Hello BBC

BBC top 100- in answer to the all knowing Auntie Bubbo Pants:
http://www.velvet-c.com/2009/03/hello_bbc.htm

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen I really don't like Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte Or charlotte bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling I tried, I really did, but I couldn't
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible I seriously read the whole thing when I got divorced.
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis Again, I just got divorced.
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley don't read this while pregnant. Trust me.
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte's Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams currently re-reading
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo. finally

26

Grandma Della's Cashmere

This is a special project. My grandmother is 82. Isn't she beautiful? Beauty is only skin deep, I know, but I'm so fortunate that her lovely image is a forecast for my own face. I love to think about that.

This was an emotional project for me, I walked home from the yarn store, not having found a pattern worthy of her, and it is cold outside, here in Colorado. She asked me, via my mother, to knit her a hat.

So, I was walking home from the yarn store, and crying, thinking of what little time I have left for her to be in this world with me. I walked back and bought two balls of Karabella cashmere/silk, in white, to match her lovely hair, that was part of her request, and proceeded to pour over my japanese stitch dictionary. These pictures don't show the stitch definition, but I chose motifs that reminded me of the 20's. Fans, and subtle bobbles, it is quite lovely.

She is thrilled. I am thrilled. I'm very satisfied and deeply moved that she loves her hat and that it will keep her warm for the rest of the winter.

Viking Interlude 445

This is what I've been playing with. I got a new sewing machine! Actually, I bought it used from someone who bought it used, on Craigslist. I found someone in an online sewing community who paid $1200 for it in 2005, and I paid $250. So I'm doing the happy dance. It is so much fun to play with. I walked over to the book store yesterday on my lunch hour and just poured over 12 or 13 fabric related books. I just fell in love with two of them:



Simple Sewing with a French Twist by Celine Dupuy







And...

Printing by Hand by Lena Corwin























I really needed another time consuming, fund consuming, self consuming hobby. (I'm so happy!)

Babel built underground

The last day of January. I have read the first two pages of a seven page New Yorker article for the required reading of an MIT writing class (free on line), having to do with writing about science.

(I have been trying to find ways to improve my writing for work, blog, and getting more into writing in general.)
Here is the link:

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/05/14/070514fa_fact_kolbert?currentPage=2

So far, this is my favorite paragraph:

The L.H.C. is a kind of Babel built underground. Dozens of countries have manufactured its components, and dozens more have lent manpower and expertise. (Some contracts went to Russian physicists who previously worked for the Soviet military; in this way, the collider has provided a livelihood for scientists whose employment options might otherwise include selling nuclear secrets.) When I ate in CERN’s lunchroom, I heard people speaking English, French, German, and Italian, as well as several languages that I couldn’t identify. The place was so crowded that it took me five minutes to pay for a cup of coffee, proving the elemental truth that man can build a superconducting collider but not a functional cafeteria.

by Elizabeth Kolbert May 14, 2007

I passed. I'm so glad its over.

So I'm way pregnant at this point, and my company offered the opportunity to become PMP certified at no cost to me, and in this economy, it seemed really worth it. I studied my butt off, and scheduled the test as early as I could because I'm not getting any smaller, and I wanted to be as comfortable as possible during the test. On Friday, I passed. 200 of the most complicatedly worded multiple choice questions in 4 hours, and I passed. I'm so happy. My reward to myself, was yarn, of course, but with it, just a little something extra -- a new LYS opened up maybe a year ago or so, and I have not let myself go because they carry Malibrigo, and I have heard so much about it..the crack cocaine of yarn-- and I'm, like, afraid of crack cocaine. But, yes, I hopped on over, fondled all of the Malibrigo that I have never had the pleasure of fondling before, and purchased two hanks of 'natural' 50/50 merino silk Malibrigo. I casted on for a scarf in my Alterknits book, which is the same 'natural' cream color. I've been in heaven.

How I found myself knitting with dpn's on the bus this morning

Last year, I took a class from Ann Budd, who asked us to purchase the Fall '07 Interweave Knits issue as course material for learning to knit toe-up socks.

In early December, ms. thing was looking through the magazine and asked for some spiral boot socks. With all the Christmas knitting I had, I wasn't able to cast on until a couple of weeks ago, and since ms. thing was still at her father's home for the Holidays, I knitted about two inches and then stopped to wait for a fitting.

