All things baby...

This past Saturday was the baby shower for one of my college roommates. Besides the three hour car ride there and back, it was actually a lot of fun. I know baby showers can sometimes be tedious (especially when the mother-to-be opens a million and one presents and everyone has to ooo and aahh over them) but this one was really nice.

We only played one game in which I did terrible. I think I got the least answers correct out of everyone. I'm actually pretty happy about that and let me tell you why. The game was to name as many children from certain TV shows as you can (ie, the Brady Bunch, The Cosby Show, Family Ties, etc) and I could barely name any. I don't watch TV and even as a kid when these shows were on I obviously didn't pay too much attention to them!

We did have to sit through the present opening but luckily there weren't too many presents. Mine was the first to illicit the "aaaaaawwww" out of everyone!I think mine was the first handmade present she opened. There were a couple of other things that were handmade, mainly blankets that were sewn. I swear that baby is going to overheat with all the blankets that were made for it (I think somewhere in the vicinity of 5 or 6 blankets) The funny thing is they live in Virginia!

I think the thing I liked best about the shower was reconnecting with friends I haven't seen in awhile. After all, it's the connections with people that matter most, right?Me and the mommy-to-be

We have bread!

So after about a month and a half of thinking about baking some bread, I finally got around to doing it today. I used a really simple, easy recipe for whole wheat bread.

Let me put this into perspective here. I did try one other time to bake some bread, but my yeast was dead. I tried proofing it and nothing happened, no foaming, nothing but a bad yeasty smell. Poo. So I gave up for a little while.

I finally realized today that I have a day off and nothing planned, why not bake some bread? I got some new (alive) yeast and I started my first ever loaf of bread. I'm sure some people wouldn't appreciate hand kneading the bread, but I was so excited that the dough actually looked right that I was all about kneading it!

Then there was the rising. I can't believe how much bigger it gets! I knew it was suppose to, but actually seeing it was another thing entirely.

So I'm gonna skip right to the part where I took it out of the oven.It looks gorgeous right? The picture doesn't, however, show the fact that it weighs about 20 pounds! It's just about the densest bread I've ever come across. Sure, it tastes fine, but this one reminds me of the movie "About a Boy" where the kid throws this loaf of bread in a duck pond and kills a duck. Yeah, it's that heavy!

I'm thinking I'm going to modify the recipe next time. Maybe mix the whole wheat flour with some lighter flour. Who knows, I know with bread, the possibilities are endless and it takes a certain amount of practice right?

Niagara Falls

I actually don't have any knitting projects to show at the moment. I started a baby hat (which looks more like a hat that could easily fit my head) but I think I have to re-knit it and the deadline is looming. I have a week. No big deal right? Well, there's work thrown in there, not to mention the cotton/acrylic that I picked out makes my arms hurt if I knit on it too long. I'll get it done though.

A week ago, my friends and I went to Niagara Falls for the day, just as a lets-get-off-our-butts-and-have-a-road-trip sort of thing. It was a gorgeous day, and by gorgeous I mean the sun was out and we hadn't seen it in a long, long time. It was still cold, but the sun totally made up for that.

I've never seen Niagara Falls in the winter. It's actually really beautiful.The mist coming up made this thin, icy layer over everything... including us after awhile! We really didn't wear very appropriate clothes for being "rained" on. So we took a few pictures and headed out.Here's the boy and I (totally blinded by that thing known as the sun.)

We all decided to be complete tourists and went over to the Hard Rock Cafe for lunch....Where we sat by Elton John's Pharaoh suit and Madonna's tasseled bustier. They really set the mood!

On our way home we stopped by RockVentures in Rochester. It's the largest rock climbing gym in the Northeast, and let me just say, I've totally missed rock climbing!Though a gym is nothing like real rock, it's still a lot of fun.

I was so exhausted by the end of the day, but it was worth it. Winter seems to get us stuck it a rut of always wanting to stay in and avoid the cold (at least it does for me) but it's good to get out there and enjoy it!

