Love for My Farmers' Market

I know that I've mentioned it before, but I love my farmers' market.  We have a great group of people who show up every weekend and they bring incredible food and wine. We had another snow storm on Wednesday night and it is still piled up everywhere.  This is what the world looked like inside the park:

From Hubby

From Hubby

But just outside the park, it was lively and colorful.

From Hubby

From Hubby

From Hubby

I cannot get over how wonderful it is to have them there. I really am spoiled.

Queued: Shur'tugal

From Alice Yu/Socktopus

Shur'tugal was in line to be my next pair of socks right up until a friend gifted me the Viper Pilot pattern. That was right before Christmas 2009, and the Viper Pilots were just finished this month. I haven't started these yet, but it sounds like they have something in common with the Viper Pilots other than just their timing in my queue.  The Ravelry comments mention some crazy twisted stitches. It sounds like I was destined to be learning to twist in 2010.

I am still enamored with these socks.  I think the pattern and the texture are fantastic.  I plan to make them in a solid or semi-solid. I'm sure I have something in my stash that will match up with them well, but none of it was calling to me during my last stash perusal, so this pattern may need to be patient for a bit longer

Follow Friday: A Rare Bread

From  Julia Baum

From Julia Baum's profile page:
Some say we're going extinct. As a redhead myself, I think the world needs more pictures of our Rare Breed

For A Rare Breed Julia Baum takes fantastic photos of some of the world's best looking people. Redheads! If you are a red head, if you love a redhead, or if you simply recognize their beauty, you will appreciate these occasional photos.

A New Old Movie Trailer

This isn't quite animated.  It may count as un-animated, but I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.


Via GeekDad

There is a bonus smile (and then perhaps a grimace) for those of you who notice the hidden Mike Wazowksi!

Queued: Boys Can Wear Pink

From Kate Oates

This is a crazy week at work, so I haven't been knitting at all. Fortunately, these are just the occasions the Queued idea was created for. There may be a couple more this week.

Boys Can Wear Pink was designed by Kate Oats. This is such a cute sweater and that little boy is melting my heart.  Don't be confused by the fact that I have queued this boy's sweater or that I am making Reid.  I do not have any children.  I love kids and I love little things, so I am drawn to kids clothes despite the lack of people to wear them.  

Really, look at him.  Look at that cute tie. How could I resist that? Here are some others that I also think are fantastic. (Rav Links) To be fair, I think the charismatic young men in those photos might have a lot to do with promoting this pattern.

Queued: Rag Bathmat

From Julie Weisenberger

Rag Bathmat was designed by Julie Weisenberger. She has a lot of great patterns.  There is so much to like about this one.

First of all it looks great.  I cannot think of a better way to mark your home as a knitter's domain than with a chunky cabled bath mat. (Ok maybe a beautiful display for your stash would work too.)

Another thing that I love is that it is made out of scrap fabrics. The one in the picture is made of a couple cut up sheets.  Julie even includes a great tutorial on rag knitting. It is up-cycling and eco-friendly at their best.  I had a pile of old white t-shirts that I was going to cut up to make this, but they were accidentally swept up and taken away in a donation trip. Now I'm waiting to collect a few more to rip up and knit together.

The final part of this that I love is the texture.  Just the thought of these bumps and cables made out of soft cotton under my feet, makes my toes happy.

Secret Knitting

I think it is time for another secret knitting sneak peek!

Pinned

Reid is pinned down. Over the course of knitting various project, I have learned a lot. Finishing this project really made clear what that I hadn't learned when I started. Two of them became very evident today.  First, I usually highlight the size instructions or take notes on my pattern now.  I hadn't done that for this project, so when pinning these down for blocking, I had no idea which set of measurements I was supposed to use.  I easily could have pinned these at the largest size listed, but then I ran into issue number two.  I did not use a very stretchy bind off for the first four pieces of this sweater. So, restricted by the edges, it looks like this will be a long medium.

For the fun of reference, here is the lace pattern opened up:

A Decision

Thank you to those of you who made it all the way through my Project Planning post and voted in the poll. I now have an action plan.  When I started writing that post, I thought that I would want to be casting on my Seattle Socks, but after working everything out, I've found myself going a completely different direction.  Instead of cabled socks, I'm going for lace sweaters.  I've decide that first, I am going to finish Reid.

I've done a little bit of work on it, and there are only 6 rows of knitting left.  That's it!  There is still a bit of finishing left to do.  I'll need to block the pieces, seam them together and then put the cute edging on.  I think that there is going to be a perfect overlap of finishing this and starting Myrtle.  While my blocked pieces are drying I can start swatching, and since my swatch will need to be washed and blocked, that will be a good time to do the seaming.  Then I'll either need to redo my swatching or I'll be able to read up on other people's modifications and comments on the Myrtle pattern while I finish up the edging.  Once I finalize Reid, I will be completely ready to go.  I'm also hoping I'll learn a few extra lace sweater lessons finishing up this child size sweater before I dive into one big enough for me. My goal for the weekend is to finish, soak and pin out Reid.

