Keeping Promises

Remember I promised ya'll that one day I would again post a picture that wasn't taken on my laptop? Here you go:
Look what arrived in the mail from Dorothy! Beautiful wool, dyed by Dorothy herself. Isn't it cool!?? It is very soft and the colors are so rich. I wonder if this yarn will felt...perhaps I could make a technicolor sheep???? We'll see. I am going to have to think on this. Also! She sent me the needles you see sticking out the top of the yarn. They are wonderful, too. Thank you Dorothy!!!

I can see the light at the end of the scarf tunnel now. I've completed about 20" on the second half. I'm really happy with the way it looks. I had to frog a little last night (about one repeat) because I had picked up a stitch. I really should work a little harder at maintaining my knitting focus. Believe it or not, most of these unknitting incidents have been because of my own carelessness. I know you find that hard to believe but, really, it is true!

The Grandmother Purl squares have been coming in at a steady pace. I hope to post an update there either today or tomorrow. The squares are all so lovely and so different. I can't wait to start sewing them together.

If Finding Nemo Took Place at the LYS

Just keep knitting. Just keep knitting.

Just keep knitting, knitting, knitting.

What do we do? We knit, knit.

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ho. I love to knit.

When you want to knit you want to knit.

The second half of the ISE scarf is up to 14 inches now.

Minimal Progress is Progress Nonetheless

Thanks for your comments and input on the wool for the little sheep. I think I've solved my dilemma with the help of the RabidCrafter. Hurray! A couple of people have asked what I have planned for these little guys. Well, my oldest sister, Carrie, collects these dolls. They are very fancy dolls, that look disturbingly like real babies. Carrie loves them and we mock her for it. It is good natured mocking, of course, so I am going to knit sheep for Carrie for Christmas, for her babies. I'll let ya'll know when I get around to starting on them. (Sometime after the completion of the scarf.)

Speaking of the scarf, I have been doing some work on the second side. See:

Yes, yes. I know. It isn't much progress...but it IS progress.

In Other News

It has been a nice weekend, kind of busy. Friday night I went to watch my niece, Tegan, cheer at her homecoming game. (No, I didn't take my knitting.) My twin sister, Katy, and I are apparently not very adept with my camera. We were able to take some relatively clear pictures of her back
though we had little to no success with a frontal cheerleading shot.
She's such a cutie. Really, she is...despite the lack of photographic evidence. Oh well. I guess it is the thought that counts, right? She is such a sweetheart and really loves cheering. I love this girl - as my willingness to attend a high school football game on crutches attests.

Have ya'll ever watched Dallas Cowboys Cheerleading: Making the Team? Not the world's most intellectually stimulating tv viewing but it is good knitting tv. Good to watch while making more progress on the scarf.

Listmaker, Listmaker, Make Me a List

Remember last weekend, when I ordered this pattern? Well, I ordered a couple of skeins of yarn to make them out of, too. (Of course.) I decided to go with the Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride worsted because:
1) Fiber Trends recommends it for this pattern and
2) I have used it before for felting projects with much success.

I ordered one skein each of:
1) Onyx
2) Grey Heather (which is quite a bit darker in person) and
3) Oatmeal"

Now. In this picture, at least on my monitor, the Oatmeal looks sort of like a dirty cream/mottled off white. I thought this would work fine because:
1) Web's didn't have any of the White Frost and
2) I have used the Creme before and IMHO it is too yellow for a sheep.
3) Real sheep aren't always super duper white anyway.
4) I have heard that the "bleached" white wools don't felt and I was trying to stay clear of that.

Unfortunately, the Oatmeal is pretty brown. More brown and, well, overcooked oatmeal colored than I had expected/hoped. So I am unhappy with this choice. I do not want any sheep this color. So I am seeking your assistance/input.
1) Does anyone have any Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride in White Frost that they would be willing to sell/trade?
2) Any possiblity that I could bleach out the Oatmeal to make it work? (If I were to bleach it, would it still felt?)
3) Any recommendations of a different yarn that would knit to about the same size/gauge as the BSLPW and would be whiter than this Oatmeal and look sheepish?
4) Does anyone have an alternative yarn that would be "just perfect" for this that they would like to sell or trade? I am really really open to suggestions here.

Edited to add: Yes, the pattern for these sheep recommends the Baabajoes Wool for the project for the whites/lights. I haven't had any luck finding this yarn. Except in one place...in a kit...and that is not what I want. I need another option.

I am counting on the collective expertise of the online knitting community to help me out with this. I am devoting a lot of my spare minutes to the Grandmother Purl Blanket Project, which is ticking along right nicely, but leaves very little time to go looking for these answers. Any help ya'll can offer would be greatly appreciated.

Oh yeah. Did I mention? I joined a scarf exchange a while back and I really should be knitting away on that. Since the great deconstruction, I have only knit one repeat of the pattern. I think I will take it with me to the HS football game Friday night when I go to watch my niece cheer. Yes, that should be sufficiently embarrassing for her.

