Entrelac Close Up

Here is Entrelac up close. For those of you who are interested - this technique is made using Noro Kureyon yarn which changes colors as it goes. Enterlac is the technique of making your stitches look like they are woven strips woven together. They actually are sections that are knitted all together. This is a close up of both the purl direction and the knit direction pattern. I suggest that if you are interested in learning this technique you take the time to visit your LYS or someone who knows how to do it. Have them stand over you and walk you through the pattern. It really is not hard once you figure out the pattern. There are several stitches that are not used often but you need to know how to do them so that the stitches get picked up in the right direction or the sided look correctly. I really enjoy the technique it does take some concentration. I have posted on my website under the pattern section my first pattern I used which really walks you through it but once you understand the technique you can morph it into all sorts of stuff. I have seen in in the edging on a sweater vest. Or on pillowes etc... I think you will really enjoy it if you figure it out. Lots of fun!

Sgt. McCall is coming home Today

Just to let everyone know I will probably not be around much in the next few days. My stepson is returning home today for convilesent leave from his military duty. More less - on Memorial day he got into a motorcycle accident while he was stationed in Oahu, HI doing his final 2 months of his military duty. He served our country and fought for our country in Afghanistan and was able to come back to us in one peice. Thank God!

So while he was finishing his duty he had a major motorcycle accident as he was passenger on his buddy's motorcycle. 2 surgeries later he is coming home to rest. We get to have him here until after the 4th of July. We are planning to have one big celebration for him this weekend (family friends and neighbors) all are coming to welcome him home and thank him! Woo Hoo...

Entrelac Purse Started

My lastest cast on - After seeing Sue T (GramsKnits) felted Entrelac Purse. I had to be a copy cat. It looks so fantastic and I love the Entrelac technique. So here is what I am doing. I am using Noro Kureyon 131 and I am doing a 10 st Entrelac with 4 base triangles on a size 10 needles (Straights are best I think) You can find the Kaleidoscope Scarf - Entrelac pattern that I morphed for this purse here. I will keep you posted as the progress goes. Off to Entrelac Land. Enjoy!

Blonde Knitting Joke

A highway patrolman pulled alongside a speeding car on the freeway. Glancing at the car, he was astounded to see that the blonde behind the wheel was knitting! Realizing that she was oblivious to his flashing lights and siren, the trooper cranked down his window, turned on his bullhorn and yelled , "PULL OVER!" "NO!", the blonde yelled back, "IT'S A SCARF!"

iPod's Hard Day

Here is iPod. He had a long day. If you don't already know iPod is my 6 month old Labradoodle. 1/2 Lab 1/2 Standard Poodle. Well today he had a long day. For the past few weeks he has been having lots of pain in his back end. This is not good for either of the 2 breeds he is. It was confirmed this afternoon afterhe had to be put out while they took extensive xray's of his hips. It was confirmed that he has hip dysplasia. The extent of it is not know at this time. We are waiting for a Vet/Ortho to review the xrays so we can make some decissions. 20 years ago they would suggest that you put the animal down. I know this fact because 20 years ago I had to have my puppy put to sleep because he was in so much pain. Well with modern day medicine they can correct it if it is caught early enough. The Vet feels we have caught it early. Now we just have to see just how far it is. It is effecting his tail and lower spin area. Notice the green bandage on his wrist from the IV and you can't see it but I found this hilarious. They shaved his privates... LOL I told Johnny he got a Brazilian Wax.... LOL Poor little Pod. Hopefully he will be ok. Cross your fingers.

Pizza Party @ Creative Persuits

Please Please don't kill me... LOL This would be Christy! I just happen to catch her before she darted out of the photo. Friday night we had a blast. A local yarn store stay open late to have a pizza party for customers. It was so much fun. If you would like to see more fun pictures click here!

