UFOctober Report, Day 19 (and FOto Friday)

It's amazing what a good night of sitting on your butt ignoring the laundry quality TV can do for your knitting. Last night was a very good night. Here's my tally thus far.

*=new progress

Blue Cascade Socks for Boy1 - Frog Frogged 10/6/07 (1:30 a.m.)

Chevron Lace Socks - Rip back to heel flap just before turn, & reknit Finished 10/6/07 (1:00 a.m.)

Early Nettie - Frog Frogged 10/1/07

* Heartbreakingly Cute Baby Kimono 1 - A second washing and blocking satisfied me that all the wayward dye was rinsed from the sweater. There's still some bad dye running, but - aha! - the HCBK is knit in garter stitch, which makes it kinda reversible. Reversible enough, in fact, that reverse it is exactly what I did. So the worst dye bleeding is inside, and the rest of anything remotely noticeable is on the back. Problem solved! FINISHED 10/18/07.

Behold the heartbreaking cuteness:


Heartbreakingly Cute Baby Kimono 2 - Figure out the sleeve seams or frog No progress yet, but feeling better after the success of the HCBK1.

Lily Pad Socks for Boy1 - Finish second sock FINISHED! 10/7/07

* Purple sweater for Girl - In progress - sewed up one side seam, picked up stitches at armhole to knit sleeve in the round. I am NEVER knitting another sweater in pieces again!

My Bad Photo:


(That's not a dye lot mistake. The color varies throughout the skein. See below.)

Presumably professional photo of the sweater from the Lion Brand site; not our family:


Yep, that's acrylic, people. Bought lots of it before I knew better, but it's soft and warm and, hello, machine washable. I'm using it. Click here for the pattern. I'm leaving off the hood, doing a roll-neck collar instead. And, as mentioned, knitting the sleeves in the round from the shoulder down.

* Recycled Navy Sweater - see below.

Recycled Navy Sweater before


Recycled Navy Sweater after


Why is this sweater in the trash? This sweater began life as an exercise in anger management. The yarn came from a 25-cent yard sale sweater. I frogged it during a particularly rough patch in my marriage, when ripping a sweater apart seemed to be the only viable outlet for the stress, anger, and frustration I felt. (Things are better lately, thanks for asking.) As you might expect, the yarn was roughly frogged, not rinsed before rewinding, and full of knots. Badly done all around. The color was SO DARK (the flash really lightened it up immensely), it was depressing. Somehow, a junior's size small sweater did not give me enough yarn to knit a little girl's cardigan. Go figure. Considering the anger, the depressing color, the yarn shortage, and the fact that I started knitting it in pieces before I knew about knitting in the round, it makes sense to me just to toss it. Good riddance. Trashed 10/19/07.

Sky Socks - Mail Mailed 10/4/07

Swap-Bot Swap Yarn - Mailed 10/6/07

* The interloper:
Jaywalker may be slightly stalled at the heel. The instructions are not making sense to me. Is it a short-row heel? Anyone know? If I can't figure it out, I'll probably just do a flap heel and hope for the best.

The Exceptions:

Jimmy Neutron sweater for Boy1

ONE ball-band dishcloth if the mood strikes

So, that's my report for now. By the way, Knitting Daily has been running a few posts recently about UFOs. They also ran a poll that shows the average number of UFOs per knitter is 7. The knitters with more than 20 UFOs easily outnumbered those with zero, by 3-to-1, in fact. Yow. That's a lotta UFOs.

If you don't read Knitting Daily, follow that link and sign up to receive it by email. It's from Interweave Press, therefore, very entertaining and informative, even if it isn't quite daily. :)

O Progress, Where Art Thou?

Forgive me, knitters, for I have slipped.

I have cast on a new project that is not on my UFOctober exceptions list.

shock!

Once I knit the entire first cuff, I realized I was fooling myself - this was no swatch. (You all knew that already, didn't you?) It is, in fact, a Jaywalker, using the second batch of sock yarn I Kool-Aid dyed in case the Autumn Leaves/Great Pumpkin didn't work out. I can't decide if I like the colors or not, but it's dyed and it's knitted, so it's NOT getting frogged. I'm calling it the Four-Berry Trifle Jaywalker Sock. (FOtos on Friday, peeps!)

