Tag Archives: Knitting

Knitting Fun

Posted on November 13, 2007 | 1 comment

There was finally time to take some pictures of the dishcloths I have been making in the past few weeks.
The first several are examples of the Hills and Valleys Cloths of my own design. In typical fashion for me, their sizes vary.

Hillsandvalleys4
This one is made with Peaches and Creme #198 Black Cherry. It was fun to see how these colors played out.

Hvbrntor_5
  This one is made from  Peaches and Creme Burnt Orange . It looks bright and cheerful.

Hvsnflwr
This one was an experiment using a color I had never used before. It is Peaches and Creme Sunflower. The yarn for this was part of a large order of cones received several weeks ago. The colors are vibrant and beautiful. They are remind me of a pumpkin with the blend of orange, yellow and green. I am so glad there is a whole cone of this. :)

Hvsnflwra
This is a close up of the stitches from the previous cloth. I decided it was time to play with my camera and learn to use the Macros feature. This is some of the result of that.

Epscrubber
This pattern is the Peas and Carrots Scrubber Cloth posted at Elmore Pisgah.The dsigner is Maile Mauch. The yarn used is Lily Floral Prints. The edges on this cloth are very  uneven due to my  own  lack of  even tension. They are not the fault of the designer. The cloth  is vey heavy and sturdy. It is a pattern worth using again.

Rib1
This cloth pattern is one from the group : Cloth of the Week. This group is one of the best  which I have ever belonged. There is lots of fun and learning.
The yarn is Peaches and Creme Shades of Blue. This pattern is simply beautiful and will be used again. It was also fun to make.

Spaclthsscha
This is the Spa Cloth found at Harvest Moon Designs Upper Room. It is made with Peaches and Creme Gumdrops. If this gets given away, another will be made to replace it.

 

Weston1                        
This is called Weston and is another pattern from the Upper Room.
It is made from Lily Sugar and Cream Holiday Stripes. This is also a pattern that will be used again.

Please do not let the flaws of my knitting be a negative reflection on Sue or Maile. 

 

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A Passion

Posted on November 11, 2007 | Comments Off on A Passion

It seems like I have disappeared from this blog. I have been busy taking care of working on one of my passions which is almost anything related to dish, wash and face cloths. The truth is, it is an addiction. At one time in the past few weeks there were at least five cloths on the needles. I am now down to three. Some of them are freebies and others are purchased.  One of them sort of does not count since there will normally be one in my knitting bag for those times when I am either a passenger in a vehicle or when I am out and have waiting time. There is a pile of them waiting to be photographed for sharing.  That is going to have to wait until my day off in the middle of the week in a few days.

The other project which has been consuming my time is working on one of my other blogs: Dish and Wash Cloth Mania . It started out innocently enough at a different location. We had little or no money at the time and my household was running low on dish cloths that were not worn out. I did what an computer knowledgeable crafter would do and turned to the internet for help. That was about a year and a half ago. The small blog has become a bit larger to say the least. I have discovered lots of patterns, both free and for sale,  by fantastic designers out there on the internet. In the past few weeks much of my time has been spent updating that blog.  My motivation for saying this is not  is not to  get you to that site, but merely to tell you how my time has  been spent.

There is  more to  be said on this topic, but  it will have to wait. There are  other responsibilities  calling for my attention.

Have a great day!

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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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Coasters

Posted on September 27, 2007 | Comments Off on Coasters

It has been coaster knitting time in my house for the past week. We have a wooded kitchen table that sometimes lives a hard life. My family is quite loud in their protesting when a protective tablecloth is placed on it. The compromise to this situation is that coasters will be put under glasses, cups and bowls. Serving dishes will have mats, such as dishcloths or potholders, under them.

My part of the compromise is to provide  an ample supply of the coasters and mats in assorted colors and sizes.  Inspired by this site  and this one, I made these coasters.

Tealcoasters1
These are made from Peaches n Creme Teal Ombre.

CoastertrioaI used Peaches ‘n Creme Aztec Ombre for the top cloth and Sugar ‘n Cream in Patio Pinks.   

Rnbwbrtcoastersb
These are made from Sugar’Cream Rainbow Bright.

The pattern I used was a modified version of Grandma’s Favorite:

Using size #7 ( 4.5 mm ) Bamboo needles:

  • cast on 3 or 4  sts
  • knit across the first row
  • increase by knitting in front and in back of the first stitch of the row, knitting across the rest of the row
  • did this until 30 sts on needle
  • The next row : knit to last 2 sts, then knit 2 tog.
  • continued decreasing until 3 or 4 sts. on needle and bound off.

