SockTart

I think I mentioned that this is the 4th or 5th time I’ve cast on using this yarn, right?  The picture over there?  Is after 4 gusset increases.  I stopped in the right place, started my increases in the right place…and the sock is too damned long.

What’s a girl to do?  Pick up stitches farther back and begin the rip.  Pisses me off…this means losing at least 4 inches of work.  Per sock.  Kerfuckedy!

Stoopid Regia Sock :(  Better be worth it when they’re done, damnit!

(as an aside, I had myself some slow-cooked porridge for breakfast.  OMG…that stuff sticks right with you!  It’s been about 2 or 3 hours, and I’m holding in really well.  This GI thing might actually work!)

No, no…your eyes do not decieve you. That is green grass. No, we didn’t have a glorious meltdown and quick growing season. This is an old photo. Why? Well, because I’m playing around with a plugin, of course! It allows me to handle my images a little easier.

So, y’know, I can bring you such quality pictures like the one over there. Because there’s just not enough bags of yarn in the world.

Well, looks like I’m getting better.  I’m mainly reduced to a scratchy throat & a cough.  Slurpees and ice-cream seem to help.  We’re having some soup for an early dinner, so that should help too.

I’ve been re-reading my book all about the GI Diet (that’s GI as in Glycemic Index, not GI Joe).  We’re thinking about giving it a try.  Robin’s Mum and my Sis-in-Law have both had good results with it, so it’s worth a shot.  The main goal?  Try to eat sensibly, and stick with it.  I know that Atkins works for me, but it’s so hard to fall off the wagon.  That’s not idle complaining, either….we really do enjoy eating lower-carbohydrate, and have done so for the majority of the past year.  It’s just that once in a while, you have to give yourself leeway for sushi.

So we’ll see how it goes.  I’m actually kinda glad to be exploring a slightly wider palate.

Somehow I picked up a little bug.  Sore throat, bit of a cough, etc.  Hit me last night at T’s Whiskey Night.   Robin has gone to the Sev to get me a Slurpee and some ice-cream for my throat, so hopefully I’ll be back up to snuff soonish.  It’s either that or OD on the Bennelyn (sp?) and/or Buckleys (shudder).

Potential Kara raid today!  Hopefully we’ll have more in the way of what we need in regards to character classes so that we can do more than just one boss.  Squee!

Knitting with the Dreaded Regia Cotton again.  This is something like the fourth time I’ve tried to use this particular ball of yarn.  Here’s hoping that it’s the last time, hey?  2 Jaywalkers at once, magic looped, toe-up with heel flap.  I’m almost convinced that this yarn is cursed.  At least it’s something to do while Robin plays around with Mass Effect.  The boys at work were right…game is addictive.  I’m enjoying watching the story unfold as I knit away.

Okay, well I got those finished fast.  The last post (from today, no less) mentioned I was working on these.  I managed to finish them off in the past half hour.

I like them just fine.  The colourway is Black Purl from Lorna’s Laces.  I overthought what I was going to do with this one, and wound up just casting on a pattern called “Carolina, Last Queen of Naples”.  I thought there would be more of a chevron (zig-zag) effect, but I guess I was wrong.  I suppose it depends on how tightly you knit, and probably your gauge.

Still have quite a bit left over.  One skein finished 1.65 socks.  I may be able to make another small pair of socks with the leftovers.  Whatever….they feel comfy, and that’s the main thing

Robin got a new pair of socks for Yule. Actually, Robin, his Mum and my Mum all got socks for Yule. Robin’s socks were knit sorta on the sly (I didn’t talk much about ‘em and he didn’t ask), and were a pattern I made up myself. I’m kinda hoping to find some way of translating it to a pdf pattern in case I get a wild hair to post it. The pattern name is “Medivh” for the legendary mage of Warcraft Lore. It’s just as twisted as him.

As for X-mas…we had a lazy X-mas eve as Robin was trying to nap for most of the afternoon in hopes of going to bed at the same time as me. Working graves makes it difficult to flip his schedule on special holidays. I think we watched Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on DVD. X-mas day was spent with the two families. Robin’s folks in the morning and mine in the evening. Lots of yarn-related goodness ensued. Robin’s Mum got me about 3 or 4 skeins of sock yarn (whee!!!) and my Mum found a couple of sock knitting books that I was wanting to pick up.

Looks like I may have another pair of socks off the needles fairly soon anyhow. I had been about 60% of the way through a pair of Carolina, Last Queen of Naples from Monkey Toes (looks like the site owner is going through a few end-of-year growing pains). Over the past couple of days, I’ve gotten the leg and heel of sock #2 done. Just working my way down to the toe now. Squee! So many new things to play with. We’ll see what I work on next.

Hope everyone else is having as happy a holiday season as I am!

You never know just how addicted you are to a routine until it’s gone.  Seriously.  I forgot my knitting at home one day this week, and it just about drove me nuts.  All of a sudden, I had a lunch hour with (gasp!) no knitting.  I tried to find ways to get to the Michael’s down the street, just so I could pick up just ONE ball of yarn and set of needles.

Instead, I plugged in my iPod (which I usually listen to while knitting at lunch) and found a few unfinished crosswords.  Sad.  Very sad.  Remind me never to forget my knitting at home again, ‘kay?

