*knitknit*
Posts tagged wip
Day two
Jul 4th
I find it very difficult to sit at home and work with fleece and yarn on beautifull days like these. I also noticed I really missed drawing.. I don’t know why but somewhere at some point I decided to split the knitting blog from the artstuff blog and then it all went down the drain. Since then I have not drawn a thing… which is a bad thing since I’m still not done with my brothers airbrush thingy… So now I’m having second thoughts about the second blog but I still don’t think the two subjects should be mixed… The blog started out as a place to organize all of my hobbies, but somewhere along the line my drawing got shoved out of the way by the knitting/ sewing and now I feel like I’ve lost an old friend…
I’m not sure what I’ll do yet but I’m thinking of returning the drawing stuff to the main blog because it’s not working out right now…
Talking about things creative – I’ve been nagging about how slow my bobbins are and that I’m annoying the living daylight out of myself treadling so fast I can’t even hear the tv anymore, but now I’ve come up with a solution. It’s still an experimental sollution but if this works out I’ll take the whole thing to the next level.
I spent a whole day searching the internet for a bobbin that will work out for me, and then came to the conclusion that I’m not willing to spend so much money on something I can make myself (funny, that’s what I said when I started knitting/ sewing/ spinning), so I grabbed my jig saw and the sander, and then the gluegun and I was a happy little girl 
Obviously this is an experiment, but it’s already a huge success, so the next step is to get me some plywood and making some good calculations to get me a 1:10 ratio
This end was twice as big and completely useless, the bigger side (now) gave me a 1:5,5 ratio, the new part gives a 1:7 ratio. Not a huge improvement but I can definately feel (and hear) the difference!
I know how it really looks very crappy but it’s totally worth it! This little experiment will allow me to actually do something else while spinning, like watching tv or a movie without the need for heavy headphones 
A total success if you ask me. So for the next step I think I’ll create some custom bobbins with different sets of plywood (recreating the original side). I’ll keep you guys updated
I had mentioned spinning a little today, but I paused because of the greyish color. It’s the first time I ever washed and carded fleece so obviously there’s a million things I could’ve done wrong with this, but the most obvious thing is that it isn’t clean. The fleece is a white alpaca, and not grey… but the singles are very very grey… It feels rather dry and gross on my fingers after a while but that’s not the biggest of my problems, right now I’m wondering if the color will ever go back to ‘white’ after spinning and plying….. 
Besides the new singles on the mutilated bobbin I spent some time trying to get the overtwisted Dandelion straight again… I was so afraid of undertwist I really really overtwisted the whole thing in the end. The beginning isn’t even that bad, but the last 50 meters are horrible… It’s 178 grams of a total of 300 grams and I’m really sure I can make something quite large with this…
I was going for malabrigo sock and tho it’s not 400 meters per 100g it’s close enough for a first attempt Here, have some pix 
BFL Dandelion in action
May 24th
So here’s another double post today I’ve been sitting here on my chilling spot awesome outdoors office and been trying out my next spinning project. As I’ve already told you my goal in life (well…) is learning how to spin as many meters as a malabrigo hank (yes 3 ply) from the same weight. Once I can do this and have a nice consistent yarn I’ll have achieved my goal. The 100 grams of Merino gave me a nice 300 meters of 2 ply (which is nice but is 300m less than I needed for 3-ply… So since I’m still learning I don’t mind at all.. and I’m actually quite happy with the amount of yarn I managed to produce
With the merino I tried some different kinds of techniques (learned from the internets of course) and got some weird results which were nice and thin at some points but quite irregular and thick at others. This time I’m doing a combination between drafting and long-draw while pincing the yarn…. wtf right? I’m inventing stuffs as I go hahaha
I’ve read somewhere that there is no right or wrong when it comes to spinning so I just went ahead and tried out whatever seemed to work best which was pincing the yarn to stop the spin from moving up, draft a bit and let the spin move up and then long-draw.. a bit weird but it works quite consistently so far
This is what I look like while spinning… excuse the punk hair (no don’t excuse the messiness). I love The Man for putting up with this (he actually likes my spinning and treats it as of it’s actual yarn and he never complains about it yay!). The pile on the right of the wheel is a quarter of the predrafted Dandelion roving. I split it in two and then split one half in two again and that’s what I predrafted… so there’s a whole lot left.
