when toes attack

It appears that I have committed another Random Act Of Stupidity. I finished, without much in the way of joy or enthusiasm, the terribly dull Regia socks...



...only to discover that I have opted to kitchener twelve stitches on one sock and eight on the other.



And it's a mighty lame job of kitchenering, too, if I do say so myself. But there is absolutely zero chance that I am going to fix it. I am more than happy to be finished with these things.

I guess I'll have to keep my shoes on to thwart those who would crawl around in a diabolical search for miskitchenered toes.

In which I contemplate finishing something

Every now and then I get one of those wacky notions about finishing things. Like, right about now I'm having wild fantasies of reducing my UFO tally to a figure that is countable on a single appendage. Nuts, I know. But the Regia socks that have been kicking around for a decade or so are in the home stretch, the Constant Companion bag is looking sort of biggish, and at some point I did start the border of the Flowing River shawl. There's hope for all of them.

There is also a sweater around somewhere and a crocheted doily-ish thing I had intended to finish by Christmas. There's one shawl I barely started (Magickal Earth) and at least two that have mistakes waiting to be corrected. And there's a lacy scarf too. And a baby sweater waiting for a button band. Not as much hope for those items, but I'll try to chip away at the heap.

And there's a crocheted blanket for charity that is zipping along nicely at the moment. I'm not too concerned about that one.

Today, though, the Regia socks. If I'm good I should be able to finish them by tomorrow.

Baseball knitting (Warning: Disco content)

We stitched, they pitched.

Probably because I bought my tickets late we were on the periphery of the stitch and pitch section. There wasn't a whole lot of knitting going on around us, though there were some folks carrying the commemorative tote bags as well as a whole lot of folks without them. The upside of that was that I didn't need to worry about my non-knitting family looking like party poopers. The downside was that I felt like I didn't get to join in the party, nor did I get to help teach the mascot to knit.

The loot bags were a lot of fun. Each one was a little different and I had a great time snooping in all four of our bags. I present herewith a sampling of the booty.



Please note that the above represents highlights from TWO bags. I stole my husband's because, well, he does not appreciate yarn.

Yes, you see that Disco stuff again, the label hiding its face in shame. It's like a creeping fungus. But the bright yellow hank is Diamond Luxor Egyptian cotton, and the two colourful balls are washable wool from Colourworks. The black Moda Dea are an acrylic/tencel blend. My daughters each got a ball of novelty stuff from Needful Yarns, one of them got a ball of Patons Divine, and I do believe there was more Disco in there somewhere.

In summary: The Jays beat the Angels and I got about four inches done on my boring grey hat.

Really not very exciting hats

Two down, one (or maybe more) to go. I have just cast one on the third one to serve as my don't-gots-to-look-at-it project for tomorrow's Stitch and Pitch.



The, um, non-luxury yarn is an obsolete Bernat product purchased on clearance at Wal-Mart a couple of years ago. I have found it does make nice cushy warmish hats that in my humble opinion should be welcome at a homeless shelter.

If you attend the game and happen to see a tired-looking woman accompanied by a husband and two daughters knitting a very boring grey hat, be advised that that woman would be me. If you mention that you read about me here, be forewarned that I will turn bright red and slither under my seat in humiliation. Just a heads-up.

And in case anyone wonders what happened to my small daughter's face...



Well, I'd like to say I used it to practise my Kitchener stitch, but it was actually a gymnastics mishap. Three stitches, for those who like to count.

Stitch and Pitch giddiness

I am giddy. I have, on top of my printer, maybe three feet away, tickets to the Blue Jays Stitch and Pitch on Wednesday.

Also, by the way, I am pathetic. As I do not seem to have any flesh-and-blood knitting friends, I am bringing my family. This includes a husband who is, as you might guess, a male, non-knitting person. I have warned him that he's going to stick out like the proverbial sore thumb but he insists he's ok with that. He is happy that he gets to see a ball game even in a sea of females and yarn. We will be accompanied by two daughters, both of whom are still struggling to master the knit stitch. I hope I'll be able to persuade them to bring their needles.

I figure that if I bring three people whose interest in things yarny is marginal or less, I will have a better shot at relieving them of their loot bags.

I picked up the Stitch and Pitch flyer at the Coats & Clark Outlet Clearance Store (6060 Burnside, unit 3, in Mississauga) this morning. I had a rockin' good time stocking up on plain old RH acrylic for charity baby blankets. I also bought a bamboo crochet hook which I hate with a fierce burning passion and which I will never, ever use unless every other crochet hook drops off the face of the earth, and maybe not even then. One might find lots of fun floofy stuff at the Coats & Clark place, if one is into that sort of thing, as well as dirt-cheap afghan-friendly acrylic. Just promise me you won't actually wear any of it.

I am so, so sick of dishcloths. I've got six in stock at the moment, one short of my goal, but I'm going to take a break. If I feel like knitting one or two more before we go to my mother-in-law's house, fine. If not I'm sure she can make do with two.

So now I'm boring myself silly with men's hats for charity. I knit one last month while I was on vacation and started a second this week. They're ultra-plain (cast on 80 stitches, K2P2 for a while, stst for a longer while, decrease) in grey wool blend so hopefully they'll be suitable for a homeless shelter. That's my goal for them at any rate. I have to donate them in batches of three so expect me to get as fed up with these as I am with dishcloths.

Edging on the shawl is stalled. Quite. I do not feel like concentrating on lace right now. Perhaps these are the summer knitting blahs that I've heard others mention.

Once upon a time I planned to make three or four dishcloths for my mother-in-law. Then I thought I would make a couple for each of the ladies who had expressed an appreciation for handknit dishcloths. Then, of course, I forgot who I had been talking to and presented two dishcloths to someone who had no interest in them and now suspects that I'm weird. And here it is eons later and I still have a bunch of dishcloths to knit.



That's what, four and a half? So if I do three for mother-in-law and two for each of the ladies who actually wanted them (can you sense the V-8 forehead slap happening repeatedly?) I still have two and a half to go.

No problem.

The Flowing River shawl has not been abandoned. Yet. No, I didn't say that. I am working on the edging and I see no reason why I shouldn't finish it before the next Olympics, to chose a random distant event.



Of course, being the me that I am, it is not going smoothly. Fortunately, I am fully aware of the me that I am and am employing lifelines liberally. This very night I had finished one 10-row repeat and was starting another when my stitch count went inexplicably haywire and I ended up ripping back to the lifeline that I had wisely inserted this morning. So now I'm back to where I was about 12 hours ago, which really isn't that drastic in the grand scheme of things. And, just to clarify, it did not take 12 hours to knit the 10-row repeat. It might, however, have taken nearly 12 hours to psych myself to do it.

In only slightly related news, I received the brochure for the Creativ festival in the mail today (what do these people have against that final "e", and are they related to the folks at Pet Valu?) and it looks way cool. I've never attended before, though I always plan to, but this time I think I really will make a major effort to go. The brochure can be found here. Check out the Knitter's Market on page 18-19.

I'm still trying to figure out whether I'm going to be able to make it to the Spinrite tent sale in Listowel this year. If the stars align perfectly I might be able to go on one of the Fridays. Not that I need any more cheap yarn, but you know. It's yarn and it's cheap.