mamacate

Merry New Year!

You have to say that in a fake African accent, a la Eddie Murphy in Trading Places.  You can actually see the section here.  Love YouTube.

Rhys and I quote this movie all the time.  Ja, from Sweden....Please to help me with my rucksack?  We're not the highest of the brows, what can I say?  Anyway, I finally bought the movie on DVD, so we can watch it EVERY New Year's Eve.  It was the Dukes...it was the Dukes...

With regard to this here holiday:

So my new year's resolution is to deal with the insanity that is my house.  I have no illusions that I will become a neat or organized person.  I just want to be able to find crap when I need it.

I don't know if I told you this, but my MIL is taking the entire family to the Cayman Islands in February.  As you might imagine, I'm deeply psyched, despite any stress that sharing a house with 12 of your closest in-laws might produce.  Dude, it's the Caribbean in February and I'd spend it in a house full of Republicans if I had to.  Oh wait a minute, that's exactly what I'm doing.  Never mind.

Anyway, as you probably know, you now have to have a passport in order to go to the bathroom travel anywhere from the US (and get back in at the end of it), so I had to update mine, which expired in '06.  So I went looking for it.  Hmm.  Not there.  Or there either.  Or in the safe deposit box.  Nor in the Big Pile Of Crap That Is Now In A Box But That Was On The Junk Counter Last Time People Came Over.  You know that box?  It wasn't in that box, or the box from the time before.  I know, I know, life is crazy, what can I say?  Well, then I figured I'd better find my birth certificate, which I always knew where it was before the renovation (you know, the one where we were going to have so much more storage space and shelving and organization?  Yeah that one).  Well, nowhere to be found.  So here I am in mid-December realizing that I might actually be waving goodbye to my family from the airport because I didn't have a freakin' passport.  I ordered a new birth certificate from the City of New York but you can imagine how much confidence I had in the timeliness of that.

My point is that I couldn't find a flipping thing in my damn house and there's no reason for this.  So after returning from nearly a week of Christmas with the Republicans in-laws, I went to the basement and I kicked some paperwork-clutter-disorganization butt and I a) found my passport within an hour and sent my expedited application off for a new passport because dude I am so going to the Caribbean and b) threw away a big pile of toys and old junk and c) organized a bunch of stuff in the basement.  Now I have to go to IKEA to get one of these for the basement and, if I can just stick with it, we're going to have a basement where we can FIND STUFF.  Seriously.  I'm also going to be selling and giving away stash over the next few months.  Watch this spot and my Ravelry feed.  (Do you know that you can subscribe to your Ravelry friends' activity on Bloglines or whatever RSS reader you use?  It's a great way to keep up with friends' projects, and it's interesting to see how virally fellow bloggers queue patterns.)

Solstice Knitting Recap:

When I said I'd be knitting for teachers, a few people questioned my sanity asked if I was completely sure that was a good idea, given my stress level in other areas of life.  That's entirely reasonable, of course, but for some reason that even I don't understand, I actually like doing that kind of knitting.  I think it gives me an excuse to make small, easy projects, and there's no pressure--the recipients aren't expecting knitted gifts so if I don't finish, no one will be disappointed and they won't be my kids' teachers next year, so I'm not setting up any expectations for the future.  I'm not sure why I'm capable of knitting gloves for my kids' teachers but can't seem to do the same for myself, but let's save that for therapy, mkay?  Here's the pile on Solstice eve (missing one pair of cashmere-silk fetching mitts, just for the record...):

Among these, for the most favoritest teacher of all, were a pair of chalice mitts, designed by the fabulous Alison. 

I test-knit these, though the pattern was perfect already.  Hopefully she'll be releasing it soon.  I used Elsebeth Lavold Angora (on closeout at Webs, of course), and it was kind of a marriage made in heaven.  I wasn't happy about this at first, but because I ran out of yarn on the second mitt, I wound up having to buy three more skeins because it would have been wasteful to just use a few yards of the third skein.  So now I can knit some for MEEEE!  Okay, WHEN is a whole other question.  Let's not get into that whole therapy thing again.

