Author Archives: kimidawn24

Cast-On-itis

So what do you do when you haven’t bought yarn in a looooong time and someone sends you a knitpicks gift card?
You don’t take into consideration that you’re still slogging away on a sweater that you cast on for two years ago, and you don’t take into consideration that you’ve promised to knit your sweetie a cardigan. Instead, you logon immediately and buy a whole sweater’s worth of yarn for yourself and then sit and count down the days until it arrives in your mailbox, itching to cast on.
This, my friends is precisely why you should not put yourself on an involuntary and prolonged yarn diet. You end up making rash, selfish decisions while completely ignoring your lack of knitting speed, or the “I swear I’ll knit you a cardigan” promises that you’ve made.
But I can’t let myself cast on for that cardigan until I have finished knitting Thermal. I was zooming away at the sleeve last night and then something went horribly wrong. It was right there, at the intersection of two DPNs, at the end of the round: one of my stitches a few rows down looked loose and saggy and I half-convinced myself that I’d dropped a stitch. (It was hard to tell exactly what was going on cause there were some increases thrown in, and the waffle pattern….) So I laddered down and picked back up the same stitches, finally convinced that I hadn’t dropped a stitch after all, that it had just been wonky. Two rounds later, that same area was all of a sudden all bunched up and tight on my needles. Something was amiss, and I had no power to stop it. So I had to tink back about six rounds. By then I was so exhausted and aggravated that I just put it down for the night and poured a glass of wine. I still have no idea what happened or how it ended up that way.

Underside of sleeve.  I like how the increases make a V in the waffle ridges.

Underside of sleeve. I like how the increases make a V in the waffle ridges.


So back to the new exciting yarn purchase; I bought Swish worsted to make Dexter by ZephyrStyle. I also promised Joey that I’d knit him the Smokin cardigan by BrooklynTweed. Maybe I can knit them simultaneously? By the time I’m finished with Thermal it will probably be warm outside. Surely there’s nothing weird about knitting two cardigans at the same time in the middle of summer. Is there?

February Funk

I have to admit, I’ve never understood why people get bummed out in February. I’ve always had a couple of good reasons to like it: Valentine’s Day, and my Birthday.
But now that I’m living in a much more northern locale, I can completely understand how it can be a bummer of a month. Its dark outside when I’m leaving work, its dark outside when I’m waking up for work. And even when it is sunny and bright outside, it’s frosty as hell and sometimes pretty miserable to bear. Add in the constant worry about “the economy,” and the fact that we are living in a really expensive city on one salary right now…. well, bummer.
I don’t want to be bummed out, so I’m trying to focus on the good stuff I’ve been enjoying lately:

Deadwood on DVD
Coraline by Neil Gaiman

The insanely adorable acts committed on a daily basis by Henry:

Maxxin and Relaxxin by the Heater

Maxxin and Relaxxin by the Heater

Hanging Out on the Stairs with Joey

Hanging Out on the Stairs with Joey

And knitting slowly and leisurely on the first sleeve of Thermal:

thermalsleeve1

Thermal Body Finished

thermalfront

thermal-back

I’ve cast on for a sleeve, but haven’t made any showable progress. Hopefully I’ll be able to score some knit-time today and bang out some sleeve!

And on a side note, how can it not be a good day when you wake up to this face?
"It's Snuggle Time."

Baby It’s Cold Outside

Our heat is out again, though it should be fixed by this evening. We have a little space heater to take the edge off the chill, but Henry’s been hogging it:
henrywarmer
I think I’ll cozy up in a wool blanket and do some knitting. Hope you’re all staying warm out there!

Going Home

Joey and I went back to Texas last week to visit our families since we didn’t get to see them over the holidays. It was a really nice trip and we enjoyed seeing both our families.

We visited with the cows:
ranch4

We got to watch Daisy prove that she’s a farm dog now:
ranch3

And we rode the horses:
ranch2

City Slickers

City Slickers

You might recognize Doc, the darker, taller horse. My parents have had him for about a year now. They recently got another horse named Scooby. Scooby has lung disease and wheezes a lot, but he is a really sweet and gentle horse and I’m glad that he has a nice family to take care of him. I discovered that when he’s trotting and you squeeze your legs to try to keep from falling off, he runs faster like horses are supposed to do when you squeeze their sides!

