Knitasha von Stashenskeins

Crunch Time

The period of procrastination is now over and the cleaning has begun. Ugh.

Yesterday I tackled my bedroom and bathroom. I removed several layers of debris from the top of my dresser, put away piles of books and clothes, took yarn and needles and magazines up to my craft room and then gave everything a long overdue dusting. No wonder I wake up with a stuffy nose every morning!

The bathroom was dusty too, especially all around our giant unused tub.

Neither DH or I are bath people, so this tub never gets used. The only time I get in it is when I'm cleaning so I can reach all the tiles around it. Then I have to rinse my dusty footprints out of the tub. Scrubbing it is scary because I have to perch on the edge and lean waaaaay in to reach the bottom. Haven't tumbled in yet but I'm sure my day will come.

Today I will tackle the guest room and bathroom and then rope it off like a crime scene to keep M out of it. Trashing her own room and bathroom is never enough for her; she likes the guest room for chaos overflow. Not this time! It is going to take me all weekend to get this house clean and I'm not doing any of it twice.

The one room that is uncharacteristically clean is my craft room. My recent reorganization blitz has not worn off yet. All I will need to do is put away a little sewing stuff and run the vacuum.

I just lost some of the hard-won space that my cleaning created to a new spinning wheel. Well, an old-but-new-to-me spinning wheel. My father-in-law is a big collector and is always prowling estate sales and thrift stores. He spotted this wheel somewhere and decided I needed it. DH was in Maryland last weekend and he hauled it home for me.




Pretty, right? It seems to be in good shape. I will need to replace the driveband and rig up a new scotch tension band, but otherwise it is intact.




Empty hole where peg for tension should go.

I don't know what brand it is - there are no markings anywhere. I am going to post a picture on Ravelry and see if anyone has a clue. There is an oval mark that could have originally been a label.




It only came with one bobbin, but I can probably hunt down some replacements if I can figure out the manufacturer.




Of course, I needed a new spinning wheel like I need a hole in my head. This one is number four, which is truly ridiculous for someone who spins as infrequently as I do. I really should thin the herd and sell my Fidelis wheel to someone who would appreciate it. One of these days I will take some pictures of it and post it on the Spinner's Marketplace. Or just put the word out at Yarn Cravin'. There is probably a local knitter just itching to get a wheel. I could make her happy and save myself the trouble of packing and shipping.

I took a couple more pictures of the blocked Multnomah shawl. Now it is draped over a dining room chair, gazing at me reproachfully every time I walk by. Maybe get it mailed tomorrow? A trip to the post office isn't a great excuse to take a break from cleaning, but I will take any excuse I can get!



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Whoosh!

That's what May is doing - whooshing by. One week from now my parents arrive, two days later M's birthday, and then on June 3rd we all head off to Montreal for the graduation extravaganza.

All this would be fine and dandy except the house is an absolute disaster and I don't seem to be making any progress. I have managed to keep up with the laundry since my laundromat trek, but that's about it. Everything needs to be vacuumed or scrubbed, but first I need to remove about seven layers of clutter.

I don't want to be a neat freak but I do wish I liked to clean a little bit. I loathe it. It's nice when the house is all picked up and clean but getting there is so painful. I think part of my problem is I'm really bad at it. Other people seem much more efficient and effective. I can clean for hours and barely make a dent.

We have tried to have a cleaning lady help once a week, but it never works out. The last one was good at cleaning but hopeless at showing up on time. Sometimes she didn't show up at all, but never apologized. I can understand cars breaking down or family drama, but at least call me! Don't show up a week later and pretend nothing happened.

So for now it's all me. My current plan is to procrastinate until it gets ridiculous and then spend 48 hrs miserable and exhausted. (Worked for med school). Who wants to clean when you can craft?

The non-pastel baby blanket has a couple more stripes. I am still loving the pattern and for once I think I bought enough yarn. (Just jinxed myself, right?).

I have also made progress on the graduation present although I still can't show it to you. Couple more weeks.

Yesterday I had the day off and had the itch to sew. I used some eyelet fabric and a tank top to make M a dress.




That's a sash hung over the dress. I offered to tack it onto the waistband but M wants to be able to change belts as the spirit moves her.




Close up of sash so you can see the fabric.




I made the flower from a strip cut off the bottom of the tank. It is actually sewn onto a pin so she can move it around, transplant it to a hat, etc.

My first attempt was a little tight in the waist but it was easy enough to redo. That allowed me to also take a little off the length as well, so now it hits her right above the knees. She seems pleased - we'll know for sure when she wears it!

