Look! Pictures.
I have been knitting, I swear! It has been ages since I've posted pictures. As usual we have been a very busy family. Here is the past weekend.

Saturday: Aptos, CA Seacliff State Beach, The Kids TKD beach party.














Sunday: Felton, CA Roaring Camp Railroad, A Day out with Thomas












That is a genuine full scale Thomas, like a dope I cut off Thomas' face in the picture, I hope my sister took a better picture. It was a beautiful day and the only spoiler was my nervous Nephew throwing up as soon as he was on the train! Fun!

Monday & Tuesday Swimming Fun with Friends at a Friend's House

All the while I was making The Everlasting Bagstopper from LionBrand Yarn Incredible. It took 4 balls of yarn. The first picture is the bottom of the bag while still on the needles. The second obviously is finished, ends woven in. The finished size is 15" tall (not counting the handles) 4" wide on the bottom. Instead of using sewn on handles as Amy Singer prescribed, I knitted on a pair of handles using a band 10 sts wide, picked up from the edge, directly above the bottom corner, then made them 15" long then grafted the end above the other corner. I used the size 7 needles so it was pretty tight gauge, hoping it would stretch out less and maintain its wide shape. I have loaded it up with about 10 lbs of stuff to see how much it stretches. It stretches some, but not an unreasonable amount. Loaded up it is probably about 25" long.
Last but not least the Felici Firefighter sock for DS! I made them a little big because he outgrows them so fast and more importantly he won't be wearing them until Fall, as it will be Flip Flops until school starts. Last but not least, I have arrived!! I am finally on Ravelry. I won't be such an idiot next time and I will jump on the bandwagon the 1st time it passes by and not the 100th... At least I am not number 21,500th in the queue... talk about waiting to get on the bandwagon.... Oh yeah only 2 days to MS3 clue 5! Sweet!

I am not a notorious project starter. I am a finisher. I start something, finish it off, then move on to the next project. Lately though I just keep on starting, project after project. Because 3 inches of toe on a sock, a 1/3 finished "Tenderheart Shawl" and Mystery Stole are not enough, I started an Everlasting Bagstopper today. I keep intending to make a bag, but I've never found the right pattern and, though I knew it was very easy to design one, put a bottom on it, make an even number of stitches and then do faggot stitch around until you hands fall off, I was never inspired. However the prospect of wiling away my day at the beach for DS and DD's Tae Kwon Do school's beach party, and the 2 wool projects and 1 alpaca project I had on the needles seemed a little hot and destined to absorb sand faster than the crotch pocket on a swimming suit, I thought I needed to bring along something else to work on. I thought, Everlasting Bagstopper, knit up with something entirely different might be cool. A week and a half ago I happened to pick up quite a bit of Lion Yarn Incredible (which is very pretty but was always over priced and knit up has a texture that eerily reminds me of a crabs lungs/gills when you are cleaning out a crab for consumption) at the local Dolllar Tree for the amazing price of $1 per ball (well duh, it is the Dollar Tree right?)! I switched up the needle size a bit using 7 and 11 instead of 5 and 10.5, using dpns for the beginning instead of circulars then switched to circular once the stitches were picked up. It is coming out, super cool! I LOVE it. It is pretty and sparkly and I am currently using Autumn Leaves, a wonderful brown/copper color that looks great! The online photo of the yarn doesn't do it justice, it just doesn't shine the way it does in person. This bag is going to be the eye catcher of all Everlasting's made and I have a feeling I will be working on it tomorrow (well, later today that is) as I ride on Thomas the Tank Engine under the shade of the Roaring Camp Redwoods!

It's Friday and I grant myself permission to finish clue 4 chart F! Wahoo!

I finished the first sock of DS Felici Firefighter socks while watching Planet Earth when I should have been going to bed. It is really quite nice, it is SO soft. It really is some of the nicest superwash Merino I have ever felt, we'll have to see how it washes up, if it gets all pilly or shrinks some or if it comes out completely unscathed like the SUPERWool I am suspecting it of being. I am surely going to have to order at lease what, 8 balls, nah, I'd need at least 11 (but no odd balls so at least 12 right?) to make the $45 minimum to get the free shipping... Oh what a sacrifice!

DS's foot is relatively (child's size 13/1) small and skinny so I have a fair amount left over in one skein, I'll have to make something small out of it, like wrist warmers or something. Now to begin the next sock. I'll have to go pull out a bunch of yarn until I get to the right spot. Teenuh knows how obsessed I am with getting perfectly matching socks (unmatched socks, like the ones I made from Trekking drive me BoNkErS!!). There is an 8 stripe variation (amazingly enough with only 4 colors) before the next matching repeat so there'll be 2 chunks of leftover yarn, unless Goddess of knitting willing I got nearly perfectly matched balls with similar starting points.....

