Chocolate Sheep v2.0

Yesterday we had a snow day. It was the kind of day that (apparently) makes kids think that whenever there is snow on the ground, there won’t be school. It didn’t look bad at all in the morning, but when the Eldest came running back to the house, we began to think something was up.

“Mom! Dad! This guy in a purple car said there’s no school today!”

After telling him not to trust everything told to him by guys in purple cars, we turned on the TV and the radio and eventually heard that school would indeed be closed. This isn’t as simple as you think. The school told us that cancellation news would be on the Madison radio and TV stations (no call letters given), and if we lived in Jefferson “proper,” I’m sure that’s how we would have found out. But our phone exchange and cable package are actually tied to the Milwaukee area, so it did take a while for the news to come across.

We’ll become better parents eventually. I swear, someday we will.

Meanwhile, with everyone at home (except for Dad, who hoped in vain that he would get a snow day) we watched as the snow started to fall, then changed to freezing rain, then switched back to snow and piled on. At about 3pm it all stopped, and I got out the snowthrower to help our landlords with our driveway. They even rescued our mail from the mailbox, which had been knocked from its perch earlier by the snowplow.

Knitwise it wasn’t a good day for catching up. I’m chugging away on a Secret Project of a new type to me, the kind where the stitches increase and increase and increase until, whammo!, you’re done. I’m not up to Whammo yet. And since I have several more skeins to add before I get to Whammo, I’m pretty sure it won’t be a Secret Christmas Project.

Something happened on Ravelry a couple of days ago that I thought was pretty funny. Some knitters were kicking around the idea of an Elizabeth Zimmermann KAL with her Knitter’s Almanac, and I mentioned that I was going to be pretty busy in January (writing a book and all), but if someone gave me a copy of the Almanac for Christmas, I’d jump in when I could. A knitter replied that she had two copies and would gladly swap one for something.

She lives in Devon. England. I live a few hours from Pittsville (WI), home of Schoolhouse Press. I wonder how many miles this book will have on it before it comes “home”?

I also checked out her blog. Note that we have the same spinning wheel except for the finish (mine is more like honey). Ain’t Ravelry fun?

But here’s the Really Big News: Last night I finished the third side of the T-shirt quilt. In order to make it easier on my back, I kept the quilt folded up except for the part of the binding I was sewing down. It brought the work closer to me and, apparently most importantly, I couldn’t see how much further I had to go until I was almost done. At that point, I had five inches to go, and couldn’t not finish.

One side left, vacuum gently, press the binding edges down, pack and mail.

Piece of cake.

And did anyone catch the Anthony Bourdain Holiday Special the other night? It was a riot, especially if you’re the kind of person who thinks The Ref is a good Christmas movie. If you can’t catch this On Demand, or in a rerun, I’m so sorry. It was extremely snarky and rude, and very very funny.

Spam Post of the Day

Contrary to popular belief, the end of the year is one of the best times to look for, awesome descion

I got a little bit of my knitting mojo back last night. I took Friday night off, and only wound a couple of skeins for future projects. On Saturday I carried the Red Scarf project around with me but didn’t get to knit more than a couple of rows.

But last night while we were waiting for Tom to start getting sleepy, I laid the Irish Hiking Scarf out and looked at it carefully. Finally I could see that I had in fact done my cable crosses too soon. All I had to do was tink back one right-side row and re-knit it without the crosses. Another wrong-side row, then it was time for the right-side crosses. Done.

Did I got on to do a full repeat? Hell no. I rolled that sucker up and went directly to the Red Scarf, do not pass go.

Today I get some car knitting time. Just to be safe I think I will only take Red Scarf with me. Don’t want to bruise the mojo.

Thanks for all your good wishes! The situation is already improving.

So when Colleen turned to me last night, said, “Mama, what does this do?” and showed me the stretched-out spring that controls the bobbin tension on Maggie, my spinning plans for last night went out the window.

