Craftastic

I've been doing a lot of knitting lately and thought it would be fun to share some of my recent projects.  It is also fun to uncover all you underground knitters out there.

I shared the Christmas Mice that I made as gifts in December, but never posted the beret boy version.  This guy turned out to my my favorite of the entire lot.

I was thinking of doing reindeer ornaments this year, but may just churn out a green beret Christmas army instead.  We'll see what happens.  With big plans in December I need to start early on my holiday ornaments this year.

I got together with Audrey and Cate a few weeks ago for a Stitch 'n Bitch.  I was working on this project at the time:

I love cowls and all the great options for wearing them.  Long like the above, doubled around for warmth, around the shoulders like a shawl.  It was a pretty easy project but I knit it in the round and every row took foreeeeever.

Lovely bee-hive stitch

After the monster cowl, I wanted a shorter, fun project so made a hat for Boyfriend for Valentine's Day.  Audrey made this hat for a baby and I found an adult modification that worked out great.

I love cable projects! You have to pay attention (unlike the mindless repeats of the green cowl), but I find, like speed work in running, it breaks things down mentally and makes them go faster.

I consider myself a fairly novice knitter and I buy the cheap yarn you find at most craft stores.  This works great for toy projects like the mice, but I do drool over the more expensive stuff.  I treated myself to some yummy, yummy handspun wool yarn recently:

So pretty I die!

I took forever trying to find a pattern I thought would do it justice.  I started on a project with it, but just didn't like the way it was knitting up.  I don't have the experience yet to know what yarns are suitable for which projects when you've got something as special as the above.  I'm working on it now with a new pattern and we'll see how it shapes up.  Stay tuned.

I've also found fun inspiration through a podcast.  I've experienced a dearth of good running podcasts to take on the run with me (I'm fairly picky about audio quality for podcasts I listen to when actually running -- everything else gets air time when I'm driving). Cast On is an awesome podcast.  The sound quality is great and I love the host and her music selections.  I've started at the very beginning and I'm looking forward to hours and hours and of entertainment on my runs ahead.  The host is a very experienced knitter and I can only wonder at how vast the knitting world really is in relation to my little scarf/hat projects with craft-store yarn.  Maybe one day I'll get there.

If anyone has any great knitting blogs they read, please be sure to mention them.  I found a couple but am looking for a few more to read.  Also if anyone is looking to get into knitting, I highly recommend making yourself a Ravelry account.  I use it mainly to keep track of my projects and to find patterns but even with just that bare bone usage, it is an awesome resource.

Oh, and I don't recall if I ever shared that Boyfriend got me a sewing machine for my birthday last year.  I haven't done much with it but am hoping to learn how to use it more.  I hemmed a pair of jeans the other week (with the original hem!! no less) and was pretty proud about that.  I'm attempting to hem some slacks now which believe it or not is more complicated than the jeans.  Stay tuned for that, too.  At the moment I'm thinking the $10 it would have cost to have someone else do them would have been money well spent.