Happy 2006

I had a good post in my head when I woke up this morning but have been rushing round like a chicken with his head cut off. Hence, I have no clue what I was going to say as dawn broke across the sky.

I guess the best thing to do it to wish you and yours a very happy, safe and prosperous 2006 from me and the Green Fairy.

I am spending the night in the house, away from the crazies or should that be, the crazy is staying in the house? LOL! In any event, I have a bottle of Absinthe that is calling my name. No, not the same one that's in the photo. I hate that stuff but the bottle is cool. I've not enjoyed this since the spring and I really need this. This is another year I won't be ringing in the New Year at the Rainbow Room in New York. Perhaps one day while I'm still young enough to enjoy it I will be able to do that. So I've thrown on part of my tux for the Green Fairy. Works for me :-)

Cheers! Here's to a productive 2006!

Imma WHAT?

You are a Nocker!! Inspired by the Gnomes of
legend, you have a natural love of building,
repairing, and dismantling things. You can
quite literally turn trash into treasure. But
as things would have it, everything you make
has some little flaw, which causes you no end
to frustration. In life, dont let yourself be
so caught up in the flaws of life that you miss
out in its beauty.


Which Changeling Kith Best Fits You?
brought to you by Quizilla

More socks

I guess I've been lazy and haven't really posted since I got Haloscan commenting installed on here. Truth be told, I'm in the middle of another pair of socks for a friend. I'm not sure if she keeps up with this blog or not (Are you reading Winnie???) so I'm not posting a photo of them. She sort of knows she's getting them but she wo'nt see what they look like.

Since that's about all I can write for now...here's a meme:

Tuesday Twosome

1. Top two Favorite Movies.
The Exorcist and Full Metal Jacket

2. Top two Favorite Actors.
Brian Bloom and Gary Sinise AND Viggo Mortensen (I can't choose between them and you can't make me LOL!)

3. Top two Favorite Actresses.
Linda Blair and Jodie Foster

4. Top two Favorite TV Shows.
The X Files and Friday the 13th: The Series (see a pattern here?)

5. Top two Favorite TV Musicians.
Mike Oldfield and King Diamond

Listening to: Under Ice ~ Kate Bush

Fingerless Glove

Well, I did it. Sort of. I'm not real pleased with the way it turned out. It's a bit too tight (it was for a woman's hand) but the stitches sort of spiral between thumb and the index finger. I did start on the second one but it will be a fingerless mitten...no fingers on the second one. It's too tight and this alpaca yarn is too expensive to just leave the gloves laying around. Without the fingerless fingers (LOL!), it's a perfect fit.

I'm also trying to figure out if it's worth the risk to try Haloscan for the comments instead of Blogger's on default comments. Anybody using Haloscan, have you had any problems or troubles getting it installed or working? I was all set to do it when Drew (The Crochet Dude) told me about it but after reading their web site and some of the problems you can run into, I decided maybe I didn't want the added headache.


Listening to ~ Mein Schmertz, Lene Lovich

Winter Solstice

I know I'm a day early but I wanted to wish everyone a very happy Yule now so I don't forget tomorrow.

That said, I got a nasty bug over the weekend. I went to Boston on Saturday and had to have picked something up on the train. Lots of people hacking up all over the place. It hit me at 2 AM Saturday night/Sunday morning. I had a fever just high enough to let me know I was sick but not high enough to put me into a fever delirium and man, did I ache! Just getting back to myself today.

Anyway, I was too weak to even pick up my needles over the weekend but have been looking for a good pattern for fingerless gloves. Anybody know of one? I had one but not being well versed in dp's yet, I'm not quite sure how to re-work the pattern which has got to be wrong. It's ok up till the index finger but where it tells to start the index finger is actually at the pinkie end of your hand. I wasted expensive alpaca the first time I tried them, I don't want to waste anymore of it but I would desperately love a pair of alpaca fingerless gloves before winter is over.

