I Won!!

I won the most recent bout of the beat the gas price contest. You’ve played it, I’m sure. You see that the gas prices are going down. Just how low will they go? Do I get it now or if I wait until this afternoon will it go down more? Sorry, you lose, it’s just gone up 30 cents a gallon. Or it’s going up and you wonder when if it’s going to come down. You keep driving, waiting for the downward turn. It’s a little like playing chicken with the train, train.

I don’t usually think too much about it – I have a little car with reasonably good gas mileage and I don’t have far to drive (nothing in Springfield is very far). But on Sunday evening I noticed that the stations closest to me were $2.75. It was time to fill up. If I fill up on the way to work Monday morning, I’ll still get it at that price because prices usually go up about 11am on Monday morning. Hummm….what to do. I’ll pass. About 10am I had to go out to run some errands. By that time the price had actually gone down to $1.69. I cave and fill ‘er up. Low and behold, by lunchtime the price had jumped to $2.95!

Nice going, right?! I don’t win the contest very often so it’s sweet when I do.

The Squirrel Cometh...

I was going to start out with other stuff but I have to tell you that I’m in the middle of the great squirrel wars. I actually have plants on my porch that are growing and thriving. That’s huge for me. I usually have quite the black thumb and often say that I never met a plant I couldn’t kill. So anyway, now I have these plants. My local squirrel has decided that it’s much easier to dig up my plants for his little treasures than dig in the hard ground around. I’ve tried the stinky spray that’s supposed to keep them away. It kept me away because I couldn’t sit out there with that stink but did nothing for the little critter. Someone at work told me to use red pepper – critter loves it. So now I’ve brought out the big guns. I went today and got some river rocks – nice and heavy river rocks – and have placed them in all my planters. So tomorrow we’ll see if they are any deterrent at all or if he’ll manage to move them out of his way. I’ll let you know.

Now that I have that off my chest, now we can get to the fun stuff. Here are my recent necklaces I’ve made. Such fun! I also made a couple of scarf pens but didn’t manage to get pictures before I gave them away.








I also got started on my Danish Skrå-Trøyer sweater this weekend. Here’s what I’ve gotten done so far. Doesn’t look like much, does it. You try knitting 400 stitches with 1 strand of worsted weight and 1 strand of fingering weight on size 1 needles! The fabric isn’t that thick but it’s very firm which makes it quite difficult to knit. You can’t just shove the stitches up to the end of the needle and knit away. You have to sort of feed it up slowly or it will shoot off the end of the needle! Ask me how I know that!!



But I’m very pleased to have gotten it started as I have a goal to finish it by the end of the year so I’ll have to get moving.

Learning from the past...

I bet you know that wool is warm and that wool is fabulous but did you know...



This is from a 1939 Beehive knitting magazine that I found yesterday when I was out and about. It seemed so funny. I think of all the studies and claims that we hear these days and people get so het up. I think that 68 years from now we'll have some decendents laughing at us, too!

"Wear Wool and Be Well

ULTRA-VIOLET TRANSMISSION THROUGH FABRIC MADE FROM WOOL – It is an established fact that the health-giving ultra-violet rays are transmitted to the body with greater power through Wool than through either Artificial Silk or Cotton."

I have finally finished my fair isle sweater (with the help of air conditioning and the fan on full blast because, as mentioned before, wool is warm!) and I'm very pleased with it. I need to do a little more blocking on the top of the sleeves but it's ready (and I'm ready) for some cool weather. I have a feeling that's a way off yet.




Now I'm going back to knitting and enjoying my long weekend!

Busy Weekend

What a weekend! Are you ready for all the stuff I actually got done.

First, I finished the main knitting on my Fair Isle sweater. Now I only have to work in all those ends...

Then I made 3 mittens for the upcoming Socks, Mittens and Hats class at Lincoln Land Community College. Two of them were a pair made from 1 skein of Crystal Palace Taos in the Sedona colorway. They are done just with a basic pattern to show off the beautiful yarn and here’s what I had left!

























Then I made this 1 mitt because I’m going to try an experiment. I’m going to try painting it with dye to see how that works – also as an exhibit for the class.



(Yes, I do have very small hands.)

While I was at it, I decided to do my swatch for my skrå-trøjer sweater. I got it done with black worsted weight wool and white fingering weight yarns using a size 1 needle. I thought the size 1 needle would be harder to use with the worsted weight yarn but it was okay. I did my swatch with 4 repeats of the pattern across and 3 repeats high. The pattern is 16 stitches by 16 rows and my gauge worked out to 8 stitches and rows to the inch (probably because of the difference in the weights of the yarns). I love the feel of it. With the gauge swatch I was then able to do the (quite considerable) maths required (I think I did it right). I even got it worked out onto an Excel spreadsheet with the repeats and the edging all marked out at the (I hope) right places. I still need to do the sleeves but I think they will be a bit easier now that I’ve kind of got things worked out for the body.

Blessings be on the head of Beth Brown-Reinsel who had the worksheet all worked out with examples of the maths to be followed. Bless her little pea-picking heart (as my Grannie used to say) because even with her help, it’s still a giant step of faith (because of my maths skills)!!! I’m determined to have me a wearable skrå-trøjer sweater by the end of the year.

This was also a good exercise as I found that I was forgetting stuff and had to go back to my little sample sweater to remember what we’d done. I certainly don’t want to leave it too long. The original was in blue and white and I did my sample in green and white but I think I’m going to use the same black and white that I used for my swatch to make the big one. One thing is that I think I have enough (from my Stitches shopping) of the black (I have about 2,400 yards which should be more than enough) and the white is easily obtainable so I shouldn’t have to worry about not being able to get hold of what I need. Also, I think that’s a very Scandinavian color combination. One thing’s for sure. When I wear this sweater, I won’t need a coat of any kind no matter how cold it gets!



