I finally went ahead and did it. I ripped up the 5-way cable shawl that I had started. I realized that I didn't quite have the right gauge for it, nor enough yarn, to do it justice. So, I'm now searching for projects for my 4 skeins of Malabrigo. I'm debating making a Bandana Cowl with one, and a hat with another, but that still leaves 2 skeins. I was originally thinking of making a February Lady sweater with it, but have since changed my mind as I don't think the shape of that sweater is the most flattering for me.
An added challenge for me right now is that Andrew broke my ball winder, so I haven't really started anything up lately despite having lots of ideas. I'm getting a replacement one soon, so hopefully my stall won't last long. Still working on that Baby Yours, and actually picked up my Milkweed shawl again. Maybe I'll actually finish something one of these days.
This weekend's been a bit of a rough one for us though. Andrew had his, and my, first experience with projectile vomiting on Saturday. I was utterly dumbfounded when it happened. He was fine after some crying and cuddling, but then had another bout of vomiting on Sunday. Poor kid. To make matters worse, Jamie also got sick, so there was A LOT of cleaning for me to do this weekend. As long as I don't get sick, we'll all keep on trucking. I've made entreaties to pretty much every deity out there to keep me from falling ill, so we'll see if that works. If all this wasn't enough, someone broke into our car and stole some cables out of our car. Thankfully nothing of import was taken (our radio, and child car seat were the two things that came to mind immediately), but it was still just maddening to think that someone had gone through our things. We are partly to blame since we accidentally left our car door unlocked (this never used to happen to us, but now that we've got Andrew, it happens a lot more than we'd like), but our car was right on our driveway, visible from our bedroom, so I still think they were pretty bold. Oh well. We're all okay, we don't need to repair anything with the car, and the stuff they took is fairly easy to replace, so I guess we're lucky in that sense.
It's been a long time since I wrote, and a whole bunch of things have happened since. One of which was me going back to work, and even though it's only part-time right now, it's made me a lot busier than I used to be. The other thing that was occupying a lot of my time was a big show I just did with the Chinese Dance Workshop to celebrate its 35th anniversary. Now that it's over, I can actually breathe again and devote my spare time to other things. One of the things I'd like to do more of is give Andrew the chance to play with other kids. He's in daycare now, so I know he plays with lots of kids all the time, but I never get to see it. Plus he has so much fun when other kids are around. Here's some video proof.
Andrew and his friend W (I won't give the full name here) were sitting patiently while their respective mommies were doing some shopping, and Jamie managed to catch it on video. Even when they're just sitting around, they seem to amuse each other! Love it.
There unfortunately hasn't been a lot of time for crafting though. Only recently have I been able to do a little here and there while watching a rather ridiculous show that Jamie introduced me to. It's absolutely moronic when you think about it, but I can't stop watching! It's called Deadliest Warriors, and it basically pit two historical warriors against each other in a virtual arena based on data collected by measuring different parameters like strike speed, force of impact, and type/severity of damage. They basically constructed a computer model that takes in all the data collected, and then runs a battle simulation 1000 times to see which fighter wins the majority of the fights.Stuff like, Samurai vs. Viking, or Spartan vs. Ninja. I know. Totally stupid, right? And yet I've watched about 4 episodes already! While watching it, I can't help but think that humans are a truly messed up species for having come up with so many ways to kill each other.
But I digress. This TV watching has allowed me to do some crafting, and here's what I've been working on. First up is a baby sweater that I'm working on for a friend of mine who has already had her baby. Yes, I am terribly late, but I console myself with the fact that her daughter was premature and that I have chosen a size that couldn't possibly fit now anyway. That's just the back. I've finished the sleeves, and am just finishing up the front now. Hoping to finish it before the end of the month, but we'll see.
These little guys are quickly becoming a bit of an obsession of mine. I found the pattern for them over at Attic 24, and got addicted. I'm not really an expert in crochet by any stretch of the imagination, but these are really fun. I'm joining them together as I go, which is a lovely, lovely technique that Lucy (the lovely author of Attic 24) explains so nicely. It's not that I'm looking to make a blanket or anything though; just going to make them here and there and see what I get.
Even though spring has officially arrived, the weather here hasn't exactly reflected that. I'm getting good use out of my reliable Clapotis and my new Fiddleheads. But something was still missing. A nice hat. Much to my dismay, I seem to have lost the Koolhaas hat that I made - it probably got tucked away in our massive clean up of the place when we were trying to sell it. So, what to do?
