lys score

I visited my LYS, Creative Knitworks, on Saturday, before my miserable sore throat started. (I would link to the web site, but I just checked and it looks like it is under construction.) I was increasing needle sizes on the leg ribbing on my Echo Jungle socks.  Although I had 2 24-inch circular needles in the size I needed, I wanted to replace the Harmony wood circ with a Karbonz 24-inch circ because I had such a great knitting experience with the size from which I was graduating.

While there, I perused the books and magazines. I have made a decision that unless there's a pattern I will swatch to begin in the coming 3 months, I should not purchase a book or magazine.  I have so many patterns.  Yes, I know the new stuff is so enticing, but when I really consider if I will knit or crochet it in the near future, I have to back off.  There will always be more and more, and I recently figured out that I will not craft the tiniest fraction of what I already have.  I am always interested in techniques I will really use, so that kind of download or print material is the exception to my rule.

I couldn't leave without checking the clearance bin.  I have found some great bargains there in the past.  Saturday was no different. I picked up 2 balls of SRK Kertzer On Your Toes bamboo yarn in a pale dusty lavender. It's now called SMC On Your Toes bamboo.  I'm sure the 2 balls I purchased were the end of the stock at my LYN. Usually, I purchase an extra ball of yarn with which to swatch or stitch test, but I know the 2 balls I purchased will make a pair of socks or arm warmers.  The retail price is $13.  The discount bin price was only $7.  It was almost a BOGO price, so although I DO NOT need any more sock yarn, it was excellent value for a nice yarn. It's 75% bamboo and 25% nylon.  It is extremely soft and squishy. I wear a lot of purple and have that Mountain Sky colorway Claudia Hand Painted  shawl, with which a pair of socks made from this yarn will coordinate nicely. Not match-y match-y, but yes, coordinate. I will love making socks or warmers out of this yarn, when I get to it. For now, I hate to say it, but, it's going into the ...... STASH!! 

  

illuminating

I was at a local craft store, last week, with a 40% off coupon that was haunting me to make a purchase.  I thought about  a small travel light and headed over to the OttLites.  2 of the 3 friends with whom I craft and take crafty road trips have the battery powered task light.  I think that will be my next OttLite purchase, but this time around, I picked up the 12 LED Flip Light.  Closed, it's 3.5 x 2.5 inches.  Frequently, when I have extra time between  guitar students, I knit or crochet in the car, a block or 2 away. Half of those times, it's dusk or dark.  I have a flexible LED light, but because it's a single LED bulb that has its shortcomings.  The 12 LED Flip Light can clip to something and the clip has a hole that can accommodate a link which will allow it to be worn around the neck.  

I had a little test run with it a few days ago.  It was excellent.  It's not quite like being flanked by a full size OttLite on each side, as I am in my living room, but it's great for my occasional night time yarn crafting in the car.  Another excellent use for the little dynamo is to see colors better.  I imagine I will be  using it to match or compare colors in a flourescently lit store or at a convention shopping mall. It's so small, it's no trouble to take it along.

If this little 12 LED Flip Light is something you are interested in, get it now. I do not see it on OttLite's web site.  It may be discontinued.  If you find it in your local shop, craft store or online, grab it before they're gone. If you have a coupon for it, as I did, it's a great bargain for what it is: quality portable lighting. 

thoughts on afterthought heels

I'm in the process of knitting my first pair of afterthought heel socks.  Whenever I hear or read about someone using the method, I'm attracted to it so when I began this pair of socks, I decided I was going to give it a whirl. 

I'm knitting toe-up, which I greatly prefer to toe-downs.  The general instructions for an afterthought heel is to knit to where the heel should begin, knit 2 rounds  of half of the stitches with waste yarn, continue knitting with the actual sock yarn and finish the socks, then put the heel stitches back on needles and pull out the waste yarn.  Knit around, decreasing a certain number of times ever so many rounds until just  6 or 7 stitches are left, then pull yarn through all those stitches.  

I understand that this could be a way to do social sock knitting without the distraction of keeping track of the wrap and turns etc. for the heels.  Last night, I finished the legs of the socks and got the stitches back onto the needles.  I will knit the heels tonight, I hope. So far, this new experience is not as much fun as I thought it would be. Maybe that's because it's the first time I'm trying it and haven't experienced the finished result yet.  I don't know.

While knitting the leg, I changed to incrementally larger needles twice and what had looked like random coloring in the ribbing pooled. I don't care in this case because my jeans will cover them. If they were going to be on display inside clear boots or something, I would have alternated every other round with another ball of yarn in order to prevent the pooling.  This sock is being made strictly for the sake of learning the technique.

penguino and mr hat

Poor little Seely Boy.  I've had to cajole him into his bathtub over the past 10 days or so, because his bath buddy, Penguino, the rolypoly penguin that used to be sold as a bird toy, split his little head open when he fell on the kitchen floor. Let's not even think about how that happened. Was it the amorous advances of a verbose parakeet (budgie) or a human accidentally bumping it?  We'll never know. All we know is that his noggin is cracked. Penguino isn't replaceable because he and his ilk were manufactured with lead weights in them, and now that's verboten.

Seely's play pal, Mr.Hat, has a cracked base, which has put him out of commission, too.  Same deal: lead weight inside.  

So what's the keeper of a parakeet who needs a friend to bathe with to do?  The short term solution is standing at his cage, playing with his lukewarm bath water in the morning until the splish splash sound becomes so irresistible to him that he ventures in and takes a proper budgie bath.  But some mornings it's not opportune. 

While trolling Ebay, I found some substitutes that I hope will work for him.  Penguino was a small little toy and Mr Hat was very slight. No matter where I look, no one has the lead-weighted penguins.  I've been keeping pet birds my whole life and every bird I have ever had, had a penguin and loved it's movement.  Enter the infamous Weeble.  I found a few online for a reasonable price, bid on them and won them.  They arrived today.

They're bigger than Penguino and Mr Hat, but they move and they're colorful.

Seely's first reaction was a high sideways glance.  He hasn't kissed his new buddies yet, but he isn't exhibiting any fear of them. More like indifference today (they just arrived in the mail today).  I hope he will warm up to them.  I'll have to take one with me wherever I am in the apartment, so he gets used to the idea that they're here to stay and to play with him.