Finishing Girlchild's projects

I loved this dress on the cover of "Handknits for kids". Girlchild loved it and asked me to knit it and a mouse from the book for her. So we ordered some Knitpicks shine to knit the dress up (it would have cost me about $95 to knit it out of the yarn specified, a smidge out of my budget for a dress the kid will stain even if I put her in a white room alone). And I knitted. And knitted. And knitted. She would stand next to me on occaision and ask if she could try on the pieces and when would I have it all done. I finished up the crochet edging (which wasn't as bad as I feared) last night and this morning I wove the ends in. As I wove in the last end Girlchild was standing next to me stripping out of her jammies to put the dress on. I explained gently to her that there's still some embroidery to do on the dress, and she explained not so gently to me, that she doesn't want the embroidery on the dress she just wants to wear it. The dress is so large on her (she's on the thin side) that when it becomes to short to wear as a dress we'll find some pink, red or turquoise leggings for her to wear and she should be able to wear this for a long long time (or at least until it's stained or ripped, because I'm sure one of those will happen before she outgrows this.

So we'll see if I can get this little project finished. Perhaps tonight when we pry her out of it to wrestle her into her jammies I'll sit and do the embroidery, or perhaps I'll just let it stay an embroider-less dress. Either way, she's paid me the highest compliment by wearing it (as I type this she's matching shoes to the dress)



Edit: There was a box awaiting my attention at the post office today. I thought that it was, perhaps, a sweater that Engineer-boy had ordered me for Christmas. It was not. Which is okay because it was from my secret pal!!! I now know her name and that she has a way of knowing just when I might need a pick me up package (she calls it being very tardy, I call it perfect for how my today was going).....Okay so I still don't know how to put pictures where I want them here. You can see what was in my package above. A yummy smelling candle, some chai mix (I love chai), a beautiful beautiful flowered tote with my name inside, a tin of lip balm (my favorite and my last tin is almost empty), a nifty little hand knit sweater, and a lovely hank of koigu!! Thank you!!

Merry Christmas

Happy Christmas, Merry Holiday and all that stuff. Santa has come it looks like a wrapping paper company has exploded in the den. Don't think any knitting will be happening today, just lots of fun family stuff. Hope yours is happy too.

Is your holiday knitting finished? (for this year, not last year)

I am famous for thinking that I 1. Knit faster than I truly do 2. Have more time than I truly do and 3. Will not bore of knitting a dozen of the same project. (I'm sure there are others but at the moment that's the best I can do). Shortly after Christmas last year I decided that the perfect gift for my husband's two sisters and their husbands would be lap afghans. My mother swore that knit on big needles this light and lofty, or soft and fluffy or whatever the name of that terrible yarn is, would knit up super fast, after all she knit up a couple of them. So I optimistically bought the yarn and cast on. Nearly 12 months later after avoiding knitting on this albatros I finished up one, smaller than it should be, lap robe. It will go to my sister in law with the 4 kids that I swear break everything they can get their grubby little hands on. My other sister in law with the grown civilized son and her husband are getting a lovely pottery garlic holder from a local potter. My sister is getting a pair of socks and a pair of fingerless gloves. My husband is getting a pair of fingerless gloves (he requested a new pair a few months ago) and that dear reader is the extent of my holiday knitting. I have knit a few tiny sweater ornaments and given away, but this year I am not madly knitting up until Christmas Eve and then hoping that my knitted object will block dry before Santa shows up and I can hide and wrap it. Nay dear reader, this afternoon I have cast on a sock for myself and plan to knit on it over the school holiday while my kids are home and my mother (who talks through any movie or tv show you try to watch) visits. I plan to drag my mother to a yarn store in Boulder that I've never been to, but hear is fabulous. So yep, my holiday knitting is gloriously finished. (okay, but the house still needs a good cleaning, and I've done no baking or candy making.....but...the knitting is done)

I hope you have a wonderfully relaxing Christmas!

Madeline has a new sweater

Girlchild loves her Madeline dolls. I remember seeing them in a toy store a couple of years before she was born and thinking how fun it would be to have someone to buy these neat dolls for, they had so many clothes, and they were so much cuter than Barbie. Flash forward a few years and I have a daughter to buy these cute little dolls for. The toy store where I found these dolls is gone, but no problem right? There's lots of neat toy stores out there right? Well, this is when I found out that my beloved Madeline dolls have been discontinued. Yes, just as girlchild is getting old enough to have the dolls you can no longer find them. So you visit ebay. Often. You buy a couple of dolls from a local toystore that still has a couple and you visit ebay to get your Madeline fix. Then at Christmas time you knit up a few sweater ornaments and you realize that with just a few modifications you can make these sweaters fit Madeline (forget trying to get the Barbie sweaters to fit her). You spend a morning knitting instead of doing the myriad of holiday things you should be doing and this is what you end up with:


I am sure that there are plenty more Madeline sweaters in my near future. Perhaps the next one will be a cardigan. This little number was knit from the top down and completely seamless. There is a slit in the back because there is no way that big ol head of Madeline's was going through the little neck opening. It was knit with Bernat Sox yarn on size 2 needles (size 1 for the ribbing, such that it is)

Girlchild's felted hat

Okay the pictures came out backwards, the hat didn't grow, but boy did it ever shrink!! This would be the yarn that girlchild and I dyed the other day with Easter egg colors. I felted the hat this morning and she modeled the still wet hat for me. It's first trip through the washer it barely felted at all. I was disappointed because it was still pretty big on her (enormous) so I threw it in again with a pair of jeans I keep for this purpose. It didn't do much and didn't do much and suddenly it was tiny. So I pulled and stretched and the child now has a very bright, very felted hat. I had considered poking some holes in the top of it, running some i-cord through and calling it a purse....

