Trying Not to Get My Hopes Up

For a week or two there, I was under the impression that I would get everything done in time for Hanukkah. Then I was under the impression that I would never get close to getting my sister's socks done, so I started putting more effort into that and less into my mom's sweater.  Now I'm left a bit of a conundrum.

To start, Hanukkah technically starts on the 16th, but I'm not going to see my family until later, so I have a little more time than that (so, lets say I have about 10 days, max).  However, I also have a lot to do.  It is better place than I was expecting to be, but still not done, or close to it.  Believe it or not, this is the first time I've run the risk of missing a present deadline*.  I did get my brother's socks done at least:

Patten I used was Mr. Pitt's Socks, using a Zauberball.  I really could have dropped a needle size for it to be better, but my brother just trashes things anyway and they fit.

However, my sister's socks were a bit more of a hassle than what I was expecting.  To give a bit of background, one of my sisters loves crazy and colorful socks.  You'd think she'd be the perfect person to knit socks for.  Nope.  She told me years ago when I started knitting that she doesn't want knit socks; she hates hand-made socks.  At the time I left that statement as is.

This year, at Rhinebeck (yes, I went.  No, I doubt I'll be doing a debrief this year), my sister finally explained why.  She associates hand-knit socks with the only pair of hand-made socks she's ever gotten -- a wonky pair of worsted-weight acrylic crochet socks my mom made when we were younger (and promptly had a crisis in confidence about, so she went back to making blankets).  After a discussion where I assured her that knitted socks were usually nothing like that and I could even use lighter yarn than normal 'sock weight', and yes I'd make sure they were the same size...she picked out a skein of lace weight sparkly yarn for me to make socks out of:

This is Star Dust Lace by Bittersweet Woolery in colorway Cirrus

A couple of things turned out to be true about this yarn:

• It is nice and soft.
• The tinsel that makes it sparkly does like to stick out of the sock a bit when you knit with it.
• It is really thin and fluffy
• It has magical gauge properties that make everything wear bigger than the measurements suggest.
• It requires a size US000 (that is not a typo) needle to work in a close enough gauge for socks.

It's the magical gauge properties that got me the most.  There are very few patterns for lace-weight socks (gee, I wonder why). Which is normally fine, since as long as there's no crazy patterning in the sock, I can adjust  it to my gauge.  But when you pair that with magic gauge properties and patterns that have a large repeat...you end up ripping stuff out a lot.

You see, I first chose this pattern.  I thought it would work; even though it's a 16 stitch repeat, the math seemed to work out on it using the gauge I was getting in my swatch (which I even knit in the round!).  So I started.  I even tried a picot edge instead of the ribbing, thinking that would look cuter (my sister does cute). In the gauge I was using, the picot hem edging took forever and then I started on the pattern and...way too big.  It was too big for me, let alone my sister. Knowing I had to get this right and give socks that fit, I ripped out and dropped a repeat of the pattern.  I also did a k3, p2 ribbing instead.  That seemed nice, and a went for awhile with that, but the voice in my head kept nagging me about how it still felt too big.  It was ok for me, but would it stretch out too much because of the lace?  Would it grow when being worn? It was already on the edge of too big for my sister and...I gave up and ripped it out.  Due to the large repeat in the pattern, I really couldn't make it smaller comfortably. However, the pattern looked amazing in the yarn, I have to say, so I was sad it didn't work.

Since time was of the essence, I quickly went to my backup pattern, which is this one.  It seems to work, but I wasn't sure if I felt that way because the colors were similar and I could picture it in the yarn I had, or it would really work.  At least this kept the cute lace only on top, where fit wouldn't be as big of an issue. The ribbing would keep the rest snug.  So I went with the same stitch count I did for the smaller sock (which -1 ease, supposedly, though it doesn't look like it) and started.

Now I have a sock:

Yes, it looks small, but it stretches...if it wasn't shorter than my foot, I could wear it.

