Knitters really are good people

To help the victims of the recent earthquake in Haiti, Kim McBrien Designs is donating 75% of her proceeds from pattern sales to Doctors without Borders for their Haiti relief effort. You can buy her awesome patterns here on Ravelry. I believe you can do that even without being a Ravelry member but I haven't tried to test that theory.

I bought both her cowl patterns and I am going to also go and make a donation directly. I hope you will do the same (donate either way, directly or through Kim McBrien Designs or both to get two chances). If you do, post a comment on this post telling me you did and I will have the random number generator pick someone to get a yarny prize for being so good.

And I do have knitting to show but I will save that for the next post since I still need to weave in ends.

This is ridiculous, you know.

For several weeks now I have on a day here or there popped up my blog and had every intention of writing a post. And then not done it. I don't know if it is that horrible pain in the patootie called "perfectionism" or just plain laziness or what. But its never gonna stop if I don't just blog something.

It's not like I haven't anything to blog either, I did in fact make more than one holiday gift this year. Although so far I am not doing so well on the post holiday knitting that is due.

Still, I did accomplish knitting in 2009 even in the last few weeks (actually quite a bit in the last few weeks and hardly any for weeks and weeks before then so maybe the break in the blog was just in the wrong place?

For the FoUI (my hubby the Fount of Useless Information - trivia? he has gobs of it) I made two pairs of socks this winter.

His Mars Tickle Attacks! socks knit in the Mars colorway (that and ticklish feet and his love of puns should explain the name of the socks) of Fiber Fiend's Superwash Merino Sock Yarn. This was a really nice yarn to work with. It makes a nice cushy sock.

I also knit him some socks in his alma mater's colors (Go Cal Bears!) in a stripe pattern I have done once before. But man, 40 ends to weave in by the time I was done! Not doing that again. If I ever decide to do this sock again, I will have to remember to weave in the ends as I go.

My daughter wanted somewhat more complicated things this year so I only got one thing made for her by the end of 2009. She is obsessed with penguins at the moment (and actually that has lasted a full year plus - interesting) so asked for a knitted penguin. I was stalling saying I had to order yarn because I didn't have the correct weight in a penguiny color and she made the mistake of saying I could use any color. I asked "even a wild variegate?" and she said yes. So she got this:

But she seems to love it so it's all good. Except I had so much yarn left I could make her a pair of socks. So now I have that on my "to knit" list for this month.

You know what else is ridiculous? We're 8 days into January and I haven't knit a stitch this year yet. Not a good way to get knitting done for Valentine's day. So I need to get back to knittin'!

Catching Up or at least not falling too much further behind

I finished one of the gift knitting items! Are you excited? I sure am. And I think the FoUI is too because he has successfully bemoaned the cold as he bicycles to work so he's getting them early. Which sort of leaves me short a present. But I think I will print out a photo and wrap that up rather than trying to add yet another item to my already scary list.

But look! A FO!



And now I am off for four days of probably not much knitting time at all. So no doubt will be considerably further behind by the next time I can post. Still, I have one present! Yay!

Oh so very far behind...

So according to the Holiday Knitting Plan by today I was supposed to be done with 1 pair of mittens, at least one sock of a pair of socks, a good half of a vest, and working on the knitting for a stuffed toy.

And where am I? I haven't even looked at what I need for yarn for the stuffed toy, I haven't gotten any further than the swatch for the vest, so there's nothing to show for that.

I do have part of the foot of the first sock done (this would be more impressive if they weren't toe up socks):



And one mitten hand done, thumb still to go and the second mitten on the last set of increases for the thumb gusset.



I am on the hook for parent helping with school stuff next week so confidently expect to be even further behind by the end of the month. Frankly, it would be likely that I would be further behind even if I weren't going to lose my knitting time for most of a week. But I have not yet given up entirely. The Holiday Knitting Plan did have some extra time left at the end which I can use to make up for lost time earlier on. As long as I can keep from losing too much time I still might pull this off. (Cynical optimist may be almost a contradiction in terms but I strongly suspect it labels me pretty accurately nonetheless.)

Wednesday Weasling - or rather Weaseling about Wednesday

No offense intended to actual weasels of course. But on Wednesday I had planned to employ some weasel words to imply I got more done than I did since Monday. Only then I fell asleep early that night instead of finishing a blog post. And again on Thursday and then other life issues intervened as they will and so on... So now we're at the point where I need to employ weasel words to cover for why I didn't even blog when I was supposed to. Only my readers are much too smart and aren't gonna fall for that anyway. So, I'll just tell the truth. I still haven't even managed to put in as many hours of knitting per day as I was supposed to. And much of what I did manage to do had to be ripped back. You would think I would learn, wouldn't you?

I'm doomed. The Plan has me finishing two items by the end of knitting time tomorrow. The FoUI's (aka husband's) mittens and his socks. I have one mitten most of the way through the thumb gusset increases.

at least this seems to fit - actually to me it seems a bit big but he says it is right and they are his mittens

The other mitten is yet to be cast on. This is Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sport in the Pioneer colorway. I'm using Ann Budd's The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns mitten pattern for these.

The socks were also only a singleton of the pair and it was only part-way up the foot, but was also too big around so is now not even finished with the toe increases.

yeah, pathetic, I know - the worst part is I knew it was getting too big but I kept going

That's Fiber Fiend superwash sock in the Mars colorway. And I'm making them up as I go along. He want's ribbed socks. I had such a clever ribbing pattern set up for them when they were 64 stitch socks. Now I have to refigure it. Ah well...

And that is it for projects started. At this rate, I might just maybe have one gift each done in time. If I speed up.

