Canadian Silliness

When I was home for Christmas, Mom and Dad took Sister and I up to Victoria for a brief jaunt. Funny how one forgets that Canada is a foreign country. It was so much like Washington, and yet so completely different. (Funny how you can travel a couple of hours and all of a sudden everyone pronounces their vowels in a quaint and exciting way.)

While there I walked past this amusing hat on sign post. It led me to wonder, was this an act of purposeful urban kniting grafitti...or did someone lose their actual hat and it was placed there for safekeeping?

I'll never know for sure.

And it'll probably bother me.

Forever.

Raiding the Gift Stash

On Halloween, some of my staff members decided to dress up as lumberjacks. They had boots, they had plaid shirts, they had 5 o clock shadows...they even had elastic to make fake suspenders. What did they still need? The iconic lumberjack beanie! What did I have lots of in my gift stash? The iconic lumberjack beanie!



(That battle axe that Arty AD is holding was found in the residence hall's magic closet, dubbed Narnia. Seriously...it is like Mary Poppins' carpet bag...whenever we need something, anything, we go look in Narnia...and it is ALWAYS there! Now if I could only convince Narnia to function like a yarn shop...)

On Becoming a Sports Fan

I can honestly say that I have attended more sporting events this semester than the rest of my life combined. And I have definitely watched more football! (I actually understand the game now!) The advantage to having so much school spirit...aside from getting paid to...was that it offered numerous opportunities to knit.

I knit at intramural games...in the stands, and on the sidelines.

I knit at ACU football games.

I knit at volleyball games.

I knit at soccer games.

After the first game or so, people stopped staring. They simply didn't notice that I was doing anything out of the ordinary. Instead, on the rare occasion I wasn't knitting, they would notice I was idle and ask where my knitting was!

So, what was the most exciting thing that happened during this strange journey into jock-dom? I got a concussion. I got a concussion without even participating

I was sitting on the bleachers at a McKinzie Skull Caps intramural football game (they are our brother hall). I saw the McKinzie RD had arrived, and decided to go say hello. I stepped sideways off the bleacher. I thought the footrest extended out a bit past the seat. I was wrong. I missed the step, landed on the side of my foot and went over backwards...hitting the back of my head (hard) on the ground. The residents I had been talking to were worried. They helped me up and asked if I was ok. Then one of their boyfriends started laughing. They stared at him, since that was not an appropriate response...till he explained, and we all started laughing. See, I had been knitting a sock. The ball of yarn was in the pocket of my hoodie, and I had the circulars in my hand. When I fell over backwards, I had instinctively lifted my hands to keep my yarn from getting dirty, and somehow managed the whole thing without even dropping a stitch. He couldn't believe that I had tried to save the knitting rather than myself. (Clearly! I mean, a gal has to have priorities. My head would heal...the sock may not have!)

I am already looking forward to next season...knitting and sports! Who would have thought they were so compatible?

War Games

Every summer a lot of the kids from church go to the Northern California Florida College Camp for a week.

Every year the camp holds War Games...a version of capture the flag played with flour bombs.

Last year every person on my team, Omega, died...except for Champ. (Champ is Ark, Fish, and Blossom's 14 year old brother.)

Champ lived until the end of every round. It was amazing. He would climb trees, hide behind boulders, and just survive. He also took out more of the opposition than I think the rest of Omega combined. (And that is saying a lot, because we had some extremely athletic senior guy campers on the team.)

A while ago I promised Champ that I would knit him something, since I had knit hats for all the other boys at church. I asked him if he wanted a beanie. After some discussion we settled on something even cooler...

I made him a ski mask to wear to war games.

I think he likes it.

(I did make him promise not to hold up any 7-11's in it though.)

Twilight Knitting

I love the Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyers. They have even inspired me to knit!

My parents live but a few hours from Forks, the town in which the books are set...so as part of my grad school graduation frivolity...on Monday we made a pilgrimage.

I, of course, wore the Twilight/Blood and Shadows scarf that I made.



