Sometimes through your own innocent actions, and trying to help somebody out you end up doing the opposite. Sometimes when your just trying to enrich someone’s life you instead create and addict. I have created an addict, he still doesn’t think he is or fully realizes he is, but Ryan is an addict. A knitting addict that is. Now he might try to argue with you that he doesn’t have hardly any yarn and he has yet to buy any of his own, or his own needles. Oh, I am wise and can see the signs early on, and this is clearly a sign of addiction.

Yes that is what you think it is, Ryan with two skeins of yarn tucked under his chin while he reads…. No I don’t know why. It wasn’t particularly cold so he can’t really get away with that as an excuse… I think it was just his internal desire to have the yarn near him. Speaking of yarn I got some new sock yarn from and amazing local dyer(two of the three skeins are above tucked under Ryan’s chin). Vintage Purls is an amazing New Zealand dyer and distributer of Knit Picks Needles. Her yarns are absolutely luscious and she offers such speedy delivery. I ordered two skiens of yarn on Monday the payment transfered mid day Tuesday and on Wednesday at 2:30 I had my yarn! and what lovely yarn it is!

There you see Gondwana, Into the Blue, and Crayon Scratch. Each one of them are as soft as, I’m just itching to get one of them on some needles. I highly highly recommend her yarns, she also has some pretty rad vintage patterns.

Speaking of Ryan, and of socks I’m just past the heel of his second sock… I know your thinking sheesh you’ve been working on those for ages, but in my defense I work a lot, have many projects going at once, AND I kinda lost the half finished sock for a bit(like a month). so I guess I will finish this post off with a picture of said half finished “lost but now it’s found” sock.

I don’t know what’s going on but today I was checking the stats of my blog seeing who comes her and how they get here, and the number one search term that people use in finding my blog has nothing to actually do with knitting or such(which i would think would be the case) no the number one keyword is vampires 427 people since April(when i upgraded and thus got stats) have come to my blog(or more specifically one post in my blog) due to vampires! I have never written about vampires in fact the one mention of vampires in this blog was when I was talking about the vampire tours of San Francisco. Oh well!

In other news I have acquired some cracksilk kidsilk night in two beautiful colors starry night, and thunder, and are just beautiful!

I really can’t believe the beauty! I got this at the wonderful Knit World Studio out in the Lower Hutt. I have been meaning to make it there for awhile  but with work and it being so far out when I don’t have a car. Every fortnight they have a little knitting circle there and I finally made it this past Tuesday thanks to the help of Susan. Now I have never actually been to a stitch and bitch that was hosted at a yarn shop, and OMG am I ever so thankful that this was my first! the entire night all I wanted to do was cast on something new in each of the fabulous yarns… They were all so beautiful and wonderful. The actual group was such a lovely group of hilarious ladies, In short I had a blast! Sally who runs the studio is sweet and the studio itself was like a little yarn zen garden of relaxation! I deffinately can’t wait to make it out there again.

Back to the kidsilk night… I am thinking of making something soft, lacey, and feminine with this.. I was thinking maybe a lace ruffled scarf or something I’ll have to think some more about it! For now they will have to be content being desk pets.

I am so very dreadfully sorry It has been awhile. I feel like I have been so very busy but now that i sit down I am trying to figure out what exactly I have been doing…. I haven’t been knitting too much… I cast on posey then ripped them. I also have somehow lost ryan’s sock in progress, I have no idea where it is! GRRRR…

Wow! I just took a look at my blog and realized how much growth I’ve got on the recycled shawl! So I just ploped it on the desk to take a picture of it and alas it was too big. So it went on the living room floor… but that meant miss nosey-bum had to investigate it!

It was rather impossible to get a picture without miss bossybum! but as you can see (using bunny for scale) it is about halfway done and looking just lovely I can’t wait to have it finished…. Also soon I should hopefully have some pictures of my fabulous split sweater, which I technically finished ages ago but have only just recently woven in the ends. and unfortunately that is all you are getting for today… I will try to be back soon then a month :-p

Just a quick post right now to let everyone know that today is Ryan’s Birthday!!! Isn’t that fabulous…. Dontcha just wanna sing him happy birthday songs?? Well leave him good wishes in this here blog and I will make sure he gets them!