iPod Tube Sock - Crocheted & Felted

Here is my latest work of art. This is an iPod Tube Sock (crocheted and felted) This was done out of my left over Cascade Pastaza from my Patriotic Bag. I am giving this Tube Sock to Bryce my stepson. He loves his ipod and I am starting to make things for my kids. Help this might take some time. Now I just have to come up with something for surfboards or surfing. But here is what I did. I chained 18 on a g-hook. SC in 2 chain from hook and in each of the remaining chains until the last chain. Chained 3 sc in last chain and then worked down the back side of the intial chains to the last chain before the first sc. SC 3 in the corner. Slip stitch into first sc to form round. Then placed marker on slip stitch. Chain 1 and sc in all sc's joining last sc to first sc with slip stitch moving marker each row. Continued in this fashion for about 5 inches. Changed to blue for 3 rows and then back to white for 3 more rows. Then back to blue for last row. I would have done another 3 rows in white but I ran out of white. Stitched in all loose ends and then fleted. This is how it turned out. Enjoy!

Patriotic Buttonhole Bag Completed

Here it is. My felted Patriotic Buttonhole Bag a gift for my mother. I was not real happy with how the red felted into the white area but my Mother likes it and that is all that matters. This was kind of a disappointment to me because I had all these dreams about just how neat this one would turn out. I made it deeper which could be a great thing - which I liked. I was just not happy with the red/white issue. Oh well off to make another felted item... LOL

Patriotic Bag Ready for Felting

Here it is. My patriotic bag for my mother. This is a variation of the buttonhole bag. The only thing different is that I used Cascade Pastaza double stranded and instead of 10 rows in the belly of the bag I did 26. Notice there are 13 stripes in Red & White for the 13 colonies. I made this for my mother since she was admiring mine for sometime but wanted one deeper. Here it is. Enjoy!

Tendinitis of the thumb and pinkie - No Knitting for 2 weeks...

You will all love this one. I had to go to my monthly pilgramiage to UCLA Medical today. 250 mile round trip but I was able to get in yarn shopping LOL but I had to see my doctor. So I have 2 major illnesses I have been batteling for the last 3 years. I thought my arthritis was just getting really bad in my right hand. I have now found out NOPE it's not my arthritis. I have Tendinitis of the thumb and pinkie. To the point that I have to splint them 24 hours a day for at least 1 week to see if it gets better... The fact is that it is in my right hand and I am a lefty so I guess I am going to put down the sticks and pick up the hook for awhile. No knitting for 2 weeks.... but I bet I can crochet... cross your fingers. I am going to go nutz with out making all my felted projects. Plus I have to finish a baby blanket that I started but frogged it and need to start it again by Saturday @ 3pm How am I going to do it! This SUCKS!

Yarn Lady Bag Sale Project

Here is a close up of our project that we are all making. WE each bought several bags of various yarns and shared them with each other to come up with enough yarn for a wrap made up of 6 different types of fibers. We started with Trendsetters Yarns Essence #501- Wool/Plyamide/Acrylic fray looking ribbon (colors Rust/Green/Teal Blue/Gold). Picitures center in the bowl. This varigated Ribbon like yarn is our base color and from there we dug vigoursly around in all the bins at the "Yarn Lady" huge bag sale. With our base yarn picked out we were able to find Austermann - Melody - color #0009 Wool Acrylic Nylon which is very interesting to the feel. It seems to be at first glance a small to large spun fiber but as you look closely to it is is actually 2 fibers twisted together that has a polyamid in it. (color:minty/seafoam green). This is the bulkiest of the fibers we got. We then found among all the bags Trendsetter Yarns Pavia color #238 Viscose/Polyamide fiber -(color: Peach) picture on the rim of the bowl only 3 of them in this picture This is much like MicroSpun but softer. At first glance you see the warm peachy color but look closely and se that the fiber is made from a very smal tread woven to make a much more weighted yarn. After this we were trying to make up the blue in the virigated base color. As we dug through even more bins over and over again we found TrendSetter Yarns Siam #5780 Cotton/Polyamid (color rusty) This was easy to match up with the virigated plus the unique look to the fiber is very interesteding almost like ric-rac with polyamid hang on in places. The next 2 colors were hard to find. First we wanted a blue but it had to be the right blue and we still needed a gold. We still needed a mohair like fiber and a furry fiber. We found a gold and carried most of the morning with our yarns as we were on the eternal search for the right shade of blue. I like colors and go for the dark colors but Marva is fantastic with colors. She is an Interior decorator by day and avid knitter by night. So we searched and search. We kept going back to TrendSetters Yarn Siam in a blue but we want to find another fiber. We finially decided it was the best blue we could find to make our varigated. So we got Trendsetter Yarns Siam #5772 coton/polyamid (color sky blue). We then were on the hunt for the last color and that was the gold. As we ventured away from the Bag Sale at the Yarn Lady we went into the massive store. WOW... I had to restrain myself from going NUTZ... all the colors in the rainbow... LOL We searched and searched and finaly found the gold and the fur all in one yarn. Lang Yarns Fox #128.0011 (color gold) this was the right fur we wanted and the right tone of gold. only 1 skein needed for each of us. notice in the upper left above the virigated in the bowl you see a little top of the fur. We have our project... and now we just need to get the pattern. The pattern was at our Local Yarn Store "Creative Persuits" but that would have to wait. On with shopping.

