elliebelly – Page 5 – Elliebelly Knit & Dye Works

Ollie’s Sweater Is Finished

Posted on October 5, 2011 by Joyce Makes Art

This is Ollie, wearing Ollie's Ragman Sweater. As you can see, he is pretty pleased about it.

I am too. It's the first time I've set aside some Elliebelly Crayon for myself, and the bulky yarn, Talia Merino, made it a quick knit. It would have been quicker if I hadn't had to stop to dye trim after running out of yarn, but a girl can't be too demanding, right?

This is the most accurate picture I have of the colorway.

And, the buttons are very sweet.

This pattern gets a high recommendation from me — it's simple but not boring and the result is an eminently wearable sweater; a perfect knit for a perfect little boy. This officially concludes my project for the Elliebelly Knit Along!

This Week’s Knitting

Posted on October 2, 2011 by Joyce Makes Art

I always seem to wrap up my knitting for the weekend at some point on Sunday. This week has been a busy one, and I don't have a lot of progress to report. But I do have this:

I wove in what seemed like a million ends (I switched skeins every couple of inches on both the body and the sleeves) and Ollie's Crayon Ragman Cardigan is now happily blocking in the first cool fall day we've seen.

In case you can't tell, it's very colorful.

That's Elliebelly's Crayon colorway, and I'm more than pleased with how it knit up for this sweater.

I'm continuing to make progress on my Storm Cloud Shawlette, which I'm calling Mermaid's Tail, since a good friend said that's exactly what it looks like. It's still an amorphous blob on the emails, but when you gently straighten it out you get some sense of how it will fan out after blocking. I'm looking forward to wearing this one — it's all mine, baby.

I've acknowledged before that I have a bit of an ADHD tendency as a knitter. It's really more of a "so many patterns, so little time" syndrome, and as I do tend to finish most of them sooner or later, I don't worry about it much. So, when I got an email Friday night from Knit Purl with a great looking ribbed scarf knit in Noro yarn, I immediately tossed my stash and started knitting. I couldn't wait. I'm knitting it as a K3P3 rib (with three knit stitches on each outer edge) and because of its simplicity, it is my "car knitting" project-I like to have something on hand for carpool lines and traffic jams.

I already know two things about this scarf: (1) I am deathly allergic to mohair, and this yarn has a small mohair content. It makes me sneeze and make my nose and eyes itch. I nonetheless like this yarn enough that I will finish this scarf despite all of that. (2) Two skeins is not enough yarn to knit this scarf as long as I would like, so I am going to have to start hunting a third skein. If anyone happens to have Noro Silk Garden in colorway 276, Dye lot A, please give me a shout!

New Works in Progress

Posted on September 26, 2011 by Joyce Makes Art

I'm down to knitting sleeves on Ellie's Tiny Tea Leaves Cardigan and Ollie's Ragman, but, through whatever quirk of knitting adhd I seem to possess in great supply, I've detoured onto two small projects. I'll get back on the sweaters next week, and finish them in time for the advent of cooler weather.

These cabled gauntlets are a fun, quick knit. Not overly challenging (unless you are totally incapable of reading and then remembering a simple, well-written pattern as I seem to have been on the first one). I love these and the yarn, a lovely blend of Alpaca, Silk, Camel and Cashmere.

This is the start of my Storm Cloud Shawlette. I love the elongated garter stitch, and although I told myself I couldn't start one more project until I finish the sweaters, I succumbed to the allure of this simple, comforting knit and the pretty colors of the Sea Wool that had been at the top of my list of yarns I wanted to knit with. When I stretch it out, as though blocked, the colors look like a cloud of rainbows. It's going to be hard to avoid knitting this one straight through.

Ollie’s Crayon Sweater: Trying Out Trim

Posted on September 18, 2011 by Joyce Makes Art

When last we left our story, I had run out of yarn for Ollie's Ragman, knit in Elliebelly Talia in the Crayon colorway, and was obsessing over how to deal with the trauma. I settled upon a solid color trim, and dyed two: one blue and one gray.

