Row Counters (or Random Blog Filler)

One astute reader asked me, "Would knitting needles with some sort of counter in them be useful? Seems like you have to count up shit a lot."

Actually, there is an abundance of many kinds of row counters. See this link: http://www.yarn-store.com/row-counters.html

As you can see, there are "kacha kacha" row counters (called that because of the pleasant clicking noise they make when you push the button down), electronic row counters, and little cylinder row counters that fit on to your knitting needles so you just change the count when you reach the counter on your needle.

Recently, someone even wrote an iphone row counter application.

I have the cylinder ones but normally just use the kacha-kacha one (I have the red one). For most things, I don't have to count or perhaps the pattern of the knitting stitches (like some of the socks I've done) marks where I'm at well enough. Or sometimes I just jot it down on paper.

For situations in which you need to know where in the row to do a decrease, increase or special pattern stitch, you just place a marker on your needles - a store-bought marker made for that purpose, a loop of contrasting yarn, or a safety pin will do. Pretty low tech. I have some plastic stitch markers that clasp and unclasp so you can move them around, but safety pins work just as well.

Maybe I've told you guys this story before, but one time I was knitting something that required careful row counting, and I was using my red Clover "kacha-kacha" row counter. I left off for the evening, slept, went to work, came home, resumed knitting, checked my counter and saw that I was on row 57. This was odd, because I remembered specifically that I'd clicked it to row 8 the night before, and I was pretty sure I hadn't done an additional 49 rows of knitting without my knowledge. I turned to Dug and asked, "Did you click my row counter?" "Yes!" he said triumphantly. "I wanted to play with it!" So a word of advice to female knitters - if there are men in your house, maybe stick with the cylinder row-counters or notebook paper.

Still knitting...

Yesterday I woke up at 7:00. I had some breakfast, made some tea, and started knitting. Determined that I will have my NP sweater ready to wear this Saturday (because Jennifer and I are going on a road trip to a fiber store in the middle of nowhere, and I want to show off), I had already finished the second sleeve and joined both sleeves to the body. I knew I was in for it yesterday, because with the sleeves joined I had 434 stitches on the needle. I had to knit at least 5 rounds of 434 stitches before starting the raglan shoulder decreases. It makes me dizzy just thinking about it.

I knit from 7:30 yesterday morning, non-stop until - I am not kidding - 9:30 last night. (Okay, I took a couple of breaks for food and laundry, but they were really, really short breaks.) I can't remember exactly how many rows of knitting I completed during this marathon...but I think it's around TWELVE, averaging about 1 row per hour.

On the bright side, the very slowest-going rows of the sweater are complete, and I'm well into the decreases now, so the rest of the shoulders should go pretty quick. I could still make it by Saturday! Unless, of course, I finish the sweater and it looks like ass, and I have to rip it all out and start over. It could happen.

On the less bright side, Dug and I had rented Doctor Who from Netflix and were planning on watching the rest of one of the disks tonight...but in my befuddlement this morning I accidentally packaged up and mailed that disk along with some others we were sending back. Whoopsie. Hopefully Dug won't kill me too much, because I'd really like to finish this godforsaken sweater before I die.

On another bright side, however, those of you who are Dusty will be pleased to note that a certain project has been started, and will hopefully be complete by this weekend! :) I just have a button band and two little sleeves to finish up!

Drive-By Gifting

I fell victim to a drive-by gifting yesterday afternoon, but fortunately I lived to tell the tale. I was in my front yard, pushing the lawnmower along the edge of the street, when suddenly a silver car squealed up behind me. Windy and Joe flung themselves out of the running car before I even turned the mower off. They catapulted themselves at me, hugged all the air out of my lungs, shoved something into my hands, and then, engine roaring and tires squealing, they were gone as quickly as they had arrived, leaving me scratching my head and, yes...giggling.

I looked down at my hands and discovered that I was holding a brand new pair of neon green Knit Lite knitting needles.

You know, so you can knit in the dark! Hilarious!! And useful!

(Thanks, Windy and Joe! YAY!)

