Sunday, January 18, 2009

TKGA and Christmas Project Photo Dump

I am completely obsessed with knitting. I'm not sure how it happened. I went very quickly from "hmm maybe I'll give this a go" to all out crazed yarn whore. It doesn't make a lot of sense. My personality is that of a dabbler, jack of all trades, master of none, dilettante, etc. I pick things up, learn a bit about them and never get particularly good at anything. Except knitting. I don't know why but it stuck.
To further my obsession, I got the TKGA master knitting program level 1 course from my dad for Christmas. I'm pretty damn excited about this. I'm hoping to learn a lot fro it ad move even further out of the realm of "dabbler". I think it will cause me to look at me knitting in terms of actually improving and learning rather than being a solely project oriented hobby. Plus, I miss the critical thinking of being in school and this also involves writing a paper. :)

I am worried about knitting and my hands. I recently started a new job that involves much more computer use than I'm used to (despite being on the internet constantly). I was working on the Fake Isle hat around the same time. The stress on my hands was not so good and I started to get some very slight carpal tunnel symptoms: mild tingling in my thumb and burning up my forearm. It went away as soon as I finished the hat and I haven't had any of the nerve issues since. I do still get some serious hand and finger fatigue. It's gotten a good bit better with a new mouse and just getting used to what I'm doing. It terrifies me though and has made me realize just how much I love knitting. I don't know what I would do if I ever had to stop. It would kill me.

The hand and wrist issues came at a very bad time as I was trying to get Christmas gifts finished. I couldn't get them all done by Christmas and I still have my dad's neck-warmer to finish up.
Cabled Neck Warmer
I'm about half way through knitting it, but then I need to line it with some fleece fabric so it isn't itchy. He is sensitive to the scratchiness of wool. The yarn I'm using is a wool-silk blend, but I didn't want to take chances on something that will be against his neck. That's a pretty sensitive area. It is much farther along than the picture, but you can see the cable pattern.


Branching Out
Branching Out

I'm pretty sure I've posted this before, but this is the scarf I made for my mom It's just under 6 feet.


Scrunchable scarf

Scrunchable scarf

I made this for my sister out of the leftover malabringo from her hat (below)


Foliage

Foliage

My sister's hat. I made one in a chunky brown tweed for her fiance, but I didn't get pictures of that one. I also don't have any good pictures of the scarf I made him. I'll try to track some down. I think my sister posted some pictures with him wearing it.


Erik's scarf
Erik's scarf

edited to add it. Not the best pic, but it's all I have.






Fruedian Hat
Fruedian Hat

This is the fake isle hat pattern, but I modified it, taking out the second stripe and changes the colorwork pattern very slightly. As a result I managed to accidentally knit woman symbols into my hat as well as male symbols and giant phalluses depending on how you look at it. Fun times. I love this hat.



Lace scarf
Lace scarf

least inventive name for a pattern ever.

Made this for Cake Kate. Hopefully she'll get it before seeing this. It got sent out just a few days ago.






Knitting
Knitting

yup.

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