Worldwide Knit in Public Day

So…. I was randomly surfing around the internets (procrastinating cleaning the bathroom) and I found this site:



How fun is that! It’s officially June 10th… Unfortunately I won’t actually be in Cleveland that weekend or I’d try to get a group together. I’m going down to Cincinnati for my friends’ graduation… perhaps there will be a group in the ‘nati doing this that I can meet up with? That or I could always just do my own thing and knit at the graduation ceremony… hmmmmmmm…..

Anyone out there from the ‘nati?

In other news... after much debate I decided to join Secret Pal 8. I was thinking about doing the One Skein Exchange instead but I had so much fun with Secret Pal 7 I really wanted to do another one... and there is going to be another round of the One Skein Exchange this fall... so I'll do the SP8 now and the One Skein later. That way when I get busy around the holidays I'll be in a less intense exchange...yeah for swaps!

Addiction

I can’t stop starting new bags! I didn't mention it in the previous post but Wed. night I knit this:



It’s the tote bag in One Skein… I figured that since I just blogged about the yarn I dyed I should knit something with it…and project spectrum April is almost over and I hadn’t knit anything orange yet….. so yeah. The whole thing took about 2.5 hours. Not too shabby. And it’s done!

Now just to finish the many other bags I have partially done.... I think that's my goal for this weekend...

Happy Friday!

Vacation Knitting

Well I got to knit a lot on vacation – between the plane ride both ways, the delayed flight home, and just hanging out at the condo after skiing because everyone was so tired I got lots done. Well… not really done exactly. I’m in serious ADD knitting mode… check it out:

Cable knit bag:

I knit this mainly on the plane on the way. I’ve been wanting to try a braided cable for awhile now and I had the wool ease in my stash… so I figured I’d make one of those cute little cable-knit bags I’m seeing everywhere. I pretty much made up the "pattern" on the flight and just sort of went with it - I used the same cable as in the armwarmers that I've made twice. It’s waaaay too wide for the handles that I have, though so once I knit the rectangle I quit. I still need to seam the sides, find handles to fit it, sew the handles on, and make a lining…. But it’s kindof done.



Bag to be felted:

This is the pretty typical felted bag pattern – I cast on 38 (or 40… I don’t really remember) stitches, knit until the bottom looked big enough, picked up the stitches around and then just knit straight up. I’m real happy with the way the stripes turned out! Made bringing all of that yarn with me worth it! I need to knit an I-chord for the handle but I want it to be black and I ran out of black wool…

Yet another bag to be felted:


I started another bag out of the pink wool… Our flight home was delayed and I only had with me in my carryon the stuff to make the other bag… so when I finished it halfway through the flight I just figured I’d start another one. I was real bored, though so I played around with some increasing and decreasing on the bottom of the bag – that way it will have skinny sides but be wide enough to put things in. I think I started with 3 stitches, increased every row at each end until I had 18 stitches on the needles, knit for about 24ish ridges, then decreased every row at each end until I only had 3 stitches left. From there I picked up stitches around the bag. I was real happy with the bottom but I don’t think I like the shape the bag is taking. I couldn’t decide what I wanted to do… so I started increasing at each side every 4th row… but then the bag was too wide and sloping so I started decreasing every 6th row… it kindof looks like a bubble. Eh. At least the colors are cute! I have enough green leftover to make a handle out of… I think I’ll probably twist it sophie style. Oh yeah and the green is the green I dyed while I was on vaca with the old folks…. I hope it felts ok!

So that means that right now I have 3 (actually 4 b/c I never finished the purple bag I kinda blogged about here) bags that are in various stages of completion... I really need to finish them before I get distracted again!

And the adamas shawl? Yeah. Still "working" on that.

Yardsale!

So in my Vail recap here I mentioned Matt’s rail experience – and how it ended in a yardsale… and how I didn’t have a picture of it. Well upon further inspection... well… check this out:

Doesn’t look like anything right? But when you zoom in….
Hee hee hee.

Project Spectrum April - Dye!

