Category Archives: Thoughts

The everything bin.

Knitting progress

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My lace socks are coming along. I put the first sock on stitch holders and started the second one from the other end of the yarn cake.

Green lace socks

I’m going to make them as tall as I can.

Thebes’s Noro sweater has been frogged. The squares puckered too much when seamed together. Then I tried to do something crazy where I had a bunch of little Noro balls and knit all the squares in a round. That was a tangled mess. It was just a world of wrong.

So I frogged it and decided to make a blanket. I found the Ten Stitch Blanket pattern on Ravelry.

Noro blanket

It’s a nice, relaxed pattern and shows off the Noro colors beautifully.

For Thebes’s sweater I’ve switched to a new yarn and pattern. I’ll blog about it as soon as I get enough on the needles for a pic.

Faith Welsh’s progress pics

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Thank goodness I’m not the only artist that is still working on finishing pieces for the Beyond The Fringe show. It makes me feel like we’re all in this together. Faith recently sent me some progress pictures of her work. I really enjoy seeing how art is shaped and changes on its way to completion.

Gratitude II

Beyond The Fringe artist: Faith Welsh

Turtle Dancer II

Beyond The Fringe artist: Faith Welsh

Want to contact this artist? You can email her at faithwatnewmexdotcom Her website is Snow Lion Studios.

Circular Knitting Needle Case

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Abbey got me a set of bamboo knitting needles for my birthday back in January. Recently I sewed a needle case for them. Ever the fuzzy helper, Prana helped out by putting his kitty goodness into the project.

Knitting needle case

The needle case closed:

Knitting needle case

I went with three rows and everything fits:

Knitting needle case

With the last needle case I used lengths of ribbon for ties. This time around I didn’t buy enough ribbon. After lining the edges I only had a bit left. There was just enough to wrap it around once so I sewed some velcro on at the ends.

Knitting needle case

The case rolled up:

Knitting needle case

Now all my needles are in a tidy place. I’m really happy how it turned out and really like the paisley fabric.

A large blouse and my cute knitting helper

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Too big blouse

I recently finished this blouse. It’s a Simplicity pattern, #5684. While it looks pretty there’s one problem. It’s too big. I made it in a size 16. Now I’m not a size 16 but my breast size seemed too big for the size 12 and 14.

Too big blouse

I’m keeping the blouse. I plan to wear it on those relaxing days where I want to wear loose fitting clothes.

Here’s a picture of Prana helping me put clasps on Arwen. He’s putting his kitty goodness into the sweater-a vital step in any knitting project.

Prana sleeping on my Arwen sweater

Hippie Tam

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Crochet tam

I’m finished with my first car project. I call this my Hippie Tam. This is the first tam I’ve crocheted in years. I used to make them a lot back in my commune days. There were a couple times I had to rip back because I was doing the pattern from memory. But it all came back and now I have a tam for winter.

Crochet tam

I did two rows with no increases or decreases to make it roomy enough to tuck up my braids if I want.

Pattern: Hippie Tam
Source: Me
Size: Custom
Yarn: Repurposed wool from a thrifted vest
Needles: H hook
Started: April 2008
Finished: May 2008
Modifications: None

Felted Sunrise

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Abbey and I went to Merce‘s place last month to do some felting. Merce showed us how to hand felt. Wow! It was so much fun. There’s something so satisfying about felting with your hands. I like it much better than throwing a piece into a washing machine. Plus I’m off grid so hand felting is something I can do at home.

The three of us went free form and “painted” with raw fleece. Here’s what I made:

Felted sunrise

It’s the sunrise over Taos Mountain. Since I’m such a night owl the sunrise is one thing I don’t see much. When I manage to get up that early (or more likely to stay up that late) and see the sunrise it feels like a rare treat.

Merce suggested we put uncarded fleece around the edges as trim.

Felted sunrise

This was a brilliant idea. I love how primal it makes the piece look.

I’m in love with painting with wool. I’ve never been a painter because I like to touch my work. This is why I’m also drawn to sculpture. After the piece is done you can still touch it. I find myself petting my felt piece.

Merce also told us the trick to hanging felt art on the wall. You simply staple a piece of velcro (the grippy side) to the wall:

Felted sunrise

I’ll definitely be doing more felt work in the future.

Inches of purple and a pig

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Samus

I had fallen into a light knitting funk and hadn’t worked much on Samus. Now that it’s nearing the end of the month I’ve kicked it back into gear. On Jan. 1st I started Samus and I want to finish it before February is finished. I’ve been working on it today and have about 3 inches before starting to shape the armholes.

Hotel pig

Thebes and I stayed at a hotel in Santa Fe and this towel pig was there to greet us as we entered our room. Kind of odd but kind of cute at the same time.

Samus, Prana and a wedding

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Samus sweater

On New Year’s Day I cast on for the Samus Sweater. I’m on row 16 of the first repeat.

I had to redo my cable chart. I had drawn the chart out in pencil which smeared. I figured the more I used the chart the worse the smears would get. So I redid it using pen and colored pencils which is much better.

The bottom cable is done all at once. This is a great design feature. With Arwen I knit the a row of cable along with a long row of stockinette. By the time I got back to the cable I had to reorientate myself with the chart. With Samus I can just get into the cable zone.

Prana hung out outside and checked out the snow. On the whole he’s still impersonating an inside cat.

Prana outside looking at the snow.

Abbey got married to her honey on Winter Solstice. And Thebes married them! It was a beautiful ceremony and I got to be maid of honor. Here’s a pic of the happy couple:

A and D wedding

Knit From Your Stash thoughts

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Knit from your stash

Knit From Your Stash ended September 30th. How did I do? Pretty good I think. I still have a stash but it’s definately smaller. All of it fits into one of those walmart bins with room to spare.

I liked this challenge. There’s a freedom in stash knitting. I felt I could take on projects with more difficulty. If I’m knitting with brand new fancy yarn I have a tendency to knit “safe” projects that I know won’t be destined for the frog pond.

Knitting from my stash gave me the confidence to experiment. Ogee and the Knucks were both from stash yarn.

The to-be-felted bowls are also stash projects. I’m inexperienced with felting so at this point I wouldn’t buy fancy new yarn for felting in case I ruined it. The bowls are made from thrifted sweaters so if they don’t felt perfectly my wallet won’t have suffered needlessly.

During the nine months I naturally bought sock yarn and Thebes bought me the yarn for my Arwen sweater. That technically meant I didn’t cheat.

Was this challenge a success? I’d say so. It helped me experiment. It helped me evaluate my consumerism. Instead of buying yarn just to buy yarn I considered my choices more. Yarn was synched up to projects instead of just sitting in my stash pile for months. I feel this project has help me grow as a knitter.

I won’t be getting rid of my stash pile. It’s a useful thing to have since my mood changes on what I want to knit. There’s nothing quite like the thrill of buying new yarn though. I think I’ll settle into a happy medium of new yarn and stash yarn knitting.

That being said, I bought some yarn at the Taos Wool Fest and will write up a post about that soon.