Monthly Archives: January 2019

Polar Vortex

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Here in Kansas it gets pretty cold during the winter but we rarely have polar like temperatures or wind chills. But yesterday made up for it! We have -15 to -25 degrees Fahrenheit wind chills at 6 am. I took extra care to put warm woolies on the kids and make sure the fur baby didn’t dawdle on his morning constitutional. But I still had to walk from my parking spot a couple of blocks to my office….

I had my Rainbow Pop hat, my honey cowl, my fingerless mitts and not pictured my Neon Vanilla Socks. I really need to find my commercially made wool gloves because fingerless really didn’t cut it at -15. But I managed to keep all 10 fingers for knitting.

And in true Kansas fashion it will be above freezing by the weekend with possible 40 to 50 degree Fahrenheit temperatures. Mother Nature keeps us guessing around here!

I hope you all stayed warm where you are! Happy Knitting!!

Continued Blanket Obsession

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I’ve managed to add eight more squares to my scrap memory blanket over the past few weeks. This has been my reward knitting and mood boost knitting. I am making progress on my WIPs and for each milestone I add a square as a reward.

I’m almost wide enough to cover the top of a full sized bed! Though I have a long way to go in length. But I’m in no rush for this to be done. This project is all about the process for sure!

Happy Knitting!!

A More Tapered Sleeve

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I managed to rip out re-knit the sleeve to Jellybean’s Mackenzie 5-ply sweater. It’s still a little huge in the sleeve cap area because there were only so many ways to deal with the number of stitches I started with that helped make sure the chest circumference worked.

I took out 20 stitches in total over about 6 or 7 inches of work. I tried to help myself for sleeve number two by putting a locking stitch marker on each decrease. My hope is then to knit a row by row copy of the first sleeve when I do number two.

The garter section after the ribbed section creates a little bit of bell effect. I’m not sure I’m totally sold on it. So I didn’t weave in the ends in case I want to pull it out and just do ribbing. I REALLY need Jellybean to slip his arm in before I start the second sleeve. Because if it’s still comically large then I will probably rip it out again. But four year olds have their own agenda…so not sure when I will convince him. Sigh

P.S. If these mods work I plan to put them on my Ravelry project page in case they help others.

Happy Knitting!!

Past The Ribbing

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This hat might just have to be all renamed my “Continuing Professional Education hat” instead of my Mood Indigo Hat, lol. I have FOUR HOUR governmental accounting standards update webinar this past week. It was about as scintillating as watching paint dry but I had to stay away to answer the polling questions.

And after finishing my Helping Hippos Vanilla Socks, this has become my purse knitting until I have time to cast on a new pair of socks. I’m pretty pleased wit the hat so far. I powered through 5 inches of ribbing without pooling and some nice subtle striping.

I switched from a US 2 needle to a US 3 needle. Which is nice because the US 2s were poking holes in my tender little fingers. Boy howdy do those small needles sizes get pointy!

Happy Knitting!!

FO Friday: Helping Hippos Vanilla Socks

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My Helping Hippo Vanilla Socks have reached FO status just as I was literally racing a waking baby PB. They are speckled and tall and glorious! And this is my first FO in like….awhile. It feels nice.

Two toe up vanilla socks worked with 68 stitches with a gusset heel. I used just under 81 grams of yarn which leaves just the right amount of yarn left for repairs and putting some scraps in my blanket. I used US 1.5 needles so my fabric isn’t the densest ever. But I think it should hold up just fine.

One side has a little more “grey area” or blank areas without speckles. But come on, this is hand dyed yarn and that’s just pretty darn awesome. The fit is also pretty good. Admittedly they are VERY snug up around my lower calves. But as hand knit socks are want to do….they will stretch with wear and maybe this pair will then be able to stand up all day long!?

I did notice one small problem. In my haste to beat the clock also known as baby nap time…I was just eyeballing sock two against sock one and I shorted the second sock by like 1/3 of a inch. See above, sigh. But you know what? You can’t tell when they are on my feet and if anyone really gets that close to my feet to investigate….well they just might get a little nudge from said foot. I have a finished pair of socks to keep my footsies toasty in the Kansas winter. That’s a win in my book!

Happy Knitting!!

