Found Things

Today is one of those lovely Saturdays when I have absolutely nothing I have to do. My time is all mine. I can knit, sleep, read, surf the Innernets, and generally spoil myself rotten. Oh, there's a few loads of laundry that need doing, and a little bit of tidying up around the house, but nothing compelling or necessary by any means. Well, making sure I have clean underwear for next week might fall into the "necessary" category, but the upshot of all of this is that I have loads of Free, Unstructured Time.

That is a glorious thing.

First up, My So Called Scarf. I love these colors. They're a bit darker than they appear in this photo. I thought diffuse morning sunlight would show them better, but I was wrong. Ah, well. If this is the worse thing to happen to me today, I am lucky indeed.

Second, a few things Found on the Internet that I just haven't gotten around to posting:

[If you click on Anti-Gravity Cat's picture, you can get him to spin around]

Hey, it makes perfect sense to me (but now I'm craving toast, with lots and lots of Calder Dairy butter). (1)

In the "What the Heck, You Never Know" Department: Kelly at Yoga Coffee Outlook is giving away a Zune MP3 Player. All you need to do to qualify is write that previous sentence in a blog post, and put a comment on her blog, etc. Details here.

I've never even read, or wanted to read, any of the Harry Potter books, but I still am sorted into the correct house (the wise, clever, learned, enigmatic ones, I am told):



be sorted @ nimbo.net

But wait! Here's more silly cat stuff:



Oh, I've got tons of these saved on my hard drive:

Cat pics (except anti-gravity cat, whose origin is unknown) courtesy of Meme Cats.

*******
(1) Sweet Jesus, they have Calder Dairy Ice Cream and home delivery in Washtenaw County. ::faint:: If you haven't had Calder dairy stuff, and you live in Southeastern Michigan, you must try it. Calder Dairy is, without a doubt, home of the Best Dairy Products in the Known Universe. Hey, I'm a grain- and milk-fed Midwestern girl -- I know my dairy products.

My God, What About the Knitting?! (1)

When I left you last, I think the state of my blogged knitting was as follows:

1) Blue proto-sock OTN ("On The Needles," for my non-knitting-blog-reading readers).

2) Noro sweater pieces awaiting assembly but being ignored because I have to do a shoulder seam next before I proceed with the arm seams and the side seams. I hate shoulder seams (and the fact that it's always overheated in the cats' room where I do my blocking and seam sewing, and that it's summer, and that I hate heat, and summer, and occasionally wish I lived in the far northern section of British Columbia, or, hell, even southern British Columbia. Vancouver, say).

There are other vague, knitting-like activities -- like a hot pink charity scarf OTN that I'm working on from time to time to keep my hands busy, and to use up the rest of the hot pink yarn not used in the Kitty Pi -- and a serious desire to make My So Called Scarf out of Malabrigo yarn.

I've shown you the Malabrigo before; this stuff is woolen opium. I'm still sitting on that black-purple "Paris Nights" colorway, but I wanted a quick knitting fix for my Malabrigo addiction. So, I order two skeins of the worsted in Jewel Blue from my eBay drug, er, yarn, dealer.

The problem was, when the yarn arrived, I was not completely enamored of its color. The eBay photo showed a more intense medium blue than the actual shade of blue - which is more white-to-ice-blue. I don't fault anyone with that; getting an accurate color from an online photo is difficult (and this particular yarn was kettle-dyed in a limited lot of ten, which lends itself to all sorts of color variations, etc.).

I kept the yarn and started working on the scarf, believing that I would Learn to Love the Yarn.

I do love the yarn. I love how it feels but, Dear Readers, I could not learn to love this color. It's wimpy. It's washed out. It's limp. It's.... It's... PASTEL for chrissakes.

I don't do pastels. I don't do fluff, flounces, lace, lettuce hems, ruffles or any other of that girly stuff. (2)

Part of being Unable to Love the Yarn was due to the pattern. I really like the stitch pattern. It's unique and shows off variegated yarn extremely well. There is even a whole flickr group with pictures of this scarf pattern.

