SSNB Knitter's Digest 7/31/07

F was without a shrug. She had a hat. Evidently the shrug pattern said cast off loosely, but she didn't cast off loosely enough. So she's giving the cast off another go. Almost there. T was learning stockinette. It was going to be reported that K was working on socks, but these were not just socks; they were dimpled lace eyelet with picot edging. They will make a formidable pair. L had completed 6 inches on her skirt which is long enough for today's fashion needs. She'll keep lengthening anyway. N brought a lovely red lace blouse which is the star of the digest and she worked on a lacy cardigan. M worked on one of the many shawls that were supposed to get done in time for air-conditioning. N was learning to crotchet again, and finished a mini-washcloth.

Stitches is coming up so people were talking about how expensive it is, how much booths cost, how much classes cost (but they're pretty good), and how you'll leave with embarrassing amounts of yarn. Various classes on clothes sizing were discussed. N is organizing YarnCon for anyone interested in a booth or what have you, look here. N was able to sneak in a couple of extra rows as her husband got sucked into conversations about dental work, shopping for yarn and shoes. Okra was discussed as potentially overlooked, but in actuality most couldn't deal with its slimy nature. Indian recipes knew how to handle the okra. L had his first lobster in the army and people wondered where the army got the lobsters. K made everyone drool talking about beans and cornbread. Even though the past couple of episodes of Flight of the Conchords weren't very good, there were plenty of good bits to review. N and M tried to show people how the guys kept trying to add wings to flipping the bird so it looked more like a bird. Others were not as entertained by these antics. N snuck in another extra row.

TGIF

Geez. I finally made it through the week and all I have to show for it is a heel flap. My good crab sock kept me company while I was on hold with my evil cell phone company. Is there anything worse than cell phone companies?

Yesterday I was on hold for 50 minutes only to be placed on hold again for 10 minutes for a conversation that lasted 30 seconds. The day before that I was on hold for 40 minutes only to get an operator that sounded like Voltran. I couldn't understand a word. She was speaking fax machine. I had to hang up.

I caught the sock trying to impale the phone and I believe sock is well justified.

Figuring Stuff Out with Stash

I'm thinking I'm some newfound genius for using my terrible stash of age-old acrylic to knit up swatches. Well, they're not really swatches. I tend not to swatch. But I needed to test out some patterns for a new knit rectangle I'm making to replace the knit triangle I lost. (I'm saddened to this very day.) I had two patterns to work with. Both were free, one was here and the other one from the lys. I used my foul stash to test these patterns out and decide on one instead of actually knitting the tests on my yarn of choice. That way, I didn't have to unravel the whole pattern and weaken the yarn before I started.

I selected the bumpy pattern. It actually uses up more yarn than I anticipated so I’ll have to make another trip to the yarn store sometime. (Oh darn, I note sarcastically.) The benefits of my stash busting paid off in that I learned the pattern. I am a mess at four row patterns. Unless the pattern is the essence of elementary, I can never figure out whether I’m on row 2 or row 4. So you can see the errors on my swatch that I figured out by the time I got to the real yarn.

It feels so good to get rid of stash. I've been living with this acrylic for about 20 years. It hails from the days of scrunchy socks. I hate looking at it and I have no idea what keeps me from depositing the whole mess in the garbage. Oh well. At least it’s made itself useful.

SSNB Knitter's Digest 7/17/07

We were back from our hiatus in the kiddie arts room. One walked into the HPAC wondering who are the people in our room this time? Then one looked closely and said, oh sorry, it's the SSNB. N was working on the baby surprise sweater and M was working on her vintage baby sweater. She promises a prompt completion. V was working on a chevron open cardigan/sweater. N finished a tank top and it looked lovely. S worked on a purse and her hat. M worked on the shoji shawl which was likened to cobwebs (as opposed to a shoji screen which it's supposed to resemble). F continued to plug away on her shrug. L worked on a skirt. K worked on the forest canopy shawl.

We discussed how some knitters would like someone to magically appear and knit up their ufos. There was brief contemplation about passing the knit objects around the room to get them finished. With a lace piece, you could probably block out the differences in gauge anyway.

Then we got into some very Chicago topics. Sports and traffic. Everyone complained about the sports traffic. We take greats pains to avoid it due to football games and baseball games. Before and after games the drunken hordes are released to the public which is just not safe or endearing. Some of us chipped in for the stitch n pitch event hoping that we could get seats together. Whether we become a drunken horde is yet to be determined.

L had some competition at her seventies party. Some people wore audacious afros and gold eyelashes. Nobody had the goldfish platforms. It was questioned whether the goldfish platforms really existed or if that was some thing from the movies. N said, "If you were a player, you had the goldfish platforms." Or she said something to that effect.

Until the next digest.

Behold my Booty

I went to the 1K knitters event this past Saturday in search of commotion and camaraderie. I only found the latter. And oh yes, I was also in search of Misti Alpaca (always an ulterior motive). The photo shoot was calm and collected. I was there pretty early 10-ish if I remember correctly. The process was as follows for anyone interested: You sign your release form, you sit down against a white backdrop next to a big light shield, pick up the provided needles and yarn and knit. Franklin, the photographer, asks questions about your life as a knitter while he's taking photos and voila. You're finished. I didn't get my picture taken because the idea of my unedited mug floating about publicly is just too scary. However I left with a sincere admiration for those knitters who were able to plunk themselves down and get photographed nevermind their bad skin or flat hair. (Not that there's anything wrong with that, I'm just providing examples.)

