Oh So Fetching

Curls’ Fetching Hand

Along the same theme that I had to make sure my sister, Curls, keeps warm while delivering mail in the mountains this winter, I used my very favorite fingerless glove pattern, Fetching, to make a pair for her. See how she can sort and deliver mail while the rest of her hand and wrist stay warm? I have lost count of how many fingerless gloves I’ve made from this pattern by Cheryl Naimath which is free on Knitty. The hardest part of the project was determining which yarn from my stash to use. I finally chose Sirdar Peru Naturals in the Payaca 0554 Colorway. I love the soft, tweedish, gray green color.

Text from Curls yesterday, “You won’t believe your eyes. See next text.”

Next text pic:

Fetching and Linen Scarf

The Fetching fingerless gloves are a perfect match with the Linen Stitch scarf Curls knit for herself and blogged about on Feb 15, 2013. Being the wise older sister I texted back, “It must have registered into my subconscious so when I picked the yarn it was a match! LOL!” How totally crazy that I picked a yarn which matches her much loved Linen Scarf. Luckily, I had a ball of yarn left which I had sent home with her. Now she can make a matching hat. If someone had written that in a novel I’d say to myself, “How cheesy is that?”

Everyday is a perfect day for being crafty. Enjoy!

A Bit of Heaven

~Unless you live in the mountains east of San Diego, the days that we really have to bundle up as the folks in the midwest and east do during the winter can be counted on one hand. We do complain when the weather drops to the 50’s during the day. Yes, we do get some nights when the temp drops below freezing. I’ve lived here most of my life and it has snowed in town 3 times since 1956. As a result, my family doesn’t really like to wear the warm, handknits that I would love to knit for them. Today’s Forecast: High 73, Low 43. Christmas Day Forecast: High 77 Low 50.

We helped daughter Emma and our wonderful s-i-l Steve move to a new place last weekend. I was so terribly pleased to see that Em busted out the hand-warmers that I knit for her some years ago when she was working in a freezing-cold office. I love seeing how lovingly worn they are. When she first wore them she called me and said they were like “wearing a bit of heaven” on her hands. Now that’s a complement! I had to take a picture of them to share. The pattern is the well-loved and much knit pattern called Fetching by Cheryl Naimath featured in Knitty: Summer 2006. This is a very easy pattern which I’ve used numerous times to make presents for various women friends.

Fetching by Cheryl Naimath

Have a wonderful Christmas Eve!

What’s in Your Notepad?

Q – Two women had a strong influence in my upbringing; my mom and my grandmother.  Both highly creative women in different media.  One habit we have because of them; always carry a notepad in your purse because you never know what you’ll see when out-and-about that desperately needs to be written down.  I have a couple of my grandmothers old, beat-up notepads.  Ugly brown, but when I open them up and see my grandmother’s notes they are priceless.  I’m brought back to my childhood, I can see her jotting down notes as we are out.  She had notes about recipes, sketches about beading ideas, creations with yarn ideas, etc.  Her hand were always busy creating something!  I wish I had one of mom’s notepads.  She designed such wonderful clothes for my sisters and me.  Her notepad was filled with sewing ideas; such wonderful little dresses filled the pages.  I was quite envious when one of the dresses was for a sister and not me!

There is nothing more wonderful than walking into a yarn, quilt or fabric store and seeing all the models on display.  Fingers itching to do something new.  We especially love it when the yarn stores have a tag hanging from the display identifying the pattern and it’s free!  These are the notes for Curls and my trip to the Northwest, collected from various yarn stores, the majority of the free ones came from Yellow House Yarns in Puyallup:

Free Downloads:

Ravelry
Mara shawl – Amy Hendrix
Moon River Scarf – Susanna IC
Annis shawl – Susanna IC
Gaia Shoulder Hug – Anne Carroll Gilmour
Madrid laced wristlets – Alexandra Brinck (any one up by Puyallup, this was a class at Yellow House Yarns)
Ginkgo Shoulderette Shawl – Maggie Magalie – If you love ginkgo leaves you must visit Marjorie Moser’s blog she silkscreens and dyes the most fabulous items.
Urchin hat – Ysolda Teague
Advent-Calender-Scarf 2011 with beads – Kristin Benecken
Matilde Shawl – Chiara Chiavacci

Knitty
Bitterroot shawl with beads – Rosemary (Romi) Hill – I love her patterns!

