December 31, 2006
A very crafty Christmas
Most of my knits this year went to a swap partner. I participated in a swap on craftster.org that was called the "12 Days of Christmas." The idea was to send your partner 12 things for day 12, 11 things for day 11, and so on - a total of 78 presents. It was a huge undertaking (although the things for some days were small, or store-bought), and I did quite a bit of knitting for it. I tried two new techniques - fair isle and intarsia. My partner said that she was really into goth things - skulls, etc. - so I tried to accomodate that. It was a bit outside of my comfort zone (not too much gothy about me...), but I found that very fun - part of why I do swaps with strangers!
First up, the Arrrgyle Pillow:
ARRRGYLE!
ARRGYLE back!
I used the fabulous Arrrgyle pattern here (links to PDF), but knit it in Lopi and then felted it. I got a very short and wide panel of thick fabric, when I then decided to make into a pillow. A bit of hand sewing and stuffing, and I was done.
And for the "big" project (this was Day 1), I did a winter set, of the Yorick scarf and the We Call Them Pirates Hat:
Skulls ahoy!
The Pirates hat is in Lion Brand Microspun, which knit up very tight and warm, but soft and comfortable on US 3's. However, my row gauge was quite a bit different from the pattern yarn and 3 skull repeats didn't result in a very tall hat. It was very much a "beanie." Rather than taking out the top and doing another skull repeat (which is what I will do next time), I added another bottom band below the provisional cast-on, and then knit the lining band. Basically, it's only supposed to have one horizontal band around the bottom, not two.
Yorick is knit exactly to the pattern out of Nature's Pride worsted.
I knit my sister a neckwarmer out of one skein of the African silk yarn that I bought at Stitches East (and blogged about here) but didn't take any pictures of it... Mom, if she brought it home can you help?
And my other crafty present was one for mom - Kaffe Fassett was at Stitches East signing several of his knitting books, but there were a few quilting ones, too! I picked one up for Mom and had him autograph it... I think she was happy:
Mom at Christmas
Of course, I received some crafty presents, too, including some amazing pillows from my sister, but those are going to have to wait until the new year.
Happy New Year!
Posted by Sarah at December 31, 2006 07:46 PM | in: holidays | PermalinkWhat happy holidays! I love the skull-themed set ;) Did you find the Microspun hard to work with? I have heard mixed reviews...
Best wishes, and Happy New Year, Sarah!
(PS--Yes, I got that yarn from the swap last year, it must have been from you!)
Posted by: Lolly on January 1, 2007 09:24 AMHappy New Year! Those goth knits are cool! There's nothing goth about me either, but it's always fun to stretch our craftylegs!
Posted by: kelly on January 1, 2007 11:35 PMOkay... it's the New Year! You can put my pillows on whenever you like (preferably before they are destroyed by kitty claws!) :)
Jenna