Doily and Niebling thoughts.

Are you tired of hearing about my doily? Well, me too. We ventured to Lacis yesterday in search of the blue thread to finish off the doily, but realized that I had left the tag for the thread at home. Hey, it's Lacis, and it's blue...how many different lots would they have?

Well, they had one ball in one lot and a passel in a different lot. After much pondering and hemming and hawing, decided to get the last ball with the rationalization that they might have restocked and I had grabbed the top one before, so this must be it. Right? Right?!

No. I came home and checked and it (I think) was the OTHER lot. I shall phone them today and just ask them to check for me. argh!

Oh, while at Lacis, I saw Mary Frances' finished Niebling. Oh, go and look if you've not seen it yet. When I grow up, I want to knit Nieblings like her...(wait, is that a noun? the Niebling? or a verb? Nieblinging)

Reminder: The next Lacis Lace group meets on Saturday, September 8, at 1pm.

Speaking of Niebling, Lacis actually had an old Anna magazine. It didn't have any Niebling work in it(that I saw), and the person working there was surprised they even had any Anna's available for sale. It was filed under their bobbin lace section, if you want to go purchase it. So, they might have misc. Anna's filed away in various sections if you want to go and look.

The other thing was that I actually won a few Anna magazines on Ebay. I'll show when I receive them. (I'm very gleeful because I got great amazingly fabulous deal on them.)

No, I did not go crazy bidding for Lyra. It amazes me that an old magazine would sell for $30-40 plus.

However, someone really really wanted this issue. If you know why, please let me know. Seriously, the bidding is up to $87.99 for an old magazine! It had better be autographed by Niebling himself. I suppose that I just have Mr. Niebling on my mind...they might have bid this much because they wanted the macrame section? Naw, the listing is titled Niebling. But still...if you really want to see the listing (which still has 3 days left), it's here. Well, best of luck to the bidders! I'll update in 3 days.

Doily angst

Well, it helps to read instructions...but it just raised my hopes and then proceeded to dash them to the ground. Here's my incomplete doily.

Yes, I have run out of thread as I'm binding off. I have almost finished one out of 8 wedges. Argh!

I read the instructions and I didn't have to do that extra knit row, so I thought aha, maybe maybe...well. No.

Just one more row...drats!

Can you believe it? I seriously have one, no, actually 2 rows left on my doily and I've run out of thread. I guess it's back to Lacis for more. I am trying to figure out what the scallop over the top and a 6 over it means...chain 6?

yeah. right.

But you know what? doilies are really cool and I'm liking them. Don't know what I'll do with them, but they are really fun to make.

Another FO?

Just kidding. I've still got 3 spikes for steg to do, so maybe by tomorrow. And I've spent way too much time over at Ravelry. My queue of projects keeps getting longer.

Oh, I received my prize from chemgrrl for guessing her age. wooo...pretty. I will post the picture on another day. Thanks chemgrrl!

Swan Song

Wait, did you miss something? yeah, sorry...wing in progress was pretty boring so I skipped it. But here it is complete.

Specs:
yarn: Elann lace
needles: Addi lace US3
time: from start of MS3 to Aug24, 2007

And for the record...the wing was a bit boring, but I kinda like it.

Final thoughts? Thanks to Melanie for an interesting lacy summer. Beads? new experience. Liked it, but next time, will find beads that pop a bit. yeah, I can't see the beads very well either.

Shel for G

Did I mention I needed to make another knitted item for another child's first birthday? Well, yes, I do. My group of friends (from 2nd time mom's group) are all having birthdays. As a lark, I had gifted a knitted item to the first child, and then I gave each child a knitted item as they turned one. I figured that they'll get lots of toys and books, but how many would get handknits?

So, with G, I decided another toy. I started on kangaroo (Joey) from World of Knitted Toys, but am not enamored with it enough to actually make mommy.

Then I decided to make a ear infection germ (all their kids always get ear infections). I thought that would be humorous, but z & a's dad reminded me that the parents might be a tad offended. So, that project will go to another child who's parents will think it's weird, but very funny.

