Sunday, July 25, 2010

New Project Alert and Product Review

After discussing my Xenocryst hat w/ D & B yesterday, I've decided to not use the Cascade 220 in the Dark Teal Heather colorway. I still plan to do the hat and matching Bella's Mittens, but I need to use a lighter color so that the work in the cables can be seen. The hat has been frogged and put away as if it never existed, but I'll come back to it. I might still grab a lighter shade of 220 or louet Riverstone and take the Xenocryst on my trip. I can probably bang out most, if not of it, on the plane ride to and from Seattle.


The bigger project that I started last night and will take with me is the Stay-Put Wrap by Mags Kandis shown here on the left. Anyone who has seen even a glimpse of me knows I couldn't pull off that horrible shade of toasted pumpkin if my life depended on it. That shade tried to get into my "I'm-a-cool-Summer" color palette, but it was run out of town.




It should come as no surprise that my wrap is going to be blue. I chose Lamb's Pride worsted in M-57, Brite Blue colorway. I just cast on last night, but I was able to do 3 or 4 inches. I need to track down the errata on this pattern before I get too far along. I've read online that there is/are errata, and I'm not ripping and re-doing this thing. By the time I get done, I'll never want to do another row of seed stitch so I'll get it right the first time. And speaking of which, I figured out how I made the error on the Everyone's Doing it Shrug.


Here is the culprit: The Clover brand piece-of-crap counter. Last night I was counting rows while memorizing the Stay-Put Wrap cable pattern and one click added 11 to the number on the counter. Uh huh. That's right. This counter caused my shrug sleeve to be exactly 10 rows short.

Here is the counter after being whacked w/ a hammer. For what it's worth, I would suggest that you either buy a better clicker or use a piece of paper and pencil before investing in this particular piece of junk.


Okay. I'm signing off now. I can't put off the packing any longer. I'll have pictures of my projects when I return from my trip. Bye!

Saturday, July 24, 2010

I'd Rather Blog Than Pack...

Since I ended yesterday's post talking about tomatoes, that's where I'll start today. But don't worry...I have a bunch of knitting stuff to get to.

Check out these guys! I can't even say how awesome they are. I love the fact that for the rest of the summer I don't have to pay outrageously expensive fees for tomatoes that taste like...nothing. (Hey Ma, there's no tomato in my tomato!)
Did I mention I'm on vacation? Kidding. Of course I did. The first thing I did last night was get my hair done. (Backstreet Salon in Medford, MA) I love having my hair done. It's really peaceful there. The ladies all talking...the trashy magazines...the smell of the bleach...the feel of the wax ripping the unwanted hair off my face (Yes, my eyebrows are rocking the house right now...Mustache? What mustache?).
I wanted to post some pictures of the Xenocryst Hat (by Linda Shelhamer) that I'm making. It calls for the Estonian Double Cast-on, which I'd never even heard of so of course I didn't know how to do it. There's a great tutorial video on You Tube: It's stretchy, it's decorative and it's Estonian - or so I've heard. I was able to get it without too much difficulty and here it is on the left. It's basically a regular continental long-tail cast on with an extra step and a double tail. Sorry if I'm getting too technical for you non-knitters. I'll knock it off. You can see that I'm about two inches in, and I've got a couple issues. First of all, there is no way this this is going to fit on the head of an adult. It's not the fault of the pattern, but the fault of the knitter (me). I'm an extremely tight knitter, so I need to switch to a bigger needle. At least I didn't get too far into it, because it's getting frogged (translation: ripped out) this afternoon. The other issue is the color. The cables are really beautiful, and they are hard to see b/c the teal is so dark. I'm trying to knit from my stash and I've got a ton of this colorway (1500 grams) so I figured I could use one hank on this hat and four or so on Bella's Mittens I'll do to go with. I'll ask D & B to opine when they get here later.
That takes me to the "Is Everybody REALLY Doing It? Shrug". That's the Holly version of the Everyone's Doing It Shrug by Megyn. What a complete nightmare. Here's the recap: D made and was wearing the shrug in less than a week. Holly thought, Cool! I'm looking for a quick project, but I'm going to add extra rows of seed stitch for sleeves and make it a bit longer down the back. Right HERE is where someone should've stopped me. I was 19 rows from completion and I knew I wasn't going to have enough yarn. D was here and held it while I frogged it directly onto the winder. I then cast on again with 44 instead of 48 stitches so it wouldn't be as long down the back. I blew through it and here it is. I sewed up the first "sleeve", tried it on and I loved it.



