Wow, I've actually been knitting

It's been a productive year, however, I've resigned myself to sporadic blog posts. Nevermind since there's probably 2 people who read this blog anyway, me being one of them. A couple of finished objects to parade around. The first is a simple thing, a pair of socks as usual, made from Crystal Palace called Mini Mochi. Not to be mistaken with the tasty Asian treat Mochi.


The second accomplishment was a shawl I made for my best friend Emily. I intended to complete it for her to wear on her wedding day, but alas, as some lofty and complicated projects go, I did not finish it in time. Instead I presented it to her on her birthday. It's made from Alpaca with A Twist "Fino" in Plum. I used #6 needles and a pattern I found in Vogue Stitchionary Volume 1 called Traveling Leaves.

Here it is after soaking in Soak Celebration.

Here it is blocking and drying.

And here it is in all its glory!

On the needles now are a few projects. another pair of vanilla socks in Claudia Hand Painted Yarn the colorway is called "Oops". I've got another pair of socks in a Turquoise Fortissima Socka that is being knit in a fish scale pattern. I've started a stole out of Socks that Rock yarn I purchased this summer from from Bainbridge Island's Churchmouse Teas and Yarn, in Washington State. And I'm certain that there are half-finished projects started eons ago that are strewn about and stuffed somewhere. Oh the plight of one that has many interests...or who is easily bored. It depends on what mood I'm in I suppose.

This blog is a joke

Ha! It's been a little over a year already and nary a peep from me. This life thing is getting out of hand and it's seriously cramping my blogging style. Part of it is laziness and the rest is just the whirling of life things to a degree that it's gotten hard to pin my ass down fast enough to take some knitting pictures and blab about what I've been up to. PhD is in full force, I am almost half way there with one more semester of classes to take. I foresee another 2 years of nosing the grind. I got a new job. We moved again. Several friends have gotten married. A few friends have had babies I've knitted a couple of socks. And I am quite involved in a couple of projects that may be too complicated for these busy times. I'm in the middle of knitting a pair of fish scale socks in some Fortissima Socka yarn that I bought years ago. I'm 1/3 of the way through a lace shawl in lace weight alpaca. I started spinning some yarn out of red merino with hopes of one day making a sweater out of it. And our recent trip to Washington State's Bainbridge Island has inspired me to knit Clapotis out of 2 skeins of Socks that Rock: Puck's Mischief. We shall see. The summer is already chugging along and I am dreading the coming of August for when school starts again. I need to have written my dissertation proposal by then and need to have started preparing for my comprehensive exams.

Things have changed

I have a million excuses for my silence. I've been knitting, I just haven't been talking about it. Mr. Rich, Dale, Fred, and I have since moved out of the Valley. We just couldn't take the cold and the mold and the housemates and the crazy landlords much longer. This happened in March during the middle of the semester. It just has been recently that it feels good to loaf about without feeling like there's something else that needs to be done to get settled in and to get the house in order. Summer's creeping in already and I feel like I have every day until the semester begins accounted for. My first goal is to get my languishing thesis published. So...if you happen to be the associate editor for the Journal of the Torrey Botanical Society, please be kind when you get my revisions. My second goal is to get my dissertation plans in order and get some semblance of a proposal together. If you can think of why it's a good idea to study endophytes on temperate region trees, please let me know. And finally, I just want to knit my little brains out. I just posted a completion on my Ravelry page for Vogue's The White Way Lace Shrug...This is what I said:

"What a pain in the ass pattern this was. By the 12th time I frogged it became a challenge. By 20th time it became personal. By the 30th time I was ready to start randomly strangling people on the street. First Vogue printed it wrong. Then they posted corrections which were also partially wrong. And took them weeeeeeeks to rectify the pattern. Then they didn’t bother to elucidate instructions at all…For instance…continue rows 70 to 74 20 times. Instructions like that make you think that you have to knit rows 70 to 74, that’s 4 rows, 20 times. Meaning when all is said and done you should have knitted 80 rows…Apparently this is not the case, you’re supposed to knit rows 70 to 74 and repeat until you have achieved 20 rows total. I should have gotten a clue when the sleeve just kept going and going. Vogue, what a bunch of effing slackers. You’d expect a magazine touting that name would have their s%$t in better shape, and that they would express their sincerest apologies by at least replying to your email suggestion. Thanks to the designer Tony Limuaco for posting corrections on her website, and no thanks to whoever it was that made her take it down.

