Not A Podcast: Episode 8

31October2012 from SewKnitpicky on Vimeo.

Short show this week; I didn't work on much so there isn't a lot to talk about.  Man, do I look crazed in that preview image!  Thank goodness I'm not a politician so no one will think to use those against me!

Onto the show notes!

♥ Nikola Tessla brooch (not broach as I misspelled in the end title) is from The Science Boutique on Etsy.  I really want the glow in the dark madam Curie one too!

FOs:
♥ The Girl's First Real Winter Mittens.  Petit Purls.
♥ The TARDIS pouch.  Sorry kittens, I forgot to get pictures of it before recording!  See last week's show notes for more details pertaining to this project.

WIPs:
♥ Pinkie Pie Socks.  That's it.  Seriously.

 Soon to Cast-On:
♥ Gearing up for the Dancing Dog Dyeworks' 30 Day Sockdown KAL November.  Broken Seed Stitch Socks.  DDD Twist sock in Love My Gnomies and Shibui sock in Ivory.
♥ Goodale by Cecily Glowick MacDonald....really.  One of these days.  I was mistaken: every other size makes a larger jump and then two will be closer together in size.  It does not  seem to have any real rhyme or reason to the sizing.

October 2012: Wrap-up

Kittens!  I decided not to bombard you with posts tomorrow.  I've slowed down a touch on my knitting this last week, and I doubt I'll work on anything further than I already have.  I may as well do my monthly yardage tally post today.

We're all doing fine after Sandy hit last night.  She ended up fizzling out before she could do any real damage here. We had some high winds for about 6 hours last night, but by 4 am, it was calm and clear again.  Today we're even seeing some blue skies.  I hope everyone out there on the East Coast is as fortunate as we were.  I've been thinking about all of you. ♥

Yardage Totals 2012:

January: 817 yds

February: 782 yds
March: 1350 yds
April: 421 yds

May: 789 yds
June: 485 yds
July: 511yds
August: 368 yds

September: 1786 yds
October: 879 yds

Year to date: 8,188 yds or 4.65 miles

For as much as I knit this month, that number is disappointingly low.  Not that it matters, but it's a pride issue for me.  Just under half of it was in socks (which let's face it, are seriously time consuming for little yardage used), a quarter of it was the wide stripes blanket o' doom, and the other quarter was small objects like mittens and a toy.  I may be the world's slowest toy knitter.  But I did manage to finish quite a few projects and this first month of Q4 Stashdown, I'm doing really well.  I'm mean really well.  I'm looking to save a little face when all is said and done if November and December are more of the same. Yowza.

I hope you are all well today, kittens, and I'll talk to you tomorrow.  (Sick preschooler permitting.  *knocks on wood*)

Question: please vote.

Kittens!  I need your help making this decision.  I can't help but feel that making a group would be putting the cart before the horse...but it seems like other podcasts have groups made at the same time.  What should I do?!




EDIT: I have since removed the poll since it's been causing issues with my blog layout. Any opinions, please post a comment. Thank you! :)

Today in pictures

This is what's happened to my lovely view, Kittens. Just a week ago, there were still pretty golden leaves all over those trees, and now, you can see hints of winter in them.

Today I took my Ghastly Uma out into the wild.  Even with short sleeves, it's quite warm.  Too warm for the house at the moment, but I suspect that in winter, it will make an excellent house sweater.

Life is never boring with a Shiba Inu, which are crazy chewers. This poor toy did not make it even 2 hours before Tala managed to open its head and pull out all of the stuffing. It's like a crime scene, and I'm some sort of CSI documenting the carnage.  (These toys are rated at a 7 or 8 on the toughness scale; I can not imagine how quickly she'd rip open a standard toy.)  She takes so much glee in ripping the insides out of these toys.


And that's my Saturday!  I hope it's treating you all well!

Not A Podcast: Episode 7

Not A Podcast: Episode 7 from SewKnitpicky on Vimeo.

Kittens, it's that time of the week again: video podcast day!  Trying to keep everything short and sweet; I came in at just over 18 minutes this week.


Onto the show notes!

