Payback

Last year my internet buddy longklaw, or Will if you’re being formal, was getting ready to go to the San Diego Comic Con and I was jealous. I kept sending him tweets about the stuff I would check out and luckily he’s a nice enough person to not tell me to shut the hell up.

Then I got this kickass package in the mail!

Not pictured is a mockingjay pin that got wedged at the bottom of the tube he shipped the poster in. Anyways- pretty amazing of him, right?

Then I felt guilty because that was way above and beyond being a cool dude. So I started watching his tweets. I knew that he was a HUGE Game of Thrones fan. Originally I was thinking of making him something themed around House Stark because he seemed to like them but upon further annoying prodding, I found out that he wanted more House Lannister stuff.

Again, I creepily waited in the shadows, biding my time to see if he would decide on an iPad or a kindle. Maybe you’re getting creeped out at this point by my thought process and I don’t blame you but there was reasoning behind my madness. I wanted him to pick an iPad because if he had, I would have been able to pick a much bigger yarn and used bigger needles. Honestly, I even tried to sway him toward an iPad just because I’m that freaking lazy. (Plus, iPads are cool.)

Nope, he picked Kindle. Good for him with that sweet reading habit.

The Lannister’s sigil is a gold lion on a maroon background and their house words are “Hear Me Roar!” However, most of the people in Westeros mistake their unofficial words for their house words, which are: A Lannister Always Pays His Debts.

I think that’s a pretty badass promise/threat. So yeah, I ended up making this out of sock yarn on size 0 double points. I found an English lion chart and then improvised the back. It had snap clasps inside, which I had never done before so I’d say those are the weakest links of the whole project. Hopefully it will cover/protect something, because it did block out a little big to just fit a Kindle. It was like night and day between how it looked before and how it looked after blocking. Since I took pictures, you can see what I’m talking about:

Before. All roly poly.

During. Half way through I decided I wanted to steam block it. So I threw it under a towel to dry and then used the iron. My cat, Sax, wanted to make sure it stayed really warm and secure.

So there you have it. A Game of Thrones kindle case and all the creepy steps it took to get me there. Have you guys read the books? I got part way through the second one, I need to get back into them. I need to finish a book period. I’ve been too scatterbrained lately. Let me know what you think! Because I’m like, I think most people will see this and think GRYFFINDOR WINS!

Mostly amazing

For every winner… do you ever feel like you get more than your share of duds? I mean, even when you’re making a winner something has probably gone wrong with it, or is about to go wrong. It’s like, dang, can’t catch a break here. Well that’s definitely how I feel about painting pottery. A hobby I should seriously consider giving up. Because before it goes in the kiln it looks cool:

Then when it comes out you can see every streaky brush stroke… well unless you know what you’re doing. Then grats, you’re a better person than me. Still, at least this one came out kind of cool with the flaming yarn ball. Everything else is a hot mess.

Also, it was my second time around on the mystery sock “Cablicious” and it wasn’t feeling good. At least, I wasn’t feeling good about it, although the instructor says I’m too hard on my own work and need to chill out. Which is funny because they’re usually telling me the opposite at that store (rip out). So I frogged my second Cablicious attempt and I’m going to say my final attempt. Usually I don’t even give things a second shot, so you know I must like the stuff that’s coming out of the mystery sock class.

With all of this failing, you’d think things would be looking down… but they’re not really. As long as you have a pug in your life nothing is really as bad as it seems:

Oh majestic pug stallion.

P.S. Sax wants to wish you guys a happy Easter. She’s all about it.

When life gives you knitting needle lemons-

I pulled this out of my bag the other day:

My needle completely splintered out of existence. Does this crap happen to people normally? All that was left was the metal holder and a little nub of wood. I want to say this was the first time something like this has happened with me and the Harmony needles but that’s a boldfaced lie. Because the other day my size 10 popped right out of the metal holder. Just like ::pop:: oh you didn’t need this right?

And me in my infinite wisdom thought, okay, no problem here, I can just superglue this thing and make it right, yeah?

Wrong!

So when life give you lemons, get a new camera:

Also, tie an ascot around your cats neck because that’s always hilarious. Or at least their indignant little faces are.

To be fair, Sax keeps scratching herself a new sore and since it would be mean to get a cone for her like you do with dogs, she gets the jaunty little neck tie. Also to be fair, I called knit picks all in a tiff and they said that no problem, they’d get me some new needles out. But while I’m waiting a month for them to get here because of all the holiday mail madness, will that vest make its Christmas deadline? So I got some Addi Turbo’s from my yarn shop. Which they found the whole story endearing in a “haha, that’s what you get for buying needles off the intarwebs sucker” sort of way.

You win this round Life.

Meet Ernie!

So lately I’ve had a big FAIL! word bubble over my head. One day when I got home though, I found this guy waiting for me:

This is our new member of the family: Ernie. He was crocheted by my awesome Granma. You might remember her from previous posts. She pops up a lot. She’s cool like that, you know with her extra Granma senses and powers.

As much as I was willing to embrace Ernie almost instantly as a member of our family, the cats were a little weary. Which is weird. I mean, I thought cats and crocheted dogs went together like peas and carrots…

Can’t they take out all their aggression towards real dogs on his durable crocheted exterior? These are the hardball questions I ask every day. Along with questions like: why aren’t my projects knitting themselves?

