Boxing Day

I think, of all of the days during the Christmas holidays, my favourite day is Boxing Day. It's a little like the hump day of Christmas and New Year's Day. I don't really care for the crowds of Boxing Day shoppers so it's a stay-at-home day for me. Boxing Day is when the craziness of Christmas has past, the presents have been opened, and everyone is relaxing to enjoy their new toys. You still have plenty of leftovers from the dinners previously so no cooking is required. There is still the holiday glow but you're not quite into the New Year's celebrations yet.

It's a day that you can sit around and catch up on all the Christmas specials that you recorded but haven't had time to watch. And knit.



Excuse the mismatched hat...she doesn't have hair yet.

6 More Sleeps to Christmas!

All the presents are wrapped & under the tree, just waiting for the BIG day. I'm counting down with 6 more sleeps to go.

This skein of Madeline Tosh Pashmina (75% Merino, 15% Silk, 10% Cashmere - colourway - Fjord) was a celebratory knitting project. The chosen project was the Eleanor Cowl from Knitty. The yarn was absolutely yummy to knit with and the pattern was quick. It only took a couple of days. I didn't weight the cowl but there seems to be a fair bit of yarn left. Possibly enough for a pair of fingerless mittens.

What else have I been doing? Finished spinning from Sweet Georgia's fibre club. Unfortunately, it's been on my wheel so long that I've forgotten which month the fibre was from.

I also started another Barn Sweater. A barn sweater is just a simple basic sweater...the kind you would throw on to go out to muck out the barn, if you have one. I don't have a barn but I like comfy sweaters. I love working with the Berroco Ultra Alpaca (50% Alpaca, 50% Wool) for the Ribbed Cardigan that I'm making a Barn Sweater in brown.

Lazy Sunday

I really should have been studying but it's really cold today and we got a light dusting of snow. I took that as a sign that I should knit something warm...like a hat...Sweet Georgia's Ballard Slouch hat, to be exact. A quick knit for a slightly snowy Sunday. I found a leftover skein of Lorna's Laces that was perfect. One thing I didn't factor in was that if you wet block it, it will take time to dry. So no new hat for me to wear tomorrow.

Brain hurts

My brain hurts right now. For the past four weeks, I've been thinking, eating, dreaming Organizational Behaviour and I have another three weeks to go. I'm not used to this. I miss knitting. I miss watching tv. I miss vacuming. Ok, that last one is a lie.

Summer is really over.

So here we sit, feeling smug that we haven't broken down & turned on the heat yet. Thinking that maybe we'll make it to November. Then we found out that the swine kid has been turning on the heat. We lost.

You can really tell that summer is really over.

I wished I did more knitting over the summer...I could really use another sweater or two right now.

Things to be thankful for:

1. No leaks here at home and no leaks in my office at work.
2. I don't work outside in the rain and cold.
3. Westcoast Express trains are heated in the winter. It's all very civilized.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Things to be thankful for:

1. Growing up with a great dad. I still miss him after all these years. Especially at Thanksgiving as it usually fell on his birthday.

2. Hot water heater broke but thankful it wasn't the great disaster that it could have been. A few days of inconvenience of washing in cold water is nothing compared to the water damage that could have happened.

3. My son. Looking at my cousin's new baby tonight reminded me of all the silly things my son used to do. Now he's an adult. I'm very proud of him. :)

4. The use of my hands. If I lost my eyesight, I could still knit. But if I lost the use of my hands, I would go crazy. One can't take anything for granted.

This was my favourite vacation picture taken at the top of the hill of the Plains of Abraham, overlooking Old Quebec City.

Vacation meanderings...feel free to skip this post.

