FO--Cabled Afghan

Wednesday evening, I finally finished the cabled afghan I have been working on. My goal was to get it finished before this weekend so I can enter it in the Kansas City Irish Fest's Knitting Competition on Sunday.

FO--Seascape Stole

I finished weaving ends in on July 25, 2008, but I still needed to block the stole. I used a 40% off coupon to order blocking wires from Joann.com on July 27, 2008, and I received them August 4, 2008. I soaked the stole that night, then wrapped it in a towel to absorb the excess water. Then I feed it on to the blocking wires. By the time I got it on the wires, it seemed almost dry and would not stretch much, so I laid it out on my daybed. After buying a spray bottle, I managed to get it damp and stretch it and then pin it in place. I left it to dry overnight, but I ended up getting it damp again and stretching it some more to try to get it closer to the 63 inch length and 15 inch width specified in the pattern. It is not quite there, but maybe as I get better at blocking lace...

Seascape

The Summer 2008 issue of Knitty came out last week, and I found myself drawn to Seascape. Last Saturday I went to Lawrence to go to Knit Lawrence. Before going to the Community Mercantile where they meet, I went to The Yarn Barn, to look at Rowan Kidsilk Haze, since that is what Seascape calls for. Unable to decide between the Kidsilk Haze in black and the Kidsilk Night in Moonlight, I bought three skeins of each. I finally opted to use the Kidsilk Night, and I am really liking how it is turning out so far.



I am not really into knitting lace, but I am really liking this.

Through the Looking Glass

Because I knit my cabled afghan on smaller needles with a worsted weight yarn, I knew I would have to do more strips to make it wide enough. Inspired by Anna Dalvi's Burridge Lake Afghan, I decided to do the other half as a mirror image:

Cables from left to right: Braid Cable, Hollow Oak Cable, Six Stitch Cable, Triple Twist Cable, Four Stitch Wave Cable, Celtic Cable, and XOXO Cable.

The XOXO Cable and Hollow Oak Cable are perfectly symmetrical, so I did not need to do anything to those. To get the Braid and Four Stitch Wave cables, I started on another row (I think it was row 5). For the Triple Twist Cable, Celtic Cable and Six Stitch Cable, I just reversed the crossings (ie if the original called for a back cross, I substituted a front cross, etc.)

The afghan is mostly done, but somewhere along the line I made an error in the Six Stitch Cable I did for the other side, so I decided to redo it.

Thank you for serving

Being as it is Memorial Day, I thought this would be a good time to say thank you to all the men and women who have chosen to serve our country.

Thank you serving.

Project Updates

I have finished the Arctic Landscape Bag. It was really challenging, but I think it turned out well.


It turns out I am not the only one who ran out of yarn on this project, but I did what the other person did and used the contrast color (navy) for the bottom of the bag.

I also have finished the Felted Entrelac Tote by Melanie Smith. This project was both fun and easy, and I think it turned out very well.


I also did another pair of socks.



I used the Symphony colorway of Wildfoote by Brown Sheep Company. It felt a bit rough before washing, but washing them softened them up quite nicely.

Yarn Shop Crawl

A few of us from the Topeka knitting group went on a yarn shop crawl of the Kansas City area last Saturday. Our first stop was The Studio. I really liked this store, and I had to restrain myself when it came to buying things. After all, we were going to hit more stores :) I ended up with two pairs worth of Forever Jacquard by Lane Cervinia (two skeins of each colorway) and one skein of Berrocco Sox. The Studio had a great selection of yarn and books, and they carry Malabrigo! They have a hard time keeping it in stock, so I might not actually ever be able to buy it there, but I might luck out once in a while.

After we left the Studio, we ventured on to MisKnits. It was a smaller store, but they still had a good selection of yarns and books. More importantly, they had 40 inch size 7 Addi Turbo circular needles. Better yet, they were reasonably priced at $14.95. I consider that a reasonable price considering some places charge more, and even if I found a better price online, shipping and handling might make them more expensive. I got the aforementioned Addi Turbo needles and a shirt that says Knitter on the front and MisKnits on the back.

Next it was on to the Crayola Cafe at Crown Center for lunch. I was a bit disappointed about the service. It was quite a while after we ordered our drinks before we actually got them. They were not extremely busy, but the did not seem to have enough waitstaff on hand for the amount of people there. They did have a birthday party going on, so maybe they were stretched a little thin. The food was pretty good though. We hit the Crayola store next where I got an activity book in case my niece ever visits me and a 120 count box of crayons.

The original plan was to go to Ryukyu next, but we made a detour to Urban Arts and Crafts. They did not have nearly as much yarn as the other two stores we had visited, but then again, they were not exclusively a yarn store. They also carried a good selection of beads, some fabrics, and a lot of scrapbooking supplies.

While some of our group stopped in at Ryukyu, the rest of us headed on to Yarn Shop and More, with a slight detour to the Krispy Kreme store. They were making glazed chocolate cake doughnuts (my favorite), so I got a couple fresh off the line before they went through the proofer.

While visually appealing to some, I did not like how Yarn Shop and More was organized. They have yarns organized by color, so it made it a little difficult to tell what brands they carried. Their selection of tools had also been pretty well picked over, but for all I know, a bunch of people bought stuff for Mother's Day. I did find one skein of Regia Galaxy in a colorway I liked, but she did not have any more in stock, and it takes ones skein per sock.

Unfortunately we did not make it to KnitWit in Olathe. Oh well, maybe next time.