FO Friday: A Couple Weeks Late

I've been delighted with my Pogona shawl since I finished it almost two weeks ago. Every time I look at it, every time I wrap it around my shoulders, I'm reminded just how amazing it is. Most of this amazingness is due to Stephen West  and Tosh Mo Light (colorway earl gray), but I'd say about 12% of it is my talent (subtle Avengers reference? Maybe not so subtle? See what I did there?). 

Overall, I enjoyed knitting this as much as I enjoy having it in my hands (I suppose technically it was in my hands the entire time I was knitting it, but you know what I mean), but the 600+ stitches per row near the end were a bit trying. The stitches were so bunched up on the needle I couldn't really see what it was going to look like, and the yarn gave me trouble in a few places. I think this was more because of how I wound the ball than the actual yarn, and I would happily buy another skein. I also want to try some other Madeleinetosh yarns, after I sample I skein or two of Malabrigo of course. 

That's it for me. In other news, I finished Peter Pan today instead of yesterday because yesterday was super busy for me and I had no time to knit or listen to anything, and I also started a pair of socks today which was probably not the wisest thing to do with Christmas 88 days away. I'll be blogging about those two topics on Wednesday... if I can wait that long! 

Thanks for stopping by! I'm linking with Tami's Amis today. 

What's Up?

How did the entire week go by without me blogging once? Truth is I've been busy- busier than I like! Between school, writing, and trying to get as much knitting done as possible, I've been continuing to neglect this poor old blog. But, to quote Batman's dad, "Why do we fall? So we can learn to pick ourselves up." (Another thing I've been doing while not blogging is watching Batman, which is why that phrase comes so easily to mind.)

Today's blog post deserves only one subject, though in fairness it is quite a big subject:

I'm knitting Pogona by Stephen West- I bought the yarn, Tosh Mo Light, at the DFW Fiber Fest this past April. The colorway is Earl Gray, but it reminds me of Rivendell from Lord of the Rings. I love the pattern- it's my first Stephen West pattern, but I see myself knitting many more in the future! 

This project was recently on a quick time out because the other night while watching Foyle's War (I do love my British TV shows) with my sister, a huge knot came out of my ball of yarn, quickly followed by another one. I spent most of the episode trying to untangle yarn! (And that's saying something, as these episodes are a good hour and a half long.) But it's all been sorted out now and I'm making good progress again. 

That being said, I just picked up a pair of socks that desperately need to be finished, so Pogona may not be getting as much attention as it wants in the next week or two! And, to add in another distraction, a box full of yarn for Christmas knitting (after all, the holidays are less than four months away!) is coming in the mail tomorrow. I keep telling myself that getting started on Christmas knitting now will mean I'll be done well before Christmas and I'll have a stress free December, but honestly I think Christmas knitting will make the time come more quickly! Then again, speaking as a kid at heart, that's not necessarily a bad thing...

FO Friday: Oh Wait, it's Sunday

Wow! I have a great many lame excuses for my three week long hiatus. To name a few, my sister left for college two weeks ago, I've been spending plenty of time nurturing a newfound love of the Disney Musical Newsies and the music found within it (I'd say this mild obsession has started to tone down a bit, but considering I'm listening to Seize the Day as I type, I know that's not really true), and I started high school a week ago (I'm homeschooled, so high school isn't all that big a deal, but it is an awful lot harder than what I was doing in the past few years).

Though I haven't found time to blog, I have found plenty of time to knit, and I have a few new projects to show you. Tonight, I present a pair of fingerless mitts that I finished just the other day.

Though it took me a few weeks total to knit these Owlie Mitts, the time actually spent knitting them was pretty short. The pattern, Owl Wrist Warmers, had been on my mental to-do list since well before last Christmas, but I've only now gotten around to knitting them. They were easy while the color work kept them exciting, and they've inspired me to do more colorwork projects (such as Bláithín by Kate Davies. Just kidding, I think steeks are a little more than I can handle with Christmas just around the corner). 

For these mitts, I used Knitpicks Palette in Alfalfa for the main color, and random scraps of other yarn for the contrasting colors. As I'm not in possession of US2 DPNs, I used US1s and tried to knit loosely- I wasn't too concerned about gauge with a project like this. Because of this, the mitts were slightly different in size when I finished them, but blocking sorted this out, and helped to straighten out some of the imperfect color work. 

