Almost Ready!

Less than 48 hours until we board the plane to go to...

Glacier National Park! I am so psyched!!

I booked two raft tours today -- one whitewater, one scenic.

Daughter keeps asking how deep the water is -- clearly she's worried about falling out of the raft. She seemed reassured that life preservers would be required, and not at all bothered that helmets would be provided as well. I wish I knew what her mental image is of "white water rafting." She asked today if "white" meant "easy." Like the color coding of ski runs. And I've decided not to tell her that the lakes are as deep as the mountains are tall. Once the water is over your head, how much difference does it make how deep it is? Right? That's very logical. But I remember spending a lot of time on lakes as a kid and being irrationally frightened at how deep the water was. When a cold draft would float by my legs, I'd have to remind myself not to scream. The fear never stopped me from jumping off a boat with a water ski, however.

The boys are busy arguing about whether there are really glaciers there. One says all the glaciers melted centuries ago. The other says there are glaciers, but they all melt in summer. The debate has scaled back now that I've got guide books to read aloud from. They are by no means convinced I am right, but they are no longer so certain I am wrong.

For knitting, I've decided to keep it simple after all. Trying to plan a Big New Project for the trip was just adding to the stress of preparation. So I will take Josephine (who didn't complain at all when I left her sitting untouched last weekend due to a sore shoulder), several balls of sock yarn, Charlene Schurch's Sensational Knitting Socks, and the two patterns I've pulled off other blogs (Dunes and Loksins.)

And I'll take the Interminable Christmas Cross-stitch Stocking as well. Yes, there's a story there, but I'll tell it later.

Kids, kids, and a little knitting

It was a good weekend, just not very productive as knitting goes.

K had a friend sleep over on Friday night. They spent hours in the pool, then fell asleep in front of Animal Planet.

E, our middle son, returned from his first Boy Scout "away" camp on Saturday night. He had the time of his life. He can't quit talking about it: how to treat hypothermia, how to treat frost bite, how to diagnose heat illness (slightly more relevant than frostbite here on the Gulf Coast!); how to inflate a flannel shirt; how to make lanyards from flat plastic cord; the tarantula, the two scorpions, and the water snake that was not a water moccasin; rappelling off a 40 foot rock. Perhaps most importantly, his best buddy -- a boy who shares E's impulsiveness and high energy -- is still his best buddy after sharing a tent for a week. Both of them started pestering their respective parents for a get-together as soon as they stepped off the bus.

And we celebrated R's birthday a few days early, on Sunday. He got his long begged-for i-pod and some tab books for his guitar. We have a long car-ride planned for the day of his actual birthday -- what's the point of an i-pod if you don't get it BEFORE the long car ride?

On the knitting front, my shoulder was aching on Friday night and every time I picked up the needles it got worse. So I decided to switch to machine knitting for a bit. I calculated the pattern for Autumn and got on the machine (which doesn't care which hand I use to run the shuttle.) I knit the back in one longish sitting. I'm very pleased that I didn't have to do anything to keep the colors from pooling:

I'm also pleased with how the lace rib came out:

There was enough hand-manipulation in that hem for me to finish my listen of "The Kite Runner." (A wonderful book, by the way -- about tradition and shame and redemption and good and evil. I highly recommend the audio version.)

On the vacation-knitting-planning front, I have found 2 sock patterns I want to knit with some of my nearly-solid stash. The first is Dipsy Doodle's Dunes of Tinfou socks. The second is Loksins from Too Much Wool. Lovely socks from both ladies.

Choices, Choices...

My paper airline tix arrived today by FedEx. We are going on vacation! I'm so excited! (Since I always find myself making the actual reservations for vacation at the last moment, I also find myself surprised when it all comes together.)

We're going to Glacier National Park. I was able to get lodging at a 2BR cabin on a ranch just outside the park -- no phone, no TV channels (though they do have a TV with VCR for videos), so presumably no internet and no way for people from work to find me. The kids -- even the almost-15YO -- seem to enjoy just hanging out in non-suburban terrain, so I'm expecting a few hours per day of "tourist-ing" followed by lots of porch-sitting, beer sipping, knitting time.

And on that point, I have begun to consider what knitting to take. Socks, obviously, but choices, choices:

Clockwise from the Sockotta (red ball band) -- casual/jeans socks for me, cotton short socks for K, funky purple wool socks for me, fancy-stitch grey or ivory socks for me, casual denim-blue wool for...someone (probably me!), and fancy-stitch blue socks for...well, me. The last ball of yarn is Rowan CashSoft DK -- destined to become a non-sock, one-skein gift for a family member -- in with the socks only because it is also a very quick, portable project.

