Things that may impede Christmas knitting:

1. Sleeping

2. Jobs

3. Large and insistent lap cats

4. Random excursions to Toronto

5. Super Nintendo

6. Cooking

7. Books that will not stay open by themselves

8. Sub zero weather (impossible to knit outside at the bus stop)

9. Car rides with anyone on your Christmas knitting list

10. Blogging!!!

the yarn must flow

The past three days have been amazingly fabulous for knitting (excepting, of course, this morning, when I thought all my internal organs were trying to escape out my nose and my mouth in the form of greenish yellow goo. But I'm better now). Sunday morning I woke up to the abominable (but rather pretty) snowstorm, and a very irate roommate with a cancelled flight (I kept my personal opinions about beautiful snowstorms to myself). But a snowstorm! A perfect excuse to hide inside, drink hot chocolate, and get cracking on the Christmas knitting (although we did venture briefly out for some shopping. Because we were apparently caught with the crazy.) (You know, I really hate it when people over and misuse parenthetical phrases. I am a filthy hypocrite and will go knit with fun fur to punish myself).

Yesterday I was complaining about the lack of new and exciting movies just sitting around the apartment, and lo and behold my roommate pulls out the special edition director's cut of the TV miniseries Dune and says, "Here, watch this. I'm not taking it home with me." Then she went off on her rescheduled flight and left me alone with the crack. I watched the whole thing, and when it was over I went and found the sequel, Children of Dune, on YouTube. Then I stayed up way too late watching it and woke up this morning with the aforementioned ailment. That, of course, probably had nothing to do with what I was watching or how late I was watching it, but for some reason I am feeling slightly resentful towards the engrossing storyline and the crazy costuming and feel better blaming the miniseries, which makes absolutely no sense, but I don't care. As a brief critical note, however, I must say, the sequel went a bit overboard with the storylines and a bit underboard with the explaining-what-happened. But I watched the whole thing anyway.

Now, this weekend, when I go home, I will most likely rush down to my parents' basement, where I know the Dune series is lurking, and try to read them. Part of me is very excited about it, and the other part fully expects to find them just as uninteresting as I did the other eighty bajillion times I tried to read them. Oh the difficulties I face! I really don't know how I bear it all.

in which I do not loosen up

I started a pair of socks as a Christmas present a couple of weeks ago (Actually, I started about ten things a couple weeks ago, but that's another story). After I knit the first one, I knew I didn't really like knitting the pattern (the way it looks is fine, though), but figured I would slog through the next one, because then I would have a Christmas present finished. Of course, because I'm blogging about it, you must know that my cunning plan has been thwarted. I don't know why, or what I was doing when I knit the first sock, but my gauge is so much tighter in the second sock that the same number of pattern repeats in the leg comes out to nearly three quarters of an inch shorter, and the first sock is about three quarters of an inch wider as well.

I'm frogging both of them. I cannot stand the idea of knitting an entire sock in this pattern again, and if I'm going to stay on the Super-Amazing Christmas Knitting Plan of Doom and Awesomeness (which I wrote on the bus yesterday), then I'm supposed to have this pair of socks done today. So I need something pretty, but uncomplicated, easy to memorize, and no freaking mini cables. Bah.

muuuuah

My dear little bloglet,

I meeeeesed you!!! And now that the craziness is OVER, I will loooooooove you, and give you connnnnnntent, and piiiiiiiiictures, and it will all be so LOVELY!

Affectionately with cheesecake,
Stephanie

you must do what you feel is right

You have run out of hand knit socks to wear. What do you do?

a. Do your laundry.
b. Wear your store bought socks.
c. Knit faster.

cable brim hat

Yarn: 200-ish yards of worsted weight wool
Needle: 5mm DPNs and circular

Pattern:

Pull out your stitch dictionary of choice (I confess, I am deeply enthralled by Barbara Walker) and pick out a cable pattern that looks like it will knit up to be 2-3 inches wide. Add two stitches to either side of the motif and do the following:

RS: slip 2 stiches, knit cable pattern, slip 1, purl 1
WS: slip 1, purl 1, knit cable pattern, purl 2

The extra stitches and all the slipping give you an even, nice-looking edge while also creating a border for your cable motif.

Knit the cable motif until it is however long you want your hat brim to be, and sew the cast off edge to the cast on edge. I tried to be clever and start with a provisional cast on and then graft the two ends together, but it didn't turn out that well. This is probably because I didn't feel like thinking that hard about it when the time came, and not because it can't be done, or that it would be particularly difficult. Do whatever you want.

