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March 30, 2007
Wall, Meet Hammer.
You didn't think I'd give up that easily did you?
Square #9
All I needed was a little RED! When I posted yesterday I already had this square on the needles. So I posted, and then I went and knit for the rest of the day. Thank you all so much for your encouragement (like I need any!) and support with this project. Blogless Betty left a comment this morning saying,
"I know that feeling. You put a finish line in front of you by putting them together. Not a time line but a what it will look like line. Half the fun of knitting them is the anticipation of putting them together later and all the random possibilities. Kind of something to knit towards um like not knowing if it's a boy or a girl kind of thing."
That's EXACTLY how I felt yesterday - sort of like a premature birth. I still LOVE the squares. I still LOVE my rules. I'm not changing any of that up. In fact, the more I came back and looked at the montage, the more it grew on me. The pictures absolutely do not capture the richness of the colors in the squares.
Today's square has lots of red!
It's funny - from what I've seen, the Tahki Cotton Classic has a million shades of pinks and purples and greens but not a lot of shades of red. Maybe I'm not looking in the right place? I don't know. But finally some reds have come in. What I love about this square is that the blue and orange and green look okay together - but when I add the red all of the colors come alive. Margene and I had a very long talk yesterday about color theory. She tauted the amazingness of Deb Menz's book Color Works. (I actually don't have this one, Margene - I have the other one - Color In Spinning. Will be ordering this one ASAP.)
Margene was educating me on Value - or lightness - in color and how a successful square will need to have all the value ranges within it. So far she thinks I've been pretty successful. The discussion came out of the lighter yellow square I posted yesterday - she said that yellow is tough because if it's too light it will look like a big hole in the blanket because the eye will immediately be drawn there. You need enough dark to offset the light for BALANCE. Isn't that what we're all looking for in life? Balance? Balance leads to contentment. Contentment leads to peace of mind and I have ALWAYS said that we should strive for peace of mind. Happiness is so overrated.
Anyway - from now on I'm going to lightly block the squares, take a picture of them, show them here, then put the pieces in the large pile forming in my bedroom on top of a stack of knitting books on the yarn dresser. I love to look at the pile with all the different colors poking through and maybe when I've got sixteen squares done I'll morph all the square pictures together again. Until then, I'm going to bask in the glory of each individual square.
I've had a few questions as to the size of the squares - I'm estimating they're about 11"x11". I would like the blanket to rest on my king size bed - almost like a coverlet as opposed to an actual sleeping blanket. I might go with 25 squares. We shall see.
Believe it or not, I'm off to Philly again this weekend. I've got a family Bar Mitzvah tomorrow, which will mean lots of hang time with my siblings. And then Passover starts Monday night. (Happy Passover!) I'll be back sometime on Tuesday and will try to post then. Then Wednesday is a crazy day. I've been asked to speak at Career Day at a local high school and I have to be there really early in the morning. I also have to come up with a career. ;-)
Have a great weekend! My goal is two more squares to show you when I get back. Thank you all!
L, C
Posted by Cara at 09:26 AM | Comments (58)
March 29, 2007
STOP THE INSANITY!
These miters are taking over my life.
Square #7
Square #8
I don't know - the light is not right on these photographs. The colors are much richer and deeper. I have 8 squares finished. I took the photographs and put them together and got this:
Click on it to make it bigger. I'm kind of sorry I put them together. I think it was too early. I'm having so much fun planning and knitting square after square just knowing in my heart that they would all go together in the end, and now I feel like it's died a little for me. I don't know why, it just has. Maybe I need a little break - but I'm so in love with the next square already and the three squares after that and I just don't know what to say.
Maybe it's the photographs. I think they're a bit dark and the color isn't true. There is so much lacking in the photographs. I'm really feeling my limitations. I'm sorry for the downer post - trust me when I tell you that 40 minutes ago I was feeling GREAT about this project. I think I hit my first wall.
Posted by Cara at 12:57 PM | Comments (107)
March 28, 2007
Choice
Before you do anything today, please go back on over to Ruth's. She's posted her first installment in the Playing with Colour series and you must NOT miss it! Ruth is really really really on to something here. I'm just jealous I didn't think of it first. ;-)
Last night I had my first color crisis with my squares. My process for picking colors is like this: dump the large bag of Tahki Cotton Classic on the floor and start rifling through finding colors I like. Once I've identified a range, I pick the four that hit me somewhere - my head, my heart, my eyes - I don't know - I'm maybe not that conscious of the process (sorry Margene!) I just get four I like together. Usually I try to make sure there's some kind of zinger in there.
Once I've got my colors together, then it's time to decide which one is going to be most dominant. As I said before, I'm choosing one color of four (right now - this might change as I go along) that is the lead color on all four miters of a square. The other three colors become the "background" with one repeating twice. Don't hold me to this particular rule. The main color rule - that's staying. I really love the cohesiveness it brings to the squares and I think it lets me go a little wild in the background colors. I haven't felt the need to go all out with four different backgrounds yet, but it could happen. There are going to be A LOT of squares. Lately I see this as a cover for my king size bed. Not necessarily a blanket to actually fit - just something to lay over the top of the bed. I'm crazy - but I'm not insane. I don't think so at least. I've always taken comfort in the idea that if I ever do truly go insane I won't know it because I'm insane. My therapist likes to burst this bubble all the time.
For square number 7 I chose a vibrant purple, a very dark purple, a wine, and a green. Right away I thought I'd go with the vibrant purple as the main color, and the dark purple as the repeating background. I like to knit all three different background colors before I do the repeat just in case I want to change my mind. I had two miters done last night at about 12:30 AM and I cast on for the third miter because you MUST CAST ON when you finish a miter. This is a law. There is no skirting around it. A tradition, but not necessarily a law - although as the rabbis teach us, tradition can sometimes be more compelling than law - is to knit the first six rows of the miter. Or at least get past the first two rows.
So I'm in bed and it's very late and I'm very tired and I just want to get a couple of rows under my belt on the next miter when I suddenly decide that I've fucked up the order of the colors! The DARK purple should be the main color - NOT the vibrant purple. (Please PLEASE don't ask me the color numbers. I'm keeping spreadsheet after spreadsheet of the yarn colors I have and where I've bought them but I neglected to write down which colors I'm using for which square. Sometimes I think I'll work backwards to figure it out (because what if there's a color I really like and want to use again!?) but then I don't. It's adding a bit of anxiety to the project - which might actually be a good thing. Maybe I am crazy after all?) Luckily I was smart enough to know that in the poor poor light of my bedroom and the dark sheets (dark purple and wine purple) I wasn't going to be able to tell anything. So I put the miter down, turned out the lights and tried to sleep. You know where this is going right? I couldn't get the miter out of my freaking mind - turning the colors over - questioning my decision. Then I had a weird dream about being thin and wearing a Von Furstenberg wrap dress. Oddly, it wasn't a very good dream.
When I woke up this morning and took the miters into the light to photograph for you, it became clear that my first instinct was the right one.
At least I think so. For now.
A couple of things about the miters - someone asked if they were heavy. I weighed one square - four miters - lightly blocked, ends hanging, unsewed and I got 68 kg or 2 3/8 oz. (What the hell do I know! It says kg right there on my scale!) They don't feel very heavy, but I'm sure the blanket will be substantial when they're all sewn up and laying over my lap.
