exile in knitville

Hello Blog!

2010-08-27T03:56:00.001-07:00

I've missed my blog. I'm considering coming back... I'm playing around with Posterous right now. If this works, boy do I have some knittastic stuff to share...

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Holiday Knits Continued

2009-12-14T15:17:00.001-08:00

So, while I am still employed at the moment I am employed part time. The benefit of this? Holiday knitting deadlines aren't so scary after all. Hail the return of the gift scarf.

His and hers scarves. Well, They're only his and hers because one is for my dad and the other is for his wife I guess, other than that they're totally different. His is the genius 'why didn't I knit this sooner?' One Row Handspun Scarf by the Yarn Harlot in a lovely yet still manly brown Berroco Ultra Alpaca. Hers is the also genius 'why didn't I knit this sooner?' Feather and Fan Scarf in a classic but still feminine gray Berroco Vintage Wool. I had never knitted or even seen Feather and Fan in person before making this scarf. Now I know why it's so popular. Easy as pie and pretty enough to make something simple and good like Vintage look like a million bucks. I have a feeling I'll be knitting both of these as gifts again in the future.

Something not so classic, actually kind of quirky? That would be these.

Trebuchet Hot Water Bottle Cozies, and their accompanying water bottles. Definitely not the perfect gift for just anyone but trust me, I think the people who are getting these will like them just fine. One is my godmother, who is from England, and often exclaims "Oh how precious!" in her thick English accent at charming things such as nightgowns and teacups and things like this that remind her of her childhood there. The other person may or may not see this so I won't be specific, lets just say she appreciates things handmade and comforting. So I think they will both go over well. Both knit it Patons Basic Merino.

Another big holiday success these days? Ina's white chocolate bark.

She's the Contessa for a reason people. This is good stuff. Easy too. Melt some white chocolate, spread it out in a rectangle on parchment, press in chopped walnuts and dried apricots and dried cranberries. Festive and pretty, my photos don't do it justice but in person the fruits look like jewels on snow. And taste even better....

B5T5 Wrap Up and the Start of the Holiday Knits

2009-12-08T05:45:00.000-08:00

The Bottom 5 Top 5 are finally done! Last one-

Pattern: Caricia by Anne Hanson at Knitspot
Yarn: Seduction by Blue Moon Fiber Arts
Needles: Size 5 Knitpicks Options

The small triangular shawl is quickly gaining popularity over the fingerless mitt for "Most Favored Knit Accessory in My Closet." I adore this item. What a shame that I passed this yarn over for (gasp) three years??? That's right, I purchased it at Stitches 2006. Ludicrous! And I love this shawl! It is silky and pretty and has the wow factor of no one can believe you actually MADE that yourself when they see it. Was it hard? I wouldn't say hard, lace does requires concentration though. Which is ok. When I'm parked on the sofa while there's football/hockey/another sporting event I'm really not that into on the TV, I don't mind having something to concentrate on. Plus, as I mentioned-LOVE IT. Thank you again Anne Hanson, have I knit all of your patterns yet? Ok no, but I think I've knit enough to officially make me a fan. A fan of Anne. Yup.

And since that sums up my Bottom 5 Top 5 experiment let me just take a minute to say- HUGE SUCCESS! I never thought I could take yarn I so strongly felt 'meh' about and make such cool things that I love so much. I love my B5T5 items! I think in a way because they were such surprises. I never intended to make a bulky weight Katia triangle shawlette. Never. But guess what-worn it like 10 times already. 10. Times. So my new theory-there are no bad yarns. Ahem, let me repeat that -THERE ARE NO BAD YARNS. There are only yarns in search of the perfect pattern. That is all. And with the power of the Ravelry, and a little time, every yarn can find it's way. Every yarn.

Boy for someone who took such a long break from blogging I seem very enthused don't I? Well, yeh, things have been a little rocky of late. My job situation has been somewhat rocky, but I'm still employed so that's a good thing. And I seem to be coming out of some horrible head cold misery this week so that was lousy, and then the holidays are upon us, yadda yadda yadda you know the drill. But the holidays-THE HOLIDAYS! I do have quite a bit of holiday knitting to share in some upcoming posts. But I don't want this to be an epic blog post so I'll just start with a glimpse at the smallest and the cutest ok?

Pattern: Mittens from the Knitters Book of Handy Patterns by Ann Budd
Yarn: Vanna's Choice (what's good enough for Vanna, is good enough for me)
Needles: Bamboo 7 dpns

My little niece in Florida asked for mittens for Christmas. I know what you're thinking, same thing I did-"But you live in Florida!" But I'm told there are some cold(er) mornings here and there, and sometimes my niece thinks her hands are cold, and ok, yeah, my guess is that these will probably be put to more "dress up" type use than "warmth providing" use. But when the cute niece asks, you know the aunt is going to knit them right? This pattern was interesting. Normally I love everything from this book but yeah, for some reason I ended up having to frog the complete top half and thumb of the first one I knit of these. The increase section is written a little unclearly and my first thumb was ridiculously short. It was an easy fix to rip back and just make the gusset shorter and the thumb shorter. And now they're perfect. And adorable. And just in time for Christmas.

Rehabilitating a Bad Yarn back into Society

2009-10-18T14:05:00.000-07:00

To say I used to have a love/hate relationship with the yarn that is in the 4th position of my Bottom 5- Top 5 strategy is an understatement. I loved the softness, the texture, it was not complete melting soft mush like some yarns, but not itchy scratchy wooliness either. It was a beautiful bulky nubby mix of something in between. And I even loved the colors, the brownish gray-mud part, contrasting so well and playing so nicely with the lighter beige mixed in, and that jewel-y pretty purple part. Well... Most of the colors...

Yikes! It's that acid green stripe of heck that just appears out of nowhere! What is that? I so don't love the acid green stripe. It burns my eyes and makes it sad. I swear it literally hid in the middle of the ball until I got it home and tried knitting the horrible cowl that is shown above. (Actually it's not a horrible cowl, it just wasn't different enough to mix up that green!) That acid green totally tricked me! But-don't despair-Bottom 5 Top 5 can fix a lot of problems. It can make the best of a bad situation. Maybe it could even tame that crazy acid green into something perfectly acceptable, perhaps complimentary at times, that I do now adore and welcome very readily near my face and around my neck.

Yarn: Katia Nepal
Pattern: Simple Yet Effective Shawl by Laura Chau-modified

I changed the pattern slightly so that I increased 4 stitches every right side row as written, but still increased 2 more stitches- one at the beginning and one at the end of every wrong side row. Similar to the increases from Ishbel. The result is a shallower, wider, less pointy triangle, more suited to wrapping and gathering around my neck all cuddly-like. This is not a shawly-drapey situation people. I don't really think bulky yarn ever is really. This is a "scrunch it down in that gap between my chest and my coat and block out all the chill and conserve warmth situation." Yep. That works.

Now there's just one more final yarn to go in Bottom 5 Top 5 except.. (cue record scratching sound)

Oh. It's lace in fingering weight. It's still a one skein project, and it's more of a scarf than a shawl but still... it's just not going along as quickly as the scrunchy bulky Katia shawl I just made that took 3 days. This one might be a little while. I'm much further along than in the photo above now, but still, I'll have to report back later on this one.

Three Projects Down, Two to Go

2009-10-04T16:51:00.001-07:00

My Bottom 5-Top 5 stashbusting strategy is proving a success. Not only am I ticking these bottom 5 yarns off the list right and left, I'm finding out that some of them aren't so bad after all. I found such great patterns to match with them, I feel kind of bad I neglected these yarns for so long. First up-a hank of Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sport. The pattern I picked for this yarn is Grumperina's Periwinkle Beret.

I adore this beret. I find myself walking around with it on, forgetting to take it off, not wanting to take it off. First of all-the yarn is really ok. The colors are right up my alley and it's soft and pretty. But this pattern-oh this pattern. Totally awesome. Love the tubular cast on, it was really, really easy and just makes wearing the hat feel great, like I've never had a homemade hat feel. And lots and lots of stockinette in the round. I love that. So much that if I had to knit just one thing for the rest of my life, it probably would be hats in the round. Which brings me to the next project.

The Pi Topper Chemo Cap by Corey Laflamme is a free pattern on Elann.com. But I think if I had to pay for it I would have. More stockinette in the round-this time inspired by EZ's Pi Are Square pattern. Mine is knit in Louet Gems Sport in a purple color I had originally intended to use as socks for my mom, but she's kind of through her phase of loving this color now, so I was free to make whatever I wanted. And I'm going to donate this one to a charity. It's not a color I love, and it is a little snug, and in this yarn not really warm enough to be a warm winter hat. However-for someone battling cancer who has lost their hair it might fit them great, and they might like it that's it's a little lightweight. I have another random skein of something else that would work with this pattern though, I think I'll knit a partner for this one before I ship them out.

The third project on the list, has not thrilled me as much as those first two I'm afraid. Maybe because it's something I was knitting for the second time, maybe it's just that this yarn definitely was at the bottom of the basket for a reason...

I first made the Cloverleaf Lace Mitts from Knitspot back in April 2007 for my mom out of the same yarn I used here, Misti Alpaca Sport. The yarn is a challenge, supremely soft, but very hairy and sheddy-not something that shows stitch definition at all as you can see. But I've had it FOR-EV-ER and it was haunting me. I worked Ravelry backwards and forwards trying to find a good project for one ball of this yarn. It just never happened. Sport weight just is not popular like fingering and worsted weights are. It can be a challenge. So I decided just to go ahead and make exactly what I had made before. The results are ok-soft, warm, I will wear them when the temperature drops definitely. I made one obvious mistake in that one is actually an entire pattern repeat shorter than the other, however, they're pretty stretchy and I just don't feel like ripping this hairy splitty yarn, so, yep it's staying, I can live with it. Next time though, and oh yes there will be a next time, I'll be making this great pattern with a tighter spun yarn that shows better stitch definition like it deserves.

Playtime and the NY Times

2009-10-03T04:08:00.000-07:00

A non-knitting post today but still worth noting nonetheless. My nephew is growing like crazy, and last week I went down to Florida to see him turn 1.

In addition to eating birthday cake with our hands we spent a lot of time laughing, playing, swimming and reading stories. Ok, most of the time he kind of just sits and hugs you and smiles and walks around but his sister-let me tell you!

She is becoming such a little card! What a character! She's a big girl now and well she is just totally smart and logical and bust-a-gut hilarious. All. the. time. Every little thing gets a reaction or a statement or a funny face or pose out of her. More entertaining than tv. Seriously. The time just flew, but I'm so glad I could be there with them again. I never get to spend enough time with them especially now since they are just growing up so, so fast.

While I was gone I kind of fell behind on my internet surfing, including reading blogs. Which was a mistake because for a few days I missed out on a blog post that mentioned me. A Big One.

If you look here there's a post called Lessons from Gardeners. Yep, that's my photo. And my name as the first 2 words of the post. My husband is running around telling people I made the New York Times, and I'm right behind him saying "The New York Times Website hon! It's the website, not the paper!" But still... Michael Tortorello has been writing this blog since the spring on what it's like to have a first garden, the victories, the successes. It's really good and all too familiar to me. Reminds me of all the stuff I went through last year-the joy of an abundance of basil, the defeat of the squash vine borers attacking all of the squash. Anyway, a few weeks ago he asked people for stories about their gardens. I emailed, sent the picture, and heck-whaddaya know I guess he liked it, even my cheezy joke about the wide margin of error! Ha! Anyway, so it's not the paper, but it is the website and I do keep going back and looking at it and it's cute how my mom printed it out to show all her friends. Oh and another thing-just so you know, if you go to the link, and then click for the Home Page at the top, and then scroll down and click for the Dining & Wine Section, and then click "Bitten" for Mark Bittman's blog. Well yes, I am a mere 3 clicks away from the ever amazing and fabulous Mr. Bittman. 3 clicks. Swoon/sigh... Now that-that has you jealous now doesn't it?

Bottom 5? Top 5!

2009-09-13T16:09:00.000-07:00

Wow, 2 weekends in a row with finished objects! A girl could get used to this!

Pattern: Pembroke by Kirsten Kapur from Petite Purls
Yarn: Encore worsted
Result: Nauseatingly cute.

Not to mention this was fun. Fast, interesting, came out looking very much like the one in the pattern photo-always a plus. I love it. I'm going to visit my nephew next week and I'll be there for his 1st birthday so this is one of his gifts. Anyone considering making this pattern I say make it-I think it would be a great choice for beginners who want to practice cabling or basic construction. Also-I would love to see one made in pink or purple for some brainy little girl toddler too, I just think that would be awesome.

But what to knit next? Well, I've developed a new strategy to deal with this very question. I'm calling it-Bottom 5, Top 5! From the bottom of the stash to the top of the queue!

I was a little at odds what to knit next. I know I should probably be starting Christmas gifts, but I do already have a couple done, and I still have a lot of time right? I figured that I really want to do is to knit the yarn that I’m always passing over. The yarn at the bottom of the stash. So I decided to single out my bottom 5. They are clockwise from the left-2 balls (one in the form of a cowl that needs to be frogged) of Katia Nepal, an odd ball of Misti Alpaca Sport, Lorna's Laces Shepherd's Sport Multi, one hank of Blue Moon Fiber Arts Seduction and a mystery amount (1 skein? 2?) of purple Louet Gems Opal which is now discontinued. Now there’s nothing specifically wrong with any of these yarns. Except maybe the fact that 3 of them are sport-weight (not a lot out there for sport weight in terms of patterns it seems). I think maybe they’re only fault is that they were purchased with no set pattern in mind and as a result, they’ve never been matched up with the patterns that are their destiny. So I decided that what I needed to do was to find these yarns some patterns. I’ve finally singled them out, poured over and over Ravelry and have found them 5 acceptable patterns to work with. And voila-these yarns and their patterns have moved from the bottom of the stash to the top of the Ravelry queue. Bottom 5-Top 5! More on the patterns that I've picked later but I will mention that I'm hoping to tie this in with some entries in the Single Skein September Knitalong over at the Stash and Burn Podcast. Just for the heck of it. I am starting a little late, but I also have some good travel knitting time coming up so it's possible to at least have a couple of entried finished by the end of the month. Also I have a feeling that while I do really love these yarns, I just don't feel like I see some of them (especially that crazytown Katia Nepal and that 'meh' purple Louet) fitting into anything I'd ever wear or any upcoming gift opportunities I have in the near future. It's likely some of the finished items will end up going to charity too. And I haven't knit for charity in awhile, and I do love knitting for charity so I'm happy to get to do that again.

Labor Day Wrap Up

2009-09-08T03:33:00.001-07:00

I'm ending the summer on a peachy note. The berries picked earlier this summer are now gone and I miss have a huge frozen fruit stash to dip into for smoothies every morning... To deal with this I went peach picking this weekend and came home with several pounds. Let me just say that peach picking is something that I think everyone should do at some point in their lives. Even if you don't really like peaches, it's quite an event to be in the orchard on a beautiful morning, with that fresh peach scent just clobbering you right over the nose. And these peaches are just perfect. No marks or bumps or bruises. They should be, they haven't been touched by anyone in a store or given some kind of crazy chemical bath along the way. We'll be enjoying them for awhile.

Something else that's perfect? My new shawl.

Pattern: Simurgh by Anne Hanson of Knitspot

Yarn: Mistralee Silk and Wool

Needles: Knitpicks Options Size 5

Yep, it's done and yep I adore it. I did make one huge mistake in the pattern-I was supposed to start off knitting the center motif for 4 repeats, finish half of the shawl and then pick up and knit the other half-starting with 4 repeats in the opposite direction. Instead, I guess I just got a little carried away and ended up knitting 8 repeats right away. Therefore, it is not symmetrical. Do I really give a whit? Heck no. I love this. I want to wear this all the time. With work clothes. With jeans on the weekend. With my pajamas. Love it. And all it's woolly silky goodness too.

Also btw I totally love this yarn. When I bought it at Stitches last year I bought it from the woman who owns the Mistralee Farm Studio. Along with the other people shopping in her booth I just could not get over the quality and beauty of the yarn and it's reasonable, reasonable price. When I paid I asked the owner if she had a website she said she does not. I asked if there is a catalog and there is not. She only sells at shows like Stitches. I was surprised. If you come across her booth or any of the yarns scoop them up. There was not one variation or knot or imperfection in any of the six skeins I used to knit the shawl. Also when I blocked it-not the tiniest tinge of red on any of my white towels. For an independent vendor and not a major manufacturer-I was pleasantly surprised by this.

Now that the shawl is finished I'm wrapping up a little vest for my nephew. This is Pembroke by Kristin Kapur as featured in the new online magazine, Petite Purls. In regular tried and true Encore Worsted it's fun and fast and almost done!

And there's only more knitting to come. I've been sifting through my Ravelry queue trying to find projects for some older yarns that have been, ahem, moldering away in the stash. (Remember Stitches 2006? Yikes!) And with fall knocking at the door, I figure it doesn't hurt to be prepared.

Knitting on the edge

2009-08-16T16:35:00.000-07:00

See I still knit lace. I'm on the edge of the Simurgh stole already...

Ok, it's just the first edge of the first half, but I've still been knitting my head off. This thing has grown into a beast and I love it. I made a mistake (of course) where instead of knitting 4 repeats of the middle section, I knit 8. Oh well, I just won't knit the other 4 when I pick up the middle for the second half. I know this means it won't be symmetrical but I don't care. I'll love it anyway.

Another big thing I've been doing a lot of lately is cooking. A. Lot. I've always loved to cook, but lately I feel like I'm starting to COOK. In a new way. I read The Omnivore's Dilemma earlier this summer. Wow. Between that and a way more successful recession garden this year my thoughts about food and where it comes from and what's good to eat have been changing significantly. I pay attention more. Our meals have been much more veggie-centered and there's a lot less red meat and processed foods around. And I think it's great. And it's changed the act of cooking itself for me. Earlier today I was cooking and thinking that I'm starting to cook the way I knit. I think about it, just like I always think about knitting so much. And it's not unusual for me to find myself in the kitchen for long stretches of time, kind of just finding my way along something involved, but totally enjoying it. I've abandoned almost all of the frozen stuff I used to rely on for quick midweek dinners and found ways to whip up a quick pizza, or stack a bunch of veggies and hummus in a wrap for a veggie sandwich. On the weekends I try to snatch longer stretches of time trying out the new recipes I came across during the week that I've been thinking about. Which brings me to this weekend- last night the husband grilled up some lamb chops (yes there is still some meat, I cannot give it up entirely) and I made the Summer Squash Gratin from my new favorite food blog 101 Cookbooks. I adore this blog and the recipe came out decent-I think some of my modifications might not have been that helpful. Oh well, can't win them all, husband liked it a lot though. Then this afternoon I whipped up The Cream of Fresh Tomato Soup from Barefoot Contessa, just to try it out and to stash in the fridge for some lunches this week. That was a big success-yummy and it helped me cut down the surplus of tomatoes from the garden that was starting to build up! Then for dinner this evening I continued my ongoing summer of 2009 experiment of pizza on the grill.

Yum. This one I'm still getting the hang of-hence the one unintentionally heart-shaped pizza and the other one that's kind of shaped like a kidney. Every time I make the pizza on the grill I start out thinking it will be the last, I'm still struggling with the dough a little, it always seems like it's going to just fall to shreds until I actually get it on the grill and cooking. But then once it's there it's just so easy, it gets so nicely charred and crispy. And it's soooo tasty that when we finally do get to eat it we always wonder why we don't eat these all the time. Here the big one and the heart shaped one are BBQ chicken pizza-BBQ sauce, chicken, monterey jack cheese and red onion. The other 2 are simple-homemade pesto and feta cheese. All were delicious. Enough to make me keep trying I suppose!

More like the Summer of Infrequent Blogging....

2009-08-09T16:02:00.001-07:00

Oh gosh, no posts since June! Talk about a busy summer. It's been bbq's and weekend trips and fun stuff as far as the eye can see. Which is great, but doesn't fair well for the knitting blog. Well, I am still knitting, and I am still knitting lace, but there have been other things too.

Pattern: Easy Baby Cardigan from Knitting Pure and Simple
Yarn: Vanna's Choice by Lion Brand

Simple yarn and a simple pattern equals a great gift! This was for a baby shower I went to in July. The mom to be is a great knitted gift recipient, so sweet and appreciative, I knew I had to make something. Now, when they say Easy Baby Cardigan, it sure was easy. I added the button and button holes to the pattern, I like them better than the ties and this came out so cute! Vanna's Choice is simple acrylic, nothing that's going to set the fiber world on fire, true, but a good baby yarn powerhouse-machine washable and will hold up through and through. And the color is Dusty Purple. It's sweet for a little girl but not too froufy. Perfect.

Also meet Absorba, the bathmat from the first Mason Dixon knitting book. This came about one night when I went to knitting group and literally finished the yarn I had for the project I was working on. I went and bought 16 balls of Sugar and Cream cotton, and a new Size 15 circular and was on my way with this one. It is so squishy and wonderful. I'm going to love having the versatility of the cotton washcloths as a bathmat. It's also my specified garter stitch knitting for those tv dance shows I love where I just can't look away from the screen that much. A must have.

In addition to knitting, there is a new hobby which will I'll wait to talk about in a later post, and also gardening is back in fashion this year. The Recession Garden lives again it sure does have me on my toes!

Back and bigger than ever, at 20' by 30' it is a big garden. It has to be big to accommodate my wide margin of error! Well, so far only the pepper plants have been a big mistake this year. A ton of rain and cold weather in June just knocked them right out with some type of devastating black spot yuckiness. But other than that things have pretty much been so far so good.

This might not look like a huge harvest but lately it's been about this much that I've been bringing in every other day. Even the zucchini is abundant! And I'm way past the squash borer season at this point so I think I've made it. I injected the stems with BT this year regularly and it seems to have worked. The tomatoes are now coming in full swing and oh yeah, there are quite a few green beans. Summer, it's what's for dinner.

Summer of Lace

2009-06-08T03:35:00.000-07:00

I'm probably a few years behind, but it looks like 2009 is going to be my first summer of lace. Blame it on Ishbel. I'm officially addicted.

Knit up in some Miss Babs Yummy Sock yarn this is my new favorite thing. I adore it. I love the points, the drapiness, the pattern, everything. And face it, I could have knit a cat bed with this yarn and I'd want to wear it around my neck in those colors. They are so gorgeous and saturated. Color name-Wine Barrels. Perfection.

Onto the next project is Simurgh by Anne Hanson. I have wanted to knit this for a forever ago but made the Ishbel first as a warm up.

I'm loving this one too already. I feel like a big lace project is what my summer knitting repertoires have always been missing. Not that I don't love the socks and dishcloths but I've always felt a little subjected to the very simple and very small project realm during the hot weather. Not anymore. It's like instead of having to read magazines, I can finally pick up a novel again. Big lace projects are fun to sink my teeth into. And I can't wait to see how this one will come out.

And that's not the only red in my life. Last week I picked 14 pounds of strawberries at a local farm with my mom. We also picked fresh peas, spinach and kale. I'm all about the local lately. And the berries. And now I've got a freezer full of both. Lovely.

2009-04-06T03:34:00.000-07:00

Normally I would make lame excuses for not blogging for so long, but this time is different, this time there are good excuses! My mom was in the hospital for a crappy, scary stretch. She's ok now but for a while there it was not good and exhausting and sad. We're all doing a little better now, getting used to a new way of things. Just goes to show you never, ever stop learning.

Also it seems everyone has been sick! Really sick, like doctor visits and medicine and the cough still hangs on for 6 weeks sick. And I got to get sick twice too! I got a cold thing and then a stomach thing. Ick! And let me tell you there are few things worse than sitting in a hospital worrying about your mom, wondering if you should just crawl into a hospital bed yourself... Anyway, then last week when it seemed we were done with all the people being sick, little Ella developed some weird skin condition and had to have a vet visit and some medicine of her own...

We don't know if it's a scratch or a skin allergy or what but she has to wear that rotten cone collar until she's done with the medicine. Poor baby...

Ironically, in the meantime, despite everything else being a mess, the knitting has gone surprisingly well. Somewhere along the line I finished knitting Cosima. Let it sit around for 2 weeks with no buttons, and then found buttons and finally finished it for real. And boy I'm so glad I did.