A couple of things about this pattern, though:

• The lace is nice, but very fiddly, at least in this gauge.  
• The yarn doesn't work as well for the lace as I would have hoped (the color changes obscure the pattern a bit), but it's good enough.
• Once you get past the lace, it is smooth sailing. It took me two days to do the small lace top, and 8 days to do the rest of the sock, and part of that is simply life getting in the way.
• Even though I changed the ribbing to be k6, p2 (mainly because p1's always look like crap when I do them; I can't seem to tighten them up enough), the damn sock still feels big to me.  The ribbing helps a bit, but not as much as I would have hoped.  I think it's just the yarn and it's light soft fluffy quality.  Nothing's going to feel tight using this stuff.

So...can I get it done?  Well, this is where I am now with the second one:

Almost done with the lace part.  So the possible answer is yes.  However, it will most likely be at a price:

I still haven't finished my mom's sweater.  I've been working on that collar for more than a week, and by working I mean mostly ignoring it and working on the sock.  So the socks may get done, and the sweater may get done, but I don't know if both will get done in time...

Better start working on it then, I guess.

*[Wait, I take that back.  I did almost miss a deadline for presents before.  The first time I made my mom socks, I was quickly finishing them and blocking them before I left her house so she could have them during Hanukkah...and the only reason I succeeded was because the yarn I had used for the provisional cast on matched the sock yarn, so I wove in the ends and left it there instead of making the sock longer. The socks were wet when I left, but they were done!]

So I Went to Rhinebeck and Brought Back More Photos of Cats Than Yarn (Rhinebeck Debrief 2013)

I said I was going to post about Rhinebeck and...I don't know what to talk about.  I re-read my post from last year and realized that my experience was pretty damn similar.  I went upstate, stayed with family, went to the fair, had a fun time, and went back home.  It was great but it was pretty much a repeat of last year, minus the class I took then.  I didn't take a class this year, so I can't even talk about that.

So, I guess I'll just picture dump then (not that I have many good ones.  I seriously have just as many pictures of cats this year, and none of the yarn):

The view from the porch of the building my sister's apartment was in (slightly north of Duchess County).  Pretty leaves. Still loooove the fall upstate, though it was freezing cold both mornings (it was better during the day).  Dunno what was going on at that church over there though.

Crappy picture; got taken through my windshield

The billboard on the way to the fair!  They seem to use the same design every year, though this is the first time I got a picture.  I shouldn't have been on 9G anyway (the billboard is at the intersection of the road from the Kingston-Rhinecliff bridge (it's also a highway, but I forgot the name) and Rt. 9G.  It's meant for people coming from the bridge, which is why it's at a weird angle here)  Turns out you can drive straight down Route 9 through Red Hook to the Fairgrounds.  Duh.  I turned in Red Hook, got on 9G, and got stuck in all the traffic coming off the bridge to the fair.  Took me 30 minutes to get through it.  On the other hand, when I went Sunday, there was no traffic and I got there early because I was expecting to crawl for at least 10 minutes.

I got to the fair with plenty of time though, and got to see everything this time, more than once (several times in some cases...hey, you miss stuff the first two times). Saturday was crowded (figures with all that traffic), so I did more looking than shopping that day, though my mother and I are a bad influence on each other and so we both ended up with unplanned things that Saturday (favorite quote from her this year: 'I'm buying so  many things for myself this year and not for other people!'  I told her that was a good thing, that she should make stuff for herself).  Sunday I ran around with my sisters, and bought most of the yarn I wanted.  I also convinced my poor college student of a sister that she had to buy some yarn there, he he he.

For some reason, I have no pictures of the actual fair, but a few of sheep:

...and a llama (llama llama duck.  You're welcome for the earworm):

Wait, I took this bad picture of a shawl I really liked and want to knit:

I did buy yarn to do it at the fair, and by buy yarn I mean I bought a skein of heavy laceweight dark blue yarn to go with some royal blue fingering weight yarn I bought two years ago and still haven't used...for a sport weight shawl.  Oops. All sorts of fail there.  For some reason I thought that vendor only sold fingering weight yarn.

Of course I then went a bought what ended up being three skeins of sport weight yarn for a fingering weight shawl I've wanted to do since Phil Plait,of all people, linked to the Ravelry page for it, because of course Socks that Rock Mediumweight isn't actually standard sock weight yarn.  At least that just gets you a bigger 'shawl' (it will most likely go on my wall, not get worn.  It's just awesome).

And before you ask, no, I can't use the yarn I bought for the second shawl for the first and vice versa (well, I could do that first one, but I don't want to).  I need a dark black-blue yarn for the second one and two different colors for the first one.

