Sunday, January 25, 2009

Peanut's Blanket--Knitting

After finishing swatches, I cast on 132 stitches on January 13, 2009. The next evening at group, I ended up dropping some of the cast on stitches while helping a friend with a provisional cast on. I ripped out, cast on again, and started after counting my stitches. However, I really should have counted a second time, because the next day I discovered I had two extra stitches. So I ripped out, cast on again, and counted two or three times before starting to knit.

Coincidentally, Peanut arrived that same day. He was a bit early, and he had to stay at the hospital for a few days after mom went home, but he is home now.

By January 22, 2009, I had finished the first two sections of the blanket. I was still tinkering around with the design a bit, so I had not moved on to the next section. After getting some input from a friend about a swatch I was working on, I started the next section. Since I work on my knitting at the pub quite a bit, I showed Rich what I was working on, and he said the trees were spooky. I asked some others, and one said they are winter trees. I like that theory better :)


Sunday, January 11, 2009

Peanut's Blanket--Swatching Part 2

Well, I finished two more swatches, and now it is a matter of putting the design elements together and getting the pattern written up.

The three motifs are:





These swatches will not be used in the actual blanket, but they have been a good dry run so to speak. I had to modify a couple of them slightly. I do not particularly care for bobbles, and they just did not look right, even though I followed Janet Szabo's tips for bobbles (found in her book, Aran Sweater Design). Then I tried substituting smaller bobbles (popcorns), but they still did not look right, so I got rid of them entirely. On the castle I just added another spire instead of a bobble, and I like how it turned out.

Thursday, January 1, 2009

New Year's Resolutions

Happy New Year's everyone!

Something tells me 2009 is going to be an interesting year.
I am not really one for resolutions, but I have made the following resolutions for 2009:

Keep enjoying life (life is short, and you never know how much time you have)
Trust my instincts
Look into getting a concealed-carry permit