Technique Thursdays

At the end of all projects is the cast off! If you finished your scarf you need to get it off those needles and if you are a beginner, you might be stumped. Casting off is relatively easy, but the first thing I do is always remind myself to be loose. Almost all the time I find I wish I had cast off even looser. The edge of your piece can curl a bit if you don't or pull inward when you want a flat seam for let's say a sweater. So think loose, relaxed thoughts. Just last week I saw a useful trick that I haven't tried yet, but it sounds like it'd work. Knit off using a knitting needle one size up!

Binding Off-
How To Bind Off Tutorial Video

Now that you know how to knit
you can now do these up easily:                      

                                                          Tender Shawl by Lion's Yarn

or a Comfort Shawl by Lion's Yarn

Enjoy your new found passion!

Yarn Along While You Sip Tea and Eat Cinnamon Rolls

It's a very snowy day in Manitou Springs, Colorado today. I can see the snow blowing past the windows, pine trees swaying, the grasses blowing over and the yuccas spikes poking out of snow on the high hillside out my window.  

Emily going off to France with Bear

My son Jon leaves today to go back for college in Maine (his girl left last week for France with my son's old teddy bear- we're expecting pictures of the bear at the Eiffel Tower). That is if  he leaves, the airport is closed now because of this spring blizzard! When he leaves I will hopefully I will see him again when my daughter graduates in May from Middlebury, VT. My daughter stays with family back East and my son is an RA on campus and works for the campus carpenter when on breaks. So I miss them- and just hope for the day when I'll see them again. It was quite a treat for my son and girlfriend to surprise me by just walking in the door after flying in from Boston for his Spring break. I hadn't seen him for over a year. So saying goodbye is hard.

This past week I've been so focused on developing my knitting & baking blog that I've been remiss in getting any substantial reading done and I'm still knitting on Wool & The Gangs Fearless Cardigan.  I can tell when I haven't read as much as I usually do. It's my escape and place to stop and rest. I find peace there and I get a bit jagged feeling when I don't. That and my knitting gives me that inner calm when facing any personal storm. So I'm making that my personal goal for this coming week to make sure I stop and read and knit.

Mosey on over to my Baking Blog Sweet To Be- Amazing Cinnamon Rolls for a comprehensive how-to on baking fantastic Cinnamon Rolls. I worked years assisting cooking classes and I've learned a lot and picked up lots of tips and techniques. I'm a Bake-a-holic and I never bake as much as I'd like because I can't eat it! I'm also sugar sensitive. So I bake and give it to my family who are thin and nothing dents them.

 I do want to try and bake more of Chocolate Covered Katie's creations. She has an amazing site and I would recommend her heartily! She has developed lots of healthy, but wonderful tasting treats that don't smack in your face health food. I mean I am always trying to fool my family who are in the white flour and sugar crowd. Try her recipes out. She gives many options for sweeteners and flours. I would recommend Spelt Flour since that is an Ancient Whole Wheat Grain and it's healthier and not genetically messed with. Also White Whole Wheat is a good substitute for white flour and Chefs recommend only substituting half your white flour in a recipe. Her food tastes so good. 

Chocolate Covered Katie- Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Bars

Teaser Tuesday

Books and a Beat by Jenn is the host for Teaser Tuesday today. 

  

Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

My Teaser today:

The Scam By Janet Evanovich & Lee Goldberg- pg. 244

"We aren't going down dead. Dey are. Dey gonna die dead."

"Die dead," Boyd repeated. "Is that a Hawaiian thing?"

"Worse kine of dead. Da woman, too."

"Nobody can hide from dem," Alika said. "They'd find you if you jumped in a time-machine to da future, took a spaceship to a-nudder planet, an hid in a-nudder dimension. An den dey would cut out yo guts, string you up wit'dem, an' set you on fire."

"I'd like to see that" Boyd said.

Musing Mondays and a Blog within a Blog

Jenn at Books and a Beat hosts our Musing Mondays:

 "Musing Mondays is a weekly meme that asks you to choose one of the following prompts to answer:

• I’m currently reading…
• Up next I think I’ll read…
• I bought the following book(s) in the past week…
• I’m super excited to tell you about (book/author/bookish-news)…
• I’m really upset by (book/author/bookish-news)…
• I can’t wait to get a copy of…
• I wish I could read ___, but…
• I blogged about ____ this past week…

THIS WEEK’S RANDOM QUESTION: Have you ever read a book after watching the movie/television version only to find that you don’t like the book as much as the adaptation?

PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT with either the link to your own Musing Mondays post, or share your answer in a comment here (if you don’t have a blog). Thanks!

In answer to the second question-

• Up next I think I’ll read…"I'm currently reading the same book- "The Scam" by Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg and I'm enjoying it, but I'm ready to go on to something new. Catherine Anderson has a lovely new book out for Spring called "New Leaf" and she's usually puts out great books, I've read all her older books. So I'm looking forward to her new tale- New Leaf.

My answer to the last question is - No. I generally like the books the best and a lot of times I'm  disappointed with a movie just because I imagined it a certain way that the movie didn't capture. If I liked it I probably just thought it did the book justice. Once in a blue moon I will think the movie and or TV series surpasses the book.  Lately I've been watching the Outlander TV series and it is amazing and it is as good as the books.

