Ten to go to 200

Hey…. since I just mailed a prize package to Michelle at Boulderneigh (after lo these many days… sorry), that means it’s time to announce another contest. My two hundredth post is coming up, and I know how we all love contests.

The prize: your choice of Wisconsin fiber/yarn (sheep or alpaca or llama), or a custom knitting bag made by yours truly. We can work out the details later.

How to enter: On post 200, send me a link to a picture of your oldest UFO. Be brave, little soldier. We’ll all take a look at it and sympathize. I will call post 199 something terribly creative like “Post 199″ so you’ll know when it’s time to let the skeletons out of the bottom of your knitting basket. Oldest UFO wins, so please tell us when you started the project.

Who is eligible: Every knitter on planet Earth. Don’t be shy!

Meanwhile…. if I have been absent from my blog (have I?) it’s because I’ve been at Ravelry checking things out. I need to take a bunch of stash pictures and update my notebook tonight after the kids go to bed, but I did stumble on a “library” feature where I can show you some of the knitting books on my home shelf. You can only add what Ravelry already has in its database, and searching is not very AI, but I came up with a lot of things they already knew about. I wonder what you’ll be able to do with this feature when it’s fully enables. These girls are seriously clever.

Knitwise I have done just about squat. I worked on Red Scarf for a few rows after the kids woke us up rather explosively at just after 6am today (nobody was sick, they just thought it was time to get up — wrong). Big Tom himself got really sick on Friday night but seems to be all done with it, so he’s probably still on for surgery on Monday.

So I’ll have to kick butt on the IHS before I start my Ravelry time. That site has so many undiscovered features, I’m beginning to think that having a kitchen timer next to the computer might be the only way to keep my life in balance. But before I do that, I need to find a photo that truly represents my Chocolate Sheep identity. Any ideas?

A shout out to Mr. Beth, who is attending the Milwaukee Brewers game with his brother. If you see a crowd shot along the first-base line, and think you see a friendly biker sitting next to Corey Hart, congratulations, you found them! And go Cerveceros!

In like Flynn

I got my Ravelry invite last night. And for those of you who don’t know what Ravelry is, it looks like a cross between a database and a playground. But just for knitters. And crocheters. And spinners. And designers. And maybe more, I was barely there but joined three groups immediately, and friended two knitters who are already on my Blogroll. Feel free to friend me too, I am chocolatesheep. I have to find a profile pic though, right now I look invisible.

I’m really looking forward to putting up my WIPs and my stash and cataloging my needles and all that fun stuff, let alone cruising the forums and sending messages and peeking at what everyone else is doing. (I love the UGH! area, where you can get the details on projects and patterns that just didn’t work out.) There’s a sense of humor and fun to all this that is just great.

If you love the Internet Movie Database, you’ll LIVE at Ravelry. I think there were about 16,000 people (I’m not kidding) in line behind me for invites to the beta site, but it’s worth the wait.

Unfortunately, I don’t think today will be my day to explore it. Colleen was sick Wednesday, and this morning it was Jack who woke up startled to find he had “spit in his bed.” Since Tommy has minor outpatient surgery on Monday, it’s critical to keep him healthy enough so he doesn’t have to be rescheduled. And since I don’t dare leave the house with Sick Jack, my plans to finally visit our new library have floated out the window. No playing at the park, either. (Thank goodness we found the DVD remote a few minutes ago.)

So.  Housework and child care, with emergency laundry moving to the head of the line. Knitting snuck in when nobody is looking. What else is new?

Knitwise I didn’t get to do an IHS repeat last night because I took the time to sew my son’s pack number on his Scout uniform. Glory be, they made a three-digit number into a single patch, and I can’t thank them enough. It still took me forever to sew and the stitches look like cr@p, but at least it’s properly aligned. I did do some knitting on the Red Scarf last night while the kids watched Cars and Mr. Beth watched My Name is Earl and The Office. I ended up with the kids because otherwise they wouldn’t sit still for one of their favorite movies, go figure. I saw the tail end of The Office, just in time to see Steve Carell puke.

