What a Life!

Every Saturday morning, Steve makes his predictions for the outcomes of some of the football game. He usually picks two or three for his “locks” of the day.

Today, his lock is that his alma mater will win. Nebraska is playing Iowa State in Lincoln. His undergraduate degree was Agricultural Studies with a minor in Agronomy from UNL, and his masters in Agronomy was from Iowa State. I think he’s right on this one!

We’ll be at the game today. If you’re watching, be sure to look for us on TV – we’ll be wearing red!

And the pictures…they were taken three years ago (2004) when Ben was about 15 months old.

This picture was taken in 2003 when Ben was about two months old.

Go Big Red!

Remember this?

‘Tis finished.

I actually did the trim last week, but I had to put it on display and walk by it and admire it for a few days before I decided for sure that I like it and that it was going to stay.

And since a cardigan alone might not get worn (because it doesn’t coordinate with anything and thus is simply forgotten), here it is with some little clothes.

I had purchased another outfit that I thought would go with it before I added the trim, but once the trim was done, the color of the trim and the highlight color of the little outfit just did not work together. Had I done green trim, it would have been fine. But I wanted pink. So that is how it is.

Hopefully my sister and brother-in-law will be kind enough to send me a picture of the little outfit being modeled. Baby is due in just about a month. This should fit her by Christmas, me thinks.

What’s wrong with this picture?

(You need not be a knitter to see it, though you probably need to be a knitter to diagnose it.)

That’s right – the stripes don’t line up. Why? Inconsistent tension. Aka gauge. The g-word.

These are the two front halves of the little cardigan I’m making Joey.

The yarn is cotton, which means no forgiveness. Wool gives a little so slight changes in tension can pass by unnoticed. Cotton doesn’t give at all, so slight changes in tension glare at you. […though the degree of difference in tension between these two pieces might be noticable in wool too…]

I knit the first one Labor Day weekend. The second one last Saturday morning. What I was so up tight about I do not know. Perhaps getting it done and off my needles? Again, dunno.

But the truth of the matter is this: the smaller one will have to be re-knit. There’s no blocking the differences out of this one. It’s gotta be redone.

I must admit, while I love the colors of the yarn, I’m not crazy about the fabric this yarn creates. It’s rather stiff, even though I’m knitting it exactly at the gauge printed on the label (that is, when I’m not too tense). I’m not that crazy about how the stripes look as a whole either. Add to that the disaster above, I’m ready to have this project off my needles. [I’m also thinking I won’t be buying any 100% mercerized cotton any time soon either. Just saying is all…]

In the meantime, I did work on the back. And after each stripe, I obsessively laid the correct version of the front up against it in order to ensure that the stripes were the same width. They are. Thank goodness.

Now just two sleeves – and a third front – to go.

P.S. Only 5422 ahead of me in line over at Ravelry.

I took the boys to the library today for story time. It’s been on my list of intentions for quite some time, but never got any further than that. Other things, other things…

I didn’t tell Ben what we were doing until about an hour before we had to be there. Part of it was my being unsure as to whether or not we’d make it out of the house by then. The other part? Well, Ben started misbehaving and I told him if he was good (I was specific, not general, like I’m being here), we could go to the library for story time. [Never waste a good opportunity to bribe motivate your children to behave.]

Needless to say, all of a sudden I had a saint on my hands. I’m telling you, he even put his own shoes on, though I still had to fasten them. [The things he can do when he sets his mind to it…] He even went out and got in the car ten minutes before I wanted to leave and sat in his seat and waited. Clearly, this was a big deal to Ben.

I told him on the way there that he would be going to the story time for big children like him and that Mommy wouldn’t go with him. He would come out at the end and Mommy would be right there to greet him when it was over. [I used to take him to toddler storytime, and you have to go through the toddler storytime room in order to get to where they have the preschoolers, so I knew the kids go by themselves, even though Ben had never gone to that group.]

We got there a little early, and I found one of the librarians and quizzed her. The toddler story time is officially for 18 months to 3 years, but she said she is happy for kids to come whenever the moms think they’re ready, which meant I could take Joey if I wanted (he’s not quite a year old yet). She also told me that the moms can go with the preschoolers if they want. Ben has never gone to an activity without me at least observing before, so I wasn’t sure how it would go.

We went to the room where the preschoolers met, and I asked Ben if he wanted me to stay with him or if he wanted to go by himself.

“By myself,” he said.

