I’m older!

I guess birthdays are supposed to get lamer as you get older, so I’m not looking forward to all that noise… because this one I just had was a good time. My dad took me to see a movie, which we do every year as a tradition. His birthday is the day before mine so it’s pretty cute.

This is him modeling the bug vacuum, which boasts that “you can play with bugs without ever touching them.” All of the obsessively clean kids out there- rejoice!

My boss is pretty great too-

Although I maintain that working on my birthday (which was a Saturday!) merited a cake. He went above and beyond and got it from some fancy pants French bakery. After work I went to a roller derby:

The Ohio Roller Girls vs. the Northstar Roller Girls (from Minnesota). If you haven’t checked out a roller derby you should because they’re a lot of fun. It’s good to go with someone who knows what’s going on though. Otherwise you have to get a little creepy and listen in on knowledgable people. The derby also rocked because I went with Jessica.

Aren’t her teeth like perfectly straight and white? I’m always amazed the pictures she takes.

So yeah, I got to see people, got to eat good food, got some sweet ass presents. My mom got me a swift and ball winder:

I guess that means I can’t give up on knitting. That’s the big time, right? Oh man, now I’ll probably never knit again. Crap.

Perspective

Okay, so this might meander a little, if you want to, feel free and skip down to the one knitting related picture I’ve taken lately.

There’s a book:

And I’ve wanted to knit a particular something out of this book for a long time… but I couldn’t justify buying the whole book because it’s expensive and I just don’t think I have a whatever body to make anything in this book work. There are also some ladies that I knit with:

(Thanks Betty for letting me use this photo!)

Well the one lady on the right, three people up or two people down depending on how you look at it is the Molly that I feel like I’m always talking about, or at least always all of the sudden. When she saw that I had finally decided to take the plunge and knit something from that book, she said that she loves the patterns but wouldn’t make anything because she would look “lumpy”. Which I thought was funny later on that night because I showed John that picture so he could see who all of these “Mollys” were… he looked at it and when I point out Mollylouhoo, the first thing he said was “she looks like a knitter” and the second thing he said was “she could eat a sandwich or two.” Which is his way of saying, Jesus, she’s skinny.

I don’t know what it is about us people but we all have sort of ‘innocent’ (and often not so innocent) ways of making judgments about peoples appearances and then saying it to that person. Like one time I was on a plane with a Woody Allen impersonator.

(I stole this image from here.)

Anyways, while this guy was telling me about how many jigawatts his first computer had and how he got his first neurotic tendency, he said “well you don’t have any piercings or tattoos, so I guess I can safely assume you’re not one of those ska girls.”

Which takes me back again to this time where I was in high school and a girl I didn’t know very well randomly said to me: “You know, your nose isn’t actually too bad. It’s not big, it’s not small, it’s actually kind of cute.”

Er, gee thanks. I think?

So, yeah, my point is that everything is a matter of perspective. That Woody Allen guy thought he could talk to me ad nauseam because I wasn’t one of those dreaded ska girls. Whereas my mom’s family is a bunch of jerks who say intensely hurtful things about my appearance pretty much nonstop. A reason I will never go back to being a red head. LOL, okay, that was probably a bad decision in the first place but honestly, they have no room to ever make criticisms about appearance. Oh snap!

Also! I feel the need to share a spur of the moment type thing… I got a new bike!

It is a red Schwinn Passage.

I don’t know anything about bikes. I just told my dad that I wanted a cheap bike that was light weight because I’m a puss and won’t ride anything that’s heavy since that’s like extra work and stuff like OMG. Well I guess someone he’s working for who does triathlons (just typing that word makes me sick a little) just got herself a new (kickass-er) bike, so I get her super sweet Schwinn… which according to the bike dude at the bike place is “a really nice bike.” (He said that about 20 times and I swear I thought he was going to get my address to come and steal this thing from me.) Actually, the bike dude almost fainted when we told him I was getting it for free because apparently… it’s a really nice bike.

Which is a shame honestly since I have no idea how to ride a nice bike. Every bike I’ve owned until now has been bought from Meier and came with a free air pump, like nice basketballs sometimes do.

So yeah, I’m knitting that Corset-Bodice nightgown from that book, in case you were getting curious about knitting…

I’m getting excited about it. This picture shows all of the yarn that I had invested in that Yosemite. Which goes to show that one mans broken half of a sweater is that same mans almost finished holey top thing. I mean, it’s all about perspective right? Oh, circular!

P.S. Does anyone have any good bike resources or knowledge they want to share with me? Because I need some serious help.

P.P.S. Sometimes I look at myself and think “geez you’re fleshy”.

Mother– son of a– ! Goats.

I won’t share my crazy form of swearing with you all here… however I felt the need to share that I am doing a great deal of it today.

Do you all remember way back when (I think it was when this blog had something to do with knitting…?) I said I was knitting that Yosemite pattern from knitty? Well I went to my knitting group last night and I finally said out loud what had been weighing on my mind…

“Geez, this thing is kind of heavy. Do you guys think it’s going to pull it down?”

When there were nervous glances back and forth I knew for real that my fear was a reality. I mean, dang.

So I got all worked up. Who can I blame this on? Those nice sweet ladies at the knitting store, that’s who! It was totally all their fault, yeah, definitely had to be them. So I got my game face on today and I went in and said, THIS IS VERY HEAVY please don’t beat me up.

Also, I want to point out that I had a good seven or so inches of this sucker done. I mean, I was heading back to increaseville in no time at all. Whatever was going on in this world in my head, I figured it would work out something like this: I would go in and gripe. They would listen to me empathetically, nodding their heads and telling me that I’m awesome. Then one of them would pull out a magic voodoo needle, tap it on my sweater a couple of times and *presto* everything’s roses.

