tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-91603722715136884622024-03-12T22:12:48.296-05:00Knitting Out Of The ClosetAstroPChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06822098915188478870noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160372271513688462.post-15340052533168402382016-12-09T13:09:00.000-06:002017-01-01T12:17:02.409-06:00Let's put Santa Claus back in Christmas<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Let me start off saying that
I do not want to offend anyone. I am a
Christian and know the real meaning of Christmas and agree we need to keep
Christ in Christmas (after all without Him it would must be “mas” and nobody
would get that excited about “mas” – maybe if it was "muchomas".)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Having said that, I think we also need to put Santa Claus back in Christmas.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Let’s take a look at this St Nick guy. Every year he goes around the world
giving cheer and gifts to everyone. He
knows the name of every girl and boy. He
has them on a list and even knows if they are naughty or nice. He sees them when they are sleeping. He encourages everyone to be good for
goodness sake.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">It has been rumored that he leaves a lump of coal for children who were naughty but that has not been
my experience. Growing up there were
several years where I would have to classify myself as naughty – but every
Christmas morning, Santa had left me nice gifts.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">In the military I was Santa Claus for the squadron Christmas parties for several years (probably because I fit
the costume.) I learned a lot about
being Santa Claus. My brother and my
Father-in-law have also been Santa Claus.
My Father-in-law did it for several years professionally. Talking to them about Santa made me realize
they had many of the same experiences I had.
Putting on the suit gives you a responsibility. You can feel it. Suddenly you are not your self, you are this
great person who loves all unconditionally.
You bring happiness to children of all ages. My brother said he often went to rest
homes where he would visit with the
patrons passing out little gifts and just spending time with them. Often tears would be shed on both sides. Truly Santa Claus gives to children of all ages.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">So why am I posting this in
my knitting blog? I got to thinking as I
was out buying a gift card for a gift.
Santa doesn’t give out gift cards – he has a team of elves that work all
year making toys for each individual. He
knows each child (the list again) and picks out something special for
them. I’m not knocking gift cards – often we give them to our adult children now and ask them to use them for their
family’s Christmas – but we also give gifts.
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">I have a spreadsheet with
every child, their spouse, every grandchild and anyone else for whom I want to
make a gift. During the year I keep an
eye out for that perfect gift for each of them.
Then I start knitting. This is
normally a year long project. It seems
about this time of year I vow to not start so much for next year – but I know I
will.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Every person on my list will
get a hand-knitted gift made especially for them. It might just be a scrubby dishcloth or a
warm hat – but they know hours were spent creating this gift for just them.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">We are knitters. With a couple sticks and some string we create joy. We are Santa Claus. We have lists of people who need our
knitting. We search patterns all year
looking for that perfect thing for each person on the list (even if they were
naughty.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">So, let’s do our part to put
Santa Claus back in Christmas.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
AstroPChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06822098915188478870noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160372271513688462.post-76474812562759083812015-11-09T12:18:00.002-06:002015-11-09T13:15:37.974-06:00More Babies - More Blankets<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b><span style="font-size: 16.0pt; line-height: 107%;">More Babies – More Blankets<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1aYCNj7gRxk/VkDb3SHDulI/AAAAAAAAATo/xGBbZlDvHZ8/s1600/OvalTruly.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1aYCNj7gRxk/VkDb3SHDulI/AAAAAAAAATo/xGBbZlDvHZ8/s320/OvalTruly.jpg" width="239" /></a>As my children get older they are presenting me with more and more grandchildren. In 2013 and 2014 we had 4 new granddaughters, Cora, Carina, Esther and LaRue. Of course any knitter knows baby girls mean lots of knitting. Three weeks ago we got a new grandson, Calvin, and even though little boys don’t take as much knitting as little girls, there’s still the baby blanket. <o:p></o:p></div>
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A few posts back (which sadly turns out to be a few years back) I posted about several of these baby blankets. Well, these last 5 are different and interesting. I’ve learned a few things.</div>
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<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Cotton is awesome.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">It may not be as pretty or knit up as nice as wool but for babies it can’t be beat.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">We all know what babies do.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Everything they put in their mouth either comes right back up and out, or if they do keep it down, it still ends up coming back out – sometimes very unpleasantly.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">A cotton baby blanket turns out to be a great baby rag.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">You can use it to wipe up the mess and then throw it in the washer and clean the heck out of it.</span><span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">Other patterns can be converted into a baby blanket.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">I already talked about this using Grannies Favorite Dishcloth to just make a big square blanket, but for 2 of the last I’ve converted a different shape into a square baby blanket. On the first I converted a triangular shawl into a square blanket – more on this to follow.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">I also made one by just making a scarf much wider.</span></li>
<li><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">The final thing I’ve learned is never make a baby blanket with fingering weight or lighter yarn.</span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;"> </span><span style="text-indent: -0.25in;">As you will see from my examples, I haven’t learned this very well.</span></li>
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So here are my last 5 baby blankets in no particular order<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Double Knit Play Mat<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6_ozLZs8hGE/VkDcfuQWDpI/AAAAAAAAAUA/2Xmar2sOMvE/s1600/Moonstone2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6_ozLZs8hGE/VkDcfuQWDpI/AAAAAAAAAUA/2Xmar2sOMvE/s200/Moonstone2.jpg" width="192" /></a><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-q4Hui3HFUss/VkDcUocOkoI/AAAAAAAAATw/qJdyKLw3fTc/s1600/Moonstone1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-q4Hui3HFUss/VkDcUocOkoI/AAAAAAAAATw/qJdyKLw3fTc/s200/Moonstone1.jpg" width="196" /></a> My daughter in law found a cool pattern she wanted me to use. It was very thick and was basically a fancy knit blanket which wasn’t reversible and a plain knit blanket sewn to the back side. While considering that, I was interested in a scarf I saw on Ravelry, called Moonstone DK Scarf by Luch Neatby. It was double knit and I wanted to try my hand at double knit. Then I got the idea of making a thick baby blanket by just doing double knit. I took the Moonstone pattern and modified it to be a blanket. I’m very happy with the results but I have one warning, You have to knit every stitch twice – once on the front of the blanket and once on the back. Also, you have to remember, every time you turn the project, the front and back color switch so you have to take a deep breath before every row and make sure you have the right colors in mind. The great things about double knit is 1 - it's totally reversible and 2 - it's very thick making more of a mat than a blanket. </div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Cotton Hexagon Blanket<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lBy-DDC1I_M/VkDcfiaS8oI/AAAAAAAAAUE/pbOIeUIWDIg/s1600/hex1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lBy-DDC1I_M/VkDcfiaS8oI/AAAAAAAAAUE/pbOIeUIWDIg/s320/hex1.jpg" width="320" /></a>Another daughter in law found a pattern with crocheted hexagons connected into a blanket. Being an old math teacher, I liked the idea of connecting hexagons but was not about to give way to the dark side and start crocheting so of course I decided to modify it and make a knit one. I also don’t like the idea of seaming anything together, so I decided to knit the hexagons together as I made them. You can look at my project page on Ravelry for more details but basically here’s what I did. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-nX2SAC8TZDE/VkDcfquDhCI/AAAAAAAAAUI/joLoxWOfZxs/s1600/hex2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-nX2SAC8TZDE/VkDcfquDhCI/AAAAAAAAAUI/joLoxWOfZxs/s200/hex2.jpg" width="200" /></a>Before I start, I was in a geometric phase in my knitting. I had just knit a life size soccer ball by connecting hexagons and pentagons and done a couple hexagonal blankets so this seemed to follow naturally. </div>