Oh — yesterday I did watch most of two episodes of How Clean is Your House?, the BBC sensation that’s “sweeping” the knitting community. It’s tough to watch if you’re sensitive to footage of intense grime or bug infestations, but you definitely learn a lot about how to clean up lots of different messes. And why you shouldn’t let dogs sleep on your phone. Eww!

I have no progress to report on learning to spin, or on combing llama fiber, but next week I plan to use the butternuts to dye some LaurenSpun merino. So I’ve got that going for me.

Merrily we slog along

Not much to report here. I seem to have acquired a gentle form of knitmojo, and things are flowing nicely as long as I don’t try to do everything at once. Perhaps it could have something to do with the fact that the two active projects are scarves.

So… yesterday I joined the second ball of yarn to Red Scarf. The end of the first skein ran out at the end of a row, so I actually had to tink back a few stitches so I would have something to weave in. Fortunately I have lots of practice with that now, and it was completely stress-free.

Before I scared away the mojo, I set that project down and picked up the IHS. I had the whole repeat done just after Top Chef ended (sorry Brian, but we didn’t think you’d make it to the final three. We were worried about Casey for a bit there, though).

The big knitting news yesterday was that I took the kids to the town’s two resale shops, and picked up some vintage single points. How’s 25 cents a pair? I got a pair of Boye size 8’s in red aluminum, a pair of someone’s size 6’s in green aluminum, and a lone wooden singlepoint with a green acorn cap, 8mm. 25 cents for the single on that one, ooh big spender. All of these needles were about 13 inches long.

I also snagged most of a cone of some very fine, soft turquoise yarn. I’m still investigating exactly what the fiber content is, but since I only paid 75 cents for it, it’s a bargain no matter what it is.

Most of the rest of the yarns at the thrift stores were harsh acrylic rug yarns (Aunt Lydia, anyone?). I did see a couple unfinished projects bagged up and for sale. Doesn’t this just tug at your heartstrings: “Child’s sweater, almost finished, $3.” (Peach maybe-acrylic.) There’s an unfinished cable sweater in brown for $10, too. If anyone would like to adopt and finish these acts of love, I will gladly purchase them for you and ship them to you in exchange for local yarn.

Oh… I also saw handknit socks for sale too. They were really something, knit from an orange/brown/white 3-ply. Probably many years ago, and looks like they were never worn.

For those of you keeping track, my Ravelry number is 376 as of 9 am today. UPDATE: At 12:30 pm, I was number 188. Thank goodness I found my camera cable today. UPDATE UPDATE: At 4:15 pm, I am number 128. I had better start taking pictures and figuring out Flickr.

To round out the post, here are my favorite words gleaned from knitting blogs. I am an English major and a sometimes freelance writer/editor, and I love new language that makes sense.

knitblogosphere. self-explanatory, isn’t it?
mojo. Would anyone but Doors fans be using this term if it weren’t for Austin Powers?
juju. The opposite of mojo.
tink. K-N-I-T backwards to undo.
camnesia. The act of forgetting your camera, or forgetting to take pictures for your blog during the Big Event.
embiggen. As in, “click on the picture to make it bigger.”

What is your favorite knitblogospeak?

Is that the end of the tunnel?

This morning I checked my Ravelry number, and it was 810. I just checked again, and it was 650.

Holy cow, here comes the Knitting Train! I’d better pack!

I’ll take my Red Scarf… just got to the end of the first skein and wound up the next one. One skein got me about 16 inches into the scarf, so I’ll use all four. I’ll take the Irish Hiking Scarf… I have been steadily doing one (repeat after me, ONE) repeat a night. Maybe I’ll even take Tyrone along to look carefully at him in leisure. Maybe I didn’t mess him up.

I did decide to frog the Dianne hat. It didn’t look like I wanted it to, anyway. It was supposed to be a copy of the knitted hat worn in Shaun of the Dead. I was very happy with it until we bought the DVD and I got a good look at it… it wasn’t anything like it. Rats.

