Tinking's evil cousin

Now I'm not going to lie, I hate tinking. I will do all things possible to get around it, mostly by just pulling the thing off the needles and ripping back. But I have found something even more annoying than tinking. It's undoing a sewn bindoff. I thought that I had finished my Endpaper hat, so I started to bind off. But after finishing a quarter of it, I looked at what I had done. It was too loose, and had ruffled. It was all pointed out to me by my mom, who also commented that the brim didn't cover my ears, and should be longer. Once again she is right.
So I'm sitting here undoing the sewn bind off, which I predict will take me quite a while. When I'm done I'll knit a few more rows, then bind off. Properly this time.

Romni Boxing Day Sale!

So yesterday was Romni Wools annual Boxing Day sale, where the entire store is 25% off. Last year I barely made it, this year I made sure to be there in the morning. I arrived with my mom at about 10:30, before my cousins and my aunt since I knew that I would take much more time than they would. It took a good hour or two for me to finally get out of there. And here are my final choices.

First off was four balls of Fortissima Socka, two red and two gray. Solids so that they will be good for cables and lace work and all sorts of wonderfull things.7 balls of Sisu Fantasy to make Frost Flowers and Leaves. The thing is going to be 'effing huge since I'm using sock weight instead of lace weight. But I couldn't find any laceweight that I liked, so I bought this instead! Oh well, I need something like it, and I am determined to make a big lace shawl this year.
Two balls of Lambs Pride Bulky in Fushia to make a big ribbed scarf.
Knitting on the Road by Nancy Bush, three circular needles, tapestry needles and I also got a set of metal dpns, but they are already being used to knit the brim of my hat. The two bigger needles are to knit the shawl.
These two balls, Lambs Pride Bulky in Lotus Pink, and Nature Spun in Grey Heather, are for Secret Santa stuffed animals. The pink will be Womb, and the grey will be Buddy. Buddy has a head now, and might get finished today even, but womb will have to wait until I can get the size up of needles, it's just not working with what I have right now.
Well that's my pretty satisfactory haul. I have a something in mind for all of it, though those last two will give me a large amount of leftovers.... What's a stash for but to add to?

Now with 100% more pictures...

I finally feel like I can blog properly. My parents gifted me with a very sexy new digital camera for Christmas, which will greatly enhance this bloggine experience. I've kind of felt like I'm pretending, since a knitting blog isn't much without pictures. I digress. The above picture also shows the Endpaper Mitts by Eunny that I knit last week. These babies are so perfect, that I've decided to knit a matching hat.

I took this picture this morning, and have since finished all the increases and have started the main part of the hat. I should be done before school starts again on the 3rd. Back to school in style!


Speaking of the gifting season, my Aunt Kathy gave me this gorgeous Malabrigo worsted merino, and a pair of super cute needles with polka dot ends. The colours are Bijou Blue and Ladrillo, simply gorgeous!

Thats enough pictures for now. Tomorrow .... Socks!

In the end....

I only knit three gifts for this holdiay season. A plain black hat for my dad, socks for my mum and legwarmers for my cousin. If I knit a hat for my dad next year too, it definentally needs to have cables or something, it's just so boring! I mean, it's a nice hat and all. But it is very unexceptional. The legwarmers rock. They are k2p2 rib, in really chunky yarn. I would keep these for myself! Maybe I'll make myself some..... They literally took one day to make, very easy.

Well, three that are actually ready for tomorrow. I have three more pairs of socks that must be made at some point. I have 1.75 socks knit already, but they aren't a pair. The unfinished one is for my grandfather, with size 10.5 feet, which translates to miles and miles of boring stockinette. It is almost done though, with the majority of the knitting done in the past few days. Mostly thanks to watching The Curse of the Golden Flower on Friday, and Kinky Boots last night. The one finished sock it a modified Jaywalker for my friend Claire. For my grandmother I am planning to knit knitty's Hedra in a heathered gray. I should finish the grandpa sock tomorrow, so then I can cast on for the first Hedra. I'm figuring that the Hedra should be a comparatively quick knit, so that I can imediately cast on for the second of Claire's socks, ready to be exchanged on the 13th of January. The grandparent socks will be finished when they get finished.

I did finish Eunny's Endpaper mitts. I added two stitches to each side of the pattern repeat, and increased the selvege stitches to two on each side instead of one. I've worn them lots already, especially since it's not that cold yet. They took me four and a half days to knit, two and a bit days each, definentally one of those fire under my ass projects. I've started a matching hat twice. The first time was bottom up, but I realised that I would invariably have issues with the way that the pattern would look when the decreased were put into the mix. So I started again from the top. It's looking pretty snappy. I have increased it to about four diamonds across already. At first I increased every row, and then at three diamonds across I switched to everyother row. After the hat, if I'm not completely mindnumbingly bored of knitting diamonds, then I will cast on for a scarf.

Christmas Knitting

I started Eunny's Endpaper Mitts last night, while watching the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice. It took me a good 45 minutes to just wind the hank of Lorna's Laces I'm using into a ball. I think I may have to rethink that though. I'm using it and some black Fortissima Socka, but the contrast might be a bit too much. Plus the gauge is completely off from the pattern. I didn't like how it looked at guage, and knitting sock yarn on 4mm just felt wrong. So I'm moving down to 3mm. But I have to add stitches for that to work. It's getting to be complicated. Right now I'm just trying to finish the ribbing, on size 2.25mm I've probably knit the ribbing 5 times by now, but this should be the last. I also finally got yarn for my grandmother's socks, the second legwarmer, and my cousin's legwarmers. I really cleaned up!

Chuckanucka

This guy is all mine! I got him today in a Secret Santa from Mike. His name is Chuckanucka and Mike wrote me a letter as well.

Dear Natalie,
I've discovered this Monster just for you because he can do some pretty amazing things!
1. He can protect porters from drunken intruders and annoying converastion!
2. He hates people who steal frying pans and generally scares them away!
3. He loves people who knit!
4. He actually once dated Tinkerbelle, things ended well. They're still good friends!
5. He writes essays for people ... in his head!
6. He makes quite the excellent pillow when you need to sleeeeeep!
7. He can travel overseas with people to protect them from pickpockets.
8. He also scares away seedy European men, but attracts the hot ones.
9. He loves tutus!
10. He knows how to bust a move!
11. He can fight off British history homework!
12. He loves people easily, and eats people he doesn't like!
13. He likes the idea of donship if he's not travelling overseas.
14. He wanted to live with someone super cool!
But most of all he needed a home and who better to give him that than YOU!
Merry Chistmas,
Secret Santa M

Chuckanucka is the perfect cuddling size, and is also super cute! He's an Ugly Doll, except not really, since I don't think that he is ugly at all.

yawn....

My goodness it is late. I am on the verge of my first academic all nighter. I have stayed up all night for various other reasons, Lord of the Rings marathon, the last night of frosh week, Horatio Hornblower movie marathons, the list goes on. But this is the first time I've stayed up to the wee hours doing work. I got a surprisingly large amount of work done. The task at hand was a 2500 word essay on the English Civil War in 1642. I got the word count surprisingly quickly, the final count being 2824, including my works cited and footnotes. I think this is also the first time I've actually exceeded a word count, usually I fall a hundred or so words short. My bigger worry is whether or not the thing makes any sense, but that's less the fault of having written it in the past 24 hours than the fact that I rarely know what I'm trying to say. Not exactly the best thing for university essays. However, I was surprised at how easy it was to write so much compared to my English essays. It is kind of making me think that I maybe should apply to have History as my second major instead of English. There are so many decisions to make! Is a double major and a minor too much? Maybe I could major in Fine Arts Cultural Studies and History and minor in English. But then that would definentally mess up my plans for going to Wales next year. I'm planning having to take at least a few courses in a fifth year, if I did I could totally do a minor.

Enough with my boring academic headaches. My real decision is whether or not to sleep for a few hours before my 10:30 class, or to just stay up untill then. I think I may sleep. I can't think of what I would do for another 4 hours. If I sleep for two, then I can get up, look over the dratted thing, print it off and hand it in, then sleep the rest of the day away before I have to porter from 5-10, after which I plan on getting throughly shmammered. And finally be able to knit without guilt. *le sigh* I can't wait. I can finish Sam's octopus, the hood/scarf, start Kim's minisweater, the bind-off on mom's Baudelaire's, Claire's socks, maybe the monkey backpack. Dear lord I've got a lot of WIP's. And I know that there are more I'm not going to even mention. Tomorrow's portering shift will be the shift of finished objects, on the plate will be the octopus, mom's socks, the backpack and the hood/scarf. All of them are so close to being finished, it's not even funny.

Now I lay me down to sleep....

well it's a little nippy noodles...