Guest Yarn: Show-and-Tell

I haven't been updating because there's nothing new - I've just been quietly knitting along on my Nuclear Pumpkin sweater. It's coming along nicely, though! I'll admit that the bottom hem is not perfect but a number of people threatened me with death if I ripped it out again, claiming that "it gives them a heart attack." Fine. (Probably I should not have even put that word "again" in there, because they didn't know about the first two times I redid it. Ahem.)

Anyway, since Jennifer is very busy and shy about starting a blog of her own, I thought I'd feature some of the stuff she's been up to! Jennifer, too, has been spinning her own yarn, using a Schacht spindle (At least I think it's a Schacht; it was actually mine once-upon-a-time, but Jennifer commandeered it when I got my wheel.)

First we have a yarn that Jennifer dyed herself. This picture is not remotely color accurate; the colors are pastels and they are more vibrant and varied. Jennifer called this "Happy Accident" yarn because it didn't come out the way she intended when she dyed it, but she was really pleased with the results of the finished yarn. I believe she was even thinking about entering this yarn in some sort of "Alice In Wonderland" contest, which I thought was perfect - in real life, these colors look like something out of the Mad Hatter's tea party.
When I interview Jen about "Happy Accident", she said, "The wool is a bit rougher than I wanted, but it worked out fine for a hat that I knitted, which looks like a big gum drop. That dye job was the first time I used food coloring and the colors didn't come out right. I was wanting dark colors (greens, yellows & browns); nope, none of that!"

The next yarn, I believe, was Jen's first attempt at spindle-spinning, using a commercial carded batt. Her FIRST ATTEMPT. Does anyone remember my first attempt at spindle spinning? Yeah, it was scary. But of course JENNIFER comes up with a nice, even, perfectly serviceable, soft skein of gorgeous green-blue yarn. How is that fair?

Next we have a bulky weight heathery-purple yarn that Jennifer spun from Mauch Chunky roving. I love the twist she puts into her yarns; it looks so professional!
Jennifer actually got me some of this roving, too, in two different colors. (You can see them by clicking on the link above; mine are Blueberry Ice and Huckleberry and I'm going to combine them when I spin it.)

I think Jennifer is getting closer and closer to adopting a wheel of her own. I cannot wait! She has her eye on a Fricke wheel that's already equipped with a WooLee Winder at a very good price. (I am going to be so jealous of her, but that's okay; I will just find excuses to "help" her with her spinning.)

DRAT.

I've been floundering over whether to (A) save my money for a second wheel or (B) just pimp out my Kiwi to increase its functionality. I was going to get a WooLee Winder flyer for it. This is a special flyer made by an independent manufacturer, and they make versions for pretty much every spinning wheel on the market. The advantage of this item is that as the yarn winds onto the bobbin, the WooLee Winder automatically moves the yarn up and down the bobbin so that it winds on evenly - whereas normally you'd have to do this manually; stopping the spinning to quickly move the yarn to a new spot on flyer.

Wait, not explaining this very well for my non-spinning friends. Okay, here's a picture of my Kiwi, stolen from the internet. The part with the yarn-filled bobbin fitted into it is called the Flyer, and you can see hooks running along that top arm of the Flyer. The yarn is held with those hooks as you are spinning, and very often you have to stop spinning and move the yarn to a different hook so that the bobbin will fill up evenly. This is not a big deal, but being able to spin without stopping would be really, really nice.

I was all excited because my mom was TOTALLY GOING TO BUY IT FOR ME for my birthday. Except, I was certain that I had read that a WooLee Winder would cost $100, and that is all. But it turns out that it costs $185...AND with my particular wheel you can't use the existing bobbins; you have to use the ones designed for this Winder...AND those bobbins cost $31/each. So I added up the Winder and the extra bobbins and the shipping and it came out to $418. Which is a quite a different number from my originally budgeted $100. This is not to say that the WooLee Winder is not an amazing product and that the price is not appropriate - I'm sure it is - but I just can't justify spending that money on my little Kiwi.

DRAT. I am so disappointed, over this silly little material object. It kind of makes me feel petty/selfish/childish...but I wanted it! [insert temper tantrum here] Now I don't know what to do. Any ideas?