Then, with your circular needle, pick up stitches all the way around the brim you just made. If you need more stitches than you picked up, increase in the next round. Knit the rest of the hat like you would any other hat (for advice on this I highly recommend the section on hats in Knitting Rules by that other Stephanie).

Cast off, weave in ends, feel clever. The end!

a small update

What I have been doing for the past month:
1. going to school
2. working
3. sleeping
4. eating
5. knitting like mad

Sadly, blogging is not on the list, although I could add "thinking about blogging," but if I start including things I have been thinking about to the general list of what I have been doing, that list is going to get pretty un-concise pretty quickly.

But, I have been knitting. I finished a pair of socks this week, but didn't take a photo, and now they're in the wash. You might never get to see them, because my ability to take photos of my finished objects is sketchy, at best. But rest assured they are very pretty, and I, like many before me, have discovered the delights of Trekking XXL.

Now I am going to contradict myself and show you a picture of another finished object I finished this week:



I made the pattern up, but I'll do a seperate post explaining what I did, because I thought it was fun, because I am a nerd. Also, I seem to be all about the almost-run on sentences today. Strunk and White are going to kill me in my sleep.

Currently, I am completely addicted to this:



Which is, of course, The Hemlock Ring Blanket. I am completely taken by this doily blanket business and have been perusing all sorts of old doily patterns, making grand plans for at least fifty lap blankets. And actually, this current one is knitting up pretty fast, so I might get through a couple before I get sick of the idea. You never know. Stop snickering.

Other than that, I started a pair of fuzzy feet for mindless bus/boring classes knitting. Actually, in the interest of full disclosure, I should tell you that I'm really not knitting "fuzzy feet." I just saw the pattern while perusing knitty and decided that I would make giant socks and felt them. I've never felted anything before, but it doesn't seem that difficult. (On second thought, I should not tempt fate by saying things like that.)

what a dream I had

You are held captive by a mad scientist in a dimly lit castle decorated like a cluttered, late 1970s rec room. As you enter the main drawing room, you suddenly spot what seems to be a basilisk. Horrified, you squeeze your eyes tight shut, until the mad scientist says to you, "Have no fear, my prisoner. The crocheted basilisk is not dangerous. It is the knitted basilisk you must be afraid of."

If this ever happens in your dreams, you can probably be sure of one or more of the following:

1. You spend way too much time knitting.
2. You have read Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets recently, or too many times. Or both.
3. You saw this in a library book:



And were duly frightened. You find out later in the book that the dear snake pictured above is, in fact, Crispin the Crocheted Cobra, but I must confess upon first sighting I was more inclined to think of him as "Sammy the Serpent of Satan". But that's just me.

And yes, I really had that dream.

is this thing on?

To start, a confession: I've been back around normal, English internet services for a little over two weeks now. I've been meaning to post, I swear, but wasn't sure what to say or how to begin. Finally, I decided it didn't really matter, and that I'd better post something before school starts (on Thursday!) or I never would.

So hi. What's up? How was your summer? Eventually, hopefully, I'll post about Quebec, and the knitting that went on, and the yarn-buying that went on, and the French-speaking that went on, but not today, mostly because at the moment I'm more in the mood to get a post up than to sift through pictures.

The past couple of weeks I have, among other things, been cleaning out the stash. Don't let the time allotment fool you: my stash is not particularly large, I'm just a slow organizer, and when I'm stumped by something (in this case, "Where am I going to put all of this yarn?!!"), I tend to let it stew for a bit before going back to it. I'm pretty much finished, and I did get rid of a lot of yarn (ok, actually, the yarn is in a big bag in my front hall closet, waiting to be mailed off to Interim House). I decided to keep only the yarn I have a very specific plan for; I've found that otherwise yarn is a source of some anxiety for me.

However, I still have a bit more yarn than I really have room for in my apartment, so I've done two things: planned my Christmas knitting around what is currently in the stash, and made some rules.

I won't go into details on the Christmas knitting, since I think some of the intended recipients stop by here on occasion, but the rules are as follows:

1. Finish all Christmas knitting the stash currently has yarn for before buying new yarn for Christmas knitting the stash cannot accommodate.

