COWLABUNGA!

It feels like playing dress-up with color. I needed an all purpose neckwarmer that would go with anything in my wardrobe and this fills the bill. Purples, pinks, orangey reds, aqua, green, lavender. Just about everything but yellow.

Wear it loose or fastened and feature the color of the garment or its contrast.

Knit in seed stitch it integrates the changing yarns for a better blend. I used alternating hand dyed yarns, two rows of each and changed colors every 2"-3". This left me with lots of ends to weave in, but worth it.

Pattern: Leftover merino hand dyed sock yarns, such as Koigu, Sophie's Toes or Yarn2dye4

Size 3 Addi turbo circular needles

Crochet cast on 60 stitches to facilitate the three needle bind off at the end.

Knit in Seed Stitch: Right side-K1, P1, Wrong side-P1,K1, until desired length.

Join with three needle bind off.

Slippers into Socks

These slippers are often seen on knitting sites and knitting books and are kind of a puzzle to make. See these directions which are in Finnish, but the picture tells it all.

Are you back yet?

Looks simple here shown in parts, but really does anyone really want to be sewing these together?

Why can't we just knit them in one piece?

So that question got under my skin today and I had to make them without having to sew squares together. While I was at it, I thought why can't I make the same pattern into a sock?

IT WORKED!!

I kept trying it on as each mitered diamond was added and knew from my recent mitered mittens how to make a tube from these units. But when it came to the heel I had to go on faith that everything would be molded to my the shape of my foot. Feet are not square, yet all the parts of this sock are. Knitting is just amazing to me.

This Side view shows a pretty shallow heel, yet it does gain stretch from the adjacent side diamonds. The diamonds for the ankle are partnered with mitered triangles front and back, and then the cuff is picked up from that flat top part. I used these several yarns and did not cut one thread. I know I will not be using this as an actual garment, so I can unravel these and knit them with the good yarn that I do plan to wear.

Since I had the squares from my mitered mitten study lying around, I started with those and just kept adding squares, picking up stitches from the previous square. Looking at the pictures of the slippers above told me when and where to pick up stitches to make the heel.

The underside of the sock.

Pattern: This is a study and uses worsted weight wool, size 5 dpns and is based on a 25 stitch mitered square. The gauge is 3.5"on the diagonal and 2.5" as the base of the square. (Square and diamond are the same thing in this case). See this pattern for the directions and use the pictures above for the placement of each square.

Knitters!

For a few weeks I have been on the search, doing detective work, to find a knitting group to join and perhaps make some friends. Now I have found three! And maybe one or two more...

The one I attended yesterday was LOUD which I loved, because it engenders enthusiasm and lifts the spirits when you have to shout across the table to be heard. Nutty? Yup.

The thing about knitters for me is that there is very little competition. If you are a beginner, there will be plenty of helpers, and if you are fabulously expert, you will inspire others and offer
hints that help everyone. No one cares what you are making as long as you are enjoying it. (and where did you buy that yarn?)

For a stiff competitor like me, this is a good change of pace. I can be relaxed and just do my thing and listen...learn... and maybe make friends. My only problem is that I live so darn far away. There are no nearby groups, so I do have the hour's drive to get to them.

This group met in the Hobby Lobby in Hixson (where I managed to browse and not make a purchase!) and right nearby is the library which would work out just great for me, not to mention TJMAXX and Panera. O dear. Am I going for the extras or the group?

Another Knitting Group

I frogged yesterday's knit and began anew. Nothing like the first one, but I have a good idea for this one, so far anyway.

And I am off to try another new knitting group which meets today in Hixson, and may include some gals I have already met. As you may know, the knitting group from the quilt shop ended when the shop closed, so hopefully some of them have been absorbed by this new group.

The directions for these mittens are now written and available here.

Sometimes a Great Notion...

...turns out to be a dopey idea. This looked good in the sketch, but the colors really aren't working together as I had hoped and so this will not become the neckwarmer, shawlette, collar or scarf or other finished but never-worn project.

