My pretties, let me show them to you.

Once upon a time, I promised pictures. Well, I just uploaded a crapload of them to both my flickr and my multiply accounts. Multiply has finished objects (I'll be uploading more later tonight, too.) Flickr shows my works in progress as well as why it is so bloody hard to stay faithful to a single spinning project. Look at those options, and can you blame me?

Should have seen that one coming...

So, my project infidelity is not limited to knitting (or crochet).

I got some of the red/orange spun up and thought to myself "Damn is there a lot of freakin' roving in this colour. This will take forever. I want to try something else now!" On the upside, I've got four bobbins, so I can do this, to a certain degree.

Red/orange went back into the basket for later spinning and I grabbed the 60/40 mohair/wool blend that Colleen gave me for my birthday.

I swear, this stuff WANTS to be spun. It's incredibly addictive, despite the fact that mohair makes me a little itchy. Just the tender bits, like the bottom of my arm or face. Easily solved: I will not spin with my mouth. See? No issues! *grin*

I had to drag myself away from the wheel to have dinner, and I find I keep glancing over at it. Addicted? Me? Naaah.

Etsy has forced me to buy more fluff, as well. Two more fiery colourways (Wanna talk addiction? I'll soon be easy to spot, as I'll appear to be covered from head to toe in flaming knitwear.) and some obnoxious batts that I have a specific idea in mind for. We'll see how I do with it!

Busy busy; always busy.

This has been a crazy last couple of weeks.

Atlanta for a few days for work and socializin', followed by immediately scooting off to Blacksburg to visit Darcy (Daven's sister) and her hubby and her woofs. We spent a bunch of time knitting and spinning and generally fibre geeking in a most fantastic manner. It was lovely, and she gave me some great gifts, including a cria (that's baby alpaca for those not in the know) fleece that is still pretty darn raw. I'm bizarrely stoked about the concept of taking it from the raw format to a finished product.

As I had to get a niddy-noddy anyway, I went ahead and got a flick card and a new drive belt for my wheel. A snazzy rubbery one that means that the mother-of-all doesn't have to be waaaay over to keep the tension right. I know, I know, I lost the non-spinners. The part just below the top spinny bit that the yarn goes around, that allows tension adjustments. Just smile, nod and accept that it makes me happy, 'k? :)

Other crazy-ass purchase that arrived included my "A daily dose of fiber" tee from Ravelry (grey, not pink) and the ridiculously expensive shipping costs of a photo-copied lace pattern from Germany. Yes, it's in German. No, I can't read German. I'll figure it out.

Finished projects (at least in terms of knitting, not seaming up): the Baby Surprise Jacket and the garter stitch cardigan I'd gotten 3/4ths of the way done with on my drip to LA in May then put down. I suck at that. Both of these were in my "Next in line" basket, so I'm proud of myself for casting them off. The seaming will happen eventually.

I got a bit of sock knitting done (as evidenced here) in Tampa at Convergence 14. That was a fan-fucking-tastic time, and we had a blast hanging out with old friends (of mine) and making new ones (for us both). What, you don't go to goth conventions to knit? Slackers.

The knee is a bit better. I finally finished all of the purple yarn I'd been spinning for forever, ending up with 810y of 2 ply that I think flails about between lace weight and light sport weight. I'll do a WPI analysis and post it later. I'm just thrilled to be finished with that project! I immediately dove into the roving that I'd posted a while ago that I bought on etsy, and it's a totally different beastie from the colonial that the purple was. Much shorter staple, but less slippery. And with the fantastic new belt, I don't have to treadle like a hamster anymore. Yay!

I still have yet to find my camera cord, but a concerted effort will be made to rediscover it this weekend. I have pictures to share. Oh, yes; I do.

(Hey, HappyGoth? I believe you wanted to see Daven in the outfit he'd described on LJ? It's a crap photo, and I have better on my camera, but for the time being, here ya go.)

"This I can promise, Sammael, for every one of you that falls, two shall arise. "

Why am I quoting Hellboy? Well, it seems that for every project I finish (that one is even blocked! Ooo!), two are cast on.

The Seizure socks continue at a fairly good clip, and my friend Colleen commented yesterday when she saw them that I could make some really fantastic gloves out of a modified version of the pattern. I'll have to work on that. *evil plotting commences*

So, those of you who knit may have seen this most recent cast on project coming. I'll do the math for you:

1 obsession with knitting mitered squares + 1 pregnant sister = ...

If you guessed the Baby Surprise Jacket, you'd be right!

