365-14: (A little late.)

Yesterday's post, a little late.

I thought a lot about posting yesterday, it's not that I forgot. I moved from cranky (which is always an overlay) to just sad. There were some triggers, seeing my oldest son have his feelings hurt on two separate occasions, and some other little things. Some is probably being hormotional, and sometimes I'm just sad.

At the risk of sounding overly dramatic, I actually spent time yesterday trying to be grateful for my sadness. It didn't really work, in that my sadness wasn't transformed into joy or anything like that, but it did allow me to step out of it a little. For me (like most people, I suspect), it's really hard to just feel sad, to not try and escape or change it or fix. To just feel it. And, there's a line for me between sitting and experiencing whatever I'm feeling, and wallowing in it. I can't come up with why I'm grateful for feeling so profoundly sad, but I am grateful that I was able to see it and be with it for a bit, rather than doing any one of the many (most unhealthy) things I usually do in order not to feel pain.

365-13: Cranky but Grateful

Yes, I'm still cranky, sorry. I'd like to be more...I don't know..graceful about weathering this bout of illness but dude, I am a Crabby McCrankypants today. I'll be honest, at this particular moment I'm not feeling all that thankful.

So, let me take a moment and breath. Yes, the kids are sick, I am exhausted, DH is cranky and tired, the house is a mess...but no one is needing surgery to deal with this virus, at the moment they're all fine, we have a lovely home to live in even if it is messy, and even if we're a bit tattered and worn, DH and I are okay.

You know what I'm really grateful for actually? That we have an great public library in my town. I am a HUGE fan of the Library, and every time I've moved, the first thing I do is go get a library card. Back in my pre-kids days, one of my favorite things to do was to go get a big bag of books and hang out and read all day. I was able to be out a bit yesterday and went by the library in part to get more Magic School Bus DVDs (because dude, if I have to watch "Inside Ralphie" one more time, my eyes may start to bleed), and I got some cheesy books for myself. The kids are all asleep, and I'm hanging out reading. I'll be asleep soon, I hope, and maybe DD will sleep through the night, maybe not, but right now, it's calm and peaceful.

365-12: Modern Conveniences

So, here's where we stand. Younger son: sick from Tuesday to Saturday, finally seems better. Due to inordinate amounts of TV watching (something not usually done in this household), he's turned into a bit of a whiny beats. Re-entry is going to be tough. Older son: lower fever Friday and Saturday, no fever in the morning yesterday and today, then hitting 102 both days. No school for him tomorrow as well. Daughter: first sign of fever - TODAY. *sigh* No, really. I thought we were in the clear. I mean, she was using her brother's straw cup last week, she was totally exposed. She had an awful night last night, we'll see how tonight goes. I am doing better today, a bit more energy, not quite so achy, but just exhausted.

So, tonight I am feeling grateful for the modern conveniences with which we are so blessed. (1) Our freezer. Instead of having to create dinner tonight, I pulled some LOs out of the freezer and we had a really nice meal. Of course, only DH and I ate it, but whatever, it was available. (2) The internet. For many reasons (and I'm sure this one will come up again) but mainly because I have a wonderful support community inside the computer. And because I was able to order DS1 some pajamas without having to leave the house.

FO: More Socks!

No pictures yet on these, I'm still coping with flu and I'm tired and need to go to bed, maybe tomorrow.

But, these are another pair of toe-up, non-pattern socks.

Yarn: Socks That Rock (lightweight, I am pretty sure), Grandma's Flower Garden
Needles: KP Fixed Circs, 32", 2.5 mm

For these, I cast-on 32 stitches using Judy's Magic Cast-On, and increase 4 stitches every other row for 7 rounds, when it seemed like they'd be big enough. Then I knit until they seemed long enough, and did a double-wrapped, short-row heel. Then I knit two rounds, did 7 rounds of 1x1 ribbing and bound off using EZ's Sewn Bind-Off. I made ankle socks because this was leftover yarn from Branching Out (which I must block and will then post about but I'm scared because I've never blocked anything like lace before and what if I totally screw it up??) so I knew I'd be cutting it a bit close. And I sure did...I had about 1 yard of yarn left at the end. Thank goodness I had enough to finish!!

365-11: Thanks, mom!

Today I am feeling grateful for both of my moms. No, my mother isn't a lesbian (though if she were, she'd make a good one, she's very competent at all she tries, my mum), I'm including my mother-in-law here as well. Most people I know don't really love their MILs. Some *really* don't get along with them, some just tolerate them, but very very few people I know have the relationship with their MIL that I have with mine. I guess the fact that my MIL was in the delivery room with me all three times, and cut the cord for my second son really says it all. And I am also very very close with my mom (she was also with me, and cut my daughter's cord, who was named after her) - we talk often, and I really rely on her. I always appreciate it but I'm feeling particularly grateful because in the next 4-5 weeks, I actually have two semi-professional things coming up (a guest lecture and a training), and I've asked for help, and it's been freely and graciously offered to me. I'm really lucky that I not only love my parents and my ILs, but I also really like them, and really enjoy having them in my life. And I'm really grateful for that today.

365-10: in sickness and in health

There are far too many things that I love about my husband to post here, but one of the most important things is that our partnership is truly that, a partnership. Some things we just do (I do most of the shopping, he does most of the yard work); some things we do together (housework) and dome things we trade off. We bolster each other up, when one is not okay, the other steps in. I feel like crap today and he's done so much. It's not like he's "helping" me or "babysitting", he's parenting and I know I can rely on him to step up when I can't, and that's just such a blessing. I feel like a lot of women I know accept things from their husbands that are just...not good. I am so lucky with my love. Not to mention, he's smart, funny, quirky, kind, and sexy too! ;-)


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And because I don't want to lose sight of the Knitting...

I actually DID some knitting!

I got some more done on a sock. And I finished the first part of my sister's Swallowtail! I've moved onto the Lily of the Valley edging! WOO HOO!

365-9: Ugh

I've felt like the last week I've been noticing so many wonderful things and each time I've come to post this series, I've thought "how do I choose? Life is so great! I have so many things to be grateful for!" That's not precisely how I'm feeling right now. Both boys are sick (so DS2 is on Day 4 of a 102 fever, DS1 was around 101 this afternoon). I can't tell if I'm actually feeling unwell, or just hyperfocused on every little twinge, and I'm obsessively checking DD's temperature too because I am really worried about her getting this. We've not confirmed that it's H1N1, but it seems to make the most sense that it is, given that that's what's going around like gangbusters. So one blessing is that I guess it makes the question of getting the H1N1 vaccinne moot.

But anyway, I haven't left the house since Monday, I've completely fallen off the exercise and eat right wagon I was on, DH was gone for a couple of days and got back late last night, I got almost no sleep between the kids and him getting in, and WAH, I am just cranky.

Which is probably why gratitude matters even more in this moment.

The thing I keep thinking today is that in fact, so much of what I'm cranky about are really First World Problems. I'm cranky 'cuz the internet is slow, or because we've watched the same goddamn Magic School Bus episodes over and over because we *only* have two DVDs. I'm cranky because my husband, who has a secure and stable job, was away for a couple of days.

I think what I want to remind myself here is that so many of these things are such LUXURIES. Even if we do have the dreaded Swine Flu, yeah, we're sick but it's not that bad. DD's stint in the hospital with dehydration from the stomach flu last March was much worse. Hey! There's another bonus! No one's barfing.

So, thanks 365 Gratitude, for reminding me what really matters.

365-8: Motrin

Whoops, I didn't get to post this yesterday, so I'll post two today.

Very thankful for Motrin which brought DS2's fever down and clearly helped him feel better.


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365-7: Friends and Neighbors

So, it looks like DS2 has the flu of some sort - high fever, cough and congestion, generally cranky and achy. His fever has been bouncing around, but has hit 103.8 today, which is high. He's not a fever-producer be default as some kids are, and while at times he seemed better, at times he seemed really sick today.

I am feeling very, very grateful for the support system we have here. We moved here almost two years ago, and in that time we've made some really wonderful friends. I still feel like we're in the early days of our life here, if that makes sense, but it's so comforting to know that we have people we can call on if we need them. One friend went to the grocery store and picked up a couple of things for us today, and we've had many other offers of help of that sort, which is really nice. It sucks to be housebound, but I think it would suck even more if we had to go out, knowing how sick he is. This is all especially helpful because my husband is out of town on one of his very rare business trips, and won't be back until Friday.