Really enjoyed Montreal and Quebec City. Beautiful old buildings with lot of history. Everything seems to have burnt down at one point or another. We walked everywhere and I do mean WALK. They weren't kidding when they said there's a church on every block. Somewhere on the second day, after visiting the 50th church, we stopped going in. Mont Royal was interesting. We were walking along and I asked my husband how far until we get to the mountain. He said we're on it. It's a very small mountain. By B.C. standards and the true definition of the word mountain, it's almost a hill. Still, it was a beautiful walk. Old Montreal was really touristy and it was very crowded. If you don't like crowds, don't go on a Saturday when the Tall Ships are in. We went back the following Monday and it was much better.

I wasn't looking but came across one yarn shop in Montreal. It was an odd little store. All the yarn was in cones and stacked in boxes like a warehouse. The prices were by the weight. You would go in and pick out what you wanted and a little old man would wind it off the cones and weight your yarn on an old scale. I couldn't tell what was the material for most of the yarn. Another thing that surprised me was how many people smoked in Montreal. Although, you can't smoke in stores, there's no bylaw that says they have to be a certain number of feet away from the entrance. There were a couple of old ladies smoking just at the entrance and it made the yarn inside smell like cigarette smoke to me. Blech!

In Quebec City, we stayed in Old Quebec. The hotel was really small and quaint but in a good way. No rusty beds. Again, we walked everywhere. Plains of Abraham, Battlefield Park, Old Quebec, the lower city, EVERYWHERE. One would think that with all the walking, I would drop pounds but paired with all the good eating we did, I'm lucky the net gain was only one pound.

Toronto could have definitely be a miss for me. What made it worthwhile was seeing old friends and meeting people I've heard my husband talk about over the years. He hasn't seen some of these people in nearly thirty years. Most of these guys knew each other in highschool band and are still playing music for fun. Some of them are in the music business there and some just play in bands on weekeneds. They got together at the place we were staying and played. That was a lot of fun. Good food, good conversation, good music, and good people.

Yarn-wise, Toronto was the only real wool stop. Visited Lettuce Knit and Romni Wools. Lettuce Knit is like any LYS anywhere. Romni Wools was filled to the brim with yarn. I convinced my friend to start knitting again. Overall, I bought one measuring tape (forgot mine at home) and one ball of yarn. Honestly, there was nothing that I saw that I couldn't get in Vancouver.

As fun as it was to go away, it's so nice to be back home. Two weeks is a long time for me...I start missing things like my own pillow and my coffee mug. Just before we left, we got our new stove delievered. I'm so glad I took an extra week off. It has been nice and relaxing. Dusted stuff (house needed serious dusting), tried out the new convection oven (baked muffins), knitted stuff (made pumpkins), and general relaxing.

Thunder and Lightning

Last Wednesday, lightning struck a house half a block away. It was loud, very loud. Thank goodness no one was hurt. The chiminey was damaged. For some reason, that affected our internet. We finally got our internet back on Friday and our WIFI back last night. It was the weirdest feeling not being able to access the internet whenever you want.

Reasonable thoughts

My brain is saying that it is completely silly to pack ALL the yarn for the projects I'm knitting during our trip. I have never EVER knitted an entire sweater in two weeks. But...in my heart, I can't bear the remote possibility of running out of yarn and not be able to knit. This is not reasonable. The only way I'm going to run out of things to knit on this trip is if the plane flew into some kind of time warp where the ratio of their time to ours is 25 years to 3 days. But still...I'm bringing the yarn...just in case.

The grey shrug is done and I love it. The green one has been ripped back and is now ready for whatever's next.

I've been in a finishing mood lately and finally finish the button bands on the purple ribbed cardigan. After four attempts, I went with my original plan of rib 2x2, simple two row buttonholes. The dumb thing was making the buttonholes without choosing the buttons first. You kinda have to keep your fingers crossed that you're going to find buttons that you like and will fit the hole. I was lucky. I found some really nice vintage glass buttons at Black Sheep Yarns yesterday. They fit perfectly and looked great on the cardigan. The drawback was that the sewing hole on the buttons were too small. If they were plastic, I could heat a needle and widen the hole but you can't do that with glass. Bummer. The buttons are great and I can probably use them with something else but the poor cardigan is still buttonless. The yarn is Berroco's Ultra Aplaca - Lavender Mix. Soft and easy to knit. Love it so much that I bought some more yesterday...in bunny colour. :)

