Pictures of the lace sweater

After a long day of slacking, I like to relax with a drink and strike odd poses in front of artwork.


Knit from light worsted acrylic, using 4 st = 1" guage. Body is Seafoam Lace, collar and cuffs are a laddered rib.

Used basic pattern from Craftster (Circular Shrug) found here. I added sleeves and some inches to make it a little longer and cover a little more boobage.

(Can you believe I actually put on some lipstick for this post?)

Romantic Poet Sweater

May I present... The Lace Circular Sweater! Ta-Ta-Da!
The sweater, as modelled by my couch. I was kinda going for a romantic, lacy 19th century poet sort of look.
Close up of the seafoam pattern on the body of the sweater and the laddered rib I used on the cuffs and collar.

This was a lot slower going than I thought it would be. Obviously, trying to work out the math as you go takes some time. But I never imagined all those YO wraps would take so long! Sheesh!

As soon as I can get someone to hold the camera, I will post pix of me wearing the sweater. It fits nicely, and I think it will be a great thing to slip on over a shell or a sleeveless dress.

Finished knitting the circular lace sweater!

So, I have finished the knitting/fun portion of the sweater I made, loosely based on the Craftster Circular Shrug (only with a laddered ribbing and lace back and long sleeves). But, alas, someone/my cat has conspired against me again and I cannot find my yarn needle to stitch it together.

Yes, I know those things are like 2 for a dollar and I should get some more, but I have 3, dammit! I just can't find them right now. The one I used to embroider the flower on the book sweater last week (Yes, books do need sweaters sometimes. I'll explain that one later.) should be right on the knitting table beside my chair, where I left it. But it's gone. And, although I don't like to go jumping to conclusions, let me just say that last week, the missing 4 sided die was found in Gracie's stash of toys.

Oh, and you know I can't even post a pic of the pieces of the thing because I broke the stupid camera!!! Yeah. I just touched the little orange thing (that is apparently essential to the battery staying in) and it just broke off. So T, being the clever monkey he is, fashioned a thing to hold the battery in place out of a piece of rubber toy so the frackin' camera will work. But now the battery is dead, and while I can recharge it, I can't replicate the weird magic T used to transform innocuous bits of rubber bug into camera parts.

Yay! I can move again!

Finally!!!!!

But I am somehow disillusioned with the sweater I had started for T just after the first of the year.

I had shown him the Chaos Sweater from Knitty , which is, of course, a toddler sweater. He loved the idea of random dice rolls making up the cable patterns. (Because you know how that man can roll dice!) So I decided to knit him a man-sized version, using the Chaos pattern.

Except I am using 4 sided dice instead of 6ers. I don't see the point of using a 6er, if you reroll 5s and 6s.

Anyway, T loves that. And he is so adamant that I use the rolls EXACTLY as they come up, without fudging at all for what I think will look good. AND... He wants to be the only one who makes the dice rolls. That way the sweater is keyed to him, right?

No pix of that yet. Like I said, I'm a little tired of doing cables.

So I picked up the needles and some dk yarn and just started fooling around, adapting the Craftster Circular Shrug to my own evil purposes. I had already done the thing as written for M for Christmas:

and it went so fast (Like scarf fast. Instant gratification) that I decided to do one for me. But not the cap sleeve version. Nobody wants to see MY upper arms, darling. I'm putting full sleeves on mine. I'm also experimenting with a different filler patterns for the middle, instead of the mock rib.

Pix of that to come.

Yeah, so...

I learned to knit during my freshman year in college. I was trying to quit smoking, actually, because I'd been dating T for a while and he didn't smoke.

My mom was really supportive. She knew (because my Dad was a smoker) that the habit was much more than the nicotine addiction. So she wanted to make sure I had something to do with my hands. My mom learned to knit so she could teach me how, so I would have something to do with my hands instead of smoke. How's that for supportive? And she went out and bought us both sets of needles, like 10 pairs, and a crapload of yarn in every color you could think of.

Anyway, the point of this story is, since I can't sit still while I watch TV, I just started knitting while I watch TV or talk on the phone or have to do something where I'm just sitting around. It keeps my hands out of trouble. (Pretty smart, Mom.)

But now, my frackin' shoulder hurts. And I am just sitting. And it is making me really grouchy. I'm giving this shoulder like one more day to rest, and then...

5 days later....

So it took me 5 days to post again. That's pretty good, isn't it?

Anyway, I've not done a lot of knitting these days because a)most of my time has been spent working on filming and writing and b)I did something to my fracking shoulder. I don't know what, but it hurts to move at all. No kidding. Like, I drove the car yesterday and it hurt. (What's up with that?)

But, since I've taken down the Christmas tree, but all that junk is still sitting in my living room waiting for someone with an UNINJURED shoulder to take it out into the garage... And since I have these ornaments right here, I might as well show you some of the Christmas ornaments I knitted.

Star/Snowflake (like you couldn't figure that out)









This is basically lace edging wrapped around an egg shaped ornament. I got the idea from the "Antique Satin and Lace Ornament" at www.HeartStringsFiberArts.com. But I like it better gold on gold.

These are variations on a theme. I basically knitted a tube, then threaded ribbon through top (or top and bottom) and tied a bow. There is: Garter Stitch, Mexican Lace inserted into garter stitch, Drop Stitch, and Cat's Eye. Oh, and I threaded beads onto the Cat's Eye before I started and then just slipped them every other stitch or so on the first and last rows.

I like to put a couple of "new" ornaments on the tree each year. I think next year I might do some mini-sweaters or something.

If you're not knitting, the terrorists win

So I've decided to jump on this blog wagon. I'm guessing I am the last person in the civilized world to start one. Hell, I think my dd has about 50 of them, herself. So naturally, all the clever, cool names for a blog are taken.

But I don't need to be clever or cool when I have logic and sarcasm on my side. I can make up a name for a blog site that is pithy, street-savvy, politically edgy, and practical--all at the same time.

Look at it this way: I could sit here and worry about terrorists setting off dirty bombs in my small mid-western town. Do I have enough duct tape and plastic wrap to survive that?

Or I could knit.

Think about it.