The Friday Harbor Disaster

Doesn't that sound like a shipwreck? Or a submarine explosion or something? Nope - it's just what I'm calling my poor Friday Harbor sock. I finished the first one on Friday (the irony of that just now struck me).


Ugh, I really need to call the carpet cleaners!

It looks pretty enough, but I'm unhappy with the top band (which is tourniquet-like around my calf, even after I used the extra-stretchy Norweigian sock cast-on) and the toe (which is freakishly long and pointy - 2-1/2" instead of a more normal 1-1/2"). They're lovely socks, but I'm not going to wear them when I can't pull them up all the way and I'm bothered every time I look at the toe. Back to the frog pond for this one! I think I will try this sock again, but with a few major modifications and not until after the holidays.

Speaking of the holidays, we are going to be going to Minnesota in January. Yes, that's an incredibly stupid time of year to visit our home state, but for some reason my aunt (who lives in DC) likes to get the family together for a little late Christmas bash. Whenever I see my mom, I realize how much I miss her and I'm helpless to do anything to defend myself against suggestions that we should come visit her. It's a good excuse to dust off the puffy North Face down jacket (think George Costanza in the liquor store) that hasn't gotten much use the past few years. Despite the freezing cold weather, we always have a good time and it's nice to see everything covered in snow. We see snow in Portland, but it's covering the sides of the huge volcanoes on the edge of town, not the sidewalk out front.

Owen has an ear infection, so my mother-in-law took Sydney to her music class this afternoon. He has been snoozing for three hours straight - hope that combined with the amoxycillin knocks that puppy out! I had horrible ear infections when I was a kid but Sydney doesn't really get them. Looks like poor Owen isn't going to be as lucky as his sister.

Results of the stash-guessing contest will be published tomorrow. We don't have any guesses that are spot-on yet, but we do have a couple that are pretty close! I was a little frightened by the number. Time to do some stashbusting! After all, I did join the knit-along (and haven't done a single project yet - bad girl!).

After-Thanksgiving Sales & a little contest!

Yesterday, I talked my mom into going on a yarn crawl with me. She doesn't knit, but she loves my knitting and I told her she could pick out some sock yarn. We were going to start at Mabel's and work our way westward, but I decided to drive by Close Knit first to see if they were open so I could get my second hank of pink variegated Cascade to finish up the felted clogs. Doing that put us on a different route, so we headed downtown first.

My mom is a library director and loves all things booky, so we made our first stop at Powell's, Portland's gigantic independent bookstore. It's possible to spend hour upon hour in there (it takes up an entire city block and is several floors high), but I made a beeline for the knitting books (what else?) and picked up these:


Mom doesn't need to buy books since she gets them for free (the advantage of being in charge of buying books for the library is you get to make the decisions), so we wandered a bit and then set off for Knit/Purl which is just a few blocks away.

I'd never been to this shop before, and I really loved it. It's nice and light with well-arranged yarns and nice big windows. They had a basement filled with yarn that was all on sale for 40% off. Yup - 40% off! Yahoo! When I first went downstairs, all I saw was novelty yarn so I was thinking it would be a bust. But...here are a few little treasures I managed to dig up and take home:

This is Douceur et Soie in Rose Plum and a ball of Trendsetter Aura that goes perfectly with it. I see these becoming scarves of some sort, with the Aura as a carry-along.


Misti Alpaca Chunky. I don't know what this will become, but it was so soft and pretty that I couldn't put it down once I picked it up.



Yes, that's a boat-load of Misti Alpaca Worsted (in pink and tan) with one lonely ball of Misti Alpaca Lace (periwinkle) in the middle. I love this yarn so much! I'm wishing I would've bought more.



After gorging myself on sale yarn, I went upstairs to do some more damage.

A nice pile of Cascade 220 Superwash for my Knit Net sweater, which I cast on for this morning...




And of course sock yarn. The two skeins of Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock are in the Pin Stripe colorway and are for my mom. I also picked up a hank of Socks That Rock from Blue Moon Fiber Arts in the Olivenite colorway for myself. And some size 0 Addis. Yahoo!

As if that wasn't enough, we then headed back to Close Knit which had opened since our first drive-by. I got the felted clog yarn I was missing along with some more for a pair for me (yes, I am obsessed with purple). And a couple hanks of Artyarns Supermerino that were so pretty I just couldn't leave them behind.

Contest! Contest!
I'm going to count up my stash and see how many balls I have. Any guesses? There might be something in it for you if you get it right! I'm going to cheat a little bit and only count virgin hanks... Post your guess in the comments and I'll announce the winner on Dec. 1st.

Too legit to quit

I'm legit, baby! I got my letter of acceptance into PKDG as an associate member. Yay! I immediately asked for a mentor, and the chair of PKDG, Diane Zangl (who is a knitting goddess to the nth degree), who also happens to be the membership coordinator and the person I asked about getting a mentor, volunteered to mentor me herself. (Okay, I just read that sentence back to myself - I definitely need to take remedial english.) Yay!

Things were going eerily well for me, and I knew that it couldn't last. I was knitting along today on my Friday Harbor sock and thought "Hmm, that looks rather small". I've become really lazy about making gauge swatches for socks, because they're pretty much all the same weight yarn on the same size needles w/ the same number of stitches. These had fewer stitches but were on size 2 needles and with slightly thicker yarn, so I thought I was fine. Hah! I decided to check my gauge on the all-stockinette sole, just for kicks, and was shocked and dismayed to discover that I was knitting 8 sts/inch where I was supposed to be knitting 6. Whoopsie! No wonder the socks were looking like they'd fit Sydney. So...ribbit, ribbit! The Friday Harbor sock is no more. They were nice and fast, though, so I'm not that depressed about it. You thought second sock syndrome was bad - how 'bout third?

