Last night, after finished Happy and in need of a cast-on fix I couldn’t decide which project to start. I got home from work and immediately started reviewing my queue and stash on Ravelry to decide what I wanted to start the most. Two hours later, when Steve got home (he was buying a radial arm saw, yeah I don’t know what it is either) I still had not made up my mind. There are just way to many things I want to make and I already have yarn for many of them. My indecision could have also been related to the fact that I have had what seems to be a head cold (or allergies) for the past few days and maybe I just wasn’t thinking straight. But, I guess I can’t really blame it all on the head congestion because many times in the past I haven’t been able to make up my mind and end up starting three or four new projects. I really don’t want to make a habit of starting doing this every time I have a cast-on attack, but I have yet to prevent it.

So, after 2 hours of deliberation I decided to let Steve pick the next project. I showed him pictures of the projects I already had yarn for and he picked his favorite one, which turned out to be Dollar and a Half Cardigan. He was even happier with his pick when I showed him the yarn I would be using.

Now, after reading a lot of the comments on Ravelry, I have decided that I need to do a lot of swatching before I start this sweater. It seems everyone has done something slightly different than the original pattern called for. Here are some of my options.

1. Shorten the sleeves
2. Do stockinette instead of reverse stockinette
3. Use two different needle sizes, smaller needle size for the stockinette, larger needle for lace
4. Make two cable fronts
5. knit complete body at one time up to the arm holes

So even though my hubby helped me make a decision, I still have lots of more decisions to make. Maybe my knitting friends will provide their input to help me decide, because I know hubby will have no clue on this part.

Errata…what’s that? Just kidding, I know what it is, but I guess I think I am too good to review the corrections to a pattern before I knit it.

As it turns out, unbeknown to me, they did make an adjustment to the number of skeins needed for the medium “Happy” sweater. Thank goodness I had my freak-out face on when I bought the yarn and bought an extra skein of every color. I do still have two full hanks left, which I plan to return to my LYS, which means I can buy more yarn. Yay! Now it is just a matter of what sweater to knit next. Decisions, Decisions.

I hope to have the finish pictures of the Happy sweater by the end of the weekend. I need to block the body before I can wear it, because it is currently way too short, but I expect it to stretch quite a bit in length.

In the mean time, here are some finished object pictures of my Central Park Hoodie. Enjoy!

I am always so freaked out that I will run out of yarn for a project, so I typically spend the extra money up front and buy an extra skein for a little piece of mind. In the case of the Happy Sweater, which I started a few weeks ago, I had to purchase more than just one extra skein. I had to purchase 5, which almost doubled the 7 skeins required by the pattern for a size medium. But I am so thankful that I took the plunge and did just that.

Yesterday, as I was working along on the body of my sweater, I finished off one skein of one of the colors that was suppose to only require one skein for the entire project. I still have two full stripes of this color so I am extremely glad that purchase the extra yarn. I am also likely to finish at least one more ball of a color that only required one skein. That would mean it would have been a double whammy if I didn’t take this precaution.

Now, either I didn’t associate the colors I chose with the pattern correctly or the pattern is incorrect. Either way, I should have enough yarn for my sweater, but, if the pattern is incorrect, I am concerned for other people making this same sweater.

In my effort to catch you up on all my finished objects I let one slip by. In all the knitting I have done recently I also finally finished my Mother Lode Socks.

Started: August 4, 2007
Finished: August 16, 2008 (yes over one year to complete)
Yarn: Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sock Multi

The only reason this project took so long to complete was because I was working on so many other projects at the same time. Oh, and the fact that I had to frog the first attempt because they were too big. So technically I finished them in less than a year if you don’t count the first attempt. More information on Ravelry.

Sometimes weekend are just for relaxing, which is exactly what I did this past weekend. Although I had a few things planned, I decided I just needed a weekend to relax. So, Saturday morning we picked up a fire pit  and a new video game and I spent the rest of the weekend knitting, reading, watching TV, playing video games, and enjoying some time with nature.