So, how is everyone's UFOctober going? Here in McFrogland, Decisions Have Been Made. Projects Shall Be Tossed. One of my UFOs is so disheartening that I am not even wasting time frogging it. More on that later. But mostly, if it weren't for mental progress, there wouldn't be any progress at all. bleh.

Let's see how our other players are doing, shall we?

Gentle Sunset is making good progress, reporting one complete, one almost complete, and one frogging.

Fiber Chic has completed another Super Secret UFO and is working on one of her exceptions.

Wanna see a beautiful Mystery Stole? Click on over to Amanda's blog; she is making great progress!

Knitterary is finally able to show off her Super Secret Project - go check out the cuteness. And let us have a moment of silence for that beautiful Jaywalker. In its passing, it has given me the peace to toss out my own (aforementioned) disheartening project. ***moment of silence***

Go give Knitty Kitty a big round of applause - she is getting lots done!

Go see KP's sock and share the love.

Turtle was making good progress, but she hasn't posted since the 7th. (Hmm, I wonder if she is hiding something like I was.)

I hope to have some real progress to show by Friday!!

UFOctober Day 10 Report

Well, nothing really new to report. The beginning of the week is usually crazy busy for me, so I don't get much knitting done. But I'm home all day tomorrow, and if I can resist "swatching" the ball o' mess (I frogged the non-toe), maybe I can get some sweater progress going.

But I had to stop in and share this recent comic from HOBOTOPIA, which I thought was great for UFOctober!



(If you don't get it, click here.)

UFOctober - Day 6 Update

Still not too late to sign up! Sign up by tonight - there will be prizes!!

My Projects:

Blue Cascade Socks for Boy1 - Frog Frogged 10/6/07 (1:30 a.m.)

Chevron Lace Socks - Rip back to heel flap just before turn, & reknit Finished 10/6/07 (1:00 a.m.)

Early Nettie - Frog Frogged 10/1/07

Heartbreakingly Cute Baby Kimono 1 - Gently wash and hope it can be salvaged, perhaps with some clever embroidery. If not salvageable, frog

Heartbreakingly Cute Baby Kimono 2 - Figure out the sleeve seams or frog

Lily Pad Socks for Boy1 - Finish second sock (In progress)

Purple sweater for Girl - Figure out where I am in the pattern and finish

Recycled Navy Sweater - Finish as vest (compromise solution, plus I am running out of yarn).

Sky Socks - Mail Mailed 10/4/07

Swap-Bot Swap Yarn - Finish and mail Dried and packed 10/6/07; will be mailed 10/8/07


The Exceptions:

Jimmy Neutron sweater for Boy1

ONE ball-band dishcloth if the mood strikes

FOto Friday - October 5, 2007

Undeserved Yarn, or, My Sock-Bot Loot:

Dyed by Debbi with acid dyes on Knit Picks base. She calls this color Sweet Tart - very appropriate! Looks like it will make some fun Monkeys if I ever attempt a pair. Seeing her neat little yarn cake makes me want a yarn winder soooooo baaaaaad. She sent along some awesome purple stitch markers by Mary! This photo is really dark, I'm sorry!


Seeing Debbi's pretty yarn and after wrestling with the kool-aid Every Single Time makes me think I need to step up to real acid dyes if I want to take this yarn dyeing thing seriously.

And did you know that many (if not all) fiber "acid" dyes are citric-acid based? So is Kool-Aid! I was thinking of something far more sinister, probably since a nasty dustup between myself and some sulphuric acid once resulted in a late-night trip to urgent care. Anyway, speaking of wrestling with Kool-Aid...