Well, I never tell you people anything, it seems, but then when I do I do ramble on don't I?  We've had a wonderfully snowy start to the winter here, and my skis are itching to get on the slopes, but it's not likely it will shoehorn its way into the schedule.  The kids tried it while we were in New Hampshire, but it never got past the frustrating stage for them.  Someday soon.  All this white stuff makes me wish I lived where Ruth lives...

There might be mittens

First of all, people, best birthday EVAH.  It started with a sweet and lovely snowfall and attendant kid euphoria, then was followed by the kindest act of comment pimping possible, and was capped off by my coworkers throwing me a rocking surprise party.  I confess I was completely unable to deal with being surprised, and was eventually given a talking-to by one of my colleagues, who told me to shut up and do as I'm told, which still didn't stop me from completely ruining the surprise.  But there were margaritas and a homemade cake with butterfingers in the frosting (I know!) and some of my favorite people and tapas so I was a happy camper.  What a great birthday.  Thanks and thanks and thanks again.

Black Friday may mean shopping for many, but for me it's the start of holiday knitting.  The situation of two schools and a crew of teachers and aides means further complications.  And of course my first project, a pair of fetching mitts made with handspun, will need to be frogged.  I knit one and it's just a little too "swamp thing" for a gift.  I'm pretty sure this teacher will get the value of a handspun, handknit gift, but you know, it just doesn't work.  Frog pond.

More successful so far is a pair of pirate mittens for Mr. Henry.  He seems to like the finished one (though pronounced it "yarny" in a way that was not altogether positive, though I think he was responding to scratchiness).  Me, I like 'em.

And back to it...

I forgot my blogiversary but getting older is harder to miss

So I don't think I mentioned that I'd been doing this blogging thing for three years in June.  So now it's three years plus.  Thing is I'm not doing it that much anymore, so I'm not sure how impressed I can be with myself at this point.  It's hard to have something to say for that long.  Aren't you sick of me?

Anyway, don't answer that, because tomorrow (Tuesday) is my birthday.  I'm a rather boring age, 38, but that's okay, because it means I have a little while until I need to start thinking about being 40.

There have been comments from certain quarters about the need to observe the wild sweater in its natural habitat.  My rack, that is.  Well, that's part of the problem.  See it took me a few wearings to really come to terms with the fact that the neckline is too wide and too low, and the raglan is too long and I will probably need to do something involving scissors and weeping and possibly also alcohol.  There hasn't been time to come to terms with it. 

Love steeking, love it, but the downside is that if you fucked something up, you're screwed because you've got yourself one-row strips of yarn there to work with.  Ain't no frogging.  I have evil thoughts that involve cutting and seaming around the shoulder tops but I'm not terribly optimistic.  --Deb has been down a similar road and it hasn't been easy.  I will probably put the sweater in time out for a while and wear it, because it's just barely wearable, but not quite nice--not as nice as I believe it should be--before I bend it to my will.  I'll let you know when I get there, I promise.  Heck, maybe I'll cut it in public again.  Anyway, learn from my mistake.  If you knit the larger sizes, make the neckline WAY smaller than the pattern suggests.  If I rip and re-knit, I'm going to remove a whole pattern repeat.  Did I mention I made the neckline over an inch higher than the pattern called for?  Yah.  Row gauge was fine while knitting, though I haven't had the heart to measure it post-blocking.

Oh right, did I mention a picture of my rack?  Here you go:

I might entertain exhortations to leave it as is, but you'll have to see me wearing it and tugging at it before you can be sure.  Anyway, pretty colors, huh?

In other news, Ellie got a new scarf.  Laura talked me into buying this insane roving from Heather at the Fiber Revival, and when I got home with the skein, which I spun at the Revival, Miss Ellie declared that it would be hers.  She preferred a Faroese shawl, but a quick calculation had me convincing her that a scarf would be a better choice.  A brief negotiation on the topic of fringe had the deal complete.  Two short evenings of knitting, a little fringing, and we've got a happy girl.

