Thursday, October 8, 2009

Knitwear To The Rescue

Thankfully, through all my sewing abominations, there's knitting. I love knitting.

~*sigh*~

Knitting is so nice and relaxing, and I can do it anywhere I want. The instructions are so very precise and you can't make a mistake unless you're not paying attention. And when you make a mistake, it doesn't royally suck to fix it (at least, I don't think it does. I know some people disagree). And it doesn't expect too much out of you. And with minimal knowledge, you can make some really awesome stuff.

So here are some knitted wearable items I've put together recently:


Some knitted lace-wrist Victorian fingerless gloves, pattern from http://www.ravelry.com/. I wore these as part of a semi-steampunk costume at San Japan this year, and I've worn them a few times to work, etc.

My first real pair of socks, made from elann.com 100% cotton Lustrado in Nougat. A few things I will never do again? 1) I will never knit socks with 100% cotton yarn again. It hurt my hands, stressed my needles, and feels horrible when I wear them. 2) I will never knit socks with nougat-colored yarn again. So. Boring. 3) Actually, I may never knit socks again, period. It was extremely time-consuming, and while it was a good project to carry with me in my purse for my bus commute and what-not, it was just, you know, not very fun. Now, I did end up knitting my husband some ninja tabi socks later, but those didn't count because they were worsted weight and, you know, fun.


Lime green worsted weight fingerless gloves. These took maybe an hour, and only because I'd just made a really badass scarf with this yarn and had a bunch leftover. I still have some leftover, along with some black worsted weight leftover from the tabi socks, so I'm thinking of combining the two in some beautiful way. Like maybe making a Space Invaders scarf or something.



My Neo-Victorian Opera Gloves, made from a pattern on Ravelry. The pattern itself wasn't that great, but these were kind of fun to make, and even more fun to put on. That's t-shirt yarn I'm using as lacing there, and the black and green bit is from the screenprinting on the t-shirt I cut up. Anyway, I think they have a funky, punky kind of look and I'm really looking forward to having an opportunity to wear them.




It occurs to me that I've made a lot of gloves, which is weird on two levels: first, I don't like gloves that much. But they sure are fun to make! And second, I live in South Texas. I have to wear gloves for all of six weeks in this city, and even then, fingerless gloves don't cut it - I need full coverage to protect all of my appendages from the absolutely brutal wind and rain we get here around Christmastime. So fingerless gloves=for fashion only, which I guess I can live with.




I was about to cast on my second of ten or so Christmas presents I'm knitting this year (the first was the badass scarf) when my five-year-old daughter insisted that I never make anything for her, which is kind of true. So I felt guilty and put away the second Christmas present and knit her up some really cute striped fingerless gloves. When I was done with those, I looked at how much yarn I had left. Long story short, I clearly had to make her a matching scarf. Then I'll almost certainly have to make my son some gloves as well and possibly also a hat.




Then I'll finish my Christmas knitting.




Really.




(Do they celebrate Christmas in hell?)

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