Allergic. April 30, 2007

To everything.  EXCEPT Mold, Oak Trees, Pine Trees and Dogs.  I HATE allergy season, which is all the time except when it is snowing.  Spring is the worst though.  Apparently not only am I allergic, I have asthma because of the allergies.  And I am clueless about the asthma thing.  I think I am doing well when I can lay down at night and not hear my lungs pop.  Seriously, like bubble wrap.  I can just lay there and hear them.  I am told this is called wheezing.  It neither feels nor sounds like any kind of wheezing I ever heard of. 

See the thing is apparently what I have is severe, even life threatening allergies.  And I want to be in denial.  I so want to just not acknowledge this.  I want to have a normal spring where I go out in my yard and do yard stuff and have a beautiful yard.  But simply going through the outdoors from my car to my house can set me off so badly I just want a nap.  I feel like an old lady who can not catch her breath.

Anyway, I have a new drug regiment, pop one of these, take two puffs of that, stick this up your nose…. and I hate it all.  I don’t want to do any of it.  Because I don’t think it helps.  At all.  Maybe I just have to understand that I cannot expect to exhibit NO symptoms…. that there will always be symptoms….. sigh.  Always. Be. Symptoms. 

So I am taking all my different medicines.  Trying to convince my family life is better in the house with no windows open.  Trying not to yell at my kids for going in and out too much….when really that is exactly what they should be doing.  Trying to pretend that I am OK with outdoors, but I am not.  I am terrified.  Terrified of the stupid allergic reactions.  Tired of looking OK on the outside and feeling my lungs just burn on the inside.  Tired of the stupid medicine. Tired of trying to convince everyone at work I am not sick.  I only have allergies… they still spray my desk with Lysol when I leave every day.  By the way Lysol sucks I can’t stand the smell and it makes my hands burn, all of which I have stated aloud, and yet they do it anyway 😦

For the record, I finally will be starting allergy shots.  I am told 15% are non responders.  Please hope, pray or whatever you do that I am not a non-responder.  I need this to work.  My other option is to move to where there are less "things I am allergic to" which I am guessing is the damn moon.  As far as I can tell I am not qualified to live in outer space.  Although if the stalker lady astronaut in the diapers went, I suppose I could actually be pretty darn close to qualified.  At no time in my life have I considered wearing diapers and traveling cross country for any purpose that has to do with a love triangle.

OK, that’s enough whining for the day.  In other news, I have cast of for a new pair of socks in a lovely Trekking XXL in a beautiful blue turquoise and misc. hue colorway that I just plain love.  But I am using itty bitty size one needles. So I think these will take TWO months.  I also cast on and made progress on a beautiful Internet hat pattern.  I promise more info on the hat when I forgive it for making me spend more time ripping than knitting because I can’t frigging count and watch a movie at the same time.  Oh and Lady in the Water…. what the hell is the matter with everyone who hated this movie?  I loved it…… A LOT.  Granted the ads sure didn’t convey the real feeling of this movie, but still do not write off a beautiful fairy tale in a strange modern setting.  I love fairy tales, and this one was wonderful.

Plain Rust Socks….. April 26, 2007

I have sock pictures!!! These are my second pair of socks, and the first knitted with actual sock yarn!!!  Oh and really no pattern, just generic sock recipe knitted from the top down.  (I totally suck at grafting by the way……)

I found the sock yarn that practically everyone in the internet world hates though….I just don’t get it, I think its kind of nice….I used Brown Sheep Wildfoote sock yarn.  It may be a touch splitty, but so far every thing I have knit with has been a touch splitty…..I am sure it isn’t the softest (my ultra alpaca socks are SOOOFFFFTTTT, but will probably will have a limited life)  but it feels darn nice on my feet.  And I have heard it blooms nicely once washed….and these are not yet washed 🙂 BUT I am wearing them anyway!!!!

