So it snowed here this weekend, for the second time this winter. I am happy about this, as it's been a long time since we had anything resembling an actual winter. This is how it looked when I got up this morning:



The street is clearer than I thought it would be, but is still covered in a thick layer of stuff that will most definitely ice up overnight, so I don't think I'm going to head in to work in the morning, at least not until that melts. Maybe I'll go in for the afternoon. I don't know. My homeowner's association pretty much sucks at snow.

I did do some knitting during the snowdays, mostly working on the Lewd Glove, but I don't have pictures of that. Especially since it now has more fingers, which is less funny. What I do have pictures of are the socks I finished earlier last week.



These are Nautilus socks, but Anna Bell of My Fashionable Life. They're included in her Sock Set, which is pretty hard to find on her website now. It's a good easy pattern, though, involved enough to not be tedious, but braindead enough to be great TV knitting. I did them in Koigu KPM in kind of a steely gray-purple color for the Ravelry Solid Socks group knitalong.

Okay, so this totally wasn't my fault.

I'm making these gloves for Matt, and the index finger came out kind of tight. So, when I moved on to the middle finger, I loosened up my tension a bit to see if it came out any better, which it did. I then ripped out the index finger to reknit it, and... yeah.

Meanwhile, VA is panicking about ZOMG SNOW. Again. I'm prepared to sit around and watch movies for the weekend. I know, it's such a tough life.

Okay, well, good news first: second project of the year? Done.



These are Susie's Reading Mitts done in Malabrigo Silky Merino, which was so nice to work in. I think I need a Silky Merino sweater someday. These were really easy-- I started them when daniidebrabant was visiting, and finished them about a week later, even while I was working on another project. These were supposed to be for my grandmother, who pretty much stole a pair of my fingerless gloves for the entirety of my trip to Massachusetts over the holidays, but the bind-off came out a little bit tighter than I expected, so I'm sending her the ones that she semi-stole instead. I called her to make sure this was all right with her, and she basically was like "the hell is wrong with you? I wouldn't have had any idea if you'd just sent them."

But yeah, you can get the pattern here.

The less good news is that I had been having some really bad insomnia over the last few days. I slept last night, thank god, but the two nights before that I was totaling about 2-3 hours of sleep. Oddly enough, I feel more tired today than I did yesterday.

I think it's just temperature-related, though; I have a lot of trouble getting to sleep if I'm overheated, and it got freakishly warm over the weekend. Last night the temperature was more normal and I slept like the dead. I know this because I apparently slept through Matt catching the cat going to the bathroom in an inappropriate spot and subsequently cleaning our floor with pet stain remover.

Hopefully I'm back on a decent sleep schedule now, though. I really hate the insomnia stuff-- I'm so stubborn that I just lay there trying to will myself to go to sleep, which pretty much never works.

In all my fervor to document the past year, I forgot to share my first finished project of this year! Stupid me.

These socks were started in 2009, but took a backseat in late December so I could finish my vest and the neckwarmer I made for my godmother.



The pattern is called Zopfwanderung, and as you might imagine, it's German. The instructions are translated in the pattern, but the English is kind of tacked at the end of each paragraph, so you occasionally get your eyes crossed trying to read it. But regardless, it's a very good pattern! I kind of turned my cables upside down on sock 2, so mine are fraternal.



They're made of Plucky Knitter Merino Fingering Superwash in the colorway "Berries Galore." I was originally going to use this for a different design that was mostly purled, but it looked too pretty in stockinette for me to do that to it. So I picked this design because it had that cool ribby part by the heel and a nice flat panel in the front-- best of both worlds!

I am going to see Enter the Haggis tonight with evafriedel, which is also good because I need to give her her Christmas present, which I had not mailed yet, being a turd.

Uh, so I kinda went a little overboard with this one...

Samples:



( 21 Icons under here! )

As for my review, I can have up to 21 words, but I'll only use 13: this movie was awesomely cheesy, and Steve Vai is nuts. Check it out.

In 2009, I
... finished 21 projects, absolutely owning my original goal of 12.
... started 24 projects, some of which did not work out, some of which are waiting to be finished.
... made 10 pairs of socks, 4 sweaters, 4 scarf-or-other-neck-related-things, 2 pairs of fingerless gloves, and a panel for an afghan for work.
... made 7 blue things, 4 orange things, 3 green things, 2 purple things, 2 brown things, a yellow thing, a neon pinkish-orange thing, and a white thing.

In 2010, I
... will finish as many of my unfinished projects as I can. To give myself a number to start with, lets go with 5. I have a lot of stuff just sitting around.
... will finish more projects than in 2009! Let's start with at least 25. Someday I'm going to plateau, but I'll keep raising this number until I do.
... not cave into knitting things I don't want to knit. This is a big thing. Most of the time I manage, but sometimes I get suckered in. Now, this doesn't preclude me from knitting for other people-- I in fact have 2 things planned for other people at the moment. What it does mean is that I only knit things for people when I feel like it. This is my hobby, not my job, and I am allowed to be selfish about it.

