Yoogly self-striping socks from last week

Ugh.

Whyever did I buy this yarn?  It's over now, whew, and I can perhaps move on to better yarn.  Say hi to Kirby.

*blows raspberry*

Just in time for preliminary World Cup call-ups, I present to you the most recent of the 2010 WC Collection by Dirtbunny:

The red and yellow there is for La Furia Roja (Spain).  The good part is finished, but I still have to weave in ends.  The green, white, and red is for El Tri (Mexico).  The blue and white is for Los Catrachos (Honduras).  It was supposed to have one more blue stripe but I ran out of yarn.  Aaaaaannnnd, the white one, which I started yesterday, is for the All Whites (New Zealand).

The All Whites got their name thusly:  The NZ national rugby team is the All Blacks, on account of their black uniforms.  When the NZ national football team came along, they wore white uniforms, hence, the All Whites.

I don't know if I'm happy about any of these.  Clarabelle keeps telling me that the Spanish kit this year is more black and red than yellow and red; the Honduras kit is not going to resemble the Honduran flag as it traditionally has; and the Mexican kit has a much heavier emphasis on the green than my rendition.  Clarabelle sez that no one would recognize any of the scarves I've done (except possibly the Albicelestes, for Argentina).  Clarabelle sez I am a failure as a designer and it probably would have been cheaper to buy team scarves than to buy yarn to make scarves, and the purchased ones would look better.  Clarabelle sez that if I can't even stack colors together in straight lines to make a decent-looking scarf, then how can I possibly expect the pink cable cardi (which I "designed" myself from a book of standard patterns) to turn out properly.  Clarabelle is some kinda pain in the ass, isn't she?

The FIGC announced the preliminary Azzurri squad yesterday.  We are most displeased.   The good news is that Idiot Il Mister (who has been testing me for a while and has now achieved official DeadToMe status) is so effing predictable that I scored 28 out of 30 in The Offside's WC Prediction Game.  Well, actually, I sacrificed JoeBeppe Rossi for, well, guess, but I never really expected it to happen, so the highest score I could have gotten was 29.  (If you care, I had Legrottaglie instead of Candreva, and I am not disappointed to have gotten that one wrong.)  Which means Dirtbunny, renowned football expert based on her lengthy association with sophisticated tactical analysis since October 2009, only missed one of Il Mister DeadToMe's picks.  



No, I've changed my mind.  This is not good news.  This is bad news.  This is very bad news.


Dirtbunny's list did not contain her assessment of the 30 best players, or the 30 players who, in combination, would be most likely to bring home the big trophy, or even her personal favorites.  Dirtbunny's list was based entirely on guessing what Il Mister DeadToMe would do, and it was distressingly accurate.  I mean, I love these guys, these Beloved Heroes from Days of Yore,  but on the whole they are old.  They are tired.  They are slow.  They are/have been injured this year.  They haven't been playing very much even for their club teams.  Or some combination of all of that. 


*sigh*


I could go on and on, but I'll do one brief rant and then I'll call it a day.

THERE IS NO WAY ANYONE CAN POSSIBLY CONVINCE ME THAT QUAGS IS SUPERIOR TO ADP IN ANY WAY WHATSOEVER, AND CERTAINLY NOT IN SKILL, TALENT, CURRENT FORM, TEAM COHESIVENESS, INTERNATIONAL EXPERIENCE, OR LEADERSHIP.  NO FUCKING WAY.  OF ALL THE INEXPLICABLE CHOICES, WHY QUAGS?  WHY?  WHYWHYWHYWHYWHYWHY?

Not a good day, again (sigh)

So it's a work at home day and I'm all jazzed because I think I've finished something and then it occurs to me, Gee, Bunny, the judge mentions all this stuff that wasn't on the tape and so I dig through the file and discover that THERE ARE SIX MORE TAPES and I am nowhere near finished. Also, it is cold and there are no cookies to go with my latte and Juve is late in posting the call sheet for tomorrow and no one seems to think that ADP will be called up to the Azzurri for next week's world cup qualifier against Montenegro.

