Post holiday lull

So I can post all of my project results now that the holidays are past.
The Polish coat is completed and delivered.  He'll be trying it out at tonight's fencing practice.  I'll be crossing my fingers that it isn't too bulky and annoying.

My sister posted that she's using the gauntlets I made for her.  I can't imagine Edmonton being very toasty warm this time of year so I made these for her and she seemed to love them.

The girls seemed to like their stuff as well.  I chose three patterns from "Vampire Knits" a book I bought for the purpose.  A tourniquet scarf, a werewolf hat, and pulse protectors or palm readers or something for the gauntlets.  They all have cutsey names but the patterns aren't too bad.  I do want to make the beer covers with the blood type based on the True Blood series ;-)

I also made some stuff for my honey including some nalbind socks.

No rest for the wicked.  I"m off to the next project and the charity knitting.

Polish Hussar fencing jacket

As a now belated Yule gift I'm in the painful process of making a fencing jacket for a friend of mine.  At each stage of this project I've had hurtles to jump and it's a good thing I'm patient when it comes to sewing.  I'm using the Russian Svita design as that seems to be the closest thing I can find for what the images look like.  http://www.strangelove.net/~kieser/Russia/KMC2.html

I had to start with a prototype to make sure it fit.  I had to resize it after that especially considering the freedom of movement preferred for fencing.  Then I discovered the fabric that I had used to make the jacket (fabric previously tested and passed) no longer passed the "punch test".  Adding a third layer to the body of the coat makes it quite bulky.  I'm annoyed at that but there's not much I can do short of buying new fabric and starting over.  Next the innermost layer was naturally reversed so that the seams went to the outside to be contained between all of the layers.  The coat design is assymetrical at the front so because I wasn't thinking I had to detach and reattach the two front body panels.  While attaching the bottom skirting to the jacket now I see that the side gores on the bottom where not enlarged with the rest of the coat and won't make it all the way around.  Sigh. I hope I have enough fabric to fix this next hiccup.

baby surprise jacket

So the jacket looks really cute and I made a toque to go with it.  They don't know if it's going to be a boy or girl so it's in yellow.  I found some wooden buttons with a snowflake design on it.  I figure that's neutral enough and boy enough if need be.  I like the buttons.  I think I'll go and get more for myself ;-)
The neck hole looks really small, but I followed the instructions so I have no idea what went wrong.  I figure they'll just have to leave the top button undone.

holiday knitting

So since I don't have enough projects at this time of year my boss asked me for a favour.  She's having her first grandchild and asked if I could knit a sweater and hat for the baby to come.  She wants it for christmas of course :-P  How could I say no?

I found a pattern for the "baby surprise jacket" in my Elizabeth Zimmerman's Knitting Workshop book.  On Ravelry there are something like 1600 people who have done this pattern.  In the knitting podcast that I listen to (yeah I know how geeky that sounds but I don't care, ha ha), by Kelley Petkun of Knit Picks, highly recommends it.  She's done several of them over the years.  I even found some YouTube videos with tips and tricks to make more sense of the vague wording of the pattern.
http://youtu.be/xMirlP_YuXo

So far I'm almost finished the first batch of decreases and I'll be onto the next stage of the sweater today.  I would have liked to have done stripes or a variegated yarn but she wanted plain jane so I guess I'll just have to make a second one for another bundle of joy somewhere down the road.  There are always more baby showers to go to right?

I used Bernat Satin Sport weight so it's super soft to the touch.  I wanted to avoid wool as I didn't know how they'd feel about that.  Some people are funny about wool.  I figured the washability was cool and you could throw it in the dryer without worry.  This line of yarn is a little fuzzy but I don't think it'll be an issue of wear for a baby as they grow so fast.  I hope they like it.

knitting

I've been working on some knitting projects but I can't post them as they are presents for this coming yule.  However, I've also just finished a baby hat for the charity I work with called LeeLee Hats.  I have a feeling I'll have to make a few of these due to the cuteness factor.

I don't have a baby to model it so this little guy will have to do.

this year's garden results

I'm rather disappointed with this year's garden.  It wasn't well organized, the weeds got away from me to the point of ridiculous.  I'm sure my neighbour with the perfect grass and robotic like garden has been cursing me.  I have a  plan for next year to downsize the garden in such a way to help with productivity and my management of it.  I'm going to try the "square-foot gardener method".  It should be less labour intensive.  I'd love to set up my gravity feed watering system but I'll have to see if I can afford it.

This year resulted in only two pumpkins, dried beans, some tomatoes and a handful of beets.  I did get a large batch of weld for dying.  Each year I learn what to change and  what works where.  Since this moving I've had to learn what works for our new location.

Sprang

So in  my travels I found that the local library has Collingwood's "The techniques of Sprang".  I began taking notes and it really helped me to get a clear image of technique.  A friend of mine showed interest in learning so I began trying to research more in depth to help her (and let's be honest I can let a fiber art alone to save me).

A year or two ago I took a class on basic sprang and another on circular warp sprang.  On the left is part of my circular warp from the class.  I still need to reach that part in the book to see what it can add to my understanding.  On the right is my playing with double intertwining at the top with single intertwining near the bottom.  It doesn't look much different when relaxed.  The difference shows when it's stretched making a hexagon as opposed to a diamond shape.  I think it would make a nice hair net.