Another wonderful benefit of Ravelry and the fact that people share info about their stash: I’ve now got a clue about the yardage of both my Colourmart DK angora/lambswool AND my Unger stash! I’m really tickled about the Unger; I think I recall not too long ago writing in my journal something about how proud I am about having more […]
A week or so ago I started knitting my Chris’s Blues wrap using three balls of a beautiful hand-dyed blue worsted wool I’d bought last August on eBay. I bought this yarn on impulse, just because the colors appealed to me (as well as the price). But it came with very little information. I bought a hank that weighed 150 g (no yardage listed), and when I began winding it on my swift I soon realized I had three separate balls of yarn. Which was a relief, because it explained why I had six different ends sticking out all over the place. “> But not knowing the exact yardage confused me; I wasn’t sure how to choose my project. My original idea was to knit up a sort of keffiyah with it; the mix of blue colors complements my skin tone perfectly, so I thought this was a brilliant idea. Except I didn’t know exactly what a keffiyah was supposed to look like, and of course there are no patterns for such on Ravelry. Instead, I settled on the New England Stole (Ravelry link). It’s a very nice, simple pattern done in beautiful wool. Except that the wool used for the original is nothing like what I’m using. It’s bulky; I’m using worsted. Her gauge is 3 stitches per inch; mine is closer to 5 stitches per inch. The original yarn is put up at 100 g (138 yds) per […]
Two years ago my sister invited me to offer something for sale at the annual holiday craft fair held where she works (in a state office building). I’d just gotten back into knitting after a very long hiatus and was brushing up on my skills — as well as learning a ton of new ones — by knitting scarves with […]
Very BAD blogger that I am, I’ve neglected my blog for months. And now I come back here and find that I actually had started writing a post in October and never finished it (does anybody else do this?). So, I belatedly present a post originally started on October 11, 2008 and finished today, 1/18/2009: This Saturday — today — […]
If I had blogged every time I thought about doing it, this place would look a lot different. And if I were into making New Year’s Resolutions, I’d probably promise to post more frequently. I have knitting progress to share and maybe a few other things, but I’m not going to write anything today because I’m insanely busy. However, I […]
Does anybody remember the Gas Station Cozy project which was first unveiled about seven months ago? Earlier this year, a woman named Jennifer Marsh decided to cover an old, abandoned gas station with a cozy made up of squares of knitting, crochet, and other fiber arts, as well as recycled plastic. In doing so she managed to bring together a […]
Spring flower, 2005 One of my ideas when I started the blog was to share my photography. I’m far from being a professional, but occasionally I manage to shoot something I’m proud of . . . or at least happy with. So today I thought I’d post some photos. Some of them go back several years, and some were […]
Yeah, we did the ride (Saturday 23 August). I honestly don’t know how I survived, but I had to do it. We got to the starting line about 11:10 (I’m guessing), and 11:15 was the cut-off time when no one else was allowed to start a circuit. We may have been the last to start, but we weren’t alone on […]
I shot some video this past weekend with my Kodak Easyshare Z7590. I’ve had this camera for a year or so; I bought it as a temporary substitute for my malfunctioning Nikon Coolpix 7500, until I could afford to get the Nikon fixed. Now, these two cameras are both very nice, but the Kodak is not exactly comparable to the Nikon. I’m crazy about my Nikon, so I haven’t used the Kodak much since getting my Nikon fixed. Until now. I finally realized that the Kodak is awesome for shooting video — in fact, it beats the Nikon hands down in this regard, in my opinion. Sure, you can’t zoom in and out; but the video I shot outdoors last weekend had great color and crystal clear sound (the Nikon’s video picks up a lot of camera noise — very annoying). And with a big enough memory card, you can shoot a quite a bit of footage. We took our three old dogs for one of their favorite walks together. We used to do this walk from our house, over to the bluffs, and down the dirt trail to Lake Natoma. At this point in their lives, it’s a bit too much to ask all three of them — especially Gabby, our little short-legged Staffy — to walk all the way down there, play, and then walk all the way back. So now we drive them to the bluff and […]