The last time...

Well, it's exam period again, which of course means that my life is now devoted to pouring over endless 30 cent notebooks filled with the usual scrawl - the above-pictured page, I believe, contains commentary on the Geneva Convention, though this time last week it was privacy law. It's rather hard to keep up - I know my brain always struggles. At least it'll all be over by this time next week. Not to mention, as alluded to by the post title, this will (notwithstanding me having some kind of epic freak-out and failing my remaining exams) be my final semester of law, my final batch of exams. So theoretically, I should be relishing it. So much for theory.

And of course with exam period comes the stress-relieving exam knitting. The above pictured cardigan is coming along quite nicely - I've only got a sleeve and a half to go now, so I'm very nearly there. Due to yarn limitations (some people would tell you that six skeins of Noro Kureyon is not enough to make a cardigan, but those people are quitters!) it's a little shorter than I might otherwise have made it, but I'm actually rather liking it this way. It's jaunty. I think I'll go with 3/4 sleeves and some bright blue buttons. Everyone I've shown it to so far thinks that it's ugly as sin, and I suppose they're probably right, but I don't care - it makes me happy, and stops me from feeling like all I've done with my day is write something bleedingly obvious about Additional Protocol II.

In other news, it's been far too hot to do anything particularly constructive, so I've resorted to my usual fallbacks for the small smattering of recreation time I do have - reading, playing woefully outdated computer games, and cooking. And buying things on the internet - have to make the most of the strong Aussie dollar. It would be simply irresponsible not to... On that note, I bought more yarn (curse you, Sanguine Gryphon, I just can't resist your charms), but that's perfectly all right, because in keeping with the Not-A-Yarn-Diet, I used up 300g of Berroco yarn and 200g of Noro before doing so. Hurray for me. And I bought less than that, so I'm still making progress. Of sorts.




Also, as I mentioned, I've been cooking, and I have pictures to back it up. This here is the makings of a very fine pumpkin, spinach and goat's cheese risotto, because I took it upon myself to buck the trend of living on breakfast cereal during exams. It never ceases to amaze me how spinach wilts down. I mean seriously, from the above, to this...




...in about thirty seconds. Crazy stuff. Crazy but delicious. I also made this cake, because I couldn't resist the pull any longer. For some reason, it's taken me a very long time to get into looking at recipes on line - up until now, I have been strictly old-school, preferring my cookbooks. But I think I'm finally beginning to get with the times. How astounding. Then again, cake tends to be very persuasive...

This time of year...

Ahh, November - the time of year when my brain and all of my time both fly merrily out of the window. The Essay of Doom got submitted with a blessed lack trouble, but I am now languishing slap bang in the middle of exam period, with more revision to do than I can shake a decent sized stick at. I suppose I should be making the most of it - as long as there are no catastrophic academic disasters, this will be my last semester of law, after all...

Thankfully, as always, there is still time to knit. Or rather, I manage to do it anyway. It stalled for a while, but I managed to finish my Gathered Pullover:




(please excuse the fact that I look knackered - I had just gotten off a very long shift at work)

The Business End of Things: Pattern is the Gathered Pullover, from the Winter 2007 issue of Interweave Knits (in a custom size somewhere between S and M), knitted on a 4.5mm circular needle, and 4.5mm dpns. Yarn used was six skeins of Berroco Ultra Alpaca Light (50% alpaca, 50% wool).

The Blathering On: For a start - man, but that cable is much simpler than it looks! I was almost disappointed by how easy it was - there weren't nearly as many crosses as I had initially assumed. I nearly blinked and missed it all!




This is a really great pattern, as is somewhat obvious due to the fact that it has, at time of writing, 984 projects on Ravelry. It's easy but interesting looking, and had it not been for my huge workload and the comparatively lightweight yarn, I probably would have finished it sooner. The only modifications I made were to omit the decorative decreases/increases from the bust, add waist shaping (because these days I just don't do jumpers without - such an improvement from so little effort!) and lengthen the body and sleeves slightly. I probably could have done without the latter as the sleeves grew quite a lot with blocking, but thankfully I am quite partial to longer sleeves, so I'm still happy with the result.

Amusingly enough, despite the fact that I've definitely knitted my fair share of jumpers over the last few years, I'd never worked one in the round, from the bottom up, with set in sleeves. I quite liked the method, but somehow I think that I might remain devoted to raglans for the time being - for all that my seam sewing has improved immeasurably over the last year or so, I still prefer to work seamlessly where possible. All said and done, I'm quite happy with this one. I'm not thrilled with how the rolled neckline quirks up a little, and it's warm enough that I won't be able to wear it for a good few months yet, but these are pretty small quibbles really.