Another thing - someone asked where I'm getting the Tahki Cotton Classic from - my initial forty skeins came from WEBS grab bag sale, which is over. Then I bought another 20 skeins from them as singles. WEBS has a nice discount policy - the more you buy the more you save. My greedy search for more colors also took me to Flying Fingers. I wasn't so happy with this store when I was actually IN the store, but the mail order customer service has been very nice. A couple of the colors I wanted are on backorder - but they assured me I'd be getting them soon. The third place I've been buying TCC is from the Tahki website - they use Shopatron. If you're not familiar with Shopatron - it's a FABULOUS idea! You buy the yarn from the manufacturer's website (I know Louet uses Shopatron as well) and the orders are actually fulfilled by local yarn stores! So my large order for Tahki Cotton Classic was fulfilled partly by The Yarn Shoppe in Miami, Florida and My Knitch in Fitchburg, Wisconsin. I don't know about you - but I think this is great! I get to shop in one place for all the colors I want and Shopatron gets to track it down for me! And I'm supporting local yarn stores (maybe not MY local yarn stores, but somebody's!) I should be getting more yarn any day now - I'll let you know how it plays out. (Just a note - it looks like the prices on the Tahki web site are a bit more expensive. By like $.25-$.50. For me, that's okay - because I don't have to go searching every small website on the Internet. I'm the person who will pay full price at Bloomingdale's because I CAN NOT STAND sifting through the racks at TJ Maxx. That's just me. Time is money.)
Thanks so much for all your kudos on our crazy weekend. As I mentioned, I am extremely close with these kids and besides my own, if I have them one day, I wouldn't do this for anyone else. (Sorry!) I love them to distraction and anything I can do to make their lives a little better - by keeping with their routines or letting them eat pasta with butter until they burst or letting them sleep with me because they miss their Mommy then I will do it. I would do anything for them. They are my family.
Okay. Off to knit miters! Have a great day!
Posted by Cara at 09:16 AM | Comments (44)
March 27, 2007
The Little Children
Hey Nancy! This is for you!!! ;-)
At 18:07:39 PM EDT, I handed back the keys to the minivan to my sister. The kids were a) all alive (I REPEAT - THEY WERE ALL ALIVE!!!!) b) fed (I won't say well fed unless you consider a steady diet of pasta, butter, pancakes and syrup healthy) and c) happy (well, as happy as they could be now that their favorite aunt was running for the hills with nary a kiss goodbye.)
Whew!
Honestly - we had a great time! We both miss the kids terribly and have talked about nothing else since we came home (remember when E did that? Remember when C said this? Remember how sweet M was when he helped out with that?) I always miss them when I leave - I love those kids so much it hurts sometimes - but I was weeping as we pulled off their street. I'm sure a lot of it had to do with exhaustion because, man, I have NEVER been so freaking tired in my LIFE. NEVER. EVER. NEVER. Bone crushing. That's how tired.
Let's refresh - three kids, 6, 4 and 2. Two childless adults, 37 and 44. Alone. For the weekend. We got down to my sister's Friday around lunch and my mom, who had the kids the night before, handed off the littlest and said SEE YA! We hung out with E for a bit and then headed off to pick up the big kids from school. All went well - I even made three different dinners for each of the kids - short order cook now on the resume - and they pretty much went to bed without a hitch! Of course, I didn't sleep for one second the entire first night. The baby co-sleeps with my sister, which means he was co-sleeping with G and I and the poor thing would semi-wake up crying for Mommy and thrashing about then stop suddenly and go back to sleep pretty much every hour. I think my big humongous EMPTY boobs were confusing him. Poor baby. And when he was sleeping, I was listening for the other kids - waiting for them to wake up and come into our room. They didn't. They slept. Kids 1, Me Comatose.
The next day was Saturday and I told G that this would be our hardest day because we had all three of them for the ENTIRE DAY by OURSELVES. It was overcast and drizzly and not very warm and I told him that WE MUST LEAVE THE HOUSE. I know from experience with my sister that three kids in the house the entire day is a like a death wish for the adults so we all piled into the minivan and headed off to The Franklin Institute. In restrospect, I was probably sleep walking to think we could pull this off and truly it's a testament to my sister and her husband and what great parents they are because these kids were fantastic. They didn't whine, they didn't cry, they didn't fight, they didn't run off - all was peaches and cream. We had a great time! And we tired them out! Everyone slept that night. Even me. This was the easiest day by far.
(OH MY GOD! How could I forget!! I gave them all baths on Saturday night. HAIR WASHING AND EVERYTHING! They were so good for me too. No one cried about rinsing out the shampoo! (Not that I'm patting myself on the back or anything. I should also note that I am extremely close with my sister and her kids. Closer than most, I think. ))
Sunday was a challenge - hebrew school by 9AM! Me, alone, with all the kids! Sweatpants under nightgowns and snow boots without socks! Superman pjs with cape! Oh NO! It's a dog in the parking lot! Everyone in Aunt Cara's arms! M got there ON TIME and he was dressed in actual clothes AND had breakfast!! Double points for Aunt Cara! Quick! Let's run home! Time to get dressed for the birthday party and pick up! No! You can't wear your nightgown snow boot combo! Hair combed! Teeth brushed! WHERE'S THE FREAKING PRESENT?!?! Birthday party pick-up complete! Time to go BACK to hebrew school! Where's G?! I SAID NOON! Run through the parking lot. There at 12:15 on the dot. M last kid picked up. Teacher says: See, I told you your Aunt wouldn't forget you! DAMN! Points deducted. Never pick up the kid last. Back home! LUNCH! (Who the hell came up with the three meal a day plan? They should be SHOT!) NAP! (Thank god!!!!) Birthday party girl arrives home! It's NICE OUT! Let's GO OUT! PLAYGROUND TIME! (Yes. G and I took all three kids to the playground. No broken bones. No bloody lips. No fistfights. 100 BONUS POINTS!!!) Come home. MORE OUTSIDE! Let's RIDE BIKES! Helmet won't fit over super curly hair. Tears. Lots of tears. Aunt Cara says fine. Don't wear the helmet. But if you fall over and crack your head I WILL NOT FORGIVE YOU! Tricycle breaks. Damn. Let's go in! DINNER! Pasta and butter AGAIN! Yes. You can watch a show. Turn show on. Do dishes (I did so many dishes!) KIDS ASLEEP!!!! IT'S ONLY 6:30!!! THEY HAVEN'T PEED AND THEY WILL WAKE UP IN THREE HOURS AND BE UP ALL NIGHT!!! You have no points left. YOU LOSE. Baby's about to fall asleep when you realize he hasn't pooped all weekend. He's a once a day kind of guy. Shit. LITERALLY! Change diaper THREE TIMES in 45 minutes. Big kids still sleeping. Baby finally asleep. Big kids wake up. Okay. Let's watch that movie you promised. Sorry, honey, it's too late. BUT YOU PROMISED!!! Kids are all in various beds - some of them their own - most of them not. OTHER sister shows up sometime in the middle of the night. Don't sleep so well. Hmmmm.
Monday, M had school and I was relieved a bit my other sister. She came down the night before and suprised the kids in the morning by managing to wake before noon. I took M to school (I PACKED A LUNCH! And wrote him a note - my mom always wrote us notes in our lunch bags) and came home to find my sister playing with the other two kids. Took five minutes to clean up the freaking kitchen AGAIN. And straighten up some toys. Sister leaves. Toddler melts down SPECTACULARLY! I made sure he couldn't hurt himself and let him go at it. Quite impressive. Finally he calmed down and we drove around in the minivan with a movie going for C and hoping the baby would fall asleep. He does, but doesn't make the transfer from the car to the bed. More melt downs. MY SISTER IS ON THE AIRPLANE HOME! Lots of TV that afternoon as I try to put the house back together. Pick up M from school. Twist ankle on front yard as kids climb through ivy and get stuck. Start crying. Scare kids. Love kids. MOM HOME!!!!
That was my weekend. How was yours?
I'm being sort of funny, but it was quite the weekend. G and I were stressed but we loved it too. We missed each other - I would see him and want to hug and cuddle but there were three kids on the couch between him and me and it was tough. He was a real trooper and the kids and he bonded which makes so happy. My sister and b-i-l got to get away. I proved to myself I'm much tougher than I think I am. We're all winners!!!!
I even got to knit. A little bit.
Square #6
I started this square right before I left for my sister's. I finished it this morning. I've already started the next one. This square was completely influenced by this post over at Ruth's. Ruth has been exploring color by taking photographs and breaking them down into their elemental colors. It's a great idea and I may just follow suit. I've got some flower pictures that might need to be broken down. Thanks for the inspiration Ruth!