So...wait, did I mention I have tons of photos of cats? I won't derail completely so I'll just post a few that go with a story about yarn.  Saturday night I spent lazing around my sister's apartment. Of course I had bought some of the yarn I bought that day (not the stuff above.  Other yarn.  You'll see). One of her cats (she has two) first decided it liked the yarn I was knitting with:

And then decided it wanted to get the new yarn in my bag:

And then decided that on top of my yarn and bag was a good place to sleep:

Yes, the socks in the bottom corner are my Crazy Purple Socks.  Had to wear something I made to Rhinebeck...

I eventually moved the yarn to the suitcase so it didn't become cat toys overnight.

On Sunday we did dinner and then I drove back to my parent's place.  Since I was lazing about on Monday as well and never made it to the bus to go back to the city (took off Friday and Monday.  Yay four-day weekend), I took pictures of what I bought:

Lots of gray and black this year

...and then decided to go check out the new yarn store that opened up the next town over this year.  Because Rhinebeck wasn't enough yarn.  Anyway, it ended up being a pretty nice store, and I had a nice chat with the owner since I was the only one there mid-day Monday.  Turns out she had organized a bus trip to Rhinebeck on Sunday, and she also had bought more yarn than she needed (her actual statement was closer to: 'I bought some yarn and then asked myself why I was buying yarn; I own a yarn store').  I also bought a skein of yarn, and signed my mother up for the mailing list because she keeps saying she's going to go check out the store and never does (I also told the owner about her so now she has no excuse). 

After the yarn store, I went to a local park and took more pictures:

I also sat in the island in the middle of the lake and knitted a bit.  Because why the hell not;  I had an hour left on the meter for my car.

And that was my weekend at the New York State Sheep and Wool Festival.  And with the cats.

Next year I'll take photos of the fair instead, I promise.

Unrealistic Expectations

I have a problem I think most people have, but anyway it's a problem.  I seem to think there are more than 24 hours in a day.  And that within those 24 hours, I can be superwoman and accomplish all this stuff, despite the fact that I can't even get my ass moving too fast (like now).

In other words, it's October, and I of course have way too many projects going on.

It's a bit worse this year, though.  The first issue is that I decided to make almost everything for my Halloween costume this year, so not only am I knitting a couple of items (one done, the other in progress:

), I'm sewing a dress.  Sewing takes up a lot more time since you can't just do 'a couple of rows' like in knitting, and is not portable.  At least I have a machine now:

The fact that it lives on my dining table is another problem

The good thing about the sewing machine is that it does save time.  The bad thing about the sewing machine is then I think I can whip out a full dress in a couple of days.  No.  No, I can't.  Especially since I'm a novice, crappy seamstress.  I then think I can do more than I can within the three or so hours after work I have.  Except when I don't because I went out to dinner.

So that's taking away from my knitting time.  Other things taking away from my knitting time are the NYC Yarn Crawl (for which I bought more yarn I didn't need) and NYS Sheep and Wool (this weekend!  Buy more yarn I don't really need!), and concerts (I've got three shows this month I went/am going to), and my boyfriend (which is related to the concert and dinner thing, at least).  And I can't even be pissed about it; I enjoy it all. But when did I gain a life?  Actually...never mind that, when did I become an adult with all these adult responsibilities on top of it all (you know, because I also really need to cook two weeks worth of lunches, do laundry, and clean the bathroom today)?

The second (third?) issue is that not only am I working on things for Halloween, I had to start everything for Hanukkah this month as well, since the first night is the evening before Thanksgiving (American, so that would be late November).  Usually I get last-minute present plans around Rhinebeck, get the yarn there, and start early November.  It works if Hanukkah is at least mid-December (though I still run into scheduling issues).  It doesn't work this year.  The good thing is that I did plan ahead on some things, and I have one present done, and I got a jump start on my Mom's socks.  The bad thing is that I currently have two more projects (including the socks) going for that because why not start another knitted present while I'm working on one already:

Ignore the gray skein...that isn't a project, just some random yarn I thought I might use and didn't

Well...started being relative.  I did swatch and do some calculations for one of them so far.  The reddish one is the Jane Bennet socks from the Summer 2012 issue of Jane Austen Knits.  I didn't pick the pattern; I had my Mom search Ravelry for a sock pattern she liked, and made the yarn I'm using the surprise (last year, it was the other way: she knew what yarn I was using, but didn't really know the sock pattern until I had to try them on her....ok, so we don't really do the surprise thing here.  It's just that she hasn't seen the work in progress yet). 