I think tonight I'm going to just work on the Aran afghan. I'm still not feeling 100% so will take it easy.

Oh, the graphic above....there's a gallery of many similar types here at Witch Way. I love the organic feel of these.


Listening To: Saturday Love ~ Cherelle

Aran Afghans, Socks and books of Poetry

First, mega thanks to Dave who helped me locate my comp book with my poetry! Keep that gift in shape Dave!!! I'm happy I have it back.


I'm working on an Aran afghan that Knitty Gritty had on some time ago. It's rather simple, just 7 different blocks to a total of 16 blocks to make a lap sized throw. I mainly did this to use up some yarn my mom had. I like the way it's looking. I'm not looking forward to doing an entire block in double moss stitch-that gets boring but I can lean my head back and close my eyes while I do it...sort of zone out or something. I'll probably have to come up with my own block to finish it as only 7 patterns doubled is 14 blocks and it calls for 16.

Knitty Gritty also did a show on socks today. It seemed she mainly followed the Universal Sock pattern I've been using. I thought she said there was supposed to be variations on the toe decreases and a heel but I can't find it on the site. It was fun to watch anyway. Her knitsters had some cool socks. I really liked the chick in the middle who had a Greek Key going round her instep. I may need to chart that out myself so I can knit a pair. I think I'll download the pattern as she was calling these slipper socks and I'd like a pair like this. I'll find a nice worsted wool and knit them up.

I think I'm gonna go make another Latte in my Tassimo and get back to my afghan.


Listening to Piano in the Dark ~ Brenda Russell

Insomnia (or a 2 AM cat fight)

I guess it's a good thing I'm generally in bed and asleep before 10 PM since I was woken up at 2 AM or so by Chris' cat fighting with my cat. My cat instigates, sneaking in where she shouldn't be but his cat is a bitch and gets pissy. So I'm sitting here with some incense burning (Dragon blood...ahh, the memories) listening to the SOS Band and reading some blogs. I suss I'll be in bed by 7 PM tonight LOL! At least I got about 5 hours sleep, I think.

I've torn up this house somewhat looking for some poetry that I cannot find. I guess I have to start over. I specifically bought Adobe's Creative Suite to get InDesign to vanity publish a book when I'd had enough written. I'll keep looking but I think that composition book is gone, damnit! I keep tossing round the idea of sitting with my Ouija board but I've never had luck using it by myself and it seems everyone is scared to death of the things. It did tell me once where to find something I had lost. My mom and I used it back then to locate the item.

I was debating weather to write some now but nothing is coming to me, it's too early and I'm not in that mindset. I'm just rather numb right now LOL!

I started an Aran afghan the other night. Knitty Gritty had shown it a couple months ago. I got one block done, am in the middle of another one now. It's being done in a soft blue yarn. My mom had bought it for something or other and I think there's 10 skeins of it? Maybe 8. I'll go as far as I can go.I just wanted to use the yarn up. I'll post a picture when I've got a bit more done on it.

Limbo Socks

I really like the way the colours knitted up. I finished these last night and was too lazy to get up and take a picture. Talk about cutting it real close, one ball of yarn JUST made one sock so it worked out well. I was praying I'd not have to order a ball just to do a couple of rows as I thought I was going to have to do.

I think next pair I make will be a solid colour. Well, maybe not-I still have that red ball of Cherry Tree Hill yarn to work up, then maybe a pair of solid colour socks. Oh wait, no! I just remembered there's a very funky pair of socks I saw that I have to try. They're so unusual that I have no choice but to try them.

I've also been going out of my gourd looking for a composition book I had stated writing a ton of poetry in last winter. I had some very good stuff in there that I cannot get back and I can't imagine what the hell I did with it. It's sort of a need to have it. It goes along with why I have been listening to Teena Marie non-stop the past week. Here's one haiku that I wrote from that book. I had saved a few on my Mac but not all of them. I've got to find that book.

