Lookee here

You can get one too at spell with flicr Thank javajem for showing it to me.

I'm thinking of making it my banner up there on top. What do you think?



I've been making toys for the Ravelry group Helping Kids at Hopkins. So far a knitted bunny and bear - and last night I finished a little crochet bird. The bird is my first actual attempt at Amigurumi. What fun! The bird directions were extremely simple, but I'm ready to tackle something more challenging now. The toughest thing about these is facial features. We have to avoid choking hazards, so none of those cute little plastic eyes and noses. Unfortunately, my embroidery skills are akin to the giant sewing cards given to blind children. Srsly. I am most proud of my bear nose. After three tries, I got it perfect.

I never thought I'd like crochet. I'm still not convinced I'll ever go "Oooo, I must make that crocheted thing . . ." other than these Amigurumi. It is better for creating a n eyeball or a bear's nose, I can tell you that. I guess each craft has it's place in my world :-)

Back to the hook . . .

Bonnie Bunnie

Did I mention that these projects are addictive? It took me all of eight days to finish Bonnie Bunnie. EIGHT DAYS! ME. Ms. Episodic, methodical, slooooow knitter.

BONNIE BUNNIE

The Ravelry Group, Helping Kids at Hopkins, is sponsoring this collection of toys for the kids in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. I had so much fun, probably more than this child ever will. As you can see, we get to attach names and personalities to them. I'll probably change her name to something unisex and I still need bunnie to let me know her personality, so I can give her an appropriate face. They especially are looking for Amigugrumi, but are taking all toys thank goodness. My crochet talent is marginal, although my eyeballs for Along Came A Spider did come out rather cute. I'm not even sure my single crochet goes through two loops or one. But I do have a crochet class at Stitches in two weeks. Then I can tackle that spider I have my eye on or find another amazing creature to delight a sick kid.

Cute doesn't always work when you feel horrid.

Lots of F.O.

Most of this stuff has been done for eons.

My husband actually began to nag me encourage me to take picture by putting the projects in a bag with the camera and sitting them in the kitchen by the deck. He even included my big glass head. I'm ashamed to say these are very late going to their charities, but now that they are washed and bagged, I can deliver them. And now, without further ado ~


Preemie Hats for Howard Co Hospital







Chemo Cap With Floppy Brim from Cancer Can't

It looks more like a cloche to me, but turned out nicely and is very soft, so who cares?

And of course another No Hair Day. This one I call Confetti.




Now then.

On Ravelry I have joined a new group that has become dear to my heart. Helping Kids At Hopkins (Ravelry link) is the brainchild of my friend Nittany Knits. You may recall her daughter Gabrielle had a brief but intense illness before passing last spring. The group knits items for (you guessed it) the kids at the Cancer Center at The Johns Hopkins Hospital. There are plans for projects in other Units too. The heart unit will be in February for instance. Every two months is a new theme - and there are even prizes, voted on by the knitters. But the incentive is the joy.

Our first effort was Halloween.

Isn't it he awsome? Oh! The hat too!

Obligitory New Yew Year's Post

It's been an interesting year for my knitting world. Changes in my body have affected it and motivation has been obsessive - but not as productive as one might think given all the time on my hands in the last 4 months.

I did get in these:

30 F.O. in 2007(okay, two aren't pictured)

I haven't figured out how to post my nice little collage of them so you'll just have to go to my flickr page to see it. Sorry. I didn't get a picture of my Banana Republic Neckwarmer yet. I still need to get buttons so it and the Banana Republic Knockoff Hat will match now that Christmas season is over. My little bird needs to hibernate in the jewelry box. Also one of my hats got taken in without a picture - it was in my bag and I was at the center so I turned it in I guess.

Looking at the stuff I did last year really made me take stock of my skills.

• 21 hats(1 not pictured)
• 2 blankets, and a few other squareish things using that same pattern
• 2 scarves, a pair of booties and a single mangled armwarmer.
  

BOOOOOOOORING!

So what's in store for 2008

• Knitting for charity of course
• Knitting for pleasure I hope
• Knitting for variety please

I do have some things in my Ravelry queue to spice things up. For instance I got an idea from a woman on "The Greater Good" charity forum to make an item and donate it for auction to raise money instead. One Lion Brand Homespun scarf on a Teddy Bear went for $600. Go figure. I can make an intricate lace scarf, a toy, or anything I want in quality yarn and still donate it. Cool!