While I was winding up skeins today, I did the second skein of Crystal Palace Waikiki. Footies here I come, someday soon. I plan to use the Harlot’s basic sock recipe for this one, but I will have to see what my gauge is with this yarn. It’s a thick/thin nylon/cotton blend and I’ve never knit with anything like it. It’s very slippery too. If you have knit with this and have any tips or warnings, don’t be shy, shout out!

Today’s summary: Colleen is at home, sick, and Mr. Beth is sulking because nobody left comments on his restaurant review. Other than that, Mr. Lincoln, how was the play?

Guest post: Mr. Beth’s dinner with Harold

If you want to see more restaurant reviews from Mr. Beth’s travels, just leave a comment!

— — — — — — — — —

My trip to Perilla was an experience, partly of my own making, on my first trip to New York City. GPS got me to the restaurant, but then I had to park. After winding around several streets, I found a garage and started walking in the general direction I was sure the restaurant was (Jones street in Greenwich Village is about a one block affair, so, in my defense, if you miss it you can really miss it). I walked about 45 minutes to an hour looking for the place (after having found it in the car), and I can show you on any of the map websites where I parked vs. Perilla location and you will wonder to the grave how I missed it by so much. (I parked 2.5 blocks away, and turned west walking from the garage instead of east. I was correct in my vague notion that I was somewhat south of the restaurant — .5 block.)

By the time I did get there (thanks to my GPS homebase unit accessible by cellphone while I was on the move), it was 6 p.m. and just past opening time. I had my choice of a table or bar, and I took table. I was placed at table 37, across from kitchen and restrooms. A perfect spot, and I sat directly across from the kitchen door (well, partially closed curtain). I was able to watch the waitstaff go in and out, and the occasional line chef pop a head out.

If I forget about it later, let me just say now the service was excellent. Absolutely no complaints. And now, the food.

Perilla was into its Summer menu, though the specials (something with a capon or small game bird??) were touted as being tested in advance of Fall menu coming out. I’m not much for chicken I haven’t cooked, and was too intrigued by the menu itself. I had decided an appetizer and entrée would do better than entrée with side dish, though the creamed corn sounded wonderful.

For an appetizer, I was stuck between the Beef Carpaccio ($10) with arugula, preserved lemon & caperberry vinaigrette or the Spicy Duck Meatballs ($12) with okinawa yam gnocchi, water spinach, quail egg. I asked the server for a recommendation, and she suggested the carpaccio was a bit lighter than the duck, since I was leaning toward steak or ravioli. I took her word. The carpaccio was delicious, thinly sliced raw beef wrapped around the cheese and greens and the sauce hit the taste buds almost like a heavy mustard and was wonderful. I could’ve left then sated. Not full, but sated.

Oh, I forgot to mention I decided to have a glass of the local (Brooklyn) Sixpoint Righteous Rye Ale ($7). I am a beer drinker (not Bud, Heineken and Coors, but real beer), and hadn’t had a rye ale before. It was tasty, not too heady, and bitter in all the right ways to go with the beef. It was a natural to order a second to come out with the steak I ordered.

You know the outcome, but I was torn between the Grilled Angus Strip Steak ($31) served over escarole and crumbled bacon with sweet onion-horseradish sauce, the Roasted Duckling ($25) with mustard greens, corn pudding & huckleberries, and the Summer Truffle Ravioli ($24) with sheep’s milk ricotta, forest mushrooms & peas. I ordered the steak medium rare, and it was a bit closer to medium, but not bad at all. Everything came together with an earthy, savory flavor that blended well with the meat and rye ale.

Sorry — I was too full to do any dessert justice, and the meal was so good I felt a little guilty when I ate again the next day.

BUT, the perfect ending for the meal came when the executive chef himself, Harold of Bravo’s “Top Chef” season 1 fame, came out of the kitchen and stood next to my table to look out over his diners. (He was obviously looking for someone, as when he popped out a few minutes later, he went to sit down with a couple to talk). Decorum prevented me from jumping up and saying anything about how much my wife and I rooted for him during the show, followed his career since, etc. etc. etc. Maybe I should have said something to him quietly, but frankly I think I was quite stunned to see him standing there looking just the same as on the show — white shirt, white pants, apron, pencil on the ear and three-days stubble.