I then lined up the second sleeve and I realized I had a problem. It's a good one, too: The problem is that even though I used a row counter for the second sleeve, I still somehow managed to skip 1 1/4 inches of seed stitch. What the hell? If someone finds my brain, could you please return it? So it's not that big a deal. I can just undo the bind off, do another 10 rows of seed stitch, bind off and sew up the sleeve, right? No... I'm out of yarn. I need about 5 grams of yarn and it comes in 200 gram hanks (200 grams is enough to knit a whole 'nother shrug). So given the choice of A) Frogging it AGAIN, B) taking it out to the driveway and setting it on fire, C) buying another hank of which I need a fraction, or D) throwing it in the closet with the other dead UFOs to never be seen again, what did I do? That's right; I bought another hank. I'm not knitting this thing a third time. I can barely stand the sight of it now.

I'm still trying to finish up the organization of my stash. I'm at the point of winding half skeins and random bits - primarily Lamb's Pride and Cascade 220. I make a lot of felted bags, so I have tons of worsted weight laying around. The spaghetti looking yarn in the foreground was the stranded part of a lovely mitten that has been mostly done for a year and a half. B says finish it or frog it. Indeed.
Gotta scoot. Thanks for stopping by...

Friday, July 23, 2010

No Pictures Today...

I'm being bad. I'm at work, but I only have an hour and a half until my vacation begins. I've pretty much wrapped everything up and I'm in a holding pattern until I leave to have my hair done at 4PM.
You probably think it's been 10 days since my last post, but there was an extra one in there from Sunday that I pulled after the fact. I needed to do a MAJOR edit after posting (generally I'll go in and fix a typo or misspell if I find any) but blogger wouldn't let me. I got so tangled up and frustrated that I just deleted the entire post. AND sadly for all of you, it was loaded w/ all kinds of fun knitting pictures. Speaking of pictures, you'll never guess who knocked my camera off my desk and broke it. (Hint: Spoiled, obnoxious, siamese who feels compelled to break things if I'm not giving her enough attention.) I'm going to Seattle Monday, so if I can't get the duct tape to work its magic on the Nikon, I'll have to get a new one over the weekend. I'm being a little more realistic this trip in terms of what I'll actually knit, so I'm only taking two projects. Maybe three. I'm working on the Xenocryst Hat by Linda Shelhamer that's in the Knitscene that just came out. I'm using Cascade 220 in a heathered dark teal and I'm going to make a pair of Bella's Mittens by Marielle Henault (in the 220 doubled) to match. Both items are holiday gifts for my sister-in-law. She lives in NC, but it must be cold enough for mittens and a hat at least some of the time. The other project that I may or may not take with me is the Jubilee Scarf by Norah Gaughan. I started it May 1st, and it has been resting since I got home from Las Vegas on May 16th. Seriously. I took the baggie out of my suitcase, put it on the table in my bedroom and have not touched it since. Nice follow-though Hols. Anyway, I'm using Louisa Harding Mulberry for the Jubilee. (Sorry about the lack of links, but I'm being lazy.)
I'm very excited about my trip on Monday. Last year when I was out in Seattle, my friend S and I took a mini holiday up to Victoria, BC. This year we're taking a mini holiday here: http://www.alderbrookresort.com/ I've been practically dreaming about it...the peace...the quiet...the spa treatments...and no access to healthcare quality data! I couldn't analyze anything - even if I wanted to. YIPPEE!!
I'll try to get a post w/ pictures up before I leave. I have a bunch of lovely, yellow cherry tomatoes that I'd like to show off. After last year's blight, I only put in a couple tomato plants, but they're going crazy. I'll blather on more about the veggies at a later date. Bye for now.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

New Books, New Yarn and Hot Flashes...

Did you ever fall asleep in the late afternoon, then wake up in the early evening not knowing what day it is? I mean is it 8PM on Saturday or 8AM on Sunday?? And why isn't my brain able to process this very important question? It was the light - the light wasn't right for 8AM - even taking the thunderstorms into consideration, plus America's Funniest Home Videos was on when I woke up (Oh - the humanity!) and I don't think Tom Bergeron does 8AM. Did you know he's from Massachusetts? Yeah... I remember when he was here. Anyway, I'm exhausted. I can't sleep to save my ass. My life as I knew it has been decimated by hot flashes. No kidding. I am a walking, talking hot flash. Since March, I've been on a diet VERY heavy in soy protein - like over 70 grams/day. Soy in high doses mimics estrogen, so for three months I tricked my body into thinking it was young and happening. The joke's on me. My bod came back with, "Exactly who do you think you're dealing with? Your eggs are cooked and there's nothing you can do about it." Now I'm back to where I started, with both friends and strangers looking at me in horror - asking if I'm okay as I overheat, melt and nearly pass out in front of them - damp and freezing five minutes later.