I have a white t-shirt and some plaid fabric to make a similar dress for me. Perhaps that can be my cleaning procrastination project for tonight!

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Home Again

Before I forget again, thanks to Katie B. for commenting a couple posts ago.
I was bad about blogging until lately, so it is nice to know there is anyone still out there reading!

Our visit in Buffalo was worth it, but we were worn out when we finally got home Sunday night. M had to sit right down and write an English paper, but DH took me out for a quick Mother's Day dinner. Then I managed to get the big basket of clean underwear and socks sorted and folded and called it a night.

L took us to Niagra Falls on Saturday and it was really nice. The weather was perfect and it wasn't too crowded. We had to stay on the American side because M and I didn't have our passports, but it is a great view no matter where you stand.

I am always amazed at the volume of water that goes over the falls. Even though my brain knows that a Great Lake is the source of the Niagra River, I still can't believe the water never runs out. (Probably because I grew up in the desert where "rivers" are dry beds most of the time)

Even though I had just opened late birthday presents Friday night, there were more presents Sunday AM for Mother's Day. I had to take a picture of one because it's KNITTING!




This is a big, soft and smooshy cowl knitted just for me by L's girlfriend J. She is a brand new knitter but had to be off her feet recently after a surgery so she cranked out two of these cowls - one for her mom and one for me. I am quite certain mine is prettier despite never laying eyes on the other one.

Of course, my thanks were sincere and enthusiastic. Old knitters like me are obligated to encourage new knitters and there is nothing better than having a present you made received with excitement. I will also make sure I wear it around her the first chance I get (as long as it is under 70 degrees)

I "had" to start a new project in Buffalo because I couldn't let L see the secret graduation present I'm working on. (She reads the blog from time to time, so I can't let you see it either.) Obviously my recent crochet fixation has not abated.




I am following the pattern for the Watermelon Wave baby blanket but using very un-watermelon and un-baby colors. I am enjoying the pattern and really like how it looks so far. I have added 2 more colors since I took this picture, so I will snap another one soon. Of course, now I want to keep working on it instead of finishing L's present. No worries, my guilty conscience never lets me stray for very long!

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Buffalo!

Arrived safely last night very late. Our departure from Toledo was delayed by my misguided attempt to get all the laundry done before we left. It has been piling up and adding to my guilt/stress.

I gathered it up in hampers and baskets, sorted a bag full of quarters out of the change jar, and lugged it all to the laundromat.

Ten loads! It was ridiculous. By the time I had the last washer started, the first one was finishing. I started loading dryers, and had 8 going at once at one point. Trying to get one dryer-load folded while keeping the others spinning was a lot like juggling chain saws. I used an inordinate amount of hangers and two folding tables, which would have gotten me dirty looks had the laundromat been busy. Thankfully there were just a couple of older women who drifted in to wash one load and drifted out again. Can't imagine having only one load of laundry to do!

By the time I had squeezed the clean clothes back into the car it was time to pick up M. She helped me haul it all back in the house and then we had to pack and load up Kermit. Had hoped to leave town by 3, was actually after 5.

It is 5.5 hours to Buffalo and we stopped for some dinner, so it was about 11:30 when we finally rolled in. Was very happy to see L and get out of the car!

Lindsey had some belated birthday presents for me, including a Kermit pez and a really cool Snow Patrol t-shirt. And this!

That, my friends, is my very own garden gnome! He is so cool. I haven't named him yet, but he will be given a place of prominence in our front flower bed.

We didn't get to sleep until after 2 but we have all managed to get up and showered and dressed and we are thinking about going to see Niagra Falls. M has never seen it and L doesn't remember.

Updates later, but I will leave you with a picture of Miles, my soulmate.




I lub him.

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Can't Slow Down

This week is flying by, but not in a good way. My to-do list just keeps getting longer and I am just running in place.

Things I Am Stressed About:

1) Haven't mailed Mother's Day presents yet

2) Need to balance checkbooks

3) House is disaster and laundry piling up.

4) Teaching weaving class tomorrow and have not prepared

5) Need to schedule board exam

6) Will then have to study and take board exam (gulp!)

7) M's 16th birthday looming

8) L's college graduation looming

9) Visit from parents for #7 and #8 looming. (see also #3)

It does not help that I'm going away for the weekend. L is in Buffalo right now, which is 5.5 hours closer than Montreal, so M and I are driving over to see her. Will be very cool to be with both my girls for Mother's Day, but it means my weekend will be entirely unproductive, so the stress list will only get longer.

I did cross one item off my list. Ding dong the shawl is done!

