you ain't done 'till you've finished

ugh! those blasted sweaters! i want the boys to wear them out west. do you think i'd work on stitching them together? no! i cast on for the pitcher of the fiesta tea set instead! i wanted something small to work on for stitch and bitch last night in case there was no room for finishing at the tables. good call. there were five of us. which isn't a bad turnout for our group.

i struggled with the base of the pitcher. i've never knit with dpns. the round knitting with all the little increases all over.... 'fiddly', as i've heard in reference to this project, is an understatement. then came the cable cast on -what? another learning experience. and finally, the icord horizontal stripe to edge the bottom of the piece. HUNH? chris smiled wryly in my direction as i struggled and restarted a few times. i apologized for my antisocial behavior that was muttering to myself with by head buried between those tiny needles. she said no need as it was entertaining enough to watch me. so, in the 2 hours i was there i managed to icord stripe one needle's worth, that would be 18 of the 54 stitches in one round. i pleaded for someone to stay with me just to reach that point. chris and jen obliged. thanks ladies.

i thank modesitt for giving me the opportunity to learn so much through her pattern, which i feel great satisfaction in having mastered even such a small portion of. when i got home i cruised through the rest of the icord and now i'm in the easy peasy stockinette section. fun! we'll see if i have five pieces in me.

penny pincher

only 5 days left until we leave for the west coast for the tots to see my side of the family. dh observed that i must really be getting excited. i admit that what is keeping me restrained in that department is the dread of the actual flying part with the three kids and no hubby along to help bear the brunt of it all. my very capable 16 year old niece will be traveling with us to help out in exchange for french tutoring from my mother and i. once we are there though, i will be on cloud nine. the beautiful northwest with my darling children and their swell uncles, cousins, and papet and meme all around them, what could be better? I just can't wait.

with the two sweaters winding up, and a trip on the horizon, i find myself at a loss for what to do next. i think i will do a couple of small projects like some kitty hats and lil' devil hats for the family to wear this fall. also i would like to make the fiesta tea set from interweave knits. after i gather the materials, i may join the knitalong for that one if i'm not too late.

my big dream is to knit something for myself, which i have never done. i think it's too late to bother with a shell or tank, not to mention that i would like to find something that would camouflage my post partum pudge as much as possible. the two contenders are gigi from chicknits and tricot from magnits these also have knitalongs that i am probably too late to join, i'll have to investigate.

so, i've been pricing needles and yarn for these projects. i have some left over cotton from guernsey style sweater that may work for the fiesta tea set. this prompted me to peruse elann for other supplies. i jam-packed a shopping cart full of stuff but decided i couldn't wait for it to arrive in the mail as it may be in time for my trip. so, it was off to fabricplace to get enough items to get me started... i just couldn't bring myself to spend an extra 2 dollars per pair of dpn. i did spend the extra thirty cents on yarn finishing needles. the stupid part is that i bought a magazine which was easily equal in price to the extra amount for the dpn. i didn't have time to really think things all the way through as i arrived with only twenty minutes till store closing, plus i brought bea with me and she was getting hungry and grumpy. not conducive to a very productive shopping trip.

this experience has shown me that elann does indeed have good deals and even with s&h i think they are worthwhile, especially since it's difficult to find time to shop without the kidlets and even worse to try and shop with them. all this for a few cents here and there... can you tell i'm a sahmom with budget on her mind?

leading me on

it turns out that the person who complimented me on the guernsey was a friend i knew after all. it's great to already have friends. a big thanks to v for the kind words and for everything else she does for and shares with me. v was actually the person who inspired me to finally get knitting. my mom had shown me how when i was a petite fille, but it never stuck. when i heard v was taking a class, well i just had to buy a book and teach myself. i didn't think i had time for a class with the tots at home etc. as it turns out, knitting has become just the excuse i need to get out of the house on my own. wednesday snb every week is chizeled in stone around here now, so as to avoid the inevitable mommy meltdown that occurs when me time is forgone.

complete nonsequitur- you may not have guessed from reading my blog, what with the absence of capitals due to my laziness, but i am a grammar queen, see!

