Twists of Fate

Monday, 12 October, 2009

I’m shipping up to…mittens.

Filed under: baseball, knitting-wip — moiraeknittoo @ 9:14 AM

Since I’m not going to be “Shipping Up to Boston“. Way to blow it in the ninth, Papelbon. And to the Angels? Lord.

For those who don’t speak Baseball, my beloved Red Sox totally tanked in the playoffs this year. I’m actually sort of surprised they made it to the playoffs, so I’m not sure why I’m so sad that they dropped the ball (sometimes literally) and didn’t make it any further. So now I’m rooting for the Angels, who beat the Sox, to kick some Skankee ass.

I had a feeling they weren’t going to get past yesterday’s game, and perhaps knowing I was going to need something cheerful to help console me, I bought the yarn for the Polska mittens (ravelry link) and got started on them yesterday while rooting for my team. The yarn is from Dancing Ewe Yarn & Tea in Ellensburg. I was out there on Saturday to deliver my Susie Alpaca wheel to it’s new owner Susan, who is entirely full of awesome and if I hadn’t been trying to expel my lungs via my throat (stupid cough), I would’ve hung out longer to chat and talk yarn and fiber with them. As it was, I barely made it home before crashing. Ellensburg isn’t that far, but I’m still getting over this ebil crud and driving out and back really wiped me out.

Um, yes. Rambling here. Anyway, sold wheel to a lovely person who will enjoy the hell out of it. Spent small portion of wheel funds on mitten yarn. Started mittens yesterday. Will continue to knit mittens as consolation for losing team and end of baseball season. It’s four months to Truck Day in Boston.

I wonder how many mittens I can knit between now and Truck Day? I’ll start with this pair (I’m past the colorwork band on the first one) and see how it goes. :)

Wednesday, 8 April, 2009

WIP Wednesday

Filed under: baseball, knitting-wip, music — moiraeknittoo @ 10:03 AM

Inaugural Edition.

It is Wednesday, right? With this mind numbingly boring job, I can’t be sure. I’m really tempted to actually work on my WIP at my desk, since officemate insists on keeping the door shut and the blinds closed. She’s not here, but everyone is used to that mode of action so I could probably do it.

Alas, I shall fart around on the intarwebs instead.

Anyway, back to the actual content, I have a crappy cell phone pic of a real live WIP!

Socks from Ann Budd’s book, at 8spi. I should probably add more info to my project page on ravelry. Maybe later. For now, I’m enjoying working with the yarn, and my favorite JKL DPNs. These needles are stainless steel, so they’re heavier than most, but they also have little to no copper or nickel on the surface, which makes my allergic-to-those-metals fingers happier too. My other needles of choice for DPN sock knitting (really, the only kind I’ve tried to date), are Inox. The teflon coating makes them a little stickier, but again, my fingers appreciate the relief from icky.

By the by, the CD you see poking out from under the ball of Seaweed Latte is called Hemi-Sync Lightfall. I really like the Hemi-Sync products, and have a number of them in a box somewhere, as well as on my computer-tower-that-is-not-plugged-in. I find the meditation and relaxation ones astonishingly effective, especially if I use them as I’m going to sleep. Sadly, I tend to drop off about halfway through, but I guess it’s a kind of endorsement for the relaxation part of the process. :D

Happy Wednesday everyone! Oh! And YAY GO RED SOX! Nice job Beckett. Pedroia? You da man. Jacoby & Lowell, keep lookin’ hot. *nods firmly*

Monday, 6 April, 2009

Boys of …deluge.

Filed under: baseball, embroidery, knitting-wip — moiraeknittoo @ 8:22 AM

Boston Red Sox opening day postponed due to anticipated deluge this afternoon. I’m so annoyed! How am I supposed to get the first of many delicious days of Jacoby and Lowell buttwatch perving in? I’m already behind (er, so to speak) for the season!

Le sigh.

I’m still pondering theme days for days I may post that are other than Friday. WIP Wednesday seems like a likely candidate. Other than that, I’m coming up blank. Perhaps it’s time for more coffee. Coffee makes everything better.

I can at least report that I got nearly all of the foot done on the first sock for my friend in Rhode Island. In between I worked on a Mirabilia cross stitch project, and started plotting which transfers to use for my first non-cross stitch embroidery project in years and years and years. I bought some teatowels, a book and some other assorted things from Sublime Stitching. Great product, ridiculous shipping and I probably won’t buy direct again. But they have teatowels that I haven’t seen while oot and aboot on the intarwebs and even in the craft stores. I don’t regret the purchase, and would recommend them as a resource, but jesus pete the shipping was nearly 25% of the total, and for a flat rate priority box? WAY overpriced.

So many crafts. So little time.

Sunday, 1 February, 2009

Something for me, finally.

