FO | | Page 15

February 14, 2010
by Jennifer Lori 3 Comments

pre-olympics

Here’s a photo I took Friday evening before the opening ceremonies. My equipment was assembled and I was ready to go!

I’m going to be knitting Franklin Habit’s Prairie Spring Tunic from the premiere Fall/Winter 2009 issue of St-Denis. I’m knitting it size 2, using the same colors as I needed it to be neutral- it is going to be a baby shower gift for my cousin’s wife. They have a chinchilla as a pet (and used to have my chinchilla too) so I will be adapting the white blips in the Fair Isle section to be chinchillas. If I have time I plan to knit a stuffed chinchilla toy as well. It is an Olympic challenge for me partly because of my time constraints, and partly because to date I find my Fair Isle colorwork sucks. I rock at intarsia, but I’m not comfortable with stranding the yarn without puckering or pulling.

July 24, 2009
by Jennifer Lori 4 Comments

pillow talk

Ever since he’s been in his big bed, Jakob has been asking for pillows. I won’t let him use our regular pillows because I find them too thick or fluffy for him, and my searches at local stores for “safe” pillows found only one- a pillow marketed for infants, of all things, that is just as fluffy as our pillows, and has a tag, inside the packaging only, stating that it is for decorative purposes only. Sheesh!

I decided to make my own pillows for him. I had some white fabric already, and bought a bag of quilt batting for flat stuffing. I wanted to make pillowcases and looked for fabric with fish on it, ‘cus that is his favorite thing.

I found a cute panel that had some fish, and planned to cut it up. I went back and found a nice rainbow print for the back of the pillows. I prewashed all the fabrics in case they would bias or shrink, and I was good to go.

Before Henri was born I had brought my old sewing machine (like, 40-50 years old) to be repaired and cleaned, and this past weekend I had the woman who had done the embroidery on Jakob’s blanket (remember?) come over and do a mini lesson with me, teaching me the basics of making a pillow case.

These are the pillows I made. They are completely sealed and while the finishing isn’t my best, it was a learning experience and they will get the job done.

jkpilfo04 My only regret is that they are slightly smaller than I’d wanted, as I’d forgotten to include a seam allowance in the measurements. I’d only realized this after cutting the pillowcase fabric, so they are a little too small for the pillowcases. Not a big deal, and they still fit Jakob’s head perfectly.

This is the first pillowcase, using the section of the panel with the duck in the boat.

…and the back with the rainbow lining.

This is the second, using the area with the worm, fish, clam and shrimp.

…and the back of the second pillow. Did you notice I made them each open on opposite sides?

When I was done I had quite a bit of fabric left over. There were 2 cute areas of the original panel left (the sun and the fish with glasses), as well as all the cute checkerboard trim (that I had wanted to use for backing but they don’t make that as an all-over print). I decided to take advantage of being in a sewing mood, dust off my memories of vague quilt-making from high school, and make 2 little quilted panels as mini throw pillows. I used some scrap black for the corner squares.

These are the throws before quilting.

These are the throws after. I had planned on hand-quilting them to get the stitching perfectly outlining the graphics. Then I remembered I still want to knit sometime, ever, and not carry around a little quilt square to hand quilt when I could find spare time. So I zipped through it on the machine instead. My lines don’t line up, but I like the free-form look.

I quilted the sun block by going around the spokes and center of the sun, and then for the border I quilted the black squares only.

For this one I quilted (very haphazardly!) around the fish, and for the border I did the checkered areas instead of the black squares like before.

Ok, so they look more like hot-pads then throw pillows. Whatever- he can use them for whatever he wants. I just didn’t want to waste the cute images.

At least the pillows were successful- he’s been sleeping with them for the last few nights, and in the morning his head is still on them. Yay! I like seeing my handmade stuff actually being used!

May 13, 2009
by Jennifer Lori 2 Comments

16 and 17 weeks, and knitting

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Mommy with Henri at 16 weeks old.

This photo was actually taken a day before Henri turned 16 weeks. Our cousins had their son (the one I knit the kangaroo and joey for) and we had the bris, and my mom took this photo of us. It was great to see that side of the family again, and after being accustomed to Henri’s size, it was so strange to see a baby be “baby” sized!