I'm not going to blog tomorrow morning - instead I'm going to try to catch up with all of the reading and commenting I need to do! It's not nice when I go into Bloglines and have 250 new posts to read... My mom is coming to see us tomorrow night and is staying through Tuesday - yay! She hasn't seen the grandkids since August, so she's due for a visit. Bill & I can't wait to have a baby entertainer in the house! Maybe we'll sneak away and see the new Harry Potter movie - I keep hearing rave reviews. Although I really want to see North Country since it's filmed in Northern Minnesota near where I grew up. And of course Wallace & Grommit for the knitting. We'll probably end up parked on the couch in front of bad TV movies. Which reminds me - it's time to watch Home For The Holidays! One of my all-time favorite movies and a Thanksgiving tradition in the Knittin' Mom household. We also have a tradition of watching Creepshow on Christmas Eve (this is something my husband's family has done for decades), but that's a whole 'nother story...

Look, ma! Knitting!

I have some very nice knitting pics to show you, but first, I have to share my good news. No, I'm not pregnant (not that you were thinking that, but isn't that what everyone always says before they make that announcement?). I had an e-mail waiting for me this morning from Valerie at Knit Net - they want my sweater design for their February issue! Yahoo! I am so excited. And they responded really fast (I think I sent that submission in last week sometime). That's the nice thing about the online publishers (apart from Knitty, anyway) - it doesn't take them MONTHS to get back to you. In other design news, I have a bunch of swatches photographed and sketches made for my No Sheep For You subs. I have so many ideas clunking around in my brain right now (thank you, Barbara Walker), it's hard to keep up. I was thinking yesterday that if all of my designs get accepted (or even a couple), I'm going to be in trouble... I'm going to be knitting 24/7 to get them all done by their deadlines. That would be a problem I wouldn't mind having (although Bill might)!

Okay, on to the knitting. First up, a pair of braided cable wrist-warmers.


They're knit in Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Chunky from this pattern over on litlnemo's blog. They were very easy and knit up fast with the nice chunky yarn. Now I'm going to try to come up with a matching hat. It has gotten durn chilly around here!


You wouldn't think it would be so hard to get a decent picture of your own arm! I was thinking of giving these away as a Christmas present, but I've decided that I'm done knitting Christmas gifts. I'm rebelling. I have my mother-in-law's gift done, and she's the one who will appreciate a hand-knit gift the most anyway, since she's a quilter and knows the work that goes into these things.

That said, I am still making up the felted clogs. In fact, I'd think this would be a gift anyone would love. If I'm not totally sick of them after I make the first two pairs, I'll knit up some more. The first one went pretty fast, despite the fact that I was waaaay off the first time around and had to completely frog all of the pink. I also realized that I got the yardage backwards. To make the 2-colored clogs, you need 2/3 in one color and 1/3 in the other. I got 2/3 of the plain pink and 1/3 of the variegated yarn. Well, after one clog, I have tons of pink left and none of the variegated. Back to the yarn store for more - bummer!


They look so funny unfelted. This one is even too big for my hubby's ginormous feet. I'll probably make him a pair at some point - it will be hilarious to see how big THOSE are pre-felting. They'll look like a papoose!

Finally, I managed to sneak my two socks on two circs out of the bedroom for a quick pic.


Making two pairs of one sock on two circs really helped me get this down. The Addis also make a huge difference. These are 20" long, too, instead of 24" and I now realize that that extra 4" was REALLY getting in the way. It's almost impossible for me to knit onto the wrong needle with this length because they're too darn short - the needle just doesn't want to bend that way! So, I am quite happy with my little project here. The lace pattern is quite nice as well. I've managed to muddle my way through two repeats.


It's annoying that the progress is much slower (well, duh, you're doing twice as much work, dummy!), but I'm excited about the fact that when I graft up that first toe, I'll just have a second toe to graft instead of a whole 'nother sock to knit!

The perfect day...

Yesterday was just about as close to perfect as it gets. It started out with a large decaf soy mocha from the lovely new coffee shop around the corner, delivered with a smile by my darling husband. Fueled by chocolate, I pinned out a bunch of swatches to block and sketched up some new design ideas. Despite my inability to draw, they actually turned out pretty good (at least by my standards)!

I checked my e-mail and saw that the new yarn store in my part of town (which was previously LYS-free) was FINALLY open, so I booked it over there. The shop is named Close Knit and it is lovely. Sally, the owner, has fantastic taste in yarn and it's stocked full of Rowan, Art Yarns, Lorna's Laces, Manos, Noro, Debbie Bliss...the list goes on and on! And it was packed with people who have been as anxious as I have for her to open. In fact, the first person I saw when I walked through the door was my friend Brittney. We had to laugh when we saw each other because we keep running into each other at yarn stores. She's as addicted as I am!

And since I want to support my local yarn-related business, I bought these lovely little hanks of Cascade 220 (the better to make felted clogs with, my dear).


As I was checking out, Sally came over to admire my scarf (the one that will be in the February Mag Knits). I blushed and told her it was my own design and my first to be published. She was delighted and asked if I'd thought about selling patterns through shops. I was too flustered to jump on that like I should've, but I'll be back in her store and will be better prepared to take her up on it next time!

