3 thousand, 4 hundred miles away

It's 4.40am and I should have gotten up earlier. I just called my Dad to say good morning and tell him that I love him but I was too late, they'd bumped him up in the order of surgery and had already taken him to theater.

My Daddy is sick, sick in a way we couldn't have anticipated last week. A fairly routine biopsy has morphed into something else and I'm scared. Whatever good thoughts you can send, please send them my Dad's way.

Peek-a-break-your-nose!

I was round my friends' place last night like I always am on a Sunday night, and was playing with the baby when, bam! I got headbutted during a vigourous game of peek-a-boo. Having smacked my nose on multiple occasions leaving it a little crooked and deviant (OK, it's only the septum that's deviated) I'm pretty much used to nose pain but man, this is different. I think it might actually be broken! My whole face is constantly aching and the bridge of nose is pretty tender to the touch. There's no real bruising to speak of but, OUCH!

Lookit, a baby hat!

Pattern: Cast on 66st, knit round and round and round, decrease K10 K2tog etc etc. So basic I could knit it in my sleep.
Yarn: Bernat Cotton Tots in baby blue, about 1/4 skein, maybe a bit more.
For: The first of many babies on the way to the lab. Mini-Chi is due any day now!

For the love of an Orange button

A while ago I bought a skein of Artyarns Handpaint Stripe at a yarn shop that shall not be named for legal reasons (think, I hate this place and have not one good thing to say about it after this one shopping experience and would never go back.) This one lonely skein marinated in my stash for a long time while I contemplated the folly of being bullied into a yarn purchase I didn't really want to make.

Then Ravelry happened. One fairly quiet afternoon in lab I decided to go on a yarn-walk (kind of like a google walk where you search for one thing and then end up wandering all over the internet until you invariably end up looking at some kind of fetish porn you never dreamed could exist. Like MOHAIR. Be warned, my school's IT department deems the site "adult content.") And while I was disappointed to discover that no one had thought to put this yarn in some offending orifice or other, I did find that a couple of bright sparks had decided to make the modest and demure Calorimetry, pretty stripey calorimetries at that. No nudity involved.

So I followed suit, making not one but two calorimetries in an afternoon. One with 112st to start and the other with 88st for my sister. Did I mention that the package I sent for Christmas containing the gloves and hat I made for her has gone missing? No I don't think I did, I was too busy looking at "yarn".


Pattern: Calorimetry from Knitty Winter '06
Yarn & Needles: Artyarns Handpainted Stripe Superwash Merino. Color 135.
Modifications & Notes: Changed the cast on number but kept everything else the same. The yarn is nice, very pretty colours but I was extremely disappointed to find two knots and at least two spots where one of the plies had snapped and been tied together. Normally I'd just shrug this off as luck of the draw but a) it ruined the symmetry of the smaller calorimetry and I NEED SYMMETRY OR MY HEAD WILL EXPLODE, and b) this yarn cost a freaking fortune because the woman in the store that shall not be named charged me almost double the retail. I like orange buttons.

But then what to do with the left overs?

Work hard, play harder

To say that I'm a little stressed right now might be a slight understatement. My lab meeting snuck up on me and I'm busting ass at the bench trying to get as many experiments done before 9am Tuesday as is humanly possible. With a hangover. And a newly developed allergy to hypoallergenic nitrile gloves, both of which aren't really that surprising if you know me in person.

On top of draining all my mental capacity into Western Blots and IPs and cloning, I've been partying. Birthdays, housewarmings, beer, more beer and more beer on top. I wouldn't be shocked if I come down with some terrible lurgy next week when I finally let off the pressure valve.

And what of Dundee? Cables have become my brainless knitting. The stitches tell me what to do next, I don't have to put an ounce of independent thought into any of. it. Right now that is a phenomenal escape....

ETA: My photoshop mojo is also being exclusively directed solely towards making slides. This is waaaay off colourwise :)

The cables are gonna get you

Meet Dundee, my latest most favourite thing. Yes I know it looks very similar to my last favourite thing, maybe I'm stuck in a favourite thing rut. It's a rut I like. A rut with cables and more cables, and maybe a few more cables on top of that.

Yum.

One Night in Marseilles*

Five hours of seaming and how does the world repay me? With a rain storm, fog and zero natural light for the photo shoot. Oh and seaming reverse stockinette? IT SUCKS. A girl can't have everything... Except the first FO of 2008 :)


Pattern: Marseilles Pullover by Kathy Zimmerman, Interweave Knits Summer 2006.
Yarn & Needles: Queensland Collection Uruguay DK, colour 05 (plum), 9 balls purchased for a ridiculously low price at LittleKnits.com. Knitpicks options 4.5mm and 4mm.


Modifications: Smaller needles to get gauge and DK yarn instead of worsted. Despite knitting the smallest size (34") I followed the neckline directions for the largest size. I three-needle bound off 17 stitches at each shoulder then sewn-bound off the remaining live stitches..... OK, I didn't exactly do that. First I cast of in a regular way and couldn't get the bastard thing over my head, much to my house mate's amusement. Curses, ripping and re-seaming ensued before I could finally get the thing over my enormous noggin ;)

How is a model supposed to work under these conditions?

So far I'm loving it! The yarn is slick and soft with a wonderful silk sheen. It still smells like Kookaburra too which is always a good thing! I'm glad I waited with this knit and made it when both my skills and taste in yarn had improved. Now to raid the stash for the next project!

*IF only this pattern was called the Paris Pullover.....

Still no FO :(

The sweater is just lying there in pieces, blocked and dry, begging me to seam her up. But no. No time time....

Last night instead of seaming I went to see the Samuel Beckett play "Happy Days" at the BAM. Now my schooling in literature is minimal ("How did she end up buried in the ground like that?" "It's a metaphor, dumbass"), but I did really enjoy it. At the expense of my sweater.

Incidentally I was going to exclaim when there were four, but oh no, there are now FIVE babies on the way in my lab. FIVE!! Three postdocs and two wives are expecting little bundles of poop joy. Better get those needles clicking!

Spot the difference

On the left is a correctly crossed cable, on the right, the duplicate stitch. Or is it the other way round? It's a been a couple of hours since I took these pictures ;)

I don't think it's too noticeable (humor me if I'm deluded) but I haven't blocked it out yet. I don't think it is glaringly obvious, a non-knitter would never point and stare and say "YOU"RE CRAP." A knitter might but then I'd just have to bow my head in shame and sadly agree.

Oh well, just the arm decreases and the seaming to go....

BTW, I know the colour of this sweater is changing from post to post. For some reason my camera decides that the sweater is either grey or purple as it sees fit. This decision, however, is not based in reality as the yarn is actually plum coloured!

First Screw Up of '08!

CAN YOU SEE IT??

OK, I'll grant you that it's not an easy question considering I already attempted a fix at the mistake, and that the particularly heinous mistake in question is kind of blurry in this hastily snapped picture.... BUT.... if you can find it I may well slap you first, then cry on your shoulder second. Never knit cables after Free Beer Hour. (New Year's Resolution #1, methinks.)

Also, if you spot another mistake that I didn't catch I'll give you a candy bar. I will have licked it first, naturally.