Tuesday, June 26, 2007

She told me to do it....

A while ago, Scooter tells me a rumor about a wool ball with multiple colors, cut in half. Another knitter had seen this in some shop far away and it was special and beautiful.
Um OK I say.
She asks, "Do you have any idea how this wonderful thing was done? I must make one"
So I go about explaining wet felting with roving and just making a ball and adding on to it, then ta-da felt ball. Easy, right?

Well, we pick colors and off she goes to her kitchen to make felted balls (wonder what kind of Google hits that will get me!).

It didn't work. My bad. I didn't realize she had never worked with roving AT ALL and did not know to pull and fluff a bit before making her ball..... and was getting things that did indeed look like balls (if you know what I mean)( or maybe heineys.)

Annoyed and frustrated she hands back the wool to me and says "Here, You Do It"
And because she is a good woman and I like to humor her I said "OK".

Bit by bit I built the ball (more Google hits) she wanted BUT refused to cut.

"I'll bring everything over and YOU do it" I said.

I felt a little woozy as she electric knifed into the beautiful ROUND ball.But it was good.And she is happy.

They needed a bit of wet felting to smooth the cut, but look good. In fact sitting on her kitchen window sill, they look like woolly geodes. Ultimately, one will be gifted to a sewing friend as a pin cushion and the other will stay with herself to sit on the sill and look like a geode

OTN: the 2nd sock of love, a gift for a friend and planning projects

Other than that.... its swim lessons every day. The humidity is high and my brain is leaking out my ears, really. You would think I'd be better at updating, but my brain is MUSH.

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Tuesday, February 06, 2007

Baby its COLD outside

In a panic because of the extreme cold coming & here this week, I knit mittens and a hat for the Mayor. (because this is how my brain works) His previous mittens were a bit small and I wanted them longer in the cuff so new were in order.
I knit mittens with a longer cuff and sized to fit me, then felted them to a smaller size. These will fit this year and next! They will be super warm even when wet. I'm thinking I should do a cord to attach to his coat.... but 5 is an iffy age for mitten cords... what do you think?

The hat came out a bit larger too, sigh. It will fit for a while. I know better and yet keep making the same mistake and not trusting my knitter instincts. Really, how hard is it to take 10% off the spi x head circumfrence?
I wanted a hat with ear flaps and got a helmet hat. Oh well, it works.

Projects:
Felted Mittens for the Mayor
yarn- Cascade 128
Needles- Denise 10.5
Pattern - mostly from the Knitters Handy Book of Patterns, some of my own preferences.

Helmet Hat
yarn- Cascade 129
Needles- 9's & 10's
Pattern- again some from the Knitters Handy Book of Patterns, some my own preference and I estimated the the ear flaps by putting the hat on his head and marking where I wanted them to go!

**note I really need to make a note in hat section of the book to decrease ALL cast on's by 10%. My hats may fit better.More tomorrow.............

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