Needless to say, I'm not getting any knitting done.

365-6: Being at Home

Today I am extremely grateful for the fact that I am a stay-at-home mom. There are aspects of it that aren't fun, there are aspects of it that are glorious. One thing I am appreciating today is that when someone gets sick, there's no stress of having to figure out who's not going to work, or canceling clients, or anything like that. It's just clear - I cancel whatever obligations we have, and we stay home. DH doesn't have to worry about it, and neither do I.

This came in handy when DS2 started the morning by running a fever and throwing up.

365-5: No Sleep

So, last night, my daughter woke up at 2:00 am. This had nothing to do with the time change, I think, but lately she's just been having trouble sleeping. This time, unfortunately, she didn't go back to sleep at all. For a long time (a couple of hours at least), she was fine as long as I was with her. She wanted to be held at first, so I did hold her, and then she was willing to go back to bed. She lay there quietly with her eyes open, just looking at me. Even though I was *quite* irritated to be awake in the middle of the night for a long period, I tried to put that aside and just be present in the moment with her. She's our third, and last child, headed towards 18 months and no longer a baby at all. She's incredibly independent and active, so even though she's really affectionate, I don't get a lot of the cuddle-time anymore that I got when she was tiny. I realized that even though I was exhausted and really wanted to sleep, I was also so grateful to have that time with her, in the dark and the still night, listening to the boys breathing and just holding her, feeling her clinging to me in absolute love and trust.

I am so thankful, so incredibly grateful for my beautiful daughter, more than words can express. I am so profoundly grateful for the love she holds for me, and the love I hold for her - so much love, it doesn't feel like my body can quite contain it. How did I get so lucky?

Justice is when you get what you deserve.
Mercy is when you don't get what you deserve.
Grace is when you get what you don't deserve.
- Author Unknown

365-4: Memory Foam

Today I am especially grateful for my comfy bed, where I will be heading soon.


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Knitting Content

I did end up finishing both hats and scarves for the boys to wear with their scary skeleton costumes, but it was about 70 degrees so they didn't need them. Which is good, because we couldn't find DS2's green hat anyway. I was mildly disappointed (but more thankful for good weather) and now they each have a hat and scarf for Winter, which probably is going to show up sometime soon anyway.

365-3: Halloween

At this moment, the thing I am most grateful for is that Halloween is over and done with for another year. :)

Many reasons for this, the main one being that my darling oldest boy is far, far too much like me for comfort, and the anticipation for this night has been building and building for a long time. Most of the evening was quite fun - we met up with "the gang" and did a bunch of ToTing with them. Unfortunately, his Halloween ended on a disappointing note. There is a house on a street that we drive on frequently that does it up for Halloween, including a huge blow-up purple spider and a huge blow-up vampire over the door. My oldest has been *so* excited to trick-or-treat there. We went all around the neighborhood with "the gang" and then took a special trip over to this house. The blow-ups were blown up, thank goodness, but instead of being able to trick or treat, they had left a bowl of candy on the front steps.

And the bowl was empty.

Poor kid was deeply disappointed (I think his brother mainly just wanted to go home and really didn't care), and my oldest is one who feels things, deeply and passionately. He managed to recombobulate a bit when I promised he could pick an extra treat out of our stash at home but it is *so* hard to see your child be so excited for something and have it not live up to his expectations. I know, in the grand scheme of life's potential disappointments, this isn't huge, but he's six, you know? My heart broke just a little for him.

We decided that *next* year we'll go over there really early. Before supper, he thinks would be a good idea.

365-2: Not too tired to feel grateful today.

It's funny, thinking about what (and when) I was going to post today, I realized that there are so many things, big and small, throughout the day that I am grateful for. Today was a day where I was busy non-stop from morning until night, including having people over for dinner when we weren't home much at all today, so not much time to get the house semi-in-order or make dinner.

So, today I am grateful for my Crockpot which allowed me to make a meal that was both simple and really good! Our friends seems to really like it too! I did a big batch today - 3 cans of corn, 2 cans of black beans, 3 12-oz jars of Trader Joe's Peach Salsa, and 2 packages of boneless, skinless chicken thighs. I rinse the corn and beans, mix them with a jar of salsa. Then I add the chicken, top with more salsa. I cooked it on high for about 3.5 hours, then turned to low, and about an hour before I served it, I turned it to warm (I put it in at 1, and we ate at about 6:30). I served this over rice with shredded cheese and sour cream, though you can also toss a block of cream cheese into the mix about 45 minutes before you serve. Not pretty but so tasty! I served with salad and corn bread and red wine. YUM.

365-1: No Time Like The Present

What really made me think of this project was that I had a small but irritating interpersonal situation this morning that bummed me out. Then I read about a friend's situation who has been in the hospital for *four months*, much of that time spent on a ventilator. I don't know all the details but that just sucks. And it put things in perspective for me.

So, today, I am grateful for my health.

Why I Blog

I read a fair number of blogs - mostly knitting and infertility, and unlike the ones I read, my blog (since I have all of about two readers! Thanks guys!) is really more of an archive for myself - mostly of my knitting (duh) but a bit of my life as well. I do blog much more life stuff over at my LiveJournal account, but since this is more public, well, I try to keep it more anonymous. Not truly so, of course, but I don't name my husband or kids here (for example). I love having this blog, even if I'm updating it more rarely, and even if no one else reads it. I love having the history of my knitting here, I like going back and reading about different projects. This blog keeps me honest in some ways about what I'm working on, and also helps motivate me to finish things so I can blog about them! However, I'm thinking of undertaking a different sort of project. I'm pretty sure I didn't invent this idea (a quick Google confirms that yes, this is not a new idea), but I'd like to try and focus on all the wonderful things in my life, all the blessings, all the things I am grateful for. I try to live an appreciative life, but I find it's easy to get caught up in the annoying minutiae of every day life. So I'm going to try and post something every day that I am grateful for, for 365 days. Can I do it? (First I'm going to need a good iPhone app for posting to Blogger, that's for damn sure.) I'll still be posting the knitting stuff (okay, annoying minutia #1, why is my spell checker no longer working?), and these posts will be separate, but I'd like to try. And for my own sanity, it's not like I have to come up with something different and unique every single day, but rather just something in that day, that moment, that I am grateful for. Maybe sometimes I'll explain more as to why I am grateful for this thing, maybe it'll be self-explanatory, maybe it'll not make sense to anyone but me, but that's okay.

I am nervous about posting this because what if I fail? What if I can't do it every day? Maybe it's a good thing I don't have a lot of readers! :)

Knitting Roundup

I've been inspired to do some knitting - it got cold for a bit, so I knit another hat. I've got several hand-knit hats now (including my Fetching Inspired Hat, which I can't find, boo) but one can always use another, right?

This is a replacement for the Foliage that I ruined. I did that one in the Malabrigo Chunky which I loved, and this one in the Malabrigo Worsted, which I also love. :) I picked this color (193 Jacinto, though my skein had much less variation) simply because it's pretty and I like purple. I started this on my KP Options, Magic Loop (of course), and then switched over to my Denise needles so I could just knit it in the round. I *really* wish the KP Options had a short length option than 24", even 20" would work for adult hats. I also didn't do all the lace repeats. The worsted weight version calls for 3 lace repeats, but I did 2.5. Now, historically, I need to make my hats longer, so it was odd to me that I needed to make this one shorter than called for! Not typical. But I am glad I did, because if the same thing happens with this one that happened with the green chunky-weight one, it'll grow a bit. It's fine now, it could be a bit longer, but definitely not 6 rows longer. Since I live in NE, and winter is coming, I do need a hat to cover my ears.

I also went through and organized my knitting basket. OH! I forgot to tell you, I found my missing knitting! It was deep in the knitting basket, hence the need to reorganize the thing. *phew* Such a relief! (Unfortunately one my kids made off with a pair of KP tips on a 32" cord, so I need to find that.) Anyway, I packed up a bunch of leftover yarn to stick in the closet, and some sewing projects which didn't materialize (*hangs head in shame*) and then looked at what's currently in flight:

• DS2's Halloween Scarf (MUST FINISH THIS TOMORROW)
• Sister's Swallowtail Shawl
• Wicked Monkeys (one completed, #2 not cast on yet)
• Lorna's Laces Purple Sock (halfway through the foot of sock one)
• KPPM Socks (one completed, #2 not cast on yet)
• STR Grandma's Flower Garden Ankle Socks (moving through Sock #2, fearful that I won't have enough yarn)
• A random dishcloth but I can only find one of the needles for it. Argh.
• And then NOT in the knitting basket I have a couple of shawls in progress.