But all is not lost. I discovered a better idea as I worked this and maybe I will have the fortitude to follow through. I really do like the long pointed rectangles, started here. I think they could be repeated, one attached to the previous one until a scarf is formed. Or not.

And I do love the yarn, just not all together in one project.

It must be my old age that has quenched the need for all colors, all the time. I do love looking at them, but I guess it's a case of been there done that which prevents me from repeating and repeating this same theme.

Hard to resist yarn candy. But experience being the great teacher, I know I would much rather have a garment or accessory that is less carnival and more coordinated.

So I will be frogging this experiment and will have nothing but neat little short yardage balls of yarn to show for my day of work. I am not upset. I know it's all in the process and if I learned something valuable, it was worth it.

Today I may finally plant the hosta that I bought in August. The leaves have all died off, so planting them just will be digging a hole and emptying the pots, with nothing on top to show for it. But I know (if the voles don't get them) something good will come of this work, eventually.

I am sensing a theme...

Busy Sunday

Since I was unable to find the sock weight yarn in the colors I needed it was time to clear the kitchen counters and dye it myself. It was a beautiful day so I hung the skeins to dry on our plant hangers outside. This rainbow skein is BFL (Blue Faced Leicester) which is slightly less springy than my Sheila's Sock yarns above, but I have had the skein forever, and figured why not dye it now? I am going to use it with the lime, orange, pink and purples above and the aqua, turquoise and kelly I already have in my stash. I don't know what the project is...yet.

But the mittens came out great. A nice fit too. Each diamond takes about ten minutes, and there are about ten (some are half diamonds) and the cuff and thumb are about 30 minutes to complete, making it easy to make a mitten while watching tv at night.

However, I redid the first thumb about four times and ditto on the cuff. The second mitten was a snap compared to the first. What I should have done was to work this out with a single yarn and save myself all the ends-weavings. Live and learn. I will try again and make a pattern, since I had to do this without one.

And then...I did the Turkey Lasagna dress rehersal too. It turned out really yummy and only took an hour to cook. Fastest Thanksgiving main dish ever. Here's the recipe:

Turkey Lasagna

(Trying to look and cook like Sandra Lee)

1 package of Honeysuckle Turkey Cutlets (five in a package)

1 big bag of Pepperidge Farm Cornbread Stuffing Mix

1 stick of butter melted into 2 cups of Swanson Chicken Broth

(reserve the rest of the 32 oz size)

1 pound of Jimmy Dean Hot Pork Sausage, cooked and crumbled in food processor

3 cored Gala apples, crumbled in food processor

1 small onion finely chopped in food processor

1 cup plumped raisins

In a baking dish ( I used a deep dish pie pan) pour a small amount of broth to prevent sticking and arrange 3 cutlets to cover the pan. Add some dressing and the remaining cutlets and top with more dressing. Pour a small amount of broth over all and top with foil.

Bake for 45 minutes at 350 and remove foil. Brown for 15 minutes and serve.

I only used about a third of the dressing and froze the rest for the real meal.

The turkey was moist and fully cooked, and the dressing was great. BUT AND THIS IS A BIG BUT...there is no gravy with this method. I am a mashed potatoes and gravy girl, so I am left wanting.

I am still on the case...

A Beautiful November Day

I left home at 8:30 to go to Chattanooga and the mist was still hanging in the low spots below the hilltops. I pulled over to the roadside to shoot these pictures. It was warm in the sun but the cold air held its moisture in the valleys.

Going downhill into the clouds.

In Chattanooga I found this house with Scarlet Runner Beans as porch cover. This is an annual which I have in my garden, in the dark shade, so it never grew like this. I will gather seeds and find a sunnier spot and see if I can get a monster like this next year.

The knitting group I joined was lots of fun, and we are of 'like minds' politically. In fact I sorta had to pass a test to join. My opinions matched, so I am in. Phew!

I met with my sister for a chat afterward and then I had to go to the Genuine Purl for some hot pink, yellow, lime green and purple fingering weight yarns. Nada. I bought nothing. I will just have to dye up my own.