I've been working on the Starsky Jr. sweater on the bus because it is knitted on an Addi Lace circular needle and not dpn's, (much safer from a 'holding onto your needles' standpoint with regards to bus kniiting) but ms. thing informed me that I can 'forget about the sweater because I want my boot socks a lot more'. She got some boots for Christmas. I asked her if they were cowboy boots and she said, "Mom, when you have a horse and ride it all the time, you just call them boots." So, yes, they are cowboy boots to me. (She has a horse at her dad's house.)

So that is how I found myself knitting very carefully with dpn's on the bus this morning.

Surprise!

I hmmmed and haaaawd about finding out the gender of this baby. Ultimately, I decided to find out for practical reasons, we can't agree on a boy's name, and ms. thing might have some adjusting to do if the baby is a girl....having been my only daughter for almost eleven years. Better to start adjusting now.

But nooooooooo. Today was the 20 week ultrasound, and, well, nothing giving. So I thought I would post photos of my latest cast on...my first baby surprise jacket. I bought EZ's 'workshop' back in September at the LYS annual 15% off sale, and we'll see how this goes. i want to knit a size closer to a newborn than a full-grown baby, so I'm using my own stitch counts, proportional to the stitch counts used in EZ's 'pattern'. I used quotes here, because, even she states that this was puzzling to her...how on earth this toallita (little towel) is going to end up being a garment of any kind will be a surprise to me. And so will be suitable for this new kid who is keeping her secret....um...or his secret, for another five months.

Orange Koigu Baby Cable Moto Hat

Knitting again! This is a lovely Koigu orange I picked out for a hat for Moto. I'm doing baby cables. This yarn is pretty luxurious! I'm using needles I inherited from my husband's grandmother, who lived her whole life in Tokyo. So there is something sweet about knitting my son a hat with his great obaachan's needles. Some good Karma there.

South Side Girl

I have a new addiction, crying tears of joy.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Utt-6HumUU&feature=rec-HM-fresh

Link thingy isn't working. This is something I found on youtube this morning: a lovely video about Michelle Obama, narrated by her mother. I guess you would have to paste the URL into your browser.

It made me cry, although, lately, that is not hard to do. :)

Guess who I saw yesterday.

Dream Trip?

OK, I admit I have a politics addiction. I didn't even know a person could have such a thing until I joined the DNC group on Ravelry and started to follow the mod's blog. I am eating up every sound bite, mostly fed to me by searching youtube for Rachel Maddow and sorting by date, at least, that is my current addiction. And Jon Stewart and the Colbert Report are just, you know, breakfast - the most essential meal of the day.

It all started with Palin's announcement just after the DNC. I remember being excited about the convention, all the energy for Barack just floating around, like fresh air to breathe. I'm asthmatic, so that is like the best thing I can compare with, totally fresh air.

But I wonder if fear feeds addiction, because as soon as I started to hear factoids about Palin, I just started going a little bit nuts. I understand faith. I do. After my divorce, I was the church lady. I went to a 'seeker sensitive' church, with a rockin' band, and I did the powerpoint slides for the main church service, which was on average, about 200 people. I did coffee bar, and pancake breakfast for the seniors. I don't understand shooting animals from planes. I don't. And, being someone who has been lucky enough to travel a bunch, I don't understand not ever having had a passport until your 40's. I know that sounds snobby. I know she is like millions who haven't been as lucky as I have been. I can't get over it. If I had never been any place except for Wasilla my whole life, and was suddenly governor, I would book a trip to Paris. Or, actually, I'd love to just see NYC. My dream trip right now is Turkey. When I was in India, I met a man during a tour to see the Taj Majal, and he said if I was impressed, I must see Istanbul. See what I mean? Does this woman not have a dream trip? What are her dreams? It seems that leader of the world is not among this woman's dreams. She was too busy to see new places? Can't you work that sort of thing into your diplomacy role? Governor's aren't allowed to take a vacation? I know she has a lot of kids, but I took my 10 year old daughter to India and to Japan, to Mexico, to Las Vegas, we road tripped it to Santa Fe, and my two year old has been to Tokyo three times. Plus, I'm sure the governor can find a sitter for a weak to just go and see Paris.

Of all of the reasons to be fearful of this woman becoming President, the not traveling thing is probably the dumbest. It has left the largest impression on me though.

What is your dream trip?

Oh yeah, I'm like almost three months pregnant, and knitting makes me nauseous, I don't know why. Everything I love to do makes me nauseous. Even searching youtube. Thus, no knitting FO's or WIPs stash photos. Boring.

