Saturday, July 25, 2009

OMGOSH I'M CABLING!!!

YAAAAY I DID IT!

Observe:



This is my first-ever-cable-project Scarf, knitted for one of my friends as a going-away-to-college present and made in a cheap but still beautiful 70/30 Acrylic-Alpaca blend (made of 70% Acrylic, 30% Alpaca wool), and its the easiest thing in the world! (Well, maybe not the easiest, but for sure WAY easier than I expected!!!) Anyways, it's got a garter-stitch border and the actual cabling business (where you pull out that snazzy cable needle and do some magic) happens only once every 24 rows or something, when the cable "twists." I'm varying the distance between "twists" for something fun to do.

Anyways, its super-rad and I'm SO PROUD that I actually figured it out! :O That pride is in no way diminished by the fact that it was ridiculously easy! I dunno, cabling always looks so beautiful and elegant, I guess I just figured it was gonna be super-tough! You just put some live stitches on the cable needle, knit a few stitches past the cable needle, and then go back to the cable needle and knit from there. The only remotely tricky part about it is wrestling with the the cabling needle a bit, cuz the live stitches don't really want to stretch as far, so the next row is, by necessity it seems, a little tight.

So YAAAAAAY CABLING!!! Whenever I get around to it, I'm gonna give those kiddie-cable socks a go. Darn, I might just have to go to the yarn store again. :P

In Other News:

I finished those socks I talked about in my last post, the ADD socks:



They turned out alright, I guess. The cuff is all... weird and foldy. But when I put them on the weird- and foldy-ness goes away. I was SO proud when I finished that I walked around my house in them, showing them off to my family, until I remembered that it's mid-summer in Austin. Well, we know they're warm enough, right? XD

My only other issue with these socks is this:



The hole where the gusset decreases start. The book I use (2-at-a-time, mentioned in the last post) gives a tip for getting rid of that (pick up an extra stitch where it looks like they're stretching in between the instep- and sole-stitches as you're picking up stitches along the heel flap for the decrease) and I did that, but it still didn't get rid of the hole thing... Any tips?

Another project I've been working on is a crocheted blanket for Seton Hospital:



Summer charity projects are always nice, and this pattern is great. Instead of crocheting through the V-thing at the top of the next double crochet, you work into the space between two DCs. That's what makes the cool spacey-stripey effect (sorry guys, it seems that good descriptive words fail me today). This blanket works up fast (I got this far in only a few days) and, once i get a good rhythm going, I can crochet without looking because I can feel where the next space to crochet into is. It's nice, cuz normally I have to put down what I'm working on when it gets to the intense part of The Phantom of the Opera (which, by the way, is just about the whole movie ^^). Anyways, it's gonna be a lap blanket. Once I get it wide enough (say, 36"?), I'll put a little orange border all the way around, just for a good clean finish. :-)

Aside from the scarf, socks, and lap blanket, all my other projects are in the planning stage. I am currently entertaining the thought of opening an Etsy shop to sell my hats and Pygmy Puffs (little fluffballs from Harry Potter, remember?) This here is Ozwald, on the left with a little purple friend who got shipped off a couple of days ago to be my sister's friend's birthday present.



Pygmy Puff's make awesome gifts and are super fast and easy to make. You just crochet a little sphere, stuff it, glue on little eyes and tie on a tongue. I brushed Ozwald with one of those wire dog-brushes to make him all fuzzy, and I crocheted both with a plain purple yarn and a white novelty "eyelash" yarn to get that hairy effect on the purple guy on the left. I'll have to check up on copyright issues before I sell this stuff, but we'll get to that later. :-)

I'll post back later with progress on the blanket, socks, and Etsy attempts. Until then, Happy Knitting!
~YoungKnitter

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