All My Loose Ends

I updated my yarn stash list...

Maybe I'll knit through it in 2006. Maybe not though. Here's what projects are planned

1) Finish falling leaves sock (one done)
2) Knit cream patons socks
3) Knit winter stripe patons socks
4) Use leftover worsted wool for felted cat bed
5) Knit beautiful into chemo caps for donation (Mom doesn't need any! Her hair stayed!)
6) Knit two dishclothes out of the sugar and cream

Find something to do with all of the various acrylic dk I bougt before I knew any better..

Maybe something like this or even this although with two large skeins of red and white I'd have o make a helluva lot of candy canes!

I am now two years behind in my Christmas album, family album and Emily album. I'm trying no to care much about that, but it's hard. We have to spend maybe 4 hours in the house in Lakemoor tomorrow, waiting for the cable guy, so I'm bringing along my supplies in hopes of making a few pages to pass the time.

YAY!

My Harry Potter scarf is finished. I'll post pictures tomorrow.

See, the USB port on the front of my computer is broken.
And I can't find the direct USB cord for my camera, so I've been using my cruzer.
THe problem with using the cruzer in the back USB port means I have to unplug the printer AND My keyboard to upload pictures.
Which isn't that fun.
And since i don't feel like crawling around on the floor right now, you'll have to wait to see it until tomorrow.

I like the length, but it's a bit wide for me. MY shoulders are narrow. But, I'll wear it. You can bet that much.

I haven't had much to add to my FO gallery for 2005. I don't think I've been enough at peace to actually sit and knit. It sounds crazy, because I DO find knitting so relaxing and calming, but I just haven't been able to find the time to sit down and make it happen.

And since I refuse to force my leisure pursuits, the knitting thing hasn't been happening. I'm sad about that, but hopeful for 2006. I love to knit. This year has been a drain on me in so many ways--not just for my knitting.

You kiss a lot of frogs...

At least I am during the course of knitting this baby sweater. I picked up my copy of Debbie Bliss's "Baby Knits for Beginners" from the library last Tuesday and packed it up to take with me for our long weekend up North.

I didn't knit. I won't lie.

But I did a little on Thursday and Friday and picked up the back (or front, they're the same) last night to knit away on it. I was measuring my progress and realized something was wrong. The light turned on. I had knit the rib at the bottom of the sweater in size 6 needles, instead of the smaller, called for size 5 on the original side (front? Back?). Bah! As I knit on, I figured I'd just rip the ribbing out and reknit it on the smaller sized needles to get my match. No big deal.

I bound off for my sleeves and measured some more and realized that I had messed up, yet again, on the orignal side. It was FAR too short.

In my disgust, I stopped knitting and ripped out the entire original side of the sweater. I have no idea how I could ahve been so hasty and careless in my measuring. Surely I know better than that!

Argh!

3.5 inches is more than you think....

I was working on Eric's fuzzy feet as we watched Mary Poppins last night. I had done the math to account for his foot size, but forgot to subtract the 3.5" of toe shaping from that number.

What I ended up with was an eighteen inch long foot on that sucker. It actually looks laughable. Like something knitting ends up as on shows. You know, when they're trying to give you the idea that knitting is complicated. And the knitter ends up with an ill shaped, ill sixed item.

That's what Eric's sock looks like. It's funny.

I already finished the toe, but I'll rip back 6(!) inches and finish off the toe. My bad. Even though it is funny.

That's going ot have to wait becuase I'm on puppy patrol again. :O) You may recall that I got the idea in my head to knit puppy puppets for dd's entire class for Chrsitmas. That didn't pan and I decided to move that project to Valentine's day. Well, that party is on Friday. And I have 9 more puppies to knit and 11 puppies to seam. That's a lot of puppies. They knit quickly, I just have to decide to sit down and do it, which seems to be my biggest problem of late. :O)

IN other crafting news, I have finished my 2000-2002 family album. It was on my to-do list for finishing before the end of 2004, but I don't think a month late is too awful.

I'm not sure what project will be on my fast track for finished next. I guess I'll have to look over my paperwork and see.

8 Sleeps to go!

My Christmas cards are in the mail and i have two people to buy gifts for. I am hoiping to have the "friends gifts" in the mail tomorrow and we'll be baking cookies this weekend too.