 But that's my favorite book series and it does do it tremendous justice. It's lovely and you can see Diana Gabaldon's hand in it's creation. Nothing beats the books- but this can sidle up next to them and be worthy and in some ways flesh out the vision one sees when imagining what Gabaldon wrote. I do love the books.  A treat- the next few weeks till April 9th the first season is on free for viewing on the Starz site- Outlander Season # 1. Enjoy! I will.

Enjoy posting on her blog your comments or links to your blog and I've got a bit of a new twist- read on and enjoy an amazing Cinnamon Roll recipe I blogged on my Baking blog called Sweet To Be.

When I was a young child I was fascinated by a painting of a horse in my Grandfather's house. In the painting the painter of the painting is standing in front of the horse while the painting that you are looking at is at the artist's feet. So in effect, you have a painting within a painting that goes back into infinity visually. So I am reading the same book and I am knitting the same cardigan (because of rip outs!), so I did a blog on how to make some awesome Cinnamon Rolls on my Baking blog named Sweet To Be. So in effect I am giving you a blog within a blog and this will be posted also on the Books and a Beat Blog- a blog within a blog. 

 I've assisted Cooking Classes for many years and helped an awesome Chef make Cinnamon Rolls, but I could never quite get it right. So here are my perfect cinnamon rolls and they're great for eating while reading (and knitting); which I am going to do in a moment. 

Amazing Cinnamon Rolls 

My blog on my current knitting project in the photos- Wool & The Gangs fearless Cardigan

Wool & The Gang's Fearless Cardigan

This is a continuation of a previous post on this sweater- Lovely Yarn Escapes- The Sumptuous Sexy Fearless Cardigan. Due to rip outs and just life in general I seemed to have dragged a day project out for weeks. But I love doing it and for me learning to knit is a process (I've knitted since college days but I'm always learning!) and frogging it sometimes is a part of that- especially for a perfectionist like me. So I'm learning a lot with this project and my husband made me large #50 Maple circular needles for it and I've finally gotten used to using them, (A tutorial on how to make them will follow).

      The Fearless Cardigan by Wool & The Gang is described in  Ravelry- Fearless Cardigan as-

"... a cardigan with a twist: the Fearless Cardigan is knitted entirely sideways, from sleeve to sleeve in one piece! Knitted in our luscious Crazy Sexy Wool on large needles, the resulting fabric is soft, drapey, and warm enough even for the chilliest of days. The unique construction makes this an extra fun project."

 I've been enjoying the actual knitting of this project, but I got carried away with adjustments. (Previous post: Lovely Yarn Escapes- The Sumptuous Sexy Fearless Cardigan). I was trying to make it more like these photos and many Ravelry knitters mention how it's not as long when they make it and the sleeves are 3/4's and it doesn't meet in the middle (which is part of the design). I'd like it to meet in front to keep me warm, and I love long sleeves at least to the wrist and maybe a tad longer; it certainly can get cold here in Colorado. 

So I over adjusted and found when it resulted in a gorilla size that frogging was in order. So it has been torn down to the 17in. sleeve at 22 stitches (instead of 15" and about 17 rows) and here I go again. I want to have sleeves to the wrist and add enough to the back for an overall bigger fit. Ravelry- GGMadeIt makes the best adjustments and I'm using her as a guide. She adds 3 rows to the body- front and back for 13 rows.
Update- I ended up adding 15 rows to the body because my stitches are still a bit under gauge and I'd rather have it extra large to wrap myself in. The sleeves I worked 23 stitches.

  It's good I just love working with this wool,  it feels great in my hands and I'm determined the end result will be as perfect as this Crazy Sexy Wool deserves.

Friday, March 25- Finally finished with one side that I believe will be the right size. I love this yarn! And working with my handmade #50 circular needles is becoming a pleasure- they've darkened with use from the wool's natural oil. 

 

Friday Fantasy on a Cold Colorado Day: I Dream of Cardigans

     It's a cold snowy day in Colorado so bear with me, I want to post my dreams of cardigans I'd like to do this year. I have a long list of possible projects queued up in Pinterest or in Ravelry under my Favorites; and I am quite aware that it would be humanly impossible to do all of them. But it's beautiful to look at them and dream. So here's some "Dreamscapes" that I hope to accomplish. Feel free to share your dreams of knitting or share your knitting blog of Knitting Adventures below with your "Friday Fantasys".

                           Hamlin Peak- Original Pattern w/Quince & Company Kestrel Linen

  

                                           Hamlin Peak in Rowan Pure Linen Sz 9 needle

                                                   Rachaellaves Pebble Hamlin Peak

                          Hamlin peak- Longer Version in Pebble Quince & Co Kestrel Linen

Ravelry- Pole Pattern

Free Pattern from Wool & The Gang

Summer Lace Wrap Cardigan

Enjoy your knitting dreams & may they all come true.

     Check out last week's Friday Fantasy Knits: Lovely Yarn Escapes- Friday Fantasy Knits