They're Here...They're Here!

Two pattern that I have been waiting for were recently released by some great knit blog designers - Chinese Lace and Scarlet Woman. They look fantastic!

Those who cannot do, should blog the hell out of someone else who can. So here you go ladies! Gotta love original design!

Nope...Still No WIP Pics but Check These Out!

But have you seen these double pts from Blue Sky Alpaca? I know I may be late to the game on this but I am loving the case. I know that is no reason to spend $28.00 for a set of double pts, but I think Blue Sky has a winner with this really beautiful looking case. If it came down to it in my LYS and they had these, I would probably dish out the extra bucks for them. But since I have not seen them in person I can resist by pretending that they are an online mirage that I will click away from and they will disappear.

And like that...they were gone.

Bad Blogging Does NOT a Bad Knitter Make

So I have not been as diligent in my updates. Everytime I see another bloglines update from my fellow knit bloggers, I feel a little guilty. However, I am reading their blogs while trudging away at the Sunrise Circle Jacket. I finished the Left Side on Wednesday at my SnB meeting and immediately casted on for the right as I am now obsessed with finishing. Besides I need to finish this jacket soon cause the weather is getting chilly, so much so I kinda wanted a scarf around my neck during the night tonight. However, I am in Southern California for Pete's sake and I feel a little silly having a scarf on in September.

I am also not a very good polygaknitter. My green mimosa is calling out to me for seaming which I promised myself that I would do this weekend. Actually that promise doesn't really count because there was no one to keep me accountable...hee hee.

I am also a lazy sewing crafter, because instead of doing a little hand stitching for my bag, I decided to get a Singer Stitch Sew Quick at Target for $14.99 to do the hard work



In conclusion, I have no knitting pictures or real knitting content but like a true knitter I am putting the knitting first! So I declare...Bad Blogging Does NOT a Bad Knitter Make!

Come back soon for some finished pictures...or at least some better WIP pics

Getting A Head

So normally when I am away from Blogging it is because I have nothing to blog about and since this is a knitting blog that essential means I have not been knitting.

HOWEVER...in this case it is exactly the opposite. I have not blogged because I have been knitting wildly for days on end with the hopes of having some finished product and or more finished pieces at least. But alas I am without something knitwise that is blog worthy. Besides I am not much for WIP photography unless it speaks to me and motivate me to take a picture. So here is the knitted hem of my Sunrise Circle Jacket which I am loving.



I keep trying it on as I knit the Left Front which is as far as I have gotten so far.

On my Green Mimosa (aka pink mimosa), I have all the main stockinette pieces but have to get to the seaming. Deadline will be this weekend for seaming.

My Easy Peasy Bag was just that until the seaming was necessary. That too has taken a backburner due to finishing.

On other fronts, I received my yarn of the month samples and am loving the Karabella Soft Tweed. I was kinda sad that I did not use it on the Sunrise Circle Jacket, but then I looked up the cost of the yarn and once again realized why I chose the much more inexpensive wool alternative.

In other news, I have acquired more knitting accessories.

Hedera's Introduction

Everyone meet Hedera, my new African American hat model. As you can see she is currently modeling Odessa for her introductory shoot.




I found her at the Long Beach Antique Market which I loved. I went with a fellow knitter from my Long Beach Stitch and Bitch group. It was great. We walked almost the entire 20 acres of "Stuff" resulting in exhaustion and dehydration. There was just so much to see I couldn't pull myself away from going down "just one more aisle". Afterwards we ate at Open Sesame in Long Beach and had the best Fried Potatoes. I highly recommend this restaurant if you are in the area.

Adrienne Vittadini Arrives

I have been waiting for my copy of the Adrienne Vittadini Fall 2003 pattern book for a week after purchasing it off of Destash for Cash. I was so happy when it came because not only did it have the pattern for one of the future knits but also had some other patterns that I will add to my might knits.




Which all in all makes this pattern book a great buy


Lord Of the Yarn (gratuitous kitty alert)

My kitties fought over who would get to play with my yarn as I knit my SCJ.





