My UnWrapped Short Row Technique - Circular Knitting

I wrote up this techinque well over a year ago, and posted it at a knitting board. For some reason it occured to me today that I should post it on my blog too. So here it is, the never fail, no gaps, not fussy, easy as pie, short row wrap technique. It combines all the best of the wrapped technique and the Japanese short row technique without the typical gaps of the first and the fiddly pin business of the second. It's fast, it's easy and it just plain works!

This tutorial is written for those who are knitting circularly and will knit in both wrapped stitches from the right side. If you're knitting flat, see the Flat Knitting UnWrapped Short Row tutorial.
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I've been playing around with how I handle the wrapped stitches of short rows. (Can you believe someone else is bringing it up again????) Anyway, I've found a great way to hide that second wrap - so much so that the wraps are pretty much invisible even on the back side. I discovered it by accident and have been using it ever since.It's never failed me, and I want to know if it will work for others, too. So try it and tell me what kind of results you get! I think it's pretty easy to do, too!


UnWrapped Short Row Tutorial

As you work your short rows, wrap the stitch as normal. When you get to your first wrap:

You have now knit back to your FIRST wrap:

1.) Slip the wrapped stitch off the Left needle & gently pull the wrap off the stitch. (I use my right needle to do this.)



2.) Place the original stitch back on the Left needle. Place the wrap on the Left needle as well.



3.)Knit the wrap and the original stitch as one stitch. (Like K2Tog)



I've found that it really doesn't make a difference how you slip the wrap onto the needle - it becomes invisible by the next round. In this picture of the backside of the wrap, the wrap is really loose, so you can see it. Normally, it's virtually invisible.


Knit as usual until you reach your second wrap. For the SECOND wrap:

This is worked the same way, except you reverse the position of the wrap and the original stitch.



1.) Slip the wrapped stitch off the Left needle & gently pull the wrap off the stitch. (I use my right needle to do this.)



2.) Place the original stitch on the Left needle. Then place the wrap on the Left needle After the original stitch. (This reverses the original order of the stitch and wrap.) Simply pull the wrap untwisted across the back of the work.



The original stitch and the wrap back on the Left needle.



3.)Knit the wrap and the original stitch as one stitch. (Like K2Tog)



The backside of the second wrap. Original stitch in blue, wrap in orange.

Baking Day - the itinerary

I'm making this a separate post so that all of you afflicted with Holiday Stress Disorder like myself can skip my stressful musings and get straight to the chocolate and "holiday cheer".

Baking Day 2006

This Saturday is Baking Day. It's the Christmas version of Pie Night. Pie Night takes place the day before Thanksgiving, when all my brothers and their families come to my parents house for a pie feast. Every gets their own pie. A whole one. All to themselves. Flavor of their choice. So we have a soup dinner and pies galore. It's fabulous fun, even if it does require baking 17 or more pies in a single day. So imagine that only Christmas. Oh, and different family members.

Baking Day, in the grand tradition, involves any female family members that we can think of, bringing the stuff for three or four different Christmas goody recipes of their choice, baking them for 5 or 6 hours and then piling every available flat surface in my parent's house full of the goodies for diving and packaging. Oh, yes. It's really that grand. Several aunts, cousins, sisters in laws, etc. are there. Usually there's enough chocolate to feed an army for a Russian winter, not counting the other cookies, candies, treats and cakes. It's dessert heaven and so much fun. Last year, I just stopped packing buckets of treats into my car when I hit 8. Really, I wouldn't want to be excessive, now.

This year's menu for me includes: Peppermint Chocolate Cupcakes, Katie's World Famous Booze Balls (They used to just be rum truffles, but have now expanded into rum, coconut rum, amaretto, Irish Cream, Kahlua and any other liquor that I might take a fancy to that year. The flavors vary according to available booze, prep time and my taste at the moment.), Mr. N's Favorite Snickerdoodle Cookies, and if time allows Orange Cranberry Scones.

Other items of interest from family members:
* Sarah's Baclava
* Chocolate Dipped Pretzel Rods
* Haystacks (chocolate dipped low mein noodles)
* Big Round Sugar Cookies
* Scotcheroos
* Spritz cookies

Now if you are counting, that's at minimum 9 full batches of goodies, plus scones if I get there. And those are only the ones that people listed on the Evite invitation. I know for a fact that all the women genetically linked to me will add at least 1 more recipe to their line up when they go to make out their grocery list. They'll hear that overpowering voice warning them that someone might not be able to come and then we'll be short and wouldn't one more thing help alleviate that situation? Plus, if they are able to come one more thing won't be overwhelming.

Oh, yes. I know this well. So who's going to send me their address so I can spread some Christmas Baking Cheer their way?

