Fibersnob! Confessions of a Stashaholic

2007-06-09T01:47:00.000-04:00

Sock Pal questionnaire.......

1.Are you sensitive to any fibres? Any you don't like? Any you need to take private time with? LOL, nope I'm not sensitive to anything as far as finding yarns scratchy or anything, I'm no princess. I need to stay away from Tofutsies because of the shellfish thing though.

2.What colors do you prefer? I'm pretty open with colour, I'm not a huge fan of yellow and I prefer strong colours to pastels though. My sock yarn stash is pretty diverse colourwise.

3. Variegated, striped, plain with texture, plain and silky?variegated that pools?
I do knit with a lot of vareigateds because that's what I have in my stash but lately I haven't been really enamoured with them, I really prefer solids and semi solids. I have a deep and unabiding love for self striping and faux fair isle sock yarns though. Pooling makes me crazy.

4.Where do you normally wear your hand-made socks? Around the house?
To work with comfy sensible shoes? Out with pumps and minis?
Anywhere with any shoes, to work, hanging around the house...

5.If you could leave your partner and run off with only one sock yarn, which would it be and why? Lorna's Laces semi solids, squishy but tough at the same time.

6.What are your foot measurements? And what height do you like your socks to be? I wear a size 38 shoe (US 7.5?) so my feet are about 9.5" long, 9" around and I generally knit my socks to about 7" from the top of the cuff to the bottom of the heel.

7.Who is your favorite sock designer? Who's patterns do you knit the most??
Favorite designer would probably be Cookie A, thinking about it though I've probably knit more Nancy Bush socks than anyone else.

8.what weight of sock do you like, fine, medium, or thick? I usually knit and wear mostly fingering weight socks but I do have the odd dk and worsted pair that I love.

2007-05-29T20:31:00.000-04:00

Ugh, the STR hates me again. With our torrid past I decided it was time to destash this so I popped it in the mail to a happy knitter this morning. It didn't want to be Charade socks any more than it wanted to be Jaywalkers or any of the other patterns I've tried with it. I did shop the stash and find a skein of Trekking XXL #100 that seems more than happy to be jaywalking so that's what I'm up to now as far as knitting goes. (Pic is from yesterday, almost at the toe as of writing.)

Far more interesting is new stuff that's been occupying my brain. Lots of downtime at work leads to lots of blog surfing to keep things interesting and I seem to be stumbling upon more and more bloggers who cross craft, those knitters who crochet and such but it's the knitter's that quilt that are getting to me. I've started to lust after fabric the way I haven't lusted about yarn for a while. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not about to quit knitting (perish the thought!) but I am probably headed towards ~~obsession~~ preoccupation with fabrics and quilts. I've added some sewers/quilters/fabric designers to my daily blog roll and held out as long as I could. I was NOT going to start quilting, it's expensive, it's old ladyish (yeah, funny says the knitter), I'm terrible with colour....

Anyway, a trip to visit friends on the weekend and a grandmother who's destashing and I come home with this: perfect, lovely, droolworthy perhaps fabrics to start my own quilting obsession and nearly enough to make a queen size quilt top at that. Turns out I can put colours together after all and the expense excuse just dissapeared (all this, there's more coming, for the price of some handknit socks for the loverly grandma in question). I'll have to post pics of the rest when I get it, it's for M and you'll laugh your arse off.

2007-05-17T12:51:00.000-04:00

Yay, another pair down. I finished the Lombard Street socks last night save for snugging up the kitchenering on the second toe and weaving in the ends so I left them at home today so I could start another pair. Charade socks in STR lightweight in "crazy lace agate", the yarn that didn't want to be Jaywalkers way back when. So far so good as far as the yarn goes, it's not pooling yet so we'll keep our fingers crossed.

In other news the building I work in has been on the news. On Tuesday chunks of marble were falling off the tower and onto (and through) the third floor roof. Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy about being here....

2007-05-16T12:39:00.000-04:00

I'm not even going to appologize for being awol for so long, suffice it to say that things have been too stressful and busy to get here to show anything off. Seems we've all been suffering from "daycare disease" the last month and a half.

I've been knitting socks on the commute to work and back which has been nice. I'd love the time to knit something more substantial but as I'm travelling during rush hour times there's barely room for me to knit a sock on the subway some days. So far I've completed a pair of Monkey socks form Knitty and a plain no-pattern pair. The second Lombard Street sock is approaching the toe too.

Other knitting hasn't been getting much attention, the CPH just needs a few more hood rows then the buttonbands but I did pick up some really nice buttons for it at the Knitter's Frolic the other weekend. Hopefully it'll be done sometime soon so I can still wear it a few times before packing it away for the summer.

M got a spring gift a couple of weekends ago, a "bika".

He also really loves his rain boots.

2007-03-21T14:58:00.000-04:00

I got to work on M's nap quilt shortly after he went to bed last night and when he woke up from his nap just now he sat under it for a bit watching tv. I did the cutting and basting last night and the actual quilting over the past few hours while he slept and I'm pretty pleased with it so far. I've decided that the blanket binding I bought isn't going to work as nicely as I'd like it to so I'm going to have a peek for something else when we run out to Walmart tonight so with luck I should have this done tonight or tomorrow sometime. I'm also thinking that a quilt like this might make a really good on-the-fly baby gift. When I haven't sewn for a while I always forget how quickly you can have an FO, it's a great break from knitting where it can takes weeks to months to have something completed.

2007-03-20T18:24:00.000-04:00

Not much knitting has been happening outside of the CPH. Right now the back and both fronts are done as is the first sleeve. The second sleeve is on the needles and should be finished tonight and tomorrow. It's so pleasing to look over at a pile of finished pieces and know you're in the home stretch, I'm keeping the pile handy for inspiration. I am, of course, suffering from a bit of second sleeve syndrome. The back is unique and each front a bit different given the "reverse the shaping" instruction but sleeves being identical you can easily fall into the same slump as with second socks, the second is identical to the first therefore you feel like you've been here before but not in an exciting kind of way.

For a break I sat at the sewing machine for a while last night and got some bags churned out so I was able to hit the post office this morning to get them on their way. The sewing bug seems to hit me intermittently from time to time it seems and I'm having more interest again all of a sudden. I have a terrible time convincing myself to get off my rear and get started but as soon as I do I find I can't get up. I have two more projects planned for the very near future: a little M sized backpack and a second crib sized quilt, also for M (more about the reason for these later).

The quilt fabric is flanelette in two adorable boyish prints, bugs and zoo animals. I'm just going to put one fabric on each side and bind them with some satin blanket edging with just a thin sheet of batting in between so the blanket is warm but not stifling. I'll machine quilt it somehow I haven't thought about just yet. The little backpack will be blue courdoroy outside but the lining is the cutest cotton print of bugs and leaves with "I'm an expolorer" written on it here and there. Both will be for M to take when he starts daycare next week.

I finally, at long last, got a full time job so M will be starting daycare fulltime next Monday. I took him for the morning yesterday and after about an hour of being a bit hesitant and nervous he was in there playing with the kids, making animal noises and fingerpainting with the others. We're going for another visit tomorrow (O is coming too) and possibly one more on Friday so he's really comfortable when he's dropped off for a full day. He didn't want to get his coat on to leave yesterday.

I'll still be working my weekend job at least for a bit so the knitting and sewing time will be almost non-existant at least for a while. At least the commute into downtown on transit every day will be some dedicated knitting time.

2007-03-08T12:54:00.000-05:00

The secret baby thingy is plugging along and I managed to pick up some trimmings for it yesterday while I was downtown. The knitting is flying by, so much so that I've managed to knit past key sections a few times now and had to frog back to put in what I had forgotten. I tried knitting surgery but I just ended up with a bigger mess than I started with so frogging really is the answer. Luckily I love the yarn and the pattern so it's not too upsetting to have to rip back.

Swatching is finished on the Central Park Hoodie so I cast on for the back on the subway yesterday. I've decided the only way I ever want to knit 4" of 2x2 ribbing is with the girls at SnB, they were a good distraction and I managed to get all of the ribbing and two cable pattern repeats out of the way yesterday. So far it's going along at a pretty good pace that I hope to keep up by taking it as my work knitting this weekend. The pattern is pretty intuitive, as long as you can remember when to cable and you can remember to knit the knits and purl the purls you're laughing.

I'm using the yarn the pattern calls for, some Tahki Donegal Tweed from the stash (yay for stashbusting!). I love the colour and the tweediness of it but it's a bit rough on the hands so far, it's not the softest yarn out there by a long way but it should soften some with a few washings. I'm using my new Denise needles for the first time and really liking them so far, I got them in trade for some stuff I wasn't using and I'm glad I took a chance on the set.

I've made myself a knitting resolution over the past few days (yes, I'm aware new year's was months ago), I can work on my main projects in the mornings and evenings (before noon and after five) and I can only knit on a UFO during the afternoon. So right now afternoons are for dad's socks, O's sweater and Lady E and mornings and nights are for the baby something and the CPH. I'm still getting lots of main project time but it means that I'm also moving some longstanding WIPs in the right direction too.

And here's a pic to cute up the blog today.

2007-03-05T17:26:00.000-05:00

No pics of the un-cowl yet, maybe tomorrow. The first baby shower gift is rushing along. Yarn wise I'm about a third of the way through. I'll hopefully be sending more than one item but I don't want to commit to anymore than the one until I know how my time will be. If I have time to knit something else, or a few something elses to add to the package I'll take it as it comes.

I am still working on the things I didn't finish for the FFF Kal as I still want them done and off my plate too though.

2007-03-02T13:23:00.000-05:00

So I finished the February is for Finishing KAL with four of the seven projects I had on the needles finished. I finished the un-cowl on Wednesday night at SnB, the ladies pronounced it cute and that was that. I did end up going with the low roll neck like A suggested and I really like the neckline it created; overall this one fits really well and I'm hoping to have some pics to post tonight as soon as I can get O to take a good pic. Dad's socks, O's sweater and Lady E are still in progress.

In the wave of all that finishing I did have an overwhelming urge to cast on something new the minute March began so I've started a secret baby something for one of the baby showers I've been invited to at the end of the month. I'll show it once the gift has been recieved by the parents as I want it to stay a secret until then. It's going nicely so far and should be a nice quick and simple knit that I can take to work with me. I'm also swatching for the Central Park hoodie which I've had the yarn for for quite some time but that's less of a priority as there's no timeline and it's for me.

Turns out all you need to get a reluctant little person to brush his teeth is to do it with a spaceman electric toothbrush. He used to kick and scream like a maniac while I brushed and O restrained him but now he goes into the bathroom five times a day to get the brush. He was playing with it this morning. The shiny spot on his forehead is baby toothpaste.

I couldn't help myself but take this one, he was peeking in on O in the shower and getting ready for his bath. The kneesocks and diaper are a great look. I took some even cuter ones but this is a family blog.

2007-02-27T10:11:00.000-05:00

Rutelilje is done and she’s so gorgeous I could cry. This tiny little sweater is the triumph of my knitting career so far, that’s a bit melodramatic maybe but I’m so insanely proud of her I could pop. I learned a lot on this knit and really stretched myself to do some things I was really afraid in the beginning I wouldn’t be able to do successfully. I knit the colourwork, I steeked, I did what seemed like an endless amount of finishing to get the details just right and in the end I think it’s paid off.

I thought about going with off white buttons to match the body but O thought the pink would have more pop and I have to say he was right, which he generally is when it comes to these things which is why I consult him so much. I’m glad that I decided to knit the body in flat stockingette, the allover moss stitch in the pattern would have been too much I think and would have taken away from everything that’s going on in the yoke.

I used a bit of grosgrain ribbon to seal the steeked edges which weren’t that nice to look at as I used pink thread to sew them so I could easier see what I was doing. It took hours last night to sew it in by hand with the tiniest little stitches but I think the work is worth how clean it looks on the inside now. I also sewed in the tiniest little tag I found at Knitomatic (click here, they’re having a huge sale).

If I had to do this one again, and it’s a strong possibility as I really enjoyed it, I’d cast on more stitches in the steek to leave myself a bit more leeway on the sewing, five was just a few too little and made things a bit tight in places where my machine stitching wasn’t perfectly straight (tough to sew really straight when you’re that nervous!).

This was mostly a stash knit which is great, I don’t think I’d have ventured to do this one had I had to buy a new ball of each colour only to use just a smidge of it. I was told by the lady at the LYS that I could probably get away with two balls of the main colour if I was doing the body stockingette but I was skeptical and picked up a third (to add to the two I already had) just for insurance and I’m glad I did, I used the majority of the third ball and I always like to have little bits of Baby Ull or Lanett laying around for something like this. Of course I'll give you the obligatory inside shot to show off my wonderful stranding.

Specs for this knit:

Yarn: a mix of Dale Baby Ull and Lanett Superwash, two of my fave baby/sock yarns as they come in great colours and wear like iron (not to mention machine wash like a dream), three balls of the MC and scraps of the CCs

Pattern: Rutelilje from Dale of Norway Baby #129 in six month size (but would almost fit M so I have to think that the sizing runs a bit on the large size)

I started this early in January so it wasn't the quickest knit out there but I'm still glad I did it and will do it again.

2007-02-26T21:50:00.000-05:00

Well it’s the third last day of the (short) month for the February is for Finishing KAL and I have to say that things haven’t gone as well as I’d hoped on the finishing front. I started out with seven UFO’s and at this point I have two that are actual FO’s, mom’s socks and the Fleece Artist mitts. Still unfinished from the original list are:

-the cowl of doom- needs the shoulders taken apart and reseamed and the collar knitting on, I’m going to go with a low roll neck so I think it should just be a few rounds more to knit then the bind off, this will be finished this month

-dad’s socks- I started sock #2 on Wednesday at work and I’m almost ready to start the heel so then it’ll be just the heel and leg to do for the pair so these are still a possibility

-the seamless hybrid- about 6 inches of each sleeve are done and they’re not likely to be done in time to knit the yoke and do the finishing before then end of the month (barring an act of God like time standing still or knitting gnomes invading my knitting bag during the night)

-Rutelilje- all the knitting is done so it just needs some ends woven in and the grosgrain ribbon sewn in to hide the cut edges of the steek, this one will be done by the end of the month

-Lady Eleanor- I knew this one wouldn’t get done by the end of the KAL but I did hold to my promise to move it in a forward direction, I have added almost four tiers of rectangles to it this month, can I call that a triumph?

Anyway, lots still to do but I’m getting there at least. Pics to come and things are finished up

2007-02-04T13:55:00.000-05:00

One more Christmas gift done. Yeah, I am aware that the big day was more than a month ago but what can I say. These are mom's socks finished and gifted yesterday. Between the first and second socks I had a big gauge shift though, the first one was knit on 2mm needles but I had to go down to 1.75mm's to match the gauge for the second one, I've never had that happen before.

The specs:

yarn: Regia Bamboo which I didn't love but is okay for socks with a smaller wool content. I found it really splitty but I will admit that it knits up to a nice fabric.
pattern: My own hodge-podge of my standard toe up recipe and a moss-rib. The yarn needed a pattern that was a bit stretchy but not a fancy stitch pattern as it would have gotten lost in the yarn.

This is my first FO for the Feb. is for Finishing KAL too. I'm also about half way through thrummed mitt #2 and I'm working on the second sleeve for my cowl so I can block that soon too.

2007-01-27T15:34:00.000-05:00

Finally a knitting post, this is a knitting blog after all. Lots on the needles these days it seems. Stuff that was started then got interupted by gift knitting and stuff that's been cast on since, lots to do.

The biggest (or is it smallest) project I'm working on right now is a colourwork cardi from Dale of Norway baby book #129, Rutelilje it's called. This is/was a shower gift for a friend of a friend's baby who's due in February. Unfortunately it wasn't done in time for the shower, real life got in the way, but I gave it in all it's unfinished glory so the mommy to be could at least see what she has on the way. There's a few inches of body to do before I steek it and knit on the button bands. I departed from the pattern a bit though as it was supposed to be all over moss stitch below the colourwork and texture patterns but I thought it looked overly fussy so I'm doing it plain stockingette. All I needed for this project was one more skein of Lanett and the buttons so I figure it's a pretty nice $8 baby gift as I had all the other yarn in my stash.

I'm through the back, front and one sleeve on a Jo Sharp designed sweater for myself. I have absolutely zero clothes that are work appropriate for when I get a job so this will make some nice office attire. I just need to get at that second sleeve and then it's on to seaming and knitting on the cowl. This one is in Lana Gatto VIP which is heavenly stuff and I got it in exhange for some yarns I wasn't using so this was pretty much a stashbuster too. No pic of this as it really doesn't look like anything but a pile of unblocked brown pieces waiting to be seamed.

