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So K's parents arrive this afternoon for their first visit to DC since he moved here in late 2005. The apartment was going through renovations and then I was moving in and there was another roommate to take into account...all things to delay their coming. But the wait has ended! What to do with the parents for several days? Tonight, I get to go (without K) to the Kennedy Center for an NSO Pops concert. This is where my strangeness comes out. I'm excited because Lucie Arnaz is singing. Arnaz is the daughter of Lucille Ball, but that's not why I'm excited (and I do love Lucy!). It's because she was in The Jazz Singer with Neil Diamond. This is why I care. Oh dear.

Not a lot of knitting progress to report. I cast on for Monkey Socks on Saturday on our way to Baltimore to go sailing for the weekend. Didn't get much further because sailing and knitting don't mix all that well...wool and salt water? Not a great combo. I've gotten a few more rows done on Tuscany and am confident it will be finished in time for the first wedding (July 20th). Knock on wood.

I am delighted to say that I've (finally) been invited onto Ravelry...which is every bit as cool as everyone who's already got on has been saying. I just need to sit down with my stash and catalog away...

A Moving Thought

A year come and gone...last year at this time I was finishing my last day at work before driving from Manhattan to DC (eek! on a holiday Friday afternoon!) to start a new chapter in my life. I had a great job in NY...not a career, but something interesting and great co-workers. I had a teensy apartment (no, really, 130 sq ft), mouse included (eek! again) with a gorgeous exposed brick wall and within walking distance to everything. I had knitting stores galore, the Metropolitan Museum 4 blocks away, the MoMA around the corner from the office...really...everything at my fingertips.

Except my boyfriend, K. He was here in DC. Previously he had been in Boston, and for a year and a half we kept Amtrak in business (or Fung-wah, depending on timing and budgets!), shuttling between cities and our individual lives. I have to hand it to those who do long distance for years. 18 months was our limit, and although we loved each other, we knew it just wouldn't work if the weekends were the extent of our time together.

Fortunately, my job had an office in DC, and I was able to transfer. I had a job, I had a place to live (more or less), and so it seemed a good time to go. So I did.

What a year it's been! I've learned how to live with my significant other (so not easy!), dealt with his roommate (thankfully only a temporary arrangement), weathered the ongoing renovation of our place (4 contractors, endless delays--more endless than usual!--and even now some details to take care of), and struggled with the disappointment of a job that isn't challenging enough or fulfilling anymore.

I miss New York...it's gritty, dirty and raw. It's also vibrant, exciting and alive. I miss tall buildings. I miss the people, the bodegas on the corner with flowers for sale, the taxis, the pizza, bagels, and good kosher chicken noodle soup. I miss Central Park.

I don't miss New York...the traffic, the noise, the bumping and shoving in the always rushing mass of people who needed to be where they are going 10 minutes ago. I don't miss the filthy subway stations or the...well, that might be all I really really don't miss.

I don't miss the weekend shuffle to see K.

I like DC. I love the clean Metro and the signs on the crosswalks that tell you how much time you have until the light changes. I find it hilarious that people will wait for the light to change before crossing the street when there's nary a car or bus in sight. I like how it's a good walkable city (not that NY wasn't...) and that there are museums galore to explore (and free!). I like its farmers markets--Dupont Freshfarms, Eastern Market. Stitch DC is a favorite spot for sure.

DC is very clean, too...but in an institutional "we want to look as good as possible" way that only bureaucrats and politicians can effect. It's not bustling. It's not vibrant. It's staid. Stable. But missing the spark I love so much in New York. I hate the taxi zone system.

I love our apartment. It is unthinkable that we'd ever live in something comparable were we back in Manhattan (or Brooklyn!). It's home.

It might be unfair to compare the two cities...in some ways they're opposites and it just doesn't work to do apples and oranges. But one was my world for so long, and the other is my world now.

What's in the year to come? A new job, I hope. Details finished in the apartment. Limes on our new lime tree. Finished objects, and new adventures in knitting (and maybe other crafts???) Visits to New York, but living here in DC.

Oh what a beautiful morning...

...and I've been up since 4am. Just couldn't sleep. I hate it when that happens...by the time I have to go to work, it feels like lunchtime. It's going to be a long day, but at least it's sunny and warm here in DC. A good pre-summer (not quite spring) day.

Made some progress on Tuscany...not as much as I'd like, but we had company and entertaining took away from knitting time.







Hope you all have a lovely day!

Slog progress

I don't think I've mentioned it here, but I've joined the slog-fest over at Mason-Dixon. It's nice to know I'm not the only one who doesn't seem to finish projects! I posted wayyyyyy at the beginning and have been slogging my way towards posting there again. My slog is the Ombre Blanket, first seen here back in July of '06 (the kitchen, by the way, is done and gorgeous). The blanket is the only project I'm still working on...not that I finished the others...but they fell by the wayside due to one thing or another.