Easter Egg dying in November, and an old dog

Miss K and I decided to dye some yarn today. We used Easter egg colors (I probably have a few more boxes squirreled away, and now that I know how easy it is to dye yarn with them I'll probably go wild at Easter time!). We stuck the yarn in the crock pot and left it for a good portion of the day while we ran errands (dropped half a dozen hats off to the nursery at the hospital, and gave blood for the first time, me not K) When we came home we were met by the smell of cooking yarn, well the crock pot was on low so the yarn was just hot. And here is our yarn, and Miss Stella modeling for us (she's not a good model, she won't hold still and can't hear instructions, and she doesn't see so well anymore either, but I think the yarn necklace suits her). This yarn will be knitted up into a hat for Miss K and felted.

A semi-successful day at the LYS

Most of the yarn shops around here are closed on Sundays and Mondays. There's one that's open on Sundays, but that's because it's in a very "touristy" spot. And there's one that's closed on Sundays and Tuesdays (go figure, the yarn shop got a new name and a new owner a little over a year ago and she's kept the old hours) maybe she figures that if someone needs a yarn fix on Monday they won't resort to Wal Mart, Joann's, Michael's or any other discount store with a limited selection. So the girl child and I went to buy a tree permit (family tradition we go to the mountains and cut down a tree), and it's in the same part of town as the LYS that is open on Mondays. There's a couple of patterns I want and I know that she carries a good selection from the company's so in we go. One of them she doesn't stock (to be fair it's fairly new), one of them she's out of and is reordering. Drat!! But I did find a nice book on crocheting with wire that I think I'll give my mother for Christmas, so it wasn't a wasted trip.

Not much going on in my knitting life. Just finished middle boy's fingerless gloves and am still knitting away at girl child's dress. I should call it a tunic because I don't think it's going to be long enough for a dress, unless you're my mother who used to dress me when I was little in dresses so short I couldn't move for fear of my panties showing.

Maybe next week I'll have something exciting on the old needles. With Christmas staring me in the face (no, I'm not knitting any gifts, the ones I did for this Christmas are done and ready to be wrapped), I'm not sure how much time I'll have for knitting (tho, I could call it my therapy and become really really crabby and maybe no one would lift an eyebrow when I sat down with needles in hand....)

Giving thanks and surviving the holiday (barely)

Wednesday night after karate class and swimming at the Y the husband and I decided to do something different. Normally on Wednesdays the husband does not meet us at the Y and we go straight home, but this being a holiday weekend, we shook up our routine and treated it like Friday when we go to the Y for the boys karate class, and play racketball and then head on over to Whole Foods to grocery shop and eat pizza. Wednesday night we decided to swim, then head over to Macaroni Grill and cash out a couple of gift cards. Robert wanted fried calamari for an appetizer. Robert and I shared the calamari (mistake #1 for me). For dinner I had "make your own pasta" (whole wheat penne, artichoke hearts, roasted bell pepper, pignoli and shrimp), no dessert, but I did have an Italian margarita. Thursday I am fixing thanksgiving dinner, but Wednesday night I'm not thinking about fixing dinner, I've done it enough times to know the routine (good thing as it turns out). Late in the evening I'm still feeling full, as a matter of fact I'm feeling overly full even tho I didn't eat to that over stuffed feeling. Thursday morning I'm feeling....well....pretty crappy. I get the bird stuffed and in the oven. My brother and his family come over. We eat, we visit, but I still feel like nothing is digesting. I am miserable (miserable enough that the husband asks if I need to see the doctor, when I'm too sick to even knit he starts to worry). Yesterday afternoon I started to feel a little better. In the evening we went to some friends house for dinner (I'm still really not eating), and I thought that I was over the worst of this (I was). This morning I took the husband to the airport as he is to be gone for the next 4 days, so I simply can not afford to be ill. I spent a portion of my day shopping about the outskirts of Denver simply because I was there and it was convenient and I didn't feel like I was going to die. This afternoon I've eaten a little and my stomach isn't very happy with me, but nothing like Thanksgiving night or yesterday morning. I blame the calamari, I blame the fact that it was fried and fried food and I don't mix well.

But thank goodness I feel alive enough to knit, because a lovely box of yarn arrived from Knit Picks and it's miserable when you're too ill to be excited about yarn (wish the family understood that!)

The holidays, knitting frenzies and time

I don't knit gifts for the holidays. Really. Okay, that's not entirely true I did knit a lap afghan for my sister in law and her husband. But in my defense (even tho I don't knit afghans) was that my mother said "It's really easy and quick with this yarn and these really big needles", and I'm such a putz I believed her. I started that damn afghan in February, and finished it a couple of weeks ago, and it's not even very big! And I did knit my sister a pair of socks (sorry if you read my knit blog Crissy), but they didn't start out as a gift for her, they were going to be mine. But other than my true lapse of judgement (the afghan) I don't knit gifts for the holidays, and I often don't knit them for birthdays (tho, I did knit my sister in law a pair of socks when she turned 40 and a lace scarf for Chris's oldest sister when she turned 50). People often ask "do you sell your stuff?" (uh, no, but I'll happily teach you how to knit), or think that because I knit (and sew) I must give home made gifts. I did knit my dad a sweater for Christmas many many years ago, the neck ribbing was so tight he could barely pull it over his head. I do knit gifts. I've given socks and scarves to friends and family. I've knitted lacy baby dresses for new babies, baby hats, baby booties. I knit a baby afghan for a pen pal's first baby. I knit if I know that the person will like and use the gift, I try to match the gift to the person no point in making something that the recipient will accidently felt or ruin (gotta match the yarn and care of the item to the person).

