Entrelac

I've always wanted to try entrelac (hand knitting) but never had the nerve to just jump in with a pattern. Well, now I have no excuse. Knitting Daily, the email newsletter from Interweave Press, has offered us a tutorial on entrelac written by Eunny Jang, the editor of Interweave Knits. Its entitled, Beyond The Basics:Entrelac Knitting Block by Block. To get the tutorial, go to http://tinyurl.com/connjv

Once we've followed along with the tutorial, there's a Basic Entrelac Scarf for us to try at http://tinyurl.com/d5tn9l . Just in case you wonder if this knit designer really knows what she's doing, the socks pictured above are her pattern, available for sale at the Knitting Daily pattern store. I think I'll try the free Basic Entrelac Scarf pattern first before I attempt something like circular socks in entrelac. You can get the free scarf pattern here: http://tinyurl.com/d5tn9l and here's a picture of it:

Before you can download these goodies, you may have to join Knitting Daily but believe me, its free and its definitely a great newsletter. I've gotten some fabulous patterns from their site, both purchased and free.

Now, just a little update on the beaded scarf. I have 200 more beads to thread onto the yarn and then I can start knitting the second side. WHEW! This seems to have taken forever but that's ok, it gives me something to do in the evenings while I listen to the TV.

Funny Thing Happened Last Night

It all started the night before, around 8:00 pm my BIL who lives around 30 miles from me called to check up on me (he checks in at least once a week to make sure I'm ok since I live in the woods (a bear might get me ) anyway, I was outside with the pup who won't go out by himself. I didn't notice he called until it was too late to call him back.

The next day (yesterday) I cleaned up around the house quickly and then went to the gym. When I got home I posted on Facebook that I was just home from the gym, checked what all the kids were doing (its fun to see what everyone is posts throughout the day on Facebook). Then I went about feeding the dog, went up to the loft and wove on my the scarf I'm working on. UPS came with a package that I'd been expecting, a broken knitting machine that belongs to a friend in Arizona.

I failed to mention that when I went to the gym, there was people at the next house working on the road. They let me squeeze through with my car (we have a very narrow road). When I came home the road was blocked and there was a hole all the way across. Since this is a dead end road, there was no way to my house except to go up and around neighbors driveway which I did. So did UPS. Later one of the work guys came by to tell me they accidentally cut our phone line. I thought to myself "humm, what would I do if I needed EMS?" But other than that, I went about my evening. fixed supper, watched the news, etc. Then I set about looking at friend's knitting machine.

I didn't get back on the computer but I did go out on the porch to call my friend in the next town on the cell phone to let her know my phone was out. Cell phone is almost always off at home because I can't get reception in the house and who wants to stand out on the porch to yell at a cell phone.

About 9:00 a car puled in, then someone knocked on the door. Creepy feeling...dog barked, pitch dark out..etc...no one comes at 9:00 when its very dark here. So I answered the door gingerly--it was a neighbor from the end of the road, he said my son had called to ask him to check on me. They hadn't seen me on the internet (facebook) and couldn't get me by phone. Apparently my BIL called my son to see if he knew anything about my whereabouts because he couldn't get me the night before. I was actually going to call BIL back yesterday but then the phone went out....etc...

Son, who lives in Michigan called daughter who lives in Tacoma, WA, who left me a text message (which I didn't get of course because it was turned off). Someone got hold of daughter in WI and grandaughter in Washington + grandaughter in Michigan were looking for me also and later I saw were pondering my whereabouts on Facebook.

The neighbor said he'd call my son for me, I emailed my daughter in WA and then sent a txt message to son in MI. Grandaughter in Washington posted in the end that it was a fun puzzle, sort of like a real-life Clue game. Other grandaughter in MI thought it was a great "test run" to find Grandma just in case it ever became an emergency.

I'm glad they had the presence of mind to call the neighbor. Also glad to know someone will be looking for me if something actually does happen. Brother in law said he was really worried about my little dog Biscuit (yeah, I know better).

So that was the Porter excitement for the day yesterday! All is well. Phone should be fixed sometime today. Knitting machine is repaired.

Update on Beaded Scarf

This is the first half of my beaded scarf. I'm not sure I like the different beads, I think it might look better if they were all the same sizes but I'm not taking it out now. The scarf is a cross between Tiny Toes Beaded Scarf kit that I bought in Asheville NC and a beaded fingerless glove in a book I bought. What I learned from the first one was that its a bit heavy and they grow longer with wear, something I might end up taking some rows out of this before I join it to the other side (you make the 2 separately and then graft together in the middle.
ps I know it looks like I didn't put some beads on but I did put them on, they're white and don't show up in the picture.


