JenLa

Stats:

Pattern: Kriya Yoga Mat Bag (Ravelry link) or direct .pdf download.

Needles: US 8 (5.0 mm)

Yarn: Cascade 220 Wool, 1 skein pink, 1 skein brown (most of both skeins was used)

Mods: Erm. No, I guess not.

Thoughts: Combining cabling and stranded color work isn’t hard, per se, but it’s a little like learning to drive a stick shift. You know how to do the things, but putting them all together at once feels a little confusing at first. It flowed into a very simple rhythm after a short period of time, though. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about colored cable work and am definitely pleased with this, so I’m sure that there is more of this type of knitting in the future. My little swatch even got some use.

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Remember when I mentioned getting stuck rubbernecking in the drama threads on Ravelry? For a short time after that they seemed to subside, which was nice because I got a lot of gardening done. Well, they’re back and they’re bigger and better (worse) than ever. I know it’s sort of idiotic to read those things, but I’m coming to terms with it. I love gossip and drama when they have nothing to do with me. There, I’ve admitted it. I don’t participate, I just lurk and secretly pick sides and sneer and snort to myself about the ridiculousness of it all. I was speaking to a friend about this and she feels the same way-as long as it doesn’t touch her, she likes to watch it from the sidelines. We got to talking about how much of it there is lately (a seemingly inordinate amount, but not as much as some other fora, I suppose.), how to find it (You know the person who deals with all the big trouble? Read all their posts.), and how wouldn’t it be nice if there was some central collection place for those of us who like to silently read up on the latest dramatic offerings like cheap pulp fiction. Admit it. You do it, too. I know that when there are 40 voices and 602 readers that there are a lot of people doing it besides me. So I got to thinking that we need a Ravlery Rubberneckers Group for staying abreast of the latest melodramatic offerings from the amateur actors, devising RavDrama drinking games and to discuss the basics of surviving the marathon reading required. This was a joke, but I get closer to actually doing it with every passing hour. EDIT: I did it. Join, you know you wanna.

I started my new job, which was basically the same job but a new location and more working, but might be morphing into an actual new job. I expect to be very busy for the next couple weeks at least. I’d like to call it yarn money, but the lack of knitting time and abundance of stash and queued up projects really probably means it won’t result in yarn collecting. Or at least, that’s what I thought until I caught wind of a new yarn shop IN. MY. TOWN. This may not mean much to you, but we don’t even have a liquor store here, only one grocery store, one fast food restaurant and a whole lotta farms. I will make time to install myself in it and report back.

Meanwhile, I’m stitching away productively on the Wank It! and soon I’ll be beginning Moroccan Days/Arabian Nights. Just the process of choosing yarn and beads has been epic so I can only imagine what I’ll be putting myself through with the execution. Another “Jen takes the hard route for the sake of a wild idea” project. There’s also a little Hyrna Hergobar in the very near future-and that is one that I’ve been absolutely dying to knit ever since I saw Claudia’s. It’s one of those things that has stayed with me, haunting me all this time. I keep changing my mind about the yarn, though, so it’s anyone’s guess right now what it’s going to look like. I’m more excited about my upcoming projects than I’ve been in a long time.

v.2.0

Pattern: Clamber(Ravel It!) by Moi!

Yarn: Misti International Misti Alpaca Sport, (Less than) 1 ball -146 yds

Needles: US 4 Addi Lace 16″ circs

Notes:

Back in Feburary I made a hat for my mom’s birthday. The hat was just the initial downpayment for a scarf-hat set that she proclaimed dire need for because she and my dad were going on an Alaskan cruise. I had decided early on that I wanted to make her the Irish Hiking Scarf, the beauty of it’s simplicity and sturdiness a perfect match for my mom’s own personality and style. Well, I didn’t really like any of the hats others have designed to compliment the scarf, so I decided to take it upon myself to design one of my own. My first attempt?

…Less than stellar, I have to admit. It was quite snug, and the woman does NOT have a huge melon. Then there’s the unfinished-looking rag-tag looking edge. So it was back to the designing board, where I came up with this…

…with which I am quite happy. Tickled actually. It made a for a beautiful set, and Mom was so thrilled she was speechless, and if you knew my mother, you’d know that’s saying something…well, actually…she wasn’t saying anything, hence speechless. Anyhow…I even caught a peek of her trying it all on again from the trunk of her car as dad was finishing packing up to go home. She wore it home. In California…in upper-70-degree Southern California weather. Yeah, I think she liked it.

The pattern is free and available on Ravelry (see where it says “Ravel It”? click there), as well as on the Dizzy Blonde Designs page at Fibercrack’d, you know, for those of you who have been hiding under a rock and are not on Ravelry. Just click the button below and it’ll take you right to it.

Stats

Pattern: Highland Triangle Shawl (Ravel It!) by Cheryl Oberle, from Folk Shawls

Yarn: Berroco Ultra Alpaca (worsted), 5 skeins-1075 yds and I used all but a couple of those yards, too.

Needles: US 8 Susan Bates

Modifications:

There is an error in the instructions not listed in the pattern errata for the book: On page 90, after finishing the eyelet pattern-

either ignore “begin lace pattern 2” instructions and go directly to the charts

OR count the 2 rows of “begin lace pattern 2” as the first two rows of the chart.

Do not do as the instructions tell you and complete “begin lace pattern instructions” followed by row 1 of the chart or your stitch count will be hopelessly off.

Comments:

I sweated bullets finishing the edging on this because that last cake of yarn appeared to dwindle very quickly. I made it with little breathing room, too, but I made it which is fortunate because I bought that yarn a couple years ago from an LYS that went out of business so matching the dyelot would have been challenging.

