Trees

One of my favorite Clint Eastwood songs is "I talk to the trees." Well, it seems, in this case, that the trees were eavesdropping on a conversation my DH and I had about them. I was telling my DH that the 3 trees seen in the picture hadn't had more than 10 leaves at a time from when they suddenly dropped all their leaves last April and that, if they didn't get any leaves this spring, we'd have to cut them down. (I'm guessing that when the previous owners of the house had someone come in to kill termites that the poison affected the trees. I had trouble growing annuals next to the wood that was treated.) Well, it seems that the trees overheard the conversation and got scared that they might get cut down. They were some of the first trees to leaf out this year. I hope they don't mind being anthropomorphized. ;)

I've finished the mid-April KAL dishcloth with the Yahoo dishcloth group. It's done in hot pink in Sugar 'n Cream. It took a while to get it finished because I kept forgetting yo's.

I've started on the second sleeve on the basketweave pullover and hope to have it done in the next week or so -- just in time for the hot/warm weather. Maybe I'll have to use the rest of the yarn in a short-sleeve pullover.

I've put my second Baudelaire sock on hold since my DS2 said he wouldn't mind me knitting a pair of socks for him. I'm making him Thuja socks. He has big feet, but the socks are going along nicely since the Thuja pattern is so easy to knit up. I hope to have them finished by the time he returns to university.

We went to a Rockies-Mets game yesterday evening. It was a fun game. I even got some knitting done there. We've yet to see the Rockies win a game even though we used to go to approximately 1 Rockies game a year when my DS and her family lived in Denver.

Tulip Bud dishcloth

This must be my year for joining KALs. The latest KAL I've joined is a Yahoo! group project of the month KAL. The first project is a dishcloth, the one at the left. It's done mostly in garter stitch. One unusual part to the pattern is that the tulip bud itself is raised. The dishcloth is on top of a 500 piece jigsaw puzzle that we recently completed.

I'm almost done with one of the sleeves of the basketweave sweater. I finished off the main part of the garment with 4 rows of garter stitch (the middle of which contains a decrease of about 10% spaced evenly around -- on a knit rnd) and then 10 rnds of k1p1 -- all in the main color. I'm planning on making the sleeve cuff match the neckline in some way.

I'm also continuing work on the Baudelaire socks. I've had to redo the heel a couple or more times because Fleegle's no-hassle sock heel doesn't come up high enough on the back of my ankle. (I have a high arch.)

I've finished off one ball of crochet thread for the curtain I'm still making and have started on another ball of thread. I'm glad it's for a small window. Though, by this time, the pattern is second-nature to me, and I can knit it even while watching tv. (I like to have several projects going at once. That way, if I need to stop and think about how to proceed with one project, I can work on another. Plus, it's nice to be able to switch from one needle size to another.)

On the weather front :) , we've had a nor'easter for the last couple of days (produced when a low forms off the New Jersey coast). We're fine. Though, a lot of people living in low-lying areas experienced flooding.

Finally, the picture on the right is of Mel Stottlemyre, a former Yankees pitcher. He was at the book store last Friday signing copies of his new book. He was there for a couple of hours. While waiting in line, my DH and I discovered that the person behind us in line works for the same company that my DH worked for -- though at a different location.

PT Cruiser

We learned a couple of miscellaneous things this long weekend. The first is that if you go to the car rental counter and say that you don't care what kind of car you get, prepare to be surprised. My DH and I did that and got a Chrysler PT Cruiser. From the outside, it looks like a London cab. It drove nicely; it had the first in-car analog clock I've seen in quite some time; plus we had no problem at all finding it in parking lots. It's the car in the picture. -- Colorado Springs is beautiful even in an ice storm.

Second, online motel reviews need to be taken with a grain of salt. We booked a motel using aol travel. Then a day later, I read reviews of the motel. They were a bit scary. The only consolation that I had was that although the reviews gave the motel a maximum of 3 stars, the average rating was 3 stars. We stayed there 2 nights (our entire stay in the town) and had no complaints at all about the motel. In fact, we liked the motel a lot. It was a pleasant surprise.

Lace curtain

I'm slowly making progress on the lace curtain for my DD's bathroom window. (I realize that I'm going to great efforts to get rid of the Venetian blinds there. But, right now I'm in the lace making mood.) I've frogged it several times so far -- once to change the pattern and to change from knitting from the top down to knitting from the bottom up; once to change the width and the edging. I've gotten far enough now that I probably won't do any more frogging. At least, I'm past the 4" mark, which seemed to be my favorite length to frog at. Though, it's still up in the air whether it will make it to the window. I'm using size 5 needles and size 10 crochet thread. (The thread plumps up a little when washed. -- I've washed it a couple of times on the needles to check washability.) The pattern is what Stanfield and Griffiths call "Candlelight." The edging is the wrong side of what they call "Shadow Rib." The bumps on the edge are created by ending each row with a purl st and starting each one with a slip (with yarn in front) st. (My other blog has details on the edging.) I'm hoping that I won't have to put a separate edging on it. My plan is eventually to have the Shadow Rib across the top and to fold it over to fit around a curtain rod. -- But, that's a long way off.

I've finished the main part of the garment for the basketweave pullover that I'm making and have started on a sleeve. It looks so weird with no sleeve on one side and part of a sleeve on the other that I'm going to wait to post a picture.

Finally, for my April socks, I've started on Baudelaire socks. I'm planning on using the heel from Fleegle's no-hassle sock pattern.

My First Tribble

While looking through posts for the monthly dishcloth Yahoo! group, I saw a link for a Tribble Scrubbby. It looked easy to do and would use up left-over cotton yarn. And it was and did. I used another type of increase than the kfb and also did something akin to a 3-needle bind off to bind off and attach the 2 ends at the same time. I haven't used it for its intended purpose yet. It's too pretty. The two pics are the finished product and the scrubby before the bind off.

I've also finished the March Monkey socks that I'd been working on. A picture is here.

The sweater I'm working on is working out nicely. It's a top-down raglan. I've gotten to the bottom "hem", which, right now, is in moss stitch. And, I've detached the red ball of yarn that was used on the neckline. In other words, I like the way the sweater is turning out well enough to make the step of detaching yarn.

And, finally, since I'm intrigued by lace at the moment, I'm trying to knit a curtain for my DDs bathroom here to replace the Venetian blinds that are there now. I'm not ready to post a picture yet since I'd hate to post a picture of something that may be frogged at any minute.

In other news, my DS1 has a car now. (He had been walking to work -- a 20 minute walk, and still may be.) But, it was probably time for him to get a car. He lives in California and works at a car dealership.
My DD has a summer internship.
And I just received my last issue of the Atlantic! Before it changed its name, it had really interesting articles. But now it has articles that one can find just about anywhere.

Sweater 3

I'm one of those people who do not have "second sock syndrome". In fact, when I finish a sock, I can't wait to work on the second one to see whether it will turn out the same (ie, to check reproducibility). The same is true for sweaters. So, here is sweater #3 for the Sweater KAL. It's the almost the same as my second sweater except in black and with more stripes and with bell sleeves.

The other picture is from the dishcloth KAL. It's supposedly a bunny. My best guess is that the picture is right side up here and that the bunny is facing away so that one can see its tail. It was fun to do a diagonal dishcloth.

Thanks to knittyboard.com, I've started watching Knitty Gritty on HGTV. It's a fun show. On another tv subject, I'm disappointed that we don't get the cable station that carries the new BBC version of "Robin Hood". I'd seen an episode or two in the UK last fall and had been looking forward to seeing the series here.

Finally, despite my best intentions, I'm working on Monkey socks for my March socks. I had started them toe-up a couple of times. They didn't look quite right. Then I joined a Yahoo sock KAL so I wouldn't have to worry and/or think about which sock to choose and decided to do whatever sock was chosen for a particular month -- at least, for the time being. Well, the choice for this month is the Monkey sock. So, I'm doing my first cuff-down sock for a while and finding out that it's fun to follow a pattern almost exactly for a change.

mid-February lace dishcloth

The Yahoo dishcloth KAL has such lovely dishcloths. Here is the most recent one. The ones at the beginning of the month are usually knit/purl pictures. The ones mid-month are usually lace or cables or bobbles. This is obviously a lace one.

