Tuesday

Wow, my blog got 80-some visits today. How did that happen?

Anyway--an entry. Today seems like a bullet-point day.

Things that make me smile:

• Embarrased, shaved Persian cat.

Poor naked Pippin!

• Jane at Magpie, who was calm and helpful when I came into her store yesterday and proceeded to announce, "I broke my sweater, and I need help!" She was lovely and averted catastrophe in my Soy Silk Shrug, even if she did inadvertently call my knitting bad. (She didn't mean it.)
• Making tiny things grow in my windowsill garden. (I wonder how long it will be before I kill them? It seems inevitable. I have a bad track record with windowsill gardens.)
  
• Authors who call on a bad day to thank me for my humor, professionalism, and ability to get things done.
• The members of the Lexington Stitch 'n' Bitch. (I keep typing "botch" instead of "bitch." I think this is my subconscious reminding me that I tend to make more mistakes when I'm drinking, snacking, socializing, and knitting all at the same time.) These people are lovely, and not only improved my mood tonight, they reacted like Knitting Champions when I busted out the Cascade superwash and asked if they would help me knit an afghan to raffle off. (I'll send out my Master Plan on the list tomorrow.)
• Coffee.

Hot, delicious coffee in my ridiculous, out of season dollar store snowman mug. It has inexplicably become my favorite mug. (I swear my countertop doesn't look that dirty in real life.)

• Being one little (huge) round of hdc away from finishing Abby's Afghan.
• My family.
• My friends.
• My bed. Sleep well, everyone.
  

Overdue *Edit

I've finally managed to get in some decent knitting!

But first, the pretty. Here's the view from my living room window.

If you look closely (and click to embiggen), you can see the pretty flowers on the tree just outside. Okay, so the tree is the reason all the bugs keep getting in, and my head isn't crazy about the pollen, but it definitely looks lovely. You can also see my new windowsill garden. The little plastic container is cat grass from my easter basket--sprouting happily. The three peat pots are chives, green onions, and sweet basil. (I decided that the carrot, broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage seeds that I bought would prove to be too much for the little pots. Ah, ambition.) Two of the three are sprouting, but I don't know which ones they are. It'll be a fun surprise.

I've made a little progress on my Bellatrix socks.

It's not quite the effect I was hoping for, but I guess the color repeats in this colorway are longer than the ones in the colorway ReBelle used. Still very cool. I have to say, though, that when I challenge myself, I really challenge myself. The two-at-once thing is going pretty well. It seems to be even a little easier than doing just one with the magic loop technique--possibly because this way there's less cord hanging around getting in my way. But rather than two balls of yarn, I'm dealing with four balls. They keep getting all tangled, despite my clever use of plastic bags as yarn bras. I shall persevere, though. I'm confident that I can conquer the socks.

Overdramatic? Me?

I also cast on a sock in Sockotta. I did an interesting thing with the ribbing that I didn't catch for quite some time--it's not quite 2x2. There are a couple of 4s in there. Oh, well. I started on Celebration socks, then messed up because I wasn't paying quite enough attention. I decided that I didn't want an attention-heavy pattern, so I frogged back to the ribbing. I picked another pattern (I don't even remember which one), but that one wasn't going to fly either. I finally settled on Charade socks. It's a pretty herringbone rib pattern. Here's the best picture I could manage. I was hobbled by the yarn color. (Click to see pretty herringbones.)

It's too bad that red is so hard to photograph. I like the way this is working up. I even managed to memorize that pattern. We'll ignore the part where I did math, messed up, decreased two stitches, realized that I'd had the right number all along, and frogged back to the ribbing again. I'm on track now, and that's what matters.

Yesterday I managed to finish crocheting Abby's Afghan! I even assembled it. Now all that remains is the edging. I'm going to save that until after May 2, when they turn on the air conditioning in my apartment complex. It's a thousand degrees in here, and I don't fancy spending a few hours with a big heap of afghan on my lap.

