Hunting

The hunt is on. My newest quest is for a set of double point needles made of Swallow Casein and Ebony wood in size 1's. The is a tough hunt and I'm not having much luck. Since I'm working on several sock project I thought it would be nice to try a new material. I've always liked my Bryspun needles but the smallest they come in is a US2 and most of my sock knitting is done on 0's and 1's. I wish I could find both at the same place and save on shippint. The casein's run about 7.00 and the ebony's 22.00 and I'd hate to have to pay 5.00 for each shipment, hell that's a whole other set of needles. I wish I wish I wish!

My Generation, My Family?

There's something weird going on with my generation of my family. On my dad's side I'm the eldest of four cousins kinda sorta (I do have two older sisters, though technically they are half-sisters and not blood related to the cousins I am mentioning here and have become Texas housewifes, ick) There's this creative streak that runs in my family and it has really shown itself in myself and my cousins. Of the four of us, I was the first to go to art school and have recently been doing this knitting thing to make alittle money and thus putting my textile classes to good use. (I will never make enough to pay of SAIC anytime soon, ever..), the next in line was my cousin Patricia, while I think her art, ah, sucks, she followed me to art school and is soon to graduate from SAIC too. I'm not sure what the next one is doing, Jason, going to school to become a teacher I think, but the last one Adam is in a band called The Academy Is, and is doing quite well, they were just on MTV, and are touring in Europe right now. I had to call his father, my uncle, to get the hook-up on a couple of tickets, see the concert is sold out at the House of Blues, it is right before my birthday, and... when I lived with them I used to wipe the shit from his ass, so I deserve a free ticket or too right? I guess with my dad and his siblings, things were kind of stifled, but my grandmothers siblings are all lawyers and writers and such. We are a weird family I think.

Fugliest Sweater

So I finished the sweater and released it back into the world for some sorry husband to wear. It's not ugly because of the design, it's just the yarn, and the raimbow affect and it looks like a Cosby reject. This sweater was so ugly that I'm sure my friends at You Knit What would agree. Funny thing is, when I dropped it off at the LYS from whence it came a customer that was hanging out knitting thought it was lovely, huh??? I seriously thought of not charging as much as I did in favor of buying the woman a book on finishing, should have photographed the seaming job she did on it, amazing. The doggy adoption fund is slowly growing thanks to my knit pimp.

Knit Whore

Yup, I'm a knit whore and I sell my skills. My newest whoring involves repairing a hack job this woman did to her sweater. She made the world's ugliest sweater out of varigated yarn, for her husband, ala Bill Cosby, unfortunately the sleeves were too long and I was called in. By the time the sweater was handed off to me, she had removed one sleeve and instead of ripping down to the right length, she CUT THE YARN. Well, I guess cutting made sense since frogging doesn't work after you've serged the seams, yes SHE SERGED THE SEAMS, what the fuck?? Well, she'll pay a pretty penny for me to clean up that mess, yuck.I recieved the Andean Silk yarn today from KnitPicks, Lettuce is a beautiful color, not too light, not too dark, just perfect, I then promptly frogged all the work I had done on the Clapotis and somehow managed to make the largest ball on my ballwinder. At first I thought I might make it into a skein again, but the ball is so cool to look at, plus I'm too lazy to hand turn the swift. I bought some Socks that Rock yarn a couple of months ago at The Fold in Marengo, at first I was going to attempt my first toe up socks and make them kneehighs, but I've been bitten by the Jaywalker bug, especially since I heard that the angled zigzag keeps them snug and from falling down, which is my sock bane in life. For those of you who wanted to know, the silk corset is officially done, I sewed the last button on, the catch is if I want to actually wear I still have to tighten the buttons because the buttons are so slick that with the slightest movement I would flash all, not a good thing. Goals for this weekend are to knit (of course), buy the zipper for the Ribby Cardy, and maybe piece together the Sweatheart sweater that I finished years ago. Lofty expectations I think.