I've finished my feather lace socks for February just in the nick of time. A picture is on the SAM3 KAL. An in-progress close-up of the sock is in the Feb 8 post here. I'm glad that I didn't give up on it. And I'm glad of Fleegle's post on left-leaning k2tog's. It's made those k2tog's so much easier to do and so much better looking.

I've finally figured out what to do for my next sweater. But that wasn't until after I'd frogged 1 finished sweater and another that had been in progress for years. The yarn for this new sweater is from the sweater that I'd had in progress for years. I liked the pattern the sweater was knit in but not the yarn. I started the now-frogged sweater with size 5 needles, then switched to size 4, and finally reached size 3 needles. This is going to be a crew-neck raglan with a reddish garter stitch "collar" and with knit and purl rectangles to keep up my interest, all done with size 3 needles. The picture is of the yarn ball and the back of the sweater. (I haven't detached the red yarn yet just in case I decide that I don't like the sweater and decide to start over. I've already changed the size of the raglan seam to fit the pattern.) This is basically a make-it-up-as-you-go sweater. If it turns out, I'm planning on giving it to my mom (who lives with us). Though, her short-term memory is bad enough that she probably won't know where the sweater came from. (She's had several heart attacks and strokes.) I just hope she'll like it.

Washington's Headquarters in Morristown

On the spur of the moment, my DH and I decided to visit Washington's Headquarters in Morristown, NJ. (We were driving by, saw the sign, and decided to stop in.) Luckily, we got there just as a tour was starting. We were surprised at how interesting it was. It's a largeish house, but, at one time, there were 70 people living there. They had guards at every door, both interior and exterior.
None of the furniture in the house was Washington's. He had to move his furniture there from Virginia when he moved in. (The owner of the house moved most of their furniture into the attic -- though they did keep a couple rooms for themselves.) Then he moved his furniture out of the house when leaving. Pictured is the bedroom where he and Martha slept plus some furnishings of the time. Martha spent her time mending shirts and knitting socks. (I didn't notice the knitting until after uploading pictures from my camera.)
On another subject, my California DS sold his first half car!
Finally, on the subject of my knitting, I discovered this morning why one should knit in good light. I was redoing stripes on my next sweater when I discovered that I needed a little bit of yarn to finish the stripe. It wasn't until this morning that I discovered that I had finished the dark navy stripe with black yarn. I'm considering leaving it as it is as a reminder. But, I'll probably redo it. I've knit and reknit that sweater so many times.
I'm also having trouble deciding what to make for my February sock for SAM3. A lady at the knitting group said that the socks I'm currently working on would look good as knee highs. However, if I did that, the socks wouldn't be finished until March. So, I'm going to put them aside and knit the mystery pattern from the Sockamaniac sock-along Yahoo group. The February pattern looks interesting.
added the next day:The February pattern is nice. However, I decided to use the advice that I gave to someone else who was worried about finishing socks by the end of February. A pattern knits up faster the further along one is. So, I now am going to finish the socks I was working on before beginning socks in the mystery pattern. -- And I redid the sweater's stripe.
On another subject, my DS in Calif just sold his first whole car!

Feb sock started

I started my Feb sock for SAM3 with the intention of making the Monkey sock from knitty.com. However, I couldn't get it to look like the picture. Plus, I wanted to make it a little narrower. I made a half-hearted effort at another sock, which looked good. But, I couldn't get my heart into it. Then finally, I thought: I've got a whole book of knitting charts that I've been wanting to try out. Why not try one out with a sock? -- So, I picked out something called feather lace. Here is how far I've gotten. I'm debating on whether or not to try to make it into a knee-high sock. My one try at knee highs didn't turn out.
Earlier this week, I went to my first knitting get-together. It was really fun. I'm looking forward to going back.

Sweater 2

Happy Groundhog Day! I heard that Punxsutawney Phil didn't see his shadow, and so the winter will end in 2 weeks instead of 6.
I've finished my second sweater for the year for the Sweater KAL. It's a 3-color variation of Tubey with a square neck bordered with garter stitch. The sleeves are a little over 3/4 length and have cuffs in garter stitch. There is a narrow stripe at the elbow with a change of color after that. The sleeve is basically straight. The only striping for the lower garment is in the 5" or so under the front neckline. Details are here. It's also linked in the side bar under the name TSquared. And this is a picture of me taking a picture of myself modeling the pullover. I'm obviously not good at taking pictures of myself. ... And this is the best of the lot.
I've now frogged my old Tubey and am going to remake it in this style. The four balls of yarn are from the sleeves, the upper garment, and the lower garment. It will have more stripes than the one just finished, but the last stripe for the tube part will be at my waist. (I tried it on as I was frogging it and discovered that if the stripes ended at my waist, it looked a lot better on me.) And I'm planning to make bell sleeves as in the original. I'm also planning on making it smaller around.
I was planning to make the first of my SAM3 socks in KP Essential using the Monkey pattern from knitty.com. However, the yarn I was going to use (the Peruvian) doesn't show lace as well as the (Italian) Essential that I used for Zokni. So, I'm debating whether to find a pattern more suited to the yarn or to use a different color (from the Essential skeins I have of it that were made in Italy). I wonder which is the "new" Essential. Oh well, part of knitting is finding what pattern the yarn wants to be knit into.

Blocking Adventure

After thinking about it, I remembered that I had blocked things before. Many years ago, when I would crochet a doily, I blocked it by washing it in hot water with Dawn detergent, rinsing out the soap, pinning it to a towel on top of something that pins would stick into, and spraying it with spray starch. More recently, I've started knitting dishcloths. I block a dishcloth by putting it in hot water with vinegar added to set the color, wringing it out to get rid of excess liquid, and then placing it on the back of a sofa.
So, for the sweater that I'd just finished (which is half wool and half alpaca), I put it in the sink with a bit of detergent in tepid water, rinsed it in cold water and vinegar, squeezed the liquid out without wringing, and then wrapped it in a towel to get even more liquid out. By then it was just damp. So, I put in on the back of our sofa. One of my kitties helped with the blocking. Here is an unblocked picture of the sweater. Details and a better picture of the sweater are here on my other blog.
The Tubey that I'm currently knitting is coming along -- without too much frogging and reknitting. I thought that it would be done by today. But, I decided it would look better if I made some changes to the order of the stripes.

Sweater number 1 finished

I've finally finished my smocked top-down raglan based on the Smock it to me pullover in Knitty.com. Mine is knit in the round with Mystic Inca forest green wool/alpaca yarn and size 3 needles. (I bought the yarn on ebay.) Detailed details on how I made are here. It has a garter stitch crew-neck neckline. It looks a little bit long in the picture. But due to the nature of smocking, it will be shorter in real life. It also looks a lot better when worn. The sleeves have a little bit of puffiness, which I like. This is sweater number 1 in the sweater a month KAL. I still need to block it. I've never blocked a sweater or anything else for the matter. So, we'll see how it turn out. At least, this time I did swatch before starting.
I've already got great plans for my second sweater. I love Tubey, but there are a couple of things that I don't like about it -- namely the fit around the neck and the fit around the arms. I was about to frog my old Tubey and knit something else from the yarn when I thought: Why not make the shrug part with an underarm seam? There's nothing in the basic construction of Tubey that says it would ruin the look. My second thought was: Why waste all that yarn around the neck when it just gets rolled under? So, I've got an idea of how to proceed.

