March 2008 Archives

Hooray! The quilt is done!

Stacked Coins Quilt in Last-Minute Patchwork and Quilted Gifts by Joelle Hoverson.

The main fabrics (brown broadcloth and orange flannel for the backing) and some of the accent fabrics are from www.fabric.com. Additional fabrics and pink double-fold binding tape from Jo-Ann..... they have lots and lots of fat quarters! (Sometimes on sale for 99 cents!)

While I was making this quilt, I discovered a quilting store really close to my house called The Quilt Shoppe Sampler. I've driven past it a million times, but I always assumed that it was a musty old store filled with boring stuff. Why did I do that? It's just like all the negative stereotypes about knitting. Those quilters were having a blast! The store was full of bright, colorful fabrics, and there were plenty of modern quilts alongside the more traditional ones. The employee I talked to was really helpful and nice. Plus - there were about 8-10 women in the back of the store, sewing away on their sewing machines! I'm not sure if they brought the machines from home, or they are the store's, but it certainly takes away my excuse that I don't like sewing because it's so solitary.

I'm not about to quit knitting and take up quilting, but I think I see a few more of these quilts in my future!

Problem: Seven gigantor holes in a sock I made for my grandpa for Christmas 2006. The other sock is mysteriously pristine.

Would you fix it?  I seriously considered just chucking the sock in the trash, but I hand-dyed this yarn, and I doubt I could recreate it to make a new mate for the good sock.  

Plus, I love a good knitting challenge, so...

Time to fix it! 

 

 

 

 

Step 1:

Use waste yarn to stabilize the holes.  I made sure to go out to at least one column of stitches past the hole.  I did this with all the holes before I started knitting, so I don't have to worry about any more unraveling during the fixing process.  

Once all that is done, I used Size 1 DPNs (same size I used to knit the original sock) to go through all the stitches that were on the bottom piece of waste yarn. 

 

 

 

 

Step 2: 

I just started knitting a little rectangle, but I wanted to minimize seaming at the end of the project.  I ended up  deciding to knit the last stitch of each row of the rectangle together with a stitch on the sock.

This is my addition to some excellent instructions on repairing socks that I found here.

 

 

 

 

 

Step 3:

Kitchener the top of the rectangle patch together with the stabilized top of the hole.

(Originally I was planning to do a three-needle bind-off here, but then I realized it was make a really thick seam, which would not be good, especially for the hole on the  sole of the foot. 

 

 

 

 

 

Finished sock - 4 patches and new toe!

Spring has officially sprung (on the calendar at least!) and that means it's my birthday!  Ever since I was a little kid, my mom made a huge ordeal out of my and my sister's birthdays.  Now that I'm supposedly a grown-up, I can't quite get over the fact that no one is going quite as overboard as my mom did.  So, I do it myself!  My parents came to visit me last weekend, and I've got birthday festivities planned for today, tomorrow, and Saturday!  I'll report back on Sunday or Monday on the festivities. 

Yay!  It's my birthday!  Happy birthday to you, too! 

(No - It's not my dog, Lucy, but it sure looks a lot like her!  You can tell it's not her because there is NO WAY she would evee put up with that hat.  Trust me, I've tried.)

Photo credit to zurbrick via flickr.

Is it working? My blog is driving me crazy lately.
If so - what would YOU do about this sock? (Additional info: this sock has 7 large holes in it. But the other one still looks perfect, after almost 2 years of wear.)

It is a little hard to believe what a difference a running partner makes for me! Just like last week, I ran 3 days this week.

I meet Heather 3 mornings a week at a park near our houses, which is on the Galloway Trail of the Ozarks Greenways trail system. I feel really lucky to live so close to such a great trail system. We run through a wooded area of the park, then the trail runs along the road for a while. We pass an interesting mix of businesses - antique shops, a quarry, an architecture firm, and a restaurant/bar that caters to the trail-users in the warmer months. The trail turns to cross under Highway 60, which is our turnaround point. Total - three miles.

