Another day, another snowfall

Winter, winter, winter. It's just unrelenting this year. More snow falling. The temps really fell, it's freezing, single digit temps, brrrrrrrrrr. I guess I'll stay inside and play with my yarn and needles and knit to my heart's content! I joined a knit-along on ravelry for a lace scarf. For some reason I have had more problems trying to get this scarf started, numerous starts, stops, frogging, changing yarn, changing needles, more ripping, swearing, frustration. I give up on that scarf. I'm going to try starting a real easy one tonight. Here is the yarn I am going to use.

I have no idea how old this yarn is. It has a Lee Ward's price tag on it! That was an old craft store that used to be around here. My mom got me this yarn at a garage sale. Real pretty mohair. Wish me luck.

I'll be knitting it with my new Knit Picks Options needles! I finally splurged and ordered the set of Options needles. The cables are so nice, not hard and stiff like the Boye cables I have now. And I also had ordered some yarn from Knit Picks, such a pretty purple color. My shawl book from Amazon came too, beautiful shawls in there. Some day I'll make one.

Starting the lacey mohair scarf will be my project tonight.

I was cleaning out my stash the other day and came across these little beauties. I forgot I had them. Sock yarn. The colors are beautiful. I'll be using them in the future for something.

I did try using that blue one for the lace scarf. It's now back into the ball form waiting to become something else.

And I had fun with my sister in Joann's the other day. We both bought some of these big bundle balls of yarn.

Can't tell you yet what I'll be using those big bundle balls for. It's a secret. And the alpaca is sure to become a hat or maybe a neck warmer. It's so soft. I just love it!

I did get another preemie hat done. I just love the colors of this one. The color is called "Snooky" on the ball band. So cute for a tiny baby! I love the light blue and the brown together.

So I'll be on my couch knitting tonight. If I close the blinds and don't look outside I won't see the snow. I just can't shovel again today. I just can't. Maybe I'll do it tomorrow.

Cozy

The snow has been falling already and winter is knocking on the door. Time to batten down the hatches and stay inside where it's cozy and warm. And to knit. And light a candle. There's nothing like the nice warm glow of a candle in a room. Here's my newest one. It smells sooooooooo good!

My daughter bought me that candle at Cabela's. I just love it! Target had flannel sheets on sale. I treated myself to a new set. $15.99 for any size, what a deal! I love these.

Nice and cozy.

I wish I had this view out my front window. So cozy to be warm inside and seeing the snow fall, with nowhere to go.

But that's not the view I get. Someday.

It's been so cold I made a nice pot of minnestrone soup yesterday. So yummy! My sister gave me the recipe. It made a ton. I'm going to have to freeze some.

Very delicious!

I also treated myself and bought another Ravelry t-shirt. The other one I got is so so so comfy, had to get another one out of the new batch they just got in. I just love that dog!

The following is not cozy:

I do not want to wear a partially knitted sock with DPNs sticking out of it. Definitely not comfy cozy!

Time to go hit the couch with the yarn and the knitting needles and cozy up for the night with my kitties surrounding me.

Toe Decreases

I'm still plugging away on the Ravelry colors socks. I've finally made it to the toe decreases after almost two weeks of working on this sock. See how it's coming along:

I'm still loving it! Here's a close-up of the heel. It's the best picture I could get without totally blurring it.

I was going to take a break after this sock before starting the second and work on a pair of Fingerless Mitts in a Ravelry group. But it's become so clique-y with pattern test knitting that I've lost interest. Maybe I'll do them on my own another time.

It's very hot and steamy outside again today. I'll just stay inside in the AC and knit. It seems so early to have the AC on so much. I am glad I have it though!

Wow, it's June already!

I'm just moving right along on my Ravelry colors socks. I've got the six inches of cuff done and I'm ready to start on the heel. That's not the scary part. The scary part is picking up those stitches along the side to form the gusset. But I'm getting better at it. Here's how it looks so far:

I've worked on it a little since I took the picture and it's now up to six inches. Do you like that cushion in the background of the picture? I got new patio chair pads. Finally! My old ones wore out and I never got around to replacing them last summer so all we had to sit on on the patio were those plastic resin chairs. Now I have real patio chairs again. Yay! I can knit outside in comfort.