I am proud to say that 21 of my FO were charity items. And I like making hats dangit. It's why I decided to knit. I will always have a charity hat in progress. I just need to branch out a bit and explore my possibilities.

Charity Begins at Home

To quote the old Bartles & Jaymes commercials, “Thank you, for your support.” The messages from you guys when I got home just THREE days after my brain surgery meant so much to me. My knitting community and desire to return to it was, for some reason, something to focus on in the midst of so much fear surrounding this thing in my head.

I‘m home. The surgery went better than expected and I’m physically capable of more than when I went into the hospital six days ago. I was knitting in ICU the day after brain surgery expected to give me more paralysis of my right arm than I started with. My whole rhythm has changed and I can knit faster. Smoother.

Life is good.

So.

I’ve been remiss about posting my F.O. because life got busy. This I can fix as easily. I’ve had several charity items finished and now it’s time for the Second Annual Knit-A-Thon at the Lakeside Café in Columbia, Maryland this Saturday. Since I’ll be saying goodbye to them, I finally got my camera out today and went out on the deck for a photo shoot.

Up there is the Jimmie Johnson preemie hat I made at the NASCAR race in September. It is a lot stiffer than I thought, but I had a lot of fun with it. Even if a baby gets a picture and it hits the floor, it was fun. I’ll do more in soft sweet colors and cushy yarns, I promise. The little model is the Taco Bell Chihuahua. It was from the Godzilla promo commercial and says “Heeeeeeer leezard, leezard, leezard!” In the commercial he sees Godzilla and followed that with “I think I need a bigger box”. That used to crack me UP.

Next is the oldest Warm Up America block in the history of the charity. I wonder if I could get some kind of award. It’s been in the car forever. It’s been ripped out, re-knitted, put on the back burner, lost, forgotten, and pattern-changed. And I’m rid of it. Bwwwaaaaa haaa haaa haaaaaaaaaa!

After that is the Nemo II preemie hat. I actually started this little guy on the way to Richmond and finished him during the Busch race of the event. I decided to make a tail on the top and improvised some short rows to give it a scaled effect. It isn’t perfect, but again, a lot of fun. I like the creative outlet. Could be worth a pattern thing if I put my mind to it, but I don’t know if I’m ready for that yet. I still haven’t written Rainbow up yet.

It’s gonna look like a fish swallowing a baby’s head, eh?

When straightening out my knitting basket last week, I came across some leftover cotton. Knowing the Knit-A-Thon was coming fast, I used it for a face cloth for a knitting buddy’s pet charity in Pittsburgh. The name escapes me, but they give hand knitted cloths to battered women in shelters so they have something feminine and personal of their own. I used the same simple blanket pattern I’ve been using for a pet blanket I hope to have finish for the same event.

The simple rhythm of this cloth gave me someone other than myself to focus on for a while.

So yes. I’ve been busy. I’m gonna BE busy. But it’s so good to look at the little collection up there with pride.

Or simply choose a WIP and pick up where I left off.

Free Armwarmer Patterns

Gotta love free patterns. I’m making some things for me for a change too. With the cooler weather(August??), I need to keep my arms warm when I knit. I started these last week and they are coming along nicely. The pattern is April May by Cider Moon. No more Patternophobia for me. It was one of about 15 or so on my list of possibilities from some talented designers. The links are below.

Gratuitous cuteness courtesy of the baby bunny near our birdfeeder just now, sorry about the haze from the window but she's very timid. For reference - that step is five inches high.

Click the bunny to make her BIIIIG.

April May armwarmers

spookycabledmitts

Clapomitaines

Fetching

Dashing

Purple Skein

warm_cable_armwarmers

Wrist Warmer Pattern Generator

Web Surfing Mitts

Simple Wrist Warmers

Cabled_Fingerless

Diamond handwarmers pattern

fingerless_gloves

Bowhunting Skills

It was a tough decision.

I work on other things in-between because I need to concentrate on the pattern with the YO. It really isn’t bad though, and is shaping up nicely. It’s got just enough YO to look lacy without looking like they’ll catch in everything. Another inch or two and I’ll increase for the hand. I’m making them a bit longer than the pattern calls for because my arm circumference shortens the length a bit even though I added two repeats of the pattern. I want them plenty big to allow some shrinkage.