I'm finally sending off my Stuffie swap package today. I'm a week late, but the thing is pretty awesome so I think she won't mind. I'm not going to tell you what it is because she might read this and then it would be spoiled. I've also added in a little package of those tiny books and a candycane.
Right now I'm sitting in the main square-ish type thing of York. It's not much of a square, but if campus were to have an epicentre, this would be it. Thank-you wireless internet! The concrete bench I'm sitting on is a little chilly, and I'm thinking that I should knit some fingerless mitts to wear on occasions such as these. I really should go back to my dorm and continue my date with Charles I and the exam I have tomorrow, but there are some very cute boys practicing thier skateboarding tricks right now, so maybe I'll tough it out for a little bit longer..... The bestest part about this part of campus is that it is between the Fine Arts buildings and the food buildings, so all the finearts kids are constantly walking back and forth between the two, there is always something interesting going on. Most notably right now are the people smoking up right behind me = ew, gross. It's clouding over a bit right now, which means that it might snow, but I really hope that it doesn't. I think one of the boys is probably wearing girls jeans, but they look really good on him, and whenever he makes a mistake he yells really loudly, imensely amusing. I am currently giggling on the inside, oh wait, on the outside too. There are also some people filming something, and I know that inside one of the buildings there was some preformance art going on from the first year Critical Issues in the Studio class. They had skipping ropes and hopscotch. Muchly fun. I would have joined in, but my double dutch skills are pretty sketch. Now everyone is congretating around the camera, too bad I can't see what they're filming from where I'm sitting. I recognize some of the people, but I don't actually know any of them, otherwise I would join in the congregation.
I have once again made use of my crafty skills for some form of profit. I sewed up a split pocket seam last night for a friend in exchange for a coffee and treat from second cup. It took about 15 minutes, so clearly I win!
I really need to finish my crazy scarf hood. I'm going to write a pattern for it, so stay posted for it soon! And with a pattern comes pictures, so maybe my wee blog will actually come to something. And if you are out there my dear readers, comment please?! I know that I get about 6 hits a day, which is fine by me, but if even one of you posted once a week that would make my day. And then I could comment on your blog, and we would have a symbiotic relationship. *le sigh* good thing I'm not at university for biology, as I'm pretty sure I've just used that term incorrectly. Have a pleasant afternoon all,
Natalie

Bit by the Sock Bug

I've gone and done it, I've officially been bit by the sock bug. I have three pairs on the needles, and I purchased my first two skeins of Lorna's Laces.
On Saturday I had a job interview at the ungodly hour of 8am at American Eagle in the Eatons Centre. I decided to walk home, as I didn't have any TTC tickets on me, and paying $2.75 when I can walk just as easily is just a travesty. On a side note, the fog was so bad on Saturday that when I was standing across from City Hall, I couldn't see the top of the building. City Hall is not that big of a building, compared to those around it, it's a piddly little thing. What is with this city right now?! Anyways, my walk home takes me through Kensington, which means Lettuce Knit. I had breakfast at the Kensington in order to waste some time, and then mossey'd over to the shop. I noticed right away that there was finally some substantial amount of Lorna's in. I have been wanting to try this stuff for ages, but Lettuce Knit is the only place that caries it, and they are almost always sold out. I had so much trouble picking anything! In the end I decided on Childsplay, which is purple, green, blue, orange and a bit of yellow. I've already started knitting it up, I've got about 2.5 inches, in Knitty's rpm pattern. It's looking very cool. They are destined to be socks for one of my bestest friends from highschool, Claire. She just told me her foot size, about 10 inches long, which is far longer than me... *le sigh* the price of friendship! I'm just hoping that they will be wide enough, I'm making the biggest size, and they are stretchy, but I don't know by how much!
My other socks are the band socks, I've got about 3inches of the first one, and I've got four more inches on the second Baudelaire for my mom. I think I'm right on track for my Christmas knitting, especially since I finish school in 6 days, then I can knit and sew all I want! Plus I don't think I'm completely over doing it ... four or five pairs of socks (one of which I have almost finished), a pair of legwarmers and two pairs of mini sock christmas ornaments for my aunts and uncles. The question is what to get/make my cousin and brother. Generally I can get them the same thing, but I have no idea what that might be. Bugger. But that's a month away, bring it Christmas, I can take it....

Confusion

I was just told by my Don that the nickname I have been using for the past three months is possibly detrimental to my reputation. There is nothing wrong with the name, Tink means nothing really. It's the association between my nickname and someone elses. That we would become so linked together that people would only see me as that person's sidekick and not as me. That it may very soon, or already may be that people cannot see me for who I am because of my friendship to this other person. My Don said that most of the time, people who become friends with him are given up on almost imediately, they are not expected to be able to do anything with themselves. Not because he is a bad person, but because he teaches people that they don't need to grow up or take on any responsibilities. While embracing your inner child is great and all, there are some choices that must be made, things that do need to change. These are things that he does not believe in, and therefore other people don't believe in them either.

I liked being called Tink because she is so independant. She is above all things an independant person. She takes ordersI have absorbed her into who I am, and now to possibly have to let her go in order to maintain that same independance that she ebodies is hard. I don't want every decision I make to be compared to his. She went as far as to say that some people may think that my decision to go abroad would be because he decided to go abroad as well, even though I decided I wanted to exchange years ago. I cannot let myself be defined by someone else, that is not who I am. I am my own person. I only worry that I may have gone beyond that point, that my reputation has been tarnished, that people have given up on me. I know that I can believe I am independant all I want, but it will take someone else to tell me so. I cannot make this decision by myself.


Who is the real me?

Shhhh......

*whispering* I have a secret. It's a new obsession. First blogs. Then Craftster and What the Craft. And now. Oh dear. Now things have gotten dangerous. Things have gone the way of.... Ebay. I've bought my first thing on ebay today. It's 30 4" squares of quilting fabric. And I've been stalking the fabric sales all day. It's terrible. But the prices! My goodness you would not believe the delicious prices! With all the pretty prints! How could I resist? But now my Stitchy will become very very important. All this and there's that essay due Wednesday.


Damn you internet, damn you to hell.....

Clean

I am sitting at my clear desk, with the bed made, the dishes washed, dresser cleared, clean clothes, clean me. I have finally gotten my room to a point where I can sit back and say, it is clean. Finally! It's been a while. It's by no means perfect though. Things will go haywire when I finally get around to hooking up the printer that is sitting at the end of my bed. I have no idea where to put it. *le sigh* It feels good to be clean.

Baudelaire

These socks make me think of The Series of Unfortunate Events, since the main character's last name is Baudelaire. I have knit the toe and one pattern repeat. They are my first item of Christmas knitting. After having read about everyone else's trials and tribulations last year, I decided to start early. I got my mom to pick out the colour, she chose a very dark navy. It isn't the greatest in terms of seeing the pattern, but it should do quite nicely. I'm really liking the pattern. It's toe up which is my favourite, and the lace pattern isn't half as complicated as I thought it would be. I envision a quick knit!
I am blogging from my parents house, and while looking around on the computer I found this picture from about a month ago. I made my brother take pictures of my Punk-Ass Skullie sweater! So for your final amusment... here is the back!

Not again...

It happened. Again. I'm knitting along happily and then.... SNAP! my wodden needle cracks in half. I'm getting really pissed off at these needles. They are supposed to be really good. But I've cracked about 4 in my entire sock knitting career. That's less than six months. I can't afford to break that many needles. Luckily they come in sets of 5, so I can keep going. But I think that I'm going to have to switch to something else because this is rediculous. Gah!
Someone once told me that Brittany will replace needles if they are broken while knitting. I need to seriously look into that.

Bigger than me little

16 years ago today something happened that changed my life permenantly. Nothing could ever make it go back to the way it was, and I would never wish that for all the riches (or yarn) in the world. I was three years old. My baby brother was born. For the longest time he thought that his birthday was actually Halloween because he always had his parties on Halloween, but really it's always been the day before. My first memory of him is of him screaming his head off while the nurse was giving him a bath. I was standing looking through the glass with my dad. He is no longer my baby brother, or even my little brother. At nearly 6 feet, he's my bigger-than-me-little brother. And he always will be.

ps. If anyone found the card that I made him please return it. It fell out of my knitting book on the TTC on Sunday evening. It's one piece of white paper, has a big 16 on the front, and pictures of Veronica Mars and Scarlett Johanssen in it.

I Knit in Public.

I knit in public. Partly because I like to knit. I like to knit every chance I get. Also, lectures can get boring. In order to not completely waste my parents money, and to not completely zone out all the time, I knit in class. I knit on the bus. I knit in restaurants. I knit during movies. I knit all the time. Because I knit all the time, I expect people to notice. I've got pointy sticks in string in my hands for godness sakes. I like it when people ask me about it. I like to hear people's stories. I like to change people's ideas about what knitting is. I do not like ignorance.

Today in class I was knitting. At break the guy next to me turned, put his hand on my shoulder and said, "So when are you going to knit me a sweater?" He said this in the kind of way that told me that he had zero clue about what knitting a sweater means. And he invaded my personal space. I mean, I have never seen this guy in my life before. These are the kinds of people who's ideas I want to change. These are also the types of questions that make me not want to take my needles out. I don't like it when people assume that knitting is really easy, lightening fast. That it could be done for everyone. I barely knit for anyone else, much less complete strangers.

But that's my gripe.

I'll still knit in public every single chance I get.

Braaaaaaaaainsssssssss.....

