PinkPurlGrrl

Dulaan Knit-In

Saturday was a fantastic day filled with good food, wonderful knitters, tons of fiber, and topped off by a preview of the F.I.R.E. Documentary: One Steppe at a Time.

Ryan was concerned that we'd run out of room for knitters, but as a bunch we fold up pretty small and were easily tucked into the available chairs, cushions and rugs.  Frankie was at her finest, dressed in ribbons and demanding the attention due her.

I was excited to meet Duranee (red shirt & jeans) for the first time, we share a love for Sci-Fi Geekdom.  Also new to me were Ginger (purple shirt) & Diana (blue jacket).  It was a treat to see Mary B.(green sweat-shirt) again, and I always enjoy being around Rebbecca (smirking) who I think is the worlds biggest smart-alek.

I should say a special thanks to the most gracious, most wonderful, provider of Chocolate Tofu Pie - TMK.  Thanks for modeling my latest green and black Dulaan hat!

Smells Like Meat Buns

Has anybody seen a green and black hat?

Green & Black Hat - part The Third.  This most recently started green and black hat is a step in a slightly new direction; I designed the color pattern myself.  I like the color flow found in many Fair Isle patterns (lighter to darker and back in one color family), and I like the joined patterns you see in Latvian patterns - so I combined those elements in this hat.  I don't like the first row of crosses where I alternated with solid and open, so I'll duplicate stitch over the centers of the open ones to make it match the other cross rows.  I am particularly pleased with the hat band.  I worked 6 rows of the darkest green, added the black and worked a knit row, a purl row and then the light green cross pattern before knitting the cast on edge into the hat body.  It is squishy and sharply defined.  I haven't yet decided on what decrease pattern to use for the top and may wait for Saturday's Dulaan Knit In to see what the group thinks.

My Library Board Open House is tonight, wish me luck.  I was practicing my introductions and my closing remarks in the car this morning with BLING.  At one point I accidentally said "I'd like to spank Murray" instead of "I'd like to thank Murray", now I'm terrified I'll say something even worse tonight.

Hat Frenzy

I seem to be on a hat binge lately.  There is something fun about learning a new trick and seeing what you can do with it.  I've been working on Fair Isle knitting, and I only bought a few colors from Knit Picks, so I'm generating black and green hats.  I finished the box pattern hat over the weekend, and charted my own design on Saturday.  I'm about 1/12 inches into the next green and black hat.  Good news - payday is Thursday, and I can buy more colors then.

Work has become really interesting.  For the last year it has been difficult to stay busy.  There just wasn't enough work to do; being a slacker doesn't suit me.  I rang the "I'm bored" bell a bunch and I think it's paid off.  I have been given responsibilities for whole areas of admin (not just support tasks), and I am having to learn lots of new things and create systems for tracking my work to make sure nothing falls between the cracks.  Apparently I'm doing a good job because I had the most wonderful annual review of my professional career yesterday.  I think that my job may grow a bit more, and I may be...better appreciated (that's a code phrase) in the near future.  Wish me luck for future goodness, and help me remember that I can post from home - this blog is important to me and I haven't been giving it the attention it deserves.

Finished Hat

Clever title huh?  This is a drive-by Blogging, as there aren't enough hours in a day this week.  I finished my Fair Isle hat this weekend; I even blocked it.  Next up is another Fair Isle hat, this one for Dulaan.  I'm working on this little block pattern.  I'm going to use the lightest and darkest green from the first hat, and keep it on a black back ground.  This should be a little more challenging than the roses.  I like this more than I thought I would and this may be the summer of colorwork for me.  BLING reserved a book of Latvian knitting patterns for me at the library (Confession: I am the Library Board Chair and I can't remember how to put a book on reserve, so I have my wife do it - I'm lame).  I can't wait to see it!

But of course...

I didn't work on Anna's cable socks last night, and it was the fault of the USPS.  They brought my Knit-Picks order. 

I was a good knitter and I worked up a swatch to make sure it looked right and to figure out my gauge.  I don't want a tight fitting hat, I'd like one just snug enough to stay on.  I have a long history of making hats that are just a scosch (is that how you spell it?) too small.  Sometimes I like to pass them off as intentionally knit for Dulaan, but the knitting Goddess knows my truth.  So I swatched and figured and did all the math. 

I couldn't get to my pattern last night.  BLING plays the Sims like I knit, obsessively and nearly without ceasing.  I hadn't printed out the pattern and just couldn't bring myself to boot her off the computer.   Do you see where I deviated?  I think I'll stick to the original, but as I've already cast on for the hat with the mistake I'll have to do some math magic to get the stitch count right.

