Very Silly Things

So I’ve been moody this week – just a lot of stress & negativity seems to be surrounding me and getting me down.  It’s nothing really horrible, don’t worry. I am usually a pretty cheerful person & I do my best to keep my annoyance & frustration to myself instead of taking it out on poor unsuspecting people…although it seems like I am the poor unsuspecting person on the receiving end of a lot other people’s negativity.  So when that happens I like to  make silly things to cheer me up, even when I have a ton of other projects I’d like to finish in this lifetime.

First there was the pickle…

Fredrick the Giant Pickle

Started: September 11

Completed: a few hours later

Yarn: a random partial ball – I’m pretty sure it’s Swish Worsted

Pattern: Christmas Pickle Ornament

Needles: size 4US Zephyrs

Notes:  So we have this pickle ornament pattern & I had to make it. Why? I have no idea, I don’t even like pickles.  Still, I added some eyes & Fredrick was created.  Actually, there is an accessory that several us in the office are making in different yarn weights, so I of course I had to have something to fit it. (Not trying to be mysterious, just some fun silly things we are doing. I love my job) Anyway, he’s sized up – worsted instead of fingering & on size 4s instead of 2s but everything else is the same.  He now sits on my desk & cheers me when I’m having one of those days.

A week or so ago, I got interviewed for the KP podcast again, talking about unusual knits (the podcast won’t be up for at least a couple of weeks). I got to talking about Mochimochiland & especially my Grass Guy.  Yesterday I was particularly down & decided another Grass Guy was needed.

Mo

Started:  September 17

Completed: September 18

Yarn: Another random ball, I think this is Cascade 128

Pattern: Grass

Needles: Size 8US

Notes: This pattern just cheers me right up.  I means it’s just so silly & quick – Mo is my third grass guy.  He is a lot bigger than his brother, the Original Grass Guy Who Never Got A Name But I Just Decided To Call Him Jo.

Plus, Mo has better eyes, now that I discovered a place to get plain black safety eyes.  I hate doing embroidery.   He’s squishy & soft so I think he’ll join Fredrick & Little Boo at my desk so I can something to hug on those bad days.

Then this isn’t finished yet because he needs legs.

he is scared of legs & wants to stay in the grapevines

Right now it’s just the Giant Grape but it’s going to be one of the Monster Chunks by Dangercraft.  I love those patterns as much as the Mochimochi ones so I think my nieces & nephews will get some of those for Christmas.

I have no plans this weekend so I am hoping to actually finish a big sewing project during that time   Not to mention some knitting projects to work on…but I have some movies and a new audio book to keep me going, not to mention a lovely rainy day tomorrow (before we go back up to the 90s – BOO!  I want fall!  I can’t even wear my new knitwear yet!).  Have a lovely negative free weekend everyone!

 

Sock Summit Madness pt 1 – Friends

Wow.

Where to even begin?  Can I just say I had the absolute best time this weekend?  So much to say & so many pictures to show, I need to divide it into 3 parts.  Otherwise, the posts will be miles long with hundreds of pictures.

So I’m starting with one of the most awesome things this weekend – hanging out with friends either I hadn’t met in person yet or else hadn’t seen for a long time.

First, it’s always a bit of a gamble meeting someone from the internet who may or may not be exactly how they appear (hey, I did internet dating.  I know of what I speak). It’s especially nerve wracking when you’ve invited them to stay with you for the entire sock summit.  I’ve “known” tutlegirl76 for at least 4 years – we’ve read each others blogs & shared a love of knitting (of course) but also of Deadwood, among other things.  We are in pretty much the same groups on Ravelry & a few months ago I offered a place for her to stay.  As the summit drew nearer, I got really nervous.  What if we don’t get along? What if she’s not like she is online? What if I’m not like she expects?  Will it be a long uncomfortable weekend where we will be glad to see the back of each other by Sunday?

I had nothing to worry about.

yes, same picture as the one on Cristi's blog - it's her photo but the only one of the two of us together and seemed to sum up the weekend perfectly

It was a wonderful weekend with her – full of beer, laughter, yarn love, knitting, naked men, and debates of toe-up vs top down socks (I promise I am making a pair of toe up socks!).  I was so sad to see her go on Sunday and even though we live on opposite coasts, I hope we will be able to hang out again in person sometime soon.

