Procrastination pays off yet once again

Ah...just put the quilt together. If I get it machine "quilted" tonight, great. If not, I'll tack it on the plane tomorrow. This is a Christmas present for my husband's sister and her family- I had to work this past week (and stayed in Chicago) so I got a little extra wiggle room to procrastinate. I bought the panel and half yards of coordinating fabric, and two charm packs for the patchwork.


This is a very quick cheater quilt- using the panel as the center cut down on the patchwork, and instead of binding it I sewed three sides together and tucked the batting in before turning it right side out. There's a little extra on the backing- AmandaJean does this much better than I, but I shamelessly copy her. :)


Faced with the prospect of racing to the fabric store at 8:30p tonight, I was very happy to discover I _did_ have some backing tucked away. It's a white on cream floral print so I put it wrong side out, making it (hopefully) less obvious that I totally forgot about the backing until I needed it. Now off to pack!

Blooming

I read a review of Peace Fleece yarn that said it blooms after washing because the mohair fluffs up. Well, there are mittens in bloom on my blocking board. And blocking seems to have helped those wonky tips even out!

all but the thumbs and a little sewing

Peace Fleece wool yarn, pattern Staghorn mittens from Ravelry.

Can't remember the name technique for machine piecing quilts- nice!

FO

Hat for my FIL. Am making good progress on the second mitten. Haven't started SIL's quilt, but this is doable (right?!)...I don't fly out until Wednesday morning.

Mika

I blame this on the harlot, er, the Harlot. I love this song. Almost as much as I love diet coke. ;)

BigGirl (You Are Beautiful)

On the needles

Do you remember me raving about vintage needles? I think I like vintage aluminum needles, but not so much the polymer/plastic kind. There's nothing like taking knitting with you to entertain yourself on a car ride only to have your needle snap!


The Peuransarvi/ Staghorn mittens are coming along nicely. The cables are easier than I thought, and very entertaining. Rather than drive to work and risk another 2.5 hour trip home in tomorrow's forecasted snow/ice storm, I'll be taking the bus and two trains. At least this way I can sit and knit for a couple of hours instead of sitting in my car having to pay attention!

snow!

Ironic that I should see this truck going by when I went to take a picture- we have the hardest time getting UPS to actually deliver packages to us here. It took me 2.5 hours to get home from work tonight, most of it in first or second gear.


Oh the joy of not having to drive 60 miles outside the city to clinical tomorrow (or ever again)! Let it snow...I have knitting and my sweetie.

Life after grad school

The amaryllis is going wild...five blossoms instead of the usual four!


I'm not bored. It turns out that you can crank out a lot of knitting if you don't have to go to work or school...or today, I found that I can do a lot of shopping. :) My class adopted a family for the holiday season. Since I grew up not celebrating Christmas with presents, it was a little weird for me. I was stressing about choosing clothes for "my" kid- what if he thought they were dorky? What if he, like, totally hated the pants I picked out? I had to remind myself that I'm not going to meet this kid so if he hates my taste in clothes, I'll never know. Anyway- the knitting (is it just me or does the sweater body look surprisingly long and thin?):


And my sweetie got a present today- a mini-spirograph. There have been some verrrrry sad tales around here lately about how "the girls" hogged the spirograph in his afterschool program (yeah, that would be first grade, circa 1981, obviously the scars are barely healed) and my little sweetie didn't get to play with it. I have to say, it's totally gratifying to give the dude a present, though. He loved his new personal spirograph.

Knitting goodness...spreading the joy (and an unknown crafting object)

I went through a little ebay loving a while ago. Late nights + insomnia + stress + a little depressed + online shopping = knitting needles and yarn! My sweetie was a bit alarmed when he realized the volume of things coming in the mail, but I'm better now. And I got some killer vintage needles.


