Regarding Addi needles: I will never buy them again.
I had the chrome wear off a pair with the knitting of ONE SWEATER. Now they’re uselessy draggy.
Inox makes a similar needle, chromed with a plastic connector, that I’ve knitted with for thousands of hours without such a problem. At least, they usted to. Nowadays all I can find are the gray ones. Anyone seen the chrome Inoxes with the black connecters?
I love this scarf!!111!!!evlentyone!!! I want to make it for myself.
What kind of yarn are you going to use? I can’t decide when I’m at the yarn crack house ( business name!) cause they are all so purty, thus rendering me into a spineless flipflopper.
I like the bamboo needles, but just picked up some Bryson Flexible needles (size 7) and am feeling this insatiable urge to buy their entire line, like I’ve nearly done with bamboo needles… Is this normal…to switch allegiances like this?
I’m 90% sure Addi will replace those free of charge. Worth a shot.
I use cheap aluminum almost exclusively. I have one set of US3 straight bamboos, but I don’t like them. My hands get really hot, and the aluminum helps to cool them down. I have a set of turbo circs (only 12" circs I could find) but they’re really too slippery.
This is probably my record year for project finishing! Mom, Dad and my brother are all getting scarves, and my grandma is getting a rug.
Mom’s is a super-long scarf in a deep red varigated acrylic boucle yarn, crocheted on a N hook so it is a bit lacy in appearance. It’s the kind of long narrow scarf you wrap around 4 or 5 times to create a cowl-like effect.
Dad’s is an indigo merino wool, double crocheted longwise in the back of the stitch with a G hook. The appearance is of chunky ribbing. This project started as a knit scarf but after two years of stalling out on it, I decided to switch to crochet and actually finish it this year! It was part of a (utterly failed because I keep buying more yarn) destashing urge I felt earlier in the year.
Bro’s is a zigzag pattern in Lion Brand Chenille – silver grey with black “charlie brown” stripes. It is single crocheted on the N hook, in the back of the stitch for depth, and it’s coming out incredibly dense – this is gonna be one warm scarf.
For Grandma I just completed my first crocheted rag rug. It is about 24" diameter, took 7 yards of fabric and was worked on a K hook according to instructions from “Crochet Rag and Fabric Tapestry Rugs” by Diana Blake Grey (highly recommended). The fabrics are a hit-and-miss jumble of scraps my grandma gave me and other fabric salvaged from friends’ reject piles. The main colors are red, yellow and green.
Not for Christmas, but about half finished, I’m making a baby blanket in Lion Brand Homespun yarn in “waterfall” which is a varigated light blue. It is double crocheted on the N hook.
My trusty N hook is getting quite a workout this year. Bearing in mind I only learned to crochet in August, I’ve been one busy gal.
Between knitting threads ( that I start!) and the google ads for Yarn…I have this strange urge to buy some yarn so I can have a Yarngasm.
I use Denise Interchangeable Needles when I have to, and double pointed needles whenever I can get away with it. I just love DPNs. I can’t explain it.
The first complete Complicated Sock is about to come off the needles, finally. For those of you who followed the Complicated Sock Saga, the yarn store didn’t have any green to replace the ball I lost. I bought some purple, which I’m not really wild about, and frogged the part-completed one, and started over. (Note to self: If you’re not crazy about the colors, you don’t have to get the yarn that very day, damnit. It’s called “the internet.” Look into it!) Anyway, the sock is extremely ugly due to the color combo, but I’m still head-over-heels for the interlocking spiral pattern, so I think I’ll bash out one more and be done with them.
I’m making a sweater for my friend John, for whom we found some Paton’s Classic Merino yarn that is soft as any 100% wool I’ve felt, and a joy to work with. The body’s done, and I’m almost done with the second sleeve, and looking forward to doing the hybrid shoulder from Knitting Without Tears.
And finally the hubby is allowing me to make him a sweater! Calloo! Callay!!! I’m thinking of doing the Kw/oT kangaroo pouch sweater—which doesn’t have a pocket in front like you’d expect. The name refers to the method for making the shoulders which employs . . . steaks! My first steaks!!! I’m so excited.
Oh, and I’m redoing the bottom hem of the wool sweater that I made this summer. It flared out very unattractively, so I ripped it out and am redoing it with Many Severe Decreases. That should Show It Who’s Boss.
It’s been so long since I knitted (I’d guess at least 12 years, probably more), but last week I started a scarf for myself. Specifically [url=http://knit.atypically.net/scarves/azkaban/pattern.shtml]this scarf[/urk] which I am making in Ravenclaw colours.
Not ready yet to be making stuff as Christmas presents.
Guh. This scarf that is
Steeks. Please. I had this vision of having to wrap sirloin up in the yarn when you wrote that. shudder
I like bamboo for DPNs. The stickiness of it helps me because otherwise I feel like I’m trying to manipulate four needles full of suicidal stitches that are just waiting for me to be distracted so they can jump off to their deaths.
Thought I’d link a couple of teddy bears I knit for the Mother Bear Project recently. This charity has sent over 7500 hand-knit or hand-crocheted teddy bears to children in various poor areas around the world. Most of the kids are affected by AIDS in one way or another, either orphaned by it or suffering from it, though other deserving kids are chosen as well - victims of sexual assault, orphans, and so on. The bears get a felt heart sewn on their chests, and a tag attached to their wrist reading “Love, Mother Bear (your first name).”
