Still pretty much the only thing I've been working on.

10 squares done, whoo! Actually, I've completed two more since this was taken. Click through to Flickr to see the colorway #s. I've bought 12 more colors from the store (including two discontinued ones that were hiding in the stockroom) and Cirilia graciously donated two discontinued colors from her stash. That brings me up to 24 squares. I could go to 25 and call it a day... but 30's a nice, round number, too. Right? Right?? Soon: a HUGE huge hank of sock yarn, handspun from this by moi.

MA Sheep and Wool, baby!

It was a blast! Thanks mostly to my three awesome companions, Cirilia, Val, and Huelo. The trip to Cummington was so easy, and the weather was gorgeous. We did a preliminary run through of the fair, ate some food (it was a veggie burger, damnit, a VEGGIE burger!), but oh, the animals! More adorable pictures here, in my Massachusetts Sheep and Wool flickr set, or here in Cirilia's. It was a very Webs-filled day - we saw Steve and Kathy leaving just as we were pulling in; Sara was there to teach workshops; and we saw Dena standing a safe distance away from the angora bunnies. We also ran into Melissa and Megan, and had a blogging standoff: Here's my haul for the day: Clockwise from the top: Romney and Wool/Mohair blends from Fantom Farms; Merino/silk from Spunky Eclectic; Camel/Tussah silk from Foxfire; a skein of Bunny Blend from Acker's Acres Angoras. Whoo! Not too bad, right? Oh. Right. Yep, that's a fleece. A 10.5 pound, unskirted Romney fleece from one of Consolati Farm's favorite sheep, Edsal. I'm in trouble, aren't I? Any advice will be ridiculously welcomed. I might tackle the skirting today. Oh, and here's the project that kept me up until 4am on Thursday: Kureyon. Log. Cabin. Blanket. Whoo! My plan is to do 20 squares (all different colorways), but I might add more if it's not big enough. I don't think I'll be knitting much else for a while :)

Dudes.

I'm back! I've missed you all soooo much. Eep! I won't draw this out - here's what I've been up to in my absence: -I got a job at WEBS, only the best yarn store ever! I've been working there since March. Now that it's summer, you can find me there Tuesday through Friday, and 2 Saturdays a month. -I joined Ravelry, just this morning actually :) I'm a bit obsessed. If you're on there too, add me as a friend - don't make me track all you down. -I got my driver's license :) in February. Having always lived in cities, I never needed one before. I'm enjoying my freedom very much. -I went on a fairly restrictive diet for 2 months and lost 20 pounds. I also became a vegetarian in the process! I have another 15 pounds that I want to lose, but I'm currently taking a break and partaking freely in cookies and beer. -I finished another semester of school - only two more to go. UMass has been a welcome change, and I had one really excellent class that made it all worthwhile (on the Mongols - an interesting and entertaining bunch). -I've been reading all your blogs! Seriously, I have. And I want to give you all a collective hug, pat on the back, high five, cup of tea - whatever applies to your particular situation. Thanks to those who checked in on me, and apologies to anyone who commented with a question if I didn't get back to you. Most of the knitting I've been doing lately has been for Webs - many of the sample garments in the store are knit by staff. There are more pictures of all of them in my Flickr or on Ravelry. Here's what I've done so far: This is Sunshine from Rowan's Kasbah Collection, in Summer Tweed. Cute little pattern, and a fun bit of crochet too. This is the Lace Accent Tank from Artful Yarns pattern book #92226. It's knit in Artful Yarns Olympic. The pattern was designed by Interweave fave Veronik Avery. There are a bunch of cute little details in this pattern, check out the back: Basically, you knit four pieces: the lace band, the back, and the front top and bottom. Then you seam it all together (I'm surprised the pattern doesn't just have you pick up stitches from the lace band, but whatever). Anyway, it was a nice little challenge, and the yarn knit up much nicer than expected - I don't suspect many or any of you have worked with it, and I don't necessarily recommend that you do ;) This is Krista, from White Lies Designs, knit up in Cascade Pima Tencel. Also fun, and super quick to knit - lace on size 7 needles. If you want to knit it, I suggest making it a little longer than suggested. Something else to show you: You can see this in my second ever post on this blog! It's the Tina shawl from Fiddlesticks knitting. Even though I finished knitting it in February of 2006, I didn't block it until this March! I decided to bring it to my Webs interview. Heh. Anyway, it's knit in Jaggerspun Zephyr in Daffodil. Pretty. I have more to show (you can probably sneak a peek at Ravelry or Flickr), but I'll wrap this up for now. Will I see any of you at Massachusetts Sheep and Wool this weekend? I'll be at Webs on Saturday, and Cummington Sunday. Whoo, weekend!