More FO's

Guess what folks? I have another couple of finished projects to show you. There's the socks for the boy for his birthday, all finished (and when I say finished, I mean the knitted part is done, I never seem to sew in the ends until right before I gift them.)I'm glad I finished these early because, it turns out I now have a baby shower to go to at the end of the month that I'd like to knit something for. Apparently I've entered the part of my life where my friends from college start having babies. Funny how life sneaks up on you like that!

Just this morning I finished up the yoga mat bag. It's perfect timing too since I have my yoga class this afternoon.This pattern was really fun. There were some design features that I really liked. For instance, the I-cord bind off on the bottom of the bag...It makes such a clean edge for the bottom. There's also the folded edge at the top which is pretty...It's funny, but I'm really excited to go to yoga tonight just so I can use my bag!

Knitting update.

Just a quick post here kiddos. I'm not dead. It seems that finding time to blog is not tops on my list of priorities at the moment (we all go through slumps, right?) I don't want to totally leave everyone in the dark though.

I've been working on a couple of projects recently. Both have been taking equal amounts of my knitting time. One because it's interesting and I've been wanting to knit it ever since I started yoga and the other because it's a birthday present and it has to be finished by the end of March.

Here's the yoga related project...It will eventually be the lacy yoga mat bag from Interweave knits. The pattern is simple and you'd think that by now I would have memorized it, but I haven't because I've been knitting it while watching episodes of The Office (I never knew I could laugh that hard!)

The other project is a pair of socks for the boy for his birthday.This pictures makes these socks look purple but I assure you they're not. It's a twist of brown and navy blue. I know he'll love them because he almost never takes off the scarf I made him for Christmas. What a good guy! I know he knows I'm making him something because the package arrived from Knit Picks while he was over and he was a bit suspicious of the fact that I didn't tear right into it the minute it came into my hands.

And just because I haven't in a long time, here's a picture of my baby, Ludo, in his typical relaxing postition...He always looks so fed up with my taking pictures of him, but I'm pretty sure it's because he's reacting to the flash... at least, that's what I like to tell myself!

Two Finished Objects!!!

Uggg... *sniff*....blah....*cough*

That's how I've felt for the past four days. I have been down with the flu. I know it's the flu because I have never been this sick for this long in my whole life. I literally couldn't get out of bed to make myself soup or get myself anything. Several of the days were a NyQuil induced blur where I was more asleep than awake which was a blessing. Being awake was torture.

Thankfully, it's on it's way out. I'm a functioning human being once again. That's a really nice feeling.

Right before I got sick I had a post in mind to show you not one, but two FO that I finished on the same day! The first being the Mountain Colors Bearfoot socks I was working on...I'm very happy with how they turned out. There's nothing like adding another pair of socks to the collection in time to actually wear them for part of the season!

Next, as you may have guessed, is the Tangled Yoke Cardigan. It's is 99.99% complete. The only thing it's missing is buttons. It just doesn't look quite right from the front without the buttons to hold it closed so I'll show some other pictures.
I'm so excited with how it turned out. I may actually leave the apartment today to go get some buttons!

A mish-mashy post

I have been like a woman on a mission this morning. My mission: clean, clean like I've never cleaned before (only I have cleaned like this before, just not in a long time). It's almost like Spring cleaning though it's not Spring. I couldn't wait for Spring. We still have two months of winter left. For whatever reason, this cleaning is helping to wash away the winter blahs I've had. It helps to have a clean space (and I mean sparkling) to make it seem less drab, less gloomy, etc.

I was up at 7am this morning. For those of you who work normal schedules this may not seem like such an amazing thing, but for me whose earliest shift begins at noon, 7am is the earliest I've woken up in awhile. 8:30am is usually my get-up-and-start-the-day time, but not this morning. I was awake, fully awake at 7am. It's sort of refreshing. I feel like I've been cleaning all day and that it's already the afternoon, but it's only 12:30. There's plenty of day left for other things.

Things like knitting...I've been working on my Tangled Yoke Cardigan ever since I finished up those socks for mom and it's really coming along. Another inch or so and I get to start the cable!

