One Crazy Fiber Lady

Quickie

Time for a really quick post today.  I had a busy morning at the office and I suspect a busy night. 

Here's Kauni relaxing on my chair at lunch today:

Kim and I had a lovely lunch at the mall again today.  Finally I remember I have a camera in my bag and have evidence...

After eating, and a brief amount of knitting, we did some shopping.  Not the usual shopping you would expect from us intrepid knitters.  No.  We hit Gamestop.  I have this sitting under my desk now.

I can't wait to go home!!!!! 

Craft on :)

How I Spent My Weekend

I spent my weekend, rather understandably I suppose, working on Kauni.  Go figure.  The folks were gone most of the weekend so the kids and I were alone.  I've been battling a sore throat and stuffy head for about a week now and on Saturday, felt pretty miserable.  I plunked myself on the den couch, remote in hand and kept the kids entertained with Noggin, Nick and all their toys.  While they played/fought/cuddled, I worked on Kauni when not sleeping. 

I took this picture last night.

Love, Kauni Style.

Sunday was spent doing some much needed shopping.  My little girl refuses to wear pants so I had to buy her a couple more skirts, as well as introduce her to the joys of tights.  After an hour or so of kidlet shopping, timothy grass was acquired for the littlest family member who lives out back.  He's a cutie who likes to bunk my hand with his nose as I put his water bowl back in.  Little goof.   And he just loves nose scritches.  He'll grind his teeth contentedly, stretch himself out as far and as flat as he can as I pet him.  Sweet guy.

Anyway, when I wasn't otherwise occupied with knitting, shopping or child rearing, I spent a good deal of time with my Nintendo DS :)  You can see the corner of it on top of Kauni in the above picture.  Friday, Kim and I stopped in at Gamestop and I picked up the new Simpsons game.  Dudes, it is way cool.  I'm kind of stuck on a particular level but will get past it if it kills me.  I have done some damage to my right thumb from pressing the B button too much and hope to have the feeling back in the tip soon.  Kidding.  Its not quite that bad but it is a tad odd and I should lay off.  I want to get the Star Wars Lego complete that comes out tomorrow.  I'll probably get it for the DS too, but there's a little voice in the back of my head that is starting to get louder and its requesting an Xbox 360 :)  Like I need another game platform! 

Craft on!

J'Adore

I'm seriously loving the whole Kauni Damask knitting.  I can't stop.  Even though I have a tendency to get queasy when not looking out at the water on the ferry, I'm knitting it, even if it means reading the chart for the next row.  That's how much I'm loving this project.  I took it to the SnB last night.  Combined with this commuting knitting this morning, I've made some decent progress. 

I took this just off Pier 11 this morning on the way to the office.

And I took this for the same reason my kids do a lot of things, because I could...

Everything is just so pretty this morning with the sun streaming down.  I do think the colors are a bit more vibrant than they are appearing here, but that's just sun + camera playing off each other.  Still.  LOVE.

I'm going to get some bonus knitting time today.  Kim and I are meeting for lunch at the Seaport Mall where there will definitely be some knitting.

Have a great weekend all!

Craft on!

Trick or Treat

Happy Halloween!

The twins had a big old happy halloween yesterday.  First there was the parade/massive candy collection bonanza at their preschool.  They had parents volunteer to be trick-or-treat cars in the parking lot of the school and pass out treats to the kids who paraded by in their costumes.  There were 20 something parent cars and @120 kids participating.  The twins each brought home huge stuffed bags full of stuff.

I left work early and when I got home, we canvased the neighborhood where I proudly watched them ring the bell, say "Happy Halloween" followed by an unprompted "Thank you".  Since they could now reach the doorbell themselves, Mom and I would wait on the sidewalk as they made the trek.  It was fun.  I finally got them back to our house and inside with the promise that they could pass out candy to those who rang our doorbell.  My favorite part of that was right after Alex had finished doling out from his bag to the two kids on the porch, a boy probably 9ish and a little girl around the twins' age, my boy said "Happy Halloween kids".  Little old man.  Mom and I cracked up.

