Category Archives: Knitting

Knitting, Project Spectrum, Those Cats

Final Project Spectrum May pictures

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Yes, yes, I know everyone wants to see pictures of luridly purple yarn. Hopefully tomorrow. Right now the yarn is eluding my best efforts to capture the color. Grrrrrr…

So, in order to placate Marina, I finished my Chaotic Black Lagoon socks last night.

Yarn: Sundara Black Lagoon
Pattern: Judy Gibson’s generic toe-up pattern modified for two circulars, with this cast-on and Maeve’s Cherry Blossom Lace pattern
Needles: Addi Turbo 0s
Duration: 28 days

And on to the last few PS May images… A treasured green card from my grad school friend Deb:

One of the best wine labels ever (and the wine’s not bad, either!) – does that face remind you of anyone?! 🙂

For Chaos size reference, the wine bottle is 12 inches tall…

“Wait a minute, what the heck is a gooseberry bush?! Can’t I just use my litterbox?!”
Knitting, Randonymity, Those Cats

Unpaw that Addi!

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Last chance to participate in my 6-month blogiversary contest – follow the link before 6 pm CDT today (May 22) and leave a caption comment to play. I can’t believe I’ve already been blogging for six months – my, how time flies. To everyone who stops by to visit Chaos and I, and to everyone whose blogs I visit – you have all enriched my life immeasurably! Thank you.

The Knit Wit has been writing a ghost story about me, but things aren’t looking so good at the end of Part 2… If I suddenly stop posting, it’s her fault for finishing me off in the graveyard!

Jane posted about a nifty blogging event happening on Wednesday, June 7 – A Day in the Life, inspired by the book This Day in the Life: Diaries from Women Across America.

In addition to the Lace from the Black Lagoon socks I’m working on (in the homestretch – doing the cuff on the second sock!), I’m also working on a pair of plain socks from Meilenweit Cotton. Inspired by JennyRaye, these will be biking socks for me. I had two singleton balls of this yarn, so I’m doing toes, gussets, and cuffs from one color and foot and heel from the other color. There’s a bit of green in them, so they’re nominally Project Spectrum, too. (Please note that the red blobule you will see in the following pictures is simply a red fur ball, not SRM!)

“Socks, socks, I love socks! Let me just slip this sock off your foot – you won’t miss it at all.”
“Oh, wait, I love these pointy things – so handy for cleaning between my fangs, where all that tuna gets stuck.”


“What’s your problem?! You don’t use these things to clean your teeth? Your loss.”

Knitting, Those Cats

Bolero and SNLGM

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So Monday night at 11 pm, I admitted I wasn’t going to finish the baby bolero that night.

“You just would not believe how exhausted I am from helping with that bolero!”

The baby was born yesterday, so I raced home after work and finished my last two rounds of edging, wove in ends, did the fastest steam block ever, and took the bolero over to the hospital (where it was well received). Whew!

Baby Bolero from One Skein, using less than a single skein of Blue Sky Alpacas Organic Cotton, color Sand. I made the following modifications: three-needle bind off for the shoulders, picking up and knitting the sleeves instead of knitting them flat, and only picking up 34 stitches on each of the front edges. I would definitely knit this again – it’s pretty speedy, economical, and damned cute. Plus the Blue Sky Alpacas Cotton is nice stuff and didn’t make my wrists ache at all.

A little Project Spectrum sparkly mouse action – Sparkly Neon Lime Green Mouse (SNLGM) has been hanging about recently, trying to cover for SRM.

“Smells like… neon lime green.”

“Must destroy evil SNLGM!!”

“Mmmmmm…”
Knitting, Those Cats

Does he love me? Or the knitting?

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Thanks for the well wishes yesterday – I’m feeling a lot better today and am back at work.

Guess what? Kreature Kat forgave me – details over at Jeanne’s.

Unfortunately, I still don’t have my stuff from Neenah organized, so… I present a little photo essay featuring Chaos Clawboy.

“Why are you poking my tummy while I’m trying to go into a sun stupor?”

“Oh, this is a very squooshy and yummy ball of yarn.”

“Wait… what is that?!”

“Addi Turbos! Wait, what’s that swooshing sound?”

“There’s something stuck between my teeth that I just can’t quite reach…”

“Whew! I’m tired now.”

Knitting, Project Spectrum, Those Cats

Back but blech

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Not blech regarding the weekend, which was very fun, but blech is how I’m feeling today. Plus Blogger is being difficult and not letting me add more pictures, so this is going to be a bit random and not at all about the actual weekend.

A last April PS image – the giant orange moose at the Black River Crossing exit from I-94 in Wisconsin.

And a giant whitetail deer from the same exit.

Chaos was pretty upset with me. He got into a cabinet and proceeded to strew tampons everywhere – apparently ob tampons are great cat toys. Who knew? I’m told he also managed to lock himself into the bedroom one day by knocking over some things that were behind the door. And he somehow got hold of my skein of Vesper, which is looking a little gnawed now. When I got my overnight bag unpacked, Chaos camped out.


“If I lie on it, you can’t leave again.”

But he did finally settle down after a few hours.


“All this mayhem has left me mussed.”

Over the weekend, I started my May Project Spectrum socks, from Sundara Black Lagoon, using a lace pattern that Maeve posted.