It was a big hit. Edward liked it.



Alice liked it, too.



I am big nerd.

iGraduated

I graduated from the UW iSchool's Master of Library and Information Science Program!

To celebrate I went to my instructor, Teen Queen's, home today for an afternoon barbecue.

Several of my fellow graduates were also there.



We discussed which lectures we actually listened to, and which ones we...well...skipped, etc.

Song brought up the fact that I used to knit during all of our residencies. I replied that I knit while I was listening to lectures at home as well.

Teen Queen looked shocked!

"Did you knit during my lectures?" she asked.

"Well...yes...but only when you were talking!"

A Few Needles Short of a Commission

On Wednesday night, Perky asked me if I could make her another (Fort) Knox beanie. This time she wanted it in black.

I thought about it, for maybe a millisecond, and agreed. They are fairly quick knits, they make for good movie/social knitting, and I had plenty of good black wool in the stash. In an impetuous moment (so out of character for me...), I told her I would have it Sunday morning.

Then I got home.

I found the yarn.

I could not find the needles.

I went through my entire bag of needles.

Then I saw them. My 16" US size 6 circular needles.

They were attached to half of a rust (Fort) Knox beanie that I had cast on a couple of weeks ago.

I had two options:

1. I could move the rust beanie over to waste yarn and recover the needles.
2. I could finish the rust beanie, and then cast on the black one.

Option 1 was probably the smarter and more practical choice.

So of course I chose option 2! (I knew in my heart of hearts that once that rust beanie was on waste yarn, it would languish in the stash...never to be heard from again.)

Luckily I knit FAST!

I finished the rust beanie Thursday night at Preach and Psych's house.

I cast on the black one Friday night.

I finished the black one Saturday night.

I even wove in the ends!

Sameness

I am fairly predictable when it comes to color.

My favorite color is orange.

I knit a lot of oranges/rusts/reds/browns.

When people give me yarn they tend to give me a lot of oranges/rusts/reds/browns.

The other color I knit a lot of is grey. I love grey. It doesn't show dirt like white, and it highlights stitch patterns better than black. It is elegant. It is neutral. It is classy.

I decided a few months ago that I needed to break out of my mold.

I needed to try knitting things not in oranges/rusts/reds/browns and not in grey.

So I ordered a bunch of yarn from KnitPicks. I bought yarn at my yarn shop.

...and everything I bought color coordinates.

It is all turquoise/blue/green/purple.

All of it.

(Proof of this is visible in the picture on my knitpicks package post.)

I guess if I really want to experience knitting hue variety I need to print off a picture of the color wheel and work my way around clockwise from project to project or something...

Predictability. It is a curse.

Miracles Do Happen

I went to a minor league baseball game tonight with Sister.

I didn't knit. Not a single stitch.

(And not for lack of knitting...I had a sock in my purse...)

Miraculously, I survived!

But, let's not make a habit out of it...

The Naming of a Cowl

I have always been fond of naming things.

Just ask my mother. One of my favorite books to read as a child was a name meaning book called The Name Game.

I named:

• All of my dolls (Soup Can Macaroni, Annabelle, Sasha...)


• All of my stuffed animals (Coco, Gunther, Sigfried, Melville...)


• Plants (Roy, Fairfax, Bertram...)


• Imaginary friends (Zonya Pasgetti...which was how I said Lasagne Spaghetti)


• Pets (Saxon, Cleopatra, Kanini, Duchess)


• EVERYTHING!!!

Yes. I am strange.

So when I knit this cowl, I knew it needed a killer name.



I looked at it. It had ridges.

Ridges was not a great name.

The ridges reminded me of ruts in a road.

Ruts is DEFINITELY not a good name.

The synonyms for ruts included grooves.

Grooves was getting closer.

Grooves morphed into groovy.

Thinking about groovy got the classic rock song "Feelin' Groovy" stuck in my head.

"Feelin' Groovy" is sung by Simon and Garfunkel.