I also got to meet several other “internet friends.”

Melanie, my favourite indie dyer who is just cute as abutton and funny as hell.  I even worked her booth for a short amount of time & got to fondle all her yarns.

Carrie & Cristi - somehow I never got a photo of Carrie & me! What the hell?!?!?

Carrie, who I feel like I’ve known forever.  Had such an awesome time hanging out with her & running into her all over at the Summit, teasing each other about the amount of Blue Moon we were adding to our stash (purchases is part 3 of the write-up by the way).

It was also nice to see old friends I hadn’t seen since I came back Portland (I’m a hermit who’s too lazy to drive all the way over to SE, what can I say?)

Nothip Christy is so adorable.  I wish I got a picture of her gorgeous knit dress, but maybe she’ll blog about it.  Hint hint.

Melissa, so funny & awesome.  I’m actually going to get myself out to Abundant to hang out, even if it is the furthest yarn store from me.  After Twisted, Abundant is my fave LYS, but it’s just a pain for me to get there sometimes. Both places have such a fantastic staff, which really makes all the difference.  (not to insult the other wonderful yarn stores in Portland – we have a bunch!)  I even ended up buying from both of those booths, even though it’s not a huge deal to go to those stores here.

Also hung out with my awesome coworkers.  Seriously, not only do I have a fun job, I have the best coworkers.

Me & KpKate - man, i look awful but it was really late at that point.

I actually took Kate’s place after she moved to a different position so we have lots to discuss & commiserate about.  I didn’t get photos, but I also did a little marketplace wandering with Tina and I ran into Kelly & Xena every time I turned around. Speaking of, I’m going to be on Kelly’s podcast this week, so check it out & listen to me dork out about the Sock Summit.

Then there was people I “knew” of on Ravelry & the internet, but only just met.

cristi (again) and Anne (Annimol on Ravelry) dancing to some Abba at the Sock Hop

the famous Jenifluer who is so funny & awesome

Last but not least, The Rubberneckers.

I don’t post a lot on message boards but I will say I’ve been a card carrying RR since day one.  I probably post there more than anywhere else – it’s the funniest, foul mouth bunch of hoars in all of Ravelry.  We have the reputation of being the Mean Girls (and Boys) of the Ravelry, but seriously, we are mostly just laughing & insulting each other.

we like to stay in disguise. Though it's perfectly obvious who I am since I am apparently a giant.

Dinner was a lot of fun, even though it made us late for the Ravelry party.  I did get there in time to see the Rubbernecker Mods meet Casey.

a very blurry but very funny photo that just makes me laugh.

On that note, I’ll leave off for today.  Next post – the knitteratti.

 

I think I need a job…

 

Yes, these are all FOs I’ve finished since Sunday. Dreary weather + boredom + short attention span – money = many simple (comfort) knits out of stash.

To count it up:

1 Grrr.  I have no idea what I’m going to do with this but it was fun to make.  I used most of a ball of Peaches & Cream I got last year sometime.  I didn’t put the face on it – it would have gotten lost.  Probably better in different colors but this was my only full ball of dishcloth yarn.

2 mitered washcloths. The pink & white is out of a ball of (I think) Sugar & Cream I received in the Dishrag Tag.  CO 70 stitches, knit every row, decreased 2 stitches in the middle every other row until 2 stitches remain BO.  The brown & blue one is out of 2 strands of KnitPicks Crayon held together.  CO on 60 stitches, knit every row, decrease 2 stitches in the middle every other tow until 2 stitches remain, icord for about 6 inches, BO, sew on end.  I’ve gotten some use out these already – pink one in the kitchen, brown & blue in the bath.

 2 Tribbles.  I love these, I’ve made them before (though not sewn up  correctly) and they are perfect for washing dishes (no dishwasher here). The black & white is made from the remainder of the Peaches & Cream I used for Grrr – I just knit until I ran out of yarn.  The other is from more Peaches & Cream I bought a cone of recently. (So yeah, I did buy some yarn this week – $6 for a cone at Wallyworld.)

