When?

When is my yarn going to get here?

I had a really long day of work. Nine hours. Okay, I know for some people that is normal or just over normal. But I barely work. I put in six hours and it feels like for ever! It's not that I don't like working. It's just that I prefer other things. So today I worked just under nine hours. I never work overtime. Who works overtime, people who don't have anything better to do. Sorry to those who work overtime, I just hate it. Even though time and a half is appealing. It is all made even worse because I can't shake this cold. It is leaving me bogged down! All I did was work on the computer all day, which also makes me feel yucky(which is also why this will be short).

Where is my yarn?

I told myself I would feel 100% better if I walked up to the front porch and there it was, but there it was not. And I don't feel 25% better. I want my yarn. Will it come tomorrow? By the end of the week? This year???

Oh Well, it will get here! (I hope)

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That is the face of someone who wants some yarn!!^
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My computer ate my last blog.

It was upsetting. I could not get the computer to do anything for me. Argh!

But I've been working on the sock. Kyle and I went to Friant for him to practice driving and go fishing. I took my textbooks and some knitting. Read a little, knit a little. It started out as a dreary day, but made a beautiful turn and ended up sunny, warm and spectacular. I made a good deal of progress on the sock. Kyle needs to try it on so I can see how close to decreasing I am. If it were for me, I'd be doing the decrease dance. His feet are substantially longer however!

I was inspired by the fishing trip and while knitting made Kyle's fishing socks even fishier. Yes, instead of the normal seed stitch heart, I knit a garter stitch fish!! I would show a picture, but I have not taken one yet. So I will only be able to post a pre fish picture.

I have made many inches of progress from what is shown here.

Funny stuff about this photo, I first took it from the other side of his leg and told him I wanted to take one from this side because I like these tattoos better. Then he made me take another one because he was afraid the way he had his legs crossed made his calf look fat. There is always a mess in the background in my pictures!! When will I ever be clean ALL the time. It's been especially hard because of school and I've been fighting this cold since Friday. I keep falling asleep really early. On Sunday night, I fell asleep at about 9:45. I was so sad when I woke up when Kyle came to bed because I missed Grey's Anatomy - my favorite show. Then last night I fell asleep some time around 10:45. I usually go to sleep between 11:15 and 11:45. So last night not too early, but I just can't stay awake!! Which means I have been waking up real early. This morning: 6:45... I forced myself back to sleep until about 7:15, but Kyle's twitching was too much, I got up and made a latte and here I am.

I'm going into work a little late today because I have to interview someone for a school project and I am meeting her at 9am. And then I am taking tomorrow off!! Yea! Get some school work done. Get some knitting done. Hope my yarn comes from knitpicks... even though I won't knit with it. Okay... well maybe I can finish the ballet T-shirt. I want to finish and wear it. I love the Shine, it is such nice yarn. So soft!

I guess I should go, get dressed, eat something, morning stuff to do.

(the second picture is the sock on my just after I turned the heel... these things are practically knee socks on me. I followed the pattern on length, next time I will knit them shorter!)

Six Feet

What do you do with 6 feet of yarn? Anything. Can you do anything? I hate to throw it away!

Maybe a cat toy!

Answer:

You make a cat toy that your cat could care less about!

Decisions

I am trying to decide which is more important right now...

1. Going to the gym (I could go later, but I like to go when it is not too busy)
2. Cleaning my house
3. Doing homework/reading textbooks
4. Knitting? Okay - this is not even an option, I must do some of the others before I can even begin to knit anything. I mean, really this is what I WANT to do. But what do I NEED to do?

Warm

Sunny California... Wow. It was COLD this morning. In the 30's and foggy. I could barely see in front of me. But now it has warmed up A LOT and the sun is out shining in full force.

I was on a mission last night. And I completed it, even after tearing out a few rows I completed it. I went through my yarn stash the other day to see if I had yarn for mom's slippers. While there I found this cable scarf I began working on about 1.5 years ago. It is from a skein of Lorna's Lace yarn I fell in love with and had to buy. I am pretty sure I bought the yarn before I moved home from Alaska and began the scarf shortly after I was back in Fresno. Off and on I have worked on this thing. A few cable repeats here, a few cable repeats there. So Sunday when I saw it in the yarn box, I thought I have got to finish this thing. I need to finish lots of things. I will FINISH IT! And I did! Last night. Actually this morning, I wove in the two ends and wore it to work. Wa-La, it is done. I am so proud of myself.
You really need good sunlight to take good pictures of knit items. I always (usually) take my pictures indoors with the flash. No wonder the cables never show up. Or the colors are always washed out. You can really see a difference with natural sunlight. I guess that is why we love it so much... it is soooo good for us! I love the palm tree in the picture, the palm tree that I never noticed until I put a camera lens up to my eye. I notice things much more different when looking through a viewfinder. Something that was taught to me in every photo class I ever took. Why don't we notice these things without the camera?

