Out with the old and in with someone else's old!

In a case of synchronicity,  Spun Fibre Arts in Oakville, sent a note a couple of weeks ago about a yarn swap.  Fantastic!  I dove into the stash and came up with a number of items.  I dove a little deeper this morning, the day of the stash, and found a few more items to add to the pile.

The swap was fun.  A bunch of nice ladies who I think all left with yarns they will enjoy knitting.

I achieved my goal of coming home with less than I left with.  Most of the items above were taken by others in the swap which feels good.  And I left the small amount of remaining items for the Project Linus representative for blankets.  I would have used the yarns to knit for charity anyway and this should, hopefully, speed up the journey into the hands of others in the form of finished projects.  And I can concentrate on my charity hat knitting.  Win-win!

The new-to-me yarns to the right.  Two balls of my kryptonite, Noro or two different types, a ball of sock yarn and a couple of other pretty skeins.

Motivation

I'm still feeling that motivation from the last post and the overwhelming desire to reduce the amount of materials in my crafty space.  That one is a bit harder due to a visit to the Knitters' Fair but if I keep the output larger than the input, I consider it a win.

As I was moving stuff around in an effort to at least reduce the number of bins full of yarn, I stumbled on this partially completed Farmer's Market bag from Weekend Knits that I started eons ago.  And by eons, I mean generously 3 years ago but more realistically 6.  I started it to make a dent in the random balls of Lopi I had picked up over the years, most leftovers from sweaters.  Given my recent attraction to fair isle patterns, little convincing was required to get going on this bag again.

The bag is slightly wider at the bottom than the top do to quite a large change in my tension since I started.  Life has been a bit more stressful so not a complete surprise.  But despite the bag's slightly bottom heavy figure, it turned out pretty well.  I don't think I'm going to bother lining it so probably won't use it as a market bag but it will come in handy for other purposes, I'm sure.

And to keep things interesting, I made a pair of Camp Out fingerless mitts from one of my Kitchener purchases.  I always forget how fantastic Malabrigo Rios is to work with.  Love it.  I'm tamping down the urge to go out and buy a sweater quantity by reminding myself of all of the other sweater quantities, not to mention unfinished sweaters, that are in the aforementioned bins.

Do It Again

Although it is still quite warm outside (but not even close to how painfully hot it was this summer), it feels like Autumn to me.  The sun is in a different place, the days are getting shorter, and I am getting the urge to knit all the time.  The urge to knit never really goes away, even in the heat, but Autumn hits and I want to finish Wips, start new projects and clear out stash, all at the same time.  And production generally keeps up with motivation.  It is a great time of year.

In trying to reduce stash bit-by-bit, I generally knit hats.  Three more done.  One bound for charity, I haven't decided on the blue one and a baby gift.  Photos of all taken, unoriginally, on the same deck chair.

In order, they are ...
 - the Spin Cycle Hat, knit with some Colinette I bought many years ago at the factory in Wales - this pattern hurt my hands and turned out very large (although it still fits me so it will fit someone out there with an equally big head and possibly more hair).

 - Sitka Spruce, a gift pattern at Christmas from Tin Can Knits.  This one hurt my hands too, a theme of some of the patterns I've been knitting the last little while.  The learning from this is to pick my patterns a little more carefully.

- the Swirl Hat, a gift for a friend who is due to have her baby any day now.  I made her a blanket, also green, so this will probably go in the box with it.  I always think a baby should have a hat.  Especially if Autumn actually arrives.

So on I go with my Autumn knitting.  I'm almost finished a bag that I can't remember starting and think I might actually add a few rows to one of my sweaters in progress.  Aaaah Autumn.

Candy Candy

I am hopelessly attracted to Noro Yarn.  Especially Silk Garden.  Every time I see it, I want to buy it, like candy.  I do resist occasionally but earlier this year, I went to drop off some hats for the 25,000 toques project at Main St. Yarns in Milton and saw an afghan, with each square made up of one ball of Silk Garden.  And I immediately planned make it.  I haven't crocheted in at least 20 years but a granny square is like riding a bike.  I loved the process and I love the finished project.  I had an excuse to buy Silk Garden at yarn stores I visited over the next few months which was also a fabulous treat.

The afghan is 24 granny squares, 1 ball per square (so not inexpensive but I've seen Silk Garden on sale quite often).  I joined them together with some leftover solid Silk Garden using a technique I picked up by googling.  And crochet is so quick.  I had forgotten that.  And for a while, I was able to indulge in purchasing candy without guilt.

