Hot Child in the City

You Belong in New York City You're an energetic, ambitious woman. And only NYC is fast enough for you. Maybe you'll set yourself up with a killer career Or simply take in all the city has to offer What City Do You Belong in? Take This Quiz :-)

Found this via the lovely (and frighteningly pale) Kristine @ Digital Yarn. I do so enjoy silly little quizzes.

Just a quickie to let y'all know that I survived (the cooties being essentially gone) but am just damn tired. Got an in& out trip for work tomorrow, so I'll be AWOL til the weekend, where I plan to knit till I can't see straight (on yarn that I already own). Woo hoo!

Do you know what today is?

"It's my blogiversary, blogiversary..."

(Apologies to Tony Toni Tone for abusing their song). Whoops.

I know everyone says it - but it's been a year since I started this journey, and I can't believe how quickly it's gone. I've "met" some really neat folks on the 'Internets' (Crazy Aunt Purl, Yarn Harlot, Miss Claudia) and have discovered some amazing patterns (like here, here and here, for example) that I might never have come across otherwise.

But I've also been a bit scatterbrained and unfocused in my yarn love - I thought, when I started the blog, that I'd be more prone to finish the stuff I started.
Er, not so much - I find I'm easily distracted by all the pretty lights and cute pictures of OPP (Other People's Projects) and am not getting enough done to suit me.

So (deep breath), as my blogiversary present to myself, I am hereby declaring a
Yarn Fast.
(Boy-O, pick your face up off the floor. I'm serious.)
There's just too many projects going on and not enough commitment to any of them. My harloty ways are starting to frustrate me. So I'm gonna have to lay a bit of smack down on my flightness and get some stuff done!

Besides, Christmas is coming and not a one of the projects I smugly began in September is even halfway finished. Gotta get on the sticks, as it were...

Holi-day-ee

"Cele-bray-ate!" (Don't ya just love Madonna? Seriously. The woman is still musically relevant after 25 years - that's seriously cool.)

The knitting proceeds, slowly. Since a currentpicture of the tie would look nearly the same as the previous one, I'll spare you. Use your imaginations, if you will - it's about an inch longer. I'm still switching skeins of yarn every two rows in order to mix up the colors, and still cursing at the pattern directions. I will say this, though - it's a lot easier to work on it now that the cooties are gone and my eyes aren't crossing when I look at the variegated skeins. (Woot!)

So: the new VK is out (Holiday '05 preview here). Not as thrilling for me as the fall issue was, but I'm still impressed. Loved the Michael Kors short sleeve aran (impractical but attractive), and the cutie pie toppers in the Miss Mistletoe story. Especially because I got the Nordstrom's catalog the next day, and saw several items in there which prove that the Vogue in Vogue Knitting really does mean what I think it means.

Just so y'all don't think I'm on their payroll, do note that I have my doubts about some of the editorial. The Into The Woods story depends entirely on the flyness of the model for its effect. Seriously: that girl's hot enough to wear the pages of the phone book and look fabulous. The rest of us have to depend on our clothes being flattering.
And I can't make up my mind about this sweater - I think it's either the cutest or the ugliest thing in the issue.
Discuss.

Back from the Brink

I've managed to (mostly) recover from the cooties which have so freely made their way around the blogosphere.
This however was your friendly correspodent for much of the time:




(Swiped from Jesse Combs - go check out his art; it's clever and perfect for Halloween.)

I haven't actually knit for weeks - my hands are actually itchy. The last thing I was working on was a knit tie. Because I am a dang fool, I believed the pattern (IK, Winter 04)* which said
that the tie would only require one skein of Koigu.

And of course, the patterns was wrong, and of course, there is a massive variation in dyelots from one skein to the next,


(Excuse the blur - my photographer is sleeping)


So this simple, portable project has become much less so. If I were at full brain capacity, it would be much easier, but we'll see if I can't manage to pull this off.

* Surprisingly, this Shirley Paden pattern is the worst laid-out one I've ever used. I guess they were attempting to save space, but there has been more Bad Language while knitting this particular project than ought to be strictly necessary.