New Pattern: Solid Bottom Market Bag

The Solid Bottom Market Bag.

Or the Farmer Market Bag of Holding

Please forgive the mess

 Just a simple crocheted market bag for use at the store or farmer's market. 

Pattern available here

Also, just for kicks?  I published in on Ravelry.  We'll see how this goes. 

Spring, finished booties

Never one for great wisdom, you should interpret this as you will:

ZOMG GREEN THINGS!!!  SPRING!!!  YAYAYAYAYAAY!!!!

And now for the crafting porn.

Starbucks Monkey says: BOOTIES!!!

In in further examples of how gauge matters: same pattern as the booties for Baby W, at least an inch bigger.  No new pattern notes other than at some point, I should probably try these with the yarn called for (sock weight) instead of worsted.  Maybe for the next pair.

In other news, found and ordered the yarn for Baby S-H's blanket.  KnitPick's Comfy Bulky in Marlin.  So I have yarn, pattern, and knitting needles.  Now I just need to actually knit it.  I also need to actually make progress on J's sweater instead of just toting the yarn and needles with me.

Have not even started on the pirate hat yet.  If Ostara celebrations get cancelled this weekend due to weather, I might start it then.  Other wise, it's going to wait until I finish this second sock.

FO: Baby C's 8 point Star

Baby C's 8 Point Star Blanket

You'll have to forgive the colors on the photos. Apparently, my camera doesn't like rainbows?  Properly, this is Red Heart's Mexicana, Forest Green, and Royal Blue.  I'm sure those are easily found.

this is the better of the 2 photos and is still awful.  But at least you can tell what the colors are supposed to be!

Pattern, such that it is, can be found here.

My final yarn count:

2 entire skeins of Red Heart Mexicana

Most of 1 skein of Royal blue

1 and a smidge of Forest Green.

I try not to pick on other folk's pattern's too badly.  Everyone has screw ups, everyone fails at math occasionally.  But, just so you know if you decide to do this one as well, the stitch counts stop being accurate after the 8th shell row in the printer friendly version.  The main pattern appears to be accurate through out (but my math could be wrong).  it's not a huge deal to fix, just add 1 dc in each side up the shell every row.

::edit:: apparently the pattern author has corrected this since I printed the pattern.  nevermind!

Attempted close up of the center.  Camera Fail.

The main part of the blanket took almost no time to knock out, even after adding additional rows to make it big enough.  The granny squares took longer than the blanket it feels like, just because there were so many, and then I had to sew them together.  All in all, this was a good learning skills blanket (granny squares!  sewing together!  sizing!).  It ended up way bigger than I thought it was going to.  I don't have the final dimensions yet, but it works quite nicely as a lap blanket for me or J, which is just amazing.  Before I added the granny squares, point to point was 34 inches and valley to valley was 27.  I possibly should have stopped there?  Adding the blocks between points adds at least 8 inches, possibly more.  

Baby C's blanket is now done.  Totally done even, outside of tossing it in the wash to get the cat fur etc off and out.  His booties will be done... in the next two weeks?  Baby shower is at the end of the month, so they'll need to be done by then.

FO: Baby W's Booties

And the matching booties are done too!

Poor kid isn't going to be able to wear these for a while (while Ravelry said they were newborn size, only if your newborn has ginormous feet) but they're cute.

Pattern can be found here (Ravelry link)

These killed the blueberry yarn from the blanket.  I guess somehow there was significantly less yarn in that skein?  I have maybe 1 foot left of it, not even enough to ball up for the cat.



These weren't too bad to make once I got it figured out.  The really tricksy bit was joining the tops (purple) with the bottoms (blue).  It really shouldn't have been as hard as it was, but the instructions weren't making sense in my head.  Theres a chance this is going to be the default bootie pattern for everyone, it's pretty easy to knock out over the course of the afternoon.  This is what I did while we were snowed in with the blizzard week before last.

Goals 2011

By Jan 31, 2011
finish Baby W's blanket  Finished Jan 15, 2011, write up coming here

finish 1 pair of socks Finished March 27, 2011.  No write up.  Not happy with them.
pick out yarn and pattern for Baby C's blanket- Done Jan 8, 2011
Finish C&C's Christmas present
start A's socks

By Febuary 28th
corset for A started (edit 3/11/2011, may no longer be on me, nor her other garb)
finish Baby W's booties Finished Feb 2, 2011, write up here
start Baby C's blanket   Started Jan 23, 2011
paint onesies for Babies W & C (possibly S-H?)
finish A's socks  Finished 2/22, 2011.  Write up coming

By March 31st
finish Baby C's blanket  Finished 3/10/2011, write up here
Corset for A done no longer my problem
kirtle for A started no longer my problem
pick out yarn and pattern for Baby S-H's blanket- pattern picked out Feb 26, 2011, yarn picked and ordered Mar 22, 2011
start 1 pair of socks Started March 31, 2011.

