I love giving stuff away. I need to do it more often. Definitely. The winner for the Berlioz/Swoolk contest is Kimberley:
So congratulations to Kimberley – I shot you an e-mail to get your information – and thanks everyone for playing along. Back to stocking knitting for me!
…that you have to comment on the Berlioz blog post if you want a chance to win the gorgeous Swoolk yarn from Fiddleknits. I will be closing comments and drawing a winner first thing tomorrow morning!
The stockings are actually coming along – believe it or not. The first one is done – here’s a grainy cellphone picture of it:
The second one is in progress even! I’m debating whether to do two designs and knit each one in red and green or do four designs. The fifth one is for the dog, so his will be a bit different. Yes, I’m planning on knitting a stocking for the dog. Yes, he gets presents. No, we are not crazy dog people.
How’s your Christmas knitting coming?
Back in the beginning of the year, I had an idea. One of the parts of designing that is difficult for me is coming up with names. I was watching “Sleeping With The Enemy” and Julia Roberts was talking about how Berlioz gave her chills. And not in a good way. And me, with my crazy designer knitting centric brain thought hey, Berlioz would be an awesome name for a pattern. And that’s kind of how this all began.
Kind of. And then I signed up for a swap. Don’t ask me why. I don’t have time for these things. But I asked the swap coordinators if I could design a shawlette for my recipient. And so the first prototype for Debussy was born. And then I went to Stitches South and CircusGirl helped me find the perfect color Bugga to knit up the real Debussy. And it went and went and went and went and went. And now it’s done. And while half of me is super happy to be finished, the other half (the insane in the membrane half) wants to do it again. And so I present the seventh song – Berlioz:
Berlioz is knit sideways – my favorite way, in a gorgeous silk/wool blend hand dyed by Fiddleknits. Seriously, this stuff is wonderful. So soft and shiny, and the color just sings. Kind of fitting that my final shawlette is knit up in yarn dyed by a musician, no? No I didn’t plan it that way. But I’m so glad it worked out!
You cast on 4 sts and you knit along and increase all happy like and then when your yarn is half gone, you turn around and go back. And when all is said and sung – you bind off 4 sts. And the angels sing. Well actually after you block it, the angels sing. Because blocking is magic my friends.
And because FiddleKnits was so supremely generous as to send me yarn at the very last minute (and save me from doom when the other yarn did not come as promised) and send me two colors so I could choose from them in person and because she’s awesome – we’re having a little giveaway. All you have to do is comment by the time I log onto my computer at the buttcrack of dawn on Thursday morning and you are entered for a chance to win this beauty *and* your very own copy of Berlioz!
So comment away – tell me something interesting – tell me your favorite song and you have a chance to win fabulous prizes. Parting gifts now that the Seven Songs have all been sung.
Yep, the crazy. I’ve got it. It might be contagious. Christmas is three weeks away, and I’ve decided that I need to design and knit stockings for the entire family. Including the dog. I’m a lunatic.
I am trying to minimize the crazy though. I’m knitting them in Lamb Pride’s Bulky. So the cast-on is only 42 sts. And the cabled version you see on the table has 48 sts in the main body of the stocking. So it’s not totally asylum fodder.
Unless you take into consideration the fact that I’m convinced that each of the stockings has to be unique and different. No… I couldn’t design just one stocking and knit five of them. That would be too easy. Commit me now.
And to add just a little extra pinch of madness I thought it might be a great time to sit down and cut out all the coupons and start couponing again. Yep, I’m certifiable.
In not so crazy news, Berlioz – the final song of the Seven Songs has been released. I’ll blog about it tomorrow and there will be a contest to win that gorgeous skein of yellow yarn that I didn’t use!
No, not bars like places to drink too much – bars as in the opening bars of a song. It’s a musical thing, not a beer-swilling thing. Although a margarita sounds good right about now. It’s nearly five o’clock. But I digress.
Today I had to figure out the best place in my new house to temporarily set up my ballwinder and swift. Temporary being the obvious key word here.
That’s my new eat-in kitchen. Ain’t it cute? Yes, I really need to get lots of new house pictures. I know. Trust me, my far away friends and family are not happy with me for the lack of pictures. But then I had to find the best natural light for taking pictures of the yarn and getting a beautiful true to color picture. How about the entryway with a mirror?
Um, nope. Let’s try the bathroom counter. We get a totally ridiculous amount of light in the morning in the bathroom through the glass block window.
Nope – too much light. Way too much. Let’s try in the great room near the back doors where the morning light is all indirect.
