It certainly has been a while since I last posted.  Things have been busy, but I thought I'd get a quick entry in before I forget again.

Per my last entry, I had something else to post, but I was waiting until after the holidays to do so.  I made my sister a blanket, which was something she requested quite some time ago.  She didn't know I was making it for her, so she was pleased.  I wanted it to be longer, but I got bored with all the rows and rows of knitting.  It ended up around 42"x52".  I used double strands for each of the panels, with one color that was consistent (the brownish one that I used for the border) throughout all the panels but the purple one.

During this time (November), I also started on another donation sweater.  But I couldn't get it completed in time (due to other small projects) for the February deadline.  I'll just hold onto it until Afghans for Afghans has another campaign that requires sweaters.  This one I completed at the end of April.  I had bought about 4 skeins of wool yarn from Joann's for this purpose.  I liked the colors and thought it would make an otherwise boring sweater more interesting because of the variegated yarn.

One of the small side projects I decided to do was a baby sweater for my coworker.  She was due in January.  She didn't know the gender of the baby, so it was harder to find a pattern where the sweater didn't have buttons on one side or the other.  I opted for this one, which is a pullover, and one I've done before.  I used two strands of yarn, one yellow, and one variegated white.  I'm not fond of the final project.  I think mixing the two yarns made the sweater stiff, but I didn't have time to frog it and redo.  During this time, I was in the midst of having all day sickness (not just morning) from my second pregnancy, and I could barely motivate myself to make anything.  I literally decided to do this about a week before the baby shower in January.  I almost just bought something from her registry instead.  The mom-to-be said it was beautiful, though I'm not sure if the little guy Guy has actually worn it yet.

I did use a cute rabbit button, as he was born in the Year of the Rabbit.  I don't think the parents cared about that though, as they aren't of Asian ethnicity, but hey, it was as genderless a button as I could find without just going for a boring round button.

This is the year for babies, apparently. My long time friend (and one of my bridesmaid) was expecting at the end of April.  I decided to make a sweater again, and had to scour the web for a pattern that would be genderless (again) without buttons going down either side of the middle.  So I found this pattern on the Ravelry site, and used up a generic white/pastel colored yarn that I used for the yellow sweater above.  I tried to make it genderless, but my hubby thinks it's more for a girl because of the coloring.

She had a boy.  Oh well.  At least the bear buttons are cute!  I finished this at the end of February or so.

Another friend is due pretty soon (May 11th) and she's having a girl.  So this time I opted for making a baby blanket.  Might as well use up some of my acrylic yarn stash.  I started this after I completed the earlier sweater, and was able to complete it early March.  It helped that I only had so much yarn left too, so that set the length and size for me.  It ended up 30"x38.5".  Good for a car seat blanket.  Mom-to-be (she still hasn't delivered, as of this posting) loved it.

It's no wonder that it took me so long to finish the donation sweater.  I had more interest in doing the others first.  Now Afghans for Afghans has another campaign due in July, but it's only for hats, socks, and mittens.  I've already knitted 4 hats, which I'll post on another date, and am currently working on a personal sweater, though I won't be able to fit it for some time.

As some friends and family are now increasing their family size, I thought I'd get busy knitting a few gifts.  The first is for a cousin's boy that I completed in May. 

I didn't have enough of each of the buttons to make them uniform so I thought I'd mix and match.

This other one I made for a coworker's daughter that I just recently finished. 

Same pattern, but the border is slightly different.  The original pattern calls for garter stitch.  Here, though the picture is sideways, it's seed stitch.  I think it's a bit hard to tell, given the acrylic/nylon yarn I used (it's fuzzier so stitch definition is not really good).  I liked the color, and it was a way to use up some stashed yarn.  And who wouldn't love those daisy buttons?

I have forbidden myself from buying more yarn until I get through a large stash...or until at least the next yarn convention. Hee hee.  :)

I'm currently working on a wrap cardigan for myself, and when the weather gets a bit colder, perhaps I can post a picture of my boy with the red and tan hoodie I made for him a year ago!

My most recent completed project is a sweater I knitted for Afghans for Afghans.  Their current project is to collect knitwear for children.  I decided to use a pattern I've used before, since it's a relatively quick knit.  It still took me a month to complete, in between the holiday season and other things.

Here's the final product on me.  It's a little short on the body, but it will fit someone for sure.

A couple of posts ago, I wrote about a sweater I made for my hubby.  I had to redo the zipper because the sweater length was short.  So I re-blocked the sweater and re-stretched it to the proper length.  But when I did that, the zipper I had originally sewn in was too short, so I had to buy another zipper.  I would've rather kept the metal zipper over the plastic one, but that's all that was available.  Either way, it worked out and my hubby loves the sweater (or so he says).

I had also made a sweater for my sister as was posted previously.  Here is a picture of her in the sweater.  She also says she likes it, and I've seen her wear it a few times already.

Until next time.

