Christmas Knitting

Have been busy trying to get some Christmas knitting out of the way, as well as busy designing a few things and NOT actually knitting... so here's my Christmas knitting.

First, I made this for my Secret Santa in a swap on a dog message board. First dishcloth I ever knit!

Unfortunately, the multi-coloured yarn made it REALLY hard to see the paw print "pop out," no matter what angle you looked at. Mistake noted. Will never do that again.

Oh, and just for fun! This is the handmade tag I did to go on it:

I got to use my nifty new Christmas stamps. I also used these to make tags for everybody's Christmas gifts, but I didn't take pics of any of those. You'll have to take my word they were really pretty!


Other side of the tag, with care instructions.


So, while I was knitting dishcloths, I also knit up a set for Auggie's lovely breeder...

This one is my original design, using the chart I worked up for the Boy + Girl scarf... the LARGER chart, that is. I don't like how much empty space ended up above and below the sheltie... it's like two rows of stockinette too many, IMO.


Doghouse! This one was a nice pattern, actually. Maybe also suffers the "two rows of stockinette too many" symptom, but it matched the sheltie cloth nicely as far as size and overall design goes! The ribbing for the border was also different than most patterns I've seen. It was kind of a fun change.


Tried again with the paw... hey, you can actually see it this time! The second time I knit this, and in comparison to the other two dishcloths, this one is HUGE. I'll have to definitely make it on smaller needles if I ever do it again.

And finally, I decided to knit something for my mom. I bought her something but I didn't feel like it was enough. But what to knit? I KNOW... a monkey.


Mr. Monkey was knit from the Mr. Dangly pattern, using some modification to knit him in the round. I also worked his ears in double-knit to speed along a little faster.

More pics:








I had to knit him almost entirely at work to keep it a secret. I normally attract some attention while knitting at work because people want to know what I'm knitting (or to tell me they can only knit scarves) but just about everybody was fascinated by Mr. Monkey. He was really fun to knit, I've never really knit anything like that where watching it take shape is exciting and fun. I put his ears on his head, then his head to his body, and his arms and legs on, then ran off to show my co-workers how cute he was turning out. I like this one a lot.
(Also, Mr. Monkey is an excellent headbanger. We tested the theory to some rock music.)


And there you have what I've been up to! I also CO my skully armwarmers again after deciding what I wanted to do as far as the pattern went, so the first of those should be finished shortly. I'm busy working on a few fun designs for things, mostly dog related... and by that I don't just mean dog sweaters or anything. What can I say - my passions often overlap.

At Last - Finished Space Invaders

It's done! At long last, it's done!! I told myself no more new projects until this was finished, and there's something I REALLY REALLY want to start working on, so I forced myself to finish this stupid scarf this weekend.

And so, at long long long long LONG last... I give you... the Space Invaders scarf.





I have uploaded and linked the chart I created for this here in my blog for you guys to use as you like. If you want to duplicate my scarf PRECISELY, this is what I did:

I used Red Heart Super Saver yarn, in black and in bright green. It takes probably half a skein of each. I knit on size 7s.
Really, you can use whatever you'd like, but I think worsted probably works best. Bulky might do all right, too.
Being that it's a scarf, gauge doesn't matter. Just knit it. Have fun. Seriously.

With BOTH YARNS held in one hand and using long-tail cast on, CO 19 stitches. This actually gives you 38 stitches - 19 green and 19 black.
For the next row, you'll start working in double-knit. (I won't go into too much detail on double-knitting because there are great tutorials out there and people who can explain it MUCH better than I can.) Knit the first stitch in green, move BOTH yarns to the front, and purl the second stitch in black. Move both yarns to the back again and keep going until you now have a row of 38 stitchs, alternating in green and black.
Work four rows of solid colour like this.
Begin working the chart, bottom-up.
When you finish the chart, again knit four solid rows of colour. Then, you need to change your colours completely to start the stripes. That is... if you're about to do a knit stitch with green and a purl with black, you'll knit with black and purl with green. Do two rows, then switch colours again.
There are a total of 63 stripes. After you've finished the last stripe, switch colours ONE last time and knit four solid rows. Then start again with the chart, going top down this time.
Finish the chart and knit four solid rows of colour again.
To bind off, again take both yarns in one hand. You will BO by doing a K2TOG instead of just straight knit stitches - put your needle through a green stitch AND a black stitch, and knit them both (holding both yarns in your hand, remember!) If you don't do it this way and just knit all 38 stitches separately, you'll end up with the BO end of your scarf bigger than the CO end!