After grabbing up my shopping bag full of yarn, I high-tailed it over to a little Cuban place called Pambiche to meet some mommy friends for lunch. The food was heavenly (I had a Cubano sandwich, which made Bill extremely jealous since it's one of his all-time favorites - pork, cheese and pickles all toasted together in french bread...yummy!), and I ended the meal with another mocha.

We then piled in my van and drove to Oregon Center Stage to see Pride & Prejudice. It was incredible! They did the entire play without any props but chairs and parasols. And the costumes! Mr. Darcy wore this buttery full-length trench coat (or are trench coats always belted? This was not belted and was very fitted on top with a flared bottom.) through much of the 2nd half which was just to-die-for. I haven't been to the theatre in ages and this was one of the best productions I've seen in a long time.

I arrived home to a big pile of mail. One was something I'd ordered:


(the new Knitty calendar and the "Breastfeeding In Public Is Not A Crime" sticker I've been coveting)

And one was not!


Erica RAK'd me! Thanks so much, doll - I love it all! Check out that yarn! It's Twinkletoes sock yarn in the Autumn colorway. Love it, love it, love it! I'm thinking I'll make the next sock we do in the On The Road knit-along with this (looks like it's going to be the Traveler's Stockings, which will be great with this yarn since they don't have too much crazy stitch detail). As if that wasn't enough, she threw in some yummy hand cream, aromatherapy crystals and a sticker (hmm, think she knows about my sticker obsession?). Erica, you rock! Thank you!!! And if you haven't visited her blog lately, she has been making this. How cute is that? I'm waiting impatiently for pictures of the FO.

After all this, I still had energy to work on the sock I started in the morning.


It's Friday Harbor from Knitting On The Road, knitted in Mountain Colors Bearfoot. They're worked on 50 stitches, so they're cruising! Somebody stop me - I can't help myself. I NEED to make socks. I also have the Yukon Leaves socks which are coming along nicely, but they're trapped upstairs with a sleeping baby so no pics of those for you.

Before too long, my knitting ADD kicked in and I wound up the Cascade 220 and started on my first felted clog.


They are going to be a fun knit, and so much faster than socks! Of course, now I'm totally paranoid that Sydney's teacher's aide won't like pink... I just can't win, can I?

Boyoboyoboyoboy!

I have been gettin' some love from the mailman. You all saw the package my SP6 sent to me the other day. Yesterday, I found this lovely little RAK waiting for me, sent by Lindsey (from the knittyboard) all the way from Germany.


Yummy, yummy, yummy chocolate! It is soooo good. I was savoring it last night as I was holding a screaming baby and watching Martha Stewart's Apprentice at 1:30 am (but that's a whole 'nother story...).

Then, today, on my way out the door to pick Sydney up from school, I found two more little packages waiting for me! I was already late, so as much as it killed me, I had to wait until I got home to tear into them.

The first was ANOTHER little sumpin' sumpin' from my lovely SP6.


The Fiber Trends felted clogs pattern! Yahoo! This solves my dilemma over the Conwys. I'm going to make Sydney's teacher & assistant clogs for Christmas! That way, there's no unanswered questions about why I asked for their foot sizes. Plus, who wouldn't want a pair of felted clogs? Since you just wear them around the house, there's no worry about fashion tastes. Plus it gives me an excuse to buy more yarn at Lint on Monday...I think I'm going to use Lamb's Pride for these babies since I was so happy with how it felted up for Spork.

As if that wasn't enough, I got a package of good stuff from my Knitty Holiday SP. Check out this swag!

Wrapped...


And unwrapped...


So, this little package o' goodies includes a cute little holiday bracelet, some body butter and peppermint foot cream (complete w/ pumice board) from the Body Shop, a book called "Tomorrow - Adventures In An Uncertain World" which is full of inspirational quotes acted out by really cute and amazing animal pictures, and three knitting-related items that each deserve their own sentences...

First, the 365 Knitting Stitches A Year perpetual calendar. Funny, I almost bought this for myself the other day! I love that it can be used over and over and over. Then, a little zippered bag that contained a wonderful circular needle that was hand-carved in Nepal. Too cool! I'm going to have to find something to knit up on a size 11 circ! And to top it all off, a ball of Knit Picks Ambrosia (which is baby alpaca and cashmere) in a lovely green color. Love it, love it, love it!

Thanks to all y'all who have been showering me with great gifts these past couple days! It is so much fun getting prezzies in the mail! It helps make up for the fact that the kids have been sick for over three weeks now and we've been trapped in the house. Owen got a fever last night (not sure from what) and didn't cry himself into exhausted sleep until 1:30 am. Poor little guy! Bill was kind enough to drive Sydney to school this morning even though Thursdays & Fridays are my days, which allowed Owen & I to sleep in until 10:30. That helped a little bit, but Owen's still cranky and feverish. I hate having sick kids!

I had another interesting "mommy experience" last night that made me think about the differences in my psyche now that I'm a mother. I was watching the Joy Luck Club, which I've seen a few times (and also read the book) but never since I had kids. If you've seen it, you might remember there's a horrible scene where Ying Ying drowns her baby son in order to punish her evil husband. I've seen this scene before, obviously, and it didn't really make much of an impact on me since I didn't remember it. But last night, it nearly made me throw up. I watched up to the point that she let go of him in the bath and the water covered his face - then I had to change the channel. I sobbed for about ten minutes while watching Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back (hoping that would take my mind off of it). It was just too horrifying.

