A Tale of Two Tabbys

If you’ve ever come across Turtlegirl’s Bloggy Thing on a Tuesday, you are familiar with the Terrible Twosome, Calvin and Ripple. A few months ago, Cristi designed a complimentary pair of socks in honor of her boys.

The Calvin & Ripple Socks were chosen for the Q4 Knit-A-Long for the Socks that Rock group on Ravelry. I’d been wanting to knit this pair anyway, and the pattern is discounted through the end of this month in honor of the KAL, so I signed up and started knitting.



Independently, these socks were fairly quick knits. They took three weeks to knit primarily because I was focused on other things. Specifically? The marathon week focused on Big Thaw, which has been loitering quietly in a corner for almost a full week now.

I knit Calvin’s sock first.



I really liked the slip-stitch pattern and the sock zipped right along. I fell in love with the mistake rib on the back of the sock. I will most certainly use this stitch pattern again!



Although Cristi did a fantastic job of reverse-engineering Cat Bordhi’s Riverbed architecture for Ripple’s sock, I like my toe-up socks, so I plunked the Ripple stitch pattern into the Riverbed master, same as Calvin. I did the bulk of the leg watching football on Saturday and Sunday. The Ripple pattern has a 4x2 "rhythm" while the mistake rib has a 2x2 "rhythm." I kept screwing up by forgetting which needle I was on (front/back). Spent more time tinking than normal on this sock, but that's OK.

Toe Pic!

As all of you know, I prefer to do a garter toe vs. a standard toe. So when I decided to do a standard toe on this pair of socks (I felt the garter toe would not work well with this pattern), I effed up the toe on the Calvin sock (in the back in the above photo). Oh well. It still worked just fine in the “big picture,” which is why I didn’t bother to go back and fix it. So we’ll just call it a design element and move on, m’kay?

Calvin & Ripple Socks

Pattern: Calvin & Ripple Socks by Cristi H. Brockway
Yarn: STR Lightweight in Dreidel
Source: Blue Moon Fiber Arts
Needles: US1/2.5mm Hiya Hiya 16” circs (2-circs method)
Started: 5 October 2009
Finished: 25 October 2009
Mods: Did the Ripple sock toe-up. Chose the plain toe option on both socks.

More Boring Than Paint Drying

Hi! Absolutely nothing interesting is going on in my life, hence the blog silence. But it’s Wednesday! So I’ll show you what I’m working on.



Last Thursday, I started working on the Big Thaw pullover for the Hubster. It has been zipping right along. I’m now four skeins of Cuzco into the sweater and I need to make Hubster try it on (again) to check length. I’ll probably throw the current live stitches on scrap yarn and start on sleeves at Hurricane Knitters tonight.

I’m working off of the KnitScene Fall 2008 version of the pattern, and the instructions for the stitch motif on the front are eight kinds of jacked up. I’m hoping that the reprint in the current IK Holiday Knits is actually correct. (so other knitters won't be baffled by the instructions like I was)



In other news, the Ripple sock has been sitting around being envious of Big Thaw. I’ve barely gotten anything done on it, but there has actually been minimal progress.

I’ve been doing a decent amount of sewing, but nothing worth including in this venue. Pumpkinstein just needs the binding hand-sewn and it’s ready to be on my wall. Maybe I’ll get there later this week! Meanwhile, Happy Hump Day, and I hope you’re having a great week!

Getting a Head Start

I wanted to do a Yarn Pr0n Friday, but the weather has been crap and I don’t have pictures of the yarn I want to feature. I’ll get to it, once the weather breaks (we may have an accumulation of snow by the end of the week. Crazy!)

Meanwhile, I have one last knitted thing to show off in the finishing blitzkrieg of Fall 2009. Before you comment on the color, IT IS A GIFT. Hence the reference to getting a jump on Christmas Knitting 2009.