Alas, as with many goals, there is a struggle. This particular stitch pattern is challenging to me because it causes me to hold my needles in such a way as to cause a more-than-usually painful bout of repetitive strain injury.

Nonetheless, I carry on because I love the pattern and I Will Make this Scarf Even if it Kills Me, which it just may, at that; and if I'm going to die from knitting-induced RSI, I want it to be from a yarn that makes me weak in the knees.

After all of this preamble, I offer you Malabrigo Chunky, three-ply superfine Merino wool, Colorway 242, Intenso.



Further bulletins as events warrant. I need to be alone with my yarn now.

********
(1) [Alright - I've got footnotes appearing in the title now, for Pete's sake] Alluding, somewhat, to "Dear God, What About the Men?" from Twisty's blog, which I believe in turn alludes to "Dear God, What About the Children?", an all-too-frequent, ridiculous sound-bite, um, thing that I see in the media. I think. I love word games and references to obscure tidbits of information I find floating around out there. You know, out THERE. [Insert dismissive hand gesture here] That alleged "Real World" place. But I digress.

(2) Ok, my bathroom is pink, with white-rose shaped shower-curtain hooks, but that all started as a joke when my second husband left me and I Needed a Change.

And Now for Something Completely Different

A picture of a sleeping cat! I'm hoping that my long weekend will look something like this. Sleeping, going out to movies, eating, gaming. All play with very few chores. Well, there are always chores to be done -- cat box cleaning, laundry, dishwashing, grocery shopping -- but I'm hoping for more Fun than Chores, more Sleeping than Not Sleeping, etc.

I feel a Knitting Mood coming on. I've started the Proto-Sock (1), and it's coming along nicely. I'm just about ready to try the heel turn in another inch or two. I might be less optimistic about sock knitting come tomorrow, but I think it's do-able. At least for now.



* * * * * * * * * * *
(1) In order to learn sock knitting, I decided that it would be best to practice on larger needles and thicker yarn than any sock pattern ever called for. I'm making one very oversized sock, essentially. Once I master or, at the very least, figure out what I'm doing, I'll attempt to make a Real Sock.

Love the Yarn, Pet the Yarn, Fondle the Yarn...

Six skeins of Malabrigo kettle-dyed merino wool arrived today (the color is "Paris Nights"). It's my understanding that this stuff is about as addictive as, say, heroin. This is definitely being put aside until my l33t knitterly skillz are much more l33t-er.

In other sort-of-knitting-related news, Crazy Aunt Purl has finally gotten around to publishing her book. The responses and comments on her blog today are simply overwhelming, in the best sense of the word. One commenter wrote this:

All I could think when I read this was "wow, Laurie got published" and wanted to tell someone my "friend" got published. Then realized I'd have to explain that no, I don't really know you and no, you have no idea who I am, but hey - My friend got published!!

That's about how I feel, too. I've been reading Laurie's blog for about six months now. She's the one that turned me on to Dyson vacuum cleaners, Magic Erasers, and Noro Big Kuryeon(1). She is the one that motivated me to start my own blog. Laurie is like a friend, in a way, because she writes about so many topics that resonate with me -- books, relationships, cats, being looked at as an "eccentric," u.s.w. I am so ridiculously happy for her.

*****************
(1) [EDIT - I forgot about the budget worksheet, her demonstration of how to put those 1-pixel borders on the photographs, the fried chicken recipe I have to try, directing me to the Kitty Pi pattern, and about a dozen other things, I'm sure]

~

The Best Laid Schemes of Mice and (Wo)Men

I thought it was "best laid plans," but a search on a quotations site says it's "schemes."(1) Who am I to argue? In any event, this blog post is about knitted cat toys -- not Robert Burns' quotes.

