Knitting!!!!!

Wait, what?!?!  Knitting content on a blog named "Prairie Girl Knits"?   What is this sorcery???

It's been so long since I've been able to show off a finished knitting project here on the blog and today I have two!

The first I want to show off is The Golden Hours Shawl from Andrea Mowry of Drea Renee Knits.  I started this shawl back in the deep dark days of January.  Of course I was thinking a worsted weight shawl would fly off the needles and I'd be cozy warm in no time for the rest of winter.  I was excited to start and chugged along at a good pace at the start, but then, as seems to be par for the course lately, I found it to be a struggle to keep going. I wanted the shawl but the knitting took significantly longer than anticipated.  Once thing I did do was to weave in the ends as I went so it wouldn't be such a daunting task upon completion of the knitting and boy was I glad when I finished the cast off to only have a few ends left to go.

I actually finished this shawl mid-April on the drive into the city for the little boys skills camp morning put on by the Blue Bombers.  The boys had to be on the field at 8:30am, there was still snow on the edges of the field and a crisp breeze was making the 0 C temps feel even colder.  I was ever so glad to be able to throw my shawl on as an extra layer of warmth while I watched from the stands.

... and then it took me more than a month to actually block it.

Despite my struggles, The Golden Hours is a straight forward, easy to knit pattern.  I chose to use stash yarns for mine and I love how it came together. The teal blue came from my Mom actually, left over from a sweater she knit a few years ago (that also came home with me!).  The purple was a random skein I'd picked up at the LYS at some point and the light blue/green was very old stash from about ten or more years ago.

My other newly finished project is the Dubois hat by Andi Satterlund of Untangling Knots.

This one I started in February as soon as the pattern was released.  Being a hat I honestly assumed it would take me no more than a week to knit.  I wildly underestimated how long it would take, and had to completely rip it out and start again a month ago because between my lagging knitting mojo, my inability to focus and a pattern that had a few different cables going on left me thoroughly lost where I was and a with a whole lot of mistakes.

I felt pretty discouraged that I had to rip it out, but once I got going again it went much easier.  Still slow going, but at least with no confusion and the cables seemed a lot more intuitive the second time. I cast this one off on Saturday evening and set it to blocking first thing on Sunday morning! (having, of course, learned my lesson with the shawl blocking procrastination! LOL) I'm going to really love the warmth of my Dubois and it'll be so nice to have a fresh new hat to make life more bearable when the temperatures plummet again next winter!

I'm going to continue to try and knit regularly.  My favourite "along"  the Untangling Knots Outfit Along, has been announced recently and will start June 1st.  Instead of having an "official" set of patterns - although we were always welcome to choose our own anyway - this year's OAL theme is Works in Progress.  I don't have any sewing WIPs, but I have my Populuxe Cardigan that just needs sleeves and my Mary Mead Cardigan that is part way through the body.  Both cardigans were started during previous Untangling Knots knit alongs over the past year so I'm hoping to finish both during the OAL.  I'm not sure what the sewing component will be yet, but likely a dress of some sort.

Here's hoping for more frequent wooly posts in the future months to come.  I'm really hoping that these two finished projects will really kick start my mojo back to where it once was.  Maybe I'll even start spinning again one of these days...

Fabric Madness

I went fabric shopping yesterday and I went fabric shopping two weeks ago and somehow it has led to madness.  Especially given my sewing machine, which was an unfortunate Walmart Singer purchase about six or seven years ago, has been having fits lately and refusing to behave properly leading to much frustration, anxiety and foul language.

Some of the new fabric, washed folded and waiting to be pressed

Two weeks ago was for specific fabric for two test projects and denim for a pair of Ginger Jeans - why?!?  I know that the Goodtime Gal Singer won't handle denim - what delusion was I living under when I decided I could make myself jeans?!?!  Then yesterday was simply for 1.2 m of cotton to go with the .4 m of stupidly expensive Transformers print cotton that mysteriously ended up in my basket the last time.  (I say mysteriously, but Baby Boy was shopping with me, so there's not really a whole lot of mystery to it...) I decided to make pillow cases for the little boys with the print, but I refuse to spend over $20 to make a single pillow case. That's just crazy talk, thus the 1.2 m needed yesterday to pair with the print.  Of course one thing led to another...

