Cow Costume

Dancing Cow costume
My daughter participated in “The Glass Slipper”, a ballet based on the story of Cinderella. During one part of the play she and a fellow dancer performed a “magical” dance, which turned straw into gold.

Together my daughter and I helped out by creating the costume. We started by making a paper Mache covered balloon. This we attached to a bicycle helmet. I carved a nose from Styrofoam. We attached the fabric and eyes using hot glue.

The cow was a great success. The dance instructor even invited my daughter to perform at an outside dance and sing fest.

Finished my husbands Hat!

Here are some nice photos of the finished hat. My niece Nili is the model. As you can see the hat is a bit large for her.

Nili has been visiting for a few days. Its been fun coming home from work and chatting. We would pour a glass of wine, break out the chips and dip and catch up.

I'm teaching her how to "blog" so she can pass along the skill to her family.

A few years ago I taught my sister to blog and now she blogs way more than I do. She also uses blogs for her classes. In case you want to see my sister's web log about boat building and restoration.http://www.greenboats.blogspot.com/

A Hat Big Enough

My husband is someone whose head size is larger than the average. He has a hard time finding hats to fit. He recently, came down stairs so proudly saying, “I just found a web-site where I can order an extra large hat.” After hearing that, I was humbled into finally beginning a knit hat that would fit his head.

Just before Christmas I downloaded Brooklyntweed’s “Turn A Square” free hat pattern. Thank you, Jared! I thought this would be a fun hat to knit and would be manly enough for my hubbie to wear. I spoke with my friend Ellen who makes recycled cashmere yarn. She had just dropped some nice gray colored yarn for sale at one of our local yarn stores. I dashed over to “Ewe’ll Love It!” and made my purchase. I proceeded to visit several other stores in search of accompanying contrasting stripe colors.

For such a simple looking hat there were some technical challenges to completing a good looking result. This hat is knit in the round on circular needles where stripes appear with steps at the color changes. To avoid these stepped stripes, I used the jogless stripe knit technique found here on the techknitting blogspot: techknitting blogspot. I wish I understood there was such a simple solution sooner. I could have used this technique earlier in my two-stranded knitting.

I didn’t finish this in time for a Christmas gift but started right afterwards. This way I got a chance to use part of my new gift of Knitpick's Interchangeable Harmony Wood Circular Needles. Instead of using double pointed needles at the close of the hat top, I used two circular needles (see photo). To make the stitches slide easily from the left side needle to the right I used one needle size smaller on the left needle connection.

I did run into some problems with this knit design. I didn’t see other commenting on this on Ravelry, so, it could just be the way I knit. I found I was creating a rather large gap where the “corner” raglan style decrease was occurring in my knitting (see photo). As I noticed the effect starting a few rows up I tried to minimize the gap. I found it helped to knit tightly in the area one row prior to the decrease area. It helped but, I still came back and ran a few tightening stitches through the loops on the backside of the knitted fabric at the raglan decrease line (see photo).

Band Costume Design

I helped my daughter’s middle school theater with their costumes for the performance of “Barnum”. We collected circus costumes and 1870’s clothes, and we found that we needed fourteen 1890’s band costumes. Well, I took on the project. I found a good web site with lots of old time band pictures. (http://www.ibew.org.uk/vbbp-us1.htm)(Mostly men, I guess women weren’t allowed out in public back then. At least not as a band member.)

At first I was hoping that the students would not wear hats since our budget was limited. But, after looking into all the old band pictures; almost every band has caps on their heads. The style I that thought would be appropriate (conductor style) are hard to find. Because of that my daughter and I thought to create them from an inexpensive top hat. It’s really Nomi’s design. She worked on them slowly but surely finished.

For the actual, band jacket I altered a short styled women’s stand-up collar jacket. I added the extra Triangle shape flap for band “flare”. This is where we added the trim straight across the chest with buttons on the ends. Michael's craft supply store sells a mix of gold buttons so we mixed and matched the buttons to the front.