2. If Christmas knitting gets extremely boring, work on a UFO.

3. Avoid Value Village at all costs.

Now, to be frank, I'm pretty sure rule three is going to get broken a lot, but it's ok, I have back up Value Village rules too:

1. I do not need any more random acrylic for the Weasley blanket.

2. Yarn may be bought only if it meets one of the following conditions:
a. it is pretty, not 100% acrylic, and enough to make a scarf
b. it is sock yarn
c. it is fabulous and doesn't meet condition a or b

The Value Village rules exist mostly because I sometimes lose all reasoning abilities in the face of a good deal; for example, the ability to determine what a good deal really is. Twelve balls of Paton's Kroy Socks for seven dollars? That's a good deal. A bag full of random yarn with questionable fiber content in dated colors? Probably not a good deal, even if it is only two dollars.

One last thing: I got my invite to Ravlery while I was in Quebec, and this past week I've finally had a chance to properly play around with it. It is every bit as great as everyone says it is, and a definite threat to my ability to not procrastinate this year. Ah well.

signing off

Tomorrow morning I'm leaving for Quebec, and I'll be gone for five weeks. I've heard that internet access where I'm going is limited, and at any rate I've been such a slacker about blogging lately that I doubt I would post anything with such distractions as "having to speak French all the time even though my French is atrocious" and...well...actually that's the only distraction I can think of right now. I am hoping that the break will make me more interested in the blog when I get back.

Later gators.

score!

I adore Value Village, especially when I can buy 12 (TWELVE!) balls of Paton's Kroy Socks for $7.00.



I must confess that I did a fair bit of maniacal laughing when I found it, and then proceeded to walk around the rest of the store with the bag clutched to my chest (I didn't think it was safe in the cart. Admit it, you would have done the same thing.). Looking back, I suppose my behaviour might have been embarrassing my friend, but she was nice enough not to mention it.

sorry

I am being such a blog slacker. My sincere apologies. Since my last post I have knit two socks, one washcloth, and ten Weasley squares (I have 96. I need 140.) I also moved into a new apartment, and that was about as much fun as you think it is. Right now I'm going to go knit more squares, and maybe I'll have this blanket finished before September.

c is for cookie

Reasons Why Eating Cookies All Morning is a Good Idea

1. Cookies are very tasty.
2. It's easier than going grocery shopping.
3. It's too hot to cook.
4. They go well with milk.
5. The cat doesn't try to eat them too.
6. Did I mention it's too hot to cook?

Reasons Why Eating Cookies All Morning is a Bad Idea

1. You can't eat cookies and knit at the same time.
2. Heat makes me sick. Excessive amounts of sugar make me sick. They will not cancel each other out.
3. There'll be less cookies to eat all evening.
4. Have I told you how nauseous I feel right now?
5. I'll feel obligated to vacuum later.
6. Seriously. How old am I?

and by 24 hours I obviously meant 2

pattern: Jaywalker Socks
yarn: Sockotta by Plymouth Yarn (45% cotton, 40% superwash wool, 15% nylon)

I must confess I liked the yarn better in the ball than I did knitted up, and was a bit irritated by the weird flashing thing it did in the second sock after behaving so nicely in the first, but I do think the Jaywalker pattern used the yarn best. I first started making just plain stockinette socks with it, and it did that weird flashing thing all over. I don't really mind the zig zags, but the colors of this yarn made it look like a kindergarten classroom threw up all over it.

motivation

There's nothing like pretty yarn, and only one set of needles to knit socks on, to cure the dreaded Second Sock Syndrome.



Expect to see finished Jaywalkers in the next 24 hours.

nobody loves garter stitch like I do

I've been hanging around the knit blogosphere for a bit now, and I know you all understand buying something yarn-related just because it is a ridiculously low price. So, I assume you'll understand when I tell you that I bought a whole box full of crochet cotton at a garage sale, because it was only a dollar for the whole box.

Heh.

I'm not really sure what I was thinking. When I got the box home, I just kind of looked at it for a bit, in a dazed, confused way. Then I got a popsicle and stared at it some more. Then I remembered that I started knitting Jaywalker socks, and I forgot about the crochet cotton until a couple of nights ago, when I pulled out some skinny knitting needles and started knitting.



So I don't know what it is. Maybe I'll just hang it on the wall. I like hanging things on the wall. I sorted all the crochet cotton by colors, so I'll have a large, garter stitch, pinky orange thing:



And a large, garter stitch, green thing:



And a large, garter stitch blue thing:



And another green one:



I'm a bit light on the purple:



But maybe, if the first four don't drive me insane, I'll go pick up some more purple-ish crochet cotton.

jaywalking

getting it out of my system

finals finals finals

So this morning I was doing normal morning stuff (get dressed, trip over the cat, burn myself on the toaster oven, etc.), and the knitting came pouting over to me with one of those "I'm depressed and it's your fault but I'm going to pretend like everything's fine" looks. Generally I ignore such silly behaviour, but I make allowances for my knitting. I mean, it's my knitting. So I said, "What's wrong?"

