Knitting progress has been suspended.

I received what has become my annual shipment* of Lush supplies today. I'd already be in the bath, but I'm having a hard time deciding what to use first. *smile*

So while I'm trying to decide, I thought I'd post a quick note, mostly to Sara, to say I tried rooibos tea yesterday. It's tasty, different from what I expected, though I liked it better than black teas, so I think it will likely become a staple. And while I'm waiting for my replacement diffuser (they have them on the website for $3.. I'm apparently not the only one who's had one go missing!) from Adagio (who also has a caramel rooibos tea -MMMMmmmm!), I've discovered that my little ingenuiTEA teapot works just fine with tea in bags and is easier to "dispense" than when made in a regular tea pot. I picked up some Lipton caramel something or other in the little pyramid tea bags last week and it's been quite tasty with a bit of non-dairy creamer.

And while it's not really related to anything, I spent a lovely weekend with three of my best friends from high school last weekend. We shopped and ate and caught up and relaxed (away from the kidlets for two of them). We've been spread a bit far and this is the first time we've all seen each other in person in about four years, and that was at one of our weddings so we were a bit occupied with other affairs at the time. Now that we're all a bit more settled, though, we've decided that we should reconnect. This weekend was the first "girl's weekend"; we have another scheduled for late July. *smile*

The timing was fortuitous - I don't have very many close female friends, but have been thinking lately that I need to take the step from post-grad-student to professional, which is a somewhat foreign area for me. Not in action, but in how to look the part, particularly in how to dress the part. I've ordered some outfits from Lane Bryant on line, but needed to expand on that meager beginning. My best friends helped me decide on a couple new pairs of pants and a new shirt from Lane Bryant and, in an effort to try to "look the professional part", helped me learn about make up.

Yes, as a *mubletypeg* year old woman, I'm just now learning how to properly apply make up. My best friend from high school is a Mary Kay representative and she brought her kit down so I could find stuff that wouldn't make me feel like I was wearing shellac. I think we succeeded - instead of a more traditional foundation, I'll use a tinted moisturizer with SPF 20, which also means I won't need to use any loose powder. I'll use lip gloss instead of lipstick, with no lip liner, and a nice subdued mocha/coffee color scheme for eye make up and cheek color. Spendy, yes, but I feel like I got quality make up that fits my needs precisely, so I think it's worth it.

At some point I may take the step of actually going to a hair stylist to get a "real" hair style, but for now I think a wardrobe update and make up will suffice!

* My sister-in-law's birthday is tomorrow and her brother (my husband) usually opts to get her Lush for her birthday. Since I'm ordering anyway, I usually take the opportunity to stock up for me, too. And since Lush tends to be on the pricey side of things, I don't order from them for me too often!

Sunday already?

*sigh* It was a quiet, lazy weekend. And it went far too quickly.

This wasn't technically this weekend, but late last week, I finished the pink Waterfall socks for my little sister. These are sort of hard to photograph - the lace pattern is essentially a 3x3 rib pattern, so it scrunches up quite a bit.



Because I'm trying to keep better track of this kind of thing (and because I actually wrote it down in the journal I got from my Secret Pal!), the details on this one are:

Pattern: Waterfall lace from six-stitch patterns in Sensational Knitted Socks, worked over 54 stitches on US 2 dpns
Yarn: KnitPicks Essential in Petunia; about 1 and 1/3 skeins
Finished measurements: heel to toe = 8.5 inches; cuff to heel = 10.25 inches

This evening I'll finish the front of Peek a boo and will try to get a picture tomorrow when it's light out. I'm hoping the sleeves go quicker; I'm not sure if I'm getting bored with this pattern or just with the cotton/modal yarn, but either way I'd like this one to be done sooner rather than later. I haven't decided yet if I'll do both sleeves at once or not, but no matter what I do, I'd like to have about half of the sleeves done this week.

Y is for...

Yarn!



(What did you expect?!)

