cutesy

picture july.

a girl walks into a yarn store.

she finds three gorgeous skeins of hand-dyed sock-weight yarn. on sale. and on a very generous sale too, she mumbles ecstatically to herself whilst attempting not to foam from her mouth like a rabid dog. she's been looking for the perfect fingering-weight yarn for a certain cardigan for ages, and this is it. she buys all three skeins and trots happily along.

unable to postpone the merryment of starting a new project she casts on, thinking it will be finished in a couple of weeks.

well. it wasn't.

instead, it lay practically unaffected on my (as you, my cunning reader, may already have inferred) dining table for five months after the sizing/frogging disaster that left me so emotionally drained that i wouldn't have pissed on it if it's kidneys were on fire. or something. i've been reading too much stephen fry lately. point is i didn't want to have anything to do with it. i was only able to muster up a couple of rows at a time.

but one night after christmas, having finally become sick of looking at the messy ball of fabric on my table, mocking me and reminding me how much i suck at all things unpleasant, i somehow summoned up enough willpower and stamina to knit the remaining sleeve. i just sat there watching five hours worth of TV and squeezed the thing out of me like some morbid life-to-hairy-purple-things-giver.

so allow me to introduce...

smaragd by svetlana volkova

ravelry link

size makeshift xs

araucania ranco (300g / 2.5-3mm)

i know i sound like a broken record here, but after all the clusterfucks this top-down cardigan put me through i'm really really happy with the result. it's a defining characteristic of my knitting to be completely unenjoyable to make but in the end satisfy me on all levels but the sexual one. and sometimes that too. why is it that i always associate woolly things with sex?

see? boobs.

i love the lace part although i couldn't find a way to block it properly to really open up the stitches. but i'm sure it'll even out in use. and the color is pretty awesome, which can only be attributed to my impeccable eye and the uncharacteristically far-sighted idea to knit alternately from all three skeins. it was pure torture all the way but in the end it produced an amazing flow of the slightly different tones that works really well with the otherwise boring stockinette. shows too how variegated the colors can be in handdyed yarns.

starting the cardigan twice from scratch was a devastating decision that resulted in me smashing stuff and swearing something along the lines of "i'll never fuckin' touch those fuckin' needles again". both times. but eventually it rewarded me like it always does because now it fits like a dream with no excess fabric in the top part. originally i was making the smallest size but it was still too big for me so i deleted one vertical lace chart repeat (8 instead of 9) and cast on 122 stitches instead of 131. it's only 11 stitches less, but just enough to turn a purple burlap sack into something that makes me look all lovely and stuff.

even the model is doing the twirl,
and only partly because i forced her to

so once again i've succeeded in making something completely awesome. i rule. i totally rule. bow down to me i'm the queen of knittingdom YE-HEARGH.

many many thanks to miss A for modeling!

lessons in finnish

christmas came. and went. with some scattered fun in between. i'm supposed to be at work right now, tackling rabid bargain-hunting yarnbuyers with all sorts of pointy sticks, but i've been sick with flu since dec 20. so i'm not.

instead, i'm at home taking these pseudoartistic pictures
of random christmas decorations and our crappy christmas weather

most of the presents i gave this year consisted of these reflectors, because i'm poor and lazy. i crocheted them (poorly and lazily) with 1.5mm reflecting tape, a whole bunch of mouline yarns, and the occasional glitter thread, because life instantly gets better once glitter is involved.

as such.

to my astonishment i've been hearing most people outside finland don't even know what a reflector is. to all of you still in the dark, literally, i reply with a popular finnish colloquialism, "kato vittu googlesta". (you probably won't find it in your regular dictionary.) and point you towards my etsy shop, where they shall be yours to buy after the new year. ish.

i also made a pair of stripey-noro-ripoff socks for my brother, but the receiving end made like a banana and split before i had a chance to photograph them. an elusive fella, he is.

speaking of photographs, you know the word my dad uses instead of "photographing" in finnish? "ikuistaa". which translates roughly as "foreverize". how darling is that?

plus i've finally been able to finish a certain knitting nightmare that's haunted me since july. believe me when i say there's a definite (and often inevitable) point at which an enjoyable, therapeutic project becomes a poe-esque tangle of gore and horror that makes you lose sleep, hair and all the other things you value most (although besides sleep and hair i can't think of any). but it's over now. just that getting someone to photograph it for me may well take another six months. so i should return with a FO post sometime next summer. but in the meantime, have a foreverization of said piece doing a nice relaxing soak in my bathroom sink.

is that the squirmy sound of anticipation i hear?

metal on metal

let me tell you about my brother.

