Finished Object

I want to knit all the things!

Posted on March 22, 2013March 22, 2013 by bekswhoknits

I have so many different projects on my needles at the moment.

I have a meerkat which is all ready to sew together, but I just don’t want to. Sewing up is my least favourite part of knitting.

I have a pair of fingerless gloves for my grandma in law. She lives down south where it’s colder, and reads on her kindle at night. So she needs something to keep her hands warm, but allows her to read. She is also one of the most amazingly creative souls I know. She is an sculptor, a sewer, a painter and makes some wonderful multi-textured artworks which I really ought to show you some time.
So she will really appreciate the work put into handmade gloves.
I don’t mind knitting for people who love my gifts.

I’m still plodding away at Parcel. This week hasn’t been conducive to cables.
At some point it will all click again and I’ll spend a whole week knitting it, but this week was not that week.

I also have my 10 stitch blanket and mini-mania on the go. Plus some other top-secret non-knitting projects (stay tuned!!)
All of this wants me to cast on something new!
But I’m resisting the temptation.

(This is typically the time when CaityRosey does one of her amazing posts showcasing all the pretty patterns she’s found this week – but I will resist. Just looking at all the pretty knitted dresses is testing my resolve)

Happy Knitting!!!

Which one of you bitches wants to dance?

Posted on March 19, 2013March 19, 2013 by bekswhoknits

I’m ticking off 2 items in my 13 in 2013 checklist. I spent the weekend making cushions.

My previous cushions I made are looking a little worse for wear. One got lost in the great cheese fight of Superbowl 2013, the other has been used as a pillow one too many times and as the closure wasn’t exactly stable it now looks like the cushion is escaping from the cover.
I’m hoping an invisible seam will fix the design flaw in my first two. (I used the tutorial on fern and freckle which was invaluable)
Once again I used quilting flats fabric. Not only are they already roughly the right size for a cushion, but they come in so many pretty designs and you don’t need to finding someone to assist you with cutting from a roll. They are really moreish aswell.

I have a notebook that’s getting quite full of sayings/quotes/lyrics that I want to embroider , but choosing which one is still the most difficult part.
This time I chose a quote from Black Books, and a lyric from Neutral Milk Hotel.

FO#6 leftover wurm cowl

Posted on March 15, 2013March 15, 2013 by bekswhoknits

This was a stash buster. I had some terrible acrylic which I made socks out of but still had stacks left. All acrylics aren’t made equal. This one was squeaky and my skin crawl.

So you may be wondering why I wanted to make a cowl rather than burn it in effigy. Well I don’t know, but I wanted to try and use up some mohair at the same time.

So I cast on I don’t know how many stitches on a 80cm needle and started knitting.
Every few rounds I’d purl.
And then knit again. Kind of replicating the oh-so-popular wurm hat but with reckless abandon.

When I ran out of pink, I changed to grey using up all of this particular yarn so I never have to buy it again. The mohair was gifted and I don’t know what else to do with it, but it combines with other yarns quite nicely.
It softens the acrylic and makes it bearable.

Now I need to decide whether or not I want to block it.

Arm knitting (or keeping yourself out of trouble for an hour)

Posted on March 12, 2013March 12, 2013 by bekswhoknits

And now for something completely different. (But not really. More like a variation on a well blogged theme.)

I was surfing through tumblr the other day (follow me if you like endless reblogs of things I like) and I found the video below of arm knitting.

The concept intrigued me so I decided to try it for myself.

The results were pretty satisfactory.

First I tried using 3 different 8 ply yarns. That looked terrible. Absolutely hideous.
So I finished that off and filed it under ‘big mistake’.

So I found some super bulky 12 ply from my stash and started again.
This time it was a success.

The process is really quite strange for someone used knitting with needles. It was a lot of fun though.
I’d definitely recommend trying it at least once.

It does require an uninterrupted block of time. At least one of your arms will be covered in yarn at any one time!
Even if you’ve never knitted before the instructions are very simple and gratifying.

FO #5 Instant Gratification Hat

Posted on March 11, 2013March 12, 2013 by bekswhoknits

Without being all TMI, I haven’t been feeling that great for the last couple of weeks.
There were even two days last week when I didn’t even pick up my needles (cue shock horror!!!)

But I thought a cure would be something I could knock out quickly, something not too taxing on the brain, but totally cute.

So I found some yarn in my stash ( Icelandic Wool from Vera Yarn who is currently on etsy holiday but there is her shop anyway) , and a pattern called Ribbed for Her Pleasure.

I still managed to screw up what is a very easy pattern. My counting was a little wonky, but I managed to figure it out and no one except for me (and now all of you kind folk) will ever know.

But I know that you won’t tell.

ravelry project page

Favorite things.

Posted on February 26, 2013March 12, 2013 by bekswhoknits

I’ve been making some progress on my Mini Mania scarf which I started just before Christmas.

This is the reason that I blog. I always forget how much progress I make, particularly on these long projects.

This scarf is taking ages. Mostly because I keep looking at how pretty it is rather than knitting it. That and getting into a rhythm of knit one slip one takes a bit of doing.

