Archive for the ‘Shawls’ Category

Swallowtail

My finished Swallowtail, knit in “Black Madera Fig” from the Madeline Tosh Society.

1st, what’s wrong with this picture?

I had finished the Swallowtail months ago, but had yet to block it, but thanks to Cheryl, I now was able to block it. Being that it had been a long time, I forgot how my Swallowtail was supposed to look, and blocked the right/left edges wrong. But I referred to the pattern and voila!

3 bad things 3 good things

Which do you want know about first? The Good or the Bad?

I’ll start with the Bad so you can leave the post with the Good

I’ve been offline for awhile because my first issue was that my camera stopped working. I kept messing with it trying to bring it back to life, but no luck. I still have some kind of hope that it will start working *fingers crossed*. I delayed posting because it’s sad to post a crappy picture when you put your heart into your knitting.

My second issue, which actually turned out to be a bigger issue than my camera ,my damn wireless router died on me. It is over 4 years old, about the lifespan of your average router. I had to order a new one, and I had requested overnight shipping over the phone about 6 p.m. about a week ago. I opted to pay the extra fee for shipping. Well, Friday came along and guess what, no router still. I contacted the company and come to find that because I ordered after 6 p.m., overnight shipping isn’t allowed and I get the standard shipping. I didn’t get charged the extra fee, but it meant I would be without internet that much longer.

After I realized I would be without internet longer that I anticipated, I actually tried to use the backup dialup # I have! UGH! So I get the backup dial up phone numbers and connect my modem and setup my connection, I had the nostalgic sense of my early years in IT *sigh*. I was prompted for my username and password, and I input my info, and BAM! Rejected!.. Seems I forgot my passsword for my main account, so no luck. After messing around with different passwords, I just called it quits, and figured I’d have to stick it out. Today I finally received my router, YAY!, and now I’m back, online and happy to be posting.

Onto my 3rd bad issue, so yesterday my husband and I got up early and went to get some coffee, and them came back to make breakfast. I made my usual, over easy eggs for my hubby, scrambled eggs for me and the kids, turkey bacon, and homemade potatoes with fresh tortillas and juice. We about ready to go eat breakfast when I went to check on something in my bedroom, I walked by my bathroom, and glanced at the floor, to my horror, there was water and cruddy overflow of gunk everywhere! It was coming out of the shower drain, and the toilet was empty! I went to the 2 other bathrooms, and sure enough the same damn thing. Well, after the initial shock, we called an emergency plumber who gave us a 45 minute window to be on-site, so we ate breakfast and waited.

Plumber got here and he asked us where’s our main line, and we looked everywhere, nothing. We got the landlord on the line, he doesn’t know, so he calls the former tenant, who coincidentally lives down the street. She was kind enough to walk over and show us where the main line was. I can’t thank her enough, because we would’ve never found it. It was literally hidden by overgrown grass on the front lawn, smack in the middle! The Plumber was like “That really should be in plain view, if we didn’t find it, the work would be way more complicated”. Phew! About 30 minutes later, everything was fixed. We finally got to use the bathroom! I had to run to Safeway to use the bathroom during all this, which was a pain. My work wasn’t over though, I had to sterilize and clean all 3 bathrooms now. I spent the next 2 hours with bleach, comet, scrubbers, and plastic gloves cleaning the showers and toilets, mopping, you name it. So that’s my 3rd!

Enough bad, now onto the good…

I have been getting some knitting done, and I’ve got these 3 wonderful FO’s here:

From left to right, clockwise

1) Swallowtail Shawl in Madeline Tosh Merino “Arabian Nights”

2) Elm Row Scarf in Scout’s Swag “Peach Pit”

3) Karma Tank in Sundara Yarn ” Brown Sugar Over Buttermilk”

All three are complete, and need blocking, but a blocking kit is one highly needed tool this knitter doesn’t have 8-( I’ll be investing on one in the next few weeks, until then, these 3 precious garments bring me happy FO eye candy and I can’t wait to show off the how they’ll transform. I’ve already tried on the Karma tank so many times, and it fits perfect. I can’t wait!

For the pictures I’m using my backup video camera, which doesn’t take the best picture but will just have to do until I can get a new camera.

