All Purpose

So not a lot going on right now. I have managed to get to the foot portion of my first monkey sock (pic hopefully to follow later), but have stalled out the last couple of days. I didn’t get any knitting done this past weekend and I’m sure that this weekend will be any better. I’m hoping to get back into my monkey groove tonight, I would like to finish these for my stepmom, maybe this weekend.

No Comments | In: gifts, knitting, life, work in progress | tags: gifts, knitting, socks, work in progress. | #

So I’m making some progress on the Monkey socks.

I’m liking the pattern, but I’m kind of bummed the colors are clumping up like they are. I have a lot of purple on one side and a lot of green on the other. It’s not terrible though, I mean I don’t care that much about pooling and flashing, I just wish the colors were more evenly distributed on both sides. but it could be worse.

It’s been another rough week. My oldest cat died this week and that has really upset me. I also got more bad news about my stepmom, so I’m not in a good place right now. I am going to Galveston this weekend to see some of my family, and hopefully that will be ok. I guess I don’t have much else to say. I’m knitting, it’s comforting, so hopefully I’ll have some good updates after the weekend.

No Comments | In: gifts, knitting, work in progress | tags: cats, gifts, grief, knitting, pets, socks, work in progress. | #

So I don’t have any pics, and I don’t really have too much knitting updating to do. I’m depressed, I’ve had a rough week. I have been totally slacking on my 365 project I skipped Sun-Wed of this week. I did manage to take a pic yesterday so if I can repeat that today I may be out of my slump there.

I have been working on my second Jitterbug sock. It is not going well. I have no idea how the first sock could have been so relatively easy and this one is so freakin hard. I think I knit and frogged the heel turn like 5-6 times before feeling like I did it right (maybe?) but when I went to pick up my stitches for the gusset (is that right?) I realized I had the whole thing on the needles all cattywonkas and I had seriously fucked something up. I was so pissed I just frogged the whole thing and started over. My reasoning was that I did make a change for the second sock: doing the small size so I should just redo the whole thing as a medium since that worked so much better last time.

I managed to get Ella’s blanket seamed yesterday and was able to measure that I have about 15″ to finish for my first trim piece.

I got my buttons for Ovaltine, but haven’t put them on yet. Maybe after work today, but maybe not since it’s supposed to be 90 (yes 90) degrees today.

M. came home last night (good) but I also got some bad news about my stepmom (bad). So now I’m trying to decide if I’m really want to go to the free shows at Auditorium Shores tonight with my neighbor/friend or if I want to bail because I’m bummed and don’t feel like dealing with the crowd, etc. I actually don’t feel like I should be out enjoying myself after what I heard last night. That’s probably the wrong attitude to take though.

2 Comments | In: gifts, knitting, work in progress | tags: blanket, depression, knitting, ovaltine, socks, sweater, sxsw, work in progress. | #

So I’ve been getting into podcasts a lot lately and I listened to one last night as I finished Ovaltine (DONE!) and I started thinking about how I got started knitting and it made me think that would be a good blog post, probably. I mean how could it be any worse than the normal stuff I put on here.

So I started knitting in 1998. I had quit smoking at the beginning of that year and taken up cross stitch (I know) to keep my hands busy. Then I moved from New Orleans to Missoula, MT and decided that I needed to learn how to knit. I think I was getting bored with cross stitch. So I don’t remember exactly the first think I knit, but I did teach myself using some books + the internet. I made a bunch of people knitted presents that year. I made my first sweater, for my sister, out of some crazy acrylic/mohair Lion’s Brand yarn. She actually still wears it, but recently confessed to me that she’s never been able to actually wear it since the neck opening it so tight it would choke her. She wears it preppy style instead (over the shoulders). I knit most of the time I lived in Montana, but since 1999-2001 included me busting my ass to finish my BA and working as much as possible the knitting tapered off toward my last year there.