Anyhoo, I started these on April 5th, at the Tattered Cover when the Yarn Harlot was in town.  SO these are kind of like souvenir socks.  Noticeable here is that it took me practically an entire month to finish ONE pair of socks.  ONE PAIR people.  I kind of thought Socktober stuff would be fun now that I am officially knitting socks, but realize that at my pace the best I can hope for is a pair and a half! If I add a design I am totally lost people, that will put me down to a pair!!!!

What worries me even more is that in the amount of time it took me to figure out I could knit socks, I amassed 7 months worth of sock yarn at my current pair a month rate.  7 MONTHS……… I have trekking, and trampoline, and lion sock (it was a BUCK A SKEIN PEOPLE!!!!!) and well something else I can’t remember the name of, and even now I know I am forgetting something I bought and stashed somewhere…. I think the next pair will be plain again, only in self patterning yarn, so they should at least LOOK prettier.  But after that I am totally switching it up!!!! Gonna make me some FANCY socks… and shave my legs for the pictures 🙂

Ogg sloooowww knitter….ogg knit socks… over and over and OVER April 23, 2007

So once one has accomplished something once…. it should be simple to accomplish it again. This is not true for me.  I have a mental block.  The scariest thing about making socks for me was that in the end I had to make not just one, but two socks.  And HOW on EARTH could I make two things that came out just alike??? Sweaters?  Two sleeves!! What makes me think they will be alike?? 

Anyhoo, the thing is I am STILL working on the same pair of socks.  Still.  What might be the problem?? Um… that would be the unknitting.  "Tinking" is the nice name knitters give it, or even "frogging" I call it lots of things even I won’t type out.  I dropped a stitch while turning the heel,  TURNING THE HEEL PEOPLE….. Which in some cases means the crochet hook trick in my case means rip the sucker back!!  Then I picked up stitches like 80 times before I was happy with them.  But this is taking FOREVER.  Sometimes I love it, other times I want to throw it. 

So just for proof that I am indeed on the second sock I have pictures. 

Things to note: 

1. The hijacker is here.  I have given up trying to get pictures of FO’s without him in the picture unless I am at work.  Therefore we do our best to actually get a decent photo of him rather than the blur you get while trying to get a decent picture of just the FO.

2. The disaster I call the living room.  Do try to overlook the clutter, this is after all a living room.  It is practically in the same room as the kitchen, and we really do live here. 

3. Hairy legs.  ’nuff said.

4. Loopy stitches that have been picked up over 500 times.

5. Indeed, one sock is done, and the other has a heel.  After photos I finally got my stitches picked up happily and was able to move on with my sock.  Expect further drama as we get to the toe.  I shamelessly modified sock #1 to fit my square toes, and did NOT write down a single thing I did. Meaning it will be extra fun to duplicate it. 

 

Baby Showers….. April 13, 2007

OK, so the sweater and booties go to their new home tomorrow.  And I am nervous.  What the hell am I thinking gifting someone with my first bit of real garment knitting?? Will this be the first time ever someone pulls a baby gift out of a box and says Awww, a sweater shaped dishcloth!!!! I am second guessing, maybe I should have made the quilt?  But I love the quilt too much (I haven’t even made it, I have only embroidered one panel, and yet I can’t even give it up in my mind) But I KNOW they wouldn’t have liked the quilt, it is my style, not theirs……

Then there is the whole thing about posting on a blog I finished something a whole WEEK before the shower…I think they revoke knitting credentials for things like this, frantic deadlines make knitters more productive, right?  BUT this was a first, I had to leave room for a crazy back up plan if it turned out I really couldn’t knit and I was full of hooey….

If there is anything I know about myself it is that I have too much self doubt for my own good.  I have seen people turn out all sorts of crafts that are just crap, and they act like they are gold…. but the thing is, I have my mother to compare myself too.  Next to her, my stuff is merely "good" Mother is the holy grail of crafters.  I often wonder that she isn’t a famous name in the industry.  She has practically impeccable taste. On the other hand my stuff is normally good… (I have taste issues, and jump off a cliff and do something MY way issues that mean spectacular failure sometimes) I definitely do not gift crap,  it is not in my nature to gift "crap"…..so why I worry so much is beyond me.  Yet worry I do. 

