And so, the flame goes out....

...but I did manage to win the sprint event (OK, the event I created for my own self). I am now celebrating.

The flash lightened up the purple in the mittens a bit, but you get the picture. These are the warmest non-thrummed mittens I have ever made. I knit them on US 5's instead of the 7's that the yarn dictated, so the fabric is very thick. I don't recall what mishmash of fiber this was, but from the halo around the yarn, I'm guessing there's either some mohair or angora in this wool. The tweediness is also nice.

But it's not my vest. Sigh. (Takes large gulp of champagne) That will be done this week once the yarn arrives from Marrakesh. When that's done, I should be getting ready to make that order from Virtual Yarns. I'm thinking Zauberflote, the Oregon Cardigan or Vest, or Glenesk. Like I really need another project after coming home from Stitches West....

I guess I'm training for 2008.

Crap. Merd. Scheiss. Caca.

Well, the Fair Isle will not be complete by Sunday evening. Apparently, North Carolina, where the skein of yarn I needed was shipped from, is a former Soviet republic, because the skein has yet to arrive after being shipped on Tuesday. Two and a half days of knitting slated for the vest are toast.

I'm so mad I could crochet.

So, in the spirit of a new challenge, I decided to forego the marathon and enter a sprint event. Around 4:30 PM Saturday evening, I cast on some handspun sitting around Ikealand. At 9:30 PM, here's where we are:

My goal was to finish a pair of mittens before the flame goes out. That should be achieved pretty easily. It's not the same as finishing the vest (which should be done on Tuesday if the yarn makes it here from Siberia), but it's something.

I mean, it's not like I did a method air and lost a gold medal.

Now, I'm guessing I'm not the only one out there who, for one reason or another, didn't manage to complete their project in the allotted time. But, hey, it's not all about winning; it's about competing at our sport's highest level, right? So, with that in mind, I offer up an award to all of us Knitting Olympians who embody the Olympic Credo: "The essence lies not in the victory, but in the struggle."

Feel free to award yourself. Hell, I did.

Step right up to the Uncle Leona eBay Fire Sale!

It's time to clear out Ikealand to cram in all of the Stitches West goodies, so the stash reduction has gone to eBay (I have a link to the goodies on the right). Here's the collection:

OK, truth be told, Mama wants to go shopping at Virtual Yarns.

Columbine, oh, columbine, wherefore art thou, columbine?

No, I'm still not awake, but I figure as well as I write these things, a little lack of sleep ain't really going to make a hell of a lot of a difference. As for the trip, it was quite nice....up until that little issue of missing my connection in Salt Lake City. Thanks to a little bit of wind, my flight out of San Jose was delayed just long enough to get me to miss the flight to Cleveland. The only way Delta felt it could help was to reroute me through Atlanta.

Mind you, Delta has a hub in Cincinnati. You're trying to tell me that Hub #1 in Salt Lake doesn't have a flight into Hub #2 Cincy around 5:00 Salt Lake time? Hell, I could have rented a car in Cincinnati and driven back home!

Anyhow, I enjoyed my own personal version of "The Terminal" overnight in Atlanta. I set up the chairs at the gate to create some semblence of a recliner (a Laz-E-Boy it wasn't), nibbled on all the noshes I had been squirreling away from the Salt Lake to Atlanta flight (I may not eat a granola bar again for a long, long time), and tried to knit as my neurons all one-by-one shut down. Didn't help that CNN Headline News runs the same 15 minutes of stories from about midnight to 6 AM...no other place with a TV set in the middle of the night in Atlanta (the bar was closed by the time I hit the airport). I tried to turn on the iPod, but alas, the battery had died.

It was a loooooong evening. Made longer by the fact that I had to rip out about an inch of the Fair Isle after trying to knit in my neuronally challenged state. It also had about three inches ripped out while I was in California (I dropped a stitch a couple in from the front steek, so the pattern was off by one stitch...would anyone else notice it? No, but I would...damn that perfectionist in me anyhow). Here's where things stand:

I think there are about 40 or so rows left to do, which is good. However, I noticed one little problem on the flight from Salt Lake to Atlanta:

This is all I have left of a shade called Columbine. I had more. One whole skein more. On the trip.

Shit.

I don't have any clue where it is. So, I ordered a skein from Nancy's KnitKnacks this afternoon. It was shipped today (I'm guessing that really means Tuesday given the holiday), so I'm hopeful that it will arrive Thursday at the latest from North Carolina.