You already know where this leads:

I couldn’t help but sniffle while she made me hold my sweater as she wound it up. Daaang.

Although… this is a step in some direction. Uh, the opposite of where I wanted to go but a step nevertheless. Right peeps?

They had me try it on (before it became those balls up there) and it turns out it was also HUUUUUUGE. So what did they recommend? Going down a needle size and also going down a size in the pattern.

However (and this is where you guys come in)

I’m not 100% sold on this pattern anymore. I just don’t know if I’m a mollylouhoo who can rip out five times, go down to an extra small and generally take many a lickin’s and keep on tickin…s. Plus, oh, PLUS! Since the Yosemite is all ribbing, I have about twice as much yarn as I really need. I could maybe even knit two (tank) tops with it, so it’s not like this amazing yarn would go to waste. What do you think?

Since wordpress is being a jerk right now, I’m sorry but you’ll have to click on my link and go to the actual poll. Sorry!

http://www.polldaddy.com/p/551925/

You let me know! Because I need to know.

Also, right after I uploaded that picture someone commented on it but it turned out to be spam… however, the spam was so hilarious to me, I figured I’d share it with you.

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?

Happy Valentine’s Day!

For my Irish Valentine <3

I know it’s a day early but I figured, hey, I’m thinking about it, so I should probably do a post before I get back in bed and overdose on antibiotics. (I have the strep, like I get every year. This year I preemptive striked it by seeing a new doctor near our new place who wears some really swanky shoes. However, it was not preemptive enough apparently.)

Pattern: Be My Dishcloth by Kristen Patay

Yarn: Lily Sugar ‘n Cream solid in green

I don’t know how smart it is to knit a dishcloth for a boy for Valentine’s day. He’s such a weird boy that I’m hoping he’ll see it and say it’s the most perfect gift he’s ever gotten. However, I’m sure he would rather have an XBOX 360. Although in my mind, they’re pretty much the same thing, only this is useful. Poor guy. (We got the tulips at the grocery store the other day, they’re my favorite flower! I don’t know if it’s because I think they’re pretty, I’m pretty sure it’s because I think they’re smart.)

Also, this one has been brewing for a while but just in case she ever checks this blog (which I’m pretty sure she doesn’t) I didn’t want to put up the pictures of them finished. So here are the socks I knit for my Granma, she got them in time for Valentine’s Day!

Pattern: Hedera by Cookie A.

Yarn: Lorna’s Laces Sock in Periwinkle.

This was an edge of the seat nail biter type knit because I was so paranoid that they wouldn’t fit. That she’d be allergic to the wool. That I’d accidentally knit in one of those seven year chain mail curses and then she’d have to send socks out to fifteen people or it would be seven years of raining toads or something. Because… that happens all the time, right?

However, she maintains that she loves them:

My poor aunt Gerri got suckered into taking this picture and sending it to me.

socks! in! action!

Oh man, just typing that has taken all of my energy. (Also, I’m going to randomly insert here that my aunt Gerri is married to my uncle Tom. How freaking cool is that? Tom and Gerri, I love it!)

As for the socks, they were a great knit once I finally decided to set the shawl aside and just focus on the socks to get them done before Valentine’s day as a nice sort of present. I of course can see all the mistakes (especially the row where I don’t know what I was doing but it certainly wasn’t the pattern!) but Granma maintains that I’m the best knitter in the world and she’s proud of me, so… I guess I really can’t disagree with the woman.

Sax was irritated I got in the way of her silhouette campaign photo.

Socks, a dishcloth- whoa. I guess February really is the month to get thangs done. Like sleeping, I think I’ll get that done right now.

Holiday Vortex

I’ve been sucked into one.

Sax doesn’t care as long as she gets fed.

Every year I fool myself into thinking that I’m a ‘Holiday Person’ and every year I get sad when I realize that I’m just not one. Sure I could point fingers and blame other people for me being a Scrooge but it’s really just in my disposition to hate on Christmas. Or at least the commercial beast that Christmas has become.

So yeah, I don’t have kids and they’re kind of what makes this season so ‘magical’. Or what makes things more stressful- jolly. There aren’t too many twenty-something holiday pageants… if there are any, that’s really creepy.

However, I have already gotten an early Christmas present- it was from my dad:

The gift of clean clothes!

Yippeeeee! He got us a new dryer. How cool is that? I’ve done like twenty loads of laundry in the past 24 hours because I can. It’s getting to the point where I’m just washing whatever I see. The cat has gone into hiding and I honestly don’t blame her.

When we were out looking for the perfect washer/dryer that would mesh well with our lives (I totally picked the washer because I liked the clicking noise it made) my dad said something that freaked me out. It was something along the lines of “this is your guyses first Christmas together.” At first my face ticked, what? All of those other Christmases didn’t count? Well apparently it counts now that we’re married and we’ve gone legit.

Then the worry set in. Wait a minute… does that mean this is like a big deal? Then panic. Oh man, the stuff I got him is lame! A quick call to my Granma cleared everything up though. For her and Granpa’s first Christmas together, she made matching pajamas. (His and Hers PJs.) So logically, for our first Christmas together, I should make John something… which leads to the blanket.

DISCLAIMER: I am not a quilter. I am not pretending to be a quilter. I cannot quilt.

Blankey

Half Life, Rush, Princess Peach, PacMan.

I’ve been making this thing for like three years. What it looks like won’t surprise him but probably the fact that I finished it will.

Oh yeah and the ending of that story that Granma was telling me? She said that Granpa still remembers their first Christmas because she left a pin in one of the legs and it stabbed him.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!