Nightfall Multnomah

Last one for the day, I promise.  This is the Nightfall Multnomah (Ravelry link).  The yarn was a gift in the All Things Local Swap from May of 2010.  I knew the minute I saw the yarn that it wanted to be a shawl and when I saw the pattern I was certain that they were perfect for each other.

I won't go into much detail here, but I didn't like this pattern.  There were some math errors that forced me to do WAY to much thinking and I was still in need of mindless knitting.  This was the last piece that I was able to work on before I put Eraser down.  My stress level was really high from the decision process and the ache that it caused and I could never find the strength to pick up the sticks and string.  I did pick up the crochet hook but that is another post all in itself.

Amy Made Me Drop These Stitches

This is the Drop Stitch Scarf pattern (Ravelry link).  Another fairly mindless pattern with GREAT results.  Again, this was yarn from Amy.  She had sent it to me in a birthday package shortly after I had moved in with SF.  This one did take me three days to make.  This was also my first time to work with Manos.  Man oh man, what was I waiting for?

Can you see a theme in the last three FO's?  Yes, I needed instant gratification and these last three fit that need to a "T".

Birthday Cowl

This is the Birthday Cowl.  Let me tell you I was in love with this one and I was totally enjoying the yarn too.  I had received a skein of the Malabrigo Merino Worsted in the color Burgundy - 41 in the Have A Cuppa Swap package.  I had never worked with Malabrigo and now that I have I am TOTALLY hooked.

My mojo for knitting was in jeopardy when I grabbed the skein, wound it into a cake and cast on before I had a chance to change my mind.  I think it too long to make but I was side-tracked with quite a few personal hurdles that sent me into tailspins often.

I would also suggest that if you love a good cowl that you should seriously consider this pattern.  It is well written and looks great.  And you can bet that there will be more Malabrigo in my future!

Cheshire Cat Scarf

Okay, so one of my entries in the planner was to post about my FO's, so here is one.  This is the One Row Handspun Scarf by the Yarn Harlot herself.  The handspun was a Pay-It-Forward Handmade gift from my dear friend Amy.

I was touched when it arrived and I watched it as it began to speak to me about what it wanted to transform into.  I knew it looked like a scarf but I wanted one that would showcase the handspun correctly.  I must admit that the Harlot was correct.  My one regret is that I made it larger than she suggested and when it was soaked and blocked it is wide and short.  That's okay in the long run, as I can wrap it around myself and tuck it into my coat better.

I took this with me when SF and I went to Knoxville and I was making great progress on it since SF is a capable driver and I actually was able to be the passenger for the first time without worrying about anything.  Such a treat to trust the one you are with and let yourself go and enjoy the landscape, the music and the company.  If you want an easy pattern AND you have some handspun to work with I highly recommend the pattern.  I am going to use the pattern to make a baby blanket because it will make a great blanket and looks great on either side.

April Goals....

Well, today is May Day, or better known as May 1st.  In a way, I am glad that April is done.  It was a hard month and a real roller coaster of emotions for me.  I hinted that I would post April goals way back in this post, but obviously I never did follow through.

April was filled with projects but most of them were not ones I should have been working on.  I did manage to start and finish the Multnomah.  For the record, I hated this pattern.  It was full of errors and omissions and that does not make for mindless knitting.  Which this pattern should have been due to all the garter stitch and the feather and fan repeats.  I loved the finished object but more than once I was tempted to frog and rip.  A photo shoot, more like a parade of FO's will appear this week.

I made myself a scarf from some beautiful Manos that Amy had send to me as a birthday present.  I also make a beautiful cowl from some Malibrigo that Amy had sent me as well.  I did finish sock one of the March socks and cast on sock two but they are still just staring at me.  I didn't have the energy to work with little needles and small yarn but I may be able to tackle them again now that things are returning to normal.

So, what are my May goals:

• Finish the March Socks
• Start and Finish the April Socks
• Start the May Socks
• Finish the Red Hot
• Finish the Red Robin
• Realta Afghan - Continue to work on the components (this is a marathon not a sprint)
• Cast on the Traveling Woman
• Finish the Friday Night Knitting Club
• Finish the Big Switch
• Work on my weight (I want to loose 3 to 5 pounds - OR get into the 14's comfortably)
• Get to know Sassy

There are a few others that I may add after I think about them.  I have been working on doing more things for myself lately (pamper wise) and I have been doing well on the mani/pedi portion.  I really want to pick a signature lip color and stick with it, so I'll keep you posted.

Eraser should be home on Friday and I am ready.  I miss her so much and I want to thank all of you for you kind words and thoughts.  I had forgotten how much she had wormed her way into my heart.  I have found some pictures of her as a kitten and I will be posting one last tribute to her.