Yesterday also had its problems. I had to do some travel stuff I DID NOT WANT TO DO and I got all worked up about it for no good reason. But I finished it, and then I cheered myself up by buying new glasses (more later when they are ready) and a new rug. However, in the process of melting my credit card on these enjoyable pursuits, I tromped all around the Golden Triangle in the WRONG SHOES and my poor Bunny toes are still suffering.

But Ima knittin'. So it's all good. (See how hip I am?)

Two weeks ago, I finished the crimson sweater. I have had a devil of a time getting a decent photo of it, so I haven't bothered to share, although I've worn the sweater a bunch already. At work, they are all probably already thinking "There goes that crazy bitch Dirtbunny in her red sweater again." I don't care. I love it.

So here's the best photo of me in the sweater:

The Man took this. I asked him to take my picture and he did. He didn't understand that the point was to show off the sweater and not the Dirtbunny. No need to notice the liquor bottles on the counter with the onions. (The creme de cassis has been deemed potable and so I'm poting it.) And, hey, I guess the white stripe on Kirby's e-collar is reflective.

Here's the best picture I have of the actual sweater:

My hair looks pretty good! And I'm sure if you disregard the glare from the flash, you can see the lovely cables. Bonus points if you can see the surprise guest over to my right.

That's right. Kirby. His motto: Whither thou goest, I will go. What a good boy. His birthday is coming up, so I hope you got him something nice that won't make him itchy.

My biggest accomplishment of the week is that I finished the September sock club socks, without running out of yarn. It was touch and go. I finished with about three inches to spare. Three inches, and that is all. Whew! Here they are sharing the sunshine with our little urinary monster and a pair of minis made from the leftover July yarn.

I'm pretty sure that my next big project is the Decimal cardigan from the current issue of Knitty. I already have a sweater's worth of pink cotton blend in DK weight that I bought for my birthday when there was no blue to be had and I've already knit and washed my gauge swatch.

I have ten repeats to go on the Flower Basket shawl--I mean potholder. I told The Man I was making a Flower Basket shawl and his brain managed to process that as "Dirtbunny is knitting a potholder" so now I call it the "potholder." You would not believe how smart and competent he is in the non-knitting aspects of life but "potholder" geez. I despair. Oh: the last repeat on the potholder took me about 2 hours to do, and it gets 20 stitches wider with every repeat, and it requires concentration so no TV knitting and no social time knitting unless I want to rip it back and weep a lot, so this is going to take a while. It's bigger than the last time you saw it, which means

~all together now~

IT LOOKS LIKE [MORE] ASS!

The March sock club sock is due any time. Wait! There goes the postman. Please hold while I go check.

[cue the girl from ipanema]

[Your call is important to us. Please continue to hold.]

[more the girl from ipanema]

Nope. Not today. Still, there is no chance I will finish November and January before March gets here. November is wound and ready to go, however.

Aaaaaannnnnnnnddd, it's been more than two weeks since I've been to the vet which must mean it's time to go to the vet, because they were so busy looking at Kirby's itchy feet that they forgot his biennial bordatella vaccination so I get to make another trip! Hooray! Kirby looooooves the vet. Off we go.

How Dirtbunny Copes with Tragedy

And so we here at Chez Nous are working on getting our heads around the idea of making Kirby into a three-legged dog in order to save his life. It is not a difficult decision. I don't know how much it is going to cost and I don't care. It is a very sad situation but the surgery must be done and that's all there is to it. And I am dealing. But first:

It took a while to get a photo of the May sock club socks that displayed the socks to advantage and simultaneously concealed from you how long it has been since I shaved my legs (my brother Patrick would be scandalized!). Here they are. All done and I like 'em.

