Variagated Yarn - the evil Siren

For some reason I keep falling in love with variegated yarns - then once they've been wound or knit, I want to vomit from the color chaos. Why can't I seem to remember this, especially when throwing down over $50 for an especially sexy skein??

Any one else have this problem? I keep thinking maybe I'm just picking the wrong kind. I LOVE things like this amazing cardi featured on my effing favorite blog ever, Knitted Bliss:

adore. EVERYTHING. about this.

Or this delightfully tasteful Noro piece:

But for some reason I keep ending with something like this:

Guaranteed not to stripe?!?! That's something people were going for?!?!

I love gorgeous color combinations but can't handle when they are mashed together to look like a snow screen on an old TV. Pure nausea.

So basically today I'm depressed to know that this:

gorgeous

...will at it's best, become this:

color stew

Of course, this is just me - I can grip that some people love this. And the woman who worked this shawl above is DIVINE and I envy her steady hand. I'm sorry if anyone loves this and thinks I am nutso. I also happen to hate it when my food touches other food on a plate. So...clearly I'm nutso. I am also too depressed to find a pattern for this yarn I bought yesterday. Sigh.

Knit Politics

Whatever your politics or awareness of current trends regarding lawmaking and women's health issues, this proposed method of protest is too precious to ignore.

The "Snatchel Project" is a creative approach that is inviting knitters and crocheters to knit or crochet a vagina or uterus, and mail them with messages to their male Senator or Congressional Representative.

Find out more information about the project here and here - as well as patterns and how-tos.

I find this hysterical and inspired and utterly charming. Kind of like that penguin jacket knitting snafu, but with more meaning. Hooray for great ideas! Who better to make these decisions, than people who are in possession  of a vagina or uterus.

Giving up - first frog of 2012

Remember the Uxbridge cardigan I was DYING to get my hands on?

Well, almost 3 weeks later and I have made zero progress. Although it is slightly past the point I got to on my first sit-down, it's pretty pitiful.

Day 1

Day 26

I'm not sure if it's because of the flu I caught, or the fact that it starts with the sleeves (my LEAST favorite part) or that I don't have a ball winder and this yarn takes FOREVER to ball by hand, or that I noticed an error in the second row which obviously I can't fix unless I want to frog the ENTIRE THING....sigh. This project is really not thrilling me.

I'm not much of a frogger and it pains me to make the choice, but I think I'm going to do it. There mere thought of trying to work on this during our upcoming 5-state road trip makes me nauseous. 

It is a mite baffling to me that something I was so obsessed with could become so insanely boring - I just need to "want" to do a project, you know? This is supposed to be fun, not torture. 

So I'm scoping out a few alternatives to cheer me up. Which of these seems most interesting?

Pomme de pin Cardigan

by Amy Christoffers found here

Darling Emma

by Joji Locatelli found here

Larch Cardigan

by Amy Christoffers found here

Knitspiration sweater

Another coveted item...how will I ever make all of these? I guess it's just dreams.
Despite being an incomplete picture, I love this!

color schemes go perfectly with my hatred of daylight savings time

The whole blog is eye candy - check out Sunshine Avenue (borderline overwhelming...still haven't been able to extract what the heck the blog is). Thanks to Khadi for reblogging this - she always has fun posts (especially when she is supposed to be working on homework!)

Knitspiration, Domo style

I can't help but love all these ridiculous pants for kids, even tho my friends tell me that THIS is the line that I am not supposed to cross.

A few samples:

http://knithacker.com/2012/03/09/hey-yo-monkey-butt/

http://www.gizmodiva.com/fashion/hello_kitty_knit_pants_a_little_too_cute.php

http://knithacker.com/2011/01/10/monster-bum/

I'm starting to think that I may need to craft a pair of Domo-kun pants...to be ironic! Of course! Totally ironic!!
I bet it would be REALLY ironic if I made them adult sized....hmmmm...

Also, speaking of irony, I might need to make some Hipster Ariel pants too. And Totoro.

Anything else?

WIP Wednesday

Here's another project that is NOT baby-driven. (It is starting to feel like babies rule everything around me!) Some gauntlet gloves for W, who is awesome and got me this cool book for Christmas: 

also love the lips. where do I get those?

[Technically the book is also from J but then I have to talk about how I should knit something for him too and that's just a conversation that I don't want to have. Mostly because he has it with me practically every day.]

There are so many cool projects that I've put on my queue from this book, but W took a shine to the gauntlet gloves: 

So on the needles we go. 

Took a day to finish a whole glove - not bad work for size 2 needles. Still have to block and seam, and just started the straps. I plan on finishing both of those before doing glove #2 - just to mix it up a little. I had tedious tiny projects when they are at the end - I usually try to get it out of the way so it feels more gratifying. 

rotten photo is all I've got

Bobbles aren't my favorite thing but these seem to have come out ok. Some careful steam block will hopefully take care of the inconsistencies I see. (Damn these Virgo eyes.) Hopefully I will finish these quickly and not get pompous or over-confidant, and ruin my momentum.

Sometimes you need a change of pace

After a seemingly endless amount of baby/toddler knits, I found myself working on a scarf. A scarf! I can't even remember the last time I knit a scarf. How....rudimentary.

a big derp's a comin'

by Deviant artist Wrathling...hurry up and make those stickers!

On special request from Baby E's abuela, I knit for her a scarf using a pattern and yarn that she picked out. To be honest, it was so nice to field a request that wasn't overly complicated, time consuming, or balls out ridiculous (can you knit me a cashmere steering wheel cover with skulls and crossbones??). I laughed at the time because scarf knitting was something I had completely forgotten about. But I soon shut up because it was way more involved, and far more gratifying than any other project I've recently taken on.

There's something to be said for straight-forward knitting. I was grateful that it didn't try to trick me with increase and decrease rows, button holes or other instructions that had no immediately apparent purpose. (You want me to do WHAT? Because WHY?) Just a pattern to be worked over and over again...and one that was too hard for me to memorize. It was interesting and complex and far prettier than scarves need to be. I am now a little wistful that this is going elsewhere - but I know she will love it. Hopefully this means some good home-cooking soon! (That's right, Junior. You can bring me more of that delicious food anyday. Aaaaaaaanyday.)

textured bag knitspiration

Just saw this posted on Knit Hacker (random image) from Green Rabbit Designs:

Gorgeous! I love the stitch pattern - a new one I hadn't ever thought of before but am really digging. Might even edge out my love of moss stitch. The flowers and buttons are so lovely- check them out up close.

layers, texture, adorbz

It looks like she did the buttons herself too - the bag is lined with the same material! Love this coordination and attention to detail.

No pattern up but the bag itself is for sale in her Etsy store. Verrrrry tempted...