A couple more inches..
.. both of snow over night and of progress on the Blue Willow. Photos of each aren’t terribly different from before, though. *shrug* I made our neighborhood Good Snowmaritan some raspberry struesel muffins yesterday and delivered them to him, which he seemed a bit bemused by. *smile* He must have had to work today, or he felt that these last couple inches weren’t worth the effort (which I doubt), but fortunately it was light enough and warm enough that shoveling didn’t take long.
I did get some lovely Morehouse Merino lace weight in the mail today, though:
I bought it from someone who posted on the DeStash blog, all six skeins for $25. The purple is more red than it looks in the picture.. I couldn’t seem to get a picture with either the red or the purple really right, though the red is pretty close in this one. I really have no idea what I’ll do with it, which is somewhat unusual for me, but it seemed too good of a deal to pass up.
Oh, and I got an email from Adagio telling me my new infuser (and rooibos tea!) had been delivered, so tomorrow morning after spin class I will once again be enjoying nummy, nummy tea.
Blue Willow Cardigan update
I feel like I’ve not made very much progress on this one, but I did finish the first of six skeins of the grey yarn this evening, so I thought I’d post a photo or two:
The photo doesn’t show the full width of the piece - it’s the full girth of the sweater, less about 6 inches which will be added with the edging, knit flat because it’s a cardigan. I’ve decided to make it longer than the pattern calls for - if I left it at the length called for, I think it would feel too short. The pattern says that if you lengthen it, you need to lengthen it by 3 inches due to the length of the pattern repeats on the boder, so I have four more inches of the body to go until I divide for the front and back. At that point the bulk of the body will be finished, so things should go a little faster.
In the meantime, I may switch for a bit to tablet weaving and/or bobbin lace and/or spinning for a bit. My knitting mojo seems to be errant of late, so maybe something else will hold my attention better.
Dedicated to our friendly neighborhood Good Snowmaritan
This was the scene from our house around 8:45 this morning:
Note that we had only been shoveling for about half an hour at that point - the walk from the house to the street. The main part of our sidewalk was cleared by our friendly neighborhood Good Snowmaritan who owns a riding snow blower. He apparently lives for days like today when he can drive through the neighborhood helping his neighbors (and saving our backs!) by clearing the main sidewalks. He does this every time it snows - even if it’s just an inch of light fluffy stuff - but days like today I appreciate it all the more. This afternoon I’ll be making some coffee cake to drop off at his house as a thank you.
I also, however, appreciate the photos I took last summer of our yard in bloom:
Of course, we’re currently in the middle of a trough between two storm systems and have another 10-12 inches predicted for overnight tonight. Our local roads are pretty clear now, but apparently the highways are still a bit of a mess; goodness knows how bad things will be tomorrow if we get another foot!
Knitting progress has been suspended.
I received what has become my annual shipment* of Lush supplies today. I’d already be in the bath, but I’m having a hard time deciding what to use first. *smile*
So while I’m trying to decide, I thought I’d post a quick note, mostly to Sara, to say I tried rooibos tea yesterday. It’s tasty, different from what I expected, though I liked it better than black teas, so I think it will likely become a staple. And while I’m waiting for my replacement diffuser (they have them on the website for $3.. I’m apparently not the only one who’s had one go missing!) from Adagio (who also has a caramel rooibos tea -MMMMmmmm!), I’ve discovered that my little ingenuiTEA teapot works just fine with tea in bags and is easier to “dispense” than when made in a regular tea pot. I picked up some Lipton caramel something or other in the little pyramid tea bags last week and it’s been quite tasty with a bit of non-dairy creamer.
And while it’s not really related to anything, I spent a lovely weekend with three of my best friends from high school last weekend. We shopped and ate and caught up and relaxed (away from the kidlets for two of them). We’ve been spread a bit far and this is the first time we’ve all seen each other in person in about four years, and that was at one of our weddings so we were a bit occupied with other affairs at the time. Now that we’re all a bit more settled, though, we’ve decided that we should reconnect. This weekend was the first “girl’s weekend”; we have another scheduled for late July. *smile*
The timing was fortuitous - I don’t have very many close female friends, but have been thinking lately that I need to take the step from post-grad-student to professional, which is a somewhat foreign area for me. Not in action, but in how to look the part, particularly in how to dress the part. I’ve ordered some outfits from Lane Bryant on line, but needed to expand on that meager beginning. My best friends helped me decide on a couple new pairs of pants and a new shirt from Lane Bryant and, in an effort to try to “look the professional part”, helped me learn about make up.
