Florida

Just a big quick hug for everyone out there in internet land. I'm in Florida, it is beautiful, and we found out today that there are no 2 bedroom homes available, so they are giving us a 3 bedroom. Happy Birthday! My boys reunion in the airport was as adorable as could be imagined, with the Monkey yelling "Daddy!" and running down the hall to him. I'm even getting some knitting in :)
More when things are a little more stable, even with a finished object or two.

Hurray!

Just got a call from Marc and on-base short term housing does have room! Funny how these things change in just a day. Packing up all my stuff today, finishing Christmas preparations. Last night I gave up on sewing a paintbrush roll (same as a knitting needle roll, just for paint brushes) when I couldn't find any cute red fabric so I just bought one and feel so much better for it. Actually read the instructions for Knucks and am putting them together correctly this time. Fell asleep with them in my hands while reading EZ's Knitting Workshop and had knitting dreams. Awesome.

Motivate me!

I have so much to do right now that I am overwhelmed to the point of complete inactivity. Every new thing I remember I need to do makes me want to do everything less. When the Monkey decides he wants lunch I'll probably lapse into a coma.
Thursday at 0700 we fly to Utah.
Friday the movers come and pick up all our crap stuff. This in a way terrifies me, because they are supposed to inventory everything which means opening all my terribly packed boxes. They will see that I've packed my dishes with tshirts, that my Kitchenaid is wrapped in a feather duvet, and the last several boxes I packed are helpfully labeled as "Stuff" and "Things."
Saturday we fly to Florida (!) to finally see that guy I think I married or something. It has been a long time.
Who knows what happens after that. According to my planning-ahead-kind-of-a-guy, he informs me last night that there is no room in apartment-style billeting (short term housing). There is also no on-base housing available. Freaking awesome. At least our car will be there by then, as it was my job to have it shipped.
Perhaps some accountability will get some things done here though. Today I need to:
-get suitcases, which can not happen before mom gets home (no car) done!
-Michaels for candy bags (also must wait) done!
-divide up candy amongst recipients (five kinds! yum!) done!
-glue tops on Ukrainian eggs and divide them up done!
-pack in a preliminary fashion, or at least clean room done!
-vacuum
-bake bread done!
-get fabric and sew SIL a paint brush roll on my mom's crappy sewing machine (also needs a car) done without the work-I bought one!
-mail hats for Soaring Eagle Project
-order cat drinking fountain for my sister

Stupid Cheetos...

You know, Christmas is getting close. I'm running out of time to screw around and knit non-gift stuff. I've even hung up my sock for the time being (after doing a really cool short row heal thanks to the fabulous advice from Misocrafty and the Knitting Fiend). So when I screw something up and waste a day, I am rather frustrated. I started a quick hat for my Monkey today. I want to give him something that isn't silly and last minute; we probably will still be in temp housing on base on Christmas, and that doesn't really lead to a festive atmosphere. I think. This is all new to me, I'm literally making up what it is going to be like in my head.
Anyway, started a cute easy hat for him while riding to the Train museum today, while watching him play in the Thomas exhibit, while riding the Santa Express train. And I was just not happy with my stripes. All wrong, somehow. Damnit. After ripping multiple times, but not as far back as really needed it, I cast off the cursed three inches and called it a headband. Enjoy it, Mom, but please don't wear it tomorrow, I don't really want to look at it right now.
Also, the bag of chips I confiscated from the monkey are kind of stale. Or perhaps that is how baked Cheetos are supposed to taste.
Why don't I ever knit something chunky?
I did figure out a jogless stripe though, desperately thinking back to reading instructions in Knitty maybe a year ago.

Shedir, again!

At Thanksgiving my brother was in town, and was blown away by the complete awesomeness of my Shedir hat. Plucking it from my head, he instructed me to "make mine about an inch longer, and a color that looks good with desert cammo"(he is in the army, and will probably be wearing desert cammo soon.) Done! Same pattern modifications as last time, with the exception of knitting 9 or 10 rows of plane ribbing before getting to the good part.

Hot dog Christmas time rocks. Big time motivation to get lots and lots of smaller projects done, ignoring large projects that you worked on all summer but still haven't finished. Ahem. Not that I don't have two of those.
Tomorrow starts candy week for me as well. If I do one different type of candy each day before I hop on a plane and begin several days of wandering the country I will have plenty of delicious snacks (and cavities) to put in everyone's basket.

Shedir, take 2

Saturday night I started another Shedir, with the goal of finishing it by tomorrow. Inexplicably, it is taking all my discipline to stick to knitting this hat for my brother, and not, say, turn the heel on my brainless sock-in-progress. Socks for me, because I'm selfish. When I knit this pattern for myself I couldn't put it down. I seem to be feeling a wee bit grinchy today. Not grumpy, grinchy. I finished and mailed off a custom order for a half dozen Ukrainian eggs yesterday; I should concentrate on the warm glow of accomplishment finishing something for someone else brings. On the other hand, a half-finished shedir does make a lovely tree topper.