SLACKERUPRISING IS NOW AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD

Go and see Eddie Vetter cover Cat Stevens in Michael Moore's new movie: SLACKERUPRISING (about 20 minutes in.)

http://slackeruprising.com/download/

Off to Alaska

These are the wedding hats, meaning, I knitted them for a wedding gift, for a sweet couple we know who live in Alaska. Now that I have a photo of them, they will go off to Alaska in the mail. I'm really trying very hard not to let the word Alaska capture my brain and take it to a terrifying place. Forget about universal health care, forget about pulling the troops, just please, don't take away my right to rule over my own body. Two more months of nightmares ahead, and then...what then?

Starsky and Hooks

I'm knitting the Starsky Jr. sweater with lavender cascade 220 for Ms. Thing. I'm about 3/4 way done with the back, have not started the sleeve-hole shaping yet. I ordered two crochet books, because I'm really loving the way crochet looks, its been catching my eye lately.

finished hats, onto a new cowl

I finished the hats I knit up for a wedding gift, yesterday. I started a cowl, with two totall different types of yarn, one is a hand painted mohair blend I bought from a quaint fiber studio in Chimayo, NM, near the Sanctuario. The other is called Panda Wool, a bamboo/merino fingering weight. It looks something like a super soft rainbow-y fishnet tube. I'm totally loving it. I think it might be the first thing I have knit for myself that I'm really looking forward to wearing. I'm just doing plain stockinette, and it really shows off the colors of the mohair, and I'm loving the stockinette curl in this case. No craptastic pictures, or any other kind today. bummer.

DNC Knitters

This is a link to a map I made of the nearest LYSs to dowtown Denver, for the convenience of the DNC knitters.

insomnia and not so coolpix

Man, its so late its early. 4:48 am. I woke up around 2. My blog is lacking photos big time. Where is my camera? In the top drawer of my dresser. Where is the memory card? In the second drawer of the desk in the foyer. OK. Be right back.

OK. so I have this Nikon Coolpix S1. It clearly is not going to produce a beautiful blog for me. Here are the shots:

There are 400 photos on the memory card, and a 'wizard' won't let me 'deselect' all of the photos so I can then select the 5 shots I want. Well, want is a strong term. The 5 shots which will demonstrate why I'll never have a beautiful knitting blog.

The wizard is on photo 110 now..............

..............

While I'm waiting, I'll take this opportunity to complain about the interface screen which blogger provides. Boring! Totally uninspiring! I've been known to carefully fill my pilot vanishing point fountain pen with avocado colored ink and write thoughtfully and ever so slowly and beautifully across the fine lined slightly tinted pages of a leather bound journal. I'd love the option of choosing a nice background while I type into this thing. But I'm a cheapo, and won't pay for a fancier blogging provider. So you get what you pay for, I guess, which brings me back to my coolpix:









I guess the last one isn't so bad. Did that bobble poke you in the eye? I'm sorry. This is a retainer case I'm knitting for Ms. Thing, who now has two retainers. I had one retainer at 16 and she has 2 at 10. A ten year old is not going to hold on to two retainers for two years no matter how many bobbles I knit into this lovely (artyarns) retainer case pouch, but a mom's gotta try her best.

The stitch is the lorgnette cable from Barbara Walker's 2nd treasury.

OH yeah, Ms. Thing is back from her summer break, and I'm loving that she has returned. 5th grade is going well so far. (2 days in.) I'll keep you posted.

Health Care

Though this is a knitting blog, I need to write about health care today.

I'm awake. I have been sleeping or ignoring, or just plain lazing. Lazy, lazy thinking has been my way when it comes to health care. I'm not saying I believe other countries have a perfect system, but I am saying that America needs a different imperfect system, one not driven by profit for shareholders, which motivates denial of ....health care.

I just joined a Barack Obama group on line, not because his plan is exactly what I think needs to happen, but because his site's Sicko group is where pertinent events are being tracked. If you would like to know more information, I am offering my humble help; I'll welcome you to join me in beginning to read the documents we need to read to decide what kind of people we are.

Is Frankensteiny a word?

I chose some coral beads for my candle flame shawl, so the same color scheme as light turquoise native jewelry with coral inlay, and I like it. I'm feeling a time crunch, as I have not finished the right 'shoulder' of the shawl and still have the left side to do, and Marcy is headed back to Chicago in a week! Also, it is coming out a bit stripey. I find myself wondering if I can find a crash course in embroidery to soften the color boundaries with some interesting embelishment. Overall, it is feeling a bit frankensteiny right now, the peril of an inexperienced garment designer...I only want to be a knitter! ( So then, why didn't you follow the freaking P-A-T-T-E-R-N? :) Because I can't follow a pattern, it is way too boring. Or at least, I can't follow a triangle pattern. Maybe something more interesting would be follow-able.

