midgeling: life in a shoe.

I meant to post this back on May 22. Obviously, I didin't get to it. Life has been insane with trying to finish up the move, get kids registered at the proper schools for next year and people getting sick.

I am going to be going to a cousin's wedding on June 28th, and I need something decent to wear. So I am knitting the Sapphire Wrap by Melissa Wehrle.

So I happened to do my shopping while the 2008 LYS Tour was going on. While at Renaissance Yarns I spent more than $25, so I got the lovely free tote bag you see in the photo. I am doing the pattern in the same color, but not the same yarn. The pattern yarn used is cashmere, which just isn't in my budget. I am using Louet MerLin (merino/linen), which isn't cheap either, but it isn't as much as cashmere.

I have one sleeve plus most of the second sleeve completed so far. I sure hope I will get it done in time. I am also hoping that the computer gets brought over to the new house soon. Until then, I still have to come over here to the old house to work and use the computer. Blech.

I hope everyone has a great weekend, and I hope to catch up with you all soon.

Posted by midgeling at 05:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I finished my January Girl socks from the Zen String Sock Club. It was knit with Zen String Harmony DK (merino/tencel). The pattern was very nicely written and it turned out lovely. Angelina dyes up some truly wonderful yarn. I can't speak highly enough about her.

Detail of lace pattern.

It took my a lot longer to finish than I would have liked, but with my back so messed up, my left hand is still partially numb, and I still have problems with pain in my left arm. So I could only knit about 15 minutes at a time for most of the sock, and the last few days I was able to knit for over a half hour at a time with no real probems. I have been seeing a chiropractor and my regular doctor for a month now. This week I went from 3 visits to two visits per week to the chiro. I'd say the pain is about 70% better, but unfortunately the numbness hasn't gone yet. I am still spending a lot of quality time with my ice packs these days, lol.

I haven't been online as much as I like lately. I am behing on reading my favorite blogs since I don't really like to be sitting in my desk chair any more than I really have to. But since things are getting better, I think I will probably be getting back to normal. Oh, yeah. My doc is making me get an EMG to see exactly how much nerve blockage I have got going on. One of the things that drives me nuts is that my typing sucks even worse now. With my left hand numb, it types slower than the right. So I am constantly misspelling things, with all the letters typed by my right hand in the beginning of the word and the left handed letters showing up toward the end. My brain sends the signals like normal, but my left hand executes things much more slowly, and with the numbness, it isn't always apparent that my left hand is lagging behind. It drives me nuts. But things are getting better!

Posted by midgeling at 10:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

And here's the lovely Lexa showing off her best friend Buddy and my birthday present from Weebug. It is Knitting Lace Triangles by Evelyn Clark. (Evelyn is such a nice lady. I remember years ago she sat near me in Margaret Stove's lace knitting class that we took at the Bellevue Fire station.)

I love the book, and of course I want to abandon all that I am knitting and start a new lace shawl for myself.

Oooh, and I got a $100 bill from one of my grandmas. Weebug thinks I need to buy a new Bosworth spindle. She may be on to something!

Posted by midgeling at 01:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tatchat list moderation...

I started that sentence a couple of times and didn't know how to phrase it nicely. So I decided that I wouldn't say anything at all.

Okay, maybe this will do....

The Tatchat email list is now acception members-only posts in plain text.

Consider yourslef notified.

Posted by midgeling at 07:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I am cursed. Or stupid. Something like that. Probably a little of both.

Last Saturday the Shuttle Brothers were at the Lacemakers of Puget Sound meeting. It was fun and those guys are so fun!

I bought their Self Closing Mock Ring book. I also bought Tatting for Pleasure by Rosemarie Peel and Tatted Animals by Inga Madsen. Oh, yeah. And a couple of plastic shuttles. You can never have too many cheap plastic shuttles.

Ok, so I start on a pair of beaded earring's out of Rosemarie's book. First go-around ends badly. I start tatting off the wrong shuttle because I am not paying enough attention. So my earrings won't have any stupid beads! I figure it is only a waste of a few feet of thread, so I start over.

What next? I space out and put the beads on the core thread, not the picot thread of the ring. Looks like crap so I give up. I figure I am not in a good frame of mind, but really in the mood for tatting, so I will just tat a few GR-8 Butterflies. Wrong. I forget a picot and a few DSs, so my butterfly is all malformed. How lame am I?

Posted by midgeling at 07:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I went to a Lacemakers of Puget Sound meeting on Saturday. I had fun. Pat Sevens taught a couple of mini classes on strip lace knitting to go around a Christmas ball ornament.

She also gave directions on how to turn 3 tatted stars (6 or 8 point motifs) into a 3D ornament. It was fun! I had no kids with me and got to talk with a couple of people I hadn't seen in a while, Like Lauren Snyder.

I bought some stuff, too! I got 2 tatting books, one by Lynn Morton and the other by Samantha Melnychuk. I also bought 2 balls of thread for some Christmas tatting/lace knitting and a thingy from Lauren - crochet hook cut in half and stuck on a beaded chain with a loop on the end to hold on your thumb. It works great.

After the meeting, Marti and I went to Charlynn's house to check out some scrapbooking stuff. I didn't do anything. I just hung out and watched everyone else and bought some stuff to update the kid's baby books with. Marti and all the kids had dinner at my house. Marti+Midgeling+Guinness=Sleepover! :-)

Wed is the Seattle Knitter's Guild meeting. I am hopeing to have my Round Trip sweater done by then. It doesn't look any different than the last pic I posted. *sigh* I better get miovign on that tonight.

Posted by midgeling at 01:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I need to get pictures of my latest projects. Saturday I went to my Lacemakers of Puget Sound meeting and decided to teach myself Needlelace. I like it quite a bit so far, and I am anxious to see the finished product. I am using the book Starting Zele Lace by Agnes Stevens and Ivy Richardson. One of the other needlelace books I have is Needlelace and Stumpwork by Loretta Holzberger. Loretta is one of the Lacemakers of Puget Sound members. A couple of years ago she taught a class on needlelace. She does the most beautiful work! Butterflies, flowers, a lily pad - they are all beautiful.

Posted by midgeling at 10:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)