As you can see Kira won

Knitting and Mail...A Match Made in Heaven

I LOVE mail! I have loved mail since I was a kid. Given, I have never liked writing letters but I loved receiving them. 'Til this day I love coming home to magazines, packages, and have even loved receiving an occasional bill or two! So what have I been doing this weekend? Feeding the knitting monkey on my back.

Yes friends and fellow bloggers, I have combined my love of mail and knitting with:

Online Shopping

This weekend was a wonderful weekend of shopping. I bought lots of new things via Elann and Knitpicks as you can see below:



Picture 1 - Zarone for the Diagonal Cables Sweater from Rebecca 28
Picture 2 - Highland Wool Yarn from Elann in Harvest Heather for the Sunrise Circle Jacket



Picture 3 - Highland Wool Yarn from Elann in Spiced Wine. I love this color
Picture 4 - Knitpicks Wool of the Andes which I was not so excited about

I also bought a set of size 7 Knitpicks Options needles which I am addicted to know and some Elann Peruvian Collection Quechua in Teal which is really pretty too and featured in a new Knitty pattern called Ivy

Secret Pal 9

Now I hesitated with the Secret Pal 9 signup because as I explained in my last post I am a bit of a perfectionist and fear not being a good enough Secret Pal. I see all the cool stuff that others have gotten and hope that mine will be appreciated as much as theirs. So on a whim I signed up and am already looking at other peoples stuff to make sure I get good presents for my pal when it starts in October.

Yarn of the Month

Ok, this was definitely a spur of the moment thing. It was late, I wanted yarn and didn't want to spend lot of money so I figured this might get the knitting monkey off my back for a while by feeding it tidbits of yarn a month to play with. It was better than the Elann subscription because it was yarn I liked, which sometimes Elann's yarn is quite weird, and also a monthly thing so I can unsubscribe when I want. Can't wait to get the first package.

Knitting News

I signed up for the Sunrise Circle Jacket KAL and was one of the last members to be added as they closed the KAL right after they sent me the invitation to join. Guess I better get cracking on this jacket so that I at least post once or twice.

Since I got my yarn from Elann I can start on the Sunrise Circle Jacket. I also must block the front pieces of the Green Mimosa before bed. But first...must check out the new Fall 06 Knitty magazine that came out

Finishing Line

Now when I say finishing line it has a bit of a double meaning. I am nearing the end on green mimosa, having knit the back and side panels, but now the finishing begins. I hear that this is where a project is made or broken for some people so I am a little hesitant to proceed. I mean it would stink to have gotten all this way to have crummy seaming going on. Now on minor projects like the bag, which I will be getting handles for on Wednesday, I seamed that baby with no concern as I didn't really put more than a day into it, but with a 3 week vest/tank thing I am a little more concerned about how it looks. Admittedly, I am also a bit of a perfectionist. Not in the since that I am perfect or everything necessarily has to be perfect but more like:

"A person with perfectionistic demands hates failure of any type. They will often avoid challenge that they determine as too difficult rather than take the chance of failing."

I have found my knitting line in the sand and its name is finishing. So on that note, I am going to block my pieces and start on the Sunrise Circle Jacket while I get out of the perfectionist rut I am in on finishing.

Here is the color I chose





It is the Peruvian Highland in Harvest Heather from Elann. It is much more beautiful in person as is the Spiced Wine color I sampled. I love these colors!

I order enough for the jacket which should get here in Monday or Tuesday and a few extra balls of yarn for some future project, including the Olive Night for the cabled jacket from last post.

Instead of Knitting....

Knitting Thought

I am thinking about future projects to knit. Yes, while I am knitting the green mimosa I am also dreaming about future sweaters, which all require future investment of non-knitting allocated moneys. Even better, instead of knitting on the green mimosa I am making flickr mosaics to compare the different yarns that I am thinking of.




Even worse is that this was not even part of my Future Projects List until today. Geesh! I need to finish before I plan for future projects. This would be an adder of $44.80 to the stash. Now...which color to knit?

