Achievements

I'm down to three work in progress knits.  My medal is in the mail right?  I hope it's super shiny.  Technically you could say four but I'm going to frog the sock.  Just not feeling the yarn.  Oh wait, dammit, I'm working on two pairs of socks.  Okay, revision.  I'm down to four WIPs.  My medal is going to get taken away isn't it?  Damn. 

I don't have any really nice photos of my latest finished project.  I looked super cute today so I tried taking a photo of me in the shawl but AUGH.  And I'm not being super self absorbed or self depreciating here.  I was super cute today, really.  A lot of people told me.  My  hair is finally long enough I can style it so it was all curly and smooth.  One of my students grabbed a curl and pulled saying 'spring has sprung!' which was cute and painful all at the same time.  But yes, I was cute, and the photos were awful.  Not just 'I'm not as cute as I'd like me to be' but like... like there was something really wrong with me.  Like I'd just seen something really confusing and I wasn't able to process it at all.  Regardless, just shawl on bookshelf photos today.  Overexposed because I had to take the photo inside due to the relentless rain. 

 Blocking in all it's billion pins (small shawl so not quite a billion)

The pattern is Elk Tooth by Caitlin French.  I modified it a lot due to being away from the pattern while completing things.  Simple double increase on the edges until I had 99 stitches than I followed her pattern but ran out of yarn from the full moss stitch border.  The yarn is holding the blocking to a scary degree so I'm hoping it'll loosen up with more wear.  I'd recommend the pattern totally, only I would say don't make the same mistake I did and hold two strands of yarn at once.  There's a slipped stitch over knit stitches and the slipped stitch kept on snagging one of the strands and making for a mess of the purl row. 

And this completes the first project of Knitmas 2012!  I'm determined to knit things for my cousins this year so this is destined for my cousin Jess (who doesn't read this blog) (oh gawd I hope she doesn't read this blog)(if you are reading this Jess this is not really for you- this is all a rouse for someone who does read the blog, thanks for helping out). 

Now here's a question, I want to make my own shawl pins out of sticks.  Is sanding and waxing enough to make a decent shawl pin or would that be just plain ugly?  I don't want to stain them, but I don't want them to just be sticks.  You know?  I'm hoping the wax will make them smooth and prevent any splinters.  Does anyone have any advice?

Cheers all, thanks for reading.

The Plan Needs Modification

I think I need to up it a little.  I do not have enough time!  I know that's a little sad.  But I think upping it to 45 minutes is going to be okay.  15 minutes in the morning and half an hour at night.  That being said I have two minutes left to write this post with the new 45 minutes limit.

So I spent most of today at Jamie's playing SmallWorld with friends.  And yes, we bought it because of Tabletop, and yes, it is just as awesome as it sounds.   We also had blueberry pancakes because last week I went out for breakfast and had very disappointing blueberry pancakes so I instantly texted Jamie and told him he needed to make me some as soon as possible.  I may be a little bit spoiled.  A bit. 

Right but yes, when I did get home instead of going online I knit, cleaned, talked to people through texting, and made myself three days worth of lunches (was going to be dinner and two lunches but I just ate the leftover blueberry pancakes I was sent home with as I was cooking), and played with Lala.  So far the experiment is proving very productive. 

Holy crap I cannot work the photos on this!  So... below are pictures of the Rock Island shawl.  I managed to get through the knitted lace part with nary a dropped stitch or mistake but managed to drop two stitches and decrease on the wrong side twice during the garter stitch section.  If I was a perfectionist I'd be concerned but I'm not. 

 

These are some darling flowers I saw on my walk with Hazel.  And yes, they are darling.  Have you ever seen more darling flowers?  No, no you have not.  Why is this text centered? Wait, why did it just move to the side? Augh!

I started a new shawl, Elk Tooth by Caitlin French.  Caitlin works at Baaad Annas and is just stellar nice and very talented.  I'd highly recommend going in to say hi to her. 

And now I'm ten minutes over the 45 minute rule.  This may need more tweeking.  Cheers all!

Great Computer Experiment

About twice a year I recognize I have a computer addiction and do something about it.  Of course it never sticks but that's fine.  There is a time that computers are lovely and it is soothing to be on them, times of stress, times of mass amounts of rain, times that friends are all away, and times when you feel like crap and want to just scroll for hours.  All that being said, now is not any of those times.  Feeling fine, not overly stressed, lots of friends, and the weather is getting better every day (I live in Vancouver so really, using rain as an excuse to be on the computer would not be a good thing, I think it's when it's been raining for five days that you get a little moody), so I have no reason to be on the computer as much as I am currently.  My challenge, starting tomorrow, is to limit myself to half an hour to computer time a day.  Yup.  Half an hour.  That means no turning on the computer when I wake up and reading Jezebel for twenty minutes, no pinning for fourty minutes when I should be getting ready for bed, no facebook games on non-stop while I do other things.  That last one is a real problem.

Now, during this half hour, I still want to blog on my progress so that'll be interesting.  Emails are no problem because of my phone, so it should just be reading Jezebel and games.  Emails on my phone could be interpreted as cheating but if I didn't have that I would be turning on my computer a lot more often and that's where the problem usually starts.

Part of this is inspired by my angst this morning.  I'm inside doing housework and it's beautiful outside and I get really really really angry with housework.  Stupid housework making me stay inside this is criminal this is stupid why I should just let you sit here and not get clean grumble mumble.  Then, as I finished washing dishes from Wednesday, I thought 'huh- what if I had actually done these dishes on Wednesday, instead of leveling up in Castleville?'.  The answer to that is, of course, I'd be bloody outside frolicking in the sunshine that's what.  

So all that being said I'll leave you with my annual spring sky photos (no magnolia trees in this area so something new this year)(also I need to tag better because I can't find some years photos, oh well), go finish my laundry, and get myself outside!

What do you think hm?

Well?

Too busy?

Have I offended all William Blake purists?

Are the colours okay?

Should I work on the background photo so the tiling isn't so jarring?

Why can't I sew in a straight line?