As for MS3. I am taking my time on Chart f. I have forbidden myself to work steadily on it, until at least Friday, then it will almost feel like a normal clue release....

Running out of things to do.

I made what now sort of seems like a mistake by finishing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on Sunday because I found that nobody else that I know has finished reading it yet!! So I have to sit patiently and keep my mouth shut about what happened so as not to ruin it for anyone else.

After finishing the book I blasted through chart E of MS3. I have started chart F but am trying to pace myself realizing that there are still 10 more days until the next chart is released. Work a line here, work a line there.... I am still working on the Tenderheart shawl and still working on DS's socks. It just doesn't have the same sense of excitement though, does it?

Hooray for clue 4...

Printed and marked all 4 pages of pattern for Mystery Stole 3. I have begun working away. I love it. It is so fun to not really have an idea of what you are doing and just go on good faith that the designer will not lead you astray.

Not that I really needed more to do. I started a pair of ST stitch socks in Felici Firefighter colorway for DS. I almost hijacked the yarn to make a pair of socks for myself. I was working away in a lovely chevron when my mom looked over at my socks and asked if they were for DS or DH because I had finally succeeded in finding a wonderfully manly color. Feeling outed and guilty for being caught in making myself another pair of socks out of something clearly intended for another person, I promptly ripped back the 4 inches of progress and reduced it to the size of DS's foot. This yarn is so very soft and smooth. It is yummy. I am going to have to order some more Felici for myself in one of the 8 fabulous colorways, or maybe all 8!

The Tenderheart shawl, (as I think of it fondly in my head, when my daughter was small(er) she had a speech impediment and was often heard saying "tenda haaaart" in a way that was so very cute) is progressing nicely although I am thinking it is more like Love-A-Lot in the color scheme and volume of hearts. My pattern is working out nicely, although my one concern is that it increases in width more than length and I will have to stop when it is shorter than intended simply so that it doesn't become too wide to be useful. I tried to rework the shawl to have only 1 increase per (rs) row but couldn't quite get the repeats to follow nicely and what not.

Never Ever gonna get in.

ravelry > antsy

patiently awaiting your invite?

If you've added your name to the invite request list on our front page then you can use this form
to check your place in line.

Email address

Found you!

• You signed up on June 5, 2007
• You are #7052 on the list.
• 1076 people are ahead of you in line.
• 11343 people are behind you in line.
• 32% of the list has been invited so far

Damn. Why did I wait SO Long to sign up. Maybe I was sort of thinking, "Who would want to catalog their entire stash and all of their FO's outside of their blogs? Surely this madness will blow over. It won't be that popular" (delusional self-talk). Then, "It can't stay in Beta forever, soon everyone will be able to sign up and no one will care much any more." (more delusional self-talk). Then, "Well, if I'm getting on the bandwagon I'd better get moving or I'll be left far behind." Cripes, what was I thinking waiting? #7,052 on the list. Over a thousand people ahead of me. Waiting. I can tell you what I'm thinking now..."Damn! I'm glad I'm not the person who is 11,343 people behind me!" Do the math. I am 7052. 1076 people are head. 5976 people are already in. How much more room could there be!? Isn't the pool getting crowded? There are still 12420 people on the waiting list. Will 18396 people fit!? With all of their stashes and fo's and wips. What could possibly contain this?

I am very impatiently waiting for clue #4. In the meantime, I have been driving myself nuts trying to design a shawl with hearts on it for my DD. I am the world's biggest heart hater, and some how I ended up with a daughter who is so totally into hearts and pink stuff and stuff that is just so girly! I bought this bright pink and purple yarn at Sitches from Helen's Half Pint Farm. I poured through my pattern books. Graphed extensively (started this part 3 separate times over the last 4 months before I sat down and got serious about it.) Began knitting. Ripped back. Re charted (repeat these 3 steps about 20 times, yeah seriously, until I kid you not, 6 AM!) At some point I switched to some waste yarn, so as not to wear out this wonderful yarn. I went to bed when I realized the sun was coming up. Began working on it again the next morning. Repeating those 3 infamous steps. FINALLY I liked what I saw, cast on 8 stitches and started to knit. I am still not entirely fond of the way it is working out, I think it should be more lacy, but I don't want it to be too lacy, since I think she is planning on using it for practical warming purposes and she said she likes it the way it is, though I suspect this is because she doesn't want me to try and redesign it, she just wants it finished. I found things worked out easier if I used a TON of stitch markers, you may have not ever seen so many markers on one project. I am waiting to see how nice or ugly it turns out before I post pictures... You'll just have to wait and see.

