i cast-on for the peanut's pants but it's nothing to show yet. i also washed and dried some fabric this week that i'm going to make a skirt out of. i've been reading up on pattern drafting and i hope to do all my measurements tonight and start on it tomorrow. so, since there's not much to show, i thought that i would pass on some randomness to give you something to do this friday.
first off, i ran across this article on wired on how to speed up your mac. i did pretty much everything that it suggested and i do see an improvement on my powerbook's performance so i'm passing it on to you.
and here are some videos (click through from RSS to see. i promise. it's only good stuff.)
well, i'm all switched over to using flickr as my primary image source. thanks everyone for the encouragement! i mentioned it at spiders on friday (yes, i actually made it into the city for a fun night on the town!) and had the most baffling conversation with lisa and virginia about how they upload pictures for their blogs. it's convoluted to say the least! so i'm going to write up a quick tutorial this week on how to streamline the process if you use a mac.
i do have an FO to show! i love it. i think that i even managed to make the right size for my head despite my laziness to make the bigger version.
gretel complete!
all the stats are on ravelry, of course. i decided to make the "regular" size and not the slouchy size after i decided that i really don't like cables. first koolhaas and now this, really, i'm done with cables for a while. they are pretty but so darn tedious!
from the top
now, about this DB pure cashmere. i didn't think that it was any softer than the cashmerino. it's nice, yes, but not as nice at the cashmere that jess and lisa got at rhinebeck two years ago. the plies of DB pure cashmere were perfect for a cabley project though. they really make those cables POP!
showing off the handknits
the peanut and i got a chance to go out and show off our handknits yesterday. it wasn't particularly warm but it was sunny!
ok, now for a little video i've been holding on to (no, it's not a peanut video. i still have to upload those!) saw this a few weeks ago and couldn't stop laughing. i love improv everywhere! (click through from RSS feed for video).
so i'm just back from a good drilling at the dentist and in a FANTASTIC mood and thought that i would write a blog entry. thankfully for all of you, i will be writing it over the next few days for a wednesday post and you will be spared most of my bitching.
i've been obsessed with finding "new" and interesting TV lately what with the writer's strike still going on (COME ON!! i'm sick of reality TV!) everyone who knows me knows that i despise all reality TV but project runway. i'm so glad it's back on the air! i was actually sorry to see elisa go last week. she had really grown on me. it's too bad that the challenge itself was such a snoozer. god, can we get a little more creative please? pour on the pressure, apply the heat! i wanna see these designers sweat!
in an effort to get more project runway into my veins, i started (and finished!) watching project runway canada (don't click on the link unless you want to know who won!) which is the greatest thing since sliced bread. i've gotta be honest here. i actually LOVE iman and brian baley more than heidi and tim. iman is amazing as a host. she really has strong opinions and i totally agreed with her on every decision. she also strikes me as being very sweet and caring.
brian baley and iman
brian baley, the mentor, was great too. he actually MENTORED. he had opinions and real words of advice for the designers. where i feel that tim gunn has pulled back from giving helpful commentary (maybe at the behest of the producers?) brian would come out and tell them what he thought was wrong (or right) with a garment and steer the designer in the right direction. mustache aside, i really adored him. i can't wait for the second season! too bad that it's not available in the US. watch it on youtube. trust me, you won't be sorry you did.
amongst all the PRC watching i was knitting on koolhaas finished koolhaas. this took me FOREVER to finish but it's because i was really only able to fit in a few rows here and there amongst all the other things.
large koolhaas
hiding
i made it large so that it would fit my dad. if it's a little too big, he can flip up the ribbing. looks great right? uuuuhhh, what's that? let's zoom in...
oops
ooooooops! forgot to cross one there! oh well, it still looks ok, i think! oh, and i got my new gorillapod. combined with the new camera, i expect my FO pics to be much better.
i also got to do a little sewing this past weekend. i whipped up two new pairs of cloth shoes for the peanut. these will be the last that i make seeing as she'll probably be crawling and walking sometime in the next 4 months.
pair #1
pair #2
i followed the tutorial again but used my pattern for making 6 to 12 month sizes. (i'll post this on the patterns page soon.) feel free to download this PDF and make your own as well. notice that i didn't exactly make right and left foot shoes. seriously, you don't need them.
shoes shoes shoes!
anyway, all in all, peanut has 4 pairs now. i made three of them and the fourth (top left) comes from kaya's kloset etsy store. if you don't want to make your own baby shoes then i highly recommend you get her to make them for you. she does great work.
i leave you with a picture of some highly yummy "mac daddy" from the veganomicon (which i got KP for christmas.)
things are going much better at the gleek homestead lately. in fact, i'm blogging while the peanut is napping. she now goes down for regular naps every three hours during the day! it's quite refreshing. and last night, she slept really well so i feel like a new person, a well rested one. i don't expect this feeling to last, of course, but i'm happy that today will be a day when i don't think about how tired i am. she's not napping in her crib yet... she sleeps in her bouncy chair almost all the time so that she can be somewhat upright. poor thing has acid reflux. hopefully that'll go away soon.
besides watching a lot of the 4400 while i'm feeding the peanut, i've been playing around in ravelry. i know that you've all heard about it so i won't begin to tell you how awesome it is. i'm looking forward to when it's open to the general public so that we can see what you're all making. how cool will that be? thanks goes to jess and casey for kicking major butt on this one. eventually, i'll have all of my projects in there and will ditch backpack for cataloging my knitting. backpack is still a great tool and i'll use it for other things, but ravelry is key to keeping everything straight now. i especially love the fact that i can favorite other people's projects or patterns. now i'll have lots of inspiration at my fingertips!
