I am working on a two-part post about my dyeing experiments adventures. Soon...
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The horrific cold seems to have passed on to some other locale. Our temp is at or above freezing :) So naturally, I finally finished my extra-long fingerless gloves, the ones to keep my forearms warm whilst reading in bed in our cold bedroom.
I tried to wear them last night but had to take them off after a couple minutes because they were... too warm.
I don't know, do you think it will get ever cold again?
Yarn: Colorado Yarns Durango (10-ply worsted, 50/47/3 wool/acrylic/rayon), colorway 5, a tweedy ecru; 1.3 skeins, 138 yds. Needles: Addi Turbos US#7. Pattern: Cobbled together, but I used the thumb gusset from Ann Budd's Handy Book of Knitting Patterns. I cast on a couple extra stitches to allow for more room in the forearm (could have used a couple more) and decreased them away before the wrist.
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Laundry day, hand washables:
Actually, these are all perfectly machine washable and dryable except for the blue socks, upper row, at right. I found out the hard way that they will felt (Pagewood Farms, Denali Hand-dyed sock yarn). But I am *practicing* using my Hand Wash cycle.
Here is my *dryer* for the hand washables:
I took this while the fan was moving to spare you the sight of how filthy the thing is. Really need to clean it... someday.
My own, longer fingerless gloves. First one done except for thumb and weaving in ends, the other about one-third done.
Progress interrupted because these (scroll down past the donation information).
Aqua square at right left done in brocade stitch from Barbara Walker's first book, red square at left right done in garter stitch. I have plenty of this superwash DK wool left from my sweater; this is an excellent use for it.
From the organizer:
And it's going to take knitters (and us) a while to make all of these. By the time we're done, the donations will have stopped, the media attention will have died down, and the families will be left to deal with the quiet of their homes. People who have lost a loved one often find that the hard work of grieving comes months after the actual death occurs -- long after people have stopped receiving cards in the mail and meals on their doorstep, they're still left with the weight of loss. And they often start feeling forgotten.
Let's start out with a bit of slothfulness. Sloths are slothful.
Trivia question of the day: for what delightful cartoon show on Nickelodeon did Mark Mothersbaugh compose music? (Answer buried in the linked Wikipedia article.) (I loved that show.)
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I am feeling better today, having spent most of the last two days in bed and/or sleeping. Having an iPad makes lying in bed much less boring; just another wonder of the connected age.
On the hip situation, I am now confronted with this decision:
Have the surgery in 2-3 weeks and probably not be able to work this tax season. Although I would be recovered enough to return to work by early March, it is really, really difficult to jump into the middle of tax season. The annual learning curve is just too steep.
Work this tax season and have the surgery ASAP after April 15. A cortisone shot this week and another in early March would ensure relatively pain-free mobility, and working would give a pleasant boost to the checking account.
What would you do and why? Discuss.
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The nurse that I talked to on the nurse line on Sunday ordered me to get a functioning fever thermometer. She wanted to know my temperature and I had to tell her our thermometer was not working properly. I bought that thermometer, an electronic one, last summer so that Elder Son and I could tell if Smokey had a serious infection or just a superficial one. Darned thing insists that everyone's temperature is in the range of 92.4˚F -- 94.2˚F. What with all the kerffluffle during Smokey's recovery, I no longer have the receipt. Damned Wal-Mart. Clearly, it's all their fault.
Yesterday Smokey went on a major errand-running and shopping trip to the Twin Cities. One of his tasks was to purchase a new thermometer. He reports that the traditional glass ones, which I had ordered him to procure, are apparently no longer available. WTF?
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And now for a bit of fun knitting.
Yarn: Colorado Yarns Durango, 50/47/3 wool/acrylic/viscose, worsted weight (perhaps discontinued?), ecru and brown. Pattern: I used Ann Budd's basic mitten pattern from A Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns* for the thumb gusset and did the mittens in 3x1 rib. Recipient's hand is same length as mine but slightly more substantial. Ribbing makes the fit more forgiving. Needles: Addi Turbo US#7; #6 for contrasting end row and bindoff.
These are for an acquaintance who has a coffee kiosk on the highway in my teeny tiny town. Although she claims it is warm inside her 6'x8' building, she has to keep opening the window to take orders and hand out coffee and make change. I suspect that her hands might welcome these during January. I don't know her well, but I do know her well enough to know she deserves these. (She has the best coffee EVAH!)