There are other ways to CO and BO with double knitting... this is just what I did. I chose to BO holding both strands of yarn because it replicated the look of my CO. Yes, it's kind of messy... and that is why I gave my scarf fringe. (Plus I like fringe.) I took two strands of black and two strands of green for each tassel of fringe and looped them through every other stitch or so until it looked fringe-y enough.


And that's it! I'm DONE with it!
My next project is double-knit also. What can I say... I love double-knit scarves. (Or I'm just a glutton for punishment.)

Space Invaders Chart

This is the chart for my Space Invaders scarf. You can do whatever you'd like with it - put it on armwarmers, socks, a sweater... take just a few aliens, add some aliens in, whatever.
This chart is really easy for someone who's a beginner to charts because it's symmetrical... that is, you don't need to remember if you're reading the blue rows right-to-left and the white rows left-to-right or vice versa, because it all reads the same backwards and forwards anyway. So if you screw up and forget which way you're going, you won't screw up the pattern.

Space Invaders Chart


My chart is slightly different from existing charts because I wanted to make it look as if you were really playing the old game... so I sought out old reference pictures. You WILL notice that my chart is technically missing an alien graphic - that's because I included the little explosion graphic. There are five rows of aliens in the old game, and for my chart, the bottom row of aliens is being EXPLODED.
Oh - it's also missing another alien graphic... the one of the guy at the top with his legs in. All the reference pics I found for the original game just had five rows, so I didn't include that last graphic either.

That's just how I chose to do mine and why I made my own chart instead of using one of the several other options that are out there! For specifics on exactly how I did MY scarf, see this post. But you don't have to follow what I did... you can work the chart bottom-up three times, then go top-down three times on the other side. Make bigger stripes in the middle; make vertical stripes in the middle. Do boxes, hearts, the word "SPACE INVADERS" - whatever. Part of the fun of knitting is making a pattern yours... that's why this is really less "pattern" and more "just a chart."
Enjoy it.

Auggiesaurus (or I Don't Own The Dogosaurus Rex Pattern)

I decided, for some crazy reason, to knit Auggie's Halloween costume this year. After much poking around, I decided on a dinosaur, because the Paton's Dogosaurus Rex pattern was supercute! Unfortunately it was also not-free and an older pattern, so I couldn't find the pattern book.
So I had to make it up as I went. I decided all I really needed was a sweater base, and then to knit some spikes... then put it all together, and voila!! DINOSAUR!

I started to use a free pattern for a dog sweater, but it was kind of frustrating. I also had been to the library in search of The Happy Hooker (I want to begin crocheting so I can make amigurumi, and I thought, hey, that book should help me!!) which was sadly checked out, and I went home with Stitch 'n Bitch Nation instead, because I was thinking of making the cable newsboy cap out of it. But oh! Look! Inside of Stitch 'n Bitch Nation, there is a dog sweater pattern!!


I still had to sort of make it up as I went. Auggie is a bizarre size, and even after I knitted the sweater something between a medium and a large (which, seriously, Auggie is 13.5 inches at the shoulder and weighs 15 pounds - he's not large, and to call him medium is even pushing it!) it doesn't exactly fit him right. It seems too tight around his chest, even though I made it long in the chest and knitted the arm holes to the biggest pattern size to make sure he had room to move. I'm not sure if I can fix that now or not... I still have some (a fistful, really) of the green yarn left over. I could knit up a belly piece to put in the middle, I guess? Hm.

Well, anyway, without further ado...











I took this to work with me today so I could finish it. The sweater base was done and I'd started the spikes - I just needed to do a few more and stitch the two sides together on most of them. I therefore planned to complete the last couple of spikes at work, and MAYBE work sleeves off the armholes if I had time. Well, I had plenty of time... so I decided to go ahead and work the sleeves, because the more I looked at the sweater the more the gaping armholes looked bad.
So, knowing that I MIGHT have done the sleeves, I had brought with me my little plastic bag that holds my one, lone circular needle, and initially I wanted to do the sleeves in magic loop on the circ. This bag also holds my set of DPNs, because I don't have anywhere else to put them. My Knitpicks needle case doesn't really have a spot small enough to slide in DPNs and hold them without having them rattle around and clatter out of their sleeve - so they reside in the bag with my circ.
I have to confess to you, my dearest crafting blog... I got so frustrated with my circular needles and working in magic loop that I actuallly (oh, my sock-knitting friends will probably be so proud) decided it would be MUCH LESS ANNOYING to use the DPNs.
Did you hear that, crafting blog? That's right... I said that I found my DPNs the LESS ANNOYING solution.

