One Crazy Fiber Lady

Surprise surprise, I have no new purchases to show today.  I might be off to Purl later this week, but that will be to pick up something for my Better Pal .   Can’t promise that will be the only yarn to leave with me though.  Also unexpected, I haven’t cast on anything new since Saturday!  I haven’t finished anything though, but at least I haven’t added to the WIP pile. 

I knitted a bit on the STS during my commute today, and the Claudia Handpaint sock for Mom other times.  I’m now halfway through the foot, though this picture is as of the end of last night.  I really love the colors and how they are spiraling around the sock.  Mom confessed that she liked these  far more than the original yarn.  Good.  So do I.  I’m really looking forward to using the skeins I bought for myself.

Speaking of mom and socks, she’s been knitting away.  Yay!  Getting her back to knitting was my favorite part of the whole weekend.  She went to her weekly MahJong game last night and they had 2 extra folk.  She treated the idle time like any good knitter, working away on her socks!  I love how she pulled out her sock to show me her progress.  Yay mom.

Last night was 24 night.  While last week was I cast on that Claudia Handpaint sock during the episode, I’ve been getting the urge to spin as I see others spinning on their blogs.  I mentioned to Cassie yesterday in an email exchange that one reason I haven’t been spinning is that on most of my wheels, I’ve got bobbins worth of plying to do and just couldn’t face the tedium of it.  But then I realized that plying with the woolee winder would be akin to knitting socks during 24.  I pulled out the two bobbins of BL/Wensleydale singles and my Lendrum Upright.  I luckily found an empty woolee winder bobbin, originally purchase for the Womack Electric and confirmed that they do indeed fit the Lendrum.  Over the course of the hour of 24, I filled the bobbin and ran out of singles.  The plied yarn is aging now waiting for me to skein it off.  Another of my favorite tasks.   I really like the look and feel of the yarn.  I hope at some point to use it to knit a gansey.  As for 24 last night, excellent episode.  Glad to see Pres. Logan isn’t a total idiot, but I do really hope that the deal he and Jack made at the end for Jack to disappear again gets forgotten.  Is anyone else having problems with a Hobbit running things at CTU?  Sure he cleaned up nice, but he’s a hobbit!

I know I’m late posting today.  I got a pretty big project at work this morning, but had to spend almost 2.5 hours futzing with my computer to get .Net 2005 to play nicely with IIS and allow me to debug the code.  Okay, how many of you did I lose with that sentence?  Anyway, I’m tired, have a few things to do before I plunk on the couch and ignore the President’s State of the Union speach.  I wonder what goodies are waiting for me on the beloved ReplayTV unit.

Craft on!

If today is Monday, it must be time to show pictures of the bounty from the weekend.  Saturday morning, Mom joined the twins and I for a trip to Handknits, followed by a stop at the Knitting Party at AC Moore.  I’ve never been to Handknits, but after Claudia’s comment last week,  I knew I had to get there soon.  It is a nifty place. Sad that it won’t be there for that much longer though as they have a wonderful selection of yarn.  I chatted with the owner, she isn’t going out of business, but moving to Vermont. She did mention that she’ll be putting together a web presence with online ordering, so that is good at least.  There were several rooms with wonderful yarns, and in the "sock yarn" room, a basket of toys for little ones.  Let’s say I didn’t leave empty handed.  Neither did Mom, but we’ll get to her in a bit. 

My first pick are these four skeins of Daletta for knitting the Children’s Sampler Mitten from the Latvian Mittens book (which did indeed arrive on Friday).  This yarn wasn’t given any time to age in stash, heck didn’t even make it home before it hit the needles.  I cast on for this first mitten while the twins napped at Mom’s house after lunch.  The picture shows my progress as of the start of knitting time yesterday.  I managed to get a few more rows in yesterday, but did more cleaning and organizing than knitting for a change.  I’m about 4 rows short of starting the mitten top shaping.  That fringe at the bottom gave me a few fits, but the third time’s the charm.  I totally dig these mitts!

Next up >are these three skeins of Daletta for another set of mittens from the same book.  These will hopefully be for me.  The sampler is too small for my little hands, but looks a tad large for either of the twins.  Not sure what their fate is going to be though.  As an aside, the Daletta was on SALE; four of my most favorite letters when combined with the other four… Y A R N.

Also on sale, and as I recently got the Baby Knits Two and just adored the boy/girl stripped sweaters, I decided to get some yarn to make my pair coordinating sweaters.  While the pattern calls for Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Baby (and yes, I found 6 skeins of this in white in stash), I opted for the Baby Ull that was both on S.A.L.E. and yarn I’ve never used but wanted to try.  I initially tried to get two tones of blue for Alex’s but there were not enough skeins in the lighter blue so I opted for cream for him instead.

Since I can’t leave a yarn store that carries sock yarns without some, I found this stuff which I hadn’t tried yet.  Lana Grossa Meilenweit Multiringel in color 5030.  Maybe I’ll use this for a pair of Jaywalkers as I think I’m the last sock-knitting blogger to make them.