You are a GRAMMAR GOD!


If your mission in life is not already to
preserve the English tongue, it should be.
Congratulations and thank you!


How grammatically sound are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

i feel that this rating is not deserved as the quiz was multiple choice and having the options to choose from is far different from writing with good grammar in an appealing and consistent manner-- i don't do that, like i said before: -L- -A- -Z- -Y-

more knitting prattle- the first knitting project i made was a little sweater in anticipation of my baby girl. as i mentioned earlier, my good friend inspired me. i went right over to an LYS, spent a tidy little bundle on fun yarn and a book with instructions and patterns made with rectangles. i commenced to knit sans swatch. as this was my first foray, it was not without frequent frogging, so much in fact, that at one point i just decided to keep going in order to make some actual progress. now i look at that sweater. the front and back are too wide and too short, the sleeves go on for ever, and the back has all kinds of funky, wiggy mistitches in it along with some rows comprised entirely of twisted stitches. it's a real frankenstein of an oevre.

as much as i would like to keep it around for posterity, the budget says i should frog the whole thing and recycle the yarn into something more sightly under scrutiny. i think this is what i would like to make in time for the fall. while the poncho is what attracts me, how can baby b have outerwear without the hat to match? i've been waiting a long time for a girl; far be it from me to miss my chance to accessorize. what are the chances that the lys will still have a couple of balls left in the correct dye lot to complete this still simple but slightly larger project? cross your fingers for me. look for a pic of the reject soon; i'll post that for posterity instead of wasting perfectly swell yarn... then i'll frog it.

a good time was had by all

last night was snb. we had a better turnout than we have had in some time and it was great! so much inspiration! karen gave me a little lesson on picking up stitches from the bound off collar of aidan's guernsey-style sweater; so i am ready to finish it! aidan wanted to see his sweater this morning, presumably to see if i had made any more progress; i can't believe he's actually checking up on me. when he sees me working on anything else he asks me to put it down in favor of his project. it's that firstborn sense of entitlement, but isn't that actually what the lastborn is supposed to feel? i thought the firstborn was supposed to know how to share things.

over the long weekend i made some progress on the boys' sweaters. i did the math for duo and hatched a plan for the raglan sleeve decreases. they are nothing like the original pattern but hopefully it will still be a pleasing and sensible shape. after snb last night, i am just 5 rows away from completing both sleeves!

i also seemed guernsey-style at the shoulders and attached one sleeve. i must say, finishing is super stress for me. will the pieces match up? will they be straight? am i doing something wrong? i just spend the whole time holding my breath and sweating bullets until it's done. the life buoy i cling to is my book of finishing techniques, and so far it has not let me down. if i'm careful to read everything and follow what it says i can proceed pretty much without incident in spite of my own hand wringing.

and because any entry is more exciting with pictures, here is aidan's fireboat. i think the finest innovation here is the curled up straw, pasted to the side, that is the firehose. and of course, what project would be complete without yarn... to attach the anchor.


fireboat and builder 

leading you on

i received a complimentary comment from someone who i don't even know! i know the whole point of this is to share and connect, but it didn't feel real until someone shared and connected back. anyway, the comment was about the guernsey. and i realize that my last post made it sound like i knit a guernsey because i shortened my reference to the sweater for ease of writing. the sweater is actually a "simple guernsey style sweater" pattern by debbie bliss, emphasis on the words simple and style. so i'm sorry if i misled anyone into thinking i'm more of a knitter than i actually am.

all that aside, the sweater is an accomplishment for me and i'm rather proud of the results so far. i will certainly get pics up one of these days. i'm not digital cameraly endowed, and take my pics the old fashioned way, which entails the whole hurry up and wait cycle of taking pictures, finish the roll, send it out, etc. i know i'm behind the times, at least i finally got around to getting the cell phone within this past year. can you say ludite? not that i am one in a philosophical sense, i'm just not the cutting edge type.