Old FO: My First Socks

Also known as The Post That PhotoBucket Made. Two months ago, I signed onto my blog and noticed that all of my photo grids (on the My Handmade Wardrobe page, etc.) had been replaced by generated pictures saying I hadn't payed for 3rd party hosting. I've used PhotoBucket since the days of Myspace, so when I needed a free place to host my pictures for this blog I just continued to use them. Apparently after being free since their inception, PhotoBucket decided they wanted to charge $400!!! if you want to show your photos anywhere other than their site. Yeah. I'm guessing they hope people will just pay that exorbitant amount to avoid the hassle, but seriously $400? Even Flickr is only $25 a year. Come on, folks! Being the cheap skate I am, I redid every photo (we're talking sizing and everything) and then replaced them in the html of my blog. This was a ton of work, but I would rather do more than that then pay PhotoBucket after pulling a stunt like that. I'm now hosted on Google Photos completely free - I highly recommend them if you have the same problem! Anyway, in the process of redoing all the photos and html work I noticed that I never posted about my first ever pair of socks! I had never even taken official photos of them, which is unheard of for me. So thank you, PhotoBucket, for being jerks and bringing to my attention this oversight :) Anyway, sorry for the rant. You're here for the socks!

These are the Lace Knee Socks from Craftsy's Knit Sock Workshop class. This class was purchased back when it was the only class on socks available (which is very much not the case now), and I just really got it in my head that I wanted to make socks when I first began knitting 5 years ago. Being so new to knitting and not knowing anything about socks or difficulty in patterns, I didn't realize how hard this would be. I thought that since I had a video class that I would be able to make them. I started this pattern only to barely finish the toe before I realized this was WAY to advanced for my skills at that time. Fast forward to December of 2014 when I had new yarn and wanted to make this pattern, so I cast on.

The pattern starts out with a Bosnian Toe cast on. I remember this was very difficult for me to knit without getting pronounced holes at the toe, but after many tries I was finally happy enough to move on. The toe has a neat swirl that I really like. Being my first ever sock pattern I had no idea at the time that this wasn't how all socks were made, but now I am able to appreciate it even more having a few more pairs under my belt.

From there you go into a lovely feather and fan pattern on the top of the foot. This feather and fan is what drew me back to the pattern. The pattern was easy to memorize but not boring (always a nice combination).

Next you get into the leg - now I knew I wouldn't be able to make these to the knee when I began due to only having 462 yards of yarn. My yarn is Knit Picks Stroll in the Blue Topaz colorway which I snagged in a clearance sale so I couldn't get any more at the time. I just wanted to knit until I ran out of yarn. The original pattern has a lovely lattice section below the cuff, but I cut that out entirely to save on yarn and it worked perfectly.

This is how much yarn I had left in the end. Wow! I'm still pretty impressed by this. As you can see I had to tink back a row to finish the bind off (thus all the kinks in the yarn), but it got there in the end and I had zero waste - always a nice feeling :)

Being that these are designed as knee socks, there is some shaping to the lace pattern at the back of the calf. If I remember correctly the added section should be longer, but I only had so much yarn so I stopped as you see.

And being socks they have totally smooth bottoms to be comfy underfoot. You can see them pilling already since I've worn them a bit in the colder months. They make nice bed socks :)

So how did things go on this first pair of socks? Well, sadly they are too big and also too small (womp womp). Since my feet are huge and I'm used to always having the larger sizes in anything having to do with me feet, I just cast on the largest size without checking the measurements. The result is that the socks are sloppy on my feet to where I could never wear them with shoes. This changes in the ankle increases where it becomes too tight for my rather muscular calves. This is normal too for me - I can never get knee high boots because they are always too tight, so I should've known, but I didn't think to check having never made socks before.

I'm also pretty proud of my heel and toe on these. Considering I'd never knitted either before, and considering the toe was kind of tricky, I'm thrilled they look this nice. I knitted a good deal of one sock while I was on a cruise in the Bahamas with my sister, so I think of that every time I see these socks.

