The things every knitter wants hear

So, I had an interesting experience last night.

Logan was being really needy last night. The problem was, he wasn't being very communicative about it, so he just kinda got pouty about it. Anyway, he finally asks me if I can knit with his head in my lap. Well, c'mon, I can knit with the 12 pound dog in my lap, I'm pretty sure I can knit with a 12 pound head in my lap. (Incidentally, I know that the human head only weighs 10 pounds on average, but Logan has an abnormally large head...anyways) So, he asks if I will knit while he lays in my lap.

Of course, I had to ask why. Well, apparently, my boy enjoys the same things about knitting that I do. He says, specifically, that he likes to listen to the sound. He likes the clinking of the needles and the sound of the yarn sliding. He said it relaxes him and he really likes it.

Wow. Seriously? A (non-knitting) boy who understands the zen that us knitters know so well? Just wow.

I was completely blow away.

The FO report

Short and sweet - since all the people who care can see the info on Ravelry:

1 - Gram's Nautilus hat in Merino Bulky from Handpaintedyarn. A Christmas knit!
2 - Amelia's Koolhaas in Cascade 220. Another Christmas knit!
3 - Celtic Cable Hat for Trevor, which is GORGEOUS. I recommend this pattern to anyone who wants to learn more about cabling. This is also a Christmas knit!

So, yeah, I'm totally busting out the Christmas presents right now.

I'm about to start the specs on a faire isle hat that's going to be for Logan's dad and my uncle. And maybe my brother in law too, since it seems like something he would like. We'll see.

Tender Potato Bread

So, what have I been going on about all month???

Well, at the beginning of the month, I received my first challenge as a Daring Baker. I'm a geek, I know. But it was SO much fun. The premise is, each month the group is given a recipe and we all have to complete the recipe before the deadline and post about our experiences. It's a bit of a social experiment. Take bakers of varying prowess, give them the same recipe...allow only minor and very specific recipe modification and see what happens!

So, November is my first month as a Daring Baker. And to be honest, when I saw what the challenge was, I just about died. Tanna, of My Kitchen in Half Cups, our hostess for this round had selected...Bread. (You can find the recipe on her blog)

I've always considered bread one of those magical foods. I know people make it at home, but I just always thought of it as something I would never learn. Bread scares me. No, no! Not THAT kind of scared! I'm the bread queen, I love to EAT bread...I was just afraid of making it.

Well, I certainly wasn't going to pass this up. This whole thing is about learning right?

So, I dove in head first. Then this emerged from my bowl:



Seriously - what is that? It was sticky. No, it was different from sticky...it was...alive. I swear. It clung to EVERYTHING. Now, we WERE warned that this was sticky dough...but apparently, my "vision" of sticky dough was off. LMAO. It was, however, very fun to play with. But then again, I've always been a "get my hands dirty" kind of girl. So, 4 cups of flour later, it was slightly more reasonable. LMAO



After the first rise, I got to form the bread. This is where we were given the most creative freedom, forming the loaf any way we wanted. Well, I have a think about bread braids. I wanted a braid. I took half my dough and made a braid. Heh. Guess what? Too big for the baking sheet....WHOOPS!



So, I opted for a smaller one:

Prebake:


Done!


I also made a loaf and another braid this time around:


Can I tell you how proud of myself I was. Seriously, it was tasty! I actually made bread!

Now, being me, you know I couldn't leave well enough alone. I decided I needed to make more bread, this time, more...adventurous bread. O.M.G. I thought the first batch was good, well, let me tell you, bread is better with CHEESE. Indeed.

Cheesy rolled loaf:


Cheesy Braid (Cheese on top and kneaded into the dough):


And, what Logan said was the best of them all, cheesy ham rolls:


So, another firm, GO ME! I conquered my fear of bread! So much so that I think my next adventure in bread will be honey whole wheat. YUM! But, that will probably wait until after the holidays! And, I've finally earned my logo - YAY!!!!

Absence

It was a holiday weekend, what can I say? Too busy to blog.

Let's review:

Wedenesday - DAY FROM HELL. Everything that could go wrong, did go wrong...ALL FUCKING DAY. Pardon my french. I'm still rather upset about how that whole day went. Anyway, I managed to write a manual from scratch for work, bake a cheesecake, and bake two pecan pies. Go me. It was also Girly-Bonding-TV night. So Bec and I watched our 3 hours of disgusting TV, and loved every minute of it. I managed to knit a hat for Gram's Christmas too. Go me.

Thursday - Family mayhem. Oh, I'm sure you expected that right? Dinners (yes, plural) were great. The pecan pie was good, the cheesecake was phenomenal (let's not talk about why I only got half a piece). Anyway, good day.

Friday - For the first time in years, I was not one of the crazies out at 4am. I wanted to sleep, what can I say. Besides, most everyone is getting knit gifts this year, so I didn't really have the need to shop like I usually do. Despite that, Bec and I headed out about 10am and had a BLAST all day. We bought stuff for ourselves (imagine that) and got some really good deals in the process. We had fun and we did good.