Of course, she's also decided that the scarf makes her a rock star.  I tried to point out that she was already a rock star, but it can be hard to talk to rock stars sometimes, especially when they're rocking out.  See?

Just so that my son does not suffer the combined indignities of not being the current recipient of knitwear (don't worry, it won't be long) and of not being featured on the blog in all his cuteness, I give you a picture of a couple of best friends.

Can ya stand it?

In wheel news, I have divested myself of a very well-loved wheel, because someone else loved it better.  The Norm Hall needed to go back and live with Sara, which is okay because it's too similar in function to my other wheel.  I've already used some of the proceeds to pick up a used Schacht, which so far rocks my world.  I'll probably hang on to the Lendrum for travel (maybe...maybe not), but the Schacht could easily become my primary wheel.  I just like spinning on double drive.

I think I'll go do just that.  I need to come up with some solstice gifts for teachers, plus I have a deprived child who has no currently fitting knitwear.

Best of KC

I'm back from KC.  Life hit me right between the eyes when I returned, and shows no sign of abating.  See how much I post when my kids, my boss, and church aren't in the mix?  Seriously.

But I still need to report on the best of Kansas City.  That would be Cottage Fiber.  All the places I visited were lovely (go to The Studio for a wide variety of yarns, to the Yarn Barn for an awesome selection of spinning equipment), but Cottage Fiber was the best.  It almost didn't happen.

In researching my trip (you know, airline tickets, rental car, conference registration, yarn near westin crown center on google maps--the usual), I found Cottage Fiber, but they were only open 4 days a week, and they were not the days we were there.  I emailed the owner just to see if she had hours by appointment, and she agreed to open up for us.

Can I tell you how glad I am that I emailed?  This place is like a fiber festival in the middle of a city.

And the owner is a wonderful fiberphile living the dream.  I want to be like PJ when I grow up.  (Seriously, if I had a store, I would want it to be like this one.  Except I might try to talk people out of buying some of the stuff, which PJ quite graciously sold to us without even twitching.) 

Here she is posing for the blog with my partners in crime, the championship institutional research fiber crawl team, Sara and Teri.

The place is fantastic.  The first room.

If that's not enough, there's actually a second room.

All those little cubbies have various sorts of hand-dyed fibers, handspun yarns, and generally beautiful, special things.

Then there was the Hutch of Exotic Fibers at Reasonable Prices.

That happens to be my favorite kind of hutch.  Out of it I extracted some hand-dyed tussah and hand-dyed cashgora.

For Sara, it yielded llama.

Teri, appropriately enough, found bunny in the hutch, though she forgot to bring it home.  That's okay, she'll be calling.

I may have mentioned this before, but I love that hutch.

I somehow managed to not take photos of the stash enhancement on my part, but there was a wee bit of falling down near the tussah, and that sunrise-colored ball of fiber in the llama photo above represents my willingness to consider once again the merits of cashgora after a deadline-spinning experience for a very wonderful cause but that put me off the stuff for a while.  Other than that, I was pretty well behaved.

Even so, I think we made the visit worth PJ's while.  I know I'll be calling her back if I'm ever in KC again.

There's more knitting I've been remiss about sharing.  I took this picture the day after Cummington.  I'm halfway through the edging now.

It's copper moth (no longer, but the dyer now blogs here) tussah (hence the falling down around silk lately), purchased two years ago at NHS&W under duress.  This yarn is so old, I have a category for it.  This blog thing comes in handy, since finding that link just told me how many yards I have.  I have to poach a few yards from the thicker skein to finish the edging, but I think I'll have a little scarf's worth left.  The pattern is my hero, Evelyn A. Clark's Leaf Lace Shawl.  I confess, I'm a groupie.  Because I started another one of Evelyn's shawls.  You know, with the camel/silk, from THIS year's NHS&W.

It's the Shetland Triangle from Wrap Style (the only reason I bought the book).

I survived the washing of the singles.  Winding the skein was no problem; the washing gave me fits.

It looks REALLY medical.  Sorry Laurie.  All I could think was placenta.