Oh, and I nearly forgot that I also have a Christmas Party the evening of baking day. We're going because it involves nice wine, hors d'ourves and no children. That's a rarity around here. Adult conversation...imagine! For that we're taking champagne and a homemade, decedent, chocolate smothered Kahlua laced cheesecake with shortbread crust. mmm.........

It's official. I'm nuts.

This meditation probably does not come as a surprise to those of you who know me. I might looks normal, but underneath is some not-so-deeply-disguised craziness. Not of the actual mental illness kind, more the self inflicted oddities that make you go "hmmm!" in a reflective and puzzled tone. Besides having three children within an 18 month span of time (twins and the X, the second and third of whom were a LARGE surprise to me) I have set up a crazy schedule of business dyeing and present knitting during the very, very, extraordinarily busy months of Novemeber and December. I should have known. Really I should have, but things seem so innocent when you're blithely scheduling them in a vacuum. The vacuum where your kids are sleeping peacefully and you honestly think that they will not interupt your work during the day because they aren't right now. Mhm. All you mothers and fathers laugh with me now. Oh, and the thought that my twin two and a half year olds would hit the dreaded "Terrible Twos" stage during the scheduled craziness us just icing on the cake.

So it's Yarn of the Month for me this month - 50 extra skeins of dyeing, or 12.5 pounds of mohair yarn if that sounds more impressive. And NOT surprisingly all the sweet YOTMers are busy too, which is delaying their color choice....which of course means that I cannot dye their selections as they're being placed because they're not being placed.

The Yarn Love Ebay store has been doing well, and people have been placing orders without provocation. Really. They're just finding me and placing orders. For the past 5 out of 6 weeks, I've had to have auction style listings in order for people to find the store listings. They're not as easily found during regular searches and so they sit if I don't have other auctions to get people to them. Now, people are buying stuff from the store without any auctions being active. The marketer in me is rejoicing, "They're coming! They're here! All the keyword research and auction style planning has paid off! Yipeee!". The shipper and inventory manager is going, "Oh, dear. That wasn't supposed to sell! I didn't plan on that and now I must dye more. eeek!"

General holiday frivolity is reigning. It's one party after the other around here. Which is great, and fun and fattening due to all the baking taking place. However, it's eating into my weekends which is further reducing my dyeing time. Oh, well. At least I'm receiving a steady stream of dessert calories to eat my way through my stress.

Travel - we have a 10-11 hour car ride at the end of next week with all three children to get to my in laws. They are so overdue for a Christmas visit, it's not even funny. We were there our first Christmas as a married couple, and for the next three years I have either been too pregnant or the kids have been way-too-small for the car ride and the visiting. I am not taking my dyeing with us, so take that week out of the schedule.

My long lost friend, Lisa is coming!!! Lisa and I were roommates in college and we don't see each other very often at all. I am so excited that she is flying in to see us. It's so sweet of her to come and I've been missing her. All phone conversations generally end abruptly by one of my children screaming, so catching up will be great. She arrives the day before we get back and will be here for several days after.

Sigh. It will get done. Right after I stop panicking.

Oh Christmas Tree

It's Christmas time in the bungalow! Well, at least it's Advent, the season of preparation for the feast of Christmas. I am very proud to report that my Christmas knitting is done. And when I say done, I really mean done. The kind of done that means if for some heinous reason Christmas actually came tomorrow, I could hand over the knitted items to their recipients without a regret. The kind of done that means the finishing work and the end weaving wasn't left for 6 or more weeks because I moved onto another project. It's a good feeling to be done.

I must admit that the reason I was done with my Christmas knitting by December 10th this year is because I set my sights very low. In fact, I think I've done less knitting this year than I did last year. Last year the girlies were 19 months old, and I had a two month old. Little X was (and still is) very mellow, so I was able to camp out on the couch and knit. Now he's starting to walk, and well, the house is more chaotic. But, I have accomplished all my goals and have been setting some new ones. I'll get those done if only my yarn arrives on time.

So far this year I have knit two Totoro hats from the free Hello Yarn pattern.

I knit one as written, and the second I reversed and knit from the top up. I had a bit of trouble with the row gauge - it was way, way off, even though I was using a heavier yarn than called for & it should have turned out longer than needed. The first hat was knit and ripped out three times before I got it to be long enough. I do completely detest (and suck at) the figure 8 cast one, so I knit it from the bottom up and kitchenered the top. It took me much less time. I also added ear flaps and ties to the hat so that it will stay on my wiggly girls heads. Oh, and I knit it big and fulled it for warmth and ease of embroidery. The pattern is great - I just rearranged things per my personal preference in knitting. Misses E & G are enamored with the Totoro movie and I know they'll love the hats. What a clever idea.

