I had a great title...

I was thinking last night before falling asleep that I should really post to the blog, and somewhere in the ether of wakefulness and sleep I came up with a really great title. Or maybe I just thought I had. In any case, it's long gone now, as is the brilliant essay I had composed in my head. I had been thinking back (way back) to the few posts I had written that were neither baby nor craft related and thought it might be nice to try and compose a few of those again from time to time. The fear that my brain is turning to a baby-talking-babbling pile of mush is a real and ever present one. I have no time to read and my capacity for a varied and impressive vocabulary is dwindling at an alarming rate. Wait, I should clarify. I suppose I might have time to read if I chose to use my snippits of free time for that purpose. But when I do get a chunk of time to myself, I usually clean something or hurry up and knit a bit. For some insane reason, I still think that I can read in bed when the reality is that I'm generally passed out before my head even hits the pillow. One night last week, I didn't even make it that far as I fell asleep while I was feeding the baby. C'est la vie.

Yesterday I was over at the Harlot's blog reading about the nastiness that has ensued due to the chaos that has become the sock summit that she has been working hard to put together. If you've read her post, you'll know that she and her comrades have apparently been receiving threatening and hateful email. When I first read that, I thought to myself 'Well that's rude' and went about my day. But I kept thinking about it and after a while I thought 'Really? Threatening? Knitters? Knitters being threatening and hateful about knitting? Socks? SERIOUSLY?' I hope it is indeed a small cohort of complainers. I mean really people...it's just knitting. Socks. Knitting socks. With other people knitting socks. There really are much more pressing things to get your panties in a bunch over. Sheesh.

Speaking of knitting, I have some to show.



First up, sock one of the Paraphernalia pair is done. Love, heart, adore. Fits like a glove too...or a sock as it were, hehehe. I think after numerous years of knitting these things, I may actually be getting the hang of it.

I've also started in on another sweater for myself, this time a Starsky by Jordana Paige. This is the third spring in a row that I've started a sweater. I feel a tradition developing. Also the third sweater that I'm knitting with Patons Shetland Chunky. I'm pretty sure chunky knits are the least flattering thing to clothe myself in, but I'm drawn to them.



Another phenomenon that seems to have repeated itself with this sweater is the curse of the cable. Maybe curse is too strong a word...the conundrum of the cable. Not the first time I've had to rip back to the beginning cuz I screwed up. I've knit the cable repeat correctly, just over the wrong number of stitches. I cast on the correct number to begin with and while I was doing the ribbing, thought that the pattern had asked for the wrong number since the 3 x 3 cable wasn't working out evenly. It wasn't until I had the 3 inches knit that I realized I hadn't read the right directions for the size I was knitting which had a helpful little adjunct which stated 'knit to last 2 sts, knit 2'. Ah yes grasshoppah, I get it now. So I just figured if I added the extra stitch that I had decreased at the beginning, everything would work itself out. Which it might've had I increased the st. on the correct side, which means I likely started the cabling on the wrong instead of the right side. Long story short, the banana tree cable pattern is moved one stitch over the entire way across. It isn't hugely noticable but kinda bugged the crap out of me. I let it marinate overnight, then consulted a fellow comrade in yarns and yes, I am going to rip it back to the end of the ribbing and fix it from there. It's only a naps worth of knittng to undo, so it's not so tragic.



Recent yarn acquisitions. All Fleece Artist. The one with the tag (Somoko) was my prize from Nova Knitters blogiversary party and the other two were purchases from the Have a Yarn mill ends sale that Heddy was nice enough to pick out and bring home to me!

Gotta go, there's sweater ripping and yarn caking to do. Then it might be time to venture out of doors. That large shiny ball of fire in the sky has returned and one never knows just how long it'll stick around. Until later...

9...a little late

Why I Love the Buy and Sell...

I love haunting the local buy and sell shop from time to time. My most recent trip yielded a few acquisitions that I felt the need to share. First up, I picked up this adorable little set for you know who.



It's in the craft room and with a little rearranging, I'm hoping to put it in front of one of the windows. I thought it would be nice for A to have her own spot in here to work on her own little projects while I'm in here playing around. I'm thinking of painting it white at some point. Dunno yet.



Here's another pic to give you an idea of just how wee the desk and chair are. That's just a regular sized acoustic guitar, to give you some perspective.



What I had hoped to find and did was a new sewing table. The one I had was just a little vanity that I picked up on the side of the road for ten bucks and while it was alright, just wasn't all that comfortable to sit and work at. I anticipate this one will be much better.



And what really prompted this frenzy of furniture buying and shuffling around was the fact that I got this out of storage after, oh, I dunno, a decade or more? My dad built this doll house for my seventh birthday and my mom furnished it. See, I was the 'late in life' baby so in many ways, I was a great excuse to indulge many a hobby, miniatures being one of them for a short while. The house (not unlike the one I'm currently living in) is in rough shape. Those marks on the master bedroom floor? Those would be from the carpet (specific doll house carpet no less) that I glued down then ripped up. Only one poster of four remains standing on the bed and nearly none of the legs on the wing-back chairs survived. I could swear that I'm still missing the odd piece of furniture, but I can't be totally sure. Anyhow, I was noodling around the internet and there is just too much fun to be had in furnishing and accessorizing doll houses, so I foresee yet another excuse to spend money on the horizon. I've always wanted to hook up some lighting in the doll house too. We'll see what's involved there.