Which brings me to these holidays, the ones staring us straight in the eyes and taunting us with the speed with which they will come. Had I considered knitting more gifts? Not really. (oh, I forgot to add the fingerless gloves I knit for the husband). I had thought about knitting some fingerless gloves for Robert, my middle son. He loved the pair I'm giving my husband. He requested some, but only out of the same yarn that his dad's are knitted from (alpaca). I thought that he was going to start stalking the post man as he waited for my yarn order to come. It's funny to see a 15 year old boy asking if your yarn has arrived, and then daily ask you how his project is coming along. No, the holidays are coming and I am refreshingly free of the stresses of trying to finish up that last sock/glove/sleeve/whatever before Christmas morning. I'd love to say that my holidays will be free of stress and tantrums, but ask me about them in mid January.

The finished project

Snow days were made for knitting. Unless, like me, you have kids then snow days are made for drying the snow off the floor and feeding the masses (or at least what feels like the masses when your teenager has a couple of friends over, the little kids didn't eat all that much). I spent a small part of my morning finishing up my leaf lace and blocking her. (yesterday you got to see her pinned down-side up on my living room carpet, today you get to see her over my gym clothes). I was amazed at 1. how simple this pattern really is especially if you knit with a fingering weight yarn so you can rip back if needed and 2. how quickly it knit up (okay, I may have been obsessed with getting it finished and therefore invested more time knitting on it than I should have in the last few days, the dishes in the sink seem to think that). But now she's done and I will go back to Miss K's dress, Robert's fingerless gloves and this weeks hospital hat.

Flower basket lace

I love this pattern. I can't find any lys that stocks this pattern on a regular basis, so I knit it from the spring, or fall 2004 Interweave knits and just adjusted the number of repeats. It is knit from a little over 4 hanks of Rowan Donegal Lambswool on size 6 needles. Here it is down-side up, blocking on my living room rug. I promise to take a photo of it right side up when it's dry. I love the pattern and may make a full blown shawl using the pattern eventually! But for every pattern that I wish to knit, I have kids who seem to find a pattern that they would like, and while, yes, I could teach them to knit, I really really like that no one really has an interest in stealing my knitting needles. And yarn. But really in the big picture, I do a fair amount of knitting for everyone. At the moment, even with this scarf/shawl blocking, on needles I have a hat for the hospital, a dress for the daughter and a fingerless glove for the middle son. Not an inordinate number of projects, but enough to keep me busy! Snow day today, so I have kids wandering around the house which really makes it hard (well, harder than usual) to keep one train of thought going.....

Spin spin spin

Night before last my knit meetup group had a sleepover. Not much of a turnout, but that's okay the few of us that were there had fun. We visited, we knit, I learned how to spin.....on a wheel! Now I want one, even tho my yarn looked like...well (crap comes to mind) let's just say my yarn looked bulky. But I am oh so proud of my first spinning attempt and so I shall inflict a picture of it on you.... (well, it's above my words because I can't seem to control where the pictures end up here). I may dye it (we learned that too) or I may leave it in its natural color and just pet it since I doubt I'm ever brave enough to try to cast it on and make anything (pot holder) out of it. Yep, spinning.....just what I need, another hobby!! (what I'd really like is to be able to spin beautiful yarn like my friend Heather does!)

Knitting enemy # 1

I know a lot of people would say that moths, or the washing machine or the cats are the # 1 enemy of yarn and knitting, but I know better. A basset hound is the #1 enemy. Oh I know that she looks all innocent with those sad droopy eyes, those oversized ears and the feet the size of Thanksgiving platters. Yup, innocent-look is her middle name (her first name being Jenny). She very calmly walks past you, brushes up against you so you'll pat her back, you don't notice that as she passes you she very gently grabs a skein of yarn and not the cheap stuff, she has good taste doncha know. Shortly after she passes quietly by you, you hear her playing and wonder what it is that she could be having so much fun with. You look. What is that, that she is throwing up in the air, and chasing? It looks like.....it looks just like....Good Lord it's your good yarn!!! You wind it back into a ball and while you're doing that, she's scoping out her next opportunity for her fiber fix.......

The faster I knit, the slower I go

Girl child decided she wanted this dress after I bought the book "Hand Knits for Kids" by Lucinda Guy. This is the dress featured on the cover of the book. It is the one that sucked me in. I am not a great color knitter. I have spent all of my life knitting things where changing colors is relatively simple (stripes and such). I've knit a couple of Christmas stockings and a Hello Kitty purse. I must have forgotten my inability at this changing of the color mid row thing, because here I am again. All in all I think the dress will be cute, and I've learned a lot. And it has dominated my knitting time lately (well, it and a Christmas gift for the husband), but at least it hasn't gotten boring.

Small hands

Fingerless gloves for a 4 year old princess sure do knit up fast. Now Robert wants a pair. I never thought I would see the day when my 15 year old son would be interested in yarn. Not, naturally, for him to knit (perish the thought of him knitting!! He doesn't think it's "cool"), but he was eyeballing some alpaca on the Knitpicks sight that would match his fleece jacket saying "Mom, could you make me some fingerless gloves to match this jacket, and that alpaca is so soft". Maybe for Christmas, if I get on the ball and get my other Christmas projects finished. Who knows.

