If you are going to be a little late you might as well pull your idea from recent events. So I could have done something like “Based on a true story” or “Ripped from today’s headlines” but in reality my class had project due today and I had each of them chat about what they did… yipes!
We had just finished the book Stone Fox by John Reynolds Gardiner which is about a boy who lives with his grandfather on a farm in Wyoming. Grandfather gets sick and Willy, the boy, tries to figure out what to do to get Grandefather better. There is a climatic dogsled race at the end and I won’t give away anything else. My students were asked last week (since we were testing) to take their evenings and put together something to illustrate that they had read the book or learned about dogsled racing. They were due today… and they fell into three categories- kid done, parent done, and not really done.
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It’s sad, over the weekend I discovered that I’ve worn through one of my green handknit slippers! A while back I broke the thread that held a seam together and that was a quick repair – just a couple of minutes my feet were back to being toasty. This is a real-live, worn out hole.
Now to decide what to do. I could try to darn the hole – in issue #50 of the Gift of Stitching, that just so happened to arrive in my in-box today, there’s an article by Danielle Tebb about darning – complete with instructions about how to correctly do it! There’s definite appeal in learning a new skill!
However, this could also be seen as an opportunity – I could make another pair!
Hmmmmm, have think about that one for a bit.
This does bring up the interesting point of usage. I find I have very different thoughts about using items I’ve knitted and ones I’ve stitched. Knitted items get used and stitched ones tend to be displayed and I have no idea why I have this bias. All I can think is that I’ve always been taught that needlework must be done in a clean environment – wash my hands before I start, work on it in controlled environments, etc. etc. Knitting, on the other hand, gets tossed in my purse, my briefcase, or luggage and is worked on in the car (no, not while I’m driving), on the lunch hour at work, or when I’m in ‘waiting’ situations. Another point to ponder.
I’ve got one of my mitts done and have just cast on number two – very, very pleased with how it came out! Look for photographs once I figure out how to best get the cabling to show up!
It’s February and we’ve got snow! Admittedly it is a few degrees warmer than it has been, but there’s still plenty of time to knit things to help us stay warm.
Bruce got his mittens a couple of weeks ago and I finally finished my “Hedgerow” socks today. I am very pleased with how they came out. There was one potential crisis yesterday – with just 17 rows to go (in the section where I was shaping the toe) I ran out of yarn! Help!
Here’s how close to being done I was when I ran out:
Now what? Went to the closet to see what I had that was the same weight of yarn and might not clash too badly and found another ball of the exact same yarn! I had bought it quite a while ago and totally forgot that I had bought two balls! Saved!
So, I was able to finish these off without further incident:
I look forward to trying them out in the next few days. But, what to do next? On the keeping warm front, my office is on the notoriously cold side of the building (which just so happens to be the notoriously warm side in the summer) so I’ve taken to wearing fingerless mitts while working at my computer. The only pair I have is actually one of my first knitting attempts – a pair of reddish brown “Fingerless Garter Mitts” from the book One Skein by Leigh Radford. I feel a bit like Bob Crachett whenever I put them on – just give me a green eyeshade and I’m ready to go!
Apparently, it’s time to upgrade to something a bit more elegant.
I bought some black fingering weight alpaca off the clearance rack at Stitches & Scones a couple of months ago thinking I’d use it to make a wrap or shawl but it’s perfect for the pattern I’ve selected – Alexandra Brinck’s “Linda K’s Yummy Mummy Wristwarmers.” I’m 6 rows in and, so far, so good!
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One of those crazy Facebook moments when someone posts a “CHANGE YOUR PROFILE PIC” messages. This one was dealing with Valentine’s Day so instead of finding a good picture of Sue and me (they exist I just tend to to take the pictures & Sue tends to avoid being in them) I decided to do this instead. You could almost call it a “Family Portrait.” For people in the know I have submitted the artwork so it will be made into a pathtag. I just thought for those folks who hadn’t seen this I would share… I’ll get home late tonight after a modified comic drawing retreat/artfest in Northern Indiana (thank you once again Lilly Endowment).
