Monday, January 7, 2008

socks by the sea

My mom went to the beach last weekend with my Aunt Jill and their friend Kris. They "camped" in Kris's trailer. Though it was chilly, they seem to have fun. And they all had their hand knit socks to keep their feet warm!



In honor of the new year, I've set a couple of goals for myself. In the hopes that it help me stick to them, I'm going to list them for you now:

1. Eat out or take out once a week. When I told my sister about this, her response was "Is that a lot or a little?" Poor girl, you have no grasp on NYC life. To be clear: that's a little. I think the hardest thing is going to be to avoid getting take out on the way home from school after a 12 hour day. But the eat out part is going to be equally hard. Often on days off from work, I would eat out, sometimes for multiple meals. The point of this goal is to save a little money.

2. Read more. This is such a vague goal that I've made a book-buying rule for myself. No more new books onto my book shelves until I read some of the un-read ones up there already. I did a count. There are currently 16 unread books on my shelf. Do I think I'll read them all this year? No. But I would really like to have half of them read.

3. Begin to tackle color-work in my knitting. (Yes, a knitting-related goal!) I want to knit a fair-isle yoke kid sweater.

I think that might be it for the goal department.

I've been knitting. Right now on the needles: a pair of monkeys for a friend's bday made from Shibui Knits sock yarn in a luscious raspberry color; a pair of merino lace socks for me(???) made from Fleece Artist SeaWool; an alpaca hat for a friend back home. And I still haven't quite finished the plum tweed sweater. All that's left is one button band, sewing up the armpits, blocking and finding buttons. That's so little work, it's a shame that I haven't touched the sweater in probably a month. Probably because I have no motivation. I tried on the sweater after the first button band was done and realized the fit is AWFUL. So, once it's done, it's probably just going to sit on the shelf in my closet. It's a bummer. No pictures of this knitting. How about some pics of one of the gifts I finished last month?

February Baby Sweater in Classic Elite Provence for Hannah's 1st Birthday

February Baby Sweater

Bird buttons!

I love the way this sweater turned out! The yarn is slightly shiny. I'm so happy to have found the bird buttons and it fits her!

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Thursday, January 3, 2008

(thank god)

Christmas is over. I made a lot of gifts.

Knitted Gifts '07

For a while there, I was knitting like a maniac. But I think everyone liked their gifts. The February Baby Sweater fit little Hannah perfectly! Melisa liked her embossed leaves fingerless gloves--I was so worried she wouldn't.

But the gift knitting continues. Tamiko's bday is in 2 days, and in the holiday knitting frenzy, I forgot about it. So I'm casting on a pair of socks today. They'll arrive late, but that's better than never.