Ravelympics Medals

Well I am nearing the end of my Ravelry Knitting Olympics. I was on 2 different teams. Team WIPS2010 with 2 projects for WPIS Dancing. Sadly I will not medal in this event with either project.

However For Team Tardis I have medaled in 4 events with a total of 5 projects!

I have 3 entries in this event for frogging old projects.


The first is an old unknown garter stitch thing. I have no idea what it was supposed to be so it clearly had to get frogged.

The second project to frog was my Brown Dragon Shawl. After I discovered I was twisting stitches in one section and knit the same row twice elsewhere it was clear I had to start over. I frogged it without remorse and decided I need to find a better way to keep the pattern in front of me when I restart this project.



Last was Growler Cozy Rev 2. The bottom section did not felt at all so I had to rip it back and try to pick up from fulled stitches.







Another event I entered was Flying Camel Spin. I had a bunch of roving from our sheep Brownie from 2006. This was her last fleece and I really wanted to spin it all up. I managed to get most of it done, 470 yards worth for my entry.





The final 2 events I entered were the Designer Pattern Skeleton and the Felting freestyle with my modified Growler Cozy Pattern.

I managed to get them done in just 2 days!






Here is the pattern:
Growler Cozy Pattern - Sized to fit a US Standard 64 ounce glass growler.

I used a very soft 24 WPI 2 ply that felts well and size 10 or 6mm needles. You need a circular or 2 and some DPNs and a tapestry needle.

My swatch started out as a stockinette swatch with a 2 stitch garter stitch border. Un-fulled it was 6 inches top to bottom and 30 stitches or 6.5 inches between borders. The swatch was 7 inches in total height

After fulling 4 inches high 4 3/4 inches wide between borders. If your yarn fulls differently then you may need to adjust the number of stitches for your growler cozy.

CO 28 stitches

P first row then continue in stockinette until it measures 3.5 inches long

K1 Kfb (Knit in front and back) to end
P
K
P
* K1 then Kfb * Repeat between * to end. You should have 82 stitches
P
K
Continue alternating P and K rows until this section is 3.5 inches long.
Set up to do a P row but instead
Cable Cast on 30-31 more stitches
Place Marker, join and the knit in the round

Continue to knit in the round until the body is 11-11.5 inches long or so.

Base
Rnd 1 K2tog around
Rnd 2 Knit
Rnd 3 Knit
Rnd 4 and all further rounds
K2tog K1

Just keep doing that all around switching to double points as required and moving the marker as required or remove marker entirely until you have 4 or 5 stitches left.

Thread the yarn through the last 4 or 5 stitches and weave in all the ends.

Make 2 I-Cord strings each about 15 inches long leaving a 10 inch tail on the cast off end.

Using a tapestry needle take the long tail and pull the I-Cord through the top edge of the cozy. It's easiest to do this before felting but it can be done later. Take care not to cut the yarns. Sew the end back to the I-Cord using the tail end of yarn. Doing it this way means you can replace the cord when it gets worn or breaks.

Full the fabric until it fits the growler. Stretch over a growler while wet and pin the top together with a safety pen.

Once it has dried you can use the ties to tie up the top.

The Ravelympics

The Ravelympics
Originally uploaded by Oogie McGuire

Here I am working on my Simple Socks for the WIPs Dancing Event for Team WIP 2010.



I have also finished Aerial Unwind for Team Tardis. Frogged an unidentified garter stitch something.

Shearing Done!

I was too busy to take any pictures but we got the entire flock shorn yesterday. We had a good crew, a bunch of folks from Ravelry came and the Clocks and people from Mesa Winds Farm. We started about 8:15 am and got done about 1:15 pm. 132 naked sheep on the mesa today. Eifion shore straight through, then we had lunch then off to do other flocks in the valley. Finished with a couple of pints at Revolution Brewing. Ken and Eifion are off to do the last 2 flocks today, I'm home sick with a cough and stuffed nose.

Wool looks pretty good, I'll start skirting when I recover from this cold.

North Fork Fiber Guild

With the loom assembled the next step was to tie it up and get it ready for warping. Margaret, Monica and Elena all helped me learn how to tie everything up and set it up for weaving. Here they are doing their spinning, naalbinding and knitting after we got the loom tied up.

We set it up for a balanced twill and tabby just to play with initially.

Here I am testing out the treadles to see if I can reach them all easily.

Loom Assembled & First Fleece Skirting

The big Glimakra loom got assembled in the shop on 4 August.

My friend Elena Dent came to visit and got roped in to not only helping assemble the loom but also to help start the skirting of our 2008 fleeces. Normally we are done by now but with the construction I didn't get started until now.

The Woolevator

The new shop second story is a long ways up there. When we stored wool in the old Red Barn loft you could toss the wool boxes up and the person in the loft could catch them. But the new shop is much too tall for that. While going up and down the stairs may be good exercise, when there are something like 100 fleeces to move that's a lot of trips even if you carry several at once. West welded up the crane, we added an engine hoist and Ken built a wooden platform to hold the boxes.

So we had a wool elevator made. Here it is being installed. The idea is that you put the boxes on the platform and use the hoist to haul them up. When it's not in use the crane assembly can swing back into the shop upper story and you can close the doors.
Today Ken and I moved all of the 2008 fleeces out of the hay barn an used the woolevator to get them up to the second floor of the new shop.





It worked really well and was easy to do. Once the fleeces are up there my plan is to set up the skirting table and do final skirting and preparation for sale upstairs. I do a preliminary skirting as we are shearing but this is the final more detailed skirting.


There's plenty of room to store the unskirted fleeces, the skirted and packaged for sale fleeces and still put in all the looms and have space to hold fiber guild meetings or do other craft work. I can't wait for the final bits to be done.