Yarn Crawl

Got my A!

Grades were posted for my MBA class and I got my A!

So far this weekend, I started the Fitted Knits Back to School Vest, as I needed some mindless knitting and didn't have anything that fit that description. I got a couple of inches done on it:

I also cut out the fabric for my dress/jumper this morning, and then touched up my hair using my method of the last few months (just doing the roots.)

Here's some pics:

I also got my eyebrows waxed this morning and got a manicure.

Now on to figure out what we're eating for lunch!

Friday!!

As always, I'm so glad it's Friday!!

This was a big week - finished my final project for the sewing class and I get my grade Tuesday at the last class, took my exam for the MBA class (it was pretty easy, no big deal) and on the knitting front, I finished the Fetching gloves and wove in the ends on Drive Thru. The knitting is done on the Chic Knits Felted Bucket Hat so I just have to felt it. I still have to graft together the hood on the Cabo Hoodie and weave in the ends, and sew in the elastic on Bounce and weave in those ends. But that's it for Christmas knitting!

I was looking at that Tidal Wave pattern

again in the Rowan Plaid book (now that I got that yarn a few days ago already!!) and I think I am going to do something different with the purple Plaid yarn. I'm going to work on my own pattern for my idea, as I don't see any patterns out there that really do what I want. More news to come soon!

Last night, as I had a rare night without anyplace I had to be, I cut out the paper pattern pieces for this:

I have some wool fabric that is kind of a tweedy black/tan mix that I want to use for it.

I think I want to make View B (the one on the upper right with the tabs under the bust.) I used to have a dress like this back in the early 90s, except long sleeve. I think this will be pretty fun and easy. It's funny - all I needed was to eliminate the "sewing on a deadline" pressure to get my sewing mojo back! The classes really do help me learn so much more than I would on my own, and some of that deadline pressure is good to force me to finish things (the part I always hate on any kind of project.)

After my class, I really have a lot more confidence to try new things now! I look at the pattern guidesheets and think on each step, "Yep, I can do that", "Yep, I can do that too", etc. There are very few things (at least on the patterns I've looked at lately) that seem too daunting to attempt. It's like Adrienne said the other day in her post - "It's just fabric, I'm going to just do it instead of saying I wish I could do it." I always say this in knitting, "It's just yarn, why not attempt it?" With knitting it's a little easier to feel this way because it's easy to rip out and re-use the yarn, but with fabric, you can mess it up. But if you start with a fabric which wasn't that expensive, who cares? And even if it wasn't that inexpensive, I look at it as entertainment. If it was a pretty expensive $10 a yard, for example, and you used 2 yards, you spent $20 for likely a number of hours of engagement and entertainment. When you look at it this way, there's no real reason not to attempt anything you want!

Other than that? No plans tonight, tomorrow night we have two open-house type of Christmas parties to attend, and Sunday my friend Patti is coming over to do our gift exchange. We've been friends since 6th grade, and I only have a few friends like that. I don't exchange with most of my other friends as we'd rather not add another gift obligation to our list. But me and Patti have been doing this for years and years and it's our tradition, so we keep doing it even after (me) revisiting the idea a few times. Now that we've reevaluated it a few times and decided to keep it, we'll probably keep doing this now until we're old ladies, sitting around knitting (yes! I taught her to knit, but she is happy making cat blankets in garter stitch as knitting isn't a lifestyle for her like it is for us crazy people) and exchanging our gifts and drinking our tea and occasional red wine.

Have a great weekend!

I'm thinking I'm going to use a two-step kit with a base color and highlighting to color my hair. click here

Thoughts? I've been wanting to go darker, but without a flat "matte" look to my hair (which I was afraid of with going darker.) I think this would do what I'm looking for.

ETA: I read some scary reviews online for this saying that people had turned their hair orange when they did the highlighting portion. I think I'm going to continue with my Nice & Easy Root Touch-up in Light Golden Brown for now!! I had kind of forgotten that you can REALLY mess up your hair when you do too much by yourself.

Quick Update

- I turned in my button-down shirt yesterday and I think I'll get a good grade on it. It turned out pretty well, and I plan to make another one with some additional fitting tweaks. It would be great to perfect a shirt pattern and get it to the point where it fits perfectly. I didn't have a lot of trouble easing in the sleeve into the armhole, probably because it is a more fitted sleeve and there wasn't a lot of easing that had to take place. My teacher even told me I did a great job on that part, as I decided to go ahead and try it on my own before asking for help, and completed it by myself. Next week, we just show up to get our grades and we're done.