Our costume committee members helped to cut out the jacket pieces. We distributed the cut pieces out to two different mothers who also helped to sew them up.
So here you see the final results on the students. Hurrah! Come follow the band!

Latvian Mitten Knit-Along

It has been quite awhile since I last posted. I have been knitting and will slowly feature my finished projects here over the next few weeks.
This Picture is the start of my latest project, “Latvian Mittens”. Our knitter’s guild, NVKG, is having a knit-along. Our president and treasurer took a Latvian Mitten knitting class last summer. They liked it so much they wanted to share.
They came up with a modified pattern and started to explain the cuff detail in our November meeting. About thirty of our member all started along. We learned how to do a modified long tail cast on which uses two different colors. The braid detail is purl stitches where the back of the stitch is actually carried in front of the work instead of the back. By twisting this yarn as you go along you get the raised looking braid. It will be fun to see the results of all our members.
The basic pattern calls for light, medium, and dark wool. Of course I couldn’t settle on just three colors so I am using all of them mixed in. I like the basic green tones when they are highlighted by the bright blues. I got a chance to knit in the car while we drove to the Cape for the weekend. That’s how I got so far.

I am sad to say that my dearly loved mother has passed away this april. We will all miss her dearly.

Combination Knitting & Noro Scarf

It seems a while ago but our last knit guild meeting was an interesting one with a presentation made by knit author Annie Modesitt.

She was a comical and interesting speaker. She was self-taught and developed a knit style where the purl stitch is created using an under-pull style called “Combination knitting”. Ms. Modesitt had our whole guild group creating knit fabric using this unique stitch. Many of our members found it a bit difficult to switch to this unique purl style, but I think I will try a knit project using this purl stitch before I give it up.

You can see my knit sample results at the left. We were asked to knit the bottom in our usual style then try the “Combination knit style” above it. I did find that my knit fabric is a bit tighter. We also learned a method for creating cables without a cable needle. The saying goes, “make a might X, then pinch, slip, poke.” I could have used the method when I knit a cabled hat earlier this year.

I am also working on a Noro single rib scarf. I was thrilled by the beautiful stripe Noro scarf , which Jared knit on his Brooklyntweed blog.

You can also see a bunch other beautiful scarves by searching for Noro scarf on Flicker.

I have been admiring the Noro Silk Garden yarn for sometime. My daughter was with me during one of my visits to my local yarn shop. She suggested we get it for my up and coming birthday. Well, how could I resist! We brought it home and she hid it until my birthday. Shortly after it was unwrapped I had it cast on. It is a great project for non-technical knitting like car rides and sitting and chatting. This picture shows it half way. After my trip to visit my parents over Easter I’ve got a quarter left to go now.

Blue Koolhaas

It's 5 AM in my house. My daughter is sick with Steppe throat. I can’t sleep, since I’m wondering if the twinges of pain below my ears are caused by her spreading infection. So, I decided to take my mind off of it and catch up on some blogs.

The second hat I knit for our Guild’s hat contest was the Koolhaas by Brooklyntweed . The original directions for this wonderful creation appeared in the 2007 Holiday issue from Interweave Knits. I loved almost every pattern from this past Holiday issue. I made the December Lights Tam from the from the front cover and Jared’s Koolhass hat. I’m seriously considering the cable gloves and my daughter would like me to knit the messenger bag so she can do the needle felting on the front flap. I could go on-and-on, but, in any case. . . .
Nice issue and nice hat! . . .
I had a few question from guild members about the pattern I used for the hat so here are some details.

One of the rules for our contest was that the yarn should be machine wash and dryable (acrylic). After the contest, all the hat entries were to be donated to the Seven Hills at Groton nursing home. Being acrylics makes it easier for the foundation to care for the hats after being used.
My daughter and I really liked the Koolhaas hat pattern. So, I decided to give it a try. The original pattern calls for the Yak yarn made by Shokay, which doesn’t quite fit into the acrylic category. So, JoAnn Fabric came into play again with Lion Brand Vanna's Choice Yarn.