This is what’s been spun up from half of the predrafted fibre. The green has become quite light but when it’s plied with the yellows I think it’ll look nice I wouldn’t want to have it to epxlosive
To document mostly for myself what I’ve been doing I added a close-up picture with my left index finger for a scale reference. There’s some inconsistency as to the thickness of the strands but overall it’s about the same I think (especially compared to the previous spinning project )
Besides spinning I’ve been doing some swatching for my evil plans for the Malabrigo sock yarn I’ve got lying around.
I’ve been intruiged by shadow/ illusion knitting for quite a while but I never really got to it…
I really love the subtle effect it has. This picture really sucks because IRL the heart is much more visible but it’s okay for now
office space
May 19th
rant
In general I’m an easy going person. I’m in for a lot of things and try not to make things more difficult than they need to be. But there’s things about me that are not so cool and which tend to give me quite some stress…. I’m not good at letting things go. Not in a petty ‘just-wait-I’ll-get-you-when-you-least-expect-it’ kind of way, but when more in a masochistic ‘why-would-they-do-this-to-me’ kind of way… I won’t react but things people do can really get to me to a point where I get really depressed.
Now before you think I’m a total freak let me explain will you I only have this problem with people who are really close to me, either my family or my first ring of friends. Sometimes people will react in a certain way that I find hurtfull, but I won’t tell them, because I’ve told them in the past and they either reacted in a very negative way or they said they wouldn’t do it anymore but continued to show that kind of behavior. So after a while I stop asking but I still do feel hurt or sad by it…
/rant
I’m saying this because prior to being a knit blog this place was supposed to be about me organizing my hobbies and my life so sorry about the rant.. but this is me showing myself I have to stop caring about people being mean to me. So this one is for me and for those so-called friends: welcome to my office
What you’re seeing here is my 2×1,2 (I think) balcony on the third floor facing the south. I have sunshine from 7 in the morning till sunset in the middle of summer, so now it’s from 8.30 – 9am till 7-8pm. I sit here everyday, reading my books, making notes on my macbook and knitting while getting a tan. I won’t post a picture but it’s noon and I’m wearing a bikini HELL YEAH!
This is my East view, with my sweet kitty Noodles checking out the strawberry plant. The cats love the balcony and plz don’t freak out they are indeed very carefull
I’m not posting these pictures to rub it in my ‘friends’ faces who talk behind my back about not spending my time at the uni’s stuffy overcrowded rooms, but I’m posting this to prove to myself that I don’t need people approving of my life and of my way of doing it, as long as I’m having fun. The next time someone sais something nasty I’ll ignore them and think of this post (yea even in the dead of winter)
so.. back to knitting….!!!
meet my sock-covered heel There’s something about me making things more difficult (in contrast to what I typed above) when it comes to knitting.. I can mask my stupidity by saying I like to have a challenge which I obviously will The pattern calld for more decreases but I have small feet… I mean I knew I have small feet but I wasn’t expecting them to be this small… I even decreased 2 stitches per repeat of pattern (which is 8 stitches in total) on top of the 4 I had already decreased with my smaller gauge… WTF?!
Or I can say you all have huge monstrous feet.. I won’t say it out loud because I love you guys but I will think it in the back of my head where all thoughts are private.
