Fall Knitting

It’s been about 3 months since my last knitting confession.  To be honest, I haven’t finished a knitting project since!  That’s pretty bad for me.  I have started two projects, but they have been pretty challenging, so the going is slow.  Since they aren’t far enough along to show yet, I will share three projects from this fall that I haven’t blogged yet.

I will start with my favorite project first, because it involves my new favorite yarn.  It’s it bea-uuuuuu-ti-ful?

 

It’s Madeline Tosh Vintage  –  a hand-dyed yarn, so that means you have to alternate skeins while you are knitting.  That’s not my favorite thing to do, but the beautiful color variations in this yarn make it worth the extra effort.

The pattern I selected for this yarn is called the Zoe Cardigan by Cheri Christian.  It was so quick and easy to knit, that I was done in no time!  

As you can probably tell, it’s a top-down cardigan, so there is no time spent seaming.  The lace and cable patterns are really easy to memorize, so that saves time as well. 

The cute lace/cable detail is also done on the shoulders.

You can find the Raverly details here.

 

My second project is the Whisper Cardigan from Interweave Knits, Spring 2009 issue.

It took me a little longer than I anticipated, as I am not used to working with such a fine gauge of yarn.  I do love this color though, as I may have mentioned about a hundred times before.

I am debating about adding more length  to this cardigan.  I’ll decide next summer when I can start wearing it . . .

{Ravelry details here.}

 

My last project is another short cardigan, though I will not be lengthening this one.  You start at the bottom and work your way up, so that won’t be happening!   This cardigan has really unique construction, which made for a very interesting knit.  I learned a few new tricks too, so I always love that.  The pattern is called Watershed and was designed by Amy Swenson.  The yarn is Pure Pima by Berroco.

I love the details along the edge  . . .

The edging works its way up the sides and meets in the back.

There are more fun details that carry up the back of the sweater.

The only thing I don’t like about this project is if the whole sweater isn’t adjusted right, it looks like this:

Of course it only stays in place about two second, so mostly it looks all slouchy in the back.  I’m not sure what to do about this.  I already took the collar apart and did short rows, eliminating about 2″ of extra width along the top of the collar.  That took care of some of the sag, but if anyone else has any suggestions, I’m all ears.  I’ve heard that celebrities use sticky tape to keep their clothing in place.  Maybe I will have to try that.  Sounds comfortable, right?  Or maybe I will have to starch the collar like my Great Grandma Anka used to do with her doilies.  Again, if you have a more comfortable suggestion, I’m game to try it cause I like this little cardi and want to be able to put it to good use!  

That’s all for now – I’ll be back shortly with my last Christmas quilt of the season.

Seasonal Fun

Hi Everyone ~ 

I have a couple of things to share about today – Things that have brought some joy to me over the last week or so.  The first being a newish Christmas quilt that I finished.  I say newish, because as you can see in the photo below, there is green grass in this picture.  The other pictures that are further below in this post show snow and ice, which is more accurate to December in Minnesota.

I finished the quilt earlier in the year, but forgot to blog about it.  As I have been unpacking and displaying all of my Christmas quilts around the house, I was reminded that I have yet to share about this one.  The fabric is Jovial by Basic Grey and I love the colors and prints.  In fact, I have made a Christmas quilt from the Basic Grey Christmas lines the last three years and they are always a favorite.  I added the cream and black dot, which is from my last Christmas line.  The pattern is called Simple Gifts and is yet another from my “Living Large 2” book.  (You are probably getting sick of this book by now, so I promise that my next quilt will be from another book :-). )

I love making Christmas quilts and add another one or two to my stash each year.  Many of them are left up for several months, as I find that January 1st, is just to quick to say good-bye to some Christmas decorations.  Eventually, there will be one in each room, but I have a few years to go yet!  If you want to check out some of my other Christmas quilts, you can click here.

The second thing that I have enjoyed in the last week was an afternoon spent ice skating on a local lake. 

