Yup, I finished my first Critter Knitters blankie — this crocheted in Plymouth Encore Chunky using a K hook.

Considering I haven’t crocheted for nigh on 20 years (and even back then only knew the basic stuff) I’m satisfied with the results. My goal was to not end up with a lopsided blankie and I succeeded. This baby is 18″ square.

In the afterglow of my crochet success, I’ve started crocheting a 24″ blankie.

Remember . . .

We are not just accepting knit and crochet blankets during this project — sewn and quilted blankies are welcome too! Be sure to check out the Critter Knitters website for guidelines on materials and sizes.

I strongly encourage any and all of you to consider making blankets, whether knit, crochet, sewn, or quilted. Because it’s for a great cause. Because you’ll feel good doing it. And because there is an absolute boatload of wonderful prizes there for the winning!

Lucy says . . . please?

Flora Collar

Plugging away on my Flora collar. It’s fun to knit, but slow-going in the undeniably funky two-color garter stitch. But the reslts are very pretty, so I don’t mind the painstaking nature of the work . . . much.

Colinette Poncho!

Just for grins, I wound my Colinette yarn for my poncho into balls.

Okay, everyone but L-B ignore this link. L-B, click here.

Diet Coke With Lime

I see I am not the only aficionado of this nectar of the gods. I was asked if it’s hard to get here. I can find it easily in the grocery store, packaged in a variety of ways.

But at the office it’s a different story. In the building where I work there are three places where you can buy bottled sodas, and two of them have started stocking Diet Coke with Lime. Both places were clean out of it last week because the distributor who delivers it was out of it. There was much consternation.

I was happy to see it back in stock on Monday. But now I’m afraid they’ll run out before the next visit from the distributor. I ordered –excuse me– asked a couple of my team members to kindly not buy any so there would be more for me.

Yesterday, these two team members, who shall remain nameless (but you know who you are, Fred and Monica), conspired to purchase bottles of Diet Coke with Lime, then stood outside my office door and opened said bottles in unison, in flagrant disregard of my order –er– request.

This is insubordination to the highest degree.

I think Flora does!

Want a neck, that is.

I finished knitting her body — see?

So I cut open the neck steeks.

And picked up stitches for the collar.

The collar is more than just a neckband — it’s a fold-over type collar (what the heck do you call that style, anyhow?). You can see what I mean by looking at the Flora photo on the Virtualyarns site here.

So you are knitting the right side of the collar on what is the wrong side of the body of the sweater, because the collar folds over — get it?

At this point you are probably muttering “So what?” to yourselves, but I just thought I’d point that out. In the interests of full disclosure.

Some Sleeve Questions

A coupla questions from yesterday’s comments:

From Glynis:

I have just cut open the armhole steek for Glenesk after letting it sit waiting for weeks. Sure enough, it’s not ravelling. I picked up the stitches for the sleeve, but there is a small, pea sized hole in the area where the stitch had been waiting on the safety pin. I tried to pick up stitches a couple of different ways to get rid of the hole but went back to the “proper” way and still have this small hole.

To Wendy or any experienced reader…is this normal or is there something I should do differently with the other sleeve? As it is, I am planning on just grafting closed that small hole.

I’ve not had this experience, but my first impulse is just to graft it and pretend it never happened. 😉

From Katie:
I remember you mentioning earlier in your blog that there is more shaping in the sleeves for Flora than there has been for the last number of Starmore sweaters you’ve knitted. I’m curious as to how easy it is to pick up and knit the sleeves from the top down when they are shaped? I can visualise how to pick up drop shoulders, but my mind fails me with set in sleeves. If this is truly a stupid question I apologise, but steeking is still somewhat of a dark art for me.

Flora does have some sleeve shaping, but when it comes to knitting the sleeves you simply cut open the steek, pick up the underarm stitches you put on a holder at the start of the steek, pick up stitches around the armhole, and start knitting!

SIP Update

I did finish my first Regia tweed sock and started on the second one.

Critter Blankie Crochet Update

And I made some progress on my crocheted critter blankie!

Critter Knitters!

Lucy would like to point out that there are even more prizes on the prize page!

And a huge thank you to Carol who sent along a huge box full of machine washable yarn and needles. As soon as I get my act together, this box will be dispatched to Liz for her Knitting in the Park events.

To all . . . mmmmmwah!

Steek Event!

Check out the Knit Happens blog!

Because I Know That You Wanna Know . . .

I heart Diet Coke with Lime.

Lucy would just as soon have Fancy Feast.

Wouldn’t you like to be a Steeker too?

Friends, do you have steek envy? Do you really really wanna cut that steek but can’t bring yourself to put scissors to your precious knitting without someone proving to you that it can actually be done without ruining said knitting?

Tell you what I’m gonna do.

On Wednesday, April 14, 2004, at 4:00pm Eastern Standard Time, I am going to cut a steek on Flora. In public.

I’ll be at my very favorite yarn shop in the entire universe, Knit Happens. And there, in front of anyone I can force to watch, I will cut open a Flora armhole steek and pick up stitches for a sleeve.

Wednesday, April 14, 2004. 4:00pm. Fear not the steek.

Flora

The body is nearly done in this photo.

