the university’s closed today, so we get to stay home. and that’s always nice. my plans for today aren’t much different from yesterday’s – so, more sewing and stuff. whee!
so it’s snowing today. and sleeting. and i think there might be freezing rain later. anyway. we took the cats out to play in it earlier, and they hated it and ran back to the front door to be let back in. hee.
so now i’m just enjoying mooching around the house and knitting. i finished the ribbed bottom edge of fluffy, and got to the point where i switch to size 9 needles. it turns out i was wrong about having a pair. so it’s on hold for now, too. so today i’m working on smaller projects – the leg warmers, hair ties, washcloths. more instant gratification type things. fun stuff.
So I’ve been foregoing updating this in order to have *even more* time to work on the Skully Sweater. So I got to the beginning of the neckline last night, and I held it up to myself? And it’s way too long. While the width is fine, but a little on the smaller end of what I’m comfortable with. Which means I can’t switch to smaller needles. I think the problem is a combination of the gauge being a smidge off as far as the length is concerned, and the weight of the front pulling it down. So I’ve put it on hold for the time being while I examine the pattern and decide where to subtract rows. Right now it looks like I’ll be taking out the three inches under the neckline, but we’ll see.
So in the meantime, I’ve started the Fluffy Sweater from the Vintage Knits book. Tiffianna made one in Homespun, and it looks awesome, so I’m making one, too. I had some Homespun I was using to crochet a sweater. And it would’ve been a really cute sweater, but it was taking forever. And also, crochet uses like three times as much yarn, so while I wasn’t finished with *that* sweater, I’m hoping I should have pretty close to enough yarn for the Fluffy Sweater. Anyway, I’m so excited! But I’ll be even more excited when I can get back to Skully, too.
I keep forgetting to mention it, but Susan is getting married in October, and I’m her maid of honor. And the best part is her plans so far are awesome. I was looking forward to the wedding, of course, but I’m also quite looking forward to being part of it, instead of just *at* it.
success!!
so two years ago, i started making pajama pants. since i’m so prone to wearing pjs when i get home, i can’t have too many. well, i guess technically i could, but i haven’t hit that limit yet. anyway. so two years ago i start these pants, and they just keep not working out. and i had to rip seams and resew and rip seams and resew and finally i just gave up. i moved on to other sewing projects, i knitted, the old sewing machine died, greg gave me a new one. et voila! last night i picked them back up, and as of half an hour ago, i have finished my pj pants. they are so comfy.
i’m working mainly on the skully sweater. it’s about 17 inches so far. but it’s been put aside recently so i can sew. we have a window next to the futon that’s drafty, so i used some scrap fabric to make a…thing. are they called draft dodgers, or something cutesy like that? anyway, it’s round, it’s stuffed with polyfil, it goes at the bottom of the window, and it actually has cut down the draft quite a bit. which is especially nice for me, since i sleep closest to the window. i used this sparkly blue fabric with planets on it that i had left over from making a dress two years ago. and after i made the draft thing, i made myself a little head scarf, which turned out very cute, if i do say so myself.
yesterday we went to dogstar, and i got tattooed (a green heart on my left ring finger), and now i’ve got to carry around bacitracin and chapstick to put on it. so i’m making a little drawstring bag for them. since i’ve been carrying around my knitting bag lately, and small tubes get lost in it and then i have to dump the whole thing out to find them. i figured a small, brightly patterned bag would be just the thing. anyway. i’m quite pleased with how my tattoo turned out, and so far it’s healing nicely and not at all grungy. although i feel rather vain – it’s the first tattoo i’ve got that i can look at easily, and so i keep holding my hand out and looking at it.
bleah. i finally took pictures of all the projects i’ve kept for myself, or am still working on, and i’d forgotten what a hassle putting up a gallery was for me, with my limited html-coding skills. plus my tendency towards laziness. and also, trying to fix it is keeping me away from precious, precious knitting time. so i’m giving up for now, which means that finished gallery link leads to nowhere but an error message. i’m off to work on legwarmers.
eeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!
i just ordered some yarn from elann.com to make the skully sweater from the stitch ‘n bitch book. so! excited! it’s schoeller stahl cecil – mauve for the sweater, and cyclamen for the skulls. i can’t wait to start.
i’m still working on the outer ring of the princess snowball cat bed, but the cats have already started sleeping on the finished inner part. so i feel like it hasn’t been a complete waste of scrap yarn. the last cushy little blanket i made for them, it took them months to do more than sniff at it. i get so excited when stuff i knit actually gets used or appreciated. i’m such a dork. it’s a frickin’ cat bed.
the leg warmers have been somewhat forgotten. i need to work on them. and i keep forgetting the rock-on pillow i was going to make for greg, and the ongoing “let’s make a people-sized blanket” projects: a variegated crochet afghan from a vanna white book greg’s mom gave me, a…blue? green? “apple leaf lace” blanket, and i keep meaning to just whip one out real fast on the machine to put in the car since my feet are always cold. so, i do have plenty of projects on the needles and waiting to be finished. but i think it’ll all have to continue waiting once the skully yarn shows up.
rebecca’s here!!!! woot. so very many pretty things in it!
thursday i came across an acrylic super bulky that i don’t hate. that was exciting, since until then i’d only seen them online, and was hesitant to buy. so now i just have to find a project to go with.
i started some legwarmers. they are going slowly but surely. i also started the princess snowball cat bed from the snb book, in order to get rid of some of the oddballs in my stash. the inner part, while not circular, looks good, and the colors are actually rather nice. it’s got fun fur, some boa, and some mohair odd bits from when i first learned to knit (eleven years ago), in blues, greens, and pinks, mainly. now i’m working on the outer edge, in a very bright orange – cotton-ease and boa. but the point was to use up yarn bits and not necessarily make something pretty. can cats even see colors? i’ll try to put up some pictures later.
