Wacky Week

I have not accomplished much crafting lately. This is for a few reasons- mostly I've been working like crazy, and in the evenings I've been a busy busy bee. Here's a taste:
Saturday night to Sunday afternoon: Harry Potter, of course.
Sunday evening: Cooked dinner for Mom and Roommate.
Monday evening: Finished the crocheted baby blanket (OK, so I did a little crafting).
Tuesday evening: Bethesda Restaurant Week- I went with a group to Rock Creek, which was delicious.
Wednesday evening: Went to a signing by Jasper Fforde, who is amazing and funny and he stamped as well as signed my copy of "Thursday Next, First Among Sequels"
And coming up?
Thursday evening: Transformers with a fellow UMBC alum.
Friday evening: Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind, at Woolly Mammoth (I couldn't resist the cheap Goldstar tickets).
Saturday evening: Gallathea (really?? Gallathea on-stage? So excited).
If you extend it out a bit further, my Crafts Cluster is meeting Sunday afternoon in Virginia, and I'm going to see a sneak preview of The Ten on Monday night. Whew!

That's a total of two fancy dinners, one book signing, two Fringe Festival plays, and a pop culture movie. Not bad! On the craft front, however, there has been slow progress. I really have been working on the MS3- I am about a quarter of the way through Clue 4 (so halfway through the first chart). That's slow going since I can't knit it on the metro. Then I did finish the crocheted Victory V baby blanket:

The edge, which shows off the Victory V's:

I'd love to say I used a pattern, but it's crochet. Easy peasy. This is TLC Baby, so a sport weight yarn- I crocheted a chain that was something long. And then I did the V stitch. And when it was about square in size (it's actually pretty ginormous, in the end), I did one round of double crochet in blue. I tried single crochet and two rounds of double, and double then single- I liked the cleanness of this version best. I rather miss crocheting- it's so quick, satisfying, and eminently easy. I have to pay attention when I knit. Well, I tend to knit lace and cables and things that require counting. It was a real treat to just zoom through an easy stitch pattern that required no counting and no real effort. It was perfect for watching more interesting TV- Roommate and I are watching Lost, and there's no way I can knit MS3 while watching that!

Ahem. I also cast on for a new sweater. I am knitting it as pictured, right down to the Alpaca Silk DK and the colorway. Because I love it.

A key feature is that you run the empire-waist creating ribbon below the bust, through the eyelets of the lace pattern. This means that I can make an empire waisted top without having to worry about altering, modification, etc. I think it will be quite flattering, and completely appropriate for work. It will also be warm, which is key in my overly-A/Ced environment. Only one small issue- alpaca sheds like crazy. Aaah well.

As if that weren't enough, when you add in slogging on the baby afghan for mid-August, I also have been doing some socks. Here's one, now ready for me to turn the heel on the metro:

The yarn is Cascade Fixation, and I'm knitting the Broadripple Socks again. Note the fantastic Lantern Moon tiny DPNs- they make me much faster. Not as fast as Magic Loop, but sometimes you don't feel like playing with Addis.

Time's fun when you're eating flies

So, this Mystery Stole. I'm getting a bit worried. I finished Clue 3 last night (horror of horrors, it took me more than just the weekend). I blame this on the obsessive kitty hat making, but I did get seven of the little suckers off to Gaia to sell at Otakon. She had three already, so ten total isn't quite such a sad inventory. I need to try selling them on Etsy, but only after my hands recover from all the acrylic.

So I finished the third clue last night, well maybe 12:30 this morning. Tuesday night... that's a new low. Most of the knitting was done at Columbia Mall before the Decemberists show at Merriweather- I scared a few of the kids hanging out by the "water feature" I think. The rest of it was on the couch while watching America's Got Talent. I hate to say it America, but I'm not so sure about that Talent label.