My question for you is: did I even do this right? it seems a bit off? This was not done with short-rows but that may have been much and much better as decreasing and then picking up stitches really doesn’t look that polished… anyway… they seem to fit perfectly now without stretching the fabric but it might grow on me…. and if I know Murphy it most definately will…
I’ve also worked on my hew for a bit and I must say that the more I knit the more excited I get about this project. By now it’s all so weird.. I’m only NOW realizing that I have spun yarn and made something unique.. whoa.. my love for spinning just grew with 20%
little picture of the backside.. The cotton keeps curling on me but I hope it won’t do that anymore once it’s washed (and while I’m wearing it).
It feels good to finally have some sunny pictures of the yarn as the sparkles show a lot more and the color seems much more ‘happy’ than it does in the overcast pictures
Jaywalker wip
May 17th
Every now and then by doing things you usually don’t do you learn things about yourself you would never have learnt if you hadn’t done this particular thing… vague much?
As I might have said once or twice I’m doing my graduation project at the moment and need to spend much of my time reading on my subject. I also have some unfinished work I need to hand in these coming weeks, for which I need to read some other books as well…. So long story short: I’ll be reading like crazy for the coming 2 months…. So what does this have to do with my knitting you ask?
You may remember this post.. well.. let’s just say I noticed I tend to read better when my hands are busy.. I can’t stand reading because I feel I’m not doing anything, so when my hands are busy I read better because i do have little breaks and my mind keeps working.. one of the main problems I encountered while reading is when I’m reading the really interesting stuff about my field of study my mind tends to wander….. I’m reading about something and then – while reading! my eyes keep reading – my brain starts thinking of ways to use this information, or arguments in favor or against this information come up because of previous literature studies…. By the time I come out of this ‘trance’ I’ve actually read and flipped through tree or four pages of book but I can’t remember any of it……..
does anyone have this?? or does anyone know what this is..? it’s so weird…
So that’s why, tho I LOVE reading books for entertainment I despise reading books for education… but now that’s over I guess… sock knitting was the key!
So now I’m sitting in my lazy chair sucking up information but my mind is not able to wander as I’m already counting stitches in the background, thus keeping my focus on the information and not on what I could be doing with it! I guess I’ll be churning out a lot of socks now…….. the first one is always the hardest I think and now I’m on a roll and don’t need to hold the massive construction of two socks, two balls of yarn and a huge magic loop I can sit in my lazy chair and read/knit all I want
So yeah, this is basically what I’ve been doing *looks really proud* You might remember the yarn from this little FO and you just miiight recall how this catastrophe took place and therefore you might wonder why on earth I’m knitting my first real socks with untrustworthy, evil yarn like this… well the answer is quite simple, I don’t have other sockyarn I’m willing to sacrifice hehehe
I have a nice stash of malabrigo sock yarn in two shades but I will not be using that anytime soon, and definately not for socks as I’m brooding on other evilness for those pretty yarns. So since there’s nothing left there’s no other option than just to suck it up and use this yarn… I won’t be putting these in the washing machine I might add…
This is the second attempt as the first one was way too large, even with my smaller gauge. I cast on 28 stitches for the toe-up adapted version instead of 32 and now it fits like a charm. I’m not sure when to start the gusset yet but I think I still have a length of knitting to do before I get there
Besides knitting socks I opened up the roving and tried to give it back a little fluff as it had become a narrow strip after the dyeing, and made a nice braid. I want to use it in a nice project (though I’m not sure what it’ll be yet) and I want to get as many meters as possible so I just dyed it all in one piece. This is also because it was shipped by Bep in one piece (thank you!) so it was a lot of fun
The braiding was quite an experience because of the length but thankfully The Man lent me a hand and it was a lot of fun I love how you can see the structure in the braid
EDIT
I wanted to end this post with a particularly hilarious picture of Noodles sleeping.. My cats thend to sleep in the most ridiculous positions but this one tops them all (so far..) enjoy!
