June Already

Wow, June. Wow. About a month ago I couldn't wait for this week - now, not so much. It's my last week at school - physicals were last night. So the next 3 days are all paperwork, cleaning, and moving. I found out yesterday that my basketball training room has to be empty by Friday. Ha. I would love to know exactly where they expect me to put everything. As it is, it's crazy enough putting everything into the inner office to attempt to stem theft over the summer. So that was my view last Saturday afternoon. My baseball team warming up for the Regional semis. A game that was originally scheduled for Thursday, but was rained out. Twice. What a game. 12 innings. Lost. Walk off homerun. Heartbreak. Due to the length, and use of all 3 decent pitchers, it probably would have been really hard to beat the team (that won 12-0 in 6 innings) we would have had to face on Sunday, but you never know.

It's been a weird spring like that - my boys track team imploded last week at regionals. The 2 relay teams that were supposed to win States didn't make it out (DQ'd). One boy got mono and couldn't do anything, one is still fighting appendicitis - he's going to States though, and the State champ in discus broke his throwing hand (the one that his college scholarship is based on) punching something a wall (I think) after his girlfriend broke up with him. Funny how things can all go wrong at once.

Anyway, Monday sees me working at the hospital. I'll try not to complain too much (but working in-patient when I'm an ATC is really stupid and I'm not happy about it). It is only for 5 weeks, then it's a week off before the family vacay to Cape Cod - I've heard reports that my nephew is already very excited - and then it's back to school to get ready for football. So I'm sure it'll all fly by and before we know it, I'll be complaining about whiny high schoolers again.

Onto the knitting type stuff. Sunday was the last day to turn things in for May projects in the House Cup. I managed to get something done for every class. The blanket was done in record time (finished it up on Thursday).

Pretty darn cute if you ask me. I did get a little tired of working on it because it was all blanket all week, but so glad to have it done. Maddie also likes it alot.
It's one of her new favorite sleeping spots. Never mind that there are 4 other blankets draped over various pieces of furniture in that same room.
I got this hat done as well. It's not my favorite, but it'll do. Kinda hard to see the pattern in that pic, sorry about that.
That's the progress on the fronts of the sweater. It seems to be going slower than the back did - I think because the initial burn to knit this has flickered out. Still love it - just don't have that crazy urge to work on it 24/7.
Because I finished up all the HP stuff early - I let myself spin this weekend. As you can see by the very full bobbins. I'm going to work on plying it up this weekend. It's gonna take forever. But it'll be very pretty laceweight - my first ever handspun lace weight! Gotta get myself worked up for it.

So with a new month comes new assignments for the House Cup. Not so in love with them this month. It's really hard to fit things that I wanted to get knitted into the assignments - and the "profs" are being very particular.The one that I do love is Defense Against the Dark Arts. This month is the study of Crucio - an Unforgiveable Curse, it causes excruciating pain - a form of torture. So the assignment is to work on a project that isn't finished due to the pain it causes you. Therefore, I will finally be finishing the Jewelled Steps socks. Yeah, from last March!
That's the start of the second sock. And the curse is continuing. The book knocked over a can of soda, I used the wrong needles to start and had to rip and re-start. Very cursed socks. Hopefully it gets better from here on out.

Just another Thursday

Yeah, that about sums it up. Nothing very exciting to report. One more day of Spring Break practices -yay. That means training room moving day on Monday! Sad that I'm excited about the prospect of more work at work.

So here's some updates (because I know you're all on the edge of your seats waiting for them). This is the completed Jeweled Step sock. For the record, it was done on Sunday at 8:30 pm, I have a witness, and that means that I got my sock done in time.
I'm not in any hurry to cast on the second one. I'll finish the one I'm working on for this week (no pics because it's for a gift). So maybe come Sunday or Monday, I'll start it.

This is the status of the Tomten. It's almost finished. Unbelievable. All I need to do is an applied I-cord edge (which I need to learn how to do), and sew in the zipper. And it's done. Yippee!
If you don't think this is the cutest sweater, your cute index is way off. When I get pics of it on Elliott, I'll post one of the hood, because it's my favorite part. Adorable.

For anyone who's wondering... I have bought yarn. I broke the Lenten "fast" on Tuesday, by going to KotS before work. I needed more yarn for the Tomten, and picked up the yarn to do Kate's Log Cabin blanket. Which I started yesterday.
I'm loving it. It's gonna be so great - there are 5 colors on each side of the central block, in different shades of blue and green. And when it's done, it gets felted and looks amazing.

And finally, the evil silk cap is completely spun up.At Meagan's yesterday, she finished attenuating it and started spinning it for me while I helped her through a tricksy bit in her knitting. Gotta love swapping projects for help. Here it is.
It'll eventually get plied with something. Don't know what, but eventually I will.

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter! Hope nobody is sick on jelly beans yet. I have been chastised for neglecting the blog, so today I will make up for it with a nice extra long post. And to my beloved family - you don't need to read much more because it's all about knitting and spinning and I know that you are not interested.

