Presents and furry friends . . .

First, a lovely package arrived for me from Wales the other day. I had asked, on Ravelry, if someone would trade something for a copy of Mazzmatazz's Rebel Knitter's Guide from the Guardian newspaper there. Couldn't find anyone to trade, but one very kind soul offered to send me a copy for free. When the package arrived, imagine my surprise and delight when it also contained a package of Jelly Babies! Doctor Who cannot have any of these . . . .


I also got the books I ordered from the Interweave Hurt Book sale. I can see absolutely nothing wrong with any of these books - other than the fact that someone wrote on the ISBN numbers with a pen. I'm guessing they did that to show that the books were not for sale. The Socks from Spin off book has some wonderful sock patterns in it. Good thing I now have a lifetime supply of sock yarn. I guess I'll start knitting other people's patterns for a while.


Still another package arrived from Dena - it contained a bunch of name labels for the girls' school stuff (thank you!), a magazine that I never got to read and this book. I printed out the pages she had already sent me, cut them down to size and stuck them in the book. Miss S wants me to start knitting a farm immediately. But those girls want me to knit everything for them with no regard to the time it takes to do it. Maybe if they'd start cooking and cleaning, but that's not too likely to happen any time soon.


And here, for your viewing pleasure, are some pics of a few of the furry beasts who live in the house. They were all playing together in one room - well all three of these anyway, we cannot let the bully in that room or he beats everyone else up. So we currently have no picture of Billy the Bully - perhaps I'll take one and add it later . . . .

First, Casey. She's looking gorgeous with her newly fixed eyes and a fresh bath and a little growth on that short, short hair cut she had a while ago.



Next Cat - she's pretending to be regal here, but we all know she's just a crazy little imp. No sooner was the photo snapped than she got up and ran off at full speed across the room and up the furniture.


And last Jessica, who prefers the solitary, quiet space under the bed when there are goings on in the room. She's such a regal princess.

Busy Knitting

I've been a very busy girl this last ten days. I may have been on vacation, but well, that's a vacation from housework and motherhood, NOT ever a vacation from knitting. When we go on vacation, we go to relax and enjoy ourselves and do what we like, right? Well, I like to knit. I don't mind going to the beach as long as I don't have to drive. The long car ride is a pain in the butt if you're driving, but if you are a passenger . . . . well, it's lovely knitting time (provided you don't have issues with car sickness, which I don't). So I knit for six hours on the ride down and another six on the ride back (well, unless we run into darkness coming or going).

So, on the ride down there, I finished the green hedgehog but then had to rip it back out because the double stranded fun fur was too thick and I was sure it wouldn't ever felt properly. Then I reknit it. Lovely trip. Then while down there, I always get at least an hour in the morning while Hubby goes to the gym and works out - and sometimes it's two or more hours. Then he comes home and we go to the beach or pool which is good for another hour or two (sometimes even more). Then it's back to the shack for an afternoon rest - which is prime knitting time, usually two or more hours or as long as it takes to fall asleep - he usually goes to the pool and the kids play gameboy or read. Then out to a lovely dinner and as long as I haven't overindulged on wine, I'll get another two to three hours when I get home.

Needless to say, I like going to the beach and I like vacations. I carry a LOT of yarn with me - just in case. Funny, there's no local yarn shop at the beach - the lady who used to run the one and only in town told me that nobody that far south ever used wool, so she didn't carry it. Any wonder that her shop went belly up? There are a couple 30 minutes or more away, but I'm usually not interested in the drive in a town I am not familiar with, so don't bother.

Anyway, on this trip, I cast on and knit about 6" on the flat feet (shown above). I'm now ready to turn the heel. It's another new pattern that I made up and I kinda like it, so I just might write it down. I also turned the heel on the Austermann Step socks after knitting them to the turning point, ripping them back almost to the toe and then reknitting them to the turning point. Now it's up to the ribbing and then they are done - but it's lace and I need to move stitches and I can come up with ten more reasons to let them sit for a while. I also knit two hedgehogs on this trip - one green with green fur and one beige with brown paws and beige/brown/many colored fur. They are currently indisposed (read: in the washing machine) so cannot have their pictures made. I'll need to order eyes and noses as they cannot be found locally, so they'll be a few days in seclusion before they join their little brown & beige pal.

Numma Numma Toasty Socks

These are the Numma Numma Toasty Socks that I won the contest with - one pair in Sprinkles for Stella and the other pair in Pepper Jelly (which I really like). If they look too big on the models, it's because they are adult sized socks on my childrens' feet.

New Yarn - Yum, yum!

We were at the local yarn shop today and searching for a specific bag of yarn at the very bottom of the sale bin. That meant that we had to almost completely empty the bin of bags to find the ONE bag that had the yarn Miss S wanted to make little piggies with.

