Christmas Stocking = DONE

Woo-hoo! I finished the Christmas stocking (originally meant to be finished last Christmas - so I got a little side-tracked...). Embroidery and all, even after I messed up their anniversary date twice. Oops. Now I just have to finish my shawl (for me ) and then I can start the girls' Christmas stockings. I can't screw this up because their first Christmas is this year!!

Current book-in-progress: Diane Setterfield's The Thirteenth Tale.
Current knitted item: Christmas stocking is done...now to finish the shawl.

Afghan = DONE

Finished the afghan last night - just need to weave the remaining ends in a block it a bit. Single crochet edges roll a bit I've noticed (not like stockinette). Yay to the Hawks for winning and having a bad first half so I could be irritated and crochet like mad.

Now I'm on to finishing the Christmas stocking.

Current book-in-progress: Diane Setterfield's first novel The Thirteenth Tale. The manuscript started a bidding war in the publishing industry. I was hooked after I read an excerpt so I had to buy it. Setterfield used to teach French Literature and is a devotee of Andre Gide - it's an honest-to-God piece of literary fiction. Check it out on the BN website - it's the first book in BN's new "Recommends" program. http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?ISBN=0743298020&z=y&cds2Pid=9481

Current knitted item: The Christmas stocking. I think once I finish the embroidery I'm going to single crochet the seam since I hate sewing seams more than I hate doing embroidery.

4 more inches

Wednesday evening has turned into watch-Project-Runway-and-crochet-like-mad night trying to get that afghan finished. I did that the last two weeks meaning the afghan grew by about a foot. Only got about four inches tonight because I got really involved in the new episode (the hated Angela was back, thank God Jeffrey's still in) and crocheted a boo-boo into it so I had to frog two rows. Yar. Bad news is that next week's episode is the last before the reunion show and then the finale. Better crochet fast. It doesn't travel very easily anymore since it's about five feet long and takes up the entirety of an Ann Taylor LOFT shopping bag - the really big one. Maybe I should crochet during the football game; it might help keep me from having a nervous breakdown during the Iowa-Iowa State game. Go Hawks!

I was really excited today because I got an email telling me the new issue of Knitty (http://www.knitty.com) was published. Yay! It even has a really cool article about how to knit two socks at the same time - on the same needles. I think I'm a little too ADD for that yet.

Current book-in-progress: Dunno. I guess back to Les Liaisons Dangereuses since I finished Oroonoko in a marathon session today before class. I have reading ADD, too, if no one's noticed.
Current knitted item: The afghan is safely tucked away in the closet (cat-proof) so I'm back to finishing the sock. I've got about half the ends from the intarsia section tucked in and I'm up to the "+" in the embroidery. Go me.

I hate Mondays.

Here's why:
1. Forgot to set the alarm. Woke up really late.
2. After ballet, some girl from one of the other classes passed out (or something, I didn't witness this) so the entire building was one huge clusterf*ck with campus police, firemen, and paramedics. None of the emergency services workers were cute.
3. Forgot my lunch (again) and had to spend money I don't have (again).
4. Had a chiropractor appointment (yay!), but the one joint that's been bothering me didn't want to co-operate and re-align itself (boo!!).
5. Got back to work and wound up getting nothing done because I got a phone call regarding parking at the AXS house. I ended up by giving up my parking space for the next two weeks or so because I am a good person and I remember what the First Object says.
6. Went to my Restoration Lit class. Found out that I read the wrong assignment. I read next Monday's assignment instead. Sh*t.
7. Returned to work. By this point I'm pissed and can't get any work done period.
8. Went to the AXS house to help with tutoring. Had lots of good talk with Ani because no one showed up (besides Rachel and Tina, who came to help tutor but wound up needed help with their Pchem II homework). Just wait until next week - they'll get their first exam back and all the freshmen go "Aw, crap." But I pretty much didn't get doodle done today.
9. Didn't get any time to knit.
10. Forgot to go to the grocery store (again).

Current book-in-progress: Aphra Behn's play The Rover, to be followed shortly by her novella Oroonoko, or The Royal Slave so I can participate in the discussion on Wednesday
Current knitted item: Whatever is in the knitting bag - I think it's the Christmas stocking.

So I like yarn....so what?

Well, the real deal is that I have knitting-ADD. I can't seem to get anything finished. I even have crochet-ADD - evidenced by the blanket I started a year ago for my brother and sister-in-law and it's still not done; the dratted thing even uses really fat yarn and a HUGE hook. It's still only about 3/4 done (I'm starting to run out of yarn, so I'll finish eventually); it was supposed to be last year's Christmas present. As was their Christmas stocking, to match all the ones my Grandma made for us. I blame the unfinished stocking on my term paper last Christmas for taking up my knitting time....then. I still haven't finished the embroidery (which is just "Chris + Kris June 4 2005) because I can't sew the backseam until I finish the embroidery.

So this is why I think I have knitting-ADD: I like new yarn. I keep adding yarn to my stash - last spring when I bought yarn for my then-unborn nieces' booties I bought 10 skiens of beautiful Cascade 220 in emerald green for a shawl (it's a pretty shawl, but it takes forever to knit one row by the time you're halfway into the pattern). Went to buy yarn for my nieces' sun hats and also came home with some pretty variegated cotton yarn. Not sure what I'm going to do with that. Went to UCLA for a conference, tracked down the nearest yarn store (http://www.knitcafe.com/), and bought yarn there. Not sure what I'm going to do with that, either (more cotton yarn in blue and yellow, chrome yellow handspun from Uruguay, and two skeins of Prussian blue laceweight; it's all Fraternity colors so I'll think of something). It's pretty, tho.

But I really need to finish things. Ack. My UFO's (Un-Finished Objects) include the aforementioned Christmas stocking and blanket, the shawl, a pair of socks (I'm braving sock knitting, mostly so when the washer eats one sock I can just make another instead of buying a whole pair - we'll see how it goes), a pair of hand warmers in this blue/green/black variegated yarn from Noro, three scarves (two knitted, one crochet), two teddy-bears (uglier than sin - bad pattern) for the nieces, and winter hats for the nieces. The hats are not quite started, but yarn and patterns have been appropriated for them, so I consider them UFO's. And I still need to make and FINISH Christmas stockings for the girls. Ai-yi-yi.

In other knitting-related news, I have a gorgeous knitting bag courtesy of Jordana Paige (http://www.jordanapaige.com/knittingbag.html) because I'm a bag slut. It's in a beautiful ocean blue. I love it. And it holds tons of knitting-related crap along with my obligatory book. To borrow from Charles Schultz, "Happiness is a knitting bag filled with pretty yarn and patterns."

Current book-in-progress: Les Liaisons Dangereuses by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos (or if I feel like doing school-work, Aphra Behn's play The Rover)
Current knitted item: alternately staring at the Christmas stocking (down to the un-fun embroidery and seaming) and the shawl (which has a pretty pattern and is still fun knitting)

One more for the road

Since my friends have blogs on all the different sites (LJ, Xanga, and Blogspot), it's just easier if I have a blog started on each one :)

So here I am....one book-loving, geeky, aging ballet dancer who likes to knit. I'm thinking I might reserve this one to write about all the books I read. Or knitting-related disasters a la Stephanie Pearl-McPhee (http://www.yarnharlot.ca/blog/). Who knows.