KnitCrush

A Bit Concerned

Do any knitters out there have as many UFOs sitting around as I do? It's shameful, really, the number of projects I have lurking about half-finished. Some of them I simply lost interest in or decided the yarn & pattern aren't harmonizing to my liking. Some of them require that I follow a chart, and I haven't had the attention span or time for that lately. Others, however, have me a bit concerned.

I have several socks started that I seem physically unable to complete. I have tried; one evening I tried one sock, put it down & tried another, then put that one away & tried to start Matt's socks. It isn't a lack of interest or dislike of the yarns; the issue is becoming more worrisome. It's my hands.

My hands won't manipulate the tiny needles & thin yarn. The two socks I've repeatedly tried to work on are on US size 1 double-points. One is a 3x2 rib, and the other is plain vanilla stockinette. Even with fierce concentration, my hands won't do it, for either sock. I even tried moving the plain vanilla onto a long circular needle to Magic Loop it instead, thinking that maybe I was just tired & therefore struggling with the dpns a bit. Magic Loop didn't fix the issue either. I tried casting on Matt's socks both on dpns and the long circular needle, and I could barely make my hands get the join started, followed by a slowly tortuous single round.

What's going on with me? I grabbed some worsted weight wool & a pair of size 8s yesterday to start a plain garter-with-lace-edge shawlette, and that seems to be going fine. But just now I again put those three socks away in sheer frustration because my hands won't go.

Maybe I'm just tired.

Oh, My. Just So Much.

Well. I haven't been around these parts for ages. Eons. Too Long.

What happened to me? Again... well. It's not so much what happened to me, it's what's been going on with everyone around me. I'm pretty much just along for the ride.

The kids went back to school, obviously (two months ago, but it doesn't seem like that long). School schedules, Open Houses, homework, you know the drill. Matt has begun college, which is a massive change for all of us, but in a positive way. I went from part- to full-time at work, a hugely welcome change that creates some chaos on the homefront but makes the checkbook feel good. You know, it makes me feel good, too. I feel like I've found A Place.

And then, one by one, people in this house started getting sick. Slowly but surely, over the last three weeks, we've been dropping like flies. Just as soon as one person is almost better, another one is ill. We've all become great handwashers, I have that to say for it.

I haven't been knitting a whole ton (full-time hours=fewer knitting hours). I'm almost done with Multnomah. OK, I'm almost done with the first one. I started a second one today. Shush, don't judge me. I couldn't help it.

I also made a wee pit stop last week at the LYS and found some beautiful sock yarn. So, another triangular shawl. Again, I couldn't help it. This one is just a wing-it type of deal, making it up as I go along. It's Cascade Heritage Handpaints, Color 9931, on US 5 circs.

Really, that's about it. I'm resisting the urge to hit the LYS again today (so not necessary). I do, however, get to go see Miss Jesica for a haircut tomorrow. Wee!

Mish-Mash & Meaning

How do designers do it? How do they actually get patterns designed, charted, written, and knit? I have a plethora of designs ready to go. I get an idea, get all crazy-excited, chart it all out (even on-the-go--hello, BlackBerry!), and then hunt for stash yarn with which to knit. In that initial excitement, I really do believe that "I'll just get this one started," then I'll go back to the one that's half-knit. I harbor this fear that, if I don't at least get a swatch knit right away for a new idea, I'll forget some important detail & have to trash the whole thing. This is why there are many, many, many unfinished design projects just lying about the house, looking forlorn.

I did start something this weekend that is not my own design, because there have been so many ideas flying around up there that I needed a little mental vacation. I realize this doesn't get any of the design work done. Shush. It's minimal-thought, short-row, garter stitch, cotton lovliness, and the only thinking I have to do is follow someone else's pattern--brilliant! Shawl That Jazz is exactly what I needed. Again, colors make me so silly-happy. (This is the second attempt, because you all know that I must cast everything on twice. The first attempt was in a worsted wool, and I hadn't adjusted the pattern numbers for the increase in yarn weight. I realized this about four rows in to the pattern and promptly pulled the needles out. Jenna & I stretched the resulting piece of knitting almost all the way across the living room. Ahem.)

Oh, want a cool BlackBerry tip? I think I read about this at Crackberry, but didn't realize its full potential until I started playing around with it. If you go into Options-->AutoText, you will see a whopping list of words that the BB will automatically fix if you mistype them. You can leave apostrophes out of contractions and BB will put them in for you (for the most part). You can also add to this list. For example, I have one email template saved on the laptop that answers all of the general questions regarding our fall registration for AYSO. Whenever I get an email asking some of those questions, I send that template email as a response; that way, I don't have to type the same email over & over again.

If you push the Menu button while you're in AutoText, and select New, you can add whatever little shortcut you want to the menu. Type what you want the shortcut to be, scroll down, then type in as much text as you need. Now, every time I type "fall09" in response to an email, it automatically inserts that whole form letter for me. Awesome.

I also had some thoughts on the last RadioLab Short, but I think I'll save those for now. Darwin & Richard Dawkins, and the purpose of flowers.