I bought more Cottontots yarn. I. Can't. Stop. Right now I'm just in a craze/phase where I keep buying this yarn.

As you can see from this bin I do not need any more cotton yarn.

For some reason I just love cotton yarn.

Well, I'm off to make some eggs or something to eat. It's nice to have time to make stuff like that on a Sunday. Later I'm making hamburgers on the grill. YUM!

Ravelry Colors!

Check out this yarn I bought from an etsy shop! It's the Ravelry page colors. How cool is that? I love it!

I needed to wind it into a center pull ball but I don't have a ball winder or a swift, so this is what I did, I improvised. Don't laugh. OK, laugh along with me.

My daughter walked through the room and wanted to know what I was doing. Then she grabbed the camera. Nice kid. But I thought I'd share anyway. The heels of my feet were pretty tired after I got it all wound into a center pull ball. Here it is, all wound up and I started a sock:

I'm going to get as much done on this sock as I can before the June Knit-Along starts in the FGF group I'm in on Ravelry. At the rate I'm going, the socks should take awhile. I'm using a pretty easy pattern. It's my first real big people socks with sock yarn on skinny U.S. size 1 needles.

No Knitting Today

My hands are feeling a little better. The left hand is OK, the right still has some pain, not as bad. I think I'm going to put some Ben-Gay on it tonight when I go to bed and see what happens. I haven't done any knitting since Friday, I'm having withdrawals, but I'm having fun surfing patterns on Ravelry and dreaming and queue-ing. By the way, I was using circular needles when this pain started, not straight needles. I really think I overdid it. So I'll lay off the knitting for another day or so.

As mentioned in my earlier post, I did get the shawl done. Wanna see? Here it is:

Finished, completed, done. Yay! Here's a close up of the stitch definition:

A few years ago my son was temporarily living here with his cat. The cat attacked my sewing chair. It looked awful. Like this:

I kept saying I was going to somehow fix it and the years went by and I never got around to it. It finally bugged me enough and I made a little cover for it.

For some reason, I can sew! My hands don't hurt then. I'm so happy, I can still be crafty! It's amazing how much free time I have since I haven't been able to knit. I've been actually making some progress with the book I've been reading, "T is for Trespass" by Sue Grafton. I love her books!

But now I'm hungry. I made some Sloppy Joe's from scratch yesterday, time to go heat some up and eat, yummmmmm!

Lazy Sunday

Meet Katie. She didn't want to be a knitwear model like Pixie was last week. She wanted nothing to do with this.

I finished the first Very Cabley Mitten. All went well. I love love love this color.

Mitten #2 is now on the needles. I plan to sit on the couch the rest of the afternoon and knit. I've got a pot roast in the oven, mmmmmmmmm!!! It should start to smell yummy in here pretty soon. A good day to stay inside, very dreary out. There was freezing rain this morning, but that's now stopped, it's been raining off and on.

Random Thoughts

Why can't we buy hamburger or hot dog buns singly? Buying the whole 8 pack is just too much. I hate freezing them, they just get that "taste", that icky freezer taste.

I think I'm spending too much time on Ravelry lately. Lots of bickering going on in some of the threads/boards. I'm staying out of that crap. Too negative. I'm just going to stay in my own little corner and quietly knit and avoid the controversy.

This is my 101st post. I can't believe I've had 101 things to post about, lol! Some days I'll just write about anything just because I feel like writing.

Tomorrow is another government holiday. No mail, no bills, no day off for me. Still gotta go to work.

And now it's time to go get comfy on the couch and play with my yarn. I hope you have a nice Sunday!

Slippery Roads

Yes, of course it's snowing again. Thanks for asking.