I’m using the Green Mountain Spinnery 20% cotton yellow yarn I got at Maryland Sheep and Wool. # 2 needles – my smallest yet. They feel kinda rough now but should wash up nice and soft. I like that I can toss them in the washer – and although I plan to avoid it, if they end up in the dryer all is not lost.

I went to the Kiwanis Group today. I needed a small project and Miss Betty suggested Preemie hats - they're always needing more and will use up small bits of yarn. While I was rooting around, she suggested Orioles colors. What fun! I may do some little pumpkins for Halloween too.

I took my copy of Simply Knitting over to the Ladies too since I was done with it. There was much oooing and aaahing over the patterns, but Miss Betty is from England and got the honor of taking it home first. I really got a kick out of sharing it - I don't think most of them buy such things and they thought that my husband was quite amazing for picking it out for me.

But then I knew that.

Doomed I Tell You

Down by the Seashore Preemie Hat looks pretty good. The Gedifra Marokko cotton yarn is so soft and cushy it will be a great chemo hat for a tender head. I've started the decreases now and am looking forward to putting this puppy to rest.

Sounds rosey, eh?

Last night to my dilemma, I discovered I don't have two balls of pink, but two balls of grey left. It figures, now that I solved the math problem everything goes hinky again. My choices are these:

• a grey yarmulke look
• frog it back a bit and make stripes like the pattern calls for
• frog the swatch for the "loopy topper" in pink
• frog it all and make a dishcloth
• burn it
  

This hat is doomed I tell you, doomed. I'm not sure of the final destination for this one.

But, he doesn't knit

So. Last night I finished another Red Hat Society - No Hair Day chemo hat. They're a quick knit and I needed something mindless the other day.

I cast on the little Down by the Seashore Preemie Hat again. I've been in touch with another knitter at Ravelry who made it. (did I mention that I really like Ravelry?) She is giving me some help with the pattern. The wonderful woman even offered to make another one and donate it to a charity so she could better help me. What an amazing gesture from someone I don't know. I cast on (the third time for this pattern) and was telling Bobby how sweet it was etc, etc. He asked me to explain the problem, which I did.

It's a lace pattern and has a section of stitches that repeat over and over. There is wording in the pattern that confuses me. Now, I've knitted Fair Isle with no trouble. The first row of this puppy reads:

1: p1, *k1, p2. repeat from * around. end p1

After my last repeat of the *pattern* I kept looking for one more stitch to purl. It got even worse later on in the pattern when yarn overs and K3tog came into play.

He got it.

He really did. Oh, he hasn't magically decided to knit and his hands are one with the needles. However the math part was clear to him. He picked up a pad of graph paper and wrote out the numbers 1 - 56 for my cast on stitches. Then he filled in a K or a P underneath to represent each stitch. I could see it. He made a knitting chart on a huge scale. He told me that his next step would have been to tape the ends of the pattern together to make a continuous loop - but I got it without that. Now I can boldly go forth.

This was the revelation: The statement " end p1" simply means the last stitch before the stitch marker should have been a purl. Kinda like a Spell Check. Sheesh!

My husband. I love him.

Saartje's Bootees

Thought I'd flash a picture of my Sjaartje's bootees and the little hat. Sartjee's are all the rage you know. So blasted adorable you can't help yourself from knitting up a dozen or so. Mike and Sully over there are modeling for the future little Monster.












The neatest part is I used buttons I found in my mother's old button box. Mom kept this old Tetley Tea can in the china cabinet with her sewing box. When one of our school blouses got ripped or was so threadbare from too many hand-me-downs, she would snip off the buttons and keep them for when we needed a replacement button another time. They were uniforms and always came from the same company. Other buttons were in there too, but the blouse buttons were perfect for the Sjaartje's Bootees.

And gee, if they're 40 years old or so are they antiques?

It's A Major Award!

For anyone who has watched and loved "A Christmas Story" those words can be ominous. Visions of crates from Frajee-lay (must be Italian) come to mind. But when my husband came home from the Borders chanting that and handed me a copy of Simply Knitting, there was more inside the plastic sleeve than a magazine. It seems that each month the editors of the magazine send along a knitting goody. So looky here at what I got. This little flock of sheep tip protectors are three different sizes and easy to tuck into a project bag.