Since I have a LOT of that Noro Big Kureyon 20 from My First Sweater remaining, I was thinking it would be an excellent color for a catnip mouse. I recalled seeing a catnip mouse pattern on the Wendy Knits web site, as well as in her book that I bought for myself after the Lenten Book Fast. (2) There were two patterns: one for a plain ol' garter stitch mouse, and one that had a cable in it. The Excruciatingly Easy Garter Stitch Catnip Mouse vs. The Sophisticated Cabled Catnip Mouse for the Debonair Cat-about-Town. Her words -- not mine.

I knew the garter stitch one would bore me to absolute tears, and I thought the more complicated one was worth a try because I could play around with knitting cables and not worry too much about how they looked. This would be for my cats, after all. If catnip is involved, they tend to be uncritical.

My first attempt was not pretty. The picture is in black and white because it shows the stitch pattern -- or utter lack of a stitch pattern -- better than in color. I remember reading that it was supposed to be a cable surrounded by two panels of seed stitch. Um, that ain't it. You can see some stockinette stitch in the upper right hand corner, and Lord only knows what's going on with that cable. It's been broken in two. [Yeah, yeah, I know it's a bad picture. Trust me. It doesn't show any more detail in the color versions.]

I went back to the web site to look at some of the photos other knitters had posted, and I found this one:

That is not seed stitch. That is so not seed stitch I could just spit. Looks like stockinette to me. Stockinette. Boring. Easy. No thought involved. If someone would have posted that it's two panels of stockinette (instead of two panels of seed stitch), I would have saved some time and aggravation -- not that I get very aggravated with the knitting. Much. I know I'm a beginner and that I learn from making mistakes, etc., etc. /sigh

I'm thinking that I should save my first attempt at making cables for posterity. Years from now I will look back at it and laugh. I hope. I had better be laughing.


************
(1)

The best laid schemes o' Mice an' Men,
Gang aft agley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain,
For promis'd joy!

(The best laid schemes of Mice and Men
oft go awry,
And leave us nothing but grief and pain,
For promised joy!)"

--Robert Burns

For some reason, I'm remembering that the first two lines of this poem appeared in one of our grade school reading books, but it was the version with the Scottish vernacular. I can't recall anything about the story, but I think a mouse was quoting. Or a cat. 'Tis a puzzlement.

(2) I give up buying books for Lent every year. I've been doing that for a while, so it's become less of a deprivation over time. This year I gave up books and yarn.

~

More Quotes, and Knitting, and Knitting Quotes

I've been in a "knitting mood" recently. I'm certain the return to freezing temperatures and snow flurries has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with this "knitting mood." Nah. Note to the Powers That Be: Huh-LO. It's APRIL down here and it's really about time this foolish snowing business ended for the year.

So, knitting. I'm working on a funnel neck sweater(from this book) in Noro Big Kureyon Color 20 (discontinued). I have one sleeve and one back/front panel finished, and am feverishly working on Sleeve Number Two. As much as I love the colorway (cream, taupe, sienna, brown, grey, black), I'm already thinking about doing another sweater in a solid color (matching yarn colors when I have to start a new skein is, frankly, a bitch).

And so, whilst perusing my knitting books looking for a sweater pattern, I stumble across all the quotes that just tickled me from Elizabeth Zimmerman's Knitting Without Tears.

Emergency knobs for double-pointed needles may be made from tightly wound rubber bands, or from those rubber needle guards which are never to be found when wanted. Dorothy Case links her needle guards with wool; then they can both get lost together.

***

A #6 aluminum needle has been known to furnish an excellent emergency shearpin for an outboard motor. It once saved us seven miles of paddling. Then I had to spend hours re-pointing the needle on rocks, having nobly, but foolishly, offered the business end instead of the knob end for sacrifice.

***

Really, all you need to become a good knitter are wool, needles, hands, and slightly below-average intelligence. Of course superior intelligence, such as yours and mine, is an advantage.