Frosted tulip glows
Twinkling on a stem of gold
My heart is there too

Lots of snow makes for great knitting

We got dumped on yesterday, it snowed early in the morning but tapered off to rain, only to pick up later in the afternoon again. It was total white out conditions so I did what any knitter would do, I sat on the sofa and knit :-) Thanks to Kae for pointing me to the fingerless gloves. I got those done. And finishing up on the socks in the Limbo yarn. I think I'll do another set of fingerless gloves in alpaca, once I get to Boston to get some more.

All the holiday knitting is done so I can get back to my stuff, namely the cable sampler sweater. I want to get that one done as there's a Rowan cable sweater I want to do. So much knitting and winter is only so long.

More later....

All I Want For Christmas

Since it's so close to Christmas, I thought I'd say this is all I want. I'm not asking for much, huh? I've drooled over Brian Bloom for as long as I can remember. I had almost forgotten about him until I saw him in his small role on Melrose Place a couple of weeks ago.

Is it too much to much to ask for to find him wrapped with a big red bow under, well, I don't have room for a traditional tree so I guess he'd have to be placed under my misting fountain. Have you ever seen this guys eyes? WOW!

I'm just on a big flashback right now...don't mind me.

And to stay on topic, I'm finishing up the first of a pair of socks in that Limbo yarn. YUMMY! IT looks awesome!

WOW! That's a lot of knitting!

I think I'm finally done with all the gift knitting? At least it appears so from this photo. Last evening, sat on my sofa, I had brought my iPod down and listened to a bunch of the knitting podcasts. I had the house to myself and just sitting there knitting listening to knitting podcasts was probably the most enjoyable evening I've had in a long time. I drank a million cups of hot chocolate which is surprising as I don't normally drink it this early in the season, nor do I generally drink anything with caffeine at night.

Which brings me to my next toy. I am totally enchanted with this hot beverage maker. Don Imus has been crowing about this Tassimo machine for a while now so I couldn't take it anymore and set out to get one. Bed Bath & Beyond had them in stock. I think I got it Wednesday. Now I've not drunk coffee in over 4 years....I cannot get enough of this. You pop the discs in and you have a cup of coffee, a cup of tea, hot chocolate, a latte, espresso or whatever else you want. I'm not wild about the coffee, I'm much more of a tea drinker but the latte is addictive! I love those! I also quite like the hot chocolate. The novelty hasn't worn off yet but it's nice to know I can have a latte quite easily when I want one.

Now I need to go make a cup of tea and package all these gifts up and get them ready for the post tomorrow.

Aran For Sale

I realise this is rather ridiculous to list this for sale on a knitting blog. Why would a knitter pay this for a sweater they could knit themselves? I've sat here with Chris trying to figure out eBay...there's no way to list this as a unisex item-if a man is looking for a gift for his girlfriend, will it click this could be a woman's sweater if it's listed under menswear? Likewise, if it's listed under women's wear, would it dawn on someone it is also suitable for a man? Also, they nickel and dime you to death-too many damn fees and I'm not making eBay rich on my stupidity - I'd sooner cut this Aran to ribbons and throw it in the trash first. Which is what I've a feeling is going to happen.

That said...if any of you know someone who has a young adult that they'd like to buy a very nice gift for, this is the item. Pictures of it can be seen under the HEARTBROKEN heading....dated 13 November, 2005. It would probably fit a young adult wearing a medium. Man or woman with a 34" chest.

Measurements for it are as follows:

Upper back @ shoulders---14"
Back width @ underarm---- 20"
Front, buttoned, @ underarm---20"
Length, waist to underarm---13"
Length, shoulder to waist---23"
Sleeve width @ underarm---14 1/2"
Sleeve length, shoulder to wrist---28 1/2
Cuff measures 4" total, folded up for finished length of approx. 2"
Wrist--- 7"


Selling price is $200.

The buttons are made of genuine leather and are 'braided'. The wool is 100% virgin wool and contains the natural lanolin