I got mine!

So when will you get yours?

This actually came in yesterday's mail, but I didn't find time to blog it on the same day, but look! A zippy new thing from Yarnissima! And it is so darn cute I may just hang it on the Christmas tree as is, instead of knitting it up. Except I can't hang up the cookies, which I already ate. And I've actually met Yarnissima in person, so I don't know if everyone gets cookies or just me (*twinkle twinkle*), but even without the cookies, this is one adorable little kit. I am seriously considering ordering a few more... for my Secret Pal, for various friends, for having LOTS to hang on the tree! Whoopee!

PIF - Pay It Forward

via Tini:

“I will send a handmade gift to the first 3 people who leave a comment on my blog requesting to join this PIF exchange. I don’t know what that gift will be yet and you may not receive it tomorrow or next week, but you will receive it within 365 days, that is my promise! The only thing you have to do in return is pay it forward by making the same promise on your blog.”

I think this is a great idea, a way to put some positive energy out in the world. So hey people - sign up, send people stuff, and I'll send you something! Let's all create some happy mail-days! I love those.

I won!

So there was a big squishy envelope in the mail today! From M.V., in Frankfurt - do I know anyone in Frankfurt? Nooo, I know someone in Hessen, but not Frankfurt-Hessen, and I haven't ordered anything from her lately, I'm still working on the last yarn I bought from her. Very mysterious. But not for long, of course, rip! shred! open! Mari! I love reading Mari's blog, even though I don't understand a word of Finnish (seriously, not one word. I know at least one word in a surprising number of languages, Swahili and Czech and Quechua and Indonesian, but no Finnish. Really. Zero.), because I like the look of it. I like double letters, as those of you who know my real name can attest. One of those things I would have put in that "six weird things about me that you probably don't know" meme, if I'd ever done it.

Anyway! My envelope of stuff! Does she know me or what? It's chocolate! With orange-y bits in it! And sock yarn, my very favorite kind that I never buy - it's both marled and variegated, such a joy to watch the colors change as the yarn slips through your fingers, but then once it's knitted up, you can't see the beauty of the yarn unless you stand closer to me than my West Coast-tuned proximity sensors will allow (I am all about the personal space, it's one of the reasons that living in Europe makes me so twitchy). So when I see yarn like this I always carry it around the yarn store for an hour, decide it's not a practical thing to buy, and put it back. But now I have some! In fabulous October-birthday colors too, purples and reds and browns and golds, see?

The photo of the yarn and chocolate together didn't turn out well, but you can see the yarn, at least. Click! Embiggen! It's pretty! This will have to make some very special socks. And then I will be the only one who knows how special they are.

Thank you thank you thank you Mari! This made my day.

Interlude

So I signed up to knit teensy hats for drink bottles (for the Big Knit) and then forgot about it because the deadline was way far in the future. That is what I do with events that are not Next: I forget them. Anyway, the deadline suddenly zooped up to next Monday, and I got the reminder email yesterday morning and went "ack!"

So I did other things yesterday, but I also knit five tiny hats. And it was fun. It did take time away from a translation that I have to do before this weekend, though. And now I am somewhat sorry about that because I have found that, even though this is not an academic text, and is quite interesting and I even understand everything, the fact is, after five pages my brain is fried and I have to take a break. But I have too many pages and too few hours, and I don't really have time for a break. Nevertheless, my brain is fried. So I guess it's fortunate that the person who was supposed to take Ignatz to Tae Kwon Do bagged on me, and I have to go sit in St. Wolfgang for an hour and stare at the wall, but to be honest, with the number of things I really need to get done, that lost hour is kind of bothering me.

But at least I had fun knitting five tiny hats. And now back to our regularly scheduled knitting.

gone over to the Dark Side

You know, I've read the posts and listened to the podcasts about Stash, and all these people who have more yarn than they'll be able to knit up in their lifetime, and I have concluded - I may even have written about it somewhere on this blog - that I am a knitter, not a yarn collector. I only buy for specific projects. Now, sometimes the yarn doesn't work out for the project I bought it for, and I have to put it to some other use, but I never buy yarn without some plan for it.

Until now.

Okay, most of these do have a specific purpose, the blue and brown will be Ravenclaw socks, the black and yellow is intended for Hufflepuff socks, that orange on the left there will be Firestarters. Three dark red and black skeins are intended for a cardigan to go with a specific dress I have. But others... the Dark Peacock and the Rainbow were just too beautiful to pass up, and I may never even knit them, just pet and admire them.

