Scarftacular!

I've blocked the clapotis Gloria made me! It's ready to wear, now if I only had somewhere to go.
So she can see just how long it is now, here's a picture of me holding it up, it's a self portrait so I couldn't get my whole self in the picture but trust me the other end is touching the floor!
I'm jumping on the Lime and Violet bandwagon and joining their finishalongapalooza (Ravelry link). I don't think it's anything official with prizes and stuff, it's just a chance to finish all your UFOs in 2008. I posted my UFOs but I doubt I'll post again, just cause I rarely keep up with message boards. But I have jumped head first into this challenge and have finished my longest standing UFO, the Irish hiking scarf!
It needs to be blocked, but I need to iron some shirts and pants before I can pin this out on the ironing board.

Since I still have this much yarn left:
I might make a Koolhaas hat from it. We'll see though, I already have a matching calorimetry that Val made me last Christmas, but I really want to use up the rest of this yarn and it's far too scratchy to make gloves out of.

Up next:
Decide something to do with the rest of the hiking scarf yarn and knit it
Finish one of the sleeves for my sweetie's sweater (I'm keeping my goals manageable!)

Some new things for the house

My sweetie and I had a long weekend at home since he has both New Years Eve and New Years Day off. We're sick so that put a big damper on the weekend. We did make it out to an Amish furniture store where we got a dresser and a cedar chest. The dresser is being delivered later this week, but we took the chest with us.I need to make a pad to put on top of it.
We also got a new rug for our den:
It's about twice the size of the old one and looks great. We can lay on the floor now and the dogs can play without sliding all over the place. We now need to replace the chaise lounge (that my sweetie and Cooper are on) with a leather sofa. That will have to wait until our bathroom remodel is done!

Since we were sick, I allowed myself a day and a half of vegging on the couch, watching a Jon and Kate Plus 8 marathon, and knitting. The result:
Pattern: Baby Bolero from One Skein
Yarn: Blue Sky Dyed Cotton
Needles: US 8 and 9
Notes: Very quick knit. The pattern was pretty easy to understand except for the back of the neck area that I think I messed up a little. You're supposed to knit the back shoulders separately and put the neck on a holder. Then you bind off all stitches. I think maybe they should have been bound off separately, but I bound them all off with one piece of yarn and there are two little holes by the back of the neck (in the top right and left of the picture below). It doesn't look bad, I think I just interpreted the instructions wrong.
I think that the design in the back is supposed to look like a heart. It so doesn't. Whatever, it's still cute.

Working on the baby bolero pushed the jaywalkers I was working on to the side for a bit, but I'll be working on it again tonight. This is from the yarn that Val dyed for me for Christmas.
I'm getting about a row out of each color repeat.
It's looking great so far. I think just a blue and purple single row repeat would look a little dizzying, but the white really helps to break the pattern up a little.

I'm also S L O W L Y adding rows to my Irish hiking scarf. I'd say it's about halfway done now. I just want to get the damn thing finished! I'm still enjoying working on it, but I want to use it already!!

The perfect husband. . .

At least for a quilter! Yesterday my sweetie was trying to open something and he couldn't find scissors. I told him there was a pair on the coffee table with me knitting. And he asked in his most sheepish voice (no pun intended), "I can use these?" Just what every quilter wants to hear!!!

My sweetie and I are sick, which means lots of knitting time when I'm not cleaning. I should have the cutest FO EVER in a few days!

AHHHH!!!

I think I've been sucked into an alternate universe where everything is exactly the same except that ravelry and bloglines don't exist!!!!! It's horrible! Both sites are not responding and I finally have a second to sit in front of the computer. I had a very fussy day. It was a good day until my sweetie reminded me we have to go to a wedding next week and we have yet to set up dog boarding (we've never boarded our dogs and I'm very nervous about this!), plane tickets, hotel, car rental, buying a present, or buying a dress! But the good part of the day is that we got an Amish made dresser for the bedroom and it should be delivered next week. I'll be able to get my clothes off the floor and the dogs won't be able to bury anymore bones in my piles of clothes! THe major find for the day was a cedar chest for a whopping $75!! I'll take pictures later, I'm not in the mood to take pictures right now. Anyway, with very little to do right now due to the ravelry/bloglines dilemma, I'm going to knit. I could get the tickets settled for this weekend, but I'm far too fussy!!

Christmas knitting revealed

I hope everyone had a fantastic holiday, I sure did! I can finally post pictures of what I've been knitting the past few months!!! First off is the socks. A pair of Monkey socks for Gloria:
Pattern: Monkey socks
Yarn: Wildfoote, color ragtime
Needles: US 1, 2.5mm
Notes:I should have used a larger needle. I got gauge with the 1 but the socks were a little tight to get over the heel, but they fit great when they are on. They were a fun knit and the pattern was pretty easy. I did change to a slip stitch heel.

Next is the embossed leaves socks for Valerie:Pattern: Embossed leaves from Favorite Socks
Yarn: Lotus yarns, color Dig
Needles: US 2, 2.75mm
Notes: I was very sad to see these go! This is by far my favorite pair of socks I've ever knit. I didn't make any changes to the pattern. The yarn was the softest sock yarn I've knit with. It's such amazing yarn and I can't wait to get more of it!!!!

I have better pictures of both of these socks on the sock blockers but they are on my computer at home so I'll post them on the next post.

A pair of convertible gloves for Mom:
Pattern: Pop-up Paws
Yarn: Harrisville Designs New England Highland wool, color periwinkle
Needles: US 4 and 6 (I think)
Size: the second smallest
This was a pretty quick knit. Mom picked out the yarn and pattern. They are for when she takes her little pup to agility in the cold.

Now onto the gifts!!!

