Sock Madness

Another happy day. I'm in on Sock Madness!!! Yippeeee again!

We were supposed to get 8 to 10 inches of snow today. Instead we got freezing rain.

Blech!! I was hoping school would be closed tomorrow because I HATE driving in 8 to 10 inches of snow or freezing rain!!!!

But I am in Sock Madness, so maybe my luck will change, and the salt trucks will get the roads clear, and maybe I can hack my way through the ice to open my car. Or maybe a miracle will happen, and classes will be canceled.

We don't quite have this, but we are getting there:
This is from a group of photos, circulating for the past couple of years on the web and via email, of an ice storm caused by quickly dropping temps in Versoix, Switzerland in 2005.

Whoopee AGAIN!! and STASH Busting!!!!

Woohoo!!!!

The Harlot herself is coming to a library in Ann Arbor, Michigan on April 1st. YIPPPPPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I cannot tell you how EXCITED I am!!!!

She is launching her new book, and the U.S. portion of the tour begins in New York in March, which btw, EVERYONE in the state and the surrounding states should attend!!!! Read her post of February 16 (Represent) for reasons why.

Now, onto the Stash Busting:
Because I love the way my niece's Fir Cone scarf turned out, I decided to make my own using the fallish color Schaefer Anne I bought last summer. (STASH knitting again!!) I have an olive winter parka, so the fall-type colors should go great with the coat.

The colors are sort of dark, lots of gun-metal blue-grey and an almost charcoal-like shade, plus orange and mustard. I cast on late in the evening when it was already dark, and knit the garter stitch border and one entire repeat of the pattern stitch. I love the way this yarn feels. I love the drape, texture, and softness, both while knitting and while wearing.

While I love everything about this yarn, I did not, however, like how dark, and almost depressing, the colors of this skein were looking while knitting up in the night-time light. I almost frogged it and thought to use the yarn for socks (good grief, my feet don't deserve this kind of yarn for socks!), but decided just before yanking out the needle to wait until I looked at it in the light of day.

Whoa, nellie, am I glad I did!!! While it is true the colors are still pretty dark at night, they are a whole new genus during the day, especially in the sun.

I had no idea there was a green and a lighter blue in there.

Just look at the subtle shades in this (take an extra click on the image):

I gotta tell ya, if you come across some Schaefer Anne, buy it. Do NOT stop to think. Do NOT stop to consider what you already have in your stash. Do NOT stop to justify another yarn purchase. Just BUY IT! PERIOD. You can't go wrong with it!!!!!!

The Remains of the (Valentine's) Day or An Essay in Photos

First some Eye Candy (not my own ~ but stunning nonetheless and worth a gaze at due to the tranquil effect this image has on one accustomed to colder climes):

What's left from hubby's delicately baked, scrumptious Valentine Day chocolate chip cookies:

Closer-up:

A few minutes later:

Two swallows after that:

A blink later:

YUMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Snow Day

Happy Valentine's Day to all!! Okay, so it is officially Thursday and thus not Valentine's Day, but I didn't have time to post before midnight, Wednesday. Dear hubby made me yummy chocolate chip cookies on Tuesday night, so I had an early Valentine waiting for me when I got home from work. He IS the perfect husband!!!

For some Valentine Eye Candy, go to Kristin Nicholas's blog to see uber-cute photos of newborn lambs. You will just say "Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh."

Here's some knitting content. A watchcap for dear hubby that just needs the ends woven in:

Project specs:
Yarn: Plymouth Encore worsted weight, 75% acrylic, 25% wool from my stash
Needles: Brittany Birch DPNs, size 5
Pattern: basic roll cuff watchcap

The colors are a bit washed out because we have such bright light due to the snow.

Here is a cowl also from the same yarn stash ~ colors very washed out:

You need to imagine that a human head and neck are where the bear is:

I tried putting this on and taking the shot in front of a mirror, but I got too much flash bounce, so the images don't show much of anything but a bright flash spot.
Project specs:
Yarn: Plymouth Encore worsted weight, 75% acrylic, 25% wool from my stash
Needles: Brittany Birch DPNs, size 9
Pattern: basic cowl ~ cast on enough stitches to fit around head, alternate stockinette and garter stitch for desired length.

