Colette's keyhole scarf is finally complete!

So, I finally finished Colette's (Christmas present) scarf.... Only 2 months in the making, but hey, who's counting? ...probably her :-P

I picked the color to match her sunny yellow walls, which unfortunately look a little dark in these pictures in comparison to seeing them in real life. I finished the scarf up this evening while we were watching Kung Foo Panda after a great dinner at Sangra in Somerville. As per usual, we stuffed ourselves and then talked through the movie...

It may sound boring to some but there isn't a time we get together that we don't say, "isn't it great how our friendship hasn't evolved [since high school]?"

2 Projects, 1 Weekend

Woohoo! I was busy this weekend! In between the party, bridal shower and finishing Brian's scarf I also managed to get these done :-D

I don't think I'll ever be this productive again....

The Love Fool

Yeay! I finally finished Brian Valentine's Day present. I'm only a week late, lol... So, I just wanted to post the pic for all to see. I ended up sewing a fleece lining on the back becuase the stockinette stitch that you have to do intarsia charts in really rolls. It basically looks like a giant sausage unless I laid it out carefully on the floor, so after buying about 12 million feet (I might have exagerrated a bit) of black fleece because I didn't know how long the scarf would be, I ended up actually cutting it pretty well down to size.

The funny thing was that the only way I could sew it on was to literally us my crafting hole punch to pre-punch all the holes for the yarn. Why, you ask? ...because the yarn was so thick I couldn't string it through a regular needle, tapestry needles are really blunt and fleece acts like body armor unless poked by something very sharp. So, huzzah for having random craft supplies at home!

our little helper

Recently I have started putting Molly up on the desk when I get home from work becuase she generally hovers around my chair and meows at me as I am going through my usual "I just got home from work" ritual. Within the past week or so, I thought, " why not have her up here on the desk where I can pet her more easily?" I can check my email, look for new patterns, log a little Wow time.... how can this be bad?

Well, today she apparently decided that I needed help playing WoW and jumped right up on my chair and the desk while I was over talking with Brian on a mini gaming break. It was so weird... Strange cat, but we love her soI guess it works out ok in the end ;-D

commuter photography

I got a couple neat pictures of sunrise and sunset today on the way to/from work. I thought I would share to try to make up for my recent lack of posting and try to get my photographer's eye working again. Winter always seems to squelch my photographic creativity somehow.

that moment of... eureka!

Have you ever have that moment when you suddenly say "why the hell didn't I think of that before??!?!?!?" Well, exactly yesterday I thought of a great idea for Brian's Valentine's Day present. And I even gave myself 3 whole days of lead time to get it done too... (lol) So, I found an intarsia chart for the Horde emblem (World of Warcraft reference) on Ravelry and had my "eureka" moment. I would make him a Horde scarf that would match his black and teal winter coat.... brilliant!!

Intarsia is a method of using two or more different colored yarns in one project. I won't get into the details, but if you are interested, wikipedia can give you a general overview of intarsia. I have never done any ting using more than one yarn before. Actually I had unknowingly bought a book on intarsia called Picture Perfect Knits as few months ago just because it had neat projects in it. When I got it home I realized it was most likely a bit over my head. So, I put it aside and figured I would come back to it in a year or so after I had more experience.

Well, apparently I was wrong about that because I picked up the yarn for Brian's scarf and finished my first intarsia chart today. Doesn't it look so cool?

Anyway, so that much was the work of last night and about an hour today. Now all I have to do is knit the main part of the scarf and then do another chart of the emblem on the bottom of the other side which of course mean reading it backwards (that should be fun :-/). So, maybe by the weekend I'll have it done for him. But, I'm pretty proud of my first attempt, even if it is a little messy on the "wrong" side. Oh well, it's hand made, it's supposed to have idiosyncrasies :-D

a tough week

Hi all. I just wanted to put up a little something today. I haven't been posting much this week for a couple of reasons. There hasn't been much of note to talk about, but the other and more important reason I haven't been blogging is becuase a co-worker of mine passed away this week.

Everyone is very sad and just muddling through their jobs. We were fairly close as co-workers go, so I haven't really been able to focus much on things other than putting one foot in front of the other and getting through each day both at work and at home.

Things are getting a little easier... and we are starting to heal a bit. However, I know it will be awhile before things really get back to some degree of normal. At least everyone in the office can understand how each other are feeling and can greive together rather than facing the grief alone. Hopefully my next post will be more cheerful in nature. Until then... take care of yourselves.