I do not yet have a sock for this week. I know, it's Sunday and I don't have a sock. How is that possible? Well, the Knitting Fates were against me this week. I think I may have angered them with my flaunting of the fact that I'm ahead on my sock count to date. So they threw their heads back and laughed at me. And still are. Here is the first Jeweled Step sock.

It's pretty right? The yarn is very gorgeous (Seacoast Handpainted in "Ambergris") and great to work with. I chose this pattern from the New Pathways book because it matched the gauge I got (see, I even swatched and still the Knitting Fates decided to screw with me). So I cast on for this sock last Friday night. Yeah - it was that long ago. And things were going well, until I looked at it and looked at the picture in the book, and re-read the directions, and said, "Crap, I did this wrong." And proceeded to rip out the arch expansion. And then, just to make sure I was clear, I re-read the directions and said, "Crap, I was doing it close to right, I didn't need to rip. Oh well, this time it'll be perfect." And re-knit.

Saturday, I continued re-knitting and almost finished the arch expansion without any trouble. Didn't work on the sock on Sunday (went to see Brigid's Cross at the East Side Irish American club with friends - yay for Guinness!), and then picked the sock back up on Monday evening at Meagan's house. Knit the heel, and got the part about the wing stitches, and realized I had skipped a step and forgot to add some stitches. Boo.

Tuesday at work, I ripped back and fixed the problem. And re-worked the heel and turned it and everything, and decided to try the sock on. Crap. The arch expansion triangle thingy is supposed to go up the side of the foot (the name of the sock architecture is after all, Sidestream), and instead, it was smack dab center of my foot. Hmmm. Hmmm. So I put aside for the trip out to SnB. Then I pulled out the book and started reading line by line to figure out where I went wrong. Yeah, forgot to move the markers after I added the stitches and so therefore worked the heel in the wrong place. So, it was time to rip, again. I spent the first hour and a half at SnB ripping and reconfiguring the stitches so that they would all be in the correct place. And somehow I was a stitch short. How it happened I don't know. But I fudged it and added one, I was not about to rip and redo again.

So on Wednesday, I re-knit the heel. Again. And started to turn the heel. And about a third of the way through, I look down at my lovely sock, and realize I've dropped a stitch. Way back 5 rows ago, in the part of the heel that's already been turned. Which means that there is no way to fix it without... you guessed it, ripping. Yay!

So I said to myself, because the Knitting Fates are seriously messing with me this week, instead of just ripping back to the mistake, I'm ripping back to fix the number of stitches correctly and it will be perfect and they can stop laughing. So I did. And when I ripped back, put the markers and the stitches in their correct original position, I counted. And had the correct number of stitches. WTF?!? Like I said, they're seriously messing with me at this point. Trying to cause insanity from knitting.

So, on Thursday I sat down with the sock. And re-worked the hell (that's 4 times now, if you're counting) and moved on. Got to the leg, and re-read the instructions for the patterned bit, and realized that I had been soing it wrong the whole time, that the first time I had done it, way back before ripping at all, it had been right. So, in my attempts to not take scissors to the sock, I put it down, and walked away. And did other things. So it remains incomplete. We'll get there eventually, I'm just so sick of it I can't stand to knit on it.

Alright, enough with the saga of the sock. Onto happier things. I did manage to work on some other stuff this week - just to maintain my sanity. This is Elliott's Tomten - about to start the second ball and start the part with the armpit holes and what not. Yay.

And this is the first of the Fuzzy Feet pattern. Just what I needed to get my sock mojo back - or so I thought. I finished it in less than 3 hours. Yay fun. I just need to do the other one so they can be felted and become the slippers they're meant to be. More about that later, when the time comes.

And Friday, I started another sock. Well, I ripped out the sock the Noro yarn had been, and am re-knitting it in the Spiral Eyelet pattern, and am liking it much more. No pics because I'm thinking this will be a gift pair of socks. But it's really pretty so far.

And now onto spinning. On Monday, at Meagan's, I managed to finish spinning up the spindle kit wool. Here it is. So pretty, I love love love it. I don' care what the family or non-knitting friends say, I like spinning, you cannot buy this at a store, and even if I had a man, I would still knit and spin, so enough with the comments already.

And here's the "Erin" wool that it will be plied with, when I finish spinning the Erin. I can't wait.

And for the record, I kept my Lenten sacrifice, I did not buy one single bit of yarn the whole of Lent. And the major bingeing has to wait a week, because Knitting on the Square is closed this week for the Maple Festival (but, on the bright side, the week after, everything in the store is on sale!). But, this did come in the mail last week.

It's the first of my Hill Country Yarn Sock Club skeins. I paid for my membership way back in Decmber, so this does not count against the Lent thing. It's their DK weight yarn in "Lilacs". It's so soft and pretty. Can't wait to finish the socks in progress so I can make these.

Alright, I think that's it for me. Thanks to those of you who made it through. I'll have to start posting more often to avoid such long and tedious posts. Happy Easter again!