Doc had an itchy face and found the perfect place to scratch it:

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doc2

doc3

I was a little too busy to get any knitting done. I tried a little, but its hard to carry on a conversation when you’re keeping track of armhole and neckline decreases, all while maintaining a waffle stitch pattern. I hope to finish off the body this week and start on the sleeves…

I think I can count on Henry's help.

I think I can count on Henry's help.

Out With The Old, In With The New

I was going to do one of those cute flickr photo mosaics like all the other cool knit-bloggers to show off how much I finished in 2008, so I started counting up all my FOs.
Hmmm…. nine. Well that’s not really that impressive, is it? Granted, I pretty much stopped knitting from March-June due to our cross-country move. And technically, the Master Knitter Swatches could be counted individually….

2008 Knits mosaic

1. Urchin
2. Dashing
3. TKGA Master Knitter Swatches
4. February Baby Sweater
5. Joey’s Stripy Socks
6. R2D2 Hat
7. The only picture I have of the armwarmers I knit for my mom for Christmas
8. My Dad’s Christmas hat in progress (finished and gifted)
9. Shredded Wheat Scarf

You see how I snuck that last one in there? I finished the Shredded Wheat Scarf on December 17th and never blogged about it because I was waiting until we got our camera back from being repaired.

shreddedwheat2

shreddedwheat5

shreddedwheat

Yarn: Brooks Farm Yarn Four Play, 1.65 skeins
Needles: Knit Picks Harmony Options, size 11
Pattern: Scrunchable Scarf by Susan McConne
Thoughts: I used much larger needles than the pattern called for in order to make the scarf even more squooshy. I really like the way it turned out and have been wearing it every day since I bound off. Soft and warm!

Thermal is still progressing pretty steadily. Joey and I are taking a trip back to Texas next week so I’m looking forward to plenty of train and plane knitting time. We’re so excited that we get to spend a few days with our families and meet our new nephew!

Happy New Year!

Here are a few fun pics from last night’s festivities….

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nye1

nye3

nye5

nye2

nye6

nye7

Knitting, How I’ve Missed You

I finished my Shredded Wheat Scarf the week before Christmas, but I’m holding out until we get our camera back to blog about it. It’s being repaired and will hopefully be back soon.
After I finished the scarf I didn’t really have anything in mind to cast on for right away. (First time that ever happened!) And so I didn’t knit for a few days. It was kind of weird. Three or four different nights I found myself wishing I had something to knit on. I was reading the latest Yarn Harlot book one evening while trying to satisfy the urge, but then after I finished it off the urge was even stronger so I just had to go to bed early. Needless to say, I’ve really been missing my knitting over the past week and a half.
Today I decided that I needed to knit something. I really didn’t want to start a new project cause I don’t have any inspiring yarn at the moment, so an old neglected project got a reprieve.

Remember Thermal?

Remember Thermal?

I can’t believe it’s been a full year since I’ve last knitted on Thermal! I got distracted by socks and other fun knits and this poor sweater was completely thrown aside. I think there’s enough armhole and neckline shaping going on in this part of the pattern to hold my interest this time, though.

Glad to be knitting again!

Merry Christmas

From Kim, Joey and Henry

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merry-christmas

Snow Day!

Well, not really cause I did go to work…. but it started snowing right around lunchtime and I had to get out and see it.

(I had to take these pics with my cell phone and they didn’t really capture the falling snow- but I thought I’d share anyway so you can see pics of the area I work in.)

Taken from my office while waiting for the elevator

Taken from my office while waiting for the elevator

On my way back from the bank

On my way back from the bank


It was falling in big fluffy groups of smaller flakes.

It was falling in big fluffy groups of smaller flakes.


Pretty Church at 21st and Park Avenue South

Pretty Church at 21st and Park Avenue South

It’s so funny how a little bit of snow just lightens my mood and makes me so incredibly happy. Probably because I grew up in the south where we maybe only saw snow once a year and it was usually just icy rain. The snow was so pretty, and it was still falling when I left for work and headed uptown to do a little shopping. I stopped near the Empire State Building and looked up and saw the lights at the top of the building were masked by the snow, creating this cloudy halo that was so pretty.

empirestatebldg

Now I’m home and I’m gonna cuddle up with Henry and try to finish off my Shredded Wheat Scarf so I can wear it tomorrow. Hope you’re all warm and safe tonight.