Basically, if you want to get this pattern right, you’re going to need the magazine, all the corrections, and the designer’s corrections to cobble together what would have been such a joy to knit. The finished product is beautiful, but I don’t think it was worth all the curses, heartache, and anxiety attacks.

Oh, and yeah, good thing I didn’t pay the upwards of $250 to use the Tilli Tomas Rockstar yarn. Having to repeatedly rip something I knit made out of that would have really ended in violence.

I'm wearing this thing to my brother's wedding in a few weeks, so I'll have Mr. Rich's take some really hot pictures of me and I'll post soonafter.

Two weeks ain't cuttin it

Rather than play catch up with what has happened in the past few months, I'll just pick up where I find myself right now. It is a Wednesday, I am in bed with dogs snuggled around me and it's almost 1:oopm. The sun is emitting a crisp warm yellow-white light outside but it feels cold in here. The wind is trying to force its way into every crack in the house by howling and pounding around outside. I did get out of bed today to get some cereal and make a really delicious cup of french press coffee. I should be working on my first assignment for my class tomorrow, however, I am finding other things that require my more immediate attention such as writing out my grocery list, finishing a row of knitting, debating on whether I should order new bedsheets and a duvet today or wait until next paycheck, and contemplating a nap.

I am on vacation. I have been on vacation since the weekend before Christmas, and with the long two week stretch ahead of me (at the time) I thought I had enough days for everything. With four more days left, I'm finding, I could have used a third week, maybe even a fourth to really get things done. Alas, I am not living in Europe where such a long vacation is practically required, so I'll have to make do and start squeezing for time to do things again.

I certainly got some knitterly things accomplished.

I finished this scarf-hoodie for my sister's Christmas gift. I divined the pattern myself, but have managed to lose the scrap piece of paper I wrote it on. Which reminds me by the way to get a couple more notebooks to leave lying around the house for such note-worthy accomplishments and to compensate for my lack of memory.

I finished this sparkly chevron shawl for my Granny in the Philippines. We ended up at my LYS during her visit last August where she saw this sparkly mohair shawl that she had to have. Being a sucker for knitting, and for my awesome Granny, I promised to make one for her. I shall FedEx it to her next week.

This pair of socks was knit out of Trekking XXL. The colors are so scrumptious! These were knitted for a special friend and have yet to be bequeathed.

The lovely lady hiding behind the lovely red socks is Ana Banana. These socks were knitted especially for her since she was a good girl this year and the Hannukah Weasle decided she should be rewarded for her excellent behavior.

Among other accomplishments...I'm 99.9% sure that you knitters out there have heard of this stupendous creation by extremely talented knitters called Ravelry. It is a knitting and crocheting community in this spectacular virtual world called the Internet. And, it has all sorts of really nifty and useful abilities like keeping track of your projects, your stash, your library, your friends, your needles. I have since joined this wonderful place and have completely dorked out by taking pictures and posting my projects, stash, hopes, and dreams. The inner obsessive compulsive organizer and everything must be compartmentalized and fit properly in its own cubby with tags full of statistics and information is rejoicing at the finding this wonderful place. If you feel this way too, I want to be your friend on Ravelry if you belong, so look for me, I am loops and sticks. If you don't belong, check out the site and ask for an invite.

I know I still have four days of languishing left, but a part of me feels sad that this freedom to loaf, and knit, and nap, and play Super Mario Galaxy, and reading fiction like Good Omens and enjoy scented candles for prolonged periods of time will not last much longer. Alas, I will make the most of this time and will continue knitting and soaking up the colors of Mr. Rich's Christmas present to me--Crystal Palace Yarns Taos, Cabled Scarf. This happens to be my first endeavor at cabling. Oh so fun!

Oh, Here I am...

Yes...I am a lazy blogger, I'll admit it. But it has not been so because I've been loafing about, reclined, staring at nothing, and breathing--which I bet would feel really nice sometimes. It seems like life is catching up, or maybe it has caught up. PhD is on summer vacation hiatus, and while it's summering, I am supposed to try to publish my previous thesis, and conduct a literature review on all the knowledge out there on my chosen dissertation topic. While I'm busy doing that, I'm supposed to hold a full-time job that is increasingly becoming more demanding and prepare myself for the impending doom of the fall semester which starts next week aack! I am also supposed to, or rather I force myself to attend to lifely duties like laundry, cooking occasionally, eating, and fighting a never ending deluge of dust bunnies. I also have mildly amused myself by reading all of His Dark Materials Trilogy, the last Harry Potter installment, seen several movies--Transformers, and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, gone tubing. Oh yeah, and I did a bit of knitting.

