Continental Knitting and Purling the deBrat way?

okay so I'm not sure I do this "correctly" but I get the proper results so far so going with it. Video is courtesy of my 17 yo (see debratsfamily blog) and not sure how this will work out on a "blog" but I'll try it.
wish me luck!
denise/deBRAT

Caelum as Marshall at East Bay Graduation 2005

Here is the handsome dude all gorgeous-ed out in the white tux. The tux was not his choice, the school's choice. He was a marshall as the top 4 in the Junior class get to be at graduation. Nice, eh?

okay pictures to post soon!
~denise who's baby is all grown up! eeeekk that is scarier than becoming a grandmother in November courtesy of my middle son and his girlfriend.

Not the best photoragher in the first place, a white tux, a setting sun, and a sweating son all make for a challenging picture taking opportunity!

A nicer pic of him as the smile I 'caught' was more natural, don't you think? Though the guy is still a great looking guy!

What pose shall I do now? Well son, that one works but wish I had clicked it a second earlier when your eyes were open.

Ah there is Mr Muscle. Too bad I'm still battling the lighting changing very quickly and that light patch of sky behind him and the white tux just made for a lot of fading away of his facial expression.

Casual dude. Actually I'm trying to con him into a couple more picture before he melts away from the heat so I had him take the tux jacket off.

Still a handsome guy. :) Mom is only a little proud teehee

And my favorite closeup shot. Face shows up decently in fading sunset and with white tux and with light area behind tree AND the smile is more natural looking. So not bad for a rushing mom so he can get out of the hot duds and eat his dinner. Hope you enjoyed the pictures! denise

And my favorite closeup shot. Face shows up decently in fading sunset and with white tux and with light area behind tree AND the smile is more natural looking. So not bad for a rushing mom so he can get out of the hot duds and eat his dinner. Hope you enjoyed the pictures! denise

Casual dude. Actually I'm trying to con him into a couple more picture before he melts away from the heat so I had him taken the tux jacket off.

It is done and not a moment too soon!

I have finished the Entrelac test bag for the bag_a_holic list at yahoo groups' November, or is it October bag? Having never done Entrelac before I was a perfect tester for this bag LOL But who knew how long it would take me? It took over 4 hours (closer to 5 on most rounds) to do each different colored round of diamonds on this bag. I am a sloooow knitter.

So now that I have gotten this bag done and felted I am moving on to another project. One that may take as long to do but is just plain ole knitting! It is a shawl in Berocco Chinchilla cream. At first I meant to make the #5 project in the berocco booklet with the hairpin lace featured on the front... but i did not like it done that way and decided to just knit and knit and knit 45 stitches on size 8 needles until I get the length I like or run out of yarn. But this yarn is sooo hard to work with. One of the ladies in my Tuesday night group, Sonya I think, mentioned it was hard to work with and she was right. If I had to actually count anything I would never be able to "see" it.

Okay now the details on the bag and the attempts to post the pictures while writing about it. sigh this blogging is an ongoing learning experience.

humpf i have to go back to the other way so I will post this and then try to order my "posts" by changing the time of posting later on to see if I can "re-order" them properly that way.

see you soon after posting!
denise aka grandma brattie-to-be

Before adding the top. I could finally see how wide it actually is after doing an i-cord bind off. It measures 29" wide at the bottom.

Now I have added the top bit to it and it measure 18" across at the change in it's sections. the handle is at the top and not yet attached and please ignore the purple lace at the bottom it is coming off of my slipper sock.... yup that is my foot peeking into the picture at the bottom.

And as you can see it measure 13" across at the very top.

And it is exactly 4" deep on that edge!

And it is 18" from the tippy top to the bottom. All of these measurements were pre-felting.

This is a terrible picture of it but it is hanging in the bathroom after felting and it is stuffed with a bunch of plastic grocery bags and one plastic hanger. I have not measured it after felting yet that will come tomorrow I think. It is an "interesting" bag. I don't care for how wide it is but I enjoyed making it and learning a new technique to do so. I dream of a similarly koolaid dyed entrelac sleeveless shell and then some very light weight and billowy sheer skirt to wear them both with! Perhaps a very long chiffon scarf that has been hand dyed to match too just blowing in the wind! Now that is a lovely "picture" but in reality I'd be tripping on said chiffon scarf or it would manage to strangle me in the wind! hope you enjoyed this bag and to get the pattern you will need to join Bag_A_holics on yahoo groups before October or is it November? LOL Happy knitting all and now back to Star Wars episode II which is truly the 4th released and more knitting on the shawl. ~denise aka grandma brattie-to-be

Life is a Beach Bag!

the Life is a Beach Bag (designed by KyleAnn Williams of KyleannsKreations.com
The basketball is in the picture to show just how big this bag is! I will hold a lot of good stuff for the beach or it will hold a large knitting project. After realising that it was too big to gift to my mother in law for mother's day (see below for what she did get) I had procrastinated on finishing the cording for the handles.