Okay, I have a 2009 wrap up mostly written up, but I want to take this moment to talk about this:



This is. the best thing. I have ever made. I would wear it every day, forever, if I could. It's, as I've mentioned before, Eunny Jang's Deep-V Argyle Vest, which I have wanted to knit since it was posted in 2006.

Of course, I had to do it the complicated way: I did it in a wool/cotton blend, which is not easily steeked, and I did it at a totally different gauge, so I had to redo math for the entire thing. Weaving in all those ends took me forever, but it was totally worth it.

The yarn is really soft and comfortable after washing, and the cotton content will keep it not unreasonably warm in this climate. And I think I need more vest-like things, as I'm really enjoying layering things this winter.

One Word Per Icon Movie Review: Excellent and undated.



One Word Per Icon Movie Review: Mostly pretty meh.

I'm back at work after my two week vacation, which did not really feel like a two week vacation what with all the traveling and whatnot. But that's okay, because work isn't bad or anything.

We got these memory foam pillows and a memory foam mattress for Christmas, and my cat thinks this is the most awesome thing that has ever happened to her. Three nights of this thing so far, and so far I've ended up with a cat on my pillow twice and one whole day where she barely moved from the bed.

( Lots of pictures, mostly focused on hanging out in Hingham and the knitting I did over the holidays. )

Next entry: Christmas Trees and a Lot of Pictures of Erin's Kitten

1 Word Per Icon Review: The soundtrack burps.

In other news, tomorrow is the annual work party, in which our department and another department get together and fail to mingle in any conceivable way. I have to plan this travesty every other year, and, if it's any indication as to how much I enjoy this process, I had threatened several times to quit before my turn came up again. I didn't, but I kind of blame the economy for that. The intention was still sort of there.

We're headed out to North Carolina to visit a friend this weekend, so my internets will probably be somewhat spotty. However! I now have this whole shiny Blackberry thing, and it does shiny Blackberry things. It has its own AIM screenname-- if you'd like it, just let me know and I'll pass it on. I did not pay for unlimited texts, because most of the people I'd send stuff to (i.e. my mom, brother_buford, daniidebrabant, and thekhameleon) all have Blackberrys anyway, so I could just use the free blackberry messenger thing instead and save $5 a month. So, if you don't have one and need to send me a quick message, the secret AIM name is the way to go.

Also, I will need some people's phone numbers, what with having a phone that is good at holding a charge! So there's also that.

1 Word Per Icon Review: 1 was better.

Re: my poll from the other day-- come on, guys! It's a 4-way tie! That's not helpful at all!

After reading this comic.

Me; You know, I bought you something tangentially related that for Christmas.
brother_buford: What, a huge framed picture of Edward James Olmos to hang over my bed?
Me: Well, isn't that what you've always wanted?
brother_buford: Wow, yeah! How did you know?
Me: Well there was that time we were having sex and you screamed "OLMOS!"* That was my first clue.

*note: did not happen

1 Word Per Icon Review: Huh. Not bad.


So over Thanksgiving I watched G.I. Joe over at thekhameleon's (courtesy of kalren, I think!) It actually took until now to get these three icons together, just because it is apparently nigh impossible to find screencaps of this movie on the interwebs, and I did not personally have a copy. As it was, I was pretty much only to find pictures of the hot women and the ninjas. I found the ninjas less exciting for iconing, because they have no expression.

Thanksgiving was mostly good, with some dreadfully boring mixed in. We went to brother_buford's parents', and they pretty much ate and then fell asleep, so it was a very dull day. However, it was only a day, and the rest of the time was spent having actual fun. So yay!

I have been pretty much obsessed with this vest since it was first put up in 2006. Well, I've finally worked up the will to actually give it a shot!

My fear springs from the fact that this involves steeking, which is the art of spending forever working on something and then taking scissors to it. This has terrified me in concept, particularly since the yarn I purchased for it is a cotton/wool blend, and thus won't "felt" together well enough to maintain a crochet steek (an additional problem there is that I am totally crochet stupid.) There are sewn steeks, where you machine sew along the lines around where you're cutting to stabilize it, but these take a lot of elasticity out of the garment, which is also bad.

A couple weeks ago, when daniidebrabant was visiting, she wanted to go by a yarn store, so we did. While we were waiting for them to wind it, I took a look at Alice Starmore’s Book of Fair Isle Knitting, which described a wound steek technique which involved neither crochet or sewing machines, and was purportedly perfect for blends. So, I started by making the biggest gauge swatch ever, which I then used that technique to cut open. And it worked! It was a little messy, but it definitely worked. So, armed with that plan, I've been working on my dream vest!

This is my progress thus far:



The yarn is Rowan Wool Cotton, which I've used before, and the pattern is linked above. I think I bought the yarn from Yarn Market, but I've had it for quite a while, waiting for me to grow a pair.