***

There is no right way to knit; there is no wrong way to knit. The way to knit is the way that suits you, and the way that suits the wool and the pattern and the shape that you are currently working on. Show me any "mistake" and I will show you that it is only a misplaced pattern or an inappropriate technique. There are patterns that include dropped stitches and twisted stitches. There are projects which should be as tight as you can possibly knit; there are others where you have to relax to the point of lethargy in order to make them loose enough. I've not yet found a pattern which includes a split stitch; this is the only real mistake I know.

Elizabeth Zimmerman died before I knew that she once was one of the doyennes of the knitting world. A shame it took me so long to discover her; I truly like her style.

A Photo Essay: All Your Kitty Pi Are Belong to Us

I apologize for the quality, or lack thereof, of my photograpy. I apologize for the mess that is my study. I never pretended to be Martha Stewart, and only dull women keep immaculate houses.

But, pictures are worth a thousand words:

The "Before" Pictures

The "During" Pictures


The "After" Pictures

The Collector

[The "Ten for Tuesday" blog meme list, and I can't get this bloody thing to format properly. Trust me; it's driving me nuts.]

I think what a person surrounds herself with can be quite telling about her personality. I realize that I'm reaching on some of this to make them fit into the definition of a "collection." Deal with it. My blog, my rules.

1. Comic books. This started around 1995 (or 1996), when I walked into Vault of Midnight and met one Curtis Sullivan (and his wife Liz, and friend Steve). I've since fallen off in my reading to an embarrassing extent, but I'm quite proud of my messy, in-desperate-need-of-sorting collection. The highlights include Neil Gaiman's Sandman (the FIRST printings, thankyouverymuch) and original artwork from Transmetropolitan (on loan to The Vault).

2. "Real" books. See recent blog post below.

3. Maneki nekos. Japanese "lucky cats." Most of my collection is from eBay, but one of the attorneys visited Japan a while ago and brought me back an authentic neko. I have about 40 of them in various sizes and colors.

[Items 4 and 5 are side effects from working in the "death care industry."]

4. Grim reapers. I suppose this is a memento mori thing. I have a pewter figurine, a small wind-up walking toy, a rubber stamp, and a fully poseable plush (with plush scythe) at my desk at work.

5. Funeral home paraphernalia. Nothing too sick, although I know I have a mouth former somewhere in one of my boxes in the basement (this keeps the mouth of the corpse from collapsing/receding). No trocars or embalming equipment, but I do have a metal box (circa 1940's) for the decedent's personal effects (A.P. Acquavella Funeral Home, Brooklyn, New York); several ballpoint pens (in need of refills) from mortuaries and embalming services in Springfield, Missouri; a metal coffin-shaped key chain from the Batesville Casket Company; and a coffee mug from the United Casket Company ("Dedicated to Quality and Service").

6. Stuffed animals (tigers and cats). I'm 12 years old on the inside. Really.

7. Yarn a/k/a The Yarn Stash. Knitters are strange creatures. They collect vast amounts of yarn that has no immediate discernable purpose. "Ooooo, that's pretty. Let's buy a few skeins and knit up….something." I read somewhere that Tracy Ullman has a room of her home dedicated to holding The Stash. My own stash is quite small in comparison. Along with that beautiful cotton chenille from City Knits (see blog post of January 7th), I have:

* 6 skeins of Noro Big Kureyon, brown-cream-gray-orange colorway (A20), bulky

* 2 skeins of fluffy Peruvian cotton, sport/DK (for washcloths) orange and yellow, and ½ skein hot pink

* 4 or 5 skeins of assorted eyelash yarns shades of turquoise and blue

* 2 skeins of Paton's Chunky Shetland, bulky (like the gray basketweave scarf)

* 1 skein Lion Brand chenille, bulky, dark blue

* 2 skeins Peruvian wool, worsted, hot pink (Kitty Pi Version 1)

* 2 skeins Australian Corriedale wool, super bulky, peacock (Kitty Pi Version 2)

* 1 skein Mango Moon viscose, red-orange-yellow-magenta colorway and matching textured twist, rayon

* 1 cone, approx 400 yards, of undefined origin, navy worsted wool

* 1 cone, yardage unknown, light blue/grayish cotton chenille, sport/DK or lighter

8. Husbands. This doesn't quite count as a collection; it's more of a series. Let's just say third time's a charm and I'm happy with the current one.