Yahoo! MS3 clue #3 finished. This is a shot of only the newest portion. This one went quick. It was fairly repetitious and just cranked off the needles, it was very similar to clue 2 and the pattern was fairly obvious in that you could see if you'd made a mistake as soon as you reached those diagonal lines traversing the stole. Here it is in its entirety still not blocked at all. My edges LOVE to curl under, I'll probably have to starch the edges a little bit when I block it. The only bummer now is that I am done for a WHOLE week. I should have taken my time... savored it a little. The next week will be a challenge, do I knit first or read my Harry Potter book. They'll both probably take about the same amount of time (well okay, the book will probably take me about an hour more than the knitting) How do I decide!? I guess if my Amazon shipment doesn't arrive before the clue is posted, that will decide for me, won't it!?

Surprisingly I got right into the Adobe file for the MS3 Clue 3 with no problems and got my pages downloaded and printed out. No huge lag, no mad rush of 6,000 people, what a relief.


So what a dork am I!? I just realized that I never posted pics of my custom needles and markers that I ordered from Scary Merry. The arrived the day before I left for Hawaii so I never had time, but duh, I should have done it as soon as I got home right? I stumbled onto her super nifty cool designs on Myspace (check out her pics it has all her work) of all places and promptly friended her and asked her to make me a of Corpse Bride needles. They are SOOO wonderful. I just need to make something that fits on straights and uses a size 6 needles so I can show them off. Ugh I am SO in love with them! She makes SO many cool things. I just want to sit around and fondle them.... You can see they are tiny (that's a dime for size reference) but SUPER detailed. Such excellent work! I was thinking of ordering some custom needles for someone special for maybe Christmas or her birthday(which just passed), but I couldn't decide what she might like best... Everything she does is so good how could you pick?!

Okee Dokee, here it is the picture of my MS3 with clue 2 finished.

It is not blocked at all, sorry for the beach towel underneath making different colors. If you click on it, you can see the beads, they certainly don't show up at all in that tiny picture, they look totally black in the photograph, they are actually a myriad of lovely rainbow colors...

Thank goodness the next clue comes out tomorrow because durn this EVIL yarn of Luna Moth Shawl. It has again, escaped only to have a GIANT hole looming 15 rows below (and like 20 stitches WIDE) where I am working. I am sure now I will wind it into a ball and give the cursed thing to some other knitter who I would like to jinx instead. UGH! For the first time ever knitting lace, I am ready to rip this thing out and never start it again!!!

MS3 Clue #2 finished!

I have to wait while my camera batteries charge . I have so many pics from vacation to download my batteries will need to last at least 20 minutes and right now they will last about 2 minutes. Then I'll post the pics.

MS3 Clue #1 complete!

I finished clue 1 and am about to embark on clue 2. It looks quite nice already. This is going to be fun, fun, fun!

Where on earth did I go again!?

I missed you all dear blogging friends! 2 weeks on Maui sure went fast! I can't believe how the time flew and I barely had any time to knit. With the exception of the airplane ride, I think I only found like 4 chances to pick up my knitting so not much progress was made on the Luna Shawl, maybe about 30 rows and I didn't manage to coerce any of my family members into taking pics of me knitting at the beach (they thought I was a super dork) or sitting at the mall waiting for my mom, or sitting in my Grandparent's house...

I was happy when I got home though, because the Mystery Stole 3, KAL had begun and I had some catching up to do! I am using the Alpaca Clouds from Knitpicks in the midnight colorway on size 4 needles. I am using iridescent black glass beads in size 6. It was started earlier this evening and I stopped for the evening on row 70, so I am nearly done with clue 1 (to row 100). Clue 2 goes to row 150 and the next clue comes next Friday so I am nearly back on track with the releases!

Someday I will post pictures of those Panda Cotton socks and the progress on the Luna shawl. Once I get caught up with MS3 I can work both at the same time.

Panda Cotton socks are finished.

I finished weaving in the ends early Tuesday afternoon. It has been my only relaxation on a sea of stress. Who wants to take my vacation for me!? Well here they are in all their glory. This yarn is SUPER fantastic! It is so soft and nice to knit with and very stretchy too. The only not fun thing is the ends when you are weaving in the yarn unwinds into the plies and grabs onto itself and tries to make knots left and right and then doesn't want to follow the needle through. Other than that, I would MOST definitely use this yarn over and over and over to make socks.

I won, I won, Ha ha ha!

For years I have grumbled and complained how much we need an air conditioner. I had a friend who did HVAC give us an AWESOME estimate.... no the DH said... we don't need it. Was he ever home then? Nope. He had a lovely air conditioned office to hide in at the hottest part of the day. Now, he works from home. And lo and behold, he's Too hot. Yesterday, he FINALLY decided we did need an air conditioner and we got a portable air conditioner! It was like heaven. I was sleeping on a cool breezy cloud last night (I always have a hard time sleeping when it is any temp over say... 72 degrees. I am so in love with the air conditioner. I sat in my room and knit even! I finished one panda cotton sock and cast on the next one. Should be cranking that puppy right out. Then it will be back to torturing myself working on the jinxed Luna shawl.

