The dragging week

Posted on 11 January 2005 by zardra

A short stop at the LYS brought me a copy of Folk Mittens and Folk Knitting in Estonia. I’ve flipped through both books and have started reading the interesting information Nancy Bush has at the beginning of the Estonian book. But, I haven’t decided if I’m crazy enough to try knitting a pair of mittens. A pair of socks in the Estonian book have certainly caught my eye though.

Le Bete Noir is plodding along since I work on it when I ~~feel like it~~ can. So, I didn’t work on it last night… there was no knitting at all last night. I have started my new exercise regime… well, it’s not all that new, I tried to start it a couple weeks ago, but the holidays interrupted it. The plan is to get at least a half hour of something that makes me sweat everyday. Mainly, I’ve been riding the exercise bike in our apt complex’s fitness room for 40 minutes (working my way slowly up to an hour). Last night, after exercising and a hot shower, I felt up to nothing more than vegging in front of the TV while cozy under a blanket. These days happen and I embrace them. *grin*

In other news, I am planning on taking a dyeing class this Saturday at my LYS. But, I don’t have any yarn for dyeing… I’m not sure I feel like spinning something up just for this class. I’ll probably just grab something white before the class starts.

Thinking about mittens

Posted on 7 January 2005 by zardra

Several people are doing the Latvian mitten thing and they are gorgeous. Now, I don’t live in an area where mittens are really needed… I probably wear gloves only a few times during the winter… but, I’ve been thinking they might be a good small project to practice fair isle. This of course has caused a wanting for such books as Folk Mittens. I’m planning on stopping by my LYS tomorrow since it’s been a few weeks since I’ve been and I have been told that I need to share pictures of the shawl. I might peruse their bookshelves and see what they’ve got. Of course, if I get something I’ll feel guilty what with Stephanie‘s wants versus needs MSF donation drive going on. Of course, I already feel guilty cause we went out shopping Wednesday night and I got things I don’t need but wanted. Part of the problem with not having bought stuff I’ve wanted for several months… now that the husband is working again, I’m catching up… stopped at the comic book store and got the comics that have been accumulating in my box. Got a manga book and a book about sushi for the husband at the Japanese bookstore. We got a new rice cooker… but that is a definite need since our old one died and we do eat that much rice. Got a new calendar for both home and work… need. And stopped by this new tea shop in the mall to see what their offerings were… got some teas and a late Christmas gift for a friend. I’m such a consumer… and such a packrat. What’s surprising is I have gotten better in recent years. Now I need to learn how to sell things on eBay to get rid of years of accumulating stuff I no longer want or need.

Boy, this post was all over the place…

Maybe I need chocolate

Posted on 4 January 2005 by zardra

Spending my three day weekend in my pajamas and not going out at all seems to have helped clear up the illness (which, of course, meant I had to go back to work today with everyone else). I did more sleeping than knitting, but I did manage to finish the back of Le Bete Noir (but not photograph it) and cast on for the front. I’m about an inch of the way into the ribbing so far… but it is indeed the front and not the back… and it is good. Thankfully, it shouldn’t take me two and a half months to finish off the front since I no longer have a lace shawl to worry over. In fact, I’m hoping to get a good portion of it done before school starts at the end of the month…. and for while it’s still cold out. I’d hate to finish it and have the weather turn warm, so here’s keeping my fingers crossed that we don’t have a weird early spring like we did last year (it came at the beginning of Feb for 2 weeks, then got cold again for a few weeks before heading into the end of spring/beginning of summer). Considering the storm that blew through here this last week, I’m expecting a nice cold, wet winter… I’ve even heard rumors that this might be the beginning of an El Nino cycle. If that’s true, we should get many more downpours. *squee*

The aftermath

Posted on 3 January 2005 by zardra

My Dad was quite proud of the glass he had to drink his champagne out of at the reception.

There were jokes about it having been full earlier when he made mistakes in his speech, like when he called someone else the father of the bride.
Here’s my sister actually wearing the shawl along with the pin she picked to help hold it close.

There was knitting and spinning loot… and not so related loot. I love my iPod. 🙂 And I’m a big Invader Zim fan… my husband actually tracked down a stuffed GIR just for me. I’ve been having lots of fun reading For the Love of Knitting… haven’t gotten to Heirloom Knitting yet. I had just gotten the lazy kate put together right before this picture; it should make things a lot easier.

