There are things I have not been doing: blogging, reading blogs, commenting on blogs, taking pictures, checking my email, cleaning my apartment, cooking, seeing my friends, enjoying springtime, or finishing works-in-progress.
And there are things I have been doing: working.
We're at a crucial stage in my current project at work, doing the final rounds of testing for a new systems implementation. This means late nights and early calls and mandatory overtime (including weekends). It also makes for one seriously exhausted Librarian-in-Training. I realized things had reached a crisis point when I had an entire nightmare-filled night of dreams where I was alternately attacked by vicious flesh-eating monsters and testing our new system. What my subconscious lacks in subtlety, it more than makes up for in inventive and graphic gore. Yuck. And even with all the gore, I honestly couldn't tell which dream-fate was worse.
So I decided I needed to slow down a bit, to make time for the things that matter to me. I went to my knitting group last night for the first time in weeks, and it was amazingly restorative. A few hours of knitting and chatting was exactly what I needed. Plus, I found out one of the my fellow knitters is a knitblogger, and a damn good one at that. Imagine, the Craft Pirate. At my very own knitting group. What a pleasant surprise!
And there actually has been some knitting, but entirely of the mindless variety. Only things I can knit a few rows on, put down and pick up days later without having to check a pattern. This includes Wicked, at long last almost be-sleeved.
I don't think I'm in love with the top-down method. I think bottom-up, where you knit the sleeves separately, then join them with the body to knit the raglan decreases is the method for me. Heaving the entire gigantic flopping weight of the body around while knitting the sleeves is a bit of a pain.
That said, I do leave him draped artfully over the living room furniture, so I can admire him in passing and give him an affectionate stroke even when I don't have time to knit.
I've also been swatching up the J Knits sock yarn I got on my Yarn Safari.
I'm thinking Waving Lace socks from Favorite Socks. I'm going to keep my fingers crossed that they'll magically fit me, even though my foot is nowhere near the pattern's 7.5" around. My friend Megan (of the dainty feet) may be getting more socks.
And for subway knitting, there's a basic stockinette sock, in Meilenweit MegaBoots Stretch. The same yarn I used for My Pretties, in a different colorway. I'm still loving the subtle gradations of color and finding it tremendously motivating to know a few more inches will bring me to the next exciting change of color.
Check out the green just peeking through. Nice, no?
9 comments:
Yeah, when you are having dreams like that, it's definitely time for some knitting!!! Hope things at work calm down soon. Wicked is looking good - I love the color. The sock yarns are gorgeous too. Hang in there!!
I was wondering what happened to Wicked - it looks very, very nice.
Thanks for the shout-out! I haven't laughed that much in a long time. Knitting & being silly & yummy desserts is an amazing combination!
Sorry you've been so busy! That sounds awful. I'm glad you been able to have some more time to yourself.
Maybe you could try the Waving Lace Socks on size 2 needles? The pattern calls for size 1. You also might be able to lengthen the repeat by a stitch or two to make it fit. Depends on how much fun you think altering things is :)
Wicked is looking great! I really like the color. I hope things start to calm down soon. Knitting is really good for your mental health :)
Nice you have you back on the blog! I missed your posts.
Glad you're back, and I hope there's less work and more fun stuff coming up for you soon! I love the sock yarn, and Wicked is looking great.
The Waving Lace pattern is essentially just a rib with some lacey bits added into the stockinette part. If you don't want to mess with altering the lace, you could just add more purls in between....that would also make it easy to adjust the lace cuff. Just add the corresponding number of purls to that rib as well. If you do want to make the lace part wider, just slide it one or two or however many stitches out to the right, then add more decreases and yo's along the established diagonals. (I hope that made sense...)
Cuz, really? It sounds like you could use a pick me up, and what could be better than a pair of your own handknit socks?
Well hello! Inspired by you and Kat I've started a knitting blog here! It currently has a whopping ONE post! Yay for knitting blogs!
"As Inigo Montoya once said, "Let me explain. No there is too much to explain, let me sum up."
I'm going to steal this from you and use it at the start of the next conference presentation I make. It's perfect.
oh yuck about work. what system are you migrating to? we're in the middle of moving from endeavor to III, but won't go live with the opac until fall term.
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