High at 3 pm 102 degrees Fahrenheit with an astounding low of 92 degrees at 8 pm....

Too hot to knit... can't go on. Will try again later....

I just couldn't wait, so I started a pair of socks with the Panda cotton I picked up at Purlessence on Sunday. Teenuh and I went out for her birthday and we swung by the LYS killing time. I visited the knitters at Boba knit, had a DELICIOUS Peach Ice with infamous Boba in it. Though mine had SO many in it, I was nearly choking to death as I drank the last 4 inches of the liquid in the cup. I may order a half ration of Boba next time, though mine seemed to have more than anyone else's to begin with....

I was very frustrated with the Luna Shawl, after dropping 2 stitches that rapidly grew into a mass of 27 dropped stitches on Saturday. I didn't notice the hole until about 8 rows later and by then it was on a rampage toward the bottom. 3 hours later I ended up ripping back a total of 18 rows. Packed it up and didn't work on it until Sunday, only to not pay attention (talking and knitting after a big mistake, not so good!) and mess up right at the beginning of the row and having to rip back to the start of the row. It was like 8 stitches forward and 10 stitches back, I couldn't make any progress! I was at that point of debating ripping out the whole thing and giving the cursed ball of yarn to some other knitter I didn't like, but couldn't think of anyone in particular. So I set it aside and cranked out a sock. It is very thick, but soft and stretchy and will be ideal during cooler months. The heel is turned there, but you just can't see it. It is a lacy sort of Faux Cable. Unfortunately the way our weather is going we may not see cooler months for 6 + more months, the weather has been so bizarre. It sure was a slow start to summer. Maybe my feet will just sweat in them in the summer... yummy.

Just a taste and an assurance that I am alive and knitting...

Doesn't it just gall you that the Harlot is here in our state, in our wonderful Bay Area nonetheless but so darn far up north that there is no way you could leave early, cross that evil red bridge and see her and get home at anything resembling a reasonable hour (or even an hour in this day) to get up in the morning and go on with life tomorrow!? Bummer. What about us Southies down here!? Don't we count for anything!? Commuknitty or someone (and we all know it isn't going to be the Knitting Room!) needs to get it in gear and book the woman!

Here is the Luna Moth shawl in JoJo land, good stuff.


I am really hating that beige stripe. Odds are though I will probably give this away (I hardly keep anything for myself) so that shouldn't be too much of a problem.

A quick glance at the March Shawl of the Quarter kit. The yarn is 50/50 silk merino and super soft.
I really want to do this project next, but have other things in the queue that need to be done, sooner rather than later. I was lagging in knitting these last couple of days, on Sunday (and those of you who know me know this is entirely possible and sadly most likely to occur with me and any mildly sharp object) I cut my middle finger on the metal edge of a tape dispenser. I got it pretty darn good, it cut deeper than one would think was possible. Then the end of my finger was aching and puffy and had gotten a little bit infected (not enough to warrant a trip to the dr.) So I was mildly incapacitated in my ability to knit. It s...l...o...w...e...d.... me down. Yeah, I know, what a spaz, but if I wasn't a spaz, I wouldn't be me, now would I?

It blogs!!!

I have returned after being held hostage by school volunteering. The teacher appreciation tea came and went, with decorating, cooking, and setting up eating up one day. My children competed in a Tae Kwon Do Tournament at Stanford and had to go to practice 5 times a week. Then dedicated an entire day to being at the tournament. I also co-chaired the book fair and it ate up all of my time: sleeping time, television viewing time, but worst of all knitting time! For an entire week, the book fair sought to drain my life from me, but alas, it lasted only a week and I survived. You will laugh, but not be surprised, when I say that I suckered myself into being next years secretary for the Home and School Club (or PTA for you old skool folk) which I had to take up right away because the outgoing secretary moved to Washington before school let out. Learning the ins and outs of that has been relatively easy but somewhat time consuming.

In between I have found the time to knit a little. My WIP is the Luna Moth Shawl from Elann's free pattern section. Made with Jojoland Harmony (or is it Melody?) lace weight variegated. Pictures soon, I just didn't have time today.

I got my shawl of the quarter kit from Joslyn's Fiber Farm, it is wonderful and green and lovely 50/50 silk merino yarn. I can't wait to knit it. Pictures of this soon too...

So now I will leave you with something amazingly precious and cute.

Cowboy Spirit Day at school.

When I saw my buddy Teenuh was a Ring Finger I had to see what finger I was.....

You Are a Pinky

You are fiercely independent, and possibly downright weird. A great communicator, you can get along with almost anyone. You are kind and sympathetic. You support all your friends - and love them for who they are. You get along well with: The Ring Finger Stay away from: The Thumb

What Finger Are You?

Best matched to a Ring finger... no wonder we get along so well...

Spinning again.

