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I love my new purse! It’s the Arden Bag kit from knitpicks. I over-felted mine by accident so it’s a bit lumpy but oh well. Just finished sewing the lining in last night and used it all day and I just love it. I wove the straps on my inkle loom. Here are pictures! And a Ravelry link.

I sewed a special iPhone pocket into the lining so my phone will never sink to the bottom and make me panic. There’s also a larger pocket for keys, pens, pocket knife, etc.

Inside-out to show lining and pockets:

It’s not huge but it’s bigger than my old purse, so I’ll more easily be able to carry along my camera, mouse, laptop power cable, or even a sock-in-progress.

Finally got a photo of Henry in the vest I made him for Christmas. He seems to like it a lot, wears it all the time and even to bed in our chilly house.

Here’s what it looked like blocking and before the buttons were on:

So hard to photograph reds — it’s a lovely dark red, not orange or pink at all. The argyle panel continues over the shoulder and down the back.

Yarn: KnitPicks Wool of the Andes, Cranberry, 6 skeins. Needles size 4 (3 for ribbing). Quick pattern notes:

Starting with 75 stitches CO at neck (provisional)
divide in 3rds
4 sets of shortrows each side, every 5 st
argyle pattern on one side, 4 plain, 17 for pattern, 4 plain (obviously, add on st to left side of pattern to balance)
46 rows (at armhole edge) down back, then pick up fronts.
same short rows.
inc at neck edge until 29+29 then add 5 each side (68 total, remaining 7 will be button bands later)
(Add some stitches at underarm when joining in round, forgot to note this info)
vest is a total of 120 rows (near armhole, more down center back).
24 rows of k2p2 ribbing on size 3 needles
pick up 2 out of 3 stitches for front bands and collar
(inc 2 stitches at front collar corners every other round)
pick up 3 out of 4 stitches for armhole ribbing
8 rows ribbing for bands

More pics on my flickr or the project page at ravelry.

Today (Saturday) is our family Thanksgiving get-together, yay! I’ve been looking forward to this for so long. Yesterday I made a no-bake pumpkin cheesecake, two apple pies, and a big casserole dish of stuffing (we have a tiny oven so can’t bake anything but turkey today). Today I’ll make the turkey, mashed potatoes, grilled onions and asparagus, and cranberry sauce. Mom is bringing a Big Salad. I only have one actual pie-dish so the apple pies are made in cake pans:

After all that baking I was totally worn out, so I played a little WoW and then watched the entire BBC “Wives and Daughters” miniseries while knitting. It’s so good, just so good.

Oh, forgot to say — a couple of days ago I finished my slinky knitted summer nightie:

The pattern is invented and the yarn is the Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece from my old “I Do” shrug, split into 2-ply. It fits perfectly and will be wonderful next summer when it gets hot again. No, you can’t see a picture of me modeling it, it’s far too naughty ;-) The project is here on Ravelry if you want more details: http://www.ravelry.com/projects/kayray/lace-nightie.

Dan let me use his fancy digital SLR to take pictures of my new fruit bowl today:

I got tired of using one of my two mixing bowls to store fruit and then having to dump the fruit out when I needed to mix something, so I made a papier mache fruit bowl. I used a basic papier mache goop: 1 part flour/ 2 parts water/ a glug of white glue and a good big shake of salt. I had to buy a newspaper. It’s kind of hilarious that I only buy a newspaper when I need a lot of cheap paper for a project…

When the basic bowl was dry I gave it two coats of white acrylic paint. Next time I will be smart and use white printer paper for the last layer of papier mache. Then I used Mod Podge to apply a layer of yellow tissue paper to the outside of the bowl and then some orange and red flowers. The inside is just white with a coating of Mod Podge.

Hooray for making something very useful and decorative out of almost nothing!

Dan’s coming home today!! He has has been gone for almost a week, learning sysadmin things at the LISA (Large Installation System Administration) ’09 conference. It felt like he was gone for a month and I’ll be soooo glad when he’s finally home.

Poor Henry has been very sick since Monday (some kind of flu — headache, fever, cough, general misery) so all he did all week was sleep and watch tv, and I kept him company. But I got a lot of recording done, too. I finished my recording of The Templars for Ignatius Press, and did a little picture book about the Pope for them yesterday as well. That one was very sweet, with pretty watercolors. I’ll provide links again when my audio is up for sale. I also recorded four chapters of the next part of This Country of Ours (kids’ US history) and another chapter of Alice in German.