Yes, I know that we really need to repaint the post for our front light. Maybe next year …

I started this moëbius back in February. It was intended to be a gift from the get-go, and I knew that moëbius knitting would be perfect for down-time and car knitting while I was on the pair of tournament trips for the ex-job at the end of February/start of March. I was right.

If you have not tried knitting a moëbius, I highly recommend it! They can be as simple or complex as you want, and they’re just plain cool. Yes, I do want to be Cat Bordhi when I grow up. Why do you ask?


Derf modeled this moëbius under protest. He said it’s a girly color. Then he growled at me.

The yarn is a single-ply silk/wool blend that had been hanging around the store for quite a while. I got it on sale and am going to be able to return one of the skeins (assuming I can find it). It’s going to be a gift for my best friend’s sister. JC lives in Florida, so this will be more a fashion statement than a scarf. I’ve never met her, so I’m hoping she likes it. I know pink is a favorite color, and she raved about the scarf I sent for her two years ago, so fingers crossed and all that. Meanwhile, it’s finished!

JC’s Moëbius

Pattern: Used Cat Bordhi’s Treasury of Magical Knitting (and her YouTube video for the moëbius cast-on) as a reference, then knit Fibonacci “stripes” of stockingette/reverse stockingette
Yarn: Karen’s Kolorways Silk/Merino (50/50 single ply)
Source: Bloomin Yarns
Needles: US 9/5.5 mm
Started: 23 February 2009
Finished: 5 October 2009
Notes: This was abandoned in favor of shinier projects for pretty much the entire summer, but finished within a week after I picked it back up.

Wednesday Again!

Wow. Where have the last seven days gone?

So it’s been fairly crafty around here. I finished my Calvin sock, but you don’t really get to see it until the pair is finished. I did cast on the toe for my Ripple sock last night



Yep. I’m knitting the top-down Ripple sock toe-up. Yes, I have the designer’s permission!

Once again, there’s equal-if-not-more quilting going on versus knitting.

The Nephew Quilt is finished and just needs a bath


It’s not officially finished. Still needs a bath!

I finished off the Bali Pops-A-Lot quilt. Got the borders on it on Tuesday morning at The Quilt Company and found a great purple flannel backing for it yesterday afternoon at a new-to-me store, Sew Much Fun! in McMurray. I’ll get the backing pieced today, so it will be ready to send north on Sunday with my mother.



The parentals are heading up to the Lake on Sunday to close the cottage for the year. The wonderful longarm quilter who did my Pineapple quilt has two quilts of my mother’s finished, so hopefully mom can pick up her quilts and drop mine off in one fell swoop.

That Pumpkin quilt from last week? It’s now pinned and ready for quilting. If piecing the Pops-A-Lot back doesn’t take too long today, I’ll start quilting on that.

So that’s about it from here. Not all that exciting, but I’m enjoying myself!

It’s a Vest Thing

My very first experience with Brooks Farm was at the 2008 Pittsburgh Knit & Crochet Festival. Before the Festival, I had never heard of Brooks Farm until I moved back to Pittsburgh and started working at Bloomin Yarns. Little did I know!



I wound up buying a sweater’s worth of Solana, but they had a really cool vest sample. So I bought two skeins of Riata and the pattern and was off to the races!

Thanks to WeirdyPants for her help with the photo shoot. Another mix-and-match with three photographers for one vest. Overkill much?

The descriptively named “Side to Side Vest” is cast on with half the button band, knit the whole way around and finishes with the opposite half of the button band.



I knit the bulk of this vest pretty quickly, then let it languish for over a year (yeah, shame on me!!!) needing just the armhole band and the neckband and the buttons to be attached.



You can just barely see where I grafted the neckband to the button bands on the above picture. I found the buttons at Bloomin Yarns. The only bad part is that I’ve gotten larger since I started this project, so it’s currently too small to wear comfortably. But I’m working on shrinking, so hopefully by spring it will be wearable.

