Stitch n Stretch

In the grand tradition of social knitting (stitch and bitch, felt and belch etc), I give you DC's Inaugural Stitch n Stretch - yogis who knit and knitters who down dog. Who says knitting is the new yoga?

Here's a picture courtesy of Lolly (aka Lauren Weinhold; see her most excellent blog at lollygirl.com)
As it was a holiday weekend, turnout was on the low side. But it was a fun few hours on a lazy-day Sunday. Later, the Yarn Widower asked me about the event, "So...you just sat around and knit?!?!?" Yes, we did. We met at Inspired Yoga in NW DC. There was hot tea, cookies, carob bars and various other goodies. Introductions were made, projects inspected, and knitting-revelations made. (I, for one, had never heard of the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival and now look forward to it with all my yarnie might.) Knitting and light conversation occurred over the span of an hour and a half. Then we cleared our needles and laid down our mats. Lolly and I (aspiring yoga teachers) led a light yoga session that got our blood moving. After savasana, we said our goodbyes and promised to do this again.

Knitting and Yoga - two great tastes that taste great together.

New and Improved Super-Duper Tuesday!

I voted today. There was such a large turnout that I waited an hour and a half to cast my ballot. There were shocked expressions of disbelief as people entered the polling place where the line snaked along both sides of the hallway, around the corner and down another hallway. Some in line were quiet, some were grumpy and some nattered on their cellphone until they got shut down (no cellphone use in the voting place! Text messages are okay but only if your device is on vibrate. No noise pollution within 5o feet of the polling place!) The Yarn Widower was there, shifting from foot to foot, muttering impatiently about the inefficiency of the Man. I merely got out my knitting.

Halfway through the line, an older woman eyed my yarn and wistfully announced, "I should have brought my knitting." A younger woman further down the line looked at me and agreed. The Yarn Widower suggested I hand the knitting over and let them do some rows - maybe they were faster knitters. I threatened to poke him with my needle tips.

May the best man/woman win.

Phew! Yarn Fast is OVER!

I did it. No yarn buying for the last six days.

Wait. Now that I think about it - I did place an online order for some Noro that I need to finish a project. Shee-it.

Does it count if I haven't received it yet?

Guilty as Charged

Today I was chastised by my husband. I snuck out to a yarn store and gleefully raided their bargain bin. All skeins were $5! I was going to hide them when I got home but things got busy and I forgot and the husband spied a skein spilling out of my bag and it was all over.

He didn't care about the bargain bin and how I got five skeins of Rowan calmer (for $5!) or how I found a particularly soft alpaca/silk blend (for $5!). He didn't care that I found some great yarn that I just wanted to try out (for $5!). He just clucked disapprovingly after chucking a ball at me (thankfully yarn is soft).

He said, "But you promised!" Which made me think: did I really promise not to buy anymore yarn? Was I drunk? Why would I have made a promise that I am unwilling, perhaps incapable of keeping? I don't recall such a thing. Maybe I did but if I did (and I'm not saying that I did) I clearly did not mean it. I'm sure Bill promised Hillary that he would never cheat on her again and I'm sure both parties knew that promise was doomed from the get-go.

Maybe I could amend my promise: No more yarn buying for the rest of this month! It's Jan 25th and I can go 6 days without buying yarn. Just keep me away from the sale bin.

A Knotty Issue

Not knitty. I mean knotty. Why is it that every now and then I will come across a knot in a skein of yarn? The only reason I can come up with is this: the yarn company would lose money if they had to throw out any length of yarn that falls short of their stated skein length. So they knot these less-than lengths of yarn, skein it up, sell them full price and call the occasional knot an "industry standard."

Frankly, this irks me. I pay good money for a beautiful skein of yarn. I kind of expect the yardage stated on the label to mean uninterrupted length. Do I really hate weaving in ends? Yeah, that's part of it. But it's also the principle of the thing. 50 yards should mean 50 yards. Not 50 yards minus the 12 or so inches I'll need to weave in two extra ends per knot (not to mention the minor aggravation of doing so).

Maybe my frustration is misplaced. Maybe there's a good reason that I should expect a knot every now and then. Maybe the sheep labor union forbids the wasting of yarn thus necessitating knots in skeins. Humph. Blasted sheep.

Busy knittin'

Yesterday was my day off. I spent it ignoring my to-do list and knitted all day. I listened to a good audiobook, snuggled with Harry (my 14 year old Jack Russell terrier) and feverishly worked on my newest obsession.

It's the Chevron Scarf by Joelle Hoverson (in Last Minute Knitted Gifts). It looks complicated but in fact is elegant in its simplicity. The pattern is easy to learn and yet I still manage to make mistakes as I find I am easily distracted and counting requires some concentration. Thankfully, the pattern (and the yarn) is also quite forgiving and I can usually decrease/increase on the next row to make up for whatever I've forgotten on the crucial row beforehand. As an aside, this project is in a book entitled "Last Minute Knitted Gifts." Now I am not a quick knitter - I stubbornly knit English style since I have no control over tension when I knit Continental. But still, shouldn't this project be in the One Week version or maybe It Will Take About a Month if you have other things to do Knitted Gifts?

Regardless, it's fun and the colors in the Koigu yarn are gorgeous. Already I have cruised Ravelry and lusted after all the other yarns people have used for this project.

Originally I wanted to have this knit for my friend Ella's birthday. I'm just about halfway through but her birthday is only 5 days away. Poop. I hate being late. But maybe when she receives it, she won't mind.

Another sock and some stitchin' and bitchin'

OK, so this is really my first sock ever (to be cast on, that is - my second sock to be finished). It's in a worsted weight so it knits up faster but since I didn't have an intended recipient (i.e., it was going to be for me) it languished while the Christmas knitting took over my life.

Now that I'm finished (with the socks, not the Christmas knitting - alas), I think I'll give them to my friend Kyra - a belated birthday gift. I'm quite happy with the colorway - 10 plies of orange, yellow and grey. It reminds me of a glorious fall day - perfect colors for Kyra.

This is the sock I started to knit at Stitch DC's sock workshop this past December. My first knitting workshop in 10 years. How nice it is to have a real live person show me how to maneuver yarn and Marie (the shopowner) was fab. But even nicer was having some company with whom to knit. So last night I attended my first Stitch n' Bitch conveniently located two blocks from my favorite yoga class in DC. Yoga and then knitting - who could ask for a better way to spend my Thursday nights?