Depth Year

I'm doing a Depth Year this year. It's based on the idea from this blog post: https://www.raptitude.com/2017/12/go-deeper-not-wider/. I've joined a Facebook group built around the idea, and I've enjoyed reading how other people are interpreting it for their own lives.

Here's what it means for me:

• Shop the stash. Start with stash and search for a project to go with the yarn instead of the other way around.
• Buy no yarn except Felici, yarn for donated items, or if very specific gift requests are made that cannot be fulfilled by stash yarn.
• Try at least a pillowcase of Yumiko Higuchi embroidered flowers. Unless it makes me miserable, set the goal of embroidering the pillow and the linen picture.

Regarding the first two goals: This may come as a deep shock to you, but I own a lot of yarn.

I know. I'll give you a minute to recover.



Better? Good.

Because I work at a computer, it is easy for me to take a break by looking at yarn, which leads to buying yarn. I'm particularly weak in the face of a sale. As a result, I own a lot of great yarn.

Now to knit that great yarn.

The way this has taken shape these past few weeks is that I've been working on projects whose raw materials I've owned for an uncomfortably long period of time. I knew exactly what this yarn would become, but I'd just never done it.

First up: Mr. Banana Foster, the sock monkey

Mr. Foster Sock Monkey (mine ravelled here),

knit in Knit Picks Essential (discontinued--I told you it's been in the queue a long time)

I bought the kit for Mr. Foster in 2012 to make for a friend. The pattern seemed fussy, so I didn't do it. Now it's done. (Spoiler alert: It was fussy.) He's supposed to have a robe, but I decided life was too short to knit it. Plus, a robe would hide his adorable butt flap. That seems like a tragedy.

Then there came Mawata Mittens. You take silk sheets that are nearly translucent in their thinness, stretch them out until you get something that sort of looks like yarn, cut the loop, and knit with it. It's strange and delightful.

Basic Mitten (mine ravelled here),

knit in frabjous fibers and Wonderland Yarns Silk Hankies, Spilled Ink colorway

Next up were thrummed mittens. Thrums are weird and wonderful. You take roving, cut them into bits a few inches long, and knit them between stitches. The outside looks like this:

Classic Thrum Mittens (mine ravelled here),

knit in Fleece Artist Blue Leicester Aran

The inside looks like this:

The thrums are supposed to felt some with wear, creating a nigh-impenetrable mitten. I've already worn them hiking this winter.

Nocturne adored both the yarn and the roving for these mittens.

Mine? Mine.

The strange thing is that these three projects took very little time. Granted, I can be an obsessive knitter, and I knit a lot, but still. It left me puzzled why I had put them off for so long. I'm feeling motivated to clean up my Ravelry queue!

Knitsonik

I'm in a Knitsonik post! It made my day.

State Fair

I hadn't been to the State Fair in years and years. I went last year because the Indigo Girls were on the free stage, and I had a great time. The weather wasn't too horrible, and neither were the crowds. Plus, Indigo Girls AND an elephant ear. Excellent.

I also really loved walking through the exhibits, especially the quilts and the knitting. Because I knit, I could really appreciate all the work that went into each item. Because I once sewed that quilt that only had 90 degree angles, I could marvel at the skill it took to craft the quilts with intricate patterns.

And don't even get me started on the quilts that were entire hand-quilted. Rock on, quilters.

So, this year I decided I'd enter some knitting. I remembered that I didn't agree with all the judging decisions last year based on what I could see in the display cases, and so I didn't get my hopes up. I don't know what the criteria is for judging, but there has to be some subjectivity. I entered three things I'd knit during the year.

Falling Stars got an honorable mention. 

That's code for "doesn't get a place, but is still fancypants."

Sidere didn't get anything.

Knitsonik mittens got a second!