Embarrasingly, I'm still working on making the matches to Mom and Dad's Christmas socks and O's seamless hybrid is still in the works. Lady E is still on hold too.

I was bad and started something else yesterday though. I cast on with a Fleece Artist thrummed mitten kit that's been in my stash since fall 2005 I think. Somehow the mitts I always wear have gone AWOL so I needed something desperately since the weather has turned horrid in the last week or so. They're knitting up really fast, the first one is done, and they're super fun to do. They're so stuffed with roving they stand up on their own and they're going to be fantastic warm. I wore the finished one, in all it's singular glory, to the grocery store yesterday and they live up to their warm promises.

I also joined the February is for Finishing KAL to get some of these UFO's off my plate so I should have some finished stuff to show soon.

2007-01-22T10:54:00.000-05:00

Okay, here comes a pretty pic intensive post. Maybe I'll do a real knitting post later on today but for now here's M. This post comes with bigtime appologies to M's Gran (my mum) as I promised to post these a while back and forgot.

M made the wrapping paper for the gifts he gave. He was more interested in painting himself than the paper. I was totally prepared for a huge mess but he was really good with the finger paint.

Getting ready to go in the tub. The bath water turned a bit of an off colour with all the read and green paint I washed off of him.

Christmas morning with his mum and dad. maybe next year he'll be better at wraping paper. This year he did best with gift bags and tissue.

A Thomas the Tank Engine train from Daddy, he adores this one. Wearing his Christmas jammers from Nana.

On our way to Gran and Grandpa's on Christmas day. "Where's your nose M?". He may be touching his brain!

"Where are your ears?", I think he's ignoring us. He loves his BSJ and has been wearing it a lot.

Gran and Grandpa gave him the igloo, it's a great place to hang out and read stories with his animals.

Playing with Steve (the hand puppet) who was sent to him as part of a RAK package from a wonderful lady on the Knitty Board.

Helping mommy cook, he's frying up some fishy crackers for dinner. This is the only way I can keep him from trying to help me cook these days, I give him his own pans and utensils and he "helps" with dinner.

2006-12-21T10:02:00.000-05:00

The Baby Surprise Jacket is done! I finished it during the SnB Christmas party last night and put the buttons on as soon as I got home. I let him try it on for a few pics but it's his Christmas knit so he'll have to wait until Monday to wear it for real (he must like it though as he had a fit when I took it off of him). As much trouble as I had with it I'm really happy with how it came out. I used an i-cord cast off instead of casting off then adding applied i-cord (seemed like an unnecessary extra step to me) and carried it around the neck and bound off the cuffs with it as well. I really like the stripes and I think it was worth the extra ends I had to take care of. The buttons are a set I had initially bought for Lucy but decided against using and I think they match great. I used two skeins of red and not quite one of the gray Brown Sheep Superwash from the stash so it was a pretty economical project and should wash up well when M gets stickies all over it like he does. I eased the width in when I blocked it so it'll fit him now but it'll take a lot more stretching so he should be able to wear it for a while, it's pretty long right now as well and I had to turn up the cuffs for him.

When I do this again I think I'll cast on the full number of sleeve stitches rather than doing one big increase row like the pattern says to do as I got a bit of a funny bump where the increases made the sleeve a lot wider. On a short sleeved BSJ I don't think I'd mind so much but on the long sleeve it makes for a sharp change in the sleeve shape that I was able to mostly block out. On another long sleeve one I might spread those increases over more rows to get a more anatomically correct arm shape.

2006-12-16T14:49:00.000-05:00

M's first haircut.

2006-12-15T12:48:00.000-05:00

What I said about the BSJ being an easy knit, I take it all back. I don't know what my problem is but I've had to rip this thing three times already. I keep ending up with a wonky stitch count and having to find where I added or missed an increase, this is the curse of the invisible increase I guess. At least finally it's starting to make sense to me how it'll go together in the end. I think I'll have to end up edging the entire thing with applied I-cord as the spots where I've joined new yarn aren't the neatest but I'll see what it looks like seamed up before I commit to anything. I'm also wavering on whether I want to put in the buttonholes or skip them and get a zipper instead, lots of knitting to go before I have to decide. I may still knit this again but maybe in a solid or vareigated yarn instead of the stripes; I've been dealing with the ends as I go but it still makes for a bit of a puckery edge.

2006-12-11T13:56:00.000-05:00

The weather has been all sorts of weird around here for the last little bit, way warmer than it seems that it should be in Canada in December. It's not quite snowsuit cold out but it also isn't warm enough for a little person to be out without mitts so I took a break from gift knitting yesterday to make these little hand cozies for M. They knit up super fast, the pair took part of the afternoon and he loves them. They took less than a third of a ball of Lamb's Pride Superwash so I'll probably make him at least one more pair in case they get lost.

I also started an EZ baby surprise jacket for M for some mindless knitting, it's allover garter stitch so there's not much thinking. She's right when she wrote that it doesn't look like anything while you're knitting it. As it is I'm not sure it's going to fit him, I'm having a difficult time visualizing how it's meant to go together but I figure if it's too small then I can try again with some other yarn (or different stitch count or gauge) and use this as one of the baby gifts I'll need to be knitting coming up. Two of my favorite ladies are expecting and I've been invited to a shower for another gal so I figure I can't lose with this one either way. I'm about half way through and I've used less than one skein of yarn altogether and I have a total of five in the two colours so I will definately get at least two BSJ's out of the yarn (plus M's mitts).

M is walking everywhere now and he's taken to going to the door and calling "wahhhhk" to anyone that'll listen. He takes either O or I on a walk down the hallway to the end of the building and back at least ten times a day, oh so proud of himself. He's got a new word as of Saturday too, "bayyyyby". O bought him some foam wash for the bath and he gave me a puzzled look when I pumped some in his hand in the tub so I told him "it's baby wash, for washing babies" and he said "bayyyby" with the proudest toothy grin on.

2006-12-06T15:04:00.000-05:00

First I'm going to start by applogizing for what a bad blogger I've been for the last little bit. There's been so much going on outside of knitting around here that the time has rushed by without a moment to stop here and let everyone know what's been going on. Suffice it to say that it's been a stressful little chunk of time but I'm feeling now like I can get back to the blog and show you some of what I've been doing. The teeth are mostly sorted out for now until the new year when I'll go back to have everything completed for good.

Part of the reason for my absence was the untimely death of my sewing machine, no less than four days after the warranty expired. Seeing as how one repair shop felt it couldn't be fixed at all and another was ready to charge me more than I paid for the machine to fix it I felt it best to let it go. Unfortunately I was in the throws of doing a bit sewing project for my LYS and making bags for my gracious donators at the time. I'm ashamed to admit that I was left a blithering crying mess by it's demise. Luckily it was mom to the rescue and I got my birthday/Christmas present early and I love her, the new Mrs. Stitchy is an amazin improvement over her predecessor and I'm excited to maybe have some more adventures with her in the new year when all this gift knitting is over with.

Speaking of which the gift knitting is a bit slow going. I had 13 names on my "to knit for" list, 8 I absolutely have to get done and 5 that are gravy (if I get to them great but I'm not going to kill myself over them). So far 3 essentials are done, and I'm about 50% with 2 more. One gravy gift is done and a second should be done in the next day or so. This has been a lesson in quick knits!

2006-11-20T21:14:00.000-05:00

KJ's socks were finished and the toe kitchenered to the foot this morning (they're blocking now), then I sat down and knit this little doozy. The pattern is the Fake Isle Hat from Magknits and I used less than one ball of Silk Garden #203 and KP WOTA "Fog", both from the stash. Click here to see a pic of the inside. This makes two items off the holiday knitting list, the hat was a super quick knit so I may do one more with some more stash yarn.

2006-11-16T19:53:00.000-05:00

One sock down and about a half to go for the first pair of Christmas socks. I woke up starving at 5am and grabbed my knitting on my way out of the bedroom and sat and ate arrowroot cookies and knit for two blissfully quiet hours this morning and got most of the leg of sock #2 done. The SH got some attention today too and I think if I measure now I may have 12.5" of the body done...lol. I sat in the quiet and made myself a little list of everything I'd like to get to for Christmas knitting and I have to say that it's a little daunting. Luckily some of the gifts are quick one to two day knits so they should fly off the list pretty quickly.

I'm headed out tomorrow for more interfacing for tote bags, my fabric stash will long outlast my supply of that so I need to pick up some more before I can do much more sewing. I've been doing the parts I can do (sans interfacing) so I'm almost keeping up with everything so far.

Was at the dentist today to have the root canal done and to make an appointment for dental surgery next week. I was a total mess in the chair, a real blithering idiot so the doc gave me a script for a sedative on my way out for next week's appointment. This'll be three Thursdays in a row at the office.

2006-11-13T14:35:00.000-05:00

It's been a busy few days, trips to the doctor and an emergency run to the dentist for me the other night. Eating dinner I felt something hard in my mouth, turns out it was a big chunk of a tooth I had had work done on back in April and has been bothering me off and on (or so I thought) since then. A run to the dentist confirmed the tooth is falling apart (I've since lost another bit of it) but more worrying is that there's a pretty nasty abcess in the tooth behind it. The doc gave me some antibiotics and some Tylenol 3's for pain and it seems a lot better now. The AB need to be taken with food so it's actually forcing me to sit and have something to eat at regular intervals, normally I eat whatever is left over from M's meals throughout the day so this is probably a pretty good thing seeing as how I could comfortably use to gain a few pounds. It's amazing how I hadn't realized how much pain my tooth had been giving me for so long until it was gone, I guess I'd come to accept that that's how my mouth felt but now the infection is clearing it's soooo much better it's crazy. I go back to the dentist later this week to have the other tooth looked at and to hopefully have part of the remaining tooth shaved off as it's sooo sharp where it's broken and it's cutting my poor tongue to shreds. I have to eat mushy stuff and I can only seem to drink through a straw without cutting myself.

Again there has been much more sewing going on than knitting but at least some projects are headed in a forward direction. How did it totally escape my mind that December comes right on the next page of the calendar from November? One page turn, one, and it's Christmas (and I have only just started pressie #1).

These are for KJ who, fortunately, has smaller feet than I do...I think, I need to ask our family shoe saleswoman extrordinaire (mom) to confirm this so I'm stopping this sock here and casting on for the other foot until I know. This would be reason #217 why you need more than one set of needles in each size. Super plain stockingette socks using some Lang Jawoll Cotton I've had in the stash for longer than I can remember. The yarn is nice and even though it's pooling terribly it's still really pretty; one ply of the yarn vareigates and the other stays a wonderful deep teal so the pooling is pretty muted. Overall these are working up to be a happy and quick project, I started this sock on Friday and haven't really dedicated myself to it too much so far.

Lady E is on hold for a bit, she's not much past where I was the last time I photographed her. Selfish knitting will have to wait until some gift knitting gets done but it's nice that I can bang out a rectangle on her every now and again in an odd moment. O's SH is still plugging along in the black hole so I'm going to count the rounds sometime soon to calculate where I really am (or more realistically where I'll be once it's blocked) on the body. I've got needles now to start the sleeves so I may cast one on for a bit of a break.

2006-11-08T22:35:00.000-05:00

This is going to be a no-pic post, the day was so hectic and there's no such thing as good light in this place after dark and some of what I've been working on for the last week or so is hush hush so I couldn't show you anyway.

The man sweater plugs along, I've entered the black hole. I knit four hundred and eighty seventy million rounds... and I'm still at 12". On the other hand the sewing is going really well and I'll be doing a mass mailing probably Friday for all the donations I've recieved so far. I'm trying now to contact everyone who didn't make a colour or pattern request so I can see what they'd like to have for a thank you gifty. A spread sheet has been created to keep everything straigh as I'm terribly nervous that I'm going to forget to thank someone. I am floored at the generosity of you all.

The design for M's seamless yoke henley is done, I got the FI pattern to fit into the yoke stitches on the first try (yay for no fiddly knitting math!) so it must be meant to be. I'll get started on it once I'm released from the vortex and the Seamless Hybrid is a little further along because c'mon we all know that I'll just want to work on this all day.

Got to meet the ever fab Cookie tonight at SnB, fun fun fun I tell ya. She was knitting a whole pair of socks...lol.

Some pics of a fantastic gift I got in the mail today coming tomorrow, it's better with pics.

2006-11-01T14:53:00.000-05:00

And now for some gratuitous cuteness. His highness the man of steel (or the toddler of tin as O has been calling him) graced us with his presence yesterday.

Because I'm a fun mommy I let the MOS eat some of his treats, a whole (thankfully snacksize) bag of cheesies BEFORE dinner (aren't I the ultimate cool mom?).

The haul. Daddy and I are eating most of it but it was such fun to play with.

He's getting so good at sharing, he must know Peanut Butter cups are O's faves.

Even the MOS needs some mommy time.

2006-10-31T10:35:00.000-05:00

It's been a few days since I posted but we've been a bit busy the past few days with home stuff and kid stuff and all that.

I've been doing a bit of sewing and a smaller bit of knitting so there's not much to report on the craft front. I had fallen off the horse a bit with O's sweater so I'm a bit behind where I would like to be with it but I'm going to make a big push on the body this week and see what I can get accomplished. Surprisingly it's taking way less yarn than I thought it would, so far at least, not even two balls in I'm more than 11" up the body.

Since I had finished the Jaywalkers and was needing an evening knitting project I cast on for Lady Eleanor from Scarf Style on Friday night in Silk Garden #84 (that was originally supposed to be Klaralund). It's going quickly and the colours are fantastic, very fall. I'm trying to be zen about the colour changes and just let the yarn transition naturally but I have done a bit of manipulating once when a ball ended and once when there was a knot that would have put a really drastic colour change right in the middle of a rectangle. I think I'll get a lot of wear out of this one and it's a fun knit.

2006-10-26T10:54:00.000-04:00

The Jaywalkers are done which makes two pair for me if the Sock Wars pair count that is. I liked the pattern in the end and they actually fit pretty well, they're not the easiest to get on but they're snuggly once they are. I'm glad I increased after the ribbing or there's no way they would have fit, for once my knitting neuroticism has worked in my favor. Pink isn't normally my thing either and I probably wouldn't have bought the yarn had it not been on sale but in the end I love the way it patterned out, I give up on this pattern with hand dyed yarns, the pooling makes me mental. I have some Vesper and some Trekking that I think would work well in this pattern too and I probably will knit it again, the Vesper for me and the Trekking for O. Now it's back to the Pom socks, wish me luck....

The swatch is done for M's seamless yoke but now that I'm doing the math I'm wondering how to handle the jog that's going to occur in the colourwork. With the yoke knit the way it is there's no way to hide it and I can't seem to find a solution that I'm really happy with so this will take some more thinking. I'm considering going with a ski sweater recipe (also EZ) so I can hide the jog of the main colour pattern in an armhole steek. My other idea was to use the Henley neck that EZ suggests as a way to adapt this pattern in which case I'd put the end of round at the center front so it'd dissapear when I steeked it open at the end. Things to ponder anyway. I do quite love how the colourwork came out seeing as how this is only my third go at stranding, the yarn (although it's superwash, bleh) is super soft and squishy and makes a really nice cushy fabric. The grey in the swatch will actually be blue when I go to knit the sweater and I'm going to reduce the flat cream rounds from three in the swatch to one on the sweater because it's more white space than I'm happy with.

O's sweater marches along an inch at a time but at this point even an inch's progress looks like nothing. Hopefully if I take this on the TTC Knitalong on the weekend it'll get enough attention to look like progress has been made. O worked from home a bit this week which has made working on it a bit difficult so I'm a bit further behind on it than I had hoped to be at this point but when he's away for a few days next month I'll have some proper time for it.

I'm needing some TV knitting too as I've now finished my second Grey's project so I might start Klaralund tonight, there may not be easier sweater knitting out there than four rectangles in garter and stockingette. Hopefully by the time we go to take a holiday photo of the family we can all be wearing our handknit Christmas sweaters!

In other great news I have tote bags to mail this week to the first few donors to the wheel fund. I did some sewing yesterday and will hopefully also have some time today to get another churned out. I love these little bags so and I hate to let them go but I'm hoping all the generous people will be as happy with them as I am (and really, how many tote bags does one person really need?).

2006-10-23T23:59:00.000-04:00

Nov.7 update- if the paypal button is not working for you I appologize, I'm trying to get it going again so please bear with me. Payments can also be sent through regular paypal to smgrant at rogers dot com

New button at left over there <-----.

Those who know me are getting pretty tired of hearing my lust over the Lendrum DT spinning wheel I've had my eye on for some time now. Unfortunately it's not in the cards financially right at the moment so I stole an idea from Julie who managed to raise the money for her wheel super quick through donations so I thought I'd give it a try.