Filed under: knitting, knitting-questions, knitting-wip, yarns — moiraeknittoo @ 8:26 PM

OK. I’m about three quarters of the way through my first mitten, which is full of awesome and I’m enjoying knitting with the lovely Elemental Affects Shetland yarn. It’s just lovely, the colors are a gentle pastel that makes me think of Sweettarts, so these are officially the Sweettart Mittens in my head. I’ll post a photo when I’m done with the first one, which may be as soon as tomorrow. I’m not 100% sure about that, given that my forearms are feeling pretty tight, but I’m taking frequent breaks and will be doing some self-massage on those muscles tonight.

But after that? I’m going to take a time out from doing stuff for other people. I’ve joined the Kauni Shawl KAL on ravelry, and am pondering my color choices. The pattern for the KAL is the beautiful, and I think you can find it here as well as on ravelry. The design name is “Revontuli”, and it’s beautiful.

I am doing my best to knit from stash, and I have more than enough of both EQ (rainbow) and EF (rust, blue, grey, green). I think I’d wear the EF shawl a lot at home, especially in the wintertime. But I’d like to actually wear something I knit out in public now and again, which has me leaning toward the EF, especially for work (should I ever be employed again). Those are a lot of the colors I wear to work, so I’m pretty much guaranteed to be wearing something that’ll go with that shawl.

I think the pattern looks simple and lovely enough to be a repeat knit, especially given the quantities of Kauni in my stash (oh hai VYT, it’s so easy to pick up a 150g ball and plop it in my basket as I doot around the store). But we’ll see.

Which color do you think I should use?

In other news, I met up with the lovely Knitting Kitty (of DragonFibers fame) today for breakfast. She was a lovely companion, as always, and I really enjoyed the two hours we chatted. I think we could’ve gone on for longer, but I had to get to my sister’s place and head out to find some pants for interviews.

I’m recovering from my now two week old cold. Slowly. I’m utterly exhausted after my little outings today, and the week promises to be a full one with my mother visiting from Colorado (she’s staying with my sister, thank. Gods.), and my brother returning to the area to look for work on the big ass container ships as his usual bridge crew gig. All I have to say is “viva la NyQuil!” Off to knit a bit more and head to bed early!

Thursday, 29 January, 2009

But I don’t wanna!

Filed under: knitting, knitting-wip — moiraeknittoo @ 11:41 PM

Long time no write. I got sick with some hideous awful very bad no good cold, went through a few boxes of tissues, got a very attractive chemical burn from the Vicks I put under my nose (I have a nice red ’stash there now, great look!) and have been doing a fab pendulum swing between NyQuil comas and utter insomnia. Good times!

Tonight, though, I feel like a four year old…I don’t want to go to bed! I’m enjoying working on my latest project too much! I started the Arctic Spring Mittens this evening out of the Elemental Affects Shetland fingering yarn I, um, rediscovered in my freezer. (I will occasionally cycle part of my stash through the freeze/thaw/freeze cycle, just for kicks, giggles and hopefully nasty critter prevention.)

I made a few changes (ravelry link) to the colors, because I didn’t have an exact match for either of the colorways pictured. I’m not sure how this’ll look knitted up, but am giving it a shot with what I have on hand. This helps with the (again, ravelry link) stash knit down effort, as well as giving me a lovely fun palette cleanser of a project to work on. They also happen to be the first mittens I’ll have knitted, so it’s a three-for-one! Or something.

I have a lot to do tomorrow, and so need to head to bed, but I would really rather keep on knitting. Y’all know what that’s like, right? I hate being responsible.

I’ll try to do actual WIP progress shots of this project, but can’t promise. I am uncertain of my color choices, but will wait until I’ve gotten past the colorwork cuff and into the mitten hand before I really make a decision.

If I ramble on about this much longer I’ll reach for the project again and start knitting, which would defeat the purpose of this post. So, I hit publish and head on to bed now.

Wednesday, 10 December, 2008

*blink*

Filed under: knitting-wip, random — moiraeknittoo @ 1:20 AM

On a whim last month, I called Ms. Brenda Dayne’s drop.io number, fairly late in the evening, and never in a million years though that she would include it in Episode 71. I saved the episode for one of those days where everything just feels like it’s gone to shit, and today was the day to listen. Right before I go to bed, because this way my dreams will be filled with all kinds of lovely knitting stuff, and maybe I’ll get a real night’s sleep for the first time in a while.

Whoa. Weeeird. Also, I need to possibly invest in a better Bluetooth headset if that’s how I come across to other people.

Anyway, I mentioned Bohus Stickening, which I took a class in this summer (because you know you want to work with a 50% angora yarn when it’s 100 degrees outside), and really enjoyed taking the class with Susanna Hansson. Please do visit her website if you’re interested, because there’s info on the Bohus Stickening exhibit next month at the American Swedish Institute.

How groovy.

To wrap up this post, I’ve spent a couple of nights now working on “Hermione’s Hat”, a free pattern found on ravelry that I’m doing for my older niece. This is a reconstruction of the hat Hermione is wearing in the upcoming Half Blood Prince film, the one that I wish they’d stop tormenting us with previews for when the release is over SEVEN FREAKIN’ MONTHS away. Anyway, this is proving a fast knit, as I didn’t work on it all that long tonight, but am already at Row 40 of the patterning. I hope to finish this tomorrow night, and get to work on a hat for my nephew (the recipient’s brother). Big kudos to Jackie L for recreating the hat and making the pattern available!