Just when I was thinking to myself that I really liked the meal, but “Yeah, right, like Harold was back there cooking my steak tonight,” it turned out he very well may have.

And that’s good enough for me.

Now to get some wine tips in person from Steven.

Urgent chocolate bulletin

I have just received the following messages from Chocolate Headquarters:

• When you thoroughly comprehend this, you will be able to research more efficiently.
• Many articles you unearth have everything you are looking for.

Reminds me of the Pierce Brosnan James Bond film where the other operative kept trying to give the nonsensical pass-phrase: “The lion sings at midnight,” or whatever. It’s about as subtle as Will Ferrell’s “Do you like luxury?” skit on SNL.

Anyway, that’s today’s chocolate news. I am still recovering from my foolhardy boast that I hadn’t made a mistake on my Red Scarf, because the very next time I looked at it, I had. And for a brief moment I thought, Maybe this is the kind of mistake that only I will be able to see. Then I gave myself a mental slap and reminded myself that I am knitting this for an orphan. And I un-knitted four rows and fixed the stitch and proceeded.

I am getting lots of experience with tinking back, but I definitely knit more quickly when I’m going forward.

No new work on the IHS. A few more inches on Red Scarf. Seriously thinking about pulling the plug (i.e. working end of yarn) on the Dianne cap. Haven’t peeked at Tyrone yet. Yet, next Monday I will cast on for a new project using the Wonder Skein.

And I am number 1654 in line for my Ravelry invite. As if I even have the time.

I know this doesn’t sound very positive. There’s a lot going on here and I’m pretty tired. I hope to have some quiet knitting time soon. Not to mention learning how to spin. Treadle, treadle, treadle…..

Un poco de mojo

I got a little bit of my knitting mojo back last night. I took Friday night off, and only wound a couple of skeins for future projects. On Saturday I carried the Red Scarf project around with me but didn’t get to knit more than a couple of rows.

But last night while we were waiting for Tom to start getting sleepy, I laid the Irish Hiking Scarf out and looked at it carefully. Finally I could see that I had in fact done my cable crosses too soon. All I had to do was tink back one right-side row and re-knit it without the crosses. Another wrong-side row, then it was time for the right-side crosses. Done.

Did I got on to do a full repeat? Hell no. I rolled that sucker up and went directly to the Red Scarf, do not pass go.

Today I get some car knitting time. Just to be safe I think I will only take Red Scarf with me. Don’t want to bruise the mojo.

Thanks for all your good wishes! The situation is already improving.

Knitted into a corner

Urgent message from Chocolate Paradise (I am providing no link):

Sometimes, you’ll get stunned by the titanic amount of chocolate sources at hand.

Now that that is out of the way….

I went over to the llocal llama farm this morning. I actually took pictures, not that I can put them on my computer or the blog or anything, but I did take pictures. Jack was no help at all. He was terrifying the alpha male, who had never seen anything like a rambunctious three-year-old boy getting out of his stroller and exploring the barn. They actually sounded their llama alert noise, which Kathy said they usually only do for airplanes or other big scary things they don’t like. But the younger llamas and the babies came over to investigate.

Kathy had many many bags of llama fiber out in the barn, and gave me one to take home. I will be teaching myself to sort out all the guard hairs and VM. There are a lot of steps in the process. This is one of them. We will see what happens next.

[My life path at this point looks like a series of stepping stones positioned haphazardly across a ragged lawn. I am hopping to what I can leap to instead of pausing to figure out how to align the stones, recast the broken ones, countersink them below grade, etc. People from my deeper past (I can’t see you, but I know you’re there) know what kind of person this behavior made me. I’m trying to be different now.]

Last night I watched two episodes of Remington Steele (Mildred got her new Tandy computer, hooray!, and even in its first episode it did the impossible) and decided to attempt two repeats of the IHS instead of just one. Why don’t I ever listen to me? I may or may not have crossed my cables at row 6 instead of row 8. I can’t know for sure unless I proceed (and tink back 7 rows if I am wrong) or tink back 6 rows (and re-knit if I was right, and tink back two more and re-knit 8 more if I was wrong).

