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Cowls go fast

By Erika, on May 14th, 2013 | 4 comments

This is where I take one of those fashionably narrow-depth-of-field pictures in order to make my knitting look more interesting.

honey cowl

It’s just about to the length where I had to rip it back last time. I have measured it several times in order to reassure myself that this one is the right size.

I will be sad to finish this project, I’ve really gotten into a Honey Cowl groove.

Then again, I have been staring greedily at the five skeins of sock yarn I picked out for my next project. But I’m ambivalent about it, because I don’t actually know what the pattern entails. Haven’t read it yet. Cross that bridge when we come to it.

4 comments      

Sims Sunday: The horse was unimpressed

By Erika, on May 12th, 2013 | 6 comments

This week I took navkat’s suggestion and installed a custom content town named St. Claire, made by a Sims 3 fan and creator. I usually stay away from custom content because in my experience it’s just a recipe for crashes and heartache later on. But navkat’s description of the beautiful town, plus my boredom with the towns I already have, made the decision for me.

Sims Sunday

St. Claire really is beautiful, roomy, meticulously designed, and well-thought-out. It makes you wonder why EA doesn’t hire some of these fansite people to create official licensed towns and houses. Continue reading…

6 comments      

The next batch of fiber

By Erika, on May 9th, 2013 | 2 comments

A few weeks ago I succumbed to Etsy (it’s so hard to resist) and bought this beautiful braid of fiber in the colorway “Fig” from Etsy seller SpunRightRound. If I said it was purple and brown and chartreuse, that wouldn’t begin to describe how pretty it is.

fig fiber

My plan for this batch was to spin it into two equal skeins, plied with Navajo ply. I started by splitting the fiber lengthwise into two identical ropes. Then I began to spin away.

fig fiber

I soon discovered the flaw in this plan: I can’t spin the entire two ounces onto the drop spindle. It gets too heavy. But if I just wound it off, the color progression would get out of order.

Thus, I decided to use an intermediate step. I wound the single off the drop spindle and onto an extremely complicated, expensive, and high-tech intermediary bobbin.

fig fiber

Incidentally, this particular style of bobbin works very well. If you fill it with a few inches of water and set it on the ground, you can wind the singles right off without it rolling all over the place. I believe Gayle is the one who tipped me off to this particular clever trick. (Dare I say, “hack.”)

As for yesterday’s plant pot mystery, I have a hunch that auntiemichal is right and the culprit is earwigs. Uggggh they are so disgusting and creepy.

I know they are harmless to people, and they don’t actually crawl into people’s ears. But I can’t help but think of Wrath of Khan whenever I see one.

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About that cowl…

By Erika, on May 8th, 2013 | 8 comments

Two weeks ago I started another Honey Cowl* by Madeline Tosh** with some yarn that my friend Dorothy had hand-dyed and given to me ages ago.

I love the Honey Cowl for hand-dyed yarn, it does great things with all the color changes. I also love knitting the Honey Cowl; once you get used to the rhythm of the stitch pattern, you can easily churn it out without paying attention.

And finally, I have been wearing the heck out of the last Honey Cowl I knit (the red one in Madeline Tosh*** Merino Light). In fact, I’m wearing it right now.

Fast forward two weeks to last night. I was knitting it on a particularly short pair of circular needles. Thus, it wasn’t until it was nearly 8 inches deep that the whole thing was un-bunched enough for me to realize that it was way too narrow.

The pattern calls for it to be 22 inches long. (Just right for an “under the jacket” cowl, but not so tight that I get claustrophobic.) Mine was only 17 inches long. Gak. Picture me clawing frantically at my neckline at the thought of it.

honey cowl

So I ripped the whole thing back and started again. Sigh.

Incidentally, anyone want to take a guess at what’s been pulling the dirt out of my plants at night?

honey cowl

Here are the facts:

  • It’s not due to drainage. We haven’t had rain for over a week.
  • It seems to only happen at night. Yesterday I brushed the dirt away and checked periodically during the day. It stayed clean all day. But this morning, there was the dirt.
  • I haven’t seen any insects going in or out, which makes me think it’s not ants. (Ants are usually not a subtle problem.)

    • Baffled shrug!

    * Excuse me, “honey cowl,” two words, all lower-case.

    ** Excuse me, “M A D E L I N E T O S H,” all caps, with a space between each letter.

    *** Excuse me, “madelinetosh,” all one word, all lower-case.

    8 comments     , ,  

    Two quick cowls

    By Erika, on May 6th, 2013 | One comment

    After using up that super-bulky Lion Brand stuff last week, I thought, “Hmm… that sure went fast! Don’t I have some more of that stuff somewhere?” I vaguely remembered having bought some super-bulky yarn on sale in order to make a Perpetually Persistent Cowl.

    It took a while to find the yarn (Cascade Lana Grande). It had been so long since I bought it that it had sunk to the bottom of the storage bin.

    This started out being a Perpetually Persistent Cowl. But I was really comfortable on the couch and I couldn’t be bothered to get up and find the pattern. So I just went with a simple cable (traveling stitch?) pattern off the top of my head.

    bulky cowl

    I like the height (a full 12″) but it fits snugly around the neck. Which, in a cowl this bulky, makes me a little claustrophobic. Finding myself with an entire leftover ball of yarn, I knit the second cowl a little bit longer.

    bulky cowl

    It’s in seed stitch as a nod to the famous GAP-Tastic Cowl. Which I probably could have made if I hadn’t started with that cabled cowl first. Oh well!

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