Maybe our love-hate relationship is improving. I did, after all, buy two more sets of DPNs in two different sizes because they were on clearance at Hobby Lobby. Less than $2 for a set of DPNs? Even if I hate them, how can I say no?? I even considered buying two sets so I could have five needles, but decided that was a little overkill when I still pretty much hate DPNs.

SI scarf - Progress Again

Today's Tom Sawyer he gets high on you
And the space he invades he gets by on you

The SI scarf at 50%:






The length of the scarf at 50% was half pattern, half striped. Now I'm on my way back down the other side! There are 28 stripes per side for a total of 56. Still agonizing over the stripes, but at the 50% mark, I counted my stripes, then put that number on my knitting counter (one of those that you change the numbers on by turning a dial.) and started to count DOWN as I knit the same number of stripes on the other side. It's easier this way... now I know what I'm working towards. Before it was just a length goal, not a number of rows or anything. With a concrete number in front of me, it is WAY easier to go "Okay, I'm knitting from 28 to 20 now" and to actually make that goal! Hopefully now I will be able to rip through the rest of the stripes, then get back to the pattern, and... and... FINALLY... finish this thing.



Right now, my only other WIP that's on needles is the Pinky Scarf, which is boring boring BORING garter stitch. I'd like to finish it just to say it's finished... not because I'm particularly excited about the FO. I guess that's kind of a bad thing... but what can you do? I hope to eventually put little flowers on it, like those in Knitty's Nagano Sakura. I'm sure once it's done, I will love it, but it's not an exciting project as is...
And why mess with garter stitch when there are so many other fun, enticing projects in my head?

Space Invaders scarf progress

Some progress pics of the Space Invaders scarf:






I've since gotten even further... the middle of the scarf is just two-row tall alternating stripes, and I'm maybe 20% of the way through the stripes. It's awful work - knit, switch yarns to front, purl, switch yarns to back, knit, switch yarns to front, purl... and every two rows I have to remember to switch colours entirely. That is, if I've been knitting black and purling green, I have to knit green and purl black.
AUGH.
Knitting the chart is far easier than this... and also keeps my interest better.

Two WIPs down

Knocked out two WIPs I had on the knitting needles this week. My Mom had a hysterectomy and was in the hospital for three nights, so I took knitting to work on while sitting in the room with her. The first night, I finished my armwarmers:




After that, I realized I should probably work on the knitting project I have FOR my mom... which is a 2x2 ribbed scarf that I started two winters ago, pretty much right after I learned to knit. Er, whoops. Well, she has it now! Before this next winter, even!



Mom's scarf was on my 10's, which I have now moved back to my Pinky Scarf... an ink pen was previously holding the stitches for that scarf.
I also got my magnetic knitting chart holder in today, so I can work more on the Space Invaders scarf! I was starting to get confused following the pattern (I hate crossing out or highlighting lines on a pattern, because I sometimes screw up and have to rip back or unknit rows and the highlighting messes me up) so this will hopefully help a lot.

More Knitting

I am now the proud owner of... CABLE NEEDLES. Hurray! Cables! Cabled scarf first, maybe, then cabled arm warmers/leg warmers come next. Also... maybe going to finally get some use out of those darn DPNs, or just learn magic loop for my circs.
I sat outside in the 80-some degree weather knitting on an arm warmer. I'm such a nerd.

I want to knit more, but I find myself wanting something a little more challenging to keep my attention. I did the illusion scarves pretty quick because I LOVED working the pattern, so I stayed interested and knitted longer each time I took the needles up. The worst part of that skull illusion scarf was the striping in the middle... boooo-ring! It was PAINFUL to knit through that after working a chart, and knowing I'd be getting back to a chart again as soon as I was done with the stripes.