1 Ninja.

So I’m a little embarrassed.  I feel like I’m a pretty decent knitter – I can pick up on techniques pretty quickly that give other people trouble.  Short Rows? No problem!  Kitchner Stitch? Piece of cake! Magic Loop? Love it!  Cables? My fave! Lace & Colorwork? Eh, could be better, but I understand how to do it.  But give me a crochet hook and I cannot for the life of me figure out what I’m suppose to do.  I picked up Creepy Cute Crochet at the library, determine to teach myself how to do cute amigurumi – I love all the little guys in this book.  I know I have crocheted in the past – I can do a chain & edging and I must have known enough to do a hat.  But after fighting with it for an embarrassingly long time, I gave up and decided to knit this little guy.  It wasn’t that difficult – I just followed the pattern but switched the crochet increases & decreases for knit ones.  It turned out cute, except for the eyes – not happy about them.   I used a very small amount of Valley Yarns Sugarloaf and size 4 needles and magic looped it.  It took a little more than an hour or so – more time was spent cutting & gluing on the white felt face.

I do want to learn to do crochet properly so it’s something I might actually take a class on.  As luck would have it, my favourite yarn store does have a class on begininng crochet – but of course it’s tonight & I have plans.  Actually, there’s a ton of things tonight I want to do – it’s my first Last Thursday back in Portland, there is an interesting looking movie playing in town, it’s one night of two nights a week I actually watch TV.  But it’s also game 6 of the Blazers playoffs, which is what I am planning on doing while hanging out my friends.  So the crochet class will be put on hold for a bit…but I may try my hand at knitting a couple of the other creatures first.

Or maybe actually work on the projects I’ve already started.

 

Amusing Things

Work is kicking my ass this week.  Seriously.  I have plans for some nice interesting posts…but too bloody exhausted to do them during the week.  But I thought I’d share some images of things that have amused me this week.

 

Someone at Starbucks HQ must be a knitter

 

Everyone in MA needs a scarf.

 

 

My oldest friend and me., waiting for our SOs.

 

 

New yarn love.

 

My buddy

Nearly every morning on my walk to work (okay, on my walk to Starbucks), I pass this lonely bird swimming all by him/herself.

It’s just odd to me, since I generally only see flocks of geese together, not one all on it’s own, especially all the time.  Maybe it’s been outcast?  So I decided this bird is my morning buddy. He (though I suppose it might be a female – I’m not a bird expert to say the least) always swims up to me, hoping I have some food.

I never do.

So he swims away

I totally have knitting related stuff to post (my second trip to WEBS – woohoo!) but no pictures to post with it.  I didn’t even take pictures of our road trip!  But hopefully when I’m actually home when it’s daylight this weekend, I can get some shots of my lovely new stash enhancements…though only one small skein for me (sock yarn, I know you are shocked.)

Work has also been nuts – it’s so strange for me, talking on the phone with people I see on TV all the time (CNN for the most part) to invite them to speak.  I mean, our CEO is on CNBC quite a bit in fact – which is weird to see him there – but getting a phone call from a CNN political analyst takes the cake.  I’m still enjoying my job for the most part, other than a lot of the times I don’t know what the hell I’m doing – my direct boss quit last September and I’ve been picking up a lot of her work – stuff I don’t feel I’m qualified for!  I seem to be muddling through, trying to stay out of fights between my two direct VPs, which, unsurprising, happens a lot.

At least there’s a 4 day weekend coming up…

 

Giggle giggle

This made me laugh so hard I cried last night. 

And then after a really creepy movie (Gwai wik - it was a good dark creepy until then end, then was REALLY disturbing), this was a much needed giggle.  I wish I could embed it but apparently Hulu (my prefered website) doesn’t work so well with WordPress and the YouTube videos were not great quality.  Anyway, I thought it was absolutly hysterical – Coffeeboy tends to turn on Oberman in the eveings but I’m so sick of all the political commentary. (okay, I do really like Rachel Maddow and, of course, Jon Stewart) and Oberman is especially wearing at times.  Ben Affleck played it brilliantly.