It lived to tell the tale, though.  I managed to make it through the hyperventilating (so did Kristen, who came to visit the kids, and talked to me occasionally too).  Apparently, I got lucky, because I even wound it into a ball without any disasters.

Yes, that's a four-leaf AND a five-leaf clover (not sure what the five-leaf one means).  I found them both within minutes of each other; the first ones I've ever found, despite looking for four-leaf clovers my entire life, and always, apparently, overlooking them.  Maybe things are looking up...

Up to Date Update

As Ruth pointed out, though I didn't arrive here on a Friday, I have already learned a thing or two (largely related to the persistence of underrepresented minorities in science disciplines and future government reporting requirements).

If you're wondering what the hell I'm on about, watch the third clip here or read here.

Sara's here, and also Teri.  I like working in an industry where there is a knitblogger contingent at most conferences.  We had a nice lunch today, and have yarn crawling planned for tomorrow afternoon.

Anyway, after learning a thing or two or three, Sara and I headed out for yarn and bbq.  A series of cases of me getting us lost (what the hell happened to my sense of direction?) meant we got to the yarn store at 6 pm, minutes after they were to close.  Sara knocked on the door anyway, and they were very kind and let us in.  There was locally hand-dyed yarn, the makings of my next sock (I am kitchenering as we speak, and was in grave danger of not! having a sock! to knit! at a conference!).

The owners were very sweet, willing to be blogged, and even wound my yarn.

Sara had fun choosing.  There was some petting of cashmere.  Can you blame her?

Then we went and had some awesome and totally non-touristy barbeque.

The ribs were good but the beans, oh my god the beans.  If you're ever in KC, go eat these beans.  I know, it's silly to wax rhapsodical about beans, but people you have not tried these beans.  My point: yum.

Anyway, it was an early morning and a busy day, so to bed with me. As for tomorrow, what next! What next?

Up to Date

Just keeping you up-to-date: I'm in Kansas City.  I've gone about as far as I can go, though my hotel room is above the seventh floor so presumably they went farther.

I'll have my head in work stuff at a conference for the next three days, but an early flight meant there was time for a wee road trip.

The Yarn Barn.  Of Kansas.  Just about 40 miles west of town.

Lawrence, to be exact.  Sweet college town.  Very nice.

I acquainted myself with this Lendrum Saxony.  Dangerous.  Very dangerous.  Little sample skein there.

Some chasing rainbows bombyx followed me home.

Also a couple of books and magazines, maybe an aptly-named shawl pattern.

Off to the plenary.  I think we're up to date.

Woolcentric Universe

I love where I live.  This is the place that, years ago, was dubbed "Lesbianville, USA" by the National Enquirer.  The history of this place is feminist and progressive and anti-racist, and I love that about it.  It's a good place, from a political point of view.

But it's also rather wooly.  My little village was even based around the spinning of silk.  Of course Webs is in my backyard, much to the detriment of my bank account.  I'm even convenient to Springdelle Farm and a local group of Tibetan Buddhists raising yaks for fiber.  If the public transport was a bit better, I'd say it was the perfect place for me, but we can work with that.

Today's paper proved Noho's profound wooliness, however.  Stephanie's visit rated front-page news.

Priorities.  I guess we're staying.

PS: Don't worry, I'm not too freaked out about the singles.  I've already wound them off, though I haven't counted yet.  Nothing snarled too impossibly.  See?

Unblogged Socks

This is how bad it is:  I finally got around to getting the camera and the computer in the same place and after looking for oh, a few days, the USB cord too.  And the first picture on there?  The kids with Santa.

When I said out to lunch, I'm not kidding.

Also, friends in the computer, thanks for being worried about me, but don't worry.  The ongoing parenting challenges, are, well, ongoing, but really, I'm okay.  My job is just giving me fits and I'm exhausted at the end of the day and blogging and going to the gym are both getting the shaft.  I'm still here, just not organized enough to take pictures of knitting, or, for that matter, knit anything really worth photographing.

Which is a perfect segue into my next topic: The Various Ways I Have Made Things By Going Around and Around in a Circle.

I give you Socks, Unblogged.

Melenweit Boots Stretch, finished.

