cant_talk_knitting

Wednesday, November 30, 2005

What a bad blogger I am!

How can I expect anyone to pay attention to hang on my every blog word if I only update once a week or less?!?

I'm not quite sure where last week went. I took Wednesday off work, and then rolled into Thanksgiving, ate too much, and then had the annual tamale fest with friends on Sunday (and ate too much again).

On the knitting side of things, I finished the main part of Sitcom Chic on Monday night!!!

Now I need to sew the armpits, do the neck and front edge borders and find a button I like for the closure. Wheeeee!

Alas, poor Yorick is getting neglected. I'm in that boring stockinette phase, and even though it does go reasonably quick, it is uninspiring. But, I only have a few more inches before I can put side 1 on stitch holders and attempt the other skull. I can't wait to felt it to see if it came out OK. I figure that felting will disappear all of the mistakes I think I see right now and everything will be happy and cozy. Mr. CTK has already asked if he can wear it sometimes.

I also want to knit up a big swatch of the green Cascade leftover from the bag I made my niece. Then I can cut out holly leaves, sew on some mini red buttons and make a holly pin to wear on Yorick for the holidays. If they come out really well, I could do some more for Community Relations here at work. They do holiday goodie bags for senior citizens. All the fashionable ladies could wear my wonky holly pins. I'd have to find a clasp that is easy to manipulate.

Friday, November 18, 2005

Ribbit, Ribbit

Just discovered that I'd made even bigger mistakes in Sitcom Chic than mentioned below, so will be ripping back quite a bit more than I originally anticipated. Wah!

At least Mr. CTK has to work tomorrow, so I'll have a quiet house in which to knit away. Return of the King is probably coming out for this one -- a nice long movie. I heart my TiVo, but it is distracting to have to put down the knitting to FF through the commercials (though it is probably a good hand break).

In other knitting news, I decided that I couldn't deal with SC last night, so cast on for Yorrick! What a fun pattern -- well, that's probably because all of the shaping happens in the first 40 rows. I have some funny holes, so am debating whether felting will fix them or if I should rip back and see if I can do a little better on a second attempt. The pictures on knitty look like the two skulls felted a little differently though, so maybe I shouldn't worry about it.

Still no photos -- Hello didn't work *again* when I tried it last night. :(

Thursday, November 17, 2005

In which I was ready to save you from the tedium of type

I woke up early this morning (before my alarm, which *never* happens), so I got up and downloaded a bunch of photos from my computer. Alas, Hello did not seem to be working, so I wasn't able to get any of them onto the ol' blog.

So its more reading for you, dear reader, and more typing while looking over my shoulder at work for me.

Two things went horribly wrong with Sitcom Chic last night:

One funky stitch that I tried to purposely drop off the needles to reconfigure correctly ended up in such a big mess that I'm stumped on how to fix it. Will probably have to rip back 5 rows -- scary! I have to make sure I move the stitch markers back accordingly so my decreases will end up coming out OK. And I was one row from starting the neck shaping (read: the beginning of the end grrrr! :(

Then, for some reason, I counted my stitches on the left and right fronts.

Right: 30 or so
Left: 25

GAAAAHHHHHH! I have no idea how or where that happened! I counted the left side as I joined the sleeves, but probably didn't count the right side, since I just finished purling that row. So the mistake could be wayyyyy back in the body of the sweater. I think I am going to tuck in 2 extra decreases on the right side, since I have to rip back anyway, figuring that will balance the sides enough that noone will ever notice. But 5 stitches is about an inch difference, which I think could show. Advice welcome...

Monday, November 14, 2005

In which I have a secret

I have a secret. Details to follow in a few weeks, when I can safely blog about it without anyone I know IRL seeing it.

(now that should keep you coming back for more!)

Thanksgiving is almost here. I am in charge of bread and a vegetable this year. Mr. CTK is doing stuffing, which I will try really really really hard not to bug him about finding a recipe for before Wednesday night, November 23rd.


More progress on Sitcom Chic yesterday -- but the thing is so wide now (including the 2 fronts, sleeves and back) that even doing one row takes forever!

Sunday, November 13, 2005

Bad Blogger, Good Knitter

What a bad blogger I have been this week. Work was a little nut-so and people were coming into my cube unexpectedly, so I didn't feel like I could risk being caught blogging while there.

However, I have been a very good knitter. I finished sleeve number 2 for sitcom chic yesterday, then progressed through the eyelet rows. Now I just have some rows of boring stockinette with only the decreases to keep me from getting bored out of my gourd.

Friday was the first Lunch and Knit at work. I made a toddler's hat on Thursday night (goes so quickly when using chunky yarn and 10.5 needles!) that received oooos and ahhhs on Friday. Then I completed most of a baby hat in the same pink chenille-esque yarn -- finished that up on Saturday. I was holding my breath that I would be able to get two hats out of one skein. Really didn't want to have to buy more for the last few rounds, but I made it.

Then I knit like a fool for most of the rest of Saturday -- catching up on TiVo backlog.

I kept fondling the yarn I bought for Yorick, but did not allow myself to cast on. I want to try to do 1 or 2 more baby hats since our Community Relations department will take them to a parenting class for homeless women on November 16th. I have some aqua blue yarn that should be good for either boys or girls & should go as quickly as the pink chenille stuff.

Off for a walk to make up for the couch potato-ness of yesterday.

Monday, November 07, 2005

Another (sheddy) FO!

