Dogs Steal Yarn

Monogamous knitting

The Rogue knitalong gets underway on the 15th. I know a lot of you have already started yours. Me? I'm waiting. See, I've got this idea that if I focus all my knitting energy on Kyoto, I'll manage to finish that up by the 15th. Then that would leave Rosedale United for subway knitting and Rogue for home knitting. See how nicely that works? I have the back and the right front of Kyoto finished, and it's a simple pattern, so no reason why I can't get it done by the 15th. Except for all that damn seaming, of course...

Here's the yarn I'm using for Rogue. It's Cascade 220, color # 9410. I ordered it on Tuesday afternoon from the Threadbear boys and it reached my door yesterday morning before 9am. Gotta love those guys.

The color is much better in person, of course.

With some luck, and assuming I don't fall into an obsessive writing fit for the next few days where nothing tears me away from the novel, I'll have some Kyoto progress pics for you at some point over the weekend. (Of course, if I do fall into an obsessive writing fit, that ain't bad either...)

Song for the day? "Te amo" by Tito Nieves. Happy weekend, folks.

I was really hoping for something a bit more fabulous...

You will be smothered under a rug. You're a little
anti-social, and may want to start gaining new
social skills by making prank phone calls.


What horrible Edward Gorey Death will you die?
brought to you by Quizilla

Sadly, I think this is sorta fitting.

Finally FO!

I set out to make a sweater for Billy's nephew, Jacob, in time for his birthday this summer. I would have made that deadline, if I hadn't decided to frog a perfectly acceptable neck because I didn't like the way I'd picked up the stitches. You may recall that the slippery Cotton Classic revolted at that point and laddered all the way down to the point of no return. I had to then frog the front of it back to the midway point. I shoved it into its project bag and pushed it to the bottom of the WIP basket for a while, unable to even look at the beast.

So then I thought I'd finish it in time for Christmas, but Christmas came and went and I just couldn't bring myself to work on the thing. Silly, because it really only needed two or three days' of work. Finally, finally, I picked it up again a few weeks ago (then promptly put it down again after one night of working on it). With the Golden Globes as distraction, though, I finally finished the knitting Sunday night. Last night and this morning I seamed it and did the weaving in of all the straggly bits. (Have I mentioned that I hate seaming? One of the reasons I knit in the round whenever possible.) And now, here it is. I don't love it, but it's decent work and I do love that it's finished. Hopefully Billy's brother and sister-in-law will like it. At two and a half, I suspect Jacob won't really care much one way or the other.

It's a Debbie Bliss pattern (with the usual DB sizing weirdness and screwed up instructions). I changed the neckline because they live in Austin and so a turtleneck would probably be too warm most of the time, even using cotton. That, and I just wanted a faster neck that would be done sooner. Ok. I admit it. Mostly I just wanted to finish the damn thing, but the thermal reason sounds convincing, right?

So we'll pack it up and ship it out tomorrow. One of these days I'll also finish my mother's stalled sweater. I swear, Mom. I really really will. In the meantime, I've added another project to my list, in spite of the fact that my knitting time will be really limited this semester. There was no way to resist, once I saw the pattern. I've joined the Rogue knit along, and ordered my yarn (using Cascade 220 in Celtic Green) from the fabulous, beloved boys today. I haven't done much at all by the way of cables yet, so this should be interesting.

Ain't technology grand?

Today's post is brought to you by two modern marvels: my dsl, which just popped into sync tonight (so lots of photos tonight); and an incredible tool I didn't even know existed until the other day. The fabulous Billy brought two of them home last night: a heat gun for stripping all this paint off the woodwork. We'd been using a chemical stripper before and it was s-l-o-w going. With the heat guns we can do in a half hour what had taken us a week before. Seriously. Take a look at what I did in an hour last night. Since I only did half of the side of the stairs, there's a built in before and after for ya.

Why do people paint perfectly good wood? I don't get it.