All in plans to be ready for one relaxing week starting Monday. We'll see if I make it.
Looking Back

Today marks my one year Blogversary and my Knitversary as well. A year ago, I cast on and knitted my first two project, a baby cap and booties for practice. SInce then I have knitted:
1) One awful Teddy Bear sweater
2) Flat knit socks
3) A flat knit cap
4) Flat knit mittens
5) Two cha cha scarves
6) Haiku
7) A giant booga bag
8) A baby sweater, cap and booties for a gift
9)Sueet
10) Eric's Chrsitmas stocking
11) A pair of fuzzy feet
12) A bucket hat
13) A poncho
14) a shaped sweater (which I am proud of becasue I seamed it awesome and solved a huge fit problem)
15) A pair of socks (knit in the round, my first)
16) a flower petal wash cloth
17) Three baby hats for charity
18) baby alpaca mittens knit in the round

(and seemed them horribley)
I also cast on and ripped out two pairs of misshapen two needle socks that would have been gifts last Christmas. They were horrible. I also frogged a very harlot poncho about sixteen times. I knit my sassy stripes socks already, but ripped a pair due to bad fit.

I finally threw out the awful ball of Red Heart Light and Lofty that's been haunting me for a year. I bought it last year to make socks. They never happened. I hate the yarn. It sucks to work with. IT's gone. Happy ANniversary to my needles and me.

The solace I have found in knitting this year as been a God send. I knit through the emotional move from our home in IL to our home here. I Knit through my mother's surgery to remove cancer and am sure I will knit more before it's all over. I have looked at projects as milestones. My booga bag will always hold the story of my last days in Lakemoor, even if it IS too big to use as I'd hoped (I may just make another, though). My sassy socks will always be a part of those days in the hospital with my Mom when I worried about whether I'd still have a Mom at their completion. Every FO tells a story, even if it's not obiouvs to the people who see it. Times of stress, times of peace and times of just being there are housed in the stiches. Every one.

I was talking to a co-worker last year about knitting Em's teddy a sweater. She asked why I didn't just buy one. THey made them. Didn't I know? Of course I could buy one, I answered, but it wouldn't be the same. There wouldn't be love in every stitch.

I am a very sentimental person and the process of knitting and the idea of knitting my sentiment into my items seems to just be a perfect fit for me. I'm so glad I found this hobby and a great community of other knitters to inspire me and challenge me.

I know i don't get much traffic here. I'm nor prolific, I'm not fast, I'm not trendy and I may not be intersting, but as much as having my blog read means, being able to read about the process of others is even more important and I've enjoyed my time here.

In celebreation of my Knitiversary, I'm removing from the left side, all of the used yarns. New year, new start.

Thanks for reading. :O)

Look! Knitting!

We're two days away from moving. My scrapbook stuff is nearly all packed. My material, patterns and sewing goodies are packed away. My books, also out of reach. What else was there to do?

Find a half a ball of cotton tots under the bed while I was cleaning, find my needles and whip out this

I will be adding a pompom after this entry and before I get back to packing.

As I haven't shared much knitting wise lately, I would like to offer up the flower washcloth...

Isn't THAT thing wild? Actually, it looks a lot brighter in that picture than it is IRL.

And, just for fun, my sassy sock....the other one is shoved in a box...

Knititng wise, would it be insane to knit 11 puppy puppets for dd's preschool class? I'm thinking of trying to whip up one just to see how long it takes. I think they'd be such cute gifts and fairly quick, though I'm not totally sure. I was going to try it with the brown light and lofty I bought this time last year, but that crap sucks to knit with. I might give it another try, though. It might come together.

I can't wait until we're done moving. We pick up the keys tonight. I think we're going to carry over and unpack a few boxes then. I think we're going to end up a few boxes shy, but unpacking a few things should help us out quite a bit.

Of course, finally moving means i can finally put my Christmas stuff up. I am starting to get antsy that nothing is decorated! I've usually started by now (which seems to be my mantra this year.)

Dilemma

First, the easy stuff. I finished my sweater last night. Hooray! I knittied through Casper The Movie on ABC family and The Girl with the Pearl Earring from Netflix. All that's left is an attempt to block it (though I understand that acrylic doesn't usually block well, but I'm having some serious rolling issues andwould like to try and stretch a little more length).