- Tonight is the last night of the MBA class I'm taking and we have our final. No biggie, I'm not really worried about it.

- I got my Elann Superwash Chunky yarn and it is DELICIOUS. The little binder thread that is incorporated into the yarn isn't splitty or annoying, and is hardly noticeable. The yarn is SOFT too, and when I swatched it yesterday, it had a Rowan Polar-like feel and look. Yeah, I'm definitely liking it. I got the new Silken Kydd yarn too and I see no differences between it and Rowan Kidsilk Haze. None.

- Work is crazy, but I'm hoping my last day in the office for the year will still be Monday (which is a half day as we have our holiday luncheon in the afternoon and are closing the office then.)

- Sooo looking forward to working on Corsica with the new Elann yarn.

Hope everyone's having a great week!

Seven MORE Random Things

Romi (a/k/a Ms. Knitty with yet another beautiful pattern in the latest issue which also made the cover) tagged me for the 7 Random Things meme, so now I am accepting the challenge to come up with seven random things that I haven't revealed before. This is kind of fun actually, after having done this one a few times, as I'm sure there are seven more (possibly silly) things I haven't revealed before.

THE RULES:
1. Link to the person that tagged you and post the rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 random and/or weird things about yourself.
3. Tag 7 random people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs.
4. Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Random and/or odd things about me:

I've decided that the theme is, "professions I wanted to pursue while growing up", with a few random thoughts that developed from that starting point. No theme is necessary, but I find it fun to use one in coming up with random facts.

1. At one point (freshman year of high school) I wanted to be an artist. In high school, we had to pick a certain number of art and music classes and I picked not only the first art class, in which I got an "A" but the harder core second art class, which was focused on 3-dimensional art. I made a faux Grecian urn and a copper face mask and got a B- in the class - no more art classes for me after that.

2. Sophomore year of high school, I really liked my biology class and suddenly wanted to be a doctor (maybe an opthamalogist??) Then I remembered that I can't stand the sight of blood or guts (or eyeballs) and scratched that idea.

3. Junior year of high school, I toyed with the idea of becoming a psychologist or psychiatrist. My father talked me out of it, saying he didn't think I could deal with "crazy people" all day, that they would upset me too much. He told me stories of his friend who is a psychiatrist at a mental hospital and some of the bizarre incidents that would occur, and between this and the discouragement of multiple years of med school, I decided not to.

4. In 8th grade, I think I wanted to be a hair stylist. Dad talked me out of that one too, telling me I needed to capitalize on my more academic strengths. (After all this discouragement, he also ultimately did encourage me to do what I ended up doing - becoming a CPA and tax professional.)

5. In elementary school, I wanted to be a teacher. (Doesn't every girl?) In 2nd - 4th grade, I was often done with my assignments much earlier than anyone else and was bored. I had at least two different teachers that had me grade other students' classwork. I can hardly believe this now. Wouldn't that be a fireable offense?

6. Before kindergarten, a neighbor boy and I used to have play dates (not those kind of dates...) My mother always told me he was cute and he was going to grow up to be very handsome. He wasn't very popular at school, as he was very smart and "nerdy" so of course, I always said "eeeewwww". He turned out to be very handsome, 6'2 and blond, as well as smart. Didn't our mothers always know who the cute ones were going be?? Back to the play dates with Chris (the neighbor boy). My mother overheard me telling him one day, "Let's play restaurant - YOU be the waitress." My mother found this hilarious, as I said waitress instead of waiter, and directed our respective roles. I can't tell you how many times she told me I was bossy! I guess I am, a little. LOL. It's served me well so far!

7. My first real kiss was also with a neighbor boy, also named Chris, in my new neighborhood that we moved to just before 7th grade. My mother thought he was such a nice harmless boy - and I guess he was - but she should have supervised us a little more closely! LOL.

Wow, that wasn't too hard to come up with.

This time, I'm going to tag Jenny, Adrienne, my SP11 spoiler Helene, my SP11 spoilee Stefanie who just had a recent birthday, Debby, doctorkate (one of the new kids on Ravelry whose blog I love) and Heather. I know some of you all have done this before, but take the challenge to come up with new things so we can get to know you a little better. I did and had a fun time with it!

