Undisciplined

I have nothing to knit.

Other than a sweater, a sock (almost done!), various "hibernating" projects, and a colorwork hat. I was going to add the Jimmy Beans KAL mystery item, but it turns out I have to wait until tomorrow for the next clue, so I really can't knit that.

I guess the real problem is that I have nothing I want to knit. Nothing that's cast on anyway. And I'm very strictly trying to finish things, and casting on something new is not conducive to finishing old, BORING things. (They're not really boring. They're just not exciting right now. Even though I only have like 24 more rows left on that sock... I should really work on it.)

It's just, I got a pile of yarn in the mail, and the cowl pattern I ordered those for was free... and I saw a beautiful shawl pattern online the other day, and translated it from Portuguese with a lot of guess work, and now I want to see how that's going to work out... And I may or may not have accidentally purchased some yarn for that shawl when I was buying sock blockers for these socks of mine.

Oops. But I couldn't resist! It's merino/silk and it's such a summery color. Admittedly, this picture sucks. I blame the sun (or I would, if I weren't so thoroughly enjoying the sun).

So, I'm definitely not going to cast on a whole bunch of other projects, I'm going to behave and work on things that I've already got cast on.

Oops. That's the Uno, Dos, Tres cowl from Jimmy Beans. I'm currently enjoying the half-linen stitch pattern, but I'm sure it'll get on my nerves soon enough.









Don't look at me like that. I couldn't stop myself.

Ideal weekend

I have to tell you, I have had a pretty great weekend. I mean, last week I was kind of cranky. But on Friday night I headed up to Boulder to hang out with a friend and feed my brother dinner (it's the only way I get to see him). Oh, and I bought some fiber, because I was in the area of a yarn shop...

I have to tell you, I'm pretty sure I need to go on a fiber diet. I was doing ok for a while, but I wasn't actually cutting down the spinning stash because, while I wasn't buying any fiber, I wasn't spinning any fiber either. I finished my fiber from last time, though.

Like I said, it's polwarth wool and it's delicious. I really need to start thinking about projects to use up my handspun. I'll think of something.

Want to see some things that I have finished? I knew you did.

These are the Jimmy Beans Downton Abbey KAL mitts. I actually finished them... a couple weeks ago? They're lovely, though. I haven't threaded anything through the eyelets, but they're also not as slouchy as the designer may have intended. Regardless, I think they're marvelous! And the color is awesome too.

I also finished that wretched cowl. It's enormous! But very pretty and I'm sure I'll have a chance to wear it soon, it's been a bit chilly lately.

This isn't knitted, but I'm really excited and proud of it anyway. I made a Bohemian Carpet Bag from a pattern I purchased at the Fancy Tiger. It was more involved than I was expecting, but I really like the finished product. It's got lots of space, too. Holds an entire sweater's worth of yarn. Ask me how I know, haha.

Anyway, today I've spent my time knitting on the stripy sweater I had to rip out, spinning a little bit (the rest of that braid from last time), and baking things. Because who doesn't like fresh baked bread when it's cold?

Warp speed ahead!

Folks, I have to tell you, the holidays were rough. Then, getting back up to speed at work was rough. Then, I got assigned to wrangle 7 different vendors working on the same project during the same week, all on property, in different buildings. It's a little bit out of control, and the stress is giving me heartburn.

But on the crafting front, things are going well. I attended Knit Night at my LYS last week, which was fun in a quiet, old lady kind of way. I cast on some new fingerless gloves (don't judge me), but it took me forever because apparently a) I can't count and b) I can't follow a written pattern. It was a rough night... but the gloves are going to be pretty, even if the yarn did stain my fingers bright pink.

It doesn't look very bright, but it is, in real life. The pattern is Zombie viXen, because I thought the pattern was pretty, not because I'm a fan of zombies... The yarn is apparently Lola-doodle's hand painted yarn. I picked it up at Colorful Yarns in Centennial, because I was overwhelmed by wool fumes and the color was so pretty. I think it'll look nice with this pattern, though.








I got some yarn from the LYS for a chunky lace shawl that I've been eyeing for a little while. I wanted to do a natural color of yarn, and this blend had alpaca in it and it's basically perfect. I'd have a picture of the shawl but it's soaking right now so that I can block it and it'll look pretty for the actual picture.

