Make room for my Fat Bottom

bag that is…

I actually finished this project a few weeks ago. I’m not one for finishing, seaming, or in this case lining projects. Fortunately, my aunt who is in town visiting for a couple of weeks is an avid sewer. Introducing my finished FBB! In case you didn’t already know, the pattern comes from Debbie Stoller’s Happy Hooker book.

Yarn: Berroco Suede, 2 skeins
Hook: Size I, Susan Bates
Time to finish crocheting: 1 week in May

Here is my FBB in the sunlight. I like this picture the best.

Here it is in indoor light.
And here’s a picture of the lining. I chose blue cause I wanted something very unexpected for this bag.

Thanks to my aunt for making this FO possible. I was actually thinking of taking this project to a tailor to get it finished. The handles are a la Michael’s. They have tons of bag handles and are very reasonably priced. If I had it to do all over again, I’d use “bamboo” handles to match the color better.

Thanks for looking

Someone keep me away from Amazon!!!

Gosh, one of my favorite things is surfing online for new books. Amazon is particularly dangerous because you can look at something and have it on its way to your house in less than 5 clicks of a mouse. I seriously added to my knitting library this time.

I ordered Wrapped in Comfort by Alison Jeppson Hyde. She’s a really talented knitter. Her book has patterns for 12 circular shawls (which I haven’t ever done) and 4 scarves. All are really beautiful but I have a few of her beginner shawls in my queue such as the Julia’s Shawl, Bigfoot shawl, and the Concert scarf. All the patterns are accompanied by a personal story. I think that’s cool. I’ve always wondered how designers get their inspiration and you find out what Alison was thinking when she designed these beautiful shawls.

The second book I ordered, Knitting America is more of a coffee table type book detailing the history of knitting in America. I have just barely glanced through it but it has beautiful pictures of historical pieces and includes 20 patterns for items such as 1865 Union Army Socks and a baby soaker from the 1930’s. Knitting was so important to America. It astounds me how many people today think that knitting is the realm of old ladies. In this book everyone knit from little kids to men.

The next one I got is the first book from Crazy Aunt Purl. I plan on saving Drunk, Divorced & Covered in Cat Hair for reading at work while I wait for babies to be born. There are patterns included. Some look really cute like the Devil Baby blanket and the Sexy Shawl.

Of course, I had to throw a classic in there like Knitting Workshop by Elizabeth Zimmermann. I have yet to knit anything from her books and I have 4 of them. I do want to knit the saddle shoulder sweater that she has in the book.

As for knitting, I’m still plugging away at my Icarus. I’m on row 11 of chart 3. So far, (knock on wood) I have had no reason to rip it back. Yeah. My stitch counts are on target this time and the shawl is getting bigger every day. Hopefully, I’ll have it done and be able to block it by the end of the week. Did anyone need blocking wires for this one? I don’t have any but I guess I can start doing my favorite thing. Search the net for a set.

On my toes with Icarus….

I’ve been quite prolific this past week. As you already know, I’ve frogged Icarus and began the daunting task of re-knitting it. I’m almost back to the point where I ripped it. Here’s a progress pic

Of course, I was getting bored with it. So last week I started CROCHETING!!! I couldn’t believe it. Now, I’ve been known to pick up a crochet hook but it’s been about a year since I’ve done that. But when I was at the sale at Bonita Knitting last week and saw a sample of the Fat Bottom Bag from the Happy Hooker made of Berroco Suede, I couldn’t help myself. I started crocheting away and was done by Wednesday of last week. I should have taken a picture of it but it’s at my Aunt’s house right now. She’s sewing a lining in and putting the handles on for me. How lucky am I to have her here doing my finishing! But unfortunately, she’s just here visiting. I’ll have to give her everything I have to finish

But… I digress. Back to the “On the toes” part of my title. I finally figured out how to cast on for Toe Up Socks. I had to start over a few times but it looks good now. The second sock will probably be even better. I used the Eastern cast on method and 2×2 ribbing. I am loosely following Ann Budd’s guide for toe up socks in the Summer 2007 Interweave Knits. Go check it out if you’re having trouble with Toe up socks. If you have questions, let me know. I might be able to help. I was sooo elated once I got past the toe part. here’s a pic for you to see my progress. It’s knit out of On Your Toes bamboo from The Grove.