Crystal Palace Yarns
Jasmine Lace Fingerless Mitts – Adrienne Fong

Not free, but wonderful:
Snapdragon Tam – Ysolda Teague
Monica scarf – Trudy Van Stralen
Traveling Woman – Liz Abinante
Entwined Cowl – Taniis Gray – stay tuned, we’re not going to buy the pattern but we’ve got a “BIG” idea
Trousseau shawl – Carol Feller

This was free in February, but looks as if it is not now.
Berry Tam – Lijuan Jing

Also jotted down were titles of  books and patterns that we liked.  One was “Scandinavian Slippers and Socks” which Curls bought.  We are knitting the Norwegian Star slipper pattern.

I found I spent the most money for yarns in Yellow House Yarns since they had so many models and the patterns were free.  I figured free patterns = more yarn!  I like that math!  Very smart marketing on their part!  This is just a sampling of the notes we took on our trip.  Doesn’t include the sewing ideas which will be a different post.  So, what’s in your notepad?

Fabulous Fractal Fiber

 Mariah was yelling at me this morning – spin, spin, spin.  Ok, time to do my spinning “homework”.  Spinning class starts again tomorrow.  It’s through Grossmont Adult School and the teacher is Margaret.  One homework assignment last term was to make a fractal yarn.  At the time I didn’t have a wheel and to be honest I never mastered the drop spindle.  So today is the day!!! Knitty has a great article on “Fractal Spinning“.  This is the yarn sample I’m going to work with.

Take the sample and divide in half.  Noting which color you start with, spin 1/2 of the yarn.

This is the first half which is spun onto the bobbin.

Next divide the second half into four equal pieces.

Start spinning with the same color as you used for the first half.  Keep adding the other pieces with the colors in the same order.  Below is my final project after plying, winding on the nitty noddy, and twisting.  Please don’t judge too harshly.  Remember, I’m a new spinner and this is only the second time I’ve tried plying!  The yarn is beautiful!  All the ends are the extra unplied yarn I used to tie the skein together.

Spinning class tomorrow, so it will be a late post.  for the rest of the day, I have to sew a carrier for Mariah.  Sewing time!

Twined Over Ewe

 – As mentioned yesterday, we decided that we have to finish some of our WIPs before we can begin new ones.  The exception is our joint challenge.  We try to get together every Monday and follow our creative hearts. Since I’ve finally retired, Barb and I have had a blast following creativity.  We’ve decided to do joint projects, in addition to our many individual WIPs. There are two rules for each joint project:  1. It has to be considered ‘”major” (hats and small projects we don’t consider major) and 2. It has to teach us a new technique. On our mom’s side, we are of Norwegian heritage.  Our passion for genealogy has made us feel more in contact with our Norwegian side.  Mom’s side of the family played a big part of our lives and being Norwegian was huge.  Seeing the Norwegian Star slippers in the book Knitting Scandinavian Slippers and Socks by Laura Farson screamed at us – “knit me”!  The project was started Monday.   This one has a new twinned cast-on technique and twinned knitting.  So we’re Twined Over Ewe.  This is the heel:

One tip: I had 2 #4 bamboo needles and Barb had 2 #4 green needles.  We traded one needle and made the green one our number 1 needle.  Has worked wonderfully well!  Both needles are a knitting joy.  Two different colored circulars make the knitting so much easier.

This is the WIP I just finished.  Hurray!  It is on the blocking wires:

The shawl is called Maja by Anniken Allis.  It’s a free pattern in Knitty, Winter 2008. I’d been wanting to try that “yarn-strands-over” technique.  I’ve had this Noro Inspirations yarn Color 5 for a few years and thought this would be the perfect project.  Its a heavier yarn and perfect as a shawlette – I made it smaller than Anniken’s Maja.  Please, don’t look too hard for the mistakes! lol!  When looking up the info for the blog today I recognized Anniken as a Scandinavian name, checked it out and sure enough she’s from Norway.  You’ll see, we just can’t get away from our Norwegian roots! lol!

Barb is a fabulous knitter, the better of us two.  She inherited mom’s knitting gene.  She just finished an extraordinarily wonderful sweater called Herdis by Elsebeth Lavold.  The pattern is in Designer’s Choice Book One.  Hum, another Scandinavian pattern.  I promise, most of what we knit is not Scandinavian!  Although my favorite cast-on is the Old Norwegian Method and I purl the Norwegian way.

We do have our next project lined up – dang I’m the type of person who wants instant gratification but we made a promise to wait so I’ll be good!  Barb did make noises on Monday that she thought she’d try the new technique.  I played the older sister card and told her she had to wait! lol! HINT – think Brioche.  The yarn has been purchased and is silently screaming at me “use me now”.