Thea's Rambling Rows Afghan

The summer has been great. I have been reading and knitting and really enjoying some down time.
The last time I posted I put up a picture of a sweater and cap that I knit and I was all ready to send it off and the cap disappeared. It is one of those annoying things that seem to happen to me every once in a while. So I sent off the sweater without the cap and I still can't find the cap. I have looked every place that I could think of and finally decided to give up in the hope that when I am not looking for it I will find it. I am so bummed.
I seem to need a bunch of baby gifts all of a sudden and I get so tired of making the same thing all the time so I decided to dig into my stash of odds and ends and on the suggestion of a friend I am working on the Rambling Rows Afghan from Cottage Creations http://www.patchworkfrog.com/cottagecreations.html. Most people think of the Wonderful Wallaby sweater by Carol Anderson, owner and designer of the Cottage Creations patterns but if you haven't looked at some of her other patterns you are in for a treat. the patterns are well written and easy knitting and easy to follow. This particular pattern is offered in three sizes and is knit in a series of 3 different sized blocks , each created by picking up stitches from its neighboring block so there is now seaming at the end. By stopping every few blocks and weaving in the ends when you compete the knitting you are DONE! I decided to dig into my stash of baby yarns and I picked out 5 colors of Sirdar Snuggly when I only had one or two balls left and I am working on a #6 needle although the pattern calls for worsted weight and an #8 or 9. I think that my blanket will be about 30 inches wide before I add a border which I think is a nice size for a baby blanket. Since I don’t know the sex of the baby I am working in shades of yellow (one having some flecks of orange and greeen color, a cream and an aqua. As soon as I am a bit farther along I will post a picture. I like this because I have a sense of accomplishment as I complete a square. I also love that there will be nothing left to "finish" as long as I am good about weaving in the ends every few blocks.

A Gift For You

I have finished the baby sweater and Beanie...Yeah!. I am in time for the baby shower.

I have decided to offer my pattern to everyone with the purchase of the yarn to knit both pieces. The patern calls for 2 calls of each color or 4 balls total.

Go to http://www.patchworkfrog.com/debbieblissvarn.html#DBpurecotton

Purchase 4 or more balls of Debbie Bliss Pure Cotton then click on the link to the Free pattern and add that to your shopping cart

Happy Knitting

Thea

In Search of the Perfect summer Cardigan

Some how I never have the perfect crdigan to throw over my sholders no matter how many I have made in the past. I am also a sucker for all the new patterns that I find.

I love Spring and Fall but it is also the time of the year when you just need something over your shoulders and I am always searching for the "perfect" cardigan. One year styes are long and others short so every year I find myself frantically knitting new things.

This year I picked out Interlude by Chris Blysma as one to knit
http://www.patchworkfrog.com/chrisbylsmapatterns.html and will also be making either 1524 Au Naturel Cardie by knit One Crochet Too in Babyboo yarn. http://www.patchworkfrog.com/knitonecrochettoopatterns.html
or 1514 Slant On Nature by Knit One Crochet Too which could be knit with longer sleeves and is a fun sweater to knit and the Ty Dye yarn is yummy.

Then there is the lace edge cardi from the Just Soya Book by Sirdar
http://www.patchworkfrog.com/justsoyabook.html

So many patterns....so little time.

These are all great summer patterns and will be perfect for layering in the fall. My problem with bought sweaters is that most of the time the sleeves are too long for me. I Never thought that I had short arms but either the problem is my body or the companies are making everything long. I am just not into that look of my cuffs hanging over my hands. I find it annoying so the solution is making my own.
Orders over $50 ship free

Knit ON!

Bumble Bee Baby Sweater

It seems as though I am always knitting baby sweaters so I went through all the cute sweaters that I have in my current books for sale and everything I loved was for a girl. Everyone who I seem to be making a baby sweater for is having a boy. So I had a real dilemma. I started going trough old pictures and magazines and came across a picture of a cute bumble bee sweater but I seem to have saved the picture but no instructions.

I figured that this would be an easy sweater to knit up without any instructions so I went to work. I choose some of the wonderful Debbie Bliss Pure Cotton . I am in love with this yarn. I am working on a #7 needle and although bees should be black and yellow I choose navy for my knitting thinking that the new mom might not like black on the baby, you never know. Here is a picture of the sweater in progress.Since I hate the finishing I did what i always do and cast on enough stitches for both fronts and the back and went to work, knitting up to the armholes and then dividing and working the back and each armhole up. I put all the stitches on holders then put them back on needles and then did a 3 needle bind off to seam the shoulders, but did it a bit differently.