(Given my last experience with getting from Point A to Point B, that's awfully hopeful)

So, I won't be done by the ladies' short program. But I WILL BE DONE BY SUNDAY! If not, I beg the judges for mercy:

The precedent is there.

As for Stitches West, it was sweet! The classes were all great (the one I took with Debbie New was far too long for a three hour class--we spent most of it just knitting little swatches without any real teaching going on). I would take classes with Sally Melville, Melissa Leapman, Leslye Solomon, and Galina Khmeleva again in a heartbeat.

Especially Galina...I haven't quite mastered that accent yet.

Stitches also afforded me the chance to meet the lovely Jewel for lunch on Saturday--thanks, Jewel (and congrats on Torino!).

Then, of course, there was that Market. I really tried to behave myself this time. Really.

This is two skeins of Blue Moon sock yarn, a bargain bag of striping yarn for my attempt at designing my own sweater, and a tube of spinning fiber for a pair of socks.

This is from SweaterKits--a tweed stitch sweater in Ohio State colors.

Purely for class retention purposes. She covered a ton.

And yet another fair isle to conquer. The kit is from Philosopher's Wool in Canada--the colors are beautiful. Initially, I wasn't going to get it after this one chick in one of my classes announced that she didn't like the vendor (after one meeting with the folks at a class). However, the longer the chick yakked, the more I realized that I really didn't like HER, so the Philosopher's Wool people were let off the hook. This one is with worsted wool, so I'm guessing I may be able to finish it in a night.

Remember, I'm sleep deprived.

I'm back, and I'm beat

An unexpected 8-hour layover in Atlanta overnight will do that to you. More later. I need a nap.

Why no, I don't have a life

At least not when I'm in Olympics Junkie mode. I think I caught nearly every hour of broadcasting over the weekend. I don't think I'm ready to explain the new figure skating scoring system yet, but give me another week. My goal this week is to understand curling.

The Fair Isle Vest is off to a better start than I could have anticipated. As of midnight, here's the progress:

I'm a little over a quarter of the way done with the body of the thing! WOO HOO!!! Remember, I needed to get a good amount done with that silly little excursion out to California in the works for later this week. I should be able to get about an inch done Monday, but then I only work half a day on Tuesday, so a good amount can be chugged through then before I need to work, pack, and get a good night's sleep Wednesday for the 7:05 AM flight on Thursday (by the way, the vest is being knitted with a bamboo circular. No one can take that glorified pair of pencils on a string from me at the airport).

By my calculations, this thing could feasibly be done by the ladies' short program. I think.

Up close and personal:

By the way, I hate corrugated ribbing. Especially on size 1's. Changing over to the size 3's for the body was invigorating. Looks cool, though. The yarn, for those of you interested, is JaggerSpun Re-Dun, which came with the kit. Everything is a bit heathery, so the blends of colors are beautiful. The stuff goes by "Digit Heather" nowadays.

Oh, and if anyone out there in the Stitches West vicinity wishes to meet up, I'm to meet the lovely Jewel for lunch this Friday between my classes. It would be great to meet anyone else who may be around!

Let the games begin

In a mere three hours or so, I will be casting on three hundred billion stitches for the fair isle vest whilst a flame begins flickering brightly for a fortnight or so.

You may not see me for a while.

Yeah, yeah, I know I am allowed to cast on at 2 PM EST, but by doing that, it stands to reason that I would have to be done with that blasted vest six hours prior to seeing the flame extinguished on TV. To my all-too-logical-by-the-numbers-former-math-major mind of mine, that just will not do.

So I wait for Bob Costas.

As for the teams, both are loading up with members:

Team Ohio has added Eboni, Jeanne, and Lars to the fold.

Team What The Hell... has also welcomed Lars (he's working hard), my ol' Secret Pal Leah, and Whit, the founder of Team DPN.

If I missed anyone, it isn't intentional--this team captain stuff is too complicated for me. Besides, I'm recovering from the new carpet fumes my office has offered up for the past three days. I'm lucky I know my own name.

Now, with all due respect to my future husband of my semi-erotic dreams, Mike Rowe:

Get ready.....to get knitting!!!

I finished one....the other will have to wait

Remember when I said I'd try to finish both the boucle and the Cathay pullovers before the Olympics? I think I was a tad deluded. I did manage to finish up the boucle pullover, though.

