From yarn to FO in less than 15 hours!

I have this yarn that I got in a swap from ADAllen on the Knitting Help forums...

...and I've been working on the Embossed Leaves socks and the Tangled Yoke Cardigan. I needed something quick and easy - preferably something that didn't involve rectangles, garter stitch, or any other boredom-inducer. So I was looking through Ravelry, and I found this. Less than 100 yards required? Check. Interesting pattern? Check. Slightly funky shape? Check. Big needles? Check (UK size 2 - which I happen to have picked up at the last Guild swap meet!). I cast on last night around 11 PM and worked two wedges. I picked it up again this morning, and here's the result!


Usually, hats make me look like an egghead, but I'm definitely liking this one!

And here's how much yarn was left over. There isn't much, but I've been mulling over a mitten pattern with detachable cuffs. We'll see.

I'm a bad blogger.

Wow, it's been three weeks since I posted. Bad me. Various and sundry things have been happening - weird viruses, another big test, family events...okay, maybe it's just apathy.

Blogstalker updates first:
1. What's for breakfast? Pumpkin bread, this morning! I love anything involving pumpkin. Pumpkin soup with curry and carrots, pumpkin pie, pumpkin dip for gingersnaps...you name it. The way I figure it, pumpkin is loaded down with beta-carotene (which your body processes into vitamin A) and fiber, so it makes everything healthy, right?

2. Junk drawer! I cheated a bit and used my bathroom junk drawer, as it's (marginally) more interesting than my main junk drawer. Of course, my junk is mostly just spread out over my room.

We've got Badger Balm (lavender orange - yum!), a couple of headbands, deodorant, my broken glasses (the bobby pins are sticking to a magnet that used to hold on clip-on sunglasses), contact cases, nail polish that I wear once in a blue moon, allergy/cold meds, hair goop, hairbrush, dental floss, a little jam jar that holds my hair pins and clips, and...a bunch of junk. Yeah.

I have been doing some knitting! Remember the bag of dishcloth cotton scraps I got at a thrift store?

Basically, I just started doing a log-cabinesque dishcloth with a mitered square (or in my case, mitered blob) thrown in for fun. I call it the Frankencloth. It's kitschy and ugly and so much fun!

At the November Knit-In (yes, I'm still calling it the Knit-In!), I broke down and got some of this.

I do have a good reason, though. Friday is Oklahoma's centennial! And while pink is one of the last colors I'd pick for Oklahoma (I'd go with purple for redbuds, brick for the red dirt, or that greenish-orange the sky turns just before the tornado sirens go off), it's still named after my state!

I'm late, I know!

Okay, so I missed last week's blogstalker post. I had a big Biochemistry test on Monday, so that's been sucking up my life lately.

Here's week 5: An Interesting Statue.

When my dad was in medical school, he had a rotation where he had to stay at the hospital and work at all hours of the day and night. After a long shift, exhausted and disheartened, he was walking past the hospital gift shop when he saw a small figurine of a red-haired blue-eyed angel holding a lamb. He bought the figurine to put at his desk, a reminder of God's love and care for him.

Two years later, he had a baby girl with red hair and blue eyes - me! I was born at 1:12 PM, the exact time (plus three years, five months, and twenty-eight days) that my dad said "I do" to my mom on their wedding day.

And here's "A day in the life," for week six. I chose Saturday.

I woke up and looked out my window. The sun's up; time to rise and shine! (or in my case, rise and...five more minutes?)

I stumbled down the stairs...

...to make Cherry Cream Scones for brunch with the girls from Bible study!

After Bible study, it was time to do some work around the house.

Watering the flower patch while the wind is clocking over 30 mph is a good way to get your jeans soaked, by the way.

As you can see, Tucker was just a huge ball of energy this weekend.

Caddie is watching Friday night's episode of Dr. Who, which I taped off PBS. That dog has good taste in TV shows. (And good news - her collar is off and she's on the mend!)

