Oop, you're on fire!

Hey all -

Sorry for the late post, we went camping this weekend, and I needed to decompress before I did anything!  This weekend was super duper fun, with lots of food, smores, improvised tools and just good times with good people.  We headed out the Cedarville State Forest, which is only an hour drive or so out of DC, and then spent the weekend enjoying some beautiful weather!  We went on a hike that was maybe 6 or 7 miles and saw some gorgeous scenery and plantlife!  I also got some work done on my Simplicity Cowl and I am only one large repeat away from done!

Working on Simplicity by the glow of the Honorable Eustace Fairbanks Bojangles, the 3rd (Ireland) & 4th (Wales), Esq., Marquis de la Cedarville.  Yes, we named our campfire.  He was a good campfire.  :)

I was hoping to be done by tomorrow, but that's definitely not going to happen.  After I finish, I need to figure out the best bind off for sewing the two edges together, and then I have to block and sew.  Hopefully I will be done soon, because I may join the Deep Sea Wanderer KAL with bear-ears den on Ravelry.  If you notice, this is a pattern from Lit Knits by Audry Niklin, which I referenced in an earlier post.  I ended up buying it, because I really want to do these patterns:

Avonlea

Motoring Madness from Frog and Toad

Down the Rabbit Hole

Deep Sea Wanderer (of course)

My first knitting book purchase ever!  wooo!  The only other knitting book I have is Vogue Knitting, which I received as a gift from my good friend in Calgary.  It's a great reference book for sure, but not a cool fun pattern book.  Although, I think Lit Knits is waaaay above my skill level.  But everything looked so pretty and clever, and it combined books and knitting, my old favorite hobby and my new.  I had to get it!  Let's see how long it takes me to make something instead of just looking at the amazing photos (oh yeah, another reason I bought the book: the photos are GORGEOUS).

I was thinking of maybe going to the Fall Fiber Festival and Sheep Dog Trials next Saturday, but I may not be able to.  It's about 2 hours away, and I don't own a car, so we have to zipcar, and the costs can just add up.  Plus the time it takes...we'll see.  We're also going to a farm on Sunday with some friends, so I should probably do something at home this weekend, right?  Sigh.  I know, I lead SUCH a difficult life.  "Do I have fun here, or here?  So many hard problems to solve! Woe is me." :)  haha.  And at work, I'm only in the office two days, on site the other three.  Those will probably feel like fun too!

Well, back to LotR with actors commentary as I finish knitting this cowl.  I've been hankering for the movies for the past couple weeks, decided to make it so.  Have a great week everyone!

J

Halfway done!

I'm working on the Simplicity Cowl at a steady clip (at least for me), and I am halfway done!  The scarf can wrap around my neck once as is, with no stretching/blocking, plus, when I actually weighed the yarn, I have used 50g, with 60g remaining.  I am good to go, wooo!  Sorry for the "It's 11pm-and-all-I-have-is-this-incandescent-lamp" photo, but see below for progress.

Doesn't this look like raw ground turkey?  Ahh, incandescent light with pinkish yarn.  Tasty.

I'm pretty thrilled about it, and pretty proud of myself.  I actually worked on it a bit at work one day, since I had to work late waiting for the engineers to send us something.  It was a little surreal.  My friend did comment on my knitting style - I think it's English.  I wrap the working yarn on my right hand and completely remove my right hand from the needle to work the stitch.  It doesn't seem very efficient, but it works for me.

In other news, bf and I did some shopping.  He was successful and looks very dapper now, with super professional shoes and bag.  I was not so successful, but I did get some amazing turquoise Cole Haan flat shoes for $30!  woo hoo!  This weekend also included an always-fun festival at the Botanic Garden (the Junior Botanist Festival), where I saw some ferns that gave me some pattern ideas with their sporangea; and weiner dog races.  And what could be cuter than weiner dog races?  A weiner dog race where one of the contestants is wearing a lobster costume!  ("of course," you say.  "That was exactly what I was expecting.")

