Blocking Tomorrow, the Mai Tai Tonight!

Life has been a social whirl this past week here at Molecular Knitting: three dinners out last week! This did not leave a lot of time for knitting but I did manage to get the Chevron Scarf off the needles. So tomorrow (Monday) evening is dedicated to blocking both it and the Aran Pocket Shawl.


"Block me, baby!"--Chevron Scarf.
"What's to become of us?!"--Aran Pocket Shawl.
"We're gonna be blocked, straightened out, my YOs opened up, your welts flattened out."--CS
"Oh, Mr. Chevron, I have such palpitations when I think of the blocking! Will you be with me and protect me, Mr. Chevron, dear?"--APS
"Look, Doll, you're a shawl and I'm a scarf. No one wears a shawl and a scarf at the same time, not even on the pages of VK. I've got a date with a coffee-colored, wide wale corduroy pea coat. We're kismet. We're destiny. We coordinate. You need to find yourself a nice shell or blouse in a nice navy blue or plum."--CS
"Oh, dear! Oh, dear!"--APS

While my handknits prepared for blocking, M whipped up the quintessential Tiki drink: the Mai Tai.



M as usual did a stupendous job on the bartending front, however, I was not fond of the Mai Tai. It was very sweet, and the orgeat (almond) syrup was over-powering in my opinion. M liked it better, considering it the "ultimate" Tiki drink, but agreed with me that the Mojito and Hemingway Daiquiri were tastier. I guess they can't all be winners. We'll just have to try again next weekend!

I hope all of you had a great weekend!

Sparkly and Shimmery

So Monday evening I finished the first pink cabled sock. I started to cast on for the second but was having difficulty counting to 66. Apparently, I don't count well after 10 in the evening. I decided to work on the chevron scarf as I only needed to be able to count to 5. I finished several inches and then lay down for a night of peaceful slumber only to awaken a few hours later having nightmares about knitting. Yes, I know you can imagine the horror. It wouldn't be entirely inaccurate to say that I became a bit unglued at that point. I didn't wake M because I didn't think he'd understand. A nightmare about being in a car accident or falling from a high ledge, sure he'd be all solicitousness, but a nightmare about knitting? The upshot was that Tuesday evening I was a bit wary of the yarn and sticks, so I played with some sparkly beads instead.



I was happy to see that I can still make wrapped wire loops that I'm not embarrassed to wear out into the world, so this little aquamarine colored ensemble graced my neck and ears today. The pearls are actually a pale aquamarine, too. It felt good to wear a new bauble. Now I feel ready to pick up the pointy stickes again, as I didn't have nightmares last night of round-nosed pliers coming after me or being stoned with giant Czech glass and Austrian crystal beads.

The pink sock looks good, but I had it on my foot for a while, so it's a little stretched out and wants a soak and block before it's photo shoot. As I mentioned the chevron scarf grows longer, and until about 20 minutes ago, I'd completely forgotten that I need to block the Aran Pocket Shawl. But so as not to post without any knitterly pictures, I did splurge last week when I found the 150 g (600 m) skeins of Sea Silk at Colorsong Yarn.


This is Blackberry Sea Silk. We're in love.

May your knitting dreams be blissful!

Catching Up

I feel I am falling behind in my blogging responsibilities, so let's play catch up.

First up, the pink braided cable rib sock is almost to the toe! It looks a little goofy in the photo below as the instep needle did not care to be photogenic today.



Astute readers will notice that I stopped doing the cabling once I finished the gusset decreases. This braided cable doesn't stretch out as flat as a simple cable, and I thought for comfort, switching to the rib was a good idea. It was a compromise between not wanting to have the cabling only on the leg, but also wanting a comfortable sock. I think it will work for me.

Next up we have an very disappointed chevron scarf posing (but not willingly) on the couch-o-meter. The scarf rather clashes with the threadbare ruby red couch cushions, and it resents be photographed thusly. But it is one couch cushion long! As I want a short scarf, it won't even make it to a full two cushions before the bind off. I plan to knit to about 44 inches (2 couch cushions=48+ inches) and then block.


She better not take my FO picture with me lying on this %#^&*@# couch!--Chevron Scarf.

Third up has no picture, but I am teaching myself to carry and tension the yarn differently. My way of carrying the yarn is becoming more and more awkward and annoying. It is hard to get an even tension without constantly dropping and picking up the yarn again, and my tension gets looser and looser the faster I knit. So, I am trying to finish my current projects in the old method while training myself in the new method behind the scenes so to speak.

Finally, the chevron scarf did not grow any longer than one couch cushion today for two reasons. The first is that I have a new baking pan for uber-cool individual bundt cakes. I tried it out today on Amaretto Cakes from a Buttercup Bakes at Home by Jennifer Appel. The pan worked! It was so cool!


Fleur-de-Lis, Bavarian, and Cathedral little bundt cakes!

