Monday, July 30, 2007

Broken Addis...Boo Hoo!



Now I've broken bamboo dpn's before. I'm even ashamed to admit to breaking a pair of beautful straight Lantern Moon needles. But never before have I stooped so low as to break a pair of Addi Turbos!




"How could this have happened?" you ask. Those things are supposed to be indestructible. Well I was knitting during a long car ride. I had several pairs of circular Addis in a totebag with my knitting projects. I got out of the car at a rest stop and when I got back in I found these poor Size 6 24 inchers on the floor of the passenger side. I can only assume they must have tried to escape thinking it was their chance now that I had just bound off. They tried to make a move when I opened the car door but weren't quick enough to get out.



I tried to think of some logical use for them hating to just throw them out. The only possible use I came up with was to use them as the third needle in a 3 needle bind off. But even that's a stretch. So these are their farewell pics. May they rest in peace.

P.S. Since the aforementioned road trip happened to be to Mass I wasted no time stopping by WEBS and picking up a new pair. Easy come, easy go, right? Or vice versa...whatever, you know what I mean!

Thursday, July 19, 2007

Shiny Happy Stitch Markers Holding Hands....




I revamped my Etsy shop, CodePurl, a couple weeks ago. Fellow jewelry maker, Nicole, had showed me some new wire twisting techniques so my stitch markers are now snag proof and more uniform looking. One of my favorites, Swirly Stitch Markers, are pictured above. Don't they look almost magical the way the light hits them?



These Chinese Lucky Star Stitch Markers are a new addition to my shop. I bought the beads in San Francisco's version of Chinatown. Every time I look at these I think of the great trip Julian and I took back in March. It will be hard to part with these but there are more where these came from!



Simple but beautiful my Fiery Red Stitch Markers are a real knockout! I'm going to continue to work on new products so be sure to check back often.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

In case you haven't noticed the giant Meetup badge on the left side of my blog I recently started a new knitting group. Well, it's not exactly new. Long-time readers of this blog (am I allowed to say that when I've only been posting for 8 months?) know that I started the Upper East Side Knitters as a Yahoo Group last year. I decided to move the group's web headquarters over to Meetup.com to utilize their unique features such as RSVP's, message boards, and to gain greater publicity.

UES Knitters lives here.

It's working well so far. We met last Tuesday and had a decent turnout of really interesting friendly people. We were going to get together tonight in Central Park to knit during the New York Philharmonic concert but got completely rained out. I'm planning on us meeting every other Tuesday or so mainly at M Rohr's coffeeshop. The shop recently moved to a larger location at E 86th St. between 1st and 2nd Aves.

If any New Yorkers out in cyberspace want to come out of lurkdom go ahead and join my group. There's no fee to join except to buy a cup of coffee or something while you're in the shop. My idea was to have frequent get-togethers mostly in the same place so people can get to know each other and feel comfortable getting to the location. If anyone has a job like mine the workload is very unpredictable and often requires staying late so I made the start times at 7pm figuring people could either go home and change or grab a bite to eat on their way over.

I'm having fun running this group so far. I'd like to extend a public thanks to Julian for being my faithful assistant organizer and always being supportive. Whether pushing me to go ahead and start my own group rather than just talking about it to always coming along even when he was tired or had other things to do I'm really lucky to have him :-)

P.S. I presented my felted laptop case to its recipient and he loved it. It fit his Mac Book perfectly. Yay for designs that actually knit up the way I planned them to (we'll make no mention of my "Shall We Dance" lace shawl)!

Friday, July 06, 2007

Felting Finale!



The last segment in our three part series here at Knitting Knews!




The knitting and sewing were all done. We went up to JF's parents house to mooch off their free washer. I was surprised how much the laptop case shrunk after one "power wash" in hot water. I thought at first it had shrunk way too much but then realized all I had to do was block it to the correct dimensions.



Blocking involved a joint effort of stretching out all sides and the flap and using thumbtacks to keep it in place. It dried out in the sunlight on the deck (remind me why I live in NYC again??)



Feeling inspired when I got home I made another attempt at a hand knitted cat toy. I put a purple and blue strand together of some leftover yarn from the baby blanket I'm perpetually working on. I basically free-styled a fish shape as I went using a bunch of techniques including short rows, picking up stitches, knitting in the round, and a 3 needle bind off. Who knew a little toy could be so complicated!?



I filled it with catnip and offered it to our resident cat toy tester....




The result? I couldn't even take a clear pic of Cosette with the toy as she was going so wild for my knitting...err, I mean the catnip!

Monday, July 02, 2007

Pre-felting: a Photo Montage



Here is the laptop case fully knit in its pre-felted state.



The cardboard model simulates the actual dimensions of the laptop.



Ok, I admit this is getting tedious but I'm just so proud of my little laptop cover.



Almost there except for sewing the seams and weaving in the loose ends.



Folks, we have garter stitch!



Yay-all sewn up....



"Please don't throw me in the wash....I promise I'll be good!"

To be continued....