he's kind. he's pretty. he takes me to heavy metal gigs and refuses to let me pay for anything. in fact, he's just so freakin' awesome that it transcends all of my usual pseudo-witty commentary. so without any further gimmicky introduction i'm just gonna blurt it out that he wanted a grey chunky modern-looking scarf, and i made him one.

anvil scarf by me

ravelry link

size 17 x 160cm

lana grossa alta moda cashmere (150g / 6mm)

the name comes from the kick-ass documentary anvil! the story of anvil which served as some sort of inspiration when i was designing and swatching the scarf. check out the woolly headgear of the uncompromising canadian metal heroes and you'll see what i mean.

i love the finished diagonal (and reversible!) look and apparently the dear bro likes it too. for once i totally nailed a custom order!

i decided not to block it to keep it as rustic and unpolished as possible, and to make sure the yarn retains its volume. again it would've smoothened some of the unevenness of the stitches, but i think the rough and bulky look works better here.

it was a super fast knit too, only took two nights with 6mm needles. the yarn is really soft and the chain structure makes for an interesting texture, but for some reason it feels like acrylic to me even though it's supposed to be 80% merino and 20% cashmere. i'm thinking the infamous debbie bliss scam here. surely the germans wouldn't lie..?

the pattern is available if anyone wants it, so leave a comment if you're interested.

otherwise he will come and EAT YOUR BRAIN

saffronian success

you know that feeling when you've entered a project thinking, "there's no way in god's name this thing is ever gonna work out"?

and the amount of sheer ecstatic orgastic joy when you realize that, against every single possible odd in the universe, it does?

saffron by me (!)

ravelry link

rowan creative focus worsted (60g / 4mm)

i had absolutely no expectations of success when i cast on the stitches. i didn't even know how many i would need for a good fit. if you've read any of my previous posts regarding my giant trapezoid head, you know that fitting hats for my head is an epic exercise in futility. none of the supposed slouchy models work for me. i just end up with six tons of excess fabric in the neck. and a couple of self-inflicted broken bones.

but after approximately 15 years of making hats that don't fit it occurred to me to use short rows to make the front longer than the back. which i did. and added a nice braided cable to the side. and ended up with the single most awesome piece of headgear i've ever owned. it's so freakin' gorgeous that i'm in a compulsive need to get undressed and run back and forth main street wearing nothing but this hat and the curly winter hair on my legs. i don't know what else to do with these waves of completely unexpected pleasure rushing through me right now.

i may look calm but inside i'm going OH YEAH GIVE IT TO ME BABY

everything just went right with this piece. the yarn is awesome and has the exact right tone of yellow. blocking made it drape beautifully and smoothened the stitches except for some of the wrap&turn rows that are more prominent than others. but then again, hand-knitted items won't look as polished as machine-knitted ones, and why should they? this one screams "NO CHILD LABOR USED" from a thousand miles away.

ravelry has more detailed info on the construction. i will be writing the pattern out at some point so leave a comment or something if you're interested.

oh, and here's something i picked up at a local book fair.

http://pulpcovers.com/?tag=drugs

why yes, that is a picture of me taken around three weeks ago. although i'd be inclined to leave the question mark out.

props to miss M for the photos!

thermis

as promised, here's some actual knitting i've been able to finish lately.

my friend turned 26. i wanted to make her something nice for the winter. enter thermis.

thermis by kris knits

ravelry link

size small

cascade 220 (90g / 4mm)

the pattern infamously has gauge errors that still haven't been corrected, but having a decent level of common sense helps. the finished piece is pretty nifty, although next time i'll probably cast on a few stitches less to make it more close-fitting. i couldn't find the right type of buttons in any store, but sort of accidentally came across an age-old cardigan in my closet that had exactly the ones i was looking for. off with their heads! they look better now than ever.

and blocking made the 220 look really good too. the surface is smooth and even and makes the thermal stitch more visible. not all yarns actually benefit that much from blocking, in my knitting at least. or maybe it's just that i can't see the difference with my beady little eyes. yeah. that's probably it.

but anyway, the recipient seems happy (notice how you can't see the shotgun pointing at her?) so i guess this one falls unexpectedly into the job-well-done category.

but i'm still in a desperate, frustrating need of a better camera. not a single photo comes out that doesn't need 20 minutes of color tweaking. it drives me insane. so someone please fix my fuckin' ass (positively no pun intended) for good so i can finally get a job and money and a killer EOS or something. thank you.

back on track

please excuse the pseudoartistic tree hugger crap of the previous post. i had to do something. not being able to knit for almost two weeks made me delusional. that and painkillers. sweet opioidic mind-numbing BFF painkillers.

