Finish all your Christmas gifts in 1 day

-- by knitting this scarf that will make the crowd go wild and take you 2 hours to knit. It requires almost no knitting skills, and though that may be somewhat boring and maybe not satisfactory not to show what you can actually accomplish with a set of needles I'm sure your recipient will love it. If you make it, try using the technique this knitter did by turning the yarn on the edges to get different colours on each side.

I'm frogging it

Some days ago I stated that I was going to finish The Somewhat Cowl although I'm not sure how it will turn out. Well, I'll never know, 'cause I decided that it won't turn out well - I'm frogging it. I decided to do so, since I now have a plan for the yarn: I'm making a vest or a short sleeved sweater of my own design using the stitch pattern of the Honeycomb Henley in Knitting Nature.

I think my June project for the KAL within a KAL on Stashalong will be the Bubble Pullover from Knitting Nature -- not a very ambitious aim, but a realistic one leaving time for writing my BScE thesis. I've got the buttons now: ladybirds.

Peek-A-Boo Cloche

I finished the Peek-A-Boo Cloche from Lace Style:

Sorry for this crappy photo of me wearing the hat, but I had to take it myself. As you can see, I still need to weave in the ends, too.

The hat is knitted from Tvinni and Tvinni Alpaca (1 strand each), red and black - the leftovers from the poncho skirt. This yarn is somewhat thicker than called for in the pattern, but my head is large, and using this yarn makes the hat larger and thicker. I used bamboo needles size 3mm and metal needles size 4 mm.

It reduced my stash with 84g - this means that I have used 1044 g of stash in 3 months :D

I think I'll be happy with this hat when the winter returns in 6 months - warm due to the double layers, and pretty.

Update

On this lovely, early Sunday morning I just wanted to make an update report, although there is nothing much to say.

The Bubble Pullover now has almost 2 sleeves - the bottom rib and collar is yet to come. And I ordered 2 different kinds of funny buttons for it! Now I just have to decide which ones look the better.

The Somewhat Cowl --- well, I tried it on, and it seems there is too much fabric next to the collar. I think I may not sew the collar in like the pattern calls for. Anyway, I'll finish it now that I have come this far with it, and hope that it turns out okay.

I just started another pair of socks in some blueish Trekking XXL. I use the Thuja seed stich pattern, but with 64sts around.

I'm still contemplating what to choose for the KAL within a KAL on Stashalong. I think it might be the Color On Color scarf - still it may be too large a project since I'm also finishing my bachelor thesis in June. Still contemplating.

That's all for now - happy knitting!

I finished the Spiral Scarf

I finished the Spiral Scarf from Knitting Nature, which I started last weekend. You can read about the yarn in the post just below this one. It has 14 hexagons, and the largest hexagon has 25 sts along the sides. Knitted on 3.5mm bamboo dpns.

I think this is a nice application for this yarn, that my DM gave me :)

The scarf reduced the stash by the 110g it added to it, since I got this yarn after I started the Stashalong - still, it doesn't count down in the amount I'm allowed to buy, since I didn't actually buy this yarn. This makes my total stash reduction since 02/25/07: 960g - so close to 1kg :D

I've started the Spiral Scarf from Knitting Nature

It is knitted from this blue yarn, which is one strand of mohair mixed with a 2-ply strand, that changes colour between black, yellow, turquoise, and pink - I think this strand is made of cotton and maybe polyamide.
I made my largest hexagon with 24 sts along the sides, i.e. two more than the pattern calls for, to make the scarf a little larger. By now, I have made 8 hexagons, starting with the largest one.

Monkey socks

So, here are the Monkey socks from knitty.com knitted from 72 g of Admiral Ombré on metal dpns size 2.5mm. My stash is now reduced by 850 g since 25th of February.

2 hats finished, Bubble Pullover progress, and Scarf

Yesterday, I knitted these two hats from a pattern from knitty.com, and today I've been weaving in the ends:


Actually, I only meant to make one, but the first one turned out too small; I thought I used dpns size 5mm for Peter's hat, but I found out that I must have used 5.5mm's to get to that size. So - I just knit another one... Even better - making two of these used all of these frogged skeins of New Zealand lambswool!
Here you can see the different sizes due to 5mm and 5.5mm needles, respectively:

The small hat used up 50 g, and the larger one 52 g. That gives me a total stash reduction of 778 g since 25th of February. See my ticker at the bottom of the page.

I've also done some knitting on the Bubble Pullover from Knitting Nature:

One sleeve and a bottom rib and a collar is missing.

I also promised to post a picture of the finished scarf:

It is more than 2 meters long, and made from a lovely, soft silk-wool blend. See earlier posts on this scarf here and here.

I think the Monkey socks will be finished soon as well - looking forward.

Not much knitting go on

Sadly, I haven't had time for much knitting lately. Yesterday, I spent 10.5 hours at the university - in the lab doing experiments for my bachelor thesis. Most of my days have been like this the past couple of weeks, and to manage that I have to go to bed at 10 pm - and since I come home around 6 pm every day and also have other things to attend, there isn't much knitting being done. When I find 10 minutes to knit here and there, I mostly knit the Monkey socks from knitty.com or the Peek-A-Boo Cloche from Lace Style.

I'm looking forward to Thursday, which is the day when I'm handing in the last two assignments this semester, since it is my last day of school (when it comes to the courses I attend besides the bachelor thesis) - then I'll study for the exams with some days in the lab in between, and in June it will be bachelor thesis only. Hopefully, I'll have more time for knitting, though not much, after Thursday.