Creature Comfort by Madelinetosh

It’s knit flat, blocked, then seamed to make a shrug, with ribbed sleeves added afterward. Here’s mine in progress:

It’s so strange, but the yarn has been 100% cooperative since I started this project. Same needles, same knitter — the only difference is the pattern. Who knew yarn could prevent you from knitting it into the wrong thing? Just a few thousand more knits and purls, and it will be ready for mom’s Christmas present. I hope I’ve given myself enough time to finish it!

That’s a dinner plate giving this Rose Red tam it’s shape. Otherwise it looks something like a jellyfish — minus the tentacles of course..and fuzzy, as it is made entirely of Sublime Angora Merino. Delicious to knit, but the cause of much sneezing on my part. Oh, the lengths I go to for my family and friends.

Who gets it? That’s for me to know and you to find out. *wink*

Edited to add: This is a response to Bells question, “How was the knitting of it?” And I feel I must endorse this as the ideal gift knit. It only took three days of leisurely knitting and was one of those projects where I would keep marveling at the finished section’s beauty — which made me want to keep knitting “just one more row” to see the next portion. I will say, that I didn’t realize at first that there was a chart with this pattern and struggled needlessly through the 1st 20 or so rows using written instructions (personally, I hate those). I finally dropped my pattern sheets and thankfully, it fell open to the last page where I noticed the charting. It just flew off the needles from there. It’s only 70 something rows long, so you’re finished almost as soon as you start.

It’s a top down knit, beginning with the i-cord. There’s a few M1 rows at the start, then you’re increasing by yarnovers and decreasing with ssk, k2together and both sskp and a mitered double decrease — s, k2together, pass slipped stitch over. Personally, I can’t see much difference in those two stitches and would be interested in any knitter that could tell me when the ideal times are to use one over the other.

***RECENTLY LEARNED TIP: Just learned of a new, left-leaning decrease. It’s slip 1 as if to knit, slip one as if to purl, then knit the slipped stitches together. It’s supposed to be the best mirror of the right leaning k2tog. I don’t think Ysolda’s pattern needs any improving, but for all you anal retentive knitters out there in search of the perfect matching decreases, this might prove useful in future projects.

I’m loving it a lot despite the beading which requires a teensy weensy crochet needle on which you slip the bead then crochet it onto the stitch that requires a bead. Then you slip that stitch back on your knitting needles and knit it. The real fun comes when you have to bead on a decrease and remember which of the three stitches you’re working with will wind up in front and then place the bead accordingly. Needless to say, there’s been some cursing during this project. See the tiny seed beads?

Pretend you don’t notice the uneven stitches from all the times I’ve forgotten the yarn overs and had to go back and add them in several rows up. I’m hoping some of the really tight spots will block out better than they look now. Fingers crossed!

All in all, I’m really enjoying my first attempt at real laceweight as well as my first run at beading. The only casualty so far has been my size 14 crochet needle. Not much larger than a sewing needle, it suffered badly when Tom got a hold of it and attempted to do minor surgery on the leather recliner. Fortunately, its insane thinness meant that it bent in half instead of piercing through. I don’t particularly love those chairs, but am thrilled to not have to replace them anytime soon.

Anyone else up to their elbows in a project that may just be a tad beyond their skill level? I’d love to hear about it. It might help prevent me from shoving this project to the back of the closet and forgetting about it for a week or two (or 20).

I’m about 50g into a 100g skein (roughly 225 yards knit up out of 450 total) and ready to start the border. Now see how it looks today:

Yup. Frogged (Rip it! Rip it!). I was a few lines into the border when I realized I just didn’t like the pattern. The main body looked a teensy bit on the elderly side, and the border had all these nupps (pronounced “noops” as in “soups”) which are little clusters of stitches you gather together to look like a flat ball. And suddenly I realized I was knitting a little old lady shawl as opposed to a hip, young, boho-chic accessory type shawl. So I ripped it all out.

Sure, I could have kept going and given it away. I’m sure there are plenty of people who would think it was great. But in my mind that would be the equivalent of saying, “Hi, you are old and/or have horrible taste. Enjoy!”

Strangely, ripping out all that yardage didn’t bother me in the least. Because I really love that burnt orange skein of Malabrigo Sock, and it would be a bigger shame to waste it than to throw away a few hours’ (okay, maybe a week’s) worth of knitting time.

Has anyone else ever been that far into a project before having knitter’s remorse or have I just set a record for wasted effort?

I bought one of these…

…but still can’t figure out how to use it. It looked a lot easier on YouTube.

I was really excited to receive this in the mail…

…and it was full of all these fun things…

…but not really all I was hoping for. It’s fun to get mail, but not fun to pay $33 for something that, ultimately, is of no use whatsoever.

