Blogcation

I'm taking a vacation from blogging for awhile. 

If you want to check out my knitting projects, I always keep my Ravelry pages up to date.

Bits and Pieces

A few random items today:

• FLAG AFGHAN:  Thanks  to  everyone  who  gave  me  an opinion about my new flag afghan,  as to whether I should add a Colorado flag (home) at the beginning or end.  I'd never thought of it, but it's true: while I think I'll still be living in Colorado when the afghan is finished, one never knows.  If you had told me 15 years ago that I would be an American citizen living in the Denver area I would have asked you what you've been smoking, but here I am, and I love it.  So, the first flag will be Colorado's, and the last block, well, we'll see where I am when I get there.  Undoubtedly it will be years from now.  I'll be graphing a Colorado flag this weekend.

• INITIAL SWEATERS:  You may remember that I made my Grandson, Braydon, a sweater with the letter "B" on the front.  Many years earlier, I had made a similar sweater for his Mom, Jessica, with a "J" on the front.  What I'd forgotten, however, is that before the "J" sweater I'd made her another one with the letter "M" for her last name.  I came across this picture just a couple of days ago:

Petawawa, Ontario - Jessica, age about 3

• SOCK YARN AFGHAN  I'm still moving forward with this project and it's as addictive as ever.  I've finished 68 small blocks and 2 large ones.  I still have a very long way to go.  Remember, if you have any 8-yard balls of sock yarn (about the size of a cherry tomato) that you were going to throw out anyway, or toss into your stash and forget about them, I'd love to add them to my afghan. 

• BRAYDON'S COWBOY SWEATER:  Originally I was going to start this sweater right away, but it's going to be a size 4, and he's only 16 months old, so it'll be a project for later on.  In the meantime, there will be other sweaters for him.

• PROJECT SPECTRUM:  I plan to knit a pair of socks each month in the color of that month.  I missed doing last month's red socks, getting sidetracked by the watermelon socks.  I don't count them even though they are mostly red.  My plan is to make solid, or almost-solid colored socks.  This month the color is green and I'll start there, catching up with the red ones as I can.

• MAN VS FOOD:  Have you ever seen this show?  It cracks me up, but not so much for the food, which is amazing and generally in huge portions, but the host, Adam Richland is a natural performer and foodie, and he's hilarious.  I just found out that all three seasons are free to watch on Netflix, so I must indulge (pun intended) this weekend and enjoy a Man vs Food marathon while I knit.  Do I know how to have a good time or what?  (I told you that today's post was going to be random!!)

• MUSIC:  I'm trying to find a copy of the 2-disc CD "One Way Out" by the Allman Brothers Band (live CD from 2003).  I can't find a reasonably priced copy anywhere.  Specifically, I'm looking for the version of "Trouble No More" that's on this album.  If you can point me to the album or a place where I can buy a download of the song, I'd be grateful.  If you want to hear what this particular version of the song sounds like, go to the H & H Restaurant website and click on the video slideshow (February 21).  Gregg Allman's voice is gripping in this song and Derek Trucks kills on the slide guitar.  In my perfect little dream world, I can play just like that... but in reality, I'll be off to my guitar lesson tomorrow, so there won't be a posting on Thursday.  UPDATE: I found a copy!

Thanks for visiting!

A Good Idea

I have a friend who regularly comes up with good ideas.  We were talking about my Travel Afghan and the fact that I just finished block number 42, out of 55.  Since I don't plan to stop travelling any time soon he suggested that I do another Travel Afghan.  His idea was to make a flag afghan.  I liked the idea, imagining all the colors and designs and memories.  I've decided not to wait until my current afghan is finished, so there will be some of the same trips on both afghans for a while.

The trip I just took was to the state of Georgia, so I would start with a flag of Georgia. 

It will be challenging, and it's not possible to do an exact replica.  There just aren't enough stitches to work with.  I'll get in as much detail as possible and call the flags "stylized"! 

I needed a yarn with a wide range of colors and decided on Cascade 220 Sport: 

8895 Christmas Red - 8505 White - 7818 Blue Velvet - 4010 Straw

The red, white and blue yarns arrived today.  The fourth shade that I ordered wasn't right ("the colors on your monitor may differ" - no kidding!).  It turned out to be a brown/camel color.  I've since ordered "straw", above, and hopefully it will be okay. 

After I ordered the yarn and make the graph for the flag I started looking at flags for other states and provinces.  Oh my.... I have some challenges ahead.  Maybe I should only visit places with easy-to-graph flags!  No, I don't think so.  I'm ready to take on all flags.  My next trip is to Calgary, Alberta and it's not going to be an easy flag, but I don't mind.

I've been thinking that perhaps I should start, or end, the afghan with my home flag of Colorado.  I haven't decided yet.  Should I start or end my journeys with Colorado? 

Back to Blue

Do you remember the blue cable sweater that I was making for my grandson, Braydon?  Me, too! 

Now that I've finished my watermelon socks (thanks for the nice comments)... it's time to go back and work on his sweater.  When I put it down a few weeks ago I had the back finished. 

Last night I cast on for the front and its coming along quickly. The sweater size 2/3, knit with DK weight yarn on size US #5/3.75mm needles. The cables only cross on one row out of a 12-row repeat, so it's going fast. 

Back to the needles.....

Watermelon Socks - F. O.

I've finally finished my watermelon socks after a wee bit of setback.  I like my socks to match as exactly as possible.  I know, I know!  Anyway, as I was working the second sock I checked and the stripes were close, but not exact, so I thought maybe I'd miscounted the rows.  I ripped back a little and recalculated.  As it turned out, I had done the same number of rows for both socks and the difference between them was because the yarn is dyed by hand and not by a machine, and the differences weren't big.  I reminded myself that it was part of the charm of handknit socks and relaxed and went forward with the knitting.  I'm glad that I did because now I have a very cool new pair of socks and I'm happy with them.

THE DETAILS

Pattern:  Generic sock pattern - 60 stitches
stocking stitch, short row heel, knit top down

Yarn:  Self-striping watermelon yarn found on Etsy at KnitPurlGurl

75% superwash merino wool, 25% nylon

460 yards/100 grams

Fingering weight

Needles:  Size US #0/2.00mm double pointed

Size:  Lady's medium

Pick-A-Stitch

A couple of weeks ago I was excited to learn that I'd won an online contest.  The prize was the CD "Pick-A-Stitch" from the PJ Young Publishing Company. 

The CD contains 130 stitch patterns in the categories of:  bobbles and slip stitches, cables and twisted stitches, edging stitches, reversible stitches, textured stitches and lacy stitches and switching from one to another only requires a simple click of the mouse. 

The feature that I like best is the ability to change the color of the swatch.  Sometimes you will see a stitch pattern in a book that you like, but you try to imagine what it would look like in another color, and sometimes that's difficult.  Here's how it looks on the CD: take this Trellis Stitch pattern in light green, for example:

By clicking on the little color grid on the right, you can see what it would look like in, for instance, a dark pink:

Under the swatch you have options:  view the swatch, written instructions, charted instructions, bookmark.  I clicked on the charted instructions.  It looks like this:

It's an excellent little program and easy to use.  If you've got a computer, you've got a stitch dictionary.

I'd love to see it expand someday... to include hundreds of patterns and more color options.  I'd be surprised if this wasn't the beginning of more CDs to come.  Maybe apps for your phone, too?

Thanks PJ Young for my cool prize!