Pattern here. Easy knit. I think I used size 7 circulars, but probably should go with 8’s in the future as I had yarn left over (I don’t remember how I did it last year, but never had any extra). Should take one skein of Mondial Merino Plus. Ellen saw me knitting this during exec one day, and requested one, so that’s now on the queue as well.

Machiko’s Bag

Long ago, Batia and I dyed some yarn with Kool-Aid. Actually, we have done this several times, and it always produces great yarn colors, but this was probably my favorite. For years, this yarn sat in my stash, until I returned from Japan, looked at it, and realized it was meant to become a bag for my friend Machiko. The pattern was inspired by one of the bags in the original Stitch n’ Bitch book, but it’s really just a rectangle, so I’m not sure how much “pattern” there is to it.

I did not enjoy sewing in the lining:

Ribbed Lace Bolero

This was my first mild success against lace knitting. Pattern here.

I started the bolero sometime in August. Didn’t touch it again until Thanksgiving Break, by which point I had completely forgotten how the pattern went — bad project to pause in the middle of. Luckily I made a comeback due to perseverance, lace-tutoring from Angelina, and a couple of afternoons spent watching Meteor Garden, an excellent Chinese drama.

Noriko’s Hat

This was one of those projects where I saw a picture and instantly knew I needed to knit it.

The popcorn stitch was fun, and this was a really fast and rewarding knit, and it’s quite stretchy, which eliminates most sizing issues. Stitch detail:

Ford’s Scarf
Holidays typically induce intense knitting marathons, and this year was no different. You really can’t go wrong with a multidirectional scarf, and this was by far the fastest scarf I have ever knit.

The premise of a multidirectional scarf is that you knit a bunch of triangles diagonally, which make up a rectangle. Here’s some detail, and you can see that the panels are knit in different directions, hence the multidirectionality.

Noam’s Hat
Noriko’s hat worked out just so well that I made the same one for Noam! I intend to make one for myself one of these days, but that hasn’t happened yet…

Passport WD Cozy
Hard drive <3

Who says electronics don’t need sweaters too? For storage/transportation purposes, an extra layer of protection makes a difference.

At least with the completion of this project, my hard drive need not be jealous of my Japanese electronic dictionary.

Yuka’s Bag

This is another example of finding exactly the appropriate color for someone (or so I hope).

This is Knitty’s Twiggy Tweed bag, but knit in the round to avoid terrible things like seaming. The best feature of this bag is the contrasting side panels, which are sewn in such that you can still stick your fingers through the purple part there.

This one still remains to be sent to Japan, but that will happen soon.

Really, the hard part about knitting isn’t the knitting itself, it’s the project decision, yarn acquisition, casting on appropriately (do I have the correct number of stitches?). Then the actual knitting goes smoothly, and suddenly casting off happens and there is *finishing* to be done. Sometimes this involves blocking or sewing, in which case all bets are off as to reasonable time estimates for the project. Then of course, if you’re knitting for someone far away, sending packages… all these things take time, energy, and prevent me from finishing projects.

However, I must mention that lately (i.e. the past few days) I have become addicted to yet another Web 2.0 community. Ravelry is exactly what the knitting community needed — craftster forums are good, but a little outdated in terms of social networking. In addition, its purpose is primarily to keep track of your own (and others’) knitting projects. You can add projects, select the yarn you used, record how much progress you’ve been making, uploading photos, etc. Essentially, I had a physical knitting notebook for this in the past, but this is far superior. The most fun part in my opinion, is that you can see anyone else who made something with the same pattern (i.e. anyone else who made the Twiggy Tweed bag). I highly advise any knitters to check it out:

Right now membership is invite based, but you can just sign up for an invite and it should come soonish.

So that’s sort of why I haven’t accomplished anything lately — been unable to tear myself away from Ravelry. Oh, internet.