I may have spent too much!!

I just made what I believe to be my single largest yarn purchase so far. About $100 worth. It came to $98 and some change I think.

I bought the yarn for the Cabled Riding Jacket from Loop D Loop. That is the official name, I think I have called it one hundred other names and never the correct name.


I also bought the yarn to make Kyle a pair of slippers (same style as mine) but with his huge size 13 feet, it took a lot of yarn.

I bought the yarn to make my mom a pair also. She went for the purple and red. She is so crazy for the Red Hat stuff (as previously mentioned!).

And finally I bought plenty of yarn to finish off the Ballet T-Shirt (also from Loop D Loop). I can knit about 15-20 rounds per two balls of yarn. I bought four more balls. It better be enough.

If I figure in the gift certificate from my brother and the cash from my mother-in-law, I only spent $22. Not so bad for the plethora of projects I will make. I have faith in myself to do it all.

The problem... I went through all my yarn because one of the colors mom picked for her slippers is the same color I used on mine and I thought I had enough to save on buying too much. So I came across ALL this yarn. I have loads. A lot of small amts, but I need to use that up too!

Kyle wants to get back online to look at fishing stuff, so I need to go and let him back to it!

Good Night!

The best knitting book...

I found this at Barnes and Noble today. It is fabulous!!

I believe I will buy it. I read through pretty much the whole thing. I at least read about every question. I did not read all the answers, but it will make an excellent reference for ANYONE who may have a question. I think the first 20 pages were on casting on. There the ways I knew and a few I had never seen before. There is a bunch of info on fixing problems. Lots of pictures. GOOD STUFF! I have up to this point used my stitch and bitch for most referencing and the internet. This book is good because it is small, think fitting in your knitting bag and doesn't contain any patterns so there is no wasted space.

WAIT... what am I saying... wasted space by patterns. Okay, not really wasted space, but a good book to have.

While I am praising this book I feel I should complain about a book which upset me a few weeks ago. I was on one of my regular excursions to B&N and came across The Yarn Girl's Guide to Beyond the Basics. And my complaint is that a book claiming to be beyond the basics should have no to very little basic stuff in it. And while the patterns were nice enough, I believe there was 40 (maybe less, I have not looked in it for awhile) pages of instructions. All the instructions you probably need to make every pattern in the book. I like have the basics, but I don't really need them in every book. Especially one that is kind of a follow up to a book that claims to cover all the basics. Kind of the way the two S&B books are. The first is full of good beginner stuff and the second sums that stuff up in 4 pages and has a slew of new info, stuff on redesigning patterns and how sweaters (and patterns) are constructed. GREAT! But I got so mad going through the beyond the basics book. I know I am ranting. But as an x book seller and as a current book buyer, I like to feel like my money was well spent and if I could have got an extra 5 patterns in those 40 pages that is what I want.

As you can tell, I am grumpy. Both Kyle and I are grumpy. He because he had a tooth implant done yesterday. Me because I am regularly grumpy for no real reason. I need to go get in bed, get warm and veg out!

So here are some cute pictures of Trout from this morning. She was in the window trying to get a look outside. Kyle and I think she needs to go outside and play more... she is getting fat. We are just worried about her running away some more. She keeps going back to our old apartment (a block away) and hiding under the house for weeks at a time. The first time she did it we thought she was gone for good. We were out for a walk, she had been gone a little over a week. We decided to walk by the old place and heard a familiar meow. I had to pull her out from under the house and she yowelled the whole way home. I felt like a kid(cat)napper. That happened one or two more times and she has been kept indoors every since. Only to gain like 5-8 pounds. Sorry I said I had pictures...
She looks pretty good here. She is not so bad when she is not attacking me or my stuff or waking me up in the morning or scratching me! I guess I like her!

As the sock grows.