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The blanket is made by connecting 23 smaller hexagons together to form a square (when you add several partial hexagons to the sides). Each side of each hexagon is 22 stitches so I did a provisional cast on of 22 x 6 = 132 stiches. Then I knit these stitches in a circle, Now, every other round decrease 2 stitches (SSK, Ktog) at each corner (there will be 6 of them since it’s a hexagon). You keep working into the middle until there are only 6 stitches left, thread the yarn through the 6 and pull them tight. That’s one.</div>
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Now, go back and cast on 5 x 22 = 110 stitches along with 22 stitches from one of the sides of the previous hexagon. That makes 132 stitches. Knit this hexagon. Now go back and cast on 4x22 = 88 stitches and knit them along with 22 stitches from the 1<sup>st</sup> hexagon and 22 stitches from the second. </div>
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Keep doing this, adding new hexagons until you have what you want. <o:p></o:p></div>
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If you look at the picture it doesn’t look like the yellow ones are hexagons, that’s because there is no border around the hexagon like there is with the white ones. <o:p></o:p></div>
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I also had to figure out how to make the partial hexagons along the side. Finally, I did a few rows of garter stitch around the whole thing and then did a picot bind off. NOTE TO SELF – I HATE PICOT BIND OFF. It’s like take 3 steps forward then 2 backwards all the way around (actually in this case, 5 steps forward - 3 steps back.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Cotton Polka Dot Blanket<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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My 3<sup>rd</sup> daughter in law wanted something with polka dots. I couldn’t find anything I liked so ended up making my own. Basically, it’s a big grey square with rows of large and small dots. I used a random number generator to decide what color dot to put where because no matter how I tried, I always ended up with blotches of color when I tried to do it myself.<br />
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This was just simple intarsia (if those 2 words can be used together). As you can see from the picture, that means lots of bobbins hanging and then at the end there was a million ends to weave in and since it’s cotton the ends are hard to hide but overall it turned out nice – She’s happy with it.<o:p></o:p><br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Rainbow Star Blanket<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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So, when I heard I was going to have a grandson, finally, I decided to make a Spiderman blanket. I’d seen this one on Ravelry and was kind of excited to do it. I got nearly completed with the Spiderman blanket when she announced that she wanted something that looked like the Revontuli –huivi/Northern Lights shawl by AnneM. That’s a semi-curcular shawl made of 8 wedges. They are each pointed at the edges created by adding one at the beginning and end of each wedge and decreasing 2 in the middle of each wedge. You do this every other row, except every 6<sup>th</sup> row you don’t do the decreases which makes the circle grow. Well, I knew from doing the spider man blanket that if you did 14 of these wedges you’d end up with a complete circle so I modified the pattern to be a complete circle.<br />
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There are also rows of lace. I was planning on using using 4 rows of white for the lace sections and alternating 3 different colors between the white rows. (The colors my daughter-in-law selected). Well, I didn’t know what I was doing because I ordered fingering. I totally meant to order DK which is what I used for the Spiderman blanket. When the order came in I was going to order new yarn when I came up with the idea to hold two strands together. This would allow me to blend the colors. I could do a few rows with 2 strands of color 1, then a few rows with color1 and 2 held together, then a few rows of 2 strands of color 2. You can see from the picture the result – I like it.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Truly Truly<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-rkCJO04GBy4/VkDd8S_nqlI/AAAAAAAAAUw/dxcNydtDYdg/s1600/truly2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-rkCJO04GBy4/VkDd8S_nqlI/AAAAAAAAAUw/dxcNydtDYdg/s320/truly2.jpg" width="320" /></a> A few years ago I saw a pattern that reached out and grabbed me. As I say in my notes, this hasn’t happened with this force before or since. I simply had to knit this shawl. Believe me, my picture isn’t nearly as stunning as the one that grabbed me. The pattern was Truly by Ann Kingstone.<br />
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After I finished the shawl, my daughter really liked it. It also turned out, she was having a baby girl, so I got the idea of doing basically 2 shawls back to back. The normal triangular shawl consists of a few stitch garter edge, then increase one stitch, knit the first half, increase a stitch, knit the middle stitch, increase a stitch , knit the 2<sup>nd</sup> half, increase a stitch, knit the garter edge. Then turn around and knit the garter edges stitches and purl everything else. Keep doing this row after row and you end up with an ever increasing triangle.<o:p></o:p></div>
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So, if you eliminate the garter edge, and do 4 panels instead of 2 you would knit all the way around. Now continue, only you’ll stay on the right side, so just knit a round. So Basically, increase, knit 1<sup>st</sup> panel, increase, k1, increase, knit 2<sup>nd</sup> panel, increase, k1, increase, knit 3<sup>rd</sup> panel, increase k1, increase, knit 4th panel, increase. Now knit a round.<o:p></o:p></div>
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So, I did that, and was very happy with the results. Don’t tell anyone, but truly-truly is probably my favorite of all the baby blankets I’ve done so far - the picture doesn't do it justice. <o:p></o:p></div>
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And of course, no baby blanket is complete without a baby or 2.</div>
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AstroPChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06822098915188478870noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160372271513688462.post-75763236908646299502013-03-29T12:45:00.003-05:002013-03-29T12:52:37.589-05:00Why We Knit<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial;">Why We Knit<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>So I spend a crazy amount of time knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I go to the dentist – I take my knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I’m watching TV – I’m knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I go visit the grandkids – I take my knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Basically, if I’m not working or sleeping – I’m knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So one must ask the question – WHY?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>There are lots of reasons that come to mind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I knit to relax.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I knit because I can.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I knit because I like it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But what’s so relaxing about poking a needle through a loop of yarn, wrapping a new piece of yarn around the end and pulling it back through the loop – over and over and over.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had to do this over 50,000 times for the last baby blanket I made.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>So why do we knit?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I love yarn and wool.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I like making things out of just a ball of string.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s a satisfaction that comes when you finish the last bind off and the project drops into your lap.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I love to see lace pop open when I block it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is that reason enough to spend countless hours knitting?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I may find some really cool yarn that would be perfect for a pair of socks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It may cost $20.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I could spend over 20 hours knitting this into a beautiful pair of knee high socks every bit as nice as something that would cost $2.99 at Walmart.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Go to ETSY and look at beautiful hand knit shawls selling for $80.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When you take away the price of the yarn this could not be more than $1 an hour.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So – we don’t knit for economy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We don’t knit to provide clothing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That could be accomplished much cheaper and easier at any box store.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Do we knit for ourselves?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>OK – we do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I go to meetings with knitters many of us wear our knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have made myself a sweater, a scarf, a pair of black socks and a pair of white socks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s 4 items.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve made hundreds of knitted items.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Many hundreds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>So, the simple answer must be we knit for others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We knit for the joy of giving something that can’t be bought.