It's a whole lot of fun to work on! I just want to keep doing it.

I was going to start this project as a New Years' thing, but since I also have another crafty New Year's goal, I'm going to start this one right now.

I watch a lot of movies. I don't actually have cable, so everything I watch is on Netflix or Hulu or somesuch. In an effort to make myself make more icons, which I've really gotten stale at, I'm going to make 3 icons per movie, accompanied by a 3 word review. This will also help me keep track of what I've watched!

Today's entry is Suspiria



Colorful murderous what?

And on top of that, I finished a Shawlette!



This is the ever-popular Ishbel by Ysolda in Plucky Classics "Tara's Velvet Drapes." I understand why people make so many of these things out of fingering weight yarn-- they're a lot faster than socks!

I really need to make more clothing items in this color-- it really goes with my coloring. You can see a larger version of its full wingspan here.

I had daniidebrabant visiting this weekend, which was exciting times, and should happen more often! There was much subjecting of Danii to neat things, and we watched the first couple episodes of White Collar, which was actually pretty good. When did USA start making good shows? I'm baffled.

I also finished a pair of socks this weekend, which are very harvesty, I think.



These are Acorn Lace Socks from Fiber Trends (whose adorable Hedgehog Kit I have been coveting for years.) I have to say that these have the most give of any socks I've made in a long time, or possibly ever. So, if you have larger calves, these would be really excellent for you, I'd say! It was a pretty easy pattern overall. I had to pay a bit of attention to the chart, but it was more of a reminder than anything, because the stitch pattern made perfect sense visually.

These socks have no idea what color they are. Sometimes they're greenish, sometimes they're gold, sometimes they're brown. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but it is kind of bizarre. Here's a close-up of the pattern:



At least I had a nice weekend, because today is rough, work-wise, and I have class later too.

So, ever since I got my new car, I've developed a rather bizarre imaginary rivalry with owners of the Honda Fit. This is in part because of the terrible experience I had test driving the fit, and partially because of one of my coworkers.

You see, two of my coworkers are dating, and one of them is a guy who's kind of into cars and motorcycles and that sort of thing. When Other Coworker finally decided to get a new car, they both looked around, and she ended up buying a Honda Fit. So, when I was looking for a car, I asked both of them how they liked it, because it was one of the cars I was seriously considering. After the disastrous test drive, I went down to chat with him, and told him that it had, well, kind of sucked. He, uh, didn't take it well. He got really huffy about it, and said he was willing to deal with a bit of bumpiness for "FUN" (which brings me back to that topic-- what the heck is "fun to drive?" I like driving. Doesn't that make it fun enough?), and apparently, he later went to his girlfriend and was like "cherry_chiicake and her husband said they didn't like your car." Other coworker/girlfriend could give a crap less, which is how I heard about this later.

I am honestly willing to entertain the idea that maybe I had a crappy vehicle, and that all Fits aren't bumpy and terrible (because the dealership that I borrowed that from for the test drive was terrible), but I still kind of find myself narrowing my eyes if I pass one on the road. I am incredibly weird.

Oh! For good news, I actually won something from a knit-along this week! I never win things, so I am super excited about this. I have some sort of mystery prize coming to me in the mail!

Happy Halloween!

I have been skimping on the LJ again, lately! But I assure you, I am around.

Matt's car has died (no accident or anything, it was just old), so we are currently sharing a car, which is... a little annoying, because it means generally that whichever one of us doesn't have a car has to lamely scrounge for food, which limits Matt to Denny's and me to overpriced campus food. We've done some looking for a new car, and he seems to like the Hyundai Sonata, which has a locking glovebox and a large trunk.

Also! After my slowfail last month, I'm making up for it this month! Here are the two projects I've finished so far:

First! We have my Paraphernalia Socks! They are by a lovely Finnish lady whose (non-English) blog is here.



I made these in Slackford Studio Stalwart Sock. I link to her blog, and not her shop, because she's moving out from Etsy and in to her own website soon. This was one of those instances where the color chose the pattern. This color (woodgrain) seemed like it would do really well in a relief-esque pattern, where it could look like carved wood. So I picked this knotty cable pattern with that in mind.

Secondly! Just Enough Ruffles by Laura Chau/Cosmicpluto.



I don't know what happened. I haven't wanted to make scarves in years, but suddenly, they're fun again (at least, if there's a fun pattern to it.) But yes, here's another scarf, in a limited edition Dream in Color colorway that I got from The Loopy Ewe. I wanted to try this yarn out to see if I'd like using it in a sweater, and I think I would!

I need a nap.

Ugh, so, I'm going to talk about news/politics, which is odd for me, but it'll be quick, I promise. Just a couple sentences.

Now, I can't say that I'm a huge supporter of the current health care reform stuff, because I think they are pushing it out too quickly without enough time to come up with ideas that really work, and also because I have no faith in my government to not screw something like this up big time. But then I read stuff like this, and I just wonder if any time is soon enough. Everyone fails, guys. Everyone fails.