I got this from Gloria:
It's a clapotis in Brooks Farm yarn that she secretly got when we were at Rhinebeck. It's ridiculously soft and the colors are just perfect! It will go great with my gray pea coat. It's knit very well too, you'd never know she used to just knit occasionally!!!

From Valerie I got this:
And this:
First up a skein of hand painted sock yarn. It was immediately wound into a ball and a swatch was knit. It's a future pair of Jaywalkers! From the swatch it looks like the color will change just about every row. I can't wait to cast this on and will as soon as I get back to Ohio and my needles!!! The picture does not do this yarn justice, it's the only one of the 6 or so shots I took that actually shows the color correctly. It's varying shades of royal blue and purple with small bit of white. Then there's a set of hand made stitch markers. They're blue and green and will be put to good use on my next projects that uses needles larger than a US2!

Happy Solstice to all and to all a good knit!!

I'm off to NY for a long holiday weekend! I'm looking forward to my presents and some relaxing knitting time (HA!, nothing is relaxing at my parents' house during a holiday!) Stay tuned for podcast #6 that will we hopefully get out while I'm home and stay tuned for pictures of the items I knitted for Christmas.

Happy winter solstice!!!

Christmas knitting is done!!!!!!!

I actually finished all the projects I set out to do with one exception. I was going to make little sock ornaments to put on all the cocoa jars. They weren't as much fun as I had hoped so I probably won't make them, but we'll see I still have a little time left.

Now for my knitting new years resolutions:
1. I will finish my sweetie's sweater in 2008
2. I will not buy yarn unless I get pregnant (then I have to buy lots of yarn), I go to the Knitter's Connection or Rhinebeck, or when I'm traveling (which I don't plan on doing much of in the coming year).
3. I will finish super secret project #2 - this is a biggie!!!

Not many resolutions, but they're big ones!!

My big personal resolution is to lose weight. I've gained back almost all of the weight I had lost before and I hate it, so I'm going to lose weight again. It's tough with being home all the time, we'll just have to make some big changes. I'm thinking of contributing to the Flickr 365 days project where you take a picture of yourself every day for a year (actually 366 this year!) and then maybe if I lose weight it will be pretty cool to see it over the year. We'll see. I'd probably have to pay for flickr then since it would be a whole lot of pictures. I'll think it over during the holidays and if I start it will probably be on Jan 1st.

4 years!

Today me and my sweetie are celebrating our 4th anniversary!! We're going out to dinner at the only 4 star dining in Knox county! We used to have "our" restaurant in Virginia where we went for all special occasions. It will be weird going anywhere else, but maybe we'll find a new "our" restaurant.

Ok, onto the crafting content. I haven't had all that much knitting time lately. Today will be a knitting day. Organizing the house can wait a few days for me to finish up Christmas presents. I got a few things made the other day. Including some homemade cocoa mixes that will go to the Aunts, Uncles, and Grandparents. Don't they just look scrumptious!!!
I'm also working on more calorimetries. I finished my second one. This one is the slightly narrower than the last one and I think I finally have the perfect pattern (at least with this one type of yarn).
I have one more to make and then I also want to make little ornaments to attach to the cocoa mixes. I think that I have a cute sock and mitten ornament pattern in one of my pattern books. And I still need to finish one of my sister's presents. It's about 75% done and if I work on only that all day today I may be able to finish it. I know that's not going to happen though. It's supposed to be 40 degrees today and it's not supposed to rain so I really need to get the dogs out for a nice long walk.

The more time I spend blogging, the less time I'm knitting, so Bye!

I missed Knitty!

I can't believe it! I missed the new Knitty!!!! Sharon had mentioned it on her podcast, She-Knits, so I went to check and yep, I missed the announcement of the winter issue. Not like I'm going to be running out to buy yarn to make anything today (being that Christmas is just a week away and I still have Christmas present to knit!), but I feel kinda out of the loop. I went and updated my e-mail address with Yahoo so this will never happen again!

Anyway, the new issue is great, although I think that the Toothpick Optional would have been a perfect addition! There's not one, not two, but 5 pairs of socks (although one is for the kilt wearers out there!) Slippery will be my first project. Sally the Eco Fairy will definitely be knit if I ever have a little girl. And I am thoroughly intrigued by Jeanie. A drop stitch cabled shawl . . . interesting, very interesting.

An FO that I can actually blog about

I actually finished something that I can blog about. It's the first time in a while.

Pattern: Calorimetry
Yarn: Paton's SWS in Natural Navy
Needles: US8
Modifications: I cast on 100 instead of 120 and I did about 10 repeats of row 5 instead of 15.
I think it came out pretty good. I plan on making 2 more, they will be for my female in-laws. I have one more skein of SWS in another color and a skein of Noro Kureyon. It's a pretty quick knit. Everyone on ravelry was saying it took them 2 hours so I must be a super slow knitter since it took me about 4 hours. Maybe the next one will go much quicker.

I'm also still working on one of my sisters presents. I spent a while yesterday working on my craft room. I got everything moved from the guest room down 2 floors to the basement. My sweetie helped by moving the bookcases for me. I've started straightening up but there's still a pile of miscellaneous craft material (like cross-stitch and soap making) that I don't have a place for yet. And I need to get a new sewing table because the mover's broke my old one. I also really want a permanent cutting table so I don't have to take over the dining room table whenever I have a project going. I think that will have to wait until we get a new dining room set cause then I can take the old table and use that.

I'm cleaning up my blog a bit so there will be no more finished object list. I figure anyone who's going to look for an old finished object is probably on ravelry anyway and updating that list is just pain in the butt!

I'm off to play in the snow with the pups! Can't wait for that damn fence to be built!!!!