Yeah, so now that I can do a fairly decent job at it, I find myself addicted to spinning while watching tv and my knitting progress has suffered terribly for it. All I've done lately is spin and spin.

Ah, yes, I have also been busy with my drum carder carding some unwashed suri alpaca that has been fun to process. I am thinking I will never buy unwashed again, because washing it in batches in a bucket in my bathroom has really been, um, interesting? I had a massive alpaca hair clog when one lock escaped and immediately spiraled down the drain. The drum carder is SO fun. Although I have learned a valuable lesson when I got bitten by the slicker. Damn that thing is sharp!! I accidentally poked my finger on one of the spikes and man was it more effective than any lancet ever made. My finger bled and bled. *Note to self - don't poke finger on slicker.* When I got it I was totally hoping I could get the kids to crank the handle and push in the fiber, but now I don't even want them to stand near the thing, not to mention putting their precious little fingers anywhere near it. All I can see is the slicker munching their hand and shredding up their skin. It terrifies me. I am sure it will be a subject for nightmares to come.

So far I have made 2 suri alapaca batts. They are silky and luxurious. The carder couldn't be easier to use. My learning curve has been steep. Lesson 1, don't hold the fiber tightly as it feeds under the licker because then it wraps around the licker instead of rolling onto the drum and then you have to pick it off and that is dangerous. Lesson 2, when they instructions say "small amounts" they mean small amounts and not smallish large amounts or it gets tangled up and the fiber doesn't roll onto the drum smoothly and more fiber gets wrapped around previously mentioned evil licker. Lesson 3, They give you a flicker card for a reason, using the flicker card or a comb makes a more even bat that doesn't have the ends of the locks still bunched up. Lesson 4, keep your damn fingers away from evil licker drum.

Well, off to sit and spin.

Spinning on the dream machine.

Gosh do I LOVE this little spinning wheel. Two pedals are twice as good as one. I can spin a lot longer without my back hurting from having to sit with my legs weird to try and alternate feet. It is a LOT easier to get consistent speeds too. Here is my handspun Merino Silk blend from Angora Cottage. I think I should have plied it the opposite way for a softer yarn. I can do it on the next one, since I have like 12 more ounces of it left. This came out as a 2 ply lace weight. It is the finest, most consistently spun skein I have made to date (you may notice I have never posted a pic of my spinning before because it was simply TOO hideous to be seen). I'm sad looking back at my skills when I ruined, wasted ugly spun some nice flame colored red, yellow, and black superwash. I still have some left, I just don't know if it will be enough to actually make socks or anything with. It makes me excited to start spinning the merino tencel I bought at Stitches.

Felted Bowling Ball Style bag is done!

The Patons wool felts really nicely. The Cascade 220 sucks! It hardly felted at all. The long band I knitted to make the sewn on stripe accents with was barely felted after 2 runs through the washing machine (the patons felted completely by the first run through). It was knitted on size 11 needles with 2 strands held together. What crap. The hardest part of the bag is getting it shaped after you have felted it. I am not sure that I did so good.
Here it is before felting.
Here it is after felting.
It is pretty ugly. I have given it to my DD and she is as thrilled as can be. I also cranked out this little one skein purse. It was supposed to be bigger according the the directions but came out about 2 inches smaller. It was made using Patons SWS. It is nice and soft and felted quite nicely.
Before Felting

After felting. Last but not least my Bauerliches socks in Lisa Souza "South Pacific" colorway. Yeah, sorry for the bizarre picture I laid on my back on the couch and stuck my feet up on the back of the couch and snapped. Before you go, a closeup of the stitch pattern.

Hooooooooray for Saturday.

Teenuh and I went on a merry yarn tour yesterday, visiting 6 wonderful yarn stores of the Bay Area Peninsula. We ran out of time and did not make it a perfect 10 by missing 4 of South Bay stores. The day started with me driving around in circles, having forgotten my cell phone at home. I picked up Teenuh and she gave me this lovely potholder set she knitted and felted. Then off to San Mateo to check out the Ashford Traveller, which turned out to be simply fantastic. I purchased that little jewel and the gal selling it offered up her entire fiber collection to sell piece-meal, which was simply too much for me! She dappled in spinning (meaning she jumped in with both feet and about 15 + lbs of various fiber) only to decide that spinning wasn't for her! My goodness did that luck out for me. Here is my new spinning beauty, I tested it out last night at 3 am after Teenuh and her DH went home. It spins like a dream. Double treadle is AWESOME. Here it is pictured next to my Ashford traditional. You can see the size difference is quite significant.

