Spincerely yours,

For more info on my finished projects see my Ravelry page:


Entrelac Socks by Eunny Jang

Pattern: Entrelac Socks as found in the Spring 2007 issue of Interweave Knits

Yarn: Koigu KPPM in colors (I think these are the numbers, at least) P137 and 2170

Needles: 5 inch clover dpns size 1

Gauge: 18 stitches per 2″ in St St in the round

Date started: About March 5, 2007

Date completed: April 5, 2007

Pattern Mods: I had to change some of the numbers for the short row heels. If you are really interested, please leave a comment and I’ll get back to you… I also made “calf highs” rather than knee highs without the tassels. This is a rather odd height for socks and I don’t really recommend it.

Sizing: I choose to make these more because I wanted to learn entrelac and I thought they looked cool. I did not think they would fit me, but they do! Not perfectly, but good enough to wear them…

Thoughts: I LOVE entrelac! It is so fun and addictive! I learned how to knit backwards too. At the shop, the owner calls it knitting back backwards, but I saw a website last night with a tutorial and she calls it purling backwards as knitting backwards would actually put the “bump” in the front, not in the back on stockinette as purling does.

Tomato

Pattern: Tomato by Wendy Bernard from the book No Sheep for You by Amy Singer

Yarn: Blue Sky Alpaca Dyed Cotton in colors 614 and 618 (I used just over 3 skeins of the main color and just a bit of the contrast)

Date Started: About March 25, 2007

Date Completed: April 6, 2007

Pattern Mods: I combined 2 sizes. I started with the size 35.5″ and changed at the sleeve division to the 31″. I also altered the sleeves a bit so they would not be tight.

Overall thoughts: This sweater fits me very nicely, however, there is a bit of an issue with the color stranding part being right at the chest. Since my color stranding knitting tends to be tighter and the pattern has you decrease right before it starts, I found that I was being pushed in in the area I least need to be pushed in. However, by the end of the day, the sweater seemed to stretch out nicely and maybe it is part of the overall design plan of knitting with cotton? It will be interesting to see how the fabric behaves after a few more wearings and washings. This was a quick knit and relatively inexpensive. It has great shaping and I love the “squareness�? of the neckline.

Ravelry link

Tiffany Mittens

Pattern: Tiffany Mittens from Knitty

Yarn: Knit Pick’s Merino Style

Started and completed: Sometime in Jan and Feb 2007

Thoughts: Buy more than 2 balls of the main color unless you would like cool and trendy mismatched mittens like these!

Santa Cruz

Pattern: Santa Cruz from February 2007 Magknits

Yarn: Andean Silk from Knitpicks (so far my favorite Knitpicks yarn) in Sangria (This has to be the prettiest color that I have ever ordered from Knitpicks.) I bought this yarn just to swatch for future projects and I do have some left to do that. It is a blend of superfine alpaca, silk, and merino, which makes it soft, lustrous, with a bit of a halo. You can even smell the silk in it.
Needles: Size 7 Addi Turbos (top of hat completed on 2 circs)

Start and Finish date: February 18, 2007

Pattern Mods: This pattern gives instructions for 4 different weights of yarn. I choose to follow the instructions for the worsted weight. I changed 2 things. First, I did 2 complete pattern repeats for the body of the hat (instead of 1.5). Second, in rounds 9 and 13, I (yo, k2tog) 3 times to start the row and in round 11, I (k2tog, yo) 3 times to start the row instead of the 2 times given in the instructions. By changing it from 2 times to 3 times in rows 9, 11, and 13, it centers the second set of cables in the lacy pattern.

Pattern Notes: I hoped to give this hat to a friend, however, it came out on the small side even though I knit an extra 8 rows. I think to get a larger size, I may have to use the sport weight instructions but use the yarn and needles for worsted weight yarn.

Dancing Socks

Pattern: Universal Toe Up from Knitty (aka My Heel is a Toe Sock)
Yarn: Dancing by Knitpicks

Started: Beginning of January 2007

Finished: February 17, 2007

More info can be found here.

(These socks were made for LFG while sitting with our dad in the hospital and while he is having his IV’s.)

