Ah Crap

I somehow managed to totally miscalculate my yarn order for Shalom. How did I not notice that each skein only has 82 yards? Why did I not check other Shalom projects and see how much yardage the ones modified to use worsted weight actually consumed until after my eensy weensy box of yarn arrived??

The only excuse that I could think of is that I took the calculations from one of the other types of yarn I was debating and just applied that same number to this yarn without double checking. That's a little lame, even for me.

Here's hoping that Knit Picks still has plenty of the same dye lot in stock!

Mary, to answer your question, yes my guess is that knitting limbo is where you have to do one of the following tasks and nothing else:

1. sew seams and weave in ends
2. calculate and re-calculate gauge without ever getting it right
3. be surrounded by gorgeous yarns but have no needles to work with (nor any way to construct makeshift needles)
4. Pick up dropped stitches 100 rows back on a project that is either extensively cabled, fair isle, or double knit.
5. Work on a complicated lace using a dark colored fingering weight yarn (which constantly splits) in very low light without a row counter, life lines, or stitch markers.
6. order yarn for a project and then finding out that it won't be near enough and you'll have to wait another 2 weeks for the shipment.

I'd rather be in Knitting Limbo

my friend just sent me this link and I thought it was cute:

I'd rather be in knitting Limbo

Seat me next to the quiet starer, please

I stumbled across this neat website, plinky.com, which is dedicated to the amelioration of bloggers block. They provide you with various prompts to get the creative juices flowing. Curious as always, I decided to check it out. This prompt caught my eye:

Who would you rather be seated next to on a daylong bus trip: a talkative person with a really irritating voice, or a quiet person who keeps staring at you?

So here's my response:

As a knitter, I usually spend long trips knitting away at my most recent project. This naturally draws stares from curious passengers. I'd much prefer having a quiet person continually staring at me then the talkative person who would ask me a million dumb questions about my knitting starting with "are you expecting a baby?" and moving on to my all time favorite, "I've always wanted to learn but just don't have the time to knit." Puh-leaze! I hold two jobs, don't talk to me about not having the time - I manage to fit knitting in my schedule any way I can, one of which being bringing my project with me on a daytrip.

As my husband can attest to, when working on an intricate project the worst thing to do is to distract a knitter. I imagine that if I'm riding the bus alone I would absolutely take one of my most complicated projects because I know that I won't be distracted by others. It's no wonder that "Not now, I'm counting" is an oft heard knitter's mantra. If I had to sit by that annoying talkative person I would go batty with irritation and it would be all I could do to hold my tongue.

The thing I've learned about those quiet starers is that sometimes they will have the best and most original knitting questions. Face it, they've been watching, and calculating all the while so when they do finally speak up it's usually worth listening to. I would take that kind of stranger over the other any day!

So now, how would you answer that question? What would your rational be?

Work is Sabotaging my Knitting

Yup. It's a sad fact.

I swear in the last week I've only knit about an inch of my sweater. Yeah, I'm still working on the same front flap that I've been working on all month. And that unnamed tam I was so diligently working to finish up? Today was the first time I was able to even touch it, much less sit down and fix the errors I'd made.

The conundrum is that I need to work to buy yarn, but then I don't have time to play with said yarn. Instead, I spend my spare time at work flipping through ravelry (in case any co-workers happen to read this, I swear I'm still productively multi-tasking and fielding calls simultaneously!!) finding all sorts of yarns and projects that I still don't have time to start. If only I was independently wealthy and didn't have to work to support my habit...

The good news? I actually got 2 hours tonight where I had nothing pressing to do and could just knit ('cause honestly, how pressing are bills, really??). I'm really looking forward to spring break, where I'll only be working my day job and will be able to spend my evenings working on my own unnamed Tam, Twist & Shout, and Shalom.

I'm still waiting for my yarn from Knit picks to come in - hope it makes it here soon! In the meantime, I'll leave you with this delicious hank by Blue Heron Yarns, a rayon/metallic blend in Spanish Dancer, which I purchased last summer during a meet up in Santa Barbara with some of my Knit Knack girls. I'm dying to make this into a shawl but I have yet to find or design the perfect pattern for it. Can't you just imagine how elegant those dark colors and gold sparkles would be draped around your shoulder while all dolled up?!