but i finally got some essential supplies on saturday and immediately made a pair of socks. oh god how good it felt. like taking a shower after spending 12 days in a broken porta-potty. and with a critically placed 7 inch wound that's not supposed to get wet for the first 15 days, i'm only half joking.

kiertoradalla by tiina kuu

ravelry link

size 37

cascade heritage (70g / 2.5mm)

they were presented to and modeled here by my sister-in-law, who graciously waited for 4+ months for me to darn the previous pair i made her, which i ended up... uh, never doing... because, well... i just didn't feel like it. the patience some people have for my idio-moronic-syncracies astounds me.

i also messed up the stitch count somewhere around the heel area (although i refuse to claim full responsibility for it, the pattern was at times just way out there), making the lace pattern uneven between the two socks, but see how cunningly i took the pictures so you can't tell? and therefore still consider me a competent and admirable knitter?

i didn't have time to block them either. so i'm not super happy with the way they turned out. but at least i got to knit something. and more important, i'm back on her favorite people list, which will come in handy around christmastime.

p.s. armageddon made me cry. again.

project infinity

a friend of mine came up to me in march.

"can you make me a lace scarf for my sister's wedding?" she asked. "of course", i replied, with a magnificent halo of professional knittingdom above my head. "i can do anything."

so she bought a pattern and some super fancy silk yarn, and told me to do my thing.

i went home, sat down and said, "gee willikers". well, something to the effect. beginning with the letter F.

i'm not very smart, you see. any work that requires active usage of the brain scares me. combine that with a whole lot of chart repetition, which hardly appeals to my tragic attention span and TV knitter habits, and you've got yourself a nice little shit sandwich.

but i boldly took up the challenge anyway, and after mere six months of extreme procrastination and subsequent consuming guilt the scarf is finally done. and i'm ready for some serious compliments, people. lie if necessary.

tuomi by milja uimonen

ravelry link

size 28 x 200 cm

bc garn silkbloom extra fino (90g / 3.5mm)

i'm really happy with it too. really. i am. the yarn wasn't exactly an orgastic joyride to knit but works great in the finished piece. all shiny and excessive. i made 28 repeats of the chart and together with a rather violent blocking ended up with spot-on two meters of lacey drapeness.

but where the designer (and other normal balanced individuals) sees flowers, i see angry bees. for some completely non-freudian reasons, i'm sure.

i'm still not hugely and obsessively in love with lace for aforementioned reasons, but i do like the part where i get to say "finished" and get unconditional admiration from people who can't or won't knit themselves (and who thus don't know any better). and of course it's nice to be able to make something and then sell it for an outrageous price donate it benevolently to someone who appreciates it.

but the biggest mystery about this whole thing is how my friend knew what she's going to wear for the wedding 18 months in advance. because it won't be held until fall 2012. very, very not girly-like. in fact, i'm not sure she's a girl at all. i check myself regularly. maybe she should too.

clockwork awesome

yes. i do appreciate the irony in the fact that i've basically replaced one genre of skinny white guys singing about their feelings (nu-metal) with another genre of skinny white guys singing about their feelings (indie).

now let's never talk about it again.

as for today's topic, let me just take a moment here and revel in the magnificent sunshine of this following piece of yarny artwork.

clockwork by stephen west

ravelry link

mokkasukka sasu & austermann step (80g & 50g / 3.5mm)

dear stephen. i think you're a genious, and also kind of hot. please write more patterns so that i can send you money and used panties flowers.

which is not to overlook the supreme keanu reeves type excellence of the yarn. mokkasukka will change your life. get some. like, now.

also feel free to worship my shirt, which is awesome.

awesome, i said.

my man paulie

you know paulie.

he's the type of dude that's all over you. like, really gets under your skin. he's kind of hairy. a little prickly. and smells funny too. it was love at first sight, sure, but later you've come to realize he can be a real asshole sometimes. on a good day he's all warm and fluffy, on a bad day you want to stab him in the face.

but still he keeps hangin' around, and you like it. kind of. sort of.

paulie by isabell kraemer

ravelry link

size modified small

fortissima alpaka & drops baby merino (270g & 50g / 2.5mm)

yes it's me in a skirt, get over it

i made some modifications to both the size and style, because let's face it, no man nor cardigan could ever satisfy me the way god intended them to. i started out with size small but realized it would be too small, so i added a couple of increase rounds and regular garter rounds before separating the sleeves. then i knitted all the way down, finished the hem and added the collar and front bands, went "oh god not again", and started over.

i didn't like the garter hems so i made a wide ribbing instead. at first the edge seemed to flip over because of the wide stockinette parts, but binding off from the wrong side makes it sit nicer. left out the waist shaping too, because as you can see i have absolutely no waist anyway. pretending i do would be cheating, and cheating is lying and lying makes you sterile.

