And Then Disaster Struck!

I wish I had a camera. I do feel that a least a few knitters would have gasped to see it....

I've been working on my Going Out Shrug, like a mad woman. I made it to the edging piece which was awesome! Thursday night I spent a long time picking up stitches....I was only able to pick up about 1/2 the stitches before my eyes started to drop. I picked up the rest in the morning before work and carted the whole mess to the office.

Maybe I should've taken the hint? I noticed there was a problem with my circulars. Then the size 7 needle went missing. But I thought it was ok when I found the needle.

I looked at my knitting at work and showed someone how I had picked up 375 stitches, yes, 375. It was the most stitches I had EVER picked up (and really ever knit in one round). I showed a co-worked (not a knitter, but did other crafts) and complained a little.

Friends and I were going to lunch and as I was getting ready, I saw it. I totally froze! I didn't know what to do. My circular needle cable had freed itself from the needle! There a quarter of my 375 stitches sat, looking at me confused trying to decide if they should pull out or just stick around.

I almost cried. I realized that I had made an idiot move, being over confident and thinking I didn't need my knitting pouch (which contained any number of things that could have saved the day). I tried a few first aid moves (paper clip and yarn), then I tried calling every knitter in my building. Nothing! I told my boss I was leaving this blob on the table in our office and threatened bodily harm to anyone who touched it.

Then I went to lunch. Yeah, you wonder how I went to lunch with all the stitches hanging out with no support? I had a plan! First, I went to lunch at a Thai restaurant (Little Spice, which was AWESOME!) with two new knitters. I explained my predicament, which didn't have as much impact on them.....however, I was able to persuade the one driving me around to take me to Michael's!

Success! I bought another size 7 circular needle (I may be done with interchangeables for a bit...) and a few tapestry needles, just in case. After I returned to work I spent a crazy amount of time picking up the lost stitches and moving the rest onto the new needles.

Unfortunately, after the betrayal by my needles, and I can't help think my shrug had some role in it, I lost all motivation to work on it. I look at it now, feel down that I won't finish it in time for the wedding we're going to. It would've been perfect.

I hate when things go awry.

Anyone seen a size 7 needle for a Knit Picks Options Interchangable Circular Set? I unfortunately seem to have lost one. I'll have to search tomorrow.

Quick update, I completed the body of my shrug! I HATE the bind off, I'm just not sure how to make them look the same. :o( Hopefully no one will notice that terrible bit. So tomorrow is seaming, then I pick up to do the edging. It seems that I will have enough yarn too (hopefully)!

Just a Shrug

I've made significant progress on the Going Out Shrug (yes Mom, your socks are still in the works). Despite it being HEAVILY modified from the original pattern it appears to be turning out ok. I'm aiming to have it finished by Saturday. I still have a bit to go and I'm kind of nervous. Keep your fingers crossed for me, that I finish it (I can't really knit with crossed fingers). Also, I think the side I'm currently working on (the right side in the picture) might be slightly tighter knit. It's been a while since I worked on the first side, I can't recall now if I intentionally relaxed for it or not. Oh well, we'll see, hopefully it's not obscenely different.

Here's a pic:


Ignore the mess behind the shrug....

Quilting, and knitting and dresses, Oh My!

So, my in-laws arrived on Monday safe and sound. We didn't do much Monday, just relaxed a bit, the MIL and I worked on crafts (her on cross stitch and I on knitting) and the FIL and hubby watched TV. After that we went to dinner to the ever tasty PF Chang's. This was especially exciting for my MIL due to the fact that they have a Gluten Free menu and she hasn't had Chinese in a VERY long time.

Saturday, we took a tour of a museum. It had it's interesting parts, but about halfway through the guided tour, the MIL and I left, but the FIL and hubby got a kick out of the rest. The MIL and I went over to Savage Mill, had lunch at the Ram's head and decided to find the quilt shop rumored to be there. Walking around, I was struck with how many business were gone or just closed during the day. I assume this was due to the economy and that most of the stores would be considered luxury. Luckily, And Sew It Goes was still there.