It also leaves time for other things.... like my new found happiness, Netflix. I've known about Netflix for awhile now and I've even known about their online viewing option, but I've just not jumped on the bandwagon until now. Let me say a few things here. I own a television set, but I do not have cable or network TV to watch on it. Most of what you can find on TV is mindless programming with equally mindless commercials inbetween and I refuse to spend my money on things like that. I do, however, watch movies. I love movies, movies that make you think, movies that make you laugh or cry. They're fantastic. As are some well made, thoughtful TV shows, but I just couldn't stand sitting through the commercials. Also one of my favorite things that I've been missing are nature documentaries. I really miss Animal Planet. Now that I have access to these things, minus the commercials, I am really excited. Now I can watch my nature shows and movies while I knit mindless projects.

There's also time for something else I've been meaning to do recently.... bake my own bread. It occurred to me that so few of us even know how to make a loaf of bread. I've been reading up on it and it's actually very basic with huge potential for variety. Having never done it before, this could end up being trial and error, but I'm ok with that. I'm also totally ok with the fact that I'll know exactly what's in my bread... anybody else have no idea what calcium propionate or natamycin are and what they're doing in bread?

Inspiration strikes.

I finished my mom's socks. Boy did those things fly off the needles. I guess when the leg of the sock is only two inches long, you cut down on a little knitting time!I washed them with the hope that they would turn out a bit softer and they did! They're going to be the perfect pair of socks for spring or fall, maybe even a cool summer day. They're not too heavy and the fiber content makes them seem a bit cooler.

I finally got some pictures of that shawl on the recipient.
She wore it this past weekend to our weekly knitting group and it was greatly admired. The wonderful part about it too is that the color matches almost all of her clothes!

So I have to say, I haven't been blogging much recently mostly because I've become inspired by something else. Cooking. Recently I came across the book "In Defense Of Food" by Michael Pollan who also wrote "The Omnivore's Dilemma" and I was so inspired to cook my own foods that for the past several weeks I've been spending a lot of my time planning meals and buying food.

I found it quite interesting that in the book he points out that it's more expensive to buy food that's good for you (mainly fruits and vegetables and whole grains that haven't been enriched, etc) than it is to buy food that's incredibly over processed. Turns out he's right. I really don't mind paying extra because I do have the money. I don't spend my money on purchases I don't need, like clothes, when my closet is already full to capacity, or spending it on the latest gadgetry. My only indulgence is yarn... can you blame me?

Also, I recently started a yoga class which, so far, has been going really well. To be honest, I think it's really going to help me with the aches and pains I get from waitressing. The only downside to the class is that it's so full that it's sometimes a little crowded and with certain poses or maneuvers you're at risk of smacking the person next to you! I guess the bright side of that is that so many people are interested in bettering themselves and that in itself is uplifting.

Even though I haven't been blogging all that much, I am thinking of it and of you. I don't always have time to comment but I'm trying to keep up on everything going on in your own blogs/lives.

Socks for mom...

Have you ever had one of those projects where you're grabbed by it and it just doesn't let you go. I've been working on one of those recently.

It's my mom's birthday in a little over a week and I've had this idea that I'd like to spin some yarn, then knit some socks out of it for her. I've been working on that for the past couple weeks whenever I could find some spare time.It's a merino/tencel blend that I bought at Rhinebeck last year. The colors are perfect for mom. I overspun the singles quite a bit because I wanted a tighter plied yarn.
Plying multi-colored singles like this is always so much fun because you never know which color is going to end up next to another color. It was interesting to see that, quite often, similar colors ended up next to each other. This is easy to see once it's been knit...
One sock down, one more to go. I know she's going to love these!

I also finished up a little something awhile ago. I haven't posted about it because I still don't have any modeled shots of it, but here it is blocking on my bed...
You can see I wasn't 100% accurate in how straight I made the edges... perhaps I should invest in some blocking wires!

A good start to 2008

This is more than a little late but, Happy New Year!