But, in any case, here it is:

I did make some stash progress, even though I did have to ad two balls of yarn to it. The pink you see is down to about a quarter skein.. They gray/grey was divided into two-a ball and a partial skein. (This was one of those HUGE skeins of yarn, nor average sized at all) and now the skein is gone, leaving only the ball (which I did knit part of the front from). My hope is that once I turn out a baby sweater and perhaps another cradle purse (Emily says she has too many babies for the one cradle she has) that most of the remaining four balls of yarn will be gone.

It feels good.

My dilemma follows. I pulled out my sock last night. I intended to start knitting it's mate. I made a screw up on finishing off the toe and decided to fix that before moving on. I ripped back a few rows, knit on a bit and finishe dit off again. But I don't like how I finished it. I am considering ripping it out AGAIN and doing a kitchener stitch to finish it. I'm sure that's the right idea.

Also, I am unhappy with the fit. I KNOW I've tried ont he sock half a dozen (okay, maybe more than that) times to check the fit and I'm sure that has stretched out the top of the sock. I'm almost sure a wash would fix the problem. I'm using Regia 4 ply funny steps that is part wool, part cotton so it would very liklely firm up agian, but I'm half afraid to wash it and have that not happen and have it be too late to rip out and reknit.

In other news, it would appear that I won't have enough of the moda dea to knit a pair of socks, so I'll have to buy another skein.

Knitting, Knitting, KNitting....

Aaaaah yeeesss..

Knitting.

After saying last night that I was sure to knit a few more dishclothes, I opted to cast on for Emily's new sweater.

Please don't take the following as a bashing of acrylic yarn. This is merely my opinion.

So I have all of this acrylic yarn. Many many skeins. I taught myself to knit from what was available at Wal-Mart and like minded stores. Besides some good cotton now and again, you're limited to acrylic yarn. Let's be honest.

So, I bought it. Some is okay, some is awful. But I'm too cheapFrugal to just toss the stuff and you can only knit so many baby booties and hats to give away to charity.

I'm knitting with god knows what brand of yarn now. Both colors (pink and white) are so STIFF! Emily could wear this into battle and be protected from flying bullets. If not that, she won't have to hang it. It'll stand in the corner on it's own. It's like I'm knititng cardboard instead of fabric.

I know that Acrylic is a good choice for her. It will take abuse and the washings that abused clothing items need.

The bad news is, I'm going to have to buy another skein. I have four skeins of worsted acrylic. ONe large gray/grey, one pink, one white and one awful yellow. I can't bring myself to use the awful yellow. It's in the car (where it will stay until I find some awful project to use it on).

In any case, I'm about 3.5 into the six inches I need before doing my armhold decreases. It's not flying, but moving along well. Emily is already excited.

In other news, friends gave me a gift certificate for my birthday that I can use at Amazon.com. I would like to add a knititng bit or two to my library. What would you reccomend? I'm going to buy Knitting Without Tears as knitters across the board seem to think that this book is a must have, but what else? Any ideas?

Some knitting accomplished this weekend

AND the weekend isn't over. Am about a ball and an eighth through the Cha-Cha scarf and am about three inches in on Emily's first two needle sock. No new projects planned as of yet . I'm too lazy to deal with the camera, so no pictures of either project at this time

No new up-coming projects to report on as of yet either. I'm actually happy right now becuase there is such a differece between the yarns, gauges and patterns that I'm using right now. Both are free form knitting, really, I just knit somethig simple until I'm done and then finish it off. That makes for simple, portable knitting, for sure. I brought Jolene's scarf with me to the MIL's last night and worked on it while Eric, his mom, aunt and uncle were doing Genealogy stuff that I lost interest in. The two needle socks have been a car project that I finally brought into the house and will take one or the other along with me when we go for Eric's bone scan tomorrow. Also, the differencebetween the eyelash yarn and regular old worsted yarn is huge as well and the gauge is so different. I'm knitting Em's socks on since 5 needles (thinking about frogging and moving to threes, but I really need to see how these fit first) and Jolene's scarf is on 11's.

I think making the promise to work through what I have before buying more is a good thing. Not as fun, of course, but I tend to be a stash accumulator. For instance, you should see my scrapbooking supplies. I'm on a spending freeze until I can work through my stash o' paper. I have too! I'm out of room to store it and I certainly don't want my knitting projects to get that out of control either.

