Mikknit

The first anniversary of Mikknit is on Wednesday, December 6. To celebrate, I’m running a contest! The contest will open as soon as this is posted and it’ll end at 5pm on Thursday December 7 - I’ll choose the winners then and post them Friday morning.

I debated what sort of contest I wanted to do, and here’s what I came up with:

I want to hear about your favorite fiber experience - a favorite project, your favorite yarn, favorite yarn shop, how you learned to knit/spin/crochet/weave/etc., a favorite person you’ve met through fibery pursuits, you get the idea. I’m going to choose two of my favorite stories and the winners will receive some yarn (yarn to be determined) this yarn:

Araucania Atacama, 100% alpaca. Color 402

Cherry Tree Hill Supersock Potluck in Brights

Leave me a comment on this entry with your story! I’ll post my story tomorrow - I have met so many awesome people through knitting and spinning, it’s going to be difficult to narrow it down to one or two stories to share.

As I promised last Wednesday, here are the pictures of Arlo’s sweater (finally). It is SO difficult to get a good picture of this kid - he never stops moving!

Here’s the sweater unmodeled

(please excuse the funky sleeve positioning - I neglected to photograph this *before* he wore it and of course he got food on it)

“Reach for the sky!” - the only way I could get him to hold still

I’m pretty happy with the sweater, though I think I made the neckband too wide. I’ll have to undo the bind-off and rip it back a couple rows, maybe. He seems to like it, though it’s hard to tell since he’d really just rather be naked.

I’ve been craving some stranded knitting lately, so when my aunt offered to buy some yarn for me on a recent visit to Borealis Yarns, I grabbed a couple skeins of Cascade 220 to make a hat for Arlo, who was desperately in need of a nice warm hat. I pulled out my (very battered) copy of Hats On! by Charlene Schurch and cast on for the Danish Earflap Hat. I believe I started this on Wednesday night and I finished it Saturday evening. A nice quick little project, good to have when Chris was out of town all week for work. I had some difficulty with the earflaps, mostly because I apparently can’t count, read patterns, or do short rows. No clue why it was so difficult, but I think it took three tries before I got it right. After that, the rest of it went off without a hitch. Arlo won’t keep it on, of course, but that’s why it’s got ties! I figure he’ll figure out how to untie it ASAP, so I’m going to have to dig out one of the cord stoppers that I have kicking around the sewing room. That ought to keep it in place. Maybe.

Excuse the white blur - Mimi desperately wanted to be in the picture and I had to snap this quickly before she jumped up on the stool.

I enjoyed this project so much that I’m already planning my next stranded knitting project - a pair of mittens from Folk Mittens by Marcia Lewandowski. I’ve got red and black yarn for the Ullred Mittens and a plan for the matching hat in Hats On! in the future. I’m hoping to get the mittens done in time to use them as a Christmas gift, so I’ve got to finish up the sock I’m working on soon. I also want to make a stranded hat for Grace, though I’m not sure which one out of the book I want to do.

Oh hey, I promised a contest to celebrate my blogiversary, didn’t I? I’m going to make that a separate post so it’s easier to keep track of (for me, at least).