Everybody Loves Saturday Night

on the mend

All the "healthy strong back" vibes you were sending my way worked, people. I'm able to stand up and walk without much pain as of this morning. And it's not really so much pain as it is "twinges" or a slight pressure, like something on the inside is pressing down on my lower vertebrae. I can't bend from the waist yet, but I should be able to do several things today that the inability to do over the last 36 hours has been driving me up a tree. Like shower. I haven't done that quite yet--I'm taking things slow, and right now am enjoying another session with the heating pad with the first cup of coffee I've been able to make since Tuesday morning (that's right, I went without coffee yesterday. I think I survived only because I was hopped up on painkillers)--but to shower is next on my list of things to accomplish today. After I take care of that, I may take the rest of the day off--we'll see how it goes. But I'm thrilled--I will be able to pick up my own mail, let Fresh Direct in when they get here, feed the cat by myself . . . I will never take my back for granted again. And yes, I will be working on strengthening it and taking measures to protect it from this sort of injury again. First thing: I'm getting rid of the chair in my office. It's a bad chair. And then I'm going to look into this Directional Non-Force Technique business.

Later that day . . .

Oh, the best laid plans. I'm still OK, but here's how the rest of my morning went down:

at about 10 am, I got ready to take a shower. Just as I was about to turn the water on, my phone rang. It was my friend in Amsterdam, and since we so rarely have the opportunity to talk to each other these days, I took the call. As we conversed, I went into the bedroom and lay down on my yoga mat, on my back, with my knees bent -- basically the position I've been assuming since Tuesday afternoon. Scout was on the bed, just chillaxing.

All of a sudden, Scout jumps down from the bed and something under the bed catches his eye, and he goes into stealth cat mode. I turn my head to see what he's hunting, and it's a GINORMOUS CENTIPEDE. I yell, "bug! bug! bug!" into the phone (not my proudest moment), somehow roll myself up to standing position, grab a shoe, put the phone down on the bed for just a second, and then whack the holy hell out of that thing. Seriously, you guys? That fucker was TWO INCHES LONG. *

And while I don't think I overdid it with the bug extermination, I think I set my back recovery back about half a day. I was able to shower, I was able to walk down the two flights of stairs to grab my mail, but once I got back up the stairs I realized the rest of my day would be best spent in that prone position with the heating pad and all that. So, you know, that's where I'm at now.

* Of course, now I'm reading that centipedes actually eat all sorts of other menacing household bugs, like roaches and, um, those bugs that come out at night to bite you and live in that piece of furniture that people tend to sleep in, those bugs whose name I dare not speak (we call them Voldemort bugs around here) lest I bring them into existence? I would much rather have centipedes than the bugs whose name I dare not speak.

I think.

No, I'm pretty sure.

**shudder.**

If it were a "Death is not an option" sort of choice, then yes. Definitely centipedes.

Please, let it not ever come to that kind of choice.

i like socks

As much as I love having the option of air conditioning, I love not using it even more. The weather here has been lovely lately, a full 20 degrees cooler than last week. The AC is off, the windows are open; it's very pleasant.

Time, then, to show you what I've been doing with wool.

First, the finished Marigold socks (Ravelry link).

My camera has apparently lost its focus ability (either that or the socks are working their Cybill Shepherd in Moonlighting soft focus look). It's an old camera and should be replaced. This can't happen for a while yet, so bear with me.

Let's try this shot:

Better. You get the idea, anyway.

I dig these socks. These are, believe it are not, the very first Koigu socks I have made for myself. Surprised? I am too. They really feel amazing.

These socks get a lot of credit for turning me around on a couple things. Previously I hadn't been an ardent fan of wearing lace socks. Knitting them has always been fun and rewarding, but I wasn't, up until now, really keen on wearing lace on my feet. (I've said as much, somewhere, but I'm not looking for that post right now.) But I love wearing these socks, and it's not just the Koigu factor.

The second thing...well, my sock knitting mojo has returned. I started another pair of lace socks, and I think I'm going to love these even more.