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I once made 5 dolls at the same time for some of my granddaughters for Christmas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They turned out beautiful so I took one to work to show off.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Several of the ladies there really liked them and asked what I would charge to make one for them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I told them that the dolls took about 20 hours each and had about $10 worth of yarn, so at $10 an hour, I would be happy to make them one for $210.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course I make much more than $10 an hour, but I told them that for a co-worker, I would be willing to work for that price.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They looked at me like I was crazy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the worth of the dolls is much more than $210 to me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everytime I see one of my granddaughters drag her doll around I get a payment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have a foster daughter who was recently divorced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even though I never see her children, I hope my doll sitting on their bed makes them realize they are loved.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I like to see baby blankets and toys worn out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of my granddaugters has drug her blanket through everything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve tried to patch it, but some of the areas are so thin there’s nothing to darn.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Still she takes it with her everywhere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m constantly running a doll repair shop for worn out dolls and other knitted animals. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I have a rocket scientist son-in-law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s a bigger nerd than I am.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s a huge Dr Who fan so for Christmas I sent his family some scarfs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They live far away so my daughter taped them opening our presents.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was fun to see his eyes light up as each of his boys unwrapped a 2/3rds scale Dr Who scarf.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was playing with the scarfs and telling the boys he would have to borrow one to take to work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then it was great to see him open his own package to discover I had made him a full sized one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Later in the video they can all be seen running around playing with their toys.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The boys have their scarfs on and the 2 year old Kaitlyn has her little alpaca shawl draped over her head.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the back is my Son in law with his scarf on.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>If you google charity knitting, or search for charity groups on ravelry you will be surprised at the number of different projects going on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s a general group called Charity Knitters that has over 4000 members.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are hundreds of other charity groups. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You want to make Afghans for Afghans – there’s a group.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve participated in several.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My favorite is knitting blankets and burial clothing for premee babies that don’t make it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can’t imagine the sorrow that a parent must go through to go to the hospital just to loose a baby.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I love making beautiful lacy things that will do nothing but let some sad parent know that someone out there cares.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Another project is making leper bandages.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You take a small needle and some crochet cotton and knit bandages about 2 inches wide and 4 feet long.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Basically you’re just making an ace bandage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I assume somewhere in a terrible place is a leper living in very sad conditions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can’t imagine how they feel to know that someone spent hours making a bandage for just them.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I’m part of a knitting group here in the St Louis Area.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of our members had a terrible house fire.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her family got out but she has a little girl who was screaming because her “babies” were all burning in the fire.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Along with her children’s toys and things, all of her knitting was either burned or smoke damaged.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So for our next monthly meeting we decided to all donate some of our stashes and try and help rebuild her stash.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We also wanted to give something for her children.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have one of my Annie dolls waiting for my own granddaughter but I won’t give it to her until this summer – so it was just sitting there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I figured I could always make another one, so I threw the Annie doll in the pile.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the next meeting we presented her with the knitting and tears were shed on both sides.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>After she gave Annie to her little girl she could not be separated from it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She takes it everywhere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That night she slept with the doll.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ever since the fire she has had nightmares of the fire and of her babies burning.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The next morning she told her mom that the doll took her nightmares away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is the best payment I have ever received for anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><o:p> </o:p>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><strong>Annie and her new home</strong></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>So, why do we knit – we knit to bring joy to the world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Out of balls of string, we make happiness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s no greater purpose. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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AstroPChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06822098915188478870noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160372271513688462.post-36004927650842260502013-01-28T13:31:00.002-06:002013-01-28T16:38:21.472-06:00Minding your P's & Q's<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial;">Minding your P Q’s<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">My mom always told me to mind my P’s and Q’s.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I didn’t know until many years later that this stood for “Please and Thank You’s” but I did know I should mind my P’s and Q’s.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> For knitting, I've come up with a new rule, Mind your <strong>P</strong>rojects and <strong>Q</strong>ueues. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">Today I want to address a serious problem that hits every knitter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Next to managing your stash (which I don’t even want to talk about), managing your projects can be the biggest problem a knitter faces.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To keep things simple, a project is any item that has at least one stitch cast on and hasn’t been blocked and had all the ends woven in.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I believe these projects fall into 3 categories.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">The Frog Pond<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">The Inactive Queue<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">The Active Queue.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">I’ll handle these in reverse order.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">When I talk about my project queues, I’m not talking about items I plan on knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is what the Queue on Ravelry is all about.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You line projects up in the order you want to start them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You find a new item you simply must knit and add it to your queue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Every so often, you may even order your queue, but if you’re like me, you normally find something you just have to knit NOW and forget you even have a Ravelry Queue, and pull something out of the stash that is perfect for the project, and away you go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Probably the only things in my Ravelry Queue that will ever see the light of my needles are the top couple items.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My current queue has 22 items.