Welcome to the Machine

What do you do when that madman Kaffe Fassett finally designs the most beautiful piece of knitting in the world? In 40bagillion colors, with color changes nearly every row and a 186 row color repeat? And, to cap it off, a mile wide, in boring, boringer, boringest stockinette?


It's a freaking scarf for petes sake. I am up to my ears in scarves and I do not need any more. But this is not merely about need. This is about desire. I do not, however, plan on spending the rest of my life knitting a boringest damned stockinette scarf no matter how much I love it. Anyway, as process a knitter as I am, I want this product, dammit, and I want it now!



Enter the Studio 360. My dirty little secret.




A match made in heaven, too I might add. I had no idea how the machine would like the doubled KSH, and half expected it to chew it up and spend the afternoon removing mohair from machine innards, but she works like a charm. And a few hours out of the afternoon got me nearly through one color repeat (not shabby, remember that's 186 rows with all the color changes). Instant gratification.

Taking it to a new level entirely

Today is a day that will go down in infamy. It will be remembered as the day I got serious about my knitting. What made this day different from all the rest? I went shopping, people, shopping. But in a very different way.

Since I began knitting, the general shopping experience has been a formless and chaotic thing. I wander into a yarn shop, look at the bewildering array of yarns needles books and tools and let it sort of wash over me. Sometimes something would swim up to my notice out of the deep, other times some yarn or useful tool would leap out and assault me until I had to purchase it just to regain some inner peace. Then there's the stash, the ever-growing stash. It speaks to me. It forces me to bring home more yarn for it. It is hungry.

{Begin Digression}
In Kitchen Confidential, author Tony Bourdain names the bread starter at one of his kitchens "The Bitch" based on both it's requirements and the difficulty of dealing with it. For those of you who don't know much about baking, starter must be "fed" regularly by adding small amounts of fresh ingredients to it, mostly to feed the yeasts and keep it risable and useful. "Feeding the Bitch" was the way he referred to the daily difficult task of dealing with the starter. Well, this is like unto my stash now, it demands feeding with new yarn in a way that makes me think I should name it soon. And although one could possibly more accurately compare it to Audrey II in Little Shop of Horrors, it will more than likely be known and referred to hereafter as The Bitch.
{End Digression}

So today I name the stash. This is not, however, where our story began. It began when I realized a very specific item was needed for a specific task, and with intent and focus I went shopping, found just the thing, bought it and only it, and came home, mission accomplished. Let me tell you, people, it was awesome.


I dared to enter the testosterone-laden halls of the temple. I moved easily amongst the giants of NASCAR fandom, Budweiser imbibement and plaid flannel. I strolled confidently past the giant stuffed mooses near the hunting and meat processing section and through the maze of clothing that was made by men, for men and which could only impress other men. And why this heroic (or psychotic) endeavour?

Because I knew that 50# test fishing line would make the best material for lifelines for lace knitting. And it does.


HA! Today is a day of greatness. Today I name myself as I never thought I would, and I never hoped I could.
And because I can hardly deny a project I am actually showing you pictures of, and also because now that I'm a bad-ass knitter I don't care if you all know, I can also admit that I joined this:

Now, for a well deserved beer.

Not your typical turbos

Most people seem to agree that the most frustrating feature of a set of addis are the blunt tips. It wasn't really a problem for me till I tried playing with lace. I found that while I got the best tips for all the crazy lace manuevers with Bryspuns, I don't like the weightless feel of the plastic and how it grips the stitches. Knitting Durrow with addis I fell in love with the slip and the speed and the feel of the heavy(ish), smooth needles, but the blunt ends were no end of grief for regular stitches, much less k2tog. So I sent a pair of potentially expendable addis with my husband to work. He's a metalworker, and, well, they ain't blunt no more. Not only could you really put someone's eye out with these, you could probably perform eye surgery with them. Me likee.

Now, someone has had to have done this before, but I haven't seen it. Oh, and it works like a charm; it works like a mofo. I don't know how long they will last this way now that the brass is exposed, but I intend to find out. And possibly eliminate my need for glasses and contacts if I'm not careful.

Meanwhile, on the frog or finish front, it just ain't gonna happen by the end of February. I have decided that while I have made lots of progress by assigning a deadline, it wasn't a very good one. Hey, this is the first time I'm doing this, so even committing to a finishing date is a learning experience. I have decided to join Got Gauge in recognizing the Ides of March as my final date. This would not include objects that might be in a "bag of denial" even if there were such a thing. I think two more weeks will give me just enough time.

Finally, I'm learning about blogs too. I have made a few modifications as I learn about html stuff, and hopefully I will resist the urge to overmodify and keep it pretty tasteful. Let me know if my blog starts looking like it got hacked by a 12 year old boy.