Instead, I watched a video on spinning (insomniacs take note), watched Top Chef, and wound up the alpaca yarn. Which took a lot less time than the two days it took to tangle and untangle it. It made an extremely tiny but soft ball. I want to make a hat out of it but don’t know the exact design I want to use yet. And I got to see my replacement Lantern Moon needles, sent out because the tips of the first set became discolored. Thank you Iris!

Today I need to get some Maggie supplies from the local hardware store: 30-weight oil, replacement tension springs (hey, maybe I should get more than one), that kind of stuff. Do any more experienced spinners have any suggestions for what I should keep on hand? Because Maggie was (ahem) pre-owned, I don’t have the Ashford maintenance kit. Perhaps I should try to score one of those… but my thrifty cheap side says, the hardware store will have everything you need. They just don’t know it.

I worked on Tyrone last night too. Got those sleeves sorted out. One had 39 stitches and the other had 43. It didn’t end up being as hard to even out as I had imagined. It was one of those things that was a little easier to see once it was all laid out on the [child-free] floor. And it sort of made sense, how to knit the sleeves on, but it was really difficult to do, in a way that makes me wonder if I have horribly fouled things up. It’s nearly impossible to get the needle tips in the right position for knitting. I think I will need to slip a second circ in there to do the raglan decreases. At this point I’m actually looking forward to backing it off onto dpn’s. Really lonnnnnng dpn’s.

Oh yeah, my stitch count doesn’t match up with Ann Budd’s, either. I wonder who’s right?

Farrrrrrrrrm livin’ is the life for me. But it needs internet!

(ahem) This hiatus has been brought to you by Charter Communications and a discrepancy between the meaning of “Highway Y” and “County Road Y.” But now that I’m hooked up again, as it were, I’m all charged up because THIS WEEKEND I GET TO GO TO THE WISCONSIN SHEEP AND WOOL FESTIVAL!

And it is pretty nearly Right. Down. The. Freaking. Street.

Okay, we’re in the country (and it’s a matter of dispute exactly where we are), so it’s a danged long street. But we’re about ten miles from a statewide fiber festival and I’ve never been to one before, I am almost ready to teach myself how to spin, I have knit the recognizable components of a sweater, and I have Knitting Friends to do meetups with and I am so excited!

Oh, during my two weeks away, did I miss anything? I am drafting this offline on Tuesday, several days before I’m actually hooked up to the Internet Tubes, so if there’s anything mission critical out there that I need to be caught up upon, please be a dear and give me a gentle nudge in the right direction.

Magazine note: I bought the Vogue Knitting anniversary issue and liked the articles and profiles very much. And the up-front photo of all the knitting needles was like a checklist for me and the kids.

But I didn’t see myself knitting a single item from the issue.

Then. Interweave Knits came out with their fall issue. I want to knit Almost. Every. Single. Thing. I tried to tell Eunny Jang at her new blog, but I couldn’t leave a comment because I apparently can’t untangle from Blogger account from my Google account, and her system is kinda fussy. But still. IK and Eunny Jang rock! Even if I can’t remember all my identities. Not Eunny Jang’s fault.

Knitwise, when I couldn’t do anything else I decided to cast on for the Tyrone sleeve. At this point (Tuesday noon) I have one finished sleeve and I’m done with the cuff on the second sleeve. I have increases every six rows, which intersects with the multiples-of-eigth rows I’m doing to get the color changes “right,” so I’m going to have to work the second sleeve quickly so I can remember what I did to make it come out the same. There was one stitch glitch in Sleeve One but I am trying to ignore it. On the other hand, I didn’t break yarn between the color changes on the sleeve, just in case it looks really horrible when I attach them and I want to do them over.

I’m also working on the Irish Hiking Scarf, about a repeat every other day. I can look at it now and see some days when I was falling asleep when I worked. (There was one night I would have sworn I knit more backwards than forwards, though that just can’t be possible. But maybe that explains something.) I don’t want to rip it out though, I want to finish it. I am sure that any small mistakes will sort of felt together, and the second one will be even better.

