Work in Progress Wednesday v.90

Welcome to the latest installment of Work in Progress Wednesday, where this week's theme is Knit it Again, Sam.  Seriously, I thought I'd be done with Narragansett by now, but alas.  I finished sleeve 1 according to the measurements on the pattern, tried it on, then promptly sat down and ripped out the ribbing on the sleeve so that I could extend the pattern 2 more inches. For a quick refresher, here's how it looked last week:

Sigh.  I'm not sure what happened exactly, but somehow my 3/4 length sleeve stopped just past my elbow.  Not a good look.  And it's not like I have monkey arms or anything...  Ah well, better to have it right than done and wrong, yes?  Here's how it looks now (with diminishing sunlight):

 It's all fixed up, and I've just picked up the stitches for sleeve #2.  Again.  Stay tuned for happier results next week.

Discouraged by ripping out a huge sleeve chunk, I turned to the simple little washcloth that I started on our camping expedition last week.  Nothing like some good, mindless TV knitting to boost the spirits, right?  Umm.

Here's how it looked last week:

Somewhere around row 49 (of 60), I realized my stitches weren't quite lining up.  I tinked a row.  Still wrong.  Repeat.  Still.  In all, I tinked 5 rows, then pulled out the needle and frogged 7 more.  I realized somewhere along the way that I was working the wrong side rows on the right side.  How is this possible?  (*hint:  it's not).  I had ripped out the whole blinking thing by the time I read the instructions again and remembered that this chart started on the bottom left with a wrong side row, instead of in the usual way.  More sigh.

Here's how it looked Friday afternoon:

(*Note: This is merely a re-enactment.  I didn't have enough wits about me at the time to capture the carnage with the camera)

And so.  I cast on again and knitted like a fiend until I finished, just to make a point.  To who?  Not sure, but I'm certain I taught that pattern a thing or two.  Regardless, it's done and cute.  And you'll get to see it on Friday.

To say I've been distracted of late seems like a bit of an understatement.  Hopefully things around here will smooth out soon, or else I'll have to give up knitting in favor of napping in the fetal position.

If you're in the mood for some actual forward motion, I suggest heading over to WIPW for some more coherent crafty goodness.

See you Friday, hopefully not from the fetal position!

Work in Progress Wednesday v.89

Holy cow, people!  It's been two whole weeks since I've been here to post.  That's definitely some sort of record, and one I'm not anxious to break.  I missed you guys!

All is well here.  Mr. Right and I decided to host a bunch of friends for Easter dinner, which was awesome and lots of fun.  Unfortunately, a few days later we decided to go on a 4-wheeling expedition...



with a bunch of his friends trekking for 4 days through the wilderness from the Colorado border into Moab, Utah on the Kokopelli trail. 



Super fun, but the combination of preparing for both knocked me out of commission for doing anything else (even knitting) over the last couple of weeks.



But now we're back, and normal life can resume... at least a little bit.  I didn't want desert dust on my Narragansett, so I couldn't take it as a trail project.  Boo.  I've managed to almost finish sleeve #1, and moving on to sleeve #2 any minute now.  Weird, but the sleeves are taking longer than the entire rest of the sweater.  No matter, our weather is still springy enough that I'll be able to squeak out a wearing or two before it gets too warm.

I did manage to get a bit of knitting done on the road, though.  I dove into the Dishie stash and came up with some awesome orange kitchen cotton that seemed destined to become a Yoshi wash cloth.  It's about half done now, and would be altogether finished if I could knit in a moving vehicle without barfing all over the place.  As it is, the dramamine and I could only manage to knit when we were stopped on the trail.  Pretty decent progress, considering.

And now, a wash cloth story (exciting, no?)...  a million or so years ago, I knitted a Snoopy wash cloth and blogged about my plans to knit an army of them to curtail our paper towel use.  I wasn't sure how it would work out, but lots of folks chimed in with encouraging words, which was very cool.  I haven't managed to squeak another of these out until now, but I gotta say, I love the heck out of that thing and I use it ALL the time.  It scrubs tile and cleans baseboards and mops up messes in the fridge (not all simultaneously, mind you.  I promise it gets laundered in between), like a champ.  And it still looks pretty good:

The moral of the story is:  Knitted wash cloths = Awesome.  You should make some.  But first, you should check out all the WIPW entries over at Tami's this week.  There are bound to be a zillion cool things happening over there.

You should check back in here too from time to time.  I'll have some fun news to share in the next couple of weeks (teaser alert!!), and I promise to start blogging on a more regular basis again.  Who wants to miss that?  Didn't think so.  See you soon.

Cheers!

PS.  Thanks for all the fun comments about the tree pictures!  Turns out it's a crabapple tree.  Go figure!

Work in Progress Wednesday v.87

Welcome back to Narragansett-land, everybody!  I swear, I'm going to get this sweater finished soon, just not soon enough.  It might still make the Easter deadline, though!

This week, despite having almost no time to knit, I managed to finish and bind off the waistband.  Now I'm slowly (and with much hatred for knitting sleeves on dpns), working my way through sleeve #1.  I would totally magic loop these if only I had a cable long enough to make it work, but alas.  Some day, I'll get my Christmas present from Mr. Right (ETA September -- ugh), and this will stop being an issue.  Until that magical day, I'll keep fiddling with these things.