I knit them "matching" pairs of mittens. The grey base yarn is the same as was used for the hats, and then I used a skein of Noro Silk Garden for the colored stripes. I loved working with the Noro. It was my first time using it and the color gradations are incredible. Lots of fun to watch it develop in my hands as I knit along. I had less than a yard left over after I finished the last mitten. It was a close call. Not too bad, if I say so myself. The merino that I used for the hats (incidentally the same stuff I used for my dad's scarf) just lasts and lasts and lasts. So I got both hats and all the mittens out of 6 ounces. I used one 50 gram ball of the Noro, color #87.

My dad's scarf is the Open Cable Scarf which I highly enjoyed knitting. I do have a few cables that crossed the wrong way, but shhh! No one will notice if I don't point them out. It was a great pattern for a scarf. Complex enough to be interesting, but easily memorized and knit while watching Lost. The scarf is fairly long - my dad is 6'2" and I got his scarf out of about 5 1/2 ounces of the same merino that I used on the girlies' hats. If you're looking for some, you can find it in my ebay store as Anne Shirley. It's great stuff. A pleasure to knit with and it lasts forever. mhm. I kettle dyed the yarn, and it's very pretty blues, greens and olives. The picture is making the olive look much more mustard than it does in person. It has a nice blending quality in person that is just lost on my digital camera.

Now if all goes well, I still plan on knitting some cotton face cloths for my mother in law, a hat for little X and a hat for Mr. N. We'll see if I get it done. I dreamt both hats up last night as I was laying in bed awake, and the face cloths late last week when Mr. N casually mentioned his mother would like something hand knit for Christmas. I'd whip her up something really quick, like a hat, but she's allergic to wool, so I have to send out for the yarn. Hopefully some pretty, pampering face cloths will be just the thing. Fast enough to get done and conveying lots of love. I'll post on my progress with the hats. I'm planning on combining the cable from the Open Cable Scarf pattern with a simple 6 X 6 cable and decreasing in the purl stitches in between. We'll see how it goes, I guess!

Who stole November?

Seriously, I woke up and it's December already. Ugh. It always happens this time of the year. November is a very important month for me (and my family). My birthday is in November - the 12th. X's birthday is in November - the 7th (even though his due date was Halloween. I was so bummed, as I wanted a Halloween baby. Our friend's daughter's birthday is on Halloween and she has so much fun! Plus, I started getting a bit cranky when the third child was a week late. Just a little cranky. I'm a pretty nice pregnant lady.)

My parents left for Rome the day after X's birthday and were gone for 10 days. We see them at least two times a week, and all the kids are very, very attached to them and of course they were missed exceedingly. Luckily, my mom is so attached to our kiddos that she called everyday just to hear their happy little voices.....ok, and actually a lot of crying and carrying on over who was going to talk on the phone RIGHT NOW to Mama (grandma).

And Mr. N's sister, her husband and daughter moved into our area from the great state of Colorado. It's been really nice to have them around and get to spend time with them. Their little girl is right in between our girlies and X, so they all play together and have great fun. The girlies are so funny. If their cousin has been here the night before, they get up asking for RayRay because they're convinced that she must still be here and is just waiting for them to come play. It's too precious. I love the outlook that kids have on life. It's simple and fresh and unexpected.

I have got to get spinning again. I've been so busy knitting and dyeing this fall that the spinning is really neglected. My poor wheels - I'm sure they're lonely! Am I crazy that I spun like mad over the summer and now that it's winter I've given it up for knitting? It wouldn't be mad if I was actually using the yarn I spun over the summer for the fall knitting, but alas I've been using purchased yarn. It's very nice stuff, but not my handspun. I'm still a little bit scared to use handspun for a large project because I'm convinced the gauge will be all off. I am currently enrolled in the Spin Me a Treasure Swap, so I am looking forward to spinning for that. Yay! The swap partners were supposed to go out the 1st, but technical difficulties have prevented it, so I'm waiting on the edge of my seat for it. I don't know if they'll be another swap - this one is already closed - but you can check it out here. The forum is both in French and English, so don't close the window if you see something you don't recognise.

My New Obsession

The knitting podcast. Oh yes, this is what I've been waiting for. Now if I can just wrestle the Zen away from Mr. N (Nevermind that I spent months saving up to gift this to him for his birthday in August....) I could take it with me where ever I go. For the mean time, I am almost-sorta-mostly content to sit at the computer and listen to these wonderful tidbits of yarn and fiber and knitting related sound bites. My current favorite is Cast-On. Check it out. Brenda Dayne does a phenomenal job of creating an interesting and well produced podcast. You can take my word for it. I am a tv/radio communications major and used to spend hours upon hours in the university basement, surrounded by black, foam lined walls editing radio shows. Now you know just how deep the geekiness runs.