BFL roving dye: Dandelion
May 16th
I’m posting twice today because I don’t want to clutter my FO posts, but there’s something I’d love to tell you about I’ve bought 300 grams of naturel colored BFL roving from wol-uniek and it arrived on friday Unfortunately I forgot to take pictures of the superpretty and airy rovings I received (sorry) but I do have pictures of the dye results After the merino coloring from the previous posts my mom told me about safflower. She told me she had a huge pile of powder left she had been gifted, which didn’t use (as safflower doesn’t smell like saffron). It had already been tested on the next dyeing event and had proved to be very effective
The safflower powder and the green food coloring bought at the Chinese toko proved to be quite a fun experment
The safflower powder was mixed with vinegar and heated au-bain-marie to make sure all of the powder was solved in the vinegar mix. I wasn’t sure if I should use the green food coloring undiluted or not because I didn’t want the green to be very dominant. So not knowing what to expect I mixed the food coloring with vinegar as well and poored it over the roving.
I rolled up the whole thing and put it in the microwave for 5 minutes but it wasn’t really hot yet, so I shoved it in for another 5 minutes. Once I rolled the roving out into the sink there was no color left and all the pigment was stuck to the roving yay
I’m totally happy with the way it turned out and hope to be able to start spinning very soon but before I do there’s a little something else I’d like to show you:
It’s the beginnings of my first Jaywalker socks The toe-up edition!
Kiwi, Noodles & CPH
Sep 28th
ssssstt, try to be quiet.. there’s a little kitty sleeping next to me :O
Last time I told you about how I wanted to adopt kittens and now I’d like you to meet them On friday morning we went to the animal shelter here in Rotterdam and asked for kittens (because we’d seen them on the website), but the clerk told us that they didn’t have any kittens at the moment. We decided that we’d still like to take a look and when we came in the cat-section (all the way to the back of the complex) the woman there told us that they just got a nest of kittens who were quarantined
There were 4 tabby’s that had been found in the streets. They were seven weeks old and we could take them with us immediately. They had been chipped, and vaccinated once and have to have their second shots in three weeks time. Before their 6th month they will be sterilized as well. It was very difficult to pick them because we wanted two and they were all so cute *drool* in the end we chose the two that played the most and seemed the most fearless (hihi).
While I’m typing this one of them (we named her Kiwi) is sleeping in the living room on the couch, and the other one (we named her Noodles but we’re not sure about it yet) is sleeping next to my computer chair wheel (wtf..) in the sun
arent they cuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuute I think they are but since I don’t want to clutter the knitblog (again) I’ve made another little blog for them you can visit this blog HERE It won’t be updated a lot I think but I’ll try to post some funny kitty stuff there for the fans ^____^
anyway, so there’s the reason.. that’s why I haven’t been knitting… I can’t stop looking/ playing at/ with them :O:O:O But I did manage to do a little bit of knitting on the side (while they slept on my lap after playing with my yarn hihi)
In the last post I said that I didn’t like the raglan ‘line’ and didn’t like how the cables just started out of nowhere. So I tried to alternate the knits and purls but it didn’t turn out the way I wanted so I made the raglan line more dominant. This way it’s a clear line and the cable comes from this line which I do like more. The thing I’m seeing now is that I forgot to mirror the right and left side.. I just added a 1×1 rib over 6 stitches between the increases, but forgot to mirror. It’s not a big deal and I don’t mind because you don’t really notice it anyway, only when you know it’s there hehehe. At the moment I’m working on my third skein (just started) so I’m starting to get worried… this little baby just might get a bit more expensive than I imagined haha.
meh.. I’m still happy about the yarn tho.. this hoodie is just too pretty for cheapo acrylics yarn
evil broodings
Sep 20th
yes.. as the title indicates I’m brooding on an evil plot to crack the misteries of the top down Central Park Hoodie. I’ve seen a few examples (thank you Google.. you are my friend) and I’ve seen some very good things, but also a few things I’m not a great fan of. I loved all of te CPHs because I love the pattern but the top-down versions made it more ‘streamlined’. I’ve noticed I’m really not a fan of seams (maybe that’s also why I just cant work on Arisaig for a while since I don’t mind the small needles). I feel seams disrupt the pattern for some reason, but I have to say that I did notice something I didn’t like about the topdown version as well.