So far 2008 has been rather nice. The time spent down in Virginia was exactly what I needed. I feel refreshed now. All of my knitted gifts went over well, especially the ones I made for the boy. Until this warm snap came, he didn't take off the scarf or handwarmers I made for him except to shower and sleep. I hate to see what would happen to them if he showered with them! Here's a good picture demonstrating the boy and his scarf.
I gave my roommate/best friend, Jill, a WillowTree figurine among other things.I also made her a lace shawl, but it just wasn't quite finished in time. I really tried, but it just wasn't happening see how I spent a good deal of my time with her! It's finished now and waiting to be blocked.

It's a known fact around these parts how much I love tea. I may not have mentioned it on the blog much, but I'm a tea fanatic. I love everything about it. I love the process of tea, of love tea paraphernalia, I love the huge variety, I love the way it warms you up. There's very little about tea that I don't love. Well, it appears my love of tea did not go unnoticed by both my best friend and my boy. The boy bought me something called a T Buddy. It's a pretty nifty little thing that I can take with me camping to make my tea.

Also, Jill bought me this gorgeous tea set. Even though I didn't have anyone to share my tea with, I still made a whole pot.The angle of this picture really makes the cup look huge, but I assure you, after three cups of tea from that pot, there were still many cups left!

I mentioned in my last post that I received two gift certificates from my family to my LYS. This particular yarn shop is closing soon for about three months for renovations and the owner is trying to get rid of her inventory.... that meant 50% off all the yarn. In a way, that made my gift certificates worth twice as much! I ended up buying enough yarn for three sweaters, a scarf and a hat. All but one of the purchases I have plans for.

In fact, I started one of the projects already. I'm making the Tangled Yoke Cardigan from Interweave Knits. I bought the yarn it calls for in a speckled gray color. I'm actually pretty far on it. This picture was taken several days ago and I'm well past it now.
There's nothing like beginning a new sweater project to start the year off right, huh?

Post-Christmas

Christmas was lovely. Unsurprisingly, I didn't finish all the new projects I'd started, but the recipients still loved the half finished gifts. Apparently I didn't take into account that the people I was knitting for would be around during the time I'd planned to knit for them. I'll have to remember that for next year.

I did finish a few things though. I decided (sort of last minute) that I'd make some washcloths for my aunts and grandma. They were actually the fastest projects I've ever knit. I'd say it takes about an hour and a half to finish one.I went out and bought some nice natural soaps and wrapped them with the washcloths and I'll be giving these gifts when I go down to Virginia tomorrow. I'll be gone for a week (and I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to having five whole days off from work!)

In other knitting related news, I received two gift certificates to my LYS for Christmas... looks like my family finally caught on to the fact that I like to knit! Ha!

In which I manage to make myself a present this Chirstmas

So... remember in my last post where I showed you a bit of the Serpentine Mitts I had started? Well, forget those, they've been ripped out. When I got to the cable, it became clear that the variegated yarn wasn't going to show off the cable very well. Not to mention the yarn was just a tad on the itchy side so I probably wouldn't wear them as often as I'd like to.

I dove, yet again, into my stash to find some KnitPicks Essential sock yarn. There is something different about this yarn. I once bought the Essential yarn a couple years ago and it was sort of scratchy. Now it's so soft. I don't know what they did to change it, but I love it!

I started a new pair of Serpentine Mitts and guess what? I finished them within a couple of days.How much do I love these things???? Ummm, that would be A LOT! They're so comfortable. They keep my hands super warm and the best part is I can knit while wearing them. Fabulous!

I finished up all my Christmas presents well ahead of schedule. I think there's some sort of trick that goes on around Christmas that makes you think you have all the time in the world because i started thinking of all these other present I might make... ummm, for some reason a week seems like a perfectly reasonable amount of time to finish four more presents....Perhaps I didn't think this through....

Christmas knitting and giggle fits

First thing's first. I am officially finished with Christmas knitting!
The final pair of socks are complete. They're the Uptown Boot Socks out of the Favorite Socks book from Interweave made in KnitPicks Gloss. They're a little loose on my feet, but my mom has slightly larger feet than I do so they'll fit her perfectly.

