Finally!

I was beginning to think it would never be Spring!

For real.

I have no idea what I have been doing lately, for real.

I started Yosemite, from this latest knitty and I’m using some sort of Cotton/Soy mixture which feels so freaking sooooffffft. It’s called Cotsoy. I feel hot and cold about this shirt though. First of all, it is a yarn eating monster. It pretty much takes all I have to give and then doesn’t call me back the next day. Jerk. Then there was something weird about the pattern and I was like, wait that’s not right, so I went and checked the pattern and it had been edited. I don’t know if I have feelings about that or not but it did make me think…

It covers the important parts, so I think I’m done.

Then, for my birthday I went out with my dad and he helped me pick out some yarn for a shrug, saying that the color would translate to Spring/Fall.

What do you think? I think it looks kind of Wintery myself. However he does a lot more with color than I do, so I’m inclined to just go with it.

Our birthdays are a day apart, so we usually do something every year. It almost always involves me dragging him into some sort of craft place and making him look at everything. My dad’s a good guy who at least pretends to be interested. I like that about him.

Besides all of that though, I’m convinced that little demons are sneaking in at night and stealing my memories about what I’ve been doing. For real. All I know is that I’ve been losing track of time, hours even. Which makes me worry that I have an alternate personality wandering around. Hopefully they’re like a hot Brad Pitt version of myself. Although, it helps when there are pictures to document the time. Here I am sitting in a big metal/mesh chair:

See, that’s got to account for at least… five seconds of my life.

The other morning I woke up next to this:

Yeesh.

I realized that I am bad at knit blogging because even though I don’t post that often, I usually don’t make too much progress. So you see every step of my knitting process. Here’s a picture of a sleeve. Here’s a picture of the sleeve hole. Now my turtle is stuffed- oh but now he has eyes! Hahaha, I’m a mess. Either way, I am already thinking about the next thing I want to start on and it’s between these two:

Drawstring Chemise

and

Ribs and Lace Tank
(Both pictures belong to Interweave.)

(Ravelry links) What do you think?

Baldy’s Hunt for Prime Real Estate

Once Baldy got his eyes affixed, he decided it was time to make it on his own in the world, which meant one thing:

New digs.

The first place was not so great. It was high, so high that it gave him vertigo and it was pretty dingy to say the least. Baldy knew a slum when he saw it, so he hightailed it out of that mess.

The next place was a little lower and a little less dingy… but twice as frightening with the big loud scary things that whirred by (some of which were really hideous colors, not that he was judging anyone). So Baldy decided, this really isn’t the place for me, plus this fence is pretty stake-y, I could loose a googly eye- yikes!

Then there was the big plastic house. Well, it was obvious that wouldn’t do since his number one fear is suffocation. Sorry big plastic house. How about something more nature oriented?

This dead bush is too prickly. While it is more natural than a big plastic house, this is just not cutting it.

Something green… this is weird and out of place. Although it needs to be a little higher to protect a turtle like Baldy…

Honestly, this:

is not protection at all.

Ahhhh, now that’s more like it. Home sweet home, at last!

He just hoped the agent was kidding when they said it would cost him $250,000 to live there…

The way the world ends…

We just watched Southland Tales.

Personally I feel compelled to watch anything related to Cheri Oteri. (Yeah… Cheri Oteri- it definitely has nothing to do with me listening to Futuresex/Lovesounds right now and my love for JT’s sweet sweet ‘fro. You can’t make me forget the ‘fro JT!) Okay, you caught me, I’m also weak for The Rock.

Dang it Dwayne! You are a pimp.

Also, I really don’t recommend this movie for sane people. Or people who laugh at appropriate things. Because I’ll tell you, I was rolling with laughter and John just sat there deadpan. Stoic. I’m telling you, mountains move more than he did during the whole movie. In the end, I really can’t tell you anything funny about the movie.

Something that is funny though…

*beep beep Ritchie!*

I took some pictures of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade that we’re apparently really proud of around here. Toots there actually goes to John’s church.

What have I been up to knitting-wise?

Oh Baldy.

I pulled Baldy out the other day and finished him up… except for the eyes. I have big googly eyes but they just don’t look right! I can’t figure out what I’m going to do with him. So right now he’s sitting on the computer that John (and I) built trying to stare me down to finish him. Man, I’m glad I only gave that turtle so much power over me.

I threw these on the needles the other day:

Oh, how did the cupcake get there? Guess I better eat it.

They’ll probably get set aside for my new project though… more about that in the next post!

Spring Forward!