Pattern: Cosima
Yarn: Cuzco
Needles: Clover circs, Size 8 and 10.5 (I think)

Results: I love this. I've probably already worn it 3 times in 4 weeks. It's not as heavy or hot as the bulky yarn would make you think, I think it's the 3/4 sleeves. And for some reason, it's just so comfortable. It wasn't a difficult knit but definitely more chart reading than I'm used to. Also, seaming the raglan sleeves on the purl side (the front is the purl side) with all that patterning was a little tricky at times. I did lengthen the body by 2 inches and make the sleeves an inch wider for my chubby arms. I'm not sure this was necessary, when this yarn gets wet it stretches considerably. When it dried it shrunk back to the dimensions I wanted but I wonder if I could have just knit it normally and blocked it to that size. Either way it's wonderful. Definitely something I'm proud of.

And already poof! I'm about to finish the second sweater of the season.

This is #994 V-Neck Neck Down Raglan from Knitting Pure and Simple and it is flying. In this photo taken 2 days ago I'm in the middle of the second sleeve but as I type this I've finished the sleeve, I'm on the garter stitch neckband (translation-garter stitch neckband easy and fast!!!) and then I'll just have the little garter button bands (also easy and fast!!!) to go. I didn't think I'd manage 2 sweaters this year before the hot weather set in. I had originally thought I'd be stuffing this in a bag to wait to be finished sometime next fall. But it looks like I'm going to make it and I'm thrilled. So far the sweater is coming out great. It seems things are starting to look up.

A little guy and some little knits

2009-02-22T15:54:00.000-08:00

Last weekend I took a quick trip down to Florida for a very special event, it was time for my nephew to be baptized.

And believe it or not he was just that calm cool and collected throughout the whole ceremony. He is such a sweetie. And just to make him even more lovable when he's not dressed in his formal wear he enjoys lounging about in a onesie, playing with some handknits.

Can you believe it, he loves his blocks! He grabs them and squeezes them and puts them in his mouth while he makes this silly grunting noise like he's trying to be tough. It cracks everyone up, and then he starts laughing and he's all smiles and giggles like all of a sudden he thinks its so funny too. It's so cute. And I'm just thrilled that the blocks are put to good use. Remember how much trouble I had making them? Ugh, I look back on those awful last stages of seaming them and wonder how I made it through, it was really that miserable. And now, now they are toys- TOYS! That someone loves and plays with regularly. I just think its so cool.

I recently finished my toe up socks which came out ok

For some reason my toe-ups seem to come out a little saggy all the time. They just don't fit as well as top down. And they seem to take forever after the heel, I think I miss having a toe to look forward to. It might be awhile before I try these again. Anyway, after I finished the socks I had to start another 'toss in my bag' project to have with me all the time so I started this scarf.

It's Rivolo by Anne Hanson. Like all lace it looks kind of bumpy and weird now but once its blocked it should look way better. I am having so much fun knitting this by the way. It's so simple, and every other row is purling back, so it's meditative with really short rows and seems to be going very fast. I worry that I might not wear this when I'm done. I realized I already have a very lovely green lace scarf that I never, ever wear. But I know that I am a process knitter, and sometimes I have to knit things just to try it, just to see how it will look finished, or just because it's there.

Inspiration, not for vegetarians

2009-01-28T18:33:00.000-08:00

A couple of things almost inspired me to post recently:

My sister called me the other night giggling and asking what I thought about Rod Blagojevich’s idea to name Oprah Winfrey to the replace Barack Obama in the Senate. She and I both thought it was hil-lair-ious!! We had a very funny conversation, laughing about the different ridiculous things we had heard him say in various interviews that day and I just thought it was so cool that I have a sister who calls me about that stuff and that we have a very similar twisted sense of humor about such things. What can I say? It warmed my cockles…

I was also thinking about blogging about getting chart burnout. Cosima is trucking along and looking gorgeous. But I miss knitting without looking so I did spend a couple of days just vegging out working on my stockinette toe up socks for a little while. The chart for Cosima isn't hard by any means but it gets tricky keeping one eye on the chart and one eye on American Idol…

But the most inspiring thing, the thing I heard about recently that I really felt I needed to blog about, because it’s so wonderful, it needs more coverage and should be shared with others, is that new culinary phenomenon known as the Bacon Explosion…

Ahh, so pretty. Coming to us courtesy of the blog BBQ Addicts, this is the most unique and scary and mouth watering thing I've heard of in awhile. First Bacon is woven (see there are crafts involved!) in a square shape and then spread with sausage and then it's wrapped around-what else? More Bacon! All rolled together into one adorable tasty little heart attack.

The inventors suggest slicing it thinly and eating it on a biscuit-so see it's not as bad as you thought! Really, click the link, go read the recipe yourself, you'll see- it’s amazing!!! Now of course the question arises- will I ever make one? Unfortunately to the huge disappointment of my husband, probably no. But for now, just for today at least, I still want to acknowledge it's existence here on the blog and look at its picture a little longer and just think about it. Even just the photo of the Bacon Explosion is better than nothing. Just knowing it’s out there, I feel the world is a better place…

I think I miss summer

2009-01-14T16:30:00.001-08:00

This is a shocking statement for me. I've always been a big winter girl. My reasoning is a) on a normal day I run hot as a furnace by nature, when everyone is cold I'm usually still warm in a t-shirt (I worry what menopause is going to have in store for me someday) and b) I'm a knitter. I want it as cold as possible as long as possible all the time. I need winter to maximize the usage of those lovely knitted items. They aren't going to wear themselves you know. But I have to tell you, these days... this year... everything is different...

This year I miss my garden. I miss my garden very, very dearly. These are 3 gardening books I got for Christmas and my first seed catalog for 2009. This past Sunday I finally got some time to curl up with them on the couch to start reading and I swear my jaw was dropped open and drool may or may not have fallen on some of (most of) the pages. Then there was a day recently when I saw Ina Garten make an ordinary Tomato Sandwich on her show. As she put the knife to that huge juicy tomato, I felt an ache in my heart like a food show has never inspired in me before. And you know I can get pretty emotional about my food. And speaking of tomatoes I've noticed all of a sudden that all the tomatoes in my supermarket suck. Did they always suck this much? And also I spend way, way, way too much time gazing out my dining room window, looking at my compost bin covered with snow and thinking "Is it going down? Does it need turning? Does it need more green or more brown? Will I have compost to put in the garden when the time is right?" Sigh... So much for being the girl that used to want to marry winter...

So in this distressed state I've reverted to my safe place and I've regressed to consoling myself with fiber...

Meet Cosima. I know she's not much to look at now but trust me she's going to be a grand girl. What fun, really, really fun. And the color that I was kind of 'meh' about when I bought it? (This usually happens to me every time I'm forced to pick a color that is not black) All of a sudden I love it! It's perfect! And that yarn, the Cuzco, it's amazing. So lush and soft, such a pretty twist. Trust me if you're thinking of making anything with Cuzco make it. If you need something to line your shelves with, hang from a curtain rod, I wouldn't be surprised if Cuzco wouldn't be great at that too. Yes I love it that much. Yes I'm being silly. But it's going to be a windchill of like 8 degrees tomorrow, and I haven't had a decent tomato in years (3 months) so just bear with me for a bit. I'm sure spring is just around the corner...

The Cutesy Good and the Ugly Bad

2009-01-06T03:39:00.000-08:00

The cute cat photo of the day is Ella in a box she found on the dining room table. She sat there for at least half an hour just posing. It became obvious she was waiting for me to take her photo.

And then this would be the ugly knitting photo of the day...

Blech. This is the GC Cowl (raveled here) which is still a pattern I like but not in this yarn. The yarn is Katia Nepal which is still a yarn I like but not in this pattern. Jess at Fig and Plum just made one of these and it's beautiful. But mine came out way too long and floppy and curly and it just doesn't really work. I wanted a cowl that is a little closer to my chin and higher, this one hangs down kind of like a scarf. Oh well, it's my first time making a cowl so go figure. I'm going to frog it and probably try another cowl pattern. I think one that's knit side to side rather than up. I think I'd like the stripes better running the other way and it will help the length/droopiness issue. I'm not going to re-knit it again right away, but I will eventually. I still really like the colors and the yarn is squishy and soft, it doesn't deserve to live in the stash unused.

Socks and some verse

2009-01-04T10:04:00.000-08:00

Pattern: Sailors Rib Socks from More Sensational Knitted Socks by Charlene Schurch
Yarn: Knitpicks Essential
Needles: Clover Bamboo DPN's size 2
Result: I'm pretty happy with the socks in the end, not so much with the Essential yarn. It fuzzes up like crazy! When I started I knit a gauge swatch, frogged it and then started the first sock. That beginning was so fuzzy and pilly I cut it off and started all over with yarn that hadn't been used for the swatch. I realize it's great that Knitpicks can offer wool sock yarn at such a bargain, but this might be a bargain I'll just pass up next time. I'd rather pay more and have yarn that doesn't pill. Especially for socks and especially for socks that are meant to be a birthday gift for someone I love, like these.

This week I was listening to an old episode of the Knitpicks Podcast on Knitting in Literature. Kelley Petkun opened by reading An Ode to My Socks by Pablo Neruda. I remembered I had first read this poem in high school and I don't think I have read or heard it since then. Now, when I went to high school I went to a school outside my district so I could attend a really good magnet program for Performing Arts. My focus, believe it or not, was creative writing. I've always known that during those four years, taking extra hours of my school day to just focus on writing that well, honestly, I know I wrote a lot of bad poetry during that time. I was a teenager, into college rock and goth music, let's face it, adolescence is just ripe to be a breeding ground for bad poetry. But listening to Kelley read that poem I realized that you know, during those years I also read a lot of very, very good poetry too. And I should be respectful of that. Like this poem. And it all came back to me and I just keep reading this poem over and over and wondering why am I not reading poetry every day because it really can be so, so wonderful. The truth is that reading this poem over now that I'm a knitter, and a sock knitter it has very special reverberations for me. How amazing is it that one of the greatest poets that ever lived chose to write a poem about of all things, his hand knit socks. You have to admit, I does speak a great deal for hand knit socks. They really are just this wonderful.

Ode to a pair of socks

Maru Mori brought me
a pair
of socks
that she knit with her
shepherd's hands.
Two socks as soft
as rabbit fur.
I thrust my feet
inside them
as if they were
two
little boxes
knit
from threads
of sunset
and sheepskin.

My feet were
two woolen
fish
in those outrageous socks,
two gangly,
navy-blue sharks
impaled
on a golden thread,
two giant blackbirds,
two cannons:
thus
were my feet
honored
by
those
heavenly
socks.
They were
so beautiful
I found my feet
unlovable
for the very first time,
like two crusty old
firemen, firemen
unworthy
of that embroidered
fire,
those incandescent
socks.

Nevertheless
I fought
the sharp temptation
to put them away
the way schoolboys
put
fireflies in a bottle,
the way scholars
hoard
holy writ.
I fought
the mad urge
to lock them
in a golden
cage
and feed them birdseed
and morsels of pink melon
every day.
Like jungle
explorers
who deliver a young deer
of the rarest species
to the roasting spit
then wolf it down
in shame,
I stretched
my feet forward
and pulled on
those
gorgeous
socks,
and over them
my shoes.

So this is
the moral of my ode:
beauty is beauty
twice over
and good things are doubly
good
when you're talking about a pair of wool
socks
in the dead of winter.

Happy New Year!

2009-01-01T15:41:00.000-08:00

We had a great night last night. Despite the frigid weather blustering outside this week we rang in the new year warmly with good friends and fine food and drink. It was very fun and heartwarming. And now today, New Years Day things have gotten off to a good start. I hit the gym early for a yoga class this morning. I put the Christmas tree away did some knitting, more on that later, let me just say I love finishing things! And then tonight I decided to whip up some toasty soup to fill our bellies. My Christmas gift to myself this year was a little ice cream scoop. One of those that that helps you measure cookie dough just right every time so the cookies all come out the same size. You know what else that little scoop is just right for? Mini meatballs for soup!

I picked this tip up from a woman I used to work with who was a busy mom of 3. Rather than browning meatballs in batches in oil in a skillet, she just threw them on a cookie sheet and in a hot oven until they were brown and cooked through. When you're talking about mini meatballs you can make a whole big bunch and it saves you oodles of time. When I started this recipe out I really just wanted to use up some ground beef and parsley I had sitting around in the fridge. They went in the meatballs with the other usual suspects- breadcrumbs, onion, garlic, parmesan, egg. I had pasta and beans in the cabinet. All I had to pick up was some chicken broth and kale. I like kale in my soup, it has a little bit more texture than spinach and I think it holds up better. In the south people eat leafy greens like kale on New Years day to bring about prosperity in the new year since kale is the same color as money. I had forgotten that little fact until I was making this. And I made it on New Years Day. That was kind of a cool coincidence.

Hopefully everybody has a great year in 2009. Like all years there are going to be ups and downs, new stuff to enjoy and new things to endure. But if you can at least try to start it off good. Make the first day count and maybe it will increase your chances of make the ones that follow good too. A bowl of hot soup is a pretty positive direction to head in if you ask me.

Taste test

2008-12-21T10:22:00.000-08:00

Just because I haven't been blogging for a little bit doesn't mean I haven't been reading other blogs. I've always read other knitting blogs, and I've been reading other food blogs for a little while, but this was the first week that I actually decided to try some recipes from some of the blogs I read. Judging by how the recipes came out, I think I'll be doing this more in the future.

The first thing I tried are these Spicy-Sweet Glazed Pretzels and Nuts from the blog Everybody Likes Sandwiches. This came out sooo good! The glaze is amazing, at first when you eat it it's yummy sweet, and crunchy and buttery. And then that spice sneaks up on you on the back of your tongue and then you realize you must eat more! Besides being so tasty and delicious I'm thrilled to add this one to my repetoire of gift recipes. The pretzels make me the happiest. I'm a big pretzel eater. I eat them plain as an almost daily snack. In a gift recipe they're a nice change of pace from plain nuts or cookies all the time. Plus-not to sound like a penny pincher, but pretzels are super cheap. And when you give as many food gifts as I'm giving this year (translation-I bought 8 pounds of butter at Costco and STILL HAD TO GO BUY MORE) cheap tasty fillers are very appreciated!

The other recipe I tried and liked was the Crockpot Chicken Makhani from A Year of Crockpotting. Sorry I missed out on a photo op, this was made on a busy day, but there's a photo if you follow the link. I love this blog so much. Nothing holds Stephanie back, she makes everything in her crockpot, chocolate, beverages, side dishes, dips, you name it! Once in awhile she has Fondue Friday, which is just so fun. Because who doesn't like fondue? Anyway, I knew this was going to be good before it was even cooked. The spices smelled just like when we get takeout from our favorite Indian place down the street. And when it was done, it tasted just like it too! Complex and fragrant and creamy and wonderful. Delish! I don't think this will be the last recipe I try from this blog either.

December happens

2008-12-16T03:21:00.000-08:00

So I know I haven’t blogged in a long, long time and I miss it. It’s sad, it’s just there is always so many thing I always want to do and never enough hours in the day, never, ever. November was a crazy month for me. First I went to Stitches East with these fabulous ladies.

Oh my god we had such a good time! The laughing and the food (and the drinks, oh yes, the drinks) and of course oh the yarn! Such good yarn. I promise to take a picture for you soon I promise it is very, very pretty.

And then almost immediately after Stitches I went on a cruise! The husband and I went on Royal Caribbean’s Adventure of the Seas out of Puerto Rico to Aruba, Curacao, St. Martin and St. Thomas. It was wonderful. We relaxed a ton. We didn’t even do any crazy scuba or sightseeing excursions or anything like that. Most days we laid on the beach, and then laid by the pool. Ate a lot, napped a lot, caught up on some reading it was wonderful.

And then Thanksgiving hit and now somehow I’ve found myself drop dead in the middle of the Holiday season! And I’m up to my elbows in cookie flour and wrapping paper and decorating and loving every minute. And I’m still knitting Christmas gifts too! This a sock for my godmother. Hope to finish these soon!

You can see I'm knitting on my lunch break in my car here. I took this photo then because it's dark so early nowadays, there's never any natural light. It's been hard to get good photos and this has made it hard to blog. Also must make deadline! Must make deadline! I do not want this to be the first year I give a gift with the needles still in it, I don't! I fear that is a slippery slope I just don't want to go down. I also have to knit through lunch because of course the baking at home has cut into the knitting time in a big way. I would say this stresses me out but I don't know, there's just something about giving lots of plates and baskets of cookies that makes me really, really happy. Cookies make it hard to be stressed.

Back in a Mac

2008-10-19T11:19:00.000-07:00

Wow the last time I posted was almost a month ago!!! While I totally admit laziness had a lot to do with it, there was also a major computer malfunction that was partly to blame. The motherboard went on our old Dell computer and since it was kind of held together by spit and tape at that point anyway we decided to put her down. We've since gotten a new IMac much to the delight and joy of several of our Mac pusher friends.

In the meantime I managed to squeeze in a quick trip to Florida and visit the niece.

She is into everything right now so we spent lots of good time swimming, playing, dancing, coloring, reading books and all that good stuff. And when I was exhausted and would collapse during naptime or at the end of the day I managed to spend some nice time with her new baby brother!

What a big boy already! He was born September 25, is happy and healthy and wonderful. And of course he loves his Mason Dixon Log Cabin Blanket!

Between traveling and computer acquisitions there has been knitting too. And I now I give you-what is for me at least-this year's Fetching!

Pattern: Cabled Footies from One Skein by Leigh Radford
Yarn: Cascade 220 Superwash

I've made two pairs of these already and I have two pairs still to make. I think they'll make great Christmas presents. I had had this book forever and was never that interested in making anything out of it until I had seen some really cute ones on Ravelry. My new theory is that the ones in the book are on this super-skinny model and for some reason they look huge and bulky. Almost like they're made out of bulky weight yarn. But they're not, they're made with worsted and they knit up very adorably and super-cute! Footies for all!

I also made my first pair of no-purl Monkey socks

In Socks that Rock colorway Highway 30, I adore these also. The yarn is just scrumptious and makes me wonder why I don't wear these colors all the time on the rest of my body. Ok, that's a little much I guess, but the sock pattern is awesome also. The no purling means you're practically knitting stockinette with just a few pattern stitches thrown in every other row. Nifty!

And knit socks are going to be a good thing in this chilly economy and this chilly weather. I'm set though, fall is my absolute favorite season ever. Today I did a good fall thing and made a little compost bin for my Recession Garden.

I know it doesn't look like much but it warms the cockles of my little home gardener heart. Plus, the Recession Garden deserves it. Despite the fact that it's late October my cherry tomatoes are still coming in in droves and it looks like in another week or so I'll finally get to harvest that lettuce I've been tending to! I am very excited!

Recession Cherry Tomatoes

2008-09-21T15:12:00.000-07:00

The squash vine borers got the zucchini. The european corn borers are attacking the peppers. The cucumber beetles eventually got the the cucumber vines. But god bless the cherry tomato plants. They've been going all summer and they just keep on coming.

I also have a couple of dishcloths to show for my week.

Yarn: Lily Sugar and Creme
Pattern: Honeycomb from Dishcloth Boutique

An oldie but a goodie. This pattern is a lot like the Mason Dixon Ballband pattern as it just flies along. These look a little wonky and wrinkled but I'm sure after a few uses and trips through the washer and dryer they's tighten just a little and look perfect.

In TV news does anybody remember in 1998 Camryn Manheim won an Emmy for her work on The Practice. In a rare honest moment for an award ceremony when she finished her acceptance speech she shouted out "This one's for all the fat girls!"

Now I have never seen a single episode of the Practice in my life, but as one of those girls I just had to shed a little tear. Just to hear someone say the words 'fat girls' on an award ceremony let alone dedicate their award to them was just so shocking and heartwarming at the same time. I still totally well up just thinking about it... Anyway tonight the Emmys are on and Tina Fey is up to win for 30 Rock and America Ferrara is up to win for Ugly Betty. If I could I'd give Tina an Emmy just for her brilliant Sarah Palin sketch on SNL last week and America one for the HBO movie Real Women Have Curves from 2002. Well, they aren't nominated for those but I still love both 30 Rock and Ugly Betty. I'll be watching, rooting for either one of them to win. And who knows, maybe if they do the could send a shout out to all the smart girls? Or maybe just all the girls that wear glasses? Wouldn't that just be really, really cool? I certainly think so.

Yarn, Cheese and my Opinion of Knitted Fingers

2008-09-07T04:25:00.000-07:00

So yesterday I had a very fun day. The knitting girls and I took a trip to Yarn-It in Deal, NJ. I had been feeling lately like I needed to buy some more yarn. I also am always feeling like I need to be buying more at local yarn stores. Both of these issues were well-remedied.

I got 2 balls of Katia Nepal for a cowl eventually, 2 balls of Cascade Superwash for Christmas sock/slipper gifts and 3 balls of Debbie Bliss Luxury Donegal Tweed to someday make Gretel by Ysolda Teague.

I really liked shopping at Yarn-It because there is a really nice variety in the yarn selections there. There were a few cool novelty yarns, lots of nice yarns to treat yourself with like Berrocco and Malabrigo but she also has the wooly basics that I love-Brown Sheep, Cascade. There was also this one wool I hadn't heard of but I liked a lot-Ella Rae. The other girls said it was itchy, my response was "That's why I love it." That and the fact that I thought the colors were very warm and saturated yet muted somehow. It was pretty. I was tempted to buy a big sweater's worth, but I abstained. Bari, the owner of Yarn-It also made our visit a very enjoyable. She was friendly and knowledgeable and helpful, and most importantly she didn't kick us out when we were giggling and swearing and carrying on the entire time as we have a tendency to do.

We ended up back at my house for a surprise dinner from my husband. It was a surprise in that he had been talking about making us dinner all week but would not tell us what it was. What was it? Macaroni and Cheese topped with Chili! It was the tastiest heart attack on a plate I've ever had! And you know I've had more than a few. It was really, really good. There was also an appetizer of Queso in case we had not have enough cheese. You really can never have too much cheese you know. And what a sweetheart for cooking! So we had cheezy treats and beer and knitting and watched the 4th season of The Office. Good, good times.

Also at Yarn-It yesterday I had picked up two balls of Plymouth Encore for some baby hats. I cast the first one on pretty much as soon as we left the store.

These are not for my sister's baby but for another friend who is due in a couple of months. It's a boy. Yes, I'm still on the blue and brown kick. So I finished the one before yesterday was over (yes!) and now I'm making the second one blue with a brown stripe.

I also finished my Knucks the other day. Sorry for the totally craptacular photo, I can't find my tripod anywhere.

I've been dying to make Knucks forever. I've been dying to use the yarn forever. Unfortunately, now that they're done I have to give the result a completely mediocre "meh..." They fit kind of weird, they're pretty tight. And doing the fingers first was kind of a pain. However, I know that from when I've tried to make gloves before that making the fingers last is no picnic either, which leads me to the conclusion that me and knit fingers just are not going to make this work. Put knitted fingers down on my list of stuff I should not knit next to bathing suits and skirts. No thanks. I'll still wear these cause they're purple and kind of cool, I just wouldn't knit them again. I feel like the 'ok' appearance and result does not outweigh the fiddliness factor of the fingers. It's fingerless for me from here on out I'm afraid.

Deep Purple

2008-09-01T15:35:00.000-07:00

These two hooligans are completely convinced my new knitting project must be a bunch of little cat toys.

But they're not. They're the fingers for my Knucks!

They're a bit fiddly at the moment, but I'm pleased as peaches to finally be making these. I've had the yarn in my stash for-ev-er and yes, I'm still very addicted to fingerless gloves once the weather starts to get frosty. Next on deck are the Delicato mitts. In the same purple Rowan Felted Tweed you see here. My plan-kill the stash. I've had it with my stash. I love it, but I want to be knitting with it already. I figure, all the yarns currently in my stash are for small projects, dishcloths, socks, mitts. They're already portable, so there's no reason to have more than one project on the needles at a time right? So the plan, pick a yarn and knit with it until it's gone. The last yarn I did it with was some ancient Kroy socks that was just aging away in it's basket.

I grabbed it, churned out bunch of quick little baby socks for my sisters very soon to be born baby. (Yay!) And now it's gone. Aah... One yarn down, not too many more to go.

In addition to purple yarn there are also some purple peppers growing around here.