green pullover

Well, I'm almost done with my green smocked raglan pullover based on Smock it to me in knitty.com. It's done with some yarn -- 50% wool, 50% alpaca -- that I got over eBay from Mystic Inca. I thought it would be very tedious knitting a sweater with size 3 needles, but it went fast, as least I considered it fast. The smocking pattern in the lower half of the garment and the lower half of the sleeves gives it interest. I'm knitting it top down and have now started the smocking on the second sleeve. Though, I may go back to the main part of the garment to make it a bit longer. I've already made the first sleeve a little longer than I had planned in order that the smocking would cover the top of my hand, if desired and if cold. If it's warm, I can push the lower half of the sleeve up to make a 3/4 sleeve.
I thought I was almost done knitting a pair of socks. The pattern for the socks is one of Chrissy Gardiner's. The heel is Fleegle's. I was test knitting the pattern for Chrissy with some yarn that I didn't particularly care for and decided to try out Fleegle's heel at the same time. (The yarn is KP Essential in pumpkin. I like the yarn but don't know what I was thinking when I ordered that color.) To make a long story short, I liked the pattern so well that I'll have to a second skein of the yarn in order to finish the second sock of the pair.
Finally, I'm knitting dishcloths as they appear on the Yahoo monthly dishcloth KAL.
My Sony camera is in the shop again, and I'm using my daughter's Sony camera. She gave it to me when she got a new (non-Sony) camera for Christmas. Her old camera takes pictures except that you can't see them on the screen until after you've taken them.
I have plans to start making Monkey socks soon. I hadn't heard about them until I finally decided to upload all my Turkey pictures to my yahoo picture albums. I took a lot of pictures and so the album is quite large and took a long time to upload. While they were uploading, I decided to read through past Yahoo sock group posts and found that a lot of people were making those socks.
We were in Turkey for over a week. In addition to a magnificent solar eclipse, we saw quite a bit of Turkey: Istanbul, Troy, Antalya, and Cappadocia. (The interesting rock formations in Cappadocia were where the pod races were filmed for Star Wars.) Troy was the most interesting. Cappadocia was the most beautiful.

Happy New Year

I'm really behind on posting.
Christmas and catnip
We decided to get our two cats catnip for Christmas even though they usually play with it for a couple of hours and then basically ignore it. This Christmas it was different. One of our cats opened her catnip present Christmas morning -- and she did open the one with her name on it -- before the rest of us got up. And then the two of them played with it and the other catnip present for the rest of the day and a lot of the following days.

The Nutcracker
My DH and I went with our two DSs and the oldest son's girlfriend to the Nutcracker presented by the New York City Ballet. We were underwhelmed by it all. Most of the dancers seemed to be just going through the motions.

The actor who plays Monk
My oldest son and his girlfriend went to a Broadway play featuring the actor who plays Monk on tv. They were quite surprised to say the least. My DS likes Tony Shalhoub and has seen him in quite a few movies including Big Night and also Galaxy Quest. Nothing prepared them for the role he played in the play. My DS thought the change of pace from Shalhoub was funny. They saw more of him and heard a more varied language than they were expecting, even though they were on the wrong side of the theater for the "best" view. At least, they got in for cheap $15 student seats. I assume though that the acting was good. It's not clear, however, whether the play will make it to opening night.

An empty feeling house
Two friends of my DD went back to Ohio last Wednesday. My oldest DS and his girlfriend went to California on Thursday. And my DD and other DS went back to London on Saturday (after their Friday flight to Chicago and then London was cancelled). So, now it's just me, my DH, my mom, and the cats.

2 here, 1 to arrive later

The house is starting to feel more lived in now. We picked up 2 of our children at the airport Thursday night. The plane was delayed because of fog here. The flight was scheduled to arrive at JFK from London around 10:30 -- but the estimated arrival time was changed to just before midnight. So, we drove to JFK's terminal 8 and timed it so we would get there just as they were clearing immigration and customs. When we got there, we were surprised that less than a dozen people were waiting for an international flight. Well, we stayed in the lounge for a while (over half an hour) and visited with a lady who was waiting for the same flight and had been there longer than we had. Finally, I walked over to the AA desk and asked when the flight was going to arrive. The lady said it was arriving at terminal 4 since the international portion of terminal 8 closes at midnight (the immigration and customs people stop working at that terminal then). (As far as we know, there were no announcements to that effect. If I hadn't asked, we would have been there for a long time.) So, we drove over to the other terminal and arrived about 15 minutes before our children (home from college) came into view. We didn't get home to NJ until 2:30. But, at least, the traffic was good.

I'm starting to knit a scarf for my other DS's girlfriend. She's arriving here the day after Christmas. I'm using my usual scarf pattern, which my DD likes. My DD has the three previous scarves I made with the pattern. She says it's so soft. It's also very easy to make. I'm using a navy colored worsted weight yarn and size 7 needles and cast on 30 sts because I wanted to make it a bit wider than the other ones I've made. After starting it, I wondered about my directions for the slipped st edging. (I didn't know the "correct" way to do a slipped st edging back then. I hadn't realized there were so many online resources. So, after trying different ways of doing one, I settled on slipping the first st with the yarn in front.) It gives an edge that faces out instead of lying flat as the usual edging does and which I like better than the usual one.

a version of Smock

I'm happy. The version of Smock that I'm making is turning out nicely -- after a couple false starts. Here is an in-progress picture. I think I stood too close for the flash on the camera. The hanger turned out white instead of a light brown. The smocking is turning out well. The biggest difficulty is counting to 6.
For the sweater, the first decision I made was to use a garter stitch neckline instead of a ribbed one. (I think it looks nice with this sweater.) I also decided to make it into a top-down raglan with a k3 raglan seam. My false starts relate to the type of neck. I started it with a boat neck and then decided that I really didn't want the front of the sweater rubbing against the front of my neck. Then I restarted it with my usual crew neck pattern (which I keep changing). Then I thought "why am I doing it this way?" So, I frogged it back to the neckline and proceeded with a new plan (which is slightly more pleasing to me than the old one). Details are in my other knitting blog.
-- When I get around to it, I'm going to change the directions for the men's v-neck tweed linked to in the side-bar of this blog to reflect my change of mind regarding how to make a crew or v neck. It's just a minor change. I decided to start wrapping and turning with the backmost sts of the front raglan seams instead of the middle.

I'm happy because the children are coming home over Christmas break. Two of them are coming home at the end of the week. The other is coming here Christmas eve. Plus, a very good friend of his, whom we all like a lot, is coming the day after Christmas. It will be nice to have a full house. (We'll be having other friends of the children coming by as well for a brief stay. None of them lives in NJ.) I don't know how my mom, who is living with us, will take the change. But, I guess, if I write it all on her calendar, she'll be ok with it.
On another note, I finally got up the courage to wash my KP shine worsted pullover. It came out wonderfully. It was damp dry coming out of the wash machine. I then decided to try putting it through the dryer. It came through all of this with flying colors.

alpaca/wool blend

The yarn I bought on ebay from MysticInca is really nice. Contrary to my usual practice, I even swatched it (5.5 st, 9 rows per inch with a size 3 needle). I first washed it by hand in cold water. The gauge didn't change much (6 st, 8.5 rows per inch). Then I hand washed it in hot water and soap. The st gauge didn't change, but row gauge did, but only a bit (6 st, 8 rows per inch). Then, because I had always thought that wool shrank, I put it in with my regular laundry on a warm setting. The gauge stayed the same from the hot-water wash, and there was minimal felting, if any. The only thing all the washing did that I could tell was make the fabric a bit thicker.
So, now I'm considering making Smock out of the yarn. As I'm basically incapable of making a pattern as written, I'm making it in the round, from the top down, as a raglan, with a garter stitch neck. I haven't gotten to the point in Smock where the smocking begins -- so I can still change my mind. The smock pattern begins on the sleeves at the elbows and a bit under the armholes on the main part of the garment. The fabric feels a little too flimsy now, but I have great hopes that after washing it will be less so.
On another front, I accidentally put my v-neck in KP Swish into the wash with my regular laundry. I didn't notice that I had done that until I was getting clothes out of the dryer. Luckily, there was minimal shrinkage. Though, next time I use Swish, I'll use a size 7 needle, as recommended.

