FO Round Up 1: Clogs

I've got a bunch of finished items that just haven't been blogged. Let's start with clogs!

I made four pairs of clogs for Christmas. Four pairs of clogs for others, and those two that are about finished for Lee and I, six in all. I had a bunch of Patons Classic Wool that I'd just decided to make useful things out of instead of keeping it around for a possible future blanket that likely won't get made while in Japan, and I've already used about half of the 20 skeins I was saving. Many of those skeins went for these clogs.

The first one was all Patons, I had a skein of gray and the 20 skeins of Taupe, obvious choice to start with.

Pattern: Fiber Trends Clogs
Size: Men's M
Yarn: Patons Classic Wool, 3 skeins, Taupe and Gray

Needles: US13

Timeframe: December 10 - 16, 2009
Mods: None.
Problems: Felting wasn't perfect, but I don't think with my setup it can be.

I was surprised at how well it felted. I have a front loader with no hot water possible, and this felted quite nicely for the most part.

For the next bunch, I put some puff paint on the bottom so they'd have a bit of traction. Two pairs are going to my grandparents, and I will not be responsible for causing broken hips if I can help it. I didn't do it for the first pair and probably won't for the last two, unless they prove to need it during use.

Pattern: Fiber Trends Clogs
Size: Men's M
Yarn: Patons Classic Wool, 1.6 skeins Taupe, 3 skeins of Japanese dollar store wool in gray, and a bit of Patons in gray because I didn't have enough Japanese yarn.
Needles: US13, US11

Timeframe: December 13, 2009 - January 4, 2010
Mods: None.
Problems: Felting wasn't perfect, but I don't think with my setup it can be, ran out of gray and used a slightly differently shaded one.

I found a good yarn at the dollar store to use, but it was closer to a DK weight so required triple stranding to match the Patons. With the triple stranding, I thought it was slightly thicker so went down a needle size to match the same gauge as the Patons.

Pattern: Fiber Trends Clogs
Size: Men's M
Yarn: Patons Classic Wool, 1.6 skeins Taupe, 3 skeins of Japanese dollar store wool in green, and oddly had enough yarn this time.
Needles: US13, US11

Timeframe: December 28, 2009 - January 4, 2010
Mods: None.
Problems: Felting wasn't perfect, but I don't think with my setup it can be.

Pattern: Fiber Trends Clogs
Size: Woman's M
Yarn: Japanese dollar store wool in pink and beige, under 6 skeins of beige and 3 skeins of pink.
Needles: US11

Timeframe: December 30, 2009 - January 4, 2010
Mods: None, though I discovered that spit splicing the two colors together works quite well since it's going to be felted anyway.
Problems: Felting wasn't perfect, in fact, the soles didn't felt well at all. They shrunk, but are still very ridged.

I learned that I should use the US13 with the dollar store yarn anyway, and this yarn makes for awesomely cheap clogs. I may just be knitting more next winter for those who didn't get them this winter.

Candy!

I enjoy trying to make things, things I like to eat. This includes a few breakfast or dinner meals, but mostly it's baked goods, desserts, and candy. A number of the dinners I enjoy include baked aspects, like curried pot pie and a casserole with drop biscuit topping as well as biscuits, bread, and tortillas for other meals. My recent candy attempts have worked amazingly well.

First off, I made some butter toffee. Lee isn't a big fan of many of the things I make candy-wise, but he loves chocolate bars containing toffee. I wasn't sure how it would turn out, and nuts are expensive here, so I made it sans almond topping, but it was delicious:


I read quite a few different recipes, because I've found that especially with candy, there are typically many different possible recipes, but some aspects remain the same no matter what. I trust Cooking for Engineers quite a bit, so adapted their recipe:

Cover a tray with parchment paper or a silicone baking sheet. Mine has a gutter around the edges, and some of the toffee dripped down into the gutter but didn't stick to the pan at all. Parchment paper may or may not be necessary, but the recipe says to use it. First off, make sure your candy thermometer is reading reliably. Boil some water, it should be 100 C or 212 F. At boiling, mine reads 110 C, so I have to adjust temperatures by about 10 C.

Put in a saucepan at least twice as large as these ingredients:
225 g unsalted butter
1/8 tsp salt
1 cup sugar
A large splash (approximately 2 tsp) of water

Boil over low/medium low heat. Stir constantly; it will bubble up while the water boils off and will stay at approximately 110 C (120 C on my thermometer) while this happens. Then, it will thicken and the temperature will rise fairly quickly. Continue stirring and heating until it's at least 150 C but before it hits 160 C.