These are the Burpee Sweet Pepper Carnival Mix and aren't the pretty? I started them from seed in March, can you believe it. They are supposed to sprout peppers that are purple, orange, red and white. As far as I can tell the only plants that made it to the garden are a couple of purple ones, and then a bunch of regular green ones which turn red eventually.

That's ok, I was glad I at least got to see a few of the purple ones. The purple ones taste like regular green ones anyway. And I like the flavor of the red ones a lot better so I'm glad there aren't too many purples.

I also knit some dishcloths this week as part of the Kill the Stash endeavor.

I still have dishcloth cotton left, that I can't knit all in one swoop. I figure I'll eliminate these one by one by color. The towels are not the most exciting the to knit but I have to admit I love to use them. I make them with one and a half to 2 balls of cotton and they're big and tea towel sized. I keep them slung over my oven door where they are easy to get to and look very cute.

Beefmasters of the Universe-in which food probably figures way too prominiently

2008-08-10T15:30:00.001-07:00

The tomato variety I'm growing in my garden is called 'Beefmaster.' This never fails to crack me up. However the name is appropriate. These girls are ample and full, the Nell Carter of the tomato world if you will.

They make me very, very happy. Even happier was that today for the first time I actually got to use produce I've grown myself to make one of our very favorite recipes-Gazpacho.

My husband used to forget the name and would shorten it to 'Gestapo' the first few times I made it. So now we often affectionately refer to it as Gestapo. I always use this recipe here. Back in the early days of the Food Network there used to be a show on at seven o'clock every night with a woman named Sara Moulton. Sara Moulton was the executive chef of Gourmet magazine and also did this hour long show every night where she would cook and actually take live phone calls over the air. I adored this show. Almost 10 years later a lot of the recipes I still make are from this show. My meatball recipe. My salsa recipe. Pasta e Fagioli soup. So many. Favorites I've made over and over. And this one that she made on that show is just as good as all the others. If you don't think you like vegetables make it and try it anyway. My husband hates vegetables yet somehow devours this stuff by the bowlful. It's the sweet tomatoes, crunchy cucumber and peppers, a little bite of red wine vinegar, a little salt and cayenne just manage to pull the whole thing together in perfection. And making it today with my own tomatoes for the first time ever. Well, I have to admit I remembered my old tv friend Sara and felt a little sentimental.

And don't worry, lest you think this is no longer a knitting blog I promise you I've been knitting my head off.

Trying to work my way through that big bag of Peaches and Creme cotton. I have this ballband pattern memorized now and I don't care. I still covet it and these cloths. These are for my niece (pink and brown) and future nephew (blue and brown of course). I am on a big "and brown" color kick if you couldn't tell. And yes, I'm totally aware they're more likely to be gifts for my sister to use on whoever is in the bathtub when that cloth is on the top of the pile. But still, I like the "and brown" thing.

And if just in case you still wanted to hear more about food (sorry) I cannot help but mention the brilliant episode I caught of Jamie at Home yesterday. Oh my gosh, I was practically fanning myself from overheating, it was such a great show. First of all I love this show because let's face it, this

plus a British accent = yum! Please sir may I have another? Plus, he spends a good deal of the show in his garden, I'm newly into gardening so this appeals to me. Third, yesterday he made this amazing salad with kaleidoscope carrots (beautiful!) and ground lamb. I love it when a dish includes something totally rich and decadent like lamb but it's still 'a salad.' Anyway, I loved it. I rewound it with the tivo and watched him make this recipe twice! But-do I know anyone I could serve this too who would probably like it? Not that I can think of. I adore my family and friends dearly but they always want gazpacho or meatballs or macaroni and cheese. Not that I don't love those things too, I do, I totally do. And I will never, ever tire of making them for the people I love. But sometimes I just want something different. Something I could probably only get by having it in someone else's or my own kitchen. Anyway, such is the lonely road of the foodie nerd! No matter, that won't stop me from making lamb salad for myself and eating it out of the serving dish in my jammies while dreaming of Jamie one night. Or I'll probably just force it on the husband anyway, he'll usually try anything at least once. We'll see, if I do try it I'll let you know how it comes out!

Limited seating

2008-08-05T03:36:00.000-07:00

It's not that the cats want me to get off the computer...

They just want me off of the chair. It's their favorite spot in the house!

Socks and Blockers and Blocks

2008-08-03T04:00:00.001-07:00

I started these socks in May, which means for some reason they took me longer than usual. But that doesn't make them any less special!

Pattern: Double Lace Ribbing from Sensational Knitted Socks by Charlene Schurch
Yarn: Socks that Rock, Raven Clan-Valkyrie colorway
Knit on Knitpicks size 1 nickel dpns

The yarn was gifted to me by Tracy for my birthday. I have knit with Socks that Rock before and loved it, but those were gift socks. These are my first Socks that Rock socks for me and I am psyched! Another thing to be psyched about, the socks are on sock blockers gifted to me also by Tracy. Her and her Dad did a bang up job on these handcrafted custom made blockers and they are perfect!

I also finished these darn baby blocks this week:

Pattern: Baby Blocks from Knitting for Baby
Yarn: The rest of the Knitpicks Comfy I had left over
Needles: Bamboo Size 3

I'm glad these are done. Yes they are cute, yes I think my future nephew will like them. But good golly miss molly it seemed like there was a lot of seaming (haha!) involved. I realized at one point that each block was 6 squares but 8 seams. And dealing with different colors and stitch patterns made that seaming pretty challenging. No run of the mill easy peasy mattress stitch here. Nonetheless, my sister is one of the best knitting gift recipients ever. And she also likes the idea of 'green' toys involving no lead, no plastic, etc. So I know these will probably get used and played with, which is the best thing. But will I be making these for anybody else anytime soon? Nope! I'll just go and buy some regular blocks from the store probably.

Win some, lose some

2008-07-24T16:36:00.000-07:00

You know how a lot of people with gardens have a proliferation of zucchini right now? How they have so much they run out of people to give it to and they get so sick of it they end up making zucchini breads and cakes and cookies? Well, lets just say, that doesn't happen to everyone.

Sad, sad, sad. Looks like those 2 squash in the last post aren't going to be followed by similar ones anytime soon. Squash vine borers have made a mess of my summer squash plants. I tried extracting them (Ew! Ew ew ew!!!!!) and covering the stems with dirt but afraid it's just too late. There are just no fruits on these plants to be seen anywhere. I'll probably pull them out this weekend and maybe start again. If I plant the seeds soon and keep a closer eye out for these buggers I might get a little crop at the end of the season. For now I guess I'll just have to keep an eye on the pretty peppers and the pretty tomatoes that should be ready for harvesting any day now...

Garter and Greens

2008-07-20T15:37:00.000-07:00

The Baby Blanket for my future nephew is done!

Pattern: How to Log Cabin from Mason Dixon Knitting
Yarn: Knitpicks Comfy, 10 balls, 2 balls each color, a little more of the Honeydew color for seaming and the border
Needles: Size 6 Bamboo Circulars
Result: Love it. Good yarn, great pattern, seems pretty baby-appropriate. I would knit this pattern again. Seriously. I like knitting a lot of garter stitch but the color changes give it enough visual interest to not get completely boring. I think if I had to knit a garter stitch square this size I would probably have gotten bored to tears. But the pattern makes it fun. I even survived the seaming and weaving of ends and i-cord border. Definitely a success!

Now all I want to do is dive into the new Peaches and Creme yarn that arrived the other week.

But I'm trying to do the right thing and use up the rest of the Comfy. I did originally purchase 20 balls, so yeah, I have quite a bit left over. For some reason I've decided to try to use it up by making these blocks.

The pattern is from this Knitting for Baby Book. For some reason it's a lot tougher than it looks. I mean knit a bunch of squares and sew them together right? Wrong! For some reason it's tough. I don't know if it's because I'm using a different yarn or there's give in the foam blocks or the seaming is... well there's just a lot of it. I think because the blocks are so small it almost feels like there's as much seaming as knitting. Yeah, exactly, ick. Anyway, I have 6 small blocks. I'm making those and that's it. I think that's enough for a baby to have a good time with.

In non knitting news the recession garden is finally producing a harvest!

I haven't had an overabundance of anything just yet but that's ok. I have lots of green tomatoes about to turn red and lots of tiny peppers and tiny cucumbers on the way. I'm just happy the plants still seem healthy and I'm still really enjoying it. There will be garden photos in the coming week I promise. And hopefully pictures of it's spoils too! Yum!

Recipe and Baby Pattern Suggestions Welcome!

2008-06-22T11:52:00.000-07:00

Forgive the gratuitous kitten shot but they're really cute. The kittens have been growing like weeds.

The other thing grown like weeds? The weeds in the recession garden. I'm plugging away, I think I'm a week or so away from the first red tomato (Take that salmonella!) of the season. And if it doesn't happen at least I know I was able to grow basil and oregano like a rock star.

Although the basil and oregano are very eager for their friend tomato to make an appearance on our dinner plates. Anyone have good non-tomato based recipes for these other than pesto? I know it sounds odd but I'm really not a pesto person... Tonight I'm making some tilapia with a lemon/oregano type of seasoning, hopefully it comes out ok.

The other cool thing I grew this week, this beautiful morning glory.

Chris gave me these seed for my birthday and I love how they've taken off and wound themselves around the banister of our front steps. With really very little care to them, just water mainly. Unfortunately the blooms only seem to last only a day-they come out in the morning and are pretty wilty by the next. But there are lots of closed pods growing on here so hopefully we'll see more soon.

On the knitting front, I can't believe I'm actually typing this but the Mason Dixon Log Cabin baby blanket is almost done. I originally thought it was going to be 5 rows of 4 blocks, but from where I'm at now it's clear, 4 rows of 4 blocks is more than enough.

I'm attaching the blocks using single crochet which surprised me. I usually don't like to attach with single crochet because it can produce kind of a bulky ridge on the wrong side at the seams. But this yarn has just enough drape to still let it lay pretty flat, and I can only imagine it will lay flatter with blocking and time and use. So I think it's working. Once I have the squares all attached I'm just going to do an applied i-cord border and call it a day.

Which leaves me of course with the leftovers... Can you believe it looks like I will only be using half of the yarn I ordered for this project? We were talking about buying yarn at our little knitting group the other night and unlike the folks that felt like sometimes they have a tendency to under-buy I confessed that I think my problem is that when I do buy yarn I buy it like I'm preparing for the apocalypse. The thought of running out of yarn really scares me! So I have a slight tendency to over-buy. How much did I over-buy with this project? Well, using only half the yarn for this baby blanket means I probably could have knit 2 of them if I wanted. Or (it's a pretty big baby blanket) I really probably could have just used all of it to make a full sized adult throw. Seriously. I over bought that much.

So here's a question. I will probably have 8 balls of Comfy left. About 200 yarns of each color. Which is ok-because I do have babies to knit for and this is a great worsted baby yarn. So what are your favorite baby patterns right now? I don't know if I have enough for a sweater, maybe one of those baby kimonos from Mason Dixon? I think I might want to try those. And some hats and booties. Any suggestions? I hear those are little and they go fast. Works for me!

Take some time and grow the tomatoes

2008-06-11T16:55:00.000-07:00

Check this out!!! Looks like I'm not that only person around with a Recession Garden! Can you believe Burpee.com saying sales of seeds and plants are up 40%? 40%! Who says there's no recession? And if finances aren't enough reason to grow your own now it looks like it might be one of the best ways to avoid getting salmonella this summer. I figure at this rate by the time the FDA figures out what happened hopefully I'll be sliding slices of one of these in between some whole wheat bread and mayo. Yum!

Cute Time vs. Knitting Time

2008-06-09T16:55:00.000-07:00

Sigh... As if having 2 new kittens around wasn't enough cuteness, I think the house reached cute overload this week when my sister and my niece came to visit.

That's my mom and my adorable niece and this was her first ice cream cone ever! I don't think it will be her last. So there's been ice cream, and eating watermelon, and running through the sprinkler, and having tea parties, and all that fun summer stuff that makes the world seem absolutely huge when you're two years old. It's been exhilarating and exhausting and I know I'll miss the heck out of her and my sister when it's time for them to go back home to Florida. She'll be getting a baby brother in the fall and she'll also be turning 3 and after that she'll never be an only child or 2 years old again. Which is ok, those are things we're all looking forward to. But for now these are times to be savored. So if there hasn't been much knitting this week, I think I'll let it slide.

But that does not mean I haven't been watching the glimpses of knitting I've caught here and there on the horizon. I got the Berrocco KnitBits email the other week with the Fall/Winter collection and just fell head over heels for the new patterns. My absolute favorite, Cosina.

Gorgeous! I don't even know if this would look acceptable on bigger/bustier girls like me but I still adore it. I love the yoke styling and the drapey shape of it. I'll have to stalk it on Ravelry and see how other people do with it.

The other knitting thing I'm into big time this week is the Knitmore Girls Podcast. Jasmin and Gigi are a mother daughter team and I think they're utterly adorable and entertaining and informative. I especially love Gigi's (the mom's) accent. Her accent and voice sound exactly like my husband's aunt Sylvia who is also a knitter. I could close my eyes and swear it was her! And she loves the color red which is a fave of mine too so I can really relate!

Good things are happening...

2008-06-01T13:38:00.000-07:00

Sorry not to post for so long, things have been mega busy around here lately, and I think by the end of this post you'll understand. Yes, we did finally make it to Maine and it was absolutely beautiful.

Somehow, going the week before Memorial Day we timed it just right with the weather and the crowds. It was beautiful and idyllic and relaxing. We spent most of our time exploring Acadia National Park, Bar Harbor and eating lobster, blueberries and ice cream. It was a great trip that was a nice break for us. I even got some knitting done there and the Mason Dixon Blanket is coming along nicely.

This pattern is awesome. I know some people find garter stitch boring but I do not, not at all. And the color changes with this pattern keep it just interesting enough. I'm hoping to finish a few more squares soon, finalize how I'm going to lay the squares out and eventually, start seaming. Another project of mine is also moving along nicely. The Recession Garden has finally made it to Garden Status and is no longer just a box of funny plants on my porch!

Approximately 5 minutes after I walked away from this after the first day of planting I walked back to it and found 10 birds happily milling about. Ack! So I consulted my "Gardening for Dummies" book, grabbed the aluminum foil and that's why there are funny bunches of foil all over those stakes. It ain't pretty but it's survived some nasty thunderstorms this week and so far still no birds, so it's staying. And we know we have rabbits around too so that's what the wire fencing is for. The tomato plants I started from seed were looking a little yellow when I planted them. A week later they were officially dead. So I bought some tomato plants from a local garden center and we'll see how that goes. I also got strawberry plants and they even have some tiny green berries already. But the pepper plants I started from seed are doing great, and my herbs I started from seed are doing good. I also planted zucchini, lettuce, cucumber and beans, I'll let you know how those work out.

In other news, the husband and I are once again happy to be new pet parents! Meet Ella.

And Louis.

Giant Husband has been provided for scale. If anyone else reading this is a jazz fan you might pick up on the fact that they are named after Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong. Two of our faves. Ella is now 9 weeks old and Louis is 7 weeks old. They were a little timid when we brought them home last weekend, that's all over now. Now they are friends chasing each other all over the place, play fighting over who gets their favorite fish toy, and falling asleep on anyone's shoulder/lap/chest that will give them the time of day. I'll be honest it was a little bittersweet for me, going to pick out new cat food and cat toys and supplies for a new cat. I still miss our old friend Allister. But these two are nothing but joy. You can't help but smile when they tumble around chasing each other tails. Playing with an empty cardboard box they discovered. We are definitely so happy to be pet owners again!

Happy Mom's Day!

2008-05-11T07:04:00.000-07:00

Due to a few scheduling difficulties, Mother's Day was celebrated a day early, on Saturday for us this year. In honor of the moms I prepared a big batch of one of their favorite foods, lamb chops!

Now I know a lot of people who don't like lamb might be gagging right now. But if you do like it, that picture is droolworthy. I've made lamb chops a couple of different ways before but this time they came out perrrrfect! Tasty and moist and delicious. The mom's were very, very pleased.

Aren't they cute? In addition to cooking there has also been some knitting going on for another mom-my sister is about to become a mom again! This time we waited to make sure everything is going good, and I think that now that she's now almost halfway there (she's due in Sept.) it's about time I start knitting something for my future nephew!

That's right my niece is about to get a baby brother! We're all completely thrilled and I have to admit I'm slightly intrigued since there are no boys in our family really. I think its going to be such an adventure having a little guy around. So I started this little blanket in the traditional boy colors, since I remember it wasn't long ago it seemed everything I knit was pink! Anyway, this is a Mason Dixon log cabin square in the new Knitpicks yarn, Comfy, that I talked about last week. I'm going to do probably 20 or 25 squares like this, just with these 5 colors in different arrangements. I like it pretty much so far except for the dark green being so dark. In person you can tell it's dark green, but sometimes it looks almost black. But I really have my heart set on these colors and this layout so I'm thinking once I get the whole thing together it won't look like so much dark green. And remember too, it's for a little baby, it's soft and warm and machine washable, those are probably the most important things.

Anyway, part of the reason Mother's Day got moved up this year is the husband and I are preparing for a vacation this week. We're headed for Bar Harbor, Maine and I'm so excited. Work has been a beast lately and we're definitely overdue for a break. I'm purposely not hunting out any yarn shops this trip. I have so much in the stash right now it saddens me. Anyway, we're hoping for a nice laid back time, no work and I'm bringing my knitting, for me that's usually a good start to a trip right there.

More Green...

2008-05-04T15:50:00.000-07:00

Sorry, that photo is what happens when I don't feel like putting on makeup or schlepping upstairs for the tripod. But the hat looks ok right? This is the Slouchy McSlouchington, pretty much my own twisted combination of Le Slouch and the Twiggy Bobble hat. Almost 2 balls of Misti Alpaca, pretty much just knit a little K1P1 rib, increase a little, knit several inches of stockinette and then work even decreases every other row. It's a cute accessory, but I'm usually more of a 'hat for function' than a 'hat for fashion' type person. I think we'll have to wait and see what kind of utilization it gets next winter.

Well, so I finished the Slouchy green hat, and I'm working the buttonbands on the tweedy green CPH, but believe it or not, I have even more green yarn coming in this week!

This is the new Comfy yarn from Knitpicks and it is squishable lovey soft. The greens are Honeydew and Cypress colorways. I also got Seafoam, Ivory and Cashew. But I'm not going to say what it's for just yet... I'm swatching around I'll probably spill the beans next week. I adore the colors so far, so I think it's going to be a great project.

Hello!

2008-04-27T16:34:00.000-07:00

Hi! Hi there!!!! Hi there blog! I miss you! Just wanted to say hi!

I miss blogging more often I really, really do. But it just seems like lately the precious weekend hours have been getting away from me. All to often I find myself collapsing on Sunday nights, without a single picture taken or idea reported on. But things do go on, like the Central Park Hoodie. This weekend it morphed itself into a big, soft, woolly, beautiful mess and I love it.

The pieces are all done, I seamed the shoulders and got the sleeves in. Now I'm simultaneously working on the hood and the side seams. I had read on Ravelry that since the yarn I used to knit this was pretty bumpy, that it was easier to seam this with DMC Perle Cotton instead of the yarn. I bought some Perle Cotton and tried it and while it was probably easier, I felt the cotton was totally obvious, so I'm seaming with the Kathmandu Aran I knit it with and it's really not that bad. No suckier than seaming usually is, but that whining is for another day.

Because this hasn't been so portable lately I have been working on my smaller project I usually keep going. I finished the sloucharific green hat (crap forgot to photo it, next week I promise) and started the first sock I've knit since before Christmas.

Ain't it pretty?

Tracy gave me awesome Socks that Rock in the Raven-Valkyrie colorway and I love it. I'm finally using a pattern from the More Sensational Socks book. This one is Double Lace Ribbing and it's pretty fun.

Speaking of fun I just found the video podcast Gardenfork on iTunes this morning. So far I've watched the episode on making raised garden beds (so informative, I needed to see this done, I'm so glad I found it) and the episode on street food from Jackson Heights, Queens. Also very fun. Hopefully next week I may have even more to report!

Pizza! Pizza!

2008-03-30T14:28:00.001-07:00

I can never, ever, ever get enough pizza. I love it to death. Even though I had it for dinner last night, I still went ahead and made a different version of pizza for lunch today.

It's a spin on this Rachel Ray recipe. Instead of spinach I had baby arugula in the fridge. And I made sure I tossed it well with olive oil, salt and pepper. Other than that it's the same, as simple as it gets. Refrigerated pizza dough, olive oil, arugula, tomatoes and fresh goat cheese. Yum! Really, I'm a sucker for goat cheese on anything. But I understand people who don't like it, you either love it or you hate it probably. Just like a lot of people and arugula. I happen to adore both. Can you image how good this will be if I can make it again in the summer with my own tomatoes?

Look at those happy little guys just growing away! All I can hope for is that the growing continues this way when I put them in the ground in about 6 weeks. If that happens the Recession Garden will surely be a success.

In the meantime Central Park Hoodie is growing also. I'm knitting the fronts at the same time to make sure they're even. Also to avoid second front syndrome. This way when the fronts are done, they're done!

Avalanche!!!!

2008-03-23T09:51:00.000-07:00

Now I can be a cluttered person at times but this really is a bit much...

See the slanted piece of wood next to the desk? It's attached to a small cabinet. It, the cabinet and a small but very cherished collection of action figures, knick knacks and toys used to be resting on top of the desk. Thursday night after getting a check with some extra expendable income we were expecting in the mail, and after finding out I'd only have to work a half day on Friday our beloved desk and toys and collection decided to somehow all implode on itself when we tried to hook the husband's laptop into the cable modem. Miraculously, the work laptop, the home computer, home monitor, external hard drive, printer, etc. all escaped without a single scratch. However the toy collection and our sanities were given a bit of a shake up. And well the afternoon off from work, and that little bit of expendable income of course went right out the window since we knew I'd have to go right to Staples the next day and get something to replace the 14 year old pile of IKEA particleboard we had probably entrusted way too much of our life to. But I think I did ok.

Aah, order and organization has been restored. Along with order and organization there's a lot of spring green around here lately. I'm starting the plants for the Recession Garden inside from seeds. They've just begun to poke through the dirt a little, I think I'll have a really good picture of them for you next week, at the moment they look mostly just like a box of dirt. Other green things: the back of the Central Park Hoodie is done.

Pretty! And then I have this hat that I've started but I'm not exactly sure where it's going.

A very loosely based amalgamation of the Twiggy Bobble Hat and Le Slouch this is my current traveling project. Knitting the Misti Alpaca Worsted stockinette in the round is lucious enough to make me enjoy knitting it alone. I think this is going to be one of those slouchy, baggy rasta type hats you're seeing everywhere that I'm probably too old to wear at this point. But still it's so fun. I keep re-naming it. On Ravelry it's Slouchy Mc Slouchington. Sometimes is Slouch-o-rama. Sometimes it's Slouchilicious. Either way, at least I'm having fun knitting it. And re-naming it constantly. That should count for something...

New Jersey-The Garden State

2008-03-16T15:09:00.000-07:00

Yes, New Jersey really is known as the Garden State. In keeping with this theme I picked up a couple of new books yesterday.

In my job, which is really pretty boring unless you do it too, trust me, fraud is not an uncommon occurrence unfortunately. We are constantly getting updates and warnings from our underwriters, FDIC etc. about whatever new real estate scheme is going down. I've actually heard important people at important meetings refer to New Jersey as "a hotbed of fraud" and talk about the many "Fraudsters" (that one makes me giggle especially hard) peppering our landscape. So when someone recommended The Soprano State to me earlier this week I had to pick it up. It is supposed to be J-U-I-C-Y baby! I can't wait to hear about some more Fraudsters! It's always so funny it's sad, and by the look of the index and the names named so far, I don't think it will disappoint.

As for the gardening book it's hopefully going to help me with what I've referred to as my Recession Garden.

Because thanks to the Fraudsters people, we are in the middle of a Recession and I figure when everything starts doubling in price it might not hurt to have some free food around. This is my first official gardening adventure and I'm pretty excited about it so far. I've started seeds for peppers, tomatoes, flowers and herbs. I like working outside in the yard and I've always wanted a garden so I figure I'll give it a try. Worse case scenario, nothing takes and I'm just left with the box of dirt I started with in the beginning right?

