Monthly Archives: October 2007

Life and Knitting

Posted on October 26, 2007 | Comments Off on Life and Knitting

It has been almost two weeks since I last posted here.
Life has been busy but  not exciting.Here is some of what has been going on:

  • I continue to knit and crochet in odd moments.
  • A few dishcloths have been made. Some will stay here while others will go to assorted new homes.
  • Work continues on the Comfortghan for a friend at work. It is going very slowly.
  • My family and I have been diligently cleaning out and rearranging the basement of our home. This has consumed the past couple of weekends I have not worked for my employer.
  • Work is going through a super busy phase. There are days when I come home so tired it is all I can to have a snack combined with family time and go to bed. Sleep takes over.
  • This is allergy season for my family. It saps our energy. We sleep, try to eat healthy foods  and force a lot of fluids to keep going.
  • As a person with heart disease, exercising is a must. Walking daily, or at least trying to, is a priority. I can now walk almost a mile before needing to stop and catch my breath. My goal is to be walking five miles daily by my next appointment with the cardiologist.
  • We homeschool. Family time and teaching/learning time are a high priority and as such dominate life in my household.
  • I belong to some online email groups and have another blog. Mail is way behind in all of these areas. I feel badly about it, but am trying to catch up.

These are the things that have taken my time and attention from this blog. It is life and it is important.

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October in St. Louis

Posted on October 14, 2007 | 2 comments

It is finally October!!!! Well duh….It is actually October 15. This is and always has been a special month for me. It is the month my Mom and I have birthdays. It is also the start of the most glorious weather in St. Louis. Some days are hot to the point where it seems that Summer in all its hot misery will never end. Some days start off a bit chilly but then get St. Louis Summer hot with all of the humidity that goes with it. Other days have a St. Louis type mixture of sunny and warm to sunny and chilly all in one. Then there are some truly Autumn days. These start off and remain a bit chilly compared to the summer days. These are my favorite. They remind me that Autumn is finally here.

There are other signs that Autumn is here. We begin to talk of and wear jackets and sweaters. They get put in vehicles just in case it gets chilly out later. We talk about jackets and heaters in cars at work. The air conditioner is no longer on the entire day. It is actually chilly out at night. The house really does get cool with the windows open. The sun is still not up at 6:30am. It starts getting darker after 6pm. Long warm pants sound good to wear. I begin to think about making scarves and hats for others from the yarn in my stash. I begin looking for slipper patterns.  The abandoned bags of hats and scarves that only require the weaving in of loose ends begins to look appealing. We begin to talk about Holiday plans and how work schedules will affect the next few months. These are some of the more subtle signs that Autumn is upon us.

It is truly Autumn in St. Louis. October is finally here.

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Free Pattern

Posted on October 10, 2007 | 2 comments

Here is a pattern for a dish or wash cloth knit on the diagonal

Hillsandvalleys2

Hills and Valleys

Materials:

100% Cotton Yarn  Peaches ‘n’ Creme 1.2 ounces-Yellow
Knitting Needles: size 7 ( 4.5 mm )
Gauge: does not matter
Finished size: varies depending on how large you want it to be.

Abbreviations used:
CO= cast on
K=knit
P=purl
Inc=Increase: knit in front and back of stitch unless otherwise stated
K2tog=knit 2 stitches together
P2tog=purl 2 stitches together
Bo=bind off

Pattern:

    Cast on 4 stitches.
    Row 1: Knit  across

Increasing Rows:

Row 2:Inc 1 in first stitch, then knit across the row.
Row 3:Inc 1 in first stitch, then knit across the row.
Row 4:Inc 1 in  first stitch, then purl across the  row
Repeat Rows 2-4 until one side of the cloth is the length you want it to be.
The yellow cloth above has 44 stitches across and measures 7 3/4 inches on each side.

Note: I like to end the increase rows by doing a purl row ( row 4 ) It is up to you.

Decreasing Rows:
Row 1: Knit across row to the last 2 stitches, K2tog   
Row 2: Knit across row to the last 2 stitches, K2tog
Row 3: Purl across row to the last 2 stitches, P2tog
Repeat Rows 2-3 until there are 4 stitches left on the needle.

BO and weave in loose ends.

If you have have any questions, please let me know.

Pattern Revision as of March 28, 2008:

The ending corner of this cloth tends to look not quite right with the pattern written the way it is. I have experimented and have re-written as follows:

Repeat Rows 2-3 until there are 5 stitches left on the needle.

BO and weave in loose ends.

This has the effect of making the first and last rows have the same number of stitches in them. Please let me know what you think of this change.

Please be advised that this pattern is copyrighted to Norma R. WAMPLER and Oct.2007-All Rights Reserved.
You may PRINT OUT A COPY for personal and charitable use only.

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What a Week!

Posted on October 5, 2007 | Comments Off on What a Week!

I am so glad it is Friday morning. This means there is only one working day left in the week.
Work this week has been a bit busy to say the least. As an RN my shifts can go from super quiet to super busy in less time than a heart beat. Most of my days have had that happen to myself or my partner since the weekend.Thankfully the nurses where I work are a tight knit group who support each other not only in words but in actions.

I placed an order on Monday with Elmore -Pisgah, which happens to be one of my favorite yarn sources. It was a huge order to say the least, but my husband and son encouraged me to do so saying it is time to spend some money on myself for once. The Customer Service lady with whom I spoke said my order would be worked on that day. From past experience I figured my order would arrive late this week, just in time for my weekend off.  Wednesday morning there was a very loud knock at the front door. It was the UPS driver who runs the route in our neighborhood. The parcels he had with him were from Elmore-Pisgah.

To say I was excited was an understatement. I spent the  remainder of my morning going through the boxes. The cones of yarn were counted, admired and sorted by color families. Several of the colors are new to me. It will be fun to play with them. The packages containing the Specials   which had patterns in them  were opened and the patterns read. They look fun and interesting. Some of the yarns they contain are new to me. I have never used Country Cotton Cabled Yarn before. Using it to make the items in this package will be an experiment.  I will definitely order from this company again.

I have only made one dishcloth this week. Three more are on the needles. One of them is the Peas and Carrots Scrubby Cloth.  The other two are a cloth of my own design. One of my goals is to post a picture of the first one this weekend. Another goal for the weekend is to post pictures and the pattern for the cloth I designed.

This has been an interesting week.


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