So on the Friday that I had off a few weeks ago while I was waiting for the paint in my hallway to dry I dyed some yarn…. I used oranges and yellows for project spectrum April! Somehow I forgot to blog about it… and I have yet to take pictures of my vacation knitting... so I'll blog about dying now! so here’s what I did.

The yarn is Patons Classic Merino in whatever their neutral color is. I bought it on sale at Catans awhile ago (who can resist wool on sale?) It comes in skeins so I wound it into a nice hank over the backs of 2 chairs. If you do this, though I highly recommend that you NOT use a chair with wheels on it. Oops.


Then I soaked it in a pyrex filled with warm water and a couple good glugs of white vinegar. I’m not sure how long it soaked for – as long as it took me to prepare the kool-aid!


Then I set up kool-aid colors… I used 2-ish packets per cup of water… and the colors I used were lemonade/lemonade, lemonade/orange, orange/orange, orange/blackcherry (only used ½ the packet of black cherry), & lemonade/black cherry (only a few drops of it, though!). So I had a nice range of yellows and oranges….



Then I laid out the pre-soaked yarn on saran wrap… and painted it section by section with a turkey baster (first time I ever used that kitchen tool! Wonder why I even have a turkey baster!) I ended up striping it in a nice gradient of colors:

Then I wrapped it up in the saran wrap, put it back in the pyrex, and nuked it. It went into the microwave in 2 min. increments… cook on high for 2 min… wait for 2 min… high for 2 min… wait for 2 min… high for 2 min… wait for awhile.


Then I carefully unwrapped it, dumped it in the sink, and ran water over it… I started with hot water and gradually made it cooler.

And that’s it! dyed yarn! So much fun.

I got a little overzealous with my striping though – I had intended for a nice, semi-uniform but still a little varied orange... not the rainbow of orange I had made… plus I still had quite a bit of kool-aid left… and some yarn… so I dyed another skein. For this one I did the same thing I just was less careful with everything… Here’s what it looks like with the green I want to add to it in felted bag form:


Dying is seriously addicting. And I’ve only dabbled in kool-aid….

So what should I make with the stripy yarn?

Vail. There's no comparison.

So we had a great time. A blast. My first time skiing out west… it was amazing.

The first night we stayed at a little motel by Breckenridge and then skiied there all day Thursday. It was sortof a throw-away day for me since the altitude sickness really, really slowed me down. After every few runs I had to sit down and chug Gatorade or the dizzy would get me. I did however, get to ski above the treeline. That’s a freaky experience! Especially when you have to take a T-bar to get there… I do not get along with any form of tow-rope type thing. Bad. The first trip up I kindof gave up and fell off the t-bar… and then had to do the t-bar walk of shame which is this little run that you can only get to if you fall off. Very embarassing. But the second try I made it up…. here’s some shots from the top– over 12,000 ft.


Another great moment from the first day was on the second lift – Matt turns to me, eyes wide, and says "my skis are really fast. No. I mean they’re REALLY fast." So I guess I did well in choosing his new skis! He also later learned that they are also great for tree skiing, mogul skiing, and skiing through terrain parks. Plus the very same skis that he has were on display in many of the ski shops there – as the latest thing. Very cool.

Then we drove to Vail and checked into the condo which btw was AWESOME. 4 bedrooms for 9 people is not so shabby – plus we had a balcony with a view, a huge common room, and a hooked up kitchen. Nice. Here’s some shots of the drive:


I love that there are these amazing views just from I-70. Anyways the next three days we skied Vail. The altitude sickness got better and better as the weekend went on and I got some real good skiing in.

Here we are at the top of Belle’s Camp (11,480ft.) before we skied down into Blue Sky Basin


Conditions were good… although the bottom of the hill had "spring conditions" meaning muddy slush the top of the mountain was great. There was fresh snow on Wed and the groomed areas were really nice. And even w/o being able to ski the bottom we hardly put a dent in what we could ski – it’s that big. I totally understand why their slogan is "Vail. There’s no comparison."