Placing the Right sides of the shoulders together I used a crochet hook to go into the first stitch on each needle and pulled a loop through and slipped the stitches off the needles keeping the loop on the crochet hook I repeated this with the next tow stitches and pulled this loop through both stitches and then through the loop on my hook. I repeated this until I bound off the stitches on one shoulder and then did the same thing on the other shoulder. It made a very nice almost invisible seam. It looks like I will need 3 balls of each color to complete both the sweater and the hat. If anyone wants to make this sweater I will send you my written instructions free with the purchase of the yarn. Just contact me at thea@patchworkfrog.com.

Thea

Welcome Spring!

Well spring may be here but although it was quite warm during the week the week end arrived and it is cold and rain is predicted. In spite of that I am working on my spring projects since this has to pass...right?

I am still working on my Noro Taiyo 3/4 coat. I did what i always do and frogged parts of it as I experimented with my ideas for knitting. The coat, a pattern from Knit One Crochet Too was knit in a similar type yarn with colors that change but it was a wool yarn. For one thing I find wool much too warm most of the time and for another often too scratchy for me as I usually have bare arms under a sweater so I opted for Noro Taiyo which is a combination of cotton and silk. As I knit along I realized that for a good fit for me I needed to make the coat a bit more narrow and I also decided to insert solid black yarn for the short rows and picked the black Maldive yarn from The Queensland collection which has tiny flecks of color and there fore blended in nicely. I finally finished the back after all the ripping and re-knitting and started on the front. I think I am quite pleased with it now.

Needing a smaller project to carry with me (I never leave home without knitting) I started the cutest baby sweater. It is my own version of a pattern from a very old knitter's magazine. I found the picture in a pile of things that i saved, but can't find the instructions so I am writing my own as I go along. I am knitting this in Debbie Bliss Pure cotton. I am in love. The yarn is the softest that I have ever worked with. I just love holding in in my hands. I will be taking some pictures and posting them soon. Once I get the pattern written I will be offering it free along with the purchase of yarn for the project.

Happy Knitting,
Thea

Getting Ready For Spring Knitting

Although for many of us the weather isn’t quite warm yet, even here in sunny California Spring is almost here.
The time is now to knit up your wonderful spring and summer cotton and bamboo cardi’s and shells so that they will be finished and ready to wear in a few weeks when you want them.
We have a wonderful selection of great yarns for your Spring- Summer projects and some great patterns as well.
We were able to pick up some Debbie Bliss Pure Cotton at an amazing price. It unusually sells for $6.50 per ball. We are passing our savings on to you and selling it for $4.50 per ball. We have 4 colors in stock, Navy, Black, Off white and Yellow. There are 96 yards per ball and it knits up on a # 7 needle. Check it out by clicking here http://www.patchworkfrog.com/debbieblissvarn.html
We have wonderful yarn from Knit One Crochet Too. You will see their patterns in Knit ‘N Style. The cover sweater of the latest (April) issue is their pattern and knit in Ty- Dy. At 196 yards per ball . 5 stitches per inch on #7 needle, you won’t need much to knit up a sweater.
http://www.patchworkfrog.com/knitonecrochettoo.html You will love this self striping yarn. The colors are so wonderful. We also have patterns to go along with the yarn. While you are on that page also check out the Babyboo yarn.
Another new fun yarn is Fil Katia Samba. http://www.patchworkfrog.com/katiaryarn.html
Again self striping, very poplular right now. We have a children’s book and and a baby book using this yarn but any pattern calling for 5.5 stitches to the inch will work with this yarn.
the Queensland Collection, Maldive yarn is another great yarn. I have been using it to knit up baby sweaters. At $3.50 per ball the price is right. Each ball has 99 yards and knits up on a #7-8 needle at 4.5 stitches to the inch http://www.patchworkfrog.com/sirdaryarn.html
We have many other wonderful yarns to choose from so go to the the yarn page http://www.patchworkfrog.com/yarns.html
And look around. We have them grouped by company as well as yarn type.
As our gift to you there is a free pattern on our website ready to download and use.
Happy Knitting!
Thea