As I mentioned before, Mom didn’t leave Handknits empty handed either.  She left with two skeins of Socka and a 40" US1 Addi Turbo.  The woman who taught me to knit oh so many years ago has been sidelined from knitting herself for at least a good 5 years.  Arthritis in the thumbs and finger stiffness make holding regular knitting hard and painful for her.  She’d never used DPN’s, which I tried to introduce her to probably 5 years ago now, but she couldn’t adjust to the fiddliness of them.  Chatting with her, I discovered that until the thumb pain sidelined her, knitting was as integral to her as it is to me.  I can’t imagine having to give it up, so I’ve been wracking my brain trying to find a way for her to get it back.  I thought that maybe the Magic Loop technique would allow her to knit again.  Here she is with my old ratty copy of the Ann Norling sock pattern, KNITTING!  She was frustrated by her initial slowness as she used to be a pretty speedy knitter.  The slickness of the Addi’s wasn’t helping matters either as she periodically lost stitches.  But she’s knitting again.  Yay!  Before dinner on Saturday, she’d gotten almost an inch done on the sock ribbing.  Naturally I set her making socks as her first return to knitting.  They’re small, lightweight and not all that fiddly, a perfect return to knitting for the woman who made all 5 of us the family hoodie sweaters.  If this works, she’s going to knit some kippahs for my nephews.  Welcome back to the wonderful world of knitters Mom.

AC Moore was a zoo on Saturday.  Oh my goodness, I’ve never seen their yarn section so crowded!  You could barely move for all the people jammed in the aisles.  I had the pleasure of meeting Kathleen shortly after arriving, though sadly it wasn’t much more than a hello as the short people were getting antsy already.  The crowd and cranky shorties, made it a relatively quick stop.  I took advantage of the 25% off couple and picked up six skeins of Patons Classic Merino in this deep purple color.  Not sure what it will be, though it was sort of tagged as a "ribby" as I grabbed it.  But then again, so has a lot of earlier yarn purchases and I still only have one ribby.  All in all, I added 26 skeins to the stash on Saturday which gives me the dubious honor of being way the hell out in the lead at the Buy More Yarn stashup.

I didn’t get much knitting time yesterday as I mentioned above as the urge to declutter finally was greater than the lack of energy.  Must be the Whole Wheat Total that I’ve been ingesting recently that has put some zip back into my step.  I tackled the much overlooked corner of the kitchen counter that had become the drop zone for things I had no idea where to put.  It is now nicely organized and no longer looks terrible.  While I was cleaning though, the short people needed a little entertainment.  After scolding Alex a couple of times to put my Bosworth Mini back, I decided to give him his own spindle to play with (can’t start em too young).  Needless to say his sister wanted one as well.  I attached a decent length of Woolease to each spindle and let them go to town.  Kept them busy for a while and let me finish what I was doing.  Naturals, I tell you.  Next will be some knitting lessons.

When they weren’t spindling, they were on the comfy couch watching their favorite "Big Comfy Couch".  Since Sara climbed into my lap Thursday night, she’s discovered that cuddling with a human can be quite nice.  She even tried it with Kat yesterday.  Kat even obliged in "making nice" and rubbing Sara’s head.  The three youngins are getting along beautifully, just what I was hoping for when I picked Sara.  She’s making a wonderful addition to this family.  Kat has gone potty a couple of more times since that red letter day, though while very supportive of her, Alex refuses to go.  That’s okay.  I know boys are ready later than girls and at least he’s very encouraging of her.  At 2.5, we’ll start trying to get that pacifier ("dee-dee") out of his mouth.  I’m going to try my sister’s approach of the pacifier only for in the car and bed.  No more running around with it all the time, so hopefully you won’t only see him with it for much longer.  Kat and the thumb will probably be a much harder task.  And yes, we took a "jammie" day yesterday.. or at least they did as I got dressed.

Craft on!

*****
Edited to add:  I just added a Stash Sale page to my photo album.  I need to get some stuff out of the house or we’ll all drown in yarn.  Just a few yarns included at the moment, but I’ll be adding as I weed through the collection.

While I did manage to get through the second repeat of the horseshoe lace pattern on STS by the end of my commute last night, I didn’t knit anymore after the twins went to bed.  I know.  An oddity around my house these days.  A night without knitting is just an odd duck.  I did to a tiny bit of spinning though.  Wow, when was the last time I actually spun?  Must of have been during my vacation.  That’s far too long ago, I really should set aside one night for spinning again. I had been combing Sara and admiring the nice little collection of apricot colored fuzz and eyed the spindle collection on the shelf above the TV.  I pulled down a Bosworth Mini and got to work.  I managed to spin about 2 yards worth of the stuff before Sara decided that the spindle was less tool and more toy.  That ended that pursuit.  She then cuddled up in my lap for a snuggling for the first time.  Yay!  I’m starting to get the impression that her tongue is too long for her mouth or is it she’s just tired of posing and telling me in a not so subtle way to take my camera elsewhere?  You decide.