It's a great idea and sparks interest in their magazine - which was loads of fun anyway. Lots of British magazines offer free items such as software or music CDs as incentives. Simply Knitting also had lots of contests, although the copy Bobby picked was a bit ripe and a few had expired. Although many of the ads were for shops I will never get to, the articles were lovely, and well worth keeping. There are lots of patterns for a variety of clothing and other items. A stuffed elephant might have to be made in anticipation of anybodies baby - and just for the cute factor alone.

What fun!

Maybe he'll keep an eye out for other issues for me, wonderful DH that he is.

In other news, I turned in my lavender lace hat at the Mayer Center. It was well received with many oohs and ahhs. Diane also regaled me with the story of my Red Hat Society No Hair Day recipient and her reaction to the hat. I wish I could have seen her in that red convertible with all the fur flying. I'm glad I have plenty of that stuff in my donated stash. I should be able to turn out another for next time.

Meanwhile, I made a little baby hat and am working on booties for a layette to go to the Healthy Families of Howard County at the Kiwanis. The girls get something handmade to bring the babies home in. Miss Betty said sometimes it's the only nice outfit they have. The bootie pattern is Saartje's Bootees and they are all the rage at Ravelry. You can get the pattern from her website Saartje breit (that's Dutch for Saartje knits) I think I'm down to two patterns for the sweater. You know me and my patternophobia. But truthfully, I'm not sure I have enough yarn and it may have to wait until I can pick up some more next week. That baby white just isn't something I have in my stash - of course I already have blue in the hat and shoes so other colors will work also. Both patterns are top down, require almost no seaming and have simple designs. I can like that.

It's fun to be working on something new all the time. I like small projects. Instant gratification. Yeah. After the forever sweater and Veteran's blanket I needed a few quickies.

Hopefully the baby sweater won't take too long - it IS for an infant after all.

The Feminine Touch

I finished my Lace Edged Women's Hat for the Claudia Mayer Center ohhhhh last week some time. I just got around to taking pictures yesterday though. I swear. I am going to get some coaching on the lace thing. I know I'm using a non-breathing yarn (acrylic) because that's what the center wants, but I can see that my painstakingly following the directions didn't get the lace quite right. I know this for sure because I can compare my work to no less than 6 other knitters with pictures of their projects on ravelry.


I hate to sound like a broken record, but seeing how 6 different women knit up the same pattern with 6 different yarns is the biggest reason to sign up for a ravelry account RIGHT THIS MINUTE.

<------- click the shiny blinky ravelry button over there <-------

I'm currently working on the preemie hat. Arrragh. Well, it thinks it is a preemie hat. Once again, my gauge is right, but this thing looks rather large for any preemie I ever took care of in Labor and Delivery or The Nursery. Hrumph! I did wimp out on continuing the lace up the body of the hat. Instead I did a color change. It's very soft and suitably cute. I found a project for booties on ravelry too from Saartje, one of the designers who has her patterns available for download directly from the site. You can see them on the right side of her blog here. She has a newborn and should know a thing or two about what stays on a baby's feet. Besides, I've alway's wanted to use some of the ton of antique buttons from my Mother and Grandmother's button can. I plan to cast these on as soon as the hat is done - they are calling my needles so loudly.

Oh I hear ya. If I ever stop playing with ravelry and this computer long enough to knit anything again, right? Well in 30 minutes I'm off to Sit-n-Knit with K1P2 down at the Lakeside and have dinner with my husband at the concert afterwards while I finish this hat.

Watch me!

Lace Expectations

Am I dense? I'm on my second pattern with lace and the repeat doesn't make sense. Either the designers left two unnecessary stitches in BOTH times or I'm just reading these things wrong. The little preemie hat doesn't say to place a marker but does speak of the pattern in "rounds" so I know I'm not mad. I've ripped it out and started over (this time with Clive Owen and Jackie Chan) and got the same result. My biggest puzzlement came when I was left with three stitches to go. According to the pattern, my next move was k3tog. No problem right? Oh yeah, what about the general directions for the row which read "end with p1"??? Where do I get the extra stitch? When you look at the area where the rounds begin, there is an awkward flat area.