Saturday - Yarn shopping, YAY! Um...not much else. Not even knitting. I don't really know what I did all day. Oh, did have a nice date with the boy. Took him to go see Beowulf in 3D - too cool! And he took me to dinner. It was nice, we don't go out much in general, but very rarely is it just the two of us. It was a good night.

Sunday - Believe it or not, after a weekend on non-production, I was extremely productive Sunday. I completely re-arranged our bedroom. No small feat considering how much furniture is in there and the fact that I only had to remove one small bookshelf from the room to move everything around. It's much better now, I'm much happier. Also got in a few hours of Oblivion, which is, obviously, very important LMAO.

So, sorry for the absence. I'll try to get FO pictures up today sometimes, and I get to tell you about my secret project for the month!!! YAY!! Hope you had a happy Thanksgiving!

I are SUPER-KNITTER!

Well, I suppose. Maybe a little?

Wednesday night was very productive on the knitting front. Despite being one of those days when I can't seem to do anything right, I managed to finish Amelia's Koolhaas. It's really nice, I'm quite proud of it.

Since it was Girly-TV-Bonding-Night I cast-on for Gram's second Christmas hat too. I finished that up at about 1am. Now, I'm not saying this was a super complicated pattern, but GO ME! A hat in what, maybe 5 hours? Yay! hehe Anyways, I think she will totally love it, so I'm stoked.

On Tedium

So, I'm a smart knitter. I can look at the pictures of a pattern and pretty much get the idea of what's going on. So, why oh why am I so shocked by the Koolhaas pattern?

Looking at the picture - suuure, easy 2x2 ribbing, pretty lattice work, that's most likely cables. Yeah. let's talk about 104 stitches worked completely in 1 stitch cables. OH.MY.GOD. I seriously wanted to rip my eyes out this morning. The effect is gorgeous, but this may not have been the best project to do FOR SOMEONE ELSE. I'm a selfish knitter. I don't mind knitting for other people, but honestly, things that require tons of my time, energy, and occasionally tons of my frustration, I want to keep. They should be mine. LOL

So, really, I'm just kinda bitching. This is a lovely pattern, and in all honesty, once I got past the tedium of the first row, it's not really all that bad. I'm through the first pattern repeat and the pattern is developing very nicely. I'm slightly concerned that I won't want to give it away, but I'll cross the bridge when I get there LMAO

Feeling Accomplished...

And daunted by what's to come.

I finally got through pattern repeat #12. That means time to bind off. The rows were seriously getting way too long for me to deal with and honestly, the last row was the row from hell. Other than that, it was a pretty fun project.




So, what's to come? Well, knitted on edging to be precise. I've never done one. I'm kinda scared of messing up this shawl, because I've already put so much time into it.

Solution? A test run. Tomorrow I'm going to knit a test swatch of 1 pattern repeat and try knitting an edging on. Wish me luck!

Knitting, Knitting, Knitting, Baking

Maybe even in that order.

I'm busting ass on Eileen's shawl. I have 2 pattern repeats left...maybe one if my skein of yarn runs out. Then I get to begin the adventure of knitted on edging. Ah well.

I think I want to start another Logan Christmas project this weekend, but the shawl is taking precedence, so we'll see.

With the upcoming holidays, I realized I have a lot of baking to do. Pecan pies, Caramel Pecan Cheesecake, possibly rolls. Can't start until Wednesday. Oh well!

Can't wait until the 26th so I can tell you about my latest adventures in baking, SO.MUCH.FUN!

Zen and the art of knitting

As I sat here this morning, working the longest purl row in history - okay, that may be a slight exaggeration - I was completely lulled by the rhythm of my own hands. It still amazes me, when I have the chance to knit by myself in a quiet house. The rhythm that my hands find is so soothing, so relaxing. Very cool.

Pride

And now that I've got that out of my system, I AM SO PROUD OF MYSELF!

I finished Logan's IHS yesterday. It's gorgeous, I love it. It also means that 1 of the 2 large projects for Christmas are done. YAY! I have a lot of stuff left to knit, but they are all smaller 2 - 4 DAY projects instead of 2 - 4 WEEK projects :) Good thing since there's not man weeks left to Christmas.



I've also got my head in the clouds because I completed my first Daring Baker challenge yesterday. I really, really want to give more details, but I am sworn to secrecy. Suffice it to say that I feel like I completed something that was quite possibly impossible for this simple little baker. I'm very very proud of myself. I want to make more and maybe next time I will let myself be a little more adventurous.

So much going on

I know, it's just the time of year, but I have so many things that I want to do...ALL AT THE SAME TIME. It's just...annoying. I always fooled myself into thinking that I could do it all.

I just can't.