My First Mittens

Hard to believe that I have avoided mittens all this time. Something about wanting to make mittens as Christmas gifts a few years ago and being told by a friend "No one wears mittens" stopped me dead in my tracks. But it was nippy the other day and I wished I had a pair stashed in my car for the ice cold steering wheel I faced. So I scoured Ravelry (that addictive knitting site) and found this easy pattern. Vroom, one hour later (big fat yarn and big fat needles) I had my mitten done. Yawn. Where was the challenge? Even the dreaded thumb turned out to be nothing tricky. Sigh. I want a puzzle.

Back to Ravelry where I found just the thing. Mitered Mittens!! Woowoo.

O oh. No pattern.

How hard could it be?

Out comes the scrap yarns and after a few false starts I think I have deduced the directions.

The front and back of my version of the mittens, with just a couple of triangles and a cuff to add.

The yarn is worsted, and they are VERY warm. Especially since today it will be in the 70's.

But I am happy to have an interesting project since I plan to attend a new knitting club today. This is the one I sussed out last week which meets at the artisanal bread store/cafe Niedlov's across the street from where my sister works.

If I were a novel writer I couldn't have come up with a more serendipitous location. You know how I love bread, and this place is way kool, (free wi-fi) and with any luck I may meet some new friends who are nutty for knitting too. I'm bringing my camera.

A Quilting Visit with Jill

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Jill is one of the members of the Dead Plants Society group that I have attended several times in Sewanee TN. She is also a great quilter, with oodles of nine patches (hundreds, really) that she makes into bed quilts. She also has a Janome 6600 and we got together to play a bit with free motion quilting. Her fabulous new studio is currently half finished so we worked in her living room which is set up as the temporary studio.

I showed her a few of my not well guarded secrets and she was instantly fabulous. I am sure she didn't need my help, but it was fun to teach a little private lesson.

On my way home I stopped at a yard sale, in which only books were offered. $10 bought me 40 new mystery/thrillers. I may have to return as I got a couple of duplicates. Greedy little me!

But seriously, one day this week I must stay home and clean house and attend to the ever present laundry.

Baktus Beret

The yarn made me do it.

I still had leftovers of my hand dyed sock yarn and the rest of the bin of colors from my Simon Cowl, so why not make a matching hat? I got the idea from this hat that had this picot edge and as a last resort I read the directions and that told me how to do it. I changed it to garter and two colors so it would coordinate. Make the band first (try it on to fit our your head) and pick up stitches along the finished closed band. Then knit a while, like maybe two inches and divide evenly for decreases. I had 147, which made seven sections of 21 stitches to start.

O yeah. You take a picture this early in the morning...

I love those spiraling decreases. The link to the hat that inspired me is not available except as a Ravelry download, so interested parties must join Ravelry to get it.

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Back to the quilting: In order to have a feel for what I am doing I make a careful sketch, and then totally disregard it as I begin to make the design. I had the autumnal colors in mind, but this combo ended up looking more like Spring than November. Not enough burnished reds, oranges and darker greens. O well.

Sister's Play Day

We got so much accomplished in a very short time. We cut, ironed and sewed bunches of parts, mostly half square triangles for a proposed 2 for 1 quilt idea, that is barely fleshed out in my mind, but it may happen. See it here when it does.

I had to look up my own tutorial on Half Square Triangles-Fast ( in the sidebar) and my first set I made wrong and had to unpick the stitches. I am way rusty as a piecer.

We will both be making these at home in the meantime. They may start out looking perfectly square, but I doubt they will end up that way in our finished tops.

Lots of fabrics to work through and not a very clear idea of what we'll need until more of the blocks are made.
We also figured out what we are going to make for our First Family Thankgiving Dinner Together. All caps, you'll notice. We come from a not very close family and are trying to remedy that, even if it only half of us that will attend.

The menu? We decided not to do a big turkey because we are cooking in Brooke's apartment kitchen this year, so we came up with this brainstorm: Turkey Lasagna.

It's not what you think.

