It has been awhile...

So I am ashamed to say that I sorta gave up on the whole blog thing. Temporarily, which led to more permanent abandonment. After moving back home in June after graduation, I could not find my camera. So I borrowed one for the post but I thought it might be annoying to do that all the time. So I searched, and searched for my camera and had no luck. At that point it had been a few weeks and I felt bad about not blogging because I wanted to update it almost 3 times a week. So I thought that maybe I should just give up on it until I had my camera. I figured no one would read it, and well I could just start over. But I did get a comment from someone which made me feel ashamed for temporarily giving up. She inspired me to try and keep up with this. Because even just one reader is awesome...so thank you!

Anyways, I finally found my camera and I am ready to go!

I finished the Modern Cabled Bib (linked to the right) in which I posted a pic of last time. It was only my 2nd cable project and I am happy with it. Anyone thinking about trying cables, this is a good project to get your feet wet. It is very small and quick and then you can use it for your own kids or give a beautiful baby present! I used Sugar n creme, a 100% cotton yarn. Here is a final pic of my project:

So the rest of my summer was full of baby shower knitting. I had 3 seperate showers to go to from July-August so that kept my needles busy. I didn't get pics of everything I made, but I did get a good amount. The biggest project was a blanket for my friend, who the bib is also for. It did take FOREVER so I ended up making it a bit smaller, but it is the perfect size for the car and stroller so it works out great. I did a basketweave pattern. I love the look of the finished blanket, but if I make this again I will make each square bigger because I was switching from knit to purl and vice versa every 6 stitches and I think that really slowed me down. I love the final project and so does the mommy!

More pics and project details are on the ravelry project page. I also knit a dress for my friend. I saw this dress and thought it was so cute! Plus I like doing colorwork pieces every so often so this was a perfect pattern. It is called Topaz from Knitty Spring 2009:

The dress really isn't wonky, I swear. This is acctually the 2nd version of Topaz that I made this summer. I made another one for my cousin's baby shower in the same colors but reversed. I don't have a pic yet but hopefully I will get one soon. The pattern calls for this dress to be knit flat, and then seamed together. I did that on the first one and my seaming just does not look great at all. I was very dissapointed. And then I had to do kitchiner for the first time on the sleeves. That did not turn out great either. Over all the first dress looked nice, I just didn't like it as much as I hoped. For the 2nd dress(the one pictured) I was going to convert it to knitting in the round, but I didnt have the right size dpns and I am not a big fan of magic loop, so I knit it flat, but instead of having to side seams, I knit it all in one piece so I only had one side seam. This worked out ok. It was better in theory but it worked out just fine. The only other problem I had with this dress was that it required a crochet neckline to help it flatten out. I can't crochet for the life of me so this was out. Maybe if I wasn't already annoyed with the dress I would have figured out something else. I am still pretty new to knitting so eventually I should be able to alter patterns to how I want them, but for now I need to follow the directions exactly. To match the dress, and to try and use up some more of the yarn I also made little fingerless gloves. I thought they were too cute.

Well, that is a good chunk of the knitting I did in the early summer. I also knit a baby shrug out of the same yarn as the bib for a family friend's baby shower, but I forgot to get a picture of that also. But I am happy to say that all 3 babies have been born happy and healthy, and I have gotten to see two of them.

For my next post I hope to get the blog all caught up to where I am right now in my knitting. Also, someone asked about my spinning, so I hope to do a post about spinning, dyeing, and recycling yarn soon! Stay tuned, and don't give up on me just yet!

My first post!!

I am so excited!! This is my very first blog post for my very own knitting blog! I've been wanting to set up a blog for quite awhile, however after reading so many others I felt like anything I could do would be inferior to theirs. I am so over that. If no one wants to read my blog, then I will read it :)

So I guess I will start off with an introduction. This whole obsession started about 8 months ago, on Black Friday. A small group of friends and I went into the city (Chicago) for a market type thing and ice skating. At the market there was a booth of handmade scarfs from Peru. They were pretty, and to the untrained eye it seemed awesome that someone had made them. I was off in the distance talking to a friend about what to get everyone for christmas on my tight budget, while watching all of the girls go absolutely NUTS over these scarves. And then I remembered when I traveled to Chile and the girls went crazy over all the hand knit scarves, hats, gloves, leg warmers, ect. The wheels turned and I decided to learn how to knit. I thought I could make scarves for all my close friends for christmas, and while it was a cheap gift, I knew it would require time and they would appreciate that just as much, if not more.

And so I taught myself to knit. And I love the hobby, and it has led me down so many different avenues, all of which will be discussed here!

So first on the agenda is what is on my needles at the moment. I am making a bib for my friend's baby shower in august.

So far I love the pattern and it is a semi-quick knit. The stitching is in k1, p1 for the whole thing, so that is making it more time consuming than if it were just garter stitch. But I think this stitching is more elegant so it is worth the extra time.

I have also been spending my time plying some yarn and I finally finished the first skein. It is only like 170 yards or so, but there is A LOT more plying to be done.

It is 75% Silk and 25% cotton. Sadly it feels more like cotton than silk, however it might soften up after I ply it some more. I have to check the gauge but at the moment I think it is a very very very lightweight lace which I have no use for. It will probably get plyed w/ at least 2nd if not a 3rd strand. I am hoping to make a few skeins of sockweight and maybe even a skein of a heaver laceweight. Also the color is a yellowish/goldish color which is muted in the picture and I really don't care for it. Eventually I am going to try and overdye it with some red dye to make it slowly turn from the yellow to orange to red. We will see.