Change of plans

Last week I was going to start another sweater after the one I finished, but then I changed my mind. I've been wanting to make another vest for a whole, but just haven't found the perfect yarn. Or, well, there's a lot of perfect yarns out there, but I was looking for the perfect color combination, and just hadn't found it in any of those otherwise perfect yarns (price was also a factor -I didn't want to pay upwards of $ 50 for a vest). And since I'm on a yarn diet, I decided to take a close look at my left over yarn bin. And lo and behold, enough of blue yarns in DK weight to make at least one vest, if not more! Who would have guessed! :D

I'm going for just simple stripes, nothing fancy:

With 3 mm needles it's kind of slow going, but I'm still enjoying it very much.

Just in time!

Just in time before it gets too warm to wear anything thick and woolly, that is! I finished my burnt red cadigan:Pattern: my own, started on Feb 2, finished on Feb 17
Yarn: Tahki Donegal Tweed
Needles: 4.5 mm circular Knitpicks


I very much like how it turned out, but the yarn wasn't the most pleasant to knit with. It was quite rough and non-elastic, so it was very hard on my fingers. Especially since I was only knitting this and nothing else for the last two weeks. But again, I like the end result, so I guess it was worth the pain.

This tweedy yarn is very light, it only took about 550 g to knit a medium size sweater, which is not very much at all! I had bought a full bag, which was 8 100 g skeins (not 10 as usual and as I thought it would be), and first I wasn't sure if it would be enough. Well, it was plenty, and now I have over 2 full skeins to figure out what to do with.

As far as I can remember, this was the first zipper I had put on a cardigan. It wasn't as diffucult as I thought, actually it was easier than most zippers, because you don't even have to fold the fabric under, so you can just sew over it once and you're done.

When I find the time, I will write the pattern out and publish it here.

Next is another sweater from a fine boucle yarn. I'll tell more about that when I have finalized my plans.

Bag

I know this is supposed to be a knitting blog, but I just have to show you all my new tote bag. I found this coolest ever fabric (I'm sure you'll agree) at a store in Minneapolis, and made a bag out of it. I'm one of those people who are always hauling a whole bunch of stuff with them everywhere, and sometimes I feel like I look like a bag lady... So I needed a nice new bag, so that I can at least look like a stylish bag lady!

Here's the inside (they also had very cool matching fabrics for lining):

And a close-up of the coolest ever fabric:

I think the name of the store was Calico Corner. Very nice little fabric store -I could hardly get out of there, because I wanted to buy just about everything they had, but my pocket book just wouldn't allow it. I did also got a couple of other fabrics for more bags, but those will have to wait till later.

There has been some knitting progress, too, mainly due to the thicker-than-usual yarn.


I've finished both front pieces and have started the back:


(Lankahamsterit: tässä on vähän vajaa 200 g lankaa. Erittäin riittoisaa, muuten...)

Socks and sweaters

Remember the yarn diet I was participating with? Well, that started February first, and one of the ideas of this whole thing is to try to knit as much as you can during the month of February. The winner takes home a prize that -of course - is yarn. But only projects started during this month count, so I was trying to finish off a couple of projects. The first one was E's sweater that has been in the works since Thanksgiving. And I have to admit that it still isn't quite finished, I need to bind off the collar, and find a suitable zipper.

I used a crochet enforced steek for the front:
Cutting the steek:And here's what it looked like after cutting:


The steeks were folded under and stitches picked up from the top:
I don't have a picture of the collar yet, but maybe some day you'll actually get to see the finished product.

I also worked on my travel project, a pair of stockinette stitch socks from Koigu KPPPM. I haven't really shown any pictures of these before, because they've lived in my bag and in my car. I don't remember the colorway, and my Little Helper took care of shredding the bands before I got a chance to write it down. He's very helpful that way. ;) Anyhow, here are the finished socks:
I liked the color much better on the skein than knitted up. The colors, even though lovely, turn out a little messy looking. But I love my new socks anyway!

Then onto the new project. I started from scratch, planning the pattern using my Excel spreadsheet again:Not the best picture ever, but you get the idea... I like it how once you've got the spreadsheet, figured out, doing the math for a new project is a breeze. Then I just print out the sheets, and off I go. I'm using Tahki Donegal Tweed and 4.5 mm needles, so it's coming out pretty fast:This is the right front. It will have a zipper closing, raglan sleeves and minimal shaping at the waist. I might add pockets, not quite sure yet.