August 27, 2004
slow progress
well I worked on moonbeam more last night, and then today I had an hour long call and because I needed to pay attention I knit instead of working on the computer (which normally results in my not hearing anything on the call because I zone out). Cool thing about knitting is you can really listen to things and comprehend them.
I guess thats why so many people knit and watch tv/movies. I couldnt remember if i had turned the counter on the last row so I am not sure if I just did 3 rows, or two rows. I know for sure I did 2, but I think I did 3.. so well I will hope for the best.. and this next row will be my last decrease before I hit 86 stiches which brings me to the next part in the pattern.
I start a new knitting class next week! It's Beggniner/Advanced and while I know I am ready for advanced (advanced their pretty much means you can handle any knit/purl pattern, read a pattern, work in the round etc..) but my friend whom took a class while I was gone, she and I want to take one together. She has to much crap going on in her life right now to get to into the knitting, but I *think* she really likes it. We will see.. it's a fun thing to do.. I just hope this time the ladies in the class are more open and talkative. I get a snobish vibe in alpahretta and plus I was of course the youngest in class, but now that I am married maybe I will be "in the club" and they will talk to me more!
I leave you with, a fun forum to chat about knittin'
Posted by brandy at 10:28 AM | Comments (0)
August 26, 2004
Moonbeam Progress
I made the mistake of decreasing not on the last stiches but on some inside ones. Big mistakes, messes up the ribbing. I am correcting it though and don't think it will be to noticable.
I only like the clover round counters. I got another brand of them that are read/white and blue/white and they don't "snap" into place at each number so they tend to loose their place. I love the clover ones. Clover has a warm place in my heart.
Posted by brandy at 01:16 PM | Comments (2)
July 15, 2004
a well worn knitting bag is the sign of..
a true hard core knitter!
Me at my desk!
You know what they say about a messy desk! hehe..
Barley there progress
In other news the storm that sent hail down on north atlanta yesterday seems to have blown up my computer. This is bad.. my homework was on that computer.. there will not be any webcam updates for me for probably atleast a week, but i got my new niffty digial camera that I ADORE!!!!!
Posted by brandy at 12:41 PM | Comments (0)
July 13, 2004
moonbeams and rainbows..
So on sunday i cast on mb (moonbeam) while drinking corona, it is sooo much more fun to cast on while drunk. After every 20 sts i counted and placed a marker because counting 98 consecutive sts while drunk is not easy! Anways it went by super fast..
Then yesterday i worked a first and second row and in the middle of the second row I got a phone call and make the mistake of knitting while talking and accidently messed up the rib by at somepoint knitting 4 instead of 2.
Okay I started about 2 hours ago, cast on again and got to 4 more rows! Go me! This knits fast for me.. I'm still slow :)
How to knit a twisted purl stich for ribbing:
I stick my needle under. I actually put the yarn UNDER it but I held it up for the pic.
Here I have pulled the yarn up through it.
Here it is knit now..
TOBY@!!!
4 rows down..
Yummy Baby Cashmerino close up.
Posted by brandy at 08:44 PM | Comments (1)
July 11, 2004
Parrell and danger lie ahead..
*in my best twilight zone narration voice*
As it turns out, I twist ALL my purl stiches. I made a whole HAT this way, a whole back of a sweater and a whole purse! ACK! No one TOLD ME!
So I went into S&S to purchase the rest of my baby cashmerino for the tank (as I have swatched and earned it!) and they took a look at my swatch and commented on how pretty the ribbing looked with a twisted stich and asked me which stich was a twisting. What?
So we identified it as the purl I am twising. Dang Nab It!! I wonder if that would make it any harder to knit or something? I hope maybe it explains why my sides are so wonky on my st st items..
So now I think I have to start over on the cable scarf... but I will continue the baby sweater with the twisted stich sence I made a whole back already.
They also helped me figure out me gauge so I am moving up a needle size to a 6 to reach the 4 inches, and no I'm not gonna test it I'm tired of it I'm going for it!
Hey guess what Jesse and I purchased yesterday? It was our first true purchase together with both our names on the loan (the house was more him them me really).
Except in silver, with real metal rims and HUGE tired and it can be washed out with a hose! I wanted the CR-V but Jesse really liked this and when you go into this car, it's hard to say no. I wanted this green but it had florecent green accents on the inside I don't think I could handle for more then 6 months.
