My CheepA$$ Secret pal is awesome!

My wonderful SP sent me some beading tools! As well as some Wool of the Andes in a beautiful teal colour, some pretty soaps, and a Foamy the Squirrel button. She pointed out that the yarn might be used for Scarvember. Speaking of Scarvember... I reached the ribbing portion of the seaman's scarf, and discovered that my version of the pattern was pre-correction. I was doing k4/p4/k3/p4/k3 etc on both sides. Since the pattern is symmetrical, it turns out that you get garter stitch which is separated by ridges. Which looks kind of neat, but it isn't what's supposed to be happening here. Mental note to self - knitting a scarf with DK weight yarn takes a long time.

Brevity is the soul of wit

From Fidoknits/Liz You. Can. Only. Type. One. Word. No. Explanations. 1. Yourself: Tired 2. Your boyfriend/girlfriend (spouse): Superb 3. Your hair: Staticky 4. Your mother: Overbearing 5. Your father: Simmering 6. Your favorite item: Bed 7. Your dream last night: Forgotten 8. Your favorite drink: Chai 9. Your dream car: Jaguar 10. The room you are in: Living 11. Your ex: Florida? 12. Your fear: Disapproval 13. What you want to be in 10 years? Creative 14. Who you hung out with last night? Cats 15. What You're Not? Extroverted 16. Muffins: Spicy 17. One of your wish list items: Time 18. Time: Lacking 19. The last thing you did: Phlebotomized 20. What you are wearing: Browns 21. Your favorite weather: Temperate 22. Your favorite book: Catalina 23. The last thing you ate: Salad 24. Your life: Mine 25. Your mood: Calm 26. Your best friend: Kyle 27. What are you thinking about right now? Knitting 28. Your car: Stuck 29. What are you doing at the moment? Blogging 30. Your summer: Hot 31. Your relationship status: Married 32. What is on your TV? Poker 33. What is the weather like? Snowing 34. When is the last time you laughed? Recently

Meme and my shadow...

As seen on Michelle's blog You are The Empress Beauty, happiness, pleasure, success, luxury, dissipation. The Empress is associated with Venus, the feminine planet, so it represents, beauty, charm, pleasure, luxury, and delight. You may be good at home decorating, art or anything to do with making things beautiful. The Empress is a creator, be it creation of life, of romance, of art or business. While the Magician is the primal spark, the idea made real, and the High Priestess is the one who gives the idea a form, the Empress is the womb where it gestates and grows till it is ready to be born. This is why her symbol is Venus, goddess of beautiful things as well as love. Even so, the Empress is more Demeter, goddess of abundance, then sensual Venus. She is the giver of Earthly gifts, yet at the same time, she can, in anger withhold, as Demeter did when her daughter, Persephone, was kidnapped. In fury and grief, she kept the Earth barren till her child was returned to her. What Tarot Card are You? Take the Test to Find Out. This is a very delinqent post about my latest SP9 package. She sent me a great book on sock knitting (how convenient, because I think I have some sock yarn around here somewhere...), as well as some tea, chocolate, and treats for the kitties. As you can see - Kyle did quality control on the milk chocolate/almond bar before I could even get the camera out (it's the bar on the bottom which has already been opened). The Knitting on the Road book might be put to work shortly - Michelle the yarn pusher dyed some sock yarn in Bears colours (without even realizing her brilliant idea), and I plan to knit Kyle a pair of socks out of it - he is a HUUUGE Bears fan. I picked up some navy blue Kroy yarn to use for toes/heels/cuff. I think this Sweet Sheep yarn is self striping, and I'm going to use the book as a reference, and possibly use one of the patterns.

Here there be dragon...

I'm pretty far behind on the blogstalking assignments - but here's an unexpected thing to come across while walking down the street:

Hey Bezzie - this snow's for you!

It seems like most of British Columbia got snow this weekend. We weren't an exception. I spent close to 4 hours at the airport on Friday afternoon waiting to fly to Vancouver. My flight was initially delayed for "mechanical reasons", and then when it started to snow, flights weren't able to land. Thankfully I had my knitting with me, and spent the whole time on the baby cable mitts (Note to Ev: if you decide to publish the pattern as a variation, you should name them either "the snowstorm mittens" or "winter's abrupt arrival mittens".) At around 9 PM they finally announced that there would be no further flights until the next day. So it was just me and the cats until Kyle drove back on his own Saturday afternoon. "If I close my eyes, I'll be invisible!" It's amazing how the world becomes black and white after a snow. If you look at the right edge of this photo, you will see some turquoise - it's a colour photo, not photoshop action on my part.

