Yarn Resolutions

The last post of the year. I've gotten some lovely yarn this year, made a few projects, completed some of them, too, though that is never a foregone conclusion.

I have a few resolutions to make. Of course I shan't keep them, but it is traditional to make resolutions at the beginning of the year.

1. I resolve not to buy so much yarn this year. I am at 21 bins, and could add one or two more.
2. I will knit my stash. I will use all that lovely beautiful yarn I've acquired over the years.
3. I will finish the projects I have on the needles before casting on new ones. Well, most of them, at least. Well, some of them, I'm sure. In some sort of order.
5. I will make some items for myself.
6. I will blog more.

Well, maybe I'll keep some of them.

This is a cowl I made for Peggy, who had been my advisor in college and one of my favourite professors.

Made of Malabrigo Mecha, the colours are Polar Dawn and Lotus. Done in a seed stitch, I carried the yarn, but I think if I make another one (and I will, I promised my cousin one, the yarn is bought, and it is waiting to be cast on), I won't carry the yarn, but will cut it and weave in the ends. The carried yarn in seed stitch is unsightly.

A chemo cap for my friend Priscilla, this is Madeleine Tosh Vintage, in Smokestack and Chamomile. It wasn't until I finished it that I realised it was the colours of the Boston Bruins Hockey team. Go Bruins! Boston Strong!

A new year, with old yarn, for new projects. I think it will work.

Merde

It's 16 December and I might as well face facts that none of the Christmas knitting is going to get done this year.

Like last year.

Oh, I have a good excuse or two, but really, it all comes down to the fact that nothing will be ready in time to be shipped for the holidays. Well, except Miz Kitty's shawl, but that wasn't really a Christmas present, only it turns out that it will be, because none of her kids can make it home for the hols this year, and will be the only thing she opens that day. If it gets there in time.

I got slammed with a really bad cold this year, one that lasted more than a month. I'm still hacking up a lung every now and then, though I'm feeling better. During much of that month that I was sick, time that I would normally spend knitting was spent sitting on the bed, trying to get a deep breath into my lungs, and then coughing up most of a lung.

It wasn't pretty.
And then there were the chemo caps to finish. One down, one to go. I just can't wrap my hands or head around what I want to do with that gorgeous Madeleine Tosh (smokestack and chamomile), except that I've got a hundred stitches on the needles and about an inch of 2x2 ribbing.

So, the well laid plans of mice and men (and bears) oft gang awry.

I'll get the Christmas knitting done after the holidays, when I'm feeling better.
And I'll feel like a heel because none of it will reach the recipients in time to open under the tree on Christmas morning. But it will get done. Eventually.

Le sigh.

I was going to write a post about all the cool yarn I bought on Small Business Saturday, but seriously, who needs to see more yarn? Even though every bit of it has a project attached to it (no free-range yarn this time), I think I'll wait til the projects are done and post pictures of them.

Most of my Christmas knitting is on hold because I've been not only working on several chemo caps, but I have had the Cold of Death, and haven't felt much like knitting. Mostly I've wanted to lie down on the bed and try to breathe. Today is the first day I've actually felt like knitting, and I cast on a cowl for a friend. But nothing is going to be done on time.

And that sucks.

I've been looking at the list of all the things I want to get done and if I knit non-stop every day without going to work of stopping to eat or bathe, I might get it all done.

Maybe.

This is one of the chemo caps I did finish. It is made with Cascade Alpaca, and is an adaptation of the Wurm pattern one can find on Ravelry. I did not use the pattern's fold-and-pick-up-stitches beginning because picking up stitches in black yarn is an exercise for masochists, so I just did a standard 2x2 rib for an inch. I hope the recipient likes it, and I hope that it fits her. It was kind of cool and fun to knit.

This is the actual colour of the hat, jet black. It's very soft and floppy.

The colour is completely off, but gives one an idea of what the hat looks like with the ridges.

The top of the hat. I have never had so many stitches left over at the end of the decrease rounds. I think there were 44 of 100 left over. I like the star-y looking thing on the very top.

And now, back to more knitting. I might be able to salvage something out of this damn cold.

It's been lovely, but I have to scream now

More than a month without an update.
Bad blogger! No merino for you!

I haven't written anything because I haven't finished any projects. And I do so like to post pictures of my projects.

Le sigh (that's French).
OK, no it isn't.

I've been working on several projects like a fiend. My shawl for Miz Kitty is almost done (just attached skein #4 of 5), and Siobhan's cowl is, well, languishing. I don't even want to think about the other Yoolistide presents.

I got the word that three more friends were diagnosed with breast and/or ovarian cancer. So it's the Mad Knitter to the needles! Honestly, my friends have got to stop with this cancer nonsense. It isn't good for them. Seriously.

I am making a Wurm hat for Judy. I decided that picking up a bunch of tiny stitches in black yarn was about as ridiculous as it comes, so I just did a 2x2 rib and called it a day. I want to do 10 repeats of the worm pattern, and am somewhere in the fifth repeat, so I guess I'm about half way done. Go  me!

