random threads

Yes, this Christmas, I did not gift anyone socks. Amazing.  Instead, I gifted armwarmers, fingerless gloves, fingered gloves, mittens with pop-up caps.  All fit into the ‘hand sock’ category in my mind.  I also provided silken braid catnip mice for the cats of friends and family. And I gave the Noro Striped rib scarf to my brother-in-law.

So here is the run-down. For my two nieces and my sister, we have a variety of armwarmers:

Blue Icicle Wristwarmers from the pattern by KaraMichele Designs.

Charcoal Wristwarmers from the pattern by by Jen Showalter called Spooky Cabled Wristwarmers. I did add a gusseted thumb to this pattern.

Of course, in the wristwarmer category, I did have to try Fetchings, the very popular Knitty pattern. My first one, following the directions was hopelessly too small, so I redid it with 50 stitches and more rows. My Turquoise Fetchings:

All three sets of these were done in Berroco Ultra Alpaca, with which I really liked working. Each pair only took me a couple of days to knit, perhaps three days at the most, so they did make good gift knit items.

More on additional hand-sock gifts tomorrow.

I ran across this site, http://krazydad.com/kaleido/ which allows you to turn a photo into a kaleidoscope image! What fun. I played around with my image of the Silken Braided mice:
Original photo:

Kaleidoscope images from that photo:


These two are ‘feedback’ images, where a kaleidoscope image is “re-kaleidoscoped.”


Click on the images to go to larger versions on Flickr.

Have fun!

Yes, I am participating in the 2008 Ravelympics. If you haven’t heard about this, there are over 4700 Ravelry members signed up to participate. As described by Kimberli, our fearless leader, this is for “any knitter or crocheter on Ravelry ready to challenge themselves to complete a project (or projects) within 17 days during the Summer Olympics.” The concept is to “cast on a project during the Opening Ceremonies of the Summer Olympics (Aug. 8th ) and finish before the Olympic flame goes out (Aug. 24th ).” Kimberli has been very creative in setting up events, the Ravelympic Village and teams galore.

I joined Team Hopelessly Overcommitted (sometimes known as ‘Team HO’), since the team charter invites all to join who meet the following requirements:

1. Love yarn
2. Love patterns
3. Never have enough needles or hooks
4. Feel a prickle of excitement at the words “cast on”
5. Aways looking for the perfect bag to tote our many projects everywhere we go
6. Can knit amazingly fast and furiously in our dreams with FOs that just leap off our needles as fast as we can envision it!
7. Must love chocolate and cake. Even if you don’t, you can still join-just watch for flying bars of chocolate and cake!
8. Project polygamist…but admires all those monogamists!

I’ve signed up for the following events, in the true ‘Hopelessly Overcommitted’ fashion:

WIP Wrestling: My Clapotis, finishing stuffing and sewing up the various knitted Silken Braid catnip mice, and finishing my Boomerang Socks (Red Dwarf pattern from Turtlegirl76).

Sweater Sprint: Two Musketeers Sweater: Norah Gaughan’s Athos sweater from the Norah Gaughan Volume 2 booklet, knit in Berroco Linen Jeans in ‘unbleached muslin’, with Artemis sleeves (3/4 length). This is ambitious to say I’ll finish this while doing everything else.

Sock Put: Knitty’s Ziggy stranded socks by Meg Meredith in Noro Kureyon Sock. This will be my first time knitting with Kureyon Sock.

Wish me luck! In the 2006 Knitting Olympics sponsored by the Yarn Harlot, I almost but not quite finished my one project– felted bag (Market Squares)–by the deadline. No medal for me that year.

(PS, new camera arrived today, I’m charging up batteries! Will have photos of the Ravelympics cast on tomorrow.)

I did tackle finishing up the six Silken Braid catnip mice I had knit last fall. All six are now stuffed with aromatic catnip and fiberfill. Whiskers and tail trims added. I even knit another half dozen with the leftover Noro Silk Garden on that ball, so I think I got about 13 or 14 out a single ball. I need to stuff and sew up the second half dozen still (maybe tonight?)

Unfortunately, I must report these are NOT the favorite catnip toys of the resident felines. They much prefer the catnip banana and the new double-pummel pillow from Best Friends. Oh well, maybe a few months sealed in a jar of catnip will pump up the flavor on the knitted mice, just in time for Christmas gifting?