Oh, and I'm knitting another sock for a KAL:

Yeah, that's not getting done anytime soon. 

And don't even ask me about the tank pattern; I haven't started writing it yet.

I Have No Excuse

Actually, I do have a few excuses.  They're just not very good, so I'll save the hee hawing about how I haven't done anything with this blog in more than a month and just catch up with the projects I finally managed to have time to sit down and start.

First off, though, do you remember these socks I made?

Yeah, I don't expect you to.  Anyway, they were my first pair that I knit up using a skein of

Fiber Optic Yarns Foot Notes that I randomly bought the first time I went to Rhinebeck. Just so you know, they made one tough pair of socks.  You see, they're the only wool socks I own at the moment.  Any of you in the northeast on Memorial Day weekend know that it was cold and rainy that weekend.  I went camping in it, well, until the wind broke most of our common tents on Sunday and we had to pack up and call it a trip.  However, the worst of the rain and cold was Saturday, and I wore those socks throughout most of that day (because who cares if they're not period when you're getting rained on all day).  They got wet, muddy, and absolutely trashed, to the point that they were so soaked I had to take them off because my feet were going numb from the wet and cold. 

Because they were so messed up when I got back to my parent's house, I decided to throw all caution to the wind and run them through the washer (well, that and my parents don't have a good place to handwash things.  And I already had asked them if I could wash my boots in the kitchen sink).  And taa da:

They look just as good as they did before the camping trip.  Granted, this was after I washed them again in my sink so I could block them properly (I noticed they bled somewhat when I did that, which never has happened before I machine washed them.  Luckily, I washed them alone in the sink, and with dark clothes in the machine).  But I have to say, not the softest or warmest yarn for socks, but pretty tough. Which is good.

So, now that I have more time, I've finally set down and started designing the tank I wanted to do.  Did I ever mention that before?  Anyway, I've wanted to do a purple and silver tank for awhile, though the design in my head has changed every now and then.  About a month or so ago, my knit group went on a field trip to WEBS, and I got a lot more yarn (<sarcasm>because I don't have enough of it at the moment</sarcasm>):

There, I managed to find a cotton yarn that wasn't Prima Cotton for once:

I then changed my whole idea of what I was doing and stopped there because I had other shit to do.  However, this weekend I managed to finally sit down and calculate out the measurements and stitch counts I needed to at least start the tank:

Hopefully it doesn't become a wreck.  If I'm really lucky, I'll be able to size it and have a new pattern!  Honestly, writing a shirt or sweater pattern has spooked me a bit, but that's another post.

Also, I started swatching for a baby sweater:

Because as luck would have it, right before I went to WEBS I found out another cousin of mine is having her second child.  So I bought yarn to do a baby sweater, which of course ended up being a sport weight yarn despite the fact that half the patterns I have are for worsted.  However, it turns out that my gauge isn't too far off for this sweater, and I just have to go a size up from the size I want to do to get that size.  It should also make a nice, lightweight cardigan (since most of my cousins live in warmer climates...boo...).

Finally, I'm still working on those other socks:

One and a half done, another half to go.  A good, easy, project with some yarn from Rhinebeck.  I tend to buy sock yarn at Rhinebeck, don't I?

Anyway, I should get back to actually getting some knitting done.  Or maybe other things done.  But knitting's better.

Such a Good Start

So, we're half a month into the new year and I haven't written a post yet.  Good job, me.

To be fair, I've been rather busy.  Not with projects, unfortunately.  Not with pattern writing, though I should have that done by this weekend (something something too lazy to do math something).  No, just life.  Holidays and the traveling that entails, work, family hanging around, that kind of stuff.

I guess what I'm saying is I got nothing. 