Then while on the phone with my ds (dear sister) she mentioned that she likes her bags big because her knitting projects are large items. Bingo! A home for said bag. So I will be sending it up to her for all the wonderful things she has been doing for me while I get started in knitting and spinning! now if she is reading this then the surprise will be gone but the bag is so lovely that it will still be a surprise in some form.

knitting hugs
denise/debrat
aka Grandma Brattie-to-be

A close up of the heathering from stranding one cream and one lavender cascade 220. You can also see a close up of the NOT felted handles made with Embellish Knit! Purchased at JoAnn's with my 40% off coupon making it worth a try. It does make cording worthy of replacing the labor intensive I-cord but you must be cautious as you make it.

Tropical Punch, Orange and Lemonade. More fruity colors for a summer bag!

The line up of all 7 colors right after I laid them out in the sun. It was so early that the sun is not really "on" them yet. enjoy the rest of the pics! ~denise

Ah the lemon lime and the berry blue. two very delicious colors and I can't wait to dye them again with many more packets of the koolaid per skein of yarn.

self explanatory you can still see some of the dye color in the scary blackberry bag. this is right after i laid them out in the sun.

From the left Grape, lemon lime, lemonade, tropical punch and Orange behind the orange is the berry blue. the only one you can't see is the scary blackberry.

Scary Blackberry, several years old and not drinkable but surely dye-able. This one would need more than the one package I used today.

Kool Aid Dyeing Yarn Adventure

Okay, so my knitpicks wool of the andes arrived late yesterday afternoon but dh was home so could not play with it until this morning. Many lessons learned about Kool Aid dyeing yarn today. Tyring to put it in a nutshell so we can get to the eye-candy!

~ when sending 17 yo son to store for vinegar be VERY clear what you are saying. Mom saying "get the one that is less per ounce" seems to have equated to get less ounces than a gallon! LOL It worked out in the end and I think it is funny but he still does not "get" it. Oh and before you get too excited about his side of things thinking he was soooo nice to drive to the grocery store for the vinegar and kool aid do realise that he got to drive the Miata when he went.

~Kool aid dyeing needs more than one package per skein but I am happy with the color I got using just one package of kool aid as ds (dear son) had already gone to the store when I found the online site that mentioned using 4 packages per skein! eeeks that is a ton of kool aid.

~Kool aid dyeing of yarn is much different then dyeing fabric with procion dyes! MUCH different. Less mess. less staining of my fingers/hands. and TONS less rinsing of the yarn! With fabric it could take what felt like forever to do the rinseing only part.

~Kool aid dyeing of yarn takes much less TIME then dyeing fabric.

-It took me 30 minutes to mix the vinegar and the powder in ziplock bags and stuffing the yarn in and making sure it was covered and soaked well with a spaghetti grabber spoon. Fabric can take you for ever to mix the dye baths.
-I let the plastic bags sit in the sun for about 2 1/2 hours but only because I was doing other things and loss track of time. the water that was left in the bag was clear before I left them in the sun!
-Rinsing took so little time that if I was experience at this I could have had the yarn arrive at the house at 4 pm and had the stuff all laid out to dry by 6 pm when dh (dear husband) got home.

~Kool aid DRYING of yarn takes a bit longer as I can't just stuff it in the dryer or I'll have a very long time of UNtangling the mess that will exit the dryer. But that is okay. I can see it outside my window as I type this.

So the only two negatives I can come with are:
1) I have to look at it out the window to make sure the nesting blue jays don't decide it will make a nice perch as it is drying on their favorite chairs and looking mighty colorful and tempting too!
2) I may not have the same color control over the mixing of colors that I always had when working with the procions but I can always drag those out to use but I suspect that I have enough Kool Aid colors to get along jsut fine without messing with the chemicals.
bonus negative? I realise that the 11 skeins of wool of the andes was not near enough and I wish I had ordered a LOT more.

The other 4 skeins are for playing with color striping and the next order will be lots of the 220 wool and a couple of skeins of the sock weight yarn too!

oh dear we have created a monster!

okay now for the pics! enjoy and do try the kool aid dyeing OH and I have a color you can't get Scary Blackberry which is very old leftover seasonal koolaid i found in the cupboard that i thought i had thrown away.

NOW I'm off to load the pics!
happy knitting
denise aka grandma brattie to be

PS if i did this right, this should now post on top of the photos which are in the order I want them (backwards to post remember) but i have not yet gotten used to writing them backwards. So the first pic of the three bags says "more colors" LOL and they are the first picture of the close up bags.... sigh.... maybe some day... but then I have had a cell phone for over 10 years and I can't put a new number into my address book very easily and I did not get my first text message to "go" yesterday when I needed it to reach my son..... more sighing... and I think of myself as a "young" grandma Ha!