The Project Previously Knows As The Great Pumpkin, Now With More Autumn Leaves Effect!:

Overdyed in TONS of lemonade Kool-Aid (pale stuff, that), then spotted with Cherry. It looks good, so I'm sending it on to the very patient Robyn once it's dry (one photo with flash, one without):



If I tried this color effect again, I would dye it with four packs of lemonade FIRST, then hand-painted it in orange, red and maybe a touch of green. The contrast of the red and green in early autumn leaves is one of my favorite parts of autumn, yet I forgot all about it.

This also qualifies as a finished project for UFOctober, woohoo!

More UFOctober Progress:

Early Nettie Before:


Early Nettie After:


Sky Socks Before:


Sky Socks After:


In other progress: I've turned the heel on the 2nd Lily Pad sock. I'm enjoying this yarn again, so this seems to be my main project right now.

If you want to participate, leave me a note in the comments by Saturday night. (I was going to have everyone leave a comment on the original post, but that seems silly to me now, so just leave one here.) If you have already signed up, check the UFOctober 2007 link list to the right and make sure your name/blog appears there.

And don't forget to grab a button! (Please save to your own account, thx.)

UFOctober: Day 4 Progress Report

My Projects:

Blue Cascade Socks for Boy1 - Frog

Chevron Lace Socks - Rip back to heel flap just before turn, & reknit

Early Nettie - Frog Frogged 10/1/07

Heartbreakingly Cute Baby Kimono 1 - Gently wash and hope it can be salvaged, perhaps with some clever embroidery. If not salvageable, frog

Heartbreakingly Cute Baby Kimono 2 - Figure out the sleeve seams or frog

Lily Pad Socks for Boy1 - Finish second sock (In progress)

Purple sweater for Girl - Figure out where I am in the pattern and finish

Recycled Navy Sweater - Finish as vest (compromise solution, plus I was running out of yarn).

Sky Socks - Mail Mailed 10/4/07

Swap-Bot Swap Yarn - Finish and mail (Finished dyeing; will mail when dry)


The Exceptions:

Jimmy Neutron sweater for Boy1

ONE ball-band dishcloth if the mood strikes

UFOctober: The 4 Ps

We have People!

Michaele of The Knitty Professor beat the rush and worked on projects the last week of September.

Knitterary has 6 UFOs to conquer, plus her Starmore KAL and a Clapotis! Yowser. She says she'll be ecstatic if she gets 4 of her UFOs off her back.

Knitty Kitty has 5 UFOs and 2 exceptions.

Turtle set some UFO-busting goals for October, so we'll count her in! She listed 7 UFOs and 11 "waiting to start" and already has knocked off 2 of the UFOs!

Elspeth has a lot of blogs said she would join in, can't wait to see what she'll be working on!

Remember, you have through October 6 to sign up here (leave a comment with a link to your blog).

We have Prizes!

Skein of Green (skein of grein? skeen of green?)

This nummy worsted weight is Shepherd's Wool from Stonehedge Fiber Mill in East Jordan, Michigan. It is the softest 100% wool yarn I have ever felt, almost as soft as baby alpaca. The color is a beautiful heathered deep sea green (lighter than it's showing up here) called "Seebreeze."

Mystery Sock Yarn
It may be hand-dyed or it may be some of my ever-growing Knit Picks stash. We'll see. (I guess you could say that deciding this prize is another UFO.)

Prizes will be awarded by random draw. If this is fun, if we do it again next year, maybe we'll have specific categories - most finished projects, most daunting, etc.

We have Projects!

Holy Unidentified Objects, Batman! Every time I dig through my stash, I find more UFOs! Here are two more alien projects I found:

Nettie 1 - forgot all about this early attempt at a net market bag; see below.
Sky Socks - finished back in, what, June? Just need to be mailed, for pete's sake!

We have Progress!

This was an easy one. I stumbled across the nascent Nettie while reviewing the Recycled Navy Cardi. FROGGGED!! Photos to come!

When Sarcasm is Not Enough...

I'm sorry, but I had to laugh. It seems a few of you took my Saturday post literally. What I meant was, it was a really rough day. The kind of day that will drive you to drink, if not alcohol, then chocolate syrup straight from the bottle.

