Brain Chimney

Double, double toil and trouble...

Double, double toil and trouble;

Fire burn, and caldron bubble.

Yesterday, with the rain tap-tapping on my windows, I pulled out the dyes and dye pot with the intent to ready some Koigu KPM (#1050), which I termed to be Day-Glo-Blue for dyeing into a more Holly-appropriate sock color.  Inspired by Socks that Rock Raven Clan's over-dyeing with black, I decided to turn this sock color, "Day-Glo, too obnoxiously-bright for Holly, Blue":

Into this sock color, which I've decided to call "Annabel Lee":

Gorgeous, if I may so myself.  Yes?  Not quite as black--intentionally so--as the STR's Raven Clan Colors, as I fell in love with the stormy teal color that developed from holding back on full-throttle black.  (I used Jacquards Jet Black dye--love it.)

They shall hopefully very happily become Cookie A.'s Hedera Socks:

(Image Credit: Cookie A. from Knitty Spring 2006)

Ah! Kiss-kiss! The French, I love the French!

I am on what my teaching job officially calls "February Break," or as they say in French: "Vacances de février".  Ah!  Kiss-kiss (*imagine me kissing your right and then left cheek*)!  How I love the French and their belief in the importance of vacations.  So très un-American!

Thus, I am sitting down and playing catch up on dreaming about all the things I'd like to knit as well as nearing the finish line on my second Carolina, Queen of Naples, Sock:

So what am I dreaming about knitting?

• The Keri-Russell-Sundance-inspired hat called Felicity, which was wonderfully interpreted by Wannett Clyde of Knitology (and a special thanks to B. for turning my head towards this lovely hat!):

• Some booties (Christine's Stay On Baby Booties) in the leftover Koigu KPPPM (from these socks) for my friend's newborn baby.

• I'd also like to work on over-dyeing some Koigu KPM yarn (#1050) I bought this summer that was advertised as "sky blue" on Ebay, but is just way too bright for my taste--more day-glo-blue than sky blue.  I am thinking of experimenting with black over-dyeing a la Socks That Rock Raven Clan, but with a bit less blackness.

• I also need to block my Fitted Knits puff-sleeve cardigan--which has been finished knit-wise for nearly 6 months now--and sew its buttons on.

• Oh, and I am dreaming of making more socks for myself!  I have at last discovered that hand knit socks are perfect for wearing to work with my gnome shoes (the black nubuck Dansko Giselles)--or as my polite, kind friends say, "Fairy shoes".

Mamoko's First Bath & My Winter Break Plans

I'm sorry--I can't resist posting a picture of little kitten Mamoko getting a bath {Edited to add: This is a picture from when Mamoko was probably about a month old or less!  He was born in at the beginning of September and has grown A LOT since this picture!}.  I got it from his foster parents and I find it too funny and adorable all at once.  And, yes, I realize that I have been quite the crazy cat lady lately.  There just hasn't been much knitting to show since I've been super busy with school.  But school is out and I only have one school-related goal to achieve over the break: my 10-12 page thesis prospectus.  Other than that, I am going to gorge myself on dvds, listening to NPR, and hopefully soon I will finally reach the top of the waiting list (which I've been on since June!) at my local library for the audio book version of Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century.  All of the previously listed things will enable me to knit like a mad knitting woman and act not-so-much like a crazy cat lady.  Yay for that, right?! 

Also on the list of things to do over the winter break--till January 24th, Rock On!

1. Sew up Christmas gifts like a maniac during this week before Christmas.
2. Dye Yarn, YAY!
3. Finish up season one of Veronica Mars--which I've watched chronologically backwards; i.e. season 2 first, then season 1.  Veronica Mars happens to be an amazingly well-done TV show, especially for folks like me who love a good detective story and happened to be a big fan of Nancy Drew.  However, it must be noted that Veronica is is a million times cooler than Nancy and her daddy doesn't always get her a new powder blue convertible each time she wrecks it.
4. Read books for fun--not for school.
5. Breathe.
6. Try to take up the Slrog--that is, running--again.  Sort of fell to the wayside when Cyrano passed accompanied by the increase in cold weather and shorter days.
7. Substitute every single possible day I can during the month of January--without losing my mind or taking to downing shots of vodka (or rather Port or good wine) every day after school!

Insomnia Sucks!

Let me start off by repeating--Insomnia Sucks!  This has been a week and a half of the most entrenched, most unbeatable, most annoying insomnia--and I know insomnia.  This recent bout of insomnia is like a virulent strain of Ebola--eager to wreck havoc and nearlycompletely immune to the strongest of drugs.  One would think that saying "Hello, $7 per pill of Ambien" (as in I have no health insurance) would mean saying "Goodbye Insomnia"--but, no, not in my fracked up world of sleeplessness.   Top that off with a week of wicked sinus pain/problems and what you have is Hades on Earth.