I guess I need to learn intarsia... kinda intimidating! But I have a few cute charts I'd like to work into some scarves. Hopefully I won't get started, then forget how to do intarsia and be totally unable to remember it, thus leaving my scarf at approximately 30% complete like the poor Space Invaders scarf. ;P

Armwarmers

It might seem odd for a Midwestern girl to knit up armwarmers in the middle of July... but let me explain.
I work in radio. We have a lot of computers and equipment, and almost all of it is running ALL the time. To keep the computers cool, and to compensate for the heat they put off in the studios, the air conditioning is cranked up superhigh in the summer, and in the winter, the heat is kept down very low. As a result, it pretty much doesn't matter what time of year it is... inside the station it is FREEZING COLD.
You can, however, always take a little trip into a studio and warm up. The studios are pretty much always warm warm warm. I don't need anything for when I'm inside the studio... but when I'm outside the studio, it's so cold!! I've been running around with my big frumpy sweatshirt on, trying to keep warm that way (it's not really working.)

So... that is why, in the middle of July in the Midwest, I am knitting armwarmers.

So here you have some, using the Jiffy Armwarmers pattern!









It was knitting up a lovely little pattern when I started, but when I got about halfway it got "off" and isn't quite such a lovely little pattern anymore. Regardless, I grabbed this yarn because it's the same as what I used for my first calorimetry and I thought it would be nice if they matched... well, they do match, so whatever!
(These are not my work armwarmers, either... I'll need a neutral colour for those.)

Dear Space Invaders Scarf

Frustration sets in (again) with the Space Invaders scarf. I knit a bit on it, and then put it away some time last year - I was working rows on it while watching Boy Meets World on Disney at 1am, and when they quit airing BMW at 1am I quit knitting on it. So it sat for a while, a little unloved. I took it on vacation with me in July, and one night in the hotel room I took it out and worked a row of the chart. I looked at it, and thought "I have no clue if I did that right. I don't think I did. Man, I'm tired - far too tired to use my brain power to do this double-knitting thing." So I put it away and left it there. I should have pulled it out again the next day, as I had a fellow knitter with me on that vacation and I'm sure she could have saw what I screwed up, fixed it, and then taught me how to double-knit again... but alas, I did not.

So some time after I got home, I pulled it out to "fix." Well, I for sure had knit it incorrectly while on vacation, so I unknit two rows to get back to where I was... and started to forge ahead.
"Wait," I thought, and looked at my needles. "wait... this is NOT right."
I tried again. And again. And again. I couldn't get it to look right, but I couldn't figure out what I was doing. Frustrated, I put the SI scarf down, cast on thirty stitches of red, and knit three rows in garter stitch just to make sure I hadn't actually forgotten how to knit... no, no, I still remembered how to do it. God, it hadn't been THAT long... a few months, admittedly, but not THAT long! I tried again with the SI scarf... and failed.
"Forget it," I thought, "I don't have time to screw around with this right now." I put it away again... and left it.

A few months later I got it back out. I tried again. And again, and again, and again, and I STILL could not get it. "ARRRGH! I'm going to just LEAVE the damn thing until July, and then I'll get my knitting friends to help me with it when I see them on vacation again!" I resolved, and put it away.

Now, I have pulled it out again. I checked my Stitch & Bitch, watched a few videos from Knitting Help... and tried again.
No, it still looked wrong, but at least this time I'm pretty sure I knitted and purled correctly. I looked at Stitch & Bitch again. What was wrong? I looked at the section on twisted stitches. "Ah-HA," I thought. In unknitting the darn thing, I bet I twisted some stitches. Sure enough, I plowed through the scarf and found several twisted stitches, and untwisted them.
Now the stitches are sitting properly on the needles. I checked the last successfully knitted row of my chart to make sure I still accurately had purls and knits in the right places... everything looks good.
Okay... time to try this again.

...and I did it wrong again.



Dear Space Invaders scarf:
I hope you appreciate all the aggravation and difficulty I am going through to finish you.
Love, Beanie.
PS: I hate you.

Chain Chomp Scarf Pattern

I knit up the Chain Chomp Scarf last year before the Super Bowl, and I've only now gotten around to typing up the pattern I used, since my friend knit this guy. Now you can have a Chain Chomp on your head AND your neck!

This is a little ghetto and I'm sure somebody out there who's far more talented than I am can create a different pattern with more civilized knitting techniques, but because I started knitting because I love scarves and therefore only knit scarves, and thusly only knit on straight needles (my DPKs and circs are sitting in my needle jar, unloved) this is what I did. If you're a beginner or just don't like to use DPKs, you can use this pattern.