The Fair Isle Period

I am really attracted to knitting fair isle lately.  Specifically fair isle hats.  I think part of the attraction is that my focus on stash busting and a fair isle hat are a match made in heaven.  This one is called SchKnit Happens.  It is really just a hat recipe that requires some imagination (or a good fair isle chart book) to come up with the patterns.  I am not completely happy with my colour combos but like it overall anyway.  It was also good practice at learning colour selection and will hopefully set me up for choosing better on the next project ... the Crofthoose Hat from the Shetland Wool Week website.  Off I go to dive into my sock yarn leftover bits ...

Ten Thousand? Unlikely!

I discovered She Makes Hats when I knit one of her patterns using bulky yarn a few months ago.  Then the other day, I read about her goal to knit 10,000 hats in her lifetime.  Knowing that was a big number but looking for context, I compared it with my 52 hats since joining Ravelry and am impressed.  Inspired?  No.  I love knitting hats but am distracted too easily by other projects.  I will continue at my more moderate pace and watch Robin from the sidelines, cheering her on as she moves towards that goal.

In the meantime, I was able to contribute a stash of hats to the 25000 tuques project.  Thanks to Main Street Yarns for collecting them.  And there is Robin's hat in pink, top right ...

Free to decide

I was half-heartedly thinking about riding in a Mountain Equipment Coop ride this morning but the Knitter's Fair is on.  What to do?  What to do?

The first would have been good exercise and a nice bike ride.  The second, a reward for the big bike ride last weekend and a morning surrounded by yarn.

In the end, it was not hard to choose.  The sudden cold weather and rainy skies, combined with the lure of all things knitting, made the decision even easier.  And now my yarn-buying diet is over.  Although, given that I had to travel an hour to get to Kitchener, could I lump the purchase under the category of travel yarn buying?  A bit of a stretch.

I didn't go too crazy.  Just a few skeins, one sweater quantity, a couple of sets of needles and two really nice bags from Alison Ruth Designs.  And I prevented myself from buying more than four balls of Silk Garden.

I was able to show Rae from Stix & Stones my Foolproof from her knit-a-long.  And hi to Gail and Susan who I saw in line at opening and then never again.  Hopefully they had as much fun as I did.  What am I saying, of course they had as much fun as I did.  Who wouldn't?

Chicago

My New Year's resolution was not to buy any more yarn unless I was travelling. And here I am in Chicago, not too far from Loopy Yarns. Since the store was (sort of) directly on my way to see the bean, I thought, how could I not go?  What a lovely store. There were so many yarns I could have purchased but I decided I could only buy if I found something I hadn't seen before or that was truly different. This yarn which might be cascade cascadia(??) was it. The name on the ball band is covered by the price tag and I don't remember the name for sure. I will sort it out when I get back to the land of wireless intermet. The hotel has it in the lobby. Otherwise you have to pay some ridiculous amount in the rooms so I have had to be creative with my internet usage. I bought a roaming plan but am going to NJ next month so need to be careful not to use it all in the 2 days I'm in Chicago. 

I'm here for a conference so haven't done heaps of sightseeing but did get a bit done this afternoon.  The bean, the fountain, a river cruise. It was all good but I brought the wrong shoes despite the little voice in my head telling me to be smarter and I came back to the hotel with a couple of blisters. Oh well, they will heal. 

Do it again

I can't resist the Tulip sweater.  I have made 3 for baby, one for a slightly older girl and the boy version, Rocketry.  I don't often want to knit the same thing twice, let alone several times.  But it is such a fun knit and I have tons of Dream in Color Classy to finish up in the stash so it was a perfect time to make another.

This is technically an olympic project by I'm not really finding myself compelled to get involved too much.  I am enjoying the olympics, particularly moguls, curling and hockey, and knitting while watching.  That's good enough for me.

I'll be up early tomorrow cheering for the Canadians in mens hockey.  Go Canada Go!!!

The sunny side of the street

We had quite a bit of snow with a quite a bit of blowing today.  The hood fan outlet has been banging away all night and much of today.  I just finished my second shovel of the driveway.  It is alway interesting how well my husband's curling schedule lines up to allow him to leave me with maximum shovelling duties.  Good thing I like doing it most of the time.

For now the snow has stopped and the sun is shining brightly.  One of the things I like about winter is the way the combination of sun and snow makes the world simply shine.  And it gives you that sense (as I look out the window anyway) that things will get warmer again.

I finished another project yesterday.  These mitts, which go with my new cowl are from the same Norah Gaughan book and are called Rosina.  These are not mitts I would have picked out to knit if I wasn't marching toward a goal.  But I'm glad I made them.  They look really nice and I feel so coordinated with my knitwear for the first time ever.

