I'm giving Blaine the finger for his b-day

More like eight of them and two thumbs lol. I am making Beer Gloves for Blaine's b-day. It's my first try at "real" fingers even if they are just half fingers lol. I like the pattern overall except for the many many errors but that's just the way it is with SnB patterns. I have most of the first glove done and they go pretty quick. I am having a big problem with getting a jog at my joins because I am purling in the round. I am hoping that when Blaine wears them that they will stretch out those jogs and they'll blend into the fabric. I can't tell on my hand because they're a little big on me. I also did not follow the pattern for the end of the thumb (no ribbing and regular bind off); after doing the first finger as the pattern calls for, I will be going back to re-do that thumb the right way. I'll be posting all of my errata here once I am done but here's my progress so far (you can see one of the jogs off to the right of the cable).

Obsessed with a hat that I don't like...

There are some patterns that make me really happy that I have other people to knit for. Reverie is one of those. B made one and I looked at the pattern and thought "Totally not for me." Then I thought that would make a very cute hat for Emily. So, I knit one up and I loved the pattern; it was uncomplicated but fun and fast. I have now knit two and I am halfway through my third....

Not knitting related but...

...this is the easiest place to post this. I got laid off yesterday. Ok, so technically they are calling it "termination" but that's a load of bullshit. They got rid of 95 people and they really reached to find reasons to fire people as opposed to laying them off. That's not what this is about. This is about....


That would be the wooden power pole that fell in our front yard this morning. I turned around and looked out the window just as it started to fall. It sparked and made a lot of noise and crashed to the ground, just feet away from Katie's car. Blaine and Katie had been woken up by the cables hitting the roof across the bedrooms. I told them what happened and I called 911. They had the fire department out there and they roped off the street and wouldn't let us come outside, which was fine considering that we had downed power cables right in front of the front door.


Since Katie couldn't move her car and Blaine's car was at her place, I took the both over there to get it. Good thing I park out back! Since all of our power was out, I spent the morning at B's and they got everything back up and working around 2 this afternoon. There doesn't seem to be any permanent damage; the lawn might end up a little dead from the oil in the transformer. Katie's car had been hit by the cables when they snapped and it damaged the roof rack but Avista is paying for it. It could have been a lot worse.

Slip Stitch Ribbed Wristwarmers

Yarn: Noro Silk Garden (less than one skein)
Needles: 6US

Slip Stitch Rib
Rows 1 &2: K1, Sl1, K1, P1
Row 3: K3, P1

CO 40 Stitches
K3, P1 for 3 rows
Work Slip Stitch Rib pattern for 27 rows (9 repeats of the 3 row pattern)

Thumb
Row 1: K1, Sl1, K1, P1; BO 7 st; cont. row as set in pattern
Row 2: K1, Sl1, K1, P1; CO 7 st; cont. row as set in pattern
Row 3: K3, P1* repeat to end of row

Work Slip Stitch Rib pattern for 12 rows (4 repeats of the 3 row pattern)
Work two rows of K3, P1 rib
BO loosley
Weave in ends

Not yay for lace

Um...so wow it's been a while since I dropped in here. I guess it doesn't matter since the only two people that read it don't even really need to, lol!!

So let's see...Foliage was and still is a total disaster. I tried three needle sizes (getting smaller each time) and the fucking hat was WAY WAY WAY too big on every attempt. Granted, I have a stupidly small head for an adult, but this thing was gigantor. It wouldn't even fit Logan. :p I gave up on it. I love the hat, the pattern itself was easy and I could probably do it in my sleep at this point, but it was getting ridiculous. I am not knitting a hat that was written for size eights on size fours because then it's just going to look totally jacked up. Yes, I know...take out a lace repeat, duh!!! Well, my little anti-lave brain says, "if it's that much trouble, fuck it". And there we stand on Foliage.

Since that time, I completed my purple Edgar, my re-worked pink SWS hat, a pair of wrist warmers from the Noro Cash Iroha that Logan got me for my birthday and a black Bukkit hat. That was all in a month, too! I was on a roll.

