Amazing Lace!!

(this is my entry for challenge 1 of Amazing Lace)

Hi… I'm Beth, and I'm a knitter. My grandma taught me and she had a few rules:

1. don't knit socks, they're fiddly
2. don't knit lace, it's a pain

After years of knitting (both prolifically and not at all) this is the summer where grandma and I part ways, but since she died about 18 years ago I'm ok with that. I have signed up for an introduction to socks, and, well… here's some lace!

So we embark on an Amazing adventure just me and my lace (and grandma's ghost!)

Meet my lace…

Birch!

Birch?

Third time's a charm! Birch!

I understand from blogville that she can be a fickle partner so I did some training before we paired up… I made something that goes from big to small.

I also worked up her little sister! All the style, but none of the fluff!

 And we agreed that all that fluff of Kid Silk Haze might just be too much of a good thing so she's agreed to Knitpicks Shimmer in a color they call Morning Mist and grandma would call blue and white.

I gathered the tools and prepared for a formal start.

With great spirit, and promptness not often seen by me, we began our Amazing journey on a journey over Memorial Day week-end. Birch was cast on in the car on I-270 while stuck in traffic. Then cast on again on I-70… Knitted on the PA and OH turnpike as well as in a lecture hall, Birch and I are the team to beat! We have passed the challenge of the 299 stitch cast on and avoided the trials of a 3-year-old car sick boy… We are invincible!

What I learned at my college reunion…

1. I can not stay up like a college student and get up in the morning like a mom.
2. Most of the people you really wonder about don't show up.
3. Years later there are some people you can always count on.
4. The LYS was not interested in my business (their loss, I had cash).
5. Some people grow up to be more interesting.
6. Some are still dull.
7. Lorenzo's salads are still great.
8. You can get a fair amount of knitting done on the PA turnpike.
9. Some people marry very well.
10. I can still be inspired by a passionate professor.

Photos

Upper: Bunny being unsafe in his skivvies in the dorm window

Left: Bunny with one of "the rocks"

Right: Illuminations.

Great Expectations!

Yeah, I read it once… Pip, Miss Havisham, all those folks. I also wrote it once. I great math unit for eighth graders about probability and expected value! It was a wonderful unit, really pushed the idea about what kind of mathematics eighth graders can do. It's been revised and renamed Great Predictions, not exactly the same ring.

But the point is today is a day of Great Expectations! I am planning to start to turn this into Birch! Yes, today I face the dreaded 299 cast on. Luckily I will have plenty of time.

Why so much time? you ask. We're headed out this afternoon (by car) for our 16th college reunion! We haven't been back to Oberlin in 10 years so I'm excited. Of course I wish I was thinner, but as I prepare to go I realize that I'm pretty happy with who I am. What more do you want after 16 years?

Tomorrow is Knit in Public day. I'll most likely be doing some KiP either on Tappan Square or Wilder Bowl or some such. If you're going to be in Oberlin, let me know! 

There once was a knitter…

There once was a knitter named Heather
Who knitted in all sorts of weather
She had lots of fun
And got everything done
But that cable scarf never came together

That was the kniterick Heather and I wrote Monday afternoon for her submission to the contest we held for the last meeting of our after school knitting class. Julie has more as well as some of the outstanding games we played. Prizes? Left over yarn of course, these kids have got to work on their stash! 

Monday I had one of those days. I felt like nothing I did was quite good enough. I didn't think I taught particularly well, I fought with my blog, and I yelled at my child. Luckily things are feeling brighter and life goes on.

Sunday when I finished the Button Hole Bags I grabbed some left over cotton and figured I would make the Mason Dixon Warshrag. I didn't have the right length size 8 circular so I went with double points. What fun (not the double points, that was a pain. The warshrag was fun). It was a quick knit and I learned how to make bobbles! The only touble I had was on the purl rounds I kept getting the yarn wound around funny as I moved from one needle to the next. Any hints on this or am I just incapable? It clearly needs some blocking so I'll do that tonight to give to Jill tomorrow to celebrate her new sublet. 

This is my very first bobble. And my second. Bobbles for all from now on!!

One part yarn, two parts youth…

Mix well over two days and the result is a whole lot of Button Hole Bags. What a week-end we had. It was a button hole bag extravaganza. Julia has a full report in her blog. I'll just give you the recipe for success!

Friday Night… Step 1: knit base

Step 2: pick up stitches

Step 3: knit, knit, knit

In whatever position works for you!

Friday night also involved some giggles and a lot of Chinese food!

---

Saturday… A new day, more bags to knit!Stir in pinch of silliness: Turns out the base makes a (strange) bonnet! Note: these girls have faces… I just don't want them is cyberspace!

Place in a warm spot to rest

Pause briefly to reflect…

Bake until done. OR "Place in washing machine filled to the lowest water level with hot water. Add a small amount of detergent or liquid soap and a pair of jeans or other clothing (be careful that it not be clothing that will either bleed onto the bag, or that will be ruined if the bag bleeds onto it). Let the washer run through its wash cycle."

