Trail Running!

Actually more like Trail Run/Hiking or maybe Speed Hiking?  I’m not sure exactly what to call it.  I hit the trail and run about half the time and hike half of the time.  Anyways, it’s a lot of fun whatever you call it!

This weekend I went out the road north of town to Windfall Lake Trail.  It was pouring rain and I had hopes that it might be nicer out the road but it wasn’t.  I got soaked but I had a blast!

Even though this is usually a knitting blog I thought I’d share some pictures from the trail:

Herbert River (extra high)

Trailside Snack

Oso also enjoys eating blueberries.  He eats them right off the bush!  I tried to take a little video to prove his berry-eating prowess:

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Oso Eats Berries

At the end of the trail there is a great cabin that can be rented for overnights.

That is a solar powered outhouse on the right

And here is reward view:

Windfall Lake

Luckily my dogs are good sports and didn’t mind the pouring rain as long as we were going for a nice long hike.

More knitting next time!

This past week I had the great pleasure to meet Lolly (of Lolly Knitting Around) and her husband Kris (of Guitarfish). I have read Lolly’s blog for years and it was such a pleasure to finally meet her and Kris in person.

Photo by Kris!

It was so much fun to have such enthusiastic hiking buddies in town for a few days.  They were very sweet and let me drag them through the mud and the rain and did not once mention the amount of dog-hair we accumulated.

Meeting both Lolly and Kris was very special to me.  It is amazing how much we have in common and I felt that we were all old friends right away.  Lolly made a point to remind me that I needed to get blogging again and if these are the rewards of blogging well… I don’t have much excuse for being a such a slacker!

You may have noticed in the above picture that I finished my 2nd Owls sweater that I posted about back in March.  It took me a while to finish because I vastly miscalculated the length I would need.  Between the heavy alpaca blend yarn and the stress of my final semester of undergrad I ended up with an extra 4-5″ in the body.  Unfortunately I did not discover my mistake until I had knit up the entire yoke…  I had to frog about 8″ total.  Luckily I used a bulky yarn so it wasn’t too painful and now I have a sweater that is comfy, warm and perfect for hiking in a drizzle.

I like this Owls sweater even better than the first one

I have been knitting a lot now that I am pretty much done with school (?!).  So here is a bonus shot of Maggie modeling all my almost-finished knits that just need the ends woven in!

Happy dog.

Every year I knit a new green sweater for St. Patrick’s Day.

I never mean to do this.  It just seems that this time of year I crave green sweaters and seem to finish them right around the 17th.  Yesterday my bf sent me a link to a dog dressed as a leprechaun and I realized that I had another green sweater on track to be finished for St. Patrick’s.

I think it might have something to do with this:

This is what my yard looks like right now

I started a new green sweater last week even though I have about a million wips on the needles right now.  I think I just wanted something super simple for when I need a break.

Apologies for the weird colors.  My camera does not like sheen

I am using the owls pattern again.  This time I am not planning to put the owls on but I haven’t decided yet whether to do some other yoke decoration or not.  I’m afraid it will be too plain but I rather like the idea of a completely mindless knit and a simple cozy sweater.

I usually have one easy project and one complicated project on the needles all the time.  This week’s Color & Design project definitely fits the bill for complicated:

mmm…corrugated ribbing…

Our theme this week is rhythm in design.  These are knit in sport weight alpaca on size 2 needles.  I am really enjoying these because I absolutely love the colors (otherwise I think I would have had more sense than to use alpaca for colorwork) but they take a lot of concentration!

I am aiming to have one mitt ready for critique in class on Friday and I’ve just started the thumb gusset.

Probably I should be spending more time on these and less on my green sweater!

If I thought I had a million WIPs before now I was wrong…

My third pair of French Press Felted Slippers – just needs sewing and felting

I haven’t finished a project in nearly 3 weeks…

Aestlight Shawl – Almost ready to start the lace pattern

That is a long time for me!  I could knit a sweater in all that time!…

Day’s Eye Hat – Started this with a KAL on Rav with the Obscuriosity Group but got distracted by school

But I have not knit a sweater…

Laminaria – Started this on a recent trip and it has languished since.  I’m rather afraid I don’t have enough yarn

Instead I have knit a couple rows here and a couple rows there…

Monkey Socks – I was really enjoying these but I still don’t have more than a couple of inches of cuff finished

And made very little progress…

Another pair of French Press Slippers – Lacking only sewing/felting

On a lot of different things…

Reflection Hat – I know this one looks done but I still have to weave the ends in before I can give it to its intended recipient

Part of the problem is that this semester I am lucky enough to have a class that I can knit for!  Not during, but for class!