Then I moved back to Austin for grad school. You would think grad school would sort of preclude knitting, but I found a lot of would-be librarian’s were getting into knitting so toward the end of my grad school time I started doing more and more knitting. I also discovered better yarn (because really all yarn is intrinsically good right). Then I finished school and I did pretty steady knitting and crocheting (yes I picked up crochet somewhere in there as well, also self-taught) until I got engaged last year. Then I stopped everything. I really didn’t even look at my knitting for 9 months. I never really thought about this until after the fact when I picked it all back up and realized how much I had missed it. Now I am sooooo into it it’s a little scary. Ok, not scary but M. has commented how I’m so into knitting lately, and I am. I think I finally reached the tipping point of seeing myself truely progress as a knitter + starting to understand fundamentals better + Ravelry. Now I’m unstoppable knitting machine.

It’s funny though because I went to a knit class a few weeks ago and most of the people in it were new knitters and I had forgotten how dejected a new knitter can get. It’s really hard at first and it seems like you will never improve, but I’m proof: you will improve it will get easier, it just takes time.

No Comments | In: knitting, ravelry, work in progress | tags: knitting, learning to knit, ovaltine, sweater. | #

First things first: the hat situation…So I talked with my sis on Friday and she told me that if I made something handwash it wasn’t a big deal. She also said she didn’t think something covering her ears would be practical. I’m still making the Earhart hat anyway though-to give her options. I also made a crochet hat out of some of my Malabrigo Chunky and that was FAST, so it’s ready to go.

The Earhart hat is a little over halfway done (only have a pic of the start of it though).

I went to the sweater workshop yesterday and realized after seaming my shoulders and starting my collar that the neck BO is way too tight. I know I said I was going to fix that last week, but I didn’t and I should have. Ended up unseaming the shoulders and ripping back and redoing the bind off on the back and one side. I’ll do the other side tonight and reseam the shoulders and try the collar again. I’m really shooting to get this done pronto even though I have until March 30th. I really want to start a new sweater (the $1.50 Cardigan) that’s more for the spring. I might even join the Knit Along, we’ll see.

I also have to finish Linda’s hat and decide if I want to start her socks or finish mine first. I talked with my sweater teacher and she helped me figure out where I went wrong. She said for Magic Loop and using 2 circulars you basically do the decreases at the beginning and end of each half. I had them messed up because I was following the DPN instructions and so one of them was in the middle. Anyway, I’m going to rip back and try again I think. So I may finish my socks then start a pair for Linda. I’m, I guess, a little nervous that she won’t like the hats. It’s ridiculous really, but I figure I need to finish my socks anyway for the practice so that hers will be even better than mine. Maybe I could be ready to start her socks this weekend while we’re visiting, or maybe not considering how much else I need to do.

The one thing I have totally noticed since I started Ravelry is that my knitting is not only more organized but I really have started taking more of a project management approach to the whole thing. I feel like I definitely work on my knitting more, I definitely think about it more and I’m definitely finishing a lot more. I have even been planning some spring/summer project, which I have never done before. I just realized I could be working on tanks and socks this summer and I could make socks my present de l’année. So anyway, I’ve been combing back through my old mags for tank patterns and bought some newer Spring/Summer issues of IK that I was missing and now my queue is exploding with projects.

But I am not buying yarn (or anything else I don’t absolutely need) for the next 3 months. If I make it then I can buy myself a skein of Handmaiden Sea Silk for the Montego Bay scarf to test it. I love the idea of knitting that Cobweb wrap from the new IK in Sea Silk, but it would be very expensive (over $100 I think) so I’d want to try it out first I think.

No Comments | In: crochet, finished object, gifts, knitting, ravelry, work in progress | tags: binding off, cardigan, collar, crochet, gifts, hat, interweave knits, knitting, lace, ravelry, sea silk, shoulder seam, socks, sweater, wrap. | #

So I realized yesterday while I was working that even though my stepmom has been battling cancer for almost 2 years I have not made her anything. WTF? I don’t really understand how I didn’t think of this before (ok last year with the wedding it makes sense, but when she first started chemo in 2006?). I guess the diagnosis came very quickly and she did chemo really fast and then everything was ok for a while and by the time they found more tumors I was engaged and trying to plan a wedding.