The lobster dog also did a little dancing trick during the trick competition.

Okie dokie, short post today.  See you all next week!  I may try and post again during the week, but we'll see how work and other adventures play out.  Bye!

They're done! They're done!

The socks are done!!! WHEEEEEEE!  I'm so excited, it's a little ridiculous.  But they're so soft and squooshy, I love them.  :)

As you can see, they don't match patterns, and one is bigger than the other.  Actually, one fits in the foot, while the other one fits on the ankle.  It's pretty funny, but they are oh so comfy and I'm very happy!  They are on Ravelry here.  Now onto the next pair!  My mom requested a pair while I was still working on them (but in a very sideways, "look, these ones fit me just right" sort of asking, lol).  So I'm checking some patterns on Ravelry to see what to make.  I think she'll get something somewhat lacy, in a solid color, with a higher cuff, maybe a couple of inches.  I only hope I can keep them from laddering so much!  That was my main problem, with both of the socks - I couldn't keep my stitches tight enough.  How do you handle that?  Any suggestions? 

I've also added to the Simplicity Cowl, but not enough for a photo.  I'm hoping I can finish it by end of the month.  It depends how distracted I get by everything else!

In other knitting notes, I had to work late one day, but I wasn't really doing any work, so I was looking at tips on dyeing yarn, and this koolaid thing looks pretty fun and easy, so I think I might be trying that soon.  I already have some ideas of some small projects, but one thing I really want to make is a shawl that has the colors of a Bermudan beach.  I went there this past summer and it was gorgeous!  See below:

See? Gorgeous!

I was thinking it would be a super lightweight airy shawl, but I have to build up some courage to do that.  It's very different from everything else I've done (which isn't much, granted).  I could probably find yarn in those colors and make an "ombre" shawl, but it would be pretty cool to dye the colors myself!

I also attempt to grow plants.  I'm not that great at it, but everything's alive, plus check out the color fade on this basil!  Now I want to make or find something that looks like that!  Inspiration is everywhere!

I'm keeping it to knitting this week (I have a cold today-boooo), so thanks for reading, I'll see you next week!

Dang - a second week?

Woo hoo!  Look at me, two weeks in a row!  That's 2x better than my last blog!  :)  I was actually super excited to write a new post - just to share everything new!

*Knitting Projects*
Never-ending Socks - I actually worked on my sock this week!  See?

New stitches have been added - 10 repeats of the Bamboo Weave stitch (*/yo, k2, pass yo over the 2 knit stitches/*, even rows are all knit).  I realize now I didn't post a photo of the sock last week, so here it is - see that tiny grouping stitches on the right?

yea, that was my sock last week.  But it looks much better now! yay!  I didn't reduce the number of stitches while I did the pattern, so unfortunately, this sock is probably another wide slipper sock just to wear around my apartment in the winter.  Oh well, I call them my practice socks.  Next time, I should probably do a gauge swatch before I pick a pattern.  I really want to do lace socks, I have a really weird fascination with lace.
Simplicity Cowl- I haven't worked on the cowl at all.  I have some tinking to do, and I've been at work late, so I don't want to do anything that requires brain power.

iPod Case - Here's a project I completed for a Christmas gift last year, but have never taken a photo of.  It's an iPod case with a Lopapeyesa (Icelandic) pattern.  It was a memento to my boyfriend for our amazing trip to Iceland.  He loves it and uses it all the time.  It's a little fuzzy tho, but that's what happens with Icelandic wool I suppose.  I also never blocked it. Do you think that would have helped?

