Buzz.

I'm a very busy little bee right now. I am getting ready to make a long list of all my to-knit items. It's getting longer everyday! Today, I received a few requests for custom items. That's nice!

I'm almost done with the scarf I've been working on for a friend. She ordered something a while ago and I sent her a test knit hat from my pile. She liked it, so she asked for a matching scarf. I knit the hat a really long time ago (I basically did it to learn how to do slip stitch faux cables), so I couldn't remember exactly how I had done it. I looked at a few pictures I had of it and was able to guess what I had done 4 years ago.

I originally had the cables running up each row except the ends. It looked very nice, but after about the 18th inch, it started rolling in on itself. I decided the easiest thing to do was to drop the stitches from the 3rd row in on each side to see how it stopped the rolling, that helped, but it needed a little more, so I did 5th row in as well.  I really love the way the plain rows make the cable rows pop.

I'm looking forward to knitting another copy of this. I have some really nice dark olive green/brown Cascade tweed. It's good stuff. I made a great scarf out of it last year. Knitting it again will help with writing out the pattern since my brain can't really seem to translate my scribbled knitting notes into something that anyone else could ever read. It's like I've never read a pattern before when I try to write my own out!! I'm just going to have to sit down with my big file and study how they are written.

I've been planning a hat using the small cables too. I am leaning towards a sock weight yarn since I have so much of that in the stash. I think the variegated yarn will really look nice.

Right...

I love when I knit something that is so truly ugly that it has no hope.

I kept knitting this damned hat. It was very ugly from the beginning. I honestly don't know why I kept knitting it. I should have just stopped knitting after the first 5 rows and called it a day. I just really needed to knit a little bit after miles of crochet. (To be honest, the crochet kind of kills my hand. It is also not as easy to watch TV and crochet for me and that sucks. I am an avid TV knitter.)

So after stupidly pushing on and knitting the entire hat, I cast off and it was too small to even fit around my head (and I have a small head)... And sort of resembled a blueberry muffin. It was awful looking. I even tried to salvage the top, but it was all so unfortunate, it had to go.

I keep forgetting I have a ball winder. Maybe because each time I use it, I almost loose a finger, strangle myself or attempt to toss it across the room. It has this nasty habit of winding the yarn around the base of the spool. This means I cannot get the ball of yarn off the spool. Other times, the yarn wraps UNDER the spool. Again, no idea why. It just does it sometimes.

Last night, it did the under thing first. This lead me to have a small meltdown that involved threatening to recycle the ball winder, getting the yarn threaded through the pull of a zipper to a purse laying under my desk, getting yarn wrapped around my own feet and legs and some other things that involved a few (dozen) choice words. I sounded like the Dad in "A Christmas Story."

So after deciding to walk away untangle myself from the ball winder and let it think about what it had done, I retrieved it from the floor and reassembled it. I set it up on the kitchen table instead and gave it another shot. Of course, I had to spend about 5 minutes untangling the knots in the ugly ass yarn. I finally got that done and tried again.

Success... for about 20 turns of the handle. Then the yarn wrapped around the base of the spool. I pulled back the mess and tried again. I finally got it and almost just threw the yarn away after all the trouble. It really is truly ugly, and now it's just going to sit in my stash to taunt me.

I spent 2 evenings of knitting on this fugly hat. Oh well... At least I finished a cute one a few days before.



Listed here on Etsy

Twit-tastic

I have a growing addiction to Twitter. It amuses me. I like typing out random thoughts and I like reading other people's random thoughts.

Saffista sent me some links via Twitter concerning my angst with reusable meshy grocery bags that are knit!! Yay! She linked me to two patterns on Ravelry and I'll be trying them out shortly. Both are free and the photos of both look great!

I'm currently holed up in the bedroom in front of the computer while Vince writes some papers. It's finals week and he has a ton of work to do, so I'm watching lots of TV and movies online. I've also read a few books and played endless on Ravelry and Twitter. My queue on Ravelry has grown to ten pages so I'm really, really looking forward to the queue organizing that's coming out. I need it.

Last night while I watched 27 Dresses and Enchanted, I knit a pair of mini cabled grey fingerless gloves. It was some crazy, almost sparkly variegated grey in my stash. I just pulled out the entire ball and started knitting from both ends until I got low on yarn. They turned out very nicely although the yarn is a little itchy. I'll try to remember to take some photos tomorrow. Oh! Speaking of photos, I have some on my camera I need to upload. Toodles!

Late nights.

I just noticed that it's 3 am. Oops. I should stop playing with yarn and the internet and go to bed.

Quickie update:

2 ballbands done!
2 diagonal stripe dishcloths done!
2 scarves done!

Woot!

I just cast on for a hat and will probably get started on the matching mittens tomorrow. I have a few other hats I want to knit but those can wait until after Christmas (they're being mailed places) and I want to make a few more dishcloths. And that log cabin... I almost forgot. It's growing. I need to spend some quality time with it tomorrow. I'm sure I'll need a break from insane cabled hat knitting.

Some stronge language and violence.

Mesa Dating

Gosh. I thought I cussed a lot more. Whatever.

I'm almost done with the Bzzz Hat for Queen Bees (which may be the most annoying project name ever so I'm calling it the Hive hat) from Stitch 'n Bitch Nation. It seems a little large, but since it's a gift I'm just going with the flow. I really like the pattern though. It's an interesting way to add some texture without doing ribbing which I'm a little done with for the time being. I'm doing the hat without the bee buttons all over it. That just seems a little childish for me.

I'm going to try to churn out a few Ballbands this week. I haven't done one in quite a while so I'm looking forward to it.

I'm on the hunt for a good Celtic knot pattern. A friend wants a cashmere scarf with some interesting detail -- since he's Irish and I love impossible cables, I thought it would be perfect. Now if I could only fine one I like.

Speaking of violence (the title), we finally watched The Bourne Identity last night. Yeah. We were the only people on the planet who hadn't seen it yet. I enjoyed it. I like spy movies.