Settling in

Thank you all so much for your support and kind wishes for us during our move. We're here, in our new apartment - and it feels great so far. There's still a whole lot of stuff to put away and many walls to decorate, but we're getting there. Yesterday's Ikea trip yielded a coffee table, shower rod and curtain, a lamp - little things to make the place livable. I took some pictures around the house today, mostly for my mom, but I thought I'd put them up on the blog (something to do until I come up with some knitting again, right?) So click below for a little tour on flickr. Warning: copious amounts of wood paneling lie ahead! Please, come in and take a look!

Top 10 Films of 2006, and then some

Well, we moved. Into my boyfriend's parents' house. (For those of you just tuning in - I'm transferring to UMass Amherst for the spring semester.) We had a hell of a time trying to find an apartment out here while we were still in Boston, so it seemed best to just get ourselves out here and go from there. It's a little tough. All of my stuff is living in the garage: The boys are less than thrilled about being uprooted: This was taken early in the week when it took a lot of coaxing to get them out of hiding - now they're back to their old selves. But! It's temporary. And we've already found an adorable apartment right here in Easthampton. Its best feature is a huuuuuuge wraparound back porch - perfect for dyeing and summer knitting parties. We should be moving in next week (or January 1st). I can't wait to take all my books out of boxes. I think I'm ready to post my top 10 films of the year - a few late entries complicated things. Sorry for the lack of explanations, I can't seem to, you know, write in complete sentences today. A full post on my #1 pick is forthcoming (after a second viewing - it's that good). Enjoy, and feel free to post some of your favorites in the comments! 1. Children of Men 2. The Proposition 3. Pan's Labyrinth 4. Inland Empire 5. Volver 6. Battle in Heaven 7. Lady Vengeance 8. Borat 9. The Descent/The Hills Have Eyes/Slither 10. The Departed The next five: The Science of Sleep, The Queen, Little Children, Manderlay, Inside Man. A few I wish I'd seen that might have made it on to the list: L'enfant, The Death of Mr. Lazarescu, Old Joy, Half Nelson, Mutual Appreciation (despite my dislike for Funny Ha Ha), Shortbus, 4, Edmond, The Fountain. A few of the worst: V for Vendetta, The Illusionist, Brick, Hard Candy, Factotum, Death of a President. We're sort of skipping the holidays this year - too much going on - but I hope all of you are enjoying the season and spending time with the ones you love.

Shameless! She disappears for a month and now she wants us to buy her stuff?!

Guys. I haven't knit a stitch in weeks. We're moving next Saturday (the 16th) and my head is just spinning, constantly spinning. There's so much to do and plan for, between the move itself and starting school again in January. Oh, and did I mention I bought a car? I don't even have a license! What am I doing buying a car? Serious proof that I've lost it. Anyway. This move seems like a perfect opportunity to have another stash sale. Here's what I have to offer: For details on everything please visit this photoset on Flickr. Whatever's left will end up at the Destash blog. I miss this blog and all of you dearly, I really do. I've been trying to keep up with your posts but, well, let's just say I have about 800 unread items in Bloglines. I'll be back once we're settled somewhere. I'm going to have over a month of free time before school starts at the end of January - I hope to see you all then!

WTF?!?!?

People. Robert Altman died last night. One Jenna mourns. (posting should resume after the holiday - too much car-buying, apartment-hunting and fatigue to think straight.)

Lady Eleanor... in action!