As I'm a faster sewer than I am a spinner at present so I'm offering to send a small knitting project bag made by me for every donation of $20 or more. I'll try to do my best and contact all qualified donators for their colour/fabric preferences. They're fantastic for small projects like socks and scarves and have pockets to put notions or your cell phone in. Some pics here and here.

At the end when I go to order my wheel I'll put the names of everyone who helped in a hat and I'll be drawing for some great prizes (I'm not sure what yet but I promise they'll be good!).

Also, because I love the boobies so, I'll be donating 10% of everything I collect to Breast Cancer research.

2006-10-20T11:52:00.000-04:00

I'm dead, I got killed by a pair of super cute red socks sent by Fiberjoy who was my sock wars assassin. They're cushy and comfy and I love them even if it means I'm out of the race now. She also sent some saltwater taffy (drool, I'd take a pic but between O and I it didn't last that long) and a set of wooden circ needles her husband makes which are just beautiful (seriously, go and buy some...you won't be sorry).

The second Jaywalker has been cast on and I'm into the pattern down the leg so that'll be evening knitting for the next few days. M was helping me yesterday while I found the beginning of the colour repeat so I can get my striped to match up, i had to wind off a bit of yarn. After another problem with the Pom socks, gaping YOs, they've been ripped back to the ribbing again. I think I've negative knit a whole sock on this project so far with all the restarts and frogging but I think I have a solution to the original problems well in hand now so we'll see how that goes after the Jays are done.

O's seamless hybrid is getting more time and attention than anything right now. I did the cast on for the body on Tuesday night and got down to business with it starting Wednesday. I'm committing to knitting one inch on the body each day, that's six rounds or just over 1600 stitches a day, which will hopefully keep me motivated to keep at it as it's stockingette in the round so it's pretty brainless but good knitting while I'm watching M play as I don't have to look at it to be making progress (this actually adds to my knitting time each day because when he's into everything I usually don't even bother trying to knit as I need to keep a super sharp eye on the sneaky little monkey). So far I've knit more than my goal each day since I started but at bare minimum if I meet my goal each weekday I'm sure to have the whole thing ready for Christmas.

I used a tubular cast on for the bottom ribbing and did it in the contrast colour and I love the effect, very polished I think (not bad for my second try using this c/o method I think). Looking at the sleeves though and how the increases fall I'm not sure how sold I am on the hem so I may rip and rib them to match the body ribbing. I just think that the body ribbing will be a more flattering fit on O. The sleeves get so wide so quickly with this sweater that I think the ribbing will at least nip them in a bit at the wrists and make them look sleeker and less bulky.

I'm in the process of swatching and picking charts for M's seamless yoke sweater which will be a warmup for the colour work in his Dale and the Telemark Ski Sweater I want to make for myself. I'm using up some Mission Falls 1824 wool for this one because I want it to be washable but I'm nervous because I really don't like working with superwash for anything but socks but we'll see how it goes. The yarn comes in so many fantastic colours that it's perfect for a project like this. I have more than enough yarn for the project so I may switch some of the main colour out to add a few more contrast colours. I'm still debating steeking a slit at the neck to make this a henley to make it easier to get over his head but we'll see when I have the design finished.

And just for some random cuteness I bring you M, asleep last night having building dreams maybe?

2006-10-16T21:10:00.000-04:00

Okay, here's the post I was going to put up before I got sidetracked with the tutorial. Admittedly I get a bit flattered when someone wants my advice about knitting, it makes me feel clever.

The Sock Wars pair are done and are went in the mail today. I liked the yarn but hated the pattern (pretty obvious seeing as how I knit most of a cardigan and a sock while these sat waiting). I'm still alive but I know my socks are mere days from arriving.

My Knitpicks order finally came today. I ordered the colour card and one ball of Telemark to experiment with before I commit to a project's worth. The yarn actually feels pretty nice but the colours from the website as they show on my monitor aren't even close to the yarn in person, they're really nice but totally different. I'm tempted to try the ski sweater on the site as I ordered the pattern, a Norwegian knit with steeks! I might use up the rest of the gift cert for the yarn for that and a few extra balls to make some FI mitts.

I like the KP needles I've tried so far but I'm not blown away by the case, there's not room for anything more than the set (like a tape measure, scissors and other little things I like to keep in my knitting bag) but I suppose it's to try to get you to order their bags too.

So other than the sleeve I started for the tutorial this morning I've been working on the Pom socks a bit. The bigger needle size is making a huge difference along with rearranging the stitches. I'm hoping to spend some more time on them in the next few days.

M has been super fun the last few days, he's fallen in love with the walker Nana and F gave him for his birthday all of a sudden and he's cruising up and down the hallway with it. He gets to either the bathroom or the couch (the end of the line) then stands there screaming if you're not there in seven seconds to turn him around so he can go back the other way.

Yesterday afternoon when I was trying to clean the kitchen floor he was desperate to get into the bucket of soapy water to play (he licks floors so I've taken to cleaning them with dishsoap as not to poison him), so I found Doug (can't say "duck" apparently) and got him a bowl of water to play with, he had a riot. The floor was soaked but he was pretty pleased with himself.

2006-10-16T09:37:00.000-04:00

I promised a tutorial about turned up contrast hems over at Zimmermania but I'm going to cross post it here as well. Blogger is not cooperating fully with the many many pics for this post so you'll have to bear with some links to pics. This tutorial will show you how to do the hem on the sleeve I posted about yesterday.

1. Gather your materials. You'll need your MC and CC, some waste yarn and needles in three different sizes. I use the needles I got gauge with (3.75mm), one size down for knitting the facing (3.5mm) and a few sizes up for joining the live stitches and the freed c/o stitches (5mm).

2. Cast on 90% of the stitches you want for your sleeve provisionally onto your smaller needles.

3. Knit one row with your MC. I do this so that my CC doesn't show when I go to knit up the hem, you'll be knitting two stitches of MC together rather than one of your CC and one MC which looks strange.

4. Join your CC and join the work in the round (if that's the way you're knitting, this also works when you're knitting flat but it's not as neat). You'll knit for however many rounds you want the hem facing to be minus one (I want my facing to be ten rounds so I knit nine rounds even).

5. Knit one round in CC *K9, M1 around to increase up to the number of stitches you want your sleeve to be around. If your stitch count didn't work out exactly here don't really worry about it. The sleeve here needs to be 53 stitches around so I c/o 48 (53-5=48 as I rounded, 90% of 53 is 47.7), just make sure to do enough M1 increases to get to your sleeve diameter.

6. Reattach your MC and knit one round and purl one round (this is the turning round and gives a neat finished edge). Alternately you could do a picot turning round or eliminate the turning round altogether (although the hem will lay neater with the purl or picot round but it's all what you're happy with the look of).

7. Knit around in your MC until the work and facing are the same length (fold up the hem to check this). I trim all the dangling ends and weave them in at this point, you don't need to but it makes everything neater and easier to keep straight.

8. Carefully unzip the provisional cast on, putting the newly live stitches on a spare needle. I like to use a small needle as it's easier to pick the sts up and I only free one needle's worth at a time (no need to have too many points going on at once) remembering that there will not be exactly as many c/o sts as live sts (you c/o 90% remember?). To deal with the different stitch counts you'll need to knit just the live stitch here and there to make up for the lack of c/o stitches.

9. Using your largest needles K2tog around your sleeve knitting one stitch from each the c/o edge and live stitches together (again, remember to knit just a live stitch every now and again as many times as it takes to make the stitch counts match. For this sleeve I had to do this five times 53-48=5). I use the larger needle as it reduces the hems propensity to flare a bit, if you use your working needles the K2togs will be tight and make a hard line around your sleeve that will be really visible on the RS of the work. It'll look like this when it's done.

10. Now you can knit away doing whatever else you need to do to the sleeve. Pics of the finished hem are here: the inside, and the outside.

2006-10-15T22:34:00.000-04:00

10 knitterly things you probably didn't know about me, a meme by Grumperina

1. I swatch. I knit 'em big with multiple needle sizes, I wash and block them, I knit them in the round if need be, I record my findings in a spreadsheet should I need to get that gauge with that yarn again. I don't really understand knitters who don't do this, they must be more tolerant of grand failure than I am. I know this means that I'm not a free spirit, I don't throw caution to the wind but I have yet to have a monumental knitting disaster. Seems to me that if I'm going to spend the time and cash you ought to get a predictable outcome. This is not to say that I've not knit things that I regret but I have yet to have something that didn't fit, ugly or not.

2. I am a terrible KALer, I have a hard enough time posting here a lot of the time that an additional blog to post at seems daunting. Saying that though I do join them pretty regularly. I am trying to get better but it's taking some work.

3. I take a "wait and see" approach to most new patterns. I hate how the knitting mags pose projects on models standing at odd angles, with so much going on in the pic that I can't really see what the garment really looks like. So I wait and see when they start to appear in blogland then make up my mind if it's something I really want to knit. Examples are Forecast and my Jaywalkers.

4. I knit almost exclusively for myself. If you've recieved a knit from me you're in a very exclusive group and I must love you a lot. I'm the only one that fully appreciates the time that goes into my knits, who's willing to try something on 87 times and who doesn't expect it to be done tomorrow. I do actually feel badly about this and really am trying to remedy it.

5. I hate superwash. I know it's great for kids stuff and for projects that will see multiple washings but it knits weird and does funny things in a bath. I am trying to improve our relationship though by knitting for M with it. I do so love it for socks though.

6. I couldn't knit without the internet. I stalk blogs, cruise the Knittyboard, fantasy shop for yarn (put a bunch of stuff in a virtual shopping cart then log off before actually ordering anything) and find help. I was taught to knit and purl by my Aunt, the rest is the internet's doing.

7. I crave blog comments. I think this explains #2, more posts on more blogs equal more comments. I know nobody reads my ramblings over here with any regularity so the odd comment here and there totally makes my day (that's a hint btw).

8. I am obsessed with fair isle. I haven't really knit much of it yet as I'm afraid that it will be my first collossal knitting failure, but it's my goal to make a Dale; that to me is like the holy grail of knitting, once I've done that I'll be a Knitter. I'm in love with Eunny Jang's FI projects and will maybe someday muster up the cahones to try one (namely the pullover in the upcoming winter IK).

9. I love knitting in the round and will do just about anything to convert a pattern to knit this way. I love a seamless construction and anything knit in one piece. I love my circs and dpns but can't stand either ML or 2 circs. I have it in my head that I can knit Klaralund all in the round, watch for that.

10. I can count on one hand the number of days in the last year that I've not knit, two. Even if it's only a few stitches here and there, I knit everyday.

2006-10-15T13:23:00.000-04:00

Last time I posted I had my yarn for O's sweater but it was two different dye lots. So I knit a swatch half with lot 16 and half with lot 14...then I looked at it really close...then took it out into natural light and looked again...then washed and blocked it and still I can't see a difference between the two dye lots so as it turns out the dye lot problem isn't going to be a problem at all but just to be safe I'm still going to alternate rounds with the two lots. So I cast on for a sleeve seeing as how my needles still aren't here.

I love how the contrast colour looks inside the hem of the sleeve, like a little hidden bit of something special. I'll be working on this during the day while DH is at work so it stays a Christmas surprise, he thinks I'm knitting a sample for my LYS which I do from time to time so I didn't have to make up some odd excuse for having so much yarn arrive while he was home for lunch from work the other day.

One pink Jaywalker down and one to go. These are going pretty quickly but I'm not sure if I'm going to try and match up the stripes on the second sock or not yet as I'll have to see how far from the beginning of a repeat I am. I weighed the sock and the remaining yarn and it looks like I can get three socks total out of this ball so I might knit the third just in cast I lose one (I have a way of doing that) or I might knit a pair of baby socks from the leftovers (need to keep ahead of all those baby gifts I need to knit). I started these having cast on for the smallest size but got worried that they would be too tight as I've read that a lot of others have had that problem so I increased on the last row of ribbing to make the second size and they fit perfectly so I'm glad I did; this way the ribbing doesn't flare either.

I've ripped the beginnings of the Pom sock I started earlier in the week and am starting it again with bigger needles. I was having a terrible time seeing the stitches on the 2mm needles so hopefully the 2.5mm's will make all the twisted stitches easier. This time I'm going to move the stitches around on the needles a bit as I hate starting a new needle with a YO.

2006-10-12T14:12:00.000-04:00

Finally we have pics of Lucy. I wore her to SnB last night. I had some trouble with the finishing as I couldn't for the life of me sort out how to graft in moss stitch so I just did it all the way across in stockingette then went back over it and faked the purl bumps with little back stitches before I wove in the ends. It fits really well and I know I'll wear her a lot. I'm thinking about a second one in another colour. More pics are here and here.

Actual Socktoberfest content today! The cuff on the left is the beginning of a Pomatamous and the right is the leg (and first row of the heel flap) of a Jaywalker. The Poms are going to be really pretty but they take some pretty good concentration and all the twisted stitches make my hands sore pretty quickly. Finally I've found a yarn that doesn't pool really badly for my Jays! Both were started Tuesday night and the Jay came to SnB at Lettuce Knit last night which is why I got so much more done on it.

Lolly asked:
Do you have certain patterns planned for some of the yarns? Do you buy yarn and then choose a pattern?
Not really, I like to shop the stash when I go to start socks so I pretty much buy what appeals to me at the time without any real plan in mind. I'm more careful about other yarns but sock yarn will always find a pattern even if it's a plain stockingette sock.

Does a certain sock yarn you have in your stash take you back to a certain event? (where you were when you bought/received it? what was going on in your life at the time!)
No again, I don't really do a lot of travel or special yarn buying so most skeins are just what I've picked up here and there from LYS's.

The yarn for O's EZ sweater arrived yesterday but now I have a problem, it's two different dye lots so I'm going to have to swatch some of each up and see how noticeable it is. My needles aren't here yet but I plan on starting the sleeves until I can get the body going.

2006-10-09T16:56:00.000-04:00

Lucy, my dear Lucy is done and resting from her bath. I'm loving her now than I was on Friday night let me tell ya. I had attached the sleeves to the body and was happily working away at the decreases when I stopped to count my stitches just for kicks. Remember last post when I said the rows were getting shorter? Yep, they were all right...probably because I was decreasing at the neck twice as fast as I should have been. There was a lot of frogging (almost a whole skein of Nature Spun which is 200+ meters), some crying, and even a moment when I threw the (now liberated) sleeves across the living room in anger. Really, the pattern couldn't be any more clearly written, my reading comprehension on the other hand is somewhat suspect. No matter, she's done now and I couldn't be happier or more eager to wear her (yes, I've been periodically giving her a once over with the blowdryer trying to make her wearable for SnB on Wednesday). My first Grey's KAL project is done and it only got me through the first three weeks of the season so I'm looking for a new project for the KAL. Pics will come when I can model her properly.

The Knittyheads have definately decided on Pomatamous so I'll be casting those on tonight I think. Hoping to have them done this month sometime for Socktoberfest. My yarn and needles still haven't arrived for my Zimmermania project so I don't have anything major on the needles at the moment. I'm thinking of using the Donegal Tweed I got a while ago for either a Tomten or Bog jacket for M instead of the DB pattern I had intended to make with it. I can't get gauge with it so I'm thinking the yarn has another destiny. Now that Fall is upon us, not that you could tell from the last few days of gorgeous weather, I want to make something warm to keep the little tyke from frosting over.

Happy thanksgiving to all. We had a great dinner at O's mom's yesterday, she and F did a fantastic job of it but we wondered how many people she had planned to feed!

2006-10-06T17:51:00.000-04:00

Not a whole lot of news on the knitting front, Lucy chugs along but doesn't look like much when I take her picture so I'm going to leave the photos for another few days when she's done. The sleeves are on the body now and I'm working through the neckline and raglan decreases so at least the rows are getting shorter.

I had forgotten all about Socktoberfest until the other day and I still haven't cast anything on after the latest Jaywalker frogging. I can't decide what to make so I narrowed the feild to four possibilities (Jaywalkers version 6.0, Eunny's Bayerische, Ponmotamous from Knitty and the Snickety socks from MagKnits) so I posted a poll to let the Knittyboarders decide. As of right now the Pomotamous are leading. I'm thinking FA merino socks in an almost solid for these.

(notice my hand drawn charts? This is why all knitters need to own printers.)
I'm going to leave the poll up until Lucy is done then start on whatever the lovely ladies decide.

And now I bring you my answers to the Socktoberfest history questionaire:

When did you start making socks? Did you teach yourself or were you taught by a friend or relative? or in a class?
I knit my first pair around this time last year, I knit the one of a pair of Knitty training socks then started my first real pair. I taught myself with the help of online tutorials and the Knitty coffeeshop.

