Saturday, November 12, 2005

She knits! For coffee to-go cups & water bottles

I've been carrying around in my purse the cast-on stitches for a pretty pink child's sock, but it's on a circular needle so I can learn to knit a sock on a circular needle ("magic loop" method). Big problem with this: I'm really busy and haven't been inclined to sit down in a quiet moment and figure out how to do this.

So. I stopped at my wonderful local yarn shop and bought some sport-weight wool yarn in fun colors, went home and got a good size of double-pointed needles from my wonderful passed-along and inherited stash, and cast on some clear red wool for a to-go coffee cup sleeve.

I've had plans for a while to make a bunch of these to donate for our parish's annual holiday bazaar, and I know each one will take me maybe two hours -- they're ribbed sock cuffs, basically -- and I also know that this is easy and fun to do... so now I have a proper purse project. I have three weeks until the bazaar, and I think I can make a bunch. For the bazaar I plan to display one on a (new) to-go coffee cup, and another on a water bottle!

I cast on Thursday evening while watching TV (and ripped it out and went down a few needle sizes and cast on again). I knit a round or two while chatting with friends during our MOMS Club visit to the local natural history museum yesterday. I knit a wide stripe of contrasting yarn and switched back to the main color while watching TV last night. This morning I'm within a couple of rows of binding off. Yay!

This coffee cup sleeve and a couple more will be in the local university's colors. I also have a thicker, variegated, dark red wool yarn, and more sport-weight plain black, pink, yellow, medium blue, and another color I forget. It really helped that they were all on clearance!! The coffee cup sleeves will have ribbing in the top and bottom thirds, and I'll play around in the middle third -- slip-stitch patterns, and various stitches and second colors. I also bought some Squiggle in a mix of hot colors (oranges, yellows, reds) and another very fun yarn in pinks, to knit into the first few rows of a couple of coffee cup sleeves for just crazy fun.

It all makes me smile. Just the thing to have in my purse or tote for the crazy, crazy week that begins today.

5 comments:

Emily said...

Sounds like you're having too much fun with all those colors.

I'm planning my convention knitting. Socks will certainly be involved. . .

Barbara said...

Oh yes, I plan to sit or stand around at convention in spare moments and do a little calming, centering knitting :)

Barbara said...

I may have left the wrong impression about convention. In the past as a convention delegate I've done needlework during the business sessions to keep my hands busy and my mind focused on the business.

This time I'm on the organizing committee, the members of which during the convention will be working hard to keep everything running as smoothly as possible.

I'll be a table host at the Thursday evening dinner, a troubleshooter for Friday-Saturday registration and hospitality, and occasional help at our diocesan Daughters of the King table. Centering and calming will be a good thing. Also coffee, much coffee, but I intend to stop that by noon. Hehe.

Emily said...

I'll look for you on Thursday evening, then (not that I won't look for you other times. . .).

See you then!

Thanks for all the hard work the committee is doing for us.

Barbara said...

You're welcome, LOL!

On Thursday evening you'll find me with a glass of wine before dinner...