This house continues to surprise us in wonderful ways. Pre stripping, the posts of the banisters looked like this:

Beneath that paint we found, strangely, plaster. We chipped away the plaster and found this on all sides except the back where the banister is attached:

Why was it filled in with plaster and then painted shit brown? I have no idea. Billy and I made this discovery at midnight last night, and we were so curious about what we'd find beneath the plaster that we stayed up until 2:30, each of us chipping away at one side of it.

My family came over today to help us strip paint, etc. I found a great Danish Modern chair in the garbage the other day. I had intended to replace the busted seat, but my brother found it was rather comfortable as is.

I had such an amazing weekend. I hope you did too.

reasons why I'm freaking out (just a little bit)

Do you know what lurks inside your walls?

I know what's inside mine...mostly because there are holes all over the place that let me peek in. And every once in a while the innards become outards and spill out into the room. The stuff that fell from the ceilings when holes were cut to replace the light fixture outlets? Now THAT was some fun. Gray and fluffy and made us itch like crazy. It was not asbestos. If what I just described IS, in fact, asbestos, well...just don't tell me.

Here's a shot of a wall in my office.

It looks much better now. They finished roughing in everything upstairs this afternoon. The rest of the week they'll be working downstairs, and then they'll tackle the biggest part of the job, which is the service down in the basement. Literally the heart of the electrical system, I guess. That may take a couple of weeks alone, but luckily once they've moved down there we can start the plastering and painting in the rest of the house. And you know what that means. When that's done we can get our stuff out of storage! I'll have a couch! And the rest of our clothes! And our damn colander!

After that, there'll be stripping paint off wood for the next ten years, renovating the kitchen, the downstairs bathroom, the upstairs bathroom, repointing the rear facade, etc etc.... But we can take that one step at a time, and we won't be camping out anymore, surrounded by white walls and dust. Lots and lots of dust. I gave up on cleaning once the electricians went to work. There's plaster dust on everything.

As for the rest of my life:

The Cat Who Wanted to Be a Flower

Last night I sat down at our lovely dining room card table with plans to finish up the Kittyville hat. The hat itself was done. All I needed to do was add the earflaps, i-cord and pompoms and the kitty ears. As I was finishing up the earflaps and trying to decide if I really did want to add that i-cord and pompoms, the hat spoke up. The conversation went something like this:

Kitty hat: Um, Cari?
Me: Yes, snuggly warm alpaca kitty hat?
Kitty hat: Are you sure about that icord? And the pompoms?
Me: Well, no, I don't have my heart set on them or anything. Why? Don't you want them? Look how cute they look in the pattern.
Kitty hat: If it's all the same to you, I'd rather just have the earflaps and none of that dangling cord and cat toy stuff at the ends.
Me: Fair enough. So let's just get some cat ears on you and call it a day, hmmm?
Kitty hat: Oh, ummm...now that you mention it... I mean, since you brought it up and all...
Me: Yes, Kitty hat?
Kitty hat: I was kind of thinking... maybe I don't need the kitty ears, after all?
Me: But you're a Kittyville hat. Kitties live in Kittyville, and they have ears.
Kitty hat: Yeah, I know... but, see deep down I don't FEEL like a kitty hat. I feel like a sleek, flirty flapper hat.
Me: A flapper hat?
Kitty hat: With flowers.
Me: Flowers? You've got to be kidding me. I'm not wearing flowers.
Kitty hat: PLEASE! (breaks into a verse of "I Gotta Be Me")
Me: Okay, okay...two roses. Only two simple knit roses. Would that work?
Kitty hat: Yes, thank you. Oh...and could you please call me Rosie?

And so Rosie was born. Whaddya think?

Hear that?

It's the sound of the last quiet moments before the electricians descend and the work really gets started around here. They did the preliminary eval. work the other week. Today is the day the holes appear in the walls, the lights start flickering, and the packs of men named Tony and Joe arrive in workboots. You know what that means? It means we're one step closer to having the work done and our stuff out of storage. It also means it'll be kinda hectic and noisy around here for a few weeks. Billy and I will be fine (well, Billy will be at work when the crew is here. I'll be fine). The dogs, though, I'm thinking they might be asking to visit their gramma in Jersey after a few days of it. We'll see how they hold up. They'll be closed up in Billy's office for safety, of course.