While I didn’t make any progress on the Very Warm Hat last night, I did take it with me today for more English Knitting practice.  I can’t believe how comfortable the whole process is feeling.  This is terribly exciting as a whole new world of knitting projects is opening before me.  My Latvian Mittens book is Out for Delivery according to UPS tracking.  Ask me how much I love UPS tracking!  Tomorrow is the adventure in yarn shopping with mom and the twins.  I’m hoping to pick up some yarn for a couple of pair of mittens, as well as any other bargains I can find.  Just curious to those fair isle/stranded mitten knitters out there, what makes a good mitten yarn?  Is it just sock yarn?  Curious (and eager) minds want to know.  I suspect I’ll be far luckier at Handknits than at the Knitting Party at AC Moore, but you never know.  I guess Paton’s Kroy would fit the bill and last I looked AC Moore carried, but then again, I think I have a pretty good stash of it myself.  Still, need to have some goal before heading out yarn shopping.

I really don’t have much today.  I’m tired.  The short people can now escape from their room as the boy can open the door.  He scared the hell out of me this morning as he wandered up to my bed while I was sleeping with a "mama".  Oy.  Time to reposition baby gates.  I’m ready for the weekend.  Kat-Kat used the potty again last night.  YAY.  We have to work on her whole concept of what to do with the toilet paper and how when wet it should stay in the toilet.  But one step at a time.  We all gave her a big hug, including Alex.  It was so sweet.  Which reminds me, there is a cute routine each night after we get home from my folks house.  Alex has Kat open is coat for him.  I’m not allowed to open the velcro closed flap covering the zipper on his jacket, but he walks over to stand in front of Kat and asks her to help.  Which she gladly does.  Every night.  It is so sweet.

On that note, I’ll bid you a fond weekend and a big..

Craft on!

Believe it or not, I have no new skeins of yarn to post pictures of, nor any new rovings.  Amazing.  Shouldn’t last long though, what with the AC Moore sale this weekend and an upcoming trip to the LYS going out of business.  Actually both will be hit by moi this weekend.  Mom and I will be going to both on Saturday, hopefully before midday meltdown of the little peeps.  Which reminds me, I better call Handknits to see what their hours are to better plan this adventure.  Yup, I certainly need me some more yarn.

I did avail myself of the Hurt Book sale that Interweave has been having and picked up one or two (more like 9) books.  I’ll show those as they arrive, but I added both knitting and beading books, as well as one on making soaps.  They were all at a substantial discount and books that I’ve been eying for a while.  Now I have to rearrange the bookshelves to make room for the new additions to the library. 

Which reminds me, I did add a book to the library last week.  I picked up Handknit Holidays.  There are some really wonderful projects in this book so don’t be surprised to see me mention it again. Fits in nicely with my whole goal of 2006 not to be knitting my fingers to the bone at the last minute for gifts.   There are some very nice gifts in here, though I do find that hat thing on the cover a tad goofy, but hey, that’s me.

I also took advantage of a $30 gift certificate that Amazon sent me for buying $80 worth of Huggies Products in November and ordered this much publicized book.  What with my new found skill of stranded knitting and having see a pair (or three) lovely mittens made from this book and have covetted since seeing those casted on.  Now it will be mine.  (Please forget, if you know, where I work if you do click the link to the book.  I wouldn’t normally link there, but said employer isn’t carrying this book presently.)  Besides,  they gave me $30 for buying $80 worth of stuff I would normally buy anyway, we actually use the diapers and they aren’t stashed like other stuff.  Seriously nice reward for buying diapers I’d say!

I made some more progress on the Very Warm Hat last night, finishing up the two color work on the first hat while watching my first episode of Veronica Mars.  Cute show, kept me entertained and held my attention.  Not many shows can do that.  Deb had recommended it and very nicely reminded me that it was on last night.  Now I just need to catch up on what’s happened so far. I’m quite pleased with the hat and how much my two stranded knitting has progressed.  To further practice the English method, I used that alone after ending the colorwork.  Practice can’t hurt right, and I am still in training for the Olympics afterall.  Love the new button.  Ahh Caffeine, mostly prefered in the coffee format.  "Coffee.  The finest organic suspension ever devised." 

I’ve been working on the Shetland Tea Shawl during my commuting and lunch this week and have been making some pretty decent progress.  I’m now halfway through the horseshoe section.  Figured now was time to give a better shot of what the lace is looking like.  Getting harder and harder to get a good picture.  The 24" needle doesn’t allow for much stretch in finger blocking.  I’m really in love with this shawl.  I’ve got the horsehoe motive memorized and can happily knit along on the train or while gabbing with my lunch buddies.

Finally today’s kitten zen.  Her tongue always seems to be peeking out of her mouth.  She was helping me take pictures of the hat and shawl last night.  Helping me much in the way you’d expect a kitten to help.  Seems she really likes the Zephyr as well.  The kid’s got good taste.   

