Monday, August 29, 2005

Aug 29th




Walk .6 mile, vacumned, worked on studio website www.vivettesdance.com, went to studio, choreographed 1 dance, came home for lunch, worked on studio website and picked back 2 rows of the shawl, and reknit those same two rows while waiting for sitebuilder to finish "inspecting", went back to studio, choreographed 2.5 more dances, held 2 rehearsals, finished taping down the marley floor, counseled a distraught teen who felt she had made a fool of herself because she didn't know someone already had a girlfriend (and he was a jerk about it)... I'm tired!

Here's a photo of the socks I made for Arlene out of Parade from www.knitpicks.com , very nice yarn, but WARNING yardage is short... if you have a bigger than size 6 foot, buy more than 2 skeins of yarn.

Also a photo of the shawl that is driving me crazy, just because I keep getting off.

Sunday, August 28, 2005

Socks n Shawls



This is the Opal Tiger Sock and a not very good picture of me wearing the Garter Star Shawl. I gave it to my friend Shelly. Now I'll have to knit another one for my mom! Struggling with the Lace Diamond one a lot. It seems like I pick back 2 rows out of every ten on the pattern repeat. I must not pay attention to what I'm doing I guess!

Worked on iris bed some yesterday, and will again today. A little at a time is better than killing myself all at once! Same concept with the diamond lace shawl, my goal is to complete 1 10 row pattern repeat a day.

Tuesday, August 23, 2005

Tuesday

Spent Monday re-arranging studio's Tuesday schedule for fall, spent today re-arranging the lobby after the dancewear sale, finally all cleaned up. Trying to take care of all the details I am suppposed to take care of for other people, mail checks, mail dance notes, order leotards,, lots of little details and I'm afraid I will forget something and dissapoint someone!

Working on a lace shawl and haveing the worst time with the pattern, keep ending up with the wrong number of stitchs, and its not that hard! So, I retyped the pattern with a bigger font, spaced it out better and printed some sections in red and some in blue so I will be less likely to get confused. Using up some scrap balls just for the heck of it...started with a goldy yellow, moved to a gold woolease, then will work with an aran cream worsted, all seem to be about the same weight and the colors are going to blend I think. If it's not big enough when I run out of cream I think a brown might look nice, think I have some of that too!

Have the night off, think I'll go knit.

Monday, August 22, 2005

Garter Star Shawl Pattern

Garter Star Shawl By Vivette Ashen-Brenner
Copyright: August 2005
Yarn: Bernat Softee Chunky 3 skeins (*or more) (bulky 5) $1.97 skein at my Wal-mart

Needles: size 10 circular at least 29“ long. (* A larger needle will give a looser fabric)

Neck: Cast on 4. Work 16 rows of garter stitch (8 ridges). Pick up 8 stitches along long edge (12 stitches)

Body: Row 1: Knit 6 stitches, place a marker, M1 by picking up strand between two stitches, and knitting into the back of that loop, place a marker, knit remaining 6 stitches. 13 stitches.

Row 2 and all even rows: Knit back across row, slipping markers and working yarn overs as stitches.

Row 3: Knit 1, yarn over, (YO) work until marker, YO, slip marker, knit 1, slip marker, YO, knit until last stitch, YO, knit 1 (4 stitches increased total 17) You will be making a center panel design with the yarn overs.

Continue working the increase row until you have a total of 40 stitches between edge and 1st marker. (81 stitches)

Design increase row: Even row: (same as row 1) Knit 20, place marker, M1, place marker, Knit 20, knit until center marker, slip marker, knit center stitch, slip marker as usual, knit 20, place marker MI, place marker, knit 20 until edge (3 sets of markers with 1 stitch in between) (83 stitches) This makes the pattern design that runs down shoulder line.

Continue in this manner until you again have 40 stitches between the markers.

Repeat design increase row. You will have 7 sets of markers with 1 stitch in between markers and 20 stitches between each set of markers. (Total 167 stitches)

Work until you have 50 stitches between markers (407 stitches).

Ladder design row: now, here’s where the longer needle will be nicer, but you can do it with 29” one. I did, wasn’t easy, but the “problem” only lasts for 2 rows.
Knit 1, yarn over twice, knit 1, yarn over twice, continue across row slipping markers and knitting center stitches as “normal”. Needle will be full, it will be extremely tight and you will think… what was she thinking!