Friday update: Just got hooked up, thanks for waiting! Of course I still have two kids crawling all over me as I try to type and read, so be patient. Mr. Beth will be out of town tonight so instead of running off to the woolfest I will be catching up then, and figuring out who won the contest.
I have both the Tyrone sleeves done, and as soon as I figure out how to make them have the correct (and matching) number of live stitches I will knit them onto the sweater body. Think I’ll need some wine for that.

It’s not really the eleventh hour yet for this move…. since Mr. Beth is still sleeping, and all his grand plans for getting enough boxes to get everything packed can’t be put into action yet. But I don’t know when I’ll have another chance to post. So…..

I actually knit on the IHS last night. I’ve been trying to do one repeat a night, no matter what. It takes me between 40 minutes and an hour to do those eight rows, depending on what distractions I have. (See, I told you I was slow.) But I got it done, and I’m not sure I have enough yarn from the first skein to do a full repeat. So I’m very nearly half done with the scarf, except for blocking.

I love the pattern, and I love the yarn Mr. Beth picked out. It has little bits of color, but shows the cables very well. I think it’s going to look outstanding after it’s blocked. The only thing I wish I had done was to knit a couple rows of garter stitch before I started the actual pattern. I started this project a long time ago, and I think my cast-on edge looks rough. It’s a little too late to do it now! But if I make another one (and I likely will, since I’ve now memorized the pattern) that is how I will modify it.

Maybe I will host a contest!

Have you ever knit a pattern multiple times without changing it in some way? Tell us this wonder pattern! Or, tell us about your favorite pattern and how you have changed it so much every time that you think your name should be on the copyright notice. Be creative and you could win a prize: how about yarn or fiber from the WI Sheep & Wool Festival?

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Movewise, today’s goal is to pack the upstairs and move all those boxes (and five beds, don’t ask) downstairs so I can thoroughly clean the upstairs rooms. Also to bring the basement items up and store them in the garage. That way when our helpers come tomorrow to load the big truck, nobody will have to go up and down stairs. Aren’t we considerate? No such luck for the unloading crew on Sunday, I’m afraid, but at least we already know where everything is going to go.

I also have to take care of change of address, ordering new checks, and transferring all utilities to the new place. Ha!

I wonder who will be entertaining the children while Mr. Beth and I take care of all these necessary things? Oh, that’s right, they will amuse themselves. Without running in the house, opening the packed boxes, climbing on the packed boxes, coloring on the walls, fingerpainting on the windows, pulling the tape out of their favorite videotapes, poking each other, stealing each other’s favorite toys, drinking from each other’s cups, or looking at each other wrong. Not that they have ever done any of those things in their sweet angelic lives.

Good golly, I can’t even type that with a straight face.

Maybe this is the last post until after the move, maybe I will be able to sneak another in sometime. Regardless, I’m looking forward to hearing about your favorite (un)altered knitting pattern. If you’ve never commented before, this would be a great time to start!

So, about 24 hours after using my knitting needles to make drain holes in the entryway ceiling, my kids ran into my bedroom and announced that the ceiling had fallen down.

While that description wasn’t entirely accurate — it was just a 12×24 inch or so chunk of the wettest part — it was certainly a Sign Of Things To Come. And it made me all the more grateful when I got a return call from the insurance-agency-recommended cleanup place.

They showed up at 1pm, and by 4pm the ceiling had been torn down, all insulation removed, rotted boards detected, the roof securely covered with a tarp, everything hauled out, and the carpet steam cleaned. It probably won’t all be fixed before we leave, but at least the beginning of the fix is here, and further damage has been thwarted. The entryway is a small space (6 by 8 feet or so), and the leaks didn’t affect the rest of the house. All things considered, it’s about the smallest terrible thing that could have happened, and the room was completely emptied before the ceiling collapsed.

I lost a lot of ground in packing, but finished the first section of Tyrone. You can see the progress shot on the Backyardiknits blog, here. Now to start the sleeves.

By the way, I seem to have plenty of image storage space over at the other blog, so I will cross-post whenever I put new pictures up there. 

This morning I had my first mammogram. The technician said that some women complained about the pain and said it was worse than childbirth. I have to wonder about what kind of birthing experiences they had. Even if you had to do it annually I think the temporary discomfort is nothing compared to chemo or radiation. So ladies? Git ‘er done.