Computer boy (the hubby) brought me home a ball winder (it says "wool winder" on the box....whatever).....late for my birthday. I think he was tired of watching me hand wind hanks of yarn onto toilet paper rolls. Sweet guy (I can't believe he braved a yarn shop!) The kids and I rolled a couple of hanks into little cakes to be knitted eventually.

Today B has off of school so we shouldn't have to rush like we usually do to get to karate. Computer boy and I have a racketball court reserved while B is in karate and K is bouncing on the bounce house the Y puts up on Friday evenings. Then our weekly trip to Whole Foods and then home......

Online Friends are the bestest.....

Several years ago I was drug kicking and screaming into the computer age. I saw no use for email, web pages, and never could figure out why I'd want to "chat" with someone on the other side of the nation (or planet for that matter)! We moved 3 states away from family 14 years ago. I kept in touch the normal way, phone calls and snail mail letters (which I still love to find in my mailbox). As my family was dragged into the computer age (my husband is a computer guy so we were pretty on the ball computer wise), I (grudgingly) learned more about this thing called email. Then I discovered Amazon, but that's a whole 'nother story. So I started emailing the few family members with email. Friends I made here moved away, so I started emailing them too. Pretty soon I was introduced to "the web". Good Lord!! You could look up anything! You could use it kind of like a gi-normous encyclopedia. Slowly I learned that there were web sites you could join, message boards!! You could BUY stuff on the internet and have it shipped to you, things you couldn't find in your little town and ordering stuff on the web is so much faster than waiting for the paper catalog!! A couple of years ago I discovered this thing called a blog. I found other people's blogs. I found that I cared very deeply for people who live all over the world, whom I don't know other than what they write on their blog (I'm still not a "chat room" kind of gal). I have found out things about the area I live in that I would never have discovered (a wonderful knit group, yarn stores, vacation spots etc).

All of this above brings me to this. We all have birthdays, whether or not we wish to or not. Husbands may manage to miss this day (he's trying, really he is, he did bring home a divine cake), but friends, even the online ones you've never met always seem to step in, as did Heather my dear online friend who lives too far away, but someday I do plan to pack up the camper and head east. A wonderful historic sock book, that even if I never knit a pattern from the book (I at least plan to use several of the stitch patterns from it and some of the toe treatments and some different heels than my standard.....okay, there are several patterns I'm planning.), is incredibly interesting and one I'd thought about buying for myself. 2 skeins of Lorna's Laces!! The color is incredible the yarn is....amazing. I've never bought myself Lorna's Laces, partly because only recently have I found an actual store that carries it, partly because....well...I don't really know why. She also included some most wonderful knitwear wash. AND a pattern for a beautiful scarf/shawl (how did she know that I have some yarn wanting to be knit into a shawl, but hadn't found the perfect pattern yet?) And the card was just something that fits in to what my family would send me. She is officially my sister of the heart.

And now for the knitting portion of this blog. Miss K has asked for some fingerless gloves. In pink. She is so tiny I should have them both done by tomorrow night barring some other thing that needs doing first.

Birthday day and other anniversaries

Today is my birthday. Tomorrow would be my parents 47th wedding anniversary and my grandparents 70th (or 71 I can never remember) wedding anniversary had 1975 happened (the year of the big divorce in my family). Every year for my birthday for many years my grandmother would say "Ted and I would have been married for x years had he not run out". Funny thing is he didn't run out on her and she kept the house while he lived in a travel trailer behind his sister's house. But the whole divorce thing is not something I wish ever to dredge up, so I'll leave it and my nana's voice in the past where that ugly scene belongs.

Today is also the marks the 7th year since dad died. I miss him every single day. Lord knows he wasn't perfect (who is?), and it took him a long time to grow up, but dad was a good person and I wish that my kids could have known him (Colin and Robert have some memories of grandpa, B and K have none).

So, at some point today I shall have a drink to dad, but in the meantime I am going to finish up my coffee and take K to the Y to exercise, run some errands and possibly, just possibly (probably) squeeze in some knitting.....Maybe even squeeze in some knitting for me instead of on the myriad of projects I have going on for others!

Cold hands, warm heart

I am not a hand model, my hands will never be mistaken for a hand models. My hands are just like a slightly smaller version of my dads hands (I liked my dad's hands). I have made several pairs of fingerless gloves, or hand warmers, or whatever you wish to call them. But, I've never made myself a pair. Finally I have decided that my hands are deserving of some fingerless gloves (and I'm hoping that with fingerless gloves I can knit, something I can't do with gloves on). Don't mind the errant strands of yarn, I've not gotten around to weaving in the ends, I'll do that when I finish the other glove, which is on my needles at the moment. The bowl in the picture is from tonights empty bowl supper. I stood in line chatting and knitting and this is one of the bowls I picked. Chris and the kids didn't get to the school where they were having the supper in time so I got to pick out 4 bowls (Robert took his ticket and got to pick his own bowl).

Snow and knitting projects

Not much to show project-wise since I finished my scarf a couple of posts ago. Just a couple of hats for the hospital. I've got a fingerless glove on the needles at the moment, hopefully I'll have two finished fingerless gloves before too long. It seems I've made everyone else a pair (the hub has asked for another pair, his met with an untimely accident while Chris was helping my brother with a building project. Chris got 6 stitches in his thumb and I can't remember if the fingerless gloves survived, I do remember blood on everything) except myself. So that's about it.