At the very least, Marcy can drape it over a chair in a lesser used room. Since she likes the color blue, she might not mind using it in this way. But I really had hoped to make her something she could wear to a book signing or art opening, as she has that type of a dream come true life. sigh.

Hopefully, I can do a photo shoot of it soon, just to document that I knitted this collosal thing.

Crazy Woman

This is Mountain Colors "Crazy Woman" color way yarn. I'm knitting a pair of regular 'ol toe-ups and loving it, I tell you! Purple, rust, copper, orange, teal, it goes on and on. Just Beautiful.

This and That.

I'm going to eat Tapas tonight. And listen to Flamenco guitar, because I have tickets to Jesse Cook, a musician brought to boulder by KUNC, Public Radio.

I spoke with my daughter today. She said she got tired of spinning beads into her fuchsia yarn and so wound it up into a ball and is now spinning without the beads. I get to see her Friday though I am told the exchange is going to be a challenge for her other Ohana. The grandma grapevine said this to me.

The twin waves cables in Barbara Walker's 2nd treasury are beautiful, gorgeous, I love them, and they give me that feeling of having accomplished something worthwhile. I brought them on the bus today and it just tickles me to work with red silk against a public transit backdrop. I feel like a princess. Not bad for a woman my age to feel like a princess once in a while!

My 82 year old grandmother sent Moto a $50 check for his 2nd birthday, and I had originally decided to file it with the others, thinking that is way too much money to spend on a two year-old's birthday present, but I learned after, that my brother used his daughter's check to buy a wading pool, and so I ordered Moto some musical instruments.

Now is where I am going to go on and on about how music lessons have changed my life. Not my lessons - ms. thing's lessons. Each day (when she is actually living with me instead of the summer-time kid-heaven horse ranch her dad now owns) she opens her violin case, rosins her bow, attaches her shoulder rest. If her notes are out of tune, we pull out the tuner and I hold it while she makes some adjustments on the fine tuners and then we start the practice. It usually starts with a couple of easy review pieces, then we go to the newest skill she is "allowed" to do, having graduated to that skill from a previous skill she mastered last week. (Have I said yet that her violin teacher is a goddess? She is.) After practicing the new skill, we take half of her review pieces and polish, the next day we do the other half. I'm not going to say I'm 100% disciplined with this, but the girl can play the violin. I swear. She sounds amazing. If I do say so myself, and I do.

We started this four years ago come September. Moto is 2. So from the very first day of his life, he has heard all of these pieces and I will tell you he wants to get his hands on that violin so bad he could just pee his diaper. Sometimes he does! So I'm totally going to take these instruments I bought for him and start up a routine just before violin practice. I thought of this yesterday as his eyes glazed over watching Sesame Street for the umpteenth time while I lie there like Jabba the Hut on my bed. Wouldn't he rather play with:







So I'm looking forward to having these in a case, cerimonially taking out the case and watching his excitement, demonstrating the instrument's sound, and then giving him his so we can play together: having a real practice routine with Moto with these instruments. (I bought two of each so we can play together.) We are going to have a blast. Thanks to my grandma :)

Reunions

I've been walking to the bookstore on my lunch hour and leafing through various books that catch my eye. One such book was about organization. I've been pretty disorganized since my son was born. (Today is his 2nd birthday.)

The book said the palest ink is better than the best memory. Write everything down. After about a month of re-using office paper I find here and there, I'm past writing down just my regular to-do list. I have written the names of 20 people I would like to stay in touch with better. Some of these people I literally haven't seen in years!

I've been inviting them into my life again, and some have embraced me with open arms. Some are still simply a name written down at the top of a blank little piece of paper I carry around with me. Just seeing their name and knowing I'm going to contact them makes me happy.

Go check out the Knitting Sutra blog latest sacred Sunday! Totally inspiring. (You can find it in my blog roll.)

Spicy Red Tank, More Blue Flames

On the Knitting front:

I am knitting a tank top made of Solo Silk (50% Silk 50% Wool - single ply) from Brooks Farm. I bought it at the Estes Park Wool Market, mid June. The closest thing on their site that looks like the yarn I'm using is their Tomato Rose Solo Yarn (100% wool).





