Blogiversary Update, Stealth Knitting, and Dreamsicle

Keep leaving comments.  There’s another week before the giveaway deadline.  The prize will be the winner’s choice among 3 books:  one by the yarn harlot, one by Debbie Bliss, and the third a raglan collection.

This makes a blogger nuts:  I’ve been working on one particular project almost exclusively for the past 2 – 3 weeks, but I can’t show it!   You see, it’s from a pattern I’ve developed for submission to Sock Madness 2008.  If they use it in the competition, no one would want any knitter(s) to have the advantage of knowing any details ahead of time.  This is probably a “safe” amount of info:   

No toe or heel or patterning details showing here.  The pins are row counters.

I can show you this:   

I finished the Dreamsicle cap.  It’s a 3-color, single-round spiral pattern, and the pattern is available in the sidebar.  I made the body of the cap too long, so both DDs prefer the brim turned up, as in the above photo.  I could now either leave it long or take out some body-rounds and redo the ribbing.  –Vote in the Comments!– 

I decided to stagger the ends of the stripes at the start of the ribbing. 
See here the end of the white yarn: 
And here the end of the lighter-orange yarn: 

When the rest of my family went on an extended outing recently, Chloe the cat had to admit that I was the only action in town, even if was just sitting at the computer. 

But, she felt she did not have to admit that I was that interesting. 

Snow, Kitten, and Master Knitting.

I may have lost my voice, but my fingers still work!  😉

May I show you a little of the lovely snow we got last week?  My ds had been in Iowa, attending/helping/observing the caucuses there, with a group of 20+ homeschool students and parents, and they drove back in weather than eventually turned into this:    (This mom was more than a little anxious, I’ll tell you.)

He and dh shoveled every few hours for a few days.  So then our front yard looked like this:   

As long as I don’t have to drive — or have someone dear to me driving in it — I really enjoy the snow.  Chloe finds it very interesting, but mostly . . .   . . . she keeps to her usual duties. . .

like laundry inspection.   

I, OTOH, have been working on stealth-knitting and Master Knitter swatching.  Seams:   

Decreases:   mirrored   twisted   and double.

And now, lace! 

Crochet and Knit, both. Also blogiversary!

Some Christmas-tide progress on the knee socks. 

But I also have done quite a bit of crocheting in thick chenille since last I wrote.  The (free) pattern for the 2 caps is available in the sidebar.  The brown & white cap you’ve seen before, I believe, but this is the first I’ve blogged about the dusty blue cap with brim. 

Writing up patterns, particularly in crochet, is new to me.  But the skill is an important part of TKGA’s Master Hand Knitter program, so I’m seeking to gain some facility at it.  Constructive criticism is welcome.  [I say that now.  We’ll see how I feel after some take me up on the invitation!  😉  ]

I have also recently learned about “blog stats”.  What fun!  Thanks to WordPress, I can view a graph of number of hits over time, and a list of sites from which people followed a link to here.  That can help me to do more of what works to gain knitter-exposure.  Speaking of which, I’d like to hold a giveaway in honor of my one-year blogiversary on January 29.  I’ll send a goodie (I have a particular book in mind) to one person who leaves me a comment between now and Shrove Tuesday/Super Tuesday, 5 Feb. 2008.  Tell me where you heard about my blog, what link you followed or what search you made.

Now, back to knitting content!

Another pattern I’ve written up, eventhough I have not finished the prototype (!) is for this 3-color Spiral Cap.  I enjoy these single-round stripes — learned this technique from Meg Swansen, someplace where she was talking about avoiding jogs in circular color-work (Dubbelmossa?).  I have made a cap in 2-colors of Baby Alpaca Brush before, but using 3 strands is also fun, and the combination of different yarns stimulates even more ideas for more colorways.  Here is Dreamsicle’s beginnings. 

And then more. . . . 

See how each round of color ends 3 rounds further down than it started? And yet, the older stripes appear continuous!   

And here, see how I’m about to pick up the lowest/oldest strand (the dark orange) to begin the next round? 

Here I’ve worked a handful of orange stitches past the end-of-round shown in the photo just above, so you see the imtermediate rounds being scrunched as I resume using the color from 3 rounds down without twisting it around any other strands — very important.   

One tip for success with this technique:  don’t pull the first stitch of the new round very tight.  Tightness doesn’t help make the transition smooth; leaving it a bit loose helps the stitches even out later once they’re away from the “scrunch zone”.

Next post (Lord willing):  more Master Knitter swatches.  Thank you for reading!