Tuesday night is my final exam, finally, for real- although I said that five years ago when I finished my master's, so it's never over until it's over (this is a post-master's certificate program, and I doubt I'm going back for a doctorate but I might go crazy...we'll see). I'm giving my classmates (a class of six) the joy of knitting as a parting gift. The needles are paired and taped together- next to find some yarn to go with them. *giggle* I think I have some yarn around.


The jacquard self-patterning sweater is soaring along. Perfect thing to do with my hands while studying "Fever in a child aged greater than 3 months but less than 5 years", et cetera.


In one of the bundles of needles, I also received this


described as "something that was in with the knitting bags". Anyone know what it is? I'm kind of guessing lace but it seems too sturdy for that...

New obsession

I have some other stuff to post- knitting from the trip to Maine, new yarn, et cetera. But first, my new obsession.


This was bought on a whim in WalMart where I was trying to find a book to read passing time before class. No luck with the book but I decided to give the Jacquards a try. It's still cheap acrylic but it's really really cute! I am making a size 6 mo and expect I'll get a full sweater out of one ball. If not, I have another in the same dyelot and the leftovers would make some cute easy hats.

85% completed baby sweater

In the home stretch now...finishing the second sleeve. Due to some imaginative increases on the first sleeve (and lack of memory as to just what those were), I now think of this as a learning sweater. The child will be able to learn the difference between left and right by looking at his arms!


This weekend I studied. That is to say, I knit and read books. The Special Olympics scarf is due by the beginning of January, so I'm trying to put some time into it. I really hate knitting with Red Heart but it will soften up after washing so hopefully won't scratch the athlete it's destined for. I have some great afghans made of Red Heart- 25+ years old and going strong.


And some yarn love. The green Malabrigo is to make a neck cowl to match my new ski jacket. :) When the package came I said "oh look, CKG's yarn came!" My sweetie, somewhat alert to how my mind works asked "but why did her yarn come to our house?" Um, there were a few skeins in there for me, too. Oops.


The gray variegated is destined for socks. I think.

Lazy weekend

We got a new mattress from Costco last week. It's pretty nice. In fact, I usually can't sleep more than 8 or 9 hours without waking up because my back is sore. Saturday I slept until 12:18pm- when my sweetie woke me up to ask "When are you meeting CKG for your pedicures?" Yeah, at 12:30p. Naturally I was a little late, got lost, was later- but the pedicures were great and we sat together and knit for about two hours.


It was fun and relaxing. Then we met the spouses and had delicious mexican food. Saturday evening my sweetie and I and our friend N went to a good friend's home and had delicious homemade pasta and homemade cheese and a strata that was out of this world...finished the evening around the fireplace. It was lovely, really. I love having friends who like to cook. It opens my world. I may have to try making some pasta here. I think we have a pasta maker (my sweetie's pretty good for that). We have a rice cooker!


I wanted one of these for a long time. It turns out I married into one. :) And my sister-in-law gave us a delicious chocolate bar that mysteriously came unwrapped today.


And there is jambalaya cooking.


And in a feat of astonishing greatness, I am almost finished my paper that is due Tuesday. Oh, BLISS! I'm taking the rest of the evening off (all 15 minutes before bedtime).

Mmmmm Lake Champlain chocolate- I recommend it!

Scary scary and happy things

I've just signed up to do something really cool and really scary. At the end of February, I will be going to Belize for two weeks as part of my graduate school's international nursing course. My group will focus on primary care, especially women and children. *gulp* This is super scary for me but I also think it will be a great experience. One of my friends from my current class schedule will be on the trip also, and I'm glad of her!


So what to sooth my nerves? Yarn, of course. This is chunky Malabrigo in pearl ten colorway. I suspect the preceptor gift scarf will go more quickly in this chunky weight.