That's all I have to say about that! For those of you who had given this blog up for dead, I hope you will come running back screaming about miracles, and if you happen to be new, please know that it is extremely abnormal for me to go on long breaks like this! I'll be back tomorrow (hopefully) with more stories of my adventures while on blogging break! 

Christmas 2012

On Christmas day or the day after, two blog posts appeared in my Reading list. Both were entitled Christmas 2012. I thought I should carry on the pattern (that has been broken by several of the other blogs I follow. Stupid people. Just kidding).

At this point in time, there are two in three chances that you know me and know my family's Christmas traditions. But for the other third out there (how unfortunate you are to be included in that category), I'll explain a little about how Lowery Christmases go.

It all starts in August (yep. Our Christmas celebrations are so elaborate it takes us five months to get through them all). There's usually a time when the whole family is together, and at that time we each draw a name from a hat, or possibly a flower pot. Then we all sit around for a few months until the holidays hit, and we go around to the stores and find some special presents for whoever we picked out of the hat (or flower pot). Think Secret Santa, but under a more dignified and as yet unspecified name.

Then, at six o'clock on Christmas Eve, all 11 of us (and now a couple of in-laws as well) gather around our table for a meal of bread and cheese. A poor man's meal, you may think, but it's a wonder how many gourmet (and, of course, expensive) cheeses you can find in the world of Central Market.

After we've eaten as much as we can, we sit around the Christmas Tree with glasses of eggnog and a platter of cookies. We start with the youngest, in this case (and every case for the last 13 years) me. I dramatically put down my eggnog, arise from my seat, and take a present from the tree. I then give this present to whoever I picked from the hat all those months ago. This person opens the present, says thank you and all, and then they take a present from the tree. And so on so forth until everybody's person is discovered and everybody has at least one present (unless their secret santa forgot who they had, in which case one person is very sad and another person is very sorry).

This year, my brother Thomas was fortunate to have his name picked by me. I made him a hat and scarf following the patterns Turn a Square by Jared Flood and His (Birthday) Scarf by Monika SteinBauer, both of which are free. I don't have any pictures yet, but hopefully will get some soon.

I also gave some other people presents. Namely, my sisters and mother. Because girls are so much easier to knit for than boys. I don't have any pictures of these, either, but the patterns I used were Forget the Fingers (for my mom), Oh, Helen! (for Mrs Elizabeth Joseph, my newlywed sister), and Cranberry Sauce (for my sister Mary Margaret). All of these are also free. And I also knit a shawl for my sister Rebecca, but I designed the pattern. I'll get it up in a few weeks (or months) if I can ever decipher my notes.

But onto more important things now- the presents I received. 

Two books, Stitch Library and Literary Knits. The latter is from my brother David, who had me for Christmas. Both of them are amazing. The first will contribute greatly to my designs with the endless supply of cable patterns, lace patterns, and simple knit and purl charts. The second already has any money I got for Christmas begging to be spent on the yarn reacquired for some of the projects (but I'm restraining myself because I have quite a few projects already on the needles...)

Also on Christmas Eve I was given a Doctor Who book, Dark Horizons, from my brother Nate, and an amazing Tardis pencil case from Mary Margaret. 

This picture doesn't do the wonder of this pencil case justice. She made it herself. She wrote the little words on the panel on the front. And made them bigger and smaller as does the real Tardis. And she lined it. Others may gaze in wonder at what comes off my knitting needles, but Mary Margaret's talent warrants even more respect. (Especially since she's also one of the smartest people on our street, can command a pencil across a sheet of paper like none other, and has more skill with a calligraphy pen than I've scene before. And yes, I might be exaggerating just a little bit, out of gratitude for my pencil case.)

On Christmas morn, we always awake to find our handmade felt stockings filled with candy and other goodies. For me, I found lots of yarn this year. True, I did pick it out myself, but there's no joy greater than finding some scrumptious balls of yarn at your place at 7:30 in the morning on 12-25)

This yarn is a beautiful self-striping aran weight under the brand name of Quasar. I'm planning on combining my new stitch book with this yarn to create a slouchy hat. 

