Yarny Acquisitions

...and now to the part where Anna drools over her new yarn. As alluded to in the last post, I picked up quite a bit of new stuff while I was gone. Not a completely over-the-top amount - after all, I did have to worry about how I was going to get it home. But definitely a goodly amount, especially considering that I haven't bought much this year. Actually, that has a lot to do with it - the self-imposed yarn diet of last year let me kick my impulse buying habit, so I've purchased comparatively little by way of yarn lately. As a result, I felt a little more justified in lashing out a bit while I was travelling. And besides, when it comes to yarn the range of what you can get in the US is just so vast compared to what is available here in Australia; I was happy to let myself indulge a bit.




This is not quite all of what I bought - I left out some of the doubles, there's some Malabrigo Twist to the right that you can only see a hint of, and I think there was one ball hiding in parts unknown that didn't make it into the shot. Still, not a bad haul, right? I visited so many lovely yarn shops (including WEBS, thanks to some awesome LSG Ravellers), and I ended up picking up a little something from most of them. Highlights included some discounted Noro and some lovely Misti Chunky Alpaca from WEBS, some gorgeous alpaca from The Quarter Stitch in New Orleans, and some Koigu and Malabrigo Lace from Rebecca's work.




Pretty right? Also, besides showing off my holiday indulgences, these photos are a good idea of where I'm at right now when it comes to colour. I've always loved black and green, and I definitely still do, but over the last year I've found myself thinking more and more of grays, purples and reds as well, and sometimes even blues when the shades were just right. And just look at all of the lovely colours I have to work with now!

Anyway, back to the yarn. Not all of them have been allocated to projects yet, but I'm working on it. I didn't really want any of these to languish in the stash for too long, and I'm off to a cracking start on that front: the Misti Alpaca Chunky (the large skein in that gorgeous shade of dark reddish purple on the right hand side of the picture) has already become a scarf. None too shabby, right? And there were a couple of skeins that I had plans for before I'd even left the store in which I bought them.



The moment I saw these skeins in New Orleans, I knew that I had to stripe them together, and I knew that they were destined to adorn my hands. I have every intention of casting on tonight, so stay tuned for news on that in the near future. However, the next post = holiday projects!

But not tonight. I have knitting to do, tea to drink, and an episode of Skins to watch... Have a nice evening, everyone!

A Cardigan, Graduation, and Plans...

Wow, did March go quickly! Guess that happens when you're busy. Study is still munching away steadily at my daylight hours (and the evening hours too), but thankfully work eased off a little bit over the last week. As a result, I finally had time to finish my stash-bust cardigan!




This is: Self designed top-down raglan cardigan, knitted from Cleckheaton Tempo (wool, acrylic and mohair blend) on 7mm bamboo circular needle.

What Anna has to say: Okay, for a start, I promise that the bottoms are not as lop-sided as they look in the picture. They are actually perfectly symmetrical - I just can't take photos, is all. When I get around to buying some, I'll be closing the front with a couple of buttons instead of just pinning it as I did above - this should remedy the problem.

As mentioned above, I designed this one myself. Lately I've been keen on cardigans with really low fronts, so I went in that direction again. I did some waist shaping in an attempt to dodge the almost inevitable unflattering tendencies that come with yarn this huge. The edgings and cuffs are garter stitch. So it didn't end up being too generic, I worked the fronts and back separately from the hips down, working to cute little points on the fronts. I worked the sleeves in the round, using magic loop.

I don't actually have all that much to say about this one. I suppose I'm happy with how it came out, mainly just because I never had any great ambitions for it. It was always intended to be a basic, unfancy, around-the-house piece - in fact it was basically conceived as a way of getting the Tempo out of my stash, because I wasn't too keen on it, and being super-bulky yarn and all, it was taking up a lot of space. Unfortunately I still have quite a bit of the stuff - but this made a good sized hole at least.

Also, now that the cardigan is done, I have officially declared it time for the winter knitting to commence. Just so that I can be prepared when the weather starts to get colder. I really need to make myself some more warm socks - most of my existing handknit socks are getting quite threadbare. I am also in desperate need of a basic black jacket. And I always need scarves. Always. A new hat wouldn't go astray either. Ahhh, plans. I love planning. The best part is that from mid next-week onwards I will be house/cat-sitting for some honeymooning friends, so I'll have plenty of peace and quite in which to curl up with tea, a DVD and some knitting. Okay fine, and homework too...

In other news... I graduated!