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I just looked through it and there’s not even a remote chance I’ll ever do 12 of them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course I’ll never remove them because I like them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Anyway, that’s not the queue’s I want to talk about.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">I believe the first rule of knitting is:<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"> Knitting should be enjoyable</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Knitting is why women outlive men.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While men have all that energy pent up inside raising their blood pressure until they pop – women drain all that pressure through their fingers into the knitting needles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If we’re knitting something we don’t want to knit – we’re not enjoying ourselves – we're breaking the number 1 rule.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If enjoying yourself is the 1<sup>st</sup> rule of knitting, the 2<sup>nd</sup> is: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">There are no Knitting Police.</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This has been said many times by greater knitters than me but it bears repeating – so I will, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">There are NO Knitting Police</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just like there is no set way to hold your needles, there is no set way to manage your projects.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some knitters can cast on a fair isle sweater on #2 needles with sock yarn and knit until it’s done.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then they cast on a Dr Who Season 12 scarf and knit until it’s done.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">I am not one of those kinds of knitters – Hence, my project Queues.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can normally knit about 1½ hours in one kind of knitting before I have to switch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Normally this is about 2 episodes of Little House on the Prairie or 4 episodes of the Andy Griffith Show (assuming you are watching without commercials).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Normally, this comes down to about 1,600 stitches in straight knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> I'm I'm knitting something that is 100 rows across, I'll break it up into groups of 15 rows or so (or other obvious breaks around that size.)</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">My project queues are for items that are either being worked on regularly or are waiting on something like more yarn, or beads.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I normally have 5 or 6 projects that I am actively working on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Normally they alternate from worsted to fingering to lace.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Simple mindless knitting will be followed by complicated lace which may be followed by small projects like dolls.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">To see my queue, you have to go into the unfinished storage room in my basement.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I nailed a board on the wall and stuck several hooks in it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I just hang my various project bags on the hocks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then, I take one down, work it for an hour or so and then hang it back up and grab the next bag.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Below is a picture of my active queue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The projects are:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">In the first canvas bag is a “Truly” shawl by Anne Kingstone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s made with DK yarn and is mindless knitting (until I get to the last 15 rows which are lace – but still pretty simple)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">In the Bart Simpson bag is a “Truly” baby blanket (by the way, this is out of order, it should be in position 3.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Since the Truly shawl is a triangular shawl, if I knit it in the round, and repeat the pattern twice, I end up with a square blanket.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More on this in an upcoming blog.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">In the black sheep bag is my Ethereal Shawl by Lakshmi Juneja.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is tedious lace work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After about an hour on it, I am close to going blind (that ‘s why its position is actually #2 between the 2 worsted projects.)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">4.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">In the blue bag (hand made by my wife – thank you very much) is a lace Rose of England tablecloth by Marianne Kinzel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s also tedious and now that I’m getting near the edge, 2 rows are about the most I can do at a time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is probably in danger of the frog pond when I get the supplies to do some of the projects in my inactive queue.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">5.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">Finally, the 5<sup>th</sup> bag which is also a canvas bag has my current doll project.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a “Little Lisa” doll by Yvonne Boucher.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">I can’t over emphasize that there are no Knitting police and there are no Queue police.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I feel like working on the baby blanket for 3 hours, I do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I get tired of the doll after just one arm (like I did last night) then that’s it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I feel like doing something out of order – I do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The queue is for guidance only.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Often, if I’m near the end of a project I’ll just work until it’s done.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the other hand, if it’s something with a million ends to weave in, I may go through the queue and skip it several times.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I find that I’m dreading something each time it comes up – it’s shuffled off to the frog pond for a much deserved time-out.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">My Queues (excuse the mess)<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">My 2<sup>nd</sup> queue is my inactive queue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These are projects that are on hold for some reason.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can’t see them very well, but they are in the above picture on the far end.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Currently in my inactive queue are the following:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">The small black sheep bag has a Downton Alley Mystery KAL project.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I only get the clues once a week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I get the clue, I knit it, then back in the inactive queue it goes. (This little guy is in grave danger of the frog pond and eventual death by frogging)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">In the Red bag holds Charity work – currently booties.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I normally work on that on Sundays.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">The Purple diamond bag holds my Christmas stocking project by Marji LaFreniere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s on hold for yarn.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This year I’m planning on making 23 of them so I better get the yarn soon.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">4.<span style="font: 7pt 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">Finally the huge green bag is a Kiki Mariko Felted Rug by Kay Gardiner and Anne Shayne.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s also on hold waiting for yarn.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">That brings me to my frog pond.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">Technically the Frog Pond gets its name from items waiting to be frogged.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While this could certainly happen to any item in my frog pond, for the most part, these are just projects that have been set aside to do at a later time or for my children to worry about after Idie (which may happen to a lot more projects then I care to think about).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> So i</span></span>t’s not really a frog pond, it’s a hibernation pond.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Right now, I have 3 projects there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are not in danger of being frogged – but that could change at any minute.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s a purple shawl made with crazy thin yarn.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have nothing against the pattern or the yarn, but they don’t really go together.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I found I dreaded this thing every time it came up – hence it’s in the pond.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Also there’s a shawl made with fingering yarn that is all garter stitch and made in waves (little shell pieces one at a time).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have nothing against this one, except there are so many shawls I’d rather be making that it got squeezed out of the active queues.