Weekend

Finally all the Thanksgiving guests are gone, for which I am thankful. I haven't been on the computer for days, due to its constant use by people who have important research papers due, or some crap like that. Silly students, use your laptops! Anyway, I finished a shawl just in time for this weekend. Not one of the knit ones. I did not compete (I don't have full regalia yet) but danced in many of the open social dances. Monkey sometimes accompanied me.
It was WONDERFUL.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I've had a lovely day today filled with cooking with my sisters and mom, hanging out with family and fancy dancing all over the back yard.
I am especially thankful this year, for many things including:
-Trileptal
-Being employed for the first time in 3 years, minus crappy summer jobs Marc did during law school. Go Air Force!
-Still having the Monkey. I've wondered several times the last 7 months.
-Knitting, of course.

What about you?

My boy is so sweet

In non-knitting news...
Today is Marc and my 9th wedding anniversary. (Wow, I'm older than you thought.) I could not ask for a better companion. We have been together since we were kids and our history is epic. I look forward to the next nine years and forever after that with much happiness.

I especially look forward to December 16th, which is my tentative move date to haul myself and the Monkey out to Florida to meet him there when he leaves Maxwell AFB. I miss him so much.

Shedir

This knitting for myself thing is kinda fun. Finished the hat on Saturday night, but have been crazy busy with family stuff and hardly get a minute to myself on the computer due to said family. Luckily I've had my spiffy new hat to keep me warm in this autumn weather. I love it! So comfy, exactly the right size and much quicker than I would have expected too. This is more than a little due to my adjustments to the pattern, explained below.

Pattern: Knitty's Shedir, from the Breast Cancer Awareness Issue
Yarn: Knitpicks Wool of the Andes worsted in Sapphire Heather, one full skein plus probably 5 yards. An even more beautiful color in person.
Needles: size 3 oak dpns that I made myself (oooh, so crafty!)
I was knitting by the seat of my pants on this one. I started out by casting on only 112 stitches, enough for only 7 repeats of the cable pattern instead of 8. My half-assed, non-gauging logic for this was as follows: I always have to go down a needle size to get gauge. Always. I would not call myself a loose knitter, I never drop needles and my stitches are even and consistent, but to get gauge on the needles called for in most patterns I would have to cause the needles PAIN. I figured that if it was too small for me, I would give it to the Monkey. Too big for me, it would be the start of a sweater for the Monkey. Fortunately, like Baby Bear's porridge, it was just right. I only knit 6 rows instead of 9 of the plain ribbing, and then only two repeats of the cable pattern instead of 5. After that I did some measuring and calculating, and determined that 25 rows would be a better finished length for me instead of the remaining charted 31 rows. No problems. I removed lines 73, 76, 79, which are repeated rows anyway. Since I had only seven points in my star instead of the proscribed 8, I needed to decrease a little faster to avoid the conehead look. After line 81 I drew the tail of the yarn through and pulled the seven stitches closed, eliminating another couple rows and ending with the perfect length.
I'm short enough that I've received several compliments on the nifty star on the top already. I had no idea the top of my head was that visible.

Knitting in the Ghetto

My cable needle is pretty awesome. I started Shedir on Tuesday and it is just zipping along, especially since I adjusted the pattern so it would work with the needles I have. And if the monkey will just relax and have his quiet time (just because he doesn't need naps anymore doesn't mean I don't need the break) I should have a FO up by tonight.

Holy cow

Look, I am in no way a fiber snob. I knit with acrylic, I buy supplies at Walmart, etc. But when I call a local yarn store and no one, including the OWNER, has ever heard the blessed name of Saint Elizabeth Zimmermann, I am going to be a little shocked.

After

My mom, isn't she cute!
The hat, after felting. I've fulled a number of things, but this has probably been the most dramatic shrinkage so far. Possibly due to my not paying attention to previous projects. The yarn is pretty intolerable pre-felting, due to an unbelievable volume of fuzz constantly shedding. But the little wooly hooks grabbed onto each other very nicely in the hot water and no longer leap from the project to my eyeballs.
Pattern: Felted Cloche Hat
Yarn: Patons Soy Wool Stripes, around 1 1/4 skeins (110 yards per)
Gauge: around 11 stitches/4 inches on size 11us needles. To be honest, I didn't gauge very closely since fulling adds a lot of flexibility.

Pattern Modifications: Boy howdy. To start with, the pattern called for a strand of really...textural eyelash yarn to be knit in at hatband level. Easy enough to ignore. I also spread out the decreases in rounds 7-13 so they wouldn't exactly line up. Not rocket science. I also knit the whole thing flat, mostly because I have a beautiful pair of size 11 needles that I made and really love knitting with on the rare occasion I need something that huge.

Before

A teaser picture today, the pre-fulled hat for my mom. Started on Thursday, finished already! Which is what you get when you knit with bulky yarn on size 11 needles. Tune in tomorrow (or whenever the hat dries) for after photos, which will be a much more accurate representation of what my Mom actually looks like.

Multi-tasking

Aw crap.

My right eye has been bugging me for two days now, a mysterious cloudiness occasionally bothering me. Mostly while sitting at the computer. I attributed it at various times to tiredness, stress, a psychotic episode, or my lasic surgery.
I just figured out what it is.
Based on what I'm knitting right now, it is a single fiber of wool, silk, or soy. Probably wool, it is a little crimped. Occasionally, I can see it if I look in the mirror at just the right time.
Ah, the way we suffer for our craft.