I also ripped apart the odd collar of my Slipped Cable Vest and re-knit it to fit a lot better.

And I wove three bands on my inkle loom. I made them the maximum length my loom can handle, a bit over 8 feet. The red-and-black one has already become shoelaces for Henry (with electrical-tape aglets). If you want woven bands for anything (bodice lacing, dress trim, drawstrings, shoelaces) let me know :) I am super-proud at how much my weaving skill has improved. I wove the last one in one quick evening sitting, probably a couple hours or so. My hands have figured out the routine quite nicely.

Oh, and I’m working on a little case for Henry’s iPod Touch, which he won two weeks ago in some kind of game of chance at a bowling alley!!

I am, astonishingly, not sick yet, knock on wood. I’ve been washing my hands obsessively and staying as far away from Henry as I can, poor boy.

I finally bought several colors of mercerized crochet cotton for weaving on my inkle loom. I just finished a pair of shoelaces for Henry last night:

And then I started another pair in green and white:

I knitted Henry a top hat for his birthday. He loves it!

(Ravelry project page)

Pattern: Hatopia (buy it at http://www.darktwist.com/ or Ravelry)
Yarn: Lion Wool, three skeins
Needles: Harmony circular size 9

Here’s what it looked like pre-blocking:

I knit the hat sides to 11 inches before blocking, instead of the 8 called for in the pattern. Tip: cast off very very very loosely! The hatband is a thrift store belt.

Monday was entry pick-up day at the fairgrounds. Celia had to get her snowglobe collection from Kids’ Best (she won first place and a special award!) and I had to get my Home and Hobby entries (three 2nds and an Honorable Mention), so Bob, Chloe, Celia, Henry, and I all carpooled up there together, which was great fun! We spent the whole time laughing, I swear. First we went to Kids’ Best in the infield, across the scary shaky one-lane bridge, and got Celia’s collection. With five of us helping, it took no time at all to get the snowglobes safely wrapped up, and then we drove back around to the grandstand where the Home and Hobby exhibits are. We parked pretty far away to avoid the terrible one-way traffic funnel through the fairgrounds, so everyone helped me carry my hot heavy handmade things back to the car. And then we all hung out together the whole evening and cooked dinner on the grill and talked and had the best time.

Photos of my prizewinning stuff:

So! What shall I enter next year?

I stared a little lap quilt last summer, if you remember. When I was planning my entries for the Fair this year, I thought I might as well finish the quilt and enter it. It’s a sweet little thing. The dates for delivering Home and Hobby entries to the fair were yesterday and today, so the last three or four days I’ve been working non-stop on the little quilt, hoping to get it done in time, and last night I finally finished it! WOOHOO! I pieced it by machine but all the rest was done my hand. My fingers are really sore. I use a thimble on the right middle finger to help shove the needle through the cloth, but the left middle finger gets stabbed a little bit with every single stitch. Yow. My left hand cramped up while I was finishing the edging last night, too.

So in an hour or so I’ll leave for Del Mar to deliver the quilt, the Girasole Blanket, the Alyssum Socks, and the Andean Chullo Hat. Wish me luck :) (Thanks, Mom, for lending me your blanket and your hat. Don’t forget to look for them at the fair! ;-)

I have a borrowed inkle loom, and just finished my first little weaving project:

I’ve wanted to try inkle weaving for years and years, but never thought it would be worth buying a loom — after all, how many straps and bands and belts and tapes does one need, and that’s all you can produce on a inkle loom. So I was so delighted when our Dehesa EF, Carol, said her mom (a weaver) would lend me her inkle loom! I figured out how to make heddles and warp it, and went to town. And now I have a nice green tape that should make a great drawstring for a summer skirt. Now I’m itching to warp it again and make something else. Anyone need a strap? ;-)

Also, Henry asked me to shave off all his hair so he’d be more streamlined at Kung Fu. No more hair flopping in his eyes, and he doesn’t get quite so hot when he’s in his sparring helmet. He looks a lot different, but still as handsome as ever.

I made cinnamon rolls on Friday:

Lordy, they were good, and gone by Saturday afternoon. (Twelve rolls is only 4 apiece!) Here’s the recipe: Ninety-Minute Cinnamon Rolls. I always use butter instead of margarine.