One of those nights

It's rainy, my car made a funny noise on the way home from class (possibly a noise from the car next to me on I 290 but it was nervous making!), it's late, and my sweetie is bringing me home a gift of...Compound W because I have a plantar's wart (yeah, I sometimes don't bring socks to walk through airport security in the summer...oops). On the plus side, my ebay purchase of Addi turbo needles came


in a cool case that works great as a knitting bag to tuck in my work bag


and the preceptor scarf is looking lovely.


and I am really happy to be married to the best sweetie ever. :) *gush gush*

Blocking

Once again the ironing board cover comes in handy- I never used it for blocking before but it works perfectly!


The mini sweater needs to be sewn together and then I plan to embroider a snowflake on the front, make a wire "clothes hanger" for it, and send it as a gift ornament. I'm not quite sure where the coaster is going- but since I'm using a block of post-it notes as a coaster at the computer, it seems I have a home for it here.


And the new malabrigo project is with worsted weight- using the one stitch scarf pattern- making a scarf for my clinical preceptor. I love how soft this yarn is, and it shows off the stitch really well. It would look great in cables but I need to finish it in two weeks so I'm going with mindless knitting.

Finished (except blocking)

Malabrigo yarn, chunky weight, color apricot, two skeins. I love it! It's a gift for a friend who has been having a tough time lately. She's really sweet and has been admiring it as I knit, so I'm happy it's going to her!

Knitting time on Tuesday

Tomorrow I plan to knit in line waiting for the polls to open (I have to be on the road by 7:30a so I can get to work- the plan is to be at the polls at 6:30a so I can get in & out quickly).

Can't wait to hear everyone's voting stories. And kudos to those smart enough to vote early! :)

update 11/4/08: 45 minutes start-to-finish, average length line going in but by the time I left the lines were to the door- and on the way to work I passed other polling places where people were lined up on the sidewalk!

Updates on projects

Last week I was in Atlanta three days for a conference. Conference=knitting time! There were lots of people around me knitting, it was actually pretty cool. I completed half the malibrigo chunky apricot scarf, and wished I'd brought the other ball of yarn with me to finish it.


I started, frogged, started, frogged, started and completed this much of a sock yarn scarf (fishtail pattern) using "Wait wait don't tell me" colorway.


And yesterday my size 5 circular 16" needle came, so I switched the sleeve of the baby sweater over and it's going a lot faster on the circular. Somehow using 14" straights was sort of awkward.


Now I'm off to write a paper!

Rippit rippit

I've gone a 180 degree turn. From the "process knitter" who never ripped anything to the frogger. Today I had about nine inches done on the Malabrigo scarf when I decided it was too wide (and95 meters x2 skeins isn't a long scarf anyway), so I frogged it all and started over.


I like the 15 stitch width scarf better. And it might be as long as...almost two meters?! :)


In other happy news, I have a new fall/winter favorite skirt- my sale find Garnet Hill stretch denim skirt, and my beloved clogs are back in service for the season!

Sleepless nights

I should have expected this one...I was wiped out and slept for three hours this afternoon. Now I'm weirdly wide awake. And start work in 7 hours. Whatever. I found a scarf pattern for my Malabrigo Chunky!


This yarn is a dream to work with, and size 11 needles with chunky yarn is a lot more gratifying than working on the baby sweater right now. I think it helps my brain to be able to change up projects. The Malabrigo scarf pattern is by Crystal Palace, "Faggot stitch scarf". It's lovely, and only one row to remember! I am going to a conference at the end of this week and plan to bring a few projects with me. Updates next weekend.

I've also been playing with my Ravelry page and adding many projects to my queue to make. This is quite fun, this knitting thing!

Fabric love

I'm making a quilt for my sister-in-law and her family for the holidays (I'm thinking about it a lot and will burst into action once school is done...I hope). Recently I got excited about the thought of having time to sew in the not-so-distant future, and I did a little internet shopping.


The only real problem I have (besides the nasty gold accents on the fabric) with ebay is my constant expectation that someone will outbid me. I was wrong, but look what I bought because of it!


The rose print fabrics will be quilt tops, the charm squares will be...something.


And the squirrels I may have to save for myself.