Happy New Year!

Hope you have a joyous celebration and a safe evening. I'm watching the Knit Girllls, hanging with my munchkins, doing some blog updates (more to come in the next few days...) and some laundry as well. And knitting of course! Sending much love and happiness to you all!

Current Mood?

SPARKLES!!!!!!!!

This is GnomeAcres in the Peppermint Mocha (a seasonal color way ) on her DK Bedazzled Gnome base which is 75% Superwash Merino, 20% Nylon and 5% Sparkle. I love it and am so excited to have a second skien in another seasonal color way. The socks are Lumberjack by Tincanknits which is available on Ravelry-I, of course, had to make a few mods because I like to be difficult like that. 

Hope your Sunday is going swimmingly!

Finally...

I broke 5000 meters in FOs...for the year (please just forget that it was a stash dash goal...mmk?).
Almost to 4.5 lbs as well...which is a bit off of my 7lb goal but whatever...there's still 5 days left in the year...

Merry Christmas, y'all!

Visions of sugar plums have been dancing around their heads all day-massive headache meant we spent most of the day in bed and resting. Hope you all had a very merry and bright Christmas day!!

P.S. If you'd like to see something absolutely gorgeous, there is an absolutely gorgeous gradient Hitofude out of handspun featured on the front page of Ravelry (it's about halfway through the first post on that page).

6 months...

Hi! I'm alive!

I actually went to write something the other day but saw that my last post was on 6/22 so i figured I would just wait until today to kinda catch you up on what's been going on...

A) I totally failed at Stash Dash...I haven't even broken 5000 meters for the year yet though I am hoping

B) I also failed at the "yarn in vs yarn out" version of a yarn diet...

C) I finished Bridge Swim! Made it in about 5 hours and 40 minutes...only thought about quitting half a dozen times. We were very excited to not get kicked out of the river by lightening this year.

D) There is snow on the ground here...I have officially driven in snow. I don't love it when its on the ground-but man is falling snow pretty.

E) I did take a knitting break after Stash Dash but now I think I'm back for awhile...

F) I bought a sweater quantity of yarn (for more than one sweater actually...) This may be part of what lead to B above...

G) I had a field mouse in my house this summer; I was not a fan. This most effective defense against field mice in this area is cats...so I decided to foster 3 of them. Four plus months later, they are all still with me.

This was the three of them cuddling with me in bed the other day. They are a wide variety of ages (17.5, 12.5 and 2.5); I adore them and love every minute I get to spend with them and be their "mama". 

I am still working at getting pictures of FOs and will keep updating the side bar as that happens. Maybe I'll even post some knitting pictures here on the blog later this week...though no guarantees. 

If you are Christmas knitting, I hope its going well! Look forward to catching up with you all and maybe getting back into writing more than once every few months :) 

Xs & Os

Literally

I might be the worst blogger ever...hoping to put some stash dash photos up this week and maybe add all my latest WIPs and FOs both here and on Rav. But none of that is happening tonight so I'll just say I'm thinking of you all and put up a pretty sunset picture from last night.

Stash Dash Update #1/2

I was going to do a Stash Dash update last Friday but I didn't (i crashed as soon as I got home from work and vegged for a few hours before knitting a couple rows and calling it a night).
So figured I would combine last week's update with this week's update-however, since I haven't actually finished anything this week, the photos from last week will still be good. Also, I know my current meterage is definitely off-pace. There is a possible finish in my weekend which should help me get a lot closer to being on track...
So what hugely epic finishes do I have so far for Stash Dash? Sadly no crazy WIPs got finished...or anything all that big-but hey, every little bit counts and I completely finished two partial skeins of Sugar and Cream that had been languishing for a bit of time.

Two baby burp clothes for a community baby shower (this week! hopefully I can get one more done in time). The one on the left completely used up two old skeins of Sugar and Cream (80.74 meters) and the one on the right had just a little bit leftover (71.59 meters). There's a good possibility I'll be making a bit of a monster burp cloth :)

Two more barn raising quilt squares! The one on the left is out of Stroll Multi which has sadly been discontinued (in the Aloha color way for 54.92 meters). The one on the right might look a little familiar as the yarn is the Cascade Heritage in the Londonberry color way that I used for my Mom's Christmas socks (59.93 meters).