"Oh, nothing..."

Ok, fine. I went back to burning myself on the toaster oven.

"It's just you've spent all week with those textbooks!"

Slightly surprised, I said, "But you know I have exams next week."

"That's not an excuse. We were together before you had exams."

That doesn't even make any sense, but again, I let it slide. Knitting.

"Listen, this isn't because I don't like you anymore. You know I love you. You know I want to spend every waking moment with you. But, if in the near future you want me to have disposable income to spend on you, you have to leave me and the textbooks alone for a few days."

The knitting didn't answer. It slunk back to the knitting basket (where it belongs) and I went to work. I thought about telling it about the lovely long train ride we'll have together next week, or the lovely nice yarn shop we can visit in Detroit, but it's being so pouty I don't even want to.

terrorist tactics

"One false move and the yarn gets it."

I got an A+ in Nerdology 101

I finally wove in all the ends on the Gryffindor scarf the other night, so I suppose I should be mildly grateful for the weather giving me the chance to wear it around before the summer. In this picture I am demonstrating rare use of the flash, frizzy hair, and my desperate love for the color balance tool in Photoshop ("Ooo, I can make everything MAGENTA!"). Maybe I'll talk somebody into taking better pictures of me wearing it...but don't hold your breath.

Stephanie 1, cat 0

I have found her weakness at last...wool!

My suspicions started back in the fall, when, somehow, this wool sweater that I have ended up sitting on my desk. The cat started sleeping on it all the time. It was great, she stopped sitting in front of the computer and trying to eat my knitting and generally let me enjoy having her around without her being extremely annoying. But then, silly me, I decided to wash the sweater and put it back in the closet where it belongs (I obviously don't know a good thing when I've got it). The cat reverted to her usually cuddly-but-somewhat-annoying self.

Then, in November, I got a wool coat. I often leave this coat draped over the armchair closest to the back door, because hanging it in the coat closet five feet away is a lot of work. The cat immediately started sleeping on it. She'd get mad at me when I actually wanted to wear it. I began to contemplate the idea of knitting her a big piece of wool to sleep on, but didn't really execute that plan because cats have a tendency to not like something if they think you want them to like it. Why waste the time and the wool?

Well, I've been knitting this wool pullover, and I finished the back last week. I had it lying on my desk a few days ago, and, surprise surprise, Sassy was all over it. Still, I didn't seriously contemplate making her a wooly blanket until today. I was sitting on my bed, trying to knit, and she was just mauling me. Biting the knitting, sticking her whiskers in my face, stepping on the cord to my headphones, and just generally making herself unpleasant. I got up and pulled the sweater back out of my knitting basket, and layed it on the foot of the bed.



Game over, I win. Coming soon to this blog: bright red wooly cat blanket.

In other news, this is the view from my apartment today:



So much for April showers. I wonder what April blizzards bring.

April blizzards bring big lizards:



Hmm.

April blizzards bring brave wizards:



No, not until July.

April blizzards bring turkey gizzards?

That's just disgusting. I think I'd rather have the showers, please.

just so you know

Planning and executing short-row shoulder shaping in your French class, without any help from the internet, will make you feel very, very clever.

And yes, I did learn some French tonight. I can conjugate l'imparfait indicatif like it's nobody's business. For example:

je tricotais, tu tricotais, il/elle/on tricotait, nous tricotions, vous tricotiez, ils/elles tricotaient

Watch out for me.

I swipe memes shamelessly

You scored as Luna Lovegood. You're an extreme introvert and because of this, are also a deep thinker. You ponder things others would never dream of pondering and stand with your beliefs without backing down. You find it more valuable to daydream than to socialize, because there's so much more going on in your head than others'. Most people don't understand it, but you seem to prefer it that way.

Sirius Black 72% Luna Lovegood 72% Neville Longbottom 69% Albus Dumbledore 69% Bellatrix Lestrange 69% Harry Potter 66% Remus Lupin 63% Hermione Granger 59% Ron Weasley 59% Severus Snape 56% Percy Weasley 50% Oliver Wood 44% Lord Voldemort 31% Draco Malfoy 25% Harry Potter Character Combatibility Test created with QuizFarm.com

Found it at Carrie K's blog.

feeling better

Before I talk about knitting stuff, can I just say that I love, love, love April Fool's Day on the internet? Facebook made my day:

click for larger

Anyway...

