Weddings Suck!

Okay, this really has nothing to do with knitting which is our theme that runs through it, but I had to post.

I hate weddings.

Don’t get me wrong, dear reader, the institution of marriage itself is a fine one in which two people can be the best that they can be, and is one in which I define myself as well.

But getting there is the problem. Stay with me….

Couples spend oodles of money that they don’t always have to have the day of their dreams, including dresses, halls, favors, people, etc, all the trappings of wedding bliss. But let’s not lose sight of the fact that these trappings are not for the couple but for everyone else.

Then all the guest are obligated to purchase a wedding gift that may not be appreciaited, and I understand that in parts of the world, the guest needs to determine the price per head of the attendance at said wedding and exceed that with the monetary value of their gift that may not be appreiciated.

Then the Guest has to determine what to wear, and purchase it for the wedding, which Guest will wear once. Invariably the Guest is uncomfortable in said attire due to lack of comunication or adherence to established formality protocols….i.e. winter weddings more formal, and evening weddings the most formal of all.

Guest also has to find a place to put the children, since children as members of society are frequently NOT welcome at what should be a family event. And this when we all know that there will be kids at the wedding due to the whole ringbearer/flower girl side of the wedding equation.

I won’t even speak to the travelling to the wedding thing, engaging accomodations, etc etc.

Now, what prompted this might you ask? You got it. A wedding. How did you guess?

My Rock’s Surinamese friend wed this past Sunday at a wedding that was pulled together in less than two months, which meant that we got three weeks notice. Luckily the Surinamese and Philipinos place a premium on family and so we were not forced to farm out the child units so that we could attend.

But it did mean that I had to find something to wear. Now you should know that my wiehgt has been out of my own control for some time now, and about 6 months ago I completely gave up any semblance of same. And so naturally, I have Nothing To Wear. Honestly. Everything is what I have for work, wherein I have also given up.

I was forced to go shopping for clothes that won’t fit and I will only wear once as my weight control thing will become a new reality soon.

Macy’s was a bust. Penney’s was a bust. Do they really think the women at that size have flat stomachs and small busts??!

Kohls’ was okay. I stocked up on casual clothes for spring with some interest, and then proceeded to buy a burnout blouse to wear over a tank top. It should be noted that the blouse was still too small, but I swas at that point beyond caring.

The single redeeming factor of this wedding was that I got about 10 rows done on my sock, while drunk.

Oh, did I mention that Weddings Suck?

National African-American Knitting Month

Not really, but it IS African-American History month, and I am knitting so, what the heck! Unfortunately, I am not a whit African, except through association.

My husband’s da was an anthropologist who specialized in Carneval (he travelled the world going to BIG parties and then got paid for the research) and dragged his wife and 3 kids around the world with him, including Africa where they lived for several years in various countries including the Belgian Congo after having my husband, then when BC blew up, they fled to what was then Tanganyika where my sister in law was born, and then later Dan led the Study Abroad program in Lagos, Ghana. So there is an affinity there for Africa.

I came into the picture via Dan’s African Art History course, and thus came to meet the father of my children and the man who shares my bed, who loves African art with any love that he has left after loving me. He also loves anything ethnic, and despises white suburban culture, and typically wears patterned sweaters, which quite frankly look fabuloso on him.

Okay, stay with me….

So Marianne Isager publishes her book Knitting in Africa which is just the type of book that I love. You have patterns, new techniques, great photos of the inspiration pieces. What more could an unconventional combined knitter desire?

Weeeellll, naturally to knit some of said sweaters in actual yarn that will actually fit my husband, who in my mind will absolutely love the sweater because they are African and his style, but best of all, knit by his lovely wife, who was wearing a Kente cloth on the evening that he met her. Really he would have to be absolutely nuts to wear anything else on my body.

Please, allow me my delusions and celebrate African American Knitting Month with me, dear reader, and whip up a few African sweaters with me!

Lenten Sockrafice

Having naturally overindulged at Stitches West, Christmas and the Joann’s that are liquidating their inventory in favor of the new superstore opening in town, I am starting to think about Lent, and the spirit of fasting or sacrfice that traditional follows the over-indulgence of Mardi Gras, Shrove Tuesday, or whatever you want to call that complete abandonment of all morals resulting in dancing half naked in the streets.

Well okay, maybe we are not all dancing naked in the streets, but admit it, if you are not dancing naked, you really want to, but are having trouble with the fastenings on your clothing and can’t get them off.

And wherein some of you have noted and indeed questioned my byline on Knitter’s Review:

Going to Hell for buying sock yarn during Lent….

I thought that some Lenten Sockrafice might be appropriate….and of course any event of this nature needs some rules:

You must fast. That means no yarn purchases for forty days and forty nights. It’s okay, really. The yarn in your stash will keep you afloat in the world.

You must sacrifice. To knitters of course this means that you need to knit at least one thing for someone else, and then give it away before Easter. Really we are talking about charity here, not something for the family. It needs to be something given to someone less fortunate.

You can have one slip up, but you have to plan for it. No impulse slip ups. This means that you can make one purchase of yarn during Lent. For me that means that when the fun fur drops to 1 dollar at my local Jo’ann’s, I will stock up.

Finally, you must knit from the stash. The more the better. Maybe there should be points for different kinds of projects. Hmmm, I shall cogitate and let you know.

So comment in here if you are sockraficing with me!