Remove from heat once it's at 150 C and stir in:
1 tsp vanilla

Pour onto the pan and spread using a silicone spatula. I grated a bunch of milk chocolate from a large block over half of the hot toffee, and laid a 60 g chocolate bar on the other half. Then, I spread the chocolate around the top of the toffee as it melted from the heat of the toffee. I tossed it into the refrigerator to cool for awhile, then broke it up. It was delicious.

WIP Down

WIPs must be finished. 34, if I'm completely honest about everything, is the number of WIPs I have.

Some can be finished easily. I have some little magnets that just need seaming and stuffing. Others are not so easily finished; a large lace stole, colorwork sweater, and two queen sized blankets as well as my cross stitches are waiting their turn.

At the moment, I have an at-home project and an out and about project. The at home projects are the last two pairs of felted clogs, just in time to store them for the summer. Oh well.


I ran out of yarn for Lee's, so used a similar color from a different pair to finish off the center sole. I'm triple soling them for maximum warmth and comfort. It's not noticeable unless you're really inspecting the clog, and once it's felted, will probably be invisible.

At this point, his are finished except felting, and I just have the final two soles and attaching to do to make mine.

My out and about project is the last of a string of Mobii. Mobiuses? Neck cowls.


I have 1.5 rows, and then the I-cord bindoff left to finish it up. I should have all three done this weekend, and will be moving on to sewing up the magnets so they're finally done (killing a whopping 10 WIPs) and probably taking one of the queen sized blankets as my take-along project. Must finish knits! So I can start more...

Pairs

I was going over my WIPs the other day. I have a lot. They all seem to come in pairs. I have:

2 pairs of gloves
2 pairs of socks
2 pairs of slippers
2 blankets
2 WIPs started pre-Japan
2 bookmarks
2 magnets, times 4, 8 total
2 pairs of socks to darn
2 WIPs that don't fit in the other categories
2 Art of Disney cross stitches
2 other cross stitches

I feel like I'm forgetting something...

Anyway, lots of WIPs, even more FOs, some baking and candymaking, and continuing blanket progress. Stay tuned.

Sadness...

I paused to count the stitches on each side of the square when I was about halfway finished. I spent quite some time trying to figure out why the sides were not equal. I ripped down to where I thought the problem was. It was not the problem. I could not find the problem, so I ripped it all the way out. I cast on again, twice correctly, using the highly fiddly disappearing loop cast on. I knit a few lines.

I went to clean up the pile of yarn to make the living room less disorganized. I realized I have more of the gray than the red, because the gray is supposed to be the main color. The main color is the center of every square and the square that is all one color.

D'oh!


Re-do. Now I'm not sure that I'll be able to finish the entire thing, pattern and all, after having 0 progress to show after two days of the 14 possible days of work. Well, 0 knit progress, though I could write up the entire pattern now, since I have the pattern done. I think I shall do that.

Ravelympics/Knitting Olympics

I have about seven unfinished posts languishing. I need to finish those and post them, but before I do, I shall attempt to blog progress for Knitting Olympics/Ravelympics daily. For anyone reading my blog but not in the know, you are supposed to set a challenge for yourself, begin when the Olympics begins, and end before the Olympics are over. For the Ravelympics, your challenge can be to finish things that have been languishing, rip out half-finished projects that you'll never complete, or even spin or dye yarn. For the Knitting Olympics, your goal is a challenging project (or multiple projects) that really stretch your skills as a knitter, whether in pattern difficulty, size, a new technique, or any combination of the above. I bought yarn for a couple of queen sized blankets in Tokyo, which need to be finished by August, so I'm using one of those as my Olympic project.

For these projects, on Ravelry there are different categories or events to "compete" in. I'm making a blanket and designing it from start to finish, so I'm in the designer's biathlon and the slalomghan, and the blanket will include colorwork, so it's in the Nordic colorwork challenge as well. The designers biathlon is making a project, from swatch to pattern, in the Olympic timeframe. This is a fairly large undertaking, as it's only a gold medal finish if you have the pattern up for free or sale through Ravelry by the end of the Olympics, which means pattern designed, sample knit, pattern written up, layout finished, pictures taken, and all of it packaged up nicely in a pdf. I figure that since it's a blanket that I'm designing, I may as well get the pattern written up and on Ravelry as well.

The Yarn

Due to time zone differences, the Olympics started at 11 am on Saturday here, so I had the local knitters who are participating in the Ravelympics over. We tried to watch the Opening Ceremonies, but it wouldn't stream, rolled some sushi for lunch, watched Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog and the musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and spent a very long time knitting. I got an initial 10" block done, bound off, and now it's drying so I can figure out if if changes much with washing. I also learned that I'll want a fairly stretchy bindoff for this one; the k2tog bindoff is way too tight and doesn't allow the edges of the square to stretch out to the full 10".

