Author: emilyWools

https://www.emilywools.com

progress!

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i am making progress on my sweater: the front is over half done. i am planning to block/seam/finish the collar and pockets before starting on the sleeves, we’ll see, maybe that’s cheating. i see a lot of people on ravelry complain about seaming, but i kind of love it. its the most motivating part for me, because im on the verge of finishing! i can go for a much longer time doing seaming/finishing than straight knitting. anyway, here’s where i am. you can see the blue melange yarn peeking out as stitch holders, but that’s what i plan to use for the pocket and collar linings. i am much further along than in this photo.

i also have my halloween costume started! im going to be a peacock! more info to come as i get further along!

baby blanket.

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i finished the baby blanket! i used a multi-color cotton batik and a polka-dot flannel. i spent a while in the fabric store trying to find two flannels that looked good together, but as i was unsurely carrying around several bolts i happened upon the batik and thought it was so pretty. i like the pink bias tape for the color pop, too.

the tutorial was easy to follow, but im a little disappointed in my sewing skills… you wouldn’t think it would be so difficult to sew three rectangles into a little quilt, but whoa was i wrong. it took a lot of patience to cut out each piece correctly, and then to sew the bias tape on to the blanket. i can only hope mom-to-be and baby Gemma enjoy it. it took about 3 1 hour sessions to complete, and it cost about $25 to make. i considered making my own bias tape, but i think i will save that undertaking for a future project.

you know she’s beachin’ it.

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wow, what a lovely beach vacation. we did so much stuff! and also so much relaxing on the beach. we had mostly great weather, but a couple bad-weather days, but we had a triple-feature-90s-movies day where we watched Point Break, 10 Things I hate about You, and Jurassic Park.

we biked to the cape may/lewes ferry and rode to the dogfish head brewery, which was DELICIOUS. we passed this sign.

we visited the cape may brewery for a tasting and tour. they are very new, but still had 4 beers: a saison, porter, and two IPAs.
my parents and sister came down for the weekend, and we spent some serious time on the beach.
during the drive down, we passed philadelphia and had the marvelous idea to stop and see the barnes collection on the return trip. my friend mike (who was with us) told us about art of the steal, an extremely gripping documentary about the barnes and how the city of philadelphia "stole" it and moved it downtown. although i am not sure i can pick a right side on the matter, i wanted to see this magnificent art collection regardless of its location. in short, it was ABSOLUTELY PHENOMENAL. i went through the rooms and gasped constantly, the breadth of the collection is outstanding. if you are ever in the area, it is so worth a stop. i would like to go back another time, though, it was very draining and i found myself going through the 2nd floor rooms too quickly because i was burned out. 

i was able to get some serious knitting time in this week! now that i see the pictures i took, it doesn’t look like i spent much time on it, but i used a lot of time to decipher the chart instead of reading the written directions (as i had been doing), and the pattern is going much, much faster now– i am almost memorizing it. i had to rip out several rows at first, but im back on track and almost ready to start decreasing for the neck! my goal is to have this finished for our san francisco trip next month (its a lofty goal, we’ll see).

babies on the brain.

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i found out my boyfriend’s cousin is having a baby girl! the shower is in mid-september. i really wanted to make something for the baby rather than buying. So i hunted on ravelry for some cute patterns. i finally decided to make the duck slippers, so i cast on and quickly realized this pattern was waaaay out of my league. i couldn’t get past row 3, and i became very frustrated. so i abandoned duck feet, and decided to make the booties (rav) that i have seen several times, but i have never had a need to make them.

i think they are adorable. i hope they don’t look too much like the baltimore ravens. i had the purple alpaca in my stash from the free Classic Elite Yarns mini skein giveaway, and it was the perfect amount for these. 
so in the vein of little ones, i found a really cute lamb pattern. i found some white fuzzy yarn in my stash, and for the legs/head, i used some leftover alpaca that is the most lovely blue. i think am too attached to him to give it away….
i think im going to make a baby blanket to go with the booties. we’ll see what happens! im going to the beach on wednesday so i hope i have lots of time for knitting and thinking of ideas.
currently listening: nick drake, pink moon

wouldn’t it be nice?

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endpaper mitts: in progress—- only ½ a repeat left on chart a.
brioche hat: on hold—- decreasing is extremely confusing/tricky
mitred blanket: semi-in-progress—- halfway through the blocks construction, but nervous that the finished blanket wont be big enough, wall hanging?
shadow sweater: mneh—- i tried picking this up again the other day, with not much success.

in other crafting notes, i made a pocket t from a plain v-neck t shirt and some old fabric i had in my stash. i like how it turned out!!

hoping to jump back into all of these so i have some beach knitting to do at the end of the month!!

currently listening: pet sounds, the beach boys

brioche, unravelled.