And just because before and after pictures for lace blocking are the best, here is a good look at Reid:

Follow Friday: A New Dress A Day

From A Dress A Day

A Dress A Day does not have an about section so this was taken from the About the Author information associated with Erin McKean's new book The Secret Lives of Dresses:
Erin lives in California south of San Francisco and spends her free time reading, sewing, blogging, roller-skating, and arguing about whether robots or zombies would win in a fight (lasers optional). She loves loud prints, quiet people, long books with happy endings, and McVitie's Milk Chocolate Hobnobs.

Sewing is not my craft, but I admire those who do it.  Despite not being able to even consider the possibility of sewing a dress, I cannot stop reading Erin's blog. She shows off fabulous fabric, and great patterns.  The absolute best part is her revelations of what the women in the pattern example images are really thinking and talking about.  She is a grammar advocate with great taste and a wonderful sense of humor.  I recommend everyone check out one of her pattern story posts for a smile, and those of you who like sewing should stick around for a few more posts.

Twitter Bonus: FakeErinMcKean

Queued: Knitted Kaleidocycles

When I decided to start blogging every day, I new I would run out of catching up on FOs and WIPs.  All along I've had a plan.  I am starting reoccurring feature called Queued.  Unlike Follow Friday, I don't have a set schedule for these posts. To be completely honest, I am going to write one of these when I don't have anything else I want to update about.  Today for example, I am still wrapped up in secret knitting and I cant tell you anything about it. As I mentioned my goal is to just write regularly, so I am introducing Queued.  In these posts, I will be showing off a pattern from my Ravelry queue.  I'll write about why I like it and hopefully feature some other knitter's projects that I find inspiring.  My queue currently has 960 projects and it's growing.  Let the project parade begin!

From Brent Annable

Knitted Kaleidocycles was designed by Brent Annable. This is a fantastic little toy that I am certain could mesmerize me for hours.  Hubby has already requested one (or more) for his desk.  I think it could be soothing to have on hand at work.  I also think that Dad would enjoy one as well.  Really anyone who likes to fiddle with things would probably enjoy one of these.  Fiddly toys are rarely as soft and cuddly as hand knits so this one this one gets extra points.

If you haven't seen this pattern before, you are probably wondering why I am using words like mesmerizing and soothing and talking about fiddling.  Well, you will just have to see them in action. This video is from the designer and it will show you how great these really are.






What do you think?  Are you hooked?  I agree with Brent, I'd like to pick one up and just give it a turn.

FO: Viper Pilots!

The weather man won't promise me any sunshine so I decided to go ahead and take pictures of my Viper Pilots inside.  The lighting is horrible, but it is good enough to show you that I have a FO!


Since the pattern for these socks was a Christmas gift, I cast on at the very beginning of my Christmas trip in 2009 and I brought them along for this last Christmas trip as well, it seemed only appropriate to take their picture up with all of our Christmas cards. (Yes I've taken down the tree and all of the decorations, but I haven't been able to part with the cards yet.  Many of them are great pictures of our friends and family and I love seeing them when I come home from work every day.  Besides, I just received one this week; it certainly hasn't gotten its fair share of display time.)

All of the pictures I have taken previously focused on the vipers that run down the front and back of the leg. Seeing them on the sock blockers really made me love the swirly clouds that run down the sides.  Those cables required a cable needle, so now, it is great to be able to look at them without complete frustration.

It was a challenging patter, but I love this finished product.  As an added bonus, I've decided that there is nothing at all unprofessional about this royal blue. They will be keeping me nice and cozy at work tomorrow.

For the Love of Acronyms

I work with grants.  Most of them are research grants.  I get to see a lot of acronyms.  They often try to be cute and witty. Today one of my proposals had one that may make my top five.  It wasn't trying to be cute. In fact, I think it was an acronym from a British title, so if it was trying to be witty, it might have gone over my head.  The acronym was NIMROD and it referred to a piece of equipment used for very precise scientific measurements.  It made for a great proposal full of great statements like, "The recent arrival of NIMROD has opened up major opportunities..." "the purpose of NIMROD is to strengthen the synergy between experiment and theory," and "NIMROD provides continuous access..."  I may have a fifth grade sense of humor, but I was thoroughly amused all day.

Project Planning

I've just put my Viper Pilots in for their pre-blocking bath. That means it is now time to plan a new project. Instead of making a plan and coming back here to tell you about it, I am going to try to make this a little more stream of consciousness and write as I go through the planning.  I don't know how well it will work, but hopefully, you and I will both get to see how I work when I'm starting something new.  There might be a lot of Ravelry links in this post.  I'll try to note them, but I apologize to any non-Ravers in advance.