Peek-A-Boo!

I see you! This is what results from trying to sneak a picture of My-Only-Hunter-In-The-Whole-World. He catches me every time, no matter how sneaky I think I'm being. He's like a neen-ja. (I love the funky green of his eyes; they've been ever-so-slowly changing from blue to green for years now.)

While I was trying to sneak a picture of him, I was working with this. It's luscious Misti Alpaca Handpaint Lace. At the time, it wasn't too humid outside to work with it; in the intervening days, it has alternately been great to work with or too-sticky-in-the-humidity to work with. I have fiddled with this yarn from almost a year, never happy with the stitch patterns I cyphered out for it. Now, I've come up with something dandy. (Yes, I said "dandy." Why? Because the colors of this yarn remind me of fields of wheat, of the Plains, and of Little House on the Prairie. And "dandy" fits that, I think.)

The deal-breaker (thank you, Liz Lemmon) with this yarn? The needles. Matt gave me the Knit Picks Options set of needles for Christmas a few years ago, and I also have several sets of Addi Turbo circs. I had started this on some Addi Turbos, but they were just a smidge too blunt--and I do mean "smidge." There is only the most miniscule difference in the pointiness of the Addis versus the Options in this small needle size, but it has made a massive difference. The double-decreases aren't sliding away from the tips of the Options like they did the tips of the Addis, which was really irritating me. See that? Addi Turbos on the top/left, Options on the bottom/right. Squint, really hard, and you can maybe see the microscopic difference in pointiness that kept me from chucking the whole thing into the garbage bin.

Finding the Time

It can be so difficult, sometimes, to find the time to get things done. Not the ordinary things, like cooking, cleaning, and running errands--those things get done because they have to be done. It's the knitting things, My things, that get pushed aside. Please don't misunderstand me--I don't have a huge issue with this; I fully grasp the fact that we have a lot of kids and opposite work schedules, and that's all fine. But when the ideas start to pile up in my head and I can't get to all of them, it makes me feel a bit unproductive.Ideas for patterns float around in my spacious brain all the time, but I don't think I'll ever have the time to get them all knit up.

I have charted out many lace shawls and stoles(I absolutely love doing the charts--flying that geek flag proudly!), but I don't think the knitting will ever get done. I work on things here & there in little stolen moments that don't seem to amount to a whole lot, especially in laceweight.

Take this sweet little bit of lace. It's Misti International Handpaint Laceweight (forgive me, I don't remember the color--I want to call it Foxglove for some reason, though). This poor yarn has tried to be several different things, but not one pattern fit it just right. I thought maybe a scarf instead of a wrap, because maybe I can feel more productive with fewer repeats per sitting. That bit there is the result of some scattered minutes of knitting yesterday.

And then these things happen, which irritate me to no end but are seemingly unavoidable. That, friends, is the result of casting on 256 stitches to knit a stole sideways so that the subtle striping runs the length of the stole. Over several days, I got about 5 long rows done. I left it at the side of my desk while I made supper the other night; when I had finished cleaning up, I found my poor, abused tiny-beginning-of-a-stole with about 30 stitches dropped off of the needles. A few of the boys had been using my laptop and had lain all over the desk, undoing all of those stitches. I tried to salvage it, I did, but it was too far gone. Oh, well.

(If only I could find a job just charting the lace. Then I would be so very happy.)

Knitting a Rainbow

Meghan, whom I greatly adore, has done an amazing thing--she re-introduced me to Ricky Gervais. Run to iTunes now and download his podcast, because it's hilarious and makes me all giggly. Good giggly. So-giggly-that-whilst-listening-and-driving-people-look-at-me-all-funny-like. Even more stitch-in-the-side-laughter can be found in Ricky's clip with Elmo, also available at iTunes. 

Adding to the giggles are these crazy people, who are crazy, and make me crazy, but are funny as all get-out. (What does that mean, anyway, "as all get-out?")

That's Wee Jack, showing me what The Uglies look like. Kid is CRAZY.

 

And that's My Only Hunter In The Whole World, hamming it up because he's really good at it. Kid cracks me up. He's been this huge kid since birth, just big all over, and he has the biggest heart, too. The crossing guard at his school told me the other day that he's been setting a great example to his class of how to welcome the new student; Hunter has buddied right up to him, which is just how Hunter rolls. The best thing? He still climbs into my lap, even though he's so big--he's always been the cuddliest one of the boys.

My Only Hunter walked up to me the other day whilst I knitted on this bit of lovliness and said, "Mom, you're knitting a rainbow!" I am in absolute mad knitcrush love with this stuff. It's so darn cheerful! Makes me smile every time I look at it. It's Jojoland Harmony laceweight in color HC05; this color name does it no justice so I'm calling in Knitted Rainbow. (I know, not very original, and I swiped the name from a seven-year-old, but it fits, so...).

Happy Weekend, everyone. The kids have spring break this coming week, so the next time we talk I'll probably be losing my ever-loving mind. (Hey, what does that one mean, too--"ever-loving mind?")

How Many Times Must Carie Cast On...

... before Carie casts something on RIGHT?! I'm thus far uncertain of the answer -- this is cast-on number four. It's Cotton-Ease, and I love the color (don't ask me what's up with me & orange lately, because I truly don't know. I am as shocked & surprised as you are, really). I had a little made-up stitch pattern in my head, for which I cast on too few stitches three times. Yes, usually I can count, but not last night, apparently.

I also don't understand this yearning for cotton that I've had lately. I have three merino scarves in progress (yes, THREE, but that really doesn't surprise you now, does it?), and I have been in absolute love with the squooshy goodness that is cabled Paton's Merino Wool -- until this last weekend. The temperature rose to something tolerable and suddenly all I could think about was how wonderful it would be to have a few cotton lace wraps to throw around my shoulders when it's warm out. Usually I don't think of these things until it's too late in the season (read: start knitting them in August so they're done in October when I want warm, cozy wool instead of lovely, breathable cotton). Am I perhaps (dare I say it?) ahead of the game for once? Now that's a novel feeling for me, really.

Perhaps this is why I couldn't properly count. AC/DC on Rock Band in the background. Sorry it's so dark. Dakota was singing, Hunter was playing bass, Matt was playing drums with Wee Jack running the bass pedal. Simply hilarious. Pretty sure the laughter was making me miscount. Surely it can't just be ME. :)

Doing Taxes All Night Long

Yes, it's Tax Night in our humble household. Too much fun for me, folks. It's not all that hard, it's all organized and ready, but, boy, there are about 600 other things I'd rather be doing. Supper's all cleaned up, everyone's homework has been done for hours, lunches and clothes for tomorrow are all ready to go -- this is actual, real & true Free Time during which I could be KNITTING (and maybe watching Battlestar Galactica on Hulu at the same time even). And here I sit with The Welder, reading names & numbers off of tax forms while he henpeckingly, two-finger types them in on the laptop. My laptop that could be entertaining me with high-def Battlestar Galactica instead. Harumph.

Don't get me wrong, please. I love that he doesn't just hand me the stack of papers and leave it all for me to do. I love that he actually giggles like a little kid when the amount in the Estimated Refund window goes up (that's what having a dual-income, six-child house will do for you -- makes The Crazy rather more tolerable). I love that we pay bills & do taxes together.

But the man types with both index fingers. And that's it. I told him he has other digits that would love to get in on the action, but he likes his Hunt & Peck style, and he's sticking to it. I type a lot, so I type pretty quickly. It's a little painful to watch when I know I could go at least three times faster.

That's OK. The knitting and my beloved Battlestar will still be here tomorrow. Now let's all hope that everything gets done early tomorrow like today, all cleaned up and prepped for the next day, that all the kids get along as fabulously as they are tonight and don't need a darn thing from me for about an hour tomorrow evening.

(Let me have my silly little hope.)

:)

Returned, New & Improved...

(... and I suppose I should include "with new painkillers to boot", but that's a revelation for another day. Please attribute any weirdness that follows to said painkillers, because right now they're working without making me hurl, which is always a good thing).

Hello everyone! I've missed this so very much. The internet Dark Ages in our home have finally ended, and I am back in contact with my beloved virtual world. I have been knitting here & there, as time permits (read: as working around the schedules of seven other folks, not including my own schedule, permits). Of course, you all must know that a Happy Dance in celebration of our Age of Enlightenment is required:

Soccer registration for spring season is upon us-- Let the Chaos Begin! I'm also working, which has been fantastic. I love my job, and I love the people with whom I work.

Knitting? Well, there's been some, but nothing completed (huge surprise there, I know). A few scarves in the works, a wrap in worsted weight wool, and maybe a baby blanket/towel/wrap to start. Once again, Startitis rules. I've been stuck sitting on my bum lately, though, so I have been getting in a little more knitting than usual.

I'm off to peruse my long-neglected internet, to visit blog friends and pop in at Ravelry and Plurk. I'll be back soon, promise.

Sporadic

  Posting, like knitting, has been sporadic at best as of late. Le Grande Divorce has still had us in court-- yes, still, two years after we were deemed Divorced and I got my Independence Day. However, HRH and his drama can't bring me down, because I have too much to be happy about! The Welder and I went and got married, and we couldn't be happier. The kids are all tickled, and happiness abounds all around.

So, while the knitting has bee sporadic, you can see from the wee pic above that at least it's been productive. That's a Flower Basket Shawl from Interweave Knits by Evelyn Clark, knit with Paton's Classic Merino on US 8 KnitPicks Options circs. It is so squishy-soft and warm! I blocked it out on Saturday morning and gave it to Miss Nancy for her birthday Saturday afternoon at work. Yes, it was still a teensy bit damp, but she's wanted a shawl forever and I knew she'd be at work when I got there, and I just could not wait. Her reaction was priceless.

And the posting here, like I said before, has been sporadic as well. It's not on purpose, honestly-- I'm not avoiding you! We have no internet at home right now, so I'm only popping in here & there. Fear not, the lack of internet will be relieved soon.