Endpaper Mitts

Pattern: Endpaper Mitts by Eunny Jang

Yarn: Knitpicks Pallete in Blush and Wood

Pattern Mods: I only knit chart A 2 times before increasing for the thumb rather than 3 times.
Started: January 17, 2007

Finished: February 7, 2007

More info can be found here.

Kangaroo Duo

Pattern: Kangaroo Duo from The Purl Stitch, page 82, Child’s 6-8.

Yarn: Hand painted worsted weight wool (Abundance) from Briar Rose Fibers, purchased at Rhinebeck 2006.

Start date: November 19, 2006

Finish date: January 10, 2007

Pattern mods: I don’t think that I changed anything. I used some different techniques to do the finishing which you can read about here.

Project notes: This sweater was simple and fun. The pocket was integrated and really easy. I love the drop sleeves. I think they look rather nice on Agent B. The seaming took a few hours, but I was watching TV and the time flew by. I would knit this again since it really shows off the handpainted yarn. I would also recommend this project to anyone looking for a nice quick simple sweater who also wants to practice their finishing techniques!

Fetching

Pattern: Fetching from Summer 2006 Knitty

Fibers: Dyed Merino 70%, Tencil 30% from Detta’s Spindle. These fibers are from Flan from Emphatic Knitting who was my fiber swap partner from the Spinning Roving Swap in October 2006.

Spinning: 3 ply approx 12 wpi.

Completed: December 4, 2006

New techniques for me: Cabling without a cable needle!!!!

Pattern mods: Surprisingly none — although next time, I think I will skip the picot bind-off.

Knucks

Pattern: Knucks from Knitty

Yarn: My handspun yarn that used to live on this black alpaca from Winters Gone Farm:

Start date: November 7, 2006
Complete date: November 22, 2006

Needles: Size 4 addi turbos

Project notes: The only pattern mod I can think of was that I knit these on 2 circs instead of double points and it was super easy to change the pattern for 2 circs and I would highly recommend it.

I held a contest for the “words” for the Knucks that can be seen here and here. Because Dave wants to wear the gloves for typing at work – and he chose a personal message – I embroidered the letters on the inside of the knucklets so it is like a private message between us, and, well, also my blog readers:)

Baby Bolero

Pattern: Oneskein Baby Bolero

Yarn: Blue Sky Alpacas Cotton

Needles: Size 8 and 9 Addi Turbos and size 8 and 9 double points

Start date: November 15, 2006

Complete date: November 16, 2006

Pattern mods: My pattern mods are more just changes in the technique rather than changes to the pattern. I joined the shoulder seams with a 3 needle bind-off and then I picked up the 40 stitches evenly from around the armhole and knit the sleeve in the round. The little sweater is so tiny it would be really hard to seam the sleeve and try to set it in. If you are interested, this is what I did after picking up the 40 stitches. I knit 2 rounds and then decreased 2 stitches every 4th round. I put a marker at the center of the bottom of the armpit and I did an SSK starting 3 stitches before the marker, K1, sm, K1 and then K2tog. After completing the decrease rows I just continued to knit in the round until the sleeve was 4.24 inches long, changed to the larger needle size and did 3 rounds of K2, P2 ribbing before binding off.

Double Cable Scarf

Pattern: Double Cable Scarf from Oneskein

Yarn: Malabrigo- pearl ten – I LOVE this yarn! It is incredibly soft and the colors are beautiful!

Needles: Size 9

Start date: August 11, 2006

Complete date: November 17, 2006.

Simple Knitted Bodice

See details at this post.
Halfdome Hats

Completed: October 28, 2006

Pattern: Halfdome from Knitty

Yarn: Harmony from Naturally Yarns
2 skeins makes 2 hats

This yarn is absolutely scrumptious! It is an 8 ply 100% pure New Zealand Merino which looks like a single – it is very firm and it does not split or pull apart. It would be a very lovely yarn to use for an aran sweater.

Brown hat: man’s
Gray hat: woman’s

Needles: Sizes 2, 4, 5 addi turbos

Project notes: I didn’t have any size 3 needles for the first band of color so in the man’s hat I used a size 4 and for the woman’s hat I used a size 2 (which in addi turbos is a size 3 mm). I increased the length of the hats to provide more ear coverage. I thought I was going to run out of yarn for the woman’s hat so at the top I increased the rate of the decreases and I actually like the results better – the top is less pointy and more rounded.