This yarn weight is a bit thicker than called for so I had to make some adjustment to the stitch count. The pattern diamond pattern is based on a 8-stitch repeat so I adjusted down from 104 stitches to 96 in the round using a size 7 US needle.

I was on a road trip in with my brother when I started testing this pattern. The printed pattern in the magazine relies on symbols to chart the actual stich-work used in the 8-by-8-stitch repeat. I’m pretty good with patterns but it took me awhile to figure this one out. (It could be that I was chatting with my brother the whole way.) I would definitely recommend a practice swatch before beginning, though. Once I understood when to hold the single crossover cable stitch in front or when to hold it in back I was able to knit without checking the pattern.

I did find the decrease instructions for the top of the hat confusing. It might have been that the pattern doesn’t translate well since I decreased the stitch count of the round. Now that I’m not tight for time I hope to repeat the hat for my daughter.

Morning Glories!

Our knitting guild the Nashoba Valley Knitting Guild had its’ hat contest last night and my Morning Glories hat won one of the prizes, the one for most beautiful. Yahoo!!! Here is my daughter modeling it. Excuse me if I say that I’m rather proud since I’ve never won anything before, not even a free scratch ticket. Our Guild even offered the winners prizes. How Cool ! I got a cute measuring tape, a fun knitting bag, a craft necklace, and a gift certificate to, The World of Stitches, a local crafts shop.

I was rather worried since after washing and drying it was not very shapely. I hadn’t knit with multi-stranded colors in awhile. I was rather rusty in the beginning. I was forcing the stranding at the back to be looser than I should have so the bottom was more floppy than I would have like. I was actually going to rip it out and my daughter convinced me to keep it. So I pressed it and wet it and dyed it with a cord and towel. Then it was much better. . .

I bought the yarn on sale in September at Jo-Ann Fabrics. When I bought the yarn I was thinking I might use it for making a hat for the contest. I had been on the prowl for something to use and at $1.97 who could resist. I got one of each color. I bought the yarn thinking of stripes or something colorful. When I took the library hat book home I was immediately inspired by the Morning Glories pattern. Now the saga begins . . .

I had the most of the colors that I needed for the pattern except green. So, coming from a crafty family, I chose to dye the white yarn green. (My mother is a rug hooker extraordinaire and dyes a lot.) Alas, I had only one white that I ball that I needed for the background! Back to Jo-Ann’s for more, what no more! . . . I had to go up to Tewksbury for more. I got it and dyed it!

So in my usual distracted fashion. I finished the hat and got around to the flowers but didn’t sew them together. Yup, Thanksgiving came and went, then Christmas. In between I cleaned up the house for company. The end of January is coming up and “Uh, Oh” I better finish the hat for the contest. After much searching I found the hat part with a bag of unfinished projects but no flowers. I spent one Saturday searching through several boxes of yarn. I finally turned the boxes over and found the flowers hiding in the bottom. Well the pieces are together and I’m happy with the results. All the members who knitted hats did a great job. Take a look at the tableful of hat contest entries. I sure hope all the lucky people at Seven Hills will enjoy them!

Project Details: Morning Glories hat found in the book
Knit Hats! by Gwen Steege

It’s one of the books our Guild has in its collection of lending books.

Yarn: Bellezza Collection Stellina
white, blue, orange, pink, lavender, green (home-dyed)

Needles: 6 US double pointed

Thoughts/Modifications: It was fun. I giggled as I made the flowers. I didn’t totally follow the flower directions though. Since the directions were well written I’m sure the directions would have made fine flowers except it called for knitting them flat. I already knit the hat in the round so why bother with stitching up a seam when I can just knit them in the round.

Finished my Alligator scarf

Hurray! I’ve finished the Alligator scarf. I have so many projects going it is nice to accomplish one.

I enjoyed knitting this scarf because it was fun to create forms such as the bumps just by increase and decrease stitches.
The yarn is Merino but it not as soft as other Merino brands that I have knit with. I found a few bits of grass within the twists of yarn. The kit definitely has enough yarn. I have about ½ skein remaining. If knitted for an adult I would recommend adding a few extra rows of middle bumps to add enough length to be able to tie.