So I lost my mind in the store as I'm wont to do. I got my Misti Alpaca, but then I got sooo much more. I bought some lovely pastel yarn that will make a nice winter hat set. I got bamboo clovers in sizes 4 and 5. I got a couple extra chibis. I got this fascinating sock yarn whose story deserves its own post. Hmm, the list wasn't as long as I thought, but I was well pleased with my purchases.

Gratuitous Pet Pic

SSNB Digest 7/9/07

Here's the project rundown. N worked on socks and a tank top. M was starting a baby sweater from a book of vintage knits she found for $0.50! This was an excellent buy with tons of cute photos and a lot of relevant patterns. And she had Sun Chips. L was crocheting a black hat for a seventies party. F has one more piece of shrug left to knit. M finally got through row four of the shoji shawl.

There are a lot of events on the SSNB calendar. Saturday, we'll be heading out to Arcadia for the 1K knitters commotion. F was telling us how to tilt our heads just so to guarantee a nice photo. Some people will be practicing. However, we're not going to get our pictures taken if there's too much madness from other fame hungry knitters.

Then a lot of us want to attend the Stitch and Pitch event on August 10. People will be bringing the dear husbands. Some of the husbands aren't into stodgy men so we had to assure each other that our husbands weren't of the stuffy tradition. (Money due next SNB! Bring your cash.)

Pets came up again. Some people's pets will turn their noses up at food unexpectedly. They'll be eating something and then they'll push it to the side with their foot as if to express their immense disdain with bothering to continue eating. Sometimes these rude pets will push the food away with their foot without eating any of it. And then L had a cat that was into coffee and donuts.

N and M like Flight of the Conchords. More people should watch it and come to SSNB to discuss. All the ladies with the babies, make them shake their booties (referring to the woolen boots that babies wear).

Happy Blogiversary!

Today is my 1 year blogiversary. I am so excited to have kept it going for a whole year. I don't knit as much as I'd like to and I'm certainly not any kind of guru, but it's a lot of fun to ruminate on projects. It's even more fun to poke around other people's blogs and learn about sweet yarns, different tips and especially marvel at some of the wondrous knitting out there.

In the tradition of other knit bloggers I want to celebrate by sending a gift to one of the 2, ok 3 readers (including myself), I have out there. The first e-mail I get will receive a little gift involving yarn and other stuff I scrounge up. Maybe I'll send you my hamster. Just kidding.

Well thanks to knit bloggers everywhere for making your antics public and keeping us all informed on knit stuff. Here's to next year!

Happy 4th!

Enjoy those bbqs, beaches, fireworks, etc.! Meanwhile I'm knitting away on the his/hers socks of a couple months ago.

So I did get to see some fireworks on the 4th. I saw a few flashes of light poking out from behind a grove of trees while sitting next to some fresh dog poop. At least I wasn't more intimate with the dog poop as were many others. It was quite smashed by the end of the fireworks. And it meant that I didn't have to sit by anyone. HA! I also went to a ball game and the White Sox won 11 to 6. It was a very exciting game in an otherwise disappointing season. To top off the festivities I ventured out to the taste of Chicago to get an enormous Polish sausage, grilled corn on the cob and a rainbow waffle cone. After that I was busily digesting for the rest of the weekend.

I got the his/hers socks finished and they turned out remarkably well. The fit was good and they just plain looked great! The stripes matched up and everything. I was well pleased. I don't know why I hadn't finished them sooner, all I had left to do were the toes. I have once again concluded that the Kitchener stitch is easy. Just say knit, knit, purl, purl as you go about it. Picking up the gusset stitches remains the evil part of making socks. I started swatching some lace as well. More on that folly later.

SSNB Knitter's Digest 7/2/07

Knitter's Digest 7/2/07

Ugh. It's already July. Where does the time go? Time was going so fast that we didn't start talking about weddings until July. People discussed their desired wedding cakes of German chocolate and tres leches. Mmm. And a lot of people had or planned to have handmade wedding dresses in our group.

M brought in a vintage pattern to discuss with resident gurus N and T. We marveled at the vintage model and her tiny self. All of the models in the vintage patterns are incredibly small women with itty bitty waists. Then the voice of reason came to our SNB as someone pointed out the serious corsets they must've been wearing underneath their hand knits. Oh yes. The corset era. We're glad that's over.

So the vintage term "wl" was interpreted as "yo" in the end.

A camera happened to be present at the SNB last night so we have lots of project pictures. N was working on the baby surprise jacket and hoping there was a less chatty pattern available somewhere. S was suffering with k1p1 on her first hat in the round. M was working on a dishcloth/baby blanket. S was working on a lovely baby blanket, note the pic. She found the free pattern online! N brought her sleeve back. (While L had RSVP’d, he wasn’t able to make it.) T showed us her red lace shawl that looks like it'll be amazing when complete. And F is making good progress on her shrug.

Hamster Living Room

I have GOT to stop buying hamster toys. I've had my eye on a hamster living room set for some time now. It has a couch, armchair, TV, and lamp. I saw it on sale and I bought it. I liked the living room because it was cute, but my hamster seemed to enjoy it as well. He rubbed his butt on the TV screen. He drank water from his lamp (probably an engineering hazard). And he dug around in his arm chair for treats filling his cheeks to the brim. This man is completely spoiled or maybe I am watching the hamster hang out with his living room toys.

Meanwhile along the way I ripped a hole on the index finger of my knitting hand. So no knitting for me! I hope it heals soon as I have some days off coming up.