Back to Kirby. The biopsy yesterday was a pretty big deal and he has a lot of stitches holding his incision together. He's on some serious painkillers and has spent the day looking like this:

You can almost hear him snoring, can't you? The Man stayed home with him today and I went to the office. On the way home from the office, I stopped at the LYS for some yarn therapy, the details of which I will share more fully later. One of the things I got was this:

That is my Special Sweetheart's Super Recovery Wubbie. I replaced the book that Yarn Bandit ate so I have my needles, pattern, and yarn ready to go. I will be casting on imminently. As I knit, I will be putting in as much love and good karma as any Dirtbunny can muster (it can be hard for Dirtbunnies to come up with positive energy) and I will convince myself that it is going to help Kirby recover quickly and safely, and it will give me somewhere to put my anger and sadness and grief that is not upside The Man's head because he's angry and sad too after all and deserves better. OK, so I just put that last sentence in another color because I wanted to see how long it was. It seemed a little long. It is. Fuck it. I'm a little scattered and it's only right that my sentences reflect that.

Sob

As promised, here is a photo of The Man's red sweater in natural light:

He is getting a haircut later today and hasn't shaved in a few days, so he asked to have his head cut off. It's about the sweater, not the model.

Can you see the problem? It isn't my fault. I swear! I followed all the rules of dye lots. I almost cried. When oh when is Bunny ever going knit a half-decent adult-sized sweater? I despair. Sob!

Kirby sez: "How can you go outside without friend Kirby?"

And these are also done:

They are perfect, exactly what yarn in this colorway is supposed to produce. Ugly, but perfect. They were toe-up by the way. Dirtbunny usually goes top-down.

And now I am down to four projects, none of which are suitable for the car or easily transported. Ima gonna have to start another pair of socks. The stash is out, but nothing is calling to me.

So the Wahoo Doggy Sweater is now complete.


He's a scholar and a gentleman, eh?



Not really. His new thing is that he wants to sleep under the covers with his muzzle between my boobs. While I appreciate the action, I suppose, I'd rather have a little more space when I'm trying to sleep.

Very Very Angry

Bunny is not happy with a certain someone because of this. She has had her lunch and checked the mail and clammed down a little, but grrr still. She needs to sit in the sun and listen to Brahms and knit. But what to knit?

There are socks for Nephew Henry and The Man to work on, but they are boring.

There is The Man's red sweater. Again: boring. I have the back and some of the front done. Actually, I did the back twice. Once again, my gauge swatch lied, the rotten stinking jerkwad, so I ended up with a sweater back that, if completed, would fit one and a half The Mans. So I ripped back twenty eight inches of stockinette and started over. I took these photos inside last week with the able contribution of Photographer's Assistant/Spokesmodel Kirby:

Here's another one from last week:

That would be the September sock club sock. We all know that Bunny can't start that until she finishes the July sock club sock. Did you know that Lantern Moon needles are awesome? They are. I like the ebony ones and the rosewood ones. In fact, I was knitting Nephew Henry's socks on a new set of ebony Lantern Moon size one's. I left for work with four needles, and came home with two good needles and the jacked-up one you see next to September. I would recommend to you that Lantern Moon dpns in the smaller sizes are not really toss-em-in-the-bag sort of needles, unless you are happy to drop twenty-five bucks for a new set every freaking time you break one.

Hmmmm. Where was I? Oh, yes. Today I have been taking photos outside. What shall I knit on?

Wahoo doggy sweater? It is now 13 inches long. Kirby is sixteen inches long from collar to the base of his tail. Who thinks I should follow the pattern and knit to eighteen inches before starting the stripey border? Then there is the winter cardi, but that's just several acres of black stockinette stitch, and I've done two balls of yarn on that already this week.

And you can stay inside too, little monster. I am unmoved by your cuteness. I am unimpressed by your pouting.

I could go to work on the May sock club sock, the toe of which you can see perched among today's new arrivals. Nah. I don't feel like being wedded to a pattern today. The new yarn is for two lace projects which, again, requires being wedded to a pattern. Angry Bunny does not need something requiring precision; she needs something soothing and gentle. Not like either of the two secret projects which will not be shown here but which both require counting.