Well, ok, I got something.  I got a three-year-old store bought work sweater that needs to be replaced, because this lovely thing popped up a month ago, and it's gotten bigger:

And, no, I'm not just wearing it for the picture.  I've been wearing it to work too (though, to be fair, I didn't notice the hole wasn't dime-sized anymore until this week.  Then I folded up the sleeves until said hole was covered).  That's because its replacement, which I've planned for...I don't know, almost a year now...looks like this:

I would blame the holidays and being busy, but its not just that (though that delayed my start.  Then again, I wasn't planning for my other one to get a hole).  I like this pattern and I love this yarn, don't get me wrong, but it is a sport-weight full cardigan, worked back and forth of course.  Purling every other row slows me down; I just don't purl as fast as I knit.  With that, on top of having a charted cable and US5 needles, means I'm not going as fast as I could.  But I guess that's every project I do.  I think I'll get it done in a couple of weeks, but in reality it takes me a month or two (or five, or a year...).

Oh, and working on this thing doesn't help either:

I'm justifying it as my travel project.

In other news, I was reminded recently that VogueKnitting Live is next weekend.  I had forgotten about it in the rush of other things.  Of course, I would have remembered when my name card came in the mail this week:

I can't wait to see what horrifying fashions are being show this year, which is what this event is good for. I mean, it's not like I need any yarn and if it's like last year, I'm not going to find much in the way of yarn anyway as bright, summery colors are not in my color palate.  Which is a good thing; I currently have too much yarn acquired from Rhinebeck and the Manhattan Smiley's sale.  Well, I guess it's also good for the lecture I signed up for.  We'll see.

At least I used and am using what I bought there last year, of which one thing was the book the replacement work cardigan is in.  The yarn I'm using I bought at Rhinebeck this year.  Woot, knitting events.

The Importance of Dye Lots

This is why you buy enough yarn of the same dye lot (or at least visibly match it when you buy more than one dye lot):

Now, for this project I both knew this was going to happen (you don't buy yarn two years later expecting to match dye lots) and don't really care that it did (it's a couch wrap small blanket that will live in my apartment).  However, I still wasn't expecting the color to be that off.  This isn't just slightly different, this is whole 'nother color of blue different.

In other news, I finished the couch wrap I was making up the pattern for.  Which isn't a wrap.  It's not even a big shawl.  It's as big as the fleece blanket I was trying to replace.  Somewhere, I had a math fail when I calculated how many chains to do.  So when I get around to writing up this pattern, I have to re-do all my calculations so it is a couch wrap.  Since you got two patterns last week, I'm not in a rush now.  Especially since I now get to work on a sweater for myself:

The pattern is the Professoressa Cardigan by Connie Chang Chinchino.  This will replace a store bought work cardigan I always wear (the temperature in my office is not consistent no matter what time of year it is).  It's been my plan to replace it for awhile, or just add some variety, but now it has to be done since the current one has a small hole in the sleeve.  Oye.

I'm using Blue Moon Fiber Arts' Woobu in, believe it or not, the Smoke on the Water colorway (look it up on their site.  It shows a dark purple color.  Mine is gray).  I just started this last week and I'm in love with this yarn already.  By far one of the best yarns I've work with, and hopefully it wears the same way.  Being that I found this yarn randomly at Rhinebeck, it was a good pick.

One point about the yarn though: I'm lucky I read up on it on Ravelry before starting this project.  All the comments were along the lines of 'this yarn rocks but my sweater grew'.  So I did a proper swatch and, yes, it grows and your gauge will change.  I'm using that to my advantage, actually.  Plan for it and you'll be fine.

I know it's pretty late for half the holidays now, but happy holidays everyone! 

The (Late) Rhinebeck Debrief

I know it's already been a week since the NYS Sheep and Wool Festival.  I also know that I got home Tuesday morning instead of Monday afternoon, had to do all my chores for that weekend on Tuesday (including laundry), and felt crappy with allergies all week because that's just my luck.  I also had my usually weekly stuff and then I went and saw Epica play yesterday (which was awesome, but meant I didn't get home till 3 in the morning).

Anyway, I had a blast at Rhinebeck. I'll start from the beginning.