Okay, that's way too many projects going on. And, for our preschool auction, I signed up to donate a Hat and Scarf, so I'll need to put everything on hold to get those made once that happens. I really want to get my sister's shawl done for Thanksgiving because we're going up to be with my family for that weekend.

It's nice to have the energy to knit, but where am I going to find the time to get all these things done?? NO MORE CASTING ON ANYTHING UNTIL I FINISH SOME THINGS!!

When I was cleaning out the basket I also came across some crochet projects that have floundered for quite some time, and I'm trying to figure out when you draw the line and just frog the project. Given how much I invested in tools and supplies for some of these crochet things, I really need to get back to them!

And, in non-knitting news...well, there's not much. I'm thinking about going back to work. Not this year though, maybe next year.

Argh!!

So I went to a new knitting group (this isn't the argh part). A woman I'm getting to know asked me to come to the neighborhood ladies knitting group. I decided to go, it's informal, just at people's houses. It's all women about my age all with kids about the same age. It was really fun and I definitely want to go back! I walked over with my friend, and left before her, so another very nice woman gave me a lift back to my car. I *think* I left my knitting in her car! Two bags of socks. So, two completed socks, two in process socks and yarn. I don't know her last name, and the woman I am friends with gave me her email which isn't working. ARGH. This is *exactly* the sort of thing that tweaks me, you know? I can't find something, which I hate, it's stuff I made, which is important to me, and it's money and time. (It's a skein of STR, two skeins of KPPPM, and two skeins of Lorna's Laces, so that's somewhere in the vicinity of $70 of yarn and many, many hours of my time).

I am torn between hoping I *did* leave it in her car, because somehow I'll be able to get in touch with her and get it back, and that I didn't and it's just somewhere unusual in the house.

That's about all that's going on here. I am way, way too busy - this is one of those weeks where I am out every night, I haven't had a conversation with my husband in days, and I'm just exhausted.

From Yarn Purchase to Blog...

Just over 4 hours. That's got to be a record for me. :) There's even a picture!

So, my daughter has this really cute jacket from Costco. It's a fleece/windbreaker thing, reversible, and it's a really pretty purple fleece, with the windbreaker material being a dark purple floral. I'd take a picture but it desperately needs to be washed. Maybe tomorrow. :) Anyway. We're at that awkward stage of Fall where you don't really need a heavy winter jacket, but a hat can be good, especially when it's windy. I decided I wanted needed to knit her a hat to go with this adorable coat. She and I were out this afternoon, so I swung by the yarn store. We got there just before closing and stumbled upon a SALE. Hmmm. Very interesting.

I found a few different things that would work, color-wise, and settled on a skein of Tahki Torino Bulky, in 228. It was on sale for $4.80, and I came home, pondering hats.

I decided to just make a simplSo recommended gae little hat, and thought about size. I did my usual method of swatching, which is to say, I didn't. I looked at the needle size and gauge on the label: 13 sts over 4" on 10 1/2 (US). I measured my daughter's head: 18.5". I did a little math, and decided to go down a needle size to 10s and make it a bit big for her, and came up with c/o of 66 stitches. I did a few rows (6 or 7) of a twisted rib, 1x1 then switched to stockinette. As I knit, I began to get more and more nervous that I was going to run out of yarn. Now, this is a worry of mine, but I really was getting low. It's a 50g skein, but only 55 yrds. I tried it on my daughte and I think it's going to be a bit big but fine in terms of diamter. Unfortunately, she had to go to bed before I was done so I was definitely winging it for length. I did a sort of off decrease pattern. First, I decreased by 2 stitches, to get down to 64. Then, on the next row, I started decreases in blocks of 8 (so knit 6, k2tog, then knit 5, k2tog, etc.). I did 3 decrease rows in a row, then switched to knitting a row, then decreasing a row, until I was down to 8 stitches. Then I decreased down to 4 stitches and knit a tube long enough to knot. I bound off, knotted the tube, and wove in the other end, and voila! Hat is done! I don't actually know if it fits the girl or not, we'll see tomorrow. (I'll try to get a picture then!)

The yarn is quite nice, very lofty. I think it's a four-ply and it's a bit splitty so you have to take a bit of care when knitting because when you split it, it's pretty noticeable. Oh, and I did cut it pretty close. I cut off a short chunk at the beginning because of a knot, and I didn't end up using that, and I had enough to maybe do 1-2 more rows of the body of the hat. I really hope it's long enough because I really don't want to pull out the top and make it longer.

Uninspired

That's pretty much where I am, creatively at the moment. It's funny, the boys had a friend over today and her mom hung out and was so flattering about my knitting (she fell in love with my Wicked Monkey socks). It was really nice, but it also made me feel guilty about my lack of motivation at the moment. I've got some blocking to do, I finished one scarf for Halloween and need to finish the other, I need to get my sister's shawl done by Thanksgiving (the next time I go home), and of course, I need more socks. And I have yarn for another Noro Striped Scarf, I have some gorgeous Malabrigo to attempt another Foliage, and did I mention that I have my weight in sock yarn? That's a lot of yarn. So many projects...so little me to do them.

Even though it's October, I'm still feeling like I'm getting used to this new schedule. I find having my oldest in Kindergarten is actually really tiring - for both of us! It makes lots of things much easier, but I also miss him. The short days are really short, so I don't get much done. Actually, that's not so much because he's only gone for 3 hours, but more because I never have a time without my kids, and my extremely energetic and spirited almost-17 month old runs me ragged most of the time. She's a love, a joy, and a terror, really. :)

There's a couple of things on the horizon for me professionally that are feeling really exciting, and makes me wonder if I am thinking about easing back into work. I don't know, really, but it's sort of fun to think about!

Nothing Like a Little Super Bulky Yarn for Some Instant Gratification!

I managed to start and finish not one, but TWO things today. Okay, both are hats, one for each son, and both are in this, so they knit up quickly, but still. TWO. It's not like I've been finishing much lately, so this was a bit of a thrill.

Back story, both sons are going to be skeletons for Halloween. My oldest decided that's what he wanted to be (because of some Lego, I think), and younger son is in "I have to be just like my brother" mode these days. Okay, fine. I got the costumes a bit big, so we can layer 'em up underneath. One of the joys of growing up in NE is that it could be 70 degrees (F) on Halloween, or it could be literally freezing. I asked them if they wanted me to make them each a hat and scarf...for some reason, I thought that would be really cute - little skeletons with hand-knits. Cute, right? They both said yes, and DS1 picked RED and DS2 picked (OF COURSE) green. Green is his favorite color. And has been since before he could talk.

I was out with DS2 at Target, purchasing said skeleton costume, and we hit the Michael's nearby. We ended up with the Wool-ease, which is mostly acrylic with a bit of wool. It's fairly soft and fulfilled my requirements of being cheap, bulky, and available. I got one skein for each kid. This afternoon, I had some time so I started the first hat. I did my usual wing-it method. Recommended needle size is 13s, and it's 9 sts/4". I decided to do 11s, and figured I'd get closer to 10 sts/inch, based on...well, nothing. I just like the number. I measured DS1's head and figured I was shooting for somewhere in the 20" diameter range (his head is 21.5"). I cast-on 50 sts, and got going. I did a twisted rib to start, for 5 or 6 rows, and then switched to stockinette. I knit it until it seemed long enough (based on trying it on his head-gotta love Magic Loop) and then did one round of 2 decreases to get to 48, and then used a 6-pt decrease. I did 1 round of decreases and one round of knitting even. I decreased down to 6 stitches, and then pulled the yarn through. I tried the hat on DS2 and decided to go down 2 stitches for his hat and make it a bit shorter. His hat had 6 rows to the ribbing, 11 rows in the body of the hat, and then the decreases.

I started the first scarf - I am doing a simple garter stitch scarf with a slipped stitch edge, over 10 stitches. Easy easy, and hopefully it'll go quickly with the bulky yarn.

Another quick post.

