It Has Been Snowing All Freaking Day

No accumulation, just a day-long veil of falling snow. Very dreary and depressing.



I decided to knit a pair of fingerless mitts for the young daughter of a friend who is the child in her family not causing all sorts of problems. She saw some that I was wearing yesterday and said, "Did you make those? Oh, I'd like some one day." in a quiet voice. How could I resist? I had some Lion Wool in the stash the perfect color for a 10 year old girl. I dug up the simple pattern to knit them in the round and cast on after supper last night. I got the first one done before noon today and got the second onto the needles right away. I hope she likes them.

(Just so you know, I cut the number of rounds between decrease rounds in half so that the wrist warmers don't go all the way to the elbows; I knit them that short all the time.)


Here's the second Ugly Bunny pincushion, already handed over to its new mom.

All Winter, All The Time

Durwood took more pictures yesterday and I have to share them with you. He captured the male cardinal sitting in the birdie tree, looking all red and cheerful.






I filled the birdbath yesterday morning and it was windy and it must have blown water out. Look at the cool icicle it made!















I'm working steadily on my Khaki Cardi. There's no way I'm finishing it by the time the Olympic Torch is extinguished on Sunday but I'm very pleased at my progress. I know it looks short, but when I hold it up to me, it's just right.






And last night I couldn't resist. It's another Ugly Bunny. I'm so bad.

Ugly Bunny!

I love him. He's a pincushion.

Durwood managed to take over 5 minutes of video of our neighborhood sharpshinned hawk grooming him/herself on the fence in back, and he took these pictures of it with the digital camera. If we could figure out how to suck the video out of the camera, find it on the computer and put it on here I'd do it, but so far we're lost in our middle-aged, not-too-techy world. Maybe we can rent a kid...

We got more snow. I don't really want more snow, but it'll be good when the Friday Night Knitters go snowshoeing the first Sunday in March. I'll post pictures. I promise. During the last warm spell the birdie tree fell over so I leaned it on the honeysuckle. I've been spreading peanut butter on the branches and just sprinkling it with birdseed and discovered that I can dispense with the pb and just use the seed. It gets caught in the needles and the juncos have a blast.

What's the Opposite of Monogamy?

I am really struggling with Olympic Knitting project monogamy. Evidently I have severe KPADD (Knitting Project Attention Deficit Disorder) so that I've stopped, or really slacked off, knitting on my cardi because it's the only project I've got going. Well, not really, but it's the only one on top of the knitting project heap right now. The rest of the OTNs are big too. I don't have any small, colorful distraction projects going.



Or I didn't until day before yesteday. I linked to Shoveling Ferret's blog through Samurai Knitter's blog for commentary on the Egyptology news clogging the air these days, and while visiting Shoveling Ferret (killing time until my online Revision class started) I scanned her blogroll and found sukigirl who has challenged herself to complete one small craft project (not all yarn-related) every day in February. And on the very first day of the month she crocheted an Ugly Bunny pincushion. It's adorable. In a totally ugly and unlovable way, which is how you want something you plan to shove pins into, right? I was hooked. (Ha! Get it? Hooked? On a crochet project? Oh, nevermind...) So Sunday night I pulled out some variegated yarn and a small hook and started. I got about halfway down the body and realized that it was just too big and this is one project that doesn't benefit from variegated yarn. *gasp* Monday morning before work I frogged it and dug out some solid skein remnants and started the "purse charm" size. It's perfect. I keep running out of yarn colors but I'm just pushing forward with the next color and the next bunny-part. I can see that making these could be addictive.

Color Change!

I finallyfinallyfinally got 18" knit from the shoulder so I could change to the white for the next 2 inches. See the thin white line at the bottom? Yay!



Two inches of the white and then I change to black and knit two more inches to finish the body, then it's on to the sleeves. A little edging around the neck and, ta-da, I've got a sweater. A wool and cashmere sweater that I made myself. Nice.

Slow and Painful

I am working on my Olympic Knitting project every day, but I don't know if it's the needles, the yarn, or the way I purl, but too much working on it makes my hands ache. I'm getting a few rows done a day, 3 or 4 maybe, and that's a whole lot more than I've been doing so I'm happy with my progress. Not as happy, you understand, as I would be if I were, say, down to the place I want to add stripes at the bottom, but I'm getting there. Nobody's blowing out any Torch just yet.


Sunday night my hands were aching and so I thought I'd put the cardi aside for an evening and work on the Lava Shawl. I was on the fourth row of the lace section and I knew it wasn't right. I didn't have the correct number of stitches and the lace squares weren't lining up correctly. Nothing to do but pull it off the needles and frog back to the end of the stockinette section and start again. It was only four rows, after all. I got it ripped back and put on long straight needles, thinking that I could do the first few rows on them without the annoyance of a circular needle adding to the mix. I knit to the first marker just fine, but when I was coming up on the second marker I realized that I didn't have the right number of stitches, and I had counted that I had the correct number after the frogging--twice, so I ripped those few stitches back and put the whole thing back into time-out. I love the yarn and I like the way the pattern looks. I will triumph, just not today.