Simon is a boring name for a handknit.

Thus...the cowl is named the Garfunkel.

Sweater Girls

It was a misty, moisty morning yesterday.

I decided it called for a handknit sweater.

Apparently, Miss-A thought it did as well!



I am in Martinelli, and she is in February Lady.

What do Berets and Breasts Have in Common?

I finished the Avignon beret last night...sort of.

I was watching Project Runway again last week, and inspiration hit. So rather than work on the plethora of started or planned projects I have piling up, I decided to freelance through my stash!

Unfortunately, once I had cast off, I noticed that the beret had developed a bit of...well...a nipple. Where the ribbing joined in the decreases, a lovely little peak had formed. Not exactly an attractive feature in a hat.

Frustrated, I set it aside. I have often found it helpful to sleep on this sort of problem rather than immediately starting to freak out. (Freaking out seems to be my first and natural inclination! Dreaming Me came up with two solutions:

• frog it back to where the bulge begins and tinker with the decreases
• try to block it out

Blocking wins. Blocking is, ostensibly, an easier solution. I tried to use a dinner plate...but that wasn't working, so I switched the beret over to an upside down mixing bowl. Now I am waiting for it to dry. If this doesn't work, we'll move on to the more work intensive and obnoxious solution of frogging. Ugh.

(On the plus side, I used up the rest of the yarn from Twilight's birthday beret. I feel a little twinge of satisfaction every time I use stash yarn instead of making a purchase. Its like my own personal Knitters' DARE program...just say no to non-essential yarn shopping!)

Knitting While Petsitting...

...has its difficulties.

I have to convince Sadie that german shepherds are not lapdogs, and Tara that cats are not supposed to sleep in my knitting bag!

Still, at least I have cable...I can finally watch the actual Olympics while doing the Knitting Olympics!

Public Displays of Knitting: Florida Edition

Here are a few of the pictures from my Florida trip...a few of the knitterly pictures that is:



Knitting the Gotham Socks at a Starbucks in Temple Terrace.



Knitting Beret Pour Moi on my mattress on the floor of Blondie's dorm room.



Proudly wearing handknits in the college student center with Blondie. (Shortly after the picture was taken, I went back to knitting socks.)



Jester, looking clearly relieved that we have arrived at Knit 'n Knibble in one piece.



The 100% sugar cane yarn that I purchased at Knit 'n Knibble

All in all...I finished 2 projects on this trip, and made significant progress on 2 more. I also wore at least one handknit every single day...a scarf, a beret, socks, or wristwarmers!

But Excuse Me, You Are Wearing My Hat!

I was working at the reference desk the other day, and a lady walked by in a lovely scarlet beanie. It was beautiful, stylish, intricately cabled...and awfully familiar.

I looked at it.

I looked again.

I was positive.

"Excuse me" I said. "That is a lovely hat. I have one just like it!"

"That's impossible!" she replied, and looked at me like I was crazy. "I made this hat. You can't possibly have the same one."

"You got the pattern out of the 2007 Holiday Interweave magazine, right? The Koolhaas hat that the Brooklyn Tweed guy based on the architecture of the Seattle Public Library, right? I made the same hat...just in navy. Tricky pattern. You did a nice job!"

She looked stunned. I could understand why. It is fairly rare that I run into someone with the same handknit...unless of course I made it for them...

In honor of the occasion, I went home and put on my hat.

You're in the Wrong Field

Candid, my nay-saying coworker, has finally come around.

All the way around.

When I mentioned that I was making my ornaments for the ornament exchange, she poo-pooed the idea. She felt that I should just buck up and face the mall traffic. She thinks my whole knitting thing is silly. I apparently act like an old woman.

(You may recall that she was also averse to the whole CONCEPT of knitted dishcloths...until she got one!)

Well, I took the finished ornaments to work with me on Saturday, and wrapped them on my lunch break. Candid saw them and told me that they were beautiful. She was astonished at how professional they looked. (She even went so far as to say that she might pay for something like that.) She also saw one of the Christmas queue commissions on Saturday, and was impressed by it as well.

