June 15, 2005

the past week's knitting highlights

Last Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday I made good progress on Tonton Guy's sock while waiting for doctors, at a meeting for knocked up anglophones and on the metro. I turned the heel and I still have a good chunk of the ball left before I get halfway. I only have one ball, so I'm weighing it from time to time to know when I should start the second sock. If they seem a little short, I'll have to add some charcoal stripes up at the ankle or something. In a couple days, I'll put up a photo to show you just how big these socks are.

Friday and Saturday I knit a lot on my top priority project (no photos, sorry). I finished the back yesterday and the design element actually worked like I wanted it to. I was so relieved because as the end of it approached, I was getting nervous that I would have to redo the whole thing. Today I started the sleeves and I decided to knit them both at the same time. I haven't decided if this is the best way to go or not. They go more slowly, but at least I won't have Second Sleeve Syndrome. I love finishing stuff. I just wish I could show you.

Yesterday, Blossom sent me photos of her knitting. I'm so proud, I'm bursting at the seams! Check this out! (Sorry chica, I didn't ask you if I could post these. I assume it's cool. Why don't you get a blog?!?)

I'm dragging her down a slippery slope. She's been buying some expensive yarns and she was online shopping for swifts and ball winders. Poor girl. Plus, she's more up on blogs than I am. The other day she said to me, "Did you see that Blahdablee from the Boobahdoo blog is spinning now." I said, "Huh? Who's that? What?" No offense, Blahdablee. I'm clueless. I don't know anyone. And Blossom, my dear, don't go getting any crazy spinning ideas in your head. I feel guilty enough about the knitting thing.

Today's highlight is I listened to the newest knitcast and got dragged into the world of Get Knitted and I've spent the last two hours trying to convince myself that it is unreasonable to order yarn. But I can't get any of these yarns in France! No, Kate, you can't but you don't need any yarn. But they are so pretty! No! Step away from the computer. But... No! (I'll see you later, I'm going sit here and fight with myself)

Posted by kate at 07:41 PM | Comments (5)

June 06, 2005

fun?

I decided that I really needed something to knit for fun so I finally started the socks I had promised to Tonton Guy to celebrate his retirement and 60th birthday. I sat and knit like a maniac at a family function on Sunday (the pétanque game was too competitive for my taste) and got pretty far. But Tonton Guy has really big feet. Even though the yarn is thicker than your average sock yarn, I think they're still going to take me a while and after a few hours of knitting them I was getting a little bored. I might need a second "fun" project to take a break from my first one. I'm not sure what it should be. I've got an itch to knit some lace so I might tackle one of the Heirloom Knitting patterns I have. Or I might not.

Posted by kate at 07:45 PM | Comments (11)

May 27, 2005

Should I brag?

Yeah. I think so.

I'm always happy to see when other bloggers have met each other and loved each other, but I have to admit, sometimes I feel a wee bit left out. I mean, I'm pretty far away from most of the ladies I read about on a regular basis. But last night, I went to Paris-Tricot for the first time in a long time and there were LOADS of people. I think there were 17 of us, including many first timers! I remembered that knitting with other people is fun and I whipped out a big chunk of a project while I sat there and chatted. And not only were there loads of people, there were visitors! Becky was up from Lyon, Jackie and Bonne Marie were here from the states, a really nice lady from Madrid was there (forgive me! I can't remember your name!) and Stinkerbellcame too. She's in Paris all the time. We just never see each other. Plus, there were lots of French gals that I don't get to see often, like Sophie, Laëtitia and Isabelle. It was really great. I'll have to come out of hibernation more often.

I love this yarn. It's Jaeger Extra Fine Merino DK. I love it. I love it. I love it. It knits up soooooo nicely. It's soft. It's springy. It's loverly. (Yes, so lovely I have to say it like Eliza Doolittle)

Posted by kate at 02:26 PM | Comments (23)

May 19, 2005

Swatch...Frawtch? Clawtch?

Anybody know a word that rhymes with swatch? The reason I ask is I make up songs on the spot and sing. I do this a lot, but not for just anyone. It's usually Frog or Blossom who get to hear them. The other night I was finishing up some swatches for... stuff (I refrain from speaking about "stuff" because I'm convinced that it will bring me bad luck and said "stuff" will be rejected and I will be told to go knit toilet paper covers) and I was singing a song about being done with my swatch. And the only words I could think of were watch or Sasquatch. Frog later suggested crotch, but I think that would depend on your accent and for me it's close, but I'm not sure it rhymes 100%, never mind the difficulty of incorporating "crotch" into a song about knit swatches... actually, I probably could because my songs have nothing to do with logic and everything to do with n'importe quoi. Any brilliant ideas you have for words for my swatch song would be greatly appreciated by Frog since he complained that last night's song only consisted of about 8 words that were used 20 times each. It wasn't my best effort.

So, despite my fear of cursing myself by talking about "stuff" and showing you "stuff", I've posted a photo of "stuff." Or at least little pieces of it. If you ever get to see the "stuff" will depend on the knitting gods, aka editors. And in one case, I'll probably just publish the pattern myself if nobody else wants to because I believe in it. That's what I did with Elizabeth. So the first swatch is... a swatch and it has a button and ribs. You couldn't have figured that out without me, right? I knit it in Calmer, which I like a lot, but I only realized today that I knit the darned thing on two different sized needles. Maybe I could have said that in my song. What rhymes with needle? The second thing is... a thing and I used this Phildar yarn that was actually pretty soft even though it's 49% acrylic, which to me, usually screams SQUEAKY! And the third thing is a mini thing. Every time I had touched Noro Kureyon, I had said, "yuck." But I really wanted a yarn with a color change like Kureyon, so I bit the bullet, paid the 9.15€ and bought the stupid stuff. It really wasn't as yuck as I had thought. Anyway, the "stuff" is sent and now I have three quarters of a ball of Kureyon, as well as some Rowan All Seasons Cotton to throw into my stash. My collection of random single balls is getting ridiculous. I guess I could return the ball that I didn't end up using, but that would involve going all the way to the 7th arrondissement which would cost me over 2€ in metro tickets and at least a half hour of stress waiting in line and explaining to unpleasant women why I would want to return the stupid ball. I think I'll just keep it.

PS Why can I never find the yarn I want in the color I want? Either I find a yarn I like in colors that I think are blah, or I find a color I like in yarn I think is ick.

Posted by kate at 11:55 PM | Comments (24)