pepperknit

I actually have a fairly small stash of yarn, though if you were to ask my boyfriend he’d have something different to say. I haven’t forced him to sit and look at bloggers’ photos of their stashes as a comparison, but trust me: I don’t have a ton of yarn that was purchased with no project in mind. For the most part, I decide on a project and buy the yarn. So I have lots of leftover bits, but never enough to make an entire something.

Until a week and a half ago, when I was inspired to buy some sock yarn “just because.” Just because it was so reasonably priced. Just because the colors were so pretty. Just because I could.

Two skeins of Sock! Merino from Lisa Souza yarns. On the left we have the color “pumpkin” (which is a lot more brown than orange, even in real life) and on the right we have “peacock” (which is a perfect name for this color). The ordering and getting of these skeins was a bit of a comedy of errors—I ordered them both and they arrived a few days later. I was psyched to have gotten them so fast. But then I looked at them more closely, and they didn’t have that yummy “pebbled” look. The labels said they were plain old Sock! yarn, not the merino version. I checked my confirmation email: I had ordered the merino. But she had charged me for the nonmerino. I emailed her to ask about it, and she quickly apologized, put two skeins of merino in the mail with a return envelope, and told me she’d just charge me the additional $4. No problem. In the interest of not making her worry that I was going to keep all the yarn, I even walked up to work on a day off so I could turn it around quickly. All good. Next week I get an email from Lisa, that she forgot about the details of our exchange and credited my account entirely for the cost of the Sock (meaning I hadn’t paid anything at all!). She realized the error and recharged me the amount. It’s all come out correctly, but it was kind of funny how many steps it took. What’s most amazing is that within one week it was all resolved—even if I had ordered the yarn with a specific project in mind, the wait was totally minimal. I’ve played a bit with the Peacock, on my new KnitPicks circular needles (!), and have enjoyed it. I’m designing a new pair of socks to use with that yarn. There’s 560 yards of yarn in each skein, so there’s more than enough for a nice long pair of socks.

The other yarn I bought for a very specific reason: EH’s baby. The baby is due August 24 (my dad’s birthday!). Unfortunately, I’ll be down the shore with family at the time of the shower, so I asked EH’s sister if I could mail my gift to her. Which means: Must. Finish. Sweater. In less than 2 weeks. I can do it, that’s a reasonable timeframe, but I decided to make this pattern up, too, so I’m kind of knitting without a safety net. The only glimpse of this I will give to you is the yarn. Checkit: PURPLE!

So if I finish this piece before the end of July I’ll have officially knit something purple during the purple month of Project Spectrum. Only, if it comes out well I’m going to be submitting this design to someone, so you won’t see it for a while. We’ll see though!

Kiri is upstairs blocking. It’s, uh, going to have to undergo some tinkering. I may still have a photo shoot this weekend, but despite using a size 10 needle for the castoff, it is too tight; I cannot coax the edging into pretty scallops, and I think I want pretty scallops. The boy says that it looks nice, but I’m really not satisfied. This is my favorite photo of the process.

Anyway, now that I’m semi-between projects, I’m thinking about the plans for the future. I have babies to knit for, things I want for myself, and–crap!–Christmas to start thinking about. I need a list in order to feel as though I have a plan.

The finished, or at least mostly finished:
Kiri in time for LM’s wedding (May due date)
Done, but in need of some revision.
Baby sweater for boss’s baby (April 26 due date)
I put the buttons on it the other morning. It’s truly done! Just need tissue paper for the box.
Baby sweater for coworker’s wife’s baby (July due date)
Giving them a sweater knit for another baby, but a baby that was too large for it from about the moment it hit outside air. Needs buttons sewn on; will post once that’s taken care of.
Baby sweater for coworker’s baby (July due date)
Going to give her the cardigan I knit last summer. I never gave it to the mom I’d thought I’d give it to, and now her kiddo is too big.

The yet to begin and in need of a plan, or just barely begun:
1. Baby something for LK’s baby (July due date)
I’m thinking a sweater involving cables + bootees.
2. Baby something for AC’s baby (July due date)
I’m thinking another version of Mr. Clunky. I have ideas for this one.
3. Baby something for EH’s baby (August due date)
E is an occasional reader of my blog, so I’ll have to keep mum on this one. But I’ve got some time, thankfully.
4. Sunrise Circle Jacket for me.
5. Pomatomus for the boy’s mom for Xmas.
Started these, at least, but only just found out her foot size.
6. Elfine for one of the boy’s sisters for Xmas.
Need to decide on a color and find some yarn. May resort to #7, below.
7. Dye yarn into self-striping pattern in order to make #8, below.
I’ve never dyed before, but I’m not finding any examples of self-striping yarn in the colors I’d want for her, so I’m going to have to do it myself. It looks like fun; how hard can it be? (Famous last words.)
8. Jaywalkers for one of the boy’s sisters for Xmas.
9. Undecided socks for the last of the boy’s sisters for Xmas. (Yes, he has 3 sisters.)
Suggestions welcome for fun sock patterns, please! I might just make it up, but if I do that I really risk SSS (second sock syndrome), because I’ll decide halfway through that maybe I want to do it a little differently . . .
10. New addition: A new Kiri.
It’s gotta be done. I can’t live with it like this.