Inspired by Shobhana's recent fit of concentrated knitting, I thought I'd try some knitting monogamy and just spend all my knitting time on Rosedale until it was done. Good idea, right? But then Alison tempted me with her adorable Kittyville hat. I cast on for one last night, using supersoft Reynolds Andean Alpaca Regal. Three-ply bulky alpaca, baby. It feels like a kitten. Rather fitting, given the pattern, no? I'm up to the point of decreasing now, but I' have a ton of work to do today, so I'm not sure if I'll get a chance to finish it tonight. I hope I can. The temperature's supposed to drop down to ridiculous again tonight and I wouldn't mind having some toasty alpaca goodness with earflaps and kitty ears to keep me warm.

Rosedale Revisited

Of all the things stuck in storage, I've been missing the Rosedale United sleeve most. Okay...that's not true. I've been missing the couch, the colander I forgot to keep with the bring-with-us stuff, and my painting supplies the most. But after those comes the Rosedale sleeve. Mostly because it wasn't supposed to go to storage. It was supposed to stay with me, and I was going to have a lovely new sweater done by the time the couch, the colander, and the paints arrived. As you know (yes, we know and we're sick of hearing about it, Cari!) that finished first Rosedale sleeve was kidnapped by the moving men when they were packing up. It was apparently thrown into the clothes hamper, along with some dirty laundry, and boxed up. Now, if you're working for a moving company, and packing up someone else's place...would it EVER occur to you that the hamper of dirty clothes was meant to be taken to storage? That is, the hamper of dirty clothes with the big "DO NOT PACK" sign on it? Grrf.

Sorry, venting again. Anyway, my point was that I was really excited to make Rosedale and was peeved that it would be delayed. Yesterday, on a work break and craving some comfort knitting but frankly a bit bored by the endless socks of late, I spied the ten-pack of Kureyon # 130 sitting in my yarn basket. I'd planned to make a top-down raglan with it, but suddenly the idea of a candy-colored Rosedale United seemed rather appealing indeed. So I cast on for a sleeve. And when I get the other Rosedale sleeve back from storage, I'll just end up with two lovely Rosedales in different colorways. Woohoo! I present, for your viewing pleasure, the first half of the first sleeve of the candy-colored Rosedale.

All hail the mighty Amy for yet another lovely pattern.

I'm meeting a friend for coffee this evening, and am going to give her her first knitting lesson. Maybe I can finish up the sleeve while she works on her garter stitch.

Oh...and for those of you interested in Proust-ing along, yes we do mean the entire six volumes. But no worries. I'll still adore you if you don't want to commit to the whole thing. I have been assured, however, that the payoff when you reach the end is spectacular.

New sock Friday!

Ladies and gentlemen, the first FO of the new house. Koigu, baby:

These have a four-inch leg, rather than the six-inch leg I usually do for socks for me. I think I like this shorter length better. I've got the first of a pair of socks in Lorna's Laces Flames colorway going now, and I think I'll make those shorter too. The shorter lengths are a more flattering fit on little me. So maybe I'll reserve the six-inch legs for colorways that are just too gorgeous to cut short.

I mentioned the other day that I'm reading In Search of Lost Time in its entirety for a class this coming semester. Em and Rachael have decided to join me, even though they aren't taking the class. It's a Proust-a-long! It's only a matter of time before La Brainy joins us, even if she doesn't know that yet.

