Wednesday, February 21, 2007

in which i jump off a bridge, become gifted, and prepare for a doppelgagner moment

Jumping Off A Knitted Bridge

When I was in high school, it seemed that I, "jumped off bridges just because everyone else was doing it." It was not that I was heavily swayed by peer pressure. Actually, I was the nerdy odd girl that had a rebellious streak. I stuck out as different, and at some age became to like that. When I did jump off the bridges that other people were jumping off, I was usually the first one with a leg over...and if I wasn't, it was because my friends had (what seemed to be) some damn good ideas. Bungee jumping had not been invented yet.




Calorimetry.
Everyone's doing it.
And I am jumping off the knitted bridge because my friends have a damn good idea.

When I saw the original in Knitty, and I didn't give it a second glance. It wasn't until I saw everyone else's done up in different colors that I gave it notice (I keep thinking about the advice to photocopy patterns in black and white so that you can envision your own own color ideas on the sample...but knowing me, if I did that, I'd probably end up knitting everything grey).



I love this thing. I can tell I need to knit a few more. It really does keep my head warm, and I've needed that around here this winter. I feel a little ridiculous wearing a knitted hat indoors (I look especially silly wearing my kitty ears hat to bed), but I've been turning the heat way down, and having a warm head really helps. Calorimetry is just the ticket. Toasty!

I also love this because I got to put the handspun sent to me by TheBon to good and gorgeous use (who, btw, just phoned to say she has arrived in town! Woohoo! More on that below).

Calorimetry
Yarn: Handspun from TheBon, merino singles plied with beaded black perle cotton (approx 73 yds), photo of it as a skein found here
Needles: US #8, Denise
Pattern: Calorimetry
Finished: 2/8/07
Modifications:
* I reduced the cast on to 104 sts, then knit to my own center (which I decided for me was having 34 stitches on the outside ends of each marker)
* I was afraid I would not have enough yarn to complete the project, so I did the first 3 rows and the last 3 rows in a contrasting color., black (from stash, Cascade 220).
Notes:
My first thought was that having a button closure seemed pointless. I planned to seam it shut and use it like a regular head band. I am so glad I did not. I looooove that I can take the thing on and off without mussin' up all my dangly little tendrils. It rocks.

I ended up having enough of the handspun left over after all, so I knit myself a wristband. Now I can be all "matchy matchy."


Even after the wristband, I still had a bit of yarn left, so I tied so lengths of it onto an elastic hairtie to make this fun little ponytail holder. It makes me look like I have hair wraps or soemthing. I dig it. It's very fun. I dont have a pic of it, but if I can get one, I'll post it.

I'm have Calorimetry #2 on the needles with more leftover stash.
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Gifted



Karen the Dancing Lurker, knit me this absolutely gorgoues scarf for my birthday. I just love it, and have been wearing it often. It's very lofty and soft.



It is very hard to capture the color. It's sort of blue, sort of purple. I'm going to call it "purple-winkle." LOL



She used two really fine yarns held together throughout, but she couldn't remember what she uesed. I have a hunch one of them is Kid Silk Haze. She's made another scarf or two with the same stitch pattern, and I think she got the pattern at ArtFibers (but I'm not sure, so I'm not going to link to it). Maybe Karen will confirm that in the comments (hint-hint), or maybe not... because she usually only comments here when I talk about chocolate ;-)
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The Doppelganger Cometh

TheBon of CatharticInk has rolled into town to visit a friend of hers, and we have plans to hook up while she is here! We're going to Stitch N Bitch tonight, and over the next few days we'll be meeting up to do a little touring around for good photos to take (she likes to shoot buildings). I've heard talk of Ikea, too. We're also going to Stitches on Saturday. Oh, and if the timing works out, she'll stop by my place and give me a little spinning lesson on the new wheel.

8 comments:

Mouse said...

I'm casting on for one of those headbands tonight.. I can't take the peer pressure! Yours looks awesome!

jodi said...

Whoo! Sounds like fun. I wish I had a conference or something out your way I could come to.

~Donna~ said...

Boing boing kersplash. I want one! I want one!

Want to make that scarf too...

I'm so easy.

Anonymous said...

Whee! That's all I can manage right now. Just Whee!

Anonymous said...

Ooh ooh! I'm going to be working at Stitches on Saturday (2-5) - I'll be winding yarn at the Yarndogs booth - the donations for yarn winding go to sponsor the Knitters for Knockers walk team for the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer. Come by and say Hi, I'd love to meet you.

no-blog-rachel (rachelatmaubydotcom)

Anonymous said...

Okay, I can be versatile and comment on non-food entries.

The birthday scarf was made with Louet KidLin lace weight yarn (49% linen/35% kid mohair/16% nylon) in Flag Blue. The yarn is actually two strands -- one blue and one almost black -- which makes the color beautiful, but also a little harder for me to knit. (More frogging than usual.)

The pattern is the Vertical Drop Stitch Scarf from Artfibers. (And one of these days I will make it with Artfibers Tsuki just like Yarn Boy.)

Love,
Karen the Dancing Lurker

Carrie said...

Love the calorimetry! Now I'm going to have to add it to the list... *sigh* Have fun with TheBon! The scarf is beautifully.

alphabitch said...

It's awfully pretty, that blue yarn. I used to drive by a house almost that color (it's better on the scarf than it was on the house). We always called it 'paralegal blue.'

I've been looking for a lacy pattern to use up this really fine Indecita alpaca yarn that I've got about 60 skeins of in my stash. I've had some success knitting two strands of it together; it's soft and lofty and I think it'll look really pretty knit up like that.