So now I have officially blogged about my first ever pair of socks :) In spite of their issues these were fun to make and I do still wear them to sleep in when it's cold (which it seems it never will be again if last "winter" is any indication). I learned a lot from these socks and I was able to go on to knit 3 more pairs of socks later. If you're an experienced knitter and want to try socks, I would recommend Knit Sock Workshop as well. You really do learn the breakdown of a sock and the patterns with the class are lovely. I wouldn't recommend the class to a newbie knitter though, to be honest. That's probably why Craftsy has so many classes now devoted to new sock knitters :)

Summary:
Yarn: 2 skeins Knit Picks Stroll in Blue Topaz - $5.50
Pattern: Lace Knee Socks by Donna Druchunas in Knit Sock Workshop Craftsy Class
Time: 2 months

OAL2017: Anaheim Wrap Sweater

It's that time again! I just completed my outfit for the Outfit Along 2017! I'm really loving my outfit  as a whole and as individual pieces, so it feels like a successful challenge. Just like last year, I will be blogging each piece separately, so check back over the next week for all 3 pieces. First up: my sweater!

This is the Anaheim by Andi Satterlund - this was her new pattern she released for this challenge. It's a wrap front style with an allover lace design. I was on the fence about the design when I was planning my project, but I decided to just go with it and I'm very happy about that decision. The finished sweater is much more versatile then I originally thought. Since the sweater is the portion of this challenge that takes the most time, I planned and made this piece first. Happily it only took 1 month and that was with mostly only knitting on the weekends.

The sweater is made with Andi's usual top-down in the round construction and with set in sleeves. The sleeves are plain stockinette stitch and a nice airy, loose gauge to keep things from being too hot (a thoughtful detail given the summer style of this sweater in my opinion, but be aware that the gauge is loose).

Gordo bomb! lol my dog really wanted to be a part of this whole picture taking business. The back of the sweater has the same all over lace pattern as the front. As far as lace goes, this is the easiest chart ever and it's very quickly memorized. Normally with Andi's patterns I knit a size Large but increase to an X Large at the waist as well as lengthening for my long torso. In this sweater I was actually able to just keep increasing along the neckline until I got the stitch count of the XL size waist. I have no shaping at the sides - my size worked out so that the lace pattern fit in perfectly, so the design is never interrupted. This extra increasing not only gave me the waist size I needed, it also gave me extra length - problem solved! I will say that while it made the knitting easier, it doesn't really help my figure much to not have any shaping at the sides. I'll still wear it, but this contributes to me not wearing it closed.

Which leads me to another cool aspect of this design - it can be worn 2 ways - there are buttons at the side seams and buttonholes at the points, so you just wrap the sweater over and button it at the sides. But you can also leave it open for a waterfall look.

I had the perfect buttons in my stash! I got an entire tube of these buttons for $2 at The Sewing Studio back in April, and they are the perfect color and size. I love the kind of 80s vibe they have with the triangle holes. I also like the i-cord bind off. I've done i-cord bind of before, but never where it went around the entire sweater before. I seriously thought this binding would never end, but I persevered and I'm glad I did because it's a nice effect.

I've never thought I would like the waterfall style, but I really like the look of this one opened up. To be honest I will probably always wear the cardigan open like this unless I maybe wear it with a dress. Because it sits right at my waist, a lot of my skirts and tops can cause the sweater to bunch up a bit. Also I don't love that the doubled up knitted fabric visually thickens my tummy. I do love the v neckline though. So we'll see how I end up wearing it most.

I guess I should probably talk about my yarn, huh? Whoops. I wanted to work from my (ridiculously large) stash for this project, and I'm happy to say that all the fabric and yarn were stash busts :) The yarn is Bernat Cotton-ish, a cotton/acrylic blend, in the Jade Jersey colorway. The color is a nice teal-y emerald green (it's not quite that teal in real life). I originally bought this to make a different sweater a few years ago, but looking at that pattern now it's not really a style I would wear much so I decided this yarn would work well for this project. It's a DK weight and cotton like the pattern calls for (the original suggested yarn is Knit Pick Cotlin), and after swatching and blocking I decided it would work out. I'm happy I was right (sometimes you never know!). This yarn was nice to work with especially considering how inexpensive it was. I would certainly recommend this yarn if you're looking for cotton DK yarn.

