Even with all my procrastination, I managed to complete my first KAL (again, that's a knit-a-long for the non-knitters).  As shown in an earlier post, we knitted the lovely Delancey Cardigan by Alexis Winslow.

See?  Lovely.
Pattern: Delancey Cardigan by Alexis Winslow
Yarn:  Knit Picks Merino Style
Needles: US 7

From the back with my new short hair.
Obviously I made some changes to the pattern.  Mine has short sleeves and a more simple collar/button band.  I thought it would be more suitable for the very mild weather here in Charleston.

Also, it looks OK open.

I'm happy to be finished with this cardigan.  It was fun to knit, but there are TONS of patterns out there I want to get started on.

Red pole love!




As soon as I saw this brooch I knew I had to knit it as soon as possible.  It is just so stinkin' cute.  I quickly procured the necessary yarn and knit it up earlier this week.

I know you're jealous of the awesomeness.

Pattern: Panda Pin by Stafanie Fail
Yarn:  Knit Picks Wool of the Andes
Needles: US 6

The cuteness is almost too much!

I basically used the pattern as a guideline.  The pattern involved both stranded colorwork and intarsia.  I'm basically not down with anything more complicated than stripes.  Instead I just knit all the head in white and used duplicate stitches for the face.  I then picked up stitches for each of the ears.  Then things got messy.

Those with OCD should look away!

I decided to add felt to the back for tidiness and stability.  I am such a sloppy sewer (maybe sewist is better).  I really try to do a good job, but things always end up a mess.  I suppose the important thing is that the felt is on there and it is never coming off.

Let's not even mention the crooked brooch pin.  Here's a cat to distract you.

Bosley might just be the most handsome cat ever.



Welcome to the new blog.  I thought it was time for a change around here.  Basically, I decided to switch to Blogger from Wordpress and dump my GoDaddy hosting.  This is the result.  I hope everyone likes the new look.  I still may tweak a bit here and there.  We'll see.

What else is new?  I finished my Big Snowy Owl.  Here he is.
Cute, right?
Speaking of cuteness.  Here's the newest member of the Simper Kingdom, Ripley.

She's even smaller than Moxie. 

Lewis caught her sleeping.  


On Monday, the knit-a-long officially started for the Delancey Cardigan. If you want more info, visit Allyson's blog.

I quickly jumped right in and got to knitting.  This is my first of two triangles.  It was completed on Monday night.  In fact, I got the first done so fast I decided to wait a few days to start the second.  Once that second was complete yesterday, I realized a sad, sad fact.  My first triangle was smaller than it should be.  That tends to happen when you forget two whole rows.


That, my friends, is why you count your rows properly.  Above you see my counting method for this pattern.  I would usually use lines to count rows, but for this one I'm writing the actual row numbers down as I do them to make extra sure I get things right.
The most frustrating thing about fixing the first triangle was the fact that I had cut both colors of yarn when I finished it.  All I had was little tails left.  Not nearly what I needed to add two rows.  That's where the beautiful spit splicing comes in.


You take your tail and the start of a new ball of yarn.  Trim half the plies off the last couple of inches of each end, add spit... I know, gross!  I actually use water.  I put a few drops in my hand, then position the overlapping ends of yarn on my wet palm.  Next you rub your hands together over the overlapping yarn.  Wetness and friction cause natural animal fibers to felt together like above.  Now you don't have to weave in extra ends.  Sadly it doesn't work well with superwash wool which is one of the main reasons I don't use superwash.


As you can see from above, I finally got all my errors fixed and joined my two triangles together.  That completes this week's goals.  Stay tuned to see what happens next week.