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Finally there’s a huge baby blanket I started years ago when I had nothing else to do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s made by holding 2 pieces of yarn together and using “grannies favorite dish cloth pattern” I just kept getting bigger and bigger.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the definition of mindless knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not in danger of being frogged because the yarn isn’t worth it (I started it before I discovered wool).<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">I mentioned that knitting should be enjoyable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If a project gets naughty and needs a time out – I throw it in the frog pond.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s not a death sentence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the other hand, I’m not one that has to finish something just because I started it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You may feel it’s giving in to something if you quit, I think just the opposite.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If a project has been bad and deserves to be frogged, frogging it makes you the winner – not the quitter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you frog something, even something you’ve spent countless hours on, no policeman will show up at your door and take away your needles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a bonus, if it’s very nice yarn, you’ll get the pleasure of making something nice out of it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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AstroPChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06822098915188478870noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160372271513688462.post-52566008589968158752012-11-20T16:37:00.000-06:002012-11-20T17:54:24.821-06:00Social Knitting - Everybody's Doing It<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial;">Social Knitting – or Everybody's Doing It</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">When I decided to go public with my knitting, I thought it might be fun to seek out other knitters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was certain that there were quite a few and thought I could probably learn something from others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I thought I could even find a knitting group.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">My Local Yarn Shop (LYS), Knit & Caboodle, has a weekly knit-in so I thought I would try it out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I went and there were 4 other ladies and another guy sitting around a table knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They welcomed me, and asked me to return, and I did for a while.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of the ladies said I should check into Ravelry (an online knitting community) so I did.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Arial;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Holy Cow!!<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">This year, Ravelry got their 2,000,000<sup>th</sup> member.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At any time, there are between 5,000 and 10,000 knitters online searching for patterns or talking about whatever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had no idea what I was getting into.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They have groups for everything you can imagine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have a Boston Terrier, so for fun, I did a search of groups who like to talk about Boston Terriers – There are 7 different groups.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m in one called Boston Terrier Owners and Lovers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are 588 members.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you like a specific designer I’m sure there is a group where people discuss her designs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For example, if you like the Rosemary Hill (Romi), there a group called Romi’s Studio with nearly 5,000 members.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">On Ravelry I heard that Stephanie Pearl-McPhee (the Yarn Harlot) was coming to the <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">St Louis</st1:place></st1:city> area for a book signing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I couldn’t believe it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I entered the world of public knitting just in time to find out my hero was coming to town.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The book signing was held at a local church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I decided to go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Again, I was still very new to social knitting so I didn’t know what to expect.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Luckily, someone said to bring your knitting so I brought some.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(This was before I learned that you can and should take your knitting everywhere).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-gfvQRMwZkbE/UKwFErSnqII/AAAAAAAAACs/V8frn9_oHwE/s1600/CIMG0904.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" rea="true" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-gfvQRMwZkbE/UKwFErSnqII/AAAAAAAAACs/V8frn9_oHwE/s320/CIMG0904.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial;">I got to the church early because I wasn’t sure how long it would take me to get there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I sat down and started knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pretty soon the church filled up – completely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, some people were standing in the back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everyone was knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was surprised at how friendly everyone was.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everyone was checking out shawls and sweaters people were wearing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People would ask you what you were knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nobody even thought it was strange that I, a man, was knitting (there were several of us.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The program was late starting, but nobody cared – because we were all knitting.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">The actual program was awesome.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the end of the presentation she did a book signing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There were several hundred people there and she was going to sign books for everyone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She said an interesting thing up front.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She said that people should start the line from the front row and work backwards – but if anyone needed to leave early, they could just come up front of the line.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She said nobody would mind because we’re all knitters so we’re friendly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She was right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nobody complained about the line.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nobody complained about people that went up front and cut in.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I stood in line for over an hour and everyone was happy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I learned an important lesson – Knitters are kind, friendly people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Stephanie acted happy to talk to me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had a picture taken with her (sorry it’s fuzzy, blame the lady who took it.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She did refuse my proposal of marriage but other than that it was great.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">Since that time, through Ravelry I have found other groups locally.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I believe every yarn shop has knit ins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I know of many many knit-ins done at women’s homes or in rest homes or churches or where ever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve kind of settled into a group that meets here in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">St Louis</st1:place></st1:city>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re called the Gateway Knitters and have over 200 members.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have monthly meetings with 30 or 40 women and an old man meeting together for a few hours to eat cookies, show off our projects, give each other knitting hints – and knit. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">I have since also discovered a knitting group which meets monthly at our local library which I attend regularly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was there last night and was again impressed with how nice everyone is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s more than just showing each other how to knit – it’s a place where someone can go without a friend and be immediately accepted.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One lady had just had her cat put down and was alone and new in the area.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One young woman was trying to learn and was knitting her first scarf.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everyone is so helpful, supportive and friendly.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">Of course, there are much more sophisticated knitting events.