We looked around the room together and other children (many with their parents) began to gather. I asked him once more before I left if he wanted to stay by himself or if he wanted me to stay with him. Again, “by myself” was the answer. So we found a place for him to sit down and I went to the other room to do the storytime activities there with Joey.

Joey paid attention about half of the time. The other half was spent playing with his nametag. But really, I was impressed that he was that interested in what was going on. He sat on my lap happily the entire time.

The preschool story time goes from 10:30 to 11:00 and toddler storytime is from 10:35 to 10:55, so we were ready when the door opened and the preschoolers started pouring out. And pouring out is what they did! It was more like a stampede. They got a picture to color as they left. I kept waiting for Ben, but I didn’t seem him. Finally, when most of the other kids were gone, Ben appeared, with tears in his eyes.

I gave him a hug and asked him if he had fun, but he just cried. Oh, my poor sweet Ben!

I went into the room and talked with the teacher, who was the only one left in there. [Did I mention all the kids left like a herd of cattle?]

I asked her how he did and she said he did quite fine. I mentioned that he was crying when he came out, and she said he just got a little confused at the end when everyone got up to leave.

It makes perfect sense, if you know Ben.

So I asked him on the way home (as well as a couple more times during the course of the day), “Ben, did you have fun at storytime this morning?”

“Yes.” He smiles.

“Do you want to go back to storytime again?”

“No.” End of conversation.

I tried to ask him if he’d like me to stay with him next time, but didn’t get much of a response until this evening when he said he would like for me to do that.

When I talked to the librarians, I asked if most people come on just Tuesday or Thursday or if they do both. The answer was that they do the same stories on both days, so most people just go once. I’m thinking we’ll go back again Thursday and do it again.

Doing the same stories over again will add familiarity to it – and if little children love hearing the same stories over and over again, Ben is no exception. This time I can go with Ben and give him a little more direction as to what to do so he feels more comfortable with it all. And maybe sometime soon, he’ll be ready to go by himself again, just like a big boy. All grown up.

In the knitting world, there is a perpetual discussion of UFOs or UnFinished Objects. Generally, either people have startitis and start projects all the time but never pick them up again after the initial knitting session(s) or they do everything but the finishing – the blocking and seaming and such.

In many circles, people get all excited about knitting in the round because you create a tube which means no seaming and very little finishing. But as for me, well, I hate knitting in the round. Especially stockinette. It’s the same stitch over and over again and my hands just plain get tired. If I knit flat, at least I have the variety of knitting one row and purling one row.

So the Cobblestone Pullover in Fall 2007 Interweave Knits is knit in the round. But, of course, I modified it a) to fit my boys, and b) to be knit flat. I know, silly me!

But here’s the thing – finishing is fun. You can take something that looks like a mess – as in, unrecognizable, nothing like the real thing – and in a short amount of time (relatively), turn it into something that looks rather great. Quite amazing, to say the least.

I mean, all that knitting – like twelve hours of knitting, and then, in about an hour, it’s completely transformed from nothing into something real.

Like this.

This would be about what it looked like in my lap as I was working on it.

Looking more like a sweater.

Looking even more like a sweater. But still. Not a sweater.

Is that a sweater I see?

Why yes! A sweater indeed!

Doesn’t it make you wish there was a chill in the air and you could pick it up and put it on? It does for me. But alas! The chill that came last week has disappeared, and the sweater doesn’t fit me anyway.

I promise. Pictures with models once I make the one for Joey.

And other knitters, no, I don’t want to finish your knitting for you. If I did finishing all the time, it would lose it’s charm. I’m happy doing my own, thanks!

I know I’ve mentioned it here before, but I have two crazy boys right now so no time to look it up…

The latest thing in the knitting world is Ravelry which is where you can post pictures of your stash and completed projects, including all the juicy details like what yarn you used, finished size, modifications, and so forth. So say you want to make St. Brigid – who else has made it? what yarn did they use? did they do any modifications? Fascinating stuff like that.

They’re just developing this – last I heard it was still in beta. So if you want to be a member of the Ravelry community, you submit your email address and then when it’s your turn (aka they’re ready for you), they send you an invite and you can activate your account. You can enter your email address at any time and see where you are in line.

Well, as of Monday, there were 10,004 people ahead of me. As of today, a mere 9015.

Now my finishing spree just got even more serious because I want to have some pictures of really cool stuff I’ve knit ready to go up once I finally get my invite. Gotta run!