One thing I don't get: On several podcasts and blogs, the host cautions us that if we knit socks for others, they will clamor for more. Not true for me. I LOVE wearing the socks I make for myself. I know I knit a nice sock. But other than my daughter, NO ONE has asked for a second pair. I recently found the pair I made for my husband 3 years ago in the cedar chest -- never worn, to the best of my knowledge. Maybe I should be thankful I've avoided the curse of Clamoring Kin, but I actually feel unappreciated.

And another thing I don't get: whatever happened to Fortissima Cotton sock yarn (the Easter-egg colored cotton for K.) I actually made K a pair of socks from this when she was 4 or so, and I had more than a ball left over. It was very nice to work with -- very smooth, very fine, good saturated colors (even after several washes), and the fabric had the give of cotton/wool blends. But I haven't seen it in ages. Too bad. I would love to knit some up for myself in less obvious colors.

But back to Vacation Knitting. The socks and single-skein projects all seem rather insubstantial. Don't I need something more complex and challenging as well? Two possibilities:

I've had this lace-weight for a while, trying to decide what to do with it. I now know it is destined to become a Print O' The Wave stole. Portable, complex, very rewarding, but too much to think about while drinking beer? Hmmm.

I'm also tempted by this sport-weight Merino that K and I found on our ski-trip to Taos. We visited Southwest Weavers, who had a gallery of some absolutely amazing modern-art weaving, but also extensive weaving supplies and a small but lovely selection of hand-dyed hand-knitting yarn. K picked a skein of this -- I figured I'd make a hat and some mittens, but she asked for a new poncho. Oops. Called the shop and ordered 2 more skeins -- thankfully they had the same dye-lot still in stock. Shown a number of potential poncho designs, K also selected the Grand Plan Top-Down Capelet from Wrap Style. Oh so much stockinette!!!

Sick-bed Knitting

It's been a productive weekend for knitting, but not for the best reasons. K is sick and has been running a fever since Wednesday. The doctor says this flavor of virus lasts about 5 days, so I'm trying to be patient. I'm sticking around the house, and since I'm worried I knit.

Josephine had been languishing, but yesterday evening I finished the back:

After that, I finished the leg of K's Clown socks. Before bed, I had her try them on to test the length. What could cheer up a sick little girl like trying on some fancy new socks?

Alas, I discovered they were very tight going over the heel (this is a recurring problem for my socks...) I double checked my pattern. The stitch is a variation on feather and fan in which you decrease on either side of the fan on rows 1 and 3, then decrease again and add 6 YO's on row 5. It leaves a respectable portion of stockinette stitch for the self-patterning yarn without being boring to knit. But somehow I miscalculated the narrowest portion of the pattern by 2 stitches. Times 4 repeats. Oops.

So, I frogged the whole thing at 11pm, added a stitch between each pattern repeat, recalculated the pattern, and re-cast on. At 2am I had finished the leg, again. I am trying Charlene Schurch's "forethought" heel, which gives a cute little bull's eye on the heel and (more importantly) doesn't disrupt the repeats in the self-patterning yarn as you transition from leg to foot. I worked the heel while K watched Animal Planet this afternoon:

Hey! What's that?

Just a quick post to show my finished Jaywalkers:
This is the first FO that was started after I started my blog -- a milestone!

Particulars: Strapaz Wolle "Cotton Effekt," 45% cotton, 42% wool, 13% polyamide. Note that for my size 10 feet, I needed 2-1/2 balls of this yarn. Knit on 2.5mm addis. Jaywalker pattern from Grumperina, modified by using 1x1 rib instead of suggested 2x2 ('cuz I wanted to practice tubular cast ons.)

I don't reckon they really need to be blocked, do you? Tomorrow I'm going to wear them with some jeans, a yellow chambray shirt, and my turquoise necklace. And I'm going to show them to people who will smile pleasantly and pretend to appreciate them, and I won't mind that they don't get it.

Of course, I'm already plotting my next pair. Daughter picked out some self-patterning yarn that I will need to cope with. It's an opportunity to figure out how to knit two socks at once on two circulars, and how to do short row heels (she'll outgrow them before she wears them out anyway.)

Just a quick post, because it is very very late -- but I am just having too much fun! I can hardly stand it!

Things that are going very very well:

• Oldest son is learning to play guitar, and not only is he learning to play Stairway to Heaven, but he has also learned to tune the instrument -- truly a happy event.



• Daughter and I started piano lessons last week with a lovely, charming, patient but enthusiastic woman. Daughter is smitten, and practices every day without reminders.



• Middle son has begun to pace himself on the king kong ball.



• Oldest son and I tested for 1st degree black belt rank over the weekend -- and passed!

And on the knitting front:

• The back of Josephine is nearly complete, and my gage in the almost-stockinette stitch is looking wonderfully even.