It was interesting, too, that I felt so unsympathetic to a mother who would do that to her child. Most of you probably don't know that I suffered pretty severe post-partum depression after Sydney was born. I never felt the urge to hurt her, but I did entertain the thought of walking out the door and never coming back, at some points on a daily basis! I was convinced that I was such a horrible mother that Sydney & Bill would be better off without me around. That I was doing more harm than good by being there. Fortunately, Zoloft helped me get my life back in order before Owen was born (and here seems like a good place to insert a hearty "screw you" to Tom Cruise and his anti-antidepressant rants). Fortunately, I have to think really hard to remember what that kind of hopelessness and despair is like. My reaction to the movie last night made me realize how far I've come. Yay for Zoloft!

Finally, I want to apologize (again) for being lax in commenting lately. I am so #*&@#*$ busy these days that it's really hard. I do read you all in Bloglines, though! So don't feel too neglected! Bloglines is great, but I really wish you could comment right in there instead of having to click over to the blog. Oh, well - maybe someday!

Thanks, SP!!!

I got a little package in the mail yesterday from my SP6 - look what was in it!


Last-Minute Knitted Gifts, just in time for Christmas knitting (it has lots of good options in case I decide that I can't get two more pairs of socks, two pairs of gloves, a scarf and a sweater done before Christmas - and yes, that's THIS Christmas, not next Christmas). And the Yarn Harlot book - a critical part of every knitter's library. Can't wait to crack into it! Of course, that would require me to read instead of knitting...

I had my second sweater design class with Leigh last night. I was thinking of submitting my design from this class to IK, but I decided I'm just going to enjoy this class instead of trying to turn it into work. So, now I can show you my progress! How exciting! Here is a picture of the swatch I knitted up as my homework for last night.


Click on this picture to enlarge to make the stitch detail show up better. The yarn is Debbie Bliss Merino Bulky (which knits like a dream). I found the various cable patterns in my stitch books - the center panel is from my Reader's Digest Ultimate Sourcebook of Knit & Crochet Stitches (which I love because they show the stitch patterns in color, which unfortunately the Barbara Walker books do not). The wavy side cables are from Barbara Walker's first stitch book.

The first thing that Leigh pointed out after studying my swatch was that the cables and the ribbing have a very awkward join.


See how the knit stitches from the cable hit the purl stitches from the ribbing and the ribbing gets deformed right there? Not a big deal in a swatch for myself, but not something I'd want to submit with a proposal. And not something that would've occurred to me! (And no, I don't know what that mysterious spot on the carpet is - probably some sort of juice being squirted at high speed out of the straw of a juice box while I screamed "Don't squeeze it! Don't squeeze it!")

In this picture, you can see how the wavy cable is lined up with the ribbing and it makes it look nice and sleek and elongates the cable.


You'll also see that the little mock-cables running between the big cables don't match the ribbing either. Doh!

I started working a swatch last night that would line up the cables and the ribbing.


I started at a different point in the cable pattern so that the twist wouldn't be the first row on top of the ribbing - I give it two rows instead, which makes it so the knit stitches of the ribbing line up with the outside knit stitches of the cable and the purl stitches line up with the inside of the cable. You can't really see it yet, since I'm only on the first row of ribbing here, but I think it's going to look much better.

Next step - I'm going to chart out the pattern making sure that all of my cables and ribbing is lined up nicely. Whew!

I'll leave you with my bad parenting photo of the day.


This is Owen trying to launch himself off of his changing table while I sit innocently reading my e-mail with my back to him. Yes, I know, you're not supposed to leave them unstrapped and unattended on those things (but he's not really unattended - I'm almost within arm's reach!). But the worst thing he could do in this position is fall on a big pile of diapers. And he's having so much fun! Please don't call DCS on me...

And I just found this little stealth shot on my camera:


Could it be that I've been lax in bragging about the first place finish my dear hubby got this past weekend in the 5k he ran? Yay, honey! Good job! You're a winner, all right! Of course, now I have to steal his thunder by clarifying that it was first place in his age group, not in the whole race. And he was the only runner in his age group. But still! Great job, sweetheart! It would've been really sad if you'd lost...

A blast from the past...

Guess what I finished last night? What's the WIP that's been hanging out on my sidebar at 98% completion for ages? Yup, you guessed it - Spork! I finally managed to get my act together last night and sewed up all the straps on my MIL's heavy-duty German sewing machine. I broke a needle and busted the thread once (and I'm surprised it only broke once...), but I pushed on and Spork is now all strapped up and ready to go.



I was a little worried when it came out of the felting process all wonky, but sewing on the straps really helped straighten it out and made it look 100% better. It's pretty small and still crooked, but all in all I likes!

Knittin' Mom dot com

First of all, I have to say that I looooove weekends. I finally managed to click through all of my bloglines subscriptions. I can't say that I read every single post (and I certainly didn't comment as much as I'd like), but there aren't 150 new posts waiting for me to read like there were yesterday morning! I love all of the blogs I'm finding and I seem to add a couple new subscriptions a week, but it's hard to find time to read all those puppies! I have to send props out to Chris at Bits of Knits. She has two little kids, too, but it seems like everywhere I go to leave a comment, she's already been there. How do you do it, girl? Have you got Bossy & Stinky propped in front of MTV with a bag of Doritos all day or what? (Hee, hee - Chris is an earth mommy extraordinaire so she'll be extra horrified by that picture...).