I did finish one more pattern repeat on my sister's Swallowtail. It's really going to be lovely, and I think it's going to be what she wants - less of a delicate pretty shawl and more of a snuggly "wrap around you and keep warm" shawl. I've been struggling with how many repeats to do of the initial leaf lace pattern and I think I'm going to 12, which should leave me enough yarn to finish the whole thing. I'd like this to be a bigger shawl but I am, of course, limited by how much yarn I actually have. Funny how that works.

This week as been all about settling back into the regular schedule. DS2 started school. He's a kid who doesn't thrive with transitions and has had some separation anxiety issues, so I really wasn't sure how he would do, but he did wonderfully! He had a great time and I'm so glad to get him back with his friends. We also have soccer up and running, both boys are playing. My oldest *loves* it and is actually pretty good, which surprises me a bit given that he had some physical issues. But he has a blast and it's so good for him. Of course, that makes *me* a soccer mom, minivan, purple hair, nose ring and tattoos and all. DS2 had his first practice/game today and was initially resistant but had fun (even if his coach had to hold his hand for a bit out on the field). :) He even scored a goal, which was so cool! DD is just a firecracker, into everything, chattering up a storm. I can't believe how big she's getting. She's so independent! And funny. She and the boys are playing together a lot, especially she and DS2 - I found them rolling a melon at each other the day and laughing hysterically. It was really funny, except for the poor melon.

I've spent the past week looking for a new phone, as my Treo is not doing well. It's three years old (which is what, 60? in people years), and it's hanging in there but since half the time it doesn't answer when someone calls me, well, that's not so good. We're switching carriers which is totally tweaking my loyalty thing, but I'm excited about what's to come. And really, it's a phone, not a marriage. Sometimes I take things too seriously. :)

I swear, I *will* start posting more pictures and knitting content, once I actually have anything to show!!

Still Here!

Just swamped in the minutiae of life with three kids - school has started and the oldest is starting Kindergarten! I am so, so thankful that he missed the cut-off as I am sure we would have agonized over whether to hold him or not, probably would have sent him and I don't think it would have been the right choice. Not simply because he is a boy, though from the research I've read, that's important, but just who he is. He's so ready academically, but he's been ready for years, but socially and in some other ways, having this year to solidify has been so important. He's riding the bus, he seems like such a big boy to me. He also just got glasses and is completely adorable. Son #2 is starting back to preschool next week (FINALLY) and I can't wait! Once we're into our routine, I think I'll have bit more time for knitting. I'm sneaking in a few rows here and there but nothing substantial to report.

It got cooler, and I broke out the socks. I need to get some more pairs finished! I love handknit socks. I also have some very pretty malabrigo slated for another Foliage hat, which I'd like to get done. I have shawls in process that I'd like to finish - especially the one for my sister. Her elderly cat, who has been her baby for 17 years, is dying, and I'd like to send her some comfort.

September?

How did it get to be September??

The rest of the summer has flown by. In part, we've been ridiculously busy the last few weeks. We were away for a week, then the weekend we came back, we rearranged our house and hauled a lot of furniture. Then we had some friends over then another friend came for 3 days with her 10-month-old baby girl. Then we were away over the weekend visiting family (and seeing James Taylor!!) and now we're back. We went down to RI yesterday to hang out with a friend at the beach, and now we're gearing up for DS1's birthday. Friend party tomorrow, family all through the weekend...and then he starts Kindergarten next week! We had the practice bus ride this morning and I will admit I got a bit choked up when the bus pulled out with all those wee folks waving to us. They couldn't see over the seats in front of them! Sometimes he seems to big to me (and he's older for Kindergarten due to the cutoff, which I am so thankful about) but I have to remind myself that he's still just a very little boy and this is a big deal. He's nervous about it, but I'm hopeful it's going to be a great year!

So, while we were in the Berkshires, I knit a sock. :) Just an ankle sock but still a sock! I used the leftovers from my Branching Out (and I'm going to be cutting it verrrrrry fine to squeeze the second one out of what's left!). I cast on in the car on the way out and bound off the day after we got home. So, it's STR, I can't remember if it's light or medium weight (lemme look at the other skeins...lightweight), toe-up, 60 sts and a 1x1 ribbed short ankle. It didn't pool weirdly at all and it's so pretty!! It knit up really nice and quickly and if I didn't live somewhere with serious, serious winter, I'd make all my socks ankle socks because it's really nice to turn the heel and think "wow, I'm going to be binding off in eight rows!"so

Now I just need some new shoes for the fall, to show off my socks! Keen replaced my warped Calistogas with new Calistogas...which warped again!! And the glue that holds the toe to the shoe leather leaked, and I can't get it cleaned up. I think Calistogas are just not in the cards for me...we'll see if they replace these. I love Keens, but this one style just doesn't work. Which is a bummer because they're perfect for showing off handknit socks.

Of course, in order to show off all these alleged socks, I need to actually finish some PAIRS. Yes, socks come in pairs. I know, it's shocking, but it's true. So, this means you have to KNIT TWO OF EACH KIND OF SOCK YOU WANT TO WEAR. Can you believe it? I apparently couldn't because I've now got four or five single socks hanging out, waiting for mates. Need to get on that.

Oh My Aching Back!!

We got home from VT on Friday and decided to rearrange the house. What we thought would be a half-day project took, of course, the entire weekend and we're not done yet. We moved downstairs to the master bedroom, moved the kids into the other bedroom and moved the office upstairs into the huge room that is now the office/playroom. I think I'll just call it the multipurpose room. We've got some very heavy furniture and wow, does my back hurt! I'm sort of worried I reinjured the thing I did where I couldn't move for two days, so I'm lying down now, taking it easy. Part of the urgency is that my roommate from college is coming to visit for a couple of days and I need somewhere for her and her 10-month old to sleep. I think I've achieved that! I've also boxed up some stuff that was on top of our wardrobe and dressers and I'm just going to stick it in storage. Why is there a category of stuff that you don't want out but don't want to throw away? Sometimes my mind doesn't make sense to me.

I'm also deep into "getting rid of baby stuff" mode. I just gave away all my maternity clothes, and all my baby boy stuff, and I've got the baby girl stuff going away soon. I can't believe my "baby" is such a big girl now, walking, starting to talk, throwing tantrums with the best of 'em! I am sure there will always be a tiny (or maybe even not so tiny) part of me that will want more, but it feels good to know we're done. I am so grateful and thankful every day for our blessings, even when they drive me crazy!

So, that's all the news here. No knitting happening. I am hoping to get motivated to organize all my knitting stuff. I got some bins for it, so let's see if it happens.

You're just going to have to trust me.

I have been knitting! My camera won't talk to my laptop (laptop too old? camera too new?), so I can't put any pictures up. But it's true, I have been.

I'm on vacation in lovely VT, land of glorious sunsets, rolling hills, and a mosquito army that is apparently poised to take over the world., We're having a lovely time but it's a skosh itchy.

So anyway. I managed to knit the entire drive up, and finished a simple vanilla sock! I also started (in my head) a screen play for short film about a woman who marries a skein of Koigu, but that's a different post. I've done a couple of pattern repeats on my Swallowtail and decided I'm going to do 12 instead of 14, because I think if I do 14, it'll be the Swallowtail That Swallowed My Sister, and that would be no good.

I also started another sock, because I need some mindless knitting. More basic toe-up, magic looping goodness. Why no, it's not the mate for the sock I just finished, what a funny thought!!

I've also been hiking, swimming, and did a brief drive-by an alpaca farm but (a) the store was closed and (b) it was apparently the breeding ground for the Mosquito Army and we were driven out.

Now I want alpacas though.

Size Matters

In which I ramble my thought process onto the page...

So I've been knitting pretty monogamously on my sister's Swallowtail shawl, but I've got a conundrum, which is the size issue. The pattern calls for 612 yards of DK/sport-weight yarn to get a blocked shawl size of 64" across. I've got about 600 yards of what Ravelry calls an aran/worsted weight yarn. 64" across is pretty big, so I think it would be okay if the final product were smaller. I've done 8 pattern repeats of the Budding Lace, and I'm just about through the first ball of yarn. I have estimated the width at about 26" so far. I The pattern calls for 14 lace repeats. I'm worried that I won't have enough yarn. I'm not going to do the nupps because it's a mini-bouclé and I don't think they'll show up. I just have no idea how much, if at all, the final product is going to grow due to blocking. Some might have done a swatch and blocked to learn that information, but me? No. No, I didn't. So here I am, knitting away, hoping that I don't run out of yarn.

