Caister, Finally

The great button drought of '07 has lifted, and I finally was able to buy some buttons to finish my Caister:Unfortunately this has turned out to be one of my less-favorite knits. It doesn't look too bad in the photos but there are a ton of little things that annoy me about it. Despite my effort to lengthen the body, it is still on the short side and I'll probably always have to be pulling it down, which is so annoying. I hate to think what it would've looked like if I hadn't lengthened it! I'm hoping that this will turn out to be one of those cotton knits that ends up stretching over time.

Another annoying thing is that the prescribed method for edging the sleeves, waistband, and collar does not keep the edges from curling up. I pretty much suspected this would be the case, since it was just picking up stitches and then casting them off, but I was hoping I'd be wrong. You can see the "flip" action of the collar in this rear view:I do like the way the shoulders fit, although I must say it was rather challenging making sure that the second sleeve's stripe pattern lined up with the front in the same way the first sleeve did. I must have ripped out and re-inserted the second sleeve three or four times!

The final thing (completely my fault) was that my row gauge was a bit off, and I should have compensated by adding some extra rows onto the collar. As it came out, it is a bit small and does not have the nice floppy look of the original.Oh well, despite these annoyances, it does look pretty in close-up view. I guess every knit can be a favorite!Pattern Notes:
"Caister" from Rowan 41, Knit in Rowan 4-ply Cotton on 3.25 mm needles
I did not find any problems with the pattern, but I would recommend possibly lengthening the body (unless you're going for a very cropped look) and finding a different method of edging. I did find one other person who knit Caister, and I think hers came out much better than mine, so don't let my troubles scare you from this pattern!

We got to go see the new Harry Potter movie this weekend, and I must say I liked it quite a bit more than the last one. It still wasn't any Prisoner of Azkaban though, which is my gold standard of the series. Like many other knitters, I was totally in love with a bunch of the knitted and crocheted items, particularly the hooded sweater that Hermione wears, which appeared to be in Gryffindor colors. I was looking around online to see if anyone had a still of it (alas, no luck), but I did find a number of discussions on it. Interestingly, it seems that those of us who saw the movie at a normal theater say the sweater was made Gryffindor colors and those who saw the IMAX version say it is maroon with pink and/or white stripes! Hmmm...I wonder which is correct??

Happy solstice!
We've had a string of the most lovely days you could imagine, which is quite unusual for here. I think the last three weeks have been the nicest start to summer in the four years I've lived here.
Well, until yesterday anyway.But it was a good thing as it was getting a bit too dry. Looks like the whole weekend will be showery as well. Hopefully it doesn't mean a return to the bugs because I think the dry weather resulted in one of the easier bug seasons in memory.

Weather can't bring my happiness down at finishing Caister, except for those pesky buttons I forgot. Here she is, hanging around with some jeans on the porch:I'm going to save my "official" photo shoot and notes for when I finally get buttons, hopefully not too long from now.

One of the great things about the nice weather is that I'm actually getting a ton of blooms in my flower boxes already. In a normal, chilly year it seems like it takes until July to get many flowers (they're also in a shady location so I'm working at a serious disadvantage), but this year they're going crazy! Here's one of my double impatiens, I think they're so pretty!I also see a ton of flowers on my tomato plants already, so maybe this will be the year that I actually get a bumper crop! Not really--these are also stuck in a shady spot so I'm lucky if I get some in August, but a girl can dream, right? ;)

Holy cow, has it really been two weeks since I last posted? Bad me! Of course it doesn't help that I don't have any new, exciting knitting to show off. Work has just been so tiring and often stressful over the last few months that all I want to do when I get home is eat high-cal food, watch movies, and cuddle the kitty. Even knitting just seems like too much mental exercise sometimes! Unfortunately it is going to continue this way at least through the end of the year--I just got put in charge of another public hearing for late August, ugh. The funny thing is that my first couple years on this job I thought it was so stressful and hard, and now looking back the first couple years were ridiculously easy! If it could go back to being like that it would be awesome! Of course now that I am one of the most experienced (and dependable) staff members I get stuck with all the big projects. Ah, well--in the big picture I know that I have a relatively easy life.

Speaking of knitting, I was certain that I would have a finished Caister this week:But, you won't believe this...I went on our big shopping expedition last Saturday and I FORGOT TO BUY BUTTONS! Grrr! It was one of, like, three things I absolutely needed to get and I forgot!

I ended up hitting another stumbling block anyway. I've been working on putting it together, as you can see above, and I did a preliminary try-on once the shoulders were seamed and the placket put in. Well, the pattern is intended to be a bit cropped-looking, but this thing is verging on belly shirt! I think I'm going to attempt to unravel the bottom and add another inch or so knitting in the opposite direction. I just did a little swatch to test out this technique and it seems to look just fine.