Yesterday was the zombie walk here in the good old T dot. I didn't think that I was going to participate, but I went to see Rufio do the Thriller dance. Then I realised that the route stopped about four blocks from my house, then what's a girl to do? I let my coat hand from one shoulder, pulled my hair over my face and drew lines all over my cheek with an eyeliner I happened to have in my purse. All that, a limp and a few groans and badaboom! Insta zombie. It pretty much rocked. Even better than that is that this coming Sunday the 29th, some people are going to try and set a Guiness Book of World Records for the most zombies doing the Thriller dance. If anyone is interested check out www.inessens.com for more info. They're still looking for a venue if you know of anything, let them know. I will be there. I will probably be knitting at some point! This is me from this past Sunday. The scarf I'm wearing is my mohair Branching Out scarf. I think I wear it everyday now.

I Stuck!

Despite having moved into residence in order to avoid being home all the time, I have slept at home at least one night a week every week so far this year. Bugger all. Some of it is for cast-y reasons, but mostly it's for family reasons. This weekend my cousins are visiting from Chicago, so I'm required. The house is full to bursting since my sister-cousin, Katie, is staying the weekend too. That means 5 kids between the ages of 19 and 4. My uncle Chris is an interesting character, yesterday was spent explaining how my knitting works. I refused to show him how it unravel it all.

My mom and aunt and I may go to the craftshow that is at the Metro Convention Centre this weekend. Maybe. I read Diana's blog though, and she wrote that there wasn't a lot of fiber stuff going on. So I don't know whether or not we'll make it...
Katie has been working on her scarf though, and it's really coming along. She keeps asking me to do a row here and there, but I told her that the only way to get it done was to keep going. She also told me that I knit too fast and that I should savour it. Pfft, I knit just as fast as I need too. Any slower and I would never get anything done! Plus going slow is for nerds. (and people just starting out, but they get faster, so they aren't nerds)

Oh, and I just found out that my roommates band, Pictures for Postcards, is playing at the Free Times Cafe on November 10th. I will most likely be there. My other friends band, Goodbye Parker, is playing at the Horseshoe Tavern on November 2nd. I will be knitting and rocking out at both... come say hello! In a bid for both band's awesomeness, Goodbye Parker has a song about Braveheart that absolutely rocks my socks, and Pictures for Postcards did a cover of Snakes on a Plane by Cobra Starship. Which I sang the chorus of when they played at Acoustic Night at the Absinthe Pub on Monday. Hehehehe, we rocked hardcore. And if they play Snakes at the Free Times then you would probably see me sing! So you really have to come.

I should start some music socks, that I only knit at band shows. I could do it.

Version 2.0 - now with opposable thumbs!

I now have a regualar thumb! I got my cast off on Tuesday, and now have a splint. I'm far from normal though, I have very limited movement, and it hurts to pick up a lot of stuff. But I'm still knitting, and that's the important thing.

On the weekend I took my cousin to Romni's to get her yarn for a project. She picked out pink and green and blue varigated yarn. I think that she's only going to work on it when she's at my house, which is cool. She's practically my little sister, so she's over a lot. Her family is also going through some interessting (and very complicated) changes, all of which she is in the middle of, so hopefully the knitting can really help.

Hey Ruthie, you got any avacados?

Today being Benny and Joon day, (so declared after having watched the movie on Sunday night) we made grilled cheese sandwhiches. With an iron. Yes, you are allowed to be a bit confused. It does work. The only dubious part about it was the cheese we used. The only convenience store on campus is a bit sadistic in their prices, so we picked our cheese on price alone. Which gave us lactose-free processed cheese. Unmelted it was like a nacho with out the chip, cheesey and crunchy. It had a grainy texture and tasted like cheese curds, which is fine, except that cheese curds aren't grainy. Our methods were as followed.
1. Aquire cheese and bread from General Store.
2. Take a nap while watching Power Rangers Ninja Storm on YouTube.
3. Go to Intervention training.
4. Rent an iron from the Porters station, that's right people, we used a public iron.
5. Doubt the integreaty of the sticky brown stuff on the iron.
6. After trying to scrub said sticky brown stuff off, decide that the heat will kill any germs and that we'll survive.
7. Butter one side of a bunch of pieces of bread.
8. Put the cheese on the side of the bread that has no butter. This involves putting the buttered side of the bread down on the counter of the communal kitchen.
9. Giggle for a bit and while getting the courage to actually apply the iron to the bread. We used a wool setting as recommended in the movie, however a cotton setting might have made things go a little more quickly.
10. Apply the iron directly to the buttered up side of the first piece of bread and let it sit for a bit.
11. Flip the sandwich over and repeat #10 to the other side until the cheese has melted.
12. Eat the grilled cheese.
13. Verdict: aside from the minor sketchy-ness of the cheese, which tastes much better melted, the grilled cheese is a complete success!
14. Repeat numbers 10 - 11 until there is no more bread or cheese.
15. Bring the stack of sandwiches to your friends and explain that the reason they are so flat is because you ironed them. Yep, ironed them.
16. Eat the grilled cheese with ketchup, which makes it taste even better.
17. Get kind of groosed out while afore mentioned friends decide that what would make the grilled cheese even better would be to add Marshmallow Fluff.
18. Get really grossed out when the Fluff and ketchup grilled cheese sandwiches are pronounced to taste like birthday cake. Note to self, never eat the cake.
19. Fall asleep on your friends bed.
20. Wake up when they threaten to put Fluff on you.
21. Write a blog post about it!

On the next Benny and Joon day we are going to eat Captin Crunch blended with peanut butter and milk, and tapioca with the raisons picked out. And maybe we'll even make mashed potato's with a tennis racket.

In the fights of life, essays will make you explode

More butt kicking going on over here chez Tricotastique, but there are sadly no pointy sticks involved. It's all essay-town over here. The second one is due this afternoon, and the prospect of not finishing in time is starting to loom ominously over my head. Very scary. But after that I will get to knit knit knit my heart out all evening. Clearly I will win.

I have gotten some knitting done, I turned the heel of a sock in a lecture yesterday. I'm using the stuff I dyed pink and blue stripey before I went to England. I'm using the undyed yarn for the toes, heels and cuffs because otherwise I don't think that I would have enough yarn. I should be okay right now though, just based on an eyeball guesstimate. They are only going to be little footies, very plain. Perfect for bringing to lectures!

The other day I went to the York bookstore to just stare at the knitting books, as I am in the habit of doing every once in a while. I picked up Wendy Knits, and started to flip through it. I didn't look very closely at the projects, so I have no idea what the book is like, but something else caught my eye. I'm not sure if it's every copy, but in the particular copy I was holding, there was a section of about 20 pages that had been bound in upside down! I giggled to myself for the publishers sillyness, and then put it back on the shelf. Very amusing.

Fair Isle kicked my butt.

I started a pair of Fair Isle leg warmers on Friday. I was getting bored of straight knitting, and have zero big projects to keep me interested right now. I restarted them on Saturday morning. By Thanksgiving dinner on Sunday I had a good 5 inches down, two inches of corugated ribbing in navy and white, and then three of navy background with white flecks. Then I asked my brother what pattern to do next. And he said diagonal stripes. So I added a third colour (purple) and knit an inch and a half. And then I tried it on. They look cool, but there is no way that that baby was fitting over my heel. So I ripped back to before the stripes. Last night I reknit using size 3mm instead of the 2.75 mm I had used for the rest. I managed to get it on, but I nearly ripped the thing apart in the process. So I got to thinking. I got to looking. I got to sketching. I got to erasing. I got to redesigning. I think I now have some real designs that will work, instead of figuring everything out by the seat of my pants like I usually do.

I'm itching to start, but I have these two very annoying essays due this week. Neither of which have been started very well. Bah, maybe they will be my reward for finishing bits. Come up with a thesis? Rip back what's already been knit. Write a page? Knit an inch. etc. Though, knowing me, I'd probably get distracted and just end up knitting the whole dang thing and not actually end up writing the stupid essay. Which would be bad. Grrr.....

I had to make room for the cupcakes!

I have started another Nautie, this time for Miranda's Birthday. It's red and black striped, will have a black face with red eyes and red tentacles. I'm pretty close to being done. Renee's Kate is just missing ears. The monkey bag needs seaming. The chocolate mittens need ends and thumbs. The list goes on.
However, in a very productive way, here are some of the 38 mini cupcakes I made today. Of which only 7 remain. mmmmmm, cupcakes.

combat baby

Today I saw Metric, one of my favorite bands ever. And it was free. The university has a band night every year and this year Metric headlined. Last year it was K-os, but I didn't make it out to that. It was so fecking amazing, you wouldn't believe it. I had so much fun! I danced on the edges for a while, and then my friend and I went into the middle. We got pretty trampled. She was forced down at one point, which wasn't so cool, so she left. I stayed on and luckily got a helping hand from some random guys who grabbed my arms everytime the mosh came by to stop me from being completely bowled over. I had to leave after one of the frosh on my floor got accidentally punched in the face and the stomach, but she was okay in the end. Altogether it was a sweaty mess, but it was spectacular. They played all their best songs and everyone just rocked out. I've decided I need to add straps to my little ballet flats because they kept slipping off, but that's just an excuse to go to Mokuba... woot!

I got in an argument with my friend Peter, who said that The Postal Service sounds like Dashboard Confessional, then realised he meant Death Cab for Cutie. Which was horrifying enough, but then he said they were just another winey emo band. I may have to ignore him for a while. The Postal Service are not winey.