Yikes!

I spazzed out last night and joined the Yarn Harlot's Knitting Olympics, even though I said I wasn't going to. The planets aligned for my participation; I finished both the Carnival Sock and the Ribwarmer I was making for Durwood yesterday. If that's not a sign, I don't know what is.

I'm bending the rules a bit (okay, a lot) since I already have the sweater cast on and knitted to the armpits, but I've been pushing this project off for months, I knit a few rounds and then something quicker or more colorful catches my attention and I'm off. I'm hoping that signing up will keep me on task. And earn me a finished cardigan in 17 days! Wouldn't that be fantabulous?

Done! **edited**

It was a day to finish things. Funny how stuff comes to completion all at the same time sometimes. This morning before work I finished sewing the two halves of the Ribwarmer together and then I gave it to Durwood because he likes earthtones and he's always cold. Next time I'll make it a little bigger and figure out a way for him to close it in the front. But look how pretty it is!













It was so quiet today at the dive shop that I finished the Carnival Sock. And I learned something--my toes are not pointy. The pattern says to decrease down to 4 stitches and then Kitchener the toe. Well, look. See how pointy the sock toe is? My toe is not in there. I should have quit two rows sooner and had a wider toe, but this will work. Oh yeah, this sock will work. And now I have 6 worsted socks so I can wear them and not have one hanging around waiting for the others to be washed. **As I suspected, the leg of this sock is about 1 1/2" shorter without the heelflap, wearable but anyone considering switching to the short row heel (I'm looking at you, Dusty) better add more length to the leg.**

New Heel

Well, new to me anyway. I decided to forego the heel flap on this sock and put in a short row heel. I'm not convinced that I didn't shorten the leg of the sock by doing that, but it went fairly easily and I seem to have only one hole where I was picking up stitches. Pretty good for the first try, I think.


I'm on the foot now so I'll just keep knitting until my usual length and that should be good, don't you think? Seven and a half inches is the same whether you're measuring a short row heel or one with a flap and a short row turn. At least that's my theory, and I'm all about theories. At first I wasn't sure I liked the way this yarn is pooling but the more I knit on this sock the better I like the way it looks. Kind of reminds me of the way oil makes rainbows in puddles on the road.







I've rounded the second turn and am in the home stretch on the second half of the Ribwarmer. I am loving this yarn. Gorgeous rich colors.





Now I have to quit goofing off on the computer and write my piece of a collaborative story for The Incredibles, the group of women I spend a week with at The Clearing every fall. I am so not a team player. Durwood bought me a shirt that says "A Team Effort is a Bunch of People Doing What I Say," and I confess that it's totally true. Here I go.

In A Moment Of Weakness...

See yesterday Dusty came by the dive shop and we were talking about different sock heels and toe-up socks, and looking at YouTube videos of short row heels, and, well, I just got to thinking that I really need one more worsted sock since I have 5 and if 4 are in the wash like they are now, well, I can't wear the newest one because it has no partner. So that's why I had to cast on the Carnival Sock this afternoon. Had. To.

Also I wanted to try out a set of Boye metal DPNs I got last weekend. DD uses metal needles all the time and she likes them so I decided to try them. They're cheap too, only $3.99 for a set of 4.

Prunes

(It's what's for breakfast with my Special K; I couldn't think of a snappy title. Sorry.) Yesterday we got the decorative snow (2" and powdery, thanks) that I ordered so now the world looks nice and shiny in the sunshine. Sunshine! That's what's different today, the sun is shining. No wonder I feel so chipper.

I wasn't able to replicate last week's feat of completing the Advanced Obstacle Course on Wii Fit Plus today, but it wasn't for lack of trying. How can what is essentially an interactive video game be so engrossing? Especially for a woman who has never really liked to sweat? I don't know, but I can't stop. It's a good thing.




I've been working on my new version of the Brangelina Glove and learned a lesson yesterday, two actually. One is that you have to knit more rows if you use a smaller needle, and Two is that a paper clip makes a terrible yarn needle when you need to thread yarn through your stitches to finish a finger at work and you've left yours at home. Live and learn, live and learn.






I'm just starting to turn the second corner on the Ribwarmer. I just love this yarn and the way it's knitting up. The colors are warm and rich and I really can't wait to finish this piece so I can sew it together and it can start warming someone special. And, Zoe, this time I turned the first corner the right way so we won't have to unknit and reknit that little collar tab at the top. Whew. I think EZ might really be a genius. (For you non-knitters out there, that's Elizabeth Zimmerman who really made knitting popular in the mid-60s and beyond, and who developed a lot of simple but wonderful patterns that people still knit constantly. I'm especially intrigued by the ones that are a bit like origami; you knit a shape that doesn't really look like anything, then you sew it together in places and, voila!, you have a sweater. And she lived in Wisconsin!! Genius.)