Charles: I could really go for a grilled cheese sandwich
Becky: There’s a place two doors down from Lettuce Knit that apparently has great grilled cheese sandwiches
Charles: You know, we really should go to Lettuce Knit!
Becky: Ok, but that’s where I got that skein of $39 yarn…
Charles: I seem to have suddenly developed a cheese allergy…

I was on team Central Purple. We started the day at the Yarn Boutique, near the corner of Bloor and Keele, where I bought this:

As well as some DPN’s. The plan is to make myself a pair of socks… because I’m some kind of crazy person (a crazy person with size 11 feet)! I’m going to try the simplest pattern I can find for my first pair.

Next stop: The Knit Cafe, which sells both yarn AND tasty treats. I had a lovely vegetarian quiche, and bought some lovely malabrigo:

I’m planning to make a hat out of it, but after winding the purple skein into a centre-pull ball, I’ve discovered that I am allergic to it after all. :( The hat will have to be for someone else, I guess. It’s a shame, because it’s just so very soft!

Then we headed to Romni Wools, which, if you look at a map of Toronto, it seems like it’d be easy to travel between the two shops, but due to streetcar re-routing, possibly due to protests, we ended up taking a scenic route down the street!

I found Romni quite overwhelming! It’s huge, and has every natural-fibre yarn you can think of (I assume… I don’t know of very many!). For someone like me, I’d have been better off deciding what I wanted to make and what yarn I’d need for it before heading in.

Still, I bought this:

I’m planning on playing with it to see if it’ll make a nice shawl. If it does, I’m going to go back and get more!

We then took another scenic streetcar ride up to Lettuce Knit where I simply could not resist buying this:

It’s soft, and even more beautiful than this picture would suggest. It is destined to become a scarf, which should be stunning with my black winter coat!

At the end of the shopping spree, most of us headed over to the Rivoli to meet up with the other four teams for merriment and prizes!

I won the “WTF WIP” prize my mitten, which I started when I got on the subway at Kipling Station. This is how much I got done over the course of the day:

Action shot:

The most frequently asked question I got about it all day was: how are you going to do the thumb? I love yarnies!

More in the next post about the amazing free stuff we got! (Look for that post either later today or tomorrow… my blog is being quite flakey today!)

For an idea of why I was going through so much trouble to make a mitten, well, here’s the one I made next to the one I try to cram my hand into every day in the winter:

Of course, the warmer weather will be here any day now (right? Right???), so this might be of limited use this year. But I’m happy with it all the same.

…

What do you mean, I’m supposed to make two of them?

I’ve made a follow-up tutorial, and was going to make it a post, but there are so very many pictures that I decided it needed it’s own page. So, click here, or scroll right to the top of this page and click on “hat”. Again, there are a LOT of pictures, so it might take some time to load.

Here’s a sample pic:

Please, please, please give me any feedback you can if you try out this tutorial. It was somewhat complicated to put together and my eyes are too blurry now to see if I missed something or messed up. I haven’t figured out how to do comments on the special pages, so feel free to comment here if you see any problems, or comment on any post here, or send me an e-mail if you have the address. Thank you so much!

Why? In short:

- they have stolen money out of my bank account (by doing something they *specifically* claimed was impossible) then wouldn’t give it back until I involved my bank

- they’ve cut off my phone service for not paying *someone else’s* bill, and even after it was proven that was the case they still wouldn’t reconnect it, and still wouldn’t even after we proved that it was, in fact, their fault that it was possible at all

- they’ve sold me a service that didn’t exist (which lead to me having to pay the cable company an extra hookup charge since they had to come to my house twice)

- and most recently they failed to fix a connection problem. For two weeks. They claim to have made 6 appointments for techs to check out the problem, but we only saw 2. Each of those techs “fixed” the problem, only to have service go back down within 24 hours. (They also both complained bitterly about working for Bell!)