I am working on an Art Minor for my degree and one of the required classes is Color & Design.  In this class we are exploring different design principles and each week our homework is to do a project based on whatever principle we talked about in class.

We are allowed to use whatever medium we want so I have been knitting all of mine.  It’s been really fun but hasn’t left much time for knitting anything else.

Color & Design Week 1:  Unity/Variety

Unity

For this project I knit two watchcaps based on the Marsan Watchcap pattern (I made one for Lou for his b-day but don’t have a pic).  For the Unity version I knit it basically just as the pattern dictates but without the folded brim (for time constraint reasons).

Variety

For the Variety hat I randomized the twisted ribbing.  For each rib on the hat I would flip a coin to determine whether it stayed straight or moved and then I would flip another coin to determine whether it moved left or right.

The other two projects for my Color & Design class I have not been able to finish.  The instructor told us that it wasn’t important whether they were finished but we should present them in class and once I’ve done that and moved on to the next project I haven’t  had time to go back very much.

Here they are in their WIP state:

Week 2:  Emphasis

and

Week 3:  Scale/Placement

I’m hoping to get all caught up over Spring Break (3rd week of March) or before that.  I will definitely share the projects here when they are done!

This week I am working on some flippy-top mittens and exploring balance in design.  I hope to have some pictures of them soon!

I am one of those people whose most recently completed sweater is almost always the favorite.  This sweater is no exception.

Pattern:  This is the o w l s sweater (scroll down) by Kate Davies.  I enjoyed knitting this pattern immensely.

I would not hesitate to recommend this pattern for anyone who is considering it.  The pattern was free when I downloaded it but now there is a nominal fee of GBP 1.50 (today that is about $2.44) with proceeds to Médecins Sans Frontières to benefit Haiti relief efforts.

Personally, I think this price is more than reasonable for this carefully thought out and clearly presented pattern.

Yarn:  I used Cascade Eco wool in a marled colorway for my sweater.  The marling effect of the yarn makes the owls on my sweater more subtle and to the casual observer they may look just like any old cabled yoke.  I like this very much because I think really obvious owls would be a little much for me.

The yarn I chose was also thinner than the yarn called for in the pattern.  To combat this I knit a larger size.  Actually I knit three different sizes, a smaller body, x-tra large sleeves and then a large size yoke.  This seemed to work out very well but it was mostly guessing on my part after the sleeves knit according to the pattern came out ridiculously small for my lumberjack biceps.

I also skipped some of the short rows.  I didn’t plan it this way I just saw the line “Here come the o w l s!” in the pattern and started right in on said owls.  Oops.

There was supposed to be a knitalong for this pattern with some gals in the Juneau Knitters group on Ravelry and my cousin Adrienne even cast on for hers in the same week but I haven’t seen any other finished sweaters yet.

My o w l s took about 1.5 months to knit and I finished it in November.

Final Notes:  I seriously love this sweater.  The fit is fantastic and for a bulky type sweater it is quite light and not too thick.

My two favorite features of this sweater are both down to the attention to shaping in the pattern.  I am quite lazy about figuring these sort of things out so I was really happy to try some new techniques and have them mathed out for me.

The first thing that I especially loved is that the shaping all takes place on the back of the sweater.  Davies (the designer) has explained on her blog that this gives a little more room for your more curvy side.  This absolutely makes sense to me and I hope to remember to employ it in future sweaters though I also like my sweaters that have 4 sets of increases.

The other thing that I especially loved in this pattern was the short rows to raise the back of the neck.  I love this so much now that I’ve tried it that I have pledged to continue the practice in all my future sweaters.

Wish me luck as I’ve always been too chicken to math out my own short rows so far!

My o w l s on Rav