Not going to make it

Yesterday at the Littleton SnB I worked on Clapotis. I'm through section two and not quite through the yarn from one sleeve.

There's no way I'm going to finish the scarf for the February Fixathon, but I'm glad I fixed along. Otherwise I would still have an ill-fitting sweater sitting on my desk and now I have a quarter of a beautiful scarf!

Early morning photos

My husband amused my son with the iTunes visualizer this morning while I took some pictures. I couldn't ask for anything more on a lazy Saturday.

The New England socks for Sockapalooza are slowly creeping toward the finish. I tried to keep up with my one diamond a day strategy, but it seems that the back of the calf patterning slowed me down. Here's a merged shot of both front and back, oddly different colors although I snapped the photos seconds apart.

After I finished the third diamond yesterday, I cruised around the blog world to see this great scarf. Now, this pattern and I have some history. Back in the golden pre-parenthood days in Boulder, we had an awesome little dinner party group going on. Everyone has since moved away and many of us have kids or, like Chris and Meriah, soon will. At some party that involved both wine and knitting as well as being up really late, I tried to start the diagonal lace rib scarf from Ann Budd's Handy Book of Patterns. It did not work. I chalked it up to wine. The next day I tried it again and found that the pattern was incorrect. I gave it up and moved on, not bothering to figure it out. When I saw that it had been made by someone with a blog, I let loose my tirade against the pattern in the comments and got back a very helpful response from Mason-Dixon Ann. Bolstered by her success, I played around with the pattern until I got it to work. Pattern conquered!


I also got some yarn the other day at Showers of Flowers.

KPPPM that will become Crusoe.

Some Colori for summer socks.

While I was talking to the clerk and complaining that my Rowan 37 hasn't yet arrived, she told me that they'll no longer be stocking Rowan. Hmm... Sometimes I wish I knew all the yarn rep gossip about the local shops.

Littleton SnB is this afternoon -- I can't wait to go and you should check it out if you're in the Denver area!

Danger!

I do not know how this happened, but believe me it's true. I woke up before my son and husband did this morning and with early sunlight streaming into the room I picked up my knitting and sat down in my glider chair to happily knit until they woke up. Somehow, in the way I moved my butt into the chair, a stray size 0 metal dpn angled backward, sunk into the cushion until it hit the base of the seat and then proceeded directly into some of the more tender, fleshy areas of my body. I screamed like I've never screamed before and woke everyone up. Chaos ensued, with me yelling incoherent phrases at my drowsy husband, all of which meant "Pick up the screaming baby, I'm probably fine!" Nothing all that important was damaged on my body, once I found out where the blood was coming from. Unlike some other recent knit injuries (Julia's immediately comes to mind) no one will be subjected to my post-partum butt in its injured state. Instead, I offer you this very accurate recreation of what the chair looked like when I stood up.

The dpn is bent at about the halfway point, illustrating the giant force that is my butt hitting a chair. I don't think I'm going to try to straighten the dpn. I'll just chalk it up to experience.

KnitCast rocks!

I'm hardly the hippest, most up-to-date knitter out there, so I'm sure everyone's already heard all about KnitCast, the knitting podcast. I'm starting to train for triathlons again and listening to interviews or books makes the miles fly by. For some reason Wendy's voice really surprised me. I thought it would be lower pitched -- who knows why? Seeing as how I just handed my son a plastic hanger to play with so he'd let me post, I'd better get back to being a mommy.

Second sock syndrome, be gone!

John, in an unprecedented move, fell asleep at 9 p.m. Not quite knowing what to do with myself, I started the second sock for Sockapalooza. John is so sleepy that I even managed to get him to show off the first few rows.

The felting frenzy continues

Last night was the first Littleton Stitch 'n Bitch. It's always fun to knit with a group and this one meets at the newest Tattered Cover. Knitting and books, what more could you want? I ended up sitting next to Mary, who was also knitting a French market bag. As I blithely knitted along, she asked me -- how deep are you making your bag? Turns out I already had nine inches of bag body and the pattern calls for eight. I kept the extra length and knit up the handles.

