Thursday, September 4, 2008

Natalie Dee rocks!

Seriously! This girl is hard core funny...


natalie dee
nataliedee.com




nataliedee.com

Thursday, May 1, 2008

Fabulous Fiddleheads

It may seem strange to be so excited about knitting mittens at the beginning of Summer, but I saw this pattern on Ravelry and I just had to cast on IMMEDIATELY!! These mittens were designed by Adrian Bizilia of Hello Yarn fame.



I have never felt compelled to do any Fair Isle knitting before. I always thought it looked too folksy or something, but this pattern combines a beautiful design with uber-functionality. I don't think these look too bad for my first attempt at stranded knitting.

I have learned a few new tricks with this pattern as well. You begin the mittens with an I-cord cast on. I can see this being a really useful tool in many other situations. I also learned the aforementioned stranded knitting. I followed Adrian's suggestion of using the colored yarn as the color you "carry under" and I tried to knit continental with my left hand and english with my right, but I am not very proficient in continental yet and my hands were cramped something terrible!!


I knit these in the small size with Lamb's Pride Worsted as the main color and Noro Kureyon as the contrast color on size US3 needles. This produced a firm windproof fabric. I am still trying to decide what to line these with. I have some Lana Grossa Babykid in Teal that is a possibility and also some Blue Sky Alpaca sport weight in a lucious turquoise color.



The lining is up next...Stay tuned!!!

Friday, April 25, 2008

Ravelry = Major time suckage






While I was waiting for my Ravelry invite for all those tedious months, I always envisioned how much easier it was going to make my knitting life. It really has revolutionized the way I have decide what projects to knit and what yarns to lust after, but there was one unanticipated effect.


Major. Time. Suckage.


It is so easy to get caught up analyzing patterns and researching the perfect yarn. Not to mention the forums!! There is a forum announcing new yarn sales, one listing yarns that people have for trade and various social groups to chit chat and be goofy in. It is really easy to spend several hours chatting and looking around and zero time knitting. I have met a ton of cool, funny and interesting people on Ravelry. It really has been a lot of fun!



In knitting news, I got my first Smooshy Arrows sock completed. I really love this yarn!! It is 100% extrafine Australian merino. The colorways are slightly variegated and shift colors gradually. I love the stitch definition that I get. This yarn is really really smooshy! I think it is my favorite yarn for socks right now.