Side-to-Side Vest

Pattern: Side-to-Side Vest by Carol H. Rhoades
Yarn/Color/Quantity: Brooks Farm Riata/Purple-Green-Brown/2 skeins (730 yards)
Source: Pattern and yarn purchased from Brooks Farm
Needles: US 7/4.5mm and US 8/5.0mm
Started: 6 April 200
Abandoned: 6 June 2008
Resumed: 27 September 2009
Finished: 30 September 2009

A Working Wednesday

I’m pre-writing this blog post and will drop in photos in the morning. We’ll see if this plan works at all, or if it’s a gigantic failure.

I went up to The Quilt Company yesterday (Tuesday) and sewed! With a group! For nearly three hours! The two California quilty friends who still read my blog may remember this quilt, since it was quite popular about three years ago.



I got it totally pieced yesterday and am going to sandwich it today and get quilting. I’m also gonna sandwich this one:



It’s gonna be for my nephew. He’s scheduled to arrive around Thanksgiving, but is making noises about showing up sooner rather than later. Here’s hoping he waits a few more weeks before he makes his big arrival. (Sister-in-law is on bedrest. UGH!)

Today is a mini-oasis in an avalanche of finished projects. I have two more still to show you! But there is still knitting being done. Namely, my Calvin & Ripple socks for the Q4 Socks that Rock KAL over on Ravelry.



There’s also some super sekrit knitting going on, but you’re just going to have to trust me on that one (or go peek at my Ravelry projects if you are so inclined.)

I’m hoping for a big sewing day today, then some knitting tonight. Fingers crossed, I’m off to the races!

Back from the Dead

I’m on a “finish things” kick lately. Projects that had been snoozing for a year … two years … they’re all getting busted out and finished. Well, not ALL. There are sweaters lurking in this house that were knit for “smaller Amy” that I’m not touching for a while.

Anyhoo, there’s this …



I started Bright Stripes nearly two years ago and knit it in about 10 days.



Got some really yummy yarns at Bloomin Yarns and found a little-knit pattern in the back of an often-purchased book.



I knit the actual scarf in what felt like 10 minutes. I really love knit-lengthwise scarfs! I might have made the pom-poms a tiny bit differently if I’d had half a clue of how I wanted to attach them to the scarf, but it worked out just fine.



This scarf was knit specifically to go with a black cashmere dress coat that I wear pretty frequently during the winter. Now that I will no longer be wearing that coat primarily to a building with two gigantic ketchup bottles prominently displayed (where I would always wear my Steelers Scarf), I figured I should have a classier scarf to go with the nice coat. Mission Accomplished!

Bright Stripes Scarf
Pattern: Bright Stripes from Scarf Style
Size: It’s a scarf.
Yarn/Color/Quantity: Cascade CashVero/Ecru/1 skein;
Rowan Cashsoft Aran/Black/2 skeins; Rowan Cashsoft Aran/Thunder/1 skein
Source: Bloomin Yarns
Needles: US 8/5.0mm
Started: 8 November 2007 (yes, 2007)
Finished (with the knitting): 20 November 2007
Finished (pom-poms added): 2 October 2009
Mods: Fewer colors than the pattern calls for, but I wanted a subdued scarf. I got it!
Notes: Steamed the crap out of it, and it now lays flat. Used every inch of the leftovers for the pom-poms

Special thanks to my scarf SuperModel, Baxter Bear! ;-)

Mondo Vest

I’ve been on a finishing kick lately, and after a very busy few weeks I feel like I finally have my life back to some semblance of “normal.” Hooray!

So I finished my Mondo Cable Vest. I started it at the very end of August as part of the Bloomin Yarns Knit-A-Long which includes the Mondo Cable Vest, Mondo Cable Pulli and Mondo Cable Cardi. The KAL is still “along-ing” and feel free to jump on the bandwagon if you’re interested. Chic Knits has fantastic patterns!