Anyway, the blanket hasn't made it that far (my slog post from a month ago is as far as it's gotten), but I've kind of had a reason. I was nearing the end of a stripe and hadn't wound the yarn for the new color. The ball winder and swift were buried in the spare room, I was focusing on finishing the RPM socks (which I finally give away tonight), starting the Tuscany shawl (onto repeat 5!!), and other mundane details of life.

All that changed last night when I had a clean house, no boyfriend at home, and a whole evening free to do as I liked (oh, the luxury!). I worked a bit on Tuscany, did lots of puttering around doing things in the apartment, watched Ugly Betty (sidebar here: I love West Side Story and always cry at the end, but it was particularly well-done here with all the plot lines tying up for the season!) and created these:






wow...just looking at them make me hungry for chocolate cake with yummy fudgy frosting.

14 new lovely cakes of yarn, ready to knit up for the Ombre. Considering it's taken me almost a year to get through the first two colors...I should be good until next May!


In other news, I've got color on my balcony!



I love the $2 orange pillows from IKEA...they match the orange of our living room walls...brings the inside out a bit. And the bright blue table...perfect contrast!



And we are gardening...

Cilantro...



Mint...



Chives...


and Basil...

big daddy basil:


and baby basil:


I can taste summer already.

Weekend progress

I was so bored by the end of Friday. I had cleaned out the office, done several loads of laundry, iced, iced, iced my cheeks, watched 2 movies, caught up on 24, Ugly Betty and Grey's Anatomy, and knit a bit. The pain was definitely there, but not so much that I had to be off my feet.

I did make progress:



It's kerchief size right now...onto the 4th repeat. I'm not sure that I'm going to go all 11 repeats, since I'm a small person and it might swallow me whole. I'm enjoying the knitting of it...the silk is really soft and smooth. I am also liking the Knitpicks Options that I bought for the occasion of this project...the 40" cable is plenty long (so far) and I don't mind the join or the needles at all. The only thing I could possibly complain about is the slippery-ness of the yarn on the needles, but that's what you get when you do silk and metal needles.

Looks like it's time for more Advil. Fun times.

Scene from San Francisco

A few weeks ago I went to San Francisco to meet K. for the weekend...he was out there for work and I'd never been so we did it up for a few days...Napa Valley, Fishermans Wharf, etc. We went to Alcatraz on a very rainy afternoon:



And while taking the very well-done self guided audio tour, we stopped by this cell:



Did I just see what I think I did?



Fuzzy, but yes...yarn! One of the prisoners' activities, it seems, was knitting and crocheting. Two things I wonder about this: 1) Don't you think the needles were dangerous for prisoners to have? 2) Do you think the pink yarn was an acutal prisoner's choice, or some curator who didn't think to think that pink was, well....pink?

By the way, Monday was much, much nicer in San Fran...here's a not-so-dismal shot:

There and Back and There Again

So I ripped it out. It was going to bother me and confuse me if I kept on doing it wrong, so back to the beginning for me!
Before I ripped:


Back to square (ball?) one:


And by the end of the evening (Tuesday):


I haven't gotten much further than that since Tuesday night as I had the lovely pleasure of having my wisdom teeth out yesterday. Not. Fun. I was pretty much out of it for the day yesterday. On the plus side, I have all day today to sit on my rear, apply frozen peas to the cheeks, watch movies and knit. Goal: another repeat or two!

Arrgh.

I guess I'm glad I'm only on the third repeat of the Tuscany shawl...since I have just realized that I've been reading the chart incorrectly. Crap! It's my first time knitting with a chart, so I guess I can be excused, but now I have to rip it all out and start again. I was reading every row left to right instead of l-r/r-l. Funny thing (to me) is that I didn't find it counterintuitive to read the chart from left to right, but apparently thinking of snaking back and forth was too much for my brain. It was so pretty...

Part of me is a little tempted to keep going with my modified pattern. It looks good (I think, anyway) and the difference is one additional knitted stitch on the purl row, so now I'm knitting a stitch on either side of the marker. I'll have to think about it the rest of the day to decide if I'm going to keep my "modification" or go back to the start.

A milestone

I finished my first pair of socks.

After many false starts, I am proud to say that I am a sock knitter! These are a gift for Fiona, my newly-knitting friend (who has just finished her first project), and I can't wait to wrap them up and send them on their way.

The next project is.....not Isabella. Having gauge issues, and I'd rather get underway knitting something than trying not to get frustrated when my gauge is either 3 stitches too small or too big. Maybe another day I'll be ready to duke it out with the gauge-master, but not this month.