9. Knowing how to order beer in a foreign language. German, Czech, and Swahili. One never knows.

10. Ranger characters. It's actually the same Ranger character, just different games. Laiane Wolfsong was born in the first Everquest. Then there was Morrowind, EverQuest 2, Oblivion, and now Vanguard. I don't like characters that can't sneak, hide, and cause obscene amounts of damage from a distance. "Security" features (in the Elder Scrolls series), tracking, and animal companions are definite pluses. There are downsides, though. I remember in the original EQ all that time in Jaggedpine Forest doing the root and shoot (with the snakes) and the snare and scare (with the griffons/griffawns). Most of my high 40's to lower 50's were a long, agonizing line of griffon butts.

PIPP's - Pi In Progress Pics!

I'm still a very bad photographer/Paint Shop Pro user. I swear on a stack of Bibles that the pink yarn in the top stripe is the exact, identical color (and dye lot) as the pink yarn on the bottom, but can I take a picture that somehow demonstrates this? No, I cannot. I have other gifts, but they do not translate into the realm of photography and/or digital editing. I know how to use semi-colons. I know the difference between i.e. and e.g. I know when you say something is a person's forte it's pronounced "fort," not "for-TAY."


Nonetheless, I suck at photography. I'm not losing any sleep over it.


The top photo is the Kitty Pi before it went into the Magic Felting Wash. I'm glad I took the time to take it out of the pillowcases and check it halfway, because it had SHRUNK like you would not believe. A lot of wet yarn wrangling later, and I got it over the cat cabana I was using for it's blocking form.


(Thomas investigamatin' the pi in process)

TGIF or "Gin and Kitty Pis"

That would be a plural of kitty pi in the title, not a shortened version of kitty piss. Pi's just didn't look right at all (not that pis looks quite right, but it is perhaps what one would call the "best choice." Or not).

Anyhoo, it's Friday, Friday, Friday at Chez Cat Barf (to borrow from Crazy Aunt Purl, one of my favorite bloggers), and I am bound and determined to finish knittin' on the kitty pi and felt the blasted thing. I feel like I've been looking at it for months, even though I know it's only been a few weeks. This is some odd attempt to discipline myself in my knitting. One Project At a Time. No New Projects Until Ongoing Project is Completed (Even if Ongoing Project is Making Me Blind). A yep. Knitting Discipline Builds Character (although I am certain I know more than a few people who will attest that I'm already a character).

And what is a kitty pi, one may ask?

It's a cat bed. An oversized, knitted cat bed that you concoct out of 100% wool yarn and then toss blithely in the washing machine with lots of hot water to intentionally turn the wool into a bunch of shrunken, matted wool fiber. Ever put a wool sweater in the wash? What size (and density) was it when all was said and done? That's the general idea. Knit oversized object, put in zippered/knotted pillowcase, and run it through a hot wash/cold rinse cycle to shrink and thicken said knitted object. [I must point out here that the sealed pillow case is very important to this process or else you could clog your washing machine pump thingie with wool, which would be a Bad Thing Indeed.]



I found the kitty pi online, and knew in my heart that it would be an ideal knitting project for me because:

(a) The cats really don't care how much I mess up on my increase and decrease rows, not to mention the utter mess of starting it out on the Double Pointed Needles of Death; and

(b) The felting/blocking process will cover a multitude of sins. I hope.

So, the photo is the kitty pi in its inchoate state. I just did the first decrease row, and figure I've got about an hour or two of knitting left, perhaps 20 more rows. I did this first kitty pi on needles smaller than the pattern calls for, which is Another Bad Thing, because I may have added on too many -- or too few -- additional rows to approximate... oh, whatever. This is a kitty pi on size 8 needles with worsted wool instead of size 11 needles with bulky wool, perhaps too much of a deviation from what I Should Have Done.

