Mine couldn't have been better: we walked, we talked, we laughed, we ate, we read, we cuddled.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
My first
Happy Mother's Day!
Mine couldn't have been better: we walked, we talked, we laughed, we ate, we read, we cuddled.
Mine couldn't have been better: we walked, we talked, we laughed, we ate, we read, we cuddled.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
You'll be shocked
Alert the media, there's a finished object chez Wollgut! It's that lace scarf for my doctoral thesis advisor that I started one week B.C. (Before Conrad, that is), which was halfway done the night we rushed to the hospital, and that took three months to complete. Sheesh.
Good things come to those who wait, and while my advisor didn't know she was waiting for anything, this scarf turned out mighty nice, if I may say so myself.
I got the yarn--delicious Madelinetosh Pashmina (merino! silk! cashmere!)--the week after I defended, mulled over lace scarf patterns for weeks, then asked you for input, then ignored your advice, and finally settled on a narrower, longer version of Nancy Bush's Lilac Leaf Shawl. Verdict: one of my finest projects.
Want to have a closer look?
Closer?
Yes, those are nupps. And ya know what? They weren't half as bad. Although I admit that I abandoned Bush's technique of making seven stitches out of one knit stitch on a RS row, then purling those seven together on the next WS row. Instead I followed my mom's advice: make seven, slip those seven back onto the left needle, then knit seven together on the same RS row. Much easier, me thinks. And the result looks the same: I checked.
Waaaaayyyy more nerve-racking than making innocent little nupps was grafting the two parts together (lower edge and body + upper edge, so that the top edge mirrors the bottom). Kitchener stitch in itself isn't evil, but bloody hell, once I lose track of where I am (part 1, 2, 3, or 4 of the operation) I just can't figure out how to continue. You'd think it's easy to see if I most recently worked a stitch purl- or knitwise, but instead I experience complete brain shutdown, and then I make a mistake. This time I screwed up five or six stitches before I was done. I kept on Kitchening as best as I could. The two parts are joined successfully, but the mistake is visible to the knitter's eye (but only if that knitter's eye is mean-spirited and closely searches for mistakes). My advisor isn't a knitter, so I just won't worry about it.
And as always when I block a lace project, this time, too, I cursed the lack of blocking wires. I really ought to have blocking wires, 'cuz this isn't pretty:
I used about 5.000 blocking needles, and with a crying baby tied to my chest, it took about two hours to block the scarf ("5.000" may be an exaggeration, "two hours" is not). By the time I was done, the scarf was dry, more or less.
As I said, the scarf is longer and narrower than the original pattern: if I remember correctly, it's two repeats longer and two (three?) repeats narrower. I didn't measure the blocked scarf, but it's fairly long and fairly wide, kinda perfect, actually. The whole scarf is kinda perfect. I hope my advisor likes it!
Good things come to those who wait, and while my advisor didn't know she was waiting for anything, this scarf turned out mighty nice, if I may say so myself.
I got the yarn--delicious Madelinetosh Pashmina (merino! silk! cashmere!)--the week after I defended, mulled over lace scarf patterns for weeks, then asked you for input, then ignored your advice, and finally settled on a narrower, longer version of Nancy Bush's Lilac Leaf Shawl. Verdict: one of my finest projects.
Want to have a closer look?
Closer?
Yes, those are nupps. And ya know what? They weren't half as bad. Although I admit that I abandoned Bush's technique of making seven stitches out of one knit stitch on a RS row, then purling those seven together on the next WS row. Instead I followed my mom's advice: make seven, slip those seven back onto the left needle, then knit seven together on the same RS row. Much easier, me thinks. And the result looks the same: I checked.
Waaaaayyyy more nerve-racking than making innocent little nupps was grafting the two parts together (lower edge and body + upper edge, so that the top edge mirrors the bottom). Kitchener stitch in itself isn't evil, but bloody hell, once I lose track of where I am (part 1, 2, 3, or 4 of the operation) I just can't figure out how to continue. You'd think it's easy to see if I most recently worked a stitch purl- or knitwise, but instead I experience complete brain shutdown, and then I make a mistake. This time I screwed up five or six stitches before I was done. I kept on Kitchening as best as I could. The two parts are joined successfully, but the mistake is visible to the knitter's eye (but only if that knitter's eye is mean-spirited and closely searches for mistakes). My advisor isn't a knitter, so I just won't worry about it.
And as always when I block a lace project, this time, too, I cursed the lack of blocking wires. I really ought to have blocking wires, 'cuz this isn't pretty:
I used about 5.000 blocking needles, and with a crying baby tied to my chest, it took about two hours to block the scarf ("5.000" may be an exaggeration, "two hours" is not). By the time I was done, the scarf was dry, more or less.
As I said, the scarf is longer and narrower than the original pattern: if I remember correctly, it's two repeats longer and two (three?) repeats narrower. I didn't measure the blocked scarf, but it's fairly long and fairly wide, kinda perfect, actually. The whole scarf is kinda perfect. I hope my advisor likes it!
