Tuesday, February 28, 2006
The Medal Ceremony
::::Crowd cheers wildy::::Then silence falls as the National Anthem beings to play. I sing along (under my breath...I may knit, but I do not sing!), hand over heart.
Here is my Knitting Olympics Gold Medal
Saturday, February 25, 2006
Gold!
Headline: Team Stro Gets The Gold!
Silicon Valley, CA - 9:18pm: Team Stro finished the Good Ole Cabled Scarf! An amazing first time effort for cabled work!
Thursday, February 23, 2006
Back to the Future...
Note: This post has very little OKC (obligatory knitting content)...a rarity for me. But I am too excited about "my news!"
It's weird how when one is young, you just can't wait to grow up. When you are older, you think of your youth as "carefree".
In my 100 Things About Me (coming soon!), you will find out that I never finished college. Close, (very close) but no cigar. Today I found out that I have been admitted to SFSU for Fall 2006 to finish my degree!
I look back now and realize how I didn't appreciate my education as fully as I could have during my college years. Toward the end, my (as then undiagnosed) ADD was really in the way, and I didn't understand why school was becoming so difficult.
Now, having the diagnosis, and the understanding & awareness that comes with it, I am fully prepared to take a final shot at school.
Yay, me!!!!
Okay, heres the OKC: I am at 67" or so on the Knitting Olympics scarf...wooohooooo!
It's weird how when one is young, you just can't wait to grow up. When you are older, you think of your youth as "carefree".
In my 100 Things About Me (coming soon!), you will find out that I never finished college. Close, (very close) but no cigar. Today I found out that I have been admitted to SFSU for Fall 2006 to finish my degree!
I look back now and realize how I didn't appreciate my education as fully as I could have during my college years. Toward the end, my (as then undiagnosed) ADD was really in the way, and I didn't understand why school was becoming so difficult.
Now, having the diagnosis, and the understanding & awareness that comes with it, I am fully prepared to take a final shot at school.
Yay, me!!!!
Okay, heres the OKC: I am at 67" or so on the Knitting Olympics scarf...wooohooooo!
Wednesday, February 22, 2006
Get Crackin' Sister!
Boy! I've been so focused on moving my blog & sprucing it up, that I haven't gotten in any knitting time today! I'm at 56.75" and have just started my third and final skein of Noro Transitions. I better get cracking...or knitting, as it may be!
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
Snafu!
Oh no! I did a pattern repeat this morning after blogging last, and noticed a huge error (cabled front when it should have been in back). Given that I had never done cables before obviously I had never "fixed" an errant one and I was terrified! I was totally thinking of leaving it because a non-knitter prolly wouldn't notice, but 1) It was making me crazy, and 2) It was not "knitting excellence" in the spirit of the Olympics.
I thought about getting some help from one of the Knitting Doctors at Knitting Arts, but one won't be available 'til tomorrow, which meant losing some prime Knitting Olympics time...What to do??
Then hubby said I should tink it back and fix it (okay, he didn't use those terms, but it's what he meant), because it would be a valuable "learning opprotunity"...so after rolling my eyes (a lot), it's what I did. Mathphobe that I am, I have no idea how I got my mind around it (prolly the same way as the 2 Colors, 2 Hands method), but I did and problem solved! I can prolly catch up & even go beyond where I was! WoooHooooooooooo! :::::happy dance::::
I thought about getting some help from one of the Knitting Doctors at Knitting Arts, but one won't be available 'til tomorrow, which meant losing some prime Knitting Olympics time...What to do??
Then hubby said I should tink it back and fix it (okay, he didn't use those terms, but it's what he meant), because it would be a valuable "learning opprotunity"...so after rolling my eyes (a lot), it's what I did. Mathphobe that I am, I have no idea how I got my mind around it (prolly the same way as the 2 Colors, 2 Hands method), but I did and problem solved! I can prolly catch up & even go beyond where I was! WoooHooooooooooo! :::::happy dance::::
Scarf Check In:
Current Offical Scarf Length: 49.75" ! WooHoooo!