*In my ears*
I've been listening to the Knitting Pipeline with Paula, and I love it!  I actually joined the group on Ravelry and introduced myself, and she is so nice, she responds to everyone's messages, AND mentions you on the podcast!  She called me "J-Yo-Pat-Knots".  I should probably have put a pronunciation guide to my name (It's Jo-Pat-Knots).  My name has a silent "y" in English.  Oh well, I still felt special!  yayyyy!  I've also checked out a ton of other blogs, and one of them mentioned this awesome book of patterns that I think is super creative: Lit Knits.  All of the patterns are inspired by literary characters! super cool!
I've also been listening to The Wind Through the Keyhole by Stephen King, also read by him.  It's considered book 4.5 of the Dark Tower series.  I absolutely *love* the Dark Tower series, so I was excited this book was on CD at the MLK library!  I'm not a huge fan of Sai King's voice, but it has grown on me as I've been listening.  I think I just start hearing the characters in my head as I want them to sound.  Roland's voice gets deeper, and Susannah's gets sassier.  It was pretty funny to hear some Detta Walker curses out loud.  Those are ridiculous!!

*Other life*
Did some climbing today, 6 climbs, but I bailed close to the top of the last one - my arms were DONE for the day.  So they weren't terribly hard climbs, but there was more than the usual quantity.  PLUS - it was prefaced with some delicious Vietnamese food at Pho Nom Nom!!  yum!

Finally - I give you a photo shot by the bf.  It makes me chuckle.

Alright everybody, thanks for reading, see you next week!

Introduction & Current Projects

Hi all!

I'm trying this "blogging" thing again.  But making it simple - trying to keep it short and sweet, and post photos periodically.  Nothing as intense as all of my previous blog attempts.  As NerdFitness taught me:  Simplify. Analyze. Modify. Dominate. Today is a general introduction plus first post.  I'll try to post once a week, mostly to keep up with my current project status.  That's right - this is a knitting project blog, with everything else thrown in.  I'm trying to get better with knitting - knitting more frequently, and keeping track of my progress, just so I can feel accomplished.

*Intro*
This blog is called knots, not just because that's the simple description of knitting, but because that's how my brain usually feels - tangled up in knots!  I get distracted easily, switch subjects constantly, and then find myself flabbergasted at what has just happened!  :)  Hopefully this blog will help sort things out.

*Knitting*
My ravelry profile is jyopatknots.  Please look me up!  There's not much on there just yet, a)because I haven't done that much; b) I forget to take photos of stuff I have done.  I've been knitting about 2 years, mostly off, sometimes on.  I initially started because some friends from the Botanic Garden were getting together to knit, and I decided to join them....even though I had never touched needles before!  We still hang out, however, we only had one knitting session, lol!

*Projects*
I'm currently working on the Simplicity Cowl by Cedar Walters, in the Azalea colorway of Wandering Wool's Saranac fingering for my sister.  She asked for a cowl, and it was incredibly hard to find one I thought she would like, plus one that wouldn't be too repetitive!  She gave me a couple options, but as she's moving to Houston, I didn't want to give her a big fluffy one either!  It's going pretty well, but I am having stitch count issues.  I tend to knit late at nite, and I'll start getting sleepy....and I'll forget a move, oops!  But it's going well, and I am making some modifications, mostly in just how much I repeat the pattern.  We'll see how it turns out!




I'm also working on some never-ending socks that I started ages ago!  It's just simple socks, and I added some stitches that I wanted to try to them.  They don't match.  It's taking forever, because I'm getting bored, but I know I'll love them when they're done!   They're so soft and squishy! Hopefully next week I'll have an update.  They are knit in KnitPicks Stroll, Duchess Heather.

In the queue is another cowl for the other sister.  To be knit with Verdant Gryphon's Eidos in The Dragon King's Daughter colorway.  Haven't decided on a pattern yet.  Was going to do Irish Mesh Cowl, but I don't have the right length of circular needles, so I may try something else instead of spending more money on something I don't know if I will like.  We'll see.

*Other Life*
Everything is beautiful and nothing hurts.  :)

Alright, I think this is good for a first blog post (so much for short and sweet!)  See you next week!  Happy Labor Day, enjoy the day off if you have it!  :)