This will be the first of many short posts to come. That dancing injury of mine decided to stop being sprained and started being fractured, so I have a cast now. I'm going to be majorly increasing my left handed knitting skills. bah! I've also got four classes this term that are all going to be pretty wordy, in the reading and writing department. A little difficult since my thumb is encased in the cast too. Bugger all.

Frosh Week!

It's frosh week over here chez moi. I am moved into res (mostly). The sweater only lacks a hood, one button band and some buttons. Due to an unfortunate dancing injury I have sprained my right thumb. Vair sad, but no knitting for me for now. Must dance more!


See y'all at the end of the week!

Boxes, Boxes everywhere.

Isn't it amazing all the little places that yarn can build up? It finds ways to hide behind boxes and piles of laundry, behind stacks of magazines, in the bottom of bins. I've been packing up my room since Monday and I just keep finding it. I've got a huge bin under my bed of yarn, but there's at least a ball of yarn in each of the 6 boxes I've packed since I started. Only the duffel bag of shoes has been spared from yarn. Ummm, yeah. I do have a duffel bag of shoes. This years estimate is probably about 15 pairs. In my defence, some of them are boots, and that includes heels. You can never have enough heels, since they are all different. The scarier thing is that I have far more that aren't coming with me. But this is a post about stash, not shoes. Though maybe that's why they've sneeked in unanounced, I've got a very visible shoe stash.

Weddings and hey, it's my dinner on the ground!

So my stupidity reared it's really ugly head on Friday night. A friend was having a party at his house, so I was discussing my curfew with my mom. I said 3am, she said 1am. We argued a lot. I got to the party and just drank way to much way to fast. I got home at 2am and puked my brains out until 3:30am. Very very very stupid. Made even stupider by the fact that my cousin got married on Saturday. I was fine all day until about 11, when I just got really nauseus. I was okay until 1:30 when I demanded that my dad pull over in the car so that I could dispense the contents of my stomach on the road. That method actually worked better than the bathroom, since there's way less clean up.

But hey, this is a knitting blog! So no more talk of loosing my cookies. The wedding was lots of fun. It was held in my Aunt and Uncle's crazy huge old house. The ceremony was held in the front part, which used to be a one room school house, and the reception was in the back, which is a massive addition. I'm kind of the odd cousin out with all the cousin's my age, made even more apparent by the fact that they were all bridesmaids and wore black, and I was wearing powder blue. My mom suggested that I just wear my black dress, but I knew they would all be in black, and I refuse to be the same as them. Not that there's anything wrong with them, but I have a reputation to keep up!

There was a brunch today for everyone, so I brought along my sweater to work on. The father of the groom was taking pictures of me knitting and talking to other people. He thought it was a hoot that I was able to not look at what I was doing. One of my Aunts asked me if I could give her knitting lessons, and the Aunt who's house I was at said that there was a whole stash of yarn from her recently deceased mother-in-law, and that she would put in a bid to give it to me. Apparently there's some mohair in there. My mom said that it would be good to give to me in order to keep down my school year expenses. Which is very true.

I knit a few inches on the first sleeve of the sweater, but I ripped it all out when I got home. It was all too big. I had to do some decreases at the beginning. It's going along well now. I've realised that in order for this to be finished by Sunday (ahem, so not happening) I need to finish the first sleeve tomorrow. I also need buttons, which maybe can happen on Thursday morning. Bah, so much to work on! Tomorrow evening is going to be devoted to packing. Otherwise I may not get it all done.

Monkeys monkeys everywhere

I went to the Stitch 'n Bitch again today, very fun. There were about half the amount of people that there were last week, but it was still cool. I've got about 2 inches of ribbing left on the body before I move onto the sleeves. I'm almost there! Victory will be mine....

I've almost finished the second strap of the monkey back-pack. However, I was sitting around and realised that a monkey back-pack would be perfect for being a Frosh Boss. But green does not go with my pink sparkly princess cowboy hat, what I really need is a pink monkey back-pack. I think that I may be insane, but I may try and knit one for next week. And knit my sweater. The thing about the sweater is that I can't take it anywhere unless I know that I'll have a good half hour to work on it. The monkey back-pack can be knit anywhere since it's mostly just stockinette. I'll just give the one I'm making now to one of my cousins, they'd love it. The even brillianter thing is that I already have all the necessary colours for the monkey bits, all I need to get is the pink. Perfect, it will be done. I think I can get to Romni's on Friday.

I ordered the colour cards from KnitPicks, vair exciting. I'll be knitting that pullover in no time. After I finish a bunch of other things first, I should finish my chocolate mittens, since they're out of the same colours as the monkey face.

I got a new haircut yesterday, so I'm enjoying the amazing feel of my silky hair. I don't know how much I like it. It's a good cut, but I'm not sure if it's me. We'll just have to see how it washes tomorrow. It's a bunch shorter than it was, and I may have to learn how to do the whole flat iron thing. Also have to pick up hair dye for the red. Woot! 8 days and I move into res, I need to find boxes.

Bunny Knits

Today I taught the girl how to knit. She actually picked it up pretty quickly, and is totally into it. The day had a lot of NatalieNatalieNatalieNATALIE!!! screaming while she yelled for me to help her with a slipped stitch or having just forgotten what she was supposed to do. At one point she was sitting there complaining and whining that she had no idea what she was doing, all while knitting perfectly fine. And everytime anything went wrong she would sit and call her needles stupid, which I find amusing. In order for her to remember what she was doing I told her a little phrase to say while she knit. I'm pretty sure that the same thing has been said all over the place and has existed forever, but it was what I thought of when I showed her. It was:

In the Bunny hole (for picking up the first stitch)
Around the bunny ear (for throwing the yarn around the needle)
Back out the bunny hole (for pulling the new stitch through)
Running away (for pulling the stitch off the left hand needle)
I just told her to say that to herself over and over again, so that she wouldn't forget what to do next.

In the morning the boycousin was sitting watching the girl and I knit and he said that one of the reasons that he doesn't get people who knit is that he doesn't understand how knitting works, how the fabric is created. So I explained that it is just loops on top of loops, and that knitting in the round is just one big spiral. It seemed to have helped him understand because later in the day the girl and I came downstairs and found the boycousin sitting staring at the girls bright pink rag that she had abandoned mid row and asked her to show him what to do. Which greatly amused her. There was the, "no let me do it", and "you're doing it wrong!" Very funny. He insisted on finishing the row, much to her chagrin. I'm going to bring the ball of black yarn I have, and see if I have some other big needles, and see if he'll go for it. He swore he won't knit, can't see the draw in knitting all day and would only see the amusement for rainy days, which today was. Besides, he doesn't wear scarves. Well only when he skis. But he does have a black knit hat that it would match....

We'll have to see what happens. We may make a convert of him yet.

In my own knitting news, the sock is a few rows and a cast-off from completion. I'm almost done the first strap of the back-pack. I'm making it 17 inches long instead of 16, since the 16 just looks just so tiny. I've started to knit the ribbing on my sweater, only 4.25 inches left! I don't think I'm going to double up the ribbing on this one, a total of 30 inches of ribbing may kill me (again). I'm also thinking of attaching yarn for one of the sleeves before I finish the body ribbing, just to break the monotony. I'm going to see how much I can get through today, since I told the girl that I would bring the sweater in to show her tomorrow and don't really fancy carrying around too many balls of yarn.

Slow slow knitting

Well today saw me being a bit slugish. I think it might have been from the sushi outing with Mira and Griffin last night, but hopefully not. I'm not nauseus, but there is some odd stomach crampyness. Despite feeling slow, I did knit about five inches on my Punk-Ass Skully Sweater. I brought it to the Stitch 'n Bitch on Wednesday, and with this coolish weather I really want to have it done soon. Like by Frosh Week. Which is in two weeks. I only have to do five inches on the body, and then the arms, and the hood, and the button band, and the pockets. Totally do-able. I mean people did more in 16 days for the Olympics.


I also have been trying to finish up some projects. I have an inch and a half left on my Secret Pal socks, and then they're all done. Today's sluggishness just means that they've been going nowhere. I started the second Chocolate Mitten, which has been going very quickly. I also did a few rows on the first strap of the Monkey back-pack from the Stitch 'n Bitch book. I think that will be relegated to subway knitting once my sock is done. I can't really transport my sweater because it's knit all in one piece, and it's pretty big. Plus it's a little difficult to just pull out for a few rows when the kids are quiet for a few minutes.

Tomorrow should have a fair amount of knitting time, since I bought needles and am going to bring some pink acrylic from my stash to teach the girl how to knit. I need something to keep her occupied for my last 7-8 days of work. I'm hoping for seven, but it all depends on when they go up to the cottage this weekend. It will probably be at least seven and a half. Other thing to make the week more enjoyable is the presence of the boycousin, who is my age, and with whom my employers were going to set me up with last summer. It makes the day go by so much more quickly when you've got another adult to talk to, instead of vaguely complaining to the baby, who can't talk back. The girl is also a lot less annoying since boycousin is her way cool older cousin, and while he and I are the same age, he doesn't tell her what not to do all the time. So in general, she's a lot less complainey.

In knitted news, I really really want to knit the Fair Isle U-Neck Pullover, from this issue of Vogue Knitting. I think my best bet for yarn is KnitPicks Telemark, but I'm going to get a colour card to see which colours will work best for substitutions. I'm also going to get a card for Wool of the Andes to knit the Hooded Jacket from Vogue Knitting Holiday 2005, which is gorgeous. I can't wait!

