Car Knitting, and Yes, I am Still Here

So yeah, it's been awhile. Travel, illness, sleep deprivation, and a mobile baby all add up to blog neglect, but we are still here, still knitting.

And I still haven't bought any yarn in 2012.

Speaking of travel, I needed something mindless to work on during a recent drive to New York City. I also discovered that I lack a plain, non-lacy, gray neck-thing in my wardrobe. I dug out my not-small stash of gray fingering weight yarn and chose a skein of Colorful Yarn Merino Sock that I'd purchased on a trip to Philadelphia years ago...let's just say Henry was still The Toddler and he was in a stroller when I went to this store.

I cast on for Nimbus, a part of this amazingly beautiful, simple collection of gray knits. I love gray. Have I mentioned that before? The pattern, once set up, is easy to memorize and perfect for the car. Off I went!

And off we went! I have one very enthusiastic City Mouse:

And someone who is undecided, but leaning toward Unimpressed Country Mouse:

So the Rumors are True

Hello. It's been thirteen days since I last purchased yarn.

My husband has "challenged" me to knit from stash in 2012. It's not like I don't have a lot of stash. It's not like my knitting time has decreased thanks to a certain adorable baby.

I am still in the Rockin' Sock Club as well as the Pro-Verbial Shawl Club, so small amounts of yarn will trickle in. I also have a layaway bag at the store that I last put yarn into on New Year's Eve, so as that gets paid off, that will come home with me as well.

But yeah, knitting from stash. Here we go.

Portraits

One of the reasons I wanted a DSLR was to take portraits of the kids. The 35mm lens that came with my camera is perfectly good for everyday use, but the aperture settings don't go down low enough to achieve the "bokeh" look that is popular now.  So with my Christmas money, I bought an inexpensive 50mm lens recommended by my family friend and wedding photographer and set out to experiment. We received a membership to the local Conservatory from my mother-in-law, which provided a great backdrop with natural light. I still need to work on white balance, but I think the composition is pretty decent, no?

 

Christmas Cables of Doom

Apparently I needed over a week off to recover from National Blog Posting Month.

The next time I chirpily announce that I am going to knit the children matchy-matchy outfits for Christmas, ask if me it is July. If it is past July, tell me it is too late for this year. The plan was to make coordinating vests (the Pembroke pattern from Petite Purls) in Christmas colors.

Originally I envisioned the children wearing these for artfully posed photos to send out as Christmas cards. At this rate, I will be lucky to get them done by Christmas day.I have almost the back of Henry's completed. This means I have the front, the finishing, and all of Michael's to go. Michael is real small, so that should go quickly, right? Right?

Tomorrow is World AIDS Day

And my friend Steven is having a fundraiser for the Pittsburgh AIDS Task Force with amazing prizes, starting at midnight tonight. Check it out here.

I might need an intervention

For the record, the first day of DEAR was a failure. I got into bed, opened the book, and fell asleep. This morning, I woke up with a migraine, so reading was out for that window of time as well.

This month, I finished two garments for Michael, a Beau by Cosy out of Malabrigo Worsted, and a Baby T-Shirt Vest out of Madelinetosh DK. The first is totally whimsical; the second is a project I made to fill a hole in his wardrobe. I love vests on babies: they add warmth without adding bulk and there are no sleeves to get sodden when babies stuff them in their mouths.





The problem is, of course, that babies outgrow these things quickly. I have a bunch of knits that I've already had to put away, and I think Michael may have reached capacity on his knitted wardrobe for now. I think it's time to focus on projects for bigger people...like myself! It's almost the time of year when we set knitting goals, and it will be interesting to see how mine shake out for 2012.

DEAR

Remember in the Ramona Quimby books when Ramona had "Drop Everything and Read" and "Sustained Silent Reading" in school? That's my plan for this week. Since the time change, every time I get in bed with a book, I fall asleep instead. I've been trying to read The Night Circus for weeks! This week, my husband is off of work, and I should have a little bit more free time. Let's see how far I can get through the big stack of books on my nightstand.

Good Morning

I get up pretty early with the baby, but in exchange, I get some quiet time with my coffee and my knitting after I get him back down.

And this morning, I got this.




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Help Me, Fashion Police

Go look at these "upcycled" sweater skirts and tell me if I want one.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Okay, so I took a day off from blogging, but it was a busy, bustling day.

I had intended for both kids to wear handknit vests to Thanksgiving, but they both had other plans. Henry has been experimenting with layered looks and ended up in this ensemble, which looked surprisingly hip.

Henry sang the "grace" for dinner that he'd learned that week in school:

Thank you for the food we eat.

Thank you for the world so sweet.

Thank you for the birds that sing.

Thank you for everything.

More on Bookstores and Reading

So we saw Ann Patchett speak on Monday night. Author of Bel Canto and State of Wonder, Patchett has made the news lately by opening up an independent bookstore in her hometown of Nashville.