What was your first pair? How have they "held up" over time?
My first pair are a horrible acrylic, vareigated pair in nasty colours. They're too big (I didn't get the whole negative ease thing at the time) but I still wear them from time to time so I guess they've held up alright.

What would you have done differently?
Nothing, they came out pretty well for a first pair, probably because I frogged and reknit until they were just right. It was a good learning experience.

What yarns have you particularly enjoyed?
I love Koigu and Fleece Artist merino, the almost solids in particular. There are lots of yarns I'd love to try.

Do you like to crochet your socks? or knit them on DPNs, 2 circulars, or using the Magic Loop method? I don't crochet that well...LOL. I do them on sharp little metal dpns, I've tried ML and two circs and they just seem too fiddly to me.

Which kind of heel do you prefer? (flap? or short-row?)
I love a short row heel and I use it most often; I find it fits my foot better. I will knit flaps though, I just prefer the SR heel. I prefer to knit my socks toe up so the short row heel matches the short row toe nicely.

How many pairs have you made?
I can think of ten pairs right off the top of my head, maybe more, it seems like more.

Watch for another meme coming in the next few days.

2006-10-02T12:36:00.000-04:00

I had written a great, picture heavy post this morning but blogger ate it so you're getting this revised and abbreviated version because I'm too cheesed to type the whole thing again.

My Gray's project chugs along, Lucy is a pretty fun and easy knit. I'm just about through the body (I'm adding a few inches to the length so it's not belly baring as I want it to be something I could wear to work). The texture is nice and the yarn is a bit heathered which adds a bit more depth to the finished fabric; it's nice that it's so geometric that I only had to peek at the chart for the first repeat and not at all since which makes it a great project to pick up for half a row here and there without having to find my place each time. I'm testing my continental knitting skills on this one, I've knit nearly the whole thing so far that way. One more buttonhole to knit then I'll put this aside for the sleeves.

Socks seem tot be the bane of my existance these days. The Sock Wars pair are still not finished. I don't like the fabric I'm getting even though I'm dead on gauge, it's loose and isn't holding it's shape very nicely. The colour is really pretty but overall I'm not loving them. The ribby socks are taking a vacation, as much because they're currently AWOL and I don't feel like pulling the place apart to find them as the fact that I hate knitting miles and miles of ribbing. I did start a new pair as a portable project though but I feel they're frog pond bound. I have a total love/hate relationship with the Jaywalker pattern. I love how so many others have knit them up and that it's a relatively simple pattern to follow, not quite mindless but good tv watching knitting. In their fifth incarnation, this time with STR lightweight, they're pooling terribly like every other pair I've tried and frogged. I can't seem to find a yarn that won't pool!

Crazy monkey trick #1: climbing stairs. Staying with my parents on the weekend to attend a friend's wedding (lovely day) M decided he didn't want to be left out of the action of the grandparents packing for a trip so decided to join them upstairs. We don't have stairs in the apartment and this is probably the third time ever he's been near enough stairs to climb but he went straight up without a problem on Saturday morning.

Crazy monkey trick #2- eating a nectarine. I know, big deal right? I had taken the fruit out of Mom and Dad's fridge along with some from O's mom to take home as we were packing to leave yesterday morning and M crawled over, poked around the bag for a moment then dove right in to a nectarine. He let me have it back breifly to wash it and remove the sticker but that was it until I had to wrestle the pit away from him five minutes later. He ate the whole thing. The pic is from his second one that I gave him later in the day as I didn't have the camera ready the first time.

Other than all that there's not a whole lot been going on around here. I used up some gift certs I had gotten in a swap a while back to order the yarn for my main Zimmermania project, the seamless hybrid sweater for O for Christmas (hopefully), and the needles to make it from Knitpicks. I ordered the options set plus one set each of the three longer cord lengths so I'm anxious to see how they knit. I've also added pics of the cropped cardi and forecast to the FO gallery that a few had asked for, go on over and have a peek (new hair in those pics too!).

2006-09-23T20:43:00.000-04:00

Mitten #1 is little M approved, now to start on #2.

Sock Wars started last night but although some people seem to already have their first pairs knit and in the mail I'm barely past the heel turn on the first one. M has been snotty and barfy and miserable all day so I haven't had the time to pay much attention to it. He had the forethought to aim a particularly nasty upchuck all over my cell phone, we'll see if it lives. And as much as winning this thing would be cool I don't think it's going to happen, it's a non-priority until M feels better. Even though he wasn't feeling the best he didn't have any trouble taking a minute for some monkey business.

Budding musician in the family maybe.

I think I've managed to knit two rows on Lucy in as many days so I won't bore you with a pic for tonight. I got my hair cut on Thursday, a more updated, less flowerchild look and as soon as I have opportunity to jump in the shower I'll get a pic taken and a before shot posted too.

2006-09-22T15:25:00.000-04:00

Having no small and portable projects on the go makes me an unhappy knitter so although I know the KAL doesn't officially start until the 23rd I started an EZ project. This is the first of a pair of Sideways Mystery Mitts from Knitting Around. Now that the seasons have turned from "road construction" to winter as they do in Toronto, my little guy needs something to keep his chubby hands toasty. I knit this one from some leftovers of fingering weight yarn, Lanett Superwash, I had used for some socks. They're still going to be big on him but he'll grow into them. I left some live stitches when I was doing the bind off and I'm using them to knit a bunch of i-cord so I can loop them through his coat so they don't get lost.

These were knit on faith that the Goddess of knitting knew what she was doing because until you're 3/4 of the way through it didn't look like anything that could be mistaken for a mitten at all, but in the end it was an interesting knit and I'm excited to start the second one.

(crossposted from Zimmermania)

2006-09-21T13:51:00.000-04:00

Camera battery is charging so maybe some pics later. I've finished some stuff: FORECAST!!! (if you would believe it) and the BSA cropped cardi (actually finished Saturday but who's counting?). I've started some stuff: odd little mittens for M, Lucy in the Sky cardi for me and have a little something (oh who and I kidding, a giant something) in the planning stages for O. Joined some KALs which was dumb because they're all starting in the next few days, Gray's Anatomy KAL today, Sock Wars Tomorrow and Zimmermania on Saturday so I'm going to be a busy little mamma.

The boy has a real mouthful of teeth that he's sharpening by chewing on O's fingers. He took a few steps on his own over the weekend but hasn't done anything like walking since but is standing on his own longer and longer the more he tries it seems. So scary that soon he'll be off and running with me gasping for breath behind him.

2006-09-15T12:43:00.000-04:00

I don't like it, I really wanted to...but I don't. I'm thinking maybe when it's dry and I try it on again it'll cast some sort of knitterly pride/magic spell over me and I'll want to wear it for the rest of my days but for right now I'm not really feeling it.

Just for a bit of levity this was the scene when I peeked my head out of the apartment yesterday:

They're replacing all the toilets in the building to low-flow models and here they are ready to go.

2006-09-14T10:59:00.000-04:00

A sleeve and a half to go for the cropped cardi, I don't want it to end the yarn is so cushy and wonderful.
Truthfully, beyond these two weddings I don't think this'll be something I'll wear a lot but I'm going to reserve judgement until it's had a block and a try-on. If I still don't think I'll wear it after all that I might frog it and recycle the yarn for a long sleeved Glee which is something I can see myself wearing a lot. Hard to believe that this is the first fall/winter I'll have handknits to wear, it seems like I've been knitting forever! Now that the weather has turned cool I've already worn hourglass a few times and gotten tons of compliments on it.

Here's Forecast in all her unfinished glory, I'm stoked to get back to her now as I'm loving the buttons (they're not really attached yet, safety pinned on for placement for now). I'm thinking they'll need something for backing so I might pick up some grossgrain ribbon to match to give the buttons something more to anchor to. Hopefully the cropped cardi will be done today so I can sit down with this for a bit.

2006-09-13T12:25:00.000-04:00

A group shot of everything I'm working on right now, it's a icky gray day outside and none of the other pics I took were enjoying good lighting so I shoved them in all together.

The cropped cardi (the soft gray) is about 4 inches into the 7 of ribbing it needs for the body then I just have to pick the sleeve stitches back up and knit down from there, hopefully the body and some of one sleeve will get done today then the other sleeve tomorrow morning so I can get this bathed and blocked and have lots of time to dry before Saturday.

Not having the greatest time with the Donegal Tweed for M's jacket, it refuses gauge entirely and it'll need some more work for me to bend it to my will. It's pretty nasty scratchy stuff but I washed the first swatch and a small hank of it yesterday with the old shampoo/conditioner combo and it's a ton better to work with now (less twinelike). I think I'll actually end up washing all the yarn before I start using it to make it a better knitting experience.

The spindle there has some merino from Cosmic Pluto in a really pretty colourway, summy yellow and teal. I'm surprised how finely I can spin this, there have been so many times that I'm sure the single is going to break and drop the spindle on the floor but it hasn't happened yet, at this rate this'll be a two ply sock yarn!

The green lump there is Forecast, I actually pulled it out last night and worked on the neverending sleeve a bit. I knit the whole section of horizontal rib that separates the cable section from the ribbing on the forearm, more progress to come hopefully once the cropped cardi is done.

2006-09-11T16:37:00.000-04:00

I'm totally cheesed at blogger right now, I want to brag a bit but can't seem to get photos to post....

Remember that Fleece Artist BFL from way back when? I pulled it back out yesterday and finally finished it. Now I'm itching to start into the second braid and wondering if I can find more of the same colourway as I'd love a sweater quantity of this stuff. I said at the outset that these weren't colours I'd have chosen but I'm super glad that I picked this up anyway, I think I had a feeling about it and it's a good thing I trusted my gut on this one. In the end it's about 110m/50g so about a DK weight. I'm loving the barber-pole look that I got and spinning the two halves in opposite directions worked out perfectly.

Linkies to pickies:
the colours- yummah!
with a dime for reference

2006-09-11T10:00:00.000-04:00

My One Skein secret pal package arrived Friday; I almost dropped it when the postman handed it to me, I didn't expect it to be so heavy. Thank you, thank you Stephanie, you've spolied me thuroughly rotten. The package included: a great cabled bag made from one skein of yarn, a sheep tape measure, playing cards with pictures of Oregon on them (where she lives, waves in the general direction of Oregon), a really cool pin cushion, a great pattern for kids sweaters in multiple gauges and sizes, the current "Bend Living" magazine and some fantastic vintage patterns!!

Also in the mail on Friday was a really nice thank you note from J, she loves the shawl and I'm much relieved to hear it. Just a few more short days until wedded bliss, I'm looking forward to it. My dress for the wedding is sleeveless and the ceremony being in a Catholic church (no bare shoulders) and the reception being in a barn (she's a farm girl and I love the barn reception idea) I've started a little cardi as a coverup in case of cold and to throw over my shoulders at the ceremony. It's a really easy top down raglan and it's moving along well, the yarn is a dream too. Initially I had a really hard time getting gauge, the pattern calls for 8mm needles with the yarn doubled but I'm using 5.5mm and finally it's working up to the right size.

In other knitting news I'm going to start swatching for this little jacket for M with some lovely tweedy goodness he picked out all by his little self.
I'll start this when the cardi is done and blocking. Klaralund has had a sleeve rewrite but no knitting has happened yet, I'm promising myself I'll finish Forecast first seeing as how I picked up buttons for her on the weekend.

2006-09-06T12:19:00.000-04:00

The paisley lace is finally off the needles. The picot cast off took most of yesterday and all morning today to finish, cast on 3, cast off six.... Oh well, it's done with lots of time to spare and I'm really happy with how it came out.

Now maybe onto something for me to wear to the wedding in the form of a shawl/wrap thingy to go with the super cute dress my mom bought me for the occasion?

Klaralund hasn't been ripped yet but I'll probably get to that today. I need to have a look at changing the sleeves up a bit, more hourglass sleeve-like I think. Not sure how much reworking I can do seeing as how the sleeve width determines the size of the top of the sweater but I suppose that if I'm picking up stitches and knitting the body down it should be pretty easy to adjuzt the length if need be. More on that when I figure it out.

2006-09-02T13:13:00.000-04:00

No pics today, I'm staying with the parentals while O is away for the weekend and I forgot the camera. The paisley lace is six rounds into the 20 round edging chart and holy mother the rounds are taking forever at this point, anyways I think I should have this done by midweek or so. I have to say I'm not loving the Zephyr, it's lovely drapey stuff but it's horribly splitty.

The front (or back) is almost done for Klaralund but I'm seeing now what a nightmare it's going to be to have to do the splice and dice to make the striping on the front and back match up so I'm going to frog it and take another approach. I'm going to knit the sleeves first (in the round to the underarm) then seam them together at the neckline then pick up and knit the body down from the selvedge edges. Plusses here are matching stripes around the body (it'll still be some work to get the sleeves to match up but I can live with that) and amost no seaming at the end. We'll see how it goes. Really this sweater pattern couldn't be simpler and it'll be nice to feel the accomplishment of having a larger project finished pretty quiclky.

2006-08-31T12:19:00.000-04:00

OMG I laughed until I cried. The mailman just came with a birthday package for M, some soccer duds from my Aunt A from England. A jersey, shorts and socks. They're a little big but man are they cute!!

2006-08-31T10:59:00.000-04:00

The paisley shawl is finally past the first chart, all thirteen repeats of it. I'd post a pic but it's really nothing to look at these days. Looks rather like a parachute hanging from a too short circular needle. I'm up to 500+ stitches per round so it's slowed up a fair bit but it's encouraging that I'm ready to start the paisley edging chart which should be a lot more interesting than the rest of the knitting has been thus far.

The first ribby sock is past the heel but now I'm noticing a hole where the short row heel meets the ankle so I think I'll ladder down a stitch or two in that spot and see if I can close the gap a bit. I started a new sweater project this morning too, Klaralund in Silk Garden #84. I need a brainless knit to counter the paisley. I am going to make some adjustments to it though to give it a bit more shape while keeping the main construction true to the pattern.

And now for some random cuteness I give you M!

2006-08-22T10:36:00.000-04:00

Almost two repeats into the Kimono wrap I decided I wasn't loving it for J, it wasn't yelling "wedding" quite the way I wanted it to. The pattern is really lovely but it's just a bit too plain for such an occasion. I think part of the problem was that the yarn and pattern weren't well matched. The Zephyr is a bit too crisp I think, I'm seeing it done in a yarn with a little more halo. Thw Zephyr is stash yarn so I really wanted to use it up and a wedding shawl seems the fitting thing for 1200+ yards of white laceweight. I'm going to swatch up some bits I have to see what yarn will suit Kimono best. I have some Kid Seta, a bit of KSH and some Misti Alpaca laceweight to try.
I think I may use this pattern to do a wrap to match whatever Christmas party dress I pick this year.

I pulled out some old IKs and found the Paisley Lace Shawl so that's what I've got on the needles for J now and the Zephyr is the recomended yarn so again I don't have to buy anything. It's worked up really quickly over the first few pattern repeats but now I'm up over 200 stitches per round it's slowed up a fair bit, at the end there will be more than 600 stitches to finish with a picot cast off. It's my first attempt at a square shawl and I had to do the circular cast on a few times before I got it neat enough to go ahead and start knitting into. Normally I'm not a fan of lace in garter stitch, I don't think it really shows all that well, but this is coming out nicely so far. I took it off the needles to have a look the other day and I'm pleased with it so far. It's supposed to be 48" square when it's done so I had to google to find the formula to calculate what the width will be when it's folded diagonally (it's been a looooong time since high school math!) and I think 67" should be a good size. I am pitiful at math, really it's embarrassing as the daughter of an accountant.

My sock is chugging along too, but is taking a big backseat to the paisley lace as it has a wedding date creeping up. The yarn is some Socka Peggy sent me ages and ages ago. I'm digging the colours, each of the three plies is a different colour and they change at different frequencies. Unfortunately the light isn't so good today that the pic doesn't do it justice. This is my travelling/watching tv knit right now for times when I can't be relied upon to count to six accurately. It's nothing fancy, just my usual 60 stitch toe up sock with a bit of 2x2 ribbing thrown in for snugness.

No spinning has gone on since last post but I'm wanting to get back to the BFL over the next few days. I'm back to work temporarily part time in the evenings and on weekends so I haven't had as much time with it as I'd like.

2006-08-17T11:13:00.000-04:00

Things have been a little nuts around chez snob so it's been a while. I've been busy though. I appologize for the link to pics today but Blogger is not behaving.

A few weeks ago I went to a meeting of the Etobicoke Handspinner's Guild to check things out and now I'm addicted. Two lovely ladies, Elizabeth and Lorraine, got me going on a single treadle Lendrum and I was in love instantly. Even though the yarn I spun was a little rough by anyone's standards it was sooo much fun. So since I've been back to drop spindle spinning. I've spun a few small hanks of yarn up for practice. I'm most proud of this though, it came out so well. It's Blue Faced Liester from Fleece Artist that I've had in the stash for ages. It's just short of 80m of two ply, about a worsted weight.