Anastasia socks

Just a short update: I've finished the Elfine socks in KP autumn stripes. I'm currently working on some test knitting for Chrissy aka Knittin' Mom and also a pair of socks in KP bubblegum parade. I'd started the latter socks with the Wyvern pattern, but that didn't work for such bold colors. However, the Anastasia pattern is perfect. I got to the ankle, however, before realizing that I had the wrong length of pattern repeat. With this yarn and size 2 circs, I had a sole and instep of 26 sts each. So, what I should have done initially and have done now is to make the repeat 13 sts (half of 26) -- ie, k9, k2tog, yo, k2tog, yo, for the sock I'm making now. It'll be the opposite, but still 13 sts, for the other foot.
A few more details on this sock: To more or less center the pattern, I started w k5 and ended w k4 on the first pattern row. Also, I used a Turkish cast on for the toe and am planning on using a Widdershins heel.
I've also made my first yarn order over ebay on Wednesday. I can't wait to see the yarn.

England

It was so nice to be back in England again and especially to see the children. We had a wonderful time. It wasn't hard at all to readjust to driving on the other side of the road and to use British phrases. You'll have to forgive me for slipping back and forth between American and British usages. (My "best" combination of the two was a month after we moved back to the States. I left the LYS by saying: "'Twas nice meeting y'all." -- We lived in NC many, many years ago.)
We had a busy time. On the Saturday we arrived there, we went to a soccer game in High Wycombe with the whole family (even our DD). It was a fun game, which Wycombe won. We didn't recognize any of the players. However, one of the assistant coaches was a very popular player while we lived near there. On the way back to London, we drove past two of the houses we rented. They looked pretty much the same, but the towns they are in had changed a bit. (The third house we rented in the 4 1/2 years we were in England is east rather than west of London. We moved once because they were going to up the rent on the house we were in while rents in general were falling. That house was also a Feng Shui disaster. We moved house a second time because the company my DH worked for was bought by another company who decided to close the office in High Wycombe.)
We didn't do much except miscellaneous sightseeing until Wednesday, when one of our DSs had his graduation ceremony. It was a grand ceremony with over 1800 people graduating. The picture is of our three children on the way to the graduation ceremony.
The next day my DD and I met at the British Museum. We had lunch with a friend of mine there. Then we went about looking at the sights. (My DH joined us there, as well, even though he had been there a year ago.) There are rooms and rooms of antiquities that the Ottoman Empire sold to people who then donated them to the museum. When we were in Turkey, we saw one of the palaces and several of the mosques that were made possible through this influx of cash.
The British Museum is perfect for anyone who loves ancient history. The museum has several giant (and I mean giant) winged horses from the Assyrian Empire. It has friezes from the Parthenon. It even has statues from one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, the Masoleum at Halikarnassos, and a couple of pieces from another, the Temple of Artemis (aka Diana) at Ephesus. It also contains the Rosetta Stone plus several rooms of mummies. Here is a picture of part of the family resting on the steps of the British Museum after a lot of walking.
The next day my oldest got us tickets to "Spamalot". He had to go to four different ticket agents before finding one that had tickets. It was a very enjoyable play. My two DSs especially liked it since they are Monty Python fans. When we were in Scotland once, we saw some of the sights from their movies. Though, the clerks in one store were taken aback when I asked them for directions to the Bridge of Doom. They weren't able to direct us there but did direct us to one of the castles in one of the movies.
On our final full day in England, we drove up to Leeds to watch a game at Elland Road. On the way, we stopped at Sherwood Forest. For a change, Leeds won the game. It was the first time my DH and other DS had seen Leeds win. It was the second time I'd seen them win -- though the first time probably shouldn't count since it was a testimonial game against Cambridge United who were a couple or more divisions lower than Leeds at the time.
Our trip back was uneventful except for immigration at Newark. The immigration officers wouldn't let people in our line go to another one since the one in that line wanted to go on break as soon as possible. (He went on break while there were about 10 people in our line.) Then the one for our line decided to go on break after we passed immigration and while the two people behind us in line were trying to help someone who spoke only Spanish complete the forms.

off to London

My husband and I are off to London on Friday to go to our son's graduation next Wednesday. It will be nice to see the children again, all three of whom are attending university in London. We lived in England for 4 1/2 years. (We had a lovely back garden for the last house we lived in there. Plus, it was near a continuation of the White Cliffs of Dover. Years and years ago, the Spanish Armada went past that part of the coastline.) It will also be nice to be back in England again. Besides the graduation, we have plans to attend a football game with our other son and to go to the British Museum with our daughter.

I'm planning to take along sock yarn to knit a pair of socks for my DD while there, probably using the Wyvern pattern and Parade yarn with size 2 needles. I'm also working on a v-neck sweater for myself with KP Swish and size 5 needles and getting a gauge of 4 1/2 st and 6 1/2 rows per inch. I'm using the tweed-stitch v-neck pattern that I used for my DH's sweater except for doing a plain knit stitch instead of a tweed stitch. I cast on 100 sts divided 35 sts for the back, 9 for each sleeve, and 47 for the front. Because of this, I had to end quite a few more short rows with k2tog and p2tog. Also I didn't knit any sts together at the base of the v. I would post a pic, but sts in navy don't turn out well. (Of course, it could be that my camera still needs a little fixing.)

Obviously, we got our camera back from being serviced at Best Buy. However, we still haven't gotten back the laptop we took in for servicing over 2 weeks prior to that. We had hoped that it would be ready by the time we left for England. It's our son's laptop. He's had to share his brother's laptop for the first month of school -- which is hard for both of them. Well, there's a couple more days left for them to finish with it...... If nothing else, we can bring out there the laptop that I'm currently using which I inherited from my other DS -- though it's far from state of the art.

It's so nice to knit with better yarn like the yarn from KP. And so I'm redoing sweaters in wool or a blend that I had originally knitted in acrylic. The original sweaters have since then "melted" in the wash machine. (Too high a water temperature causes a sweater to double in size.)

Square summer raglan

I'm so happy. I've finally finished the summer sweater I was making in KP Shine Worsted. I redid it once because I didn't like the joins. But I finally found one that looked ok with a cotton blend (knit 1 st w new skein, knit 1 st w old skein, then continue w new skein - tying the loose ends in the back until weaving them in). Then in the middle of the project, I had to order more yarn. I finally ended up using all but a few inches of 7 skeins of the yarn -- and that's with ultra-short (8 or 9-row-long) sleeves and a simple bind off (knit or purl then slip st over). I didn't have enough yarn to do ribbing on the sleeves and so did the sleeve pattern there instead. It was really touch and go. I would have had to order more yarn if I weren't so short. I usually knit a medium size but take off an inch above the armhole and another inch below. To save yarn (and to make it more form fitting), I also shaped it around the waist by decreasing 4 sts every 10th row above the waist and increasing every 5th row below. (Added 12/17/06: I've changed the chart to show the underarm diamonds as well. In the underarm diamonds, one can see the first 2 decrease row. I've also changed the chart to show the full sleeve pattern.)
It looks really nice, if I do say so myself. A picture of the sweater in progress is at my August 8th post. I used a size 7 circ and got 6 rows and 4 sts per inch when slightly stretched. (I didn't do a swatch first. I just assumed that a size 7 with worsted would give that gauge. But it worked out ok because the material did stretch.) Here's how I began the sweater. Line 1 of the garment chart is line 45 of the sweater as I made it. (Also line 45 of the sweater is line 1 of the sleeve.) The pattern is knit across on even rnds. I also fitted a couple of diamonds under the armholes themselves - which is now charted here.

Neckline:
CO 92. Join.
Work *p1, k1* around for 6 rounds, starting w the p1.
*p1, k11, p1, k33* twice
p91 (ie stop 1 st before beginning of round)

Upper Body:
R1: *m1, k1, p1, k1, m1, knit to 1 st before next purl, m1, k1, p1, k1, m1, knit to 1 st before next purl* twice (For the first k1 on the first time knitting R1, p1 instead -- to complete the purl around.)
R2: knit the knit sts and the m1's, purl the 4 purl sts

Continue alternating these rnds to 17 increase rnds total and 238 sts total. Continue making just R2 until 45 total rnds for me (51 for most people) not including the ribbing. (The 45th rnd can be used to start the pattern by replacing R2 with: purl the knit st, purl the purl st, *k3, p3* around, p1.)
Then to start the lower part of the sweater: *k1, put the next 13 sts on a spare circ, co9 (w single cast on), k66* twice. (152 sts total)

Tempting II finally finished

It took a while, but my version of Tempting II from knitty is finally finished. It took a while because I frogged it after it was finished because I had made the yoke too long . Because of the ribbing and the length of the yoke, the sweater's neck was riding up around my neck. To make it worse, the arms were also too tight. It wouldn't have been so bad if I hadn't made it top down.