More on the vet: Our "old" vets office is a multi-partner practice, and one of the vets is a real Tool.  I don't think I've ever used that term seriously, but it fits.  Two years ago we had put off having Brody neutered for a few extra months because I had recently had surgery and had been off work for 7 weeks.  There wasn't any extra money and there was almost zero chance Brody would accidentally father a litter (and he didn't).  This vet lectured me on American priorities, American diets, and how people could better take care of their pets if they didn't buy so much disposable food.  That sounds disjointed, but it's how he made his argument.  Basically he was saying I'm fat and because I've put too much money into my body I didn't have the money to put into my dog and that made me a bad person.  Niiiiiiice.

This jerk was regularly rude to BLING and I, and normally I wouldn't take that kind of treatment but he was good with the dogs, Brody clearly loved him, and he was skilled.  His behavior did eventually cross the line with me too many times and we've been looking for a better vet since.  We learned this week that he's no longer with that practice so BLING and I are talking about whether or not we want to stay there (none of the vets has much of a bedside manner, but they are all skilled vets).

I don't yet know exactly how I feel about the first vet we saw last week.  I'm too emotionally close to the scare.  I think I'm mad that she went from zero to emergency in 2 seconds.  I don't think we'll go back to her, I would never trust her to take a moderate approach.

Creation

I am working on a pair of socks for my friend Anna.  Together we chose this subtle gray Opal sock yarn, and initially we decided on the Pomatomous pattern - but that just wasn't to be.  The Opal is just too thin and hairy for Pomatomous, but it's just right for cables.  Besides, the understated gray calls for a more classic pattern.  I looked at the different cable patterns I have and finally came up with my own rib and cable pattern.  Roughly this is a K4, P1 pattern with cables worked every 8th round.  Instead of turning the cables in the same direction each time I have reversed them and had the cables run as a curving zig-zag down the length.  At the heel I worked a cable then extended the ribbing down to the sole where I worked short rows for a nice rounded heel. 
Sunday was spent knitting and watching scary movies (The Exorcism of Emily Rose, & The Bone Collector), I finished the patterning and have started on the first toe.   With luck I'll finish sock one tonight and cast on for sock two.  If I get my Knit-Picks order today (not holding my breath) I may have to swatch for my hat instead.  I have no project fidelity lately.  As long as I get these socks into Anna's hands by the end of May I'll feel good about it. 
Maybe I should flash all of my WIPs, keeping myself honest may be a good thing.

Last week was a rough one.  Brody, our lab mix baby who isn't even 3 yet, went to a vet and we thought we were going to lose him.  He has a big red growth on his side.  My research shows that it probably isn't anything to worry about and we were keeping an eye on it.  Last weekend he developed a kind-of unspecified pain.  He started crying when he would get up from a nap, and sometimes would cry for no visible reason.  He stopped getting up on furniture (very unusual for him) and seemed really worried.  We took him to a new vet (long story, maybe in another post) and she said the lump had to come off right now, and she wouldn't even touch him.  Her quote was way beyond what we can afford and we were in shock.  We don't want any of our animals to hurt, and we want to do good by them - but you can't spend your mortgage on the dog and then lose both house and dog.  Fortunately we decided to get a second opinion from the "old" vet practice.  The vet said the growth should be removed, but it wasn't an emergency and he's not terribly worried about it.  The pain was already starting to self resolve and can maybe just be chalked up to sore muscles, or an injury caused by playing hard in the back yard with the other dogs.  We have time to save up for the procedure, and are happy that Brody isn't actively dying (as we first thought).  I'm more than a little shaken up, on the first vets advice and quote I was preparing myself to have Brody put to sleep.  This is a major lesson learned.

Fishing for a post

I feel like the Govenor in "The Best Little Whorehouse in  Texas" singing "Sidestep".  I just don't have a lot of knitting to report on.  So here is a picture of Kiska with her fresh new do courtesy of Canine Groomers in Shoreline.  She looks awesome, and smells great.  Let's see, what else can I tell you?  BLING and I joined a new heatlh club in Mountlake Terrace, it's called Retrofit - love the name.  They will need seismic retrofitting if I ever go to an aerobics class, think I'll stick to the cardio machines.  Cirque du Socks ended Sunday and the prizes are posted today.  It was a lot of fun to host a knitalong, I'll do it again in the future.  I enjoyed reading the participants blogs, and had fun finding circus themed pictures for my posts.

Wish I had more for you today.  Now that the KAL is over I bet I'll be a little more regular with posting.