Yep that’s what Ryan’s sock looks like. I bet you were wondering about the progress and where I had gotten with it! well that’s where I had gotten. Oh before you start to think that i ripped out all that work i guess i should show you another picture of Ryan’s sock.

Yep that’s right I finished the first sock and isn’t it a lovely sock. Look at the way it just splays itself along the desk lounging gracefully. It is already begging me to become a model, despite my attempts to remind it of the evils of the fashion industry. For those of you not paying attention this yarn is Lorna’s Laces Shepard Sock in the Shadow colorway. I love the way it stripes causing a nice look.

I have always maintained self striping sock yarns are not for control freaks these socks only prove that matter! I have already noticed that even though both the skeins are the same dye lot they are not perfect. The second skein has more black and mess whit and in general seems darker. I don’t have too many issues with this and nor does Ryan so it should be fine. We will have to see after they are finished. They have been moved up to bus socks so thus they should be finished sooner!

Now I bet you have been wondering what has happened to the bottom up deep ocean vest I’m working on. Well I’m working on it but darn that slip stitch doesn’t want to grow. I really looked at the ribbing and realized 3 inches was much more appropriate than 4.

It’s currently in a total of 4.5 inches long and looking good, the disadvantage of the linen stitch is that it takes two rows to equal one. so this is slow going but at least it’s going! here’s a nice close up of the beautiful yarn! I reall love this color too!

Also a couple of weeks ago I was doing the shopping and saw some beautiful blue and green food dyes that came in pretty decent sizes for fairly cheap I grabbed them and some vinegar and came home and did some dyeing! This is the fruits of my labor! some dyed roving and some blank yarn i had and finally some over dyed yarn (that was a really ugly country blue nasty color)

(Sorry its fuzzy I could NOT get a clear picture of this yarn for the life of me!)

Anne has done it again! She has designed yet another piece that just makes me twinge with need to knit it! I don’t really have the time or need to knit a lacy nothing right now, I need a warm something as the chill of winter pervades my every bone. Yet Alhambra (the rusty red one) calls to me, in a soft ghostly whisper “Brooooooooooooooklynne knit me please! *whimper* Brooklynne save meee from the torment of not being knit! Brooklynne, Broooooooklyne Broooooooooooooooooklynne” It’s maddening! Anne how do you do it? How do you make such compelling items to knit? How many of your patterns do I own? More than I would like to think about!

So instead I have been reading, mostly these books, which are a trilogy, by one of my favorite Science Fiction authors. Melissa Scott writes some of the most intense interesting science fiction I have ever encountered. Her work is often very thought provoking and often challenges your mind to open up more and more. She creates dystopian worlds that are amazingly intricate and complex but doesn’t bombard you with inane details, she doesn’t describe bright blue suns with green skies that go on and one for pages. She tells you what you need to know to understand the story and nothing more beyond that. Which is wonderful because it allows your brain to fill in the gaps if you feel the need to.

I’m not very science minded so one of the things that i like about all of he books is that new sciences that she has created are always explained in a way that I can understand them. By this I don’t mean they are simple explanations, but straight forward and yet again telling you only the important stuff as you need to know it. An example I can specifically think of is in one of her books people connect to the internet by interfacing through cables that plug into your head and then you are in the “net” much like virtual reality. Well when she explains this in the internet she doesn’t go into great detail about how the wires are connected to your brain or how things interface etc. which I often feel are really just unimportant details that often cause my eyes to gloss over. Another great feature of the way she write about technology is that she doesn’t go on and on for pages about the technology for no reason at all, and never just to show off that she’s smarter than you ,like I feel many Sci-Fi authors do. The phrase that I say over and over that I think is really the great part of her books is that you get told what you need to know when you need to know it, and not a moment sooner!