This isn’t even considering any plans for Xmas gifts for other people. I think I’m going to knit gifts this year, because if I plan it right, I can do them affordably, and money is tight this year. But I need to decide what to make for the rest of the people on my list.

Other thing to consider: I have another whole skein of Alpaca Cloud and would love to knit some more lace.

Feeling a little overwhelmed. Reminder: Knitting is for fun.

What do I tackle next? I think the Clunky Jr. That will soothe the nerves.

But Lolly’s Project Spectrum hype is a little too much for me to resist, and I just made a red toy this morning, so I think I might be taking part in this shebang.

A friend joked that his method of observing Lent was to keep careful notes of everything he does during that time, then at the end he looks over it to see what it was he gave up. So if in those 40 days (it’s 40 days, right?) he happened to not eat lamb, or not watch a particular TV show, or maybe not date anyone, he could say “oh, I gave up lamb,” or “I gave up this TV show,” or “I gave up on women.” We laughed about that for a while, and I’m ashamed to say I seem to be using a similar rationale to join Project Spectrum.

“Hey, look, I just made a red thing. Looks like I managed to participate after all.”

But now I’m interested in the event as a whole. And I may be making something in pink very soon, which would be after joining the project and thus count for more. Stay tuned!

Take a look at this sad, sad sweater.

I made it for the boy 5 years ago. It was a surprise that I whipped up in a month-long frenzy. I didn’t know his measurements very well, and we didn’t live together at the time so I couldn’t just measure off a sweater. I figured a ribbed sweater would work no matter what.

Well, it’s way too long and doesn’t fit very well at all. He was a trooper though, and wore it a few times that winter.

Recently I asked him if he still had it (if his answer had been “no,” we probably would have had to break up–wear it or don’t wear it, fine, but don’t get rid of it) and suggested he give it to me to take it out and make him something new. He was game.

I’ve not gotten very far with this project. But check out the “before.” I’ll have an “after” in just a bit . . .

Is that a quote from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory? I think it every time I think of buttons. When they’re getting the full meal chewing gum made? Hm…

Anyway, in thinking about the Beatrix Potter buttons, I found a site with many options. I’ve decided to go with:

The Crayon from KnitPicks shipped out yesterday. I’m really hoping it arrives by the weekend, because I have the long weekend and it’d be fun to play around with the Fibonacci blanket as soon as I can. I actually went with just five colors, following the suggestion of Diana. This way I can repeat the colors on their way around, and just that one center square is done in a single color. It’ll go red, orange, yellow, green, blue, red, orange, yellow, green. This gives the center square some oomph, and I like the lack of pink and purple. I also bought enough yarn to do two blankets–the second one in a different color order.

Rachel, your idea for working it as an intarsia piece is intriguing–I’ve never actually done intarsia before. It still creates a front and a back, right, but no big ridge as it would with picking up stitches? I’ll have to play around with that. I’m certainly not afraid of intarsia, but the idea of doing one square at a time, and marking progress one by one, slowly increasing in size, seemed so appealing to me. (I’m certainly willing to toss this psychological lift out the window if it would be faster and simpler and cleaner-looking to do the intarsia!)

Have you all seen this? I could just die, it’s the cutest thing in the world. Cuter even than baby bootees.

The Penguin Jumper Project was getting folks to knit sweaters for penguins who’d suffered after an oil spill. But now I just want my own penguin so I can dress him up.

I’m home! It took me 4 forms of transportation, 8 hours, and 2 days to get home from Portland. But it was all the expected travel time, so though I dragged myself home dead tired and dirty this morning, it was all part of the vacation. I just woke up from a 5-hour nap; let’s see if I sleep at all tonight!

I have no knitting news to report. None. I finished Cirque right before I left, and didn’t have time to come up with something else to do. That was ok with me, though, and I don’t know how much knitting I’d have actually done anyway. On the way home, I thought a little about the color pattern I’d like for my new hat and I had an idea, finally, so I’m going to play with that a bit.

Thanksgiving was fabulous–why don’t we cook this meal more often? Heritage turkey (apple cider brined), two stuffings, cranberry relish, brussels sprouts, salad, my awesome gravy (see above), lots of pinot noir, two pies, homemade vanilla ice cream, and three of my best friends. (This year it was a girls-only event.) We’ve rotated hosting from year to year and have pared the menu down to only our essentials. Hope everyone else had a wonderful holiday.

No knitting occurred last night, because I spent the entire day suffering some kind of all-body achiness. I got home, layed on the couch, and eventually got into bed at 8pm. Asleep by 9. Feeling much better now. But Pam has been totally derailed. Since I haven’t posted a picture of these damn sleeves, I figured I would right now.

It’s a little blurry, and the morning light isn’t all that bright, resulting in a slightly too blue image, but there you have it! Two sleeves about 4 centimeters from completely finished. Huzzah!

A response to Rachel’s comment, which made me laugh out loud, is warranted as a full-on blog entry.

I did not know all that info about 28! And since yes, I am turning 28, this is exciting to know! I’d never even heard of this perfect number phenomenon before. I’d intended to be a physics-math double major in college, but dropped the math pretty darn quickly (after linear algebra, which kicked my ass second semester of freshman year).

I am a big fan of prime numbers, though, and will be psyched for 29. I once went to a talk by a friend on happy numbers; that was something I’d never heard of before the talk. Turns out 28 is also a happy number! Boy next year is going to be good :)