This is the Södera pattern (Ravel it!), worked in Regia Silk 4-ply. Also working the mid-80s soft focus look. I took this picture on June 12, after I'd reached the heel. Here's where I am now:

My legs are . . . well, I like them. I do. Got no bone to pick with my legs. But as a New York pedestrian, my calves are fairly well developed. In trying this sock on repeatedly to determine where to place the increases for the calf shaping, I've discovered that my ankles slope ever so gradually into my calves, but once my calves start, they bloom. Significantly. You can't tell from this photo, but I started the calf increases after 25 pattern repeats, then worked 8 rows before doing the next set of increases. And after a mere two rounds, I need to increase again. I'm not saying this is a bad thing, just noteworthy in that way that only other sock knitters may get.

I started these socks thinking that with any luck they'd be done in time for crispy fall weather. At the rate I'm going though, they'll be done by July. The pattern is super easy to memorize, it's a cinch to figure out what row to do next, so I've been able to work on them everywhere from the subway to the couch. Of course, now that I've hypothesized an end date, the second sock will languish until mid-November. 2009.

Haven't decided whether I'm going to go with the ribbon at the cuff. I like the look, but I'm not sure it's really me. If I do, though, it'll be black ribbon.

ball 1

This is what one ball of mystery yarn yielded:

I'm a little over halfway through the raglan increases, which I opted to do in yarnover fashion. I think this is going to be more shrug-like than cardigan-like, given how much yarn I have left. This is fine. Do you know how long it's been since I just sorta winged it? I'm having fun.

how to feel better about your stash

Oh, it's going to be one of those days. There isn't enough coffee in the world to revive me. Had freak attack of insomnia--strange because it usually only happens when I'm unhappy or severely stressed, neither of which I am at the moment. My eyes are tired today.

Had a fantastic weekend, though, Saturday especially. There's really nothing like impromptu plans with a good friend on a gorgeous day. Seriously, folks, Saturday brought one of the best New York spring days--the kind that inspire both joy and gratitude. It's so easy to love the city on days like this.

I did something I rarely do: I went shopping, and actually came home with clothes. And then I did something even more amazing: I put my new clothes away, immediately. But wait, there's more: I took out a couple things from my closet that I haven't worn in three years.

(At this point the person I was a few years ago is standing back, scratching her head and asking, "who the hell ARE you?" My mom might be asking it as well. All I can say is...everything is new.)

One of my new skirts, this one

was calling out for a matching cardigan, so it can stay out late and still be warm when the sun goes down. (Sorry about the clashing print of the comforter.)

I have a lot of purple yarn, so it wasn't a surprise that I found some that matched perfectly. I'm working on Cosmic Pluto's top-down raglan right now.

It's a mystery yarn, no ball bands at all, picked up when I still worked in the place that offered free yarn. I only have about five balls of it but the yardage looks good. I'm working it up on US 9s, slightly larger than I need but it gives the fabric great drape. And I'm counting on not having full-length sleeves, either. But even if I do start to run out...this is the best part...I have this odd skein of Fiesta to add in:

I think it would be totally cute to have this at the end of the sleeves, in a ruffly bell sort of way.

Can I finish this within the week, though--that's the question.

this right here

is a hot yarny mess.

But hey, it only took 2.5 hours to get it to this:

Sheesh.

hey, I finished a sock!

Today's post is brought to you by the color purple and KnitPicks, who knew I needed to get something good in the mail.

I started a lace project at the beginning of this week, but it wasn't going well. The yarn was too thin even for my 3.00mm needles. I have had this trouble before, and compensated by doubling the yarn. This time I decided to bend to the yarn's will instead of the other way around, but this required new needles.

I turned to KnitPicks, and given how slippery laceweight yarn can be, opted to go for the Harmony despite my general preference for metal needles. What you see above are 40" Harmony needles in sizes 2.00, 2.25, 2.5, and 2.75. I figured it would be wise to cover all bases, and wise to get the 40" so when I'm not knitting lace they can be used Magic Loop-style, and wise-ish to buy four needles for a little over the price of one of the Addi Lace needles.

And then I couldn't pass up the chance to get free shipping, especially since I could buy a sweater's worth of yarn and only just push my total over the free shipping mark. I am aware that I probably shouldn't be buying yarn at all in the first place, but you know, I wanted the yarn therapy (hat tip) and whatever. I justified it somehow. It's not like I'm buying Koigu cashmere. Onward.

I perused my Ravelry queue and came up with Thermal, so that skein on the right is Gloss in a new color: Cosmos. I had a hard time deciding between that and Parsley, flirted with the idea of getting both for the additional shopper's high, then rationally opted for only getting the yarn I knew would be used. And I do love the color, and I believe I have the buttons already. I also know that I'm going to start this sweater as soon as Dollar and a Half is done (I'm nearing the armhole shaping on the back).

