Of Yarny Things

Mom absolutely adored her mitts!  In truth, I got a better reaction out of her than I thought I would.  After she oohed and aahed over them, conversation turned to her Kindle cover.  She had been examining it over the weekend and she wanted to know how I had made it.  She pulled it out to look at it while I was explaining....and she had her mitts on at the time.  Suddenly, she did a double take and then put the cover against her mitts.  My reaction? "Yes, Mom, it is the same yarn."

I actually had a moment of panic on Monday while I was grocery shopping where my brain thought, "Oh shit! I didn't get a present!"  And then right there, in the middle of the store and out loud, I said, "Stupid Kris.  You have the mitts."  Then I had to chuckle at myself because I completely forgot about them for a couple of seconds there.  I'm not used to finishing things early.  In the few instances in which I have, I've been exceedingly grateful that I'm done before the deadline.  I really need to try to do more of that.

And speaking of making things... One of my coworkers is having another baby.  Well, his wife is. :)  This was the one where I tried and tried to make a baby blanket and then I ended up finding one I had made and forgot about years ago.  But they found out today they are having a boy.  Which apparently surprised the crap out of him, because he thought he'd only ever make girls.  The baby is due in July, so I have plenty of time, thank goodness.  But I already know what kind of yarn I'm going to get.

But Izzy's shawl first.  And then the other mitten for the BFF.  And then I can start thinking about things for a baby blanket.  

Happy Birthday Mom!

It's Mom's birthday!

Happy birthday Mommy!

We're all getting together tonight for dinner and cake and prezzies.  I'm excited.  I'm also a wee bit nervous about my gift.  But mostly excited.  Dinner will be late, but it'll still be good.  I love it when all of us are together.  We laugh so hard.

My mom is awesome.  Just a truly awesome human being.  And I could spend a great deal of time extolling her virtues.  But I have dinner to cook and cake to bake, so I won't.  Suffice it to say, she's just stellar.  And I'm very, very lucky to have her.  

She's also proof you can teach an old dog new tricks...and I couldn't be prouder!

Epic

Yesterday went by both way too slowly and way too quickly!

Getting up at five o'clock int he morning on a Saturday?  Not fun.  No matter how you slice it.  But I managed to haul my ass out of bed.  The baby fell asleep when she wasn't supposed to and then, later, wouldn't sleep when she should.  But the times when she was sleeping were awesome.  He took a good long nap.  I ended up corralling them and confining them to two rooms, just because I couldn't keep chasing them.  I was tired and my patience was worn thin...and I didn't want to snap and be harsh when I didn't need to.  Finally, 3 o'clock rolled around and they went home.  I felt like I'd had a day twice as long as it was already.  But on the other hand, I was like, "holy crap! It's already three o'clock!"

Didn't stop me from taking a nap though.  

Then I went and collected Tato from work and we had one of our nights--which equals dinner and a movie.  Dinner was tasty and he made me try something new...which I didn't like.  Which always happens when I step outside of my food comfort zone and why it's so hard to get me to do it.  Though, in all honesty, it wasn't bad and I did eat it.  I just wouldn't eat it again.  

We watched Epic, which neither of us had seen.  It's exactly his kind of fantasy.  It was completely predictable and really cute.  I enjoyed it.  It was not, however, epic.  It was good, though, and I wouldn't be opposed to watching it again.  

Before the dinner and the movie, he helped me hash out some plot point that were sticking.  I'm worried about getting all the details down but I'm certainly going to try.

Today is a lazy day.  I need to clean some, but I might put that off till tomorrow.  I also need to yarn and I may or may not do that today.  Other than a couple of errands that I have to run (the cats are out of dry food and I need more litter) I'm thinking that I might not do much of anything at all.  I have tomorrow off, just a chill day, and I can get things done then.  Or not.  :)

Hope everyone has had a lovely weekend!

Well Then

There's no help for it.  I have to scrap Izzy's shawl and start over again.  But at least this time I know what I'm doing, I understand the rhythm of things, and I think I'll be able to do it well.  It's always a possibility, with a new pattern, that you don't understand what's going on until you actually work it.  Even though I read through it first and tried to visualize what was going on, what I thought I "saw" was not quite what was happening.  Now that I've actually worked it and caught the repeat-y-ness of it, I can make it without jacking it up, missing stitches that need to be there, and making it a funny shape.  That's next on my agenda as Izzy has patiently waited long enough.  I think I may be able to accomplish a great deal by the end of the weekend and my goal is to have both that and the mitts finished by next weekend.

Actually writing words on the page is going to have to take a back seat until I get those two things done.  But even though both things require a bit of concentration, I can devote at least part of my brain cells to plotting and planning while I work.  So really, that's the best of both worlds.

