Ask and ye shall receive

August 11, 2006 By

You guys are worse than a thousand [insert ethnic group of choice here] mothers! Sheesh! Morgan‘s comment yesterday sent me over the edge though. The guilt was just too much and I pulled this baby off the couch:



I know it’s not the palette one or the green one but it IS a log cabin. That counts right? I finished binding off the latest red section then did the newest white section and then I’d had enough. I did actually do a few rows on the main piece of the palette blanket – I’ve only got like 2.5 strips to go on that one and the big piece is finished – but I couldn’t do it. It was late and I was sort of on fiber overload.

Here’s a picture of the back of the Chance Log Cabin:



People always ask to see the back. I don’t think it’s so bad really, but then I’ve successfully woven in the ends of Short Rows, so, this is a piece of cake.



Here are some stats to date in case you’re interested:

Yarn: Socks that Rock Heavyweight in the colorways Lover’s Leap (red), Earth (brown), Rock Salt (white), Cotton Candy (pink) and Black Onyx (black.)
Needles: US Size 5 Addi Turbos
Pattern: It’s RANDOM.

Currently, the piece is measuring 23.5″ x 27″ and according to the handy dandy spreadsheet I’m keeping of all the numbers, I’m through 28 sections. I plan on continuing until I run out of yarn. I’ve got a ways to go I’m afraid. I know I’ve said all this before, but people keep asking. And currently I don’t have a good way of searching the archives or a complete listing of categories, but I’m working on that. It’s in the queue.




This thing’s getting harder and harder to photograph in a pleasing kind of way, but I try. I have to say, the pictures don’t do it justice. It’s SO MUCH BETTER in real life.

Yesterday was a long day. G never made it in to the office, but it certainly didn’t feel like he was home. CNN was on the TV all day and I loathe cable news so I stayed in the bedroom doing what I do best. That is, not cleaning and doing fiber stuff. I spun some more and I decided that slow and steady wins the race. As much as I’d like to spin it all up in one day and get it over with, I’m better off taking my time and stopping when I get really bored. So that’s what I did and I much more pleased with the spinning results. I hope I didn’t fuck things up too bad the other day. Yesterday’s session went much easier as I spent the time daydreaming about what I’m going to knit with my fabulous yarn. A shawl of some sort. It really depends on how much I end up with.

And I continued on with my knee high.


The pooling took a rather drastic turn around 76-70 stitches! Check this out!



It’s starting to even out again now that I’m one decrease away from my beloved 64 stitches. I think it’s going to be pretty good and maybe I can start churning out plain stockinette STR socks. Wouldn’t that be cool? I’m a dork, yes I am! I find the whole hand dyed hand painted yarn and how it’s manipulated by the number of stitches very very fascinating. Anyway, the sock fits perfectly. Natch. I LOVE THIS PATTERN!!!

Today is a NEW DAY people!! This morning I opened the window as I often do, to smell the weather. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending of course, I have a very highly honed sense of smell. Forget doppler radar and all that shit – I can tell what the weather will be like by my nose. And today? Well today when I stuck my schnoz out there I squealed like a $2 whore!

“What?” said my husband. “What is it? I’m coming!” He ran to the balcony door.
“Shit, it’s cold out.”
“I know.” I sighed. “Isn’t it great?”

Filed Under: Chance v.1, Knee Highs

Wake Up Call

August 10, 2006 By

It’s been an exciting morning in the JanuaryOne household, and not in the good way. G’s work cell rang at 6AM this morning and I was up for good the second I heard him say WOW. When you are head of Travel in the Americas for a Global Bank – this is not a good thing. Not good at all. He’s been on the phone since 6AM – literally the phone has not stopped ringing. He’s home today, but not the way I want him home.

So I’ve been hiding out in the bedroom knitting on my new knee high.


Sorry to leave you hanging on the socks yesterday – dramatic license and all. You know how it is. The yarn is Socks That Rock in the Jewel of the Nile colorway. I have to say – it’s been a while since I knit with STR lightweight and OH MY how I’ve missed it. I just absolutely love knitting with this yarn: I love Tina’s colors, I love the fabric it creates, I love how it knits – the way the yarn feels between my fingers, the way it slides off the needles – EVERYTHING!

There’s a bit of pooling in the mid calf section where I’ve increased to the largest number of stitches, but I’m excited about it because I see it as kind of an experiment – I’m decreasing now and I can’t wait to see if it pools a bit more when the numbers get increasingly smaller. I’m not one of those people who really hates pooling or anything – it is what it is. I had a moment of wishing that I had alternated skeins, but I got over it quickly. There’s a pattern in the pooling – I’m not sure if you can see it in the pictures – but the blues seem to go through the reds and yellows as if they are striping. I like that.