However, I really like the neckline. I might use it for another sweater -- but a raglan this time. Here's how I started:

Neck:
CO 90 sts (chain cast on), join.
Round 1: p90
Round 2: k90
Repeat these 2 rounds for a total of 14 rounds in garter stitch On the next to last knit round, increase more or less evenly to 108 sts. End w a knit round. (There will be a line where the rounds begin.)

Body:
(yo, k1) 108 times
(p1, k1) 108 times (216 sts in round)

Continue working in p1, k1 until the sweater is about 1 1/2" shorter than my normal sweaters. Then divide the sts w 41 sts for the sleeves, 65 sts for the garment, and casting on 13 sts under the arm with a single (not provisional) cast on.

Zokni socks finished

My DD is modeling a pair of Zokni socks in KP Essential that I finished a couple of days before she left to go back to university in London. Universities in the UK start classes around the first of October. Hopefully, they'll keep her feet warm this winter.
They're made toe up with 2 circ size 1 needles, with a Turkish cast on, a round toe, a Widdershins heel, and a crocheted bind off (single crochet 1, chain 1).
Here's how I started the sock:

Wrap yarn around 2 circ needles 9 times (under, back, and over). k9 off of top needle. k9 off of bottom needle.
R1: k1, m1, k..., m1, k1 on top needle, k1, m1, k...., m1, k1 on bottom needle.
Repeat R1 to 19 sts on each needle
Alternate R2 (k across) with R1 to a total of 25 sts per needle
Do R2, R2, R1 to a total of 29 sts per needle
Do R2 on top needle and k across on lower needle. (31 sts on top, 29 on bottom)
After that, work the Zokni pattern across the 31 top sts. Knit across the bottom.

Approximately 4" (for me) before the end of the foot, start making increase as in the Widdershins pattern. Since I wanted a heel flap of 28 rows and 31 sts wide, I increased to 51 (= 28 + 23) sts then worked the Widdershins heel on the middle 23 sts.

I'm currently working on finishing Tempting II, which I hope to finish in a few days, hopefully before it gets too cold to wear. Though, it has been warm here recently -- a lot warmer than I thought it would be here in NJ.

Karen's Sugar-Free Diabetes Walk Socks

Karen's Sugar-Free Diabetes Walk Socks is an easily knit cabled sock from KnittinMom in sportweight yarn for size 3 needles (or thereabouts). Information on ordering the pattern plus a picture of the completed sock are also in the sidebar. Proceeds from the sale of the pattern will aid in the fight against diabetes.

Yankee Stadium

We went to Yankee Stadium yesterday to see the Twins play the Yankees. Our tickets weren't as good as the tickets we had to the Mets game, but they were nice. We sat in the loge section behind right field -- in the first row. The game started on time despite rain from what was left of Ernesto. It tried to rain several times before the bottom of the 8th inning when it started raining hard enough to first delay the game and then have it called on account of rain.
Rules have changed since I looked at them last. The official score for the game was 6-1 with the Twins scoring 4 of those runs in the top of the 8th inning. The Yankees were only able to have one batter in the bottom of the 8th before the rains came. Back when I knew, or at least knew quite a bit about the rules of the game, the final score would have reverted back to the score at the end of the 7th which was 2-1. But the official MLB site has the official score at 6-1. I wonder why the change was made.
On the way back to New Jersey, we decided to avoid traffic. (Yes, there was traffic even after the 40 minutes of rain delay before the game was called.) So, we went down through Manhattan by crossing the Harlem River and then going along the Hudson River. We passed by the USS Intrepid. It was very impressive.
The mountain picture is of Will Roger's Shrine on Cheyenne Mountain. Cheyenne Mountain, some people might know is the home of SGC. ;) My sister and I were driving along the Gold Camp Road west of Colorado Springs when we stopped to take the picture. We were lucky at the timing because we also got to hear the chimes from the Shrine -- which we hadn't heard in years. The Gold Camp Road originally connected the gold mines and miners of Cripple Creek and Victor with Colorado Springs and places to spend the gold the miners had accumulated. It's still gravel, 1-1/2 lanes in most places with some fantastic scenery.

Back from Colorado

I'm back in NJ after a week in Colorado. Before going there, I finished my DH's sweater which is modeled by my DS on my other blog. (He needs a shave and, in fact, got one while I was gone. He prefers to let his beard grow until whenever and then shaves it off.)
I thought I'd get some knitting done while in Colorado but didn't get any done. My mother is too old (90 in Nov) to live by herself anymore especially since my sister and her family just moved from Colorado to Oregon. (My family and I just moved from England to NJ.) So our mother is now living in NJ with us. My sister and I spent a week at her house taking items to Good Will and also the Marion House, cleaning, and also filling up a 15 cubic foot bin. I hadn't done so much lifting for quite a while. Fortunately, her house was in pretty good shape and didn't have as much clutter in it as I had feared. We worked every day from about 8 in the morning to 10 at night with time out for meals. We also got a lot of visiting done.
In talking to her, I learned that there were children other than my own who had refused to watch "Sesame Street". Our children, when of preschool age, liked shows like "Winnie the Pooh" but wouldn't watch "Sesame Street". Mine even liked to watch "Mr. Wizard" at that age. There's just something about the voices that was condescending or, at least, annoying.

Tweed v-neck update

I'm making good progress with my DHs tweed-stitch sweater, if I do say so myself. I've finished one sleeve and have started the other. (The sweater has a white sheet of paper so that the v-neck will be more visible.) To start the sleeves, I took the 13 provisional cast on stitches off of the chain stitches used in the cast on and put them onto a circular needle (the one holding the sleeve stitches -- 6 onto one end of the needle and 7 onto the other). Then starting with the middle stitch, I knitted 6 sts from the cast on, knitted the last cast on st together with the nearest sleeve st, knitted to the last of the sleeve sts, knitted that together w the nearest cast on stitch, and then knitted 5 sts to reach the middle again. (The last sleeve round was a slip 1, knit 1 round.) Then to start the new round, I looked at the sleeve sts to see whether I should start w a knit or slip stitch and then worked the *k1, s1pw wyif* pattern around.
I'm almost through with a sock for my DD who's attending university in London. (one almost done, one to go) She likes to save money by keeping the heat low in her flat. So, I hope she likes the socks. She doesn't know I'm making her any. But, I think she'll like them because the last time she was here to visit us (and especially the cats) she borrowed a pair of mine. The sock has a Zokni pattern with a Widdershins heel. I posted a picture of it on the Sock-It-To-'Em knitalong (See sidebar for link.).

Knitting w cotton

I never thought I'd knit with cotton until I joined a dishcloth Yahoo group after hearing about it at knittyboard.com. It was strange knitting with cotton at first. It felt as if I was knitting with cotton string that I remember from childhood when you were supposed to tie parcels before sending them. But that strangeness left when I found out how nice the finished object looked and how well it worked as a dishcloth. Now I'm working on a new dishcloth twice a month through that KAL.
Since people at knittyboard.com were talking about cotton being a nice type of yarn to use for summerwear, I decided to make a summer sweater out of cotton yarn, specifically, Knitpicks Shine Worsted. I'm using a size 7 circular needle and assuming 4 sts and 6 rows per inch -- even though it's actually more like 4.5 sts and 7 rows per inch. (I'm glad I didn't check gauge. Otherwise, the sweater would be too large. It is stretchy.)
I like to keep several projects going at once. I'm making good progress, at least I think it's good progress, on my DH's sweater. I'm almost finished with the bottom ribbing. I like separation between ribbing and the rest of the sweater. So, I ended the tweed stitch with a knit round. Then I knitted another round to decrease the stitch count by about 10%. Then I purled a round and joined it to the previous one the way one joins round to avoid jogs. (Rounds start and end at the center front, and so I had to do something to keep the purl round from jogging.) Then I knit a round before starting the k1p1 rib.
I'm working on a dishcloth from the dishcloth KAL and a pair of socks with a Zokni pattern and a Widdershins heel. By the way, I looked up Widdershins in Wikipedia. Among other things, it means anticlockwise or in the opposite direction from normal -- which is what this heel is. It's a heel-flap heel knit from the toe up with only 8-10 short rows and no stitches to pick up.
We're getting the piano tuned as I'm writing this. The piano hasn't been tuned since we lived in Sweden about 5 years ago. We bought it in Ohio. Then moved it with us to Sweden and then England and finally New Jersey. I'd forgotten how much one of our cats likes the sound of the piano. (It was so out of tune that no one had played it since we moved here.) She's usually the one who hides under a bed whenever anyone comes to the door. Instead of hiding, she's in the living room with the piano tuner.