♥ This is one of my favorite mugs.  It can be found at the Sugar Bunny Shop.  I have the Mashimaro one too.  Eee!  They are large, nice heavy weight, hold almost 2 full cups of liquid, and are high quality.  And really, $15 for something like that isn't so high priced.  LOVE.
♥ Hopefully the bit about our renter wasn't over-sharing.  The house has been a huge sore spot for us since we bought it in December 2006...and 2 days after closing were told we had orders to PCS.  It's been a dramatastic ride ever since full of dead beat renters and now our current one is getting shafted by VA and the military retirement system.  Which means we are getting shafted by them too.

FOs:
♥ Diamond's Little Sister - US Size 6 needles.  Knit Picks Swish Tonal in Queen Anne.  Minor foot mod: removed 5 rounds.  Made felt and embroidered eyes rather than safety eyes.
♥ The Boy's First Real Winter Mittens - US Size 4 and 6.  Knit Picks Swish Tonal in Canopy and Kindling.  Modified the cuff to be twisted ribbing and lengthened.  Also lengthened the thumb.  I think this is a good pattern, but you should watch it to make sure it will fit your child's hand.  

WIPs:
♥ One sewing project but no projects on needles were worked on this week.  Crazy!
♥ Open Wide Zippered Pouch tutorial by Anna at Noodlehead.  The one I'm making is a modified size Large.
♥ TARDIS panel from Amanda Hall's Etsy shop.  She blogs at The Craft Junky.
 


Soon to Cast-On:
♥ Goodale by Cecily Glowick MacDonald....maybe. Yarn choice is fighting me hard on this one.  I may have to accept that it's not meant to be.
♥ Gearing up for the Dancing Dog Dyeworks' 30 Day Sockdown KAL November.  I'm not 100% sure about pattern and yarn choice yet, but a full month is plenty of time for at least one pair of socks. 
♥ I may cast on a second pair of mittens for my daughter.  The last pair took 3 days start-to-finish; I could definitely finish a pair for her before the end of the month.

Stash Flash:
♥ Ladybug Fiber Company 75/25 Self-striping in "Mesa Sunrise."  PURDY.  Thanks to after-the-fact color correction, there was no reason I had to go through so much trouble getting this skein to look right!  When will I learn?!
♥ Other podcast I referenced is Whatcha Swatchin?  with host, Emily.  We have similar taste in yarn and patterns...and she keeps her shows fairly short, which I love. 

Another week...

...and more changes to my view.  Soon, there will be no more pretty leaves to gaze at while I take Tala out for bathroom breaks.   This makes me a little sad, but I've been enjoying the gasps of wonder from my children who have never seen seasonal changes like this before.  To them, this is all magical and new.  In Alabama and Texas, when autumn  early winter arrived, the leaves would go from green to brown and just fall off the trees.  None of the pretty transitional stuff you see here.

I hope no one minds that this year I've been posting so many scenery pictures.  After almost a decade without, it seems a bit magical to me as well. ♥

Not a Podcast: Episode 6

17Oct2012 from SewKnitpicky on Vimeo.

Kittens, it's been two weeks since I made a video entry.  This one got a little long at just under 26 minutes.  It gave my computer issues saving it, but I *think* it's OK.  I watch these through quite a few times throughout the process, and it was looking alright when I skimmed it.  Despite my thoughts at the end of the video, I was neither able to get this up early, nor to attend a knit date: it was cancelled.  I'm hoping the weather holds out next week.  I'm trying to enjoy all of the freedom I can get right now.  Once the Mister leaves for his "business trip," I'll be restricted to going out just to the daytime play dates during that time.

I'm still learning how to edit video, so I appreciate the patience with me.  This one isn't too bad, but a couple of the jumps are fairly jarring.  I *could* play with more effects, but I tend to find them annoying and distracting.  And once again, Vimeo's preview image makes me look like I am seriously peeved about something.

And in Manda-ese, "early morning" is 10am.  Just in case anyone was wondering.  During a part of this video, I was seriously tempted to make a paper shark and play the Jaws theme.  I'm not sure if such goofiness would be appreciated in a podcast.  I know as I do more of these, the format and tone will evolve with it.  So um, consider yourselves warned: the more comfortable I get with this, the more my quirks will pop up.

Anywho!  Show notes, let me show you them.

FOs:
♥ Trick or Treat Socks-- Aquaphobia Socks by Crystal Flanagan. US size 1.5. Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock in Trick Or Treat. 17 days start to finish. ~ 254yds.
♥ A note about the LL's: I believe they no longer make the 50g skeins like I used here.  They're all 100g now. 


