branching out = done

Here's Branching out blocked out:

Here's it in the box!

Yaay! I got something else done! On time even! It blocked really well :) This was my first chance to use my new blocking wires, and I love them.

Now if I can just get Bristow done. I blocked the back and front pieces tonight, but have yet to make the sleeves. So at least I can sew those bits together. Mom could end up unwrapping a sleeveless sweater on Christmas.

And finally: Go chek out today's Google logo! There are two kangaroos knitting! I have no idea why this is the logo, but it makes me very happy!

Progress

I finished Jill's Branching Out tonight. Yay! It's such a fast and easy lace pattern, good for a present. Hope she likes it! I'm going to block it out when I get up tomorrow.

Also, satchel is all done. (Here with Pippin, the family corgi)

But I think I'm giving up on MancalaMia...I'll finish it after Christmas for Lori's birthday in January. It's just too much, I need time to work on Mom's sweater. But now I have to think of something else to get for her....


Also today, Mom and I made pugoch! The BEST cookies to ever exist...eveeer. They're a Christmas tradition in the Newman household :) Pastry cookies with jelly in the center, soooooo delicious and buttery.

Looking past Christmas knitting, I mentioned earlier that I was hoping to start a shawl on my trip to the Bahamas after Christmas...well I got the yarn today! I was very excited, I ordered the yarn (The Alpaca Yarn Company's Suri Elegance) on Friday night and I wasn't sure it would get here before I leave on the 26th, but it did! :) I'm going to be making the Icarus shawl from this past summer's Interweave Knits. I've been eying the pattern since it came out. I'm really looking forward to it. I'm very much looking forward to doing another large(ish) lace project, and one that I don't have to rush on. I can just take my time and enjoy the process. It will be wonderful.

To add to that, I bought my very first pair of Addi Turbos specifically for the project, I can't wait to use them. I took them out after I bought them and..well..they're wonderful..and I didn't even knit anything with them yet! This could be bad, I'm probably going to want Addis in every size now. I can't afford that as a poor college student :/

Now to get some sleep so I can knit more tomorrow! Time is running out.

Christmas crunch pain

I've been pretty much knitting constantly since I got home on Saturday. My hands are killing me. My thumb was actually bleeding when i stopped knitting tonight. Guess I didn't have as good a callus built up as I thought I had.

The biggest show for all the knitting I've been doing is Brian's satchel. It's been felted, has dried for over a day, and is ready to assemble now.

Pre-felting:

post-felting, ready to dry:


This was my first time felting...and it was really cool! I'll be assembling that in the morning.

I have two thirds of the base for MancalaMia done plus six of the 14 cups knitted. I should have taken pictures of them...but I was tired of looking at them.... Hopefully I can get other six small cups, two big cups, and the rest of the base knitted and felted tomorrow, plus dried and assembled in time to ship them (plus satchel) out on Thursday. I just might go crazy.

After that I have to finish Jill's Branching Out and Mom's Bristow.

I'm starting to think this isn't going to happen. Especially if the joints in my hands don't start feeling better. My thumb I can put a band aid on, but there's not much I can do about the joints :(

Let's hope things start looking up with my Christmas knitting....

Movin' Out.... big honkin' post.

Time to pack things up to head back home to Auburn tomorrow. I'm really not looking forward to sorting through all the crap that's piled up on my floor and shoving things into bags and boxes, which will then be stuffed into my soccer mom van.

Packing might not be so bad if I didn't have to pack for both the cold winter of Central New York and the heat of the Bahamas (vacationing there with Scott's family after Christmas). Oh....and if I didn't have to stuff my two chinchillas and one snake plus their cages into the car...with the addition of a friend's snake I'm sitting. Oh and I need to decide what I want to knit over break. I.e. what to take from my stash, what WIPs to take, etc. This could get interesting.....

/whining...maybe.....who am I kidding? I never stop whining.

Anyway...on the knitting front. I've picked up a few more projects as Christmas gifts.

Here we have some Cascade 220 with which to make MancalaMia for my lovely sister Lori:

And here is a half finished (small) satchel (Cascade 220 as well) for Lori's husband Brian:



I may buy more yarn to make a second satchel and give one to Brian, and one to my other sister Jill's husband, Tim. Following? Yeah, I thought not.


Anyway, I finally finished the left front of Bristow. You can see the mistake I made on the first cable a lot more clearly in this picture. And I finally got a shot that does justice to the color! Wooo! Still trying to decide what to do with the first two cables on the other side before I cast that side on.

Oh and I re-started the scarf for Scott's father in Plymouth's Baby Alpaca Grande (I convinced Scott). Not very far on that though....

Think I can finish all that before Christmas?
It'll take a miracle.

P.s. Sorry for the weird picture-ness....blogger is being cranky :/

Back from oblivion

Wow! Busy week.
I only have one major paper and one final left now. Then I'm free to knit! I've managed to get a little of the front of Bristow done amongst the stress...that's what breaks are for!

