Waiting for Spring Sweater

So my sweater is finally finished. That was a lot of work, and the seaming and weaving ends was tedious. I'm happy with how it turned out overall, though there is something I might go back and fix if I feel up to it at some point. The body worked up more sheer than I would have liked, but the white yarn was a bit thinner than the red, making it near impossible the get the same kind of coverage without changing needle size and gauge. Increasing the stitches (and doing the math for it) was more work than I was willing to give it at the beginning.

The pieces came together well; this pattern is a bottom-up, worked in the round piece that made the whole project that much easier. The only seams were at the shoulders and where the sleeves meet the body. I would like to take the sleeves off and reseam them. That may or may not actually get done, the sweater is wearable as it is, the sleeve caps just bunch up around the front and top. Not a difficult fix, but it would be time-consuming.

All told, it was a learning piece that was completed well. I certainly have a bit more of a handle on how sweaters come together and will probably get another one started before too long. I've got some yarn in a nice color that someone gifted me while cleaning out her stash. There should be plenty to make a sweater with what she gave me.

If anyone is interested in the pattern for this sweater it is free. Waiting for Spring Here is a link to the Ravelry page where you can look at other peoples photos of the sweater and download it for yourself.

Goals for the New Year

With both the calendar and the lunar new year begun I feel like it is appropriate to mention some of the goals I'm trying to meet during this upcoming year. First is a reading goal, I've been giving myself a reading goal of 50 books per year for the last several years; and (with the help of some quick reads like comics) have been able to meet those so far in my life. I'm currently on track with those but have really not been reading anything of actual substance so far.

As for knitting or otherwise crafting during the new year, I mostly want to set specific goals to finish projects that I have had ongoing for some time. I have a scarf in a nylon sock yarn blend I want to finish and a shawl in a beautiful silk and wool blend that I bought from a hand dyeing artisan last January. That particular project is about halfway finished; a one-skein wonder project.

The one I am most determined to complete is the sweater I have been attempting to complete for 4 years now. This is the first sweater I have ever made. The process has been ... rocky. I started with a cabled pattern that was beyond what I really should have tried for a first attempt.

The sleeves I just finished in the photo here, are actually a second try. You see, because I purchased the yarn for a different pattern, I did not have the right amount of the main color. When I finished the shoulder of the first sleeve I had less than half enough yarn for the next sleeve. So I frogged the first sleeve, divided the yarn in half, and restarted on the pair.

In my experience with knitting, I have almost always found that it takes three restarts to get a new technique looking competently done. This sweater has been no exception, with the body started and restarted, then the pattern changed, then the body started and restarted, then the arms frogged and restarted. This sweater has been a learning process and I'm finally almost finished. (knock on wood, no more big flubs.)

I'll talk about the gauging some other time. That's a whole other kind of process that I have feelings about, as most knitters do. For now, all I have left is connecting the sleeves and finishing the collar. I'll be using the dark red for that, adding a turtleneck style collar instead of the shorter, garter stitch collar the pattern calls for.

Alternate Options

I know I haven't posted anything here in a long time. That doesn't mean I haven't been crafting though! In fact, I've been doing a lot of embroidery in the last year or so and have really enjoyed it. Also learned a lot about stitching...
Anyway here's where I've been posting most of my recent photos: Artsome Things!

I'll try to start updating here more often. I've got some things I definitely want to get done this year and will share as I continue.

All the Projects

currently listening to: Shameful Metaphors by Chevelle

Is this not a true statement for everyone who does any kind of craft work? I knit and crochet and dabble in a number of other things as well, but it has been a while since I was able to finish anything. There was a hat a while back that I did while on a road trip to D.C. That was an 18 hr+ drive in a minivan with another chaperone and 2 high school students. thank all that is good in the world that I was not in the 15 passenger van!

That aside, I've got at least 2 things I'm trying to finish this month to put in the county fair in a few weeks.

The first is this cowl that I started working on not too long ago. The pattern is free, Abstract Leaves Cowl and not too difficult. I'm working with a really beautiful Merino wool mix that I got from the Yarn Barn  on a club outing in May.