WIPs:
♥ Pinkie Pie Socks - Susan B. Anderson
♥ Monkey's Little Sister - If you look at the back left corner of the video, there on the bookshelf is the purple monkey.  A couple of nights ago, she was renamed to Diamond.  The Girl tells me that the pink monkey's name is Ruby.  All day she's been chattering at me about how I'm working on Ruby.  Too Cute.  And since making the video this morning, I finished the second arm and am now working on the feet and legs.  It's slowly moving.
♥ Rebecca Danger
♥ Wide Stripes--the never-ending blanket o' doom.  DOOM!  And uh, sorry about trying to deafen you all.  I think my needles hit the wall as I was trying to show how wide the blanket is.


Soon to Cast-On:
♥  ???  Way too many choices.  The Paradox of Choice by Barry Schwartz was the book I was thinking of.


Stash Flash:
♥ Bad Amy Knits - Etsy shop  (She also sews and sells cute knitting bags.)
♥ Dancing Dog Dyeworks - Etsy shop  (For those wondering about why I said, "'colorway' of the month," it's because the last two months have had multiple colors up for grabs.  Last month there were 3;  this month was the same when she opened up the new colors.)
♥ DDD Ravelry group
  

"Wordless" Post

Just something pretty to look at today, kittens.

WIP-it Wednesday: 10 October 2012

Kittens!  I am taking a break from the video entries this week to give myself a chance to better organize my notes and maybe have an FO for you next week.  I didn't finish anything and my current WIPs are not too interesting: it would have been a pretty short boring show. ;)  [And I kinda sorta want to go to a knit date tonight and editing the entries always takes me longer than planned.  So um, hiatus for a week!]


That doesn't mean I can't share my WIPs with you, though. ♥

Behold!  You may recognize the Trick Or Treat Socks and see the start of Pinkie Pie socks for my daughter (I started those while meeting a bunch of lovely ladies that all live within BLOCKS of me on post...crazy!).  The brown square is part of a collaborative blanket knit.  I mostly knit socks this week.  This isn't a bad thing, but socks often have so little to show for them.  Last night, I finally pulled out the Wide Striped Blanket O' Doom and worked 5 rows of that, and I've even been quilting a few lines a day on that languishing bed quilt.  About time too--it's been cold here already.  I think I see many hand knit/crocheted/sewn blankets in my future.

So that's been my week: how have you all been?  Keeping warm?

Time keeps on slippin'...

...into the future.  The view outside my window is changing daily.  Gotta love that! ♥

Saturday Amusement

I thought it might be nice to throw in a text entry this week before Wednesday inevitably comes around again.   The 6 of you kittens that regularly read this, you do not mind the more fluffy posts, do you?  Lately, I've noticed a spike in page views on this blog, and I've been starting to dig around in Blogger's stat features. ( I haven't done anything to promote it, which makes the spike all the more intriguing to me.)

Today, I finally decided to figure out which blog post is my most viewed one.  Lately, I've been getting 20+ page views a day, but not on my most recent entries.  Strange, non?  So I did a little sleuthing: at 307 views as of today, this is my most viewed blog post.  Why?  I have no idea.  It does amuse me.  The next highest is my 2011 Stashdown numbers for the year.  Those I can almost understand since I'm in the actual group on Ravelry.  But a 2 sentence entry with no pictures and real reason for it?  No.  Idea.  Heh.

Other than that, I'm enjoying the ever-changing view from my back yard.  Here's some more Fall Foliage spam for you all. :)  (Make sure to view them full size for more clear details.  I try to avoid stretching all of your pages.)

Hopefully you can appreciate these as much as I do, kittens.   One forgets how "magical" season changes can seem when she haven't seen one in almost a decade.

When we first shared where we were being stationed, you would have thought we had been exhiled to Siberia based on the most common reactions.

"I'm so sorry to hear that!"

"You know it gets cold there, right?"  At this point I'd mention we are from Madison which is about the same average temperatures year-round; we are kind of aware of what cold feels like. As in, cold enough with wind chill to cancel school and work.  As in, cold enough to have the liquid on your eye balls instantly freeze as you walk out the door in January.  Heh.  We've actually seen snow in the wild too!  IMAGINE THAT CRAZINESS.