There I am, on the steps of the Old Law quad, looking every inch the proper student. Why yes, that is two degrees, thank you for asking! That said, the university managed to screw up my testamur - they left the "with Honours" off of my Arts certificate, which was a bit irritating. And they managed to stumble over my surname during the ceremony (jeez guys, it's only the seventh most common surname in the country). It was still a fun day though, after I escaped the boredom of the ceremony and got to the part where my family and I made silly mischief during refreshments afterwards...



Knitting related goals aren't the only plans in the works either... But more on that later!

Project Banishment and a Trip to the Zoo

A few posts ago anyone reading even slightly attentively would have seen a project I was working on - a summery top made from my long hoarded Sanguine Gryphon 'Dance' yarn. Looked a little like this (and yes, I am blatantly reusing the picture, because I am a Slovenly Blogger).




Last post I believe that I made mention of the fact that I was having trouble figuring out how I was going to finish it. Well, alas, progress was not made - or very little of it anyway. It got to the stage where I just didn't really feel like knitting any more because I knew I should be working on this, and it was niggling at me whenever I worked on something else. Obviously, one does not indulge in hobbies with the goal of feeling unpleasant about it, so I decided that something had to be done. So, from this point onwards, this project is banished to the naughty corner. Life is too short to knit things that you are just not that enthused about. I have knitted things that I have enjoyed making but have worn very little - that is not the ideal, but it's still far from a waste of time. I have knitted things that were completely tedious, but that I adore and wear to death once they're done - again, a worthwhile endeavour. And of course, there are those wonderful projects that you love every moment of, both the knitting and the wearing. But I'm not willing to spend time on knitting something that I am so underwhelmed by.

I would like to salvage this one if I possible, as that much stockinette in such a small gauge has taken forever and a half - all the more so because the bottom was deliberately designed with A Lot of negative ease. But this is gorgeous yarn and I don't want it to languish forever on something that I don't really wear, so if I have to rip it out and start over, I will. At least now I'll have a better idea of how the yarn behaves, and can design with that in mind. The amusing part is that I feel so much better now that this decision has been reached - it never ceases to amaze me how liberating a decision can be, even when it's a decision to abandon something.




In other news, life has been busy around here (all the more reason I do not need to be spending my precious leisure time on knitting projects that I'm not really feeling the love for). I got a new fishbowl (a lovely big 12 litre number) and three lovely (but tiny) white cloud minnows. This is not a good picture, I know - I found the bowl quite difficult to photograph, but at least this one shows off the beautiful plant. It looks quite lovely against the black gravel, and I've had a lot of compliments about how the whole set up looks.

I've also been working a lot, which eats a lot of my energy, especially when it's this hot (we have no air conditioning inside the shop, which means working in temperatures going all the way up to the high 30s and beyond - not fun). And I've been doing a lot of writing and sewing, and also hunting for a new job. It's been fun, but I am beginning to realise that I probably need to cut down on hobbies if I want to keep my sanity once uni starts again - I had to go home sick from work last week simply because I was so tired that I was dizzy and disoriented, and classes aren't even running at the moment! So unfortunately I think that the future holds more rest and fewer fun things for Anna - perhaps I need to learn to knit while I sleep.




And as alluded to by the title of this post, last week there was a trip to Melbourne Zoo! I went with the boyfriend and a couple of friends, and a very good time was had. It was the first time I'd been to the zoo in years, and definitely the first time I'd been since I'd gotten my mitts on a digital camera. Behold, the incredibly cuteness that is the red panda. Though the highlight for me was some leopard rays that were in a small tank near the seals. They were amazing - like big friendly curious frisbees with funny little faces and oddly human looking eyes. I fell a little bit in love with them, proving I think that deep down I will always be that little kid who collects bugs and creepy crawlies in jars.

I was going to blog a little about my newest project, but I recently came to the conclusion that this blog would probably be a lot better if I posted shorter posts more frequently, rather than the (comparatively) huge but sporadic posts I make at the moment. So in the spirit of this resolution, you'll just have to wait until next time!

A constructive day...

I'm having one of those glorious days when I feel constructive. Only problem is that now it's evening and I've just eaten, which means I'm feeling too full and sluggish to actually do things. So what do we do? We make lists, and plan things, and feel constructive that way, that's what!

There's lots of knitting things I've got lined up at the moment. I don't have a lot of money right now, so I'm trying to burn through the not-insubstantial stash instead of gallivanting around the yarn shops and making merry with my meagre funds. All of the things I've got lined up in my brain are things I can make with yarn I already have. Especially after Friday (Clegs sale + Anna being owed a belated birthday present by certain parties = yarn acquisition).

