FO for Halloween

Other than waiting for the trick-or-treaters, I generally don't do much for Halloween. Sometimes I'll try to wear something interesting for greeting the kids at the door. Thanks to the great blogosphere, I discovered, this hallowig pattern on knitty.com. I used TLC Essentials acrylic yarn from Red Heart. I chose it because I liked the pumpkin-ish color. I chose this color figuring that it would be more wearable than a bright orange hallowig, although I guess "more wearable" is a relative concept.

I like the natural flip that it forms on the bottom -- part of which is helped by particular head shape -- I seem to have a deep occiptal ridge, or whatever, as well as a longish neck. I made my bottom section about 7.5" long before starting the bangs.

FO: Drape Neck Top

This is the Drape Neck Top from Vogue Knitting spring/summer 2011. My yarn is Cascade Ultra Pima, which is a finer gauged yarn than the recommended Cascade Sierra. I knit it at just under 5 stitches/inch, which is looser than its recommended gauge of 22-24 stitches/4 inches. I wanted a very draped look because the top has positive ease.

I changed the shaping to an empire shape instead of an A-line shape, and I made it a few inches longer. Instead of the sleeve bands which sort of stick out, I knitted short cap sleeves. I also omitted the gap at the bottom of the front panel. Instead of using YOs for the holes, I did make-1 in knit or purl and omitted the twist, which creates a hole. This created smaller holes than yarn-overs would create. I didn't want ginormous holes because I wanted to wear this without a layer underneath. It's a spring/summer top and two layers would be too warm.

I'm pretty happy with the top, but I'm hoping it won't stretch too wide with wear.

Craft blog directory

CraftyRie has decided to take on the daunting task of compiling a list of all the crafty blogs out in the blogoshpere. All you have to do is submit your link on her site, and just spread the word on your own blog.

A couple of yarn shops

Thank you for all the nice comments about my finished Peterborough!

I recently visited a couple of yarn shops that are new to me. First off, I have to give credit to the Other Half for spotting the yarn shops for me. He is proud of himself for becoming quite the good yarn shop spotter.

This first one is The Twisted Stitch in Monterey. It's located a block up from the famous Cannery Row and a few blocks from the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

This is a fairly small shop and its inventory is not large, but it's also only about 15 months old. I believe the owner was there when we visited and she was very nice. They stock a lot yarns by Universal Yarns.

I bought one skein of Tundra to knit this Riviera Scarf. I did not see the pattern there, but there were some samples knitted up and the owner explained to me how to knit it. I don't knit or wear scarves much, and this almost looks kitschy, but for some reason, I found it appealing.


This shop has a lot of nice framed lace art on display, such as the one shown here. They are created by a local artist.

The second shop is a part-time LYS because I am a part-time resident in San Francisco's Sunset District where the shop is located. For those of you unfamiliar with the San Francisco neighborhoods, the Sunset District is equivalent to Outer Mongolia for residents in the trendier neighborhoods. But, I digress. This small shop is named Urban Fauna Studio.

It carries mainly local hand-dyed yarns, as well as lots of supplies for spinning and felting. They have a nice selection of Cascade Ultra Pima, an I bought 4 skeins of it. One of the owners was there, and he was nice and helpful.