Then, I attended a Stitch and Bitch in Denver, which was a much rowdier kind of fun. We talked about reusable tampons, why you should never put popcorn kernels down the garbage disposal, and born-again virgins. I think I'll be going back next week. I just worked on this cowl that I've had on the needles for a while, because I didn't have time to go home and get another project, and it needs to get done anyway. It's going to be really long, but that's what I was going for.

The pattern is September cowl, which my sister thinks doesn't really look like much of a pattern. I guess she's not much of a fan, which is fine, because it's for me, not her. The yarn is Galileo, from Knitpicks. It's very shiny, and I like it, in general.








Let's see, then there's the Jimmy Beans Downton Abbey KAL. Which is, you guessed it, another pair of fingerless mitts. Listen, I don't want to hear that you think I have a problem. It's only a problem if it's hurting someone.

I'm a little late joining the KAL, because it took FOREVER for my yarn to come in. It's this month's color of the month from Lorna's Laces, which is "A River Runs Through It" on their Sportmate base. I really dig the color and the yarn both.









Then there's many things to catch up on.

I finished the body of the laceweight sweater to the armpits. It does, as I suspected, take a LOT of time to make any kind of progress. On the other hand, the pattern is quite enchanting. And would be more so, if I could quit crossing the cables the wrong effing way. I don't want to talk about it.

You know what else I don't want to talk about? The fact that I finished the ENTIRE BODY of this sweater, sewed up the shoulders and started getting ready for the sleeves and then tried it on. Turns out it wasn't going to fit the way I wanted it to. So I... Ripped. It. ALL. OUT. That wasn't painful at all. And then I had to order a couple more skeins of yarn so that I'll definitely have enough.

But let's DO talk about these adorable little stitch markers that my parents got me for Christmas. Well, they didn't arrive by Christmas, they arrived several weeks later. But they were shipped from Israel, and they're adorable little vegetables on wheels! I thought they were Cinderella carriages when I saw them on Etsy. I find that I am enamored of the fact that there's a little artichoke on wheels. And a bell pepper on wheels. And an eggplant on wheels. It's just so cute!

OOH! And we can talk about the precious little counting bracelets that I made. They're definitely cute. And I love using them. Even for the stripy horror sweater. I found that the original counting bracelet that I made wasn't... working. The beads had holes that weren't big enough for ribbon or something with a higher coefficient of friction. So I found these slightly more grown up version of pony beads. Well, I think so, anyway.

Oh! And we can talk about how I spun half a braid of polwarth into these fabulous singles! They're very pretty, and the braid has more colors in it than the ones shown here. But I really love polwarth wool. I don't know what it is, but it's got all kind of qualities I enjoy. Like, it's squishy, and easy to spin. It feels nice when it's done, too. I like it.

Ok, well that's a lot of pictures. I hope you like them! I'll try to do this more often than once a month so it doesn't happen again, though

Setbacks

Hons, I ran into a big problem on the blue, cabled sweater. I ran out of yarn. Then I thought I wasn't going to be able to find the same color, let alone dye lot. Fortunately, the lovely people at Jimmy Beans Wool found me the right color, but not the right colorway. It's Malabrigo, so I figured that would be the case. But it's really a different dye lot. So now I need to rip back a bunch of sleeve, so I can blend in the new skeins unobtrusively. Lame.

Those little stubby things at the top? Sleeves. They're not that stubby in real life, but they're certainly not done. In lieu of working on this doomed sweater, I have started a whole bunch of other projects. Cuz that makes sense, right?

Abby asked me for a couple pairs of socks to wear with her boots, so I started some cabled socks. I got all the way to the heel, started to read the pattern more closely and realized that there were supposed to be cables on both sides of the socks, instead of just one, like I was doing. Since Abby doesn't know this, and they're kind of large socks (she wants them to reach above her knee), I'm not gonna rip back. I'm just going to do the other sock the same way. Except, you know, with the cable on the other side.

Then, I wanted to knit something else for me, something that wasn't a sweater, you know, but would keep me warm as the weather gets colder. So I started a very pink cowl. It's very shiny, because it's made out of the new Knit Picks yarn line "Galileo." The pattern is the September Cowl, which I thought was really pretty, and large, and will keep me nice and toasty. I hope.