Little side story - usually I take blog photos on my own with a shutter release, but now that my husband is back around he wanted to help me. Both of us out on the porch was just something my dog had to be involved in, and he kept walking over to be in the shot  - which is so odd since he typically hides when we start pointing a camera at him (I think he didn't like that I was getting all my husband's attention). So now blog photos are a family event, lol. He is a pretty cute photo bomber though.

So that's my Anaheim sweater!It's so nice to have have another sweater finished (I was starting to think I wouldn't hit my sweater quota this year compared to the previous few years!), and I really enjoyed this as an easy but not boring knit. I love how it goes with the rest of my outfit, but I also know it will go with other things in my wardrobe. Yay for basic items!

Check back throughout this week to see the deets on the rest of my outfit!

Summary:
Yarn: 3 skeins of Bernat Cotton-ish in Jade Jersey - $9.75
Pattern: Anaheim by Andi Satterlund - $5.40
Notions: 2 buttons - $0.10
Time: 1 month
Total Cost: $15.25

FO: Christmas Ginny Sweater for Mom

This is my final project I knitted for Christmas 2016. It's been knitted since Christmas, but I didn't have pictures to blog because I was still searching for buttons. Now that it's finished, I can share it here - the biggest project I've ever made for someone else :)

Back in March of last year, I was shopping in Michael's and discovered they had all of their Issac Mizrahi Issac's Colorways Merino Blend yarn on clearance. They were half price, plus I had a coupon for another 20% off my whole purchase, including clearance and sale. That was pretty epic, and it doesn't come around often, fyi. The yarn was being discontinued, and at just $3.13 per skein (!) I knew it would be a great yarn to stash for sweaters. Some colors were down to just a few balls, but they happened to have a lot of their red colorway (called Betty) left when I came around. I decided then and there to knit my mom a sweater for Christmas, as her favorite color is bright red. I love knitting sweaters, but being a Florida resident my sweaters don't see a ton of wear. I've never made sweaters for other people because I am worried they will not appreciate and take care of them like they need. Sweaters are a lot of work! But if there is one person in this world who love and appreciates anything I make them, it's my mom :) She does so much for me, and this was a way that I could show what she means to me in gift form, and in a way that would be nice item that I could still afford.

I'm sure this looks a little familiar to those who've read my blog this past year - I made myself the Ginny's Cardigan by Mari Chiba in The Unofficial Harry Potter Knits magazine this time last year. If I was going to all the effort of knitting this sweater for someone else, I wanted it to at least be something she wold love, so I told her about it when I bought the yarn. She loved the color, so I started showing her designs that I had in my stash that would work with the yarn. We went through quite a few that she thought were pretty, but in the end she said she really liked my Ginny Cardigan. So I made one for her :) The real design feature of this sweater is undoubtedly the owl lace pattern on the back. This is the first time I've ever made a sweater pattern twice, and the nicest part after knowing exactly how the sweater will fit is that I already knew the lace pattern. Woo hoo!

This sweater fits me ok, but my mom is taller and bustier than I am, so it doesn't fit me exactly on purpose. My mom wanted this to be a sweater she could throw on indoors when she gets chilly at work, etc, so we wanted a slightly relaxed fit. The arms are a bit long on me, but they fit her well.

The big hang up with calling this "finished" was the button situation. Ever since my local Hancock Fabrics closed, I've had to drive almost an hour to Joann's and hope they have enough of the right type of buttons for any given project. I don't frequently make the Joann's pilgrimage, so this sat. Earlier this year, a Hobby Lobby opened only 15 minutes away from me, so I tend to swing by there on the regular, lol. I pass by it all the time in my commute to my house, so it's no big deal to swing in and buy 1 thing at 40% off and then leave, lol. I brought the sweater soon after they opened and found the perfect buttons. They were shiny, 7/8", smooth, and the exact color red for this yarn. It was fate. Plus they were 50% off that day. I bought 4 buttons because that was all they had, then I had to wait for them to restock, then I proceeded to go in and buy just 1 card of 2 buttons to get them for 40% off each time, lol. I figured my mom had waited this long already for the sweater to have buttons, and she agreed that she would like them better if they were all super cheap, lol. She is my mom, after all :) So over the course of a few weeks I accumulated the 9 buttons I needed to finish.