Can't complain too much, though.  It really is going pretty quickly.  If only I could figure out how to avoid all this weird gappy business in the underarm (sorry about the blur!).

Thoughts, anyone?  Barring any flashes of brilliance that might show up in the comments, I'll just stitch up the holes with the tail when I'm done.  Worse things could happen, right?

Since that's all I have to report on the knitting front (soon people, I promise!), I thought I'd share some pictures of my favorite tree which spent last weekend bursting out with springtime.

I LOVE this tree.  I have no idea what it is, but it puts on this amazing show for a few weeks every year and it's all kinds of awesome.  It's also filled to the brim with bees to such an extent that you can actually hear the hum from 10 or so feet away.  The whole thing is very cool.

And fleeting, since we went from sunny and 84 on Sunday to 34 and snowing like crazy today.  It makes me extra glad I managed to snap a few pictures before all the blossoms get snowed off.

That's it for me this week, now I'm off to check out the rest of the WIPW entries.  See you there!

Work in Progress Wednesday v.86

True confession time:  I really, really love knitting sweaters.  And when I'm knitting them I get all sorts of obsess-y and become very knitting monogamous until I'm done with whatever sweater I'm feeling obsess-y about.  And that, my friends, makes for a whole string of really boring WIPW posts that are all about the same thing. 

Sorry.

But not sorry enough to cast on something else to stir up the pot a bit.  So this week, you get Narragansett.  Again.



It's longer now.  I'm just starting the ribbing tonight.  Two or so inches of that and then it's sleeve city, baby.  It's all very exciting, at least for me.

In other news, we're burning up around here.  A wildfire broke out yesterday about 10 miles away in the midst of sustained 50 mph winds with gusts up to 90 mph.  Within a few hours, it was about 5 miles away.  Here's what our sky looked like last night...



It's still burning uncontrolled, but not moving closer so far today.  We've got all the important papers and the sentimental stuff that can't be replaced gathered up and ready to go, just in case.  But we're really, really hoping it doesn't come to that.  I'll let y'all know if things get really squirrelly, but until then, assume we're fine and I'm still sleeve-obsessed.

Now, go visit all the other WIPW entries for lots more yarn and hopefully less peril.  :)

ps.  Also linking to Keep Calm Craft On today since it seems appropriate somehow.  Check them out too, if you're so inclined.

Work in Progress Wednesday v.85

Happy Spring, everybody!  I'm super duper glad to see it arrive this year, but a little disappointed that we didn't even get one big spring snowstorm.  Love those giant wet flakes that appear only in the spring, and that melt after a day or so.  Ah well, there's always next year.  Now, bring on the flip flops!

Other than the weather, not much has changed around here recently.  I'm still (when I can scrape together a few minutes to knit) working on Narragansett.  It's coming along.  I've finished the waist shaping now, and about to start the cable detail that carries down the front and into the hem.

I should finish up the body this week, and then get started on the sleeves.  With a little luck, it'll be done by Easter and I'll sneak a few times to wear it in before the weather gets too hot.

Boringly enough, that's all I've got to report from these parts today.  I do have some pretty Adventure in the Mountains pics to share, but you'll have to come back this weekend for those.  In the mean time, go check out all of the other WIPW entries springing up today.  There are zillions of them these days, and all of them are pretty awesome.

Cheers!

FO Friday -- Duck and Cover Edition

And finally we reach the end of the post-swap FO Friday pile-up.  It's been so fun to have something to share every Friday, but unless there is some major miracle-knitting on Narragansett in the next few days, our run has come to an end.  At least for a week or two...

For now, let's focus on the socky love.  I finished the Duckie socks on the way to Stitches West, on a plane packed full of knitters.  It was awesome.  I even kitchenered on the plane, and without help from my favorite youtube video on the subject.  Yay, me!  Oh, and voila!

I have to say, I'm loving these socks.  The yarn is probably one of the best skeins I've ever worked with, and I'm feverishly trying to figure out what I can knit with the 80 or so yards I have left.

The pattern was great, too -- super easy to memorize and nothing fancy to worry about.  Also?  Free!  Bonus.  It called for 10 repeats of the pattern before the heel turn, and I added two more for longer socks.  They're still a bit short for my taste, so if I knit these again I'll do 15 repeats on the leg, I think.  Also, if I do these again, I probably won't make a little cable in the sole of the sock on the left next time.  Like so:

Heh.  Apparently, when I picked up that dropped stitch, I put it back in not quite the exact right spot.  Oops.  Ah well, I'd still call them a win. 

And writing about them makes me want to cast on another pair of socks.  Hmmmm.....

Happy weekend, y'all!

ps.  Go visit Fiber Arts Friday, too!

Stitches West Giveaway -- Winner! Winner! Winner!

Happy Saturday, y'all!

The deadline for the Madeline Tosh giveaway passed this morning, and we have a winnah!  The trusty random number generator from random.org coughed this up:

Comment #29 was left by the lovely Sarah at On Being A Knitwit!  Yay, Sarah!  As soon as Sarah sends me her contact information, I'll be dropping this in the mail to her:

Big thanks everyone else for stopping by and entering.  I was a little shocked at how many folks dropped their name into the hat for this giveaway -- Way more than in my first and second giveaways combined.  Rest assured, there will be another one at some point this year.  They're too much fun not to do on a regular basis. 

Happy weekend, you guys!