On Friday night the Teen Club from Dehesa, Henry’s new charter school (which we LOVE), met at the mall to go ice skating. Henry had the Best. Time. Ever. and I worked on my Thick Warm Socks:

(these socks on Ravelry)

They’re made of Briggs and Little’s “Tuffy”, an aran-weight 80% wool/20% nylon blend. I love this yarn. It’s a bit rough, still has lanolin and bits of hay in it, and smells of sheep. It seems like it will wear very well.

Sunday night, Bob and Chloe came over and we talked and knitted and watched TV and had a wonderful time. You should see Chloe’s socks — I think they’re even prettier than mine: http://www.ravelry.com/projects/xsolv/warm-winter-socks. Same yarn, different colors.

This eyelet pattern reminds me of the Sweet Alyssum flowers that grew in our yarn when I was a kid. If I remember correctly, there were white ones and purpleish ones, so if I make these socks again I’ll choose purple instead of orange.

I wrote up this pattern in a way that makes sense to me, but if you find it confusing please let me know and I’ll try to clarify :)

This sock fits my skinny size 7.5 foot with room to spare. The eyelet pattern and the Risata are both nice and stretchy.

One ball Knitpicks’ Risata in Clementine (use Fairy Tale or Marionberry for more botanically accurate socks)
One ball Knitpicks’ Risata in Buttermilk

Needles size 0 (I knit very loosely — you may need to use needles several sizes larger to get gauge)

Gauge in Stockinette: 6.5 st/inch

Eyelet chart:

Cast on 48 stitches. I used both colors and this lovely, two-needle, stretchy cast on: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXDMsy949yw. That’s my favorite cast-on for cuff-down socks and mitten cuffs.

Work 11 rounds k2 p1 ribbing in Buttermilk.

Switch to Clementine, and begin eyelet chart.

After 8 rounds of Clementine, switch back to Buttermilk and work next section of eyelet chart. Move round marker forward one stitch so that the eyelet pattern fits within the round. As you knit around, you may need to shift stitches from one needle to another to avoid having to work eyelet motifs between needles. Do whatever makes it easy. Buttermilk eyelet motifs will be centered between the Clementine ones. I carried the yarn loosely up the back of the sock between color rounds so I didn’t have a million ends to weave in.

Continue switching colors every 8 rounds and shifting round marker one stitch forward or back until you have four Clementine stripes.
Work heel flap in Clementine on 25 stitches. Be sure that your heel flap is centered relative to the lace pattern! I like a long heel flap so I worked 30 rows, I think. I used the basic Heel Stitch. Turn the heel according to your favorite method. I prefer a German heel.

Switch to Buttermilk and pick up gusset stitches. Here’s a good way to avoid holes at the corners of your gusset: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOI_oXPm1iA.

Arrange stitches so you have your 24 instep stitches on one needle, and continue eyelet pattern across that needle as established. Keep the sole of the foot and gussets in stockinette and decrease away your gusset stitches every other round, with k2tog just before you knit the instep stitches and ssk right after, until you are back at 48 stitches.

Knit in pattern until you have 5 Buttermilk stripes on foot. Switch to Clementine for toe. (If you have a shorter foot, knit until you have 4 Clementine stripes on foot and make toe with Buttermilk)

Pretty Little Toe (my hybrid of Round Toe and Flat Toe):
k 1 round Clementine
Decrease round: k6, k2tog around (42 st)
k 5 rounds plain
Dec round: k5, k2tog around (36 st)
k 4 rounds plain
Dec round: k4, k2 tog around (30 st)
k 3 rounds plain
Dec round: k3, k2tog around (24 st)
k 2 rounds plain
Dec round: k2, k2tog around (18 st)
k 1 round plain

Arrange stitches on two needles so you have 9 instep stitches on top needle and 9 sole stitches on bottom needle. KNit a few stitches as necessary to get yarn to side of toe. Graft stitches together (tutorial here).

Block to open up eyelets, and wear!

****************

Detail of the Pretty Little Toe:

Genuine Sweet Alyssum flowers. Look, each tiny flower really does have four petals!

