Saturday, December 19, 2009

Posted on the Wench at home as well

Happy (ish) Saturday everyone! I've been in kind of a funk lately and haven't really done much of anything useful. Well, except for the fact that I finished my finals! I am done, done, done for 5 glorious weeks. What will I do with myself?

In any event, it doesn't feel like Christmas per-say lately. How can I when it looks like this outside:
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And I'm doing this:
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Winter is in two days and California was resoundingly cliche with 78 degree weather today. There's a blizzard on the east coast and I can't even get some clouds? Luckily, it's supposed to reach the 60's tomorrow!

But other than Finals and hanging out with some friends and doing a little bit of knitting, not much is going on around Casam Wench. I'm hoping the dissatisfaction and stress and doubts and nerves go away soon, it's driving me batty. Maybe I'll go knit something.

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Happy Yule to those who celebrate it.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

FInished Object!

Spring Beret by Natalie Larson (rav link)

It matches my sweater! I mean, clearly since it's the same yarn. But still!
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Ta Daaaaaaa.

Monday, October 26, 2009

School, A Wedding and little-non existant knitting.

Hi everyone! Long time no post and all that. These next few weeks are going to be even MORE crazy than before so pretty please bear with me as I do my best to knit and post and take pictures and be interesting for you all.

Here's a sample of my life for the next 6 weeks and even I'M shocked!

Last weekend (16th)I went to Las Vegas for my best friends Bacherloette party. Then that Sunday night I found out a dear cousin of mined passed away from cancer. The same cancer my Aunt is now fighting. Things got weird for a bit there.

Then last week and this week are midterms, This Saturday is Samhain (or, you know, Halloween for the non-religious), then the next weekend is my best friends wedding (!!) the USMC Ball and my own 2 year wedding anniversary. The weekend after that the hubbs leaves for a month for training, then papers start to need to get done, then it's thanksgiving, then papers are due THEN the hubbs comes home the week of finals then it Christmas and Yule.

Oh. Em. Gee. SO all I'm currently working on is Sommerwind by Monika Eckert (Rav link) out of lovely wollmeise for the Loopy Ewe KAL. The only other thing I want to knit I dont have the yarn for and no time to learn fair isle. Boo.

But I promise, I'll post more (if nothing else to show the wedding, MC Ball and our anniversary). Really.

Much Love,
Wenchy

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Finished Sweater

(Back to the old template because the new shiny one doesnt let my full pics show).

I participated the the Sexy Knitter's KAL 3rd Quarter Challenge (designers) and so I finished my Indigo Playmate Jacket by Wendy Bernard (Rav link of course). I used 4 of the 8 balls required out of Cascade 220 Superwash. What to do with the other 4? Bah.

It's the smallest size and the mods are only that I didn't knit a belt nor used short rows on the collar-because I don't know how and wasn't all that interested in figuring it out. LoL!

indigo1

indigo2

Photo's thanks to my mom. :) So now, I've some plying to do and then I get to wrestle with some lace. Ciao!

Monday, September 14, 2009

It Bugs Me.

It bugs me when people think that public places are their living room. I know the Yarn Harlot and many others have said it, but good lord it drives me crazy. In fact, it down right pisses me the fuck off.

That being said, this isn't MY living room, so let's go to knitting content!

I'm soooo close to being done with my indigo playmate jacket! I'm picking up the stitches along the front now and have to figure out how to do short rows. I've never doen them before and, due to a lovely cold my hubby gave me, I don't have the brain power to "wrap" (i hear you do that in SW's) my brain around them. But it's so close. :)

Speaking of the hubby, he's doing training for 3 weeks. Boo. On the plus side, I quit my job at Rib Trader. Finally. After almost 10 years (January 2000-Sept 2009) I finally quit. It's such a weight off my shoulder -though the not having a job is trying to take it's place but I intend to enjoy myself first. I plan on taking the next 3 weeks to finish up misc projects, and start christmas gifts (it's that time again!), do school work, and I don't know, meditate/workout/pamper myself. I'm also planning on a few projects for the house while the hubby is gone as a surprise, but I'll wait until later to let you know since he keeps reading over my shoulder. LoL.