Because Chompy was knit on straight, I had to come up with a way to create the whole thing - a circle (or several) - on straights. Think of it like a pizza, or a pie. You're knitting a triangle shaped slice of the pie, and they're all joined up. You need 7 slices of the pie to form the full circle.

You'll need:
US Size 10 Needles
A crochet hook or an embroidery needle for weaving in ends - my favourite all-purpose crochet hook happens to be pink and reads only 5.5mm on it, and that is what I used.
Two colours of yarn - for a proper Chompy, use black (MC) and white. (CC)
Note:I use Red Heart Super Saver, because not only am I cheap and allergic to a lot of wools so I'm afraid to buy the more expensive stuff, acrylic holds a nice, stiff shape fairly well, so your chains will stay pretty stiff and loopy, and your chomp head won't curl up or fold in on himself. HOWEVER, you can use whatever colours of yarn and kind of yarn you prefer... it really is up to you.
I apologize for not knowing exactly how much yarn you need, but it's not a heck of a lot. If you're using something that you don't have a lot of or are worried you won't have enough of, make SURE you knit your Chompy's head first... then if you need to skimp on extra chain links, it's not such a big deal.


Chomp Head:
In MC, CO 10.
*K1, turn. K1, turn.
K2, turn. K2, turn.
Repeat, adding 1 each time until...
K10, turn.
Last row - slip 1, K9.
Repeat from * until circle is formed (6 more times.)
Weave in ends.

Eyes: (Knit two)
In CC, CO4.
K1, turn. K1, turn.
Repeat in pattern as above; repeat into circle (3 times.)

Pupils: (Knit two)
In MC, CO3.
K2, turn. K2.
K3, turn.
BO.

Chain: I knit 25 links for my scarf, but you can make as many or as few as you'd like!
CO 21 in MC (long tail)
Work 2 rows in knit stitch.
BO.
Alt- I like to stretch mine out widthwise to make them flatter; you could also work 4 rows for wider chains.

Knit individual links, and then seam (weave in) the ends of the links through each other to get them linked up.

Big Teeth: (x4)
CO6 in CC.
K6.
K1, D1, K4.
K5.
K1, D1, K3.
K4.
K1, D1, K2.
K3.
K1, D1, K1.
K2.
K1, D1, BO.

Small Teeth: (x8)
CO4 in CC.
K4.
K1, D1, K2.
K3.
K1, D1, K1.
K2.
K1, D1, BO.


Place all your little parts (white eye, pupil, and six teeth per side - two of the big teeth on the outer edges, four small teeth making up the inner teeth) together on the Chompy head. Put them where you think they look right, and use duplicate stitch to "sew" them to the head. Try to be symmetrical, but it's not really that important - just make sure your duplicate stitching doesn't show through incorrectly on the other side! The teeth look a little funny at times, so try to use your duplicate stitches to stretch them into a real triangle shape.

Alternatively, you could just duplicate stitch teeth and eyes to the head, or make them out of felt instead!

Chompy-Chompy

I like to knit while watching football. (GO BEARS!) Sometimes it can be hard to do. Close games and overtime tend to wrack my nerves and make my hands tremble. Knitting is supposed to be relaxing, isn't it?!

Anyway, I knit this guy up yesterday while watching football, and finished him later while watching Law & Order.

Chain Chomp Scarf

He is lovely! And surprisingly warm.


Laid out on my bed, at home on the circle pattern. He says RARR.


The inspiration started with other knitter's intarsia of video game characters on scarves, the thought of "Chompy!!", jumped here for the chainlinks... and then my own dorked-out brain imploded to create the rest. It took some trial & error and lots of ripping out stitches after my silly novice ideas failed, but hey! In the end, he turned out pretty cute. I love it.

illusion knitting

Two FO's that were made as Christmas gifts in 2006. I adore the skull pattern, and think I require one with pink!


Made from this pattern.


Made from this pattern, minus the "I" chart... changed the robots a little bit too.

boyfriend scarf

I call it the boyfriend scarf, merely because I saw the yarn in the store and thought "Wow, this is a nice boy yarn!" and 'boy scarf' gives me an entirely different mental image/inspiration.

Garter stitch in some yarn I have since forgotten the brand name; 15 stitches on US 8s.


It's so very warm, and it stands up nicely around the neck so when it's really cold out, it's easy to bury my nose down in it!