With all the random knitting I've been doing, I thought I'd make something for my hubby.  I had found the book "Knits Men Want" by Bruce Weinstein and decided to borrow it from the library.  Looking through, I found some patterns of sweaters that I liked, and I asked Ryan to pick out a few he liked.  We agreed on one, and I proceeded to buy yarn for the project.  Fast forward several months and I decided to start the project.

It's a rather easy knit, so I figured the turn-around time would be quick.  It went between stockinette and reverse stockinette stitches in panels.  Needless to say, I made great progress on it.  I started mid-November, and by early December, I had all the pieces completed.  Then it was time to wet block and then sew the pieces.

I don't have pictures of the whole process, but again (as it seems with most of my knitting projects), I made a mistake and had to redo something.  I had started the armhole shaping on the wrong side of the left panel.  I made sure I read the directions correctly too, but apparently I misinterpreted them.  The author wrote, "knit the left panel the same as the right, reversing the order of the panels and reversing the shaping."  I took that to mean that the front side would then be the panel with B-A-B, versus A-B-A.  By the time I figured it out, all I had to do was sew down the collar, really, maybe 10 minutes left of work to do on it.  

I had to take off one side of the zipper and un-seam that whole left front piece.  Long story short and another week and a half later, I finally finished the sweater.  I really hope it fits him.  Ryan wasn't willing to do a test fit earlier on in the process, though I did measure his chest width and made the appropriate size according to the pattern.

I'll have to post another picture of my DH wearing it after he opens it as a present.  Yes, he knows about it and has seen me knitting it, but it's just a process of gift opening.

Hopefully, whatever my next project is, I won't make any mistakes.  A knitter friend of mine said it was very common for her.  I wonder if, with time, these mistakes will stop occurring the more experience we get.

It's been a while since I last posted, and it's a two for one at that.  I completed another Mother Bear for that organization.  I believe it's #9 for me.  I don't whip these out quickly, as I choose to do them in between other projects and mainly in the car when I'm traveling.  I also thought it'd be neat to see how many I can make as long as I show interest in it, so I'm keeping count.  I looked at other knitters online and have seen numbers of up to 200 bears for an individual knitter!  Talk about motivation!  I don't think I'll get there any time soon, but it's very cool to think about.  That's 200 children affected by HIV in any way who gets some joy in life with a bear.  You should look at the smiles on these children's faces.  Just look at their photos on the website www.motherbearproject.org.  Here's my contribution.  I haven't yet mailed my box yet.  I'm hoping to get one more done so I can send about 6 in this box.

The project that has been keeping me busy is a sweater I'm making for my sister for Christmas.  Given that it's a surprise, I had to sereptitiously get her measurements by comparing her to me.  She's about 6" shorter and has a thinner frame, so I figured that I could make a small size for her.  This pattern from Phildar required blocking the pieces into the final sizes.  That means that as I'm knitting, I had to stretch it out to see if it would fit the final measurements.  If I knitted the pieces by themselves to the required size, and then blocked (i.e. stretched to size), then it would be too big.  Anyway, it took a few months with a few mistakes here and there.  Here's a picture of all the pieces without blocking.

Here's a picture of the pieces blocked.  I soaked the pieces in water for about 15 minutes, then proceeded to measure and stretch it to the required size.

I had to reknit the button band...the result of one of my mistakes.  I used size 3 needles to get the gauge, but didn't have (change) the needle size to a smaller one for the button bands.  So when I knitted accordingly, the bands were much longer than the length of the body of the sweater.  I reknitted using a lower amount of stitches.  After I seamed all the pieces together, I tried on the sweater.  Granted, my sister is skinnier than I am, but I felt it was too tight.  The length wasn't right, even for her height. I figured I could reblock the sweater and stretch it.

So this next time around, I blocked the whole sweater in one piece.  See all the pins here.

 Although you can't see it in the pictures here, there were rust stains on practically ALL of the points where the needles pinned the sweater onto the board.  I read this on a blog somewhere about using stainless steel pins to prevent rust stains.  I didn't listen.  -sigh-. I don't believe it rusted the first time because I only blocked for a day and the pieces were separated, so they dried really quickly.   This time around, the sweater was soaked and pinned for several days.  Needless to say, I was very upset.  It's not like the sweater is supposed to be brown (by the way, my hubby asked if I could just dye the sweater brown to hide the stains).  :)

Anyway, I scoured the internet for ways to clean the rust stains off. I already tried SHOUT spray, but to no avail.  You gotta love the web.  Different people were suggesting a mix of white vinegar and salt, or lemon, salt, and tartar powder.  Given that I only had the first two, I tried that method first.  It helped, but not much.  So I sent my helpful hubby to the store where he purchased lemons and tartar powder for me.  Thank goodness it worked!

My last step was to add my label on the sweater and viola!  Finally finished!  The sweater looked ok on me.  I think it would be better if I wore a camisole underneath so it wouldn't be so bulky.  But again, my sister is thinner, so I'll have to take a picture of her in it and post that when the time comes.

Lesson?  BUY STAINLESS STEEL PINS!