Shawl for grandma finished

Here are the pictures of the shawl I knitted for my grandmother. It's the swallowtail shawl from Interweave. I believe you can purchase the pattern through their website.

Miss Kalendar has been knitting a bit

There will be a longer post later, but I wanted to pop and say that I finished a shawl and a pair of knucks, both of which I am very happy with. I am in the middle of the frankensocks, and just a few pieces from being ready to sew the baby sweater together.

Never doubt the power of Star Trek movies to help the knitting mojo along!

Monogamy in Knittin? How disgusting!

I've somehow managed to become a fairly monogamous knitter in the past month. This is good and bad. While it means that I finished my grandmother's shawl (a congratulations on kicking cancer's butt again gift) and it is out blocking, and also have already almost managed a recycled sari silk market bag for an SOs's mom, it means that the project not currently foremost (the baby sweater) has moved only incrementally closer to completion. I know that the issue with this is that I don't like the yarn. But as this is the correct type of yarn (aka, not going to trip the baby's allergies and is machine washable and drier-safe), I need to stop winching and just get going. I believe there are three pieces to the sweater and I am almost done with the 1st, which leaves me 2 smaller pieces and some finishing only. My goal is to have it done by the end of the month, so long as work doesn't eat me first.

Then, I get to focus full time on the frankensocks. I am in love with them - so it's only fitting that I am making them for someone very cool. This guy seems to appreciate knit gifts, so I won't be as crabby making the largest size and going on forever because he is endowed with large feet as I could be.

In other news, Miss Kalendar got a brand new car. I'll have to go take a picture of her so I can put it up on here. She's GORGEOUS. I am in love with my car - but I'm pretty sure that's a normal American thing to do.

~ Miss K

Miss Kalendar Likes to Dress Up

Cosplay, Re-enacting, and Dressing up in general are all parts of my life. One of the things I like best is to get into costume and then go somewhere mundane. I like that people stare and I like to think that they may get inspired to dress up as well. Once, at a Burger King after Dickens Fair, in my full Christmas Victorian, a little girl was staring at me. In a whisper, not moving her eyes from my dress, she asked her mother, "Is she a princess?" I loved that moment. I love feeling like I'm showing people, especially children, that dress-up doesn't have to end just because you grew up. That you can be who you want and wear what you want in your free time. Granted, I can't dress up this way at work, but that's why they pay me to go there, not the other way around.

So, here are some pictures of my friends and I going to the Scarlet Pimpernel Ball (I know I must have just misspelled that......) Miss Kalendar is in the cream flowered dress, they man is in pirates, and the fiend is in red.

Miss Kalendar takes up Spinning

So......I have been wanting a spinning wheel for a long time. I have browsed craig's list for one for months, and have practiced my drop spindling for about 2 years. Drop spindles are great for re-enacting because they are period (for some of what I re-enact) and because they are portable. With a background in knitting and drop spinning, I determined that I should get a wheel if I could find one at a decent price. It would save me money in the long term because I would buy my knitting supplies in roving form, spin to yarn, and then knit. Thus, I would be adding in an extra step of entertainment for my money - and I was sure that the roving would cost less than the completed yarn, giving me a way to effectively 'work-off' the cost of the wheel. And if this went well, I could try getting raw fleeces or non-dyed roving and process or dye it myself. This may sound very silly to the more experienced spinners, who will assume that I don't know what I am getting myself into, but I have spinning friends with whom I have debated the merits and flaws, and I am the sort of person who follows through.

Well, I did find a wheel at a decent price - an Ashford Traditional, already built, stained a lovely warm color, and the proceeds went to a weaving website much like Ravelery. How could I say no? I'd already decided that my first, and maybe only wheel would be an Ashford and had read up on the wheel and spinning on them. I purchased the wheel and brought her home. Then, a friend gave me some roving out of her stash (and some locks, and some cotton, and some linen), and I begun. I will admit, I spun several singles together, working on tension and evenness, and then ruined the whole lot by plying them together backward. I ended up with the dog's breakfast....and only made it worse when I tried to re=ply them the correct way. This is why I began with my lowest quality, oldest roving, from when I was just learning on my drop spindle. I haven't had a chance to finish enough singles to ply again yet, but I'm hoping that I will now that I have finished and submitted my knitting masters level 1.

~ Miss Kalendar

Miss Kalendar goes to Stitches West!

Well, it's official, I am a yarn nerd. This year, I finally made it to Stitches West. I'd only heard of it last year and then, only after it had come and gone. This was a huge disappointment, and one that would have been repeated this year if one of my friends hadn't booked it on my calendar for me. Stitches was a few days after I returned from my Florida/NC trip, and there is no way I would have remembered through the haze of catching up at work and at home (and dealing with the ending paperwork and mechanic stuff from my accident in December), if she hadn't been sure to remind me of it.

So, these pictures, in no particular order, are my friends and I at stitches. I won't be using names as I'm not sure what they want to be called. Needles to say, there were no cameras allowed inside, so the countless times I smooshed my face into yarn will live on only in the memories of those present. (Which is good since it's sort of yarn-perv habit). The haul was pretty good. I purchased a bag of sari silk yarn, 10 small skiens, on the way cheap, some gorgeous wool/silk fibre, and a device to hold the yarn from my wrist for walking and knitting. I was very careful with my purchases.....but that was mostly due to the restraining influences of my friends rather than any tendency for restraint on my part.

The last thing I bought was a Navajo Spindle. It was the largest one I had seen at the convention. I then walked around flaunting it in an attempt to inspire "Spindle Envy." I don't yet know how to use it, but I intend to learn. Besides, if I am still re-enacting the Rennaisance, it makes a hilarious prop as an overgrown drop-spindle.