Actual Knitting

On the Green Mimosa, I am working on the Left Front and am past the decreases and about 1/2 the way to finishing the side. This is boring stockinette so I am chomping at the bit to get to the lace. Not so hot about the seaming though.

To take a break I decided to knit up the Easy Peasy Bag from Louisa Harding with the Sari Ribbon I purchased on the cheap. I just need to seam and add lining and buy handles. Hmmmm....that actually means I am even not close to finishing and have 75% more work to put in it as it was pretty much stockinette stitch on 15's but at least the knitting is done.

First Sweater Jitters

I guess I should say first "not a scarf, hat or shawl" jitters as it doesn't necessarily count as a sweater since it has no sleeves. Is it a vest, or tank, or...I don't know. It is my first big project that I am focusing energy on.

So I blocked the back to the green mimosa and she looks kinda big. Not enormously so, maybe only 1-2 inches bigger than my fitted shirts,but it is kinda scaring me as this is also one of the first times I have had to block anything to an actual critical dimension. (By the way, I work in manufacturing as a project manager so this critical dimension thing is all to familiar as something that can make or break a project).

It is also longer than expected. Yes, I know, I should have looked at the dimensions a little better to see if it needed to be shortened, but as my first large project I decided I would not tempt fate with my non-existant tailoring skills



I also thought I would show you the booty that will be added to my Stash from the weekend. This was all my discount yarn from Tall Mouse. Tomorrow I will have to fight yet another tempation as our Stitch and Bitch meetup with be at Banana Berry, a local LYS, and they are having a sale. Geesh, this could be bbbaaadddd. Wish me luck.

Today is my lucky day!!

Man, so much has happened over the weekend. I mean, nothing related to actually seeing people or existing in a community (remember future spinster here). I mean in the, I spent all time by myself sort of way.

1. I posted some stash on Destash for Cash and have managed to sell all but one item! How cool is that. I have already sent and collected the booty. Only problem is that is supported the next 4 items...

2. I bought yarn on Elann and Knitpicks for the first time. I know I just did the equivalent of changing from heroine to crack but everyone got an addiction mine is yarn, not necessarily healthy but definitely not deadly...I don't think. I will post the pictures when I actually get the new stash...I mean specifically project purchased yarn.

3. I bought 8 more balls of Queensland Llama Seta in beige, a light green, and a ball of purple for $1.98 per ball and some Louisa Harding Sari Ribbon for $2.94!!!!

4. I found a pair of $3.74 shoes that I love. They will match my green mimosa when it is complete. Now this is almost bigger than the $1.98 yarn as I wear a 12W. Shoeboxes are the next size up.

5. Last but not least...I have finished the back of the Green Mimosa! I feel like my own self managed sweat shop. I have imposed a 3 week deadline for finishing this project. So far I am on track but I think I will interrupt the mindless stockinette by making the Louisa Harding Easy Peasy Bag with the Sari Ribbon purchased during lucky moment number 3. See!!! I am trying to stick to my project on purchasing of yarn.

The only bad part is that my bronchitis is still here, I feel horrible and feverish and it has been 3 weeks. What did I do to you body to deserve this? Was it the fried chicken? the skipping gym workouts? the evil looks at the scale? What??? I just don't know! Whatever it was I don't deserve this. Gimme a break... k?

Check Out my Future Projects...Flickr Mosaics Rock!!

Future Projects, originally uploaded by MoPix.

