Knitting?  Yes, there has been knitting.  After my second hand surgery I finished the most glorious mittens to keep my oddly and obnoxiously cold hands toasty.  

The pattern is Fiddlehead Mittens by Adrian Bizilia of Hello Yarn.  The yarns I used were the prettiest, nicest, most delicious yarns I could find that did not completely cripple my bank account–just seriously injured it:  The lining, and the light green and the purple are both Road to China  by The Fibre Company (the colors are Peridot and Garnet).  The dark green and darker blue are Berroco Ultra Alpaca Light in Oceanic Mix and Moss Mix.  The white background is Manos del Uruguay–a lovely yarn called Silk Blend in Natural.  Last but not least is Blue Sky Alpaca’s Melange in Cornflower, so beautiful and soft.  I bought two little skeins of this several years ago from Kaleidoscope Yarns for 3 dollars each and still have some left despite making multiple projects with it–its like magic.

I have also finished the Terra Shawl by Jared Flood, which I need to re-block before posting pictures, started several pairs of socks which are all gifts, am nearly done with a pretty red sweater, and am working on a hat for my mentor teacher that needs to be finished by next Friday.

And, because I am apparently growing up and friends are beginning to do things like get married and have babies, I made my friends these booties.  They are so cute it is terrible.  The pattern (sorry it’s a Rav link) and yarn are both by Plymouth Yarns.  It is the pure angora yarn and it is fantastic.

2) To knit my stash down by half starting with the amount I have now.  I have 37 skeins of yarn so I need to knit 18 skeins of yarn this year.

3) No purchasing yarn until I am in Europe in July and I must have knit 9 skeins of yarn by then.  This means I must knit 1.5 skeins of yarn a month.  That sounds fairly reasonable.

4) Write.  Every day.  It can be a blog post, a journal entry, a poem, but it must be something semi-creative and not be school work.

5) Go to the gym at least 3 times a week.  I feel much happier when I am active.  This does not count for the two weeks when I am recovering from surgery from January 13th-26th.  Not much counts during that time anyway.

6) Learn how to cook more things that are delicious and healthy and also learn how to bake things that are delicious.

I have started my destashing efforts with a simple 2×2 ribbed hat for myself.  It is knit from Malabrigo Rios in Aguas which I picked up at Rhinebeck.  It is a gorgeous color that reminds me of the ocean in Maine.  Hopefully it will be done soon, but my hands hurt so I’ll have to take it easy on the needles.

Did I mention that I am now the proud owner of the best needles in the whole world?  Matt gave me Addi Turbo Lace Clicks for christmas!

Happy New Year!

The sweater I am referring to is Hermione’s Fair Isle sweater from the new film The Deathly Hallows Part 1.

Some things I love about this sweater:

• The cabled button band (awesome detail)
• The colors (surprisingly pretty for pastels)
• The Fair Isle pattern (simple, very fashionable)
• The fit (long arms look cozy, has enough ease to wear layers underneath and is still flattering and not bulky)

Currently, I am working on my first fair isle (stranded color work) project.  The Eesti Trail Hiking Socks from the book Favorite Socks published by Interweave press.  I love this book, and the socks are gorgeous.  I’m using Vintage Wool by Berroco

So far, they look like this:

Here is a close up of my stranded panel

Now I just need to finish them by tomorrow…(That’s a sock-and-a-half).

But I have been knitting, and here is what I’ve made in the mean time.

Star Crossed Beret: knit in Maine in September on the beach and in the rain.

Yarn is Manos del Uruguay Rittenhouse Merino, Colorway is Thistle

Beth Brown-Reinsel's Twined Fingerless Mitts Knit in June

Twined Fingerless Mitts by Beth Brown-Reinsel in June at Squam Art Workshops

Koolhaas by Jared Flood knit in November

Koolhaas hat by Jared Flood knit in November for a Yule gift that I caved in and gave away early.

Yarn: Malabrigo Worsted in Azul Profundo

Embossed Leaves socks by Mona Schmidt knit in October

Embossed Leaves socks by Mona Schmidt from the best book ever, 25 Favorite Socks

Yarn is Malabrigo Sock in Boticelli Red

Central Park Hoodie by Heather Lodinsky finished in June

And the finished sweater…finally.  Started in August 2009, finished June 2010. Central Park Hoodie by Heather Lodinsky

Yarn is Malabrigo Worsted in Black Forest.

Oh yes, more to come

Yesterday, on a seemingly innocent excursion to the yarn store to buy buttons for my CPH (almost done!), I left with two skeins of completely unnecessary and also extravagant skeins of MadelineTosh Pashmina in Mourning Dove.

Yes, it is stunning, isn’t it?  And I am going to make Jared Flood’s Willoughby with the lovely Cashmere/silk/merino yarn that honestly feels more scrumptious to me than pure cashmere.   However, I am not allowed to buy any more yarn until I use some of what I already have up.  This means I need to finish all those little balls of partially used skeins, purchase the patterns that I intend to use with my new skeins, and otherwise de-stash.

