swatches

Friday Roundup: Getting Creative

What I’m Knitting

I finished the secret knitting (yay!), although pattern writing is still happening behind the scenes. But I was itching to get something else on the needles, so I cast on for this trial swatch. It’s a heavily modified version of a closed-loop cable from one of the Barbara Walker treasuries, and it required several false starts. But I really like the final result!

I think this will end up in a hat. This is scrumptious Madelinetosh DK, so if I get it together to knit the hat up before the end of the month, I can participate in the fun activities happening for Madelinetosh May over in the Tosh Lovers Ravelry group, hmm…

What I’m Cooking

I love baking, but I try to keep sugar low. My husband and I certainly don’t need it, and anyone who says toddlers don’t react badly to sugar is lying through their teeth, in my experience! My son loves muffins, but most of them have tons of sugar. I tried out this muffin recipe sweetened with only ripe bananas and raisins this week. It was pretty good!

I was asked to bring a dish to pass to a get together yesterday. Since I was arriving late, I figured cookies would be a good choice. These are vegan, maple syrup-sweetened jam thumbprint cookies—one of my absolute favorite recipes! And they look so pretty, see:

What I’m Reading

I’m on a middle grade kick after reading my friend’s fabulous book, so I picked up one I’ve wanted to read for a while—Masterminds by Gordon Korman. I’ve been reading his books since I was a preteen, and this one is just as awesome as I remember!

Friday Roundup: Mishmash

What I’m Knitting

While waiting for yarn to arrive for a few secret commissioned designs, I put my time to good use. First, I worked up a couple new swatches for submissions to a yarn company. This pic is a good illustration of gauge at work—size 15 needles with super-bulky compared to size 5 with sport:

And since my yarn still hadn’t arrived when I was finished with those, I started the next square in my cable/lace baby blanket! It doesn’t look like much (or even like a square) yet, but it’ll show its true colors when I block it:

What I’m Cooking

I didn’t get much cooking time in this week, but I did make up some tasty veggie fajitas. The refried beans are canned, but the guacamole, sautéed veggies, and Mexican rice are all homemade. (That’s dairy-free sour cream and cheese—looks pretty real, doesn’t it?)

What I’m Reading

I’m nearly done with book #2 in the Thrawn trilogy—I love this series so much!

Friday Roundup: Swatch City

What I’m Knitting

I finished the cable/lace hat from last week, but it needs a good blocking before it’s fit to see. So instead, I’ll show you the design swatches I’ve been working on! Here was my original swatch concept (this is for a dolman-sleeved Aran pullover):

I liked this swatch, but the more I looked at it, the more I realized I didn’t love it. The central motif is too small and a bit too plain for my liking (this is the cable on the left, which will be in the center of the pullover with the V cables arranged on either side). I also decided I wasn’t a huge fan of this yarn for this design—it’s on the thin side for a worsted weight, and the swatch had more drape than I wanted even with a needle size that gave a good fabric.

So I went stash digging… and made a decision. Remember this in-progress cardigan?

My Ravelry project page tells me I started it two years ago almost to the day—just a few days before I found out I was pregnant and went down the rabbit hole of baby knits! I tried to pick the cardigan up again, but I’m just not feeling it. Plus, I’m (ahem) a larger bust size now than I was, so it isn’t even going to fit me well when it’s finished.

Luckily, this yarn (Stonehedge Shepherd’s Worsted) turns out to be PERFECT for the new design I have in mind. It’s soft, tweedy, and has the body that the first yarn I tried was lacking.

After three swatches with this yarn and different cable patterns, I think I finally have a winner!

(You can see a bit of my design process in that pic—the second V is a little larger than the first, and I decided at the top I might like a slightly less tight rope cable to separate motifs.)

So now I just need to knit a few more inches of swatch, block it, and take some measurements. Then it’s designing time!

Oh, and since I’m lazy, I’m just knitting the swatch right off the sleeve:

What I’m Cooking

I knocked out two recipes from my personal cookbook challenge this week. First up, potato-spinach curry. It was pretty good, but my husband and I both agreed that we really missed the richness that some fat would have brought to this one. With some coconut milk in the sauce, I think it would have been awesome.

And then a less-guilty taco salad, which was delicious! The recipe used “guacamame” made with half avocado, half edamame to cut fat and calories. It tasted fine, and I liked that it also upped the protein content. The recipe said to layer the ingredients prettily and top with cilantro… but sometimes you just gotta throw everything together.

What I’m Reading

To my husband’s chagrin, I’m still working on The Shepherd’s Crown. A couple of early mornings with the little guy means I’ve been too tired to read before bed. But I should finish it within the next few days!

Interview on Harrisville Designs Blog

I recently designed some accessories for the Harrisville Designs Autumn ’13 collection, and today they have an interview with me up on their blog!

They haven’t released the collection yet, so no pictures of the finished items… but I can show you my swatch of the stitch pattern (shown in the blog post, so I’m not giving anything away).

The yarn I used, Harrisville WATERshed, was ammmaaaazzing. It looks like a crunchy, tweedy, rustic yarn, but it feels incredibly soft and lofty. I can’t wait to see the rest of the collection–and like I said in the interview, I’m definitely eyeing this yarn for a future sweater design.