Hogwarts Coffee Cup Sweater

Have your coffee Harry Potter style!

(I didn't have an actual Starbucks cup handy, so I improvised with a glass - I'll post a better picture when I can.)

I made this as a little surprise for my husband for the midnight HP7 book party at B&N tonight - shhhhhhh! It's too hot in our parts, even at night, for him to wear the huge Azkaban scarf I made him, so this is my quick and dirty version of a little knitted HP goodie to commemorate the occasion (well, quick and dirty would be because the idea didn't occur to me until late last night). There are 3,000 people signed up at our location with reserved copies of the book, so it's looking like it will definitely be a Starbucks night. I can hardly call it a pattern since it's just k2p2 rib in a circle, but for those who may want all the little details, here they are:

Notes:

• You can add more stripes, widen or narrow them, or change their placement on the cup sweater; just remember to knit every stitch on the first row of every color change.
• Finished size is 3 inches in length. Gauge: 6 st/1" and 8 rows/1" in 2x2 rib pattern. I wouldn't think that exact gauge is terribly important since the finished product should be stretchy.
  
• Knit in the round with a set of 5 dpns.
• I used the long-tail cast-on method; if you use another one, make sure it's stretchy.
  
• I carried the main color up the inside of the sweater - less ends to weave in.
  
• I would suggest a wool or other animal fiber yarn for warmth, despite my use of Plymouth Encore, which is 75% acrylic. I only used it because I happened to have it handy and yarn stores aren't open at 9 P.M., which is when I thought to do this. Stolen from atypically.net's Azkaban scarf pattern, here are the various House colors you would need if you were to do this in Brown Sheep Nature Spun Worsted, which is 100% wool:
• Gryffindor - brick road (#225) and sunburst gold (#308)
  Slytherin - tornado teal (#121) and silver sage (#107)
  Film Ravenclaw - blue knight (#004) and silver sage (#107)
  Book Ravenclaw - blue knight (#004) and Bev's bear (#094)
  Hufflepuff - pepper black (#601) and impasse yellow (#305)

Supplies:

• Size US6 /4.0mm dpns
  
• Plymouth Encore Worsted (25% wool/75% acrylic) in a main color (MC) and contrasting color (CC). I used scraps from the Azkaban scarf in (MC) burnt sienna (#0999) and (CC) butternut (#1014).

Directions:

Using MC, cast on 48 stitches and divide them onto four dpns - 12 stitches on each dpn.

Being careful not to twist the cast-on row, join for working in the round and work 5 rounds of k2, p2 rib.

Change to CC and knit one row. Work two more rows in k2, p2 rib.

Change to MC and knit one row. Work four more rows in k2, p2 rib.

Change to CC and knit one row. Work two more rows in k2, p2 rib.

Change to MC and knit one row. Work five more rows in k2, p2 rib (to make it even at the top and bottom of the cup sweater, I added an additional row here to compensate for the extra row created by the long-tail cast-on; if you use a different cast-on, you may only need four additional rows. Clear as mud?).

Bind off in k2, p2 pattern. Weave in ends.

Booking Through Thursday: Just Wild About Harry

This blog was mentioned in the Ravelry yarnwords group, offering questions on Thursdays to answer on your own blog about various bookish topics. Why not? Here goes - my answers are in bold:

1. Okay, love him or loathe him, you’d have to live under a rock not to know that J.K. Rowling’s final Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, comes out on Saturday… Are you going to read it? Um, that's a rhetorical question, right? Yes!!!

2. If so, right away? Or just, you know, eventually, when you get around to it? Are you attending any of the midnight parties? Right away! We are going to the midnight party at our local B&N. I never bothered with any of the previous parties, but we decided to go since this is the last one. Hopefully, we'll get our book and out of line fairly quickly, since we've got reserved copies and my husband is going to go pick up our wristbands first thing tomorrow morning. We're getting TWO copies because he doesn't want to have to take turns reading - a waste of money, perhaps, but he's a bit obsessed...

3. If you’re not going to read it, why not? n/a - and I can't imagine why anyone wouldn't! Muggles!

4. And, for the record… what do you think? Will Harry survive the series? What are you most looking forward to? I'm an optimist - I think Harry will survive. I can't really say I'll be glad to have a resolution since it means the end of the story (and nobody wants good stories to end!). I look forward to just reading and enjoying it, as always, and the discussions that inevitably will follow.



May as well add some random photos - these were taken just a few weeks ago; Cole was getting into mischief while I was making silver dollar hots for breakfast (recipe in Joy of Cooking), so I asked if he would like to help - another rhetorical question! He helped put the ingredients together, stir things up, and even pour the little pancakes on the griddle (we were very careful with that part, of course). He loved cooking and was very attentive to my directions. He was so pleased with his work!

(Yes, those are my "pajamas" - men's XL T-shirts are a cheap solution just now to my lack of pjs that fit over the baby bump... also, yes, I had already showered, fixed my hair, put on makeup, and then got back into my pajamas. I had nowhere to be just then, might as well be cool and comfortable!)

He's lucky he's cute.

(And for once, I'm not talking about someone or something destroying my knitting when I say this! But yes, I will talk about knitting in a second.)

My little boy. Aren't little boys sweet? And inventive? This, for example:


See, I would never have thought to squeeze in there. Or to even look there for a little boy who is hiding while his mommy, starting to become a little hysterical, frantically searches the front of the house. I could hear him breathing. I could not hear him answering me - because he wasn't. I knew that he was near, but I had visions of him getting the life squeezed out of him by something on top of him so heavy that all he could do was breathe. He always answers me! Until now.

