You people.

Here I post about DH's reaction to my weird dream, and you all chide me for subconsciously picking Jessica Simpson instead of some hotter, brainier chick. ;-P
The Lene Socks are washed and dried and awaiting the rest of their little box of stuff to join them. I told DH I'd mop tonight, but I think it might be more important to go shopping. >:-) Actually, I could probably do both, but I don't want him to know that.
I ordered my Beaverslide yarn this morning. I went for the new 3-ply McTaggart Tweeds, in a medium brown. (Autumn Dogwood, if you care.) I'd originally envisioned the coat in a bright lipstick red, but lately I've been rocking the brown maternity shirt, and DH mentioned how nice I looked in brown, and well. Brown coat it is. I can't wait to get started on it. Please remind me I said that when I'm whining about the acres of stockinette.
In the meantime, I've been Monkeying with some Fleece Artist (in Marine) to keep me busy. It was part of a prize from Joan, who knows from good prizes. Blogless Lynn wasn't kidding, that pattern goes fast.



I'm learning that I really don't like turning heels, except for the standard heel flap, but I hate casting on stretchily (is so a word) and prefer to knit toe up. Even knitting a toe-up gusset is distasteful, as the gusset grows and grows instead of shrinking, as it does from the top down. I'm giving some thought to knitting a sock starting at the top of the heel, with a provisional cast on, and then knitting up from there. That way I can make best use of the yarn, I don't have to do that heinous cast on, I get to do the beloved heel flap, and I know I won't run out of yarn on the foot. Best of both worlds, or ridiculous fiddly overcomplicated procedure? Who knows until I try it? (Hey, I only just heard about Houdini socks, so I still have a ways to go before I get to Most Complex and Unintuitive Way to Make Socks.)

Ugh Sunday.

So, thanks for all the input last time. I do plan to buy the Beaverslide. I have the color all picked out and everything, and now it's just a matter of finishing up the Lene socks so I can allow myself to order the yarn. (The new yarn and Linden are my reward for finishing these long-overdue socks. Orders will be placed when they are in the mail to their new home.)
I love posting about stuff like this on the blog. Almost always, I think I have it all straightened out in my head, but your comments and the ensuing conversation help me see things that I hadn't noticed before. (In the money case, I have come to the conclusion that I will spend money like water on fleeting things, but if I actually BUY something with it, I will know where my money goes and it will be much easier to live in denial about my spending habits. Hey, you don't come here for maturity or grown-up behaviors, let's be honest.)
Further along the lines of spending money we don't have, we went to California on Friday. We left at lunchtime, drove over and stayed the night, and came home yesterday. 14 hours on the road for 16 hours in the state, including about an hour at the beach. (The kidlet LOVED it and was soaked in a matter of minutes.)



The purpose of the trip was house-hunting. We are in the running for two houses in Escondido, and we wanted a walk-through and to see the neighborhood to make sure we weren't making a mistake. I hadn't been planning to take Friday off, but house worries kept me awake all Thursday night, and I was pretty well useless Friday morning anyway. Happily, we liked them both, and DH got a chance to test out his new commute (without much traffic, but at least he knows where he's going). Then it was back in the car and back to the heat. I'd been calling Tucson Satan's Armpit, but I have since decided I was wrong about that - that's Yuma, for sure. Ick. We managed to get home at a fairly reasonable time last night, but today, I still feel like this:



I have managed to do a little laundry, and I might do a little knitting, but other than that, it's nap time.

It's all Cookie's fault, as usual

I think Stacey used that title for her goals too, but hey, whatever works. Cookie's one of those pushers who is subtle enough that you don't even realize the brainwashing. It's true. Try to resist her.
Anyway, the idea behind this is to list out goals for summer knitting. I joined the Summer of Socks and promptly lost any and all mojo for yarn and needles, so this is going to be designed to ease me back into the swing of things, slowly. (When I say I lost the mojo, I lost it completely. Monday I wound a bobbin of plied yarn into a skein, and that is the first time in over a month I've touched yarn except to move it out of my way. That mojo was GONE, yo.)

ETA: the original contest linky is here.

So. My goals.

• Finish all socks on the needles. I can think of two offhand, but I think there are more.


• Knit one pair for me, out of something I dye myself. (I have the dye bug for cotton now since BigAlice and her lovely article.)


• Knit either BYOB or Traeth.


• Crochet more tiny lace angels for my aunts' Christmas gifts. My goal is three each, a total of six.

That is the extent of the main list. I'm not going to kill myself knitting or berate myself for making crazy goals. (Hell, at this point, if I knit one whole row on anything I'll call it a success.) If time permits and/or my mojo comes back all screaming-eagle, I have a few more ideas, in no particular order.

• Knit a pair of socks for DH.


• Knit the baby-sized practice socks from the Cat Bordhi mind-blowing book.


• Finally get off my butt and make Morning Glories.

Holiday Hangover

Wow. Has it really only been four days since I posted? I feel like I've been run through the wringer, in a good way. (In another generation, will anyone know what that phrase means?)
We traveled to Phoenix to spend Christmas Eve with my mother's family at the annual Aunt's Christmas Eve party. The aunts loved their votives, though they only got two each. (I ran out of wire midway through votive #6 and the bead shop was closed on Christmas Eve. Note to other wire-knitters - that pattern says 5 yards per votive, but with 40 yds I only got 5 sleeves.) I plan to finish them and send the others off later.
Christmas was a whirlwind. The Bug was thoroughly and shockingly spoiled. He got every single Cars-related product made. My BIL apologized several times for the overwhelming amount of stuff he was given and I thought many times about possible ways to limit my sisters next year. (In their defense, he is the youngest of their nephews by many many years, and it's been ages since they've had a little kid in the family to spoil.) DH and I have co-opted Bug's fuzzy Mater blanket, though - that thing is awesome.