The Class
After crashing at one of my sister's apartments and going to a brewpub with a really good pumpkin beer on Friday, I drove up to Rhinebeck early Saturday morning so I could be at the fairgrounds in time for my class.  I, of course, misjudged traffic so my first plan of grabbing breakfast and dropping my stuff off at my other sister's apartment failed. I was lucky one of the food vendors was serving food before the fair technically opened and that the workshop area had free coffee. Of course I found this out during the class, so I spent the first part of the class in a pre-coffee daze.  It could have been worse.

I signed up for the Introduction to Sweater Design workshop by Donna Kay.  Before I took the class, I didn't know the instructor or what exactly we would cover.  The class ended up being more of a lecture, but it was funny and enjoyable.  We covered tips and things to keep in mind when designing...how to swatch to figure out if the yarn you have works with your idea, how to use different types of graph paper to make sure your calculations work and everything's proportional (this would have helped tremendously for the baby sweater.  Also, I never knew knitter's graph paper existed), touched upon originality and copyright in patterns, and other many random tips to keep in mind (like don't shove every idea you have into one sweater.   I kind of knew this, but I'm also guilty of doing it). Many of the things mentioned were also conveniently given on a handout, so I didn't have to remember everything (yay reference materials).   What we didn't get to was actually doing anything with the yarn and other materials we brought.  It was obviously meant to be a longer course, yet we only had four hours and the written material covered the whole time frame.

Overall, I think I was expecting more, but I'm not disappointed that I took this class. It was enjoyable, and it did give you a method of getting from idea to complete design, which was something I needed to hear, as I'm lacking a good method right now.

The Fair
Last year, I went on Sunday only.  Because of this, it was shocking to see how crowded this event got on Saturday.  When scoping out vendors the rest of the first day (first with some friends and later with my mother), it was hard to even stop and look at stuff.  I wasn't as shocked at the crowds as my mother, though, who had 1) never been and 2) was under the impression that the Sheep and Wool Festival was simply a local fair.  I informed her that it was a big event in the yarn crafting world and people come from all over...hell, that's how I learned about it.  My local sister simply said (after the fact):  'Duchess County doesn't do small events'.

*Side Note*
The New York State Sheep and Wool Festival and Breed Ewe Sale is the official name of this event:

Sorry for the slightly blurry picture; I took this through my windshield when stuck in traffic

I think most yarn crafter attendees know this, but for some reason in our world it's called Rhinebeck.  This works fine if the context it's used in is 'major yarn crafter events'.  Calling the event Rhinebeck to the locals, however,  gets you inquisitive or odd looks, as Rhinebeck is the town where the fairgrounds are located, and the town is a tourist trap in its own right (a nice one, but it is).  Also, the fairgrounds are known locally better as the site of the Duchess County Fair, which is (I think) the biggest county fair in New York.  Therefore, calling it Rhinebeck really doesn't make sense at all (though since it's in use and it's shorter by far than the proper name, I'll still use it.  In the right context of course).  Do I get my local cred back now?
*End Side Note*

I spent most of Saturday scoping out some vendors and got some yarn.  I also helped my mom pick out nice alpaca yarn to crochet a shawl.  We also checked out the sheep, for which I got lots of pictures of because I remembered to bring my camera:

After having dinner with the family and crashing at the local sister's apartment (who lives ten minutes away; I'm so lucky), I went back to the fair on Sunday with both my sisters.  We found the alpacas and llamas (which my mom and I missed), though my camera decided to die on me as soon as I tried taking pictures of them (and I had just replaced the batteries!  Stupid me must have used bad batteries).  I bought more yarn than I've ever bought at one time because it was my birthday, I had extra money, I have tons of projects I want to do, and 'oo, pretty sock yarn...I like knitting socks!'.  I'll put that in it's own section though.

Also, I'm pretty sure I passed the Yarn Harlot in one of the vendor buildings, though she was going the opposite way and it was a little too crowded to do a good double take (or do that sneaky picture thing with my cell phone...I forget what it's called...Kinnering, maybe?).  That, and my sisters, not being in the yarn crafting world as I am, hadn't noticed and kept going, and I was trying to not lose them.  I tried slowing them down by telling them 'hey, I think we just passed someone famous in the knitting world', but they didn't care.  They were already putting up with my lingering at vendors to buy all the yarn, so I dropped it.

I also showed off my socks (which I wore on Sunday) to the vendor who's yarn I knit them from.  She liked them.