To the stash!  I usually go to one of two places when I'm looking for inspiration, my Ravelry queue or my stash.  I've been wanting to knit more out of my stash lately, so I've just pulled everything out of my toy box (yes, I keep my yarn in the toy box that I've had since I was a little girl) that struck me as next project worthy. Now I'm going to go through it one yarn at a time and look at my queue to see if can find the perfect combination.

First up is my Noro Sock yarn.  I just bought this over Thanksgiving as my souvenir Seattle yarn.  I think I want to make some simple socks out of them.  Glenna has a perfect pattern (Rav Link) designed specifically for the yarn that I think would be best. If you had asked me three months ago if I'd be casting on another Glenna pattern as soon as I finished my viper pilots, I'd laugh. Her stuff is beautiful, but intense. This patter, however, is even titled simple and a review of it doesn't include any Ktbl stitches so it is probably safe.

Next I have some left over Knit Picks Felici. I originally used this to make some leg warmers for Sydney, but I have quite a bit left of each ball.  I thought they would make some adorable toe up ankle socks.  It would be a simple project with some quick gratification.

I've also got just over 2 balls of Knit Picks Andean Silk left over.  I've used this for my Francis and a pair of mittens. I don't have a project picked out for this, so I'm going to queue to see what I currently have in there that needs knitting. Hats and cowls are what I'm seeing. I like Coline, Ribbed for Your Warmth (PDF), Fenimore, and Bas Relief Hat. I don't have any tams and I have a complete knitter crush on Jared Flood so if I go with this yarn I may just have to do Fenimore.

Next up, I have 8 balls of Rowan Cashsoft in a beautiful shimmery grey.  In the queue that may work for this is the Austin Hoodie, Myrtle Cardigan (Rav Link), Folded (Rav Link), and Dulce de Leche. The amount of yarn I have would be cutting it close for a few of those.  I think my favorite would be the Myrtle Cardigan.  I wouldn't have to worry about the yarn, and the lace cardigan would let me brighten up the grey color with whatever I'm wearing underneath.

Digging in my toy box, I also found Reid. This is an adorable Knitty pattern that I started in May of 2009.  I wanted to make it just because it is so darn cute, but since I don't have anyone to make it for or any sort of deadline, it has been untouched for a long time.  I'm on row 56 of 70 for the final sleeve.  It just needs to be blocked, seamed and edged once that is done.  Not much work at all to make this an FO.  I still have no idea who I'd give it to though.

Speaking of unloved WIPs, I also have a feather weight cardigan hibernating. Before I can work on this again seriously, I will have to figure out why there are two sets of needles in the bag.

I have two skeins of Knit Picks Imagination that I need to come up with a new project for.  I originally bought them for socks, but I think I want them to be repurposed.  I have a pair of Imagination socks that I love.  They are like  having a teddy bear cuddle with your feet all day.  They have slightly felted so they are perfectly form fitted to my feet, but they are a little too thick for my shoes and shed quite a bit. Besides this yarn should be admired more than my feet. I recently gave away my Hibiscus Shawl, so maybe another wrap would be nice.  My queue has a lot of great things, but I want to keep it simple since the yarn is so colorful.  I think Multnomah (PDF), Simple Things, Gaenor, Linen Stitch Scarf, and the Sango Shawl, would work well. The last two would prevent pooling, but the first three would really show off the yarn.  I torn on this one.

That's a lot, so I'm going to revisit and I'll throw the projects into a poll just so I can learn how to do that. Why do you tell me what project you think would be good.

What do you like?
	Seattle Socks
	Stripy Ankle Socks
	Purple Fenimore
	Grey Myrtle Cardigan
	Finish Reid
	Finish Feather Weight Cardigan
	Undetermined Shawl
pollcode.com free polls

That took longer than I expected, but now I think my socks are done bathing and ready to be blocked. Hopefully I'll have pictures this week!

Surge in Activity

Those of you following along have probably noticed the dramatic increase in activity and posting here. the very observant of you, will have noticed that it began on January 1st. You will just have to believe me when I say, this wasn't an intentional New Year's resolution. The truth is, I was inspired by my uncle while we were visiting over Christmas.

He's writing a book. Reading his chapters and listening to him talk about page counts made me think about how little writing I've done over the past few years. I had a writing intensive undergraduate program and during my graduate program I kept a blog to work out my ideas. My current job has a lot of writing involved but most of what I do is editing and working with other people's ideas. For the past couple years, I have toyed with the idea of taking an open source course to start writing again, but I have also been enjoying not be a student for a little bit. It wasn't until this Christmas that I started to remember how fun writing can be. I also realized that value writing and my post-college adult life was missing it.

I've decided to start in again by blogging. I don't expect this blog to full of lofty or remarkable ideas. I just want to get use to expressing myself again. Daily posts are a goal, but not a promise. I cannot think of a good knitting picture to complement this post, so I'll share one of my amazing uncle instead.

He is the best at making me laugh.