We haggled the car dealer down and got a good price on it. I DID THE HAGGLING! Jesse is my support. I was so proud of myself. We also got a dang good rate. Afterwords the finance guy (we got along with very well) asked us what rate would we have been happy with.
We had written down everything before we went in like the MAX we would pay for anything. We where right on with the car, the trade in was about even and the interest rate was HALF what we thought it was. We think they gave us a fair rate because after we settled on the car I said to the guy.. if we walk in there and get a crappy rate we will not be purchasing this vehicle today. So we think he went and told the guy to give us a fair deal. Buying cars is sick and it's all about ripping you off so we are really proud we did good and got what we wanted! So I don't think we sould have been so honest with this guy, but hell we already had the deal we wanted so oh well. Helps them sell better I guess, but now we know what we can get for the future! Jesse said he will wait till my/his car gets good and old before he gets a new one (he's so good that way, i want a new car every 3 years) and it will be paid off in 2 years which is good.
Honda Carland in Alpharetta comes highly reccomended by Jesse and I. When pulled up this one dude was all over us I told him we just wanted to look so we crawled into some cars and waited till we spotted another salesmen that we liked better (he wasnt trying to stalk us) he was very polite, Jesse says I irritated him which Jesse says GOOD do it more! lol cause I want the numbers given to me straight and I dont want this Taxt/Tag/Title BS bitting us in the ass.
We bought the rate down some more by putting more down and we did a 4 year loan with a payment which is already $60 less the my car (which is now Jesse's car).
We are honda lovers! It's neat though the car was made in ohio, has very low smog stuff and most of the parts come from canada vs. Japan which is nice sence EVERYTHING is made in Japan.
I'll post pics of the car and me in it, and the tank cast on soon!
Posted by brandy at 11:52 AM | Comments (2)
July 09, 2004
excuse my bare walls..
You will notice pinned to the chair is my swatch.. hehe.. the whole chair is foam so it makes a nifty blocking board lol.. okay so like it's stretched out and pinned (not to stretched!) so do I spray it with water or what? I'm gonna go ahead and do it! Cause I want it ready tommorow for when I go to the yarn store.
the room is bare because we havn't painted or moved furniture in or anything (well we don't own any furniture for the most part). Today the dog yacked on the bed and then cleaned it up himself! How nice.. *puke*.. so I had to change the sheets. Heh, every cam shot has my rumpled comforter behind it.. yeah me and Jesse are not into makin beds!
Posted by brandy at 10:20 PM | Comments (2)
July 08, 2004
Moonbeam - Swatching!
My first true swatch..
Okay so it's 2 inches with 15 rows. It's supposed to be 4 inches when I do 30 rows total, but which part do I measure? As I show above, the height, or the width??
These are the things they don't tell us newbies!! For example.. my freakin book for refrence etc doesn't have an explanation of Stockinette vs. garter stich patterns. It tells you that st st = stockinette, but it doesnt tell you what makes that stich! I had to HAND WRITE it into the book lol.
Also the ball of yarn says that about the same amount of rows and stiches as my swatch has should be 10cm (4 inches) but on US 3 needles, I used 5.. and I think umm.. I am getting that same gauge?? I must be doing something wonky! HELP!
Oh and.. of course I love this yarn cause it's for fancy baby cloths. Why do I like baby yarn? lol.. it's soo soft stiched up.. it's also easy to knit!
Posted by brandy at 11:20 PM | Comments (4)
June 22, 2004
Knitting while distracted
So I was on a very long call at work, had my headphones on (yay for headphones vs holding the phone up with my shoulder and getting a cruck in my neck!) and I pulled out Vera to knit a row or two while on the call. So there is a lot of talking going on in the call and it starts to concern me so I start to pay close attention and at the same time I am knitting nearly at the end of the row (ohh i get anxious near an end..) and then i hear my name from behind.
A lady at work wants to show me how the tree outside looks like its about to get tossed across the lawn becaues of a very loud thunderstorem that just popped up.
So i have the noice of the storm, the muffled words of the lady showing me the swaying tree, and then the call which is about to be something i may need to respond to. I forgot the phone at that moment was not on mute and as I try to turn around to look at the lady/storm my second needle falls out of my hand. 2 stiches are now free! The other needle is pulled down or jerked I can't remember and some of those stiches become free and a mutter "shit". Opps phone isn't on mute! I am sure someone heard me but no one say anything, so i hit mute. Try to untangle from the headphones cord which is caught on my chair and scurry to salvage my stiches. Shew.