Wow

So I've decided, tomorrow I will frog the Clapotis in favor of a better yarn choice, namely the Andean Silk (alpaca, silk, and merino) from Knitpicks. I've seen it done in this yarn and it drapes beautifully, as it should given the design. Oh, and the color choice is called lettuce. For those who know me, this is a very unusual choice, but after careful consideration and advise of friends, I bought it. Plus it will match my new bracelet which I love love love, almost as much as my new necklace. Now you must be thinking what the hell? I know people who have offices full of vendor gifts of notepads and pens, well they don't do it quite like that where I work. While I have my share of t-shirts and totes, the bracelet was an incentive that I worked for (which will eventually be accompanied by two watches and a necklace), but what I just recieved was a gift and the thought behind it was the kindest. It truely think it is a challenge to surprise me, unfortunate for my friends and family. Well, early last week a vendor rep came in and needed help reupholstering her display pads. I just so happen to be very good at that type of thing, keep in mind I was dealing with silk moire cloth and am a control freak about this type of shit, also no one else would have done it. I of course pimped myself out on this project and hinted that I will work for free stuff, i.e totes, t-shirts pens, the usual stuff, but all in fun and jest. Well, I got one hell of a surprise thursday evening when that vendor sent via UPS in a bos what I thought was a little jewelry storage case for when you travel (I thought she was thinking about our conversation when I had told her that while visiting my grandmother, the queen of fun fashion jewelry, that she actually owned a rind by the vendor reps' designer). I read the note she wrote thanking me for my hard work and assistance etc... and found out she had included a necklace from her lines collection, a necklace I had almost bought! It's called the 'Heart of Chicago', because its a silver heart on a silver chain (quite heavy too) carved with the skyline of the city, and can only be found her, in Chicago. How cool, how nice, everyone was jealous at work. I've never recieved such a nice gift that was because someone truely understood my hardwork, dedication and all the other crap I do. Wow.

1-5-0-0, Yea Baby!

Who the hell is readding my blog, because some how I've reached 1500 hits, and very few of my friends know of it, cool. I have a new baby to add to my jewelry collection, and it didn't cost me a penny, I earned it from the vendor for selling so much of their crap! Yea! I also got a pair of earrings, but since they aren't my style they've been banshed to Ebay. I also opened my own ebay store, I tried to get my own website but couldn't quite figure out how to do it, yet. So if you're interested in hand made high quality artisan stitch markers or a pair of Yurman earrings check out the short cut to Stitch Markers, my eBay store. I started my first group of classes tuesday night, and went well, though a table would be nice, we were just sittingin chairs in a circle. The first class is always the toughest, the students are not used to using their hands and fingers like that, but I have confidence they will pick it up fast. Still haven't decided to frog Clapotis yet, I found the yarn the my friend Linda used, just need to find out have many skeins to get. That's all.

Frogging, Teaching, Cooking

To frog or not to frog, that is the questions. One of my many WIP (works in process for you nonknitters) has been the Clapotis shawl/scarf. I started knitting it in October using this beautiful purpley/black hand dyed silk/wool boucle from Tess' Designers Yarns. I had bought the yarn several years ago at Stitches, I had never felt a boucle so soft, the silk you know. Now boucle is tough to knit with, not technically but designwise, it visually had bulk to your shape, and some of us don't exactly want that, so I thought the Clapotis was perfect, well almost. Recently I was discussing with some fellow knitters the look of the piece, and the boucle is not making the grade, yes its' beautiful yarn, but the stitch definition is vague, it doesn't have the drape I want, and half done, I think it should be frogged. While it kills me to do it, I know it must be done. I will only frog the Clapotis when I have bought the perfect substitute yarn, so off to Knitpicks I go, a friend of mine made her in a silk/alpaca blend and it drapes beutifully, I'm jealous.
Today I had my first faculty meeting for Lill Street, big step for me. It was more fun than I expected, I'm looking forward to teaching, and I found out I can take any class for a severly reduced price. I talked to the dye teacher and I think it might be fun to do a one day workshop of natural dying yarn. It's a small world ya know. The dye teacher used to work for the same Saudi ethnographic museum place I did, but before I was there weird huh? Later on I went to Whole foods to pick up some hair conditioner and hummus fixings and while checking out the clerk asked me what the jar of tahini was used for, I said to make hummus, she said she never heard of anyone making homemade hummus. I would expect that from a clerk at Jewel or Dominicks, but Whole Fooods, come on, it's the Mecca for strange people cooking strange things. I feel good right now, even though I balled up while looking at Italian Greyhounds available for adoption, my high might even get me through a crappy day at work tomorrow.