I finished this shawl in a total of five days, but two of those days I ripped everything I’d knit the day before, so had I not continually screwed up the border it would have been done in three or four. Big needles and worsted weight yarn, people, I’m not that fast of a knitter!

This shawl is enormous. I love that! I really feel cozy and warm when I wrap up in it, there’s nothing quite like a substantial yet pretty wrap.

This pattern is SUPER easy. There’s not even any purling in the pattern. The hardest thing is picking up the 276 stitches for the edging.

The yarn is not my most favorite yarn in the world. It’s 50/50 Alpaca and Peruvian Highland Wool. The wool content seems to have utterly negated the alpaca content. It feels like a wool yarn, which is fine-I love wool-but the name “Ultra Alpaca” would seem to indicate some level of additional softness which it doesn’t possess.

This is one of my favorite knitted articles ever. I wish I could wear it tromping up and down the Scottish Highlands in the mist and rain. I might make this one again someday, and believe me that’s saying a lot. I almost never knit something twice.

Jared came home for the weekend. It was short notice, he decided to come and happened to find a flight and was here for three short days. We squeezed a LOT into those three days, the biggest project of which was this:

I tilled up the back yard. I’m sick of mowing a hill and the grass was crappy there anyway. So it’s going to be a flower bed. I wasn’t expecting any help, but Jared was happy to pitch in and help me dig and assemble the pond:

Which will eventually be surrounded by flowers. I’ve already planted some and seeded much of it. I got the rest of the seeds today, but I need to bring down some more wheelbarrows of llama poop to fertilize the beds before it’s time to kick back and patiently await the fruits of all my labor. That’s the hardest part of gardening, sometimes-the waiting. I also got the vegetable garden done as well as the herb garden. Jared did everything on his honey-do list plus bush hogged the areas that needed it, watered the line of baby trees he planted earlier in the year and killed the poison ivy on the field road. Oh yes, and we sheared goats and trimmed hooves.

Needless to say you can’t knit when you’re sweaty and dirty, so no knitting has happened in several days, but I intend to remedy that as soon as I hit publish. I might even go knit out in the dirt patch while I daydream about the flowers that will be there soon.

Nope, no meme here. Nope, nuh-uh. I’f you’re looking for a meme, you better just keep on moving, cuz JenLa’s a meme-free zone, dontcha know. Not a single solitary meme. Instead we have shameless pimpage of cuteness. The fact that it just so happens to be Friday is pure coincidence people, that is all. No way, no how should this be considered in the general vicinity of…

Just so we’re clear on that.

Yes. That giant person is none other than my darling granddaughter, Marina, taken around Easter time. I can’t believe she’s almost 18 months!

And then there’s Baby Levi…

nom nom nom nom nom

Daddy pillow…good

Can you believe that his parents have made me partially responsible for this little dude’s spiritual upbringing? Yep, I’m his godmother, can you believe that?

And just so you know, things are starting to progress over at Dizzy Blonde Yarns. Wanna see? Okay, but just a peek…

So out of the blue, my SIL calls the other day (she usually emails, and she NEVER calls unless it’s a birthday or holiday) to tell me that she loves my gifts…that I give the gifts that keep on giving. Apparently, every time she wears the sweater I gave her for Christmas, she has amazing sex that night. I asked her if it was with my brother, to which she responded, “Of course!” to which I replied…”and it’s actually amazing? Wow.”

You have to understand: SIL = Beauty; Brother = Geek. They SO based that show on them, I swear!

Anyhow, when they were here at Christmas, my SIL was admiring the socks my mom was wearing one day. She said she liked how cute and stripey they were, and how much fun it would be to wear them and how adorable the looked on my mom with a pair of mary janes. Come to find out, the pair in question were these.

The ones I knitted back in Nov. 2006…my first ever pair ever.

So what have I been working on?

Yep, that’s right. May. May 4 to be exact. To Denver. No sweat. Uh, what’s the date? Guess I’d better get crackin, huh?

By the way, I only have one question. Well, it’s more like a request, but it’s a relatively simple one, minuscule, really. Why, in the name of all that is good and woolly, can’t I find a DECENT self-striping sock yarn without all the weird mish-moshed white-and-colored mottled bits, in the colors I like? Is that too much to ask? As Jen is want to say…I WANT THE KIND THAT I WANT!!!!! Hello! Yarn companies. Not everybody likes those. Some of us would like our self-striping sock yarn to be solid. sheesh!

Oh, and hey! How about these two bits of “yay me!” news? First, I’ve been alonged! Yup, by she that is oh so Charmingly Wicked has organized a KAL for…

…with it’s own yahoo group and everything! So go join, already. You know you wanna!

Also, remember that abomination aka The Muppet Pelt Assmat pattern? It’s been published for reals. It’s in “Knitting Purls”; a wonderful gem of a newsletter from Charing Cross Publishers, and more specifically by Ida, founder of the Lily M. Foundation, Friends of Lily website and organizer of the Lily Pads Project (for which I designed the Muppet Pelt Assmat). Man, that’s one busy lady there! The newsletter has all kinds of fun stuff; humorous and informative articles, helpful yarn and product reviews, interviews, and original patterns. To subscribe just send an email to knittingpurls@charingcrosspublishers.com.

And before I go, I leave you with the cutest Ravelry fuck-up glitch ever.

What don’t see it? I’ll give you a hint. C’mon and sing it with me…

Now it’s time to say goodbye
To all our company…
Are Aay Vee…Ee-el Are Why
Em-Oh-You-Ess-Ee
(R.A.V.EL.R.Y
M.O.U.S.E…
over on the right where the screenshot of the blog is s’posed to be. See it?)