In other news, I've been thinking that I need to blog more often. I think that my main problem with updating a knitting blog regularly is this: I don't work fast enough to only post when I finish a project, but I have a chronic inability to take decent in-progress shots. Oh well, I shall attempt to find some way to fill the gaps. Watch out, blogopshere...

In the meantime, here is a picture of the very delightful afternoon tea I had with a friend on Friday:


Why yes, it was delicious. What you see there is almond croissant and sticky date pudding from the local bakery, washed down with a couple of pots of jasmine green tea. Om nom nom.

In other news, I am working away diligently on the Noro cardigan I started as an exam-time, no-though-required, relaxing, therapy knit. It somewhat failed on the relaxing front when my circular needle broke and spilled my stitches everywhere, but thankfully the knitting gods were smiling on me and I managed to restore order with no lasting harm.

The Not-Yarn-Diet is going well too - I haven't bought any unauthorised yarn (and for this I thank this blog, just for keeping me accountable), despite being occasionally tempted. Soon I shall indulge though - the Gathered Pullover took up around 300g of yarn, and I've used 150g on my Noro cardigan so far. This means I am a single paltry ball away from being able to buy more yarn, though I must say that the urge has, for the moment, passed. Oh well, I'm sure that it will be back soon enough...

Self Restraint and a Cat

So. It occurs to me that I probably have enough yarn (see above for pretty green things!). More than enough yarn even. Realistically speaking, I could probably continue knitting at my usual rate for an entire year without needing to buy more yarn. This is arguably a rather delightful problem to have, if indeed you could call it a problem, but I have decided that seeing as I don't really need more yarn, but will have a need to conserve money (exams are not too far off, so I won't be working nearly as much as usual), some self restraint might be in order over the next little while.

I'm not going to use the word "diet" because I'm not keen on it. It's not something I do when it comes to food (frankly, I'm young and healthy, so what on earth is wrong with just eating well and exercising?), and I'd really like to keep my life "diet" free. So I'm not going to stop buying yarn all together. However, there shall be creative and productivity-encouraging restrictions put in place: the rule of this Not Yarn Diet is that I am now supposed to knit 500g (so ten 50g balls, or whatever) from my stash for every yarn purchase I make. Blog will keep me accountable. Hopefully this will curb the unwarranted impulse buys.

I considered putting a meterage requirement instead of weight, but decided against it: I'm too lazy to add up lengths, and I don't really care about yarn weight as long as it gets used up. Yes, I know that I'll burn through 200g of bulky yarn in the same time it'll take me to knit up 50g of fingering. I don't much care - it's not a competition. I just want to reduce the space being eaten by my terrifying stash of knitting fodder. To play fair though, I'm not counting any part of Sylvi, as it's been going for so long (shame, because I believe that there's over a kilo of yarn in that monster). To not play fairly, I'm counting all yarn knitted from the point that I received my last purchase in the mail. Which puts me at nearly 100g, all from the Gathered Pullover (which is coming along nicely, thank you very much).

That's the plan. Now let's see if I stick to it.

In other news, well, life is crazy. Beyond crazy. Between uni, work, and social commitments, I have so much to do that it isn't even funny. For the first time in my life, I'm being afflicted by semi-regular insomnia, because I lie in bed unable to sleep because all of the pressing demands on my time are dancing around in my head humming circus music loudly. Thank heavens that knitting is a hobby that you can sort of slot into the gaps formed between everything else - one of the many reasons that I love it.

In knitting news, I have started seaming my Sylvi and have commenced the hood. I am so close to finishing that I can almost taste it - and I'm hoping that that will help me finally knock it on the head. Even the fickle Melbourne weather wants me to finish - the weather at the moment is bitingly cold for October, and it's just begging for a slightly unseasonal woollen coat. The Gathered Pullover is coming along nicely as well - I am still in love with the colour.




Unfortunately all is not well in other areas of life - the furred and finned areas, more specifically. More diligent readers might recall me gabbling happily about Titus, my fighting fish. Well, alas, poor Titus succumbed to a fungal infection yesterday, despite putting up a brave fight while we treated him with scarily green medicine. Poor wee fishy - he was a lot of fun, had a lot of character as far as fish go, and I will miss his hungry little face in the mornings.

If that wasn't enough, my poor old geriatric cat Alex has a large nasty swelling in his neck. The vet is not sure whether it's cancer or just a gland that's swollen up as a result of an inflamed tooth - he's going in tomorrow for blood tests and possibly dental surgery if he's stable enough. Anything involving anaesthetic is risky for a 19 year old cat with heart issues, so I'm trying to be prepared for the worst, just in case it happens. He's content enough at the moment though - asleep on my dressing gown, which I suspect is now officially His dressing gown. At any rate, please send cat mojo for my poor old man!

And that's about it. Hopefully the next post will involve a finished Sylvi - let's just hope that procrastination doesn't strike (again) in the meantime...