Now, it is a bit embarrassing to be finally doing this about a month after everyone else, but here are my "seven random facts" (I think it was supposed to be seven, right?):

1. It's my opinion that beer might possibly be the most perfect beverage in the world. Plain old water probably ties with beer though. I drink plain water almost exclusively and can't feel hydrated from anything else!

2. My dream job might involve cuddling with kitties all day (pet sitter?).

3. I somewhat regret not majoring in math or history in college. I'm not sure what career path those could have led to, though. All I can think of is math or history teacher/professor.

4. When I feel particularly stressed, I find comfort in reading about astronomy and cosmology. Life's problems seem to melt away while pondering ekpyrotic theory or looking at the Hubble ultra deep field.

5. If I won the lottery, I would open the Farm Animal Sanctuary for Wayward Chickens and Pigs (other animals welcome).

6. Although I enjoy looking at fashion, I am the world's most boring dresser. I basically wear some variation of jeans and top every day, and I'm too lazy (and I'll admit it, cheap) to ever be fashionable.

7. Nothing is more exhilirating to me than finding something beautiful each day, like this wild rhodora that I photographed the other week:
Hope you enjoyed reading these, and NO I'm not going to tag anyone else! ;)

A week and a half of knitting...And here's all I had to show for it! You can all just start calling me speed-needles, LOL. This is one of the sleeve-bands. I've finished cranking out the second one tonight, so hopefully I'm a bit back on track with this project.

Unfortunately my cold turned out to be one of those nasty ones, all stuffy and coughy and yuck, but I managed to have a pretty fun weekend nonetheless. The nice weather we had went a long way towards making me feel better. The bugs even stayed away for the most part, which is truly a minor miracle. We had a nice walk up to a neat waterfall:And also took the obligatory moose sight-seeing drive and saw five of the goofy critters. Most of the rest of the weekend was taken up with eating, strolling around town, and general relaxing. Oh, and we also took my parents to the first dance of the season over at the Finnish Farmers Club and had a hilariously good time. I must say, my dad was the hit of the dance and took three or four turns around the floor learning to schottische (aka Jenkka in Finnish). My mom and I were quite amused by this!

Before we move on to the next color phase of Project Spectrum starting in June, I put together a green, yellow, and pink photo mosaic for April/May:See the Flickr photoset for full-size images.

I was having a hard time finding pink objects to photograph but managed to find a few. I also captured a photo of my favorite pink thing of all time:Cute little Quincy nose!

I'm going to have to post my "Seven Random Facts" next post as I need to go to bed and get rid of this darn cold...toodles for now!

Thanks to all of you who offered suggestions for lace patterns in the last post--there were definitely some intriguing options! The lace yarn may be temporarily cast aside in favor of a couple other projects I'm mulling over but it will re-surface at some point, you can be sure.

Of course, I first need to finish up Caister. Can you believe that I didn't knit a stitch last weekend? The show we went to was supposed to be outdoors but due to the rainy weather it ended up being indoors, and that was just not conducive to knitting! I've only knitted one of the sleeve bands (actually have 2 cm more to go which shouldn't take more than 10 minutes). All this delay doesn't really matter much anyway, as I still need to get buttons and I won't be able to for another couple weeks. Apparently they don't believe in selling buttons in this town. I hope we don't see a rash of falling trousers and half-open shirts. That would be scary!

I thought I would show how I have been dealing with the stripes/yarn issues. I was originally cutting the yarn after each stripe except for colors that would be used again shortly. However, it turned out that weaving in a ton of ends (besides being not fun) caused a slight change in texture of the final fabric, making it kind of stiffer and not as nice. So, I ended up carrying the yarn up the sides as much as possible, although I still cut yarn when it's a color that won't be used for a long time. Carrying the yarn up the side makes for a rather messy selvedge...Here is the "nice" selvedge:
And here is the messy one (with woven-in ends that are kinda sloppy looking too!):Not perfect but I decided this was the lesser of two evils. I guess with cotton yarn there are better ways of weaving in ends--for example, I saw it suggested that you split the plies and weave each ply in separately--but that just sounded excruciating, especially with yarn that is already very fine. Blocking seems to take out any irregularity but it will be interesting to see how the seaming goes. So, anyone have any clever tricks for dealing with stripes that I might be able to use next time?

We've been having some amazing summer-y weather (although it was a bit hot for my taste today--I think my ideal temp is 65 degrees). Yesterday G and I were intending to see a play about Patsy Cline that his friend's band is featured in. We went to dinner first, and right as we were finishing up the power went out. Went outside to discover this:Have no idea what happened here but it would appear that one pole was hit, pulling two others with it. We hung around until 7 PM but they ended up having to cancel the show.