In particular, *my* yarn. This has been a very exciting week.. I've been spinning for over a year, but just learned how to ply this summer. And I have yet to actually make anything with anything I've spun & plied. You see, I have this unnatural fear of cutting my plied yarn. I think that somehow cutting it will undo the magic that makes it yarn and it will come all unraveled. But yesterday I had to spin the yarn for the Breed Swap and then *gasp* cut it into 1-yard lengths. The above is a shot of the yarn after a quick dunk to let things relax. I'm happy to report that even though I didn't take a picture, cutting the yarn did not, in fact, make it unravel.

So now I'm all charged to finish the grey merino so I can make something with it. I have one skein plied already and waiting for me to finish the rest. The singles from the second spindleful were on my spindle for so long that they became de-energized and I didn't want to try to ply them that way, so I dunked them to re-energize them.



I'll probably ply this up tonight and then start spinning the last bit left - which might be another full spindleful, but I don't think so. Then I think it will be socks.. it's superwash and I had 4 ounces of it, so I think if I do toe-up socks, that will work out nicely.

And now that the holiday knitting is finished, I'm happily working away on a special request from my "little sister":



These are done in KnitPicks Essential (which means they're machine washable; the last pair of pink socks got accidentally washed and .. well.. yeah) and I'm using one of the six-stitch patterns from Sensational Knitted Socks - waterfall lace. The recipient has tiny little feet, so I'm making them pretty small, but the lace is pretty stretchy, so they should still look good when she wears them.

I'm hoping to deliver these in two weeks and also to pick up the yarn for the largesse project (stockings with clocks from Folk Socks, I think) which will need to be finished by early February. I also need to finish Peek a boo by the end of February.

Oh, and I ordered yarn (Knit One Crochet Too Angora Soft in Moss & Light Moss) from Webs annual year end sale to make Celtic Icon from Inspired Cable Knits, so between that and the two sweater kits I already have, I think I'll have more than enough to keep me busy for awhile!

Hope!

Assuming I'm going to finish the last holiday gift on time, I determined that I needed to finish the back by the end of this weekend:



I have a groove in my left fore finger from tensioning the yarn and an odd little numb spot on the side of my left ring finger where I grab the needle, but it's finished. There's more arm hole shaping than it appears - there's a column of reverse stockinette that's curling up on itself in the picture.

I'm at least a few hours ahead of schedule, and given what else I need to finish, that's good. To stay on schedule for completing Peek a boo, I figure I need to have the front finished by the end of next Saturday and the sleeves finished by the end of the following Friday, leaving Saturday for seaming and blocking.

In between times (hah!) I also need to start and finish the other Father sock, and make the ties for the Tied Up Tee. I'm a bit torn on the best way to do the ties, though. I think that I-cord will be more time consuming than it's worth, so I might try to do them on the lucet, which I think I can manage to do while attending an all day meeting on Tuesday.

Countdowns.

Someone (if I look I can pr'bly find who)(Aha! It's MimKnits! And now I must go ask her where to find the pattern for the monkey!) on my blog roll has a countdown to the solitice. This is a Good and Noble Thing(tm) (or is that s'posed to be a Right and Proper Thing(tm)?) - not for any religious* reason, but because that's when the days will finally start getting longer again.

But that's not really the point. It's the countdown bit that's the point. Because I've reached that part of the holiday gift knitting where I'm counting down until it's done** because I want to move on to other projects*** that are not holiday gifts (some of them are gifts, just not gifts with a deadline, per se). Not because I'm not enjoying the gift projects, I'm just feeling .. confined.