I wanted to thank you all again for your participation in the discussion on comments and blogs. I've seen the topic come up quite a bit around the blogs and everything I've seen remains thoughtful and respectful. That's no small task in this day and age where everything seems to break down to a toddler's level rather quickly among the adults in this world. I said it first! I said it best! I'm RIGHT! She's WRONG! It's NOT FAIR! Honestly, I didn't see any of that and I thank you so much. I hope we can have more give and take like this real soon. Thanks again for reading.
Up next: More miters! If you're sick of these, you might want to take a break from reading. That's about all you're going to get for a while, I'm afraid. Well, I'm not really afraid because I love them more and more each day, but you might be bored.
PS - I almost forgot! While I was being SUPER AUNT, I also managed to do an interview with Tara for Create A Connection and the Interview Tuesday series. Check out the site - there's lots of great stuff. Melba's done a great job putting it out there. Thanks girls!
Posted by Cara at 03:53 PM | Comments (77)
March 22, 2007
One Million Possibilities
About the only thing that could possibly make me feel better is this:
When I took to my bed yesterday, I wanted to knit. But not socks or the cardigan or any of the other half knit stuff I have laying around the house. I wanted to knit a mitered square. I really really REALLY wanted to knit a mitered square. So I laid out all the TCC I have and started moving colors around on the bed and I came up with a couple of possibilities but nothing I loved. And my head hurt so I told myself don't push it. Wait. Be patient. Today I was rewarded! One of my new batches of TCC arrived and I see a MILLION possibilities! I'm going to try to be good and get everything ready for the weekend and get some work out of the way and THEN I will be allowed to knit my miters. Only then. I might plan a few out before hand, might move some colors around, but NO KNITTING. No. I will be good. It's a very lucky thing that I have to watch those kids this weekend, or we all might be in trouble. You might find me Monday one very sick girl mumbling miter miter miter miter over and over again rocking back and forth with imaginary needles and imaginary yarn in hand. DUDES! WAIT! IDEA! I've never wanted to take LSD before, for fear I'd lose myself in some kind of psychedelic haze - but OH MY GOD! What if you could take LSD and KNIT MITERS?!?! Seriously. I haven't taken any cold medicine at all. I swear.
Before I sign off for the weekend, I wanted to sincerely thank you all for your comments on my post yesterday and especially over at Steph's. Thank you for the tremendous insight you left here, and over there, and thank you for being respectful. I promise you: I read EVERY SINGLE COMMENT left here. I even read the fucking spam comments. I may not be able to reply to every one, but I READ THEM. And I appreciate every one of you - whether you leave a comment or not. ETA: I have my blog set up so that every comment I get comes in as an email. This way it makes it easier for me to reply back to the commenter (when I can - I'm sorry I'm not better than I am.) You might want to check your blog to see if you have this setting - it makes communication so much easier!
Have a fantastic weekend!
Posted by Cara at 01:25 PM | Comments (90)
March 21, 2007
Best Laid Plans
I feel like stomping around and throwing a fit. I'm home today. I love my home, don't get me wrong, but I'd much rather be playing with my friend than blowing my nose every 30 seconds. I had the sniffles at the beginning of the week and thought maybe it was just allergies. But sometime in the middle of my nice romantic night in the big city, it turned into a full-fledged cold. So no Spinning Guild for me. No fun. Just snot.
I will be spending the next 36 hours doing everything I can to rest and rest and rest. Three kids, 6, almost 4 and 2 weeks from 2, are depending on me for FUN FUN FUN this weekend and I cannot disappoint. At least if your nose is stuffed you can't smell the poop when you change the diaper. Right? RIGHT???
PS - Steph inadvertently started an interesting conversation on blogging. In this post, she asks the question "Why blog if you don't have people pop in and say hello?" in regards to blogs she's visited that don't have any comments. It didn't go over too well, so she explains herself here. I jumped in with my opinion. It's slightly incoherent - but I'm SICK so give me a break. I'm sure Steph would love to hear your opinion - no matter what side you're on - she's open minded and terrific like that.
PPS - Okay - so I just read some more of the comments over at Steph's and because I don't want to take up all her space I'm going to write some thoughts on commenting on blogs over here. One of the commenters mentioned how hard it is to get people to comment on blogs when you're not in the "clique." Oh man do I understand that feeling! What the fuck is she talking about, you're saying - she gets like fifteen million comments a day! She IS the clique. Biotch. Comment Ho. Yeah, yeah, yeah. NOW I get a lot of comments (comparitively - there are bloggers out there getting WAY more comments than me - unless, of course, I'm giving something away - NOT THAT I'M COMPLAINING. I'M JUST STATING FACT.) but when I first started blogging - I got a handful of comments here and there. For the first year or two in fact. Blogging in a community (as opposed to blogging for yourself - which I also think is VERY legitimate if that's what you want) takes work. It's a RELATIONSHIP. Community is a RELATIONSHIP. I've been asked a lot - recently in fact - how to get new blogs on the map. My answers to these questions: read and COMMENT on other people's blogs. I like to go and leave comments on blogs that are new to me. Link to people! It may be narcisstic of me, but I like to check my stats. I like to see who's linking to me and what they have to say. I often leave comments on blogs that have linked to me. Be a part of a swap or an online blog ring but most of all, people will engage with you if you engage with them. There are literally thousands of blogs out there - not everyone is going to read your blog. If you want an audience, go out and get it.
I'm sick. I can't hear very well. Did that sound bad? I don't want it to sound bad. I want it to sound honest and truthful and not pedantic and oh whatever. I have to go blow my fucking nose again. HONK!!!!! SNIFFsniff. Please excuse me. Thank you.
Posted by Cara at 11:53 AM | Comments (137)
March 20, 2007
Colors
Ice T said it best:
(If Ice T isn't your speed, Ann's got some Mr. Rogers You Tube goodness over on her site. Just sayin'.)
You don't come out the other end of a weekend like I just had without learning some stuff about yourself. Things I learned while sitting on the couch knitting like a fiend for three and a half days:
- My husband is a saint. He can't stand to be in the house all day and I thrive on it. So after the twenty-third hour of my sitting on the couch, knitting away furiously, saying "Isn't this the greatest weekend ever!" over and over, it's a miracle he didn't hit me. He smiled and thanked me for being so happy. He also didn't mention that I smelled. You think you're not working up a funk sitting on that couch but you do. Trust me. I actually showered Saturday night at around 11:30 PM. (Which may not seem weird to you, but honestly, if I'm not leaving the house, I ain't showering. Please call before you come over.) ETA: I should also say that I didn't MAKE G stay in the house with me all weekend. He was allowed to leave. And he did. Just not as much as he would've liked.
- While I greatly admire the funkiness of Nona's spectacular short row log cabin swatches (FANTASTIC TUTORIAL HERE), my mind can't do that. How I would love to bend the way they do out in Gee's land, but I get such satisfaction out of all those little v's lined up in a precise, neat, orderly row that to deliberately knock things off their wack is something I'm not capable of. It makes me feel weird. AND I'M OKAY WITH THAT. I really really really am. Because I can bend and twist and turn and scare the bejeezus out of myself with COLOR. C-O-L-O-R. That's what I'm all about.
I was particularly taken with this fuchsia color.
I used it as an accent in three of my miters.
Did you know fuchsia rhymes with Lucia?
- I'm not sure if this is really learned, because I've known it for a long time, but it really is all about COLOR for me. Rarely do I shoot with black & white in mind. My personal work has always been about color. My knitting has always been about color. My SPINNING has definitely always been about color. The only reason I started spinning was to make yarn like this. That was it. Not even to necessarily knit with it, just spin up all that color.
It's funny too - my house is kind of drab in it's decor. I have white walls EVERYWHERE. Well, the walls you can see because my living room/dining room is covered with wood-like (is particle board really wood?) bookcases thereby hiding the walls. There's lots and lots of wood (which can be colorful, but my wood's not) and my furniture is navy blue and my wall to wall carpeting is brown and my bedroom's kind of brown with lots of wood and my sheets are dark and blue and so are the drapes and no wonder all I want is color in my life! Why limit myself to ROSE colored glasses?!? I want all the colors of the rainbow!