I've got a couple more things that could probably stand to be finished (I'm looking at you, mystery mitts and chuppah). But I've had a stressful couple of weeks at work and I don't really think I should overtax myself with knitting, do you? Dealing with all these setbacks has been bad enough.

Look! A distraction!

I'm starting to feel the stress. And my favored method of dealing with stress is to not deal with it, and focus on something else. I never said it was a good method, just that it was my method. 

This weekend, we got our first snow! It's kind of hard to see, but I know it's there, so you can trust my word. It was really cold, and I finished the chunky sweater last week (it still needs to be blocked, but I'm giving myself a break), so I cast on a lovely new cowl. 

Pretty, right? I love cowls. They're so quick (compared to sweaters), and they can be either fairly simple or super complex, they don't involve any shaping at all, and you only have to make one of them. Basically, they're perfect. I'm nearly done with it, and I just started it on Friday afternoon. I'd say it's a pretty good project to get me out of the old project slump that I've been in lately. Maybe. Hopefully. This cowl is made out of Misti Alpaca handpainted yarn. It's pretty much the best stuff I've ever touched (except for maybe cashmere). The best part? It was a gift. My dearest Caitlin gave me some yarn when she was destashing, and these skeins weren't really the kinds of colors she likes to wear or use. But they certainly are mine!

One more thing:

My dog makes a really cute fairy, doncha think? She's adorable. 

More of the same

I was going to write about something else today. But then I remembered that I need to post some pictures, and I didn't have pictures for the other thing I was going to write about. So that will have to wait. Maybe tomorrow.

Today, I shall just say that my knitting continues apace. I got a fair amount of Abby's big ass scarf done today, because I had work and class, where I am able to knit more or less unmolested for large swathes of time.

It's overflowing my school bag in this picture. That should give you some idea of how much work I actually have to do for the MBA I'm working toward, i.e. NONE.

Caitlin and I started the fronts for our Runcorns, and I've already messed up some of the required decreases. Which is somewhat disheartening, since I hadn't even been drinking. Or doing anything else that required my attention. So bleh, and no picture of that because it's stuffed back in its bag until tomorrow. I'll just have to try harder. We decided that we would be happy if we finished the fronts before the end of the week. (Psst, Caitlin! What are we counting as the end of the week? Friday or Sunday?)







Also, I finished the cowl for my mother on Monday, but was too lazy to photograph it. And even having photographed it this evening, it doesn't look like much. I'm gonna make Abby come over and try it on anyway, so I'll make her pose for a picture when she does that. And I suppose I'll have to block it at some point, so it looks less like a lump of alpaca and more like the luscious, cozy winter accessory that it is!

We went to Texas Roadhouse for a fundraiser for Abby's sorority, btw. I ate too much, but it was delicious. And terribly unhealthy. I'd feel bad, but I love steak so much!



I worked a few rows on the melonstrosity this morning. It has been sadly neglected of late, because I had more exciting, and portable, things to do. Like scarves. And a cowl. So it hasn't seen much action and my efforts this morning were basically a drop in the bucket. I would vow to do better, but I have this thing about breaking vows, just because I object to making vows about things I enjoy. It's cuz I'm stubborn like that.

I think I need to do something to shake up my knitting in the near future. All this lazy k2, p2 rib nonsense is putting me in a coma. Suggest something exciting?

Not much knitting

I haven't gotten much knitting done today.

I got a few rows done on the Christmas cowl for my mother, but then we had to clean the house before she flew back from Iowa, so I helped with that. Then I had to get dressed, check on her flight status, find my dad and herd everyone out the front door so that we could pick her up from the airport in time. And, in case you were wondering, she wasn't flying in to DIA so there wasn't any knitting time in the car. Plus, the only things I had on the needles (that I wanted to work on) were her cowl, which she obviously doesn't know about and I'd like to keep it that way, and Abby's scarf, ditto. So, no knitting in the car.

Then we went on errands. And Wyatt was grumpy. And so was I. Then we came home, had lunch and watched some really stupid tv. Has anyone ever heard of American Ninja Warrior? It's a reality show about these guys who are basically insane and challenge themselves to undergo the world's most intense obstacle course. No American has ever achieved the title of "Ninja Warrior" but they still keep trying. Long story short, Wyatt had set up DVR for all the episodes of ANW that he was going to miss because he now lives 2 hours away, so we watched about 5 episodes of it this afternoon.