We all need a giggle these days!

 

In case of an invasion…

(take the quiz here)

Happy Halloween everyone!  It’s funny, it’s my favourite holiday (I love bats!) but I never seem to do anything for it – tonight will be more of the same.  I won’t even be home in time to hand out candy!  Ah well, at least I got to wear my little devil horns yesterday & hand out candy to my coworkers kids.  It would probably be different if we had kids or had close friends here to spend it with (miss you Carmel!) – next year will be different.

Have a spooky day all!

 

My weekend

I did not go to Rhinebeck. I had thought I would until a couple of weeks ago.  I just didn’t have the money, nor, to be completly honest, the desire to buy more yarn.  Am I sick?  Perhaps.  Honestly, it’s begining to stress me out, having all these projects still.  I mean, I’ll still get my sock yarns from my clubs and maybe some holiday project items but really, I need to cut back in a serious way. But my weekend was not spent moping around.   

Saturday was filled with chocolate.

a table full of chocolate!

I went with some lovely ladies to a Chocolate Buffett, I’ve written about it before.  It was a smaller group than usual but still a great time.

One of my (many) plates.

We then did our post-chocolate routine of shoe shopping at Downtown Crossing.

We did not buy this shoe.

And the it was off to Lush, where I spent some of my Rhinebeck savings on Lushy stuff – a nice trade off, I supose.  I will admit I did stop at Windsor Button before the meetup to pick up the Holiday Interweave Knits and I finally found Franklin’s book!

The next day I continued my One Day Project Sunday with a snowman.

Hello there.

Posey

Started & Finished: October 19th

Yarn:  Mission Falls 1824, white and leftover sock yarn (held double) for the hat & scarf.

Pattern: Snowmen from KnitPIcks

Needles: Size 4US for the body, Size 3US for the scarf & hat

Notes:  I actually saw the prototypes of the cute little Snowmen way back in July when I visited Melissa at Knit Picks – she either created them or test knit them – I can’t remember!   Anyway, they were super cute so I had to make one when I saw they were avaiable.  This is the Rosey one, although I just gave her a scarf and hat instead of her little capelet.  I also didn’t realize it was felted until after I picked up some Mission Falls 1824…oops.  Superwash.  So I knit her at a pretty tight guage and I think that worked okay.  I used some left over sock yarn (finally!  Something to do with it!) for the hat & scarf.  Posey will be a gift, but I’llprobably be making more of them.  Super quick project.

So it was no Rhinebeck, but still a nice weekend.  Friends, chocolate, Lush, & knitting…it worked out just fine for me.

 

Quizin’ the SO

Lots of my favourite people have done this on their blogs – Amanda, Pam and my fellow commuting knitter Britt (sorry I missed you on the train today – got caught in a meeting).  CoffeeBoy was a bit reluctant – he thought I was testing him and would hold against it him.  Whatever.  Since I don’t have my completed Ravelympics sweater yet (6 inches to go on the sleeve & then the neckline – woohoo!) and the best boyfriend ever bought us ticket to see Neil Diamond on Saturday (at Fenway! In the dugout!  Woo-hoo!), I figured it was as good as time as any to post this.

(yes he said I had to say that when describing him)
Question in bold, his answer in regular font, my response or thoughts in italics

1 – What is your favorite thing about my knitting?
That’s a loaded question.
(I don’t know why he wouldn’t answer this.  Silly boy)

2 -What is your least favorite thing about my knitting?
You knit at the movies.  I never know if you are enjoying the movie or not.
(I explain it’s because I fidget too much if I don’t.  He still doesn’t get it.)

3 – What is something I have knitted, that you recall is good?
My socks.  Or the one sock you made for me that you didn’t finish.
Ha ha.  You just won’t let me forget that.
Or that blanket thing
What?
That shawl thing.
(He means my Clapotis.  Blanket…yeah whatever.)