In knitting news the bandwagon ride has been going along smoothly...

Chris in my knitting group originally suggested that we should all knit the Central Park Hoodie as a race. Being the person who would have to knit the biggest sweater I put the kibosh on that right away. It just wouldn't be fair. However, I don't think anyone else has really started that much... and Chris has been on vacation in Florida where I'm certain it's got to be too hot to be knitting a Central Park Hoodie right? I might actually be in the lead so... race on ladies!!! Eat my dust! Ok, just kidding, who cares when anyone finishes. I'll just be happy if the end result does not look like a circus tent or a sausage casing. That's how I usually gauge my sweater success. Aim high right? And if it comes out the wrong size I'll just have to go and find someone that it will fit to own it.

Wool... and some golden brown deliciousness....

2008-03-02T15:05:00.000-08:00

The top down raglan quietly blocks and I wait...

To find out if this is a weekend sweater or if this sweater will be good enough to qualify as during the week workwear status. The neckband was a little wavy when I tried it on the other night. I hope the blocking stopped that. By the way what do you think of my new blocking board. I think it's totally awesome! We realized that the store that my mom works at carries table pads made by the same company that makes the boards. So since she was able to get one with that steep employee discount it was one of my Christmas gifts. It's pretty nifty if I do say so myself.

In the meantime I started swatching the Queensland Kathmandu Aran I bought from WEBS at the last Stitches. I'm going to be jumping on that Central Park Hoodie bandwagon this week and I just can wait...

In food news this evening I made this Chicken Tetrazzini recipe from Everday Food. Something tells me like the Stuffed Shells I made with my mom a few months back that Chicken Tetrazzini probably qualifies as retro food.

It has that 50's casserole-ey aura about it and I'm pretty sure it's something that I probably rejected eating a few times as a kid. But the last time I visited my sister this very recipe was the meal she had waiting for us when we got to her house from the airport. Something about being tired, going into a family members home, being served food, such good feelings you know? So that memory probably makes it even better. But still, if you want to try something you might not have eaten as a kid, it's really is pretty good eats on it's own. Chicken, mushrooms, peas, pasta, smooth Parmesan cream sauce with wine? Either my mom didn't make it this good when I was six or those taste buds just had not developed yet I guess. And the recipe makes enough for one dinner now and one to freeze for another time. You couldn't beat it with a whip if you tried!

By George!

2008-02-24T12:14:00.000-08:00

Remember back on Monday when I talked about having the flu? Ha! By the next morning my cough had progressed to sounding something satanic and I threw in the towel and dragged myself to the doctor. What I just figured was the flu was actually bronchitis, a sinus infection, a nasty throat infection, fluid behind both eardrums and a temperature of 102. Since then I've been on hardcore antibiotics and cough medicine and a decongestant. I'm starting to feel more like myself but I decided I'm tired of winter for some reason.

Normally, I love winter but this winter, as far as winters go kinda blows. It hasn't been that cold really, we had a lot of those weird days where it's like 50 degrees and warmer and hardly any snow whatsover. Friday was our first major snow 'event' but it really wasn't even an 'event.' I believe we officially need over 4 inches to have an event. This was less than that and today it's starting to warm up again, and you can already see the dirty grass through the snow. I hate that.
To make matters worse I believe my sweater sleeve is having an identity crisis. This is why I should probably be knitting with a pattern.

I rely too much on this 'try it on as you go' stuff. I swear I did the math at the top of the sleeve and thought I had my decreases down pat but I've decided that on this sweater gauge is just a big fat liar!!! I had one gauge while knitting the yoke back and forth, another gauge knitting the body in the round and now the sleeves are another gauge all of their own. This lead me to start out decreasing every 3rd row at the top of the sleeve, then changing to every 5th row in the middle and now as I'm nearing the wrist I figure I'm almost completely done decreasing, maybe I'll just do it one or two times more. For all the erratic-ness the sweater still actually looks decent on. If my notes are good enough and I can manage to duplicate this sleeve for the second one I might actually have a wearable garment.

Boy this post sounds cranky for some reason! I promise I'm really not in that bad a mood, it's just coming out that way. Well, in non-sick, non warm weather or sleeve crisis news the Oscars are on tonight everybody! You know what that means!! George is going to be on tv!!!!

Sigh... George I love you... Even when you played George on Facts of Life I knew you had only begun to tap into your hotness. And I loved Michael Clayton. I work with attorneys. Why can't any of the attorneys I work with look like you? Why can't they look like someone who might even qualify to carry your water bottle? That scene where you have on the shearling jacket and black turtleneck? You should wear turtlenecks all the time. You should wear a turtleneck tonight to accept your Oscar for best actor...

So look at it this way whether he wins or not, we'll probably get to see him in a tux so really, how bad can the 4 hour speechfest be if there's 30 seconds of George in a tux... Even if Juno wins, because let me tell you I've had a whole Juno rant these past few weeks.... Yes the movie was cute but best picture? No. I haven't been this irritated since Julia Roberts won her Oscar for Erin Brockovich. This is basically how my whole argument goes-Julia Roberts does not win Oscars, Meryl Streep wins Oscars. And Juno is a teen movie, as much as John Hughes has affected my life let's face it, teen movies do not win oscars. Heathers was a great movie. Never won an Oscar. The Breakfast Club was a great movie-no Oscar. So as much as I love Michael Cera-no Oscar for Juno. Sorry, hands off that statue Diablo Cody... That one is for George!

Racer

2008-02-18T11:17:00.000-08:00

Somewhere between last week and this week I found I've tumbled headlong into what honestly feels like some type of horrible, Dickensian-era type of plague... Ok, I'm whining, I know it's just the flu but still I hate it. Fever, chills, sneezing and a lovely cough have all somehow yanked my 3 day weekend right out from under me. I slept all day Saturday and Sunday, and when I say I slept all day I mean I slept all day. No knitting, no socializing, no eating, no tv, just sleep! Today, I am feeling halfway human again. The cough still hangs on but I did manage to get up and about and get to the bank and grocery store. So by tomorrow I should have things back together, just in time to go back to work...

I finished the hemmed edge of the body of the top down raglan this week. So far I'm happy with it, it flips a little but I'm hoping blocking fixes that. It actually doesn't flip when I put it on. I got a ways into one sleeve and then realized I don't have the needle I want to do the sleeves on magic loop so I placed an order from Knitpicks and in the meantime I'm working on the second sleeve until it gets too small for the 16 inch circular. So since I'm kind of in the middle of this long slog of stockinette on the top down raglan I thought I'd take some time and go over the origins of this sweater. It's kind of funny. Well, it all starts with my favorite sweater ever, this thing

I know it's not pretty. It is pretty old though. I think I got this in high school. My dad bought it for me at the mall for my birthday one year. And yes, don't ask me why I still have it and I still wear it on my mostly-staying close to home days. There's something about it, well it is soft, yes, and black which always appeals to me. But something about the slightly open neck and the ribbing also makes it at least somewhat flattering without being too form fitting. And I like that. So all my of knitting days I've always thought in the back of my head, that I should really re-knit this sweater someday. This one is totally pilly and fuzzy and it really wouldn't be that hard to knit- 2x2 rib. The only thing I think intimidates me would be figuring out how to get the ribs to line up for the yoke. I see myself inevitably completing a body and 2 sleeves that do not fit together in any logical way at all.

Once day back at Stitches East 2005 I thought I had it figured out when I saw a sample sweater at the Shelridge Farms booth. It was ribbed and long-ish, it looked like the right silhouette and the tag said it was Unisex. But it looked girly enough to me. It's not a ball gown or anything but I figured I could wear it with jeans and I didn't think anyone would call me 'Sir' by mistake. And I liked the yarn and the price and it came in my size so I kindly asked a salesperson if they had what I wanted in stock. When they gave me the kit this was the photo on the front.

Sigh.... Anyway, I guess after I brought it home and forgot what the sample looked like and kept looking at these photos I kind of fell out of love with the pattern. Nothing against the poor lad in the photo (because let's face it he looks a lot more like a 'lad' than a 'guy' or a 'dude') but he always looks to me like a younger calmer Rowan Atkinson for some reason.

And while I adore Rowan Atkinson I just don't think I'm up for wearing a calmer, younger version of his sweater. Even though it appears that perhaps the designer originally meant for this to be a women's sweater pattern after all!

The writing saying unisex was on the pattern when I bought it, not my writing. But still it's Rowan's sweater and I needed to go my own way. Anyway, the yarn is great and hopefully my top down raglan comes out ok. If in the end I totally hate it for some reason you know I could always frog the whole thing and knit myself a Racer...

First Football Free Weekend!

2008-02-10T13:48:00.000-08:00

The Mitered Mittens are done!

Pattern: Mitered Mittens (for May) from Elizabeth Zimmerman's Knitting Almanac

Yarn: Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran 1 1/2 balls

A few years ago (I've had that stuff this long, yikes) I waaayy overbought on the Cashmerino Aran for some Fetchings. This gray stuff has been sitting there forever staring back at me. Not only did this pattern give me a good opportunity to use it up, I really enjoyed knitting them and I'm pretty happy with the outcome. Pretty happy because I still like the more colorful versions of these I've seen on Ravelry, the ones made out of Noro, etc. a little better. Also while the gloves look lovely off and just lying there when you put them on, the thumb does yank that center seam over to the side, since most of us don't walk around with our thumbs glued prettily to the centers of our palms. But otherwise they are warm and done, good and good.

The current traveling project is the Fine Cabled Mitts pattern from Knitspot. Using some Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sport I want to use up. Black is hard to photograph.

But take my word for it the pattern is terrific. This is the third of Anne's patterns I've made and I'm always so impressed how well written and easy to follow they are. Plus, going with what I have now, I think I'll just adore the finished product.

And the top down raglan is moving right along. I'm just going to do a finished hem at the bottom and the cuffs, I'm thinking I'll probably finished off the body tonight or tomorrow and then it's just the sleeves and the neckband and I'm done!

In non-knitting news it's the first Sunday of the New Year with no football. Also known as the first Sunday of the New Year I get to have the remote for the big tv and knit! Today I watched a few episodes of Everyday Food, the latest Project Runway and Lost from the other night. I'm really starting to like Lost even though I am a really, really late newcomer to it. I like the characters and the suspense and the surprises that seem to be popping up all the time. It's not Heroes, but here in the middle of February, hopefully close to the end of the writers strike, it will do just fine...

Monday, Monday...

2008-01-28T03:22:00.000-08:00

I finished off this weekend yesterday thinking another weekend past with no blog post but I have a few minutes this morning so maybe I'll try to do a little quick one.

My mom came over the other day wearing the white Fiber Trends Fuschia Lace Scarf so we decided to take some photos.

I'm pretty happy with how it came out. I think the Zara Merino yarn I used was perfect. I think she's pretty happy with it too.

And in non knitting news Friday night I went to see Fuerza Bruta with some friends in the city.

It was amazing!!! Great music, dance, performance art maybe??? Like nothing I've ever seen. Anyone around New York City for the next few months, definitely take some time out to catch it. I promise it's like nothing you've ever seen!

Today the procrastination ends here!

2008-01-21T07:50:00.000-08:00

I found out a few days ago I would have today off from work. I am resolved to use it to do the stack of things I've been putting on the back burner for 'when I have time' for way too long. One of these is mailing out some charity items I knitted (gasp) probably years ago. The Here and There Cables Scarf I just finished. But the EZ hat, baby and preemie hats, baby sweater and booties were made ages and ages ago.

So many ages ago that the sweater is actually the first sweater I ever made. (I think I might have even made it before I had a blog! I told you-gasp!) I think trying to knit a baby sweater before an adult sweater gave me a lot of insight that helped before I made the real thing. Even if the sleeves probably are way too long, hopefully it can help out some poor baby somewhere that's chilly and needs needs help keeping warm this winter. I feel bad I've held these things for so long, on the other hand it seems somewhat appropriate to be packing up charity items today. In the spirit of helping out others, I think the Reverend Dr. King would approve...

In more current knitting news the top down raglan is going so much more successfully...

I think I'll be separating for the body and the sleeves soon. I really am having so much fun knitting this one.

And the mitered mittens are moving along too.

I think the thumb on the first one looks a little chubby, but these are for me and it doesn't fit so badly that I feel like I should rip it out. These are really fun so far. Sometimes I think they look kind of plain, the Noro ones on Ravelry are so much more colorful. But the Cashmerino Aran is so soft, I usually get over it once I get I on my hand...

Knitting, Stamping, L-Boxing

2008-01-13T07:22:00.000-08:00

We're off to a Christening in Brooklyn today. You know what that means-I'll need to have some knitting for the car-

While I'll admit I'm back to drooling over pictures of socks being knitted on other peoples blogs already, I'm not ready to start knitting them again yet. Which is ok, I've had a barrage of mitten and fingerless glove patterns kicking around in my head for months. So these are the first ones I decided to start. EZ's Mitered Mittens from The Knitter's Almanac. The I-Cord border was a little tricky but I think it's really pretty. And I'm a little concerned about the upcoming Thumb-Trick which involves clipping a stitch and unraveling the knitting to expose live stitches. But I'm up for it. What's the worse that can happen right? It's not like I'm going to end up frogging 70 rows of a top-down raglan or anything like that...

Yep, this sweater looks mysteriously smaller this week doesn't it? After trying on what I had over and over and over and knitting more and re-calculating and knitting more and re-calculating it became clear that the v-neck I was working on was going to have the bottom of the 'v' positioned probably just slightly above my belly-button. I wanted an open v-neck true, but this was going to be obscene, tank top underneath or not. So to the frog pond I went and it's really ok. It was a relief in a strange way to see all the yarn balled up again, to see that it survived just fine and is all ready for me to take a second chance. It's not wasted knitting time lost-it's yarn forgiveness. A very Zen perspective isn't it?

I did have a lot more success making a rubber stamp this week.

In a former life I was big into making linoleum prints so this was a fun venture that felt very familiar to me. Lime and Violet started talking about Letterboxing in Episode 49 1/2 and I'm pretty intrigued. Basically you follow clues posted on the website to a planted 'letterbox' where you will find a stamp and a book. You stamp that stamp in your book and your stamp in the book in the box. It's a nice twist to a walk or a hike and becuase you get to use a compass it's just nerdy enough for me to give it a try. Chris was very, very intrigued and has already been out to find her first. I'm thinking next weekend I'm going to go out too and give my stamp a try.

Knits and Giggles

2008-01-06T13:48:00.000-08:00

I officially finished the last of the holiday knitting for real. These Fetching mitts were done in plenty of time to gift to my hairdresser yesterday.

I always think hairdresser sounds like an oldy-lady word. Like she's going use a pick and lots of Aqua Net on my hair or something. Anyway, she loved them. I did a regular knit bind off at the top this time. I've done the picot bind off like the pattern suggests in the past and I find it curls back a lot. I like how these came out. The recipient was also very happy with them!

And I finally (finally, finally, finally) got to start a sweater!!!

Although I have this icky nagging fear that this sweater start might just be extensive hopeful swatching and my not end up being a sweater result. I'm using the book Knitting from the Top by Barbara G. Walker for this one. The book is amazing but it involves a lot of trust. I figured my pattern based on a much wider neck opening than recommended. It's a top down V-Neck and I like my V-necks a little wider than I think some patterns account for. I like to wear them with tank tops underneath just fine. So far each time I put it around my neck and 'pretend' like it's a sweater it actually looks ok. I guess I'll know for sure when the time comes to join the neckline in the round.

Other than knitting this sweater the other thing that just plain freaking made my week was my new favorite website EVER!!! I Can't Believe He's Still Single is a blog that copies REAL personal ads from the internet and it is hilarious!!!! And for those of you that think it's mean just remember-I met my husband on this crazy internet. And before that I will admit I did kiss a few frogs. And apparently those frogs are still single and there ads are being posted on this blog!!! Ok, probably not really, but some of these scenarios do seem somewhat familiar... You guys have to read it, it's just so, so funny. Do not, do not miss the post Millionaires Need Love, Too or Dumb and Slutty ISO Dumb and Slutty. And on Bloglines there are only like 5 subscribers or something? How is this possible? I'm telling you guys I marveled about the ability of Ravelry to just suck the time out of my day. This site is just as good. Seriously. Enjoy.

Happy New Year!

2008-01-01T12:33:00.000-08:00

Oh my gosh! I can't believe how long it's been since I blogged! I missed my blog! I think it was just that I liked looking at all those finished socks on the last post over and over. That and of course those holidays in between. The shopping, the cooking the wrapping, the baking. I loved it all and had a lot of fun. But a lot of the time I found myself at the end of each day wondering where the time went.

Ok, so since I'm here now and I'm writing I do first of all to say a big Thank You! to Grace from Little Knitting Black Crow for this awesome package.

Grace was the person I got to buy for a while back during one of the first Punk Rock Gift Exchanges. She was so much fun to buy for, I didn't expect anything in return, but this stuff is great. Lavender soap, Tasmanian honey, nice warm wooly sock yarn, a cool sewed skull and a cute bookmark. Good stuff! It was a really cool surprise!

On the knitting front it has been happening. I finally finished a scarf that seemed like it was taking forever.

Pattern: Here and There Cables from Scarf Style
Yarn: Patons Canadiana
Needles: Lantern Moon, size 7 straights-possibly my faves

The real reason this seemed to take so long was that the holidays and the gift knitting that went with them fell in between. But it's done now and I'm really happy with it. I feel like this scarf really is a testament to how much I like knitting. I have no one to give it to. I don't really want to keep it for myself (I already have a ton of scarves and several red ones) I'll probably donate it to charity. And for a charity scarf it's a really lovely pattern, in a sturdy, warm, workhorse yarn, that took me a pretty long time. But that's fine. I knit it just to knit it. Just to see how it came out on the other side. And it's really pretty awesome if I do say so myself. I hope it's a help to whoever ends up with it through whichever charity I decide to send it to.

And that's where I'm at on this 01-01-08. I've also been doing some swatches for a sweater I'm probably going to start later tonight. (Finally!) And I'm ready to face the new year ready to go. While I'm glad I made it through a lot of the challenges of 2007 I also had to acknowledge yesterday that a lot of those challenges really sucked. I spent the summer on crutches. We lost our beloved little pet. My husband & I both went through job changes. And a lot of our family members had surgeries and similar rough patches of their own. Is everyone ok now? Yes, we're fine. Do I count my blessings? Every day. Things can always get worse and we're luckier than most. Would I change anything at all? Nope, never. However will I be sad if there is a little bit more smooth sailing and fewer 'challenges' in 2008? No, I think we deserve a break. And I feel like I'm starting with some sturdier footing this year. (No pun intended) So that's good.

We rang in the New Year last night in the best way possible, with friends and food and merriment. I hope you did too and you had a great holiday season and I hope you're as ready for 2008 as I am!

14 Socks

2007-12-09T09:44:00.000-08:00

I think I'm in the home stretch, I finally started the last sock!

Only thing is of course, you know these are for my husband so of course they are ginormous. Don't expect a post showing them as finished tomorrow or anytime this week probably. In the middle of these and the white scarf somewhere I also managed to knit these up.

Wee little socks for my wee little niece! Unfortunately, even with wee socks I have yarn-running-out issues. This is just some random acrylic I had floating around, I was certain when I started them there would be more than enough. Oh well... So if you look really, really close you can tell the one in the back is probably knitted tighter (because I knew I would run out) and then the tip of the toe is actually some Kroy sock yarn I found and used triple stranded to finish them up. Hopefully she won't be too bothered by it, she's two you know. So big socks, little socks I had to take this picture.

And of course my favorite picture:

I wish I could have taken this when the second husband sock was finished, on a day that wasn't gloomy gray so I'd have better light, but I'm hearing the lines at the post office are murder this year so some of these have to get wrapped and mailed soon! But still seven pairs of socks... 14 socks... I want to print this picture out and carry it with me and when I feel blue I can say, in 2007 I knit my friends and family 14 socks... and boy it sure was fun! Or what if I put it on my desk at work next to my wedding picture... Now that wouldn't seem too weird would it? I guess it would, I've realized lately that when the people at work hear me talking about knitting it's probably a lot like when the people at Dunder Mifflin hear Dwight Shrute talking about growing beets... Or Ping Pong...

Yup, I can see it that sock photo on his desk, right next to the bobble head and the Sheriff Mug... Too weird...

Can you believe it's December already?

2007-12-02T11:33:00.000-08:00

I certainly can't. I know back in August I promised pictures of the girls in their soakers. I don't think I could have asked for cuter photos! The pink pants look much better on, and it looks like they fit pretty good!

This is my sister's friends daughter. I figure the pants must fit ok and I guess the itchiness isn't issue, otherwise she would never be able to do this-

Right? How cute is the acrobatic photo? So sweet. And of course I made soakers for my niece too. Except her version wasn't the pants, it was just the regular short soaker.

I'm not crazy about how this one came out kind of see-through. I think maybe it was the Cascade 220 being a little thin. (The pink pants were made with Patons Merino and that yarn is a little thicker) Also if anyone is thinking of making these my sister did agree that if I make any more in the future she thinks she'd prefer the long pants-version like the pink ones. With that one the baby can just wear them like little leggings, and they don't really need pants over them. With the short version the soaker is still very diaper shaped, and not so fashion forward.

As for what I'm knitting now I'm motoring along on the white scarf.

And I do concede that I no longer think it looks like crap. It is actually very, very pretty. I saw someone had knitted one of these out of Silk Garden on Ravelry and I swear it made my heart go pitter-pat. Proof again, that it's just the white that's really not my thing, otherwise this pattern is actually really very nice. You never know, on a different day, in a different yarn, I might someday knit one for myself!

Sock salvation

2007-11-25T14:29:00.000-08:00

Another Christmas gift finished and done! This is the regular old sock pattern I love from The Knitters Handy Book of Patterns by Ann Budd. The yarn is Shelridge Soft Touch Heather I bought in Rhinebeck. They went super fast with the magic loop method (yay!) I did something weird on the first sock where the toe came out a little crooked but I don't think it's anything someone on a galloping horse would notice as they rode by...

This on the other hand was kind of startling...

The first time I chose to wear handknit socks this season a couple of weeks ago I chose to wear the Waterfall Rib socks I finished during the summer. Somehow I got this blow out on their very first wear and it just broke my heart. Who knows, maybe I had something in my shoe, maybe it's because my foot is still swollen from the surgery (yes... still...) but I almost fainted when I saw that big ugly hole staring back at me. So what to do? Learn how to darn socks of course! I found a pretty good tutorial here. After I read it through, I was like, ok I can do this. But like a lot of things in knitting it's totally different once you sit down and actually try it in real life.

Here is my sock with it's Hannibal Lecter like sewing thread grid. And notice my light bulb held inside since I don't have a darning egg, it says try a light bulb which I think is kind of funny, but it works. Looks pretty neat, like this should be a straightforward endeavor at this point right?

Yep, about as straightforward as mud. At this point I'm really fudging it, each time I try to pick up a stitch I'm like "Is that the right loop, is that a yarn or a thread? Or a piece of fuzz? Do I go around 2 pieces of thread or one?" As descriptive as the tutorial is there is the part about 'faking' a stitch. I think about halfway through the hole I finally had my aha moment and my work started to match what I had read online. Unfortunately by this time the shape of the stitches was getting a little 'creative.'

Nonetheless, I'm pretty happy with it. It's a pretty thick patch and I think it should hold for a good long time. I know it's not perfect but it is my first darn job and I think things will only improve from here. I know a lot of people don't bother to darn socks, they'd just rather knit another pair but I really kind of enjoyed this. The alternative, to only have worn these socks once and call it a day? I just wasn't ready to go with that...

What we're giving it for this year, big and small...

2007-11-22T05:23:00.000-08:00

For the pie, the stuffing, the potatoes, the sweet potatoes, the turkey, the gravy- the carbs, the fat, the sugar, I love you, I love you, I love you.

For the fact that I have 2 feet and 2 legs that work without pain. With every step, several months later, I'm still glad I'm not on those crutches anymore.

For my husband who is constantly taking out the trash, doing the dishes in the sink, helping people with their coats and cheering me on, every step of the crazy holiday, usually before I even need to ask.

For my family and friends near and far, I'm never with them enough. The ones that are far away today or not with us anymore, today I will miss you like hell.

