Kitchner!

So, I am almost finished with the buga baby bunting for my friend's shower on Saturday. I just need to weave in the ends, make ears and wash it (the yarn is super linty). Last night I had the bunting portion and most of the hood done. I took them into knitting circles today at Renaissance Yarns as there were parts of the instructions I didn't understand. First I had to learn to mattress stitch the sides of the hood together. That went pretty well, but then I had to graft the hood to the bunting. That meant learning the mythical kitchner stitch. I have heard a lot about how hard it is and been told to take a class or private lesson to just learn to kitchner. Maybe Michelle is just a super teacher, but she showed me once and I did the rest no problem! I was so excited to have my first kitchner under my belt!! This bunting is looking super cute and I will post pictures of it once I am all done.

Other than that, Joe was really sick yesterday, and was feeling worse this morning. So, I stayed home with him to try and help him out. After feeding him lots of airborne, orange juice and ibuprofen it seems he is starting to feel better tonight.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

Ooga Buga

So, my test knitting project is going really well. I am still enjoying it and it's getting easier with every repeat. I think I should have it done to wear in time for winter. Since the back is the biggest piece and I am thinking that will be done by the end of October (at the latest). So, I think a reasonable goal is to have the whole thing done by the end of November. Let's hope for sooner though. I got the rest of the yarn for it in the mail today from Knit Picks, so at least I am prepared!

Also in that knit picks order was 2 new books. Socks A la Carte 2: Toes Up! and Pint and Purls. Pints and Purls is a really clever book that uses the number of beers you can drink while working on a pattern to rate the difficulty of the pattern. Socks A la Carte 2 is a build your own sock book that lets you choose a style of toe, heel and cuff with cute flip pages and put it together into a sock pattern to knit. I look forward to using both.

The other part of that order was the needles I needed to start on Spud and Chloe's Buga Baby Bunting. It is to be my big gift for Ben and Kim's baby shower this weekend. I really loved it from when I first saw it and thought it'd be a really cute present. I am doing it in the recommended yarn, which is the Spud and Chloe outer in bayou. Kim loves blue, and the  baby is a boy, so I felt it was appropriate. I managed to finish 7 inches of the bunting including the first set of decreases today. So, my chances of having it done by Saturday aren't too bad. Wish me luck!

A long weekend

I was on call this weekend, which always creates uncertainty on how things will go. I got called in Saturday morning and worked about 9 hours. I met up with Joe once I got off and had some dinner with his co-workers. We've been working on finishing the last season of NCIS so we can start watching the new one. It always amazes me how some shows can keep going and stay good while others fall apart after a few seasons (Heros, I'm looking at you).

Today was spent getting some stuff done around the house like bathing the poor dog. I feel if  bad every time I do it, but if I don't, her skin infection starts coming back. I also got to do a little shopping which was nice. Then there was Plants vs. Zombies. The endless survival is just kicking my butt. I have been working for 2 weeks to try and get the achievement for it and today I set a record of 11 flags. Joe did tell me a tip he read and I might have to try it out tomorrow.

I also got some knitting time in tonight. I am up to about 10.5 inches on the back now. Just 4.5 left before I start armhole shaping. The pattern is looking really pretty. I am not sure how the measurements are going to come out though. It seems a bit off from the pattern. Which is interesting since I am totally on gauge now. The good news is that if anything it might be a little baggy. Which I guess is better than too tight.

I've finished all but the last of the new seasons of Doctor Who now. I have been watching through old episodes. Tonight I started the serial "The Daleks" with William Hartnell as the Doctor. It's really pretty good considering it was filmed in the 60's. This series never ceases to amaze me. Forty years and they can still come up with good plots, actors and refreshing storytelling.

sew simple

So, since one of our surgeons is out of town, we had no cases today. I went into work for a little while, but left early to meet Joe for lunch before a meeting. After the meeting I popped over to Julep to use one of my several member manicures I have built up. I don't get my nails done very often as I ruin them quickly. Between the knitting and all the hand washing I do at work they just don't stand a chance. I went with a nice dark blue, and as I am typing this I can see one has already chipped. DAMN! I did find out for future reference (read con) that they now have a nail polish that UV cures that is supposed to last 14 days without chipping. This I have to try!

