Sea Anemone Knits

I’m going to see these some of these huge dudes in March.

So. Excited.

In other news, I’ll also be going to the ArtFibers store. Anyone been? What should I check out?

A while back, I think in October, I bought some silk thread from Blue Moon.

It’s quite a pretty color called Stormy Weather.

(Note to self: Self, avoid yarn that is named after a type of weather that can be nasty.)

So last night, I decided that I wanted to wind it. You know, to get it ready for February when I’m allowed to start new projects. (I know, I have been seen cheating. Oops.)

So I set everything up and I’m winding, winding, winding (these are 1200+ yard skeins folks) and I keep encountering knots. Not the type of knot that means that the yarn broke and was retied, but the type that you get when the yarn tries to eat itself and then all of a sudden you can’t get the knot out because it’s so tight in there that you’ll break the yarn should you try.

Frustrating much?

So I’m ignoring these and picking out the big ones with loops all over the place that are still fixable. Somewhere in there, a huge loopy knot slid by me and got wound in and in another spot a couple of big loops worked their way to the surface and half way through the skein I think to myself, “This is ridiculous.”

So I very carefully remove the ball of yarn that I’ve already wound and set it up to reball it on the all winder and move a little slower so that I can try to prevent the knots and before I know it, the yarn has barfed.

The yarn yakked all over the side of the table and down onto the floor.

I attempted to untangle this. It wasn’t worth the headache.

(I have to give my Bug-man credit. That one picture was the closest he got to the yarn the ENTIRE time I was struggling with the knot.

He truly is a wonderful cat and even better knitting companion. Never messes with the yarn. Not even when it’s rolling around the floor. He will stare at it disconcertingly though. Like he wants to.)

I have cut the knot out and made a wee tiny knot in the yarn on purpose to rejoin the ends and will just ignore the knot when I knit it. And that will have to do.

In the mean time, I still have half a skein of yarn to wind and the ball on the ball winder to retame.

Suggestions? How do you wind your silk lace yarn?

I’m back!

I feel a lot better having finally taken a hiatus. I suppose it was inevitable given that I’d gotten into the habit of not posting except every couple of weeks and even then, it kind of felt like something was off kilter. So I just stopped.

I’ve had a couple friends ask if I was going to give it up entirely. And until now, I wasn’t so sure if I wanted to keep going. But honestly, I kind of miss it.

Onto knitting related things. I’ve had a lot of projects cluttering up the needles. As normal, I’ve over extended myself and I’m paying the price by not wanting to actually work on the projects I was originally excited about.

I did attempt to pare things down and I ripped some stuff off the needles and frogged it before I could think about what I had done. Some of the things to bite the dust included

The Waterlily Top

The Mis-diagnosed Clap

Some of the things to get hurriedly finished in fits of “Oh-goodness-I-have-to-have-this-finished-tomorrow-so-I-guess-I’ll-stay-up-late-tonight!” as a result did not get photographed. But did you really want to see a huge batch of Fetchings? I’ve now knit 7 pairs and 5 of those have been in the last month. Never. Again.

I’ve still got some stuff on the needles. Stuff that will not not get frogged.

One is a project for Drew, that I need to go ahead and finish. But cannot be photographed.

One is my Drunken Circles sweater, that I love. I knit on this sweater from morning to night in between baking and cleaning with my mom and it still only grew what feels like an inch. Really, I managed to add 8 inches of length to it. But it’s stocking stitch, so who cares if I didn’t take new pictures.

Another one is Ward from Kim Hargreaves new book (book! finally!) Heartfelt: The Darkhouse collection. It’s a great book! I wholeheartedly recommend it. To see what it will look like complete, follow the link. My pictures are awful for this one. The lighting sucked and just from looking at the knittin I’ve got done, you can’t tell that I didn’t just knit a brain fart instead of a cardigan piece.

See? I told you.

I’ve also got a tiny baby sweater on the needles for a friend. But no pictures of that yet. I cast on the 29th and I’m already almost done. I’ve got a few more rows on the body and then I need to knit the sleeves and get some buttons. It’s super quick and maximizes the cute quotient. I have not however photographed this.

In face of the new year, I’m not real great at keeping resolutions. But I always try. One that I will keep this year is to not knit anything that does not make me happy. January will be my month to finish things. Tie up loose ends from last year (that feels funny to say). Etc. I will finish organizing the stash. (I’ve sold a bunch.) I will organize my fifteen million needles. I will finish photographing things so that I’m no longer pretending on Ravelry to have a modest stash. Because I don’t.

On February first, I’ll start with clear needles. And I’ll pick a project. And use stash yarn. And I’ll knit it. If I find that I’m not happy about it and thus stalling, I’ll take it out.

All this and I’m going to start taking a walk in the mornings when I get up. I need to get moving around and lose some weight. My pants are tight again.

I’ll be back again next week!