Well it looks like I’m going to be posting monthly even though I had plans on posting every other week. I can get a lot more done in a month though so my posts will be more impressive.

The things I have started but I didn’t work on this month include all of the blankets I have going right now. The pink and grey one and the granny square one are for my own baby and the blue and green one is for my friend’s baby

I finished two hats this month but they were kind of cheater projects. The first was a hat that I found when looking for yarn to make a hat. I pull what I think will be just black yarn out of a bag and it was a hat knit from the top down that just needed the ribbing. Not only did it just need the ribbing but it was knit with worsted weight yarn held double!

The second hat I finished was a baby hat for my kiddo. I used worsted weight superwash merino yarn from North Cabin Fiber Crafts. (Link to the shop) I mostly followed the Slippery pattern by Sarah Dupuis. The pattern is written for an adult size so I modified to make a baby size and I changed the crown shaping. My crown shaping is that there is none. I knit until I got to 6 inches and kitchnered the top and added some pom poms. I don’t know how this could possibly be any cuter!

My boyfriend’s socks are still coming along. I don’t know how to split a skein of yarn in half correctly because one “half” ran out long before the second one. I don’t know what I was thinking exactly, but when I got to the heels I put the socks on separate needles and I’ve continued to work on them on separate needles. Right now I have each sock on its own needle, half way up the leg, with one of them being out of yarn and the other having lots of yarn left. I’ll get things evened out soon. Soon being before Christmas…

At the end of October, Tina of the Knitting Blooms podcast started a mystery knit along for a new shawl that she designed. I picked out some Spud and Chloe fine in the Hippo color way and so far I’m really enjoying the pattern but I’m not so sure about the yarn. I love the color and I loved how the sample felt in the store so I’m hoping once it’s washed and blocked it will be softer. I have one and a half more repeat of the second chart to go and I’m hoping to keep up with the clues.

I have also been spinning! I got this fiber from North Country Fiber Crafts when I bought my yarn. Actually, I picked the fiber first and then heard she was having an update and kindly asked her to wait to ship until after I saw the update. Then I saw that yarn and added that to my order and I couldn’t be happier! I split the braid into 4 almost even parts and will be making a two ply. I’m spinning two parts end to end. It goes from tealy blues into the brown shades back to blue then to brown again. I’m planning on spinning both plies with the same color repeats and eventually making a shawl or scarf with it. I really love the variety and depth of the colors in this fiber and I have really enjoyed spinning it so far.

Its fall now and it is beautiful outside!

Links:
Knitting Blooms Blog
My ravelry project page
North Cabin Fiber Craft
Mystery Knit Along Pattern
Slippery Hat

I finished all of the slippers for my brother's family! His are the huge green and brown ones and his wife gets the brown with the pink toes. I Had just enough brown to do the toes and the heels for their 6 month old baby girl. I still need to weave in the ends for the baby ones. They are made out of red heart soft held double for the big ones and single for the baby ones. 

I finished knitting one of these huge felted slippers for my brother in law. It took about 2 whole skeins of wool and a good chunk of time. I'm hoping to get the other one done this week and then get the seaming and felting done. 

My friend sent me a picture of a hat that she liked and asked if  I could make one like it but grey. This is my third attempt and I hate this yarn. It's a fuzzy acrylic nightmare but it's bulky and should be done in no time now that I've figured it out. 

I'm making some steady progress but I think I have about a million hats left to make! Plus I'm working on a couple of projects for me so I don't go crazy!

If you're reading this and you haven't done so already.....
You should enter the raffle! <-- click there
It's a chance to win something for you or it could be a great gift!

Up for grabs in this raffle is this shawlette that was hand knit out of malabrigo lace weight yarn. It was one that I knit while testing my Lil' Bit Shawlette pattern. The pattern will be available for sale through Ravelry for $2.00 later this month. If there are more than 100 entries I will be giving away 5 free copies of the pattern as well. 

Only one entry per person please. Enter by filling out the following form. It's not much of a form but its a good way to track how many people enter and in what order. I won't email you anything unless you win and your email address won't be saved anywhere and will be removed once the raffle is done. If you have any questions at all please contact me!

