Life, Knitting and the Pursuit of Roller Coasters

One of the side effects of putting a lot of my yarn on a bookcase at the foot of my bed is that I’m looking at it all a lot. And it’s begun to call to me in the quiet moments of my days. Some of it is very chatty yarn. It makes it difficult to keep my number of active projects within a reasonable scope when there are all those little “knit me” voices calling from the shelves. Especially since most of the yarn on that wall is meant for projects for me, and I’m currently ramping up the gift knitting for the holidays.

I did succumb to a ball of white karabella aurora bulky from the shelf that had begun yelling at me and keeping me up at night. I got the yarn pre-wound in a ebay lot a couple years ago and it was enough yarn, and knotted up enough, that it was likely two or three balls strung together.

It really wanted to be a cushy hat. It really really loudly wanted to be a cushy hat. I have encountered some chatty yarn and some stubborn yarn and even some of that stuff that puts on the puppy dog eyes in the store then turns nippy and mean once you get it home, but this ball was just downright demanding and obnoxious and I was beginning to lose my resolve to fight it. Telling it to stay on it’s shelf until I was ready just wasn’t working anymore. It was like fighting with a three-year-old. So I did the only sane thing I could do.

I stopped fighting it and started a hat from it last weekend using the Robins Egg Blue Hat pattern and finished it up on the drive to Pittsburgh on Friday. It was a nice quick knit and resulted in a great hat, plus the yarn quieted down for a bit. I thought I had my sanity back once it was done. And the yarn wasn’t wrong, it definitely makes a great cozy winter hat. I did make some mods to the hat… 15 rows of seed stitch total and I just kinda did my own thing with the top decreases once I got there.

Then on the drive back home on Sunday, I was going to take a break from knitting and read, but as I was fishing through my bag for my book, the leftovers from the hat saw their opportunity and started to speak up again. It didn’t even start at a low murmur or a whisper this time. As soon as I opened the bag there were shouts of “Finish me! Finish Me! You need Mitts too! I don’t care if you don’t have a pattern! Make something up!” Since my resolve for this ball of yarn was so low and I knew I was still in for a long drive in a confined space with this yarn taunting me, I once again gave into it’s demands. I was done dealing with it and was ready for it to just be done so I could move on. I whipped up a really quick pair of fingerless mitts to coordinate with the hat and breathed a sigh of relief. That seemed to finally do the trick and there is so little yarn left that I don’t think it’s even whispering anymore. It is very pleased with it’s new life as cozy cool-weather accessories.

…Now if I could just figure out how to organize the stash so the sock yarn will stop multiplying (it just needs some temporary birth control, not a permanent solution).

I could also use some help in union negotiations, the sweater yarn and lace weight are starting to protest for equal knitting opportunities.

I’ll write the mitts pattern up here quickly as a freebie in case anyone else is holding on to an especially chatty ball or two of bulky-weight yarn. They’re a good companion piece for some of the bulky-weight hats floating around the web and are very quick to knit.

Chatty Bulky Mitts

On Size US 10.5 DPNs, with the bulky-weight yarn of your choice (or the bulky weight yarn that has chosen to torment you) Cast on 27 stitches

Join in the round being careful not to twist.

Knit 7 rows in seed stitch (k1, p1). Because your stitch count is an odd number of stitches there will be no visible “seam” in the seed stitch rounds and the seed stitch pattern just keeping going around.

Knit another 15 rows in stockinette (knit around). Or how ever many you would like before placing the thumb.

On the next round, bind off 3 stitches and knit remaining round.

On the next round, cast on 3 stitches and knit the remaining round.

Knit another 8-9 rows or as many as you’d like before the fabric hits just below where you’d like the top of the mitts to hit on your fingers.

Purl one row, then bind off purl wise.

Repeat for the second mitt and weave in your loose yarn ends.

Wear and enjoy the peace and quiet and warmth of yarn that is finally content to be something other than a ball of yarn.

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 That’s Lily’s take on it anyway.

 Several months ago, I got a random email. Normally, I would have dismissed it as spam, but for some reason I opened this one, did a little digging to determine it’s legitimacy and went ahead and gave the sender permission to use one of my photos.

The email was from a publisher, and the photo is now in a book forever cementing my two kitties as an inconsequential part of pop culture history. I’m such a proud pet parent.