And today, I sank even further into the abyss:

That's right, 1200 meters, that's 1312 yards of purple MariSilk, and no plan whatsoever for it. No project is fantastic enough for this color and this yarn. I can't imagine what I'll find to do with it.

It sure is pretty, though.

ADD and the knitter

Well, the Henry yarn + stitch pattern is kind of inflexible, and the scarf is pretty long, so it's not going very fast - and I have to put it aside completely when DrBob is home this weekend, because he's not supposed to see it. Christmas present.

So then I'll work on the MIL's Flower Basket Shawl, but it's a bit of an attention whore. Usually I can sort of grok a pattern after a couple of repeats, and I can see what this is doing in retrospect, but I'm not learning the pattern well enough to anticipate what comes next. So I have to squint at the pattern the whole time, and tink back if I lose my place, and never stop in the middle of a row. This too must be finished by Christmas.

And then there's the socks I promised to knit for Billy Reid, in the Knitters Uncensored mini-KAL which has only three participants. I think I have finally settled on a pattern and am ready to start thinking about maybe knitting them. I'm not sure what the deadline on this is, but I do know that MsB knits waaaay faster than I do, and Elemm has more knitting time, what with the not having children. I probably shouldn't leave that till the last minute. Especially since I don't actually know when the last minute will be.

So I think you'll agree that I have quite enough going on, knit-wise. So what do I go and do?


Buy more yarn. And needles. And start swatching.

Duh.

what I would do...

Well. Mari has a bunch of natural white, alpaca-silk blend yarn - I don't know the weight, but swoooon! And she wants to know what kind of sweater she should knit with it. I think that's a very good question, and if I had a bunch of natural white, alpaca-silk yarn (yah - I wish), I'd be thinking Aran. Something cable-y like Jenna Wilson's Morrigan, from No Sheep For You. (Not a lot of images around, outside of Ravelry, but you can follow Morrigan's process on Jenna's blog). Or, if the yarn is bulkier than that, maybe Eris, also by Jenna Wilson, though that refers to "advanced cabling," which some might find a bit intimidating. Ooo! Speaking of advanced cables, what about Alice Starmore? Though that's out of print. Hmm.

For something simpler, I really like Juju's variation on Jen Chau's Cavern Cardigan. Mostly, though, I think I'd pick up a book on cables, like my copy of the Harmony Guide to Aran and Fair Isle Knitting (or maybe use this as an excuse to buy a new book on cables, hee!), and assemble something myself. Something fine and girly, because alpaca and silk sounds so refined.

Anyway, good luck with deciding, Mari, and let us all know what you choose!

it worked!

Well, I followed Elemmaciltur's link, showed the photos to Ignatz, and half an hour later he was back with my Lego swift. It did seem kinda flimsy and wobbly, and I was very skeptical, but we put the second skein of MariSilk on it last night, and he helped me adjust the little sticky-uppy bits, and it worked like a dream! So thanks for the tip, Elemm, and kudos to Ignatz for phenomenal Lego talent!

Although I don't know how it'll do on 1700 yards of Wollmeise laceweight... LET'S TRY IT OUT HAHAHAHAHA...

Go, Henry!

My 100cm wooden circular 3.4mm needle finally arrived, and I was able to continue the Henry scarf (pattern is here). I'm liking it so far; once you figure out the repeat, it's fairly mindless, although you do need to look at it as you knit, so it's a good project for TV knitting, but not for reading. The yarn is 100% silk I bought at Benediktbeuern, from a woman who doesn't believe in websites and, it would seem, doesn't sell in shops, just at markets. Okay, whatever. The yarn is yummy, though kind of creepy - I don't like to wear silk because it feels like skin, but I figured yarn would be different. It isn't, really. Anyway, that was a digression. I saw this yarn (DeKnit actually pointed it out to me), and the color was just right and the sheen was so beautiful and DrBob has mentioned that I could maybe knit him something and maybe he wouldn't lose it this time, at least not right away, so when I saw this lovely yarn I seized the moment. It's not the weight the pattern calls for, so I had to go up a needle size. This may mean it turns out to be longer than expected, but that's fine, and it won't have to be wider than expected because I can just stop knitting when it's wide enough.

So then. So far, so good!