North and South

I just watched the BBC miniseries North and South with my friend Claire. Well Claire and Kim came over on Tuesday and we watched the first three episodes, but we didn't have time for the forth, so Claire came over to finish it today. I think I almost died. It was so good, I could feel my heart break at the end. It sounds really sappy, but it's spectacular. It was amazing. We had to watch the end twice, and it was even better the second time. Mr Thorton now joins the ranks of Mr Darcy in my love of period drama heros. Yes, he's that good.

I also watched The Devil Wears Prada last night with my parents, which has given my mom and I the sudden urge to go out and buy purses.

I must go to Lettuce Knit, and the maybe to a bookstore to find the book of North and South.

Lettuce Knit Stitch and Bitch

Well I finally made it out to the Stitch and Bitch. I had been meaning to all summer, but I finally just did it yesterday. It was muchly fun. I talked to a girl named Zoe (who really has umlauts on her name, but my computer skills are less than that.) and Michelle, who was working on her 2nd Pomotomus sock, which matched the t-shirt I was wearing. Hot pink was a popular colour, there was some yarn, a suitcase and a guy (plus me and the socks). Very cool.
When I arrived I had enough time locking up my bike to calm myself down from the fact that there were knitters there whose blogs I read. Like YarnHarlot, Michelle, and Denny (who may have been quite drunk.) I had difficulty with my lock, so by the time I was ready, I had fully composed myself. I really wish I had a digital camera, then I could have taken pictures of everone, but I do not, so I could not. Perhaps I will hint at one for Chirstmas.
The Secret Pal socks are almost done, I just have a few inches on the ankle of the second. I think I'm going to nominate August to be finishing month, and try to have some FO's for my blogging. I have quite a few that will actually be usefull in the coming months. Plus I have to move into Res in two weeks, so I don't want to take anything up that isn't imediately needed. Like mittens. If they are finished they can wait at home until winter, but if they aren't then they will need to come along so that they can be finished. Plus finishing things is an excuse to start new things!

Secret Pal, Michigan, and the Transformers

I got a package from my secret pal! I actually got it on Thursday, but haven't had access to the interweb since then. We went to my grandma's in Michigan, I thought the computer would spontaneously (I know that is spelt wrong, and yet cannot fathom how it would be spelt correctly) combust just trying to read my email, so I didn't try anything more. It was an excellent package though. A ball of blue Fleece Artist sock yarn, that has alread been made into a sock, with the second sock about to be started. Two pairs of needles, one 2.5, so that I could knit socks without worrying about my Waiting for Robin Socks, and 2.75 because I didn't have any of those. A box of Laura Secord chocolates because I said that I wanted to eat chocolate when Trevor left for camp. A bottle of vanilla perfume from the Body Shop. I think that was all of it, but I have a feeling that I'm missing something. The box of chocolates had a little teddy tied to it. I'm very excited about the socks. I have decided that short row toes fit me best, the other ones I have been doing are more pointy than my toes actually are.
It was lots of fun to go away for the weekend though. We went to my grandparents house in Michigan, though they were in Oregon visiting my uncle. It looks like they're going to be stuck there for a while. My grandpa has a bloodclot in his leg and some little ones in his lungs from the plane ride, and has been hospitalised. He'll be fine, but they're nervous about him travelling again and having the same thing happen. That's my tangent. The reason we went down to their house is that my aunt lives in Chicago and so she and her husband and my little cousins met us there. It was the only way we would have been able to see them. My cousin's are 4 and 5, and very cute. My other cousin Josh is from Rochester, so he took the bus to our house on Wednesday, and then went with us. He is 17 and my brother is 15, they tried to convince my little cousin's that their names were Megatron and Optimus Prime (as in Transformers). The five year old kept calling my brother Madison. To be fair, they are fairly tricky names to pronounce, especially when you still say things like "chlocolate".

Babysitting Blues

I'm posting this while at work. I probably shouldn't, but the baby is asleep and the girl has a friend over, so I've got a quiet moment to do this. I had to bring my computer along anyway to figure out my courses for next year. The kids are driving me up the wall. I am not going to babbysit next year. Luckily they'll be getting a regular nanny for September, so I don't have to worry about letting them down. I just need a change of pace, I've been looking after kids since I was 15, and it never really changes. Plus the isolation is really annoying. If these were actually my kids, I wouldn't feel bad about going out and doing my own errands, or meeting up with friends, or having people over. But because I'm working, I need to be totally focused on the family I work for's needs. Well that's a little ranty. I just can't belive that I still have three and a half weeks left to go for working. I may explode.
I finished my Waiting for Robin sock on the plane on the way back. I did it toe up, with a 10x2 knit purl rib in Fleece Artist Merino. The colourway is all blue and green, witha a bit of purple. It was my first time doing toe up, short row heels and toes. I think that it was pretty successfull. The only question now is whether or not I want to finish the next one now, or wait until next year when I'll have to wait for Robin again. Hmm decisions. I might just finish them here and then bring them along to show!
Next year I will be taking over the t-shirt organizing. It just got way to crazy for it's own good this year. Mostly because Robin is just far to busy doing everything else to worry about the t-shirts. It almost didn't get finished! Luckily Danny worked his butt off and we got everything that absolutely had to get finished done. But there were some paying jobs that would have been good to finish if we had had the time. It's the sort of job that I can organize from here, and have all ready to start once I get there. Very excellent.
I'm making a scrapbook of my pictures from this year, I'll post some of the interesting pictures/pages once I'm done. I ran out of photo corners last night, and I need some better glue. I wrote in a journal all while I was there, so I'm going to copy that into the book where it fits.

Well the socks I am knitting have gone from Travelling Socks, to the Waiting for Robin Socks. Every time I have nothing to do, which generally has something to do with Robin being on the phone, or being slow, or having dissapeared, I knit on my socks. I just turned the heel this afternoon, and I imagine that I will have a lot to time this evening yet. I may finishe the first one tonight.
I did learn how to clean a screen, which was excellent because it involved the pressure washer. It was even more stinking hot today than yesterday, so it was really the best job ever. Early in the morning I counted and sorted out 300 shirts. And we went swimming today. That was definentaly a highlight. And if Danny is silkscreening tonight, I may actually get to do something... yay!

Cricket and socks

Renee said that I should knit things for myself to represent people. My god, brilliance! I am doing that sort of. The sock yarn I dyed before I got here is my Truck yarn. The website is pink and blue, so the sock will be pink and blue. I was going to start them as soon as I got here, but I think I'm going to see if I can just do them in the weekend. I'm only going to be able to do little footie things I think, because I only dyed one skein of yarn.
Not much is going on here right now. Joe and Chris are playing cricket. I watched for a bit, but it's really hot and extremely dull, so I left halfway through. They won't be done for a few hours yet. Edmund and Deborah (the parents) have left to go for tea at a friend's house, and Robin is at a wedding. I might go back to the cricket match later, when it cools down and knit a bit. Only Joe is playing, so I can bug Chris to explain what's going on. One of the annoying things about being in England is that everyone assumes that I'm American, even though I'm not. But they assume because I sound like I'm American. Then when they find out that I'm Canadian, they inevitably ask if I say aboot. I don't know that I've actually ever met anyone that says aboot. It's a completely unfounded steriotype. Bloody Hell. Anyway, that's the end of my rant. I'm going to start my Fleece Artist socks. I might have to surf around to find a pattern to do them in. I don't know if I want to do the standard one that's printed on the back.

I'm in England!

Well I've been here since Wednesday, I wish I lived here. Everything is so old and saturated in history. I stayed in a hostel for two nights, and met some really cool people. Two girls, one from Australia, the other from NewZeland, and a guy from Malaysia. The girls are going to be travelling for about two years by the sound of it. They have working visas for England, so they'll work, then travel around for a few months, the work again. One of the girls might come to Toronto, which is super cool. Today I went to Picadilly Circus, Oxford Circus, and Covenant Gardens. All of which were cool. Oh, but holy crap were there a lot of people. I mean I thought that Toronto could get busy, but not half as busy as London. There were just thousands of people walking and talking and jaywalking and shopping. It was just endless. The people were everywhere.

In knitting news.... I started an i-pod case for myself, but it's too big, so I'll just have to felt it a bit. And I knit a headband for Katy, one of the people I'm staying with. I just have 12 inches of i-cord to go, but she doesnt' arrive for a few days, so I'm alright. I love the pattern though. I might make myself one at some point. I also bought some Fleece Artist sock yarn to work on, and I have my hand dyed stuff too. It should all keep me knitting for a while.

Earl Rowe Camping

I went camping this weekend with the family. We did absolutely nothing at all. It's the first time in a while that my mom has come with us, normally she passes. It's not to say that she hasn't camped, because she has and under the worst conditions at that. She just likes being able to shower, and not have to sleep on the ground. We went to Earl Rowe, which is about an hour away, it was very nice. Small, but with decent enough tree coverage in most of it. My mom read a book, my brother read about two Harry Potters, I knit 1.5 repeats of my Pomotamus scarf, and read half of Love Detectives The Complete Quin and Satterthwaite, by Agatha Cristie.