It only took me an hour to get home from work. Normally a 20-25 minute drive. So sick of this shit. I have the winter blues so bad. I'm crabby and cranky and just don't know what to do with myself. I don't even have anything on the needles. I've lost my knitting mojo. I tried to get interested in something last night, just couldn't. I'll try again tonight. Maybe knit up some of that nice Cascade 220 I got not too long ago. I have the perfect mitten pattern for it. It's just a matter of getting motivated.

I did a Pay It Forward thing. Put it in the mail today. I hope the person likes it.

Speaking of mail. I'm in a Valentine's Day swap in a Ravelry group. My person received their package yesterday and I got mine in the mail yesterday too.

I'm excited. I'll open it on Thursday. The dreaded V day. The made up by Hallmark day where guys are pressured to buy gifts for women. I don't know if it was always such an awful day, but it just seems to get worse every year.

OK, enough of my whining for today. I have a house, it's warm, I'm home from work, safely, I've got enough food to eat, and I have yarn! I'll be OK.

Knit from the Stash Month

I finally finished the Braided Gauntlets. I have no idea what took so long, but they are done. The one on the left had so many mistakes and so much frogging in it. I'm surprised I kept going. I tried my best to match up the colorways, I think I did pretty well in that regard. I know one thing, I'll never use that yarn again. It was a pain in the ass.

So now onto another project. I started this beret for my daughter:

It's very plain and simple. I've never knitted a beret before. I did all the increases so it will be bigger after the band. I did the M1L increase. I'm so proud of myself, I learned something new! Yay me! I made her a hat and scarf for Christmas out of some merino wool. She says they itch her like crazy. So I'm using acrylic (don't throw tomatoes at me) for this hat and I'm sure it will work out fine. This yarn was in the big box of yarn I received not too long ago.

My daughter was home for the weekend and brought me a present!

Would you look at that! I got a Valentine gift. I absolutely hate that holiday and so does she. That was so sweet of her to get me something. She wasn't sure if we'd see each before Valentine's Day so she brought it for me. What a sweetie! The gift means the world to me, she spent her little tiny college budget on this for me.

I've bought so much yarn lately I need to quit buying for a while. I decided no new yarn this month (it's a short month, ha!) and I'm going to knit from my stash for a while. I bought yarn with projects in mind then would find new projects then buy more yarn and so on and so on. I need to quit browsing the patterns on Ravelry, ha, like that's possible. So let's see how disciplined I can be this month. But watch out in March!

Postage Stamp Sized Parking Lot

My daughter left to go back to college today. It was so sad. We cried our eyes out. I'm really going to miss her. It was nice having her here for five weeks. Now I have a damn cry headache, can't get rid of it. So, in order to try to cheer myself up I decided to go the the LYS! A real LYS! I haven't gone in a while. I get on the freeway, drive there, and then when I get there I remember . . . tiny microscopic itty bitty parking lot. Nowhere to park. Nowhere. I look on the side street, no parking except way at the end of the block. Circle around again. No one left. Not one dang stupid frikkin' parking space. I didn't feel like parking way down the street. So I said the hell with it, and I left. So Neighborhood Knits if you are reading this, please somehow do something about this lot. This isn't the first time I've had this problem. I decided to drive to Joann's instead, I needed a yarn fix . . . bad. I've been lusting after this yarn for a while . . .



I had a 40% off coupon, so I bought it today. I started another pair of fingerless mitts with it. I just love those things. So cute, and fun to make up and they work up quickly. Perfect kind of project for me. I was happy with my yarn. I also bought a pom-pom maker thingie, as I have a hat in my queue on Ravely to make and it has a pom-pom on it.

I've made some progress on my hat currently on the needles. It's going so slow, I haven't had much knitting time the last few days. I got the cables done and now I'm in the 2 x 2 ribbing. Nice mindless knitting, good to take to knit night.

The hat is called "Palindrome", I found it on the Ravelry site. I can't get a real good picture of it, but can you see all my cables? Yay, I'm done with them now!

Tomorrow I'm going to just sit and knit and get used to the peace and quiet around here again. The silence is deafening.