Full View of my Stash from the Yarn Lady Bag Sale

Here is a smaller view of just my damage of our fieldtrip to 5 yarn stores yesterday... Yeap count them 5 stores. I refrained myself from shopping at 2 of the stores but it was so hard... I thought they were going to have to pry my charge cards from my cold dead hands... LOL But Here is the count as of last night: 3 full bags of TrendSetter Yarn 2 of which will be shared with others in my stitching group. 1 bag of Noro. 1 skein of cascade Pastaza which was the wrong dye lot complete worthless. 1 skein of Foxy Fun Fur to be used with the wrap we are all making. 2 more skeins of Cascade from another store and 2 more varigated Cascade skeins from the same store. 1 pattern from our local yarn store and lots and lots of fun. I will tell you more about each stores as I have some time. They were all very very wonderful and I can not wait to go back but I must finish a project or 2 before I do that again... LOL

Yarn from our Yarn Field Trip (Yarn Lady Bag Sale)

Yeap... look at those heaps! Heaps and heaps of bags from the Yarn Lady Bag sale yesterday. I have to tell you how much fun I had going to all our fun places yesterday. The next few post will explain about all our fun. The yarn bag pictured here are not just mine but 4 peoples fun shopping for yarn in the Southern California area. We started at Yarn Lady and that is where most of my damage was done. 3 of us decided to split several bags of yarn to make a wrap with. I also was able to find some noro as that was what I was going down there for. My idea of only spending 20.00 bucks was rediculous... Ya right. But here is the start of all our fun. Thanks to Christy, Marva, Nancy and myself we will be on a high fiber diet for a few days.. LOL after this fun.

Moebieus Completed - Hand Dyed Cotton Ribbon

Just another vision of my Moebius. I am so excited. I want to wear it right now but I have to wait. First think that I made for myself that I actually like and will wear.

Moebius Completed - "A Treasury of Magical Knitting"

My first moebius is completed just in time I am going to be wearing this on Saturday when we venture down to Laguna Hills, CA for the Yarn Lady bag sale. This is from the book "A treasury of Magical Knitting" it was so easy and quick. The twisted is not grafted but this is the way it works with the Moebius technique. You work the top and bottom all at once. I think a total of 3 days and one of those days I had a huge bbq and the other day I was getting ready for the bbq. They yarn I used was cotton ribbon that I had hand dyed myself. I am very happy with the out come of it. Tell me what you think.

Patriotic Buttonhole Bag Cast On

Yeap onther cast on it is totally against my religion to cast on something when I have not finished something but time is ticking and I was so inspired by someones patriotic buttonhole purse that I had to make one. I am going to do a little different. I am going to have 13 stripes of red and white all together for the belly of the bag and then I am goion to finish with blue at the top of the buttonhole bag. This is what I got finished so far as of yesterday.

5 Stranded Diagonal Baby Blanket Cast On

Here is my latest work. I am working on. Casted on my first baby blanket (Knitted that is). I am making the Lion Brand Diagonal Baby Blanket using Red Heart Baby. My adaption is that I am going to be using all 5 strands at once with a size 19US 29" cirucular needle (Quick and painless) I have to have it finished by June 11, 2005 so I wanted something simple and quick. The Acrylic Gods will be happy. It is for my Niece who is expecting in November but her shower is on the 11th of this month... Nothing like lots of notice.