A side benefit of making these is that I finally figured out what stash yarn -- the ecru Durango -- to use for a pair of long fingerless gloves for myself. I want them for when I am reading in bed; my hands and forearms get cold, and it is annoying to have to keep pulling my pajama sleeves down when I'm wearing regular fingerless gloves. Yeah, it's a real bitch, I tell ya...
* Do you have this book? If not, why not? It is a great resource when you want to make a basic [thing] and just need a little help on the shaping or the cast-on or something. Or, you can follow it blindly; no shame in that.
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Last night I was on the Twitterer. I found it humorously ironic that the most plentiful tweets in my feed were, 1, Chuck Todd (NBC news) live-tweeting the Notre Dame-Alabama game, and b, Amanda Palmer and her followers tweeting about kindness and selflove and how to stop the bullying.
Maybe we should introduce Chuck and Amanda and let them educate each other. Or, really, let Amanda educate Chuck. (Nothing against Chuck Todd. He is one smart dude. But, srsly, which is a more important topic?)
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Speaking of the Twitters, did you watch the season premier of Downton Abbey? Of course you did; we all did. Want to relive it through the eyes of a highly jaded but clever sheep? This guy preserved Dolores Van Hoofen's live-tweet of the premier. What a hoot baaaaah!
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Today is the twelfth fourteenth day of Christmas so I unplugged the lights on the tree. I'd really like to make a tree cover out of a sheet and just store the whole thing somewhere out of sight until next December. But I will probably just let it sit in the *conservatory* until Christmas. Like I have done for X years.
Once the kids leave home all tradition and semblance of civilization go right out the window.
Per doctor's orders, I had to stop taking ibuprofen last weekend and instead take Tylenol until the surgery. The latter does not work nearly as well as the former for joint pain. Just in case you were wondering.
On the knitting front, I finished Scotty's mittens (New Year's Day) and Younger Son's hat (New Year's Eve) as promised. Cast on for a pair of fingerless gloves for a friend; she runs a drive-through coffee kiosk in town so has to open and shut her window all morning long. Although she claims it is warm inside the kiosk, I bet her hands get cold. Thus, the fingerless gloves.
As an added benefit, I realized that the yarn I am using -- Colorado Yarns Durango -- would be perfect for the extra-long fingerless gloves I want for myself, to wear when I am reading in bed. I have 4 or 5 skeins of the ecru -- plenty! I shall cast on for them next.
Smokey wants a tuque for himself like the ones I made for Harley and Peter. I don't have any more of that yarn, Phildar Pure Laine 3-1/2 DK, and it is discontinued. I have been searching for a suitable substitute. He desires the hat to be wooly and (probably) blue. As I am determined to knit exclusively from stash for the foreseeable future, this has necessitated some serious stash diving. But I may have found the solution: the Rowan Pure Wool 4-ply fingering weight I got when I subscribed to the Rowan magazine. If I double-strand it, it should be roughly DK weight. The tuque requires about 350 yards of DK weight, so that would be 700 yards of the fingering weight; if Ravelry is to be believed, I have a little over 1,000 yards. Score!
It has been snowing nonstop for two days, with a total accumulation <1/4". Such is January on The Great Frozen Tundra.
That is Alex's lovely hand above. I made these for her from the same yarn I used for her hat and cowl last winter. Great pattern, fast to knit*, impressive result. I have plans to make myself a pair from the same yarn in my stash but in blue. These are the BEST fingerless mitts I have ever knit -- I loved making them and I will love wearing mine.
* "Fast to knit", assuming the knitters does not miscross cables -- and who among us has NOT miscrossed a cable or three? -- or lose her place in the pattern. I ended up rewriting the pattern to demarcate the cable panel from the stockinette portion, after which I did not lose my place again.
We spent Christmas day with Alex and Matthew. It was delightful to see them hosting the gathering of our little family. They had clearly put a lot of thought and effort into the day -- food (tossed salad and pad thai -- yummy! I brought dessert), presents (perfect, every one!), and they even got dressed up. Not Smokey nor I nor Andrew; we were all in jeans, although I did wear a handknit scarflet to dress up my sweater.
There was festive dress.