Shrug Version 3

Version 3 is doing well. Version 3 is completely different from the previous versions as I didn't bother ripping out the original shrug. I just started a brand new one with yarn I bought for a second shrug. New yarn, new colour. I'm coming to the tail end of the second ball and already at the start of the second sleeve. Definitely will have enough yarn with just four balls. Amazing how things work out if you follow directions. This time, I'm following the pattern...with really minor adjustments.

Our Montreal/Quebec trip has been booked. Hotels, planes, trains, blah, blah, blah...all done. Knitting projects have been sorted out and ready to be packed. Itouch loaded with patterns of each project. Thought about taking my spinning wheel but decided against that. Yarn & Fibre places have been checked out on Ravelry and on the internet. Directions for these places have been printed out. All the important stuff done.

Shrugging off the Shrug

Version 1 - I hate sewing so I thought it would be brilliant to knit the shrug in the round. I always get gauge so didn't bother doing a swatch. By the time I finished the first sleeve and was well on my way through the back, I decided the fabric was too tight. I wanted something looser. Ripped everything out and started with bigger needles.

Version 2 - This time, I casted on for the sleeve and knitted 4" and checked the gauge. Close enough...just off by a stitch or two. No problem. I wanted the shrug to be on the big side anyway. Merrily knitted the first sleeve, the back, and then the second sleeve. Keeping in mind that I wanted this shrug to be loose, I added 2 extra inches. Did I mention that because I wanted it on the big side, I casted on for the largest size? Well, I did. According to the pattern, this would give me 22" across the back when all done.

This morning, I noticed that I have only less than half a ball left and I still have the ruffles to do. Odd. I don't usually run out of yarn. Off I go to the LYS and found out they were out of the colour I'm using. If I'm lucky, I might have enought to do a simple edging. Got home and knitted the last three rows. I decided to pin the shrug together & make sure everything fits before binding off. It was too big. Measured it and it turns out that it was 5" too big across the back. 27" across the back meant that it was falling-off-my-shoulders-too-big. No wonder I ran out of yarn.

Version 3 will have to wait until another day when I'm not so frustrated.

Things that save the day:
1. Picked up fibre from Sweet Georgia. Can't wait to spin that.
2. Picked up more Noro Shirakaba in a different colour in case I want to make another shrug. This time, I bought extras.
3. First time ever! Four balls of Noro and only found two knots.

Twit

Twitter is a strange bird. Is there a prize you get for having lots of followers? Is that why people get all bent out of shape if you stop following them or not follow them back? I'm afraid I've offended a few people there. Oh well. Life goes on.

Teeny Tiny Tomatoes!!

When I first saw these, I thought they were jelly beans! Super teeny tiny cherry tomatoes. Weird year for growing veggies. I think the weather got too hot too fast and the poor little tomatoes didn't have a chance to grow before ripening. They're very tasty, though. It's like all the flavours of a regular tomato squished into a little jelly bean sized package.




I'm really going to miss being down by the waterfront when the construction for the Stadium is done. One could get used to the view here. This pic was taken this morning. No filter on the cell phone camera so the colour is a bit off.



A couple times a week, there would be a cruise ship parked in this spot. I love the atmosphere here when the place is teeming with lost tourists. It makes you feel like you're almost on vacation yourelf. :)

Things that makes me happy:
1. Teeny tiny tomatoes are better than no tomatoes.
2. Living in a place where people come for vacations.
3. Gibson's Fibre Fest this Friday! And I have 2 days off!

Woohoo! Blueberry crop!

Seriously! This is it. Our entire blueberry crop to date. Ok, not really...there were three more blueberries on that plate which got taste tested.