These three skeins are Kroy Paton's Sock, but it is intending, not for a pair of socks, but for a scarf. The pattern I'm using is Koigu Linen Stitch Scarf, and it costs five dollars but if you do a quick search for 'Linen Stitch Scarf' on Ravelry you'll find some free ones as well. This is going to be my Thor scarf, because the colors are wonderfully reminiscent of how Marvel has reproduced the Scandinavian god.  

Of course there's more, but not that I can remember right off the bat. So onto Christmas day....

Since most of our celebrations are done on Christmas eve, we usually just mill around on Christmas day, taking naps and eating chocolate. For the past couple of years, though, we've gone to the theater on Christmas Day. Last year, we went to see The Adventures of Tintin (have I mentioned that it's co-written by Steven Moffat, who is the head writer and executive producer of Doctor Who?). This year, we went for something more serious: Les Miserables, starring Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, and Anne Hathaway. The musical was so wonderful, we all left the theater in tears. 

While we were watching it, the snow began to fall, and our dream of a white Christmas transitioned into reality. 

Mary Margaret failed to take any photos of our wintry landscape, but this one is pretty cool. Hope she doesn't mind I borrowed it. I think it's of one of our outdoor cast-iron stools or flower pot holders or something. 

We by no means were caught in a blizzard, but it was still very chilly so we were very grateful for the Indian meal Nate and his girlfriend, Niha, prepared while we were watching Les Mis. 

After dinner me and Mother washed and dried a lot of the dishes, because our hot water heater broke (only for half the house, thank heavens) and we couldn't run the dishwasher. 

And that concludes the 2012 Christmas celebrations. Tomorrow I have a costume party to attend, and on the 31st most of my family departs for a five day backpacking trip to Palo Duro Canyon. I'm really looking forward to that- I'll have the house almost to myself!

Merry Christmas all, and apologies about the long post. The next one will be shorter, I promise. 

All A Bit Harry Potter

I think that it's in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire that the Christmas trees are decorated with live golden owls. Of course, this may be in all the books that include Christmas at Hogwarts, but I read the Goblet of Fire most recently so that's probably just what I remember.

Well now our Christmas tree has a little owl, though when I made it I was not thinking in the slightest of Harry Potter. I was probably thinking more along the lines of The Hobbit (which I haven't seen yet but am hoping to either before or shortly after Christmas) or Merlin, or possible Artemis Fowl, the audio book of which I was listening to while I knit. He's sort of supposed to be a barn owl- you know, the ones with the heart shaped faces, but heaven knows I'm terrible when it comes to knitting fair isle hearts. They always turn out sort of wonky.

The exciting thing about this owl is that it gave me the excuse to learn to graft stitches, i.e. take two unfinished edges of knitting and graft them together so it looks like a continues knit stitch. I tried and sort of failed to snap a good picture depicting this, but I rather liked the one I took anyway.

If you can see, where the green ribbon is sticking out of his head is where there would be an ugly seam had I not grafted the stitches. 

I used sport weight yarn and US2 needles, and I used the magic loop method (just so that the knitters who want to make an exact replica of this owl know what to do). I'll also put the chart for the heart on my ravelry project page hopefully tomorrow. 

Elf!

I've spent the better part of the day with my needles clicking and churning out this little elf. Tell me he's not the most adorable thing you've seen all day. 

I designed the pattern as I went, and unfortunately made no pattern notes so if I want to recreate him I'll have to use my memory and where that fails look to him for help. But it's all pretty straightforward, so were I to wish another one into existence it wouldn't be too difficult. I did it once, right? 

I'm very proud of his feet. I did a little heel and everything, and I've never even knit socks. And I only had six stitches to work with. And look how neat my stitches are. Oh, I'm so happy with him!

I used boring old scratchy Red Heart yarn, mostly because it's the only worsted weight yarn I have that isn't being used for a Christmas knit. I knit most of him on size 7 dpns and the ears and belt on size 4 dpns. 

Gosh. I still can't believe I made something so incredibly cute. 

I've found that I like knitted toys a lot more than crocheted ones. I just like the look of stockinette more than that of single crochet, no offense to lovers of crochet. Knitting looks so much tidier to me- perfect for a little Christmas elf who likes to hide in stockings.