Non-Knitting Related

Is anyone else addicted to I can has cheezburger? Does anyone else think fondly of time spent playing Oregon Trail?



Too funny. (Click to see the caption more clearly.)

Striped Socks

I have to confess... I love knitting socks. I love sock yarn. I love all the patterns that I'm not brave enough to try yet. I have made exactly two pairs of socks, with another sock on the needles, and I'm contemplating casting on one more, since last night I finished this:



My second pair. Here's a side view:



I'm aware that the heel flaps don't match up. I feel no need to explain this. Both socks fit comfortably, and that's what matters.

I'm also aware that the stripes don't match up perfectly, either. My socks are fraternal, rather than identical. I love them equally.

Today I plan to buy the yarn for David's kilt hose. I'm still trying to figure out something wonderful and special I can make for Abby for a wedding present. (Yes, they're getting separate presents. Shut up. Just because they're getting married doesn't mean they can't get separate presents. They'll still be two people, after all!) I'm aiming for "not a creepy gift to give your sister-in-law," so no negligees, thongs, or garters. Any suggestions? Abby, feel free to make a request!

Yesterday's Progress

I had a very satisfying evening yesterday. On the way home from work I picked up some dinner, which I ate while mentally composing my Important Letter. My Important Letter came much more easily than I had expected, which was nice. I sent that off and added the pictures to my last entry, then got out the Scrubbing Bubbles and scrub brush and set to work cleaning out my bathtub, which was covered with grime from its recent adventure with clogs and Roto-Rooter. Man, I wish I had taken a picture before cleaning--it was nasty. Now, however, it is sparkly and clean. Hooray!

And after that, I got out my knitting.


I made a fish. A brown one.



I worked on my brazen attempt to turn an illusion chart into an intarsia chart. I'm not sure I like it, but dammit, I will finish it. Eventually.

I worked some more on my friend's shawl.

I didn't take a picture. Imagine the one from yesterday is longer.



And I made another fish--a speckled one--thus doubling the size of my school. Now I have 4!

All in all, I feel pretty good about my night's work.

Bad Blogger *Now with pictures!

It has been pointed out to me that I haven't posted in over a week. It really doesn't seem like it's been that long--but I guess it has!

I can only plead busy-ness, and try to do better from here on out.


I finished the mid-month KAL, and in the end, my laziness won out. I didn't rip out the row with the mystery YOs. I did add the pattern to the pile I like to call "knit this again, but without screwing up," though! It looks pretty nice, and I have a picture... on my digital camera... at home.

My camera seems to be morally opposed to photographing dishcloths well. You can hardly see the bamboo pattern in this picture--and you can't see it at all in the other one I took. Bah.

I've gotten through one entire skein of purple bouclé on my friend's shawl, and am into the second. I have a picture of that, too. At home.

That's a ballpoint pen on it (on the left), for scale. It will be long and rectangular when I'm done--more like a wrap than a shawl, I guess, if that's a valid distinction. Or even if it isn't.

Uh, I'm not blogging at work...

Not anymore, I'm not.

I've also been working on the first of a pair of Dublin Bay Socks, designed by Ryan Morrissey. This is the sock that I started, messed up, and frogged--attempt #2 has been going much better than the first attempt went! I haven't photographed this sock yet, but perhaps I will this evening.

The beginning of a cuff of a Dublin Bay sock. You can kind of see the lace pattern towards the left-hand side... Does everyone else have this much trouble taking nice pictures of their knitting?

And I knitted one more fish for the fish-along.

I don't really have a caption for this one. Umm... One fish, two fish, not red or blue fish!

I really feel like I've been slacking in the knitting department, because things have been getting in the way. I missed both Stitch 'n' Bitches this week (Sunday and Tuesday) because for one I had a Harry Potter hangover (i.e., I was too sleepy and dazed from having stayed up late Saturday night finishing the book to go out in public), and for the other, I was out of town. I hope to do some catching up--and probably some adding of photos to the blog--tonight, after I finish writing what will almost certainly be a very difficult letter. (One of those where every word could conceivably be really important--so I write, delete, re-write, re-delete, and re-re-write. Like knitting and tinking, only less satisfying.)


And I will try to be a better blogger from now on.

Whinge

I'm taking a little break from the huge project I'm working on, because it's giving me a migraine. I would knit, but my knitting is in my office--and I am holed up in the office of someone who is on vacation, because her office has a door (whereas mine barely has walls). So instead, I blog.

Which brings to me the Knitting Dilemma. On my lunch hour I was working on the mid-month dishcloth KAL, and found that in my previous row I managed to put in two yarnovers--there aren't any in the pattern for that row. Also, a few rows back, I had put in one yarnover (somehow) where there should have been none. That first time I just knit it together with the next stitch, going with the philosophy that it's only a dishcloth, and it's only for me. To be honest, I can't even find that part when I look at it. So I'm thinking about just doing that same thing again in the next row to hide those two mystery YOs... but I want to do it right, and I'm trying to stop leaving mistakes in my knitting because things are "only" for me. I deserve pretty, error-free knitting as much as anyone!

So then I think I should rip out the row with the extra YOs and do it again... but does that mean I have to go back and find the first one? And do I care that much, when the first one is invisible?

It's so hard to be a perfectionist when you kinda suck at something!

Lots o' Knitting

For your viewing pleasure, I present a photo essay called "The Shawl: A Progression."






The End.

All right, not the end of the shawl--the end of the photo series. But the huge (size 20) needles are definitely the way to go when you're making a big, rectangular shawl. That last picture shows one evening's progress--not bad!

I also made this:










Skully (front and back), destined to be felted into a keychain. My first stranded colorwork! (Okay, so I started that thing for Grandma... Skully is my first finished stranded colorwork.)

And now it's late, and I need to go to bed.

I'll try to put more words in my next post!

More Birthday Goodness

I had such a good birthday! The cookout was great, the company was wonderful... and I was right about there being more yarn in my future.

(I have pictures of all my presents, but I'm in all of them and have odd facial expressions, so I've decided to spare myself the embarrassment. I might post them if I muster up the energy to crop myself out.)

Natalie gave me an adorable cat pendant, a little red purse-thingy with an oriental carpet design, and two balls of Patons Cha Cha in bebop--it's a red, lavender, and pink eyelash. I'm trying to decide if I can use it to make the cat bed in Stitch 'n Bitch (which calls for Fun Fur), or if my cat will just eat the eyelash stuff and get sick. It's a distinct possibility. I might have to stick to Wool Ease. (I want to knit her a bed so she stops laying on my knitted knitting bag and getting mad when I need to get something out of it!)

From Amanda, I got a gift certificate to ReBelle (link in the sidebar). I plan to use it to buy myself something that is extravagant and luxurious--something I wouldn't buy for myself ordinarily. (Of course, I probably won't be able to buy enough of it to make anything with... but a girl can never have too many skeins of yarn to just carry around and pet, right?)

Samara and Aaron went all-out. Not only are they taking me to The Beach, a waterpark near Cincinnati, on Monday, they hosted the cookout, and bought me presents! From them, I got a skein of Malabrigo in Sealing Wax (a pretty orange-y red), an issue of BUST magazine, and two things to help fill the box--round Simpsons playing cards, and a soda fountain-style drinking straw holder. My friends are strange and fun.

Speaking of strange and fun, I should go get ready for today's excursion--Fort Boonesborough. I've heard that they have working smiths and coopers--I'm hoping for a spinner, too!