I really don't understand it. Things that are supposed to be super easy to grow would just not grow for us. Things that are supposed to be difficult to grow would spead like wildfire. To date, we have not successfully grown rhubarb. We've tried using store bought plants from reputable garden centres and cutting from friend's tried & try plants...nothing. I guess we can now add blueberries to that list now.

Things that are Double Rainbow:
1. Stat holiday Mondays.
2. Cooler weather for knitting & spinning.
3. Ice coffee cubes for making iced coffees.

Psst to Gillian - good idea about VitD. I will look into that. Unfortunately, I seriously doubt I could convince the guys to switch from cow's milk. I don't care for cow's milk so this is a great alternative for me.

Almond Milk

I really don't know why this happens. I'll be sitting there, perfectly sane, and then an idea pops into my head. When that happens, I just run with it. If I don't, it will drive me crazy.

This one is making almond milk.

Found all sorts of recipes online (love the internet!) and this seems to be the general idea...

1 cup of raw almonds, soaked 12 hours. Take the husks off and rinse.
3 cups of water.

Blend until smooth, strain with a fine mesh strainer. That's it. You have almond milk.

My first batch earlier this week was ok. It was a bit watery as I used only 1/2 cup of almonds...one recipe said to use 1/2 cup and they will swell to 1 full cup. Too bland for my taste. This time, I soaked one cup of almonds and blended that. Much better. Some recipes also suggest blending the almonds with dates as a sweetener but plain is fine with me. So far, it hasn't killed me yet so I guess it's all good.

Apparently, you can save the almond meal, dry it out in the oven and use it for baking.

On Friday, I wandered through Nood in Gastown & picked up some silicone cupckae cups. Much to my surprise, they were on sale! 30% off! They would be perfect for making your own peanut butter cups. :)

No fibre pics today

I finally finished spinning and plying the August 2009 Fibre Club fibre from Sweet Georgia. Thank goodness for Ravelry. I had to look up the colourway because I couldn't find the paper description. Copperhead. I would have pics to show but the swine kid took the camera to the fireworks tonight. >:

So, instead, I have pictures of today's lunch and the lunchroom...







Vancouver is such a beautiful city. Just behind the Olympic cauldron there are benches overlooking the water - outside where I work. These aren't your ordinary park benches. They are high back wooden loungers! What amazes me is that every time I've been there, there's hardly anyone there.

Things that makes me happy:
1. Fresh fruit in the summer.
2. Looking forward to squeeing over the new Aug/Oct fibre club offerings from Sweet Georgia.
3. Cell phone cameras - the best invention ever!

More hexagons!

Y'know, these hexagons are not too bad to make. I have thirteen joined together and a whole bunch of crochet bits in various stages of hexagon completion. I've been crocheting them one colour at a time - do a bunch of centre purples, get tired of that and move on to the cream, and so on. It's perfect for mucking around on the computer. I can do a handful while waiting for LFG to pop on WoW. Multitasking at its best.

Hexagon love

I came across this tutorial on how to crochet hexagons and thought to myself...what a great way to use up leftover yarns!

I'm sure for the crochet savy folks, it's a piece of cake. It took me the whole week to make one. But once I got the first one done, it wasn't bad at all. Made a few more and thought I could piece them together to make a little blanket. I estimated I will need 160 hexagons.



So far, I've made six. I will also need more yarn - which defeats the purpose of using up leftovers. And I didn't factor in the bazillion little yarn ends to weave in.

I think the novelty of crocheting will wear off before I get this finished.

Sidenote:

Picked up my new glasses this week. I feel old. I needed bifocals. Yes, you can get them without the lines (which I did) and they're called Progressives. It wasn't too bad adjusting to them.



Happy Thoughts:

1. Extra long weekend! And it's not raining anymore.
2. Love the super lush green colour of the grass.
3. No plans for the long weekend except do eat, knit, sleep, and WoW! Not necessarily in that order.