Hat weather

Voila! Two hats knit for a good cause, modeled by Mr Incredible and PenPen. Ribbed tuques, knit from no particular pattern from some cute and soft acrylic because not everyone has the ability to carefully launder hand knits.
Today I rewarded myself for finishing another few rows on Adamas while the monkey took a nap with a handful of leftover Halloween candy. Really, the hour to myself while he was asleep should have been plenty a reward, but I wasn't about to deny myself the chocolate after my past several days.
Also picked up a couple skeins of Patons Soy Wool today, to full a hat for my Mom's rapidly approaching birthday. Finishing this by the 13th is a lot more realistic than my Mothers Day sock marathon knit though.

Babies!

Not mine of course. This morning I purchased some soft red and green yarn, to knit a strawberry baby hat for my expecting cousin-due at the end of the month. But I heard as soon as I got home that the baby was stressing, and they were inducing her. No way I'd take the chance of prolonging her labor, so the yarn sits expectantly by the phone, waiting for good news. It seems I'll have to work on some project already in progress, instead of adding another new one. The Adamas shawl is coming along swimmingly, and is getting quite large and therefore slow. I really seem to loose steam as obvious progress slows, and such is the nature of a triangular shawl. Must be vigilant!

Fixer-upper

Found the perfect place for me (stashed in my parents' attic for who knows how many years).
Constructed (poorly) by me when I was twelve, a birthday gift from my grandma.


It needs a roofer.

And a glassier.

The kitchen needs to be gutted.
A great fixer-upper for while I am still homeless (it turns out you can't knit constantly, your wrists just won't take it.)

Happy Birthday!

Today my sweet little guy turned three years old. Happy Birthday Monkey!
Yes, that is a Trogdor cake. He was delighted.

Marc left for Maxwell AFB this morning. Now I'm all alone (with the Monkey of course) staying at my in-laws house.
A week ago we didn't know where he would be going and now he's gone already.

Frequently at night we would find ourselves snuggled on the couch, him playing video games, me knitting, and we would discuss quantum physics, Elvis' affect on the culture of music, how sad it is that the Pieta is behind glass in the Vatican and you can't really experience it the way Michelangelo wanted, or whatever. So I don't really feel much like knitting in the quiet tonight, even though I am quite enjoying Mim's Adamas shawl. If anyone feels like hanging out and talking while I knit though, call me. We have dozens of video games and half a container of Cookies and Cream ice cream. Snuggling optional.

Wow

So, a fast update because I've actually received a couple of emails wondering what happened to me. In the past couple weeks, I have:
Downsized our belongings by at least 30%
*Moved out of my deluxe apartment in the sky to my in-laws house
*Fixed a big freaking hole in their roof
*Sent off my KSKS package and had it returned by the post office with tire tracks on it...(thank goodness for insurance)
*Spent several days in the hospital after the monkey ingested about two weeks worth of his anti-seizure meds (this was absolutely horrible-they flew him in the helicopter he was going down so fast, but he is doing fine now. Kids are rubber)
*Found out Marc passed the Bar Exam, Hurray!
*Spent hours on the phone with the Pentagon getting our placement preferences etc set because Marc will be going active in 2 1/2 weeks. For months now everything has been wait wait wait, now it is HURRYHURRYHURRY! The really awesome thing is that we still don't know where we will be moving yet.
*I've even done some knitting
For a long time now I've felt like we've been dragging along slowly to our next stage, but now everything seems so sudden. We found out Marc passed the Bar on Thursday and Friday the Air Force told him to be in Alabama (for a 9 week military law class) in 2 1/2 weeks. At that point Monkey and I will load up our car and drive to California to stay with my parents while Marc is at Maxwell AFB.
Wow.
For now we're running around getting things taken care of like doctor appointments and traveling back to Boise to be sworn in to the Idaho State Bar. I keep trying to think of some witty way to end this post but all the news has rather knocked me over. Peace out-

It's a bird, it's a plane, no...

It's a FINISHED OBJECT! One present down for Christmas this year. These socks are a surprise for my sister, whom I tricked into picking the yarn while helping me decide on the colors for the Momsocks, and I cleverly got her to give me her foot measurements without her suspecting a thing. In trying to do something interesting between the two socks I knit one from the inside of the skein and the other from the outside, resulting in not quite matching socks. No pattern to speak of, just your standard 2x2 ribbed socks on #1 needles.
My next project is a pair of Knucks for my FIL (I'm pretty much grounded from any personal knitting for a while, at least until I have a more significant lead on Christmas). And I would have a pretty decent start on these stupid gloves if I didn't so completely suck at casting on. How is it that in 25 years of knitting I still haven't learned a way that really is stretchy and attractive? But that is a gripe for another post. Off to pack* some more.

*By "pack" I mean tape together another box, then stand in my kitchen looking at it and curse quietly.

Oddly compelling

Lest you think I've been wasting all my packing time by creating quilted breakfast food for the monkey...



The chocolate cake is really the coolest thing I've done so far.

Fluff

Instead of getting any meaningful packing done or even posting anything with substance, the monkey and I have been playing kitchen and sewing together. He loves to sit on my lap while I'm at the machine and only touches when it's not moving. Better than actually feeding my family: quilted breakfast.

Weeeee!!!!!!

So what did you do this weekend?

Oww.