Still life with unblocked Argosy and cat.

I still don't know what I'm going to do with it, but I'm sure eventually some occasion will call for giving someone an orange mohair lace scarf, so I'm not too concerned.

And now, now, I am going to say to the world: I hate the carpet in my living room. HATE IT. I can say this because I'm moving into a different apartment in June, and I no longer feel obligated to tell myself the brown carpet really isn't that bad. UGLY BROWN CARPET!!! Ugh.

A strange family of turquoise yarn has taken residence on my printer:



But I am ignoring them in favor of a large quantity of brown stockinette:



The turquoise yarn looks a bit vulture-like, no? I was knitting Wavy with it, but I really didn't like how it was turning out. Frog pond! Now I am rather suspicious that it is asking to be another Argosy, but like I said. I'm ignoring it.

tune in tomorrow for the next episode, in which Stephanie starts a turquoise Argosy

blergghh

Finished Argosy. Too sick to write anything clever. You go look at Harry Potter cover art. I'll go read a Star Wars novel and moan weakly. The cat cares. mahgfuadhibjnhjfw...

belated blogiversay

I meant to post something on the 24th, which was the official one-year anniversary of this blog, but I wanted to post something...special. Something exciting. But, it wasn't finished yet. Heh.

So, last night (or this morning, if you want, but I generally consider everything before I went to sleep as yesterday, no matter what standard time keeping systems might have to say about it) at 3AM, I finished...a sweater!



And of course, I immediately rushed to take dorky blog pictures. I suppose that picture doesn't look quite so dorky, since I cropped out my dorky head. My face looked a lot like my driver's license photo, which basically looks like "WHEEEE!! DRIVER'S LICENSE!!!" Just replace "driver's license" with "sweater" and, well, you know...



Here you see the sweater actually being blocked, and the cat suffering intense inner conflict, as her urge to lay all over any piece of clothing battles with her deep dislike of touching anything wet.

I think we're under attack!

black sheep

Usually, I avoid horror movies at all costs, but this made me laugh hysterically. Maybe it's a Shaun of the Dead thing; it's kind of scary but you're supposed to laugh. Or maybe they just didn't realize that zombie sheep are hilarious. Or maybe I'm crazy.

options socks

When I was in middle school, I met a girl named Kristen. Kristen never, ever wore matching socks. Ever. She probably still doesn't. In fact, I really hope she still doesn't, because I always thought it was fabulous. Who cares if your socks match? Why wear two that are the same, if you don't want to? Besides, if your socks don't match, you don't have to fold them. You can just throw them all in your drawer and pull two out at random every day! Fabulous! I have occasionally thought about doing this, but I absolutely could not stand it if the socks felt different on my feet.

Later, I discovered knitting blogs, and people knitting socks, and people who go to great lengths to make their hand knit socks match. Please, if you are one of those people, I don't think there's anything wrong with it. It's ok. I like my silverware to match*, so I kind of understand. I've knit matching socks. But I was thinking about the lovely wall of Koigu at the yarn shop, and how you have to buy two skeins of Koigu to make a pair of matching socks. But, all the Koigu would probably feel the same, no? So what's stopping me from buying two, or four, or maybe just three different skeins and knitting them all into socks using the same pattern? Mix and match socks! It'd be spectacular. Kristen would be proud.




*If you are thinking "but obviously when you buy a set of silverware, all the pieces match..." then I must tell you about my parents' silverware, which is comprised of not one, but three different sets of silverware. As a child, if I was setting the table for dinner, I would always make sure the silverware at each place setting matched. And sometimes, if I was irritated at someone, I'd give them mismatching silverware, although I doubt they even noticed, much less felt the burning sting of my reproach.

gratuitous sheep photo

Icelandic sheep at the Lavender Fleece

easily amused

This afternoon* I knit a wee lace swatchie from this pattern (first one on the page), and then I blocked it. It was really, really fun. I giggled while I did it. Even the cat was impressed (she didn't say so, but I know). I ran out of straight pins (I only own six), so I used some thumbtacks too. When I was done, I pointed at it and giggled some more. I'm glad my roommate is napping.