Have a lovely evening and I'll have pictures soon!

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Getting back into the swing of things.

So my knitting mojo is finally back. (Yea!) I've been working on the Indigo Playmate Jacket (rav link) from Custom Knits by: Wendy Bernard. I'm using Cascade 220 superwash in a heather light blue. It's going to look awesome on me when it's done (my eyes are going to look amazing...) modesty? Moi? I'll have to get pictures shortly. Right now I'm just trying to settle into my school and pick up from the summer. Trying to find a routine. Probably biting off mroe than I can chew. :) It's awesome.

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

September Already?!

Can you believe it? Good Grief. I kind of feel like everyone is just taking a step away from posting or some such. I have because A: I've done no knitting and B: have had absolutely no free time. Thankfully, I passed Latin with an "A" and now am panicking because I'm in the next lvl of Latin and so shouldn't be. >< Ah well. So my regular school has started back up again. Yay. It's been hella hot here, and if I'M saying it's hot, you know it's in the 90's. Blerg.

So, no knitting. I started on a jacket, and had to rip it out, pair of socks, ripped it out, lace shawl, ripped it out. So aggravating. I wondered what I used to do with my free time prior to knitting and it's this: read anywhere from 1-3.5 books in a day (If I dont have work or school), play internet games, hang out with non-knitting friends, do school work and related activities and sleep.

Who knew?

Monday, July 13, 2009

FO'S!

Salve! (Hello-pronunced sal-way. in Classical Latin V's are pronounced with a W sound).

Good heavens it's been quite awhile hasn't it? Sorry about that. Latin class swooped in and I didn't knit for a VERY long time. Very. I am taking a break from Latin to type this up then it's back to translation ectera....(or ect...) WHICH, I've learned, is Latin (duh) and mispronounced. It's eh-ket-tra. In case you were wondering. I did however manage to finish up some knitting:

Kai-Mei by Cookie A is FINALLY, FINALLY done!
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It's finally summer here so I can't wear them but they are pretty aren't they? I also finished my Shetland Triangle Shawl in Sundara Yarns Aran silky merino. I used to skeins and so i still have enough to make a hat or some such for when it gets colder. Not that I have the time per-say. And sorry about the picture, I don't have the time to take pretty ones. :)

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I've knit 4 dishcloths (two are a gift so i can't mention it yet) but these two were for a RAK (random acts of kindness) in my Reclaiming the Home on Ravelry group.
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And so now currently, I've got Domus Aurea by Fiber Dreams OTN, but haven't been able to work on it very much. I've a st-st felted striped tote that's almost done (primarily due to not working Friday night) from the book One Skein by Leigh Radford- I'm trying to get that finished up so it can be felted and then I'll only have two projects OTN. The Last one is a mystery KAL I'm doing through the Unique Sheep (I love Laura's stuff). I started that on Friday and it was a small clue but since it's a Pi chart, well, it'll get bigger. It's in her gradience yarn and it's heaven to work with. Go. Go buy her yarn. It's so lovely and the color- caelum! (heaven)

So that's it for me for now. I've more translating to do. If you'd like, I can always put up some fun sentences for you to say/write in Latin. Leave me a comment and I'll put some up in a post. Otherwise, I'm afraid the next one will be more of the same. Have a lovely week or month or summer and I'll do my best to be more interesting. :) Vale! (bye! "wal-ay)

Thursday, June 11, 2009

Creativity

My question to you:

What inspires you to be creative? What gives you new ideas? What things have you tried?

Thanks!

(FO pictures in the near future!)

Saturday, May 30, 2009

Knitting

Well then. Knitting. I've done it.