Almost

Yesterday, after writing about darning socks, I got the urge to keep going.  Nine pairs later and I now have an overflowing sock drawer again.  Yay!  The crazy thing, I can only say that I'm almost done.  I still have 2 or 3 pairs in the sock repair bin. I do like knitting, and wearing, socks.

Warm love

I really should try to take better pictures.  This one doesn't do the project justice.  But anyway, I have finished my second January goal project.  It is the nyx cowl by Norah Gaughan.  It used 2 skeins of Manos del Uruguay Maxima that I bought using a Groupon from Spun a few years ago.  I have looked at it many times and couldn't decide what I wanted to make that would maximize its coziness.  I think I chose the right project.  I love it.

I now have mittens on the needles with the third and last skein of this yarn from the stash and am really looking forward to having matching winter wear for the first time ever!  And with a goal of January 31 completion, I'll get to wear it all this winter!

I feel it all

These are the first pair of "fat socks" I made.  So called because they are made with Hello Yarn's Fat Sock Yarn, a sport weight yarn that I quite enjoyed knitting socks with.  I had three different colour ways that made three pairs of very comfortable socks.  I like wearing them around the house when I have no plans to venture too far in shoes that are too small to fit the socks.

I made these socks several years ago and have worn them quite often.  As a result, they have popped a few holes.  The heel and a good part of the toe are both made up of replacement parts (aka leftover yarn).  They are now quite a bumpy walking experience but I still can't bring myself to throw them out.  I guess as long as the darning is on the bottom of the sock, I'm the only one who is going to know about it and until feeling the little bumps from the darning starts to bug me, I'll keep fixing them up.

I have a box of other socks with holes in them that I've started fixing gradually.  If I have a few moments when getting dressed, I'll darn a pair to wear for the day instead of pulling a pair out of the sock drawer. This might get them finished in time to start popping holes in my newer socks.

A nice side effect of my sock knitting hobby and reluctance to part with any of the socks … I get to link with the past by using my grandmother's darning eggs.

Little Creatures

A co-worker who suspects that I might knit socks while on conference calls is having a baby.  So I decided I would achieve two objectives in one go.  I made some socks for the new baby and amended and PDF'd the pattern for a baby sock I wrote about in this blog ages ago.  I think they are so cute.  And at 25 grams of yarn, they make a decent dent in amounts left over from adult socks.

Purple Haze

Another batch of hats are going in the mail to Warm Hands network today.  I like the idea of someone in a colder climate than mine having something nice and cozy for their head.

I guess I could have used all of the purple Merino Aran for something else but it makes such a nice hat and I don't have as many babies to knit for as I did when I bought it so it was languishing in the stash.  It's nice to put it to good use.

The only hat of the bunch I have been tempted to keep is the multi-coloured one but, as I've said before, hats aren't my best look and I have a couple that don't squash my hair too much so I'll stick with wearing those when necessary.

I drafted a pattern for mittens that I'll use the striped approach for and those won't sit in a pile in the closet never to be worn.  I've drafted the pattern as mittens but have been thinking of these future items as fingerless mitts.  I'll see what I'm feeling when I get there.  They just need to get on the needles which I should try to make happen for the January striped challenge the Knotty Girls are running.  There's still lots of time, right?

Baby, It's Cold Outside

We were in Northern Ontario for a few days over the holidays and it was cold.  Minus 25 before the wind and I kept thinking … I'm so glad I don't live here anymore.  Then I came back down south to the Polar votex or whatever they are calling it and all I can say is, at least I became acclimatized while I was away.  And I have a nice parka … not a Canada Goose, Kerry … but a $100 generic special picked up when a local store was going out of business.  And of course, lots of nice wool items to keep my head and hands warm.  Now if only they would put a bit of sand or salt on our street, I could actually go for a walk and really test out the cold resistance of the outfit.

The projects are progressing and now I'm trying to decide on my olympic-viewing projects.  I'm thinking a finishing-based objective might be a good one but I'm still undecided.

All the Small Things

1.  My first stash busting challenge is done!  It is the 76 Stitches hat made from bits of yarn.  The Debbie Bliss Merino Aran in purple that I've been making a bunch of hats from is, once again, featured here but the colour changes break the monotony of using the same yarn over and over and over again.  In my mind I'm seeing fingerless gloves in a similar colour pattern so think I'll cast on for those too.  That will likely use up most (hopefully all) of the little pile of yarn I started with.

2.  I've made good progress on the Nora Gaughan orange cowl this week.  I'm about half way through the first skein and have acquired the rhythm of the pattern so think things should move faster from here.  I managed about 4 rows on the sweater, had to take them out because I missed one set of cables so gained no ground.  I'll try to get some traction there today.