It has been an extremely busy fall around these parts. I'm not sure I'm coping and things are about to get much more intense. Mr. N's sister and her husband are going to be moving into our area in 3 weeks. On very, very short notice. It's a good thing - Sarah and I used to spend a lot of time together before Nick and I were married. She attended the same college Mr.N and I did during our senior year. It will be nice to have her 10 miles away instead of 10 hours away. Lest you think I am a big meanie, the reason that this is very intense is because Jake, Sarah's husband, interviewed for his new job at 4pm last Friday, and got the job offer yesterday evening. We are their only family for several states, so we're on for moving duty, moral support and general acclimation to a new place. It's funny how some big changes in life happen so fast. I'm not sure how well I would handle a cross country move on short notice....but I'm one of those people who likes to think and plan things to death.

I have been dyeing and knitting and knitting and dyeing. The yarn shelves are very well lined and I need to start moving some stock. Look for new yarns soon at both websites. www.kandfshops.com is the place to go for the very latest in my creations. It's the easiest place for me to stock, and our customers don't seem to mind when I dye new colorways in small batches. It's kind of like my testing ground for colors and yarns.

I have just introduced a fabulous new yarn. It's produced on a small, farm mill here in the United States and is available on a very limited basis in some LYS. Ok, they're local to someone, just not me. A customer clued me into the source and I was able to snag an account with them even though they are offering their yarn at wholesale to a very limited number of people. Currently, I am the only one handpainting this yarn. It is a fine merino, and one of the softest, loftiest yarns I have ever had the pleasure of working with. Shepherd's Wool is available at K&F Shops.

Sale! Sale! Sale!

If you're looking for a good deal on yarn, stop by K&F Shops this Friday at noon EST. It's our quarterly sale. I will be stocking plenty of yarns at clearance prices. They've just been hanging around, and it's time that they found a new home. Who doesn't like fabulous yarn deals, anyway? And I will be listing some of the fabulous, new Shepherd's Wool at a 10% discount.

I was going to end the post with a cute picture of Miss G and I in matching hats. It was actually some recent knitting I did for a customer, and I needed to try them on to make sure they came out to a normal size...however, my image host is not loading. Stay tuned. I will put them up. The kids are going through an adorable, I must be shown off stage...if I could just find the time to load up the pics.

Life & Such

Someone please tell me where September went! I'm actually wondering what happened to August and it's now October. It's been a crazy busy month around these parts. Good busy - nothing in particular, just life. The new site is up and running. We're still tweaking and adding and improving, but we'd love for you to drop in. I'll be working on the first newsletter later this week. For now, I'll leave you with this to ponder:

What kind of knitting needles are you?

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You are "turbo" charged.Fast moving and classy, you get things done with power and grace. Your expensive tastes can be deceiving, since what you really value is quality and efficiency. As you're careening around those corners in life, finishing a dozen knitted objects each month, stop and smell the roses. Don't miss the beauty of process!
Take this quiz!http://quizilla.com/redirect.php?statsid=17&url=http://www.quizilla.com/users/larissmix/quizzes/What+kind+of+knitting+needles+are+you%3F">quiz!
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The Top Secret Project

www.shopyarnlove.com
10 yarns, 4 dyers, hundreds of possibilites.

9 Days and Counting

Top Secret Project goes live in 9 days. It will be a very good thing. The past four months have involved lots of planning and doing getting ready for the major event. This is of course the last stretch - then I'll see if all the hard work was worth it! I hope so! My shelves are burgoening with new yarns and new colorways looking for an adoptive family. I've also sought out new suppliers for the endeavor and the research was worth it. The new yarns are top notch and definitely luxe!

So basically, until the new site is up and running the way I want it to, I will be a computer hermit. You know - where I sit online day after day, hour after hour hammering out the details and mixing it up with lovely yarn photos.

What could be better than lovely yarn in the fall?

Missing in Action

There has been action folks....just not on the blog. But around the bungalow yarn has been streaming into and out of my dyepot faster than normal. In preparation for the Top Secret Project which launches in 24 days, I have dyed up over six pounds of yarn and more is being added to the total everyday.

In addition to that, I have to send a very warm thank-you to Sarah of TeleKnitter for her suggestion of using these shelves. I've been on the search for perfect yarn shelves for months, but until Sarah came along, I only knew what I didn't want and what wasn't working - which, truth be told, is not very helpful at actually finding what you need. Unfortunately, the search was further extended for three weeks as I travelled to various local stores searching for these shelves, which they didn't carry. I finally Froogled them, found a great source with free shipping and life was happy. I haven't completely finished the stash move, but soon it will be done. I hope. for your eye feasting pleasure - yarn on shelves!
Blank Yarn:


Small Personal Stash:


6 + Pounds of Yarn for the Top Secret Project: