Quick progress update

I've completed the hood on the Third Wave Harf, and picked out a couple sock patterns to use for my first pair of socks. I'm hoping to cast on tonight for the Owl Baby Vest.

I'll get pictures up soon.

Serendipity

Last month I had to drive an hour a day to get to work. I was driving through country roads to get to a jury trial in a nearby county. I didn't want to spend my brand new two-hour commute (it usually takes only 7 minutes to drive to work) just thinking about work, and started listening to Lime & Violet's podcast.

I downloaded a few random episodes and got to listening. In the first episode I listened the gals talked about Amy Weber's artwork, among other things. The next episode I listened to, they talked about Amy again, and followed up on a whole lot of the things they'd talked about in the first episode.

When I got to court and fired up the Internet connection I went to Amy's blog. It just felt a bit too coincidental to let it pass by. She had just posted information about her newest project -- a traveling art box. Crazy stuff started happening in the trial, so I had to stop paying attention to the Web.

As soon as I got home, and got the toddler off to bed, I fired it back up, and managed to get myself on the list.

The box is off, winging its way around the globe. I can't wait for the day it gets here. I've got some ideas for some projects to load back in when it arrives.

Devil brownies, a la Sie Macht

Last week I made devil brownies as described by my good buddy Erin over at Sie Macht. I committed the cardinal sin of fudge brownie-making, however, and overbaked them.

I shall try again, and this time, I won't be a chicken. Those puppies will come out when they still look gooey.

Of reading and knitting

Lately, if I'm not knitting, I'm reading. I went through a stage where very little knitting or reading got done and now I want to do both all the time. Sleep? Who needs sleep... There's books to read! There's stitches to knit!

I checked Middlesex out from the library last week (if you haven't read it, I recommend it), and just finished it this morning. I'm now blazing through The Children's Blizzard, and will then pick up Sex with Kings. It's that last one that gave me and a literary friend an idea: a chain of book titles.

See, I'll go from Middlesex to Sex with Kings to something that starts with Kings and ends with some other word, then follow that one to the next book, and so on and so forth. This brings me back to my college days, wandering the stacks of Memorial Library letting the typeface, title and first sentence of a book seduce me.

Middlesex would have won on all three counts, had I actually encountered in the late 1990s.

In knitting news, I managed to get another full repeat of the cable pattern finished in the Third Wave Harf. I'll get pictures posted soon. Here and on Ravelry.

A sock pledge

I'm getting together with a knitterly buddy on Saturday, and we're making a stop at Just 4 Ewe in Oak Creek. I popped in there one day and left with a tiny circular needle perfect for making socks! Now I've just got to make the socks... I should really search ravelry for a sock knit-a-long or something.

Also, I'm intrigued by Kory Stamper's double-knitting sock technique. That might be the key to getting me to knit socks.

Green with envy...

I've been at a jury trial all week. Another knitter worked on a lime green baby hat throughout the whole thing. I took notes on my work laptop. My fingers were jealous.

Back home

So, the new blog location's all gone, and I'm going to move back here.

I've been driving an hour each way to and from an off-site work site this week, and discovered Lime n Violet's podcast. I've been inspired, and am rededicating myself to knitterly and other artistic and creative pursuits.

I've got some ideas for writing, knitting and quilting to start with... we'll see what else appears.

I've moved!

Check out my.journaltimes.com/knitwithchopsticks

(now defunct 8/19/2009)

SP finale

I should have pics up here for you to see, but camera-wizard husband has been working like crazy since the box arrived. The stuff's too nice for me to give it my usual cell phone camera treatment.

Either way, my spoiler was Karyn, who sent me a lovely pink lace shaw (I've been using it almost every day, particularly at work), some gorgeous brown yarn, lavendar-scented face mask, and delicious treats! I promise the photos will come soon.

Wedding day!

Two of my dearest friends are getting married today. My husband and I are in the wedding, and I'm super excited to be a part of their big day. Some last-minute things to take care of (like hair, shoe shopping and make-up buying) but other than that, I'm ready to go.

Yay wedding!

So busy!

No knitting is getting done. Ack. So much for my four-rows-a-day commitment...

It's my birthday, SP10 style!

I got an e-mail from my secret pal last weekend, wishing me a happy birthday (it was on June 3) and letting me know that a package was on its way. I must admit, I was getting a bit worried when it still hadn't come by the end of last week. But, no worries anymore! That package just had an awfully long way to go -- check out that postmark!

A goofy aside about the package... I got home from work and checked the mail about 5:30 p.m. Monday night. No package. My husband and I were going grocery shopping and I thought I had forgotten to lock the front door. When I went to check, there was this package sitting there. Who delivers packages after 5:30 p.m., without knocking on the door? My suggestion -- the postman we saw driving in our neighborhood on Sunday. Apparently there's a good samaritan mailman in town. Thanks, whoever you are!

I couldn't wait to see what was inside, and I started opening it (leaving my husband waiting out in the backyard). Oops. He came to the door pretty quick, though, and watched me finish opening.

Here's what I found:

Fruit jelly candies, some chocolate and an adorable notebook that says "Mon chouchou" on the front and "Quelque chose de bon peut m'arriver" on each inside page. Mon chouchou was always my favorite of the French pet names -- chou is cabbage -- though I suppose the American pumpkin doesn't make much more sense. The inside phrase means (roughly) "something good will come to me."

Missing from the picture are sticky notes that say "A note from a groovy chick." Those are so coming to work with me.

Also:

Chopsticks! These are way nicer than the wood ones that come with take-out Chinese! I'll bring them to use on sushi days with my friend Sarah. I also love the cute red case to put them in. It's got bunnies on it, which is hard to see through the plastic package.

And finally:


Yarn! It's way more blue than this picture shows. This is, I think, the softest bamboo yarn I've ever seen. I touch it often, but never buy for some reason. This shall become a baby something. I just don't know what yet! The color would work great for a boy or a girl!

Thanks, secret pal!

(p.s. I had a dream about the chopsticks last night. It was very odd. There were tiny candles inside them. That's all I remember.)

And in a side note, I've decided to try plowing ahead with the Mommy Snug. I'm committing myself to a minimum of four rows a day. I had 12 done, realized my gauge was totally wonky, so I frogged it back, and now have eight. But it looks closer to the right size.

Delusional knitter? Yeah. That's me.

So, I'm coming to realize that I was incredibly delusional when I thought I'd be able to knit the Mommy Snug in time to wear it. It's June and baby's due in November. That gives me just about three months to knit it.

I swatched, and my row guage is off, so I did all this math, and I think I got it right, but I haven't even had time to cast on for the front. Argh! I'm not the world's fastest knitter to begin with, I've already got one failed sweater project lurking in my stash (Swatched, cast-on, started, then frogged) and I'm not looking forward to another one.

This has me rather disappointed. I could start the sweater, see how long it takes to do the front, and save the whole thing for any future pregnancies or I can start hunting for alternate uses of 19 skeins of Classic Elite Four Seasons Cotton. Grrr.

Finished!

I finished the Ballet T the other night. No pics yet, but I'll try and get some up this weekend. It's all rainy and cloudy, so the light's not great for photo taking...

Must keep knitting!

The baby must have been going through one heck of a growth spurt last week, because I was back to napping every afternoon. Not much knitting gets done when I'm zonked out for two hours. I knit a few rows on the Ballet T last night, though, and I think I've got nine rows left. I'm hoping I can finish it up this week. I really want to get cracking on the Mommy Snug now!

100 Books

I stole this from I Need Another Skein (sendyarn.blogspot.com)

Look at the list of (100) books below.
Bold the ones you’ve read.
Italicize the ones you own.

Movies don’t count.

1. The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
3. To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)
6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)
8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)
9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)
10. A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
11. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)
12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)
14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (Rowling)
17. Fall on Your Knees (Ann-Marie MacDonald)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban(Rowling)
20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)
22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
25 . Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)
27. Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)
28. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie(Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)
33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. 1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. I Know This Much is True (Wally Lamb)
39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)
40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)
42. The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)
44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. Bible (Only parts)
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas)
48. Angela’s Ashes (Frank McCourt)
49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
50. She's Come Undone (Wally Lamb)
51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. Great Expectations (Dickens)
55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)
57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrey Niffenegger)
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolstoy)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davis)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (Ann Brashares)
68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)
70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
76. The Summer Tree (Guy Gavriel Kay)
77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
78. The World According To Garp (John Irving)
79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)
80. Charlotte’s Web (E.B. White)
81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)
82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Wizard’s First Rule (Terry Goodkind)
85. Emma (Jane Austen)
86. Watership Down(Richard Adams)
87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)
90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)
96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)
97. White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)
100. Ulysses (James Joyce)

I hit 60, provided I can accurately count numbers... What's funny is that I've heard of most of the books I haven't read and actively avoided reading them. The ones I haven't heard of, I may just track down and take a look.