1. brown cami, 2. Wisteria Sweater - knititude, 3. roses and leaves, 4. pink ruffle scarf, 5. deep V Argyle Vest, 6. Rhapsody in Tweed, 7. Pullover flair, 8. Juliet Pullover, 9. Floral Felted Bag, 10. Tubey, 11. sunrise circle jacket, 12. shimmer shrug, 13. mermaid gloves, 14. lace leaf scarf, 15. klaralund, 16. kimono styled sweater, 17. grey4sm, 18. danica scarf, 19. branching out scarf, 20. basketweave dress, 21. amelia earhart aviator hat, 22. Pullover-Vogue-Knitting, 23. Peacock Shawl, 24. KnittedBodice, 25. ITW-SM05 - Leaf sweater, 26. Indian Summer Jacket, 27. Diagonal Ribs and Cable, 28. Cables Toad, 29. Flame Stitch Cardigan, 30. Embellished Sweater, 31. Cabled bag, 32. 30739110, 33. Buttony neckwarmer, 34. union square pullover, 35. Round Neck Lace Pullover, 36. pink mimosa

I am loving the flickr mosaic maker! Here is a collage of quite a few of my planned future projects. One is already in the works and that is the pink mimosa (picture 36). Photo mosaics....ahhhhhh

Destashing - The four step and counting program

So have you heard of Destash for Cash? Well I have and I am trying to sell off some of mine. Given I LOVE my stash. It kills me to part with it, but I know that I must. I am a stuff hoarder and I admit I have a problem (first step, people!!) so I am parting with some parts of my stash (second step...taking action). If it goes well there may be more, but no promises. Here is what I have up for sale, so come take a look (third step...asking for help). Man, I am on a roll!!!


SOLD!!! - 4 balls GGH Velour Suede - $20.00


SOLD!!! - 4 Skeins Steadfast Fibers Marvelous Mohair - $25.00


SOLD!!! - 10 balls Jo Sharp Dessert Garden Aran Cotton - $27.00


SOLD!!! - 6 Skeins Rowan all seasons cotton - $25.00


SOLD!!!- 4 Skeins Mission Falls 1824 Cotton - $20.00

Escape the Chair!!

I must escape the chair! If you don't know what I mean check out this Reebok commercial which explains EXACTLY how I feel right now.


Now I know I am a bit of a nerd and a recluse but this is getting ridiculous. I have spent the past 5 days holed up in my house, with the exception of minor stints at work. My chair and computer have completely sucked me in. Between knitting and reading blogs, which has become an addiction, I have sat in this chair for the majority of my waking hours.





I do have an excuse though as I wasn't feeling well and found out that I have Bronchitis to blame it on (Note: box of tissue in picture, cup of tea, and Vicks container). Since I never go to the doctors when sick, only for the annual checkups, I didn't even know where to go and get my prescription filled. Thank goodness I stumbled on a RiteAid with a big sign that said PHARMACY.


Knitwise, I started on the Pink Mimosa Tank from Interweave Summer 2006.





Not very many people are knitting this on the web but I did find a very lovely blue one here and a grey one in progress here. Hmmm....I guess mine would be green Mimosa. Although it was not on my list, I had an epiphany at the end of the Shedir hat that this pattern would go well with the Green Cotton Twist yarn from my now dead Kyoto Sweater.


Yes, I did say that Kyoto was dead to me. The would be first sweater is now being dismantled for the sake of a newer knitting idea. I just couldn't bring myself to do finish it. The measurement, although a loose fitting sweater anyway, would have been too big as I casted on for that about a year ago and have since lost 20 lbs. So I felt justified in killing it off. I also killed of the Criss Cross Shrug that was on Hiatus because one, I am pass the garter stitch stage of my knitting and two, it appeared on You Knit What? and I am just a little too vain to let that go.


Speaking of new projects, I am also eyeing Knitpicks Wool of the Andes for use on the Sunshine Circular Jacket. Hope it is not too scratchy or at least not more scratchy than Noro, but I may have to order a sample skein. Anyway I am making progess on the back of the Mimosa and will keep you posted.