ok, it's a short post today because i have to upload photos and video from my camera for the next post (yes, i promise i'm going to start posting more often now that the peanut is on a schedule!) so that i can show you what little knitting i have done. in the meantime, here are a few videos i've uploaded to youtube! (click through from the RSS feed to see the videos.. still need to figure out how to get them in the feed.)
the peanut enjoys some time on the boppy video taken: april 21, 2007
more of the peanut on the boppy ... you can hear daddy in the background on this one. video taken: april 21, 2007
sorry that i have no knitting content except to say that i'm into my third ball on the noro shawl and by all accounts (thanks to math!) i'm going to need 11 balls to finish this sucker so i ordered another one from ebay over the weekend. let's hope it's enough. i also finished my first christmas gift hat and am planning my second one now. on friday, i received 3 new balls of knitpicks swish in coast grey to make my own glittens but i'm putting that aside until i'm done with christmas knitting.
in the meantime, here are some links to harry potter and the order of the phoenix videos on youtube (courtesy of mugglenet.com):
many of you who know me know that i have a wide array of taste in music. i grew up on 70s folk music and then graduated to classical music through most of my young adult life. i turned to pop music in college and completely overdosed on it (now i can't stand it at all). then came techno or electronic, or whatever you want to call it. i met some great friends working my first web design job in detroit and they were into the club/rave scene, and especially detroit techno. we're talking about derek may and the like. really brilliant stuff. i was smitten from the beginning and still am! in fact, though my newer favorites have been the magnetic fields, the shins, and thievery corporation, i still listen to techno/electronic music on a daily basis. the real front runners in my ipod playlist are aphex twin, bill laswell, boards of canada, luke slater, etc. hhmmmm, i believe it was a minidisc of luke slater that i really got KP to think that i was the coolest girl ever.
one of the first techno discs i ever owned was EBN (emergency broadcast network.) most of you are probably shaking your heads, not knowing who i'm talking about. after all, my audience is mainly knitters. but if you know who i'm talking about, then you know what's coming! EBN were the bomb (i'm not sure if they're still around) because they took all of these old video clips and mixed them to music. it's the perfect match of video and beats. if you're a media nut like i am, then you'll find their offerings to be mind-blowing. every time i see them, i want to pop a VHS in my recorder, tape infomercials all night long, and make mash ups with them. of course, i don't have that kind of time because i knit too much, but if i did have the time, that's what i would do with it.
so in honor of halloween (the one holiday i can't stand but can't wait for the peanut to be born so that i can dress her up.. oops, i forgot to tell you that it's a GIRL! see how i slipped that in?) i present these videos found on youtube. why today? well, some of them are so good, they're creepy. watch, you won't be disappointed.
(click through to the extended entry to see them. i know that they won't make it to my RSS feed because of the embedding.)
so it seems that lots of people this year overbought their stash and have no need to accumulate more, huh? that's ok :) i have alternate plans for most of the yarn in the last post. my mom has asked for the assorted cotton and someone else is going to take the sock yarn off my hands. i'll leave the post up for a few more days in case anyone has second thoughts (that tahki cotton classic is a STEAL! especially if you need some for a mason dixon log cabin blanket!) but i do need your advice on two other matters.
NYC residents! i'm seeking a charity that will take yarn donations. i have a large bag of mixed yarn from the spiders that needs to go to a place that will use it. i was thinking that a senior's center, domestic abuse center, or other women's center might be good choices. i've done plenty of google searches and asking around but have come up empty. if you know of someplace that will allow me to drop off this yarn in manhattan or brooklyn (no shipping! that would be crazy), please leave it in the comments.
on a more non-localized charity note, i'm looking for charities that will take things like simple knitted hats, scarves, etc. also for a good cause. i know plenty of you knit for charity but a lot of the names are escaping me. i figure i can whip up some really quick and easy hats with a lot of this leftover yarn and that they would be greatly appreciated by a charity that collects such things. also, please leave names/URLs in the comments. thanks!
a quick update on all of my projects:
the baby N blanket is past the half-way point and is getting easier to handle, row by row, as i'm decreasing one stitch per row. i already wove in the ends on the first half of the blanket so that it wouldn't be a crushing task at the end.
the angel sock is ready for its heel! i made good progress on this first sock at a play reading this weekend. i'm going to do a garter stitch short row heel using the wrap method outlined by misocrafty.
wow, the contrasting yarn looks really gold in this picture. it's more of a wheat color, i swear. i took all these photos this morning as i was running out the door. should have color corrected them! kyoto has the beginning of its sash! horray! i looked at the photo on knitty and made sure to do the opposite (incidentally, her instructions in the pattern are correct.. it's left over right but the photo is backwards. my guess is that knitty flipped the photo.) i noticed also in the photo that the cross over on the front is pretty wide, but when i tried it at home, it looked horrible. it looked best crossed right at the front. so i'm working on this every now and again when i'm tired of the baby blanket. but the baby blanket HAS to be finished soon. my cousin, kate, is ready to pop! she's posting her eviction notice soon. i must knit furiously!
speaking of furious knitting, check out this really cute youtube video i found this morning (runs about 7 minutes, but it's worth it.)
