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Knitalong Whore

This is what a friend called me the other day. It sounds wretched but, yeah, it's true. I have recently joined knitalongs for the Flower Basket Shawl, Recycling, Monster Slippers, Mariah (don't know if I'm going to knit it), Jacqueline Fee's Sweater Workshop Thing (just got the book yesterday), Greenalong, Scarf Style and Alison's Sockapalooza! What's wrong with me?

I'm still waffling on the yarn for the Flower Basket Shawl. I have some Elann yarn that might work. I was going to order some of the Baby Cashmere at Elann but while I was decided it sold out!

For the Recycling Knitalong, I will finally sew something together from the bag of felted thrift store sweaters that's been in my craft closet for over a year. I may also refashion an old sweater.

I finally finished the monster slippers on Saturday. I couldn't find the hot glue gun so good old Elmer's will have to do for now.


I have picked out a pattern and bought the yarn for Sockapalooza.

I am double-dipping on the Greenalong and the Scarf Style knitalong by making a Backyard Leaves scarf in green. But everything else I'm knitting is green too so I'm not really cheating.

*Updated*

Party Time

Wes was out of town for few days this week. Normally on Thursday nights I meet with a group of friends at a bakery to knit. Since I begged a friend/neighbor/fellow mom to sit for the boys while I was at work I didn't feel right asking her to stay for another two hours so I could go hang out. So in an inversion of the old adage, if Mohammed can't go to the knitting group, have the group come over to Mohammed's house. Seven of my best knitting buddies came over after I got home from work and knit with me. It was Molly's birthday on Friday so we had some goodies for her.


Marti was there too. Which was good for a few reasons. The first is that we love Marti. The second is that my boss loaned me her Lendrum single treadle folding spinning wheel(!) and Marti helped me set it up.


It was funny having everyone at my house. Even though I see them every week and we know each other so well we don't really see that much of each other's lives. We rarely meet each other's families, see each other's homes. I was so excited to have everyone over. I let the boys stay up a little late so they could come down and meet everybody. My four year old wanted to wish Molly a happy birthday too. We had a late night of knitting, chocolate and fun. I really enjoyed it.

I started my Retro Prep sweater too.

Spinning Snaps and More

Here are photos which go with some of the spinning I described.



This is my first attempt at 6 wpi (wraps per inch), then 8 wpi, then the pencil roving at 10 wpi.
And my latest attempt on the spindle which is even finer.


Here's the massive wheel of roving I got as a gift.


Here's the first half of the Fir Cone pattern scarf I'm working on for the shop.

What's New in Seattle

I still can't get the photos from my camera on to my computer. But I'm knitting and taking pictures. I will share them as soon as I can.

The monster slippers are still damp. I ran them in the dryer yesterday for about 40 minutes. And they are still damp! They will probably stay damp until July. Darned Seattle climate. (Oh and all of you with tons and tons of snow? I hate you. We have drizzle that may turn to snow in the middle of the night and turn back into drizzle in the morning. That's the best I can hope for--light slush. Sigh.) I will venture into the attic and attempt to find my glue gun. Hopefully hot glue will still stick to damp slippers.

I've been working on a new very small project. I am doing a one skein swatch/scarf for the shop in Lana Gatto's New Alpaca. It's so soft, so lovely. I chose another little lace pattern from 365 Knitting Stitches. This one is called Fir Cone. It's very easy although at some point watching Law & Order last night I misplaced a stitch and just kept on knitting. I had to rip several rows. But the scarf is only 31 stitches wide so it wasn't a big deal. I'm knit half the ball of yarn and then put the stitches on a holder last night. I will cast on for the second half today and then graft them in the center so the fir cones will all be right side up when it's worn. I wish I had done this with my Silk Garden lace scarf.

I have been thinking about my currents WIPs and have come to a decision...I think. I am going to abandon the Brown Beaded Socks. I will not complete all six socks for the Six Sox knitalong. I want to enjoy my knitting and this feels like homework now to me. But I feel badly. Like I'm quitting. I also decided I needed to start a new sweater. So I wound up my yarn for my Retro Prep sweater and I'm casting on right now. It will be some good mindless knitting which I can really use right now. A little break from lace scarves.

Clarifying the List

Okay, when I said I made 13 sweaters last year, I lied. I made 14. But I finished one on January 2nd so I really did all the heavy lifting on that one in 2003. And these were the first and only 14 sweaters I ever made. And two were baby sweaters. Let me recap for you.

In January, I finished Rosedale United.
In February, Banff.
In May, Lola and Lottie.
In June, the Shapely Tank and Rosy.
In July, Scrapenstein and the Norwegian baby sweater I made at camp (this is the one I forgot about).
In September, the GE Cardi.
In October, Rogue and a top-down baby sweater.
In November, Paula.
And in December, Butterfly and the Big Sack.

Shit. That is a lot of sweaters.

And I won't be gluing any eyes on monsters tonight because they are still damp! I even threw them in the dryer for a little while.

Eyes Acquired

I have giant google eyes in hand. Hot gluing will commence tonight!

2004 Knitting Wrap Up

Bags: 6
Hats: 13
Scarves: 2
Socks: 6
Dolls: 3
Sweaters: 13
Ponchos: 1
Sweat Pants: 1
Tiny Baby Mittens: 1

Wow, I had no idea I made so many hats. Or sweaters.