As I knit, this yarn reminds me sometimes of red chile and sometimes of cinnamon. It is hot spicy latina sass either way. :)

My tension is 7 stitches to the inch on US2 Addi Turbos. To make the math work out, I have chosen a 3X1,2X1 ribbing from waist to chest. I took the measurement at the lowest point where I want the tank to hang, multiplied by 7, and casted 280 stitches, joining for round knitting. I have four markers, one at each side and one at center front, one at center back. I did this because I am doing 2X1, 3X1 from side to center, then mirroring with 3X1, 2X1 from center to side, and the same thing on the back side. Waist shaping: When the work was a few inches long, I decreased on the front side of the markers leaning toward the front, so beginning the row with ssk, and ending the row with k2tog, for seven rows, removing 2" from the circumference. I continued, to a point where I want to now start knitting the chest in a cable design. I found some beautiful asymmetrical cables in BW2nd Treasury that work across 15 stitches. I took the work off of the needles enough to try on the tank and I'm loving how it is coming out. Except for the fact that my rib cage just under my chest is a lot smaller around than the inches provided by the 266 stitches I have on the needles right now. I want to wear the tank over an oxford type shirt, and so I want the bust to be fitted. What do I do? Decrease the four inches over a mall number of rows? Rip back a few inches to accommodate an even decrease? Or calculate an even decrease of the four inches I need to reduce, and live with a longer tank? I like option 3. Thanks for helping me sort this all out.

So: Decrease by 28 stitches, beginning the row with SSK, SSK, ending the row with K2tog, K2tog, over 7 rows. Then start cabling! Can't wait!!

As far as the deep V goes, I ran into the exact same problem as the woman who opted to make a vest out of it (consult Ravelry): the sleeve caps were way to short for the armhole. Really, I was 23 rows short, and there are only 25 rows in the sleeve cap, so it was off by half, or double, or however you want to think of it. I'm opting to reknit the sleeve caps, adding an extra full row such that 23 total rows are added. I knitted all of the pieces and then used the needle to cast on the red tank, so I either am going to splurge on an Addi US2 Lace, or wait until the red tank is done to reknit the sleeve caps.

The candle flame shawl is crawling along during my bus commute of 80 minutes per day, and I think will look lovely once blocked. I'm running out of the second lightest blue, and have three blues to choose from for the most prominent part of the shawl, which will wrap around the front to hug my friend Marcy. I think I might just let her choose. I'm thinking of some light beading for this portion but can't decide between turquoise or a contrasting color, like cinnabar. Mmmm. Cinnabar sounds yummy!

Look Around

You'll get no answer from me
About what I want or what I get
Brave enough to speak afraid to see
Confuse the issue til you forget
And I've tried
To finally decide
Why
I'm in your face

And if you can't already tell
I am unable to let things go
I'm told I do it very well
But more important you should know
That all the same
You've got no one to blame
But yourself
If you call that a waste

Cause it ain't me
That's been hurting you inside
And if you've learned
You'll know much more than I
That you're gonna have
to go and find it
You'll have to dig beneath the ground
You'll have to unearth
every ugly stone
That kept you on your own
And simply put them down
You're gonna have to look around

You'll get no answer from me
About what I get or want I want
That was enough to make her leave
She's not the first one come and gone
And I don't care
Buyer beware
Of me
Cause it might get rough

If you want peace then live alone
If you wanna hide then find a stage
Each a brief but perfect home
To accomodate your rage
And sometimes
In the midst of all my crimes
I feel lost
Or have I lost enough?

Remaining friends
Remind me as they say
It's up to you
The things you throw away
And still you're gonna have
to go and find it
You'll know much more than I
That you're gonna have
to go and find it
You'll have to dig beneath the ground
You'll have to unearth
every ugly stone
That's kept you on your own
And simply put them down
You're gonna have to look around

You're gonna have to look around.

Look Around - Blues Traveler

Just some good lyrics I'm listening to today.

Ravelry: Why O Why?

All of a sudden, about two months ago, I got this message when I clicked on my Ravelry bookmark at work:

You cannot access the following Web address:
http://www.ravelry.com/people/hopelovepeace


The site you requested is blocked under the following categories: Dating/Personals


You can:
The web site you have requested has been blocked due to one of the following reasons:

a) presents an information security risk to the company.

b) contains inappropriate content.

c) violates the company's policy, or

d) is a company website designed for external use only.

If you have a compelling business need to access this web site, please submit an online web access request using this link: Contact Infomation Security to request a review Information Security will review and follow up with you. (Please note: Director level or above must approve access to any blocked web sites.) Access to web-based e-mail (ex: hotmail, yahoo mail, etc) is currently blocked due to security (virus, worm, etc) risk and will not be permitted -- we are pursuing additional protective measures to permit this access in the future. Thanks for your support and patience
Company Risk Management/Information Security


Use your browser's Back button or enter a different Web address to continue.