Sorry, sweetheart. You have to stay in too. I just don't have it in me to chase you into the weeds of Lucy's yard next door, and I can tell that's where you want to go.

So what's left?

Ab-Fab is left. Mohair. Ugh. Not today. At least not now.

And so, Wahoo doggy sweater it is! Maybe I can finish the back before The Man gets home.

Laceweight

I have lace weight yarn. Not a lot, but some. Zephyr in five colors. A variegated Australian mohair blend. At least half a ball of Helen's Lace in "Black Purl." I have lace patterns. Books with patterns, and single patterns. I have ideers. Many many ideers. I can make any number of scarves with what I have in stash.

However,

I do not have enough of anything to make a respectable shawl. I want to try to make a shawl. In order to make a shawl, I will have to buy more yarn. This does not make me happy. I was hoping to use up stash.

But enough about my problems. The mommies now have all their baby stuff, so let's take a look, shall we?

Poppy's Stuff

The Bean's Stuff

The Bean gets a longer range because Kirby wanted to help display them. So we have blankets, sweaters, mini-socks, hats, and scarves for the mommies. The Bean's mommy is hoping that The Bean wants to be born today. It's a nice day to be born, so come on out, Bean, and meet your family and get your real name. Poppy, maybe you could stay put just a little longer.

I managed to get out of this baby-knitting frenzy without making a Baby Surprise Jacket.

Froggy!

Here's the thing about Froggy. I love her. She's beautiful and all. But I felted her just a little. It's not that bad. Really. The thing is, though, I was aiming higher than "not that bad." I give myself a B. Um, I learned a lot, and I suppose that's good. I've always been good at patterns and now I'm getting good at tidy increases and decreases, and I'm making real progress at seaming. I'm still working on blocking, but this time around I learned a really important how-not-to. If you have recently suggested that I teach you about blocking and would now like to change your mind without hurting my feelings, we can just pretend you never asked.

See? Not that bad. It even looks a bit chenille-ish, which isn't such an awful thing. I even confined my post-fuck-up tantrum to a few sniffles and an hour so of feeling a little sad, and then I moved on without any extra calm-making medication. That is also progress.

Here's a first (not really, but a first for Dirtbunny):

The classic knitblogger photo-of-self-in-bathroom-mirror shot featuring yours truly and a surprise guest.

I wasn't going to include this next one because of the glare from the flash, but I think it gives you an important insight into exactly what my life is like around here:

Dirtbunny, when at home, is never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, EVER alone.

And what about the Elephant Blanket. Is it done yet?

Not yet.

Something you don't see every day

I finished the tiger socks yesterday. I put them out in the sun to take their picture, and Kirby decided to have a look, so I didn't get a very good picture.




Then he had a seat, and, if you look closely, a good chew.






Busted!





The socks are safe now.

In other yarn news, Froggy is soaking in anticipation of a good blocking. Here she is getting the Barbara Walters treatment:

She doesn't need it, though. She looks good even with an ordinary focus.

See all the ends I wove in and snipped? I'm pretty tired of yarn now, but when Froggy is done with her soak, I will have to mess with yarn again. There will be more photos later.

Bunny's Big Mess

So this is what Dirtbunny's dining room table looks like today (please note that Bunny is always under surveillance by a certain you-know-who):




There is so much yarn and yarn-related stuff on it that you almost can't see the coffee stain on the tablecloth. The Man, bless him, is quite tolerant of this kind of thing, for which I am quite grateful.

Here it is from the other side:


Today, while The Man handles some urgent yard work and Bunny handles some urgent inside-the-house work, I will be stopping by the Big Mess to try to make some sense of it and to show you what's on the needles.

