FO: another colorblock bias blanket.

Posted on May 22, 2015 by barefootrooster

Turns out that actually knitting produces actual finished objects! Even though we’re solidly into warmer temperatures, I’m excited to get this in the mail and to its intended owners, dear friends who had a second baby boy a handful of months ago.

I know they don’t exactly need warmth right now, but I’m hoping this will be useful down the road.

It’s actually a little chilly here right now, and I didn’t mind at all having this blanket on my lap as I wove in all the ends last night!

A classic academic’s dinner. (Black bean soup atop a pile of books.)

This guy, not at all interested in whatever I was doing yesterday.

Life is so hard for this dog.

And eek! I picked up my regalia yesterday for this weekend’s graduation. I’m not doing the whole big procession-thing, or even the hooding (the PhD ceremony where the dean puts the fancy hood–the thing on the right in this picture, with the blue velvet signaling the doctorate–on you), but I am going to attend my department’s graduation ceremony on Sunday, and for that, I need the fancy robes. I sort of think it isn’t going to feel real until sometime in the middle of the fall semester, when I’ve gotten used to being called Dr. Rooster or Professor Rooster by my students, but I will say that trying on this stuff yesterday helped a little bit…

FO: ANOTHER colorblock bias blanket.

Posted on June 12, 2014 by barefootrooster

Hi, friends. Haven’t been blogging, but clearly, I have been knitting. (And writing, and even running/working out.) Not quite settled into a summer routine, but closer than I was a few weeks ago. And I’m pretty sure this blanket pattern is helping. I’ve got such a backlog of wedding gifts to knit, and this pattern is perfect: easy enough to knit after a long day, fun for playing with color and yarns in my stash, and really, really lovely when it’s all done. Here’s my latest:

The colors are more accurate above, but here’s one shot with the flash on:

It’s a bit grey and rainy, so there isn’t as much natural light for picture-taking as I’d like, but you get the idea. With this one, I worried less about the amount of yarn I had for each color, and just picked colors I thought might be nice. I really like the mint green Malabrigo stripe in there, and with the switch to some darker greens and blues near the end, I think I’ve changed who this is for! (Not to worry, though. I’ve already started a third…)

Other stuff happening around here?

Morning “helping.”

Our first of many weekly walks en route to picking up the farm share. (Paws/toes in the water.)

Lots of water and mist after some steady rain.

Boh, mid-yawn. Love this dog.

FO: colorblock bias blanket.

Posted on May 27, 2014 by barefootrooster

Tada! I love how this turned out, and I finished it in time to give it to M. and J. on Sunday. I’m bummed that I won’t be able to attend their wedding next month, so it was nice to at least get to give them their present in person.

The blanket, folded.

Boh, napping.

Happy dog, after a walk that got cut short by a downpour!

Stunning sunset.

More napping.

Farmers’ market flowers.

Boh with a ball of yarn that’s attached to colorblock bias blanket #2!

Yep. This one is also a wedding present.

I’m absolutely loving these colors together. Hoping to make some serious progress on my overdue wedding knitting this summer. (You know, in addition to making progress on my dissertation…)

FO: turnstile.

Posted on May 4, 2014 by barefootrooster

I LOVE this. And I can’t wait to make more. I might cast on another TODAY.

I snapped these pictures very late last night. I figured I’d kitchener the two ends of the tube together right after dinner and then have plenty of time for other things.

Wrong. The grafting took hours — in part because I haven’t kitchenered anything in quite a while, but also because to kitchener many many stitches you need to have a pretty long yarn tail, and it kept getting caught on the other needles, tangled, etc.

But worth it? Totally. The stripes are addicting, and I anticipate wearing this (and any others I might make) a lot. My handspun eternity scarves might be the knitwear I wear most frequently, and I think this pattern (or some variation on it) is a great way for me to use beautiful sock yarn. (You know, because I’ve realized that I mostly wear socks with boots, so you can’t see them.)

In other news, I took this dog on a great walk. It was clear we were going to get pretty muddy — this is a before picture.

Doesn’t this picture just look like spring? So much growth in the woods.

Happy dog.

We were muddier than this toes/paws picture lets on. And we were quite content. (Though Boh needs to work on actually sitting on the blanket I keep in the back of my car for post-walk muddy dogs. He just moves it out of the way…)

Also, we’ve reached that point in the spring where I can put on a fleece and take my coffee out to the porch. See that new french press? My dear friend D, the person who goes with that adorable dog who visited us last month, remembered me saying that my beloved stainless steel french press was on its last legs. The mesh ripped, so my coffee was rather gritty. That was a year ago. So when D came to visit, he brought this: a bigger press, which is stainless steel on the inside, but has an insulated bottom and handle so I don’t burn myself on it. And the lid has a screen, so there’s no chance of coffee grounds getting into my coffee. Also, no spillage while pouring, which means I can bring it out to the porch. Perfection.

FO: lila.

Posted on April 16, 2014 by barefootrooster

Lila, blocking. The pattern called for blocking the sweater before knitting the neckline, and then my friend D. and his new dog came to visit, which is why it has taken me a few days to share this with you. (Pictures of his sweet dog, Honey, below.)

None of my pictures of Lila do it justice. The lighting is terrible, and I’m including this shot so you can see the hemline, even though I think I’ll wear this over a tank instead of over a v-neck tee like this one.

Again, awkward pose, but this shot has some of the best lighting in the set I snapped yesterday. You know, when I knit the neckline and then put on the sweater. And then didn’t take it off.