Yes, as a *mubletypeg* year old woman, I’m just now learning how to properly apply make up. My best friend from high school is a Mary Kay representative and she brought her kit down so I could find stuff that wouldn’t make me feel like I was wearing shellac. I think we succeeded - instead of a more traditional foundation, I’ll use a tinted moisturizer with SPF 20, which also means I won’t need to use any loose powder. I’ll use lip gloss instead of lipstick, with no lip liner, and a nice subdued mocha/coffee color scheme for eye make up and cheek color. Spendy, yes, but I feel like I got quality make up that fits my needs precisely, so I think it’s worth it.
At some point I may take the step of actually going to a hair stylist to get a “real” hair style, but for now I think a wardrobe update and make up will suffice!
* My sister-in-law’s birthday is tomorrow and her brother (my husband) usually opts to get her Lush for her birthday. Since I’m ordering anyway, I usually take the opportunity to stock up for me, too. And since Lush tends to be on the pricey side of things, I don’t order from them for me too often!
Peek a boo! I see you!
All done! (Sorry the photos suck; the modeled ones even moreso.)
The first picture is blurry, but more color accurate; the second is not blurry, but completely washed out.
*sigh*
I’m a little worried that the arms will be a bit too small - I have fat arms, though, so maybe it won’t be quite so tight on the recipient. I need to remember to include a note with care instructions, though. It’s cotton/modal and I don’t want her to wash and dry it and have it be too small. In any case, I’m giving in one more blocking round now that the seams are in, so it pr’bly won’t get sent until later this week.
Shopping for a good cause, anyone?
Want to support an agency that works year round with women & children victims and survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault and get some great deals on clothing, housewares, and more at the same time? If so, you can purchase a Community Day coupon booklet - which has a $10 coupon and eight %-off coupons all good on March 3 (and only March 3) *on top of to special one-day sale prices* at any non-New Jersey location of the Bon-Ton, Bergners, Boston Store, Carson Pirie Scott, Elder-Beerman, Herberger’s, or Younkers.
The booklets are $5 each (so you get your money back and then some when you use the coupons) and the money from the sale goes directly to support the programs and services provided by Houston County Women’s Resources (disclaimer: I’m on the Board of HCWR). If you want a booklet, let me know!
Oh, and there are also a couple special one-day sales that day - like $30 off their entire stock of Men’s & Women’s Clarks shoes, or Leisure Lakeside luggage for $19.97 per piece (originally $80-$120 per piece). You can’t use the %-off coupons on the bonus buys, but they’re still pretty good deals.
They do Community Days twice a year and last spring we got some very good deals (like a $100 jacket for Jack for $5). It’s getting close to spring and time to refresh your wardrobe and Community Day means you save money and donate to a great cause at the same time.
On a more positive note..
All the pieces for Peek a boo are blocking; they should be dry tomorrow sometime and I’ll seam it this weekend hopefully, leaving early next week to do the last finishing bits and about a week to mail it. Yea! I’ll post pictures when it’s more exciting.
In the meantime, I’ve picked up the Blue Willow Cardigan and even though the rows seem impossibly long, the larger gauge means that inches get added much faster than just about anything I’ve knit lately. Progress pics as of last night:
The patterning is a diamond slip-stitch with yarn to the right side sort of thing and in all honesty, I’m not quite sure of why they did the slip-stitch patterning instead of a purl stitch which I think would result in a fairly similar design and, in my opinion, make it easier to see the pattern from either side of the knitting. But I’ll knit it as written since I have about three or so inches of it done already.
I haven’t really read through the entire instruction sheet, but my understanding is that the main body is knit first and then the fair isle border is added. Not sure yet if it’s picked up and knit on, or knit separately and then sewn on, but I’m sure I’ll find out.
The yarn looks like it should be scratchy, but it’s really not. I expect this sweater to be quite warm and soft, though maybe not next-to-the-skin soft, which wouldn’t really ever happen anyway as I usually wear cardigans over another shirt.
Not my day.
Bah.
It’s the sort of day where I wondered while drying my hair briefly after my shower after spin class if I’d remembered to rinse out the conditioner. I think I did.. but can’t quite remember and my hair felt unusually slick for lack of a better word, so I might not have.
I arrived in my office to discover that our building is still without water. Something happened - not sure what - Tuesday that caused them to turn off all water service to the building. They stripped a router bit trying to clear out the main sewer pipe, which would seem to indicate that they hit something concrete or metal. Not a good sign. Rather than do something logical like close the building, though, we’re all just expected to hike to either the student center or the technology building next door to use the restroom. Never mind that there’s no access to water in the building so if you want a drink you’d better bring it in yourself. Need to rinse a coffee or tea mug? Sorry; out of luck. (Fortunately, I do usually bring some water in with me from home and have been doing so this week; it’s still annoying, though.)