*By this afternoon, I mean I just did this about five minutes ago, and I wanted to blog about it right away, while I still feel rather clever.

tasty mittens

So I talk to my friend Adam about knitting a lot. Adam doesn't knit, but he doesn't seem to mind the knitting talk. This is probably because I listen when he tells me all about ballroom dancing and playing the carillon, activities which are not listed among my hobbies.

A few weeks ago I offered to knit Adam some orange thrummed mittens, because he thought my thrummed mittens were cool, and I have a whole bunch of roving left over from the mittens I made my dad for Christmas (which I don't have a picture of. They were black and thrummed. I think you can work it out for yourself). I bought way too much roving, I know, but I was thinking about making a drop spindle and learning how to spin...

*ahem*

Adam and I had this conversation earlier:

Me: I think I'm going to have to dye the wool myself, though, because I went to see if they have orange wool in the brand I like to use for mittens and there wasn't any. It'll be fun, and I have an excuse to learn how to dye wool with Kool-Aid now.

Him: Kool Aid?! I can't wait until you're done with the mittens... so I can taste them.

sign of the apocalypse #397

Last night I was sitting around, feeling kind of bored, and dreading the return to classes today. Usually when this kind of mood hits, I knit something. Obviously. So, I picked up several different knitting projects, knit a row (at most) and then discarded each of them. I went over the stash in my mind, wondering if I could cast on anything new. Nothing occurred to me. Then I thought, "I should do the dishes."

I should mention here that when I started living in my own apartment, most chores really didn't bug me too much. They probably don't get done as often as they should, but I don't really mind doing them. But I realized very quickly that I really, really detest washing dishes.

But last night, I filled the sink up with hot, soapy water, and sang songs from Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals, and had a really satisfying time washing the freaking dishes. I willingly washed dishes instead of knitting, and I had a nice time doing it. Dios mia.

go go gryffindor

The Gryffindor scarf is off the needles! I think... I may actually add two more stripes, but we'll see after I finish the mittens. I did start the mittens, but they are a teensy bit smaller than I'd like, and for some reason have ladders. Ladders! My first pair of socks didn't have any ladders! This must be the universe's idea of a funny joke, "Heh heh, let her get away ladder-free the first few times she makes stuff with DPNs, then BAM! Out of nowhere! Ladder her dead! Muahahaha!"

We are not amused.

Other not-amusing things include an unsuccesful battery harvesting. I did raid my small, unused electronics, and got a total of six double A batteries from my CD walkman (Duracell), my portable tape recorder (Energizer), and my Gameboy (Polaroid). My camera only requires four double A batteries, but apparently they all have to be the same brand, because no combination of any of those brands would make the camera stay on for longer than it took to give me the raspberry tell me to change the batteries. Picky picky.

I have not knit a single stitch on the Bayerische sock since I spouted off about wanting to finish it over slack week. It has been lying on the floor by my desk giving me accusatory looks every time I walk by ("Yeah I know where you're going. You don't even want to be in the same room with me. You're going to the living room to work on that scarf. I am way more impressive looking than the scarf. Didn't you see your Grandmother's face when you showed me to her? She didn't look at that stupid scarf that way. And you know what, everyone's going to think you're a nerd when you wear that scarf." Hey sock, guess what? Chicken butt.)

Yesterday I bought some yarn at Zeller's because I thought it was funny. I mean, everyone giggles when they see grey chenille, right?

my camera is dead

...but something tells me I have batteries in this apartment somewhere. Or, at least, I have electronic devices that I don't use with batteries in them (watch out, CD walkman, I'm coming for you). Pictures...later!

My apologies for the ten-day absence, this week is reading week (or, more appropriately, slack week; or, more Americanly, spring break), so of course last week was a bit hectic with assignments due. Anyway, I was just pouting because Eunny Jang has been absent from blogland for so long, and I quite miss all her cleverness. Then I felt like a bit of a hypocrite since I've been slacking over here, so I thought I'd stop in and say hi...

There has been a lot of knitting going on since last Thursday. I started another Harry Potter scarf, in Gryffindor colors this time, and it's about four and a half feet long already (I spent a lot of time riding in the car over the weekend). I'm aiming for somewhere around eight feet, plus fringe, and then matching mittens and this hat. Then, I can be really smart and date a tall, red-haired guy. I can't wait.

I also made a lot of progress on the second Bayerische sock, and I'm hoping to get it finished by the end of the week. I'd like to finish something else too, and it will probably end up being the Gryffindor scarf, because right now I am sadly addicted to the knit one, purl one ribbing. Mmm...monotony....

startitis

Here I was, thinking I would diligently finish at least most of my started projects before I began new ones. In hindsight, that sort of planning seems laughably optimistic.

