Thursday, February 28, 2008

A new sweater and a blocking board!


I finished my blue sweater and its blocking right now. On my lovely new blocking board :) It was a whopping ten bucks at JoAnn Fabrics and it folds up to be a quarter of this size. Its lovely.

And, I went back to In A Yarn Basket today to get more fun yarn. I love it in there. They even remembered me from last week; which was cool. I'm embarking on my first pair of socks soon. I bought cool purple yarn cascade yarn for this endeavor.

I also bought some Alpaca Suri Merino for a scarf. Expensive? Yes, but it feels so luxirious I needed it. Really.

Sunday, February 24, 2008

Yay! I love this


I finished my new swiffer cover. I think its the coolest thing ever; here's why.
1. I love how quick it is. Just an hour and you have something cool!
2. The finishing is minimal, and who cares if it looks a little shitty, you're mopping the floor with it.
3. Blocking? I think not.
4. No disposable swiffer covers.
5. A fun gift to send to a random friend.
6. Inexpensive yarn- fun colors- stash buster.

Am I too excited over this itty bitty project? Maybe. Is the picture too big. Maybe.

Now, on to finishing some other projects so that I can start knitting with the NEW YARN!!! Its so soft. I love it so much. Blue Sky Alpaca you rock. If only you weren't the most expensive thing I've ever purchased at a knitting shop.

Saturday, February 23, 2008

better

Surgery went well. Well enough that as we walked (yes, walked! no crutches!) all I could think of is going to the new LYS. So, we did! I loved it! Everyone in there was very nice, helpful, and seemed glad to be there. I only bought one skein of Blue Sky Alpaca and I'm completely in love with it. I just keep touching it.

I'm working to finish my blue sweater (pics below) I didn't like how one of the sleeved knitted up so I ripped it out and joined it at the shoulder and I'm knitting it that way. I hate finishing. Knitting directly to the sweater suits me better. I'm excited to finish this because it means I can start something new and go back to the yarn store!

I'm still working on my afghan but it is less exciting because its being knitted with boring acrylic yarn...

Thursday, February 21, 2008

A quick update

I really want this to be a knitting post for the most part, but sometimes life interrupts and I feel like I have to explain this whole ongoing surgery debacle so that at least one day I can look back and remember all of this...

Once upon a time there was a girl whose feet and legs always hurt. She thought that everyone had this problem. Even though she sometimes had stress fractures and often couldn't fall asleep from pain in her feet and legs she thought she was normal.

Then one day, she got out of bed, her ankles cracked and she fell to the ground. Then this happened again. And, as this continued she realized that walking around in the morning was painful and took getting to used too.

So, she decided to go see a doctor. He gave her some pills that made her violently ill. So, she went to a new doctor. The new doctor decided that insoles in her shoes were the key. She decided to call them nerdy shoes. Her friends called them special shoes. After three months of the nerdy shoes the pain was no better.

The doctor told her that the next step was to have a screw put in each ankle to realign the bones. Although the girl was not super excited about the plan she was super excited about less pain.

Just after Christmas the girl went to have surgery. She had never been in the hospital and was nervous about the unknown. As they wheeled her back to surgery she started to cry, and then she was asleep. She woke up with metal in her foot and very little pain. She decided that this wasn't so bad after all. Once she got used to walking with this new screw she loved it! It was the best piece of metal ever!

Four weeks later

The girl is back in the hospital to get the next screw put in. She is no longer scared and is happily chats with the very nice nursing staff. Jokes are made on the way to the operating room and everything is lovely. She wakes up from this surgery and heads home. Yay screws.

One week later

The girl is at a conference happily walking without crutches when all of a sudden she feels an awful burning sensation inside of her foot. It hurts but she decides that it must be normal. She goes to the doctor the next day and he tells her that her screw has been pushed out of place. Sometimes this happens (which is why you sign documentation that says you understand that this could happen and that it doesn't mean that it is anyone's fault.) She has to have surgery the following week to correct things.

One week later


Back to the hospital. Everyone is nice, things are jovial and surgery is done. More precautions are taken and the girl is on crutches a full week instead of a few days. At the post op appointment things look perfect on the X ray. Sadly, when the girl returns home from the appointment she carefully steps through the house and feels the screw go back out of place. She calls the doctor. He has her in a few days later and they discover that the screw won't stay in place. She has a loose ligament (who knew screws were promiscuous...) and it won't hold the screw in place. She has to have the screw taken out and let scar tissue form. Hopefully, in four months there will be enough scar tissue to hold a screw in place.

