Jofrog is Knitfrog!
January 30 2004
You're Such a Super Lady
Bonus points for anyone who can name the movie that today's title comes form.
So.... this bonus Friday post comes to you because I forgot my phone at
work yesterday... whoops! Naomi and I stopped in to get it and
thought we'd pay tribute to three of our newest friends.
You may have noticed the newest addition to the Men-along, "Fantastic Lisa". She is knitting "Kirby" from A Yorkshire Fable
for her son. We've been exchanging emaills lately and they always
make me smile and laugh. It's a shame that she doesn't have a
blog of her own... yet!
Two newcomers to the blogiverse are Jody and Erica and neither fail to entertain me daily. Go check them out and have a super (bowl) weedend.
January 29 2004
Calling All Boston Area Knitters!
My LYS, A Good Yarn in
Brookline, MA, is having a HUGE sale this Sunday. They are
clearing out winter yarn to make room for the new spring and summer
yarns. Check out the details:
9AM-10AM 50% off yarn purchases of 10 skeins or more
10AM-11AM 40% off yarn purchases of 10 skeins or more
11AM-12PM 30% off yarn purchases of 10 skeins or more
All day (until 5PM) 25% off of all yarn purchases of less than 10 skeins or after noon.
This public service anouncement has been brought to you by your's truely, Johanna. Happy Shopping!
January 28 2004
Buddy Bear Says...
Yup, you get the picture...
My "Purple Ox" is basically done, except for the fact that the sleeves
are too short and the first time I bound off the neck my head wouldn't
fit through! I'm really kicking myself about the sleeves... I
knew they'd be too short, but I was anxious to join the body. It
is a springy sweater, I might just wear it with the sleeves pushed up
for a while, but, with Alison's eyes watching over me, I will cut them and knit them longer... it must be done.
As for Mike's sweater... it's too wide. I took out the center
cable and replaced it with another much smaller cable... I thought
about taking out some extra stitches, but instead made them reverse
stockinette and made the small size rather than the medium. Well,
it turns out, even the small size, when made by the instructions, would
have been wider than he wants. Therefore the size I've made
him... the back is four inches wider than it should be! Luckilly,
there is a border of three inches done in seed stitch, so I'll just
seam out two inches from each side, and I decreased two inches from
each side before starting the arm decreases, so I think that all is not
lost, just frustrating. I'm glad that I caught this now, but I
wish that I'd measured his favorite sweater before last night!
Better luck to you all and your knitting.
January 27 2004
I Went Shopping!
I went shopping for my class this weekend, and boy was it fun! I
forgot how cheap cheap yarn is! I bought enough yarn, and needles
for two projects for nine kids for less than the cost of a sweater for
me. It really makes me want to knit in acrylic again... oh wait,
no I don't!
Check out all of the pretty colors, Naomi liked them too. Look hard to see her on the left.
I picked up needles for them so that I can cast on before the first
class... no need to frustrate them first day and waste time learning to
cast on. We'll probably learn that in class 2.
One last thing that I picked up was the cotton for dishclothes.
I'm really hoping that we get to that point in our class, but if not,
maybe that will be the beginning of the intermediate class. Again
I get ahead of myself! Look at more pretty colors, who knew there
were so many options?
I can not wait for my class to start next Tuesday! One week and counting!
January 26 2004
Everybody’s Knitting!
So, we all know of this resurgence in knitting, but do you know how
wide-spread it’s become? The local gang in my area
isn’t interested in drugs, they aren’t interested in
violence, or sex, they want Yarn!
Doesn’t this give you a renewed confidence in today’s
youth? Next time you see that kid hanging out in the alley,
looking shady, maybe he’s hiding his knitting needles under that
jacket and not drugs, you never know!
January 22 2004
Alice is Coming!
My sister Alice is coming this weekend to stay with me! Woo
hoo! I’m really looking forward to it. Unfortunately
it’s going to be ridiculously cold again! We were hoping to
go ice skating, but not in single digit weather!
Alice is going to give a try at knitting again and this time I’ll
be prepared. (Last time we only had size 3 needles and worsted
weight yarn!) I bought her this yarn to work with. I think
that she’ll really enjoy it. It’s like a worsted
weight sock yarn! I think that the color changes will keep her
motivated.
