Busy Month of November

November just flew by! I was looking at the date of my last blog entry and it was back in October... I've been busy, or trying to stay busy. I decided that I needed more adult activity and I've attended a few MOPs meeting (Mothers of Preschoolers). I've also attended my very first Knitting Group. It was a long drive, 2 hours but I wanted to meet up with people who share my common interest in Knitting.



As far as my knitting projects, I've been steadily working on some new and not so new projects. I started on the February Lady Sweater. This sweater took me about the whole month of November to complete. I think it took so long because the lace is so boring and I decided to re-do the front band on my feather weight cardigan (more on that later). The yarn I used for my February Lady Sweater is Plymouth Encore. This was one of my very first purchase from the LYS. I think I always had this sweater in mind for this yarn. Unfortunately, I'm not too thrilled with the color and one of the skeins had so many knots, it was awful! I did manage to finish my sweater. The modifications I made are to the underarm area (to eliminate most of the puffiness) and adding length to the sleeves. It's a very easy pattern , just tedious!

I also managed to re-do the front band to my Feather Weight Cardigan. I had made this cardigan in the summer using a lace weight yarn. While pulling on the band one day, I manage to snap the yarn...so I decided that this was a good time to re-do the band. I needed a break from my February Lace Sweater. I didn't realize that when I had picked up the stitches before, I did not pick up every stitch around the neck area. This time I did. I also decided to go with stockinette stitch and just do some rows of seed stitch to finish off the band. I was hoping this would eliminate some of the "curling". I switched from a size 6 needle to a size 7 needle for the seed stitch and used a size 8 needle for the bind off. I'm happy with the front being longer but I HATE the neckline now! I've decided for now, I'm not going to frog it and keep it as it. I'll probably wash it later and just let the neckline roll! (Yes, it still rolls w/o blocking). Here's a photo with the cardigan blocked:








My final project for the month of November was the Cowgirl, Astronault, Cowgirl Vest for my daughter. I usually only make projects for myself but lately, I've actually been making projects for other people. (I forgot to mention that I also made a pair of leg warmers for hubby somewhere between the February Lace Sweater and the front band of the Feather Weight Cardigan). I was inspired to make a sweater for my daughter because of preschool. I was noticing the cute outfits the other littler girls were wearing and I thought to myself that I could make something cute, if not cuter for her! So with that in mind, I searched for patterns and found this vest. I wanted to make this vest in a variegated pink/red combo but I couldn't find any yarn in those colors I liked. Instead I decided to go with a green theme. I had trouble deciding on what color to make the band, but with help from fellow raveler's and hubby I decided upon beige. The bottom half of the vest went very quickly. I was excited and looking forward to getting this done way before my mother in law's visit.... I wish that the rest of the vest went as well, but I had to frog almost every step along the way...After the decreases for each front side and each back side, the stitch count would not match up! I had to modify the decreases to make the stitches come out to 12. It was very frustating and my poor husband had to hear me complain! I feel guilty because the person was nice enough to provide a free pattern and it it a very beautiful vest! After a lot of perseverance and frogging, I did complete this sweater in a week's time. I'm happy with my color combination and I hope someday I can get my daughter to wear i for longer than a few minutes! If not, I'll always have something to show her when she's older, that her mommy lovingly made this sweater just for her!





Me with Hubby's Leg Warmers (With "X" and "O" lace pattern):

And finally my daughter's vest: (I actually found some cute butterfly buttons)!!!