I started a pair of Serpentine Mitts out of some Mountain Colors Bearfoot that I had in my stash. So far I'm loving them, but I haven't even gotten to the cable part yet.
The colors are actually a bit darker in real life, but they're still gorgeous.

So I have a little story to tell you folks, but I have a word of warning to you, if you don't appreciate potty humor, you may not appreciate this story.

Recently I've been feeling the need to join some sort of community and not really knowing where to go, I happened to run across a Ravelry group for Unitarian Universalists. I'd heard of them before but never really looked into it because the idea of church never sat well with me. For whatever reason I decided to do a little research and it turns out that UU principles speak pretty closely to some of the things I already believe.

A little more research later and I found a local UU group where I live. The boy and I decided to go to the service last Sunday. Being new, we sat in the back and took in the feel of the service. About five minutes in, a woman brought two elderly gentlemen in to sit in the row in front of us. I barely even noticed their arrival until, not five minutes after that, a rather powerful odor reached my nose.

Turns out one, or quite possibly both, of these gentlemen had a case of the old man farts. Rather than be disrespectful and move, the boy and I sat through the onslaught of pungent flatulence. Somewhere through the middle of this, I looked over at the boy and notice he has his hand to his nose and for whatever reason that sent me into a fit of the giggles.

I don't know if you've ever had a giggle fit in a completely inappropriate place, but I can tell you it's awful. All you want to do is let out this giggle energy but you can't!!! And what escapes your nose is some kind of outward snort and your body is shaking from the silent laughter.

I couldn't even look at the boy because when I did, I would start to silently laugh harder because he was laughing.

Aside from the old man farts, the service was quite nice. It wasn't preachy and there were even light hearted moments where laughter was complete appropriate. Thank god for those moments. Hopefully next week we can pay a bit more attention to the service and less attention to calming a giggle fit.

Up goes the tree.

Last week my roommate and I put up the Christmas tree. Granted it isn't real, but the majority of my Christmases have been spent putting up the artificial tree. In many ways, for me at least, it has become tradition. I can remember every year getting so excited after Thanksgiving because the day after was usually the day we pulled out all the Christmas decorations and put up the tree.

This year was slightly different, but memorable all the same. My roommate (who's also my best friend) never fails to make me laugh and laugh we did as we brought the tree out of storage, out of the box and "fluffed" the branches. What made this particularly festive was the Kid Rock music playing in the background. (I must add here that neither of us actually listen to Kid Rock voluntarily, rather we had a party a couple of weeks ago and made a music mix full of one hit wonders and music you haven't heard in years. It went over well at the party and Jill just happened to have her iTunes on the party playlist while we put up the tree.)

As we headbanged while fluffing the tree it occurred to us that perhaps Christmas music would be more fitting. So the Christmas music was put on and the tree was put up a little jollier and a little less violently. It's amazing how music can affect ones activities.

Here is the tree in all it's glory with the foot of fresh snow outside.It certainly doesn't get much more Christmasy than that.

There's an ornament that I have that has a bit of a story to it. A long time ago, my mom bought an ornament from Hallmark and it became a most cherished ornament. My brother and I adore this little thing. For years we talked about who would get it when mom finally decided to give us the old ornaments. When that day happened my brother conceded and let me have this ornament.Can you see why this is the best Christmas ornament in the world? Imagine yourself as a little kid looking up into the tree to see a little elf working on the light bulbs! It just doesn't get much better than that!

I think the year after I had the elf I was trying to think of a great Christmas present for my brother. A few things came to mind, but mostly I thought about wrapping up the elf and giving it to him. I knew it'd be something special that he'd love. So I did.

Would you like to guess what I received the next year?

So this little elf has been passed between my brother and I for about 5 years now. Each year we try to come up with better ways to wrap it. One year I wrapped it inside box after box after box. (I know this is wasteful but I wouldn't have done it had I suspected these boxes wouldn't be reused!)

