The prodigal blogger returns

Bliss is done. Heavyweight STR, 2 skeins, and lots of entrelac. It'll be a long time before I want to do entrelac again, but I'm glad I did this. It just got to be really boring, and hard to work on towards the end (ok, the middle and the end). My other two wips right now are Salto, and the February Lady sweater. I know just about everyone in the internet knitting world is making this sweater, and I can see why. It's fun, easy, and extremely cute. I'm making mine out of Malabrigo the pearl colorway. I'm already dreaming of some shell buttons to go with it.

It does have a little more pink than the picture shows, and is coming along nicely. The sock has been trying my patience since Sea Socks. I keep doing the cables backwards. I think it may be some of dyslexia coming out; I just can't seem to follow the directions. As a matter of fact if you look closely and see that I'm in the middle of knitting the cable back up to where the rest of the stitches are because, I knit them backwards. I will have a beautiful pair of socks...eventually. This picture really doesn't do the color justice. It's much brighter in person. This is Neighborhood Fiber Co. that Pam gave me before we left on the cruise.


I bought a new wheel. I sold my Kromski to a girl in my knit group before I left on the cruise for some extra spending money since I never spun (and really didn't get along with it). Then I visited Emma (also on the cruise) in Seattle, and she tempted me with her Lendrum. It was love at first site...maybe that should say spin? I wasn't going to cave then I noticed Nikki from my knit group had one, and it was all over from there. It's a lot of fun, and so much easier than the Minstrel. That wheel just wasn't for me. I've been spinning up such a storm that I've joined the Tour de Fleece (also prompted by Emma) and have already spun my beginning yarn today. I don't foresee spinning every day to be a problem except that we're going home the weekend of the 11th. I just have to decide if I want to drag the wheel home, or just take the spindle. It'll probably be the wheel. So my first few skeins of handspun are looking pretty good.


They're posted in order. The red is some mill ends merino that came with the wheel. The middle is some superwash bfl (I think?) that I bought at PKF from Artsygal. The last is some Targhee that was a lot of fun to spin, and is definitely more consistent than the rest. The last two are navajo plied which was so much easier than I thought. Right now I'm spinning some superwash merino that I'm hoping to turn into a 3 ply sock yarn. We'll see how that comes out.

I think that's about all the knitting related content I have! I know I haven't actually talked about the cruise at all, but honestly I'm still at a loss as how to describe it. It rocked. The people, the places, the classes; it was a lot of fun, and I'm so glad I had the opportunity to do it. I don't think I'll be making it this year for a few reasons. I will (along with DH this time) be trying to make more trips up to the Pacific NW as well as Alaska. They're just amazing places.

So what knit blog entry is complete without the cute kitties picture? This is so unusual I had to grab a photo. They're just not this cuddly or sweet to each other normally.

Dyslexic I am.

It wasn't until a day or two after my last post (and a few re-reads) that I realized I posted 'Stash your Flash' instead of the other way around. Oh well, you guys understood; that's all that matters.

So, I've been promising pictures of my entrelac baby blanket, right? Here it is. BMFA STR Heavyweight in Hoofle Foofle. Pay no attention to every picture currently on the internet of this yarn. It is not yellow. It's more of a dreamsicle orange. Luckily the mother I'm knitting this for likes orange as well as yellow. I like the pattern; it's pretty straight forward. Entrelac is a lot easier than it seems. If you can increase, decrease (specifically ssk and p2tog) and pick up stitches then you can do entrelac. So far I'm just supremely annoyed by how much I have to turn the work. I did teach myself to knit and purl backwards to help, but trying to do the mistake rib (not to mention an ssk) bacckwards has proved difficult, so I'm saving that for one side.

I also started a pair of socks from the yarn I talked about last week. It is rather springy, and fun. I also am trying 2 socks on 1 circ a la 2-at-a-time Socks by Melissa Morgan-Oakes. So far, so good. I like the patterns in the book, and the method seems fairly straight forward. It's a method using a cuff down construction, so I think I'll likely be more successful since I understand how that works a lot better than tow ups. The pattern is a slip stitch, and I think it's going to be really cute in the yarn; I had a good 2-3 inches finished when I realized the socks were going to be too small for my feet. I ripped them out and started again; these are definitely for me cause I love this colorway.

This week's SPS comes to you from my friend Pam. Last August when she was showing me around her stash (and yes, I mean around) she pulled out a bin full of STR. I started pawing it as I had never seen so much of it in one place. I pulled out this particular color; oohing and aahing over. She told me to take it as she had never really been that into it anyway. 8D I had known this woman for less than 3 hours, and here she was *giving* me a skein of STR. Pam seriously rocks, and I'm way excited to be going on the SeaSocks cruise with her (and Emma, and Sobe). We're going to have a blast.