The CPH shows two cables in on each front side, which means that one of those cables will have to start somewhere in the middle since there’s no seam at the top. The thing about cables starting in the middle of nowhere doesn’t appeal to me at all…..
So I tried to think about the different possibilities and had a little talk with my mom who gave me some nice advice
Here’s an ugly drawing made by me As you can see on the right side you’d get a weird start for the cable. Now I know you can make the cable start ‘more nicely’ by making visible raglan increases, but I don’t like that either (i’m picky). I’m just not a huge fan of the straight line, or the straight line with holes. And in this case I don’t want to do invisible increases either because of the above stated problem.
So the answer (hopefully) is this: a 2×2 or 4×4 rib between the increases. I’d have to calculate to see where the ribbin would be so that I could make it fit around the purl edges of the cable and make it ‘introduce’ the cable column… (lol)
Anyways, for now it’s just a thought, if I feel like it I just might make a swatch to see how it turns out, if not I just might wing it haha But I’m only on the 5th repeat of the top part so I’m not even nearly there
CPH
Sep 18th
Yesterday, after some research, I started on my Central Park Hoodie. I’ve been waiting to do this project for ages and I’m totally psyched about the knit And since I enjoyed working on Vaila so much I decided to do this one top-down as well.. again, it’s the first time I’m knitting a hoodie, and my second sweater-like (in size) ever so yes I know I’m an idiot. The thing is that my biggest fear in knitting is that I won’t get a nice snug fit, and that the sewing together will leave ugly seams and it will stretch in places I don’t want it to stretch. This is reason enough for me to keep doing this to myself. I like keeping things interesting I guess hehe. Anyway, I’ve found some more people on Rav who are (way) more experienced than me and who have successfully knit the CPH top down. So I’m thinking that if I follow their notes I might be able to pull this one off as well
I think I’ll need to use a lot of lifelines for this project, even if it’s just to keep my cables organized at first haha
I already started with the hood What do you think of my stitchmarkers? I made them myself
Another thing I’d like to share I’ve always (even as a kid) wanted to have a cat, so my parents thought “sure why not” and we got the cutes little kitten A few days later my dad started sneezing and coughing and within two weeks the kitten was gone. Nowadays I’ve got my own appartment and some 75+m2 free for cute little kitten(s)/ cat(s), so I’ve been looking and doing some research on creating a safe environment for them (since I live on the 2nd & 3d floor and have a busy street nearby). But while searching I find the cutest little kitties you can imagine. Here’s a picture from the kattenplaza forum:
losing my religion..
Sep 13th
Today I realized that my knitting activities have become more and more interesting. Vaila is my first ever sweater and I’ve already learned tons and tons about the art of sweater knitting hihi. The first thing is to completely understand the whole pattern before starting. I have the bad habbit of just starting to knit something whenever I feel like starting a knit.. and then it doesn’t matter what time of day it is, and if I’m even able to clear my head enough to actually read the pattern before I start. Or even to have a sort of plan.. On Vaila I didn’t even make a gauge swatch, and I didn’t even wash the swatch to see if it would grow or not… I just assumed that either the sweater would grow or my body fat would have to shrink.. (which is not a bad plan anyway haha).
Lucky for me it’s all good and the sweater is almost done and I’m very satisfied with the way it looks. But it doesn’t mean that there were no bumps along the way… there’s actually a few haha and in a way this knit has been a lesson more in patience than in anything else..
This is what the sweater looked like yesterday. I’m still showing the old pictures because there’s something funny going on. The pattern called for larger needles on the ribbing than on the pattern and the lace panel. In my case it was a 4,5mm on the ribbing and a 4 on the rest. I wore the sweater before starting on the second sleeve to show my mom what I had accomplished in a few days (which for a chaotic person like me really is an accomplishment haha), and the first thing she sais is: the right sleeve is too tight. So I tell her that I think it’ll stretch during the first wash and otherwise I’ll block it out and hope for the best, but she’s not convinced.. At this moment I’m bummed out because of her response..