My “Anne’s slippers” are no more.* I didn’t even realize there were holes in them until I stepped onto a cold tile the other day. I peeked down and saw this mess. Hmph. I’m guessing it was from throwing them into the washer and dryer whenever necessary. Still- I’m tired of saving my knits in pristine condition without any use so they don’t show wear. What’s the point of spending all the time knitting if you’re not going to use the final result, right? So while I’ll have to toss these slippers, I’ll at least always know that I made them, incorporating my grandmother’s vintage yarn (the pale purple) and some vintage buttons from my stash (that I’ll cut off and recoup). This is my first knit to wear out, and I’m kinda proud to know that I got good use from something I made. It feels good.

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Here’s a peek at the finished Log Cabin Squares blanket. I’ll put together my “finished object” post soon.

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Here are those two teeth I told you about! 2 teeth, both out before Henri “turned” 4 months old.

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This is the progress so far on Kayla’s lace cardigan. This is the pattern that I translated from Norwegian so I could knit it. The color is beautiful in real life, a smoky gray/teal.

This was the progress on the Unbiased Purse I’m knitting. I stopped working on it once I got the blanket squares from Robyn and Amy so I could concentrate on finishing the blanket in time for the shower. I’ve since completed the second triangle. The purse is knit by working 4 of these sections then seaming the outside edges and inside joins. The unfortunate part is that the purse center is only as high as the narrow edge- which means if you want a deeper purse you need to keep going until the outside edge is practically huge. I browsed some finished purses on Ravelry and found that a few people had worked up a cool solution- they knit an additional triangle to fit in between the purse sections, upside down. I’m currently at that point now- I worked on it last night at the Montreal Knitting Guild meeting and am just about halfway done that triangle.

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As a reward to myself for finishing my squares and the seaming of the Log Cabin Blanket, I restarted a sock yarn blanket for Henri. At the hospital, waiting for my c-section, I had started a blanket for Henri. I had decided to make octogons instead of mitered squares like Jakob’s blanket, and had finished the first one using the deep red yarn you can see in the blanket above. After Henri was born, however, I found the octogons too “girly” and put the blanket aside waiting for another idea to strike. Inspiration hit after working on the Log Cabin Blanket. The garter ridges match those in the mitered square blanket, and I like the idea that both boys have blankets made of garter squares the same size, both will have the same stretch, and the cool thing is that I’m using the same yarn to make the squares. So Jakob will have diamonds with angled stripes, and Henri’s will have rectangles (kinda like the difference between square and diamond Shreddies, lol) with straight stripes. So now for every project I finish I’m going to work up a few squares until Henri’s blanket is as big as Jakob’s. Then I’ll work on them both simultaniously, adding squares to each from the same sock yarn scraps.

Mommy with Henri at 17 weeks old.

Am I caught up? I think so. I took Henri’s monthly chair photos on the 8th so I’ll put that post up soon.

I can’t believe that Jakob is going to be 2 this weekend. He’s such a big boy already, jumping and counting to 10 and trying to do everything for his brother. I can’t wait to see what he learns next!

*I lie…I’m still wearing them.

April 20, 2009
by Jennifer Lori 4 Comments

fo report – Sourwood Mountain Fingerless Mittens

Pattern: Sourwood Mountain (Pattern link, Ravelry link)

Size: cuff: modified small-to-large (see mods below), hand: small with gusset mods (again, see below)

Yarn: Butterfly 10 cotton, color 3884 (almost a denim blue), about 2/3 of the skein

Needles: 3 mm dpns for body, 2.5mm dpns for cuff (the smaller needles were necessary to get gauge)

Notions: 6 buttons from my large button box

Dates: March 13 – 29 2009

Modifications: (copied from my Ravelry page) I had to slightly extend the cuff because the small length didn’t fit around my wrist. I also had to redo the first mitten 3 times (only from row 25 of the hand onwards) because the thumb hole was too tight for me.

My final mods are as follows:

worked the cuff as written for small until the chart was worked twice. Then followed the directions for large until the bind off. Then did an extra 10 rows even in established pattern. Bind off.
worked the hand as written until the gusset was completed. Instead of binding off on the next round (round 26) I worked 4 more rows as per the chart (building the gusset up higher) then did the bind off round, placing the BO on round 30 (and giving me a thumbhole that was higher before the BO and subsequent CO, so it wouldn’t be a tight and dig in to the fleshy part of my thumb like the original pattern’s version).
worked the BO round as written, but modified the following round as follows: Next round: work in pattern to bound-off sts, pick up and knit 1 st in first bound-off st, CO 8 sts over gap, k 1 st in last bound-off st, continue in pattern to end. This gave me a much looser thumb hole which I find more comfortable.