Because I don't have enough going on in my life right now, today the universe conspired with a 16 year old driver and I got hit by a car while riding my bike to the gym.
Stupid freaking cages.*
I ended up on her hood (then flying back onto the ground) while my poor bike ended up under her tire. We (the bike and I) were lucky; I so far only have some scratching and bruises, and the bike is looking pretty awesome with her new bad-ass black front tire (the front tire frame was taco'd) and a tune up since everything was out of wack from being hit.
I declined a trip to the hospital; we were up there with the Monkey last week and I'm sure they are getting tired of me. I'll re-evaluate the knee tomorrow.

*Be the first to name that literary reference and I've got a prize for you, no jokes.

Knit Sock Kit Swap

I received the best package in the mail from Jenny, my Knit Sock Kit Swapper the other day! I am hugely spoiled. She sent me a great embroidered polka dot bag that already contains my sock-in-progress (retiring my crappy ziplock bag), a matching needle holder containing an addi turbo needle (my first!), stitch markers, stitch holders, a cute measuring tape so I can be cool like the girls at the SnB, delicious candy that you can see from the picture has already been sampled significantly, and a booklet about Magic Loop. And best of all, she sent me two skeins of Regia Stretch in the extremely awesome Camouflage color. Holy smokes, it is even cooler than everyone says it is. Browns, greens and blacks; my favorite colors all wrapped up in one fantastic elastic yarn. Thank you so much Jenny!
One more dyeing of the sock yarn for my secret partner and my box will be ready to mail. I hope she loves it as much as I adore my present.

Adultery

I am slowly staggering along on the Project That Would Not End, and I admit that I am beginning to have feelings of...infidelity. I'm tired of knitting away on a project that does not change in any easily perceived way. The socks I'm working on are getting a lot more attention than the shawl, absolutely due to the actual progress the sock makes. Meanwhile, the shawl hangs there, looking not unlike the string bags I carry my groceries home in. It's impossible to really even show someone who is interested, I usually end with "it's hard to tell, but someday it will be really beautiful!"
Yeah.
So my cheating heart is looking around seeing all these beautiful shawls (I obviously really want to work on a lace shawl, I just want one that will someday be finished. And isn't such a mindbender trying to figure how one pattern transitions into the next when you finish a row) and I admit to having feelings for a number of other patterns. Mims Adamas shawl pattern is right here, literally hanging on the wall in front of my desk. It is especially tempting because I recently bought a giant cone of Zephyr in white, and it whispers so seductively.
"I'm such a dream to knit with. You could dye me any color-you have dozens of packs of Kool-aid. You could knit right off the cone. Over 5000 yards, I'm anything you want me to be!"
Please just let me finish this thing. It has been a long time in the works.

Rain, plus more jam

It rained again last night and now everything is so fresh and cool; a beautiful 68°. Apparently the ideal temperature for me. It has been a busy week in my little world, in preparation for moving I had to clean out the bedrooms in the inlaw's house that we are moving in to. The only kid living at home with them for two years has been our drummer Sean, who behaves like a gas and expands to fit the space provided. Since there are two free bedrooms and three bathrooms available for his use, he has expanded to use all of this space to one degree or another. Between his crap and the ginormous collection of polo shirts acquired at trade shows, the closets were no small task. I feel honest fear about the time when I will claim one of the bathrooms as ours and clean it out. But I was then able to bring in a few big rubbermaid boxes, filled with Christmas decorations and baby clothes, giving me a warm glow of accomplishment that I so don't deserve. Yep, three boxes, I'm practically moved already.
Due to the overwhelming popularity of the Cherry Nectarine jam, and it's subsequent disappearance, the Monkey and I made another batch yesterday. Soooooo delicious! I maintained a little more creative control during the blender portion of thejamss construction, so it is a little more chunky this time (the Monkey prefers to blend everything into oblivion). Hopefully I will have the good sense to stash these jars instead of handing them out to family again

Hiking

This weekend we took the Monkey hiking in Alta. He does better and better while we are out, but still does a considerable amount of sniveling while being forced to walk uphill. I think he's so happy to have Marc around all the time that he wants to constantly be carried by him. We saw hummingbirds and squirrels and a pica that a clueless youth group was absolutely delighted to see, as they all thought it was a beaver. No moose on our trip, the Cecret lake trail is waaaaaay to crowded for them. Too crowded for me too, but it still is a beautiful area so I'll put up with the crowds once a year or so. The Project that Would Not End came too, and enjoyed the amazing wildflowers that still blanket the mountains.

Hurray!

We are finally home and back to normal after the Bar exam, which took us to Boise for 5 days. I'm really glad to be back home, and the monkey is too, based on his much improved behavior. Still broke, still unemployed, still have to move by the end of August, but I'm focusing on the fun stuff that we get to do while we have a lot of free time together. I'm even getting some knitting done! Still clicking away on The Project That Will Never End (aka Shetland tea shawl), working on a sock for Christmas, and finished a Sophie bag a week or so ago.

Pattern: Sophie from MagKnits
Yarn: Knitpicks Wool of the Andes in Winter Night
Alterations: I cast on 50 stitches instead of 39, because I carry around a lot of stuff for the Monkey. I followed the pattern for decrease rows, but knit an extra 8 or 9 rows after the last decrease. I made the handle longer too.
In retrospect I probably didn't need to make the bag bigger since it has become a project bag for The Project That Will Never End. I will definitely re-block and maybe further felt the bag in order to make is a little more tapered towards the top.

