Hehee!

November 4, 2008 at 8:25 pm | In Crafts | Leave a Comment
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So I’m sitting here in my local coffee shop, knitting and checking the interwebs. This older lady had come in behind me and was waiting for her coffee to be made. She snuck up behind me and was watching me knit for a little bit, very impressed. I showed her the pictures of the finished part of the Gathering of Cypress sweater and she told me I ought to bring it to the Art department of the local college, where she worked. She said she’d love for the other students to see my work.

Excuse me whilst I strut about the room for a bit. Heeee.

This is so stupid.

October 28, 2008 at 11:23 pm | In Crafts | 1 Comment
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Saturday night, I bit my tongue. Literally, and really, really hard. Since then, I haven’t been able to eat or talk much. This is a problem because, as you know, food is good. Also because I tutor for a living so I need to be able to explain complex math equations to people, often several times. Unfortunately, both talking and eating (and sleeping) are very, very painful right now.

Thanks to this whole “not eating” issue, I’ve been very lazy, listless, lackluster, and several other L words over the past few days. Very little knitting has gotten done, less work (I took off all of Monday, the shame!), and lots and lots of laying around whining about how life sucks.

I did happen to get a tiny bit of knitting done. I cast on for the Luscious Lace Scarf and knit probably ten rows or so; just enough for the pattern to show up. I’m using the Karabella Lace Merino I received from stitchnstash. This reminds me, I need to post about all the pretty laceweight I got from her. Later!

The pattern isn’t complicated, and I’ve already got the first half of it memorized. I really like how it looks in some of the project photos I’ve seen, if not the “official” photo which really doesn’t show off the lace. The Karabella is this gorgeous blue that I’m in love with (I’m a bit of a fan of blue, if you can’t tell), and like my other favorite merino yarn (Bollicine Dolly), it’s very squishy and stretchy.

I probably shouldn’t have cast on anything new, as I’ve got at least five projects waiting for my attention at home, but I just couldn’t face the thought of those heavy cables, fiddly socks, or frustrating hat brim when I was already so tired. I wanted something light and easy and not complex at all. I promise that as soon as I can eat again, I’ll finish the blasted hat and catch up on Mom’s sweater. I’m so close to decreasing for the armholes that it’s ridiculous that I haven’t done it yet.

In the meantime, my mouth hurts and I’m going to whine about it. And possibly think about going home early.

We’ll Miss You

October 22, 2008 at 1:55 pm | In Uncategorized | 2 Comments
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Last night, we lost one of our herd of felines. Beebee, one of the two boys (of five kittens altogether) died last night. We’re not sure what happened, but suspect a vehicle was involved. Luckily all of my other babies are fine.

Beebee was born May 19, 2008 while I was at work. My mom helped deliver the kittens and texted me to let me know all five were happy and healthy, as was Mama Cat. He was one of the two tiger-striped cats.

Beebee was the last kitten to open his eyes. For a while, we were concerned that something had gone wrong with him, that his eyes were messed up, or maybe he was having trouble developing properly. One day I gave all the kittens a bath to help get rid of some of the fleas. Not a single kitten enjoyed this experience, but Beebee squalled the loudest. He cried so hard, his eyes came open a little bit. They opened normally after that, and he turned out fine.

He got his name from the fact that his eyes hadn’t opened—B. B. stood for Blind Bat. Later, when they got bigger and he proved himself to be a bit of a bully, it stood alternately for Billy Badass or Big Bully.

He was one of the sweetest cats I’d ever known. He’d let you rub his belly for hours if you wanted. He’d crawl into your lap and fall asleep, purring. He liked to curl up with me if I was taking a nap, or lean over my shoulder and watch me knit. He was the admitted favorite of the family, especially my dad.

He looked a little silly, as baby animals do, but as he got bigger he grew into a beautiful little cat. He’d had really big paws, so we expected he’d grow into a much larger cat than the others. He wasn’t without faults, though. He was the only one who still had trouble with the concept of “the bathroom is outside”, and more than once I’d wake up in the middle of the night to clean up a present he’d left for me.

He answered to Beebee, baby boy, the beebinator, the beebster, little beebs, and fuzzball. When he felt like it.

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I love you, little fuzzy.

I <3 the 80s.

October 16, 2008 at 4:01 am | In Crafts | 1 Comment
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Say what you will, the eighties gave us some amazing music.

Folks, I have an announcement! I will be shipping out to basic training on February twenty-fifth! In the meantime, I will be doing my best to exercise as much as possible, knit as much of my stash as I can, and live it up before they send me off.

Right now I’ve got I think four or five projects on my needles. My mom’s Gathering of Cypress sweater (Gathering Intentions, from Inspired Cable Knits [errata]); my own First Sweater (Tubey, from Knitty.com); the Blankie (basic log cabin blanket in eye-searing colors); a pair of socks with an original design I’m trying; and Brian’s hat that I must re-knit so it actually fits him.

Let’s talk about the Gathering of Cypress sweater for a minute. I LOVE this pattern. Love it. The cable pattern is easy to memorize, interesting without being tiresome, and it looks SO GOOD knit up. There’s only one issue I’ve noticed with the way the pattern is written. There are two setup rows you’re supposed to do before starting the cable pattern itself; the instructions for it are included in the section on the back portion of the sweater, but not anywhere else. If you’re not paying attention, your cables might be two rows off between the front and the back.

I first heard about the pattern from the Knit Picks catalogue. That catalogue is probably my favorite thing to receive in the mail besides packages and money. In it, they show Gathering Intentions knit up in Knit Picks Comfy in ivory; it looked gorgeous and I fell in love with it. I knew my mom would love to wear it—she’s big in to the big, cozy sweaters.

Of course, in the course of falling in love with the sweater as it appeared in the magazine, I didn’t bother to read any reviews of the book, check for errata, note the fiber content of the yarn, or do any of the other things people should do before shelling out for a hardcover book and a sweater’s worth of yarn. Oops!

I lucked out though and the book and yarn are both great. I’ll write up a more comprehensive review of it later, but thus far I haven’t found any errors in the patterns I’ve looked at. The yarn turned out to be seventy-five percent Pima cotton, twenty-five percent acrylic, and so soft! It almost feels like it should fall apart in your hands or turn to dust because it’s so smooth and soft. I really do love Knit Picks yarn and I feel a little guilty when I buy it because it’s just so inexpensive! Mmmm.

The color is a pretty dark green that my mom picked out, and I really like it. My only issue with it is that it comes up a dark grey (or lighter grey, depending) in my photos, unless I take the time to take pictures while the sun is out and make sure they come out nice, so really the only issue is that I suck at taking good pictures.

Okay, this has gotten long enough. I’m thrilled with this pattern thus far, and have knit about ten inches of the back panel. More on the book and the other patterns in it later!

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