Socks that Rock Mediumweight in the Fred Flinstone colorway, finished.

<Apparently Fred is shy.  How did I manage not to photograph these?  They're done.  Really, I swear.>

Austermann Step, also known as Socks With Pox, or Measley Socks, because it has these inexplicable random dots all over.  But they're comfy and wash up wonderfully.  Think Opal with aloe and jojoba.  Yum.  Oh yeah, also finished.

<Again shy.  What is this?  Pictures soon, as soon as I do laundry.>

Trekking 105 (?) in progress.

Socks that Rock Lightweight in the Rocktober colorway (a gift from Ms.-soon-to-be-Dr. Med Student).

All these need is a little kitchenering and an afterthought heel.  I'm all about the afterthought heels with the STR.  When you're hanging on to hand-dyed yarn striping by a thread (so to speak), my philosophy is "don't mess."   Also, I just like the idea of picking up stitches, and as EZ advises, proceeding to make another toe.  Too clever.

Finally, I've decided to make another red sweater, if Elizabeth is not going to do my bidding.  This is a scoopneck pullover thrown together with Sweater Wizard software.  It's time to start worrying about armholes so it's taking a break (plus, it takes a great deal of energy to connect a camera to the computer, seriously).  I will get back to it, though, as I'm still optimistic.  And by the way, the yarn, on closeout at Webs?  People: yum.

Armholes (set in sleeves, of course) soon.  For now, it's being closely supervised*.

*I think this may be the cat's first appearance on the blog, despite being my housemate for the last fifteen years.  This either means I'm a bad knitblogger, a bad cat-person, or both.  Oops.

The Tragic Defeat of A Knitter

Ugh.

Last night was NOT pretty.  It's one thing to knit on with that vague feeling of dread, but it's another when another knitter looks at your knitting and says "yup, you're screwed."  And that's what happened last night.  There was the holding up of pieces of Elizabeth.  There was measuring.  There was the tragic realization that the stitches that made the bottom 46" around were eaten up by a center panel of twisted stitches, resulting somehow in the underarm, that place of far too much boobage on my particular bod, measuring only 38" inches around, which basically would have worked upside down but not so much with the boobage.  Boobular Elizabeth knitters be warned.  This is not a boobular sweater. 

There is great sadness.  Kristen suggests side panels.  I shall have to buy more yarn, and I have already bought more yarn and I am sick of buying more (very expensive) yarn for this sweater and the whole thing just makes me feel overweight and, well, overly boobular, and generally unhappy with my body, my knitting, my judgment and my investment of time and energy over the last six months.  I really thought I had this one right, I did.  The irony is that I started the sweater in a yarn that was too big for the pattern.  It would have come out just right.  I still have the 2" of sweater I knitted in it.  But I think I might have to undertake primal scream therapy before I actually knit this damn sweater again.

I did think seriously about a weight loss strategy motivated entirely by the desire to wear this sweater.  Don't worry, it didn't last long.  The 8" difference between the hips and the boobs, which is directly reversed from the actual difference in my hip:boob proportion [for those inclined toward formulae, sweater(hip>boob)<>body(hip<boob)=FUCK], will never work, regardless of what I do at the gym.  I think there are going to be side panels, just as soon as I get over myself and crawl into Webs for more yarn.  I need someone to hit the discount for me, since I may decide to give up on knitting and all, so there's no point in buying stash.  Anyone want to help a poor decrepit pudgy knitter with lousy judgment and expensive yarn?

So last night was fun times chez mama.  In between the wailing and the chest pounding and the rending of garments (not handknit ones, though, not yet, I still have hope for side panels), I decided that socks were my only salvation.  The knitting goddess laughed at me and made my Opal DK look completely hinky.  I mean, it's computer-printed GERMAN sock yarn.  How can it look messy knitted up?  Ha, laughs the goddess.

