Archives for August 2007
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Here is what happened to my skein of Lion Brand Homespun. I had to cut the yarn before this and join in the middle of the square because this mess showed up. I just can’t believe how poorly this yarn is constructed. There literally is no yarn in this section. It’s gone. All that’s there is the thread that holds the fiber together cause it’s not really spun or plied. It’s just crazy. So once this project is done, that’s it. Nothing else will ever be knit or crocheted using this yarn.
It so happened that I was at my SNB tonight when I came across this problem. So after some whining, I cut the bad section out and continued on. But yes, in good blogger fashion, I saved the crap so I could take a picture and post it here. :)
Besides that I’m really enjoying the simplicity that is N’s afghan. At least till I get to the seaming and ripple border.
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Tuesday, August 14, 2007
OK, I just finished reading Dolman Rerouted at Mason-Dixon Knitting and now I’m rethinking the whole idea of knitting this sweater. It looks gorgeous in the picture in the magazine, but I guess I’m totally out of the loop. I didn’t realize that dolman was a style of sleeve that doesn’t have a seam, it’s an extension of the body. Seeing the picture on the MDK site of Pam wearing it makes me think UGH! I’m not so sure I want a sweater like that after all. I guess it’s a good thing I stumbled on the post before I started the sweater. Maybe there was a good reason I’ve had the yarn sitting in my stash for 3 years instead of being knit up into this sweater.
Now I’m off to find something else to knit with that yarn. :(
Update: I’ve browsed the projects at ravelry and saw one really gorgeous dolman sweater. So now I’m thinking it might not be so bad. I guess I might just have to knit it and see. If I don’t like it, then I’ll frog it and find another use for the yarn, but I won’t know till I do it. Maybe this can be a “next up” project. After I get some of my current WIPs done of course.
Posted in Sweaters and Cardigans | No Comments
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
I’m beginning to hate Lion Brand Homespun. I’ve had nothing but back luck with this yarn. In my first project one skein had pooling in the color, horrible, there were sections where one of the colors in the mix was missing so instead of being a bronze-y color it was miliary green with a pinkish hue! I thought maybe I had a different dye lot, but the color problem occurred within the same skein.
With this project, I’m getting towards the end of the first skein and it looks like the yarn ends and all I’m left with is the single strand of thread that holds the fiber together. How frustrating!
I think this is the last time I do anything with this yarn! Had I known how bad it would be, I would have just fixed up my other project and given it to my sister, so I wouldn’t have to use this yarn again. But I’ve got 9 skeins of this crap and I’m determined to make this afghan and make it right. I don’t think I’ve ever been more committed to a project. So it will get done, but it will be the last time I use Lion Brand Homespun.
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Monday, August 13, 2007
If you’ve been here recently, you’ll notice I changed the layout. I wanted something simple, so I found a decent Wordpress theme that I liked and am now using it. It’s been tweaked every so slightly. I customized the header, of course, and changed the wording in a a few places. This was so much easier than trying to create my own theme and plug it into WP. Because I already had a two column layout, it was easy as pie to tweak my code to fit into the theme. Since this is a knitting blog, it only made sense that I had a “blog” theme. And I’m pretty happy with this one. I may at some point change the colors and if I’m feeling adventurous, add some scripting so that you can choose which color you like better. But I’m not sure if I’ll go that far.
In knitting news, I’ve made it to the gusset on sock on of dad’s thujas. I think the 3rd time is the charm on these. The fabric feels much stretchier but also like it will fit snuggly on the foot. I’ve finally (after many start overs) have made it past the first square of sis’ afghan. I’ve got 2 squares done; 10 more to go. But these are going to be better than the last “squared” afghan I made. These are the same # of rows and the same # of stitches across. *And* these will be pieced together the same way, so when I sew seams, I’m sewing rows to rows and stitches to stitches, so I think it will be much easier. You learn from your mistakes and this time around I have to say, I’m doing much better.
But I’m so amazed that I’ve started these two projects so many times over. I’ve never done that with a project to get it right. I guess I’m actually learning a thing or two in my knitting and “getting” gauge is something I’ve been trying to finally get right. Let’s hope this trend continues when I start working on something that really needs accurate gauge, like a sweater.
Posted in Afghans, Knitting, Personal, Socks | No Comments
Sunday, August 12, 2007
I made my own blocking board. It was so easy and cheap. Here’s how I did it:
I went to the fabric store and got 3 yards of 1″ gingham fabric. Total cost of fabric was around $7.
I went to Home Depot and bought two ceiling tiles. I found them in the building materials section over by the insulation. I got the ones that were rectangular instead of square. They are a little bigger so they can hold larger items. total cost was just under $10. I wrapped the edges of the tile with duct tape. This was to help smooth out the edges and to keep it from falling apart as easily.
Next I used a right angle tool to make some marks on the board. This was so that I could make sure that my fabric was somewhat squared up on the board.
Then I lined up the fabric on the marks I made and smoothed it out. Once it was fairly straight, I stapled it down and folded it over to the back side of the tile. On the back I also stapled it down and covered the edges of the fabric with more duct tape.
That’s it. I repeated the whole process with the second tile. I still have some fabric left over but I definitely needed the 3 yards for coverage. Below is my final board with some granny squares blocking on it. To view the whole series of photos check out my flickr set: knits.blocking board
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