So here's the progress on that:

Believe it or not this is my first time doing cables. Surprisingly easy, they are.

If you look closely you can see how I messed up the first cable...ooops!! I'm thinking about repeating the mistake on the other side? suggestions? Should I just do the other side normal and hope no one notices? I'm not frogging back to there.....

OHHHH!!!!! I almost died of excitement when I saw the new Knitty today!!!!!!!!

AAHHH!!! I want to make this and this and thisss and....well you get the point. Emily and I had a little screeming session in the service center looking at the new patterns. We were very excited.

I think Sheldon will be my first project from the new issue. So cute!

Tonight Scott, Omar and I went to "Skate with the Big Red"
Fun stuff :)





















Me and Topher Scott :)
No...I'm not tall....he's just that short...

The week from hell: Monday

I had two things due today, and managed to get them both in. Hooray!

Normally I would feel very releived after turning in two assignments. However, I still have 4 papers and one exams yet this week plus one exam next week.

UHGGGG.

I finished the back of Bristow on Saturday night after the Union game (Cornell won 6-0, good game). Oh...and we (women's club hockey) lost on Sunday to the Syracuse Warriors. But they were a reaaally good team, and we put up a good fight.

Sooooo...... here it is!


























Very exciting. And that is actually very close to the real color this time!
Now if only I had time to work on the rest of it :(

Hockey hockey hockey

Had a chance to relax last night after the last day of classes! Wooo!
Men's Varsity tied RPI 3-3, but it was an awesome comeback and an intense game.
Got some good knitting time after the game while Scott and I watched Miracle. I'm very, very close to being done with the back of Bristow now.

Today: Women's Club played the Wheatfield blades. We won 7-5 (?). Very fun game.


That's me (in white with the puck) :)

And now for Men's Varsity versus Union.

Let's Go Red!

Bristow day 2

I've been working on Bristow today instead of doing homework, studying for my two exams, or writing any of the five papers I have due next week.

This is not good.


The progress today. Peanut, my female chinchilla, is checking it out. She's your eye candy for this post :)

The yarn is not that red. My room is dark, so I guess the flash washes it out. The yarn is really much more maroon. Closer to what it looks like in the first picture of the last post.

Yay!

My Knitpicks order arrived today!

16 balls of Andean Silk with which to make Bristow!
















I had to start in immediately. I was very excited.


I love this yarn. I'd forgotten how much I love it.

Humble beginnings:
















Looks like everything else will be on the back burner for a while...

Rant: Cotton -or- "Who doesn't love alpaca?"

What are the warmest fibers?
Animal fibers.

What have I just started knitting a scarf out of?
Cotton.

Why am I doing this?
Because I'm a weakling, perhaps?


I'm knitting a scarf for Scott's Dad for Hanukkah. So I had Scott pick out the yarn. That's all fine. But Scott for God-knows-why somehow has it in his head that every type of animal fiber is itchy. (Not true, Scott! NOT TRUE!) So he picked out Blue Sky Alpaca's Cotton. It's a nice yarn, I love Blue Sky yarns. But...why cotton...for a winter scarf???!

I mean...come on... Who doesn't love alpaca!?


Besides...there's just something about cotton yarn that just feels yucky to me. Not what I want running through my fingers somehow.

*sigh*
Well...here's the scarf so far anyway....





I think I'll go shove my head in a pile of alpaca yarn now....

*hides*

I just bought yarn. I'm supposed to be on a yarn diet....but I had to. It's going to be for a gift....

16 balls of Knitpicks andean silk in hollyberry. For Bristow.

It's going to be a Christmas gift.

If it gets here in time, and I can knit fast enough......


I want it to get here now!!!

Past projects #4: the shawl

I think it's time to chronicle the project that ate all my knitting time and memory all last spring ans summer: the shawl.

Sometime spring semester I decided that I should make a lace shawl for my sister, who was married in August. (Hey...I'm ambitious!)

I scoured the internet and knitting books for a pattern I liked. I finally landed the Spanish Peacock shawl from the gallery of Meg Swansen's A Gathering of Lace. Then I had to find a white lace yarn I could use. Lori (sister) is allergic to wool, so that narrows things quite a bit. I eventually chose Misti Alpaca Lace. I started in with a lot of apprehension, but I gained more confidence stitch by stitch.

I think I cast on in the beginning of May. Around and around I went. It was practically the only thing I worked on for months. I had my set backs of course - like the hole I made near the beginning that I was absolutely freaking out about, but turned out to not show up one bit in the finished product. The hardest part for me may have been trying to figure out how to do the edging, which was from Barbara Abbey's Knitting Lace. I had a lot of time to work on it in July, after I had surgery on my foot.

I finally finished the first or second week in August. I was ecstatic. I'd actually finished before the wedding! I couldn't wait to block it out.