4 – Do you think knitters have an expensive hobby?
no.  you have boyfriends buy you swifts.  It’s time consuming, that could be expensive I guess.
(Hee hee hee, if he only knew…)

5 – Do you have a stash of any kind?
yes.  porno mags. (laughs)  I don’t know, what is a stash? [I explain] I don’t think so.
(He does not have porn mags. I packed & unpacked all of his stuff when we moved..  I told him he has a tea stash, a guitar stash, a motorcycle stash…)

6 – Have I ever embarrassed you, knitting in public?
no.
(good answer)

7 – Do you know my favorite kind of yarn?
Well i know you buy a lot of alpaca but I think your favourite is something you don’t buy because it’s too expensive like yak. (he means quivit)
(I probably would have said sock yarn or Malabrigo I think, but I don’t have a real fave yarn  I do love alpaca – but I think he just remembers how much I liked the alapcas at the wool festival)

8 – Can you name another blog besides mine?
Anthony Bourdain’s blog.  Can you name another football team other than the Patriots?
Yes I can – [I name several]  I do watch it with you.
(I think he doesn’t really understand blogs – he was asking me about them a couple of days ago (where do you find them?) & I sent him Bourdain’s blog link)

9 – Do you mind my wanting to stop at knit shops wherever we go?
I don’t mind that, taking you to a knit shop out of the way maybe.  I took you to that wool festival [NH S&W] and I didn’t mind that.
(I don’t really ask him to go out of his way to go to a yarn store actually, I prefer to go on my own or with my mom/friends)

10 -  Do you understand the importance of a swatch? Please elaborate.
Are you talking about about a Swatch watch? Then no.
(I have explained them before)

11 -Do you read my blog?
no.  I used to read The Little Green House one, but you don’t send me the link to your blog
It’s on the bottom of every email I send! (we exchange several during the workday)
Oh, I thought that was just spam
Hrmph  I don’t care if you read it, I just don’t think you’ll find it very interesting.
The little green house blog is a very old one about our house in portland, before I even had a decent camera, mostly for our relatives)

12 – If I didn’t knit, what would be different?
I don’t know, I didn’t know you before you knit.  You’d make me talk about my feelings?
Ha ha.

 

Good things/bad things

Good Thing: It’s a three day weekend (that includes my birthday!) and the weather is supose to be really nice.

Bad Thing: I will officially be in my mid-30’s on Sunday, we don’t really have much for plans or money to do anything, and it’s the time of the month I would prefer to curl up on the couch & eat chocolate (sorry folks)

Good Thing: I joined a gym and worked out three times this week!

Bad Thing: I couldn’t button a pair of shorts I bought yesterday. (No I didn’t try them on in the store – I HATE trying on clothes/shopping for anything beyond yarn or books – but in my defense, these are the same size & style of the jeans I wear all the time and a different pair of shorts I bought yesterday that fit just fine). It was not a pleasant way to start my day.

Good Thing: I finished my Reversi commuter socks!

Started: April 23

Completed: May 22

Yarn: Knit Picks Gloss in Pumpkin

Pattern: Reversi by Mean Girl Jen

Needles: Size 1US Harmony

Notes: I think these are the loveliest socks I’ve ever made.

I realized I have, out of all of the socks I’ve knit, never made a solid colour pair until now. And I’ve never really used the colour orange for anything. And most of the socks I make are plain or some sort of ribbing. And so I love everything about these socks – the yarn, the colour, the pattern, the fit, everything! I especially love the unique heel on these.

I’ve already received (unsolicited!) comments on them – one from a fellow knitter in the locker room of the gym who spotted them and one from my new direct manager at work who raved about them (I made the baby sweater for her – which turned out cute, but the picture did not). So that’s always flattering. I think I’ll be getting a lot of wear out of these.

Bad Thing: Before I could even sit down on the train this morning I somehow managed to hit my bag just right where I snapped ALL FIVE OF MY SIZE 0 DPNS for my new commuter socks. Now that takes talent. It also made a very boring ride back & forth to work.

But I’ll leave it on one last Good Thing. Happy Holiday Weekend All!

Apparently all I take pictures of these days is baby geese. But I couldn’t resist when I saw them this morning.