"eww, there's nature in here"

for some reason the front garter parts seem to bulge out a little. it's not that it's too wide. i guess garter just doesn't work with my saggy boobs. also the collar won't fold stay folded like it's supposed to. and the left sleeve is wider than the right. what else? oh yeah, i sewed the buttons at the wrong places. point it out and die.

i dare you

but paulie grows on you. like most guys do. and by most i mean anyone who tells me i'm pretty.

hit the jump for more info and photos.

from me to you

welcome to the family, sweetheart.

holy cow(l)

i like cowls. my friends like cowls too. so i made a bunch.

(also i'm taking a short break from cardigans because seriously, one more of these knit-like-a-fruitcake-for-seven-days-then-realize-it's-all-been-for-nothing experiences and i will start hurting myself. and others.)

this first one is yet another willow thingy for a friend with some unexpected preferences in color. i had to order the yarn for this number all the way from the U.S. because, for some incomprehensible reason, the requested combination of pinks, limes and yellows is not readily available in regular merino color charts.

it's 100% "twisty" type of merino with different shades in each ply. according to the nice lady who dyed it, the color is called "spring in bloom". i'd be more inclined to use the term "skitsovärjätty" (look it up) instead, but i'm terrified my friend will punch me in the mouth if i say such things out loud. so i won't. phew.

then there's the cowl i made for myself with the yarn that i'm totally prepared to have immediate sweet sex with in case such an endeavour ever becomes physically possible, koigu kpm. the color is so perfect that i'm stumped for words. no human language is worthy of its splendour. and the best thing is it only took one 50g hank, so i still have one hank left! ye-heargh!

tidepool by cayli harris

ravelry link

koigu kpm (50g / 3mm)

i wasn't sure about the sizing because i like my cowls very close-fitting, so just to be safe i deleted one of the chart columns and cast on with 99 stitches instead of 110. which turned out super. the upper body part is long enough so it can be folded (like in the first photo) for extra warmth, or pulled up to the ears for extra coverage. managed to avoid the death traps of ambiguity too when reading the pattern, so high five!

if the cowl above is one i'm willing to have sex with, then this next one is more of the i'm-ignoring-you-because-you're-so-fugly type. i hate it. i hate making it. i hate the yarn, i hate the pattern, i hate the very thought of having to go back and work on it. like giving sharp needles to fire ants and sticking them both into my ears.

eclipse by jacqueline ridzy

ravelry link

malabrigo lace (25g so far / 4mm)

you just don't do it for me

but as you're by now well aware, letting go is not an option. so i keep hoping it'll finish itself. some underpants gnomes type of solution could work. or maybe i should just dye it black or something. anyone have any experiences dyeing malabrigo lace?

this little shelly went to germany

shelly's famous, man! after the previous post a friend of mine in germany expressed some interest in getting a raunchy little turtle of her own. and being the generous and overallily* nice person that i am, i made her a very special edition of shelly in sumptuous pink colors. poor thing was stuffed in a tiny box for four days, travelling up and mostly down europe, but apparently recovered quickly and is already busting some steven seagal type of dance moves.

props to antje for the photo!

also he's taken up learning german. should i be worried?

in other news: i was making a pair of paraphernalia socks, because the cable pattern seemed nice and also i wanted to use my mokkasukka for something more than just a basic pair of socks. anyway, this is how far i got...

...before i realized there's no way in hell they're gonna fit my giant quadrilateral feet (which pair up nicely with my giant trapezoid head). apparently my gauge was off by roughly a gazillion stitches. how about making a swatch or something first? no, that would remove the whole element of surprise. which is what makes knitting interesting. you get what bob allows you to get. and frogging is good fun, too.

and no, i don't want to donate them to someone with lesser feet. because if i can't have these socks, nobody else can either. ha. ha.