I was flattered, and surprised...since it was, after all, Candid.

I was even more surprised this morning when I heard her discussing them with one of my other co-workers. She brought them up, and asked if Miss-A had seen them. She then told me that she thinks I am in the wrong field. She suggested that I open a retail store or a yarn store...or at least teach classes professionally. (As opposed to the for free stuff I do here at the library.)

Hmmm...my own boutique...it is a thought.

(Although, I fear if I knit as a full-time professional that it might lose some of its charm...and I highly doubt that I could completely support myself that way...)

Whiz's Wit

I did a special Christmas storytime at the pajama party the foster fam had last night for all of the small folk from church.

As I was leaving, I was slowly putting on my gloves, scarf, hat, coat, etc. and talking to Whiz. (Who had been wearing the Whiz Bang Beanie, by the way...) The conversation went like this:

Whiz: Did you make your hat?

Me: No. I probably could have, but this one was on sale at Target.

Whiz: Do people ask you that a lot? If you made everything you own?

Me: Yep. All the time.

Whiz: It would be pretty cool if you could make, like, everything you ever needed.

Me: Well, I do make a lot of it.

Whiz: Well, but not stuff like food or money.

Me: It would be pretty cool if I could just knit up some money.

Whiz: Yeah...but...you know that's illegal, right?

Me:...

I love that kid. So concerned that I might try and counterfeit cash with yarn from the stash...wanted to make sure I was aware of the government's current stand on currency production!

Pumpkin Toilet Paper Cozy

Nothing is sadder than a naked roll of toilet paper sitting on the toilet tank. To solve this problem, dress your TP in it's autumnal best! The ribs in the cozy imitate the ridges in a standard pumpkin.

Pumpkin Toilet Paper Cozy Pattern


Finished Size: Fits Standard Toilet Paper Roll

1 - 2 oz ball of orange 100% cotton worsted weight [MC]
Small amount of green worsted weight [CC]
1 - 16" circular US size 6 needle
1 - 16" circular US size 6 needle, or 1 set of double points when needed.

Gauge: 20 stitches = 4 inches in garter stitch

Cast on 70 stitches onto circular needle, join for working in the round
Row 1: Knit
Row 2: Purl
Row 3: Knit
Row 4: Purl
Row 5: Knit
Row 6: K5, P2* (Repeat to end of round)
Repeat Row 6 until cozy measures 4.75" from cast on edge, or try it on a roll of toilet paper, knitting should equal the roll width

Begin decreases, switching to two circulars or double points when necessary

Row 1: K2tog, K3, P2* Repeat to end of round
Row 2: K4, P2* Repeat to end of round
Row 3: K2, SSK, P2* Repeat to end of round
Row 4: K3, P2* Repeat to end of round
Row 5: K2tog, K1, P2* Repeat to end of round
Row 6: K2, P2* Repeat to end of round
Row 7: K2, P2tog* Repeat to end of round
Row 8: K2, P1* Repeat to end of round
Row 9: K2tog, P1* Repeat to end of round (14 Stitches remain)
Change to CC
Knit even for 6 rows
Decrease Row: K2tog* Repeat to end of round (7 stitches)
Decrease Row: K1, K2tog, K1, K2 tog, K1 (5 stitches)

Cut off yarn, and use a darning needle to thread tail through live stitches, pull tight.

Weave in ends. Block on roll of toilet paper overnight to acheive proper shape.

Enjoy!

Colors: I used Peaches & Creme #11 Sunburst and #53 Verde Green

The Ultimate Cheerleader

I may not play Ultimate Frisbee.

I may not even completely understand the rules to Ultimate Frisbee.

But that won't stop me from cheering on my team.

And knitting.

Interlude of Supreme Silliness

What do you give the woman who has everything?



A knitted sushi toilet paper roll cozy of course!



Happy Birthday Mama L!