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our little group had 2 retreats a year where we go to a local hotel for a long weekend.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> T</span>here are other events that are much more exotic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I just did a computer search for knitting cruises.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s one going to China in Mar 2013, the Panama Canal in April, and <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Alaska</st1:place></st1:state> in July – and so forth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are mountain and/or beach retreats on both coasts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can go to a retreat in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Vancouver</st1:place></st1:city> where they just do sock knitting for a week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These can cost thousands of dollars.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">There are Knit-a-longs (KALs) where a group decides to knit the same pattern.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can help each other over difficult parts, compare yarns, or just see how different people knit the same thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These groups can be in a small <st1:place w:st="on">LYS</st1:place> knitting group, a designer’s forum, or a Ravelry group with hundreds of people knitting the same thing all around the world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">One additional point I will make is that most knitters are obsessed with yarn shops.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For me, I’m content with on-line shopping; I use knitpicks.com for nearly everything, so I don’t go to the <st1:place w:st="on">LYS</st1:place> too often.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I do, it’s in and out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m not sure what the big deal is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Other knitters talk about going to the <st1:place w:st="on">LYS</st1:place> and spending all their time and money there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I guess it’s a testosterone thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I may knit – but I don’t shop.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">So, what I learned from going public is that there are lots and lots of knitters out there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are uncommonly kind people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They love to knit and they love to talk about knitting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They love to help.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What I really learned is that I am not alone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Last weekend I visited my mother in law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I knit while I’m there (surprise) and one of my sisters-in-law told me that she thought there might be a knitting group there in the area.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I just smiled and thought, “Yes, there probably is.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
AstroPChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06822098915188478870noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160372271513688462.post-15155791873016486062012-10-29T12:31:00.000-05:002012-11-15T15:01:56.426-06:00The Death Shawl<a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=9160372271513688462" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a><a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=9160372271513688462" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a><br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6zw7IfewNyg/UI69EyC3xMI/AAAAAAAAACM/T1IeFKCByM8/s1600/Skull.jpg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6zw7IfewNyg/UI69EyC3xMI/AAAAAAAAACM/T1IeFKCByM8/s200/Skull.jpg.jpg" width="150" /></a></div>
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6zw7IfewNyg/UI69EyC3xMI/AAAAAAAAACM/T1IeFKCByM8/s1600/Skull.jpg.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-6zw7IfewNyg/UI69EyC3xMI/AAAAAAAAACM/T1IeFKCByM8/s200/Skull.jpg.jpg" width="150" /></a><b><span style="font-family: Arial;"><v:shapetype coordsize="21600,21600" filled="f" id="_x0000_t75" o:preferrelative="t" o:spt="75" path="m@4@5l@4@11@9@11@9@5xe" stroked="f"> <v:stroke joinstyle="miter"></v:stroke><v:formulas><v:f eqn="if lineDrawn pixelLineWidth 0"></v:f><v:f eqn="sum @0 1 0"></v:f><v:f eqn="sum 0 0 @1"></v:f><v:f eqn="prod @2 1 2"></v:f><v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelWidth"></v:f><v:f eqn="prod @3 21600 pixelHeight"></v:f><v:f eqn="sum @0 0 1"></v:f><v:f eqn="prod @6 1 2"></v:f><v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelWidth"></v:f><v:f eqn="sum @8 21600 0"></v:f><v:f eqn="prod @7 21600 pixelHeight"></v:f><v:f eqn="sum @10 21600 0"></v:f></v:formulas><v:path gradientshapeok="t" o:connecttype="rect" o:extrusionok="f"></v:path><o:lock aspectratio="t" v:ext="edit"></o:lock></v:shapetype><v:shape id="_x0000_i1025" style="height: 42pt; width: 42pt;" type="#_x0000_t75"><v:imagedata o:title="Skull" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\BART~1.LAR\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image001.jpg"></v:imagedata></v:shape></span></b><b><span style="font-family: Arial;"><b><span style="font-family: Arial;"></span></b></span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Arial;"><b><span style="font-family: Arial;"><br /></span></b></span></b><b><span style="font-family: Arial;">The Death Shawl<v:shape id="_x0000_i1026" style="height: 42pt; width: 42pt;" type="#_x0000_t75"> <v:imagedata o:title="Skull" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\BART~1.LAR\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image001.jpg"></v:imagedata></v:shape></span></b><span style="font-family: Arial;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">OK, I really hesitate to tell this story because it may offend. On the other hand, it’s Halloween, and everything in this story happened a long time ago – so What the heck. – here’s the true story of <b>the Death Shawl</b>.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; text-indent: 0.5in;">I was in the military stationed in </span><st1:state style="font-family: Arial; text-indent: 0.5in;" w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Virginia</st1:place></st1:state><span style="font-family: Arial; text-indent: 0.5in;">. We decided to go visit family in </span><st1:state style="font-family: Arial; text-indent: 0.5in;" w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Utah</st1:place></st1:state><span style="font-family: Arial; text-indent: 0.5in;"> for Christmas. My first wife’s grandmother was very sick and was not expected to live more than a few weeks so we especially wanted to get a chance to visit with her for one last visit. I had been making a few shawls and decided it would be nice to make one for her grandma. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">The pattern was lacy, but this is before I discovered there was something besides acrylic worsted yarn from Michaels, so I made it out of some sparkly white acrylic yarn from the local big box store. We were staying at my parent’s home in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">Provo</st1:city></st1:place>. I worked on it like mad for a couple days after we got to <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Utah</st1:place></st1:state> so it would be done when we went to visit Grandma. I finished it the night before we drove to her home in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Ogden</st1:place></st1:city>. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">Grandma was thrilled. She cried (no surprise there my wife’s whole family has leaky tear ducts) and was so happy. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">She died a couple weeks later. No surprise there. We flew out for the funeral. After it was over, Grandpa returned the shawl to me. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">A couple years later on a summer vacation to visit <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Utah</st1:place></st1:state> again I gave the shawl to my mom. A few weeks later my mom announced to my sister that she was going to take a nap on the couch for an hour or so before the football game. She never woke up. This was a complete surprise. My mom was old and had a history of heart trouble, but had been fine for quite a while before this. When we were dividing up my mom’s possessions, there was the shawl. Of course, since I had made it, I again took it home.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">On that visit we visited my first wife’s other grandmother. She was in a rest home and would fade in and out of reality. She asked why we were there in <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Utah</st1:place></st1:state> and I told her that my mom had passed. When I told her how mom had died, grandma teared up and said that was so beautiful. Then she told us that she couldn’t die because she had a pace maker. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">Grandma lingered on for a few years, wishing she could pass on, fading in and out of reality. She would stand by the micro wave because she had heard people with pace-makers shouldn't stand by macro waves. She wanted the pace maker removed - but of course doctors won't do that. She was convinced she couldn't die as long as she had the pace maker.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial;"> Before our next visit to family in <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Utah</st1:place></st1:state>, my mother-in-law told me it was time to give Grandma the “<i>shawl.</i>” Of course that was a joke, but it did remind me that I had that basically unused shawl that Grandma would probably enjoy - so, I packed up the shawl and brought it to Grandma. I was hesitant to do so because I have heard stories about how nice things owned by people in rest homes are stolen by the staff and that shawls especially find a way of disappearing, but the shawl was just sitting in a drawer not being used so I figured Grandma might as well enjoy it. So, I brought it to her.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">Two weeks later Grandma died!!!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">To quote Goldfinger in James Bond, “Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it’s enemy action.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"> The shawl is now buried deep in my old knitting boxes. I really should destroy it because I certainly wouldn’t want anyone to find it when I’m gone and decide it’s a pretty shawl. On the other hand, it’s an old acrylic shawl. I have lots of really nice ones that will be found first, so it will probably be thrown out anyway.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
