knitted – Elliebelly Knit & Dye Works

New Year’s Knitting

Posted on January 3, 2015 by Joyce Makes Art

I wanted to catch you all up on the knitting I have planned for the month of January. I've joined The Plucky Knitter WIP Wrangling KAL, the goal being to finish Plucky projects that were started before the new year during the month of January.

I started Olivia at the end of November, but promptly set her aside to get some final holiday knitting done. Fisherman's Rib has been slow going for me, but I really like its plump, cushy effect. I'm hoping to spend some quality time with Olivia and conquer the short row technique necessary to finish her off this month.

Because I'm like this as a knitter, I hit a Cast-On-All-The-Things streak the last two weeks in December and set up a number of other projects to include in the KAL:

I'm knitting a second Nevermind Hat in Plucky Snug. This one is for me.

Vodka Lemonade is a sweater I've wanted to do forever. I've cast on in Plucky Crew — a cotton/merino blend. Although there is about zero chance I'll finish this in January, I'm hoping to get a good start.

I'm in love with Paddle Mitts and am doing mine in Plucky Scholar. The stripes on the hands will be in a different weight Plucky yarn, but I'm optimistic that it will all work out.

Some of my precious Plucky cashmere is going to become a Lina Hat. I'm not overjoyed with my cable cast on, but I've decided to assess it tomorrow and rip it out for a fresh start if it sucks as bad as I think it does seems to need a little help.

Wish me luck, ok? January is always a busy month at work for me, so this may be my knitting for several months, rather than just January. I'm really happy to have it all on my needles and ready to carry with me for delays and lines.

Finally, a sad note to the start of the year. Longtime blog readers (that would be you, Mom), know that we have four cats. Our beloved black cat Squirt, the oldest of our cats, passed away peacefully but suddenly. I'm going to miss his affectionate nature and loving support for my knitting — he enjoyed the holidays and was especially fond of having me sit on the couch for hours at a time and bat balls of yarn around for his pleasure. I'm going to miss him a lot, but am really glad he sat for one last family photo shoot a couple of weeks ago.

Studio Sunday

Posted on May 30, 2010 by Joyce Makes Art

Among the joys of a rainy three day weekend is having a lazy studio Sunday.

I'm spending some time dyeing; but as you can see, this one is a surprise for now. Any guesses?

The multi-blue square I've been working on for the knitted Barn Raising Quilt is finished. I'm meeting my goal of one a month — I didn't want to shut down all of my other knitting to work on it, but it's hard not to. The squares all look so pretty together. I need to pull them all out soon and do a photo of them together for you to see how it's coming along.

I'm devoting most of my day to working on a collage piece. I started this a while back, prepping the canvas and dyeing a piece of silk organza to lay down as the background. The problem was, I liked that simple, paler-than-ballet-shoes-pink rectangle so much I became unable to work on it.

Yesterday, an old post card of the Capitol caught my eye and I decided to play with this piece. It is evolving into a multi-page altered book spread, done on one canvas. This is an idea I've been playing with for a while.

The basics of each of the three pieces are blanked in, but I'm still working with ideas for unifying the piece and I'm still auditioning the embellishments. I'm hoping I can find a larger skeleton key tucked away somewhere, as the one thing I definitely want is a long key that stretches all the way across the middle collage.

I like the buttons anchoring the bottom here, but am thinking I may want some darker buttons. Either way, I'll sew them on as the last step.

I'm still debating how to adhere the mica here. I rarely use mica, but it seemed just right on this piece. And that sweet little flower, which came off of an old hat, is definitely destined for this piece.

This last segment is still very unformed. In the studio it isn't shiny as in the picture, but rather it's a very textural bone colored base for the tiny collage I've temporarily adhered with nail heads (who knew you could make them gold by smashing them into a gold stamp pad and baking the color on with a heat gun?) This part is very much in play still. Really, the whole thing is. I'm glad to have some time to see what it's going to become.

Back to the Barn Raising Quilt

Posted on February 21, 2010 by Joyce Makes Art

My Barn Raising Quilt (oh the folly of knitting a blanket on size 2 needles) has been languishing for some time now. This is due to a series of sad circumstances involving a mean stewardess, some missing stitch markers, and a charming, but wool loving, mutt.

I'm back to it, though, knitting two squares at once.

This quilt is probably the best use ever for leftover sock yarn. And it's a fun knit — pretty good Olympic knitting, which is what got me started again.

The quilt is made up of 42 knitted squares, which means I will probably finish that at some point in the year 2018 at the rate I've been going. It's meant for Ellie, so as long as I pick it up and finish before she goes off to college, I should be ok. Fortunately, I have lots of sock leftovers and plenty of plane flights ahead of me — this is the perfect airplane project — so stay tuned for more progress.