Eris, divided.

Just divided the body and sleeve sections. It looks a touch small but I tried it on and it seems okay; I think that if it does turn out a tiny bit small I can probably block it bigger.

Eris, take two.

So after several days, a lot of chocolate, and a little bit of alcohol, I finally felt (mostly) not upset about my mistake and was able to re-start Eris. Here is the collar, half done and with the stitches picked up to start the second half.

Irritated as I am, I really am glad that I re-knit this. The first try had several small mistakes that bugged me but not enough to make me rip it and start again. Once I discovered I'd used the wrong gauge, though, I obviously had to re-do the thing. This time around I was more familiar with both the chart symbols and how it looked on the needles, so I caught mistakes right away and could fix them.


I'm much happier with this collar.

What goes up must come down.

So apparently November is National Just About Everything Month (Write a Novel, Blog Every Day, Knit a Sweater, etcetera). I have had the yarn for a few sweaters for several months now and so I decided to take the plunge and make a sweater this month. Right from the start there were problems. I didn't have enough of such-and-such yarn to do that project, that sweater wouldn't look good in that color, and so forth. After doing some gauge swatches, I settled on making Rogue. I got perfect gauge and even though I didn't have quite enough yarn, I was able to order more - in the same dyelot, even! - until disaster struck. It wouldn't print. Now, we don't have a printer so any printing jobs include copying files, traveling to the library, checking out a computer, printing files, and returning home. Since I was at the library, there was nothing I could do except retry to print the same thing that I had. Not happening. I must have done something to mess the pattern up when copying it. Plan B. (Well, C, actually, because I was planning on making a Hand-to-Hand Aran [Ravelry link, you have to sign up] until I decided I didn't like that yarn worked up at that gauge.) I was able to print the pattern for Eris, and I had good yarn for it that worked up to gauge. The collar went beautifully. I adore the complex cables. So other than several mistakes, doesn't it look great?


I picked up all the stitches around the edge (one of my least favorite knitting jobs) to start the body of the sweater. I read ahead in the pattern to make sure I knew what I was doing. Everything was clear except there were no specific instructions for the raglan increases, so I checked to see if they were supposed to be done a certain way. Lo and behold, I discovered that I had been working the perfect gauge for the BODY portion of the sweater all the way through my lovely collar.

My knitting will be in time-out until I have eaten enough chocolate to get over this.

Free barrette holder pattern

I had one of these barrette holders when I was young and I may someday make one for my daughters. I thought I'd post it in case anyone else was interested - barrettes are not the easiest things to store neatly.

Playhouse

These are just the cutest playhouses ever. I wish we had a card table.

Slippers

The slippers turned out well and were well received. They did turn out to be the right size to fit the recipient in about three years, but you can't get everything right.

Sobering news

I just found out that my friend Amanda's little boy, Noah, was diagnosed with Tay-Sachs, a fatal genetic disorder. Please pray for him and his family. They are missionaries in Mexico City. If you are able and willing to donate toward some of his medical expenses, you can find more information here.

Knitting by the seat of my pants

Scene: The girls are napping. We have a birthday party to attend in less than 24 hours, and I haven't come up with a gift idea that I like. I am suddenly seized with knitterly inspiration.

No pattern.

No gauge swatch.

The exact size of the recipient is unknown to me.

I cast on anyway.

12 hours before the party, and I have this:



They're fulling in the washer while I have my fingers crossed. Update tomorrow. (Assuming I remember to post; I've been forgetting every little thing this past month.)

How cool are you?

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March, march, march.

Have any of you seen the Algorithm March? I was mystified until I watched this video. Now I get it.

Sort of.