And now that the afghan is mostly done, I can start on a new project for myself. I'm planning to borrow a dress from Amanda-by-way-of-Samara to wear to one of the wedding events, but there's a problem. Its strapless nature means that my ample charms look even more ample than usual. I've decided that what I need is a bolero to break up the lines. White. And I think I'm going to make the Anthropologie-inspired Capelet. It's not so much a capelet as a little sweater. I bought some natural Cascade 220 at ReBelle, but I've pretty much decided that it's not white enough. So yesterday I went to Michael's for some Cotton-Ease. I was persuaded to go for 100% cotton, but now (sorry, guys!) I've changed my mind. Cotton has no memory and tends to stretch--and that's just unacceptable. There will be an exchange today before the cast-on.
EDIT: New plan. That pattern is one-size. Not mine. Damn! So I found a soy silk shrug (.pdf), very similar, and I don't have to do math. Much better!

And that's what I've been up to! Dieting is going well, but I think it's adding to my general crankiness of late. I'm doing my best to snap out of it. Hopefully, all this fun yarniness will help!

Yarny Goodness

First, I am determined not to fear the Centipede In The Stash. I've decided that centipedes don't like yarn (they get tangled in it), so it almost certainly ran away as soon as it saw all those tangly fibers.

This was good news, and I immediately grabbed some cotton and cast on the mid-month dishcloth.


Pretty! It's also easy, which is always a good combination. It's a simple slip stitch pattern, and aside from a few moments of, "Wait, which one is color A?" I'm trucking right along. I'm still about 3 days behind, but what can you do?

I also put my nose to the grindstone and finished my Primavera Socks.

I made these with KnitPicks Gloss, and they're amazingly soft. There's nothing like silk to make socks fabulous. I can't wait until it's cool enough to wear them!

Yesterday evening I had very good intentions--I was going to call my mother to finish the conversation we had started in the morning. Then I got distracted. First, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was on TV. Then I suddenly realized that I didn't have any socks on the needles. Tragic! I out on my Big Girl pants and separated the skein of yarn I bought for Bellatrix (Ravelry link; pattern .pdf still not available) into two balls. How did I do at halving yarn?

Not very well. (This is Tempted handpainted yarn, in the colorway Wicked Witch. I got it at ReBelle.) I'm not worried, though--I'm going to follow the lead of whoever made the store sample (Sarah, I think) and alternate two rows of black (Regia 6 ply) with two rows of the Tempted. And if the smaller ball does run out and I have to weave in a few more ends, big deal. The sample looks amazing--I'm really hoping my socks turn out that well!

So I got out my 40" Addi Turbo circs and cast on with a little help from an online tutorial.

I love the way this looks--like some bizarre deep sea crustacean or cephalopod. It's early, but so far, so good!

I also grabbed a skein of Sockotta and cast on a traveling sock. I don't have a picture--right now it's exactly one round of 1x1 ribbing. Not impressive. But I need something that I can take with me to work for breaktime knitting, and Bellatrix doesn't fit the bill. I feel better now--I'm back to having two socks on the needles. Three, really, since I'm doing Bellatrix two at a time. Ahhh!

Stereotypically Girly

So I was just sitting here at my computer, catching up on e-mails and plotting what colors to use for my belated cast-on of the mid-month dishcloth, when I glanced up at an unreachable corner of the ceiling and saw an ENORMOUS house centipede way up there, where I couldn't reach it. You know the ones--impossibly long, spindly, gross legs, bajillions of them, and they bite? (The centipedes, not the legs.) (They also sometimes leave a purple mark when you squish them.) I immediately let out an appropriately girly exclamation of fear and disgust, intensified by the fact that there was no way in hell I could reach the thing to squish it. These suckers seriously creep me out. Even when they're right there on the floor, easily reached and squished, I have to do a few minutes of tiptoe-dancing before I can get myself close enough to do the deed.

As I watched, it started to try to make its way across the ceiling. For a moment, I was happy--this could bring it within squishing range. Then I realized that this would also possibly bring it directly over my head, and I made girly noises again. Then--this is the worst part--after only a few inches, the textured plaster of the ceiling proved to be too much of a challenge for its many disgusting legs--and it dropped. DIRECTLY INTO THE STASH AREA. I now have NO idea where it might be--apart from possibly borrowing into one of the bags that hold overflow stash. It could be in my yarn! The yarn that I was planning to use for a dishcloth this very day!