Even though I have these 3 FO’s waiting in the wings, I went and started a new project, with more Sundara Yarn. I’m happy to be back online and hope I’m past the “3’s”, at least the bad ones!

Happy August everyone!

It’s all about the “1″

No. “1″ for 2008 has been a milestone number.

As most of you know I didn’t start knitting until December 0f 2007, when a good friend, Leslie B., taught me the basic Knit and Purl. Before that, I knew nothing of the fibery world beyond the staples of Knit and Purl. Little did I know at the time that it would be a craft I would wholeheartedly embrace and thrive in. Since then, knitting has been a “gateway” of wonderful things for me.

I’ve learned how to knit useful, beautiful, and creative garments. I’ve met other wonderful, creative knitters, crocheters, spinners, dyers, to name a few would be Marisol, Nell, Leslie, and Cheryl. All are great knitters, crafters, creative and inspirational in their own special way. I have knitting to thank for meeting them.

I’ve learned more about myself, how my love for this art really has a deeper meaning, finding out that my late Grandma Luz was a natural in this craft. Many times as I’m going through my stash, knitting, or anything that involves the wooly stuff, I often think of her. It’s a connection with her I never knew when she was alive, but one that I’m thankful for now because I feel her presence with me when I knit. Other great things I’ve experienced are swap, competitions, dyeing, spinning, and novice designing.

I’ve compiled a mosaic of pictures all from my 2008 year, which now that I look back was filled with so much. Especially this blog, something I enjoy so much. I’ve been maintaining it for 1 full year now, and am proud of what it inspires and how I can look back at my past.

There were so many more pictures I wanted to include, but felt this was pushing it. I won’t list what each picture is because there’s too many, but for short will list an overview below.

I look forward to another year of knitting, blogging, dyeing, spinning, and crafting.

-Sock Wars Socks, 3 kills
-Mini Scarf pin (personal project for Etsy)
-Tunisian Blanket
-Tech Square Afghan project (4 squares shown)
-Traveling Scarves Groups
-Crochet bag, Crochet Cowl
-Christmas Stocking
-MS4, SofSIII, Elm Row
-Basetweave scarf, Niners scarf
-Bookmarks, Dishcloths
-Gloves, beanies
-1st Rockymoreno “Skull” Cowl design
-My own dyed yarn, My handspun, knitting at night needles, knitta tag

Rocky's 2008 Year of Knitting, Dyeing, Spinning, Everything

Where does time go?

So much lately does it seem like my time continues to diminish everyday. I miss the days when time seemed to stretch out longer, when I had the time to do things I wanted to do, as opposed to running errands, cleaning, working, life stuff. Sadly the days of T — I — M — E really lasting were, as you would guess, when I was a kid.

Doesn’t it seem like we lose our time as Adults? Or maybe we don’t, maybe it’s just our perception. There’s a movie called “The Boogeyman”, it’s a kids movie, and the premise of the movie is that as a kid your mind is open and free which allows you to see things adults wouldn’t, like a real life Boogeyman. I think TIME is our Boogeyman, as kids time is endless days of swinging on swings, feeling the air go through you, it’s days of just meandering, frolicking or plain nothing.

As adults, our perception is different, our time has a different purpose, no more frolicking, only errands or work, work which most of us can’t escape unless we enjoy pillaging for food, leaching for items, you know what I mean *-)

I always wonder if things would be more simple if we just simply bartered for items, maybe as adults we’d have more time, instead of trying to earn that evil green, money that is. I really think money is the root of all evil. It can cause most of us grief, stress, unhappiness, envy, for those who have an abundance of $ it can provide them with feelings of power, veiled happiness, gluttony, to name a few.

What is of real value, not $, is our time, without it, nothing happens. I’ve digressed about time because I’m obviously feeling like I have none. There is so much I want to do, so much I can do, but time is the key ingredient I lack. As a result, I’m dropping out of HAT ATTACK, cause I just don’t have the time to commit, and I must admit my loyalties to the fiber craft are now more towards KALS, Holiday’s, Swaps, and oh yah, personal items.

I started my Mystery Stole 4 knit this past weekend, didn’t get to far into it, but hopefully I’ll at the very least get CLUE1 finished by end of week. I’ve chosen to go with the LACI STR I bought not long ago, there’s going to be A LOT of yarn left over from this skein, as it’s 1750yds, but hey, it can always go to another knit, maybe something to coordinate with my finished MS4 Stole.