And I was completely innocent! Just browsing knitting patterns! :)

Can it be fixed? (Other than asking my director, because, um, that ain't gonna happen. )

Moto Moto Moto

I took these photos of Moto today on a walk out behind my folks' new place. A mindful moment. :)

Radio Shack, Mindfulness and PMSing

I need to start moving my body a little bit, I'm so prone to sitting around. I work in downtown Denver, so there are a lot of neat places to walk to.

Today during my lunch hour, I walked to Radio Shack and bought a $15 radio.


Then I blew $40 on a set of V-Moda headphones at Virgin Records.


Then I walked to Barnes and Noble, picking up books and walking around through the stacks listening to my new radio, antennea jutting out of my backpack. I picked up a book that caught my attention, called The Mindful Woman. Wow, I read through the first section of the book, and was sort of blown away. A lot of ideas there at once.

One of the ideas is that in a lot of cases, to really know someone is to love someone. I had to let that sink in. I thought of the few people I've really spent the time to get to know. I understood Sue Patton Thoele to be saying this: rarely do you find a person with such bad qualities (once you really know them) that you cling to the notion of disliking them. The author says that paying focused attention to someone is an invaluable gift. It allows you know someone when you spend time being focused on them. Really focused.

Then the book leaps to: if you pay good and close attention to yourself, you get to know yourself better, and love yourself better.

I've struggled with this all of my life. This loving myself thing. Even through Whitney Houston's debut back in middle school- "learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all". It's amazing how knitting has helped, because it is my one thing that no one can stop me from doing. Mine all mine, completely focused on me the whole time.
I'll never fall out of love with the mindset knitting puts me in, and with the idea that there is fruit to show for my time on the planet.

I look forward to making a habit of walking to the bookstore, maybe the farther but quainter bookstore, Tattered Cover. They have a large staircase I can climb up and down.



I like the simplicity of using my little radio. The static at turning a corner reminds me that I'm a part of the world, my movements carry consequence. The family owns a 20G Zen at home that would offer zero static, but, I just can't seem to find the songs I want to listen to with all of the stuff we have put on it.

I heard "Right Here Right Now" on KBCO while walking away from the bookstore. "Right here, right now, there is no other place I want to be....then watching the world wake up from history." I was thinking the chorus goes along well with this idea of being in the moment and focused, really focused. (Also, how appropo can an 80's song be in 2008 with the election coming and all?)

If the radio plays a song that goes along with my mood and mind that well, why the heck do I need to go and search for that perfect song through directories albums and song lists? By that time, the mood is kind of over. I'm old school. I'm nerdy. I know. (Of course, not everyone has a KBCO, I'm so so spoiled with KBCO.)

P.S.
While still at the book store, I also flipped through "Knitting For Peace" and Project Linus brought tears to my eyes.

Anyone else PMSing out there today? Anyone?

Mosaic Game :)

1. sunflower and bud hdr, 2. Janie's Crab Legs, 3. Dragonfly, 4. Beautiful old lady from Darap(Sikkim) village, 5. LL, 6. Pink Elephant, 7. The Omen, 8. Peach Cobbler, 9. Fair Isle Tote Bag, 10. Shibuya Crossing at Night, 11. mum's world, 12. breathless

If you want to do it too, here are the instructions:

a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
b. Using only the first page, pick an image.
c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.

1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you go to?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What do you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One word to describe you.
12. Your Flickr name.

Japanese word for Seredipity?

I cast this on when I was in Tokyo. It is called "Japanese Feather" and is from BW2ndTreasury. It is really easy to work. Definitely a high payback for the time and effort involved in the stitch. The yarn is the undyed silk I bought from Sarah's yarns to make the Forecast Sweater, I have no idea how long ago that was. I think it predates the blog.

(The color is more accurate in the 2nd photo.)




The problem is that it really doesn't look like any sort of garment a person would wear. A scarf, maybe, but I made it too narrow to be a shawl. I have 1000 yards of this lovely stuff! It would be a very long scarf, I think.

Well, can you believe one of Cheryl Oberle's Folk Shawls calls for 1000 yards of silk? (I know I am so behind the times on this discovery. I can't get to Ravelry from here at work, but even just plain old Google will tell you that I'm like the last person on Earth to know about the Kimono Shawl.) Keeping with the Japanese motif! So the silk I bought was meant to be knitted up into the Kimono Shawl. The funny thing is, shawls were one thing I just didn't get when I first started knitting. I definitely have caught the bug. That is obvious.

Long Lost...But Found.... Friend

A friend I made when I was young, but lost somewhere along the way is going to re-enter my life for a season. During my trip to Santa Fe a couple of months ago, a memory of her just jumped into my brain, pushed all of the other thoughts aside.