I’ts been a crazy week around here. I came down with the nasty cold/sinus infection that’s been going around and that knocked me out for several days. I somehow still managed to attend my cousin’s wedding reception last weekend despite that fact that I looked like death warmed over. Then while still quite sick but grocery shopping with my parents, I stumbled upon 3 Wii Fits on a shelf and quickly snatched up two of them (one went in the mail to my brother and his wife who have also been on the look out). Now that I’m feeling better, I’ve been playing with it quite a bit and enjoying the forced activity.

And then at work on Tuesday they held a raffle and I came home with another new toy…

It’s  a Panasonic  Toughbook CF-19 tablet PC. Still not sure what all I’m going to use it for, but it’ll be nice to have a working personal laptop again.

I’ve been working on a bunch of knitting projects, I’ve had a bit of a fit of startitis and I’ll have a few more projects to show off soon, but for right now I have a sneak peek at another stranded mitten pattern I’ve been working on.

Mom wanted monkeys and the purple is a dead on match to her winter coat. There will be a hat to match as well. If anyone is game to test knit one or both patterns before November, leave a comment and let me know.

My mom has been working with Paws with a Cause to get a service dog for well over a year now. She’s finally started her part of the training and met her dog on Monday. The dog will come home with her in November. Her name is Jade and she’s a Black Lab/Golden Retriever mix. She will help pick up dropped items, provide companionship, sound an alarm if there’s an issue when dad’s home and sound an alarm that will alert 911 if there’s an issue when he’s not.

So, meet Jade.

I seriously did not intend to take 2 months off from the blog, but it is what it is and things are starting to settle down enough to bring me back around to the blogging again. It’s honestly been a relatively knit-free couple of months which hasn’t contributed to my desire to post anything.

I do have two finished pairs of socks to show off though.

Early on after my last post, I completed my pair of Something’s Shady from SockMadness.

I also completed the pair I had at work during go live. They were a pair of Monkeys in Socks that Rock Fairgrounds.

Beyond that, I’ve got plenty of started projects and just haven’t been knitting as much in general.

I am halfway down the foot of my first Odds n’ Sods sock, another Sock Madness pattern. I have a baby sweater started that just needs some sleeves. I’m turning the heel of the second Pomotomous from a pair that I started in January of 2007. Also on the heel of a first Embossed Leaves sock, and part way up the foot of a new pair for my brother for Christmas.  I’ve made a handful of yarn purchases this summer including a stop last week on my way back from Minnesota at The Fold.

My travels haven’t been as extensive this summer because of work. My season passes for the various park chains aren’t getting their normal workouts. Although in the last few weeks Mike visited and we visited Indiana Beach and Waldameer parks, and this last weekend I spent 3 days visiting in Minnesota.

I took advantage of the no sales tax on clothing thing and re-wardrobed myself at the MOA, and visited a very crowded and hot state fair as well as a fly by at Valleyfair for their newest coaster.

I don’t even have new Rainbow Sock photos since Craig has been having some computer issues. I think he’s working on a video of some sort though.

My dishcloth finally made an appearance on ARN&R  although their write up was a bit of a cop out.

It’s just been a bit of a quiet layed back insanely busy summer without a whole lot to report. Now that I’m current and posting again though, I’ll poke around some more. Christmas is approaching faster than I care to admit so I need to pick up the needles again and get moving.

And will be returning to the blog thing shortly with plenty of new stuff to report. It’s just really hard to restart the momentum when I’ve unintentionally taken two months off.

We are in the midst of a huge project at work right now, and I am scheduled with 12-hour days July 1 – the 13th, then I get to carry the pager for a week. Crazy and tired doesn’t even begin to describe it, and I’m only on day 3. So, blog updates will be even more sporadic than usual. I think I basically told my parents to pretend I don’t exist and that I would talk to them again on the other side.

During craziness prep this weekend though, I did finish another pair of socks.

These were extremely fast, toe-up stockinette socks out of Ultramerino on size 3s. I think I knit the pair in about 4 days and used up all but the teeniest scrap of the yarn in both balls. Very cushy and comfy.

I do have a sock in my bag that I’ve been picking at between calls after hours on these long days, and I’m slowly adding stitches to the purple socks from sock madness every night before I go to sleep, so I may have a couple more finished pairs to show off in the next couple weeks… but I have to survive first.

Meanwhile, the Rainbow sock is gallivanting around Europe. 

Maybe just a little jealous. Maybe.

Pattern: Monkey

Yarn: Panda Wool (received in a swap one year ago)

Colorway: Circus

It’s nice to finish a pair for me again, as my last two finished pair have gone to my mom. I love how these came out, they weren’t my first Monkeys and they won’t be my last. The pattern is about as second nature to me as plain stockinette anymore.

Why is it the weeks that are craziest and should spawn a zillion blog posts are the weeks that I’m most quiet? Last week was one of those weeks, and I think I kept the contents to myself because many of the events of the week weren’t all good. It was a rough week for my circle of friends and there wasn’t much I could do or say that would make the pain go away so I opted for silence instead. Within my group of close friends in fewer than 7 days, we suffered the loss of 3 family members. My boyfriend’s grandmother passed away on Saturday the 14th, a close friend lost her dad on father’s day, and another lost his dad later in the week. It was a week of tears and exhaustion, and I wasn’t even in the thick of the mourning. My heart has gone out to these three friends in their time of mourning and that’s all I have to give.

My mom also landed herself back in the hospital for treatment of some open sores that have come and gone in her legs over the last several years and have been getting progressively worse over the last month or so. If the insurance approves the extended 3-week stay that the doctors have advised for her, hopefully the treatment will stick this time and she can stay out of the hospital again for a while. It’s not pretty, and the treatment she’s going through is painful and was horrible to watch on Saturday night when I was visiting. But when they had her legs undressed while performing the treatment, it was obvious that it is ultimately helping despite how much it’s obviously causing her pain in the short term.

But, it wasn’t all illness and death and helplessness in my life last week. I rallied some coworkers to do the heavy lifting and finally bought myself a chest freezer. I made ice cream. I discovered the bliss that is Balsamic Roasted Strawberries. I had a momma turkey and about 8 babies cross in front of my car on the way to get my veggies from the CSA farm. I finally met my uncle’s new wife (they were up visiting from Florida when mom went into the hospital). I knit on some socks. The plants on my patio are going gangbusters and I should be in for a summer of veggie overload. And at the point when I needed it most, I drove through just the right sized raincloud yesterday on my way back home from visiting mom in the hospital, and that raincloud produced a perfect full rainbow.

Today is my birthday. Well, at least for another half hour or so. I’ve had a day full of food and friends and fun and luck.

I spent last weekend with lots of friends at CoasterMania at Cedar Point. We had a blast on Friday for the event despite the heat. Several of us headed to Waldameer Park in Erie, PA for the day on Saturday to give their new coaster several spins (it’s awesome, if you’re even sort of close, support this great little traditional park. The new coaster is definitely a winner!) I’ll be making more trips to visit, hopefully yet this year. And on Sunday, my friend Ed and I went to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland.  The whole weekend was a blast. The RainbowHappySock was there too, and it brought Craig along, so I’m sure once he gets his photos uploaded we’ll have another update here.

Mike told me earlier in the week that he was being a cheapskate and not even sending a card. So instead, I received a bouquet of 18 pink, orange and yellow roses at work this afternoon from him.  They’re lovely even if I had to put them in a Jimmy John’s cup because I don’t have any vases at my desk. They’ll live at work for the remainder of the week to keep the cats out of them, but I think I’ll bring in a proper vase for them tomorrow morning.

I was also sent on a quest today. My mom decided sort of at the last minute before father’s day that she wanted to get my dad a Wii for father’s day. I think she’s had my brother searching for a couple weeks now, and just asked me to start looking last night. Since I was running to a few places after work today anyway, I went on a small search here in town. Birthday magic is a funny thing. I tried Sam’s Club, K-Mart, and Circuit City with no luck. When I got to Jackson Crossing, I knew there were at least 5 or 6 stores that could potentially carry the system, so I parked at one end (Target) and started at the store furthest from where I parked (Sears). Once I got to the department, I asked if they had any in stock, and the guy gave me something of a “I’ll humor you and look” look until we rounded the corner and there in the display was a single Wii box. I snatched it right up and gave mom and my brother each a quick call. The other thing I was on the hunt for was my freezer. I’ve finished pricing them out now, and it’s looking like Sam’s Club and Lowes are the cheapest, Sam’s is about $20 less, I’d just have to convince a coworker to lend me some braun and his truck for part of an evening, otherwise I think I can get Lowes to deliver.

I am still knitting, I started another travel-buddy sock. Another pair of Monkeys. This pair in Panda Wool in the circus colorway. They’re pooling in a kind of strange manner, but they work well for in-park knitting and saw plenty of knitting time last weekend while at the parks.  I have so many other sock patterns I want to play with, but it’s good to fall back on an old standard sometimes too.