I may have to buy new yarn. All new yarn. My old yarn is a loss.



Also, I do not feel that this in any way diminishes my feminism, or my status as a strong, independent woman. I firmly believe that even Attila the Hun cowered in the face of house centipedes. They're even creepier than spiders.

Knit-Free

Today the morning news told me that there was an earthquake early this morning in southeastern Illinois--and people reported feeling it in Lexington!

I, of course, was asleep for all this. Damn! I've always kind of wanted to be in an earthquake--a minor one, where no one dies or gets seriously injured, but you can definitely tell that the earth is moving. Looks like I wasted this opportunity. From now on, I do not sleep!

(See Leah's blog for slightly more info, and a nifty graph/recording thing of the earthquake.)

I also managed to exchange my faulty (ha!) scale last night. Took home the new one, set it up, and nervously stepped onto it. And it didn't crack! Hooray! Weight loss continues, but I choose not to record it at this time. Sunday is weigh-in day--if I start weighing myself willy-nilly, chaos will ensue!

I might be imagining it, but my jeans feel a little looser today. :)

Another pair down!

I finished another pair of socks! These are Jacobean Socks, the first pattern in the Sock Knitter's Pentathlon. I may not have placed, but I finished! I wore them today--very comfy, and stylish, if I do say so myself.

I'm making good progress on my Primavera socks, too. Only six more 6-round repeats before the toe. Can that be right? *checks* Okay, six and a half. When I think about it that way, it doesn't seem like much at all. I'm working on the gusset. I realized, after I did the heel flap and picked up all my stitches and everything, that the pattern on the second one is slightly off center, while the first is perfectly centered. Oops. It's a matter of 2 stitches, so I'm not that worried--it just irks me a bit. They're still going to be beautiful.

I haven't cast on Bellatrix yet. I'm not sure why, apart from the fact that I'm a teeny bit daunted by the idea of trying to evenly divide my skein of yarn into two balls so I can do two at once. I know, I know, it was my own dumb idea to work these both at the same time--but what can I say? I'm a girl who likes to scare herself every once in a while.


On the diet front, things are going well. I weighed myself on Sunday and I had lost 2 pounds. I bought a nice bathroom scale, and the first time I stepped onto it--the fucker cracked. I mean, I know I need to lose weight, but this is ridiculous! Stupid shoddy workmanship. I plan to exchange it tomorrow. If the next one breaks too, I may have to trade up. (When I say "nice," I mean "the nicest I could get for $30, because who wants to pay more than $30 for something that'll make you feel bad about yourself half the time?")

This week the diet is going even better than last week. Maybe it's because I'm more used to it, or maybe it's because I caught "seasonal allergies" from someone. *Pointedly doesn't look at Samara* These "seasonal allergies" (read: germs) are doing a number on both my sinuses and my appetite.

Oh, and David? The Mango Green Tea Sorbet is yummy. (Only 2 points per serving!)

Ta-Da!

I give you the Second Work Socks!

The yarn is Trekking XXL, in a colorway that is compellingly named "101." I kind of like that the stripes don't match--when they're way off, I don't have to be bothered by the near-match. Rather than beautiful poetry, these socks are earthy prose.

And since the temperature today dropped to the chilly mid-40s (that's chilly after mid-70s), they're currently on my feet.


I've only got one square to go on Abby's Afghan. And I made some progress on both of my other socks today. I'm feeling pretty good about that.


Last night I, shall we say, used up some Flex Points on my diet. (I don't think a cheeseburger and fries really constitute "falling off the wagon." And the Diet Coke totally mitigated the rum. But, like a good girl, I counted the points anyway.) I really like the fact that Weight Watchers has wiggle room built in--that way, I could pick right back up today without feeling like a loser. Tomorrow I need to remember to weigh myself. I'm trying to prepare myself for the possibility that I haven't lost any weight--I've probably got some water weight hanging around. But I feel very good about my eating habits this week. I'm becoming a Popcorn-itarian. Plain popcorn only has 1 point per 3 cups, and since David told me about the clever paper bag-microwave trick, I've been popping up a storm!