I’m only taking two classes this year – both of them jewelry oriented.  On Saturday, I have an all-day class with Betsy Hershberg on knitting beaded jewelry.  You can see here amazing work here.  And on Sunday, I’m taking a half-day class to learn the basics of kumihimo braiding.  I’ve usually taken some spinning classes, but this year, my wheel’s just going along for the ride (and evening entertainment). 

Look for a full report here later!

I did end up needing to come back and make a few edits, but overall, it seems to work quite well.

At last year’s Madrona Fiber Arts retreat, I discovered a new (at least to me) variety of Noro yarn called Chirimen. In appearance, it’s very similar to Kureyon, but instead of being 100% wool, it’s a mix of cotton (60%), silk (24%) and wool (16%). In weight, it compares to Silk Garden Lite at 11 wpi (wraps per inch) instead of Kureyon’s 9 wpi, so just a little bit lighter weight. I picked up 3 balls in Color 2, a blend of mostly shades of blue with a little tiny bit of brown, and an even smaller bit of green, but at the time, really had no plans for this addition to my stash.

Fast forward a few months and I learned that a friend will have some unexpted and fairly substantial medical bills in the coming month. Sure, she’s got insurance, but a plan that carries pretty high deductables and co-pays, so she’s pretty worried about getting into debt. A bunch of us have decided to find various ways to raise some funds to help her out since added financial stress is the last thing she needs right now. Amoung other things, we’re going to be doing a raffle at a music show another friend’s band is doing next month (as well as donating the band’s take from the door). I have volunteered to contribute some knit scarves – perfect for January in Seattle! I’ve got some stashed away already that just need finishing and blocking, but decided right away to use the Chirimen to make a scarf following HeartString FiberArt’s  Morning Surf Scarf pattern published in the Summer 2008 issue of Spinoff Magazine. I even contacted the designer, Jackie Erickson-Schweitzer, for permission to produce the scarf for fund raising, which she quickly gave me permission to do.

The first scarf, using the Chirimen, is about half finished:

I’m also planning making another one (or a variation of it) with some Noro Silk Garden Lite, Color 2014 that I also have in my stash (and have had for who knows how long!)

And now for a little more Noro love  – a picture of some Kuryan Color 95 from my stash:

I only have 4 balls of this, and I’m seriously considering ordering 16 more so I’ll have enough to do a Lizard Ridge afghan from Knitty. I’ve seen one on Ravelry done in this color, and it’s quite delicious.   And if I order today from Webs, I’ll get gree shipping.  Decisions, decisions…

There’s just one problem that the landscapers won’t be dealing with - Frankenshed.  That’s the name I’ve affectionately given our very unusual shed.  You see, the original owner of our house was a sort of “do-it-yourself” type with rather odd taste and methods.  As a result, our home has a few peculiar features, one of which is Frankenshed. 

Frank is not only an unusual shape, but also constructed of unique materials – a concrete block foundation with heavy gauge corrigated steel walls and roof.  The foundation is very perminent, attached to a concrete slab that’s part of our hardscaping, so to replace Frank would be a big job that we can’t afford right now.  Besides, despite Frank’s odd, some might even say ugly, appearance, there’s something appealing to me in his post modern industrial design.   Below is a picture of Frank:

Pretty scary, isn’t he?  Let me tell you – Frank’s not going anywhere, so I’ve decided that I’ll just have to give him a makeover.  I’ve already decided I’ll paint the foundation and door – most likely a nice green.  But what else can I do to help him out?  I have a few small ideas starting to germinate, but I’d like your help. 

So, I’m having a Frankenshed Makeover contest.  I’d like you to submit your ideas to me.  Go all out - since it’s just ideas, anything goes (aside from tearing Frank down, that is).  My goals are to come up with something that can be done relatively inexpensively (a few hundred dollars at most), and without spending the rest of my life working on it.  So have at it – grab the photo if you want to, or download a higher resolution one here.  Feel free to use your favorite photo editing tools to embellish to illustrate your vision for Frank.  Please submit your ideas as a comment to this post.  If you have pictures to submit, you’ll need to host them somewhere on a photo sharing site and send a link.  I can grab any I want to share and upload to a future post. 

I’m looking forward to hearing about or seeing your creative ideas.  I’ll choose the best and give recognition (anonymously if you choose) in a future post.  I’ll even choose a first, second and third place winner for the most creative ideas.  Good luck and thank you!

• Learned to knit two at a time
• Learned Judith’s Magic Cast On for toe up socks
• Learned to do an afterthought heel
• Learned the suspected bind off

But here are the problems and how I should fix them:

• Dropped a stitch so early on that I had to pick it up through several inches of the sock, which left a ridge where the guage is significantly tighter.  Note to self – count the stitches regularly to make sure none have been dropped.
• Got so excited about adding the waste yarn for the afterthought heel that I completely missed some ankle shaping in the pattern.  I don’t think this shaping was critical though, but it might have helped the fit.
• For a longer sock, it might be a good idea to do some increases in the leg to go over the wider part of my calf.  As it is, it’s too tight at the top!

