A Little Yarn On The Side

So 2 weeks ago I got a message from an old boss that there were a couple openings with her group in Oregon that she wanted to talk to me about and would follow up on the following Monday.  Granted, we'd already decided that I'd start looking for a job in Oregon, but that kicked us into high gear because of the possible short time frame--hence all the frantic cleaning/sorting.  And then I never heard back from her.  It's kind of weird and disappointing, but I'm more worried that she'll feel bad and potentially draw back as a friend, because she's far more important to me as a person than any job is.  And it DID get some tidying of the sewing room accomplished, so I'm kind of grateful for that with or without a job. I am still pursuing jobs outside of Idaho, and with that in mind, I decided to cancel my Vogue Knitting subscription.  I had canceled all knitting magazine subscriptions several years ago, but there was recently a pretty tempting offer for t...

Friday I was sending out more resumes, and in order to apply for one, I had to upload my resume to Monster.com, and in case it made it easier for me in the future, I allowed other companies to view my resume.  So yesterday was "Cowboy Bob Day."  Oh my goodness.  Lots of emails, and one phone call, which was kind of confusing because the company name sounded a lot like a company I had actually applied to, but after tentatively agreeing to an interview, I discovered it was a company that ALWAYS has ads running and seems to do door-to-door sales of some sort.  Yeah--not going to interview THERE.  And, to be honest, I'm pretty sure that "part-time retail associates" at AT&T don't actually make $50536 "on average,"  There was a lot of embellishing from the "Oh look! Fresh meat!" contingent on Match.com, too. I hate to admit it, but instead of exploring all those wonderful employment opportunities, I took the day to sew.  First, I got th...

Yesterday I had a really bad cough and my lungs were so congested that they hurt, so I had a Knitting Day.  While I can't recommend the circumstances, I did get the chemo cap done.  I hate to admit how much of a boost the new yarn has given me because I'd still like to earn that 2-year badge, but having some quick projects has been nice.  In fact, I forgot to photograph this one.  It was kind of fun, and part of me kept thinking, wow, I could make great Christmas tree garlands out of this stuff, but I'm going to leave well enough alone.  The shelves make things easier to access but in some ways reduced the amount of space in the sewing room, so the big push is still to use up stuff, not add stuff.  I'm still thinking of getting back on the sheep on January 1 to try for the 2-year badge, but this time I'm really going to think it over between now and then, and add a bit of yarn for small projects.  I'll be climbing onto the fabric wagon as well, ...

I have finished something!!!! Sorry, didn't mean to shock anyone. I know what a surprise a Finished Project is around here.......

......which is a new month, so I shouldn't be surprised that the newest ornament kit has arrived, though the fact that I received the shipping notification AND the ornaments on the same day was new.  The new kit will involve some gluing, though I just love how they look and really do want to make them.  I had put one set into my Summer Stash-Dash Basket, and decided it was time to start on them: Okay, start on the easiest one.  This kit actually has FIVE ornaments, so I won't feel quite as bad if I mess one up.  Actually, as long as I get to count it for a Finished Project, I might not feel too badly at all.  Being almost a month behind on projects is terrifically motivating.................

Okay--even I have admitted that I won't finish the month at 50 finished projects.  I'm an optimist....and a pretty deluded one most of the time....but I need 7 projects in 5 days when we have plans for most of those days does seem a stretch--even to me.  However, the second beaded scarf might have been preempted by the Saroyan scarf, which is on size 10 needles and is currently half finished and has at least some chance of being finished object 44 before the end of the month.  I'd still be behind, but not quite as far.  These things matter,  at least to some of us............

Funnily enough, I had thought of the 6 gold/6 silver idea because I was more confident of my gold thread than of the silver, but after seeing the first one, I really like the silver, and thank to everyone's unanimous input, I went with all in silver and finished the last one just a few minutes ago, making Finished Project number 24.  YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Which leaves me..............behind.  Am I ever anything else?  To reach 100 projects, I should be at 33-34 at the end of April.  I am, by nature, completely delusional an optimist, but finishing 9 projects in 9 days sounds a wee bit daunting, even to me.  Tomorrow it's supposed to rain, so I won't be gardening and can spend the morning sewing, but in the afternoon I have an eye appointment, and after the dilate my eyes, I'm guessing all crafting will be over for the day because I'm never able to focus on anything after they do that.  You know, I really loathe the "women's annual wellness exam," b...

I just went for the longest walk I've been on since December 26.  I remember that day because I was thinking how great I was feeling and was ready to try for longer walks, and the next day was smacked down by bronchitis.  And it doesn't hurt.  And my hands only hurt a bit.  I had physical therapy on Thursday, and because when you're trying to avoid touching things people who have met you before are bound to notice how weird you're being, I explained to her that I had burned both sides of both hands.  I can't say that I blame her a bit, but she did take a step back from me before asking if I was a bit accident-prone.  I do wonder about that myself.  Wednesday I was walking into our bedroom and managed to smack the back of one of my hands on the doorknob as I went past.  As I stopped getting taller sometime time during college, my hands have been in pretty much the same location for the last 20 years, and the door has been in the same location for...

This week's lesson learned: Just because a broken toe feels better after three weeks, it is not really healed.   Since it will be 4 weeks tomorrow and there is STILL bruising, it probably shouldn't be surprising that walking around on it can still really, really hurt, but AMAZINGLY I was getting a bit impatient, so Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday I was out running errands and "catching up" on things that I hadn't been able to do very easily.  By Wednesday night, the real catching up seemed to be being done by the pain.  My foot actually hurt more Wednesday night than it had at any time since the x-ray fiasco.  So, figuring it needed a day of rest, I moved my to-do list to today and used yesterday as Finishing Thursday. First, a finished chemo cap: Then casting on for a new chemo cap:  and the scarf is so very close to being done that I think I'll have it doe by the end of the day--to-do list not withstanding.  I decided my desire to raise my "s...

