I Got Game

I can bring it. Oh yes I can.
Behold, the Liberty Bell Afghan in all its finished glory:

Pattern: Liberty Bell Afghan from Cover Up with Nicky Epstein

Yarn: Various Acrylics and cotton backing fabric

Needles: 5mm Addi Clicks

Here you can see the backing fabric and how it goes with the afghan front:

Isn't it great? I can't wipe the smug grin off my face at the moment.

This was the backing fabric pinned and tacked befoew sewing in.

Thanks to the girls from my knitting group and my sister in law, I have mastered the invisible hem stitch. Check it out:

Neat huh? It took me about 4 hours to sew in the backing fabric which I think is quite good considering it was by hand, and my first time. I finished it at about 6 this evening when I made and sewed on the tassels.

So, do you think my sister in law will like it? I sure hope so!

In the meantime I cast on for this Baby Aran Cardigan.

The back:

The Left Front:

Just the thing, some instant gratification after a long hefty project like the afghan.

In other great news, I got the most fantastic care package from Tara. I had put out a plea for a copy of Interweave Knits Weekend, as it wasn't available here, and she kindly volunteered to post it to me. Much to my surprise, there were goodies in the parcel too!

A gorgeous sheepie card addressed by her adorable daughter, a kite for Alice made by her husbands own fair hands and a ball of Rowan Handknit cotton in the most scrumptious shade of yellow. Reminds me of banana ice cream. Isn't she the best? Thanks Tara!

My Mam had her brain CT scan today. Once I managed to get her up, dressed and out of the house it wasn't too bad actually, I thought when she saw the machine she'd have a fit, but the staff were great. They didn't give her a chance to freak, just popped her on the bed and bish bash bosh. Just what she needed.

Let's hope the results of the scan and the geriatrician appt on Thursday go as well!

I'm one subborn MoFo

I'm a really stubborn person. Maybe it's the Irish in me, I don't know, but I won't let anything beat me. Especially not this knitting project. I'm going to finish this by God, and I would prefer to have this finished in the next week or two so I can get back to something nice for me before the holidays. Speaking of holidays, time is getting on so I need to pick my airplane sock project. Any ideas?
Progress so far:

I've finished the star chart and am on to the second last chart, the emblem.
Here's an idea of the size of it so far, compared to Alice (who is tall for her age)

It's looking good, no? Of course once I finish the knitting I then have to figure out how to sew on the backing.
We've started watching the West Wing again from the beginning (Rob Lowe as Sam Seaborn, sigh) so I'm feeling suitably American-ly patriotic whilst knitting this.
I've had an awful cold recently too (no, not Swine Flu) so it has been very comforting to have this on my lap.

I got what I presume is the Fall issue of Vogue Knitting in the post today.

I don't know what is up with the Designer Knitting title, why not just call it Vogue? Anyway, I've only just got it and haven't read the articles yet, just flicked through the patterns.
Two catch my eye so far:

I like this, but don't know how wearable this would be for me. Methinks a tad bulky, but I love the stitches in it, especially the cabled band.

This one I love.

I think it looks fab on the model, but she has no boobage. I think the place where the cables stop and the yoke begins would make mine look even bigger (if poss) so if I were to make this I would have to make the cables stop lower or higher. If I ever get round to it! I do love it though, I love cables, and I reckon this could easily enough be converted to in the round á la EZ's EPS. Hmmm...

The Eagle Has Landed

Heh. Not a blog post title you get to use every day!

I've finished the Eagle chart of the Liberty Bell Afghan:

It's probably my least favourite chart as I don't think the details show up very well, but it's done baby!
It's getting quite large now:

My lap is lovely and warm as I knit it.
But look at the ends to be woven in just from this last chart:

That there was a whole nights work on its own. Ugh. End weaving has to be almost as boring as sewing seams.

So I'm oficially over half way now. I have done each chart once and have the star, flag and bell charts left to do once more. I think the flag chart may be modified this time, instead of having a new length of yarn for each stripe, I may try and do it fair-isle and carry the two colours across. hmm.

One thing I've learned about myself whilst doing this is that I think every knitter has a natural project length that suits their patience (or lack of) level. For me and this project, that was a while ago. I found myself looking at the afghan last night and seeing if I could just border it and try and say it was a lap blanket, or car blanket, anything to get out of finishing it. But then I reminded myself why I was making this, as a present to my SIL & her family for my fantastico holidays, and I told myself to shut the F up. I can be so ungrateful sometimes. A few weeks of knitting a blanket is nothing compared to the joy this holiday brings me.