Enjoy the rest of this beautiful Sunday and start your week off on a positive note.  I'll be fixing healthy dinners for SF and myself.  I need to share some of the treats I have been fixing.  They are low cal and yet packed with flavor.

My To Do List for the week will include a post on some of the recipes, the pictures/details of the FO's, the tribute to Eraser and a sneak peak at the crochet work for the Realta....it is stash busting of some ancient acrylic (Red Heart/Lion Brand/Caron) so don't stick your tongues out.  I am making it for Zoe.  Stephanie will be able to toss it into the washer and dryer and move on.  I'll make an afghan for SF and I with some Cascade 220 later in the year...

Topi

I finished the Topi!

Details:

Started : 09/09/2010
Finished: 09/11/2010

Yarn Used: Cascade 220 Superwash - Color 811 (Como Blue) - One Skein
Needles: US Size 7 DPN's and Circulars AND US Size 5 DPN's

The whole thing took about ten hours of knitting.  Give or take, as I didn't actually time myself.  I know that I did the majority of the knitting while we watched college football Saturday.  I started it late on Thursday, as I procrastinated over the size 5 needles needed because my DPN's are only 4" long.  I ended up using them by placing a needle point protector on the right end of the needle so that the stitches would not slip off.  I used them on both ends once I was done with a needle and moving on the next.  Quite clever if I must say so myself.  It really flew along and I could see the design literally unfold as I progressed.  I had to go to Michael's to get some canvas for the brim and after it soaked and dried yesterday.  She will get the brim insert and be whip stitched closed later today.  I plan on wearing it this week, so I'll see if I can get some action shots.

Overall, this is a super quick knit and can be made to fit any head size if you do the math.  I have already started a test one for Zoe with the leftover yarn from mine.  I'll probably add buttons or decorations to hers but mine will remain plain.

Make one for yourself!

Wednesday

Well, it is indeed Wednesday - AKA Hump Day.  Not including the Friday Fill-Ins posts I have been quiet as of late.  Not intentional I can assure you.  It seems that every time I think about posting, I am either not near the blasted PC or I am in the middle of something else and when I am finished the post has evaporated from my thoughts or slipped off my radar.  Miss Ginger brought up this issue in her blog.

So, what have I been up to that has kept me so preoccupied?  Well, first, I finally finished the Diagonal Granny Afghan.  And I want to emphasize FINISHED!  This was one of the UFO's identified for the Finish-A-Long Contest.  So, I listed four projects and I have completed two of them.  I will be picking up the Red Robin later this week and we'll see if I can get it done before the August 13th deadline.  I hope so but I will not be putting undo stress on myself to get it done.  The object for me was to get the motivation I needed to get some of these older projects finished so that I would fell better about starting some new ones.  Not to mention the boost to the ego one feels when the project is finished!

Not too bad for yarn picked out and purchased in 1983.  She was started in September 1983 and restarted on July 19th.  So, it took me ten days to get her finished.  Not as fast as I had expected but the border was a pain in the ass.  I was finished with the border last night but I had to weave in all the ends (two per row) and that was finished this morning.  She will get a spin in the washing machine later tonight and will most likely end up as a donation to Warm Up Winchester for Amy to get in to a person that needs it.  And trust me, it is SUPER warm.

I finally made it to one of the CLACK meetings.  These gals/ladies are a HOOT.  We meet every Monday at the Panera in Webster (I45 at Bay Area Boulevard) from 6:30 PM until they kick us out or you need to leave.  I took the Clementine Shawlette with me, as I didn't really want to haul the afghan out in public.  Especially for my first appearance.  I was amazed at the diversity.  There were socks in progress and while my preference is making them on two circulars, I was amazed at the number of younger women hooked to their dpn's.  There were some wonderful women that are newer knitters and they were so proud of their work.  It was amazingly refreshing for me, especially since my own daughters have no desire to learn.  And, sadly I could have been the mother to many of the women that were there.  But, I'm okay with that because I know I started hatching them young and will be a very active woman for a long time to come.

Last Friday SF and I went to the first showing of Salt.  Now I will admit that I am not always a huge fan or even a fan of Angelina but I LOVED this film.  The costumes, the action, the plot and the intensity were all spot on.  I may need to see it again, as I fear that I missed details.  I was like that with Gone In Sixty Seconds as well.  I had to see it twice at the cinema and then purchased the DVD.

SF is back on her diet as well.  She had been on it prior to meeting me and was in the maintenance phase when we were dating.  Since I moved in she slacked off a bit and gained back weight.  That was in stark contrast to the pattern I was on when we met.  I lost two more dress sizes after moving in but have since slacked off a bit since the last race.  I too have now added back pounds/inches and have re-focused my workouts to conquer the trouble spots.  I will not go back to the previous size I was.  Mostly because it is not healthy but more importantly I refuse to buy that size ever again.