Since then we had time to hang with Bug's sister K, who came down for a few days, we ran circles around the airport (I'm thinking about having an escalator installed in our house since it is clearly the Bug's favorite thing ever), we texted K all night as her connection in SLC was delayed, delayed, delayed some more, a pilot was lost, a pilot was found, etc etc etc. She finally arrived home after 2am. I am not a fan of the SLC airport, y'all. Also, the DH rekindled his desire to live in Denver and has been contacting realtors, finding properties, considering modular homes, etc. (Aside - my first response to the mod home idea was NO WAY until I saw these things. Did you know you can buy a factory-made 3500 square foot multi-story cape-style home? Neither did I. Check these things out - all modulars.) I finished the blue Vermont sock, and started again on DH's socks. As seems to be the case after the focused rush of the holidays, I feel at loose ends not having deadlines. I have been giving some serious thought to what I want my goals to be, knitting and otherwise, for the next year, but nothing has really gelled yet.
Here are a few photos to warm you up...



Show-off grapefruit.



Shy orange.



Mockingbird against blue sky.



Warm pibble in sun.

Stuff I Need to Know, and stuff I figured out

Stuff I need to know:

How do you ply the godawful crap singles you spin on your spindle? Does it require extra equipment? I can't find anything online, so I'm lost. (I'm sure it's there, I am just not searching for the proper thing.) Can you either tell me what to do with one godawful crap singles whilst I spin another godawful crap singles?

Also, what's a good basic book about yarn creation? Something that maybe doesn't focus on the method, but more on the ideas? I need to know about grist, and why I'd make a three ply over a two ply, and how to spin for socks or for a sweater and such stuff as that. Recommendations, pweeze?

Stuff I figured out:

Cutting my knitting is no big deal. I might feel differently about steeks, but the socks? No problem. I cut one little thread and unravelled it as though it were a giant provisional cast-on, and I reknit. That's it. I actually did it one row higher than necessary, in case my stitches slipped, but they were good little stitches and stayed right there for me.

I can kitchener without looking at the directions, if I take the stitches off the needle. It makes perfect sense if I can see them flat and just "duplicate stitch" even though there aren't any stitches there. If I can't flatten them completely (like, say, for a sock toe) I kitchener them backwards and end up with a purl row instead of a knit row. Even though it's unintentional, I think this is funny so I left it.

I get a fever blister when I'm dehydrated. I didn't make this connection until La pointed it out, but Sunday morning I woke up with the first hangover-headache I've had in ten years (women in my family don't get hangovers, as a rule - we're just genetically lucky that way) and later that day I got the biggest fever blister I've had in my memory. Another reason to drink my water.

Well, wouldja lookit that?

I blew right past my one-year blogging anniversary. Right past. Counting by this here blog, my first post was on 3/7/06. I had briefly toyed with Livejournal prior to this, making my real inaugural post 1/31/06, but I hated Livejournal and wanted rings and buttons in my sidebars. I started a blog for the express purpose of having someplace to post the Knitting Olympics gold medal (that I didn't win). Tee hee - now that I think about it, my KO project was my first pair of socks, and I knitted my heart out and still couldn't do it in two weeks plus a little with a kid who wasn't even mobile yet. Now, here I am, knitting a (too big!) pair in five days while chasing a toddler. I've come a long way, baby.
Ain't life grand?
I should do something to commemorate the fact that I have been pushing my opinions on you writing this blog for so long. But what should I do?

Monday bites

HARD.
I am having A Day. It's 9:30, and the day is already screwed beyond redemption, I think. It may end up being just an "eh" day, but for now, I'm ready to write it off and start over on Tuesday.
This weekend ended up being sunny but fairly chilly. I know, I know, it's nothing compared to the monster ice and snow storms happening in the east and midwest, but still. My brain doesn't switch that fast. It takes me a couple of days of long sleeves to realize it's too hot for long sleeves, and it takes me a couple of days of flimsy t-shirts to realize I'm freezing. Anyway, it was a nice day yesterday, and we took the Bug to the park where he played and played and played some more. There were tons of bigger kids there playing, and watching them, I wondered again how we all lived through our childhoods. They were playing on the swings, doing flips and twisting and jumping like I remember doing, and I don't know why I didn't kill myself with my acrobatics. And I DO know why my mother's heart gave out at such a young age. Holy cow.
Anyway, I didn't knit on anything I'd already started, I cast on for a new project. Yes, I jumped on another bandwagon and knit myself a Fetching. I finished it last night (just the one) and it suffers from the problem I thought it would - it gapes at the top, near my fingers. I dunna like that, so I am going to pick out the binding and add either another cable round, some tighter ribbing, some decreases, or all of the above. I would keep going and make it into a fingerless glove instead of a mitt, but I'm making it with Shine Worsted (in a lovely Bachelor Button colorway, like dark periwinkle) and I think two layers of worsted between my fingers would annoy me deeply. I might use a little crocheted chain between the fingers to hold them on, or maybe a finger-loop around the index and little fingers... There are many possibilities with these cuties, so I'll play with them tonight and see what I like best.
I'd started these mitts once already, on DPNs, and hated every second. This time I tried them magic-loop style, and I must say I like that much much better. It's also nice to know that I can knit a tube with magic loop and avoid the dreaded ladders, so top-down socks are within the realm of possibility. I did use the DPNs for the thumb, and that wasn't terrible, so I may consider gloves at some point as well. Perhaps I will buy some smaller bamboo DPNs and cut them down to be short before I do that.