And fin...

I found a basket. Finally. I did go to the Ross/TJ Maxx stores seeking one. I gave up and just went to the Container Store, which had them in 4 different colors. It's high enough to keep the yarn from crawling out of it I think. It's perfect to sit on my couch, and should deter the children son from stepping inside of it. It even has a nifty zipper.

My order from Crash Into Ewe came in the mail yesterday I think. It's so pretty. Red and sparkly. I think I'm yarned out now until June.

Now I just need to figure out what I'm going to knit with all this lovely sock yarn.

Lastly, I got to go check out Purls of Wisdom in Parker, CO today. Only because hangs head in shame, they have Flat Feet in stock. This stuff just looks so nifty that I couldn't help it. It also makes me realize that I'm very happy I don't live any closer than I do to this store. This place is *great.* Not only did Jen the owner offer that it is okay to just come over and hang out at the store, but the kids can come too. She has a little TV and VCR set up in the back with kid sized chairs. She also carried dyes for wool and roving. What more can I ask for. Sunbeams? Yup, her store had those too at 10:00 AM. Sold on this store.

Atmosphere: 4 sheep
Smaller without feeling crowded at all. Inviting and the knitting areas are well lit.

Kid friendly: 5 sheep
Jen, the owner, has set up a small area in the back of her store with a TV and VCR with kid-sized chairs.

Product: 4 sheep
Nice selection. Could use a bigger selection of sock yarn, but they carry Flat Feet. I'm not complaining. They also sell roving and dye.

Staff: 5 sheep
Very friendly and willing to assist in any information about the product or project you may be considering.

WTF (willing to frequent): 5 sheep
I've never had a yarn store owner say to me that it's okay just to come by and knit in the store's atmosphere. That was really neat actually.

I'd just like to say...

I hate my oven.

I used to have this wonderful oven in the first place that I owned with my X. It cooked everythig correctly. Since we moved from there I have had little luck.

This oven has no window, no self clean, and it's set too high.

Note the picture to your left. Those are cookies. They look like pancakes. They would be slightly overcooked for pancakes. I think I may stick to the toaster oven. At least I know that works.

Well, they taste okay. Now if I just had milk. (shh...the kids didn't notice either)

On the up side, I received my order from Dreamweaver Yarns.

Oh happy day. I really like these Namaste bags. I have one with a scarf project, one with a sock project, and one with a blanket project.

I'm still not thrilled with the part of this bag where the yarn goes because the fabric used is very stiff and difficult to close. However, the color is wonderful and apparently I'm a sucker. :)

Too bad the picture quality on the second bag is not my best work. Doh.

This bag is pretty cool though. It has 3 sections inside, and little pockets for stuff. And the color is great too.

It's bigger than I expected from the pictures. This bag is actually the same color as the bag above. Hard to tell, gotta love autofocus and being in a hurry.

This past Saturday, Imbrium got married. In efforts to have well behaved children at the wedding I drove my kids all over the place to try and get them to fall asleep in the car. This effort was in vain. They did however rest and take a small nap directly before and on the way to the wedding.

On my effort to have naps occur, I found myself at A Knitted Peace. I suppose if I pick an LYS this one is one of my top 5. Mostly because of Kauni and Koigu, although the Koigu I was hoping for was already sold out.

Atmosphere: 4 sheep
It's comfortable, the staff is friendly, it's in downtown Littleton close to food and benches in the summer.

Kid Friendly: 2 sheep
It does not however cater to distractions for young children. I only include this bit in my reviews because of the fact that there are LYS that have little baskets of toys/books or TVs even. However, the staff is friendly and they don't hover over you if you do happen to bring your children with you, which is why it's at a 2 and not a 1.

Product: 4 sheep
They have a wonderful selection of yarn and a variety of notions. They don't have a very large selection of bags. However, this is fine now that I have plenty of bags to choose from and do not need more unless I clone myself. This is the only place locally that carries Kauni, and they just started carrying other colors besides the EQ (rainbow). I'm thrilled. So thrilled I bought a cone as you can see above. This also is the only store I've been in thus far that carries Koigu however, my sock yarn fetish has only just begun since I think I want to attempt to make this.

Staff: 4 sheep
Very friendly. Always willing to start a conversation with you and never seem bothered if you happen to walk into a conversation. Knowledgable about their products and willing to advise on technique.