Lots of color

I can't decide if what I like most about yarn is the colors or the feel or maybe it is really both. I admit to being a yarn-aholic. It is truly an addiction and one I am not willing to give up.
This is the year of rainbow dyed yarns and just looking at them excites me and I want to start to knit. I have just added a new company to the Patchwork Frog Family, Knit One Crochet Too. You can see them featured in Knit 'N Style Magazine and of course their patterns and some of their yummy yarns at the The Patchwork Frog. The yarns is wonderful to work with and their patterns are different and fun.I am on a mission. I just will have to knit several of them. Stay tuned to see which one is next but right now follow my progress with the one I picked for my first project.
I couldn't resist the "Go Fly A Kite" coat. I can't decide which is more fun, the knitting or watching as the colors change in in the ball of yarn as I knit. It's a tough decision but the knitting defiantly is fun. You start by creating triangles and you add on to them building the center panels. Then you pick up for the side panels, add in a bit of short row knitting to create the gussets that give the flare to the bottom then do a three needle bind off to join the seams (no sewing. You just can't get bored making this coat. The changing color yarn makes this look complicated but the knitting is actually easy for anyone but a beginner. I have the center finished as well as the left side panel and I am now working on the right side panel. You can see when you look closely at the picture my white needles peeking out on the right side. My Denise Needle set came in handy when I attached the connector, slid the knitting on to a small cable and used the button caps to create a stitch holder. When I am ready to join the sides I will just take off one of the buttons,attach a needle on the end and will be ready to knit without transferring the stitches from a traditional stitch holder back to a needle. This is one of the things I especially like about the Denise Set.Visit the Patchwork Frog! for yarn and patterns needles and more.

The TNNA Convention

Each year I look forward to attending the TNNA convention to see what is new in the knitting world and find new yarn, patterns and products for the website. The convention this year was in San Diego and was fun although not as well attended in my opinion as in past years. Maybe it was my imagination and maybe the economy.

I will write later on in the week about the actual convention and post pictures with some of my favorite vendors but first I thought I would share my funny experience with you all.

Traveling with my friend Harriett is always interesting. A few years ago my husband and I went to Cancun with Harriet and her husband and she decided to take along some meat that she was going to cook. She packed the meat frozen in her suitcase and when we arrived in Mexico and went through customs they ask if you are bringing in meat or vegetables. At this point since they weren't opening the suitcase I would have said no but not Harriett. So she fessed up and we all watched as they took away the meat and threw it into the trash. I tell you this just to give you some background. So the two of us went to San Diego for two days. We left early in the morning on Saturday and after a very long day at the convention center running literally from one end to the other every hour (I will explain more about that later) we checked into our hotel exhausted. We got to our room and the first thing we hear is a train. A very loud train. It was like the train was going through our room. It turned out that our room was on the corner right above the train tracks and the trains were coming though about every 20 minutes with loud whistles. We panicked figuring we were not going to get any sleep. We were tired and hungry. We wanted to change rooms but the hotel was completely sold out so we were going to have to deal with the noise. We rested breifly and decided it was time for dinner. We thought we would go to the Gas Light district but found out that the hotel shuttle wasn't running. The desk clerk recommended a restaurant in Little Italy that was only about a two block walk from the hotel that he said was his favorite restaurant so off we went. When we got close a nice man started to talk to us so we told him we were looking for Filippi's that we heard it was the best place to eat and did he know where it was. He told us that he did and that in fact he owned the restaurant. We figured he was joking but he told us to follow him pointing to the signs and the awning. It might have been more weird if the streets were not all crowded with people. We arrived at the restaurant door where a long line of people were waiting to get in and a woman was taking names. The man said "they are with me" and he marched us in and sat us at a table. It turned out he really is the owner and it is a family owned business. It could be one of the best meals I have eaten in a long time.

We started to order and our waitress told us that we probably wanted to share the dinner salad and share the meal. Harriet said she was really hungry and she was concerned that there wouldn't be enough food but I told her we could always order something else if it turned out not to be enough. It was a good thing we listened. The salad came and it was really large. More than enough to share and so was our dinner. We orderedShrimp Filippi. I would highly reccomend it. Tony and the waitress suggested either that or the lasagna. I am still thinking about how good it was. It was loaded with bay shrimp over linguine tossed with Olive oil garlic and chopped mushrooms and tomatoes. We ate about 2/3 of the meal. We had a half bottle of Chianti and order of garlic bread and the salad and diner and our bill was $28. We had so much left over that I told the waitress to pack it up and give it to a homeless person and she told us they do that all the time. For desert we went to a Gelato store two doors down and had wonderful lemon ices. Things like this only happen when I am with Harriett. It turned out to be a night I will remember for a long time and I am looking forward to returning to the restaurant. That is Harriett, me (in the middle) and Tony the owner.