My sweater is looking fabulous.  I have almost 2 inches knit of the left button band knit, and now that I have the buttons, my soak wash for blocking, I am feeling pretty done with this project.  Looking forward to casting on my second big sweater project.

In other (wonderful) news, the Squam countdown begins!  7 days and I will be relaxing, learning, knitting, and turning 25 on the shores of Squam Lake in the white mountains of New Hampshire!

I do not have a swift yet.  It is coming in the mail as a birthday gift from my mother.  But I did have a partner, so I asked my boyfriend to be my swift and thought to myself, “Yay!  A pretty yarn cake awaits me!”  Yarn cakes from a ball winder look like this:My ball winder did not produce a cake, it produced a gourd shaped yarn blob that flopped around while ANOTHER yarn cake started forming itself underneath the yarn gourd.  Not good.  The gourd shaped thing flopped off of my ball winder mid-wind and this other smaller ball was winding along still attached.  It kind of looked like a cancerous yarn tumor or something.  Definitely not a yarn cake, and definitely not what was supposed to be happening to my pretty Malabrigo yarn.

So I have created a list of things not to do when winding yarn:

1. Do not use a partner, use a swift.
2. If you are holding the ball winder in your hand, be careful to hold it in one place and do not wave it around in the air.
3. Do it right the first time.  There are no second chances.
4. If you create a yarn gourd by accident and do not want other knitters to see your embarrassing blob, rewind some of the yarn to create more of a misshapen ball.
5. Be patient, and wait for the damn swift.

On a less bizarre note, my sweater is going good.  I’m knitting the left button band.  It will be 2 1/2 inches instead of 1 1/2 inches so that the sweater looks a little more balanced.

For the hood, I knit 11 inches as the pattern directs, and instead of doing 4 decrease rows, consolidated and completed 2 decrease rounds in an attempt to make a less pointy hood.  The hood is still pointy, but certainly not as razor sharp as it would have been.  Instead of seaming the top, I decided to Kitchener stitch the whole thing, which wasn’t that bad…it just required total silence and complete lack of interruptions…

Also, I knit some simple hand warmers out of leftover Madelinetosh DK.  I didn’t use a pattern, but I did use the gusset from Nancy Lindberg’s “Fits Like A…Glove” and they are warm, pretty and all mine.

Last night I started another pair of handwarmers which will be a gift.  The pattern is called “Cancans” by Erica Lomax. I’m using Malabrigo Sock yarn in Boticelli Red.  It is so luminously lovely.  The pattern has a short version as well as a long version and I am going to follow the directions for the shorter armwarmers so that the recipient is able to wear them with ease under long sleeved shirts.

(can you tell I’m wearing my new handwarmers in every picture?)

My hand is feeling a lot better!  The scar looks great, and the pain is less every day.  Hopefully by June it will be in fabulous shape, for I will be knitting with Jared Flood!

Now, for some knitting and Arrested Development.

This is right before they doped me up.  I felt ridiculous in that blue hat, and I was afraid of getting doped up.  When they wheeled me out afterwards, my mind boggled at the largeness of the cast. The picture below is after the swelling in my hand had gone down.

This next picture is after I’d had the cast on for a week and wasn’t in so much pain.  And Kalcifer was helping me do my homework.

Not being able to use my hand was certainly making me reflect upon how lucky I am to have a good one (hopefully it will be even better after it heals). All I could do was lie around and read.  So far, I’ve finished a book for school, a book I started months ago, and a book for Bread Loaf (I have also watched the entire Farscape series, which may or may not be something I should be proud of).

After the cast came off…my hand worked.  Every single thing that I do hurts, but it works.  The doctor told me that the best thing I can do for my hand, is to use it.  And so I have.  I have been knitting, cleaning, and getting dressed without help.  It is amazing…all the every day things that I never noticed before.  But now…now I notice everything.

Of course,  I had surgery less than a month ago, and the cast only came off 6 days ago so there is much healing to be done.  Vitamin E oil is my friend.

After the butterfly bandages fell off, I could see the actual size and shape of the incision.  The doc cut my lifeline so as to hide the scar.

Now it is even better!  But man does it still hurt.  I have started a pair of fingerless gloves to hide the healing scar at work so that patients don’t ask questions.  Knitting is not currently my favorite activity because of the way my hand stretches when I hold the needles.  Opening doors hurts, holding objects, cooking, cleaning, my work duties, pretty much everything.  However, I have not felt any tingling or numbness.  I can feel anything I touch and even though it hurts to hold stuff, I haven’t dropped anything randomly.  As soon as my body heals underneath, I think that this will be more than worth it.  In the meantime, I’ll focus on healing and exercising the hand in question.

I have some thoughts:

Learn to knit socks really, really well.  Most of these socks are ankle down.  I’ve made one pair from this books already and they were lovely.

A book that just came out which focuses on the knits of the Netherlands.  This would be really hard, but probably amazingly rewarding.  The yarn would also be far more expensive.

Humph.  Maybe I need to go hang out in a bookstore for a while.