I'm not complaining, although it does sound like I'm whining doesn't it? I'm just stating what I've been up to as more things that I will be up to continue to swim around me. As you have probably guessed, there has been no publishing done (I actually got declined by the Journal of Ecology), so I have to try again elsewhere. So if any of you happen to have any sort of influence on any scientific journals, you know where to find me, I will knit you something beautiful in return...probably a pair of socks.

I did finish reading all I intended to read (ummm, fiction-wise). After years of reading science-y stuff, it's been hard to read fiction again but thanks to many good friends that insisted I got started again with His Dark Materials Trilogy. I highly recommend it. I also picked up a few more books--Christian Priest's "The Prestige" (most excellent), Stephanie Pearl McPhee Casts-Off (halfway through already), and Tolkien's The Children of Hurin.

So really, what do I have to show for this summer of blogging silence?

Knitting pal Emily finished her Monkey Socks

Knitting pal Ana started and finished these Jaywalkers in this uber scrumptious Jitterbug yarn. Alas I do not have a finished object photo.

My Mother-in-law acquired Bearance Bee Bernett or "Beary"...redunkulously adorable so we visited him a few times.

I finished these organge Jaywalkers in Koigu I got from a trip to Knit NY a while back. (Check out the squintage by Fred)

I purchased this most colorful knitting items containment unit.

Daley O'Maley took alot of naps in between knitting.

I acquired this beautiful yarn by Jitterbug which I absolutely love. Just absolutely love.

I wound it into this delicious ball

And I turned it into these socks from "Sensational Knitted Socks"

Then I completed this Lace Shawl (pattern from Vogue Stitchionary 1)

I soaked it in Eucalan Lavander Woolwash

Blocked it

Fred had to collect its smell as he always does when I wash something wooly (sometimes he misses).

And here it is in all it's glory, "Ana's Wedding Leaf Lace Shawl"

Which was gifted to Ana for her wedding shower. She married VJ that guy in the background grinning widely. Lovely couple. Meant to be together forever!

And the bane of my existence...Pomotamus...which I almost completed but ran out of yarn with two inches left to go. Beware of the Jitterbug yarn, it's not quite enough. So I basically reknitted and I'm still reknitting. And my head hurts.

Blunt force trauma

I recently went on a business trip to San Jose California. As usual…I brought more than enough knitting to occupy my time on the flight and during my evenings at the hotel just in case for some miraculous reason my 50 pages of notes for my histopathology final exam was not enough entertainment. The trip went smoothly, it was actually productive, the team I worked with were good people, I ate well, and I slept well considering I wasn’t in my usual bed with Mr. Rich, Dale, and Fred. So…all went well. Thursday early morning (like 5:00 am early) I awoke, ready to go through the usual airline ordeal so I could happily fly home to my family. I queued up in line at the security checkpoint, put my belt, my bag, my jacket, my shoes in the dirty gray bins and sent my belongings through the x-ray machine, knitting and all. I stood on the other side waiting for my stuff, and my stuff did not go through. The x-ray guard was intently checking the x-ray contents of my bag with greater duration than the other passengers’ belongings. Oh no, I thought, this is it, he’s going to pull up all my knitting and pull out all my dpns which would cause my mom’s birthday jaywalker socks to unravel. Then he will probably wave them in the air in self-righteous indignation and announce that pointy wooden sticks were not allowed on the aircraft, and I, a persecuted knitter would be thought of as a terrorist with intents to skewer fellow passengers and be forced to withstand hateful glances during my 5 ½ hour trip home.

My bags came through, and the guard followed stating with much official-ness that he needed to further inspect my bag. Sure I said, let him do his job I thought. So he dug around, and as he did so I kept expecting needles to fly out and tempers to rise…but no, instead, he pulled out my nosteppinde. He raised it up, looked at it oddly and probably thought “hmmm, wooden dildo”. I echoed his thoughts “hmmm wooden dildo” and said outloud “umm, yeah, that’s a yarn ball winder”. “I know what it is” he said defensively. Okay, geeze, I had no idea that he would have a clue about what a beautifully turned walnut stick could possibly be for. Despite his affirmation that he knew what it was and that it wasn’t some weird, perverted, midevial thing he proceeded to inspect it with such seriousness, waving it in the air, and swinging it downward in a swift motion as he imagined someone…maybe me, probably me…wielding the thing with such force to crack skulls while on a plane thousands of feet above the mid-west with intent to take over the flight for evil purposes or for fun, who knows. He couldn’t decided, he had to bring it to his security pal for further inspection and deliberation and security pal asked “well, does it pass?” and guy says “yeah,” and security pal said “then it passes”.

