Author: Polgara

Completely off-topic rambles

It’s been another taxing day at work, and tomorrow promises to be no better.  I’ve done no knitting yet today, but hopefully will tonight while I’m watching Bones.  I played some Scrabulous during lunch, removed some patterns books from my Amazon wish list that I no longer want, and read a disturbing blog post about an elderly Japanese man who was removed from a train in Connecticut by security for the horrible crime of photographing pretty scenery from the train and not understanding English when (conductor?) told him to put the camera away. (I’d link it, but I don’t have the window open anymore, and I’m too lazy to look it up. Also? It made me very angry, and I don’t want to revisit that.)

Also also, I 100% support the striking writers of the WGA.

It’s freezing outside of my cube, but nice and cozy here where I sit, because I have my space heater on full blast.  This is why I’m still in the office at 6:30pm–I don’t want to leave my space heater.  Alas, I must go, mostly ’cause I’m hungry. 🙂

Categories
Knitting and Crochet

Day five of NaBloPoMo

Starting to feel the pressure.  Not sure what to post today, unless y’all want to hear about my busy day at work or the coworker that pissed me off. Still hard at work on bag #2 (brick red and tan). Freezing in my cubicle, where my heater is doing little to alleve the chill. Almost done with the gazillionth viewing of season seven of Buffy.

I have not looked at any knitting sites or magazines or books today, so I can’t post about that.  Haven’t even logged into Ravelry yet today–horrors! Um, I did take two minutes out of my day to contemplate buying a knitting related Xmas gift for a friend. I showed my current bag in progress to a colleague, and explained what stitch markers are for.

Oo! I lost five pounds in the last week, does that count as news?

Shoot.  This is only going to get harder, isn’t it?

Ok, I just logged into Ravelry, and there was a group invite waiting for me, for a local yarn store.  Hmm, I wonder if the other local stores have groups?

Um, go Patriots!

And now, a picture:

Hats

This is the most popular knitting-related image in my Flickr photostream. We now return you to your regularly scheduled surfing.

Categories
Knitting and Crochet

Sparkly blues, autumn-y reds and browns, festive reds and whites!

multi colored laces
Photo by Skitterphoto on Pexels.com

Last night I finished knitting the first balloon bag (the sparkly blue one). Woot! I still need to stitch the strap to the bag, and of course do the felting part, but woot! It’s a great start to my belated holiday knitting!

Now it’s Sunday afternoon, and I started the second bag–this one in brick red and tan (Cascade 220) with a tag novelty yarn to carry along–while watching the Patriots game. (Three minutes left in the third, and it’s not going so well for my boys.)  I’m so glad I organized everything on Friday. On my way out the door this morning, I didn’t have to make any decisions, I just grabbed a pre-packaged ziploc, complete with all three yarns, the pattern, needles and stitch markers. Hopefully I’ll zip through them all just as quickly.

I’d post a picture of the shiny blue bag, but since it’s a Christmas present for an as-yet undetermined recipient, I’m afraid pics will have to wait. Instead, here’s a shot of a Little Coco I made last year with Cascade 220 that I’ve only just gotten around to photographing:

Little Coco

Categories
Knitting and Crochet

Squares and bags, bags and squares

squares for a scarfAs promised, pictures of fun, bright squares, to be used at some future date for a cheery scarf in spring-like colors. The yarn is Plymouth Encore, worsted weight–basically, whatever was leftover from the scrap blanket that I haven’t touched in months. I adore these colors and smile whenever I see them. I just need to pick up some more green, and then I have to decide if I want join the squares together, or border them all in one unifying color before joining. (There are more pictures in my Flickr–just follow the image link to find the photostream to click through.)

In other news, I got started on the Christmas bags last night, and so far I adore this first one.  It’s a deep blue (Lamb’s Pride chunky) paired with two skeins of shiny blue Aura from Trendsetter.  It’s sparkly and shiny and glittery and yes, I know that’s three words that all mean the same thing, but I don’t care, but that’s what it is, to the nth degree.  (Perhaps double stranding the Aura was a bit overkill, but it’s too late now, it’s already half done!) Yesterday I went through my feltable yarns and my novelty yarns and paired complementary colors wherever I could, then assigned each set a pattern based on available yardage. Right now I’m looking at a possible five balloon bags, two little cocos and one clutch, and there’s still an enormous bag of Gjestal in three different colors that I haven’t even touched yet.  It’s nice to have a plan, though–no more wondering what to do next.

That’s all for today.  I hope y’all are having a marvelous Saturday!

Categories
Knitting and Crochet

My path is clear

For weeks now I’ve been trying to decide what to do about Christmas–do I knit/crochet presents this year? Do I really want to make myself that crazy? And what about the company’s charity auction at the holiday party? What would I do for that this year? I’ve done the scarf and hat thing to death already.

Yarn!  
The three boxes and the blue bin in the front are what I just pulled out. The white rolling drawer set and the two boxes in the back are filled with yarn I’ve already photographed and catalogued.
 

Well, I pulled out four boxes of yarn to photograph and catalogue for Ravelry, and now my path is clear–I have so!much! wool that obviously this is the season of felted purses! Most of the wool is secondhand, passed to me when my friend Kat decided to divest herself of most of her stash, and therefore the colors are not what I’m usually drawn to–lots of earth tones, to be honest. It’s doubtful I’d ever do anything with this wool for myself, so transforming it all to gifts is the only answer.  And maybe I can get some space back in my bedroom in the process.

I’m a smidge undecided on patterns. I have several books with lots of neat felted bags that would teach and challenge me, but really, I just want to make as many purses as I possibly can before December 25 (and really, preferably before December 18th, to give myself some time off to focus on other stressful parts of the holidays, like baking and shopping). This will probably mean using the patterns I’m already familiar with–Booga Bags, Little Cocos, Balloon Bags, and the clutch purse from One Skein.

In other news, I’ve finally photographed the 12 granny squares I’ve finished in the past week and a half, but I’ll need something to post tomorrow, so I’m saving it for then. Hey, it’s something to look forward to, right? 🙂 Until then, here’s a picture of my brother-in-law playing “zombie” with his and my sister’s kitty, Greta:

IMG_3928