Central Park Hoodie

Progress report

Finished front left. Cast on front right last night. All was going well with FL until a few nights ago when I attempted to do the arm and shoulder shaping. Somehow, I mananged to leave a stitch behind at some point. I guess I dropped it, but it was on the edge so not sure how that happened. Anyhoo, had to go all the way back to pick it up and re-do all that I had just done. Fortunately it wasn't that many rows, and I managed to redo it all last night and even get FR cast on. So I'm on the ribbing of that and hopefully that will be a nice quick knit like FL was :)





Progress Report

Finished the back! Didn't take too long at all (although I did spend every spare knitting moment working on it and nothing else has progressed). Only one minor stuff up. Well, two. Got to the arm shaping part and stopped to take a look at my handiwork, only to discover that on one cable column I'd forgotten to actually do the cable! Ugh. So, ripped it back and started that again (thankfully I'd only gone one more repeat on so it wasn't all that much) BUT..... get to the next cable repeat and check again and guess what?! dropped a stitch back when I was reinserting my needles :( Fortunately I managed to repair this without ripping it all out again and finished up the back last night. Pretty quick if I do say so myself, and considering I've been sick so have had quite a few non-knitting nights recently when I've opted to lay about feeling sorry for myself instead.

Have just cast on the left front.

Oh, and if anyone notices anything amiss in the above pic, I DO NOT WANT TO KNOW!




Well, even though I said I was going to knock some of my WIPs off before I started anything else, I just couldn't resist :)

I actually thought I'd just cast this on and that would be enough motivation for me to finish the other things and get on with this, but once I'd done that much, I just couldn't stop. Finished the ribbing on Saturday night and the rest of the progress was over the course of yesterday.

The cables are surprisingly easy! And I'm finding them something to look forward to as I'm going through the pattern repeats. I love this yarn, it's so soft and silky and is lovely to knit with. Thank goodness considering the cost of it!

I decided not to try knitting this in one piece, and a good thing too, because I'm sure I would never have been able to keep track of where I was without stuffing up somewhere. I think it would have just felt like it was taking forever too, with such long rows.

Not knitted by me!

These longies were knitted by Ali from BumnRound and purchased through the Four Bags Full store on OzeBaby.

Ali's knitting is so neat and nice looking! LOL

The fit is great too. Legs are just about perfect with the cuffs rolled up, which is great since M is GROWING not shrinking :)

He seems less impressed with them than I am, but at least he's wearing them :)

The trouble with Dyelot #95

Someone was selling Jo Sharp yarns for half price on ebay recently, so I snapped up 8 balls of the Silkroad Aran Tweed for only $36! In colour Taffeta #142, dyelot unknown. I had been thinking of using this yarn for the CPH, but in a different colour, but at half the price, Taffeta would work just fine for me :)

I went to my LYS to see if I could see the yarn IRL (after I made the purchase of course LOL - more to check that the colour was what I thought it looked like) and what do you know?! They only had exactly 7 balls of it left - dyelot #95! I needed 7 more balls. So I bought them.

Now, I *knew* that the dyelots would probably have some variation, but I figured it wouldn't be so different that I couldn't incorporate the different dyelots into the one garment fairly invisibly. Oh, how wrong could I be?!

The ebay purchase arrived and the colour was SO different as to be almost a completely different colour :( Very disappointed, however I soon discovered that later dyelots than those I bought from the LYS were more like the ebay balls. Unfortunately no one local had anymore of dyelot #95 left, which was the dyelot I preferred. Tried a few online stores also, with no luck :(

But! -

A big thanks to Kelly from Dyelicious, who managed to find me some stores that did actually have dyelot #95 left!!

First batch arrived today, and now I have 14 balls sitting her waiting to be turned into something lovely! and the colours match perfectly, of course :)

Three more balls in the mail!

One of these days I'll put up something I've finished

But not today.

Just my progress on the hoodie for L. You can see where I used the two balls that had much more intense purple in them, but I don't mind, I think it looks pretty good. So I'm up to sleeves and hood now. Will hopefully start those tonight. Still have more wool to dye up. I can't believe how many balls this is taking!

