The brand new addi 5.5mm circs I am using for the red hooded jacket are rough at the join on one side. Every other row is like knitting with a rough fingernail. I am getting a similar feeling to being in a room with someone repeatedly dragging their nails down a blackboard. I have contacted Janette from styk and she says to send them back. I will knit a bit more before deciding that is definitely the needles as I will feel a fool if she finds nothing wrong with them.

As for the jacket it is coming along nicely, my gauge is spot on width wise, off a bit in the length but they give the instructions by cms not rows so I am feeling ok about that. I have a few loose stitches and it seems like that will be much harder to fix in garter stitch than it was in stocking stitch. I will post a photo tomorrow when I have some decent light to take it in.

As in a red swatch for a tiny hooded jacket. I love baby things. I forgot to take a photo of the swatch but I did make one, really I did. I almost got gauge too, at least in terms of stitches, but when I did the math on how much extra width my one extra stitch per 10cm was going to give me I found that I should get the exact measurements given in the pattern. On the other hand my calculator tells me that if I had perfect gauge I would actually have 1.5 cms more fabric than expected…I decide 1.5cms here or there wasn’t worth worrying about, the babe isn’t even born yet - who knows what shape it will be.

Ever so carefully I typed the instructions for my next project into googles language tools and this is what it returned:

“Be 29 cm total height, to form encolure. in folding back the 6 meshs, power station then to continue, a side at the same time to fold back of it side encolure 2 row plus height 7 meshs”

I don’t intend to knit this jacket at the local power station so I am looking elsewhere for translation assistance at this time. Alison was kind enough to send me these very helpful links for translating knitting terms:

Wise Needle and a french knitting dictionary

We went to town today. Those of you with toddlers will understand why not going has been easy despite the ever growing list of things that would be best achieved in a major shopping area. My impending moss stitch casting off experience is what made me stop procrastinating and do it. I decided I needed a more in-depth knitting book badly enough to go to town and do all the other things I needed to do too.

So I printed off my amazon wish list and off we went. I sent Jesse to the aquarium with Isabelle while I did the stuff only I needed to be present for and I did well:

Book in hand, I went and bought some rust proof pins, a needle gauge, a pair of “knitters needles” and a new purse (for half the price I had budgetted no less). After such a happy retail experience I was feeling so good I recklessly strayed into the ladies underwear section of a major department store and that was the end of my shopping success story. When I departed an hour later with no further purchases, I was significantly less happy than I went in, close to tears in fact. At least I got the book and despite the outrageous amount of time I wasted trying to get a new bra (or three) Jesse still managed to get himself one new shirt too. The rest of the clothes shopping will have to wait for another day.

So by now you may be wondering what all this has to do with knitting tools… I did buy the needle gauge, pins and knitters needle today, and yesterday I got these in the post (shown with todays purchases for good measure):

All the needles I need for Isabelle’s Jacket with Moss Stitch Bands, the Phildar Jacket and Reverse Bloom Washcloths. There were supposed to be needles for Kate too but they somehow didn’t make it into the packet. To add to my parcel opening excitement Janette from Styk included this lovely little stitch holder sample.

I know, I know, its all a ploy to make me spend more money - well it’s working. I expect I will order 3 more when they are available in mid october.

This is my very first blog post, ever. how exciting. This blog is also my first web project in a long, long time. Even more exciting. And this blog is going to be about my new obsession - knitting. I am really excited. can you tell?

On the topic of excitement I am officially growing a little stash of my very own. I got goodies in the post today, two back issues of interweave knits and yummy yarn for an Isabelle sized cardy.

This forms my infant stash, this and the lovely redness I purchased during a visit to the dentist on the weekend (no really, we honestly did drive all that way to get to the dentist, it wasn’t the lure of lovely yarn or the amazing gourmet deli at all). Of course now that we KNOW about the fantastic bread at the afore-mentioned amazing deli across the road from the yarn store that turned out to be worth the LONG drive we won’t be waiting for another dentist appointment to make a return visit. So back to that redness:

This is destined to become the jacket on the front cover of Phildar Layette 5. A gift for a cousin’s 2nd babe, due this christmas.