So, what’s a gal to do during this internet outage? (Did I mention that the internet wasn’t working at work either because of a computer virus? *yanks out hair*) Well, I certainly didn’t plan any part of my wedding! (Whose idea was it to keep our notes about it in a Google document? Oh wait, that was me…)

I crocheted, naturally! I also loom-knit.

You all remember Mom’s sorority’s charity thing with the kids hats and scarves right?

Check it!

The plan is to fill a bin with these. The current count is 23 complete sets (I took this picture before finishing a few of them… all of those hats in front of the pile have matching scarves now, plus there is another set not pictured… and a blue hat I still need to make a matching scarf for…)

I also made quite a few dishcloths. And a crochet-on-the-double hat using Bernat Soft Boucle (that still needs sewing up), and blew through a few more balls of red on the Ladybug blanket. I’m woefully behind on motifs, but expect to see a rush of those soon, as I’m in another motif swap. ^_^

A possible conclusion from all of this might be that having no internet access can be really good for my crafting! Another conclusion might be that having no internet had the potential to drive me so crazy that I needed that many projects to distract myself with just to get through it…

*eye twitch*

I was really hoping for a lighter motif, but this one is quite dense in the middle, and it’s very heavy. It also curls inward, but I think it would do ok if joined to other motifs. I’d hesitate to tile this motif, as the resulting fabric would be really heavy… though, I suppose that depends a lot on the yarn.

And, hey look! Another hat!

And the other side:

Pictures don’t do the colours justice. I took a lot of pictures of this hat. In full sun, in difused sun, with flash, without flash, with indoor lights of various types… you’ll just have to take my word for it: it’s pretty. ^_^

It’s Bernat Satin again, about 3/4 of a ball of teal, and almost an entire ball of “Luxury Ombre”, which is the variegated yarn.

It’s the same pattern as my last hat, but I did 45 stitches to start instead of 50. It turned out a little bit too small for my liking… the brim doesn’t cover the whole of my ears. Ah well, I’m sure I’ll find a use for it.

This is how much of the variegated yarn I had left after making this:

Good thing I bought more than one. ^_-

Black side out:

Rainbow side out:

Level of difficulty: if you already know how to do crochet-on-the-double, this is really really easy. If you don’t, but you are comfortable with the Tunisian Simple Stitch, then you’ll find this pattern somewhat easy once you get going on it. If you don’t know either of those techniques, I recommend learning them on something easier (perhaps a scarf?) before attempting this. ^_^

Yarn: Bernat Satin, uses the equivalent of 1 ball for each side of hat; for mine I used 1 ball of black and small amounts of 8 colours.

Hook: 6mm double-ended hook

This pattern is for crochet-on-the-double, using the Tunisian Simple Stitch. Each row has two parts, A and B, in A you lift loops onto the hook, in B you [b]turn[/b] and work them off

MC = main colour
CC = contrasting colour

Pattern:
ch 50 in MC

Row 1A – lift up one loop in 2nd ch from hook, and in each subsequent ch (50 loops on hook, including starting loop)
Row 1B – turn, pull a loop of CC through first loop of MC. *pull a loop of CC through two loops* repeat until 1 loop of CC remains on hook.

Row 2A – loop on hook counts as first loop, insert hook from right to left through vertical bar of the second stitch from the hook on the previous row, pull up a loop of CC. Do this for every subsequent stitch (50 loops on hook)

Row 2B – turn, pull a loop of MC through the first loop on hook. *pull a loop of MC through two loops* repeat until 1 loop of MC remains.