More FOs!

The beauty of small projects is that I actually finish them! Managed to finish off my cashmerino mitts yesterday. I also finished the maryella that I have been knitting for myself since the summertime. This is a photo of a top secret project. It came into being when I spotted a skein of Katia Mexico in blues with a touch of purple. I found some Classic Merino in a coordinating colour, and then had to figure out what to do with it!! All will be revealed in the next few weeks

Tragedy averted!

A few trips to Toronto ago, I picked up 2 skeins of Baby Cashmerino in a light green colour. I decided to use them to knit mitts based on Ev's baby cable wrist warmers. The colour perfectly matches a pashmina type scarf I bought in Boston a few years ago. When I was leaving for work this morning, I decided that I'd wear that scarf, but couldn't find it!! I knew that I had worn it when I left the office at the end of the day, but I stopped at the hospital before heading home (to do some stuff for my wee little patient). Couldn't recall taking it off when I got home from the hospital - realized I must have left it on the ward. Sigh. So I went to the pediatrics ward first thing this morning, and lo and behold, it was still sitting on the counter! OK, so it wasn't a tragedy that was averted, but I would have been bummed if I lost the scarf just as I started to knit some coordinating accessories. Here's a partially completed mitt #1 Hopefully I can finish the mitts this weekend, because the high temperature for Monday is going to be -13 Celcius! A bit of a shock for this balmy part of Canada.

Doe, a deer, a female deer..

There's a reason why this song is stuck in my head. I stopped to pick up some milk at the grocery store near my office and took a look in their magazine rack to see if they had any knitting magazines. I discovered "A Needle Pulling Thread", which is a new Canadian "needle arts" magazine. The magazine featured at least one pattern for each of the "disciplines" (knitting, crochet, weaving, knitting with beads, quilting, sewing). I quite liked it, and decided to subscribe to it. There are a few benefits to this particular subscription - there are only 5 issues per year, and with only a few knitting related patterns, the number to projects that will get added to my "to knit" list will be manageable. Last evening was also evening knitting class at my LYS. I picked up an orphan skein of Kureyon, because I think I might start a Lizard Ridge afghan to use up the skeins left over from Kyle's sweater the felted backpack I made. I also picked up 2 skeins of Berocco Keltic and am gong to see how they work with the Lizard Ridge pattern, because it would be cheaper than the Kureyon. I think the colour shifts are much more subtle, so it will be interesting to see how it works out. I might end up making a Lizard Ridge Pillow.

Kids scare me

Sick kids, that is. I did my medical school pediatrics rotation in 1992, and have almost exclusively treated adults since then. I had to see a young kid in the ER this weekend, and for reasons that are somewhat complex, I am the "most responsible physician" - I avoid that status in general, let along when I am dealing with someone outside my usual patient group. I am worried; this kid is sick, but has the potential to get much sicker. It's funny how some patients get under your skin, while others make little impression on you.

The photo free* blogging begins...

A vote is being held to elect the 7 new wonders of the world. I want to start a write in campaign for Magic Loop *Kyle is going to compete in the BC Poker Championships. and has taken my laptop with him (because his is on the fritz), so no photo uploading until next Satruday.

FO sighting.

Melinda sent me a quick Photoshop tutorial, so here's the "negative" of the Rockies image: I mentioned earlier this week that I knit a cap for Kyle, but the accompanying photo was pre-completion. Here's the final product. Knit with one skein of Avanti colour #17(a DK weight yarn made by the makers of Trekking).

Today is World COPD Day

Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease is a Woman's Health issue of equal or greater significance as Breast Cancer. Please. Don't smoke.