All on the way down there and back, I kept having this little cough. Could not figure out what it was until I woke up in the middle of the night with my throat on fire! Looks like I got some kind of cold, ugh. Here is a little tableau of my afternoon (left work at 2 PM):Hope this goes away stat, as my parents are coming tomorrow to visit for the weekend and I don't want to be a miserable wreck! I'm starting to feel a bit better and I think I'm gonna run off to bed now so I can get a full night of sleep. Hope everyone has a fun and relaxing Memorial Day weekend!

One last photo for ya--I found out that someone loves yarn as much as I do:
I guess we'll have to share?

Lots of happy stripes and happy cats (sometimes) in my corner of the world:This project seems to have 8 million little pieces though...above you see the front and back, two sleeves, and the cute lil' collar (at the bottom). I still need to make the bands for the sleeve bottoms and the shirt bottom (which looks to be rather interminably boring), and pick up and knit the button band at the neck. Still need buttons too, which are impossible to buy in town unless I want real cheapies. Well, I should have some time to knit some of the remaining parts this weekend when I watch G play with his band at a local bluegrass festival. Should be pretty neat!

In other excitement, I received this handspun laceweight in the mail from Rebekah, as a prize from the Blanket of Hope project:I love the crazy colors, but I have been racking my brain trying to think of lace patterns that would work with such strong variegation. I guess it would have to be something very simple. Any suggestions are appreciated; feel free to leave one in the comments!

On a tragic note, one of G's Russian Boots has already sprung a leak in the bottom:Gah! I thought they would last a bit longer as they were made from a rough yarn, but alas I was wrong. I'm sure I can patch this up and make it last a bit longer, but clearly I need to make some felted slippers at some point. I imagine those wouldn't get holes nearly as easily. I do wonder though, is it just me or do guys seem to wear out their clothes so much more quickly? It doesn't seem like G and I live very different lifestyles or anything that would account for this. Perhaps it is just one of those mysteries of the universe?

Finally, a nice daffodil...they've been sprouting all over town despite the raw weather we've been having (I even saw a...gasp...flurry of snow and sleet yesterday morning. Luckily it didn't last long!).Perfect for Project Spectrum this month! Enjoy your weekend!

Aaaah! My eyes!Yes, the sun has finally come out to play! (This is especially funny because my father is convinced that everyone up in Maine has big dark eyes set into impossibly pale faces, due to the lack of sunlight. A world of Gollum-like people, if you will. Based on my own pasty complexion, I fear that there may be some basis in reality for this joke).

Anyway, I am sure glad the sun is shining because my fave snowbank "Big Bertha", while quite dirty from the last few plows over soft ground, has not shrunk very much from the last time I photographed her:
I want to say thanks for all your kind words on my fair-isle cardigan! I wish I had some cooler photos of it, but unfortunately the sleety icky weather forced me to stay indoors and I can't seem to take inspired photos when I'm inside. It's going to be too warm to wear it in the near future, so hopefully next winter I can revisit it with some more interesting shots.

One thing is for sure, mud season is here...At least I have some stripes to keep me happy! :D

It's a bit late for the Feb/March Project Spectrum party, but it's finished and whew, I'm relieved! This thing was becoming a wintry weight around my neck, and with all the finishing details required (zippers, cuffs, bottom band, etc.) I was seriously procrastinating.

I don't think this is my best sweater but I don't dislike it either. Substituting a different yarn (and a rather rustic hand-spun one at that!) required a lot of calculations. Despite all my work to convert the pattern, the pieces still didn't have the exact shape required. After decreasing the raglan portions to the proper length, I ended up with much wider tops than there was supposed to be, resulting in a too-large neck opening. I made the collar band as short as I dared and probably eased in a good 7 or 8 inches (!) of neck opening while attaching the collar. Still, the collar seems a bit gaping to me but I think I can live with it. I also couldn't find cute toggles like the ones in the pattern photo but I can easily replace those if I find better ones.

The ever-fascinating "wrong side" shot:
I had a lot of yarn left over. I'm not sure what I'll do with it...
Pattern Notes:
"Maine Fair-Isle Cardigan", AKA Pattern #28 from Vogue Knitting Winter 2004/2005. Knit in 100% wool yarn purchased from a local hobby farm.

I didn't have any problems with the pattern. I do think there are some small errors near the beginning of the pattern in terms of how many stitches you should have on the needle. Since I was calculating my own numbers anyway, I didn't get too involved in trying to figure out if there really was a problem, but I wrote a bit about it here.

Overall I am fairly pleased with the final product. However this thing is heavy and I don't think there will be many days that it will be comfortable to wear it, even up here!

Even if it doesn't look like spring here, I'm ready to start some spring knitting. I've gathered the yarn for Caister, from the newest Rowan #41 and it looks so cheerful and bright:I was totally boring and bought the "suggested" colors, but with only internet purchasing available to me I didn't dare try to substitute! That usually results in disaster for me. And, it so happens that two of the three Project Spectrum colors for April/May are represented here: Pink and Green! Whee!