Weird but Good Weekend

OK - this is going to come as a shock - but I didn’t do really any knitting this weekend, and only spent about a few hours sewing. Instead, I was in a organizing/crossing things off the to-do list mood, so I decided to go with the flow and do that while I felt like it (as this mood rarely hits!) I cleaned out/organized my yarn and fabric closet, getting rid of some old papers and junk I had in there and moving stuff around, making sure all of my latest yarn acquisitions now had a home. It had gotten pretty bad in there with stacks of fabric, bags of fabric and yarn purchased in the last few months, patterns, sewing notions, etc. To give you an idea, it was impossible to walk into this walk-in closet. Eeek.

Here's how it's looking now:

It feels soooo good to have it organized now. I realized one thing – I REALLY need to knit from stash. I have enough to knit for at least one year, probably two, without buying anything – but I’m not going to get that extreme. I’m going to try to make it until the next fiber fests next year in the summer, but am not going to make any pledges or anything like that, as if there’s a sale, it makes sense to take advantage of it. Right?

Like on Saturday (the day before the Starbucks-fueled closet cleaning morning). I remembered that I received an email about a yarn shop going out of business and selling all yarn at 30% off. At first, I wasn’t going to go, partially because I know I have so much yarn, but more importantly, because I didn’t remember them selling any yarns I particularly liked. Then Saturday morning, I remembered that they sell Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece. Don’t ask me how I forgot this fact. And out of all the yarn in my stash, the one thing I was short on was Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece, because I usually buy it and knit it up right away. As you know, I feel it is THE 100% cotton substitute, as that 20% of wool content really softens the harsh effect of knitting with cotton on my hands. So I bought enough for six summer tops on Saturday. Three skeins makes me a nice short sleeve or sleeveless summer top, so I bought three of each of six colors (two purple shades, two pink shades and one orange) plus one more skein to round out the two skeins of Barn Red I had in stash. I also discovered that Ravelry wasn’t 100% updated and I needed to add some additional purchases in.

So that was all over the place. Here it is, chronologically speaking:

Friday night, we went to Holy Mackerel, a new seafood restaurant nearby in the new Westin hotel tower they built about two miles from me. We shared oysters and crab claws and crab legs – they were sooo fresh and good. On Saturday, we postponed Morton’s again so just went to Carlucci’s, another nearby restaurant. Sunday morning I woke up around 7, went to Starbucks for a skim Peppermint Mocha (yum) and was fueled for the entire morning’s closet cleaning/organization. Then while Jim was watching football, I went to an “open house” at one of my co-worker’s homes where she was selling some jewelry she made, and other vendors selling Partylite candles, Tastefully Simple mixes, Body Shop shower gels/lotions, and some handmade cards. I bought four pairs of earrings at $6 each and added on to my Partylite order with my friend who sells that, then went home.

I worked on my shirt later on Sunday afternoon, and have the front facings sewn on and the hem is done. I used the serger to do the hem and it actually looks neater than the narrow hem I had started to do. I probably should have switched it over to the coverstitch mode first, but I was ready to be done and just wanted to get it over with as it has to be turned in on Tuesday. Now I have to do the buttonholes and buttons tonight, and will be doing the sleeve cap easing in class on Tuesday, and I can cross this thing off the list.

I was looking at my other button down shirts at home that fit me well, and every last one of them is made out of a stretch fabric (either cotton with stretch in it, or a knit.) I really don’t like 100% cotton shirts, as they will be too loose in some spots and too tight in others. I actually think that what I need is a “broad back adjustment” in shirts, rather than a “full bust adjustment”, as I’m pretty sure I’m wider across the back than I am in the front, because of my muscular build. I have a lot of muscle in my back, shoulders and arms but am actually pretty narrow across the chest in the front.

So this shirt was a “muslin”, as I planned, as I really didn’t care about the fabric. I am going to continue to plan to make multiple versions of a pattern to get it 100% perfect, and am only going to use fabric I don’t really care about for my first few versions until I work out the bugs. I learned a lot from this shirt, and I also learned how much I like working with my serger. I need to investigate more of its features, now that I’m no longer afraid of it, and figure out how I can maximize its use as I love the clean, professional finish it gives everything.

Last night when I finished working on the shirt, I wrapped a bunch of presents (again, working on this while the mood struck!) and then Jim and I painted wood Christmas ornaments. This has become a tradition of sorts, and it's one crafty thing he likes to do. He is super careful and precise about the painting, with zero mistakes - whereas I'm maybe 95% accurate at painting inside the lines, but finish pretty quickly. Isn't this pretty much how I do everything?