Jolene's cha-cha scarf

is back on the needles. As I noted yesterday, I ripped the entire scarf, rewound it and decided to start again. I am being super careful and counting every row as I tend to want to add stitches with this yarn. So far, so good. I'm probably three inches on. Only 69 more to go! I also did some work on Emily's two needle socks today and yesterday and are about three inches in on those as well. I'm afraid they'll be too big, but I have to finish one before I'll know for sure.

Was nearly drawn in by some Lion Brand Polar Spun at the store today. I've been eyeing the yarn for a while, but had no idea what I would make with it. I really want a fun scarf to go with my new coat, but I don't think Polar Spun is it. I'm still leaning toward Boa.

In other non-knitting, but still craft related knows, today is a "scrapbook" day. I do assign days to work on crafts. I know I have a problem, but I have to divide the time as have two hobbies that I adore and feel this is the best way to approach the system right now. I have three albums (a matter of about 20 pages) that I want completed by February. And another, oh, five or so I'd like to have completed by the end of the year. We're hoping to have another baby in the next year or so and I'd really like to be caught up with all of the old stuff before a baby comes to distract me.

In non-knitting, non-craft related news, we took our Christmas tree down today. I get so depressed doing this. I freely admit that Christmas wasn't much fun for me this year, bu the taking down of the tree is just the END of CHristmas and I hate that. Mostly, this year, because it was just NO fun. Between stressing out over getting things done (and Eric trying to attempt to convince me that they don't matter) and the whole cat bite thing on Boxing day, it was just an unfulfilling season for me this year.

ANYHOW, the taking down of the tree meant vacuuming up needles and we decided today that our old vacuum just wasn't doing the job anymore. The damn hose gets clogged so easily meaning I spend more time digging out pine needles with crochet hooks and (gasp) my knitting needles (there really is no other way to get them out) then I do vacuuming up the mess. We got a newer, stronger, smaller,vacuum and I'm thrilled with it. It did such a nice job. I suppose we should probably clean house tomorrow and use it on the whole thing.

I haven't wrote at length yet about Eric and the cat bite. On Christmas morning Eric's mother's cat attacked him, bitting his right knuckle. It sounds pretty simple, but he ended up with a roaring infection and went into the Hospital on the 26th and stayed two days. The darn infection was streaking up his arm in less then twenty four hours. The hospital puts him on two antiobiotics and his hand is so sore and swollen that he can't work (he's a network engineer).

After a week or soreness and being swollen he went back to the doctor who ordered two more weeks of antiobiotics (which cause a problem in that they swell his hand up and cause more pain) and a triple phase bone scan to rule out infection in the bone. If he does have infection, it will mean surgery to have it scraped (blah!) out. Poor guy. Needless to say, he's home this week as well and probably feeling a little stir crazy as he is NOT a homebody.

To those who left kind comments yetserday, thank you! :o)

In Opening News

In opening news, I have completely frogged my sister's scarf. The eyelash, while knitting quickly, somehow convinces me to pick up stitches and the scarf was a good, inch or two wider in one spot than planned. Eric kept saying it looked fine, but today, after thinking a bit, I ripped the whole thing out and decided to start over AND be more careful. I think I'll also slip the first stitch of the a new row as opposed to knitting it as I seem to get a better edge when I do that. I'm a bit disappointed as I had about a ball and a quarter knitted up, but I can't let it be completely imperfect (I can deal with a few fairly invisible mistakes, but I can't let something so huge go) and so, little sis will have a perfect Cha-Cha scarf instead. It's more than a month to her birthday, so I should hit my mark in plenty of time. If I'm afraid of running close, I'll take it with me to WDW at the end of this month for plane and room time knitting.

Am also having to re-work the two needle socks I'm making for Emily. I ended up frogging the two or three rows I had already knit this afternoon and started over. I was concerned about them being too wide for her and dropped a stitch I didn't feel like picking up (I was in the car, and it was easier to frog then to wait).