Time for a hot shower and bed. I’ve come to the conclusion that, “Oh. Right. That PMS thing has reared it’s giant fucking ugly head again and I am not fit to live with AT ALL!” so it’s a) a good thing I live alone and b) I still don’t own a gun. If only chemical regulation worked for my cycle without sending me completely round the bend…I’d love to be on birth control all the damn time so this wasn’t even a freakin’ issue. Alas, I am not, can’t without being even MORE emo (note the CAPSLOCK OF EMPHASIS has made an appearance again), so I’ll simply have to slog on through it. And get a freakin’ planner for next year and block out these days in huge swaths of red or neon orange or something so it’ll highlight the fact that I should plan ahead for massive mood swings, raging bitch behavior and crushing doom, gloom and despair all around.

Good times!

Tomor…today is another day, and I hope, when I wake, that it’s a better one.

Friday, 21 September, 2007

Take that iron and shove it up yer….

Filed under: brain_dump, knitting, knitting-wip, personal — moiraeknittoo @ 10:55 AM

So I “multitasked” for work this morning. There were no concalls scheduled (SHOCK!) and most of the boss-types were out doing a “day of caring” (um, how ’bout a little for your slave labor vendors, eh?), and all’s quiet on the Western front. So I took my Bluetooth & phone, and my ginormous bag of quarters, and headed to the laundrymat to do some sorely overdue laundry.

I can’t believe I’m actually writing this down, but I haven’t done laundry in nearly two months. Three things enable me to do this, really.
1. I bought a ridiculous amount of underwear at a clearance sale a while back.
2. I work at home.
3. I bought a ridiculous number of yoga pants from a clearance sale not too long ago.

But when you run out of undies, it’s time to head to the ‘mat.

Who knew it was so busy on a Friday morning at work? I did my wash (yay for triple loaders!), stuffed things into the dryer, fed an ungodly amount of quarters in and headed to the farmers market. Oh, I also finished most of the other Fetching mitt, and hope to finish off the set tomorrow sometime. /obligatory knitting content

Have any of you had ground cherries? They’re awesome! I gather they’re a cross between a strawberry and a tomatillo or something, but whatever their heritage? So good! They taste a little like kiwi strawberry to me. Or maybe the pink diamonds in a bowl of lucky charms. I got a pound, but maybe I should’ve gotten more. The’re just really a unique and nummy fruit-thing.

After a quick run through the farmers market (mmm pecan white chocolate scone for breakfast yum), I hit the regular store for a few other things, including peanuts for the pair of thieves robber barons Stellars Jays that are visiting my yard. They looooove the peanuts. I hope I’m not giving them something that will make them sick – they’re just unsalted roasted peanuts in the shell. They’re just so full of character…I like it when they visit my yard.

After getting everything but the pack of smokes I went in for, I went back to the ‘mat. Where most of my things were dry. I did my usual haphazard folding, which is mostly just to ensure that everything fits in the giant Ikea Laundry Bag of Potential Shoulder Dislocation, when one of the older ladies standing at the folding table began taking me to task. “Oh, dear. What will your young man say when you bring him home all these clothes that are so wrinkled?”

…uh, what?

“Honestly. You should take more pride in your wifely duties.”

…bzuh?

“It’s a shame that young women these days are so lacking in essential skills.”

And here is where I began to get pissed. While I don’t have a degree, because I put myself through school and petered out after my third year of forty hours a week at a job and 18 credit hours too, I’ve done pretty damn well for myself. I pay for my own housing, car, food, etc. I am teaching myself to cook, albeit super slowly. I taught myself to knit, spin, make candles, tried a batch of cold process soap once (let’s not talk about that again though m’kay?) and keep house (poorly). I make more money on my own than my parents ever have together or alone, and I’m including my mom’s second husband in this equation, and I’m an independant person who tries to contribute to society in what small ways I can.

Whether or not I can fold clothes well or iron shouldn’t fucking matter at this point.

I haven’t had coffee yet, so perhaps I can be forgiven for snarking back. “Actually, my girlfriend doesn’t care what the clothes look like.”

Shock! Horror! Picking up and moving of things away from someone who might transmit Teh Ghey!

Now, disclaimer – I don’t actually have a girlfriend. Or a boyfriend, a spouse, a lover, a partner, or an interested party. I should be so blessed to share my bed and/or my life with someone, but I’m a cranky wench before (well, and after, if I’m honest) coffee, and honestly. What bidness is it of yours, bitch?

*breathes deeply and exhales* I finished my stuffing of the bag, and sailed out of there with my head held high, and eyebrow set on maximum distain. I’m sure it was quite the discussion point for all the older folks in the ‘mat, but one lady caught my eye and winked at me when I left, which made me smile.

And then I came home and hung everything up and let the wrinkles take care of themselves.

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