Wuv… Twue Wuv
All of my recent projects seem to have come in pairs – socks & mittens.
The problem with pairs it the simple fact that there are two of them! Finish a mitten or sock and then you’ve got to do it all over again! The other big issue is making sure the two things actually match!
Taking meticulous notes comes in very handy with the latter. For instance, on the purple socks I wrote down that I did ten rounds of ribbing at the top and ten pattern repeats for the leg. Now doing #2, I know exactly where to switch to the next step! I also have a nifty App on my iPhone called StitchMinder to help me out – it has four built in counters so I can keep track of my progress on various parts of a project.
I haven’t yet found a good solution to the former. There is a method called ‘magic loop’ to do socks two at a time but I don’t think I’m not ready to try it just yet.
Bruce’s Troiclaux mittens are done so it’s time to share some photos. Anyone catch the troi in the name? Yes, these are mittens Mr. Spock would appreciate (and the reason Bruce thought they were so cool!). As you can see from the fuzzies, they were grabbed and worn before there was a chance for photographs.
So, the only active project on my needles right now is the second of my two purple socks. The leg is almost done and the plan is to have it done this weekend. With the start of the Olympics, I think I’ll be getting a lot more TV (and knitting) time in over the next 16 days!
On a side note, in this week’s story Bruce talks about my 100 day geocaching challenge. Yes, I finally succumbed – a number of friends have completed it and there’s even an event next month surrounding this accomplishment! Today was day 74 so I’m definitely on the downhill slope.
This seems like a perfectly ironic time to talk about the wonderful time we had in New Orleans over Christmas! Not only was it amazing to tour the city but we also had to opportunity to find some very cool caches. Two of particular note were GCGFHX – Marie Laveau, Voodoo Queen and GCE02C – View Carre’. The first is a virtual in St. Louis Cemetery #1 – not only did we find the needed information for the cache but we also spent a good while exploring and photographing this wonderful, historic cemetery. The other is the one cache in New Orleans that I’d say is an absolute ‘must do.’ Not to give too much away, I’ll just say that it will give you a unique ‘vertical’ experience.
Before we left home I did check if there were any knitting or needlework shops in the area. I discovered the Garden District Needlework Shop wasn’t all that far from where we were staying!
The day we visited, there was a fair amount of traffic in the shop, which was quite large. Housed in an old building in a quaint shopping and dining area, Garden District Needlework consists of one large room with areas for sitting and shopping. There is also a smaller room up front dedicated to sale merchandise.
The shop is a combination of knitting and embroidery (focusing on painted canvas) so I set right to browsing through everything! As painted canvas has never been a particular preference of mine, I went through the embroidery section fairly quickly but did pick up some Caron Watercolors in a fun Tahiti colorway (on sale, too!) that I think I’ll use for the Hardanger amulet bag from the EGA State Day and two skeins of Pure Palette silks in shades of green.
On the knitting side, they did have a wide variety including many of the ’staples.’ I focused on the sock yarns as I believe they’re easiest to buy while traveling. Oops, I may have gone a teensy bit overboard here! I got JitterBug in a beautiful pink that will most likely end up as a scarf and also in more ‘manly’ colors for socks for Bruce. They also had TOFUtsies in a black, tan and cream combo that had Bruce’s name written all over it.
Finally, I found some Muench Cleo in the sale room. This metallic & viscose yarn should make a fun scarf for the office – it’s a silver around a core of Mardi Gras colors – a terrific souvenir of this trip!
All of this new yarn is patiently waiting to be used because I’ve been focusing on the black, blue and purple projects this week. Bruce’s mittens should be done tonight so I can post photos in a day or two. My poor purple socks are sitting with one done and one left to cast on. They’ve been put aside so I could use my blue yarn to make some small items to help the monkeys get in the spirit for the big game tonight! Mongo has some socks and Cecil, despite what he says in the comic strip, is pleased with his new hat and scarf.
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