Kaffeinated Knits

Ohhhhh Noooooooo!

I admit it.  I was a big-haired, big makeup-ed, shoulder-padded 80's girl. 

We had Atari, a Betamax, and rotary phones.  I actually studied the Preppy Handbook and tried to get my friends to call me Kiki (it never caught on.)  My sister and I carried our "little" TV with the 12" screen on the bus to school so that we wouldn't miss Luke and Laura's wedding.  I saw Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Fast Times at Ridgemont High and ET right when they came out, and watched the Love Boat like religion.  On Saturday mornings, I still have the urge to sing "Interplanet Janet," "Conjunction Junction," and "Interjection!" 

The 80's were, like, totally cool.  Like, totally, ya know?  Fer Sure.... even if there were a lot of questionable fashion choices.  Parachute pants.  Plaid, pleated walking shorts.  Huge plastic, multicolored, dangling earrings.  Poofy lambchop taffeta sleeved prom/bridesmaid dresses.  Flashdance sweatshirts with leggings.

But retro fashion is cool, right?  Hip.  Trendy even.  Maybe it's me, but I just think the 80's are not a decade we should ever, ever, ever look to for fashion guidance.

Lord & Taylor feels differently.

                            

What A Feeling.

(Bonus points for you if you caught the 80's snl reference in the title of this post.)

Have You Ever...

...gotten so close to the end of a project... you're almost there... just a little more... and then there's just a little more... and then there's a little more... and suddenly it feels like it will NEVER END????  Yeah.  Lola's making me a little crazy.  Three more pattern repeats to go.  Only 3.  Except that's 192 MORE ROWS.  It's good that I will wash Lola.  She's had my hands around her neck a few times now.

...gotten so close to the end of a never-ending project and all you want to work on is your next project?  I mean, just look at those little intarsia sheepies.  They're even on the booties.  Can you stand the cuteness?  This is from Debbie Bliss' Baby Knits book.  I'm knitting this one for a friend of mine at work who just had her first child.  She's only 3 weeks old at this point, and I'll be knitting this to fit her at about 6 months - sometime in the late Fall, early Winter.  The baby was 9lbs at birth, so she'll likely be wearing 6mos much earlier "real time."  The yarn called for is the discontinued Wool Cotton - I'm using Baby Cashmerino in a light lilac color.  Or I will be.  When it gets here.

...checked the mailbox every hour to see if your new yarn has been delivered?

...secretly planned for another new project that's actually for you because you want a quick, satisfying knit that you actually get to wear?  (Come on... have you seen Sizzle?  It really is a quick... and hot! knit.)

...found a substitute yarn for a hot! quick knit because you just aren't paying $15 a ball for the called for yarn?  Yeah.  I'm using Berroco Glace - from elann at a mere $3.48 a ball.  I love this color.  It just seems right for a hot! quick knit.

...counted out the 3 mailing days it takes for elann to ship to you and tried to figure out if you'll get that yarn before the baby dress yarn so you can justify starting the hot! quick knit first? 

...hoped Fifi doesn't find out you aren't going to work on her next??

Saturday Sky

Mostly cloudy here at the Jersey Shore.  Not a great beach day...

                        

Me, Lola and Spike

Over the long weekend, I had a list of all the things I should do, could do, and needed to do.  Instead, I camped out in my living room with Buffy and Lola.  See, Lola was going the way knitting goes sometimes... where you knit and knit and knit - and you still have forever to go.  This stole (the "Frost Flowers Stole" from Hunt Valley Cashmere) is 10 pattern repeats long - and each pattern repeat is a bazillion rows long.  Okay. 64 rows per pattern repeat.  But - hello? SIXTY FOUR rows for a pattern repeat??  But then again, that's 10 x 64 rows of pattern repeats in cashmere.  And it's kind of wrong to complain about cashmere.

I should have taken some before pictures (didn't), but here's where I am after the weekend (warning:  crappy photos ahead.)

                                 

I've now just about completed 6 pattern repeats.  It looks more like a scarf than a stole here - but blocked, this stole will almost double in width, and the stitch pattern really pops - the "flower" portion of the pattern is beautiful and kind of flow-y.  My camera is not so great with close-ups, and I don't have my pins with me to really stretch this out - but you at least can get a sense of the stitch pattern. 

Lola eventually goes back to Hunt Valley Cashmere so she can hang in all her glory at trade shows, festivals, etc.  Lola is quite excited about the opportunity to travel like that - she's hoping if she gets near California, she'll get to meet Spike.  She seems to have developed quite a crush on him after all the Buffy watching this weekend.  Can't say I blame her.

