It's been a long week...and it's only Tuesday

Somehow it feels like a verrry long week - and it's only Tuesday. Monday felt like it should have been Thursday at the very least.

A lot of people told me today how tired they were, and felt. It was an overcast day, and somehow the weather seemed to suck the life out of people, quite literally. It was a day of baby steps - 2 steps forward, three steps back..it seemed, all day.

Hopefully, tomorrow will be better and sunnier. Maybe it was just because last week I had a lot going on - the exciting visit at the office, relatives from out of town, and met a friend at Spinnaker's for a yummy meal...and then, I got a lot of stuff done at home on the weekend.

..could be the lull before the storm ?

A brush with greatness

Tuesday, my boss at work brought her daughter in to meet us.

Her name is Gillian Carleton and she and her teammates won Bronze at the London Olympics for the Track Cycling. She brought in her bicycle and bronze medal to show.

Gillian talked to us about her bicycle, being at the Olympics, her ride, and the race itself.
On the left with her bicycle (weighs 16lbs, or 14.5 with her race wheels on); and on the right with her Mom (Nancy Carleton), also a triathalon champion.

   

   

With her medal-which is surprisingly heavy. 

According to Wikipedia, the bronze medal is made up of 97 percent copper, 2.5 percent zinc and 0.5 percent tin. Info about the London medals on wikipedia here.

I also finished up by Seastorm of Petals (#8 of 12) - i think I could have made the shawl smaller to be more of a tight cowl; I think it will be more like a staged shawl.

Yarn is Sweet Fiber Yarns in Heirloom (70% Silk; 30% Cashmere Top). It is so soft; such a lovely hand. The colorway is seastorm. Shown below the cowl blocking, and the original skein (shown right):
























and I'm continuing with leaves - this is Strip 3 in Arkady - coppery-brown and blues:

Scalene Shawl Complete

TA DA!





and



Interesting technique - this shawl has 2 keyholes, to allow you to tuck in the ends, and make a neckerchief.

To allow more versatility, I modified by making the first keyhole red, and the second keyhole black.
I also modified Section 4 of the pattern to end with a larger stripe of black. This makes the shawl more striking next to my face, but less symmetrical.

I was surprised at my commitment to complete the shawl even though it's garter. A very boring knit, but I like the result. Also, I my shawl is rounder and larger than most people's as I inadvertently increased on the middle band (section 2) on both ends, so I increased at a faster rate  - I ended up with 437 stitches before the Jenny’s Surprisingly Stretchy Bind-off. I was supposed to have 302 stitches total. ha! yes, as you know, I cannot follow a pattern.

As for my other project, I decided with less than 2 days left to the Ravellenic timeframe, I wasn't going to start another project and be frustrated so I decided not to start the other planned project - the Strands of Pearl shawl, that will have to be for another day.

Ravellenics

I cast-on Scalene last Friday, a garter shawl. I know, I know, I'm not really into garter, but it seems to be knitting up fairly fast, and I hope to finish it and perhaps another shawl in the 2-week timeframe.



The colors I'm using are SG Rhinocerous Beetle which is a black, and the January Nudibranch which is a Rusty-red color. The contrast is striking and so far it's a very pleasing knit.

 

These leaves are lovely to knit, but currently on hold.
The project doesn't meet the requirements for wips-wrestling which is the normal event I enter.
Projects had to have not been worked on since mid May to qualify for wips-wrestling, so this will have to go on hold until I'm through the Ravellenic period.

Hurry up and wait..

The weeks have flown by and I'm still living without a dishwasher and in a challenged space. I pushed and pushed to have work done at my place in a timely manner. I was project manager extraordinaire even though the resources were not my own, and I didn't know about any of the other dependencies or competing projects. The weather's been warm, hot, overcast, stormy, rainy, electrifying, dry, and warm again, and I've had a train of people coming in and out.

Today, at last, we're ready to paint, and I know I have that little paint can just waiting for me...and there it is. I take a snap and e-mail it so I can get the quote in my hands, and realize as I turn the corner into my bathroom that that the walls are not as I remembered, they're not the same colour as the kitchen, that of the paint in the cute little can. Nope, it's a light peachy colour. So, another little surprise expense unplanned. People tell me that work on your home is always more than you expect, so to budget a bit more than you plan for just such surprises. At this point, I'd say budgeting 30% more or more, and allowing for 3x as much time as you think the  minimum will be.

Some weird weather we're having

Five people told me today about the thunder / lightning and torrential downpour last night (thursday). I woke up twice in the night myself to the rumbling thunder, but no lightning. I suppose I'm not high enough to see it.