I found this awesome fabric. I love the colors and the cats absolutely crack me up.


My MIL bought some to incorporate into a quilt she wants to make us. We then traveled over to Joann's and looked through quilting fabric there. The whole experience has made me want to make a quilt out of every fabric that catches my eye. Which would probably not end up very well, but I want to do it anyway! Having never quilted before may be problematic, and I'm not sure I have the staying power to see it through.

In other news the hubby and I are attending a wedding next weekend. I go through this everytime we have to go to a wedding. I have very few nice clothes that I can wear. I bought this dress awhile go, but have yet to wear it.


Is this too black to dressy to what? I was hoping I could get away with wearing it, but I don't know the rule on black dresses at wedding these days. Any thoughts?

To wear with it, I'm determined to finish my Going Out Shrug. I put it down a while back because the patterns confused me. I wasn't sure how to proceed. Last night however, I just did it. Came up with a game plan and went forward. I think I'm on the track, but I'm worried the sizing may be of. I heavily modified the original pattern, I guess we'll have to see how it goes. I would laugh, very hard, if it turns out way too big, I did a lot of math to try and get the sizing right for me.

Sexy Back

So I finished the back of the Central Park Hoodie! I really am enjoying this pattern. It seems to move faster than a lot of other stuff.....or at the very least I like to work on it more. Two fronts and two sleeves and I'm finished. Sounds like a lot, but I am not going to let that slow me down (if possible). My brain always does weird things to me, so I may slow down, but I assure you it would be against my will. Here is the picture of the back.


It's Monday, a holiday for me. The in-laws are coming down for some vacation time. I am familiar with my mother-in-law (MIL) coming down, but my father-in-law (FIL) is a new factor, hopefully he doesn't get too bored, or hate being here. Anywho, my MIL has requested we go to a quilting shop down here, I'm assuming this will be without the hubby and FIL (especially since I don't think that they are into such things). I know one that is right next door to a yarn shop, perfect! Hopefully it's still open.

The other day I received my copy of Interweave Knits, Spring 2009. These magazines usually have at least one pattern I like in every issues, which keeps me getting them. This month I flipped through quickly and was almost disappointed because there wasn't a ton I wanted to make....until I saw these....


I am officially, obsessed, and I don't even know why! I almost went out online and bought the exact same yarn to make them. I did control myself and decided that I should look around, just in case. A few people have them projected on Ravelry, I'd love to see how other's turn out.

Mish Mash

So last night, was crafting night! I had some ladies over to work on the crafts of their choice. Most people knit, except one who was doing a very nice embroidery. We also had two people at different stages of learning. It was a really nice night! I love knitting company. It gives me people to obsess in front of, who won't look at me funny because of it. We will definitely have to that again!

I worked on my Central Park Hoodie. I'm so close to being finished with the back. I think it will be very nice when it's finished. Though of course I still have two fronts and two sleeves left.

So today was food experimentation day. First, I attempted to make Green Chili Stew in my new Crock Pot. So, that experiment didn't turn out so well. Granted most of my ingredients were slightly on the old side, but it was worth a shot. I keep trying to use raw onions in my crock pot recipes. For some reason I cannot stand the smell or flavor of onions that have been in the crock pot. So, next time something calls for onions, I'm going to have to sautee them, perhaps that will help?

The second experimentation was attempting to make "ice cream." For me this involves not using any milk. The ice cream maker attachment for my kitchen aid came with a recipe for gelato. It contained 2% milk, sugar, egg yolks and flavoring. I thought this might be a good start, with regular unflavored rice milk and only a vanilla bean. The motivation is that if the vanilla version turns out well, flavored versions (chocolate or strawberry, etc.) should be better.