The back bowls are amazing. The groomed parts of them are my ideal skiing – big, open, steep, fast, and long. Perfect. Although I think my fav. place to ski there was in Pete’s Bowl in the Blue Sky basin. That’s this area that’s waaay far away from everything – and these really nice, well groomed runs through the woods that dipped and wove through pretty pine forests with a view of the mountains. Definitely made for some fun skiing! Here's Blue Sky Basin from Pete's Express lift - the ridge in the photo is called "Lover's Leap" and I did not go off of it (Matt did!)


Skiing in the spring is nuts – especially on the last weekend. Everyone was in such a party mood. People were in crazy costumes and even some were shirtless or in a bikini. That to me seems like a bad plan because if you fall the snow is like sandpaper on your skin… but whatever. And I’m used to eastern (aka freezing cold, can’t feel your fingers toes or nose) skiing – So skiing in sunny, warm weather was wild… here's some shots of Vail Village on the last day of the season:


I did have one scary experience on the third day. Were skiing into the back bowls in search of some steep groomed niceness… and ended up in an area that may or may not have been closed. We were the only 2 people there… and we were surrounded by the steepest slopes I’ve ever been on… that were covered in moguls. I don’t ski moguls. I avoid them like the plague. They scare me. But there was no way out. No where to go but down through the giant mogul field. So I got a crash course on mogul skiing…there may or may not have been a few tears involved… but we made it out ok (I didn’t even fall although if we’re telling the truth I did slide down part of the really steep part)…. And overall the experience made me a much more confidant skiier. If I could handle that I could handle anything. Which made the rest of the day really really fun.



Matt also got to play in the terrain park… back a few months ago during the x-games he was talking about how he wanted to try sking rails… so when we saw them at Vail I kindof convinced him to do it. Well there were three rails lined up… and he did ok on the first one… made it down part of the second one.. and then was approaching the third one thinking "hmmm that’s real steep I wonder if I need to do anything differ…" YARDSALE. I was above him and all I saw was him go over the hill and then one of his skis and a pole fly. In retrospect, it was hilarious but at the time I felt real bad he wiped out on something I convinced him to do! I didn’t get a picture of him on the rails (he was too fast for me) but here’s our friends in the terrain park:

Jay railin'

Heather Flying


All in all I’d say it was a really good vacation.

Oh and as always there are more photos on the photoblog… and I’ll be adding more as I get the pictures from the other people who were on the trip with us.

Vacation all I ever wanted

Vail ruled.

But right now I’m exhausted… we didn’t get home until after 1am last night… and every muscle is sore from the 4 days of skiing. But it’s a good tired and a good sore. I have many pictures of skiing and mountains and knitting to post and a few stories to share but right now I'm to tired...

It was a good trip.

and we're off!

Ok… I’m writing this as I print my bording passes… I won’t be around until next week for either blogging or commenting. But then I’ll be back with lots of pictures of Vail and lots of pictures of the knitting!

Have a great weekend!

Knitters are Insane

Ok I leave for Vail in what… like less than 5 hours… and I’m in a serious serious dilemma. I don’t know what to bring with me to knit. I have no clue… and I’m freaking out and just packing everything. I’ll have at least 3 hours worth of plane/airport time each way to knit during, several long carrides (although the scenery may be more interesting then the knitting), several nights in a condo by a fire recovering from a long day of skiing. So that adds up to lots of knitting time…. And a lot of different knitting situations….But I’m not working on anything big and mindless right now which would be perfect for a trip like this. Bad planning. I know.

So tell me if this sounds like an insane amount of yarn and projects to bring for a 5 day trip:

Adamas shawl – requires 2 balls of yarn (perfect plane knitting when I want something to occupy my mind)
Cable knit bag – requires 2 balls of yarn (I want to experiment with these and this might be a good time to play with cables and figure out what I’m doing when I get bored of Adamas)
One skein wonder shrug – requires 1 ball of cotton fleece. I’ve wanted to work on this for awhile and this is going to be a good opportunity….
Random wool for a felted bag (perfect idiot knitting – I can start one of these puppies on the plane and have a good mindless project for when I get home from skiing and am tired and distracted) – this requires about 5 balls of wool so I have options for stripes.