Progress pics at last

Finally made some progress on something worth showing LOL


Yarnswap Longies

I really like the way the colour is pooling with these. I haven't switched balls at all, and I'm not planning to either. Not my favourite thing! I'm interested to see how the legs will knit up. I'm just about to split off for the legs, so I'll know pretty soon!

I'm not working these from a pattern. Making it up as I go along really. We'll see how they end up fitting :)

Mulitple projects on the go

I've decided this really isn't for me. I'm definitely a one-project-at-a-time knitter. I just want to finish something! I feel unfulfilled with so much on the go and nothing actually completed. I keep knitting and knitting and I'm not getting anywhere! So, as the rest of the wool for the hoodie has arrived, I have decided that as soon as I have dyed that and it's ready to go, I will finish that before I pick up anything else. Of course the throw rug will have to contine to be an ongoing WIP as it's so huge it will be the only thing I knit all year if I knit only that! So here's my order of finishing:

Child's hoodie
Yarn swap longies
Start CPH
Shrug

The shrug is lovely, and I really want to finish it, but I think I will *need* the CPH before I need the shrug, IYKWIM. And that may well take me a while to complete since I've never knitted cables before! LOL

Oh, and another thing about multiple projects... no pics! I can't believe this is my 4th or 5th post with no progress/finished photos!

Note to self.....

....next time I take my knitting to the hairdresser, remember to close the knitting bag BEFORE she starts cutting hair, not after.

and just a note on knitting skill guides...

my shrug pattern states "beginner knit". It fails to mention that you must also have "advanced concentration" skills if you are to successfully knit it.

fortunately I had only done one repeat of the pattern (in which there was a minor stuff up as noted in an earlier post), but I've decided that knitting a pattern like that, which actually requires me to pay attention, needs to be done when I am completely alone and not also trying to watch television. the former of these situations does not occur very often.

consequently I've ripped it back to the end of the ribbing and I'll be starting again later today.... maybe.

A little something to make you all drool

Mmmmmm..... Chocolate Cake (insert Homer drool here)

Cadbury milk chocolate cake. Yum. What more can I say.

Actually, I can say this... is fantastic with a few scoops of vanilla icecream ;)

(and no, that's not on the CSIRO diet either. But it WAS my birthday :) )

Not much going on here....

...but 3 hours at the hairdresser did make for a bit of progress on the shrug. No pics yet as it's really very uninteresting at this point. 51cm of ribbing (ugh!) and I'm finally on the lacy pattern, although I did notice that I stuffed up one of the diamonds. At first I was beginning to feel a bit devastated by this, but then thought about the hassle (and pain) of redoing it all, and after a bit of reflection about how totally invisible it will be to anyone else, I decided it's not that bad after all :)

Everything else has pretty much ground to a halt atm. Been a bit busy the last few evenings and just no time to sit down and knit really. Have done a few more rows on the throw, and am now up to the third set of squares. The thought of knitting that thing really does my head in LOL I must get it finished for DH by winter though. It's deceptively difficult really, I think because it is so easy and therefore very easy to *tune out*, which I did on the last set of squares, so my squares have some flaws. Again I decided that the time and effort required to rectify this is just not worth it so I'm leaving it. I will pay attention on the next block of squares. This is my solemn vow.

I keep meaning to pick up my yarn swap longies again, but I really need to try measuring them against M to see how I'm going with the rise (I'm winging it again and trying something different to see how it will look so I'm not working from a pattern), but everytime I remember I need to do this, I've just put him down for a nap, or to bed for the night. I really do need to write myself a "To Do" list LOL Well here's a brainwave.... he's not asleep right now and I'm thinking about it. Hmmm.....

I did make something with a haul of beads I got from Bead Needs last week, but no pics as not terribly exciting. They are a gift for someone who was very generous.

Ok, that's it. sorry to be boring to anyone that happens to be reading this! Housework has taken over my life and I'm pretty sure no one's interested in seeing my vacuuming my floor! (esp me LOL)

Birthdays

Here I sit on the eve of my 36th year.

I'll be 35 tomorrow. Not *the wrong side of 30*. Not *mid-30s*. Not *30-ish*. Not *that much closer to 40*.

Just 35.

And I'll be 35 until this time next year.

So there. *insert raspberry smilie here*