I continue to make progress (slow but sure) on the sock. I had to get a knit fix this morning, so I knit one round before I left for work. I knit for awhile this afternoon, but knew I HAD to finish the FABO red hat lady scarf for mom. She loves it, and is going a bit crazy for the whole red hat craze. She has quite the collection of outfits for her upcoming red hat trip to Reno. So not much to say but here are some pictures...
I must say, yes RheLynn, I am worried about felting. But I figured I could hand wash these socks. Kyle said he really wanted wool for the warmth. I'm very worried that they won't fit or he won't like them, or I won't finish them. Plus many other worries, so I am just making them and will see how they turn out. For my first pair, I figure I need to stumble through and make some mistakes.

We will have the first try on session for Kyle this evening. I at least don't want to get to far if they aren't going to work out. Yes, I told him, I didn't even try to keep it a secret.

A secret I will keep from Kyle... I broke my over three year no McDonalds streak this morning. My stomach was weak and I had to eat an egg mcmuffin with cheese. At least it was good and hit the spot instead of being very disappointing like I was expecting. It is not that we are totally opposed to Mikey D's, but I got a pretty severe case of food poisoning that I attribute to them many years ago and had not been back since. Oh the shame of breaking such a long streak!

Now they are REALLY on my feet.

And here it is, a half inch of 2X2 ribbing complete. So I am now wondering if I could make these completely in secret from Kyle. I don't think I get enough private knitting time alone. Plus, I am really bad at putting stuff away and would leave some tell tale sign. And finally, I am afraid that they may be too big. They seem large on me, but his legs are pretty big. Hmmmm. I'm sure I will tell him, I can keep NO secrets, even if I want to.

Trout has already caused damage to these needles, looks like she is back for another chew. I have to turn them each time I use them because two of them have ruined ends that don't slide into the yarn very well. They snag. My cat drives me crazy, however she has been useful for curling up under the covers with me warming me a little bit!!

Socks on my feet.

I am planning to make my first pair of socks. They will actually be for Kyle, the ones he asked for a few weeks ago. When he called me up in the middle of his fishing trip, I want socks. Warm and wool. I told him we needed to disguss options, style, yarn, pattern, what-not!! But what did I do, I went to the yarn store today. I wanted to buy something. I HAD to buy something. And just before I left I decided it was time I join the sock knitting masses. I have made it this far with not a sock coming off any needle of mine. I did produce one pair of (GREAT) slippers, but they required not turning of heel madness that socks require.


Ball Winder Away!

So I decided to forgo the option of letting Kyle choose anything to do with the socks. I found this yarn. I loved this yarn. I thought Kyle will love this yarn. I bought this yarn. I guess technically Kyle bought it for me with his gift certificate. I think I told him I was not going to make him ANYTHING from my gift certificate money... I just wanted to keep it for myself. Here I am going against that. Oh well. I am also going to buy the Addi Turbo's I need for the Loop D Loop Cable Coat. Plus I had my lovely LYS owner order my Knitting from the Top. A book on designing (I think) your own sweater patterns and knitting them from the top down. I love all those pretty rows of increases and decreases... what drew me to the ballet t-shirt!!


Cascade 220 yarn for socks

So now I must find a pattern. Hmmmm. I did a search, need to see what it turns up! I know I want basic... because Kyle wants basic. There will be no pattern, no lace, no fancy. Just plain sock!!

Oh, and the yarn. It is a green black mix, it looks like it is two strands (one of each color) wound together! I am off to guage away!!

Tag... I'm it.

Four Jobs you've had:

1. Martial Arts School Office Manager
   
2. Nanny to my sweet niece Teagan
3. Barnes and Noble Bookseller for too many years.
   
4. Two weeks at a printing shop. Not a good job
   

Four movies you can watch over and over :

1. Cocktail
2. Batman (any of them)
3. Office Space
4. Of Course... Hedwig and the Angry Inch.

I agonized over this one, I love movies, but four I could watch over and over again was very hard.

Four places I've lived :

1. Fresno, CA
2. Anchorage, AK
   
3. Oxnard, CA
   
4. That's it!!
   

Four TV shows you love to watch :

1. Grey's Anatomy
   
2. Curb Your Enthusiasm (I don't have cable, but I watch this via Netflix)
   
3. Six Feet Under (same as CYE)
   
4. The Amazing Race
   

Four authors I read (there are sooooooo many... as I said I worked at Barnes and Noble for a long time:

1. Nick Bantock
   
2. Orson Scott Card
   
3. John Irving
   
4. Wally Lamb
   

Four places I've been on vacation ... eep! Vacation?