On the knitting front, I ripped back Kauni last night.  For a fleeting moment, I thought I could just pull one of the remaining two skeins and start it with the orange/red section and work the other direction.  Unfortunately, both skeins where on the orange/yellow and I would have had to lose alot.  It wasn't worth it.  The third skein started with the right color, but it was in the wrong freakin direction.  Seems three of my 4 go red to purple via the center pull, but the fourth was wound in the other direction.  I'm back to where I was in the pattern by the end of my commute this morning.  I reversed the orange/red yarn I'd been using starting with the red and spit-spliced it into the correct directional skein.  This should probably result in approximately the B pgrogression.  Cool.  That was my favorite!

Lastly, I leave you with this quiz...

What Kind of Knitter Are You?

Snarky Old School. You may be old, you may be young, but you're the knitter that puts us all to shame with your amazing skills. Novelty yarns that NOT your gig. Your knitting library probably out does most, especially with the old but goodies, like Alice Starmore and the original editons of Barbara Walker's books. You're cool, but you scare me.
Take this quiz!

Quizilla | Join | Make A Quiz | More Quizzes | Grab Code

Tonight is the beloved MY SnB and Kauni is coming along.

Craft on!

1000 Words...

...or the equivalent:

I started, needless to say, last night.  I did the knitting maths to figure out how many repeats around the motif would go, how many stitches were left over and what should go where.  I then set about knitting.

I did opt for the Dale inspired cuffed hem, which is the yellow bits you see.  It transitioned to the green just as I finished and worked the turning row.  I can't say as I'm ecstatic by that green, but better at the hem then my face!

In case you're curious, as I was, about the color progressions, someone put together a bunch of graphics displaying the alignment results.  Super cool.  If I'm reading it correctly, I'm doing something entirely different as my color progressions are opposite.  One is working Yellow --> Green --> Blue --> Purple-->Red--> Orange and the other is Orange --> Red --> Purple blah blah.  Interesting.  I wonder how it will play out.  I might just have to much with that graphic a bit and see if I should move along or correct it before I get too much further along.  I guess that as long as the colors don't line up I should be fine.

And a close up...

Love it!

Craft on!

Edited to add:  I have to rip back.  I've got a big problem(s) colorwise and it is pretty glaring even in this terrible image.

This is a recording

We are not available at the moment to answer your call.  Why?  I'm glad you asked.

This...

Plus

This...

(squueeeeeee!!!!  It arrived in yesterday's mail! Super service from Garnbutik.dk.)

makes for a very busy and distracted fiberholic.  All messages will be returned at the earliest convenience.  Please leave a message at the sound of the beep.

BEEP (squee!)

Craft on!

Almost

So close. You see my hands were very cold yesterday as I walked to and fro the ferry. I'm a knitter so I figured I could fix that problem. I walked into the MY SnB last night with a mission: must make hand/wrist warmers.

After scoping out the yarn choices I settled on a new one: Evolution by Chameleon Colorworks in Scarlet colorway. Now armed with yarn and a set of US3 dpns I went to work. I've never worked with optim before and I must say that I really like it. By the time I headed home (listening to the Sox on the radio - go Sox!) I had the first one done. The ladies were betting that I would have the pair by the time I got off the ferry at Pier 11.

They were close. I'm ready to bind off now thanks to an awfully slow reboot of my computer. Nothing fancy mind you but simple warmers that will do the trick.

On other fronts, I'm going with concensus and the otherwise unavoidable obsessive pull and will be working the Kauni in the Damask as soon as the bloody yarn arrives. Pray that it is today to protect my sanity!

Have a good weekend all.

Craft on!