After a bit of pampering, I headed home where Joe and I watched NCIS LA. The new season seems to be not so bad. We are still trying to finish the previous season of regular NCIS while we are recording the newest season. Same for Bones. Oh and Sons of Anarchy.... yeah that show needs to be on cable. I love it so!

I decided tonight after getting some knitting in while watching T.V. that I would work on my sew simple kit from Knit Picks some more. I figure since I plan on ordering some more needles that having a place to store them could be nice. Tonight I managed to finish the cable pockets. It's slow going as I have only used this sewing machine a few times before and that has been over a year now. So, with some luck maybe I will get to finish up this weekend. The test knitting is still going well. I just need to be less busy so I can do more than 5 rows a night. I am starting to get a bit faster at it now since my gauge is getting more consistent.

My needle pouch in progress. Not the prettiest thing ever, but hopefully it will be functional.

Interesting Day

We had our monthly planning meeting for Sakura-Con this morning. It went pretty well. As it is still relatively early in the planning process, there wasn't a lot to discuss. There was however a humorous moment when I got an text message before the meeting and our secretary popped her head up and looked around and she said "who's tardis was that." As you all know I have become quite the Dr. Who geek, and so my current SMS sound is the tardis taking off/landing noise. Erin is an extreme Dr. Who geek, so I promptly had to go over and hook her up with the file. Thankfully since we both have droids this was an easy process. I am was able to hire some key staff today after the meeting, which was really nice and a big relief.

After the meeting we popped over to the Tap House for lunch. They had some new beers on one of which really surprised me. I usually drink Belgians and/or Belgian style beers and I never like dark beers. As we are regulars there the GM brought be out 2 samples of some of their new stuff. One was stone Cali-Belgique which is an IPA brewed with Belgian yeasts. It was Belgian in the front, IPA in the back, and pretty damn tasty. The other was Firestone Velvet Merkin Stout which is an oatmeal stout aged in bourbon barrels. It was super smooth and I really enjoyed it.

After we left the Tap House, we stepped outside and a group of either bikers or band guys walked by us. I noticed one of them had a cool Black Label Society patch on the back of his vest, then I noticed a second one did and then I noticed in the mix of these long haired dudes was one guy in slacks and a dress shirt totally dressed to the nines. Yeah, that was the manager, I was less than 2 feet away from Zakk Wylde. *squeal* No, I didn't stop them or make a scene or anything crazy. I just thought it was cool.

Meanwhile, I am over 8in on the back of my hoodie. 7 more inches to go and I can start the arm hole shaping. I think it is coming along pretty well. there have been some small mistakes, but I think they will be hard to notice when it is done. I am really looking forward to getting to wear something I made this winter.

The burdens of pet ownership and more knitting geekery

So, last night I went out with Joe and our friends Sabrina and Aaron after all of us got off work. We had dinner and drinks at the Hi Life. The food was great and the drinks were also good. Sabrina (I know it's weird) and I managed to discuss some con stuff and life was happy.

When I got home, I found the cat peeing in a stack of old bills I had meant to gather up and have securely shredded. So, I got to cleaning all of that up while Joe headed up to bed. He came back downstairs to inform me that the dog had an accident upstairs while we were out. So, I finished with the cat mess and went to take care of the dog poo. While I am upstairs scrubbing carpet, I hear Joe getting sick downstairs. I finish with the poo and head down to find that Allison (my dog) had vomited all over the floor and Joe had in sympathy done the same in the sink (thank you garbage disposal). So it was a rough night of cleaning up everyone's bodily functions. I hope everyone else finds this and humorous as I did.

Anyway, it's been a bit slow going on my test knitting project. I haven't had a lot of spare time in which to knit. I try and do at least 2 rows a night and a whole repeat if I can manage it. I am at  just under 7.5in, so about half way until I start the arm holes!

I also decided tonight to bust out my new iron and ironing board and start work on my sew simple needle case I picked up from Knit Picks. I got all the fabric ironed and cut to size tonight. Maybe tomorrow or this weekend I will start piecing it together. This way my interchangeable and circular needles will had a home other than random pouches in my Nantucket bag.

Anyway, I think that is it for tonight.

