wiggin' out

when i first started knitting i made a scarf. it was two feet long and about three inches thick. it -- to put it bluntly -- sucked like a hoover. a friend made fun of it and i stopped knitting for a while, utterly forsook.

but then i saw two patterns on knitty that intrigued me. one was the voodoo wristwarmers, and the other was the hallowig. both involved using either double pointed needles or a circular. at this juncture not only did i not own these implements, i did not know what they were. adding stitches in the round midway through a project was utterly terrifying. however now, returning to this pattern as a seasoned knitter, i was ready. and here are the results:





pink just isn't my color. perty, ain't she?



now let's rate 'er.

DIFFICULTY:
AWESOMENESS:

why didn't you tell me?

now, anyone who follows technology in the slightest should know full well that three megapixels is so four years ago, but alas i did not. i have just picked myself up a new six megapixel beauty and will soon be posting all the knit wonderment that i have made over the past month. don't you worry, it's not that i haven't been knitting, i've just been sans camera.

and so you know, my loss will be your gain. the new pics are way better than my old camera could have done. *looks around* i hope she can't hear me. anyway, i'll be backdating about half a dozen posts of scarves and hats and the like over the next few days based on when i finished them. enjoy!

i'm a loser baby

i lost my camera. this makes me sad for several reasons. i mean, yeah, my elph was a relic from a bygone era. with it's paltry 3.2 megapixels and hulking 3.4"x2.2"x1.1" design. but we'd had some good times. and now she's gone. an offering to the hogs and heifers gods. well, we had a good run of it.

what has any of this got to do with knitting, you may ask.
nothing.
however, it has everything to do with blogging. i cannot post new digital pictures of the hats, gloves, and shoes...er...socks without a bit of electronic assistance. i plan to rectify this in the very near future.


*sniffle*

let's go hiking

if there is a bandwagon i generally am about halfway to my destination before i realize that i've jumped on. such is the case with the irish hiking scarf. a friend of mine was always kind of confused about why i knit. and really confused about why i got excited by yarn. then i took him on his first yarn store outing. he was all, "ooh! what can you do with this?" he found a lovely skein of eco wool, and requested that i make him a scarf. a really long cabley one. since i both loved the yarn and have been wanting to make a cabley scarf, i gladly acceded to the request. and it only took about a week. yay thick yarn!



this was knit on size 10 1/2 needles. for the first time, i think ever, i actually followed the pattern. i am quite pleased with the results.



one more time? i think yes.

DIFFICULTY:
AWESOMENESS:

is that from banana republic?

so a few months back i went on a road trip to upstate new york. for those of you not from manhattan, urban new york is colloquially defined as "anywhere outside of manhattan that is not long island. and a few parts of the bronx." when embarking upon this trip i arrived with an overflowing coffee in hand, bright eyed and lightly packed, ready to face the hourlong trip ahead. then i heard it was five hours. oh. do i have to drive?

so the beginning of the trip was spent detangling a mass of yarn and balling it. this bit always irks me as it seems rather redundant if you're going to be knitting it into something else eventually anyway. this is probably why i wind up spending so much of my time unknotting things. but this is neither here nor there.

after unhappily detangling and happily knitting a basket weave scarf, i ran out of yarn. i nearly cried. what am i going to do? must. keep. moving. i managed a good day without knitting. or, rather, a day without knitting. then i got to hit up a small town yarn shoppe. with the "pe". there was a class outside with women hand dying their own yarns. i was thrilled. i sauntered in and perused their wares. after a bit the woman behind the counter asked the older woman with whom i was shopping if she could help her. "oh no, i don't knit. he's the one who wanted to come here and get yarn." after my blush settled i was guided to a corner with some lovely peruvian wool in charcoal grey and mint green. after picking up two of the former and one of the latter, the below scarf was made.





size 7 needles, 2x2 rib pattern with 1 extra stitch on each side which was sliped to make the edges look neat at the beginning of the row. 6 rows MC, 2 rows CC, 2 rows MC, repeat until you run out of yarn. very simple, it just required some patience. what allowed me to make such small striped was carrying the yarn up the side when switching colors instead of cutting and working in the ends. that would have been disasterous and possibly ended my knitting career prematurely. on the 2 row bits i just brought the new color around to the front. on the 6 row stretches, i brought the main color around behind the green, kind of trapping it between the first two stitches. it turned out about 6' long, and i'm pleased as punch.

DIFFICULTY:
AWESOMENESS:

**note: a girl in a bar actually asked me the title question on friday. i promptly wet myself and then said thank you no, i made it. idle chitchat ensued. **

knucks

i've been a big fan of fingerless gloves for ages and have been known to scour army navy stores in their pursuit. they are so practical! you can reach your keys. and use an outdoor atm. and knit. and polish your nunchucks at the busstop. all around wonderful creations, these fingerless gloves. and, contrary to popular belief, they do keep your hands warm.

so imagine my excite at seeing the pattern for knucks on knitty! i had some leftover sock yarn and a lot of enthusiasm. the result is here:



so the yarn was crochet cotton meant for size 7 needles. i used size 3, and the larger of the two patterns linked above (or here). at fisrt i screwed up the cuff. i did a 1x1 rib the same width as the hand bit, and it turned out like something liberace would think was too frilly. clearly this was no good. so i frogged back to the stockinette part, decreased two stitches, and switched to size 2 needles. that, i think, did the trick. no?

DIFFICULTY:
AWESOMENESS: