Thursday, June 18, 2009

Lovely waves of color...


Here is the lacy scarf I have been working on. Picture #1 is it now. Picture #2 is what it was a few weeks ago and I was bored to tears. The pattern was nice and interesting but the mercerized cotton was too stiff and non-elastic to carry the give and take it needed to make the holes and waves. I knew I wanted to make a lacey scarf but didn't know what pattern to do it in. Picked up the latest "Yarn Forward" magazine and bam! there it was, near the back. Picture #1 is coming along nicely. It's wanting to curl on me so adventures in blocking is a must (note to self: must get mesh drying rack; still haven't washed that other sweater either and need this badly now!) but I'm finding I might like lace. It has enough changes to keep the attention and it's lots of fun to see the pattern emerge and see why there are so many yos, ssks, sl2k1pssos, k2togs, etc. and how they shape and move the lines in the yarn. I do not recommend knitting lace during a car trip. Tried that a few weekends ago and somehow dropped several stitches, which can be detrimental when knitting lace. I had to put it away before I was tempted to panic and throw the whole thing out the window.

I was reminded that I need to be working on AAnt's afghan; his birthday is in a few weeks. Must do. Cross-stitch birthday gift is being changed to cross-stitch Christmas gift, unless I get on a serious cross-stitch kick, something I seriously doubt. Hunky Hubby's sweater is coming along slowly but is so soft and so nice to zone out and knit. LMSS's baby blanket has been pushed to being a 1st birthday present. So I have little over a year... I think I can get up the courage in that time. How come I can knit sweaters and not bat an eye but a baby blanket is freaking me out? Must over-analyze...

LMSS also informed me that she has time saved up for her friend's long-arm quilting machine so when we are there on baby watch in another week or two we can go there and finish up whatever quilts we need to do. Very tempting. I still have a quilt to quilt (pinned together and waiting for me in a bag), SuperGirl's quilt to layer, pin, and quilt (was given to me pieced, thank goodness and I have all the materials, just haven't put it together yet), and my first quilt I started but haven't gone anywhere with it yet. It's cut out but I have yet to start sewing. I think a king-sized quilt was a huge thing to take on but I'm still going to do it. Until now, I've only done 9-patch and patchwork quilting, no actual quilt blocks, and I need to make that bridge even if it's to finish it and say "look what I did!" and never make another again. I have a feeling the cross-stitch will be a project like that too...

SOCKS!

I had to post these, even though they are a gift for LMSS. I had the best time with this yarn. It was discount priced at Michael's ($1 a skein!!! Caution or throw it to the wind? Hmmm...) I wasn't sure how it would knit or turn out, but I'm so easily amused the color changes kept me greatly entertained; the colors knitted look TOTALLY different from the way they looked on the skein. The yarn itself makes me suspect that it might felt a little if thrown in the dryer so no dryer. I don't know anyone who throws hand-knitted socks in the dryer anyway, except maybe me when I'm not paying attention. On the pattern, I adjusted how many stitches to decrease to on the toe: I did 16 total (so the stitch count was 4, 8, 4 on the double points) instead of the 8 the pattern called for (2, 4, 2). I suspect the pattern called to go down that far so the knitter didn't have to practice the Kitchener Stitch for very long. I don't mind the Kitchener Stitch and I like a wider, less pointy toe, so this worked out nicely.

I had told LMSS about the color combination and how it wasn't our usual RED!/YELLOW!/ORANGE! choices for socks. I had hoped it would be ok and she said it was because she needed some more socially acceptable hand-knit socks. These are mostly socially acceptable; notice I did rebel slightly and not match the stripes. :) Such a wild life I have...

Saturday, June 13, 2009

P.S.

I had forgotten. Where the "pursuit of sunlight" also came from was the fact I was trimming gardenia branches so to let the light shine on the poor azaleas that had been overcome. They had been trying in vain to reach the sun but the gardenias had blocked off most of their vantage points. They are now stretching to the sun and I am right with them!

I've also finished LMSS's 1st sock and started on the other. Will have pictures posted soon!

Friday, June 12, 2009

Blue skies smiling at me

I decided something today while hacking the small trees that have decided to grow in my flower beds. (I say small trees as in they are actually my height; they've been taking lessons from my kids on how to shoot up 6 inches in a night!) I've decided the name of my autobiography/biography, if there is ever to be one. I don't know if I'd ever write it and I don't know who would want to read it but I would so that's all I need! :) It is "In Bold Pursuit of Sunlight." In light (haha, no pun intended) of all that is going on, Hubby and I have been working through our true priorities and have come to the same ones we had in the beginning: nothing is worth it if we aren't together, taking care of each other, no matter what the income is. We keep it simple, be happy with every day that comes, and know God will provide. And in saying that, while I was cutting the trees (nothing malicious but they really were trying to take over), I remembered that I've never asked for anything more than happiness. What makes me happy? Sunny days. Thus, the title.