It just so happens that I have two skeins of this colorway from the old put up – so 325 yds each. Just perfect for knee highs. I added about 8 extra rows before I started increasing for the calf and I probably could’ve added more but I decided to be safe rather than sorry. I can’t wait to get down to my regular 64 stitches – I’ve never knit just plain stockinette STR socks and I want to see how my 64 on 1s works with the yarn – will it pool away? Stripe? Do something else? Something completely unexpected? Stockinette is my best friend these days and I’m sticking with it. For socks at least.


Vicki asked me yesterday in the comments how I take pictures of my legs/feet when I photograph my socks. Very simple. I bend over.


Filed Under: Knee Highs

Marathon

August 9, 2006 By

DUDES! Enough with the L words. If you’re not careful, you’re going to turn this blog into a more scary than sexy soft porn cable drama about women who say they love women but only end up hurting each other in the end. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I’m on L word overload – too many to process – but I’m all about turning lemons into lemonade so hopefully I’ll have a new ABC entry this weekend. Get your M words ready. Just in case.

And thanks for the book ideas. I used to read more than I now knit so I’m always gratified to ask for book titles and find that I’ve read a hell of lot. It’s one of the only bad things about knitting – I read so much less it’s pathetic. I’m off to the book store today, so I’ll let you know what I pick up.

Yesterday was an experiment of sorts. I started out the day with only a couple of goals: Fold the laundry. Check. Spin up the rest of the blue merino. Not so check. Guess what I learned about spinning? The first 4oz? Exciting! Fun! You don’t know what you’re going to get so you spin spin spin and then you ply ply ply so you can smother yourself in handspun goodness! I MADE THIS! It’s beautiful! Look! I turned THIS into THIS. YIPEEEEEE!

The second 4oz? Not so much. OH MY GOD I’M SO BORED I CAN’T STAND IT ANYMORE!

So I take the wheel out onto the deck because it’s still early enough that the sun hasn’t come around to my side of the building and I download a couple of episodes of Cast On because Ann and Julia have been singing Brenda’s praises and I have my water and phone and fiber and I’m ready to go. There’s a nice breeze and it’s fairly quiet (read no kids in the pool) and I start spinning. It’s okay. I’m not loving it – but it’s nice to be outside and not sweat and stuff. The podcast is fairly interesting but I keep getting the headphones caught in the fiber and then my water goes flying with a big gust of wind and I’m sure the fiber’s wet now and after I curse for like ten minutes and the headphones come flying out of the CD player (no IPOD here thank you very much) I pack everything up and head inside.

Lesson learned: I’m not an aural kind of girl.

Even the Bruce music I love so much I love because of the words – not so much the music. G is all about the music. He’s always telling me what a great song such and such is and I’m always horrified because the words are like “I’ll be so happy when you die” or something like that. But he doesn’t even hear the words. Don’t get me wrong, I like music – even love music – but it’s the words that get me. Anyway. I’m not an aural kind of girl. I’m visual. I’m about touch. I’m not so into a voice inside my head (unless, of course, it’s my own voice driving me insane – then again, I’m not really so into that either.)

Lesson learned: You know what I like to do when I spin? Watch TV. So much for the lofty pursuit of zen while spinning. I only want to watch episodes of Another World. That’s it. And since I was all about accomplishing something yesterday, that’s what I did. I moved the wheel back into my bedroom (where the Tivo lives) and started watching. But I was still so bored!!! It was then I realized that I have never gone back to a fiber before – I usually buy a decent amount of something I like but when I spin up and ply that first bunch – I don’t go back. I move onto something new. But I want to knit something significant with this blue stuff so I’ve made a concerted effort to go back.

It was about two episodes in, when I couldn’t even stand the latest Cass and Frankie shenanigans anymore and I was tired of waiting for the new Vicky to show up so her and Ryan can get it on, that I finally understood the TRUE zen like quality of spinning. I’m going to go out on a limb and say it’s like hitting the wall when running a marathon. I’ve never run a marathon and can pretty much guarantee I never will, but I can understand that point where you just can’t do it anymore. You are dead for all intents and purposes and somewhere deep in you, you need to find the strength to soldier on. I think I hit that wall in spinning yesterday. I couldn’t do it. The yarn was killing me. I was blurry from the wheel spinning and spinning and on my god the spinning and my fingers were burning a little bit from running the fiber through my hand and I had a weird tingling sensation radiating down from my left shoulder and it got so bad I couldn’t tell the difference anymore between Vicky and Marley and OH MY GOD! I DON’T CARE IF I NEVER SPIN ENOUGH FIBER TO EVER KNIT ANYTHING BIGGER THAN A BABY HAT! MAKE IT STOP PLEASE!!

And then, as quickly as it came on, it was over. I kept on spinning and I broke through that wall and achieved some kind of fiber like zen that I can’t quite communicate to you. It was a centering, a balance between my hands and my heart and the fiber and I did the only thing a person can do when they are in that sacred place:


I cast on for another pair of knee highs.

Filed Under: Knee Highs, Spin
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