Regardless. This is a kitty pi made with Love of Felines in mind, so I will plow ahead and post pictures of my foray into Knitted Cat Items. It may be a resounding success (and then the cats will turn their noses up at it) or it may be a dismal failure (and they will love it anyway).

We shall see.

My, I'm Feeling Feisty Today

Never let it be said that I am not opinionated. I have plenty of opinions. My cup overflows with opinions, and, since this blog is my own little solipsistic corner of the universe, I figure I might as well let 'er rip.

[N.B. To those easily offended: I'm not saying that these must be your opinions, too, merely that they are mine. A careful, clever reader will note many tongue-in-cheek comments. If you want your opinions, you are more than welcome to get on your soapbox and post them on your own blog. I won't mind.]

Opinion No. 1 - Valentine's Day doesn't "count."

Receiving a gift from a man on Valentine's Day is nice, admittedly, but since it's a Holy Day of Romantic Obligation and he MUST provide his inamorata with a token of his affection (or else be met with severe disapproval), the gift given is one of placation -- not one of sincere depth of feeling. Note the large number of gentlemen in the local chocolate shop at 5:05 p.m. on Valentine's Day evening. They are not motivated by "love," cats and kittens; they're merely trying to save their bacon by not coming home empty-handed. You want to score points with me, bring me chocolate for no (apparent) reason whatsoever. One well-placed gift of a king-sized package of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups "just because I was thinking of you, darling" is a major point-scoring coup.

Sub-opinion: Women who judge the depth of their partner's affections by the quality or quantity of what they receive as a Valentine's Day token are a few sandwiches short of a picnic.

Sub-opinion: Red roses are ubiquitous, boring, and take almost no effort to procure. Gosh, you got me red roses for Valentine's Day? Me and eleventy billion other women got red roses today. How…thoughtful. That took you what? Five minutes on the phone? How about yellow roses? How about, get this, ORANGE roses (well, I think florists use the term "apricot") in the middle of OCTOBER "just because"? Ok, so that takes perhaps six minutes of effort of the phone, but has a far greater amount of "oomph."(1)

[Note to The Husband, who I know reads this blog - Don't take any of this personally. You're one of the most romantic guys I know.]


Opinion No. 2 - Cats are superior to dogs.(2)

I have nothing against dogs. I like animals in general and I like dogs just as much as I like wombats, lemurs, platypuses (platypi?)(3), and just about anything else that travels on four legs. However, in the eternal cats vs. dogs argument, feline trumps canine every single time.

Reason One: Dogs have no mind of their own. Dogs, as pack animals, must define themselves in relation to other dogs, or their owner, and/or the owner's family. A dog by itself is at a loss. Cats, on the other hand, are complete entities unto themselves.

Reason Two (closely related to Reason One): The argument of "dogs are smarter than cats because we can teach dogs tricks" is utterly specious. Let's put this into other words and see how much water this argument is capable of holding: Dogs are smarter than cats because dogs want to please humans and dogs bend their will to suit us (instead of suiting themselves, as felines do). Dogs are smarter than cats because dogs are boot-licking, obsequious, toad-eating synchophants. A dog is a brown-nosing suck-up so, ergo, the dog is smarter. Yeah, right.

Reason Three: Dogs don't purr.


Opinion No. 3 - Continental-style knitting (holding the working yarn in the left hand) is superior to English-style knitting (holding the working yarn in the right hand).

I didn't really have an opinion on this until I read in Elizabeth Zimmerman's book, Knitting Without Tears, that she was discouraged from continental, left-handed knitting by her governess because it was German and therefore inferior. As a person of German extraction, I take umbrage.

The following may make no sense if you're not a knitter, but the difference between the two styles is remarkable.

The right-handed, English method of knitting is inefficient and takes too many steps:

(a) Insert right needle into stitch on left needle.

(b) Grasp both right and left needles with the tips of the fingers of left hand.