Finally, the meme that Chris tagged me with late last week:

Four jobs you’ve had in your life:

1. Word Processing Secretary
2. Restaurant Hostess
3. Cashier
4. Computer Programmer

Four movies you could watch over and over again:

1. Armageddon
2. Arsenic & Old Lace
3. Star Trek: Wrath of Khan
4. Gone with the Wind

Four places you have lived:

1. Bergen County, New Jersey
2. Middlesex County, New Jersey
3. Bergen County, New Jersey

Four t.v. shows you love to watch:

1. 24
2. House
3. ER
4. Star Trek: Voyager

Four places you’ve been on vaction:

1. Mexico
2. Israel
3. Caribbean Cruise
4. 6 week cross country bus trip

Four websites you visit daily:

1. Gmail.com
2. Bloglines
3. MSNBC
4. Google

Four of your favorite foods:

1. Italian – love pasta
2. Chinese
3. Mexican
4. SUSHI

Four bloggers you are tagging:
   
    Anyone who wants to be tagged, hereby consider yourself tagged.

Craft on my lovelies!

Since a picture is worth a 1000 words, I don’t have to write much thanks to yesterday’s post.. and today’s!  No dilly-dallying around, here’s the stash acquisition that I’d forgotten to photograph over the weekend:

A skein of Trekking for, um, socks.  Yeah.  Interesting colors too, especially when seen against the other colors I’ve been buying recently.  This is my third trekking purchase for those who have been tracking and someday, I might actually cast on a sock out of the yarn.  Right now they are adding interesting color (100) to the yarn cabinet.  I bought this from Yarn Barn in Kansas.

While placing the order with them, I couldn’t JUST buy a skein of sock yarn (okay forget that my original reason for ordering from them was the Brittany Cable needles set), I also picked up a lb of dyed Corriedale Sliver in Eggplant color.  (Click the picture for some much better wool porn.)  Like always, I haven’t a clue what this is going to be, I just had to have it.

While I’m eagerly awaiting the beginning of the Olympic games, my yarn from Knitpicks arrived late last week.  Here are my team members.  I like how the colors play together and really can’t wait to get started on this thing.  Though I better start doing the math corrections to the pattern as I hear it is pretty FUBAR.  There is a KAL for this vest that I’ve joined. 

Whoops, there was sock yarn in with the vest order from Knitpicks.  Forgot about that, but hey, they are the potato chips of the yarn world.   Not like they count towards the Buy More Yarn StashALong anyway as I ordered them before the start date.  Phooey.  Along those lines though, AC Moore is having one of their Knitting Parties (click for adv and coupon) on Saturday from 11-3 and I have a coupon for 25% off knitting supplies (read yarn).  Don’t you know where I’ll be sometime that day!  Further opportunities to enhance the already obscene stash was brought to my attention by Claudia in her comment yesterday, a LYS is sadly going out of business.  I’ve been meaning to check out that store, and from what Claudia and another knit blogger have to say, I better get over there quickly.  Okay Carole, get ready for more | next to my name.

This is the other mitten that I’d worked from the Mittens book.  I don’t like how they have the top decreases working together with the stripes, and I haven’t exactly tried the mitt on the girl child yet.  It really was a practice exercise in seeing how well I could switch between yarns.  As I noted yesterday, I’d get into a groove and hit the end of the needle.  I hypothesized that a larger garment on a circular needle would be a better indicator of how comfortable I was with the two-handed knitting. 

In chatting with Deb yesterday, I remembered the Very Warm Hat pattern in the EZ book, Knitting Around.  When I ordered a batch of yarn from Knitpicks a while ago, the cranberry WOA that ended up being Twist, I ordered extra, as well as a coordinating skein or two in Snickerdoodle with the express purpose of knitting this hat.  Having gone 24 hours without casting anything new onto the needles, I was overdue.  This is where I’d left off last night at the end of the two hours of American Idol.  Okay, I sheepishly admit to watching it, and well enjoying it, especially the early tryout stuff before they ever get to L.A.  This part is just priceless.  Anyway, within a round or two, I was comfortably knitting with both hands.  While it may be a bit slower than my normal knitting speed, it is still fast enough that I wasn’t ripping the yarn out of the dopey hand. I’m getting pretty confident that I might just actually medal during the Olympics!

There was a request last week for pictures with the kid(s) and Sara.  She doesn’t mind the little creatures at all and will let them get right into her face.  Here’s Alex peeking over the back of the sleep chair at her.  She has a thing for wooden surfaces and will choose those over the couch and the like.  Could be her coat color blends into the light wood scattered around my house.  Maybe she’s part chameleon.

Yesterday was a red letter day in my house.  See this adorable little girl (ignore the tomato sauce please).  She isn’t such a little girl anymore.  Kathryn went on the potty last night for the very first time.  I’m so proud of her.  Mom and I reacted appropriately, gave hugs, praise and she was very excited about the whole thing.  I got her to sit on the potty this morning (without the same exciting results), but praised her nonetheless for trying.  My babies are growing up.

Craft on.

Sorry for no post yesterday.  I awoke with a terrible headache and after getting the twins off to daycare, curled back up in bed for a while.  I did feel better later in the day and got some knitting done, but just didn’t want to play with the computer, even though I have a lot to show!  This was one of those excellent weekends (ignoring the ignoble end to it of a migraine). 