In other exciting news, I bought the domain name knittinmom.com last week. It just sends anyone who clicks on it back over to this blog, but now when you're talking to your friends about that awesome Knittin' Mom blog, you can tell them to just go to "knittinmom.com" instead of "knittinmom dot blogspot dot com" (which they will remember for about two seconds if they're anything like my mother). I'd love to get all jiggy with it and code up my own blog, but I'd need about two replicants to do that (and yes, Acornbud, I've seen Multiplicity and agree that cloning may not be the best idea if it turns out like that (although it would still be tempting)...have you ever seen the Simpsons take-off on it, where Homer buys a magic hammock that allows him to clone himself? Now THAT is some funny television!). But I digress. Can you tell it's 7 am and I haven't had my coffee yet? (Yes, I know, I drink decaf but it still affects me mentally...)

Speaking of Acornbud, head on over to her blog and check out the beautiful Noro Silk Garden scarf she just finished. Niiiiice!!!

I got a big beautiful bag of NZ wool in the mail yesterday. Unfortunately my camera battery is charging so I can't show it to you. I spent most of the day yesterday swatching up a storm. Today I'm going to be doing a little swatch photo shoot and preparing a few submissions. I got all inspired by my new stitch pattern tome and came up with a sweater idea for the upcoming issue of Knit Net. I also swatched like crazy for my sweater class tomorrow night, and I'm thinking that I might submit the design to IK (if it's okay with Leigh). I'm also trying to finish up the swatches for my No Sheep For You submissions. I've got one complete and one about 1/4 done. I used to hate swatching, but now I'm really getting into it. I will admit, though, that there's a huge difference between swatching in stockinette to get gauge while you've got a pattern in your hand that you're dying to start and swatching with different stitch patterns, etc. while you've got a design idea in your head.

Also, for any of you interested in the design process, check out Amy's blog. She's one of the designers over at The Garter Belt and she's currently blogging about one of her designs from start to finish. It's very cool!

Time to get that coffee brewing!

More, more, more!

I got this in the mail yesterday:


It's a little pattern for a partially-felted wool soaker (cloth diaper cover, for you disposable types). The yarn is from Treliske Organic, a little outfit out of New Zealand, and is literally the softest merino wool I've ever felt. It's a good thing, since I ordered a bunch of their yarn directly from their website. You have to order a kilo to have it shipped to the US, but their prices are good (and with the exchange rate, they're VERY good) so I went for it. I think I ended up ordering two cones of their Bio-Natur organic at NZD$31/cone (about $21 US) and one cone of their merino at NZD$42/cone along with a few skeins of their babyweight merino which is a shocking NZD$1.60/skein on clearance! Gotta love it! I don't know what I'm going to make out of all of it, but I'm sure I can think of something.

I've also joined a new Knit-Along, one that I can really get behind! It's Alison's "Who Wouldn't Love A Hand Knitted Gift?" holiday gift knit-along. I'm afraid of being someone who keeps joining knit-alongs just to get the button for my sidebar, but this one will actually help me reach my goals rather than just adding randomly to my WIP pile! I've divvied up my knit-alongs into in-progress, not-started and completed. I really wanted to join Laura & Amanda's "Cover Your Head" hat-along and the Norwegian Knits-Along, but I couldn't do it in good conscience (at least not yet...). If any of y'all are looking to knit hats, or fair-isle, (or perhaps a fair-isle hat?) go check those knit-alongs out!

Who am I kidding?

I'm not on a yarn diet! I don't even know why I bother to say that I am. I have no self-control. I had another class at Mabel's last night and came home with this:


Yes, that's two more skeins of Shepherd Sock in the Aslan colorway. I loved it so much on the baby sock that I had to buy some for big socks (hmm, who's going to get those d'ya think?).

The class was Advanced Lace Sampler, and I made this:


It's 1-1/2 repeats of Picture Lace from one of the Barbara Walker books. It was fun, although the other knitters were both beginners, so there wasn't a whole lot for me to learn. It was nice to get away from the kiddos to knit, though, and it's always good to practice lace!

Speaking of Barbara Walker and her awesome books, this arrived yesterday from Amazon:


If you ever need some knitting inspiration, this is the place to get it. I spent a couple hours just paging through, thinking of the sweaters, scarves, socks, hats, etc. that could be made out of each stitch pattern. These books are darn expensive (about $30 each), but the rest are definitely going on my list.

I finally heard back from Creative Knitting about my design yesterday. It was bad news and good news. The bad news is they're not using it for the Sept. '06 issue. The good news is they really liked it and want to try to fit it into Nov. '06. Yay! I think that they get a lot of designs from the yarn companies, so the designs that little designers like me send in go to the bottom of the list. It was better than a flat-out rejection, for sure! I'm also going to be working up some sketches and swatches for Danielle over at No No Kitty Yarns. She has some delectable hand-painted yarn and she's looking for patterns knitted out of them. I'm also trying to come up with something for the next IK and Knit Net deadlines. When am I going to do all of this, plus blog, plus keep up with all y'all's great blogs, plus raise the kiddos? I have no idea. Anybody know anything about cloning adults? Or perhaps a robot that can change dirty diapers and yell at Sydney for me?

Another one bites the dust!

One down, 25,000 to go. At least that's what it feels like right now! I just couldn't go to bed last night without finishing the toe on Conwy. They're done! Yahoo!




And boy, are they gorgeous. I was worried that the stitch pattern wasn't going to stand out enough because of the wild yarn, but when they're on my feet and the stitches stretch out, the cables really pop. I love this pattern - it's a little hard to get the hang of crossing the stitches at first, but it's easy to memorize and really is pretty.