Then we went on vacation where the boys and I spent tons of time at the beach and in the pool. Sadly all those pictures are on Tessa’s camera, and until I get copies, you’ll just have to take my word for it. But Jason did go fishing, where he caught a bunch of these:

…and saw a bunch of these:

And laughed himself silly over this:

Then, as we were frying up all those fish, I caught a glimpse of my rearview…

…and realized a diet had become mandatory. So I’m now a member of Weight Watchers Online. Lovely. If you’re suffering there, too, look me up! I’m registered under The Drunch and need all the support I can get.

Last week was pretty horrible, as Sam had (and still seems to have) a pretty vicious case of stomach flu. There are no pictures.

You’re welcome.

That brings us to today. Wherein Will enjoys a chocolate doughnut while trying to touch his nose with his tongue…

And Gus lurks nearby — ever hopeful…

Which gives Sam a fit of the giggles…

And leaves Tom plenty of time to clean up before I can get any embarrassing photos of him.

Now Jack and Jason are at the movies catching the afternoon showing of Iron Man 2 and Sam, Tom and Will are taking turns being the baby while the other two boys are the mom and dad. Babies apparently cry a lot and demand that their “mother” bring them cups of apple juice to make them feel better. Pretty spot on so far. Don’t you wish you were here?

Amended: We’re all fine! Although the weathermen were saying in both grave and delighted tones that conditions were the worst they’d seen, thankfully most tornadic activity remained in the sky and few actually touched down in Alabama. Bells kindly pointed out that I’d neglected to follow up. Sorry for the unnecessary worry! And no I didn’t buy anything, because a) I’m on a budget, b) I already have so many projects in the pipeline I may never catch up and c)I have a coupon for 25% off at the In the Making in May so I’m going to do my Christmas project stash then because I like to touch, squish, pull-on and generally molest my yarn before I commit to a purchase. It makes internet shopping kind of difficult.

And not to toot my own horn (because I copied it from one I saw at “In the Making” earlier today), but how cute is this closure?

It’s just a simple crocheted flower with a starting loop of 8 instead of 5 so there was plenty of room for the button. I just finished the first and crocheted a 7 stitch chain then 8 more stitches for the beginning loop of the second flower. Easy peasy. I am now going to pick up a little bit and spray some air freshener so Jason thinks I’ve been slogging away at housework all day. Think it’ll fool him? Nah. Me neither, but hopefully he’ll play along.

What’s the appeal? Variety, my friends. You get samples of luxury yarns and fibers — enough to knit and spin your heart out and determine if you’d like to order more, all from cool independent artisans like these guys. PLUS there’s lots of surprises like nifty notions and whatnot. I hope my box arrives on a sunny day so I can dutifully photograph each fabulous piece. Until then, just know I’ll be watching my mailbox like a hawk. Victory!!

Yeah…it’s pretty hard to miss. I noticed it as I was binding off that panel, but thought it was something I could fix in the blocking stage. Nope. Looks like I lost my row count and skipped a few lines of pattern. Now I get to disassemble the whole thing, redo that panel, then put it all back together again. Excuse me… (*turns head and clutches throat*) O.k., sorry. I just had to throw up a little bit in my mouth.

On the upside, I must be really good at weaving in ends, because I cannot find those suckers anywhere. *sigh*

I know. I know. Sure I said I was going to keep Sophia’s project a secret until she received it in the mail and was photographed in it herself. But this is for her yet-to-arrive baby sister, Lola. And since Lola probably won’t be able to wear this until next spring, I was unable to stop myself from showing off right now — essentially the instant I got it blocked on my ancient and rickety ironing board in my poorly lit laundry room. Whatever…it still looks great and I am shamelessly proud of myself. Wanna know what I did? Good…because I’m dying to tell you.

I took the lace pattern from Sophia’s pinafore (o.k. so I’m spilling all the beans, but I’m not even sorry), then I found a baby cardigan that had the right stitch count and went to town cobbling the two together. Unfortunately, I failed to see the problem of pairing a top down raglan bodice with a bottom up lace pattern until it was too late (if you try to knit the lace top down from the bodice it just makes waves). So, in the end, I had to knit to the bottom of the bodice, put those stitches on a holder, then go knit the lace portion from the bottom up. Then I kitchener stitched the whole thing together right in the middle. Can you tell? Please say no, because I’ve almost dislocated my shoulder patting myself on the back over this one. Of course, if I attempt this again, you can be darn sure I’ll find some other bodice that can be knit from the bottom up.

All I have left is to crochet the finishing bits around the neck and sleeves, then Voila! an original masterpiece is finished. I’m going to wait and pop both in the mail at the same time. I hope you’re getting excited, Tamara, because I can hardly wait!