Saturday I had a play-date with Deb, who very nicely documented the adventure!  Here she is sitting in the Ridgewood Starbucks working on the early rounds of her shawl.  Yup, we had some of Starbucks very yummy Espresso Brownies.  MMMMMMMM.  I had a very enjoyable time with Deb, always do.  Lots of laughs and for the first time during our play-dates, we actually knitted!

What did I get?  At Majestic Yarns, I picked up 4 skeins of the Aurora 4ply for further Olympic training exercises.  I’ll knit some of the toddler mittens out of the Mittens book I mentioned on Friday.  I also picked up a set of size 0 dpns, because really, a girl can never have too many small dpns.  I’ve worked two of the mittens out of the book, and while there’s a picture of one below, I didn’t photograph the second. Some of the frustration of two handed knitting is receding.  While I can’t possibly say that I’m truly comfortable with it, I’m not as uncomfortable and frustrated with it as I was before.  My only complaint I think has to do with the projects I selected for training, little glove/mitten bits on dpns.  By the time I get up to speed, it is time to change needles.  I think I’m ready for the vest with the circular needle and should feel more comfortable as it progresses.  I guess I should pull out the yarn (which arrived on Friday – hmm forgot to photograph that) and swatch it at least. 

Anyway.. there were more purchases on Saturday.  I can’t tell you how ecstatic I was to find that second yarn store, Close Knits.  While Majestic is nice, it has a limited selection.  Fabulous if you want Karabella, but terrible if you want sock yarn.  Enter Close Knits.  Big comfy couch in the store and more Cascade than you can shake a stick at.  Finally a local source for Cascade 220.  They also have sock yarn!  I found these babies, Claudia Handpainted, and picked up enough for two pairs.  The blues/purples on the left are the new skeins for mom’s socks.  The others are for ME. 

I probably would have picked up some Cascade had it not been for this.  I bought this bonanza of Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran from Deb’s stash.  Yummy yummy yummy.  I’ve been eying this yarn and luck would have it, Deb wanted it out.  I’ll probably design something for this, right now leaning towards a simple cardigan with maybe simply cables running up the sleeves perhaps.  I have some time to decide, what with all the current projects and the Olympics coming up quickly!  There is a little crazy voice in my head that is whispering that maybe I should ditch the fubar pattern vest and go with this.  I’m trying to ignore it.  Yarn this nice deserves to be savored.  After the Olympics, definitely.

Those were my purchases for Saturday (well a couple of Sudoku books and some things for my BP), but the goodness of the day didn’t end there.  I got home to find a box jammed in my door.  Naturally I started mentally checking off all the things I’ve ordered and haven’t received yet.  While this probably says a lot of my shopping habits, I couldn’t think of what it might be, and didn’t remember placing an order with The Woolen Rabbit recently.  It never crossed my mind that it was from my better pal.  I had to wait until the twins were down to open the box.  I have the best better pal!  I found this jar of knitters & spinner’s cream, soap and 4 balls of bunny crack!  How very  cool is my bp???? I should have figured it out.  Friday night I opened an envelope that had the neat Yarn Yak notecards and a card telling me to watch out for a package.  Thank you again BP.  I love it all!  My BP is definitely going to spoil me:  first cashmere and now bunny crack.  Sweet.  Thank you!

One other purchase to display.  Last week Deb so nicely posted about more sock yarn she had purchased.  She even so generously provided the link to where she bought it on Etsy.  Such thoughtfulness of her!  Weak as I am, I had to click the link.  Even weaker, I had to buy some of the lovely sock yarn.  Who could turn down handpainted merino that comes with two tiny coordinating stitch markers.  Okay forget for a moment that I don’t need coordinating stitch markers to knit my basic socks.  That’s besides the point.  I picked up this skein in the "Autumn" colorway.  Gorgeous.  Simply gorgeous. 

Yeah, last look showed me kicking ass at the Buy More Yarn stashalong with 47 points.  I’m not entirely sure if that is a contest I want to win.  There’s also a skein of Trekking and a pound of eggplant colored corrie sliver that I added and haven’t photographed.  I’m not the crazy fiber lady for nuthin eh?  First step is to recognize there’s a problem

What else is there?  Oh it hasn’t been all about socializing and acquiring ever more stuff for my collection.  I have been knitting.  I finished the socks that originally started out as Mom’s belated holiday gift.  Except they were too big for her feet.  Naturally I found that out as I was halfway through the foot on the second one.  I just couldn’t rip out that much sock, and considering the availability of new sock yarn, I finished them on Saturday and they will be going off to my baby sister.  She’s been coyly asking for a new pair of knitted socks, and well, her feet are a bit larger than mom’s and mine.   Done.

Then there’s the EZasPi Anniversary Shawl.  I’m using the gorgeous ruby colored Zephyr that Deb gave me before the holidays at our last play-date.  I’m in love with this yarn.  Anyway, I decided on the Shetland Tea Shawl from Gathering of Lace.  Its getting to the nice sac-like dental floss look.  Since this picture was taken, I’ve transferred it to the 24" circular needles and moved into the 288 (or this case 290) stitch section.  I’m on the first round of the Horseshoe Lace pattern.  So far, so good and I do so love this yarn.  I dug out the old Pi Completion Calculation spreadsheet and dusted it off for this one.  I’m currently 8.885% complete.  Weeeeee.