Onwards to the knitting and dyeing content:

This sock is made from yarn I recently handpainted for a secret pal.  When I get a chance, I will post this yarn up for sale at my Etsy shop.  Amazingly it is pretty much self-striping, although that was not intentional--just happenstance! 

The Down-and-Dirty:

• Pattern-Good ol' reliable, super-easy "Starter Stockinette" from Betsy Lee McCarthy's Knit Socks.  Using the women's small-medium size.  Cast on 48 stitches.
• Needles- Susan Bates size 2.  The pattern calls for size 3 needles but the yarn knits up better on size 2.   
• Yarn-My own handpainted yarn.  Any ideas of a name for the color?

Dye-O-Rama-Riffic!

At long last after waiting to no avail for my bum swap buddy to send me her hand-dyed yarn, some wonderful angels for the Dye-O-Rama swap --Noelle of ABQ CraftMafia and Laurie Gator of MooKittyKnitting--came to the rescue and sent me this fun package with gorgeous hand-dyed yarn and goodies:

Included are two lovely skeins of handdyed sock yarn from Laurie Gator, jasmine tea incense, bathtub-friendly* origami, a great plastic tote (striped on one side and see-through on the other so I can see what's in my new knitting tote), a fun postcard with the ABQ CraftMafia, and my prize from the dye-o-rama contest, the sock blocker keychain.

*I'm assuming that the origami is bath-friendly since the "paper" is plastic-y and the elephant and bunny are playing with their origami in the tub.  The instructions are all in Japanese--luckily, there is illustrations for me to follow.

A bit o' Knitting

Not much happening here.  Or maybe a lot.  Depends on which way you look at it.  After having written a 30 page paper after writing a 26 pager, everything else seems sort of wimpy in comparison.  I am in the midst of grading final papers for my prof's class and am dying to be done with this semester.  Tomorrow I'll meet with my prof  in Rockridge (the "gourmet ghetto" of the San Francisco East Bay area) to discuss final grades for the students and drink good coffee at Oliveto's (the downstairs cafe).  Yum.  And hopefully a goat cheese galette.  Yum. 

Friday grades are due.  Saturday I'll meet with my prof and her other TA Gordon for sushi and lots of drinks to celebrate the end of another semester!  Yippee!

I'm eagerly awaiting my order from Prochemical so I can start playing the wicked queen with my poisonous apple yarn in my new big ol' canning pot (also in the mail).

And soon I will feel human enough to actually hang out with other humans.  Esp. B.

In the meantime, I am vegetating while watching movies.  Actually vegetating and knitting while watching movies.  Here's where I am at with my Lorna's Laces Black Purl fingerless gloves:

And here are two pictures of pretty Zoe.  She is really hard to photograph because she is paled out when you use a flash.

Sunday in the park with dye.

In the spirit of brevity due to the extremely fast speed with which time is running out before my paper is due...here's the latest dye jobs:

Ms. Patagonia

And what will most likely go to my dye-o-rama secret pal since she really likes these colors (although I'm not estactic over the colorway, personally):

And the following includes a dark, purpley, greyish, slate-ish yarn that I'll probably use myself since I tend to wear only black socks, charcoal grey socks, or striped socks with black and grey.  By gods, I'm quite boring in the sockwear arena.

And finally, a special shout-out to my secret pal, Jane Doe.  I'll be back in the conversation on Friday most likely.  You are in my thoughts

P.S. According to Sartre, I am currently engaged in an act of mauvaise foi--an act of bad faith, a flight from responsibility.  Yep, that be a good description of my acts of procrastination.  Here is what I should be looking at and being authentically engaged with:

 

Stay Tuned...Back in a few days.

Busy with finishing up my last 20+ page paper for this semester.  I have changed the paper to look at the Sartrean existentialistic (and non-existentialistic) characters in Toni Morrison's Sula and so am having to sort of start over.  But there will be pictures of dyed yarn as soon as the sun comes  out again--I promise.

Hot Weather=Quick Dye Dry Time

I guess one of the good things to say about this unseasonably hot weather (which was preceded by days upon days of rain) is that dyed yarn sure dries fast.  Here are some post-drying pictures of today's dye jobs.  I've named the following one "Costa Rica":

And the following one is called "Minsk":

And finally, "Mykonos":

Dyed Hands

I really need to work on keeping my gloves on during the dyeing process!