Today’s surprise will be posted this afternoon or evening, with a picture, so keep stopping by.

I promise not to get into the details… but today’s errands are filled with paperwork and last-minute fixes as well as an actual enema.

Yesterday we discovered that the ceiling of the front entryway has been taking on water. It had been stained but we really didn’t notice it. Until yesterday, when I noticed the floor was wet and the ceiling was dripping. I used a German wooden knitting needle to poke holes in the ceiling to drain off the bulk of the water into a tub formerly used to hold Colleen’s toys. Today I’m off to the insurance agent’s to see if we’re covered. It rained all weekend, so I suspect lots of folks are having the same problem.

I also need to drop off paperwork at the real estate office. And finally I really do have to pick up a pediatric enema kit. Poor Tom, doc says he’s full of $#!%.

Knitwise, I just did the first round of the second orange stripe of Tyrone. I have a feeling that once I measure the work, I’ll be surprised at how close I am to needing to start on the sleeves. It all seems too small for Jack. At this point I’m just trusting the pattern. At any rate it doesn’t seem like it would be too hard to make the next sweater.  JC says, “Mom, you’re a very good knitter, and that’s what really counts.” (I have him completely conned. I think he just wants the next sweater.)

I haven’t picked up the Irish Hiking Scarf since Friday night. Maybe I’ll try to work in a repeat a night so it keeps moving along. I finally got an invite to join the IHS KAL, but it’s been so long since I started a Google account I’ll probably have to start another one so I can participate.

Tommy was up several times in the night, so right now he’s not sure if he wants breakfast or an 8:30am nap. I’m trying to stuff in as many calories as I can before he gives up.

Pictures later… and my big surprise tomorrow!

Pardon me as we dry out from Irish Fest. Friday night was perfect (although tempered somewhat by the fact that there was no wool, yarn, or knitting except for mine — I’m working on it), but Saturday it slowly started to rain and never really let up all evening. Sunday it was raining hard all day and we opted not to take the kids there, especially since most of them had already developed a cough.

I managed to miss both Molly Bee and the freckle contest at the same time, which made Saturday pretty frustrating. But JC recovered from his disappointment — eventually — and I’ll cross paths with Molly again, hopefully soon.

The big deal on Saturday, though, was the curragh regatta hosted by the Milwaukee club. After a slow start under cool and drizzling conditions, they won some races. They won the last official race, the one-woman race, which forced a three-way tie between the leading teams. Then they proceeded to win the row-off by picking another one-woman race. Milwaukee’s team used the same rower twice in a row, while the other teams picked fresh rowers. Kristin prevailed — she is an awesome tough woman — and basically won the regatta for us.

This video is from the Pittsburgh regatta but it’s still excellent.

Mr. Beth is still recovering from the beating he took in the boat during his two races. Skin is missing from all over his hands, and the rest of his body is covered with bruises. I can’t think of anything I can knit that would help with this, but I’m trying. (Mr. Beth gently suggests that I finish the Irish Hiking Scarf.)

We also visited our new [rental] house on Friday and saw one of the local Catholic schools and totally fell in love with it. It may turn out to not be the most convenient for us to use, but since that convenience depends on other factors, we’ll have to wait and see. I have a feeling we may not know which school we’re using until the first day of school.

Knitwise I cast on again for the BSJ but will have to check around to see where to put the stitch markers before I actually start knitting. There’s only so many times you want to cast on 160 stitches.

I did three or four repeats on the Irish Hiking Scarf during the driving and the sitting around in the curragh tent. I also knitted on Tyrone and I’m almost halfway done with the second blue stripe. Since I’m working from the bottom up, I’ll just knit the same amount of rows in each color change when I work on each sleeve. When I get to the joining row it ought to all link up. The Cascade knits up great, too. I hope it comes in Packer green and gold, because I’d like to use it for the bucket hat I’ve been asked to make.

We’re moving this weekend, so it’s time to start packing things up. AND…I will have a surprise for you on Wednesday. Picture included!

