Thursday, March 22, 2007

Spring, Sticks and Twisted Strands

I think Spring is finally here.
I heard the red-winged blackbirds talking to the bluejays this afternoon on the way home from work; and I'm pretty sure they were all talking about the sunshine. It was odd day. We started off with sunshine, then cloud, then misty rain that quickly turned to torrential buckets! Then it tapered off and got warm when the sun came out!

We were watching WNED the other night and I was pleased to see "A Song's Best Friend: John Denver". They played a lot of my favourite songs, and some I'd never heard. If I had to pick an absolute love-the-most, I guess "Sunshine On My Shoulders". I know I was certainly humming it today!

Remember the bamboo needles I mentioned before? Well, I've knit with them a bit more, and I'm still trying to decide if I REALLY like them. Maybe I've just been spoiled by metal smoothness; I don't know. I recently decided to try knitting mitts, and after a couple of stutters, it's not bad. I'm nearly done the first one, a multi-coloured attempt at unashamed creativity. It's not going to get a mate, I'm hoping to get all the BIG mistakes out of my system with this one. What a nightmare trying to remember how to knit with four needles! And then I found out that the cuff was going up instead of down. I was knitting the wrong way! Pull it all the way back to the cuff (I came to my realization 15 rounds past the cuff), flip it right side out and do it all again. All in all, it's been a learning experience.

Are you a knitter? When you start a new skein, do you use an outside strand or pull out the guts and use the inside strand? A few of us get together at least once a week and work on our projects of the week. (I am the only person who does not crochet, but they're trying to convert me.) Anyway, my friend Lorraine is a go-for-the-guts kinda gal, and sometimes this backfires on her. Last night I thought I would capture our friend, Diane, (pictured above) trying to sort out the yarn. See, THIS is a true friend, willing to go the distance, willing to tie herself up in knots...and the only one of us loopy enough to even ATTEMPT to sort out the mess that was Lorraine's skein.
(note to self: CAREFULLY pull the guts out of the next new skein.)

Well, back to the newest baby hat. My co-worker is due at the end of March, and the hat won't finish itself. I'll see if I can finish the mitt tonight too, and scan it for you to see.

Be crafty!
Taleweaver

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I usually go for the end in the center of the skein. But this has backfired on me numerous times, and I end up having to either shove half of the guts back into the skein or wind them around the outside. (Which defeats the purpose of starting from inside to begin with!)

crissy said...

"Are you a knitter? When you start a new skein, do you use an outside strand or pull out the guts and use the inside strand?"

tell you what if i cant get that thing to going right i just rewind it with my ball winder stick and then i keep going because i know where the inside yarn end is then for sure LOL

Anonymous said...

I'm an outside strand knitter. I usually have three or four projects at one time. If I work from the inside-out, some of the skeins would be felted or fuzzy from all the time spent inside my knitting bag.