I went back over the entire row and checked to see if I had made a mistake. Nope. I can't explain the math part, it hurts my brain. The only thing I can figure is the original directions were written to be knitted on circular needles and someone tried to add stitches at each end to make it a flat pattern? That wouldn't work. Every other row would be backwards. It would explain the extra stitches - they would be used for seaming. Since the pattern is a wavy thing anyway, I'm gonna mush on and see what I got. "end with p1" be damned.

Now my problem is I have one fewer stitches than what I cast on after the k3tog decrease row. The pattern doesn't state any reminders like "54 stitches now" or "53 stitches on the needles". I'm moving on and if the next row comes out one short I'll "M1" and fudge it next row. It's a teeny tiny hat puffy and hopefully an error will get lost in the folds of the waves. I could chuck the whole thing and use another pattern, but now it's a matter of knitterly honor.

But I'm liking the lace part.

Fear of Socks

Why am I sooo afraid of these socks? Last night I started a preemie hat for the Kiwanis Wallis Center and all I could think about was the damn socks. It probably has to do with my whole avoidance issue with my sister right now since the socks are for her. Hmmm. Maybe I should make different socks. That's it! I'll make Jaywalkers or Monkeys or SOMETHING other than my original plan. I've seen so many great patterns on ravelry, I'm sure I can get motivated somewhere to knit something with some kind of pretty string. It's daunting you know. "Her socks are prettier than my socks" "My socks are so plain" "Everyone will laugh at my socks". You get the picture.

Meanwhile, ravelry continues to fascinate me. Just photographing and logging in my inventory is overwhelming, and by no means do I have a lot of stuff. I've seen the stash confessions of the knitters , some of whom I admire from afar. Geez! It's embarrassing to look at my pitiful personal collection. I don't really count the donated yarn, although some of it is nice for acrylic. I like to keep the two separate, and I never use the donated yarn for personal projects. I have expanded out of my original cupboard though :) something I never thought would happen. I blame Maryland Sheep and Wool for that. I HAD to have better storage for the good stuff than wedging all of it into the top shelf. I was worried about damaging the fibers. Gotta protect the investment don'tcha know.

::wink wink, nudge nudge::

Anyway. This morning ravelry won't load. The site must be down for repair. Waaaah! I'm stamping my little knitter's foot and pouting my little knitter's lower lip. After checking about every half hour (oh my, she is obsessed isn't she) I just checked the link by hand entering ravelry.com in the browser window. HUZZAH! My link in my bookmarks works too. Rejoice knitters of the land and lay down thy needles, ravelry is up and running.

Gotta go.

Fireworks

Night-blooming flowers Lucy Huntzinger used with permission

Okay, so I haven't completely retired. We went out to the car to go to the fireworks last night (I know, it was raining). I didn't want to take the lavender hat because of the decreases - in the dark. Bobby found an ancient WUA block in the Toyota so I transferred it to my car. It took me a minute to remember the pattern around the edge, that's how long ago it's been since I'd seen the poor thing. Boy! That is some huge acrylic.

I love fireworks. With the rain, lightning and threat of cancellation I wouldn't let Bobby pay ten bucks to park by the Lake. We headed to the mall parking lot with our dinner and went up the parking deck by the theater. It may not be as spectacular, but it was dry and sinus problems have been rampant in our house lately. There were others gathered and the atmosphere was festive.

We ate with the windows down and listened to someones radio as we watched the intermittent rain and lightning. People kept coming. After a delay of about thirty minutes, it stopped raining. I noticed a big puff of light in the direction of the water. That wasn't lightning. Everybody out of the cars! A modest but thoroughly enjoyable fireworks display followed. From where we were, we could hear the Ahhhs and applause from the lake. I couldn't believe it.

I leaned on Bobby and softly hummed The Star Spangled Banner.

Swearter gets the Checkered Flag

Well, I finished my Swearter on Sunday, you win Nittany Knits. With four laps to go and Jeff Gordon battling for first place I began to cast off my four stitches. I crossed the start/finish before the checkers. Jeff came in second but retained his first place standings for the NASCAR Nextel Cup Championship. Go #24!