It's snowing. Tonight we're supposed to get 4 to 7 inches tonight, then 6 to 10 inches tomorrow. Then 1 to 3 inches tomorrow night. Normally I'd be thrilled. I'd be chanting "snow day, snow day" with the kids (if anything so there'd be no reason to leave the house). I'd make hot chocolate, bake some cookies and knit. So, kids, what do you think I'm doing tomorrow? Well.....funny you should ask. My son for civics class must do community service. A friend of his (whose mom is one of my dearest friends) also must do community service. So at 6:30 tomorrow morning my friend and her son are picking up my son and me and we're driving half an hour (if it wasn't snowing, hopefully it won't take us an hour) to the soup kitchen and volunteering from 7 until 2 in the afternoon. And if that weren't enough yucks for my day. Chris will pick Robert and me up from the soup kitchen and we'll drop Chris off at the hospital, because Chris is having sinus surgery tomorrow. I'll drive home, situate the kids and drive back to the hospital to fetch Chris and bring him home. Hopefully we won't get so much snow that the only way to accomplish what I need to get done tomorrow will be with a dog sled. (I can guarantee that my old golden and the little basset are not good sled dogs). I am hoping to squeeze in a little knitting tomorrow.....if anything for my own sanity!

g'night all, the snow is sticking and tomorrow is going to be a busy day, I need my beauty rest!

It's Yarn (and magazine) day!!

What a surprise it was today to walk out to the mail box and find a package!! Thank you Susie, and I'm glad that your auction went so well that your hubby doesn't have to sell his pride and joy project!! 8 skeins of Elsebeth Lavold silky wool in black.....I'm thinking some kind of sweater top (short sleeve? sleeveless? plenty of time to figure out the particulars) a bunch of Interweave knits, some of which will be sent on their way to Belgium where I hear you cannot buy them. A lovely smelling candle (I don't think I'll burn it, I think I'll put it in with my yarn so that the yarn will smell purty too), and......some of the most lovely yarn for hospital hats!!!

Girl child "helped" me with my hospital baby caps today. We made a pom pom for the top of one, and she promptly spilled drops of blueberry juice on the cap, so it's freshly washed and is drying so that it can be pom pommed. I think tomorrow when I cast on the next hat I shall cast on the lovely new yarn. I had thought about trying to have 2 more hats done by Monday and dropping them off at the main hospital (I am a volunteer knitter for the same hospital, different location). But Monday is looking a bit crazy. Robert and I (and one of his friends and his mom, who happens to be a dear friend of mine) are leaving here about 6:30 am Monday morning to volunteer at the soup kitchen from 7 until 2. Chris will meet me in town and I will drop him off at the hospital at 3 for his 4:30 surgery (sinuses), I will (more than likely) go home, situate the kids, or bring them back to the hospital with me about 6 (I figure that B and K would think it very very cool to have dinner in the hospital cafeteria. Robert being a teenager, probably won't think it neat, I may leave him home to eat cereal). Hopefully Chris won't have to stay in the hospital very long and I'm hoping that I can have whatever prescriptions he needs filled done at the hospital pharmacy. No, I'm thinking that I'll just wait another week or two before I turn in the knitted hats. I'll probably be lucky just to remember my knitting!

One of those days.

You know, you plan your day. A trip to Farmers Market (the last one for the season), thinking you'll pick up a few veggies for the week, a couple of errands, a workout at the Y. You don't bring your knitting with you, because, after all, you're running errands and exercising for goodness sakes! You don't need to throw in your knit bag. Besides you can knit tonight. But what you don't plan is finding pickling cucumbers at the FM, you figured that the season was long over for those. When your mom was here you gave her a jar of your home made bread and butter pickles, leaving you with only 2 jars to last until next season. (it is your mother's grandmother's recipe you're using, so don't even mention those nasty excuses for bread and butter pickles sold in the stores). So you buy a couple of dozen pickling cukes and a bunch of onions, knowing that tonight you'll be slicing cukes and onions and salting them to pickle tomorrow.....bites into the knitting time, but you really don't like store bought bread and butter pickles (you picky thing you) and you've had a hankering for them and everyone that used to make them for you is dead, leaving.....work for you if you want them. And you do. Very much.

So. You pick your son up at the bus stop and you stop in to the neighbor's by the bus stop and ask her if she'd mind if you picked her apples, as the trees are loaded and it doesn't appear that she uses them. She says no she doesn't mind at all, that she's never done anything with the trees and gives you a couple of bags so you don't have to walk home and grab bags. So. You come home with 2 grocery bags of apples (I actually may go down and pick some more in a couple of days). With which to make applesauce (I was raised on home made applesauce, and if you haven't guessed home made pickles and all sorts of home made stuff, I am spoiled that way). B is planning....apple pies, apple crisps, applesauce. The boy is disappointed because there is going to be no apple pie tonight.

Where does knitting fit in here. You see, it doesn't. K and I went to Farmers Market, then to the mall for a short errand (think shoes and socks), then over to Target. We mustn't forget the quick stop in Hobby Lobby. The Miss K just thought she'd die if we didn't go to the Y. So she went into the child care (her idea of heaven) and I rode the bikes and lifted weights for an hour. I came home fixed dinner, helped with homework sliced up cukes and onions (I thank God for the mandoline my MIL gave me because she couldn't use it). I have merely gazed upon the 2 bags of apples, they can wait until tomorrow while the pickles are in the water canner. This is a night for knitting on a hospital hat. I can knit them in my sleep. I wondered how I'd manage when I set the bar for making one hat a week. I know it doesn't sound like much. Just one baby hat a week, all of the kids but one are in school so I have more (yea right) time. But you know, I can knit gifts, I can knit for the kids or for me. But that hat a week. That's my peace of mind. Yes, I've skipped a week here and there, but I've also knitted 3 hats in a week. I love walking into the hospital with those hats. I think the feeling is much like the one my mom feels when she sees a bald woman and asks "I hope you don't mind my asking, but do you have cancer? Would you like to have one of my hand knitted chemo caps".