WE don't have a recipe but are not letting that stop us. We think: Turkey Cutlets layered with dressing, layered with more cutlets, and dressing and baked. What do you think? Sounds easy and quick and make ahead, kinda.

And after we had lunch on the patio (72 degrees in November!) I had Brooke show me some crochet stuff that I needed to learn.

Picot edging for my knits, and using crochet to start a knit hat. Isn't that cute, so far? The hole lets out the steam, methinks.
I learned to crochet from our dad who learned how to in the TB sanatorium after WWII, imagine that. He taught me all the stuff but not the names of things, so I have not been able to follow a pattern because I didn't know what anything was called. Brooke does and will be giving me a book explaining all. She crochets, doesn't like knitting. O well. To each her own.

Pssst! There's a giveaway on Candy's new website here.

Simon Cowl

A knit so nice I made it twice!

Well, I had all the leftovers which I loved from the last Baktus Scarf, so my new piece is just a smaller version of the previous. It is knit flat and joined into the cowl with a three needle bind-off, made simple with a crochet cast-on that unzips, exposing live stitches.

I am getting better at mirror photography.

In case it ever gets really cold, or I have to rob a bank, I have just the accessory.

And of course it can be worn as a turtleneck too. I wanted the vertical striping and also wanted it to flare out at the bottom, so I added short rows every 5-7 ridges. (this will be explained in the pattern, later).

You may be able to see the short rows in this picture. Essentially one knits part way down the row and turns the work (wrapping the last stitch) and then knits back to the start, turn and knit that row back, picking up the wrapped stitch. I have pictures in the pattern here.

Today I will be playing with fabric in the studio with my sister Brooke. Or at least that's the plan. So I had to get this finished and put away the yarn (again) and change my thinking to fabric...whaddya bet we see these same colors in the work today?

Anne Lullie comes to visit

It's as if I only have famous people visit me. Anne was teaching at a quilt guild in Crossville TN so she and her husband Joe took a few days to drive around our state and see how beautiful it is. Then they stopped here for a short visit. Anne is showing me her hand dyed jacket, which is adorable, if you ask me.

She brought some of her newer pieces to show me, and I am apologetic for the bad fotos. Go to her website to see them in all their glory.

They were here for such a short time, but we managed to get caught up, have lunch and then it was all over. Good fun.

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Meanwhile back at the ranch...Sometime ago I joined a knitting group at the late great Stone Light quilt shop in Soddy Daisy. I missed a few meetings because of my knee problems and then the shop closed and the knitting group went with it. Pooh! Just when I am ready to get back to the group. So I asked around and found out that there is another group that meets at Niedlov's Breadworks in Chattanooga on Saturdays. They have a cafe and yummy wonderful bread-y things and I am bound to attend next week.

Now here's the thing. This bread bakery is across the street from the shop where my sister Brooke works. I had read about them in Southern Living Magazine and visited it when we went to see her workplace and now it turns out to be the place to knit. Could this be where I meet my new friends to fill that social gap-a-tosis I am having? We'll see.

I'll be wearing my new Baktus Scarf.

Now that's the colorway for me.

I especially like the way the alternate yarns are carried along the edge. It makes for a neat finish.

This was gonna be my last knit for a while, as I have put away my yarn. But then I had another idea I have to get out of my system before I really focus on other things. Isn't that just the way these things go?

I changed my mind

Compare these two pictures. What was I thinking with that brown???

The top picture is much more in keeping with EVERYTHING I do, wear, quilt, paint etc.

I frogged the brown/multi scarf start, and dug in my stash for leftovers and found lots of brights to play off my hand dyed yarn.

This is more like it. Although I have a ton of pink yarn, none of it is sock weight, so I may have to augment my selections by dyeing some small batch of pink/red. 30 minutes + drying time is all it takes.

And this morning I located this nice IKEA container to carry it all around with me. Just right.

Again I am knitting the Baktus scarf. (#3, if and when it is finished) It turns out to be just the right weight for wearing around my neck around the house. Sock (yarn) for my neck. And it is so mindless to knit, which is why I am using so many yarns; to make it interesting.