I want to not have a queue

Ever have so many projects lined up that you don't know where to start? You look at this pattern then remember that pattern then cast on for another pattern only to feel as if you're neglecting the old pattern and then you realize you haven't knit a darned thing. Why? Because you've spent hours going 'round and 'round in your mind or out loud to your friends or just to your cats. You haven't knit a stitch because you can't get out of your own way.

My queue is stressing me. 

It's full of pretty stuff. Intricate lace. Bulky, toasty sweater. Gorgeous lacy shawls. Cabled goodness. All still in queue, mocking me. 


I'm afraid to look anymore. It's that "ravel it" button followed immediately by the "add to ravelry queue" button that gets me into so much trouble as I saunter across the internet ... I'm going to remove those buttons from my browser, at least until I get the queue under control. Move some items out. Actually knit a few. There's a concept: knitting something in the queue rather than just adding to it every time I sign on. *rolleyes*


No queue = no pressure.


No pressure = happy knitter.

My shawl is growing like crazy. I think I can finish this within a few days if I just concentrate on completing this project before beginning another. 


I think I can. I think I can.

 

Mara me, please

When I first saw Mara, I loved her but when I took a closer look at the styling in the photo, I hated it. Too "I'm a cowgurl and I'm about to eat a big ass lobster and I need a big ass wool bib." And since I don't like seafood, the image burned on my brain of the model with her wool bib pulling up to the table holding a huge knife and fork in each hand with her elbows firmly planted on the table was just too much for me. 


All of this is not to say the model isn't pretty and feminine but the sight of this chick slouching against the wall while wearing her lobster bib, shorts and high heels made me click on the red "X" and look for something else. Is that a barn door she's leaning against or the lobby of a well-heeled restaurant? Is she about to go ride a raging bull? Did she leave her hair salon in a hurry? Is she just waiting for a galpal for drinks?

In spite of all the inner commotion caused by this badly styled photo, I continued to be drawn to Mara over and over. I took a look at other project photos and she began to grow on me all over again. I looked at the remainder of the photos from the pattern and all I can say is, it is truly astounding what better styled photos can do for your garment design. 

(Can someone please, please talk to the "stylists" over at Interweave Press and let them know they do a fairly shitty job of styling what are often lovely garments ... Show-off Ruffle skirt being a prime example ... thanks).   

I have the most glorious yarn for Mara. It was purchased a year and a half ago at Seed Stitch during one of their clearance sales. It was still pretty spendy but not nearly as much as the original cost per skein which was about $25.00 and I think that's obscene for yarn that isn't even 70 yards. I'm not bending over for that. It's Road to China from The Fibre Company and while the temptation is strong to purchase it full  price and feast on peanut butter for the remainder of the month, someone has to reign you in and talk some sense into you. There is pretty yarn and there is pretty yarn on clearance. Indulging in the latter is best for everyone, again considering each skein is barely 70 yards. The color is  Topaz and it's 65% alpaca, 15% silk, 10% camel and 10% cashmere. All in all a fine smooshy, squishy, soft piece of heaven. I cast on last night just before giving in and going to sleep. It's going to be quite something.

Cure for the Greens

Yes, I found even more green and green mixtures in my stash. It is really quite absurd that I have so much of a color that really doesn't excite me very much. Something Must Be Done. 


Since that early morning Green Epiphany, I've begun the long road back to Other Colors. I headed out to Seed Stitch and told myself I would not buy anymore yarn (I didn't) or any more pattern books (I didn't - again, yay me) but I'd exchange the ocean of green Creative Focus Linen I'd purchased there. Five skeins were already put into cakes so I was out of luck on those but the remaining five were still in hanks so I was able to exchange them for a color that is NOT GREEN.

 Is that not a gorgeous lavender? It's far more interesting than the green. Ok, maybe not as interesting but at least it constitutes variation on theme.

This is a very good start. The Cure is to stay out of yarn stores and if I'm in a yarn store, stay by the door while I wait for friends and resist the urge to get sucked in by NEW AND EXCITING new fall colors and IMAGINATIVE NEW PATTERNS.  But fail miserably.  You GOTS TO BE STRONG, I say.


Yeah. That's the plan.

What am I, a Leprechaun?

I seem to have a problem with green yarn. I'm not sure why or how I accumulated so much damned green yarn since it isn't even one of my favorite colors. But everywhere I look, I see green. 

This honking hank was purchased early last year to make a shawl I loved on Twist. Or maybe it was the year before. I found I needed another one so now I have two. This was dyed by Chris and the color variegation is hard to capture but the work is genius. Genius I tell you. 

Then there is Noro Silk Garden. I'm not a big Noro fan ... yet I have a ton of Noro. I think this is because Jill at Yarns in the Farms is a Noro fan and whenever she puts together a kit for a skirt, there is always Noro in there. I routinely take the kit apart because I get home and experiment with other combinations and all the Noro ends up in a separate bag, blatantly discriminated against by me, the ultimate Yarn Ho. Noro generally cannot be trusted, that's part of the problem. Noro looks so beautiful in the skeins. The colors are beautifully mixed and contrasted and you fall in love with the rich and often vibrant but sometimes subtle mixes. You take a bag of serene and elegant mauves and emeralds and chocolates and begin your project. Suddenly, inexplicably and without any kind of effing warning, out comes a huge splat of lime green mixed with orange tinged with purple. WTF? You grab the other skeins thinking it is some kind of evil, awful fluke and lo and behold, more orange and purple yarn vomit.  You realize Noro has sold you a bag of wood. Looks so innocent there in all it's green and grey splendor but I'm telling you, there is a hot mess of orange/purple/lime green waiting to spring at you. Although I admit Iro is what-you-see-is-what-you-get - no plunks of weirdly colored yarn vomit in those and for that, I'm grateful.