The details - Conwy from Nancy Bush's Knitting On The Road. Yarn - Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock in the Black Purl colorway. Needles - Addi Turbo circs, size 1.

It seems like you guys were pretty evenly split on whether to give these or keep them (thanks a lot!), so I'm going to keep knitting socks and see what happens. She may get these if I run out of time, or if these end up being the most fitting pattern. I'm also thinking of knitting up Yukon Leaves and Friday Harbor and seeing how those go. I am truly a sockaholic.

In mommy news, I am reading the BEST book - The Big Rumpus by Ayun Halliday. It's written by a mom of two who started her own 'zine to keep from going nuts. She can be quite crass and is not afraid to use the f-word, but if your sense of humor is irreverent like mine, you'll love this book. I highly recommend it!

Midday updates...

First off, I told you all that I sent my rejected Knitty design off to Mag Knits. Well, Kerrie liked it and it's going to be in the February issue! Yahoo! I won't give too much away, but I will say that it's fuzzy lace. Like I said, it's all about getting it in front of the right person at the right time...

Also, WEBS is having a closeout on Rowan and Jaeger yarns for the first time ever. For once I'm controlling myself, but wow! There are some good deals there.

The lovely and talented Leigh Radford

I don't know how much time I'll have here, since Owen may have limited patience with crawling around picking lint off the carpet, but I am totally amped up from my class last night and wanted to share.

The class is Design Your Own Sweater at a lovely little shop called Lint in Portland's Pearl District. For those of you who don't know Portland, "The Pearl" is one of those urban renewal areas that used to be old warehouses and vacant lots but is now filled with trendy shops, restaurants and pricey lofts. Lint fits in perfectly there - modern architecture and tons of gorgeous yarns that are very nicely displayed. They don't have the selection of the Yarn Garden, but the layout is much more conducive to browsing and fondling.

There are only three people (including myself) in the class, so it's very intimate. The first class was kind of an orientation, where we talked about what we wanted to do (I want to try a raglan worked in the round with some stranded colorwork), looked at the "textbook" (Ann Budd's Handy Book of Sweater Patterns), and talked about yarn selection. Then we wandered around the store, picking out balls of yarn and asking Leigh how they would work for what we had planned. It was so great to have an expert to tell us "yes, that yarn would be great for colorwork" or "that yarn would give you problems because it wouldn't stick together very well". Leigh is also a big fan of combining different yarns for effect, and showed us several different combinations that were quite interesting (a strand of Silky Tweed and a strand of dk merino wool, for instance). She said that she often likes to carry along a strand of Kidsilk Haze to give her knitting that little extra magic.

After we got done pawing the yarn, we wandered back up to the little library area and grilled Leigh about her book. The shop has the knitted screen door on display in the window, and we talked about that for awhile. She also talked about the yarn choices and failed attempts leading up to a couple of the sweaters (i.e. she was trying to work with yarn that just wouldn't cooperate and ended up using something different than she originally intended). She has a new book coming out next spring that is called "One Skein" and has a bunch of patterns using a single skein of yarn or odds-and-ends from your stash. I can't wait! She had on a pair of fingerless mitts from the book, knit out of bits of Koigu, and they were (of course) fabulous.

We also talked about how she got her start in designing. She's been knitting since the age of 12 (or 13? I can't remember exactly in my sleep-deprived state), and designing for five years. She estimated that she has completed about 70 designs in the last year and a half, which equates to around 4-1/2 designs per month. She is a machine!

I ended up buying a little yarn (after all, I had my 10% class discount that had to be used), but not too much. I got a skein of Blue Sky Alpacas Cotton, just to try it out, and a few skeins of Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Chunky to work into my sweater (I'm going to use the DB Merino Chunky that I got from WEBS awhile back).

I can't wait for next Monday!

What a bizarro day...

Yesterday had disaster written all over it. I should've just stayed in bed. First, I posted what I thought was an innocent little invitation to join my Beginning Designers Webring on a Yahoo group for knit designers that I'm in. Firestorm of the century ensued. I won't get into it here, but suffice it to say that it was a wee bit stressful, especially since there are folks on that list who can make or break your career as a knit designer. I did get a few personal e-mails of support, one of which was from Lorna Miser, founder of Lorna's Laces. This was a little thrill (okay, a big thrill) for me, since it's the company that makes my very favorite yarn! She sold the company a few years ago, but still. She is a very sweet lady.

Then, rejection came swooping down on me in the form of an e-mail from Knitty. They're not taking my design. Not a huge surprise, but still disappointing. I try to keep thinking of selling designs as being like selling a novel, or a house. You just need to get it in front of the right person at the right time. After a little pity party, I dusted myself off and sent an e-mail off to Kerrie at Mag Knits. They publish monthly, so they might have a little more room for my humble little scarf pattern...

To top it all off, I screwed up the short row heel on my little baby sock on the very last row.


Sorry about the blurry photo - I really need a camera that takes better close-ups! The way that these short rows are constructed uses a series of yarn overs instead of the usual wrap-and-turn. This makes it next to impossible to tink and get all of the yo's back on the needle in the right place and facing the right way. Good thing it's a tiny little sock!


This one has the x-o cable pattern down the front. I'm knitting this pair on size 1 needles (the pairs I made for Owen were on size 2s), and it is soooo teeny! Karen just bought some of this same yarn, same colorway - look how nice it knits up! You've got good taste, girl!

I did end the day right, though, by finishing my mother-in-law's Christmas present. Click here for pics. It turned out great, so I'm very happy.