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AstroPChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06822098915188478870noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160372271513688462.post-4052208801569061762012-10-25T09:40:00.001-05:002012-11-15T12:05:44.667-06:00The Baby Blanket from Heck<strong><span style="font-family: Arial;"></span></strong><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial;">The Baby Blanket from Heck<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">In my original how-to-knit book, there was a nice baby bootie pattern. I used it to make booties for several different people who had babies. When I started having grandchildren, I decided to graduate to the next step – <b>The Baby Blanket</b>. I currently have 13 grandchildren and have made 9 baby blankets. I guess I should go back and make 4 for the older kids, but I’m not sure how much a 10 year old would enjoy a baby blanket. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PCBtuJLT0sE/UImas019uAI/AAAAAAAAABk/X-X0sEjQbYw/s1600/Jeff+Blanket+2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PCBtuJLT0sE/UImas019uAI/AAAAAAAAABk/X-X0sEjQbYw/s320/Jeff+Blanket+2.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Simple block pattern</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"> Baby blankets are really just a big square. You don’t have to worry about gauge because it really can’t be the wrong size – somewhere between 28 and 48 inches square – and square – or nearly square.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"> You can do square blocks, stripes, solid, diagonal, or even entrelac. I have done at least one of each. It’s fun to compare my knitting skills progress from blanket to blanket. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">The quickest blanket that isn’t just straight garter stitch is probably the diagonal blanket. You can find the pattern all over the web. Normally it’s for a wash cloth or something else like that – but what’s a baby blanket but a big wash cloth. The pattern is simple. Basically you increase every row until it’s big enough, then you decrease every row. You end up with a square. Here’s the pattern:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial;">Diagonal Baby Blanket</span></b><span style="font-family: Arial;"> (or wash cloth or whatever)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;">·<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">Cast on 5 stitches<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;">·<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">Knit one row<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;">·<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">Increase row: K3, YO, K to end. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;">·<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">Repeat Increase row until blanket is half done.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;">·<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">Decrease row: <st1:place w:st="on">K2</st1:place>, K2tog, yo, K2tog, K to end<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;">·<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">Repeat Decrease row until there are 5 stitches remaining<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;">·<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;">Bind off<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">I had to do 2 blankets close together (my kids should learn to space their children out better.) I made the first one using the diagonal pattern and two colors of yarn together. For the baby girl, I used white and pink. I went from several rows of two white yarns, to several rows of one white and one pink to several rows of two pink yarns – and then reverse. It turned out pretty cool with diagonal strips blending from white to pink and back. It was also very fast since I used large needles and a very simple pattern – nearly all in garter stitch.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">Since the blanket was so easy – I decided to make another one using blue and white in the same way.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pXHazA11GIo/UImai_rjgdI/AAAAAAAAABc/rNYpK4e5n9E/s1600/Entrelac+Blanket.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pXHazA11GIo/UImai_rjgdI/AAAAAAAAABc/rNYpK4e5n9E/s320/Entrelac+Blanket.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dexter tries out all my knitting first</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"> I also tried an <b>entrelac</b> pattern for a baby blanket. My daughter-in-law says she has been stopped by people on the street commenting on the blanket. Entrelac looks hard, and is not. If you haven’t tried it, do it. A baby blanket is a great place to start because it uses large stitches and the gauge doesn’t matter. Of course a huge drawback is that it is not at all reversible. The right side is beautiful. The wrong side looks like the wrong side.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">So, my oldest granddaughter didn’t get a baby blanket (I hadn’t started making them when she was a baby. I decided I should make her a “big girl” blanket. She loves rainbows so I decided to make her a rainbow blanket. I went back to the good old <b>diagonal</b> pattern. My wife always gives me a bad time about my stash - so I threw about 40 different balls of yarn into a big bag. Fingering, worsted, bulky - whatever. Then I would randomly pull a ball out, knit a row, throw that ball into a different bag and grab another ball. When I finished all 40 balls, I just start over. I left the ends about 10 inches long on each end. Then every row, I would tie the end with the end left from the previous row. I used over 40 different yarns – all different sizes and materials, chunky next to fingerling. When I got done, I trimmed the ends to about 6 inches. Even though she’s now 8 – but she loves her rainbow blanket. It was the best stash burner ever. You know – you can never throw any yarn away longer than 3 feet. You never know when you might need it. In fact, I liked the idea so much I made a “rainbow” scarf for my newest daughter-in-law. Figured she should know right off that she had a crazy knitting father-in-law. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-73h7Ye3b6MA/UImbkTe2szI/AAAAAAAAABs/CW3h7WT54K0/s1600/Log_Cabin_04_medium.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="150" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-73h7Ye3b6MA/UImbkTe2szI/AAAAAAAAABs/CW3h7WT54K0/s200/Log_Cabin_04_medium.JPG" title="" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Again with the dog</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"> I also made one blanket based on an afghan pattern I got for free. It started with a large square. Then you pick up the stitches along one side and knit for a while. Then pick up the stitches along the side of the 2 pieces and knit for a while. Keep going until you have a blanket – kind of like a log cabin blanket only you just keep building. (I also made a <b>Log Cabin blanket</b>) <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">An important part of making a baby blanket is that it has to be reversible. Babies tend to mess them up so if there’s not a “right” side, it helps. The diagonal blanket is great for this because it’s all garter stitch which is the same on both sides. With this in mind I saw a pattern for a reversible shawl. I saw it on KnitPicks.com. It’s called <a href="http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/courtyard-drape"><b>Courtyard Drape</b></a> from Reversible Knits © 2009 by Iris Schreier. It is multi-colored with white cables going across one side. The cables are cleverly worked on one side only and don’t even show on the other side. I saw it and immediately thought it would be a cool baby blanket with soft white cables going down one side. The pattern said to use US size 5 needles – so I did. I learned a valuable lesson - never use anything smaller than <st1:country -region="-region" w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">US</st1:place></st1:country> size 8 on a baby blanket. The above diagonal blankets I mentioned used double strand and US size 11 needles. Anyway, the blanket turned out beautiful and it’s one of my favorite baby blankets – it’s not the “baby blanket from heck” but it did take a heck of a long time.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial;">That brings me to the Baby Blanket from Heck.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">I knit a set of hats for my granddaughters. I picked up a little pamphlet with 3 different hats. One of them had a cute pattern going around brim with a star stitch design. Basically it’s knit the RS and on the WS P3Tog leaving the triplet on the left needle, do a YO, then P3Tog through the same 3 forming a star. Then Purl one stitch and do it again. Repeat. That makes a 2 row pattern of stars. If you switch colors and on the next WS row you Purl 2 before you start the first star, you’ll build another row of stars that fit nicely down between the stars in the previous row. Very simple. Very fast.