Spinning...and Musicals

I showed my mom the yarn I wanted to buy, and she pulled her spinning wheel and a basket of wool out of the basement. I think I'll still buy the yarn for this vest, but I would like to learn how to spin. It's actually very rhythmic and relaxing, once you stop thinking about it. I'm not very good at it yet, as you can see from this example. Although, I suppose the fact that it holds together fairly well when you tug on it a bit is something...

I actually did get a part in Sound of Music - as a nun. It's a small part, but it will still be fun. Unfortunately, thinking I hadn't gotten a part, I agreed to accompany a children's theater production of Guys and Dolls. So, I'm going to be very, vey busy this fall. If I had to go to every rehearsal for Sound of Music I would literally have a rehearsal for something every night of the week except Sunday. But considering it's such a small part, I imagine I won't have to be at every rehearsal until closer to the performances...I hope!
posted by Sarah Reilly 11:13 AM -

Wow!

Knitty.com is fantastic! It makes me want to design something to contribute! In the meantime, though, I'm almost done with the first of the mystery Christmas projects - I'm going to have to find a way for non-recipients to view these things, since waiting until after Christmas is a long time - and since it's going so fast, I found a project to make for myself. :) Unfortunately, it calls for Colinette Point 5 yarn...at $19.50/skein, that's going to be one expensive vest. So, I rolled all of the change in my bedroom and came up with just enough for three skeins and the needles I need for it. It must be a sign.
posted by Sarah Reilly 9:37 PM -

Adventures in Home Ownership
(or, how to have a new furnace installed, in three easy mistakes)

So, I worked from home yesterday so that we could have a new furnace installed. Yay. I thought, this will be great - no interruptions, I'll get tons done... Mistake #1 - I forgot that everyone who might usually stop by my office also has my phone number. Mistake #2 - not finding "doggy day care" for Molly. Molly was, to say the least, very disturbed by all of the banging and rattling going on in the basement, and spent the entire day barking at each and every heating register on the first floor. Continuously. Just in case, of course, I didn't realize the danger that at any moment might spring through the registers into the main floor of the house. Mistake #3 - not understanding what the installer meant by, "you should open your windows, there will be some smoke when you start the furnace the first time". Try prodigious amounts of smoke, pouring through the house, causing all of the smoke detectors to go off. (Side note: I didn't realize that the different smoke detectors in the house beeped at different pitches and rates - I guess this would let me know where the smoke was at any given time?) And, of course, being vertically challenged, I couldn't reach the detectors to rip out the batteries. Finally, I relocated myself, my laptop and Molly to my parents' house to try to salvage the rest of my workday. What a relief to come into a quiet office today.
posted by Sarah Reilly 4:42 PM -

Christmas Project Woes

Last night I realized that I had totally screwed up a sleeve I was almost done with all the way back at the beginning. The only way to fix it was to rip it all out. The only thing worse than ripping out a sleeve is ripping out a sleeve done in Fair Isle (two colors). The only thing worse than that? Ripping out a sleeve done in Fair Isle on double-pointed needles. I just took 'em out and ripped...all the way back to the ribbing. I did manage to pick up the stitches there, though, so at least I didn't need to re-do the ribbing. Funny, though, I was determined to at least put back part of what I had ripped before I went to bed, but it went so much faster than the first time I did it I managed to get even further than I was before I'd ripped. Maybe I'm just finally getting used to these dratted double-pointed needles... I actually finished the sleeve on my way in to work. (Thank goodness for car-pooling!)
posted by Sarah Reilly 8:49 AM -

Update

I didn't get a call-back. Oh, well. I think I'm actually somewhat relieved, though, because I saw my entire fall (my favorite season) getting very busy, very quickly. Now I'm only committed to band one night a week. The rest of my evenings will be spent knitting! :)
posted by Sarah Reilly 9:45 PM -

Am I Crazy?

Last night I auditioned for Sound of Music. (As if I didn't get enough of it last spring!) Rehearsals are three nights a week, and I'm starting band tonight, which would make four nights a week I'm not at home... Of course, that all assumes I get called back, and then manage to get a part. I guess the worst that could happen is that I don't get a part and I have more time to sit at home and knit. :) I'm really glad I did the audition, though, because I was very nervous about it, and seeing as how I used to think I'd like to do theater professionally someday (way back, ages ago, in high school), I was angry with myself for being scared of it. But once I got up on stage I realized I had nothing to be nervous about, and I think I managed to not make a fool out of myself.