I've just finished spinning up half of the first braid (of two) of BFL in another colourway to hopefully end up with a similar 2ply as the other FA. The colours aren't what I'd normally pick but I think once it's plied it'll be really pretty. The colours make me think of oil on puddles, sort of iridescent with purples, browns and blues. I spun the first single keeping the colour lines all running the same way when I split the fiber and I think I'm going to spin the second single in the opposite direction so the colour lines run the other way. I really liked how the other BFL came out in the spots where the two singles were different.

I'm using my Ashford spindle so I can only do a bit at a time; I like it but it's a lot heavier than my Turkish spindle that I love so much. The Turkish spindle is great for spinning singles but the shaft is a bit short for plying which is why I got the Ashford (click here for a comparison). The Turkish weights 29g and the Ashford 81g. I had another top whorl I really liked but M grabbed it and tore the hook off and I wasn't able to repair it.

I'm hoping that once I'm working I can start saving for a wheel, I've decided I want either the Lendrum DT or the Ashford Kiwi. I'll buy new if I have to but I'm going to keep looking out for a good used wheel once I've saved enough.

On the knitting front I've finished a few smaller projects, some mittens for our SnB's charity project Streetknits, Shedir from Knitty and the Phyllotaxis tam from Knitting Nature. I'm in love with just about everything in the book and have enough stash yarn to knit a few more projects from it coming up.

I've also started some socks and a shawl for our friend J for her wedding, it's the Kimono shawl from Folk Shawls. I hope to be appologizing to Forecast by spending a little time with her over the next few days.

2006-08-01T13:25:00.000-04:00

Stick a fork in me 'cause I'm done! Finally, Child's First Socks were completed Saturday. I had to rip the toe on sock #2 twice before it came out as I wanted it. I really wanted to follow the pattern to the letter but I just can't abide the pointiness of a decrease toe. In the end I just knit a short row toe (my favorite) and grafted the live stitches accross the bottom of the ball of the foot, looking at it you'd never know. I had a hard time too getting the socks the right length for my foot, the pattern repeats are hard to see and count. In the end I'm happy with them but the yarn wasn't really a good choice for the pattern, too splitty. I did learn with these though that if you don't want anyone to sit next to you on the subway knitting a blood red sock with shiny, pointy metal dpns is the way to go.

The pic doesn't do the colour justice though, the red is much darker in real life but it shows the lace well.

I haven't really touched any of my other WIPs in a few days but hopefully I'll get back to them sometime this afternoon if M decides to grace me with a nap.

2006-07-26T21:57:00.000-04:00

Just getting back from SnB, good times. I didn't buy anything, I can count that as the third time I've been into a yarn shop and not bought anything. I used up my free day as per the stashalong on Monday when S and I went down to Knitomatic's sale. I picked up some blush pink yarn for a top from Vintage Knits and a teeny tiny (8g) ball of Opal sock yarn to jazz up the toes and heels of some otherwise boring man socks in the near future. S bought sock yarn and hat yarn to knit for her boy toy, I'm going to make a sock knitter out of her yet.

Stashbuster project #1 is moving in a forward direction daily. I've promised myself that I'll add three squares a day to M's blanket but I've been knitting more than that most days and it's so cute and he loves playing with it already while I'm not working on it. I started a second stashbuster project on Friday that's actually almost done. A cropped raglan cardi (of my own design-and-knit as you go sort of thing) to wear over my cute red summer sundress in Knitpicks WOTA and some mohair that I had hanging around. The yarn is the natural dyeable and the mohair is beige so it's knitting up to have a cute tweedy effect that I like the depth of. The body is done and button bands are on so I just have a few rows on each sleeve then the ribbing to finish. I'm using both yarns doubled and 9mm needles so it's working up super fast. Surfing through the blogsphere the other day I fell in love with someone's Sunrise Circle Jacket from Interweave and I have two lots of stash yarn that might work so I'll be swatching them up sometime soon too.

The socks continue (I'm about halfway between the toe and the heel on the second sock) so I think I should have them done over the weekend at latest. Im working on Forecast a bit tonight too, the never ending second sleeve knits on.

2006-07-20T22:53:00.000-04:00

This is why you don't let them feed themselves.

Thats all, no knitting has been done today.

2006-07-19T22:41:00.000-04:00

Not a lot going on as far as knitting the last few days, CFS are at the heel flap of the second sock and Forecast still needs that second sleeve (is there such a thing as second sleeve syndrome?). I started a stashbuster project though, a mitered square blanket with some superwash Cascade 220 that's been lingering the stash for a really long time. The idea came from Shelly Kang's sock yarn blankie. When M goes to daycare he's going to need to take a blanket with him for naptime and I'd like it to be something his mommy made for him. It's knitting up really quickly and he's already playing with it when I'm not adding squares.

(I'm actually a lot further along now as the pic is a few days old. I'm on the 6th tier right now.)

I've joined the stashalong on the 15th too to make myself commit to whitling down some of what I've amassed over the last year or two. I've committed to three months of knitting what I've got...ack! I get one free day to enhance the stash in each month (so one day between 15th July and 15th August,...) and I'm going to try and use my remaining store credit at Knitomatic so I'm not spending any actual money on yarn. My goal is to reduce by 40 skeins over the three months and I got that off to a good start by posting a bunch of stuff for sale at the destash blog (button on sidebar if you're in a shopping mood). So far I'm down 11 skeins and the blankie will add another four to that once it's done. Maybe I should knit some socks?

2006-07-13T11:24:00.000-04:00

Not much new on the knitting front, I'm totally in a rut. Forecast is stalled needing about half a sleeve so I'm going to try and push myself to just get it done over the next few days so I can stop feeling guilt over it. Socks are getting there, #2 is on the way but I'm going to rip and fix the toe on #1 as it's really pointy and it's bothering me.

Went to Knitomatic for SnB last night with more odds and ends to return (I applaud your patience with me H, I'd have smothered me with scratchy acrylic by now). I came away with this loveliness....fable baby alpaca in the most heavenly smoky teal colour imagineable. This is the sort of stuff you want to just strip naked and roll around in, this needs to be next to skin.

It's going to be Ogee from Knitting Nature. H has the book on order but I wanted to steal the store copy last night and knit everything in it immediately.

I ended up with Vintage Knits which has some super cute girly stuff I love. The best part? All the patterns go down to my size, every one (bless those iddy bitty 1940's housewives). Not sure what to knit first from this one.

We've had a fussy little monkey on our hands the last few days and finally this morning M's top two front teeth made their appearance. They're just barely peeking out but at least they're on their way. He's been really sleepy since they've been bothering him. Wearing his new man pyjamas he got for his big #1.

New button, new button!! I finally got around to getting a destashing page set up. There's not much there right now but I hope to add some more stuff I want rid of and what my wants are as far as trades over the next few days so check back soon.

2006-07-07T15:15:00.000-04:00

I finished this little hat a few minutes ago, very cute I think.

Very loosely based on this tomato hat which seems to have some wonkiness going on. I started it on the subway on the way home from the party on Wednesday night. This is in answer to Stephanie's call for donations of baby hats to support breastfeeding awareness and education. Since the cause is something I'm a strong believer in, I wanted to send something to help out. M and I celebrated one year as a successful breastfeeding team yesterday and over the last two weeks or so he's started to say "booboo" when it's time to feed him (which probably comes from O asking him if he wants some boobie).

I wanted to make a strawberry instead of the tomato to get a bit more fair isle practice in before I start a bunch of big projects using the technique, I'm feeling a bit of an obsession coming on. I have always wanted a Dale of Norway sweater but $300 is so far out of my reach it's sad. For me knitting one has always been one of those lofty goals that have the "someday" tag attached to them, now I think I might actually be in a position to attempt one (albeit something in M's size).

Progress on Forecast is chugging slowly along, motivation is waining though so I'm going to set a goal of having it done by Monday. All it needs right now is the second half of sleeve #2. Sock #1 just needs a toe so I should get that out of the way today then cast on for the second before SSS sets in. I'm swatching for Picovoli with the bamboo and as much as I love the knitted fabric it's a total witch to knit with, splittier than bananas.

2006-07-07T12:08:00.000-04:00

Today is a day to relax from the birthday mayhem that was yesterday. O and I began celebrating his brithday shortly after midnight by creeping into M's room and whisper/sining the birthday song to him while he slept. M started the day with ice cream for breakfast, we agreed it was a good way to start the day. We made a paper bithday hat together and played in that a bit.

He had chocolate milk with lunch (all his favorite foods) and O came by for lunch to play. The afternoon was pretty quiet aside from talking to my mom on the phone. M was trying to lick the phone while he was talking to his Gram. Nanna called late in the afternoon and made the little man smile too. O surprised him with a balloon when he got home from work.

We all went out to Toys 'R' Us to pick out a present. M liked just about every second toy we looked at but ended up picking (or maybe we picked) this and two stories: "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" and a book called "I Love you".

He had a chicken McNugget happymeal for dinner and ate/destroyed/bathed in his cake. I wiped him off pretty well before putting him in but the bath water was still pretty blue.

2006-07-05T22:48:00.000-04:00

What a busy, busy day today has been. I'm ready for some tea and to think a bit, mostly about the last year....

On this day last year I was working my last day, going on my last date with O as a childless couple and having my last good night's sleep for a while. I was getting ready for a few weeks off before the baby arrived and was getting anxious and really excited about meeting the little person I was already so in love with. Baby's due date was still nine days away but I wouldn't have to wait that long. Tomorrow our little boy turns the big #1 and it's all gone so incredibly fast.

I never would have believed how in love I could be with such a small person, and how it would be possible to love him more everyday. He's becoming such a little boy; my baby is fast fading and being replaced by the most perfect little person with great personality, silly quirks and all.

The last year has been at times joyous, terrifying, pride-filled and (I'm ashamed to admit) occasionally desperately lonely. I so enjoyed and am terribly thankful for the year I got to have home with M, it was a blessing. I suffered a bit with lack of adult contact sometimes but now I'm faced with returning to work I'm feeling terribly about those times. Finding daycare had been emotionally wrenching for me. I know M will enjoy and thrive with other children around but I can't help thinking that I'll miss so much. I don't think anyone could ever care for our boy better than O and I can and have. I'm going to miss our intimate times, the midday breastfeedings where it's just us cuddling together.

I know he needs the interaction with other kids but letting him go is breaking my heart. I've only ever left him with anyone other than O three times, each for a short evening so whole days are going to seem like an eternity to be away from him. My solace is that I know he's going to have a wonderful time with the other children.

Okay, no more sad... let's get on with the knitting. We made a trip down to Knitomatic today, probably my last SEX for a while. Thankfully H is pretty forgiving of my serial returning because I had a bunch of stuff that I'd bought from her that I knew was never going to actually become anything if it hadn't already (like what was I thinking?). So, without spending even a single cent (and still actually leaving with a $30+ credit) this was the haul:

Six skeins of Dale Baby Ull, two Dale baby/toddler books, two pairs worth of sock yarn (one for me, one for O), five Eden Bamboo for Picovoli, tape measures, a set of circs, and one more Silk Garden to complete what I needed for Klaralund. Good times.

The Baby Ull wants to be this for M:

Then it was off to LK for Amy's party!!! The new store is fabulous (THEY HAVE A BATHROOM!) and lots of knitters turned up. I left early but I still had a really good time.

2006-06-29T11:19:00.000-04:00

The other day I promised some Eunny Jang-esque design posts so I'm going to make good on that promise now. I've been kicking an idea around my little brain to do a cardigan for my friend A's new little peanut set to be born (sometime around) the end of August. I'm thinking challenge here: fair isle, steeks, non-traditional baby colour combo, hemmed edges and pu&k button bands and such. I was looking at basing the whole thing on this little steeked sweater, but adding stitches at the center front to accomedate the steek that will transform it from a pullover to a cardigan.

I fell in love with this fair isle chart:

which I think will make a really pretty allover fair isle pattern in this yarn:

Okay, I said non-traditional and I went with the pink, but in my defense the brown doesn't exactly scream "baby" (A knows she's having a girl otherwise it would be pale blue and brown). Lanett Superwash is a great yarn, I love it for socks and other fine work and it washes like a dream. I'll be swatching some of the pattern up in the next few days and I'll post photos then.

So first I had to see if I could actually do the steeking. I knit a swatch the other day for this little jacket I want to make for M. I have a ton of this yarn (thanks ebay!) and I wasn't getting gauge so I decided to cannibalize it to give steeking a try. So this:

became this:

then I pu&k on the button bands to give this:

(click here to see it unbuttoned)
Now I'm going to toss this through the wash to see what happens to the steeks.
I also need to play with the tension on my sewing machine a bit because it was a bit looser than I'm feeling comfortable with.

On to other things now. Forecast had a bit of a break for a few days to have a mid sleeve block. I was worried about the length and where the horizontal ribs were going to hit my arm so I gave it a preliminary bath and laid it out to dry to see what would happen and I'm glad I did, it's eased some of my fears about the sleeve length as well. You can't tell so much from the pic but the horizontal ribs on the sleeve fall exactly paralell with the ones on the body when the cardigan is on which is a total happy accident but I like the effect. I'm hoping to have this done by the end of the (long) weekend as I'd like to get buttons sometime next week. I saw the most perfect green clay ones at Lettuce Knit the other day and since I'm going down on Wednesday for Amy's party I want to be ready to pick them up.

Between swatching and steeking and all that blocking I started a sock too. The Child's First Sock from Knitting Vintage Socks. Yarn is Fleece Artist merino in the most gorgeous ruby red.

2006-06-22T18:20:00.000-04:00

Well, as you're about to see I've been knitting not blogging. I appologize for the lack of posting here recently but I've been a shade on the busy side now that M is moving around at lightspeed.

Forecast is moving along nicely, I have to say that I love the one piece construction of this. Seaming is the enemy! This pic was from the other day and I'm actually a bit further along with it than I was there. The buttonhole band is on but the button band needs to be reknit as I picked up far too many stitches so it's making the front come to a nice point at the front (basically a big arrow to my crotch and we can't have that). I'm doing the sleeves in the round to avaid sewing them up but it's a bit of a PITA turning the whole body as I knit around the sleeve.

I've already made some mods and have a few more planned. I added two more increase rows before dividing for the sleeves (the smallest size was too small and the next size too big so I created a middle size), added a bunch of rows to the lower body and went with holes for nine buttons instead of ten (couldn't get the math to work out right for ten). I think I'll be ending the garter stitch and cables just above the elbow on the sleeves like some others have done because I prefer a more fitted shape but we'll see when I get that far. I was hoping to go and buy buttons tomorrow but I think it'll be Monday at this rate.

Finally pics of my Hourglass. The knitting has actually been done about two weeks but I haven't had the brain to remember to take a pic. It's blocking right now although I have worn it once or twice already. I'm glad I bought extra yarn because it took almost two extra skeins to complete. I totally rewrote the sleeve pattern because they were elephant-like on my spindly arms, I really like the way they turned out. I'm really happy with the finished product but I'm in no hurry to use Cash Iroha again. This is my first adult ls sweater and I'm super proud of it (and myself for sticking with it).

My Green Gable, another one that's been done ages (maybe a month?)and not photographed. I basically rewrote most of the pattern on this one, waist and hip shaping, neckline, sleeves.... Anyway, I'm happy with how it turned out and it's become a staple of the summer wardrobe already. I might consider doing this again in another colour. At last a (mostly) cotton yarn I didn't hate, BS Cotton Fleece.

This is the best FO of all though, Icarus from the current Interweave. I knit this in a blind panic day and night on a deadline and I think it came out well. It was a gift for S who spends all her knitting time and money on everybody else but never herself so she needed someone to knit for her. She was really shocked and pleased with it which is great, it's about time someone did something nice for her.

Okay, enough FOs for now. Over the next few days I should be posting about some designing I've been thinking about, as soon as I have something to show you it'll be posted here.

2006-06-01T23:52:00.000-04:00

Finally I'm getting around to posting about the magical mystery lace project, Birch. All the secrecy was to avoid my new SIL Deb from finding out about her gift before she had it in her hands. Not sure she reads my blog but as I'm linked from M's I was keeping it all on the downlow just in case.

All in all it was a really fun knit and I'm super pleased with the results. I was a bit worried that a ten stitch, eight row repeat was going to be mind numbingly boring but it was a really quick project and it grew really fast. Once I was through the first pattern repeat I tossed the pattern and was able to knit from both memory and reading my stitches as I went. I had heard scary things in blogland about both the pattern and the yarn but neither presented any problems at all, after the first few repeats I chucked the stitch markers and lifelines altogether. I have to admit though that the first few rows were a schlog and the cast on almost made me cry (I can barely count to ten most days, 299 is asking a bit too much).