The second reason for lack of chevron scarf progress this afternoon: a Hemingway Daiquiri:


Not your frozen limeade daiquiri by a long shot

I had two such daiquiris today, but since M used my calcium-fortified grapefruit juice, I built strong bones while I drank. BTW, the recipe M used is from the book and a Bottle of Rum by Wayne Curtis. M enjoyed the book immensely.

I hope everyone had a great weekend!

Couch-o-Meter

When work takes up so much time that knitting progress slows to the proverbial crawl, I find it soothing to use an alternative measurement system. A shawl or scarf requires far too many inches to be complete to make two inches seem like much to crow about. Therefore, I have made use of our red couch-o-meter (or sofa-o-meter, depending upon your region of upbringing).


Three couch-cushions and your scarf is complete! 3.5 cushions makes a shawl!



Almost 2 complete sofa cushions of Aran Pocket Shawl knit! The chevron scarf isn't so far along, but it is much narrower, so it may catch up. Can we stand the suspense?! Has putting in 12 hours of work today made me silly?! Is the damage permanent?! Can I relearn ending a sentence with only one punctuation mark?!

Tune in later this week...!

Chevron Scarf the First

Thanks to all my readers who left an opinion on my chevron scarf options! More of you thought the Cherry Tree Hill yarns of option 3 were the yarns they would go with. But my original choice didn't fare badly. I think I may do a version with each (as that still leaves a lot of sock yarn in my stash for socks). There are a lot of stitch patterns that make a chevron shape, and many of them can be knit as a rectangle or a triangle, so I don't intend for identical patterns. Theme and variations!

As it was, this weekend when I wanted to get started, M, my swift, was off running errands. This left Option 1. Now, I don't own Last Minute Knitted Gifts, and my LYS doesn't really sell books, and my local bookstore didn't have a copy. I had seen the stitch pattern on blogs, and I have knit Feather and Fan, so I pretty much understood the game plan. But I decided to mess around on the web and see what other sorts of chevron stitch patterns I could find. At Yarnover I found a chevron edging from nineteenth century Denmark that I liked (really pointy). I charted the pattern, changing a few decreases so they would be directional (all were K2tog in the original), added 2 edge stitches to my chart in garter stitch and cast on 47 stitches. At least, 47 stitches was the goal. Since I made 2 set up rows where I didn't have to count, it wasn't until the first pattern row that I realized I had miscounted the cast on as I cast on and when I recounted after casting on. I ripped and cast on again. Then after counting wrong again, I ripped a second time. The third time was the charm, and I was able to count to 47 twice and start my scarf. Whew!


The colors are better in real life!

I got home from lab too late to take pictures outside, so the colors are much richer and better in real life. Trust me, these yarns look great together. Although I can tell I am going to want to knit a burgundy tweed sweater to "go with." Ever since seeing Neither Hip nor Funky's sensational Sunrise Circle sweater in glorious orange tweed, I have been coveting tweedy yarn.



It was not a happy weekend for sock knitting. Two pairs were ripped due to fit issues and pattern frustration. I do have a successful sock in the works, which no one but Elsie (who doesn't blog) has seen. I think I will wait until the first sock is done (I'm on the foot) before showing a picture. I'm feeling a little jinxed at the moment.

I leave you with a picture of the delicious dinner M made (well I made the rice and vegetable--they were easy) on Sunday. It was a lovely evening for our first outdoor meal of the year. He made Cedar Plank Cooked Salmon from The Cakebread Cellars Napa Valley Cookbook: Wine and Recipes to Celebrate Every Season's Harvest.


Thanks, M!

Evil Eye Candy and Indecision

Aren't they pretty?





Don't they look sweet and innocent? Innocent like Brigitte's Gandalf! Deep within their flowery hearts lurks an insidious evil. I speak of pollen. Actually, I don't know what these flowers are, and if in fact their pollen causes seasonal allergies, but somebody's pollen does. I am not the only sufferer. We gather at work in the morning to compare symptoms. Since I don't wear contacts, my itchy eyes weren't the worst in lab, but the fact that I had to blow my nose six times before getting out of bed gave me most active nose honors. The lovely breeze today just spread all those plant male gametes around, and with 315 cash crops in California, there is a lot of variety. It will be a couple of days before my new anti-allergy prescription will be effective. Until then, the outside and I do not get along. But you came for knitting content.

And the knitting content leads to indecision today. In my last post I was all set to make a chevron scarf as many of you figured out. I am very busy with science work for the next several weeks, so I want happy, pretty, easy therapy knitting. As I said I was all set, then I perused my sock stash looking for my STR Henpecked to give to Elsie for her birthday (if your birthday is on the Ides of March, you deserve STR), and then indecision struck. So which option do I choose?


Options 1 and 2

Originally, I chose the burgundy with the Woodland (bottom yarn), but then I found the Claudia Hand Paints in Walk in the Woods (upper left), which also looked good with the burgundy. But if that wasn't enough to consider, I found these:


Option 3: Cherry Tree Hill in Gypsy Rose and Martha's Vineyard

I am at a complete impasse. Any thoughts?