Lanam Facio

I've now sent in my registration for the Institute where I learned the ribbing pattern I'm using for the School's Out Socks. I feel this means I really ought to get them finished up.


Caleb and I went on a hike on Saturday, and I worked on the knitting on the way there and back. I'm now about halfway through the post heel section of the sock.

Providence has eight inches of snow, so things are rather shut down now. I may actually get a little more done today in between doing school stuff and research.

The front of the orange aran is coming along. I would have thought that I'd have the pattern down pretty well after the back, but I kept mixing up the two sides of the central cable.


I think I'm still on track for Rhinebeck, even though I haven't gotten much knitting done this week.

Thanks for the compliments on the sweater!

The zipper actually showed up Saturday afternoon, after I'ld blogged. I had it sewn in in time to wear to church on Sunday.

As for the ends on the baby sweater, partly that was because I like doing finishing all at once and partly because I'd just woven in a lot of ends on the black sweater.

I've started working on my Orange Aran again. I really want to have it done for Rhinebeck 2009. Right now, I'm about two inches done on the front. One step at a time.

Pattern: Ribby Cardi
Yarn: Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride Worsted in Onyx. It was left over from the first Ribby I made. It was planned to be a CheesyLove, then Samus Aran (in which incarnation some of the yarn flew to Russia), and now this.
Needles: 6 straights
Size: 36"
Amount of yarn used: 4.8 skeins
Source of Yarn: Webs
Modifications: I only used the small needles and I made the arms a little longer than I might have normally.
Thoughts: I like this pattern. It's even better when I make the right size!

I am now at the 99% spot on the black sweater.

All nine kasquillion ends are woven in. (Again, lots of Mythbusters. Kari, if you're ever looking to retire, please pass my name along as a possible replacement.) The collar is done. The seams are sewed.

The only thing left is the zipper installation, which should be pretty fast once the zipper shows up.

Of course, now that the sweater is wearable, the weather is distinctly warmer.

I met my goal. The major work on this sweater for my cousin's baby is done, and I haven't heard any storks come flapping by.


The buttons will wait until I know the gender, as will the weaving in of ends.

It's nice to have this done in advance. There's a lot of Mythbusters in that sweater.

I'm now 97% done my sweater!



This is not the most flattering picture, but it fits. It's pulled to overlap by a couple of inches so I could use a quilting pin to close it (I was worried about the arms), but it seems to work. It's long enough, the sleeves are long enough, and I like it.

The three percent that remains is: knitting the collar, weaving in the ends, and installing the zipper. I finished the sleeves and ordered the zipper a few minutes ago.

This is an excerpt from a longer poem for the poetry reading today.

Ah, yet, ere I descend to the grave
 May I a small house and large garden have;
And a few friends, and many books, both true,
Both wise, and both delightful too!
Source.

Today was a day of sleeves.

I went to a meeting where a lot of people knit and worked on the sweater for my cousin:



I'm knitting the sleeves in the round, but with the same number of stitches.

I joined in the second ball of yarn, but the sequence seems to have worked out well.

Once I came home, after dinner I worked on setting in the sleeve on my Ribby. It's really starting to look like a sweater!

There is a kind of needleworked edging called 'mouse teeth,' used to prevent cuffs and similar things from wearing through as quickly as they might otherwise. I guess the many teeth of the nutria might keep it from wearing out early as well. (That would probably be because I'd leave it in the dresser, though.) Or maybe I could make a little i-cord muzzle. (Or this could be the reason I finally get a lucet...)

Clapotis is coming along. I finished the increase section and weighed it. The knitting, with stich counter and needle, weighed 42 grams. The other needle weighed 11 grams, and I have 76 grams of yarn left in the first ball.

It was a lot of fun to ravel that first column.

My mom was definitely correct when she said that this sweater seemed to be going much more quickly than usual. I had hoped to have the sleeves done by the end of January, but, with a little over a week to go, I have the main knitting done and the sides sewn up. I need to sew up the sleeves, set the sleeves, knit the collar, weave in ends, and procure and install the zipper. When that's done, assuming I got the size right, the sweater will be ready to go.

My main motivation has been the low temperatures. I just need more wool. I've noticed that Victorian clothing tends to be very good at retaining warmth, so I've been daydreaming about a knitted underskirt, a nubia [link is to a pdf] (or, as I keep misthinking about it, a nutria), thrummed mittens, and so on. It's supposed to get up to forty today, but it's to be in the single digits over the weekend.

I do love the excuse this gives me to revel in my handknits and my handmade wool garments.

I split off the arms of the baby sweater. In order to make it easier to keep the colors in sequence, I'm working the body before the arms, and cast on four stitches under each arm.



