Random Thursday

Things of late that bring me immense joy (oh well aside from my children, husband, and job):

1. Gomez's How we Operate pure pop perfect delerium
2. David Duchovny in Californication. The man still has it, love watching him. I love this show so much I'm sure that next week they will tell me it is cancelled. Just like all the other very cool shows that just disappear Keen Eddie, Studio 60, and Hustle.
3. The Knit Picks catalog. I shriek with joy and lock my wallet in the file drawer when it arrives.
4. Ravelry! I'm so in love I don't know what to say.

The only single thing bothering me now (ok two):

1. Having to drive my kids hither and yon. Admittedly the new van makes it all so much better but I tell you leaving at work at 3 to get two kids from two different places and take them to a place by 4:30 (an hour and a half!) is just old fast. Heck in 90 minutes I could have been in Canada already!
2. Above driving is made far worse by obnoxious shit drivers. Unlike Laurie, my commute took place on a rural dirt road where said obnoxious shit driver was going 20 mph (can't make that metric conversion, sorry) on an uposted road, meaning we could go 45. Not only was he going this slow but he was driving down the middle of the frigging road. Granted it was a dirt road and there are no lines, i'll give him that, but it wasn't like it was a single-lane road or anything. It's more of a dirt highway it is so wide. The dumbass. So after tailgaiting him for about 30 seconds (my bad) I decided to try a go-around. As I was going around him his arm emerged with his middle finger prominently displayed. DISPLAYED I tell you, not just a little flip of the finger, a statue of a finger. He left it there for long after I passed, maybe half a mile up the road it was still DISPLAYED. Jakob: "Mom, that guy won't put his finger away. That's rude." Yep. You got that right. Just because he's a kid in a lovely yellow sportscar does not give him the right to tell me how fast I should drive and insult me when I choose to go my own way. He can insult me if I'm doing something illegal or dangerous but driving my kids to gymnastics at the posted speed limit!

Developmental Lessons...the Hard Way

I'm not much of a child developmentist. Worked for one once, picked up a little here and a little there. Having one child 8 and another 3 really gives you perspective on how far apart they are emotionally. My poor 8-year-old is going through this phase where he wants to explore the 3-year-old's boundaries. These boundaries belong to a very opinionanted, volatile young lady so you can imagine how often these challenges occur. During a particularly heated exchange between children and mother, which ended in "just don't touch your sister, ever," the 8-year-old (let's just call him Jakob because 8-year-old is too much to type too many times) made the observation that the 3-year-old (let's just say Clara, see argument above) always smiled and giggled while he was being yelled at. His impression, that she was teasing him about getting into trouble. My impression, how can a 3-year-old be that sinister? I resolve it to being she's uncomfortable with the tension in the room and she's trying to break it. Please tell me that I'm right because that level of complexity in a 3-year-old is just scary to me!

Kidnapped!

I've been kidnapped from the blogger world!

I'm being forced to do things like work. Going to Alcatraz can't really be considered work but everything before that was. I almost wanted to stay in the prizon. Nice view, clean salt air, ocean breezes.

Somehow I roped myself into signing up for this thing called a Master's degree. Almost done but I think the coursework this semester is going to put me over the edge. Thank god for only having a thesis left after December!

Kids make me take them to school, gymnastics, Ring of Steel. Time for knitting, not much left over for blogging. I need to learn how to blog and watch Tiger's baseball at the same time. My evil husband went and got a new job which means that the wireless router we enjoyed for many years had to go back. Now I am wireless. Ugh.

Thanks for stopping by. Sorry for no real content. Know that it is my goal to some day write about my life in some meaningful way. I'm still not convinced that people will find my life or much that I have to say very interesting! Help me change my mind!

There is Nothing More Powerful than Creating

This first bit of interesting arrived in the mail late last week.  It brought with it a very interesting discussion of what they term "knitting's new guard" (Vickie Howell, Adina Klein, Shannon Okey, Clara Parkes, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, and Debbie Stoller).  A bit to think on that.  Kinda been letting their ideas of community and finding a quiet way in a technology driven world just sit there a bit.  Maybe it will go somewhere.  Perhaps not.

When another item just as moving comes along you think that maybe you should be paying closer attention.  Simon Schama's Power of Art did a piece on Rothko on my local PBS station this week.  Even if you don't care about art, hate modern art, watch it.  Think about it.  This is why fine art is so important.  Suspend your beliefs and opinions on his work.  I did and wound up in a lovely, contemplative place, quite far away from ordinary.

Ivy's Fab Fibonacci Cardi

Or what I like to call the randomized, double-pattern, Fibonacci-controlled trial. I think my job follows me home a bit too much some days!

This stash-inspired cardi was born after I fell in love with the pattern, admiring a store sample at the Clever Ewe. Absolutely adored the finished project but did not want to buy any more yarn (see stash "law"). With the 9 partial balls of Shine Sport living in my stash, I threw this together.


Yarn: Knit Picks Shine Sport
Colors: Grass, Violet, Sky, Apricot, Butter, Orchid, Green Apple, River, Blush
Needles: US Size 2 and 3 24" Circulars
Gauge: 6.5 st/in in garter stitch using US 3 needles
Size: 18-24 Months
Cast On: June 15, 2007

The names of all colors were drawn at random until all but the 9th color had been drawn. The last color in the sequence was the last un-drawn color. The sequence of colors would be repeated as necessary for the size of the cardigan.