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after some more frogging, i caved and got some circular needles for my brioche hat. im just about ready to start decreasing. i have made one visible mistake so far, but i could not figure out how to go back and fix it… so many yo’s and overlaps and two colors. it was slow going for a few rows but i mostly fixed it. i dont like to post mistakes but oh well… here it is (i think ill try to “fix” it when i have it off the needles, by faking in the blue stitch with a regular needle and yarn):

ive read several people on ravelry have experienced trouble with the decreases. i cast on 62 stitches for the hat to begin with, so now i have an awkward number of stitches to decrease. i think i will split it 15-15-15-17. we’ll see!!

brioche hat.

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im making purl bee’s brioche hat. i think ive started it and ripped it out at least 4 times, which i almost never do. the brioche stitch is soooooo confusing, with all the bark and burp rows (WHAT!?!). i looked for youtube tutorials but they all were very confusing, and since i was doing the maddeningly specific “two color brioche stitch in the round,” it was difficult to find the video tutorial i needed. i did find one tutorial that showed continental style knitting in the round but it was so slow moving and the narrator knits in a really foreign way to me, so it made no sense.

i finally found a website dedicated to brioche stitch and i familiarized myself with all the different types and what the stitch is actually doing. i had actually found this site earlier, but i didnt click around on it, so when i came back and realized this site has an insane amount of info, i mentally kicked myself for not realizing sooner and learned my way around the brioche state of mind.

salvation came to me in this newsprint cowl (rav link). this is seriously the exact same cowl pattern as the purl bee. whoever made this pattern, THANK YOU SO MUCH because its the only two color brioche pattern i’ve found that makes sense to me. its so simple, why do other patterns have to muck up the directions so much????! but ANYWAY!!! im several rows in and she’s looking mighty pretty. im glad i found a use for this traded handspun white yarn– its sooo soft! and i also had this teal blue cascade 220 sitting around, and the combo is just so perfect! yay!

despite all of this, i love these little triumphs i work myself through.

my first lace shawl!

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i did it!!!! i finished my first shawl! its not perfect, but i cannot believe how good it looks. i furiously worked through the last of the edging on saturday, and then i bound off the top using the russian bind off, which is perfectly stretchy (but not TOOOO stretchy). when i finished it, i laid it out on the couch and i was pretty mneh about it– the top of it wasn’t straight, and you couldn’t really see the edging points at all.

so i blocked it! i soaked it in lukewarm water with wool wash for 20 minutes, and then gently squeezed it, and pinned it out. it took A LOT of pins to get every single edging point, but it was so worth it. As I impatiently waited for it to dry, i kept visiting it, which was a little silly. When i finally removed the pins and put it on, i was sooooo giddy! im so happy with it, and i love the color. i definitely feel a sense of accomplishment.

almost an aestlight.

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i picked back up my aestlight (rav) shawl. the birds eye lace is a little messed up on one side, but i’ve already frogged it once, and i decided i was just going to power through it and deal with it later. im now ½ way through the border, so its so very nearly done!!!

i came across a fabulous tutorial for blocking lace that i plan on following: yarn harlot. since this is my first lace project, i figured i should really read up on blocking, since its pretty much the only way to make this thing look presentable when its all finished.

long-awaited updates

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this past weekend i found a resurgence in my desire to knit. ive been really bummed that i haven’t really wanted to in months. you’d think the winter doldrums would be enough, but naturally its the spring weather and its lack of need for knitted things that pumps me up. im not complaining! i have so much beautiful yarn to use.

i have picked back up my mitered crosses blanket, but 5ish squares in, i realized this is going to be a tiny blanket unless i add more squares than the pattern specifies. i think im just going to use up all the yarn i have for it, and then assess the situation then. i really love the noro colorways, they make such unexpected color turns, and they way the mitered middle cross is constructed, random stripings from the yarn pair up. i love it. im flying to san francisco next week, so this will make for great airplane knitting.

ALSO, i finally finished my thrummed mittens. i let them sit for almost a year (sad!!!) with only the second thumb to knit! im not thrilled with how they turned out, i think they are very fuzzy and bulky, but i suppose that’s the nature of the thrum beast.

ANOTHER ALSO, i’m teaming up with a friend to make a footstool. he made the frame from scrap wood, and im going to weave the top from fabric scraps. i started experimenting this weekend, and i think achieving adequate tension is going to be difficult. i think i may need to use twine for the weft, and then the fabric scraps for the weave.