Shout out!

I was given a shout out at Canary Knits for Indie Designer Day. Thank you Canary Sanctuary! If you get a chance, check out some of her original designs Here. I'm a big fan of this sweater, Alatus:

April KAL

In April, along with the Knit Knack girls, I'll be doing a KAL for this lovely Sweater: Shalom by Meghan McFarlane I'm leaning toward using Knit Picks Shamrock yarn, even though it's a heavy worsted rather than a bulky yarn. Since the person that I'll be making this for is on the smaller size, I'm hoping it will work out in my favor. Here's the color, Connolly, that I'll be using:


I wasn't initially drawn to this colorway, but as I browsed projects on Ravelry I discovered that I really like the way the colors fall.

I've also been asked by a coworker to design a beanie for him, so as soon as I can wrangle him down to pick out his colors I'll be able to place my knit picks order. I'm actually looking forward to working on this hat for him!

Certification!!!

This is totally not knitting related, but a huge accomplishment nonetheless:

I passed the Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf National Interpreter Certification Test which means I am now officially certified!

I'm on cloud nine!

New Knitty is up!

The new issue of Knitty is up! I can't help but wonder if I'm on the same brainwaves as some of these designers. I've been working on and off on a pair of mitts that resemble Sourwood so when I saw the small image for Reverie I freaked out momentarily. After viewing the full picture I've decided that it's different enough from the tam that I've been working so diligently on. This designing stuff is a lot harder than I had anticipated!

And Perhaps Not...

Per Mary's request, I finally sewed the buttons onto my Bulky Cable Sweater and took some shots. Well actually I had to drag my hubby away from his ukulele in order to snap the photos. See how happy he was?


Guy insisted that I had to show off some of the cables on the arms, so we ended up with quite a few hammy poses such as these:




After finishing up this sweater, I have to admit that I'm a little disappointed. It's a little big, which is normally okay, but the neckline nearly falls off my shoulders. I'm thinking that I may want to pick up some stitches for a yolk of sorts. Have any suggestions how best to do this?

The buttons that I picked out worked perfectly, although I think I may want to reposition them. Only time will tell if I actually put forth that effort. I'll probably end up giving this sweater away, since all I can see in it are the flaws.



In Knit Knack news..
I mailed out the last of my blanket squares today, so those of you who were (not so) patiently waiting for my squares now have your very own. Of course, in my (not so) hastiness to ship them off I totally forgot to snap a photo. If any of you feel up to sending me a photo of the square I made I'd really appreciate it for my ravelry page!

And lastly the design-in-project...
I was making some serious headway on this draft of the tam, then I noticed that it was getting a lot bigger than the first draft. I hadn't realizedthat I was nearly finished with one too many repeats of the pattern! Then I frog backed to the end of the previous repeat and somehow really screwed the pooch.

Yup, I managed to mess up my own pattern. It takes an extra special knitter to do that! So test knitters, don't hold your breath, since I've clearly got some kinks to work out.

Conversations with my Sweater

Thanks to an unexpected afternoon off of work I finally had the time to washing and blocking my first sweater. It went something like this:

Me: alright you, in the wash you go
Sweater: hey, not so hot! I'm part wool, remember??!
Me: Oh shit! sorry about that.
Sweater: Ahhhh... cool water. That's much better.
Me: Ok, we'll just soak you for a few minutes there and I'll be right back.

30 minutes later

Sweater: Hey... hey... HEY! The water's freezing! Get me out of here!
Me: sorry... I got distracted
Sweater: It's a good thing you don't have any kids
Me: Geeze you're heavy when you're wet
Sweater: What's that supposed to mean??
Me: nothing, just, that you're well, not exactly a lightweight.
Sweater: Are you calling me fat?

after the first attempt at pinning

Me: Why is one sleeve longer than the other when I knit the exact same number of stitches?
Sweater: I don't know what you're talking about...
Me: Don't make me bust out the measuring tape
Sweater: You shouldn't have called me fat
Me: sigh Here we go again...




And for all you knit knackers, yes, those are your blanket squares still drying above the sweater.