Yew Tawk Fonny

From Jane's blog What American accent do you have? Your Result: North Central "North Central" is what professional linguists call the Minnesota accent. If you saw "Fargo" you probably didn't think the characters sounded very out of the ordinary. Outsiders probably mistake you for a Canadian a lot. The West The Midland Boston The Inland North The South Philadelphia The Northeast What American accent do you have? Take More Quizzes Mistaken for a Canadian alot, eh? Since I grew up about an hour's drive from North Dakota/Minnesota, it's not a surprising finding. Although I did "hear" the accent in Fargo. A few months ago an Irish doc who has been living on Vancouver Island for the last 20 odd years asked me where in the US I came from. I guess that is what happens when you grow up in a province where the descendents of immigrants from the Ukraine and Germany outnumber the Brits. When I worked in Hamilton Ontario, I was the only respirologist out of a group of 11 or 12 who was of British Empire heritage (hell, more than half of them were born in England/Ireland/South Africa/New Zealand etc). I used to joke that as a young, female, Ukrainian from Winnipeg, that I probably filled several quotas. For those of you waiting with bated breath to know what's up with the knitting, I am working on "Moozhies" (knitted slippers) for Kyle using the slipper pattern generator from the Knitting Fiend Almost done the first one. From Friday's plane trip - the Rockies. I don't think the picture captures it well, but the shading from the snow made it look like it was a photo negative. If I could figure out how to use Photoshop, I'd reverse the black and white to see what the negative would look like.

...Insert catchy title here...

I am in the process of completing my Scarf Around. Neat thing happened when I used Yahoo to search for the Scarf Around pattern - my blog was the second hit. Man, the only thing more tedious than casting on 274 stitches is casting them off. At least I didn't need to keep count. The Sale Bin Yarn Scarf got finished - and was only 36 inches long. A beautifully soft and cushy 36 inches, but not "a guy's scarf" by any stretch of the imagination. Sigh. So I spent much of this morning frogging it, and separating out the yarns that had been knit together. I dug through the stash and found some beige/grey mystery yarn that feels merino-ish, as well as some Classic Merino (bought on sale - the Sale Yarn theme lives on). The latest incarnation will be based on the "Men's Rustic Scarf" from Last Minute Knitted Gifts. Wouldn't you know that the first line of the pattern is "Cast on 171 sts." Double sigh. Other knitting activity this weekend included knitting a touque for Kyle out of some yarn that I picked up to use as possible Sock Wars artillery. Slowly but surely I am making a dint in the stash - a microscopic dint, but a dint nonetheless.

Scarvember update

Here's the current batch: Red Scarf project / test knitting scarf. It's a Seaman's style scarf, and I am about 2 inches away from starting the ribbed portion. The yarn is a llama/alpaca purchased on ebay, and is more of a dark terracotta than red, but I plan to overdye it with Koolaid once it is done. The discount yarn gift scarf, pre frogging. Since I wasn't sure of the yardage on the mystery yarns, I have been weighing as I go along. I just realized that I am more than 1/3 through the yarn, so since this photo was taken, it has been frogged and restarted on US15 needles. The Scarf around, knit with sari yarn and a mystery yarn that I picked up from a $10/lb bin at the Seattle Fibre Festival this spring. For those not familiar with the pattern, it is knit in the round, and then when completed, you cut through a specific section, and voila - a scarf with longitudinal stripes. I have to say, the response that I get when I explain to knitters that I will be cutting it at the end has universally been a horrified gasp. "Eek! You cut it?!?" My So Called Scarf, being knit out of Debbie Bliss Soho. If you look to the left end of the scarf (click on the picture to enlarge), you may notice that there are no white flecks in the last few cm of the scarf - same dye lot, but the white went AWOL in that skein. There was also some funky pooling action at the right hand side. A better (yet slightly blurry) photo of the stitch pattern. I am trying to decide whether or not this scarf will need a fringe; if it gets one, it will be made with the white-free yarn. I am taking a quick trip to Calgary this weekend - fly there tomorrow afternoon, meeting Saturday morning/afternoon, then fly home early Saturday evening. I specifically booked an early flight so that I can go hang out at Make 1 Yarns and knit on their comfy couch. Now I just need to decide which scarf to take with me...

If a tree falls in the city...

who gets sued? Can Mother Nature be charged with trespassing? In the urban jungle do we yield to the pressure of overcrowding Or just put in more condos?

I got mail!

In addition to the mountains of bills and flyers that were sitting in the mailbox when we got home on Sunday, there were some gold nuggets - Secret Pal packages!!These little guys are checking out the sock yarn that they travelled with in the Haloween package sent by my Cheap A$$ Secret Pal. I have always loved the smell of coffee, but not the taste. Now I love the colour of coffee - CTH sock yarn in the "Java" colourway! Compliments of my Blogger SP9 pal. Here's a slightly blurred (maybe I should ask for a new digital camera for Xmas) closeup of the yarny goodness: Yesterday, I spent about 2 hours going through mail that came to the office - nothing fun about that. But when I got home, there was a package from my Spooky Secret Pal. Candy, Alaskan chocolate and Chai, And more yarny goodness! This is the CTH Fall Foliage colourway. Also a mini sock kit, and 3 sets of bamboo needles: 2mm/2.25mm/2.75mm (US 0/1/2). With several sets of sock needles, I can carry on my tradition of having more WIPs than is healthy once I start working through my ever expanding sock yarn stash. Thanks guys!!