Okay, I just did some math with my lovely, lovely spreadsheet. I've completed3,903 stitches out of 19,550 (pattern as written). That is 19.96%, which looks very close to 1/5th so theoretically, I should have enough yarn.

Of course, you know what they say: In theory, there's no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is.

It's all in how you think about it.

Yesterday we spent the entire day at the celebration of a friend's mother's wedding. It was a lovely day, beautiful weather, lots of love and joy in the air. It was also very, very social, and I think we're a family of introverts (even me! This would surprise most people who know me), so we were all left a bit tired. Today, the boys were just Not Listening to me. I'd tell them to stop doing something, they'd do it again. I'd tell one boy to knock it off, the other would then do the exact same thing. We were out on a walk and I ended up taking the boys home because of this, while DH took the girl off to poke sticks in the lake (a favorite pastime of most of the family). Instead of staying angry, or just tuning out, I decided that we needed a little running around, so I got out the cones and the soccer ball, and we played a soccer/tackle/rolling down the lawn game for the next hour, that left us all laughing and breathless. It was a powerful reminder to me that so much of life is truly what I make of it. I have been very influenced by Viktor Frankl's work (probably time to go reread it, actually!) and it's useful to remember that I have a great deal of control over how I experience my life.

And on to the knitting!

I got a chance to do some knitting, and I actually took a picture! My sister, when I told her that I'm currently obsessed with knitting shawls, asked if I'd be willing to make one for her. I immediately got excited, and did a little stash-diving to come up with this! The yarn is some yarn that my mom found for me at the local second-hand store: The yarn is Madil Rebus in sapphire. The pattern is Swallowtail and I'm knitting it on size 8s. Since the yarn is listed as a bulky weight, I'm sort of winging it on size. I've got 5 skeins (600 yards), which I am hoping is enough to give me a good-sized shawl. I really wasn't sure this yarn would work with a lace pattern, because it's a mini-boucle, but it actually really works nicely, in my opinion. It also just feels so soft and velvety! I think this will be a lovely, warm, but lightweight shawl. I'm interested to see how it blocks, with the nylon content that it has. It looks like it will felt, so I'm hoping to spit-splice the skeins and have fewer ends to deal with. I've done 7 pattern repeats, and am about to do a couple more. I haven't decided if I'm going to do the nupps or not, since it is a bigger and fuzzier wool, I'm not sure if they'd look good or not. I'll decide when I get there! Mainly I just have to figure out how many pattern repeats to do! And yes, I am using lifelines.

And in other news, my SIL asked if she could "hire" me to make my niece a cardigan! On the one hand, wow! I got really excited...on the other hand, I am not sure my skills (especially my buttonhole skills!) are really good enough to do something that she could actually wear. Scary!!

FO: Falling Leaves Lace Socks

(subtitled OH MY G*D, I FINALLY FINISHED THEM!!!)

So, I apparently started the socks in August of 2007. So yes, that's two years. I recently got re-energized on them, and today I actually finished them! Remember that whole thing of "three major errors is my threshold and then I need to rip and redo"? Well, apparently it's context-dependent, and when the context is that it's something that's hung out on the needles for two years and I'm 12 rows from done, and it's socks so the error(s) will be hidden under my pants leg, then I don't rip and redo. Just saying.

So, anyway. Here they are!


















Pattern: Knitty's Falling Leaves Lace Socks
Yarn: Tofutsies in 729 (according to Ravelry, the ball band is loooong gone)
Needles: KPs fixed circs in 2.5
Pattern Mods: none really. Used Judy's Magic Cast-On, a double-wrapped, short-row and did 2x2 ribbing instead of 1x1.

Thoughts: First, this yarn, while pretty, was annoying. It's splitty and the repeats are a bit too long for this pattern, leading to interesting pooling.


















As you can see in this image, they both pooled, but quite differently, and it's actually a great illustration of the impact of knitting tension. The sock of the right (labeled first sock completed) was, um, the first sock I knit. Apparently I finished this in October of 2007. If I recall correctly, I was a bit stressed out. I was newly pregnant with my daughter, and we were seriously house hunting and planning on moving. So, I knit quite tightly. The spiral is thicker on the foot of the second sock, started definitely after we moved, though I can't find a date. I was clearly more relaxed. I apparently got a little too relaxed around the heel and ankle, so I started deliberately tightening up my knitting to get the spiral back. So, it's fine, I'll wear them, of course, and I'm thrilled that they're done, but I think this was not the right yarn for this pattern. How the yarn stripped on the heel was really pretty and it if had done this over all of them, I'd like them better.

It's funny, I'm such a control-freak, but I *love* variegated yarn and the total unpredictability of the outcome. It's good for me. :)

I still have too many things on needles and I'm feeling really psyched to get some things done!

Did you hear that thud??

That was me, falling off the yarn diet wagon with a resounding thud. You may have heard it? You know it's bad when you're gathering your new purchases to photograph them and think "waaait just a minute, wasn't there a whole 'nother box around here somewhere??"

So yes. I have purchased yarn. A lot of it. Well, a lot for me. And now, reallytrulyseriously I have to stop because, well, I just don't have that much time to knit!! And this pretty much blows my allowance for a while too.

First up, we have the Knit Picks order:

Here we have the Essential sock yarn (now called Stroll) in Meadow. You know, I read the description of this colorway, but in the picture on my monitor, the brown looks more greenish, but it's really...BROWN. We'll see, I'm undecided about this.














Next up is Stroll in Pansy Multi. Purples, it's very pretty, what can I say. I love purple. This will probably be a basic stockinette sock.



















After this, we have the Stroll Handpainted, in Make Believe. This is gorgeous! I have three skeins because I was pondering a lace shawl of some sort, but I'm a bit concerned it'll be too busy. I guess I might *gasp* have to swatch. Not sure what pattern, maybe a Swallowtail? And really, it's a handpainted, superwash sock yarn with Nylon in it! I don't know if this is the same base as the Felici self-striping, but the socks I made from that line have worn really well so far, and I do love being able to toss them into the wash as needed.

Also in this order I got a replacement Options cable (for the one the cat chewed on) and some more locking stitch markers because I'm running low.



Then we have the Simply Sock Yarns order. I was a bit frustrated with how long it took to get this until I read the blog wherein they mentioned that they were on vacation! So, once I knew that, no worries and they shipped immediately upon return. First, the Ty Dy Sock Yarn from Knit One, Crochet Too, in Blue Pansy. What can I say, I'm a follower. It's totally "my" colors, and will be some sort of simple sock. I need to do some Rav surfing to see what other people have done. (Ooo, just found a gorgeous sock in the same colorway, I may have to do it!)
















Then we have the gorgeous Dream in Color Starry in Midnight Derby! It's *much* darker than on their website, but on the Simply Sock Yarns website, it's a bit more accurate. There are color shifts in there, but they're more subtle. But, the main reason I wanted a darker yarn was that the silver fibers just really pop! This is destined to be shawl of some sort.



















And then we have the huge, terrible splurge from ColorSong Yarn. Hand Maiden Sea Silk. More of it than one slow knitter should have. I just fell in love with the Lily Pond colorway, so I actually bought two skeins of that. I don't know what pattern it will be, but a shawl of some sort, most likely. And then, they had the 150g balls. So I got one in the Renaissance colorway, which I think will be a Gail. This yarn is gorgeous, just gorgeous.





























I was feeling pretty seriously guilty about all this, but you know, it's not like I really have any other vices left to me! I do love yarn, I really do.

The Simple Things

There's a song I really love (exposing my adoration of cheesy music) by a guy named Jim Brickman. Most of his stuff is sort of new-age, instrumental, George Winston-esque piano, but he's got one song that has been in my head all day. Here's a sample from it:

So here we go,
Let’s just dance,
Teach my soul to take this chance,
Put my heart, in your hands.

Out of all the moments that,
We leave behind,
Turn around and tell me,
Baby we’ll remember.

The thunder and the rain,
The way you say my name,
After all the clouds go by,
The simple things remain,
The sun, the moon, the stars,
The beating of two hearts,
How I love the way the simple things,
The simple things just are.

I think it's on my mind because I've had a day just filled with simple moments of joy.