So that puts me at 267.18 meters! Which makes me .05% of the way to 5000 meters. Fun fact, 267.18 meters is .16 miles for non-metric people (aka me). In full honesty, whatever I can move along makes me happy. Definitely looking forward to finishing some WIPs up and digging out some deep stash to love on.

Talking about deep stash, this is my first Rose City Roller (which has now been finished and I am ready to pick up gusset stitches for number 2!). The yarn is an old skein of Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock that only has 215 yards per skein. So this project is perfect for the skein and I love it so much. There are so many fun projects on Instagram (looking up #rosecityrollerkal will make you so happy).

Thinking...

Tomorrow will be one week since the start of stash dash so I'm thinking of posting an update both here and on Ravelry with my finished objects (and meterage) as well as one or two things that I am working on and hoping to finish in the coming weeks...
Also, for all my workout friends-on Instagram there is a hashtag going around #howfastdoyouknit
I love it and it inspired some of my workout tonight so: to anyone whose up for a little challenge, let's  make a little race of getting to 1000 meters...whether you run, bike, walk, swim, spin, row, etc...Don't hurt yourself now, but maybe push just a hair harder to get there just a second faster. And if you're feeling adventurous, maybe a post to Instagram... #knittersrace (because no one has used it that I can see!). All are welcome to join-I just know there are a few knitters who stop by here :)

Pretty clouds the other day

Further Down the Rabbit Hole

Yes, yes I do have yarn.
Seen at the FiberTrain Festival in Nampa, ID

Well, if you've been keeping an eye on my sidebars measuring input and output, you'll notice that the output has gone up...a whole .08 from Friday. This is progress-one row at a time. However, the input has also gone up...and is now more than a mile ahead of the output. And I have 2 more skeins that should be coming in Tuesday that haven't yet been counted for (because it doesn't till it actually gets into the house!).

These just so happen to be the lovelies that have come home with me since last week-two of them picked up today at the FiberTrain Festival in Nampa, ID.

From left to right we have...

Cascade Heritage Sock Yarn (my workhouse!) 75% Superwash Merino, 25% Superwash in 5626 (Turquoise)

Alexandra's Crafts Timberline Ice (new to me) 63% Superwash Merino, 20% Silk, 15% Nylon, 2% Silver in Water [bought today]
Greenwood Fiberworks Gold Dust (new to me) 75% Superwash Merino, 20% Nylon, 5% Stellina in Tiger Lily
Greenwood Fiberworks Star Dust (new to me) 75% Superwash Merino, 20% Nylon, 5% Stellina in Lavender Hedgerow [bought today]
Nomadic Yarns Twisty Sock (my self-stripping!) 80% Merino, 20% Nylon in Campus Visit

The current plan is to knit as much as humanly possible between now and August 14th. However, I am really going to challenge myself to limit yarn input till I catch up a little. The next time I foresee myself buying yarn is June 13th because one of the area LYSs is doing a bit of an event (including a sidewalk sale). And almost definitely on June 18th because I want the Special Delivery tag from ESK. There is also a high likelihood I will buy yarn when I am in Portland in July...because TwistedPDX now sells Republic of Wool and I've been eyeing her pretties on her site and via Instagram. And I may or may not have been looking last night...

In other fun news, I chatted with two different friends about some possible travel plans this year. Extremely tentative still but it would make me so, so happy if they worked out! One of the trips would be Disneyland in October with one of my bestie and the other would be to see a good friend for a long weekend. Fingers crossed over here!

In Case You Were Wondering

This is what my needles looked like last night at the start of Stash Dash 2015 (no, not all these projects are on the sidebar or on Ravelry because I did a lot of casting on this week and didn't feel like putting them up everywhere they need to go...I will get there at some point in the near future...).

This was my pre-dash yardage...for the year. I have not even knit 2000 meters (in FOs) this year...in the five months that have already gone past. Stash Dash is 2 months and twenty some odd days. I'm hoping to make it to a 5k. This could get interesting.
Since last night, I have casted-off an  item and cast-on two more to replace it (I cast-off my BRQ square and put a new one on the needles and then also cast on a baby burp cloth for an upcoming community baby shower) so the yardage has jumped up by a grand whole 59 meters. Still, I'll take what I can get.