It's going through another round of felting in the washing machine as I type. Although the yarn turned my needles and fingers a teal green, the water in the machine is turning blue. Oddly enough, it seems to me that the lighter green is felting faster and the darker base isn't producing a stiff enough fabric. We'll see what happens after this last trip through the washer.

Although it's not really about knitting, I never wanted it to be weekend as much as I do now that I'm a mom at home all day with a baby. I thought it wouldn't make a difference but having my husband at home for two whole days in a row is the best thing in the world. To any single parents out there -- I'm amazed you manage to do it!

Rowan 37, where are you?

Although I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one still waiting, I really want the spring Rowan to arrive. Rowan and Kim Hargreaves new site are starting to irk me. At least one thing is arriving on schedule -- here is the first New England sock for Alison's Sockapalooza swap. The hardest thing is that I can't try the sock on -- my pal's foot is significantly smaller than mine. Sigh...

In blog news, I've updated my comments back to Blogger with their new and improved no need for a Blogger account commenting. In the process I wiped out my old comments, so I'm sorry they're gone. Perhaps a savvier blogger would have been able to save them, but I'm not so great when it comes to website programming.

Don't you want to be a designer, too?

Maybe the talent from the amazing women of the Littleton Meetup has rubbed off on me and that's why I'm trying to design something. I figure the worst that happens is I get a rejection letter and then post the pattern on my blog. You need to start somewhere, right?

The yarn is All Seasons Cotton, the color Cookie. I'm a sucker for yarn colors with names of food.

Felting Success!

Here's my felted Sophie. She's a tad uneven, but I like her.

Sophie
Magknits
Cascade 220
Denise Interchangeable circular and birch dpn, 6.5 mm (US 10.5)

I ended up putting the bag inside a zippered pillow case, adding some towels and running the hot wash cycle four times. I found out that the red bleeds. The French market bag I'm knitting is also Cascade 220 and my needles are turning green. Maybe this is a problem with all of their darker colors. Despite the slight pink hue some of my kitchen towels are now sporting, the whole process was harmless. The excess fiber was safely trapped in the pillow case and the washing machine can go on to serve us for many years to come.

A diamond a day...

...keeps the Sockapalooza panic away. I just found my lonely abandoned New England sock for my sock pal and realized that we're almost to the halfway point. I'd better get knitting! I redid the heel and am pledging to knit one diamond repeat a day. Here's where I stand now.

Two repeats + one toe + seven repeats + one heel + one more toe = twelve days of knitting. See, there's so much extra time now I could even skip a day if I wanted to!

Clapotis strikes again!

I was really going to try to reknit the Debbie Bliss scoop neck cardigan. I even reknit and then re-ripped a sleeve. But then the yarn jumped onto the needles all by itself and made this.

Apparently the camera also took the picture all by itself and that's why it's so blurry.

It's another Clapotis. It's so different from my last one that I won't mind having two. Besides, all of my husband's job prospects look like they'll be landing us in winterless locales. Seeing as how it's been claimed that Silk Garden is only useable as attic insulation in Nashville and we're looking at New Orleans and Houston, I figured that maybe a sweater out of the stuff might not get much wear in my future. So even if I have to crank the air conditioner in the middle of winter to wear this Clapotis, I'll do it. Besides, I've sort of become a Kate Gilbert junkie. I'm planning to knit a Silk Garden Elizabeth from some of the other recycled yarn. The minute I even think I'm pregnant again I'm going to knit an Anouk on the off chance that the baby will be a girl.
Stacey's sew up bee today was quite fun. I'll let her show off the afghan first, but if you'd like to see a sneak peek of my son playing with some squares, go check out his blog Johnlet.

Free Your Mind

I've really come around on this whole stitch marker thing. I thought that my superior immune system had let my son and my husband get sick and left me in perfect health. Turns out my body was just waiting for its turn. Since my brain is like playdoh right now, I started a simple project -- the French market bag from Knitty. The nifty increases are the perfect use for stitch markers and make for mindless knitting. Then, since I was sort of punchy, I put it on my head like a hat for a progress picture.