What I’ll do next is cut open the neck steeks and knit the collar. Then I’ll cut open the front steeks and knit the front bands. Then the sleeves will come last.

And one of those sleeves steeks will be cut open in public. See above.

Knit Happens

I did stop by the Knit Happens Grand Opening Celebration on Saturday — the place was hopping! Evberyone was having a grand time. I didn’t stay too long because a migraine was blossoming, but Ian picked out some yarn for socks and I got a crochet hook too.

And “Hello!” to the girls I met in the needles & crochet hook room who recognized me from my blog!

Ingeborg Knit-along

A whole lotta people have joined the Yahoo Group I established for the knit-along. Right now there are discussions of yarns and colors and swatches going on. You can join by following the link from the Ingeborg button in my sidebar!

Why is Lucy wriggling in happiness? Because there are more prizes on the Critter Knitters prize page and more blankies on the blankets received page!

Yesterday I created a Yahoo group for the Ingeborg Knit-along, which we plan to start May 15. Anyone and everyone is welcome to join. You can join at the Group Page.

There’s no requirement to join if you’re going to knit along, and no requirement to knit along if you join. I just thought it would be easier for us to communicate with each other by doing it through a group. And anyone who wants to will be able to upload progress photos to the photo area.

It may be a bit premature to start the group now, but before we start the actual knitting we can discuss things like what colorway we wanna make, where to get the yarn, yarn substitutions, size issues, etc.

I have set the group up so that the list of members is visible only to the moderator — me. Hopefully that’ll prevent any spammers from trawling for email addys.

So join up!

By the way, I had originally stated “sometime in the first half of May” as my target starting date for Ingeborg. I’ve moved it to May 15 because I’ve got a couple of things I want to do before I get started on Ingeborg. But if you’re raring to go, you can certainly start knitting earlier. Or you can start later if that works for you. No big whoop.

Critter Knitters Blankie

I am bravely soldiering along on the crocheted blankie. The first row of double crochet is less than perfect, but it’s improving the more I do. Still, I don’t plan to give up knitting for crochet anytime soon.

Comfort Knitting

I like the comment that Cat left about my Regia tweedy sock yesterday:

Just looking at it makes me want to curl up in my knitting chair and not budge all day, except to grab a cookie & some tea long about 1 pm.

I know what you mean! I think it’s the knitting equivalent of comfort food. It’s such a nice comfy cosy looking yarn.

Flora

Miss Flora is now sporting three full pattern repeats. Another 18 rounds until I start the front neck steek.

Lucy Sez . . .

Check out the prize page — there are new additions!

Oh and yes, that is my shoulder on page 12 of the new Vogue Knitting. I haven’t seen it yet — did they get my best side? 😉

L-B emailed me this yesterday:

“Hey, you knitters who have abandoned Wendyknits because every time you visit she’s knitting a new masterpiece with tiny little needles and tiny little yarn? Well, come back! You won’t believe your eyes! Wendy has been knitting big-needle (well, big for her) scarves! One out of novelty yarn! She’s even going to knit with Encore—with acrylic content! And just wait for the poncho—big needles AND novelty yarn! And she even graced a real live yarn shop to buy the kit! Woo Hoo! And the icing on the cake? Crochet in the very near future! I know. I know. This can’t be THE WENDY! I have a sneaky suspicion that she may be in a mid-life crisis. You know, when men run out and buy a new car? Oh, yeah. She did that, too! The battle cry is XENA! Now, if she ever strays from her toe-up sock pattern to something top-down with cables we’ll be sure to stop the presses and alert you! But, please come back to Wendyknits—you never know what you might see!”

Hmmmmm . . . I feel some top-down cabled socks coming on . . .

Speaking of socks, here’s my Regia tweedy sock. I’m moving really really slowly on this because I’ve not had a lot of knitting time during the commute and lunch hour lately.

Speaking of Crochet . . .

Julie commented yesterday that she’d crochet along with me on a Critter Knitters blankie! Yay, Julie! It’s so much less scary when you do scary things with a friend!

I’m using the K hook I happen to have lying around with my Encore Chunky. I’ll do the blanket in double crochet, and then work a nice little edging around it. This would be the same edging that appears around the neck and armholes of Dale of Norway design Haiti in book 122.

Can any of you guess why I’m planning on using this edging on my blankie? Tee hee hee.

As someone mentioned in my comments, crocheting is like riding a bicycle — it all comes back to you.

For some reason, I’ve got a bunch of crochet hooks. A few usable ones, and about twenty tiny metal Susan Bates hooks. The tiny ones all have the price “10 cents” stamped in them so you know they are old. Dunno where I got ’em.

I’m a Yarn Geek

Because I spent some time last night playing with my yarn for the Colinette poncho. Just playing with it.

I also played with this.

Anyone know what this is?

It’s VirtualYarns 3-ply Hebridean in the color “Sea Ivory.” A whole big honking box of it. It’s destined to become my third Inishmore.

L-B requested a photo of Lucy reclining on the yarn but I said no. If I did that, Her Highness would expect a kitty bed knitted from it.

I will use Cherry Tree Hill yarn for a felted kitty bed. I will use Noro yarn for a felted kitty bed. I will not use Hebridean 3-ply.

So there.

Another cool prize on the prize page guys!

And more blankies received!