The Whole Shebang

Where to begin? So much to report. And tons of pictures, which I tried to do at a lower resolution to avoid the slow loading of the page.

I am perhaps most excited about the serger. Here she is:



She was very expensive. But she is now mine. I got her from an amazing sewing store in Queens, called Sew Right. They have a web site, but since I can't link with my Blogger-Safari combo, you are out of luck. I have gotten many supplies there for my Bernina, and the service is just amazing. My mom and I decided that since I wanted a serger, she would combine my birthday and hannukah gifts this year and contribute some monies towards my purchase. I thought I could get one for around $300, but no dice. This one, an Elna 744, is used, and she was almost double that amount. She retails for $975 if anyone is truly interested.

This is the one stitch I have mastered, the Safety 4 Thread.



Next, I'll be trying to do a rolled hem. How freaking awesome is that? I'm going back to the store on Thursday morning for the first of two free hour-long instructional sessions. Like I said, the service and support at this store is amazing. If you are looking to get a machine, even if you come in from Brooklyn like I do, it is totally worth it to patronize this store. Let me know if anyone wants more information.

And on to the next. My lame-o sock. I am using the Socks 101 article from the Spring 05 Knitty, and Trekking XXL yarn, on size 2 dpns. I got the yarn at needles at Seaport Yarn, my first foray to that store. I have mixed feelings. The woman who helped me there was FANTSTIC, but the store itself left me feeling disorganized, confused, and bewildered. I don't know if I will go back... but I did appreciate the cash-only policy. It helps with the budget, you know.



As you can see, its less than an inch of ribbing right now, and its an understatement that I got distracted by all of my other projects. But I like it. Here's the full skein for color hounds:



I can't wait to see what its going to turn into. So far, there's some speckled black-n-white, and then a solid band of that pale, minty green. I know it'll be awesome. As this is my practice/learning pair of socks, I think I'm going to do one sock top down and the other toe-up. We'll see what happens.

Moving right along, I wanted something portable to work on, and love scarfy goodness, and feel absolutely in love with this lush yarn at Knit-A-Way in Brooklyn.



I love the colors, and it is sooooo soft. I've got about 30 inches out of one ball, on size 11's doing 2x2 rib. Its pretty. I have two more balls, and I'm thinking I can use the second one to finish up and use the third to make a hat. Or, go back to get a fourth ball so that I can make the scarf a little longer (I like to wrap twice), and then have extra for fringe.

And finally, the third and final piece of work is this mohair shrug-like thing from a house pattern from Downtown Yarns.



I'm having a heck of a time with this. The project is shown as a sample in their window, and its so cute. Its got a ruffly collar and sleeve hems, and is knit in this beautiful mohair. But they yarn they recommended for the project is pretty off gauge, and I am finding the pattern to be quite poorly written. I'm doing a lot of math on this one, and its starting to hurt my head. I have finished one sleeve, and am ready to progress to the back and back-neck shaping, to continue on down to the other sleeve. And then, similar to the OSW, you seam the sleeves and then pick up in the round around the edges for the ruffle border. That's done in short rows, which I am excited about. However, I think I'm using more yarn than I should be, given the gauge problems, and I don't even know if this is going to fit me. I should have just started over at the very beginning to try to match the gauge instead of fudging the pattern, but now, after doing almost a whole skein of mohair, I am quite loath to pull it out and start over with much bigger needles. I have a dreaded feeling that this might be a throwaway project. But, its keeping me busy in the short term, so I guess I'll just keep fudging. Or, how hard do we think it'll be to frog mohair and start over with bigger needles?

Whew. All done. And now I'm exhausted!