This shot shows how pleased I am with the armhole/shoulder area of the sweater. This construction seems to fit my shoulders better than any top-down raglan I’ve knit. Hooray! I think I might block this one more time, a bit more aggressively, to get a smidge more length and a tad less width in the finished product, but I’m really happy with how this turned out. I promise to take better pictures the next time I wear it.

And here’s Honey, perched in the window.

And here she is napping with Boh after A LOT of playing.

And here she is, absolutely out cold in my grandfather’s chair. Love her.

FO: houseguest handspun seaman’s cap

Posted on February 17, 2014 by barefootrooster

For those of you who’ve been following along, last month I finished the handspun seaman’s cap for P., our October houseguest. He was kind enough to send along this shot of the hat in action AND to let me put his face on the internet:

Pretty sure this picture comes from some ice caves in the Apostle Islands. (P. works remotely, and is adventuring westward. Right now, I think he’s in Montana.)

This was a super fun project to work on, especially because P. gave me extensive feedback on the fit, both during and after the knitting. (And he picked out the fiber.)

Sounds like this time around the fit in the crown is just right, but the ribbing could be more snug. (Snugger? That can’t be right.) I wonder if the issue is the sproinginess (to continue making up words) of my handspun? (I am a little rusty in the spinning department these days.) I couldn’t have knit the ribbing on needles that were any smaller, and the stitch count seems to be right for the rest of the hat. Would a 1×1 rib be tighter than a 1×2 rib? You know, for next time.

Alright. Time to stop writing on the blog and get back to writing the dissertation. Happy Monday, folks.

the new year.

Posted on January 15, 2014 by barefootrooster

This is what getting ready for a conference looks like, especially as I’m still working to put together appropriate academic “costumes” for myself.

The conference I attended just after New Year’s was back in DC, which meant plenty of time to see dear friends. And admire bike racks outside coffee shops.

No trip to DC is complete for me without Teaism. Its proximity to the museum I was working at last winter helped solidify it as the place for comfort food: really good chai, restorative spicy chicken noodle soup, amazing salty oat cookies. The polar vortex extended my DC trip, which mostly meant I ate more of all of the things at Teaism.

I’ve been borrowing this sweatshirt for more than a decade. How crazy/wonderful is that? (Just when I’m visiting and cold.)

A beautiful latte at the Tryst inside the Phillips Collection.

And my lovely workspace inside Champ and N.’s fantastic apartment.

The hat for P. wasn’t quite right (he tried it on in DC) so I ripped back and reknit it.

I think it turned out even prettier the second time around, and I’m hoping it fits perfectly. I’m in between knitting projects right now — I need to find something simple and soothing to balance everything else going on in this week before the semester begins. So much to do!

FO: snowbird.

Posted on December 19, 2013 by barefootrooster

I love the pockets.

The sweater is a little slouchy, but overall I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. And just in time, too. These pictures are from last month, but since then, we’ve had cold and snowy weather.

Sweetness.

Squash soup.

A few pictures from the last good fall walk we took before the weather turned.

This light. So lovely.

It’s been a very busy fall around here, folks. So busy that I missed my blogiversary! Six years and counting now, even though I’ve slowed down a bit recently. Hope you’re all well.

FO: nanny’s mittens.

Posted on December 18, 2012 by barefootrooster

These little mittens have a big story. Long-time readers may remember when my grandmother, Nanny, gave me all sorts of old patterns and yarn. I donated the yarn and kept the patterns, along with a small ziplock bag with these mittens inside. They were finished, except for the thumb of the second mitten. (And there was a third, which looks to me like something went a bit awry with the beginnings of the thumb.)

It didn’t take much to improvise a thumb for the second mitten, and now I’ve got a pair. I’m extra excited about this because there’s a great-grandchild in our family now, and this will be her first Christmas. I’m planning to take these mittens to show Nanny, and to remind her that she did most of the knitting, and to ask her if she wants to be part of my surprise: we’ll wrap them up and give them to our family’s newest addition, my cousin’s 11 month-old daughter. The mittens will be a bit too big for her this year, but I’m not sure Nanny will be quite as lucid next Christmas. Sewn, knitted, and crafted gifts from her were always a big part of our family Christmas celebrations when I was little, and I love the idea that there will be something made by her hands under this year’s tree.

And there’s this guy, holding onto his favorite bone. It has nothing to do with the mittens, but I had to share.

View from the porch, sometime last week.

Homemade hummus with toast.

Stay tuned for more holiday knitting…if I finish it in time!

FO: cider press hat.

Posted on December 11, 2012 by barefootrooster

Here are a couple of pictures from that walk I told you we took on Sunday.

I wore my new hat. (I’m much happier with it than I appear to be in this picture. This is clearly me focusing too much on keeping my eyes open.)

I cast on the hat from the Cider Press Set, an Amy Christoffers hat and mitts pattern pair that I purchased a few weeks ago when they were on sale. This ribbed and waffled combination is awesome: squishy, stretchy, and oh-so-warm.

Also, totally addicting to knit. I made this hat out of most of a skein of Berocco Ultra Alpaca, and I love it. Good thing this color has my brother written all over it, or I’d keep it too! (I might make one for me out of handspun.) I used US 4 and US 6 needles because I couldn’t find my 3s and 5s.

Hooray for last minute (and late-night) Christmas knitting. I’m so excited to send this, along with the rest of his present, to my brother, who has to stay in Colorado for the holidays.

barefoot rooster

cockadoodle-doo: one rooster's ramblings

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