Knitters Arent' Strangers

I had two doctor's appointments this afternoon so I took a boatload of knitting with me in case I had to wait too long.

I almost took a phone pic of myself - in the teeny, tiny paper-thin gown - with my knitting propped up close to my chest trying to keep the aforementioned gown covering my "assests" - with a giant wall sized window overlooking downtown San Francisco on the most glorious sunny day. But I couldn't figure out where I'd hold the phone and still keep the gown closed.

That visual probably pales in comparison to one of me, inside the mammy room, with little stickers with metal dots placed over my nips, gown dropped around my waist, my "assests" being positioned

in the vise-grip they call a mammogram machine by a woman I've never met before who happens to be from Petaluma but grew up in Columbia and was taught to cross-stitch by the nuns and now hates to cross-stitch because it feels like home-work. And I know all this how? You guessed it - the x-ray tech who vise-gripped my boobs is a knitter. She's looking for a new shop in Petaluma - her favorite lys closed and she hasn't knit a stitch since. And the more bizarre part of this whole event - once I knew she was a knitter - I totally forgot I was nearly nekkid in front of a stranger - knitters are never strangers :)

Some progress

still lots and lots of knitting to be done and not enough time to do it. I did make some progress on one of the Lime N Violet Scarf Circle III scarflettes - hopefully I can send it out in the mail tomorrow. I'm loving knitting the Twisted T - something about rows and rows of stockinette seems very calming - don't have to think much - just a decrease or two every 10 rows - easy BART knitting until it gets bigger. And Jayne hats are making a comeback - I still have a ton of Jayne yarn so I listed a hat on eBay which sold easily. So I'll start churning a few out now since it's going to be holiday time soon. I'm debating on whether or not I want to finish Mystery Stole III - I do want to hone my lace and beading skills but I know I'll never wear it - maybe a gift for my former MIL - she loves that kind of shit.

Some ladies at the LnV message boards posted this cartoon - made me laught - even though she says "crochet" when it's clearly K N I T. When will they ever learn?

Chore Wars

For all of us knitters with too much free time , the wonderful ladies over at Lime n Violet have devised a Knit Wars version of Chore Wars. Anyone familiar with MMORPs like World of Warcraft will find Chore Wars vaguely familiar - you earn XP for completing knitting related tasks. The whole point of the site is to encourge folks to do chores whether it's kids taking out the garbage or menopausal women knitting socks. Anything from finished a sock to resisting the temptation of buying new yarn ears experience points - and let's just say, I'll never earn XP for NOT buying yarn. It's a fun way to pass the time at work - of course only when I'm not actually working. I noticed tonite, as I put in some xp for the 2 hours of knitting I did last night while watching "The Trouble With Angels" (best.movie.ever). That gave me 40 xp plus another 10 for the 4 skeins of sock yarn I got online. 50 xp for the day. Not bad. I've got a total of about 400 xp. Then I looked at some of the other knitters - those who had thousands and thousands of experience points. On person had claimed 40xp for knitting dishclothes at 2 hrs a pop, 4 times in one day. I guess I'm glad I don't have THAT much free time. Course now that I've blogged about knitting, I can go claim some more xp :)
And, in other knitting news, I'm loving the way the Twisted T is beginning to look - the color of the Cotton-Ease is a most yummy shade of purple, it's far easier to knit than Sugar n Cream or Mission Falls 1824 (that stuff almost killed me), and I L O V E how the twisted hemmy part turned out - and sooooooo simple. I predict I'll be finished by the end of next month - and hopefully I'll be 10 lbs thinner so I'll look so hot (not!).
And, my ball winder arrived at my mom's bar today so I'll go pick it up in the next day or so. Not having a car sucks but all the money I save buys me more yarn!

Lot's O'Knitting

My efforts to avoid the nasty bug that's going around by taking a sick day on Thursday failed miserably. I went back to work on Friday and now I'm sick as a dog. I did run bar errands Saturday morning, and went grocery shopping, which make it all worse. So now I'm staying put, taking lots of sudafed and sneezing my brains out. The bug is more of an annoyance than anything else - I'm not sick enough to sleep through it and I'm hungry as a horse. My WW weight in tomorrow may not be pleasant.

But I did cast on for the Twist-tee from Knitty. I'm using Cotton Ease (because I couldn't find a shade of Debbie Bliss Cotton Angora that I liked) in a nice purpley-mauvey colorway. Since it's an actual garmet, I did knit a gauge swatch which was dead on so I'm feeling fairly confident. It won't be BART knitting and it pushes MSIII on the back burner (I wasn't loving it). I do have 2 swatches for Lime-n-Violet Scarf Circle III that need finished soon and some purse lining to do but I think the Twisted-tee is good for stay-in-bed-knit-all-Sunday-so-I-don't-use-another-sick-day knitting.

Here are some random pics of my daughter and my niece shopping for clothes at Wal-Mart (who knew cool-urban teenagers would love Wal-Mart?).

