Stripes Gallore

Good grief!  I really am into stripes these days.

Stripes and more stripes

Autumn Fire is still on the needles, as is the black & clown barf striped cowl.  They have each only grown in length by a a few rows over the past week.  I've been knitting on the diagonal striped scarf instead.

I got pretty excited when I started the diagonal stripe scarf.  I desperately need to purge a few things from the stash pile in order to make room for newer, incoming yarns and last week, when I pulled out a bunch of partial skeins, it looked like I was making some pretty decent purging progress.  But, alas, the diagonal striped scarf is not eating up anywhere near as much yarn as I expected it to.  In order to make a noticeable dent in the pile, I may end up having to knit coordinating mittens.  Lots and lots of mittens.

Okay, since it's Wednesday and I'm linking up to  Ginny's Yarn Along post, let's talk books.  The e-book I mentioned last week but couldn't remember the name of....  was Nine Minutes by Beth Flynn.   I finished it over the weekend.  I enjoyed the story but the ending came on too quick.  It read as though the author had suddenly gotten really tired of writing the book & sloppily threw together an ending just so she'd be done.  As for this week, I'm still reading Skulduggery Pleasant by Derek Landy.  I've mostly been reading this one while at work and work has been busy so it's taking me a while to get through it.  Honestly, I'm a little surprised I haven't done the 'stay up 24+ hours straight to finish reading' thing with this book.  It's a magical world collides with non-magical world story which reminds me a bit of Harry Potter and the characters have snappy, sarcastic comebacks which reminds me of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.  Both of those are favorites of mine so I should be zooming through Skulduggery.  I think I've just been too tired to read.

More Stripes

I seem to be into stripes these days.  I also seem to have reached my limit on Christmas gift knitting in October.  I suddenly lost any shred of interest I had in knitting Christmas gifts.  I mean really, why should I be concerned about knitting them in October when I have, you know, Christmas Eve?  I mean really!  I should be able to crank out four or five scarves, a few hats and a couple of pair of mittens on Christmas Eve.  Right?  Sure I can.

So, yeah, I'm procrastinating.

And I decided to use up some of the odds and ends of left over worsted weight wool I had laying around.

I started out with the idea of just knitting a plain striped scarf.  I was going to knit simply knit with one color until it ran out then add on the next.  Sort of Dr. Who scarf style.  But after taking a closer look at the odds and ends of yarns I have on hand, I decided that wasn't going to look so great.  The majority of yarn in my odds & ends pile are either too similar in color or they clash with each other way to much to simply knit wide stripes with them.  So, I decided, in an effort to confuse the eye and tame the clashing colors a bit, I'd knit three color stripes on the diagonal.

More Stripes

So far, I think it's working.

Too Early?

Is it too early to start decorating for Christmas?

I went coat shopping yesterday.  I didn't find a coat, but I did find this:

Christmas sweater candle

It's a knitted Christmas sweater candle!  If you zoom in, you can see the little knit stitches!

I think I may be way more excited about this than a normal person should be.

Stripes

Stripes have taken over my knitting.

Striped Cowl

I'd started this cowl last month but frogged it back to the ribbing and started over.  Originally, I thought it would be fun to add a blue bead to each splash of blue yarn.  You know how you picture some fantastic thing in your head but the reality of it turns out to be so awful you frog it and find yourself trying to pick up live ribbing stitches knit with slightly fuzzy black yarn?  At night?  Yeah, that was fun. But it's back on track now.  Christmas gift #2 is in the works.  I am SO rocking my Christmas knitting list this year!

As for my reading, I'm rocking that too.  Except I have no idea what the book is called that I'm reading.  It's on my Kindle (which is really a cheap tablet that I use as a Kindle,) and my daughter has taken it to school with her (because her 5 month old non-Mac computer has died. Don't even get me started on how much I dislike non-Mac computers) and I've just realized that although I'm really enjoying the book, I have no idea what it's called.  It's about a young teen girl who gets kidnapped by a biker gang, she gets the Stockholm Syndrome thing going on and ends up marrying the gang's leader.  It sounds horrible but I'm actually enjoying it.