Joong (or better known as rice wraps at our house)

Many cultures have these. Call them whatever you want but they're the Best Thing Ever. Ok, not as good as chocolate and coffee but pretty darn close. I have 60 of these. :insert happy dance here:

When asked if I wanted 60 of these, I didn't considered the amount of space they will take in my freezer. They take a LOT of space!

Creative uses for a meat mallot...

A few weeks ago, I had a conversation with my sister about a pair of granny boots I used to have. I wore them until they fell apart and always meant to replace them. We were wandering through a department store shoe section at that time. Her reply was less than flattering about the selection such a store would offer.

So, with that in mind and a free Friday afternoon, I decided to wander through one of my favourite shoe store. I also heard a rumour that they were having a sample shoe sale as well at one of their stores. The store was just too crowded to look properly so I headed to the other store. Found the boots I wanted and they had my size. The only problem was that the arch on one boot was slightly higher than the other. Experience tells me that if I could feel it then, it would irritate my foot after wearing the boots all day. Unfortunately, they only had one pair my size. The other store (the CROWDED store) had two pairs and I really didn't want to walk all the way back. The clerk wasn't able to get in touch with anyone at the other store becuase of the sale and everyone was too busy to answer the phone. Then she did a very nice thing...she offered me a nice discount so I could take the boot to a shoe repair and have them restitch the lining. So I bought them.

When I got home, I took the meat mallet and went Bop! Bop! Bop! on the spot and it worked. I've had these boots for a week now and they still feel great.

Food shopping

A zillion years ago, we lived near 11th & Fraser...not too far from Famous Foods. The Famous Foods then is nothing like the Famous Foods now. This place was recommended by someone who is very particular about what she eats. Now I know where to go for my hard to find baking needs in bulk, although their stock of baking chocolate is not quite as extensive as Gourmet Warehouse. They have organic everything there. Stuff that I wouldn't think you could even get organic!

And I found Greek yogurt there. Organic Greek yogurt. I've been looking for some to try & make my own yogurt. Wish me luck on that. :)

View from the top...

There was no way I was going to say no when asked if I wanted to go up to the ring beam.

View from the freight elevator going up:


View of False Creek and Science World from the ring beam:


View of the hole in the middle of the Stadium roof as they're cutting away the panels:


It was a beautiful day to be up there.

Coffee Bag

Ethical Bean Coffee is a good coffee at a decent price. We drink a lot of coffee which means we go through a lot of bags of coffee. I think these bags are supposed to be recyclable but I couldn't help but wondering if there's something I could make with them. You know - reuse, reduce, etc...

In the spirit of my bag-making phase, I present...

the Coffee Bag!





Things I would do differently next time:
The plastic wrinkled when I turned the bag right side out. I would leave the opening larger so the bag could turn without wrinkling the bag too much. I made zipper tab ends and it added bulk to the end seams - making it very difficult to sew the sides. I think I would prefer to have the air vent facing inside than out. Mylar is slippery to sew so don't rush the sewing. You only get one chance with this material. If you make a mistake, you can't redo the seams...it leaves holes that won't go away.

The bag smells like coffee.

Round two...

I wasn't really happy with the cow bag. The cotton was a bit too soft even with the lining. This was made with some green upholstery fabric I had left over from making a teddy bear.

Oh, did I mentioned that Button Button is just a few blocks away from my new office? This is very handy.

Things you do when you're bored...

I had planned on meeting up with the Twisted tonight but didn't feel great when I got home. I decided to stay home tonight and play a bit of WoW. Tonight I really sucked at healing and wiped the group twice. At lvl 53, it's BRD...a dungeon that I absolutely hated. It was time to go do something else.

Scrounged up a zipper, some fabric, and half an hour later this is what you get...


...a little cow bag. Maybe I should iron out the wrinkles?

BC Place Stadium...end of an era

Now you see it...






Now you don't...

BC Place Stadium's roof was deflated for the final time this morning. I watched it with mixed feelings...a bit of sadness and a bit of excitment for what the next year will bring. I was also sad that not all my Stadium friends were together. We all watched it from various locations. I wish we could have all been together for this.

