November 17th: Everything's falling apart!

Ack! Everything is falling apart! It started a couple of weeks ago when the zipper pull on my Knitpicks Options Case fell off. Just... broke and fell off. Oh well, I thought, I can just move the slider back and forth. Annoying, but still functional. Well! Then, this weekend, the slider just breaks apart. *poof* I can no longer close the zipper.


This is what's left of the slider thingy.

I contact Knitpicks and they are quick to respond and mail me a new one. I was going to wait and mention it once I receive the replacement, but then two (2!) things busted tonight.

First: One of my 40" options cables pulls apart. This is not quite a *poof* moment because I was pulling on the cable from the needle end. Still, I did not appreciate that breaking. I'll be letting knitpicks know what happened, but it's probably more in the realm of user error than defective item. Thankfully I didn't drop any stitches.


Second: One of my favorite stitch markers went poof. This is what they look like:


But this is what one of them now looks like:


The bending is my fault. Inexplicably, the bead portion just fell off! It's still whole, so I tried to force it back on, and cannot. I guess the marker is technically still functional, but it's gonna catch on everything now. :P


I mean, really, what the hey? I understand things break, but this is all going down at the same time. The needle broke on my first row of joining the sleeves of the Amelia cardigan to the body. The stitch marker went sometime in the next couple of hours. Yeesh. Here's to hoping everything stays in one piece tomorrow.

November 16th: FO: Pink Granite socks

More knitting! I call these my Pink Granite socks because the pink and the grey reminds me of stone.


I knit these on size one needles using J. Knits SuperwashMe Sock. These are a basic toe-up stockinette sock. My go to movie theatre knitting. In fact, according to Ravelry, I started these on May 10th of this year.


The first sock was knit with a short row heel. The second one got an afterthought heel - I got to the heel point just before we left for the movie, so I decided to put in some waste yarn and have different heels on the sock. Not a big deal, since these aren't gift socks. But I definitely think I like the short row heel better.


It's amazing how hard it is to get a decently lit picture in this house. I went out to our mudroom and brought out my sheepskin rug to cover the grody carpet that's out there. The light lasted about as long as I took photos for. Maybe on a day when the sun is actually out....

November 15th: Mom's lap blanket

I started knitting during the summer of 2004. I told my mom and learned that she used to knit. I was really excited about this. So for Christmas that year I bought her a pair of size 8 needles and two hanks of what I think might be bulky weight Blackberry Ridge Kaleidoscope from The Sow's Ear back in WI. Shortly after, she borrowed a pair of size 15 needles from me and cast on as many stitches as the long needle could hold and began knitting back and forth. She'd work on this every once in a while, but mostly it was held in a cupboard where the cats couldn't reach it.

She knit continental. I never really caught onto continental.

In July of 2007, my mom was killed by a drunk driver. As I dealt with her estate in the month that followed, I found the lap blanket she'd started. I took it back to Washington state with me and knit on it some. I finished the first ball of yarn and began knitting from the second. I would only knit a row or two at a time, and then put it away.

It felt like a connection to her.

But now I've finished it. I bound off the edge I finished with a crochet loop to differentiate it from the cast on edge. The finished lap blanket is really more of a shoulder shawl. It's wide, but not that long. It sits nicely around my shoulders. Or over my lap if I'm curled up on the couch.

I have mixed feelings about having finished it. But it's done.

November 14th: Girth

I finished knitting and cast off my mom's lap blanket while playing Super Mario World on the Super Nintendo with Pants. I did a crocheted bind off. I wasn't sure what size crochet hook to use. I figured I should use something about the same as the needles I was using. So I grabbed the biggest crochet hook I have - my selection isn't great, though it's not bad - and went for it.


I maybe should have gone with my second biggest crochet hook. That's the hook I used, the size 15 knitting needle I had been knitting with, and a standard #2 pencil for scale. That hook? Is behemoth. It worked, but it was not the easiest way to do it. Lesson learned.

I think I'll go weave in the ends and watch some Ghost Hunters. I'll start the heel on my sock as well, I think. I slept in until nearly 11am this morning, so I might be up for a while...

November 13th: To Washington!

Pants and I just finished watching Mr. Smith Goes to Washington for the first time ever. It's a wonderful film.

I spent the movie (except our break for popcorn - I <3 my Whirley-Pop) knitting on my mom's lap blanket. I'm very nearly done. I need just to finish the row I'm on, and I think then I'll move to a crochet loop bind off. I think I'll just wing it.


Size 15 needles.... what size crochet hook do you suppose I ought to use to bind off?

November 12th: Long day

When I'm really tired, my legs feel tired. I don't know how else to explain it than my legs feel tired, and I get spazzy if I can't put them in a comfortable position. I've got that kind of tired now.

It's been a long day. Up before sunrise, run around right before I have to head out the door because I've lost track of time. Busy day at work, with at least three crises, and I end up staying 9 hours instead of my usual 8. Run home, dinner with Pants, then off to knitting. Knitting for a couple of hours, which flies by. Then home where Pants and I pick out art for our living room walls. This takes two hours. So it's 10:30 now and I have some time to think about blogging. And I am just weary. Mostly in my legs, but I think I'll fall asleep pretty quickly.

Anywho. At knitting tonight I bought a pattern. A pattern I was going to mention, but since I am thinking about knitting Christmas gifts from it, I had perhaps better not mention it. Initially, I'd planned not to knit much in the way of Christmas gifts, but I'm feeling pretty broke right now and knit gifts are sounding better all the time. We'll see how this all shakes out.

Also, I'm at 13.5" on my sleeves. I need 18". According to the pattern, I'm nearly done with the increases, but I think I'll be adding more for a better fit. It's good to see progress.


It's funny though - I'm fixated on this sweater, but I'm almost done with two of the other wips. My socks just need a heel. Just one short row heel. And the lap blanket can't be more than a couple of hours away from done. And I'm working on this sweater. Maybe it's the onset of winter. I guess it's supposed to snow tonight/tomorrow.

November 11th: Tangled Mess

Today is a state holiday - schools and state employees have the day off of work. A good day for tackling those projects you let go. One such project was to clean up my scrap yarn bag.

To be clear, I have two bags of scrap yarn. One is for sock and laceweight, the other is for everything else. The everything else bag is the problem.


No, really, look at that mess.


And that was even after I'd pulled out some of the more well behaved balls of yarn. It took about 10 minutes of detangling, but eventually I got it sorted out and looking more like this:


Ah. Much better. I have two scrap yarn projects percolating in my brain. The first is barely worth mentioning. I need a coaster. See, we decided we need to respect our furniture, now that we've got a few pieces worth respecting, and coasters are part of that. We have this great set of coasters that are red with white flowers in the center, but they're also curved up at the edges. Which is great for juice glasses and whatnot. But I favor large nalgene style bottles or large pottery mugs which don't sit nicely on the pretty little cup holders. Thus, I need to knit some coasters.

The second project I am contemplating is a felted cat bed, ala Kitty Pi minus (probably) the fun fur. This would lighten the scraps load considerable like, I think. The cat clearly has a fondness for knitted things. Why just today she was scaling Mount Blanket.


Mount Blanket features my last stashbusting effort, the ugly afghan and a wonderfully warm shawl gifted to me by my friend Laura.