The July 4th holiday has come and gone since my last entry. Everyone was home, which was cool. My sister H liked my bulky sweater, so I gave it to her. Maybe she'll let me wear it when I'm in Tahoe in the fall...





No trip home is complete without a trek to Freeport, and while there, I picked up a few knitting books at Sherman's Bookstore (which I need like another hole in my head). I've been meaning to pick up Knit 2 Together for a while; there's a shrug in there that I want to make but I don't think I'll do that now. I've been trying to decide what to do next. I want to start something kind of meaty, but it has been so hot that I can't deal with a ton of wool draped across my lap. I keep looking through pattern books, and keep coming back to the Janis Joplin coat by Jill Stover. This one I won't give away to one of my sisters. It's for me, and I can wear it in the fall. Tomorrow D, B and I are going down to Pawtucket to see the PSox play. (Beckett has a rehab start, which is crazy lucky for us!) D will probably drive, so I can spend some time either thinking about what to cast on, or actually casting on Janis. We'll see.

When I was in my room a few minutes ago, there was a commercial on with a guy named Dr. Richard Bock. He was saying, "Are you or is someone you know addicted to Narcotics?" I thought, hmm - I'm addicted to yarn. I wonder if there's a program for that. I bought some new yarn today, but I'll get to that in a minute. I'm really diggin' the fact that I organized the stash last week and put it all up on Ravelry. Today while I was out and about, I was looking at a pattern that called for 19 hanks of Berroco Softwist. I know I have some b/c I just inventoried it, but do I have 19 hanks?? I take out my handy BlackBerry, sign on to Ravelry and look at my stash, which has 22 hanks of Softwist - plenty to make the sweater in question. Wow. If I'm not careful - I'm going to come off as organized.

Today I bought some Debbie Bliss Alpaca Silk Aran for a specific project, and some Noro Retro which is headed to the stash. The Alpaca Silk Aran is just sick. It is so gorgeous that I just want to hold it against my face. I'm not sure what to do w/ the Noro. I'm not a Noro lover, but maybe I'll like it once I work w/ it. Everyone else seems to like it. The only reason I like the Retro is because it is solid in Color. All the color variation in the Noro yarns bug me. I mean seriously, if you are buying yarn because of the blue/green/gray variegation, do you want to suddenly run into a big blob of orange? I don't. Anyway, the color is greener than it looks in the picture to the left.
I'm going to sign off. It's almost 11P and I need to go to sleep. Hopefully I'll get some cool shots of Josh Beckett tomorrow, which I'll post next time. Thanks for stopping by!


Friday, July 2, 2010

Quick Wrap Up...


So. I went through MOST of the stash. Here is the stuff that is done.


And here is the stuff that is not done. Most of the not done stuff consists of long dead UFOs which I should frog. I probably will - just not today. I've looked at the yarn enough already.
H is going to get into Logan in about half an hour so I should scoot. I accidentally mentioned her by name in my earlier post. Sorry H - I outed you as my sister.
Happy 4th to all! Happy Birthday Mom!

Stash Inventory/Organization Update

I'm in hell. That's the whole update.

I've been planning to give the yarn its own room for quite some time, but haven't gotten around to it. I've been hauling it up to the attic, and left unattended, it has been breeding up there. I was totally pumped this morning around 7:00 when I was bringing it all down, but by about 8:00 I was not so psyched.



This is what the yarn looked like when I got started this morning.




And after five hours of work, this is what it looks like now.
I've loaded 28 different yarns into Ravelry, which means they have been logged, counted, photographed and reloaded into a bin (based on either project or yarn). I need to get the hell out of Dodge, so I'm going to Target to get some more bins.
Heather's flight appears to have taken off on time. I was going to make guac, but didn't get around to buying the avacados. I also considered making nut brittle, but that is a holiday thing so I also blew that off. Now I feel kind of bad b/c there isn't a speck of food in this house. Luckily we're not opposed to restaurants.
Yesterday I bought this very cool book entitled No Idle Hands - The Social History of American Knitting. It's pretty cool; I'm in Colonial times right now. Who would've thunk it?? The history of knitting in America. Hmm.
Off to Target. Catch 'ya later.