(c) Remove right hand from right needle and pick up working yarn with right hand.

(d) Wrap working yarn on right needle from back to front.

(e) Drop working yarn from right hand and return right hand to right needle.

(f) Knit the stitch created on the left hand needle and slip it onto right hand needle.

Compare this to the left-handed, continental, German method of knitting:

(a) Insert right needle into stitch on left needle.

(b) Keeping both hands on respective needles, wrap yarn held in left hand around right needle by flicking left finger to manipulate yarn.

(c) Knit the stitch created on the left hand needle and slip it onto right hand needle.

Q.E.D. Left-handed German yarn-holding is far more efficient. Lord only knows where the English got the idea that right-handed knitting was superior. Perhaps they haven't gotten over "the sun never sets on the British Empire" thing.

-------------------------------------------
(1) I'm not sitting here making "quote marks" in the air with my hands. Really.

(2) For more in this vein, I refer the gentle reader to H.P. Lovecraft's essay, Something About Cats.

(3) I discovered in one of Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin books (I can't recall which) that male platypuses can sting you. Dr. Maturin, overcome with the exuberance of the natural philosopher, is brought low by a male platypus he picks up without permission. MSN Encarta says: "Adult males have a hollow, horny spur on the inner side of the hind leg, from which a toxic fluid is ejected and which may be used as a weapon of defense." Life Lesson: Don't pick up adult male platypuses. I think I would be hard pressed to distinguish the gender of a platypus, but that's a topic for another blog post.

Look! A Finished Object!

I actually finished this scarf a week or so ago, but just got around to taking pictures of it today. I'm quite fond of it. It's far from perfect (I note that one can see the hole from an accidental yarn over even in the small picture), but it's mine.

I saw on a TV documentary, years and years ago, a Native American tribe that was known for their woven fabric. Rugs, perhaps? When they made a new rug, they would intentionally make a mistake in the design because they believed that only The Supreme Being/That Guy Upstairs could make something that was "perfect." I like to keep that in mind when I'm knitting.

As always, click on the photos for close-ups.

CBIP - Cat Bed in Progress [finally]

He Who Bakes Spice Cake Chocolate Rum Balls and I went to Jim and Terri's this afternoon, and I finally, finally, FINALLY got the cat bed started. I took advantage of Terri's good nature and maternal patience and talked her into getting the first three or four rounds on the Double Pointed Needles of Death(tm). I was able to take it from there and made quite a lot of progress today. I am now, of course, blind and arthritic from all that knitting, but progress has been made. Amen.

It's 1:30 a.m. Why am I Taking Pictures of YARN?

Well, it's utterly indescribably delicious yarn, is probably the reason behind that question. He Who Occasionally Lapses Into Bad British Accents and I went to the Fisher Theater in Detroit to see Spamalot. We got there early enough that we wandered around the Fisher Building for a bit before we went in to the theater, and I stumbled into City Knits (a very high-rent yarn store).

I saw the sign for the store, and I was drawn like a lamp to a flame (me and several other women with their husbands/significant others who were there to see the show). They (and this includes Yours Truly) would walk into the store; their jaw would drop and the face would light up with Possibilities. Yarn! Lovely Yarn! My God(dess), What Can I Make Out of All This YARN?! They looked like they discovered that Santa Claus was real, that fairies do dance in the moonlight, and that they had won Publishers' Clearinghouse and Ed McMahon was in their driveway. This would be the knitters. The gentlemen who accompanied them would sigh, shake their heads despondently, and look at the floor.

If you're a knitter, I double dog dare you to click on that photo of the yarn and not squeal. I just about squealed, and I DON'T SQUEAL. Much.

I'm thinking the Mistake Rib Scarf from WendyKnits. That's the same web site that has the pattern for the infamous Kitty Pi (the cat bed I will eventually get around to making once I learn how to deal with knitting on two circular needles). Plans, plans, plans.