Dan’s hands get cold while he’s computing, and, though my usual “gamer gloves” are like chopped-off mittens, he wanted his fingers to be almost completely covered, so I knit him some fingertip-less gloves based on the Annemor #10 pattern from Selbuvotter: Biography of a Knitting Tradition. Marvelous book, by the way.

Yarn: Knitpicks’ Palette, black and gray, exactly 50 grams total for the pair.

Needles: Size 00 for the wrist ribbing (I worked 5 or 6 rounds), size 0 for the wrist, size 1 for the hand and fingers, size 0 for the finger ribbing.

Pattern: Annemor #10 from Selbuvotter

These gloves on Ravelry

It took me a while to get the first glove done because I had some gauge issues and had to rip back several times. I started out knitting at my usual loose tension on size 0 needles, but the wrist was way too baggy. Then I started over knitting tightly on the 0s, got up to the finger divisions, and the hand was too tight. Ripped back again to the end of the wrist and switched to size 1 needles and a sort of medium tension and it worked out fine. There are not enough stitches charted for the 13-stitch finger pattern to work out, so I had to get creative and redistribute things differently and do a couple of m1s here and there, but it all worked out ok. The second glove worked up really fast! Dan loves them and they keep his hands nice and warm while he’s running around Azeroth.

(If you’d rather look at the photos on flickr, they start here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kayray/3333349859/)

By popular demand, here’s a chart for the edging I used on Kathy’s Stole. It’s a heavily modified version of an antique edging I found online somewhere. The original was twice as wide and didn’t use nicely balanced decreases. Enjoy!

I knit a hat for Henry today:

How cute is that?

Yarn: Knitpicks’ Wool of the Andes Bulky — exactly one skein, wine-colored.

Needles: Harmony circs, size 5

Pattern: Sí, Capitán! (Free!)

My hat on Ravelry

Such a cute hat, and a very easy pattern! It took about four hours, start to finish. I knit the hat part yesterday but knit too tightly (for a change) and ripped it all out and started over this morning at about 10. I had all the knitting done when I left at 2 to pick Henry up and he chose his buttons on the way home. He tried to find the steampunk-iest ones. I sewed them on and shot the brim and band with some steam to even them out, and Hey Presto, it was finished! Thanks for the GREAT pattern, Rosi!!!

On Saturday Henry and I went to a really neat behind-the-scenes Family Day event at the Opera! We got to go on stage and see their Don Quixote sets up close, listened to little talks by their costumer and conductor and stage manager (all women, by the way), saw a demonstration of the science of the human voice and, best of all, were treated to a little up-close-and-personal performance of Mozart’s Cosi Fan Tutte, accompanied by piano. The singers were marvelous. What a treat!

Last night Henry and I went to Chloe’s house to watch the Oscars, and I finished Mom’s Girasole Blanket!

Here it is, blocking on our queen-size bed. It’s about 6 1/2 feet across!

Close up. It’s not really this gray.

Pattern: Jared Flood’s “Girasole” (The pattern costs $6.50 and is worth every penny. It’s extremely well-written.)

Yarn: 18 balls of Knitpicks’ Wool of the Andes in “Winter Night” (18 was not enough to work the pattern as written. Keep reading.)

Needles: Knitpicks Harmony circs size 9

Project on Ravelry

This was a really fun project. The first few charts worked up really quickly, and the whole thing was well-planned and well-written, and the result is just fabulous.

I actually thought I’d finish last weekend, but I ran out of yarn with just a few feet of edging left to go. This color is out of stock at knitpicks, so I ripped back all the edging and the second rep of chart G, and that gave me enough to finish. There’s only a tiny bit of yarn left. If I were to knit this again with the same yarn, I’d buy 21 balls to be safe. The finished and blocked blanket is 6 1/2 feet in diameter, which makes it about 20 feet in circumference. Whew! I loved making it except for the edging, which of course I had to work twice (that’s nearly 40 feet of edging). That did get a bit tiresome :) The edging ruffles quite a bit, so next time I might try working two stitches together at every K2togE (that is, work together two stitches from the blanket with the one stitch from the edging)

My beautiful Surface cardigan is all done! I sewed on the buttons yesterday!

Pattern: Surface, by Norah Gaughan (free at knitty.com)

Yarn: 9 balls of KnitPicks’ Merino Style (which I won in a Knitpicks contest back in December). Color: cinnamon.