As you can see it is a scarf fit for a child. I’m sure a young boy would really like it. On me it drapes around my neck but is hard to knot. My friends all have said how great the color is. The sage green color really makes it look like an alligator. When choosing the pattern on the
Morehouse web site there are 14 colors. I’m thinking in the future I might enjoy a scarf of one on the other colors such as gold or purple.

All in All I would knit this Alligator again and have even looked into some of the other fun scarf patterns that Morehouse offers. There is a funny one, which looks like a bunch of foxes linked together. Well, it’s a thought that I’ll consider during the summer. I’ve got too many other projects to finish.

I did finish one more hat which will I’ll show off after our Guild’s hat contest in two weeks.

Happy New Year!

I resolve to be a more consistant blogger. I resolve to knit more. I resolve to pull out my knitting machine and “blaze” away . . . maybe loose weight . . . clean out the closets . . . organize my stash . . . All right; nice dreams! . . . I’ll start here.

We did have a nice holiday season that came and went.

I finished my December Lights Tam in time to wear it for the holiday. It’s cheery red-green combination helped brighten the season. Almost every time I wear it I get compliments. I’ll post my summary soon.

I started and tried to finish a Nordic design pair of mittens for my daughter. They turned out to be way too big so I had to rip them out. I’ve told a few people but was trying to keep it a secret from my daughter for a present. Well she found out by snooping through my knitting bag. So I guess I can talk about it out in the open.

I found a design of mitten with a reindeer motif that I liked. Since my daughter is madly in love with her dog, I thought it would be cute to replace the reindeer with a black lab silohette. I could not find the right silohette that I wanted so I used my Photoshop skills to recreate a new image. I took the legs from one image, the tail from another and the head from a third. I liked how the designed graphed using 35 stiches across but now that I am using less stiches total for my mitten the image is rendered using 25 stiches. With fewer stiches the dog image looses detail. The legs used to be two stiches wide and now they are only one. I’m sort of stuck at this point. I might just continue to knit the less charming dog or try to re-design it.

Any way, I’m putting it aside to work on a hat for the NVKG knit hat contest. Sorry, I won’t post any of those pictures until after the contest since the knit hat owners need to be secret until after the contest.

Hello NVKG

Knitting Blogs
presentation for Nashoba Valley Knitters' Guild

Personal blog: http://knitmoreand.blogspot.com/

Favorite Blogs:
Socktoberfest KAL creator http://lollygirl.com/blog/
Brooklyntweed http://brooklyntweed.blogspot.com/index.html
Grumperina http://www.grumperina.com/knitblog/
Free Patterns http://www.knitty.com/
Wyoming Knitter http://www.unwindknitting.net/
Master Yarn Dyer Blog http://purlywhites.typepad.com/purly_whites/
Brookline Group Blog http://www.knitsmiths.us/
Circumnavigated Cardigan Project http://www.ample-knitters.com/cnc.html

Start your own Blog
Free site: Blogger by Google https://www.blogger.com/start
Check Comparisons: http://www.ojr.org/ojr/images/blog_software_comparison.cfm

Knit Alongs (KAL) Examples
Soctoberfest http://lollygirl.com/blog/2006/09/18/socktoberfest-questions
Zimmermania http://zimmermaniacs.blogspot.com/

Web Rings
New England Knitters http://newenglandknits.wordpress.com/
Knitting Blogs http://knittingring.blogspot.com/

Pictures
Upload Low Res Pictures
Another Picture Venue
Flicker is used for online photo albumshttp://www.flickr.com/groups/socktoberfest/

Podcasts:
Place to search for Podcast News http://www.podcastingnews.com/
CraftSanity Podcast http://www.craftsanity.com/podcast/
Craftcast with Alison Lee http://www.craftcast.com/

Halloween '07

My other domestic skills came into play this week for Halloween. Every year I make a costume for my daughter. This year it was a geisha kimono. It came out very nicely if I do say so myself. Even thought the costume will probably be worn once or twice I always mind the fine details. It takes longer but I prepare a quality-sewing job. I always back stitch at end of seams. I knot the end threads and sew them into a hidden seam. My daughter doesn’t appreciate these things and I wonder sometimes why I bother especially for an outfit that will be worn only a few times. Oh well, at least I enjoy the process.
We had a nice night here in New England for trick-or-treating. My daughter had some of her friends come over. They claimed to be the “Asian” sisters with the Queen Marie Antoinette. It was fun and the girls were very tired once they got home. I must say even I, who am not a great sleeper, slept well last night.