Artsy fartsy, isn’t it? But still not quite right. My old light box got destroyed in the move so I am just gonna have to buckle down and make my husband make me a new one. What? You thought I made the old one? Oh no. I cut myself with safety scissors. Much less an exacto knife. I would have to get the ambulance there before I got started!
The shawlette is getting started and I really love the way the motif is coming together. Hopefully you will too. So grab yourself some Swoolk yarn from FiddleKnits so that you are ready to start singing along when December 1st comes!
I’ve been branching out – trying to submit some of my work to online and print magazines. It’s hard for me, because A. I fear rejection and B. I have no patience. Magazines of any kind take so long to come to fruition. But this is kind of worth it, yes?
Yeah. I think so too. I’m insanely proud of it. I had an idea, I sketched the idea, and when push came to shove the finished sweater was even prettier than I imagined.
I absolutely adore the way the inserts on the sleeves came out! And the Green Mountain Mohair yarn cabled like a dream. So nice to work with!
And this beauty is available in the new winter issue of Twist Collective! I’m so proud to be part of such a beautiful issue. So many things that I love in this one. Yep, now I want to design sweaters all the time. Must learn to knit faster. Oh yeah, and move to Canada. It was nearly 80 here today! But I know lots of you live in places where it is snowing already – so head on over and find yourself a lovely winter sweater to knit – preferably mine!
I can’t believe the Seven Songs collection is nearly done. I’ve learned so much and had such a neat time designing these shawlettes. But now it’s down to the wire. The design for the final song is pretty well set in stone – swatching in leftover yarn has been done, I just have to pick a color.
These are not true daylight pictures. Mostly because since the yarn arrived I haven’t been home long enough in any true daylight. Today I left the house at 7am and didn’t return until 8:30pm. It was a very long day of volunteering and working at the yarn store.
But late night pictures aside, this yarn is beautiful. These are two yarns from the Fiddleknits collection. If you don’t know Fiddleknits – you should. Erica is an amazing designer and is really coming up with some gorgeous colorways. Good Day Sunshine is on the left and Lust is on the right. I’m leaning towards the Lust. But lucky for y’all, whichever one I don’t choose will be put up for a contest when the pattern is released.
So I have to decide. And then I’ll be casting on for the seventh song. So which one would you pick?
Rachmaninoff is finally available for purchase! This is the sixth of the Seven Songs, and I’m very much in love with how it turned out.
It uses the gorgeous Paca Peds yarn with the heel-toe skein from The Alpaca Yarn Company. I used almost all 90 yards of the heel-toe skein, and about 280 yards of the main color. I really love the way the yarns played off of each other, and I think it will be lovely in any of the colors they offer!
And yes, that is my new backyard. I love not having neighbors right up behind us, and instead having the lovely little lake. I actually saw otters in it the other day. A far cry from the feral cat community we had at the old house.
The motifs in the border are easy to memorize, but it is lace where there is patterning on the right and wrong side rows. The shawlette is finished up with short-rows, and then stitches are picked up all the way around to do a simple eyelet edging that finishes it off and ties everything together. And I really love the shape it blocks out to:
I’m very excited to be working on the seventh song. I’m so happy so many knitters have loved the projects that I’ve come up with so far!
Rachmaninoff is available for individual purchase for $6.00 USD 
Or as part of the Seven Songs collection for $21.95 for all seven songs –
I have a problem. When it comes to certain things I am a crazy perfectionist. I dismiss a lot of really awesome design ideas because I feel like they are not good enough. Of course my “curse” has not led me to become a crazy famous knitting designer. It actually hurts me.
This is why I’ve been swatching for over a week. I swatch. I rip out. I swatch. I curse. I rip out. I *think* I’ve finally figured things out for this song. The math and the crux of the design has been done forever. But the motif for this first section has been giving me gas! But I think I finally got it right.
This yarn is wonderful though. Such a beautiful shade of silver grey. And you need some Paca Peds with the heel-toe skein so you can make this design when it comes out!
What? We’re having turkey tonight, not chicken. Easiest dinner ever. Throw a mess of rice in the rice cooker. Brown up a pound or so of ground turkey with garlic, cayenne, chili powder, salt, pepper, and some Braggs or soy sauce to taste. Throw in a few good handfuls of fresh green beans chopped small and cook til just crisp tender. Serve over rice with some fruit on the side and you have a super tasty dinner!
But you did not come here for a recipe. You came here to see if you won a free copy of the KnitCircus 2011 Gifts issue. So here are my winners, that I am e-mailing here in just a quick minute. (Sidenote: Don’t all minutes last exactly the same amount of seconds? What is this “quick minute” that I speak of?)
And the winners are:
Thanks for playing guys!