Even though I don't know my book's title, I'm joining Ginny's Yarn Along.

Check

This must be a record for me.  It's only October 14th & I'm already checking off the first item on the Christmas Gift Knitting list.

Gift #1

Pardon the photo.  It's barely one step above black & white.  I was too lazy/rushed to move the mannequin further from the window & the sun is streaming in and the back lighting is well...  You can see for yourself.  But this time, it's actually okay with me that my photo is horrible.  Maybe the cowl's recipient won't recognize it for what it is.

The yarn is Mirasol Sami purchased back in the summer from the wonderful folks at Knitting B and the pattern is a simple 5 x 5 rib pattern.  So simple, so soft, so thick, squishy and warm.

Yarn Along Wednesday

I'm joining Ginny for Yarn Along Wednesday.

Once Is Enough & Autumn Fire

I've only advanced one and a half pages in my book, Once Is Enough so I'm not sure I can honestly say that I'm reading it.  But I am trying.  Okay, okay.  The book is laying on my bedside table.  Based on a random comment left on some other knitting blog (I don't even remember which one) I'm also reading Skulduggery Pleasant.  It's on my Kindle so I can read it at work so I'm making a little bit more progress on it.  Work has been pretty busy lately so I haven't had very much time to read there either.

And speaking of work.....  I think I've finally settled into the new job.  I've learned how to do what I'm supposed to be doing and other than the occasional radio code,  I don't have to look up how to do things anymore.  Being able to just do it instead of having to stop & find the directions for each little task is making the job much more enjoyable.  As for those radio codes... The radio & I will never be BFFs but I no longer break out into a cold sweat at the thought of having to use it.

But back to knitting....  My Autumn Fire scarf is growing.  Slowly.  Very, very slowly.  It's garter stitch on 430 stitches on US 2 needles and fingering weight yarn.  So yeah, slow is definitely the word.  I'm still loving the blend of fall colors though so I keep knitting.

I'm also trying my hand at weaving.  What I really want is a table loom (okay, what I really, really want is one of those huge, giant floor looms that takes up an entire room that you can weave bedspread sized things on) but what I got was a Martha Stewart Knitting & Weaving Loom Kit.

Weaving  101

I've only used it once and the results are way too loose.  I obviously needed to use either double strands or bulky weight yarn.  But as a first time, practice piece, it didn't turn out too badly.  I'm going to try felting it & call it a coaster.  Meanwhile, if you are a weaver and want to offer opinions on table looms for beginners, I'm all ears.  I'd like to be make much larger things than the Martha Stewart loom can accommodate   Things like scarves, table runners and place-mats.  I'd also like to not spend a fortune until I know if I actually like weaving.

On the needles

I'm still knitting on the green Christmas gift.

Christmas gift knitting

I think the yarn has magical powers.  For two days, I've been knitting away, thinking that I'll come to the end of the skein any moment.  The end never comes though.  Sort of like the end of this project.

Yes, this Christmas gift is starting to have that never ending feel to it.  I'm having to fight the urge to start a new project, or twenty.  Instead of finishing the thing on my needles, I just keep adding to my Things To Knit in 2016 list.  I could knit 24/7 for the next ten years and not finish everything on my 2016 list.  Good grief!

Oh well, at least I won't struggle with coming up with a list of things to knit in 2017.

Yarn Along Wednesday

I can't believe another Wednesday has rolled around already.  Where does the time go??

Basket Weave Hat

I'm still reading Once Is Enough.  It's an interesting read but slow going because it's in paper form rather than digital.  I don't have much opportunity to read real books these days.  I'm also still knitting the green Christmas gift thing.  I did manage to start and finish a hat this week.  My intention is to get it listed for sale in my Etsy shop by tomorrow afternoon but you know what they say about good intentions....  We'll see.

To see what others are knitting and reading, join me over at Ginny's blog, Small Things.