• Breakfast with one of my dearest friends and her son (who is, of course, my daughter's future husband).
• Some time home alone with my girl, just playing. She adores me right now, and I'm trying to soak it up because I know (a) it won't last and (b) she's the last one. The older they get, the more complex the relationship gets. We've been having all these moments lately where she looks up and connects with me and just lights up, and gives me a giant, sloppy kiss. Pure love, what an amazing gift.
• Time playing Lego with the boys while the girl slept, just listening to their imaginative play and chatter.
• Time knitting - I got re-engergized on my Falling Leaves Lace Sock! It's sock #2, and I started the pair in, oh my, August of 2007! For some reason I just have been dragging my feet. I don't love the yarn, but it's bothering me less right now than it did. They're so pretty, and I am almost done turning the heel, and then I have 7 pattern repeats to go and the ribbing and the pair is done! (I am totally laughing because I am doing colorway 726, AKA "Put One Foot in Front of the Other"!)
• A gorgeous moment this afternoon, at the farm where we pick up our CSA produce. We always pick up the veggies, put them in the car, and then go visit the goats, the chickens and the bunnies(in that order). Today we also took a walk out by the pond. My daughter was walking next to me, holding on to my finger (did I mention, since Friday, she is *totally* a walker now!), the boys were running and playing and chattering, the sun was so warm, it smelled like sweet hay, and it was just a moment where all was *right* in my world. The only way it could have been better is if my husband had been with me too.
• We had a delicious dinner: steak (from our meat CSA, so local and humanely raised); fresh, local corn; fresh local greens for the salad; and mac'n'cheese (always a hit in our household).
• Another wonderful moment, when I was taking out the recycling. Our lot slopes up to the road, so I was hauling stuff up the hill, smelling the summer evening, and feeling the earth beneath my feet. I try to be open in the present moment as much as I can, but it's so easy to get lost in all the things I "have" to do.

This isn't to say that I'm somehow calm and zen and happy all the time. I live with an anxiety monologue in my head that can make me crazy if I'm not careful, not to mention all the regular worries of an ordinary life (Did I pay all the bills? Why does my sink smell so bad? What *are* we going to have for dinner? Oh crap, the deadline for soccer registration is tomorrow!). There are also always larger concerns in any life of substance. But, I believe I have some choice, a lot of choice, actually, as to how much power I give those worries.

Ultimately, all I have, all any of us has, is this moment right now. Sometimes those moments are painful, or scary, or sad, or lonely, but often, far more often than I pay attention to, those moments are just simply beautiful.

Knitting and Math

Now, I really like math, I always have. I never got far enough along for it to get messy, and I just always enjoyed the fact that there were right answers, and they could be worked out. I loved equations, I adored geometry. Calculus was where I met my Waterloo but up until then, I loved it. It's odd, given my love of black&white thinking, that I ended up in Philosophy and Psychology, both areas known for fuzziness.

(Total tangent, I've been reading a bit on the whole issue of illiteracy in the US, and I'm wondering if math illiteracy is also an issue. Is that even the right term? Not quite the right term, but yup, it's an issue. Thanks, Google!)

Anyway, so I love to read and I love math. And statistics.

So, I'm knitting on my Forest Canopy shawl, and looking at the pattern, which calls for 8 pattern repeats. I'm knitting a large gauge yarn on smaller needles (god, will you just stop with the whole SWATCH thing already!!!), which is looking nice, I think, but really, I'm already halfway through the 5th pattern repeat, and this thing is nowhere near shawl size. It's not even napkin size, should you, you know, want a wool/silk blend, lace, hand-wash-only napkin, which I'm not saying you would, but it takes all kinds, people, it really does. Wait, what was I saying? Oh yes, it's not big enough. I also don't appear to have used a whole lot of my 100g ball of yarn. Given that it's a triangular shawl, knit...well, how to describe it if you haven't done one, it's knit out from the center of the long side. So, you're increasing every other row for a bunch of rows (20 stitches per pattern repeat of 8 rows). So I was pondering how to figure out how much yarn I might be using.

So, I created a spreadsheet. Ahh, the noble spreadsheet.

I figured out how many rows the pattern calls for (this is just for the increases section, not the scalloped edging, I'll fudge that calculation later), and put those in, and figure out how many stitches you're doing on each row. Then I look at how many rows I'd already done, and weighed my ball to see how much I've used. (Caveat, I didn't weigh the ball to start with, so I don't know if I started exactly at 100 g or not. Which may make all my calculations way off.) Then I summed stitches completed (2974), and divided the weight I'd used (100-the weight of the ball, or 3 g) by the stitches I'd done, giving me, I think, a grams per stitch calculation. Just FYI, it's 0.0010.

Then I summed the total number of stitches for the lace body as the pattern is written (9706) and multiplied it by my grams per stitch variable, giving me just under 10 g for 8 pattern repeats. This seems low, so I'll be interested to see what it comes out to be! It is interesting to me that while I'm just over halfway through the lace repeats, I've done about less than a third of the pattern stitches.

This means, obviously, that I'm going to be doing far more pattern repeats than the pattern calls for. Which is so not a problem, but I was all psyched to get this thing done, and it's not going to happen that quickly.

And, since I'm home with one baby sleeping and two boys off at Machines Camp, I'm going to go knit on the thing right now! I *should* be doing housework, but knitting and math are way more fun.

Proof that I'm doing *something*

Well, I guess TECHNICALLY it isn't proof that *I'm* knitting, just proof that someone has started a Forest Canopy Shawl. This is being knit in a fingering weight yarn, purchased from the Vermont Yarn Company, and it's one of their yarns, hand-dyed. I can't find the tag, but I believe it's a wool/silk blend, with 2% silver fibers. I wish the silver showed up more, it's very subtle but really pretty. I don't think you can see it all in these pictures. The color remind me of the twilight sky.

I am trying to get better at the double decreases (sl1, k2tog, psso), because when I pass the slipped stitch, I tend to pull it a bit, and it gets loopier, and thus more noticeable than I like.














And as you may have noticed, I am using lifelines. :)

Hubris

I am a researcher. Whether it's psychology, child birth, diaper bags, strollers, yarn, or whatever, if I am caught by something, I like to learn a lot (A LOT) about it. I love to share what I've learned, but I also just like knowing things. So, having gotten caught up by lace, I've done some reading, books and blogs and whatnot, about the process, other people's projects, etc.

The hallmark of hubris is a presumptive pride, and let me tell you how mine went. "The pattern's not that hard...I'll be REALLY careful...I can do this...I DON'T NEED A LIFELINE."

Ha. HA.

I ripped out the 7 pattern repeats I'd done on the Swallowtail shawl for a mistake that I cannot for the life of me figure out. I finished the pattern repeats with the correct number of stitches, I did Row 1 of the next repeat correctly (verified about 8 times) and yet...I had the wrong number of stitches. Perhaps it's the fact that I did something horrible to my back yesterday that resulted in hours of lying on the floor weeping from pain (that's actually not an exaggeration, sadly), but my morale was low, and I frogged it.

*sigh* I decided to do the Forest Canopy Shawl instead, as that is listed as a good beginner project, and I *am* a lace beginner (however many lace socks I've knit notwithstanding). It's very pretty, and I've already got my first lifeline in. I'm using unwaxed dental floss and the clever clever hole in the KnitPicks Options needle to pull it through.

In other news, I finished Wicked Monkey #1 and it's very pretty.

It's funny, I really like variegated yarn in lace, but when I linked to some yarn I was interested in in another forum, one (very experienced) knitter raised the opinion that the yarn was "too busy" for lace (and clearly owned it as her own opinion). I thought it would work. I am doing Branching Out in STR, (this, to be specific) and I think it looks nice. I don't know, now I'm second guessing myself.

Willpower is overrated.

Isn't it?

*sigh*

Back on the yarn diet tomorrow...

Things I am Interested In

People who know me, know I could be described as a bit obsessional and controlling a planner. I like to think about what I might do, I like to look at yarn...I am pondering some purchases (which I should NOT be making).

So, let's see what's on the radar right now.

A friend *cough*ROBIN*cough* has me convinced I need this yarn, in this colorway: Knit One Crochet One Ty-Dy Sock in Blue Pansy.