*ahem*

The most persistent negative reactions came from people who grew up in the south and had never actually been stationed in the few northern duty stations the Army has.  This added to both my amusement and annoyance at the conversations.

"It's out in the middle of NO WHERE!"

Again, amusing given the duty station we were previously at was in an area with a population of roughly the same size and an even farther distance from larger cities than this one.  And there's more to do in this area to boot.  People and their prejudices, I tell ya.  And to be honest, with a few exceptions, most military bases are out in the boonies.  You very rarely see them close to larger cities.

Anywho!  Those are the things on my mind this chilly, rainy Saturday.  I hope things are going well where you all are, and you're enjoying some relief from the heat!

Not a Podcast: Episode 5

03October2012 from SewKnitpicky on Vimeo.

Kittens! It's that time of the week again.  While the video is getting posted a little later at night than I'd like, it will post on Wednesday.  Huzzah!  Today I talked for a little over 20 minutes--that's even after editing some stuff out that I realized just wasn't working.  (I'll take better notes and talk about those later or maybe actually write a blog post about them.  I realized part way through talking about them how negative I was being, and I think that may be better suited to text.)  I think my color editing and cuts were a bit better this time. I seem to finally be getting the hang of how to do it and getting better at catching natural breaks in my speech.  What do you think, kittens?  Is there anything you'd like to see me do a video entry on or is this current format enjoyable enough to watch?

And Vimeo: why you keep catching stills of my looking so angry?!  O A O  This is a pleasant podcast, I swear!!


Onto the show notes.


FOs:
♥ Ghastly Uma.  US size 8 & 10s.  Twisted Fiber Arts Olivia in Ghost, ~940yds.  11 days start to finish: feeling like a knitting rock star.  Oh yeah.

WIPs:
♥ Trick Or Treat! US size 1.5 with LL's Shepherd Sock in Trick Or Treat.

Soon to Cast-On:
♥ Goodale in Bugga!  Arge Moth
♥ Sweet Vintage Tomatoes.  I'm pretty excited to try out Cat Bordhi's Sweet Tomato Heel with these.  Now if you love to knit socks and want to spend the $20 on the ebook, have at it!  Socks with pockets and socks designed to look like zebras aren't exactly my thing...but if it floats your boat, enjoy it!  (And there are some lovely sock patterns in there; I just have similar patterns already.  I'm weird when it comes to sock patterns: I do not like to pay for them.)

Giftmas Plans:
♥ More Ribbed Socks for Kids for The Boy in Buzzed and Donkey Kong.
♥ Ribbed Socks for The Girl in Positively Pink and Astro (And I was correct about how long I've been hanging onto the Vesper without using it: stashed in July 2010).  
♥ Promised linkie for Ma Vie en Rose, how I used the other skein of Positively Pink.
♥ More Aquaphobia Socks or perhaps Hermione's Everyday Socks for my sister in Vintage Kitchen. (HES seem to work really well for self-striping yarns too.)

Monday Pretties

Kittens, I thought I'd share some lovely pictures with you today.  In my video entries, I keep talking about how Autumn has hit where I live, but haven't shown you.  This was the view from my backyard yesterday morning.  Today, it's slightly more orange and red.  I haven't seen a true Autumn in almost 10 years.  I know a lot of people love the American south and southwest for its weather, but I was never happy there.  I'm the kind of gal that anything over 75ºF is hot and too much sunshine makes me cranky because I have to stay indoors.  (Fun fact: I can sunburn through 50SPF+ sunblock in about 45 minutes.  I have long suspected I am part vampire:  I have a widow's peak, am pale, have fang-like incisors, and am naturally noctural.  Definitely a vampire minus the bloodlust.)  But one of the things I missed most living in Texas and Alabama was Autumn--true Fall weather.  Changing leaves, slowly cooling days with crisp nights and mornings, frost starting to peek out later in the season, the first light and timid snow falls, and most importantly, Sweater Weather paired with hot beverages season.  I am happier than I've been in years.  I know come February I'll be sick of snow, but for now, I'm enjoying this.

With the cooler weather has come a new-found enthusiasm for knitting.  Crazy how not having sweaty hands will bring the joy back into it.  I cast these on two days ago, and I'm already finished with the leg for both socks.  Now onto the heel flaps and gussets!

And Tala would like you all to know that it's a hard life out there for a puppy. ♥  Happy Monday, kittens!