I recently picked up Elizabeth Zimmerman's "Knitting Workshop" because I kept seeing these damn things floating around the web and I figured that since everyone had raved about her mad skillz, I should totally check her out. I've been a little too distracted knitting to read the book yet (what I have read was good, albeit basic), but I'll bring it with me on the Atlanta trip for some learnin'.

As to why I cast on another project...well, I'm loving the socks so much that I want to extend the knit a little bit. They are really just joyous to work on and I'm going to be sad when I'm done with them. Also, this morning I sat down on my couch to work on the last couple of squares for the blanket and had A Moment. You know the type. Where you are convinced you've done a good job, but when you review, something has gone terribly awry? Yeah. So, I knit the last three squares along the bottom of the blanket instead of the side. Argh. Nrgh.

I was good and pulled out the misplaced squares (I may have experienced a bout of un-ladylike language during that portion) and wound the newly-free-again yarn into a ball. I did finish about half of one of the squares along the side before I was overwhelmed by the "Feh". Clearly, I needed some new-project joy to bring me out my funk, so I went and scouted through all of my sock yarn and found some superwash (I love my sister; I'd never burden her with a hand-wash baby gift. That's just cruel.) that was appropriately boy-ish in colour and cast on. This is also flying along, and again, I am enchanted. Aaah, better. I'll still return to the blanket and try to finish the bastardly thing this weekend, but my spirits were raised sufficiently to re-knit what was torn out.

More spinning will be happening, too. I've been a good little spinner, and I've kept track of only spinning 15 minutes at a go, so my already screwed up knees don't worsen. The one that got the shot continues to improve, and so long as I don't accidentally overdose on painkillers again (yesterday was a long day), I have hopes that I'll be able to avoid the surgery that the Ortho was talking about yesterday.

As I'm supposed to do house-stuff in addition to the really important stuff (knitting & spinning, obviously), I'd best get to it. Tum is full of tasty steak and fresh pineapple, projects are waiting for me; time to work!

One down, many to go...

Well, this one sort of counted as a WiP, as I'd cast something on with the yarn and torn it out at least half a dozen times before settling on this pattern. It is a gift, though, so no pics. Neener!

With that done, I had to cast on a new portable project. I was planning on knitting a pair of Jaywalkers since everyone but me has, but then I found these. Oh, yes. Mitered squares, which I'm just mad for currently. (The blanket is 5 blocks away from completion now. It'll be a big square of squares.)

The only thing that could make that pattern more obnoxious is that I'm using some of the yarn I dyed in May...the rainbow yarn.

I keep calling them my "seizure socks" as I'm pretty sure someone will have one from looking at these bastards. It is an incredibly fun knit, and I'm flying through the blocks.

So. Very. Horrifying.

I love obnoxious socks!

For I am weak...

And I missed my spinning wheel. I only did it a little bit...5 minutes with both feet before remembering one of the ladies from the spinning group I no longer go to saying that if you can work a double treadle with one foot, you're golden...So I did that for about 15-20 minutes. Just enough to get a fix. It was sooooo gooood to get back in front of the wheel. I'm still damn close to finishing all of this roving, and if I can do a few minutes a night, I'll eventually get done with it.

Ah, joy is indulging in what was denied to you. *grin*

Ya gotta rippit, rippit...

So, as I'm no longer using a cane, I've taken pictures of several of my WiPs. Not the ones I'm actively working on, of course, because that'd be normal. No, these are the ones that have been sitting in boxes, sending out waves of guilt. I found the scarf I made with my third handspun yarn with just one sad end waiting to be woven in, and the cute tank-style shirt that I've already posted photos of on multiply still wanting to have the ends woven in so it can leave the house.

I also found a few things for the frog pond, and I'm working on ripping them out. A sock that I crocheted (don't ask, it was a long time ago) that will never have a mate, and the first handspun hat I made that just didn't work.

I of course forgot to photograph the grey sweater. But, hey, I don't know where the connector for my camera is. I said I'd take pictures, not that I'd post them! ...Fineeeeeeeee, I'll work on that. Later.

There was also some organizational work done; I've put the projects that are all organized on a shelf in the craft room/office and segregated the finished projects from the finished-bits-but-not-finished-projects.

Now I've been on my feet too much, so I'm going to start actually working on some stuff. House still needs organizing, but I'm cheerier just from making these small changes.

And for the record? I <3 cortisone shots. Screw you, cane!

Small blessings

In the midst of this stupid knee thing (MRI on Tuesday, orthopedist appointment tomorrow), I've had to work from home, as sitting in chairs for very long isn't very much fun for me. Though they've found additional work for me to do remotely, in addition to my normal duties that I'm trying to keep up with via a Citrix connection, you know there's some knitting happening.