I knit like a maniac, and I'm so proud of what I accomplish. Then I look around the house. I need to vacuum, I need to pick up the dogs toys, I need to do the dishes (again), I need to clean the dining room table (you know, so we could actually eat there if we wanted to), I need to clean our bedroom. And that's just the housework. I need to pull up the tomato plants before it gets to cold, I need to trim back the roses, I need to clean the lawn before the first real snow. These are the needs.

What about the wants? I want to redesign my blog. I want to start knitting both a shawl and a scarf *gasp* FOR ME. I want to do a lot of things, and I just don't have time. It seems like picking one thing means sacrificing another.

I know, it's the same for everyone, and I'm not really in a super melancholy mood. I'm just...frustrated.

Don't do this.

Don't, under any circumstances, try a new, challenging, probably out of your league pattern on a day when you have slept in two days and you don't feel good and your boyfriend is being needy.

Just don't.

In other news...

1 - Started the Celtic Cable Hat for Trevor (boy's brother). It's...challenging. We'll leave it at that until the urge to throw it across the room passes.

2 - I'm horribly behind on uploading pictures. The Felted Lopi Tote is done and pictures have been taken.

3 - I got a new order of yarn...oy...that's a story all it's own.

4 - After having a minor heart attack over Eileen's Shawl, I realized that I'm dumb, and a lot farther than I thought - umm, like 20 inches close. Don't ask.

5 - Logan's projects - both of them - are coming along very, very well. I've spoken with both Kate and Kythryne about the last couple of things I need, so I should have those in the next couple of weeks.

I can't think anymore, and I'm stupidly going to attempt another two on Trevor's hat...

Alive...sorta

Okay...so...sorry for the prolonged absence...it's been a rough week.

Had a great weekend (last weekend) with my mom and Bec. We went yarn store hopping - which I haven't done in AGES. Of course, because I hadn't done it in ages, I spent more and bought more yarn than I should have. I think, considering the circumstances, I did pretty well. I went to Harmony and picked up some size 2 DPNs so I could (re)start my Lake Park Gloves, and two skeins of Noro so that I could make a small version of the Lopi felted purse. (that's done by the way, and on it's umpteenth run through the wash with the normal laundry - I have a top loader and it takes forever to felt - it is coming out nicely though.)



After Harmony, we stopped by Jo-anns, where I managed to spend $12 on nothing...I know, I don't get it either. Oh, I take that back, I did get a skein of white microspun for Heather's Christmas present (and then I tried to knit with it and remembered why Bec gave me her microspun in the first place - BLEH!)

Then we hit Boucle's. You know, Ricky may not have the yarn selection of Harmony, but I just like the shop better. So Bec and a bounced around there for a long time, feeling all the yarns. Yumm! I was good and only picked up a skein of Cascade in black (for a Christmas present) and a small skein of Brownsheep's Handpainted Originals, because I just couldn't resist the colorway. It's GORGEOUS!



So, Sunday, mom and I just bounced around town together, which is something we don't do nearly enough, but we always have SO much fun.

Monday, the week from hell began. Bec stayed home from work (mental health day) and so we started the day knitting and chatting while I worked. Then, we made the fateful decision to go to Taco Bell.

A note on Taco Bell - Bec and I both have fond memories of chili cheese burritos from Taco Bell when we were in high school. So when they released these new chili cheese nachos, we decided that we should ask if they were making chili cheese burritos again - well they are (YAY!) and we had one for lunch Sunday.

So, yeah, back to Monday, against our normally impeccable judgment, we went to Taco Bell for lunch again. Well...this decision didn't work out so well for me. Suffice it to say that I got the worst case of food poisoning I've had in YEARS. It knocked me on my ass from Monday afternoon to Tuesday night. It was HORRIBLE.

On top of that, my beloved pet bug died Tuesday night. I'm so sad. I know it's dumb, but I really loved her. I didn't realize how many times a day I came in to say hi to her and watch her and just check on her. I really did love her and I'm gonna miss her.



Wednesday...Halloween. I'm not touching that one. Logan was very sweet and got me my new Sims game for the Wii. It's AWESOME! I spent all day playing it. Totally fun. The night kinda went to shit, but oh well.

Yesterday was the first day I had felt human all week. Then...about 4 in the afternoon, Logan and I start getting sniffly...and headachey...and sneezy. Yup, you guessed it, we both have horrible colds. Ugh. Unbelievable. It hit hard and fast too. We were both find, then all of a sudden, WHAM! Head cold. Grrr.

That said, I made some FANTASTIC chocolate cake last night. I got the idea for making the cake from La Mia Cucina, who got the recipe from Orangette. Regardless, this is the BEST homemade chocolate cake I've ever made. Sooo moist and just deep and rich. This will be a layer cake soon. Very soon. These are so damn good. I should take a picture of them.

Anyway, I suppose that catches you up on my life and times. Next on the Agenda:

1 - Join the Daring Bakers. I got my invitation yesterday - YAY!
2 - KNITKNITKNIT! I have to get some Christmas projects done! No more personal projects!!!
3 - Explore the new island my Sim found yesterday - yes - this is important.