(Sometimes I honestly groan at my own titles.)

Hey, guess what?

…

(I hope that was enough time to guess because…) I finished the SWF Sweater!

(I’m channeling Reese Witherspoon here.)

I feel pretty good about this sweater! John told me that it looked like I could have bought it and then he went on the compliment my “even stitches”. What a doll baby. I like that no matter what kind of messed up stuff I did to it, it’s still pretty presentable.

First of all, this is the first project I actually swatched for. Then I went ahead and completely ignored the swatch because it told me bad things and called me names. So, I ended up going down a needle size from the preferred or recommended. Okay, no biggie.

Then I remembered my first sweater and how it sits in the hall closet because it is so baggy and just heavy. Which reminded me, always knit down a size when knitting raglans! So, even though I might have been pushing it with medium, I said whatever and knit the small.

Uh… then to compensate at the part of me where I am medium (read: potbelly) I started adding random stitches for my voluptuous curves. Yeah, that sounds way better than potbelly. How this sweater didn’t burst into flames from all the jacked up nonsense I put into it… I’ll never know.

Moral of the story: despite me being crazy, stuff does eventually get knit. Also, this is a great pattern for a first sweater. I think any person who wants to knit a sweater and is scared to do so should knit this one because it is so easy and great and if I can do it- so can you.

(P.S. It snowed and we had a level 3 emergency thinger.)

Pattern: Tree Jacket by the Zephyr Gals.

Yarn: Lion Brand Cotton Ease.

Needles: Size 9 and 8 (I feel like I’m getting some good use out of the interchangeable needle set I got off of eBay.)

Time to knit: About a bajillion years. Or maybe four months…? Aboutish. It took me a whole season to knit a sweater. So by this logic, I should start one every season so by next winter I’ll actually have some sweaters and I can stop wearing my cats.

What I love: Top down! Basically no seaming (since I don’t think I actually know the right way to seam anyways) and all I had to sew up was the arms and the placement of that is just right so no one can see my poor sewing skills to boot. I think I am a top down advocate now.

What I hate: This yarn was alright but I’m not 100% in love with it when it comes to the garter stitch portions. I just think it’s a little too… scrubby… on the sleeves.

Why you should knit it: Because you love it too, don’t front.

Together we can build a better tomorrow.

Follow the Garter Stitch Road…

Somehow I’ve made progress on something…

Okay, so you know things are bad when you get tired of hearing that you’re sick. So I can only imagine how other people feel when they hear that I’m sick. AGAIN… (forever). The first time, I kicked some strong antibiotics back and while I thought it went away and I’d dodged a bullet, turns out I just angered whatever sickness was inside of me to hide for a week, then come out with a vengeance. Leaving me with some sort of awful head congestion cold thing for a week of no knitting, no progress of any sort in any aspect of my life… well except for the being a lazy bum aspect, I’m tops there.

Remember that contest I entered a while back? Well Crazy Aunt Purl sent me a “you don’t suck and I love you even though you didn’t win” prize (aka pity prize if you want to be succinct. psht.) Which included a signed copy of her book, two mixed tapes and a cute thank you card which I definitely hung up on my fridge.

Speaking of fridges, mine is kind of a monster, what about yours?

I have to feed it new magnets monthly or it gets mad and eats my bacon. I can’t have that. I’d post a picture of it but I’m kind of embarrassed at how freaky it is, so post a picture of yours first so I won’t feel so bad.

Also, speaking of books, since I’ve been sick that’s all I’ve been doing. You know, burning them. (Wait, can I get thrown in library prison for saying that?)

(All pictures taken from Goodreads and belong to their respective owners.)

So yeah, if you care about all that, check out my Goodreads profile or leave a message if you have any good book suggestions because I’m always looking.

What else? Oh yeah, someone recommended me as an off beat knitting blog on a livejournal community and described this blog as having “a high cat content and general life content.” (here.) At first it made me antsy, oh no, I’m a high cat content person. (Because I work with a woman who talks to herself a lot and she’s considered a high cat content person. Is that me? Do I talk to myself a lot? Do I have conversations with my cats and not even realize it anymore?) Then I realized I need to stop thinking about it and just embrace my freaky cat crazed blog for what it is. (freaky. cat crazed. rambling and long.)

Sax was almost worried I would get through a post without her.

Hey, since you’ve read this far, do you want my extra copy of Drunk, Divorced and Covered in Cat Hair? If so, leave a message and let me know, if more than one person wants it, I’ll put names in a hat and have the cats pick. If one person wants it, lucky them!