Seeing Red

Well that was a quick loss of mojo.  Part of the problem has been the eager anticipation of the soon to arrive Kauni yarn.  I know whatever is on the needles will be tossed aside the moment that yarn arrives.  It really is all that I can think about for the last week.  I've been debating what pattern to actually knit with it.  There are a number of options.  First is Ruth's Sweater(pdf).  Then I saw her Autumn Sweater. 

Other's have followed this same path down Kauni Madness ending at the same place too.  To me, the ultimate is the beautiful Damask (From an out of print Dale pillow pattern).  I've thought of little else since I saw it.  I googled my fingers to the bone trying to find a copy of the pattern to no avail.  So I took the graphic, enlarged it greatly, broke out Excel, created graph paper and graphed the darn thing.  I'm now ready to knit this when the yarn arrives, which should be imminent.

As Spongebob would say, I'm ready. Though there is a little crazy part of me that wants to make the plain version considering that I'm planning on making this commuting knitting.  At least before the sleeves enter the picture.  Maybe I'll hold this version for a second sweater.   Yeah, that's the ticket.

Anyway.  I seem to have regained some sock mojo.  I thank everyone for their suggestions and commiseration on the sock burnout.  I've tucked all the in progress and rewound skeins away and have moved onto a tried and true favorite.  I did go for a new pattern, Baudelaire from Knitty with the Louet Gems in Cherry Red.  So far so good.  It could be a scootch smaller, but fits as is okay.  I've been using my new Lantern Moon US1 Ebony DPNs for this sock and I have to say, I seriously love it.

Besides, I think there's something to this Red Sock...

(BTW, it is now 12 13 to 1 as I write this and another pitcher got chased.  Sweet.  Let's go Red Sox!)

Finally I have a picture of the under-represented cats in this house.  Sara gets most of the screen time, but last night I found the other two, Duchess of a'Rat and Earl Grey snuggling in a pretty darn weird position.

I like her choice of a foot rest ;)

Craft on!

Missing Mojo

Sock knitting mojo seems to be a fragile thing, not to mention easily misplaced.  I don't say lost as I'm sure its around here someplace, but mislaid somewhere.

I've started and tossed aside quite a number of socks recently using a number of patterns and several yarns.  For one reason or another, none have quite cut it.

What's here?   Working right to left:

1.  Duet Skinny in Sailor Girl, pattern currently is my plain vanilla sock recipe with just the coordinating color on the toe.  There's nothing wrong with the yarn, it just isn't rocking my boat, though it has been my ferry knitting as of late.

2.  Union Center WhatNot Sock in Kitty's Eyes.  Not in sock or to-be-sock state at all.  I tried a couple of patterns including Anastasia and my vanilla socks.  Either the color, the split/pattern and/or size were wrong.  Which is odd because I like the colors.  I might give them another attempt using Monkey but then again, the K2Tog with Anastasia had me rip out half a sock.  Sigh.

3.  Fearless Fibers (etsy) in the Chocolate Pink Cherry, just past the heel on the first Monkey.  This sock was tossed aside when SOS started.  I went back to it this morning, but  maybe its me.  I'm just not feeling it.  Seeing half a plain foot in the project bag from the other end of the wound ball reminds me that it started as a plain vanilla toe up that just didn't grab me either.   

4.  Lornas Lace Shepherd Sock in Parfait.  Started Saturday as a vanilla but then ripped after the toe to then become Monkey's.  I tossed it aside last night while watching a super funny episode of Top Gear.  I'm not liking how the colors appear.  This seems to be another example of when I like a yarn better in the skein.

There might be another couple of socks-in-progress-but-not-loved somewhere around here.  I just can't remember them at the moment.

I'm not entirely sure what to do now.  Did I burn out on socks over the summer?  Maybe.  I think I lost my mojo for a bit then too now thinking back.  Freaked my SnB buds out that night, but was able to recapture it ASAP.  Do I try something else with one of the existing non-favorites?  Do I try a different yarn from the stash (of which there are plenty)?  Do I go with a yarn I know I love (a solid Louet) and work a new pattern?  I do have Wendy's Asparagus Cable socks and a Claudia Handpaint in a tone-on-tone nearly sock of Lipstick.  I also have a semi-solid Yarntini also in a red.  I'm just scared if something new isn't successful, the mojo might just be gone for longer. 