USB cable found

My husband found the USB cable for me. Actually, he found a miscellaneous cable near the modem and asked me what it was for. So, now I'll be able to post pictures from the camera again.

The first is of my DH's sweater after I frogged it back to the neck ribbing. It was very satisfying to see his sweater that way. I hadn't liked how it looked before the frogging. But, now, with the yarn ball about half the size it was, I still like how the sweater now looks. So, so far, so good. (The doily is one crocheted by my mother-in-law.)

I have some hopefully good news to report about the tree in our backyard. It's possible that it isn't an Ailanthus. Although, Ailanthus is the tree featured in "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn", it is also as close to a weed as a tree can get. According to the web, it looks like a walnut tree -- except it smells and is very aggressive. My hope that it isn't an Ailanthus comes from the facts that the only smell I can detect from the leaves is a "green" smell and that we've found 2 green walnuts in our driveway in the past week.

The other picture is of the game we went to at Shea Stadium. It was fun to go to a ballgame again. The last few "ball" games we went to were soccer games in England -- which were fun as well.

The only other thing I have to add is that I've finally made my sweater planner into an Open Office spreadsheet. I should have done it a long time before -- It's such a help. I wasn't sure about the row gauge for the tweed stitch and, in fact, changed my mind about what it was a couple of times. (I've finally settled on 7 1/2 rows per inch and 4 sts per inch.) Having a spreadsheet made it much easier to redo calculations. (By the way, I'm using Open Office instead of Microsoft because I'm using the laptop that I inherited from one of my sons.)

Tweed sweater update

I still love the tweed pattern for my yarn and am still very, very happy that I frogged the old half completed sweater that the yarn came from. I'm past the bottom of the armholes now after doing a provisional crochet cast on (for the armhole base) which (--the cast on--) I learned about while making Tubey. I've changed my mind about the front center of the sweater twice now. I originally decided on a k3 for the center -- but after a few rows decided it didn't look good and besides it had accidentally been started off center. So, I got out my crochet hook and redid 2 of the k3's into the tweed pattern and then knitted a few more rounds of the sweater. It still didn't look right. So, I got my crochet hook out again, dropped stitches to the bottom of the v, and redid it in the tweed pattern. It looks good now -- even with rounds starting at the center front of the sweater. (I'll post a picture of it after I find my USB cord. It got lost again.)
On another note, we (my husband, one adult son, and I) went to Shea Stadium Monday night -- our first time there. It was a good game. We followed online directions to get there (by going through Manhattan and also through a couple of tunnels) and then after we got there discovered where it was in relation to the airport. So, when we left, we decided not to risk the Manhattan traffic again and instead went through Staten Island on our way back to New Jersey. It was just over 10 miles further but, in our opinion, worth it in terms of the aggravation of waiting to enter a tunnel.
Let me preface the rest by saying that weird things often happen to me. I don't know why. Anyway, while at the ball park, I decided to take a couple (and by a couple, I mean exactly 2) pictures of the field and scoreboard before it got too dark to take pictures. I took the pictures with my little Sony digital camera and was seated at the time. Well, a security guard comes over to me to say how dangerous it was to be taking pictures. He said I might be hit by a foul ball or a bat. I explained to him that my son and husband would protect me and I was done taking pictures anyway. (While our seats were just a few rows from the field, we were seated about halfway between first base and the outfield fence.) I still can't figure out why he felt it necessary to come over to give that warning. Other people were taking flash pictures. A lot of them were a lot closer to home plate (and "danger") than I was. So, I decided to root for the Cubs -- who eventually won the game.

Tweed sweater

I'm really enjoying the tweed sweater I'm knitting for my DH. The stitch looks so good with the yarn I'm using. I'm very, very glad that I frogged the sweater to the neck ribbing and started over. While frogging it, I discovered that I had started the sweater before I'd even heard of wrapping and turning or short rows. I'd used short rows in making the sweater, but there were many big gaps because I hadn't known about the proper way to make short rows. I had attempted to hide the holes by ending the neck ribbing with a knit round followed by a purl one. I kept these rounds when making the sweater anew. (Details of how I'm making the short rows for this v-neck sweater are in my other blog which is linked in the sidebar.)
At the bottom of the V, I decided to use something else I learned and knit the 3 stitches at the bottom of the V together to make that sturdier and to keep there from being a hole.
Now I have another problem. Rounds begin and end at the center front of the sweater. For now, I'm having the 3 center stitches in plain stockinette and the rest in tweed stitch.

WIPs

Using advice offered in the WIP KAL at knitty.com, I decided to frog some of my WIPs. The first one I frogged was a sweater that I had started a couple of years ago. Once I finished the body of the sweater, I discovered that I didn't have enough yarn to finish it. Then about 6 months after that, I discovered that the yarn had been discontinued. (It took me that long because I didn't remember what kind of yarn it was.) I even checked on eBay and actually found it -- a couple of hours after the bidding had ended. So, it kept sitting in the back of the closet -- until I finally decided that I really wouldn't care for the sweater even if it had sleeves. So, I frogged it and made it into a shrug. It was even touch and go for the shrug. I finally finished it with 3/4 sleeves and with a garter stitch cuff for the sleeves.
Today, I frogged a sweater that I was making for my DH. I frogged it all the way to the neck ribbing. It was a top-down sweater that I'd finished the body for. I had actually started on one of the sleeves. But, the cables, etc. that I had made on it never really fit with the yarn. I decided that the reason that it was taking me so long to finish the sweater was that I didn't like how it looked. I'm going to make it in tweed stitch -- and have my fingers crossed that this time it will look ok.
By the way, I'm also working on the mid-July dishcloth from the Yahoo dishcloth group and a Zokni sock.

mid-June dishcloth

The house we moved into a few months ago is next to a small stand of trees -- as many places in NJ are. Having never lived in the Northeast before, I recognize some trees here, but some are a mystery to me. This tree recently finished blooming. It's a good looking tree, but I have no idea what kind of tree it is. The flowers were pretty, and so I took a picture of them, and here it is.

The other picture is of the mid-June dishcloth from the Yahoo dishcloth group. It turned out pretty well. And I even got some help knitting it from one of our cats. She and her sister are 15 years old and still alert and still really, really sweet. We got them from a friend of ours who was adopted by a stray cat. They're world travelers, too. They were born in NC, but they've also lived in Ohio, Sweden, England, and finally NJ. They even understand a little Swedish.

By the way, I also finished a new pair of socks. It's the mix and match pair described in the June 11th post. Details and a picture of the sock are at my other knitting blog (on aol). By the way, thanks to one of my sons who is here on break from college, I now know what a Wyvern is. He showed me the Wikipedia article. He's played a few video games that had Wyverns in them. The sock pattern does look like a Wyvern's scales now that I think about it.

flowers for my birthday

Here are the flowers my children and husband sent me on my birthday. It is so sweet of them to send me flowers.

plans for new sock

I decided to try another toe-up sock since I decided that I shouldn't give up on it after one bad experience and because I had a ball of yarn that was barely enough for 2 socks -- if they were short enough. But this time I decided to do everything differently using a completely different toe and heel than the short row ones from before.

