Swatching

This is my new Woven Gems Inca Cotton (the colorway is "Desert") that I got from Sangeeta when I went to visit her and watch HP6 together. I love it. So much that despite having so many WIPs that are *this* close to being done, I chose to spend my limited knitting time today swatching it to see what hoodie-sweatshirty type pattern I might be able to knit with it (possibly Under the Hoodie?--that's a Rav link). I'm getting 17 sts to 4 inches on US 7s, but I'm thinking of going down to 6s and seeing what happens. Meanwhile, any suggestions?

Finally, some knitting

This is the reason I haven't posted anything about knitting (or anything else, for that matter) in the past couple weeks. I had been feverishly knitting on this Big Bad Baby Blanket (in Berroco Comfort) for Mazhalai. I don't know why I thought I could finish it in a week and a half, with after work commitments most nights, and cooking to do for the Saturday evening baby shower as well.

But right up until Saturday morning, I was convinced I'd find a way to do it. I was even knitting the borders and the knit stitch sections in continental style to make it go faster (I would have done it all in continental, but I realized early on in the project that my gauge is really really inconsistent when I purl in continental). Anyway, at some point as I was knitting furiously while getting my 9am pedicure, I saw the light. After my pedicure I went to the mall and bought some onesies and other baby clothes, and when I came home all I did was cook the unda curry I had committed to bring (recipe from this Madhur Jaffrey book).

But at the shower, I showed Mazhalai my progress, so the cat is out of the bag now, and all I have to do is actually finish the blanket sometime before, or at least very soon after, the baby comes. And best of all, I cam finally stop hiding from my own blog.

In preparation for Meatless Monday

Ok, so Sangeeta and I have a deal with each other to try and be healthful while also reducing our negative impact on the environment by reducing the amount of meat in our diets and dedicating at least one day a week to not eating any meat.

Lucky for me, the West End Farmers' Market is on Sundays. My haul this week, from top to bottom: summer squash, zuchinni, heirloom tomatoes, basil, and new potatoes. I have to use all this in 2 days, since I leave for Spain on Wednesday, so I won't have much space for meat in my
diet even if I wanted to!

What I did on my day off

Yesterday, after a couple hours struggling (and failing) to get my new sewing machine properly threaded and operating, I sat down and (finally!!) finished hand-sewing the zipper for Samus. Words cannot express how relieved proud I feel to finally be done with this first sweater ever for myself. Appropriately, a fellow knitter was the first to see me wearing it--I spent the afternoon with Sangeeta knitting and drooling over yummy new yarn in Fredericksburg. A perfect day off!

Unbloggable

I think Samus is afraid of me. This is as far as he's peeked out of his bag all week. How, you ask, can I be sooo close to the end of a project and yet seem unable to finish it? I scared him off, that's the only possible explanation. Hopefully I'll coax him out of his bag and onto the blocking board by the end of the week.

Meanwhile, with Samus cowering in his bag, I've been plenty busy: the VA Fall Fiber Festival with Sangeeta, finally getting on Facebook and rediscovering old friends, a 7 mile hike with Taz, several dinners and lunches with friends, a TON of work at my "real" (paid) job, and an unblogable surprise project that I didn't take pictures of and can't tell you about until next week.

So, USB cable gods willing, I should have some good knitting and stash growth pics for you then. Until then, I'm taking suggestions on how to sweet talk an almost-finished cardigan into taking a bath.

Remembering girlhood

This past weekend was divine. It started out on Friday evening with me and Taz finally signing the lease for our new place. We asked them to rip up the carpeting and sand and varnish the underlying hardwood floors for us, and they did. On time. No extra charge. And it looks great. This bodes well.

Then we tried to see HP5 with some friends, but since none of us thought of buying tickets online at 6am the day before, we had a snowball's chance of seeing it at either of the 2 cinemas we tried (or, I'm sure, the 4 we didn't). So instead, we sat and had some beers and talked about everything from upcoming concerts, to what ingredients go into different beers, to the best way to get from point A to point B by bike in our area. Great fun, and it sure beat trying to find a 2am show for HP5. Taz and I did eventually get to see it. My thoughts are here.

The next day, my best friend from elementary school arrived with her husband K, and even though we hadn't seen each other in nearly a decade, the bond was as strong as ever. All four of us had a great time walking, playing mini golf, showing our competitive streaks in Super Scrabble, eating, drinking, talking, laughing, and remembering. It was fun reminiscing about the time some boys pelted us with snowballs when we were walking home from school, and how one of our friends used to bring peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch every day, and how much of a drama queen my 6th grade boyfriend was. But the best part was the feeling that our relationship is not just a collection of shared memories, and that we still have so much to offer one another now that we're all growed up. I am so so SO happy that they chose us as the first stop on their summer vacation.

Oh, and there was knitting. And yarn buying. Pictures coming soon.

On Sunday evening, Taz and I finally saw HP5. It was fun, but I left the theater with a somewhat unfulfilled feeling. Like when you're used to eating this kind of pizza and are given this instead. I thought about it, and reading JennSquared's entry today helped me articulate it better. She said the movie more or less "represents the book" and I think that's true, but not in a good way. The book is represented, but not expressed. The film had all the major plot elements, but it didn't explain anything and didn't get you to feel involved. I'm not even complaining here about the parts of the book that didn't make it in. I'm talking about the parts of the book that were in the movie, but that you wouldn't understand the significance of if you hadn't read the book recently. Like whose voice is speaking the prophecy, for example. There's a reason Book 5 was a long book--there is so much we learn that we need to know to properly understand the significance of events in Book 6. I know that background info might not make for an exciting movie, but I would have been satisfied with even just a line or two about certain key things. Still, it was fun and had some good special effects. And it was enough of a refresher for me that I can now finish rereading Book 6 in anticipation of this Friday at midnight!