Prisca's hat, well, I keep on trying different yarns. Prisca is a big gal, with a big presence, and with a big head, so I'm thinking sport weight yarn is not going to work for her. So I got some gorgeous Tosh in chamomile and smokestack to make a Wurm hat for her. Need to cast it on, but I think the colours are going to totally rock her stripy socks. I wonder if she wears stripy socks?

This past weekend I was down in Provincetown, and my friend Adrienne said that I could stay at her house during Bear Week in July. Ummmm, yeah! Only a fool would say no. So I'm going to make her something in pink and black, her favourite colours. However, it is going to wait until I'm done with holiday and chemo knitting. It just has to. I'm thinking of a shawl in black, with a pink fleur-de-lys in the middle. Or something. I'd have to learn intarsia to do what I want to do, but worse things have happened to nicer people, and I've always wanted to learn intarsia. I suppose I could double knit it, but by the time I finished it, I think we'd both be in our dotage.

Enough with the blogging. I gotta get my needles in hand and all this yarn knit up. Christmas is only a month away. Thank you. It's been lovely, but I have to scream now.

Panic: The Realisation of Christmas Closeness

OH MY GAWWWD!

Only 73 days until Christmas!

ONOES!

Get a grip, Ken, get a grip.

That's just over 10 weeks for knitting everything up. Which means I have to find that second ball of Madeleine Tosh, STAT! For the blue cowl.
I have to tink back a row of 224 stitches on the red cowl to find where I made a mistake.
I have two, count 'em, two Ameeta scarves to finish, and one of them has to be ripped back at least 20 rows or more, because, you know, I skipped a row. I'm such a dunce sometimes.

And am I at home, knitting my fingers to the bone?
Not no, but HELL NO!
I'm at an internet cafe, writing a blog post, reading Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (on line), and swilling cola like it was, well, cola.

Where are my priorities? Where is my Calvinist work ethic? Where is my Stephanie Pearl-Mcphee-tenacity?

Out the window, apparently.

I'll get to the knitting. If it gets done in time for the holidays, so much the better. And if it doesn't, then I'll hand over an unfinished garment, and if the recipients are upset with that, then they don't deserve the fruit of my labour.

Now, back to Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality.

Rhinebeck or. . .

Bust.

I won't be making it to Rhinebeck Sheep and Wool Festival this year.

Alas.

Think of the hit my yarn stash is going to take because I won't be there to sop up new yarns from different places.

No, don't look at earlier posts, detailing all the yarn I bought in August in Seattle, none of which has been knit yet. Don't look over there, la la la la la, look over here. Oooh, shiny!

Seriously, though, I've got a few things going on that weekend, like a Dar Williams concert, and I'm going to Provincetown on Saturday to help a friend deliver cupcakes from his business. And, true, I now have 21 bins of yarn sitting in my room, taking up most of the free space there. I really do need to start knitting my stash. My friend Erick has threatened an intervention in my yarn buying, so I guess it's getting pretty dire.

But I did so want to wander Rhinebeck, and see all the cool yarns there, and look at the alpacas and dream of taking one home with me, and eat maple cotton candy. Not this year. Next year. Because by next year I'll have run out of yarn!

It's good to dream.

Twenty-four Inchs, or Bust!

Whenever I start a new circular project that isn't a hat, my friend Valaree reminds me that the Sainted Elizabeth Zimmerman insisted that no one needs circular needles that have a cable longer than 24 inches. I do not know if this is true (and I suppose, with my mad librarian skillz, I could ascertain if it were), but I suppose it is. That said, what the hell am I doing knitting a cowl (I almost typed, "scowl") on 24 inch circulars? There are well over 200 stitches of worsted weight Madeleine Tosh cast on for this project, and the damned thing is all bunched up together. Elizabeth Zimmerman may well have been able to knit hundreds of stitches on 24 inches, but I, alas, am no Elizabeth Zimmerman. I look at it and have a hard time getting a sense of what it's supposed to look like, and how many iterations of the pattern I'd like to do (the pattern calls for five, but I'm using a heavier weight than the pattern calls for, so I'm thinking three). Elizabeth Zimmerman, you may be the patron saint and goddess of knitting, but 24 inch circs are not always the ideal needles for every project!

There. I feel better now, having got that off my chest. I mean, seriously, what would I do with a sweater knit in the round in bulky yarn (my favourite sweaters!)? I doubt I could get almost 300 stitches of bulky weight yarn on 24 inch circs. What, never! No, never! And we won't go further with the lyrics from that song.  What's sauce for the goose may well be sauce for the gander, but not for the swan, the hen, nor the pheasant. What worked for Saint Elizabeth will not necessarily work for me. I shall knit future projects on circular needles I deem appropriate, and if that causes Elizabeth to spin in her grave, well, we'll then consider the soil well aerated.

I feel so relieved.

Here is my Milanese Loop cowl, for Siobhan (the pattern is free and can be found on Ravelry). The yarn is Madeleine Tosh, Betty Draper's Blue, Limited Edition.

You can see how the poor thing is all bunched up and unhappy on that 24 inch circular needle.
But I am loving what I can see of it.