I probably would have completed it faster, except for the baby blankets I'm working on. Funny how I continue along with my knitting life, completely blase, until the moment I realize I have less than a month to finish two blankets that I started ... 3-6 months ago. I anticipate that the crocheted blanket will be 100 (long) rows, and I'm on 64 as of this morning. Amazing how much you can complete while waiting for the cable guy to show up. The knitted baby blanket will probably be 30 squares, and I've completed 10. So that's some progress, at least.

I'm scared about the next clue for the stole. Instead of 50 rows, we have well over 100. Also, Melanie suggests strongly that we use a lifeline in Row 287. I hate lifelines. They offend me. But if the designer is telling us to suck it up and use one, in this particular row, so be it. I have this sinking feeling this is going all multi-directional or something. I have trust in her that it will come out lovely, but I admit that I'm less in love with it after 1/3 of the stole than I was in the first clue. I still love the intricate border, though, so maybe I'll be able to regain my initial admiration somewhere in Clue 4 or 5...

What I did over my summer vacation...

A little trip in pictures. If you will recall, we last left our intrepid knitter just home from Mom and Dad's. Forget R&R, this was a working break! Here's the evidence:

Posing with a work in progress:


Pieced apples:


Messy work in progress (I love my mother's sewing table. Oh yes I do):


Finished but for the quilting:


I also received my snazzy bag from the Craft Exchange right before I left. The outside:


And print interior/alternate exterior:


And not to be biased, but my favorite project of all?? The Mystery Stole 3, Clue 2 completed about a half hour ago:


Hurray for pretty projects. Did I mention the four kitty hats that need ears? And the charity scarf that needs to be completely redone by Saturday? I'm getting there. I would have been significantly more productive if I hadn't had a stomach bug today, but that didn't keep me from knitting this week's MS3 clue. I did have to rip out three rows, however, since I evidently lost my place while losing my cookies. I'm not sure which bothered me more.

Next post: I take on quilting, the actual hand quilting part, and see how many kitty hats I can knock out in short order. Here's my first kitty hat, back in Bloomington, when I decided it was almost as fun to leave the ends out and go Fraggle Rock:
(Care of Yahoo Photos, which has conveniently sent all sorts of old photos I'd forgotten about into my Flickr account!)

Quilting Lessons

I took a very long bridge-the-gap weekend. Wednesday I had off for the fourth, and by taking Th/Fri off I get a 5 day weekend. Nice! I spent the majority of it learning how to quilt and making a wall hanging.

Yes, there will be pictures. But not quite yet.

This weekend I knit 4 kitty hats (rather, four bases, but not the ears yet). Also 6 or 7 rows of the Mystery Stole, which is a piddly number but I have a whole day tomorrow to work on them. I also knit another bit of a square for the baby afghan.

Much more importantly, I finished a wall hanging to give as a wedding present to a very old friend of mine getting married in two weeks. By finished, I mean I completed the piecing, got the backing on, and my mom was sweet enough to baste it and add the binding. All that's left is to quilt the sucker! Mom taught me the basics, and my stitches were looking almost acceptable on our practice placemat after a few hours, so hopefully another couple hours to practice and I'll be able to whip through and mail the finished project off. I also learned some neat tricks for making squares of two fabrics on the diagonal, without cutting triangles. I hate cutting triangles, so that was a godsend. This got put into use for another quilt project, which is super secret for now.

I also received my craft exchange project from Dallas's exchange group- crafted by the ever amazing and talented Dallas herself. Again, I have pictures to post later, but it is the cutest thing ever! Adorable bag, exactly the perfect shape to use as a purse and stick a small knitting project inside. It fits exactly under my arm, so I don't need to worry about things falling out. It has a cute little rosette flower attached (in hot pink, of course). Best of all? The whole thing is reversible!! I can do sophistocated black, or an amazingly cute and bright swirly print, a bit Pucci-esque. I love it! In fact, I'm already using it as my purse. I went with black for my night on the town tonight, but I suspect that print is going to get a fair bit of use this summer.