It took awhile to figure out just how exactly to change the pattern so that it goes back and forth instead of around and around, but I finally got it. And I think that it looks pretty good.

On Thursday I took my first hand at dying yarn. I used a blue and a pink Kool-Aid and made it all stripey. In the end I only had enough for one skein. Maybe I'll get another two packs and dye it in England. I won't have time for it to dry and all while I'm here. I'm very excited about going! I picked pink and blue because those are the main colours of the website for the festival that I'll be going to and helping out with. truck festival.

And today will tell the out come for the world cup. Personally I'm rooting for France.

Well those photo's never happened. However, most of the fabrics are little prints in blues. Very cute. I really should make something out of those. I think I want to make a bag for when I got to England in a week and a bit. I'm so very very excited. In the words of Renee, Whoop-di-whoop!

So I turned 19 a few weeks ago, and so I finally had a party last night. I haven't had a party in a few years becuase my birthday is exactly during the exam period in high-school, however now everyone is solidly out of school. Not everyone could come, like Miranda, Andrea and Renee, who live in Kingston, Bowmanville and Welland respectively. Their prexence was sorely missed.

Some Uni people did come though, Peter, Sam, Felix and Kim. Claire couldn't come either since she was working. Which was annoying since she and Kim are almost exactly the same intrests wise, but they have yet to actually meet eachother. When they came to visit up at York, Kim was at Sheridan all day. It's actually very annoying.

The party was a complete sucess and was very much fun, just a bunch of us hanging out in my backyard for about 8 hours. We went to the park a few times, and became the teenagers my parents used to warn me about. Which makes me laugh, because I'm certain that those teenagers weren't the sketchy kids my mom always made them out to be, doing drugs and the like. Well some of them might have been, but not all of them.

I didn't get any fibery presents, but I got something just as good. Peter wrote me a song called My Best Friend's Girlfriend, all about what I would be like as a robot. It is halarious and brilliant. Definentally the best gift of the evening. I've already listened to it about 5 times. I must find a way to send it to Trevor, who has left for the whole summer. Man am I going to miss him. *le sigh* Oh well, fiber is my friend, I'll just knit the whole summer.

I started the Pomotomus sock, however I started it on 2.5mm's instead of 2.75mm's becuase I don't have any 2.75mm's. I didn't swatch either, I just went for it. It's to small of course. However my mom had a fantastic idea to turn them into really dainty gauntlets. It's been a bit complicated figuring out the math, but I'm getting there. I'm already at the gusset for the thumb, and it's only been about three days.

I ran out of white yarn for my Punk-Ass Skullie sweater, so that's at a dilema. I'm almost done the image now. I'm about 5 inches down from the armpit. I don't think I'll get it finished by the time I go to England though since I leave in about 10 days. No point in creating undue stress, There's no way I'm going to get it finished. so no point in trying.

Well my cousin is visiting from the States for the weekend. Or maybe for the week, I don't actually know. I just asked, he's leaving on Tuesday. Cool.

HAPPY CANADA DAY!!!!!! Now go out to your backyard, crack open a beer, and celebrate this wonderful country. Have a fantastic long weekend.

The Black Vortex of Purls

I'm about 5 rows before splitting off the sleeves and working on the body of my sweater. Let me tell you (as I'm sure you already know), it's the purl rows that get to you. In the knit rows at least you have to look for the m1's, but in the purl rows it's just endless. I'm doing the image on the back fair isle, which means.... purling fair isle. Which just really doesn't help me not liking the purl rows to start with. At this point I think I have about 350 sts on the needle, and I still have another 32 to add in. It makes progress very hard to see.

My SP asked in the comments about what fabric I like/use. On Wednesday I'm going to go all photo-styles on y'all and take pictures of fabric and some FO's. My Branching Out scarf is all done, and maybe my Jaywalkers will be done, since I can't work on my sweater on the subway very well.

Does anyone know if Kool-Aid dying stains the pot you use? I want to try it, but I don't want to take my chances with my mom's fancy pasta pot. I also don't have a microwave, so I have to do stovetop. Any help would be great!

Love is knitting a sweater twice.

So today is Father's Day. And my 19th birthday. The odvious solution to this clash of festivities was for my dad and I to go out for beers together, which was much fun. I really need to do that more often. He has to travel a lot for his work, and with me at uni, we aren't always home at the same time. He came up to York a few times during the year and took me out for dinner, but we have yet to find a good place to go. The off campus choices are Kelseys and Eastside Mario's. Thrilling I know. We went to Paupers Pub on Bloor St and sat on the patio. I wanted to sit on the rooftop patio, but only the ground floor was open.

I have discovered that either my boyfriend knows me very well, or I'm really easy to read, because Trevor got me the perfect gift. 1m of white crinkly fabric, 2m of teal paisley fabric, three balls of yarn, big dangly blue earings and a candle. The perfect crafty-ness. He leaves to work at an overnight camp near Haliburton on Saturday for the whole summer, so now I can make something and think of him. I think a skirt with the paisley and a shirt with the white.

My mom gave me the Stitch 'n Bitch knitter's diary, which is very cool. It has everything. It's perfect for travelling because it has a whole reference section at the back of techniques. Which is good for when you just need to know one thing, but don't want to lug around the entire regular book.

I also recieved some other stuff, but it's not as crafty, so not as interesting. Except for the pastel set my aunt gave me. It has a sketchbook, 8 oil pastels and a 144 page information and technique book. Very cool. I've never really used pastel, so now I can work on that.

In actual knitting news, I've started my World Cup project on Thursday. It's a few days late, but I'm giving myself an extra day and a bit to work on it. My deadline is the 11th of July, instead of the 9th. I'm re-kitting my skullie sweater. Oh don't make that face! I had a few issues with it that really bugged me, even though I loved the thing. I'm using a smaller gauge, which means that I had to do math to figure everything out. I'm almost to the point where I section off the sleeves, so we won't know if my math is right until then. I also wanted a bit more fabric in the back section, and I'm doing m1 increases instead of yo. I'm hoping it goes well.

Happy Fathers Day to everyone, I hope it was crafty. Or you know, not. Whatever floats your boat really.

Finishing

So I have decided that I must finish some projects before I start the Pomotamus socks. I'm almost done the Jaywalker socks, I only need about an inch more and then the toe on one, and I think I'm going to rip the toe back on the other one and add another centimetre in length. They were a bit short when I tried them on last. Luckily I left a very long tail when I had to find the right spot to start the second one and have the stripes match, so I can just continue with that. I'm also going to finish my Branching Out scarf, which only needs one more repeat and blocking. I may just leave it unblocked though, it looks very nice just the way it is.

yummy yarn

My Grandparents arrived today, for my cousin's grade 6 graduation. With them came my e-bay yarn! Woot. It is sitting beside me... tempting me. I want to cast on, but I need my needles to finish my second Jaywalker sock. I think I'm going to make some Pomotomopus.

I turned the heel of the Jaywalker on Friday while waiting for Trevor and his friends to get out of a play. I was not in the theatre because I was late. This is an example of how knitting saved my sanity. If I hadn't happened to have thrown it into my bag at the last minute, then I would have gone simply batty waiting for two hours in the lobby all by myself.

I also finished all the knitting parts of the Nautie for Mira. In the end I only knit three tenticles and didn't give it eyes. It looks pretty cool, and has already been given to her. She totally knew what it was, even though everyone else was a little confused. However, I now have a massive bag of stuffing in my room. Apparently Fabricland only sells it in size massive. At first I was shocked, but then I realised that it was 50% off with my membership, so I think I won.

I also knit a chunk in the waiting room of the doctor's office before my appointment this morning. I'm still okay! hahahaha. I don't have to have another check up for a year. I also found out that I completely missed the freshman 15 (to gain 15 pounds and drop 15 % in grades) as I am only just over a pound heavier than last year. Which kicks ass. There was a woman in the waiting room with her husband who was very large. When she came back from being weighed by the nurse she said that she had stepped on the scale twice. The second time she was a full kilogram lighter because she had taken off her sweater. That is one heavy sweater.

Naughty Nautie

I have finally finished the i-pod case for my brother's friend. Thank God. That thing was starting to be the bane of my existance. I won't even try to photograph it or scan it or anything, it is the most butt ugly thing ever. I had to duplicate stitch wings on the top, but it made it really stiff. But I hope the guy likes it.

I started Nautie from this issue of Knitty for Mira's birthday. I'm doing it in Cotton instead of acrylic, since that's what I have. It's green and yellow Bernat that Meegwun gave me from his Aunt who used to crochet. I've almost finished the shell, only 8 more repeats left! However, I have run out of stuffing, so I'm going to go now and get some more. I must say, it's looking vair cool. I think I'm going to make a bunch of stuffed animals for the craft fair that I'm doing in August. I'm really sick of doing i-pod cases.


My brother just came in from school and said that the kid wants a different symbol on the front because the wings look like a bra when they are upside down. fucker. But he'll pay me 5 bucks more, so I'll do it at some point this weekend. If anyone ever asks me for another case, I'm only letting two colours.

Too Hot.