So I made a real list for my gifts. An official one. Unfortunately it made me realize that I don’t have very many gifts done. I had three done but my dad needed another hat and I decided to not make him wait two months for it. Now I have two gifts done out of 12 and luckily 4 gifts are for kids. I’m really trying to focus on gift knitting so I put my socks on hold and I finished a shawl I was working on for me. This is the Lonely Tree Shawl made out of reclaimed yarn.

I used my hand spun alpaca to start this lined beanie. The brown gradient is the hand spun and the blue is reclaimed alpaca yarn. I’m a little more than half way done and I think I’ll be able to finish it this week. 

I felted these slippers and they ended up a little furry. They are a little too fuzzy right now and one of them felted more than the other but it was good practice for the ones I’m making as gifts. 

I started these new slippers last night and I might be able to finish the knitting today. I’m making these women’s size medium

My plan for this week is to finish the felted slippers and the alpaca hat. I also want to make one of the kid’s gifts but I keep changing my mind on what to make them.

In other news, my pattern is almost done being tested and I took some new pictures of my completed shawlettes. Thursday I’ll be starting the raffle for this blue shawlette. 

The testers are almost done testing the Lil’ Bit Shawlette pattern. This pattern has a lil’ bit of lace and a lil’ bit of ruffle, hence the name. I have made two of these and I will be raffling a shawlette made out of Malabrigo lace weight yarn. It was hand knit by me with lots of love. On November 1st I will post a survey in my blog. Not like a serious survey but an easy way for me to track who wants to enter in the raffle. Only one entry per person and the raffle will close on November 30th. I’ll be covering the shipping costs and I’m open to sending it internationally so everyone has a chance! If I get more than 100 entries I will raffle off 5 copies of the pattern as well so invite your friends to enter! The package will arrive before Christmas so if you would like to give it as a gift for the holidays, you should have plenty of time. If you have any questions you can leave a comment here or email me at [email protected]

This week I finished knitting two gifts! Two whole ones! I took pictures yesterday morning and last night I finished these socks for my boyfriend (I only had 5 rows left for the cuffs). I’ll get some finished pictures after I wash them and weave in the ends. He loves wearing wool socks but during the summer he likes to wear short socks. It’s hard to find short wool socks in stores so I knit him these ones. If he likes them then maybe I’ll knit some more.

I also finished this hat that I made out of some locally raised alpaca fiber. The farm isn’t far from here and they get there fiber milled in Oregon as well so I was able to enter this item in Amy Beth’s local fiber KAL (the LoKAL). This was awesome yarn to work with and I love the rustic texture. Not rustic in a bad way but it just feels like petting an alpaca and it looks like almost like hand spun (from a super awesome and consistent spinner). This will be a gift for my brother or my dad. 

On top of finishing some knitting I finished some spinning as well. The cowl that I made with hand spun alpaca used a little over half of that fiber. I spun the rest of the fiber a lot thinner and was able to get about 130 yards of sport to worsted weight yarn. I’m planning on making another alpaca hat and I think I’ll let my dad choose which one he likes and then my brother can have the other one. That’s my plan today but who knows, I might end up with another cowl lol. 

I worked on spinning some fiber on my drop spindle as well and it’s just a slow process. I’m about 2/3rds done with the first half and I’ve been working on it for a while. It’s some kind of superwash wool blended with bamboo from shooting yarns in the berry patch colorway. The tag is somewhere so by the time I finish it I’ll have all of the info. I was planning on spinning this yarn for socks but it depends on how it turns out. 

This is turning out to be a lot more than I thought because I also started a new project. I joined a KAL for the Lonely Tree Shawl in the Beginning Lace Knitters group in ravelry. I am using reclaimed worsted weight yarn that is a wool silk blend. I have more of this yarn in my shop and I was planning on listing this mega skein but it just needed to be this shawl instead. I have no idea about the yardage because I didn’t measure it but I would estimate it to be about 500 yards and the shawl calls for 330 yards so I’ll have plenty and I could possibly make it bigger. It’s a free pattern and I’m about half way done with chart B. 

For the rest of my Christmas knitting I am planning on making slippers. I have some of that orange wool dying in the crock pot right now and it looks like it will be a really deep red color. I’m using that and some other wool for felted slippers. I’m also still trying to get motivated to work on those slipper socks. I just haven’t been in the mood for them but they are a quick enough knit that I can procrastinate just a little longer. Next week I should have an update that includes felted slippers and the results of my dying today.