We were playmates as young as Elementary school years, and knew each other well in high school. We had more of a camaraderie than a childish BFF kind of thing going on. She supported me a lot when I needed it, that I do remember very well.

After high school, I went off to engineering school, and she graduated number one in her college class at UNM. It was too many years later when the grapevine revealed that fact to me, and I just became so proud of her! A daughter-sister feeling. I have the first email I got from her printed out and hanging up on my Dilbert-cube wall. It says "Chicago is cracking in ice, and it is hard to imagine the deserts of Rajasthan exist." She became a writer.

Three or four years ago, we found each other and shared our stories over a meal. She wore a shawl. I remember that she cuddled into her shawl at dinner a couple of times. I remember it was red or rust, but not knitted. Weaved maybe? She told me of her adventures. She was headed to law school after undergrad, and just decided to take a hard turn away from materialism, and went to Asia instead. She walked all over Asia. She studied various Buddhist practices. She took a vow of silence for a year. She learned what she needed to learn. Then she came back. To Chicago. Not to our little home town in Southern Colorado.

After that reunion, I proceeded to date and marry an amazing man, move to a different city, change my name. She has been busy as well, I learned when I googled her name (because of Santa Fe). She has published a book. It is called the CTA Chronicles. When the screen popped up, that daughter-sister feeling rushed over me, so proud!

I no longer had her private email, so I sent her a note at the book's web site. Guess what. She wrote back. I have to admit I was a little relieved she still had time for me. It turns out she is going to be in Colorado all summer! It is a sad time for her. I won't share that part, but she needs something soft and warm to cuddle into right about now.

Can you guess what I am making for her?


Normally, when faced with an endless array of beautiful yarn colors, like when I was in Creede, I have a very tough time choosing. Here is the excerpt from Marcy's book that made the color choice unusually easy for me:

So, if my truth isn't your truth and your truth isn't the truth of anyone else, how can we be true to each other? Satisfactorily, satisfyingly true blue.
Out of the blue, a large black man in a large shirt my favorite shade of blue leaps up to the front of the bus to chat up the bus driver as tenderly as he would a man tending bar. The driver's doing a good job attending to the bus but, meanwhile, he falls into a chat-rap with the guy. The guy's shirt is shiny as the night.



I bought five shades of blue, started with the deepest darkest shade, and I've decided to only use the two darkest shades. Being a new knitter, I had no idea how far each hank would go. This isn't exactly a secret gift, but Marcy's computer has crashed, so I'm not sure if she'll see this or not. She'll see it Friday when we meet and head to the Estes Park Wool market together.

Marcy, if you see this, here's to you! Congratulations on your book being published!

Frootloops

Get this. I'm sitting at my LYS knit-night and this occurs during introductions:

"I'm Kristi and I'm knitting this sock, it is something close to Cookie's Monkey pattern - I have more time than I thought, she only needs it by Thursday."

And I'm like:

"Cookie? How did you get a test knit gig with Cookie?"

And she's like:

"She's my best friend. We blog together."

And I'm thinking: "I'm talking to another local knitting rockstar, aren't I?"

So my ears are totally perked up to see if I can find anything else out about this knitting rockstar while I sit and knit my. candle. lame. shawl. Yes, no "f" because as nice as Kristi is, she has to be thinking: Candle flame shawl. How lame.

So I bring up Ravelry, and I say something to the effect that, yes I have heard of Cookie, and know about the Monkey pattern and isn't Ravelry the bomb? And I forget how I learn this, because this is all just no big deal to Kristi at all, but somehow, she ends up mentioning the froot loop sock. I love the frootloop sock. I love the pictures of all the frootloops lying on the floor around her feet. So I'm like really excited at this point, and I can feel my voice getting really loud, telling Ms. Thing that when we get home, I have to show her the frootloop sock on line, and she's going "My mom is a frootloop so these socks will suit her just fine."

Meanwhile, Ms. Thing is bonding more with Kristi than I am being that they both agree that spinning is way more fun than knitting. And its totally no fair, because Ms. Thing has never even heard of the frootloop sock.

Now, to top this all off, I logged into Ravelry yesterday for the first time since Monday (I had access from work until about a month ago -- Why the heck is Ravelry categorized as a personals/dating site?) And I have a PM waiting there. Um. From. Kristi. She found me. She looked for me. All I had time to do in the meantime, was go and look at her blog and fall in love with this.
So as soon as candlelame is done, lookout needles. You are going for a ride.