And now, my faithful reader(s?) I am rambling because my eyes don't really want to stay open, I'm off to sip some tea and put another couple of rows on this darling lace (simple pattern I've been knitting so long I don't even keep a row count) baby hat. G'night

And here she is!!!

She's Finished!!

Never could decide upon a name to call her, but my FiberTrends Estonian Garden Scarf out of Knitpicks Alpaca Cloud. She's pinned to the livingroom rug blocking, hopefully tomorrow I'll have a chance to take a picture or 10 of her and post at least one here.

Over the weekend Chris bought me 4 balls of beige Kidsilk Haze and 4 balls of dark grey Kidsilk Haze. He's asked me a couple of times what I plan to knit out of it. Really I just plan to pull the yarn out of the bag and pet it. Hopefully I won't wear the yarn out before the perfect wrap pattern presents itself (perhaps one of the colors will be the Estonian Garden wrap...we shall see...).

Changing who can comment and other such things

I've not played with this blog much. I've had people say that they can't leave comments here, which suprised me as I didn't think that you needed an account to comment here.

My mom has been visiting for a week which means lots of busy-ness. Actually with the kids in school it just means a new twist on an old routine. She drove out in her sporty new little car (which my brother and I knew nothing about), and didn't have room to bring her usual assortment of junk and can't shop for a lot to take back with her. We've knitted and visited and toted kids around to various things. She was here to watch Robert get all gussied up for his first date and, of course, got to see K's dance class, and B's karate class. Her visit has sped by she'll be back at my house Sunday night then she's heading home.

My little ballerina girl

Miss K had her first "Twinkle Toes" dance class this past Wednesday morning. As we dressed her up for her "debut" I decided that to be a true ballerina girl she must wear her shrug. She was quite pleased with looking like a ballerina girl, but truthfully, she adores her tap shoes....so maybe she won't be ballerina girl, maybe she'll be tap girl.

Hey!! I can finish something!!!

I know, I know I finish quite a few things. But truly most of them have some sort of deadline. Kind of like that big report in school that needs to be done next Tuesday and no later than next Tuesday. I have felt like I've been knitting this top forever, and I was never going to finish it because I kept mucking it up and having to frog it and start again. For the most part I'm happy with it and while I was leary of the yarn (shine, or shimmer whatever one is cotton and modal from Knitpicks) because it sure did lint while knitting, it's washed up beautifully and I'll probably order some more. You can't complain about an unexpensive sweater!! So here's a picture of me and my new sweater (and new pants too, that the dog jumped up on and left some nice footprints) taken by my favorite 7 year old photographer.

Knitting and the great outdoors

I live in heaven, really, I do. Earlier this summer we bought (on sale!) a couple of Adirondack chairs for our back deck. Now my favorite morning activity is to take my breakfast, coffee and/or knitting out there to enjoy the great outdoors (another great thing about this altitude is no bugs to speak of). So, just for Heather, here is a photo looking south west from my back deck.

The sports car of knitting needles

In high school my first car was a 1965 Mustang. It was an early model manufactured in mid 1964, it never ran right and I spent an inordinate amount of time under the hood. I have always been happy to just have transportation, happy to get from point A to point B in one piece. Happier if that trip included comfort like a heater when it was cold and until we bought the car I drive now windows that rolled up and down to cool off the car. (I will admit I do love that air conditioning!). I've always felt the same about my knitting needles. Whatever I have on hand is fine the finished product will be the same if I knit them on $2 needles or $15 needles, right? Now, I do own a set of the Needle master needles simply because I wanted to have a collection of most of the sizes I use in one place. And I do like knitting on metal needles with sharp pointy tips. Plastic doesn't do much for me. I've looked at the Addi Turbo's and said "I'll never spend that much money on one needle". Then. I saw them. Size 8 12 inch circulars. I knit hats for the hospital, I knit them in the round and I get very tired of stretching them around a 16 inch needle or using 2 circulars. So tonight I fixed crow for dinner because this afternoon I forked out $11 and some change and bought my first pair of addi turbos. Do I like them? You betcha. The ultra short needle is a trip and not a natural lenth to work with, but boy I could see where with a longer needle you could just fly knitting on those babies. I'm hooked. But you see my friends, this is where my yankee nature comes in. As much as I love those needles I refuse to part with the money to buy them....I'd rather have yarn. So. Here's what I think. I think that I'll buy a set every now and again and just slowly replace the needles I use the most with addi's. Or maybe I'll just stick with my Needlemaster set with the really really sharp tips that I like.

And maybe just for yucks I'll see if I can once again post pictures here because it looks like the hubby has replaced the drive where the pictures go on this computer.....but not tonight, I'm tired......

Another pair of socks

I have heard of the "second sock syndrome" and how there are all of these socks where only the first sock has been knit with the second one never even casted on the needles. I have fought against this syndrome ever since I started knitting socks. I do not allow myself multiple projects until that blasted second sock is done. Today I finished the second sock (but I did NOT finish cleaning the bathrooms). Can't post a picture because the hub took the drive out that the camera hooks up to on the puter, so just suffice it to say that sock number 2 pretty much looks exactly like sock number one!!

