its kittens not knittins....but i'm sure you don't mind. they're cracking me up today.


baby kittehs are in a laundry basket that they’re quickly outgrowing. brutus (the biggest stripy-est one) is big enough to almost get over (he actually toppled over once today but he was using a sibling as a step stool.)

anyway earlier today he was trying to climb over again. he had his little paws hanging on the top while his bottom feet scrambled in mid air trying to connect with something and making a TON of noise.

enter mama kat.

she looked at him for a second then thwapped him (hard) upside the head. he was so startled he fell over onto his back and just laid there for a second!

he hasn’t tried to climb over again. :)

fast forward to this afternoon. i'm sitting here, waiting for the new version of windows media player to load (so i can instanetflix dr who) when i hear this horrible shrieking kitten wail come from the basket. i lean over to check (only slightly panicked) to find that while mama has little brutus pinned down giving him a bath (concentrating mostly on the back end of things) one of his sisters decided that was the perfect time to nom his head with her pointy little bebeh teefs!! i've been on the receiving end of those teefs in the last couple days....i really feel the little guy's pain.

poor bebeh! it's just not his day.



(brutus is on the far left. i'm not going to admit that any of the others have names because i'm not supposed to be getting attached.)

unlimited knitting time for the next six to eight weeks? sounds like a dream right?

i. am. so. bored. curse you klutziness!!

not bored with knitting per se. but with sitting and pain and my house and immobility and all those other things that make it hard to concentrate on (let alone ENJOY) what you're doing.

i've been on bed rest since the 7th from a chipped and fractured talus bone. it's the bone that forms a big part of your ankle joint between the tibia, fibia and "heel" bones. (the heel bone has another name, calsomething....but i don't remember and you don't really care. in case you do google is your friend.)

long story short: as i left my niece's adorable pirate/peterpan (ie tinkerbelle) themed birthday party at an adorable pirate themed restaurant, i missed a step/tripped over my own feet and took a spectacular fall. could only have been better if i walked a plank. really. i wish i'd walked a plank...at least that's a better story. the sad truth is i've been trying to master this walking thing for nearly 25 years and still don't quite have it down. i'm a bit slow.

luckly i probably won't need surgery. but i've been on bed rest for two weeks already and i'm looking at two more (although the conditions of the next two weeks of rest are far less restrictive). thank GOD almighty and baby Jesus too for my amazing supportive husband. he has been helping me from the first thirty seconds of this debacle onwards...everything from bringing me tea and changing the dvd at my every whim to explaining medical terms and calming my fears. not to mention putting up with my cranky butt (to my credit i'm making a HUGE effort to stay positive...and doing a kick ass job at it, if i do say so myself. and i do.)

he is caring and calm, patient and kind. i don't know what i would do without him. seriously. i can't even get to the bathroom alone (corralling dogs, unlocking doors, and moving random obstacles all whilst hobbling on crutches? near impossible alone. and painful.) i really wish i could clone him for my single friends.

another big shout out to casey, jess, mary heather and jeninmaine for ravelry in general and CPaAGg in particular. i'm sure they're all sick of hearing of my woe but at least they give me cake and entertain me when i'm too gorked out on pain or pain killers to be productive. i'm lucky to have found a place where productive is frowned upon. :)

on the bright side the boys' spiderman afghan for is nearly complete. the double crochet, skip two chain/two every once in a while pattern is about the only thing the percocet and pain have allowed me to concentrate on. i did decide to add an extra skien to the pattern though. partly as a time occupier for myself, partly as a fight prevention for my dear friend who is mother of said boys. i figure if the blanket is big enough (and the three little monster loves of my life are tired enough) everyone might consent to sharing.

one can dream, no?

its hooooottttttt. whiiiiiiiiiiiine.

i'm afraid that if i work on my socks, they'll felt. that's how friggin sweaty i am. and my house is an oven. and it's baking all of the previously dormant house smells into a nasty kennel/garbage/dirt bouquet. i'm seriously about to vomit.

whiiiiiiiiine.

so i put all my yarn in two big plastic 16gallon tubs today (one worsted and smaller, the other bulky). they're about half full (each)...but it looks like a lot. i'm really worried for my husband to get home tomorrow. i don't think i'm going to be allowed anymore yarn until i finish some things. tear.

oops. kind of forgot i had one of these. typical. find something. get really excited. do a whole bunch. then....nothing. zip. burnout. meh.

i've gotten quite a few things done lately. right now i'm working on socks. its going pretty smoothly...you know if you don't count the four false starts. i'm working jaywalkers toe up in some sockotta fair isle pattern yarn. they're pink/yellow/orange/red/white and took a while to get used to. eeeeny weeeeeny stitches in bright colors are hard on my eyes. but i love how portable they are. i even took them to mcmenimans for our now official weekly wednesday no boys allowed night. some fine kip banter was had. observe:

bartender: "cool! is that some kind of mini crochet?"
me: "nope. it's knitting. a sock in fact. well. more like a toe."
bartender: "a baby toe!"

he was fun.

i've realized i have to knit in bars now. it used to be i had a drink in my hands. always. and cigs. and the social lubricant made me unselfconscious. since i had an opinion about EVERYTHING making conversation wasn't issue either. but since i've i stopped drinking (well, stopped keeping up anyway) i'm me again (for better and worse) and going out has gotten really uncomfortable. i know i know, just don't go....but damnit. i hate bars. my friends love bars. i love my friends. enter knitting. my hands are busy. i can zone stupid people out if i need to. i can join a conversation if i need to. and i can stay out as late as everyone else if i want to. woo. but i digress. i think my point was it's so much easier to kip with that tiny half sock than the blanket or scarf i've usually sprawled out for my drunk friends to fondle while i work.

another (completely unrelated) fun thing about socks? since socks usually take only a skien or two it's a good way to try handpaints without going broke. which i have been doing. a lot. turns out it's making me broke afterall. speaking of which....i ordered mamaE's yes we can yarn to support the obama cause (WOO!). i was going to donate about $15 or $20 dollars this month anyway...this way i get some super cool one of a kind yarn for about five bucks. i mean really, the yarn was basically free, right? i totally plan on knitting some obama rocks my socks while i work in the campaign office this may.

i'm also working up a suprise for my hubby that i'm pretty excited about (used my math skills and all)....but i don't know if he reads this, so i don't want to say more. maybe i'll still be excited in a few weeks after i give it to him.

that is all.

my knitpicks order came today! yay! i was completely torn between the harmony and options tips so i bought one of each: the harmony 17s and options 13s. i love bulky yarns and have lots of large gague needles....but no metal 13s and no 17s at all. and now i do!

i specifically bought berrocco hip hop yarn to try out the harmonys. i figured the colors are similar to those in the needles so if i wasn't distracted confused or bothered, i wouldn't have any issues. it's also a really wooly super bulky yarn to test the slippyness. i'm making it into scarf for my sister. i did promised her one before she started to piss me off...and now i'm not annoyed anymore so i should actually do it. (sidenote: i really need to stop promising to make people things....it makes me look like a flake when i take too long) i'm working it in afghan stitch. i don't know if that's an actual stitch or stitch name but hey, that's what the free stitch handout from the LYS says at the top.

so far so good.



although i completely disagree about options cables not having memory....mine are pretty tightly coiled still. not as bad as the takumi bamboo cables, but annoyingly twisty just the same. the harmonys are heavier than i'm used to but much slicker than bamboo...not as slick as addi turbos though dispite some of the reviews i've read. they're so pretty! and the points! the hip hop yarn not only verigates colors but also thickness....i've had no problems getting under the thickest and thinnest parts. i'm in love.

that said, i think i'm going to buy the nickel plated set first though and probably wait til my birthday for the harmonys. i've gotten pretty excited lately about knitting quasi fast and i don't want to go back to wood. i'm going to buy a set of size four tips though to work the print o the wave shawl in. i think fast would be a bad idea there.

aaaah love it! ok. back to my scarf.

oh. and in case you're curious....here's a picture i took yesterday on the afghan's progress. so much left. *sigh*



i wish i could figure out how to link/post pictures with flickr. if i could get down to one photo sharing site, that would be awesome.

i spent the last couple of hours photographing and cataloging my stash and i've come to a few conclusions.

1) i hate acrylic. hate.
2) i am too cheap to buy anything else.
3) i am too lazy to take care of anything else (and so are all my friends). we are definetly wash and wear people.

this is a problem.

it's compounded by the fact that acrylic is such a tricky beast...i *think* it's soft until i actually handle it for more than a minute or two. so i have multiple skeins from long ago (and not so long ago...because i never learn my lessons) that i have no intention of using. even the blends (with the exception of berocco comfort *love*) have been tricking me lately. i have a mohair/acrylic/nylon blend that felt plush and soft in the store....turns out it was on clearance for a reason. lion brand homespun is the worst. once it knits up, it's so scratchy but still weirdly soft. i need to just stop buying it....but it's so pretty! and goes on sale a lot.

i found some fun superwash wool/cotton at the LYS the other day which takes care of the lazyness in fabric care factor. i'm going to buy some tomorrow and see how that goes. sigh. i can't afford to be a yarn snob.

after taking pictures of the booties today, i realized they are a sad sad pair (see?). lopsided, lumpy, and one is pointy! definitely into the first tries pile. but i'm still going to make the hat. dorky booties deserve dorky hat. viva la pom poms!

of course i get my ravelry invite at 1am. and of course i screw around for an hour instead of going to bed. it's just as cool as i anticipated though. love it when that happens.

i knit the other sock/bootie tonight. it's just as lumpy and not entirely on purpose. i dropped a lot more stitches on this one too...got too involved in the shield. poor lem.

i still don't know what to think of them. hubby says they're cute but he has this thing about smallness = cute. either way, i'm going to make a simple hat with yellow ribbing trim and the same pattern. and a pom pom. i've always wanted to make something with a pom pom but i think they're kind of dorky. since i'm 90% sure the whole thing will end up in my first tries pile...well why the hell not.

ok. bedtime.

i'm number 596 on the raverly list! today or tomorrow baby! i wish i'd know about the waitlist checker a week ago. i've been stalking my email (im)patiently and quasi compulsively....and now i know for sure. i can't believe some people waited for months. well. i can. but i wouldn't have been happy about it and i'm grateful i didn't have to.

i found a pattern for lindsay's hat. yay. but it will probably still be a while....i don't want to buy any more needles that will ultimately come in an interchangeable kit until i decide if i want one or not. i guess i could make it on sixes. we'll see. need to work more on the afghan. speaking of which...i must bid you adieu.

i have officially annoyed my friends and family with my incessant knitting chatter. somehow, they just don't get as excited as i do about how quick i can knit with my new addi turbos or that i learned a new stitch. the first couple of projects, sure. there were the oohs and aahs....but i think i'm turning into that person. you know the one....their stuff is kind of cute, in that homemade way but they're not quite good enough yet that it's anything special. and while that may be true.....it's still special and i want people to see it damnit!

enter blog. now it's your own fault if you you read my rambling and look at my lumpy socks.

by the by: look at my lumpy socks!!!!

(the second photo truely showcases the lumptasticness)

i used the adorable adorable flakey baby socks pattern from anny purls. but no sleep the night before (that'll teach me not to refill my meds) and my first try at color work, magic loop AND socks makes mine not quite so adorable. should have just worked on nathan's afghan. but still a pretty good first try.

because i was so tired i only did one repeat of the fair isle pattern and the rest in mindless stockingette. i also tried a three needle bind off which would have been fine if i would have remembered to turn the damn things inside out. doh. i blame sleep deprivation. oh well. this way there's no seam rubbing on baby's foot. yeah. that's it. i also made the color on the toe less thick to match the cuff. but yeah....magic loop is AMAZING. never ever EVER using DPNs or short cables again. ever. dropped stitches and ladders? $10 to $20 for a better length of cable for the project? i will not miss thee.

too bad i have to make the second sock kind of lumpy too, so they match. (yeah. it's intentional. that's it.) then again, if i decide not to subject any of my friend's babies to my ineptitude and just add them to my "first try" pile, that isn't an issue and i can make "prettier ones" right away. but then i have an unmatched sock (which is really more like a bootie because the worsted is so thick and tight). that's annoying. what to do what to do.....no really. tell me what to do.

anyway. i tackled them as an afghan break....but really? i just need to stop getting distracted from the afghan. it's going to end up a christmas present at the rate i'm going. it's still only 1/3 done.....but knitting much faster thanks to my new needles. yay addis!!! the gage didn't even change like i was afraid it would. yay. too bad they cost so much. my pocketbook is hoping hoping hoping that when the options/harmony trial tips i ordered come in a couple days i'll like them just as much.