Finished Object: Shedir Hat

Yarn: Rowan Felted Tweed - Whisper 141
Inspiration: Knitty Shedir
Needles: Size 3
Yardage: 1 ball
Modifications: Yarn style and only 4 repeats instead of 5, but still turned out long enough to cover my ears. 3 repeats would have been better.
Enjoyment Factor: 7 - Good: Cabling was fun and kept my interest, love the pattern, Bad: Needle issues, 5 repeats of the cables is way too much, P2tog tbl (see yesterday's entry) enough said!
Knit Time: August 14 - 20


The shedir pattern is not for the faint of heart. It took me 7 days straight knitting to finish up. The size 3 knitting was not as bad as I thought it would be and went fast until I reached the decreasing. That is when all hell broke lose. The decreasing was long, my hands hurt, the needles were constantly a problem and I was on a mission to finish ASAP.


I took a lot of inspiration for the hat from Eunny (kinda feels like name dropping,as though she is my best friend) in terms of using the felted tweed, however, I should have followed her lead with only doing 3 repeats because mine came out long and I only did 4 repeats. I will do the pattern again, but not anytime soon. I highly recommend learning to cabling without the cable needle . I discovered this a quite late in the process but would have helped me immensely.

All Needles are NOT the same and Who the Hell Thought up P2tog tbl!!

I know that the title may be a little misleading. I really like the Shedir pattern. It was a great knit that kept me entranced for a week straight, but this pattern was a Bitch at times.


Needles


Now I KNOW all needles are not created equal. Eunny spells it out in her Majoring in Lace Part II but when in need I tend to pick the best of what choices I have when a project arises. But this project has taught me a big lesson that you really have to pay attention to your knitting tools.


First mistake was buying the Addi Naturals. These looked great at first sight - bamboo material, fairly sharp point, good joint - but when I began knitting on them I kept getting stuck. On closer inspection I noticed this:



(click image for larger view of gigantic chasm in needles)


What the hell is this? Why would you need an enormous ridge in your needles? Could this be for lace or for people who can't keep the stitches on the needles? My carpal tunnel and irritated wrist were cursing me for not looking closer. This made knitting slower and more wrist work as I would forget and wonder why my stitches were becoming harder to move so I would have to tug the stitches over the great divide to continue.


Next I needed Double Points. So I rushed to my LYS to buy needles and all they had was the Brittany's. So in my desperation I bought them. Well the damn things are blunt. You can see the difference between the Addi's and the Brittany's in the picture.



(left side Brittany, right side Addi Natural)


I might as well tried to stick my finger between the stitches because it was as effective as trying to P2tog TBL with those damn Brittany's. I HATE BRITTANY NEEDLES!! It basically resulted in the mess below in which I am trying to pick up the stitches with my sharper Addi's.





P2TOG TBL


This little acrobatic move was made the ending of this pattern massively laborious. I had to look it up to find out what the hell I was supposed to do. For those of us who still need the tutorial it can be found here. With my hella blunt needles I had to twist and bend nearly my entire body to get this to work. Was it worth it? I have no clue. The funny part is there are only two rows that call for this and that is all I can remember now. I will definitely be on the look out for this maneuver in other patterns and then decide if I really want to knit it.

So these were my troubles with knitting the Shedir. I am finished now and will post pictures soon.

Who am I? I am an ISFJ of course...

My Bloginality is ISFJ!!!


As an ISFJ, you are Introverted, Sensing, Feeling, and Judging.
This makes your primary focus on Introverted Sensing with Extraverted Feeling.


This is defined as a SJ personality, which is part of Carl Jung's Guardian (Security Seeking) type, and more specifically the Protectors or Nurturer.


In blogging, your journal will always be immaculate and have a touch of style. You may also feel overwhelmed because you want to be a part of everything going on. Because of your wonderful memory, other bloggers may come to you to ask about things you posted months before.


Wow, I feel a little naked..I mean personality wise. This fits me to a "T", which is kinda scary for this impersonal test to be so accurate. And yes, I know that is it kinda like horoscopes in that you can pretty much find yourself in every sign if you look hard enough (By the way, I was born a Pisces, but decided that I was really a Taurus), but this is surprisingly me. You have to take this quiz if you have not already. This is exactly me, which is kinda scary to be pinpointed to accurately.


Knitting News...