I’m now on “vacation”, so will be home for the next couple of weeks.  This means that I can play housewife over the Yule season.  I think I’ll be spending the bulk of the next couple of days on knitting.  Plans for this evening include cleaning the living room, putting up the tree, and likely decorating it.  Yay!

X-mas shopping is pretty much done.  It’s done for family members, at least.  This makes me a very happy lady.

Mmmkay. My Secret Pal sent me this package, stuffed to the gills, AGES ago. I’m very very lazy, it seems, when it comes to actually photographing things.

Actually, part of the effort is getting “the right lighting”. I generally do most of my knitting, and hence, most of my knitting photography, in the basement…where the lights are a couple of yellowy pot-lights. For the photo in this post, however, I wound up taking the contents of the Big Envelope of Doom into one of our spare rooms that had a little bit of remaining daylight, a lot of yellowy overhead light, and touch of camera flash. It seems to have worked well.

I’m going to extend a public apology to Melina, my secret pal. She revealed herself to me on November 22nd, and I’ve been a lazy arse about posting. Gah.

At any rate…the STUFF!!! (I squee’ed when I opened the package. Honestly).

1. Cookie A. pattern for Gothic Spire socks. OMG! I have NO idea which yarn I will use to knit these, but…g’damn! I love me some good lacework

2. Tarot Cards! I can’t read ‘em worth beans, but I LOVE to collect them for the imagery. I dream of someday framing some of my favourites. I have a feeling that this deck will somehow figure in this scheme. Joy!

3. Stitch Markers! Not just stitch markers…HALLOWE’EN stitch markers! The nice thing about being a person who does/did chain mail jewelery? I can remove some of the jump rings and replace them with claps so that I can use a few to clip onto actual stitches. I’m funny that way

4. I am all about the sock yarn, yo. Melina spoiled me rotten here….some gorgeous Tofutsies (in purples and fuschias and black), and a skein of Scout’s Swag (!!!!!) in Superwash Merino. The colourway is called “Secret”, and OMG…I think that Scout, Koigu, and a couple of other places use the same blanks. I am going to LOVE this. I finished working with my Koigu not too long back, and have been pining for more. THIS will more than compensate.

There’s also a nice little note from Melina, who seems to share my love of kitsch when it comes to stationery. This little note now sits on my desk so that I can look at it often. Awwww

So yes….I got spoileded really good. THANK YOU Melina! I can’t wait until I can really dig into these goodies

The weekend went by fast, but felt somewhat long.  Robin got maybe an hour’s sleep on Friday before we headed out to get haircuts, then tried to nap when we got home (didn’t work).  Had to call a friend for a lift to the Hyatt Regency for the company Xmas party because my company decided to hold “Cocktail Hour” and the “X-mas presentation” at rush hour.  What’s up with THAT?  We couldn’t get a cab.  Thank goodness for Jamie!

Dinner was nice, and spent a little time mingling.  Wound up going home early, as Robin looked like he was about to pass out. Staying awake for about 36 hours (more or less) will do that to a guy.

Yesterday morning, it was up & at ‘em early (remember, I said we had an early night), and a trip to one of The Malls for X-mas shopping.  There is only one family member without a X-mas present at this time.  We rock.  Over the next month, all we need to do is get this one family member taken care of & shop for each other.  If we see things that remind us of our friends?  Bonus.

It was a long day, though.  We were at the mall from about 10am til 4:30 PM.  Robin had to get me a new pair of Airwalks just so that I didn’t kill my feet and/or back.  I definitely do NOT recommend marathon X-mas shopping to the weak.

Tyler caught up with us by the end of our shopping spree & we headed out for a nice dinner at Tony Roma’s.  Not exactly the world’s most orgasmic food, but seemed OK to me.  Even if the waitress did insist on sticking the three folks without a kid right between two tables with multiple crying babies.  If the Food Services Industry was being paid off by Planned Parenthood on the sly, this would make some sort of wacky sense.

Went home, put up the feet, stuck an episode of Dexter on the tube & watched that while knitting on my shawl.  Still only on clue #2, even though the last clue was unveiled yesterday.  D’oh!  Early to bed, and early to rise, and here we are today.

All in all, a nice weekend, if busy.  Hopefully next weekend will be more relaxed

‘kay. So the Jaywalkers were cast off around noon this afternoon. While watching the last episode of Dexter, Season 1.

We got addicted to the show a few days ago. Watched a couple of episodes on OnDemand, then found out that they only had the first four episodes of season one, and the first couple of episodes of season two. Sooo…we went on a quest to find Dexter, Season One on DVD.

After a full morning of searching, we finally found it at our local Blockbuster…usually the place we’d check first, but we’d thought maybe Wally World would have it. Riiiight. Not. But it is now ours, and we’re now happily finished watching it. And the socks are finished with the toes grafted & everything.

Makes me a really happy camper. This means that my Fawkes socks may be finished soon. Because I need to cart around the pattern with me, it doesn’t make for a really good travelling sock, so it will be my “knit in the evening at home” sock. I have a pair of charades on the needles that will serve the purpose just fine.

So yes…progress! Pictures of the much-maligned Brimstone Jaywalkers will be forthcoming