Row 3A – pull up a loop in the second vertical bar from the hook, and continue to pull up loops until there are 2 vertical bars left (48 loops on hook)

Row 3B – turn, work loops off in CC

Row 4A – work loops on in CC (48 loops on hook)

Row 4B – turn, work loops off in MC

Row 5A – work loops on in MC until there are two vertical bars left (46 loops on hook)

Row 5B – turn, work loops off in CC

Row 6A – work loops on in CC (46 loops on hook)

Row 6B – turn, work loops off in MC

Row 7A – work loops on in MC until there are two vertical bars left (44 loops on hook)

Row 7B – turn, work loops off in CC

Row 8A – work loops on in CC (46 loops on hook)

Row 8B – turn, work loops off in MC

Row 9A – work loops on in MC until there are two vertical bars left (42 loops on hook)

Row 9B – turn, work loops off in CC

Row 10A – work loops on in CC (42 loops on hook)

Row 10B – turn, work loops off in MC

Row 11A – work loops on in MC until there are two vertical bars left (40 loops on hook)

Row 11B – turn, work loops off in CC

Row 12A – work loops on in CC (40 loops on hook)

Row 12B – turn, work loops off in MC

Row 13A – work loops on in MC, 40 loops from previous row, plus the 2 missed vertical bars from each previous row (50 loops on hook)

Row 13B – turn, work loops off in CC

Row 14A – work loops on in CC (50 loops on hook)

Row 14B – turn, work loops off in MC

One wedge made!

Repeat from 3A to 14B until you have 8 wedges

To finish, slip stitch to bind off both colours by *inserting the hook through the next vertical bar, pull a loop through it and the loop on the hook* until you reach the end. Do the MC first, then the CC. Leave LONG tails.

Use the CC tail to sew the last row made to the first row (try to join it with the CC of the first row if you can). Use the MC tail to weave in and out of the stitches at the top of the hat, pull tightly like a drawstring until the hole at the top is closed. Secure with a knot, then use the rest of that tail to sew the seam down on the MC side of the hat.

Weave in all ends.

To alter this pattern to fit better, or use a different yarn, etc. :

Make a swatch (I recommend making a scarf-sized swatch ;)) to determine how many stitches and rows you get per inch/cm. Measure your head, and do some math. ^_^

You can easily start with fewer stitches to make a shorter hat, do more “stop two stitches short of the end” rows to make the rounded-top part bigger, and change the number of wedges you do to fit a smaller or larger circumference.

To easily keep track while making this hat, I made sure that my “miss the last two stitches” rows always happened with the black yarn (MC in the pattern), and the CC rows were just repeating its previous row. It’ll make sense when you’re doing it. ^_^

If you need any help with this pattern, feel free to ask! If you spot any errors, let me know so that I can fix them. ^_^

And what do you think of the new blog layout? I’m still tinkering with it; let me know if you find anything that doesn’t work!

The other problem, which I suspect affects all types of blog is: computers suck sometimes. :P

I can’t do a whole lot about that last problem, but take a look at these not-Christmas-presents I made using crochet-on-the-double.

A pink and purple hat for Maddie:

Purple side, pink side:

One wedge shape (hat consists of 8)

And a matching scarf:

This yellow one is *slightly* bigger and is for Katie:

Side:

Flat dark yellow, flat light yellow:

The folks on Craftster seem to think these are pretty good (I’m glad I’m not the only one!), so why not give these as Christmas gifts? Three reasons:

1. I’m not entirely certain they’ll fit, as I’m just figuring out the pattern… and giving items made for testing a pattern you’re writing seems somewhat unthoughtful.

2. I already made them each something else.

3. If they were gifts I wouldn’t let myself blog about them. :P

Come January I’ll be looking for more test subjects, including adults, so stay tuned!

I bought this:

I’ve only had a short amount of time to play with it, but so far I like it! It’s spiral bound, which is awesome. All craft books should be spiral bound, because there’s nothing more frustrating than having the book close on you mid-row!

I tried out some of the crochet-on-the-double stitches it has, and got to thinking: would the short-row dishcloth pattern work in this technique? (No, there’s nothing about short-row COTD in this book… that I’ve found, anyway.)

This is what I came up with:

(I’m not happy with that big line of blue at the join… I’ll have to remember that next time and use the other colour for the bind off.)

