Spinning with my Matchless

I bought a new Matchless.  Last Sunday.  She's gorgeous.  She actually is an older Matchless, made in April of 1999.  She's had a lot of use, but the woman who bought her hasn't had time to spin with her, and gave her to her daughter, who sold it to me.  I've been spinning the roving she had brought for me to try her out.  Love it!  I believe she said this is Shetland. 

And I love the orifice hook I bought from Barefoot on the Farm:  https://www.etsy.com/listing/187324289/

So pretty.  Perfect for this wheel. 

Football Hat recipe

I don't know who originally designed and knit this hat, but I want to make some of these and took notes of what it looks like: 

Cast on 70 in the round.  Knit 9 rows in brown (9 Vs) in Stockinette, which makes a curled edge

Knit 4 rows cream

Knit 25 rows brown

Knit 4 rows cream

Knit 3 rows brown

Begin decrease rows: 10 k2tog (right slanting) spaced 7 stitches apart, Knit 5, k2tog ten times.  Then knit one row plain.  Knit 4, k2 tog.  Repeat till you are down to the last 12 or so stitches then just keep k2tog each row till you're down to two stitches.  Run the tail through those two and seam it into the inside of the hat. 

The seam part in cream covers four stitches, in the middle of the Vs. So really, it covers three upside down Vs.  It starts on the fourth row of brown, and leaves four rows at the top.  The extra stitching part covers two upside down Vs on either side, every four rows, total of five horizontal stitches. 

Football Hat fixed

My co-worker came up to me on Dec 23.  He said to me in the kitchen, "I have a knitting question for you."  Really!  A knitting question.  I was intrigued.  I walked back to his desk and he showed me this:

Oh, uh. Boo boo. And it didn't look like it had enough yarn to rework it. I told him I thought I could fix it, but needed the break over Christmas to do so. We talked about whether I could use another color for the tip if I couldn't find a brown, and he agreed that a cream would be ok. 

I asked all my buddies if they had a match for the brown, and Becky thought she did, but not in acrylic.  I then checked with Mary Ann, who has oodles of Simply Soft, but she said the yarn was thinner than Simply Soft when I showed her.  Ah, but her house is about a mile away from Michael's, so I stopped there on the way home.  I also didn't want to risk ordering something online from JoAnn's, because I knew the child would be wanting it asap.  Well, Michael's had three browns to choose from, and I ended up with a too thin Loops and Threads superfine weight, which I doubled.  I had a 50% off coupon in my email, and the very patient man at the register helped me get the right store location on my app and navigated me to the coupon, so I could pay a whopping total of $1.50 cash for the yarn.  My entire purchase.  Ha!  I love the hunt for a bargain and the conquest!

And here is the finished product, my first finished project of the year:

I ended up ripping back only one row or so, and then worked the k2tog rather tightly until there was just 1.5" of the old yarn left.  Then, I tied that to the new yarn which I had doubled, and kept going with the decreases till there were only two left.  I used my needle to thread it through the last two loops, and brought the tail to the inside, and aggressively tacked the ends in.  I know it's a little pointy.  But I didn't want to risk the stitches coming loose again, and hey, it's supposed to look like a football. 

The inside:

I brought it in Jan 2 and was glad to see out of our skeleton crew that the dad was in that day.  So glad I finished it the night before, as his two year old was missing his hat.  Here Jake is modeling with the it:

Happy New Year!

Just uploaded the Blogger app to a new phone.  Seemed a shame to have no entries for 2014, so have a very Happy New Year! 

Plarnin' Around

Decided I want to get rid of some unsightly unspun plarn (plastic bags) so I have been working on crocheting plarn the past few weekends. I've got some nice, thick white bags from work that I'm making into a nice sized tote. And I've got a bunch of WalMart bags (who doesn't?) and I'm tired of them taking up space in my house. Well, not the WalMart bags. I had folded them lengthwise and cut off the handles, and squeezed the air out of them. They're quite compact. It's the other miscellaneous bags in the walk in closet that are the problem. I definitely don't want to throw the brown ones out. They make a lovely base for the other colors. Plus, people stood in line at the Post Office to send them to me. That would be an awful waste. It's the other bags. They just remind me of unstarted projects. So I gathered all the brown ones together and shoved as many would fit in that bag holder Emma had made and given to me. First had to chuck all the bags I had in it, including the Wonder Bread bag ends with the colored dots. I know I won't get them anymore, but they really were pretty crappy. Started the WalMart bag tote last weekend. Used the black bags Dorothy had given me for the bottom of the tote, and they really were nice to work with. Thanks, Dot! Then, decided I wanted to use some gray, pink and white before I start in with the ever so flimsy WalMart bags, and now I have a Fair Isle effect going on. Not nearly so attractive as it sounds, but I'll keep going with it till I really hate it. Some bags work up stiff, and others have more drape. All depends on the thickness.