The blocking process took me about six hours. (Keep in mind this was my first time block anything, let alone a huge lace shawl.)


There was one mistake I made that was very evident. Instead of a sl2tog-k1-p2sso throughout the pattern, I had been doing a sl1-k2tog-psso the whoooole time. This resulted in an open line between pattern repeats instead of a nice tight line, and also made the pattern go in a pinwheely shape instead of like spokes. This made me really really upset. But I got over it. I told myself it was still beautiful, and anyone who didn't know the pattern wouldn't know the difference.

I felt so empty without that shawl to work on. "This must be what post-partem depression feels like" was my thought.

It was an amazing experience...and I can't wait to start another one.....when classes are out....


Lori loved it. She cried.
:)

Back in Ithaca

Back from the weekend hockey trip. We lost to URI and the Panthers, but we beat Hahvahd (YESSS!!!) and MIT. Was overall a very fun weekend, but left me exhausted. Which partially explains why i didn't knit as much on the ride home as I should have. The other part of why I didn't get as much knitting done as I meant to is that we were watching season 2 of LOST on the bus. Granted I've seen all the episodes multiple times...but I just can't turn down LOST.

Anyhoo...I'm mostly recovered now. A good night's rest tonight should take care of it. My leg muscles are crazy right now. No hurt fingers either!

The progress:

The coming weekend

I'm about to head over to Lynah Rink to get on a bus to head up to Rhode Island and Boston for an intense weekend of hockey with the Cornell Women's Club Team. We're playing four games this weekend (Rhode Island Panthers, U of Rhode Island, Harvard, and MIT). Hopefully I won't die.

But the good news about the trip knit-wise is six hours each way of free time on the bus...for knitting! Granted, I've promised myself I'd also do some homework and nap during this time as well, but I'm actually going to have time where I won't feel guilty for just sitting around knitting!

I've packed the branching out I just started in Rowan kidsilk night in pink. (No, I don't like pink...it's going to be a gift.) And I packed the second sock in the pair that I promised my mother. The first sock was finished this summer, and this poor sock has been sitting around with a measly three rows of a cuff for..well..months.... Damned Second Sock Syndrome. At least it got cast on at all.



Hopefully I won't break any fingers this weekend...I don't know what I'd do if I couldn't at least knit ^_^

Past projects #3-who knows

After this things get a little fuzzy. I can't remember what I knit when and I can't remember everything I knit.

I know I did Bubby and I did Pasha. There were some hats in there for Scott. I did some fingerless gloves for my brother-in law. I started some armwarmers that ar burried and neglected in my stash somewhere.

I started my first lace project during this time. It's a scarf that still has yet to be finished. I'll get around to it some day, right?

I know I did more things, but it's hard to remember until what I did this past summer. Soooo, we'll just mumble this all up as what-the-heck-happened-spring-semester 06? and I'll move to what happend this past summer in the next few posts.

Past projects #2: Jayne Cobb hat

Not long after learning to knit, I fell in love with Firefly, and hence I just had to make a Jayne hat.

And so it was that a Jayne hat was my second project. I jumped from garter stitch (only knowing how to do the knit stitch) to knitting in the round with ribbing (had to learn how to purl) decreasing, picking up stitches, and even making a pom pom.

This is one of my proudest projects to date. Whenever I wear my Jayne hat I feel happy ^_^

"A man walks down the street in that hat, you know he's not afraid of anything"


Edit: Oh dear! I forgot the specs! Yarn: Lamb's Pride Bulky. Pattern can be found here

Past projects #1: Gryffindor Scarf

This was my first ever knitted project (about one year ago). I was pushed over the line from crocheting to knitting by the prospect of the Gryffindor scarf. I decided I liked the look and feel of knitted fabric better, so I learned to knit. Bronwyn helped me along.

The pattern I just made up on my own.
It's worked in garter stitch.

Yarn:
Knitpicks Andean Silk
cranberry and mustard


I was so proud of myself when I finished!!

It's not a very flattering picture of me, but that's ok. It was taken right after I finished.

And so it begins

So after a year of knitting I figured it's about time I start my very own knit blog. I read enough other peoples' knitting blogs and I'm sure my boyfriend is tired of me complaining about my knitting woes. He doesn't quite understand the joys either. (Sorry Scott, but you just don't get as excited about a beautiful alpaca yarn as I do.)

So here it is! The start of "Newman Knits"

I guess I'll start off with going through projects I've done in the last year in the next few posts. Then I'll move on to works in progress.

Oh, a little knitting history is in order I suppose. My lovely sister got me into the fiber arts initially by teaching me crochet. I soon took to knitting as taught by the absolutely marvelous Bronnie. :) And the rest is history. My knitting talent grew quickly, if I do say so myself, and I've already knitted a full lace shawl (more on that later).

That's all for now :)