For a New York Jets Win. Please, please, please let it happen. Please.

For the money to pay the bills, put the food on the table, for the health to enjoy it. For living in a country where it's easy to feel safe, I have clean water, shelter, clothes. Hey, a lot of people in this world don't. A lot.

For the parade, the cheezier the better. I love it! The balloons, the broadway numbers, the songs where a million people dressed all the same do cheezy little dances. And Al Roker. Al, I love you. Call me, we'll celebrate the carbs, fat and sugar together...

For taking off my shoes, having the glass of wine, picking up the needles and watching tv at the end of the day after everyone has left.

Happy Thanksgiving everybody. Wherever you are and whatever you do I hope you are thankful and well fed and happy.

I'm knitting and I'm breathing...

2007-11-18T13:38:00.000-08:00

Even though my progress is just running smoothly along on these socks (thanks to Magic Loop!) I realized I still have an entire scarf to knit before Christmas! I'm not sure why but for me scarves always seem to take a long time so I figured I'd better get cracking and cast on this.

The pattern is called Fuchsia Lace Scarves by Fiber Trends. It's for my mom who very specifically requested an all white-6 inch wide-not overly thick or heavy scarf. (Specific right?) I have to admit working with the white yarn makes my inner high school goth girl reel. Half the time I just know I'm going to spill something on it or get it dirty somehow, the other half of the time I just think it looks like crap. But I know it does not look like crap, it is just something that I would personally never, ever, ever wear. It looks kind of flared out because after 2 repeats of the pattern it was so narrow and I was worried it looked really weird so I blocked what I had so far and it stayed to be six inches wide, and actually looked a lot better after blocking. So now I am tempting fate and by just taking what I blocked and kept on knitting on it. Hopefully once I block the whole completed thing it will stay a uniform 6 inches wide throughout, and the section I've already blocked won't expand further mysteriously or anything like that. Hopefully...

On a completely unrelated note I did something different today and took my first yoga class! It wasn't anything too fancy, just the basic class they offer at my gym but I really, really enjoyed it. And it was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be! For the most part the poses aren't terribly complex but when you hold them for 2-3 slow breaths sometimes you really start to feel it. I've been back at my gym (since the foot surgery) for awhile now, I actually did my physical therapy there so I would be back in the habit of going when I was ready. Since this surgery I've realized when I've always exercised before I would always just knock myself out with the cardio and never did any strength training whatsoever. Dumb move. This is a good way to end up hurt and on crutches I now know. So I still do my cardio and I had one of the trainers set up a strength training program with the weight machines for me. And guess what? I am a total weakling! Kickboxing? Cycle classes? None of these have helped the fact that I can only lift 5 pounds with some of the upper body machines. Sheesh! So I think the yoga will be good because it does take strengh and focus and it really calms me too which is nice. Especially now that the holidays are here and I'm sensing that crazed, way too much to do and not enough time feeling creeping up on me ever so slowly. It was nice to take the yoga class today and breathe and just be calm, for at least part of my day!

Magically Delicious!

2007-11-08T03:21:00.000-08:00

One more pair down, just 2 more to go. These are for my dad, the yarn is Louet Gems Fingering Weight in Charcoal. I'm pretty happy with them, I'm beginning to think Louet yarns are perfect. Really, I can't picture being unhappy with them ever. Even though I have to admit earlier this week the sock knitting was beginning to get well, nothing short of tedious. I have 7 people who want pairs of socks for Christmas this year. Do the math and that is 14 socks altogether. Yeesh. I know I started a while ago, but with 2 pairs still to go, I'm not exactly at the end of the tunnel. Thankfully this week I was snatched back from the fiery gates of sock knitting hell (oh how I hate to see the words knitting and hell so close to each other in a sentence!) because Tracy helped me learn to Magic Loop!

This is really fun for me because if I had my choice right now I'd love to be knitting a sweater. The weather has finally turned colder here and it seems everywhere I look there are these amazing sweaters being knit or that I want to knit. Chris in my knitting group is knitting the Radiance Cabled Jacket from Webs and it is gorgeous! And I keep feeling the pretty, thick tweedy yarn in my stash wishing I was clicking away on a warm, hefty sweater rather than all these silly little socks on their silly little dinky bamboo dpns. Magic Loop feeds my delusion of sweater knitting just a tad since it's on circulars, I know it's a delusion but it might be enough to finally get through these Christmas socks. (We saw Lars and The Real Girl last night. I have the feeling delusion is going to be my new word for awhile...)

And in reality of course there are a lot of other cool pluses about Magic Loop. Beyond the 'your needles won't fall out and get lost' benefit because that was never a problem for me, I probably carry my knittting more carefully than I carry my wallet most of the time. Instead, the big thing I'm really enjoying is the absolute, complete lack of ladders. Not that the ladders killed me, I had made my peace with them long ago, and they were never huge for me-but they were there. But now with this method it's so much easier to eliminate ladders because when you go to start on the next needle you're tightening the yarn around the cable instead of just another needle and it's much easier to tighten the fabric.

I thought maybe I could make this point with this photo above-does it any make sense? On dpns when you try to avoid ladders by pulling the new yarn tight to start the first stitch of a new needle you are only tightening the yarn on the last stitch around the previous needle. With Magic Loop you are actually pulling the yarn tight around the cable which has a much smaller circumference than a needle. The result is less yarn between the last stitch of the last needle and the first stitch of the first one and therefore no ladders! Brilliant! I love it!

I swear I'm totally pulling the fabric tight in that photo too. Isn't that cool? It makes me feel smart like the guys from my new favorite show.

Ok, I know as far as shows go The Big Bang Theory isn't that good, it is very corny sit-com-y but I still can't help but love those characters. Especially Sheldon, I adore him. While I lack the actual hardcore math science knowledge of these true nerds, they possess a geekery I completely envy and probably would totally crush on if they ever existed in real life. That and the novelty t-shirts, sci-fi references and video game obsessions just get me every week.

Where I've been, where I haven't been and why

2007-10-28T12:58:00.000-07:00

Gosh it feels like forever since I've posted. I know I had the little 'hi' in there last week with the pictures of my niece but other than that I've been kind of out of it. And even though I've been around doing stuff I'm now looking through my computer realizing I really don't have many pictures to show for it. But either way I guess here goes.

I went to Baltimore for Stitches East with the girls and had a great time. I have to admit I really, really love Stitches. Well the Marketplace at least, I have never taken classes actually, just buying the yarn along seems to get me in enough trouble. I love Stitches because I love buying yarn and I also think Baltimore is just a fun city. It's always easy to plan a trip around because it's easy to get a hotel nearby and there's always stuff to do in walking distance once the yarn haze has worn off at night. Truth is I always have fun with these girls you know. We just have fun sitting in our knitting group chatting and knitting every week-send us on the road and you know it's going to be a good time.

The weekend after that (and after the niece babysitting) we went to Rhinebeck. I have a strong urge to just admit it and say "I just don't get Rhinebeck" but I really know the truth is I probably went into it with the wrong mindset. People always say such great things about Rhinebeck, it seems to always be what everyone wants it to be. I guess I was looking for something else. After having fun buying yarn at Stitches in Baltimore I was kind of hoping Rhinebeck would be somewhat more of the same-another yarn buying extravaganza but with animals and some other stuff. And well, it's just much more of a variety than that. The emphasis at Rhinebeck is not on yarn, it' s on everything. Rather than viewing it as a yarn extravaganza it would be better to think of it as a fall festival with an emphasis on wool and fiber and some yarn. (BTW they had some neato food at Rhinebeck-fried artichokes, lamb burgers, fudge covered brownies, who knew?) I think one main factor that caused me to not get some of Rhinebeck-I don't spin. I think for spinners Rhinebeck is probably like what Stitches is like for me with yarn. And I think that's great. There's not a lot of places out there selling fiber and wheels and spinning stuff. So for spinners Rhinebeck must be mecca, and I think that's wonderful. Also I think Rhinebeck is also a big social meet up place and I can see the appeal of that also. I get the impression that many of the people who attend go year after year and have formed friendships from getting to see each other over and over. Believe it or not, even though there are times I just open up and mouth off on this blog, in person I tend to keep more to myself, or at least to our little group who I know won't laugh when I start babbling about nothing for no reason. (It just happens) We did go to the Ravelry party on Saturday night in Rhinebeck. And I thought it was a real treat, it was a really cool event Jess and Casey planned, and it was fun, but sometimes I have a tendency to be more of an observer than a partaker and that just happened to be one of those times. And of course I still had fun with our little group, food, drink, yarn, very happy.

Believe it or not this is the stash I have to show for it. Two big bags of Queensland Kathmandu Aran in a pretty tweedy green which I adore. I'm big into the tweeds these days. A lovely shade called Highway 30 of Socks that Rock, 2 skeins of Shetland Heather from Shelridge Farms, brown Regia sock yarn and a new case for my circulars from Crippenworks. I love the Crippenworks cases and recommend them highly if you're in the market for one. But that's about it. And that is my lame pictureless recap. Sorry I haven't been more attentive, writing, updating, picture taking. You'll have to excuse me, it's been a really tough last couple of weeks.

This past Wednesday we finally made the decision to have our little cat Allister put to sleep. He had been very sick and very much not himself for a long, long time. We tried to make him comfortable the best that we could but at the very end it was very clear that there was simply no quality of life left for Allister. And it sucks. And we miss him. Every day brings a new thing that you remember doing with him there and now he's just not there. And you always know the end will come, you know they're not going to live forever but it just doesn't prepare you for it any better. And in the end we know it's worth it. It's worth it to go through this lousy sad time, for all the good times you had with your happy pet, when he would greet you at the door, or jump on your lap or just be there when you couldn't sleep at 3 in the morning when no one else was. Of course it's worth it. It's just going to take time to get some perspective back. Time and yarn and friends and family help. And I'm a very lucky person I have all those things in spades. And we'll always be lucky we had such an awesome little friendin our lives with us as long as we did.

Insert yarn photo here

2007-10-19T19:15:00.000-07:00

So last weekend was Stitches and tomorrow I leave for my very first Rhinebeck, you'd think there would be some stash photos here. Well, I did buy in Baltimore and I plan to buy more in Rhinebeck but being away 2 entire weekends in a row has left little time for blogging. Well, that and also a visit in between from the world's cutest niece! My sister was thrilled to win tickets to hear J.K. Rowling read and sign books at Carnegie Hall this evening. She's a huge Harry Potter fan so she didn't think twice about booking a flight to come up for the event. But who would babysit? Me of course! Well, ok, with help from my mom I guess. I knit the soakers, that is the extent of my diapering knowledge and I'm content to leave it at that level. In the meantime we've had a great couple of days eating crayons, playing with Mr. Potato Head and licking Playdoh. (Hey, I sniff yarn, I see the point of connecting with the essence of your medium.) If you need knitting content, well those socks she has on in these pictures are the ones I made a couple of months ago. There will be stash photos in the near future I promise. In the meantime, proof that the niece is not only still cute-but still fast!!!

Dr. Strangelook, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Knitting in Public

2007-10-05T03:24:00.001-07:00

I knit at work on my lunch breaks now. This might not seem like a big deal to some but it's a very new thing for me. Before my surgery I was very much a closet knitter. Outside of my knitting group and my immediate family people knew I knit and saw some finished objects here and there but very few actually got to witness me in the act. Not being able to drive for 2 months changed all that. Always relying on others for transportation means a lot of waiting. Not that I ever minded, I was always grateful to get rides from anyone even if it meant waiting for a cab to take me to the train station to take the train home from work. I was grateful to have the option to have a cab to take me where I needed to go. But there was a good solid month before I was even coordinated enough to take the train. Before that I would have to wait for my husband to pick me up. He works later than me, so once I finished work I usually had a good hour before he could make it to my office to pick me up. Those hours started to add up. Those plus the fact that no driving (or walking that much for that matter) also meant no lunch hours out. I sat at my desk everyday. Now spending that much time waiting is not really that bad, but if you're a knitter without your knitting, well, it's going to put you over the edge a little.

So now I knit at work and it's not so bad. My co-workers are intrigued. I have yet to do it in front of my main boss, he's not around a lot and I still worry about what he would think of it. But for the most part each day I either bring my lunch and sit at my desk and knit for an hour or go out and eat and knit somewhere else for an hour. My work is part of real estate, and the real estate market is frightfully dead right now so things are slow. I never skip lunches like I tend to do when it's busy.

And this knitting in public is not limited to work anymore. I knit at the vet waiting for the cat's appointment. While waiting for my hairdresser. On car trips where I'm not driving. I always knit on the long car trips before sure, but if I pick up the needles on a trip here or there, the extra 2-3 rows still put me 2-3 rows ahead.

It's made me super-productive, I think. On these soakers the legs sometimes seem like take me forever. They're 70 rows of 50 stitches, it kind of reminds me of knitting a pair of socks. I can usually do about 15 rows in a lunch hour. Add that to what I normally do at night and the finished objects are just flying off the needles. Before I start I usually set little goals for myself, like doing a certain number of rows or finishing the i-cord drawstring. I usually meet them and surpass them, I finish the lunch hour feeling very accomplished!

And this is how it should be. Knitting is so important to me really, why should I always hide it? Leave it for when I only have blocks of time in private to devote to it? It's funny how many people know so little about such a big part of me. While I'm not yet one of those people looking to spread the word necessarily (I'd rather sit and knit myself than teach someone new, I'm selfish I'll admit it) I'm definitely more comfortable with this than I've been in the past. And so what if someone thinks it's strange or silly? Really would I rather be concerned with what they think or be on my way to finishing up another project or using up more stash? Like I said I'm selfish...

I'm making a list, checking it 3,472 times....

2007-09-30T15:44:00.000-07:00

Stitches East is less than 2 weeks away!!! And then Rhinebeck is right after that people!!!! Yay!!! Call me an overthinker, but I always make a list for fiber related events like these. The list makes up some things I need to get and then some general instructions. This way I don't end up buying too much or too yarn for certain projects, hopefully. An example of something I need-I have 2 men I have to knit socks for by Christmas and somehow the lavender Louet Gems in the stash is not going to cut it. So I need to get some more masculine sock yarn. A suggestion-I know I would like to buy some yarn for a shawl this year. I think something more fingering than lace weight. And I don't have a shawl pattern in mind, but I just need to make sure I buy a large enough amount to make a shawl out of. Another suggestion that I'd like to stick with- when I've gone to Stitches in the past I usually like to buy enough yarn for at least one sweater for myself. Well, since I still have a sweaters worth of yarn left from last year, I guess I'll only buy for one this year. I have 2 sweater ideas kind of kicking around, one is a bulky weight sweater where I could use any kind of bulky weight yarn probably. The other is a Berrocco pattern which I would want to use the Berrocco yarn for, I would not want to substitute yarns for this sweater. So tell me what you think-

One thing I've decided lately is I'd like to be knitting from my books more. I'm afraid I own more knitting books than I'd like to admit, and honestly I've knit from them a lot less than I'd like to admit. Enter my first consideration... Order and Chaos from Inspired Cable Knits.

Ok, I know it sucks the one in the book is knit in white, and the model's poses make it tough to make out how the sweater actually looks. Forget the fact that the guy she's forced to pose with is a complete tool (and why are they posing like it's for a prom photo???) forget all that. This really is a great sweater. I think. It is bulky weight yarn and yes I know bulky weight is not always that flattering on those of us who happen to be more curvy than the average bear-however- I think the cabling action will detract from that don't you? It's a comfy cozy type sweater, v-neck, not overly long and I like it alot. I've only found one other person who has made it - Melanie from Pink Lemon Twist (yes Mysterly Stole Melanie) has some great pictures of her finished Order and Chaos here and here. Bonus-if for some reason the yarn does not work for this sweater I could also easily use it to make Starsky or I also have a Ruana pattern I like that I could use it for. So purchase of yarn for this sweater would be a versatile purchase as well...

Unfortunately the amount of money I have to spend to buy the yarn for the other sweater I'm considering may well rival the budgets of some small, third world countries.

Jiada is a sweater that has haunted me ever since the Berrocco newsletter that featured it popped into my Inbox. I love the collar, and the colors, and the sheer stylishness of it. It is knit with Berrocco Peruvia and Jasper. Cha-ching! But that's ok, remember these fiber events are usually where I spend most of my yarn money for the year. It's one of the few times I don't look at the price tags of stuff. And I've only heard very drool worthy comments about Peruvia and Jasper, so I don't mind spending that kind of money since it's good yarn I'm getting in return. But, would this style of sweater even look good on me? Of course the model in the picture has no chesticles to speak of whatsoever. It's hard to picture how this would look with boobs. But I like how the collar 'frames the face' and that with the straightness of the diagonal front edge I consider this a bit of a 'jacket' type sweater and I think the color and the fabulousness of the yarns might hide some sins under there. Hmm... So any opinions? Order and Chaos or Jiada? I know, I like them both too...

In the meantime I'm knitting soakers. The soakers I knit before were a little too small for their recipients, so the bigger recipient donated hers to the smaller recipient and at least one of the girls has a soaker for now. But I'm knitting away at them, I finished one for my sister's friends baby, (pretend the ends are sewn in on the pic below) I'm on a second for her and once I finish it up I'll do another for my niece. And the small from before that didn't fit anybody is being donated to charity that accepts soakers. So you see, it's not that it didn't fit-it was really just meant to be for someone else!!!

Muchos Gracias!

2007-09-23T16:06:00.000-07:00

First of all, thank you for all the nice comments you guys left on my last post. Thank you for wishing Allister well. And thank you so, so much for not thinking I'm crazy and being patient when I was just feeling so, so sad about our little guy. Maybe it is all the well wishes that are helping! Mid-week or so we started to notice a few changes here and there. He started eating a little more and hiding a little less. He started meowing again and as of this weekend we're certain he is definitely feeling somewhat better. While he does not seem to be 100% his normal self, we're so happy for just these little improvements. He goes back to the vet Monday night, so maybe after all these well wishes the results might actually come back better.

And I have another huge thank you to send to Sunne! I left a silly comment on this blog post and she liked it so much she decided to send me a treat!

What a cute little package & a sweet card. Such attention to detail! What's inside?

Stitchmarkers from Sunne's etsy store! Aren't they so pretty? Seriously, these are like prettier than a lot of the jewelry I own! And much better than the crappy ones I tried to make ages ago, no snaggly cut wires here! I love the colorful little hearts, and I love the little kitties and of course the sun will always remind me I got them from Sunne! They are the perfect size for socks which is good-I just got another request the other day, I now have 3 pairs of socks I have to finish by Christmas that I haven't even started. Eep!

But that's ok, the Waving Lace socks are done and that's a pretty good start.

Pattern: Waving Lace from the Interweave Favorite Socks Book

Yarn: Socks that Rock lightweight in Gunmetal Gray

Needles: KnitPicks 6 inch DPN's

These are an allover success in my book. This was the first chance I got to work with the Socks that Rock in my stash and now I see what all the fuss is about. It is beautiful, doesn't split, it's warm and woolly and so saturated with color. And just as I got to start to try out these needles of course KnitPicks comes out with an even newer type of needle! But this was my first time working with shorter dpns and metal dpns and I love both features. The length makes turning the sock so much easier, and the metal feels so solid, I know these are never going to crack or split! And the pattern was easy to follow and memorize. One more pair down, three to go!

Little guy, big love

2007-09-16T05:32:00.001-07:00

Sorry for the pause between posting but we've had some pet drama going on here lately. Two posts back I mentioned our cat wasn't feeling so great. Unfortunately, after several prescriptions and many vet visits since then things have not improved. The vets aren't so sure what's going on. It could be the parasite they originally figured, but they think there is probably also something in addition to that, maybe a feline immune deficiency virus. All of his blood counts have been way down and while they seem to have levelled off a little, they still haven't improved the way they should from the medicine he's being given. And from his behavior we can tell he's feeling pretty crappy too. Allister is 11 years old and the vets have said this is a situation he will have to deal with until the end of his life. Whether that end is days, months or weeks away no one will tell us. He still has his good moments, he still wants petting sometimes, this morning he managed after 3 tries to jump up on the couch to sit next to me. I took the picture above when he felt like sitting by the door and watching leaves blow around for a few minutes this afternoon. But most of the time he secludes himself off in a dark corner exhausted. He barely, barely eats and he never comes upstairs anymore. Call me a crazy cat lady but seeing our friend like this has us just at our ends. Allister has been with us for 11 years. And in a house of 2 people a little pet starts to play a very big role. He has a big personality and he is loved very much. When he is down, 1/3 of our household is suffering and he carries our hearts on his shoulders. Maybe I'm a big sap but it just has not had me in the blogging frame of mind lately. There have been pity parties. A lot of crying and a lot of chocolate eating... It just sucks.

Crying, eating, knitting I suppose. Tracy reminded me knitting helps so it's worth a shot. If it doesn't work maybe I'll try gin. Or gin and knitting together. I don't see how it could make things worse. So far though it's just been knitting.

Those are the Waving Lace socks growing. And this is the Here and There Cables Scarf growing.

Eventually I'll be back into it. Concerned about the stash, excited about the new Knitty. Later though. For now it's just one stitch after the other. Counting each day as a blessing...

All it takes to make me happy

2007-09-03T04:50:00.000-07:00

Yep the second soaker is finished. I mailed the soaker and pants off to the recipients Saturday. I have requested a picture of the girls in their soakers, if I get it I promise I will post it here first! I'm really glad about meeting this goal, I wanted to have soakers done by September and I did. I wanted to finish my cotton yarn by September and I did. I think this goal-oriented stuff might be a good way to knit for me. Next up-I said I wanted to knit all my yarn from the last Stitches East before going to Baltimore in October for Stitches East 2007. This goal I'm pretty sure, is one I'm not going to make. The problem is the majority of what I have left from Stitches is sock yarn. While I will really attempt to ramp up my sock knitting in the next 6 weeks (good god....) there's no way I can knit all of this without needing wrist or shoulder surgery. I really feel it when I only knit on small needles for 3 or 4 days in a row. For this reason I have to break it up with a worsted weight project. I started a scarf I will probably end up donating to charity for this purpose. But I need to remember it's just to break up the sock knitting, for the next 6 weeks (is it really only 6 weeks away?? that's so good yet so bad...) I really need to think socks!

And to those who think romance is dead lemme tell ya, despite the glamour of the cast and crutch situation in this house the romance lives on! The other night my husband was out of the house at some silly Fantasy Football thing when he sent me a text message on my phone:

Him: Did Amazon come today?

Me: Yes, what is it? (Thinking what is so important that it merits an interruption to the much anticipated kick off of the Fantasy Football season? Must be good!)

Him: Open it.

Inside was this

I have not gotten a gift or bought something for myself this cool in a long, long time. Yes those are already my greasy fingerprints on it, I covet this so much I don't know how I've kept myself from sleeping with this darn thing. I cannot tell you people how much I love this freaking show. The characters, the storylines, how it's science-fiction-y without being too 'out there.' And all of the actors are just so talented, their characters all manage to be flawed and realistic and charming and strong and it all just pulls you in! I'm constantly changing my mind as to who is my favorite. (Peter? Claire? Hiro? Parkman???) Of course I've already started watching it. I keep bubbling and gabbing to my husband about how you know, few things make me quite as happy as watching Heroes and knitting. And to do both at the same time? Really, that's like all I need. Both things make me just so happy. He doesn't get it, but that's ok, it was sweet of him just to get me the dvd.

In rocking out news, thanks to Jodi for naming me as a Rockin' Girl Blogger!

Thank you!! I try, even though I admit I just downloaded a bunch of Paul Simon songs to the ipod the other day, Paul rocks out in some ways too right? Anyway, I'm more than happy to tag some other rocksters out there. How about-

The Fabulous Traqua: Tracy went to a hardcore show with us in Toms River a few months ago. She can tell you I'm rocking when not listening to Paul Simon. And she just knit a Condom Critter. She rocks!

Sunne: I can't believe she hasn't been tagged for this before. She's so rockin! She runs the Punk Rock Gift Exchange. One must be rockin' to be allowed to fill such a post.

Knitxcore: I know, you're a dude. I'm sorry for the rockin' "girl" misnomer. You are a rockin' dude. He knit a sweater from the yarn colors 'lettuce' and 'carrot.' Go look, we will all want to knit sweaters too.

Self Portrait Saturday!