It adds up to around 10 balls of yarn… plus my denise kit plus 1 knitting book. For 5 days. That sounds insane. It all fits neatly into a little carry on bag though… well maybe it’s not such a little bag… but it’s not like yarn is heavy.

What’s insane is this conversation that actually happened last night:

Me "seriously I don’t know what to knit on this trip. I think I’m bringing an insane amount of yarn"
Matt not really paying attention to me "there’s a ton of room around these boots in the boots bag…"
Me "Ohmygosh you’re right! I could totally put yarn in there!"
Matt… blank… stare… then… "seek help."

Apparently that’s not what he meant. Apparently I have lost my mind.

Happy Easter!

So I wanted to post this actually on Easter but I ran out of time…. So Happy Belated Easter!

I’ve come to trust NPR completely. I know they’d never lead me astray… so… when I saw this article - Rollin' With My Peeps - I had to do it. I had to. I love kitch, I love spring, and well.. I even sortof like peeps. And I had to come up with something to bring to my family’s Easter gathering anyways….

Happy little bunnies



Where are we going?



Um it’s getting a little warm in here….




 

Ohhhhh... What a world! What a world!




Round 2


 

Mmmm peep goo…(I find it extremely disturbing that their eyes don't melt.)


Then you add some chocolate and whipped cream…




And you have pie!


Oh but it doesn’t stop there the website suggested making green coconut "grass" as a garnish… so I did what they said and I got a nice subtle green…


But this pie is made out of peeps. Subtly is not really a goal here…. So I added alot more green and some yellow to go for a more of an Easter grass neon:


Perfect.


and Voila!

Peeps pie.

And it even tastes pretty good!

It's my b-day and I'll blog if I want to

So yeah… today is my birthday! And I have lots to blog about…I had a very busy weekend. But instead I think I’ll go out to lunch with Matt… mmmmm Tastebuds. I’ll post something much more amusing tonight or tomorrow!

what the...

So I’m sitting on my back stoop eating breakfast this beautiful morning that I don’t have to work…and Dexter is wandering around the back yard sniffing everything… life is good… and then… my dog started eating grass. Seriously. Like chowing down on it like it was a frickin’ steak or something. WTF? He’s not a cow!

I tried to get a picture but he wouldn’t do it on camera…. I’m gonna go paint now.

What am I thinking

No seriously. My husband says I’m nesting but I think it’s a combo of spring fervor and allergy medicine. We leave for Vail in 6 (well really 5 since today is over) days and I decided I needed to paint my hallway. I have tomorrow off for the holiday so yeah… I’m thinking I can get it all done. I managed to get a coat on the trim tonight…and we painted the ceiling when we painted the ceiling in the living room so that’s done…

Notice how everything is the same color of off-tan? Shudder. It needs painted bad. Real bad.

In other news – I’ve been traveling to Canton a lot for work lately – which is an hour away… and since we’ve been carpooling down there days like today when I’m not driving I get to knit for 2 hours – and get paid for it.. Kindof makes up for the fact that I don’t get paid overtime (really, who does) and when we do site trips like that they are always loooong, loooong days. Kindof….

so blogger just ate my adamas shot.... oh well.... I am now 7 and a half repeats in…. and thanks to Kristin’s disastor warning I will be using lifelines every repeat. I think I need to type that again so I actually do it… I will be using lifelines every single repeat.

every single repeat.

I wish I knew how to crochet

Check out what my mother in law made me for my birthday:


It’s a mantle scarf! Apparently the pattern is from 1899 – how cool is that? Here’s a closeup of the lace:

Very pretty –and it completely reminds me of the crochet that my great grandmother used to do – really beautiful and really intricate stuff. I don’t know that I’d have the patience to make something that delicate.

She also sent some fun yarn:

Thanks, Cheri!