Tuesday, December 04, 2012

Red Heart Super Saver

I've heard (or rather seen) a lot of people posting across the internet about how icky RHSS is. I'll concede that, years ago, it was pretty rough. But, then again, it was also the only affordable yarn for knitters/crocheters who had very little money to spend.

Now, RHSS has softened over the years into something much more workable. And to tell the truth, most people want an item that they can just throw into the washer and dryer without worrying about it losing its shape.

Now, I'm not disrespecting quality yarns at all, I love to use them when I can afford them, as long as they're items for myself so that I know I'll take care of them properly, but for gifts I would use a good quality, soft acrylic.

These days, there are many, many brands of acrylic yarns, but I have no way to get to them except online, so I use mostly what my local W-M offers (sucks, I know, but that's how life is.) When I can afford to get some money into my Paypal I'll shop around for the good stuff, usually on Ebay since they take Paypal and I can usually find something nice at a good price.

Such as the three skeins of sock yarn I purchased a few days ago. I hope this link works.

Brown Sheep Wildfoote

It's in the color Ragtime, which is different colors of purples and plums, some of my favorites.

I can't wait to knit up a pair of socks from this yarn, it's very soft and cushy. But I have other projects that must be finished first, so it will likely be after Christmas.

Monday, December 03, 2012

Twenty pairs of fingerless mitts

Well, three-fourths of them. I have five more pairs to make before the end of the week. They turned out really nicely and I even found something to store them in to keep them clean, a blanket bag. You know, one of those clear plastic zippered things that some blankets come in when  you buy them. It'll hold all twenty pairs nice and neat when I deliver them. I hope everyone who gets a pair will enjoy them.

I truly enjoyed making them, even though it got boring with all those repetitive, sc ribs. I'd have to stop sometimes and switch projects just to keep from getting bored to death. Hey, you sit and crochet nothing but sc rib for days on end and see how bored you get ;)

Still, that's what other projects are for.

Ruffled scarves

They're all the rage, and rightly so. Soft and squishy and ruffled, you can have one to match every outfit if you like.

The only problem with them is that they're a pain in the backside to knit. You're using a net-like yarn that's about 2-3 inches wide and knitting through the edge of it. You have to stretch it out as you go (or unroll it, stretch it out and re-roll it onto a piece of cardboard). Either way, it's a pain to do that.

The upside is, once you adapt to the netting, things go a bit more smoothly and faster. There are any number of youtube vids about how to do this, along with any number of brands of the netting yarn.

I'm making my first one with Red Heart Boutique Sashay in the Waltz colorway. Take my word for it, it'll look crappy when you first start, but give it a foot or so and it'll start looking really nice. I'm going to give this one to a friend for Christmas, she likes the browns and blues in this particular colorway, so it goes to her.

Saturday, December 01, 2012

Crochet hook case

I just received an order of bamboo circular needles and crochet hooks. Knowing me, if I didn't do something, the hooks would end up somewhere that would result in them getting broken, so, I went to Crochet Pattern Central and found a beautiful pattern for a crochet hook case and I made it within a few hours. I used some Caron Simply Soft in a butter yellow color that I have no idea what they call it since I don't have the wrapper for it anymore. You should be able to complete one of these with yarn leftover since this skein was a partial skein and I still had plenty leftover.

Anyway, here's the picture:

As you can see, the openings are roomy and I doubled up on the smaller sizes. The largest one on the other end is a 10mm, a US P, I think.

I intend to make more of these for my aluminum hooks and figure out how to make a holder for my straight knitting needles and my circulars.

More to come when I get that done.