Saturday, I spent the majority of the day knitting outside with nature. The only bad thing about knitting in and around nature is that you will likely have unexpected and uninvited guests who try to claim a chair, a cake of yarn and even a knitting bag for themselves, which is exactly what happened. As I was knitting along Saturday afternoon, I went to grab another ball of yarn and found a little spider had joined me. As I went to shue it from the yarn it tried to take up residence in my knitting bag, which really freaked me out because I really didn’t want a family of spiders spinning their webs around my yarn. Eventually, the spider was set free to find some other spot to occupy, which made me much happier.

Steve couldn’t handle all the peace and quiet and he ended up watching a movie on his iPod. I could sit and stare into the fire for hours on end, but that was all too primitive for my hubby. He must have technology.

Sunday was spent doing much of the same.

I know I have been a major slacker the last few weeks when it comes to my blog, and reading blogs too for that matter. I have been knitting, which is way more fun that sitting in front of a computer. Plus, I haven’t had anything fun to talk about other than my knitting. Yes, I lead probably one of the most boring lives you can imagine. I get up go to work, come home, sometimes workout, and then watch TV and knit. Nothing very exciting about that. But I like my life so I guess that is all that matters. I just don’t want to bore you to tears with my extremely mundane life.

So on to the fun stuff, the knitting. I finished my Central Park Hoodie. Well, technically it isn’t finished yet, because I still have to find the perfect buttons, but the knitting part is done. I don’t have any finished pictures yet, because I am hoping to get the buttons sewn on first.

I also finished these three Knitting for Hire projects. You can find more information on my Ravelry Page

Back in June I made my first Baby Surprise Jacket, but forgot to take pictures of it before giving it to the new mother. I recently went to see the family and had to take some pictures of the sweater. It was still too big for the new baby.

I finally took some pictures of the Eye of Partridge Shawl and the Kitty Pi, but both of these projects are now hibernating.

The Kitty Pi was done with Knit Picks Wool of the Andes double stranded, but I don’t know if I really liked how it was turning out, so I started a second one single stranded, which is also hibernating.

For a long time, basically since I completed this sweater, I have wanted to shorten it because it came out much longer than I thought it would.

And I finally did it. I should take a new picture showing the difference in length, but it has been way to hot to put it on, even for a minute to take the picture. Here are some pictures showing my progress during the shortening process.

It fits much nicer now, and I might actually wear it more than once this winter.

I have also started this sweater.

But I am using different colors. Here is a picture of part of the first sleeve. I love the detail the stitch pattern makes.

Another project that had been hibernating for a long time is finally back in progress and that is the Purple Goodness socks. I decided to do plain stockinette socks with this yarn, mostly because I wanted a very simple project to work on.

And I think that brings up just about up to date with all my knitting projects. Maybe in the coming weeks I will have some interesting things to share with you, something that won’t bore you to death.

In my last post, I mentioned that I have been doing a lot of knitting in my absence on my blog. So I thought I would update everyone on what I have actually accomplished in that time. I sometimes even amaze myself.

First up, the Sweet Pea Shawl that I did as a TEST/Sample knitting for hire. I don’t recall the yarn right now (I will look it up and post it later), but I can tell you that I loved it. I would definitely work with it again.

I also completed this One-Shoulder Tunic as a TEST/Sample knitting for hire project. This yarn is a new yarn that will be out soon, it is Atlante made for Naturally, and I believe it will be sold by Fiber Trends. I love this yarn too. It is so much fun doing TEST/Sample knits because I get to work with so many different yarns that I may not get to otherwise.

I also started two new projects, which I don’t have pictures of just yet. I started another Kitty Pi to match my newly redecorated basement, and I also started the Eye of Partridge Shawl. I will take some pictures of both of these and post them in the next few days.

I also still have my Central Park Hoodie on the needles, which hasn’t seen any progress since I have been trying to get these other projects completed. And I am almost finished with the MotherLode Socks, which seem to be taking forever. Hopefully, I will completed these socks before I start another pair.

I know it has been a really long time since I last posted. Life has been busy this summer and I have been working on writing the pattern for these.