Scarvember

(Way better creation than Lacevember, if you ask me) I am officially on a scarf kick right now. In addition to the Mountain Pine Beetle Scarf, I am still test knitting a pattern for Ev (which will go to the Red Scarf Project), and am also working on a So Called Scarf as well as a Scarf Around. And then there is the newest project - the sale yarn gift scarf. I participated in the TTC Knit Along yarn crawl during my recent trip (future blog post). I spent at least 45 minutes in the basement at Romni Wools (their clearance section) because it's all about the bargain, baby! In a box containing skeins of yarn with no label, just prices written on masking tape, I found these 3 skeins of super soft yarns. The cream coloured yarn on the right did have a label - it's 50/50 merino/alpaca. The other 2 skeins were incredibly soft, and I have since learned that they are most likely 100% alpaca. This flash photo shows the texture better. I decided that I would knit a scarf for Kyle's buddy Steve, who is kind enough to let us stay in his apartment any time we visit the GTA. I started out using the one line pattern recently featured on the Yarn Harlot's blog. It look like something that Somerset might hork up. (OK, I exaggerate, but it wasn't great) So now I am doing a k1p1 scarf inspired by the "purl scarf" from Last Minute Knitted Gifts. This was done on 8mm (US11) needles, but I think I will move up another needle size. Most of these scarves are intended to be gifts for friends, with the exception of Mountain Pine Beetle and Scarf Around - those are for me. The only scarves I have knitted for myself are my ribbon yarn Clapotis and my Mobeius. And the Clapotis is more shawl than scarf. Because I didn't intend to knit anything for Xmas presents, it's a low pressure endeavour; the only one with a deadline is the Red Scarf Project scarf. Low pressure, easy to knit sans pattern, no need to swatch - the perfect project for me right now. Come to think of it, I need some mitts; my stretchy mini mitts are getting kind of dodgy. Can anyone suggest a pattern for the Auracania alpaca yarn I have in my stash? Bezzie mentioned having New Year's Knitsolutions; with all the sock yarn I am accumulating, I think I will try to do a pair of socks a month in 2007. You read it here first.

PSAs

We are now back at home. Our direct flight got cancelled by Air Canada, so we had to connect in Calgary. As we were walking through the gate area, trying to decide at which of the fine establishments we would eat, some guy came out of the men's washroom and said "Hey guys - I saw you in the terminal at Toronto." He then walked up to Kyle, wrung his hands together and implored him to never use his laptop on his lap because it "can do a number on your reproductive organs." Which made our layover pass so much quicker, as we spent the time either coming up with various responses that we could have used instead of the stunned silence that followed, or trying to decide exactly how rude it is to walk up to someone and give them useless unsolicited advice. Have no fear readers, once I extricate the cat from my lap, I will download some new photos for future posts. In the meantime, here is a scarf that I am working on. It's being knitted with one of the skeins of yarn my one skein secret pal sent me together with some coordinating yarn. Pattern is Southern Snowfall scarf from (the ever so talented)Julie'sMind of Winter blog. This specific scarf isn't particularly wintery - I think I will call it the Mountain Pine Beetle scarf instead.

Unreal Estate

Kyle and the Realtor saw a house last Thursday that was great - I went to go see it that evening. Awesome layout, great deck and yard, good location. Expensive, but not outrageously so considering the area we are looking in. We go see it during the day on Sunday - it is such a great house! The owners are flexible in terms of posession date, and might even sell us some of their furniture. Kyle and I debate about whether we should make an offer, whether we should wait to see what will happen with our house, talk about where our various pieces of furniture might go. We almost put in an offer yesterday, but because it is crazy at the hospital, I get home late, and we don't have a chance to sit and talk about it. Today is again crazy - mid afternoon I sit down to quickly check my email. Kyle has forwarded a bunch of emails to me from the real estate agent. Turns out that the land next door to the house belongs to a developer, and an application has been filed to build a 7 story condo on the lot. Sigh. I don't know what is worse - this great house not working out, or the prospect of more house hunting.