First up: St-St Socks in Cashmere from Zen Yarn Garden:
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Lovely stuff to work with. However They didn't ease the pain of the Kai-Mei socks so I then grabbed some hand spun and knit a scarf.

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I think it's Lorna's Laces Roving. Anyway, that also fulfilled my 101 in 1001 to knit an item from hand spun. Not sure what to do with it per say. it's not really my style or anything but It's short (yet wide) so I don't know that it'll fit any adult I know. Ah well.

I've also fixed the kai-mei socks but I'm getting to the toe bit and really don't want to mess it up (again) so I'm going to have to wait until I can go to Monday knit night and get some help there. So for the duration, I've started on another pair of st-st socks in a forgotten colorway by Yarn Pirate. It's all blues, grays and silvers.

Oh! And I didn't get a picture at the time but I finished sewing a needle roll for myself when I did the star quilt. :)
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I've had that material for years with the specific purpose of making a needle roll and I finally finished it. :) All projects of which are stash busting. How awesome is that?

Friday, May 29, 2009

I'm such a moron.

I'm not going to post about anything else today save for the SUPREMELY AWESOME SWAP PACKAGE I got LAST FREAKING MONTH. It was for the Loopy Ewe Spring Fling Swap and I got it right before Matthew came home. You remember how much I blogged then right? Well, then the Fling came along and I got to meet my AMAZING partner LynnZimm (Rav Link). But (hangs head in shame) I still hadn't blogged about it. Then I moved. Then this and that and a whole bunch of other life-getting-in-the-way things. SO. I'm sorry Lynn, please don't hate me (and that bag I made you? It's somewhere in the boxes-I didn't forget).

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Gorgeous Roving!; The green/purple/blue is Kaleidoscope by Freckle Face Fibers and the purple bag of holy goodness Merino w/ sparkle. I'm saving this and not spinning with it until I'm really good. (Trust me, in the next post you'll see).

Yarn; Yeah , she spun that. It's simply amazing. It's so even and perfect. I am so eternally grateful I didn't spin up any to give to her (I just bought some) because she is amazingly perfect (and I'm not exaggerating in my shame, I said do to her face-so there :P) and, and...it's so EVEN! I bow down.

The red black and white bag; She made that too. She gave it to me at the fling actually, and it's next to my red Ladybug spinning wheel holding my spinning supplies.

There's an adorable sheep felting kit as well as delicious chocolate (I held on to that until the hus-beast started eying it after he ate all his chocolate he brought back from Germany), tea (completely gone)and the adorable yarn card.

But seriously? The best part; the blue bubble wrapped sticks. She gave me a portable niddy noddy! OMG! I shrieked so loud when I saw it that the cat ran out of the room. My brain went sploody and I started babbling at my mom-who I might add looked at me like I was crazy... (a niddy noddy? That's nice dear). She does, thankfully, get my brand of crazy-ness.

So Lynn, thank you so much again for the lovely swap package. And I'm really, horribly, sorry it took me forever and a day to blog about it.

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Quilting

I've been quilting because, quite frankly, my knitting is ticking me off. More so today than yesterday. Anyway, yesterday I went to my moms and we went to various quilt shops looking for material for two baby blankets I need to make. Afterward we went her her house and I started on a wall hanging kit I've had for years and jsut never did. And by years I mean since before Fall 2006 since I bought it before I knew how to sew.

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Taaa Daah! All that is left is to do the binding and a strip of material so I can hang it and it'll all be finished!

I've also completed my st-st cashmere socks and started a scarf in hand spun since those bloody socks that shall not be named are in knitting purgatory until they've learned their lesson. The hand spun scarf, henceforth called the "Crazy Lady Scarf" is going to be very colorful and well, crappy. But it's an easy two row pattern repeat and my hand spun isn't at a decent level or consistency yet. What else would I do with it? And it's taken the rage off from knitting. Gah.