Love it.

I'm almost done with LMSS's sock. I should finish it tonight and start on it's mate. It fits so good I might keep it but no, it's all for you, LMSS! :)

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Just warning you...

This is totally not knitting related but in the likelihood that some of you might share the same tastes music-wise (some of you very likely!), you so need to watch this:

http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1810025498/video/13892245

Rock on. Hopefully the Robinson Film Center here gets it.

Tuesday, June 9, 2009

I've seen better days...

This week is the last week of definite work. I can't tell you how mixed I feel about it. There is the side of me freaking out because there will be a drastic decrease in family income but there is also the side of me saying, "Hey, here's that break I was wishing for." There is a side of me trying to plan where I will be making up the drastic decrease in income but there is another side of me happy that I will finally be a true stay-at-home-mommy and can clean the house at leisure. Both sides are making me nutty because even though I know those statuses (or statii?) will be reality in only 4 days, 2 other landmen and I still have a huge project to finish and we have to finish it in those 4 days. Who cares that everything is pretty much over, they just won't tell us anything different, we still are working like there is no tomorrow.

Not only is that going on, the church is having Vacation Bible School 5:30-8pm M-F, which I, in a moment of feeling good and not knowing what was to be, volunteered for, I'm having to renegotiate our health insurance (gives me mixed emotions), and I've ended up having to watch an additional 2 kids and dog (kids potty-trained, dog not) while my sister-in-law goes for different meetings in the process of getting her family moved here. While doing everything else. And SuperGirl's birthday party is Sunday because that was the latest we could schedule it before hitting baby-watch time (looking forward to seeing you LMSS!)

Just needed to vent. No knitting happening, just lots of diaphramatic breathing and something telling me in my head "be like the squirrel" (fabulous White Stripes song; a must hear for those who like good rock and a great message).

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Up on the date

I'm waiting for a landman to get here and sign some stuff so that I can, yet again, have more stuff to do, so meanwhile I'm going to blog.

In the previous blog I mentioned the interesting things my daughter tells me. About 6 months ago, one morning while getting ready for work, she told me she wanted me to take a shower so that I would look pretty. In fact, prettiness has been a big thing lately, like how pretty is she, is she pretty, and will she stay pretty, all this being said while she twirls around as only almost 5 year olds can do. The other day she said something else to me and I can't remember what it was. When I do, I'll tell you. Hopefully it does happen.

I've been working on several different things:

1) socks for LMSS. It feels so good to be working on socks again! They are so satisfying and gratifying as you work through the different steps. I had finally decided I was ready to start on another pair, who cares how much I'm working on already. I was digging through my sock yarn stash and remembered I owed LMSS a pair because she gave me some sock yarn. I found the perfect colors and started knitting. Heaven.

2) sweater for Hunky Hubby. Totally doing the pattern on my own with EZ's Knitting Without Tears by my side. Hubby is excited about it. I did double up the yarn; it's still on #2 circs but much more workable and feels fabulous. However, it does take a while, so so far I've only completed 1.5" of ribbing for the bottom and another 0.5" of stockinette. 2" down, twenty-something" to go!

3) balled the yarn for my cabled sweater. That was an adventure. I left the kids with Hubby and hauled all 6 skeins to the yarn shop to innocently work on her ball winder. Thank goodness one of the regulars was there and she noticed the yarn I was attempting to begin winding. It's hand-dyed cotton, really lovely, but a booger to wind because it has a mind, and tangles, of it's own. She helped me get started and held the skein on both hands while I wound; the adjustable frame was out of the question. An hour later, and one 15 minute mess that stretched across half the shop, we were finished and I had nice neat balls of yarn. I also stayed and helped her wind 2 skeins together to at least repay her partly for all her help.

4) the green/blue lacey scarf which totally changed it's pattern on me. I had a picture to put up of it but I really was getting bored with the pattern. Like so bored I wasn't even torturing myself working on it. I looked at the latest Yarn Forward magazine, found a much better pattern, frogged the old and am a fourth of the way through the new. It looks lots better, even though I think the pattern was more for wool or something more like that instead of mercerized cotton. I still like it though. When finished it'll be my first lace blocking so we'll see how that goes.

5) cross-stitch for M-i-l. I'm liking it ok but I am not a cross-stitcher.

6) queen-sized afghan for AAnt. It's actually going to be fun because it's crochet so doesn't take as long, and I'm getting the chance to use up those odd, random skeins of acrylic I still have hanging around. Stash buster bonanza. I'm even in the process of frogging an old striped afghan that I couldn't stand (it was buried in the linen closet) to use in it.

7) LMSS's baby blanket... which I'm sad to say hasn't been happening. It will soon. Somehow.