I put Vera away promptly.
Posted by brandy at 01:14 PM | Comments (0)
June 21, 2004
Pattern time!
Alrighty well it's 11pm so I am stopping (heh) and I frogged Vera and got right back to where I was and then some. I am 5 rows into color B. No mistakes!
Pattern help please! :)
Work Straight in SP (Stipe pattern) for 8 rows. Continuing in SP, shape sides by decreasing 1 st at each edge of the next and every following 8th row 4 more times as follows:
(so this means once I hit my 8th row I decrease on each END? and do that 4 more times (5 total)?
k1, k2tog, k until 3 sts remain.
k2togb, k1 (71 sts).
Okay thats telling me to decrease by 2 so if i did that 5 times thats 10 sts left and sence I started with 81 i would in turn end up with 71. Okay makes sence. I think k2togb means knit 2 together BEHIND so I think i can find that in my books cause my teacher showed me so I have some inkling.
So at that point I will have knit like.. a lot of rows.. atleast 8x's 5 which is like 36 or something... so then next..
I'll stop at there for now..
------------------------------------------------
In other news my finger is doing better. The issue that happend a day or two ago where I really messed it up again kinda made it better now because.. well there is no way to say it without being gross but anways its looking better!
I went postal last night when i spotted the painter got paint on my brandy new, first item of real furniture in my new house, solid wood, mahagony finish, 2 thousand dollar dinning room table (well that included 6 chairs). I actually got a migrain I got so upset (I harldy ever get headaches) and I think it was partially post party hosting stress.
Well he tried to deny it on the phone last night (hence my anger) but I worked from home this morning and he was ALL nicet nice to me when he came over to fix another small issue(thats cause I'm a smart girl and hadn't paid him yet) yeah mr you want your check DONT YOU!@ MUHAHAHA NOT TILL YOU FIX MY TABLE!! So he sat for like half an hour till he got the table fixed (though there is still trace amount of paint there but no one would notice like ever). So I am happy again even tho it should not have ONE MARK ON IT! :)
Posted by brandy at 10:57 PM | Comments (2)
Anti-Progress - My scanner rocks!
Here is a pic of my Vera progress. This is my second attempt (new needles which I adore - Turbo's from Yarnlady.com for $9 and no shipping!).
Click for more!
I am going to frog it again as you can see that one weird mistake. I was going to let it go then i spotted a small hole (again, thats what I get for knitting past 11pm) but that's okay. I do better when I frog at the beggning and it lowers the chanse of my having to frog farther on down when i mess up again. Practice make perfect and this cotton is kinda sticky.
Also it was my first attempt at changing colors, I just knit it right in, no tying or anything. It was a little wonky and loose but I paid attention and I think it turned out very nice. So I'll frog when I get home and go at it again. It knit up faster then I thought it would so I think i can make some good progress tonight. The pattern confused me some but I'll wait till I get to the first 10th row to ask questions!
Here also is Sophie. Over halfway to the top!
Click for close up!
I use the bag as a yarn holder and counter holder heh!
Posted by brandy at 02:22 PM | Comments (2)
June 03, 2004
Mission Falls - Vera Tank
Click to view pattern details and book details.
I am doing it in these two colors (Sea & Fog):
This cost $48 with the pattern book and 7 skeins of the yarn. Jesse won't be happy but we won't tell him now will we! I don't think he knows I have this blog.. :)
I ordered it from here.
The yarn store I go to I just never can find a pattern I like that meets all these requirments. A) Not knit in the round B) They have the exact yarn for it in the store C) The alternate yarn they suggest is something I like.
I don't like cotton twist it has a little twist of a silky thing in it so I can't tell which strand is which, same goes for the Denim DK i got for the ChiKami. I can't see the stuff very well cause of the teeny white bloches.
I can't wait to get this in the mail! I like the name of the yarn even. I'm going to wait and see if any of the LYS in Atlanta carry Phildar so I don't have to pay shipping. I just love that red sweater, but I still need to finish the kaki one. So no rush, and it's a new pattern book and I know of a website that I can order it on!
Posted by brandy at 12:42 PM | Comments (3)