I really do like the increases on the bottom of the bag.

This is yet another Cascade 220 project. I'm really liking this yarn for felting projects.

Sophie

I started this Sophie yesterday to have a simple project to work on at the Littleton Meetup but I finished it before it was time to go. It's made of some Cascade 220 I found in my stash -- I honestly can't remember what it was supposed to be. Here's the pre-felting picture.

I'm a little afraid to felt it. When I felted a thrift shop sweater in my mom's washing machine just over a year ago there was a felting disaster and the washing machine choked. I'm guessing it could have been revived, but my mom wanted a new washer and I provided the excuse. It's left me a little felt-shy. I'm going to buy a zippered pillow case and hope for the best. I don't think I could go back to a shared laundry room now that I have a baby who makes more laundry than anyone that small should be allowed to!

Ack!

Can my blog get any more boring? It just may... My son and my husband are sick. I never knew just how much work a sick seven-month-old could be.

I got the greatest new book -- Knitting for Two. While the baby knits are very similar to many of the other baby knitting books I have, the maternity sweaters are great! This may fall under the category of way too much information, but it made me realize that I'm not scared of having another baby. Hopefully I get some more time with the break my body is giving me due to breastfeeding, but if I don't, I'm going to happily knit myself three new sweaters.

Soon there will be a return of knitting content!

Yet another pictureless post...

Wow -- two in a row for me.

It seems that everywhere I turn I see Montse Stanley's Knitter's Handbook being mentioned. Since I've given up waiting for POK to be republished and there's no way I'd spend good yarn money on a book that expensive ($150 right now on ebay and it will probably go for more) I decided I should give this book a shot. So far I like it. It's not a great read, but it's very thorough. I've just realized I need to get going on my Sockapalooza socks lest I leave my swap pal in the lurch -- hopefully they'll have a new heel by tomorrow!

So easily distracted

I swatched for my new afghan project and since that swatch was the same size as one of the one hundred eighty-one squares I need to knit, it sort of got me started knitting on the afghan. Knitting small garter stitch squares is sort of addictive, a back to basics kind of project. I'm actually glad I stopped everything else and knitted on this for a while because I learned that I'm going to need more yarn.

The pattern assumes you can get eight squares out of one ball of yarn. Since I substituted Knit Picks Wool of the Andes for the now unavailable Rowan DK Tweed I'm only getting six squares per ball. I tried again, leaving miniscule ends at the cast on and bind off. Still just six squares. For some colors I'm fine, but for others I'll need more. I'm glad I went back today, since one of the colors in Wool of the Andes is sold out until April! Fortunately I've been able to get what I need.

The only bad thing about this new project is that it's distracting me from things I need to get done, like my Sockapalooza socks. I decided I didn't like the heel called for in the pattern (after I'd knit it, of course) so I have to go back and fix that. Maybe it can be a double entry in two of Alison's knit alongs -- the fix-a-thon and Sockapalooza!

More gift yarn

After an error on a website, my mother-in-law ended up mailing me a check that I was supposed to use to go get a massage. Well, as nice as that sounds, I decided to, umm, massage my fingers with yarn. It's the new Wool of the Andes from Knit Picks.

It's really soft, which surprised me for $1.79 per 50 g skein. I got all of these colors to knit the Heirloom Nine-Patch Afghan from the Winter 99/00 Interweave Knits. The main color is supposed to be navy. I hoped against hope that the blue online and in the catalog was really a little darker, but I was wrong. So here's the wrong blue.

I think I'm going to make a foray into dyeing wool to make this a nice navy blue. I've never dyed wool with anything but KoolAid before, so if anyone has any handy tips, I'd love to hear about them.

Off and running

I didn't think I'd be able to do it, but I did! I ripped out my sweater for the Fix-a-thon.

I even have a plan to make everything better.