Stash Enhancement

A few weeks ago, I noticed that I had a book that I hadn't read yet, so I, well, I read it. Wow. Fabulously boring sentence. Whaddaya know? Wendy knits has her a blog! Duh. It seems to start out as a blog and then becomes a book with many (at least two) of these knitbloggers. And so Ms. Wendy is also an employee of Uncle Sam here in Our Nation's Capital, and she likes the same LYS that I like. And so I look at her blog and I decide I like it, so I start back through the archives and, well, and I mean this in the best possible way, but Wendy sucks. Because of her, I now have this:



That's not entirely accurate. Some of that is "teal" yarn from the "teal" sweater. Let's have a better look:



Excuse me, Kirby. I love you too but I want to go play with my yarn right now.




That's my new yarn. In there is the Colinette ab-fab kit that I bought because Wendy did one and I thought it was purty. The kit is not in stock, so I had to order it, which means one trip to order and one trip to pick it up. There's a lot of strange and wonderful stuff in that Colinette bag. I'm a little afraid of it right now, but I'm sure you'll be hearing more about it later.

Also, there are four balls of Zephyr lace weight. Because Wendy did a Summer of Lace in 2005 and although I am still recovering from my little lace experiment, I somehow got it into my head that I ought to be doing more lace. Clearly and obviously in collusion with Wendy, the LYS had its Zephyr out in all kinds of pretty colors. Bunny's colors. So I suppose I will be doing some more lace at some point, like I need that kind of stress.

There is also some silly fuzzy novelty yarn that I am going to use to edge the felted dog bed I am going to make out of my leftover emerald Manos del Uruguay.

WTF, you ask? See, it's Wendy's fault. She knits kitty beds for her cat, and, hey, I could probably do that only I don't have a cat, but I do have dogs, and they are only twice as big as--I mean only a little bigger than--her cat and just because I said felting is stupid and pointless doesn't mean that maybe I intended never to try it out and it's only a dog bed so if my felting sucks, no one will care, and Manos isn't really that expensive.

Manos. The hands of fate. You knew you were thinking it, Food Guy.

There are also five skeins there that are going to be socks one day. That is also Wendy's fault, because everyone knows you can't go into a LYS without buying sock yarn. That just wouldn't be right.

So you can see why Wendy is both my new best cyber friend (even though she doesn't know it) and a great big hoser, all at once, and Bunny's on-deck circle is getting a little crowded.

But Never Fear!

Projects are nearing the finish line:



The Bean's dress needs a seam (although I finished most of it waiting for my photos to upload), a ribbon, a button, and a good blocking, and that's it.

I've got most of a tiger sock.




The "teal" sweater has a bottom, one and 1/20th of a sleeve, a back, and one and 1/3 fronts. It could possibly be finished before too much longer, depending on how interesting season 2 of Battlestar Gallactica is.



Does the Yarn Bandit help me take photos?

No. He's busy.

More thunder

It is time for El Puto to go for his evening walk. He does not want to go because another thunderstorm is passing near here--not enough for rain Chez Nous, but enough so he can hear the thunder. He has been dragged out with promises that he can come home as soon as he makes dookie. The last thing I heard The Man say to him was "Get ready! Think poopy thoughts!" Trust me on this: those words, or any like them, were not spoken in this house before the dogs came.



And that leave me free to catch up with what's on the needles. First, what's off the needles:





The dear, departed blue ribbed socks. They started out fun, but the love ran cold, man; the spark is gone. So they are done, and that's good.

Also, Poppy's sweater is off the needles, stitched together, blocked, and is drying flat. When I get buttons and sew them on, it will be finished, and then you can see.

The purple scarf is still chugging along, and the tiger socks are destined to become my new commuter sock knitting, so they won't take much longer. Here's the March sock club sock, aka "Leafling":

This is knitting that requires frequent consulting of the pattern, so it's home knitting for now.