So in the knitting world, Christmas is traditionally a time of knitting like a freakin' maniac into the wee small hours of the morning in an attempt to finish a marathon of gifts that a knitter would have to be on crack to attempt at any other time of the year.  So what happens when the knitter has ceded all most of the gift-making to her loving spouse? There has still been a crazy amount of knitting going on.  Two more chemo caps and a scarf from the newly-acquired yarn that is moving in & out of the stash so quickly that maybe it really didn't count as stash anyway.  There was even a fleece baby blanket sewn & embroidered in one day, but I seem to have given it away before getting a single picture.  And since there's no photographic evidence to contradict me, let me just say that it was THE cutest and most creatively designed baby blanket ever.  Um...yeah.  That makes 16 finished projects so far for December, with 4 days left to go.  Th...

A friend has sworn that the next time I mention that I am going to make two project simultaneously, she will remind me to stab myself in the leg repeatedly until the urge passes.  This is a good thing. The problem with doing two projects from the same pattern AT THE SAME TIME is that if you make a mistake on one, you're more than likely going to make it on the other one as well.  Another problem is that if the pattern was written by psychotics who leave you with two unexplained pattern pieces, you have TWO projects with unexplained pattern pieces.  According to the pattern, the red one belongs somewhere on this apron: and the black one on this one:  which doesn't make any sense.  Since I had them, I decided to go ahead and use them as facings for the top yoke, but decided to actually match them up color-wise so they would make sense.  Of course, by the time I decided this, it required mostly hand-stitching them in place, but it would really irritate m...

To be honest, when I dreamed up the idea of doing 100 projects in one year, I had doubts about whether or not I would be able to pull it off, or whether I'd be doing a 72-hour knitting marathon during the last days of December to meet my goal, but I just cast off project 100.  And it's my favorite of the entire year: It's not a great picture, but on Monday I received an email from a cousin who is currently battling cancer.  I'd sent her a chemo cap about a year ago, and she asked if she could hire me to make her two more--one in chocolate brown and one in black--because the other one is currently about all she can wear right now.  As most of you probably know, when someone you like is going through something horrible like cancer, what you wish for most (besides their full and rapid recovery) is the ability to do something to help.  I told her I would be more than thrilled to make her more and that she is to consider them a Christmas gift, so I could think of no proj...

Bob:  In a surprise move yesterday, Ms. Sutton abandoned the expected cornucopia-finishing and instead surprised us with a flurry of scarves. Ron:  How right you are, Bob!  We were predicting all 11 cornucopias to be necessary for Ms. Sutton to hit 100 projects for 2010, but seemingly out of nowhere came project 98: a pair of scarves that no one predicted.  Bob:  This certainly is getting interesting.  These scarves were a complete experiment for Ms. Sutton.  She was attempting to use a combination of threads on a rolled edge  and I think it would be fair to call the results only moderately successful as the edge doesn't have that nice finish that Woolly Nylon would have given it, but as Woolly Nylon has become almost impossible to find in Boise, I think she was a bit too desperate to finish the scarves to wait until she could mail-order the missing thread.  Ron:  We are certainly seeing a slight relaxing of project standards ...

Ron:  Here we are at Chateau Sutton-Goar and with cornucopia number nine being finished today, the question now is what will give out first:  cornucopias, quick knitting projects, or Ms. Sutton's sanity. Bob:   It's looking like an even race at this point. Ron:  It does indeed, Bob, though Ms. Sutton did manage to complete the Ravelympics sweater even after completely parting with her sanity, so anything could happen now. .........

The good news is, towel number 3 is done which finished project number 94. The bad news is, Jeeves is definitely having problems--not the card or the design.  See the little "jag" on the inside curve there? That isn't supposed to be there.  Nor is the line of random stitching BELOW the solid orange.  These are problems caused by Jeeves randomly resetting his location.  He still did it in the place he did on the other two towels, but this time he expanded and did it several other times.  Luckily, I was ready for it this time and was able to readjust him so that it wasn't too obvious. Now, want to know what makes this even MORE fun?  THIS IS HOW THE ORIGINAL PROBLEM WITH JEEVES STARTED IN THE FIRST PLACE!  You know--that first repair that took two weeks, which then spawned the much LONGER repair because he came back with more problems than he went in with. It is just two months since I got Jeeves back.  Oh, and just in case I didn't hate ...

Unless something goes majorly wrong (or I finally snap and Andy finds me running around the house with an unfinished cornucopia on my head yelling "I'm an elf!  I'm an elf"), the next 5 Finished Projects are likely to be cornucopias.  That will leave me just two projects short. No promises, but possible contenders are, a new scarf, using a clever but somewhat boring pattern by the Yarn Harlot . It is going quickly, and is good for multi-tasking--like while embroidering with Jeeves.  My trusty side-kick and I   have been making towels as prizes for our upcoming Christmas party & cheese tasting.  I need 3 and just finished the second one tonight.  There's a problem, happening with the design--it keeps moving at a certain spot.  On the first towel, you can see the black, which is supposed to be the shadow of the cheese, quite a bit lower than the cheese.  I had enlarged the design on the machine, and thinking that might be the problem (no...