So the next day I’m starting the ribbing on the left sleeve and notice I’ve been knitting the whole thing with 4,5mm needles.. After the neck ribbing I never switched the needles to 4.0mm. I did however knit the first part of the right sleeve with 4.0mm DPN’s (which caused a whole different problem themselves..).
Anyway, I continued the ribbing in 4,5 since the sweater didn’t look bad, but it did dawn on me why the gauge didn’t make sense the whole time…. Anyway, today I frogged the right sleeve and started knitting it again with the 4,5mm needles.
There’s a few things I learned on this project. I started out with my knitting booklet where I would write the whole pattern in to be able to have all the patterns I ever knit toghether in one booklet.. this was fantastic because I’d have to go through the entire pattern before starting to knit and I’d always have to check it very carefully, but I stopped using it because it was very time consuming and ofcourse I’m a fan of jumping in head-first without thinking… I also learned that I suck at using DPN’s for sleeves.. I didn’t have any trouble using them on hats but obviously sleeves don’t work for me… my knitting became very very tight and there’s this ‘edge’ forming on two sides of the sleeve which sucks a lot…
So here’s the reason behind the ‘dramatic’ title, since this blog is still here to help me evolve into a better person and to help me organize myself: chaos has ruled my life for as long as I remember. The happiest times were the most chaotic times. I’ve been a workaholic without an actual ‘life’ to get to and I need this to stop. So in order to get to the zen like state I’d like to have some day, I need to lose this religion. And letting go is a part of that.
It may seem that it’s just knitting, but it’s not. These projects help me in a way to see the things I do wrong in my personal life and in my ‘career’. A year ago I would’ve been so bummed about the sleeve that I would’ve cast it aside and not look at it again for a whole year, being unable to face my failure. But now I embrace it (am I sounding corny yet? )
Today I frogged the first sleeve I ever made (which cost me a lot of time as wel…) only to be halfway done with the sleeve an hour later
PS. I’m NEVER using DPN’s again.. magic loop is the only way to go
radiosilence
Sep 8th
With schools starting and all I’ve been a little preocupied. But now I’m back again and ready for the knitting action! I haven’t had te thime to start sewing the things in my queue from the last posts yet but I have ordered some more yarn for some new projects. 
I’ve already started on the brown alpaca yarn and I’m working on Vaila at the moment and am working on the sleeves. The purple one is destined to become a Central Park Hoodie and the grey one will become a nice set of long mitts for which I haven’t decided on the pattern yet…
Anyway, here’s Vaila The body took 4 skeins and now theres only 1 left to make the sleeves and to make the hem longer. I’m don’t think I’ll be able to make all of those with just one skein but it might just be possible.
The pattern for this sweater is written as a bottom-up knit. I started bottom up first but ended up making the whole thing way too big. I have something against loose knits, which is why I never liked to wear knitted garnments as a kid, but now that I’m knitting myself and I can decide the final look of my knits I really don’t want them to be loose. After some searching I found out that I could also knit the sweater top-down. I have no experience with top-down knitting and this would be my first ever top-down sweater.. This is me… I’ve never done something before… I really want to learn to to something.. so how do I learn? I try to learn by modding an existing bottom-up sweater to a top-down one… yea.. that’ll work.. hihi
I’m still surprised to say that it did, but it’s no thanks to me tho! I found some great notes by fellow raveler NessaRenee. Without these notes It would’ve been a huge mess
I was very surprised to see how fast a sweater like this grows..I’ve been knitting on the Arisaig for what seems like forever and I’ve only just got to the huuuge ribbing of the right front part….. with no end in siiiiiight omg this knit is driving me crazy….
Thankfully there’s a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel tho… the back part is finished and I just fool myself by saying that I’m over halfway done hahaa