Last night was our local TKGA Guild meeting, so I got in several inches. Of those present, four of us were working on our Olympic projects. KnitWitty had to be the ultimate Olympian, with her stopwatch and all! She's clocking herself to get her "official Olympic time"...I loved it!!!
Last night was our local TKGA Guild meeting, so I got in several inches. Of those present, four of us were working on our Olympic projects. KnitWitty had to be the ultimate Olympian, with her stopwatch and all! She's clocking herself to get her "official Olympic time"...I loved it!!!
Monday, February 20, 2006
Yarn in Two Hands!
Knitting with yarn in one hand is too cool, but knitting with two colors, one in each hand, has to be the pinnacle of knitting fun for me! Audited the Working With Color class by Knitting Arts newest teacher, Barbara Warsavage, and learned a lot more about options with color.
Since I didn't take any knitting classes at TNNA last month, I decided to really challenge myself to learn something new. I charted a first project for the first time, and taught myself intarsia. So I was pretty stoked about working with color.
So, I knitted American with one color, and Continental with the other! It was so much fun, and fast!!!
Since I didn't take any knitting classes at TNNA last month, I decided to really challenge myself to learn something new. I charted a first project for the first time, and taught myself intarsia. So I was pretty stoked about working with color.
So, I knitted American with one color, and Continental with the other! It was so much fun, and fast!!!
Friday, February 17, 2006
34" & Counting...
So 48" may not do it for a guy's scarf. If I do 60", I will need to do 3.75" per day & need to be at 26.25" today to be on track. I am proud to say that I am at 34" so far, with many more knitting hours left in the day...wooohooo!
Citius, Altius, Fortius
(Faster, Higher, Stronger)
Thursday, February 16, 2006
Love The One You Knit...
Okay, last night I was ready to pack in the Good Ole Cabled Scarf. Love the design, but wasn't too sure about the yarn (just for this project, not in general).
Knitting is such a personal thing. You have to love the one you knit. It really is like a relationship, you have to have some interest in this thing in order for it to progress. Usually you pretty much know right away if it (the relationship, or the FO!) will work or not. I wasn't feeling the vibe & wanted to chuck it...but I said I'd finish the skein. By then, I'd have gone through all the color & textural changes, and could see if this was gonna work. During my son's Lego Robotics class today, I saw the scarf in true daylight and started feeling better about it. Hubby, who has a very severe litmus test for all things Manly, declared it manly enough for my friend and thus passed theUltimate True Test of Manly Scarf-ness.
25" done & we are off to Spanish class for 50 (mostly) uninterrupted minutes of knitting time!
Knitting is such a personal thing. You have to love the one you knit. It really is like a relationship, you have to have some interest in this thing in order for it to progress. Usually you pretty much know right away if it (the relationship, or the FO!) will work or not. I wasn't feeling the vibe & wanted to chuck it...but I said I'd finish the skein. By then, I'd have gone through all the color & textural changes, and could see if this was gonna work. During my son's Lego Robotics class today, I saw the scarf in true daylight and started feeling better about it. Hubby, who has a very severe litmus test for all things Manly, declared it manly enough for my friend and thus passed theUltimate True Test of Manly Scarf-ness.
25" done & we are off to Spanish class for 50 (mostly) uninterrupted minutes of knitting time!
Wednesday, February 15, 2006
Progress & Random Thoughts
In order to complete my scarf by the end of the Knitting Olympics (KO), I have to do (at minimum) 3" per day. Each cable repeat is exactly 1.5", so I must 2 per day. If I do one more repeat today, I will be on track.
It is interesting to see the reaction to the KO. I'm reading a lot of blogs. Some have embraced it for just the collective bit of knitterly fun it is, others are downright...hmm...what is the word? It's hard to define, but it's sort of like being a 7th grader, getting invited to the cool 8th grade party, and the folks who were invited but didn't go being kinda, "Well, I didn't want to go to that dumb old party anyway"...about it.