3.  I have been semi-following the Bon Appetit Food Lovers Cleanse again this year.  I learned from the last time I tried it that I can't keep up with everything and I'm not making two different meals for dinner.  I might be able to trick the husband into eating a vegetarian dinner once in a while but never if it features beets!  So I've made some of the recipes and kept with the spirit of the menus where I haven't followed them to the letter.  After a month that involved a lot more eating out than normal, rich food over the holidays and altogether too much wine and cookies, it feels good to be eating healthy food again.  This plan is less of a diet and more of a launching pad back into eating good stuff again.  I am expecting a bit of a reduction in weight as a nice side effect.

4.  I deleted that annoying Tetris Blitz game and have been getting things done during times I would otherwise have been playing the game.  I did go down a solitaire rabbit hole last night but have now won the Forty Thieves game that was distracting me so can now move on with my life.  I am really glad we never got into PS3 and the like.  I would be toast.

Happy New Year!

The stash diet officially starts today.  In addition to the project objectives I defined using the Stash and Burn challenges, I've also decided on a Knotty Girls challenge.  This one is a challenge to use up partial balls to "stripe it up".  I'm going to make a hat that I've planned to start for a few months but hadn't managed to get to yet.  It is called the 76-stitches hat and is from Interweave fall 2004.  So two objectives met:  stash reduction and using a pattern in my collection.  Perfect.  And the next mail-in deadline for Warm Hands is January 31 so I'll be motivated to finish and get it in the mailing for this month.

I finished this hat yesterday.  It is a free pattern called Barley from Tin Can knits and I really like it.  A quick knit but with a little bit of design that makes it more interesting than a basic hat.

I also realized that I hadn't inventoried my sock yarn collection so I did that today.  I have so much yarn it is frightening.

Beginning the stash reduction project

So here we go.  I've joined a couple of threads on the Stash and Burn group on Ravelry.  They are posting stash burning challenges which I will follow to the extent that my stash fits.  So far so good.  The January challenge is to use recent stash or a precious yarn.  While I can probably name quite a few precious yarns (aren't they all), I chose a Manos Maxima yarn, bought too long ago at Spun Fibre Arts.  I haven't made anything with it yet partly because one forgets stash yarns but also because it is so soft and I felt it needed just the right project.  I've decided that the project is nyx from Norah Gaughan collection, Volume 9, seen here.  It is a cabled cowl in worsted weight yarn.  I think the Manos should work as a nice substitute.

The second challenge is for the first quarter and is to complete a sweater.  I am choosing my in-progress kaide that I blogged about when taking inventory of in progress projects a couple of months ago.  I've made some good progress on it in the last couple of days to the point that I'm now about halfway up the back.  I've been knitting with so much fingering weight yarn of late that I'd forgotten how quick a bulkier yarn knits up.  

Only one small problem that I'd also forgotten.  My formerly recurring wrist pain which doesn't seem to bother me as much when I'm doing small projects with lightweight yarn has cropped up again.  I can keep going on the project, I just need to pace myself a bit better.  Several hours constantly on a car trip might have been over doing it.

They look messy but these might be the ones

A few unrelated thoughts in this post:

1.  I love the Chocolate Aroma cookies at my local coffee shop, Aroma.  They are chocolate, with icing sugar and are almost perfect.  And the best thing, when you feel like a small sweet with your coffee, they are a small sweet.  They aren't the as-big-as-your-head cookies that Starbucks sells which provide a meal in a cookie and don't actually taste very good.

I've tried a few recipes over the last few weeks to see if I could recreate them and I think I've finally come close.  Since this recipe was passed to me as being a possibility by another cookie-loving friend, I should have tried it first.  They are called chocolate crackle cookies and are from Martha Stewart's website.  As I went over there to get the link, I notice there are several other chocolate crackle cookies that would also be worth a try.  But in the meantime, I have these.  And they are delicious.

2.  Outside today we have a blanket of ice.  Thankfully our power hasn't gone off, despite trying to a few times (touch wood).  I stuck my head out earlier to look around and could hear ice crashing down off of the trees.  It looks pretty but treacherous.  So we're hibernating today.  I baked the cookies above.  We had squash soup from the freezer for lunch with garlic bread made from some leftover baguette and a glass of Chardonnay.  Can't get much better than that.

3.  I made another hat for the Warm Hands Network.  I have discovered that I quite enjoy making hats but am less crazy about wearing them.  My already flat-as-a-pancake hair does not need the added influence of a hat.  With Warm Hands I get to enjoy the making and someone gets to enjoy the wearing. A winning solution all around.