Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Sampler Afghan With My Sampler Square


Here is a sampler afghan a going away present f0r a fellow fiber artist made up of 20 different sampler 12 x 12 inch squares each from a different knitter and/or crocheter and afghan squares all crocheted together and all finished with a crocheted border.
Afghan measures roughly 4.5 ft x 5.5 ft
My own square is the pink one on the very bottom edge 3rd from the left side and is of Ella Rae worsted weight yarn made in Romania. Knitted in diagonal garter stitch which guarantees a perfect square with very little casting on and no binding off at all.

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Ta se nios teo na an diabhail Irish language It is hotter than the devil

Ni raibh se ro-chompoirdeach la ina dhiadh la...bhi se nios teo na an diabhail. Rothe agus rothais dom. Ta suil agam go mbeidh se nios fionnuaire agus nios tirime De hAoine.

Nil fonn ar bith orm cniotail a dheanamh ag an am seo. Afach, b'fheidir go dtiocfaidh fonn orm oiche Deardaoin a chniotail aris le mo ghrupa cniotala.

Ta mata banchorchra na gcat agam a aththosnu. Sin a chaoi, thosaigh me e, agus ansin, bhi fadhb le mo mheir mar gheall ar an meid sin chniotala. B'eigean dom mo chniotail a stopadh le coicis.

Bhfuel, fan go bhfeicfidh me oiche Deardaoin an gcniotail no nach gcniotail me.

Translation:
It was not to comfortable day after day. It was hotter than the devil. Too hot and too humid for me. I hope it will be cooler and dryer on Friday.

I don't want to knit at this time. However, maybe I will want to knit again with my knitting group Thursday night.

I have a lavender cat mat to restart. That is the way it is, I started it and then there was a problem with my finger because so much knitting. I had to stop my knitting for 2 weeks.

Well, I will see Thursday night whether or not I knit.

Saturday, May 31, 2008

finished laptop cover and its liner




Here is what it looks like finished with wooden button in front acting as closure and here is a pictorial sample of the Chinse silk brocade liner that went into the inside of this bag. Unfortunately, this digital camera shot does not give a good close-up view of the beautiful cable knitting on the front and back of this bag.
This shiny silk brocade liner has a nice bamboo leave design woven into it.
If using this bag for a laptop cover this silk liner facilitates sliding the laptop in and out of this bag.

Tuesday, April 29, 2008

A kitten named Blue

This kitten named Blue by a good knittng friend of mine named Debbie stayed at my house for a few days until Debbie could get ready for him and his good health was vet-verified. She then took him into her home and her 2 other cats ('Scilla-'Scilla and Toby) have come to like and to accept him.

These 3 kitties all sleep with Debbie (mycatsmy kids) at night and all are very happy indeed.

She is both a great cat-mom and a great friend knittng and otherwise as well.

She has been knitting for a long time and is has been a great help with my knitting.

Anyway, Blue and her other kitties enjoy the cat bed I knitted for them (seen under projects in skein123 or on my blog "The Yarn Guy".)

Friday, April 25, 2008

New Yarn Projects


Working on a cable-knit laptop cover (pattern "Aran Pocketbook" from Bags - a Knitter's dozen). Shown on the left is a detail of the cabling of this laptop cover.

got the cabling all done front and back and now onto a triangular flap f0r the front of the bag. That part done by Wednesday of next week all purling and a p2tog decrease in every row until down to 8 remaining stitchesThen work on getting the remaining point of the flap ready for a button hole. Then knit the bag's strap.

Then block the bag, sew a lining into the inside of the bag and then sew the strap into the base and form the sides with the strap.

And then to sew a button on the front.


When this is finished, I will gift a 12" x 12" square toward an "oddball" afghan made of squares that of which no two squares are alike that is a collaborative effort.


Then onto knitting a flat " 24" x 24" cat mat" with no sides with a pastel fun fur yarn and a similar color of medium-weight yarn "knitted together as one" for a lady with 2 cats that will likely use it.

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

Three Tables Full of Knitters at this Cafe

That is typical for a Tuesday night I was told to see three tables full of knitters, so full that people had to draw up extra chairs and wedge themselves in at the corners of these table any way they can dodging plates of food and wine glasses etc and knit all at the same time.
I get just about 6 knitters at the most on the 2nd and 4th Thursdays of each month that I hold my knitting group. We sometimes have to join 2 tables together.

This place is called Adega Wine Cellars in downtown Silver Spring, (MD suburbs neighboring on DC) my town for the last 9 years. This downtown area has around Adega has seen a huge change that ended in about 2000 and was onc of the crowning achievements of the administration of our previous county executive Doug Duncan a true visionary for renewal. This and the revitalization of the Strathmore music hall in neighboring Rockville, which now has concerts again. He contributed a lot to making our county a great place to live. This area is very attractive now in a downtown that was stagnating and a bit decayed. This area of several blocks was demolished and blossomed anew with 2 cinemas and a stage for plays, endless great dining choices including Thai and Vietnamese cuisine, parking garages, apartment buildings close in to all this vitality, Pier One, a gym and pool, Whole Foods Market, hardware store, fashionable clothing store for women, convenient hardware store, Adega Wine Cellars (where you can have wine by the glass or buy the whole bottle, full cafe style menu and table space ideal for knitters, scrumptious deserts) Baja Fresh for great freshly made Mexican food.