Lately, I've been daydreaming about long scarves in crazy patterns, and thought Wavy would fit the bill nicely. I have an idea for another scarf that involves lots of cable patterns, but obviously I won't start that until I've finished this one. *ahem*



Besides scarves, I've really wanted to start another pair of socks (that don't have crazy cables all over them (and yes, I did start the second Bayerische sock)), but I don't have any more "sock yarn." Then I kicked myself and decided I can knit socks out of whatever yarn I want, hmph.



I'm using Wendy's generic toe-up sock pattern and some wool I happened to have around.

Tra la la la la...

"I sold my soul to Voldemort and all I got was this lousy scarf." - roommate

And by "lousy" she obviously means "so fantastic my heart might burst with happiness."

Ok, at any rate, I've seen her wear it. Voluntarily.



Pattern: no real pattern, just alternating colors in 1x1 rib. I know that the Slytherin colours are actually green and silver, but she wanted something that didn't really scream "Harry Potter," so we went with the green and white. So, you know, people might think she just likes Michigan State.
Yarn: Caron Simply Soft or Super Soft or Squeaky Soft or something, I don't remember
Started (well, this version anyway...) January 12, 2007, and finished February 10, 2007.

full disclosure

I thought you might be interested in knowing about this:



And this:



The first being, obviously, Argosy (I say obviously because I think every other person in knitting blogland and elsewhere is knitting or has knit this pattern.), and the second being the Simply Marilyn sweater from Interweave Knits.

I'm really just knitting Argosy because I like the pattern, and I needed something to do with the yarn. I won't be keeping it. I look terrible in orange, which is sad, because I do like orange quite a bit. And, because I know you're asking, I bought the yarn because it was $2 at Value Village, and it looked happy. It wanted me to take it home. What was I supposed to do?

As for Simply Marilyn, I've finished the back and one sleeve, but remember how I mentioned that I'd figured out how to hold my yarn differently? Well, it does make knitting go faster, and I stop paying attention to my tension, a situation which is only made worse when I really, really just want to get something done. So that sleeve that I mentioned? It's about an inch and a half longer that it should be to match up with the body. Argh. Haste makes waste, dearie, haste makes waste.

save point

And lo! Out of the chaos and clutter, there rose one...completed...Bayerische sock.

two-day project

Pattern: Fetching from Knitty Summer '06
Yarn: The rest of the Icelandic wool from Laurie at The Lavender Fleece
Modifications: The picot bind off, while pretty, curled a bit too much for my liking. I wanted something that fit a bit closer and snugger to my knuckles. So, while binding off, I knit the two middle stitches of each four-stitch knit section together, and didn't do any picot-ing at all.
Started February 6, 2007 and finished February 8, 2007

random sunday

1. I have finally figured out that whole "holding the yarn by weaving it through your fingers to create tension" thing. I'll have to tell my grandmother. She only tried to teach it to me twelve years ago.

2. I've been weaving in the ends of the Slytherin scarf, but it's taking twice as long as I thought it would because I have to split the ends to avoid creating big lumpy spots where I weave them in.

3. What to wear with ice skates:



4. There really is no need to carry your purse if you're carrying your camera bag. There's plenty of room in the camera bag for the camera, your wallet, your cell phone, and an in-progress sock. However, if the camera starts acting up and you have to take it to the camera shop in the middle of your excursion, you might feel a bit silly pulling the sock out to get to the camera, especially if one of your DPNs goes flying out of the camera bag, and you have to chase it halfway across the shop.

5. The camera:



6. This cat is so plotting evil things.



7. More proof of evilness:



8. I love gumbo.

silent poetry reading

for the Bloggers' Silent Poetry Reading

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments; love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no, it is an ever-fixèd mark,
That looks on tempest and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand'ring bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his highth be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Sonnet 116
William Shakespeare

too much excitement

1. The Slytherin scarf is off the needles as of...as much time ago as it took to toss it triumphantly onto the bed and log into blogger.

2. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows comes out on July 21.

...