Pics, progress, news!

First, a big apology to my secret pal -- It's taken forever for me to get these pictures up, but you'll see I've been busy.

Here's the wonderful package that was waiting for me after our trip to Florida. The outside was sealed with the cutest tape -- it had red, winged balls of yarn printed on it. Inside was this adorable sheep postcard and three skeins of Candy Apple Cotton Fleece. It's super soft, and lots of fun to knit.


This picture is closer to the actual color of the yarn, and shows just why I know the yarn is fun to knit. I've been busy with it. This is the Ballet Tee from Loop D Loop. It's my first adult-size garment, and it's been going really well. It's knit on US 15 needles, and goes fast.

I worked on it all weekend, while I watched movies on TV. My husband had to work, so I was left home alone with the new cable and my yarn. No complaints here! I've been exhausted, so it was nice to have a few days to be lazy and relax. Since I was knitting, I still felt productive.

I watched The Hunt for Red October on Saturday and Spiderman 2 on Sunday - and knit the whole time. I'm about half done with it. I'm making the larger of the two sizes, and hoping I didn't make a mistake in that.

The smaller size is for people who wear a US 2-8 dress size, and the larger size for those who wear a 10-14. I typically wear an 8, but I didn't really like the idea of wearing something that's on the top end of a small size.

I'm also ready to share some news -- I found out a few months ago that I'm pregnant! Hence the utter exhaustion. And, another reason I'm erring on the large size for the Ballet Tee. It's just starting to get warm out, and I'll have a bit of a baby bump by the time I can really start wearing it. I figured a bit of extra room couldn't hurt.

The pregnancy's also the reason I needed the 19 skeins of the Classic Elite. I'm going to try making the Mommy Snug in time to actually wear it when I'm gigantic this fall. Here's the sweater...



And here's my swatch. My gauge is a bit big, so I have some math to do before I actually start knitting. I think if I knit the smallest size, it'll still fit about right, given that I'm getting bigger stitches.


And just to show that I wasn't the laziest being in my house this weekend, I give you Cairo, the wonder cat. I came home from brunch on Sunday to find this:


Sorry about the wonky color. It's really hard to photograph a black cat who's hiding under the covers. Isn't she silly?

Pictures soon... I promise!

I got my first bit of goodies from my Secret Pal last week. They were in a lovely box on my dining room table when we returned from a week in Florida with my grandfather. It's some gorgeous Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece in Candy Apple.

What with vacation, then coming back to a super-crazy day at work today (Don't ask. You don't want to know. I just wish people would leave their stinking guns at home. Gah.) there's still no photos. This stuff is too pretty for me to take a cell phone pic, so I'm waiting until I've got a husband to bug about batteries and memory cards and what not.

But I'm so excited about the yarn, and about knitting something with it... I've got two ideas. The lovely (and quick!) Ballet T from Loop D Loop and some baby thing. Maybe the Baby Surprise jacket? Maybe the Garter Stitch Sweater and a matching hat? Or hat, booties and thumbless mittens on a string? Or, something to be determined once I've actually made the first thing and seen how much yarn is left?

Oh well.

Thanks, Secret Pal! I love it very much!

Yarn came! SP Package on the way!

The yarn for my sweater came the other day, but I haven't had time to take pictures and get them up yet. Hopefully this afternoon...

And I got an e-mail from my secret pal this morning -- my first package has shipped! I can't wait!

Curses! Foiled again! -- Happy update!!

Shade tree on back order. Another week or two before it ships. Oh well. That gives me more time to knit for my secret pal!

Just got an e-mail from WEBS... It's shipping today. No more waiting! Yahoo!