 Most importantly, I got this the evening I went to see how I did:

I'm really happy with how my items did. I'd never, ever knit something specifically For The Fair, but I'm happy to enter stuff I knit for another purpose. And if nothing strikes me as something I should enter, I am always happy to go admire other people's work... and eat an elephant ear.

Knitsonik Mittens Finished!

It's been a fascinating process, and I'm really glad I did it. Here is my inspiration:

Here are my finished mittens:

Knitsonik Mittens (ravelled here),

knit in Knitpicks Palette in Alfalfa, Grass, Thicket, Almond, Mist,

Sky, Chicory, French Lavender, Hyacinth, Blush, and Fuchsia

I think I like the palm of the mittens as much or more than I like the back. I love the simple, repeated pattern. There's so much going on color-wise that simple is best.

If you want to see more about the process, you can read about my inspiration, palette, color contrast, and charts from earlier posts. Here are some thoughts about the process from when I finished the first mitten.

I really like stranded colorwork, and I like that these mittens will always make me think of the original beautiful garden photograph. I'd be up for doing more projects like this!

Knitsonik Mitten #1

I've knit my first Knitsonik mitten. As a reminder, I started with this inspiration:

Chose this palette (ended up not using the yellow):

Figured out some charts, and then started to knit.*

Some things really worked, and other didn't so much, but the whole point of swatching in this process is to play around and see what works and what doesn't. This is hard for me, but probably really good for me, too. 

I couldn't accept that the swatch would just be decoration, so I took a risk and knit the swatch as a mitten.

I think one of the sections that worked the best was the cuff. I did a double cuff. The inside is plain brown, because all gardens start with a base of brown dirt. I knit approximately 20 rows of plain brown, put in a purl row, and then started the patterning. When I'd done the same number of patterned rows as I'd done plain, I folded the inside of the cuff, held the two layers together, and knit them together on the next round. This is not as easy as I make it sound, and my cuff's a bit wonky. It wasn't wonky enough I needed to rip, so I didn't.

Anyway, the pattern part of the cuff is inspired by the path in the photo.

The circular flowers are the pink flowers from the back, right side of the photo. The green vine and leaves represent the abundance of green foliage.

The stars represent the balloon flowers. The heart I added because I needed a small motif for the decrease portion of the mitten, and I'm kitschy and adorable like that.

The section that really didn't work is the green/mist section between the stars and the circular flowers. The outline is done in the light mist color, and I think it was just too light to show up properly. Still, that's what experimentation is for.

I contemplated the thumb for awhile. My first inclination was to match it to the mitten exactly, which means I would be changing colors every couple of rounds. For a 30-stitch thumb, that sounded like madness. Not only would I have a lot of yarn ends that would bulk up the material of the thumb when I wove them in, but I thought I might lose the will to knit before I reached the top of the thumb. Instead, I used the same pink (blush) for the whole thumb and just switched the background color once. I feel fine with the way it turned out.

A surprise for me is how much I love the palm! I think it's beautiful. This is the same pattern I used on the Swirly Mitts 2.0.

I'll make its mate soon, but perhaps I'll allow the sting of that many ends to weave in fade a bit before I do.

*This would look better blocked, but I'm not blocking it until I have its mate finished. Use your pretend eyes and imagine that it's blocked, please.

Lost and Found

On Monday morning as I was getting ready to head out the door to work, I went to grab my mittens.

There was only one mitten on the table.

That night, I checked more carefully. Did it drop out in the car and get kicked under a seat? Is it in my work bag? Have I worn a different coat recently? How many times can I check the same coat pockets before it becomes obsessive behavior?

It was gone.

On Tuesday, Andrew, because he is a saint, went to Target after work and looked through their lost and found. He walked the pond I'd walked around on Saturday, diligently searching.

It was gone.

I told myself the usual things: It's just a mitten. I knit it and loved it, but I love to knit and can make another pair. I'm planning to knit a pair for my Knitsonik project anyway. It's fine.

Lies, all, but what else could I do?