On to the sock. Yes, I finally finished the ONE sock I started ONE MONTH ago.

Would you guess that this is Koigu? Look at that striping action going on! I didn't even realize how uniform it is until Juno pointed out that Koigu doesn't usually act like this. At least, not typically. Or are we both wrong on that?

At any rate, I started the second sock and have a sinking feeling that it's not going to turn out the same way. But the pattern is absolutely delightful. Again, it's Flint Knits' Marigold (Ravelry link to free download). Super easy to memorize, though there is a spot on the foot where I forgot to do a purl row, so it looks like an extra-wide band. Because of the color changes it's less noticeable, not that I would've ripped out and reknit had it been glaringly obvious.

mustering mojo

I was faced with actual subway riding time over the weekend (how rare!) and was still not feeling the love for the still-yet-unfinished Anastasia socks, but in the mood to try a new pair of socks, to attempt to regain a little bit of sock knitting mojo.

I think the problem with the Anastasia socks...well, there are two problems. One is that I can't seem to concentrate on the pattern and keep making mistakes. It's a very simple yarn-over pattern, and I'm on the second sock already, so the fact that I keep messing up is ego-bruising. And I have one way of dealing with ego bruisings. I run away. The second problem is that, much as I am still in love with the colorway, it strikes me now as too dark and gloomy for the early months of spring. The blues are still blue, in other words, when I'm ready for leafy green and sunshine yellow and lilac and rose.

And I just so happen to have a leafy green/yellow/lilac/rose kind of sock yarn, from the Koigu family. No surprise there. But what kind of pattern?

Once again, I turned to Ravelry and once again, spent the better part of a day searching for possible patterns. My Rav friends may have noticed an uptick in number of sock patterns queued that day, because in a fit of indecisiveness, I simply queued anything that looked like it might work with Koigu.

Like Cookie A's BFF socks, for example. Gorgeous ... but more a wintry sock pattern, I think. For Mojo-Generatin' socks, I wanted something light and breezy, even if the socks themselves would be warm and toasty.

There have been a couple excellent looking slip-stitch patterns that would work well with Koigu, like Anne Campbell's Show-off Stranded Socks (Ravelry link--it's a free download either way) and Knitfreak's Aquaphobia socks (fear of pooling. Clever!). But again, for springtime socks, I felt something frilly and lacy would be in order (despite my ambivalence about lace on my feet). Something to wear with a really cute skirt. (I have some STR that I plan to use for Aquaphobia, later).

What I love most about Ravelry (well, one of the things I love most) is that I can look at all the different incarnations of a particular pattern. What I've noticed about the knitting community is that there are a lot of people out there who have, at some point in time, knit a particular sock pattern originally intended for a solid color yarn in variegated or self-striping yarn, with varying degrees of success (and these degrees are entirely subjective). (The converse is also true, but with slightly more predictable results.) So when I came across the pattern for Flint Knit's Marigold Socks, I knew that by checking on the 67 people who have started and/or finished them, I could see how the pattern works with variegated yarn (completely forgetting that I've already drooled over the modified version Veronique attempted with Vesper yarn).

I was sold. It's a lace pattern that stays relatively closed up, so there's no danger of getting lost in the color changes, and the single purl round lends definition and the appearance of stripes even if the yarn itself isn't striping. But mine seems to be. Imagine that.

I started with a Turkish cast on for the toe, which has become my preference in working toe up socks. It's easy and fast and there's no fiddling about with provisional cast ons or short rows. And I think I've found my magic number for how many wraps to make around the needles (which is the first step in the cast on): 12. And now that's been recorded for posterity, should I forget the number but remember which blog post it's in. (ha.)

I may go in for a picot bind off to boot.

So yeah, sock knitting mojo risin'.

 

25 cents worth of a sweater

I did the only sensible thing to do when one faces a knitting rut. I started something new.