Until next time

Icarus has died…

I’ve been knitting Icarus as my only project for about a month now.  It was going well.  I’d make a mistake here and there because it’s so dang boring.  k2 together, yo, knit 7, skpo.  That’s all I did for about 3.5 weeks.  Then chart 2 came along.  It came and went with a few mistakes.  I actually was way off on the stitch count for the first row.  I think I had 7 stitches too many.  That was corrected with some strategic decreasing.  Then I realized that my stitch count was actually right on the next right sided row.  Gosh… so I had to add them back in.  This was the start of my denial.  I kept compensating for little mistakes.  Then chart 3 was started last Friday.  I was doing so many decreases and increases to compensate for my incorrect stitch count.  Ugh…

So I brought Icarus with me to my knitting group on Saturday.  The day started out wonderful.  Nice and sunny.  Great company.  I knitted on Icarus for about 2 hours.  Then I looked at the shawl.  A really good look.  Ack!  The lace was not lining up!  I mourned for about 5 minutes and made the decision to frog it.  I got a few protests from the group.  But I stood my ground.  Denial is an ugly thing and I’ve said it before.  There were too many mistakes for me to be happy with this.  I didn’t want my wedding shawl to start my married life with that many mistakes.  Lisa told me that she knits everything with at least one mistake.  Another woman told me that I shouldn’t hold this project to too high of a standard or it would freak Matt out.  He’d think that he’d have to be perfect and marriage isn’t always perfect.  I listened to everyone’s opinion and started to frog it.  This was very unpopular and a few women left… I wonder if it was because they couldn’t stand to see 500+ rows of lace weight knitting go poof in 15 minutes.

So, I was going to take a break from Icarus but decided to keep on going.  If I stopped, I might never pick it up again.  So since the pattern is so familiar, I’m trucking thru it.  I’m on the 2nd repeat of the stockinette pattern.  Yeah!!!!

So… lesson learned, use lifelines once I get thru the main repeats.  Rip your work back and pay attention to the stitch count.  It WILL come back to bite you in the butt later.

Take the pledge

Help fight animal cruelty. That commercial on TV with Sarah McLachlan gets me every time. I’m going to donate a monthly gift after I post this.

I’ve been tagged…

Thanks to Knitting Nurse. It’s nice to know that someone is interested in quirky things about me. Here are the rules for this meme.

1) Link to the person who tagged you.
2) Post the rules.
3) Share six non-important things / habits / quirks about yourself.
4) Tag at least three people.
5) Be sure the people you tagged KNOW you tagged them by commenting what you did.

So… Here goes.

1. I have not been able to get that song from the Advantix commercial out of my head for about a week. It’s so cute. I sang it in my head all day at work yesterday and even hummed it. People must have thought I was insane. You can view the commercial here
2. I am a coffee/wine lover. I also like liquor shots. Hate girly drinks like lemon drops and midori sours. My dad says that I have the taste buds of a 50 year old man.
3. I love reading the paper on Sunday mornings with a cup of coffee.
4. I like eating good food but hate cooking.
5. I hate being cold. It’s a good think I live in Southern California.
6. I wrinkle my forehead when I’m perplexed. Like when someone says something stupid and I think “WTF, why would someone say something like that?” Matt says it’s his pet peeve about me.

I am going to tag the following people:

• Karla
• Margaret
• Pam

I

Bobmas (the aftermath)

I attended the Bobmas meeting at The Grove down in North Park last Wednesday and met a lot of knitters who’s names I know from Ravelry. It’s really fun to put a face to a name Hi to Margaret, Tania, Bernadette, and everyone else I met at the Grove. I really hope I get to see them soon.

Besides knitting and talking about knitting, I did a bit of stash and book enhancing. I got my first non-wool sock yarns and I’m really excited to use them. The first one is Schoeller + Stahl Sockina Cotton in a fun colorway. I hope it knits up in stripes.

The second skein is a bamboo blend that is soooo soft and heavenly to the touch that I just couldn’t resist. The Grove had a few really pretty colors and I had a heck of a time choosing just one. But here’s the one I ended up with.

It kinda reminds me of Pink Lemonade with the pinks, yellows, and a bit of lavender thrown in so that’s what I’m calling it. But it’s really called On Your Toes Bamboo. It’s 75% bamboo and 25% nylon.

Unfortunately, I was starting to get bored of knitting socks my usual 2×2 rib method so I picked up Cat Bordhi’s New Pathways for Sock Knitters. Again, the Grove made it extremely hard to resist because all the craft books were 20% off on Bobmas Eve. I have a few socks I really want to knit like Ocean- Toes and Coriolis.

It seems like I’ve been working quite a bit so knitting gets thrown to the wayside. However, I did make some great progress on the Icarus shawl. Like I mentioned in my previous post, I’m knitting it out of South West Trading Co. Infinity which is 100% soysilk. What I didn’t realize when I bought it was that it is cobweb weight yarn. Yikes! It’s about as thin as sewing thread. But the shawl is coming along splendidly. The pattern so far is very easy to memorize. “decrease, yo, dec, knit 7…” is a mantra I’ve been singing to myself as I knit this shawl. I’m on the 3rd set of repeats so it’s almost 200 stitches across. Yikes, it almost boggles the mind until I remind myself that because it’s so light weight, it’s probably not that wide yet. I do have a progress pic but please forgive how it looks. Lace always looks like limp noodles prior to blocking and since this is cream colored, this shawl is no exception.