1. Washington DC
   
2. Mexico - Ensenada and somewhere just south of El Paso
   
3. Four Corners in Colorado
   
4. Yellowstone park in Idaho
   

Four websites I visit daily :

1. Mail.yahoo.com
   
2. knitandtonic.typepad.com
   
3. knitowl.blogspot.com
   
4. 
   

Four of your Favourite Foods :

1. Lasagne
2. My current fave: Turtle Chex Mix (except for all those pretzels)
   
3. Fried Rice (esp with bacon... I don't get that very much)
   
4. Chocolate in many forms.
   

Four places you would rathar be right now :

1. Somewhere warmer... Southern Hemisphere, Beaches, Sun!
   
2. In bed, I like to snuggle in bed when I have nothing better to do. Or when I am avoiding the things I better do!!
   
3. Alaska, Anchorage to be specific.
   
4. Barnes and Noble with a cup of coffee and a good knitting book

I don't really have anyone to tag... but thanks RheLynn

Sunday morning fun

Here is Kyle wearing the Red Hat Lady Scarf. It is lovely and thick. He is busy playing bass and ignoring me wrapping red and purple fancy stuff around him.


Then I tried on the ballet t-shirt - still in progress. I am planning to place my order for the final balls of yarn later today. It doesn't really show my bra through so much until the flash hits it (at least that is what I tell myself). I look so sleepy in this picture, but it is almost noon. Time to get some coffee... mmmmmmmm!


And finally here is the long sleeve wonder. My batteries were dying in the camera so I had to have Kyle snap quick shots and not worry about how good or BAD I looked. So these pictures don't show me in a good light. Argh... but here they are anyways.


I will try to take more (and better) pictures later and post them. I have knit so very little since I got home, I've been trying to work a lot to make up some of the hours I've missed and because school starts on Wed, I want to get as much done as possible! I finished the Red Hat Scarf and have been pondering whether I will really make the cable cardigan. It will be such an undertaking and I would hate to order 38 balls of yarn to never complete the project!! What to do!! I asked Tara for her advice and she was no help. Kyle is no help. I guess this is one for me to decide if I have the gumption to follow it through to completion.

Up?side?down?

What is it...

Up Side Down

Upside Down

Up Sidedown

Upsidedown.

I could look in the dictionary. But it would be hard... and I am lazy!

Few Words... Many Pictures

I will not blah blah blah for much and will get on with the pictures:

Here he is, Handsome Hound and the cutie patootie Ian meet. Alas, it was not love at first sight. Ian was more interested in the tissue paper I wrapped Handsome in. And once they were placed on the floor together to play, Ian went straight for the (real) dog food. I even put Handsome on the dog food bowl to sway his interest. Ian tossed him away and snatched up some dog food. Ah well... to be expected. As was exhibited by Teagan and her knit goods. But I will get there!

Here they are. Downtown Brown Pants! Showing up rather dark in these pictures (they always look lighter on the camera and I was in no mood to lighten things up prior to posting!). They are so cute and slim fitting and hairy/fuzzy. Tara said Teagan looks like an animal, like they are bear pants. Teagan wore them for maybe an hour and was done with them. Because she is on a big pajama kick (it is approx 4pm in the picture and she has changed into the pajama top she is sporting in these pictures), I tried telling her that's what they were in hopes of persuading her to spend more time in them, it hasn't seemed to work so far. Oh well, they knit up in less than a day and used up some of the left over 3.5 skein wonder yarn.

Okay... bikini scariness. This will never be shown on my body with nothing else on this blog because it is SKIMPY! But I had fun knitting it. And in the second picture you can see Tara and (neighbor) Brit also working on theirs. Too bad it is dark outside or you could see the thermometer that reads 10 degrees. Nothing cures the winter blahs like a little bikini knitting get together!!

Teagan loves her some lotion, here are the goods from Gramby.

Ahhh... I love Target. I bought Teagan a hat and mitten fleece combo. She loves them. See happy expresion of delight. She actually wears them (unlike hairy pants or swing coat). This kid got some Christmas loot!!