* I'm atheist. I believe that there are forces at play in this world - natural forces such as the gravitational pull of the moon - the have effects on how things happen, but I don't believe in predetermination or that any of those forces are sentient. I've tried to figure out if this means I "lean" toward one or another nature-based "religion", but I've given up. If you care to have a theological discussion about it, go for it, but don't expect you'll change my (or anyone else's) opinion on the matter. *shrug*

** For instance, I have half my last pair of holiday gift socks finished, which means I have half left to do - 1 sock still to complete. All but the ties for the Tied Up Tee are finished, which means I have two short (about 3/4 yard) and one long (about 2 yards) i-cord ties to complete. I'm about a third of the way finished with the back of Peek a Boo,



which means I have.. a lot left to go. And three weeks to do it in. You'd think that having started holiday knitting back in September, I wouldn't be in this position. (Admittedly, I have completed three full adult sized garments, one child garment, a pair of kids socks and half a pair of adult socks since then, but *still*!)

*** Like the Felted Bucket hat for which my darling boy just bought me the pattern (it's an early part of my birthday present). I have leftover Knit Picks Merino Style from the Fair Isle 101 sweater that I'm contemplating using to make this hat, but I can't start it until after the holiday knitting is finished (but it's darned cold out there this week!). Or the pink socks for MJ, which I really would rather do because I can do a more interesting pattern (that I haven't knit four**** times already) *and* because the girl needs pink socks already! Or the largesse stockings with clocks.. or other fun socks for me.. or I could work on the sweater kit I got *last* birthday/holiday.

**** Yes, four. I made the first child sock in the toddler size which was far too small.

Insert clever post title here.

I'm sure I did something this weekend other than knit, but in all honesty, the knitting is all I have to show for it.



That would be none other than the Tied Up Tee, finished by for the ties and blocking. The color in this picture is pretty much all wrong - the red is far too bright and the towel underneath it is actually forest green, but it was this or a shot that is too washed out to see anything. I machine washed it and originally machine dried it, but it tightens up quite a bit that way. Fortunately, wetting it stretched it out again to the proper size, but I'll have to be sure to include a note so the recipient knows not to machine dry it.

I really like how well the neckline on this one turned out, and in general I'm still rather fond of the shaping in this line. It's a pattern in the "shapely" series from White Lies Designs. The only pattern bit that I'm still a bit troubled by (and it's not just this pattern) is that there seems to be more bulk under the arms where the sleeves join the body than there should be. It's almost as if the top of the sleeve cap is just a smidge too long - or maybe too narrow - and it causes some bunching on the underside or something..

The ribbon yarn is a little scratchy to me, but I'm hoping it will soften with wear and washing. I'm tempted to try to run it through the wash another time or two to see if that will help to soften it before I gift it, but I don't want it to look used. :/



With Tied Up mostly done, I've cast on (and am actually half through the first repeat now) my last holiday garment. I'm using Knit Picks Shine Sport in Sky and so far I'm rather fond of it. It's very soft and has a beautiful hand, but the cables should still pop quite well. I'm really liking the color for this one as well - it's enough to give it shading that the white model lacks, but not overpowering.

It's a slippery little yarn, though, so I'm having a hard time settling on proper tension - the cables mean the tension should be a little looser or I have a hard time making the crosses, but I don't want it to be so loose that it stretches out when it gets washed. I'm hoping the 60% cotton will help combat some of that. It also splits pretty easily, which so far hasn't been too much of an issue with the cabling, but is another reason to try to keep things a little more loose than I might want.

The yarn is also pretty light, which is a little surprising given that I'm used to high cotton content yarns being rather heavy for their bulk. If this one turns out as well as I'm hoping, this might be a yarn (or at least a fiber combination) that I can use to make sweaters for Jack out of (he's allergic to animal fibers and we've not had the best of luck with either acrylic or 100% cotton for sweaters for him).



I even sat down and knit up the swatch of Cotton Fleece I used to make an earlier gift so I could wash it and provide appropriate warning for how much it might shrink (Color in the second shot is accurate). As I'm told is usual for cotton yarns like this, the shrinkage is much more noticeable in the length and in the width - and it's substantial! It shrank just about 3/4 inch over an original 4 3/4 inches, which is almost 16%. So the warning will be either not to machine wash/dry, or to know that it will lose about 15% of the length. I suspect the latter won't be that big of a deal, so it might be what the recipient opts for.