Overall: 4 sheep
Mostly because of the staff and especially for the selection of yarn. If you haven't stopped by, you definately should add this to your list.

WTF (willingness to frequent): 5 sheep
This store is great. It's close to the lightrail. They have an awesome selection of Koigu and more colors in Kauni. Their staff is friendly. I always come here.

I spent sometime last week making and measuring (approximately) how much handspun yarn I have created thus far.

Hello, OCD. I actually ended labelling them twice because the first time I didn't include yardage and I had some of the fibers named incorrectly.

Now if I could just figure out what to do with all of this yarn. I've made rough guesses on how many yards each skein holds, so that will help in the project picking.

Lastly, more yarn.

A friend of mine is crocheting a scarf out of this. Two strands...it's very thick, but fuzzy.

I however have been looking for thick chinelle for the stuffed rabbit. This I think is the yarn recommended for the project if I recall, and hey, it was on sale.

I think that attitude is going to make me go broke.

LYS

Why me?

:D

I always find something...something super, and then, well, I find it about 50% cheaper online. Let's just chalk it up to instant gratification. Yes, we'll go with that. I will not be tempted to go and return. Besides, LYS don't usually return well.

Anywho...

I ended up ordering a cranberry knitube and a messenger bag.

Yay

Yay.

This bag is so freakin' cool. I liked the cranberry one in person, but the lining was very stiff and I couldn't get the darn drawstring to close fully. I did try. A lot. Oh well. I like this one too.

Just what I need. Another pointless object. I heart it.

It occurred to me I could probably just use a yoga mat bag, but this is pretty durable. I suppose I could try to make one, but I'm not very talented with any shape other than a square.

I've also never lined a thing in my life. This works much better.

I'm excited.

1) It'll hopefully distribute the weight evenly-ish on my back instead of my side bag or my backpack.

2) You can wear it while knitting.

3) I think it's stylish. I'm telling you, the red one was really really pretty.

Inside is my favorite yarn ;p it's going to be a multidirectional scarf. It's turning out sort of the way I think it should. I think I should make one out of Noro someday.


This was my quick fix to my size 6 needle that my son accidentally stepped on. The project of stealth was partiallyknitted on this as well as my trusty old aluminum needle.

This fix consisted of craft glue (which didn't hold) and nail polish (which did). Quite clever. I'll have to remember that trick, or just settle for knitting needles sold at LYS.

The replacement finally arrived. Much, much sooner than I expected which was great. Although I had already finished the project of stealth.

It'll be ready for next time. I've also acquired some DP out of the harmony wood. Not as fascinating as the circulars, but still neat looking. Shorter than I usually knit with, only 6 inches. I would have preferred the 8 inches. Oh well. This works.

I also picked up some bare wool for my dye experiment. I didn't take pictures of that. I figure the kids and I can take out the crockpot sometime and some food coloring to try it out. I am sold on the whole acid dye thing...but really, studios...outside, vented...away from the house is a good thing.

Anyone interested in the fish tank...

Look!

I have fish!

The bacterial bloom has cleared itself up. No casualties. Woot.

Dear Neighbor...

The post in my LJ is:

Much swearing to follow. Please avoid if you aren't one prone to the taste of swearing.

As much as I like the Eagles...which I don't...I especially don't like being woken up to them blaring through my fucking wall at 11:45 pm.

HATE SHARED WALLS

HATE THIS FUCKING NEIGHBOR

This has been a problem since elephant feet and her kid moved in with their little dog.

Yes, I am the fucking wicked witch of the west. Note to self. Do not live on 1st floor under stupid neighbor.

Bitter. Bitter.

Get this out before I go insane. Please Mr. Sandman fucking whap me in the head.Oh and you know what's super cool. My apartment doesn't...um what's the word? Oh yea, give a flying fuck. Okay whatever. Their courtesy patrol doesn't cover this property anymore. Great.

Note to self. Wake up at 5:00 AM and slam doors, and make children scream. Maybe karma could help me out and thirtysomething, party animal, with child, could wake up with a big hangover or something. Maybe her hand could be glued to her forehead. Maybe her dog will pee in her shoe.

I've already written my complaint to my worthless management company. Again.

I cuss like a sailor. Screw it. I'm tired. I'm cranky. I hate being woken up. The thing that bothers me the most is that I can't figure out if I am a light sleeper or if my neighbor is an ass. Right now I think it's the latter. On the off chance that she's a knitter and surfing the knitting blogs...it's 12:19 am on Wednesday March 5, 2008...please turn it down...