Actually, I started two new things, but I'll tell you about the second one tomorrow. The first new thing I had actually started last month, with a swatch. I had intended to work on the Dollar and a Half Cardigan (Ravelry link) while working my way through the BBC adaptations of George Eliot novels (which I bought as a boxed set for a song) last month, but that didn't happen. The swatch hung out on the front table for most of March. It occurred to me last week that, although the lace pattern in the sweater is not as intricate as I may have been looking for when I went on my hunt for lace patterns, it would probably be satisfying enough and, as a bonus, because it stripes with reverse stockinette, it won't get boring.

So I started on a sleeve last Wednesday or Thursday, and now it's done. Wanna see?

I decided to work the ribbing for only 2 inches instead of 4, so I could get to the lace part quicker. The lace is really fun to work, and fairly easy to memorize, though I have been double checking--it's worked with selvedge stitches, and I have a tendency to forget that they're there.

I also decided not to make the sleeves as long as the pattern designates. For my size, I was supposed to make the sleeve 21.25" before starting the cap shaping. Measuring this fabric is tricky, because the reverse stockinette stitch stripes bunch up, so I basically had to pseudo-block the sleeve each time I wanted an accurate measurement. And from that I could tell that this baby is going to block way the hell out, so that in order to get a final measurement of 21.25" I only needed to work to 19.5"...but I worked up to 20" anyway, just so I could start the shaping after I'd finished with the last row of the reverse stockinette stripe.

I hit the bind off in the middle of the lace pattern, which required another slight modification. The stitch count changes from row to row, and the last row I worked before I was supposed to bind off was one that decreases the total number of stitches. So I wound up working one extra row of the pattern in order to bring the total back to wear it belonged before I bound off. This means I have yarn overs in my bind off, but I think it will be OK.

Here's a close up of the lace:

Complete with cat hair, as usual.

Going to start on the back soon. I think I'm going to be really happy with this sweater.

nope, no fools here

Rejected April Fool's Day post ideas:

* "Michael and I are moving." Reason for rejection: Couldn't pick a place that was believable enough where no one we know lives.

* "I got a bun in the oven." Reason for rejection: Might cause Michael to go into shock. Not to mention my mother, his mother, my aunt, and so on...

* "I'm shutting this here blog down." Reasons for rejection: 1. It's been done 2. It's too plausible, given my lackadaisical approach to regular blogging.

* Variations on "there's been an accident..." Reason for rejection: too cruel.

* Variations on "Did I ever tell you about the time..." Reason for rejection: I would actually have to come up with something to tell you.

So anyway.

Knitting. I'm bored. I have multiple projects in progress but I've stalled on every one of them. I keep messing up on the Anastastia socks, so those are stalled. The first flush of ecstasy I felt for Vinterblomster has dissipated upon the woeful discovery that if a pattern calls for stranded knitting where there are five or more stitches between color changes, I am physically unable to make it look nice. I ripped out once, started over with a new stranding strategy, but I'm still getting puckering and grossness, so the mittens are also stalled. I started the back of Flicca a few days ago but I am so not in the mood for mindless knitting.

I'm feeling the desire to work on something lacy, but also something small and quick. Something I can finish in a day, which is no longer possible today because I've spent half of it looking for something small and quick to work on (well, and working too. I have been working). I have over 100 things queued on Ravelry but none of them are calling to me.

Maybe this is just a sign that I should stop knitting or crocheting for a while, until this passes, but I have to have something to DO. You know?

it's still scarf weather

Living in the northern part of the hemisphere, as I do, it's safe to assume that March 21 does not bring with it an immediate return to warmer weather and that, even into April, the air will bounce between "no jacket required" and "where did spring go," and scarves and perhaps even mittens will still be required gear. So I plugged away at my Silk Garden Variety Scarf (Ravelry link) knowing that I would not need to pack it away until next winter.

Good thing, too, because I looooooooooove it.

And check out how wonderfully it coordinates with my red coat:

I am pleased.

All told, I used a little under six skeins for this extra long scarf: 3 of #88, and 1 each of 252, 71, and 203. I manipulated the 88 at times, mostly when I encountered knots that joined two disparate sections of color.

When it's just around my neck without wrapping, it hangs slightly below my knees.

It's incredibly warm, too, which means that it will serve me well in transitional days when it's too warm for my winter coat, but still chilly enough to need something.

So I managed to finish some stuff this month! In addition to the scarf, I put the final pieces of Starsky together. Haven't sewn the belt on yet, but I'm counting it as a finish. And wow, is this sweater warm. Again, another lovely transitional item. Pictures to follow, when weather allows.