And here is a photo of Princess Teagan. She is a little upsidedown... crown and sun glasses are both on upsidedown! I bought Teagan these sunglasses when she was like 9 months old. She was barely standing and on her way to Las Vegas so I wanted her to be stylish. In some pictures from then Tara said she looked like Elton John.



After MANY attempts to get this on Teagan, she finally put it on for 10 minutes max. And the only way I got this picture was by letting her jump on the bed. Okay I know those damn ends are still dangling off this beast. BUT I FINISHED IT!! Tara thinks Teagan did not want to wear it because she knew it was not done. But once complete she STILL did not wear it. I spent a lone time working on this. Why are my child knit goods not being worn!!



And here is the swift and ball winder Kyle got me for Christmas. He is VERY Excited about the swift, it is made out of lace wood and he bought it on ebay. He has told me many times "It cost less then I would have paid for the wood," in fact I am sick of hearing it!! But it works. At first I thought I had no hanks and Kyle kept asking me to use it. Then I remembered I had a hank of recycled silk. Here it is in progress.



And I will finish this off with me on New Years at the fireworks display.
GOOD TIMES.
I love Alaska.

Happy New Year and Knitting

New Years was fun! We went to downtown Anchorage where they had set up an outdoor ice skating rink (I had no skates - but slid around the edge in my tennies) and had a really great fireworks display. I went with Tara, Teagan, Rich and Rich's mom (Brenda). We had a good time, although Brenda and I got rather cold seeing as we didn't have the long johns under our clothes that Tara and Rich wore. My feet suffered the worst because I didn't bring any really snow friendly shoes and we were trudging through the snow. The fireworks display was quick, maybe 15 minutes, but I think it is a well recognized fact that not everybody wants to stand outside in 20 degree weather in the snow for an hour. But they were really good, I took lots of good pictures, they will come later. Then we stopped in Tara and Rich's office (located downtown) to thaw our toes. All this took place at 7pm, nice so the young kiddos can enjoy it instead of staying up until midnight.

I called Kyle and wished him a happy new year, we have spent two apart. He has been whining about me being gone, but he is not too unhappy. He has been busy fishing. I also extended my plane ticket by two days instead of leaving Thursday night I leave Saturday night. Good thing, we have plans for Friday night.

I have been knitting like crazy!! One of the yarn stores was having a HUGE inventory reduction clearance sale. That's right: 30% of EVERYTHING (Well- all the yarn, 10% off everything else!) I felt the need to buy loads of stuff. But instead I decided to make the bikini from the first stitch and bitch. Only the top though. I don't really think I could pull off a knit bikini bottom. And this plan caught on. Tara liked the colors and is knitting one as well. And her neighbor Brit is also making one. She is making hers to wear in Hawaii in March. So last night when it was 15 degrees outside, Jan 2nd - the three of us were sitting around making string bikinis! Silly.

I also finished the 3.5 skein long-sleeve wonder. Several times of tearing back to make it work. I wanted longer ribbing then I did on the first sleeve, so I knit one sleeve twice. And I made the ribbing around the body too tight and tore that off and re-did it. I am wearing it right now. Tara gave me a hard time for not weaving my ends in and leaving things unfinished for so long (Swing Coat Cardi to be exact - which I only just finished two day ago) so I have been completing as I go along. Ends all in on Wonder and on the bikini. I tried it on several times and was just tucking them in. Last night I finished it. It is not hard, I just hate it!!

So with the left over brown thick and quick, I designed and knit a pair of pants for Teagan. I told her they were pajamas so she would wear them (that is all she wants to wear right now). They are really cute and I knit a red heart in the butt. She did wear them for about an hour with her Christmas pajama top from my Grandma. So I got some pictures (I will post them later). They are slim fitting with a little flair and a ribbed top with a drawstring.

Now I am working on the ballet T. I am worried about enough yarn. I may have to order more. I got 5 balls when the pattern called for 3, but I reworked the pattern to be worked on smaller needles (and I am using a different yarn) so I had hoped that the two extra balls would be enough, it is hard to say right now. What I can say is the knit picks shine is the softest most lovely yarn ever!! I will be using it again in the future.

Today is my first day home alone since I got here. Now it really feels like a vacation. I went back to bed for sevaral hours after Tara and Teagan left for work and daycare. Then I got up and have been knitting and watching tv. NICE!!

Alright this is quite the lengthy post, so I guess I can end it here.