So, this is Pink Granite, and I'm pretty sure it's mediumweight. No clue when or what pattern, but it sure is pretty just sitting there in the mean time!

Stash your Flash!

Ok, quick and dirty since I'm at work.

A couple weeks ago I photographed all my sock yarn individually. I did a group photo just for this purpose. I tried to make a cute shape, but it proved harder than I thought.


Photo may or may not have been enhanced with Photoshop to define shape a bit. No comment. :)

I have a lot of sock yarn.

SPS II

You should be proud of me. Week 2 of SPS. I don't usually do schedules very well, but on a day where I'm typically lounging around not doing much anyway it seems to work for me.

This is UnionCenterKnits Whatnot Sock Yarn in Laura IV. I love this colorway. Anything with these bright greens and pinks or purples is a must have for me; I just can't resist. It's squishy, and has about 450 yds of 75% superwash merino and 25% nylon. I think this may be my next socks as it's been marinating in my stash for a while, and it seems like a perfect spring color. I imagine it'll knit up to look a bit like a spring garden. This was the product of searching through etsy one night. That's a dangerous place over there. I pretty much stay away from etsy these days for that reason. Too much temptation.

Anybody have any pattern ideas for me? Cristi left me a great comment last time about using my sock yarn for Fair Isle. I made the Three Tams from Knitty in January. I did Tam B using Silk Garden and it came out beautifully. I get compliments on it every time I wear it. I think she could be onto something with the Fair Isle. I'll have to think on it some. This I definitely want to be cute socks though, so if you know the perfect pattern please enlighten me.

In other news, I'm still slaving away on Bliss. I promise a picture for you next time. My friend is due April 26th, and this is the blanket that Brie will be wrapped in to come home. There's a whole story; have I told you? I honestly can't remember. Well, I'll check and if not then I'll tell you all about it when I finish it. I've learned to knit and purl backwards for it. I don't know if it's actually going any faster, but at least I don't have to turn the work every 10 stitches.

I also finished a pair of socks that had been languishing for about a year, but again, no pictures. Next week; I promise!

Sock Pr0n Sunday

Yesterday I gathered up all my sock yarn to get an idea of how far in the hole I am. I guess the good news is that I'm not as buried as I thought I was, but I definitely have enough sock yarn to last me 4+ years if I started knitting a pair of socks a month. We all know how well I stick to that timeline. Don't confuse this with feeling bad about owning yarn. I don't feel bad about my stash. What I feel bad about is my lack of knitting. This is something I really enjoy doing, and I absolutely bought this yarn (a tiny bit of it has been gifted to me, but by and large I bought it) for the purpose of making socks. No resolutions here either; forbidding myself to do something does as much good as telling a baby not to use her diaper. How about a conscientious effort to knit more socks, and buy less sock yarn?

Anyway, I dragged all my sock yarn outside and photographed it all. Thus paving the way for at least one post a week for the next year or so. Welcome to the first installment of Sock Pr0n Sunday.

Ok confession time, it was going to be Sock Pr0n Saturday, but like the good procrastinator I am I waited until after midnight to write the post thus defeating the title of the post. I think I like Sunday better anyway, it reminds me of that monster truck rally announcer with the deep raspy voice saying something like "Sunday, Sunday, Sunday! In Stephie's backyard! Wool, all the colors of the rainbow, and a camera!" Oh, and I know that SPS sounds like I'm actually showing you some socks, and maybe eventually that will be the case, but Sock Yarn Pr0n Sunday just doesn't have that ring; you know?

The pictures were taken with my spiffy new iPhone as my regular camera still has a dead battery. I can't seem to locate the charger. Maybe in future installments I'll supplement with a few other pictures, but for now...here you go.

This is Claudia Handpaints Eat Your Veggies. I love this yarn so much that when I thought I had lost a skein (seriously could not find it anywhere) I went back to my LYS and bought their last remaining skein in the hopes that it matched the dyelot. Guess what? It totally does. Guess what else? Within 15 minutes of getting home I found that lost skein. So, now I have 3 skeins of it. Maybe I'll make some longer socks than normal. Or maybe it'd make a cute baby hat. We'll see. Not sure what pattern I'll make with this; I bet Jaywalkers would be pretty.


I'd be lying if I didn't say this was spurred on by talk of some bloggers I enjoy reading being down about their own yarn pr0niness. Take this as a sign of solidarity, and who knows maybe I'll pull out some of my non-sock yarn and join in on your fun. I don't know if the world can handle that many pr0n posts a week though.

A sock or two.

I know I promised some knitting pics. It's not the greatest pic ever, but here's a pair of socks I finished a month or so ago. The pattern is Sockbug's River Rapids. It's pretty intuitive, easy to memorize, and everyone thinks it's a cable pattern. It's not; it's some well placed increases/decreases.

