There's a New Blog In Town

I'm starting over.

http://candyknits.blogspot.com

Goings-On

As it turns out, this girl is not a very good blogger. No matter. The important thing is that there has been knitting. A "metric shit-ton" of knitting (as my sailor husband might eloquently say.) After completing my CPH - which has been worn almost every single day since- I realized that my heinie was going to have to get into gear in order to complete all of the hand-knit Christmas gifts that I was supposedly going to give my family + friends. The debate over whether all this knitting would actually be for my benefit or for those of the receivers is irrelevant. In the end, everyone wins. I get a legitimate excuse to fondle yarn at the LYS and to dive into my Ravelry queue, and the giftees get smooshy pieces of hand-made heaven. (Okay, maybe it's unreal to expect people in my family to love these knits as much as I do, but I believe what I choose to believe.)

Now, here it is, 6 days before hubby and I fly back to Arkansas for Christmas, and all the gift knitting is done. With pictures to prove it:

There is a Hemlock Ring Throw for MIL #1 (Hemlock Ring Blanket, Cascade Eco Wool)



A snakey Noro scarf for MIL #2 (Kureopatora's Snake, Noro Kureyon)


A mitered Boku scarf for SIL (Edgar, Plymouth Boku)


A ribbed hat for Dad (Jacques Cousteau Hat, Knit Picks Swish Worsted)


A butterfly hat for niece (Butterfly Hat, Caron Simply Soft)


A Honeycomb Hat for cousin (Groovy Cable Tuque, Plymouth Encore Worsted)


Manly Mitts for Bro (Men's Fingerless Mitts, Plymouth Encore Worsted)


And even some gloves for Husband (Cigar, Patons Decor)


All of these go along with other projects already finished for Mom, Sister, and Nephew.


Ahhh, it's nice to have everything done. But I sure do have a lot of scrap yarn left over from all these projects. That means it's time to start on the scrap-busting mitered-square psychedelic afghan!

Looking Back on These Things.

Well it certainly seems like such a long time since this blog has seen a new post. Free time hasn't been as abundant lately because I did in fact take a job in retail, and the only part of it that is satisfying is that it allows me to buy more yarn.

Anywho, enough about that. Today I have been looking back on all of the things I have learned about knitting since picking it back up about 6 months ago. Cables, lace, felting, fair isle. Kitchener stitch, mattress stitch, three-needle bind off, short rows. Provisional cast on, cable cast on, picking up stitches, yarn over, ssk. Button holes. Continental knitting. Even the goodness of natural fibers. These are all things I had no experience with until recently. And realizing how much I've learned is a good feeling.

When I started this blog, I mentioned my desire to move away from "beginning knitter" to an advanced skill level. Well, one thing was keeping me from feeling that I had reached that point. Looking at my Ravelry projects page, there were many small projects (hats, wrist warmers) and a couple of fun accessories (head bands, hand bags), but no actual garments. No sweaters. And what self-respecting knitter could call him/herself a knitter without having made at least one sweater?? Well, not me. A sweater was going to have to come off of my needles, and that was that.

Luckily, some of my lovely in-laws sent me some birthday money last month, and off to the LYS I went. The pattern in waiting was the ever-popular Central Park Hoodie. The plan was to get some lovely tweed or heathered yarn in a nice, warm, autumnal color. The plan was to avoid green because green is in excess in my wardrobe and home surroundings. Cascade 220 would be a nice choice. Well, the LYS did indeed have a selection of 220. Many different colors, but very few skeins of each. I needed 6 skeins of the same dye lot. Turned out that 6 skeins of Cascade 220 in the same dye lot were only available in light green. *Shrugs* Such is life. I purchased the green yarn and immediately went home to begin work.

Central Park Hoodie as written is worked in several different pieces and sewn together. This was daunting at first. Seaming is no friend of mine. But I figured what the heck, the practice would be good. So I made the separate pieces, did a crap load of mattress stitch, sewed on some buttons, and voila!! A sweater was made!













Oh, how I loves it :) My very first sweater.

Frowny Face

Attention, all ye who may be reading this blog: this post will be full of bellyaching and devoid of craftiness.

There has been a certain amount of suck lately, and the gist of things is that I am starting to feel old.

Oh, my eyes. Knitting + reading + inadequate lighting (+ age) is putting much strain on my eyes. My sense of vision has never failed me or caused any distress until recently. The world is slowly starting to blur. I should plan a visit to the ophthalmologist, but if the nice doctor were to say I need glasses, well..... my insurance doesn't cover glasses so I'd have to do without because there already exists the problem of imminent dental work.

Oh, my teeth. Cavities. Yes, cavities for the first time in my life. Not painful yet, but generous in number and cringe-inducing in cost of repair. And not only does the dentist want to fill holes in my teeth, but he also wants to remove whole teeth altogether. Geeeez now I understand people's fear of dental work, because the thought of needles and drills and pliers and scalpels and blood in my mouth is frightening the crap out of me.

Oh, my knees. They've been feeling warm and tingling for hours after I sit for a while with my legs folded in. Wtf?? At least they're not in pain. Yet.