- I learned that I'm accepting of the dual nature of my obsessive tendencies. Because sometimes they can be truly grand and net me five glorious blocks of color, but sometimes they can fuck with me to the extreme and make me miserable and scared and feel vastly out of control. It's okay though because I can take the bad with the very very good. Sometimes.
- I learned that on occasion I DO like Mondays because they give you the break you need after a weekend spent obsessing. And spinning guild. I'm extremely grateful for spinning guild because when you're spinning you're not knitting (because as much as we'd like to, we can't knit ALL THE TIME, we must eat and sleep!) and yet you still get to play with COLOR!
Pre-Drafted Spunky Eclectic Fiber
Biffle - Tie Dye Colorway
Fluffy goodness all drafted up - ready to be spun!
Yesterday I knit a few rows on the KH Cardigan - it was comfort knitting is there ever was one. I learned that when you throw yourself into something - even something that COULD be comforting (like stockinette stitch miters) - when your brain is working overtime processing colors and ideas and thinking thinking thinking it's NOT restful. Invigorating? Yes. Inspiring? Yes. Compelling? Creative? Fulfilling? Yes. Yes. Yes. Restful, though, it's not. Today I'm going to spin a little and then I'm spending the night in the big city with my G. Tomorrow I'm off to Lawn Guyland to hang with my favorite martian and the guild. Thursday I'm off to my sister's to BABYSIT. No rest for the weary. I'm not sure if I'll be blogging at all until next week sometime. I will try to check in to let you all know that the kids are taking very good care of us - but if not, have no fear. My voice is back and it's LOUD. (In fact, I wish I would just shut up already....)
Have a great week everyone!
Posted by Cara at 10:41 AM | Comments (27)
March 19, 2007
The Lost Weekend
Starting Thursday afternoon, when I first posted the beginning of my first ever miter, I knit miters the entire weekend ending about midnight last night. 20 miters in all. Five blocks. It's only the beginning. Not surprisingly, I found my voice - and there are lots of pictures and words to prove it. Skim if you like. Thank you.
Okay. So this is what happened. Back in January, I got an email from WEBS saying that they had Tahki Cotton Classic grab bags on sale - it came out to like $2.50 a skein. I had never used TCC so I called Kay, who I know collects TCC the way I collect STR and asked if this was a good thing. She said it was a very good thing, so I bought three 10-skein grab bags and gave them the specifications Kay suggested: 1 bag warm brights, 1 bag cool brights, and 1 bag neutrals. All different please. Now, with a grab bag you are at the mercy of whoever's putting the bag together and whatever stock allows. When my yarn arrived, I realized I was a little light on the purples and reds, so I did what you all would've done and bought another 10-skein grab bag and asked for purples and reds. I got oranges and some pink, but that's okay. That's why they call it a grab bag.
I bought the yarn, took a couple of pictures of it (see above) that I didn't really love and promptly put the yarn in a huge plastic bag and stuck it in the closet. Honestly, it was one of those things I needed to have but didn't have an idea about it. Another Log Cabin? Who knew? I just knew I needed the yarn and the price was good and that was that.
Fast forward a few weeks. I keep seeing these interesting ripple blankets and chevron scarves everywhere. I'm not going to crochet and I hate scarves, but the undulating color is appealing to me. Then, I go to my sister's for the weekend and I'm in my niece's room and she's playing with my hair (god I love having a niece!) and I'm looking around her room and I spy some of the swatches I gave to her so she could have blankets for her babies. Back in the old days, I'd make tons of swatches - I mostly knit blankets for other people (oh how the times have changed), in acrylic no less, and there are lots of leftovers. One of the blankets I made was a ripply chevrony blanket pattern that was my grandmother's - well - actually - it wasn't her pattern but she had used it to make blankets for all of us grandchildren. Mine was the first, I suspect, and it's quite boring in its color choices, but my sister's is inspired. I'll try to take a picture of it while I'm at her house next weekend. Anyway, I had made this blanket for a friend's daughter and had swatched a bit before I started knitting. This swatch had purple stripes. My niece wanted to know why I didn't make it bigger.
The swatch stuck with me and started niggling around in my brain while I was knitting away happily on the Katharine Hepburn Cardigan (which I WILL BE FINISHING) and on Thursday, when I was out of sorts, I thought - HUH! This could be a great use for my Tahki Cotton Classic. I'll knit an undulating ripple blanket in my grandmother's afghan pattern and how fantastic will that be!?! So I took out the yarn and chose two colors I didn't really care about - an orange that I had five skeins of and a bright yellow. I found my grandmother's pattern written on the back of a receipt and tucked away for safe keeping and tried to cast on. Not only couldn't I read my writing to get the pattern to work out but I started to cast on and got the stitch count wrong and then I thought forget it. But I had the cotton out and Kay's always talking about her miter love and I'd never knit a miter before....
Quickly I took out my copy of Mason-Dixon Knitting - possibly FOR ME the single most influential knitting book I own - and turned to the miter page. I studied the pattern and my mind went a churning. Then I remembered that Kay had a no-sew miter thing going on so I went to investigate. Might as well get as much information under your belt before you start. While I was over there, reading the tutorial and thinking this probably isn't for me - I WAS STRUCK BY LIGHTNING. There was a square - a group of squares - in the no-sew miter that spoke to me on such a level I was instantly dumbstruck and foaming at the mouth. Muttering and silent. I was NUTS!
Then I remembered that I, myself, had photographed this stupendous mitered blanket before it was finished. I went and looked through my photographs.
I did NOT knit this masterpiece. Kay did.
See that big orange square up in the right top? See it? THIS, my friends, is the secret to everything. Immediately the whole thing fell into place for me and I dumped that bag of glorious Tahki Cotton Classic color and started throwing things together.
Square #1
My favorite thing about Kay and Ann's book is the whole thing about rules. Kay loves the rules. They rein you in and set you free all at the same time. So I made up some rules for my new mitered blanket. First off, there will be approximately 20 squares, made up of four miters, and they will each have a dominant color that runs through the square and keeps it cohesive. The four "background" colors may be in the same color family, a different family, I may use a background color more than once, I may have four different colors. The background is kind of like anything goes. I won't be sewing them up until I'm finished - I may throw out a square in the end, I may need to knit more.
Once that was settled, I began to knit:
Square #2
And knit:
Square #3 - knit on St. Patrick's Day
And knit some more. (So my hand was cramping up before I went to bed Saturday night. So what?)
Square #4
At some point, I don't know whether it was Saturday or Sunday, my ass went numb from sitting on the couch. All the movies started to blur together (but I do remember that I REALLY like Daniel Craig as the new Bond. He's got that grittiness to him that's essential to Bond - they can't be TOO pretty, ie Moore and Brosnan) and I had scoured the internet looking for every color card of TCC I could find and promptly printed them all out and cross referenced them with the list I had put together in Excel of the colors I already had in my possession. I may or may not have left the house on Sunday to buy a HUMONGOUS GLASS VASE so that I could throw all of the half balls of TCC into it and let the colors mingle around together to find new and exciting combinations. I definitely bought another 17 colors. I am desperately in need of red.
I do know this: by Saturday night I had identified the fourth and fifth squares, started the fourth and thought I'd at least CAST ON for the fifth. Whatever.
Square #5
Whew! I'm done for now - or at least until the new yarn comes. I've exhausted the color combinations I've got. I'm sure I could push them and find another few squares, but I'm mentally exhausted. I need to go back to the KH Cardigan - one color - for a little bit. Besides, I won't have a weekend like this one - where I don't have anything to do, really, for a long time I'm sure. But I've got it down that I can knit a miter, one quarter of a square, in under 90 minutes - three sitcoms - it's not going to take me long at all. I'm already 1/4 finished! And away we go....