Sunday, May 1, 2011
Three paragraphs about Salt Lake City
One
We Got House! Currently we're renting a large apartment that is, however, in a dump of a building with neighbors from hell in a not-so-great neighborhood. Last week we zoomed to Salt Lake to see if we could do better there. Many rental houses and a quick consideration of becoming house owners (*gasp*) later, we're happy renters of this little house:
For just two-thirds of what we're currently paying for rent we got a ton of extras, including a backyard and two fireplaces. I've never lived in a house or had either garden or fireplace. I'm excited, like, big time. Especially since everyone we've talked to says that our neighborhood is awesome. I can't wait to discover its awesomeness (although I do dread the cross-country move).
Two
Utah is the most conservative state in the country, and the most conservative county in the most conservative state is located less than fifty miles outside Salt Lake. Or so Jon Krakauer writes in his description of Mormonism, Under the Banner of Heaven, a book I'm reading so that I have a reply ready when the next person tells me a polygamy joke the minute I say we're moving to Utah. What I'm learning is that the Mormon church condemns polygamy as an outdated custom practiced today only by a misguided few who have been excommunicated by the church. I suppose that's good news. What's bad news is that Mormonism appears to be a religion based, in part, on the complete submission of women and children to their husbands and fathers. The biggest threats to the Mormon church, according to the LDS apostle second in line to become LDS president, are "the gay-lesbian movement, the feminist movement, and the ever-present challenge from the so-called scholars or intellectuals."* This really bothers me. I'm a scholar, feminist, and gay rights advocate. Throw "pro-choice" and "environmentalist" into the mix, and you know where I stand politically. If the views of ordinary parishioners really match the official positions of the LDS church, I worry that living in Salt Lake, where half the population is Mormon, will require a lot of adjustment on my part, and not because of the mountain climate.
*Boyd K. Packer, cit. in Krakauer.
Three
While cruising the streets of Salt Lake in search of "For Rent" signs, I ran into and talked to four people. All of them were very nice. The first was an older gentlemen who gave me a tour of his garden and invited Conrad to visit often and play in his treehouse. (Conrad can't quite roll over yet, and climbing trees will have to wait for a few years.) The other people were women and--yay!--knitters. All three mentioned the knitting group at Blazing Needles, a LYS that's just a twenty-minute walk from our house. I was given phone numbers and invitations to meet for tea. Despite my second paragraph misgivings, it does seem like SLC is going to be a fun place to knit.
We Got House! Currently we're renting a large apartment that is, however, in a dump of a building with neighbors from hell in a not-so-great neighborhood. Last week we zoomed to Salt Lake to see if we could do better there. Many rental houses and a quick consideration of becoming house owners (*gasp*) later, we're happy renters of this little house:
For just two-thirds of what we're currently paying for rent we got a ton of extras, including a backyard and two fireplaces. I've never lived in a house or had either garden or fireplace. I'm excited, like, big time. Especially since everyone we've talked to says that our neighborhood is awesome. I can't wait to discover its awesomeness (although I do dread the cross-country move).
Two
Utah is the most conservative state in the country, and the most conservative county in the most conservative state is located less than fifty miles outside Salt Lake. Or so Jon Krakauer writes in his description of Mormonism, Under the Banner of Heaven, a book I'm reading so that I have a reply ready when the next person tells me a polygamy joke the minute I say we're moving to Utah. What I'm learning is that the Mormon church condemns polygamy as an outdated custom practiced today only by a misguided few who have been excommunicated by the church. I suppose that's good news. What's bad news is that Mormonism appears to be a religion based, in part, on the complete submission of women and children to their husbands and fathers. The biggest threats to the Mormon church, according to the LDS apostle second in line to become LDS president, are "the gay-lesbian movement, the feminist movement, and the ever-present challenge from the so-called scholars or intellectuals."* This really bothers me. I'm a scholar, feminist, and gay rights advocate. Throw "pro-choice" and "environmentalist" into the mix, and you know where I stand politically. If the views of ordinary parishioners really match the official positions of the LDS church, I worry that living in Salt Lake, where half the population is Mormon, will require a lot of adjustment on my part, and not because of the mountain climate.
*Boyd K. Packer, cit. in Krakauer.
Three
While cruising the streets of Salt Lake in search of "For Rent" signs, I ran into and talked to four people. All of them were very nice. The first was an older gentlemen who gave me a tour of his garden and invited Conrad to visit often and play in his treehouse. (Conrad can't quite roll over yet, and climbing trees will have to wait for a few years.) The other people were women and--yay!--knitters. All three mentioned the knitting group at Blazing Needles, a LYS that's just a twenty-minute walk from our house. I was given phone numbers and invitations to meet for tea. Despite my second paragraph misgivings, it does seem like SLC is going to be a fun place to knit.
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