Pattern: Lady Eleanor from Scarf Style (duh!) Yarn: Noro Silk Garden, color #234 - 10 balls used Needles: Denise circulars, size 8 Started: Not sure! Probably about a year ago (gasp!) since I ordered the yarn on 10/26/05. Finished: November 3rd Measurements: 61" x 20" Modifications: Yarn substitution, cast on 9 triangles (instead of 7), only 4 rows of knotting for the fringe. Ah, complete! I can't believe it took me a year to finish this. I worked on her in three big spurts. Luckily, it's a very easy project to pick up at random - once you get a decent grasp of the pattern and how it works, there's no row numbers to worry about. I never got tired of knitting her, and I found the entrelac very satisfying. It goes fast, and with the Noro it's fun to see the colors change. Here's how I'll probably look all winter: She's the perfect size, I think. Wide enough to cover my ears and nose, but it's not too too bulky wrapped around my neck. Happy with the length, too :) I don't have any yarn left over, and had juuuust enough for the fringe. My fringe is a little imperfect. There was no way I was going to get it all lined up evenly, so I just did it quickly and, well, it's fringe! Whatever. I love it. It may look like I'm posing here, but.... I'm frantically picking leaves out of the fringe. Leaves! Yeah. Don't put your handknits on the grass. Back to the details. I wasn't always happy with the way the colors were lining up - too much saturation in one area, too much boring taupe in another. My least favorite color in the bunch is the blue, it's the least muted and pushed the whole thing towards the garish side. So sometimes I would cut out a whole blue section and save it for later (or for the fringe). Also, just like Jessica did (ps - welcome Fig and Plum readers!), I left off the crochet edging and didn't block her. I'm glad that this pattern has gotten popular. It's great. Everyone should knit it, or at least a smaller entrelac scarflette. No two Eleanors look alike! Yeah, I'm way too much of a goofball for such an elegant knit!

Lady Eleanor: The Preview

Just a little preview photo of Lady Eleanor, since the last one went over pretty well. As you can see, she's destined for a life tucked away safely in the closet, not spread out on the couch - that fringe could drive a cat crazy. Last night was a spinning night! I finished plying that corriedale: 340 yards, can you believe it? I'll get some better shots when it's skeined up, the colors are wonderfully subtle. I have no idea what weight it is, though, maybe light worsted? Things like this remind me that I'm quite a novice. I also started spinning the roving I posted yesterday: I'm trying to spin it as fine as I can. It takes forever, but that's a good thing! I don't have the money to buy tons of fiber all the time (ohhh I wish) so this is a way to make what I have last, I guess. Maybe that's a backwards way of thinking about it, but it works for me right now. Oh, and here's the questionable lace that I mentioned last time: Apologies for the awful picture, I had to take it with no hands. The pattern is Eunny's Print o' the Wave stole, and the yarn is handpainted Zephyr from Furryarns in Monarch. I can't remember why I bought this yarn - and I certainly don't remember the colors being so garish (I think the photo on the website has been changed in the year or so since I ordered the yarn). Anyway. Is it hideous? Is it worth continuing? I'm really thinking no. It's not something I would wear, first of all, and I think I'd feel bad giving it away because I dislike it so much. Aaaaand I think I just answered my own question. I'll soothe my craving for a lacy project in a different way - by casting on for Pomatomus! Finally, inspiration came to me, in the form of Interlacements Tiny Toes. This yarn was begging me to knit it up - it's sooo cushy and bouncy. And I just know that Pomatomus will show it off perfectly.

The post I made earlier, then deleted because the blog freaked out.

I've been suuuuuch a slacker. My thoughts these days are more on our impending move than anything else, I guess. I have over 400 of your blog posts to read, and I will read them all - but forgive me if I don't comment :) I'm in a bit of a slump, which I guess is natural after finishing so many projects? Lady Eleanor is done, too, by the way - I finished her at the office last Friday, fringe and all, and even wore her home. I'm in love already, silently cursing the unseasonably warm weather we've had here this week. Pictures this weekend, I hope, if I can get someone to cooperate one more time. My yarn for the Phildar Swing Jacket is on its way. I was about to buy 6 skeins of Beaverslide (in Frosted Smoke, I think).... but I balked at the price at the last minute. I'm supposed to be saving up money for the move, and while I love the pattern I'm not sure how much I'll wear it when all is said and done - I just want to knit it. So I went for Elann's Highland wool instead. I've never used it before - I heard it's a little pill-y but I can live with that. I started knitting some lace, too, but I think it's ugly. Really ugly. I'll post a picture of it soon, and you guys better tell me the truth. The problem is with the yarn... what was I thinking, ordering variegated laceweight? In colors I'd never wear? If I keep going I might pass it off as a gift, but ugh. I just really wanted to knit lace, I guess. Stay tuned. Why am I feeling so uninspired? There used to be hundreds of things I couldn't wait to knit, but nothing is grabbing me these days. I'm sick of pawing through my stash, hoping for inspiration. I think a bit of a purge is in order, before the move. Stash sale #2, anyone? Sorry for all the booooooring! I'm even putting myself to sleep. I will try to pep things up a bit this weekend, maybe some dyeing? Look, here's some pictures! BFL that I over-dyed - it was too pastel the first time around, now it looks like watercolors! Corriedale from the Sheep Shed - all spun up now, and in the process of being plied. Lovely stuff.