How to wind a ball of yarn with a nostepine.

Farewell AssenVassen, Hello Lacey, and Other Things to Celebrate

I know I haven’t posted in a while, and honestly the PhD is the one to blame. Ever since the semester started, I haven’t had a moment’s pause. Stupid PhD. I’ve had to squirrel away knitting time between term paper paragraphs as reward, and five minutes here and there before bedtime. This insanity should abate soon and I’m looking forward to a fairly free summer of knitting and napping, and blogging, and barbeques, and dissertation proposal writing, and master’s thesis publishing, and…well, I’m sure I can come up with tons of things that will try to get in between me and knitting but will surely fail.

What’s with the title you so astutely ask…It’s not a famous Filipino saying if that’s what you’re guessing. Let me begin from the beginning. My immediate family (before marriage) was comprised of six people—2 parents and four chirrens as we were called. All us chirrens at one point or another owned a Honda Civic hatchback or shared one, or inherited one from the others. Patrick had a red Civic, I had a silver one, Nina and Mark shared a gold one until Mark got his own red one (he’s on his third now). Anyway…so Nina got a gold Honda Civic hatchback, it was a 1990 and in great shape. She decided to get her nused car some vanity plates. I think at some point in time, maybe during the junior-senior powder puff football event she (my sister) was tagged with the nickname Asian Invasion—a force to be reckoned with (which she is, but that’s another story). Sticking to the catchy name, Nina decided to announce to all motorists that she is indeed an Asian Invasion. As we are all aware, license plates have a limited number of space, so how to put the essence of Asian Invasion in 7 letters? ASNVASN. It was supposed to say Asian Invasion but it really translated as AssenVassen, whatever that means.

So the AssenVassen continued its life through High School then graduated to Virginia Tech in Blacksburg for its undergrad, and I eventually inherited it as my mobile unit for graduate school. I kept AssenVassen for a good two years at least and about three weeks ago her clutch gave out. The average price to replace a clutch is roughly $200.00. AssenVassen was worth less than $200.00, how did I come to this? Well going further back in time to Thanksgiving of last year, AssenVassen was mangled in a hit and run event as it calmly sat parked in front of a friends home. Intent on getting my investment’s worth in auto insurance I contacted my agent and I was informed that since AssenVassen was worth less than the damage of the crushed front left panel, they would treat the situation thusly…

Insurance company would buy the AssenVassen from me for $250.00. So they would pay me $250.00.
After said purchase they would sell AssenVassen back to me for $1.00, so I’d be left with $249.00
After this transaction, if anything ever happened to the AssenVassen damage wise, nothing would be covered (unless of course AssenVassen ran over someone then their medical bills would be paid for)

So seeing the idiocy of this whole situation of having to sell my car and buy it back and whatever, and that I paid more in insurance than the worth of my car, I bit the bullet, refused to replace the clutch and decided although premature in my life plan, I went ahead and bought a newer used car.

Therefore…I would like for you all to meet Lacey, dubbed as such by Ana because of my new vanity plates YOK2TOG. The plates are cryptic enough for muggles to get confused over, but simple enough for a knitter who has dabbled in pattern knitting to recognize and smile. Yes I am a knitting nerd. Yes, I know…go ahead…bring it on.

It’s nice to finally have a car that runs, that has air conditioning, that has more than one speaker, that hasn’t been lived in by a mouse with a penchant for ketchup packets in the glove box, and that doesn’t shake when it’s driven. The AssenVassen has served my family well, but it is now the dawning of the Lacey knitting mobile.



The semester is coming to a close and there are a few things to celebrate and possibly more to come.

Emily has finished 1 of the 2 socks required for a pair of monkey socks!

Ana has finished 1 out of the 2 socks required for a pair of glittery socks. The sock yarn she used was very sparkly, but oddly enough there's a weird dark line that showed up on one area of the sock but not on the rest. Strange.

I finished my last presentation for the semester last night and I think I am well on my way to the end of this round of classes! Yay!

Now I have can look forward to a trip to NY with Mr. Rich to see Go Home Robot play at the Creek and the Cave bar in Queens on Friday 4/27, there's going to be some yarn hunting in Brooklyn with Ana, a lot of food eating with my brother Pat, and Rich will be attending the Bent Festival.