I'd better crack on. Only 6 1/2 weeks left to finish!

Bounty!

Where to start? I feel like I've loads to tell today.
Let's start with progress shall we?

My second BSJ progresses merrily. This has only been knit occasionally, so I guess I should really ramp it up a bit.

I love how the colours are turning out, this should be yummy.

I've finished the star chart of the Liberty Bell Afghan. Thank God! It's slow but sure progress. I wove in the ends last night whilst watching The Wire.

It's going ok, I think, although I think the star looks a bit unbalanced, to me it's larger on one side than the other...

I'm dreading the next chart, the Eagle:

It's a real doozy, isn't it? I'm pretending it's not there and am going to tackle it one row at a time, a bit like life I suppose!

In bountious news, I was gifted some yum last night at the knitting group:
7 skeins of this gorgeous beast.

I'm almost certain this is Kilcarra Aran Tweed, although it's in skeins rather than balls which is what I would normally see in the shop. It's just faboo. According to Ravelry this is 616 yards, but it does feel like a bit more than that. Now I'm just clueless what to make with it... I want it to be something special as it was gifted, but there's no way I'd get a cardi or jumper for myself out of it. Hubby won't touch it coz it's wool and I doubt my Dad would wear it either. Any ideas?

My next gift was a skein and a half of this:

Sirdar Aran in a lovely pinky purply colour. This will become a lovely Aran cardigan for my friend Ellens impending girl. Yum.

I splashed out the other day and pre-ordered Alice Starmore's new book, Fair Isle Knitting. While I was looking at it, I also grabbed this one which arrived today:

The Celtic Collection.

I am in love. Head over heels. These patterns speak to me, they are so steeped in Irish history and the stories behind their inspiration feels so close to my heritage. The photography is gorgeous too. I can't wait to leaf through it properly and add loads to my queue! I have a feeling I may be going through a bit of a colour phase at the moment, and Fair Isle will be my next challenge.

In personal news, the Occupational Therapist is coming tomorrow to assess Mam & Dads house with a view to getting maybe a bath seat and an extra stair railing to make things a bit easier, so I'm off on a half day to be there too. What a shame she isn't coming on Friday and I could have had a long weekend!

Happy knitting!

Oh Happy Day!

I'm so happy, I'd knock a happy clown over with my happy dance.

Mam got a home help!!!!!!!!!! The health board lady came today and she was really nice. It's initially going to start with once a week for two hours and she's going to clean the kitchen, bathroom and hoover. Fair play to her if she can get all that done in 2 hours! It's a start, and I'm overcome with happiness. At last! Hopefully this will take some of the strain off Dad.

Knitting has been a little slow chez moi this week, but I do have an FO:

Pattern: Garter Yoke Baby Cardi (Ravlink) by Jennifer Hoel

Needles: 3.5mm Addi Clicks

Yarn: Miscellaneous pink acrylic

I loved this knit, so simple and structural and fail safe. Just what I needed to distract me from the afghan that smirks at me from the living room corner. It knows I will be back, and it thinks that's really funny. I'll show it who's boss, oh yes.

Back to the baby pattern, I'd recommend this to anyone for a really quick, easy and cute knit. This could be customised really easily, different colour for the garter yoke, cuffs and waistband, stripes on the body, etc etc. I definitely will make this one again.

I actually gave in to the afghan and started it again last night. The star chart is handy enough, so hopefully it won't do my head in again so soon.

Oh! I almost forgot! In my excitement about the home help and the yummy baby cardi I almost left out stash enhancement! How could I????

I popped down to This Is Knit, met the lovely She Knit Up That Ball who helped me pick out some yum stuff, and got me some goodness.

First up, some Wendy Happy in Sagittarius:
This is for a girly BSJ. I think it's going to be faboo, and it will be the babys star sign! Fate!

Next, we have a skein of Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece in Perrys Primrose:

I love Cotton Fleece. This baby is going to make some more yummy girly baby bibs.

And finally, because sale yarn baskets can talk and plead with you to buy stuff, I got this skein of Araucania Nature Cotton in a lovely orange shade. No idea what to make with it, but it was almost 75% off so a total bargain. Maybe a baby hat?

I'm going to cast on for the BSJ tonight I think, as we're off on a car journey tomorrow to maybe see about buying a little holiday home. Maybe, only maybe so far. And y'know I can't be knitting that afghan in the car!

Happy weekend everyone!