Disclaimer: any resemblance to actual Lent is purely coincidental, as anyone who knows me, knows that I ain’t real religious. Any offense real or imagined on a reader part is certainly unintended!

Olympic cable poncho-lower band

So here is the lower band in progress for the Olympic cable poncho. There are 5 and a half repeats here of a total of ten repeats. I have used a ball and a half, and have three balls total. 1 ball = 4 repeats, which leaves me somewhat short of a full poncho.

One would think that locating 2 balls of Wool Ease Chunky in Fisherman (off-white) could be so difficult in the greater SF bay Area, but it is. I finally ordered it online and the yarn should be here between the 1st and 8th of March, which is somewhat after the Olympics closing ceremony. I plan to knit it to the last inch of yarn that I have.

Anyway, it looks like I might be the last knitter over the finish line at the rate I am going. Oh well.

The whole thing acheived what I wanted, which was to try something more challenging.

Team Ceallach update….

Team Ceallach seems to be lagging a bit due to several ahem delays and false starts. They have now had to cast on no less than 4 or 5 times, after swatching unsuccessfully.

Oh the humanity, crosses and twists are flying everywhere.
Knits and purls are landing all askew resulting in some less than interesting results.

But look at that, John, Team Ceallach is coming up along the outside, with 3.5 repeats of the ten necessary for the bottom portion of the poncho, before picking up along that one edge and knitting to the finish. What do you think, Charlsie?

Well, Joe, Team Ceallach got a slow start indeed, and there’s the adequate yarn issue too to think about, but there are still 6 days to this year’s Knitting Olympics which means that it can be done!

Charlsie, what adequate yarn situation?

Well, John, Team Ceallach fell into the yarn enough pitfall, where the knitters think they have enough, but then realize that they do not. In this instance, I overheard Team Ceallach talking about needing not just one but possibly two extra skeins of yarn, with none to be found in their county. With only 6 days left, they need to rustle up 2 skeins of Lion Brand Wool Ease Chunky in Fisherman locally as there is not enough time for shipping. It will be tight, but even if this team does not finish the event, it was still a good showing. Back to you, John.

Thanks, Charlsie, and may I say that that is a lovely Fair Isle shawl that you are wearing this evening. And now we go to the USA Shawl team……

Rowan Too!

Okay, so years ago I bought a cloth raggedy doll as part of a healing exercise after miscarriage #1. Wierd I know.

Recently I located said doll in a closet where I had stuffed it away. Now that I have a daughter of course, dolls are somewhat appropriate. But have you seen the dolls that they have these days? There’s Barbie of course, who can’t actually hold her 42 inch bust up with her 13 inch waist, the Bratz which are basically gansta slut dolls and then a whole slew of dolls that can walk, chew bubble gum and declare their undying love for YOUR CHILDS NAME HERE.

So I dusted little forlorn raggedy doll off, dressed in some of Rowan’s clothes and gave her to Rowan, who was cautious but delighted at this new creature in her small world.

Naturally, Dear Son at 5 was also delighted since the doll made an excellent sidekick for all those 5 year old adventures as various comic book superheros involving tights, masks and fighting injustice in the living room.

But finally I got motivated and spiffed Rowan Too as she has been monikered up a bit more than her blue moon button eyes and bearded stuffing hair.

I present to you Rowan Too: (drum roll)

Rah Rah! Go team Ceallach!

How’s the cableing coming? We want a progress report!

We are doing the cabling event for the Olympics!

The royal we, that is.

We decided to knit the cabled poncho, and since the instructions are in knitting gibberish a la ‘easy knitting’ style, spent several hours charting them last night on the laptop use Stitch and Motif Maker.

I now have two lovely charts for the two cables used in the pattern, and the yarn is ready. To be fair, I do need a pair of needles, it calls for 10.5 and I really want to knit with straights for a while then switch to circs. Not sure why, but it works. Who am I to argue?

So last night I tried casting on, ans knitting a bit but decided to rip it out. I need to have a thingee to hold the chart and my place in it.

Off to the Olympics!

Knitting Olympics…..project

Okay, the Knitting Olympics are coming and I have not decided on a project. Mind you I already have a number of projects on the needles that I have just recently started, and my natural inclination is to finish all 4 of them by Friday before casting on another project during the opening ceremonies.

I am torn between two ideas: a cable poroject, which I have been playing with, or a color project, which I am dying to try, which probably means that I will foul it up so bad that I will be totally unable to continue, and will be the only knitter out of thousands incapable of making it past training.

I am not good at this training thing. As you can see, I am quite good at identifying the shortfalls, the things that could go wrong, but not so good about finding the half-full glasses. Occupational hazard I am afraid.

So the cable project would be the Knit It poncho from 2005, where you knit a long strip of braided cables, pick up stitches on the long edge and then knit the poncho from the bottom up. Cool, challenging, a project on my list anyway.

The color project looked like it might be the KISS bag by Sally Melville, but then I would have to buy more yarn, which I really cannot consider after looking at my sewing room, wherein Hurricanes have apparently come to roost for the winter. So then I started to think about the socks that I have just cast on with Wildfoote yarn, and was thinking that I could in fact do in Mosaic, as a prelude to Fair Isle or Intarsia.

I even posted on KR for people to vote. One person voted for color. That’s it. I am starting to think that really no one cares at all what I knit….Anyway, does not really matter since I am not doing it for anyone, just for me!

I may also look for some other possible projects. Maybe GrandmaHatter has some suggestions….