What else? I'm about 2/3 through Eat, Pray, Love and I still like it. I have to say "Pray" isn't as fun as "Eat" was, but it is more profound for sure. The fact that she is a professional woman like myself helps me relate to her and adds to the credibility of her story, although she's much more of a "seeker" for spiritual fulfillment than I'll ever be. I couldn't 100% relate to the "Eating" part of the story in Italy, either, as I don't think I'd ever be able to let myself indulge as much as she did as I'd be too worried about the consequences and wouldn't even really want to (except for the wine - LOL.) I do enjoy the audiobook and I love the sound of the author's voice (as she narrates the audiobook herself.) I think she really "puts herself out there" with this book, especially for someone as emotional as she is. I keep finding myself asking whether I would like her, if I met her, maybe because she is around my age. At the beginning of the book, she seems like someone who would be too emotionally needy and draining for me to get along with, but as she progresses through her travels, and finds herself, I find myself liking her more and more. Overall, very interesting and believable so far.

I found the buttons that were inside the fabric my SP Helene sent me and they are GORGEOUS. I couldn't take a good closeup picture of them but I should be able to rectify this problem after Christmas as I think I will be getting a new camera!! Thank you, Helene!

So I leave you with a picture of my cat being bad yesterday (caught mid-whine)

Hope you had a great weekend!!!

Friday!!

After a really long and stressful work week, I am soooo glad it's Friday!!

Last night I almost finished the Fetching gloves that I'm giving as a gift at my co-worker's Christmas Eve dinner party. I completely finished one of the gloves, and on the other one I just have to pick up the thumb stitches.

I got my other Elann order*, so I have my periwinkle Peruvian Highland Wool to make a Chic Knits Felted Bucket Hat for my only other knitted gift. I had decided against Dashing gloves for Michael and Tommy. Instead, I looked on opentable.com for the St. Louis area and got them a nice gift certificate for a dinner out at a place that received great reviews, a subscription to Cook's Illustrated per Lisa's suggestion (Michael used to attend culinary school so this is perfect), and a bottle of one of the Michigan rieslings we bought last month. I have everyone else done, pretty much too - except for Jim, who I'm working on ideas for.

Anyway, I just plan to knit and work on my shirt (which is due Tuesday at the end of class) this weekend. Knitting wise, maybe I'll finish the sleeves on Cherie Amour, or finally sew my cabled purse together or weave in the ends on one of my gift sweaters. On the shirt, I plan to get everything done this weekend except easing in the sleeve caps. It has been going REALLY well and there are only a few things left: the front facing, buttonholes/buttons and the hem. I am waiting to attack easing in the sleeve caps until class when I can get the teacher's help.

What else? We never ended up going to Morton's last weekend, so Tim may be inviting us out again on Saturday night if he doesn't have to work. I also bought some more plastic containers for my yarn last night at the Container Store, in case the mood hits over the weekend to redo the yarn closet (as it is bursting at the seams right now.)

Have a great weekend!!

*BTW, I thought yesterday I was ordering the chunky version of this , which I had previously ordered one skein of. This arrived yesterday as part of my order, and I LOVE this yarn. I don't think it's going to be like the one I ordered yesterday in texture though. I think I was hoping it would be. But we'll see. I recommend this yarn very highly though - looks and feels just like Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran!

Pounced!!

To use (blog-free) Lisa's word, which fits perfectly, I "pounced" on the Elann sale just now and bought the Peacock! I bought an extra skein as I'm not sure if I will make the 32 or 34.

I also bought a skein of their new Silken Kydd in Baked Apple to see how similar it is to Rowan's Kidsilk Haze. I will let you know how everything is! Yay!

Which Color for Corsica?

You may think that there's no way I could possibly need MORE wool, after reading my posts throughout this year and checking out my Ravelry stash (which actually isn't 100% up to date for some recent acquisitions.) However, I have a shortage in the chunky yarn category (4 stitches to the inch, in my definition) and Elann is having a sale today starting at 9 am Pacific (or 11 my time) and I can make Corsica for less than $30 if I take advantage of it.

Sooooo....I need some chunky yarn for Corsica and I am having trouble figuring out which color to pick. I was thinking maybe Merlot but also am thinking about Peacock, Amaranth or Sable Grey. It needs to be light enough to show the cables, but other than that, I think the color choice is open.

My hair has been "light golden brown" lately as I have been using "Nice & Easy Root Touch-up" (this is an AMAZING product) instead of spending crazy insane amounts on my hair (and am liking it better). It actually is a light enough color to turn my grays to highlights and blend with the rest of my highlighted hair. I think it's saving me about $200 a month, on average! More money for yarn...

Back to the yarn purchase. Any and all color suggestions are appreciated, especially those I may not have thought of!

Wordless Wednesday!!