Alligator Scarf

I am thrilled with this cute scarf, although I don’t think my daughter (11) is. She asked why I would want an alligator wrapped around my neck. The directions are easy to follow. The main pattern workhorse stitch is an increase stitch. They have a very detailed explanation for this stitch and other details.
I was reading the back pages of Interweave Knits and came across the ad. I followed the
Morehouse Farm Merino Link
and found this scarf in many colors of 100% Merino. I chose the Sage color because I think it is closer in color to the real thing. I made some swatches and found that the suggested 5 US came close to gauge. Even though, the gauge swatch made in 6 US felt softer I went with the number 5 US needles. I’m sorry I did since, I was struggling to slip my needle into the increase and deceases stitches.

The final knit head is fun though (see left). The yarn has a nice smooth feel. I do find the knitting on size 5US feels too hard for my taste, especially if the scarf will be wrapped around my neck. So I decided to go up a needle size. I’m not afraid to rip out. I would rather have a knit product that I will wear than to worry about the time already spent.

I had heard some discussion in my Knitting Guild about a “lace needle.”
Since I already decide to go up a size I thought I would try it out. I bought an Addi Turbo 'Lace' Circular. It’s amazing how this one small adustment can make the knitting process simpler. This pattern has a great deal of increase stitches. The extra sharpness of the point allows it to slide through the tight loop without as much struggle as I was having with a normal needle. I took a picture so you can see the difference between needles.

The pattern is basically garter stitch with increases and decrease stitches of knit 2 stitches togethers. It’s just plain fun knitting and then suddenly you have some eyes and a snout. The yarn thickness to the scarf is good enough to retain the animal shape.

Guild Project - Circumnavigated Cardigan

Our knitting Guild has chosen to work as a group on Meredith Glover’s Circumnavigated Cardigan (CnC). Our Guild purchased the pattern for every one this year using a part of the dues. You can check out Meredith Glover’s patterns Here . During our most recent Guild meeting one of the members was explaining the construction methods and has us working on specific techniques by generating a mini one-arm sweater. I’m excited to work on it together since everyone will generate a unique one with his or her own yarn and styling.

It seems like a fun sweater with side pockets. They have an interesting creation method of knitting a longer bottom edge, which includes the pocket fronts on the sides. The pockets are then folded over and the sweater is then knit with normal sizing for the middle section. During our meeting we were also instructed about the “i-cord” edging. It adds a nice finish to the edge, but I found from my sample swatch that I need to knit the pocket edge very loosely or it bunches up.


Now, to my current concern . . . .
I can’t decide on a yarn to use yet.
I’ve been playing around with a variety of yarns thinking of different textures and yarn qualities that I might want in a sweater. On top of that I have a desire to use my stash.

Well, as you can see from my examples I have a variety of options to choose from. I really like the red tweed. I definitely want to make a sweater out of this but, after seeing the pattern and it’s alternative leaf edge lace option, I’m thinking, I would like to use this red tweed yarn with a bit of extra detail along the button edge. Since the lace edge pattern suggest that you have made one before altering the basic pattern, I think I might use some thick yarn to knit one fast. If I do this I can work out the construction details then use the red tweed with a flourish.

It just so happens I went to JoAnn Fabrics looking with my daughter for Halloween costume suggestions. While we were there I couldn’t just walk past the yarn section with out seeing the pretty colors, now could I? I just so happened to find some really chunky yarn for .97 cents a skein. See, it actually knits up “Fun”. So I think this will be my yarn for the CnC.

I'm Back . . . .