I'm beginning I have a strange addiction to reality tv. I end up watching a lot of it. I suppose it's related to the fact that my work and school schedules set me up to be home a lot during the day. When there's nothing else on. Anyway, I was strangely fascinated by Ninja Warrior, and therefore didn't seclude myself in my room to work on secret Christmas knitting. Plus, Wyatt no longer lives at home and I needed to spend time with him while he was here.

Yeah, that's a good excuse.

I was going to knit while my parents went to the store, but then I remembered some things that I needed there, so I ended up going with them. Then it was dinnertime. And now, I'm sitting on the couch, typing with some knitting in my lap. The Runcorn is officially back in business. I've knit all of 2 rows on them. I'm planning to knit maybe 2 more rows before I give up for the night and go hide in my room to knit on something else. But I'm going to start putting in some serious work on this sweater, because I have another sweater that I'd like to make and I feel like having more than 2 sweaters on the needles at the same time seems a bit like unfaithfulness. And lacking in stick-to-it-iveness. So I have vowed to finish the Runcorn before casting on the new sweater. That way I can feel good about myself. And not need more cables for my interchangeable needles. That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

You can be the centerpiece of my obsession...

The title of today's post is particularly apt, since I'm feeling a bit obsessed this week. With many things: the song "All your life" by the Band Perry (if you haven't listened to it, I recommend it), the chunky scarves that never end (I started another one), and The Bridal Shower. There are often times that I find myself wholly taken up with a concept or activity. Therefore I know that these obsessions will pass, but for the moment, they are all-absorbing.






I had a good reason for casting on another of the big scarves, I swear! I was going to work, and I didn't have anything on the needles, because yesterday I finished Dj's scarf, and the day before that I finished the socks, and the Runcorn (what Runcorn?) isn't very portable or work friendly since it involves 3 colors and an ability to pay attention to the pattern, and... well, you get the idea. Anyway, since I have the yarn for 2 more of those giant scarves and Abby expressed an interest in one, and her birthday is in December... I cast another one on, just so I would have something to do at work.

Stop that laughing. I can quit whenever I want to. I just don't want to right now, ok?

The bridal shower, well, it's a big event, for one of my very close friends, who I haven't seen in a while, so of course I'm obsessed. Not to mention that I like girly things and decorating and baking and all that. So it's totally natural that I walked in to Michael's today and started freaking out about all the cute things that I could make from the baking section: cake pops, mini brownies, tiny cookies in the shape of her initials, little chocolate candy hearts... let's just leave it at that. I told my sister that I was going to open a bakery, so I could make those cute things all the time. She just laughed at me. Psh.

She's probably right, though. I'm more of a box-baker. Not that I can't make things from scratch, just that the box mixes are so much more convenient and quick! Anyway, probably not opening a bakery. But it's a fun thought!

Another of my totally fabulous obsessions is the fact that my friend Mariah is interested in learning to knit, and it's her birthday coming up, so...

I got her some yarn (Simply Soft and cotton, since they're both pretty accessible), and some needles (straights and circs in metal, and wooden straights). I'm planning on finding some pretty simple patterns too, maybe, and adding those to the bag of crac-- uh, I mean, her lovely birthday present. I'm such a good friend.

And, one last obsession that I forgot to mention up top: I'm knitting a cowl. Out of the most wonderful alpaca yarn that I got on sale from one of the LYSs where I live, because they are going out of business. I don't know about you guys, but when I'm confronted with the kind of closeouts these guys were offering on some absolutely wonderful yarns, my defenses crumbled! So I have a bunch of alpaca in this soft grey, and in a pale green. I'm not sure the green is really a color I would use, so I may be forced to over-dye it. Which will probably end up being another obsession. At least I can spot them coming?

The cowl will likely be done by the end of this weekend. I really like the pattern, A Noble Cowl (ravelry link, so if you don't have ravelry, it won't work). It's simple, easy to follow, easy to spot where you've made a mistake. Basically perfect. I hope my mom likes it. It's going to be her Christmas present.