Back to the Hubby Sweater, Bleeding Hearts Stole, and A Day Out with Thomas!

I hope everyone at Rhinebeck is having a wonderful time!  I didn’t go because of my stupid appendix.  I am pretty much recovered, but the festival is so big and overwhelming, I didn’t think I’d have the endurance to make the 2 hour drive worth it.  Plus I have too much yarn and spinning fiber in my stash anyway.  😦  Next year I hope to be there!

So I’ve been knitting instead.  Recently, I resumed working on my hubby’s sweater, which I put down when the weather turned warm last spring.  I already had the body done, so I cast on for the sleeves, using the percentage system from Elizabeth Zimmerman’s Knitting Without Tears.

Apparently, Elizabeth Zimmerman never knew anyone with arms as large as my husband.  The cuffs are appropriately snug, but the sleeves are way too tight around his forearms!  Wah.  So these will be frogged, restarted with more cast-on stitches, and I will increase less frequently than she specified.  For now, they are sitting in the corner.  Bad sleeves!!  I picked up my Bleeding Hearts Stole instead.  Here is what I have so far, looking rumpled.  I have finished 13 repeats of the center section.

The pattern is designed to be cast-on each end, knitted toward the center, and grafted together, but I don’t like the way it looks that way, plus I am not confident in my grafting skills.  So I have knit past center, and will try to place the graft where it will be covered by my arm as I am wearing it.  I have cast-on the second half using yarn from the outside of the ball, and will figure out where to graft the two parts together.

Now for some Timmy pictures!  Over Labor Day weekend, we went up to MA to see Baby Andy and to attend A Day Out with Thomas together.  We got to ride a train pulled by Thomas himself!  Here’s Andy on the train, with his parents Pat and Rob, and Grandpa!

Here’s Tim, Chris, and me.

After the ride, we got to take photos with Thomas!  I love Tim’s little crooked smile.

There were also carnival type rides there.

Also, we saw the most gigantic bug I have ever seen.  I think it is a praying mantis.

There was an indoor play area, where the two boys ran around like crazy.

Fake tattoo!

There was a guy telling stories and singing songs. Here’s Auntie Pat telling a joke!

It was a fun day!

 

Tim’s new bed and Baby Andy’s visit

Tim’s almost 4 years old now, and we just moved him out of his crib into a bed. The guideline is to move a child out of a crib as soon as he or she is able to climb out of it, since at that point it’s no longer a safe haven. Most kids move out by the time they’re 3 or so, but Tim really loved his crib and was reluctant to go to a big boy bed. So we talked it up, dressed up a twin bed with a Thomas the Tank tent, and bought Thomas sheets, then after a couple of weeks he warmed up to the idea. Last week we finally made the switch, and he was really excited!

Turns out he doesn’t want the tent, but he loves the sheets. That blanket is his beloved “purple cozy,” a quilt made by Grandma Judy’s friend, Anita, who is also a knitter!

Of course he sleeps with all of his “friends.” His allergist would be appalled.

This weekend, Baby Andy and Auntie Pat came to visit, so the two boys had fun jumping and goofing on the bed.

Also, I introduced Pat to my wheel. She got the hang of it pretty quickly!

Here’s Tim giving Daddy some affection.

I finally got back to Chris’s sweater. The body is now long enough, and I’ll be starting on the sleeves soon. He was grumpy about being photographed, but I told him – if you ask for a sweater, you’ve got to be on the blog! 🙂

 

Chocolate puppy cousins, and Chris’s birthday

Here are some pictures from the past weekend. Grandpa bought matching sleepers for the boys, and I couldn’t resist cuddling them together!

They had a great time together, and it’s really sweet how they truly love each other. Tim is always excited to go to “Baby Andy’s house,” and Andy wakes up in the morning calling “Timmy!”  Look at these dance moves.  Do you think this is future boy band material?

Here they were having fun with Auntie Pat’s salad spinner. They had them on their heads like little spacemen.

Today is Chris’s birthday, and unfortunately his sweater is nowhere near done, since he graciously volunteered to have his sweater last in my holiday queue, but I am almost up to the armpits.

He also likes to choose his own gifts, and orders things like German radio dramas. We celebrated already over the weekend with my sister’s birthday, but we’ll go out to dinner tonight too.

Happy Birthday, Hunny! Love you!

 

Thanksgiving knitting progress

In addition to delightful Thanksgiving family time, I had some good knitting time. My sister Pat is the one who bought me yarn and needles with the Knitting for Dummies book, and taught me to knit for Christmas in 2005. Since then, she had a baby, and her life has been very busy, so she hasn’t knit as much as she would like. So it was nice to be able to sit with her for some fiber time. I brought a spindle and some roving to continue our spinning lessons, and she did great once again! She spun a 2-ply from hand-dyed Corriedale, then swatched it up into a lovely fabric. Unfortunately, I don’t have a photo but I’m hoping she will take one soon! While she was spinning, I made some progress on Chris’s hubby sweater.

I think the dragon scales are turning out nicely. Soon I’ll have to decide on the upper body construction. As for the Clapotis, I didn’t work on it during the break because my mother was around, but I’ve made some progress in secret.

I wasn’t paying attention and increased one repeat too many, but that’s okay. It’ll just be a tad wider than it’s supposed to be. But I was very excited to start dropping stitches!

The bamboo yarn is nice and drapey, and the stitches dropped nicely, as expected!

Also, my sister gave me this from her stash:

Some luscious Malabrigo worsted merino in Verde Azul and Brown Berries. Two sweaters worth! Actually, she was intending to use the brown berries for me, but she doesn’t foresee enough knitting time to make use of it. So after all my holiday knitting is done, I’ll find something fun to knit with it. Thanks, pal!

 

Starting a hubby sweater

I’ve never knit a sweater for my husband, Chris. Not because of the “sweater” curse — I’m not afraid because we’ve been happily married for 5 years, together for 14 years, and at this point it would be ridiculous to break up for any reason, let alone a sweater! But he is a really big guy (6’3″), as you can see in previous posts (for example), and he dislikes bulky sweaters. I’ve never had time to knit a big sweater in non-bulky yarn, but now I do, and since his birthday and Christmas are coming up, I thought now would be a good time to do it.

I’m posting it here because it’s not a secret. He helped me pick out the yarn, color, and pattern. I didn’t want to spend all that time knitting something he might not like in the end. So here’s my initial swatch:

It’s Cascade 220 in Cordovan, a lovely heathered brown with reddish undertones. I’m using a size 7 needle, and have come up with 48″ around. Chris is on a diet and has had some initial success (sorry for broadcasting it, but yay for you honey!), so I’ve decided to forgo short rows in the belly area. I don’t have a specific pattern but am using the Dragon Skin stitch from Barbara Walker’s Second Treasury of Knitting Patterns, and am using Elizabeth Zimmerman’s construction for in-the-round sweaters. I haven’t decided yet what kind of shoulder shaping to use, maybe raglan. Here’s what it looks like after one pattern repeat.

There’s a loooong way to go, but hopefully I’ll finish it this holiday season!