I interrupted His Highness (aka Mickey, aka Gollum/Smeagol)in the middle of a nap to take his picture. He may forgive me one of these days.

And what would this blog be without some knitting? This is the Tangled Yoke Cardigan from the Fall 2007 issue of Interweave Knits. I'm using Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool, and it's going faster than I expected.

I finished the clown socks last week! My mom was very impressed - much more than I was. Sockotta isn't my favorite yarn. It has a high percentage of cotton, which makes the yarn less elastic and more hard on the hands. The forethought heel also messed up the fit. Chalk one up for experience, I guess; I know how to do the forethought heel, but I choose not to.

I also finished the purple stripe basic socks, but I haven't worn them yet. I'm making progress on the Swallowtail Shawl as well, but I've decided that nupps are not my friends. I also started some Embossed Leaves socks with the teal Cherry Tree Hill I got in a swap. (CTH is AMAZING, by the way. So soft and squooshy!)

Love/hate relationship

This week on Blogstalker: Three things you love and three things you hate!

Let's get the hate over with:

1. See the Swiss-cheese-esque wood? That would be termite fodder. In the cabinet where we keep the cookware. 'Nuff said.

2. This is pretty minor in terms of hatred, but I despise this silverware holder. It's hard to get the silverware out, and it's so unstable that it falls over with an earsplitting crash at least three times a day.

3. Disclaimer: I do not hate Caddie. I love Caddie. What I hate is that she has to wear this collar right now. She had surgery to remove a cancer, and this collar is to keep her from ripping out the stitches in the incision on her tummy. (Her long-term prognosis is very good, though, and she doesn't act like she's in any pain at all.)

Okay, now on to the happy!

1. I love autumn! Exhibit A: fresh apples These are destined to become applesauce and apple butter. Mmm...the house smells so good right now.

2. This is an antique pump organ that we brought back from England. One of my favorite memories is when we finally brought it into the house (it had been quarantined in the garage - mice!), and my dad asked my mom to play Amazing Grace. And then we found out that only one pump was functioning. Playing the pump organ is quite the leg workout! I used to love dusting this organ. There's a lot of woodwork on it, and I used to try to find faces and animals in the designs.

3. This...art piece...is an example of how completely insane my family is. (Click for details.) On top, we have "Lucy in the sky with diamonds" a la my little sister (who teaches middle school math, but will always be my little sister). On the bottom, we have some sort of shark-like character with Hebrew writing on its side. My dad did that part - he taught himself Hebrew when he was in high school. (He also had his own X-ray machine in the basement, and he and his best friend would hang out in a classroom doing physics equations during school dances.) They're completely kooky, so I fit right in. I love them all, even though they drive me spare half the time.

Knitting stuff: I finished the first clown sock! And my mother, who (usually) has very good taste, thought it was just amazing. So I guess I'll be making her some socks for Christmas or her birthday.

The Swallowtail Shawl is coming along, but I feel kind of silly taking pictures of it when you can't tell whether or not it's grown. I've got one more repeat of the first lace pattern to go, but my stitch count is off by two. Bummer.

Oh, and check out this sock pattern! I'm definitely making these sometime soon.

Getting the hang of Thursdays

Another Thursday already? I'd better go ahead and do this week's blogstalker post before the next one's up!

This week: How I Get from Here to There! (here being my house, and there being the lab where I work/live)