I ripped out what I had done on the Shedir hat. I was unsatisfied with how the cabling was getting all mottled in the tweed of the yarn so I took Eunny's approach and did the twisted knit stitch (aka knit tbl) to get greater stitch definition. So the real start date for Shedir begins today. I will try to have the hat done no later than Sunday. I think this may be fatally optimistic but I am up for a little knitting challenge as I have so many new things to try before the year is out.

Nubian Craftster gets a facelift

No...not me...my blog. I was inspired by so many nice looking blog sites that I decided to make some updates to my own. They are not all that obvious and you might not ever pick them out, but making these tiny little changes has given me blogging peace of mind that my site is not the worst looking in town.


The bad part was that this took me hours due to my non-existant knowledge of HTML. I figured it out through trial and error so after hours of looking for fonts, adding borders to pictures, centering text, locating HTML colors, and finally getting my comments to show up, I am pooped!! The worst part is that I was keeping me from quality time with my Shedir hat which I casted on yesterday.





This pattern is proving to be harder than I thought. Mainly due to the size of the chart which I need to enlarge at work tomorrow. The yarn is also making it a little hard to see the stitches being that it is so small and tweedy.


By the way, I am falling in love with tweed. Especially because of the wonderful FO from brooklyntweed. Gosh I wish I could knit like that.

Finished Object: Odessa Hat

(Click for Larger Image)


Yarn: Queensland Collection Llama Seta
Inspiration: Magknits Odessa by Grumperina
Needles: Size 5 throughout (because I was too lazy and cheap...uhh frugal to bye more)
Yardage: 1.25 skeins (approx. 110 yards)
Enjoyment Factor (1 to 10): 8 - beads and pattern detail were the highlight of the knitting. Had trouble with the beading at first and the ending decreases dragged on forever.
Knit Time: August 6 - 11



Odessa took 5 days of knitting to finish up. For this one the devil is in the details so I took appropriate pictures. I enjoyed the bead knitting immensely. I think I have gotten through the phase now. The pattern was excellent and easy to follow. I used Queensland Collection Llama Seta yarn that I bought a slew of during a Tall Mouse sale for $4.00 so this hat cost about $6.00 which is pretty cool. It is also beautifully soft and I loved touching it through the entire knitting process.


I can also say that I have kept my stashbusting oath and busted a ball...uhhh you know what I mean.

Tilkkupeitto - Fair and Square

Tilkkupeitto - Fair and Square



These blankets are amazing. I have been lurking on blogs all night as I knit away on my Odessa hat. I especially love blanket number 95. This woman is on a mission!

On a Knitting Mission

Odessa is moving along smoothly. I think I am well on my way to my goal of finishing it by this weekend so that I can start the Shedir hat. I even already bought my #3, 16" Circulars so I am rearing to go.


My other knitting related project for this weekend is to make a circular needle case. I have seen so many variations on the internet but decided to go the cheap...I mean inexpensive route by taking a placemat and napkin from Target and stitching them together. Sounds weird, we you will see the finished project come Sunday so you will have to wait and see.


I am hoping this will quench my desire to sew for a little while. It keeps coming up as a crafting alternative but I know that I am obsessive and will have to have every gadget and fabric on the planet. Delving into this new universe of crafting would definitely put me off my goal of budgeting.


Must resist...but resistance may be futile (if you didn't already know I am a HUGE Star Trek fan)

O....dessa

I am completely in a beading phase thanks to the Perdita's. I finished my 3rd Perdita on Sunday and decided that I had to take a forced break and move on to something else, especially because that embroidery yarn was not whiddling my stash significantly. So, I started back on Odessa. I will count Sunday as the start date because I had to rip out my first attempt as my beading technique was incorrect then I casted on AGAIN and the stitches were twisted. I nearly gave up because I hate doing the same thing over and over again. But having struck 110 beads I knew it would have to happen sometime.


So I am back in the saddle with Odessa slowly progressing to the end. Hope to have her done by the weekend so that I can start on the Shedir hat. I will be making with my Rowan Felted Tweed. At least that is the next project today...who knows what tomorrow will bring.