*overallily [adv]. mainly; in most cases; altogether.

shelly the turtle

meet shelly.

he's a turtle. and in contrast to his gentle appearance, his favorite movie is machete. he also gets all them lady turtles, because he's that smooth.

sheldon by ruth homrighaus

flavia baby & drops baby merino (25g each / 2.5mm)

ravelry link

looks cute, don't he

you see, nobody ever suspects the turtle

but when he gets randy he slips out of his shell
and does the naked lambada

baby stuff part deux

okay, forget everything i said about girly and boy-y clothing in the previous post. i just had to make this lacy number. look how pretty it is!

maile sweater by nikki van de car

ravelry link

size about 3 mo

sandnes lanett (65 g / 3mm)

a couple of grievances though.

first, i should've used smaller needles. 3's made the piece a little droopy and blocking made it even worse. always go for number 2 (chuckle) with fingering weight yarn. always.

second, i very nearly slit my wrists at the armhole part like everyone else, because the author in her infinite wisdom herself prefers to "struggle through" joining body and sleeve stitches without binding off any. no sane person will be able to do that, without breaking stuff at least, and there should've been a clear plan B for those of us with lesser blessings in the patience department. shame on you!

but again, the finished piece shows no signs of any near-death experience, which can only be attributed to my personal mental stamina. obviously.

baby stuff

like i said, there's a tiny person on the way in my family. and she's in desperate need of my knitting. the mother may disagree. but the fact is, without clothes she'll go around naked, and that kind of behavior will not stand, man.

sunnyside cardigan by tanis lavallée

ravelry link

size newborn

flavia baby (80 g / 2.5mm)

the pattern called for a heavier yarn and 3.5 needles, so i wasn't exactly sure what size would emerge from the green ball of joy. after blocking and stretching it a little it seems like a pretty good fit for a newborn (chest circumference 40 cm). so all's good. unless she decides to keep baking in there and pop out two months later as some sort of giant inflated monster child, which in my pseudorealistic universe is entirely possible. that would render the cardigan useless though, and make me a very sad panda. here's to hoping for a normal, healthy child with normal, healthy proportions. although an extra finger or something would make her more unique.

my only complaint with an otherwise good pattern is that it advocates needless gender divisions among defenseless children. listen to this: "a lacy cable and picot edge can make a pretty cardigan for a little girl; or a handsome rope cable and garter stitch hem make a masculine cardigan perfect for a little boy". really? feel my gender-egalitarian wrath! FEEL IT!

obviously i went for the "masculine" version to prove my point.

after recovering from this gender shock i also made a butch pair of socks to match. to keep them piggies warm.

garter stripe socks by jennifer hoel

ravelry link

size newborn

flavia baby (20 g / 2.5mm)

i made the heel and toe with my regular sock pattern, because the given instructions just didn't work for me. i'm not very smart, you see.

more pictures after the jump.

odds & ends

apologies for the radio silence. it's been a busy month. sort of. watching quality movies and eating chocolate has taken more of my time lately than expected. of course by quality i mean roland emmerich, and by chocolate i mean double-chocolate. blinding, searing, never-ending nerve pain does have some perks. i thoroughly recommend getting some, if you're into the whole get-all-the-free-time-you-want-but-cry-yourself-to-sleep thing.

anyway, like most of us in the knitting universe, i'm a TV knitter. i can't watch TV without knitting something. so thanks to classics like 2012, godzilla and independence day, i've been able to make a bunch of random things, of which a small selection thus follows.

the first one is another cowl made with the willow pattern. i made it with the same amount of stitches and decreases as the hemlock cowl, but the yarn (flavia baby - yes, again) was thinner so the end result is even snugger. i can barely ram it through my giant head, but once it's in place it looks and feels pretty good.

mom likes the socks i make, and will stop at nothing to get a new pair. so in order to avoid being disowned i made her a simple pair with the extra hank of knitpicks stroll i got from great british yarns. i'll be safe for another month or two.

then there was the suicide mission called trail socks. the yarn is gorgeous. and 20 euros a hank. and yet, only through sheer manic perseverence was i able to finish this pair. have you ever heard of a thing called pooling?

the first sock was perfect from the start. the yarn behaved beautifully and created an almost self-striping pattern. then came the second sock, and all hell broke loose. no matter how many times i started over (and believe me, it was lots) i couldn't duplicate the color flow. every time i ended up with dark splotches and light splotches. i tried different gauges, starting at different points of the yarn, but no. bob the saint (remember him?) wouldn't let me off the hook. and no, pooling is NOT something that makes hand-dyed yarn interesting and/or beautiful, it's fucking annoying, and if anyone tells you otherwise, they're probably on sedatives or have already died inside a little.

then, after five painful days, i threatened bob with a murder-suicide-scenario, and he finally caved. and now i have a killer pair of socks. with no pooling. thank's for playing, bob!

i also made some stitch markers. girly ones. because i'm a girl. i checked.

knitting-wise there's lots of other stuff going as well. there's another lace scarf i'm making, slowly but surely, and a mountain of baby clothes for a certain someone who's expected to pop into this world during the summer. before you ask, it's not mine. dear god, no. but more on those projects as and if they develop.