I can't turn the lap blanket in until two weeks from now. We won't meet on the Fourth of July for some reason ;) I know the ladies will be proud of me. I picked up some baby yarn last week so I can do a few preemie hats. I need some instant gratification. Baby yarn isn't something I got in all the donated yarn my bag o'yarn stash from columbiafreecycle. I chose some soft, silky, shiny white partial balls leaving the whole skeins for the blanket and sweater makers. I really do like this mindless pattern though. It begins each row with a simple 4-5 stitch pattern and then it's k,k,k,k. It's knit on the diagonal and increases each row until the middle of your available yarn or when you've reached you're desired length. Then you start to decrease until you reach the other side. Brilliant! It's great for Thursday nights down at the Lakeside. A pretty eyelet forms around the edge and Miss Mary tells me she threads a ribbon through it for her baby blankets. Maybe a baby blanket the next time, they do get a fair amount of pastel at the Senior Center and I do need something mindless when I talk..

In other news, I am sad to announce my retirement from knitting. ravelry is so much fun and time consuming that I have decided to give up knitting and concentrate on the world surrounding knitting. I feel really fortunate to have the account. It's like manna from heaven. When I got the invite from frecklegirl (one of the originators) I was excited. It wasn't until I began to explore the site that I got so amazed. From the site 10 days ago:

We are up to 3063 users, 682 unclaimed invitations, and 7303 people on the waiting list.

Geez! I'm more in awe than ever. I was reading in the forums today and realized something. They only started the site nine weeks ago on May 2,2007. Nine weeks ago! These people live in our heads. It has everything I've been thinking about for organizing my knitting and more, so throw away your little books and spreadsheets. They do have plans to tweak several areas like the needle inventory. It's still in Beta testing after all. But there is a forum dedicated to working out any kinks. Turns out Firefox is the browser of choice so I'm in the pink as far as that is concerned. They had no idea it would fly off the needles like that.

Huzzah! Revel in ravelry!

I've been busy exploring the site (screenshots here), entering data about my projects, FINDING the data for my projects, taking pictures of my stash to enter, gathering data about my needles . . . the list goes on ad nauseum. Seriously, no knitting for two days. Haven't looked at the needles or fondled the Austermann yarn now that the Swearter is done.

So go! Get in line. It's only going to get longer. I'm tinkknitz there too and you'll see Javagem, KnitGlit, StormMoonKnits and GiantsKnitter too. There are others I recognize and designers too. C'mon over to the dark side.

I only hope I can keep up. Back to ravelry now . . .

Group : Take II

Since the Mayer Center is only twice a month, I started looking for another daytime charity group. The Kiwanis Wallas Rec Center on Frederick Road in Ellicott City was just what I was looking for. They meet two days a month also - on the alternate Wednesdays from my other group. Perfect!

Their stash is huge. Four two-sided cabinets, six feet tall and crammed with every imaginable color. These ladies turn out a lot of knitted goods, let me tell you. On the day I was there, They turned in about 20 blankets, their biggest project. There were also numerous hat/scarf/mitten sets, baby sweaters and hats for hospital nurseries. Several blankets had gauge problems with mixed yarns, and when I offered to help organize, the ringleader laughed it off.

Honey, we're all about product here. This is charity work.

Seems she just can't keep up with the supply and demand. Women go through large lots of yarn as fast as she can bring it in and return odd balls and partial balls. These are tossed in where they will fit. People use several small balls for hats and scarves for shelters. Besides, it would take time away from knitting. I acquiesced.

Their current biggest charity is lap blankets for wheelchairs at the Veterans Home. They have a great pattern that starts with four stitches at a corner and knits with diagonal increases on both sides. When you are halfway through your chosen yarn, you start to decrease This forms a square. The YO increase even gives it a pretty edge. It's simple and eliminates waste. One lady had several lovely blankets made in this pattern made from ribbon. They were beautiful, luxurious and flexible. There was some discussion of how the gentleman in wheelchairs liked the blankets like this because they stayed in place better. Pop Pop had one at Riverview. I never knew who knit it or where it came from, but it was always there. When he passed, I asked if I could have it. I liked the idea of "replacing it" for somebody else's Pop Pop.

I found a woven cotton yarn from Spain. 5 grey, 2 red and 2 mauve. I took all nine balls, no leftovers from me.