Before we leave, I need all y'all's opinion on something. I was making Conwy with the intent to give them to my daughter's preschool teacher for Christmas. However, she's an all-black, twin-sets-and-heels kinda gal. Do you think these are too wild? I'm thinking that maybe I should keep these for myself (yeah, wouldn't that be a bummer) and make her some heather gray straight-laced socks. What do you guys think? To refresh your memory, here is a pic of the second Conwy, languishing without a toe.

Crack cookies

I opened this tin of cookies at about 8:30 pm last night.


This is the tin at 8:30 am this morning. Pathetic. I call these my crack cookies because I just CRAVE them and can't stop eating them once they're in the house. They're some sick combination of shortbread, pecans and chocolate. I should just stop buying them, right? Somehow, I just can't pass by them in the grocery store without them sneaking into my cart. They're on a little stand that I HAVE to walk by. Sydney came up the other day and said "Want some crack cookies!" I think we may have a problem.

Because I don't have enough socks on the needles right now, I started yet another pair of better than booties baby socks last night. These are in Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock in the Aslan colorway, which consists of creams, tans and pale mauves. Very pretty. These will be for our neighbors, who just brought their daughter home after a couple weeks in the hospital (she was about 6 weeks early). I just love these little socks, so if you're having a baby anytime soon, you can probably guess what you'll get from me as a gift...

And just for you, Mom, some pics of the grandkids.


She had a really cute expression on her face right before this was taken, but I wasn't quite fast enough. I don't think she likes the flash.


Yes, he's wearing one of his sister's bibs again (no, we don't dress him in pink and take him out in public). And no, he doesn't sit in his highchair all the time. This just happens to be where he's easiest to photograph because I can run and get the camera and know he's not going to try to roll off of or under the couch...

Wishlists!

If you're looking to RAK me, here are a few little things I might like (updated 1/7/06)...

from Knit Picks:
Autumn Leaves Lace Socks Pattern
Checks & Charms Hat & Mitten Set Pattern
Sweet Mary Jane Cardigan Pattern and 4 skeins Vineyard Shadow yarn to make it
2 balls Sock Memories in Paper Dolls
Any number of balls Essential in any color!

Amazon Wishlist

Knitiot t-shirt-XL
Yarn Ball t-shirt-XL
Brainwash Bag kit
Vesper sock yarn of ANY colorway

Droooooool!

Okay, I know I talked about this blog yesterday, but damn! There is some SERIOUS yarn p*rn over there today. Go check it out. It's making my palms all sweaty!

Bill is off playing racquetball again this morning. Another tournament, but he's probably not going to do so well since he was deathly ill up until this morning (I think he's probably still pretty sick but hid it with drugs and chutzpah this morning so I wouldn't yell at him for going off and playing while he's got one foot in the grave). I'm not quite sure why he thinks he's going to win tournaments when the only time he ever plays racquetball is AT the tournaments. A little practice might help, my dear!

I've also revamped the Beginning Knit Designers webring homepage in an effort to get some more subscribers and make it more of a resource. So, if any of y'all ever think about doing some designs for publication (whether free on your website or in an actual magazine), come join us! I posted a whole bunch of links on the homepage sidebar that could keep you busy designing for years. If anyone knows of any more great knit design resources, please let me know so I can put them up.

I'm off to knit some more on Conwy. I've turned the heel and now have a straight shot down to the toe. This is now my 8th gusseted sock (not counting all my tiny baby socks w/ their short-row heels) and I've gotten so much better at getting the stitches all picked up without leaving those pesky holes. See, practice really does make perfect! I'm also getting comfortable enough with one sock on 2 circs that I'm ready to get back on the 2 socks on 2 circs horse. Giddyup!

Bliggity-bloggity-boo!

As those of you who use Blogger know, it's rife with issues. Posts get eaten, photos take forever to upload (or just flat-out refuse). So, I decided to give Typepad a try. They have a 30-day free trial offer, and then there are three levels of membership w/ the cheapest being around $4/month. Well, after playing around with Typepad for five minutes, I've really come to appreciate Blogger, despite all of its idiosyncrasies.

First off, Typepad seems to have a very complicated interface. Of course it offers many more features, and you can customize your template in detail without having to hack into the code, but I wasn't able to figure out how to get a similar look and feel to what I have on my current blog. Unless you get the premium membership, it doesn't look like you're allowed to access the HTML code at all (at least, I couldn't find it in my five minutes of looking around). I upgraded to premium (after all, it's a free trial...), and didn't like what I saw when I did get access to the code. It was broken up in a whole bunch of different spots and was formatted kind of crappily. I much prefer the Blogger template where all the code is just laid out for you on one page.

So, five minutes after signing up for my free Typepad trial, I canceled it. I've decided that Blogger is more flexible AND it's free. It would be nice to have the photo album and category features, but they're just not enough of a draw to me. I think it would be a great tool for someone who doesn't like to touch the code at all but wants to customize their template like crazy, but for me, that's much of the fun of blogging! And I'm not willing to pay $15/month for that privilege. So there.

I found a great website last night while roaming around the net - it's called Spin|Knit. Check it out! Not only does he have great knitting on his blog, but if you click on the little "Visit the shop!" link on his sidebar, you can actually BUY some of the beautiful handspun yarn that you were just drooling over in his blog posts. There are some other cool things as well, like handmade journals and jewelry. Plus he's a Minnesotan. I'm holding strong to my yarn diet as of today, but I might have to binge as of January 1st...

