Still Alive

Enter the ICHC online Poker Cats Contest!

Actual post to follow at some point. Really, I promise.

Socks and Shoes

I have yet again started a pair of socks. I cannot begin to tell how many times I have have started a sock in the past few weeks and it has just not worked out. I was really starting to think that I that have lost my sock mojo. I have had this beautiful Lorna's Laces Shepard Sock sitting around for nearly a year, worked and frogged and worked again. I positively love this colorway, Flames, but I could not find a stitch count that would keep it from pooling in the worst way. Much to my delight this pattern is working brilliantly with it. My gauge seems spot on and what I've done thus far fits nicely. By golly, I think I'm knitting a sock!



I hate shoe shopping. I have flat feet and an arthritic toe, shoe shopping hurts and it's frustrating. I have shoes that I have worn for years and hang on to for dear life because they are comfortable and I have such trouble finding good shoes. Imagine my delight in happening upon this pair and finding when I tried them on for kicks that not only did they fit, but they were comfortable, and cute, and on clearance. I think they will look damned adorable with some knit socks.

Back to the socks: I'm doing the Fawkes pattern, on my new KnitPicks Harmony DPNs. I love these needles. They are smooth and sleek and work quickly, while having the comfort of wood. Someday I will have a full set of these. They work great for my socks, and for my lace. I just got a circ in the mail today to put Icarus on, I've been sitting here sproinging and flopping the cable, the join looks wonderful, I may actually finish that shawl at some point now that I have them. Need More Harmony!

Happy Caturday!

moar funny pictures

WIP it, WIP it Good

It's Wednesday, let's take a look at what I'm working on.


Print o' the Wave, using that gorgeous Malabrigo lace I bought the other day.

I didn't intend on working this shawl just yet. I just wanted to try out my new Knitpicks Harmony tips, and my sister hasn't given the thumbs up on the yarn I picked for her Juno Regina yet, so I cast on this one. I was only going to work one repeat to see what I thought and them put it up for later. Yeah right. Done laughing yet? Good.

Pictured here is ten repeats and change of the center panel. I'm doing the center all in one piece, rather than the two pieces grafted together. I just don't like the look of the seam in the middle. I think I'll have to cut out a couple of repeats as well. I've read a number of complaints that the pattern is short on yardage. I have 940 yards so I'm hoping it will be enough. I know the edging is 40% of the yardage, so I'll work the center until I have a little more than 40g left of the 100g I started with and cross my fingers that it comes out. I will cry if it doesn't. Seriously.

Icarus is pouting in the corner. Sorry, buddy. I've ordered some size 3 Harmony circs, I really don't like the needles I'm using for him, I think I'll go faster with the Harmony. I'll get back to him eventually.

Caturday!

Mino says "HI!"



Spooky just wants to be left alone in his box.



Ok, there, my cats, I am now a crazy internet cat lady. Hooray.

Am I Not Beautiful?

It's Friday, I think some Yarn Pr0n would be in order.

Malabrigo Merino Lace/Emerald

I had a great time shopping yesterday, checking out an LYS I hadn't been in before because it's way out of the way in the next city over. I found a number of gems, not in the least an amazing amount of Noro, scary crazy piles of the stuff. I would have adopted them all and brought them home and loved them and hugged them and called them George (yes, all of them George), but I am on a budget here, so no.

I could not resist the call of the Malabrigo, sitting there so seemingly innocent on the shelf, sweetly wound into it's little skein. I had to have it.

I don't know what it is about Malabrigo. The colors are so rich and the fiber is so soft, it is irresistible. I even have a pattern in mind for these particular specimens, Eunny Jang's Print o' the Wave. I just need to finish Icarus, do my sister's Juno Regina, clean the house, mind the kid, and apply for school. Not to mention the whole list of other patterns calling my name.

(Oh yeah, I think I've talked myself into going back to school, more on that later)

Bother

OK, I admit it. I have lost my mojo. I have a case of startitis that you don't even want to know about. Nothing is working out right. I have been caught in the knitting doldrums.

So, I dug out my Icarus Shawl. I've had this thing hanging around for a year and a half. When I started it I was in love. Oh, the yarn was so soft and glowed with an inner beauty. So light, so ephemeral. And them the basement flooded and I realized that the silt that now covered every square inch of the floor was the very same color of my shawl. The very same color that I reveled in was now nothing more to me than dirt. That spoiled me on the shawl. I worked on it a bit more, but I had lost my enthusiasm and eventually I gave up and put it away. Occasionally I would bring it out again and work a few rows, but it never caught me again the way it had before and back into the closet it would go.



So, I have brought it out again in the hopes that an old project can shake me out of my funk and maybe I can actually finish that thing. I have two more charts and the edging to go. I'm concerned though, I fear I don't have quite enough yarn, and it's a discontinued color. Granted I could finish off the edge in a different color, there is one that would look nice, but I can't shake the feeling that this shawl is doomed.

I am determined to finish it. I will, and it will be grand, warts and all.