Yup.  This is me.

I got the fabric I was after.  The boys picked out the colours they wanted.  But they were so very, very well behaved in the fabric store, which is very, very hard for two little boys to be, that when they asked if we could buy new fabric for summer pjs I said sure, and let them pick whatever they wanted.

Beautiful princess dress fabric

As we were wandering the store to pick out the pj fabric, Little Man came across a floral print he really wanted me to buy for myself.  I put it back on the table and we continued our hunt for his fabric, but he kept gravitating back towards the floral. Finally he pulled out the big guns.  "Mommy.  You should really buy this to make a pretty dress for yourself.  You will look like a beautiful princess in it."  SOLD.  How could anyone refuse that?

Then they both picked out their pj fabric, some fabric for a new handbag (I'm planning on Swoon Pattern's Blanche Barrel Bag) for me for spring and some cotton lawn for a spring top also for me.  See? Pure unadulterated madness.

So I need a list, and it needs to be prioritized. Because not pictured here are the test projects, the denim and the fabric for costumes/pjs promised for Superhero day at Baby Boy's preschool. (fair is fair and I made special ones for Little Man's Superhero Day last year so you know how it goes...). So onwards and upwards.  Let's get a handle on this fabric madness.  Maybe this list will keep me motivated, accountable and most of all ON TRACK.

1) Finish test project one Done!
2) Superhero costume/pj x2 (Batman and Robin.  By Wednesday.  Ack!!!!!) Done!
3) Finish test project two Done!
4) Crayon roll promised to good friend's little ones
5) Pillow cases x2 Done!
6) Spring top one Done!
7) Summer pjs x2
8) Blanche Barrel Bag
9) Summer Dress for me - can't decide what to do with my bright yellow floral... another Rebecca Shift, a Jamie with a 1/2 circle skirt, an Jenny with a 1/2 circle skirt or a Carolina Mae.  Maybe I'll just let the boys pick out the pattern too.
10) Baby gifts x 2 Done!

Oh and because I'm nothing if not crazy when it comes to crafting I'm also in the process of knitting a pair of socks for a test pattern and another pair of socks just because.

If you're looking for me, I'll likely be in the corner buried under stacks of fabric and tangled in sock yarn...

Summertime and the Knitting is Easy

I cast off my Work + Shelter sweater this morning.  I started this a little under two weeks ago, suddenly inspired by the other variations that were popping up on the Luvinthemommyhood KAL's Finished Object Picture thread on Ravelry.  I had thought there was a chance I could zip through it between the 23rd when I cast on and the 29th when the KAL ended, but alas.  I am not that quick a knitter, nor did I have that much energy to stay up that late at night each night to accomplish a feat quite like that.

I knit it in SWTC Bamboo - a yarn I had in my stash for several years. I originally bought it online in a bag sale from Discontinued Brand Name Yarns to make my Josephine Top. This yarn is fantastic. I machine washed and dried my Josephine lots over the course of time and it still looks great. (I just don't wear it much anymore because I lived in it when I was expecting the little boys and now associate it with maternity wear even though it wasn't intended as such).

I did do a couple easy modifications on the pattern. I wanted a touch more length than the pattern allowed for so I added an extra lace stripe before attaching the sleeves.  This also allowed for the lace on the sleeves to line up with the lace on the body and I do love symmetry, so was happy that it worked out that way!  I also started the ribbing for the neckline early in order to have a lower, wider neck.

I feel like quite a "grown up" knitter right now.  I not only took the time to put all the stitches on waste yarn to see how the length would be once I joined the sleeves and reworked it to a proper-for-me length, but I did the same thing again at the neckline to see where I wanted it to sit. I didn't just blindly follow the pattern hoping for the best (which in this case would have been a short, high necked disappointment). Yay for putting in the extra effort!!  I LA LA LOVE my new sweater!!! I also la la love how easy it was.