Month: November 2006

I haven’t posted or been commenting much on your blogs because I have been fighting with many retarded programs on my computer.  So, I spent the last 2 days fixing things. They are not totally fixed but well enough that I can return to cyberspace.

Knitting tonight at the Java Station will be fun, as usual. I am taking my spinning wheel tonight, hopefully Molly’s husband will join us to spin on his new Lendrum too.

My sock class at Knit & Pearl finished this last Tuesday and the ladies did a wonderful job on their first sock. I must say it turned out to be a great class to teach and I am so glad that I did it. Too bad one sock got eaten by a dog, it really happened, the dog ate her homework. But she did a good job saving the sock even though she had to buy new dpn’s to finish.

I will be teaching a beginning sweater class starting in January, that one will be a hoot I am sure!

The Shedir hat is moving right along for George. His is the only one I will get done for our Christmas trip. I am using knitpicks Telemark yarn and I do believe I love that yarn. It’s smooth and a nice wool to work with. It doesn’t feel like it is going to pill like the Merino Style or Wool of the Andes.

I have a good friend who’s daughter is getting married in January and she needs a matching stocking to hang for her future son in law. I am going to help her out by embroidering his name on a stocking that she bought that matches the rest of the kids stockings. I will post some pics of the progress once I get it started. Which will be my entire morning tomorrow so they can actually have it to decorate with.

Okay, I am off to get my wheel in the car and ready to go!

 

I really thought this long weekend would get me a sweater or some other amazing finished project. No, but it did get some Christmas presents done and out of the way. Ones I had forgotten about, procrastinated on, made to replace already knit gifts that I now think are totally too cheesy. I organized, ripped out projects I had long abandoned (and really, really needed the needles from). I got all of my roving spacebagged and put away so it wasn’t overflowing with all that extra air (come on, who needs all that air?).

I do have the front of a sweater done for George. He likes to call it Rohan, we are very LOTR dorky around this here house.

Real name: Lars from Rowan 36 using Rowanspun Bulky (from Summers, thankyouverymuch)

One of the christmas gifties is going to my niece Sydney, who is 1 1/2 years old. I decided that I loved my hooded scarf from Knit2Together so much that I would mimic the pattern for a cute, smaller, toddler version. Kids don’t do so well keeping the scarves on so this one needed a little help with a button. I used a simple row of chains down one side of the scarf as buttonholes.

Wanna see it on a kid?? Prepare yourself, he’s not a toddler anymore folks.

I think we stretched it out a bit but it’ll be fine I am sure. You get the gist of how it works now right? good.

And I went a bit meathead crazy for other nieces and nephews.

I have 2 more nieces to make & then I am done.

As far as getting my family’s hats done? Not gonna happen anytime before Christmas. I will do my damndest to get George’s done so he can have it for skiing. This is where it was at as of last Wednesday,

it’s about 15 rows further along now.

I also started my sock from theknitter.com’s November sock of the month. I actually cast on right away this month. I haven’t knit any other month yet and I signed up last May or something. None really struck my fancy. But this pair I hope to have done soon.

Size 0 needles, silk/wool sock yarn, leaf and rib pattern

Tomorrow night is my final sock class. We get to do toes, fantastic! It’s been a learning experience but I must say I feel like I did an alright teaching job. Kinda surprised myself on that one. Well, that is about it for now. Hope everyone had a lovely holiday weekend & got TONS of fibery goodness done!

 

And there is a lot to it. I have been a busy little project bee. I find myself rather discontented with what sweaters are on the needles right now so I have been flitting from project to project without accomplishing anything. I needed a quick fix. As I opened up my Knit 2 Together book I realized I have a trip coming up to a very cold region of the US. Living in Santa Barbara I have very rare occasions when I need warm items; scarves, gloves, mittens. So I don’t knit them for myself so much. But then I laid eyes on the hooded scarf. Perfect! And I have more than enough lamb’s pride worsted in Kiwi to make the hooded scarf and a set of mittens for the trip. So I cast on on Saturday not expecting to get too far considering it was 2×2 rib. But by the time I went to bed I had the scarf almost finished. Sunday after church I hurried to pick it up and finish. By 4pm I had it totally completed~ voila!

Here is a side view of where I had to sew the hood down to the scarf. It’s not an even sew down. You want to gather the hood just a tad when you sew it down to the scarf so it will give it a bit of a round shape to fit around your head nicely.

Here you can see it laid out flat to get a better idea of the construction of the hood and scarf. I love it!

I even got one mitten completed last night. Nothing fancy schmancy. I just wanted mittens to match.

I made the cuff extra long so it will stay in my jacket sleeve.

I also felted the brown flowered pouch that I knit ages ago. I will need to trip the top edge to it is perfectly straight before I sew a zipper in.

And, Saturday night when Tracy and I opened to front door to walk her to her car there was a package sitting there. Ripped it open and what came out?

Tube socks!

How brilliant is this kit?? It’s just too much fun for words.

And I joined the Meathead Hat knitalong that I found over at Stitch Marker

I still need to embellish the hats, sew in ends, etc. but here is what I have done so far.

From left to right, top to bottom: pink Lamb’s Pride Bulky- one skein, magenta HPY bulky wool- one ball, brown multi Lopi- 2 balls, green Eco-Wool- scraps from my lacey hooded sweater

So as you can see I have been knitting plenty, it’s just not a finished sweater ;o)

I have been meaning to do this for a while now. First I will confess, I have adult acne. Proactiv and all those other snazzy programs do not work. So I have been on the hunt for the past year (longer really) for a foundation/makeup that will cover the acne that won’t go away.

