Knitvent Day 10 – Playing with math

Quite awhile ago I created my own pattern for seamless baby booties to match a hat I had designed nearly a decade previous.  It’s my goto personal pattern for baby gifts.  I had the booties test-knit, the pattern tech edited, but never got to publishing it, thinking I wanted to do something more.

Last year I thought these booties would make great slippers.  So I’ve been playing with yarns, needles, math to upsize the bootie pattern.  This past weekend I’ve knit a mens’ small in Drops Eskimo wool, and a ladies medium in Premier Appalachia.

I like how they look, but there’s more work to be done before I’m ready to test knit, pattern write, etc…but these are quick gift knits!

Knitvent Day 7 – my launching pad

As the month progresses, I have everything ‘in process’ out for me to pick from when I find a minute or two to sit and knit.  Knitting (knit repair) isn’t my full-time job (yet) so I carrying ‘something’ with me each day when I have to travel to meetings, arenas, appointments, school, etc.  Everywhere I go that may have a wait, is an opportunity for knitting time.  In the house, I have it laid out so if I have time to sit and knit, I can grab something quickly.

At the moment, the launch pad is my living room coffee table, beside the Christmas tree & fireplace – a very cozy place to knit.  It’s also the first thing I see when I come down the stairs in the morning (yikes!)  At the moment, this is ‘tame’…I’ll post a progress photo as we get closer to the ‘deadline’.

Note, there are 3 project bags as well as what’s on the table.

Knitvent Day 6 – Woolly Dozen

Another way that I get gifts knit throughout the year, is participating in a year-long challenge (a different kind of KAL).  One designer I truly love is Woolly Wormhead.  On her Ravelry group, they created a challenge to knit a Woolly Dozen.

I’ve participated each year, and have yet to actually knit a dozen, but it does help me get part of the knitting done.  Some hats goto the school holiday fair, some are given as gifts during the year, some are donated, and one or two are wrapped up as Christmas gifts.

Below is a peek at one of four I’ve managed to complete this year (yikes!)

Knitvent Day 4

It happens a lot at this time of year.  Distractions, not being present, lack of focus and I have to rip something back.  This is nothing compared to the pile of yarn I ripped back last evening…

Mistakes happen, miscounting stitches, purl instead of knit, miscounting the two colour pattern, or having a dog at your feet suddenly get up and take the yarn right out of your hands because it caught on her tail.

It happens, just a bump in the road, no need to panic…..yet

21 knitting days

Knitvent Day 3

I easily get distracted during the month of December.  I usually have a ‘plan’ for my gift knitting but I see some wonderful ideas from following others on Instagram and Ravelry.

Yesterday was a distraction day!  I’ve seen a number of these knit stars popping up in my feeds, so it gave me the idea I could “whip up” a dozen of these for the school holiday market.

I made 2 failed attempts before my gauge seem tight enough for stuffing – and managed 2 stars in one afternoon. I am faster now that I know what I’m doing with these, but the distraction is now deluding me into knitting a bunch for my own tree and maybe extra gift knits.

Pattern is Stjarna and is a free download on Ravelry

Knitvent Day 2

This is only a sneak peak so the recipient doesn’t know what it is!  I’m posting just a closeup of the brioche stitch that makes up this particular knit.

This was from a knit-a-long (KAL) back in the spring (for the non-knitters – a KAL is where hundreds (thousands) of knitters around the world knit the same item over a specified time period and chat/share their tips, problems & progress)

This was a brioche stitch KAL over the US Memorial Day weekend. Sometimes these KALs help me learn something new as well as set things aside early!  I do try to spread out the holiday knitting across the year, and periodic KALs help me to do just that!

Knitvent Day 1

Countdown to #knitmas – day 1
As anyone who knows me is aware, I try to knit a small gift for family members, as well as a bunch of knits for my son’s school Holiday Market. So as I go crazy with getting things completed, I’m going to post sneak-peaks of how much I actually get done – one post per day as my “advent calendar”

For Day 1 – I’ve completed 20 of my candy stripe facecloths which have already gone to the school and I have another 3 to wrap around soaps for neighbour gifts…I’ll likely be knitting at least another dozen – fast last minute gifts for when I run out of time 

I’m trying to get pattern tech edited and posted in time for others to do quick last minute knits!

Happy Holidays & a new Christmas Eve tradition…

It all started with a pinterest post that I didn’t even read –

The socks gave me a new idea for my family gift knitting!

After some pinterest Ravelry searches for both Christmas and Holiday Socks…I found that Drop Design (Garnstudio) has a number of Christmas socks

And so begins a new Christmas Eve tradition…
#knitmas

Merry Christmas – Christmas Eve socks – #knitmas

A photo posted by Katherine Caughran (@stringandbeans) on

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All the best to you & yours this holiday!

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Upside down and backwards

It’s been years of me saying I’ll knit myself a new christmas stocking, since mine is so much smaller than hubby & child’s…(yes I’m glossng over the fact its been years since I last posted here).

Each year, I’m usually too busy with gift knits to get around to my stocking, so this year, I started the stocking after Christmas, so it’ll be ready for next year.  I’m following this Falling Snowflake pattern and after starting off great, realized I needed my name added.

Now, when knitting a sweater or blanket, you just chart and go…but this stocking is in the round and top down…so I could chart my name using excel, but needed it to be upside down.

I tried a couple of things:

1) I searched Ravelry for upside down alphabet charts – didn’t find one
2) I googled upside down alphabet charts – didn’t get results I needed.
3) I charted name as per usual in Excel then knit it backwards from what I’d usually do with a chart.

  • I set my column widths to .74cm so it would look like the graph chart in use by the stocking pattern
  • I chose to have the letters in the same height as the 2nd snowflake band of the pattern so only 10 rows high
  • My letters were ‘narrow’ but I still had to add an extra repeat of the snowflake pattern (ie cast on an extra 32 stitches) in order to fit my whole name.

And now I have my own ‘larger’ stocking, albeit still smaller than the other two