Gnomes - FO

 The gnomes are done! 

 I love them. 

 I'm already making more.

This time shorter and fatter...

because I have some big dpns...

and I like my gnomes well fed!

FO - Lattice Mitts

Last weekend I finished a pair of fingerless mittens. This is a fun free pattern on Ravelry by Jennifer Elaine. It used up almost 1 ball of Knit Picks Essential Multi.

Sadly this yarn is discontinued now and I have a few (um, maybe 5) more skeins in my stash. I may have to fire off a few more pairs of these. They are so cute!

I don't know what I enjoyed more that afternoon, the mitts or the white wine sangria! Here's my mom's super simple recipe:

White Wine Sangria

1 cup chopped fruit (we used strawberries, blueberries, a small nectarine, lemon and lime slices)
3 tbsp sugar
1/4 cup Grand Marnier
2 bottles dry white wine

I always add more fruit than this recipe calls for and you can sub whatever you have, citrus is lovely and raspberries too.

Mix the first 3 ingredients together and let marinate for a few hours, stirring every so often.

Add wine and stir. Pour into lovely glasses with ice and enjoy!

FO - Made Up My Mind Tank

I finally have a FO to share with you today! I kinda lost my knitting mojo there last week and didn't get much accomplished at all. I did work on this tank whenever I had a bit of time and inclination.

I think that's my favorite part of this pattern. It's perfect for putting down and picking up and knitting a few rounds and doing something else. I was really happy with that. The knitting was interesting and fun and the stitches were easy to do.

So the pattern is called Make up your Mind Racerback Tank by Julie Crawford of Knitted Bliss fame. It's published for free in the Spring/Summer 2011 edition of Knitty. This is a link to my project page on Ravelry if you want a few more details.

I knit this tank out of 1 skein of TFA Blue Label Fingering weight in the Deep Sea colourway on size 4.5mm 16 inch Hiya Hiya circulars. I loved knitting with this yarn! It's super pretty and the colours pooled and shifted in such fun ways. Each panel is different. It's an eye popping blue so it looks really nice against a black t-shirt. I'll be trying it with a white one and also over a gray lacey tank I have (but only when it get warmer). I had bought 2 skeins just in case I needed the yardage and now I have one sitting all happy in my stash.

My collection of TFA is growing. I think I may need to start knitting with the Colour Club installments instead of hoarding them. This yarn is such eye candy for a knitter!

So the only mods I made were to cast on 132 stitches so I could do an inch of 2x2 ribbing before starting the pattern, then I just decreased in the knit row before the pattern started to the right number of stitches. If I was to knit this again (which I have plans to do already!) I will increase the length in the torso by increasing the panel lengths.

You'll have to forgive the Superstar's room. She's 12, and her room often looks like a bomb went off in it. Unfortunately the only long mirror in the house is in her room right now. Hopefully I can get B to snap some nicer pictures of this tank soon.

I've had a ton of compliments on it already. I wore it last night over to the library to help set up for the book sale happening today. I was too late to help, the ladies there had already finished but Karin really liked the tank and so do I!

Cute pattern Julie! Can't wait to see what else you're designing!

FO - Rootbeer Hoodie

Hurrah for another finished project this year! I'm up to 3 officially and so close to a few more!

I've blogged about this sweater and given a few peeks at the progress but here is the finished hoodie.

This is such a fun explosion of colour! The knitting went super fast and the pattern was straight forward and easy to follow.

A few notes and mods:

I knit the size small and it was perfect.

I omitted one of the colour bands. I wanted the colourwork to be lower than the pattern suggests.

I knit an extra 1.5 inches of stockinette at the waist area to add more length to the torso.

If I was to knit this again I would decrease the arms more to make the shoulder seams shorter. The shoulders are bit too broad even with the hood turning part of the fabric back.

If I knit this again (I can actually still do this if the mood strikes) I'd knit short sleeves. That way I could ignore the above point because it wouldn't matter.

I striped the hood. I thought I'd run out of the brown so I knit 1 inch stripes (worked out to 6 rows of each colour) alternating colours until I reached the length stated in the pattern.

I didn't do pompoms, I did tassels. We'll see how they stand up in the wash.

I knit all the ribbing on 4mm needles, the rest of the hoodie on 5mm.

I'm going to enjoy wearing this one with jeans. I don't think have shirts that match though! I need to go shopping for an orange, lime green and electric blue t-shirt. Never thought I'd need some of those!

Uke-Mochi Shawlette

Remember this post? And this one?

I took some pictures of this project when we went camping last summer at Crooked Lake. Can you guess what pattern this is?

This is the lovely and very popular shawl/scarf pattern from Alana Dakos (aka Nevernotknitting) called the Cedar Leaf Shawlette. I bought it shortly after it came out and knew I had the perfect yarn in my stash. Because the yarn was intended for a mitten project (ha ha) for my mother in-law, I decided to knit this scarf for her. It made a great christmas gift!

I had so much fun knitting this shawlette! I'd love to knit it again in the reccomended weight (DK) and with some Madelinetosh yarn.

Victorian Lilac Lace

I had such high hopes for this shawlette! I was going to give it to my mom for Christmas but after I bound off and blocked I found the bind off was too tight! It didn't want to block to nice points like I had envisioned. I thought it might still work out though.  What I didn't realize was how it would it pull and curl at the edge in an unflattering way.

You can see in this picture how the edge tends to curl. Now granted my mom may not have noticed this but I find it glaring. It makes me sad.

This was a lovely yarn purchase from the Kangaroo Dyer. The yarn is called Victorian Lilac and is very pretty! I love the purples and greys, so trendy right now. Poet Seat is a 50/50 blend of silk and merino wool and feels super soft. I'd love to order more of this yarn in the future. Silken shawls feel so nice against the neck and this shawlette doesn't disappoint there.

The pattern is called the Travelling Woman Shawl  by Liz Abinante,  a very popular pattern on Ravelry with over 5000 projects. I can see why too, it's easy to knit and looks classy.

I'm going to try this pattern again one of these days with a better, stretchier bind off. But right now this little shawl is worn only occasionally to work when the mood strikes. Too bad...