This vest has a very unique construction. It is cast on provisionally at the shoulder seam, then worked down.



I did fine with the provisional cast-on since I used my favorite trick: Lucy Neatby’s technique (YouTube link) where you crochet your chain directly onto your needle. It’s the only way I can do a crochet chain provisional cast-on and NOT screw it up!



I did screw up the pattern at one point. I misread the pattern and was increasing the fronts too quickly (neckline increases every RS row instead of every other RS row). I was knitting both fronts simultaneously and had to rip them out and start over. But it was just one night’s work down the tubes. Worth it in the end to get a great-fitting sweater!

The yarn I used for this sweater was absolutely fantastic. It will definitely be one of my first considerations for this gauge in the future. It held up perfectly to the limited frogging that I had to do and was a lot of fun to knit with.



As I got down to the every end of the sweater, I started thinking about how I wanted to bind off. The pattern called for a regular bind-off in pattern, but after a quick consult with Cristi, I decided to take her suggestion and use a three-stitch applied I-cord bind off.



It needs a bit of a steaming to sit a little flatter, but all in all I’m very happy with the bind-off and the sweater as a whole!

Mondo Cable Vest
Pattern: Mondo Cable Vest / Shell by Chic Knits
Size: 46” I thought I was (intentionally) knitting a too-small size, but it fits great now
Yarn: Classic Elite Waterlily
Color: Lake
Quantity: 950 yards (9.5 balls)
Source: Bloomin Yarns, McMurray, Pa.
Needles: US 10/6.0mm and US 9/5.5mm from my KA Switch set
Started: 31 August 2009
Finished: 26 September 2009
Mods: Did one more repeat than the pattern called for to add a little length. Did a 3-stitch applied I-cord bind off instead of the pattern-dictated in-pattern bind off.

Special thanks to both Michelle at Bloomin Yarns and WeirdyPants for help with the modeled photos for this finished vest. I appreciate your help!

Sanity Savers

You’ve seen these socks around the old Blog on WiP Wednesdays for a few weeks now.



They’ve come in particularly handy during meetings and other situations where if I didn’t have something to do with my hands (and that little “I’m bored” corner of my brain), I would be prone to inflicting bodily harm on someone in the immediate vicinity.

Toe Pic!

My good ‘ol Garter Toe, then a plain stockingette sock. Let the yarn do the hard work!



Riverbed arch expansion, then the beyond-memorized New Pathways heel turn

I did try one new thing on this pair: Jeny’s Suprisingly Stretchy Bind Off on the second sock. The Knitty.com editorial was posted after I had finished Sock #1, so we wound up with a nice compare-and-contrast

Jeny on the left, EZ’s sewn bind-off on the right.

All in all, a very enjoyable pair of socks. These will most certainly count for the STASH (Seriously Terminate All Stash Holiday) Knit-A-Long. (Ravelry Link) This yarn was one of the first in the door for my then-puny sock yarn stash. I've had it for at least three years!

Socks for Erin

Pattern: Riverbed Master
Source: New Pathways for Sock Knitters
Size: Teeny-Tiny (a US women’s 6, I believe. Circumference is 7.5”, length is 9”)
Yarn: Collinette Jitterbug
Color: Jewel
Source: Beach Knitting, Manhattan Beach, Calif. (Yes, it had been in the stash THAT LONG)
Needles: US 1.5/2.5mm. Next time, I’ll use a 2.75 for this yarn. These are dense socks, even for me!
Started: 1 September 2009
Finished: 27 September 2009

Da Burgh

In case you didn’t get my comment yesterday about the remainder of this week in Pittsburgh being brought to you by the Letter G and Number 20, it’s because the G20 summit is in Pittsburgh today and tomorrow.

Although this seems very odd. Air Force One isn’t expected to land until 3:30 pm today (Thursday) and everything is supposed to be “back to normal” by tomorrow (Friday) evening. How long is this summit? 15 minutes? Sheesh.