This is what I currently have on my wheel. The shiny multicolor bobbin is silk dyed blue, purple, and light teal. The other bobbin is dark teal baby alpaca.

Getting back on track?

Posted on 30 December 2004 by zardra

Trying to get back into the habit of posting more often than once a week… should be slightly easy since I don’t have shawl time competing with blogging time anymore. Unfortunately, I am horribly sick… we’re talking the works here, folks… stuffy nose that occasionally runs, sore throat, plugged ears, bit o’ cough. I should be at home cuddled on my couch with a warm blanket watching something mindless while knitting or downloading wedding pictures from my camera so I can actually show you what the shawl looked like on my sister* as well as the pictures of knitting and spinning related loot that was gotten for Christmas… but, no, that’s not my reality… at the moment I’m at work trying to share my germs with all my co-workers cause I used the last of my time off to go to the wedding. Good planning on my part getting sick right afterwords, eh? *sigh*

*It looked really good on her; I was jealous. Everyone loved it… some were so surprised that I had made it they asked me 3 different times in amongst going on about how lovely it looked. I even have one friend asking what sort of bribes I would take to churn out another lace shawl that might be sent in her direction. *grin*

The Horizon

Posted on 29 December 2004 by zardra

Now that the Sister Shawl has been completed, wrapped, unwrapped, and worn, it is time to look to the horizon and see what’s next…

Not much actually… I dreamt about knitting the shawl for 2 nights after I finished it. I did take Le Bete Noir down to Monterey with me and have gotten most of the armseye shaping done on the back. A worsted weight yarn is a big difference from a lace weight one…. I think my fingers were grateful for the larger soft wool. Of course, now I’m itching to make something for myself, so a pair of socks might be in order. My sister got me a gift certificate to Knitting by the Sea in Carmel, and I pick up some lovely superwash merino yarn… I got the Glacier Lakes color, although I was tempted to get the Tilting the Gizmo color because it was such a bright green color, which was odd cause I’m not a big fan of green in general. I’ll probably have to do toe-up socks since each skein is only 123 yards, but a nice soft pair of kick-around socks would be nice.

Done at last, Done at last…

Posted on 26 December 2004 by zardra

I finished the shawl on Thursday night at about 1 am… so Friday really. I then had to wash it, rinse it, and condition it. I finally finished blocking it at 2:30 am. But, I did indeed get it done in time. I was wrapped Friday afternoon and unwrapped this morning. There was true amazement over how light and airy it looked.

The shawl

Close up of the main pattern

Close up of the edging

We also gave my sister and future brother-in-law a couple of Riedel champagne flutes as Christmas gifts. A little later we decided to give them their wedding gift early… a bottle of 1996 Dom Perignon. The look on my sister’s face was priceless… wish I had had a camera.

Mmmm… vegetarian chili time.

Happy Holidays!

Time? What’s that?

Posted on 22 December 2004 by zardra

Thanks to work, looming trip to Monterey, and end of the year stuff that needs to get down before… well, the end of the year… knitting time is at a premium, so I can pretty much forget about blogging time.

The Christmas surprise for my husband has fallen to the wayside, but I think he’ll understand since he wants to see the shawl done almost as much as I do.

I have discovered one thing that sucks about knitting a white wool/silk lace shawl… no chocolate is allowed near the shawl (me, any white fabric, and chocolate have a ceasefire agreement… none of us are allowed in the same area at the same time). This is a problem because I think chocolate would help me to relax a little and enjoy knitting said shawl rather that trying to break land-based speed records and failing miserably (worst case: dropped stitches *gah*).

The fast and the furious

Posted on 17 December 2004 by zardra

I have been trying to knit fast and furious on the Sister Shawl… I have to have it done and blocked by the 24th, which is when we’ll be driving down to Monterey. Unfortunately, with people staying at my parents’ house and the dog I can’t block the shawl there… of course, I’m not entirely sure how I’m going to block it at my place. The last lace shawl I dressed I pinned out on a full size bed. I have a queen in the guest room… hopefully, it will be big enough. I’m thinking of using fishing line as I have not had enough time to get dressing wires… okay, so I didn’t remember I needed dressing wires until too late. But, fishing line and T pins should do the trick. Although this raises the question of where one goes to find fishing line… huh. I’ll have to figure that one out. Anyways, the shawl… I’m up to only 116 rows cause I didn’t get half as much knitting done last weekend as I wanted to. I looking forward to tomorrow… I have nothing else I am required to do until 8:30 pm when I’ll be whisked off to a company Christmas party.