I always thought that when I grew up I was going to party all night and be loud an obnoxious. What I'm finding out is that my party animal ways and opinions are becoming more and more conservative the older I get. I don't know if this is good or bothersome. Frankly, my one brain cell is having enough problems typing in the dark rather than puzzling this out. Oh, how pissed I'm going to be if one of the kids wakes up...try me...

On to a better topic. Yes, so my sleepy brain can go back to happy dreams of Star Trek and yarn. Yay.

I found more Noro sock yarn, in less circus like colors. Yay!

My 4th plastic yarn box is becoming crazily smaller than I thought...rats. Not sure where I'll stash a 5th stash box.

Stupid addiction to randomly buying squooshy yarn. Now...all I need to do it knit some socks up. It amazes me the lack of knitting items I've done, even though I've knitting for about 8 years now. I'm pretty sure I can knit anything, but all I ever seem to knit are scarves and socks for other people.

My current project is the project of stealth. One day I'll post pictures of it, but not today. :)
I bought books.

Another annoying habit of mine. I'm suspecting that if I didn't have this nasty tendancy of picking up books, yarn, card/board games, and kitchen appliances, I might actually buy a house.

Nights like this should remind me of this. Although the one little hang up I have is this overwhelming stress I have from the X over a lousy property owned between us that we just could...wait...that he just lazily dealt with and now is going belly up because of it.

Ever have moments in your life where you are being dragged under because you were too close to the edge of the whirlpool? I'd like off of this ride now. One day...one day...all of the crap I've got to deal with from my divorce will stop.

Right? o_O

I broke my ball winder. I'm not sure when it happened, but one of the little feet snapped off. The worst part is that I think I found it at one point in time and I threw it away because I thought it was part of some toy wandering around the house.

I made a sort of hopeful replacement from Fimo. I tried super glue...to stick it on. I think I need epoxy. Eventually I'll remember this from the hardware store.

It seems a shame to throw the whole thing away for a tiny foot. However, I found that tiny missing foot to be so important.

I finished the Crosspatch fiber batt. I have another one I just started spinning.

The new one has a pretty high silk content and is spinning almost threadlike. I was going to spin it on the Golding spindle I've never used. However, either I've forgotten how to use a drop spindle or at least I'm not sure how to use this one. It would wildly spin, and it annoyed me, so on the wheel it goes.

The spindle seemed as though it was going to be beautifully balanced. Top whorl, but it seems to spin the bottom half wildly...going to try again at a later date.

This batch however, made a lot more yarn than I expected. I'm not sure that I spun it tight enough. That sadly didn't make itself apparent until after I plyed it. 2 ply. Seems sort of wispy here and there.

Now that I've spun other fiber brands than Crosspatch, I'm not sure I'm so excited about it anymore. I enjoy the colors and especially the tubes for some reason, but...

I am going to some how figure a way up to the Estes Park festival this year so I can stock up on some fiber. I've got to remember this this year. Mostly because I don't want to develop a habit of buying fiber online. Way too tempting to do it all the time. :)

Kay...time for bed again I suppose. Pillow over head.

Plague

I hope this isn't an annual occurance, but I seem to recall fighting off illness that turned into walking pnemonia last year at this time. Suck. I hate being sick.


I'm not sure I'm going to need to finish my story. It's mostly for myself I think, I like to beat a dead horse.


I'm pretty happy though. So, perhaps it's just the inability to understand happiness.

I found.


I called a couple LYS instead of just the one I go to for Kauni. They actually had Noro sock yarn in now. Although I wasn't super crazy about the colorways at the one store I went to. So I'm going to try the other store sometime.


Did I blog about this before? The sick is getting in the way of my normal brain function. I sure hate germ season at daycare let me tell you.

The boy's still pretty cranky too from being sick, but at least there isn't the fever anymore.

I finally got mail! Yay!


My bf told me to quit stalking the mailman. I think I must have checked the mailbox at least every day for a week. This normally is only an occurrance twice a week, sometimes just once a month.


KnitPicks Options needles. Pretty. They do snag just a hair, but I like them. Eventually I will acquire the two longest cables. I don't like that the actual size isn't somewhere on the needle or on the cable. That's just asking for disaster when dealing with me.

Look, they even look pretty when used on the project of stealth.