Isn't that lace just the greatest? I love that this is such a simple design with a pop of something interesting on the back. Plus this color really makes it eye catching. I need a sweater in this color for myself, lol.

Realistically this is how the sweater will be worn, and happily it drapes nicely.I was a little worried the buttons would be too heavy and pull that side down, but it looks just fine.

And here's the happy recipient :) This picture was taken on Christmas without the buttons.

And the ever lovely back :) So cool, right? I really love this design.

So there's another sweater for the books :) And my first sweater for someone else. Love you, mom! No one deserves a month of my knitting time like you do, lol. I hope she loves it for a good long time and it keeps her warm when she is chilly.

and THAT'S my last Christmas project, lol.

FO: Lacey Wrap Front Top

This is one of those projects that make you wonder if sewing actually is fun, lol. All was well ... until it wasn't... and this project sat unloved on my ironing board for a solid 2 weeks yet I wouldn't allow myself to sew anything else. *sigh* I've had a little distance from it now, so I'm not as upset with it as I was, and I even think it's very pretty considering I thought I was going to have to throw it away at one point, haha. So here's a slightly more fancy project than my norm to break up the monotony of toddler print t-shirts: A stretch lace wrap front top.

As soon as I made my first Dawn to Dusk Top using New Look 6150, I sort of had a vision of this shirt. I wanted to make it up in an ivory stretch lace. I had thrifted a beautiful 100% silk chiffon blush pink knee length skirt earlier this year, and I just didn't have anything quite fancy enough to wear with it. I knew that silk chiffon and lace would be a lovely combo, and since this pattern uses a knit I could have an outfit that was both fancy and comfy. Behold!

I couldn't get a whole body shot, and I was in no mood to futz with it, so trust me when I say the skirt is knee length, lol. I already had a very nice ivory rayon jersey in my stash that I bought from a friend ($5 for 3 yards!). The fabric is buttery soft but just too sheer to wear alone in all decency. You could see everything through this stuff. So it sat for years until I made this up. I hunted for a stretch lace to use on top of it hoping that the pattern of the lace would help with the opacity, and I finally settled on this stretch lace from Fabric.com (affiliate link). It was the right color and not too expensive, so I snapped up 2 yards with a coupon back in June. Combined the two fabrics are still a bit sheer, but the pattern in the lace does distract from that fact so I felt fine proceeding.

You can see on the back that it's still a bit sheer, but not overly so. You can also see my unintentional pattern patching on the lace - score! Anyway, this projects marks a few firsts for me: this is my first time working with lace (other than trims, but they are a whole different animal), as well as being my first successful attempt at underlining anything. Early into trying to sew clothes, I tried to underline a shirt dress with disastrous effects. It did not matter what I tried (I even hand basted it flat with silk thread) the pieces would shift as I sewed them and they wouldn't line up, leaving me with puckers inside. How did people do this so effectively with no puckers? I decided I was ready to try it again since I have loads more experience under my belt AND I would be making this in a knit so I knew I could just fudge it if the fabric slipped (I could just stretch the other piece to fit). I did not have to fudge anything though! Which makes me wonder what I did wrong the first time around, but at least it worked now. After spending about 2 hours cutting out everything, I stitched the lace and lining together around the edges with a straight stitch.

From there I sewed the body together with no issues. I even managed to figure out a rather tricky instruction that I did wrong the first time I made this pattern. The bodice looked great, and when I tried it on it was a little snug but I realized that I still had all those straight stitched edges so the skirt wouldn't give like it should. I pulled out all those basting stitches and it was better, but it was not as loose as the first shirt. It's a snug fit, but not uncomfortable or unsightly, so it's ok. I just figure it's from having more layers of fabric. 