In progress (we both needed a rest):

I love and hate how lace comes off the needles. You have to suspend your disbelief a bit to get through the last few rows trusting that the wet ramen noodle looking lump of yarn that you've just dedicated three weeks of your life will actually be something really beautiful. Then the miracle of blocking, the magic wand of knitting (okay, it's a sink of tepid water and some eucalan but you get the picture) swoops in and transforms that lump into a coherent fabric of stitches and holes that defies beleif. There's a lot of faith in knitting lace.

Having her bath:

Blocked and dried I packed up the shawl for mailing, this was going traceable mail. I almost had a heart attack when the receipt with the tracking number on it dissapeared into the abyss (mess) that is my computer desk. Luckily Deb is as quick with thankyou cards as I am with panic, less than a week later I got a lovely card from her assuring me that it had arrived.

Ready for her trip:

The wedding was lovely, a really nice intimate affair. Unfortunately the weather left something to be desired, cold and wet for most of the day which forced the ceremony into a cold drafty tent. The whole wedding was held in a really beautiful apple orchard in full bloom with an apple theme, very tasteful and a lot of fun. Luckily though the clouds did break for about an hour so that the bride and groom were able to get some really nice pictures in the gazebo and among the apple trees.

My brother Chris, his beautiful bride Deb and Birch looking as happy and in love as two people (and a shawl) ever could be, I wish them all the happiness in the world. I know I'm over the moon for them.

2006-05-26T11:16:00.000-04:00

Wow, things have been busy around here. Lots of knitting and working going on and the summer is shaping up to be busy.

I finished my Green Gable sweater, no pics yet, but it came out really well. I've worn it a few times already. In the end I wish I had knit a size smaller but with the waist and hip shaping I added it's not a terrible fit. The Cotton Fleece was a really nice yarn to work with, the wool content makes a huge difference in how it knits but the finished top is still really light and summery. Now that I have the pattern pretty much rewritten to fit me properly I'd think about knitting it again. This is the first adult sweater that I've actually finished and it's encouraged me to start another.

I'm on to the hourglass sweater from LMKG. I bought the cash iroha in a great grass green a while back but never got motivated to get going on it. Thrusday night I cast on and I have the body done to the underarms and I'm working on a sleeve. I'm totally rewriting the sleeve portion of the pattern though, they were going to be terribly wide had I knit them to specs. It seems odd to me to design the body of the sweater so form fitting and flattering to those of us with clearly defined waists then put elephant arms on it. I'm keeping the bell cuffs but narrowing out along the length of the sleeve to match the fit of the body a bit better but we'll see how it goes. With the adjustments I've made to the sleeves I've hopefully inadvertently solved some of the neckline issues the girls at the KAL were facing.

I like the pattern so much I'm toying with the idea of a 3/4 sleeve cardigan based on the hourglass pattern. I'd knit it in the round then steek it and knit the button bands on, maybe adding some fair isle trim too while I'm at it. Once I have the first one done I'll have a better idea of what I need to do to make it work. I have some stash yarn that's calling to me to be some sort of fitted cardigan for the fall. Maybe an argyle motif around the hem or something?

Time to get knitting but I'll post later revealing the Magical Mystery Lace Project complete with pics!

2006-04-24T16:29:00.000-04:00

Wow, it's been a really long time since I blogged last, no worries though as I'm alive and well. It's been a busy few weeks now that M is moving around so much, he's getting tougher to keep up with all the time.

On the knitting front there's been tons going on. The magical mystery lace project is done and I'm really happy with it, it was such a fun knit even though it seemed at times like it would never be finished. It goes in the mail tomorrow and once I know the recipient has it I'll post some pics (I don't want to ruin the surprise). The circular shrug is done as far as the pattern is concerned but I think I'm going to fiddle with it a bit. The arms are jsut a bit shorter than I'm comfortable with and the curling is not helping so I'm thinking of adding a 2" sleeve just to give it a bit more of a polished look. I bought a really pretty wooden toggle to sew on it for closure so I'll be doing that in the next few days. I'll post pics when I'm a bit happier with the finishing.

I started Green Gable yesterday and it's going really well so far. I've read that the sizing runs really small so I'm making a size up but it's a top down raglan in the round so I know I can always try it on as I go and add as many increase rounds as I think I need. I'm through section A/B and part way through section C/D. I couldn't figure out how the neck worked out so I just did my own thing with that and I like the look of it so I'm not really worried about it. I'm using Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece (the recomended yarn) in "Lapis" and the colour is so pretty, not normally something I'd choose but it's so rich I had to have it. I normally don't like knitting with cotton but the 20% wool in it seems to make a really big difference.

I've also finished two pairs of socks in the last few weeks, one for M and one for myself, my first foray into self striping sock yarns and I really like how they came out. I had a mommy day last weekend and hit Lettuce Knit to see the Socks that Rock yarn everyone on the knitty board raves about and picked up four skeins as a treat. The colours are fantastic and it's superwash. The Knitter's Frolic was this weekend too and S and I had a really good time, lots to see (and buy)!

All right, enough for now but I promise to get better at updating more frequently.

2006-04-01T09:34:00.000-05:00

So, I signed up for Flash Your Stash to force me to examine how much yarn I've accumulated since my full on knitting obsession began. I'm pretty sure I've not reached SABLE yet but I feel like I'm well on my way. Unfortunately I think seeing everyone's stash is going to make me crave all those yarns I've yet to try and thus add to the hyperaccumulation that has been happening over the last little bit (and as Zib says: life is short, buy more yarn!). I was hoping to feel guilt about the whole stash laid bare but that's not what's happening.

I had visions of drowning in yarn but lost motivation for it when I realized I would either a)have to clean the bathtub or b)submit my prescious skeins to ring around the tub and c)figure out how to take a picture with the camera timer (as I can hardly see O freely participating in such foolishness).

It's interesting too, looking at the stash as one entity rather than a somewhat random collection of supplies for various projects. I'm a bigger purple fan than I had thought, and there's a lot more gray and brown in there than I would have guessed (discounting of course the Very Ugly Afghan Kit as I had nothing to do with that one).

So here comes some gratuitous yarn porn so pull up a comfy chair, a glass of wine, your credit card and open a seperate window for your favorite online yarn store and here we go, this is going ot be a long one....

Ahhh Noro, my love. As you're about to see I love vareigateds and Noro would be the cream of the crop. I'm not really a matchy matchy girl which is good and I'm not that bothered by a bit of VM (reminds me that this was once sheep and other wooly mammals).

Fleece Artist and Handmaiden tempt the patriot in me, both are made in Canada. The stash of this stuff is particularly small given how much of it I've used, it rarely remains unknit long enough to become stash as it generally goes from LYS to FO in pretty short order.

Socks have grown to a bit of an obsession within an obsession recently; I seem to knit about a pair a month these days. At that rate I don't understand why I feel the need to have at least a years worth of sock yarn at all times. There are so many sock yarns I haven't tried too.

The most brain challenging thing I do these days, lace.

Cascade, the meat and potatoes stash. Good for just about anything basic, I love the stuff.

In the beginning I had a somewhat love afair with this stuff, Debbie Bliss yarns and patterns. I love her designs for little ones and one of her books is pretty much why I started knitting again. Now that I've used so many other yarns though I'm not much of a fan which is why this isn't really getting knit up all that quickly.

Knitpicks, 'nuf said.

Brown Sheep, great stuff. I love the worsted for felting, now if I could just find a washing machine I also liked for felting we'd be in business.

MMmmmmmmm Maaaannnnoooooossssss.

Having only been given this Colinette very recently I can't say much about it yet but I'm envisioning doing something big using all of it together.

I love green and that handspun I got from my SP7 is screaming my name these days and I don't know how long I can ignore it.

I also very much love red...

...and blue (particularly that hand dyed there in the middle)...

...apparently brown too...

...and all that gray.

Black and I don't do much together.

And finally (insert drumroll here),

The VUAK for which I take no responsibility as I'm never intending to knit the thing. If you find me knitting it you have my permission to poke out my eyes with bamboo dpns. I won this on the KOL Team Canada blog. I think the yarn may be divided and make some man hats and man mitts for the boys in my life.

Hope you had fun here, now I'm off to check out all of your stashes.

2006-03-25T11:51:00.000-05:00

Look ma! I'm knitting!

2006-03-23T10:48:00.000-05:00

Have I mentioned recently that I am married to the most wonderful thoughtful man on earth? No? Okay, time to do that now then. Friday night he came home a bit late and knew I had had sort of a down week. He said he needed to run out to pick up some things at the outdoors store but ended up coming home with a bottle of wine, some bath goodies from Lush (my favorite) and a gift cert for when my goodies are all used up, what a sweetie. So, needless to say I was pretty pleased. Skip ahead to Tuesday at breakfast....he asks me to bring in his portfolio from his laptop bag while he's getting ready for work because he wants to show me something. Not a rare occurance, he shows me stuff from it all the time so I didn't think anything of it. I open it up and there's two tickets to Coldplay at the ACC last night for S and I! OMG I was freaking out.

The concert rocked! If you like the band they are better in concert than they are recorded, it was such a good time. O was worried the seats wouldn't be very good because he bought the tickets sort of late but they were great, right beside the stage on the upper teir but because the cameras were on our side (they were filming for a dvd) and the piano faced our way Chris Martin was facing our direction almost the whole time, the seats were unexpectedly good. Richard Ashcroft opened so that was a really good set too (I love the Verve as well).

Okay, now for your regularly scheduled knitting update....

The circular shrug is almost long enough that I can start the last ribbed section, I'm trying to knit at least an inch on it each day so it makes steady progress and doesn't turn into a UFO on me. I'm actually getting excited about being able to wear it now that it's getting towards done. I've been working on the We Call them Pirates hat too but it's a schlog, sooo slow going because it's my first real fair isle and I'm using dpns because I don't have a circ in that length. I've swatched fair isle stuff a few times but this is my first project and it's going really well (although my gauge is a bit off so it may need a trip through the dryer to make it wearable for O). Here's a progress pic.

Another lace project is on the needles too but sorry no pics for now. It's a surprise for someone special. It's a challenge but it's going well and will be (fingers crossed) beautiful when it's done. I'm taking progress pics and will post them and finished pics once the special someone has recieved it.

I recieved a package from my SP7 on Tuesday too. Some gorgeous handspun, a Fleece Artist scarf kit in a beautiful colourway along with other goodies. Thank you!!!!

2006-03-17T11:23:00.000-05:00

Be still my beating heart, I am in love! I made handpainted yarn....

I was all psyched to try Koolaid dying but wasn't able to find anything but grape and cherry no matter where I went so, feeling dejected, I went to the knittyboard for suggestions and found out that you can dye just as well (maybe better) with Wilton's icing colours. Yipeeeeee! Those I have from my days decorating cakes for extra money, and lots of them.

I sort of made up the technique as I went along and am super pleased with the results. The two skeins aren't exaclty the same (one has a bit more pink and the other more of a burgundy colour) so I'll have fraternal rather than identical twins for socks but I don't care, makes them look more homemade and organic. For my first foray into dyeing I'm pretty happy with the results. I also dyed this hank of Paton's Classic Wool and it came out such a great colour and I think it goes with my Fleece Artict bluefaced lecester roving so well I'll make some thrummed mittens for M or someone else small with it. It's not handpainted but the dye separated a bit during the process and it has a great kettle dyed effect. I just completed a swap for some more natural yarn to dye so I'll be doing some more again soon.

I got another card from my Knitty SP yesterday, she's all about the luxury let me tell ya. First it was a great hair treatment, then a great soap and wonderful perfume and now a face mask that smelled so yummy I wanted to eat it. I feel like I've been to the spa which to me is the ultimate in pampering. Thank you SP, you're wonderful!

2006-03-12T08:57:00.000-05:00

Wow, long time no blog huh? Lots going on around here these days it seems and the family is full of good news. M finally cut his first two teeth the other day after a lot of drooling and discomfort. I noticed them when he bit me, the front middle two on the bottom and they're pushing further throught his gums everyday. My parents are off on a bit of a holiday celebrating their 29th wedding aniversary this weekend, we should all be so in love as those two after all this time. Our invitation to my brother C's wedding came in the mail this past week as well, I'm soooo excited and happy for him. His fiance is a great lady and they deserve each other. I'm excited to finally have concrete plans to take M to Montreal to see all the rest of the family too, we haven't been since he was born and I want my grandfather to get to meet his great grandson. My little bro got accepted (early) to grad school at Dalhousie (very good school) and we're all really proud of him.

In other good news I got a package from my Knittyboard SP! So many goodies: Opal sock yarn I've been wanting to try, some great smelly soap and a loofah for the bath, two different perfumes (the little size vials I like for carrying in my purse), candy that met with an untimely fate not long after the package was opened, the cutest monkey stickers among other things.

Not much going on on the knitting front. I'm going to try some Wilton dying this week, I've never done it before so we'll see how it goes. I have a few colours from decorating cakes but we'll probably head over to the mall to get a few more. I'll post pics of the finished product.

2006-02-27T22:07:00.000-05:00

Go on over to AmyKnitty's blog for pics of the closing ceremonies party and a much better pic of me wearing the finished DFS.

2006-02-27T19:51:00.000-05:00

It's here! The mailman may not be back tomorrow though, the little dance I did when he handed me the package may have frightened him just a little (he half walked, half sprited into the stairwell away from me). It says something sort of sad about me that the highlight of my day is the mail no matter what comes but today was happy mail and I was excited.

It's perfect: it's warm (I had to turn the heat off and put an extra blanket on M when I got a bit hot wearing it around the apartment), the colour is incredible and the texture is so fun. MelissaAmy you rock! She dyed and spun the yarn herself, it has thin and thick spots that pooled really cool when she knit it so it's lumpy and I love it. The colour is deep purple with patches of a great medium blue. When I put it on and looked down at it I realized it matches almost perfectly with my Koigu socks that I was wearing. A million than yous, well worth the wait and I really hope you're feeling better Melissa. The package had a pink KitKat bar and some Jelly Bellies too, candy and I don't go well together...everytime we get together one of us magically dissapears (I'm a sucker for jelly beans).

2006-02-26T20:10:00.000-05:00

Triple gold for me, yay! I'm no Cindy Klassen but I'm still pretty proud of myself. I wasn't as down to the wire as I thought I might be although I got some funny looks while I was stitching up some titbits in the Second Cup over coffee and a muffin this morning while I waited for a friend. Here are my Olympic medal winning projects:

The Diamond Fantasy Shawl:

A fun knit and a really well written pattern, I highly recommend this one for newer lace knitters as it's not overly complicated and it comes out beautifully. Sivia Harding has super customer service too, she answered a lot of questions for me (and I imagine I was making her a bit nuts for a while there). I'm excited to wear this to some summer weddings.

Toe up, magic loop, picot edged socks:

From a generic toe up sock pattern by Wendy Johnson (the picot top was my own addition). These are so comfy and I like that I could have ended them at any time had I run out of yarn, I've already cast on another toe up pair. I did not, however, like the magic loop and I don't think I'll be using it for socks again. I got ladders between the two needles that I don't usually get, I'll be sticking with my beloved dpns I think.

A pair of TitBits:

A super easy (yet funny and heartwarming) knit for a great cause. Thanks Gina for telling me about them and I'm sure to have more on their way to you soon. Check out the link and knit one (or a bunch) yourself.

The closing ceremonies party was a good time and we got to see Stephanie finish off her sweater. As this is a family blog I won't repeat what she said when she finished it! It was great to see everyone's gold medal efforts in person, now I have about twenty projects I want to knit....

2006-02-24T08:31:00.000-05:00

It's soooo close to being done it hurts (just some ends to weave in and I prefer to do that after the blocking). Here's the DFS resting after it's bath. I have to say that it's incredibly gorgeous if I may be so humble.

And a closeup of the detail.

I'm really glad I decided to end it when I did, another repeat would have made it much too big to really consider wearing, as it is it's almost as wide as my bed is long and I probably could have blocked it more severely than I did. Just as I suspected thought the colours aren't as horrible now that the lace has been opened up so it's going to be a really nice accent to go with a plain sundress for wedding season. I have faith in lace again.

In more Olympic news my socks are getting there, I'm about halfway up the leg to the picot round then just the facing and finishing to do. I imagine these'll be done today then I just have some titbits to go for my medal.
(In the interest of decency and because I love you all I even went to the trouble of shaving my legs for this pic, enjoy.)

I like how comfortable I am on time with all this, I was really worried at the beginning that I had taken on too much and there was no way I was ever going to get it all done. In retrospect had I not been working last week this all probably wouldn't have been the challenge I thought it would be. Many thanks to the inventors of the exersaucer for giving me the time to knit.