TYPHOON TINA

As for Secret of the Stole III, I’m still stuck in HINT 2, just haven’t go to picking it up, but it is another goal to at least get done by end of this week too.

I’ve actually been really working at nailing down Crocheting, which has been an interesting experience. I bought a Crochet Cowl design, “Undulating Cowl”, and when I first was looking at this pattern, I was like what the hell??? I finally figured it out, and am now one row away from finishing it. I can’t believe how fast crocheting is. I’ve heard it was fast, and I can remember when I first learned to knit, my husband was like “My Mom used to crochet scarfs and sweaters in one weekend when I was small.”, and I remember telling him “Your crazy!”, but now I believe him, especially if your an experienced crocheter. It’s pretty freakin’ amazin’ to me how fast it is, and I’m still a newbee at it, but so far I’m real comfortable with it, and am confident I can tackle a more intermediate crochet projects. DONT’ GET ME WRONG, I’M NOT DEFECTING TO CROCHET, but I’ve always wanted to learn it so that I could use it to embellish knitting or for those quick needed garments to crochet.

Here’s a pick of the Undulating Cowl, I’ll post picks of my FO if not tonight then tomorrow morning, this is from the pattern.

I don’t think the yarn does this pattern justice, it really is prettier. I’m knitting crocheting it with some real pretty Malabrigo Charrua, which is turning out to be just gorgeous, and soft.

Speaking of time, somehow, don’t know how, I’ve found time to be MOD in Ravelry for the Traveling Scarves Group Noro 37 Knit/Crochet. I’m co-moderating with Trustcrazyideas, it’s nice having her help. We’ve officially started today, our first deadline is on 9/23/08. I’m excited to see how my scarf will turn out. The group is only to us NORO yarn, which is even better, and we can do either Knit or Crochet, perfect for me to hone my Crochet skills.

I’ll leave you with this video of the widely popular, plus one of my fave groups, The Bangles video of their hit song “Hazy Shade of Winter”, which was a hit for the movie “Less Than Zero”, another good but sad movie, great performance by Robert Downey Jr., another FAVE actor of mines. Which reminds me, I’ll have to post some movie reviews for some movies I saw recently, one of which stars Robert Downey Jr. in “Tropic Thunder”, I’ll say quickly it was “Freaki’ Hilarious!”.

This song reminds me of TIME.

A Good Weekend…Part UNO 8)

I hope everyone enjoyed this past Labor Day weekend. It was a very nice one for me, and very productive I might say! I have so much to share and can’t fit it in just 1 Lil’O post, so I’ll be splitting this baby into 2, the 2nd to follow shortly…

My weekend started with a BANG! I got off at a little before 4 p.m. on Friday, all day all I could think of was… “Is it 4 yet? I wonder if I’ll enjoy the game? I wonder if my kids will?”

What game you ask? Well, the last pre-season game for the San Francisco 49ers vs the San Diego Chargers. Woohoo! My husband and I bought 4 tickets a few weeks ago to take the kids and let them experience a real NFL game. We left San Jose about 5 p.m. and headed North towards San Francisco. We were all geared up, I had on my white 49ers tank top with lace trim, and I was wearing this lovely “Moss Ribbed Scarf” in Scout’s custom dyed “49ers” colorway…

I’m thinking I might add another 10 inches to it, cause it fits more like a cowl than a scarf, but boy did it come in handy.

Now us (me’family and I) being San Jose natives, left the hot San Jose weather wearing our normal summer clothes to go to San Francisco. You would think that we would know what to wear to S.F., considering we go there all the time, but no sir’ee’bob. I was the only one who brought any kind of warm gear, my scarf a.k.a faux cowl *) and my beige sweater jacket, but nobody else brought anything warm to wear?

So we had nose bleed seats (which I love!) and up there at night in Candlestick, it can get windy & chilly, and it didn’t fail to deliver this last Friday as we watched the game. My hubby & kids were all rattling their jaws, curling up, and trying to enjoy themselves. We ended up buying a S.F. blanket for a whopping $55.00 bucks! We’ve learned our lesson, and we’ll gear up next time, but the blanket will come in handy this winter, so I guess it’s a positive.

There was also this “49er Elvis”, so cute! You gotta see this pic….

