Hedgehog Knits

Adventures in knitting from the eastern edge of Canada.

Saturday, February 21, 2009

Not So Much on the Road, but Knitting Anyway

I'm supposed to be in Toronto right now. I had some meetings to attend, and was planning to spend a little recreational knitterly time with Glenna and Martha. But alas, a snowstorm interrupted my plans, and my flight was canceled. Given the level of service that Air Canada has become known for around these parts, they were unable to reschedule me to fly within a reasonable period (i.e. before the date when I was supposed to return!), so I'm grounded at home. Too bad, as I was really looking forward to visiting the Purple Purl and also shopping for new hiking boots - the shopping options in St. John's are somewhat limited.

It hasn't been all bad though. I got to go snowshoeing yesterday in the aftermath of the storm - finally we have enough snow. Also, I've been attending those meetings by teleconference. I can't knit at when I'm there in person, but when I'm attending from my couch at home, there are no such limitations. I knit a whole sock yesterday, and nobody on the other end of the speakerphone knew any better.

Stripey socks, improvised pattern, 70 st in stockinette on 2.25 mm bamboo dpns.

I also seamed up my finished Trellis baby cardigan this week.

Trellis, knitted in Lion Brand Cotton Ease, on 4 mm and 4.5 mm circs.

My only change to this pattern was to knit the bands at the bottom and sleeves on a smaller needle size. Looking at photos on Ravelry, I noticed that a lot of people ended up with bigger, puckered moss stitch bands, and there's still a hint of that in mine, that I'm hoping a final blocking will take care of (I blocked the pieces once already, prior to seaming). I think the smaller needle size helped to reduce the puckering significantly. If I were to knit this again, I would do the fronts and back in one piece up to the armholes. There are a lot of bulky seams for such a small sweater, that could be reduced.

I rushed to get this finished because I was going to see the intended recipient in Toronto this weekend. I guess now I'll have to mail it. Just as soon as I get some buttons.

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Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Knitting on the Road

A quick post from the suburbs of Houston. Both my hotel and the facility where my course is being held are located in Katy Mills, which is essentially an enormous shopping mall surrounded by big-box stores, chain restaurants, and Interstate 10. Needless to say, this is a purpose-driven visit, not a vacation!

As the neighbourhood does not offer much in the way of culture to take in, there has been significant knitting progress.

This is my Trellis baby cardigan in progress:


It's just zipping along. Luckily I brought along JoJo too, in case I get this finished before my return home. I can't imagine anything worse than a full day of flying with nothing to knit!

Last evening I went exploring the enormous shopping mall next door. In a store called Books-A-Million (How could I not check that out?!), I found this little gem:


I don't know why I've never heard of this book before, other than perhaps that it's very new (published in 2008). I haven't examined it in too much detail yet, but it appears to have very clear diagrammatic instructions for toe-up socks, including multiple cast-ons, and both short-row and flap heels, and a handful of patterns at the back. As I have struggled with my couple of attempts at toe-up socks thus far, I think this may be a useful little addition to my collection.

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Sunday, February 01, 2009

And Now We Return to Baby Knitting

After that brief quilting interlude (there will be more quilting to come, rest assured), I have finally settled on a fun new knitting project. Since I still need one or two girly baby sweaters to keep up with the ongoing run of new babies in the family, and I enjoyed knitting JoJo so much last time, I decided to knit another one. Or maybe two - I seem to like being on a roll with things lately. This pattern is great, full of great little details, and it knits up really quickly considering that it's sock yarn.

Those are the two fronts. The yarn is all Norwegian: the bands are in SandnesGarn Sisu, and the main section is another fun colourway of Drops Fabel. The colours are a bit off in this photo, but as we've had a snowstorn here today, the light hasn't been good. The colour that looks like yellowish mud in the photo is actually closer to peach.

I'll be packing up some travel knitting soon. I'm off to Houston in a week for work, and then shortly after, another quick trip to Toronto. I think it might be time for a lace project...

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