Anyway, I knit Sheldon from Knitty for him. It's originally done in sport weight, but I chose to do it in worsted. Then I decided I'd better double the yarn and knit w/ US6. Woah! what a mistake. I finished knitting the body, only to decide that a smaller Sheldon would be much cuter. Not only that, but I don't think I had enough yarn.

Finished stats:

yarn: worsted acrylic in limeade green and 'baby blue' from lb of love
needles: dpn US3 (clovers)
time: August 21-23, 2007
size: 13inches long

mods: I did make one for the body instead of kfb. Instead of choking-hazard-eyes, I used felt and cut out circles for eyes which then I sewed on. I had such issues trying to knit together the shell while doing the attached i-cord that I ended up doing the attached i-cord to the top shell, then sewing the bottom on. I also put the shell on Sheldon before I sewed on legs. Unfortunately, this means that it'll be difficult to take him out of shell.

Well, it goes to a new home tomorrow. Hope he likes it.

Another baby sweater

This was for a baby girl who turned one this last weekend.



yarn: 1.5 balls of cotton-ease
time: 8/10/07-8/17/07
needles: US6
pattern: EZ baby sweater much modified.

Modifications: English mesh lace replaced gull lace
yoke knit as raglan to EZ specs plus 6 stitches

The buttons are sweet flower buttons.

Guess what...

I'm in! And upon much thought and pondering, I've decided my Ravelry name will be: Tinker

As in, I'm tinking. Get it? I was going to keep z's momma, but with A too, that is also floating around...zanda's momma. Then I decided that too much of my identity is to do with the kids, and knitting (altho' for the kids mostly) is something I do for me.

I was going to be really geeky and use EcoRI or my fave, Ecl136II, but the warning from Ravelry was that this will be your moniker, and you are stuck with it...and who wants to be called a restriction enzyme?!

btw, I love love love ravelry. Hope everyone gets in soon.

Doily in progress

A doily (or doyley) - a small ornamental mat usually made of cotton or linen placed underneath a dish or bowl. (from Wikipedia)

Who knew that doily could be spelled with 2 y's...

This is the KAL from the Lacis Lace Knitting Group:
Lavori Artistici a calza No. 11 - Figura 66

Translation can be found on the Lacis museum forum site or originally found on the Yahoo laceknitters group. This is a beautiful doily. I'm enjoying this immensely.

The center is a single crochet over a double loop and pulled in tightly when a few inches into the doily. I started this project using 2.25mm dpns from Lacis, but then switched to US2 circs from Knit Picks because I don't yet have US1 circs. The blue is actually much darker, but my camera...what can I say about my camera?

A bit of it is a little confusing and I might have shifted over one, but hey, whatever. It's a doily.

HP7 fini and lace

I've finished HP7! It was a good read, but I feel that now, I must find the old ones and reread them. It was a tad difficult remembering names of secondary/tertiary characters that cropped up.

The only thing I must say is that boy, there were many many deaths. And given that I had a sick child, I managed to power through it pretty fast...not as fast as I could have, I did want to savor the book.


As a thank you for my friend that lent me her book, I made this for her.

Yep, another bookmark. Since she's a knitter, and definitely a reader, I figured this would be good. I was going to make her a HP scarf bookmark, but I didn't know which house she liked (and I didn't have the colors anyway).

Specs:
yarn: cotton w/ gold twisted in (I forget)
needle size: US2 straights
time: 8/8/08
pattern: from lace bookmarks

hmmm...I do hope she realizes it's a gift, and not a bookmark I accidently left in there...

Not enough time...

I'm torn.

I just finally have HP7 and told the lender-friend that I'm a super fast reader and I'd be done w/ the book lickety split. And I've got MS3 and doily on the needles. Not to mention steg. I've got one of four spikes done for him and then all I have to do is to felt the spikes and then seam and stuff.

It's not like I can read HP7 AND knit lace or some fiddly little spike. I did toy with the idea of setting up another cropped cardi or Wicked or Green Gables and start that up since all of those projects are pretty brainless once you get past the set-up.

Oh, who am I kidding? I'll end up reading first...and every once in awhile, I'll stop and knit a row of something.

