Christmas projects and digital camera

I'm working on several projects for gifts this year. Socks, poncho, shawl, books marks, maybe a scarf or two. Everything I make this year will need to be quick since I don't have much time. As it is November is half over.

I wish I had a digital camera, so I could take pictures of my finished projects or chart the progress though pictures. But that will have to wait until I have more disposable income. Besides at the moment if I have extra cash, I'm going to going to use it on higher quality yarn.

Second pair of socks

I'm currently working on my second pair of socks. This time using the Lion Brand Blue Stripe yarn. These socks will be a gift however. The first sock is finished, so I just need to start on the second. When the semester is over I'm going to start the felted bag pattern. After that I may make another afghan.

Door Hanger nearly finished, another afghan

Well the door hanger is nearly done. I finished knitting both the front and back and I have done the duplicate stitch on the front. All that is left is to make the handle and sew the front and back together.

I am nearly finished with another afghan. This one is a dark red shade. I made this one as one piece, so it is taking a bit longer. But I prefer the look of it to the one that I had to put together afterwards.

Then I guess I'm going to start whatever Christmas projects I'm going to do. They will be small this year though. I have too much school work for large projects.

Finished the afghan and started the door hanger

I finished the afghan over the weekend. It has been washed and has all the ends weaved in.
Thank goodness it is finally finished. I started the door hanger. I finished the front, now I have to do the back. That shouldn't take long. I have little less than a month to work on it. I'm sort of doing the cheaters way. I'm going to use duplicate stitch for the letters instead of intarsia. I don't have time to learn intarsia at the moment. I tried it out once a year or so ago and it did not look good. I'll save that for after the semester is over.

Afghan and door hanger

I haven't finished the afghan yet, I became lazy before I left to go to the bridal shower and stuff out of state. I'll finish it this week.

Then I'm going to make a door hanfer for my sister. I found a pattern on Knitty which I thought would be a cute bachelorette gift that would use up some scrap yarn I have. I think I will make it in red and black, and then maybe modify the pattern by picking up stitches and doing a border in eyelash yarn. But I'll have to see if I have time, since I will be busy with school.

Made a mistake on the afghan

When I was attaching another strip to the afghan I had in the wrong direction. Of course I only noticed this after I had finished. So I had to take it out and now I still haven't put the strip on. I have two more to attach, including the one that would have been done yesterday, and then the afghan will be finished.

At least I have learned my lesson about working on projects when I'm tired.

Looking over older posts...

I was just looking over some of my older posts and realized I met the goal I had set. My goal was to knit a pair of socks before the end of the year.

I did force myself a bit by purchasing the yarn. I knew that if I bought the yarn I would end up making them.

I probably won't be making my felted bag by the end of the year, even though I have the yarn. In fact I don't see myself doing many projects this semester, or they will all be small quick ones. I have a twenty-five page paper due in November. I need to think of a topic and get started so that I don't find myself with ten pages a few days before it is due.

The afghan is going well

I have put three pieces of the afghan together. There is a slight seam, but it looks better now than it did before. It is less obvious.

If I do make this pattern again I think I will try to knit it all together. It will probably take longer but I'll separate the sections by a stitch or a yarn over or something. I really don't like putting the pieces of knitted items together, so if I can find a way to avoid it I will.

Finished with the shawl, on to the afghan

I finished the shawl for my grandmother over the weekend. I weave in the ends yet, I'll have to do it when I go home for the bridal shower.

Now I need to put together the pieces of the envelope afghan. I think I'm going to pick up stitches and then unse the kitchener stitch. I don't like the way it looked when I tried to use the mattress stitch. I don't want the afghan to have obvious seams. Depending on how it looks I'll probably end up making another one in a different color. It just needs cheap worsted weight yarn. I used Caron Simply Soft in Plum Wine. I think if I make it again it will be in Dark Country Blue. I can't believe I finished knitting the afghan in June and still haven't put it together yet.

Expensive Yarn

I'm currently saving to buy the yarn for a sweater. The main negative part of knitting is that yarn can be so expensive. Especially the yarns that I tend to like, because they are natural fibers. When you are on a budget, you either buy cheap yarn, look for bargains, or save to buy what you want. And of course the more expensive the yarn, the smaller the skein, so you have to buy more.

I suppose that you spend about the same amount for the yarn that you would spend to buy a pure wool sweater. At least when you knit it yourself, you know how well made it is. And you also can knit a gauge to test how well it washes by hand or machine.

Needles

I don't think I ever posted about the Denise Needle set I received for Christmas of 2004. The Denise Needles are an interchangeable circular needle set. It has really been a help since now I don't have to buy new needles for each project I do.

I also received my late great-aunt's old needles. Most of the ones she had were aluminum, but she also had several plastic ones. I use the plastic circulars when I travel by plane. I'm glad knitting needles are allowed on planes, since knitting while I fly really relaxes me. I made a shawl and an afghan during two separate round trips.

I'm not sure if I will bother to bring knitting with me for the plane trip to my sister's wedding. There will be so much stuff going on, I probably won't bother.

Socks

I haven't updated in a long time.

I finished my first pair of socks a few weeks ago. I'm working on a green shawl for my Grandma. I was supposed to do it months ago, but I kept forgetting to get the yarn. I made her a similar one for Christmas last year, but it was red.

The yarn for my knitted bag is still at home waiting to be used. I decided to wait until winter since that yarn is pure wool.

The socks are Lion Brand yarn Magic Stripes in Jelly Bean. It was easier than I thought it would be. Initially I stopped knitting them for a few weeks after I finished the cuff on the first sock. Picking up stitched along the heel gusset made me nervous at first. Since the socks are mostly wool, I won't be wearing them for a few months.

Knitting Update

I haven't written in a long time. I've had a lot of work with school and everything. I finished all the Christmas projects on time, which was great. I don't think I will ever knit for that many people at Christmas time again though. It took me longer than I thought it would. I knew it would take several weeks, but it was just a lot to do. I'm currently working o a scarf for myself with some yarn I received for Christmas. It is lovely and soft alpaca yarn. Though since it is now March I won't be wearing it unitil the latter part of this year.

I still haven't gotten to the socks. That might have to wait until summer along with the felted bag I'm going to make. I'm going out of town for spring break this Friday so I will be taking an easy knitting project for the plane trip. I really hate flying and especially flying alone so I think that knitting will calm me down a lot.