Major milestone!

I have started my first sweater!!  It is the simplest pattern I could find, but if I do it correctly, I think it could be a sweater that I really really love.  I am making it out of yarn I received for Christmas from my college roommate, and I am using a pattern I fell in love with on Ravelry; the Bella Tunic by Phoenix Bess.  SO far I have half of one sleeve cuff done...  I think it is going to take me quite a while to do it, seeing as I am having trouble staying focused on the cowl I have been working on since the beginning of the year, but I'm hoping that because it is my first attempt at a real article of clothing, I will persevere.  My goal is to have it done in time to wear for St. Patrick's day.  :)  Here is my gauge swatch that I did last night:  (trying to do it by the book!!)

Back from... everywhere!

I am a bad bad bad bad blogger!  Just after Christmas, I left to go to Puerto Rico with my man to visit his family, and while there is no shortage of computers available there, I just didn't want to be on them!  I mean really, when you have the choice of blogging or beaching, there's no choice, right?  And then I came back to busy busy busy at work, so I just haven't had the time.  Anyway, back now!  :)

While I was away, I started and finished a hat out of one of the GORGEOUS hanks of Malabrigo (Emerald colorway) that I got (see last post) for my mom, and now I am about halfway through a cowl to go with it.  I'm still going to have more left, so maybe its time to start on mittens?  I haven't decided yet.  BUT!  She called me a couple of week ago to tell me that she had stopped somewhere on a road trip with my dad, and that someone had complimented her on the hat!  Yay me!!  : D  As a side note, I did a lot of the hat while I was in PR...  it is a strange strange sensation to be knitting in a tropical climate.  At least with wool...  hm.

In other knitting news, my friend Jo and I went to Vogue Knitting LIVE in NYC January 22nd and 23rd.  SO MUCH FUN!!  I blew a month's yarn budget in two days, but it was totally worth it! 

We went to a lecture called "Turning Your Passion Into a Business", which was not at all what we expected, but still, very, very interesting.  It was given by Nadine Curtis, the founder of Be Sweet, a yarn, knitwear, etc. company that works with Mohair vendors in South Africa.  Its a really inspiring story, and its nice to know that it is possible to be successful with a truly socially responsible business model.  You should check her out!  Its probably not the kind of business that I will be starting anytime soon, but it was a really interesting experience to hear about.  After the lecture, we decided to check out the yarn market...  Oh my god!  I have never seen anything like this in my life!  It was wall to wall people, and hundreds of vendors selling yarns, needles, anything related to knitting.  It was amazing!  I got lots of yarn...  Two of my purchases are meant to become my first couple of sweaters, which I am super excited for, and I bought my first yarn in a weight small than worsted...  Lace weight, because...

My second and last class for the weekend was a class called "Understanding Lace" with the fabulous Sarah Hatton of Rowan design studios.  Now, obviously, I have NEVER attempted lace knitting before...  But I have always thought that it is just so, so pretty.  So I knew I wanted to learn it, and what better way than from a professional knitter/designer.  The class was a challenge, to be sure, but Sarah was SO much fun to be around!  She is British, which in itself makes everything she says much more interesting to listen to...  But also, she has this personality that it is impossible not to love.  She was telling stories about her boyfriend, her travels in America so far, and the way that Americans interpret British culture in TV shows.  She was, in a word, a hoot!  The class was meant to really be a design class as much as an actual technique class, so she started out by showing us samples that she had knitted, and told us to pick out the patterns from a selection on the papers she had given us, which was harder than it sounds.  She then started us designing our own lace pattern on graph paper.  I think I still have some problems with mine, but I at least know enough now to find my mistakes.  It was a great experience. 

So now,  I am back home, without any other major trips planned for a little bit, and I am getting down to some serious stash/project planning.  I have the somewhat urgent need for some fingerless mittens for work, because they keep the area where my desk is at roughly the temperature of a cooler case at Starbucks.  I'm thinking my Malabrigo in the Verdes colorway for that, and then, additionally, a scarf and hat set maybe?  I also got some really fun yarn from my college roommate, Chryssy, for Christmas, which I really want to do something with soon.  The yarn is green and sparkly, and I don't know if I have enough of it for what I really want to make out of it, but I am going to try.  So new projects soon, and hopefully some pictures of my new yarns, but in the meantime, here is a fun one from Vogue:

Mal means bad in spanish...

I just bought SIX HANKS of Malabrigo yarn today...  in three colors...  I have no idea what I am going to do with them...  I just crave the cushy, squishy texture and gorgeous vibrant colors.  I can't wait to meet them!  Hats for everyone!  or maybe just me...  :)

Hats off!