It’s a little tempting to think of doing it as a cardi as it will be so warm but I’m going to go the full way for the first one (we’ll see if it’s also the last). I’ll also have to decide whether I’m going to steek the sleeves and front opening. The original one was not steeked so I may just go that direction. I don’t mind knitting color back and forth. Originally this pattern was knitted in the round up to the sleeve openings and then was knitted back and forth for the front and back. The sleeves are knitted from the cuffs up as they use the twinned knitting for the cuffs. So that’s what I’m going to try to do.

As if all that wasn’t enough, I took a class Sunday afternoon – a beginning PMC class. PMC is precious metal clay and it’s just what it says. It’s fine (.999%) silver in a clay form. You can mold it, shape it, cut it, wrap it around stuff that can burn away, and twist it. Then it gets dried out and fired and, whallah, you get a fine silver bangle or ring or earrings or whatever you want to make. At the end you just shine it up and, whallah. It’s absolutely amazing and you don’t have to have a bunch of specialty stuff to use it (except a kiln or access to a kiln that can heat it to about 1200 degrees). There is a lot of specialty stuff you can use but you don’t have to have it. I had a ball and made two wee things. I couldn't get a good picture but will try during daylight. They're not that good but they were worth doing to learn. I can definitely see myself using this stuff more for all kinds of things.

Sunday night I even got some of the 4500 yarn ends worked into my fair isle sweater. I have to say, I got even more of it done this morning at the clinic while I was waiting to be told I had an ear infection and needed both an oral antibiotic and antibiotic drops. Yea!

Huh?!?

In the “What were they thinking?” department:

I recently got a new computer from a large electronics retailer (who shall remain anonymous). I actually had a really good experience with the sales staff, got a great price for exactly what I wanted and even had a great experience with the mail-in rebate. I was nervous about the rebate offer because I’ve had horrendous experiences in the past with this process.

Anyway, I got through all of that and when I received my rebate check, I also received a $15 gift card (with purchases (sic) of $149 or more). Fair enough, 10%, right? Well it was until I got to the really small print with the exclusions:

“Qualifying purchases excludes computers, music, movies, games, Game Hardware, Sharper Image, Verizon, Infinity, Velodyne, Bose, Polk, Apple, Kicker, MTX Thunder, LG, KEF, Denon, Outlet and ‘anonymous’ Gift Card purchases.” I sat stunned for a while trying to think what it might actually INCLUDE. The only things I could come up with were sodas and batteries. $149 worth of batteries and cokes, anyone? I tremble to think what that might lead to...

Read on and you discover that this gift card is good for “future use only.” Is there actually a future target date? Are we talking 2010? Well, no, I see in looking closer it’s only good until 8/15/07. Hummmm…

I finally got my bead/jewelry-making stuff organized this weekend and while I was at it made this ring.

Finished Danish Skrå-trøjer

Just a quick post to show the finished article. It's not perfect but isn't it fun?! I used 1 strand of white fingering and 1 strand of verigated fingering for the braided cuffs and collar. I think it gave an interesting effect. I've started ciphering for my real Skrå-trøjer - I can't wait to have one of my very own!! Keep in mind, though, that this sample was knit on size 4 (3.5mm)needles and the real one will most likely be knit on size 1 (2.25mm)needles. That should be interesting!

Stitches Report

I wanted to post a quick report about Stitches Midwest, at least enough to say that an interesting time was had by all. We had quite a large representation from our Guild but I wasn’t sure I would run into any of them as I travelled separately from the others. We did run into each other all over the place, making it feel a little like we were taking over! Everyone seema to have really enjoyed their classes. I'm a little sad I missed the Guild meeting on Sunday to hear everyone's reports.

One thing that made the weekend a little more interesting - as if it needed it - is that there was a “Wizard’s Conference” right next door, evidently one of the Comicons. So there were people dressed up all over the place like animé characters and comic book characters. Quite a few Star Wars characters (those seem to be the most popular) but also Batman and Spiderman and, for the ladies, the most popular seemed to be some sort of I-Dream-of-Genie belly-dancer sort of character. One lady in my class came in laughing because she’d just passed a Spiderman with his “head” off smoking a cigarette. Priorities, eh?! Of course, there were numerous comments on the interesting combination of the comic book fans and the knitters. One thing held in common was the amount of money that must have been spent. Wow. Either there are a lot of broke people today or there were a lot of rich people this weekend (or maybe a combination of the two).

I had a wonderful, wonderful class with a lady named Beth Brown-Reinsel. She was so sweet and encouraging and a wonderful teacher. Here are some of the samples she brought to show us:



The class was more than I could have asked for. I learned so much and enjoyed so much the project we did, which was a Danish sweater. The sweater’s history is a bit cloaked in mystery.

They know who knitted it (the wife of turner (sic) Hanson) but not who he was or what he did. The

original – here’s a picture of a reproduction – was made with a worsted weight wool and a fingering weight wool. So it has some interesting definition and effect on the color work. Beth was able to study the original and created the pattern for the large sweater from the original. But for the class, she designed a miniature version that allows the knitter to practice all the components of the larger version – twinned knitted cuffs for the sleeves and neckline, half gusset, color work, following a color pattern and knitting a facing for the neckline slit.

I had a ball and here is the finished product (before blocking):


I’ll post later once I get it blocked. I’ll also post a note of a few of the things I learned during the class and a few more thoughts.