Keeping My Options Open

Just Because it is the Right Decision Doesn't Mean it is an Easy Decision

I am a little ashamed to admit it but admit I shall: I am an emotional knitter. More accurately, I am an emotional unknitter. You know the type: happily toddling along on a nice little knitting project and then, one little bump in the road and all hell breaks loose. One minute I'm all warm and fuzzy about a project and the next: I'm mad at the knitting. Cursing it, trying to reason with it, shoving it unceremoniously into my bag - with little or no regard for whether or not the stitches even stay on the needles. I pull it out and stare at it some more. I fiddle with it, I look at it in several different lights, from several different angles. In disgust, I photograph it, I parade it around the internet as if to shame it into behaving.

And in the end, I drink wine and I put it out of its misery. Then, as if to say, "Move along folks. There's nothing to see here," the yarn that was a botched side two is now peacefully and contentedly back in three nice little center-pull balls.

Thank you all for your advice. I did go over and try the cable fix at the Yarn Harlot's place but it just didn't come back together in the way it should. It was obvious it had been monkeyed with. So I took the opportunity to embrace a clean slate for the second side. I really did want to go along with your well wishes and just find the zen in it. But I couldn't. I kept looking and looking at it and all I could see was the mistake.

As a show of good faith between me and the Pima Cotton Silk, I immediately cast on again.See? No hard feelings.

When The Going Gets Tough, the Knitters Buy Yarn

Aside from the wine, what is the best cure for the battered heart of a knitter? New yarn, of course! And what could be better than yarn on sale for 50% off at the LYS where you have a gift certificate!?! This was not, however, just compulsion yarn buying. This is called having a contingency plan. If I can't make myself happy with the Cables in Relief scarf (though hopefully, I can, because I still love the softness and the originality of it.) Worst case scenario, though, if I have to kick the Cables in Relief to the side of the road, I bought these two skeins of Cherry Tree Hill Supersock, 100% luxury merino fingering weight in the Tropical Storm colorway. It is very pretty and very soft and perfect for the Cozy pattern from Knitty, which was my other top choice for this project. It was a debate between the two.

While I'm in the Neighborhood...

Since all of their yarn was on sale for 50% off, I decided to buy these, too.

Two skeins of Kraemer Yarns' Mauch Chunky, one skein in Kiwi and one in Plum. My SIL Lori said she liked these colors together and wanted something felted from them. So I got these and now I have to figure out what I am going to make for her. Each skein is only 120 yards so it isn't going to be a big something. I am thinking maybe I will modify this pattern. I like the pouch concept but she isn't really a fanny pack kind of girl. Or, more likely, I will just make something up when the time comes.

I Tink, Therefore I Am

With my apologies to Mr. Descartes.Do you see that? Oh no?

Try this closer shot. Do you see it now?

Yes, intend that is yet another glaring you-call-yourself-a-knitter-you-careless-incompetent type of mistake. I’m not sure if this is a case of zigging when I should have zagged or if it is a complete lack of zig or zag. I am thinking lack of. I am going to look at it more closely. When I saw that big wave where a small wave should be this morning, I just put it in my bag and tried not to think about it.

Unless I come up with a way to undo and fix just that section (any thoughts?) between now and my knitting time this evening, I am going to be doing some more unknitting. I have never had so much frogging in one project in all of my knitting days. I hope my pal loves this scarf when it is (eventually) complete.

On Saturday, I got the first half to 33” and so I set it aside and cast on for this second half. Do ya’ll like the single black strip? I wanted it to have some character…

I have a good excuse for the mistake riddled second scarf half: All of the knitting you see in that picture (as well as three different incidences of knitting and unknitting) was completed at the ER yesterday. I was there all day – nearly 12 hours – with my husband. I won’t go into the whole mess but, needless to say, my mind wasn’t very focused on my knitting. (He is doing ok now and is at home.)

I tell you that as explanation for my stunning display of knitting ineptitude and also to tell you a funny story. The room my husband was in was one of the small trauma areas. The room has four beds that can be curtained off from one another. Of course, we all know that, while curtains will shield your personal bits from prying eyes, they do nothing to prevent the patient and loved ones in the next bed over from hearing what’s going on behind the curtain. Mid-afternoon on a Sunday is apparently not the busiest time in this particular ER so at the time this incident occurred, it was only my husband on one end of the room and a “lady” who’d been brought in by ambulance on the other end of the room.

In the relative quiet, all we could hear was the (mercifully) soft beeping of his monitors and the conversations going on at the other end of the room. When they first brought little miss other end of the room in, she was screaming and being hateful and belligerent (this could have had something to do with the restraints they’d used to strap her to the gurney) and being escorted by police. Over the course of…maybe an hour or two or more, I guess. I sort of lost track of time…we heard her story.

Apparently she had overdosed on her daily Wellbutrin. She’d taken several times what she was supposed to take because, as she explained to the doctor, she couldn’t remember whether or not she had taken it so she took it again. Later on the doctor came back to give her some rest results at which time she became a little more forthcoming. He told her that the results of her toxicology reports showed that she had indeed overdosed on Wellbutrin, however, the high levels of cocaine in her system MAY have contributed to her condition.

At this point, she started crying and explained to the doctor that, once she realized she had taken too many of the Wellbutrin, she started feeling sluggish and tired so she did a little cocaine to “perk up” but about 30 minutes after doing the cocaine, she started to feel crazy, like her heart was beating too fast and she had too much energy. So, to counteract this manic feeling, she drank a bottle of bourbon to calm her nerves. Yes, yes indeed. An entire bottle of bourbon.

Hospitals and airports really are the best places for people watching.