Out of the pot

Just out of the dye pot:

The colors are a bit brighter in real life, but it is so pretty.  I really don't want to break it up into a bunch of mini hanks and swap it!  But, blanket needs more yarn.

On the topic of blanket, I am almost up to 200 squares.  Sam got some new sheets and they came in a nifty plastic bag, which is now my new mini storage container.  Works great, and now I don't have ziploc bags all over the house.  With all the zippies everywhere, I felt like a drug addict!  I guess swapping mini's is kinda like crack.

As for all the baby blankets I was working on, I decided I wasn't feeling it anymore and have been focusing on socks and mittens for me.  It was so freeing to work on projects that I actually wanted to do, not ones I felt like I should.  It certainly has brought the joy back to the knitting!

Cherry Cola

Awhile ago I lost my sock mojo.  I was just off socks.  So many stickin' baby blankets to make.  The socks I made my sister-in-law were so yucky, it put me off socks for awhile.  Well, I am getting my mojo back.  I found this amazingly lovely yarn, and am now making a pattern called Mojo.  They are socks that don't match, they coordinate.  LOVE that!

It is called Cherry Cola... I love cherry cola, and I love this yarn.  This yarn did not, could not, refused to go and live with my stash.  It would have been in good company, but it showed me it's teeth.  So I didn't put it away.  Apparently, this yarn does not play well with the other children.

Sock pictures to come!

On the needles

I have been knitting like crazy, but haven't finished anything in a while.  I think it is because I have too much on my needles.  I really need to finish some stuff and start to focus on one project at a time.  Perhaps I can keep my sock blanket, a pair of socks and ONE other project going at a time.  Rather than 6 or 7.

I really want to make a cabled afghan (the one right there in the tiny picture).  Something about snuggling under a thick wooly blanket seems very appealing to me right now (it could have something to do with the fact that it is 65 degrees and rainy... feels like fall).  I keep looking at yarn, drooling over patterns and planning my blanket.  But, it seems very irresponsible to start this project, when I am already working on a massive blanket.  I really need to finish the one I am currently doing before I start another one.  It has nothing to do with my feelings about the current project.  I love it, and would love to work on it exclusively, BUT, all these other projects need to be finished.

I am forcing myself to NOT purchase the yarn until I am ready to knit the blanket.  This blanket will take about $150 worth of wool, so I am not really interested in investing until I am ready to start.  That said, I have picked the yarn a million times!

My list of UFOs and DLK (DeadLine Knitting) is large.  I need to make a baby doll for Hannah's birthday. I have 3 babies coming shortly that need presents.  The December holiday's loom as well.  I am making a pair of socks for my SIL, coasters for the other adults, perhaps a couple of knitted toys for some of the kids... it will all depend on my time.

I also, so very stupidly, signed up to teach kids to knit at temple.  This will suck my Sunday's right away from me.  I will get to knit for a while, and I wonder if I can incorporate them into the larger knitting group or not.  I will have to see.  I felt like I should do something for the religious school program because they are not charging us this year, due to our financial situation.

My new found freedom, one would think, would free up a lot of time for knitting.  I just feel like I should be doing something more productive like laundry.  A brief word on laundry... it multiplies more rapidly than rabbits. If only my money compounded as fast as laundry, I would be rolling in green backs.  Seriously, you leave one pair of dirty underwear on the floor and suddenly you can't walk in the room anymore because of all the dirty clothes.  How does this work?

So, I hope to get over the need to clean the house and take more time to knit.  Until then, knitting is like a sock monkey on my back.  I have so much of it to do and so little time.  So, I must stop blogging and start knitting.  I wonder if I could figure out how to do both at the same time.

Great, just great

Great Googly Moogly... Dishrag Tag is starting. I am super excited about this. Teams are assigned, and my team is the only one that has even started posting in the forums. I am thinking we are very enthusiastic. This is so great. (I just realized that we can not see the other teams forums, so that we can strategize. Duh.)

As I was tooling through my teammates, I checked out their blogs to see what they were about and what not. They all seem totally cool. THEN...

I tooled by my blog just to see the public face. It occurred to me that the post that was fairly current was the one where I discuss the state of my underwear. GREAT, just freakin' great. Yeah, I finally get traffic on my blog and I am talking about my underwear falling apart.

So, now all of my teammates must think I am something. I am not even sure what sort of something they might think I am... I want to say, listen, I am not what ever bad thing you are thinking.

I am sort of just a Mom, apparently with bad underwear. I hold a post graduate degree, I used to have a real job and make money. Now I have a pretend job that doesn't pay well.

So, don't be sad about having the crazy one from IL on your team. I am ok, motivated, able to knit AND purl. I will finish my dishrag in one maybe two days, depending on the kids schedule. I live near a postal handling facility.

Sam's Panda

I have to finish Sam's Panda... It always at the bottom of the list, but I think that it is because I don't want to sew it up. I started sewing this up, and realized I was sewing it up with the wrong sides together, duh. So I get to do it again. Needless to say that Sam is not really going to like it in the current state.

OK, I am going to finish this project. His birthday is soon... so soon... must sew panda... must stop blogging, must sew panda.

OH, btw, I just put my first picture in my blog... look at me, I am all technical now.

Yarn Barf

Today I spent the better part of 2 hours untangling a 450 yard hank of yarn. I will never do that again! It was so frustrating, somehow the ends of the hank meshed together... so I would unwind a little, then turn the other direction and unwind some more. Of course this was done after much untangling! If it was alpaca, I might have felt differently about it, but it wasn't.

The kids started summer vacation today. Can you believe I now have a 4th grader, 1st grader and preschooler? I can't! It seems like yesterday they were just little (9 lb plus) babies in my arms. I remember our very first day of school, we were living in the apartment and driving over here. It was not the smoothest transition, but now Mac can walk home by himself and today was lamenting the fact that school was over and he would not see his friends. What a difference 9 months make!

Reconnecting

As part of the whole job loss thing, we are starting to reconnect with old friends. So many people have reached out to us, it has been amazing. It is just good to hear from all these people, some doing well and others also in the throws of unemployment. I am sure as the days go on, it will be nice to know that there is this group of people that care.

It is scary, because it sounds like jobs are going to be very hard to come by. It seems like seeds of growth are germinating, but it will be a long time coming before anything opens up. This is sort of concerning.

That said, I knit like crazy. It seems counter-intuitive to put pointy sticks in the hands of a crazed, stress-out mommy, but it really does help. Right now I am making a panda for Sam. It is a birthday present of sorts. I am also working on some socks. They are from a pattern for my May sock club, but may also be the June pattern. I didn't like the June pattern, so I guess I have another month before I have to start another pair.