Wednesday, February 22, 2006

Ooo, Noro!

Yes, I got my Noro yarn for the butterfly jacket from the Noro Knits book, and WOW. I now know why people go so crazy for Noro. It doesn't feel any softer to me than WotA, but the COLOR! Mine is colorway #74 and it is amazing. Such vivid fuschias, pinks, purples, blues, greens, ohmygosh! I don't have the book with the pattern yet, but now I am going to have to get it sooner, so I can actually work with this wonderful yarn and see how it knits up!

Some very nice person on www.bookcrossing.com sent me the Folk Bags book. She didn't even ask me to pay shipping! How sweet. I offered to do a trade, or at least pay shipping. I'm really glad I was able to get it through there, because now I can check it out and decide whether I want to actually buy it, or just knit the one pattern I know I want from this book and send it on its way. I haven't been able to look through it yet, because all of my mail goes to mom's, and I won't be going there until tomorrow. Yay, the break starts tomorrow after my Chemistry final!!!

Also, the Brilla. Oh! This yarn really does have such a wonderful sheen to it; it looks like silk. It's really a beautiful yarn, although I already am not fond of working with it, because it has no elasticity. I knit up a swatch to see whether I could get gauge for the Modeknits' corset top. I was able to get a decent gauge, but I found it difficult to get even stitches, which normally is not too much of a problem for me. So I think I need to get used to working with it before I start my top. I'm also worried about running short - I think I'll have enough with the 4 balls in colorway #400 (a nice, bright red), but I'm not sure. I did read that Marnie Maclean knit hers in the 35" size using just over 4 balls of Brilla, which mades me feel a bit better about it, because I'm knitting mine in the 32" size.

I was able to procure a copy of IK Fall '04, and I didn't have to buy it off of ebay or spend even $20 on it! I've seen it go for between $20 and $40, but I made a post in the Livejournal knitting community, asking whether anyone had a copy, and was able to get it for what it would have regularly cost! All of the patterns are in perfect shape, and that's all I cared about, so yay!

Somehow, I also got in the mail a copy of Jan 2006 Crochet magazine. There are some supercute designs in there. It has a jacket, sweater, and a cropped top that are fab! I also love the idea for the little Christmas trees using Bernat Disco. Which reminds me, I never got my free ball of Disco I'd requested from their special offer.

I haven't had much time to knit because of finals; actually, this week, I've done no knitting at all. Last week, I thought I was making progress joining the flowers on the Ella crochet scarf. I got 4 done (which really did not take long), and thought "boy, this really doesn't look quite right." So I looked more closely at the picture again, gave the pattern another read through, and I'd be danged if I wasn't doing it wrong. Crap! So now I have to take them apart and start that much over.

And... we're getting a kitty! I think. Dusty and I "rescued" this pretty orange stray cat with the intentions of keeping him at Dusty's parents' (his mom oked it). We took him to the vet and discovered he is positive for FIV (which is cat AIDS). Dusty's mom has 3 other cats, so they can't keep the cat. So, now I think my mom is going to keep him until Dusty finds his apt, and then the kitty will stay at Dusty's. I know it sounds crazy to keep a cat who has FIV, but he's such a good and sweet cat, and I think we can handle it. Yay for kitty!

Ok, time to go study for my last exam.

Wednesday, February 08, 2006

More on the Delphine sleeve...

I now have two completed sleeve bottoms. Yay!!

I know people are just dying (ok, so maybe not!) to know what I'm doing for the top part of the Delphine sleeve. Well, I've been thinking about it alot, and have run two or three different ideas around in my head, but I've finally settled on something I think will look really nice. I don't particularly care for the holes in the sleeves of her sweater. True, they are very interesting and make you wonder how she did them, but well... I just don't see the practicality of a sweater with holes in it. I mean, the whole idea of a sweater is to be warm, and well, this just seems to be defeating the purpose a bit. So, instead, here is a little drawing of my proposed sleeve. The picture looks pretty bad, because I sketched it as quickly as I could. But anyway, here it is, with a little explanation.

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This picture isn't perfect, but it's close enough. For the upper section, I plan to do another tube, again, picked up from the armband. I'm going to do two regular cables. The tricky part is that I want mine to cross over one another like hers do, except no holes. So I'm (hopefully) going to have two cables, that are going to travel in a curve and cross over at the elbow of the upper, and then come apart again at the armband... assuming I can figure this out. I'll do some shaping and all...hopefully this will work out; I'm just going to fudge it until it does. I am so glad I'm not afraid of ripping out!

Monday, February 06, 2006

Rambling about knitting, and the knitting olympics

Well, I'm ~ 1 inch from being done with the bottom of the second sleeve. Then I'll have to figure out what I'm going to do for the upper parts. I'm considering two or three different things, all with cables, of course.

The knitting olympics is tempting me! I really want to do this, but I'd have to pick something really simple because I'd really only have a couple of days to work on it, since finals week is during that time and I'll be putting aside everything else to study... including knitting. I'd been wanting to knit a hat with the DNA cable on it, so I may enter that. I'll be winging it, and since I've never done my own pattern before, that should make it a bit more complex. Or I could do the little cropped sweater I want to make with the hyacinth WotA. I've been wanting to cast on, and it's all stockinette with a little ribbing, so it shouldn't be too hard... again, the biggest challenge would be finishing it in the alloted time. Or I could do the craftster circular shrug. I'm only looking at the couple of things I have yarn for already.

I am so mad that the only place I can find to order a 5th skein of Brilla in the colorway #400 is http://yarnlady.com/. I've never bought from there before, and for all I know, this may be a great store, with wonderful service, but $7.25 for one skein? Is the retail value even that high? Geez. Everywhere else I've seen Brilla, it's been for $6 or $6.50. With shipping, I'd be paying $12 for one skein! But I can't find it elsewhere, so if I need it, it will have to be from there. Their Trendsetters Kashmir is a bit expensive, too, not that I'm considering buying any. I'm in love with the stuff, but at $23 a skein (or $25.75 if you buy from yarnlady), it's out of my budget. It's the softest, most beautiful yarn I've ever touched; they have it at "my LYS" (in quotations because it's actually about 4 hrs from me, but it's the only actual yarn store I've been to). One skein is only 110 yds, so there wouldn't be much I could do with it, other than just enjoy touching it!

Ok, I really think I do want a subscription to IK. Like I need more patterns... more things to add to my To Do list. It will probably take me a year to finish all I have on there right now. But... I'll just say I'm subscribing for the articles!! Hehe. I doubt I'll be fooling anyone more than the guys who say they read Playboy for the articles! Before I subscribe, I want those back issues I mentioned in a previous post. I've been looking on ebay; it seems to be the only place I'll have a chance getting the one.

Another knitting mag I've discovered and now love is Phildar. I cannot understand one word of the site, but ohmygosh are the patterns beautiful! Their "English" version of the site is not very helpful, since when I click on it, nothing is in English. Oh well. Here are a couple that intrigue me the most:

Possibly from the Autumn-Winter 2005-2006 catalog (?? a guess), is this jacket:
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and my absolute favorite of these patterns is this "riding jacket"
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which is in the Spring 2006 catalog?? I really couldn't tell. I want this jacket so badly! :-)

... and there are seriously, so many other gorgeous patterns. There are also some lovely FREE patterns, but I'll be danged if I can find them just now. Just look around a bit... it's wonderful! Well, the site isn't wonderful, just the knitwear! I think even if I could read French, this website would still be annoying. Sites like this are almost always difficult to manuver, for lack of a better term.