This year I have the best plan... and it sort of just fell into my lap. I knew the elf came to me last year so when the tree went up, I went looking for it. Keep in mind I moved rather quickly midway through the year. For the life of me, I couldn't find it. In desperation I called my brother to confirm that it came to me last year. Oh yes, he said, I have it this year and he didn't sound too pleased that I didn't know the whereabouts of the elf. Well friends, I found it today... but I'm not going to let my brother know that!

Happy December everyone!

It's December already? When did that happen?

Lucky for me I'm moving right along on these Christmas presents. I finished up the Jaywalkers.
And, of course, started on another pair. I recently bought the Favorite Socks book from Interweave. I'm already in love with this book. It's so convenient to have all these great sock patterns in one book. I decided to make the Uptown Boot Socks with Knit Picks Gloss.I'm changing the pattern slightly to make short row heels and toes, other than that I'm leaving it alone. It's such an easy pattern too. Very fun to knit.

In completely unrelated news, the boy and I went to the symphony last night to see The Nutcracker Suite. I think it's the first time this season that I've actually started feeling like it's Christmas. Personally, I think retailers ring in the holidays just a tad too early (*read= extremely early) that it kills the feeling sometimes. But anyway, we had a very nice evening and the show was well done and entertaining. It was a nice way to welcome in December.

Christmas knitting update.

One holiday down, a couple to go...

My Thanksgiving was wonderful even if it occurred on Friday rather than Thursday. I was working Thursday night. To be honest, I was somewhat shocked by how many people came out to eat for Thanksgiving rather than be in there own homes with their families. It was really very interesting. Of course, my family came out to eat at the restaurant I work at just so they could spend a little time with me on Thanksgiving even though we'd see each other the next day. I love my family. This is why I'm so happy to be back in the area!

I currently have 373 blog entries to read in my bloglines.... it's safe to say I'm a little behind in reading those. I'm sure spending time with the boy has something to do with this, but lucky for me, he understands my passion to knit and lets me knit even while we're cuddling on the couch watching movies, or in the car, or wherever else the mood strikes me. You see, he has passion for some things too (World of Warcraft and running) so I'm more than happy to allow him his time as well.

Here's the finished socks I was telling you about.The leg looks pitifully short on these, but I'm sure they'll still be worn with love.

I started another pair of socks as well.Those are definitely Jaywalkers out of KnitPicks Felici. I've had trouble in the past with this pattern being too tight to get your foot into, but something about this yarn (perhaps it's the nylon content or the fact that it's superwash, who knows?) makes it a bit more stretchy and allows my foot to fit easily into it. This picture is actually a bit old, I've finished one sock and am turning the heel on the other one.

Now that I'm this far, I don't feel like I'm under too much pressure from my Christmas gifts because I only have two others to finish!

Finally the season it's supposed to be.

In my last post I wrote about how it just didn't feel like November and that it seemed strange that Thanksgiving is so close. Well, with this recent cold snap and a few white things falling out of the sky, it's feeling a bit more like the right season. We actually got more than a few flakes too, I woke up to this...I knew without looking out my window that it had snowed. The light that comes in through the window is totally different when it snows.

Since I had the day off, the boy and I decided to go to this nature center not too far from here and walk some of the trails. By the time we go there the snow had melted some, not to mention there were still quite a few leaves on the trees to catch it and keep the paths clear.

Here are a few pictures from our walk.
There were about a million geese on the lake while we were there. They were about all you could hear. Look closely at this picture and you can see all those little black specks on the lake are geese.
Because we're still young at heart we decided to climb on a fallen tree.The going up part was fine... it was the getting back down that was trickier than I remember as a kid!

By the end our hands were freezing (after all, why would we need gloves on a day that it snowed???) so we called it a day and went home for some hot cocoa and soup. It was great =)

As for the green socks, they're finished. Whatever had been bothering my hands and arms is now a ton better and I'm knitting at my normal speed again. I'll post a picture as soon as I have time to take one. I've started another pair of gift socks and I'll also be posting pictures of those too.