Well, we finally got enough snow to cancel classes. The weather has been particularly wicked this past week. Frigid temps last week, well below zero Fahrenheit during the day; all K-12 schools were closed due to the freezing temps, but as I mentioned in a previous post, not my college.

Tuesday night the snowstorm was DREADFUL. We quickly had six inches within a few hours, very strong 50+ mph winds, and visibility was nil. Very treacherous driving conditions, especially at night. Yet the snow wasn't deep enough to cancel classes before 3:00 p.m., so we had to make the dangerous trip in and back. Thank goodness someone had sense enough to cancel Wednesday's classes.

Hubby shoveled lots of snow Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday morning. I spent most of the day getting the snowblower to work so hubby doesn't exhaust or kill himself shoveling (remember, midwestern snow is heavy and wet, not light and fluffy). Drove all over town looking for a siphon to empty out the snowblower's gas tank, hoping a new mix of fuel would start the damn thing up. After finally siphoning out (read: tipping the stupid thing upside down and pouring the fuel into an old gas tank) last year's gas and getting a new mix in, the snowblower sparked right up, and I tackled some drifts in the driveway. The stupid siphon was a piece of CRAP. I got gasoline all over my hands trying to get the siphon to work. I got so annoyed with the thing I ended up just picking up the snowblower and tipping it completely upside down.

Because my hands were soaked with gas while I was outside, I couldn't put my gloves back on while I cleared the snow. I have washed my hands at least two million times today with all kinds of cleansers and harsh detergents, trying to get the gas smell off them, to no avail. I refuse to knit until I can rid myself of the smell. Any suggestions how to do this are welcome! I left soap on for five minutes, soaked, scrubbed, hand-cremed. Still stinks!!!

We still have more to tackle come tomorrow because some of the drifts are four to six feet deep, but we got the critical stuff cleared today.

Thank goodness we have a decent layer of snow, though. The Great Lakes have been receding over the past 10 or so years, so we REALLY need the snow to boost the lake levels and to fill aquifers. When we don't get enough snow during the winter, we have terrible drought conditions during the summer. It would be great if we could get several more inches before winter is up, and we are supposed to get another three to five by the weekend, but more would be better, even though the constant shoveling is a pain!!!

Cold Spell

We are still in the very low single digits daytime and below zero at night. Windchill is another problem altogether. I cannot wait to get my heating bill!

Entire school districts have been closed since Monday because of the frigid weather. I don't think a pre-school or K-12 district in the tri-county area has held classes this week. Some community colleges are closed. My college is not. Grrrrr!!!!

During the daytime we have bluish grey or simply grey everywhere. Sometimes the blue-grey is beautiful, not quite like in the arctic in Finland, though, but beautiful nonetheless.

Here is a shot pressed up against the windowpane from inside the house:

I don't have the courage to go outdoors other than to start the car everyday to make sure the battery doesn't die or to go to work.

Because we are freezing here, no pun intended, I had to change my wallpaper/background on this blog. I did so like the bright and colorful Christmas bulbs, especially because there are so few colors around outdoors this time of year. But baby, I need some heat!!! I figured this stunning, glowing, warm-orange is just the ticket. If I can't see the sun outside, I can at least pretend the sun is still there when I use my bloglist to read other blogs.

One of my sisters and my youngest brother are working in California. They went to Yosemite and sent some photos.

As Ansel Adams knew all too well, it's hard to beat Yosemite for stunning photo ops:

A couple of trees:

The view across a valley:

I have a couple of new projects in mind, and I tried to take a picture of some yarn in my stash during the day, but the day is so grey the yarn looks black. I used my flash, turned on the overhead lights that are as bright as old time arc lights from Hollywood, but still black.

Out to the back porch then with these babies.

I won't go outside for anything but work and the car battery, but will stand outside without a coat, hat, scarf or mittens in -12F for pictures of yarn. Good grief!!!

We haven't had much snow, maybe three or four inches of light flurries. But cold we got!!! Do you think these have the white stuff in 'em?

