Tag Archives: disappointment

Still here!

knitting, ,

We’re still here and up to beer- and fiber-related things. Just not much to say much about at the moment.

I extended my son’s “silver” mittens, which went fine. My daughter has demanded a pair of her own, which is fine except that I’ve realized, as I finished her first mitten (minus the thumb) that I HATE double-pointed knitting. I’m also knitting Redbeard a hat, which I love to knit because I can knit in the round. Pictures soon, I want to wait until I can get the mitten finished enough for my daughter to model, because they scrunch up into yarn-balls when not worn. Does one actually have to block mittens? That just seems wrong!

(A “Massive” snow “storm” here (read: 2 inches over the course of the morning) in the Netherlands meant we had to cancel our trip to Paris this weekend. I know, world’s smallest violin and all, but it was still pretty pitiful to watch our son standing in the snow at the outdoor-only train platform crying while we waited for our train that never came. Plus, this was supposed to be our birthday present to our daughter, so she was only barely managing not to cry herself, at least at one point. Poor things!)

A wet dry run

Beer, ,

Redbeard and I (mostly Redbeard) have been tinkering around with a new insulated mash tun that will allow us to more easily do all-grain brewing.

Yes, I know – but “insulated mash tun” sounds so much better than “10-gallon cooler with a bunch of weird hardware we shoved into it.”

A view from the inside:

Things were going so well, until we sprung a small leak at a little over 4 gallons. You can see the drips on the silver and then coming off at the bottom.

Oh, well… the search for the right-sized rubber washer continues…

An analogy

knitting, , , ,

I’ve decided that knitting has some important similarities to baking. Actually, I’m sure that there are lots and lots of similarities, as I think about it just now. But, the one – the key one – that matters right now is that if you’re going to go off-recipe, you need to think through all the other things that might need adjusting to deal with your crazy off-recipe plans.

So – I’m making another felted bag and decided to modify the same pattern I’ve used before. I wanted to make the bag oblong instead of circular, though, and change the sizing a bit, so I knew that I’d end up with a different number of stitches. No problem. When I got to the point last week where I needed to start the handles, I got out a pencil, counted my stitches and worked out how to adjust the pattern.

The circular bag pattern calls for K25 and BO25 back and forth, so that you have four patches of 25 stitches awaiting four spiffy handle straps to be knitted on them, which will then be paired and kitchener stitched together for two handles. That equals (carry the 1, cross the ‘t’…) 200 stitches. But my oblong bag only had 152 stitches, so I dutifully recalculated – I wanted the handles to be the same width, so I shrunk the BO stitches to accommodate 150 instead of 200. I dithered a little about having the smaller gap, but decided it would be good. So, off I went…. I do the first the first handle strap. Ta Da! I do the second and then stop to think about whether I want to attach this strap to the one that I just knitted because… (anyone see where this is going?) I want the handles to be oriented like a tote bag, and so I need to make sure that the right… straps… are stitched… togeth- oh, crap.

Yep – I’d kept the equal spacing of the circular bag pattern. So, I’ve got bag straps that just sort of randomly sprout up around the bag. I have seriously considering just rolling with it, and having a crazy freak bag that only a mother could love. But, no… I’ll frog it back down the rim tonight and try again. This time I think I’ll use a calculator… (because that is clearly the problem here, nothing to do with my logic-type thinking abilities)