I mixed up the milk and vanilla bean and heated it (it is the scalding step of the recipe), then mixed up the egg yolks and sugar. Tempered the eggs and poured it all back onto the stove. Let it cook for a bit. Cooled it down and put it into the ice cream maker attachment. I let it spin away. I tasted it on the way out and it wasn't bad! It still had that certain taste behind it that rice milk has. Perhaps a different brand might be better made and less of that flavor.

It's in the freezer, freezing up at the moment. The soft stuff was too sweet, which was my fault. I added extra. Next time I may try a chocolate or strawberry. See how that turns out. In the mean time I'm going to troll around the internet for recipes. Ones with eggs may work better for omitting regular milk, but I'll try different styles.

Yarn Fumes

I've been stressed out recently from work and weird mood swings. So my form of therapy? Yarn shopping! I traveled up to Large Marge's Yarn Shop up off of 40 East in the Normandy plaza (this much detail is because my GPS lies about where it is). Large Marge is a wonderful lady who just opened the store in place of the Celtic Knot, which closed a little while back. She's still getting her yarn stock in, but the atmosphere is laid back. There's lots of places to sit and relax and knit. There's also movie night! The 21st is the first one, I'm going to try to attend, they are watching The Princess Bride.

I looked around and saw the Deluxe Worsted Yarn by Universal Yarn (in Caribbean Sea). The colors were vibrant and drew my eye and the price was pretty good. I debated about what to make with it. I finally settled on making Amused (definitely click the link, it's a very nice pattern), even though that used a superwash wool. Here is the yarn I bought, unfortunately, my camera does not do it justice. It is not this blue. It is more of a dark-ish blue/green.


So, I couldn't resist the sock yarn either. I'm a sucker for all things sock yarn. Do I actually make that many socks? No, not really, but I aspire to. I think my goal of learning to make two socks at a time, will help that. I feel kind of wussy changing from DPNs, because I really like using DPNs, but I have real problems with "second sock-itis." Oh and here is the yarn, it's
It's Tubular x2 by Scarlett Fleece (in Raisin Berry).


I always find yarn shopping kind of relaxing. So I like to think it helped after my recent sleep issues.

Back to Our Regularly Scheduled Knitting

I have made slow but steady progress on some of my knitting projects. I've worked some on the Monkey Socks, the Central Park Hoodie and the hat part of the 5-hour hat and gaiter.

Over Christmas I actually ended up making 3 of the quick hats from the hat/gaiter pattern. I made one for my niece, my mother and sister. I think they all liked them. After we got back I decided to make one for myself. I'm making mine a little different, I added a ponytail hole. So basically after the brim I knit back and forth for a few rows instead of around, then started back in the round after I thought it was big enough. I looked through my meager quantity of buttons and found a neat black and white button of a face. So I will add that for when I wear my hair down or it's short. I think it should be interesting. I don't have a picture of my modifications, but here is what the rest of it will look like:


The Central Park Hoodie is moving along. I really enjoy working on it. For the first time I actually don't mind purling. It's a 10 row pattern with a cable on row 3, so it's short enough to keep interesting. I only have 2" left on the armholes for the back, then I start the shoulder shaping. I plan on knitting both fronts at the same time, also the sleeves. Hopefully that will be a little quicker, if a smidge more confusing. Here's what it looks like so far:


Finally, the Monkey Socks. I completed a whole sock and am about 3 repeats into the leg of the second. I have such a hard time with second socks. Motivation to knit them is low, low. I feel like a wus, but I'm going to learn to knit two socks at once. There are a couple techniques I can use. Anywho, here's the finished sock, no pictures of the started second one. None of these pictures do any justice for the colors of this sock. It looks much more vibrant in real life.


Hopefully, I will keep the slow and steady knitting pace, though I would prefer if I could pick it up some. I swear, at some point the knit meter will get updated, I really like knowing how many yards of yarn I've knit.

