Knitting Goals

In August, it'll be two years since I taught myself to knit. Since then, I've completed 12 washcloths (some are duplicates of ones I've posted about) and four scarves, and I've learned a few techniques and tried new stitch patterns along the way. So, I've gotten pretty good at knitting things shaped like squares and rectangles, but circles, triangles, and various polygons are calling my name. I'd also like to get a little less 2D, if you will. Here are five things I hope to learn/try in order of increasing perceived difficulty (to me). I'll call them goals, but I'm not going to put a time limit on them.

1. Using different yarn colors in the same project. I don't know why this seems difficult to me, but it's probably just a pain to have to keep switching colors and having to weave in a million ends when you get done. I couldn't find any good photos of small projects that I liked, but I'm thinking maybe a pot holder or fingerless gloves.

2. Knitting "in the round" (pretty much knitting in circles). This is useful (and often required) for hats and some garments. I think a good way to start would be a basic beanie-type hat in a bulky yarn, like this one:

That Favorite Toddler & Baby Winter Hat (Photo credit: A Crafty House blog)

Then maybe I can try to make this adorable stuffed hedgehog:

Knit Hedgehog (Photo credit: The Purl Bee, Purl Soho)

3. Cables. Maybe I could start small with a reusable coffee cup sleeve:

Woven Cable Coffee Cup Sleeve (Photo credit: Purl Avenue)

4. Sweaters/cardigans (garments in general, really), preferably from vintage (mostly 1930s-1950s) or vintage-inspired patterns. I really can't wait to start knitting tops for myself and sweaters for Ed.

Cardigan knitted from 1940s pattern (Photo credit: Elegant Musings)

Sweater knitted from 1930s pattern (Photo credit: Elegant Musings)

5. Socks. I'd like to knit some wool socks for Ed (and for me, too), because they're surprisingly hard to find around here for a decent price.

Sporty Striped Peds (Photo credit: The Purl Bee, Purl Soho)

Homespun Boot Socks (Photo credit: The Purl Bee, Purl Soho)

I'll let you know if/when I successfully knit any of these things. (That means less washcloth posts!)

Homemade Lip Balm

As I mentioned in the Christmas 2012 posts, I made some lip balm for gifts. I made a variety of flavors, including peppermint, lemon, orange, cappuccino, French vanilla, brown sugar, and pumpkin cheesecake, as well as a few others.

It's pretty easy and only takes about 30 minutes per batch. Most of the time is spent waiting for it to melt together and then harden again. I followed the "Flavored Lip Balm" recipe on the LorAnn Oils web site. One batch yields about eight standard lip balm tubes.

I did make one change, and that was to add a little bit more flavor oil (for most batches, I found that 1 tsp. was the right amount to cover the beeswax smell). I used the LorAnn Super Strength natural oils for the peppermint, lemon, and orange flavors. For the other flavors, I used some flavor oils I ordered from lipbalmtubes.com.

Supplies (see link above for recipe and instructions):

• 1-cup glass measuring cup* and small pan (for double-boiler)
• 1 Tbsp. and 1 tsp. measuring spoons*
• small spatula (for stirring)*
• 0.15-oz. lip balm tubes (lipbalmtubes.com)
• beeswax pastilles (lipbalmtubes.com) (these are much easier to measure consistently than grated beeswax); I used yellow (unbleached)
• shea butter (brambleberry.com)
• sweet almond oil (got it from Valli Produce, the international market in town); could use extra virgin olive oil or sunflower oil instead
• flavor oil (LorAnn oils from Hobby Lobby baking supplies aisle; other flavor oils from lipbalmtubes.com)
• 1.8"x1.8" waterproof inkjet labels (20 per sheet) (lipbalmtubes.com)

*If you want to make your own lip balm, be sure to dedicate the tools you use to lip balm-making only. It isn't recommended to make it in/with tools you use for cooking.

I printed the labels on our computer using the basic template they have on the lipbalmtubes.com web site. I also got some shrink bands (lipbalmtubes.com), but I couldn't get them to shrink for some reason.

Bonus: We'll never need to buy lip balm again!