P.S. Complain to the right people and you get attention: look here. By the way, are there any other “My Boys” fans out there? I like this show for its good writing and good ensemble. I don’t think it’s a “girl” show any more than it’s a “sports” show even if it’s narrated by a female sportswriter. In fact, we started watching because Jim Gaffigan was in it. To me it feels like “Scrubs” about relationships.

Doctor’s appointment? Check. Tommy’s OK and gaining weight again.

Kennel? Check.

Last-minute grocery shopping? Check, plus the fall issue of Interweave Knits. Though, the 8 year old called me on it — “What knitting project did you finish?” I told him I didn’t have time to look at it today anyway.

Now: pack the bags, wash the dishes, bake the cookies, put away the extra clothes, clean the house for the showing, and I think that’s it. Oh yeah, put the kids in the van.

Last night: rewound a skein of BSJ wool, but didn’t cast on. Realized this morning I should have cast on. Worked on a wee tiny giftknit. Knitted on Tyrone. Watched the last Doctor Who with Christopher Eccleston. Maybe it was because Tom was awake and crying then and I couldn’t hear every word, but I was left disappointed and sort of forlorn. So I popped in the next Remington Steele episode, which turned out to have curious and strong parallels to a time in my life I don’t really want to rehash. (Lots of good eye candy, though. I even rewatched a scene. Whew!)

I had to sit quietly and finish the wee giftknit to get myself to where I could sleep. Life is curious.

Back to our regularly scheduled panic. Where is a HHGTTG when you need one?
Irish Fest free promo: Get in free on Sunday by going to the Mass and bringing a canned good donation. After Mass (including singing by the Irish Fest Mass Choir [name may be mangled, sorry], of which my MIL is a member) you are free to go to the rest of Irish Fest. Have a Harp. Buy a harp. Dance to harp music.

Have a good ol’ Irish time and I’ll see you by the curraghs. Bring your knitting. (I was going to write “represent!” in Irish Gaelic but upon a cursory inspection of the Gaelic tongue, I will leave that to the scholars.)

Now I feel like I’m on the right track with projects again.

Tyrone: Cast on to the new needles (in a flash of good karma, the brand of needle I chose happened to be 50 percent off in an unadvertised sale) and I’m on the third row of ribbing. The Cascade is really nice to work with, but since I’m still in a section of yarn that’s been used for two gauge swatches and rewound, it’s a little splitty. I’ll bet the un-knitted section is just fine, and the color is grand.

BSJ: I frogged what I had, re-skeined onto the table legs from the cake, tied up the skein, and gave both skeins a lavender baby shampoo bath, rinse, and spin in the washing machine. (By the way, why is there agitation in the “soak” cycle? I nearly had a stroke as I rushed to turn off the washing machine.) The skeins hung up overnight to fully dry, but they’re still a bit damp. I want them to be perfectly dry before I wind them up. And start again.

Irish Hiking Scarf: Ready to pop into the Racing Knitting bag for work on the weekend.

I also have acquired a sort of commission piece, in which I’m going to try to knit a replacement for a Packer fan’s long-lost favorite hat. It’s going to involve searching for the right yarn, finding or creating a workable pattern, and stranded colorwork. I hope I can get it done before the end of the season. Look for updates as I work on solving this puzzle.

Irish Fest promo: The music is the main attraction for many. Today’s link goes to a band named Enter the Haggis. Seriously, how neat a band name is that? I don’t think I have heard them before, but I plan to listen this year. Personal connection: at our wedding reception, one of the dishes served was chicken breast stuffed with haggis. It got lots of compliments, especially from people who would have been appalled if they’d known what was in it. Did I mention we were married on St. Patrick’s Day? I probably should have.

What else is there? Oh yes, Doctor Who. With only three episodes remaining of the Ninth Doctor’s season, last night I watched two of them, grudgingly leaving the exciting conclusion for tonight. When, I just realized, it will have to wait until after Top Chef.

Will Howie finally get kicked off the show for being sullen, mean, and uncommunicative? Will Hung finally cook tasty food? Will Casey take another dip in the hot tub? The whole world is watching.