I bought Knit Christmas Stockings by Gwen Steege before Christmas and Eric and Emily and I went through to pick out what we wanted to day. Eric picked out the very simple Lodge Stocking (at least, I hope to goodness it's simple) and I picked out the Star pattern stocking towards the end of the book. Emily, of course, picked out the Snowman stocking, which is the very first (and a most complicated looking pattern) in the book. I might tweek the colors a bit as I don't like the limey, olivey green color used at all. I know it's not MINE, but it DOES have to hang in my house

I'm dying to buy some new yarn and needles, but am now on a spending freeze until after our vacation. Bummer. I did get Eric to agree that if I use up what i have I can buy early, but that will never happen. I have several skeins of yarn at home right now, gray bernat,(two needle socks for me) yellow bernat(just about anything I can make for Emily), blue sugar and cream(unplanned), red heart light 'n lofty in three colors(one to finish off Eric's second sock, one for a puppy puppet and one now unplanned), a small ball of green(swatch bunny), a ball of white dk(unplanned), a ball of red worsted(unplanned), an untouched ball of white with gold dk(unplanned), a ball of blue and white (unknown weight-unplanned, but I will probably knit up baby stuff and mail off to a charity knitting group) and I think that's it. But, as you can see, my chances of getting anything knew before March is slim to none. Too bad as I'm ready to start something knew!

I also froget to mention the two skeins of cha cha, but they are accounted for. I'm just dying to get into some more luxurious yarns. I know I have good things here for a first time knitter, but when, for instance, I read Rob's blog at threabear, I go just about CRAZY. I WANT NEW YARN!

Okay, rant over. I think I'll be putting together a new blog tonight. I tired to set the goal of reading 100 books last year. I feel off the wagon, but thought I'd try again this year. I have a gather of great books I'm taking home with me tonight (lucky, me, I work at a library) to get started. Two by Kaye Gibbons, one by Elizabeth Berg, one by Jane Hamilton, one by Susan Monk and one I can't recall. The Gibbons and Berg titles are pretty small, but I'm looking forward to trying to achieve this goal.

Deep Thoughts...

Turns out, I do have time to post today.

I haven't taken pictures yet, but I finished Emily's hat today. Just the one blue stripe. I stitched the hat in manner that the brim would need to be folded up, but Em doesn't seem to like wearing it like that, so I might pull off the pom-pom, cut a few stitches and leave it "regular". I don't know what would make her happiest. Cast on and knitted about an inch and a half on her matching mittens. Pictures of those to follow

Have also decided that she might need a cool, fringed scarf to match her coat, hat and mittens. I have an abundance of the yellow yarn left, so I'll have to use it up as much as possible.

However, I do have some balls of contrasting color at home, maybe I should work on this:

However, now that I think about it, the yellow and dark blue with gray might seem a little masculine. Maybe I should do white or a more feminine color. In any case, I should have more than enough. There is also a hooded sweatshirt at Lionbrand.com as well that might be fun and easy too. Emily is in LOVE with Yellow (even though I don't personally care for it all that much).

You know, there are two things that I'm finding as I knit. First, I am obsessed with sweaters, hats, scarves, gloves, mittens, socks, etc. I look at everything now. Today I assessed that I was wearing a Fair Isle knit it stockingette stitch with a 2x2 rib on the cuffs, neck and hemline. I also love looking at hats etc and thinking to myself that I could probably make that. That's awesome.

Also, I am finding that projects beget projects. For instance, I bought that big ass ball of yellow yarn to make one hat and one pair of mittens. That has now morphed into one hat, one pair of mittens, one scarf and one sweater. And maybe slippers or socks. I was also wondering today if Emily's teddy bear would like (meaning, would Emily like) a matching yellow hat and scarf as well.

Happy Frogging!

I'm not sure if I will have a chance to post between now and Christmas, but if not I wanted to wish everyone who may be reading a very Merry Christmas. Also Happy Chanukah, Kwanzaa, Solstice or just Happy December, if you don't celebrate anything. I finally have some pictures of my FO and one of a WIP. I know they're not as terribly exciting as things some are doing, but I'm proud of them.

This is Em's teddy bear in his jaunty red Christmas sweater. The neckline is totally messed up which you may or may not be able to tell from this picture. Sweater making may be a bit too advanced for me at this time, but I'll try again.
And now for a project I'm actually pleased with...

