oooo la laz

A larger project has finally come to fruition, and also come on vacation with me...

The Modern Lace Henley, thanks Pam Allen. In Knitpicks Telemark. I did a right and proper gauge swatch this time, and boy am I ever glad I did. I've got some loosey goosey knitting, and swatching in pattern with 3.5 mm turned out way over gauge, so with a bit of calculatoring, I cast on for the smallest size. I'm not actually the smallest size by any means but it fits :).

I modified to knit in the round. I could have dealt with the side-seam increase/decrease area a little more smoothly (I guess I could have stood to read today's Knitting Daily back in February when I started... where's a time machine when you need it?) Also, I left out the collar thing. Sorry, Pam Allen, it's just not me. I continued the neck band as instructed around the entire neck opening.

And, you may have noticed it's practically long sleeved. Yes, I decided while I was knitting that I would like the sleeves to hit me just after my elbow, instead of just above the elbow. I failed to consult the Oracle (e.g. the swatch). Instead of calculating from the swatch how many rounds that should be, I just knit out 10 inches of sleeve. Duh, blocked lace grows. Well, I actually don't mind the longer sleeves as they are a bit warmer for chilly Oslo mornings. Except it looks like I don't know how to knit a proper sleeve. Which I guess I don't.

Tough Love

This yarn was frogged from my earliest sock attempt -- I bought the yarn in Germany and got about 3 inches before I set it aside for a few years and moved back to the States. The next time I picked it up, I decided the colorwork pattern was beautiful but too inflexible and small for me. I managed to try it on once, then had to frog it off my foot! I took pictures... I might be able to scare them up some day.

Grumperina's epiphany about spirals really struck me, and I thought it would be the perfect color play for my old favorite yarn. I had hoped that my subsequent (10 years') experience as a knitter would make this sock more wearable than the original incarnation... but that eternal hope-spring is all dried up.

I think my cast on of 62 was too much. Me and my loose knitting. I like this yarn a lot, though, it's been with me for a long time. And I can't make something not perfect with it, so... Tough love is a frog.

Teh Uber Suxxorz

On Christmas Eve, I lost these...

In my grief and despair, I turned to yarn shopping. Who doesn't, in troubling times? The yarn smorgasbord her in Oslo is a little limited... there are lots of totally great, solid, yarns coming out of Scandinavia that I really respect. Socks, colorwork sweaters ... this place has a long venerable history of keeping itself warm with sheep hair. But the yarn shops around here are a little light on the squishy sweet, twinkly-tinkly hand-painted yarns that make your eyes salivate. So, while browsing at Bente's Butikk, I decided to spring for a skein of Rowan Tapestry. I'd admired it before, at Uldstedet in Copenhagen.

Initially, I was in love.

Then, the honeymoon ended and my suave lover turned out to be coarse, hairy-backed and stubbly chinned. And too short.

Summation: boo to Rowan Tapestry. Expensive, coarse and scratchy, and pilly after barely a month's use. Pilly in that way that isn't really pills, like you can't pull them off. Just a halo of fuzz. But not in that nice mohair way. Just ugly dread-locky fuzz.

Pictures and Unrelated T3xt

Last night I had my first dream about yarn/knitting. First, no kidding. My dear husband and I were in a restaurant in Japan and eating fantastic food.

They were giving us super huge portions, though, and I was afraid they would be grumpy that we weren't finishing them. So we were taking a kind of long time over dinner. I remember this one dish in particular was a salmon tempura with a slightly sweet sticky sauce. Yummerz. So finally we were getting ready to go and I noticed -- for the first time -- that the restuarant had a basket of yarn on the wall next to the table, with some needles. My conception was that it was like a bread basket, a while-you-wait kind of thing. I bet all the best ideas come to people while they are sleeping.

The sad thing was, I was really excited to see what kinds of fancy Japanese yarn they had,

but it was all European yarn.

Du Store Alpakka, Garnstudio, Opal sock yarn, some unlaballed balls. Not even any Kauni!

PS. Did you spot the FO in this post? It's my final pair of replacement Pomatomus mitts. If these get lost or stolen, or I end of hating (ravelry link) them (though I doubt that, they are a beautiful brown silk/cashmere from Colourmart), I will try the new Spirogyra pattern from Knitty.

Entrelac Roolz

For some reason I really dragged my feet on finishing these (no pun intended… really). I carried around the two, with only the kitchnering to do, for like 3 days. Finally I finished and I love them! I think I was procrastinating because I didn’t want to face the fact that they were actually a little too large. But, with the 6-stitch-block thing, it’s kind of hard to get a fine gradation in sizing.

Plus I think I’m just not expereinced enough with socks to tell early-on what’ll be too big for me. That, and my crazy super-loose knitting. I don’t know what’s up with loosey goosey me.

  Anyway. I haven’t blocked them yet, and I’m hoping that will make some magic happen. As it is, they slouch a bit (unless I actually have my legs up in the air admiring the socks, or it's seconds after I just pulled them up), and the heel is a bit poofified now and then. But you know what? I love the colors so much, and I love the look of the entrelac so much, and I loved knitting them so much, that I can accept the slight not-exactly-perfectness of them. And hope that blocking will save the day. Yay for me.

(P.S. it's Annetrelac, in Regia Desgin Kaffee Fassett)

kthx bai!

2008.02.24.19.09.42, originally uploaded by katy_pine.

Pattern: Knucks, from knitty.com

Knitted for my favorite Norwegian. I started these near the beginning of January in anticipation of his February birthday. It was a quick knit, about two evenings' worth of knitting (including frogging and reknitting the 2nd glove three times because the decreases didn't match properly, entirely my fault, it's a great pattern). So, there they sat for almost a month while I decided what the 8-letter statement should be across the knuckles. I did quite a bit of research and pondering and wracking other people's brains about it.

Here's a sample of other people's choices, culled from ravelry pictures and around the internet, and some from my own crazy brain:

high/five rock/roll game/over whatever nerd/core play/golf serenity rtfm/unix cuteness omg!/wtf? laughter strength read/jane bike/safe dynomite star/zero fuck/yeah patience play/loud knit/soxx play/time late/fate cats/meow half/full piss/off! song/bird love/life all()aces cozy/warm baby/wins brit/pop bull/shit purr/hiss liebling damn/cold snow/babe yarn/diva look4luv look/lush lush/life geek/girl geek/love hard/core nerd/core geek/chic

the winner:
kthx/bai!

I know, not all deep and stuff. But my recipient laughed and laughed and laughed, and I think that was worth it at least.

Ravelry Ate Me

Ravelry is an incredible tool for organizing and encouraging my knitting. What can I say, I'm a sucker for a progress bar. It's been a little consuming lately, but I've been very productive in the knitting realm.

Annetrelac Socks
Regia Design, Kaffe Fassett


sweet baby Djevellue
silke-alpaca


My So-Called Scarf
colonia 140 from handpaintedyarn.com


and some coldie-pants of my own pattern (basically)

Also we had the most amazing Stitch-n-Bitch this last Monday. We got some exciting baby-makin' news from one of our members, and met two new members. Emily has a beautiful blog and makes adorable little babushkas and gives them super-scandinavian names like "Vilde". Esther didn't have a blog but she's making charming baby hats... you'd have to see them to understand... I'll try to get a picture next time.