Altho' I attended a party this weekend where I overheard a guy saying that he and his girlfriend each had their own book and read the book in 37 hours. (they don't have kids)

Field Trip to to the Wonderful World of Lace

Saturday was fun! I attended my first (their second) lace knitting group at Lacis in Berkeley. What a lucky duck I am to live in such a wonderful area. Actually, I went on Friday to check out the beautiful knitted lace that's presently on display there. Gorgeous!

And on Saturday, left husband with kids and headed off-island to the Lacis, totally forgetting that there's the little thing called Berkeley swap meet going on. After acting land-sharky for awhile, finally found a parking spot on a side street. Extra bonus was that I now know where the Thai Temple is located. This is where you are supposed to be able to get the absolutely most delicious Thai food for very little $ on Sundays.

So, I met some wonderful folks and we knit lace and showed lace and it was fun. I know there are bloggers I read that were there, but I didn't ask (so if you stumble on my post, please leave a message). The two hours whipped by so fast. I finally had to dash because that parking space I got? Well, it's residential with a 2 hour limit. I really didn't need a ticket and I am pretty paranoid about Berkeley parking (ie. they tow cars parked too long--at least during football season).

Besides the knitting and all that amazing lace, I learned how to cast on for a circle using a crochet hook from Mary Francis. That is so cool. She also talked about the belly button cast-on. I think grumperina has a link to that (or she did it, can't remember).

There was also a Show-n-Tell. A swallowtail done in 3-ply loveliness. A hat inspired by GoL, a Red Hat doily hat, and the Elann aran lace sweater (you know the one that I have 3 types of yarn for). These are the ones I remembered, there might have been more. And the WIPs, wow!

Oh, and the yarn?! Lacis is carrying some amazing laceweights. I don't know if you remember awhile ago when I was lamenting on the fact that Lacis only carried shetland cobweb wool? And when I asked about zephyr they told me they'd might have ecru and black to start. Later, I got a phone call from the owner saying they didn't have any demand for it...hee hee. A year (actually 11mo.) later, they've got the full spectrum of zephyr and handpainted and linen and tussah silks and all sorts of laceweights.

So, I decided I'm doing the KAL with the folks. The info can be found at the Lacis site if y'all want to join. The magazine? spendy. But worth it. Beautiful patterns. And #66 is a Niebling (if you're interested).

The next meeting will be on the 2nd Saturday of September due to Labor Day.

Ha! And who says you can't take lace to a knitting group?! The trick is to make sure that EVERYONE else is ALSO knitting lace.

In my next post, I'll show the progress of my doily. I purchased some 2.25mm metal Inox dpns, but they're a tad fiddly. When I got home, I knitted on my US2 (2.75mm) 32in Knitpicks circs and they're fine for the doily. Gotta love magic loop!

The Mystery is Revealed

The MS3 secret is out. What's my thoughts? Well, due to the fact that I was super lame and did not put in the 'super important lifeline' properly, I shall forge ahead. And it has nothing to do with the fact that if you're knitting it symmetrical, you need to frog back a bazillion stitches...Actually, I had decided to follow the pattern as written back when there were hints as to this stole being 'different'. What's the fun in a mystery shawl knitalong if you don't knit along?! (That's my story, and I'm sticking to it)

Of course, do I wear shawls? No. Do I wear my knitted items? Actually sometimes yes. I wear Bianca and Leafless Leaf.

Anyway, it doesn't matter if this stole is unconventional (since I don't wear haven't worn shawls), I believe there will be hundreds and thousands of the same stole all over the world anyway (if even a fraction of the folks that signed up for MS3 actually complete the shawl).

I might make another one, but this time, in a different color and more contrasting beads. And maybe on this one, I'd make it symmetrical.

MS3 clue 4 done

Given the fact that I haven't read HP7, it still took me awhile to finish clue 4. Not only that, but I had 2 errors in the project. They can be seen here.

I only fixed one. I tinked back 5 rows to fix it. The other problem I tried fixing by laddering down, but decided to just knit it back up because I could be making more of a mess than it is. I'm pretty sure that no one will notice unless I tell them there's a problem.

The other issue I had was with the putting in the super duper special lifeline. I forgot until row 295. I went back and weaved in a string. I'm totally crossing my fingers hoping that the lifeline won't be used, because I could be totally hosed.