Anyhoo, I grew up in Pittsburgh as well as living here now. I firmly believe that when they handed out civic pride, Pittsburghers got in line twice. We are very proud of our city, with good reason. Since I’m a bit concerned that most of the images out-of-towners will see from my city will be of the protesters and other ugliness, I wanted to show you a tiny bit of happy from this city that I love.

Last weekend, the Hubster and I were able to show off Da Burgh to his parents, who were visiting from Chicago. Hubster had been dying to do a Just Ducky tour, so we did!

The tour starts at Station Square, then crosses the Smithfield Street Bridge. As we started the tour, we got a nice view of the Monongahela Incline



I do want to mention that I wasn’t thinking ahead when I “packed” for the day, since my good camera doesn’t take great Roaming Tigger photos. Oh well.

After driving through town for a bit, we crossed the Warhol/7th Street Bridge onto the North Side, then splashed down into the Allegheny River near Heinz Field



Tigger doesn’t swim all that well, but he’s happy to take boat or Hippo Tours.

We also floated past the Carnegie Science Center



I tried to lighten up RT in Photoshop, but all of my efforts just made it look like I had cut/pasted him into the photo. So you get a dark Tigger.

I did get one nice shot of Tigger and Dahntahn



Don’t be surprised to see this shot on a Ravatar near you…

After the Ducky Tour, we headed over to PNC Park to witness one of the Pirates three wins in their last 25 games (YUCK-O). We did a bunch of tourist-ey stuff in the Strip District then visited the Heinz History Center, but no fun photos from that field trip.



So once all these idiot protesters leave town, come and visit! We have two spare bedrooms! Plenty of space! And here’s hoping that none of the protesters break anything while they’re here.

Bracing for the Storm

The remainder of this week in Pittsburgh is brought to you by the LETTER G and NUMBER 20. If that makes no sense to you … consider yourself very, very lucky.

Sorry it has been so quiet here at ye olde bloggity blog. I’ve been running around like a crazy person since returning form the Lake a week ago. But there has actually been knitting!



I finished the first sister-in-law sock and am cruising along with Sock #2. I hope these will be off the needles by this time next week.

Meanwhile, I’m zipping along on my Mondo Cable Vest. When I’ve actually been home, I can crank out nearly a full ball of yarn (100 yards) in a single sitting.



I can also see the home stretch on this project, so hopefully you’ll be seeing brand new shiny WiPs this time next week. And with any luck? They might even be fabric instead of knitting!

Speaking of quilting, my favorite quilt store is having a three-day sale Wed-Thu-Fri this week to encourage people to leave their homes. If I can get from here to there tomorrow, I’m gonna try to go, but I have to make certain about road closures before I leave the house. Yeesh. Still, I’m quite glad I don’t need to go anywhere near downtown for the next three days.

Many Photos, Few Words

It’s late and I have a packed day tomorrow, so I’ll make this as quick as I can so I can go hit the hay.

Woke up this morning and took a walk. Same distance covered in half an hour less than normal. I only picked up the “really good” pieces of glass today, one in particular kind of blew me away. Whole haul:



As (I hope) you can see, there’s one gigantic piece of glass there next to the battery. But you can’t really tell what’s going on with that piece until you see it up close a little better



That blue piece is larger than normal and I got a few more good ones, but yeah. Let’s talk about that monster just above the battery.



It just dwarfs the battery



Bigger in every way. I was just shocked when I saw that piece on the beach.

I snapped a few WiP Wednesday photos



I cranked on the sister in law socks on Saturday. Almost done with Sock #1!

And I’m still Mondo-ing along



I’m on my fourth ball of yarn and it’s a pretty simple knit at this point.

Snapped a few final photos of the Lake and I was out of there.





So that’s it. I have a gazillion things on my to-do list for Thursday, so I’d best hit the sack.