Bill is home sick today, poor guy. He looks like death warmed over. He got Sydney's cold and then some. I'm really crossing my fingers that Owen and I don't come down with it, although Owen is definitely fighting it by sleeping a lot and being crankier than normal when he is awake. Fight, baby boy, fight! I hate to think of all the things that Sydney is going to drag home from preschool this winter. Well, what doesn't kill us only makes us stronger, right? And since we're all going to be killed off by the bird flu soon anyway, why sweat a few little colds?

No knitting to show today since I've started working on a couple top-secret designs. I'm going to try to work up a couple submissions to Amy Singer's new book, "No Sheep For You". I still haven't heard back about the two designs I submitted in September. Keep your fingers crossed for me! I figure if I keep putting them out there, eventually someone will buy one...

Support our troops...

...bring them home!

Okay, I'm going to get political today. I do have some knitting content (scroll down to the pictures if you get tired of my ranting and raving), but my soapbox has been begging me to step back on, so here goes. Today's title is inspired by a bumper sticker I've been seeing around and that I love. It's also sparked by the irritation that comes over me when people say that you can't support the troops without supporting the war in Iraq, or that if you're against the war, you're somehow diminishing the sacrifice that the soldiers are making over there. I think that this is totally untrue, because I'm 100% in support of the troops and 100% against the war in Iraq.

After doing a lot of thinking about this whole issue (I've been against the war since before it started, BTW), it comes down to this. The men and women who enlisted in the armed forces, and particularly the National Guard, signed up to defend our country. In my opinion, that is NOT what is going on in Iraq. Perhaps they are defending Iraqis, and spreading democracy, or what have you (these are not my opinions but things that people say to defend the war), but in fact that is not what they signed on to do. However, since they are good and honorable servicepeople, they go over there and do the job that they are asked to do. They leave their families for months (or years) at a time, fighting in a country that doesn't necessarily want them there.

I know that 9/11 was a horrible attack on American soil. Even though I am by nature a pacifist and against almost any war, I was so upset by what happened that day that I whole-heartedly supported the search for Osama bin Laden. Some folks have tied the war in Iraq to the war on terror, but how does that work? Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11, despite the president's feeble attempts to somehow tie him to it. All the war in Iraq has done has been to distract from the hunt for bin Laden and open Iraq up as a hotbed of Al Queda activity (where it was NOT when Saddam was in power, despite all the other lousy things he was doing). Yes, Saddam was a horrible dictator, but there are horrible dictators all over the place. Why is he so special? Why do we get involved to such a huge degree in Iraq, but not in Rwanda? Or Somalia? Or Sudan? These are all places where horrible things are happening/have happened to large numbers of people.

I am just heartbroken when I think of all of the soldiers who have died in Iraq. Despite the fact that I don't support the war, I do believe they are heroes who died for their country. You can support people even though you don't agree with what their boss is telling them to do, can't you? So again, I plead, "Support Our Troops - Bring Them Home!!!".

Okay - soapbox is now put away. On to the knitting, for those of you who are still bothering to read this!

Pasha is finished (apart from the eyes, which I'm still deciding upon - to embroider or to button - that is the question).



I'm going to have to make another one, since Sydney instantly claimed this for her own and proceeded to get play-dough all over it. I had another Martha Stewart moment yesterday and made some homemade play-dough colored with lemon-lime Kool-Aid...


It made quite the mess on the kitchen table, but it kept her busy for a couple of hours so I can't really complain too much.

Last night, I took the Fair Isle Sampler class at Mabel's. It was really fun, and I ended up with this:


Unfortunately, it was knitted on borrowed needles so I had to pull them out and give them back at the end of the night. But I'm thinking I'm going to do something with this cute little pattern - a little stitch marker pouch? Or baby socks, perhaps? Hmm...

I also, of course, bought some yarn. I can't show most of it to you because it's for various secret pals and such, but I did get a little sumpin' sumpin' for myself.


Cascade Fixation! I can't wait to knit up some socks out of these bad boys. I'm also going to make a pair of drop-stitch gloves. I'm doing some technical editing for MK Carroll on this pattern, and it's so cute! I don't know when or where I'll ever wear them, but I gots to have them! She's going to have the pattern available for download on her blog soon, for anyone who loves them as much as I do.

I know, I'm pathetic. I blame Jillian and her yarn ho-iness. And I had to take advantage of that 10% discount, right? Right? Right!

This is why it's a bad idea to knit in bed...

Somehow my poor little dpn got lost in the comforter as I was putting my knitting away for the night. I found it poking me in the knee in its new reincarnation as two dpns when I was changing a 3 am diaper. Bummer! And no, I don't know what that white stain on the table is (probably baby barf). I just noticed that in the photo. Sorry, but we do mysterious blobs right in this household.

It's a good thing I'm going to Mabel's tonight for a fair isle sampler class so I can pick up another set of needles. You get 10% off everything while you're enrolled in a class, so I might have to have a little yarn binge while I'm at it. This is why I can't get rid of the baby weight - no self control.

I don't have anything interesting to say, so I'll leave you with a couple of progress pics. First, the 2nd Conwy, on which I made some progress last night during knitting group.


And here is Pasha, stuffed and waiting for feet and wings.


This was such a fun little project - very quick and the pattern was very well-written. It rates itself as Piquant, but I think just about anyone who knows how to increase and decrease could handle it. I'm knitting it in LB Wool-Ease because it's nice and cheap (and who needs a stuffed animal knit out of luxury yarn?).