Posted by Cara at 01:32 PM | Comments (78)
March 18, 2007
Obsession
by Tahki Cotton Classic.
Full details tomorrow.
Posted by Cara at 11:22 AM | Comments (19)
March 17, 2007
Like Freaking Potato Chips
Posted by Cara at 11:48 AM | Comments (21)
March 16, 2007
Love it lifts you up it brings you down
makes you want to shout
I'm sort of feeling like I've lost my blog voice. Hopefully I'll get it back over the weekend. The title of today's post was brought to you by a google search that landed someone on my blog. Have a good one.
Posted by Cara at 11:20 AM | Comments (36)
March 15, 2007
Beware the Ides
Posted by Cara at 09:57 AM | Comments (33)
March 14, 2007
Menage A Trois
Today I had a three way with Vicki and Ann. Then Georgie popped in for a few minutes. It was quite the morning. Vicki wrote a very nice post today (which turns out to be a contest - so go- have fun) about how she and Ann quit smoking TWO YEARS AGO. (I'm bursting with pride, by the way!) I'm not sure I remember when I started reading Vicki - she was one of my first blogs for sure. When she first quit, I sent her this huge box of stuff to help her and she sent some of the bounty off to Ann. So I started reading Ann. Her blog was, you know, okay. Nothing special. But I read, because she was friends with Vicki and I love Vicki, so I started leaving her encouraging comments too. Then, that summer, Vicki came to New York and Ann and I crossed our respective rivers to pay homage to the Knitorious One. About 30 seconds into our meeting, Ann let the F-BOMB fly and I knew we'd be friends forever. It was love at first curse word. Since then we've traveled together, spun together, made fun together and Vicki gets all the blame.
I left a comment over at Vicki's that said: "I send you a big box of goodies and you give me Ann." I was reading the comment to Ann (because I like to read aloud to her all the time - it's the only way I know she reads the blog) and she said something like - what kind of secret pal swap was that?! And I said, YEAH! It's the TAKE MY PAL PLEASE Swap. It amazes me on a daily basis that I could be such great friends with a person that takes in shit off the street. Literally.
Seriously though - my life is made SO MUCH RICHER (in the heartfelt sense - these girls have COST me money for sure!) by them. I can't tell you HOW HAPPY I AM that you both quit smoking. I want you around for a long long LONG time.
Speaking of valuable people in my life - go on over and give Margene and big ol' HAPPY BIRTHDAY! Have a great day my friend!
In other news, my "real" life (as opposed to my knitblog life) is completely and utterly boring. Yesterday my only goal was to load the tax software onto the computer. I got so carried away, that it turns out I'm pretty much finished them. There's a couple more boxes to go through - but I'm only looking for one or two papers and then I'm DONE. Much faster than I expected. I'm a laugh RIOT.
Knitting wise, I started the armhole decreases on the back. Hopefully that will be done pretty quickly. YAWN!!!
God help me. I think I put myself to sleep.
Posted by Cara at 12:32 PM | Comments (13)
March 12, 2007
Color Me Wonderful
I'm in a really good mood today. Which is probably the last thing you want to say out loud - or at least out blog - but it's true. And my morning wasn't all that great either. I'm going to attribute it to the fact that I -GASP- ate breakfast this morning. I NEVER eat breakfast. In fact oftentimes I won't eat until 2 or 3 in the afternoon. So I ate some oatmeal with cinnamon and honey and then a couple of hours later I ran and now I'm going to eat I just ate my lunch and I feel pretty damn good.
I had a GREAT weekend with my sister and the kids. On Saturday we went to the Crayola Factory which was, in a word, FANTASTIC! It's in Easton, PA and I would recommend anyone with kids go there NOW. It's like one HUGE craft project. Actually, a million little craft projects. You can go from station to station and make all sorts of stuff and the best part is that the three kids, ages 6, 4 and 2 could do the same projects - just each to their own level. We were there for like five hours and I barely had a headache when we left. ;-) This was actually really good practice for me. Kind of like training camp. You see, in two weeks my sister and her husband are going away for a long weekend and they're leaving the kids at home...WITH ME!! (And G actually.) We will be TOTALLY RESPONSIBLE for the lives of three VERY young humans. To say I'm a bit freaked is putting it mildly, but as my sister keeps reminding me, I volunteered for the job. The kids are so super excited about it, and I am too.
Maybe that's why I've been knitting like a fiend on the KH Cardigan. I want to get as much done as possible before I go back down to Philly.
You're looking at 12" of back BAYBEE! Another 2.5 to go and I'm ready to start the armhole decreasing. I'm going to go with the size 40.5" decreases - so that the sleeves measure up no problem. Fingers crossed it all works out. Still LOVING this project. Every time I finish a repeat (or sometimes more often) I lay it out over my lap and run my hand over the yarn. It's very satisfying.
And in the definitely NOT "Not Your Grandmother's Knitting" department, I'm sure you've all heard that Eunny Jang has been named Editor of Interweave Knits. This is grand in so many ways, but most of all because Eunny, as evidenced by her superior technical skills and innovative designs, GETS our grandmothers' knitting, APPRECIATES our grandmothers' knitting, and takes their genius and builds on it. The most original and creative people in the world did not and do not turn their back on the art that came before, they incorporate it into their own work. They feed off of it. Most of all they show the utmost RESPECT for it. Through her blog alone, Eunny has raised the knitting bar for all of us. I, for one, am very excited about what she can bring to IK and the knitting community in general. Whether I ever knit an IK pattern again, I am confident that the patterns that DO appear under her creative direction will be SMART and CHALLENGING. That cannot be a bad direction to take our craft. Congratulations Eunny! I wish you only the best!
Posted by Cara at 03:33 PM | Comments (30)
March 08, 2007
It's not a hobby, it's a lifestyle.
Second verse, same as the first:
The color is way off here. Not so blue/green.
The other day I was having lunch with a friend and she looked up at me and said, "I love knitting so much. It's just the greatest thing ever." And I said, "I know. I do too." And she said, "I feel so sorry for people who don't knit." And all I could do was nod my head in agreement.
I've thought a lot about this conversation and it's not so much that knitting IS the greatest thing ever - but that knitting is the greatest thing ever FOR ME. And while I don't really care so much if everyone else knits (there's a part of me that would like to keep it just a tiny bit exclusive) I do feel sorry for people that don't have something in their lives LIKE knitting. Something that can at the same time frustrate and amaze and comfort and that can only TRULY be satisfying with a lot of hard work and disappointment. Anything worth having takes a bit of work. You know? I don't care whether it's tennis or gardening or stamp collecting - if it makes you cry and lifts you up and brings you joy - if it keeps you up at night or helps you sleep or makes you want to see another day - then it's GOOD.
The other night G and I were watching TV and he said to me - "It's knitting, right? You're thinking about your knitting?" And I sort of waved him off and said, "Yeah, I'm trying to do some math in my head. Did I look like I was having trouble?" "Well, I was going to ask you if you were okay - if something was wrong, but I figured it was your knitting." And then I turned to him and words started to fall out of my mouth and I was explaining the problem and what I thought I should do and how stupid the designers were to make the sizes so far apart and my love's eyes glazed over and I thought to myself: Thank god for Ann. And Vicki. And Margene. And Kay. And thank god for all of you because I don't need everyone in the world to understand my knitting. I really could care less if 99% of you never pick up yarn and sticks in your life. But I do NEED at least a few of you to understand that look I get. And more importantly, share in the joy.
Things are going to get really really really boring around here. I'm knitting and knitting on my KH Cardigan and it feels like it's going NO WHERE. I've never knit a whole sweater on size 5s with sportweight and lace and I can see this getting tedious fast. But yet I can't stop knitting. I feel like if I can just get through the back I will feel like progress has been made and the rest will go really quickly. I've got the pattern memorized and I'm sailing without a cable needle and I'm counting rows so that repeats go fairly quickly, but still, I've only got like 5". I need 14".
I'm off to my sister's today and I'll be there through the weekend. Which probably means not a lot of knitting. Although the train ride today will be nice - I've got Kate and Ira Glass and we'll be having a little party on the Northeast Corridor.