This is a crummy cell phone picture of it blocking on the dining room floor. I hope to get a better picture before I mail it off. (add another trip to post office to my list)

I am really glad to have this done. Mutnomah is a really nice pattern, but I did not enjoy this yarn. It is Araucania Ruca - the label says it is made from sugar cane. It is very soft and drapes well, but it is very splitty. It wouldn't slide on a bamboo needle at all, so I switched to an Addi which was a little better, but I always felt like I was fighting the yarn. Not a peaceful knitting experience, which is sad because I made it as kind of a prayer shawl for my SIL who is going through chemo. You are supposed to think positive loving thoughts while you make a prayer shawl, but I'm afraid I was mostly thinking "This yarn is such a pain in my @$$!!"

I bought my mom season 1 of Downton Abbey for Mother's Day and I am also sending her two log cabin table mats. I wove these out of dishcloth cotton on a warp I put on during my last weaving class. I find selvedges tricky on log cabin weaving, but they turned out ok. I imagine she might put them on end tables in her little TV room.







Ok, gotta quit blogging and start working. Will try to blog from Buffalo this weekend - there will be cute puppy pix for sure!

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Archeology

I always take the day off on my birthday. I love the idea of a day to spend exactly how I want. Some years I have gone on little road trips to Ann Arbor to shop. (yarn store, bookstore, Whole Foods, Macaroni Grill - bingo! Perfect day!)

This year I decided to stay home and putter. My craft room had passed messy and was rapidly moving toward federal disaster area, so I thought I'd try to impose a little order.

After several hours, I had reached the phase when you have taken everything apart and it is three times as messy as when you started. (not my favorite phase) I had also come to the conclusion that my ratio of plastic bins to yarn/fiber/fabric/etc was very unbalanced.

Thus puttering at home turned to wandering through Walmart and I didn't get back to the mess until this Friday. Armed with additional bins and some giant ziplock bags, I retackled the chaos.

The ziplock bags were for UFO's. I decided if they each had their own bag and were all in the same bin, they might get addressed.

A few of the projects were so old, the yarn so cruddy, or the memories associated so traumatic, that I chose to abandon them. I frogged them if the yarn was worth saving, but a few just got tossed.

Dale Ann from Yarn Cravin' mentioned they will be gathering bits of knitting for a planned yarn bombing, so I set a couple pieces aside for that. Anything I thought had a chance of being finished got its own ziplock bag.

Bits and bobs for yarn bombing

A couple of my UFO's are crochet afghans that wouldn't need much work to finish them. I really should make the effort. But first, I really really REALLY need to finish my sister-in-law's shawl! I think 2 more pattern repeats and I will call it good.

In a box I probably haven't opened since we moved into this house in 2005, I found a truly ancient UFO. Not knitted, not crocheted, but cross-stitched!

I bought the fabric and pattern for this back in med school and almost had it finished when I set it down and wandered away.




All this needs to be done is 1.5 words!

I couldn't find an embroidery hoop, so I picked one up at Jo-Ann's today. Miraculously, the pattern and thread were with the project, so there is nothing standing in my way. I hope those 15 year old creases will iron out!

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No Wheelies!

So, I'm officially a biker babe.

After over 20 years of managing to limit my speed-junkie husband to off-road motorcycling only, he somehow outmaneuvered me and bought a street bike. A "sport cruiser" to be specific, which is a more peppy, less cumbersome touring bike. Looks a lot more crotch-rocket than Goldwing, but does have some on-bike storage, helmet-to-helmet radio system, etc.

In his delusional haze, he is picturing us taking trips all over the USA on this thing. Improbable destinations like Yellowstone and the Pacific Northwest have been mentioned.

23 years of marriage to this man has taught me to not panic when he is throwing out ideas. Most of them never come to fruition, he's just brainstorming. I don't waste time and effort arguing over every crazy idea and save my energy for when he actually takes action.

So, even though I don't intend to ride that motorcycle on anything but a casual day trip, I will bide my time until he actually gets an atlas out and starts looking at motels online. There will be plenty of time to dig my heels in then.

In the meantime, we did take it back and forth to the gym tonight. I was comfortable enough, although I really don't care for the roar of the wind in my ears. I can't see around him without imprudent leaning, so I mostly just put my head down and hope we don't die. I had to keep reminding myself to unclench my teeth and my neck is tired from the big heavy helmet. I wish I was young enough to find it exciting, but after you've worked in an ER, it is hard to turn off the warning sirens in your
head. I'm such an old lady!