So this weekend, even though I was busy with all sorts of social plans, I finished my Celtic scarf. AND, I cast on for the second sleeve of Sitcom Chic & did 30 rows. Mr. CTK had to work last night, so I somewhat suspect my progress was assisted by no talking in the house. :)

See, I really cannot talk *and* knit efficiently at the same time. The name don't lie. (though it is really taken from an episode of The Simpsons)

I wore said scarf sans washing or blocking to work today. Fortunately, I made the wise decision not to wear the navy suit I was thinking about. My black pants suffered a bit, so I had to wrap tape around my hand and lift off the pink fuzz. It didn't seem to shed as I was knitting, but since I do most knitting in my jammies, perhaps I didn't notice/care.

This weekend we went to a friend's club on Friday, a joint birthday party at another friend's house on Saturday (where I brought delicious cakes from Sweet Adeline's in North Oakland -- chocolate and a coconut that was to die for), and then got up at the crack o' dawn to drive to Sacramento for a baptism party for another friend's two children. We only got to stay 2 hours because of Mr. CTK's work schedule. So we spent 4 hours plus of driving time, to spend two hours there. Sigh.

But, it was worth it because we arranged our annual TAMALE party with those friends and another family for the Saturday after Thanksgiving. We get together, eat & drink all day, and make enough tamales that everyone can take some home. YUM!!

I was reading the rest of the Sitcom Chic pattern yesterday for the 20000th time, and really cannot figure out how the directions create what I see in the picture. At least I know it is a good pattern, so I'll just need to trust in it. But, I will troll the knitty boards just in case before I start on that portion. I'm hoping to complete the 2nd sleeve this week so I can get onto the top portion this weekend. Then I might even have time to make a few more knitted Christmas gifts.

Oh yeah, my other exciting Knitting Knews is that I bought a SWIFT! Joann's had a 40% off coupon, so I snapped it up. Have been bidding on ball winders on Ebay & keep losing, so I think I need to just buy one directly. Ebay frustrates me -- I go on thinking that I can get a bargain, but someone always drives the price up at the last minute. I'd much rather pay one price out right than wait out the auction only to lose out.

xoxo,
CTK

Thursday, November 03, 2005

1 Sleeve down, 1 to go!

Hurrah! I finished sleeve one tonight. Want to know what it looks like? Scroll down, look at photo and mentally add a few inches! ha ha

Seriously though, it just didn't seem exciting enough to take a new photo. I am excited for when the second sleeve is done because then I get to do the detail work on the top portion of the sweater. I am not looking forward to picking up all the stitches on the front edging, but it will be a new technique, so I hope it comes out well.

that's all the news for now.

Wednesday, November 02, 2005

In which yarn accompanies me to work

So, I caught back up on my Sitcom Chic sleeve last night. As always happens when I rip back, I am much more pleased with the results than if I forged on with the mistakes.

As a treat for catching up, I knit several more rows on my double seed scarf out of the luscious pink Celtic.

Yesterday I realized that I've fallen into a bad habit of always eating lunch at my desk (my time to catch up on blog reading). But, I really should get away for a bit. Sooooo, today, my sleeve traveled to work with me. I'm going to escape to the lunch room and get some knitting done. I can't knit on BART in the mornings because I generally have to stand and am not coordinated enough to handle dpns while standing.

I usually get a seat in the evening, so will have to see whether or not I feel like I can knit w/out poking my neighbor with my elbows and/or shocking those around me with the funny concentration look I get when knitting. I guess I did knit on BART one day when I was going out to school.

The main reason that I have resisted is not wanting to give up my daily commute reading time, so yesterday I checked out a book on CD from the library to see if I how I like "reading" w/out the tangible of holding a book, turning pages, feeling the heft in my hands, etc. This morning went OK, but I did find my mind wandering, and then would snap back into the story and not know what had just happened. Maybe I should only get books that I've already read?

Tuesday, November 01, 2005

idea placeholder

As a reminder to myself for future knitting projects:

I want to see if I can make the Knitty pumpkin surprise pumpkins as a little tote bag format.

I also want to make a little felted holly pin to pin on my Yorick to get some Christmas use out of it (if I even get to it by then) -- It's all about the Nightmare before Christmas vibe, baby. :)

Halloweenie

Yay -- I picked up my sparkly yesterday -- love it! Photo to come.

Last night we went over to a friend's house in Alameda to help with passing out Halloween candy. I helped with eating some of it too, but those are the perks of the job.

My official job was using my knitting row counter (see, this post *does* contain knitting content!) (really, a tally counter from Staples) to count the number of people we passed out candy to. My similarly A/R friend was *thrilled* with my accuracy as previous years had involved a 3x5 note card and hash marks to keep track.

Here are the stats:

Number of people candy was passed out to: 680 (yes, six hundred and eighty!!) This was over the time period of 5:45pm to 8:45pm.

Best Costume: A kid who came as a whoopie cushion! He was also one of the funnier kids because he was so desparate for a mini bag of Skittles that he dug through his bag for the Heath bar he'd already received to exchange for Skittles.

Honorable mention to his friend that came as a milk carton, and a little boy who came as a bumblebee in a costume that he'd obviously made himself -- a paper grocery bag cut to fit like a vest and colored in like a bee and a mask cut out of more grocery bag with pipe cleaners glued on like antenna.

Most Popular Costume(s): A toss up between A)Batman B)Spiderman and C)the ghost mask guy from 'Scream'

Worst Costume: The teenagers and/or parents who show up with no costume and a plastic bag. I was all for making kids tell me who they were supposed to be in order to procure candy, but my friend was happy to pass out to anyone, and it was her house.

Number of Suspected Repeats: 30-50 people -- though I don't necessarily think it was on purpose as the streets wind around in that neighborhood & it is easy to get confused. However, the house was decorated fairly distinctly.

And that's the report from here.