More Washcloths

Are you getting tired of washcloth posts? Sorry, I guess washcloths are my favorite thing to knit right now. I think it's because:

1. Each one takes less than one ball of yarn.
2. They don't take very long (unless you procrastinate or get sidetracked, like me).
3. You can try a bunch of different patterns and colors.
4. They're useful. 
5. They're easy to take along and work on when you know you have some time to kill.

Anyway, I diverted for a little while from the book of dishcloths I'm working through so I could make the washcloths in the Chicks with Sticks Guide to Knitting.

(image source)

That's the book I used to make my dad's scarf last Christmas. The book calls these "Dirty Girl Washcloths". They were quick and easy for me; no new techniques to figure out. I used Lily Sugar'n Cream cotton yarn for all three.

One of them is just knit (garter) stitch, which I surpirisingly hadn't done a washcloth in yet. I used US size 7 needles for this one.

Garter stitch washcloth closeup

Another was stockinette stitch with a garter stitch border (to keep its shape). I used US size 6 needles, which is what the book called for (actually it called for size 6 for all three), but it ended up really wide and not long enough when I followed the pattern, so I added about 10 rows to make it longer.

Stockinette stitch washcloth closeup

The last one was a basket weave pattern (pretty much the same pattern I used on my dad's scarf). I used US size 5 needles for this one, and it came out about the right size (10" square).

 

Basket weave washcloth closeup

I'm working on some vacation posts, so those should be coming shortly.

Watercolor Gifts

Alexis recently celebrated her 30th birthday, so I wanted to do something different/special/unique to her. First, I did a gradated watercolor of the Seattle skyline (she currently lives in the Seattle area). The idea was inspired by some stuff I saw on Pinterest and my recent obsession with watercolor art.

I found the skyline silhouette online, printed, and copied it with pencil. Then I put pieces of painter's tape around the outline so I could paint the gradient of colors. The tape part was pretty time-consuming, but worth it.

Then I thought some watercolors of the states she has lived in would be a good idea, so I did those and decided to combine them into a set. I found some silhouettes of each state online, printed, copied onto the watercolor paper with pen, and then painted them in. I had to include a Clemson tiger paw for SC!

SC Watercolor. Go Tigers!

NC Watercolor

WA Watercolor

She said she liked them, and she actually needed some wall art in her apartment, so I guess it was the right choice. (I signed the state paintings after the photos were taken.)

Knitted Washcloth #4

Sorry for the long absence. I'm still plugging away, off and on, at the washcloths. I took a little break from knitting, but I got motivated again and finished the next one. So, the next one I completed from More Than a Dozen Dishcloths is from the pattern called Neapolitan. I used Lily Sugar'n Cream yellow cotton yarn and US size 7 knitting needles. This one didn't involve any techniques I didn't already know--just knitting and purling.

I don't know how obvious it is, but this yarn actually had some stains on it (My hands weren't THAT dirty when I was knitting!). I didn't let that stop me from using it, though.

Lessons learned:

1. Vitamin Water will stain yarn.
2. Make sure your drink bottle cap is properly threaded and tightened before putting it in the same bag as the yarn you intend to knit with (This will also help you avoid having to use an insane amount of paper towels to try to dry out your backpack in the airport bathroom and getting strange looks from people while you're doing it.). Maybe it'll come out in the wash.

Anyway, moving on....

I like the kind of zigzag pattern. The book called for a multi-colored yarn (Guess which colors. Hint: The pattern is called Neapolitan.), but it's more difficult to see the pattern with all of the different colors distracting you, so I went with a solid color instead.

 My collection is slowly growing!

P.S.--My Vanilla washcloth is featured on the pattern page in Ravelry! (I think it's because I used the "right" color of yarn for that one.) If you know what that means, go check it out!

Knitted Washcloth #3

The next washcloth I completed from More Than a Dozen Dishcloths is from the pattern called Vanilla. I used Lily Sugar'n Cream white cotton yarn and US size 7 knitting needles. I had my first try at increasing and decreasing with this one. There was only one row that included increasing and one row that included decreasing, so I'm slowly working my way into those. It was pretty easy, though.