To get rid of some of those extra sts before the end of the mitten, I placed a marker in the center of the 8 cast-on stitches over the thumb hole. On the last 2 chart rounds I worked as established until 3 sts before the marker, ssk, k2, k2tog, cont as established around. I also worked the decreases in the first round of ribbing.

my final modification was to work the bind off round as tight as possible insted of loosely. Cotton stretches, and I had more sts than in the actual pattern. By working a tight BO I ended up with a mitten that fits perfectly!

As usual you can find my finished (and unfinished!) projects in my “projects” page by clicking the tab up at the top of every page on my blog, and I also have this project in my Ravelry notebook here.

p.s. thanks for taking these photos Maaike!

April 11, 2009
by Jennifer Lori 5 Comments

fo report – Sidewinders Socks

Pattern: Sidewinders – A PerpenSOCKular Sock Pattern (Pattern link, Ravelry link)

Size: not sure, but I wear about a woman’s 9

Yarn: Regia Winter Color, about 80% of 1 100g ball

Needles: 2.5mm needle

Dates: January 4 2008 – March 3 2009

Modifications: None, but I plan on some. I’ve noticed that since the increases are done on either side of a marker, which puts a lot of strain there. I put them on to wear to the Passover seder on Thursday and found that both the toe and heel had too much strain at that space to wear without being afraid of a tear. You can see what I mean in the photo below if you look at my left toe- you can see “ladders” of the gap where the marker had been. I will need to reinforce the socks before I can wear them, and when (not if) I knit these again I would modify it slightly to leave 1 stitch on either side of the marker, THEN work the incs.

p.s. thanks for taking these photos Maaike!

March 22, 2009
by Jennifer Lori 6 Comments

fo report: Mackenzie’s dinosaur

The first project I finished after Henri was born was my Sidewinders Socks. Unfortunately I haven’t had a chance to photograph them yet, so here are photos of the second project I finished- the dinosaur for my cousin Robyn‘s son Mackenzie. When her son Sean was born I’d knit him an elephant, and she’d requested a dinosaur for Mack. I had all the pieces knit before Henri was born, and once I’d caught up on some sleep (ha!) I took advantage of some free time to squeeze in 5-10 minute finishing sessions here and there. It was slow going because I was still dealing with a newborn and all that comes with…but eventually I finished it.

Pattern: Modern Day Dinosaur from Family Circle Easy Baby Knits (Ravelry link)

Size: one size

Yarn: Smart Superwash, 5 balls in 5226 (purple) and 1 ball of 8615 (green).

Needles: 3.75mm needle

Dates: January 1 – February 14 2009

Modifications: I didn’t want to glue on felt dots (choking hazard) so instead I cut out felt circles to use as templates, and embroidered over them with the green yarn.

January 5, 2009
by Jennifer Lori 3 Comments

holiday wrapup part 4

This is the last holiday gift to blog about! (Or, everything you didn’t care to know about the Very Cabley Mittens, in much too much detail).

I’d mentioned Brigitte’s Very Cabley Mittens before, when I complained about the sizing issues I was having, and how I’d basically spent a day knitting to have to undo everything. In the end these mittens were knit waaay too many times. I think the first mitten was knit at least 3 times before I got it right.

To sum up…I’d knit the cuff on 4mm as directed (and after getting proper gauge) but I found the cuff much too loose. Had I kept going and knit the body of the mitten it might have seemed ok, but I wasn’t thrilled. I changed to 3.75mm needles and got a great cuff, but working the rest of the mitten as written led to a mitten body that was much too tight. I added length but the width was crazy tight- I couldn’t even uncurl my hand, and Brigitte’s hand is about a centimeter wider than mine. At the end of the first day I undid the entire mitten body and kept the cuff from the smaller needle.

That night (Dec 23rd) I redid the mitten body using the 4mm needles as required. This width was perfect, and everything came along swimmingly until I got to the end. Even with the added repeats the top shaping came up too suddenly and it was too short. Twice I had to undo it and and more length. I realized quickly that trying on the mitten as a tube didn’t give me an accurate length, because it pulled the tube up higher than it would sit normally but closing the mitten top would make it actually too short. When I removed the waste yarn for the afterthought thumb and THEN tried it on, the mitten was able to snug down around the base of my thumb as it would sit properly, and actually be shorter than it had appeared before. Once I realized this I was able to measure the length properly while having it tried on with new waste yarn holding the live sts but keeping the thumb hole open.