I crave the normal

I will start updating this again with some frequency in a little less than a week, when my life returns to as normal and predictable as it ever is. But for now, it is going to remain a little erratic.
For those interested in my band, we are playing tonight at a club called The Circuit (7711 South 700 West). We'll be up at around 9:00pm. If you are interested in going, I've scanned in a sheet of discount passes that will get you in the door for just $5. Just print them out and please be sure to write Lucky Dragon - Erin on the back of the pass. Streetlight Silhouette, Blame the Sea and 4 Saken 1 will be playing too, so it should be a really good show. This is the first all-ages show we will have played (read: non-bar) so it will be interesting to see how it goes. I hope to see you there!

Dry those eyes!

I just finished reading Elizabeth Zimmermann's Knitting Without Tears. My goodness she is a hoot. I will probably not use any of her sweater patterns anytime soon--I fear no seams and think set-in sleeves look best, but her overall knitting advice is very sound and practical. And again, she is hilarious. Best quote:

Really, all you need to become a good knitter are wool, needles, hands, and slightly below-average intelligence. Of course superior intelligence, such as yours and mine, is an advantage.

Lazy Sunday

Another lazy lazy weekend here, due more than a little to the unbelievable heat outside. Last night at 1am it was 84 F outside, too ridiculously hot to sleep. Thank goodness for air conditioning; wo/man's greatest triumph over nature!
Continuing on my efforts to feed my little family, yesterday I made more jam. Just in case we decide to eat nothing but peanut butter sandwiches between now and whenever we move in August. Three big jars of Cherry-Nectarine, yum! They look a lot like the jars from Thursday's post, only red. I've come to the conclusion that I'll pack these carefully in the boxes that will not be opened until we are wherever the Air Force sends us, probably in December. That way we will have something delicious and homemade, wherever we end up.
Marc's last day at his job was Friday, blah. But to see it with a positive light, now he can spend the next week cramming for the Bar exam. As it is only the most important test he'll probably ever take, we are going to call this a good thing. I'm not really concerned about him passing, he is a very smart guy and great at taking tests. But there still is that abstract fear in the back of your mind any time something this big is coming up. Just one and a half weeks though, and the anticipation is over!

Where have I been anyway?

Today I got up and actually got things done from my list, amazingly enough. I haven't been sick for a couple of days, but it really took me a while to get back on my feet. It feels like I've been laying around for weeks, getting nothing done. And while nothing is a bit of an exaggeration, it only just barely falls into exaggeration territory. I've been staying afloat and nothing more. But today has seen the bathroom and kitchen cleaned, the house vacuumed, and jam made, and it's only half past noon. Behold the beauty of the jam!
Apricot-Pineapple! Apricots from the trees in my in-laws backyard, and pineapple from... Indonesia, according to the label on the can. Global economy at its most delicious! It does seem a little silly to be making jam though, as our move out of our deluxe apartment in the sky looms close in my mind (still a month and a half away, but I'm really dreading the thought). Since the Air Force has not yet decided to send Marc to Japan, we have to make other plans. Currently that means moving in the with in-laws at the end of August, and staying there until mid-October when Marc goes to Maxwell AFB and I float to California. I love Marc's family but still feeling apprehensive and sad about the move. It feels like one more useless step between us and whatever the future holds.
Wow, I had no intention of unloading like this today, I really meant this to be a positive post. I guess what is really there is oozing through my cracks more than I thought.

Ouch

Ok, I apologize for the omission from today's earlier post. I am on pain meds because I have one awful aching oozing case of strep throat, and it has caused an abscess on my tonsil. Needless to say, I feel like shit. I can barely even knit.

FIRE BABY!

Yesterday some pretty cool thunder and lightning blew in for the 4th of July, bringing with it delightful cool temperatures. So we opened up the windows and turned off the AC (it was smelling weird anyway, like something blew into the big water tower outside). Fast forward to this afternoon. Remember the weird smell in the AC last night? This afternoon I turned on the AC and looked down the hall, and there were FLAMES in the air intake. Little flames, but flames non the less. So I calmly unscrewed the thing, popped out the filter and patted out the fire. Go me! Maintenance is up here now replacing a fuse (the part that was on fire). Way to go original fuse! I thought your job was to prevent this kind of fun. It was probably the pain meds that kept me calm, otherwise I might have been more concerned about being very sick and having a naked toddler (he's potty training himself) while my apartment went up in smoke.

Ooo, pretty

So, somebody somewhere is doing some sort of posting involving pictures of the sky, which I could very easily look up but I'm making ice cream and it is almost done. Anyway, the sky is so beautiful right now I wanted to share. Have a wonderful evening.

Yipee!

Thanks to all the creative energy flying around the room at the SnB last night I actually figured out what my problem was and fixed it. Mim and Shelley were especially nice as I sat there and stared at my pattern for easily 30 minutes, knitting and then tinking the same 14 stitches over and over. It seems I missed a YO on one side of the pattern and picked up some random loop on the other side, making my overall count ok but still nothing was fitting.
Now if I stare at everything else for long enough, maybe my next move will become clear...

Arg.

Overall, the knitting on my Shetland Tea Shawl has gone extremely smoothly. Until tonight. I'm not really sure what the problem is, in fact, yesterday I finally figured out what the heck they are talking about when they talk about moving the stitch markers, and why I should do that. But I either have a missing stitch or my markers are just scattered helter skelter through my stitches or something. At least I've isolated the problem; it is definitely somewhere within the lace.