Ollie favored the blue, so I knit it up into cuffs. The 1×1 rib looks oversized to me, knit on the same size needles as the body of the sweater (size 9) and although the color has much to recommend it, I wondered it the gray wouldn't be a better match. So I'm trying out the gray on the bottom of the body, going down one needle size to get a neater fabric.

I think the gray is the winner, so once I finish the body, I'll rip off the sleeve cuffs and reknit them.

The inside of the sweater looks great to me too. At some point, I'm going to have to come up with a reverse stockinette project for the Crayon colorway!

Progress Knitting The Honegart Hat

Posted on September 4, 2011 by Joyce Makes Art

I'm knitting Steven West's Honegart Hat for my oldest child, who goes to school up north. He asked for a new hat a while back, and I had been rather obsessively stalking Ravelry for a basic hat he would like when I stumbled across this pattern.

I'm into the second repeat of the honey comb cable pattern. After one more set of cable patterns, I'll be ready to start on the decreases. It's a simple knit with enough variation to keep you interested throughout.

The yarn is Elliebelly Alpaca & Merino. I opted for a blue and a green, rather than the gray and yellow high contrast hat in the sample. I loved the sample hat, but thought the boy might be more prone to actually wearing the hat knit in these softer colors.

Dye Yarn. Dye.

Posted on August 29, 2011 by Joyce Makes Art

Sometimes a girl just has to dye yarn. Nothing else will do.

I dyed some Blue Faced Leicester for a very sweet girl.

I dyed two skeins of Elliebelly's Eco Alpaca — I guess that makes this an Eco Duo — to use together in a hat for my oldest. The skeins were dyed together and then the skein on the bottom was overdyed. I'm hoping this means I get complimentary skeins that work well together. It's an experiment I've been wanting to try for a while. You can see the richness of the colors a bit better in the close up photo below.

There is a bit more yarn steeping and you would think I would be tired of dyeing, but of course, that never happens.

The First Week Of The Elliebelly Knit Along

Posted on August 27, 2011 by Joyce Makes Art

Two weeks ago we casted on for the first ever Elliebelly Knit Along. In the two weeks since, there has been masterly knitting, some early finishers, a lot of talk about pattern selection, tasty yarn pictures, and, exactly what I needed, encouragement for getting my fall knitting out and going strong.

Today I thought I would share some of the projects with you. They are all so beautiful, but I've got a few at random (the knitters who I was able to catch up with and insure it was okay to share their pictures and projects), so I will start with these few and show off the rest over the next couple of weeks.

You are in for some serious eye candy in this one!

Siobahn is knitting mitts for her Mom, a nurse. Actually, I should say past tense, knit, as she is so amazingly quick that despite using a sock yarn, Elliebelly Ellie-Blue BFL Sock, she is finished. Isn't her Mom lucky? The pattern is Alexandra Brinck's Fishtail Wristwarmers and the colorway is "Purple Rain."

Cricket is knitting this amazing sweater and bloomers set. She is using Carina Spencer's convertible bloomers pattern and Elliebelly's Ellie-Blue Aran BFL yarn in Cupcake.

My cousin Ann is knitting a Shoulder Scarf using some yarn she spun from Elliebelly Alpaca Roving.

She is an amazing spinner and knitter and my best role model. Isn't that scarf an artwork in its own right? It is so simple and so beautiful. I cannot wait to see it completed.

Clarissa is knitting the Storm Cloud Shawlette by Hanna Breetz. I'm particularly interested in seeing how this turns out as I have some yarn earmarked for the same pattern. She is using Elliebelly's Sea Wool in "Chihuly."

Tina knit Cappuchine for an incredible little model, using Elliebelly Ellie-Blue Bulky BFL. I've never noticed this pattern before, but now, I can't wait to knit it. Tina managed to show the yarn off to perfection.

The last bit of knit-porn for the day is Jenn's Citron, using Elliebelly's Juliet Sock Yarn in Marmalade.

Jenn's knitting is so pretty that I feel like she has captured a piece of the sun and is knitting it.

There is a lot of very cool knitting going on these days. I'm really grateful to everyone who is participating in the knit along for all of the fun and inspiration it's bringing me!