A Bitter Knitter

At the end of the year, it seems that there is always a race to finish those WIPs...  Christmas deadlines and New Year's resolutions and other goals always seem to create a knitting rush.  There were some WIPs that I wanted to finish before Christmas and year's end and some that I had planned on finishing sometime in the next year. This WIP was one that I thought was going to wait until January... But ended up being a December surprise! My baby girl, whose moniker for this blog shall be "Jo," was born December 21st.  I had gone into the hospital for a non-stress test to monitor my blood pressure on the 20th and it was discovered that I had severe pre-eclampsia, so they decided to induce me early (37 weeks) for both our safety.  Jo weighed 5 lbs 5 oz at birth and is 19 inches long.  As you can see, she's got a head full of dark hair (except for a blonde patch in the back).  She's also got long fingers like her mommy. I'm loving being a mom. ...

This November, rather than NaKniSweMo (a sweater in 30 days), I participated in NaKnitMo, knitting as much as possible in 30 days.  Over the course of those 30 days, I competed: A blessing dress for my little one : Booties to go with it : (somehow already lost one, and she's not even born yet.  Ah, well.  Just have to knit some more...) And a Dalek jumper for my little one as well: Plus  I finished another Gaptastic Cowl for a friend of my mother's , a pair of stealth projects (Christmas presents) for my biggest and smallest nephews, and got good progress made on a couple other stealth projects for Christmas as well.  The Gaptastic is pictured on my Red-Headed Sister below: So, all in all I completed three works in progress, started and finished three new projects, and got half-way through two more... all in November!  I feel highly accomplished, especially in comparison to a few months ago!  I aim to finish the two half-done...

I've been keeping secrets... Secrets about a "stealth project" and I've been keeping them for months now... That's the reason that I've gotten nothing done and haven't written any posts... I might've spilled the beans... But now it's bean-spilling time.  Oh, it's still a work-in-progress, but I've reached the point where I'm willing for it to not be so stealthy anymore... This WIP is about two-thirds done and should be finished in January: (The photo is a few weeks old; it's time for a new one.  My bump has gotten much bigger since!)  Oh, and for those of you who will ask, it's a GIRL! As such, I have reexamined my knitting goals ...  (I was off knitting for a few months when everything  made me nauseous and caused motion sickness, including watching TV, being on the computer, or knitting.  I read a lot...)  I set a goal in January to complete at least 24 knit projects.  I have thus far completed fou...

Take some yarn... (well, not just some yarn.  Lots of yarn.  About 1200 yards in this particular instance.) Add some knitting needles, a few stitch markers, a handful of blocking pins, and an emergency crochet hook.  Wait 125 days (who knows how many hours... I'm not sure I really want to know that number...) and then, if the Knitting Fates have smiled upon you... ...your yarn will grow up to become a sweater. My NaKniSweMo sweater is finally all grown up.  *sniff*   More photos when I can get some one to take them for me--I'm just ecstatic with the fact that these sleeves are LONG ENOUGH for my abnormally long arms . Also, since my last post, I've finished another pair of socks: These are the first pair of socks I created without a specific pattern--they are knit straight from my brain.  They are also my first socks with afterthought heels.  I love the colours, especially of the variegated yarn.  The LYS I ...

If I would stop stealth knitting, you would get blog posts.  I'm planning a post for late March that will show you what I've been up to in January and February, but you're going to have to wait until then for most of my knitting progress. For today, however, I have some good yarn-y news. I have finished all the pieces for my sweater! Yes, my NaKniSweMo sweater is finally cast off.  It's currently blocking (perched precariously on my piano) and looks like a puzzle waiting to be put together...  A sweater sized jigsaw puzzle... The second sleeve is hiding down on the piano bench.  Each sleeve took a whole skein of yarn.  Or, to rephrase, it took 200 yards per sleeve to make them long enough for me.  Of course, it was after  knitting all 400 yards (or 50 inches) of sleeve and putting the whole thing in to soak that I noticed the mistake below: Two stitches that should have been knit that I distractedly purled instead.  If I had noticed before...

I first tried knitting in 2002 or 2003.  I'm not sure which--I was sixteen or seventeen at the time.  I learned how to do a long-tail cast on and how to knit and purl.  As a result, I knitted a piece about eighteen inches wide and four inches tall in 2x2 rib.  And then the royal blue yarn and the aluminum size 9 needles sat abandoned in my closet.  And then I moved, and they sat abandoned in my new closet. Eleven months ago today, 22 September, I walked into the yarn store near my university and bought yarn and knitting needles.  I had seen a pattern online for a Hogwarts scarf and wanted to make one for my little sister for Christmas, so I purchased yellow and black yarn (Hufflepuff colours) and a size 7 circular needle and, with the help of YouTube and half a dozen knitting sites, I cast on again, some seven or eight years after I first attempted knitting, and began knitting again. Just knitting.  Solid knitting.  Solid stockinette...

Been a bit, hasn't it?  Now that I'm not in school, the days just blend together...  It's actually getting to the point in the summer when I'm ready for school to start again, but I'm not going back to school in the Fall.  Hmm... time to actually start looking for a job perhaps? In the past month, I have finished one of my hibernating projects in time for Elder Sister's birthday and I am making good progress on a couple of my stealth projects.  I also finished another pair of socks made with yarn that I received for my graduation from the woman who taught me to knit: I'm also almost done with my first shawl!  Yay!  The pattern is Bermuda , and I'm knitting it with Mini Mochi's Beach Scene , which is wonderfully soft.  The short rows and colour changes work together to create an amazing effect.  I'll post pictures when I'm done.  This week?  Maybe next? I've also cast on for another pair of socks.  I'm addicted!  My p...

I haven't blogged recently.  There's not much to blog about knitting when one is knitting multiple stealth projects.  I've added a new one... so in addition to   and  I have added: Isn't that just so exciting for you?  Yeah... that's all you get.  Sorry.  (Ravelry friends, however, can go see real pictures on my Rav page .  Everyone else has to wait.  Perks of being a knitter...  Family: please do not go making fake Ravelry profiles just to see the projects.  It defeats the purpose of them being stealth.) I've turned the heel on my second Joy in the Journey sock and am meandering my way down the foot.  (It's just not exciting to knit the same thing a second time.  Not that it's exactly the same thing--I did flip the pattern so it will be the reverse of the first one, but the concept is the same.)  And as it looks remarkably similar to the first one, I have no pictures for you at this present time.  Once I ...

It's been an absolutely crazy couple of weeks.  I finished all my classes & turned in papers (including one I especially loved writing which I titled "Knit Two Conceptual Domains Together" and which was about the use of metaphor in knitting) and then I GRADUATED!  That's right.  I now (or rather will, once final grades are posted,) have a B.A.! Here are pics from graduation.  These were taken by my sister & friends.  I'm shiny!  (You know what the reason is for having tassels that hang down the sides of your face?  Distraction!  Something to play with during graduation (such as while the student speaker sites "dictionary.com" as a reference *serious eye rolling*)!  The cords were fun to play with, too...  but I digress... What can I say?  I'm distracted by shiny objects...) Sorry, photo vanished. Sorry, photo vanished. I graduated "cum laude" but I'm hoping that my final grades will nudge up my GPA so that my dip...