To show that I don’t just stash the yarns I buy, and that I am indeed training, here’s the first of the practice mittens.  The pattern is the Chicky Feet from the Mittens book (link above) in the Red and Yellow Aurora 4 from Karabella.  Nice, soft, squishy yarn.  I made the 2 YO size, go figure.  Fits the boy short person perfectly.  Was good practice for dealing with long floats and tucking them in so the short people fingers don’t get trapped.  I was so involved with fighting with the yarns that I didn’t notice until 4 rounds later that I had only switched one of the three smaller dpns to the larger size after finishing the cuff.  Since this was "practice" and in the category that one size difference in dpn wouldn’t matter much to a short person, I left it.  I started another mitten yesterday after my nap, but naturally not the second Chicky Feet, but an entirely different pattern as it involved switching the colors more frequently.  Was an excellent workout for the dumb hand and it no longer feels so incompetent at the task.  Will be even better on a circular needle, and not the ML switching thing, come the games. 

As last night was a new episode of 24 (YAY) and I love me that show, I took a quick mental inventory of the current WIPs.  Actually since the mental inventory is notoriously bad, I actually hit the blog and checked out the On The Needles section to see if there was something I could work on during the show.  Naturally nothing is really mindless knitting.  While the STS is relatively easy, the small stitches are somewhat grabby and I have to make sure I am working them one at a time.  The Nachaq was ruled out last week and therefore already not good for this week.  I really had nothing.  The Olympic training still requires too much attention paid to the wayward finger and therefore wouldn’t suffice.  I needed something that I could glance at occasionally, like during commercials.  Left me with no alternative but to start.. wait for it… socks!  Figured not time like the present to start those Replacement Belated Holiday Socks for me.  I picked out the Claudia Handpainted in the Walk in the Woods colorway (though I’ve never seen a blue and purple woods), winded into a ball and got to work.  By the end of 24, I was well into the sock.  Here’s my progress, along with the kitten zen for today. 

The Claudia Handpainted?  Great yarn.  Reminds me a bit of Koigu, price is certainly in the KPPPM range, but feels a bit softer.  I like how these colors are working up.  Hopefully mom will as well.

That should be enough for today.  I’ll have more pictures tomorrow, including the second FI practice mitten and the stash extras that I forgot to take pictures of (need to document this for myself and a meme that Chris tagged me with.

Craft on!

The Olympic training progresses.  Frustratingly slow, but I am making some progress.  Yesterday I mentioned in an email exchange with Deb that this whole experience with learning to hold the second yarn English style must be what its like to learn to knit.  I’ve been knitting for so long that memory (what hasn’t been trashed by the short people experience and busy holding Star Trek trivia and the like) only reveals me knowing what I’m doing and feeling comfortable with the yarn.  I do vaguely remember fighting with continental style, not wrapping the yarn, dropping it between stitches.  But that’s so far back that it is very vague.  30 years can do that to a person.  I’ve recently made the discovery that I was fortunate, in more ways than one, to have learned at such a young age.  I avoided the whole awkward, need instant gratification stage.  Now I’m fighting the urge to grab the yarn out of the English hand and into the Continental hand.  I am making progress but and have no doubt that at some point I’ll have it down, but it sure is a bumpy road. How appropriate that today’s Knit Bits calendar has this:

Learning to knit is one of the most awkward activities one will ever undertake as an adult.  Every digit feels like a swollen thumb, your hands don’t feel your own to control.  You’re a four-year-old trying to tie impossible-to-understand shoelaces.

–From Zen and the Art of Knitting by Bernadette Murphy.

I am doing fair isle and you do see a pattern emerging. There are obvious tension issues as you can see better on the palm side of the glove, where the blue/grey stitch all but disappears into the surrounding black.  I’ve tried the thing on and there is absolutely no give in the fabric.  I need to loosen up a tad or these "ladies medium" fingerless gloves will only fit Miss Kat-Kat.  Yes, I did switch to the pointy metal dpns for it last night.  I was having issues with the ML cable and was fighting it as much as the goofy second strand of yarn.  Thanks to Katy’s comment yesterday, I’ve dug this book out and will further train with the little mittens it it.  I’ll probably pull out some stash sock yarn and have a go at the little kid mittens in it.  Getting comfortable with the Fair Isle is more than just an Olympic goal now.  I must beat the yarn.

Umm speaking of yarn, a show of hands please as to how many really thought I’d be able to not buy the Noro Silk Garden I mentioned yesterday?  I didn’t think I had anyone fooled.  Okay so I’m a Noro and Rowan ‘ho.  I liked the colors, I liked the deal (disclaimer:  I can’t be held responsible for weak folk like me who click the link to the Noro and then wind up buying it.  You’ve been warned   Looks like I’m going to have two Klaralunds.  Where they will fall into the knitting queue is far beyond me.  Lets not forgot that this weekend is the official cast on for the Anniversary Pi shawl, and I have FLAK (next installment due out on Tuesday) and all the other WIPs, not to mention the Olympics.  I need me a time machine, a longer commute and/or more hours in each day.  Hmm, I could probably get by on less sleep.  I know I did when the short people were tiny people.  I think now is the time to buckle down and quit buying yarn (after this weekend that is) and start using up some of the monstrous stash.