Hopefully both Blogger and I will feel better by tomorrow morning, so I can post more about the weekend!

Knitting, Project Spectrum

A few more April PS images

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My Sunny Opals are nearly done – just a bit more ribbing on each of them.

I have some Mod Podge on hand for a decoupage project that Jeanne and I are going to do, involving our old yarn labels and some small wooden boxes.

A very happy cat food can cover…

My favorite parking lot at the mall…

A cheery photo shoot from Minnesota Monthly…

Some very battered sparkly mice (the yellow one has no fur on his back half and the orange one has no tail)…

A magnet from the fridge…

And Chaos waiting for the magic toy retrieving yardstick to do its magic.

“I can’t exactly remember where I last saw SRM… It might’ve been as he ricocheted under here.”
Knitting, Those Cats

Knits and flicks

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Saturday evening I went over to Jeanne’s to knit and watch movies (The Aristocats, In Her Shoes, and Playing By Heart). Oh yeah, and to eat and drink and be merry.

I worked on my April Opal socks and Jeanne made good progress on the P sock while “Pud” relaxed on her lap.

Bugsy spent some time glaring at me, one of his favorite pastimes.

Kreature might be Bugsy’s apprentice…

And Chaos hung out at home, keeping an eye on things.

“Shhh… This is my favorite part of March of the Penguins. Don’t those penguin babies look scrumptious?”

Knitting, Randonymity, Those Cats

Where I’ve knit and a shocking revelation about Chaos

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Kat is having a contest – list five places other than your home or a knitting store where you’ve knitted. Here’s my list:

  1. With Christine Lavin before a concert (she signed not only a cd, but her chapter in Knit Lit, Too)
  2. During team meetings at work
  3. Out at happy hour with my coworkers
  4. The Ghost Ranch (where Georgia O’Keefe did a lot of her painting)
  5. Walking around Lake of the Isles in Minneapolis (this caused a runner to run backwards for a while to watch me)

And the place I always mean to go knit but never quite manage to make it to… The Smitten Kitten (a feminist s*x toy shop about 10 blocks away), which has a weekly knitting group on Sunday mornings.

I finished the cage liner and will send it off to Chris tomorrow! Although there might be a bit of resistance about that…

“What do you mean, this isn’t for me?! I demand tuna in restitution!”

What I particularly like about this picture is that, if you click on it and make it larger, you can see the tabby striping on the side of Chaos’ face. Chaos is not exactly a black cat – he’s a stealth tabby. He has ultra black tabby markings on a near black background. You can only see the stripes when he’s in bright sunlight, illuminated by a flash, or if you spend some time around a cat who’s really, really black, like Chaos’ mom Riley.

I’ll give you some time to cope with the shock. Do you think I need to bow out of the Black Cat Web Ring?

Contests, Knitting, Randonymity, Those Cats

Scattered in the sun

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A few oddiments… I’ve made some progress on my Sunny Sock.

Most of it while I was hanging out with some coworkers after work on Thursday. It was 82F. In April. In Minnesota. We drank and were merry.

I’m also making quite a bit of progress on the cage liner that I’ll send to Chris on Monday for her local Humane Society. Sadly, I’m almost out of orange Canadiana, so I’ll be switching to all black or to green and black.

“Helloooo? Is anybody in there? Just nod if you can hear me.”
“Smells… orange.”

Here are a few more songs for the playlist – some from the comments yesterday and some from cds I picked up at the library:

  • Wimoweh (The Lion Sleeps Tonight) – Nanci Griffith
  • Under My Thumb – The Rolling Stones
  • Year of the Cat – Al Stewart
  • Slappin’ on My Black Cat Bone – Tony Glover, Dave Ray, Big Joe Williams, & Spider John Koerner
  • Devil’s Gonna Get You – Bessie Smith
  • Black Cat Moan – Tiny Parham & His Musicians
  • Black Cat, Hoot Owl Blues – Ma Rainey & Her Tub Jug Washboard Band
  • Black Cat Bone – Lightnin’ Hopkins
  • Black Ghost Blues – Lightnin’ Hopkins

It’s sunny and warm here, so I’m going to clean up my bike and hit the trails. Have a great weekend!

Knitting, Project Spectrum

A little of everything

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Very sleepy today. Set my alarm wrong and only Chaos being naughty and knocking something over woke me at anywhere close to my regular time. So be warned – I’m even less coherent than usual!

Another thrift store find – perfect Project Spectrum April colors, eh?

I’ve also started knitting (brace yourselves for the surprise) another sock, in a very Project Spectrum Opal that Christine sent me for losing a contest.

To reassure Marina, who’s concerned that I seem to be knitting nothing but socks these days, here’s a picture of the cage liner I started knitting last night. Chris is collecting 6″x6″ acrylic squares to be sewn into cage liners for her local Humane Society, although I decided I could certainly manage a 24″x24″ cage liner for some poor kitty looking for a home.

Halloween or Project Spectrum?

For those wondering if Chaos really is that curious (leading to many pictures with him in them), yes. He’s a very curious, busy guy and he keeps a close eye on me. Of course, that said, you’ll have noticed that he isn’t in any of the pictures above. That’s because he’s been very busy keeping an eye on birds through the window:

“Mmmmm…..”