Saturday Book Review

I couldn't possibly venture out to take pictures today. We have a daytime temperature of zero degrees, yes, 0 degrees Fahrenheit today, plus windchill factor down to -25F.

I know Lene can walk three miles in this weather, but not me!

If Saturdays aren’t good for skies, then they are good for book reviews. Finally, yes, finally, the long awaited order from Borders.com cum Amazon arrived. I placed it on December 29th, and it arrived on January 18th. Talk about same day shipping!!!!

Before I launch into the shipping fiasco, here is a review of the books and the condition in which they arrived. They’re scrumptious, aren’t they?

Stitchionary One has a lovely cover design, and I am a sucker for green, so that’s probably why I was interested in the knit ~ purl stitchionary. I was mainly interested in the Barbara Walker Treasuries, but they are $30 (U.S. $) each, and the Vogue books were on sale online, 30% off. So I figured I could wait a bit more for the Walkers. I’ve put off buying them for over 11 years now anyway.

Volume One (knit ~ purl) though, isn’t what it’s cracked up to be. Sure, there are almost 200 pages of lovely patterns, but come on, we’ve seen these patterns, herringbone, basketweave, moss stitch, seed stitch, etc. Nothing, and I mean NOTHING, new.

Now here is the another issue, check out the wasted space:

Mind you, not every page is wasting space, but enough pages are, so why not give us some more patterns and swatches? Wasn’t that the goal of this set, to sort of update the Walker books in color and more legible font and in high gloss large format? Or did someone just get tired of swatching?

If you are going to waste space, then why not move the image over a bit and spread things out? Why jam image and text onto one side of the page?

As if this isn’t enough, there aren’t any charts. WHAT? No charts?

No, no charts. Just a bunch of text. And some of the text directions are about one page long for one repeat. COME ON!!!!! Is this 1972? Remember McCalls and Women’s Day knitting directions? Laughable. More accurately, cryable.

Volume Three (colorwork) is marginally better. Granted someone figured out we need/want charts, and some interesting designs are included, but some are so simplistic, and others so UGLY, that I have to shake my head and shudder.

See what I mean:

Okay, sorry to offend those who may like colorized cables, but I am not one who does.

What might be important to know is the books aren't carried in the bookstores around here, so it was practically buyer beware ~ sight unseen and all that. Before seeing these books, I had already decided that it was likely nothing could beat Alice Starmore’s Aran Knitting and HT cable books, and I have several, so I opted not to bother with Volume Two (cables). I feel completely vindicated by that call! I can just imagine the patterns: 2 st cable, 3 st cable, 4 st cable, 5 st cable, 6 st cable, and a few other every day, regular old cable stitches.

Alright, I’m still not finished. Look at the condition the books are in:

It’s hard to see in the photo, but the corner above is actually split down to the cardboard guts of the cover. How long do you think this will remain intact pulling it on and off the bookshelf or, heaven forbid, if I put it in a knitting tote?

The other:

This after waiting over three weeks for these books to arrive!!!!

Stick with the original Vogue Knitting:

(Mine was published in 1999 and cost $35 U.S.) This book is superb! It not only contains a stitchionary with charts and better swatches:

but it also contains superb chapters on issues such as basic techniques, understanding knitting instructions (how-to read charts, how-to understand symbols, how-to reconcile written directions with charts, etc.), how-to correct errors, blocking, assembling, and finishing, care for knit garments, designing, and a whole slew of other very useful info:

Now granted when I bought this book I worked at a bookstore, and when it was unpacked from the day's shipment of books, I carefully covered it with BrodArt to protect the dust jacket, and didn't bother putting it on the shelf because I bought it lickety-split that day. But books that are shipped to the stores are shipped in boxes 1' high x 2' wide x 3' long, so the boxes do contain several books and bunches of Styrofoam peanuts, and the boxes do travel some distance, even though in those days the shipping warehouse was within 50 miles of our store. (I worked at the second Borders Books Shop to open. The first Borders Books is in Ann Arbor.) Sometimes better care is taken of books that are shipped to stores ~ that's all I'm saying.