So, the new project is Tuscany, from No Sheep For You. The needles should have arrived today, and here is the lovely silk I'm going to use (with the not so lovely color name "Taupe." I prefer "Shimmering potential.")

Now, I'm not allergic to wool but I LOVE this book. So many things I want to knit from there! I have a feeling that the yarn for Isabella from Knitty may end up as Eileen from this book.

And finally, a pretty picture for the day.

Happy May Day!

I love the short row heel.

Back in July, I posted a picture or two of the sock I was currently knitting. That sock has since moved on to the world of "will never be finished" because I decided I didn't like the color, the shaping, or well, anything about it. Until last week (9 months later) had yet to finish a sock, despite a few more attempts at one.

Then I joined the fiber flix kal, and cast on with this:



for the RPM socks.

It was, as Aladdin and Jasmine sing (wow, I'm quoting a Disney movie), a whole new world. The socks flew! I liked the yarn! (STR in the Scottish Highlands colorway) The needles didn't drive me batty (addi turbos, of course)! And, most exciting of all, the short row heel made me feel like I might actually knit more than one pair of socks in my knitting career.

I've tried the flap heel many times, on many unfinished socks. I realize that there are legions of knitters out there that swear by them, and I think that's great. But for me, knitting the flap then having to work my way around the gusset before I can knit the instep feels like knitting h-e-double-hockeysticks.

The short row heel was just that. Short. then a heel! Before I could get frustrated, it was done, and I was zooming on to the instep. Then, all of a sudden, I had this:



And now, there's this:



Which will be two socks...a whole pair...very soon. Which is good, since they're for my friend's birthday, which falls on Thursday. She's Scottish, so I'm thinking the colorway will be just right for her.

Whew!

Just under a month has passed...thought I should check in. It has been a busy almost four weeks, that's for sure, and it's only going to get busier! Spring is springing here in DC, and that means busy travel season for K. (as if travel doesn't happen during non-busy season). But let's review the last month, shall we?

Knitting: the sweater didn't make it. I still have a sleeve to go. I made quite an effort, but as I believe that knitting should be largely a guilt-free hobby, I refuse to get down on myself for not getting it done. Besides, I don't want to be knitting warm cozy sweaters right now--it's 70 degrees outside! I have procured yarn for the "Isabella" pattern from knitty's spring '07 issue. Haven't cast on yet, since there are baby bibs to be finished (just need to add buttons and weave in ends, look for pictures soon) for the expected-any-day-now new arrival to my boss's family, and I'm trying to finish one of the pouches that graces the cover of Last Minute Knitted Gifts as well. Small projects, but encouraging when they're actually done!!

The apartment: We have new colors! The living room was repainted a few weekends ago in an interesting and decidedly non-living-room-y orange and yellow. It's different (and still yellow!), but I like it. We also have a new bathroom...in a spectacular kelly green. No pictures (I'm -- gasp!--at work, and don't have my camera) yet, but soon, very soon. The work left to be done on the apartment is officially down to the details, and those should be squared away in the next few weeks. What a relief! It will be nice to finally feel settled and relaxed and not agitated because the place is still in flux.

I hope to post pictures soon, but will be gone for the weekend. I'm heading to Rochester (where it's not 70 degrees...shoulda finished that sweater) to visit my mom and reclaim some of my stuff from her attic. It's been a year since I was there, which I think is the longest I've gone without visiting my mom. I've seen her, but not at her place--down here and at family functions. I'm looking forward to getting out of town for a bit and taking a day off work!!


That's the latest for now...

Sigh

Friday. Whew. Have you ever noticed that short weeks that start on Tuesday due to a holiday on Monday seem to be longer and arduous than a regular 5-day week? Maybe it's cramming 5 days into 4, or just being off one's schedule. I love the day off, but find that by the end of the week I'm pooped.

The knitting has been slow going this week. I've started on K's cabled hat, but haven't gotten far. I finished a sleeve of the sweater, which leaves a little more hood and one more sleeve to go. I'm still hoping to finish by the end of February, but I'm not sure. Maybe finish all the knitting, and not finish the finishing? I have to admit that I'm very nervous about the finishing. Since this is the first sweater of its kind, I don't know what blocking is going to do to it, or if it will fit me, or look awful when it's all done. I know it will not be perfect, primarily because I have not always been consistent in the knitting of it. For instance, I garter-stitched the first couple stitches of most rows on the front, but didn't do that at all for the back. Fortunately, it's not the kind of sweater I'll be wearing to a 5-star restaurant, and if it is a cozy at-home piece that looks a little wonky, that will be OK since it was a learning experience.

Anyway, the camera made it back from Australia with proof it went there in the first place.


And the camera's return allowed me to document my first FO of 2007:


(sorry for the awful self-shot (not even a portrait)...my forehead is not that enormous, nor am I a cone head.