This is a photo procession to show that I have found a solution (to at least cover it up since there is nothing that actually makes it go away I have decided).

Voila, Bare Escentuals arrived on the radar. Fine, I said, Fine. I will spend the frickin’ hundred dollars for the kit and hope beyond all hope that it works.

Now listen, I am putting myself out there with this one. You will be scared of the pizza face but hopefully you can take this information and pass it on to anyone in your life that is afflicted with adult acne. It sucks, by the way.

First, my face washed without any makeup on.

Second, just the foundation applied:

Third (and final so you all don’t have to see this mug anymore ;o)), all makeup applied:

Pretty miraculous huh? I think so. So I thought I would share. I know the photos are a bit large but I wanted to really make it obvious the greatness of this makeup. So there you have it.

SO I sat down last night to finish spinning up the last of Tracy’s Maple Sugar roving. After about 10 minutes of spinning the drive band finally gave way and snapped off the wheel. sigh. Sadly I thought I was going to have to drive to Solvang Village Spinning & Weaving frantically first thing this morning to purchase a new one. Then, as I am talking to Tracy on the phone and playing with the broken band, I realize that I can just heat it and melt it back together. I wasn’t sure I could get it hot enough so I used my hottest burner on my gas stove to heat both ends, remove from heat for a second, heat again, remove, heat again until the whole of the end was molten plastic ready to be smushed together. IT WORKED! Here are the ugly but very, very useable results.

Man was it hard to get a picture of this at night inside. But it is the best my retarded camera can do. I let it sit for about 15 minutes to really set after I got it back on the wheel while I came out to the computer to order myself a new band. And behold, I found a whole new site that I had never shopped from. The Simpson & Co. store, www.cyberfyber.com.  Not only did they have a band for a great price, they sent it with free shipping and no other handling charges. I got it for the stated price! Such great service! Now, if I had ordered another item as well I would have had to pay shipping but how nice is it to not have to worry about some outrageous shipping fee for a small, lighweight item that should only cost 78cents to send anyways. And they have fiber. Good prices on good fiber. And they have Euroflax in all weights and colors available on cones. It was a good find of a store!

So now the last 2 hanks of the Maple Sugar yarn are drying, I will take them to Tracy tonight before my class starts at Knit & Pearl. I am teaching them the heel tonight. Flap, gusset & decreases.

George was supposed to fly home last night but his flight from Reno to SF was delayed due to weather so he was going to miss his flight from SF to SB. He decided to stay the night with his sister and catch the first flight out this morning. He will be home in just 2 hours! Yay! I like my husband. a lot.

Oh & I ripped out the VK Lacy Top out of the Noro Cash Iroha. I couldn’t get the shaping right having my gauge so far off. Then it dawned on me, why don’t you just write your own pattern for it using all the little details you love about the top? dumbass. So that is what I shall do. Maybe not today but soon.

Seeing as how George was out of town for the weekend and I get very lonely, I decided to have Tracy & Summers over for a casual dinner/knitting/spinning/talking/yarn buying afternoon & evening on Saturday. It was so nice to “entertain”. Even the kids did alright. No major incidents. Poor Summers isn’t used to the loudness of children so it was funny to all of a sudden “hear” the noise in my house that I have become deaf to.

Summers brought over all of her Lizard Ridge squares & we had fun laying them all out in different color patterns so that she had a plan to sew them together. Our plan was to work on sewing them together but that just didn’t happen this week. Maybe another day planned? Tracy’s hostessing next time around! wink wink

Summers brought over a bunch of yarn from her stash that she decided she did not need to have anymore. Tracy & I purchased some of it from her (and I know she has more at home that I MUST HAVE, hint hint). Much lovely HPY yarn, Noro, Rowan, Lorna’s Laces (which Tracy took). Just fantastic yarn! Here is what I took:

Notice how most of it is HPY? Yeah, no surprise there. There are 8 balls of Noro Cash Iroha. I cast on promptly for the Lacy Top out of VK.

The gauge is nowhere close so I just cast on less (makes it a faster knit anyways) and will adjust the pattern shaping throughout so that I get the fit that I want. This is one that I can’t wait to have & will wear all the time. Fantastic isn’t it??

I spent most of Saturday spinning more of the Maple Sugar roving for Tracy. In total there are 450 yards now done. I think that is what I will work on today when I get the chance.  

And I got one hank (with 9 more on the way) of Rowanspun Chunky in a gorgeous green colorway.

I am really hoping it will be enough for another Starsky. I need to do a gauge swatch to see if I can get it to match. If it doesn’t it will become a sweater for George. Nice huh? Maybe this one will actually fit him.

doubtful

What is it that I can’t make a sweater to fit this man? I take measurements, I design a pattern, it does not fit. He is not abnormally shaped, just very muscular with a long torso. I can do the same thing for just about anyone else and have it fit, but oh no. Not him. This cycle has to stop! He has 5 sweaters that don’t fit him. 1 that does. That is sad. just plain sad. Half from patterns, half my design (usually in the round). I must have success soon with him or I may just give up completely.

Knitting goals for this week:

-Finish back of the Rebecca cabled sweater

-Finish back of the VK Lacy Top

Spinning goals:

-Spin the rest of the Maple Sugar roving

Tada! Look how short my lists are! Gotta love easy goals!

 

 

I posted a new photo to WorksinProgressPhotos.