Test knitting continues as does Dr. Who

So, I finished all of the current Dr. Who series that Netflix has to offer as well as all of Torchwood (I am very sad they ended it). Now have started on some of the old episodes. I watched one of the William Hartnell (the first Doctor) serials last night, The Aztecs. It wasn't too bad, a bit old for me perhaps. Tonight I decided to watch one of the first Tom Baker (the fourth Doctor) serials, The Ark in Space. It was much better than one of the other Tom Baker serials I had seen and I really liked it. If you can get around the 1970's special effects, the acting and the story is really quite good. I am really happy Netflix has so many episodes available for instant viewing.

Along with my late night Dr. Who marathons, goes my knitting. After tonight I am half way through the third pattern repeat. That puts me at roughly 5in which is a third of the way through this part of the back. After some gauge checking I found as per normal I was knitting too tightly on the broken rib section. I managed to loosen it up some, but now I am going to have to keep a close eye on my gauge to keep from getting to large or to small again since I am not in my natural rhythm.

I would have been much farther along with the knitting, but I discovered that Xbox put Plants vs. Zombies (by Pop Cap Games) on their arcade. *sigh* When I first played this game I said "I love this, but it would be better if it was on a console." Apparently MS was listening. So I have been getting sucked into mass hours of horticulture to keep the zombies from eating my brains. The game is super fun, but seriously addictive. Who needs sleep anyway?

Lots of awesomeness and more test knitting

I got my Droid X today, and I am in love with it! I have been playing with it all day and trying to see what all I can do with it. There is so much that I am getting a little overwhelmed with it all. I took some pictures tonight with it to post on here.

First up is the project that I am test knitting. I am halfway through the second repeat of the trail cable (the larger one). I have about 4in knitted so far on the back piece. I need a total of 15in before I start the next part. While these photos were taken with my Droid X, some of them were also touched up in picnik.

I am really enjoying working with this yarn and pattern. It is knitting up really nicely. I just wish I had more time to work on it in a day. If I don't get called in this weekend I plan to spend a bit of time working on it.

I also wanted to show off the cutest thing I just picked up. Reading the new issue of Vogue Knitting (late fall) I read through an article called "Gauges Galore" featuring devices for checking the size of knitting needles. My gauge/ruler is aluminum and has gotten all bent up in my project bag, making the ruler not very accurate anymore. I fell in love with a gauge that had painted alpacas on it. I went and checked out the creator's etsy page karatstix.etsy.com and fell in love with her super cute products. I ordered a crafters' rule with sheep on it and it got here in a few days!

Blocking Day/ Test Knitting Part 2

So, I acheived my goal of finishing the 2in ribbing section of my test knitting pattern. Yay! Now I get to start on the interesting part which is all the intricate cables.

I also decided that today would be a good day to block all of my projects. It went pretty well. I am amazed how much the lace really changes in the blocking. It went from being a kinda pretty wad of string to being quite stunning.

It was hard to get the color to look right in the pictures. Here is the shawl on the blocking wires all stretched out.

These are of some of the details on the shawl:








I also blocked out a lace choker and my first sock.

Test Knitting part 1

So, I recently agreed to test knit a pattern for hoodie  as it goes to quite large sizes and I am a plus sized knitter. The designed was king enough to let me give is a try even though I haven't knit a full sized garment before and I am perhaps not the fastest knitter in the world. I have decided to dedicate most of my weekend to working on this though. I decided to make this with a relatively cheap yarn as I didn't want to choose a really expensive yarn and ruin it. Also, since I need 3000 yards of yarn to make this in my size, I can only afford so much. I went with knit picks telemark in royal heather. The color is really lovely and I think it'll soften up nicely once I wash it. I'll try and post pictures as I go along with this. I am currently almost done with the bottom ribbing. I would probably have finished it by now, but I found a an issue where it looked like I sat down my knitting and dropped a stitch while I was gone, so when I came back I started knitting in the wrong direction. So half of the project was on row 5 and the other was on row 3. Yeah... so I just frogged it and started over.

The good news is now that I am wearing night braces for my carpal tunnel my wrist isn't getting all sore and numb from marathon knitting. So, I can knit a lot longer now. Though I think my doctor might not be so happy with that statement. Ah well.