Other observations

I didn’t like the afterthought heel decrease and finishing.  It was don with evenly divided decreases like a hat and finished off just like one too, so there’s a bump at the heel.  Doesn’t seem like it will wear well, and it looks sort of silly too.  I think for my next pair, I’ll learn a short row heel instead.  I think it will look much tidier.  I don’t want to be discouraged and stop trying to improve my socks skills, which I could easily have happen after this project.  Fortunately, I uesd really inexpensive yarn to make these, knowing that they were sort of experimental.  I’m going to rest from socks for a few days, and then forge ahead with another pair.

Last month I finally took the plunge and uploaded the newer version of Wordpress. I noticed today that the photo features have been enhanced greatly so now I’m going to test them out using this post. 

Image Test - my beautiful Kitty-boy, Rajah

Well, it appears that all that’s improved is that the uploader is different, and that you can resize the photo using the uploader.  I was able to choose from several sizes – the one above is “medium.”  I thought that it was going to allow me to show a small image linked to a larger one without having to manually link to it, but not so.  Oh well.  It’s still a little easier I guess.

Next thing I need to do is try to alter my stylesheets a bit.  I seem to have lost a small bit of my formatting, like my background color, during the upgrade.  I’m also working on a new header image, so that will come later.  I’m creating a cool new “Virtual Knitter” logo that I hope to use in the future.

Heart & Sole Socks in progress

As you can see, it’s a simple pattern – I’m just doing stockinette stitch for the whole thing until I get to the cuff, where I’ll switch to ribbing for about an inch and a half.  I’m also doing an ‘afterthought heel’ for the first time ever, to keep the striping consistent and create a bullseye effect at the heel.  That’s the last step after everything else is done.

Well, I’m nearing the start of my ribbing, so I decided to count stitches one final time to make sure everything was still on track.  YIKES!  One needle only had 33 stitches on it!  I had fiddled with the stitches at the point where the needles cross a few rows back, so I assumed I must have accidentally slid one stitch over to the other side.  Counted them, and nope, 34 on that needle.  Oh oh – had a dropped a stitch at some point?  I started closely inspecting the socks and found where I had dropped a stitch – way down about 3 or 4 inches up from the toe – yup – about 10 inches back!  Oh dear.  At this point, I had to put the socks away for a few hours and move on for a while:)

Well, came back to them last night and started picking up the dropped stitches with a crochet hook.  Things were going slow, and I was tired so I only did a few rows before retiring.  This morning, I picked up again, and struggled with it for a while, having difficulty due to the small guage.  After contemplating things for a while, I decided to try helping things along by using a #0 needle to lift the previous stitch up and out so I could more easily bring the new one I’d picked up with the crochet hook through without catching part of the new stitch.  WOW.  It worked like a charm and I managed to bring the dropped stitch back up to the top of the sock relatively smoothly and quickly.  The downside is that now I have a sort of ridge where the stitches are tighter in that line and puckering the fabric a bit. I assume (hope) this will all come out in the wash so to speak.  Regardless of whether or not it does though, at least I’ll have a wearable pair of socks that won’t run on me!  Up till now, I’ve only brought up dropped stithes two or three rows, so I’m pretty pleased with myself!

I’ll have up for sale both my existing Schacht Matchless and a HitchHiker wheel (that I bought on a whim).  My Matchless has some minor cat “dings” since Lily left a few tootmarks in the spokes before I realized she liked to chew on wood.  Also, it’s got a very faint green spot on on treadle, where I dropped some green Koolaid when I was dyeing some wool.  Both very minor things though, and otherwise it’s in perfect working order.  A new Double Treadle Matchless now costs over $900 (a little less from the right dealer) and ships for free.  I’ll be trying to sell mine in the greater Seattle area to avoid shipping, although I do still have the original shipping box.  Shipping will still be a hassle and expensive so I’d rather deliver it in pereson.  I expect I’ll ask about $750 for it.  I’ll be asking about $225 for the HitchHiker.  It’s much easier to ship, but I’d still like to sell it locally.  And finally, I’ll have about 8 matching bobbins for the Matchless that I’ll want to sell for about $30 each.  All these things combined, will still not quite pay for the new wheel, with it’s premium price of over $1100, especially once I buy matching accessories for it, but they will come close.

Please leave a comment if you’re interested in buying any of these items.  I won’t want to let the Matchless go until closer to the time I will receive the new one, but the HitchHiker can go any time.

I did have a scare in the process.  I failed to upload the files in the root directory of the new version, uploading only the folders.  For a few moments there, I was sure I’d completely broken the Virtual Knitter and that I was going to have to start over completely from scratch.  Thank goodness after sitting back and re-reading the directions, I realized what had happened and got things put back together again.  Now to start playing with themes!  Maybe there are some new ones that I’ll like better than my old one ayway!