Then, after overfilling my teacup twice, I realized that the reason the tea leaves were getting stuck in the drain and keeping it open was because the little screen that was in my ingenuiTEA teapot yesterday was no longer there. I can only assume that it fell out yesterday when I dumped the leaves from my last cup of tea. I had checked it earlier when I first got it and it seemed like the screen was in there more or less permanently, so I didn’t think to check for it after dumping out the leaves. I guess I was wrong. *sigh* (Yes, I’ve emailed Adagio already asking if I can order a replacement for it; I’ve grown quite attached to my little ingenuiTEA in the last few days..)
Edited to add: And we just had a last minute staff meeting where our Provost (who I report to directly) announced that she has accepted a position at another institution. Yeah. Not a great day.
Teapots, part three!
It came!
It’s bigger than I expected (the pictures below help with scale), which is neat. And holy “samples” man! The little box on the right contains four not-so-sample-sized tins of flavored tea - oriental spice, vanilla, mango, and strawberry. There’s pr’bly enough for 10-12 cups of each flavor in the tins! Having been on a chai kick lately, I decided to try the oriental spice first.
It took me a few minutes to figure out how it works because I thought the little video on the website showed a lever that you slide to make it pour, but you just set it on the cup to make it pour (there’s a little piece that slips down to block the water from pouring, but the edge of the cup pushes it up out of the way).
And I was almost stymied in my quest to try it Right. Now. because the sewer pipe for my building has apparently decided to back up which means not only do we all have to trek out to another building to go to the bathroom, but also that we aren’t allowed to run any water or pour anything down the drain. Fortunately, I bring in water every day from home (the water here has a chemical/cholorine taste), so I just needed to decide it would be okay if I drank tea out of my unwashed cup from yesterday.
MMmmm.. I need to learn more about how much tea is enough - the oriental spice was tasty, but not quite strong enough.. or something. Maybe it just needed a little milk. I guess I’ll have to make another cup and try that out. *grin*
In other news, do you know about the DeStash blog?! Evil thing. I’ve added it to my blogroll just in case something irresistable comes up (because, you know, between several pairs of socks, at least three sweaters for myself, and at least one more bucket hat, I don’t have enough projects).
Speaking of projects, though, I finished the second sleeve for Peek a boo in the car this morning (all but the last cast off because I think this one ended up a row shorter than the other and I want them to match; the other sleeve is at home so I’ll have to check tonight). I’ll try to get the pieces blocked tonight, but I have a planning meeting with the Board officers for HCWR from 6 until about 8, so I may be wiped out by the time I get home.
So that means I need to figure out a commuting project to start tomorrow. I need to make another bucket hat, but since I’m stubborn and didn’t want to buy a 16 inch circular when I could make five dpns work just as well, it’s not really a good project to toss in a bag until it gets past the brim part. I have yarn for Celtic Icon (but not the yarn used in this picture; I have Knit One Crochet Too Angora Soft in Light Moss & Moss from Webs) from Inspired Cable Knits, a sweater kit from Blackberry Ridge, and the Easy Lace Jacket kit (which I was a bit surprised to find included Cascade 220 for the yarn) from White Lies Designs, all for me. I feel sort of obligated to do the Blackberry Ridge kit first, both since it’s the oldest of them but also because it’s going to quickly be too warm to wear it comfortably. But the Lace Jacket is whispering things like “but I’ll be quicker”, so I’m a little torn.
Teapots, part two.
As promised, here’s a picture of my other teapot:
This one is a bit more conventional - but rather uneven. The knob on the top isn’t properly centered, the ridge is a little crooked. It’s also somewhat considerably smaller:
(The tea bag steeping is actual a variety of Chai, not the Lipton Green Tea, but I left in the Lipton package to show scale a little better.)
It is just about the right size for a single cup, which works well at work because I can heat water in a mug and in the teapot at the same time, steep a tea bag in both and have one cup ready made in my mug and a second already steeped when I’m finished with the first. It’s also a useful vessel for heating water for other uses - like instant oatmeal or those noodle cup things - because it’s easier to pour out of than a coffee mug.
Not as exciting as the other, but still suits its purpose rather well. I’m hoping that by tomorrow I’ll be able to round out my little teapots series with my latest acquisition (thanks again to Sara for pointing this one out)!
I made more progress on the Peek a boo sleeve last night and this morning in the car and I’ve only got a couple inches left to go.
Today is just flying by, though, pr’bly because I had a dentist appointment this morning to get the permanent crown I lost a couple weeks ago replaced permanently. Despite past dental trauma (yes, even for somthing as “easy” as placing a permanent crown), this morning’s appointment was a cinch, so I’m in a much better mood than I expected I would be!
