Football

I tried and tried to get pictures of Michael wearing his Steelers baby booties, but his little feet move too quickly for me to get a really good picture.

And honestly? The news coming out of Penn State is enough to put me off of football for life. As the mother of two little boys, it is really difficult for me to form any articulate thoughts at all, other than wanting to throw up. I love Pittsburgh. I love the Steelers. But I think it's time we question the culture of football, because, Penn State aside, we live in a city where we cheer on a rapist every Sunday. I thought I was okay with that if I focused on the rest of it, but I'm finding out that I'm not. I'm really not.

What my kids did today

...while I was at work. What another gorgeous day in the city!





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Six Months!

Michael turned six months old yesterday! We celebrated with carrots. And a hand-knit bib.

Crazy Colors

I always gravitate toward semi-solids, but there is something about Tina's dye choices at Blue Moon Fiber Arts that makes me want the CRAZY stuff. Here are two crazytown colors that just arrived in the mail:

Frankenhen

Cattywampus

 

 

Photography FAIL

I have been reading too many Mommy Blogs with photo tutorials, because on my walk this morning, I saw these lovely piles of leaves in the park, and my first thought was, "Oh! I'll stick my kid in the leaves and get a charming picture!"

Um, no.

Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

Today was a gorgeous fall day that made me so happy and proud to live in Pittsburgh.

Anyone know what's up with the padlock installation piece on the bridge over Panther Hollow?

That Darn Vest

After a complete restart and several time-outs, the Pepo Pie is finally completed! My little sartorialist requested a purple vest and declared this color on the Cascade 220 wall to be "perfect."

I love fall

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A Walk in the Park

 

Baby Sophisticate

I've been wanting to knit this free pattern forever, and last year around this time when I found out that I was having another boy, I put this in the "babybrudder" tagged section of my Ravelry queue. Then I started reading that the pattern ran small, and I realized that the specified gauge of 15 stitches over 4 inches in aran weight would result in a loose fabric that I wouldn't be happy with.

I finally cast on for this sweater at the beginning of October and decided to try my luck with chunky yarn. I cast on for the 0-3 month size in Dream in Color Groovy in Cloud Jungle (one of my all-time favorite colorways), using 10.5 needles and 10.75 needles for the sleeves in the round.

After several false starts (I blame the sleep deprivation -- we're going through a really rough patch right now), this was a quick knit, and a well-written pattern. The only downside to using heavier yarn is that this will function more as a coat than a sweater.

Hexipuff Swap

I've never participated in a swap before, but when the idea started brewing in the Socks that Rawk! group on Ravelry to do a swap to get mini-skeins for hexipuffs, I jumped in eagerly. For each skein of Socks that Rock Lightweight I sent, I would get six mini-skeins back. I sent in Gingerbread Dude and Henpecked, and yesterday, to my delight, I got this back in the mail:

 

Look at the detail on the labels the Swap Mom made! This package completely made my day.

New Camera!

I've been wanting a DSLR seriously for at least two years now. Recently, I asked my father, an art professor and a crack bargain hunter, to keep an eye out for one he thought would work for me. He very generously bought me a Canon Rebel, and I just got it on Halloween.

It will take time to learn all the bells and whistles, and I want to learn how to work it manually, but for now, I'm having fun and getting decent results with the automatic portrait and macro settings.

Michael models his Baby Albert

Happy Halloween!

My sister joined us for Halloween this year! Henry's costume is a wonderful hand-me-down from Yvonne, and Chrissy crocheted Michael's Mike Wazowski hat.

How It Really Looks: Sock Yarn Sweater and Gift Wrap Romper

I've been wrestling, off and on for the past few months, with a paid pattern that is poorly written and full of mistakes. The pattern -- which will remain nameless, but I imagine you could figure it out -- has been updated a few times since I started knitting it, but really? The mistakes should have been caught in the test knitting and tech editing stage. I don't mind paying for patterns. I love to support the important work of designers. But when I pay for a pattern, I don't want to pay to be someone's tech editor. I'm only persevering with this project because it's important to my son to have the finished object

So with all that frustration swirling in my head, I thought I'd blog two patterns that were both well written and a joy to knit.