See the little loopy things? That's really the new technique I learned while making this one. The yarnover. Thanks again to http://www.knittinghelp.com/, I was able to decipher the pattern instructions and get the hang of it quickly.

From top to bottom: Vanilla, Strawberry, and Chocolate patterns

Now I have a nice little set of coordinating washcloths. Only 13 more to go!

Knitted Washcloth #2

The next washcloth I knitted from More Than a Dozen Dishcloths (you can read about the first one here) is the pattern called Strawberry. There are alternating columns of knit and purl stitches, as you can see. I used Lily Sugar'n Cream Twists cotton yarn in Green Twists with US size 7 needles (every pattern in the book calls for size 7 needles). Here's how it turned out:

Tea Tree Soap

My latest craft obsession has been soapmaking. Ed said he liked the smell of the tea tree essential oil I bought (40% off, of course!), so I made a couple of bars for him. I actually also used some Eucalyptus-Mint fragrance, but the tea tree oil kind of came out faster than I anticipated (despite the bottle having a dropper top), so all you can really smell is the tea tree.

I used one drop of blue liquid dye and two drops of yellow liquid dye to get the light green color. The color makes me think of the 1950s. It's not quite as masculine of a green as I had intended to make, but it does coordinate nicely with the washcloth I knitted. 

Supplies used (yielded two 4-oz. bars):

1/2 lb. (8 oz.) opaque white glycerin soap base (Michaels, with coupon)

1/2 tsp. sweet almond oil (grocery store)

Eucalyptus-Mint fragrance (Michaels)

Tea Tree essential oil (Hobby Lobby, with coupon)

1 drop blue liquid dye (Hobby Lobby)

2 drops yellow liquid dye (Hobby Lobby)

rounded ovals soap mold (Hobby Lobby)

I'm estimating that it cost $1.50-ish to make these two bars of soap, so about 75 cents each. The amounts used of the oils and dyes amount to pennies in cost, combined. The soap base was really the only item of relative significant cost.

Knitted Washcloth #1

I got a book called More Than a Dozen Dishcloths at Hobby Lobby (with a 40% off coupon, of course!). Even though the book calls them dishcloths, I prefer to call them washcloths. You can wash whatever you want with them--not just dishes.

(source)

Some of the patterns call for techniques I haven't tried yet, so I'm doing the most basic ones first. I hope to do all of them eventually. The pattern shown here is called Chocolate. It looks like the author named the patterns after the yarn colors used. Obviously, I used a different color.

This took less than one ball of cotton yarn (the color is called Sage Green, but it's showing lighter in the photos than it really is). It's about 10"x10".

I'm working on another pattern right now, in a coordinating color. I'll post it when I'm done.

Knitted Gifts

Now that Christmas has passed, I can share the things I knitted for gifts. First, a dark purple scarf for Alexis:


Broken Rib Scarf

I just followed a basic "broken rib" pattern from one of my stitch books (p.s.- I got that set of books for $5 from a craft book club). Here's some more detail:



Close-up (Left: Front of scarf; Right: Back of scarf)

I found a pattern online for this paw washcloth/dishcloth and had to make it. It looks like they took the Clemson paw and made a pattern out of it (see the little notch at the bottom of the paw?).


Clemson Paw Washcloth

So I gave that to Alexis, too, since she's a fellow Clemson alum and would totally appreciate it. And she got orange and purple gifts, to top it all off! I also made a couple of these for my brother, Daniel B., since he's a Clemson fan.

I made a scarf for my mom. It's really soft and warm. I used a pattern from one of the yarn labels I have; it sort of looks like a waffle pattern.


Mom's Waffle Scarf



Close-up of Mom's Waffle Scarf

And a scarf for my dad. I used a pattern from the Chicks with Sticks Guide to Knitting book. It's called the Boyfriend Basket Weave Scarf. It's also really soft, and I like the color.


Basket Weave Scarf



Close-up

Well, that's about all I had time to knit before Christmas. Considering I've only known how to knit since the end of August, it seems like a lot!

Merry Christmas!