Completed Projects 2006

More media exposure and an experiment!

Coventry Knit-Wits were in the local newspaper again last Thursday. I knew it'd probably be in on the week I'm nowhere near Coventry and can't get a copy! Hopefully K (yolanda gypsy) has saved me a copy!! Apparently it was nearly a full page photo and has a pic of yours truly, W, and K in it. Can't wait to see it! Asked my mum to save me a copy, but she managed to lose the last one we were in and had to raid the neighbour's recycling, so I'm not holding my breath this time!

Also K was on BBC Coventry radio on Thursday night - she did a sterling job, considering she only had 10 minutes.

I'm experimenting with a wider version of the Lizard Ridge afghan. I've cast on 100 stitches - you can't make the full width one as on the Knitty site, as most chunky machines don't go up to 184 needles (you could achieve this with a Bond though you'd need a looong table!).

Row 4 you centre the 8 stitch blob around needles 40-20-0-20-40, and row 10 a half blob around both 50s and a full blob around 30-10-10-30. I'm using scraps of any old yarn I have to hand - may take it off the machine before I'm finished as I can't do anything else whilst it's on there - will take it off onto WY and photograph it. It's OK, though the blobs are further apart than on the small squares. I may have to recalculate it, see if I can't work out a formula for getting them closer.

I seem unable to summon up the courage to partly frog the pink jumper with the too-long arm - it's sewn up so well I can't see the stitches. Pah! Got January's Knit Today and think I've found a pattern for the dusky pink aran yarn.

Finished the Rowan jacket thing last night, well, not the sleeves, and not sewn up. Think it may become either a short-sleeved jacket or a waistcoat - bagged the last two balls of yarn at Hobbycraft yesterday, and managed to resist buying more yarn. I just can't help myself!

Last minute xmas projects, and LR progress

This is the blanket I completed on 23rd December. It's full needle rib, the entire length of the chunky machine bed and I used up a few oddments to make it. Mental note - FNR on the chunky gauge should be kept to no thicker than 4ply. It was ruddy hard work!


One skein scarf, crocheted from the "Happy Hooker" book. Alas, I failed to compare the length required with the length I had, so had to skimp a bit - lost a row of trebles, and cheated on the bobbly edge somewhat. Just made it by the skin of my teeth! This was made with the Bergere yarn I got at the xmas Knit-Wits meeting.

Lizard Ridge squares - the progress so far! Aren't they purdy?!

Crocheted ipod case, also from the "Happy Hooker" book. Alas, it fits the old ipod and is a little too big for the nano. Now it's been opened I can measure up, and make a smaller version.

Santa's been!

I got some cool presents this year - The Knitter's Handbook by Montse Stanley. Who knew there were 15 odd cast-on methods? I only knew there were 2! Funnily enough I'd bid on this book on Ebay before xmas, and missed out by 50p. Other presents? Two nighties that don't fit, a gorgeous pink cashmere sweater that does, an electric razor and the best gift, the Evenstar pendant from the Lord of the Rings. Yolanda_gypsy has one and I've often fancied it, but had never mentioned it to the Cog. Uncanny or what?! Also Red Dwarf series 7 and 8 which completes my collection, the entire box set of "Goodnight Sweetheart", a cute cat keyring, some nice towels and tea-towels for the house. Plus quite a lot of Lush bathbombs - the Cog is pleased there's no glitter or stars this year, as he ended up wearing some last year!

Eaten far too much over the last two days to the point my stomach's complaining - most of the rich food has been eaten now anyway.

Made another LR square, which brings the total up to 6.

Merry Christmas!

Merry christmas and happy holidays to all my readers!

Whoops

Serves me right for knitting sleeves for Leah's jumper on two separatenights - one sleeve is exactly 22 rows longer than the other. A pity Ididn't spot it until after I'd sewed it up! Feh! I can never remember ifyou're supposed to reset the row counter on that pattern, it's not exactlyclear.

G has suddenly decided he wants me to knit a blanket for his Dad for xmas - nice to have some notice, innit?! Got to see if I can find some brown woolnow!

Cov Knit-Wits Secret Santa!

Looky what I got - two balls of lovely soft Bergere and a pattern-a-day knitting calendar! Cool!

Cast off the "extreme" knitting we started last Monday for the "Made in Coventry" publicity shoot. It makes a dinky little mat - will go in one of the bathrooms I suspect!