• I am down to the toe decrease on the 2nd Jaywalker -- likely complete tomorrow night.



• The stubborn Iris has been ripped out and stowed until I am ready to deal with her again. (I wonder if she would really rather be a shawl?)



• And...I have discovered what Autumn wants to be.

Initial swatches of Autumn:

And the final swatch is where Autumn revealed herself at last:

She will become a short sleeve pull-over, with that lovely lace rib at the hem, along the the square neckline, and on the sleeve hems. Obviously it's machine knit -- I bought the yarn for machine knitting -- multi-color yarns need stockinette, and machines do stockinette best. Sometimes I do the edges by hand, but I did these on the machine and I think they look lovely, for once.

A Wicked Discovery

First, some background.

At work today I participated in a conference call with a group of project management types. We are trying to get to the bottom of why our construction costs seem so high, and some members of the group had just collected and analyzed a great deal of data on all aspects of field construction labor productivity. As rarely happens, the data actually pointed at a pretty clear conclusion. We quickly moved to an action planning discussion -- how about we change this multiplier and that approval process, and how will that play out in the field, and does this conflict with any contractual obligations, etc.

So this was a fairly deep discussion -- lots of technical information, plenty of difficult issues to address -- amongst ENGINEERS. None of us is a compelling speaker. None of us. And most of us are participating BY PHONE.

I am a multi-tasker by a nature. I can't just watch TV. I have to watch TV and fold towels/knit/do my grocery list. I carry my sock knitting with me everywhere, because I can't stand to just wait for a kid to finish a 30 minute music lesson or for the dental hygienist to call for me. And so teleconferences are very difficult for me. The lure of e-mail is nearly always more than I can stand, even though I know darn good and well I CAN'T listen and do e-mail at the same time.

Today, however, after I got my cup of tea, closed my door, and dialed in, my Jaywalkers began calling to me from my purse, under the desk. "Susan!" they called. "You're on mute except when you're talking. They can't hear you knitting!"

And so, the very very wicked discovery:

I CAN listen to AND participate in detailed, complicated work conversations WHILE I KNIT. In fact, I am a more effective participant when I knit than when I try not to read my e-mail.

This seems extremely subversive. It seems like the sort of thing I ought to get disciplined for. It is certainly the sort of thing that I would frown upon if I caught one of my engineers doing it.

But I contributed nicely to the meeting's outcome. And I finished the gusset decreases and am 1/2" into the long fast run to the toe...

Can you feel the tension?

I pulled Montse Stanley off the shelf recently and have been re-reading the first couple of chapters. And she's got some very nice pointers for how to address tension problems (which I suspected and she has confirmed I have.) And since Josephine has a fair amount of almost-stockinette in a detail-revealing yarn, I have been paying a good deal more attention than usual to my tension, and to what it is doing to my knitting. I have found that:

• my knit is tighter than my purl


• my tension gets tighter when I'm anxious or frustrated


• my tension is all over the place if the thing on TV is interesting
  

Ms. Stanley has some very nice pointers for correcting the first problem. For Jospehine, I'm double-wrapping the yarn around my pinkie on purl rows and I'm seeing the most even knitting I've ever done on cotton. For the other two, though, I'm going to try listening to engaging-but-not-exciting podcasts and see if I can "standardize" my mood. I'll keep you posted on whether this works.

Project updates: It was a good weekend of knitting. I'm up to the bodice-section of the back of Josephine:

Wonderful crinkly featherweight texture in the lace section, then adorable little eyelets for the future drawcord, then just a hint of texture in the bodice. Not as perfect as I'd like, though. In addition to the issues with tension already mentioned, I'm finding the knitted fabric has a slight bias to it -- I don't know if it's the stitch pattern, the yarn, or something I'm doing. But it definitely swings to the right. If a miracle doesn't occur when I block this baby, then I'll just have to rely on the fact that none of my friends know any better.


And the 3 hour round trip to the in-laws house was very productive time on the sock front. I finished the last 2" or so of leg, knit the heel flap, turned the heal, picked up the gusset stitches, and am well on my way through the decreases. But -- another annoyance -- the heels don't match! I was very careful -- using the self-striping color repeat as my guide, I started and ended the ribbing in the same place, and then started the heel flap in the same place. I carefully counted the heel rows. And I still ended up with one blue heel, one black heel:


The only difference I can think of is that one sock 1 I counted the "bars" from slip stitches, but on sock 2 I counted the slip stitches in the selvedge. So maybe I'm off by 2 rows on the #2 heel -- but I'm surprised that it makes such a big difference in the heels.



The visit to my in-laws was to celebrate M's birthday. I will leave you with this picture of the birthday cake. (No, it only looked like watermelon.)