This morning, I was walking Dexter and looked down. My mitten! I brushed the salt, leaves, and bit of snow off it, and this weekend it will get a proper bath. (That didn't stop me from wearing it this morning though.)

It was on the edge of the road. I'd walked right over it more than once this week but never saw it. I know why. My brain is filled with Knitsonik information, and when I look at this:

I definitely see this.

It was hiding in plain sight.

Rainbows all around!

Holly, mom to the adorable kid, and I have been friends since the third grade. (Second grade was rough for us. I was super jealous of her.) She lives in Germany and is in Indiana for a visit, so we pretended yesterday was her birthday even though it's not for another six weeks.

She's asked for a hat:

Ann Budd's Basic Hat Pattern with picot edge, 

using polka dot chart from Hilary Smith Callis' Dots Cowl

(mine ravelled here)

a cowl:

roughly based on "My Favourite Things" Infinity scarf

(mine ravelled here)

and Totoro mittens:

Norwegian Totoro Mittens (mine ravelled here)

 All were knit in Cascade 220 Superwash in 854 Navy and Knit Picks Chroma Worsted in Carnival.

I don't know Totoro, so those didn't strike a cord with me, but I love the hat and cowl A LOT. I'd wear them myself in a heartbeat.

Happy birthday, Holly!

Dither Mittens

Back in April, I wrote about retiring my swirly mittens. I set about replacing them last week.

I used yarn left from two other projects. I was worried I wouldn't have enough yarn, so I weighed one of my old mittens:

It was 27 grams. I weighed the new mitten:

The new one was 34 grams. It's amazing how using better yarn impacts the weight. The structure of the two mittens is very similar.

Then I weighed what yarn I had left:

Oy--17 of the darker and 16 of the lighter. The use of the light and dark yarn was pretty even in this pattern with the exception of the inside of the cuff. I knit that in the lighter gray, then folded it inside and knit the cuff together with the outside of the mitten. The cuff was 24 rounds, so I was definitely going to run out of the light yarn.

I decided to alternate the light gray with some leftover Sock that Rock Lightweight in a similar color (Deep Unrelenting Grey, leftover from these) on the second mitten so I wouldn't (hopefully) run out of yarn before I finished the thumb.

I can tell the difference, but it's not very noticeable... and it's the inside of mitten cuffs, so who cares? I barely had any light gray yarn left at the end of the second mitten (and not a ton of the dark), so it was a good decision.

The Dither pattern is a chart and some instructions for making socks, so I had to cobble together a mitten pattern. Details are on the Ravelry page if you're interested. I added a Latvian braid at the edge of the cuff because my love for them is pure. I made the braids to mirror one another, which amuses me.

Dither mitten (mine ravelled here),

knit in Indigodragonfly Merino Sock, Angst for the Memories 

and Townhouse Yarns Grafton 4ply, Menace

I love that I was able to use the remainder of two really great yarns to make these. They're extremely soft, and perhaps they'll hold up even better than the Swirly Mittens since they're made with nicer yarn. 

Swirly Retirement

My mittens are wearing out. My Swirly Mittens 2.0 were finished in the summer of 2010, so they've had four winters of hard use. I should not complain about that.

I was still deeply saddened when I saw that they're wearing out. I've patched them in three different places, but I have to accept that the fabric is getting really thin in the places that get the most use. I cannot darn them forever. This is the latest hole:

I've darned them once again, but I think they deserve to be retired, perhaps to take a place of honor on a shelf above the fingering weight yarn. I imagine in the middle of the night, the mittens will tell stories to the skeins of fingering weight yarn, stories of their creation, of falling snowflakes, of holding a leash and a snow shovel and a bag, of being pulled on and off and being stuffed into coat pockets time after time after time. The skeins will sit in awed silence, hoping that someday they, too, will transform into something beautiful and useful and loved.

Damn. Now I feel guilty about all the unfulfilled yarn in my stash.