Hurry up and wait...

Today was Moving Day at work. They're putting in a new roof at work and we all had to leave the building. What doesn't make any sense is that while WE had to leave due to safety concerns, the contract company will be moving in and using our office area. Whatever.

The bright side was that there was a lot of hurry up and wait time. Luckily, I had my knitting with me. Any day that you get to knit on work time is a good day, right?

How Green is Green?

Earth Day 2010

For the most part, our family is pretty green. We do all the usual stuff like recycle anything and everything. We use energy efficient light bulbs. We compost. And lately, our city has a program to compost food scrapes like chicken bones, etc. So I can safely say that we're Green. But one can be a bit more Green if you look around. Lately, at work, I've been putting my sugar and milk in my coffee cup, pour a little bit of coffee, swirl, and then top up my cup with coffee. This is so I don't have to use a wooden stir stick or spoon to stir my coffee. It seemed pointless to dirty a spoon just to mix coffee. Give or take, that will save ~300 stir sticks a year. Not big by global standards but every little bit helps. I've also started bringing my little plastic chopsticks when we go for take-out sushi. No bamboo chopsticks were harmed in the feeding of my sushi cravings. I got this set at one of those Japanese dollar stores. It came with a nice little carrying case with little bunnies on the front. Really cute!

Every little bit helps.

Finding treasure

I was going through some boxes in my junk work room and came across a stash of Rowan Lima that I bought on sale. Finding yarn that I had forgotten is like finding treasure. Going through that room is like digging for treasure sometimes. The original plan was to knit the Alana Cardigan with it but not so sure once I looked over the pattern again and checked out some of the finished projects on Ravelry.

You know what I really want to knit right now? A little sock monkey pouch for my Ipod.

More procrastination

I kinda feel bad...every so often, I get requests for my knitted Waldorf doll pattern and I don't have one...yet. It was one of those pick up your needles and knit until it looked right projects. I've been telling people that I'm going to write out the intructions one of these days.

It took me forever to write up the Sock Monkey pattern. I'm a procrastinator.

Sick

You know that commercial where the gorilla is jumping and beating up on a suitcase? It was to show how tough their luggage can be. Well, I feel like the suitcase...except I'm not as tough. I hate being sick. It's such a waste of time. Even my hair is achy.

Blech!

Ravelympics - Cedar Leaf Shawlette

Well, the 2010 Winter Olympics is more or less over. Paralympics is still to come next week but the hype for that is much less than the regular Olympics. A shame, really. The stadium is now gearing up for the big opening ceremony next Friday. This year really does seem to fly by fast.

During all that I did managed to finish my Ravelympics project.



Pithy Details:
Yarn - handspun Blue Faced Leicester, fibre dyed by Sweet Georgia (Fibre Club), colourway - Foumndation.
Pattern - Cedar Leaf Shawlette - Never Not Knitting

The yarn was probably thicker than what was recommended but it was perfect for what I wanted. A nice thick and soft shawlette. I added an extra row of eyelets before starting the leaf border to better separate the border and the shawl.



Would I knit this again? You betcha!! I'm looking forward to trying this pattern out in different yarns.

2010 Olympics Fever

This was the view that greeted me as I was walking around BC Place on my way to the check-in gate at 6:45AM this morning. It was so breathtakingly beautiful that I had to pull out my cell phone to take a couple of pictures.

The dark objects along the bottom are little Inuksuks along the shoreline. It was really amazing. There must have been at least a hundred or more of them. This just reminded me that I'm lucky to be where I am. It's so easy to forget; being where I am, it's like being in the eye of the hurricane. I forget what's going on around me until I step outside. I'm always surprised at the level of excitment that's in this city right now. Despite the work stress leading up to this point, it is so cool to be part of something this big. This city is going nuts!