I hope you enjoy this pattern. Let me know if you have any questions or comments.

Here are a few more pictures.

I had every intention to post my weigh in yesterday, but I spent most of the afternoon instant messaging a friend and didn’t have much time for blogging. Therefore, you are getting this post one day late. The good news is, although minute, there was weight lost this past week of one pound, which I feel pretty good about, considering I didn’t workout for 5 days while I was out of town. As I mentioned in my last post, I was careful about what I ate all weekend and I did move quite a bit running after the twins, who will be turning 2 at the end of May.

In addition, according to my body fat analyzer, I have lost two and a half pounds of fat since last week. So even though the scale only shows a one pound lost I actually lost 2½ pounds of fat and gained a 1½ of muscle. See the body does have muscle memory, and it is remembering very quickly.

I haven’t noticed it as much in my arms, but I have noticed that my legs are getting much stronger. I mentioned before that I have been doing some mini exercises at the office, one of those exercises has been wall squats. Before I left for the weekend, I could do the wall squat for one minute and I was struggling the last few seconds. If you have ever tried wall squats they are not as easy as they appear. When I did the wall squat on Tuesday I noticed that after one minute I felt I could go a little longer so I went a total of 1 minute 15 seconds, which still wasn’t quite long enough. Yesterday I did nearly 1 minute 40 seconds without a problem. Today, I will try to max out to see just how long I can actually go.

Also, since I have been wearing the heart monitor I have also noticed some improvements in my cardiovascular fitness as well. My heart rate is recovering even more quickly and doesn’t go up quite as high. I do still want to push myself to work harder but I want to give my heart a chance to get stronger before I overdue it. There are a few fitness tests over at MSN.com I would like to do this weekend to see exactly where I am. Then after a few more weeks I can take them again to see how much I have improved.

I am back from Maryland! Now, I need a vacation from my vacation. The weekend was very busy and there wasn’t much time for relaxing. On Friday, I started the weekend by meeting up with a friend from high school who I had not seen in more than 20 years. We enjoyed a meal together and were able to catch up on where our lives have taken us over the last 20 years. Unfortunately we only had a few hours together but it was so good to catch up in person rather than just through email. The two hours we spent chatting was the most relaxation I got all weekend.

My mom and I had planned to go to the Sheep and Wool Festival both Saturday and Sunday, but of course my sister through a wrench into those plans. She moved into a new house a few months ago and planned a house warming party for that day. Which meant that my mom had to cart my niece back and forth to her play rehearsal, which also meant that we couldn’t get up bright and early Saturday morning to head to the festival.

In an attempt to visit with my grandmother, we decided to attend the house warming party and then go to the festival in the afternoon. There was so much commotion at my sister’s house with all the kids, my grandmother and I barely got a chance to talk. So, we met up with her for dinner Sunday evening.

While we waiting for the play practice to end on Saturday, my mom and I went to the computer store to shop for a new laptop, and I talked her into buying an iPod, and wireless keyboard. Then we went back to the computer store on Sunday to purchase a wireless router and a new monitor for her desktop computer. We then spent most of the day Sunday installing new computer components and getting her laptop and iPod set up.

We only made it to the festival late Saturday afternoon, and we missed the Ravelry meet-up, which I was totally bummed about. But, I did get to spend a lot of quality time with my mom, nieces and nephew, and my grandmother, so not all was lost. Except for the fact that I didn’t workout the entire weekend while I was there. I did watch my diet so I am hoping the worse that could happen is that I haven’t lost any weight. We will see when I do the official weigh in tomorrow. I am not looking forward to it.

Needless to say, it was a very busy weekend and I am so happy to be home. It always takes me a few days to re-adjust to my normal life after all the ciaos that I encounter while visiting my mom. Steve and I have lots of shows to catch up on this week so I am looking forward to some relaxing evenings this week. And this weekend I will be having my knitting friends over for our Saturday Club, and that will definitely be relaxing.

I don’t have the cable to my camera here at work today, otherwise I would post pictures of my 2 year old niece and nephew in the sweaters I finished for them a month ago. So, look for them tomorrow.