Strangest thing I've knit

I was kind of burned out for a few days from working on nothing but the big-ass shawl, so last night I started Nautie from Knitty. Very weird and cool, plus a good use of the crappy Red Heart I have floating around since before I started knitting with decent yarn a few years ago. The green of the shell is Wool-ease, and not bad to work with at all. The cream is the tiniest fraction of a giant skein of Red Heart, and is nearly impossible to touch with knitting needles. I've been knitting for 24 years, how did it take me so long to pick up decent wool? Anyway, since I started this I am full of ideas of who I know that needs such a strange knitted object. My mom is a science teacher, of course she needs one! Brother in law and his wife just had a baby-and what better toy could an infant have than the weirdest thing in the ocean? My cousin is pregnant, hurray! A pink one for her baby-in-waiting. Tomorrow I'll pick up some googly eyes for the wacky little guy.

Getting better all the time

Today was a much better, smoother running day than I have had in a while. My post-seizure paranoia has lessened to the point where the Monkey does not have to be in my direct line of sight. And my outlook on everything always improves after yoga, which I went to tonight. The kind people at Knitpicks also sent me a catalog (yarn porn) the other day, so I also partook in a little retail-therapy, and bought myself a project or two-s yarn.

Last Saturday I did a little KIP at the Farmer's Market and met David and Jessica. Beautiful day, and the Monkey was actually really good while I sat and knit for quite a while (food always helps him hold still-eating is serious business to this kid). When the wiggles got to be too much for Monkey, Jen had arrived and we did some shopping. David's genius idea for my impossible to shop for MIL's birthday was to knit her a washcloth. The farmer's market is a really easy place to pick up some delicious handmade soap, and I whipped up a cloth from cotton in my stash that night. Done in plenty of time!

And last, I will finally post my Knit Sock Kit Swap questionnaire for my very on the ball secret pal. I admit I didn't answer some of the questions thought. What kind of yarn would I be? The kind that is baffled by that line of questioning.

What are your favorite colors? Purple, brown, earthy dark colors
Are you a new sock knitter? Very new, I've knit two whole pair so far!
How long have you been knitting socks? Just a couple months.
Do you prefer solid or multicolored yarn? Solid or very lightly variegated
What fibers do you prefer in sock yarn? Haven't really been doing this long enough to have a strong opinion. Wool/nylon blends seem like a good sturdy idea.
Where do you usually knit socks? The park while chasing my kid (or otherwise on the go), with the ball of yarn tucked under my arm.
How do you usually carry/store small projects? Ziplock bags. Serious class, that's me.
What are your favorite sock knitting patterns? dyeing to try Pomatomus, it is so pretty.
What new techniques would you like to try? I would like to try magic loop.
Do you prefer circulars or dpns for sock knitting? DPNs, but only because that is all I've used.
What are some of your favorite yarns? I'm working on a huge lace project with some Gems Pearl, and it is a delight to knit with.
What yarn do you totally covet? Sea Silk. Never seen the stuff but I'm smitten by the idea of yarn containing seaweed.
Any pattern you would love to make if money and time were no object? I'm still looking for the perfect yarn to knit the Shoalwater Shawl with. Were I to fall headfirst into a big pile of money I'd use Sea Silk.
Favorite kind of needles (brand, materials, straights or circs, etc)? All but two pair of the needles I own are straight wooden, made by me.
Do you have a favorite candy or mail-able snack? I have one easy to satisfy sweet tooth.
What is your favorite animal? Cats! I even spun cat hair once...
Do you have pets? Just my husband and kid
What are their species/names/ages? Homo sapien/Marc and Monkey/30 and 2 1/2
Describe your favorite shirt (yours or someone else's).. I designed and screened a Muddy Waters shirt for my boy. Coolest shirt ever.
What is your most inspiring image, flower, or object in nature? I have a special place in my heart for the ocean and most things in it.

Monkey had another seizure yesterday, so back up to Primary Children's ER. So I'm a day behind again.
Fuck.
I have actual updates to do, but they'll wait until tomorrow.
Really big hugs to the SLC SnB girls, you have no idea how badly I needed a fun normal night tonight. Thank you.

Nemo!

Thanks for the great comments about my Amazing Lace challenge post. My guitar is an older Fernandes Native, which I love. It has a sustainer, which has become more fun the longer I play. It really does look a lot like a Jag-stang, but has more of an evenly curved bottom so it doesn't quite have that retro cool. Real great warm tone, solid wood body without weighing a ton. Has the added bonus of being the only non-black instrument on the stage too-in case I don't stand out enough, as the only girl.
On to the crafty stuff, for those of you who don't know what I'm talking about. Tonight I pulled my Supermom costume out of the closet and made my kid some really cool Finding Nemo shorts. So easy, and when you're making size 3T clothes you need less than half a yard. The pattern is only two pieces also, so you don't even have to finish that many edges. Pictures of him actually wearing the shorts will have to wait for some time when he is awake (as opposed to now when he is supposed to be asleep but I can hear him jumping on the bed.)

Have a wonderful time everyone who is going to Estes! I'm jealous already!

Amazing Lace Challenge #2

My weekend involved some pretty x-treme knitting in public, combining both the Amazing Lace Challenge #2 and WWKIP day.