Non-stretchy Bind Off

Today, Day 2, I should be finishing the square (if it dries) and finishing the pattern for the other 8 squares. The blanket will be a queen sized blanket of 9 squares, 8 patterned (the same pattern) and one plain square to make a Sierpinski Carpet. Once I've got the easy one color square done, I'll be able to finalize the design for the 2-color ones and get started on those. I need to do more than half a square per weekday and at minimum one square per weekend day to make it. This will certainly be a challenge, but that is what I signed up for!

Finally Updating...

just not quite yet. I have all kinds of projects I need to update both on here and Ravelry. I haven't uploaded pictures of knitting for almost two months, and have finished quite a few things in that two month time period. 29 off the top of my head (Only 12 different patterns though (one with 5 variations), and three of the 12 I've knit before!); I'm probably forgetting one or two. Or will be finishing another one or two before I finish updating.

Before I jump into the yes, I blew my 50 projects goal out of the water posts (mostly, I'm counting the first few days of '10 as still '09 because I was on vacation!), I'm going to set some goals for 2010. This year, I'm going for quality rather than quantity. I want to finish four pairs of socks, three huge projects, two felting projects, and a couple of languishing projects before August, because they are all gifts for people in the States, and since I'll be going then, it would be easiest to bring it all with me and give it to the recipients there. In addition to that, all yarn that was brought to Japan above laceweight needs to be used up. Or at least, it needs to be down to leftover scraps. My yarn closet is currently overfull (due to recent shopping expeditions!) and needs to be emptied. I've used up nearly 10 skeins of my 22 Patons Classic Merino so far, and I have another couple of felted clogs to make, a work vest to finish, then maybe another work vest and/or cardigan, so I am not worried about using all that up. I have plans for a good chunk of the laceweight, but I don't know if I'll get to it all this year (lacweight is time consuming!) and would rather get the larger skeins into my wardrobe instead of in my yarn closet.

I think I know what everyone will be getting for Christmas this next year, and plan to purchase yarn and knit their items accordingly, and early. I've knit four pairs of Fiber Trends Clogs for this Christmas, am finishing two up for Lee and myself, and think that these will be the main gift for those who had not gotten them this year. That will be my main large needle project for the year, and if I always have one on the needles, I can get them done in time for Christmas definitely. I think I'll finally be able to make Pocket Creatures for my sisters if I can get some Patons Classic while in the States. I haven't been able to find a good substitute here, and could order some Cascade, but I like the feel of Patons better. So, another goal, is to have what I'm knitting for everyone decided before August and to have it all finished by the end of November.

I'm also joining the 10 Shawls in 2010 group and Ravelympics. For the shawls, 8 of them can be under 500 yards, which is perfect for one skein fingering weight shawlette/scarves that I've been considering making out of my gorgeous handpainted sock yarns. The other two, well, I'll cross that bridge when I get there. I'm not 100% positive what I'll do for those, since my plans for larger laceweight projects involve a scarf and a dress (Butterfly), not shawls, and the one shawl I will be definitely making over 500 yards is already started, so doesn't count. I love having my sock blockers show off my completed socks; I'm thinking of making some kind of shawl-hanging bar to show off these small-ish triangular one-skein shawls I'm planning to make. I suppose I could just put it on blocking wires, then just hang those up on the wall somewhere, or just pin it up. Something to consider...I'm not sure if I'll have one or two of those shawls be my Ravelympics project(s), if I should use that time to try to bust out some pre-Japan WIPs, or if that should be my major attack on one of the three large projects that need to be finished for my trip to the States. I have about a month to decide, I'll figure that out later.

Non-yarn-wise, I need to photograph more WIPs and FOs and blog about them (no point in taking a bunch of WIP pictures if I don't show them off 'till the item is done!) and just blog a bit more. Some months were good, some sucked. December, I'm looking at you. I have gotten pretty good about photographing things when I've finished, though I forgot to photograph three of the 29 most recent FOs, but should show off progress more. I think in conjunction with Ravelympics, my goal will be to post updates of how far I've gotten every day that I knit, even if it's just a quick snapshot of something that doesn't look any different than the day before. Maybe that will get me in the spirit of photographing things more often. Like the vest I'm working on right now, which is already split for the two fronts and the back. I should have taken pictures of it already.

Anyway, projects that are currently up: Finishing my second Lady Sunshine, an excellent glove pattern from Laris, Basil, a work vest for Lee that's about halfway finished, and knitting up some Fiber Trends Clogs for Lee and I along with photographing anything I still have around that hasn't been photographed!