The first stop on our yarn tour was Nine Rubies in San Mateo. It is a new store, very nice, friendly people, the setup and locale reminded me a lot of Commuknitty. Teenuh made a purchase there, but not me, though when she got her bag, I had total bag envy over the heavy duty black polka dotted back she received. Our next stop was Purlessence where I really controlled my self and bought only 2 oz of silk hankies from Rainbow works. In yummy browns and golds. In spite of the Sheep To Shoe kit that had AMAZING purples and greens in it that SCREAMED my name. We proceeded on to Yarn Place to partake of their best 20% off everything sale. Some shiny black mohair roving. A cheap drop spindle and a nifty felting needle set, that can use 1-6 needles (scary, scary I can just see stabbing myself in the hand or leg or something with that) completed my Yarn Place purchases. We then drove back up to The Knitters Studio in Menlo Park to see the Annie Blatt trunk show, but bought nothing because of the high price of everything in the store. Then schlepped over to Full Thread Ahead in Los Altos where I sold myself on a some more Seasilk in this yummy aqua blue to beige-ish silver blend. So yummy. As well as some white Cascade 220 to make the edges on the Seven Ten Split bowling bag from Anticraft that I've started in black. Why is it so hard to find WHITE 100% feltable wool?? Doesn't anyone believe in white wool? Apparently only Cascade seems to. Our last stop was a dash to Uncommon Threads, just a few streets away from FTA. We arrived just before closing and had only 10 minutes to peruse. They have a nice selection of Lana Grossa that I want to go back to and sift through some more.

Duh, it seems like I've forgotten how to post!? Really, has it been like 10 days since I posted? I guess so. So yesterday was my birthday (unenthusiastic Eyore type cheer here *yay*) and I got to pick out my own present when the hubby let me spend the big bucks and told me get a drum carder (for this so called Birth/mother's day combo present) . So after extensive research I went for the best and I ordered a Strauch's Finest drum carder (405) yippee. I can hardly wait for it to get here. I also ordered some unprocessed Suri Alpaca fiber from Homestead Wool and Gift farm, that came SO quickly (like 3 days after I ordered it from Wisconsin even!) That I know is going to be super nice once it has been washed and carded. It makes me crazy eager for that carder to get here. I just can't stand the tedium of hand carders, *brush brush brush* *pick pick pick* *brush brush brush* repeat. I want to go *crank crank crank crank crank* *pick pick pick* *crank crank crank* and be done with 20 times as much fiber in 1/4 of the time. The carding is most certainly NOT the fun part. Maybe it will be now right?

Looking forward to a fiber filled Saturday of fun with Teenuh. We are going up to look at an Ashford Traveller double drive, double treadle spinning wheel a woman is selling, hopefully that will work out. Also we are going to look at Nine Rubies an lys in San Mateo, catch the Yarn Place sale and have a jolly meandering day of fun. Although most any day I spend with Teenuh is fun fun fun. Pics of my socks to follow soon, I am binding off the second one later tonight and I will be ready to wear them for this unseasonably cool weather.

More socks? Maybe to go with my new shoes? I got some ultra comfy new soft walk shoes, humorously enough named, Lafon(Didn't notice that until I was throwing away the box at home several hours after I put them on my feet) that will show off my socks knit with an interesting zig zag pattern from my Bauerliches Stricken 3 book. Knit up in the Lisa Souza South Pacific sock yarn I picked up at Stitches. I knit away like a fiend and in a day had the whole sock done.

Like a hump though, I didn't really pay too much attention to the size of my foot asI was knitting this sock. So As I am completely done with it, at the point where I am debating what type of ribbing or non-ribbing to put at the top of the ankle, it occurs to me to put this thing on my foot. So I slip 1/2 the stitches onto a circular and cram the sucker on to my foot, only to find it is a bit, um, short. I blink in surprise " Like, duh, this is too short why didn't I make the toe section longer so that it would fit my foot???" It was the kind of tight, where I thought to myself, yeah, I can wear it like this... Yeah, I don't mind my toes pulling down just a little like that.

Then I frogged it. Pulled out all 18 inches worth of stitches back down to the toe where the pattern work began and added an inch of stockinette. Stupid. So now I have worked back up a whole 1". Wahoo, just 17" more to go...

At 51 days. I lost my will and bought more yarn.... I guess I won't get my 60 day sobriety coin now. Hmm. Nobody seemed to be rewarding me for not buying yarn anyway. Not even DH seemed to notice. Guess I should have been buying yarn all along. I just couldn't resist buying the jumbo skeins of Seasilk that FTA got in. I ordered 2 skeins of the Nova Scotia colorway. Still having that thing for peacock colors. Now I am debating using that to make the Peacock Feathers shawl from Fiddlesticks instead of the purple mohair I have been saving. Oh the debate. Not that it is likely to be the next item off the needles but there is always some yarn to project debate going on in the back of my head somewhere, those are the voices in my head telling me what to knit.... Must obey voices....

Several weeks with no post. These have been crappy times. My FIL. A kind and patient man who was so full of life, had a massive stroke, spent 5 days in a coma and went gently into the good night on April 1st. We buried him on April 9th. Life was chaotic for a while. Now it is as back to normal as it is going to get without him in our lives.