Have a great weekend everyone! See you on Monday!
Posted by Cara at 09:44 AM | Comments (62)
March 07, 2007
Reasons to be cheerful
Reason No. 7,659 that I love knitbloggers: Yesterday, about fifteen minutes after I posted about my encounter with extra terrestrials Jenni sent me an email detailing EXACTLY which solar system the aliens were from, which kind of ship they used to land, the instruments they used to cut the crop circles and how butt cream would do nothing to stop the twitching in my ass. Thanks Jenni!! No, really, Jenni, an engineer and ecologist in New Jersey said she thought it was probably salt marsh mitigation and DING DING DING! She's right! I heard back from the NJ Meadowlands Commission and apparently they cleared the reeds for a mitigation project being spearheaded by the Commission and the US Army Corps of Engineers. She thinks they're probably going to plant some new pretty plants out there. WHOOHOO! No building here! It's like the Ghostbusters sign. Closed for business! (Oh and Risa - the stuff on the other side of the river is, I believe, going to be a golf course and/or a new apartment complex. I don't think I'll be able to see it from my view, thank god.)
Reason No. 7,660 that I love knitbloggers: Ivete emailed me the other day asking about the double decreases I'm doing for the Katharine Hepburn cardigan. She said she was knitting it as well and her double decreases look A LOT different than mine. I, cockily it turns out, told her I was doing what the pattern said: slip two stitches knit wise, knit the next stitch, then pass the slipped stitches over. What Ivete pointed out is that it actually says slip two stitches as if you were going k2tog, then knit one, then slip the stitches over. BIG DIFFERENCE! Thank god Ivete told me this early because her way, the CORRECT way, looks a helluva lot better than the bonehead way I was doing it. There was some ripping on my end, but not that much, and I'm VERY happy now and oh my god what if she had noticed it when I was halfway done the sweater? I would have been SO PISSED. Crises averted. Thanks Ivete!
Reason No. 7,661 that I love knitbloggers: The KH Cardigan has lots of little easy peasy cables that you turn every fourth row. I heart my cable needle. But not that much. I decided I needed to learn to cable without the damn needle, for this project at least, and Wendy came to my rescue! I can now do a simple four stitch cable cross - both left and right - without a cable needle. Although it would be great if I could remember which way I'm twisting. Yeah, yeah. We all know I can fix a freaking miscrossed cable. That doesn't mean I should have to. Thanks Wendy!
Reason No. 7,662 that I love knitbloggers: I'm feeling extremely confident in my plan for KH - I think KNOW it's going to fit EXACTLY the way I'd like. This is in no small part to all of you, but especially Emily - who reworked the numbers again for me and told me that I was completely correct in my assessments on how to knit this baby up. Thanks Emily!! You really made me feel good about my skillz! Now imagine my surprise, as I'm knitting in bed last night, flipping through the channels, to find EMILY on TV!! I was gliding through the guide and saw a show on PBS called The Art of Quilting. Hmmmm, I thought, this could be good for some inspiration. So I turned to it and there she was!! EMILY! Have you seen what this girl can do with some fabric and a sewing machine? OH MY GOD! She's a genius! (She knits, dyes yarn AND she likes crunching numbers for other people. I guess she's crazy, too.)
After all this goodness, I'm cruising on Katharine Hepburn!
God bless KNITBLOGGERS one and all!
Posted by Cara at 12:53 PM | Comments (24)
March 06, 2007
Crop Circles
The other day Margene had a contest asking everyone to reveal a little secret about themselves. (I think the contest is still going on, by the way.) I revealed this:
My secret is that I've been probed by aliens and I have the anal fissures to prove it. Ann says she has a cream to help me, but honestly, how can we believe her, er, I mean him?
Dudes. My ass has been mighty twitchy lately and I think I've discovered why!!! The aliens are sending messages in the form of CROP CIRCLES! [Click for bigger photographs.]
I am FREAKED! As some of you may know, I live in the swamps. My apartment looks over a beautiful field of reeds leading into the Hackensack River. We get gorgeous sunsets. One of my favorite things in the world is watching a storm roll across the swamps. All of the many windows in my apartment face over these swamps and I can get lost staring out the window. If I didn't have these swamps, I can guarantee I would've looked for a new place to live a long time ago. My view is one of the few things I'll miss when we do eventually leave.
You can understand, then, why I was horrified to see that the reeds had somehow been mowed over or destroyed or cut in such a way as to write out SURRENDER CARA! I tried to find some comparison pictures of what it looked like BEFORE the aliens came and ruined it:
I'm not sure if you can tell from those pictures what a lush wonderful landscape I've been enjoying over the past 15 years. Now I've got this catastrophe:
I spent the day calling many high ranking officials in my local government and the NJ Meadowlands Commission and no one knows what the hell I'm talking about. One guy at the Meadowlands Commission actually said the words: Crop Circles. I laughed and said that IF I was crazy, which I mostly certainly am not, that is EXACTLY how I would describe it. I senthim the pictures and hope he'll get back to me soon. My worst fear is that someone is going to build something - which I find really hard to believe - I think it's all protected land - and that my glorious view will be gone and I'll have to move ASAP. I refuse to live here without my view.
Thanks for all the suggestions on the Katharine Hepburn Cardigan. I understand what a lot of you are saying about how knits stretch and ease and all that stuff. I don't want a fitted sweater. I don't like fitted sweaters. While I have been blessed with a lovely girly figure, I don't like to call attention to it and I can guarantee that if I make the sweater at 40.5" I will be uncomfortable. It might look fabulous to you, but I won't feel good. The fact that the designers/editors thought it was okay to have 5.5" jump between sizes is preposterous to me. The last two sweaters I've made have been the 43" size and the 44" size - and I'm quite happy with both of those sweaters. Last night I cast on my modified pattern - probably around 44" - and my plan is to knit the 40.5" shoulders and sleeves. I'm not done tweaking yet, so we'll see. Oh and I decided to do the thing in pieces instead of the body in one piece. I was all set to do it in one piece and I had a lengthy discussion with Ann about structure and whether it would work without a real seam (we decided it would because we'd have two cables and two purl stitches where the seam would be) and I cut and pasted and photocopied the pattern and calculated the number of stitches needed: 309. It was then I decided pieces would be best. There was no way I was casting on 309 stitches. It would take me FOREVER to knit and I would get bored and it would get tedious. So pieces it is. And this way I can figure out the sizing if it needs to change much more easily.
Okay. Off to wait for the Mother Ship.
PS - Heather is running a drive to provide books to kids in South Africa. You can donate money and/or books and there is YARN to be had! Heather has INCREDIBLY offered up yarn to everyone who donates at least $20. The girl is NUTS! Please go visit to learn more about this very worthy cause. Literacy is EVERYTHING.
Posted by Cara at 11:38 AM | Comments (29)
March 05, 2007
The Fat Girl
At about midway through this post I'm going to ask for you to put your thinking caps on. I need serious KNITTY MATH help. You will be given fair warning. THANK YOU.
Thanks everyone for checking out my yarn and double thanks to those who purchased it! I've pretty much destashed everything I'm going to destash now - I'm getting much smarter about my yarn purchases. Everything I've sold off in the past few months has been impulse buys. No more impulses for me!
But that doesn't mean I'm not buying yarn. No siree bob. I've got two sweaters worth of Beaverslide in the stash and yesterday I bought yarn for my Katharine Hepburn Cardigan. But first, some adventures in yarn.