Plodding along

Work progresses slowly but surely on the Liberty Bell Afghan. I've finished Chart 2, the Emblem chart. The pattern calls for the stars to be embroidered or duplicate stitched on at the end, I can't remember which. Something I don't know how to do anyay, so we'll cross that bridge when (if) I come to it.

It's turning out ok, not great, but ok. I suppose I was expecting too much from it, wanting it to be perfect. Intarsia is hard y'all!

I have to weave in all the ends from this chart, then do the next border before the Star chart. At least it's only a big yellow star on a blue background, I hope to get through that one a bit quicker!

I'm on the heel flap of Alice's Sunday Swing socks, nothing very exciting there. I'm not rushing them either, just breathing deeeply and knitting away on my lunchbreak. Every evening and weekends are devoted to the Afghan to get it done.

I have loads of patterns picked out to hopefully make for my friends impending girl, I must make a list and put them up here so I have to make them. If you blog it, it must be done, right?

It's really dark and gloomy here this evening, yuk. Hopefully the weather will pick up a bit for Alices last week off before back to créche and then school in 3 weeks...

Happy Thoughts

Think happy thoughts, that's what I keep telling myself. That way I can cheer myself up a bit.

So, I'm enjoying the bit of evening sunshine here today.

Some prospective knitty news:

My best friend is currently expecting her 3rd child in December. She has two boys and we were both praying for a girl. She had her first scan yesterday, and, it's 95% certain to be a girl!!! I'm so thrilled for her, she was crying on the phone to me with happiness. She's had a tough few months so I'm really pleased she has some good news. Although, the pressure is on to knit pink! I don't know where I'm going to find the time!

Here's the pics of the cotton bibs I made last week:

I made two of these. Bear in mind that it needs a press with a steam iron to flatten out the petals!

Pattern: Petal Baby Bib from One Skein (Ravlink)

Needles: 3.5mm for the bib, 2.75mm dpn for the Icord

Yarn: Zettl Colorado cotton

I used smaller needles than called for to make the bibs a little bit smaller for a newborn and also to make the Icord a little bit firmer. And, to be honest, as they were the only dons I had in my "bag 0' bits" on holidays!

I love this pattern, I will make more of these for sure.

I've made three others of this before for charity, they're such a quick knit, I get one done in an evening. So, at least I've begun the baby knitting!

Work progresses slowly on the Liberty Bell Afghan:

Not a huge amount to look at, but that there represents a few knitting hours, let me tell you!

I'm about halfway through Chart 2.

Each row is taking ages as I need to de-tangle before I start. It's enjoyable enough though, so I can't complain. Although it's not the best tv knitting in the evening project I've ever had. But, that's the only chance I'm getting to do it, as it's not exactly portable!

So, I cast on a portable project, socks for Alice! I'm not going to partake in the Cookie A KAL this month. Instead, I've started these:

Sunday Swing Socks from Knitty.

I'm not sure it's the best meld of pattern & yarn, but it's easy and soothing to knit, so I carry it everywhere with me and knit it at lunch in work so calm the nerves.

There's something a little Harry Potter, "jolly hockey sticks" about the stripes too, I think.

I really must get cracking with some pink girly baby knits though. I would love to make my friend a blanket, as her youngest son loves the one I made him, but I just don't think I'm going to have the time.

Yay! squishy chubby girly cheeks on the way!

Such a sad day.

I'm really sad today. I hate Alzheimers. It's robbed me of my mother. I can see why it's called the long goodbye. She looks the same, sounds the same, but she's gone. And I'm heartbroken. I want my Mam back.
I was in the hospital with her all day today seeing the geriatrician. All day yesterday and this morning I had a barrage of the same three angry questions because she was scared I suppose.
Where are we going?
Why are we going, sure I'm fine?
What are they going to do to me?
Rinse and repeat these questions for the last 24 hours. My poor Dad has taken the brunt, merely because he was there most of yesterday.
I brought her along this morning and it was a struggle. I had to get her out of bed, wash and dress her, give her breakfast and put her in the car. All along answering the three questions above over and over.
She was cute enough to lie through her teeth to the doctor about how she felt, but the cognitive tests don't lie. She scored 12/30 and apparently that's severe Alzheimers. :(
She didn't know what day, month, year, season it was or what country she lived in, how many children she had etc. I couldn't bear to hear most of it. The doctor was lovely, she was very sympathetic, but at the end of it all there's nothing they can do.
As Dad said to me today: "How come they can spend billions sending men to the moon, but they can't find a cure for this horrible disease?"
Which leaves me so torn about what to do myself.
I know my Dad can't cope, I've known for a while, but I think I've kind of stuck my head in the sand, hoping it will go away. It hasn't. So now I need to step up to the mark. How? Working a shorter week and being there more? I simply can't afford to. Get a private home help in, as our shitty Government won't pay for one? Again, I can't afford to and my "brother" refuses to help. So what do I do? I know family is more important than money or career, but it's a case of paying for Alice's school fees and such. I dunno. I'll have to try and come up with some sort of compromise, coz it can't carry on as it is.