This heat has brought out all my summer skirts and dresses. Which I love love love wearing. I think in the summer I'll sew a lot more instead of knit, it's much cooler. Our sewing machines are in the basement, where it's nice and cool. I live in an old house where the only kind of air conditioning we could get is window units, and those don't do much for the overall house temperature. The house is too old to easily put in anything else. Plus our yard is small and we have nowhere to put that unit thing that goes outside. We survive with fans. The heat has completely killed my knitting spirit though, it's far too hot for wool. I think I may knit a cotton shawl for the knitting world cup, which starts in 10 days, and runs for a month. I must participate!

My Butt hurts ... a lot.

I just went on the most brutal bike ride of my life. We biked for 12km along the waterfront, all the way to past Jane subway station. That was sort of bad, but bearably. Then my dad decided that it would be faster and easier to bike along the Humber River trail. It wasn't. There are some really brutal hills there that he runs up when he does hill training for triathalons. Holy crap does my butt hurt. We ended up biking for about 27 km total. Holy macaroni struedel Batman, I hope I don't have to do that again for a very long time. I think I'll watch TV tonight, and knit something for me instead of all the stuff I should do for other people. I deserve it!

oh crap.

So I finally went to Romni's today and bought the blue yarn I needed for the I-pod case my brother's friend asked me to make. In the store I thought that it looked a bit purple, but I couldn't see anything bluer, and the label said Nordic Blue. I bought it and chalked it up the the lighting. I went to my friend Claire's house and knit through four episodes of The OC on DVD. I got home and pulled it out to show my brother for approval. I said I know it's a bit purple-y, but ... he said that he thought it was pretty purple, but shrugged it off. So I went up to my room and pulled out the yarn that I had bought a few weeks ago, just to compare. Well you know that ball of yarn that didn't have a ball band? That decidedly purple ball of yarn? Well turns out that it's the same colour. Suddenly purple is the new blue. So tomorrow I'm going to go back and try to find something that is actually blue. I'm really not in a purple mood right now because I found the other balls I had bought and I am really not digging the Purple Splendor either. I'll keep the Nordic Blue that I already started, it's not a bad colour, but I don't need two balls. These i-pod cases take very little yarn, and I can't imagine knitting enough to neccitate two balls of almost blue yarn. Bah. I was so looking forward to being done with this. Oh well. I'll just have to deal.

Pomatomus and movies

Well I didn't knit much this weekend since Trevor was over. I did finish the cuff of the second Jaywalker while waiting for him at the train station, but then realised that I was knitting it on 2.5 mm instead of 2.25, so I'll have to start again. I didn't feel like ripping it out right then, so I just kept knitting on it. I needed something to do!

I bid on some e-bay yarn on thursday and won. 10 balls of gorgeous blue and red verigated fingering weight wool. I don't know exactly what I'll do with 10 balls of sockweight, but I'm sure I'll figure something out. I think I'll knit some socks for my grandma, since they're being sent to her house in the States, and maybe some for my mom, who has been admiring my Jaywalker. And maybe some Pomatomus for me.

Everyone is knitting Pomatomus right now. I think it's like the next Jaywalker craze. A new sock craze. Socks are perfect for knitting crazes because it doesn't take that long to knit them, so you can actually finish it within the craze time. A sweater craze would just take too long. Plus socks look good on everyone, sweaters : not so much.

This weekend was so dreary that we did nothing but watch movies. The Terminal, Lost in Translation, Forrest Gump and You've Got Mail. I cried for Forrest Gump, I had never seen it before. Actually of the four movies, I had only seen The Terminal before, Trevor had only seen Forrest Gump and You've Got Mail. We got to take three movies off our must see movie list. (Yes there is a physical list, we made it in October with plans to watch all 130 movie that year. That objective was quickly changed to before we graduate. I think we've watched about 30 so far.)

Marks and Egg

I found out my marks today! Woop-dee-woop! Natalie le wins. I have a 6.50 GPA. Keep in mind that York grades out of 9 for some completely rediculous reason. I don't really understand why, but they do. I only did a little shitty in Anatomy, but I wasn't expecting brilliance. I think I finished the final exam in about 25 minutes. Hey, it was multiple choice. It is nice to finally know how every turned out though, and that I did pretty well.

Now I just have to figure out my schedule for next year. I ploted out all the classes I want to take a few weeks ago, and I only had classes on Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. I really want to have more spaced out classes this year, so as to avoid the day of hell that I had last year. Maybe I'll do that now. It's not like I have to work tomorrow or anything!

I knit my friend Andrew an i-pod case. It looks the same as my brothers, except that there is an egg in the middle instead of the skullie. I did an egg because that is Andrew's nick name. He is very white (blond hair, blue eyes, pale skin) but loves everything Asian (he's leaving on Saturday to go to China on an exchange class for a month). So he's white on the outside and yellow on the inside, Andrew Egg! There were a bunch of Andrew's this year anyways, so we needed a way to keep them all apart. Egg just stuck.

I cast on for the second Jaywalker, but I really need to get another ball of Nature Spun in Blue to make an i-pod case for a friend of my brothers. This time though, I'm getting moulah! I win ... again.

The Questionaire

Dear Secret Pal,

This is my first time participating in a big swap like this, but I had a lot of fun with the pirate booty swap, so I'm excited. Here are my answers to the quiz! I'm glad I heard from you!

1. What is/are your favorite yarn/s to knit with? What fibers do you absolutely *not* like?
I'm not much of a yarn snob in terms of content, it mostly just has to be soft. If it's squeekey or scratchy or looks like that shreded plastic stuff you get in easter baskets then I probably won't like it.

2. What do you use to store your needles/hooks in?
I have a needle case that my grandmother made for all my straights and longer dpns. I store all my shorter dpns, circulars, crochet hooks and notions in a make-up case which I carry with me every where. I don't know why I feel it's neccessary to carry needles around that have nothing to do with my current project, but I do. You never know when you're going to buy some yarn and need to cast on right away!

3. How long have you been knitting? Would you consider your skill level to be beginner, intermediate or advanced?
I learned the baisics when I was about 7 from my mom, knit for a while and then lost interest. In grade 10 (which was 4 years ago) I decided to knit myself a pair of leg warmers, so went with my mom to the LYS and taught myself how to knit in the round and have taught myself since then. I would say I'm an Intermediate knitter.

4. Do you have an Amazon or other online wish list?
I do have an Amazon wish list. I'll send you the email I use for it if you ask for it.

5. What's your favorite scent? (for candles, bath products etc.)
I'm not very picky about scents. Strawberry and Vanilla are good bets though. Nothing to oppressive.

6. Do you have a sweet tooth? Favorite candy?
Do I ever! I like a lot of stuff, I'm not very picky. I like any of those sour gummy things, in any flavor. I love going to candy stores and making a huge bag of candies with 3 or 4 from like 25 different bins. That way you never know what you're going to find!

7. What other crafts or Do-It-Yourself things do you like to do? Do you spin?
I like drawing and sewing. I would like to learn to spin, but haven't gotten around to it. I'm also going to start scrapbooking my travels this summer, and make a big book of what I've done. I'm going to try and do much more art this summer than before.

8. What kind of music do you like? Can your computer/stereo play MP3s? (if your buddy wants to make you a CD)
I love music and my taste isn't too specific. My favorite bands are currently The Postal Service, The Stars, Metric, Missy Higgins, Death Cab for Cutie and Garbage. I also listen to some pretty obscure British bands, like Trademark and The Schla La La's. I have a random soft spot for Ashlee Simpson, Jesse McCartney, Aqua and Prozzac. One of my favorite CD's is the Moulin Rouge soundtrack. I'm currently listening to Cyndi Lauper and Madonna. Make me a CD of everything, you never know. Yes my computer and my CD player play MP3s, though that doesn't really matter anyways.

9. What's your favorite color? Or--do you have a color family/season/palette you prefer? Any colors you just can't stand?
I love blues and purples, most of my yarn and clothes are blue. I try to branch out, but I'm just drawn to those colours. The only colours I'm really picky about are orange and really bright greens. But everything else is welcome.

10. What is your family situation? Do you have any pets?
I am currently living with my parents and younger brother. During the school year (September to April) I live in a dorm at York University.

11. Do you wear scarves, hats, mittens or ponchos?
I wear scarves, hats and mittens. I have knit a poncho, but I don't wear it very often and I don't think that I would wear a second. Plus I'm a little undecided on their attractiveness.

12. What is/are your favorite item/s to knit?
I have yet to discover it.

13. What are you knitting right now?
The monkey bag from Stitch 'n Bitch, and i-pod cozy, a sock, a scarf... other things I've forgotten about.

14. Do you like to receive handmade gifts?
I do.

15. Do you prefer straight or circular needles? Bamboo, aluminum, plastic?
I like circular needles for their versatility, but I don't mind what material they're made over. I think that bamboo works best for socks though.

16. Do you own a yarn winder and/or swift?
I own neither.

17. How did you learn to knit?
My mother taught me the basics and then I taught myself the rest from books and online.

18. How old is your oldest UFO?
I think it's 8 months old. I have only just started having more than one project on the go at once recently.

19. What is your favorite holiday?
Halloween.

20. Is there anything that you collect?
Only what I find interesting.

21. Any books, yarns, needles or patterns out there you are dying to get your hands on? What knitting magazine subscriptions do you have?
I don't have any subscriptions, but I have been buying Vouge Knitting off the shelves recently. I would really like A Gathering of Lace to make a shawl for my grandmother, any of the yarnharlot books and the Bazzar Bizzare books.

