stop and smell the rowan

from the new rowan classic summer. i'm not saying this is distracting me from the fake-a-gamo.

much.

but this isn't the only excuse for my procrastination. i AM waiting on six skeins of classic elite provence in "natural," which i finally ordered the other day.

so what about the purple?

i'm not so sure...and why does the yarn look so shiny? what do you think? like? hate? meh?

p.s. thanks to olga jazzzzzzy for the pic!

p.p.s. i love how they make the chick in the pic a knitter. yeah, like a real knitter would actually buy the bag instead of spend three months of her life trying to figure out how to knock it off. um. on second thought. maybe she's onto something there...

from russia, with love (i think)

while checking out my blog stats today, i noticed a whole slew of links from here. it appears to be russia's version of craftster...it looks like even our friends over there have an obsession with decoding this ferragamo stitchery! i have no idea what it says, but i do see a lot of smiley faces...so hopefully, it's all good. small world, eh?

upon further investigation, it appears they also have the bag in a shade that would have barney drooling with lust:


nastrovya!

obsession decoded: part 1

'member the scene in "the shining," where shelley duvall finally gets a look at jack's novel in progress only to find out he has typed thousands and thousands of pages of "all work and no play..." well. this is what i fear. after they've hauled me away, they will come into my studio only to find thousands and thousands of swatches. fake-a-gamo swatches.

this is what obsession looks like. the other night, i had a dream about garter st triangles. this morning, while picking up some coffee at starbucks, i spotted some cupcakes in the display case and i'm thinking how much they look like the scallopey triangles of the ferragamo bag.

back in december, when this whole thing started, i naively assumed it would be sooo easy to knock off this bag. oh, i was so young then. and so very, very innocent.

yeah, so here i've been for the past month or so tearing my hair out trying to do just that. in the beginning, the ever-resourceful yahaira suggested i just run crying to eunny. i was like, NO. i will not do that. i will figure this thing out if it's the last thing i do.

so i swatched. and i went to the library. and i swatched some more. and i looked through every counterpane scallop reference i could find. posted pics on flickr. started up a KAL on craftster to get some help. more swatching. more whining.



well, long story short, i guess i should have just run crying to the magnificent marjan! i've long admired her beautiful creations on flickr. turns out, not only is she an amazing knitress, but she is also quite the stitchery sleuth! these swatches were made using the pattern she devised. perfectly ferragamo!

she has given me permission to post the pattern here, which i will do later today. bear in mind this is the pattern for the main body of the bag only. the top part is still up for grabs.

fake-a-gamo: new swatch!

this is my swatch from lambsear from craftster's take on the ferragamo triangles. i think it's mighty good, but still not sure about the garter st triangle. on the bag, they seem much more sculptural and not flat like here. marjan from flickr is working on another version. i can't wait to see that. and of course, i'm still hacking away myself.

a few of you inquired about the yarns on the baby afghan, so here are my pattern notes:

pattern: "hot damn" afghan by jan metzger
yarn: goddess yarns "martina," be sweet "magic ball," schaefer handpainted merino, and fleece artist mohair, plus a bunch of pink leftovers from my stash.
needles: US19
notes: this baby works up so fast. i held together two-three strands of whatever tickled my fancy at the moment. you can really have fun with the yarns--it's a great way to use up all that eyelash and fun fur you bought five years ago to make scarves.

and finally, a happy 2nd bloggoversary to queen linktifah herself, amy at and knitting. not only does amy knit a mean cowl and pen some powerful bloggy prose, she also dishes up some of the most entertaining and eclectic links i've ever seen on a knitblog. keep it comin' amy.

FO: it's a girl!

just thought i'd take a break from swatching to post a pic of my other baby: this"hot damn" afghan for the soon-to-be-arriving stella. oh, how i loved it on my couch. it's like an explosion in a flamingo factory. i hated to part with it. but part i did. with promises from mommy to keep it free from spittle. (yeah, right.) the best part is the pattern was so damn easy--and so damn free! yeahhhh, baby.

swatch 3: fan triangle

swatch 3: fan triangle
Originally uploaded by hitbyabus.

i kept trying to make the fan increases with a lifted increase. never looked right to me. but this swatch with YO instead of the lifted inc, seems to work better. not quite right in terms of row count and number of YOs, but it's pretty darn close.

fake-a-gamo so far

fake-a-gamo so far
Originally uploaded by hitbyabus.

here's a couple attempts at swatching so far. also, it really helps me to sketch out the triangles like this, just to see the placement. i think for the fan triangle, i am making too many increases too early. i think they need to fan upward and outward more gradually. click on the picture to take a closer look.

ferragamo: one down, one to go!

i think i may have figured out the pattern for the garter stitch triangle. here's the pattern...i think it's pretty close to the stitch on the bag. see what you think! (see pics for elongated stitch technique below.)

c/o 17 sts

row 1: K
row 2: K
row 3: SKP, K15, K2tog
row 4: K
row 5: SKP, K13, K2tog
row 6: K
row 7: SKP, K11, K2tog
row 8: K
row 9: SKP, K9, K2tog
row 10: K
row 11: SKP, K7, k2tog
row 12: K
row 13: Knit each stitch, wrapping yarn around needle twice for each stitch
row 14: Slip all stitches knitwise, dropping wrap to create elongated stitch
row 15: Turn and knit all stitches together to form gather

double wrap each stitch to create enlongated stitch at top of triangle.


next row: slip all sts knitwise, dropping wrap to create the elongated stitch.


knit all stitches together...


...and you're left with 1 st.


knit that stitch and voila!

blogger ate my template

i went to login last evening to find my blog had completely disappeared. gone. zip. hasta la vista baby. before panic could completely take hold, i posted an SOS on bloggerforum. by this morning, i had a remedy from the intrepid redryder. he had recovered my blog's cache from google and repieced it together for me with most of my template hacks in place. (who was that masked man!?) i'm gonna have to knit that guy a scarf or something. the moral of this story:

BACKUP YOUR TEMPLATE. stupid me did not know this is as easy as copy, cut & pasting your template code into a word file.

also, internet people sure are nice.

ferragamus interruptus

nothing like a deadline to get a project moving. this one is due thursday. as in this. if all goes well, i will be fringing like a fringe whore tomorrow night.

need mo' hair?

never drink anything bigger than your head. but when it comes to knitting, i say go big or go home. especially when it is mohair in a luscious shade of rosy pink. this and these other pink ladies are destined for the world's most impractical baby afghan. (shhh, don't tell mother.) found them all at this adorable yarn shop.

i wish i could quit you

instead of swatching like a mofo, as the ever-sanguine yahaira has suggested, i am apparently swatching like a moron. it's like i've forgotten how to knit. also, how to use my swift as evidenced in the hoopled-up ball of yarn below. today, i'll try again. knitting is exhausting. i mean fun.


another thought for today: is anyone knitting the oscars?

brick wall

despite my wanking, the ponies hauled ass and got the book to my local library branch a day ahead of schedule. you can imagine my trembling fingertips as i flipped through the pages, breathlessly searching for the stitch pattern of the counterpane scallop of my dreams.

it was not to be found.

now what?!