2007-08-25T08:38:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I may be the only blogger taking part in this Self Portrait Saturday, probably because I kind of made it up 5 minutes ago and haven't told anyone else to take part. Why? Well, I'm just very happy today because today (August 25th) is the first time I have put in my contacts since June 27th. It's also the first day I've blown out my hair since June 27th. It's the closest I've felt to being my 'normal' self (stop laughing!) in awhile so I just wanted to take note of that, show my face and say hi to everybody! Anyone else feeling like taking part in Self Portrait Saturday (or Sunday or Monday, etc.) please feel free to have a blog post and a smile!

I know maybe it seems weird, my foot was operated on, this shouldn't affect my contacts or my hair but well, it just does. I'm one of those practical type girls that if it gets hard to get around (or I partied the night before, or I feel like staying in and knitting all day- hey it happens) well, the glasses go on and the hair is going to suffer. That's just what ponytails are for. Thankfully, these days I have been getting more and more mobile every day.

This is the hardware making me mobile. The walking cast is black and heavy and a godsend. Lately, it's allowed me to take the train home from work which gets me home almost an hour earlier and gives me a nice little knitting break after the work day. Last night it helped me get my laundry done, today the hair and the contacts, what's next world? Look out! Actually we're a week and a half away from no cast and physical therapy, and I promise Iwill be ready!

Unfortunately my little cat friend Allister, is not feeling so great. I'm not posting his picture because he even looks like he doesn't feel like having his picture taken. This week the vet diagnosed his recent general malaise as the parasite Hemobartonella. It's caused him to be anemic which means he's not eating a whole lot (he's lost 3 pounds), he's laying about even more than usual and sometimes he's been sick to his stomach a lot. Poor baby. We have him on the meds though, and once he finishes them the parasite should be gone and he red blood cell count should be back. It has not been a fun week at all, but we are of course VERY happy to find out it's not leukemia or cancer or anything really, really bad like that.

In other news I started a sock.

It's the Waving Lace sock from the Favorite Socks book from Interweave. In Socks that Rock Lightweight. Buttery stuff I know. But so far my favorite part about this sock? The needles! These are my new metal dpns from KnitPicks and I love them! Their shorter length really makes a difference and I've never knit socks on metal dpns before. They make the ssk's and k2togs so much easier. I think I must be a tight knitter because the needles don't fall out for me and sometimes I struggle with those increase and decrease stitches. No more, thank you KnitPicks metal dpns!

Little Things

2007-08-22T15:30:00.000-07:00

Well, the soaker with legs/baby pants are finished. Before I show you mine though, I'm going to show you what the recipient has used in the past, and what I used as my model.

Even my sister who is using these now too admitted 'they look weird, they don't look like pants.' But they are meant to be roomy in the diaper area, and then fitted in the legs to catch leaks and apparently that's why this shape works.

Ok, I know mine looks even weirder. Tracy made the keen comparison to the knitted uterus from Knitty. Or I keep thinking it looks like a new muppet soon to be appearing next to Elmo and Grover. But, I think it is along the same logic as the original model and I happen to think it will work. I really adhered to the measurements of my sister's friends toddler who everyone says is very long and skinny. I made legs fitted enough to catch leaks, yet long enough to reach her ankles. It looks silly, but I think is will fit and wear well.

The navy blue yarn is the soaker I'm starting for my niece, she is a medium (the pink is a small). I plan to finish both and then mail them together, that way maybe they can try different sizes if they need me to make them different next time.

In non-wool-butt covering news I also finished the last 2 dishcloths from the Peaches and Creme yarn.

Ok, I have a few random little leftover end balls floating around the bottom of the stash baskets that may eventually come together as one crazy, scrappy cloth, but for now I'm pretending they're not there. Besides, something tells me I'll be placing another order for more Peaches and Creme before I know it. I love this yarn so much, and I feel like I've only touched on the knitting and gifting possibilities.

Here's a look at another project I was really into this past weekend, I made a big batch of stuffed shells with my mom.

Kind of retro right? I don't know why I think that, were these a big deal in the 70's? Or maybe they're just something my mom made a lot when I was a kid? I'm not really sure why I think this but it was just so much fun! Boiling the pasta and making the filling was super easy! And it's easy to get it in the shells too, but it's the impressive kind of thing that might look super difficult to people who have never tried it. They came out delicious, and I'm totally inspired by all the pasta filling possibilities I can explore now that I know how to do this. Shells with meat filling, spinach, seafood.... mmm. How about seafood and cheese and some kind of alfredo/cream sauce??? Yum!! And yeah, making them with my mom was really fun too. I always like cooking with my mom. It's such a great bonding time, we have fun and good food is always the outcome. I feel bad for some kids growing up today who never learn to cook or who never get to cook with their parents. Or only ever get to eat in restaurants and eat stuff that comes out of a box. I always treasure the fun times I have cooking with my mom, it's those little things that count.

A change in the color spectrum

2007-08-12T15:52:00.000-07:00

I finished knitting the Pi R Square shawl. It just needs to be blocked. It's an ok size now, but I want it to be huge!

And I finished that skein of Louet Gems on those socks...

And now I'm going to knit a dishcloth for a clown!!!

Just kidding, I'll probably use this, it's just funny how the colors are so much brighter than what I normally knit with. But alas, it's the last of 2 balls of Peaches and Creme from the Mason Dixon pack. And it must be knit before summer's end. Don't ask me why, it just does.

And another rare color for me is, pink!

Hmm... What do you think I'm knitting that's pink? Is it a hat? or maybe a sleeve??? No, it is actually-a pair of wool pants for a toddler! A friend of my sister's is big into cloth diapering and has been looking for someone to knit these for her. For those of you who are as clueless about diapering as I am (I know it goes on the butt part, and after that I'm lost) cloth diapers are both better for the environment and cheaper than the disposable ones. Much, much better for the environment. People like to use wool soakers (which are kind of legless pants) over the cloth diapers because wool is so absorbent. If there's a leak, wool can absorb something like 40% of it's weight in water without feeling wet. So these soakers are like a big deal for the cloth diaperers. Since my recent epiphany (that if I continue to only knit for myself all the time I will someday drown in a pile of hand knit items in a way that would justify institutionalization) I know I need to knit for others more and I was more than happy to oblige. This person has actually requested the soaker to have legs, so she won't have to put on a soaker and then pants over that. (Good thinking!) The plan is to use the curly purly soaker pattern found here and to convert what are mere cuffs in the pattern into fitted legs. Wish me luck. This soaker pattern is nothing to scoff at people, short rows, needle size changes, picked up stitches, SSP's! Yeah, but it's fun so far and looking really cute. And once I get through the first one I think the rest will be cake. That's right I said first one-my sister and another friend I have who is expecting are both also starting to show interest in cloth diapering so who knows, this might be my new knitted item to add to the repertoire!

Another pink thing I really like right now? this amazing cd box set from Rhino.

My husband picked it up the other day and I was surprised, I think it's kind of more my taste than his. It's chock full of good bands I wish were still around and/or still as good as they were in the 80's. Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians, Camper Van Beethoven, the Stone Roses, and my all time fave, the Replacements. Feels just like being back in high school. Sigh...

Socks and a Certain Celebrity Chef

2007-08-06T18:34:00.000-07:00

Smaller projects get finished faster. Like the short socks.

They went fast, but unfortunately didn't use all of that yarn. So what to do? Go back and make a small pair for my niece.

How cute are they? And they are going super fast. I was going to save them for Christmas. However, I got some new pictures today and my little niece is growing up fast! I'm thinking I might just go ahead and send them now, they may fit her better now than later. Plus I haven't sent her a package in a little while, and she deserves to be spoiled.

On a completely unrelated note, here's another good picture. I hate to admit it but these days I'm crushing on Alton Brown, hard.

A new series of Feasting on Asphalt is on the Food Network for the next couple of weeks and I am simply in awe. I also wish I knew how to ride a motorcycle and had cool foodie friends that would want to tour the country with me searching out fried food and adventure. If you have any interest in food or eating or adventure or travel or anthropology (totally serious I swear) please watch this show. I fear for the oodles and oodles of people out there today that are clueless as to how to cook and that live off of fast food and chain restaurants just feeding the corporate machine. Alton is here to change all of that. (My hero!) He often points out that if we don't appreciate and learn about our food origins and food heritage and yes, food history, that we are going to lose these stories. And yes, I think the show is pretty darn entertaining too. Please watch it. And cook something. I promise Applebee's is not going out of business tomorrow...

A Nightly Row

2007-07-29T13:02:00.000-07:00

I think what is hurting my wrists the most is when I go up and down stairs without the crutches. Basically, the few steps outside my house and at work aren't bad but after a few very botched and scary attempts of hopping up and down them using the crutches I took the advice of the nurse at the doctors office and I now just go up and down on my butt. I kind of sit on the bottom step, put my hands on the step behind me and using my good leg and both hands, lift or lower myself as needed. Trust me, it is just as glamorous and graceful as it sounds! Ok, so it's clunky, and awkward and embarrassing at times, but being that close to the ground means there's no danger of falling. And we know falling is bad, I want to avoid it and get the heck out of the cast asap!

Anyway, I've always worn braces on my wrists when I sleep, without them, I curl my hands in so hard I wake up and my hands and fingers are completely numb. The braces usually do the trick but since I've been lifting myself up and down steps lately I notice that even with the braces at night I'm waking up with completely numb hands in my sleep. And a lot of days I find my wrists and hands hurt sometimes, my shoulders hurt. It sucks, so hoping to avoid further damage to my wrists (I don't want to end up needing wrist surgery after all of this) I'm trying to do what I guess is a sensible thing and knit a little less.

Still, I usually can hold out until about 8 at night. By then I'm like well, I can probably just knit one row... Only thing is the one row I usually knit on the Pi Are Square Shawl each day is now probably about 400 stitches wide...

Yes, I do it on purpose. I need to knit a row that will make me feel like I've accomplished something after all. And I do feel accomplished. This is all the yarn I have left.

This cashmere laceweight boucle, has enough interest and variations in it, I'm actually just going to stick with the garter stitch until this runs out. Which if I was knitting on my normal schedule would probably be a couple of days. On this schedule, maybe a week or two. But that's ok, I do feel better with my little one row a night schedule. Plus, on another positive note I don't have to wait 2 weeks, 12 days to that walking cast and I'm hoping to say goodbye to the wrist pain and finish this baby off...

How I get myself into (and out of) trouble

2007-07-25T16:09:00.000-07:00

I've been knitting here and there a little lately. A few rows at night won't kill me. In the meantime I'm catching up on podcasts, surfing Ravelry, petting the stash. The other day the stash was bugging me a little. It haunts me and it's levels refuse to go down. I don't know if it's that we're starting to plan our upcoming trips to Stitches and Rhinebeck, or the fact that Christmas is exactly 5 months from today or what, but I just decided yesterday the stash needed some kind of resolution. So after much deliberation I came to 2 conclusions I thought would help.

1. What's left of the Elmore Pisgah Peaches and Creme (3 balls) must be knit by summer's end.

2. Ideally, I will have knit all the yarn I purchased at Stitches last year before I go to Stitches this year.

Number 1 definitely doable. Number 2, maybe with the exception of 1 or 2 skeins, I think I can probably come very, very close. I have yarn for 4-5 pairs of socks left from Stitches last year so it will take some resolution to finish them before mid-October. But still, I was very happy with these 2 goals, they are reasonable, and I think they go well with the upcoming stash increasing ventures. I went to sleep happy and content and at peace with the stash.

Then I wake up this morning and I have one thing on my mind.

Perdita. Knitty 2006. It's not as random as it seems. First, this past weekend I noticed a pretty beaded bracelet worn by Chris, who I knit with. She's had it on a couple of times and it's so cool. I'm not normally a bracelet person but this one really catches my eye. Then, thanks to Ravelry, a couple of days ago I noticed Jessie's version of Bauble from Spring 2007 Knitty really catching my eye. All this leads me think what is that beaded cuff pattern from Knitty I seem to re-visit every few months? Why haven't I knit it yet? I better go and read the pattern again... I better go and look at the finished ones other people have knit on Ravelry... It would look so cool in black or red or purple, which color would I choose? And all of a sudden I am back in love with Perdita again! Forget the stash anxiety, the goals, I want this on my wrist!!!

But this time it's different. Remember the cast? The crutches? I still can't drive for another 6 weeks! And even if someone did drive me simple stuff like walking around a store is so tiring. I really economize on the steps and the crutchwork each day and try to save it for the important or at least the really, really fun stuff. So no way to get DMC Perle Cotton. No way to get seed beads. And it's really for the best. Do I really need to go out and purchase more stuff to knit right now? No... I guess I don't... I'll put Perdita on the Ravelry queue anyway. After all the Christmas knitting I guess... Sigh...

Tired...

2007-07-20T03:42:00.000-07:00

I didn't mean to get a cast that matches the cat. I guess it just kind of happened. I haven't blogged because I haven't knitted much. My hands and arms hurt so much from the crutches and pulling myself up all the time that last night I didn't knit at all. A day without knitting is a very rare occurrence and a big, big downer for me. I'm back at work which is good, it's very good because it keeps me from going crazy, which is directly where I was headed staying home all the time. However, it's also bad because since I can't drive and rely on help to get back and forth, I went back full time right away. And it's just kicking my butt. This upcoming weekend will be much resting. I am actually looking forward to resting.

19 days until I get my walking cast and can give my arms a rest. Can't wait.

What I'm Doing with my Summer Surgery Recovery

2007-07-09T06:46:00.000-07:00

Pattern: Waterfall Socks from Knitspot
Yarn: Merino 4ply sock yarn "Kelim" gifted to me by Suzi from Darkside of Knitting 2 Punk Rock Gift Exchanges ago
Needles: Size 2 Clover Bamboo DPN's

Result? Love these socks! Love them! I wish I could model them on my feet for you guys to show you how great the lace pattern looks but with the cast and all, it's just not happening. But if you look at the Knitspot catalog my end result does look exactly like the ones in the picture. I think unless you are deliberately making changes to a pattern, if you set out to knit a pattern as is, then it should end up looking like the one in the picture. I've found to be the case so far with both these socks and the Cloverleaf Mitts. I think I'm actually going to be doing another pair of the Cloverleaf Mitts soon. I've decided I need a little break from the socks. I think I'm going to do a bunch of glove and mitten patterns I have lined up as soon as I finish the socks I just started Saturday.

Which you can tell, it won't be long before I finish these. They're sport weight Louet Gems Opal, with a gauge of 6 stiches to the inch. Plus making them short like this, you finish the cuff, and right away you're up into the heel flap! It's great! When I bought this yarn I didn't know it was sport weight, so I think the thicker gauge makes it better for short-slipper type socks for winter like these. So these will probably end up being Christmas gifts for someone eventually. Only problem? The yarn is not going fast enough! The ball you see is half the hank and I'm at least 2/3 of the way done with this sock. And I bought 2 hanks! Oh the stash will never end...

In non knitting news I've been doing a lot of... well... nothing I guess. Which everyone tells me is what I'm supposed to be doing after surgery. But it still sucks. I did have one fun day last week, the knitting girls came over and knit and brought food and just cheered me up so much. But then Saturday I started getting a little weepy when I realized I had not even been out of my house in over a week. Ick. I'm hanging in though, now I'm looking forward to Wednesday when I'm supposed to get a fiberglass cast put on and I get to go back to work. Looking forward to going back to work, words you think you'll never hear yourself saying right?

In the meantime I guess I could tell you about some of the great movies I've been watching lately. First the other day I re-watched The Girl in the Cafe.

A lot of people might have missed this when it came out in 2005. It was actually an HBO movie, never in the theaters but it really is a wonderful and beautiful movie. It stars Bill Nighy who you may remember as the aging rock star from "Love Actually" and as Davy Jones from the "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies and Kelly MacDonald who has been in several films, but unfortunately I haven't seen her in anything besides this and "Trainspotting." The two meet and before long Nighy's character asks MacDonald to attend a G8 Summit in Reykjavik, Iceland with him. The results are powerful and beautiful. The music, the scenery is amazing. During a time where I'm sure the new, loud, action packed "Transformers" probably has some merits, "The Girl in the Cafe" is a simple movie of people talking, but it's really so much more.

I also finally got to see A Prairie Home Companion the other day. Loved this one too. My husband told my Robert Altman had to deal with 65 speaking roles while making this film. It sounds so difficult but then look at who's doing the speaking- Meryl Streep, Lily Tomlin, John C. Reilly to start. Ok, so Lindsay Lohan is in it but not a whole lot, don't worry she's not that bad orangey tan, or pulling up her dress or passing out drunk or anything here. And the whole movie is just kind of sweet, a little hokey, with lots of intersting storylines and layers going on all at once to pull you in. I really liked it.

Last night I started watching Amelie. I know so many people who love this movie and now I see why. Audrey Tatou is so attractive and charming. And the whole film is so entertaining, the colors of every scene remind you of a painting, and the storyline is charming and whimsical and emotional. I just have 40 minutes to go and unless it turns into an entirely different movie somewhere in those 40 minutes I'm pretty sure I'm going to like this one for awhile too.

Elevate Good Times Come on!

2007-07-04T15:25:00.000-07:00

It's an elevation! My life for the moment that is. All about elevating, elevating, elevating that foot. You can see by the gross foot photo (sorry) below the the surgeon has came, saw and conquered.

The surgery did not go all that badly. My tendon ended up being worth saving after all and did not need to be replaced. It was just very, very inflamed so they just needed to clean it up a little. The rest of the foot, well, the bones needed to be 'realigned' which meant cutting and screws. Yeah, so it's not like it ended up being a picnic or anything. I also ended up waking up at the end with a deathly bout of nausea that lasted well into the evening so instead of coming home the same day I had to stay over. What a lovely post this is so far isn't it? Inflamation? Nausea? Foot photos? Alas, this is my life-hence my new motto "All Glamour! All the time!"

So the home time has meant elevation, and Percoset, and trying to use the crutches without hitting myself or the cat or the furniture too much. How do people end up getting addicted to pain killers? Really so far, they help the pain but just make the rest of me feel like crap. I'm thinking today is the last day for the Percoset. The pain has really lessened and well, honestly the percoset knocks me out and then I can't knit! And that's what I'm really home for isn't it?

So I'm not going to lie, I am knitting while the knitting's good. I'm about two thirds of the way done on the second Waterfall Sock and I still love them as much as the first day I started them! Aww...

I also finished the last cotton cloth and picked up something a little softer than cotton. CASHMERE!!! MMM! Mmm! I'm using the laceweight cashmere boucle I purchased at School Products and started a Pi Are Squared shawl.

I really like it so far. I mean, what's there not to like about garter stitch with a bunch of yarn overs here and there. It's great, the yarn is great. The true test of this project will be how much I actually wear it once it's done. I'm not a big shawl wearer now and I'm not sure knitting them myself is going to turn me into one either. But I probably won't know until it's actually done and in my hands either. So we'll have to see how it turns out.

In other fun time consuming news I got my invite to Ravelry. I haven't gotten to spend as much time on it as I would like but I am getting there. It is really, really cool. For anyone waiting for an invite, be patient, it's coming and trust me it's worth the wait!!!

A set and a sock

2007-06-24T15:25:00.000-07:00

Maybe I'm taking this Peaches and Creme thing too far... First, a bunch of washcloths, then I did 2 baby bibs. Then 2 burp cloths. Then I reached in to the stash and realized there was yarn for a burp cloth that would match the catepillar buttons on the bibs perfectly!

But, orange and green? I know, it's pretty loud. And a big step away from the blue/green theme of the baby set so far. Not that I'm trying to follow a blue/green theme for a particular baby at all. In fact this might not get gifted for awhile. My sister has had some problems with her pregnancy of late and it looks like she won't be having a baby next January as planned after all. I don't want to go into any of the details here but things just haven't gone well. So she has some waiting to do now before trying to get pregnant again. But she & her husband really do want another baby, and say they do want to try again when they can. So I think the baby set will be gifted eventually, just probably later than planned. In the meantime I think my niece has been distracting everyone with fun stuff, like discovering just how wonderful water can be in the summertime...

In other news I'm making progress using up the sock yarn. I finished one of the Waterfall Socks.

Like I mentioned before I love this pattern. It's pretty and stretchy and fits wonderfully. I knit it exactly as the pattern reads and I just could not be happier with it! I think this was the only sock pattern I've purchased from KnitSpot. Hmm... I'm going to have to go back and check for more. Especially judging the amount of sock yarn I still have. And my surgery is later this week... Hopefully I won't be too out of it to knit, if I feel good enough to knit, I bet I could really turn out some good stuff!

Weight and creative ways to distribute it

2007-06-15T16:02:00.000-07:00

These are done.

Yarn: Patonyle Made in Australia. Gifted to me by the wonderful Suzi at Darkside of Knitting

Pattern: regular old stockinette sock pattern knit on Clover bamboo dpns size 2.

They are done and in the Christmas bag! Look out-the holiday knitting has begun and it has it's own bag. I love putting it in it's own bag. Then when it gets to be the end of the year I have a big bag (I hope) of fo's just sitting there waiting to be gifted.

The Christmas bag is not the only new addition to the stash baskets

This is my new favorite toy. Fresh from Bed, Bath and Beyond where I practically stole it for a mere $5.99. Look it, even stores itself in itself!

Why would I have a diet food scale in my stash you ask? Well, it measures ounces and grams so I can use it to weigh my sock yarn halfway through instead of getting all the way to the end of the second sock and then realizing I'm going to run out of yarn:) In this case I can make 2 nifty little balls from one hank straight out of the gate.

This yarn was also a gift from Suzi back when I did the Punk Rock Gift Exchange. Basically, I'm trying to de-stash, it's hot and I want to knit the sock yarn the most and I'm starting with my favorites! In this case not only is the yarn awesome, but I picked a great pattern too.

These are the Waterfall Socks from Knitspot. I said nice things about Anne's patterns before when I knit the Cloverleaf Mitts from my mom and now you're going to hear me say nice things about her patterns again. I love this one! I don't even want to put it down. And this is not my usual experience with patterned socks. A lot of time patterned socks to me feel tight on the needles and I always find myself furrowing my brow and sticking my tongue out while I try to do weird stuff like purling 3 through the back loop and crap. So far with this pattern-not the case. The hardest thing is a k2tog and even I can do that. And it's coming out so pretty and stretchy- so I know it will fit well. Anyway, stay tuned to see where this one goes, I have really high hopes for it.

On the non-knitting front the sports medicine doctor did not give me good news this week, he basically reiterated what my podiatrist has already said. So I went ahead and scheduled my surgery for the very end of this month. I have 6 weeks on crutches, and then 4 weeks in a boot and then 4 weeks of physical therapy to look forward to. It sucks, but what can you do? It was bad news to get but I'm trying to be positive and keep a sense of humor about things. This brochure really helped a lot

I can choose, if I like instead of the boot to use a Roll-a-Bout! Fantastic! (sarcasm) The first thing I said when the doctor showed me this "Oh now that is SEXY!!!!" My crazy mother of course had to ask "Does the man in the picture come with the Roll-a-Bout" wink wink (Note to self-get mom boyfriend) Now I apologize if there's anyone reading this who has experience with the Roll-a-Bout and just loved it and feels strongly about their connection with their Roll-a-Bout but well, it's just not for me. I know the boot will be big and clunky but I just think it will still be slightly less noticeable than the Roll-a-Bout. Although I think it might be fun to hang out the skateboarders at the train station with the Roll-a-Bout and gauge their reactions... Am I sensing a new sport here maybe? Synchronized Roll-a-Bouting could be performed by teams set to music. Extreme Roll-a-Bouting would require helmets and elbow pads of course. Just think of the decorating possibilities- flame decals along the bars, ribbons and streamers to wave in the wind, rims on the wheels... Tony Hawk, I await your call...

Catching up so I can hurry up and wait...

2007-06-09T11:10:00.000-07:00

I didn't blog at all last week. I've fallen a little behind on a few things. Like getting the buttons on the red cardigan. I was with Tracy when I finally bought the thread to sew on the buttons, which had arrived a few weeks before. She said if she had finished a sweater she would have stayed up until 3 o'clock in the morning sewing them on just to see it done. This made me feel bad. Not bad enough to stay up that night sewing on the buttons... but bad enough to get it done like a couple of weeks later I guess.