I have a busy weekend ahead of me.  A book I've been waiting for is being released on Friday, watching the babies on Saturday, and needing to yarn.  Fortunately, I've taken Monday off from work to kind of recuperate.  And the Dr. Feelgood anthology is released Monday...I have a story included in it, Hero Worship.  I adore Matt and Alex and I love their story.  The entire anthology is filled with great shorts about finding love with men in the medical profession.  It's a really fun compilation of stories.

And thankfully, the snow has stopped for the time being.  My drive home from work last night was terrifying, but it's clear today.  Cold, very cold, but clear.  As much as I love having four distinct seasons and yes, even enjoy the snow, days like yesterday make me want to move somewhere where there is no snow.  Probably never happen though.  

And that's it for me for now.  Hope y'all are doing well! 

The Good and The Not So Good

I started and finished one of the BFF's mitts this weekend.  It was, actually, a study in extreme patience.  And, a couple of times there, I was convinced the mitt did not want to be made.  Twice, I crossed the cable the wrong way.  Fortunately, both times, I realized it immediately and was able to go back straight away and rearrange my stitches.  Twice, I dropped a stitch.  The first time, I didn't realize it at first and had to "ladder" it back up a couple of rows and put it back on the needle.  The second time, I saw it was not on the needle as soon as I finished the row so I stuck the cable needle through it to hold it until I got to that spot again, put it back on the working needles, and knit it.  Several times, while working the cables, my needle slid out of the stitches and I had to quick grab them back up again.  When I got to the very end, I somehow had the incorrect number of stitches so I had to fudge it to finish the top.  That didn't matter so much because you can't tell and I didn't drop any stitches.  But one mitt is successfully completed.

After that, I jumped over to Izzy's shawl.  Now that I'm about halfway finished, I sort of think I should trash it and start all over again.  See, the pattern is in Swedish (yes, Swedish) and even though the pattern maker also translated it into English, I seem to have trouble following along.  It's taken me an extraordinarily long time to realize exactly what is going on and how it is all put together.  To be honest, I'm not entirely sure I understand one part of it.  But it's sort of misshapen.  I can fudge it...I can finagle it from here and make it work.  But I sort of think it would be better to just bin it and start over so that I can do it correctly from the start even though that means she'll have to wait even longer for it. I'm still contemplating my options.

At any rate, I do feel a bit accomplished.  It was a good weekend for the yarn...even if it didn't all turn out as it should. 

Two At A Time

Here's the thing about making stuff that comes in pairs: it's hard to make them exactly the same.  Even if you count rows/rounds meticulously, there's still a margin of error.  I usually do pretty well but there's always slight differences.  A stitch or two, a row or two...they fit differently.  I finished Mom's mitts the other night and the difference is a lot more than normal.  I'm a little bit upset about it, to be honest.

The wine colored fingerless mitts I made are pretty good.  My mitts have a row difference that I only notice sometimes.  I remember when I made the BFF's mittens the first time around, one was a couple of rows longer than the other.  

There's a way to almost eliminate this.  When you are making something that there are two of--mitts, socks, sleeves--you can knit them both at the same time.  This way, you are essentially working the same row on each thing at the same time.  I've only tried it once before, when I was playing with sock yarn, and ended up accidentally using the wrong ball of yarn, so that I connected the socks.  Frustrated, I tossed it aside and have only worked one at a time since.

But seeing the difference in Mom's mitts...and remembering the difference in the first pair of BFF mitts...I decided to give it a go again.  I tried.  God knows, I tried.  But I couldn't seem to get my needles sorted and everything kind of got completely frustrating and It just all fell apart.  And then, I thought I had gotten it all set, only to realize I had screwed up the pattern on the second row and hand to pull one out and that I would be much slower when I had to switch back and forth between the different balls of yarn.  And I was worried that I would get into a rhythm and just...forget to pick up the right yarn.  At that point, I decided it was much easier--and sanity saving--to just make one at a time.  

Though I admittedly sometimes feel like a failure when I can't manage to master a simple technique like making two mitts at one time, I also know that I'm a pretty good knitter and I make beautiful things.  So I've got my trusty click-action row counter, and I'll pay attention, and hopefully, things will work out like they are supposed to.  Wish me luck!  

Doin' the Steek

Here's a quick lesson in knitting steeks because this time, I remembered to get photographic evidence.  

Here's what it looks like

And from the side

And cut open!

Okay, so, here's what it looks like.  Basically, the premise is this: cast on the number of stitches that will go across the hole you want to make.  Knit them in stockinette (knit every stitch when working in the round).  It's erroneous fabric, a place holder, if you will.  Then cut open in the middle of the section of stitches.  For this, I cast on an extra five stitches, knit them, then, when I was done, cut down the center of the middle stitch.  Looks scary, but it's not.  Then you can just tack the flaps down on the inside of the work, pull out the little stray ends, and you're good to go!