I decided to include a close-up of the five pairs of socks I've got running at the moment. All but one are first socks. All but one are still on the leg. I've been chatting in the Stash Dash forums with another knitter and there's a possibility that i will be attempting to finish 15 pairs of socks before August 15 (I'm counting baby socks I'm thinking of making for the shower...she is not).

Last but not least is a picture of the four blankets I currently have going-two are piece blankets (hexipuffs and BRQ squares) and two are just knit till I run out of yarn. Hoping Stash Dash might given me the motivation to finally finish the Block and Tackle blanket.

Who else is dashing? What are your plans? Good luck!!!

Even The Mighty...

...do fall down. I made it 5 months and 17 days before just totally blowing my yarn diet plans out the wazoo (see the side bar if you're curious how off track I currently am...the bottom one in pink is yardage in).

In good news, stash dash starts in 6 days so right now I'm loading up the needles and hoping maybe going for my first 5K will get me back on track!

Sometimes...

Stash isn't just about yarn...

That, my dears, is a picture of all the size 2 needles I could find...all 8 pairs of them! Now, there is a pair of DPNs in there and some differences in cable length...but 8 pairs?! Go figure. I'm a bit afraid to look at the other sizes and see where I have repeats...

Happy Mother's Day! 2015 Edition :)

I'm the meanie pants who made my mom open her Mother's Day present early since we wouldn't actually be together on the day.

This (Age of Brass and Steam in Malabrigo Arroyo in Regatta Blue) and a bar of absolutely amazing smelling soap from a local maker were her presents. I found the absolute perfect card at Trader Joe's and I think she was pretty tickled :) Now onto figuring out her birthday :)

I was looking at my posts from around this time a year ago (because wow, I've been doing this for over a year now!) and it made me happy that the WIP I was working on at the time is now an FO :) It was fun looking back at the two pairs of socks I had finished around this time as well. It'll be interesting to see what comes next year!

On a major plus side, I managed 3.5 miles yesterday and am still feeling pretty good. It's still a bit off of 11 but I've almost 9 weeks to get there. I think it might be time to start looking for my perfect suit...

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms near and far. We wouldn't be here without you!

Now...With Pictures!

No knitting pictures but a few funnies from the past few days! :)

I get a fancy jacket that says I'm really, truly a PHN! I actually have two of them, but this one is prettier :)

This is quite possibly one of the greatest books going, not even gonna lie

Stickers make everything better

Happy Star Wars Day! BuzzFeed has some pretty adorable pictures of animals dressed up by their humans in various Star Wars attire- I am definitely looking forward to December 2015!

I have a thing for you all

WIPs

3-5-7 Mitts by Josh Ryks

Red Heart Shimmer in Blue and Turquoise

Hermione’s Everyday Socks by Erica Lueder

Lion Brand Sock-Ease Prints in Lemon Drop

Boneyard Shawl by Stephen West

Cascade Yarns Heritage Silk Paints in Queen of Hearts

Cascade Yarns Heritage Silk in Charcoal

Business Casual by Tanis Lavallee

Shibui Knits Socks in Fluids Anime and Tweed

Barn Raising Quilt (square) by Shellie Mackie and LarissaBrown

Cascade Heritage Paints in Londonberry

Block and Tackle Blanket (Adaptation of Sarah Burton’s Blockand Tackle Scarf)

Red Heart Softs Solids and Heathers in Berry and Turquoise

FOs

Baby Socks by Kate Atherley

Bernat Softee Baby Solids and Marls in Grey Marl

Click for Babies Hat (out of my head)

Cascade Cherub Aran in Lavender Mix

Diagonal Potholders (out of my head)

Lily Sugar’n Cream Ombres (not sure of the colorway L)

Age of Brass and Steam Kerchief by Orange Flower Yarn

Malabrigo Arroyo in Regatta Blue

Barn Raising Squares by Shellie Mackie and Larissa Brown

Patons Kroy Socks Jacquards in Denim Jacquard?

Red Heart Heart and Sole in Tequila Sunrise?