22. Are there any new techniques you'd like to learn?
I would love to learn to spin, and do the kitchener stitch properly.

23. Are you a sock knitter? What are your foot measurements?
I am a new sock knitter. My foot it 9" long and are a bit wide. I generally wear a 7 and a half or 8 shoe. More consistantly and 8 though.

24. When is your birthday? (mm/dd)
My birthday is June 18 and I will be legal! (hahahahaha! Natalie wins!) This is by Canadian terms though.


I hope that this was usefull, if you have any more questions fell free to ask. I look forward to hearing from you.

Natalie

I have returned!

I am back from Moncton, which is a lovely town, where I met some very cool people and witnessed them plan some amazing ... plans. I was however, looking after a not so happy baby. Who decided he didn't like being in an alien hotel room with someone he didn't know very well after having not slept very much. Which ment that he cried ... for two days. Which made me cry ... but only for a few minutes while on the phone to my mom while I freaked out about my baby calming inadequecies. bah. The whole thing about the freak-outs is that he is entitled to them and while they were insanely stressfull, I could understand them. It's impossible to explain to a baby that Mommy will be back soon and that everything will be okay. We survived.

It was a fun trip though, baby freak-outs aside. Moncton is pretty cool, and will be even more cool once these people are done with it. The whole trip was to start planning how to revitalise the downtown. It will be possums. It made me think that maybe being an urban planner wouldn't be such a bad office job. The woman I went with works her butt off all the time, but she's making a difference and changing things. I may go again in June, but we will have to see.

In knitting news, I have knit about an inch past the heel on my Jaywalker. I'm liking it a lot, though I can see what everyone says about them not being very stretchy. I had my progress impeeded at one point yesterday when one of my 2.25mm bamboo dpn's snapped clean in half. I considered tapeing it back together, but I didn't have any tape, and that's a bit ghetto. So I used my 2.25 mm circular needle. Until I remembered that metal knitting needles and the plane I had to take later that day would not mix. The Jaywalker pattern says to knit it using all five needles, so to use four I had to put half the stitches onto one needle. I didn't want to split up the stitches any more for fear of completely messing up the pattern in my head. Luckily I was at the heel portion, so it didn't really matter. I knit the whole heel on the plane, and a bit extra. I ripped the extra bit out when I got home though, since it had issues. I also transfered all the heel stitches to the circular. I really like knitting like this. I may have to get a second 2.25mm circular and do socks on two circulars. It goes so much faster on metal than with bamboo.

I'm going to get some Lorna's Laces on Tuesday or Wednesday. And I think I may try and get to the Lettuce Knit S'nB this week, if it's happening. I need to get myself out of the house more. Maybe I'll see some of you there!

A picture post for you all and the debut of Legs

So in order of finishing we have:
The skullie I-pod case I knit for my brother while in California. Knit with Nature Spun sport weight in charchol and creme. It has a linning of blue cotton, I think it's Dale of Norway, but I've lost the band. I made it up mostly, but I took the basic idea from the We Call Them Pirates hat and mitten pattern by Hello Yarn. It rocks hardcore.

These were my plane knitting. They are super basic-nothing-really-added-or-fancy footie socks. I did a three needle bind off on the toes because I forgot how to do Kitchener and the last time i did it it was really fugly anyways, so this way is better for right now. They are being modelled by Legs. They are exact replicas of my own legs, only made of cling-wrap and clear packing tape. They will be my sock models forever more! Which means I have overcome the awkwardness that is photographing your own feet. Natalie wins!
This is my love for LewisCraft. Yes, I know they are going out of buisness, but right now that is part of the awesome. I got all that you see there for 13.02. More specifically 37 skeins of embroidery floss and 3 crochet hooks. I most certainly win... again!
This is my yarn haul for today. Three balls of Nature Spun sport weight in Purple Spendor, Navy Nite and... ambiguous as I seem to have grabbed a ball that is minus a ball band. Oh well. They will be used for more i-pod socks. The ball in front is Lana Grossa sock yarn, destined to be more socks. I'm thinking Jaywalkers or Pomotomopus (however you spell that). I'm going to save them to knit while flying to Moncton on Wednesday.

I also got A Gathering Of Lace, a collection of lace patterns. I think I'm going to try and knit a shawl for my grandmother from it. Her birthday is in late September, so I think I should be okay for time.

I hope everyone had an excellent weekend, and a better Monday. We are having some spectacular weather, so go take that knitting outside!

The Clothing Show finds

I went to the Clothing Show at the Automotive Building today. It was hella crowded. I kind of zoned out about an hour into being their, I may have been dehydrated. The only thing I could find to re-enrgize with was a chocolate and nut covered ice cream, not very helpful. I did find a very pretty blue print vintage sundress. I bought it without trying it on, but it fits really well. I thought that if it didn't fit I could at least use the fabric for something. I'm a little dissapointed that I won't be able to use it, but it is very cute, and I will probably get a lot of wear out of it on really hot days this summer.


In other news, I was wondering if anyone knew of any yarn shops in Moncton Newbrunswick. I will be going there next week and would really like to go to one. I know about the London-Wul Farm, but it's just outside the city. I don't know how to drive (and won't have access to a car anyways) and will be looking after a baby, so I would really like something more central. Maybe I'm just being a little naive, but I have a belief that every city or town must have at least one yarn shop. The knitters have to get yarn somewhere. So if you know of any yarns, or if you know for certain that London-Wul is my only option, or a way to get to London-Wul that won't drain my bank account, let me know!

Ramble-ey

Today I saw something that put a smile on my face. I was on the Go Train on my way home from visiting Trevor in Burlington. At one point the train must pass quite close to a grade school. There was a woman standing outside with about 20 kids in probably grade 2 or 3. They were all waving very energetically at the train. So I waved back. Almost instantly the woman started jumping up and down, I think she was laughing, and pointing in my direction to the kids. I couldn't help but smile. I guess I was the only person who waved to them.


I've caught start-itis. I can't seem to decide on what to knit. I finished the socks I knit in California, and put them on my mannequin legs to take pictures. I would have taken them, but my brother lost the connector cord for his digital, so no pictures for you. I also knit him a cozy for his i-pod, which is much better than his old one. It's black and white fair isle, with the skullie from the We Call Them Pirates hat and mittens I tried knitting a few months ago. I've also knit two other i-pod cozies, started a third and another pair of socks out of the same yarn. I think that I'll have to give the yarn a rest, I think I need something new.

I picked up the monkey bag from Stitch 'n Bitch again too. I've finished the front and back, and am half way done the gusset. I think on the weekend I'll look for some fabric for the lining, if I can squeeze it in.

If anyone is looking for a movie to watch I highly recommend Stay. It's got Ryan Gossling, Ewan McGregor and Naomi Watts. Oh man, it's one of those movies that grabs your brain, mixes it up and gives it back to you for you to figure out. It was all I could think about for about an hour afterwards. The cinematography is also amazing. It was an all over solid film. Go watch it now!

Spring Has Sprung

I was reading through my bloglines list, and I noticed that a lot of people have caught the creative spring bug. You know, that point where the weather warms up a bit, the flowers start blooming, the trees start... leafing. You just want to creat something, to grow and have something of your own bloom. The creative juices just start flowing.
I started working again today. I am babysitting a beautiful 7 month old boy, and his 6 year old sister. It'll be mostly Luis and I for a while, since Alexandra will be in school until June. I just have to pick her up from school at the end of the day. Luis is a wonder baby though, he plays by himself, laughs and babbles. He doesn't get very cranky or grumpy, he's mostly content. Which all makes my job so much more enjoyable. I'm looking forward to the summer.

Jane Austen fan club

I found this Jane Austen quiz via notanartist's blog. I love Jane Austen, and hey, Marianne Dashwood is pretty cool, if not a bit naive when it comes to character judgements.

You scored as Marianne Dashwood. Most girls can relate with Marianne on a more personal level than some of Austen's other characters. She represents the emotional longings and struggles that seem to attack and bless us at the same time. Loyal to a fault, passionate for experience and life, and a bit over-emotional, Marianne matures and grows (making her so beloved). Marianne Dashwood 66% Emma Woodhouse 63% Elizabeth Bennet 47% Jane Bennet 44% Elinor Dashwood 44% Charlotte Lucas 28% Lady Catherine 22% Which Jane Austen Character are You? created with QuizFarm.com

Note to self: Read more Jane Austen.

A remedy for lazyness....

Well I've gotten a bit behind now haven't I? This shall be fixed!
The sock saga went successfully, except that I ran out of yarn 3 inches from the end of the second sock. Blast! oh well. I went last weekend and bought a new ball of sock yarn, it's green and blue varegated cotton blend, with colour repeats of 4 rows each colour. I knit it on the plane to and from California (family vacation, blame it for the absence) and finished my first pair. Except that I have to graft the toes and weave in the ends. But other than that they're done. I made them little footies, so I have loads of yarn left, since the ball is enough for two regular sized socks. I definentally have enough for another pair of footies. I think I'm going to get more colourways of the same yarn, I remember there being a delightful pink and cream combo. Maybe some yellow for project spectrum? We shall have to see.