that I didn’t flash my belly at work. Because of this, I know in my gut that there are only a couple of possible options:

1. Give the damn tank away because the thought of knitting the purple cotton again makes me want to burn it. Any takers?

2. Cut the tank in the middle of the body. Knit up a bit further from the bottom half and then graft the 2 pieces together.

3. Laboriously undo the cast-on edges and rip it back to the section between the waist and bust darts and knit down.

I’ll be honest. Option 1 is looking good. I wouldn’t be afraid of option 2 if this were wool because it is infinitely more forgiving than cotton during blocking. Option 3 makes me nervous because I am guessing that the darts won’t line up correctly if I do that. Hmm, that last thought supposes that I will be able to graft it back together with the darts lining up correctly. This might not be an accurate assumption.

* I finally signed up for Ravelry and there are only 14,119 people ahead of me. I will not be OCD about it and put in all of the old projects that I have done, nor will I photograph my stash and post it. Mostly, I want to be able to surf and look for good ideas for some of the odd ball quantities I have of certain yarns.

I am currently looking for something to use up ~450 yds of Rowan Magpie. This is the yarn that I used to knit Twist, so I don’t have enough to make another garment and the thought of getting all cutesie and having matching hat and scarf makes me want to gag. I keep going back to the idea of something lace. I have a vague recollection of the candleflame stitch shawl that was done in worsted weight being all the rage last winter. But, I am too damn lazy to search the archives of all of the blogs I read.

Okay - I lied, I just realized that I saw the shawl on Brooklyn Tweed and a quick look at his 2006 photo archives let me to the post that I wanted.

* As a HUGE plus, Sunday I am heading to Stitches in Chicago! Yay me!!

Finally, a post worth writing.

I have been working slavishly steadily haphazardly on Sizzle and the end is in sight. The body is completed. I have bound off the shoulder seams and picked up and knit the edgings. Thankfully, these came out okay on the second try. About 1/3 of the ends need to be woven in yet and the ends of the neck edging need to be tacked down.

I tried it on last night and am not sure about it. I am loving the deeeeeep neckline and the negative ease, but even with adding a couple of inches to the body length, it is still a bit shorter than I would like. Either my row gauge was waaaay off or I can’t measure worth a crap. Right now the body is 21” long, a bit shorter than the 22” – 23” I usually like.

There is no way in Hades that I will be ripping this back. Again. I am hoping that a good blocking will add a bit to the length and that the weight of the Cotton Fleece will stretch the tank a bit further when I am wearing it.

Please tell me this will work. I’m not sure that my sanity will hold up if I have to knit a third tank from the same damn yarn. I am sick to death of purple Cotton Fleece. Sick. To. Death.

The only other option would be to cut off the bottom and add another inch then graft the 2 pieces back together. It would work, but I think this particular “solution” will have to wait until after I wear it for a day to see if it grows of its own accord.

Pictures to follow shortly - stealth posting from work...

Besides getting another wearable garment out of this, the best part of finishing Sizzle is that there is another long-standing UFO that is done. I can start working on the Peacock Shawl again as well as knitting up another version of the Christmas stocking that I designed for my nephew. (My sister is trying for number 4 and I want to be prepared!)

#####

My parents are coming for a visit this weekend. This can mean only one thing. Eric and I will be bickering working like crazy for the next 24-48 hours as we frantically try to disguise the fact that we actually live in our house. This necessitated a trip to Wal-mart to stock up on some missing cleaning supplies. (The fact that we have been out of the Swiffer Wet Jet solution for months is not lost on me.)

Sizzle

I have been knitting lately on Sizzle in a mad dash attempt to finish it before summer is over. Seeing as how we are halfway through, I need to get a move on. Because I am doing this in the round, I have had a few, ahem, challenges.

Splitting for the neckline went fine. At first I knit the left leaning decrease on the purl side so that it would line up evenly with the K2tog on the other side of the opening. Doing a SSP was a pain and after just a few, I decided that if it was one row off from the other side, NO ONE but me would notice. Once that was settled, the next obstacle step was to bind off for the armholes.