Tomorrow

The screw comes out. We start over. Boo. The girl surely needs new yarn to feel better.

Saturday, February 16, 2008

Yay for Presidents!

There are lots of reasons that I like teaching. I think its fulfilling, you get to help people, watch them grow... yada, yada, yada. But, one of my very favorite (and very shallow) things about teaching is the random days we get off. Okay, President's Day itself isn't random, but having it off is something random. This will give me time to finish my lovely sweater, reusable swiffer cover, and work on the afghan.

Finally, I did get past row 30 on my afghan and things have been much better.

Sunday, February 10, 2008

ahh...


I finished the second pair of Bird In Hand Mittens! I'm very glad to be done with them because I want to work on my sweater and afghan, but since these are for someone else I thought I should finish them out.

I have decided not to take any pain killers today so that I can figure out what I'm doing wrong with this afghan I'm making. I don't want to keep ripping it back, and I love what the finished product looks like so I'm going to work out the kinks until it works.

Tomorrow I'm allowed to drive so I can go pick up new size 7 dpns and cast on for my sweater sleeves! Hooray!

I'd love to have something fun and witty to say about something, but without the pain medicine I'm not very fun today.

Friday, February 8, 2008

back and forth

I've been knitting steadily since I returned from my surgery yesterday. I have one mitten done, the body of my sweater (I need new size7 dpns for the sleeves and I can't drive until Monday) , and I'm three rows back on my afghan. I have steadily knitted an inch and have torn that inch back for the last few hours. Maybe I need to wait until I'm not on pain killers. There's a lot of counting involved in this afghan. I think I might have to go back to the mittens for awhile.

I watched "Jane Austen Book Club" today. Pretty good.

I finished reading Twilight last night. It was tremendous. I sent my husband out to buy the second one, but they didn't have it. Had I waited 30 more minutes to send him I could have sent him for needles too, but I'm trying not to make him too crazy...

Thursday, February 7, 2008

last time

So, my third surgery is complete. I am assuming that this one will take. Hopefully, I'll have some good FOs in the coming days!!

As a side note, I just finished watching the series Twin Peaks for the first time. My head is messed up for sure.

Sunday, February 3, 2008

Using all of my maturity

So, I could sit here and be cranky that I have to have surgery on Thursday and be upset about until then, and then be upset about it for the weeks after when I'm healing. Or, I could go on through the pain and crankiness and be a productive member to society. (Well, at least the knitting society.) I've decided on the second. Here is a list of things I'm working on to fill my time as I'm stuck on the couch.

1. This is going to be a Celtic Knot Afghan for friends that are getting married in October. It is full of cables and what not and I don't think I'll want to sit and knit only this. So, I'm working on it while I work on other projects. Oh, plus I think I need more regular gratification than watching it grow at the snail pace it seems I'm knitting it.


2. On the left you see the second coming of the Bird In Hand Mittens. I ended up giving the pair that didn't fit mom to my sister. She lives near my mom and was going to go pick them up. I still want a pair, but I want lime green and brown. I think that these mittens look HUGE, but the other ones were so small on her hands that I'm hoping we're close. I only went up one needle size (from 0-1) so, I can't imagine that they're THAT big.

3. Aahhh and for me... Is the Gathered Pullover from Interweave Knits Winter 2007-2008. The picture doesn't do it justice at all; it is a simple sweater but really cool. I'm not a fan of the rolled edge because its so rolled right now, but I like how it looks in the finished picture so I'm dealing with it.

I'm holding strong to my goal of having the mittens and sweater finished by the 22nd. That is the Oh So Special day where Bloomington gets a new LYS, and I want to go in to that store looking for yarn to start a brand new project... this... Oh, and the new store has like a million colors of Blue Sky Alpaca.

Saturday, February 2, 2008

if you thought I was cranky yesterday...

I just found out the the screw from my second surgery did not stay in place as one might have hoped. I've been scheduled for surgery three. Since I have no nice words to say I think I won't say anything.

Friday, February 1, 2008

icky

I have nothing positive to say. Here are the negative things that I've come up with.
* My foot hurts a lot. I don't remember the other one hurting like this.

* Took the Bird In Hand mittens to mom. They're too small. So, they're mine and I have to start over on hers. Left them in another city with her because I'm stupid.

* I really don't want to start a new set of mittens.

I'm going to the couch to be pout like a small child.