Out With The Old? In With The New?

First, Out With The Old. Here's a recap of last year:

What I Knitted:

ToolMan’s Driving Cap
Barbie Clothes
Queen Anne’s Lace Shawl
Dryer Balls
White Mohair Cowl
LaLa’s Simple Shawl in Sea Wool
Storm Cloud shawlette
Hot water bottle cozy from handspun
LaLa’s Simple Shawl in StitchJones (gifted)
Readers Wrap in Twinkletoes (may be frogged)
Baby Surprise Jacket for trtlbby
Clapotis in BMFA handspun
Socks for me
Bamboo & Ewe socks for ToolMan
Wool socks for ToolMan
Transitions short sleeve cardigan for me
Sample sock for StitchJones
LaLa’s Simple Shawl in Glam Sock Yarn
Swallowtail for me
Yak Hat for ToolMan
Fingerless Mitt (6 pair) for coworkers
Hat for Nic
Scarves (4) for coworkers
Coffee Cup Cozies (12 or 13, I lost count) for coworkers
Felted Bowl for Jane
Elf Hat
Fulled Bags (gifted)


What I Spun:

Lots and lots of yarn in lots and lots of different fibers


New Things I Learned:

Went to a sheep shearing and processed the fleece
Drumcarded batts for the first time
Went to alpaca shearing
Processed and spun the exploded clown fiber


Other Stuff I Did:

Unraveling Sweaters Tutorial
Dryer Balls Tutorial
World Wide Knit In Public Day
World Wide Spin In Public Day
Demonstrated at Multnomah Days
Assisted at Sock Summit


Of course, there's the other stuff that happened last year: Although there were some really great things that happened last year, like Sock Summit, the basket of hearts from Knit Sibs, there were also the really not-so-great things that happened last year. Like ToolMan's heart attack and colon cancer, got a new job in The Big Company and changed offices, Andy Rooney became diabetic, my brothers faced health issues, and I continued battling sarcoidosis. I wasn't sad to see the end of 2009. As far as I'm concerned, it went on way too long.


Now, In With the New. Here's what I've got planned, so far:

Pattern Writing:

There are a couple patterns rolling around in my head that I'd like to get published this year. I signed a contract for one to be in a book, so one of them will be released into the world this year. As for the others, we shall see what develops.


Knitting:

I've cast on a new project: a pair of socks for myself in Bamboo and Ewe. I loved the way it felt when I knitted that pair for ToolMan and decided to make myself a fancy pair in red to wear with my black mary janes. I must have been suffering from temporary insanity because I picked a pattern with . . . are you ready? A 72 row repeat. That's right, A SEVENTY-TWO ROW REPEAT. I started it three times before I quit arsing it up. I thought for a moment, and only a short moment, about knitting them the way I usually do: two at once on separate sets of dpns. Except that in this pattern, the socks are MIRROR IMAGES of each other. So you knit one sock reading the chart from left to right and the other from right to left. Even thinking about doing them at the same time seemed like a big ole' piece of crazy pie that would surely come back to bite me in the ass. So, one at a time it is. Gotta say though, I'm almost to the heel on the first one and it is seriously beautiful.


Spinning:

I'd like to get through a lot of the stash. There are some really luxurious fibers in there that I've been holding onto until I felt I was good enough to spin them. I think I'm ready now.


Blogging:

I've thought about giving up the blog. Not shutting it down or anything, just not being as regular about posting as I have been in the past. Oftentimes it seems that this blog is a lot of self-centered navel-gazing for me. I mean, really, I don't get all that many comments, although when I do, they're great. Usually, when I get to thinking like that, I get some great comment like the last one from Anonymous. Or my Google Analytics Report comes in and shows a bunch of hits from all over the world. Estonia? Really? Do you know how flattered I am that an Estonian knitter (you are a knitter, right?) come to read this? And Iceland? And China? And Japan? And New Zealand? And Brazil? So then I decide that I'll keep it up for awhile more. But really, see that button on the side bar that says "Would it kill you to comment?" I meant that.

My Gall Bladder:

OK, so this is new to the blog but it really should be up there in the Out With The Old. For at least 3 or 4 years, I've had near constant heartburn and reflux. About 3 months ago, nearly everything I ate made me nauseated. We finally figured out it's the dang gall bladder. So, next Thursday morning, out it comes. We'll have to see how that 72-row repeat sock gets along on pain killers.

It just wasn't in the Cards

to win the Super Bowl, that is. I really feel bad for the Cardinals; nobody thought they'd make it that far, they played their hearts out, and then to loose the game in the last two minutes of the game must be crushing to their morale.