My sister emailed out a schedule for the 27th and 28th (D-day)… boy, am I glad that Josh and I did the simple yet sweet wedding*. This is insane. I must admit that I thought it was pretty funny that she reminds all the guys going to the store to pick up their tuxedos the day before to check for both the left and right shoe. *hehe*

Thankfully, I picked up my dress on Sunday… very pretty… of course, now my mother hates me. *sigh* She showed me a dress in a catalog by Spencer Alexis… the dresses are mostly flowy things using different types of fabrics in all the same color or nicely contrasting ones. Then, I found out a place in Carmel sells them, went in and tried one on, ordered one in what I believed to be my size, and picked it up a week later. Now, my mother is moaning over the fact that she wanted to get a dress by Spencer Alexis, but now she can’t cause we’d look like twins** even if she got a different style and color (her words, not mine), and what is she going to wear. *sigh* But, with my dress safely in my hands, all I have to worry about is the shawl and if the pins I bought on eBay are going to arrive in time. (I picked out a couple of sparkly pins, both of which are kind of art deco in design, so that I can give one to my sister to help hold the shawl on without needing to worry about holding it or tying it, etc.) I should get at least one before next Friday since it’s already shipped out.

Wheee… I am so glad this is not my wedding.

*We did the 20 people in the redwoods with a fancy dinner afterward… no dancing… no cake cutting… simple.

**People usually think I’m either my mother’s clone or her younger sister we look that much alike. Clone I don’t mind… but sister? Granted my mom is only 20 years older than me… I should just be happy that no one believes what age she is and that I got those genes.

And then there was dyeing

Posted on 13 December 2004 by zardra

Here is the romney yarn that I spun up and dyed for my SIL… it’s about 118 yds of fingering weight. For the dyeing, I decided to just have fun with the food coloring and pick two colors I thought would look good together; I thought turquoise and purple would compliment each other nicely. I mixed 2 oz of vinegar and 6 oz of water with the food coloring drops according to the box. After making sure the colors were well mixed, I tested them on a paper towel. The turquoise looked great… the purple… well, the purple was completely washed out. I had used just the regular food dyes… 6 drops of red, 5 drops of blue… it looked purple in the squeeze bottle, but nothing much showed up on the paper towel. In a fit of panic I pulled out the neon food coloring and decided to go for deep purple, as the box called it. I just added the drops to the squeeze bottle filled with the lame regular purple, shook it up, and paused when I realized that the liquid now looked black… tested it… yup, black. I thought, “What the hell,” and went with it… black and turquoise go together, too. The thoroughly soaked skein was placed on my purple plastic wrap*, and I proceeded to randomly squeeze the dye liquids all over it, patting it to make sure it went all the way through. I went heavy on the turquoise and used the black for accent. Actually, I was perhaps a bit over zealous with the turquoise… okay, I used all 8 oz… I thought it was all getting soaked into the yarn… no, it was forming a puddle under it… lurking… waiting for me to try to pick up my yarn package. The wrapped, sopping yarn went into the microwave. Five minutes was all it took to get the liquid clear. I think it’s lots of fun to watch the package blow up with hot air only to vacuum seal when the microwave stops… so cool! *grin* I rinsed the yarn with hot water, then slightly less hot water, slowly bringing it down to a more manageable temp. Then, I washed it in a citrus shampoo and conditioner to do away with the vinegar smell.

And here is the result of my dyeing adventure…

I’m not sure if I should name it or something… I have no idea what I would name it. I have a tendency to be very descriptive in my naming, which would cause this to end up something like Monterey Bay Lightning Storm.

I stopped by my LYS on Saturday and picked out both a matching and contrasting yarn to up the yardage. I went with a cotton viscose blend that’s really shiny**. One is a blue, which looks really nice, and the other is a peacock blueish green. I think they are numbers 12 and 16 here.

I hope my SIL likes it… I have no idea what she might be able to knit up with this selection…

*Unfortunately, purple plastic wrap was all I had… makes it damn hard to tell if all the color is exhausted…

**I like shiny.

Knitting from Outer Space

My adventures in knitting, spinning, and life

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