Tuesday, April 26, 2011

A trip to the bank

I went to the bank this morning. A very ordinary errand on a regular day. After I stopped my car at the drive-thru and placed my signed check and deposit slip in the pneumatic tube, a pleasant voice asked me how could- insert large national bank here -help me today. Did they not see the signed check and deposit slip? Did they think I wanted to pick up my dry-cleaning? Or that I wanted an order of fries with that deposit?
I am left with many more questions. Is common sense such a rare thing? Should I leave my hard-earned dollars in a place where they hire such utter idiots? Or, should I keep it in my sock drawer where I am reasonable sure it would be safe from everything but the cat who is unusually fascinated by socks.
Before I pulled away the very genial teller asked me again how "Big Bank" could help me. I hesitated, wanting to ask for a shake with my fries, but in the end said "No, thank you" like Mother taught me before driving off, shaking my head. Sigh.

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Novelty

Yes, this is a novelty. An actual post about knitting on a knitting blog. I have been working for a couple of months on a project of my own design. Nothing fancy, mind you. Just a gift for a friend that I wanted to be special. As it happens this friends' family are huge fans of the University of Georgia. How we EVER became friends is a mystery since I have long loved the University of Tennessee. There is a nod to Neyland stadium in this design though most will not see it. I am sharing the pattern for my fellow knitters and I hope that you will enjoy it.

University of Georgia themed baby blanket:

This pattern can be modified using any teams' colors of your choice.
Materials: 2 skeins Caron's Simply soft in white
1 skein Caron's Simply Soft in red
1 skein Caron's simply Soft in black
4 stitch markers
Size 8 circular needle 80cm
Row counter

Cast on 120 stitches using black using cast on of your choice. Place marker at beginning and every 40 stitches. Work in garter stitch (knit every row) for 7 rows.

Change color to red. Continue in garter stitch for 3 rows.

Change color to white.

Row 11 (right side row): Knit across.
Row 12: (wrong side row)Knit 40, Purl 40, Knit 40

Continue in this manner until Row 40 is completed.

Row 41: Knit across
Row 42: Purl 40, Knit 40, Purl 40

Continue in this manner until Row 70 is completed. You will notice that you are creating a very large basket weave or checkerboard pattern. (Just like the end zones in Neyland Stadium)

For the next section the center panel will include the "G" logo for the University of Georgia.

To create a center panel with a UGA theme I used a simple piece of graph paper obtained here:www.printfreegraphpaper.com. I then traced the logo on the graph paper which has 40 blocks. I then decided to purl all stitches of the logo to create the design, knitting all remaining stitches. The opposite would work just as well. So the directions for the next section read thusly:

Row 71 & 73: Knit across
Row 72 & 74: Knit 40 Purl 40 Knit 40
Row 75 and all right side rows up to row 100: Knit 40, begin pattern stitches in purl, Knit 40
Row 76 and all wrong side rows up to Row 100: Knit 40, purl all knit stitches, knit all purl stitches, Knit 40.

Row 101: Knit across
Row 102: Purl 40, Knit 40, Purl 40

Row 131: Knit across
Row 132: Knit 40, Purl 40, Knit 40

Row 161: Change to red and knit 3 rows of garter stitch
Row 164: Change to black and knit 7 rows of garter stitch. Bind off.

Finally, to complete the blanket pick up stitches along the sides of work and work 3 rows of garter stitch in red followed by 7 rows of black and bind off. Work opposite side in same manner and bind off. Weave in ends.