Doesn't he look pleased with himself?

Or, there's this from last night. Did you know that blue monkey puppets, given the opportunity, can eat children's food right off their plates? Or that they are carnivorous?


I certainly didn't know these odd facts. I wonder if this is only specific to blue monkeys? Or if this is like a Toy Story thing, where they only move when no humans are around to see? What I do know is that this particular blue monkey most certainly must have dragged my poor, hungry little boy out of his high chair and then eaten his pot roast (and snubbed the corn), because when I came out of the restroom (for the 20th visit in a day, thanks), here was my small angel waiting for me, to tell me that the monkey ate his meat! You can imagine my shock and outrage, to realize that a plaything would be so cruel as to rob my son of portions of his dinner. I had first thought that the boy must have fed the meat to the dogs, who are always ready and willing participants in the rousing game of "Trying to Dupe Mom Into Thinking I Ate my Food"; however, the fact that the monkey was still sitting there in the chair, with a smug look on his well-fed fun-fur face that clearly demonstrated his indifference toward my authority, was proof enough. This, coupled with the fact that my little one pointed at the offender sitting in his chair and repeated, quite seriously, that the monkey had eaten his meat. Well then, it must be true. Because my boy never lies.

(Especially not a little boy who looks so proud in a tux. Don't you just want to call him "governor"?)


I guess all the dogs' lip-smacking action when I re-entered the room was just their efforts at cleaning their teeth. Good for them for attending to their own hygiene - and good for the monkey as well, who managed to gobble down the roast without getting a speck in his fur. That's civilized, I tell you: he may be a dinner-stealing, child-swindling monkey, but at least he's got manners.


Finally, some WIP action

I finished the first of the pair of Embossed Leaves Socks yesterday morning. Here's a picture, but no on-the-foot shots until I have them both done.


It's not the pattern's fault that these are taking me so long to complete - I can't say enough good things about this it! I love the garter-stitch bordered heel flap, the leaves, the toe... all of it, perfect in every way. I did make some small mods, but I'll save those for the FO post.


Tea, anyone?


Just a picture of a new little thing - the Cup'a Tea? group on Ravelry inspired me to share! This is a cheapo tea infuser mug I found while shopping for goodies at World Market for the Yarn in a Teacup Swap. It really is cheap - I've already chipped it by barely clanking the infuser and mug together while washing dishes - but I bought it because I loved the pattern.

The smallest things are sometimes the greatest treasures, aren't they? Tell me about yours! ;)

Enter crickets, stage left: Chirp. Chirp.

Despite my best intentions, it seems that I inevitably have lapses into quiet with this blog. Tonight I thought that perhaps a quick post of "yes, still here" might be in order? Here's what's been going on...

1. Biting my virtual tongue

We have friends - my husband's close friends - who just got married this weekend. I will politely refrain from saying anything more than this: it recently required a lot of our free time. I felt like I had a hangover the day after it was finally all over with.


2. Pregnancy: 32.5 weeks and counting

Still tired. Still lack energy. Still a blimpotamus. 'Nuff said.


3. Summer of Sock, 2007

No, that's not a typo. I did mean sock, because I think that at the rate I'm going, I will only finish one sock by the end of the summer. I haven't done much knitting in the last week and a half, and here I'm supposed to be challenging myself to knit as many socks as I can, whittle down the stash and all that. Distractions have included items #1 and #2 on this list, reading (A Trip to the Stars and A Thousand Splendid Suns), and trying to clean / organize this place before Baby Girl arrives and any time I have to do these things vanishes. (Did you see Oprah today? My house doesn't look like that, but the closets could use some work and weeding out, and we do have a "junk" room that needs to become a bedroom for our son instead.)


4. Yes, I bought more yarn.

I was bad recently - sort of: most of it is for baby projects and lace knitting (which I've never done, but yet I am suddenly obsessed with laceweight yarn), and not for more socks. But no more! I ran out of storage room today, and as I saw it, I had two choices: A) find more storage space, or B) stop buying the stuff already. I know it borders on sacrilege, but I chose option A. My stash is nothing in comparison to pictures of others' hordes that I've seen on the internet, but that doesn't really make me feel any better about it. I don't need to have all of this; it's a hobby, and having even this much in my stash is starting to make me feel pressured, like I have all this knitting to do - and this is supposed to be fun. So. I'm going to try to stop buying yarn in any category until I've used up or otherwise disposed of (sold, traded, eaten - whatever) the stashed yarn in said category, and then, I want to maintain a level of only two or three projects' worth of yarn in the category (don't think I can't hear you laughing!). In simpler terms, no more baby project yarn until I've used up the yarn I've already bought for baby projects. No more sock yarn until I've used up my sock yarn stash (which means I won't get to buy any more sock yarn until I'm 83). My goal is to get the stash to fit into the two bins that used to contain it - right now I've got about twice that, and the overflow is being contained in two large beach bags (except now those are overflowing, too). Exceptions: buying yarn for (adult) gift recipients as needed, and one small co-op purchase that I'd already planned on later this month. Any other purchases I am tempted to make will need to be cleared with my husband first (since he knows the size of my stash and made no effort to hide his dismay when packages came in the mail today, this is a pretty good safeguard against further purchases, I think).


So, that's it. Off to bed for me - perhaps the WIP pictures for the next post, since I am too tired to bother with uploading them to Blogger tonight.