I also received my Pimp My Queue Swap package from Paula.  Look at the pictures!

Yep!  I was spoiled and so was Zoe.  The cute little bag with the hearts is for her.  I can hardly wait to get it to her.  Bonus, since it is cloth Stephanie can wash it whenever it gets dirty.  The object of this swap was for your spoiler to pick an item from your top ten projects in your Ravelry Queue and supply all the needs to complete it.  That included the pattern and needles.  I have been wanting to make Green Gable for as long as I can remember and I was so happy to see that this was the chosen project.  I have it with me today and will be casting on as soon as I can.  I love the color of the yarn.  It is Caribbean Sea and I think it will look great against tanned skin and make the blue in my eyes even better.  I can't wait to get this one under way and done.

I have also been reading The Beekeeper's Apprentice for the Out of the Box Reading Game on Ravelry.  I can blame/thank Martha for this.  Martha is another wonderful woman that I met via a swap.  She supplied me with these goodies:

The Scavenger Hunt Swap was so much fun.  The yarn for the Clementine was in this package.  That is how long I have wanted to make it.  The breakdown of the contents can be read in this post.  That goes back to Miss Ginger and how the world of blogs touch our lives.  I have had the honor and pleasure of meeting so many wonderful women and men through connections from the Interwebz.  Looking through the Scavenger Hunt Swap blog, I came across this one from Leah.  And I will admit that I have been remiss in reading her blog and not posting comments when I do read a post.  Something I will rectify with my next visit to her blog.

I can also now share these:

They were photographed much better by AHJ on her blog.  Of course, if you are on Ravelry you can get the details here.  If you knit and you knit socks, then you should really check out the RPM pattern.  It is quick to learn and they are a lot of fun with variegated yarns.  I have made them twice with a third pair on the needles.

The last thing on my mind at the moment is Amy's post from yesterday.  I am still working on my Ten Things but I hope to get them up by the end of the week.  I think I will share the list with SF, as I think we watch a little too much TV sometimes.  Read Amy's post and see if you have ten things to add that are different and need to be shared/aired.

One last thing before I get back to real work....tonight I am going out again without SF.  No, there are no problems in paradise.  One of our favorite places is having a wine tasting event again tonight.  They are offering some of my favorites this go-round, so I wanted to go.  SF cannot have any adult beverages during the initial phases of her diet, so told me to go without her and have a good time.  Plus it starts at 5:30 PM and she would never get there before it ended since she doesn't get off work until 5:00 PM and it would take her at least an hour (with no bad weather and no traffic hardships) to get there.  Twist my arm a little harder please.... Seriously, I love the fact that we have so much trust in our relationship that we can both encourage each other to do things like this.  So, I will be taking both the Clementine and The Beekeeper's Apprentice with me to the event.  I doubt that there will be knitting after the tasting begins but it will be there as back up should it become necessary.

I leave you with pictures of Sassy and Eraser, as they have been plotting my demise since I do not share their beauty and majesty with the public enough to suit their egos.

Monday....

Well, it is indeed Monday.  We have had a good dousing of rain this morning and it has managed to stay overcast most of the remainder of the day.  Good news for the energy bills and the water bills.  We are still keeping a close eye on Tropical Storm Alex and are hoping that he decides to stay far away from out part of the Gulf so that the oil spill cleanup can continue.

This weekend I was craving a hamburger and a good beer.  Well, SF is not one to turn down a good beer so we decided that we should go to the HEB and peruse their vast selection and get something for each of us.  We also decided to get some chips and salsa, as we were out and it is great for watching TV.  We also agreed that burgers from Whataburger were the best choice.  We could both get the burgers we wanted without any delay and could get home to watch TV.

Beer was a harder decision than either of us had expected.  I immediately saw Left Hand Milk Stout....I wanted that!  SF was pondering and looking.  It was taking her longer than I thought it would.  She really prefers wheat beers, so I was sure she would be ready before I was.  Fooled again!  What happened next was funny.  I am not one that likes confrontation, so I asked what she wanted to see if we could meet in the middle.  Much to my surprise, so showed me a sampler pack from Michelob that had four beer types.  I looked them over and three of the four sounded great to me.  I knew that the Shock Top was what she was after.  The sampler pack contained three each of the following: Shock Top, Hop Hound, Ginger Wheat and DunkelWeisse.  Well, I knew that I liked the DunkelWeisse and after reading the Hop Hound I was confident that I would like it as well.  The Ginger Wheat sounded interesting enough so we both agreed that we should try the sampler pack.