Friday I was in the city to get my hair cut and colored (MAN did it need it!) and also I had become obsessed with the KH Cardigan and getting some Louet Gems Sport Weight (I guess they don't call it Opal anymore) to swatch with. I had some yarn to return to Seaport so after my hair appointment, I trekked it all the way downtown to see if I could switch out the yarn - I was trying to return the Gems Topaz I sold yesterday. After the staff was particularly unhelpful and pissy about my return, I wasn't able to find the needed amount in a color I thought I wanted. So I didn't buy anything. Not even a skein to swatch with. I have a strict policy of not spending my money in places that treat me poorly. (I hear what you're saying Ann, but the Post Office is a totally different story. YES IT IS!) I feel this is really the only way to get my displeasure across and I'm fairly good about keeping my policies in check. Okay. No yarn. I'm in NYC with about a million yarn stores. It's Friday at 5:45. SOME STORE must be open AND have ONE FREAKING SKEIN of Gems Opal so I can AT LEAST SWATCH! Did I say I had become obsessed? After a few phone calls to G to check the web for me, I found out that Purl was open until 7. So I hightail it up there because I know that I've seen tons of Gems at Purl. Tons.
I get to Purl, out of breath and hot - it was WARM this weekend. (Although not as warm as the 40 people I saw wearing shorts thought it was.) I stumbled into the store and ask "Gems. Opal." They pointed out the fingering weight. "Sorry. No. I mean the Sport Weight." "Oh, sorry, we only sell that on the website." WHAT?! Does anyone else think that's weird? I mean, yes, Purl is a VERY small store, granted, but still - they can't even have like a FEW skeins of the sport weight. For, like, you know, SWATCHING purposes?
I stumbled back out onto the street. MUST.FIND.SPORTWEIGHT. My weekend was starting to deteriorate. Friday night and I've got new hair, but who cares? Think, Cara, THINK! The Point! Don't the Spiders knit there Friday nights? Hmmmm. It's around the corner. It's open. It's a yarn store. There's a chance.
I called up G again and asked him to look up the Spiders. He found their website and I told him to look to see where they meet on Friday nights. He didn't find that info, but he did find the "rules" for joining and he asked if this was some kind of secret society or something and do we really need to give up our first born for me to find some yarn and I said they're NICE girls, they don't want our kid and then I passed Julianne Moore and her lovely family on Bedford (which was a little bit weird because I had just watched this movie the night before) and then I was there. At The Point.
Did I mention I haven't eaten yet that day?
Gleek seemed genuinely happy to see me and I was genuinely happy to see her and sit next to her and hear her big pregnant belly laugh all night long and then Craptina showed up and was all like where's Ann and Flair? And I said I dropped those bitches like a hot freaking potato and then Marie came in and gave me a great hug and there were lots of other Spiders there that I was introduced to but don't remember their names and for that I am oh so sorry but you see I hadn't eaten all day and then I had a cupcake so I was so sugared up I was actually about to fall asleep.
In case you're wondering, they had Gems Fingering Weight and Gems Worsted Weight.
I left after a little bit because I had to go get my car and pick up G and I was super starving and tired and I didn't have my fucking yarn and then, on Madison around 67th, there was a man lying on the ground in the middle of the sidewalk sort of crumpled up and looking very much NOT alive and people started gathering and I called 911 and then I had to wait for the ambulance to come and people in NYC are nice when there's a crisis and the guy turned out to be okay, I guess, after the EMTs started yelling at him to GET UP. At least, he was able to stand up and when I came around the corner again with my car the ambulance and the guy were gone, so who knows. Hey Ginny! Don't Stop Believing!!
Damn. This post is turning out to be long. Sorry about that.
Okay. No yarn. But the night was saved because my husband found me a very nice burger and more cupcakes. The next day I went and had lunch with my mom, who was in town for the opera, my sister and my brother. Family love! It was actually quite nice and then my bro and I head up to Knitty City because the QUEST HAS NOT ENDED! Luckily for me my bro had some time to kill AND his girlfriend is a knitter so he knows the drill. Knitty City didn't have the yarn, but my brother buys his girlfriend a Lover Boy.
What to do, what to do, what to do!
You know, when it comes to yarn, policies don't apply. Seriously.
My brother just happened to have to be down town to meet his friend and I KNEW Seaport had the freaking yarn - at least one skein in any freaking color so I could freaking SWATCH and the Japanese place right around the corner was probably open with my favorite chewy fruity candies so I got myself lots of candies and one skein of yarn. Although the subway ride down there almost made the whole thing very UNWORTH it.
A sort of happy ending is coming to all this. I FINALLY found some Gems Sport Weight and I swatched.
My swatch is perfect and I love it.
So I swatched on Saturday and I LOVE the yarn and it's perfect for the pattern (imagine that - given that it's the yarn CALLED for in the pattern) but I swatched in Willow and Willow isn't the best green. I wanted Fern Green because I think it will look fantastic with this pattern and fantastic on me and I would've done the red, but all I do is red (although this will be the second green sweater) but G says I look great in green. I should wear more green, he says. Clearly, it's not easy being green.
And of course now that I found the pattern AND the perfect yarn and identified the perfect color, well, you can imagine where this is going. Luckily for me it only took two phone calls to find enough yarn in the same dyelot to get my project going. Sheila, the owner of Stix-N-Stitches in Montclair, was super sweet to hold the yarn for me and she put me on some list to get me two more skeins. (I imagine the list is like the kind they use at car dealerships - I need a 2007 Red Camry with white leather interior. I can trade a Black Corolla with tan interior. Only, you know, with yarn. I need two skeins of Fern Green, dyelot 12, and I can trade you one French Blue and one Crabapple, etc.) Everyone at SNS was really nice - I'm sorry to everyone I met (some for the second time at least) that I can't remember your names. I was holding them in my head so I could remember and then I started winding up my new yarn and all the names just flew out of my head like Scarlett O'Hara in that scene when she tries on her new bonnet. Please forgive me and shout out in the comments! Thank you! SNS is a beautiful store - TONS of yarns and accessories and I should really go there more often. Oh yeah, and they had my gorgeous yarn.
I cast on for the sweater last night...BUT...I'm having problems with sizing. I need help. And since this post is already a freaking novel, I'm going to talk about my size issues after the jump. But first, the title of this post refers not only to my body, but to my favorite short story - "The Fat Girl", by Andre Dubus. It's one of the best stories I've ever read in my life. And, also, Eve needs some help. She needs you to read comics for her and then, maybe, she'll send you some yarn. Go help.
THINKING CAPS ON NOW!!! KNITTY MATH HELP NEEDED!!!
Hi! Thanks for sticking around to help me out. I am both math phobic AND math handicapped, so please be patient.
Okay. So I want to make this cardigan. I have a 40" chest, which, even if I lose the 15-20 pounds I want to lose probably won't be much smaller. And then, if there's any luck in the world, I'll get pregnant and the boobs will threaten to smother all of the tri-state area but let's not worry about that right now. Let's worry about the Katharine Hepburn cardigan.
40" chest. Let's look at the sizes: 40.5" and 46" chest/bust circumference, buttoned.
Let's look at the models - hmmmm. Both are stick thin with absolutely no boobs to speak of.
Let's think about my own personal style: I LOVE the cardigan. Perfect for the big boobish among us - stylish, but you can keep the sweater open so they don't constrict the girls. I RARELY button a cardigan. I like things on the bigger side - I'm not really into the body hugging knits.
Initially I thought - okay. Do the 46". But that seems too big. And the 40.5 just seems too small. I mean, sure, probably if I'm not going to button it I could get away with it, but I'll be self-conscious and uncomfortable and not happy with my beautiful sweater.
Can anyone tell me why they sized it this way? With 5.5" between the sizes?
I did, in fact, cast on last night for the 46" size. But it seems big. So I took out the charts and my notepad and did some math. The charts have you starting at different places depending on your size. The way I figure it, if I start at the size below the 40.5 and then I add two extra repeats, I will gain about ten extra stitches (there are 20 stitches between the 40.5" size and the 46" size.) I will be casting on 159 stitches for the back (including two selvedge stitches) instead of 167 for the 46" size. I can get gauge - I didn't wet block my swatch, but the directions say to block lightly so I will be doing the wet towel thing to the pieces which I don't see changing the swatch that much. So let's say I can get gauge - 29 stitches to the 4". Divide that by 4 and I get 7.25 stitches per inch. So I get about 22" for the back. The 46" size schematic says you should get 23". So I'll be getting a 44" sweater - which seems like it would be just right!