G's out tonight - some more present wrapping, finishing of a jumper for Leah and something for him, plus I need a bath. Hmm - wonder if I can multi-task some of that?! :)

Current mood: giggly

The beauty of Kureyon

This didn't look too promising in the ball - but look at the colours! Tape measure alongside for a sense of scale - the colours change roughly every 2-3cm over 40 sts.

Lizard Ridge: another finished square

Another one. Now I am back at the same place as I was before I realised I'd converted the pattern wrong. Next ball is going to be knitted straight, so that I can measure some colour changes for Elizabeth.

LR - two more

OT - Progress bars - progress!

Some useful blogger sites here:

Bloggers Paradise

Betabloggerfordummies

Yep, my hand is up, I'm a dummy! Heck, can't be good at everything! ;)

Many thanks to Vin for helping me to fix my progress bars. What I know about XHTML or whatever it is called, could be written on the head of a pin, and still have room for an expletive.

The colour printer is now working, although the media centre is making weird beeps. Technology - one up, one down!

Lessons I have learnt - reprise

Finally confronted the office gossip last week - I deliberately picked a day when she was on reception so that (a) I wouldn't chew her out as much as I wanted to and (b) I wouldn't have to continue the conversation at my desk.

Apparently it was totally taken out of context, and she meant nothing by it. I know what I read, but I shall keep my own counsel for the sake of keeping the peace. Having tried to be a good christian and forgiven her, there is still the nasty taste of betrayal in my mouth. Despite her words, I am glad I read that e-mail. Forewarned is forearmed as far as such characters go. To mis-quote R Stevens of Diesel Sweeties fame (www.dieselsweeties.com),

"De-friended!"

The fact that she didn't even have the decency to approach me is a pretty good indication of her character, IMHO.

Famous at last!

Yep, I made it into the local newspaper today. A rather blurry picture of me balancing a broom-handle knitting needle on the, ahem, derriere of a breakdancer who had to pose upside down for some time. Got an excellent view of his pecs, nice six pack!

The blue n green street artists stole the show, (and the main pic, lol!) - they were really good! Poor old tapdancers didn't even get a mention. One was the spitting image of Eastender's Little Mo.

It was freakin' freezing yesterday, the car park queues were unbelievable for a Monday morning, and I was sooo glad to get into a car with a good heater and back to work for a hot coffee!

'twas all to publicise an arts event at the Ricoh Arena in February - not sure what we're doing there yet, either a knit-a-thon or a teach people to knit workshop! Must talk to Kellie about what we plan to do....

Another LR afghan square last night - did make a start on a jumper for my niece which I guess I should really concentrate on.... too addictive!

Ho hum, java's done

Well, have improved the title to my liking - dunno why I didn't figure to leave out the description and reduce the font in the first place. Heck, in my defence, it was getting quite late!

Can't get the Java progress bar to work anymore, I guess I'm stuck with little pink gifs. Feh!

Might go and convert the personal blog - pity the header graphics can't be centralised....

Scratch that

Found betabloggerfordummies, and have at least fixed the title bar - could do without having to have the title twice, mind you. Will figure out the java problem later - G's off out, and needs a lift.

Upgraded and confused

Upgraded this blog to Blogger Beta, because I liked the idea of having categories and the expandable archive. Spent about an hour tonight categorizing some 200-odd posts. However, the entire thing seems to be written in XML, which I know nothing about, and I've got two bugbears with it so far:

1. I can't get it to display my old java progress bars, so have had to resort to a graphic instead
2. Can't figure out how to put my old banner back up the top - every time I paste it into the template, it moans about my breaking the XML code.

Anybody got any ideas?! And yes, I did try nicking the code and pasting it back into my old blog, but it didn't seem to work very well.

Almost Finished Object - Rowan cardigan

The rowan cardigan - finished, except for the buttons! Looks short because of the shirt I am wearing, but it's not, it's lovely and roomy!

Got some wooden toggles to sew onto it tonight.

Lizard Ridge - some diagrams

Click on these to get a bigger picture.

On the first diagram, where the number of stitches is is brackets, this means just knit to the end, you shouldn't need to count them.

On the second diagram, - means to knit, w means manual wrap, and a blank space means this needle is in holding position.

More progress

These two are done from the corrected pattern - have unpicked the others. Ooh, I'm such a perfectionist, no? Also a pic of the one currently in progress! We've got dinner ready-made tonight, so I might just have the time to finish it ready for club.