While I'm Waiting

For Mother's Day this year my gift was an upgrade of my MP3 player from a very old, very clunky, very small (storage wise) Zen Touch, to a brand new iPod Touch. One of the things I'm liking most about it is that I can download books from Audible.com as well as from my library via MyMediaMall. Once they're on it I can then go walking/jogging/riding my bike with a good book. The down side is that it takes a really long time to download a book onto first the computer, then transfer it onto the iPod.

So while I'm waiting for Sacred Stone to finishe downloading, I'll update you on the small amount of knitting I've gotten done.

After finishing what I'm calling the "6 Million End" outfit, I decided I'd like something simple, with not a lot of ends to deal with. The perfect project for that is a Wallaby. So I looked around in the stash and came up with some green yarn that hadn't yet found its purpose in life and whipped one up.



It's made with Caron Simply Soft and Lambie Pie. I finished it while my family was here for the baby shower and my mom remembered that she needed a baby gift for another new Mom, and she promptly purchased it from me.

Life Keeps Moving

Life is certainly an interesting thing to experience. You're coasting along, everything is in its groove, and then suddenly it all gets crazy. Spring break Disney vacations, birthdays, funerals, weddings, baby showers, then the next thing you know it's your kid's last day of school.

So I've been busy is what I'm trying to say. So busy that I have done very little knitting. Because of the upcoming baby shower (this Sunday in fact,) I did finally buckle down and get some stuff accomplished.



That's the Zebrafol pattern from the Dale baby collection #129. I made it out of Knitpicks Pallette which is Peruvian Highlands wool. It turned out nicely, but it's certainly not a pattern that I'll be making for casual acquaintances. Because of the number of colors that are used this is what the inside of the leggings looked like when I started sewing in the ends. Keep in mind that I worked about half of them in as I went, so this could have been double what it looks like.



And this is what the pile of cut off ends looked like when I got done:



So definitely a labor of love. Hopefully the Great-Niece and her parents will appreciate it.

Secret Socks

Last time I alluded to some socks that had been working on that I couldn't share yet. Well, I finally finished them and sent them off to my mother as a late birthday gift. They are made out of KnitPicks Stroll yarn in the Deep Waters colorway.

There are a lot of cables in these socks. The pattern is Sweetheart Socks (Ravelry Link.) The pattern on the top is supposed to continue all the way down to the toes, but I would have rather stabbed myself with my needles than have to keep working all those teensy tiny cables.





Socks modeled by Daughter, who declared them "uncomfortable," but she is notoriously finicky about what goes on her feet.

Creeping Along

Yes, I have been alive since the blizzard. I've mostly been working on a project that I can't show pictures of yet, but will be able to very soon. I made something that shouldn't ordinarily take a long time, but because of the persnickedyness of the pattern and the size of the wool and needles, it took me a good while to get finished.

When I finally did finish the mystery project, I immediately started on a sweater for the baby girl my niece is currently working on putting together. I'm making the sweater, leggings and hat on the cover of Dalegarn 129.



In a matter of three days I got the entire body done, as well as one of the sleeves.

This is one of the reasons I like making baby things; even with tiny needles and fingering weight yarn, I can still get a lot accomplished in a pretty short amount of time. The only downside that I can see is that there a lot of ends to be dealt with. The leggings are going to be a real monster in that department, but the cuteness factor will make it more manageable.

I also finally finished my cursed Blackhawkey Sockies. Every time I worked on them on a game day the Blackhawks lost. Now that the socks are finished I tested wearing them on a game day, Sunday afternoon. The Blackhawks lost in overtime.

Perhaps I need to start making socks for the other guys...

After

OK, so after looks a lot like During, mostly because the additional 5 or 6 hours of storm didn't actually happen.



This is the only window that we have on the south side of the house. Because the wind was mostly from the north northeast, this side of the house got a lot more snow than the windward side did.



The dog trying to swim through the snow. He hasn't been able to run around in the yard since Tuesday afternoon. I shoveled out a couple of paths for him so that he could at least get off the patio to do his business.



Husband got the sidewalk next to the house shoveled off (it's on the south side of the garage, which is again why so much snow.) It feels like going through a tunnel.



Daughter has been making tunnels and snow caves. This is her just outside the living room window. She's close to 5 feet tall, and you can see the snow is up to the top of her chest.



I think this will be one of the more memorable Groundhog Days that I'll ever have.

During

It started snowing at 2:00 yesterday afternoon. We got at least an inch every hour, aand because of the 40-50 mph winds, there are drifts everywhere.



That's Husband trying to get the sidewalk shoveled out so we can get to the garage and the snowblower.



Murray (that's the snowblower) is my new hero. He's a little guy, but he's been out there taking the 8 inches out of our driveway like a trooper.



Our street hasn't been plowed since 7:00 last night. Our neighbor across the street works for our Park District, and he's been on plow duty. He got up very early this morning and had to walk out to the main street because there's no way anything short of a snowcat is getting up or down our street.



The fence in the backyard is four feet tall.

Snow's supposed to keep coming down for 5 or 6 more hours, so we'll see how this all ends up.

The Before

As you are probably aware, I live in the Chicagoland area. They have been telling us for the last week or so that a big storm is headed our way. As time has gone by the meteorologists have been predicting worse and worse weather for us. As of this morning we are expecting the worst storm the area has seen since 1967, with the blizzard watches having been upgraded to blizzard warnings.

I thought it might be interesting to have some before and after pictures to record this event, so here is what our neighborhood looks like today.












Stay tuned for updates as the snowpocalypse hits us this afternoon and evening.

False Start

Happy New Year everyone. Yes, it's true that the new year has been around for nearly two weeks already, but I find that it's best to give it a little time to feel the new year out before assuming that it will be happy. As Sherlock Holmes says, it is a capital error to theorize without data.

And based on the data that I have accumulated thus far, it is going to be a year full of challenges and partial triumphs. I started the year by casting on for a new pair of socks. It's one of the October Rocking Sock club offerings called Buggin Out. (Ravelry Link)



It's made with a nice deep green that I like very much. The pattern at the bottom of the photo is supposed to look like a spider. I was a bit concerned while making them that they seemed a little on the narrow side, but they called for the same number of stitches to begin with that I usually use with this yarn and needles, so I figured that they would just stretch to fit.



So I continued on, creating spiders and turning the heel and knitting up about half of the foot. This is the point where I start trying the socks on to see when I need to start the decreasing for the toes. Unfortunately I was unable to determine if the foot was long enough because I could not get my own foot into the leg portion of the sock. While it is true that the ribbed portions of the sock stretch nicely, those cute little spiders do not. Not at all. Not even a little bit. After finishing almost 3/4 of a sock before determining that it won't fit on anyone other than Olive Oyl, I ripped the whole thing out and wound it back into a ball. I'll have to come back and revisit these when I am not so mad at them.

In the meantime, I started another pair of plain socks using some wool I got several years ago from Interlacements. These will certainly not be socks to wear to a somber gathering.