The seed stitch cuffed baby hat. I have friends coming over with small babies on Monday, so I'm going to pull it out and try it on them. I hope it fits! However, they're nearly two months old, so I won't be disappointed if it's a bit small.
And now a picture of a WIP.

A hat for Emily. We had to buy her a new coat on Saturday (long story) and while her coat before was a nice icey blue, it's now bright yellow and has NO hood. This is an adaptation from a the Shaker Knit Pattern. I wasn't getting the Shaker rib, so I'm knitting a 2x2 rib instead and I like the results. The stripe wasn't in the pattern and I may add another small stripe toward the top as well. The yarn is knitting up really quickly, although the blue stripe yarn is a little more difficult to work with.

I also have to get to work on N-N's red and white striped scarf. I had about four inches done on it, but decided it was too wide for a teddy bear and frogged the whole thing. In fact, I frogged a lot yesterday. I think I did more frogging than knitting, but that's okay. I'm happy with the results now, and that's what counts.

Friday Five

It's been several days since I updated. Thursday and Friday I was down with another reincarnation of my yucky cold. I feel a little better today, but I have that nagging "You're Gonna Get Sick" feeling at the back of my throat. I guess we'll see. I'm drinking a warm cup of coffee and waiting for my husband to bring some cocoa up to work for me. Let's get started with the Friday Five, shall we?

List your five favorite beverages.
1. Water
2. Pepsi
3. Lemonade
4. Orange Juice
5. Milk Shakes :o)

List your five favorite websites.
1. Moms Who Think
2. Two Peas in a Bucket
3. Knitting Blogs List
4. Yahoo Games (Love those Crosswords)
5. MSN Groups(where my favorite on-line people reside)

List your five favorite snack foods.
1. Nachos
2. Pretzals (particularly Schnieders honey mustard and onion nibblers)
3. French Fries
4. Baby carrots and French onion dip
5. Good citrus fruit

List your five favorite board and/or card games.
1. Trivial Pursuit
2. Balderdash
3. Euchre
4. Dominoes (I know it's not a board game, but it is a favorite)
5. Solitaire

List your five favorite computer and/or game system games.
1. Mario kart (Yes, I know it's old, but it was my favorite game to play with my brother)
2. Super Mario Brothers (another old pick)
3. Some driving game that my dh owns that I cannot recall the name of, but that I like to play
4. Crazy Taxi
5. Just about any on-line word game

Okay, so that's done. I joined another web ring yesterday-for knitters with CATS! How cool is that? (well, probably not cool, but I think it is). I have three cats and consider myself a cat person (though I do own a dog). My eldest cat, Shelby, is four. We got her from a pet store (long story! We DID try and adopt a cat from a shelter, but didn't come with proof of current address). Anyhow, we have made up for our transgression with Shelby and have since adopted three strays, so I think we're dong pretty darn good. Our youngest cats are siblings, Angus (male) and Belle (female). They'll be a year old in April.

Here's a picture of Emily with Angus and Belle when they were babies

Aren't they sweet?

I did remember to take pictures of two of my FO Thursday, but didn't get them uploaded and now I'm at work, so I can't share. Hopefully tomorrow I can get those up.

Started work on a surprise red and white striped scarf for N-N (Emily's teddy bear) last night. Thought we'd give it to him for Christmas. It's my first time every knitting with two colors (Yes, I AM a novice). I'm knitting it in garter stitch on size 6 needles. I'm just going to go along for a foot or two and then bind off and add tassels. I think Emily (and by default, N-N) will love it).

Also working on some thumbless mittens for Emily. She has such a problem getting her little thumbs into the thumbholes on her winter mittens. It's awful. I found a pattern at Knitlist for Toddler Sized mittens and am now making a pair, with some adjustments, to fit Em. The original pattern called for size 6 needles. I upped the size of needles to 8s. I made one mitten that is about one inch too short, so I'm going to work a few more rows tom ake them longer for her. I'm knitting them in Red Heart Light and Lofty in a really nice Ice Blue. They won't be waterproof, but I figure she can wear them when we're out running errands and to school.

I am also thinking about altering them to fit my Grandpa. He's disabled (he has muscular dystrophy and cannot use his arms from the shoulders down). I know he wears mittens, but wonder if he has problems with the thumbholes as well. I will ask him about that the next time he calls and add them to my project list if he wants them