Frogging, Teaching, Cooking

To frog or not to frog, that is the questions. One of my many WIP (works in process for you nonknitters) has been the Clapotis shawl/scarf. I started knitting it in October using this beautiful purpley/black hand dyed silk/wool boucle from Tess' Designers Yarns. I had bought the yarn several years ago at Stitches, I had never felt a boucle so soft, the silk you know. Now boucle is tough to knit with, not technically but designwise, it visually had bulk to your shape, and some of us don't exactly want that, so I thought the Clapotis was perfect, well almost. Recently I was discussing with some fellow knitters the look of the piece, and the boucle is not making the grade, yes its' beautiful yarn, but the stitch definition is vague, it doesn't have the drape I want, and half done, I think it should be frogged. While it kills me to do it, I know it must be done. I will only frog the Clapotis when I have bought the perfect substitute yarn, so off to Knitpicks I go, a friend of mine made her in a silk/alpaca blend and it drapes beutifully, I'm jealous.
Today I had my first faculty meeting for Lill Street, big step for me. It was more fun than I expected, I'm looking forward to teaching, and I found out I can take any class for a severly reduced price. I talked to the dye teacher and I think it might be fun to do a one day workshop of natural dying yarn. It's a small world ya know. The dye teacher used to work for the same Saudi ethnographic museum place I did, but before I was there weird huh? Later on I went to Whole foods to pick up some hair conditioner and hummus fixings and while checking out the clerk asked me what the jar of tahini was used for, I said to make hummus, she said she never heard of anyone making homemade hummus. I would expect that from a clerk at Jewel or Dominicks, but Whole Fooods, come on, it's the Mecca for strange people cooking strange things. I feel good right now, even though I balled up while looking at Italian Greyhounds available for adoption, my high might even get me through a crappy day at work tomorrow.

New Years Non Resolutions

I do not believe in the whole New Years Resolutions crap because most people fail on those unobtainable goals. I have some ideas on what I'd like to WORK on this year and have decided it's the year of ME!
1. Knit my ass off. Besides three teaching gigs and private lessons I need to start making my own patterns and designs, why not?
2. Get a new job and be appreciated, because hopefully that new job will help pay off the student loans from art school.
3. Get a man, (find a man) or at least explore more options of how to meet guys because I'm not getting any younger and really just want to have a good excuse one day for buying baby knit books.
4. Clean my room. An endless struggle which probably reflects inner turmoil of some kind.
5. Mend my broken heart. I've decided if Mona is not found by my birthday I will either adopt an Italian Greyhound or buy a new one, and yes in the Simpsons tradition she will be named Mona 2. (Ok now that just made me break down and cry, admitting that I may never see her again)
6. Save up enough money somehow to buy a cute scooter to ride around the city with, I like those Honda's that have the retro Vespa look.
7. Start selling some crap on EBay, because I have alot of crap to get rid of.
8. Coordinate and coerse my friends and family into only giving Visa Gifts cards for birthday so that I might actually get that 5 qt. Kitchenaide Stand Mixer in Caviar that I have been lusting after FOREVER!
9. KNIT MY ASS OFF!

If my sisters knew of this blog I would say thank-you for the gift card they gave me for (they remembered this year!) Christmas because with it I bought my favorite parfume from Tiffany's and now smell like a goddess! And likewise to my aunt for she gave my an 11 quart cuisinart food processor in which I can make super batches of hummus! Of course non of my family knows of my blog what's the use in that?