So out of the depths of the WIP pile came the Wrixlan Jacket.  And I was too lazy to get the book off the shelf so I just kept doing what I'd done so far on the row I was on (row two, what's your point?).  Turns out I should have checked because the rope cables on the front panels are twisted in a mirror image of one another, so I needed to unknit and retwist them on the next row.  But here's the thing, while I admire the OCD-ness of mirror-twisted cables, why aren't the back rope cables similarly mirrored?  This gets me all twitchy and in no way helps my state of mind.  You know?

Anyway, I put the damn thing in the Pile Of Knitting I Don't Want To Talk About (growing, at this point, from large to mountainous) and went back to my socks.  The goddess apparently wants me to knit socks.  I will say that my heels and toes are as nice as they've ever been, these days, what with all the practice.  I've even gone back to flap-and-gusset goodness after a long and torrid affair with short rows.  It was passionate, but we're just not right for each other, me with my deep heels and all.  Really, it's me, not the short rows.  I still love short row toes, I do.

I did start thinking maybe lace would be kinder to me right now.  I've been meaning to knit the Swallowtail Shawl for months now.  It's just that I hear this faint laughing coming from somewhere near the yarn stash...what is that?

Thankya, Thankya; Gift Knitting; Shall We Unleash The Knitters?

The Thanky:

It was a very nice T-day.  We had all the grandparents who usually come but not the best friends, which was too bad.  The turkey was overcooked by moi who did not put the thermometer in until it was way, WAY too late.  I managed to overcook the pecan pie too, and advertised it as "blackened, caramelized pecan pie."  Despite being a wee bit, um, caramelized, it actually was quite edible.  As was the turkey when doused with some pan juices and smothered with gravy.

I was trying to take it easy, cooking-wise (I confess to a certain amount of obsessive behavior about thanksgiving dinner--my standard is no room for the plates on the table and more pies than people).  Somehow, we managed to have more food than could fit on plates despite missing salad and rolls and creamed onions and a couple of spare veggies and the homemade vegetarian nut gravy, etc.)  Maybe I'll dial it down again next year, even if there's no reason to.  Yeah, right.

Four days off in a row was kind of amazing.  We stayed home, unpacked (our closet shelves and hanging bars came Friday), puttered, and played.  Man, I needed that, and the kids did too.  I don't think anyone was trying to play me guilt-wise, but there were a lot of comments about how I wasn't at work and I was able to play and such.  We flew kites and went on expotitions and sat in front of the fireplace and watched the Wizard of Oz.  All good.

Coming back to work was hard, but it's okay.  I sure am looking forward to a week off at the end of the year.

Gift Knitting:

I've been starting the Yule sweater for the last three weeks.  Every year I knit a sweater for the person I draw in our family gift exchange.  It's usually a lopi sweater, but I thought this year's recipient might like something different.  Well, I've now been through two yarns and two patterns, I've swatched and ripped and knitted inches of sweater and yanked out the needles and now I finally think I've got something.  It's the Cabin Fever Top-Down Swing Coat and this thing is a blast to knit and it seems to be coming out vaguely the right size plus I can adjust it as I go, which after having ripped out this many times is the only thing likely to keep me sane.  Pictures when the camera, me, my computer, and a charged battery are all in the same place.  No promises.  Anyway, right now it looks like a big lump.  I'm about halfway through the yoke.  Elizabeth is on hold but might get finished when (if) I get sick of the Swing Coat.  She just needs a sleeve cap, some sewing, and a neckline.  Maybe three night's work, and I could wear her for Solstice.  Hmm.

Unleashing the Knitters:

So there's this guy who's doing a panel at the MLA, and he's checking to see how a meme or, depending on how you look at it, a chain letter, moves through the blogosphere.  We knitters have a rather populous corner of the blogosphere, and one that I think routinely buffaloes those who attempt to study blogs and blogging.  Who are all these knitters and what do they want?  (Wool.)  If blogging is concerned with social change, what the hell are all these people doing talking about yarn? (We'll get back to you when the plans for world domination are available in pdf format.)

Anyway, Jody explains it all in a way that is far more interesting and complete than I have the patience for, but do please play.  All you need to do is mention and link to the project, beg ask others to participate, and then ping technocrati.  Let's show the MLA a little knitting mojo, eh?