I initially didn't have the button in place, but after viewing the splay once my boobs greeted the bustline, I quickly sewed one in place. It does the trick. Now I have to find out if Halcyon Yarn will take back the four skeins of boucle I have left (this sweater only used four skeins and part of a fifth) from the batch I purchased out there this summer.

If not, that's why God gave us eBay.

I'm happy to announce that Team Ohio is getting loaded with players--little did I know that there were so many of us out there in knitblogcyberland! So, welcome aboard to Bad Hippie, Mary, Teresa, and Beth.

Team What The Hell Was I Thinking also has a few stars out there--mad props out there to Jackie, Linda, Kris, and Kathen, who is manning the Canadian division of the team. Let us all finish our damn projects before that flame goes out.

Anyone know how to get a Zippo to Torino?

Disappointment

You know, when you're promised the Apocalypse, you expect the Apocalypse. What we received from Mother Nature yesterday was weak. Case in point:

The darker areas of the driveway represent about an eighth of an inch of snow. Beyond that, yes, that's grass sticking up under the trees. I was so looking forward to the blizzard. There are some pretty areas, though:

I still stand fast by when we REALLY get clocked. See the countdown in the upper right hand corner? Subtract about an hour to get when I need to be at the airport. That should just about do it.

And add three hours to see when Salt Lake City gets clocked (yep, that would be my layover).

I hate flying.

After much consternation with the crappy short row instructions for the boucle pullover, I came up with my own plan. The Garnstudio's pattern had me removing stitches "to a thread" every other row--no mention of what to do with the working yarn when said stitches are "removed." After all of the removals, one was to put the stitches back on the needle and knit like nothing happened. Uh huh. So, with a little help from Vogue Knitting, The Bible of Knitting Books, I finagled some short row shaping of my own. The result?

Worked good, huh? The neatest part, though, was the bind off for the back neck. During the bind off, the pattern insisted that you add a yo between each stitch to keep the back edge from being too tight. Well damn if that didn't work like a charm! I'm not sure how good that looks with a smooth yarn, but with this stuff it's perfect.

Now I'm in sleeve purgatory. Well, I will be when I get back from Target. The Diet Coke supply is getting mighty low.

One more thing: I was doing a little Olympics surfing today and noticed that the state of Ohio is a little behind the times when it comes to forming a team. I mean, there's a Team New Hampshire, for pity's sake! We're three times their size at least! So, to remedy that situation, I got a little creative:

Feel free to join the team. We need all the support we can get!

Good bye, cruel world...I'm going to tune up the snowblower

This has been an odd winter so far. Since Christmas, this land of milk, honey, and lake effect has been downright balmy. We haven't had a significant snowfall since mid-December; I was just commenting last week that I didn't use my snowblower once in January.

Me and my big mouth.

All of the weather gurus out there are forecasting the next coming of the apocalypse starting later today. Some are talking about snow in the "feet" term. Of course, this is the day I planned on turning in the Saab (lease end), so I get to drive in this crap. Thankfully, it's only raining right now, but the snow is starting to enter Ohio as we speak.

Damn that groundhog. Someone needs to take a shotgun to that rodent before he has a chance to open his eyes.

Progress is being made on the boucle pullover--I put the lacy one aside for the time being until the boucle is done. I think it's all psychological; winter is still here, so I need to do the mohair and not the cotton. The front and back are now joined at the shoulders, and I'm working on the neckband:

There are some seriously funky short row instructions for this neckband, but I think I know what to do. My biggest problems other than being lost in translation with this pattern is dealing with measurements in cm. Yes, I know it shouldn't be an issue, but I'm a dopey, screw the metric system American. And don't get me started on needle sizes in mm...

I forgot to show my latest cool felted bag. I had been lusting after the Sheep Tote pattern for a while (it's the one with the needle felted sheep on the front). I was loving all of the pockets on the thing. So, I took some BabbaJoe's WoolPak in a lovely shade of lavender and my size 10.5's (that's AMERICAN, baby!) and went for it.

This is the first tote I've done where the pattern tells you to put EVERYTHING together (handle included) and throw the whole blessed thing in the washer. It really worked out slick, I must say. No, I'm not doing the needle felting thing with the sheep. I like my totes simple.

That, and I value the integrity of the skin on my fingers.

The Olympics are less than a week away! Oh my f-ing god! I really need to get training. Maybe I'll swatch during the 10 hour Super Bowl pregame show tomorrow.

Lord knows that if the weather guys are right, I may be snowbound. Better go find some beer.