Dropouts Never Prosper (Unless They Do)

I spent Thursday of this week feeling a bit green around the gills. Since there's been a horrific flu going around, I called in sick to work and stayed in all day (by Saturday I concluded it was allergies - daily Claritin, here I come). I did, however, manage to jaunt up to Purlescence for some lace weight in order to start the third round of Sock Madness 2. The premise of the sock is pretty neat, with 2 strands of laceweight held together to create color striping. Omly's are an excellent example. For myself, I picked up some Panda Silk in pink and purple as a tribute to my first 10-speed bike. And to my wardrobe from the same era. Let's face it, if I could have, I would have painted my room and dyed my hair pink and purple when I was 10. But I digress.

Lovely aren't they? But wait, there's more!

The laceweight sock pattern came out, and man, I was ready. For the first hour, I was into it. Then I realized that the "laceweight" I picked wasn't actually making a sock that would fit anyone I know. Two strands of Panda Silk held together do not fingering weight make. And I wasn't having any fun, because the last socks from SM2 weren't socks I would wear either. And then, in a final deathknell for my career as a Tennessean, I realized that I could and would wear a pair of pink socks and a pair of purple socks if I ripped out my too-large monstrosity. So there you have it: I dropped out.

As soon as I finished re-winding the skeins, the weight came off my shoulders. Somehow it's easier to voluntarily drop out than to be beaten by someone else, so I'm fine with it. Next year for Sock Madness I'll either be A) recently graduated or B)only taking a few classes, so I'm sayin' it now, SM3 people: you've been warned!

This left me with only 3 projects on the needles, however. Two are sock projects and one is the Tangled Yoke Cardi, which is in time out until I get brave enough to connect the sleeves to the body. And the 2 sock projects are... well, let's face it: boring K2P2 socks. I've got a few spinning projects here and there, but I've caught Startitis and I'm not sure where it's going to take me. There are a few candidates, though. I told my friend Kate about the wedding shawl I'm planning, and it was the first time I've seen her pout about not wanting to get married. I caved and offered to make her a shawl since she is moving to Prague within the next year. We both knit, but I am the avid knitter (instead of the recreational knitter she is), so she requested a red shawl for cool Prague summer evenings. On Thursday, I found the perfect not-too-purple, not-too-orange red yarn that won't aggravate her sensitive skin:

Fiddlesticks Knitting Zephyr Laceweight, 4oz in Cinnabar

This yarn will grow up to be a Juno Regina shawl, but I haven't started it yet. Mainly because I was busy finishing the massive cabling project for the Posset yarn I got from Colourmart. And behold, the project, she is done!

2000 yds, 100% cashmere laceweight

Purple disc for scale; it's the size of a quarter.

It's as soft as a kitten and a lovely grey-purple color that I just love. The cabling makes it a very visual yarn; I think it'll show stitch definition really well. Y'know, if you care about those things. Which apparently I do. I didn't spin this yarn but I did re-spin and cable it, so I'm going to award myself 1/2 mileage for a total of 1000 yards finished. Hopefully I'll find a pattern for it tomorrow and get to start actually knitting with it; I feel like I deserve to after the oatmeal-brain-mush project it's been so far!

And lastly, today I finished spinning the PRS singles to go with the Quietude singles from spring break. I'm letting the fresh singles sit overnight (like a good little spinner) and I'll try to ply them up tomorrow. Getting things done is such a relief; dropping out was, in this case, the best thing to do. Here's a shot of the bobbin I finished tonight back when it was only half finished:

It'll be so pretty! I'm excited.
Millefiore SW Merino from Pigeonroof Studios

And lastly, I must say I agree that the anthropomorphized cat pictures can get a little... eye-roll-y. But Crazy Sarah put a caption on this photo that made me spit tea on my keyboard this morning, so I'm going to share anyway.

"I said MUSH, vile human!"

"Madness takes its toll.

Please have exact change. "

On Thursday night, I stayed up until 2:30 am finishing my Sock Madness 2 socks. Despite the fact that I'm not super jazzed about this pattern, they turned out well.

Reversai Socks, "Red Hat" colorway 347 yds.

Every once in awhile, it's good to do things you don't think you'll like. Once I got to the point where I could read the pattern in the sock itself, it went fairly quickly. Four days for a pair of socks isn't bad considering this time last year I was lucky if I could churn out a single sock every week! These will put me over the 2 mile mark on my 12-Mile Quest. Some parts of the Quest are going well and others... not so well. I've curbed my yarn buying by quite a lot; the only actual yarn I've bought since Stitches West is for a specific project, but I've definitely added to my fiber stash. Apparently I'm in a Spinning Place instead of a Knitting Place, but that's fine with me. I've been doing a fair bit of spinning in the evenings, so it will all even out eventually.

I finally got the lace yarn and beads to start Elizabeth's wedding shawl - the above-mentioned "specific project." It's this lovely shade that I've decided to call "Posset" because it looks like the wine/milk mixture Victorians used to feed their babies.

100% cashmere lace weight, ~2300 yards
It's also hard to photograph.