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Nesting

So I've been nesting more so than knitting lately. Although, since last week I have picked up the needles but for 2 weeks, I had ZERO (no, I'm not lying)projects OTN. I guess my creative energy only has enough to go around for one project at a time and moving, decorating the house and getting through finals was simply too much for it. Not to mention cooking, cleaning and baking.

(Smiles) However, finals are DONE, and school is DONE...er, for a month anyway. Then I'm back in for an intensive Latin course-a years worth of Latin in 9 weeks. Ahem. No I'm not crazy per-say, but it'll put me ahead of schedule by a year. That is, if the school doesn't drop all the freaking courses I need. Classes are scarce and I don't even have enough for 12 units (Have to take them in a certain order) Bah. Don't get me started on them raising tuition by $300 either.

But Knitting! Yes knitting! I started on Cookie A's Kai-Mei from Sock Innovation (In DyeDreams Sox (LOVE! Mad crazy LOVE!) and I am having a heck of a time. So, in between knit nights when I get help on the blasted things, I'm also working on a pair of Cashmere st-st socks and they are DIVINE! Really, the heavens parted and the angelic chorus sang. Ahem. I'm on the second sock of those (still the first on Kai-Mei) and once I finish that I'm either going to CO the Shetland Triangle Shawl or the Dream in Color Shrug. (All rav links btw) The Shetland Triangle is going to be done in the Sundara Yarn Silky Merino Aran and the DIC in DIC Classy (Tea Party).

I've knit night tonight and then home to bother and pester the hubby. :) I hope you all have a lovely day!

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Spring Fling

So I went to St. Louis to visit Sheri and Her elves at their Loopy Ewe Spring Fling! I met a TON of new people and finally got to meet people I knew from online. It was fabulous to say the very least. Allow me to do a picture montage for you since there was just so much that I couldn't possibly write it all:
Here is myself at Loopy Central!!
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It was fantastic! Oh Man, there was so much YARN! (drool) And to be quite honest, for an ONLINE store, it's much nicer than many brick and mortar stores.

loopy central

Here is the WALL of Cascade 220. I refrained since my LYS carries a huge ammount (and I don't felt enough of the stuff I have).
cascadewall

And one of my favorite pictures:
me and sheri
Sheri and I! She totally had to bend down to my height, she's tall. I'm short. Sigh. I'm ALWAYS short. :) She is FANTASTIC by the way. She knew people on sight and asked about things going on in their life that they've blogged about and such. Now THAT is excellent customer service. But more so, she's so welcoming from the get go that you feel like you've been friends forever! And now:

loot
The Loot. :D There is Fleece artist, Dream in color (Classy and smoochy), malabrigo lace, and Antenti bag (a story will be given in the next post since that is so worth blogging about and patterns and so much more!

So right as I got home, we had to pack up everything in the house because we moved into our own place again. I'll have to get pictures for you once it's all done. :) I enjoy moving. New places, people, sights etc.. but still close enough to family, friends and good yarn stores (though I'd totally move to St. Louis for the Loopy Ewe). More to come!

Friday, April 10, 2009

Seeded Cables Cardigan

Matthew comes home TOMORROW! So that being said, I'll leave you with pictures of my newest cardigan:

scc1

scc2

(I was on the phone with him when this was being taken). Let's see, I started it January 13th and it was finished on April 6th. Hazza! it went into timeout a few times and I didn't work on it for weeks at a time so this is by far the longest time it's taken me to knit a sweater. It's the Seeded Cables Cardigan (rav link) from Sensual Knits (learn to test knit before printing a book). I used Zara yarn in some un-inspiring numbered colorway that I swapped with a friend from knit night. The color is gorgeous!

As for other knits, I'm on the toe decreases of Pomatomus socks by Cookie A (did you get her new book? I did!) and another Large Triangle shawl from Greetings From Knit Cafe (rav links again). The shawl is in dark gray instead of the nutmeg and won't have the tassels since they were so tedious to make. Since we have to wait around on base for about 4 hours before the guys will be dismissed, I'm thinking I'll bring both the sock and shawl to work on. Next time I post, Matthew and I will be in the same picture again!!! Have a lovely weekend everyone and happy Pagan/Christian holiday (easter)!