In any case, she is starting yet another course of chemo (an old school kind I hear) in a couple of weeks and I’m going to see her beforehand next weekend, so I decided it would be nice to present her with some comfort items when I see her next weekend. I am going to make her the Amelia Earhart Earflap hat and a couple of pairs of socks. I looked around for some yarn ideas and found that most people say you should give something machine washable. So hard. So after backing and forthing over it I decided since these are gifts I could buy yarn for them. I went to HCW’s after work and found some great sock yarn that proclaims to be machine wash (gentle/cold).

But finding something for her hat was harder. I did end up picking up some Berroco Comfort, but while it is soft I don’t really like that it’s all non-natural fibers. I found a couple of other possibilities though, but wasn’t crazy about the colors they had, and I was just dithering because I wasn’t sure how well the allegedly machine washable stuff will really hold up, then again it’s not expensive (2 skeins/balls) so I could always make her the hat again if it fell apart. Will dad be doing the laundry? So freakin hard to make a decision.

Anyway, I got home and decided that I wanted to knit her something really great and I began doubting the Berroco purchase. I decided instead to start a hat using my last skein of Malabrigo worsted because it’s so soft I just want her to have it, even if dad ends up machine washing it and ruining it. But I’d still like to make her 1-2 more hats in a more practical, yet natural fiber, and since it’s already hit 90 and will be in the 70-80′s this weekend I wanted to do make the next hat in a lighter yarn, maybe try some bamboo. I’d also like to avoid cotton unless it’s organic since we all suspect that her exposure to cotton pesticides (cotton farming is basically what she grew up around) might be a BIG reason she has cancer. Plus, since the hat covers her whole head I wonder about colors.

So anyway, I bought yarn (about $50 worth) + 3 old Interweave Knits that I was missing. I think when I go for my Sweater Workshop on Sunday I’ll return the Berroco and get a different yarn or if I can find something online I might order it online. The Berroco was cheap (I think $3/ball) so really returning it is silly, but I need to get in the habit of returning thing I know I won’t use.

In other news, I finished the sleeves for my sweater on Wednesday night and ripped back the bad right front so it’s ready to fix. No more progress on my sock or Ella’s blanket, and I think that’ll be on hold until I finish the sweater and L’s gifts.

2 Comments | In: gifts, knitting, stash, work in progress | tags: cancer, chemo, cotton, farming, gift knitting, gifts, hat, knitting, natural fibers v. synthetic, pesticides. | #

So, I’m catching back up on the Sweater Workshop sweater (aka Ovaltine). I’m almost done with the 2nd front piece. I’ll be adding pics later today. Woot. I won’t be able to do my sleeves until the yarn reinforcements come though so they better hurry since I think I need them soon.

I’m trying real hard to restrain myself from starting a new project. I want to start some socks….big time. Maybe I should just start them. I mean I have yarn for 2 pairs now I think so I need to break my sock cherry. The problem is that the lady who is doing my SW (Sweater Workshop) at HCW’s said if I really want to learn I could start coming to the Thursday night knitting class (a free for all) and she’d teach me. I would love to because I sat in with them last week to make up my missed SW class and they are a very fun bunch, and I think I might start doing the Thursday thing AFTER I finish the SW. I’d love to be able to afford to pay for the Thursday thing now, and really $40/month is not bad. But I need to get control of myself with the spending. I did exempt my running class and the SW from my goal though, and I’m going to have to drop my running class. The other negative is the fact that it means missing Lost, but I guess we could catch up later. I’m babbling.

I’m also fighting, sometimes successfully sometimes not, the urge to buy/trade yarn on Ravelry. I did sell some yarn last week though (go me). I found 4 skeins of Manos Wool in Bramble for sale so I’m thinking about doing that and using the other 2 skeins I have with it to make a cardi instead of another stinking scarf. I have like 5 scarves hanging by my front door right now. I don’t need another scarf. I really want to try out the Manos though so I don’t want to put the yarn up for swap either. So hard.

No Comments | In: knitting, ravelry, stash, work in progress | tags: knitting, manos, money, socks, stash, sweater, yarn. | #

I have been sick since Friday. It sucks because I’ve been so sick that I really couldn’t knit and the sickness made me miss my sweater workshop class on Sunday. Damn it. The teacher told me to come by the Thursday night class though so I can see what I missed. So I should have some updates later in the week.

No Comments | In: knitting, work in progress | tags: flu, knitting, sweater workshop. | #