The yarn is Trekking color 100 which is apparently their best selling color. I can understand why; it's pretty awesome. This is the first time I've used Trekking, and I really like it. It's washed up to be pretty soft, and they're really comfy.

I'm just glad I finally finished them! They were on the needles for months. My next sock is waiting for it's mate, but I really am not looking forward to the second sock (though I think I'm close to the heel flap, or getting ready to turn the heel...I can't remember).

It's a Monkey sock, which I've made before. The pattern is easy, and fun. I've got it memorized, but it doesn't make me want to stab my eyes out like straight stockinette stitch (or ribbing). I actually gave away an almost completed Lorna's Laces sock and the yarn for it's mate to a friend simply because I really didn't want to rip it out, but I really, really, really didn't want to finish the 2x2 rib either.

Anyway, this is the infamous Noro sock yarn. I don't really know what to say about it. It's Noro. It rubbed a spot on my finger while I was knitting with it (thus why I'm in no hurry to get back to it's mate). The sock itself is pretty, and sturdy. I'm not thrilled about how the cool spectrum of colors are all at the top, and the all the warm ones are at the bottom, but there's not much to be done about that. I'm sure I'll finish them eventually.

Right now I'm working on an entrelac baby blanket. I'll post some pics as soon as I charge my camera battery.

Fuck You Radiohead

Our first try at seeing Radiohead in concert was in their heyday. I want to say somewhere around '01 cause I think we were married, but I could be wrong, and it could have been before that. We were excited as they were relatively close to our hometown (an outdoor theatre in Manassas; about an hour away from home) and was on a Saturday so no time off of work was necessary. There had been a lot of rain and bad weather, and they had cancelled the show they were doing the day before. We were in the car about 30 mins from Manassas when we heard it on the radio.

The stage had literally sunk into the ground, and there was no way they could play (without, you know, electrocuting themselves).

Strike one.

A few years later (maybe, 'o4?) we heard about a festival in NY where Radiohead was headlining. There were a lot of pretty cool bands playing, and we got tickets (expensive tickets) and were planning on camping out, etc. It was going to be an awesome time. So, what happened there?

The festival people managed to pick a spot in all of NY that just happened to be the mating spot of an endangered bird THE weekend of the festival, so it got moved to the Giants Stadium in the city which we weren't prepared to have to get a hotel, and Radiohead (and a bunch of other bands) dropped it anyway.

Strike two.

I'm going on a cruise with some knitties in May. May 9th - 16th to be exact. So, when is Radiohead finally showing their faces around these parts again (after years of not being around here?) May 9th & 11th.

Strike three Radiohead. I'm done with you. I'm scraping your sticker off my car. You've dissed me for the last time.

ETA: Just to add insult to injury Nathan was going to get 2 tickets to the show in Charlotte for him and whoever he could find to go. The tickets for both venues close enough sold out in 5 mins. They never even made it to TicketMaster.

Today is the greatest day...

Alright, so today is my 28th birthday. A lot has happened since my last birthday. Last February 9th I was in a dead end crappy job, I wasn't really healthy, I was kind of depressed, and my great grandmother passed away (but no one bothered to tell me until the next day). Wasn't exactly the best day ever, you know? Even though I'm referencing one of the most sad & suicidal songs by Smashing Pumpkins in my title this day is starting out much better.

On the job front I'm now working as a designer/project manager (to tell you the truth I don't know what my job title is...) at a sign shop. It's not what I ever thought my design experience would lead to, but I am loving it. My co-workers & bosses are awesome, and I love going to work. It's nice to not hate my job (pretty much a first).

Health wise? I don't know if you could call me healthy now, but I did lose 20lbs last year, and have kept it off. I'm officially vegan now. I successfully made the transition about a month ago, and I'm really happy about it. People ask me what I miss, and I can honestly say convenience more than anything. I have found some really good recipes to make up for the sweets that I miss now, so it's not so bad. The Joy of Vegan Baking has a lot to do with it. This book is amazing, and everyone should buy it and use it. Every single recipe I have made (pancakes, choc chip & peanut butter cookies, cornbread, brownies, and choc & vanilla cupcakes with cream cheese and buttercream frosting respectively) have been delicious and completely unknowingly vegan.

I deal with depression in odd ways. I'm definitely happier than I was then, and have taken some time off of school to keep from being completely burned out by it. I think the overall changes in my life have really helped with this problem. I've met some really sweet and lovely people this last year, and made some good friends (yes I'm talking about all my new knitting & knitty friends). That's been really awesome, and good friends always help.

I can't really help that last one, but here's hoping I don't have any sort of repeat on that front.

I do have some pics to upload with *gasp* actual knitting content! Unfortunately that will have to wait until later as this post is already long enough, and I have a somewhat full day planned.