Anyhoo…keep your fingers crossed for me.  All I want to hear is How cute!!! so I can go home, and never know…….

Random Stuff. April 11, 2007

Yesterday was swamped.  I was so busy at work it felt like I was stealing time to visit the bathroom.  By the end of the day I was essentially brain dead.  And I still had to drive home.  Actually I had to drive to my sisters house, which is good, because I had to actually pay attention to where I was going.  I do this thing sometimes where I get on autopilot.  A bad case of autopilot can take me to work on a Sunday, or on a really bad weekday to somewhere I worked 5 or 10 years ago.  I wish I could explain this, but I just get in the car and go where I need to go. Only I don’t really pay enough attention to realize what I am doing.  If I ever have memory issues, I am toast.  Absolute toast.  Pray for my kids eh?

 I am still knitting the socks I started at the Yarn Harlot party.  I am still on sock one of the pair, although I am past the heel, and that in itself gives me considerable relief.  It is fitting well, and looking very nicely plain sock like.  Just like an obedient plain sock should look. Only I must have some kind of mental issue, because it is also beginning to look like a canvas for some extraordinarily inappropriate duplicate stitching.  Stitchers should not turn to knitting for relief for this very reason.  I will do my best to own a perfectly beautiful pair of plain rust colored socks.  

Life with boy has become distressingly stubborn.  I know there is absolutely no set age where a perfectly adorable child whom you adore turns into a little monster (that you still adore) but boy is at that age.  If you want to do something, ANYTHING, he does NOT want to do that thing.  He wants something until he has it.  He rats out his sister for giving him "mean looks" and thinks it is funny when she gets yelled at for anything.  (He used to sympathy cry, even when she got in trouble for being mean to HIM!) Things they are a changing at the ole mintlatte home front, and I am a touch disturbed.  I am hoping said changes will be short lived, and the summer outdoor livin’ neighborhood tribe of children will carry on as happily as always, but should my son remain in beastly form, he will likely continue to be left inside with us, while the rest of the tribal community forages garage freezers for flavor-ice pops.  I really think our house will not be a happy one if he is ousted from the tribe.  I am thinking the next weekend with warm weather I will have extra sweets on hand to entice the tribe to take him along.  Maybe tribal exposure will get him over the attitude.

And that wraps up today’s bout of random thoughts and blenting, tune in another time for hopefully crafty related content.  

Lose this Weight Swap…. April 9, 2007

Hey I received 🙂

This poor box decided to take a fairly long detour in getting to me… thanks to a wickedly strange mailman…. who delivered it to a neighbor, who was on vacation, but whose mother picked it up, only to be retrieved by said neighbor and delivered late into the night Easter Sunday.  First time I have ever received US mail on a Sunday, let alone EASTER Sunday 🙂

Anyhoo, I tend to get very lucky with my swaps, and this time was no exception.  I received a fantastic storage pouch with a psychedelic tummy…, a very adorable journal (I notice the journal has its eyes on my lunch….. this worries me…..), and one unmistakably clever altered pedometer……

Thanks Fizzle!!

The day the Harlot came to Denver…. April 7, 2007

I do not normally go to events.  But when I heard that the Yarn Harlot (www.yarnharlot.com) was coming… I just knew this was different I had to go.  I started reading the Yarn Harlot blog just about this time last year.  Soon, I had devoured it, archives and all. The strange thing about it all, is that at that time I didn’t even knit.  I just knew she was talking to me though, my love of fabrics threads, anything creative, I have a room in my house dedicated to my crafts, and I often find that people find this "excessive" to say the least.  Stephanie Pearl-McPhee became my enabler.  It wasn’t long before I started surfing other knitting sites.  I found other knit bloggers I liked to read (Stephanie is still the queen) Then I picked up the sticks.   I had a brief love affair with a couple of novelty yarn scarves, but it ended all too quickly.  I did not (I believed) have the skills to do this.  This was not what I wanted to make.  I began a hollow existence of surfing web sites and wishing I could do that.  I even talked my mother into making things I wanted.  I swapped all sorts of crafts on line for knitted things…..