Bah.

Craft on!

Sunny Sunday

I don't know why I keep a camera in my purse at all times because when presented with a fiber festival, I come down with fatal camnesia.   I finally remembered I had it as I headed home and saw the gorgeous view from the Rhinecliff Bridge.

The weather was gorgeous, maybe a tad warm for the lovely woolens that everyone was sporting.   

I took this picture shortly after, surprised (and not surprised) by the readings for late October..

It got to wear Minimalist, saw a number of Clapotis and best yet, saw up close and in person glorious Kauni sweaters.  At 4:30PM yesterday, my car was reading 75F.  I kind of liked the effect in this shot, you can see me in the rear view mirror.  That was so accidental.  The happy glow on the face totally disappeared not too long after when I got stuck for far too long in g-d awful traffic on the Thruway.  Stupid Thruway.  The drive up took just about 90 minutes.  It took me 2.5 hours to get home.

It was a wonderful day, but it usually is.  I did buy some things, but not much by a Crazy standard.  It was more about seeing and being with friends, some that I get to see regularly, and those that I only see during Festival Season.  I met up rather early with Jessica and spent a lovely day shopping and gabbing with her.  She makes a great festival buddy!  Thank you Jessica.  I won't spill as to her big purchase, but it was a good one :)

The blogger/Ravelry meetup at 1pm was much smaller than the Saturday showing, but still, a great opportunity to see old friends.  Cheryl and Kathy both tried on my newly finished Minimalist! I got to touch Stephanie's Kauni in person!  (BTW Lynne, it is not the softest of soft yarns.  I reminds me greatly of a shetland - much like that stuff I'm knitting Autumn Rose from.  I still send you a snip when mine arrives which should be seriously soon!).  I toured the Sheep to Shawl with Brooke, whom I'm always happy to see.  I ran into the MY SnB Gals, Ina, Katie and Nancy a number of times over the course of the day.  Quality time was spent in Brooks Farm and Merlin Tree with Laurie and Juno, both of whom I'm always happy to see.  I ran into Cassie and got to meet Sigga Sif, who probably came the furthest for the festival!  Travels through the festival also met with Cate, Manise, Marcy, Teresa (who was sporting a gorgeous Indigo Ripples Skirt!) and Norma.  I was also pleased to finally be able to put faces with the names to Danielle, Feminitmafia, Eklectika, Maia and Rachael.  (Boy does this linky love take time!)  I'm sure there were others who I'm sorry if I've forgotten you!  I was a seriously senile slacker who forgot to put on my Blogger Bingo Square button and didn't print out my game board either.  Sigh.  All in all, a fabulous day filled with those who get it.

Get it, I did.  But on a small scale.

Lace weight from Skaska that I now realize is about 1300 yds short of Wedding Ring Shawl (shall order another skein)

5 skeins of Four Play from Brooks Farm destined to be Ribby Pullover..

One ounce of totally yummy cashmere roving and a super small spindle from Golding to spin it on (which I started last night)...

closeup of pretty little spindle... ( can get the specs on this baby if anyone is interested )

A beautiful set of Lantern Moon DPNS in US1.  They might just become my gold standard for sock knitting..

And finally, 8oz each of Merino and a Merino/Tensel blend (Jordan's Choice) from Sheep Shed.  These will be spun to about a sport/dk weight to knit either Eunny's Argyle Vest or something similar.

That's pretty restrained by crazy fiber lady standards I'd say! 

I'll end with a picture of my mutant purebred cat with her serious underbite...

Oh yeah, I finished the first sleeve for Autumn Rose and started the second while rooting on those Red Soxs!!  Dudes they rock.

Craft on!