Either way, I’m not looking forward to that. I could blame the two glasses of local wine, or the sight of 27-year-old Pierce Brosnan vaulting a 6 foot fence while wearing a suit, or just place the blame square on my own head for rushing things. I always say that’s the biggest source of mistakes in hobbycraft, and now it’s my behind that got bit. Ouch.

I feel like I’ve knit myself into a corner. The IHS is maybe stalled, the Dianne hat is definitely stalled, and I’m afraid to even look at Tyrone for fear I’ll discover that I screwed that up too. So far I haven’t made any mistakes on the Red Scarf, but then again that pattern is pretty bulletproof. (Maybe I should compile a booklet of knitting patterns for those afflicted with memory loss. I could call it No Lace For You.)

So that’s where it all is. Feel free to send mojo, but maybe I should just take some time off from knitting.

P.S. Melanie, I *just* got the box of butternuts! Thank you!

Time out

I have written a wonderful post about the llama farm visit and Remington Steele and all kinds of interesting things, and the computer or the software or the Internet keeps eating the second half of it. I am not up to rewriting it for the third time just right now. I am very sorry because I think you would have liked it.

When I can calm down I will try again. It may be one of those WordPress “thangs” where it seems to be going wrong, and later you find out the right stuff has magically reappeared. I certainly hope so.

In the meantime, please send mojo if you have any extra. Any kind will do.

Sock this

Sigh. There is no efficient way to describe yesterday. I will just say that taking three small children to the grocery store was much more enjoyable and productive than taking four children to the doctor’s office with an exam room smaller than many master-bedroom closets.

The details won’t be posted here (except to say that the doctor himself was an angel, it’s everyone else [including my own children] that was difficult), but the upshot was that when the kids realized the depths of my frustration and asked, “Where are we going?” I pointed the car towards a yarn shop. One I had only heard of, but was sure I could find.

Find it I did. It’s a combination quilt and yarn shop called Loose Threads. It’s almost all quilts, but they were sympathetic and led me to the yarn room. Noro. Jo Sharp. Plymouth Galway Chunky. They even brought me coffee and asked if that would help. Aaaaaahhhhhhhh.

I walked out with patterns for the Fiber Trends Felted Clogs (adult and child sizes — different patterns, take note!), all-purpose mittens, the Knitter’s Handy Guide to Yarn Requirements, and two tiny 50g skeins of Waikiki in a colorway that is not typical for me. I think it is called “Spring,” and it is yellow and orange and red and purple. Really bright, with slubs all through it. I’m thinking a pair of footies for myself. To cheer me up.

I also found a lovely quilt shop right in downtown Jefferson, but I’ll go into more details whenever I get a chance to get into quilt mode. I hope that comes soon. Because I have quilts to finish.

Knitwise, last night I Kitchenered the toe on the second baby tsock, and sent the leftover Dalegarn Falk to the yarn bucket. Five needles liberated. I tried to work on my Dianne hat, but had no idea where I was or what I should do next, so I should probably tink back whatever it was I did last night, and be more thoughtful about it next time. I could always frog the whole self-invented thing but I’d really rather see it through. I will have to get a plan and a running start.

I knitted a little bit on the red scarf but by then was really tired. I’m searching around for a picture on the Internet Tubes, because surely this stitch pattern is Already Out There. But I haven’t found it yet, even after a full five seconds of Googling.

The llama owner called me back, yes she has fiber, no she doesn’t know what to do with it. This could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Oh yeah, Top Chef was on last night. Good call on sending home the chef who served the undercooked chicken to the judges. But tell me again how Brian Malarkey made it to the finals? To me, he just doesn’t have the “presence” of a Top Chef. Harold “the quiet one” had it. (Mr. Beth is going to try to have a meal at Harold’s restaurant while he’s on this business trip. He will have to bring back some proof!) And good luck Dale, but this house is rooting for Casey.