Crafty Update

Gull Pattern Preemie Hat made for Knit One, Save One

I'm back! I've had a long break from blogging as I dealt with other issues in my life. Things are a bit calmer now and I'm ready to get back to posting about my crafty adventures.

Even though I've not been writing, I've continued to make and create. I've made quite a few baby hats over the past year for charity. My school group donated over 1000 hats to Save the Children's Knit One, Save One campaign last year and I had the joy of accompanying a group of my students to Washington, DC for a Save the Children volunteer event.

The Arthur Dollhouse (w/red clay bricks, white clapboard siding--no shingles yet)

I've also adopted a few other craft interests recently. The first is building dollhouses. A dollhouse is something I always wanted as a little girl, so I decided to build one with my DD. It is still a work in progress, but it's coming along well! The above house is only about halfway done. We still need to finish the roof and outside trim before starting to decorate the inside.

The most recent new craft I've taken up is scrapbooking! Again, it's something I've wanted to do for ages and am finally making the time to begin. I recently finished my first layout featuring my DD at bathtime.

I have SO much to learn about scrapbooking and have been doing a lot of reading and surfing to learn about techniques for creating layouts, journaling, lettering, and more. I advised our school yearbook for almost 10 years, so I have a good understanding of design and what looks good on a page, but even though there's lots I can apply, scrapbooking is a different animal. It's been a lot of fun and I have a lot of pictures to scrap, so look out!

Drop Stitch Gone Horribly Wrong

Today was a sad day, but it started really well. I finished my Hufflepuff hat last night and was on my way to finishing the drop stitch scarf ("Magic Scarf") this evening. Two projects done in two days! That almost never happens. The scarf is for charity too (I rarely keep anything I knit) and will be part of our fall fundraiser for Stitch for a Cause. Now, I've never done a drop stitch scarf but have been eager to try this pattern. I thought I followed everything to the "t" and it looked pretty good after I had cast off. You can see the stitches on the left starting to run down the length of the scarf (as they are supposed to).

Now, the first problem I had was that at the second to last row, I was supposed to purl a stitch then drop the next. This was little freaky, but it went fine until the end of the row. I was supposed to be left with 21 stitches, but found I had 22. I decided to knit the last two together and bind off on the next row according to the pattern. Didn't seem like a big deal. I would have a row next to the edge that wouldn't drop, but I didn't think it would be very noticeable. As I started to pull my scarf lengthwise, you can see the dropped stitches running just like they should.

Then things started to go wrong...really wrong. In a few spots, I got big loops of yarn that seemed knitted o.k., but were just REALLY loose. I figured I had just knit a stitch too loosely. As I continued to pull on the scarf and use my fingers to help the dropped stitches, it looked very pretty, but I noticed some of the other rows that were not supposed to drop, starting to come loose. Ahh! What was happening? So I stopped pulling and laid it on the table again. This is what I had.

I felt sick. All I could do at this point was frog the whole thing. I am planning to knit the scarf again, but may use a different drop stitch pattern. I'm sure it was something I did wrong in first rows, but since I'm not sure what... Part of my problem came from working with a slippery yarn, so the next time I try it, I'll try a different yarn. In the meanwhile, I'll go back to knitting more hats...sniff...

Finally...Yarn for a Gryffindor Hat

I stopped by Hancock Fabrics today and they had just the colors I needed for my Gryffindor hat for the Charmed Knits KAL. Finally! I also found a better (brighter) yellow for my Hufflepuff hats and a pretty purple sock yarn on clearance (color didn't photograph well on that one).

I am not a sock knitting fan and keep wondering if I'm missing something when I look at all the blogs and patterns out there, but I'm willing to give it another shot. If I don't find a pattern I can get into, I find that sock yarn makes very cute self-striping baby hats also. *smile* I have an unfinished pair of socks I started last year that I dug out today. One sock is finished and the other is about half done. I would have worked on it today, but I can't find the pattern...oops! If I can't track it down in a few days, I'll talk to my friend who owns the yarn shop where I bought the yarn. The pattern was free with the purchase, so I'm sure they have more copies.

Hufflepuff Baby Hat

So, I've been working on Hogwarts hats for the Charmed Knits KAL. This is my eighth one, a little Hufflepuff baby hat. It's rather a pale yellow, but oh well. I've had to be budget-minded lately and got some Wool Ease on sale, but the choices were pretty limited. These hats are super simple, which makes for great mindless knitting (when you want busy hands but not a busy brain). I'm so used to working on hats for little heads with my charity knitting, that I scaled down the size a little from the pattern. I'll do some bigger ones when I increase my yarn stash.


Here's a look at the inside. Do many of you carry the yarn for stripes along this way? Is there a better way, short of cutting it off and weaving in each bit? I've tried twisting it every three rows instead of only at the color change, but I didn't like it any better. I'm happy with the jog technique I'm using (knit row in new color, slip first stitch in row 2, knit normally until next change). It only looks a little funny on the hats with the narrow stripes (two rows). I will have to investigate other jog options.

I've got to find a box so I can get these all in the mail this weekend. I've wanted to do a Gryffindor hat from the start, but I can never find the right colors when I'm looking for them. I've got the scarlet now and just need to get the gold.