So what do I do with the sleeves and the armhole/neck shaping?
I guess I could add the same number of stitches to the sleeves - I mean - I'm going to make the sleeves longer anyway so I'm going to be changing those all up.
According to the schematics, there's only a 1/2" difference between the 40.5" and the 46" size in the armholes and stuff - so probably I could just pick one and do that? Right? I guess I would pick the 46" inch size and go from there. What do you think? Could this work? Should I mess with it or just do the 46" size?
One more question: Since I'm going to need to cast on again, should I do the body in one piece up to the armholes or should I keep the back and fronts separate - please discuss!
ALL OPINIONS ARE WELCOME!!! (Well, that is unless you're going to call me an asshole. Please refrain. Thank you.)
Thank you so much. I love you all!
ETA:
My row gauge was pretty good - off by a couple rows, but I know how to fix row gauge. I'm talking more about binding off for shoulders and arm holes and stuff like that - I know I mixed things up a bit. The horizontal shaping as opposed to the vertical shaping. It might not matter anymore anyway because I just soaked my swatch and it's drying. Probably I'll have to make either the 32" size or the 50" size. You know how it goes. I'm trying to learn PATIENCE. I want the sweater to look NICE.
Posted by Cara at 08:19 AM | Comments (63)
March 04, 2007
Come and Get It!
ALL YARN HAS BEEN STORED IN PLASTIC BAGS IN PLASTIC CONTAINERS IN A SMOKE FREE, PET FREE, LOVING ENVIRONMENT.
PAYMENT THROUGH PAYPAL ONLY.
ITEMS SHIPPED USPS PRIORITY MAIL. SHIPPING INCLUDED IN PRICE TO ADDRESSES IN THE CONTINENTAL US. ALL ITEMS SHIPPED OUTSIDE THIS AREA WILL BE CHARGED AN EXTRA $5.00.
I've tried to be as explicit in my descriptions of the yarn as I can be. What you see is what you get. THANK YOU!
ALL GONE! THANK YOU SO SO MUCH!
Sold Items after the jump.
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!
HABU TEXTILES - Tsumugi Silk Combination
Habu Textiles Tsumugi Silk Combination: SOLD
100% Silk
Each balls is approximately 28 yds (27 m), 1 oz. (28g)
Color: 11 (gray, rust, white)
8 BALLS FOR SALE
CRYSTAL PALACE YARNS - COTTON CHENILLE
Crystal Palace Cotton Chenille: SOLD
100% Cotton
Each skein is approximately 98 yds, 50g
Color: 2230 (orange) / Dyelot 513940
3 SKEINS FOR SALE
KARABELLA MAGRITE
Karabella Magrite - There are a total of four balls - two unused, two have been partially knit. I'm only charging for two, but you get all four.: SOLD
80% Extrafine Merino, 20% Cashmere
Each ball is approximately 154 yds, 1.75 oz. (50g)
Color: 11 - Ice Blue; Dyelot 7588
2 SKEINS FOR SALE
LOUET GEMS TOPAZ
Louet Gems Topaz - Worsted Weight: SOLD
100% Merino
Each skein is approximately 168 yds, 100g
Color: Burgundy (58) ; Dyelot 80-2584-5
9 SKEINS FOR SALE
JO SHARP SILKROAD ARAN TWEED - DUSK
Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran Tweed: SOLD
85% Wool, 10% Silk & 5% Cashmere
Each ball is approximately 95m (104 yds), 50g ball (1 3/4 oz)
Color: 118 Dusk (brownish gray tweed) / Dyelot 106
19 BALLS FOR SALE
JO SHARP SILKROAD ARAN TWEED - ENAMEL
Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran Tweed: SOLD
85% Wool, 10% Silk & 5% Cashmere
Each ball is approximately 95m (104 yds), 50g ball (1 3/4 oz)
Color: 129 Enamel (navy tweed) / Dyelot 20
8 BALLS FOR SALE
JO SHARP SILKROAD ARAN - EMPIRE
Jo Sharp Silkroad Aran: SOLD
85% Wool, 10% Silk & 5% Cashmere
Each ball is approximately 85m (93 yds), 50g ball (1 3/4 oz)
Color: 137 Empire (light blue) / Dyelot 25
15 BALLS FOR SALE
HANSPUN BY STEFANIA - ROVING
Handspun by Stefania - Rovings: SOLD
8 oz.
Color: red and pink blend - cochineal
8 OZ FOR SALE
HANSPUN BY STEFANIA - ROVING
Handspun by Stefania - Rovings: SOLD
8 oz.
Color: red blend - cochineal
8 OZ FOR SALE
JENNY JUMP FARM - JACOB SHEEP ROVING
I am fairly certain this fiber is wool from the Jacob Sheep at Jenny Jump Farm: SOLD
8 oz.
Color: three color Jacop Sheep wool
8 OZ FOR SALE
TREKKING XXL STRIPE COLLECTION
Four skein collection of Trekking XXL Striping Sock Yarn. I would like to sell these all together. If they don't sell, I'll consider splitting them up.: SOLD
75% New Wool, 25% Nylon
Each skein is approximately 459 yds (420 m), 2.5 oz. (100g)
Colors: 48 - Blue stripes, dyelot 7248; 39 - Green Stripes, dyelot 8284; 35 - Red, White & Blue stripes, dyelot 7245; 05 - Pink Stripes, dyelot 2997
4 SKEINS FOR SALE
THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!
Posted by Cara at 12:00 PM | Comments (8)
March 03, 2007
Purge
Stash Sale Sunday March 4, 2007 12NOON EST.
We've got Jo Sharp, Trekking, Chenille, Gems Topaz, Habu and some fibery goodness for the spinners. Oh yeah. And Dick Cheney to greet you at the door.
See you tomorrow! (YOU TUBE ROCKS!)
Posted by Cara at 10:08 AM | Comments (15)
March 02, 2007
Seek and Ye Shall Find
YAY! I'm pretty sure I've found my next sweater:
Can you guess? It's been all over the knitblogs - I'm hardly original. Oh alright. I'll tell you:
It's the Katharine Hepburn Cardigan from the new Lace Style from Interweave. I'm having a bit of a Goldilocks moment in regards to yarn selection. So far I've semi-swatched with two yarns - the green is Rowan Wool Cotton and the red is Heavyweight Socks That Rock. I'm not 100% happy with either one of them. The Wool Cotton has a bit too much drape and a bit too much sheen and the HSTR is a bit too flat in the sheen department and a bit too heavy. The pattern calls for Louet Gems Opal and I'm going to pick some up today to swatch. Hopefully that will be just right. The best part is that I like the pattern and I'm getting to know it so when I finally cast on I'll have it memorized and G likes the sweater and it's different than the other two sweaters I've knit this year and it's perfect for the coming spring season. I'm planning on making the cropped version.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!
Yeah. That shit would barely cover my areolas. Dude. I'll be making the Amish version. Long body, long sleeves. I'm planning on turning the 3/4 sleeves into long sleeves. And I'm toying with the idea of doing the body in one piece again. This has more to do with getting it all done in a seemingly faster fashion than it has to do with my feelings for seaming. I LIKE to seam. I've got no problems with seaming. What I hate is all the pieces. You do the back. Then you have to do the sleeves and then you have to do the fronts. If you do the back and fronts together - well - when you're done - you've just got the sleeves! Then you do those together and voila! You're DONE! Doesn't that seem like it goes so much faster? Plus I think it might make the lace lay together nicer to do it in one piece. No fuddly seaming. We'll see. I'm jumping ahead of myself. First I've got to find a yarn.
But I'm feeling much better. Am Kamin will have to wait. I know that many people have successfully knit the sweater - hell - I was running the knit-a-long. I've gotten much farther than I have before and I WILL knit this sweater. I'm just not ready yet. This is going to be my next Short Rows. It may take me awhile to do it. And that's okay. For now, I'm excited about jumping in with Katherine. It might be time f