WHEEEEEE!!!!!

infiltrators

Yeah, so, those moths? They weren't wool moths. They were meal moths, and they were living in the large bag of cat food in the kitchen. Now, being totally honest, I would prefer cat-food eating moths to wool eating moths, but still. Ew. And poor kitty, what sort of moth stuff has she been ingesting? Of course, I've seen her and the cats at my parents' house eat bugs before, so I don't suppose eating some moth eggs would be terrible for her. She seems fine, and she hasn't been burping up moths. Needless to say, however, I threw out that bag of cat food, and I haven't seen a moth in days.

Now I'm going to go take a shower. Just thinking about bug infestation makes my skin crawl.

pretending to be organized

Last night, all the yarn lying around my room in plastic bags finally started to get on my nerves (you should read that as "I tripped over some innocent looking wool and almost died"), so I put on some music and set about thinking up a new way to store all the yarn, as it has managed to outgrow the plastic box I had been keeping it in. I finally came up with this:



Which, I think, will work very well. On top of the blue box is the yarn for things that I'm currently working on, and inside the box is the yarn for the projects I'd like to start next.

I think my needle storage solution justifies my saving any cool-looking box that comes my way:



And I put the rest of my yarn in the Office Depot file boxes currently pretending to be a night stand:



Now, I'd like to introduce my oldest Unfinished Object:



Why yes, that is a crocheted afghan. I started it in high school, but I don't really remember the exact circumstances. It's at least five years old, if not older. I do kind of like it, except I'm not really sure about the orange stripe. I know, when I started it, that I really liked the orange stripe, because my color preferences in high school were generally "loud". Not that I don't still like loud colors, I just now also have an appreciation for colors and combination that don't burn out your retinas.

Anyway. I like the pattern.



Just, for some reason I have an odd sense of confusion whenever I look at this blanket. Ah well. Maybe I'll go grab a crochet hook and do a couple rows.

Or maybe I'll knit a sock.

lady thrumsalot

I actually finished these back in December, but for whatever reason I didn't get around to weaving in the ends on the second one until this morning. I suppose some part of me feels more motivated now that it's actually cold outside.

Pattern: Thrummed Mittens from Interweave Knits Winter '06
Yarn: Dyed roving from the Zeilinger Wool Company, and Icelandic wool kindly given to me by Laurie at The Lavender Fleece.

bayerische beginnings

This pattern is so much fun, I can only work on it for short periods of time so I don't over stimulate myself.

Ok, actually, the pattern really is fun, but it's slow going because a) I haven't memorized the charts and b) I'm a slow knitter anyway.

On the moth front, I went through all the wool I own, and I did not find any evidence of a moth infestation. I'm still suspicious, because I killed two more moths yesterday, so I separated my yarn into ziploc bags. Hopefully, if the moths do decide to show themselves, that should make it really obvious which yarn needs to be frozen, microwaved, refrozen, remicrowaved, vacuumed, and then blessed by a priest.

war mongering

Today, I waged war on the ends, specifically the ends dangling off the sides of all my Weasley squares. I got through about a third of the squares I've already knit, and resolved not to knit any more squares until I've finished weaving in the ends of the completed ones. Then, I'm going to weave in the ends of each additional square as they are finished. Why I didn't employ this very logical, sane process before, I have no idea, but I have decided that it is more beneficial to my sanity to not think about it.

I restarted my roommate's Slytherin scarf again, this time on straight needles in 1x1 ribbing. I was previously knitting it on a 12" circular needle in a long tube, but she and I both agreed that it was just too thick for a scarf. I'm two stripes in, the first stripe representing V for Vendetta, and the second representing Kingdom of Heaven. I'm probably going to have to call in Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, and Harry Potter for some help as well, because movies are really the only way this scarf makes any progress.

On a scarier note, I've killed five moths this week in my apartment. I'm...concerned. But, explaining to my roommate why I am microwaving my wool might be fun. And so it begins, the great battle of our time...

Ich bin eine Socknitter

One sock...

...Two socks!

This photo is closer to the actual colors...


Pattern: generic sock pattern, as explained by that other Stephanie in Knitting Rules!
Yarn: Koigu KPPPPPPPPPM...ok, I actually can't remember how many P's there were, so, um, Koigu of the sock-yarn variety, which was purchased when I randomly decided to go to the yarn shop after my last exam in December.
started December 27 and finished January 13

The worst part was finishing the first one while I was home by myself and not having anyone to show it to. Fortunately my roommate was around when I finished the second one about an hour ago, and she seems to think knitting is pretty cool (even though she usually declines my suggestions that she take it up herself), so she was properly impressed when I modeled the pair for her.

Oh, and kitchener stitch? Fabulous. I love it. It's just so gosh-darned clever.