Many of the lakes have just frozen over in the last week, so it is was just perfect for ice skating.  Just to give you an idea of how perfect the ice is, in this next picture, you can see that the ice looks like a sheet of glass (which is also perfect for this guy with his ice-glider thingy). 

In the past 10 years, we have only had two times where the ice has frozen on a calm night.  That, in conjunction with the fact that we have had little snow and it was pretty warm out, made for ice skating perfection!   It was too perfect an opportunity to let pass, so Joel and I called up the local nieces and nephews to join us.  It was the first time out on the ice for all of them, including my oldest niece Bella.  She took to it like a natural and went up and down the shore with me.

My other niece Addi will be four shortly, and she gave it a try too.  If you look closely, you can see her double blades, which helps keep such a little one on her feet.  If you look closely below her feet, you can see how clear the ice is.  You could easily see all the sand and rocks on the bottom.  It was so clear, that all the little kids were freaked out to walk on itt.  After a little coaxing, they warmed up.

For the kids that were two little for skates, they ran around in their boots or got chair rides from Uncle Jed.  The chairs are really helpful for getting your skates on, but way more fun for sliding!

The littlest ones even came out on the lake in the stroller, which isn’t something you see everyday.

When the kids weren’t busy skating, they were busy exploring the lake bottom.  We saw a few fish and even a few muskrats swimming under the ice – we could see every fish bubble and muskrat claw.

Really, who needs a big screen TV when you have this?

I have to admit that I was a little worried that the one of the kids would get hurt, but I guess I should have been worried about my hubby instead.  After catching his blade on a crack, he tried to stop his fall with an eyebrow.  Not on purpose of course, but on ice these things can happen really fast.

This brought an end to his skating and resulted in 8 stitches.  We have decided that if the kids can skate as fast as Joel can, they will need to be wearing a helmet.

 

Despite the stitches, we had a great time (even Joel).  We hope the kids made some good memories too.  We can’t wait to do it again some time soon.  If you are in the area, you should try it too!  (don’t let those stitches stop you)

PS – Later that evening, when Joel and I were reminiscing about the day, he said that it would have been so cool if I would have gotten pictures of him falling to use on the blog.  I admitted that while he was seeing stars, I had snapped a few pictures.  He was a little dissapointed that it didn’t show any blood, but I figured this was already brutal enough.

More Patchwork Posies

Here in Minnesota, we are settling into winter.  We haven’t had as much snow as we did last year at this time, so it has been nice to get a few extra weeks of fall.  The lake is threatening to freeze over.  In fact, it has frozen over three times, then the wind blows it open again.  I am grateful for a few more days of seeing the beautiful blue water, rather than a sheet of ice.

Did you have a good Thanksgiving?  We had four family get-togethers over the holiday weekend, which was fun, but not good for the waistline.  Time to break out the Thanksgiving pants!  In addition to all the get-togethers, Joel’s sister Andrea came over and we made Raspberry jam together.

We added a touch of lemon juice, just to brighten the jam a bit. 

It was a fun process, and not as hard as I thought it would be.  Now we have about 14 pints of jam, so I might be looking for ways to use jam, other than just breakfast.

On the quilting front, I am in the process of finishing up a bunch of things.   Several haven’t been photographed yet, but I do have one that I haven’t blogged yet.

It’s called Patchwork Posies and can be found in my Living Large 2 book (preview here and here).  It’s the perfect pattern for those of you who hate sewing triangles!

I love the combination of the royal blue and the aqua blue.  I wouldn’t have thought to put them together, but it’s so attractive.  I especially love the blue block second from the corner above and the one below.  The fabric is by a new Moda designer named Lily Ashbury.

The machine quilting is pretty simple.

I just did a loops over everything.

And just in case this post doesn’t have enough pictures, I’ll add a few more.  You know I love color options, so here are a few more version of this pattern.

(fabric:  the newest line from Mom and I called Whimsy)

Awww… now I miss fall!