Sorry for the outburst, but it helps to talk to you, blog friends, as I don't want to burden hubby too much with it all.

On to knitty news:

On a plus side of today, I got about 10 repeats of the leg chart done on Hedera sock no 2 while we were waiting. Bonus!

Border Chart 1 is complete on the Liberty Bell Afghan:

Save the drumrolls and wild applause. I know it's not that impressive, but that there represents quite a few knitting hours!

If I ever needed cheering up here it is:

Alice in her Good Stripe Dress twirling this morning. Hubby took it. Apparently she is now a Level 2 Jedi fairy that can summon sunny fireballs to the sky to make the weather nice. Her bonus power is that she can change traffic lights from red to green so we can get home faster in the evening.
You've got to love her.

Happy weekend

Happy Sunday everyone, I hope you are all having a nice weekend and not thinking of the dreaded W word tomorrow. I know I'm not!
I'm about to get snug in my chair and get knitting while I watch my EZ dvds for the zillionth time as hubby is upstairs killing stuff on the pc. I can't think of anything nicer ;)

I'm getting myself geared up for Tuesday. Mam has a hospital appt with the geriatrician for the whole day while they run a battery of tests and find out exactly what kind of Alzheimers she has. I've been kind of lying to her about it, saying it's just a checkup to see if the new tablets are agreeing with her. I don't think thats a bad thing really, as she wouldn't go otherwise!

I still haven't decided on a project to bring with me on holidays next Saturday along with my Hedera socks. It's so hard to choose! Maybe a nice cotton top for Alice? I dunno.
Speaking of Hedera socks, I'm way behind. I'm only 3 repeats into the leg of the second sock, and I need to get these done by the end of July for the KAL. But, they're doing fine otherwise.

In afghan news, I've finished chart 1!

What do y'all think? It's not perfect by any means which bugs me as I really wanted it to be, but I'm proud of it nonetheless. It's much more difficult than it looks, believe me!
The ends? OMG they're taking over the planet, breeding like rabbits :(
I've discovered a way to weave them in as I go thanks to Kaffe Fassett and the Vogue Ultimate Knitting book I bought half price, so that was worth it! Hopefully it'll go easier for me now.

I bought some backing fabric for it today, isn't it nice?

I thought both the red and the stars went well with the project, plus it'll make it much nicer to snuggle up in front of the tv with, won't it? And, I didn't want my SIL and BIL to see all the woven in ends! I'm smart, y'know, hiding the shoddy finishing, heh.
All I need now is to figure out how to sew it on once (if) I finish it!

Happy knitting and happy week!

Sad knitty news

It's a sad bit of knitty news I have to impart.
I found out yesterday that our local Borders is closing down. Apparently they're pulling out of Ireland and the UK altogether. So sad.
It was the only place to get a lot of US knitty publications and by far had the best selection of knitting books.
It also means we have to look for a new home for our knitting group as the Starbucks in the store is closing too :(
A clothes shop is opening in its place. Great. Like we need another clothes store in the shopping centre :/
They have a HUGE closing down sale on at the moment. 50% off everything, including school books. That's what I get for being efficient. I only bought Alice's books there 2 weeks ago.
So, I went along to the knitting group last night to see what we could sort out about sourcing a new venue and the place was jammed to the gills. They had to close the doors to stop people entering the store 2 hours before closing time. The queue wait was about an hour to pay for the books, it was mental.
On between sorting out the new venue (hopefully the local library, but we're going to keep supporting the store as long as it's open) and sympathising with the fantastic staff there who will shortly be unemployed I (hubby who queued whilst I knit ha) managed to snap up some bargains:
1. Vogue Knitting Stitchionary 4: Crochet I hope this may encourage me to try crochet again.
2. The Ultimate Sourcebook of Knitting and Crochet Stitches A gal can't have enough stitch dictionaries!
3. Vogue Knitting The Ultimate Knitting Book Yay!
4. Vogue Knitting The Ultimate Sock Book Socks. 'Nuff said. I've stalked this one for a while.
5. Fitted Knits Not 100% sure why I bought this, as I think the sizes are below me, but I've heard it has good shaping techniques. This one was the "eyes-glazed-over-it's-half-price-impulse-purchase"

I know, I'm mad, there's a recession etc, but y'know, it's knitting and it was half price. Conversation over.