The number of garter stitch ribs per color was determined using the Fibonacci Number Sequence. The numbers used were limited to 1, 2, 3, 5, 8 and 13. Cards with these numbers were drawn at random until each color in the sequence had been assigned a Fibonacci number.

Through this process the stripe sequence was determined as: Grass 5, Violet 2, Sky 8, Apricot 3, Butter 2, Orchid 8, Grass 1, Green Apple 8, Apricot 3, Violet 2, Apricot 3, Sky 1, River 5, Blus 13.

The body and sleeves of the cardigan are based on the Lace Edge Cardigan in Simply Baby by Debbie Bliss, knit using established stripe pattern. The plan is to finish it with an EZ-inspired (and Tulip Cardi for that matter) attached I-Cord edging. For now all I have to show for the plan is the right front and bottom to show. More is coming soon I hope!

Knitting got a little loose above the armhole shaping so I switched to US 2 needles for this portion.

Just for illustration sake, the below pictures illustrate the stash storage allotment. Good for now. Maybe Ikea and I can dream up a larger solution!



Something about that stash makes me think I like green!

In From the Land of Jang

Back on the blogger track...not that I was really on it to begin with (and I have less excuse than Ms. Jang)! Happenings since my last post:

Minus one appendix
Plus two pairs of hand knit socks
One home bought, one put on the market
One home unbought, one taken off the market
One cabled baby sweater
One 7/8 completed Lift and Separate, summarily frogged (yarn waiting for inspiration)

The explanations of many of those are very long and drawn out...things that would have made for interesting blogging had I not been so caught up. We are also sadly now minus one grandmother. It is always hard to say goodbye to those who have such profound influence on our lives. After the past few months she has had we were relieved for her to be at peace.

After a week of vacation the ineptness and malaise from work that seemed to follow me home lifted and the breathed new life into my knitting. I have a finished object to post:



Pattern: Tulip Baby Cardigan
Color Option: TBT05
Yarn: Dream in Color Classy Worsted

Love the yarn, love the pattern. It is fun, fun, fun knitting all around! Minus the time it took to get extra yarn from the yarn shop, this took less than 10 days to knit together. Best of all...very minimal finishing. Love only having to weave in ends! I can't wait to do another one. We'll see how that pans out. I tend to be a bumblebee knitter. What else do I have on the needles? The April STR Grasshoppers, Spiral Boot Socks from IK Summer 2007 and another baby cardigan of my own design. This requires a longer post and pictures so I'll save that one for another day...hopefully sooner than later. I have to document what I did somewhere anyway!

Along with this new wind of knitting fever came the desire to organize and generally clean up the mess which was my stash. In our home remodeling projects I was given a strict "area" for said stash. This "law" arbitrarily set down by my non-knitting spouse elicited a feeling generally confined to roller coasters. Items that did not fit into said "area" were not allowed to find a home elsewhere. Panic, serious panic. Miraculously 90% of the stash fits (a very arbitrary term) and the yarn that didn't wasn't anything I had any fantasies over. Lots of straights and Lion Brand Yarn are up for grabs. If anyone reads this and would really like to know what's there and would like it before it goes in the garage sale is welcome to it! Email requests to phoebesma at comcast daht com.

Gotta go knit on Ivy's Fab Fibonacci Cardi!

Cable Me Surprised

This lovely little book was given to me as a gift and ever since I have been itching to make the Chunky Cabled Sweater. Either I didn't have the time or the skills to complete it before. The latter is still in arrears but have made some ground in the skills department. Give me a new baby and the motive is set. There is suitable yarn conveniently making itself at home in my stash. Seems to have all the hallmarks of a perfect project.

Imagine my surprise after a Sunday afternoon of knitting when I arrive at a product that looks like this:


Don't get me wrong, this is only the second cabled project I've ever even attempted, but something seems amiss. Hmmm...did I follow the pattern correctly? Yep, sure did. How come it doesn't look like the picture? I'm confused. Being the novice I am, at this point I am still assuming that the problem is mine. I mean, I couldn't even endeavor to presume that an author who creates such lovely patterns could make *gasp* an error.

Sure enough, that's what's happening here. Now my heart is all a flutter and my stomach has that sinking feeling like when you show up for class and realize the final is TODAY not next month. How will I ever figure out how to fix it? Ah...the internet and it's army of blogging knitters. Surely someone has figured this out already. Nope. No love from the publisher or author either. I'm on my own and I'm really not sure I'm comfortable with winging it. But I want to make THIS sweater. My heart and mind are both set on it. It's beautiful.

So after fretting and muttering and cursing for what felt like a year I say to myself (and the yarn and the dog and the cat, whoever will listen actually), how much would it hurt to chart it out? Conveniently this pattern is written out long-hand with no charts...who thought that was a good idea!? Ok, after I found the graph paper that has been living in my file cabinet since 1990 when I last took a Physics lab, I chart out what the book so erringly has published. EUREKA! It isn't going to be hard at all. It's a stinking typo. Really, a simple, run-of-the mill, typo. Simple I guess in some circles. In this case a 4 where a 2 should be is a REALLY big deal. And this is the way it is supposed to look with the typo corrected.


So for those of you desperate knitters with a copy of Adorable Knits for Tots by Zoe Mellor who want to knit the Chunky Cabled Sweater on page 90, the correction is really simple. Page 92, column 2 the instructions for 6th row of the center cable repeat should say "As 2nd row" rather than "As 4th row." Easy schmeasy.

Here's hoping the knitting gods are with me and I'm not forced to pull out any more stops for this project. I'm not sure the yarn can take it.


And this little guy, well he's strapping to begin with and I may already be running out of time.