So, how about the rest of my trip? It's been a week since I got back, I should probably write about it, since the longer I wait, the more I'll forget. Here is the link to all the pictures, take a look: http://picasaweb.google.com/smilingkid/NewMexico#

On Friday I went to deal with some work stuff. After getting lost, par for the course, I made it to my destination. I learned a whole bunch of interesting things being worked on. I liked the group and the work. After this work bit, I was done and got to hang out with my uncle, his wife, her kids and my cousin. Before dinner my cousin and I drove up to the base of the Tram for Sandia Peak. Here's one of the views:


For dinner we went to Garduno's, my uncle's favorite. They have guys who come around and sing, decent food also.

Saturday we took a trip to Santa Fe. Santa Fe is an artsy type of town. Lots of street vendors and cute shops. I didn't end up buying anything, but it was fun to look at. It was a really pretty day. Though I guess all the days were pretty when I was in New Mexico. Santa Fe is north, as evidence by the snow:


There was also this interesting lady, I believe she was outside of a church:


After Santa Fe, we went home and hung out. We had spaghetti and garlic bread. Watched the Notebook, which was sad. But before all of that, I got to see why Sandia, is called Sandia. Apparently, sandia means watermelon in Spanish. The mountains were named such because of the pink color they get at sunset. Everyone had mentioned it, but until you see it, it's hard to believe. So here is a picture, thought it's a smidge more orange than it actually was.

Wish I had a camera

So the Emmy girl and I went for a walk this morning. After overcoming inertia we went down to the Nature Preserve right near our house. The Nature Preserve has ponds and beavers and ducks and all sorts of nature-y type things.

It's been pretty cold lately, so the smaller ponds were frozen, and the large Duck Pond was mostly frozen. There was some snow and ice, it was a really nice temp for a walk too. On the way back I walked down to the water's edge. It turns out the ice could hold Emmy's weight. Of course I didn't let her go any further than the length of her leash. I played a little cracking the ice near the shore. We proceeded further to find two Canadian Geese standing in the middle of the pond. That was pretty cool and I really wish I had a camera. Then I saw about 10 ducks trying to find a place to land that wasn't iced over. They finally found a spot and they were all noisy talking to each other.

Overall, it was a good walk. Very nice, sometimes I appreciate this area more than other times.

PS

Don't believe the knit meter over there to the right, it lies. I've actually knit a bit since the beginning of the year (I've added to the Central Park Hoodie, Monkey Socks and the "hat"). I just need to weigh and measure to fix it.

Sleepless

I can't turn off my brain, which in turn means I can't sleep. I really hate when this happens, but at least it's Friday and I don't have to be up tomorrow.

I think that I'm not exactly in a place where I can deal with the frustration at my job. I really like my office, the work and the people. I just don't think I want to be a manager. It seems that there is wave after wave of frustration. I haven't learned to let it roll off, but I also don't know if that's what I should do.

I can definitely see how some managers stop caring, but I don't really think that's a solution. I worry if our folks are happy, what we can do to keep them happy, how not to burn them out. All this worry and I know that eventually it won't matter. It's frustrating. Lots people try to work our people into the ground, because of course they should be able to do everything, quicker and with a smile on their faces. Yeah, they love their work, but there's only so many REALLY important things. Frustrating.

So, what would I be doing instead? Who knows, laying on my couch being a lazy bum? That sounds nice. Not sure the hubby would appreciate that much.

Maybe tomorrow I will feel completely better, after some sleep.

Guilt Feelings

So, it's early Sunday morning (0543) here in Albuquerque. Today I leave, my flight is at 0830. I'm just waiting for folks to wake. I'll add more pictures and info about the trip to Santa Fe when I get back home.

I feel kind of guilty. I've decided that if I would be taking someone's room (the room in which they regularly sleep), I will just try to stay in a hotel. I spent last night at my Uncle's house and ended up kicking his step-daughter out of her room. I feel bad for this fact since the hotel I was in was really close to their house. I didn't realize that the step-son was still at home while going to college. I did know this fact yesterday, but I thought they would be sharing a room (stepson and stepdaughter), but she's sleeping on the couch instead.

Give me an air mattress, pullout couch or a hotel, but no more taking someone's room.