The Yarn
I'm surprised I fit all of this into my suitcase and a shopping bag:

The unfortunate consequence of this is I now have more stash than the Tupperware container can hold, even after taking out all the yarn associated with projects I'm working on.  I had to go buy another small container to shove under my futon to hold the rest of it, and a storage ottoman to hold my tools.

For one, I found a vendor selling that same damn wool I had the equal number of similar colors issue with...and it was half off.  Me, not wanting to deal with the whole two equal colors thing, bought four more skeins of black

I would have bought the charcoal color, but they didn't have it (because no one does, it seems).  Now, I'm not sure if I'm going to go with my original plan of knitting the basic sweater I have a pattern for, or still make up my own pattern.  I'll see.

I also bought enough yarn for two sweaters:

The gray skeins (its a cool smoky gray...picture doesn't do the color justice) are the first thing I acquired after the black wool. They will be a work cardigan (and unless I completely misjudged the yarn, they will be this cardigan).  The blue...well, I was looking for DK weight yarn but found this worsted weight in the perfect shade of blue, while their DK weight was slightly lighter.  So I said 'screw it, I have worsted weight sweater patterns', and bought it.  That blue wool is one of the softest I've ever felt (the woman standing behind me in line thought so too, and asked me if I was just going to curl up with it because she was tempted to do that).  It will be a nice sweater, though I have yet to decide exactly what pattern.

I also bought tons of sock yarn, because all I needed was more sock yarn:

I tried to not buy it all in blue and blue-black shades.  There's one thing I do (and it's at its worst at Rhinebeck) is that the yarn I'll be drawn to at first will inevitably be royal blue or blue dark variegated yarn  (It's worse if its cashmere.  I don't know how I know it's cashmere until I read the label, but I will inevitably find the cashmere yarn first.  Then I find the price and run away).  So I bought gray and dark purple as well.

The light blue one is alpaca and silk sock yarn, and you can guess by the last paragraph that it's not for me.  I'm not giving up on the hat pattern, but I decided that it'd be better if I set my sights a little lower and make my mom socks for Hanukkah instead.  The funny thing about this is that when I showed her all the sock yarn, she first went to the gray ones (which are rather soft wool; they're my favorite by feel) and cooed over that one.  The surprising thing to me is that she did it because she liked the color.  But it was all good when I pointed out that the light blue was alpaca.  She conceded that she would love alpaca socks, though she would only wear them in the house (we'll see how long that lasts.  She wears the $130 sweater I made her to shovel snow.  I bet you she'll wear them to shovel snow in as well). I'll have to remember to buy that gray sock yarn for her next year for real socks, though.

On the other hand, one of my sisters convince my other sister and me to try drop spindling:

That started when we found cheap small balls of angora roving.  The 'other sister' is a bunny lover, so we were scoping out angora vendors to see angora rabbits.  One of these vendors didn't have rabbits, but they had royal blue angora roving for $6.00.  What did I say about me and the jewel tone blues?  Once I pointed it out as 'pretty, but I can't spin so screw it' the conversation went from bunnies to 'you should try to drop spindle, I can teach you!  It's easy!'

Yeah, two things about that.  One, it's not that easy.  Two, my sister was talking herself up, and when she said she could drop spindle, it meant she owned one and had spun some 'yarn'. I tried after we left the fair with a little bit of the roving and I got nothing but messed up roving. Oye. I'm still going to try to learn, but I need to set some time aside and research it.  I know it can be done; someone in my knitting group had caved to the drop spindles everywhere at Rhinebeck herself, and had already learned enough in the three days between these two events to make nicer thread than my sister had.

Conclusion
All in all, it was fun, and I would do it all again. Hopefully I'll have most of this yarn compiled into projects by then!

It's a good excuse to see the beauty of a Hudson Valley fall anyway.  It's amazing how much you miss in the city.