This lovely bamboo was in the sale bin and apparently calling Miss M's name. She saved it out when we were busy replacing all the 200 bags we had removed in the search for the pig yarn. Then she found the blue/green bamboo and apparently it was calling her name even louder. So she decided that this lovely purple/green/white bamboo could be for a sweater for Miss S and she gets the lovely blue/green bamboo.
Obviously, I get to knit these sweaters. I probably get to knit them according to some strange design that lives only in that little blonde head of hers . . . . and I probably need to have them done before the first day of school. A little more than a week, that's enough time to knit two sweaters, isn't it?

This lovely yarn is the yarn I won for my sock pattern. The green yarn was a substitute for a skein that was black and red self striping yarn. It was meant to be University of Georgia colors and I'm sure many people here in Georgia would absolutely LOVE it, but I'm going to start being a Georgia Tech fan since I'm sure that's where Miss M will end up. Now do you think I can get the lady who owns Numma Numma Yarns to dye me up a batch of yellow and black tech colored yarn?

Anyway, these are the Numma Numma Toasty for Needle Nook Exclusive Colors (except for the green). From left to right, meet: Pesto, Needle Nook Nosh (my favorite I think), Lou's Brew and Shirley's Breakfast Blues (really pretty in person).

I really like the Numma Numma yarn - it's smushy and nice to knit with. I might make Steve a pair of socks with the Lou's Brew colorway. Not sure about the rest, but with all my new sock books, I am sure I can find something to do with it.

More flowers and a bug

a wierd little bug that crawled up my foot
swamp mallow I started from seed years ago

p. Star of Surbiton - a gift from a friend

Flowers and a friend . . .

p. blue bouquet

p. pura vida and friend

Finally!!!

It seems that I've finally found the right size needles, right number of stitches, right gauge and right pattern to get a sock that won't drown my foot. I haven't measured it to see what the gauge is since the gauge the pattern calls for doesn't work. But the socks are back to about half where they were the second time I ripped them out and they seem to fit fairly well. (They are still a tad loose, but part of that could be the needles pulling.)
I couldn't be happier to actually be knitting something that might not get ripped out again. I have two more hedgehogs to do and lots of socks and I am getting itchy about starting my norwegian sweater. It's been a while since I did anything complicated. I really need to get into something that will challenge my brain a bit.

Girlfriend had such a great time at the engineering camp that she came home psyched to build a new robot. I'm happy to see it and can't wait to see what she ends up with . . . . She had a great time at camp and, I think, learned a lot. She wants to go back and do it again next year. That's just fine with me.

Pura vida, mate . . .

p. pura vida purple

and p. violacea form #3

One more time . . . .

I've ripped the austermann socks out for the third time. This time there was a good 6 inches done on both of them, but they were too wide. At least I started from the toe up and could tell that they were definitely too wide. I'll do the same toe (a round toe) and the same pattern (forget the name) and the same heel (one I've never done). But it's start over time.

First, I'm finishing Mom's birthday present tho - it's almost done. And I have orders for two more hedgehogs. Miss M wants one that is similar to the first one I made - same colors wool, but the fun fur will be slightly different but still somewhat realistic. Miss S wants hers green - she's not sure if I'm to add some pink to it or not, we'll see.

And the next big project that I'm going to start is the Norwegian Sweater that I planned to make for myself. I've figured out what the pattern will be - mostly red and black but there will be a stripe where I add white to the pattern either on the chest or around the neck and shoulders. I've been thinking a lot about the design elements and the more I think about it, the more I want to begin the sweater. It's been a while since I did a large project and it's about time I quit playing with the kids' stuff and did something really good.

I don't know when they return the contest socks or when the book will come out, but would you two like copies? And are you interested in doing the knit a long with Schoolhouse Press and Joyce Williams with me?

Just for fun, remember the Adipose pattern? The lady who created that also created patterns for Ood, the Tardis, Cassandra, The Face of Boe and a couple of other things. All those patterns went away when the BBC went on their rampage. (I had already saved a couple of them, but don't have the Face of Boe and would have really loved to have that one.) Well, she was asked to create all the patterns for a supplement to the Guardian Newspaper in England and it's been published today. Not all the patterns are on the web, but most of them are here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2008/jul/26/therebelknittersguide

I'd very much like to get a copy of the supplement, but I have no idea where foreign papers are sold in the U.S. So I guess I'll have to settle for the ten patterns that I can print off.

I'll have some pics to post later today . . . . .

Not sure . . . .

Not sure how this works, but I'll ask (supposed to be for my Ravelry profile).

My adipose arrived on Mazz's doorstep today. He/she will be part of the gang of 100 that to to the cast and crew of the Doctor Who show. More pics of the gang later.

And then I decided I wanted an avatar for Ravelry that said the same thing (someone else had one and I was jealous). So now it's official - I am 1 of 100 who made an Adipose for Doctor Who.