We got home with the hamburgers and the groceries.  We popped the burgers into the microwave to stay warm and put two of each beer into the freezer to get really cold.  We put the rest of the groceries away, got the chips and salsa into bowls and got the burgers out and finished.  We both added a few things from the fridge.  We also opened jars of pickled okra.  SF had picked spicy and I have, of course, chosen mild.  We made the burgers ancient history rather quickly and snacked on the okra.  Once we were done with that, we agreed that it was beer time.  In the spirit of a sampler, I got two beer coozies that covered the entire bottle.  I opened both of them and secured them in their coozies.  It was a total surprise to SF.  I had chosen to give her the Ginger Wheat first due to the pairing sheet that said that it could cool down heat such as wasabi.  I had a DunkelWeisse first.  She was very pleased with her first selection.  It was her turn next, so she got herself a Hop Hound and got me a Ginger Wheat.  It was better than I had even guessed.  Our third ones were Hop Hound for me and Shock Top for her.  We both agreed that we needed to get another one of these packs, as there was something for both of us and that is always a bonus!

Okay, enough with that.  I have also been knitting.  This weekend I finished the Sugar Rush Tank.  This yarn is SO yummy!  I have been looking at my Ravelry queue and my stash of patterns to see what else calls to me to be made from it as well.  I took this picture before I had the straps sewed on, as I had to enlist SF to help me place them.  I wanted to be able to wear a bra with it, so placement was key.  I'll post pictures of it finished and perhaps one of me modeling it as well later this week.

I also finished the Ballerina Wrap for Zoe.  It was blocked heavily prior to assembly, as suggested by the Yarn Harlot herself.  I was glad that I did, as it made the seams much easier to match and the finished piece is lovely.  I can't wait to get it to her.

And two shots to leave you with this afternoon.  The one above is the daylily above with the fresh rain upon it.  The one below is Sassy in her overlord pose.

Until tomorrow....

Finished Stuff and More UFO's

This is my third Calais.  This one is made from ShiBui Sock Yarn and I love that too.  It is for Megan.

These are BMG's Footies made from Lorna's Laces sock yarn in the MSU colorway.  They took me three days to cast on and complete both of them.  Can you tell that I have this one memorized?

This jewel is now officially all knitted.  It will be soaked, blocked and assembled this weekend ot Monday at the latest.

This is the next mystery UFO that I will be posting about.  The only Clue is that is is made from Unger Fluffy as well.

These are the next two UFO's that I will be finishing.  One is called Red Robbin from the Kid's Knit book that the Ballerina was also from.  It is made with Unger Plantation in Blue and Oatmeal.  The second is a baby blanket that is made from Jamie baby yarn.  It is a total pain in the butt, as I chose to use moss stitch.  It I had more than one skein left to finish it I would probably frog it instead.  These two will get their own special post with more pictures next week.

Stephanie's Mother's Day Calais

This post is long overdue.  I finished Stephanie's made to order Calais for Mother's Day on May 16th.  Details can be found on my Ravelry Project Page.  The more I work with this pattern the more I love it.  The two charts are super easy to memorize and the sock yarn that I used for this one was a super fun way to use one skein of yarn on something other than socks.  Not that I don't love making socks, I just love to see what else I can make out of the yummy yarns that are available for socks.

Pictures

The finished object.....

Trying to get a close up.... not so good this time

A few rows into Chart A

Colinette Jitterbug in Bright Charcoal

Calais the Night Away

So, I finally finished the Calais that I was making for myself.  I will admit, I should have used bigger needles than I did.  I used US size 4 needles.  It ended up more as a shawlette than a shawl, but here in Texas that is actually a good thing.  I guess I could have added more rows in the body (Chart A) and then more rows in the edge (Chart B), but I decided to make it as written this go-round.

I needed two cold water soaks to get her to stop bleeding color, but that was okay by me.  If I had been thinking clearly, I would have taken pictures of her soaking.  She did morph from a glob of stitches into the wrap as she laid in the bottom of the garden tub.  I rolled her in a navy towel just to be safe and them pinned her out on the guest bed to dry overnight.  I was so pleased this morning when I saw her all dry and I removed the pins.  She is soft and looks wonderful on my shoulders as well.  No, I do not do self-portraits, so unless SF catches me without the camera in my hands, chances of getting to see me wearing her are slim and none and I like it that way.  Although I might acquiesce when Stephanie is here for Mother's Day since I am making her a Calais as well.

I was trying to show off the wonderful yarn when I was taking the pictures.  I thought that the rocks that make up the waterfall and surround the landscaping of the pool were the perfect shades to offset the blue....who knows.  And I couldn't resist the fact that the Calais looked like water for the fish in the hallway.  The colors in them are almost a direct mirror of those in the yarn.  I believe that I have enough yarn left to make me a pair of BMG's Footies too, so I may cast on for them after I get some of my other WIP's finished.

I can't wait to get the perfect evening to wear her....maybe the upcoming Flamingo Party....depends on what I decide to wear.