The second time I had to undo the top and add more length is because apparently I can’t follow a pattern, or count, and somehow I’d managed to mis-align my cables and it looked stupid. In any case, by the time I went to bed on the 23rd, I had one full mitten (sans thumb) and a blueprint for making the second one to match. On the 24th I figured I’d get everything finished up during the day, but I only worked a half-day due to the holidays and since I wanted to get some actual work done (you know, in case I went into labour before going back to work on Saturday) I didn’t really do more than cast on and complete the 2nd cuff. After work I had my hair appointment, but quickly decided that even though I had a good 40 minutes to sit with the color in my hair, I didn’t want to risk my only ball of CREAM COLORED yarn to the Fates. The last thing I’d need is to get some dye on the yarn!

Luckily our Christmas Eve plans were to stay home and veg in front of the TV since we see Yannick’s mom’s side of the family on Christmas Day, and his dad’s side on New Year’s Day, so Christmas Eve is often just us celebrating together. Yannick didn’t mind me knitting (especially since his name would be on the gift too!) and by the time I went to bed on the 24th I had 2 complete mittens. Well, both were thumbless. I should totally have had time to complete the entire pair of mittens and be done…but somehow I’d screwed up. I finished the 2nd mitten and closed the top, laid them side-by-side, and realized that the 2nd one was longer than the first. Visibly and noticably longer.

I spent longer than I should have trying to figure out the mistake, and eventually ripped back to where I knew things were good and redid the top part. For the life of me, I still can’t figure out what I’d done wrong. I was about 4 rows too long, and the pattern DOES have an option for ending on either row 4 or row 8 depending on the length you need, so theoretically I could have worked an extra 4 rows before doing the top shaping…except that would have meant I’d have had to follow the “modified top shaping” instructions, to get the cables to flow properly, and I’m SURE I didn’t, and yet the cables were perfect. I’m still very confused. It didn’t take long once I actually started undoing it, and I did manage to reknit the top before bed. But I still had no thumbs.

The next day (Dec. 25th- talk about close!) I knew I only had to knit 2 thumbs and weave in the ends, I’d had no plans on blocking the mittens like I’d done for the socks. Our internet was down and I had to sit on hold with tech support for a while, so while I sat there I knit, and by the time the call was over both mittens had thumbs and all ends were woven in. I had all 3 gifts nicely labeled, bagged and wrapped by noon, and we weren’t even expecting Yannick’s family to arrive to do our gift exchange until 4pm. I made it under the wire! (As another plus, I now know how fast these mittens are to knit, and how cute they are when knit up. If I ever want a pair for myself, Brigitte’s fit me perfectly so I just have to follow what I did for her. Nice!)

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Pattern: Very Cabley Mittens by Kelly Porpiglia (Ravelry link and direct link)

Size: one size.

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Yarn: Brown Sheep Lamb’s Pride Worsted Superwash in “White Frost”, 1 skein (which was surprisingly enough, even though I added repeats!)

Needles: 3.75mm needle and 4mm needle

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Dates: December 23 – 25 2008

Modifications: I knit the first cuff using 4mm needles as per the pattern, but it came out huge. I went down to 3.75mm and the cuff was perfect, but the mitten itself was too small. Third time was a charm- the perfect pattern was doing the cuff on 3.75mm and the mitten and thumb on 4mm. I did have to add 2 repeats to the mitten cable pattern, and I did the thumbs on the 4th repeat (of my 7 total) not the 3rd repeat (of 5 total).

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Here are the 3 gifts for my in-laws’ families, all labeled and ready to wrap. I think next year I really have to knit a pair of socks for my brother-in-law, because this is the third Christmas where he’s seen a pair of my handknit socks and he constantly makes comments about being impressed with the detail, the tiny stitches, etc. I felt bad that everyone else got a “made” gift and he got a gift certificate when he seemed to appreciate the work that went in to the socks the most!

January 3, 2009
by Jennifer Lori 3 Comments

holiday wrapup part 3

I still have a few more gifts to get through on my 2008 holiday recap.

On December 22nd I finished up my father-in-law’s Christmas socks. These photos are very boring because, let’s be honest, they are boring, all-brown, all-stockinette stitch socks.

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Pattern: N/A I used a basic sock “recipe” from a booklet I got from my LYS many years ago. 2×2 rib for the cuff, stockinette leg and foot, flap-style reinforced heel with gusset, and regular (wedge?) toe.

Size: 64 sts around, and his foot is 9″ around and 10.5″ long.

Yarn: Regia 4ply in color # 1231 (brown), 2 50g balls

Needles: 2.5mm dpns

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Dates: October 27 – December 22 2008 (but only took so long because I waited for my in-laws to get back from Florida to try on the first socks for size).

