{"id":193,"date":"2009-11-22T21:36:41","date_gmt":"2009-11-23T05:36:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/melissaruth.com\/blog\/?p=193"},"modified":"2010-06-24T12:42:02","modified_gmt":"2010-06-24T19:42:02","slug":"stuff-i-made-that-is-awesome","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/melissaruth.com\/blog\/2009\/11\/stuff-i-made-that-is-awesome\/","title":{"rendered":"Stuff I Made That Is Awesome"},"content":{"rendered":"

The end of year crafting extravaganza has begun. I love making presents for people. “People” also includes myself. Okay, mostly myself, haha. Seriously though, I have started two of the three knitting gifts I plan on giving this year, one of which is about 75% completed. \u00a0So I’m way ahead of my “OMG it’s December 15th??? I should get started on the present making!!” I usually wind up with.<\/p>\n

So no pics on those till after Christmas. They’re awesome, though.<\/p>\n

Hey, so I finished Liesl and I love her.<\/p>\n

\"Liesl<\/a><\/p>\n

You can also get a nice view of my sassy wood paneling up in there.<\/p>\n

She fits nice. Here is a crappy picture I took of myself in my “vanity” area, and it is a mess so ignore the laundry all over the place.<\/p>\n

\"Liesl<\/a><\/p>\n

Not only is that a fairly crappy picture, but it’s an “in the mirror” picture, haha! But as you can see, Liesl looks super cute on.<\/p>\n

Though I will fess up to the fact that even though there are six buttons they don’t all close. I should have stopped making button holes after four, but, whatever.<\/p>\n

Basically I knit the 46″ size, but didn’t, you know, swatch, or use the right needle or anything, so it’s a miracle that I like it and it fits! And I did the picot bind off, which is kinda twee but I think works for this highly girly knit. The buttons are from the La Mode vintage reproduction line. I found them at JoAnn’s. They cost more than the Vanna yarn, heh.<\/p>\n

The other thing I made is this awesome beret:<\/p>\n

\"#14<\/a><\/p>\n

\"#14<\/a><\/p>\n

I made this out of Fleece Artist Merino 2\/6, which is an awesome fingering weight yarn. Very silky feeling. I used a #3 US needle. I should have used a smaller needle for the ribbing because it blocked completely ridiculous. Like, too huge to fit. So, annoyed that all my hard work had been negated by a very necessary block, I bought some red elastic thread and sewed it into the cast on edge. You can’t even see it, but it salvaged the knit spectacularly! I noticed that a lot of store-bought berets have elastic in the edge, so it must not be that uncommon for the edge to be a little too big. But that would be my recommendation on this pattern (#24 lace beret in the latest Vogue Knitting Holiday mag) to not be lazy and actually knit the edge on smaller needles. I think the pattern actually tells you to do this, but, whatever. Now it fits great.<\/p>\n

\"#14<\/a><\/p>\n

Anyway, so aside from the Christmas projects, I have also cast on for a sweater out of some gray wool-ease I had lying around. Much like the Liesl yarn, I suspect that I bought this way on sale. Here’s the initial design for the sweater:<\/p>\n

\"graysweater\"<\/p>\n

I’m winging it, as usual, so we’ll see A) how long it keeps my interest and B) if it even does what I want it to. Basically I want it to have a yoke of some sort, whether garter stitch or cabled I haven’t yet decided, sort of blousey sleeves with a narrow cuff and a sewn hem for neatness. Worked top down. I already have the top rib started and need to look in my stitch books for the yoke part.<\/p>\n