For anyone who wants to Proust-along with us, we're reading Lydia Davis's new translation of the first volume, Swann's Way, and then for the remaining five volumes we'll be reading the Modern Library edition. Mind you, I'm the only one who'll be getting actual grad school credit for this, or get to go to the class discussions, but the rest of you who choose to join us on this adventure will have the joy of knowing they've scaled what my teacher refers to as "the literary Everest." Woohoo! Who's in?

casa en obras...life in the restoration zone

Well...there are gummy bits of stripped paint on our kitchen floor and counters, and wedged into every nook and crevice of the treads of our shoes. I have little white freckles of primer on my skin that I can't get off no matter how many showers I take. Our light fixtures have been replaced by naked bulbs in yellow safety cages hanging from holes in the walls and ceilings. Work has offically begun around here.

It's exciting. It's satisfying. It's often fun, even. But it's also tiring, time consuming, expensive, a bit overwhelming. Billy and I are definitely getting that adventure we'd hoped for. It's not just home improvement. It's archaeology, dammit. Did you know that there are seven--count 'em, seven--different colors of paint piled up on top of the lovely oak builtin in our kitchen? Yup. There's white, brown, off-white, green, tan, more white and yellow in there before you hit wood. Or there were. At least four of those layers have now been stripped away.

Billy may never be the same, by the way. I've taken this sweet physical therapist from the upper west side and put him in Brooklyn with power tools in his hands. And get this--he's really good with them!

In the midst of all of this, there hasn't been a whole lot of knitting time. When I do manage to carve out some time to relax and knit, I've been really craving comfort knitting. Simple, small projects that require no thought. Just something soothing for my hands. So it's been socks. I'm half done with the second sock of the latest Koigu pair. I'll post a pic when that's done. Nothing exciting. Just good ole' Koigu yumminess in st st.

It's funny...I had such big knitting plans for this time. The thought of Season right now though...It doesn't appeal to me at all. I just don't think I could concentrate on it the way I need to. So much brain energy being directed to other places. The house, my work, the writing. But also the reading. I'm taking a Proust course next semester. We're reading all of In Search of Lost Time, and we have to have Swann's Way read before our first class. Wonderful, wonderful stuff--I mean, I want to eat the pages--but it ain't subway reading. I'm thinking this month and all of next semester might be one of socks and simple sweaters: Kyoto, when the replacement yarn comes, Rosedale when the kidnapped sleeve is sprung from storage, maybe some top-down raglans and percentage sweaters... and lots of lovely Koigu and Lorna's Laces. I'm feeling so many demands from other quarters that merit my attention more than knitting these days. Which is okay... Knitting is part of what will help quiet me and keep me balanced in the face of all the work.

Just a heads up, though, to any readers who might be looking for acrobatic feats of knitting daring here. You probably won't be seeing them for quite some time. Anyway, there are plenty of other knitting bloggers who do that kind of thing much better than yours truly.

Here's to warm handknit socks with bits of lead paint chips stuck to the soles!

Sadie has discovered that the window in the yoga/meditation room is the perfect spot for watching the birds and squirrels in the backyard.

happy new year!

Billy and I had a great New Year's Eve. I generally dislike New Year's, all that pressure everyone seems to feel to make it The Best Night Ever. And you know what? It never is. We skipped the party thing for the second year in a row, and had a lovely time doing it. We went to see Return of the King (him for the second time, me for the first. I was waiting for the crowds to thin a bit.) and then went home. Midnight came as we walked home from the train, and we could see a bit of the fireworks from Prospect Park. We thought about going up on our roof to watch them, but opted instead for hot chocolate around the card table that's currently serving as our main piece of furniture.

What happens these days when I've stared at the computer screen for hours and only have a few sentences to show for it? I take a break and head down to the basement, where I take advantage of owning a real live washing machine that doesn't take quarters. Remember the layer cake hat from a while back? (It's in the FO Gallery, if you don't.) Well, I felted it. Whaddya think?

Oh, and here's another house shot. It was taken standing in the dining room, looking into the living room. I'm doling the photos out so slowly only because it's such misery to upload them on this dialup. (I've already been booted off four times while trying to write this entry.)

Song for the day: "Tomorrow Tomorrow" by Elliott Smith. Listen to it if ya got it.

Happy New Year, everyone. Lots of love.