That's all. Until later...

She's a Maniac...

A ready for her Jazzercise class. Or, ya know, a Flashdance remake.

An Inch an Hour, Two Feet a Day...

*If you know the album and group from which today's post title comes from, I will give you 1000 coolness points.*

Alright, I'll admit it. I have my cranky pants on today. We've been here in Nova Scotia for two years, although this is our third spring. And try as I might to hang in there and be optimistic, today, as of this very minute, after what seems like an eternity of rain and greyness, I loath springtime on the East coast. Loath. It.



Everything I do these days, I do in little chunks of time, which doesn't come as much of a surprise. The fact that these little chunks add up to actual progress does somewhat. During my morning reprieve from mothering duties (yay for predictable naps) I spent some time in the craft room getting reacquainted. I hauled out the spinning for a brief interlude. Didn't get very far, but it was kinda fun to play with an old toy. I also dabbled in fusing plastic. More about that in another post.



In addition to the Clapotis and the little cardigan I've been working on in the knitting department, I just couldn't seem to resist the urge to cast on a sock. The pattern; Paraphernalia (Ravelry link). The yarn; Kertzer On Your Toes 4 Ply. Liking the cabling quite a bit. I've been wanting to knit this for about a year or so, but I don't know if it's just me or what, but the pattern seems to be messed up. What I ended up doing to make it look like it should and what the pattern tells me I should be doing are not one and the same. In reading others descriptions of this pattern, no one else seems to have encountered any problems. The pattern is translated into English from another language (Dutch perhaps? I wasn't paying attention), so perhaps that's where the problem lies. In any case, once I got a rhythm down, they seem to be progressing quite quickly.

And now little miss is awake. Perhaps not so predictable after all, as I was expecting to get a whole other hour out of her. Off to 'enjoy' another dreadfully dreary and blaseh day. Yippee.

Until later...

It's All About the Hair...7 Weeks

We're having a hard time deciding on a hair-do for miss Bean.



Can't pick between the Nolte...



or the Beethoven.

The End of the 4th Trimester...

A weird angle, but she fell asleep in my lap like this and I thought it was rather amusing.

So six weeks. Sort of a bittersweet milestone. Some refer to it as the 4th trimester, the 'getting to know this wonderful little weirdo' phase. You'd think that the giving birth part would feel like the end of the pregnancy, but it sort of feels like the six week mark is. Getting the pregnancy out of your head seems to take a little while, and as odd as it sounds, even to me, there were times when I quite missed it. You can't ever be as close to another human like that and while there is a whole litany of things that suck about it to be sure, there are an equal number of things are quite wonderful. So it's with just a tinge of sadness that it now seems to be officially over and onward and upward into the great unknown we go.

A is doing great. She's discovered her hands and likes to chomp on them when she's hungry. She's smiling a lot more and cooing a whole bunch and is just generally content most of the time when she's awake. She's grown out of a handful of her sleepers already and has slept 7 hours the last three or four nights in a row. Crazy. Yesterday we took a big two hour trip to do some shopping in Bayers Lake and she pretty much slept through the whole day. It was awesome. I'm a worrier, I seem to enjoy envisioning worst case scenarios, which actually may work in my favour sometimes. She was so easy and relaxed and content that the day turned into an exceptionally wonderful outing for me, as I had foreseen any number of stressful or awkward outcomes. And the added bonus? I now have jeans that fit. Yay me. I'm not *quite* fitting into my own pre-preg. pants just yet and rather than walk around feeling conspicuous and overstuffed, I opted for comfort. Better than arguing with myself over whether or not to commit the ultimate fashion faux pas; going out in public in pajama pants.



While in Bayers Lake, I hit up Michael's, as I had wanted to get some wooden letters for A's room. I want to put these up over her crib. I'm either going to paint them to match the colours in her room, (crimson, light green, light blue...one in each colour) or leave them white. Thoughts? As of right now, I can't make up my mind.



Work on my Clapotis (pronounced CLAP-oh-TEE in case anyone was wondering) is coming along swimmingly. It's dead easy, that is, once I figured out what the hell I was doing. Complete mental block when I started this. I think I ripped it three times before I figured out what I was doing wrong. Duh. Seriously, brain turning to mush over here. I really really need to start reading more. And not just knitting mags. and patterns. In any case, I'm loving this project all because of the yarn. It's soooo luxurious. Sheds like the dickens, but soft and warm and I can't wait to wrap myself up in this.



And because I can't leave well enough alone, I've started another baby sweater, another top-down cardigan, again with the Jr. Jacquards. Hey, the yarn shop was having a sale, what can I say. This one will likely be for my nephew. His big sister got all kinds of hand-knits when she was wee, I feel it only fair that he get some too.

That's the round-up for this week. They're going by so fast I can hardly keep up. Until later...