Judging by the comments to yesterday’s post, I seem to have struck a chord with the knitting for hire quandry.  Overwhelming response was that I go with my initial reaction and just not do it.  I agree.  I tend to go with my gut reaction as it really hasn’t steered me wrong yet.  It was quite nice to get the compass check that you all so thoughtfully provided.  It is nice to know I am not alone in this problem.  While I don’t get asked every day, it does happen from time to time.  My free time is in such short supply that, as many noted, I’d never get fairly compensated for it.  Especially when you take into account how much I have in my "to do list/want to do" list.  I’d end up resenting anything that took me away from the items I really wanted to do.  I know that happens every year with the teacher knitting.  I wind up hating that knitting as they become "have to" rather than "want to" projects that keep me occupied for the better part of a month, not to mention cramp my fingers so badly at the end of the push that I can’t knit for 2 days.  I’m going to stick with tacit and polite, no I don’t knit for hire.  I can teach you to knit or direct you to others I know who do.  I’m also resolving to avoid the end of year gift crunch and better spread it out over the year.  In that vein, the Noro MD scarf I finished last week is the first of the 2006 Teacher Holiday gifts.  I’ll pick up some more Noro to do another scarf/hat set next month, but hope to avoid the whole mass buying only to not use and fill up stash problem that I’ve perpetuated the last couple of years.  Maybe this weekend I’ll weed out that stuff and put it up for sale/trade.  Anyway, thank you all for your feedback on my quandry.  I do appreciate it.

And finally, some kitty zen.  I got ya some bonus Earl lovin’ too today to hold you over the weekend.

Have a good weekend.

Craft on!

I didn’t get much knitting done last night my new Ott light was waiting for me by the door.  Hopefully my pictures will be much better for you all now.  After putting the thing together and getting it situated, I was able to sit down and do some training knitting.  I finally got to the fair isle portion of this glove.  You can see that one row with the slate blue peeking out at you from all that black.  I have to say, I’m glad I’m working this training piece as the yarn in the off hand is frustrating the crud out of me.  I’m a continental knitter and I wrap the yarn around my wrist and then my index finger.  Works nicely, been doing that for 30 years now.  Now this whole English method is worlds different and I just can’t hold the yarn.  It feels wrong.  I can’t maintain any kind of workable tension and the yarn is going every which way but loose, getting hooked around the needle at the wrong spot, etc.  Oy.  Frustrating!  Needless to say, I haven’t progressed very far or very fast on this during my morning commute.  I did manage to get 4 more rounds done during my 30 minutes on the train.  That’s nowhere near my normal speed!  I need some serious training.

Oh and there’s another problem with this whole project.  At best, if I ever get to the second one, they’d be fraternal twins.  I only have one skein of the black and off-white 4ply, nicely documented here.  You think I could have looked at the picture more closely, or dug through the bag some more before selecting the colors I did for this. Noooooo.   I wonder what the odds are of getting one more skein of Rowan Yorkshire Tweed 4ply, color 281 (Knight) in lot 6C3 are?  Oy.

I’ve made it a tad further on mom’s belated socks and got Sara to spokesmodel them beneath the new Ott light.  Your moment of kitten zen. I’ve finished the second heel and am into the foot.  You see correctly, I continue to embrace the whole Magic Loop thing.  Same goes for the nasty FI gloves above.  That is a US0 40" addi turbo.  If I weren’t so scattered knitting hither and thither, I’d say these would be done in no time.  Realistically, I want to have them done for her birthday on 2/12.  Best get them done before the Olympics start.

I’ve now turned down a second knitting for hire job in less than a week.  Does anyone else do this?  As I knit every day during lunch, I’ve drawn a bit of attention.  One fellow announced that he’d like me to knit him a pair of cashmere socks.  I politely declined, and continued to decline as he pushed more.  I then pointed him at a website I knew that sold decently priced cashmere socks.  Another coworker, after verifying that I am indeed a knitter, asked if I knit for hire.  She’d seen something she liked in a store, but since it wasn’t wool wouldn’t buy it.  Could I knit it for her.  Uh no.  Could I make me some money doing that?  I don’t doubt it.  But I don’t think I would enjoy it.  I don’t like the pressure of knitting for others.  I’ve also jealously guarded this most treasured of hobbies.  Computers used to be a very entertaining hobby that I now make money at and has lost hobby status.  I no longer enjoying futzing with the computer and haven’t since I gone pro-geek.  I don’t want to go pro-knitting and lose that enjoyment.  Does that make sense?  Am I just being silly?  Should I go chase this lady down and ask really what she wanted and just knit it for her?  How the heck do you price for the service?  Time + materials is the minimum, but what rate for the time?  I would highly doubt I could get away charging what I make on an hourly basis for the pro-geek gig.  That would make for a VERY expensive headband indeed.  On the other hand, my few hours of craft time each week are worth more than a mere pittance.   But… knitting for hire would go a way to supporting my serious yarn habit.  You’d be proud of me, I just abandoned a cart with cheap Noro Silk Garden in it.  As Nancy noted, I’ve developed a bit of a Noro habit. I’m torn between going back to coworker and this time really talking to her to see what she wanted and give it a serious consideration.