Knitting for fun and/or profit

I am often asked "do you sell your knitting", or more specifically "do you sell your hand knit socks". Yea right, there's a whole line of people who are willing to fork out a small fortune for a pair of hand knit socks. I always want to smile and say "You know if I charged $35 a sock, it would be a bargain for the amount of hours I have invested", but I don't. I smile sweetly and offer to teach the question asker to knit. No, I don't sell my knitted goods. Every week I knit a hat for the hospital nursery, otherwise on my needles are things for my family or gifts for friends/family. If I am paid to do this it becomes a poorly paying job and takes the fun out of knitting. I don't know how others feel about this, maybe they knit faster than me, or have more time. But me? I think I'll stick to what I enjoy.

One lonely sock.......

Sock #1 came off my needles this morning. Jeanie Townsend's Cascading leaves pattern, Skacel Trampoline Stretch yarn. Now, one good sock deserves another and here is where I always have my knitting block. Depending upon how much knitting time I have and other outside factors, I've been staring at a sock for days/week(s)/months and that's just one sock. By the time I've finished sock #1 other projects are calling my name, not other sock patterns mind you, no. Lace patterns, sweater patterns all seductively calling to me from their glossy perfect pictures, saying "knit me next, knit me next". But unless I plan on losing a leg I must finish that socks buddy. Maybe this is why I always find the second sock so much quicker to knit, because there is another project calling to me. I'd love to say that it's willpower that gets me to finish up that sock. But if I had willpower I'd be a happy size 6-8 instead of a pudgy sized 12, no, it's not willpower.....it's cold feet. And now to cast on that second sock......Anyone want to bet that I can have it finished before my mother comes to visit in 7 days?

How to design a sweater.....kind of...

Make a sweater for yourself following a pattern. Listen to your 4 year old daughter when she says she wants one. Pull out your "Knitting From The Top" book and measure the girl. Write down said measurements and cast on. Here's the results:







She's rather pleased with the results. It was knit with one skein of Cotton-ease and is probably the cheapest sweater on the planet (cost me $3 for the yarn). I have another skein of the pink Cotton-ease and may just cast her on another sweater....

So many projects so little time...

or something like that.

I enjoyed knitting my tivoli. I have the yarn to make another, with a narrower neck and maybe a little more bust room. But Miss K wanted me to knit her a top. I found some nice pink Cotton-ease and using "Knitting from the top" by Barbara Walker I have cast on my child sized ballet necked top for her. I shall soon have a picture to post as a child size 4 is much faster to knit that a sweater for a pudgy middle aged woman.

At the moment on needles I have an afgan for my sister in law and her husband for Christmas...we'll see if it's Christmas of this year. The first sock of a pair for myself. A hat for the hospital and this little top for Miss K. I am fighting the urge to cast on another project.......(I really should finish Miss K's quilt....but that's another subject)

Tivoli finished!!

I am happy with how it came out. I knit it up using 6 skeins of Tivoli Aran weight denim yarn. I had better luck with this yarn than Grumperina did, only 2 splices in the 6 skeins I used. I've had worse luck with expensive yarn (I bought this yarn cheaply off of ebay so I have no idea what it's actual cost would be). I ordered some knit Picks Shine with which to knit another top like this one only I will customize the next one a bit to suit me a bit more (narrower neck).

All in all a great knitting experience...again...

Camping and knitting, knitting and camping

We left Friday for a quick weekend in Ridgeway. It was supposed to be a relaxed long weekend (leave Thursday, return Monday), but Chris had problems at work (as seems to happen whenever we plan anything) so we left Friday and came back yesterday. Hardly seemed worth dragging the boat 6 hours each direction. But it was fun to get away (and much needed) and I love Ouray and that whole area. And I brought my knitting. When camping I always bring my knitting, something washable when it's finished just in case it picks up that "I've been camping and sitting in the campfire smoke" smell....I do not knit while sitting around the fire lest an errant ember burn a hole in my project. I knitted part of the trip up, and a couple of rounds on the way home and still have about 4 inches left on my Tivoli.

Yesterday morning sitting on the lake shore after my outing for a lap of skiing, I was happily knitting away and chatting with our camping buddy, when we noticed the rangers towing our boat back to shore. It seems that after Mr Ranger scolded Chris for making a wake in the no wake zone (our boat is a jet, and Chris swears that he wasn't making a wake that it's just the nature of the jet....read...Chris was making a wake) about 45 minutes later Mr Ranger had to tow the offending boat because it sucked up the tubes tow rope. So instead of getting to happily sit in the sun with my knitting. I got to drive the truck with the boat trailer down to the dirt ramp while the guys dragged the boat around the cove so that we could drag it out of the water. The boat is now safely in my front yard until we have time to cut/pry/pick the rope out of the intake......and my knitting is not finished.

Finally making progress. I think.

The Tivoli t-shirt is coming along. I'm to the waist decreases, from here on out it shouldn't be too bad, especially since I plan to take it camping with us and working on it while we're gone. I really should give credit where it's due. You can find the pattern and some lovely photos of finished ones at www. grumperina.com. She's used real people as models and really it's a quick knit (if you don't have a bunch of kids and a new dog to make sure you have little time to knit). I have to say that I was leary of the Tivoli yarn. I bought 11 skeins off of ebay for about $11 including shipping, so we're talking cheap. I'd read a not so glowing review and that's about all I had to go on as far as this yarn goes (and I read the review long after I had 11 balls of the stuff staring at me). I've wound 5 skeins into balls and have only found one splice, the dye job on the skeins I bought seem to be pretty uniform. My only gripe is each skein only has 95 measley yards and that it's not machine washable. I have a front load machine and I wash everything in it and this sweater will be no exception. This next week I should have some "shine" yarn from Knitpicks, which is machine washable to knit this top up in. My daughter has already told me I have to knit her a sweater next to match mine. At the tender age of 4 years I love that she wants me to make her clothes.