Smokey always wears his Santa hat when he works on Christmas, and he brought it along. In the photo above, Andrew had just attempted -- unsuccessfully -- to put the hat on an attentive but uncooperative Ser Percival, so he donned St. Nick's chapeau himself.
Matthew had recently shaved his head.
Smokey was delighted to get a calendar from Alex. He has always been a big fan of Xena, Warrior Princess. (He was gobsmacked also to receive an automotive code reader, but that is not a particularly photogenic object, being basically just a black box.)
I got tags for my handknit items (sadly, they had not arrived by Christmas) and an iPod dock and a Mac Magic Mouse.
Andrew also got an iPod dock, but I neglected to get a photo. His looks approximately like this:
I had put together a basket containing a couple of beginner's supply kits for Alex. There was a knitter's kit: US#7 Dreamz needles, a ball of dishcloth cotton to learn on, and two skeins of Cascade 220 in soft yellow for a scarf once she has mastered the knit stitch, plus assorted small tools, and a How to Knit pamplet from the The Knitters' Guild of America for when I am not around to help her. The other half of the basket was a beginner's sewing kit -- shears, seam ripper, pins, needles, thread. I have found myself with three sewing machines, and one will be hers. She wants me to teach her to sew and to knit, yay!
Smokey had put together a similar gift for Matthew with assorted tools and gadgets, including a set of lighted jumper cables. Go ahead and laugh, but Matthew was pleased with them; you will wish you had them yourself next time your car will not start on a cold dark night.
Ser Percy's sweater was finally done and presented to Himself.
It fits him pretty well, considering I had no pattern and had very limited access to the actual dog's body for fitting. The next one will be better. Please note Percy's bow tie and Alex's sparkly shoes. It was a very festive day!
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I had hoped to finish a pair of fingerless gloves for Alex by Christmas, but it was not to be.
The pattern is Vancouver Fog on Ravelry, the yarn is Knit Picks Andean Dream (alpaca, silk, merino worsted). I bound off the first one tonight and cast on the second. They go very quickly except for the idiot who crosses cables the wrong way and loses track of where she is in the pattern. That does slow them down a mite.
Knitting was primarily of a stealth nature, but did include scientific swatching and the F'ing of a couple of O's that had been OTN for nearly, and over a year, respectively. (I am rather proud of that sentence -- and its punctuation -- awkward though it may be.)
June
June was for knitting and vacation and celebrating that brief magical time that is summer in the north woods.
Lots of knitting.
July.
July was for more vacation -- the rest of the one in Wyoming and another on the North Shore.
I learned the difference between eagles and turkey vultures, and I had surgery to remove some extra/unneeded bits and pieces and repair that torn cartilage in my knee.
Knitknitknit.
September.
In September I had lots of catsontheblog, it was my turn to give the prayer at the beginning of the monthly county board meeting, the county budget process blew up, and the most gloriously gorgeous month of the year was here.
morenew-to-memusic found its way into my iTunes, and we celebrated 35 years together
by not-camping on Lake Superior.
The kneedles continued to fly.
November.
The van that took us on some wonderful vacations met up with an unfortunate bear on the road and was replaced by an older but bigger and more customized van.
Cold weather arrived, and once more I cooked and baked.
Mostly, though, I knitted. Apparently I can crank out hats like other knitters crank out... sweaters
December.
I continued to be thankful (there is a lot to be thankful for).
With the help of Matthew and Maggie, I decorated for Christmas. This decorating thing is never a given.
I showed you my ornaments, y'all showed me yours.
We ate well.
A bit more knitting* for others.
I pretty much finished my Christmas knitting. (Shhh, the Calorimetry is a surprise.) The medical mittens are still OTN -- stay tuned.
*For someone who doesn't like pink, I sure knit a lot of it lately...
As soon as I finished the bright red Fetchings featured in yesterday's post, I cast on some for myself. The first one took about 20 seconds. Well, actually, it took one evening. The second took the rest of the week. Since these were knit from Plymouth Boku, a long-color-change yarn, I decided I wanted the stripes of the second one to match the first.
After starting and frogging twice, I gave up on that idea. Apparently the stripe sequence is not consistent. Or is so long that it doesn't necessarily repeat within a skein. My efforts were complicated by the fact that I cannot count rounds nor remember exactly how I screwed up the pattern what I did on the first mitt.
Anyway, here they are in all their non-matchy-matchiness.