This is in Ulster County, not Duchess, but the same lovely tree colors

Procrastinating and Creating

For once, I should be doing other things such as packing and maybe trying to get some rows of Crazy Cable Blanket done, but instead I'm writing a blog post and making little pumpkin breads:

(I actually don't care for cooking, but I like fresh food and saving money)

But anyway, this weekend my ass is going to be upstate, a trip for which I even took a few days off from work for (yay limited vacation time). I've stopped packing because I'm trying to convince myself that, no, I don't need to bring my whole knitting needle set because I have enough projects going that I don't need to start anything from the yarn I plan to buy at Rhinebeck before I get back home.  I'm also trying to pack for four days in a small suitcase while leaving enough room for more stuff.  Over packing (which I always do, unfortunately) is one thing.  Trying to lug an over packed suitcase on the subway and a bus is a completely different story.  My trip involves at least six staircases, crowded subways, a long distance style bus, and a long hill, and yes, you count when you're lugging bags.

I probably don't need all my projects with me either, but they're going.  Crazy Cable Blanket (of which I have 30 rows left) is going.  The spatterdashers (halfway through the second one!) are going.  Those  Log Cabin squares I make when I can't do anything else are going.  That blue crochet thing from the last post is going:

That will be my fourth posted pattern, and I swear it, because I have the pattern written down already and I'm following it.  It's a long time coming; I haven't tried making my own pattern since the baby sweater, and haven't posted one since the baby hat I did.  I'd admit, for awhile I just wasn't feeling it.  I didn't want to deal with the creative process, and I had enough projects going I didn't need to.  After really gearing up at the beginning of the year I fell flat.  I think I was hoping to get going with the design thing, but got overwhelmed with life, then said screw it and forgot about it for awhile.

Reciently, though, something clicked. It started when I went on a yarn crawl and ended up with this yarn:

I bought the blue-green yarn with the idea of making my mom's Hanukkah present out of it.  It's alpaca, of course, and the plan was another hat.  But I wasn't sure if I would find a good pattern for it.  Then an idea hit me. I knew exactly what that hat's going to look like, and I sat down and charted out the cable I wanted and drew sketches:

Now, I haven't tested the design yet in yarn, nor written the pattern (I need to figure out how I'm doing the top still, and if I want to do a contrasting brim), but I figured after I get done with the Halloween stuff I'd get down to that.  I may need extensive modification, who knows.

Then I realized that the other yarn, which I bought thinking I had three skeins of it in my stash already, was the wrong color.

Oops.  I called the yarn store I bought the three black skeins from and asked if they had any of the charcoal color I actually have in my stash. No such luck; they didn't have it.  Now I'm stuck with three skeins of charcoal and three skeins of black yarn, which killed my first idea of what I was going to do with that yarn.

Then I realized I needed yarn for that class I'm taking at Rhinebeck.  Ok then, I'll try to come up with my first sweater pattern using that yarn.  Which may or may not happen, but that yarn's what I'm bringing to class.

I did sketch out some ideas of sweaters, though.  I'm not sure how far along this class wants you, but they mentioned bringing fashion pictures.  I don't really have any inspirational pictures right now, so I just sketched, and I'm hoping to wear the jacket I want to mimic in a cardigan pattern at some point (since, you know, it's already got a hole in it).

Finally, after setting out all these knitting projects, and knitting stuff like worsted weight yarn on size 0 needles, I decided I really needed a easy, bulky, crochet project. I also decided I needed a wrap because it was cold outside and the heat wasn't on yet in my apartment (because I was totally going to get it done before the landlord got around to turning the heat on.  Didn't happen; the heat kicked in a week ago).

Luckily I have tons of Loops & Threads Charisma in my stash that really needs to stop living there.  Out comes the big crochet hook, and I started crocheting a wrap.  Then I frogged it.  Then I crocheted a square.  Then I frogged it.  Then I searched Ravelry in vein and got sick of all the repetitive crochet blanket patterns. Then I found this stitch in a crochet stitch dictionary and thought, hm, that looks interesting.  So I charted out a repeat from memory (which meant it's different than the actual stitch dictionary version), figured out the arrangement I wanted, actually figured out my gauge for it, calculated the number of chains to do to start, and went at it.  I'm actually shocked it's coming out as nicely as it is in this yarn.  I was thinking that my pattern idea may be more suited for a worsted weight, or maybe even a sport weight, but I was doing bulky first because stash.  You'll see.  When I'm done with the bulky version, I'll post the pattern.  Then maybe I'll figure out a worsted weight one (though I would have to buy yarn for that one, oye).

But I really need to pack now.  It's amazing what you do when you have something else that needs to get done.