In other news: I will no longer be able to post on
Fridays. Don’t cry too hard, I’ll be here every
Monday reliably! My work situation has changed and I won’t
be at my full time job on Fridays any more, therefore I don’t
have internet access on Fridays any more, therefore no more postings on
Fridays. See you Monday.
January 21 2004
Exciting Opportunity
Starting on February 3rd I'll be teaching a beginner knitting class to
kids at a local elementary school. I'm so excited about it.
The kids will be grades 3-6 and it is one hour a week for ten
weeks. I've been trying to figure out what yarn to buy for them
and what needles I should have them buy.
My plan for now is to start with them knitting and purling then bring
in some swatches to have them decide stitch patterns for scarves.
Why start with garder stitch? No reason for them to wait on
learning to purl. I think that waiting is what makes people think
that purling is so much harder.
My goal for them is to make dishclothes by the end of the class, done
on the diagonal so that they can learn to increase and decrease
too. Too ambitious for kids? I hope not.
If all goes well, maybe next session I can teach an intermediate course
as well wher we make a sweater for a toy bear... maybe I shouldn't get
too ahead of myself!
January 20 2004
It's No Yoke
It's not a joke, I started my yoke! Purple Ox is stampeeding towards completion. Who knew that I was so close?
I finally decided that my sleeves were long enough and it was time to
join the parts. I did the neck shaping with help of the Fiber
Trends "Sheep Go Round" pattern. The short rows give it a nice
smooth scoop.
My goal is to wear it this Sunday, but I must not forget to work on Wetherby too, so maybe it will be a Superbowl Special!
January 19 2004
GSRP K1P2
The box made it to Knitsmiths yesterday, thanks to Becky. Dava, Alison,
and I got to sift through yarn and needles and some patterns.
Other than some sock yarn that Dava put in, there was really nothing I
wanted so I took that and put in some Rowanspun Chunky in it's place,
which Alison promply took out! I guess it was a Knitsmiths swap,
but the stash still got redistributed!
Alison is going to use the Rowanspun Chunky for a hat for her husband (he and Mike
will match) so add one more to the Men-along! ...actually, add
quite a few to the men along, including Jody who was inspired enough to
start up a blog of her own. Go on over and welcome the Savannah Chik yourself!
January 15 2004
Wetherby Begins!
Now that I have the pattern worked out, (there is a correction on the
Rowan site), this sweater is so much fun to knit. I go back and
forth on which I enjoy more, two-color knitting or cabled/textured
knitting and I'm starting to think that I will always need a balance of
both.
Here is a picture of the WIP. I'm through one full pattern repeat
now and I'm really happy with the pattern and with the substitution of
the middle cable. Click for a close up view of the pattern.
Welcome to all of you who joined the Men-along! Knit away for others and good yarn karma will be your reward.
January 14 2004
Love Rowan Yarn, Hate Rowan Patterns
I love Rowan yarn. For ages I looked for yarn to substitute for
Cork and I’m very glad that I finally decided that there was no
substitute. My new love affair is the Summer Tweed.
I’ve been looking at the patterns in the Rowan Summer Tweed
Collection and I love them, and love the yarn. I’m pretty
sure that will be my next yarn purchase.
My problem, however, lies in the patterns. Smooch… loved
the modeled picture, loved the end product, had some patttern
issues. Mike’s Cork Hybrid… no major problems to
speak of, but I did totally modify both Ronan and Mart so I can’t
really say how exact they were.
For the Men-along I started Wetherby
from “A Yorkshire Fable”. Again, love the pattern,
(for the most part, I am going to substitute the bulky middle cable
with one additional diamond motif), but the pattern chart is totally
wrong. Major problems. I thought that there was just one
problem, then I found another one as well. It’s fixable in
the sweater, and it makes more sense the correct way than the way it is
written, but it is VERY frustrating that all of these Rowan patterns
have issues with them. Doesn’t anyone proofread them?
Don’t they have someone knit up the patterns before they are
published? Apparently not!
Maybe I should volunteer to knit up all of their beautiful patterns in
exchange for the yarn called for, and I get to keep the knit
product… hmm, who do I call to talk to about this? At the
very least I should get a reward for reporting a problem like the
Wetherby chart. Don’t you think?
January 13 2004
Our Men are Cold!
How many sweaters have you knit for yourself since you started
knitting? How many have you knit for HIM? Uh huh, I thought
so! Let’s start off this year in an unselfish manner with a
Men-along!