But oh the plots, the plots are what really make her books ace! With worlds and scenarios that are up there with Margaret Atwood but taken to places Margaret is to conservative to go. The plots are intense and twisted often without a clear villain, but more a group of people that are more problematic the pure evil. I hate that in many Sci-Fi books they are these epic adventures with huge goals the crush massive evil, in a way that when the book ends you don’t really care about what happens afterwards to the characters. Melissa’s books aren’t like that, they are fantastic journeys with people on regular events in their lives, sometimes you are 200 pages into the book before you find out what the main event is supposed to be. Some authors this would make the begin drag and the end seem rushed, but Melissa does it in such a way that it mirrors life and is believable. Where some books a riot that is important to the books would happen in the beginning and the novel would focus on those fights happening, Melissa teasingly holds the riot till the last chapter, letting the tension build even within you, really exemplifying the feelings of the people. She draws great complexities within those tensions and shows you the softer side of the “villain” shows’ you the fears he’s reacting on, the fears that make him become the “bad guy” in such a way that you can’t help pity him. She draws this out in glimpses of several peoples perspectives so you don’t feel like life is dragging on, but more so that when that first brick flies, or that first shot is made you want to do the same and join them.

When you come to the last page everything isn’t tied up in a pretty little bow for you. It’s raw It’s imperfect, there are things that have been certain characters goals from the first page you met them that have not been achieved. Sexual tensions between other characters that your sure are going to end up together never end up together. the ending are so rough, tense, and emotional that I often find myself crying. The thing that sticks out the most for many of Melissa’s books is that the ending rings true to life, reminds you that this isn’t the end but just where you have to stop watching. Even though that having to stop often makes your heart ache that in itself reminds you how well written these books are.

I was going to go into a review of these books but i have a feeling that should wait for another time seeing how long this post has gotten so far! So I guess instead I leave you with this picture of yarny goodness that I will talk about in a post to come! If you want to check out any or Melissa’s books I encourage you to do so at amazon.com, I deffinatly recommend the Silence Leigh Trilogy(Five Twelfths of Heaven, Silence in Solitude, and The Empress of Earth), Shadow Man, Night Sky Mine, and The Shape Of Their Hearts(this one isn’t perfect but really gets you thinking!)

So go have a read and tell me what you think!

P.S. There is alsoa crazy pastor by the same name… :-p i find that just hilarious!

Well the wind is starting to get crisp. I’m starting to grab scarves when I head out and about. The dew in the morning is starting to look a lot like frost. I’m pulling out my sweaters to wear. I’m even wearing socks inside the house! you know what all of this means? yes autumn is upon us and soon it will be winter.  The other day I knew the perfect answer to out chilly dreariness… STEW! Yes an nice warm yummy stew, with kumara, pumpkin, potato, onion, celery and tomato. Add some yummy herbs and boil it all in homemade chicken stock(made from boiling a roasted chicken carcass until it was boiled to bits) and you have the prefect autumn treat! We had so much of it yet it disappeared rather fast.

What’s the knitting been like? distracted that’s what… I haven’t been doing a lot of knitting mostly because I have been reading and working on my vest design, which I’m happy with and started.

So that is the beginning of the linen stitch vest. I cast -on (5 freaking times! When am I going to realize the long tail cast-on isn’t good for when you have many stitches to cast on) Tuesday afternoon and set it aside after semi trauma of casting on. Have I ever told you that I hate (HATE) casting on, really I would almost pay someone to cast on for me. But yesterday I took it to the Embroiders Guild meeting with me and then today on the bus and am now an inch done with the ribbing three more inches to go! I want a nice thick ribbing on the bottom it make my tummy look well less pregnant.