2006-02-20T22:13:00.000-05:00

I cheated, I'll admit it. I tried my best on Saturday when I was out with S but I caved and bought yarn even though I'd had my day for the month. But one piece of cake doesn't ruin a whole diet right? I don't feel so guity about it though because it was on sale and I was really restraining myself....

Anyway, I came home on Saturday afternoon and O had moved M's crib into his own room (formerly the yarn room). I'm glad he just went ahead and did it because even though I knew it was time to move him from our room I wasn't really looking forward to doing it and was really a bit nervous about him being on his own. Saturday night I slept pretty lightly, everytime the lights on the monitor flashed I was wide awake and freaking out a little. It took every ounce of willpower not to go running in and check on him every three minutes. It's funny, he's getting to be such a big boy but he's still such a baby when I think of him being in there all by himself. I was torn between wanting him to sleep through the night and prove to me he's ready to be in there and wanting him to cry like crazy because he missed his mommy. In the end he slept pretty well (for him) and I'm getting a bit better about it.

The Olympic projects are coming along, I'm not as far ahead with any of them as I had hoped to be but there's still a chance that I'll finish. The shawl is almost through the fifth pattern repeat and the second sock is almost at the heel. Half of one TitBit is done but they're a quick knit so I'm not that worried about it. The more of it I do the more I think there's a huge element of faith to knitting lace and the shawl is definately testing mine. It looks like Chinese noodles or somewhat organized yarn barf at this point and it's not really encouraging. Also I'm really starting to hate the colours of the yarn, there's a semi flourescent orange in it that I'm a bit worried about but I'm hoping that with washing and blocking the colour will either fade/run or the lace will open up enough that it will seem less bright. Fingers crossed on that one. At least my work project is done for this quarter so I'll have a lot more time this week plus O came home at noon today sick and likely won't go in again tomorrow so that at least gives me a bit more time because M is far too interested in knitting these days for me to get much done when he's up.

I've been stalking the mailman for the last few weeks for my ISE scarf and at this point I've totally lost faith that there's anything coming my way. My scarf has been sent but I don't see that it's arrived yet but I let my pal know it's on the way. Maybe I'll do a stashbuster scarf for myself after the Olympics are over to make me feel better about the whole thing.

2006-02-16T21:42:00.000-05:00

So after many restarts and agonizing over patterns I'm finally getting somewhere on my Olympic socks. I started with the figure 8 cast on and actually got it right the first time but didn't like the shape of the toe it made so I found another toe. Having to do the short row toe three times I think I like it better, it fits my foot a lot nicer. I've elected to eschew the lace and let the yarn speak for itself with a plain stockingette sock, the colours are so great it really doesn't need anything fancy. I'm getting nervous though as the heel is fast approaching. Everyone told me I'd love magic loop for socks but I'm not really enjoying it, I miss dpns.

I've put the shawl aside for the time being, the first three repeats of the second lace chart went fine but the fourth has been frogged numerous times now (thank heavens for lifelines!). I think if I leave it for a few days and go back to it with a fresh brain I'll be a more attentive lace knitter.

I've really not had near the knitting time since the Olympics started as I thought I would have. Working, family stuff and M's refusal to nap have been getting in the way. Hopefully this project will be out of the way for another quarter by Friday so I can concentrate on what's on the needles. It's all the corrections to other people's work that's taking me so long (which is frustrating but seeing as how I'm being paid hourly isn't all bad I guess). How's this for inter-office communications: S got a promotion this week (yay!) but only found out about it in the company wide e-mail that was sent out to announce it. For all the garbage she deals with I sure hope it comes with a pay raise!

I'm headed down to yarn heaven with S on the weekend, I'll have to be good to keep my resolution but I never said anything about buying books and patterns....

2006-02-08T09:49:00.000-05:00

First, see new button at right-----> Go ahead and give it a click.
I've joined a second team for the Olympics, Team TitBit! I've committed to knitting two titbits in honour of my aunt Val who has successfully battled breast cancer. The pattern is linked from the site and I'll get it linked here asap. Even if you only knit one (and really they look like a really quick knit) you're helping in your own way. As they say, every muffin counts!

2006-02-06T12:08:00.000-05:00

The River Rapids socks are done, I thik they came out pretty well. There should be enough of this yarn left over to make a small pair for M too.

(my readers should feel special knowing that I even shaved my legs specifically for this pic..LOL). I've decided that I love KPPPM, it was really nice yarn to work with and I'm looking forward to my shawl.

Here's the finished ISE scarf too, it'll be mailed today. I keep looking at the blog wondering which of the scarves is headed my way, I have no patience for presents, I'm worse than a little kid.

I started the Crafster Circular Shrug too to give me something to work on until the Olympics start. I'm using Knitpicks WOTA in a really nice chocolate brown. I'll post pics when it starts to look like something.

2006-02-03T14:51:00.000-05:00

My pattern is here, my pattern is here! Yay. I want to start right now, not seven days from now. I've been training all afternoon, had a good read of the pattern, soaked the cord of my new bamboo circs to mellow them out a little and now I'm trying not to let myself wind the yarn because I know once I do that it's game over and I'll just have to start.

I finally finished my ISE scarf and it's blocking at the moment, I'm so glad to finally have it over with but I'm really pleased with how it came out. Maybe all that humming and hawing over pattern and yarn were worth it in the end. I'm going to try and get it in the mail tomorrow.

2006-02-02T16:37:00.000-05:00

I can't believe I blogged earlier and forgot to mention what went down at my LYS yesterday. I was in for my yarn shop and took the socks I'm working on with me to get some advice.

(Sockbug's River Rapids socks in Koigu KPPPM). I wasn't happy with the little points on the sides after grafting the toe together and I wanted some help.

One of the guys who works in the shop asked if I would be interested in doing some knitting for pay, he really liked my work. Now I didn't think I was that good a knitter. He took my e-mail and phone # so we'll see if he gets in contact. I was really flattered.

2006-02-02T13:49:00.000-05:00

I don't think anyone would be surprised to hear that I've had February's yarn buying day already. Oh well, I was very good and have actually kept my resolution so far. I changed my mind about what I'm knitting for the Olympics so I needed new supplies. The original plan was to knit Kiri with KSH but it seemed a bit blashemous to knit a pattern designed by an Anmerican with British yarn for the Canadian Olympic knitting team. So I bought this yarn:

Koigu KPPPM (made in Canada) to knit the Diamond Fantasy Shawl by Sivia Harding (a fellow Canuck). Talk about customer service, I e-mailed Sivia with some questions before I ordered the pattern and she was not only really helpful but got back to me almost instantly, I see myself knitting some of her other patterns in the near future. Other than needles the only other thing I bought for me was a Fleece Artist merino sock kit. I did pick up some yarn for my secret pals but in the interest of said secrecy I won't post pics.

In other news I've changed my mind (again) about my ISE scarf and I actually have this one almost done. I bought the yarn months ago because I loved the colours but had no real plan and it had been languishing in the stash ever since. I was a bit worried about how it looked on the hank

but it looked a lot better once I'd wound it

and this is the scarf, the Multidirectional Diagonal Scarf and it's going really well. I'm about to start the third ball of yarn (I might as well use it all up, my pal wanted a long scarf anyway) but I think I'll cut the pieced for the fringe first so I don't run out at the very end as it's taken long enough and I don't feel like having another setback.

Recently a new species of mammal has been discovered hanging around our place: it's smallish, eats everything in sight and is irresistable drawn to any yarn within a five meter radius. It has been dubbed "knittus interuptus" and I managed to capture it on film today:

2006-01-23T14:03:00.000-05:00

And now for a public service announcement:

Just a reminder to all Canadians to get out and cast a ballot today. Voter turnout is pitiful in this country and I think this election more than ever we all need to have our say. Remember, you can't bitch if you don't vote (and four years is a long time to stay mumm about the government).

I actually had a really hard time deciding who to vote for this time around. I'm feeling completely dissilusioned with the Federal government these past few months so I decided to think locally when casting my ballot. It's been interesting to see how the local campaign has been run. Party A's candidate visited my home personally, was seen in the building on other occasions, handed out his own fliers personally that spoke about how his constituents would be represented in the capital and was generally around for questions and comments. Party B's candidate mailed two fliers out, neither of which included anything other than party propoganda (basically all about what the party leader would do as PM) and nothing about how he would represent us in Ottawa. Party C delivered one flier, the day before the election which didn't even have candidate C's name on it but just some info about the party leader. Wanna guess who I'm sending to Ottawa?

All right, with that said on with the knitting....

I cast on again for my ISE scarf, I'm knitting it the long way (read: 265 stitches on a 100cm needle) I must be nuts because it's driving me crazy with all those stitches crammed together. If nothing else it's almost done so I can have this commitment nightmare over, the pressure is just too much.

2006-01-19T22:22:00.000-05:00

What an absolutely horrible day. I spent more than five hours in the dentist chair today and another two almost passed out in pain. Let me biging by saying I am TERRIFIED of dentists in general (sorry A, you're the exception I promise) and I haven't been for cash flow reasons in a while but I had a toothache that started last week and I was getting to the end of my rope. So I went on Tuesday for xrays and such and the news wasn't good and I had to come back today to have some cavities filled. So they were filled and DR. M told me that I had avoided a root canal, fine so I went on my merry way glad that it was taken care of...until the freezing wore off and I was in ten times the pain I was at the start of this whole affair. So I had to drag O back from the office to take me back for an almost four hour dental marathon to have the root canal done. Needless to say my jaw is sore from having my mouth propped open so long and neck pain from sitting in the chair (and to add insult to injury I have to go back on Tuesday to have it more permanently filled).

In other news I've entered the Knitting Olympics, I'm hoping to knit Kiri in KSH, I must be out of my mind to think I can get it done in sixteen days. Well, it's all about the challenge right? There are a few others knitting it too so there should be some solidarity in our craziness if nothing else.

In less encouraging news I'm still not decided on my ISE scarf and the deadline is flying towards us at incredible speed....wish me luck.

2006-01-08T22:31:00.000-05:00

SP7 starts at the end of the week and I'm getting excited!

1. Are you a yarn snob (do you prefer higher quality and/or natural fibers)? Do you avoid Red Heart and Lion Brand? I’ll have to admit that I am. I prefer natural fibers to man-mades but I don’t have to have the most expensive thing either (I loooove Knitpicks). A nice basic all purpose yarn is great no matter what natural fiber it is.

2. Do you spin? Crochet? I can crochet but haven’t in years and don’t have any projects planned. I’m learning to spin with a drop spindle.

3. What do you use to store your needles/hooks in? I have a roll up case for my dpn’s, my few straights and my addi collection are in large ziplock bags.

4. How long have you been knitting? Would you consider your skill level to be beginner, intermediate or advanced? I leared to knit about twenty years ago but have just come back to it in a serious way in the last two years. I’d say I’m intermediate to advanced and I’m always trying new things to try and improve my skills. Luckily being on maternity leave gives me lots of time to work on it.

5. Do you have an Amazon or other online wish list? No.

6. What's your favorite scent? (for candles, bath products etc.) I like vanilla and spicy sort of scents.

7. Do you have a sweet tooth? Favorite candy? Any sort of junk food is wonderful, I’d love to say I’m not a junk eater but it would be a total lie. Any candy is good candy.

8. What other crafts or Do-It-Yourself things do you like to do? I'm almost finished a patchwork quilt for my son but I don't see myself doing another one anytime soon.

9. What kind of music do you like? Can your computer/stereo play MP3s? (if your buddy wants to make you a CD) It’s probably easier to say that I don’t like country or Opera, other than that I’ll listen to it. Our cd collection is very diverse. Yes, I can play MP3s.

10. What's your favorite color? Or--do you have a color family/season/palette you prefer? Any colors you just can't stand? My favorite colour is green like my eyes but I love any intense or vibrant (read: non-pastel) colours, earth and natural tones are great too. I really don’t like yellow much.

11. What is your family situation? Do you have any pets? I’m married with a six month old son. No pets.

12. Do you wear scarves, hats, mittens or ponchos? Yes, yes, yes and no.

13. What is/are your favorite yarn/s to knit with? My current fav is Artyarns followed closely by Koigu and Noro. I use a lot of vareigated yarns.

14. What fibers do you absolutely *not* like? The more I work with it the less I like superwash wool, acrylics.

15. What is/are your current knitting obsession/s? Basically just knitting in general. I’ll go through a sock phase, then a scarf phase then I’ll knit baby clothes intensely for a while, then lace…. I have knitting ADD.

16. What is/are your favorite item/s to knit? I’m really loving lace and socks right now.

17. What are you knitting right now? The flower basket shawl from Fall 2004 Interweave and the backyard leaves scarf from Scarf Style among other smaller projects.

18. Do you like to receive handmade gifts? I love being given something someone spent their time on, to me that is the ultimate expression of caring.

19. Do you prefer straight or circular needles? I mostly work with circs (I’m building an Addi collection) but I find them a bit too fast for lace work so I want to start getting some bamboo circs. Dpn’s are cool too.

20. Bamboo, aluminum, plastic? I prefer bamboo and aluminum.

21. Do you own a yarn winder and/or swift? Both.

22. How did you learn to knit? My aunt Val taught me to knit and purl when I was about seven or eight but I hadn’t knit in years, I picked it back up when I was pregnant and have taught myself tons with books and knittinghelp.com.

23. How old is your oldest UFO? Thanks to the WIP along blog it’s only about 3 months old, a cardigan for myself in Manos del Uruguay. The girls have encouraged me to clear the backlog a fair bit.

24. What is your favorite animated character or a favorite animal/bird? Monkeys!

25. What is your favorite holiday? I’m a Christmas person, I love giving gifts.

26. Is there anything that you collect? Clay Chinese teapots, it’s a staple Christmas and brithday gift from my husband every year and I so look forward to them.

27. What knitting magazine subscriptions do you have? I get Interweave Knits but I usually buy Vogue and Spin-Off from the newstand.

28. Any books, yarns, needles or patterns out there you are dying to get your hands on? Any lace books or stitch dictionary sort of books, I drool over them in my LYS. I’d love to try SWTC’s soy silk or anything from Alchemy, I can’t seem to find them anywhere local. I love Fibertrends lace patterns too. I'm longing to try Lorna's Laces Helen's Lace, maybe with my income tax refund....

29. Are there any new techniques you'd like to learn? I’d like to get better at Fair Isle and try a steeked sweater.

30. Are you a sock knitter? What are your foot measurements? I love knitting socks but I like to do them with great dk and worsted yarns for cozy warm feet. I wear a European shoe size 39.5.

31. When is your birthday? (mm/dd) December 12th.

2006-01-08T21:58:00.000-05:00

So keeping to my resolution I've had my yarn buying day for this month. S and I met and hit Lettuce Knit, Romni and Knitomatic yesterday in a yarny whirlwind few hours. I actually bought very little (for me): some SWTC Bamboo way on sale, supermarino for my ISE knitting (more about this later) and some KPPPM for me for socks. My first trip to Lettuce Knit and it may have to be a monthly adventure I think.

So I've finally bowed to the pressure and started my ISE scarf. Just to preface this, although I often knit for gifts I have yet to knit for a knitter. I was having a terrible time deciding on yarn and pattern, the pressure was too much! Something for DH or DS is always appreciated but they don't have the same critical eye for knitting (and luckily also for knitting mistakes) that a fellow woman of wool might. Looking at all the pics of everyone's progress on the blog was a lot of pressure to preform and I don't knit well when I'm being "forced" to knit. So at this point I've bought three different lots of yarn and swatched more patterns than I can count trying to come up with the just perfect combination of SSS (soft, stylish and snuggly). In the end even the most recent yarn purchase (see supermarino above which will now become socks for me) didn't make the grade, I've pulled something out of the stash that was bought for a project for me to use and after much agonizing the pattern is starting to make some sense too. I'm working on my first two charted patterns right now and it's taking some getting used to. Now that it's getting down to the wire though I'm nervous I won't get the scarf done on time to mail to it's destination as something I mailed to the USA in the Holiday SP round took almost a month to arrive. The only thing that's making me feel better about my procrastination is that my scarf hasn't arrived yet either.

I spent half the evening pureeing "real people food" for M. More applesauce and some carrots. I have visions of little gobs of orange mush everywhere because he thinks it's really funny to blow on the spoon when it's almost in his mouth and spraying me with little drops of his dinner.

2006-01-06T18:15:00.000-05:00

Happy Half-Year Birthday to little M!!! I can't believe just six months ago I was as big as a house. People can tell you the time goes so fast but until you've been there you don't really realize, it's zoomed by.

Mommy and Daddy eagerly awaiting the little person's arrival.

With Grandpa on his second day in the world, my poor dad looked so nervous.