Knit something for your 50 year old husband, your 20 year old
boyfriend, or your 4 year old son. (Heck, knit something for all
three of them if you dare!) It doesn’t have to be a sweater
to apply, just something knit for him by you, preferably with love!
Calling all knitters to their needles! Join me and Kerstin and make something for him!
January 12 2004
What’s up with Inox?
My absolute favorite needles are my Inox size 2 6” DPNs. I
LOVE them. I’ve been waiting and waiting and waiting for my
LYS to get in the same needles in size 1. I asked on Saturday and
found out that Inox is no longer making them… No longer making
size 1 needles in the 6” length? Absurd!
I searched online for some this morning and thought that I found them,
Yeah! Notice that I said “I thought I found them”,
well, not really. The 6” lengths come in sizes ranging from
2-4mm in 0.5mm increments. This does not necessarily correspond
to needle sizes. For example, a size 1 needle is 2.25mm, a size 2
needle is 2.75 mm, but Inox offers a 2.5mm needle. What am I
supposed to do with that? Now I have to go home to see what my
“size 2” really is.
Okay, so I can accept that this is a quirky way that Inox does
things, but no, not really! Their 8” needles are in
standard sizes 0-10.5! Why? Every once in a while I ask for
things to make sense!
Now the big question, what to do now? My current size 1 needles
are Pony Pearls. I like them, they are fine, do I get another
pair of them? I really do prefer metal over plastic or
bamboo. (I actually bought the Britney size 1s and traded with Ingrid
for the Pony Pearls because I hated the grabby-ness of the wood.
Good deal for all involved!) I also really like having sets
of five needles or else I’d get the Susan Bates needles. As
silly as it sounds, I’ll probably end up buying two sets of the
Susan Bates and love them.
Don’t you wish that these were the biggest problems in your life! Have a worry free Monday.
January 9 2004
ZERO!?!?
I woke up this morning, turned on the news to checkthe temp before
Naomi and I went out for our walk and saw 0F. Zero!
Really? Naomi was shivering, even with her fleece jacket on for
the three minutes or so it takes for her to go to the bathroom and come
back inside!
This is definitely a day for hand knit socks!
The pink Opal socks are done!
The beaded ones are in the final stretch and the November sock of the
month club sock is started. (I'm still waiting for December's
package to come due to a clerical error and January should be sent out
next week!)
I've got a whole lot of sockin' going on!
January 7 2004
How do You Measure Sucess?
Dava, the founder of
Knitsmisths and one of the newest members to the blogging community,
showed up to our knitting group on Sunday with a wonderful new tape
measure. He was a cute little elephant (maybe she'll put up a
picture if we ask really nicely). I'd been looking for a cute
tape measure for a long time. I've seen a few that came
close... J. Crew has a beautiful one that is leather and so sleek and soft, but $32... really, is that practical... I don't think so! Kerstin
has an inventive Pinnochio one. I saw a cute happy face one that
was a contender, but I'm really not the happy face kind (I think
that my own face is happy enough without having big yellow ones around
me!). What I've been looking for, and if it doesn't exist, it
should, is a frog tape measure where the end of the tape measure is a
fly and the tape itself is the frog's tounge! How great would
that be? Well until I find him, I have this little guy, from the
same place that Dava got her elephant! Thanks for the tip Dava!
Isn't he so coy. It's like he's saying "I've got a secret."
Your sleeve STILL isn't long enough!
Anyone else have any great tape measures to share?
**UPDATE** Check out this incredible link! Antique tape measures I want them all!
January 6 2004
One More Christmas Gift Given
Christmas Morning Santa brought something very special to a little
buddy that I know. It came in this bag... click to see what was
in it.
The little guy loved them! He and I played finger puppets for a
while that afternoon and I truely hope that they can become part of his
Christmas tradition for years to come!
I didn't get a picture of him playing with them, but I did get a pic of
him playing with another toy that we got him. Aren't kids
amazing? He is 18 months old, has never seen a saxaphone, yet
knew just what to do with it! Incredible, play on!
January 5 2004
Where to start?
I feel like I've been away from work, the blogging world, even a
computer for so long, I don't even know where to start today! As
promised I have pictures of my sister in her sweater:
And Jenny in her scarf, which by the first picture I think she loved, but the second... well, you decide...
More pictures will come tomorrow once I figure out what the heck is
going on and why I'm not at home, on my couch knitting and watching
Regis and Kelly!