I'm not crazy about this photo, it's on the hanger and kind of dark and kind of cheezy. But I promise the sweater is awesome. It fits great, it's just way too hot now to put it on for a proper photo shoot. I promise eventually to take a good photo that does it justice. Hey-for now I got the buttons on at least right...

And example #2 of not liking to sew on buttons. Two finished (almost) baby bibs from the Mason Dixon knitting book. One just needs to have the other caterpillar button sewn on.

You caught the cute caterpillar button right? See, he's on roller skates or something. Cute!

Don't worry-I still have plenty of time before the babies arrive (whichever one is getting these, don't know yet). I promise the button will be on by the time the item is gifted. Other than the crappy-having-to-sew-on a button part these bibs are kind of fun, neat gifts. They go super fast and I like how the cotton is easy to take care of the colors are kind of modern and fun and gender-neutral. Definitely a good pattern to have around to whip up as a last minute baby thing...

And I'm almost done with these socks.

I've realized the sock yarn is what has me most anxious of all the yarn amounts in the stash so I'm trying to focus my knitting attention there. There's just so much of it, I feel like I will never get through it all. The tragedy of which is that I will never be able to buy more. What an cruel, cruel circle the stash runs in!

But I might have more knitting time than usual very soon-here's the hurry up and wait part. I found out a few weeks ago that I tore a tendon in my foot when kickboxing and I'm going to need to have surgery. The bad part is-I tore the tendon in January. And I have been walking and kickboxing and cycling on it since. Yikes. When it happened I figured I had just sprained my ankle or something and figured it was temporary. I've had pain since but I never ever thought it could be something this serious. Boy was I wrong. At first it looked like I was just going to need the tendon surgery and would be in a cast for 3 weeks. That would be a pain in the tush-but something I figured I could deal with. But when we finally go the MRI done and I went back to my doctor for him to check it out he told me that since I have walked on this injury for so long the bones have been affected and the ankle is beginning to collapse. (Yikes again) It's now likely I'm going to need to have bone surgery (yeah, like they CUT off a piece of my BONE and put a screw through my ANKLE) and I will have to actually be in a cast for 8 weeks. Yes, after receiving this lovely news I am not happy. I am scared and depressed. Because of this development I've been referred to a Sports Medicine Orthopedist in Princeton. (Do you know how laughable it is that I have to go to a Sports Medicine doctor??? Do you remember the post about the hot dogs???)

Mmm... Hot dogs... Anyway, yes sad and depressed and even the looming possibilities of hours of uninterrupted knitting time are not enough to cheer me up yet. Talk to me once I have the screw in my ankle and I'm spaced out on some decent pain meds. We'll see, I'm trying to remain positive. I am. I hope to know more after I see the sports medicine doc Wednesday. In the meantime like I mentioned I'm trying to catch up (at work, around the house, socially) so that I will be prepared for when the healing period has to begin.

Stash Anxiety

2007-05-29T03:23:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I get anxious about the stash. I know, it's weird. Most of the time I love it and appreciate it and pet it and all is well. But sometimes I get flashes of "I'm never going to to get all of this yarn knit" and I gasp and hyperventalate a little. Sometimes I get a few hives. And my stash (from what I can tell) is really not all that bad compared to some so it's really a strange thing. Anyway, this week I've felt like that a bit so I'm trying to knit my way through it.

The Peaches and Creme yarn is good for this. It knits up pretty fast and each time I make a couple of these dishcloths I'm down 2 balls. I've also decided to use it to start some of the knitting for babies I should be doing.

This doesn't look like much now but it's a baby bib from the Mason Dixon book. Again, fast fast and the lovely garter stitch is easy easy. My easy easy sock is also going along great and has hopefully beat the bad sock karma of last week.

Compared to a patterned sock these are going really fast too. Not bad for the past few weekends we've had. It's just been really busy around here. Saturday we had a wedding in Vermont and then Sunday we drove home and rested, did some stuff around the house. Then yesterday, we had a Memorial Day BBQ to go too. Every weekend has been like that lately. Thankfully next weekend it looks like we're getting a break. So far the social schedule is wide open. Finally! It's still 4 days away and I'm already looking forward to it. I get to catch up on my knitting (maybe knit enough to make the stash anxiety subside a little?) And maybe (finally) get to take photos of the completed red cardigan.

Sock carnage and taking it on the road

2007-05-20T07:39:00.000-07:00

Earlier this week I found myself working on a sock, once again praying to not run out of yarn before finishing the 10 rows left I had to go in the toe.

I took the sock with me to work and on my lunch hour officially ran out of the ball of yarn before finishing the sock. I then completely LOST MY MIND!!! Logic went out the window and I got this crazy thought that "I know, I'll just cut off the cast on edge, frog what I need from the top, and then bind of the top edge again." WHAT????

Argh. Well, it worked when I had to shorten my Main Street Pullover but you see, that was stockinette. This is not, this was knit 5 purl 2 ribbing. Which meant tangling. Which meant that idea I had was just dumb. These were supposed to be socks for my dad for Father's Day. The pattern is the Diagonal Cross-Rib socks from the Favorite Socks book from Interweave and it was going just fine. I wasn't loving the yarn which was Fortissima Socka but I'm not sure it was the yarns fault. I had bought it at a LYS where I (along with other people I know) have had problems in the past. Basically, the place is totally unorganized and if you interrupt the help from their constant non-knitting related chattering amongst themselves, well, they kind of treat you like crap. I'm not going back there anymore and that's ok. I wonder if maybe the yarn has some of that bad-shopping experience karma stuck on it and that's the problem? Well, yeah that and of course, I told you about the part where I completely lost my mind.

This sock massacre was a big bummer for me. I really wanted to have socks for my dad for Father's Day because he specifically asked for them for Father's Day. (Even though I keep thinking Dad, it's in June, you're not going to be able to wear them yet anyway!) Between these and the Jaywalkers, I'm kind of sick of frogging and bad knitting luck. Problem is as the weather's been getting better lately, our social schedule has been filling up and sometimes it feels like we spend most of our weekend driving in the car. Which of course requires car knitting. Which is usually socks. Time to take it down a few notches.

Simple, stockinette sock with beautiful variegated yarn. Can't beat it. This is awesome Patonyle yarn from my Punk Knitting Swap pal Suzi. I haven't seen this yarn anywhere here ever, and it says 'Made in Australia' right on it, so I'm not sure I ever will. But I really, really like it. And going back to a simple stockinette sock is just making me feel like a genius. It is flying! And looking great! Who me lose my mind? Run out of yarn? (Oh yeah, note to self-stop making these socks too damn long, you keep running out of yarn) Never! Throw it in my favorite silk Lantern Moon bag, rig up the ipod and don't forget my favorite LED Ear Light so I can even knit in the dark, and I'm ready for the road.

Almost there...

2007-05-16T16:12:00.000-07:00

Buttondrawer.com came through with much success! Although I'm still surprised that what you see below is $30 worth, they are all quality items, and I'm sure what doesn't get used this time will definitely be used eventually.

The "Smoked Agoya" buttons are nice, but larger than I wanted for this sweater. I kind of got them just in case I changed my mind. The metal buttons called "Ripple" are really, really cool, but not for this sweater, this time. I'm going to go with the "Gray Seashell" since they're closest to what I had picked originally and are exactly the thing I had in mind.

Mamarama!

2007-05-13T06:50:00.000-07:00

Happy Mom's Day all!!! Guess what? I'm not a mom but I did get some good mom-related news today- I'm going to be an aunt again! Yay! My sister told us this morning she is pregnant with their second and she is due in January! They are thrilled. We are thrilled. Everybody's thrilled! So let the baby knitting begin! We also found out recently some good friends of ours are also pregnant and expecting in November, so I guess I better get cracking. Gosh, even though my niece is only 18 months I feel like it's been forever since I knit baby stuff. I feel kind of out of the loop with the baby patterns. Time to do research! And of course the challenge-I don't expect either set of parents to find out the baby's sex in advance, so I'll try to make the items gender neutral. So any suggestions? Anybody knit a baby pattern recently they love? Let me know, I guess I'm just going to have to my more yarn again. Sigh.... :)

Sunny days are here again!

2007-05-07T18:02:00.000-07:00

The woolly cable scarf is done. And wonderful. It was fun and I love it. I love the colors, loved the stitches, it knit fast and I'm happy with the finished project. But I do remember knitting on it on a couple of warm days towards the end and it was starting to feel a little sticky. So... onto something a little drier, a little sunnier.

These are the first 2 of what I'm sure will be many Buttonband Dishcloths from the Mason Dixon knitting book. The yarn is the great stuff I ordered from Elmore Pisgah a few weeks ago, and what can I say? The colors are like candy, they just leap right off the needles. The pattern was fast and easy and enjoyable. And something interesting to note-the pattern is exactly the same as the one on the paper band on the Peaches and Creme yarn. While I love the Mason Dixon book and think there's something in it for everyone, it's good to know too-if you don't want to commit to the whole book, just pick up a ball of this yarn and the pattern is right there.

Oh Drat!

2007-04-29T16:23:00.000-07:00

The red cardigan is all seamed. Sleeves set in. Side seams sewn up. The neckband is done. Now to just do the button bands.

But how wide should they be? Well it depends on the size of the buttons right? Herein lies the problem. The day I went into the city for the Radical Lace and Subversive stitching show I bought the buttons. At the amazing store M&J Trimming. I liked that store a lot by the way. It's bright and colorful and cheery and clean and super-organized. (My local sewing/button store is a little dingy and could really benefit from some cheer and some clean) And they have a huge selection, so of course I would find the perfect buttons there.

See? Perfect! Only, not-so-perfect. This is all I bought. Five buttons. Five buttons?!?!?! What was I thinking? All I can think is that in the past I have knit sweaters with only five buttons I guess. But you always need an extra, for just in case. Plus this sweater is different. It's a smaller size, a smaller gauge, everything is smaller. (Which is making a much better fit, in the past things have turned out somewhat drapey at times) But smaller buttons also would mean-more buttons. These guys are on the smaller size and only five looks ridiculous. And alas. I just don't have more. I've emailed M&J Trimming's customer service email a couple of days ago. And well, maybe they'll write back but... I HAVE NO PATIENCE!!! I AM ON THE BUTTON BANDS AND I JUST WANT THIS THING DONE!!!

Really, it's so close to done it's ridiculous. So what's a girl to do? Head to the dingy not so great local store? Get a crowbar and try to find time to schlep back into the city somewhere in my joke of a schedule? Of course not! The times that try women's souls are also often perfect opportunities to whip out the charge card. Enter The Buttondrawer.com. My new source for buying buttons online. So I did some damage, ordered 10 of 3 different kinds of buttons that I think may be comparable somewhat to the 'perfect' buttons and well, we'll just see where this takes us. And if M&J Trimming comes through and emails me back that they've found more of my button that I can order then I'll probably order them again from them too. Something tells me I can just see myself getting in this situation again, so maybe it is time to start stockpiling some buttons...

Spring has sprung

2007-04-22T13:36:00.000-07:00

And I've been buying some yarn! This is the Mason Dixon Pre-Pack Kit from Elmore-Pisgah. Isn't it just so pretty? I actually knew about Elmore-Pisgah before the Mason Dixon knitting book. I don't remember how but I've had that link in my favorites from way back. I had always wanted to order a bunch but could never decide on colors. I think they did a great job matching these up. Originally I thought, wouldn't it be nice if I could knit a bunch of washcloths for the moms in my life for Mother's Day? Wouldn't it? But wouldn't it also be nice if Mother's day was more than 3 weeks away? Alas it is not. So perhaps I'll be knitting those gifts for the moms in my life for Christmas. Or next Mother's Day? I don't care all I know is I can't wait to cast these on and knit them in all their spring and pretty color glory.

But I haven't cast on yet, because I'm in the middle of this.

Wheee! One more bit of wool knitting before Spring settles in for good. This is lovely Taos wool made by Crystal Palace. It was gifted to me by my Knitters Tea Swap Pal Anne from Wandering Cyberspace from the Cornfields. I ordered some extra from Jimmy Beans Wool because I knew I would want the wider version. Between getting this yarn and the Peaches and Cream from Elmore Pisgah in the mail I have decided the yarn buying alone could be a new and fun hobby for me in and of itself. Anyway the pattern for the scarf is actually here and it's free and wonderful. They actually have a bunch of great patterns there you should check out. I memorized this one after just a few rows. I love the texture and it's soft and warm. It keeps my attention but not so much that I can't concentrate on other things. Like the tivo I finally got to catch up on today- especially that cute-as-a-stitchmarker Apolo Anton Ohno. Oh no? Oh yes....

Cuteness. At warp speed.

2007-04-16T17:10:00.000-07:00

Blog activity has been temporarily interrupted. We have a visitor.

My niece isn’t the only one visiting this week. My sister and her husband are here too. It’s great to have them here and hang out and have family time together. Which is also time to try and overcome my new photography challenge. Try to get a decent picture of this one during the .003 seconds she might actually stand still once in awhile.

It's tough.

Even though there aren’t knitting pictures I assure you there has been knitting activity. I gave my mom the Cloverleaf Mitts for her birthday and she went nuts over them. She adores them. I adore them too. And now I find myself coveting them. Time to make some for me now I guess. I’ve also cast on for a scarf I'm completely in love with. But between the toddler photography challenge and the low light conditions created by this weeks nor'easter, better to wait until next week and do it up right. I feel bad not properly blogging this week, but the niece (and her parents, gosh I keep forgetting them!) is only here for a little while, and you know she won't be this adorable, hyper, and very sweet age forever!

(And did I mention it took both my sister and her husband to get her dressed yesterday! And they're both college graduates! My sister went to an Ivy League school!!! But getting a toddler in tights, I guess it just levels that playing field huh? I don't know, maybe it's just funny when you get to watch your sister do it. High comedy!!!! How did I miss getting pictures of that? Hmm....)

Off and on the needles

2007-04-08T04:46:00.000-07:00

Happy Easter to those who celebrate it. And to those who don't a very Happy Sunday to you also.

We're off to my in-laws today where they are having a crowd of people. This is the take along I've made, an Orange Dreamsicle Cake from one of my favorite baking books The Cake Mix Doctor. For my foodie friends-if you have not checked out this book you should. I've had it for years and have yet to make a bad cake from it. With hits like "The Coca Cola Cake" and "Mississippi Mud Cake" no, it's not high culinary culture or something you'd want to make your wedding cake from. But everything is a crowd pleaser, and with the cake-mix doctoring methods, a lot of time it's like mix it up, bake it, frost/glaze/ice it and go.

While I don't have good easter egg or candy pictures to show you, I do have a good picture of some easter egg colored socks.

Pattern: Jaywalker Socks by Grumperina

Yarn: Trekking XXL and then leftover Kroy socks when I ran out of the Trekking

Modifications: Obviously there's the different colored toe-thing which was completely unintentional. I also made the heel flap a few stitches deeper-and they're still pretty snug.

What I think: At the moment I’m just glad these are done. Running out of yarn wasn’t the only issue at the end, somehow when I decreased & went to kitchner the toe I had more stitches on one needle than the other. Sorrowfully frustrated at that point I honestly just divided them evenly between the needles and grafted away.

Here is my thing-people shouldn’t complain about public television. They shouldn’t complain about the free samples in the grocery store or free knitting patterns on the internet. They’re FREE after all. We pay nothing for them. If you don’t like it don’t partake. That said I will now contradict myself and probably come out sounding like a total hypocrite. I have noticed some times there is a difference between that free stuff and the stuff you pay for. I don’t know why I had so much trouble with these socks. Maybe it was me, frogging this so many times in the beginning was hard. Definitely somewhat my fault-I chose to do a 'gauge sock' instead of a 'gauge swatch'. But still, the un-stretchiness of the sock completely surprised me and was difficult to work around. I just feel like I’m a little spoiled I guess. I’m used to getting my needles, getting my yarn, getting a pattern, and sitting down and knitting a pair of socks. At one point when I was knitting these I was whining about this to a friend who said "Yes, but now that you've frogged the socks, now you know what you're doing." And I continued to whine still more saying "Yes but I thought I knew what I was doing before I started them..." That said will I knit these socks again? Maybe. Someday. I do really like how they look. I like it that the stitch pattern was easy to memorize. After I had my sizing issues though, I’m wary to make them for another person as a gift. And there are already many more patterns in line I’m ready to try and I'm going to have to start my Christmas sock gift knitting sometime.

Cast on cast off, cast on cast off. Cast on is the Cloverleaf Mitts in Misti Alpaca, just ready for me to pick up the thumb stitches and finish it off.

I had bought the yarn for the Anemoi mittens in grey and green. It was a bad purchase. Not only is it almost impossible to tell the difference between the colors in anything less than perfect sunlight, I somehow managed to get 2 balls of sportweight in gray, one ball of sportweight in green, and one ball of worsted in green. Duh.

I came upon Knitspot when I noticed the Yarn Harlot knitting their pattern for the Delicato Mitts. Anne's catalog has lots of cute patterns for mitts that don't take a lot of yarn. Perfect for using up stash, and if you buy patterns from her you get the gratification of buying something knitting-related for yourself without adding to the stash too. The patterns are clear, well written and the photos are great. Again-possibly the big difference between some free patterns and the patterns you pay for. The Cloverleaf Mitts pattern is wordy. It is wordy and it is detailed. And that is wonderful-they’ve really gone above and beyond anticipating any confusion I might have along the way. And I think so far the mitt is looking great, I would really recommend purchasing this pattern!

Totally Radical...

2007-04-01T12:32:00.000-07:00

So Saturday I packed up the second Jaywalker sock and took it into New York City for some culture. (See how the sock is almost done? Yeah, so is the yarn. I see an unmatched toe in this socks future and I really think I'm ok with that at this point.) Along with my knitterly friends Tracy and Chris we went to the Museum of Arts and Design to see the Radical Lace and Subversive Knitting exhibit. Definitely more art than craft it was really something to see. Some of my favorite pieces would have to include an untitled piece by Hildur Bjarnadóttir which was actually a crocheted lace tablecloth surrounded by 3 dimensional skulls around the edges. Very cool. Another favorite-the work of Piper Shepard written about in Knitty here, was simply stunning. She had taken huge swaths of fabric on rolls and hand cut what seemed like miles and miles of lace panels out of the fabric by hand with exacto knives.

Before the museum we went for a visit to the amazing School Products. Wow. What an amazing yarn store. It was big and bright and just had tons and tons of stuff. They seemed to have a lot of laceweight which was good for me, that's just what I was in the market for. They had an impressive stock of Koigu. I see why this stuff makes people weak. It was hard to resist. But I remembered my new 'No New Sock Yarn' mantra and stayed strong! Lots of unusual things, silk blends, coned yarns, and cashmere.... Now this might seem silly to some but I always kind of wondered what the big deal was about cashmere. I think maybe I just let myself stop at the price tag and that was enough to dissinterest me right there. But at School Products cashmere is actually affordable. It was reasonable to find skeins in the $30 dollar range that would have enough make a nice, respectable lace weight scarf. I on the other hand just blew that figure right out of the water and picked up enough of the stuff to make a big ol' drapey shawl for myself. It's actually a cashmere boucle, in a dark hunter green with a few variances of brown and gold here and there. I'd show a picture but the photo I tried to take in today's cloudy weather of it looks so bad! It's enough to sour generations on cashmere in the future! So no picture, I promise when I start knitting with it you'll get to see it, promise.

And of course the company just made the day a complete success. We knitted on the train both ways, took part in a great lunch and libations at a brewery near the museum and giggled and giggled a whole, whole lot.

In the spirit of the Radical Lace and Subversive Knitting show when I got home I decided to try my hand at some Subversive Knitting and come up with some soft sculpture pieces. You know, maybe to keep in the wall unit by the tv, or to submit for an exhibition or something.

Just kidding. It's not sculpture. But it is the finished pieces of my red cardigan! Finally! Let the drudgery of seaming and button bands begin! Sigh. But this has to mean I'm at least halfway there right? Maybe?

Raking in the presents!

2007-03-25T10:35:00.000-07:00

So, here we are closing in on the end of March and I may or may not have had an event this week involving turning another year older, blowing out candles, and over-indulging in a dessert kind of way. (Can you tell I don't really feel like talking about now being thirty-two? Sigh....) Anyway, the good part of course is that I have I'm a lucky girl who got to spend time and get very well wishes from the very sweet people who love me. Chocolate, laughing and beverages were consumed on the appropriate birthday-level scale. Oh yeah, and they also gave me presents too. Here are the knitting related ones

Look at that! That's like enough knitting knowledge to stop a bus isn't it? Wow! My dad gave me the 2 Barbara Walker knitting treasuries (and also "Knitting in the Old Way", which I now just realized is not in the picture). My husband gave me the Nicky Epstein "Knitting on the Edge" books and the Amy Sedaris book (I know it's not knitting but it's in that craft category, and totally hilarious by the way) and also Little Miss Sunshine on DVD which I watched for the second time yesterday and have officially decided it is my new favorite movie. The lovely Tracy gave me the "Favorite Socks" book and yes it just as good as they say it is. It's one of a handful of books I own where I can really say I'd be hard-pressed to find a project in there that I would not want to make. I really could make every one. And the "Victorian Lace Today" book? That would be a gift from me. To me. And I happen to love it. What a great gift! Doesn't everyone buy themselves birthday gifts? Gifts as in plural right? I hope so because that's not the only thing I got myself.

I had heard someone talking about a corduroy messenger knitting bag on a podcast awhile ago. I didn't buy the brand the person was referring but recognized immediately that a corduroy messenger knitting bag could possibly be the penultimate knitting vessel that would someday surpass all my knitting in public dreams. Behold the Namaste Messenger Knitting Bag. Can you tell I love it? I adore it? And I'm so not into 'buying stuff' lately. But this bag... Every time I knit I admire it. The corduroy is soft as butter, yet sturdy. The inside? Gobs and gobs of space.

The bottom even unzips to make even more room! So the next time I'm knitting a 50 inch top-down raglan I don't have to worry that the entire sweater is not going to fit in my bag. No problem! It is so roomy! But small stuff is kept safe and sound too-the little pockets in the front? So useful, and cute. And there a bunch of small pockets lining the inside also-it's hard to photograph the black. And the style? It's just so me. I love messenger bags. And I'm so happy with this, it's so useful and practical, yet stylish and classic and punk-ish. And I'm totally tempted to cover that top flap with different pins from bands and stuff. Because even though my drivers license says otherwise in my head I am still living in 1995. But that's ok right? Back in 1995 I'm still 20 years old. Eeek!

May the bug bite you, and may it bite you bad

2007-03-18T08:12:00.000-07:00

Well, on the knitting front I’ve recovered nicely from the frogged Jaywalker.

This one fits and I’m much happier with it. I do like this pattern a lot. I’ve pretty much knitted exclusively on it this week. And it hasn’t been hard because I’m afraid I’ve gotten a little bored with the other project I have on the needles.

I’m halfway through the sleeves on the red cardigan and I don’t want to say it’s like slogging through concrete but well, sometimes it is. I can’t believe it. I’m the girl that loves mindless knitting. Miles of stockinette. Hours of straight stitching. Well I guess I’ve met my match. I’m not sure if it’s the yarn (it’s acrylic, which is ok, but after this much of it it no longer says ‘touchmepickmeupknitme’ all the time) or the color (it’s almost exactly the same color as the last sweater I knit, that could bring about boredom too). But something has me just wanting to get through this. I think it’s that I also know once I do finish the sleeves I still have a few weeks of seaming and buttonbands to go (I usually only do that stuff on the weekends in high concentration mode so it takes a while) and probably not much wearing time left in the season. It could also be all the other patterns I’ve been looking through and planning. Or that this is the smallest gauge I’ve ever knit a sweater for myself with. Who knows. But I’m going to keep at it. Since that’s the only way it will ever get done I guess.

In other hobby news I purchased my first pair of clip-on cycle shoes this week. They clip onto the pedals of a stationary bike to keep your feet in place. They’re better for your feet and can give you a better workout than just using regular sneakers.

I’ve been taking cycling classes at my gym for quite a while now and I love it. (It’s also called spinning but whenever I tell people I took a spinning class they always assume it’s the fiber yarn making kind of spinning:) Depending on my schedule I usually go to the gym between 3 and 5 times a week and I alternate between cycling and kickboxing classes. I know, I’m chubby for a healthy person, but at least I’m healthy and I’ve made my peace with that. But that’s a topic for another day...