It's hard to get it to display attractively on straight needles.

Yesterday, when I was walking home, it felt so warm that I had my mittens off. It was 18F (about -8C). True, it was sunny and lovely, but it's amazing how much my weather perceptions have changed. In Nashville, Caleb and I were frolicking around in fleeces when it was in the twenties, reveling in the warmth.

In weather related news, I have decided that, when I am queen of the world, I shall have sidewalks plowed in addition to streets. This way, there won't be the choice of wading through snow and over ice versus taking one's chances in the street.

I worked on Clapotis while Caleb and I were in Nashville, seeing the Polk homestead, among other places.

It's coming along nicely:



I ended up not working on it while listening to the radio today; I was fluttering about, unable to sit still, sweeping, making muffins, and so on.

Providence is cold. Today, I wore a wool skirt, socks to above my knees, a cotton t-shirt, a fleece turtleneck, a fleece jacket, and a Russian wool shawl (bought in Moscow! 100% shelouf!) pinned in place with my Victorian bar pin. At points inside, I added my heavy wool hat. It's cold.

I started on Clapotis today to cheer and warm myself. I now have a lovely little triangle. Each row is currently coming along very quickly.

I finished the knitting of the black sweater last night. By my calculations, that means it's 90% done!

Yesterday, Caleb and I went grocery shopping in the morning, before the storm. We bought bread and milk, but no toilet paper or eggs. We also bought a wide variety of other stuff; this was our normal week's shopping. We'd run out of milk on Thursday evening, and didn't have enough bread to make sandwiches for this week.

Still, as we were going shopping, I wanted a t-shirt saying "It's not because of the storm; we needed it anyway."

The storm itself ended up being a bit of a disappointment. We got about three inches of light, fluffy snow that we were able to shovel out of the driveway rather quickly. It seems that other parts of Rhode Island got a lot worse, though.

I did get the sleeves shaped to where the slope gentles out. The rows are finally seeming to go more quickly.

I finished up the arm part of the sleeve and am now working on the caps. I opened the last ball of the original dye lot of the yarn to do this.

We're supposed to be getting a lot more snow on Saturday, so I might be able to get the knitting finished this weekend.

Well, I didn't stay strong for long. I do have a rather half-baked excuse, though.

Caleb's brother is in town, and we went out to a quiz last night. I have two and a half inches left before I start the shaping on the sleeve caps of the Daughter of Ribby. I knew that I could get that much done, and at the quiz, there wouldn't be space to measure it or light to double check.

So, going on that flimsy excuse, I started a baby sweater.

This is NOT FOR ME. (I may be short, but it's still too small.) It's for the arrival of a cousin. (Off the top of my head, I don't remember how the numbers and removings work for this one.)


I made this sweater before, in a more rainbow version of Encore, when my undergrad advisor had her first baby. It's a nice, straightforward pattern.


So far, I'm working on the hood. I got a nice, big chunk of it done last night, and it's pretty straightforward until the back of the head. That part is like a giant sock heel, so it's pretty fun to do.

I've finished the increase section on the sleeves, so I now just need to work even until I start the underarm shaping.

The pattern calls for 17.5", but, after measuring my favorite hoodie and fleece, I'm going to go for a full 18".



I only have 3.5" to go until that point, which I think will be the 80% mark of the pattern. I won't finish the sweater before school starts again, but I'll have taken a pretty good crack at it. Considering that the original goal had been to finish the sleeves by the end of January, having them this far along three days in feels rather good.

I'm also highly motivated by the lovely yarn I got for Christmas, a present that I need to knit in the next few months, Clapotis, and the fact that AfA might have a new collection in March. I'm trying to focus more this year, so I really want to finish this sweater before I start on any of the new things.

(Of course, the rather nasty weather predicted for Providence in the upcoming week, as well as the historic trends of the early year, does tend to increase my motivation to get a warm sweater finished.)

(Jonathan- It's freezng rain and wintry mix, not snow; we aren't being greedy, even if it did snow last night.)

Today was a low-key day. We shoveled out the driveway so we could go and return the presents we ended up not giving and things that didn't fit right. We also did things to fix little problems: we got batteries, I rearranged some things so my desk works better, and so on.

Before and after that, we did a lot of puttering. I started and finished my first book of the new year, marked my hoopskirt channels, and got up to the more widely spaced sleeve increases. (The cold weather is strikingly motivational.) I didn't get to the gym, but I figure I get partial credit for working up a sweat shoveling.

For dinner, we had leftover fajitas and beans for good luck:


The chili was amazingly good, and simple to make.

Happy New Year!