Craft on.

This is going to be a quick post.  I’ve started training for the Knitting Olympics.  Last night I pulled out this book
and got to work.  As coincidence would have it, I picked a pattern called "Snowflakes" without realizing the name.  This is for a pair of fingerless gloves in 3 colors with a snowflake pattern on the back of the hand and some grid thing on the palm.  I dug out the Rowan Yorkshire Tweed 4 ply from the stash as I forgot that I only had 2 colors of the Cashsoft left.  While two color gloves are nifty, I wanted the practice of more colors, or at least one more.  So there we go.  I started the first one last night and am a good way into the cuff, I’ve yet to start any fair isle work.

I must apologize for depriving you all of your daily kitten photo.  Elaine called me on the carpet for it.  She’s a sweet little kitten who purrs incessantly.  Though she isn’t the cuddliest kitten I’ve ever had.  She seems to be content to be lying near you rather than on you like Earl.  Here she is draping herself over the back of the convertible chair in the living room.  The tail end is on a rubbermaid tote filled with fleece.  So while she’s in the same room with me, I’m too far away (while sitting on the couch) to mess up her glorious fur.  My mother’s persian, Shawn, is much the same way.  Likes to be with people, just not touched all the time.  Must be a persian thing.  I’m starting to get a little bits of combings from her and my-my, any resulting yarn is going to be gorgeous!

Anyway, gots to go..

Craft on!

As I am pretty obviously a few crayons short of a box serious knitter, I read Stephanie’s post on the Knitting Olympics and just had to join in.  Challenges like that I cannot withstand.  I too love the Winter Olympics even as I hate winter.  No way, no how am I going to strap myself to sticks and hurl myself down the side of a mountain in the most dreaded of substances: SNOW (count them, there are 4 letters to that word).  My little ankle fiasco of July should emphasize that I have enough trouble staying uninjured doing every day activities.  I have no business being on snow and/or ice in any form.  (Yeah that doesn’t work so much for trying to stay home all winter long.  Go figure.)  But in the spirit of "Faster, Higher, Stronger", I’m going to push myself and further challenge my knitterly boundaries. 

Blogging has been very good for pushing those.  While knitting for years and years, I had not done any cable work until starting the Irish Hiking Scarf (which I will finish someday – hmm need to find where I stashed that bad boy) and now am part of the FLAK with several cabled sweaters worth of yarn stashed away in the queue.  Another boundary?  Designing my own lace piece.  Done that now too, twice even.  What’s left?  Intarsia.  Yeah, did a bit of intarsia (eeew) a couple of years ago using a simple vest pattern and sticking the profile of my favorite starship in as a intarsia design mirrored on both fronts, came out very nicely if I do say so myself.  That leaves….

Fair Isle! 

It came to me in a flash.  I’ve been interested in trying some stranded work, even have the Nordic Mittens book in my wishlist, as well as a couple of others.  I didn’t think mittens would be whack enough of a challenge worthy of the Olympics.  I spent some time looking at the projects on Knitpicks and saw it.  My Olympic dream appeared before my eyes:

This is the Snowflakes & Arrows vest. 

While the original is lovely, I’m not really a purple person.  These days I’m drawn to the reds and oranges so I’ll be working it in these colors:

Now that is what I call a challenge!  I’m actually itching to get started.  I think I’ll do a little warmup/practice before hitting the main event on Feb. 10th.  I have a book of Fair Isle mittens that I’ve been eyeing recently and will use them as practice.  I should be able to "practice" using stash yarns, probably my Rowan 4ply or the three remaining skeins of Cashsoft that I didn’t wind up using for teacher gifts.  I’ll pull out the book tonight and see if I can start anything while listening to the most entertaining of performances of American Idol.

Okay now 24 we just awesome.  Love that show and it never ever disappoints.  I knew what Jack was up to with his message to Curtis, just surprised me at who interpreted it.  I do have to add, President Logan is an ijit.  I didn’t like him last season, but cut him some slack as he’d gotten the job quite unexpectedly and at a really crappy time.  Now, 18 months later,  the man is still a dope.  But hey, that differs very little from the real guy in the White House.  I’m eager to see where the rest of the season will take us.  I’m now closer to catching up on the earlier seasons as I only started watching 24 last year.  I watched Day 3 on dvd throughout last season via Blockbuster.com.  I bought the boxset of Day 1 over the summer and just finished it last week.  A&E has graciously been airing Day 2, so I’ll be watching that now along with Day 5.  Love it, love it, love it.  I’ll probably be bouncing down the Day 5 stuff to DVD as I’m "collecting" it on my DVR   I made it to just shy of the heel on mom’s second sock by the end of 24 last night, so progress is being made on things and I’m not just casting on willy-nilly.

On that note, I shall bid you a fond…

Craft on!