Sweet Georgia Tough Love Sock in Silver

New Pretties

Madelinetosh Unicorn Tail in Whiskey Barrel

Dream in Color Groovy in Good Luck Jade, Lot B

Leading Men Fiber Arts Show Stopper Minis in You Betcha!, Sucker Punch, Bahama Mama, Fox Says What?, and Midsummer

Pinkie promise I will get the links into the show notes at some point in the near future. It may end up being a few at a time...
Love you all so, so, so much!!

Guys

Just did the math (since I reached over a mile of yardage in FOs this year the other day!) and it's looking like weight-wise I've knit up about 695 grams of yarn (or about 1.5 pounds). Not saying I'll get there this year, but think it might be kinda cool to knit up the size of a healthy newborn in yarn (about 7-9 pounds). Future goals...along with hitting a 10k (I think maybe I am shooting for a 5k this year...)

Hi There!!!

Successful move? Check
New car? Check
First week at the new job completed? Check!

Still getting settled a bit, but I have started knitting again so that feels great! Nothing too crazy-just working on some barn raising squares as they don't require too much of my mental capacity :) Also, combined my two stashes and found lots of beauties that I am very excited to play with in the near future-am actually using one of my finds as my latest square :)

So glad to be back! Hope all is well with you and I look forward to sharing WIPs and FOs and adventures from the boonies (where I now live) with all of you!

Lots and lots of love to you!

Pretty sunrise from one of my recent flights

View from a fancy dinner before I left

Delays

Currently packing and getting ready for the big move
And if that all weren't exciting enough, I know have strep too :/

                                             Someone is enjoying the sunshine we have here

I Know

I was supposed to post an FO post on Friday-but I ended up getting distracted by other goings on and didn't. So I'll just add last week's FO to this week's post since I have a few other little things I've finished up.
In super exciting, non-knitting news, I successfully swam today! First time since the accident that I was actually able to do laps-the most painful area was my biceps because they've been getting off easy. Looking forward to more swimming again in the upcoming days.

Took this photo for Soak's photo challenge #modern: I love indie dyers and they are definitely a modern trend in knitting in my opinion!

Hmmm

So the one issue with posting a late WIP post is that when I post one on time, it doesn't seem like I've done all that much. Also, I've been a bum and haven't been knitting as much this week as I have on some other weeks. So sorry for minimal changes in my knitting (I do have an FO though so yay for Friday!).
Electric Lemon Socks

These socks are growing on me. Still the first one but I'm actually pretty stoked out to finish them and have them to wear. And I think this yarn should make a pretty cool BRQ square :)
The Queen of Hearts Wants Your Bones

Didn't finish in time for Valentine's Day, but I love this so much. I'm pretty obsessed with seeing how the yarn is going to interact in each section. I thoroughly adore the dark grey...when it stripes with the red, black, light grey...it makes me so happy. 

Seedy Coffee Cozy

I have so many loose ends to use up (and I'd love to clear some out before I move) so expect more cozies, coasters and bookmarks in the upcoming weeks. 

The Sky

Is definitely bigger in some parts of the world. A picture from near my soon-to-be new home :)

Knitting Every Which Way

All the yarn I worked with this week

Sorry for the delay in post-we were traveling on Wednesday and I needed yesterday to recover. Alas, since I have no FOs this week because I was too busy jumping around from project to project, I figured I would share my WIPs today. Also, there was pretty sunshine so I quite like some of the pictures.

This yarn should be looking quite familiar to you all by now-this is however, the second sock! I will finish these, I swear!

This too maybe, looks vaguely familiar-except I can't spread it out because it has outgrown its needles. It's my second Age of Brass and Steam Shawl and I mega love it. I think I'm becoming a shawl person. 

This is a new one! It is the Boneyard Shawl out of Cascade Heritage Silk. I had originally thought this yarn was sock yarn and was mega stoked to make some Valentine's Day Socks. However, with the silk I figured a shawl was probably a better bet. I am so happy with this and am loving some of the striping and pooling that is going on. 

                                         

This is also a newbie! It's the Hermione's Everyday socks out of Lion Brand Sock-Ease. These suckers are neon bright and while I'm not crazy about the olive green, I love the yellow and spots of bright lime green that appear. 

                                  

Last but not least, a Swatchless Watch Cap made out of some Loops and Threads Charisma Scraps. Nothing too fancy but just a fun knit to de-scrapify just a hair of yarn. 