The mitered rug that turned into a blanket is slowly pluggin' along. It's 7 blocks long and currently 4 blocks wide...which translates to being about 6' long and 3.5' or so wide. It's still an entertaining knit, which is good, because it's a LONG knit. I'm planning on making a square, or go until I can't complete a long row of blocks. The upside is that I'm using up this boucle that I've been hauling around with me for years. I think I bought it a month or two after I moved back to the DC area, so that'd be nearly 4 years ago, and I continually failed to find a good use for it before. Also, this is *big* yarn that takes up a lot of stash space. Each skein is 11 oz and about a foot long by 5" tall, which, even when taking into account the squishability of yarn, is a lot of room. I initially only thought I had three, which would have made a tragically long and narrow blanket, but whilst digging around, I found three more of the blasted things, and now I should get a decent blankie out of it. I'm holding the three strands together to knit it on size 13 needles, thus why it's knitting up relatively quickly. It's definitely a stay-at-home project, with it's size.

Yesterday, as I was working on the other tasks that I was provided with, I was briefly amused to observe that I had four knitting projects within arm's length of me. My spinning wheel is right nearby too, but it taunts me. No knee = no treadling and no new yarn joy.

So, I view this as a prime opportunity to finish up some projects, as I'd discussed before. I can't be distracted by spinning or, you know, moving around, so knitting it is!

Again, photos of stuff will happen someday. I finished my fiery socks last week, and they're quite snazzy, in addition to that oft-mentioned but never photographed grey sweater.

Someday. When I'm not using a cane. *bitter about the cane*

Life requires constant adaptation

Thing the first: I seamed up the grey sweater last night at a 4th of July party. People were somewhere between amused, perplexed and encouraging. Why was I knitting at a party? Because I had to sit quietly, and I might as well be useful if I can't buzz around and be sociable.

Y'see, I've hurt my knee, and now I'm kind of gimpy. I don't know quite what I did, but it is making sort of liquidy popping noises when I go down stairs...or up stairs...and sometimes when I'm just walking. I'm going to give it a week to get better, and then I'll start the referal process required by HMO land to go to a specialist to check it out.

Why does this relate to fibre, aside from the fact I finally finished (ok, there are still ends to weave in...let's not be crazy here.) the sweater? *glances at her wheel* Yeaaaaah. None of that for me for a while. Which vexes me greatly, as I'm almost done with this spinning project and dammit, I just bought a nifty yarn measurererer and and...bah. *grumble*

Also, I got a leeettle enthusiastic with that rug I cast on... now it's going to be a blanket instead. It's just too warm and soft and nice to stand on, and as anyone who has stayed at my house can attest to, I somehow don't have sufficient warm blankets. I don't know how this happened; I think I gave too many away when I stopped crocheting.

At any rate...blanket instead of rug. Sweater almost done (someday there will be pictures). Lots of knitting, since spinning is out. Hopefully there won't be any other new curve balls thrown at me in the future. A girl can dream, can't I?

In which there are rambles.

So, all of our stuff is transferred from point A to point B. All of point A was painted and the keys mailed off (registered mail, since we never heard back from our former landlady).

My wheel has been set up in the living room, so I can be relatively near to the hubby, as well as have streaming music and spinny goodness. I've got the grey sweater out to finish off...but I've only done one little seam so far. I'm much better at knitting than I am at finishing, but I think a lot of people experience that.

Still no word on the job front, which means that I continue to be a stress-monkey. However, I should be heading down to visit Jennie and Laura and Linz, and since I'll be going on official business, I won't have to pay for the vast majority of it. Yay! I apparently keep a whole snotload of talented friends in one general area. I'll go play with string at them, and they can be awesome in my general direction.

I always feel somewhat lame for not being an artist, as that really was my intent when I was younger. All of those classes and now I'm a quasi-techie managerial type. Enh. However, many years ago I figured out that I'm a pretty handy crafter, but not so good on the artist part. I tend to be better with shaping with my hands (yes, I enjoyed sculpture) and string seems to be what I get along best with. Channelled creativity (ie. patterns) is good for me; the creation from new and novel ideas... not so much. I can tweak the hell out of patterns if so inspired, but I tend to be better at adapting other people's ideas than coming up with my own, which leads to a general sense of ripping people off if you're drawing what amounts to a recreation of their work. This is encouraged with knitting; not as much with drawing.

Er, I've gotten distracted somewhere. And now, your turn.

Look, shiny thing! *scampers off to lift heavy things*