I am knitting with a local version of Dream in Color's Starry, and I *love* it. I want to do a darker colorway because I think the silver will really pop. I'm pondering another triangular shawl (you know, because I've already finished the one I'm worki...oh wait, no I haven't). But I'm thinking about the Forest Canopy Shawl maybe. Either in a dark blue or green colorway. Pretty, right?

I am also thinking about doing Gail in Handmaiden Sea Silk, maybe in Lily Pond or Renaissance (if I can find it anywhere).

Hmm, apparently I have become obsessed with knitting shawls. I think a shawl (or three) would be really useful for me to have around the house this winter, as we like to keep the heat low, and I don't actually own a ton of sweaters (odd, I know, I live in New England). I love being wrapped up in a blanket, and really, what is a shawl but a blanket sized for mobility?

I still laugh at how emphatic I was that I would not, never, no way no how, want to knit lace, and now....well, that's all I want to knit!

I'm also pondering Rona (in Iris Heather) and Janet (as shown, I love that color) from KnitPicks. And, they've got some new sock yarn colors that are nice too.

Hi, I'm Knitting with a Purpose, and I am addicted to sock yarn.

There's a lot of muttering in knitting lace.

For me, at least. I have to mutter the pattern aloud so that I don't lose my place or forget things like a YO or a K1. And since I'm either sneaking some knitting in while on kid duty or knitting after the kids go to be (i.e. when I'm in an exhausted daze), I need all the help I can get.

Someone, please stop me before I order some of this. Look at how pretty the pansy is! Pansies were my wedding flower! I have pansies tattooed on my back! *sigh* I'm broke.

I am very very tired. We had two very sick little boys yesterday who recovered enough to have energy today, but not enough to do anything (and we were still in quarantine anyway). And the baby got me up at 5:30, which is too damn early. Good thing she's cute.

And, I am completely ashamed to report that in the midst of a bounty of wonderful produce and delicious meat, tonight's dinner was canned baked beans, hot dogs and frozen garlic bread.

Wait, what's that??

It appears to be my knitting mojo! Not embracing me completely, mind you, simply putting in a bit of an appearance.

Part of the circumstances leading to some actual knitting happening are that both of my boys are SICK. They've got some crappy (and hopefully short-lived) virus that has knocked them out with HIGH fevers, and each one has had one random barfing episode (SO FUN). So today was spent entertaining the baby while bringing them ice water and letting them watch the most consecutive hours of TV they have ever watched. They watched more TV today than they've watched in the last 4 months, seriously. We're not usually a big TV family, but today was one of those "do what you gotta do to get through." I'm swimming in a triathlon on Sunday as part of a team, so I'm praying I don't get it. But anyway, I had some actual time while the baby was napping.

And I had some repair to do. SOMEONE who shall remain nameless (mainly because I don't know which kitten it was) pulled a sock-in-progress out of my bag and CHEWED THE YARN THROUGH! ARGH!! It's my KP Imagination in Wicked Monkey sock. I *love* this yarn. So I sat down to fix it in my own fairly half-@ssed way. It's superwash so you can't spit splice it, so I just tied a tiny knot and hoped it would land more on the side of the sock. Which it didn't, hopefully it won't be really uncomfortable under my foot. But, I'd rather have the knot there then in the lace work on the top of the foot. So, I actually managed to complete a couple more lace repeats, and I think I have about 4 more before I'll start the toe. Which makes me very happy. This sock is going to fit me very snuggly but it should work.

Then I pulled out my Koigu stockinette sock and swooned over the yarn a bit, and then knit about 15 rows. I decided to decrease it down 2 stitches as it felt like it was going to be loose. (Gague? Huh? What?) This is another one of these socks where I just increase until it sort of looks right.

Yesterday I also managed an entire lace pattern repeat (it's only 6 rows) on the Swallowtail shawl. This is so, so pretty. I'm struggling with my higher nature on this project, in terms of keeping it versus gifting it.

AND I also got Branching Out going again. I'd say it's close to half done, it really doesn't need to be that long as it's a decorative scraf, not a 6-foot-keep-me-warm-in-the-depths-of-Massachusetts-winter scarf. Also, so, so pretty.

So there you go, I'm knitting a bit. It makes me happy.

Blog Name Not So Accurate

...at the moment, anyway. I'm not doing much knitting at all, either with a purpose or without one. It's summer, it finally got warm, I have three kids. Yeah, yeah, same old same old. It does hit me sometimes, holy cowzels (a phrase of my son's), I have THREE kids! That's a lot of kids. Thankfully they're awesome. Have you ever noticed that all bloggers' kids are (a) awesome and (b) brilliant? Heh.

I will say that I'm enjoying July a lot more than June. At this moment in time, everyone seems healthy (knock wood, it won't last). Older son's bone thing was nothing. Younger son's tummy thing is NOT celiac (don't know what it is but it's not celiac). We're really busy, which seems odd, because it is summer, but we're having fun. The last couple of weeks have been hit or miss with weather (miss, really), but we've had a couple of good days. Today being one of them - it's GORGEOUS out there. We spent the entire morning at the beach. Both boys actually enjoyed their swim lessons - hey, how odd, when it's warmer than 60 degrees, they like it better! Then we just hung out for the rest of the morning! We came home for DD's nap and now we're heading back to the beach, to meet up with more friends and have dinner there. The local pizza place delivers to the beach, how awesome is that?

I'd love to get more knitting done...but somehow, when it's hot, I'm just less in the mood.

Summer is here!!

After something like 30 straight days of rain, we've finally had some wonderful summer days! This weekend, my DH and I were able to go out for dinner ALONE together! The place was even BYOB so we had a lovely wine for a reasonable price. It was so wonderful just to sit and be together, and remember why it was we wanted to get married NINE years ago! He's the best. We had a nice long weekend filled with some productive stuff (finally weeded the front gardens, which desperately needed it!), some lounging around, and some fun family stuff. AND, I got some swimming in! I'm doing the Appleman Triathlon with two friends, and I'm the swimmer. I finally got in the lake and did the course, and I'm quite pleased with how it's going. The race in is less than two weeks. Of course my gym membership expired Saturday so I have to decide if I'm going to re-up or not. I probably will, it's cheap and close and has babysitting. But for now, I'm swimming. Today was gorgeous, and we spent the whole morning at the lake, and then the afternoon at a friend's house for swimming lessons. I am *exhausted* now. But happy.

Knitting has been, well, um, you know, not so much going on there. I started YET ANOTHER sock, because I needed a plain stockinette project for knitting group (that's my story and I'm sticking to it) and I just couldn't face the Mini Mochi yet. So I pulled out some Koigu. Ahhhh, Koigu, how I love thee. It's just so pretty! I also did a little more (like, two rows) on my Swallowtail but made the mistake of leaving it out on the couch. Did I mention we have kittens? Thankfully they didn't pull it off the needles, but SOMEONE chewed on my KP Options cord, so it's no longer usable!!

I think I may go do a little knitting right now! Though honestly, given how tired I am, I'll probably just go nap on the couch until it's time for bed.

Darn computer!

I had a whole long post going but my computer froze up and WHOOSH! It was gone. I was a bit demoralized, so I took a day to recover my strength and try again. Ha ha.

So much is going on, I cannot believe it's July on Wednesday, not to mention my 9th wedding anniversary!

In the knitting part of my life...I finished the knitting that had been giving me so much trouble. Clearly it's not a pattern I am meant to do, as each part was just FRAUGHT with difficulty. I couldn't get gauge, I couldn't keep track of my rows, apparently I forgot how to read in English, which is not only my native language, it's my only language...really, it was just bad. It's a gift, so I tried to imbue the project with love (you know, in between curses), but mainly I'm thankful it's done. It's also clear to me that knitting on a deadline is just not a good practice for me. It's odd, because as much of a confrontation-phobe as I am, I also really don't like being told what to do...even when I am the one doing the telling!! It's a problem. Anyway, it's done and in time, to gauge. More details when I can reveal them.

Now, while I was up in VT, I got to spend some time at a lovely LYS. I know, I know, I'm on a yarn diet! Except that I have no will-power. Some gorgeous purple Malabrigo came home with me (she had FOUR DIFFERENT SHADES OF PURPLE, oh my god, I thought I had died (dyed?) and gone to heaven but even I couldn't justify FOUR skeins!). And, she had some hand-dyed sock yarn in a base that must be similar to this, but dyed by her, in gorgeous light and dark blues and a bit of purple. It's so pretty, it reminds me of an evening sunset with the stars just starting to shine! I finished the above-mentioned project and immediately cast on a Swallowtail with this. I'm knitting it on size 5s, and I think it really works. I am just praying there's enough yarn. I have 420 yars, and I'm planning more of a scarf than a shawl. I've still got several socks in flight, and recently when cleaning my desk, I came across my Branching Out. *blush* And another lace project. I have entirely too many lace projects in flight, and not enough brain cells to complete any of them!

