Contest!

Basket and fireplace not included.  Sorry.

Would you like to have this dreamy sweater's-worth of yarn for your very own FLAK sweater? Enter the contest, and all 2,610 yards of 100% wooly goodness could be yours!  Here's what to do:

1.   Make up your very own, original FLAK-ronym.  That's right; the orignial FLAK acronym stands for "Follow the Leader Aran Knitalong".  So now I'm asking you to create a new acronym that expresses your personal FLAK experience (or the one you'd like to have).

2.  Post a comment to the blog with your FLAK-ronym and its description before 12 AM on November 1, 2014.

3.  Stay tuned and I'll announce the winner shortly thereafter!

I can't wait to see what you come up with.  My readers are the cleverest beasties ever.  In the meantime, it's not too late to join me this weekend at Vogue Knitting Live in Chicago. CLICK HERE to register!  The Windy City will never be the same after this, I promise.

Want something a little closer to the West Coast?  Come play with us at Knit Fit in Seattle! CLICK HERE to see more.

And if all that weren't enough: Something Slipper-y is Coming.  That's right:  I just received the first advance copy of this little number, which should be on store shelves in time for you do do some seriously fun Holiday Knitting:

Featured slippers: "Killer Rab-Boots"

The official release date is November 15, but I have a sneaking suspicion that pre-ordered copies will arrive before that.  And these are some seriously silly slippers, if I do say so myself. Need a little something to knit for your loveable, zany friends and relatives?  Look no further than Carrot socks, Panda-face maryjanes, and real live furry MukLuks.  You knew you could count on me to bring the whimsy in time for gift-giving, no?

Yakity-Yack, My FLAK's Back

The Astoria Stitchfest was a bona fide success, thanks to the organizers and participants.  We all agreed we can't wait to do it again next year, so stay tuned and plan accordingly!

Still warm from the glow of my time among the knitters, I spent some quality time with my sweater yesterday.  It's complete to the bottom of the armholes, so now I'll put the stitches on a holder and start working the front neckline curve.  

Things I love about my FLAK back, in no order:

1.  The mixture of small, medium and large cables.

2.  The combination of open vs. rope-like texture.

3.  The (unusually) restrained use of bobbles. I think I hit the sweet spot for how many.

4.  The fortunate mistake in cable placement that I made in my initial plan. I originally had the bobbled vines cordoned off from the center heart cable with more mini cables between.  That arrangement meant that my neckline would start in the center of each vine cable, which was awkward. Removing the extra mini cables made the vines connect to, and frame the hearts in a much better way.  Making the big swatch of 1/2 the back that Janet recommends in the workbook totally saved my bacon.  I would never have known to make the change, otherwise.

In the meantime, I'm designing something new for next year's Madrona Winter Retreat.  I've been asked to make another Eeek! Steeks! exclusive, so keep a weather eye on the horizon.

And don't think I forgot that I promised you a contest!  Remember this?:

It's no less than 2,610 yards of Elann loveliness, just for one very special winner's FLAK!  This is the very same yarn I'm  making my FLAK from, in the classic Aran Ivory. What do you have to do to win it?  I'll tell you next post.  In  the meantime, tell your friends: I know you'd never hold out on sharing a free yarn opportunity with your fellow knitters!

Oooh, Baby!

I can't remember when I have swatched and fiddled and measured and mathed as much as for my FLAK.  Which is saying something, since this kind of thing is not just my compulsion, it's my JOB.  I have made no less than 7 swatches, and at least triple that, if you count how much tearing out and reknitting those required.  That said, I think the result is starting to look exciting. Here you can see the first full repeat (24 rows) of my back pattern.  I ended up with practically no filler stitches at the sides, but I'm okay with that - I never like to devote too much real estate to side panels.

This photo shows my newly rediscovered favorite stitch.  I don't know its name, because I have only ever seen it in Japanese patterns, so I'll call it the Open Baby Cable. It's so delicious because it has left and right-leaning iterations, looks adorable right side up, or upside down (shown here), and requires no cable needle to execute.  The Open Baby Cable is worked over three sts, on every 4th row. In my sweater, I've placed a purl st on either side of each OBC to set them apart from their neighbors. Wanna try it?  Here's how:

Open Baby Cable Right

Pass the third st on the Left needle over the first 2.  Then k1, YO, k1. That's it!  How sexy is that? And you can make all your OBC's lean right for a really beautiful, cohesive effect.  Unless you are a spaz like me, with a pathological need to mirror everything that can be mirrored, in which case you will immediately have to try this:

Open Baby Cable Left

Slip three sts from the Left needle over to the Right needle, purlwise. Now pass the third st on the Right needle over the first 2.  Slip those 2 sts back over to the Left needle, then k1, YO, k1. TA-DAAA!  Sexy Party Trick complete. 

Have fun playing with these (wouldn't they be cute on socks?), but don't say I didn't warn you: they're kind of addictive.  I'd hate to see you go off on a bender and surface on Monday with an Open Baby Cable hangover.  Let's keep things under control, people.  

I'm off to the Astoria Stitchfest tommorrow - see you there!