Sunday, January 30, 2011

The Week In Review

I have to send weekly updates at work on a project basis. I'm almost in the habit. Well, I would be if not for the fact that they are due to be emailed on Thursdays and I have 8.5 hours total meetings scheduled on Thursdays.

Jason's Aunt Doyle passed away, so he's out of town. Aunt Doyle was great. We will really miss her humor.

We haven't made much traction on the house. We did get the tree down. And I hired someone to make a run to the landfill with the old drain stack pipe, the old dishwasher, the old water heater, and some other old house debris. Now we can make more debris. I think the replacement windows for the basement would be great to work on, but I'm not the project manager. I'm just the minion!

I am keeping up with the laundry still, and it's such a relief to know that there are school shirts and socks and underwear every morning. I do have a little pile of mending to do and will probably tackle that today.

Speaking of mending, I FINALLY seamed the Baby Surprise Jacket and put on some buttons. It's . . . enormous. It would fit a 3 yr old. Trouble is, I don't know any 3 yr old boys. It's a very boy sort of color scheme. I will get a pic up on flickr today. This is my favorite part of the droid-- I can upload photos without finding some stupid usb cord.

I found a list of the books I read last year and didn't review! Then I lost it again! I did read Jane Eyre, which I'd never read before. I really liked it a lot, but I honestly wonder if Mrs. Rochester wasn't gaslighted by Mister Rochester.

The prototype shawl continues along. I am not sure which way to go with the Real Yarn. I may take the Citron and put different stitch patterns in lieu of the ruched bands. I read about Crazy Lace on ravelry, but cannot find a copy of it anywhere for less than $70. No. Just. . . .No. Apparently it is a way to knit lace without charts or instructions. I am dubious. There is a rav group, but they don't have much to say that is useful-- it's all adoration for the designer. Not that there is anything wrong with that, I just need actual information.

As it is the time of year when I often have a little windfall at work, I ordered Vogue Stitchionary 2: Cables,
2-at-a-time Socks, and Sock Yarn One-Skein Wonders. I really want to also get Stephen West's delightful pattern Clockwork. Of course, since I want to make it in Knit Picks City Tweed DK which I do not have in stash, I will have to get medieval on some other stash busting projects in order to buy the yarn. Note-- I have added the knit meter gadget to the sidebar.

Sunday, January 23, 2011

First Finished Objects of 2011

An acid green cowl for my coworker Stacy. Ravelry pattern is Ruched Cowl and it's free! I only used the smaller sized needles and it was plenty ruchey. It was a fun knit. She loves it!

Too bad that STUPID BLOGGER won't actually upload my damn picture. You'll just have to click the link.

There is another dumb bathroom shot of me in the hat I made for my other coworker, who had to fly up from Argentina in order to test unmasked data for me. It's summer there and of course, totally vile here. I finished this last night and errr, he flew home this morning. Sadly my droid is not uploading pics to flickr anymore. It's probably user error. I'm not reading a manual for a damn phone.

As it happens, I have 2 knitting related resolutions this year. I resolve to replace yarn at only half the rate I knit it. I further resolve that my yarn depletion method is not going to be FIFO or LIFO but instead will be cost based. I have several skeins of Supah Fancy Stuff that I really want to show off. And let me tell you, I've learned that anyone can appreciate a fantastic scarf but if you try to get people to pet a skein of yarn they just think you're off your rocker.

Book 3: Feeling Sorry For Celia

This is a young adult book in the epistolary form, where some of the letters are real and some are from pretty funny imaginary societies. Elizabeth, the heroine has a completely out of control BFF named Celia, and a great penpal in a nearby school-- Christina. I believe that this was one of the recommendations I got when I looked for similar titles to The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.

I really liked that in this teen book, teens actually HAVE SEX. Because let's face it, in real life, they do HAVE SEX. I also like that this book talks about consequences- emotional and otherwise.

There were a couple of unlikely twists that I didn't care for, regarding Elizabeth's dad and his new family.

Book 2: Seven Nights To Forever

I must say, I am always dubious about happy endings for couples where one of them starts as a whore. The book was ok, but I agree with the commenter on the Smart Bitches site who wondered why the hero didn't exercise his rights as a husband on the bitch he married. If anyone deserved The Mrs. Rochester Treatment, it was whatshername.

Book 1: The Spymaster's Lady

I did read additional books last year, but I just couldn't be arsed to write reviews of them. 2010 got a lot less pleasant there for a while, mostly due to work. (My new year's resolution for work is No Crying At Work. So far, I've kept it, but I did have to take a brisk walk a couple of times and there have been more cocktails in my evenings.)

Book 1 of this year was Joanna Bourne's The Spymaster's Lady. Pretty fun read, I must say. I loved how completely brilliant and wily Annique was. She kicked all sorts of ass, physically and mentally. I do like that in a heroine. I didn't much care for the Startling Conclusion About Her Mysterious Parents.