"It's been one week since you looked at me.."

I had a longer than usual long weekend due to the added bonus of today off. That is undoubtedly the reason I've mostly "caught up" with the holiday knitting.

I've finished the back and one sleeve of the Tied Up Tee and have the other sleeve about a third done. The pieces are a little wonky in the pictures because they curl really terribly so it's difficult to get them to lie flat for pictures.



My camera has decided to switch itself inexplicably into "no flash" mode and I haven't had the motivation to switch it back, which might be for the best with the Rowan River Tape. I apparently can't hold still while taking pictures though, so the first two are a bit blurry. The last one has both the best stitch definition and the best color.

I'm hopeful to have the second sleeve finished by this weekend so I can block all the pieces and sew it together this weekend. That will leave just one more garment and one last sock to do in the last twenty-something days of December. Should be do-able.

How do you spell "relief"?

Whew!



It's a terrible picture - washed out, off color and slanted because I took it from the side of the bed - but it's the front of the Tied Up Tee, wet and pseudo-blocked. It measures 19 inches across the bottom hem (not counting the curve) and 12 inches from hem (not counting the curve) to the start of the arm hole. The only measurement that's not to the letter is the arm hole - it comes in at 9 inches instead of 8 - but that's the one that's most easily adjusted.

Edited to add: I just went to wind a new skein of the Rowan River Tape so that I could use the remains of the two partial skeins to do the arm split on the back and realized that the front of the Tied Up Tee took about 2.5 skeins. Assuming the back will take slightly more and that each sleeve will take slightly less, I should have as many as four spare skeins (I have 12 total) once I'm finished.. Which means I can pr'bly make the Mikado Ribbon Gloves (after the holidays, that is). Neat.

I wet blocked Breezy Cables while I was at it and it stretched out enough, but hopefully not too much. I'm still torn on whether I should machine wash it before I gift it, just to be sure it won't do anything odd the first time it's washed, but at the moment I'm taking it in small steps.

Also added: I'm also contemplating using some green merino stuff I got awhile back in a trade to make a scarf of some sort for a silent auction for HCWR, but I'd have to find a good lace scarf pattern that's not Branching Out as I made one of those in some yellow merino stuff last year for this auction.

Gauge woes..

I finished the first of the father socks...



This is a good and fine thing. Assuming that my gauge with this yarn has now stabilized. Because in examining the son pair, I discovered that my gauge was apparently noticeably tighter for the second sock..




Fortunately, I will have enough of this yarn left after finishing the second father sock to make another son sock if I decide that the difference is too noticeable to give the pair as a gift. It's not really noticeable unless you have them one on top of the other, specifically with the smaller one on top and then you notice that it's about half an inch shorter and about a quarter inch narrower. *sigh*

This may be due to the issues I was am having with the Tied Up Tee. I've decided, however, to proceed with completing the front (I'm working on the shoulders and should finish the front tonight) and then blocking it, and possibly washing it, to see how it wears. I *think* I have enough of the yarn that if I decide after blocking/washing, I need to remake the front to different specs, I'll have enough. Maybe.

But I'm remaining optimistic that remaking the front won't be necessary because that would put me rather farther behind on the holiday knitting and I've been doing so well on that so far that it'd be a shame to tarnish such a good year.

I also got buttons for Breezy Cables, but I think I'll block it first. I'm trying to decide if I want to actually block it or just throw it in the wash (it's washable wool) so I can see how it will wash before I give it to the recipient. I'm alternatively afraid that washing it will stretch it out *a lot* and that it will shrink it (wool in the washing machine.. *shudder*), and I'm even moderately concerned that washing it will have no effect at all because I do want it to stretch out *a smidge*.
*sigh* One of these days I'll be a really good knitter.