In non-knitting life...well, WHOA. I just feel like my head is spinning! We had our New England tour last week, which went very well, considering the potential for it to, well, not. We spent time with my family, we spent time with my husband's family. We're working with our oldest, who is quite social but is truly an introvert and needs alone time to recharge, on figuring out how to learn his internal cues so he can get what he needs without having to act out to get it. So there were some moments of challenge there. We're now back home. This morning was my older son's appointment at Children's in Boston to make sure that the bone anomoly thing really is just nothing and not some horrible SOMETHING. It's nothing. :) It was about a 5 minute appointment, where the doctor basically said "It's nothing, a variant of normal, don't come back, don't let the door hit you on the bum as you leave." My *favorite* kind of appointment! I slept very poorly last night, envisioning way too many "what ifs." Then, my husband suggested that DS1 and I have date day, so we did! We went to the Aquarium, had lunch out, and then rode the T for a very long time. Funnily enough, we ran into a good friend on the Green line! We stopped in Porter Square for some vitamins and then went home. I am exhausted!

Tomorrow begins our regular "hang out at the beach" part of the summer. We always see lots of friends there, so that'll be fun. Let's home the weather cooperates!

It is what it is.

So, one of the things that knitting does for me is that it gives me a lot of practice in facing reality. As I said to my lovely husband, it's hard to lie to yourself with knitting. You've either done it correctly, or you haven't. It's either 5 inches, or it isn't. You've either done the yarn over, or you've forgotten it. Now, an error doesn't necessarily mean a do-over. I can compensate for some errors. Not all, of course. As I've mentioned before, I do have my error threshold, and once I pass it, I need to redo or I'm just not going to be happy with the finished product. But, the thing is what it is.

This is very good practice for life. At the conference I went to in May, with the Dalai Lama, there was discussion about compassion and wisdom, as if they are the two wings of a bird. Without both, you can't fly. Wisdom in the Buddhist tradition, as I understand it, is related to seeing things as they actually are. For me, this is not always easy, as the world is often other than how I wish it were. Knitting allows me a wonderful practice in facing things are they are.

And now I have to reknit the damn project because a 1/2 inch too big is a 1/2 inch too big.

Cursed Knitting

I am working on a project that I can't really blog the details about, but I will say that I am cursed. It's something that's being knit with great love, and yet, as they say, love can only take you so far. It turns out skill counts for something too.

In this latest case, I managed to do the pattern just fine, this was an easy one, but somehow ignored the fact that my piece was a 1/2" too wide. That's a lot. I was just about DONE and ripped it out. *sigh* I need to get this done, and done right.

Other than that...we're on the mend here. We're fairly sure that DS2 does not have celiac, though we're waiting on lab results. We're fairly sure that DS1 does not have bone cancer, though we're waiting on our specialist appointment (the fact that we're not in as an urgent appointment is deeply, deeply comforting to me). We're mourning our sweet kitty, it's true. It's interesting though, while I have moments of intense sadness and grief (after all, she was my family for 15 years), I'm also realizing how hard it's been to see her failing for so long, and how worried we've really been. I am sad she's gone but I am so, so thankful that we made the call when we did. I think we could have made it without guilt a couple of months ago, but I don't think we could have gone much longer. She died still herself, not in pain.

I told my wonderful husband that "the universe will tell us when it's the right time to welcome some new kitties into the house." Two days later, our very good friends and neighbors rescued some kittens and were seeking homes for them. Hmm. I think that's the universe saying NOW!!! NOW!! So we leaped and now have two adorable little boys living with us!

Yes, it makes life more complex, more chaotic, more messy in all senses, to be sure. But really, isn't it the complexity and chaos that makes life so vibrant and so damn interesting?

Kittens!

It's been a hard week.

My oldest son got bitten by dog this week. In addition, he's got some GI stuff going on and had an x-ray, during the reading of which something "weird" was discovered on one of his bones. We're pretty sure it's not something horrible, but we'll be following up with Children's Hospital next week. My other son is having a minor surgical procedure this week, to test him for Celiac disease, but the procedure involves general anesthetic. And then, we had our amazing wonderful kitty, Miss L, put to sleep yesterday.

I'm not enjoying June so much yet.

Sock Wear

So, I posted on the LJ Sock Knitters group about my frustrations with my socks wearing out and got some interesting feedback.

1. Apparently, 8 stitches per inch (which seems fairly standard in sock patterns) is, according to one commenter, way too loose, and will not result in a dense-enough fabric that will wear well. Hmm. Sadly, I like the 8 sts per inch fabric so I don't think I'm going to totally change what gauge I am knitting at (nice grammar there, KWAP).

2. Pure merino wears out more quickly than yarn with nylon in it. Yes, I knew this, and the socks that are starting to wear are not pure merino, they're knit with Felici, which is 25% nylon.

3. Perhaps your shoes are too tight? Hmm. This might make sense. I've been wearing my Calistogas a lot, and they do rub more on the heel. In addition, I believe that my three pregnancies may have transformed my dainty, elf-like feet into something a tad...larger. Thank god I've gotten over the vanity thing and now I'm pretty much mainly about comfort. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm still about the cute shoes, but just in a larger size.

My thought is that perhaps these Calistogas aren't the perfect shoe for me, especially in this size. (These brown ones are the replacements for my black ones that got all hoarked - I don't think I blogged about it here, but Keen's customer service ROCKS.) Perhaps I need some new shoes? I think I'm going to get these in the fall, in Soy. I think they're really cute, and I think I like them better than the slide version of the Calistogas. I like the ballet flats too, but they may have that heel issue. (I also love these, but I'm not sure they really GO with handmade socks, you know?) I'm also interested in these and these, but I think I'd have to see them in person and on before deciding. It's funny, I'm not really a SHOE person, you know? I tend to have two pairs (one brown, one black) that I wear all the time, and that's about it. I am in love with those slides though...I just wonder if they'll be warm enough in NE in the Fall.

All this to say, I did finish the Mini Mochi sock, did I tell you all that (you know, all five people who read this blog! ;) I'm trying to plug away on some other projects but it's tough when you're tired. I am sick of the Mini Mochi yarn, so I may start another vanilla sock out of something not so...annoying, before I come back and finish it. We'll see.

It is almost summer!!!

We've been so busy here, it's crazy! Between school, friends, social stuff, and just life, I feel like time is FLYING. My oldest heads off to Kindergarten in the fall, so they're talking about it A LOT at school and I think he's feeling a bit anxious. He missed our K cutoff by a week, and I have to say that I am so happy about it. I think for him in particular, being one of the oldest is such a good thing. I am so glad that we didn't have to make the call, because it would have been a tough one. I can't believe I'm going to have a kid in real school! Amazing.

I have been doing some knitting. I did a few rows on the Falling Leaves sock. I finished the leg of the Mini Mochi sock. I am so not happy with how that is going. I did a sewn bind-off, which is what I usually do for toe-up socks and it did NOT play well with the yarn. Because the yarn has almost no twist, it's not strong enough to the sewing, and it BROKE, THREE TIMES. And since it's superwash, it (of course) doesn't spit-splice. I was so annoyed and frustrated that I ended up just knotting it. Annoying. Then I totally screwed up the picking up the stitches for the heel. I somehow managed to hook the loop from one side onto the needle (no idea how I did this, or even really what I did), so I had to end up SNIPPING it and knotting it. It's noticeable and I am not happy. I also somehow ended up with way too many stitches. Which is fine, I can use a bit of width there, as I also made this just a bit too snug (I should have done one more round of increases), but all in all, it's made me annoyed with the sock. It'll be wearable and the front is pretty but still. *I* know about the errors. Not my best effort, by far.

I've got a couple of other projects too, which I'm not feeling up to blogging about, so suffice to say, I've got a lot to do.

AND, a FB friend posted a picture of an adorable dress she made for her daughter and now I am totally wanting to sew for my daughter, so I'm in the middle of some sewing too.