Shmoo needs to get over herself. I mean a levitating crocheted wiener dog is a pretty normal occurance around here. I’m starting to worry whether or not she’s getting along alright. Then I see her sprawled out in the most random places, like right in the middle of the floor-

-and I figure, she’s fitting in fine.

Ernie’s ready to hit the road:

Pumpkin Show here we come!

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!

The pursuit of happyknits!

Er, Happy Presidents Day?

I’ve been doing some whim knitting lately. The first whim knit was kind of a bust:

Pattern: The Fidget

Knit in some Caron Simply Soft… I guess the whole point of this project was to display fancy pants yarn. Well I don’t have time for yarn snobbery or just general snobbery in my life, which is another story completely.

I’m just sad because I knew the second I finished it that it was an ‘enh’ project that I probably wouldn’t ever think about but whatever, it taught me how to knit one below. So, yaaaay for learning!

My second whim knit was a little more sweet, since I wear it pretty much all the time now:

Pattern: Hannah

Yarn: Sweet sweet Baby Alpaca Chunky by Cascade.

I knit this in a Sunday afternoon while watching one pretty good movie and another terrible terrible movie that suuuuucked. (Surprisingly, it wasn’t Shoot Em Up again.)

Since I seem to only be capable of wearing my hair in a ponytail, this hat was long overdue. Plus I love any pattern that has buttons! Yay buttons! John and I actually went out on Valentine’s day and shopped for buttons. I’m that devoted to them and he’s that devoted to me.

Oh yeah, not to be left out. Sax doesn’t usually like catnip at all but she loved Cath’s homegrown stuff.

Also, I’ve come to terms with being crazy, here’s a video of Sax and her nip:

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.

They saw me coming…

I went to the yarn store to pick up a book…

Oh yeah, and some chunky alpaca yarn.

Did she see me coming or what? The thing about yarn stores is that you can’t get mad because it’s not high pressure sales really. (Well there is one store around here that I had a high pressure sales experience with but that was just a weird situation, so I don’t know if it counts.) It’s friendly pressure sales. She was my friend who knew I was interested in some yarn (like a month ago) and she happened to get it in (two weeks after I stopped caring) and it was kind of the color I wanted (except a little chalkier than I wanted) so I really couldn’t argue with that.

Dang, am I bitchy or what?

Oh yeah, it’s probably because my cat is in hiding thanks to this little fuzzball:

Fur EVERYWHERE.

This is my husbands new cat. I say she’s my husband’s new cat because if I said she was our cat, you would be getting posts from me from the beyond since that is where Sax will send me.

Tensions are running high here. I think we need to get a kitty calmer but dang those things are expensive. At least I coaxed her out from behind the TV and got her to stop hissing long enough to force her to take a yarn shot:

Such a sweetie.

So yeah, we have a new cat! However, we tried calling her Jade, as per Betty’s suggestion and she was having none of that, so we’re still looking for name suggestions. So far the only thing she has responded to was Dilophosaurus and considering I can’t even spell that and she eventually got irritated with the name, we’re back to square one. I honestly think she’s just playing it up. Like she plays up the gimp leg- but that’s another story for another time.

Oh crap, she’s giving Sax a run for her money.

In the next post: actual! finished! project!

Maybe send a search party because I might have died.

The first rule of Fort Snax is… your hair will definitely look freaky.

We had some people over, who (although it’s hard to believe) are also married adults… however it quickly digressed to this:

Snackopolis. This is a Fort City.

I swear- we try to be upstanding and dignified. However, when it’s cold out and you’re bored and you’re with some goofy people, it will almost always end up in a fort. If only to keep warm. Because it all started with people feeling cold, so we brought out alllll of our blankets. (Maybe also a couple of pillows.)

Also, I still haven’t boxed up the Nutcrackers. This laziness has definitely started affecting my knitting. The colder it gets, the lamer I get. I’m not going to lie, I’m going through a [burnt out on knitting] stage.

Sax however is not feeling these same thoughts and is instead very energetic. She’s decided to run for office:

Doesn’t this picture just scream Sax in ’08?

There are others on my flickr. However, she definitely chose the dirtiest corner in the whole place to pose for her campaign shots.

Sorry I’ve been so lame guys. I know I was gone for like two weeks, then I come back with nothing cool to show for it (because I can’t go on with my lace, I just can’t right now) and you don’t even get a crappy souvenir ashtray even though you don’t smoke and it’s kind of insensitive… Geez. You don’t even get an insensitive gift that you can try and sell on eBay. I give up- it’s time to go into hibernation.

Here’s an old picture of the boy knitting (and the cat helping):

My Lace Face

I cried a little today.

Turns out, I’m not a lace knitter! But I will prevail. Because lace is not going to get the best of me… just yet anyways. I think I’ll suck it up and let it kick me in the face later.

How does Sax feel about it? Just fine:

Unless you try and take her mouse- then she might cut you:

I thought, I need some cheering up, since it took me like two hours to do a row today because I kept messing up… (at least I finally have the right amount of stitches now and if it’s all jacked up, according to my Granma, that just makes it more my (terrible looking) shawl than anyone elses.

Also, let’s be honest here people, this sucker isn’t going to be a shawl, it’s going to be a monster. So I thought, what will cheer me up? … you guessed it!

Googly eyes!

Although… I got a little out of control.

Heh.

Thanks Amy Sedaris. I definitely feel ready to party!