Posted by: trimitup | March 20, 2011

Knitting Rules!

My friend and I had the wonderful opportunity to take a sock knitting class with the very funny Yarn Harlot herself Stephanie Pearl- McPhee.  She really knows her knitting stuff and is a fun teacher.  You should watch her knit, her fingers are lightning fast!  Here’s a pic of Stephanie (on your left), my friend Grace and I with her at the end of class, (She called us the paparazzi).

Sephanie on your left, me in the middle and friend Grace

Her knitting book “KNITTNG RULES!” is one of those books that you want to go back to from time to time to refresh your skills.  She has many tricks and formulas to help you when you don’t want to use a pattern but want to create your own from scratch.  This book has a wealth of information in it…… fact it makes me want to go read it again. 

Happy knitting!

marilynknits 🙂

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Posted by: trimitup | March 16, 2011

Getting reorganized…..sorta

I have been feeling the need to reorganize everything, including my yarn stash and knitting supplies.

Sorting through patterns.

I don’t know about you but collecting knit and crochet patterns has become a big hobby for me.  Many patterns are stored on my computer, but then feel the crazy need to print most of them out, just in case!!!  I had to sort though all of them and decide how to binder them up, meaning……… do I put cowls in a separate binder or do I put the scarfs and cowls together.  And what about the hat patterns, the coffee cozy patterns.  Do I put sweaters and vest together with baby sweaters??? Or just baby stuff separate? (currently the way it is)

Then I forget which way I have organized all the patterns (done this before with books).  Did I put that afghan pattern that I want to knit in with the baby stuff??? because it really was a baby blanket that I want to convert to an afghan.

A lot of the patterns I collect are from Ravelry and many are from other various knit & crochet web sites.  Many patterns were free and some I purchased.  I have several E-books too.  I store some of the patterns on my Kindle if they are in PDF format. (Did I say I love my Kindle?)

What about all the knitting magazines?  That’s a hard one…..I don’t want to cut up the magazines and take out what I want because sometime down the road, my tastes might change, or somebody might want me to knit them something that I knew I saw in one of them.  Plus the magazines are just too attractive to dismember.  Not really sure how to organize them except to put sticky flags on my favorite pages, but then later wondered why I had marked that page!  Good memory helps.   I think the magazines will be stored in magazine boxes by their name.   The saga continues!!!  I need help!  Your comments are welcomed. 

Happy knitting!

marilynknits 😉

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Posted by: trimitup | March 11, 2011

Sock Yarn One-Skein Wonders book Review

The Sock Yarn One-Skein Wonders book is a must have for your library if you love sock yarn.  101 patterns for your knitting and crochet enjoyment.  This book has shawls, scarves, socks, bags, gloves and all kinds of baby patterns. You gotta love the French Press Snuggly pattern to help keep your coffee from getting cold (pg 239-41).  I have all of the One-Skein Wonders books and this one is equally wonderful.  I like that this book is solely devoted to sock yarn, but of course you can use lace weight yarn if you want to. (I did!)  

Remember the beaded wrap I knitted?  That came from the Sock Yarn One-Skein Wonders book.  The Calypso Shrug/Shoulder Wrap (pg 145) was a lot of fun to knit up and it didn’t take to long to finish.  I wouldn’t take this project anywhere you don’t mind losing a few beads.  Also pay attention to how many beads you have on hand, as I did not have enough and had to finish the rest of the wrap without them.  

 Here it is finally finished!  The yarn I used was a hand painted fingerling weight yarn by Araucania.  The fiber content is 70% super wash wool, 15% silk and 15% bamboo.  It was wonderful to knit with!

Calypso Wrap unblocked

Here it is showing the buttons for the shrug

Here it is as a wrap

I am very happy with how it turned out!

Happy knitting!

marilynknits 🙂

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Posted by: trimitup | March 8, 2011

Left handed knitter

Being left-handed can present problems, I know because I’m one of them. Most of the time it’s really not a problem, you just learn to adapt!   I just need to remember when making a cardigan that when they say to knit the left front side, I’m really making the right because I am mirror knitting.   If I’m knitting from a chart then I should read the chart the opposite way.   But to make it easer on your self reading charts backwards is really not necessary because in the end it doesn’t really matter which way the cable goes does it?.

 When I was younger you could find knitting books that had instructions for lefties.  But it’s rare these days to find a knitting book like that now.  If you are teaching someone to knit and they are left-handed, then I recommend that you teach them right-handed because it’s just easier for reading charts and knitting cardigans.  

Here are some samples of my knitting and as you can see here you should not be able to tell the difference between left and right-handed knitting.

I like working small projects, can you tell?

Happy knitting!

marilynknits 🙂

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Posted by: trimitup | March 3, 2011

Bead issue continued…..

So I went to my new favorite bead store …..the huge warehouse called South Sun Bead bead store in SD……but…. they did not have the bead I needed to finish the wrap that I started and I am so close to finishing.  There is no choice left but to finish the wrap without the rest of the shiny clear beads.  I don’t think anybody will notice, but now I can’t give it as a gift if I want too.

I will post a picture of the wrap when I finish, but for now you can take a look at one of my favorite kitties.  She looks sleepy here.

This is Portia’s favorite place to play.

Happy knitting!

 
marilynknits 🙂

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