LunaKnit

Anstruther Mittens Pattern: Anstruther Mittens by Erica-knits Yarns: Main color Garnstudio Drops Baby Merino 13 Navy Contrasting colors Pirkanmaan kotityö Roosa Nauha Sukkalanka #54 salmon, white Novita Pikkusisko & Pirkanmaan kotityö Roosa Nauha Sukkalanka #58 gray For some reason I've been unbelievably and abnormally tired for the past few weeks. It might be because of the time of the year: it's still dark when I walk to work and the sun has set again before I get home. The days have been gray and heavy with clouds so that hasn't really been something to boost my energy levels either. Every day after work I've been so tried that I have just slumped onto the sofa and watched Mad Men while knitting absentmindedly. The good thing is that I've actually finished a few of my projects in the past few days; like the Stasis pullover and the burgundy Hutchin hat. And last night I finished the Anstruther mittens I've been working on for a while n

Hutchin X2 Pattern: Hutchin by Jared Flood Yarn: Drops Fabel #113 ruby red Needles: 2.5mm and 3.0mm I really liked the first Hutchin hat I knitted a short while ago, but the hat didn't really turn out the way it looked in the Brooklyn Tweed photos. Mine was a tad too big for me and instead of being a smallish beanie like it was supposed to be, it turned out to be a very loose slouch. The fact that I knitted it with cotton yarn didn't really help either since it only stretches the more I use it. I like the first Hutchin despite these shortcomings and I've used it a lot, but I still wanted to knit another one to get the kind of hat I wanted to begin with. This time I used the rest of the ruby red Drops Fabel (leftover from the Stricken socks) and went down with the needle sizes. I started the ribbing with 2.5mm needles, skipped the part about the tubular cast on (I didn't really like the look of it the last time) and did a long tail cast on instead.

Stasis Pattern: Stasis Pullover by Leila Raabe Yarn: Drops Baby Merino; main color #22 light gray   and contrasting color #20 dark gray Needles: 2.5mm and 3.0mm This pullover was at the top of my knitting queue for a long time (like over a year) and I had the yarns stashed for it for almost as long before I finally decided to cast on for it. Nomen est omen and the pullover faced a literal stasis for a while before I finally found the flow during my trip to Amsterdam. After that the knitting went more smoothly and it didn't take much longer before the whole thing was finished. I used 2.5 mm needles for the ribbing and then changed to 3.0 mm for the stockinette stitch. There's a third needle size suggested for the charted sections (3.5 mm) and I knitted the first sleeve according to these instructions. However I thought the pattern became quite loose with that needle size and you could see the difference between the gauges for the fair-isle and the stockine

My Stasis pullover and second Hutchin cap are now ready. I'm hoping to show you more soon.

Quadrillion Pattern: Quadrillion by Meghan Fernandes published in the Pom Pom Quarterly issue 6, autumn 2013 Yarn: Novita Wool 442 #gray Needles: 4.0mm Now that I'm all done I definitely get the name Quadrillion for this sweater. I feel like I have knitted at least that many cables! There are 8 different types of cable patterns on the front, and that's not all: some of the cables have two or even three different types of cabled sections inside them, and one additional small lace part. And if that's not enough to get you confused, the cable charts have different row counts for repeats so keeping track was quite hard. There was a suggestion of highlighting the correct rows with washi tape, but after a while I came to the conclusion that I would save a lot of time and fuss by photo-shopping them together to make one long chart. I knitted the ribbing for the back and front separately but joined them in a round on the first row of the charted section (note

The post about my trip to Amsterdam started to become so long with all the photos and everything that I decided to divide it into two parts. The touristy stuff is in the previous post and this one is dedicated to yarn and knitting. Even though I was really short on time during my stay in Amsterdam I made sure I had time for a couple visits to yarn stores as well. I think I liked Penelope Crafts the most of the ones I visited. I've written earlier about being dubious about buying yarn that I haven't tried before, especially ordering them online since I don't like buying yarn without being able to touch it, see how it looks and behaves and feel if it itches me before I buy it. I've been wanting to try to knit with Quince & Co. yarns for a while now: they look beautiful in all the photos, but I haven't been able to get my hands on them here in Finland. Now I got to fiddle the skeins a bit and I know what they are like so I can start ordering them

I'm back, tired but happy. Amsterdam was wonderful; I really need to go there again soon on a holiday, because when you are on a business trip you don't have that much time to do the things you would like to do yourself. I tried to squeeze in a few museum visits during my stay, but I didn't have time to see everything I would have wanted since I only had the evenings for myself. It's a good thing that visiting museums is regarded as "business" in my line of work but it sometimes also feels like a chore: my boss wouldn't probably like it if I didn't visit any exhibitions during my stay but instead spent my "free" time shopping and drinking wine :)  I arrived in Amsterdam on Thursday afternoon and had the evening for myself. I spent the day roaming around the city without any real destination - I was just so overwhelmed by the beauty and the history of the city. Oh how I just love Amsterdam! I remember thinking the same thing last t

Mare Nero Yarn: Novita Florica #99 black Novita Wool #010 off-white Novita Bambino #528 rose Needles: 3.0mm There are a lot of different scallop and wave patterns on Ravelry, but none of them were exactly what I had in my mind. So I used them as my inspiration and combined them with my desire for something black-and-white, simple and graphic. (Although I did add some pale pink yarn for the pompom in the end.) This is the result and I'm really pleased with it!

I'm off to Amsterdam next Thursday for a business trip. I'm taking part in an international furniture conservation seminar in Rijksmuseum but I'm hoping I will have time to check out some other sights as well and of course visit some local yarn stores. (I'm giving myself a well deserved break from my stash slimming project.) So if anyone of you know The Places to visit in Amsterdam, I'm very interested to hear! (Photo borrowed from here ) I've been kind of holding off knitting the Stasis pullover with this trip in my mind. I've noticed that I concentrate a lot better if I have something to do with my hands (i.e. knitting), especially if I just have to sit still and quietly listening to presentations and lectures all day long. The Stasis is mostly just simple stockinette stitch so I thought it would be perfect mechanical knitting for such an occasion. Plus I don't have to check my charts in a dimly lit auditorium or be afraid of drawing unwant

Trellis Scarf Pattern: Trellis Scarf by Purl Bee Yarn: Garnstudio DROPS Alpaca Mix  #2925 rust (yarn held double) Needles: 3.5 mm and 4.0 mm  

OK, so I lined the scarf according to the TECHknitting blog's instructions . I sewed the lining to the scarf with the  overcast stitch , also instructed on the same blog. I used soft cotton muslin for the lining, and it seems to work out just fine.  I wasn't sure if it would be sturdy enough to stop the scarf from curling but I didn't want the piece to turn into an inflexible and hard plank either. The muslin seems to make the scarf hold its form nicely, but that might just be the vigorous steam blocking that preceded the sewing. I will keep you posted if the lining doesn't work in the long run. I do love the fabric and the scarf feels actually really nice now that it's lined. Alpaca tends to be a bit itchy sometimes so the cotton lining feels much softer against the skin. I actually might line other scarfs in the future, but hopefully those projects will be premeditated and not rescue missions such as this. I'm just a bit annoyed that fixing the pro