Look at that lovely shoulder draping! I stopped sewing the shirt that night after getting the body fully assembled figuring I would quickly insert the sleeves the next night and be done. When trying on the shirt though, I noticed that the shoulders were too wide - they hung off my actual shoulder by a few inches. This is a problem I have with the other top too, but I never realized the reason the shoulders fell off all the time was because the shoulder was drafted for a football player (stupid big 4 grading...). I just figured the problem on my first version was caused by me not doing that tricky instruction right that I mentioned before. Apparently it was a combination of that and the shoulder drafting. So, I started messing with the sleeve. I sewed the sleeve about 1.5" inward on the shoulder, but that looked really odd. "No worry," I told myself, "it's because there's all that extra fabric I don't need. I'll just cut it off and THEN sew in the sleeve." You can guess where this is going, right? I tried it on after this and it was even worse. The sleeve was pulling the fabric over to itself, which was completely eliminating the drape that the front needed. In fact it was causing diagonal drag lines toward the seam. This is when I realized I'd royally screwed up. I was going to have to put that cut out piece back in, which would cause a ridiculous looking seam around the entire arm hole. I was so frustrated at this point after all that work and unpicking (for the record unpicking a lightning bolt stitch in ivory thread from ivory rayon jersey is no picnic in itself, but add in stretch lace and you have a serious nightmare) and I just couldn't even look at this shirt anymore. I set it on my ironing board and didn't touch it for 2 weeks straight.

Sorry for the awful phone pictures, but I couldn't get my regular camera to show the extra sleeve seam. This what each shoulder looks like now, which is really not that bad considering all the trouble I had with it and how lost I was. I actually only cut a piece off of one side before I realized my mistake, but I had to make the other side match. Once I got the piece sewn back in, I basically pinched a pleat on the other sleeve opening to try and match the other side. It's not exact, but who's going to stare at both my shoulders to compare? So not I've ended up with a "design detail", lol. Oh, and as fate would have it the shoulders fit fine now :/ And I was really surprised when I put on the shirt - you don't even notice the extra seams. All that stress for nothing ...

All that unpicking caused a couple of holes - only 2 which is amazing considering the fabric types and the tension on the lightning bolt stitch. Happily they were at the seams and my thread was an exact match, so I was able to just stitch back and forth a few times to secure the fabric and I haven't had any problems. That little lump in the circle above is where I did this - looks pretty good, eh?

So after all that, I now have a very pretty lace shirt that I really like. And it does look really good with my chiffon skirt :) Now, since you've endured this whole word-filled post, you get rewarded with this super sexy photo of me trying to look demure and swishy in lace. You are welcome.

So next time I run into issues, I'll try to take my own advice and not get so upset about it :) Don't sweat it, folks! It's just fabric :) Considering this was my first time with lace and my first time underlining, I'm pretty thrilled with my new shirt.

Summary: 
Fabric: 1.5 yards ivory rayon jersey (similar here) - $1.50, 1.5 yards Ivory Stretch Lace - $8.50
Pattern: New Look 6150
Notions: knit stay tape - $0.10, thread - $1.50
Time: 10 hours
Total Cost: $ 11.60

WIP: Christmas Procrastination

So, I've been plugging away at my Christmas gifts still ... frantically stitching my heart out in hopes of completing everything on time. I have reached the point on most of my items that I have to sit at home and devote time to them (either from confusing parts or small pieces and stuffing), so when I needed a travel project this weekend (that could be seen around my family members) I had nada. Against my better judgement, I started a sock.

This is my gorgeous new Knit Picks Stroll Sock yarn - it was so delicious and soft, it was just begging to be made into something. Needing something pretty quickly to grab and go, I decided to try again at the one sock pattern I have attempted (and not succeeded with) before - the lacy knee socks pattern from the Knit Sock Workshop Craftsy class. I started this pattern back when I first learned to knit, but quickly realized it was beyond my abilities. Plus I now know I had picked horrible yarn for this project (it was self striping). Anyway, I already had the pattern printed out and I knew which size to make, so I grabbed it and started. The pattern uses a swirl toe and a Tunisian cast on - I love the swirl of the toe, but my cast on could be tighter. Oh well, it's my first go, right? I love the lace pattern and it's an incredibly simple stitch pattern.

Here is the bottom - see the cool swirl? I'm pretty proud of it :) In one day of knitting I got farther in the pattern than I had years ago - and I had worked on it for at least a week, lol. Nice to see my skills have progressed a bit. Sadly, I haven't been able to work on it since Sunday because of my mad dash to finish presents this week. I am itching to get this baby on my foot and try out my first hand knit sock!

The rest of my projects are not safe to share here, but it won't be long before they are revealed! Wish me luck at getting it all done in time :)