something with a colon (:)

One of the up-sides of not being all that motivated to correct several stacks of essays and homework assignments, is that I manage to find *all sorts* of things to keep myself occupied.  This kind of productive procrastination led me to the long neglected scarf of the H-e.  He is now the proud owner of one rather good looking creation.

scarf and short sleeves -- the inner hipster is released.

I’m unclear if it’s been one or two years since I started it. He says two; I disagree.  In fact, I think I may go dig up the receipt to prove to myself that I’m not quite that lame. Only half as lame!  Finishing knitting projects is not exactly one of my strong suits.  If I choose bulky wool / fat needles it’s no problem.  I’ll knit exactly like a lunatic until said project is finished.  But projects with worsted weight (or worse, sock weight!) yarn mean I’m in for the long haul.  Thankfully, there are a whole bunch of babies on the way in August, so I can start on some tiny sweaters. They’re so satisfying and way less cumbersome than adult size sweaters. I’m also considering some hats that make the baby heads look like fruit. They’re totally ridiculous, but that seems to be one of the benefits of parenthood — dressing your kids like fruit. Fortunately for him, O is too big to be dressed as fruit.  Though I am thinking of some kind of step-parent positive, non-gender hegemonic applique t-shirt. B/c shirts that say “mommy’s little genius” or “daddy’s little princess” are pretty difficult to escape. But I digress!

For the H-e’s scarf, I used a pattern from Grumperina. If you haven’t checked out her site, you should. It has all sorts of nice, pretty un-weird knitted things. *And* she’s located in Cambridge, which just warms my cold cold currently-tethered-to-the-Midwest-and-missing-home-and-the-ocean heart.

Pattern: Dad’s Sharfik

Yarn: Cascade Yarns Dolce in grey (Color 975). It’s a blend of 55% superfine alpaca / 23% wool / 22% silk.  It’s was easy to work with, feels fantastic and was reasonably priced at  the local yarn shop. I used just about 4 skeins. I’m somewhat on the fence about adding fringe.  Though I just asked the H-e and he shook his head wildly in the negative, so I guess that issue’s solved. :)

My favorite thing about the scarf was how beautifully it blocked.  In the past I’ve used wet blocking and always felt kind of meh about my results.  Today me and Rowenta went full force at some steam blocking.  So super! The yarn fulled and the stitches evened out. Plus it gained quite a bit of width. So what if I looked like a foggy-spectacled loon, wildly steaming a scarf down cellar. Beach towels work nicely for pinning — fyi.

see how much wider it is on the left?

My other favorite thing was my new birthday yarn bowl.  (thanks ma!)

It’s the handiest of handy things. It keeps the skein covered and bouncing around nicely. Plus it has space for two sets of needles.  Or one set, and a cable needle, as was the case w/ this project. There are a bunch on yarn bowls on Etsy, but I think jampdx‘s are nicest. They’re pretty and don’t scream “hey I’m a crazy knitting hippie w/ a special yarn receptacle”. jampdx also makes the coolest “salt monsters,” for which I should save my pennies.

Thus far, the yarn bowl has kept the 30 lb cat alliance away, but no telling how long that will last.  They are, after all, evil feline monsters. I would like a salt monster shaped like one of these fools.