Poor clapotis

I started knitting my clapotis last August. When I finished one ball I got bored and put in away until after Christmas knitting was complete. At the start of this year I knitted another ball and put it away again for a while. Last week I took it out again with the aim of completing it and using the last ball up. So there I was, merrily knitting away, until it dawned on me that I had 92 rows to knit and the yarn was decreasing quite rapidly... 5 decrease repeats and the last 1 rows left to knit and the yarn runs out :(

Seems the clapotis doesn't want to be finished. Thankfully, Ravelry has helped me source a knitted who is selling my colourway... so I bought 2 balls to only really use one. bit of an odd way to use yarn up, lol

Evil knotty yarn!

I've half the sleeves for this cardigan finished - I'm knitting them both at the same time so that if I make a mistake on one sleeve, I make it on both, lol.

I'm not loving the yarn though, in every ball I've knitted there's a big knot somewhere where they've tied two ends together to make the ball. Its seriously a pain. But on the bright side, I'm halfway through the cardigan and therefore halfway through the yarn - only 6 more balls left for the cardigan leaving me with a grand total of 2 balls left and no idea what to do with them!

My new mantra for this project shall be "only 6 balls left to go, only 5 balls left to go" etc. Hoping I get the sleeves finished today and then the mantra shall commence, lol.

Total time!

I thought it might be interesting to put out there just where I am on the knitting front.

I have just moments ago finished the 37th ball - I have knitted 33 of these and donated 4 to other people. I'm happy with myself although you can't actually see the small hole where these 37 balls used to be, lol.

So from January until May we have the following:

January - Bought no yarn, used 391g so for the month I was +391g

February - Bought 700g, used 748g so for the month I was +48g

March - Bought 900g, used 1358g so for the month I was + 458g

April - Bought 1000g, used 688g so for the month I was -322g

May - Bought no yarn, used 250g so for the month I was +250g

Generally it seems that the numbers are going in the right direction, and the used yarn doesn't count the gifted to me or by me stuff. I'm destashing slowly but surely, and this month was basically socks, lol.

I think the important thing is that for two months this year I have bought nothing. There's 7 months left, lets see how many more yarn free months I can do!

Whoop!!

I've just finished knitting my 29th ball, which means I'm over quarter of the way to the 100 ball knit down challenge. However, the downside to this excitement is the fact that I've bought yarn nearing 50 balls. I'm taking one step forward and two back with this challenge thing.

So I need an incentive. I'm not buying anymore yarn. If I manage to stave off the yarn buying bug I can go to the spinning class that we're hoping to organise with the SnB ones. If I buy yarn then I can't go, simple.

Ideally, I'd love to have knitted 100 balls AND the new yarn too by New Years Eve. One can hope :)

Does this count?

On Wednesday, at SnB, Jolene gave me my Christmas present - a "Hand it to 'em" glove kit from Getknitted.com. Unfortunately, the kit contained sock yarn in which to create the said gloves.

In my whole "no new yarn" thing, does this count as a 2008 intake (since it was for Christmas after all) or a 2009 (since this is when it was received)

More to the point - how do I put this one into the notebook? My categories are used and bought, so should I start a new category for gifted??

This, simple as it probably is, hurts my brain, lol.

How very interesting!

I have a 2008 diary that I used to keep track of the yarn in/out and completed projects. Since I last purchased yarn in November 2008, I thought I would have a look to see just precicely how many days it's been since I last made a purchase.

As of right now, its been 72 days... thats right, 72 whole days since yarn came into my house. This, I think, is mighty impressive. And you know, its not as bad as I thought it was going to be. I've looked on yarn sites at the sale stuff, contemplated buying it and closed down the window. I have a lot of stash, I don't need anymore for a while.

I'm having a sock issue though. I'm in the midst of a father sized sock and although its going swimmingly, I believe I don't have enough yarn for a decent lengthed leg. It took 30g of yarn to do the foot and heel and I don't know if he'll wear them with a shortened leg. I guess the only way to find out is to knit the darned thing. I wound 50g off the ball for the other sock, so the entire ball will be used this time (usually I have something left over)

Onto the sock then!