I know, I know, I’ve been away for a while. Well, I’m back. I’ll try to be more blog faithful. I don’t know what it was; maybe getting used to my new job, summer, garden, dog or all of the above. While I was away I hardly knit and I only picked up my shadow-knitting project 2 weeks ago.

Since then I’ve been busy knitting though. I’ve knit 5 inches of the second front to my shadow vest (see picture).

Our knitting guild is knitting the circumnavigated sweater together, so I was working on swatches for that as well. While we were traveling up to Maine I was busy swatching. I show the swatch samples on another day. Until them . . . I can say . . . I’m . . .B A C K . . . .

Eye Candy Friday 5.11.07

Jessie found that she likes asparagus. In this picture she is laying down and licking the stumps where I cut some stalks. The bed is messy with old stalks laying around. I was late mulching the bed. I'll have to weed soon.

Jessie has been trained to lay down by following a treat past her nose down to the floor. Until last week this was the only way to get her to lay down. Just last weekend, my daughter taught Jessie to lay down by just pointing to the floor. She used an asparagus as a treat.

Eye Candy Friday 5.4.07

We have daffodils! I love these spring flowers mostly because they keep coming back year after year. I love gardening but the Spring always seems so busy. Last weekend I weeded and mulched our strawberries. I tend to keep the perennial beds for later in the year.




I have been working on my Mermaid socks from the book the
Cool Socks Warm Feet book. I needed a simple project that I can knit without thinking too hard. My Shadow Knit vest requires too much consentration that I can’t listen to people talking, knit and count easily. The basic socks knit pattern is K2, O, K2tog, K2. The O and K2tog (yarn over and knit 2 together) make the socks have a sharp right slant ridge. The self striping yarn looks interesting with the knit pattern. Because of the slanted ridges the striped look broken up into slanted squares. I like it.



I was knitting this sock during our
NVK Guild’s May meeting. (See picture.) At the end of the meeting four different people came up and wanted to know about the pattern. It does intrigue you. It’s pattern is deceptively simple. I think from afar it looks like it is a knitted basket weave.

Something Else

We have built a kennel for our dear dog Jessie. She needs a place to stay while I'm at work. My husband is now traveling more and is away for several days at a time. This project went together fairly simply. The kennel itself was a kit from Home Depot. The hardest part was gathering the materials. The stones alone required two trips from the hardware store. Its a good thing that my husband finished the trailer kit last summer. We have used it alot for hauling things such as building supplies and even stage scenery for my daughters plays. For our kennel, you can see my husband and daughter did most of the base assembly. They were working on the stones and pavers while I carted over them all over from the driveway. My shoulders hurt the next day. Jessie is quite comfortable in the pen. My first two days at work I was worried since we didn't get a chance to try it out before Jessie needed to stay inside. She did fine! This week it rained a bit while I was at work and with her umbrella and the dog house Jessie stayed quite dry and comfy. Its two weeks now and I'm not as worried as I was at first.
By the Way:
I have been knitting. I am working on my shadow knit vest. I'm almost done with the front left panel.

Eye Candy Friday 4.13.07

Isn’t she cute? Well, sometimes! I was trying to photograph the Lace Top directions picture for this Blog and Jessie couldn’t resist being the center of attention.

I must say, being black, she is very hard to photograph. I rarely get a photo with good detail. She usually ends up being a black blob. This one was made using a flash, which sometimes washes out the rest of the picture detail.

It’s Friday the thirteenth. Should I be worried because my black dog crossed my path? (Or sat on my work?)

I wanted to show an idea for a future project . . . . I like it, but might not look very good in it because of arm flab. My daughter really likes this sweater also. I first saw the finished sweater as a completed sample when our knitting guild had the “Yarn Tasting” in the Fiber Loft. (I wrote about that in the last blog entry.) The pattern is in the Nashua Handknits North American Designer Collection No. 4. Pattern book.

It is planned to knit using Nashua Natural Focus Cotton yarn but I might consider using some of the Bamboo yarn that I sampled. We’ll see when I get there. . .