Things are better now, but - hoo boy - has something got to give.

On an unrelated knitting note: I'm thinking of designating October as "UFOctober" or "UnFinished October" and make a goal to finish, work on, or even frog all my UFOs. Who's with me?

Lesson Learned

This, people, is why you must not only knit a swatch, but WASH IT.



Look closely (click for bigger). The red color speckles are running. Grr.

This was supposed to be a gift for a baby due any second. Unacceptable.

Next life: dishcloth. A plain ugly one. No cute ball-band goodness for you! (Stupid yarn.)

The pattern is the "Heartbreakingly Cute Baby Kimono" from Mason-Dixon Knitting. And it is not only Heartbreakingly Cute, but also Super Fast, Really Easy, and CHEAP.

Also heartbreaking with the running dyes.

Thankfully, I went on a booty kick a while back so I have a stash of booties on hand for emergency gifts. ("Booty kick" - heh.) But still. I really wanted to make this baby a sweater. Rats.

Alohahahaha - Hawaii Laughs at Me

Well, maybe not the entire state.

But these socks? Definitely. Let's review our progress thus far...

Cast on 64 st on size 1 (US) dpns, knit in k2p2 rib for 1 inch.

Make one extra stitch (on purpose). Start pattern, a repeat of 12+1 (because 13 divides evenly into 65, right? Stop laughing. It gets better.)

Complete one full pattern row repeat (14 pattern rows). Realize that a stripe of plain stockinette stitch is forming at the end of the rounds. Ponder.

Decide that since it is a 12+1 repeat, that I will just add the "+1" to the beginning of each pattern repeat to avoid the stripe. Rewrite pattern notes to reflect this brilliant breakthrough.

Decide to not frog yet, but try to work out the pattern for the back of the heel and top of the foot. Move 32 stitches to one needle and start each row with the beginning of the pattern repeat instead of with the "prep" stitches that the official pattern calls for at the beginning of each row. Fail to produce satisfactory heel pattern. Figure it will work out once I have the cuff done and am more familiar with the pattern.

Frog back to ribbing. Re-pick up 65 stitches on tiny (for me) needles.

Fail to realize that if the heel flap experiment failed, adding the "+1" to the beginning of each pattern repeat is not going to work either.

Knit two rows. Realize the above.

Tink back to ribbing.

Really study pattern. Realize what "12+1" repeat means.* Start knitting pattern as written. Again. Flash of insight as I realize that "end last repeat K4" means that instead of the "k7" instruction at the end of the repeat, I will K4 on the last repeat. (Isn't that what it just said? Duh.)

Realize I have 4 extra stitches, which accounts for the previous stockinette stripe. Decide to work the last 8 stitches as k2tog. Ha! Got rid of those pesky extra stitches.

Work second round. Realize I have miscounted somewhere; I do not have enough stitches to complete the last pattern repeat.

Frog the entire sock in fit of temper.

Re-cast on 60 stitches. Work 1 row stockinette. (For socks, I always work the first row after cast on in stockinette because I would go stark, raving bonkers trying to k2p2 rib that first wonky row.) Work second row stockinette unintentionally.

Quietly set sock aside and eat many, many snacks.

Mom will be here in 8 days. I have zero socks for her. I am NOT a fast knitter.

On the positive side, I learned how lace repeats work.

*Newbie Note: A 12+1 repeat means there are 12 stitches in the repeating part of the pattern, plus one extra stitch somewhere in the row to make it even. So instead of 65 stitches (13x5), I needed 61 stitches (12x5=60, 60+1=61). I still didn't quite get it for a while. Read on.

Tinky McFrog

I am a knitter.

I am not the best knitter.

In the language of knitting, "tinking" refers to undoing your knitting one stitch at a time. "Tink" is "knit" spelled backwards.

Also in the language of knitting, "frogging" refers to undoing your knitting many, many stitches at a time. It's called frogging because you "rip it" (say it fast).

Since it seems that every project I start eventually gets frogged or at least tinked at some point, well, why not Tinky McFrog?