I finished the hat I was working on for my love yesterday!  And it came out really really well; I am quite happy with the result.  At the end, it took a little bit of extra work to figure out the last details, because I used a different yarn weight than the pattern called for, so I had a different number of stitches to work with.  I also must have randomly picked up a stitch somewhere along the line, because I ended up with 81 stitches at one point.  How does one do that???  Anyway, I got it all figured out, and it came out incredibly well.  I couldn't wait for Christmas, so I gave it to him last night as soon as it was done.  He wore it to work this morning.  :)

So now, on to a new hat, this time, for my sister.  Her favorite color is orange, which makes things difficult, because it is very hard to find the happy medium between colors that are "orange" in the sense that they are not quite brown, and colors that are so orange the scream "I'M GOING DEER HUNTING!!!!".  Especially for a hat.  SO I looked and looked, and even considered finding a compromise color that was still bright and cheery, but not so closely related to killing Bambi's mom.  In the end, I finally came across a perfect orange mohair, but  its intimidating, as a new knitter, to think about tackling something like that.  Plus, its so fine, I'm just not sure I can make that into a hat!  After a discussion with the woman who owns Moonshine Fiber, and explaining my predicament, we decided that I should try the mohair, but that I could hold it together with a wool blend of a slightly lighter, more pumpkin-y orange to make it a little more substantial. 

I have had the pattern that I wanted to use for awhile...  Its a basic hat with a ribbed brim, but with one awesome exception.  It has a button flap in the back to allow the wearer to have a ponytail without smushing it under a too tight beanie.  My sister has gorgeous long hair, down to her waist, and there is a LOT there.  As with any lady with longer than chin length hair, hers starts to get super static-y as soon as the first snow falls, so she wears her hair in either a long braid or a big knot on the back of her head for most of the winter.  Obviously, though, when you have that much hair knotted up on the back of your head, it makes wearing a hat rather difficult.  So this hat will be, I hope, a perfect solution to this problem.  We'll see.  :)

I started this hat last night, after I finished the one I made for my man.  I'm only about 10 rows in, but its coming together nicely so far... 

Keeping It Coming

Just a quick update today, mostly for some pictures...  Still feeling pretty good, though I am starting to feel a little bit concerned that the finished product is going to end up too small...  We'll see, I'm not going to do anything about it now based on a fear.  If it is, then I know to start bigger next time, right?  :)  Anyway, I think I'm about halfway through the straight knitting before I start the decreases.  Here's what it looks like so far:



The whole thing so far





A close up shot, the brim is on the right, in Garter Stitch



Good foundations

So, I feel like I am doing pretty well with this hat...  I had to frog about three times, but I finally got it.  I ran into a myriad of problems, from too few cast on stitches (I am using a different yarn than specified in my pattern) to a twisted round.  If you want my opinion, round knitting is something best studied in books before a practical study.  This was a frustrating start for me, and it took more than one video to understand how the heck I was supposed to join a round, use a stitch marker, or figure out my "round gauge".  But now, I have gotten it figured out, and I think I will be knitting hats for everyone I know.  There won't be a cold head for miles around.  It is SO easy!!  You just keep on knitting, and (at least in bulky yarn) it is incredibly simple to see when you start a new round, so you don't even really have to pay attention.  The color of this yarn is coming out so nicely...  After last night, I have finished the brim of the hat, and am three rounds into the body of the hat.  I am supposed to keep going for another few inches, so it should be smooth sailing tonight.  And I may even be able to finish it by the weekend!!  Which would be great, as we are headed up to Rochester for a friend's housewarming party.  Brr!  Here's a picture of my progress, but its from Monday night, so I'm further along now.  Maybe a new one tonight.  :)

The first is over!!

See what I did there...  The first...  the worst...  No, really though I am quite happy with what I ended up with.  The scarf is done, its not strangely shaped, and it feels nice to wear something that I knit myself.  That being said, I think it will be a bit before I go for another scarf, at least in a worsted weight, because my LORD they take forever!  I started knitting this thing in October, and I just finished it over the weekend.  I loved doing it at first, because it was new, and I thought I was doing something cool by doing seed stitch.  And in the long run, it does look very cool, but it was all very elementary and wrote once i got over the novelty.  The next time I tackle a scarf, I am considering making my first cable piece.  That would be a very good and interesting thing to make.  We'll see though.

Now, its time to move onward and upward... literally.  I am starting hats!  I have two in mind that I want to do right now:  One for my wonderful boyfriend, and one for my lovely sister.  The one for my boy friend is up first, with a beautiful merino blend in a blue and grey variegated colorway:

I am very much looking forward to this project, because I am promised that hats can be done fairly quickly, for one, and also, because I can't wait to give it to my man.  It will be my first knitting in the round experience, so I am also looking forward to that.  Also to get him to stop wearing the beanie he has been wearing for the last three winters.  :)

I'm planning on starting tonight, so hopefully I will have something to put up within the next few days!