No nupps yet…

Just more packing procrastination.
Think this will be enough to keep me occupied on the plane?


Whether it’s because of the imminent trip (Wool! Fiancé! Wool!) or the fact that I’m finally feeling better after days of being “off,” I’m positively giddy today. Not even the thought of the many sleepless airport/plane hours ahead has been able to make me feel anything besides bright and bubbly. I blame that same giddiness for going a little crazy at the bookstore today. Somber literary novel, intriguing mystery, mindless romantic fluff, and a knitting magazine*, all in one trip! All this and trying to figure out how one would wind yarn with one’s knees (Alison and Janet, please enlighten me!)…should be sufficient to keep my brain busy for twelve hours!

*For those of you thwarted in your attempts to purchase the Holiday Vogue Knitting at your LYS like I was (all copies sold out within a day of being available!), try Borders. Quite a bit less competition. Oh, and the issue? Definitely worth owning, if only to admire and think covetous thoughts about the blue-lilac cables and white lace.

I may not have a swift but I do have doorknobs

Yes, doorknobs.

Necessity is really the mother of invention. Well, inventions new to me at least.


In a pinch, these doorknobs worked as well for me as a pair of extra arms (when you take into account the advantage of the doorknobs being inanimate objects and thus possessing infinite patience) or the back of a chair. Fifteen minutes and some minor untangling later, I had myself one perfect ball of yarn.


I don’t have too many more days before I leave to tackle the things on my household to-do list. And yet, as soon as I run through my mental list to note that it’s all not checked off, my brain tacks up a “Gone Knitting” sign and I find myself playing with fiber. Call it stress-induced procrastination. Rather than putting clothes in the wash or making packing lists, I’ve been pondering what knitting projects to bring with me for the long, long plane ride (6am to 5pm…oh the joys of a non-direct cross-country flight). After all, choosing knitting projects is a complex endeavor. Most importantly, there should be at least two projects to minimize stitch pattern fatigue. Said projects must also be interesting enough to block out the frantically restless rat-in-a-cage feeling elicited by the tiny space allotted to one on the airplane. And yet, these projects can’t be so complex as require many manipulations that would be difficult in such a small space. So, given that Cyd comes with an entourage of no less than eight ball of mohair-containing yarn, all the strands of which love to tangle with one another, it won’t be making it into the carry-on. The bubble gum argyle sock 2, on the other hand, does manage to make the cut. But what other project bring along?
Well, you can probably guess from the skein-winding going on that I’m starting something new for the trip. With these. (What about the other WIPs? What WIPs?)


I wish I could capture reds accurately with my camera. Imagine the most perfect autumnal shade of rusty red occasionally lightening to a gold like fall leaves. I spotted this particular mostly solid shade of Koigu and could not leave the store without a few skeins. I even went back and bought more once I decided I wanted to show off the knitted item rather than hide it in my shoes as socks. Of course, in a perfect world, I would have sweaters, scarves, and socks all of this yarn, but in a perfect world, money also grows on trees and I float about all day in my Victorian mansion doing nothing more taxing than eating chocolate, sipping champagne, and knitting (the former two having no physical consequences, of course, being in a perfect world and all). Since I have yet to find that perfect world, I have to devote my four precious skeins to one perfect project. After much dithering, I finally settled on doing a smaller version of Madli’s Shawl , designed by the sock goddess herself. A fall scarf in fall colors. Watch this space for nupps.

Tumbling off the blog-wagon

It hardly seems possible that more than an entire week has elapsed since I last posted. Nothing specific precipitated this lapse. No malaise, no emergencies -- just a dash more than usual of mundane happenstances that litter the day to keep me completely occupied and away from the blogosphere. Admittedly, I have been trying to get a bit more done in lab since I will be going on a mini-vacation at the end of next week. At this time seven days hence, I will be joining the legions of knitters, spinners, weavers, and other fiber-addicts in making the pilgrimage to Rhinebeck. I would be beside myself with excitement had I not managed to come down with some odd strain of cold/stomach virus a few days ago. Now I’m preoccupied with fretting over all the things I would like to get done before I leave. Besides list of work-related things, there is also that knitting-related item known as the Rhinebeck sweater. To wit, Cyd.


A sick day wouldn’t be a sick day if one wasn’t actually ill but it’s still so indescribably frustrating to have hours and hours of potential knitting time on my hands just when I have no ability to do much else besides sleep. So, the front of Cyd has been growing very slowly. With just a week to go, perhaps Cyd will just have to be at the festival in spirit… However, is anyone else going to be there in person?

En pointe

Happy



Dancing

Foot!

Operation knitting retrieval was a success so here is the completed argyle sock number one. And just in time to join in on the


fun (hosted by the wonderful Lolly) too! As I have a tendency to be overly ambitious in my knitting plans, I'm going to try to be restrained this time and limit my sock celebrations to admiring sock yarns, finishing the argyles, starting only one other pair of socks, and of course, poring over these hallow tombs of sock knitting.


How are you celebrating this month of socks?

Une petite souris

Look who showed up on my doorstep yesterday!


She has flown all the way from Belgium (where she lived with her talented creator and a large delightful family filled with colorful characters) to come stay with me! The trip left the little dear a bit shaken up, though. The security officials must have been convinced that her travel conveyance, instead of holding a wee little mouse, harbored instead those mysteriously missing W*M*Ds. So, they weren’t terribly nice. They ripped open the package and tore into the box and roughed her up a bit before shoving everything back.


Fortunately, the damage was minimal. After a bit of a rest on a tuffet...


and some TLC with a little glue to put her tail back on, she is feel much better. In fact, she’s already helping to water my neglected plants and making friends with her new neighbors!


Merci beaucoup, chère Geraldine, pour m’as donné une souris beaucoup mignon! Bizous!