Needles: Knitpicks “Harmony” wooden circs, sizes 3 and 1 (for ribbing)

My Ravelry Page

Notes:
I was, of course, as usual, completely unable to get gauge. The nearest I could get was 21st/4 inches on size 3 needles in stockinette, and 18st/4 inches on size 3 needles in the blister pattern. Ok, whatever. So I just had to do a lot of math. It’s apparently my fate to NEVER get gauge. Luckily I am fearless about rewriting patterns :)

I worked the sleeves on 50 stitches, which gave me about 11 inches in the blister pattern, which is about right for the xs size (I have the world’s skinniest arms). The blister pattern was great fun! Looks fantastic and tricky, but is actually a piece of cake and super-simple to memorize.

I worked the smallest size around, and the third size in height, more or less. But smallest size armholes.

When the sleeves were done, I made the back, using short-row shaping for the shoulders, then worked the fronts both at once on one needle, working short-row shaping for the shoulders and then three-needle binding-off with the back.

I decided to seam before blocking. I hate pinning out curved edges. Sewed everything together easy as pie, knit the button bands, then decided to pick up stitches for the collar instead of working it separately — was sick and tired of seaming :) When the collar was done, I wet-blocked, then sewed on the buttons!

Here it is, blocking (no pins, you see):

Here’s another finished photo:

Woke up with a little sore throat yesterday and I still have it. And a drippy nose. Bah. But the weather is cold and rainy and blustery, which makes me happy. While I help Henry with schoolwork I’m seaming my “Surface” sweater. That’s the one I won the yarn for from Knitpicks! Can’t remember if I’ve posted photos yet so here they are:

Sleeves:

Back:

Fronts, partway done:

I usually knit sweaters all-one-piece and top-down, but I figured I’d give the pattern as try as-is. The seaming is not that bad, but I’d still prefer being able to try on as I go! Some books say you must block before seaming, and some say you must seam before blocking. Seaming before blocking makes the most sense to me, so that’s what I’m doing and it’s working fine.

My sister-in-law, Tabatha, and her 6-month-old, Jaylah, are visiting from NY for a week! We’re having crazy hot sunny weather, which is a big treat for them.

I finally finished my Hopscotch Socks:

(Ravelry page)

And I made a pair of booties for little Jaylah and they turned out as cute as can be!

(Ravelry page)

Happy new year! I’m a bit sick, came down with something on Monday, but it’s not too bad. Had a little sore throat for a day and now I’m just stuffy and tired. I’m sure I’ll be feeling fine again soon. Anyway, I have to catch up here a little bit so here is some random info.

Last Saturday I took down the tree and then we went to Bob and Chloe’s house to watch the Chargers play. Very exciting game — it was tied at the end of the 4th quarter so they went into overtime and the Chargers won, so now they go to the playoffs! Looking forward to watching the next Chargers game with them on Sunday afternoon. I’ve never cared a fig about football, but it’s so much fun to watch with C&B, and they explain what’s going on.

This year, Henry’s set of little Homestarrunner figures joined the holy family at the manger:

I packed them with the Christmas stuff so they can attend next year.

Back in December, Knitpicks ran a yarn giveaway contest, and I won!! My prize yarn arrived yesterday — twelve skeins of beautifully soft Knitpicks Merino Style so I can knit a Surface cardigan. It’s lovely yarn without a hint of itchiness. It’ll make a great cardigan and would also be perfect for anything you’d wear next to the skin. I swatched it last night, with annoyingly predictable results (I’m a loose knitter). I’m supposed to get 23sts/4 inches on #5 needles. I get 21sts/4 inches on #3s. Sigh. Ok, I can do the math. I don’t want to, and I wish, as usual, that I could just GET GAUGE, but oh well. Also I am tempted to rewrite the pattern and work fronts and back all together at the same time.

Here’s a photo of my lovely yarn:

Upcoming knitting plans: I’m going to knit Jared Flood’s spectacular Girasole Blanket for Mom’s Christmas present using Knitpicks’ Wool of the Andes, but the color she wants was out of stock and should be in tomorrow (knock on wood) so that’s exciting! I already bought and printed out the pattern and it looks well-planned and fun. Also Dan just requested a pair of gloves with no fingertips, and I need a larger laptop bag for my new Macbook Pro, and everyone always needs socks. So that’s a lot of knitting coming up!