Some are pretty clear about not wanting to do it for whatever reason. I applaud them for being individualistic enough to know their minds. But the other backlash is kinda, well, unfathomable. Do it or don't...I mean there have been some KALs that I thought were goofy, but I didn't blog it and talk about how silly I may have thought it was. Wasn't my cup o'tea, so I didn't do it. End o'story.
Risking the collective wrath of the BlogWorld for daring to speak my mind.....
It is interesting to see the reaction to the KO. I'm reading a lot of blogs. Some have embraced it for just the collective bit of knitterly fun it is, others are downright...hmm...what is the word? It's hard to define, but it's sort of like being a 7th grader, getting invited to the cool 8th grade party, and the folks who were invited but didn't go being kinda, "Well, I didn't want to go to that dumb old party anyway"...about it.
Some are pretty clear about not wanting to do it for whatever reason. I applaud them for being individualistic enough to know their minds. But the other backlash is kinda, well, unfathomable. Do it or don't...I mean there have been some KALs that I thought were goofy, but I didn't blog it and talk about how silly I may have thought it was. Wasn't my cup o'tea, so I didn't do it. End o'story.
Risking the collective wrath of the BlogWorld for daring to speak my mind.....
Sunday, February 12, 2006
Good Ole Cabled Scarf
Thanks for the vote, Trek, but my friend (that I'm actually knitting the thing for!!) decided he'd like the Good Ole Cabled Scarf.
Anal doofus (just call me A.D.) that I am, I wanted to do exactly the right thing and be honorable in my intent, so I followed the letter of the law not to cast on before the Olympic flame was lit. I didn't see the Yarn Harlot's post that due to time differences, everyone could CO at 2 pm (2pm where? Huh??). And you know I am not a big Olympics fan...so it was somewhat torturous to sit for 3 hours, have them finally light the thing, and then have it be midnight & I'm too tired to knit now! UGH!!!!
But it is a thing of beauty! I've got about 7.5" done, and it actually looks like a cable...woohoo!! I'm using Transitions by Noro & US size 10.5 needles. The only thing about cables is it is not mindless knitting!!! I mean I know it was supposed to be something challenging, but you can do a challenging sweater that has long periods of mindlessness! This pattern has you do something different every stinkin' row!!! Which would tank if I actually cared about watching the Olympics, but since I don't, it's just slightly annoying to be tethered to a pattern.
Onward & upward!
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
Knitting Olympics?
OK, I am so not an Olympics fan since my shattered childhood dream of becoming a world class skater :P
BUT:
I have a friend who is into the Olympics and just had a birthday.......
SO:
I may join the Knitting Olympics and do one of two scarves for my first-ever cabling project (now that I am fresh off my cocky first-ever intarsia high) :
Good Ole Cabled Scarf (loooove it....but not reversible, alas..but am told it is pretty on both sides anyway)
Irish Hiking Scarf (reversible - highly probable)
HOWEVER:
I absolutely cannot do it unless I finish both the Sideways Curly Fries Vest (3/4 done) & hubby's Man Bag (somewhere between 2/3 & 3/4 done) - Doable if I totally haul (pix will surely follow of both + the intarsia blanket!)
SO:
What say you all? Should I go for it? Which scarf?
BUT:
I have a friend who is into the Olympics and just had a birthday.......
SO:
I may join the Knitting Olympics and do one of two scarves for my first-ever cabling project (now that I am fresh off my cocky first-ever intarsia high) :
Good Ole Cabled Scarf (loooove it....but not reversible, alas..but am told it is pretty on both sides anyway)
Irish Hiking Scarf (reversible - highly probable)
HOWEVER:
I absolutely cannot do it unless I finish both the Sideways Curly Fries Vest (3/4 done) & hubby's Man Bag (somewhere between 2/3 & 3/4 done) - Doable if I totally haul (pix will surely follow of both + the intarsia blanket!)
SO:
What say you all? Should I go for it? Which scarf?