Anyway, the story I want to tell you about today is about my new friend-the cycle guy. I went to a cycle shop near where I work to get the shoes. When I was there I asked the man helping me about getting a bike too. I haven’t owned a bike since, well probably since age 13 or 14. But I like these cycle classes a lot, and sometimes see one of those weekend cyclists riding around on a beautiful day and think "Hey, I could get used to that." Nonetheless, I probably won’t be getting a bike soon. According to my sales person if I want to get set up with a quality bike for the long haul (which I do) he positively assured me that he could definitely get me set up for less than $400. Which wouldn’t be so bad. I don’t want a toy but I’m not about to start cycling competitively either. So it’s not completely out of the question, but also not an amount I’ll be running out to spend tomorrow either. Anyway, we started talking about biking in the area and all the trails, biking by the beach and in the woods. And his eyes glazed over a bit and he spoke a little quickly and I noticed he had a look on his face all too familiar to me. As he went on to tell me how wonderful it is to cycle in our area and how alive it makes him feel when he hits the road I couldn’t help but think "I totally know this look. This is how I look when I talk about knitting." After a few minutes the conversation wound down and I told him if I did decide to buy I would go back to his shop. It means a lot to me that the person selling to me really cares about what they’re selling. He said that would be fine and told me, "Well, may the bug bite you and may it bite you bad." And I nodded and smiled. Because I understood. After all I have all these knitting bug bites all over me already right?

A Frog and Some Dogs

2007-03-10T16:45:00.000-08:00

So how much yarn would you say goes into a halfway completed Jaywalker sock? Probably about this much.

Probably? More like definitely. Unfortunately the Jaywalker got thrown into the frog pond today. Here is a picture of it before the swim in all it's pink and stripey lovely Trekking glory

Sigh.... Now I understand what Sachi meant when she commented "Just remember that they don't stretch. At all." Up until this point it seemed like the sock would be fine. It slid over my foot just fine. Not really tight, but still not all loosey goosey like that first attempt. But today I knit the heel flap, which was seeming a little shallow. I was prepared to make it longer than in the pattern and decided to try the sock on to see how it would go. And it turns out it wouldn't go- over my ankle at all that is. Now I understand the part about the stretching. The leg fit over my foot just fine, and it probably would also fit around my leg just fine. What I really need is some stretch and leeway to get it over my heel. So I've already re-cast it. I'm keeping it on the size 1's because I think it shows the stitches better than the 2's. I'm just going up to the 84 stitch size. But if this doesn't work, then I'm afraid I don't know where we're going with this. They might turn out to be socks for someone else. We'll have to see.

So since the sock frogging incident left me a little, well... dejected. To cheer me up the husband was sweet and decided to take me out for a hot dog.

Last month the cover of New Jersey Monthly Magazine featured their article on cheap eats. Great places to eat for less than $15 bucks. Some of the places in there look fabulous, and this weekend we decided to try our first one Amazing Hot Dog in Verona, New Jersey. Which also got an excellent "4 grease stains" rating on the Holly Eats website Tracy shared with me awhile ago. A great site to look and and drool over. Let me tell you the hot dogs... well, they were absolutely amazing, just the fix for a frogged sock.

You can get a "Classic" hot dog which is a wonderful 1/4 pound start. But most of the dogs on their menu start with their "Amazing" dog which you may or may not be able to tell from the pictures, is one of the 1/4 pound dogs, wrapped in bacon and deep fried. That's right- I didn't say steamed, I didn't say blanched, no these babies are DEEP FRIED!!! (Disclaimer-Don't worry, I promise I don't eat like this every day, I have a lot of yarn in my stash and if I die too early it won't get knit after all.) My favorite that we had? The one called "My Schmero!" in the lower left hand corner, an Amazing Dog served on a bun spread with cream cheese and sprinkled with scallions. Maybe it sounds weird but it was so good!!!! (And you know I'm beginning to now consider how cream cheese really can complement a variety of foods...) Vinny had to have the one pictured at the top called "The Jersey Breakfast Dog." That one is served with a fried egg and cheese. Yeah. Also on there is the "Smokey Joe" served with barbecue sauce and baked beans of course. And then one traditional Amazing Dog with mustard and sauerkraut. MMM... Fries on the side, and oh the little fried things in the middle? Those are Egg Roll dogs- mini hot dogs wrapped in egg roll wrappers served with duck sauce. Delish!!!

The owner tried to talk us into trying their "Amazing Hot Dog Superhero Challenge." Eat 6 specialty dogs and get your name on their plaque. Apparently only one person has done it so far and it only took them 45 minutes. We knew, we could just tell by the pictures there was just no way. We were more than fine with what we had ordered. We got our dogs sat down to eat and other than just saying "MMM" a lot we were pretty quiet. After a few gluttinous minutes in Vinny was halfway through his first dog. He looked up and half spoke/half sighed "It's really good.... Really... But there's no way I could ever eat 6 of these f**king things..." And trust me, 6 normal hot dogs for Vinny, not such a challenge. But these Amazing Dogs? Well, you can only taking in so much Amazing in one sitting... Highly recommended.

Beastie Boys Survey

2007-03-04T09:20:00.000-08:00

Swiped this survey from Sunneshine and just had to do it. Why? Because I own this shirt

Now I didn't buy this shirt anywhere, even though Craftster does have some pretty cute ones. No I actually had this shirt made. I had to have it in black (of course) so I ordered it from Neighborhoodies which is a fine business I recommend highly. Anyway-so now you know I'm not only the type of geek to go to the trouble of having a shirt like this made but I also do really love those Beastie Boys just that much. So when I saw this survey loosely based on the lyrics from the very same song as my t-shirt is based on, well I knew it was destined for a blog post.

1. I've been hooked on the needles since: Learned to crochet from grandma when I was 5. Knitting from my godmother soon after.

2. I'm still a virgin, but not for long: I’m dying to knit a big fancy lace shawl this summer. Also socks on 2 circulars. I’m also a virgin to steeking but I don’t think I’ll be getting past that one for awhile.

3. She's crafty - she gets around...to : Knitting everyday or every other if that’s not possible. If not I’m a serious crank. Seriously. And I rarely miss a meal. You don’t want to see me hungry either... Give me yarn and food and everybody’s happy...

She's crafty - she's always down...for: Knitting, tivo, trivia, eating out, cooking for friends, online shopping.

She's crafty - she's got a gripe...about : The serious injustices in the world today. The blatant consumerism in this country. The fact that youth culture has been replaced with Coach bags and Lindsey Lohan. The phone, I hate it. MySpace, I just don’t get it. I feel like I was a geek in high school and now I’m a geek on MySpace. But lets not talk about the gripes...

She's crafty - and she's just my type. What type of knitter are you? A process knitter (as opposed to a project knitter). I like the finished objects, but it’s the activity of sitting there and concentrating and knitting and relaxing that always brings me back... See #3.

4. I'm dying to try: lace shawl knitting.

5. I gravitate towards colors like: Black. Gray. Red. Purple. Green. Brown.

6. My most cherished possession (kids, pets, family don't count) is: Maybe this sounds cheezy but for as much of a collector as I am I’m really not into possessions lately. They’re things. Lately for me it’s all about people and action. Put me in a store (unless it’s a yarn store or I need something) and I feel bored to tears. I don’t need anything. Time, rest, peace of mind, more time to knit, now that’s the stuff I really need.

7. I'm stuck on an island, what am I reading? A knitting or food magazine. Or doing crosswords or sudoku.

8. If I were about to be executed and I was offered a last meal , I'd be dining on: It’s ridiculous how I’ve always known the answer to this question and it comes up in conversation a lot-rack of lamb, Bombay Sapphire gin and tonic, and creme brulee for desert.

9. Music to knit by: I usually knit to the tv or to podcasts. Music on the ipod right now would include the Pixies, NOFX, Bad Religion, Ella Fitzgerald, the Replacements, Louis Jordan...

10. I have a crush on: Jim Halpert on The Office. Drool....

11. Least favorite celeb: I don’t know why this question kind of bugs me. But I guess I’d have to say Teri Hatcher. Can she have any more plastic surgery? And this is supposed to be our new standard of beauty in this country?

12. Choose:Brad Pitt or Johnny Depp? Johnny Depp

Madonna or Janet Jackson? Old Janet Jackson- the Control album, I wish there were more female artists out there that still were delivering that type of message to young women. Sadly, I’m afraid I think Janet has even abandoned it for that troll Jermaine Dupree....

June Cleaver or Peg Bundy? Peg, only because Katey Segal also did the voice of Leela on Futurama

Jackie or Marilyn? Jackie

Love or Money? Love

Brains or Looks? Brains

Math or English? For me english, but because my math is lacking, I’m totally impressed by it in others.

Cat or Dog? Cat

Leader or follower? Hmm.... How about sarcastic bystander? Degenerative heckler? I’m not a follower, but I don’t think anyone should follow me either. Really. Do I look like I know where the heck I’m going?

Beer or Champagne? Good beer-I’m a beer snob. Although I wouldn’t turn down good Champagne either.

13. My favorite smell? The grill in the summer. Bacon cooking. The smell when you walk in Carvel Ice Cream.

14. Not many people know this about me: Nobody knows that stuff for a reason... :)

15. My hidden talent is: digesting legal info and spitting it back out sounding like I understand what I’m saying. Yeah, that one’s hidden for a reason...

Happy knitting, hope everyone's having a great weekend, I'll be posting knitting pics soon.

It's a socky kind of week

2007-02-25T07:37:00.000-08:00

Pattern: Standard toe-up sock pattern from Charlene Schurch's Sensational Knitted Socks

Yarn: Lana Grossa's Meilenweit Fun & Stripes in color #625.

Needles: Takumi Bamboo #2 dpns

Previously deemed the Fugazi socks this project has seen me through thick and thin and good times and bad times. And I do think I have finally made my peace with them. As things gradually started to calm down the knitting on the socks seemed to calm down and I realized that these were really pretty simple little stockinette socks that are actually pretty cute. I think I'm going to like wearing them and I think we should have a long happy life together as long as they keep me warm. Pardon the lame picture with the rolled up jeans. I know you can't see the tops of the socks but I'm a married woman and it's February. In the winter I shave my legs just often enough so no one at the gym will complain, close up sock photography is a whole different ball game I'm just not up for this weekend.

So here's a top of another sock to look at

It's my first Jaywalker sock and it's probably been totally frogged by the time you read this. As you can tell, I decided to go with the pink Trekking XXL yarn and I love it. I am so not a pink person, I would never be able to wear this color all over my body, but for something small like socks it's A-OK. I also love the Jaywalker pattern. Love it love it love it. I like patterns that don't require too much concentration and this is like that, but interesting to look at at the same time. The only reason I'm frogging this beginning here is that the sock was coming out way way to big. Serves me right- sometimes with socks I figure well, just start the sock, it takes almost the same amount of time as a gauge swatch. And that is how this one ended up frogged. Which leaves me using the smaller 76-stitch version of the Jaywalker pattern. Which is so random-not only did I not have to upsize this pattern like I thought I would but I'm actually using the smaller version of the pattern? Well, it kind of makes sense, the Fugazi socks are 70 stitches around, so 80 stitches around did seem kind of large. Hey-I'm not complaining-fewer stitches around means finishing faster right? Sweet!

Knitting and Running into Spring

2007-02-17T16:50:00.000-08:00

The Canadiana cardigan is moving along. The back is finished and I'm working on the fronts, both at the same time. I finished the ribbing today and I'm already on the stockinette. And the gauge karma hasn't bitten me back yet, so... so far so good.

The Fugazi socks will be finished up soon I hope. I love how the toe and heel of each sock both kind of mimic the other sock, yet aren't exactly the same. I know if I cared I could have probably made them the same, but I like them a little different.

I'm hoping to finish them soon because I have a March knitting event coming up. FiberFlix is a really neat group where we watch different types of movies and discuss them in the online forums. I am a big, big movie lover, so just the process of voting on movies and picking new ones for each month is something I get totally interested in. March is going to be really neat because for the first time there's a little knit-along to go with the films. The films are Run Lola Run and Logan's Run. And to go with the films people can choose to knit either Jaywalker socks orRPM socks. I think I'm going to knit Jaywalkers-I know I'm probably the last person in the blogosphere left who has not knit them. I like the mostly-stockinette look of them and I'm excited to try the pattern. If anyone has any tips on knitting these please let me know-especially if you made the larger size. I have to knit the larger ones and I'm hoping that they will be big enough and I won't have to upsize them more. I don't have dainty little feet and I've heard these socks can come out kind of narrow. So today I started the planning for the socks. The first big question-which yarn to use?

This was a quick survey of some of the sock yarn I have to chose from. (See why I'm trying to cut back on buying the sock yarn a little? That's 6 pairs right there and that's not even all of it!) Right now I think I'm mostly leaning towards either the Patons Patonyle in the lower left corner or the pink Trekking XXL. The pink is really pink and how it ever ended up in my stash is really beyond me. I'm really not much of a pink person at all. But it's there and I love it just as much as the rest of the sock yarn. I think I'm favoring those 2 because I think the colors will look good with the pattern and also they are kind of spring-y colors. And you know, spring will be here before we even know it...

For the Seafood Lover (and Gauge Heretic) in you

2007-02-11T11:05:00.000-08:00

I missed a week of blogging last week. Call it a blogacation I suppose. What was I doing? Everything except taking pictures or sitting at my computer or knitting it seems. I know, lets not speak of this non-knitting/picture taking/blog reading/writing episode any longer. There are more pressing things to discuss.

Like the excellent dinner I had last night. Husband & I drove to lovely Bayonne, New Jersey to meet my dad for some much needed Bayonne soul food. Not traditional southern American soul food-which is also something I do adore and rarely turn down. This is Bayonne Spanish soul food. Rincon de Espana is always a family favorite. And I love going with my dad, we tell him what we want to eat and then he orders in spanish for us. The waiters are probably better with spanish than english, it is Bayonne after all. For stick to the ribs, tasty spicy stuff you want to eat when it's 10 below outside, it's just the ticket.

Garlic shrimp, spicy chorizo sausage and yes-snails!

The appetizers are always coated with delicious golden garlicky olive oil. You always have to dunk your bread in the bottom at the end, just to savor one last bite. A lot of the dishes at Rincon come in these huge tin-metallic pots that they've probably been using longer than I've been alive. But I think that just makes it better. Big pots of yellow rice, seafood, plates of meaty spare ribs and delicious sliced and fried potatoes.

Paella Marinera and friends

Sorry, I know somewhere out there there is a seafood hater cringing at that last picture! (Sorry!) Pitchers of fruit laden sangria and creamy flan for desert completed the feast. And of course the company was great too!

Me and Dad

Anyway, on the knitting front my dad says he really likes the socks I knit him for Christmas and is eagerly requesting another pair for Father's Day. I think that's doable, I have enough time. And of course it's always easier when knitting for people that you know appreciate the work and really enjoy the finished project.

Which is not always the case with myself-I can be so picky! The project I'm working on now isn't even done and already I'm all whiny about it.

Yep, it's another sweater! Already! Well, everyone seems to be in this reduce-the-stash yarn diet spirit so I figured I should play along. This is acrylic-Patons Candiana I bought with my husband's aunt in Queens last year. I'm trying not to discriminate against the acrylic but somehow it just always happens and I sound apologetic about it for some reason like I do now. But I like this acrylic, it has body without being scratchy or crunchy. In a way it almost feels like cotton to me. You'd think I'd be happy to already have the back almost halfway done. But there have been issues. Issues of the worst kind-gauge issues. When I started knitting this I knew I was knitting tight. I just couldn't relax the tension for some reason (Wonder why Jana? Stress much?) Anyway my hands were hurting and but I liked the gauge (20 stitches to 4 inches) and I just kept going for some reason. However, yesterday something changed. I was all curled up with a nice cup of tea, knitting and watching Good Night and Good Luck and having a grand old time. When the movie was over I felt like the sweater was looking kind of big. Sure enough when I got out the gauge check it turns out all of a sudden it was coming out only 19 stitches to 4 inches. What's up with that? It's not a huge difference, but was still kind of annoying me. So today I just said "Screw it!" and went ahead and changed from size 6 needles to size 4 MID SWEATER. I know, how bad is that? But hey, it did get me back to the original gauge. I'm hoping it doesn't end up causing major size issues or anything. But the acrylic is pretty tough and even. And in my experience the sweaters I knit (especially the few acrylics ones I have done) seem to just stretch out on their own no matter how I knit them anyway. So maybe it will be ok? It's not a sweater I'm planning to wear to the Oscars or anything, maybe something to just keep on my chair at work when it gets drafty. And after I knit it I will have more room to buy more yarn. Which seems to be my main motivation right now. Pathetic, but yes, true.

Finally... the cold arrived...

2007-01-28T16:26:00.000-08:00

And there were warm items to be worn. The hat... the wristwarmers...

The sweater...

And she was very, very happy...

Who knows how long it will last so better to wear the wool while the getting's good. Right? First off, the hat and wristwarmers.

Yarn: Dreamy, delicious Rowan Chunky Wool. Knits up at a magically delicious gauge of 3 stitches to the inch. Go Speed Knitter Go!

Patterns: The hat from a very beloved standard The Knitters Handy Book of Patterns by Ann Budd. Easy as pie. The wristwarmers? A quick and dirty ripoff of the Fetching pattern from Knitty. I'm so about the wristwarmers lately. I used to be a big glove lover every winter. I couldn't understand people walking around with cold hands when that was what gloves are for. But this crazy year has been the year of the multitask. Riding in the car? I can't work the ipod with those gloves on! Can't dial the cell phone or get the hands free thingy in my ear. (Even though I secretly hate the cell phone, I really do, and I will see to it's demise one day) But put those wristwarmers on and everybody's happy. And both accessories? Warm as heck of course.

And the sweater?

Pattern: Main St. Pullover from Webs in the recommended Lenox yarn. The yarn knits up pretty fast. Except when I got to that Fair Isle part. There are rows with 3 colors which was new for me. But if you're willing to hang in and make it work I think it's really worth it. With every sweater I knit I really do feel like I learn more each time. And so far I've liked each one better than the last. So yes, this is my current favorite.

Modifications: I added to the bottom and knit it longer, then when it was done, decided it was too long and chopped a bunch off. I also didn't do all of the waist shaping which is now right above the bottom ribbing and I kind of blocked it out anyway. (Better to skip the midsection for me, I don't need anything clinging there, there are issues not worth mentioning) The yarn is very stretchy and drapey. If you knit it and have that cling and don't want it I found it blocks out bigger very easily. And if you need help with the blocking just give me a call and I'll send my blocking assistant Allister over. I dunno, he always promises to help but then a lot of time I find him slacking and just laying down on the job. Literally...

Of plumbers and eating yarn and Fugazi...

2007-01-21T15:24:00.000-08:00

I think it's so funny you guys haven't seen the Bloglines plumber yet! Maybe he's like Santa? But no-trust me-he does exist! Maybe I've seen him more because I tend to surf early in the morning when I'm up, like before 7 a.m. early in the morning and maybe they tend to do more maintenance then? But yes, Virginia, there is a Bloglines plumber, keeping the Bloglines pipes clean for us so we get our happy blogfeeds every day...

So the Main St. pullover is done, done, done! I wove in the last of the ends this afternoon and it's all blocked and resting and ready to wear. Too late to get a good photo today though. I'm going to try for a good one next weekend, I promise as soon as I take it I'll have it up and ready.

So this left my main, non-traveling needles empty and I needed to cast-on. But what? So I tried something new last night, I gave my husband a bag of yarn and told him to close his eyes and pick one out at random. He was laughing and asked me why in the world would he need to close his eyes? It's true, it would be like asking me to reach in a bag and pull out a football player. Who cares? They're all the same aren't they? (I promise I'm not that ignorant about football... But not by choice.) Anyway, he pulled out the Misti Alpaca I had gotten a couple of weeks ago so I cast on and tried to do a gauge swatch of the Anemoi Mittens. When I realized the colors were so close I couldn't tell them apart when knitting them I realized it wasn't going to work. So I reached in the bag and pulled out what sounded like maybe it was speaking to me.

Rowan Chunky Print. Yum. This is a hat for me. My dream hat. In my dream yarn. I love this thick, slubby, wooly yarn. This hat will be warm as heck when it's done. I love this yarn so much I want to eat it! It makes me salivate, it really does. Elevating yarn to the level of food? Ok maybe for me, that's not a big step, but this stuff is the real deal. If I could make a sweater out of it I'd love too. But on my ample frame with the yarn's ample gauge it would probably be chunky and unflattering not to mention pretty darn expensive. Sigh... I guess my head will have to have all the fun for now.

And then there's the Fugazi socks.

They're called the Fugazi socks because my favorite song by the band Fugazi? Waiting Room. So there you have it Fugazi socks. And they're going to be my Fugazi socks because just by looking at them we can tell they're not going to fit mom. Way too big. That's ok, her birthday is in April, and I've got some lovely Louet Gems set aside that will be just perfect....

Main St. Monday

2007-01-15T16:07:00.000-08:00

Aww shucks. You guys are so sweet. First and foremost thank you for all the kind comments last week about the situations with my mom and the new job. When things get that tough, just hearing a little 'hang in there' once in awhile really means a lot! And thanks also for your patience-I know I haven't been able to comment on a lot of blogs out there lately because things have been so crazy. I worry I'm so behind on Bloglines I'm going to log on one day and there will just be a picture of the Bloglines Plumber guy giving me the finger.

But not yet! So I'm starting to catch up and will hopefully get to read and leave comments for you guys soon too.

Having gotten through last week things are going much better. My mom is doing well, we had her follow up visit with the surgeon today and he gave her the green light to shower and sit up for half hour intervals so she's really psyched about that. Laying flat on your back all the time-not fun at all! And the best part, she is now 10 days into quitting smoking! Now I am the furthest thing from a non-smoking activist or anything like that but for my mom this is a HUGE accomplishment! She's smoked for 46 years and just the fact that she has decided to try to quit is something entirely new for her. So she is now up and walking (and sitting) and making lots of funny and hopeful plans about what she's going to do with all that money she used to spend on cigarettes.

And I have to say as far as the new job goes so far (knock on wood) it's going great. The people are very friendly and patient with a lot of my newbie questions. The office is clean and comfortable (not a luxury I had at the circus tent that tried to pass for an office where I worked previously) and the work seems steady and along the lines of what I want to be doing. So hopefully it keeps up and things are starting to get back to normal.

And I had off work today for the holiday so I thought I was going to finish the Main St. Pullover.

It looks like it could be finished doesn't it? Well, I guess actually I thought I had finished it last night. But as I cast off the stitches at the neck I couldn't help but think that the neck was honestly looking more like a waist. And when I tried it on it was even more true. It was way to open and big and actually pretty floppy and wobbly. Ick. It took me a minute to figure out what I wanted to do but once I did it worked, I pulled out the cast off, picked up the stitches, went down from the size 8 needles to a size 4 (yep a four!), knit another inch on the 4's, did a little decrease row and bound off. Voila! So much better.

But then there was the issue of the bottom. I had decided to lengthen this pattern and for the life of me now I have no idea why. It was like way to long, like long past my butt and totally unflattering. What to do? Once again-rip it out. I chopped off that ribbing, wound yarn from the bottom onto the ball winder until I got to where I wanted, and picked up the stitches again. So tonight I get to start re-knitting the ribbing.

And that's ok. I'd rather go through all this stuff to have the sweater that I really think I'm going to love in the end. So I decided I need to stop this bad habit I have-I get really excited when I think I'm almost finished with stuff. I start to fantasize (I know it's a strong word, but let's face it, it's appropriate) about what I want to knit next. I go over my social calendar and start to think about opportunites to wear the new garment out where someone might notice it and ask where I bought it. (See pure fantasy!) So I need to not do that all the time. Knitting the garment the first time is kind of like a rough draft. It's rare I don't go back and rip out the next or fix the buttonholes, tweaking it here and there. And that stuff takes time. And it needs to be done right.

Oh yeah, you know what else is going to take some time?

A lot of times I weave in ends as I go. This time I've decided to wait until after I block this. The yarn is really stretchy and I don't want to weave them in tightly and end up with a pucker or something like that where I weave them in. So there you have it, you see London, you see France, and now you see the inside of my sweater with all the crazy, hanging-out ends!