Enough of that, who wants to see some knitting? I finally finished the Heather Hoodie Vest, just in time for the weather to get too warm to wear it. That's ok - I love it anyway.

I know I will wear it lots once it gets cold again. I love the color and it fits well. (Other than the hood which is inexplicably enormous. I can't imagine putting the hood up anyway, so it really doesn't matter.)

I give this pattern and the Vintage Chunky I used two thumbs up!

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Alrighty Then!

Ok, so I can post from my phone AND add photos! I am ridiculously pleased.

So I was telling you about the impromptu sidewalk performance of Fiddler on the Roof. Once it was too dark and cold to go on, they announced that anyone with Friday night tickets could show up Saturday night and they would squeeze everyone in somehow. Or we could contact the school for a refund.

Well, I don't intend to ask for a refund. Those kids performed under very crazy circumstances. There is no way I could say I didn't get my money's worth.

It would have been great to go to the Saturday show, but we already had tickets for a concert in Cleveland. Eric Hutchinson, one of my favorite singer-songwriters gave a concert at a funky little ballroom and we were second row!

He's touring to support his 2nd album which I love, but he also played lots of songs from his first album which I totally adore and still play all the time. His backing band was great, his stage patter was hilarious, and a good time was had by all.

We had to drive home right after so M wouldn't be home alone all night. We didn't get to bed until almost two, which is a very late night for a non-party animal like me. I was glad to have Sunday to sleep in and recover.

My current knitting project is a Multnomah shawl for my sister-in-law. She has stage IV breast cancer and is in the middle of a chemo protocol from hell. She lives in the Pacific Northwest, so I am unable to be any help whatsoever. The best I can do is to knit her a hug to wear.

A lace shawl partially knitted and bunched up on a circular needle does not make for pretty blog pictures. Instead I will show you a recent FO. I made a brief foray into crochet.

This African Flower Mandala caught my eye recently. I first saw it on a blog called Crochet With Raymond. She had adapted the pattern to make a hot pad and was kind enough to post her notes so I could duplicate it.

I just used bits and bobs of dishcloth cotton. After you crochet the flower circle, you crochet a plain double crochet circle the same size and then crochet the edges together to make a nice thick pad. I added on a little scallop border for panache.

Of course, these colors do not match my kitchen or that of anyone else I know. I think I will send it to my mother-in-law for Mother's Day. She is not particular about matching decor and is totally a non-crafter so she thinks anything I make is little short of magic.

The truth is that the pattern is easy and fun and I crocheted it in an evening. No magic required!

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Test Part II

Ok - that posted just fine. Now I need to see if I can get a picture in.

I found myself in an odd position last Monday. M needed a dark apron for her Fiddler costume, so I bought some fabric and sewed one. No pattern, just winging it. Basically a rectangle with some waist gathers sewn onto a sash.

I was just finishing it and feeling pretty successful when M announced she had a second project for me. For extra credit on her science class, she needed me to make her a mole!

She had a Xeroxed pattern she brought home, which was good. I would have no idea how to improvise a mole! I cut out the pattern pieces and then rummaged in my little fleece stash.

Past experience has taught me that my sewing machine and fleece don't get along, so I hand- stitched it instead. The felt nose and paws got glued on because it was getting late.

This is the underside view - makes it look like road kill. M chose the colors.





Here he is upright. He's an odd little thing but kind of cute. M got her extra credit and now we have a mole. He was actually quick and easy enough to make me think I should find some more fleece critter patterns. They would make good presents for little people.

A post with 2 pictures - stay tuned sports fans!

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This Is A Test

Big week at Chez Knitasha. I had my birthday on Wednesday and DH and M got me an iPhone!

I had been using a very rickety Blackberry that was only holding charge for 10-12 hrs, so my new phone seems crazy luxurious. I also can't get over the big screen.

I've had an iTouch for a couple years, so I didn't have much to acclimate to, only the phone features are new to me. I will have to put all my contacts in by hand - the Verizon people weren't able to move them over. First world problems!

M has been crazy busy the last two weeks with daily musical rehearsals. They presented Fiddler on the Roof on Thurs, Fri, and Sat nights. She was not getting home until at least nine and performance nights it was eleven, so she is behind on homework and sleep! Hopefully she will get back on track now.

We had tickets for the Friday night show and then disaster struck! The power at the school went out. We hung around for a while hoping it would come back on. When it didn't, the crazy director dragged the piano out onto the front sidewalk and the kids performed about half the show right there while we watched from the parking lot. It was very surreal but also kind of cool.

Ok this post is to be continued- I just want to see if I can post from my phone. Later, gators!


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