Picture, if you will, a purple-haired rocker grrl standing on the stage of a smoky bar. Lights flash, the beer flows, loud music is produced. Finally a set break, and does the grrl light up? No. Look perpetually confused like her drummer? No. Regret her comfortable but kind of dorky footwear choice? Maybe a little.
She pulls out the lace...























This lace that has been mountain climbing, worked on before yoga and kickboxing classes, sat beneath trees and grown in four city parks and one Utah State Park, and has been to the PCMC ER three freaking times. But I think this is the most extreme we've gotten so far.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is some serious bad-ass lace. We rocked, and we rocked hard.

Nakedfotolady do not look!

A few months ago I started a spirituality swap project on Glitter. Lots of things have come up for both myself and my partner, so it took until early this week to mail it off. It will probably arrive at her house any day now, so I can finally post pictures hopefully without spoiling the surprise.




You're not looking, right NFL?






Embroidery with cool silver thread. The first not crappy embroidery I've really done.













The banner! Hung so attractively before shipping on a yardstick. I sincerely hope it is not as crooked as appears in the picture. Hard to see, but there are a small embroidered sun and moon in the top corners as a reminder to keep life balanced. The two pockets on the bottom are green, the color of Mother Earth, and blue, the color of Father Sky. The pockets are there to place goals and wishes, the appropriate side depending on whether the goal is physical or ephemeral. I spent a lot of time trying to think of different ways to embellish this banner, before I realized that personalization would best be left to the recipient. The medicine wheel and most of the surrounding space is blank, to leave lots of room to place items that are important or symbolic.



I'm still too chicken to proceed with my Shetland Tea Shawl as the pattern is written to my understanding. The patterns have so far been very intuitive, so I'll follow along the way that makes sense to me. And if that completely fucks it up, well, that is why I've placed no small number of lifelines.

Bread

An interesting facet to my character is that I always bake my own bread. I the past 8 1/2 years I've bought maybe a dozen loaves. I started out with a bread machine as a wedding present, and wore two pans and eventually the machine out. My second bread machine was not as good, so I only used it to kneed. A couple of years ago my parents got me a KitchenAid mixer for Christmas, and I've been baking up a storm ever since. When I do need to pick up a loaf at the grocery store I feel like I've somehow failed myself, or that The Man is bringing me down. So with this abominable heat we've had here for the past couple weeks I've really been suffering. Mid 90s for days! Unseasonable! So today when it was forecast to reach only 80 (the average temperature for this time of year, according to weather.com) I got busy early in the morning and pounded out 4 loaves of bread to freeze, which is exactly how many fit at once in my oven. Not nearly as exciting as the other foodie pics from Utah grrls, but still delicious.
Please ignore the absolutely black bananas in the corner; you just can't make banana bread with yellow bananas.

Music, yarn, love and logic

I had a cool graphics assignment given to me yesterday: come up with a flyer for the show my band is playing in on Saturday. We (Lucky Dragon) are opening up for our friends General Confusion, and it should be a blast. Assuming you are into Punk/Blues.
In knitting news I am at the last pattern section in my Shetland Tea Shawl and am sooo stuck. The directions helpfully advise me to "move the marker one stitch to the right." Um, I can not for ANYTHING figure out why I should do this. The pattern balances out with increases and decreases, at least to my eyes. Grawr. The pattern corrections are here on page two (Diamond Madeira pattern), in case anyone feels like enlightening me.
This would probably be easier if the Monkey had taken a nap today. I get to be the mean momma tonight, as he was also sent to bed without (much) dinner. He's had a major food-throwing issue of late; not a desirable trait. So he was informed that food on the floor would result in dinner ending. Three bites of salad later and there is food all over. Calmly he was marched to bed, where he cried/sniveled for an hour. Being weak and concerned that he would be too hungry (I've been warned low blood sugar might bring about seizures on him) so he got to get up and eat a PBJ. He was mostly finished before the food throwing began, so back to bed for him. I am determined to be a real hard ass about it this time. We'll see how it works out tomorrow evening.

Dark ages...

Yesterday afternoon our power was out for a couple hours, and you would not believe the suffering we did because of it. It is not as though we are weak people, shuddering at the first sign of the wilderness. We weren't even doing anything power-intensive: Marc was studying for the bar, Monkey was sleeping and I was knitting and fixing dinner. But with our complaining you would think we had to dodge dinosaurs to sharpen pigeon feathers to scratch our crude marks onto curls of birch bark. Monkey woke up because it was hot and his fan wasn't going any more, therefore distracting Marc, and my dinner plans were shot to hell. I was making bread and ice cream for a friend's birthday-fairly low tech. PIONEERS made bread and ice cream, for crying out loud. But typically I use my lovely pink KitchenAid mixer to knead the bread, and I needed the stove to cook the ice creams custard base. So with much sniveling and suffering on my part I kneaded the dough, which we threw on the BBQ at the party (yum!) The ice cream was cooked and frozen at the party which occurred in a more enlightened, electricity-blessed part of town.

Lace

I'm up waaaaaay too late tonight, but I was really on a roll with the Shetland Tea Shawl and didn't notice the time creeping by. Marc is reading, which quite effectively removes him from the realm of this earth's time too. No matter, I finished the second block of lace patterning (the horseshoe design, to be exact) on the shawl and am zipping along on yet another increase row. Possibly the last increase actually, but the book is all the way over on the coffee table-much too far to check. The rows are about to get twice as long but I think I'm going to be finished with this a lot sooner than previously anticipated. Something about frequent stress and knitting to pull myself together...
I waffle between being afraid of running out of yarn early and worrying that it will turn out too small. I could probably do some complicated math to determine actual number of stitches done vs. remaining stitches as well as comparing weight of remaining ball of yarn with knit yarn. But that is going to have to wait until at least tomorrow. Enjoy your weekend everyone.