In actual knitting news, I'm in a bit of a muddle with my Liberty Bell Afghan:
Tangles! Lots of them! I'm trying to think of a way to prevent this happening. I think I may have an idea. I'm going to try and put each pattern repeats worth of yarn into an individual ziploc bag. That should do the trick. Fingers crossed, I'm going to get de-tangling as soon as I finish this.

Hedera sock No 1 is done!:

I'm still not completely in love with the marriage of yarn & pattern, but I'm going to persevere. I finished this one today when the rest of the office was on tea break. Isn't the heel flap HUGE? If I were to ever knit these again(unlikely) I would most certainly reduce the length of the heel flap by at least 1/3.

So that's it for today. Keep an eye out your window tonight at approx 11.03pm GMT as the space shuttle will hopefully take off and it should be visible (fleetingly) in the night sky. Having seen a launch before in Florida I can say it is a fantastic sight. Although if I see this one tonight, I won't be sitting on Daytona beach with sand between my toes like last time. :( On the bright side, only 3 months and 1 week to go!!

Startitis (sort of)

I bring news of great joy, bloggers!
Look what I found under a pile of shoes and handbags by my bed:

My little lost sock and needles! The poor thing looks a bit worse for the wear, but I'm sure with some gentle ripping and caressing it will return to its former glory. I can't believe I found it! (I also can't believe I had such a pile of crap by my bed that a sock could become lost for two weeks)

My Hedera sock progresses:

I'm almost at the toe of the first sock. Still not feeling the love for the yarn & pattern together, but I'll persevere because I'm not ripping out now!

Maybe that's where the little spurt of startitis has come in. I'm not hugely feeling the sock love so instead of finishing Hedera or pouncing on the prodigal sock I've decided to move a million miles away from socks and cast on this baby:

It's the Liberty Bell afghan from Cover Up with Nicky Epstein(Ravlink).

(Apologies if the pattern on Ravelry isn't fully correct, I added it yesterday morning whilst under the influence of lack of coffee.)

I must be mad starting a huge intarsia project like this. I really must. But, see, the thing is that my sister and brother in law are really good to us and let us use their holiday home in Florida every year. If it weren't for them I'd never have seen the States, or bought yummy yarn so I figure I owe them a nice present. I usually buy them a gift for the house each year as a thank you, but wouldn't this be so much nicer draped over the back of their couch?

I think so.

Only problem is I want this to be perfect.

I think it's looking good so far, but I'm hopeless at weaving in ends. They always seem to come loose and pop out after a little while. So, what can I do with this?

I'm knitting it with acrylic so it'll be washer friendly, so I can't felt ends together. What way do you guys weave in ends? Hundreds of ends, so many it will probably take me as long to weave them in as it did to knit the darn thing.

I was also thinking of maybe sewing on some backing fabric once done so that the "ugly" side wouldn't be visible. What do you think?

This doesn't need to be done until October when we go over, so I've plenty of time to finish it off, right? Right??

I also need a project to bring on holidays with me in two weeks time.

I've booked the Golf Villas here for a week at the end of the month to give Mam & Dad a holiday. I can't afford it, but what can you do? They need a break too.

Anyway, I don't fancy bringing down that mammoth afghan so I need something else (along with a sock of course) to knit there. What do you like to bring for holiday knitting?

Good news on the oily dress debacle, almost all of the oil came out so I think it will be fine next wash. It's barely detectable to the non knitter eye now. Phew! Thanks for all the advice on stain removal!

As an aside, one of my work colleagues saw a picture of Alice in the dress and has asked me to knit one for her daughter! errrr, that thing took FOREVER to knit, I don't think so! She asked me if there would be anything else then, so I said I'd have a look. I really don't fancy knitting that again, so any suggestions? I was thinking maybe a skirt instead? Maybe this?

I can't say I'm all that keen on the idea, but can't see how I can get out of it. I'm also not that confident in my knitting skillz for someone to actually pay me for the yarn and for their child to wear it?

Ah we'll see. If I say nothing it may all go away!