By April 30th
Kirtle for A done no longer my problem
Over-dress for A done no longer my problem
Finish Baby C's booties Finished 3/20/2011, write up here

By May 31st
start Baby S-H's blanket
finish 1 pair of socks
pick out yarn and pattern for shawl

June 30th
Finish Baby S-H's blanket
finish Baby S-H's booties
start 1 pair of socks

July 31st
paint Baby S-H's onesies
start shawl
finish socks
pick out yarn and pattern for J's sweater.  Done March 13, 2011

August 31st
Knit 1 pair of socks
start sweater  Started March 14, 2011
reach at least half way on shawl
sew Starfleet Uniforms for Babies C and S-H

September 30th
start christmas/yule presents
finish shawl
reach at least halfway on sweater
start baby kimono

October 31st
start and finish 1 pair of mittens
finish sweater
finish at least half of christmas presents
finish baby kimono

November 30th
finish christmas presents
knit 1 pair of mittens

December 31st
knit 1 pair of socks.
make sure there are at least 1 photo of every FO in use
write goals for 2012

Fo: J's mitts

Hey Look!  I finished something!

Finished J's fingerless mittens Saturday night.  A bit late for our anniversary, but well within reason.  Afterall, it took me nearly a year to finish his scarf.

flat on the couch.  Obviously, several errors.

He's really happy with them.  Which is good, as it's going to get cold tonight and probably won't worm up significantly until spring.  I love Missouri.

Why, yes, we do need to clean and do laundry.  Why do you ask?

Yay!  I finished something!

Project notes:
Mitt #1 was done at 38 stitches around.  It's a hair too small, but is still better than the 36 it was originally.  I'm hoping no one will notice how freaking awful this one looks in comparison to the other.
Mitt #2 was done at 40 stitches around.  Fits much better.

Both were done with 3 rows a stripe, which makes for a *lot* of weaving in ends.  Which I hate.  I still need to work on the row ends not wandering... they tend to do that when i'm crocheting in the round and I'm not entirely certain how to make it not happen.

On ward!

J's Ravenclaw Mitts/ Fingerless Gloves

Never fear, I'm still working on the baby blanket, however, I'm both out of space on the needles it is currently on and it is still not big enough for the circular needles I have in the bag.  It is far prettier on the wrong side than the right side however.  It's a blanket, I suppose there is not right or wrong side.

Anyway, J's Ravenclaw Mitts.
He's always been in love with Harry Potter's Ravenclaw apparently.  I made him a scarf back when we first started dating and now he's expressed a desire for fingerless gloves in the same blue and "silver".  First problem: the acrylic yarn I bought for his scarf 4 years ago is long gone.  I might be able to find the silver/grey, but I have no idea where the blue has gone. 
Second problem: finding silver, washable, yarn in something natural with a corresponding blue and in my price range.  I found a really nice, superwash, 100% wool, chunky at one of the local shops.  They have the blue!  And a grey that's close enough.  It's silverish at any rate.

I'm using this pattern for them, sized up to fit a giant.  The pattern, as written, is up to an 8 inch wrist/forearm.  J needs at least 8.5 inches, so I did an initial 36 stitches instead of the 34 called for in the pattern.  It's a bit tight, but it should work out okay.  Afterall, it's wool and will stretch a bit with wear.  I'm alternating 3 row stripes of the blue and grey.  At 28 rows, I'll start the thumb gusset and run that for 8 rows.  Beyond that, I'll need to have him on hand to try on occassionally, so the first one might not be done until the weekend.  But once I have the first one done, the second will go pretty smoothly as I won't need him around to constantly be trying it on. 

Currently, the first one looks like a long wrist warmer band.

Please excuse the messy desk.  Work is... work.

Plans for tonight:
Pork steak and sweet potato fries.
at least 15 rows on Mitt #1. 
Move baby blanket to next size longer needles.

uh... Hi?

Lets see how this works shall we?

It's hard to keep working on something when you never see any progress on it.  So things like shawls, snoods, and other highly repeative projects get lost in the shuffle simply due to it's boring and you're not getting anywhere!

You are, of course, actually getting somewhere every time you actually pick up the needles/hooks/pin cushion.  As long as you keep working on it, you'll eventually finish.

So time to try something new.  In an effort to actually motivate myself to finish these.

Current projects

Knitting

• K's shawl.  On needles for over a year now, and I'm overwhelmingly bored with it.  Also nearly out of yarn which is the bigger issue.
• Balaclava thing.  Really just needs to be switched over to longer needles, but is at a standstill until i find my size 5 circular needle.
• Cable practice.  Decided this morning that this is going to be the shoulder strap for another shopping bag.  Which means I need to pick up another skein of the yarn, as I only bought 1 skein and I can either have new socks or new bag at the moment.

Crochet

• Snood.  well, it might be one eventually.  currently, it appears to be a doily like what my grandmother used to make.  except uglier.  will definately need to be blocked... which I don't know how to do really. 
• J's handwarmers.  I don't even have yarn for these at the moment- his Ravenclaw yarns got lost in one of the moves over the past 4 years (only 4?  really?)

Sewing

• 2 New corsets (me).  Just need pattern and hardware for Steampunk as fabric has been picked out. Jan 2011  RenFaire is going to be standard pattern, but fun things with boning. 
• Steampunk/ Firefly/Serenity coat (me).  Have the pattern and the fabric, just lacking motivation. Jan 2011
• J's steampunk coat.  technically, I just need to offer moral support on this one, but I'll probably end up doing more to make sure it's done by SteamCon. Jan 2011
• A's Flemish garb.  this will be fun!  May 2011

Hrm.  Maybe I have reason to be kinda panicky about getting all this done.  Fortunately, only the sewing stuff has hard deadlines.