I finished the last of the pattern rows on the Queen Anne's Lace Shawl during Westside Wednesday. As I suspected, by the time I finished that last row, there wasn't enough of the Paton's Beehive Baby for the cast off. I had looked for another skein, but all I could find was Beehive Sport, which is just slightly heavier than the Beehive Baby. I later discovered that Beehive Baby was discontinued in 2005; no wonder I couldn't find any! Thankfully, I was using white, so I didn't have to worry about color matching. I did a Russian join at the end of the last row and worked the castoff with Beehive Sport and a crochet hook. It took a hour and 45 to cast this baby off, so I had to spread it over Thursday night and Friday night. Of course, Inspector 37 came over to check out the work as soon as it was off the needles.



Apparently, it passed muster and was deemed "nap worthy". As always, click the pic to embiggen.



I also scratched my leg pretty badly on Thursday. Actually, I wish I had a really good story to go with this but I don't. I scratched it with my own nails while trying to take off my socks.



Pay no attention to the hairy leg; shaving is too big a pain in the patootey unless I'm wearing skirts and it hasn't been warm enough for me to wear them. How I managed to scratch it horizontally, I'm not quite sure. And thankfully, they were store-bought socks, as there was bleeding. I've been putting antibiotic cream on it in the morning and cortisone on it at night so it's looking better now; unfortunately the sarcoidois really slows healing so I'll have to keep an eye on it for awhile.

On Saturday, I gave the Queen Anne's Lace a good long soak while we went to breakfast and Costco. ToolMan and I used to go to breakfast every weekend, but since my hours have been cut back to 32/week, we've been tightening our belts. Like everybody else, we're cutting out what few luxuries we have, tightening our belts, and bracing for the worst financially.

When we returned from the Costco run, I moved the coffee table and pinned Queen Anne's Lace to the carpet; it was too big to fit on my blocking board or the guest bed. I didn't stretch it as tightly as I could have; my knees just couldn't take all that crawling on the floor.



After crawling around on the floor putting in all those pins and adjusting the points, I needed to just lay there and admire my handiwork. ToolMan helped out by bringing the camera and getting a few shots. I didn't measure the width but it's probably a good 5 feet across; the pattern says it should be 6 to 7 feet, depending on how much it's stretched for blocking.



Andy Rooney was extremely interested in what I was doing so we had to use the coffee table and sofa cushions to blockade him from walking across it while it dried. Since he's lost his sight, he's become very clingy to me when I'm home. He follows me around and is constantly under my feet or in my lap. He's not that way with ToolMan; he'll often leave the room and go to bed for several hours. But if I'm home, he wants to know where I am and what I'm doing every second.

By Sunday morning, it was dry so I could unpin it. ToolMan obliged by taking pictures again. I'm pretty happy with the way this came out; I'd like it better if I'd really stretched it for blocking but I can always do that later. I'm glad I used the heavier yarn for the castoff; it makes blocking much easier.

And yes, those are my pajamas. I had a rough week and decided to participate in Super International Pajama Day.

This will be the perfect shawl for spring; it'll be nice to carry along for the cool mornings when it gets to warm for a coat, and it'll look great with my dresses for summer. Maybe if I wear this, no one will notice my hairy legs.

Gettin' a groove on . . . .

I finally feel like I'm getting back in the groove. I started feeling a little run down early in December; I'm not sure if it was starting the new job or the holidays or what, but by Christmas I was really starting to feel worn out and by the end of the year, I knew a sarcoidois flare was coming on. After going on that little fiber jaunt with Duffy, I knew a flare was definitely underway. I tried the rest of the week to just struggle through it, but by last Friday, it was just too much so I wound up in the ER getting a prescription for prednisone. By Sunday, I was feeling back to my old self and finally today, I think I've got my groove back on.

Even though I have the yarn for a test knit job and I'm anxious to get started on it, I knew I just wasn't up to it until the steroids kicked in. So, I've been knitting these on the train:

I know, I know, I did a whole bunch of these not too long ago, but those were all given away and when I reached in the drawer last week to get a dish rag, every single one had a hole in it! So, back to the Ballband Warshrag pattern and cotton yarn. And they make for very good commute knitting.

Remember that fiber from Butternut Woolens that I was spinning? I took Kathleen's advice and plied it into two 2-ply yarns, starting with the same end, and am I glad I did. Just look:

Since my spinning wheel doesn't have a large bobbin and flyer for plying, I couldn't ply this on the wheel; I had to do it using my drop spindle. The advantage was that I could really control the twist doing it that way, but I was worn out after standing almost 5 hours to get all this plied!

I'm REALLY happy with the way this came out; there are long stretches of the same color ply with sections between with 2 colors of ply. I'm not sure what I'm going to knit with this; it's 80% merino, 20% silk so whatever I do with it will be soft and comfy. I have a little over 440 yards, so I'm thinking maybe a mobius or small shawl that I can wear in the office. With all the colors, it will go with just about everything I wear. I'll have to contemplate the dilemma while I'm working on the test knit.