On a side note, I came across a quote the other day that really struck a chord in me and I thought I'd share it.

"You are the creator of your own reality. Therefore, seek not to find out who you are, seek to determine who you want to be and create it."

It really hit me because it's so proactive. It really emphasizes taking control of your own life. I like that.

Stalled

Last weekend I was moving right along on the sock I started. I was fairly determined to finished at least one of them. My roommate and I rented a couple of movies (nothing makes socks grow quicker than watching some good movies while you knit.) I was nearing the toe when it became painfully obvious that I wouldn't have enough yarn to finish the foot.I was so close! I guess it just wasn't meant to be. I ripped, and ripped and ripped and somewhere along the way realized why I usually knit from the toe up. You definitely avoid these sorts of problems when you knit from the toe up!

As if the ripping wasn't bad enough, I had to take a break from knitting to rest my hands and arms. They've developed an ache in them from all the knitting and I just don't want to overdo it. Better to rest and avoid problems in the future than stubbornly press on and develop carpal tunnel or something.

I may not get as much knit for Christmas, but that's alright. I'll do what I can.

I'm finding it hard to believe that Thanksgiving is only a week away. They holidays are upon us and for whatever reason it just doesn't feel like they should be here yet. Perhaps it's the unusually warm weather? I can't say. All I know is that this Fall was one of the most peculiar seasons I've experienced. 70-80 degree weather is not what I think of when I think October in the Northeast, but it's what we got. Strange...

On to the next.

The scarf is finished.This scarf is so soft and squishy that I'm tempted to keep it for myself. I may not have mentioned the best part about this thing. It's superwash merino... yeah, you can wash it in the washing machine without fear of it felting up into a mass of brown and black fiber. I think I'm in love. Anyway, I won't keep it. It'll go to it's intended recipient (whom I can't mention, Christmas gift and all that)

So I started a pair of socks as my next gift.These are moving right along. I guess it helps that I got a couple of audio books from the library and have been listening to those while I knit. It certainly keeps the mind occupied during those mindless portions.

I don't know if I mentioned this but I don't have TV. That is to say, I have a TV but I don't have cable, and local channels don't even come in because there is no antennae. I love not having TV. I loathe TV. Actually, I loathe commercials, certain shows I think are brilliant, but I can't stand the commercials. My strategy now is to watch the shows online or rent the seasons from Netflix. I haven't gotten around to watching too much though. For now, the audio books keep me mentally occupied.

My local library is fantastic too. It just got built about 5 or 6 years ago and it is beautiful and the selection is great and the staff is even greater. Yay for libraries!

It's crunch time...

It's November and with it comes deadlines for Christmas knitting. I have been working quite a bit recently on Christmas presents. I've also been trying to come up with a list of presents that won't be too much work. I'm trying to be realistic this year. I don't want to overburden myself with a ton of projects I can't possibly complete in time. I've decided that this year's presents will consist mainly of socks and washclothes. And maybe a scarf thrown in here and there. Like this one...It's some yarn from Brooks Farm that I bought at Rhinebeck. It's soft and the best part is it's superwash merino. I had no idea superwash could be this soft. I'm actually very happy with how it's pooling. It's not too obnoxious, you know? Though I will admit, I ripped this scarf out... ooooohhh, I'd say about four times. It was mostly because I was trying to see how wide I could get it and still get a long enough scarf. Now that I think of it, I probably could have used some math for that.... but really, it's much more fun to re-knit such beautiful yarn.

With all these Christmas gifts looming, I've had to put my own projects aside. This is the main reason why I haven't got any finished socks to show you from Socktoberfest. It occurred to me sometime in October that I should probably be starting on Christmas gifts instead.

Recently my LYS was having a sale and I couldn't help myself when some of their yarn is 50% off! I ended up buying some Mountain Colors Barefoot and some discontinued Jaegar yarn to make myself a sweater. I'm so motivated to start using some of this yarn... but then the Christmas gifts pop into my head and I don't.... I suppose that's going to be my motivation to get these gifts done huh?