I didn't think it was possible that I could love him more than I did on the day that he was born but I find that every day my heart gets a little bit more full. A big thanks to O for giving me such an incredible gift.

2006-01-05T15:11:00.000-05:00

So glad the holidays are over, time to unwind. O and I have spent just about every waking moment watching 24 which we've become totally addicted to (I'm having dreams, or is that nightmares, with the ticking clock in them). We caught a marathon on A&E on Boxing day having never seen it before and since we've watched two entire seasons. I can't wait for the new season to start next week.

I've decided to make som resoclutions of the knitting kind, I need to get this stash under control so I'm going to try and post some trades on Knitty to get rid of some of the stuff I'm never going to use. I'm also going to limit my yarn buying to one day per month, I can buy what I want on that day provided I have the cash to pay for it. I'm hoping that this'll make me less prone to impulse purchases and make me think a bit more carefully about what I buy (plus less buying days means more knitting days so hopefully I'll knit up some of what I'm storing). I actually cast on for my Flower Basket Shawl I've been wanting to do for a while with stash yarn thins morning. MY fist adventure in charts so we'll see how it goes.

In other knitting news SP7 starts next week so I'm looking forward to that, I had such a good time last time both spoiling and being spoiled rotten! I'm obsessively checking my e-mail box for my pal's info.

The munchkin started fruit this past week, O bought a book with baby food recipies so I made him some applesauce. He was pretty resistant to it at first but now he doesn't seem to mind. Another week and I'll start him on some carrots I think.

2005-12-26T23:20:00.000-05:00

A post for Peggy (because I know I'm driving her nuts)...

It's been a very hectic few weeks with Christmas and all. So much Christmas knitting to get done and a few things knit for me in the last little while too. Have a look at the WIP blog for that (see the link over there ---->). I had huge felting problems which led to a very teary call to Ram Wool's customer service on Friday. In the end I gave Daddy a touque because his clogs barely felted so if Shaq needs some slippers he can give me a call (after I was up past 2am finishing the knitting).

Christmas was fun though. We did brunch with O's mom last weekend which was nice, she spoiled all of us rotten (M in particular). He got a great rocking chair that's getting a ton of use already seeing as how he's totally grown out of the playdome now. After Christmas with his mom one of O's dad's family members threw M a baby shower so he got a bunch of great stuff there too; an exersaucer from Great Grandma is taking up half the living room right now. O did the big dinner yesterday with my family which was so good, the only cruddy part is that there weren't too many leftovers but there's a pot of soup on the stove right now. M was, as expected, spoiled rotten with toys, clothes and some really great books from my family. Everyone seemed to like their knitwear too. O really spoiled me: another teapot to add to my collection, an iPod (I was mourning the death of my minidisk player which died of overuse) and from O and M the most beautiful gold locket that I'm going to put a picture of each of them in.

If you've looked at M's blog you'll know that he's on solids now if you can call rice and wheat cereal solid. He didn't seem impressed the first few days but he's turned into a little hoover now. Hopefully he'll get back to gaining weight like he was before. Still no teeth but the drooling is getting worse by the day it seems so hopefully not long now. O's sister was here from Calgary for a quick visit a few weeks ago which was great, she flew in for an extended weekend as a surprise to see us all and meet her nephew.

I found out my Blog SP was Peggy at Rainberry Blue, go over and visit her and say hello (I like to go and pinch B's cheeks on the computer screen he's so cute). The last package from her was huge and heavy (have I mentioned I am so spoiled?). She sent me a new spindle, some vanilla scented bath products, roving to spin, hot chocolate, very cute yarn and the coolest spinning kit among other things. The kit is all the fiber to spin and knit a really cool pair of gloves, now that my Christmas knitting is done I can get started. A huge thank you to you Peggy for tsking such good care of me over the last few months.

My Knitty Holiday SP was Stariel who you can visit at her blog Stariel Knits. She sent me my first Sari silk which I'm hoping to get to sometime soon. Have a look at all of her FOs on the WIP blog, she's putting us all to shame.

All right, that's it for now. I'm tired and sick and I need to go to bed.

2005-12-04T14:47:00.000-05:00

It's been a while. Not much new just knitting up a storm for Christmas which seems to be approaching at the speed of light. I really don't have that much left to do but I'll still be panicking until it's totally done.

Little M seems to be teething so he's not really that happy these days, poor kid is drooling everywhere it seems. Because he puts everything he can get his hands on in his mouth O keeps putting a cloth in his mouth and telling him to wipe his face, which of course he does (funny stuff I tell ya). He goes to the doctor again this week so we'll see how he's growing.

The company kid's Christmas party was last weekend and I'm looking forward to seeing M's picture with Santa, he just stared at the ceiling as far as I could tell. I was impressed that he didn't cry at all. It was at the same convention center where the adult party was last night which didn't have either a changing table or anywhere to breastfeed (which makes me wonder what the social committee were thinking when they chose the space). There were kids being changed on the floor in the bathroom (ewww!, luckily M is still small enough to change on the counter between the sinks) and kids being fed in bathroom stalls (double ewwwww!).

Stuff to do, more later maybe. In the meantime check out http://markusjeffrey.blogspot.com for new pics of the monkey.

2005-11-21T23:06:00.000-05:00

Ahhh another Monday; the weekend seemed to go so quickly. Mail on Friday from my SP again, she's more than spoiled me now. Among other pressies there was a Phildar magazine that I've been looking at for awhile but didn't buy because I'm barely remembering my one high school French class but I really loved the little double breasted baby coat on the cover. She sent not only the mag but the English translation, so of course it took me less than an hour to get anxious and order the yarn for the coat (like I don't have enough yarn ready to be cast on as it is). SO thank you, thank you, thank you to my SP!!! I'm getting really curious who she is, the more I get e-mails from here and such the more I think she's someone I would easily be friends with in person.

Looks like little M is starting to teethe. The doctor says that it's a bit early but not unheard of as he's chewing on everything in sight all of a sudden poor kid.

2005-11-15T10:50:00.000-05:00

Christmas knitting is going nowhere fast it seems. The more I get done the more there seems needs to be done. I hate knitting for FOs not just for enjoyment, being under a deadline sucks. Not to mention I'm having pattern probs up the wazoo which is an even bigger disincentive to work on any of this. Oh well, there's a gift I've been wanting to make for somebody for a while that I might cast on just to give myself a little break.

The spinning class on the weekend was great, I've started to spin some yarn for a hat for O and I'm finding it really relaxing. The class was taught with bottom whorl spindles but I'm really liking the top whorl my SP sent way better as I'm getting better speed and way less wobble with it. I hate to say it but I feel a new obsession coming on. I'd love for someone ask me where I got my (insert knit item here) and be able to tell them I knit it myself with yarn I made.

I started a little project for work this week, now if IT could get their acts together and fix my laptop I'd be a lot happier. I needed something to challenge my brain a bit and give me some adult contact (not to mention a few hours of work here and there to be paid at a later date when it won't interfere with my mat leave benefits). Hopefully by the time my benefits run out I'll have amassed enough hours to pay for a semester of school and I can go back and finish this degree finally, I hate being so close and not being finished. Hopefully this also puts my foot in the door to do some more special projects coming up when I go back (and hopefully part time while I'm in school).

M and I got needles yesterday so we're both a little cranky this morning. He got his four month vaccines at the doctor and I got my flu shot. The little man didn't cry at all when he got them, a bit of a yelp when the first one went in because he wasn't expecting it but he was so brave.

2005-11-11T21:01:00.000-05:00

I'm so excited, my spinning class is tomorrow at "yarn heaven". Finally I'll learn how to use the drop spindle my wonderful SP sent me! I signed up for this months ago it seems. Now I hear there's another package on it's way from my SP, I am one spoiled little momma....

2005-11-09T00:03:00.000-05:00

Holy crazy windstorm the other night Batman! The good part I guess is that we acquired a fishing net in the deal, it blew off the balcony of the appartment above us and onto ours along with a bunch of branches from the willow trees by the pool. I cleared off the branches but I'm not going to be so quick to do anything about the net (insert evil little laugh here). I thought the windows were going to shatter at one point, they're not sealed that well and they were rattling in their panes.

Been a bit busy dealing with the little man by myself the last few days while Daddy's hunting. To all the single mothers out there I truly don't know how you do it, I'm about to have a meltdown and it's only been a few days. You are clearly stronger women than I. I really don't do well by myself and being alone all day with M is enough to drive me over the edge on days when I know O's on his way home but knowing it's going to be days before I see him is torture. I worry constantly about him, I almost think it would be better if I didn't know what they were doing. I feel a lot like a big piece of me is missing when he's not around, the good part.

In knitting news, I have Cozy and the blasted cabled baby blanket done. I feel a bit better now that my oldest UFO is off the needles and I'm making some noticeable progress on Christmas gifts and have two SP pressies are finished. I got some packages together today for SP6 and the Holiday SP round, an excuse to go to the mall and pick up some bits and pieces. I'm beginning to think Canada Post may send me a Christmas card for my patronage this year...lol. I've decided that the only thing I love better than shopping for myself is spoiling other people, no wonder I love Christmas so much. I also signed up for the International Scarf Exchange 2, hoping to get my match in the next few days so I can plan some post Christmas knitting.

Freaking Debbie Bliss!!! I can't believe I've let myself be drawn in again, it never fails that I have problems with her patterns and yarns but seem to be inexplicably pulled by some odd magnetic force to knit them anyway. This time it's the man slippers from the Simple Living book. I thought they'd be a good gift for Daddy (I'm a terrible daddy's girl can you tell? about to be 27 and still calling him Daddy) but the pattern has so many problems I was about to throw both the pattern and half knit left slipper out the bus window this afternoon. Apparently she can't count to 49. Had the slipper not been on my much loved 3.75mm addi turbo it would have gone and I wouldn't have felt bad about it either. I suppose it's a teeny tiny smidge my fault that I thought this time would be different.

Almost forgot, I want to say thanks to my HSP for such a cute card (I love Taz!) and Terby who sent me some beautiful stitch markers and chocolates that arrived on a day when I was feeling a bit off, you made my day.

2005-10-31T10:55:00.000-05:00

Been a busy few days. First I need to thank my wonderful SP for the pressies I got in the mail on Thursday. She sent me mucho candy (didn't last long enough to take a pic), a copy of Yarn Harlot which I've already started reading and is making my stomach ache I laugh so hard, some Noro Shinano to add to my growing obsession with all things Noro and a treater for M. The yarn is really pretty and I know exactly what I'm going to make with it.

2005-10-24T12:03:00.000-04:00

Look, it's a felty pumpkin! It's going to be M's "great pumpkin" for his Charlie Brown halloween costume.

2005-10-21T15:19:00.000-04:00

I swear he just gets cuter everyday!

2005-10-20T11:38:00.000-04:00

So much for yarn diet, I had the yarny equivalent of a whole cheesecake yesterday. That yummy yarn I was making my secret SP something with? Yeah, I bought more and it's going to be part of a cardigan. Going to my SnB last night way bad news for my fiber waistline but it was cool to see so many more people starting to come out.

I've started on cozy from Knitty to wear with my dress and it's coming out beautifully. I'm using some cashmerino aran in beige and it looks really similar to the picture and is really nice and soft. The dress I'll wear with it is either my navy or black one so it should go with both. I'm surprised how fast it's knitting up.

The couch has finally arrived! Finally, but still no ottoman. Maybe on the weekend.

2005-10-17T15:18:00.000-04:00

I'm a big cheater. See that new WIP there on the right----> ? That something for my SP? Well, I'm feeling a bit guilty about it really. I bought the most fabulous yarn that I know my SP would love, it's a wonderful mix of her colours. But then I got tempted. I loved the yarn so much that petting it turned into knitting with it and now I think she has an FO coming rather than the yarn itself. Is that wrong? The thing has literally flown off the needles and I love it so much I may need to make myself a the same secret something in order to be able to part with it.

Seems we've been invited to a possible fancy dress party and I have nothing to wear. Nothing, that is, unless I can knit a wrap of some sort between now and then so I can wear a summery sort of dress which is about the only thing I own fancy enough for the occasion so I'm on the lookout for free patterns.

My yarn diet starts today, I'm so broke right now I don't even want to talk about it.

2005-10-14T10:13:00.000-04:00

It's been a busy few days. I feel like I'm keeping Canada Post in business just recently. I mail a SP package, two RAKs, a swap, a cd to my SIL and four thank you cards yesterday. No wonder the people at the postal outlet get giddy smiles on when they see me coming.

Between Walmart and Fabricland I still can't find a good backing fabric for M's quilt. There's just so many colours and patterns on the quilt top that I want the border and backing fabric to be a nice solid, then I can make his curtains and crib dust ruffle to match and the whole thing won't be so overwhelming. I'm going to get baby S's quilt started in the meantime so I'm washing all the fabrics hoping to get at least some of the squares cut this afternoon. Now to figure out what to make for Agnes and Grace's babies before they come....

O called the Bay yesterday about the, still awol, couch. He's asked for a manager to call him back but barring that (I mean, nobody else has called us back when they promised to so why start now right?). I just worry that if they give us our money back it'll be in the form of a gift card because that's what we paid with. If only we had a gift certificate somewhere else we could have gone somewhere else(read: Sears) to buy it and not had to deal with all this. If we get a gift card back I'm going to be very reluctant to spend it.

2005-10-12T21:07:00.000-04:00

Ohhh dear, it's been awhile so I'm going to cover a lot of ground in this one post. So last week really truly sucked. I hate when O's away and not being in my own space with my own things isn't a lot of fun.

In better news I taught myself to knit socks last week, I'm so proud! Now I can use the yummy yarn my sp sent and actually do it justice. Here they are:

Now I'm working on some camo socks for O so that I can use up the yarn I bought for his and K's touques. I currently have a freezer nearly full of moose and they're headed out to see about some deer this weekend. We may not be buying meat for a very long time.

So dad's finally on the road to recovery, he's back to the "honey do" list for the condo seing as how their vacation was a bust. Mom promises the place will be done by Christmas, we'll see...it's been a comedy of errors so far.

M got to meet his uncle N on the weekend, he was down for the holiday at mom and dad's. Lots of good stories about his summer and presents for the little man, a stuffed hippo from Kenya. Na was pretty taken (read: terrified) of the little guy.

I've requested some more Knitty RAK addresses so I'm going to get some more packages out in the mail tomorrow with luck. I was out to buy the last few little gifts today at the mall. I looked for fabric to finish M's quilt at Walmart but didn't see anything I was wild on. The top is done now so it's just time to do the finishing. I picked up everything to do one for K's new baby S: some really cute Winnie the Pooh fabrics and a really pretty rose coloured backing material so I'll probably get that started in the meantime. I guess a Fabricland run is in order.

2005-09-29T17:56:00.000-04:00

I am sooo spoiled! A package arrived from my sp this week which was so great seeing as how it's been a bit of a bad week. I'm excited about learning to spin with my new drop spindle and I got some of the most gorgeous sock yarn I've ever seen, great greens and reds. I'm going to try the training sock pattern from Knitty first and get the hang of socks and dpn's before I use it though, I want the knitting to be just as perfect as the yarn. There were really pretty stitch markers (already in use), some chocolate (Otto says thanks) and hand and lip wonderfulness in the box too.

So daddy's still in the hospital. The stone was blasted on Monday but now he's developed an infection so they're keeping him until that's under control so no vacation for he and mom next week. At least this means that they'll be around for thanksgiving so N can come home and meet his new nephew. I know they have their own lives but I was a bit dissapointed that none of my siblings were around for M's birth.

So M and I are staying with S next week while K and O are at the hunt camp. Things being as they are we don't want her to be alone and I know O will be dissapointed if Kyle doesn't go hunting particularly given all the preparation they've done already.

2005-09-22T17:38:00.000-04:00

Yay, branching out is done! On to other knitty things. Clapotis scarf is done too but I had to let KnitPixie know that their pattern was flawed, I couldn't figure out how they got the last two ladders to drop from the way the pattern was written but I've let them know. Now that it's done though I'm not sure I'm that happy with it, the Silk Garden striped oddly and I think the yarn is telling me it wants to be something else. O's yarn finally arrived so I'm winding balls to start on his camoflage hat and mitts.

Talked to N yesterday, sounds like his summer in Kenya was pretty memorable and I'm hoping he'll send some pictures. He did after all get home without being eaten by a lion like mom feared the whole time he was away.

In somewhat less happy news dad is in the hospital again. Kidney stones. I only found out when I called mom to ask about their vacation plans and thanksgiving and asked her what was wrong. Supposedly he was supposed to be transfered to the hospital in London to have the stones blasted because he's in agony. They kept him in because oral pain meds weren't doing anything so they put him on gravity meds to control it. I'm hoping mom will call today to tell me what's going on.