ARGH!!!!

So, I'm pretty behind on the knitting, what with having many other things to be doing. I got the booga bag done and felted it last night (and attempted to re-felt the purple slippers too, but I think they may be as felted as can be, they got a little smaller, so that should be okay, but next time I make the ladies M). I got the bag done and decided to let the icord felt a little more. Can you see where this is going? I spaced out, and tossed the things I'd put in with the felting items into the dryer...and the pillowcase with the icord in it. Which managed to shrink it so it (a) looks like crap and (b) is nowhere near long enough. F-ck. So, now I have to HOPE I have enough yarn left to knit another one, and then refelt it it sometime tonight, while also finishing the 2 pairs of Fetching left to do, plus doing primary kid care for the rest of the afternoon, plus somehow cleaning, doing laundry, and packing, so that we can go away for vacation for a week tomorrow, oh plus we're doing the walk-through for the house tomorrow on our way out of town. Did I mention we're closing in less than a week and moving in 3 weeks?

Can't blog, knitting.

Well, not just knitting. It turns out that if one wants to make a holiday festive, and one does not go visit one's Mommy who will do this for one, then one must do all festivity-creation oneself. We were totally low-key and it still was a LOT of work.

But, presents were wrapped, cookies and a pie were baked, the Christmas meatloaf was delicious, the fancy breakfast with homemade cinnamon rolls was also delicious, and fun was had by all.

On the knitting front - booga bag is knit and I've got about 18" of icord done. One pair of mini-fetchings are done, another is started. The third pair is just a gleam in my eye. The hat for BIL is done. It looks sort of funny off the head, but it fits my DH just fine (who has a huge head), so it should be okay. Turns out I knit it on size 9s, not 8s, and I took out 1 12-stitch cable repeat, but it looks just fine to me. DH has decided he wants one too, so if I have enough of the Swish Superwash left-over after I finished the braided cable scarf, I'll do a hat for him in that.

Once everything is done, I'll post a ton of pictures. I've been sadly delinquent on the photo-front, which makes for a none-too-interesting blog, I am sure.

And I pulled out the baby blanket that I'm almost half way through. Remember how I thought it was girly looking and wasn't sure whose daughter I was knitting it for? Turns out it was for mine*. :)


* At least, they give us an 85% chance of the Frog being a girl...which apparently is as good odds as they'll give.

I am so smart (not).

I have a lot of knitting to do in the next week and a half. A LOT. Well, a lot for me, because my available knitting time is really small. Perhaps if I had full-time childcare and no job (and, you know, some random, seriously lucrative source of income to pay for said childcare), I could get it all done easily and perhaps toss of some more socks for myself as well. But that, sadly, is not my life situation so my knitting time is mostly limited to the evenings, and it turns out that by the time evening rolls around, I Am Fried. Today was a particularly busy day, as it involved not only some Christmas shopping (I relented after I asked my husband to go purchase his gift from me and agreed to do it myself as well as get the present for his dad), but about 200 phone calls between my real estate person, my mortgage person, and my lawyer to work through a last-minute hitch in our house-buying experience. IT WAS SO FUN. Then I had to go to my husband's office to print out a revised P&S, get him to initial some stuff, initial some stuff myself and fax it to our mortgage lady (who does rock my world). So instead of having a fun afternoon hanging out with the boys at home, I was doing all that. It's sort of good that I don't actually have paid employment, because in my grown-up life, I'm a psychotherapist and not really available to wrangle a million phone calls.

So, yeah, what's left? About 10 more rounds of Fetching 2 of 6 (sounds so Star Trekian) plus the thumb, the rest of the Fetchings (4 total), 32 rounds on the Booga bag plus 6 feet of i-cord and felting, and a cable-knit hat for my BIL because apparently I am NOT CABLING ENOUGH.
I am doing my BIL's hat out of some sort of craft-store yarn (Patons worsted weight wool). I actually do like this yarn. It feels pretty soft, they had the color I wanted (a charcoal grey), it doesn't break the bank, it is actually 100% merino wool, and I was AT Michael's and didn't have to go make a special trip anywhere to get Fancy Nice yarn. He won't care at all. Do I sound defensive about using craft store yarn? :)

What else. The Frog has a nice heartbeat. It looks like our house deal is going to go through. Perhaps our condo will even sell. It's all good. It's all going to be okay. *deeeep breath* Tonight, I think I'm going to climb into bed and read and do Sudoku and go to sleep early.

Slogging Through

That's how it feels, anyway. We've got lots going on, big stuff, some very good but stressful, some simply stressful. Nothing truly BAD (no one is sick or dying, knock wood). But other big stuff. So, I'm doing some easy therapeutic knitting. Even though I hate casting on, I enjoy starting projects, so I've got mini-Fetching #1 going (1 of 6 needed), and I started SIL's Booga Bag. It's funny, the colors she chose so aren't ME (since I pretty much only seem to like green and purple), but it's actually fun to be knitting something so bright and cheery. Lots to get done, but it'll all be gifted POST-Christmas, so I've got some time. I'm going to knit BIL a hat too, since I can't really give hand knit stuff to everyone in the family but him.

I still haven't taken pictures of finished Fetching-Inspired-Inspired hat, but I am loving it. I didn't wear it today, as it's not as entirely wind-proof as I'd like (fleece is good for that) and it was a raw and chilly day today, but I do love wearing it.

I feel like I've been focusing a lot on knitting for MEMEME lately, and once I get through the Christmas season, I need to get back into knitting more for others (err, you know, not including the hat, the booga bag and the 3 pairs of Fetching I'm doing for family). I haven't been doing the NICU hats that I love, and I need to keep doing that. I've got plenty of yarn, just need to get focused. Anything that can get me out of my own head and into the perspective of what's really important is good right now.

Fetching-Inspired-Inspired Hat Done!

I'm not sure where the camera is, so no pictures at the moment. Maybe tonight.

The hat is done and it IS long enough! Woo hoo! This makes me happy. I ended up modifying the pattern a bit. Where she has you doing 8 rounds of st, I did 14 (I think). I then did one round of decreases, 5 rounds of st, then alternated a decrease round and a round of st until the end. For the last couple of rounds, I did decreases (so 16 to 8, and then 8 to 4), and then did not do the last knit round (I didn't like the little bump it made).

I think it's going to be toasty warm. I wore it around the house a bit, but I was self-cleaning my oven, so it was really hot in the kitchen. My head was quite warm though. I am going to wear it out in a bit when we go to pick up DS1 from school, so I'll report back. But, at least it fits, and I think it's cute!

Buh-bye hat!

So sad. I ripped out the hat. I actually tried it out last night (24 degrees, felt like 10 or so with the wind) and it was entirely inadequate. It just didn't cover my ears, and it turns out that when it's very cold out, you don't just want the top of your long and pointy head to be covered, you do actually want your ears covered too.

So, I pulled it out, and managed to pick up all stitches (only really dropping two, which were easily picked up), AND figure out where the start of my row was. I am pleased! I also actually measured the (ballpark) length that I need to add, and did a rough estimate gauge, and figured out how many rows. Turns out it was double what I was assuming. I guess I have tall ears as well. :) So, I'll reknit it and see if my math leads to a hat that fits me in reality. It would be nice to have such a thing, and it's a good thing to learn that I need to add a couple of inches to hat patterns to make them cover my ginormous pointy head (why no, I haven't developed a self-esteem issue around this AT ALL). (Really.)

I must say that I do adore the Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran...it's so yummy!!!