And then the REAL order of things

Okay so below you will see that my if, then theory is correct but uncorrectable! So let me give you all the stuff about what you are about to view below and then tell me if you agree with me or not....
Mother in Law's Mother's Day gift details:

PATTERN Sophie bag by Julie Anderson for Black Sheep Bags www.magknits.com/warm04/patterns/sophie.htm

YARNS
Cascade 220 9408
http://www.cascadeyarn.com/cascade-220.asp
Melissa 10
http://www.ericas.com/yarn/melissa.htm

HANDLES
Clover Bag's & Tote's HandlesU-shaped marble (brown) Art no 6335
http://www.fabricsunlimited.net/batouhabycl.html

All purchased from Knit 'n Knibble in Tampa Florida
www.knitnknibble.com

NEEDLES
size 10 1/2" 16" circulars (Denise's literally)

MARKERS/COUNTERS
bits of leftover bright pink cascade and one row counter

Here are the differences from the pattern as posted at
www.magknits.com/warm04/patterns/sophie.htm


I started to decrease earlier as someone on one of my knitting lists mentioned they did that and liked it better. I could not put my hands on the print out of that woman's email so I just decreased at rows: 7, 14, 21, 28, 35, 42, and 50
[Note: I added the Melissa in at rwo 43 after the decrease at row 42.]

Then I knit one more row and used an I-cord bind off
Don't know how to tell you the "number" of stitches but I knit 3 then knit 2 together and then slip the stitches back on to the left needle and knit 3 together and knit 2 together and so on and so on.

Sorry don't know of a link for that one I use a combination of the actual I-cord instructions found here
http://knitting.about.com/library/blicord.htm
and the I-cord bind off directions in a hand out pattern at Knit 'n Knibble (Autumn Tote) that I did not understand without the online directions... makes no sense but if you think of it I-cord is soooo confusing until you "get" it smirk

No one can tell me what to do when I get to the end of my I-cord bind off so when I can no longer knit in the pattern (in the above case I'm down to just 4 stitches) I then knit 2 stitches then slip the first stitch on the right needle over the 2nd stitch. then knit another stitch and now slip again until left with one stitch. cut yarn leaving about 8" of yarn. Pull through loop on needle. The 8" of yarn leaves you plenty to attach the bound off edge to the start of your I-cord bind off and work in the tails.

The pre-felting measurements are in one of the "ordered" posts below as are the after felting measurements. What I forgot to say in one of them is that when it was all felted it had a "waistline" better than I've ever seen on this body and it just begged to be folded down over the bag! That made it just right and I could not have been more pleased with the finished bag.

The brown cascade 220 has a slight heathering look to it that does not show up much in as you work with it but it showed up NICELY in the felted bag! What a bonus that turned out to be.

FELTING
12 minutes in a pillowcase and nothing else in the washer on hot with one pot of hot boiling water added to the water and a bit of Dawn detergent. ummm that gave me a scare because I had not added that before and it looked like I would become a suds action disaster in my garage!
rinsed
6 minutes again all alone in the washer and it was just right for my tastes.

It is now stuffed with plastic Winn Dixie bags and upside down on a canning jar on my dining table drying! I'll add the handles after it is dry and make a final decision as to whether or not to add a decorative button or beads on the folded down area of the bag. I think a trip to Wannabead Tampa Florida (conveniently located near Heritage Quilt and Needlework where I work and teach) to test lay out some stones/beads on it.

so now.... on to the pictures and the writings.
have a marvelous day filled with God's Blessings
denise aka grandma brattie-to-be

Mother in Law's Mother's Day present felted bag

And now ...drum roll please.... this post to enable the last post to show up! It has also come to my attention that when i post a series of things using Hello from Picasa I end up missing the last thing I posted (which would be the TOP thing) so I am posting this comment to make sure my other "last" post shows up! And now that i have put this in writing like this of course this post will show up.... don't you think?

I don't know HOW this picture got loaded in here first when it is the LAST picture I took on the camera...sigh... so much for my posting in which order theory, read last post of this series which was the first post LOL....

hmmm have to figure out how to upload these from the camera AND turn them so they are right side up in the blog... you canNOT teach an old grandma-to-be new tricks it appears. this is a pic of the bag before felting. it measures approximately 8" across at the top of the bag; 14" wide at the widest part of the bag; and 15" tall. I actually made this bag TWICE already as I ripped this one bag after finding more than one hole-making-mistake in it!

a close up of the mixed yarns at the top of the bag and the bottoms of the handles-to-be.... it is truly very lovely in person and I'd do this one again! Maybe even in the same colors as I bought two skeins of the brown and did not use much of the Melissa.....

close up picture of the mixed yarns before felting......

close up of the finished felting with the mixed yarns. nice in person, sucky picture, and this is from a $1,000 camera? eeeek! of course they would blame that on operator error. who me? surely not me who messed up this shot. but of course I am posting this before the ones you have already read and two of those are "golden" to say the least in their hue.... sigh.... not a good technical week....i'll just blame it all on becoming a grandma to be! teehee

Trying to get the pictures in a LOGICAL order here. According to my previous results if we read from top to bottom.. but it posts from bottom to top.... then (Gosh this sounds like an if then theory and that sounds like school!) then I need to post the last thing first and the first thing last so it reads logically.... ummmm sure sounds right to me....

I took this picture first on top of the pattern page I used.

Oooooh the first pair of first grandchild baby booties are done! They are so cute and so tiny I do hope that the parents to be will like them. I used the pattern at this link to make them www.socknitters.com/PATTERNS/bluebaby.htm