I'm loving the hat, and have gotten nice comments on it, albeit in the knitting store when I went to go buy yarn for K's hat. It's nice and warm and not at all scratchy, which is very important with hat!

Waiting for the time to pass...

thanks, knitty! feel better! (get your own card here)

Cables FO!!

Finished the cabled hat tonight. I'm SO happy about this since it's, to put it mildly, frigid outside. Still no camera (hopefully this weekend), so you can see the pretty green-ness of the cables. It's a little roomy, but I think if I had knit any less, it would have been a little too short, and I have plenty of short hats.

I've made a little progress on the sweater, I'm almost done with one sleeve (the couch project) and 1/3 of the hood (the out-and-about project). Hoping to get all the pieces done this weekend so I can block, seam and finish next weekend...definitely before the end of the month! I have other projects I want to do, but I won't let myself cast on for anything until the sweater, like the cables is an FO.

Pictures soon!

Cables ho!

Well, my first class was great! I am quite pleased. Cabling is really very easy...I could probably have figured it out myself, but a class is a great excuse to socialize and knit, so why not, eh? The project is a cabled hat (from Stitch & Bitch Nation, I think). I would show pictures, but K. has taken my camera to Australia with him, so I, and the blog, will be picture-less for the next week or so. Oh, well. It's sad that my camera is more well-traveled than me...

Progress

So the sweater I've vowed to finish by the end of February is the "Not Your Standard-Issue Sweatshirt" from the Yarn Girls' Guide to Simple Knits. Not the one that's available on knitpicks.com, which is a variation with cables. Since I don't do cables (yet...check with me tomorrow after my first cable-knitting class at StitchDC tonight!), I'm doing the straight stockinette stitch, which I really like.

Honestly, I don't know what took me so long in getting this sweater done. I had the back finished by this time last year, and started the front...but then, oh yeah. I had a MA thesis to finish, moved from NYC to DC, then really didn't feel like sweater-knitting in the summer, started other projects, went on vacation, and well, here I am.

But...I have made progress. I finished the front last night:

So now I have that and the back (long-finished):


And now I've started on the sleeve.

Two sleeves and a hood away. Hooray! I can totally do it. Lots of knitting time this weekend since K. will be on the long flight to Australia. I can't wait!

Knit Along!!

I've joined my first knit along: February is for Finishing. Hopefully it's the kick in the pants I've been looking for to actually finish something.

Several members of the knit along seem quite ambitious with several projects set to be finished. Me, I'm goin' for just one. A sweater I started in December of 2005 (ouch)...It's the "not your standard-issue sweatshirt" from The Yarn Girls Guide to Simple Knits book. Simple it is--mostly stockinette stitch with some seed stitch thrown in, but it's a good zone out in front of the TV knit. I just haven't worked on it for ages. I figured I should put this sweater away before starting on the next sweater--a cardi for K, my boyfriend.

I've got the back, and most of the front. It still needs sleeves and a hood. And by golly, I will finish it! In February!! I'd post pictures, but there is nowhere in my place with good light at this time of the day. Maybe tomorrow.

Oh, and if I get the sweater done...I may try for socks. But I won't get ahead of myself.

In other news, our kitchen is grouted! Once I get the camera going in decent light, look for wildly updated pictures of the kitchen. It's like a different room, and I have to say that being able to cook here is a pleasure. It's the nicest kitchen I've ever had (in my adult life, that is).

For the Feast of St. Brigid*

It's the Blogger (silent) Poetry Reading today, and I'm so excited to be part of such a great idea. This poem is one of my favorites...by one of my favorite poets ever: Rainer Maria Rilke

Remembering

And you wait, are awaiting the one thing
that will infinitely increase your life;
the powerful, the uncommon,
the awakening of stones,
depths turned towards you.

Dimly there gleam in the bookcase
the volumes in gold and brown;
and you think of lands journeyed through,
of pictures, of the apparel
of women lost again.

And you know all at once: That was it.
You arise, and before you stands
a bygone year's
anguish and form and prayer.


More this weekend on knitting, the apartment, and visits from parental figures.

*The word around the blog-town is that it's St. Brigid's Day, but that was actually yesterday. Today is Candlemas, otherwise known as (among other variations), the Presentation of Christ in the Temple. Either way, it's a good day. Especially since, in secular lore, Puxatawney Phil didn't see his shadow and spring is on its way!

Dear Blog:

You poor, neglected blog. No attention for months!

Can we start again? Pick up where we left off? Maybe actually get off the ground this time?

I can't promise that I'll be successful...I've never been good at this continuity thing, but maybe the time is right for me to blog now and then about knitting, yes, but other things too. Life, thoughts, books, etc.

I don't know if my life is interesting enough to do this! But we'll see. You and me. And anyone else who might want to read.

Sincerely,
me