So really the only other knitting I have to show for myself is the simple moss stitch shawl. the worst part is you can’t even tell that it’s bigger but it is! It’s almost twice the size as it was last time you all saw it! This is my TV project and I have been watching more TV lately I don’t even know why. Well I guess that’s all for now! I have a really cool post about feminism coming up that I hope doesn’t offend anyone but frankly I don’t really care! :-p

As I begin to look for a side job, one that will actually allow me to eat and such while I start up my fashion design label and get people buying things, I have realized that I have very little to actually wear to a job interview and work in general. So my brain started turning and I looked through my closet then raided Ryan’s closet. I came out of the venture successful, matching a pair of simple black pants of mine, and a hoochie mama vest that i usually wear with my breasts hanging out, and one of Ryan’s white dress shirts left me with a very professional look(placing the hoochie mama vest over the dress shirt). Not only did it look professional, it also looked great! That moment got me thinking why don’t I wear sweater vests and such, oh yeah cause I usually see them in baggy body covering ugliness. About this same time the new Knitty came out with a vest pattern(Honeycomb), that was exactly what I was thinking of.

Except I didn’t like the, stitch pattern….. Or the length of ribbing…. Or the shape of the neck line(especially in the back)…. I didn’t have any yarn on the right gauge… And I wanted to knit my vest in the round… You can see where this headed didn’t you? Darn It I’ll design my own! So I dug into my stash and found the perfect yarn!

Isn’t that just beautiful? The nice deep ocean color of Knit Picks Swish Superwash, and I have more than enough of it! I absolutely love this color and the texture of the yarn it’s sooo soft! It wears rather well too, which is always important! So with a ball of that and my trusty Options set, and a stitch dictionary or 5 i started swatching. many swatches were started only two survived! One of the ribbing and stitch pattern together and the more important one of the stitch pattern it’s self.

This is the linen stitch and is a simple slip stitch pattern with the yarn held in front and alternating stitches being slipped it creates a dense but still stretchy fabric that has a nice woven look to it! The bonus is that the wrong side looks like a regular moss stitch which leave the potential for a reversible vest which I kinda like the idea of.

So after I was happy with both of my swatches it was time to do some measuring and some math, which makes my head hurt in general. Sorry the math has been smudged out due to security reasons, mostly so that you all don’t know my waist measurements. Next comes the fun part of casting on all those stitches… I hate casting on absolutely hate it! Which is a problem considering I love starting projects…. So hopefully in a week or so I will have more progress to show you on this particular vest! I’m still thinking about a tutorial/blog post about steeks and their fabulousness! I hope you are all well and everything in nice in your lives!

Since I moved here in October(and actually for several months before hand) I kept telling Ryan, “I’m going to get you knitting” or whenever he’d laugh at my knitting craziness “just wait till your start knitting, who will be laughing then?” Well that day has come! I knew he would be keen to knit seeing as he already sews and embroiders, and comes from a long family of fibery crafters. His Grandma used to spin wool for socks which she knit for the whole family. Now there was one small hitch in this plan, I knit funny. There I said it I knit funny, actually backwards to be completely honest. Now since i have knit like this for over 16 years I have learned to adapt patterns and knowing lace and such is going to be backwards but it was hard at first, so I didn’t want to teach anyone else an odd way of knitting. So I waited patiently for a time when he wanted to goto my Monday night knitting group with me. Well last Monday was the day, and he took to it like a fish to water!

So now he has had to deal with me chasing him around the (very small)house with my camera, urging him to let me take a picture while he knits. As you can see I prevailed and he pulled faces! It’s all very interesting having a hobby that you can do with your partner, I really enjoy it. I can’t even begin to tell you how wonderful it is to sit next to your partner on the (way to small)couch and both knit while watching The Simpsons(even if it means that our elbows are constantly hitting each other).

In other news I treated myself to a new blog theme in response to upgrading my wordpress to 2.5, which I’m really liking. They have fixed a lot of the bugs and issues that really bothered me before. They also made it easier to upload your pictures to your actual server and blog post. The old way was just so frustrating at times that I often found myself either not blogging , or choosing to use flickr(which is just bad practice). The theme isn’t perfect and you will probably see some change in the near future, but I’m getting there.

I want to do a tutorial within the next week about steeks, seeing as everyone seems to be really panicy about them.. so keep your eye’s peeled out for that.

I leave you now with this final picture of Ryan. This was after several pictures and he kept screwing up due to ya know a flash in his eyes, and  me moving around him like the paparazzi at  The Beverly Hills plastic surgery clinic!