I fell for lace. Hard. I have so much lace and so little nerve. *snicker* I love it but I can't bring myself to actually pick a pattern and dive in. While I do have pink silk lace and chocolate alpaca lace, of course I have green lace. Green lace in all textures and variegations. Oh, lookey here. Tosh Lace. In green. It doesn't look green in the photo and that's what fooled me. Hah. It's green Trust me. I told myself it was more brownish blue-ish but when I got it home in the natural light, it was clear as day that it's green. Just a different saturation level of green but green all the damned same.

I also have been bitten by the linen bug and the other day, I found a bag of Euroflax in my trunk. I'd purchased it long ago to make a lace sweater. Guess what color the linen is? You'll never, ever guess. Actually, there was a yellow hank in there but the main colors are ... light green and dark green with the mutant yellow in there for variety. *rolleyes* The photo doesn't do justice to the vibrancy of the yellow and the dark green. The lighter green is a good balance. What is behind this accumulation of green?


Could it be a desire for more money? I can't imagine why I would want more money ... oh, I know. All of my disposable income is represented by bins and bags and baskets of yarn in my house. I'm overrun with yarn. Yarn and pattern books. Yarn and projects in varying stages of completion. I'm the crazy lady with the cats AND the yarn. Double whammy. But just so you fully understand and appreciate the depths of my newly discovered and completely unforeseen love of green, let me show you more. 

This Alpaca lace is from when I wanted to make a lime Citron. This shawl is the cutest thing ever. I'd make it much larger and wider but I love it. And it is one of the only projects I'd make using the same color as the model. The green is fabulous and I don't say that simply because I seem to have a freakish amount of green but the green really does suit this shawl.

I haven't made the shawl yet. But rest assured, I have all the green makings for it. In alpaca lace, in the Bramble silk lace ... in green. I even have Briggs Little big honking Atlantic in pale green. I have Tosh DK in Jade. I have Cocoon in green, thanks to Jill and one of her skirt kits.

It would be fabulous. But then I pick it up to admire it and teeny tiny little string of silky alpaca makes me crazy so back into the bin it goes. This is about when the chunky yarn begins to look more attractive to me and I pull it out and revel in the fact that I can whip out a project using chunky yarn in no time as opposed to cursing and screaming and ripping out dental floss yarn.

See how more inviting the chunky looks over the teeny lace? And what do you know, the Debbie Bliss Chunky Tweed is in ... green.


All righty now. I'm off to work on a new version of Swallowtail using fingering weight in Schaefer. Dammit all to hell, the yarn is green. Sue me.

Getting your Knit Geek on ...

So Chelsea at Stitch House and Annisa (and everyone else there) loved Flower Basket. She is so pretty and I'm really proud of her. Chelsea put her on the form, took photos and posted to their blog. *beams* 

Chelsea and I always like to hang because we really get into the patterns and yarns and designers and just rock the geekiness in us. Annisa just laughed at us and made fun of us. Claire came in and headed to the bowels of the basement to dye. Hah! She was there when I selected Glazed Pecan in the Tosh to use for the edging on Flower B. 

I have decided to use Cascade Heritage (from Seed Stitch ages ago) for Swallowtail and so far, the yarn loves Swallow, unlike Cascade Pure Alpaca. So unambitious that pure alpaca. It just wanted to fuzz, create halo and totally obscure the lacework. You may think the color I've chosen (Camel) is boring but rock that camel shawl with a red sweater or pink jacket or black coat and it will be beyond. Trust me. Plus I'm going to bling it out with beads instead of nupps. Not feeling the nupps. Aside from just not really liking big blobs of twisted yarn on my stuff, it sounds vaguely breast like and I'm betting if you really look at nupps, you'll see that they even look breast like so I'll just pass on the whole thing. Beads it will be. Blingy, shiny, sparkly, lovely beads. It's the kid in me. What of it?

Damned yarn won't bend to my will

Why? WHY? I want this baby alpaca to be Swallowtail but it is resistant. The stitches won't pop and give me great stitch definition. Clearly this baby alpaca just wants to be stockinette. So my ambitions are lost in the fuzzy floppiness of alpaca.

Sigh. I don't know if it wants to be this sweater or the higher neck sweater. 

Swallowtail Re-visited

Returning to our regularly scheduled blogging, I actually found pretty 40% off baby alpaca yarn yesterday and I've decided to do Swallowtail in this. I also have gorgeous beads to replace the nupps. I don't like nupps in the way that I don't like bobbles.

I do love the bobbles on the Show-off skirt and may have to get over my bobble hate because the skirt is just adorable.

With the option to add beads instead of nupps, Swallowtail is even more attractive to me. The color is greenish yellow and it is heathered. It is so squishy soft as to make me *squeal* and since it is DK weight, it is kinda flying off the needles. The progress from last night until this morning has been amazing! 

The color is more accurate in the first photo but this is just rocking along. I can't wait to get to the beading section. I also found a great hint on Ravelry re: enlarging this shawl dramatically without mucking up the stitch count. Yay!