Tuesday, June 30, 2009

The Ron Weasley Blanket

Note: I am sure that a very clever prop designer created the blanket found on Ron Weasley's bed in the Harry Potter films. I am not that prop designer; I am merely a fan who had a lot of random yarn to use up. I was asked by a user on Ravelry to create a pattern page others could link to when making their own Ron Weasley blankets.

Materials:
A whole bunch of yarn in various exciting colors that knits to about 5 sts/10 rows per inch in garter stitch.
Appropriate needles

I would also suggest finding one or two good screenshots from the films to get a feel for the blanket. If you can't make these yourself, The Leaky Cauldron has a great screenshot database.

Guidelines for squares:
I found 7 inch squares looked the most authentic to me.
You'll want to knit some of your squares solid. The patterned squares should be striped patterns only, not stitch patterns. This is a garter stitch blanket.
Knit a few squares on the diagonal.
Include some heathered yarns, or some tweedy yarns.

Guidelines for finishing:
The squares in the original blanket are arranged so that the garter ridges are aligned alternating vertically and horizontally. Basically, you will always be stitching a cast-on or bind-off edge of one square to a row edge of another. Except for the diagonal squares, obviously.

Tuesday, June 09, 2009

startitis

It's not really the most creative of blog post titles, but last night between the hours of 9:00 and 10:00 I started four projects. There was the previously mentioned top-down cardigan, a pair of mittens for a friend, a scarf, and this hat (Ravelry link), which I have since finished. The scarf is probably going to get frogged, I don't really love it. Really, I don't love knitting scarves, but this past winter I noticed that while I have many lovely individual winter accessories, most of them don't really match. Hence, I have a vague summer goal of knitting hats, scarves, and mittens to match what I've already knit. We'll see what happens. So far I've only managed to produce another hat that doesn't match anything else I own.

Monday, June 08, 2009

are you a good knitter or a bad knitter?

The situation: Many months ago I finished knitting the second sock of a pair of Sidewinders. The sock has been languishing on its circular needle, waiting for me to suck it up and finish the never-ending final graft. Today, I decided I want to knit a top-down fingering weight cardigan without leaving the apartment for supplies.

The good knitter would take twenty minutes and finish the graft on the Sidewinders, especially since they're for my boyfriend's mother and she knows I'm knitting them.

The bad knitter would find a pair of straight needles in a close-enough size, transfer all the stitches, and carry on with the cardigan.

Today, I'm a bad knitter. Oops.

because I have updated my facebook status too many times

Let's skip all the nonsense about how I haven't blogged in forever and why, it's very boring. Right? Right.

The cat level has increased from one to three. Cat number two, Windsor, joined Sassy and I in January. Windsor enjoys climbing my curtains and clawing the carpet. Cat number three, Max, joined us in April. Max enjoys sitting in the bathtub and eating my yarn. And by eating I mean...eating. Literally. I can't leave yarn out anymore. Or toilet paper, for that matter.

My knitting has been all over the place. The only constant has been socks, and that's really just because they fit in my purse. I'm pretty sure the day I pack a complicated knitting project to work on during downtime at my job is the day we'll suddenly be so busy I won't have time to breathe, let alone knit. I feel my coworkers won't thank me for pushing it.

Today I went to the doctor for this monstrous sinus-thing that has been plaguing me in various forms and degrees since Easter. She gave me a prescription and recommended I also purchase the special sort of Sudafed that they keep behind the pharmacy counter and you have to sign for. And geez, did I have to sign for it. I figured they'd just card me to make sure I'm old enough to get myself addicted to the OTC medication of my choice, but no, they took my address and my driver's license number, and I probably signed away my soul and my first-born child too, but I was so out of it I stopped paying attention. I have drugs, I don't care.