When the weather gets warmer, I think we might meet at a different location one day a week to do some hills.......... (so not fun, but so good for getting in shape!)

ps - I had this great idea to carry my phone with me and take pictures on my morning runs. But... I forgot about the time change! It is D-A-R-K when I am running! So that will have to wait for a while. Luckily, I'm having lots of fun finding fun running-related pictures on Flickr.

Photo credit to Janny Brocken via flickr.

Now I know not to leave my laptop on the coffee table where Lucy can get to it!

I guess she's right though, I have been complaining a bit about my "boring" knitting projects. The problem is that they're all fairly big projects. But I think if I really apply myself tonight, I might get pretty cose to finishing Matt's socks. That would be very good, since I'll have basically knit 3 socks by the time I'm done, thanks to my idiot move that caused me to frog the whole second sock.

Moving on....

Here's a progress pic of the Glee Tee. It will be cute when it's done, but my goodness it is boring to knit. I'm adding a bit of waist shaping to keep myself awake.

Next we have the Green Leaf Shawl, which fits my criteria for trying to knit up some of my sock yarn stash in anticipation of the Loopy Ewe Spring Fling. (Yarn: Numma Numma Saucy in Green Goddess - thanks June!)

Last but not least, I've been working pretty hard to finish a baby quilt for my friends Will and Nicole, who are expecting baby Ainsley in May. It's the Stacked Coin Quilt from Last-Minute Quilted and Patchwork Gifts - very cute. I doubt I'll be able to hold out on posting until the baby shower (April 20), but I'm going to do my best.

Hi knitters! Don't believe those ridiculous lol-dogs sites. We dachshunds are quite articulate, although I can't speak for other breed. That's why I picked this picture - it shows my arty side.

Zarah asked me to write a guest-blog for her, because she thinks all her projects are kinda boring right now. Plus, I owe her one for getting tangled up in her yarn and pulling the corner of her shwal off the needles. Put she fixed it pretty fast, so I don't know what she was getting so upset about.

She's heading to bed already - I love the nightlife! She keeps getting up before the sunrise, then coming back with particularly stinky running shoes. I love those smelly shoes. Almost as much as I love eating stuff out of the trash can.

I went running 3 times this week! If I can survive the time change (dark, dark mornings) next week, then I think I'm back on track. (ha ha. Bad pun.)

Have a great weekend!

Photo credit to EricNixon via flickr.

Hmmm.... not too much to say about this.

I've got the pattern down, so I can knit it without having to look at the chart every time.  But - definitely still not boring.

The colors are turning out well - no wierd pooling.

It seems like it's going to take forever, but I'm using 1 skein of sock yarn, so it can't be that much than a pair of socks, right?

I'm not sure how I'll actually wear this, but lace has always been really challenging for me, so I'm glad that I'm finally having a little success (knock on wood!)

Also - totally random - is anyone watching "America's Best Dance Crew"?   Carol (owner of Simply Fibers) and I share a love of the show "So You Think You Can Dance," and she turned me on to this new dance show.  I love it!  The contestants choreograph their own dances, and they are AMAZING.  

No new pictures lately, but these socks were cruising right along.  Finished the first sock - foot fits great - leg not long enough, so I cut off the cast-on edge at the top, picked up all the live stitches, and added another inch or so.  Woo hoo!  Now that that's good, I started the second sock and had almost competely finished it.... when things went south. 

I was more than halfway up the leg, and I started comparing the first and second socks to figure out when I needed to switch needle sizes (for calf shaping).  I had been knitting the second sock with the first as a template - 7 pattern repeats on the foot, 8 on the leg.  That was fine.  Except the second sock was longer than the first.  Oh #$^&!  I've been knitting 8-row repeats instead of 6-row repeats!  So that meant the foot was 14 rows longer on the second sock - that's not going to work.  

After consultation with my knitting brain trust (Tammy & Kate), I determined that I was not going to settle for less than perfection after all the trouble these socks have given me!

RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIP!  Back to the toe of the second sock.  Blargity Blarg!