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Not yet but 10 days!

Hubby will be home in 10 days. Which is funny considering I said that he *could* be home in 10 days (that's the advance party and they got back on Saturday). In any event, I've been away because I *gasp* haven't been knitting...Ok so that's not entirely true, but I've nothing to show for it. My Seeded Cables Cardigan is off being seamed up and the sock I'm working on is about to be ripped for the 3rd time and I haven't been taking pictures of the st-st shawl I've been half assing. And by half assing I mean a row or two before I put it don't and wander off elsewhere.

But then, I'm almost caught up on school-I'm currently on Spring Break. I've done no knitting (or studying-must get on that) but tonight is knit night so perhaps... Also, I've been doing a ton of sewing. OH! And I finally got my Asian Themed quilt (and my Asian I do mean the fabric has cherry blossoms on it) from the quilt shop, take a look:

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But the back is by far my favorite because of the color!
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Isn't it gorgeous?! I also finished an adorable apron:
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And am almost done with my first needle roll. :) And check out what I scored for $188 (pre-taxhike) from an antique store in AMAZING condition:
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(the chair not the cat...he cost more)

So hopefully I'll have more to show you soon when I stop being lazy(ha ha ha) and and get my butt in gear.

Woooo! 10 days!

Friday, March 13, 2009

HOLY SHIT!

MY HUSBAND IS COMING HOME EARLY FROM IRAQ!!!!

OH MY GOD! He could be here in as little as TEN DAYS!!!!

Wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!

(and here we all thought it would be may 1st!)

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Are you game?

The first three people to respond to this post will get something made by me! My choice. For you.This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:
1- I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!
2- What I create will be just for you.
3- It'll be done this year.
4- You have no clue what it's going to be.
5- I reserve the right to do something extremely strange.
The catch is that you must repost this on your blog and offer the same to the first 3 people who do the same on your blog. The first 3 people to do so and leave a comment telling me they did win a FAB-U-LOUS homemade gift by me! Oh, and be sure to post a picture of what you win when you get it!Who's in?

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Where TIme Drags on

I've not too much going on in my life, it's all sort of fallen into a rut. Get up go to school, com home, do homework (knit night if I'm lucky), go to bed, Get up and so forth ending the week with work and then starting all over again.

School has been kicking my arse and I'm sad to say I'm still not nearly caught up in some classes. 9 books for one class if that's any indication for you. There has been a little bit of knitting on the Seeded Cables Cardigan (I've finished the back and front left part) and a pair of st-st socks, as well as a quick knit beanie. I'm at school however so I can't do much more than show you the back of my Cardigan and I will hopefully get a reprieve soon:
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Monday, January 12, 2009

Computer Woes

I'd show you my two latest projects that I finished (a Chevron Scarf and Pillars of Fire socks) but my computer died and I won't be able to do anything with photos for a little while. Bah.

And then I'm casting on a cabled cardigan. Hopefully. If someone can show me how to do the specific Cast on it calls for. /facepalm

Friday, January 2, 2009

Chevron Scarf

...I get the addiction now. I'm finally making a Chevron Scarf from Last Minuet Knitted Gifts out of BMFA STR Lightweight Blarney Stone (I love that colorway) and Jabberwocky. Gorgeous colors. Here's Jabberwocky:
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And I CO'd the scarf around 12, so after 4 ish hours I am here on the scarf:
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I'd be further along but I did want to finish:
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THis pair of Monkey's. I think it's a Fleece Artist colorway but I am not 100% sure.

But the Chevron scarf? I have a feeling I'll be making a few (not all at once). It also helps me work on my 101 in 1001 list item #79 which is to complete 20 projects from my Ravelry Que. I'd knit more on it but my hands are starting to hurt and I've work soon. Have a great day!


(I'm drooling over the colors).