Having converted several patterns from the flat to the round, one might believe that I would remember the basics of how to do this.

One would be mistaken.

The first attempt resulted in an uneven number of stitched being bound off on each side of the back. Again, previous experience should enable me to do this in a less painful procession of events. Why, oh why can't I remember that it is the number of loops lifted over the stitches that need to be counted, not the number of stitches knit?

Rip.

After much fiddling, all of the stitches were back on the needles and the markers were back where they belonged. I was on to my second attempt.

To ensure that I knit both the fronts and the back to the exact same length, I reasoned that knitting them at the same time would be the best way to go. The arm sycthes for the fronts were done and the stitch count appeared to be correct. Whew.

I counted the stitches in the back. Hmm. 66 stitches. After referring to the pattern, I was quite dismayed to discover that I was supposed to have 68 stitches.

Rip.

After putting all of the ^#$*ing stitches back on the (^$&^%ing needles, I took a deep breath and counted. Again.

Damn. 70 stitches. The farking stitch count had been correct and ripping them out was just an exercise of my rapidly diminishing patience.

#####

Stop over and see LaVerna and her contest. I haven't a clue as to what the answer really is, but maybe you will!

A knitting we will go

Honestly, knitting does happen her occasionally. Like last night. I turned the heel on the hippopotamus sucks socks. I have to admit that I am less and less infatuated with KPPPM as I knit these socks. I am finding it to be splitty and a bit underspun, which I am sure contributed to the disaster.



I really want to finish these up. I'm not entirely sure why I picked these up from the bottom of the WIP pile considering that I have Sizzle in the mix and the summers in Wisconsin can be wickedly short (compared with the winters which seem to last a lifetime). I think some of it is that all of the other knitting that I have been doing is utterly brainless (felted hats and dish clothes for sale) so a bit of lace is a nice respite.



That and I am not entirely sure about how I feel about Sizzle at the moment. I have not tried it on recently to ensure the fit. Factor in the blooming that will happen because it is Cotton Fleece, the fit feels like a total crap shoot. And yes, I did swatch and am following it faithfully.

BTW, stop over at the Heathen Housewife for a chance to win a copy of Victorian Lace.

Dreamin' large

I was reading through my bloglines this morning when I came across this post that intrigued me. Over the years, I have given my dream home lots of thought. Mostly when I buy a losing lottery ticket and am waiting not-so-hopefully for the actual drawing.

For the most part I don't want anything too extravagent (unless we win the lottery - then all bets are off). Honestly, I would rather live in a smaller house and be able to do more things then be saddled with a mortgage that strangles us. That, and I am not keen on cleaning. Give me one or two extra rooms - these can be converted attic space or a finished basement - as long as it is clean and dry - I'm good.

But my ideal crafting room is pretty clear in my mind. It would be sunny and well lit with full spectrum lighting. Yarn and fabrics would be displayed beautifully in cubbies and shelves along a wall. In plastic to keep them clean, of course.

I would definately need both a sewing machine and a serger. The work space for sewing would also have a table with a permanently mounted self-healing cutting mat.

This would also be where I would have my spinning wheel and drum carder. Yes I know I don't spin yet, but I've tried it a couple of times and I enjoy it so much. It is another of the things that my hands just seem to know how to do. It just makes so much sense to me. Of course, I haven't done much and the fates will smack me for sounding cocky.

---

I haven't been knitting much for myself, but have been whipping out the washcloths and felted hats. My goal is to have have about 30 hats for the fair and at least that many washcloths and handbags. Right now I am currently at about 25 washcloths and 7 hats. I've also have an inventory of about 15 bags. It doesn't sound like much, but it is quite time consuming to get all of them made.

Not much progress has been made on Sizzle, but I am feeling the need to get working on it. I really want to get it done before the end of the month so that I can wear it during the summer.