When I looked out, everything was green and calm.  Then, when I was just settling back to sleep, an incredible downpour of rain pelting the roof - twice in one night, both times -  short but intense.

In the morning, overcast skies with just a hint of blue peeking out when I looked out of my window at work warmed to sunny weather in the afternoon, coinciding with free "refreshers *" at starbucks this afternoon. Again some weird rain - lightning bouts alternating with flashes in the sky at knit night, and driving home, a few streaks of light horizontally across the purple night sky.


* Refresher a.k.a the equivalent of an italian soda made with regular tap water instead of carbonated.  Pretty amazing how they can evolve another $4+ product line from watered down juice and ice. One was a lime-mint flavour, looks/tastes like a mojito mix without the alcohol, and the others a berry mixture with a few frozen berries thrown in. ka-ching.

The secret handshake

"Yarn", I said, as I stood in front of a lady standing in a small crowd that had gathered in front of Future Shop today.  The lady looked at me blankly.

I said it again softly. She turned to me and stared. When I asked her her name, it turned out she was the wrong lady. Turns out Future Shop was having some kind of gaming release, so there was a reason for the small crowd that gathered there.

I ended up finding the knitter I was looking for; turns out, I was early for once, and she arrived right on time. I didn't have to say "Yarn", either, I just showed her the yarn, and she smiled.

The Levenwick is off the needles....

I finally finished the button band on the Levenwick, and blocked it last weekend:



and I've pinned Larch, but not seamed yet.

Meanwhile, new projects are beckoning...
I started one long-term one - 

(a) a Sylvan Blanket which is made with leaf strips dovetailed together.



The yarn is SG Codex in Delirium. Here is a pic of the original skeins:



Two leaves measures 9" long, and 3" wide.     

I have about 26 strips to make, each with a guesstimated 16 leaves, and using ~48g of yarn.

So far at knit night, I knit 6 leaves, so I have 8 total.
Needle Size: US 7


and hopefully, a short-term one - 

(b) a Summery Lacewing top. Intended to be using corn yarn, but I'm adapting the yarn, the gauge, and hoping I can adjust the decreases to the waist, and increases.

Here's the start -



US 6 for the border cast-on and for the body.
My gauge 24st/32 R, targeting the 38.5" for 36".

and the yarn:

So

So I usually just mark a project as 100% when it's off the needles. Larch is definitely off the needles. Problem is that I have yet to pin, and seam the arms to the body, so I can't really say it's done, even though it's practically for all intents and purposes off the needles.

So, while I brew/stew up enough courage to pin and seam, I swatched for something new.

Lacewing, a short-sleeve top with a lace bottom, and picot edge, and mirrored lace cap sleeves. The yarn is Verdant Gryphon Bugga in Crimson Dropwing. I cast-on and knit the picot edge on a US8, following the pattern's intention to go up 2 needle sizes, but it was too big, so I've frogged it back.  The pattern calls for Corntastic but no ease, so I'm taking into account the stretch of the bugga yarn, and making allowances for that. To re-start with the US7, I need to take back a needle, so the Blue Morpho Shawl is getting bound-off. Turns out with all of the stockinette that I did in the middle to prep it for the columns shawl, I ended up knitting almost past where I knit the Brass and Steam, so it's pretty close in size to the other shawl. I'm binding that off now.

I had swatched for two new projects - a cardi wrap called Pas de Valse in Blue Lobster Bugga, and Gavotte a pullover with Satin Green Forester.  Neither of these are calling to me right now, as I'm looking for a cheerier colour.

My Sweet Fiber Yarn Club arrived today - it's a lovely grey wtih teal and brown, and some cute stitch markers, which I really love. I guess she includes one set with each 3-month subscription, so this is the month for that - yay!

...oh, and they changed the name of Ravelympics to Ravellenics due to the Greek influence.

Waiting to seam and swatching

waiting to seam and doing some swatching...

While I'm waiting..doing some interesting reading - apparently the last few days there has been an uproar within Ravelry - the USOC sent a nasty letter described here,
with a follow-up apology here.

Articles from Adrian Chen here, here, and apology  here.

-and we made news in Businessweek here, and on it goes..france.

earlier news from the Uk here.

Larch: Bound-off

I bound-off the fronts and collar yesterday and today. It was a looong collar. Now, I've pinned and am blocking the armholes and sleeve caps, so I can seam. I debated about blocking the whole thing, but I think this will work for now, I don't want to risk stretching until I've got the arms in.

Here's an earlier pic -



I tried it on briefly and I think it's going to be a good fit.