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;"> The “stars” turn out to be nice little squares and I noticed they formed a square diagonally as well as up and down. This gave me the bright idea – make a variation of the diagonal blanket I described above only instead of using simple garter stitch, use this star stitch. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">It worked beautifully. I did one pattern in pink, 2 in white, one in yellow, 2 in white and so on. It looked great. I got to the halfway point and noticed that the blanket didn’t look too square. Well, one thing I’ve learned from many knitters – we are stubborn. I mean, we can see a sweater is big enough to fit a hippo and still press on thinking it will block alright. So, I ignored what looked like a catastrophe and pushed on. Near the end, it was clear I was crazy, but I kept on. Finally, I got to the last row of just 5 stitches and bound off. Now, I put it out on the floor and had to face the reality that I had just knit an abomination. It looked like a kite. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">So, I was a Jr High math teacher, I told myself I could figure out what happened. Let’s look at the anatomy of the diagonal blanket. Garter stitch has the wonderful property of having 1 stitch be almost the same length as 2 rows. Because of this, if you add one stitch at each end for every 2 rows, you are building a nearly perfect right isosceles triangle with the active row being the hypotenuse. If I lost you, just trust me, it works great. Now the star stitch is close to the same measurement as stockinette. 2 stitches = about 1 1/3 rows. Again, if I lost you that means, it won’t work.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">After figuring out what went wrong and messing with the math, I figured out that if I added 2 stitches every other row on the increase rows and decreased 2 stitches every other row on the decrease rows it would work. I frogged the whole dang thing. I rolled each color onto its own ball and then reknit the blanket using the pieces I rolled together. It turned out the pieces were close to the same size (in fact I required a little less which meant I didn’t need to use other yarn. When I finished I have a beautiful blanket that had to be completely knit 2 times. I plan on publishing the pattern if I ever get around to it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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AstroPChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06822098915188478870noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160372271513688462.post-13941841969905942222012-10-22T12:07:00.001-05:002017-02-01T15:17:25.679-06:00Coming out of the Closet<br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><i>As you'll see by the note at the end, I wrote this in Sept 2011. It's now Oct 2012. So much for keeping up. Anyway, now that I'm finally getting around to starting the blog - I'm putting this in as my first post. - Bart</i></span></div>
<b><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14pt;"><br /></span></b><b><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14pt;">Coming out of the Closet<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">As a little boy I heard of how my grandfather, Joseph Barton, knitted socks for soldiers in World War I. The story goes that he would go to the place where they handed out yarn and get enough yarn for only one pair of socks. They would not give more than that at a time. He returned the next day and asked for more yarn. After 2 or 3 days of this they finally just gave him enough yarn to do several socks at a time. My mother said he was the fastest knitter she had ever seen. I never saw anything he knitted, but I always thought it was cool that an old man could knit.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jyAnGmEwR6g/UIb0W_CvCWI/AAAAAAAAABE/_k0kTWMT8mQ/s1600/Bernat+book.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jyAnGmEwR6g/UIb0W_CvCWI/AAAAAAAAABE/_k0kTWMT8mQ/s320/Bernat+book.JPG" width="240" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">In my mid 20s, I was a young Lieutenant in the Air Force. I got sick and knew that I would be home for a couple weeks with nothing to do (we didn’t have a TV at the time.) I was reading a book of family history and thought of my grandfather knitting, and decided there was no reason to wait until I was an old man to start. I sent my wife out for a book on knitting. She came home with the book, <i>The Bernat Book of Complete Knitting</i>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;"> I picked out an afghan pattern which was knitted as a set of long narrow strips using #13 needles (Note, the picture below is not my afghan, it's the pattern in the book</span><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">The book gives detailed instructions on how to cast on and other basic knitting steps. I looked at the pictures and figured out how to do it. I couldn’t really ask anyone how to do it, because men don’t knit – and of course there was no internet yet. I finished the afghan in those two weeks while I was home.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">For the next few years, I knitted on and off. I knitted nearly everything in the book. I was very self-conscious about knitting as a man but now and then I would knit something for someone outside of the family. Usually it would be a pair of baby booties (from the book) for a co-worker or for someone at church having a baby. They were always very well received but very few people knew that I had knitted them. Most thought my wife had done it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">Things progressed until I had the knitting bug bad. I started to knit all the time. During work I would think about what I would knit once I got home. I started knitting something for everyone every Christmas. (This is not something that should be started unless you are really serious – I’ll probably dedicate future blogs to this subject) I remember once I went to pick someone up at the airport. I was knitting something on circular needles so I decided to take my knitting along while I waited. I really tried to knit there in the waiting room, but there were so many people there, I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I was truly a closet knitter.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">As the years have progressed, I thought one day I should write a book about my experiences with yarn. I was going to call it <b><i>Knitting in the Closet</i></b>. It would be about knitting from a man’s point of view.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">Last year, during my usual marathon Christmas knitting, my wife and I went to <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Hawaii</st1:place></st1:state> to visit my youngest daughter and her husband. They had a new baby which we had to see – even if it meant traveling to <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Hawaii</st1:place></st1:state> and spending a week on the beaches – the things we do for our children. Anyway, I was in the middle of my Christmas knitting and couldn’t really see how I could possibly take off a week and still finish everything. I decided I would be around strangers who wouldn’t know me so what the heck – I decided to come out of the closet (at least for two weeks).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">I started knitting on the flight to <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Hawaii</st1:place></st1:state>. One of the stewardesses came over and asked what I was knitting. I would have liked to have said, “A gun holster” but instead I told the truth and said, “Baby doll panties.” Well she wanted to see the doll pattern, and the next thing I knew, I was in the back of the plane with her and she was showing me the linen stitch shawl she was just finishing for herself. She gave me the pattern and made me promise to send her an email picture of the finished doll and of the linen stich shawl if I ever decided to make it (still haven’t, but it’s in my list of things to do – I promise to start as soon as I finish my current Christmas list.) On that trip and at other public places, I was approached by countless women. I got 3 email addresses from women I didn’t even know – all the time sitting next to my wife. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">This is something that should be taught to boys of dating age. Knitting in public is a babe-magnet, more than a puppy, more than a baby. Women come out of the wood-work to talk to a guy that’s knitting. I recently read <i>Free-Range Knitter: The Yarn Harlot Writes again </i>by <a href="http://www.yarnharlot.ca/blog">Stephanie Pearl-McPhee</a>. She mentions this fact and says it is an insult to men because women make a big deal when a man does something many women can. Well, that may be true, but that shouldn’t stop us from enjoying the attention.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">Now, I take my needles wherever I go. I show off my projects at work. I’ve even stopped a woman once to admire a sweater she was wearing and took notes on how parts of it were done.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">That brings me to my blog. I never got around to writing a book, so here’s the next best thing. I’m going to try and put up something weekly. Go ahead and nose around. Let me know your thoughts, things you like, things you don’t, or even ideas for other things I should write about. You’ll notice my title changed – I’m now <b>Knitting Outside of the Closet</b>.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri;">-<span style="font-size: 7pt;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 12pt;">Bart Larsen, Sep 2011<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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AstroPChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06822098915188478870noreply@blogger.com1