To graph, since I'm doing a garter stitch, I'm going to Elizabeth Zimmerman's Knitters Workbook for directions on grafting in garter stitch. I'm not real good at grafting so need all the visuals I can get.

Meanwhile, I'm working on a scarfvest on the LK 150. Its a scarf that you wear as a vest. You'll see, when I get it finished. I'm weaving it on the machine and have made a gazillion samples because it keeps rolling up on the edges. I think I have solved that problem now, more later about it once I know for sure its solved.

Meanwhile, if you love to look at knitting projects, have a look at this http://knittaplease.com/KNITTA_PLEASE.html

New Pattern up on pineymountaincottage.com

Yes, its true, it's been nearly a year since I knitted anything worth talking about on my machines but suddenly just before Christmas I got in the groove again. I made my 2 great grand kids sweaters (which you can see below). But when my granddaughter sent me a picture of the 4 month old baby wearing his new sweater, I just had to put the pattern up so if you go to http://www.pineymountaincottage.com/babyhood.html
you can get the pattern.
And here's the picture that inspired me to get the pattern up

Great Grandaughter's Sweater and Hat

Finally! Jada is at that age where she does what she wants when she can get away with it so she refused to put her new sweater on for the first few days after Christmas. Finally!!! She posed in it and isn't she cute? These were made on the LK 150. The sweater is my daughter, Natalie's pattern (www.nataliesknitting.com). If you'd like to buy the pattern, go to Machine Knit patterns, she wrote it for the standard gauge machine in size 2 to 14 but I used her figures and recharted it for the LK 150. The yarn was thin, probably a light sports weight. I suspect it would work on a standard gauge machine but sorry, I can't remember what it is, I think it was Caron. I do remember it came from Hobby Lobby and is pink with little purple flecks in it. (duh, CRS has set in).

I tried the Bickford Seaming that Marg Coe has taught us many times on the back
neck because the ribbing goes up one side to the center back and then up the
other side to the center back. There is a rolled edge and it looked awful with
mattress stitch, I couldn't get it not to make a lump so I tried the Bickford
and that worked. There's no big lump in the middle of the back neck. All the edges are rolled, I really, really like the rolled edge, it makes a nice soft edge instead of a fitted rib.

BTW you can see the sweater just after I finished it on the Nov 14, 2008 note below.

Traveling HK Project

This is my "travel" project. Its easy to take out in an airport while I'm waiting for a plane, its easy to drag out when everyone is sitting around watching TV. Perfect Project! When I'm done, I'll have a great looking scarf. The pattern was inspired by the Tiny Toes scarf kit I made last year. I bought Tiny Toes at a yarn show in Asheville and wanted another one but didn't go back this year so I decided to make my own kit. I bought some Bamboo yarn from Hobby Lobby and the beads are an assortment called "Mahogany". Then I decided to buy some purple beads as well, thinking I wasn't sure which ones I wanted to use. When I started stringing the beads on the yarn I found I needed around 4400 of them, 2200 on each side of the scarf so I ended up pouring the purple and mahogany beads in a shallow bowl and started stringing them on the yarn at random. The mahogany beads are all different shades of gold and brown and even a few white and unfortunately even though they were labeled 6mm, they seem to be all different sizes, some didn't fit. Pretty much the purple beads, which are also 6mm seem to all fit on the yarn.

So far I've only strung one ball of yarn. When its finished, I string another ball full and make the other side of the scarf. The idea is to cast on 5 stitches, string on 10 beads, 5 more stitches, 10 beads, across. Next row is the same, then 9 beads, 5 stitches twice, next is 8 beads, 5 stitches, etc....till you're down to 1 bead. I atually cast on 3 stitches on one edge and 2 stitches on the other edge. You knit till you run out of beads and then take off on waste. Knit the other side exactly the same way and then Kitchener stitch the scarf on the center back.

Next project is a scarfvest which is a scarf that looks like a vest in the front. I'm going to weave mine but more about that later.

Great Grandson's sweater, charted with Knitware Sweaters with shaped hood. I love the sweater, you can tell he does too

Information on Knitware is at www.greatknitdesigns.com You can buy the Basic, Sweaters and Shawls and Skirts. Basic has doggie and doll patterns as well as adults basic sweaters and includes pants for all sizes. Its inexpensive and I have all 3 sets . The plus with this software is, it is written for hand knitting, machine knitting and even crochet. What a deal! Its so easy to use I haven't EVER read the tutorial (but then I'm known for not reading help files...I'd rather fumble my way around than read.....still, I haven't done a lot of fumbling with this.
(No affiliation with this software, I just like it because its easy and quick)