Sunday, November 12, 2006

Toeing Up

Ok so I'm still working on the endless shawl. I'm almost done with the straight section. But there is a consequence to such knitting project monogamy, especially when it's endless stockinette stitch.

You end up teaching yourself how to do a short row toe-up sock in bed at midnight. I also taught myself how to do a crochet provisional cast-on in the same sitting.

I should do this more often because there were significantly fewer mistakes than when I've ever tried any other new knitting technique.

photos of this miraculous achievement to come.

GG

Saturday, November 11, 2006

Knitting



nuff said.

GG

Holiday season is already here.

Did I mention my mother in law is coming to visit? She's arriving the day before thanksgiving and will be here through Christmas. Thankfully I have a great relationship with her. We're going to have a great time. We're going to go wine tasting, to the Dickens Fair. We're going to buy a christmas tree and decorate the house. There's going to be cooking and movies. In general, this just spreads the whole holiday season. I'm really looking forward to it.

And then my brother is getting married next weekend. And I've been working on this shawl to wear and making good progress. I hope to have the length of the shawl done this weekend.

as such i have a lot of work to do! I have to get crackin'

GG

Tuesday, November 07, 2006

Retreat in detail

Okey dokey there have been a few comments and emails bemoaning the brevity of my retreat post, so here's some details and some photos!

The cool thing about the retreat is that I made my mom go with me. In my world everything is better with your mom, especially if it involves knitting. So mom came up to my house and my husband came home from work and we all went out for dinner at Chili's. I pigged out on the southwestern cobb salad and fries and even indulged in a Dr. Pepper.

Then mom and I headed out to the retreat which was only 10 minutes away. I know not so far for a retreat, but far enough. We stayed at a gorgeously remodeled victorian house. I felt like I was suddenly on that Real World reality show, you know the part in the first episodes where the cast sees the house for the first time and they go running around checking everything out. Yeah I did that. It was a pretty awesome house. Plenty of room for everyone to get comfortable and knit.

Unfortunately since mom and I were the last to sign up we were stuck with the den room with fold out couches. But that was the only room with a tv -a tv with cable. Not that I'm so tv crazy, but I do enjoy watching David Letterman.

So once everyone arrived, Warren introduced us to the yarn that we would be playing with. We got twelve boxes of Lana Grossa yarn. They have now moved up in my favorite yarn company list. Soft and versatile. There really was a yarn for everybody. I fell in love with the Pashmina (and managed a sneaky trade to get an extra ball) while my mom liked the Luxor. There was this other soft green one that I really liked, but can't remember the name of. There were some yarns I didn't like so much, but I was on a mission to horde the ones I liked. Eventually I ended up going home with a bunch of pink Maxi (aka that big pink stuff) and two balls of pashmina, as well as a couple of sample balls of Jo Sharp's new yarns (yay!!!!). So yarn wise I was a happy camper.

Not that I did a whole lot of yarn tasting anyway. I've been on a feindish knitting mission to finish this Lana Grossa shawl. And I really wanted to get those odd duck socks done.

The other ladies were fabulous and everyone got a long pretty well. It was nice spending time with women of all ages. It seems all of us have a tough time with doctors. For people that spend so much time and money getting education, they can be pretty stupid sometimes.

Anyhoo after an evening of knitting and new yarn (and irish coffees too) I went to bed and watched Letterman. Unfortunately I should not have had that Irish Coffee because I didn't sleep well at all. I usually have a tough time getting aclimated to new sleeping arrangements. So I got up at 6am. It was nice to watch the sun rise and the fog lift. It was very relaxing and nice to have a bit of quiet alone time.

Soon enough everyone was up, but I couldn't stay for breakfast. I had to go to the grocery store to get the last fresh ingredients I needed to make dinner and dessert. I made a deal with Warren that I would provide dinner and dessert in exchange for attending the retreat. I actually like cooking for people and I needed to get some practice before Thanksgiving. Anyhoo I made spaghetti bolognese and vegan bolognese, greek salad, garlic bread and apple-cranberry crumble. It took me 5 hours to put it all together, but I was well organized and knew how to direct people when I needed help. You would think that something like this would stress me out, but I was odly relaxed through the whole thing.

Anyhoo that was the weekend in a nutshell.

I did manage to finish the socks



yay!
GG

Sunday, November 05, 2006

This kind of fun should be outlawed

12 Women

One immaculately restored Victorian house with a front porch over looking the redwoods.

Twelve Boxes of Lana Grossa Yarn for us to play with (one of which was cashmere)

Three dishes for dinner cooked by me (and an apple cranberry crumble for dessert)

for one weekend of knitting.

I had so much fun I need time to recover.

GG

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

Works in Progress...

This box by the couch is home to all of my knitting projects. I only just recently cleaned it out of all of my random bits of yarn that I won't be using (which I will be donating to a school)

The WIP Box

So here's what I'm working on right now:


The Central Park Hoodie from Knitscene.

Knitscene
CentralParkHoodie
CentralParkHoodieclose

A shawl that I just started that needs to be finished in less than three weeeks:
Shawl

And I'm making a pair of socks. I'd have them finished, but I left one of my needles behind at my mom's house the other week. doh!
Socks

I'm going to a knitting retreat this weekend so hopefully I'll get a lot done!

GG
PS: Blogger was a PAIN in the you know what today. Stupid photo program