Say hello to the Tempest Beret, from the Winter/Spring Knit Scene. It was a really fun knit. I made it from the Malabrigo that Adrienne sent to me way back. I was originally hesitant to knit a beret because I was afraid that my ears would be cold, but this hat covers my ears nicely. It also takes the award for most fun blocking. You put it around a big plate! How fun is that?! Uh...okay...maybe I'm the only one who finds it fun (haha!).
Also got a package from Knit Picks today containing yarn that will be fashioned into more baby items. I'll post about those when I've actually started them. I just got some superwash merino since I figure new moms and dads don't have the time to hand wash.
When I was younger my mom once bought me a beret. I think it was purple, or maybe red. I think I wore it to school, but I always had the vague sensation that it looked sort of dorky. Not that berets themselves are necessarily dorky, just that they look dorky on ME. In fact, I firmly believed that ALL hats made me look like a fool, so I switched to wearing earmuffs. Huge, neon pink ones (remember those?). Clearly I'm not that bright. =)
I've since resigned myself to wearing hats since the cold gives me headaches, but I still harboured a slight beret prejudice. So imagine my surprise when I fell in love with Gretel. I'd seen a bunch of them around blogland/Flickr and didn't think too much of them. Then suddenly I woke up one day and HAD to have one. Immediately! So I ordered some Malabrigo (Pale Khaki) from the Personal Threads sale and cast on as soon as the yarn arrived.
I knit the "normal" size, and I assumed that I would have enough yarn since the pattern called for ~200 yards, but as soon as I started the crown decreases I realized that I didn't have nearly enough. I didn't want to buy another ball of yarn, so I totally fudged the pattern and eliminated most of the rows between the decreases, which included a cable.
I think the hat still looks ok, despite the fact that it's missing maybe 8 rows of the pattern. I definitely want to make this again though, the "proper" way so that it's just a bit slouchier. It was a super-fun knit, pretty easy, and involved lots of cables containing both knits and purls. =)
This is how much yarn I had left at the end. Looks a bit like a tapeworm, huh? Eww. =)
Sorry, but I wasn't able to get a photo of the commission that I finished. I showed it to my co-worker who requested it on what was quite possibly our coldest day here, and she said it was perfect and that she'd use it right away. So, I didn't have the heart to tell her that I wanted to take it home to photograph. Oh well. I'm considering knitting one for my mom, so I may still get a photo of it up yet.
In other news, I've started my version of Koolhaas in the Malbrigo. Here it is in its unfinished glory. Excuse the odd yellow cast to the photo. I wanted the stitch definition to show, so I turned the flash off. As per my comment to Adrienne's last post, I'm not going to build any fancy contraptions in order to take better photos, so I think all my pictures will forever more have that yellow tint to them. I might play with Photoshop later tonight to see if I can cook up a formula to get rid of it, but for now, I'm going to leave it. In case you're curious, here's what it looks like with flash. So, what do you think? Flash, or no flash?
The Malbrigo seems great, except that it knits up a bit taller than gauge. For the record, I didn't knit a gauge swatch. Why not? Well, they the gauge in terms of the lattice pattern, and since the pattern is written in the round, I was too lazy to convert it to flat. Also for the record, I'm a believer that gauge swatches should be standardized to stockinette. So, I didn't really notice the gauge difference until I was reading the pattern and it said 10 rows of k2 p2 rib should be about 1-1/4". I had knit about 7 rows in order to get that height. In conclusion, I think I'm going to do one less repeat of the lattice pattern before starting to shape the crown. I don't know if that will leave me with a hat that fits, but again my laziness prevails. I don't want to figure out how to alter the pattern if I only wanted to half a repeat less. I'm just going to toss my lot with the knitting gods and see what happens. Even if the hat doesn't fit me, I'm sure there's someone out there who has a head just that size, so I'm not going to worry about it.
I know this seems like a super long-winded post already (this should totally be considered two posts), but I just wanted to write a little rant about my thoughts on cables. I'm a little torn about what I think about cables. I love the way they look, but find the whole process of having to deal with the cable needle a bit cumbersome. I don't know I'm feeling this way because this hat requires you to use that cable needle, like, every other stitch, or if this is how I will always feel about any and all cables. It might just be this hat in particular because I don't remember being this annoyed when I was knitting that black cabled hat for Jamie. Or maybe I'm just forgetting any annoyance I might have had because the project is done. Also, I'm still wrapping my head around the 'physics of cables', if you will. Somehow, it doesn't seem as intuitive to me as lace knitting, but I'll probably get it after a while. Maybe at that point I'll feel more confident, and able to alter the pattern so that I can do 4.5 lattice repeats instead of 4 or 5.