C O T T O N rules

In a valiant effort to anilate my yarn organization, my almost 22 year old son insisted I drive him to the mall this evening as he needed a new backpack. Since his college classes started this morning and since I got paid today, I agreed. Unfortunately we found a parking spot near the Beverly's (conveniently located between Jamba Juice and Gamespot). As I'm feeling as if I'm coming down with a nasty little cold, I headed for the Jamba Juice. My son, being male, headed for Gamespot. We met in the middle, in front of Beverly's. What harm could I do in a chain craft store? After all I just got rid of thousands of yarns of Red Heart. Unfortunately I'd been reading Mason-Dixon blog whilst working and feel in love with the Buncha Squares Blanket that Ms. Kay just posted. It's quite fetching and it's cotton and its garter stitch. So I was thinking I could make something like that as a Christmas gift. I've got a decent selection of cotton but no creams or white which the aforementioned blanket required. The rest is a blur because I'm not entirely sure how I managed to spend more than $50 on little tiny skeins of yarn that cost a little over $1 each but when my son opened the trunk of the car, there it was C O T T O N for days. I did have an Eureka! moment about creating something other than a blanket with all this cotton which I'm going to go work on righ this second.......details later!

alpaca

alpaca
Originally uploaded by newspixie@sbcglobal.net

Protect your apples!

Does your apple need a jacket? What about your oranges or peaches or pears? Cherries!! Surley your cherries need the protection of a jacket. Once all your fruit are sporting hand-knits, won't your veggies get jealous? Avocados are fragile, shouldn't they be protected as well?
And what about those pork chops in the freezer? They definately need protection.
Gotta go.......off to make some handknits for my grocery list. :)

Stash Reduction Weekend

I've finally come to the conclusion that the massive amounts of yarn in plastic tubs in my bedroom are offically annoying me. I've also come to the conclusion that I will never, ever knit anything with the shitload of acrylic that I currently own. Since most of it was purchased decades ago, I would have no problem with tossing it. But since I'm a fan of Al Gore and try to be green I'm hesitant to add it to some landfill. I'm thinking I'll take it to Goodwill? Do they even take yarn? So tomorrow, instead of Angel Island picnic day, it'll be stash reduction day. Anything that doesn't have a purpose or potential purpose is going into a giant bag and sent to the garage until I find out if Goodwill takes yarn.

Then Sunday's gonna be organize day - I'm breaking out the Christmas list and starting now - because with less than 2 weeks of summer vacation, it'll be the holidays before you know it.

I've already got a pretty good idea of what I'll be knitting, and what I'll be sewing for holiday gifts, and even have most of the materials. It may also be time for a S E R I O U S yarn diet.

2008 is going to be an expensive year - high school graduation and the bigass party I'm going to throw for the graduate is going to take some fiscal planning. Not to mention the laptop someone was promised if she makes honor roll - or college tuition that'll be due next summer. But it'll be worth it!! Time to get organized - pics of progress manana.

And - GO B A R R Y!!

Booja denied

I've been rushing and rushing to finish up the Booja bag as it's an early birthday gift for my favorite aunt (and godmother). Her birthday's not until the end of the month but we were celebrating it this weekend on Angel Island - a traditional picnic spot for our family. But poor Aunt Laurie did a nosedive at the gym and broke her ankle - cancelling the family outing. I'm still going to try and get it finished - and superfastknit a pair of socks she can stretch over her cast to keep her tooties warm for the next 10 weeks! I can ship it off to her house since I know she ain't going anywhere!!! Yuck for broken ankles!

Tragedy......and a Trifecta

Just back from my Tahoe vacation - to my utter dismay the Jimmy Beans Wool store in Truckee is now closed. I was heartbroken that I would not be able to visit the store again (although my credit card was happy). To cheer me up, my daughter & my niece took the most recent scarfette from Lime & Violet's Scarf Circle III out for some sightseeing at Emerald Bay.
I did finally get to visit a Wal-Mart on the way up and on the way back. You see, the company I work for does some in-store advertising at Wal-Mart and since I don't own a working vehicle and there are no Wal-Marts nearby, I've never been in one. So I've never seen "my work" in action. So today, I got to visit the Wal-Mart supercenter in Dixon where outside the store it was a whopping 108 degrees. Inside the store, it was cool and crisp and I was able to see my work in action. And, of course, buy some yarn. Just a little cotton for some holiday washclothes, but yarn nonetheless.
In other non-knitting news, we did get home in time to watch Barry tie Hank Aaron's home run records. It was a classic Barry homerun - no doubts from the second the ball hit the bat - and watching him bear hug his son at homeplate was priceless. I almost bought tickets early in the season for Monday's home game - Irish night - but since it was my first day back at work from vacation, thought I'd be too tired - now I wished I'd gotten them because I'd love to be there when he breaks the record. Go Barry.
In addition non-knitting news, since today is my 29th birthday (again), along with a 6 hour drive from Tahoe to SF, I got some stellar birthday gifts - the best of which are a Darth Vader light saber and the UPSP Star Wars commerative stamp set. We won't mention some of the other gifts - like the Menopause For Dummies book - which my sister will pay dearly for when her big day arrives - but all in all, it was a good day. A trifecta of historical goodness - the anniversay of my birth, Barry hitting # 755, and my first trip to a Wal-Mart Supercenter. What more can a girl ask for?