The first set, which were the Rainbow Bright coasters were made with 3 stitches cast on. I chose to use  four stitches for the other coasters because it looked nicer that way to me.
They measure approximately 4 3/4 inches square before washing. They have not been washed yet so the final measurement is not known.
I weighed them on the kitchen scale this morning and learned that one coaster weighs 0.4 ounces. Five coasters weigh 2.2 ounces.

This is not the most interesting or challenging bit of knitting I have ever done. It is meeting the need my household has for coasters quickly and easily. 

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Early Morning Writings

Posted on September 24, 2007 | Comments Off on Early Morning Writings

It is hard to imagine that I am up and awake at this hour. Normally I prefer to be in bed asleep long before now. It has been a busy few days since my last post here.
The new washing machine  was delivered on Thursday, Sept. 20 at the time it was scheduled to do so. It works wonderfully. There has been a lot of laundry done this weekend thanks in part to its presence in our home. That combined with my Fall Cleaning mood has meant a very busy weekend. The house has been de-cluttered so much that it has been worth the time and effort.

I have been struggling with the lack of progress on the gift for my friend who lost her child this past summer. The crocheting is easy. The hard part of the process is that when I work on it, I sense her sorrow and pain. This might sound totally crazy to some people, but it is the truth. Of course, she is in my prayers daily, but she is even more so when I am making her gift. At this time, it is only 1/4 of the completed. My goal is to have it completely made and ready to give to her by the middle of October. It will just take a bit of self discipline to do so.

I have spent my knitting time in the past few days  making coasters and dishcloths. I find these to be wonderfully relaxing items to make. I will post pictures of them later this week.

My treat to myself for the past two days has been lots of computer time. It has mostly come in the form of adding  patterns to Dish and  Wash  Cloth Mania. Last year I promised to have an ample supply of Holiday related links to patterns listed on the site. Hopefully there are plenty this year.

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Interesting Day

Posted on September 19, 2007 | Comments Off on Interesting Day

Today started out like a normal work day. I did a few things around the house; did some knitting and crocheting and spent time homeschooling. In the middle of those things, I did a few loads of laundry. That is typical. At least it was until I went downstairs to see if uniforms were ready to be put on an extra rinse cycle. The washing machine had stopped in the middle of the wash cycle and would not restart. I checked to make sure it was properly plugged in, which it was. I tried to start in on different cycles with no success. By that time I was worried. All of my uniforms were wet, dirty and soapy.

I did the best things I knew to do. I checked the checking account balance; figured out what could be spent to replace or repair the machine and called my husband at work for his thoughts on the subject.  The conclusion of our conversation was that I would ask my boss for the day off if possible and then check on the price of repairing this machine. If repairs were not cost effective then I would go buy a new washing machine.

My boss responded by giving me the day off. Now for the fun part of my day. I called a local appliance dealer with the reputation of honesty and integrity. Based on the symptoms the washer was displaying he said it sounded like the motor was going bad. This was not good news. He said the estimated replacement cost is about $175. This was worse news. It was clearly not cost effective to repair a machine that already had other problems besides that. It was time to do some shopping. The result is that a new washing machine will arrive here in the morning.

A check of Laura Spradlin’s site last evening provided a wonderful surprise update on the Rebuilding Greensburg Block by Block Project. Take a look here if you are interested. Words fail at this point. :)

I have been busy and having fun with fibers in the past few days.

Dworbla
This is a Darrell Waltrip Cloth made with Bernat Summerset. I enjoy using this pattern with variegated yarns because it shows off the colors well. It also works up quickly and easily. Despite all of the patterns readily available, this is one of my favorites.

Kbbdishclothbycathywald_3

This cloth is one I have never made before. It is called KBB Dishcloth by Cathy Waldie. I made it using Sugar’n Cream Twists in the color Denim Twists. It was started on 4.5 mm needles. Somehow in the middle of making it I started using one 4.5mm needle and one 4.25 needle. That was the result of knitting at the kitchen table with several needles handy and not paying attention to what I was doing. In spite of that, the cloth came out looking fairly well.  This is one of those patterns well worth using again and again in a variety of yarns.

Some time was spent this morning working on part of the gift for a friend at work. It is not progressing as quickly as I wish it were. One of the issues is that I am finding it a bit difficult to switch from using the natural fibers in the dishcloths to the acrylic fibers being used for this project. Could it be my taste in yarns is changing?

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Posted on September 15, 2007 | Comments Off on

Changing the home of this blog has been and is a bigger job than I realized. While I want to customize this location to resemble the old home in some ways, I do not want to completely duplicate it. It is still not finished, but I am getting there. It might take a few more days only because there is life off the computer and this blog.

Today is the day of the Seaming Party for Building Greensburg Block by Block. I wish I was there rather than here in St. Louis. My husband and I discussed the possibility of my going and decided it was too expensive considering the price of gas and the other factors involved. So instead I am keeping Laura and the project in my prayers today that all will go well. 

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