And Oh My God, my uterus. My effing uterus. For 4 weeks I have been patiently waiting for this month's cycle to occur so that I can start taking the pill. But my uterus mocked me and stubbornly refused to follow its normal course and timeline of activity, leading to a highly stressful pregnancy scare this weekend. Things are righting themselves now, though. My body finally decided to start cooperating this morning, four days later than scheduled. Hmm, maybe this was due to the stress of everything else mentioned above.

Sigh.

And then there's the job hunt. The one thing that makes me stand out is that I've been accepted to medical school. This fact does more harm than good because in less than a year I'll be going back to Arkansas. So the entry-level science jobs don't want me because I can't commit to a career. Other jobs require more experience than what I have. Since getting a job in my field hasn't worked out, I turned to retail/hospitality jobs. No luck there yet either, probably because I request day shifts and minimal/no weekend hours in order to have time to spend with my husband. But the sad fact is that I'll probably have to take a job that will work me on evenings and weekends, just as if I were still in school. Damn it all.

Good Things

Well it's time for another FO. The Hemlock Ring Blanket I made for my mother's Christmas gift was cast off and blocked yesterday. In truth, I would like it to be a smidge bigger. But I was really itching to get it off the needles and see it all finished. There was probably only enough yarn for one more repeat, anyway. I cast off after row 111 and did the crochet edge suggested by The Rainey Sisters. It's a light & airy throw made with just over 3 skeins of Patons Classic Wool Merino. Next time I would buy the Cascade Eco Wool called for in the pattern in order to have a heftier, warmer blanket. Also I would shorten the crochet chain that makes up the scalloped edge.

In other news, the past week was filled with the pleasure of company. My aunt and cousin spent a week here with us and we got to show them around San Diego a bit. Too bad they had to leave California to go back to hurricane weather. Anyhow, one day while they were here we hopped a bus down to a trendy block on 5th Avenue filled with all varieties of boutiques, bistros, and used book stores. Oh, how I love used book stores :) I have always been the kind of person to browse non-fiction and or medical science sections first, but this time I made a bee-line for the craft books. What I found was a 25 year old knitting guide chock-full of great information: size conversion tables, how to take proper garment measurements, a stain removal guide, a stitch dictionary, and how to alter patterns based on gauge. Love it. A person like me needs these things carefully written out in order to make any sense of it.

The book wasn't the only recent find that pleased the hell out of me. A couple of days ago Cameron and I walked into a thrift store across the street from where we live and somehow I found the only two skeins of yarn in the whole place: Bernat Softee Chunky in Heather Gray. I was hoping to have found some cool vintage needles, but no such luck. A lady at the counter told me $1 would get me both skeins, but my pockets were empty, so I found Cameron looking at leather jackets and asked him to buy them. Well, there turned out to be a $5 minimum card purchase and neither of us had any cash whatsoever. All I had was a single quarter in my pocket. It was my lucky day, though, because the clerk was in a good mood and accepted my one measely quarter :) So it's not fancy-pants yarn or anything, but how often can a person get 2 skeins for twenty-five freaking cents, right?

And just for good measure here is a view of the San Diego skyline from the harbor. This city is awesome.

Be a Man About It

I don't have knitting friends. Nor have I ever joined the any of the groups around SD that get together to sit and knit for a few hours each week. Rarely have I seen another person knitting in public. Nope, my knitting world involves my couch, my small designated "craft area", and the vast expanse of the Interwebs. As such, I have never seen a man knitting, although I know many of them do. As normal as knitting might be to those particular men, and no matter how frustrated they might get by people's looks and comments of astonishment...I have to admit that I would stop in my tracks and say something to a man who was knitting. Not anything negative, of course. Actually I'd be pretty happy to chat with a man about yarn crafts without seeing that he is smiling and nodding along with what I say but secretly thinking, "Oh, god, she's rambling about that yarn crap again!?"

Procrastination is My Constant Companion

Uhhhh...I desperately need to clean house. Tomorrow night my cousin, whom I haven't seen in over a year, is coming to visit. She has spent the last 13 months in Germany getting all wordly and seeing Europe (geez..) Ah well, I'm not that jealous. I did leave Arkansas for the excitement of the west coast, after all.

Anyway, I digress. For the past few days I have been making mental notes of everything that needs to be scrubbed, dusted, vacuumed, etc.. and now the time is upon me..but I'm having a hard time getting started. Instead I have spent the morning gawking over FO's and potential future projects on Ravelry.

Well, that's not all that's happened. I did get around to coloring my hair again. My feelings on it are....meh. The box was full of promises of shine and shimmer. Honestly though, my hair looks exactly the same except that the horrid blonde chunks are toned down to a light brown. Good enough for now. As I sit here, the tv is playing TLC on mute and Nick Arrojo is styling some lucky woman's hair. Oh, how I wish that Nick Arrojo would do myyyyy hair. The hair styling segment of What Not To Wear is always my favorite part. And I am always green with envy when I see the final results, especially when the "contributor" on the show doesn't like her new hair cut and complains that too much was cut off. It makes me want to throw things and yell at the tv, "SHORTER HAIR IS BEAUTIFUL TOO!!"

Ohh, now I really digress. Okay, what I need to do is put on a playlist that moves me to get up and dance and then get to gettin'. Maybe I'll use knitting as a reward afterwards. I've been heavily eyeballing Coachella and already have just the right yarn.