Before next fall, I need to knit myself a new pair. I've been narrowing down the choices. (You can see them on Ravelry here if you want.) For right now though, I'm still in mourning.

Ravellenics Medals!

Ravellenic Medals have been awarded! I entered two projects.

Ravelled here

The mittens were entered in the Mitten Moguls event with the colorwork technique.

The mittens were also part of the "rainbowllenics" event. Ravelry recognized projects that were made with rainbow colors, whether they were made in support of the LGBT community or not. You can see those projects here.

Ravelled here

The socks were entered in the Sock Hockey event with the added entries into lace, using no more than a single skein on the project, and using yarn that had been in my stash for over six months.

  

I think the Ravellenic games are a lot of fun. I like looking through the events to see what other people have made (entire sweaters? I'm impressed.), and it's nice to get some Bob medals!

Birthday Mittens

The mittens one of my sisters requested for her birthday are complete!

Smaragdi Mittens (mine ravelled here),

knit in Cascade Heritage Silk, Real Black and Knitpicks Felici, Rainbow colorway

(Rainbow is now discontinued, but I'm hoping they bring it back again.)

The pattern is written so that the mittens are identical. Since our hands aren't, this means that the back of one is the palm of the other. The fact that the backs of the hands didn't match made me twitchy, so I changed it.

See?

These were my 2014 Ravellenic project, which was excellent motivation to keep moving on them. Now i am wondering if I have enough time to get a pair of socks finished...

The Ravellenic Games Have Begun!

I love participating in the Ravellenic Games. It's fun to have a concrete goal for the Olympics time period, and I like to poke around and see what other people are knitting. 

In 2010, I made Leyburn socks for the Sock Hockey event as part of Team Blue Moon (for Blue Moon Fiber Arts).

In 2012, I entered the shawl event with a Clapotis.

For 2014, I decided to make mittens my sister requested for her March birthday. They fit in the colorwork event, the hands event, and even the rainbowllenics because of the yarn I'm using.

Things were going really well. Really, they were. Then I realized as I got farther and farther along in the mitten that it seemed really long. I tried it on, and it nearly covered my fingertips.

I hadn't started the decreases yet. 

Things ended up looking like this:

You'll note that there also is water all over everything in that photo. In the midst of ripping back, I also dropped my water glass and drenched everything.

I frogged 1.25" of colorwork, but when I picked up the stitches again I kept getting the wrong color. I am too embarrassed to tell you how long I worked with it until a very kind friend said, "Can't you just pick up the stitches a few rows below?" Ah. Yes.

I carefully picked up one leg of each stitch on the round with spare needles, THEN pulled out the needles at the top and frogged back to where the stitches were sitting securely on the spares.

I finished the first mitten last night, and I feel much better about my chances of successfully completing them before the Olympics end than I did two days ago.

Is anyone else knitting for the Ravellenic Games?

Fraternal Perianth

I love yarn with long color repeats. I have not yet decided if I love it on these mittens, though.

I think I do.

Perianth Mittens (mine ravelled here),

knit in Knitpicks' Capretta in Black and Chroma in Lollipop

The mittens are the exact same pattern, but because the rounds are not symmetrical, each one looks different. The pattern on the palm of the green/yellow one is on the back of the hand of the orange/pink one and vice versa.

I did two-color ribbing for the cuff. The knits are normal and the purls are twisted. I could pretend this is a design feature executed after careful aesthetic consideration, but the truth is that I knit them using the combination style and was too lazy to untwist the purl stitches.

They were very tight before blocking, but, once again, blocking does magical things. My mitten blockers are very high tech. I have two pieces of cardboard for the body of the hands and two small pieces for the thumbs. I wrap each of these in bits of plastic grocery bags and cram them inside the mitten. Please try not to be jealous of my fancy tools. You, too, can have such mitten blockers.

These mittens also look awesome with my tattoo.