In the next couple of days look for the information I'm going to be posting on how the enter the raffle for a shawlette knit from the pattern I'm getting tested right now. If you are interesting in testing the pattern I still need a couple of people to test in fingering weight yarn. You can join this group and look for the Lil' Bit Shawlette thread or feel free to PM me on ravelry or in my etsy shop or email me or comment to this post if you have questions. 

I have officially begun testing my shawl pattern! I posted it in the free pattern testers group in ravelry so if you would like to join the test just hop on over to the group (link to get there). The deadline for testing is November 15th. I’m going to be starting a raffle for the finished shawlette on November 1st and picking a winner on November 30th! I’m deciding a method for conducting my raffle but it will most likely be done here on my blog. I will announce to rules for the raffle by October 20th. Depending on how many entries there are I will also be giving away free copies of the pattern. 

I have a quick update to post before I head out to work. I took pictures yesterday but I was just too busy to do anything with them! With moving, family stuff, my school, and the BF starting school I think going to work tonight will feel like a break. First I finished everything but weaving in the ends on some slippers for my sister in law. I tried a new method for the short row heel that I will probably write about next week when I hopefully have one more pair of slippers done. I used red heart soft held double with size 8 needles.

The next project I have is the pair of fingerless mitts for my BF. He has larger hands that me so that’s why they look a little loose on my hand but he has tried them on and they are a perfect fit. Since I took this picture yesterday I’ve finished weaving in the ends and I washed them and they are currently laying flat to dry. 

The other update for this week is that I drove past a garage sale that had a huge sign that said yarn. I tried to resist but I ended up going back and getting a big bag of wool yarn for $5. It’s pretty old and most of it is marked as permanently moth proofed but after researching it I’m pretty confident that it will work well for felted slippers. The picture is just a sampling because most of the yarn I was able to get multiple skeins of. I didn’t exactly need more yarn but those felted clogs eat up a ton of wool and I want to make several pairs so I’m sure it won’t linger in my stash for long. 

So I haven’t made tons of gift progress this week for Christmas knitting but I have made progress on other knitting. I had planned on making some of my hand spun into a hat for my dad or my brother but after several attempts I really just didn’t have enough yarn. They were the only two people who would really appreciate that I spun the yarn by hand so I decided to keep it for myself in the form of a cowl. I really like it and I love how the color changes look. 

I’ve started a pair of fingerless mitts for the boyfriend and have put his socks on the back burner. As he pointed out, he has socks but no gloves. I’ve made it past the thumb gusset but in my attempt to hurry up and get them done I’m starting to get a little burnt out on them and sock yarn in general. 3 of my 5 projects this week have been using fingering weight yarn. It doesn’t help that I was insisting on doing them two at a time but had  to start the cast on about 4 different times. 

My last project was for a gift but not for Christmas… It’s a Halloween gift! It’s a ghost that I knit using a made up pattern and then felted him up in the washing machine. I had a partial skein of bare wool yarn and I used almost all I had left for this little guy. I used some random felted sweater pieces for his eyes and I filled him with beans. He knows he is a little "rustic" looking but he looks like he's ok with it. :)

My plans for this week are to cast on for a hat for my dad and cast on for slippers. I purchased the comfy cozy squishy sock pattern that uses heavier weight yarn and I think I might be using that to make several pairs for the women I’m giving gifts to. I'm hoping for a very full update next week :)

I took lots of pictures today! I found batteries while we were moving so I had some to put in my camera. It’s tricky to get decent pictures but it’s better than nothing! I finished two projects while I was on my road trip and made a lot of progress on two other ones. The projects I finished were two pairs of little kid’s slippers. I held the yarn double and used big needles and they were done in no time. 

I made a ton of progress on my scarf that I’m making for my mom and it looks done but I don’t like how the ruffle looks on the cast off end. Making increases for the ruffles just doesn’t look as good as the side were I decreased. I think I’m going to cast on a ruffle and sew it on so they look the same. 

On the socks I’m making for my boyfriend I got about 10 rows into the gusset increases. I have a feeling that I’ll be using all of the yarn I have for these socks because of my gauge and how big his feet are. 

I made one slipper using the non-felted slipper pattern and even though it’s a nice pattern I just don’t know if I can make myself make the other one. I don’t like seaming and I honestly don’t know how many stitches I cast on for this first one. I wrote it down somewhere but who knows which random receipt or scrap of paper it's on lol.