I know it is stupid of me to put a link here to a sock that everybody and their dog is knitting, but it also feels stupid not to at this point.

Kristi, if you come across this post, Um. Hi! Hi. How's it going? Tries to act normal.

Colorado - Fiber Mecca?

I went to Creede, CO over Memorial Day. The most incredible camp site ever because it has its own LYS. A camp site. With an LYS. Camp Site. LYS.

I bought 3500 yards of tapestry yarn (virgin wool) , five hanks, each in a different and lovely hugh of blue.






The shop is owned by Teri Inman. Just google her name, and you'll learn she is a very accomplished weaver. She is going to offer classes in all of the obvious fiber skills, plus Arashi Shibori dyeing! Oh, my lord her stuff is gorgeous. Too bad it is a 6 hour drive from Boulder to Creede, or I would totally hang out there all of the time and take all of her classes. The shop is called Bristol Yarnworks Studio and is truly amazing, with a view of the river. Any yarnee passing through MUST STOP in to see it. (Did I mention she raises her own herd of cashmere goats?!)

I immediately cast on the candle flame shawl in the darkest color of my tapestry yarn, as Teri advised that I start with the darkest and move up to the lightest, sequentially. The candle flame was chosen because it is very flexible for size (just quit whenever you want) and it handles color changes beautifully. (Just take a look on Ravelry, and you'll find a gazillion beautiful candle flame shawls, both solid and multi-colored.)

Yesterday, I stopped by B&N and bought "Folk Shawls" by Cheryl Oberle. She lives in Denver! I'm so excited she has included a Rebozo! And a Kimono Shawl! I just had to have the book when I discovered it during my search for a shawl pattern for the tapestry yarn. I have it here at my desk and keep flipping through it, longing to touch the shawls in the photos.

With Ann Budd in Boulder, Cheryl Oberle in Denver, Teri Inman in Creede, and Sally Mellville popping in annually to catch some slopes, Colorado is proving an excellent place to carry on a knitting addiction. I'm so lucky!

Ann Budd Toe-Up Sock Class -or- "Toe-Up-Upside-Down-Wavy-Lace-Koigu"

That's right, I ditched work last Thursday to attend Ann Budd's toe-up sock class. What a great lady. There was much laughter and learning, and yes, I am almost finished with my first real sock. (We made a baby sock in class.)

I splurged on Koigu (sp?) in a black/brown (Taupe?) color, and since I bought the 'Favorite Socks' book for Ann to sign, I used the wavy lace pattern. Sort of. I'm thinking the pattern is upside down because I ran into that realization on the baby Kimono when I tried to knit a 'banana leaf' panel - but the Kimono is knit from the neck down! Yes, the banana leaf was upside down and I opted for vine lace instead. (also upside down, but it isn't a obvious for vine lace;)

Um. So my banner should say : Living and Knitting Upside Down in Boulder.

Anyway, my first "Toe-Up-Upside-Down-Wavy-Lace-Koigu" sock is turning out amazingly soft and lovely, very much satisfying my addiction at the moment.

I am looking at the workshops for Estes Park wool market

http://www.estesnet.com/events/woolmarket.htm

and if I were going to sign up, I would have a very difficult time deciding between these workshops: Steeking, Crochet, Double Knitting. I decided to pass this year and hopefully join the fun on Saturday or Sunday. I'll pet me some Llamas and buy me some yarn, if it all works out right.

Next Sweater

This is the next sweater I want to knit. I love the cute collar. The vertical ribbing seems to add a flattering flair. Hopefully, the Japanese Knitting group in Ravelry will be able to help me translate the pattern. I bought so many pattern magazines in Japan that I don't remember which one this sweater came from. If anyone asks, I'll go an look it up.

I suppose step one is to find the right yarn. Yeah. Buy yarn. Sounds like a good step one to me :)

The deep v is coming along well. At this pace, though it will be mid-May before I finish it. I get a lot of compliments on the color from other bus passengers, so I'm excited to be able to wear it someday!

New Mexico

My little familia is taking a road trip. We're heading out today.

Yesterday was take your child to work day. I brought ms. thing, and at a presentation given by local authorities on internet security, we watched some videos from iSafe, and some other places. They are pretty scary!

Have a lovely weekend!!!

Lily's Yukata Finished!

I started this baby kimono prior to having started this blog. The WIP photos are in Ravelry, but now this is a finished object.

I chose vine lace because Lily is a Christian, and there is scripture along the lines of Jesus being the vine. HE is the vine, I think is what it says.

This yukata is made of Panda silk. I have detailed shots of the finished lace panel on the back coming soon to a post near you :)