A "Fast Knit" sweater that takes me forever

I downloaded a pattern from the internet. The Tivoli t-shirt. Seamless top-down, my favorite type of sweater. I don't like to do seams so whenever I can I convert whatever pattern I'm doing to knitting in the round anyway. I like top-down sweaters because I can try them on as I go and adjust the arm holes and other such fun things. I have started this darn project about 4 times before getting it right. I was beginning to think I'd never get past row 20. So, casting on and ripping out have dominated a great deal of time for this project. I am now up to row 27....10 more rows and I can begin the waist shaping. I am having better luck with the yarn than the pattern maker had with the yarn, hopefully my luck will hold and I'll finish this sweater/top in this lifetime. Hopefully it will look as good on me as it does on the "real people" models from the site where I found the pattern.....

Goodbye nana

I know this is my knitting blog, and this entry has nothing to do with knitting, but it's my blog and I can put this here if my heart tells me to.

My nana passed away this morning. She was 91, the last of her brothers and sisters to depart this earth. She was 4 feet 11 inches tall and weighed about 100 pounds. She was a terrible driver (she got her license when my mother was in high school), and a pretty good, old fashioned cook. She had been pronounced dead 4 times just before she got pregnant with my mom, but just after my uncle had been born (this time she's really gone). My grandpa said she was a lot different after that illness. She was always different, kinda like she was sorta senile, if that makes sense. She learned to swim and water ski when she was in her 50's. Ski first, learn to swim later...and the only stroke she knew was the side stroke. She used to jump into the water when us kids (her grandkids) were putting on our ski's, no matter how cold the water was she'd yell "Oh, the water is just heavenly". I remember begging her to get back into the boat so that we could yell "hit it" and get up on our ski's and out of the cold cold water.

There are so many many stories, she was a colorful little person (no she was not a dwarf, she was just short, tall in her family was anyone over 5'4"...which is my height, at 5'7" my sister and brother are practically giants.

So when I actually cast something onto my needles that I don't knit 2 inches of and then frog, I will be back. Perhaps with more stories, maybe not (since I'm the only one I know, except my sister, who reads this blog, it will be merely to jog my memory and entertain myself).

Boring projects, new dog = uninspired knitting

Shortly before Christmas my mom decided to knit up a couple of afgans. She raved about how fast they were to knit. Six (or seven) skeins of Light and Lofty, size 17 needles, 100 or so stitches, knit each row until it's the size you want. Yea.....well, I find garter stitch about as exciting as watching paint dry in an empty room with no windows. But....think of it!! A Christmas gift for Greg and Lesley that their kids can't break!! Something that (in thery) they could use!! So off I run to my least favorite store on the planet for some of this cheap yarn and I find some size gi-normous 17 circular needles and cast on 104 (just to be different) stitches. And you know what? It's boring, and because it's boring it's slow. And I am bound and determined to have this damn thing done in time for Christmas!!! And if I ever lose my mind enough to actually say "Why, yes I think I will knit an afgan", someone remind me of how much fun it is, or at least hand me something with some pattern in it so that I can exercise my little mind!!!

Just call me the frog queen

Thought I'd make "Tina" from the Berroco free pattern site. Cast it on in Tivoli Aran Denim cotton and knitted up about 3.5 inches of it. Looked like it was going to fit, but.......everytime I'd switch from purl to knit the first knit stitch was larger than the rest and try as I may I couldn't get it to come out to my liking. Now I know that Chris would say "No one but you would notice"...but he's WRONG!!! Every knitter I know (which, I grant you, is not many) would notice. So I frogged it tonight and will make a nice cardigan or something that won't have weird stitches.....eventually.....

Bursitis=very little knitting

I don't know if I slept wrong last night or what, but today my arms ached. My shoulders, my right shoulder, has a tendency for bursitis. Lifting weights has helped, but I've not lifted for about 3 weeks and tonight my right arm is aching. I'd hoped to cast on for a sweater out of the tivoli yarn I found on ebay. Love the yarn, hopefully will love the sweater....not enjoying the forced rest. Ug!! Motrin has brought the ache to merely dull, it's kind of on the hairy edge so I'm afraid to push it much. So that is the knitting content for tonight....me....whining.

Well, lookie there!!

Well, maybe (finally) this can become a knitting blog.

The tank I'm wearing in this bad picture taken by my 7 year old is from the Berroco site. It is their "Tank of Many Colors" as knitted in some mercerized cotton I bought at Hobby Lobby. I'm sure it would be nicer (much nicer) in the yarn it called for, but my pocketbook said no. Besides, I still have small kids meaning that anything I wear must be washable. The skirt was my find up in Denver yesterday, the lizards spoke to me.

Oy!!

Here I am....again.....brought here by leaving a comment for someone on knitty. I really really need to learn more about the computer....and just what it is I want from a blog.

Dinner time at the Cherice house so I'm off and knitting...er....cooking....

How many blogs does one need?

I had thought about keeping this one for just knitting, but I guess that would require that I come here once and a while. It's not like I have readers here....and usually I end up here only by accident. And with a blog about knitting it might be nice to say....post pictures and folks, I barely know how the camera works posting pictures on my other blog is just beginning to be a little easier (I no longer think that it's magic when I get one posted) So, we'll see what I do here. In the meantime I'll keep the blog I've paid premium to, and that I understand and perhaps I'll figure out what I'm doing.