On a brighter note. Today was my mom's birthday and she received the Ostrich Plume shawl and a pair of Queen of Cups socks knit in Knitpicks bare Kool Aid dyed by me. They were a perfect fit for her foot. She then humorously posed with her shawl and her new socks on the lawn. A neighbor walking by with her two dogs asked what we were doing and if I was taking photography. We all had to laugh and tell her I was taking pictures of feet because I had knit the socks. She looked at us a little warily smiled and walked on her merry way. My sister also wanted her feet photographed in the socks I made for her a while back that never made the website. My whole family loves to make fun of me taking pictures of feet or whatever but they are quick to run outside and pose. Hillarious. Tomorrow back to the grind. At least I am looking forward to Bunco this week.

The cure for the common pool.

Teenuh and I were discussing pooling sock yarn and what could be done to "unpool" it short of knitting your sock sideways or adding 20 stitches to the width of the sock. After a bit of brainstorming, Teenuh, made a freakin' brilliant suggestion, to knit the pooling yarn in a stranded pattern to break up the pooling. She had seen a sock somewhere that was stranded and the colors that were lifted up broke up the pooling a little. Merely from the strands in the front breaking up the color blocks. I totally dug the idea realizing she was right because the strands would use less yarn than a knitted stitch and the colors would start repeating differently than they were. So I grabbed my trusty pooling Tofutsies yarn and started to work it out. Here you see the sock with it's pooling in full effect.

After reaching this point I began stranding only in the front and it started to shift the pooling but did not get rid of it entirely. It wasn't until I started working the pattern on both sides of the sock (imagine a pattern on the sole of your foot!!?) and it was then that the pooling magically disappeared! Hurrah! Here you can compare the front (left) to the back (right duh!) and see that the inch and a half that I was only working the pattern in the front was changing the pooling somewhat into longer strands like windblown clouds, thinner but still connected.

















You can really see the slip stitches changing the course of the colors as I work the pattern on the front and back stitches, the pools just slip into lines and actually break up. Here is a close up of the unpooled section as well. You can see the yarn is even kind of striping.
This is MUCH more pleasing than the blotchy pooled up yarn isn't it? The first problem is you have to keep doing this pattern which isn't very exciting or interesting to knit. Row 1: ( k2, sl2 with yarn in front) across, Row 2: K across, row 3: (sl2 with yarn in front, k2) across, row 4 k across, repeat until brain falls out bored slack jawed mouth and I did try knitting it without the knit rows on even rows but it began looking like a bizarre old thing with tons of strings stringing flatly across the front. The second problem is how many pairs of the same style of socks can I knit? I have 2 different colorways of Lorna's laces that pool and the Tofutsies as well as some other yarns I know I have in my stash which would make at least 3 pairs of socks knit from this mind numbing pattern. Any suggestions? I will have to sit and think about it and maybe incorporate the strands into another more interesting pattern. Maybe a barred stitch with some cables or something? Hmm.

Anyway, here is a glimpse of my Monkey socks in progress. The photo really doesn't do the color justice. The purple is much deeper and brighter and the green more shady forest-y. I am LOVING the Melody yarn and wishing I had bought like 10 skeins of this instead of only 2. I could have had one in every colorway.... What a fool....

Redo!

I changed my mind. Now I am making monkey in my Jojoland Melody sock yarn and it is coming out AWESOME! Yeah! I am happy. It looks good, feels good and I just KNOW it is going to be good.

Froggedfutsies.

Tofutsies and Monkey are SO not working. It is pooling SO badly. I have decided to frog it and work Monkey out of some other sock yarn. I identified said pooling by the top of the toe cap. Once the increases stopped the pooling started. Realizing there was no increase in stitches to fix this I immediately frogged the stupid thing. So now what? I am thinking of using the Kool Aid dyed sock yarn I made and giving that a try. We'll see how it turns out.

Tofutsies it is.
I spent the weekend, goofing off with some girlfriends, scrapbooking this weekend, so I didn't get any knitting done this weekend. Bummer. On the other hand, I have just started working on Cookie's Monkey sock (flipped over and worked toe-up) with Tofutsies. I wound it into two equally sized balls. I am using 723, Put your Foot Down. The yarn had lots of knot joins in it. The one skein had 4 knot joins in it, kind of annoying. It also has a smell that reminds me of baby vomit. I am REALLY hoping that smell will go away when it is washed, on the other hand, I will be wearing the socks on my feet and not my face so it probably won't even matter!

Ostrich Plume Shawl is finished!

I finished the Ostrich Plume shawl. I cut it very close on the amount of yarn I used. I had about 6 feet of yarn left. Chart a was worked once, chart b (the body portion) 7 times and then chart C from row 1 to row 25 (instead of row 32) because I noticed I was running out of yarn and did the bind off. It would have had 2 more repeats of the ripple at the bottom. It looked very pruney and puckery before blocking. The plumes look puffy and puckered.