Whew… It was fun to spend quality time with our students in a fun, informal setting! All in all we helped 12 people start bags (and raised a bunch of $$). A bunch of the bags were finished by today!

Here is my week-end's work

Bonus: Can you name this mystery blogger? Ok, it's not really that hard. The real question is can you find the photo she had just taken in her blog?

Back on track

I am beginning to feel that I have my life slightly back on track after the stealing of the wallet episode. Interestingly it seems I was robbed by the same folks who robbed the daughter of an important law enforcement official who teaches at another school. Thus my new motto is, "If you're going to be a victim, be one with someone famous!"

On the knitting front there's not much to report. I have started the front of Avery and am now slogging through the corrugated ribbing. Two rows down, four to go. I find it really tedious with all the moving the yarn back and forth.

This afternoon and again tomorrow Julie and I are teaching at Button Hole Bag Parties… no, it's not a new kind of Tupperware. You see, knitting is really popular with our students and so for our school auction we offered one of these parties. The idea was to gather some kids and some Lamb's Pride Bulky and get them to make a bag (or get a really good start on one) in a party setting. The item was so popular that we ended up agreeing to do three parties… and making a lot of money for financial aid at our school. The photo shows some of the yarn that was floating around school today. You can tell which colors are popular with "the youth of today!" I'll try for a photo essay of the event on Monday. 

Argg…

After a long day yesterday I stopped at a Chinese restaurant to pick up dinner for my folks, Bunny, and myself. I reached into my purse and no wallet! I am pretty sure it was taken from my classroom while I was at an after school reception. Mostly it's aggravating. I was able to cancel all the credit cards and have one more call to make to the bank. Oh, and I have lined up a friend to take us out to dinner tonight :).

You never know what you might find in the living room!

Well, perhaps you do know what you might find in your living room… but you see, B and I have a stuff problem. The problem being we have too much stuff. One of the ways I know this is that stuff gets lost under other stuff. As a result when I (very occasionally) go into a cleaning and straightening frenzy because company is coming I think it's important we change our ways, we find things we forgot even existed. Resurrected blanket is such an item.

In 1997 friends were expecting their first child. I was deep in graduate school and much impressed that anyone would want to reproduce so I figured I would show my admiration by knitting a blanket for the blessed event. Clearly the event occurred before the completion of the blanket and thus the blanket was stuffed into a plastic bag. It must have made the move east with us and I have this vague memory of working on it again while pregnant with Bunny.

Fast forward… last week I found this, complete with Lion Band Imagine yarn, hanging on size 15 circs. Also in the bag were some size 13 circs (another project perhaps?) but no pattern. It looked like it would be pretty easy to figure out the pattern, but I was annoyed I didn't have it…

Here are some close-ups in case you want to play along!!

So I did what any good knitter would do… I went to google! With a little searching I came across this. Looks pretty similar doesn't it? So using her pattern, and some counting of what I have already done I am back on track! Maybe I can this done soon. Certainly before the yarn is 10 years old. I know of a number of bundles on the way, this can go to one of them!

Bunny went to the dentist today. He did really well and I was impressed with the care the hygienist took with him. He got a pink frog, a pink fish, a pink dino sticker, and a pink balloon. He picked out a purple toothbrush because they didn't have pink. Here he is modeling the pink butterfly he had painted on at the gym Monday. May I be so lucky that he always chooses what he likes and not what others think he should choose!

Wow! 5AM is early.

When Bunny was new on the scene and I had just gone back to work I got up at 5 every morning to pump (sorry if that's tmi). This morning when the alarm went off at 5 all I could think was, not this again… But there was a reason, Bunny and I were to drop B off at the airport this morning. We got him there in plenty of time and he is now jetting off to JavaOne. That means I am a single parent for the week. I know plenty of people do this all day every, but I am not one of those people! Luckily I have called in reinforcements. My parents will arrive tomorrow afternoon and stay till Thursday morning. Thanks mom and dad!

On the knitting front, I finished the front (log cabin) and back (plain brown) for Mom's mother's day washcloth. Now I have to put them together an I'm thinking attached i-cord. It may end up more of a pot holder, but oh well. Did you notice they are arriving tomorrow afternoon? That means I have to get this done tonight!

Because the gift would not be delivered on mother's day I thought I would send a note on their Ceiva frame to be there Sunday morning. This is the photo I took:

I put some cute text on top about the gift being in progress… Only seconds later this was the scene!

That's Lattice… my string loving calico!

I got the info about my ruffle bib into my finished objects section with only a little fighting with the html. Julia has a great post about our knitting class including photos of some of our stars.

More soon on the case of the resurrected baby blanket…

Mother’s Day

What does the mother of a three and a half year old want on Mother's Day? Not much, to sleep in a little and to not step on a Lego in bare feet… Well, one out of two isn't bad :). Said and done I had a nice day. Perhaps the best part was when Bunny woke up about 7:30 and wanted to watch TV he suddenly froze, looked at me and said, "It's Mother's Day!" The "Happy Mother's Day" as he brought my waffle on the blue plastic plate into me in bed was priceless too.