Patchett opened her store to fill a gap left by the closure of two major chains in Nashville. Like Pittsburgh, like towns all over, the major chains had come in, decimated the smaller stores, and then collapsed when they couldn't match Amazon. Certainly, that has been the case for me. When I first moved to Pittsburgh, Squirrel Hill had an independent bookstore. Then Barnes and Noble came in and the bookstore closed. Then Borders came to Shadyside. And now both that particular B&N and Borders are gone.

So I've filled that gap with Amazon and my Kindle. Is it ideal? In many ways, yes. It's instant gratification. It's lower prices. Patchett offered a list of books that she's recommending to her customers, and I ended up getting them on my Kindle, because I have no local bookstore. Have I contributed to this problem because I use Amazon? Sure.

But, what Patchett pointed out is that while she has nothing against e-readers and reports that her husband actually reads more on his e-reader than he ever has before (something that is proving to be true with my husband as well), her sales of State of Wonder have been split evenly between Kindle sales and hardback sales. And the people who don't want to read on e-readers deserve a bookstore, a place to go. The book is not dead. The bookstore is a community.

(And I can't help but point out that the same is true of the Local Yarn Store. You can buy all the Knitpicks you want, but if you want help, if you want to meet fellow knitters, if you want community, the best place to get it is your local yarn store. And since I see so many of our customers at the Arts and Lectures series, I know that knitters and readers are of the same tribe and can understand this.)

So where is my book community? For now, in my neighborhood, it's my library, which deserves all the help and money we can give. When we go to Jackson, I am delighted to spend my time and money at Valley Books, an excellent, well-curated independent shop. 

I don't know if we'll ever get an independent shop back in our neighborhood, but the ultimate message of Patchett's lecture is to READ, to support authors, and support communities of readers.

Ann Patchett on the Bookstore

I have a lot thoughts swirling around in my head about this, but for now, here's what Ann Patchett, who I saw speak at Pittsburgh Arts and Lectures last night, has to say about her new bookstore:

"I actually think that this is really going to work. The day of the small independent bookstore has returned. It's the giant bookstore that can't be sustained," she said.

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11323/1191020-44.stm#ixzz1eU01siAV

Quick post

It's Monday, which means work and then "date night."

I had food with foam on it.






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I Stuck the Other One in the Leaves, Too

Or rather, he stuck himself in the leaves.



Look! It's his Tomten, and it still fits!



These pictures are terribly over-exposed. I can't figure out how to set my camera on portrait AND turn off the flash. I need to suck it up and figure out how to shoot manually. I pinned some tutorials on Pinterest. If you know of any others that have helped you, I'd love to see them!

I Stuck Him in the Leaves Again

Actually, if the light had been better, this would be a halfway decent shot.

Too Many Hand-Knits on One Baby, Part 2

Really, the knitting can get out of hand. The adorable hat was made by my friend Karen. It's chilly this morning, so I stuffed Michael into his Baby Sophisticate as well, and tried to cover his kicking feet with his Zig Zag Pram Blanket.

Part One, in case you've forgotten, is his big brother five years ago:

Hat in Action

We are to the point in NaPoBlMo that I feel a little like I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel, but here goes anyway. Butterbean sported Tubey by Wooly Wormhead while waiting for his brother at the bus stop yesterday. The weather has turned cold for real today after a strangely warm period, so it is hat time in earnest now.

How It Really Looks: Baby Albert

Last winter, my mom decided she wanted to brush up on her in knitting, so we chose a project to make together, the Baby Albert (Einstein) coat from Sally Melville's The Knit Stitch.

I decided to liven up the plain garter stitch by using Noro Chirimen. Because the sweater is king of wild in color and made of a silk blend, I thought this was going to be a fun sweater to put on every once and awhile, but not very utilitarian. In reality, it has become Michael's fall jacket. He has worn it everywhere!

Pinning

At first I thought Pinterest was an excellent time-waster, useful for looking at pretty pictures. Then I thought it was a tool designed specifically to make me feel bad about myself, featuring pictures of gleaming laundry rooms, cute crafts I will never make with my children, and perfectly organized organic pantries.

But now I've realized that it is a useful tool for helping me pull it together, particularly as I'm trying to get out of the cooking rut I'm in. I can use Pinterest to bookmark recipes! When I'm at the store, I can pull up the Pinterest app on my phone, click on my cooking board, and see if I have the ingredients I need! Brilliant!

Are you on Pinterest?

Tri-Terra Cardigan

Last spring, I eagerly volunteered to test-knit the Tri-Terra Cardigan for Cosy. I knit almost the entire sweater before all heck broke loose and I was diagnosed with pre-eclampsia and the date of my c-section was moved up. I quickly wrote up my notes of what I'd done so far, sent them to Cosy, and handed off the sweater to Yvonne to finish the i-cord edging at her leisure, because she is awesome like that.

I finally blocked the sweater yesterday! The body is knit in Steadfast Fibers Wonderful Wool in Copper. I love this yarn a lot, and I'm sorry the store doesn't carry it any more (but I'm glad I have a sweater's worth in green in my stash!). The stripes are Cosy's Rainbow Chard. In retrospect, I think the top two stripes aren't contrasting enough, but the colors overall are fun, and I loved working with Cosy's hand-dyed yarn. Go see her this weekend at the Indie Knit and Spin!