But this week I’ve needed something distracting but simple whilst I’m at home with uterus trouble.

Here are some of the other things keeping me sane this week.

There’s no milk in the house, so fruit tea is brilliant. This is one of my favourites. (Plus polkadot cup!!!)

Tim Tam mini packs are fab. My sweet tooth comes and goes depending on the time of the month. It’s also a great way to try out new flavours. Turkish delight is my favourite chocolate. Can’t wait to try them.
Plus a heat pack is essential.

Harry Potter is all I feel like watching, so I’m watching them all!!!

And of course knitting. It’s a great distraction.

FO#4 Dangerous Turns

Posted on February 18, 2013February 22, 2013 by bekswhoknits

I had a non-monogamous weekend.
Friday night kicked off with a show at Festival Gardens, and knitted some rows on Parcel.
I learnt how to turn a back cable into a front cable one row after discovering it. Disaster averted.

Saturday night was spent watching Castle, before having a girly night and spending some time with my 10 Stitch Blanket (which is slowly getting bigger after being ignored for some time).

Then Sunday was all about the next step sockalong socksDangerous Turns. These socks fit like a glove.
The only thing I’m not happy about is the cuff. But I’m never happy with my cuffs, they hang of my ankle rather than hugging it.
Somewhere along the line I missed a cable repeat and I’m still deciding how annoyed I am about it.

So I’m not over the moon with these socks. And I haven’t weaved in the ends as there is still the possibility that I will frog them.

I don’t mind them, but I know how they should look.

I’ll look at them in a couple of days and see whether I can live with the mistakes.

Next Step Sock Sockalong

Posted on February 12, 2013 by bekswhoknits

I’ve gone a little cable crazy. I’ve cast on two cable projects in the last week, one of which is dangerous turns.

These are a good candidate for the Next Step Sock Sockalong (hosted by crafts form the cwtch and is about stepping out of the sock comfort zone and trying something new).

Firstly I’m knitting these out of cotton. Which I haven’t knitted with before. I have no idea if they’ll make nice socks but I wanted to give it a go. I’m a bit tired of using Noir all the time and I’ve promised myself not to buy it again, but I was in Spotlight and wanted instant gratification yarn, so I bought Panda Regal 4ply Cotton.

Secondly I’m knitting cables without a cable needle. I’m a cable beginner, who naively assumed that there was only 2 types of cables.
Well there aren’t. And last week they had me beat. The tutorial I used didn’t cover what to do when there was purling involved. And stubborn old me wasn’t about to use a cable needle.

Fortunately the answer came to me in a dream.
After nearly throwing them across the room, frogging them, and sobbing into my cotton, I wisely decided that I would sleep on it.
After dreaming about knitting (is this common?) I had the answer.

All of a sudden the cables fell into place and I knew what to do.
So I manually transposed the stitches. Once I had done that I could knit and purl as I pleased.

And then last night I figured out how to do it in one clean swoop, the grumperina way. And it seems so simple I don’t know why I didn’t get it before.

So these are my next step socks.
I’m hoping now that I’ve got the cables figured out for good and the early cables don’t look too rubbish in comparison.
Or that I forget it all and can’t figure it back our.
Or that I have actually ‘got it’ and haven’t just made something up which doesn’t work.

Eep, maybe I’m not as confident about cables as I thought I was!!

FO#3 socks like a waltz

Posted on February 8, 2013February 8, 2013 by bekswhoknits

1, 2, 3.
1, 2, 3.

Knit knit knit, purl purl purl.

And so it goes.

Knit knit knit, purl purl purl.

Until you shift it one stitch to the left and then start waltzing again.

Knitting heel-less socks felt like dancing.

The pattern is really easy. So easy I didn’t think it would work.

But it did. And just in time to.

I did manage to finish these last Friday. And I wore them last Friday as my gorgeous polkadot cons were hurting my feet.

I still need to weave in the ends but I have cast on new projects since so that’s just not a priority right now.

So the pattern I made is as follows. Cast on 60 stiches. (Next time cast on more but make it divisible by 6 – not 3 as the pattern says. That doesn’t work)

Work in rib for a while. I went the twisted rib route which goes like
Row 1) knit 1, purl 1 through the back loop
Row 2) knit 1 through the back loop, purl 1

Once there’s enough rib, start to waltz.
K3, P3.
Do that for 4 rows.
Then
P1,K3, P3 (keep repeating the waltz, you’ve just shifted it over).

After 4 rows shift it over again.
P2, K3, P3

And then you’ll have swapped over and you’ll be starting with P3 K3

Just keep on going, shifting it one stitch along every 4 rows.

Try it on and when you’re ready, make a toe.

I did a standard decrease every second row, toe.

Once you get to the end, say you have 16 stitches on the needles, panic because you don’t have a needle to do Kitchener stitch or a decent enough Internet connection to google it.

Instead decide to so a 3 needle bind off, with a bobby pin.

Later regret this decision because it was so freakin fiddly, but be grateful that you finished them and they could soothe your feet.