For needles I use mostly Denise interchangeables, with occasional bamboo circs and DPNs. I bought a mess of cheap metal DPNs in sock sizes, but they’re so slippery, so if I like doing socks (er, not small stitch size ones apparently), I’ll look for less slippery ones.
Yay knitting!
I just made the Airy scarf from Last Minute Knitted gifts as a birthday present for my sister-in-law. My first foray into any kind of lace knitting. It was surprisingly easy and it looks nice.
I’m currently working on the Haiku sweater and am almost done - the body of the sweater is done and I’m knitting both sleeves at the same time - and they’re 1/2way done.
I tried making a felted eyglass case (the pattern is from Bev Galeska’s Felted Knits book) and it turned out well, so I’m going to make a bunch of them for Christmass presents, along with a couple of openwork skinny scarfs from that $1-a-ball novelty yarn that Target was selling.
I’m hoping that I’ll get Scarf Style for Christmas, and if I do, there’s a bunch of stuff I want to make.
I’m also hoping to get a gift certificate so that I can order some yarn from Knitpicks. I’ve heard so much good feedback about them and the prices are really good. Not that I need more yarn right now…
However, after the holidays I think I’m finally going to succumb and jump on the Clapotis bandwagon - I am fascinated with the pattern.
I mostly use Clover Bamboo needles but I’m considering buying a 40" #4 Addi and trying to learn the magic loop method of knitting a sock on one circular needle.
OK, OK, shut up mcms_cricket…
Well, shoot. I knew that, and I still got it wrong twice.
That’s ok – I misspelled it, too. I like bamboo double-pointed and circular needles, although I’m far from a yarn or needle snob. One big advantage as far as I’m concerned is the needle size is stamped on the needle so I don’t have to sit there and poke needles in my needle sizer or worse, a hole poked in a piece of paper until I work out what size they are! :eek: They also do feel nicer.
CJ
Tearing through a ribbed striped scarf for my hubby’s mom. Have another lacy type scarf planned for the stepmom, so I can practice my yarn overs. The dang kitten ripped up another ball of wool but I may be able to salvage a scarf out of it. Finished the baby hat and I have more planned, since a couple other friends found out they are having twins. For myself, I have this as a long term project: http://knitty.com/ISSUEsummer04/PATThush.html
I just bought online (via the wonderous world of Ebay) an addi turbi size 10 circular needle. YAY!
I have more needles than I need…and I crave more.
I’ve also unraveled an Abercombie & Fitch sweater for its purty orange-tweedy yarn. I have the back left to unravel and I am becoming such a Yarn Dork that I found on a local PBS station some wood working guy that I’ve never seen making a yarn swift and other stuff …all by hand. (HAH! buy it online and get it NOW NOW NOW!) Still, it looks like tinker toys for adults.
I 'm waiting for him to make or demonstrate how a nostepinne works.
Isn’t it a great pattern? I made 3 of them last Christmas (for mom, aunt, and cousin), all different colors, and each scarf only takes about half a skein. So I’ll use up the skeins from last year. I think one color is Douceur et Soie, which is the same makeup as Kidsilk Haze, the one called for in the book (I think. I know it’s Kidsilk something). The other colors are Kidsilk Haze – so the colors I have are a sage-y green, a lovely burgundy (that one’s for MIL) and a dusty pink (for SIL). I also got a new yarn – dangit, I can’t remember who it’s by – but it’s similar enough in ingredients and gauge that I think I’ll make one for me. It’s gorgeous – peach and blue and yellow. I’ll look it up when I get home tonight so I can tell you about it, and you can go get it – they have it in lots of other beautiful colors, too. 
I’d never used laceweight yarn before last year, and I found it pretty easy – just don’t mess up, because it’s a hemorrhoid* to frog! And the scarf knits up really quickly, because it’s so short.
*pain in the butt
I love Addis. Bamboo circs are pretty and very light weight but the connector is way to snaggy for the projects I work on.
I’m not knitting anything specific for gifts this year. Think I’ll just be gifting out all the models I’ve created while designing. Really, I don’t need 14 knit purses and 9 knit shawls in my closet. I’ll probably whip up a dozen or so of the felted driedels so I can perfect the counter top felting technique (and make more loaded dreidels) ;j
I second the vote for the Denise Interchangeable Needles. They’re massively versatile, the joins are smooth and non-snagging, and they’re a resin so any irregularities on the needles can be easily smoothed away with a nail buffer or 600 sandpaper. You can get cords of multiple lengths, and join them to increase or decrease the length as needed. The only drawback is they don’t go below size US 5 (3.75 mm). But even though I’m a fast knitter, my knitting speed increased exponentially with them with no effort on my part.
But I also do recommend putting point guards on when you put your knitting down – it only takes a moment, but eliminates a lot of aggravation. Especially when you have a couple projects in the same bag and they get mixed up as you try to pull one out. 
I hadn’t thought to check my library for that Folk Shawls book – thanks for the suggestion!
I would like to state that I bought an antique wooden billy club that I am hopefully turning into a nostepinne.
If that doesn’t work, I’ll just go back to beating people with it.
$10 well spent.
Inquiring minds have to ask: What’s a nostepinne?
And my library system has not one but four copies of the Folk Shawls book, so one is now on hold for me at my neighborhood branch. Man, it’s nice to be back in the Land of Decent Libraries again!