I have swatched for the vest for the Remembrall (aka daughter) and now have enough information to start actually designing the pattern. I think I will start the back of that today. The yarn is a really lovely green from Tactile Fiber Arts.

which this photo captures best out of the ones I took today but still doesn't really show the glow

A little of the indigo (I think I am remembering how this was dyed correctly, indigo over something else to produce this lovely shimmering green that really does look like a kelp forest shining in the sunlight that filters down) is coming off on my fingers as I knit but that is to be expected. And it's just barely noticeable. Much less than some other yarns I have worked with. I'm really looking forward to working on this and have been using it as a bribe to get more workaday stuff done.

And now that I have done my bloggerly duty. I am off to knit while the FoUI takes the Remembrall on a bike ride. If I get enough of the mittens and socks done early enough today I will get to spend a nice little bit of time working on the vest back. I really am looking forward to that so motivation isn't going to be a problem.

Well, that good intention went well didn't it?

Not.

Still no completed knitting to show off. Lots of mucking about in the real life areas since June what with packing for moving back home to California and then unpacking once we got here. Not to mention getting through the first month of school etc. It all just left much too little time for my hobby life. Which is annoying as all get out. And nearly equal amounts of tinking to knitting means very little progress to show for what time I did have for knitting. Plus much of the knitting now is "secret" so really I got nothin' blogwise.

But this is ridiculous. So I think I'll just blog the secret knitting anyway and hope that the recipients are smart enough to not read my blog between now and Winter Solstice. I thought about ending that sentence with just Solstice so that when the deadline for the knitting blows by and I wave at it, I can tell people, "Oh, I meant the Summer Solstice" when they ask where their present is. Then I decided that I really should try to aim for the goal. And maybe my nice readers, if I still have any after such a dreadfully long hiatus, will cheer me on to completing everything in time. Or, you know, something.

So here's the knitting list for the holidays (and my family's inconveniently timed birthdays falling as they do in the winter also) so far:

For the FoUI (aka hubby): Mittens, a "Professor" sweater (anyone who has an idea what that means past leather elbow patches please please please clue me in), two pairs of socks, and maybe if there is time, a hat.

For the Remembrall (aka daughter): a vest, a knitted stuffed toy, a sewn stuffed toy, a pair of socks, a doll sweater, and maybe some other knitted or sewn clothes for her dolls and a pair of fingerless mitts.

For my Mum: a sweater (the blame for which can be laid completely at my daughter's door - she piped up oh so helpfully at dinner one night last week that I could knit Mum a sweater for her Holiday present this year), a pair of fancy gloves (which was what I was "sensibly" limiting myself to)

For my first BFF: A scarf and a pair of socks that are seriously overdue from her birthday.

For my second BFF: a pair of socks.

My BFFes may have to settle for New Year's presents because this list is already scary scary scary long and that doesn't even allow for the fact that I kinda wanted to have a knit by me shawl to wear to the FoUI's office holiday party this year.

And of course, considering my track record over the last 6 months with completed knitting this list is preposterous raised to the ridiculous and multiplied by insane. But very much in keeping with jumping in where angels fear to treadle, right?

So I've got a plan. The official start is Monday. If I knit the entire evening every night from now on, I might make it. If I guessed right about how long each thing was gonna take to knit. I plan to work on three projects at a time; one big and two smaller more portable ones. Starting with the FoUI's mittens and one of the pairs of socks, and the Remembrall's vest. Progress thus far on this is nil. I am designing the Remembrall's vest and I know what I want it to look like. But getting there... not so easy. The FoUI's mittens and socks I can pretty much just knit. Although I will need him around to be sure of fit issues. So since he'll be out of town all week next week tonight I need to find and wind yarn for these two projects and get started on knitting them so I can be sure of the fit before the body is inaccessible for a week. The yarn is found and the first skein wound for the Remembrall's vest. So it is also time to start swatching for that.

Just as soon as I finish a couple of design things I was doing over the summer...

Go ahead, laugh at me. I am. Progress report and photos on Wednesday.

I really need to do better than once a month...

I hope that will be easier soon. By this time next month I think I will at least know when I will be able to move everything back home. Can't recall if I've mentioned here that we have been spending the last few months mostly in Texas. The FoUI (the Fount of Useless Information - aka my husband) is doing some work for a client of his company there. The carrot that got homebody me out of my house here (we're home this week) was that after the months in Texas we'd then be sent on to Australia for a year. Now I ask you, could any fiberholic say no to a year in Australia? Only, it appears that the Australia part has gone poof.

Which is ok. We'd have had to leave our dog behind for that year and I think I'd miss her an awful lot. And besides, now that we'll be home instead, Operation Second Dog can commence sooner. As soon as I get us moved back I'm puppy proofing and then we are on the hunt for a new Golden Retriever puppy. We like to have two dogs at a time so that when we're out they have company. And we haven't had two dogs for a very long time now. It still feels a bit odd. Although not as odd as no dog at all!

OK back to fibery goodness type stuff... Except, I got nothin'. A few more rows on what I posted last time. A decision made that there was no way the sock I was designing was going to work as I had done it so I had to rethink it. A new sock started for that friend in someone else's pattern thinking that that would be quicker at least. And it looks like my gauge is off... In fact the only thing I have is new yarn and fiber which arrived while I was in Texas. And is staying here because even I can't really imagine taking it back to Texas just to move it here in July or August.

I swear my fibery mojo has totally deserted me in Texas. I need to get home for good. I had a sense of direction there (which I don't here nearly as much) which was nice but not if I had to give up my fiber-pursuits mojo for it.

I promise some kind of actual knitting or spinning or something related content next time.