Clockwise from top left:
1. My dirty car. I've had this car for almost two years. The car before that, a Mitsubishi Galant, met a messy end on I-40 when a tire blew out at 70 mph. It was my first (and hopefully last!) car accident. If the tire had blown out just a bit earlier or later, I would have gone into oncoming traffic or fallen into a ravine. A positively angelic couple stopped and helped me and my passenger until my dad got there. (That was also the first day that my dad ever went ~20 mph over the speed limit.) Thankfully, no one was seriously hurt. But it still kind of scares me to think about it.
2. The front of my dirty car. Pretty self-explanatory.
3. The floor of my dirty car. (If you're thinking that I usually ride alone, you'd be right.) We've got a Whiz Kids tutor notebook (I tutor a 3rd grade girl on Tuesdays), a sunshield (quite necessary when it's still EIGHTY DEGREES IN OCTOBER), a stray size 6 from some knitting project, a jacket, and a Blockbuster receipt.
4. The passenger seat of my dirty car. Notables include my Bible, the book that two friends and I are studying (Lord, I Want to Know You, by Kay Arthur - it's about the names of God in the Bible), some books that my church library was giving away, and another jacket.

Knitting update: I was up until 11 PM last night doing my first afterthought (or in this case, forethought) heel. I'm not convinced that it's any better than your average heel flap. Dealing with one really long circular needle, waste thread for a stitch holder, more waste thread for a provisional cast-on, and two ends of the same ball of yarn was a bit of a mess, in the same way that tuberculosis is a little cough. Wrestling Harry Potter's giant squid would probably have been easier.

My grafting looks a little wonky, too. I think I may undo it and get rid of the little ears on the sides.

Blogstalking, knitting, and birthday present

This post should make up for the lack of pictures the past few posts! It's been a busy week. I had a big test on Monday, which I didn't quite tank, exactly.

Anyways, on to the good stuff! This week's blogstalking theme is Purse Guts!

Clockwise from top left: my purse, beginnings of purse guts, actual purse guts, knitting-related purse guts, and my keys.

See the yarn keychain? That's a tiny hank of Malabrigo (!!!!!), a gift from a swap partner. The whistle is a "self-defense whistle" from college, and considering where I work, it's a good thing I have it. (It also comes in handy when I'm working with kindergarteners.)

Notables: I have way too many pens/pencils, but you never know when you'll need one (or when someone will borrow one and not give it back). The pink circle thing is a very clever little screwdriver set.

I've been working on a couple of knitting projects lately. First of all, the same swap partner who sent me the Malabrigo keychain also sent me some laceweight Malabrigo. It's been waiting patiently in my stash for a project, but no longer!

This is the Swallowtail Shawl from Interweave Knits, Fall 2006. I cast on September 16th, and I've done 11 of 14 repeats of the first lace pattern. It's really easy! This will be for my grandmother for Christmas. The colorway is called Tuareg, and it's a variegated blue that reminds me of the sky in spring to winter. You can see a bit of the color changes in this picture. The laceweight Malabrigo is soooo soft! I did have to frog it once, though, when I only had a few stitches, and it had almost felted itself together.

Here's a significantly less subtle project.

This is my VERY BRIGHTLY COLORED CHEVRON SOCK. The pattern is from Sensational Knitted Socks, and the yarn is Plymouth Sockotta. I'm calling these my clown socks. They'll be a good pick-me-up this winter when it gets dark early. This is the third skein of Sockotta that my mom and grandmother got me for Christmas last year.

Speaking of my grandmother, look what she gave me for my birthday!

Clockwise from upper left:
1. A picture from the instruction book of my great-great-grandmother's sewing machine.
2. A drawer from the sewing cabinet with some neat wooden spools. There's also a couple of tubes of tiny beads and a drawer full of crocheted lace edgings.
3. My great-great-grandmother's button drawer. My aunt and I spent almost an hour going through this drawer. There are some very cool buttons from the 1920's. Apparentely she liked green too!
4. Some wooden needle holders and a packet of the tiniest needles I've ever seen. I don't think I could draw a line with a pencil that would be as narrow as these needles! My grandmother told me that she couldn't even get a needle threader through them.
5. "The Army and Navy Needle Book," a packet of sewing needles.

I don't have the actual sewing machine yet. It's still being worked on. But I'm very excited to have a working treadle sewing machine! I may have to brush up on my sewing skills before long!