Knit 2, Purl 4

I've been teaching myself how to knit for about two years now, and I'm finally at the point where I'm completing projects. Projects that I actually wear in public, or use. Don't laugh; I have pictures. You can click on the pictures to get a better look, if you're so inclined.

Exhibit A: The Pink Washcloth.

No, I don't wear this in public, but I do USE it. Not use in public, but use in general. It's made with this lovely fluffy Peruvian cotton yarn I got from www.knitpicks.com. It's delightfully soft. I used about 1/2 a skein for this cloth, and I have two full skeins left of yellow and orange sitting in the Yarn Stash(tm) for future use. A very easy pattern (which is good, since I can only knit up the really easy stuff).

*Cast on 4 stitches
*Knit 4
*Knit 2, Yarn over, Knit across the row until you have 44 stitches (or however many stitches looks like half a square to you).
*Knit 1, Knit 2 Together, Yarn Over, Knit 2 Together, Knit across the row until you only have four stitches remaining
*Bind off


Exhibit B: The Blue Cowl Thing.

This was done with one skein of plain black wool and one skein of some funky faux mohair/eyelash yarn (all synthetic but it feels good; I hate itchy) The black wool is from knitpicks (again) and the faux mohair from www.joann.com. (1) This was all done in knit stitch, and when the scarf looked long enough, I flipped it into a mobius strip and sewed the ends together. I think I got the idea for this from another craft supply web site; I can't recall. I've gotten several compliments on this one. Not that it's particularly creative or well made, but that it's simply cool yarn. Cool yarn covers a multitude of sins, and flubbed stitches.


Exhibit C: The Gray Basketweave Scarf (a Work in Progress)

This is a doozy (do click on the pic of this one to see the stitch pattern better; it's gorgeous). This is going to take about 3 skeins of Patons Shetland Chunky (charcoal). No fancy eyelash yarn to hide the botched stitches on this beauty. Just me and my knits and purls. There were several beginning knitting books/blogs that suggested doing a simple basketweave scarf as follows:

Rows 1-10: Knit 5, Purl 5, Knit 5, Purl 5
Rows 11-20: Purl 5, Knit 5, Purl 5, Knit 5

I didn't care for how that turned out. The scarf didn't lie "square," and the edges curled. So, I found a little more elaborate pattern (from Stitch 'n Bitch Nation, the pattern called "Mom's Sophisticated Scarf" by Nicholas Caratzas). It's still essentially a basic basketweave pattern. Nothing fancy.

Cast on 38 stitches

Rows 1-6 in seed stitch
Rows 1, 3, 5 - *Knit 1, Purl 1; rep from * to end
Rows 2, 4, 6 - *Purl 1, Knit 1; rep from * to end

Begin Basketweave pattern

Rows 1, 3, 6, 8 - Knit 1, Purl 1, Knit 1, *Knit 2, Purl 4; rep from * to last 5 stitches, Knit 3, Purl 1, Knit 1

Rows 2, 4, 7, 9 - Knit 1, Purl 1, Knit 1, *Purl 2, Knit 4; rep from * to last 5 stitches, Purl 2, Knit 1, Purl 1, Knit 1

Row 5 - Knit 1, Purl 1, Knit 1, Purl to last 3 stitches, Knit 1, Purl 1, Knit 1

Row 10 - Knit 1, Purl 1, Knit to last 2 stitches, Purl 1, Knit 1

Work in basketweave pattern to desired length.

Do last 6 rows in seed stitch.

Bind off.


I not completely enamored of the Patons Shetland Chunky -- it's 75% acrylic/25% wool. I'm turning into a yarn snob and acrylic just seems so tacky; but still, I need to improve my skills and I can always donate this prototype/practice scarf to a homeless shelter and then do another one in a beautiful 100% merino wool or alpaca/silk/cashmere blend.

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(1) I have no problem buying yarn online. I buy everything but groceries online. I found the Husband online. Yes, I can't see it/feel it in person (the yarn, you perverts, not the Husband), but I figure I can always send it back from whence it came if it's utterly horrendous. Again, the YARN, not the Husband.