Truth be told, I've got a thing for Spike.  There's something about the whole bad-boy-so-in-love-he'll-do-anything-for-the-girl that gets me.  Plus, he's hot.  Very hot.  (So he's undead.  Everyone has quirks.)  I've even been trying to get Felicia to come up with a Spike sock yarn colorway for a while - dropping hints, begging, pleading...  I mean, the Slayer has one, Angel got one... where's the love for Spike? 

I keep telling her that a Spike in the Hawaiian Shirt (from "Doomed" - where he shrinks his clothes and has to wear Xander's) would be a great colorway... so for Felicia... here you go... you know, for inspiration...

                                     

The Amazing Lace: Poetry Challenge

Once upon a Sunday dreary, while I knitted, fingers weary,
Over Lola's charted knits and purls and then yarn o'ers -
While I plodded, needles slapping, suddenly there came a tapping
As of someone loudly rapping, rapping at my chamber door -
"It's only Fifi," Lola muttered, "that damn green silk that I abhor -
She's only worm poo, nothing more."

"Only Fifi?!" Now came the yelling, louder now, the voice was swelling
From the bottom of the basket perched beside me on the floor -
"I am ze Fifi! ze one Amazing - Lola (puh!) deserves not this praising
It is me you should be turning, swirling round through the fingers sore
Yet you work the lousy Lola - repeat, repeat - is such the bore
Row and row - No more! No more!"

Lola answered, strong and certain - "Listen here, you filthy vermin!
I've had pert' near enough of that snarky mouth of your'
Shut your trap, you - quit your yappin - you don't want what's gonna happen
If Miss Lola has to hear even just one stinkin' word more -
'Cause you're worm poo - nothin' more."

Stop! I cried - Enough!  I cannot take this constant snapping
And my mind is near to breaking though I'm trying to ignore
All these insults while I'm knitting, though you both I do adore -
"But she!" called out Miss Lola - then "No! She!" came from Ze Fifi -then
Said the Knitter, Nevermore!

Now I sit in silence splendid, fingers fast, mistakes I've mended
Made while pestered by the chattering, nattering that I abhor
Lola's quiet, Fifi's solemn and this respite I am taking
Since their mouths I shut with taping, and now am left both calm and sure,
Knitting along through charted lore, knits and purls and then yarn o'ers -
Knitting peacefully ever more.

                     

Challenge 1 - Meet the Team

Challenge 2 - Xtreme Knitting

Saturday Sky

The Saturday Sky from down the Jersey Shore...

            

*In New Jersey, there is no beach, only "The Shore."  And one does not go 'to' The Shore, one only goes 'down' The Shore.  Don't ask me.  It's a Jersey thing.

Help Me If You Can...

...I'm feelin' like a do-o-ork...  (with all due apologies to Sir Paul.)

Does anyone know how to set it up in Typepad so that when I have a button in the side bar, if someone clicks it, the button actually clicks through to the site the button is about?????  I cannot get this to save my poor, html deficient life.

Sock Me Upside the Head

I am not a good Knitalonger.  I get very excited about signing up, and post the button (though I still don't know how to make it so when you click the button it takes you to the KAL site...) and even join the Yahoo Group/KAL Blog/etc - and then never post to any of them.  I may even knit the project - I just forget to post.  I am still getting updates from the Clapotis-along (that I never did start) because I am too embarrassed to un-join. 

So of course, after the insight that came with the guilt of being late sending my socks to my Sockapalooza pal, I promised myself not to join another KAL.  Then I promptly joined the Amazing Lace.  Which I love.  A Lot.  And I am actually posting.  So I started to reconsider my stance on KALs.  Maybe I am not so bad at KALs, after all.  Hmm.  Maybe I could even join another. 

So I did.                        

There is a questionnaire for this one - and since I am newly a "not so bad" Knitalonger (an upstat from a "very bad" Knitalonger, but who still hasn't acheived "good Knitalonger" status), I am only a few days late with this:

1. What are your favorite colors?  Blues/Purples
2. Are you a new sock knitter?  How long have you been kniting socks?  I've been knitting socks for about a year now. I wouldn't consider myself new.
3. Do you prefer solid or multicolored yarn?  Multicolored.  I love watching how multicolored yarn knits up - it's like a secret surprise in the box of cereal when I was a kid. 
4. What fibers do you prefer in sock yarn?  Er... soft ones?  (I'm not allergic to anything fiber-y.)
5. Where do you usually knit socks?  Where don't I knit socks???  Socks are the knitting that goes everywhere with me, and I'll pull them out when I'm in line at the bank, waiting for my latte, while I'm getting gas... I've been known to knit socks just about everywhere.
6. How do you usually carry/store small projects?  In a ziploc baggie stuffed in my purse.  (Lola doesn't like this much at all, btw.  Haven't tried it with Fifi yet, but I'd expect lots of Italian curses thrown at me.)
7. What are your favorite sock knitting patterns?  I loved the Elfine socks for how delicate they were - and of course the Jaywalker pattern for how easy and great for multicolored yarn it was. 
8. What are your favorite sock knitting techniques?  Knitting on 2 circs - hands down.  Or dpns down.  As in, put them down and never pick them up unless absolutely necessary.  DPNs and I don't get along so well, really.
9. What new techniques would you like to try?  I'm not sure about this one... there's nothing I don't want to try, though.
10. Do you prefer circulars or dpns for sock knitting?  Did you know that dpns actually stand for "damn pains in the neck?" 
11. What are some of your favorite yarns?  If I don't say Lola and Fifi I will be in a LOT of trouble.  So definitely - Lola (Hunt Valley Cashmere) and Fifi (Filati Fantasia Cezanne).  (*And shhh...  don't tell them, but I also adore Rowan's Kidsilk Haze.  It may be my favorite of favorites.)
12. What yarn do you totally covet?  "Slayer" or "Angel" sock yarn from SweetGeorgia.  Or the "Spike" colorway I am begging dying for her to come up with.  (In my next life, I want to be Buffy the Vampire Slayer.  She got all the cool guys.) (Okay.  Two out of three were dead.  But come on... for undead men,  they were pretty darn hot.)
13. Any pattern you would love to make if money and time were no object?  Either a Hanne Falkenberg jacket, or an Alice Starmore Fair Isle. 
14. Favorite kind of needles (brand, materials, straights or circs, etc)?  Wow... different ones for different projects.  For really fine yarn and lace work - (KSH/Birch) my favorites were Boye circs because they're so pointy. Addi Turbo circs are what I normally knit with, though.
15. If you were a specific kind of yarn, which brand and kind of yarn would you be?  I have no idea how to answer this one...
16. Do you have a favorite candy or mail-able snack?  I am a chocolate freak and thankfully it is not good timing for mailing it.  I'm really trying to stop eating sugar.  (Don't ask me how that's going.  Sugar withdrawal is really not pretty.)
17. What's your favorite animal?  Meow.
18. Do you have pets?  What are their species/names/ages?  Elmo and Elvis.  Both are long haired black cats.  Elvis has a white priest's collar - but don't let that fool you - he is evil.
19. If you were a color, what color would you be?  I think it would have to be the color of a (Soy) Latte, since I drink so damn many of them they have started to replace my blood supply.
20. Describe your favorite shirt (yours or someone else's)...  An ancient navy t-shirt of Marc's that is worn so thin it's almost weightless.  It's one of those favorites you refuse to get rid of because nothing is anywhere near as comfortable - even if it is so old you would have to stop to change before exiting the building due to a raging fire. 
21. What is your most inspiring image, flower, or object in nature?  Pictures of my nieces and nephews before they got old enough to try to always look "nice" and were still messy and silly and wild.
22. Tell me the best quote you've ever heard or read.  Most anything from Brian Andreas of StoryPeople - and if you do not know StoryPeople - go now.  Do not keep reading.  He is so much better than this list will ever be.   This is one of my favorites - I gave it to Marc one Valentine's day.  It's called "No Words":  "I read once that the ancient Egyptians had fifty words for sand & the Eskimos had a hundred words for snow.  I wish I had a thousand words for love, but all that comes to mind is the way you move against me while you sleep & there are no words for that."
23. Do you have a wishlist?  Yes.  I wish to be eternally young, rich, and swimming in yarn.  (hee hee.)
24. Anything else you'd like to share with the group today?  Lola and Fifi are going on a little adventure this weekend... stay tuned for more of the fireworks!

Happy Blogiversary!!

Kaffeinated Knits turns 1 this week.   (Actually, it was the 13th, but hey - I never claimed to be perfect or on time.)  I lurked in blogland for over a year before I decided to jump in, then wondered what the hell I'd been waiting for all that time.  You guys are the best.  Thanks for reading, for cheering me on, for celebrating my victories, and for not forgetting me when I went on an unscheduled hiatus. 

Mostly, thanks for being a community of amazing, talented, funny, thoughtful, generous people who make me happy every time I sign on. 

The Amazing Lace: Ze Fifi ze Xtreme