Invitations

Invitations, check. I designed these myself and had them printed on paper similar to watercolor paper. My future-mother-in-law, myself and two friends spent an afternoon painting the flowers with watercolors. 

Thanks for all your help!

Letting them dry on the table...

And the finished product! We left the response cards unpainted; we are encouraging our guests to color or pain them before returning them. While my fiancé and I were at work, my mom spent the morning getting them ready to mail. Thanks, Mom!

The Sweater From Hell, part The Final; Wedding Hair Accessories

As promised, the photos of the completed Sweater From Hell, aka Movie Theater Cardigan. My dog was confused, as he seems to think it's his and has taken to sleeping on it. 

I put together a few hair accessories with the goods I picked up yesterday. Usually, when I start a project I have a pretty clear idea of what I want it to look like. Not this time. 

I kept going until I ran out of ideas/got bored. I may try some other things out yet, but so far I like the pink ones best.

Inspiration

Pics of the revised sweater from hell will be coming soon. I tried to take some myself using a tripod and the timer setting on my camera; the pictures didn't turn out well. I'll ask Ben to take some when he gets home, and try to get them up later tonight. 

I was in need of a little inspiration, so I went to my neighborhood LYS, Yellow Dog Knitting (Eau Claire, WI). They did not disappoint. 

I intended to get sock yarn for my first attempt at socks, I came away with a whole lot more.

This is for the socks. The bright colors will keep me interested as I go, since I intend to use a simple, basic pattern. 

This lace yarn was calling to me. It's a wool-mulberry silk blend; I love how it feels, and it has a nice luster. I had to take two pictures.

The gold one is a cotton-viscose blend that really shines. An idea is percolating, combining this yarn with this next one...

...with a creamy white mercerized cotton, and possibly some gold-ish beads I have on hand. Stay tuned. 

 Don't they play well together?















After Yellow Dog, I looked for some kind of a headpiece for my wedding. There was a fascinator that I loved, from the store where I bought my dress; I went back to look at the fascinator again, and didn't like it. Or anything else they had. So I made a trip to a craft store, and we'll see what I can come up with from these materials:

The Return of the Sweater from Hell

After an accidental two-week break, I had hoped to have more to show. But, during that time, my 75 year-old grandpa had back surgery and recovered more slowly than expected; then I had an abscessed tooth and am still waiting to get the root canal; and started a part-time job at a local craft store. Gramps is doing well now, back at home and walking with only a cane for assistance; my tooth pain and discomfort has subsided, but I didn't do much besides sleep and complain for a while. Tonight was my impromptu first day at the new gig, and I thought it went well. That said, I do have two things to show.

The oft-mentioned "movie theater sweater" aka "sweater from hell" was, briefly, finished and blocked.

If you can see T.R. Knight in the background, it's because we were watching Grey's Anatomy reruns and I forgot to turn it off.

It wasn't quite hanging the way I wanted, because I should have placed the buttons higher. Which sounds like an easy fix, except for the placement of the button holes.


So I ripped out the button bands and color (luckily, from picked up stitches around the garment edges, and knit in one piece).

Pictures coming soon, but I am much happier with it.


On the needles, a baby sweater for my fiancé's cousin, who with his wife is expecting his second child in early March.

 I'll share the details once it's finished :). I'd better get knitting!

I'm a knitter...

I'm a knitter: After booking our honeymoon, my first thought was "what knitting project should I bring?"

The honeymoon is in June.

The Cardigan From Hell, Pt 2

I frogged the entire thing, and completely redesigned it. Now, it's normal length instead of hip-length, stockinette stitch instead of cables, no color work, with big coconut shell buttons; it's asymmetrical and the collar is a mashup of shawl and cowl. I love it. There is only one problem.

I didn't really plan much before I started knitting, and once I got to the collar, I made it up as I went along. Consequently, the button placement isn't quite right. The top one is fine, but the bottom one is much too low. And I only realized this after weaving in ends and grafting the underarms and after (of course) binding off.

I really don't want to frog this, again, even though it would technically be the first time for this specific sweater. I love the design but I really really don't want to remake it. I can't just leave it, because it doesn't hang right. At least, as far as I can tell it doesn't. Blocking will help, but it won't be enough.

Driving home from work tonight, I had an idea. I could put a small button on the WS right front, and add a loop to the WS left front; similar to how some pants have a "hidden" button near the fly to keep the crotch crease-less. Or the same concept, but with ties? Must research...

The Cardigan From Hell

Months and months ago, I started knitting a grey cardigan of my own design. I swatched, and knitted up the waist, and then ran out of yarn. To make a long story short, the yarn was indefinitely postponed; after three months the warehouse was still depleted, and my local LYS ordered the yarn for me from another store (which was incredibly generous and greatly appreciated). Delighted, I dove back in. Just earlier today, I thought I'd be able to finish tonight. And then I got to the point where I could finally try it on.  It was not the Eureka! moment I expected. If anything, it was an "oh, s--t."

The belted detail at the waist wasn't actually at the waist. I tried a one-piece set-in sleeve construction modeled after the Deep V-Neck Sweater from the Purl Bee, but I didn't quite get the adaptation right. The (already attached) sleeves are too short, and snugger than I'd like. And it is much, much too warm. I'm always cold; I'm the one pulling my winter coat out when it's 40F, I use an electric blanket in the summer. And I grew up in snowy Minnesota.

I have no choice but to rip. At least back to where I joined sleeves to body, so I can make the sleeves longer. And as long as I'm messing with the sleeves, I should frog them so I can make them a bit looser. And after watching Project Runway reruns all afternoon (Season 2), I need to edit. Cables or the Fair Isle belt detail, not both. And I should take another look at the sleeve construction, see where I went astray. Shorten the over all length. Maybe add a cowl-ish element to the neck and button band?

But then maybe I'm being too rash. Maybe I'm over-thinking, over-designing. Maybe I need to re-discover some affection for the original design, fall in love with it again. Maybe I just don't want to start over.

I don't know. I have ripped back to the sleeve-to-body join, and I frogged both sleeves. The remnant of the cardigan is in one piece, for now. I'll sleep on it. Thoughts, anyone?