Startitis?

Is that what this is? It doesn't feel like startitis. Perhaps that is because you only feel startitis when you fight it? Since I have given in to every whim, I have not noticed?

Hm. Anyway, I kind of feel like I have an awful lot OTN.

--Shedir
--Big Black Socks of neverending doom
--Bigfoot missionary shawl (the missionary I was planning to give it to? back already. dangit)
--Snug Harbor
--Starry Night Socks

I also started a scarf for a friend but I don't like the way it is coming out so I plan to rip it back, and therefore I do not count it in this list. Those are just the active projects. The "hibernating" projects, to borrow a ravelry term, are:
--Witterings hat
--garter stitch shawl
--chocolate waffle scarf

The last is so mind-numbingly dull that I only work on it when I don't have anything else at the "relatively thoughtless" stage. It's been getting a lot of play since out of the projects listed in the first list above, the only one that I really had at a thoughtless stage was the snug harbor one and that one is really too large to be as portable as I would like.

Last night I solved this problem by inserting a dental floss lifeline and ripping back part of the BBS. I misunderstood something in the pattern and knit about an inch and a half past where I was supposed to on the foot. So last night I fixed that, and now that sock only needs a toe and then I can cast on for the second one, which will have 12 utterly mindless inches of ribbing before I have to think again. I hope to finish the toe tonight.

But, I didn't do that until after choir practice last night, and since I really needed something to work on that wasn't the chocolate waffle scarf (please not the chocolate waffle scarf), I cast on the second starry night sock. This turned out to be perfect because I got almost exactly the right amount of ribbing done at the top of the sock, so now I am set to start the patterned section whenever I am ready.

I start to get fidgety when I have too many things going on, like I have some sort of guilt complex or whatever, so I'd really like to finish off some of these projects. Shedir is about a good day's work away from completion (and I am really concerned that it is way, way too big). I have a long way to go yet on the missionary shawl. I may try to put in the time tonight on the Snug Harbor, which really should be the fastest of all of these to finish, I would think. I am thinking I will try to finish the first BBS and the Snug Harbor by the weekend, and then spend Sunday afternoon finishing Shedir. Saturday we're having a board game party, so I will need something simple to do on that day - which will be perfect for the second BBS! I'll still have a lot on the needles, but at least I will feel like I have made progress, which has been a sensation severely lacking in the last couple of weeks.

I am itching to start Odessa and also a baby blanket for a high school friend pregnant with her first child, but I am doing my very best to hold back until I can finish a couple of things.

No news

Work has been crazy and my pup has been sick so I haven't knitted anything this week!! Saturday I got most of the way through my big black sock - so far, in fact, that now I think I am going to have to rip back an inch because I made them too long!! Sunday I worked on Shedir, hoping to finish (I didn't). After that, I just had no time. Lulu has had a skin problem that's been keeping both of us up all night with her itching, and work has been such a killer that I get home and don't even have the will to knit. I'm so tired that the needles feel like lead.

But even if I can't knit, I can think about knitting, and what I am thinking about knitting right now is a baby gift for a high school friend who is pregnant with her first. I don't know yet and probably won't know for a couple of weeks whether it is a boy or a girl. They're having a shower at the end of May so I have some time, but not enough to dawdle around.

The problem is, I want to make something she can wash. It seems kind of lame to make a baby item that cannot be cleaned easily. I guess she could always dry clean, but I just don't know. I thought about making a smaller version of the Hemlock Ring blanket. I have also looked at this organic cotton wrapper. I thought about the moses basket lining in Mason Dixon knitting. I am just awash with indecision. Cotton (ugh) or wool (too warm for an August baby?) - this pattern or that - superwash or not - lace or not - I don't know what to do!!

Getting On

This weekend was productive despite a lot of puppy-related problems. One of my new babies was rather violently sick in the smelliest and messiest way possible on Saturday night late.

But, I did use the dental floss lifeline that someone from the SFS list suggested to me and now my BBS are back on track. It worked great and I didn't lose a single stitch.

I also worked on the Bigfoot shawl and I am approaching the halfway point - by which I mean, I am halfway out of yarn. I have a date with my ball winder this evening for the second skein.

Unfortunately, the intended recipient leaves for her missionary trip on Thursday, and there is no way I will be done in time. I'm not sure how long they will be gone - I think I week but I am not totally sure. In any case, my current plan is to finish it and give it to her when she gets back. I wanted to make one for the other lady going on the trip, but that is just not going to happen. I wouldn't have it done for any time period remotely related to their going. Not sure what to do about that at the moment.

I'm dying to see what this shawl will look like when it is blocked. I can't visualize it very well while it is on the needles since there is no real way to stretch it out and look. I could put it on scrap and look at it, but I think I would rather just wait. Why spend knitting time trying to visualize when you can just go for it?

Minimal at best

This has not been a week of getting much done. I did a little work on my chocolate waffle scarf since my socks for soldiers sock is out of commission until I rip back a bit to fix whatever I did wrong on the gussets. A helpful list member suggested that I use dental floss to pick up the stitches before ripping, which I think is genius, so I am hoping I will be able to take care of that before tomorrow's D&D session.

I am kind of having to accept that I am not going to get the Bigfoot shawl done before the ladies I wanted to give the shawls to leave for their trip. I'm on the body now but I guess I did not realize how long it takes to do a whole row when your row is a couple hundred stitches long.

Yes, I realize I may be rather slow.

The good news is that I can finally start to see the pattern a little bit. I really couldn't before now, so that is a nice little bit of progress. Even so, I am only getting at most one and a half pattern repeats done each time I sit down.

Bit by bit

A couple of updated photos of Shedir:





It's still looking kind of huge to me. I don't know. I guess I could, y'know, actually MEASURE the gauge, but not doing so makes it much easier to worry.

I am about halfway through the yoke on my bigfoot shawl (ravelry link). I include my hand (also, apparently, my lens cap) for scale. Obviously, I have a long way to go.



P.S. I would really like to know how to get my pictures to stop cutting off on one side, without making them smaller. Surely there must be somewhere I can adjust the column width on this thing?

P.P.S. I've changed my template.

So pretty.

I had mail yesterday. It looked like this.



and this.



Hand Maiden Casbah in Mineral and Earth, respectively. I was a happy camper. I started a Bigfoot shawl as soon as I could get it wound and the puppies fed.



I hope to be able to finish two shawls before my church friends leave on their missionary trip...at the end of the month. I realize this is both ambitious and unlikely, but I am going to try. I hope I will at least be able to finish one, and then have the second done when they get back.

Creeping along

I have been working almost exclusively on Shedir and the big black socks. I am on the last repeat before the crown shaping on Shedir, and it...looks a little large. We'll see how it comes out when it's done. It's definitely not too large to wear, but it is larger than I expected it to be. It's probably a gauge problem. I wouldn't know - I haven't checked!!

I knit the heel flap and turned the heel on the big black socks, and now I am working on picking up stitches for the gussets. This is harder than it really should be because the socks are black. I was trying to do it during a superbowl party (so not a football person) but had to give up - and like a twit I had not brought any other knitting with me, so I was sitting there with no knitting for pretty much the whole game. I was very vexed and probably more fidgety than was really polite.

I am SUPPOSED to have some Casbah coming in the mail, because I would like to make a couple of shawls for some friends that are going on a mission trip, but yesterday it didn't get delivered. Tracking shows that the mailman left a notice, but if so, it must have blown off into the ether because I didn't get one. I'm very disappointed and a little aggravated; the post office is out of my way and I don't want to have to go pick it up. Why on earth does it require a signature in the first place?

Oh well - I'll manage one way or the other.