So, here are the two, in progress:

The Feline Pine bag, top, is a real pain to work. I have to cut the bag to about 3/8" and then sort of fold it in half to allow the color to show. The WalMart bag on the bottom is much easier, but the flimsier bags don't hold their shape. Ah, well.

To start again

Three and a half years later, I guess I will revive this blog.  So many yarns to show off!

Backdating posts

Needles to say (spelling intended), for various related reasons, January, February and March were stressful. So here over Memorial Day Weekend, I am back posting everything that got put on hold...

Sadly, the posts for May 2009 were drafted three years ago, and tonight, 10:01 pm est Nov 18, 2012, I am guessing at what day I drafted them up, and publishing them.  The yellow bag didn't make it.  It got much taller and cool looking, then started resembling the foot of an elephant.  It met an untimely death by kitty pee.  The blue tote I use all the time for church!  Perfect size for the bible Kara gave me, with my name gold imprinted on the cover, and a small notebook.  The Feline Pine bag needs the right handles, and is still not complete.  And it's rather scratchy.

I started a yellow bag tote...

I started this bag some weeks / months ago, but I didn't add the yellow till late Friday night / Saturday morning. Today is Sat, May 23 and I have just introduced a pale blue using C-Town bags an art friend of mine gave to me.

MD S&W

This year's Maryland Sheep and Wool festival was a little rainy. Saturday the rain threatened and sprinkled, but by the time I got there at 2:00 pm, it had stopped and the sun actually tried to come out. I had a great time, of course, but didn't get much shopping done. Sunday I made up for it, and spent well over what I had planned on spending.

Blue plastic bag tote

Here's my newest creation: my blue Klein's bags tote...

I had begged my sister for some blue Giant's bags, but she found this store (also in MD), and was able to send me a whole box of them! Took a while to cut up.



Just in time to show off at the Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival!!!!!

Feline Pine plastic bag tote

I've been working on a crocheted plastic bag tote, made from recycled kitty litter bags, for over a year now. I started it on Earth Day 2008. I remember because one of my sisters called me to see if I had the lights out, and I was watching Mel Gibson in "What Do Women Want?" So no, I did not have the lights out.


But the bag is green, literally and figuratively:


The plastic is much thicker and sturdier than regular grocery store bags, so I've had to use it "one ply" and cut the bag into one huge, 1/4" thick spiral. The only other con to it is that the material is so thick it isn't exactly soft and fuzzy when it connects against skin. Great color, though!

My Mom's Amirgumi

My mom made all this stuff in the 70s when she was diagnosed with high blood pressure. She had to take potassium for medical reasons, but making these cute little animals also relaxed her. She was way ahead of her time!

First up, the Goose

Then the Mouse

Bunny

Mr. Giraffe

looking very Lascaux cave painting...

Here's looking at YOU, kid...

The pig, made from panty hose

The other bunny

and the crocheted pig

Ta da!

Les Autres Chats

Feb 21 / The other cats

Left to right:
Felix, Kitten, Midnight, Simon

... and my blue tote making a cameo appearance, top left corner

Felix visits the Vet

Feb 7 / The spring was a little stressful. I took the stray cat inside in December, and when she first went into heat, I scheduled her to be neutered. Then, Kitten aka "Fat Cat" and Felix got into a fight. I walked in to the commotion to see Kitten with a mouthful of hair in his mouth, looking as innocent as he could. I thought Felix was ok, but after a week I noticed he had pus on his back and after unsuccessfully trying to clean it / cure it (it's one of those "don't try this at home" instructions), I brought him to the Vet. This is his homecoming after four nights at Kitty Club Med. Advice to pet owner's: bring them right away.

in the waiting room, homecoming day!

Conehead

(lots of stitches)