A little Change-a-roo

If you scroll and look at the right-hand side of my blog, I have my lovely little yardage counters. Well, I wasn't really digging how the ticker for bought yarn looked so I went ahead and made a second knit meter one...so the bright yellow/pink/turquoise thing that's currently saying I've knit .23 miles...ya, that's currently keeping track of how much yarn I've bought this year. Thus far, that number is still happily below the how much yarn I've knit counter...here's hoping I can keep the trend going! Also, if you have an amazing yardage ticker that I could use for keeping track of how much yarn I've bought, please let me know!

Lazy Bones

Sometimes, we just hang out in bed all day and wear flannel. Hope your Sunday was a nice calm before the storm!

It's been a finishing kinda week

But only of littleish projects. Whatever, I'm still happy.
In no particular order, we have
A baby hat for a family friend whose expecting her first

A barn raising square (my first!)

Three seed stitch bookmarks

Happy Friday! Hope you all have a wonderful and safe weekend! It's raining here so they'll be quite a bit of sitting and knitting and drinking hot cocoa. 

What I'm Working On

That is a different color than the rest of the sock...in fact, it's the same color as the heel which can only mean one thing...  Yes, it's still the first sock. I'm making some progress here, mmk?

Yes, I'm working on another Age of Brass and Steam. Yes, it's out of Malabrigo again (Arroyo this time though!). This one is for mom...theoretically. Unless I keep it because I really love it.

I've jumped onto a new bandwagon and I think I'm already in pretty solidly even though this is only my first barn raising square. Thank you to both Knitting in Circles and Minerva Turkey for enabling this latest bout of loconess. I 100% blame all y'all's.
Linking up with the wver wonderful Ginny

.49

Miles of yarn knit so far this year :)
I'm only counting yardage from FOs (and I weighed my WIPs from last year so hopefully I get an accurate count).
I may or may not have bought a pack of five miniskeins to celebrate. Hoping I reach .5 before it comes because then I'll definitely feel accomplished!

Finished Things!

Two very, very happy FOs this week and fun fact...both have already been worn at least once!
First up, Mom's Zigzagular Socks

Finishing these means the Christmas 2014 knits are finally completed! And less than a month after the actual date! And yes, that is a little puppy butt :) These were a great knit and I'm already 99.9% sure about what yarn I am going to use to knit a pair for me!

Age of Brass and Steam

Woah my goodness...I am so in love. I'm ready to cast on another ASAP. And buy more Ratista cuz it's some amazing stuff!
 

Zoinks

This whole not having my own computer thing is kinda throwing me for a loop...however, I have done of podcast watching since Hulu is off the books for me (also watching lots of Gilmore Girls on Netflix and totally loving it!). If you're curious about some of the podcasts I watch, head on over to the inspiration page. I include links and everything.

Didn't do a WIP post yesterday as I was very happily binding off a project...so I have not one, but two FOs for Friday...yay! I do however have three WIPs for you...and I started a fourth one last night but alas, no pictures.

Baby Socks

Just decreasing the toe on this...yes, this is still the first one...did I mention I have two FOs for tomorrow? :)

Block and Tackle Blanket

Since I last took a photo of this with me under it for comparison, this has definitely grown. Hoping to try and add ~10 or so rows every day/every other day so that maybe I actually finish this before next winter. This is definitely going to be a loungy-type lap blanket for me. I have 1 additional skein of each color still waiting to be used so when I finish those skeins, the blanket will be done.

Business Casual

I know this doesn't look like a lot of progress (if you want the actaul truth, it's seven rows difference). But I did work on these some more yesterday after I took the photo so who knows? Maybe next week they'll be an actual difference you can discern :)

Sorry for the WIP post daily....definitely looking forward to the FO post I have for you all tomorrow :) Also, kinda stoked out the I've knit almost half a mile in Finished Objects this year...Eat Sleep Knit has Sea Wool by Fleece Artist on sale as the yarn is being discontinued. I've never used it before but am definitely intrigued by it...and mega in love with both the Seastorm and the Twilight colorways. I need to wait for my next paycheck to come in...but I'm thinking if I hit half a mile and one of those colorways is still in stock, it might be coming home to me :)

Linking up with Ginny today and every Wednesday(ish)