Knitting Musclemom

Cardigan progress

The Refined Aran jacket is progressing nicely. I finished the back and started on the first sleeve:

The back went quickly, even when I had to frog about 20 rows because I wasn't happy about the way I had added a new ball half-way through the row. I should know better; but I have a tendency, when the mistake happens, to convince myself that it really doesn't matter. Then, once I have progressed through another couple of hours of knitting, I realize I can't live with it. And I will hate it, and it will haunt me forever, every time I look at the sweater, and every single time I wear it. So I frogged back to that row and then did what I should have done all along, join a new ball at the beginning of the row... duh.

It took me 3 balls for the back, so I estimate the whole cardigan should take about 10 balls. I have started the first sleeve, because I hate doing two sleeves in a row, and it breaks the monotony that way.

Today, the mail carrier (post person?) brought me some yummy yarn and lovely stitch markers. The yarn is from Fearless Fibers -- this is Superwash Merino Wool sock yarn in the Marrakesh colourway:

and this is the same, in the Coral pink colourway:

Yardage is 550 yards, isn't that awesome? and for $18.00 a skein, it's a real bargain. I am waiting for Deb for dye some new cashmere, and then I will splurge in the near future on some cashmere lace yarn.

And here are some cute stitch markers from Good to be girl:

There is an owl and a mushroom in one, and two wreaths and two Christmas puddings in the other. I love her stitch markers; unfortunately, they are hard to get, because she doesn't put them up for sale very often, and they sell quickly. I was lucky -- she had just done an update in her shop when I happened to check what she had in stock.

The Hyacinth shawl has progressed a bit, but not enough that it looks like I have done much. I am still on the main chart (Repeat 7 of 9) and working on 159 stitch rows:

That's my knitting during quiet times, when I am not interrupted and there is no TV blaring in the background. I am knitting it in the same yarn and the same colour as the one used for the pattern, Dream in Colour Smooshy, Ruby River colourway:

That's it for now. All my Christmas shopping is done and I shall stay away from stores until the New Year; I admire people who can actually shop at this time of the year, I find it positively exhausting. Knitting is way less stressful!

Winter in Toronto

Aaaahhh... our first snow storm of the season. This was the beginning of it -- look at the car in the background:

This was the same car a few hours later:

And a bit later still:

And this is the way it looks this morning:

Why am I so fascinated by this car, might you ask? Because it's my son's car, who was "too tired" yesterday to help us shovel the crapload of snow we had to shovel yesterday for several hours. Do you know how much help he will get from us to get his car out of this mess? As much help as we got yesterday from him. I wish him lots of luck...

Moka was a bit horrified by all the white stuff, but she did spend a few minutes outside with us. She didn't even need a leash, as she couldn't exactly run away, since the snow was higher than she is:

She did try to help by peeing on the snow to make it melt:

And look at that puzzled expression on her face:

Today, there is a pale sun shining; I do hope it will help melt a bit of the snow on top of the solarium:

A good day for knitting, an area where I am slowly but surely developing ADD. I have so many projects I have just started, and I can't stop casting new ones. I have the Jane Slicer-Smith jacket on the needles, I cast on the Hyacinth shawl, and two days ago, I cast on the Refined Aran Jacket, from Interweave Knits Winter 2007, with some Filatura Zara yarn I had in my stash. Here is the pattern:

Of course, I don't have enough yarn to knit the whole sweater, so now I have to find 3 more balls of Zara in colour 1466. Today, the traffic is too iffy to go to Romni Wools, but I will try to make the trek tomorrow. I know, I am an idiot to start a project without knowing whether I will be able to get enough yarn for it (I had enough yarn in the same yarn in white, but no, that would have been too easy).

I have already finished counting my sock yarn stash. I won't post numbers here, because I am sure to be told off by people who think (rightly so) that I ought to spend my money on more worthy causes. But it makes me happy to see all this yarn. This inventory counting has also prompted me to stop buying sock yarn (at least for a while), as I have established that I have enough to knit socks continuously for the next 10 years. I think I need an intervention... Here are photos of a part only of my stash:

I'll send a skein of Socks That Rock to the person who can guess within 15 skeins of the total. If you look at the storage bins on the photos, there are three of these stacked with sock yarn, plus two more smaller ones -- about a third the size of the clear ones. So, to the two or three readers of my blog out there, here's your chance to get a skein of STR!

Socks and Madrona

I am looking out the window and watching ugly freezing rain falling outside. The dog is refusing to go out for a walk; most days, she is reluctant to dirty her little paws in sleet and snow, but today, she won't even consider going out the front door, never mind walking down the street. I share her feelings; it is grey and sad out there. Winter has started early here in Toronto and it looks like it is going to be a cold and long one. I am definitely spending more time at home. Not much Christmas knitting this year; I am finishing today a multi-directional scarf for my sister, whose birthday is on Saturday. She leaves with her family for France on the 19th, so they are all gone for Christmas. My brother lives in Ottawa and we send money to his two teenage boys; they don't want anything else. My parents are not alive anymore and my husband lost his mother in June. As we get older, the generation that precedes us disappears and we become them. Although I don't feel like my mother!

On a cheerier note, I finished a pair of socks I was test-knitting for Sock-a-holic Katie:

They are knit with J. Knits Superwash Me - Sock, in the Rancho Mirage colourway, a nearly solid colour. The yarn came from The Loopy Ewe. It was a pleasure to knit with this yarn and the lack of distracting colours let the pattern show up nicely. Katie's pattern was a quick knit, enjoyable, easy to memorize without getting boring. I knit them in one week, which is a record for me; it usually takes me 10 days to knit a pair. And I didn't have this feeling of dread as I cast on for the second sock (no! I have to do this all over again -- please kill me now, I don't wanna knit another one). Actually, the second one was knit even faster than the first one.

I have been counting my sock yarn stash, in a bet I have with Cindy that I have more sock yarn than she has. We have to provide our respective stash numbers by December 20th; needless to say, I fully expect to win. The winner has to buy dinner during our Madrona stay, February 14th to 17th, 2008. And yes, I am going to Madrona in February. Registering for it was worse than getting tickets for a rock concert. The registration frenzy was such that we crashed the server within a few minutes. It took them several hours to get the site working again, and shortly after that, the Madrona retreat was full. I was lucky enough to get on early and register for all the classes I wanted. I am taking classes with Lucy Neatby, Evelyn Clark, Jean Wong, and Nancy Bush. I am so excited! And Cindy is coming too! And I've never been to Seattle, actually never been to the West Coast, other than once in San Francisco years ago; and that was for work, which meant I was there for 5 days, and didn't see much of the city, other that an office and my hotel room.

What else am I working on? I have started a Jane Slicer-Smith pattern, the Coco Dune, Merino & Pandora Jacket (JSS#56):

It's in the same style as the other JSS jacket from Knitter's that I made some months ago. I enjoyed the knit so much I wanted to make another one, but with totally different yarns. And it's straighter than the other one, which was a swing jacket.

I also knitted, along with 50% of knitters worldwide, a Koolhaas hat, as designed by Jared Flood, from the Holiday Gifts edition of Interweave. Here it is, knitted up in Dream in color Classy, Chinatown colourway:

And yes, the hat is for me, not my husband. But he was playing a computer game and in no mood to take a photo, so I stuck it on him instead and took the photo. It came out really nicely and it was a quick knit.

I also finished the Fit to Be Tied Jacket:

I am itching to start another pair of socks and this shawl -- I have the yarn, I have the pattern, I need the time! 

Which reminds me it is time to go and count more sock yarn stash. I have been putting some of it on Ravelry (where my ID is Musclemom), but it is a slow process...