The other is a set of fairy wings that I'm putting together to hopefully wear to the Renaissance Festival in September. I'm not sure if they will be finished in time for the fair, or if they will turn out any good but it's my first wire working project, and almost my first project working with plastics so we will see. If they are any good when I finish I will post a tutorial. My Goal was to make them adult sized, and have them so that they could hang down my back rather than stick out and get in the way. That last part will be more about how I affix them to a harness when I get the rest of the 4-piece set completed. The photo here is the nearly completed first wing. The harness will have it hanging lower on my back than where it is being modeled here.

Terriermon

Sweater frontpiece

The rest of my ongoing projects include this Terriermon amigurumi that only needs his face stitched on, the beginning few pieces of a Happypotamus  amigurumi and the front piece of a sweater called Rings of Saturn.

Happypotamus flowers

Those are in addition to the Babette Blanket that it currently on hiatus because it is almost finished but needs one more granny square but I don't want to buy a whole skein of black yarn right now for just one square.

Bits and pieces

Currently listening to Stars by Sixx A.M.

So between my own Babette project and the blanket my club is putting together for a charity project I've got well over 100 little bits and pieces of blankets littering my house.

That said, joining squares is nothing new to anyone who has been crocheting for any length of time. A quick google search of Crochet Granny Joins brings up all sorts of useful things. I'm using a simple whip stitch to join my Babette squares, but for the club blanket, with both crochet and knit squares, all roughly (and roughly is a good way to term it) 5" I need something that's going to be a little more forgiving of the differences between the squares. I decided to try a flat chain join.

Believe it or not, between these two blankets, this is the first time I've actually been joining things together like this. Both of these were little experiments for me. This is the video I used on the chain join courtesy of Drops Design.  Here's a sampling of the club blanket. I've got twice that many squares again to add on after this though.

The woes of online searches

With the roast in the crockpot, my most recent granny square finished and the laundry finished, now it's time to start the real work. I'm just over a semester away from graduation, and by this time next year hope to be in another school working toward my master's degree. That means graduate school shopping. Deadlines for applications will be coming due soon so I have to start seriously searching.

The hope is to get myself out of state though I know that will be more expensive. Really, schools should offer a discount for out of state students instead of the other way around. It would be a great way to increase the diversity of ideals within their student bodies. Random opinions aside, I have for some reason been fixated on the idea of going to Arizona. I don't even have a school picked out; though the field is narrowed to three from that state. I also want to look in Oregon.

The problem with looking for information on the websites that universities have set up is that so much of what is there is useless, and to find what I'm looking for I have to sift through literally every page on their website to get the one or two useful things for me. KU had a wonderfully informative and easily navigable website for example, Cal State however, had nothing, not one piece of the information I was looking for.

Rant finished, I've got some more online shopping to do and then some phone calls to make to try to get real info.

Christmas Break

Currently listening to Burn by The Pretty Reckless 

So, Christmas break has officially started for those of us who's life revolves around the schedule of schools. Final grades aren't out yet so tension still flavors the air, but is no longer the totality of the lives around me. I find myself with a sudden abundance of free time for reading and knitting. In the last 4 days, I've binge read my way through the complete Lunar Chronicles, knit almost an inch on my latest pair of socks, frogged a lace shawl (started during break last year) that was beyond repair, wrapped presents, and driven to my dad's house for a visit and back home for work. It's so nice to have free time!

I do plan to finish these socks by the end of the month. There's a whole list of things I have to do to over the next 4 weeks I have off from school. These include the extra 10 hours per week I'm putting in at work. Those extra work hours really aren't anything, because personal goals and how I spend my time outside necessary adult social obligations are more important in my mind. Tomorrow's project is making fliers for my knitting/other-needlework club at college who's members are dwindling and will be cut short by 75% when May graduation rolls around. Recruitment shoes will need to be put on come January! (Ugh, there's a good reason I didn't join a sorority in the last four years.)

On a happier note: I'm submitting several pieces for publication to the student literary journal at my uni. I've gotten good reviews from several people I've asked to read and critique, so here's hoping!

I wish everyone a Merry Christmas, not to be politically incorrect, but because I celebrate Christmas and am hoping to be merry myself. If you don't celebrate the same things I do then take it in the spirit of the general well wishing and go on.