Swatch, swatch, swatch...

I hate swatching. I'm so damn impatient and I feel like I'm wasting valuable yarn (even though I know that having my sweater come out wrong because I didn't search is a much bigger waste in many ways.) So I swatched (and washed!) with the recommended needle size, and boy am I glad I did! My stitch gauge was an inch too big, and the weave of the fabric was a bit more airy than I like. I decided to go down two needle sizes since an inch seemed like a lot to me. Well, now my swatch was way to small. ( do you sense a Three Bears story unfolding?) So I went with the needle size in between and it was juuuust right. The row gauge is a bit short but that's easier to adapt your pattern to than stitch gauge.

It's late, so I'll be casting on tomorrow. I feel like I already have too many wips but I don't care, I'm so excited about this sweater! I'll just have to make sure I don't completely neglect my other wips.

So glad I swatched!

SODAMNEXCITED!

I decided that for my 20lbs loss reward(still 4lbs to go) I was going to purchase yarn for a sweater. Well, when I heard that Tempted was offering a sale on custom orders of sweater quantities of yarn, I convinced Mom to get it for me as an early Christmas present! Stacey of Tempted is such as sweetheart and a pleasure to do business with. I told her what I wanted color wise and she hit the nail on the head. It's gorgeous! I'm going to knit the Calligraphy Cardigan, which has been in my queue for at least a year. I'm going to knit a size smaller than what I wear now, as motivation to keep up my weightless efforts.

Tonight, we swatch!

Happy Halloween

Finished these with plenty of time to spare. Started a second pair but didn't get them done in time.

Slacker 2.0

So much time has passed since I last posted! Home life has been crazy (not in a good way) and I just haven't had time. So, quickly, just to bring things up to speed:

- Tour De Fleece: I spun EVERYDAY like planned, but I didn't finish anything, and I haven't really spun since. It's been too hot here. Fiber felts.

- Camp Loopy: FINISHED! I got my yummy prize skein in the mail last week. It's finally cooling off here so I'm thinking about making some fingerless gloves with it, and possibly a cowl depending on the yardage left.

- Weight Loss: is going. I'm not gonna spew out any numbers just yet.

-Stash Dash: FAILED. I probably would have finished if it had counted by yardage, not weight, since I used mostly fingering weight yarn. Oh well, it still motivated me to get a lot done.

Slacker

I know it's been a while since I posted.  I've been having serious internet issues and my provider can't seem to figure out what the problem is.  Anywho, let's get caught up!

• Weight Loss - sucks. I've been up and down and am pretty much where I started.  Not giving up though, just have to try harder I guess.  I started using Loseit.com with a few friends, and I really like it so far.  It's free, you can find friends via their email address and comment on each others progress and such, and there's an app for the iPhone (not sure about android) that allows you to track food, look up food, scan bar codes with your phone to get nutritional info, and reminds you at meal time to track your food.  Awesome.  Feel free to look me up and friend me.  I could use all the support and motivation I can get at this point.  
• Camp Loopy - Project two is due in the less than ten days!  The challenge for this project is to knit in a color from your country's flag with at least 800 yards. I decided to knit the Tempest cardigan in Cascade Heritage sock yarn in a navy blue.  About 1600 yards. I must have been insane when I decided to knit a fingering weight cardigan in a month.  All I have left to do on it is both sleeves, the button band, and seaming.  In 9 days.  Oh, and this is my first sweater.  The next challenge is 500 yards, two different colors, and a pattern you haven't knit before.  I'm debating on knitting my first fair isle socks, or an illusion scarf that I've been wanting to make for YEARS.  I'm leaning towards the scarf.
• Stash Dash - I had nothing this check in!  I've been working solely on my camp loopy 2 project.



• Tour de Fleece - I finished and played the Storybook SW BFL that I was complaining about last post.  I have to say, it's growing on me.  At first I hated it, but either way, I definitely learned a lot from it.  I'm not sure what I'll do with it yet.  I don't know the yardage or what weight of yarn it is because I don't have a niddy noddy or wpi tool. Yet.  I'm guessing it's about a worsted weight. 

So far I've been successful in spinning everyday for at least ten minutes during the tour.  I'm spinning my merino super thin so it's taking a long time.  I'm not sure if I'll be able to finish it by the end of the tour, which was one of my goals.

• Various Other Junk - I've been messing around with dyeing yarn and I hope to open my own Etsy shop very soon, I just need to come up with the initial investment.  This will be a joint effort with my mom to help us both recover from the serious financial blows we both experienced last year.  I plan on selling hand dyed yarn (semi solid, variegated and self stripping), stitch markers, project bags in three sizes, and possibly solid lotion bars. So keep an eye out, I'm very excited to get this going.

Let the spinning begin!

Today is the first day of Tour de Fleece! I'm excited as its my first time participating. I have two simple goals: spin everyday, and finish the merino I've been slowly working on. A few posts ago I was talking about spinning a superwash BFL in the "Story book" color way. Well I started that and it's been...disappointing. Only because I bought this braid for the screaming bright colors. Well when I went to split it I found that it wasn't dyed all the way through, so there's big chunks of white in the middle. This is toning down the color a lot when I spin it. Now, the listing may have mentioned that, I don't recall and I'm too lazy to go look. I'm not enjoying this at all. I don't know if it's the actual fiber or the color, but I catch myself trying to rush through it. I also decided to spin on my heavy spindle, an I'm having a hard time keeping my singles consistent. Oh well, if anything it'll become a monster.

Dusting off the stamps

It's been a good 3 years since I did any paper crafting. It used to be my number one hobby before I really got into knitting. So today I decided to break out the rubber stamps and ink, and make a few cards to throw in some swap packages. This is the first card I've made in three years and i must say, I'm very pleased with it. I didn't struggle or have any artist block at all. It's as if that three year gap never happened. I'm not going to list dimensions or instructions for this card because I'm pretty sure I don't have many paper crafters following me anymore. However, if I get enough requests I might start doing tutorials again.