Enchanted Birthday Jaywalker Socks

Completed: October 7, 2006

Pattern: Grumperina’s Jaywalker Socks

Yarn: Knitpicks Bare Superwash/Nylon sock yarn dyed with Prochem one shot dyes

Needles: 5 inch size 1 Chiagoo double points

Project notes: I was seeing the Jaywalker socks everywhere on the internet but I thought they would be too hard for me to make as a carry along project. I finally gave in to their charme and decided to jump in and give them a try. I now know why they are so popular – the directions are easy to follow and they make a lot of sense. For example the way the stitches are distributed around the needles makes it really easy to remember where you are in the pattern repeat. They did take a really long time to make, but they were on size 1’s.

The Knitpicks yarn is extremely soft though it has a tendency to be splitty. I also think it will be on the pilly side. I really hope not though as they were a gift…

These socks have left my home and now live a fun filled life with Crops a lot!

Colorwork Sling Bag

Completed August 4, 2006
Project details:

Pattern: Colorwork Sling Bag by Kelly Bridges

Yarn: Mostly Araucania Nature Wool

My thoughts on this project: I choose this project because it used 3 different colorwork techniques. I had never tried intarsia before, but had done some stranded knitting and slip stitch. I also liked the colors that came in the kit and being that it is summer, I needed a fun project that I could start without much thinking or prep work. I had also always wanted to felt with Aracuania Nature Wool.
What I learned: I found that intarsia is really no big deal and that stranded knitting is the most fun. I also found that Nature Wool felts extremely well. Since I have a front loading washing machine, I usually have to put my feltables through many many loads. For example, my Rainbow Bag went around 7 times! The bag was completely felted after 2 loads!
Overall: I would recommend this project to anyone who wants to learn colorwork on a small scale before venturing out into the realms of a sweater. The pattern was well written and contains detailed explanations of the techniques used.

Koigu Universal Toe-Up Socks

Completed September 4, 2006

Pattern: Summer 2006 Knitty Universal Toe-up Socks

Yarn: Koigu Painter’s Palette Premium Merino color number P304

Needles: 5 Size 2 double pointed really shorts

Project notes: These are the second pair of socks that I’ve completed with this toe up pattern. For the first pair (no, I haven’t entered in the details for the first pair yet!!!), I did a tubular bind-off and I was not thrilled with the way that came out. On these socks, I tried a couple of different endings. First I tried doing a baby cable at the top and then the Elizabeth Zimmerman sewn bind off, but I didn’t like the way either the cables or the bind off looked. This yarn did not look good with ribbing at the top around my calves. I tried doing the picot bind off a couple of times and ending up doing this – knitting all the way to the top without ribbing. Purling 3 rows then doing a picot bind off where I cast on 1 with a cable cast-on, then bound off 3, returned the last stitch to the left needle and repeated from cable cast-on. At the top they have a nice little fold over and then the cute picot edging. I hope they stay up without any ribbing!

I really liked knitting with the Koigu – I wonder how they dye this yarn. It is almost like the dye is sprayed on because it doesn’t seem to saturate through the plies to the middle. I also like how the colors did not pool. Maybe that is due to short color repeats and variations in the lengths of the colors used. I just found this site that has some information on how the yarn is created. I have 2 more skeins – one multicolored and one brown. I’m just waiting for them to let me know what they want to be.

Pending Projects:

Felted Bag for Agent J

Yarn: Steadfast Wonderful Wool and Knitpicks Palette. (I know, an extreme yarn dichotomy if there ever was one!)

Pattern: Trying to design my own

Status: Second side almost done

Sweater for IHA

Pattern: Cambridge Jacket by Ann Budd, Summer 2006 Interweave Knits

Yarn: Chaco from Little Barn purchased at Rhinebeck

Project status: Working on the back

Rustic rose

Yarn: Barely spun hand dyed pencil roving

Pattern: Trying to make my own – more of just a winging it thing

Status: Needs straps.

8 x 8 Maine Alphabet Vacation Album

Maine vacation from July 2005

Project Status: about 3/4 complete plus needs journalling.

Hoops and Yoyo Album Started: Summer 2006

This is a family project that consists of chronicalling the life and times of Hoops and Yoyo in the Spincerely yours/ Inhouse Agent household.

Project status: Barely begun