The Sock Yarn Sweater, by Hannah Fettig, knit in Malabrigo Sock in Indicita:





The Gift Wrap Romper, by Carina Spencer, knit in 1824 Cotton. If you remember, this was supposed to be the baby's coming home outfit, but the newborn size came out way too big in the cotton. It fit very nicely at the two month mark!

Clara Parkes Knows My Name

My coworkers used to tease me that if there were the equivalent of US Weekly for knitters, I would be all over it. And I admit, I get all fluttery and tongue-tied in the presence of "knitting celebrities." (To writ: omg Jared Flood Touched My Hand!)

I always have been simultaneously fascinated and horrified, and okay, jealous, by the way Steven barges up to knitting celebrities and then manages to make friends with them. Jokingly, the last time he took a class with Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, I repeatedly texted him "Tell the Yarn Harlot my name!" And so "Tell [insert name of famous knitter here]" has become our running gag.

Still, imagine my surprise when Steven sent me this gift from Rhinebeck. It's an autographed copy of Clara Parkes' The Knitters Book of Socks.

Clara Parkes knows my name!

Thank you, Steven. I miss you lots, Work Brother.

How It Really Looks: Baby Eggplant

It's hard to find time for knitting -- or for blogging -- with this cutie around.
I've been trying to get "after" shots, pictures of Michael wearing the things I knit for him while I was pregnant. Between his, um, "mercurial" temperament, the cloudy weather, and the limitations of my old point and shoot camera, it's been difficult. But I keep trying.
Here's the Baby Eggplant by Cosy I knit in Malabrigo Rios in Glazed Carrot and Lettuce.

And here are the action shots:

So This No Casting On Business...

I should not have given myself the out of being able to cast on for hexipuffs. I got distracted by puffs, and I also have been in some serious denial about how little time I have to knit (and to blog). The month of no casting on was not really a great success.

I did finish two pairs of socks in my pile.

Cotty in madelinetosh tosh sock in the Foxglove color way, part of the Year of Stash Socks on Ravelry:

Breaking Hearts in Socks that Rock in Cozy Fierce Scummy Girl, part of the Socks that Rawk KAL on Ravelry:

Fall Cleaning

I'm feeling...not anxious, but a little frustrated about the number of WIPs I have and my now-reduced knitting time, so I'm declaring the month of September to be FALL CLEANING TIME. That means I will not cast on for new things (except maybe, maybe a hexapuff or two) until October 1. I did some spring cleaning back in April 2010 and it worked out pretty well.

I have nine active WIPs and a bunch in hibernation. Let's see how I do.

HEXAPUFFS!

Isn't everyone in the knitting universe making these addictive little puffs for the Beekeeper's Quilt by Tiny Owl Knits? I haven't seen a pattern go this viral since the February Lady Sweater.
Other folks seem to have elaborate themes and color schemes for their quilts. I'm just taking a mindless "knitter's life" approach and using up the scraps I have. It's the perfect knitting for the short spurts of knitting time I have while the baby naps.

I'm glad to have this cheerful project because my other main knitting has been chemo caps for a friend who was recently diagnosed with Very Bad Cancer. These are a Meret in Malabrigo Worsted and a Tretta in Vintage DK.

So, did you buy any yarn in Wyoming?

Yes. Yes, I did.

I have to admit, when you work at a LYS, especially with a boss as generous as Martha, it's easy to get very spoiled by the employee discount. If I am in Jackson, I try to buy something each year from Knit on Pearl because I like the shop and feel it's important to support local businesses. But the discount at home makes me extremely choosy, so what I buy elsewhere has to be special.

Fortunately, that's easy to do at Knit on Pearl. I chose my crack, Manos Silk Blend, in this new spumoni color way because Manos is produced by a women's collective and it's not something we carry at home.

I also picked up some Brown Sheep Lanaloft to make longs for the Butterbean. Brown Sheep is "semi-local" in Wyoming, located in the beautiful panhandle of Nebraska.

Finally, I chose some truly local yarn from Lucy's Sheep Camp, a few hours east of Jackson in Thermopolis. This is a gorgeous single ply bulky yarn that I think will be mittens.

I've been busy with the Butterbean, and now my oldest, the former Toddler, is off to kindergarten! I hope to get back into blogging as things settle down and am considering some blog redesign as well. I've been using Blogsy for the past few entries, and am loving the drag and drop features!