drip drop

mushroom2.fall08
Originally uploaded by Pairaschut

It's a rainy day here in Boston... I'm hoping it leads to an outburst of all things fungusy, because I'm really into taking pictures of mushrooms lately. While pictures are great, what I really want is to make some spore prints as seen here by KnittingIris.

drip drop

more knitting in the works, details to come:-)

Autumn Street

I had dinner at a friends' house tonight, and as I pulled into their driveway I noticed that they live on Autumn St. "Autumn" isn't in their mailing address, but as visitors soon realize ~ that's just part of the charm of Boston and it's surrounding towns.

This week autumn really hit ~ our yard is covered in leaves, and I love it! So is the bike path ~ so much fun for biking and running through. And best of all ~ the temperatures have hovered around the mid 60s which has made for some really gorgeous and comfortable time spent outside. So while my address also doesn't mention Autumn, I definitely feel like I'm living on Autumn St.

And more knitting surprises. I'm really excited about this one!

Man in the Moon

Bits of another surprise project that I'm working on*

my friends

camel.cardigan
Originally uploaded by Pairaschut

If I never hear those two words again, I will be the happiest US citizen there is.

IF I have to hear those two words for the next four years (impossible, I hope), then I may have to start packing. The first thing in my bag will be many cozy sweaters to keep me warm as I hide out with our friends to the north.

Until then, here's an updated shot of my camel sweater. The tan yarn is from a camel and the blue yarn is the softest wool/silk blend. This may not get much attention due to holiday knitting, but that's ok because I still have to think about how I'm going to knit the sleeve cuffs - any suggestions?

Have a great day my friends*

ps - I'm working from a cafe today, where I ordered a bagel with "almond butter". I've had almond butter many times, but today I wasn't thinking of it being ground almonds, instead I thought I was going to get some real butter infused with almond essence. It wasn't, but now I'm imagining how delicious real butter with almond flavoring would be. yum

Finished for fall!

Just an update of some projects that were finished over the past month. A birthday hat for my brother::

This was just a simple hat of my own design. I cast on 90 stitches, ribbed the bottom, added the stripe, and finished it off with the star on top! I used some malabrigo (for the stripe and star) and berroco peruvia for the body of the hat; it was a great way to use up some left-over bits and I'm excited to know that it'll keep my brother warm this winter! {now I just have to get a picture of him wearing it!}

I also finished the February Baby Sweater that was a gift for a family friend::
I'm glad I restarted this, making it slightly larger and using the brown yarn made for a perfect little gift. I LOVE this baby knit. It was so fast and easy, and I definitely want to knit more of these. I'm evening thinking of doing the adult size version for myself. I really like this version.

And I finally sewed on the buttons for my Drops Cardigan. So here are some shots of the final product::
Again, I LOVE this sweater! I think it's going to get a lot of wear this fall. I used Malabrigo, making a soft and cozy sweater. I am worried that it's going to pill a lot, but I'll just take the pilling as a sign of how much I love it.
Some notes for this sweater:
I followed Canary Studio's lead and knit this all in one piece. I cast on the same number of stitches as she suggests here. After the cast-on, I knit down the body, with no waist shaping, and stopping when I was happy with the length. I then went back to the cast-on edge and picked up the stitches for the neck. When it came to the sleeves, I knit them in the round with no shaping at all, it made for a nice wide cuff (where again I used seed stitch to finish them off).
Notes on the neck section::
While knitting the whole neck section with the double seed stitch, I continued with the should seams (decreasing because I'm working 'up' the neck). To do this, I would just incorporate the decreases on the right side rows while still following the double seed stitch pattern. For decreases, I would either k2tog, ssk if I'm at a point in the pattern where I should be knitting, or if I should be purling, then I would p2tog. After doing a decrease row, it would mean that for some rows, I would have one, three or four knit/purl stitches in a row, rather than the two stitches for the pattern. While this seems like it would cause a problem, it doesn't. If you look at my shoulder seam area, you can see where the seams are, but it doesn't look like the stitch or pattern is messed up. Although, I didn't finish the shoulder seams until I was back at a point where the stitch pattern lined up correctly (two knit, two purl, two knit, etc). I hope this helps, and I'd be happy to answer any questions!

Yarn Malabrigo - 5 skeins (give or take, I bought 6 and have a lot left over)
Needles - size 8 US

And finally, a spooky picture of me and some fall foliage::

It's Fall!!

I haven't officially recognized the start of fall yet, but it's here! And I'm excited for all things fall. Like the pile of new projects {check 'em out now because you won't see much of these until the gift-giving season has arrived}::

Then there are my fall boots, paired with some knee-socks. There's definitely going to be some knee-sock knitting in my future::


The trees along the bike path are starting to change::

And there's baseball! My family got together last weekend for the Phillies game. We lucked out and were there for the game on Saturday when they become the National League East Division Champs! The weekend was also full of great company, much laughing, and some tasty drinks.

And the city skyline from the stadium::


Next up ~ some finished knitting and more excitement about fall*