I got the bug!

I don't have a "real" finished shot of this, but I guarantee it looks a lot like it does while blocking. This scarf was pretty while I knit it, but ok - I get it now - blocking really does make the lace. I'm currently blasting through a pair of socks, but I'm plotting my next lace project (ignore the fact that I already have a lace scarf on the needles, it's not what I'm craving to start.) I've wanted to knit Ene's Scarf forever and a day. I've linked it, but I'm pretty sure everyone knows this one already. I finally think I might attack that project, and the Trellis Scarf which I started and frogged (no thanks to probably choosing the wrong needles and failing to use a lifeline - silk and the 7 into 5 stitch is slippery) are next up on the radar.

And yes, I cast on for a new pair of socks. On a whim, I started knitting the Mockery Socks on Saturday night. I spent the better part of yesterday with needles in my hands, and have zipped through the gusset and am working my way down the foot already.

Today is a day off of work for me. I should be doing other things, but I'm taking advantage of the time off to rest, knit, and regroup. Thanks to some really impressive insomnia and the discovery of Ballykissangel, I've found myself doing a lot of knitting lately. Yesterday was the 5 month anniversary of my dad's death. His birthday, and my former mentor's birthday, were both in the first week of February. Although they're had milestones, I am starting to feel like my old self again. Still, I'm grateful to Netflix and their "watch immediately" feature. Especially when so many BBC programs I missed are available at the click of a button.

Completion

I'm really going to regret it come morning, but I stayed up late to finish knitting the lace ribbon scarf. It desperately needs to be blocked before I can make any decisions about it - at the moment it's a soft but crumply mess.

Now, I desperately need to go to bed. I was tired before, and I'm only going to get about 5 hours of sleep before it's time to start the day again.

Project monogamy

Doesn't make for the most exciting blogging. I'm still knitting the lace ribbon scarf. It grows, on and on, slowly. I'm still enjoying the process of knitting it - the Handmaiden Sea Silk is some seriously nice stuff, and the color is gorgeous. This is a good thing, because ultimately, this scarf is for my mom, and it should be something good. Last night I worked on it while watching episodes from the first season of Ballykissangel. I'm a Netflix user, and the new "watch instantly" feature has been getting a lot of use from me lately. I had gone through much of what I wanted to see already on hulu, so it's nice to have some additional options for when I'm up late and knitting. Especially when they are things my husband isn't really interested in seeing. I watched the original version of The Office while knitting and baking last week.

I continue to give away handknits. The latest thing to leave my house was my Midwest Moonlight scarf, knit back while I still lived in the midwest.

The date on this in progress shot is June 24, 2005. That's a while ago.


It's been gifted to my office mate, who appreciates these sorts of things, and is a really really nice person.

My schedule for the week has radically changed, and I'll be on vacation instead of at work. I didn't get in some supplies I needed, the lab has mostly shut down, and I don't really feel like spending $10 for someone to watch TV with my son while I read at my desk. So, I'm hoping to take advantage of this time to play and catch up on some things around here. This hopefully includes some time to catch up on photographing some things, and posting a bit more.

Almost a week later...

And almost no knitting. Still knitting the same lace scarf I've been working on, and plan to finish it someday. I've been working a lot, and doing some reading, although nothing too exciting, or at least not worth mentioning.

I painted my fingernails.


I made rice crispy treats.


I made cookies (blogged by someone else, here) from Nigella Express.

I baked some pumpkin cranberry bread, that, despite being non-photogenic, was delicious. I've been on a bit of a cooking tear, actually. I've been having a good time with Nigella Express, and have been nibbling on martini olives (green olives marinated in gin and vermouth), and chocolate pistachio fudge, which was way too simple to make for my own good. Tonight I made an incredibly simple salmon dish from the book, and it reminds me that I want more of Nigella's cookbooks, no matter how many miles I would need to run to continue to fit in my jeans.

And today I went to the beach in December. It was windy, chilly and overcast, but still beautiful.


Enjoy your holiday preparations, and time with your families.

Unusually single-minded

It took several days and a location shift for the orange sweater to finish drying. I still need to sew on the buttons and get someone to take decent photos of it.

In the meantime, what little knitting time I have has been occupied with the scarf for my mom. The color is called periwinkle, and it shifts from a light blue to a deeper blue to a purple shade. I think the effect is fairly subtle, and it plays nicely with the shine of the silk. I've really been enjoying working with the Sea Silk, and the pattern really only requires memorizing 4 rows. But, since it is a scarf, and it is lace, it's growing slowly. I'm estimating the length to be about 27" right now, and I'm guessing I'm about halfway done. I'll be honest and say that despite enjoying the pattern and yarn, and wanting to get it done to gift to my mom around her birthday, I'm not at all certain I'll make that deadline. It's taken me about a month to get this far, and jumping projects tends to help me continue to enjoy what I'm working on.

Unrelated photo

It's a bit of a blogging tradition that especially if you don't have much to say, you should still post a pretty photo. I haven't been out much lately, so this is a bit of a stretch. We've officially hit my crazy time of the year, and my sporadic updates get even more scattered.

I leave for Washington DC very early Thursday morning. After that, things will slow down very slightly, but I'll be with family for Thansksgiving, which is coming up fast, then it's just a few weeks before Christmas and the new year. It starts to all blur together for me starting around Halloween, frankly.

This year, I'm not doing any holiday knitting. My plans are to get through my meeting, hang out with friends, and to come back and work to generate more data and hopefully be working on a manuscript by the beginning of 2009. Other than that, I'm just hoping to survive the holidays.

This year, I'm not planning on any crazy baking, either. Last year I was so sick of baking that the smell of butter made me ill. It is baking season (I made a loaf of pumpkin bread and some chocolate zucchini bread today) but I'm not going overboard. I'm planning on making a few batches of cookies and cooking lots of soups and roasts for my family. Maybe some more breads, too.

On the knitting front, well, I finished a dishrag this weekend, but that doesn't seem exciting enough to post. The big red blob is ALMOST done, and I'm looking forward to the end of that project. There are some tough memories knit into it, but also, well, it's boring. I'm working on some garter stitch rounds and then binding off, but the stinking thing is huge now, and each round takes me a while. I started a Lace Ribbon scarf out of some really nice yarn, Handmaiden Sea Silk in periwinkle. It may be for my mom. It's my kind of comfort knitting right now. My orange sweater still needs seaming (I need time that I don't have to work on it.) Oddly enough, socks are beginning to sound more appealing again, and I'll take some yarn and needles with me for my flights, but I don't expect to get much done.

Facebook is still sucking up a lot of my time, thanks to word games I play obsessively. But now I really should go read and prepare....