That ended this year.  This year I really learned to knit.  Clearly I am in baby step land, but I am here. I even have a favorite LYS.  I even have a tiny, but respectable stash of REAL yarn (not all acrylic 🙂

So you can see that I had to go.  I was obsessive.  I took the entire day off of work.  I showed up at the Tattered Cover downtown,  at 2:30 in the afternoon, tickets were to be given out at 6:30 and Stephanie Pearl Mcphee was to arrive at 7:30.  I was so nervous about going to meet a bunch of strangers that I almost tossed my cookies on the lightrail. But I didn’t and I went anyway.  Once I got in "the line" I relaxed. A lot.  There was a lady in line who had been there since 7:30 in the morning.  I was nervous about her, but I recognized what she was knitting as entrelac socks.  SO I decided to like her anyway.  Next in line was a young lady who was knitting the most amazing sweater with a swirly pattern on it.  The type of things I want to make.  Next was a couple from Alaska, they happened to be in town to visit family, the cool thing was, they were both knitters!! He was knitting something yellow on circular needles, and she provided fixing services for him.  As I nervously cast on one of the few socks I had made, I asked if she offered that service to others…and I tell you what if I had had a problem, I know she would have fixed it for me.  Next in line was a girl (and soon to be a group) from a local Stitch n’ Bitch…http://www.poshayarnboutique.com/ Oddly enough I could tell you in detail about every project these women were making, but I don’t remember their names.  Right in front of me was a mother daughter pair.  I can’t even tell you how cool they were….

See the thing is I could go on and on about all these people.  We didn’t even know each other and I had a great time…I petted silk/merino roving and briefly pondered the possibilities of spinning, I saw cool socks made of the very sock yarn I was using to make plain socks…( I hope the yarn isn’t offended by that) I petted soy hats…and admired so many socks, I can’t even explain it!!

Finally after an impromptu pizza party that probably still has the folks at the Tattered Cover shaking their heads…. we got down to the business of congregating in the room.  After an hour or so of socializing with new people, I caught a glimpse of something unmistakable….the Bohus.  Our celebrity was in.  She was all they say she is and more.  For me this was pretty simple.    I heard all she said and could quote some of it, but the real message for me was that  Knitting makes me a better person, and that it is OK to share that with others. 

I have bad cell phone pictures, and great memories.  ( I petted the Bohus…… the cell picture makes it look like I took a picture of an incredible bright light…it was like that in person too.)

Front of the line……

Other way in line….

The room….

The Bohus ( see it glow???)

  The traveling sock.

OOh…look a baby sweater! April 4, 2007

Ok, I am really to smug to say much today.  Anything I say will sound smug.  I typically love being obnoxious, but figure I will actually overdo it if I talk about this too much…

So… here is the finished baby set 🙂

Booties !!!! April 2, 2007

I would like to offer quotes from those around me regarding my knitting frenzy of late.  All I know is that for some reason knitting makes my family say the most patently absurd things ever. 

Try this from the DD – Are you sure you are knitting, that is making it smaller? (said while I am tinking stitches to figure out how on earth I added one) She survived the comment, but things may have been icy for an hour or so afterwards.

 It also turns out no one can wait till the end of this row…not even a little row.  That they all find it amusing when I try to count.  In fact it is even better if they throw out random numbers while I am counting.   That having knitting stuff anywhere where they can be seen with it by someone NOT an immediate family member is high torture.  Sigh.  Clearly you see what I am fighting here.  I think the hardest thing is that I do so many other crafts they are all slightly agog that I would even think about taking on another one.  What they do not get is that this is the one I have coveted.  I have always wanted to do this.  I just couldn’t.  Until now.  Now I am admiring the work that I do, and I see so much potential here….  

Anyhow….Look, see here… First booties (I am pretty sure I will eventually get over the first thing) and these are just so clever.  They make me want to practice seaming 🙂 AND they go with an adorable sweater of shich there will be pictures as soon as it is dry.   These are from knit simple and would not exist if there werent a beautiful picture by picture tutorial in there…..