I bought 2 cones of 2300 yards each, which turned out to be a brilliant move on my part because I'll need to cable it together into a stronger yarn for hand knitting. Today I'm going to run each cone through my wheel to tighten up the original ply, then tomorrow I'll ply those two yarns together to end up with 2300 yards total. Then maybe I'll finally be able to start stringing the beads onto the yarn to begin the shawl... but I'm not holding my breath.

Yesterday I met a specter from the past. Jasmin 2007 came out to play, and we had a lovely time! First it was just an Etsy jaunt that resulted in some lovely roving from Crazy Monkey heading to us across the country, but then we decided to hit up Purlescence, where the real damage took place. We decided to split a BMFA Sheep-2-Shoe kit of Chapman Springs after seeing Nathania's lovely bobbin-in-progress at the shop, then got sucked into another S2S in Haida from the Raven series. My pictures are blurry because the little L2 doesn't like to focus on fiber, but you get the idea.

So all in all, I ended up with another pound of fiber yesterday. And it's all Jasmin's fault.

We also hit up DSW in a search for Kick-Ass Boots (as opposed to ass-kicking boots, which is another style entirely) but came up with bupkiss. Either we missed the winter boots or we were too early; only another trip will tell! However, we did find a pair of... shoes? that was squite amusing. A plain black Mary Jane style pump with a sewn-in knitted legwarmer. With cables. And there were only 2 pairs in in the aisles we looked through (sizes 7-8), which means people have bought these shoes. Multiple people. And the intention of some of them must have been to actually wear said shoes. This probably says something about the state of the fashion industry, but really I'm just too bemused by the shoe itself to pose a theory.

ManCandy is on a tear to clean the house judging by the clattering coming from the kitchen. This means I should probably go supervise before my things get relegated to Places Unknown.

Printer Kitteh does not like ur papr. Writ a new 1.

Sock Madness and A Tale of Woe

Bella and I are getting along better now. We've established some ground rules and she's more comfortable now that she knows what they are. She's never had rules before - something I've been told over and over isn't good for a child. She's largely stopped crying about little things like being told to sit up and eat her dinner and started crying about the things that really hurt her bruised little heart.

A few days ago, we arrived at her house and I sent her to do her homework. She sat down at her desk for a few moments, then I came into the room.

"Bella, come here," I said, pointing to the spot directly in front of me. She came over slowly and stood on the spot (progress! Obedience without questioning!), looking up at me curiously. "WHERE," I demanded, "is my big hug for the day??" She smiled and jumped into my arms - all 38.5 pounds of her, the tiny thing - and koala'd me.
"You didn't remind me!" she laughingly accused when she was done with her hug.
"I have to remind you now? You don't want to hug me on your own?" I wailed. She laughed and tickled me, and we giggled together. Then: "Bella!" I cried in mock sadness, with big grin on my face, "don't you loooove me anymore?"
"Of course I do!" she yelled, and buried her face in my neck.
"I love you too, button," I chuckled. Then I realized she hadn't moved her face, and that her little frame was shaking. "Baby, what's wrong?"
"You - you - you thought I didn't loooooove you!!" she sobbed. I was shocked. Somewhere my brain was chiding me for not remembering her utter and total lack of a sense of humor, but the rest of me went into instant Big Sister mode. I kicked off my shoes and carried her to the bed, letting her curl up against my chest and sob.
"Sweetheart," I explained, "I'm so sorry. I was making a bad joke, but I didn't think it would hurt your feelings! I know you love me, baby, and I love you too. Shhhh." And then it struck me. "Bella, honey, do you sometimes feel like people lie to you when they say they love you?"
She looked up at me with huge, watery brown eyes and nodded, still sobbing. "Who?" I asked. Seconds ticked by while she tried to call up a feeling she doesn't examine very often.
"My mommy - sniffle - my mommy never comes home even if she's not working, and she never does what she says."

I have never been kicked in the gut, but I can tell you exactly what it feels like. I think I stopped breathing for a moment. My family's not perfect, and we've had our altercations, but there has never in my whole life been a single second that I seriously considered that my family - all 12 of them - didn't love me. The idea that a little girl could have reason to question the very foundation of the word "family" breaks my heart. 

Poor little dear. Thank god it's Friday.

*****

I woke up early yesterday so I could print out the first pattern for Sock Madness, but it wasn't out yet. Another reason in my long list never to get up early if I can help it! It wasn't a big deal - I had no knitting time in those classes anyway. I swung by the school print shop between classes 2 and 3 to get the pattern. By the time class 3 was over, I had the ribbing and a few rows of the pattern done.

Originally I kicked myself for forgetting a set of smaller needles, but since the pattern grows organically out of the ribbing, it worked out okay. Last night I finished just over 1/2 of the first heel flap stitches and went to bed - probably good, since I have to look up my HPSS3 pal's foot size. The Zombie pattern is wicked stretchy, so I'm not too worried about the leg. Here it is so far:

Zombie Socks by Sheryl Ball

It also just occurred to me that this is the first time in awhile I've had any knitting pictures to show off. Sleeve 1 of the Tangled Yoke Cardi continues apace. As Brie hoped, my length gauge and I found each other; I've got about an inch or 2 of plain knitting to go and the sleeve will be done. Then only one more to go and Tangled Yoke becomes at-home knitting, as it'll be too unwieldy to carry around to classes.

I think it's time for more tea and some Angel, season 4. And some Zombies.