This area is always popular but is jam-packed with people on Friday and Saturday nights dining out, grocery shopping at Whole Foods Market and going to the movies.

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Goodness Gracious, How Could I Misspell "Ravelry?"

Sorry, I suppose not enough tea, coffee or Solmate bought from My Organic Market aka. as MOM (From "sol" Spanish for "sun" and mate as in yerba mate....) causing tendencies such as turning Ravelry into "Raverly" and other such terrible things. I love Ravelry, really do, keeps me away from even my favorites Will and Grace on TV, and Vicar of Dibley on DVDs...

(Yerba mate....a South American plant made into a tea traditionally sipped from a "bombilla" or gourd with a straw placed in it......this slightly carbobated and delightfully fizzy drink Solmate derived from that gives energy "without the jitters of coffee" according to the label.... Prefer the lemon-lime flavor, somewhat less bitter-tasting than the original Solmate)

Oh well, now that my blog is now tuned to Ravelry I trust my friends in Ravelry will chuckle over "Raverly", my oh my, did he actually spell it "that way?"

Anywho, on to my morning stimulant.

My First Cat Bed Project and Second Non-Scarf Project


This pink cat bed with a white bottom all of it a blend of acrylic "fun fur" aka. "eyelash yarn" and "Encore" (part wool and part acrylic) "knitted together as if one yarn". Modeled closely on the Princess Snowball cat bed pattern from Stitch N' Bitch, a Knitter's Handbook.
Feline model: 'Scilla 'Scilla
One close male friend enthused, "How adorable, 'Scilla 'Scilla looks like she is floating in a pink cloud".
This was a Christmas gift for my closest knitting friend. Her 2 beautiful cats 'Scilla 'Scilla and Toby love this cat bed and relax in it often. As she is the far more experienced knitter of the two of us, she and I consulted closely together toward the successful conclusion of this project. This is my first project involved knitting a knitted shape other than rectangular, (scarves and cell phone cozy) And one of my first completed projects that isn't a scarf as I incorporate more increases and decreases into my knitting.

Raverly

For those who are in fiber arts and haven't tried Ravelry, it really is a treat.
Just being able to instantly connect to knitters, crocheters, spinners, etc in Iceland, Scandinavia, Finland, Germany, Scotland, Australia, and different parts of the USA, and see their projects is truly amazing. And sometimes maybe to see even their cats and dogs, spouses, kids, domestic partners. You can find on Ravelry a knitwear designer in Finland, Icelandic people who who tell their readers places to see in Iceland, or an interesting place to buy Icelandic yarn, knitters in Australia, a guy who authored a pattern that I am buying today from Oregon for a nice Christmas stocking, a dad new to knitting who is a fireman and many more interesting people.

If you speak German, Icelandic, Danish, Norwegian, or Finnish, you can write to other knitters on Ravelry who speak your language.

And no end to the huge variety of knitting and crocheting groups interested in many different ideas, themes, etc to build their own unique knitting community around.

And the changing ads that feature a different yarn supplier every time you look may provide you with a different yarn resouce that provides you with maybe some exotic Japanese yarn, or maybe if you are in the green mode of living, a supplier of organically raised natural fibers of different plant and animal sources.

Ravelry, a truly unique and also very diverse fiber arts experience.

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

The Yarn Guy

"The Yarn Guy" welcomes all to my blog, thank you for visiting here.

End of March, already April...70 degree day and I am still thinking about that 60" X 90" afghan in diagonal garter stitch (a slipknot and two cast-on stitches and one front-and-back increase. as I call it, don't know the correct term for this increase.... at the beginning of each row starting with the first row on for creating width (minus all that casting-on). I've been working on this project for months... in a few weeks, it will be finally 60" wide and I can finally start thinking about working on just its length for a while. This project is now 42 inches wide from corner out to needle. Looks like a triangle with the corner held downwards and like the corner of a rectangular afghan done in diagonal garter, which it is, if the side and bottom of it is held at 90 degree right angles.

Anyhoo, down to see the Japanese Cherry Blossoms (in Kenwood in the Bethesda, Maryland suburbs of DC) while at their peak. Enjoy driving down there with my bicycle in my car, park and ride all through Kenwood. All the streets by the curbsides there are lined with nothing but Japanese cherry trees. In the height of cherry blossom season there each year, a few families have their kids selling cookies and lemonade in front of their homes near the curbs.

I enjoy both knitting and all springtime has to offer at the time of year...actually knitting I enjoy doing any time of the year.