The yarn is rather scratchy, but that does not matter because I plan to wear these over my leather gloves for extra warmth when the temperatures once again dip into Cold-Depths-Of-Hell-range. With luck that may not happen again this winter, but I am oh-so-ready for it next year. My gloves are dark brown and my coat is brick red; I think these will look quite *fetching* with them. Yeah, I crack myself up.
Yarn: Plymouth Boku, 38g (~80 yds) Needles: Knit Picks Options US#5 circ, Magic Loop. Pattern: Fetching from Knitty.com. Mods: I cast on 35 st instead of 45 and used a slightly smaller needle.
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The kittehs have been staying close to my office window.
The birds have re-discovered the feeder that hangs on the deck railing in front of the window, and the felines have re-discovered the birds. Kittehs are looking mighty lazy here, but they are very, very alert when there are birds on the feeder. Hannibal can only stand it for a certain length of time; then he has to attack, forgetting every damned time that he cannot pounce through the window. Although he tries. And every time he tries, a pile of carefully sorted papers flies off the desk -- arrrggghhhh!
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We had unseasonably warm weather earlier last week. Lots of melting occurred.
That's the platform in front of the garage. The first day after the melt, I attempted to walk from the front door (off to the left, out of the photo) to my yellow car. I made it around the blue car at the left of the photo. Then I had to cross four feet of slightly sloping driveway with nothing to hold on to.
I could not do it.
Every time I took a step, I would slide downhill. I tried several times, same result. Even when I stood perfectly still I slid downhill. So I gave up and walked -- very, very carefully -- back into the house. If I couldn't walk to the car, there was no way I could drive up the hill.
Sometimes Hannibal *helps* when I want to photograph my knitting in the light box.
Sometimes the kitteh is IN.
Sometimes the kitteh is OUT.
Whenever I see this
outside the window, I see this inside.
Then the kitteh must go OUT again.
But not for long.
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In honor of Valentine's Day, I give you these:
Yarn: Knit Picks Swish Worsted, redredRED. Red Pepper, actually. Pattern: Fetching (duh). Mods: I cast on 35 st instead of 45 and used a smaller needle; apparently both the intended recipient and I have smaller hands than the designer. Needles: Knit Picks Options, US#5 circ, Magic Loop.
Made for my neighbor, who said she had been looking for fingerless mitts in stores without luck. I told her that was because no one makes them for sale and offered to make her a pair. They are so quick to make -- what an easy way to be a hero and make a friend happy!
* * * * * I finished Maggie's pink Lamb's Pride fingerless mitts but forgot to take a picture. Picture a pair of Fetchings knit from fuzzy Lamb's Pride worsted the color of raspberry sherbet. That's what the photo would be. She seems very pleased with them.
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When your cats decide that this bit of exposed Styrofoam insulation makes a dandy scratching post:
I finished Maggie's Christmas present today. If I hadn't had to tink and frog so damned much they would have been done by Christmas. Too many screwups lead to diminished enthusiasm for a project. But they turned out pretty darned good, considering.
(I flipped that last photo, taken upside down with my left hand just like the one above it, 180 degrees, but apparently Typepad only caught 90 degrees of the flip.)
Yarn: Chugiak hand dyed sock yarn from Pagewood Farm; color New Horizon. Needles: Cuff and lower hand, Addi US#1 circ; the rest Addi US#0 circ. Magic loop. Pattern: Eric's Glovettes from Green Mountain Spinnery. Mods: Worked over 52 st to account for different gauge.
During the disgustingly cold weather we had last week I started wearing my own worsted weight fingerless gloves over my outdoor leather gloves for extra warmth. They really helped; so much so , in fact, that I have decided to rededicate my blue & black alpaca fingerless gloves -- too itchy to wear over bare skin -- to being worn over gloves.
To make up for Maggie's Christmas present being three weeks late, I am making her a quick pair of Fetchings in her favorite color to wear the same way. She has to walk about half a mile to and from the bus every morning and afternoon; wearing these over her gloves will help keep her dainty paws warm.
This Lamb's Pride that has been marinating in the stash for a couple years is surprisingly nice stuff -- fuzzy and warm and fairly soft for being wool. It's little too scratchy and too warm for me to wear in a sweater, but nice stuff anyway. If I ever decide to make another afghan, Lamb's Pride may be the yarn of choice.
