I Miss My UFOs

I only have one UFO right now. I think I have maybe 12 rows left. It really wouldn't take me long to finish it, and I really want to finish it before starting anything new, and I really don't have any motivation to work on it at all.

I've been sewing. But I don't have anything to show you, because I haven't finished any of the things I've been sewing either.

I started this fish years ago. When I picked it up a couple of weeks ago I had finished the head, and everything else was cut out and ready to go but completely unworked. I found a motivation I never had before and I became a handsewing freak these past couple of weeks. Because, you see, that was what put me off it in the first place. Handsewing. All those utilitarian seams. I was supposed to baste the whole thing first too, but that didn't last long so only a couple of pieces got basted. I had fully planned for it to be a machine sewing project but my machine found the foam to be just too much. So here I am now, about 10 inches from completion on the last, most annoying, 3 layers of foam (and 4 in some places), seam. Okay, so I'm going to have to seam it twice to really be comfortable with it holding but that still only makes a couple feet of stitching left.

This chair is the sewing project that has completely seized my attention and my motivation. Apparently it's a discontinued pattern since I could only find pictures through eBay. I found a yummy upholstery fabric remnant that was just barely big enough to do everything but the bottom of the chair. I felt like I was playing klotsky to get all the pattern pieces out of my fabric, but I did just barely have enough. It is swank, not all country and silly like the photo. I've almost finished the pillow forms that go in the chair. This means I am very close to actually getting to use my swank fabric and make the cover. So. Close. If my child would ever take a decent nap I might actually get to work on it! If only!

Anyhow, since I know you're probably really bored with me by now, here's an even more boring picture of my computer I took a while back.

(Yeah, that's SaunShine I'm checking out on the screen. She's not boring! You should check out her site in the sidebar).

And the closeup:


No, I don't collect pigs. This one just travelled a long way, accidentally, with several different people, to reach me. He's classy and he fits under my monitor, so there you go.

Flower Washcloth

I made this from the book Weekend Knitting. It's really cute, but it seemed like a ton of petals while I was making it.




Isn't it cute?

Yet Another Hat

Yup, I made another one. I used pretty much the same dimensions as the one for my son, but a little bit shorter.

It's for a sweet little red-headed baby with beautiful blue eyes and the complexion to wear blue or green. I couldn't make up my mind on the color for the stripe so I used them both. This baby has the roundest head and the hat is so cute on him, but I didn't get a pic of it on him. Sorry!





And yes, I come back to this hat again and again. It is faboo. Check it out in the sidebar or just click here: That Chocolate's Gone Straight To Your Ribs Hat.

Longies (Edited to add Graph)

I have designed and knitted some longies for my boy. I think they might have fit him better about 4-6 months ago, but oh well. See what you think:








And oh yeah, don't forget to look at his butt (cause it's so cute!)


I put this blurry pic on here so you could see that the diaper doesn't peek through when there's no flash. :^)



Again, I shouldn't have bothered turning the hem (at the ankles, it was great for holding in the elastic at the waist and I was able to do that with just knitting 2 together from the provisional cast on with the current row).

It's really not too tight on him, don't know why it looks that way in the pic. I charted the recycle symbol with the KnitPro Graph Generator and cleaned it up a bit in MSPaint. If anyone wants the graph I used, just let me know.

(Edited to add graphs):

Here is the one I used for the longies.
Recycle Symbol for Longies.

I modified it to be smaller, and this is the original large graph I tweaked out first.

Oh, did you want it sideways? Because I worked one out that way before doing it right. Sideways Recycle Symbol.

Enjoy!!

My Socks

I made some socks for me this time. And not just yoga socks/ankle warmers either.

I bought some sock yarn from KnitPicks and used this toe-up sock pattern from Elann.

I will say that their solid colored sock yarn is a bit on the thin side. I ended up using a smaller needle and tighter gauge to get the coverage I wanted. These knit up for me on size US 1 needles and gave me 9 st/inch. I got to see a friend's sock yarn that she had purchased from them in one of their variegated handpainted colorways and it seemed more in keeping with the sock yarn to which I was accustomed. It looked like it would knit up well on US 3 needles.

So without further ado, the socks:


It's hard to see in this pic, but I finished them by turning the hem in a brown yarn.


Yummy Japanese short row heels.






Peek!

This is a great, no-frills toe-up pattern. My gauge was actually 9 st/inch instead of the recommended 7 st/inch, and I really like the fit so I'm thinking this pattern might be a little bit generously sized if you have small feet or like a tight fit. These are definitely tight though, so be warned if you decide to get creative with the gauge or stitch number.

I do not recommend turning a hem for socks. Ever. It took so long to finish, even though I used a crochet hook and chain stitched it instead of using backstitch. It also makes the edge kind of flip out a little. Next time I'm just going to suck it up and do ribbing. And I'm going to buy 2 balls of yarn so I can make the socks as long as I want and not worry that I might run out of yarn if I do ribbing.

P.S. - I sure as heck used exactly that whole ball of green though. I had to tie it to some other thread to have enough to weave in the ends. Hah.