I made some changes to the original pattern. I only did 10 stitches instead of 15, and after the first row, I picked up 2 stitches extra each time. I ended up needing 8 wedges to get all the way around, though, so it’s more of an octagon. I’m not sure if the extra wedges are due entirely to using the COTD technique, or if it’s because I picked up two stitches each time instead of just one, but there you have it.

Ideas for next time: alternating sides with the colours in each wedge, which would make both sides the same; binding off with the white; trying more stitches.

Thoughts: This is totally do-able. The shorter rows are kind of annoyingly fiddly, so if I were to make an entire blanket using this technique I’d either make waaaay bigger motifs, or I’d just make one giant octagon blanket. I think it might be cute as motifs with squares added in to make the geometry work.

To make up for using blue and white instead of red and white like I should have (what? I used my patented “use the yarn within reaching distance of where I’m sitting” colour choosing technique. I totally can’t be blamed for this! Besides, what is more Canadian than being cold? And what colour is more cold than blue? Q.E.D.), I’m going to include some of my favourite “You know you’re Canadian when…” jokes:

You know you’re Canadian when you understand the sentence, “Please pass me a serviette, I’ve spilled poutine on the chesterfield.”

You know you’re Canadian when you’ve had to design a Halloween costume around a snowsuit.

You know you’re Canadian when you’ve ever had to plug your car in overnight.

You know you’re Canadian when you’d trust your children in the care of a grown man in tights playing a flute to a chicken.

and finally,

You know you’re Canadian if you know that Casey and Finnegan aren’t a Celtic band.

Who knows? Maybe my next post about this book will have, you know, something actually FROM this book. ^_^

Remember this one?

Yep! I’m totally ready to get back to it! (Look at me, being all responsible! Finishing what I start, and all.)

In other news, I decided to prep some more eyelash yarn for use. I can never find the centre-pull on novelty yarn, so I rewound a couple of balls in an effort to solve that problem:

There they are, all prepped and ready for me to do more experimenting.

What’s that?

Behind the yarn? I don’t know what you’re talking about.

No, wait! There’s no need to look closer! Wait- !

Seriously, back away from the laptop! Don’t make me get ugly! *shakes a fist*

Ok, ok. I admit it. I’ve started another blanket. At least it’s pale green and yellow! That’s a step in the right direction, right?

Er…

And now for a distraction helpful video! Tired of uneven edges when doing rows of dc? Unhappy with how different the turning chain looks from the regular stitches? (”ch3 counts as first dc” my butt!) Check out this video I found on how to skip the turning chain and start with a dc.

(And don’t forget to watch the tc version)

…

What?

Yesterday I found out about a street festival that happens every year, literally a block away from my house. I’ve been living here for two years now and had no idea. Unbelievable!

I got to thinking about it, and I’m debating whether or not I want to get a table for it. The problem, as I see it, is that I seem to specialize in making blankets, scarves, and toques. That might be a hard sell in June in Toronto. There are a handful of things that might be appropriate that I can make, so I’ve been playing with that today (I’m off work today due to an extremely sore knee. Resting it has helped, but it still hurts a LOT!)

I’ve been experimenting researching different techniques.

Here is today’s result:

Big deal, right? It’s fun fur! No one is making things out of fun fur anymore! (Actually, it’s Bernat Eyelash. I got it on sale when the Zellers near me thought they were closing.)

But wait! Take a look at the back!

It’s a bit tricky to see in the picture (I’m stuck taking pictures of things placed artfully on the floor in front of my chair) but that picture shows the other side of a swatch of crochet-on-the-double with the novelty yarn on one side, and black Bernat Satin on the other.

I’m still working out how to get less of the eyelash yarn to show through to the plain side, but it’s quite a promising start!

And just in case my swap partners are stalking me checking out my blog, here’s a little preview for you:

*snickers*