Cosmic Convergence

I signed up for a wheel spinning class in March. So I did what I always do when I'm interested in a new subject--check out everything from the library on that topic. I got a copy of this video and started watching it last night. I was trying to knit Backyard Leaves while I watched. I screwed up my pattern and I didn't understand anything on the video since it was created for someone watching while sitting in front of a spinning wheel. But I did watch the pre-drafting and drafting part carefully and today I grabbed my drop spindle. I have only used it once and not at all successfully. Today I did a bit better. I spun a small amount of roving I bought a while back. I was able to look up how to ply it and ended up with two tiny balls of burgundy yarn. One is about 10 wpi and the other is more like 5 or 6 (from the old attempt).

I was feeling very encouraged and pleased with what I had accomplished. I had to stop to go pick up my oldest son from school. When I got there he said, "Here." And handed me a wheel of pencil roving! He told me that one of his friend's dad gave it to him to give to me. He also mentioned that it breaks easily which he noticed when he pulled on it. When we got home I tried to get more of the story out of him. He said that it was a present for me because I'm such a good knitter and that there was more where that came from.

How crazy is this? The day I decide to try spindling again someone gives me roving! Nutty! The universe is a strange and mysterious place. I started spinning the roving immediately. It's spins so nice and thin. No drafting problems. I was late leaving for Purlygirls because I was so entranced.

Oh! Further craziness. Today I was playing with an anagram generator that I saw on Melanie's blog who saw it on Hillary's blog (which is great! Check out the amazing holiday robot cookies and this huge handmade stuffed bunny in pajamas.). I tried a few variations on my name with and without my middle initial. I came up with "Jess, Ira -- close." This was very funny because my dad's name was Ira. But the name of the man who gave me the roving is...Ira! Weird, huh? I also came up with "Here's Calais, Jose," "Lice Harasses Joe" and "Ass Coil Jeers." I must have been pretty punchy this morning because I thought that was so damn funny. For Rose-Kim Knits I got "Ike Kim Snorts," which is insanely funny because my father-in-law is named Ike Kim. Wes got "slimy wee elk."

I Was Very Bad

Yesterday was the Acorn Street Yarns New Year's Day sale. I met up with 7 other Thursday night knitters before they opened. We were the first ones there. That did not stop several people from walking in front of us to wait by the door. What is up with that? There were a few people there who deserved some sharp kicks to the shins. People shoved. One woman stepped over me as I was sifting through a bin of Debbie Bliss Wool Cotton and actually tried to push me out the way with her foot. What. the. fuck?

Anyway, I was armed with a list of yarn requirements for many projects I'm interested in. I thought I would probably only end up with yarn for a hat for Wes. Well...see, after I sifted through the Wool Cotton and did not find what I wanted I head to the Merino Chunky--for the hat--for Wes. But on the way, something caught my eye. It was a box brimming with this gorgeousness.



Noro Cash Iroha on sale for $6.99! Yes, cheaper than Wool Needleworks, where I'd been mooning over it earlier this week. So I got some. Okay, I got 15 skeins. I'm going to make the Curry Cable Cardigan from the Fall 2002 Interweave Knits. Oh baby!

After my cashmere/silk interlude I did head to the Merino Chunky and got Wes's hat yarn. I had to put back several skeins of Lorna's Shepherd Sock, also $6.99, because I'm already up to my eyeballs in sock yarn and I was already going to be overspending by a whole lot.

They also had Mountain Colors Merino Ribbon on sale. This stuff just rocks. It's soft. The colors are unbelievably divine. And it was $17.99 a skein. Fortunately for my bank account they only had two skeins left in Wild Raspberry. So I got one to make some sort of shawl/scarf/wrap something. I'm going to think long and hard about it. I want it to be really special.



We all did pretty well at the sale. One friend is going to make a v-neck raglan out of Lorna's Shepherd Sock. Won't that be awesome? She got China Blue and one skein of a variegated blue for the trim. That's going to one great sweater.

We headed to a very nice lunch at Atlas Foods and then found a table in the cafe at Barnes and Noble to hang out and knit. We were very surprised to see Marti sitting at the table next to us. She had also been at the sale with some other knitting friends. I only brought my Brown Beaded sock to work on. The beading has been deadly slow. It was driving me insane. I was finally getting into a groove with it when I ran out of beads! What? Then I remembered that I added a pattern repeat because the original seemed really small. So I was only able to do six of the ten rows of beads. I can't say I was that broken up to be done with the beading early. I'm making the socks short and finished knitting the leg and started the heel flap last night.

I knit Wes's hat last night too. I think it came out well. It's very dense and warm.


I really like the swirly decreases.

Today was inventory day at the Fiber Gallery. We counted and counted and counted and counted for six hours. But it's all done now and the store looks gorgeous.

And one last thing, I saw this photo at Got Yarn and I just have to ask. What is this picture all about?

Is this two friends chatting or a snapshot of Girl Bar from the mid-80s? It seems kind of odd to me. I don't usually go out to chat with a friend wearing just jeans and a handknit scarf. Have I been watching too much of The L Word?

Eyeless in Seattle

I felted the monster slippers today. They are, er, interesting looking. I ran to the craft store to get the fun foam, red felt and google eyes. They had the felt and the foam but they didn't have the right size eyes. I ran to another store and struck out again. I really hope I find them in Seattle. I would suck to have to mail order a $1 item. I'll probably still have to pay $6 for shipping!

I also knit two more afghan squares while watching the second Lord of the Rings tonight. Man, those extended versions are long.

Happy New Year!