You see him striking the signature “Elvis” pose? Look at the back of his shirt.. I love it! “Viva Las Niners”!!!

I always thought “nose bleed” seats were the worst, but now that I know how the view looks, I’m going to pick these seats more often. Check out this view:

Another cool thing, which I swear was a wish granted to me, cause as I was attentively watching the game, still cold under my sweater, I wished silently “If only they had a stand vendor who could serve you hot chocolate right at your seat”… I totally swear I wished this, and then next thing you know… BAM….

I couldn’t believe my eyes! I quickly bought a $4.00 cup of hot chocolate..I was just in ahh of it. If only I had wished for $$$, wonder if that would’ve come true??? Oh yah as soon as I got the hot choco, I took a big gulp and I burned my lips. Guess all that ooh & ahh just took the common sense right out of me Friday’s done PERIOD

Begin Saturday… I started off with cleaning, I’m a good knitter, I clean my house before I knit so as not to feel guilty. I can’t stand to have guilty thoughts and I really hate the voices in my head sometimes, I’m just totally neurotic, I’m always thinking about something or everything. Thinking of dinner, what to knit next, knitting patterns to devise, colors to dye yarn with, meals to write down, job stuff (I really hate when job stuff creeps in), bills (ahh!), upcoming appt.’s, on and on I go in my head. Is everyone neurotic or is it just me? Are you? I have the hardest time going to sleep, I just can’t get my mind blank.

After my cleaning I was just pooped. I decided to finally catch up with my Secret of the Stole III KAL, which I’m so behind because I kept debating over what beads to use, and decided to go and buy some to match my lovely lace yarn. After some lazying around, I just didn’t feel like driving down to the bead store. I had some beads I bought from the Knitting Arts going out of business, and decided to go with those. There green, and the lace I have has shades of green in it. I was a little skeptical as I started my SofSIII Hint 1, but I’m really liking how it turned out. I think the beads turned out pretty darn good, in fact I think they give the yarn that special *something*. This is the completed SofSIII Hint 1 portion:

Yarn is Schaefer Yarn Company Andrea lace weight, it is so so soft and silky. I remember when I bought it from GPY, I was just in love with it the moment I saw it and felt the silkyness.

Besides my SofSIII I continued knitting on my Elm Row scarf, this is one of the newer patterns published by the marvelous Ann Hanson from Knitspot, this pattern is so pretty, but I have to say, you do need attention to detail for it. The stitches are your basic increases, decreases & such, but I’m finding I need to pay attention as I’m knitting because the pattern consists of a 10 row repeat, each row has a different combination of stitches. For me, I tend to make mistakes because I have this type of built in memorization I do. I played the Memory game alot when I was a kid, maybe that’s where I get it from? You know the game Memory? It’s where you have a bunch of cards, each has 1 pair of identical pictures, and you mix them all up, face down, and slowly try to match up the pairs by memorizing where you saw the previous picture cards position? I played this so much as a kid, and it has helped in my adult life, I memorize everything, from numbers, to phrases, etc. For knitting this is good because I can remember entire patterns I knit, and because I memorize stitch sequences, I’ll start knitting ahead knowing the next sequence, but with the Elm Row the pattern changes so frequently that I find myself knitting a sequence that is not next in order, so I TINK TINK TINK away!
Anywho, I’m making good headway on my scarf, and I just can’t wait to finish it and block it. My little yarn cake is diminishing rapidly. The yarn is the beautiful “Peach Pit” from Scout, one of her debut colorways back in late July 2008. I’m going to custom order more of this color, I love this colorway.

To end this post, I did also get another “TO DO” done, I knitted up a Square from the “Barn Raising Quilt” pattern in the “Knitalong: Celebrating the Tradition of Knitting Together” book. Stacey from “Sheep in the City” (great blog!) posted awhile back regarding volunteers to knit a square for Father. I love my Father, and from one kind thoughtful knitter to another, I was more than happy to volunteer my knitting time. I knitted up this square using the softest yarn, I don’t have the label on me right now to give you the yarn specs, but I can tell you it is soft, velvety, rich and vibrant. I just love how this *star* pattern evolves as you knit the square. This went out in the mail to Stacey this morning

Okie Dokie folks, I’ll post Part DOS later, stay tuned 8)!

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