Behold the ill gotten gains:




I got a whole bunch of 100% wool (12 balls odd?), some lurvely green merino/silk yarn (6 balls), and a single merry ball of grey Patonyle. Very nice indeed. And I know what I'm going to do with it all!

(eeew, but now I'm dissatisfied, because the above picture gives the heinously false impression that I might have bought pink yarn... the very idea... It's actually more of a pinky purple. I definitely do not do the colour pink)

Oh, and on the note of yarn sales, I'm finally using some poor languishing yarn that I've had kicking around since the Cleg's Boxing Day sale... It's been hanging around for so long because it's... mohair. And I don't do mohair. I honestly have no idea why I keep buying it. It just really isn't my thing. I don't like fluffy (or not in my yarn, anyway... it's forgivable in small animals). It's not something that features in my wardrobe with any great frequency. But, for some reason I bought it, so now I'm using it, and it's actually pleasing me for some inexplicable reason. I'm making a Simple Yet Effective shawl using it and some black fake mohair that somehow found its way into my possession as well. And, well, it's pleasing me! It's fun to pat, it's rainbow and black, and very relaxing to knit.

That said, I don't know if it will ever make it out of my front door. Fuzzy (and stripey rainbow fuzzy at that) isn't something I think I can pull off. Maybe it might work if I was small and cute and had pigtails. But the fact remains that I am nearly six feet tall, frown a lot, and generally can't pull off cute to save my life. I don't think that fuzzy is something that's going to happen. But you never know, do you?

Wow, that was a tangent. Anyway, the knitting list is as follows:

• Finish my poor languishing alpaca cardigan, while it's still winter and alpaca remains a valid wardrobe choice - all it needs is it's zip put in, and a little crochet (whimpers in fear) to fix up the neckline
• Finish my Woodland shawl (over 2/3 of the way through now)
• Finish the garter mitts I've been making for Richard's birthday (which, Anna you lazy bum, was on May 13th... get off your arse and knit, dammit! It will take you all of two measly hours to finish)
• Make the lining for that poor bag that's been kicking around my study for the last six months - it'll take all of five minutes once I finally get out the sewing machine and get down to it
• Either rip or finish that crazy, abnormally coloured cable jumper that's hiding half-finished in my bedroom... before it evolves into something living and tries to gnaw my leg off while I sleep

And once I've done these things (or at least enough of them to justify starting new stuff), there's other stuff on the agenda (because I am now organised enough to have plans for my stash yarn!):

• Make a Tempting with the awesome cables mod I saw on Ravelry out of my beautiful, shiny, lovely, verging on edible Naturally Me yarn
• Some Endpaper Mitts in my grey/black Patonyle
• A Luna Moth shawl in my Naturally Merino et Soie yarn
• A top down raglan with some self-designed colourwork with all of that 8ply wool
• Socks! I don't care what kind, but I want warm feet and have the yarn with which to attain this goal!
• A vest (something with a cable, I dunno, I'll make something up) out of that maroon acrylic/wool blend that lives near my bookshelf

There are other plans too, though most of them are either things that I need to buy more yarn for (I want a Noro shrug, but that will unfortunately need to wait until I have more money, as right now I have all of one skein of the yarn that I want to make it from), or uses for yarn that I have that haven't quite coagulated (hehe, yeah, that's definitely the correct word) into projects in my head yet.

Hmmm, I should probably conclude this post now. But at least it's here to motivate me. Now that the "Internet" has heard my plans, I need to follow through and do them.

(I have this weird mental thing where I think of the "Internet" as being like another person who will judge me if I procrastinate... well, whatever works, I suppose, though I think that all this really does is reflect just how technologically backwards I am)

And now I must go and write stuff. I've decided (in non-knitting related constructive thought) that I'm going to submit an entry to the Melbourne Uni creative writing anthology publication this year, and since it's full of people who can actually write, I'll need to lift my game and put in some effort if I even want the slightest piddling chance of making the cut... and even then I'm not getting my hopes up - I suspect that these things only publish people who have a much better command of the English language then me.

(Back to my original paragraph... at least I did constructive things earlier... I went into uni, studied diligently for a few hours, returned library books, made a hairdressers appointment, etc. And at least lunch was lovely and a half... my favourite spicy hommus from Queen Victoria market, turkish bread, some lovely fresh dates... man I love dates, washed down with a glass of rather nice Cabernet Merlot. If all lunches could be so good, I would be a happy Anna indeed).

Oh my, I am very brackety indeed today, am I not?