Red "O" Mitts - the Reader's Digest Version

I wanted something Olympic-like and functional for those fun times when I'm sitting outside at the check-in tent. My red mittens would be perfect but just can't write with them on. The solution? Half mitts. It only took a couple of hours on Friday. The Friday we had off because they're doing a security sweep of our offices. These mitts are red - same wool as the full sized mittens - but for some reason, looks pinky in this light.

2010 Olympics - a knit-free zone?

Hmmm...going to have to rethink how I'm going to knit my Ravelympic project. Just found out that I may not be able to bring my knitting through the check points for my venue. Which means I won't be able to knit on transit going to & from work. I'm going to have to leave my project in my office.

February's desktop

It's the year of the Tiger so I thought this screenshot would be appropriate for Feb/March desktop.

Mittens

I want a pair of red mittens but didn't like the acrylic store bought ones. So I made my own. It was also to keep me from casting on the Cedar Leaf Shawlette. The mittens only took a couple of days to knit. While these mittens are not the Red Olympic Mitten pattern, they're close (I mean, mittens are mittens) so I made a donation.

Want to see something incredible? Knitters have raised over $1,000,000 for Doctors Without Borders.

And if you're interested in knitting your own mittens, Swatchless has the Red Olympic mitten pattern. The proceeds are going to Penguins Can Fly.

I will now have to find something else to knit for the next two weeks.

Ravelry's Knitting Olympics 2010

It's countdown time to the 2010 Winter Olympics. I have mixed feelings about this Olympics. Normally, I'm all over it, especially with this one being in our own backyard...literally. Working at one of the venues can be really exciting but it has been so stressful. Every time I think or hear about the Olympics, I get heart palpitations. I wasn't sure if I was going to do the knitting Olympics this year. But then, I thought...how often does this comes around? It might be just the thing to de-stress things a bit.

So, I joined Team Canada Ravelry group and picked my project and yarn.

Cedar Leaf Shawlette. Something nice and uncomplicated that won't make me want to poke my eyes out with my needles. The yarn is the Blue Face Leicester that I spun up last summer. Fibre is from Sweet Georgia's fibre club...Foundation colourway. I've been trying to think of something special to use this yarn for and when I saw the pattern, I knew it was right.



I'm all set to go. I've been knitting like a crazy person to finish up my Almost-Cassidy cardigan just so I could get that done and out of the way so I wouldn't break my resolution of finishing things before starting new projects. The main pieces of the cardie just came off the needles tonight. This weekend, I will sew them together, knit the band and I will be done just in time to start the shawlette for Feb 12th.

Things I'm thankful for:
1. A cool bunch of friends at work.
2. New knitting projects
3. Books

2010 New Year Resolution (despite my objections to making resolutions)

Normally, I'm not big on New Year Resolutions. For me to make resolutions is pretty much condemming me to failure. I start things and I never finish things. I have lots of ideas for projects and things to do but once I get started on them, if it takes more than 10 minutes, my interest has moved on to the next shiny thing. Very easily distracted.


I would like to change that. I'm going to start small. Give myself a few things to finish so I wouldn't get discouraged.

1. Finish the grey cable cardigan. Yes, that cardigan is still not finished. It's all knitted but still need to be sewn together. I promise I will do that this year. I think giving myself a year is good except I'm also a procrastinator. I will most likely wait until December and think maybe no one will remember that I put that on my blog to finish. It's getting silly...I finished knitting the sweater in December 2007.

2. Finish the hair on my Waldorf doll. She still only have half a head of hair. And she still needs clothes. Maybe I should list the half-finished sweater that I'm knitting for her here too.

3. Finish my cashfern scarf. Honestly! I only have 1 repeat left to do! It's sititng in a margarine tub somewhere in my wool room.

4. Finish the finglerless gloves I promised my niece. I promise to have them finished by next winter. You will get them eventually.

Happiness is...

...yarn sale at your local yarn shop and coming home with a sweater's worth of Rowan Lima.

Yum!