Since then, I have knit on one thing: a Lady Eleanor stole. Mom came to visit for Frouth of July and when she saw Brandi's, she had to have one. It was decided that this would be her birthday present. Now, let's all stop and chuckle at the thought of me being able to actually afford the yarn for a Lady E.....everyone done, up off of the floor, tears wiped away? Good. Now that we have come back to my reality of a gas bill that eats up nearly half of my monthly income, I will admit that Mom did buy her own yarn. I know, you must be thinking...wow some birthday present that your mom had to pay for herself! True, not my proudest moment, but anyone that has knit one of these will recognize that the time and dedication that it takes to make one of these monsters if most definitely a gift in and of itself. And it's one hell of a gift, trust me. Right after mom left, I whipped out a quick bukkit hat for her in a gorgeous shade of green and sent that off to keep her somewhat satiated until October (her birthday). On July 27th I cast on the infamous entrelac stole. I finished knitting it today. I still have a lot of work to do on it...blocking, fringe and weaving in. Sometimes I stop and think that this project took up so much of my knitting time, but to be honest, I never knit much during the summer. It's just too hot and I am rarely inspired. Considering the weight and warmth of this thing, I am surprised that it is done already. There were a few weeks that it had to go away; just looking at it made me sweat. Now it is done and I am very very proud of it. It is beautiful and I cannot wait to see it totally done. I think Mom will look beautiful and elegant in it.

Now...I have another Eleanor to knit. Insanity, I know. It will only be half of a real Eleanor and I have until Christmas to finish it. It will my godmother's Christmas gift from both my mom and I (yes, she bought the yarn, I am doing the grunt work). We decided on a similar, but more muted color palette in Kureyon for this one and I've decided to work it on larger needles. I think it make it lighter and I can get more out of my limited yarn (the yarn store was short one ball from the number that I really wanted).

On top of all of this...I have to start figuring out my Christmas knitting. I successfully worked B into a panic about this tonight as well. I'm a good friend like that. I can't be alone in my frantic race to the Christmas finish line!! I was just being encouraging and helpful...yeah...that's it.

Happy knitting!

yay for lace?

Anyone who knows me, in a knitterly way, knows that I am not a fan of knitting lace. The amount of frustration is way too disporportional to the amount of satisfaction that I get from it. Actually, I've never gotten any satisfaction from it. It just makes me mad. I love seeing other people knit lace because it is gorgeous and I do envy a few things that I'll never make for myself, but in the end it's just not worth it for me.

 

Last night I decided to cast on Foliage from knitty. I've had it in my Ravelry queue for a while but haven't been motivated to do anything about it because it's lace. Granted, it is lace with a worsted weight yarn which redeems it a little bit, but not enough to make me really eager to try it out. I've even had the yarn since before I found the pattern!! I don't know what got into me last night, but I decided that it was time. On tv night, no less (and let's not forget that it's a TOP DOWN lace hat). A recipe for disaster and needles being hurled across the room, once would think. In fact, I saw just that thought flash across B's face when I divulged my less-than-intelligent plan.

 

Still, I merrily wound my yarn and packed it into my WIP basket with my needles and dropped it off in front of the couch, waiting for 8pm to roll around. We settled in to watch our shows and I cast on. Five rows in and I've fucked it up already. No surprise there. Froggity froggity. Completely distracted by tranny bitches and sad losses on ANTM, I hot back to it. By the end of ANTM, I had half of the crown done and only had to tink back twice!! I looked down at my hands and thought "where the hell did this come from?". So I kept going. By the end of the night, I had the crown done and the first lace pattern repeat done. Not once did I have the urge to catapault the project from my sight or even get frustrated.

 

So....kinda yay for lace. I love the pattern and the hat is just so damn cute. I think I just might be ok with it. But don't start thinking that I'm going to be eyeing any other lace for a very long time.

In desperate need of focus!

I am in such a scatterbrained mood with my knitting. I busted out that bucket hat, which was good because I've been very ADD since I finished my Clap. I'm still working on my Edgar but summer makes it so hard to stay focused on winter projects. The problem is that there isn't much warm weather stuff I want to knit. I really really need to get started on my Rogue so that I can wear that this winter. I need to actually swatch...the right way, lol. I have so much yarn that I don't know what I want to do with most of it yet and I can't afford any new yarn so my options seem to be limited but I think I'm just being lazy.

I need to clean out my WIP basket and get it back to it's original intent. I need to re-wind a couple of balls that are left over from recent FOS, measure and record them so I can figure out what I want to use them for. I should have enough of my Dream in Colors left over from my Bucket Hat to make matching wristwarmers. I promised Garrett I would make myself a pair of mittens so that my hands would stay warmer in the buggy.

I just need to focus and get myself organized so I'm more motivated to get started on new projects.