One of the best things about Stitches West was that I met the Knitmore Girls, our local San Jose area podcasters. They were just as charming in person as their podcast. I very much enjoyed talking to them.

Needless to say, I can't wait to go next year and see another room full of yarn and fibre and my kind of people.

- Miss Kalendar

Miss Kalendar is homeward bound and what she knitted on the trip

The two flights home from North Carolina took all day, literally, even though I had to run through the airport to make my connecting flight and, thus, didn't manage to get anything to eat (note the deathly pallor). This post features pictures from the airport and what I knitted while on my trip. I'm in the Lime and Violet sock marathon 2009 in Ravelry, and this trip allowed me to double my goal and knit two pairs of socks in one month. Good thing, since I don't know if my job and upcoming podcast ambition will allow me to keep up with the marathon over the next few months.

The completed items are the Kew socks from Knitty.com and the Whisper Lace Socks that were available on Ravelry. The Whisper Lace Socks had a picot cuff with a construction that I'd never seen before. Ingenious picot! I very much enjoyed making both pairs of socks. The Kew have a great leafy lace that is just charming, and the Whisper Lace socks have a darling eyelet back, which is nice and stretchy in order to hug the ankle and widen over the calf.

Miss Kalendar's Trip to North Carolina

After Florida, Miss Kalendar went to North Carolina to visit some of her favorite people. Obviously, one of these people is very photogenic.......and very adorable.

Those bright blue eyes and little smile, could you just die? Miss K had a lovely time playing with the baby, and has a baby-sweater on the needles because of this trip.

(And I just couldn't resis the cute little shower-smiley picture. Do all babies love bath time this much?

Miss Kalendar's Trip to Florida

Hello Everyone. Normally, I try to post things around when t hey happen, but I've been busy at work and then I lost my camera with all of the pictures in it. Luckily, the camera has been found. Not so luckily, I am home sick with the flu (again). But this does afford me the ability to catch up on my posts - and it's a good thing, too, because a lot has happened. First, my trip to Florida to visit my grandparents. Grandma just got out of surgery, and my mother and I went to help.

Featured at right are the daily Plate 'O Fruit that Grandfather takes an hour or more each morning to cut. Every person is required to eat their share.

Next is his Portrait of Che. This explains so much about the old man.....

Lastly, a picture of the patriarch, himself, pretending to have a heart attack over the price of red peppers at the grocery store.

Miss Kalendar's Knitting Masters swatches are done.

Here you go - all of my swatches for my Knitting Masters Level 1. The first 15 (without #12) are shown on the blocking board. I am a blocking novice, so we'll see how this blocking turns out. I've still got all of the swatches on the board since I'm afraid to take them off.




Also featured in this post is something I've deemed the "ugly Charlie Brown hat" because, sweet God in heaven, would you look at it?




Anyway, here we are.....swatches all knitted, ends hidden, mostly all blocked.....Wow, am I really going to finish this? What scares me is not the questions I've still to answer or the essay I have to write - it's thinking about someone looking at and judging my swatches and possibly finding them too poor to pass. I've always been more or less the best knitter I know - so the idea that someone can tell me that I'm not good enough at this or that technique is upsetting.....especially if it means any re-knits. I guess I'll just have to wait and see.



All of these are knit in cascade 220 except the yellow, which is lionbrand wool. The blue I bought for the masters - the brown and yellow were in my teaching box (or scrap box, whatever you want to call it.)



I'm sort of excited about what the level 2 will want from me. So, I guess if I pass level 1, I will go ahead and order level 2. We'll see how that goes.



Also, the limenviolet sock marathon 09 starts on Feb 1st, and I am signed up with a modest goal of a pair a month or a pair of knee socks every two months. This may seem like a really small goal, but I only have 3 miles of sock yarn, so I don't really have enough to knit more socks than that.

Miss Kalendar goes on a finishing spree

So, here we see some of my most recent projects. There is a scarf for my hairdresser, some nautilis toys for my best-friend's daughter, a pair of thickwoodsman socks for my boyfriend, a pair of monkey socks for myself, and a button-up shrug that moves from a shrug to a stole.



I've always been a rectangular shawl/stole sort of girl, I don't generally like the triangular or pie shawl. But I am thinking of making an exception and trying out some EZ pie-shawl patterns or a pharosee shawl.....or even one of the nice not rectangular shawls from Victorian Knitting.



There is also a picture of Miss K, herself, looking partially maniacal as I contemplate more of my finishing. And because I was in the mood to get things off the needles....


I picked up the knitting masters level 1 again and actually tried my hand at blocking the 15 swatches that I'd knitted. I only have one more swatch and a hat to knit - and then some questions to answer and a short research essay to write. About now is when my SOs began asking me why I was doing this and why I was paying for the priveledge. My only reply is that I want to know that I could do it and I wanted to learn more about knitting. I feel like there are holes in my knowledge, and I want to fix them. I figured this would be a pretty comprehensive way to do that. Besides, if I am teaching knitting workshops and steampunk knitting groups, etc., I should have the skills and certification to back up my teaching. It's like knit-teaching street cred - beyond my ravelry projects and patterns.

So, enjoy the pictures. There will be pictures of the dreaded blocking soon!

Oh SNAP!!

The flow chart - and the most important part of the flow chart, as demonstrated by a rather ill-feeling corporate automaton.

More recent knitting pictures

My two recent projects: a branching out scarf from Knitty.com and a viney looking scarf of my own devising.