I'm going to use the closed toe from Bradyphrenia and Debbi Young and the heel from Denise Powell and Dianne Martin. To make it a little more interesting for the self-striping yarn, I'm going to use the Wyvern pattern from Marnie MacLean

Hedera finished

I actually finished this Hedera sock a couple of weeks ago. It was supposed to be my April socks for the sock-a-month KAL, but now it's my May one. I thought I'd better post this before it became my June socks.
The socks are done in Fortissima Colori Disco Socka Color, which is 71% superwash, 26% polyamide, and 3% metalized polyester. It's the first expensive sock yarn I've ever used. At least, I consider it expensive. For me, with short legs and narrow feet, it took 2 - 50g balls to make the socks. To get the colors to match, I did one sock by taking yarn from the outside of the ball. I did the other sock on the other ball by taking yarn from the inside.
If I had it to do over, I would have used smaller needles. (I used size 3 since I hadn't yet bought any size 1s.) I would have also done the second yo differently. I did both yo's in the pattern by yarning over front to back. If I had it to do over, I would have done the second one back to front -- hopefully, to keep the holes approximately the same size. Or, maybe, to get bigger holes, I would do the first one back to front and the second one front to back.
My other project, other than unpacking boxes and working in the garden, is Tempting II.

Things settling down

Things are settling down -- not so much as they have settled down but that things have started to get into a routine.
The trip to Turkey was great. The weather for the eclipse was almost perfect. (For details, look on the web at eclipse-chasers -- which is hosted by one of the leaders of the tour.) Turkey is a fantastic place. Highlights for me (other than the eclipse) were visiting the ancient site of Troy and, in another part of the country, seeing formations just like the ones on Tatooine (in the movie with the young Anakin Skywalker).
When we got back, it was time to resume unpacking from our recent move. (We closed on a house about a week before going to Turkey. We had been living in a rental until we could find a house.) Happily, two of our children came to visit also. They'll be leaving for university later this week. (Spring break at British universities lasts for a few weeks. Then after the break, students have exams that cover the entire year.) My 89-year-old mom is here, too. She's here for a visit now (since my sister and family are preparing for a cross-country move to the west coast). She'll be moving here in June.
As for knitting, I'm working on Hedera socks. I'm going to see if I can make them knee length (which isn't too hard) and if they will stay up (of which I'm hopeful given the stretch in the pattern).

Vacation

We'll be heading off for a week plus in Turkey soon. We're planning on watching the solar eclipse there as well as doing a lot of sightseeing. We'll also get to see our children for the first time since Christmas. (They all attend university.)

Tubey finished

I finally finished Tubey!! It's a great way to use up extra yarn. (A doorknob is hiding behind one of the sleeves.)
After redoing Tubey (from knitty.com) quite a few times, I finally came up with something I like. I'm still not sure about the neck. I might add some stitches to the bottom of the neckline to make it higher. Instead of knitting 60 sts back and forth for the entire top, I decreased the number of stitches to 30 for the middle of the top with a garter stitch edging to keep it from curling. I'm short; so I decreased the arm length by about an inch before the stripes and an inch after. The body is as in the pattern -- except it was long enough after I finished the last stripe.
I've been making a concerted effort to finish up projects since we close on a house tomorrow. Then the next day (and the day after) we'll get our boxes unloaded to our new house, and I'll get to start unpacking.

March socks

Well, I finally finished my first (and probably only) pair of toe-up socks. The cuff-down socks that I made for January and February for the sock a month KAL were relatively easy. This pair was extremely difficult. First, I had to redo the toe several times to get it the right width and also to be able to pick up stitches from the cast on edge to work the rest of the sock. Then I had to redo the short-row heel several times. Evidently, my high arches don't just mean that it's hard for me to find shoes that fit; they also mean that I have to do some adjusting to get a heel to fit. I had to add a few stitches to the sole half of the sock before starting the heel to be able to get a heel that wasn't stretched out of shape. After redoing the heel quite a few times, it finally looked ok. Then I thought all I had to do was a little bit of ribbing and the cast off. The ribbing was ok, but I ended up doing a very loose crochet bind off in order to be able to be able to get the sock on.
The socks are made with one 50g skein of Moda Dea Sassy Stripes 100% acrylic yarn. Details of how I made this sock was made are at my other knitting blog.
On the plus side, I found out that it was possible to make a pair of socks with one 50g skein of yarn -- 150m. (I knit one sock to a point just past the heel with the outside of the skein, then put the skein inside the sock and knit the other sock with the inside of the skein.) I found out that acrylic is warmer than a wool blend. And I became almost an expert at doing short-row heels and toes.

Skirt

Since there was a discussion on knittyboard about skirts, I thought I'd post a picture of the one and only skirt that I've made. I made it out of some cheap worsted-weight acrylic yarn that was on sale for a very low price. It's really comfortable, doesn't stretch except at the waist and probably a little bit lengthwise, and is really warm to wear around the house. I keep thinking I should make another, but there are always other projects that get in the way. Here's the link to my directions for making the skirt: http://journals.aol.com/carolsch/Myknittingpage/entries/250 . The bottom of the skirt is done in a checkerboard pattern (each square is 4 sts by 6 rows so that they're square) with occasional cable overs.
The main things to remember are to make the waist a little smaller than your waist and to make the hips a little larger.

Sherman sock thoughts

The Sherman sock toe has sort of a moccasin look on the sides (don't know if it's me or the pattern). So, for turning the heel, I decided against using the directions as the heel and decided to use the directions from knitty.com for toe-up patterns -- with the wraps and double wraps.
LATER UPDATE: This still didn't work. So after staring at the sock (and a cuff-down sock) for quite a while, here's what I'm going to try. First of all, I have half the sock stitches on one circular needle and the other half (the sole) on another. Starting 3" before the heel, increase by 2 sts every other round by doing k1, m1, knit to last st, m1, k1 on the sole needle, 4 times. Then use the directions for the short-row heel (haven't decided to go back to the Sherman one or use another one). Then decrease 2 sts every other round by doing k1, k2tog, knit to 2nd to last st, k2tog tbl, k1 on sole needle, 4 times. I hope this works. I'm getting very discouraged with toe-up socks.

sock and Tubey updates

After quite a few false starts, I've finally got the toe done on my Sherman sock. (The pattern is probably in a few different places, but the place I found it is in a Yahoo group:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Socknitters/message/59091

I found that I had to place a short strand of yarn at the end of each row as I made it in order to figure out where to end the next row that direction. It took my full concentration. Plus, I started by using a crochet provisional cast on and then found that the loops were hard to find after removing the crochet yarn. So, I restarted with a single cast on. Then after getting a few rows past the toe, I decided that it was going to be too wide. So, I frogged again and cast on 22 instead of 26 stitches. Finally, I decided to do a Crusoe pattern after that. (I love a good pun. A stranded sock called Crusoe is in that category.) Unfortunately, the sock looked better on the plain side than the stranded side. (It's Moda Dea Sassy Stripes yarn -- which I thought I'd try even though I do like the Magic Stripes yarn I used for my two previous socks.) The yarn has a nice pattern to it. Maybe I'll try the Crusoe sock in unstriped yarn.
More in the "I like to FROG" vein: I've frogged my Tubey sweater quite a few times as well. The first time I frogged, I frogged to the top of the first sleeve so that I could make the sleeve fitted to the elbow. Then after finishing the shrug part and getting about 20 rows down on the tube part, I decided I didn't like the neck. It turned under; it felt tight at the back of my neck; and there was so much knitting that was hidden. So I frogged the tube, one sleeve, and most of the back -- and then made the neck squarer with garter stitch around the sides and back of the neck. The neck is a lot wider now even though I made it so I would cast on fewer stitches for the tube in front.

February dishcloth

I just finished the mid-February dishcloth from the MonthlyDishcloth Yahoo group. I started it in one color but decided that the color I was using didn't do justice to the pattern. So I bought Sugar n Cream Cool Breeze Ombre and really like the results. I used the least noticeable cast one that I knew -- the single cast on. Then I finally found a matching, I think, bind off -- the crochet bind off.
(While I was buying yarn for this dish cloth, I bought yarn for a few more. Making dishcloths is great.) -- The picture makes the dishcloth appear darker than it is. It is actually a fairly light color.