Modifications: None.

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A quick wrap in a care label and one yarn baggie later, and this gift was ready to go too! Once this was done it meant I was finally able to start my sister-in-law’s mittens. I finished these socks around 11:30pm on the 22nd, so the Christmas gift mittens were only started on December 23rd. No pressure!

December 30, 2008
by Jennifer Lori 4 Comments

sneaking one in

If I wait until I’m fully caught up to show some current knits, then I might be playing catchup forever. Well, until I’m sidelined by a newborn. Anyways…I thought I’d sneak in a second(!) post today to share a quickie with you.

This is the chemo cap that my mother-in-law requested for her cousin. For a last-minute project, it was great! The yarn was on sale for $1/ball, and it took me exactly one ball with enough left over to add to my project ball and still have a few “emergency” yards to give the recipient. I’d bought 2 balls just in case, but I think that instead of returning the second one I’ll keep it and knit a silly little stuffed animal with it one day.

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Pattern: ”No Hair Day” Hairy Chemo Cap by Sue W. Thompson (Ravelry link and direct link)

Size: 21″ (the smallest size). I don’t know how big of a head the recipient has, but my mother-in-law had tried on the one for my cousin, and it was a good fit on her. She thinks her cousin has a slightly smaller heat, but I think that when the recipient has undergone chemotherapy, it is probably better to be a little looser than tighter so it doesn’t irritate. In any case, she is going to bring with some elastic thread when she gives it to her cousin, so if it is too loose she will snug it up for her on the spot.

Yarn: Bernat Boa Lash in the Silver Fox (grays with a tiny shot of blue/steel) colorway. I used about 90% of 1 ball.

Needles: 5.5mm needle

Dates: December 29 2008

Modifications: None.

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December 30, 2008
by Jennifer Lori 3 Comments

holiday wrapup part 2

On the 19th I finished the last of the 3 Flower Scarves for Jakob’s daycare teachers. This was the result of my “magic knitting”…the knitting that gets done on the go so by the time you settle down you realize you’re practically finished.

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Pattern: Flower Scarf by Robyn Diliberto (Ravelry link and direct link)

Size: one size.

Yarn: Colinette Jitterbug, in the colorway Velvet Olive. I didn’t check yet but I’m assuming it took the same 150 yards as the other two. These photos don’t do the color justice…after my original hesitation, I LOVE this colorway.

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Needles: 3.75mm needle and crochet hook

Dates: December 8 – 19 2008

Modifications: None! I used the garter variation from the pattern itself, and did everything else as written.

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I made labels for the Flower Scarves just like for the socks for my in-laws, and also wrapped up a little remnant of the yarn “just in case”. I was afraid the 3 teachers might not realize that it was an outdoor garment and not just a “hold my bangs back” hairband, so I also included a little photo-card of some possible wearing methods.

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Here are all 3 gifts ready to be wrapped, with their photo-cards and yarn baggies tucked into the labels. Last Tuesday, the 23rd, was Jakob’s last day of school before Christmas, so I brought in the gifts when I dropped him off.

Wednesday, Christmas Eve Day, saw Jakob home from school and reacting to either a sick kid from his class or the flu shot & vaccines he’d received Monday morning, so while I went to my latest OB-GYN appointment, Yannick kept the store open for me with a sleepy Jakob on his lap. Things went fast (and well) at the doctor and not long after I got back to work I kicked them out so Yannick could get Jakob home in time for lunch and a good, long afternoon nap. I closed the store early for Christmas Eve and braved the freezing rain to treat myself to some highlights. I guess the baby hormones have been kicking in, because the last batch that I did on my birthday in early September had grown out by almost 3 inches, and looked horrid. I know I won’t get a chance to go again until there is some kind of breast feeding and sleep routine established with the new baby, so I decided to go now. (Plus my hair gets to look good in any “new baby” photos).

I had my eyebrows done while I was there too. Isn’t it amazing how just that one, simple act can open up your whole face and make you look like you’re rested and wearing makeup, even if you’re not? I don’t know why I don’t go more often, I love the results!

Christmas Eve was spent knitting in front of the TV together, catching up on some of my tapes. A few of the shows that I tape are ones that Yannick enjoys (Chuck, Heros, Pushing Daisies*, Terminator and Supernatural), so whenever I come across one of those as I am watching I have to make a note and remember where to rewind back to so we can watch it together. It felt good to “clear off” some tapes and be able to reuse them instead of just adding to the growing pile of “watch when Yannick is home” cassettes.

*RIP, sob. 😦

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