Chic Knits

I'm very much in love with Chic Knits' patterns. I've already made two of her patterns

Ribby Cardi

Mondo cable pullover

AND, I'm currently working on Cerisara. (I'm about to get to the reverse stockinette stitch portion).

I'm also spinning up of Frankto work on the Mondo Cable Cardigan! And I'm itching to actually start knitting it up...nevermind that I haven't finished Cerisara yet AND I haven't plied ANY of my singles yet... :-)

Bonne Marie...you are my bane. :-)

FO: Ribby Cardigan

Back on July 4th, I started a very pretty cardigan, Ribby Cardi, by a wonderful designer. I had modified the pattern to knit everything in-the-round instead of in pieces, which worked well.

• On Thursday nite (10/14), I *finally* finished it! It's been quite a slog with it, but it's done, and it's pretty!
• On Friday nite, I washed and blocked the cardigan. It took nearly all weekend to dry the sweater, because the weather turned to a little bit of the cooler side.
• On Sunday, I sewed in the zipper for the cardigan. I ended up getting a parka zipper at Joann's Fabrics. Unfortunately, they didn't have a blue or grey zipper, so I went with a black one which works just fine. It's not the double zipper shown on the designer's website, but I'm okay with that.

It shrunk just a teeny bit (mostly in the sleeve length) after washing (even with aggressive blocking), but not enough to impair wearing it.

The wool is Cascade 220 Sapphire Heather (which is a bright blue-jean color) & in a Charcoal Gray. I bought a bit more wool than I actually needed. The designer is pretty generous with her estimated yardage. So I still have 3 skeins of the Sapphire & 1 skein left of the Charcoal Grey.

This makes me happy because it's been on the needles for far too long, and I've started other projects around it to break up the monotony of a single large project. It's started/stopped between other projects, small heatwaves, and finger injuries.

Overall, I *love* the sweater. And I shall be making another one (probably in a bigger size 38") just so that I can wear bulky shirts underneath.

A bit of Knitting & Spinning

Yesterday, I got an itch to get really going on a project, so I spent part of last night finishing up the body of my Ribby cardigan (knitted in the round). Then I steeked it, and started both of the sleeves in the round (magic loop). All the while, getting caught up with various sci-fi/fantasy podcasts.

This project has taken *forever* to finish as I knit primarily at lunchtime, but I can actually see the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel. (I started on July 4th, 2010!!!!)

In spinning news, I finished up 4 oz of a purple tweed merino fiber, 2-plied it, which was then washed, thwacked, snapped, and hung to dry.

I sampled a 3-ply and 4-ply yarn, but it was too much for the project I want to knit with it (the Citron shawl from Knitty.com). So, I went with a 2-ply that landed me with a heavy-ish fingering weight yarn. Next time, I think I will sample more than I did before and actually knit up swatches of the finished yarn, but I was far too lazy to actually do that this time around.

It's a lovely lovely yarn with a really nice hand. Four ounces landed me about 400 yards. I just now have to finish spinning the other 4 oz of said purple tweed fiber.

And eventually, I'll get around to knitting the Citron...right after I work through the rest of my queue on Ravelry. *sigh*

Too Hot to Knit

Where I live, the weather is pretty moderate. We occassionally have very hot days but they are few and far between. Because of the temperate weather, I really don't have "summer knitting" versus "winter knitting" -- although I will not do a huge blanket in the middle of summer.

Yesterday was one of those few & far between days. The high was supposed to be 107 deg F. And it was never going to get any cooler than 75.

I picked up my Ribby Cardi that I had been working on, and managed to get through two rows, before setting it back down in disgust because...It Was Too Damn Hot To Knit.

Then when the evening rolled around, I simply sat & spun, while watching movies. This was much easier in the heat, then trying to knit anything.

Drive By Post

I'm making progress on my Ribby Cardi. I've finally gotten to the armhole shaping as of last night! Yaay!

I still have 5 inches to go before I can start the neck shaping. At this rate, I just might finish this cardigan before the holidays.

Although, truth be told, I could use it NOW. Our office is freezing!

When Knitting Attacks: Sweater

I finished gauge swatching for the Ribby Cardy by Bon Marie Burns (Ravelry link).

And surprisingly, I've gotten gauge on the first set of needles I've tried (US 6). O also tried a swatch at US 5s and US6s but the blocking/washing still puts me at correct gauge at US6s.

But, better safe than sorry, yes? For big things like sweaters, where it might take me a month to complete, I'll definitely swatch religiously. On smaller projects, like hats & socks -- not so much.

Luckily, the swatch went without a hitch. HOWEVER, the actual knitting has been problematic at best.

I cast on the sweater, and am 5 inches into it since the July 4th weekend, and it's been slow going due to various errors (on my part, not the pattern). Why? Because I rewrote the pattern to do it in-the-round (about 2 weeks ago), and I was second-guessing myself, AND I'm not reading my own damn pattern notes OR I put in not-so-detailed notes to my modifications. Consequently, thus far, I've had to:

1) begin 2x over, because I couldn't count correctly, which lead to the incorrect number of stitches.

2) frog a few rounds, because, apparently, I can't keep read a pattern. (Several times over.

3) I had to drop down more than a few stitches, because I'd switch a purl to a knit or a knit to a purl....multiple times over...and not notice until a few rounds later.

I'm only FIVE INCHES and it's been nearly a WEEK since I started.