And the back part of The Bean's lilac dress is done. Here it is modeled by handsome international porn star El Puto:

I have fourteen inches of "teal" sleeve, as worn here by Der Kirbenhund:

Plain stockinette stitch and not much worth seeing. I also picked up stitches along the lace panel to work the top part. That, plus the sleeve and the Elephant blanket, puts most of my size 7 circulars in use. I say "most" because I think I have another somewhere. That won't stop me from getting more in case of emergencies or something.

Oh yeah. The sweater. This time, I only got 247 stitches instead of 250. I did not rip it back. I increased three more evenly spaced along the next row. The hell with it. If i didn't blog about it, no one would ever know. (And since I have practically no readers, that means pretty much no one knows anyway).

There is also the Elephant blanket, but that's nothing to see yet either. All in good time.

That was Fun!

Sadly, Poppy's Sheep Blanket is finished. It was a kick to knit, and now it's over. Kirby helped me take a picture:



Oh, well. Plenty more going on in Bunny's knitting bag. I've got about about six inches a week going on the purple scarf. I've got the second blue ribbed sock started. I've got the March sock club sock started. I've got a tiger sock going. All of the pieces parts for Poppy's sweater are done and I could finish in a couple hours if I felt like sewing it up. I have a hard time sewing a nice seam. I normally just do it however, and it shows. But this is for someone else, so I want to do it correctly, so I'm going to have to teach myself some finishing techniques. Lucky for Poppy (not like he cares, but I do), I have something like 50 books with finishing demos in them. We'll be OK.

I tried to take a week off from the teal sweater, but I only made it five days. I am going to need some simple, portable stuff to do at some upcoming seminars, so I cast on a sleeve.

No, it is not rude to knit during these things:

1. It's a video, so I won't be distracting the speakers.
2. Nearly everyone there (I can say from experience) is going to be reading the paper anyway.
3. Those who are not reading the paper will be fooling around with their blackberries.
4. If you are not convinced, then please explain to me why knitting is more rude than #2 or #3. Also, since I have to go to get credits for maintaining my bar license, i.e., it's mandatory, and since none of it is going to be directly relevant to the tiny sub-niche of the very specialized area in which I practice (and no such courses are offered), please explain to me why I should suffer when no one else is.
5. I can't just sleep. I snore. That would be a distraction to everyone else.
6. If I wanted to pay attention, which I don't, I could knit and pay attention at the same time.

It's time to cast on something for The Bean. I haven't decided what, yet, but I have a shopping bag full of pretty pretty yarn to choose from.

Maybe Bunny won't quit knitting

So I quit knitting forever on account of the mendacious gauge swatches. But my life felt a little empty. So I went through my cookie box full of sock yarn leftovers and picked something out and made a mini-sock. While Kirby watched.....

I took a picture of it:

That's a pretty good looking sock. Nice yarn, nice even stitches, good mastery of teeny tiny size 00 needles. I felt some satisfaction and thought maybe I could knit another so I'd have a pair. That is going OK.

So I worked on the purple lace scarf. I've dropped three stitches so far and haven't been able to get them back, so it isn't perfect. But it's still nice.

And I picked up the red lace scarf. It's almost done. I could probably finish it today, but I don't think I will. It looks pretty crappy, but it'll come together when I block it. And I "can't" do that until I get some lace blocking wires because there is "no other possible way" to block lace. So, hardship of hardships, I need to go shopping at yarn stores and yarn websites until I find some.

And the stripey socks look pretty good, so maybe I'll cast on the second one.

Hmmmm. This is starting to feel not so bad. Maybe I don't have to quit knitting forever.

I know! Maybe I could knit the cable and lace panel on much smaller needles and switch to bigger needles when it's time to work the stockinette part! That'll work! And maybe before I've invested an entire week in it (like I did with the seven-foot panel--lordy was I in denial), I'll take some measurements and do some math to see if it's working! I can start with 5s and I can go down all the way to 000s, and somewhere in there is going to be a needle size that gets me the row gauge I want. At least I'm not the only one having trouble with row gauge this week.