Sleeve Proportions

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Another WIP that saw some decent progress during the trip to my parents. I packed Jellybean’s Mackenzie 5-ply sweater and finished one sleeve. The new short circular needle was just the trick to reduce laddering and make the sleeve zoom.

Except for one thing that didn’t occur to me until I was completely done with sleeve number one. IT’S HUGE!! I mean like completely and totally ginormous.

That’s my adult 34 year old hand sticking out the end of my 4 year old’s sweater. I had Jellybean slip this on as well. The length was bang on and the fit in the sleeve cap was nice….the rest of the sleeve was just ludicrous.

I sat patiently in the winter sunlight and put my needle back in just past the sleeve cap where the arm started and RIIIIIPPPED back a whole sleeve. Based on some fussing around when Jellybean was wearing this I need to reduce the stitch count by about 1/3 to just under 1/2 over the course of the arm.

My plan is to get some locking stitch markers, work out the number of decreases against the finished length that works on Jellybean and just taper the snot out of this puppy. Using the locking stitch markers as a guide to help me re-create what I did on the second sleeve. I don’t know if this is a pattern feature or problem. I am making the 7 year old sized pattern to fit my larger than average 4 year old. But these sleeves had 70+ stitches….that seems excessive for even a 7 year old!

This will need a tiny time out so I can pout before picking this back up again. The silver lining? With all the extra decreases I won’t have to work as many stitches this time and it should go faster!

Happy Knitting!!

This Might Be Insane

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I’m INSANELY close to finishing my Helping Hippos Vanilla Socks. And last weekend we spent some time at my parent’s house….which meant BABYSITTING! I’m also trying to up my daily step count for health initiative at work. So I decided to see if I could multitask!

I did managed to stay upright and add some decent leg length to my sock. Lots of people walk and knit, so why would a treadmill be different. Now, I don’t know that I would do this all the time as this particular treadmill is a little finicky. But it was an excellent use of my time on a cold winter morning when neither PB or Jellybean were glued to my hip.

What is the best thing you have ever multi-tasked while knitting??

Wishful Knitting: Hedgehog Fibers Merino DK

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I keep finding my thoughts drifting to the Merino DK I have in stash from Hedgehog Fibers. I have roughly 650 yards between my grey and blue colorways. I REALLY want this to grow up to be a shawl.

I had originally thought about doing Touchstone by Laura Aylor. But it’s a one color shawl I would have to commit brain cells into converting to two colors in a logical way. So I did some more Ravelry searching and came up with a few more options.

AAACK! Why do I have to have so many options. All of these would be lovely but I don’t have a clear front runner that scream KNIT ME! Perhaps these precious skeins just need to marinate a little longer before they decide what they want to be when they grow up…

Happy Knitting!!

More Conference Knitting

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A couple of weeks ago I attended another professional development conference. (If you haven’t figured it out I have to rack up a ton of CPE hours for my professional certifications each and every year.) This conference was held in a lovely event center that even had a good mother’s room for breastfeeding moms! But the topics weren’t exactly targeted towards this municipal governmental employee. And I was still fighting a terrible cough from the upper respiratory bug that went around my house.

So basically I was bored and miserable. Thank goodness I packed knitting!! I pulled my Mood Indigo sockhead slouch hat out because it was the easiest no-look auto pilot knitting I could lay my hands on. I added maybe 2.5 inches to the brim? This is a DK weight modification to the traditional sock weight sockhead slouch. I probably could have/should have gotten farther but I even had trouble concentrating on ribbing.

But progress is progress! I think I have roughly another inch to go and then it’s stockinette for days! I’m really liking how the colors are spreading out and almost striping? And the cashmere content in the yarn doesn’t hurt either. It’s just about the right kind of meditative knit!

Happy Knitting!!

Snow Pretty

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We are gearing up for another round of winter weather this weekend. But I thought I would show you some of the beauty from the last snow storm. This one was pretty mild in my area and fell mostly over night.

It was a nice wet soft snow that literally blanketed everything in sight!

But yet didn’t make travel too terribly bad. The streets cleaned up nicely.

But best of all, it was perfect snowman snow for Jellybean and the hubby! Jellybean says his name is “Snowy”, lol

Happy Winter to everyone!!