Work back by knitting the knits and letting the yarn overs drop off the needle. Halfway around you’ll be thinking less cranky thoughts, as the stitches on the needle get looser.

Work at least 4 rows plain garter stitch, no longer increasing at markers. (Keep markers on though).

When you are nearly out of yarn, or just plain sick of the project, bind off. Try to keep your yarn extra loose at the points (reason for leaving the markers on) so that it doesn’t cup when finished.

This yarn washes and dries very nicely in machine, softening up considerably. I chose to block mine however. I blocked my shawl by soaking in bathtub of warm water for 30 minutes then patted out onto a towel-covered tabletop. Blocked: my shawl measured 21” from back neck to center point, 45” across from shoulder point to shoulder point.

If you did the work back rows in purl, so that you had a Stockinette fabric instead of garter the shawl would be longer, as garter pulls up. If you use a larger needle, fabric will be looser and have course, larger.

Sunday, August 21, 2005

Star Shawl


I finished the garter star shawl I "designed". I put designed in quotes because I just kind of "did it" and didn't work it all out on paper 1st. I think it's kind of neat. I probably should have done about 10 more rows at the bottom edge, but I was thinking A) I'm going to put a border on this, and B) I'm tired of working on it...I want to be done so I can see what it looks like! It's kind of plain, but will be warm I think. I'm going to give it to my mom as she mentioned it would be nice to have a shawl for the evenings when it gets a little cooler. I like the way it sits on your shoulders. The star design kind of surprised me...didn't think it through!

I wrote out the pattern incase anyone would ever want to make one. Like I'm some big shot designer huh? Right now it's wet and blocking, when it drys I'll get Sid to take a picture of it one me.

Working on my tiger socks, I need to finish them as I realize that many of my 1st socks are really disintigrating. I've reknit toes and can do so again, but some of the cuffs are "popping" at the join I think and begining to ladder, and not sure I can do much about that... Problem is ... I like these socks, and hate the thought of throwing them out! Maybe I could unravel, rework as children's socks for charity...that's probably really silly though....however, if my income is curtailed this year as I think it may be, that might not be such a silly option to buying new yarn I can't afford.

Tuesday, August 16, 2005

Karim!


I'm an "Oma"! Karim was born July 31st to my "daughter" Isa and her husband Stefan. Isa stayed with me for a year in highschool and we'ved stayed in touch. I'm so excited!

Have knitted him a couple of pairs of tiny socks, but need to get busy as a cold winter is coming!

Sunday, August 07, 2005

It's Done!

It's Done! The skirt is done! (doing happy dance) I finished in time for the Tri-Rivers Fair! Whoo hoo! (Better than last year when I was still working on my sock entry at 1am the morning of entries!) Some of it I'm not completely happy with... My gauge could have been tighter, I've got some serious puckers from some of the stranding, and I'm not really happy with how the yellow highlighting duplicate stitching looks....but that's perfectionist me. Most people won't see a single flaw, and my daughter who will wear it more often than me (and who I really made it for) thinks it's wonderful. We'll see what the judges say of course. Just to be clear, this is Jodi Green's Hot Tamale pattern from www.Knitty.com. I knitted it from Garnstudio "Paris" a cotton yarn on a size 6 needle.

Wednesday, August 03, 2005

Busy Busy!

Wow, time is just flying by! Fair entries are due in Wed am, and I still have to finish highlighting 1/4 of the skirt and line it. I'll make it, I'm determined. I'm not totally happy with it, I have some puckers from the stranding pulling to tightly, and I've tried to cut and tie in pieces to loosen it, but there are too many rows to do that, and I'm afraid for the structural integrity of the piece.. oh well, Lisette likes it and I guess I did my best on it, so that's all that counts, isn't it?

Have my next complicated piece picked out, a beautiful baby sweater using Debbie Bliss yarn, will cost about $55 for the yarn, but it will be nice. Hoping Isa has a girl so that I don't have to change the color scheme around!

Still want to make a Kiri shawl as "everyone" on the Townsend list is making them,...so many projects, so little time!