Tada! Here is the blocked version, much nicer and smoother. It is 82" wide and 43" long down the center.A close up of the chart b (top) sections as well as the chart c setcion (bottom).

This is the bottom point of the triangle. The towel it is on has cows on it sorry it makes the picture look weird.

The silk was very nice to work with. I think this will make a nice summer shawl.The yarn had a funny smell when I washed it to block it, just as soon as it was wet. Sort of like moth balls or something smelly. Yuck. I hope it doesn't retain that smell when it is dry.

Next on the needles? I am not sure. I am in the process of designing a shawl with "lots of hearts on it" for my DD. She asked me to make her a lacy shawl with the Half Pint Farms Merino/tencel I picked up for her at Stitches. So far though, I only have the cast on, center strip and edging. I am still working on the body of it to try and add more hearts. It is hilarious she loves hearts and pink so much which are some of my least favorite things. Oh well. If it makes her happy. Maye I'll start some Tofutsies socks.

What Kind of Knitter Are You?

You appear to be a Knitting Goddess. You are constantly giving and are unconcerned with reward, you simply want others to love knitting as much as you do. If someone wants to knit miles of novelty yarns, you are there for them. If someone wants to learn short row shaping, you can help. There are no taboos in knitting, only opportunities to grow. Everyone should have friend like you around if they want to learn to knit, and there's a good chance that your passion has rubbed off on a few others.http://marniemaclean.com
Take this quiz!








Quizilla |
Join

| Make A Quiz | More Quizzes | Grab Code

Stitch Markers.

During Stitches I was TOTALLY inspired by Teenuh, who bought a spiffy bag of glass beads on Friday, ran home and cranked out some stitch markers and had them to show off on Sunday. Which for some reason she has never posted a picture of *nudge nudge*. Seeing how cute her stitch markers were, I just HAD to make some too. So on Sunday of Stitches I picked up a bag of the glass beads and last night I finally got around to making something with them. These were my favorite beads in the bag.
They are so cute, these little duckies. Sorry for the blurry picture it was late last night and I was a spaz.
These wierd little guys, I had a lot of debate over. The kitty heads (and purple mushroom) came in the bag and I had the weird little underwater mine beads already that happened to match so well. I tried several different configurations with lots of other beads, but DS really like them like this and so I went with it.
Lastly, I quite like the birds, they are opposite colors, the white bird (not clear in this pic) has lavender wings, so I did opposite colored beads on them to make them a "matched set". The hearts I just had to use. I actually hate hearts. Hate em!! But I am a SERIOUS crow and I LOVE shiny shiny things and they are SO shiny and red.

Not too much longer I'll post pics of the Ostrich Plume shawl. It is almost done, probably 1 more repeat and then the border before I run out of yarn.

A little bit of Luxury

I was so super excited to get those yummy little angora puffs that I couldn't wait to make them into something. But pathetically they only contain a meager 50 yds each, imagine trying to make a sweater or even a scarf, the number of balls it would take plus the cost makes me feel a little faint... So I sat around and thought of a nice project that would make the skimpy amounts of angora into something usable and enjoyable (what's the point of an extra soft mouse cover or finger puppet or pony tail holder right?) and finally came up with these little spiffy things.Each one is made from one ENTIRE ball of angora. As I worked on them I had some people say to me, "Oh you should make them go all the way up your arm!" at which point I want to smack them in the head and yell "DUH!" because I only have 2 balls and I could just make one that goes up to about my elbow and then only have one or I could make 2 short ones and have one for each hand. Hmm, which do I choose? Like these people think this stuff is cheap or angora grows on trees or something. I made my own pattern using a little lacy 11 st wide edging from Knitting On The Edge (Nicky Epstein) along with a made up rib with a mini cable that was a p2, mc, p2, k2, p1, k2 rep worked in the round on size 5 dpns over a total of 44 sts with an Elizabeth Zimmerman cast off.

My only qualms with this yarn, other than it being the softest most pleasurable to knit with yarn ever in the history of yarn is that it breaks SO easily. Tug a stitch a little too tight to try and close the ladder between your dpns and POOF the silly thing has torn apart and it wasn't as if it was pulled very hard. It is very, very weak yarn. Also, at the cost of 10 cents a yard on super clearance lucky sale price and with a full price of about 25 cents a yard, I wasn't going to make a swatch and leave it swatched. I swatched it then unwound it, boy howdy, once you knit with it and unwind it (perhaps even as you make a project and you have made a mistake and must frog) this yarn is even weaker after. It falls apart just tensioning your stitches as you knit. Still, sesory wise, it was nice to knit and I feel grateful to have just this little bit of luxury (boy will I be typing in style...) and I will revel in it and enjoy it because it will probably be the only piece of angora luxury I will ever knit.