I have put my Ribby Cardigan on hold until I finish the Icarus but I do have a progress pic on that as well. I’m using Lion Brand Cotton Ease in the old White. I dont’ know what is up with all the white knits that I’ve been doing lately. I actually bought 6 skeins of this prior to the discontinuation of the line a few years ago and just have never got around to knitting with it. But since I have, I actually really like it. I really hope that Lion Brand does not discontinue it again because I will be soooo sad.

As for the wedding, things are going well. I think we’ve picked out our invitations at a very surprising place, Papyrus which is a chain stationary store in every mall. We’ve confirmed the Maria Lanakila Roman Catholic Church in Lahaina and the The Plantation House for our reception in Kapalua afterwards. I’ve booked our airline tickets and am about to book the honeymoon hotels. We’ve decided that we’re going to hop around the island so we’re staying at the Westin in Kaanapali for the first four days, Hotel Hana for two days, then some other less expensive hotel/condo resort for the last four days. I still have no idea where but we’ll do a bit more research. I’m thinking the Outrigger Palms because I heard really good things about that place.

Anyways, I’ll be working tomorrow so I should go off and do some knitting before I hit the sack. I love watching babies being born but it’s such a stressful time, mainly because I’m still learning so much.

New project

I have knitting ADD. I bought some lace weight soy silk from South West Trading company called Infinity. It comes in a cone with 1400 yards of yarn. Great value. It reminds me of sewing thread, it’s so fine. The white is more of a cream color. I didn’t know but it comes in more colors besides the white and natural that were on the Crown Mountain Farms website where I bought the yarn. They, I might add, have the best customer service and shipping. I ordered it online on Monday afternoon, got an email saying it shipped out a few hours later, and the yarn on Tuesday. I was so surprised, I started knitting the Icarus shawl from Interweave Knits Summer 2006.

It’s going to be my wedding shawl. Yeah!!! I’ve heard some bad things about this pattern thought. Mainly that it’s supremely boring. But I’m going to plug thru it. I’m in the beginning stages and it’s already boring. Hopefully I can get thru 500+ row of this. Wish me luck!

My dress!

Just a short post to let you know that I found my wedding dress. You can view it here. Take a look at the dress from the back. That’s what sold the dress to me. I was not able to save an image to post it on my blog. It looks so much better on than in the picture and they even carry petite for my short body. I ordered it in ivory because I think white might be too blinding with my tan skin color. I also decided that I want my colors to be a teal color, kinda like Tiffany blue. David’s Bridal calls it pool. I’m still working on getting the location. We’re leaning toward a church wedding with a reception at a resort. We are hiring a wedding planner to make things a bit easier on us but details are such a pain. That coupled with dealing with the insurance companies about the accident is stressing me out!

Another one hits the frogpond…

My Bonita shirt has some serious flaws in it.  For one thing, you have to cast on a huge amount of stitches.  210 for my size.  And I’m notoriously bad at casting on the correct number of stitches.  So armed with this little bit of powerful information, I used stitch markers to help me count.  To no avail… I was off by 10 stitches which I did not discover until I started the lace pattern.  Now, if you’ve knit this shirt, you know that you do something quite painful in the beginning which is knit the hem and knit it back onto itself.  I know that sounds awkward but if you have the directions, look it up and you’ll see why I fudged the shirt for so long.  It took me a week of knitting before I got to the lace repeats.  I was flabbergasted but did what any lazy knitter would do.  I simply added increases until I got my additional 10 stitches.  So I trudge along with the correct number of stitches for a while.  The decrease instructions got a bit hazy for me and I ended up doing that wrong too.  Now I made “allowances” for the stitch discrepancy again.  You can tell I’m not one who takes to the frog pond lightly.  I keep going in complete denial until the increase section and I break down.  The shirt just doesn’t look right with all of my fudging.  So I’m going to put it away for a while and come back to it.  I almost cried as I came to this conclusion this morning but it needs to be done.  I was working on Bonita since the my Maui trip which was a few weeks ago now so I’m quite despondent.   Small gauge yarn and small needles came to disaster in this case.  On the positive, the lace pattern is quite fun and I loved the knitting in the round construction.  I suppose I could have just continued on in denial but then I probably would never wear this shirt.  I’m so heartbroken that I can’t bring myself to take a pic of the disaster.

I think I’ll start on Brooklyn Tweed’s Hemlock blanket that seems to be all the rage on Ravelry.  I have some Eco Wool in the stash that would be perfect.  Hopefully, that gets my mind off Bonita for a while.  I wonder what percentage of knitters successfully stop and start a project all over again…