One more day of freedom. By next weekend I hope to have a bunch of kitty hats done, and to have completed the second MS3 clue. Here's hoping! Otakon is almost here... so I definitely need to get cracking on those hats, if I ever want to make back the yarn costs...

Goals

I've been reading a number of posts about knitting goals lately. I have a few of my own- now that we're entering the second half of the year I should check up on my goals from before and see how I'm doing. And of course, set some new ones!

Here was my post from February (alright a bit belated for resolutions, but it'll do):

FORMER MIKAIYA SELF: I have a few knitting goals for 2007. They're pretty simple, actually. I want to knit myself two sweaters, and at least one pair of socks. Actually, I'd love to knit myself three sweaters and enough socks that I don't need to wear store-bought ones, but I'm sticking to realistic here. In this aim, I have the yarn and patterns for THREE sweaters already... and have cast on for one. Ooh la la. I also have a nearly finished pair of socks which has been languishing for a year or so.

CURRENT MIKAIYA SELF: Wonder of wonders, I finished that almost-finished sock. Finally. It's green! Now I just need to take a picture of it. I also knit two pairs of socks, but gave them away to my mother and my sister. I made one sock for my dad as well, though it's currently suffering from second sock syndrome. I'll get on that, though- as well as the two other socks I have on the needles!

I also finished one of the sweaters already, my Bobble Blue. It was a blast to knit, but it's a bit bulkier than I had hoped for. Maybe I need to re-block it. Either way, I get compliments on it at work and it's perfect for the spring and fall- warm wool counteracts the fact that it is short-sleeved and it's incredibly comfortable on the metro and in the office.


That's two successful bits- looks like I need to hurry up and make myself another sweater and get on those socks. Here's a review of the finished objects from the year so far!


My additional knitting goals? How about a list:
- Mystery Stole 3 (Clue 1 complete!)
- 2 pairs of socks (they're already begun...)
- one more shawl
- something Fair Isle
- another sweater (maybe 2!)
- finish the two baby sweaters that have been languishing in time out.

Mystery Stole 1: some progress!

I managed to take pictures along the way this weekend.

This is Mystery Stole 3 (hereafter MS3) at 3:30am Saturday morning when I completed Chart A (ie, 3 hours after casting on... including the first 15 rows which I had to rip out and redo):


I was already loving the border swirls and points.

I completed the rest of it over the weekend, and this is what it looked like at 8 Sunday evening (2 days for 100 rows! I'll take it):


A detail of the edging (Wow do I love this border):


And the inset at the center (this one actually shows the beads- they're the bright shiny things peeking out at you):


This was really a record knitting weekend. 100 rows of lace, a few inches of the baby owl sweater front, and 3 or 4 squares for my cousin's baby blanket (they're all repeats at this point, so not much point in showing pictures until I get farther along). I also did another few rows of the crocheted baby blanket. I need to be more active tomorrow!

I also picked up my HDTV... finally joined the 21st century. It looks SO GOOD. Best of all, I can move Buffy episodes back up in my Netflix queue! On my old tv, it was virtually impossible to watch- everything looked pitch black. Hurray for contrast and brightness!

This week I'm taking a mini vacation. Two more days of work, then I am heading up to Baltimore for a quilting lesson and fireworks watching with Mom. I'll be home Friday to start working on MS3 Clue 2!

EDIT:: I should note one thing. I had to rip out about half a row twice (in rows 95 and 97 I think) because I wasn't paying attention. It cost me a total of five minutes, I think. Otherwise, this stole has been incredibly easy to work on!! I found Hanami to be much more difficult to follow; this pattern is logical and beautiful to work with. I just thought that I should add that tidbit! I've been thinking I should run a lifeline through- everyone else seems to. Seeing as I haven't had any real issues so far though, I am not terribly worried. I also haven't found it necessary to use stitch markers, but I might later on depending on the pattern.