New Year's Resolutions!

I know its a tad early for the resolution business, but I'm going to throw these ideas that Nicky and I came up with out into the ether.

Socks
We're going to do our own sock club, and some of the patterns will be coming from the Simply Knitting calander that came with an issue a couple of months ago... since all I can do is plain socks, this is going to be a challenge. I'm asking my mum to bring home lunch bags from Washington next week - if I can see the yarn, I'll not want to knit it so its best to hide these things, lol.

Stash
We're also going to try the Stash Knit Down 2009 ravelry groups "Knit 100 balls in 2009" challenge. I know I have more than enough stash to keep me going to for a while and I'm going to not buy any yarn. However, there is a clause here. Nicky and I are hoping to go to Toronto at some stage, so it is my plan to not buy yarn until I go, I can buy when I'm there and then when I get back, its no yarn again. Unless I need a ball or two to finish a project, thats allowed.

Our challenges/knitalongs!
To make 2009 slightly interesting, Nicky and I came up with a list of 13 challenges/knitalongs for us to do over the year. One challenge starts whenever the last one ends, so it could take 18 months but on the other hand it could take 9 months!

So we have, in no particular order:

1. fairisle and steaking in the one project, we're nothing if not crazy, lol.
2. the pi shawl
3. crocheted starghan (I can't crochet so should be interesting for me)
4. baby suprise jacket
5. Dream swatch headwrap
6. Clapotis
7. Endpaper mittens
8. Hoodie time! We both have hoodies we want to knit, just different ones
9. Emerald cardigan
10. More cardigans!!! (it gets cold here you know, lol)
11. Gift challenge - knit gifts for birthdays/Christmas
12. WIP finishing marathon
13. Pinwheel blanket

So there we have it, the 2009 crazy train!

If we add all the yarn from the 13 knitalongs AND the socks then I think I'm well over the 100 ball mark and therefore have succeeded in knitting down the stash in 2009, knitted some pretty nifty things AND learnt some new knitting skills as well as how to crochet! Win/win I'd say.

Current WIP's
I have a few wip's on the go now that are starting to take over my life, lol. I have 2 different socks on the go, trying to knit a Christmas present and have a birthday present to start. Then, once those are done, I've a few things to knit for the ones I work with (which they demanded I should add) Although the socks aren't desperately needed by a deadline, they see m to be the only thing I want to knit. I think I need to hide them until Christmas is over, or at least until I get everything else knitted!

Jumper take 2

Well, I managed to finish the sleeve last night, now just to sew that bad boy up, do the ribbing (ick) and ta da!!

I don't know the name of the stitch i ususally use to seam things, but Nicky tried the matress stitch a few weeks ago and liked it - out comes Knitting for Dummies and i shall find instructions on how to do it nicely.

Overall so far, the jumper hasn't used that much - only about 450g of sirdar click dk. Not bad for a manly jumper, lol

Oops!

remember how on Saturday I bought a ball of yarn I already had so I could "make something bigger" out of it? Well today I did the same thing again. Only this time it was a ball of James C Brett's Magi Knit. Just don't know what to knit with it though.

With the Saturday and today' purchases, my total in/out tally for this month is as follows:

Used: 750g
Bought: 650g
Completed: 5

Just think, if I hadn't bought those 4oog of yarn, the tally would be much better looking!

Socks or slippers??

I started mary jane's during the week - quick and easy AND more importantly helps me destash 2 50g balls of paton's moonglow. I got one done on Friday night in starbucks with Nicky and started the second.

However, I was watching Supernatural on Friday when I got home and for some reason had an urge to cast on socks. I haven't knitted socks since the start of the summer where I finished 2 pairs in rapid (for me) succession and put myself right off them.

So now I have a dilema. I'm over 3 wip's now (blanket, jumper, mary jane's and the socks) and I would like to have 3 again. Do I finish the MJ now and work on the sock OR do I just let the MJ lie there for MONTHS before finishing it and therefore miss out on using another ball of yarn?

Oh yes, and when do I finish the jumper? Time is running out on this one!