So I get another Thursday tomorrow, right?

Apparently when you are prone to seizures, every time you get sick your threshold is lowered and you are more likely to have a breakthrough seizure. Easy to read, shitty to experience at 7 and 9 in the morning after a long sleepless night. So we got to spend the morning at Primary Children's again, where for probably the first time ever the doctor heard someone cheer when they announced "Your kid has strep." Hurray! This is very reassuring; this is the first time we've had a reason for a seizure. So his anti-seizure meds stay the same, and we add some antibiotics to the mix for the next ten days, and we start the X days since the last seizure clock again. I was hugely upset this morning-we had been doing so well-but the monkey and I curled up on the couch together and took a long nap and are both feeling a lot better.
But all this does lead to my missing day. I honestly did not get a single thing done off my list today. Nothing. I barely got dressed. So I'm going to need to schedule a make-up day, to catch up with myself.
Meh, who am I kidding? I know I would just lay around knitting.

On a more cheerful note, broccoflower is really beautiful.













It looks like fractals up close. I am such a geek.

Hiking

We had a mostly good time at Antelope Island on Monday. Much to my absolute shock they do have antelope there, but I am not completely crazy with my antelope doubts. Apparently they did all die out years ago, but were re-introduced in the 90s. We did see a dozen or so of the alleged antelope, as well as a bunch of buffalo. Monkey was only really impressed by a huge buffalo, standing alone in the middle of the road. We hiked around, had a picnic lunch and checked out the ranch house. Monkey enjoyed himself the most at the ranch house, where he sat in a tree 7 feet up and played with bark and leaves for half an hour. I enjoyed myself the most talking to the two women spinning there. I need a wheel; this drop-spindle business is for the birds. Even did some knitting in public while speaking with them and was asked questions by the curious (who probably wondered why I was dressed so not-historically with the blue hair.)

Happy Memorial Day!

Today we are waiting for the inlaws to show up, so we can take Monkey to Antelope Island. As I understand, there are no actual antelope there but hopefully it will be fun anyway. It has been a pretty busy weekend despite the rainy weather, so while the rock climbing got canceled lots of other things did get done. Friday we snuck in a hike in Little Cottonwood Canyon before the weather became strangely cold. Everything was so green and beautiful, and the river is unbelievably high. To high to let Monkey even get close to in our favorite protected and (usually) slow moving spot, so he splashed for an hour in a small run-off creek that went right down the trail. Freezing cold fun at only two inches deep.
Have a happy Memorial day everyone. Spend some time thinking about someone who has affected your life drastically but is no longer with you. Share this memory with someone else - this is how people live on.

Kids these days...

My kid sat on my bed for over half an hour today, letting an electric fan blow his pinwheel. He'd still be there if he hadn't started sticking things in the fan blade and giggling (he likes the forbidden thwackthwackthack sound, but he laughs and gives himself away every time.)

Stash enrichment...

Two women in Atlanta are accused of stealing nearly $13000 worth of yarn from several yarn stores.
Holy crap.
I've been trying to come up with some clever remark about enriching your stash to the extreme, but I'm at a loss for words.

Finished socks!

I just finished the Momsocks, only one week late. I am amazed at how remarkably identical they are; aparently the Knitpicks Simple Stripes yarn is dyed in a manner that is downright mathmatical. Tonight they will get blocked and tomorrow they will be in the mail, on their way to California to arrive hopefully while they are having some unusual cold weather. I probably should have planned the socks for her birthday (November) and come up with some other clever Mother's day idea, but sometimes you just have to hop on your bad idea and ride it.
After grafting closed the toe tonight I was considering what an elegant solution the kitchner stitch really is. You k p p k a few times across the toe and TADA! No evidence that you were even there. I'd write a song about it but A) I am not much of a songwriter, just rhythm guitar, and B) I probably couldn't get the guys to perform it. "Thank you! This next song was written by erin. It's about coughknittingcough..." Not exactly the image we're going for.
Coming up tomorrow when I hopefully have more time, pics of my violet hair! I don't have any yarn to dye like everyone is doing, but the protein growing from my head is fair game.

Attention!

Men of the world, attention! I'm only going to say this once, so listen up.

This behavior will not get you laid:

That is all.

Knitting enabler

I love self-striping yarn. It is the perfect enabler to staying up too late knitting. You think,
"Wow, it's getting late. Just one more round and I'll stop."
But it's hard to remember where you started, so the once around turns into approximately 1 2/3. Then you reason,
"I'm so close to the end of this color, I'll stop then."
But the next color is really the short-stripped part, and it is easy enough to justify knitting up that. After that is just more of the original color, and why stop then? Just keep knitting until you actually get to the real next color. But you are on a roll and when you reach the next color, you forget to stop and the whole cycle starts over again. Before you know it, it's midnight and you are really tired but hey, your sock looks good.

Good thing I don't have a job.

(Those of you who know me and have met my kid already know that the last statement was hysterical. The rest of you do now.)