Jaywalkers now finished

I've finally finished the Jaywalker socks for my DH. Surprisingly, for me, I didn't make many changes to the original pattern. Also, surprisingly, his foot is just 1/2" longer than mine. Though, his ankle and instep are an inch wider. He also has a wider heel -- which is no surprise since I have a very narrow heel. Because of his short feet, I was able to use just one ball of Magic Stripes yarn.
The original pattern is at: http://magknits.com/Sept05/patterns/jaywalker.htm . Details of how I made this sock was made are at my other knitting blog.
I'm looking forward to making my next pair of socks. If it hadn't been for the sock-a-month KAL, I probably would have stopped after the first pair of socks. But now, I find that I enjoy making socks and am looking forward to making my next pair (toe-up socks).
I'm also enjoying making dishcloths -- thanks to the MonthlyDishcloths Yahoo group that I found out about on knittyboard.com.

Washing Magic Stripes

I'm happy. After dreading and postponing washing my first pair of socks -- made with Magic Stripes yarn --, I finally decided to wash them. I put them in the washing machine with the rest of my clothes -- hot wash, cold rinse -- and then the dryer. They came out perfect -- no shrinking, no expanding. They look better than when I finished knitting them in the first place.

Sock ideas

Mom's Fast Florida Footies by LynnH at http://lynnh.com/patterns/florida.htm has some nice ideas for socks. First is the cuff. Instead of having k2p2 or k1p1, the cuff is k one round followed by a k1s1 round -- to make a rolled cuff. The heel flap is done in a modified garter stitch -- ie, knit the WS rows, k1s1 the RS rows. The heel is turned w the same stitch and the regular directions for turning a heel. The sole of the foot is done w purl stitches (and the top with knit stitches). Though, I'm unsure why the whole sole isn't done in garter stitch. ---- a lot to think about
I enjoy the planning more than the making. And I like to start planning even before I'm finished w a project that will use the same needles.
I'm also thinking of doing my next sock with crochet thread (the larger diameter kind).

Tubey, a further update

I increased the number of rows for the back part of the shrug to 138 from 130. That crocheted provisional cast on is nice!! I can't see where it was. With 138 rows for the back, I'll have 69 chain stitches on the sides (1 chain loop per 2 rows). Then my plan is to work k3, yo across the back to end up w 92 sts across the back. (69 + 23 = 92)

Tubey update

I frogged the sleeve I was working on (the first sleeve) because I wanted some shaping. So, I decided to decrease 2 sts every 10th row to end up with 50 sts from the original 60. Then I decided to keep the bell part of the bell sleeves by increasing 5 sts evenly around. Instead of doing (k10, m1)5 times, I did k5, yo, (k10, yo) 4 times, k5. Then to keep there from being a hole from the yo, I knit into the back of the yo in the next row. Finally, for the jogless color change, I picked up the stitch in the bottom row by picking up the back of the stitch below (before putting it on the left-hand needle) which gives a short of twist to the stitch below. I guess after knitting on Cinxia for so long, I've grown to like twisted stitches. :)
When I get to the other sleeve, I'm going to knit a few rows flat before starting knitting in the round, to make the back a little bit roomier (as suggested at tubeyknitalong.blogspot.com).

Jaywalker update

68 stitches cast on works. I've done 14 rounds of k2p2 and then 26 rounds of the Jaywalker pattern. Now it's about 5" long and I'm ready to start the heel.
I haven't decided what to do with Cinxia. The neck is a little too big for my liking. I have worn it and found it to be nice and warm. I'm debating whether to wear it as is, redo the collar and neck to make it smaller, or to frog it and make a skirt with the yarn. (I've frogged whole sweaters before. I figure it's better to frog than not to wear.)

Jaywalker sock sizing

Since a cast on of 52 stitches worked for the last pair of socks I made (for me for k2p2 socks), I thought that a cast on of 60 stitches would work (for my DH for Jaywalker socks -- pattern at http://magknits.com/Sept05/patterns/jaywalker.htm). I'm using Magic Stripes yarn with 2 size 3 circular needles. Well, after doing the socks down to the ankle, I decided to FROG. The socks fit me but probably wouldn't fit my DH. So, I'm going to cast on 68 stitches this next time. I already decided to do 14 rows of ribbing instead of just an inch and to do k3tog tbl instead of the dd.

Plans for next socks

My next pair of socks will probably for my DH. Though this may change, I'm currently thinking of using the dark, almost black, Magic Stripes yarn along with a jaywalker pattern and a heel that people are talking about in knitty.com now (s1k1 pattern on RS rows of heel and p on WS rows). --
Tubey is going well. I'm on the first sleeve.

finally finished

I've finally finished with both my first pair of socks and Cinxia. The socks are knit with Magic Stripes yarn and 2 size 3 circular needles. I decided to make it a short sock to hopefully fit with and look well with tennis shoes. The k2p2 pattern down the top is to get a tighter fitting sock. Details of the pattern are at my other knitting blog.

almost finished w sock & Cinxia

I have great hopes of finishing my socks and also Cinxia over the weekend. I'll have plenty of time to knit tonight with 2 hours of Stargate and 1 of Monk. I'm down to the cuff of the second sleeve for Cinxia (which since I'm knitting it from the top down, is the last I need to do on it). I'm halfway through the second sock. Though I still haven't decided how to finish of the toe of the first. I'm strongly leaning towards turning it inside out and crocheting the leftover loops together or else binding them off from the inside.
When I finally get these projects done, I've promised myself that I can start on Tubey.

almost finished w first sock

I'm almost finished knitting my first sock. I've redone the toe a few times. Hopefully, this time it will turn out -- right length and right shape. Then I'll have to work on seaming the tip of the toe together. While I'm thinking about what I want to do with the sock, I've been working on the second sleeve for Cinxia.

Restarted the socks

Well, I've given up for now on trying to post a picture here. I've also frogged the sock I started. I'm going to make it tighter (52 instead of 56 stitches around) and shorter so that it will work, hopefully, with tennis shoes. I've almost finished with the first sleeve for Cinxia -- 2 rows to go.

Some baby gulls

I'm trying to post a picture. (edited, finally got it posted) So here, I hope, is a picture of the backyard for our old house in Kent with a couple of baby seagulls and our cat looking at them. Our cats learned that one does not get too near a baby gull. If one gets too near, the babies start to yell, and suddenly there are a lot of adult gulls checking out what might be the problem. (There were no confrontations.)

Trying to knit socks, too

I've finished the body for Cinxia and am now working on the cuff of the first sleeve. Luckily, the sleeves are wide enough that I can use alternating circular needles on it -- ie, knit one round with one circular needle, then knit the next with the other, then the next with the first one again, etc.
I'm also working on my first sock -- using a generic sock pattern. I may decide to frog it because it's pretty roomy even though I started by casting on 56 stitches. I'm using 2 circular needles per round on the sock. The first half of the round is always done with the first circular needle and the second half by the second one. (I did it this way because when I was ready to begin knitting the sock, I discovered that I didn't have any DPs in the right size, but I did have a couple of circulars in the right size -- size 3.) I'm using Magic Striped yarn.

Restarting Cinxia

Well, I finally got the yarn to finish Cinxia. I'm almost finished with the body -- haven't started the sleeves yet. I'd almost given up on finding the yarn. I'd looked in Colorado and New Jersey but couldn't "find" any. I was almost ready to order it on line. Then as my oldest son and I were walking through WalMart, we saw it. There were enough balls to finish the project. I was so happy.
Now to the strange part: I guess I must have been waiting till the Christmas holidays were over with to start on Cinxia again. It turns out that some yarn that I'd bought over a month ago because I thought was the right color but then decided wasn't, actually was. (I knitted that yarn into a scarf.) So, anyway, I'm now happily knitting Cinxia again. It looks like it's going to turn out nicely.
A day or two later, I got some more yarn for other projects -- a couple of sweaters from the newest issue of knitty.com.

Knitting projects, etc.

Knitting projects, etc.
just an update:
still haven't been able to find the yarn I wanted -- however, I did finish the shrug and since I still have some white yarn left, I'm using it to make a "knitty" sweater that goes by the name of "Bob".