I have much to show for today's post. So many things going on; I'm not sure how I suddenly got time to work on all of them, but in the past week I finally sewed the buttons on my Barn Sweater and got it blocked. (Did I ever mention that I found some awesome buttons made out of Juniper wood on etsy?)
Barn Sweater, in all it's finished glory.
Unfortunately I have gained some weight since I started knitting it early last Spring (can you say 'stress eating'?) and the upper arms are a bit tighter than I'd like. But, I can still button it without the placket looking strained, so hopefully if I quit grabbing a handful of chocolate chips every time the 25 yr old members of my house jangle my nerves it won't take much to lose a little weight before the weather turns cool enough that I'll need to wear my newly completed sweater.
I've been working here and there on sock #2 of Dad's Petty Harbour socks and got the leg and the heel flap done. The heel cup is also done, now I need to pick up stitches to make the gusset. Barring any unforeseen calamities, I'm guesstimating I'll have this sock done by the middle of September--about an entire month before Dad's birthday!
I'm about seven or eight chapters into a murder mystery set in a fictitious Amish Village in Indiana. Murder Freshly Baked opens with the actual murder, then in the next chapter goes back in time six months and the story works forward from there. So far so good. I believe it is number three set in the same fictitious place, but I have yet to read the first two. Jumping in like this is making sense, mostly, so I think it will be all right to read the others later, if I continue liking this author's style.
The other knitting project you see in the above picture is the beginnings of my first knit kitchen towel. For some reason, the 10-12 dish towels I had eleven months ago when DS1 & family moved in with us have dwindled down to only 4 or 5 that can be found at any one time. I do not like running out of clean dish towels every two to three days; yet there aren't ever enough in the laundry basket at one time to make doing a load of towels more often than once a week a viable option. Which is not cool with me. I'm not thrilled with the idea of going out and purchasing six to eight more nice quality kitchen towels (cuz nice quality isn't cheap, and cheap quality aren't nice), so I'm trying a pattern I found on Ravelry several years ago and bookmarked as a 'someday in the future' project. It is called Towel Ups N Downs and is a pretty simple pattern to follow. I'm about nine rows, or slightly more than two pattern repeats into it. On size 7 needles, it makes a nice break from my sock dpns when I have time to knit yet aren't feeling like tackling anything too intricate. I'm using a big skein of worsted cotton that I think I picked up at Hobby Lobby back around the same time I first saw the dish towel pattern. I think I can make several (matching!) towels with that one skein.
The ups n downs are starting to form
Your finished sweater is just beautiful! Wish I could see the buttons close up. And being from Indiana I've been curious about these Amish mysteries. I almost bought one last week, but other books called. I have to give them a try.
ReplyDeleteLove the Barn Sweater - simply gorgeous!
ReplyDeleteThe sweater is gorgeous and I love the look of the ups and downs towel.
ReplyDeleteknit dishtowels. I'd be curious to hear what you think of them after using them for a while. I always have knit dishcloths, but my friend knits the same thing and they are washcloths for the family bathroom.
ReplyDeleteI love the barn sweater, and I understand the call of chocolate, even behind closed cupboard doors.