Part of me thinks I shouldn't publish this, because I might jinx it, but the rest of me figures that's silly.
posted by Sarah Reilly 8:55 AM -

...And Again!

I have another Picture of the Day!

So let's see, this weekend (three days for me - I took Friday as vacation) consisted of knitting, buying knitting supplies, and watching football. Ahhh. I love fall. I'm starting Christmas gifts now, which I can't put up pictures of, because the majority of the people I'm making things for read my blog on occasion. Oh, well. Let's just say that I bought a significant quantity of yarn over the weekend, all of which is destined for gifties. My living room looked like a yarn shop by the time I brought in all of the bags!
posted by Sarah Reilly 1:19 PM -

Picture of the Day

Check it out - my picture is Picture of the Day today! This would be much more exciting if I didn't work on the project, but it's still neat. And no, I'm not the person who does the image approval (thank goodness - I wouldn't want that part of the job!) so it's not like I hard-coded my image in there or anything. :) <shameless plug> Go on, upload some pictures - you know you want to! It's a contest, besides, so if you don't work for Kodak you have a chance to win neat stuff, like digital cameras and Ofoto credits. </shameless plug>
posted by Sarah Reilly 1:08 PM -

Finished Objects

See? Another project finished. I can too finish things occasionally! I have so many projects that are "almost done", I will hopefully finish several things in the next week or two. Of course, only one person was really hassling me about it...not mentioning names or anything...just someone who lives in my house and isn't a dog. :) So, now that I've finished that project, I can start another, right?
posted by Sarah Reilly 11:28 AM -

Just a warning...

..to all of you who like to put your hair up and have to travel by air... Bobby pins do set off the metal detectors, at least in the JetBlue terminal at JFK. Ugh. I figured I was safe when on the way there my jewelry didn't set off the detector, because jewelry has at least as much metal as bobby pins do, right? No such luck. Actually, the worst part was the other passengers waiting in line staring at me suspiciously. UGH. It's a good thing I checked the bag with my knitting needles. I can just see trying to explain those to the security guards. But here's the thing. If you can't bring knitting needles on (and I'm talking large, 8mm plastic needles here) why are you allowed to bring pens and pencils? I would think those would make just as good - and unlikely - weapons. Oh well. It was worth it to see my nieces and totally surprise Denis' mom for her birthday. :)

The side trip to the yarn shop turned out to be a dud, for the first time since I've started going there. How disappointing - they were having a fantastic sale, just not on any yarn that I wanted. At least I got a few more pairs of needles, which I'd had a hard time finding here. Jo-Ann's and Michaels seem to think that if you want big needles, they should also be very long. When you're only knitting a 7-inch-across thing on 36-inch circular needles, it's a royal pain. 10-inch straight needles work much better! (Yes, I've started a new project or two - I didn't bring my computer along with me, so I haven't updated the crafts page yet...maybe tonight, if I'm not too busy knitting!)
posted by Sarah Reilly 11:32 AM -

Finally!

I finally finished something. The valances took a little longer than planned, but they're done. It's hard to see what they're like, since I had to take the picture after dark, with a flash, but you get the idea. I also put up a page about my living room redecorating project. And no, I still haven't set in the sleeves of my sweater yet. :P It's not cool enough to wear it yet, anyway.

In other news, the spider seems to have found another home. We hadn't seen it in a couple of days, so Denis destroyed the web, and it hasn't been rebuilt. I really do hope the spider is living somewhere else and didn't get eaten by a bird or anything, but quite honestly, as long as it's not in my garden, I don't care. :)
posted by Sarah Reilly 10:17 AM -

I didn't forget.

I know yesterday was September 11th. I meant to blog, but couldn't find the words. I still can't. It hurts me to think about what happened. It hurts me more to see how commercial it has become, with everyone trying to out-do everyone else's tribute. "9-11" is a brand now, "God Bless America" our theme song. I went to a prayer service and kept my TV off. I don't need to see the towers fall again - I can still remember them falling. I watched it happen. There was no danger of the day passing without any sort of recognition on my part. And I didn't put out my flag. It was raining when I left home, and despite what everyone else in my neighborhood thinks, you don't put out the flag in the rain. I'm sure I've made myself very unpopular with my view on things. Oh well.

On a "lighter" note, what a very bizzare, almost creepy, coincidence that yesterday's Lotto number was "911".
posted by Sarah Reilly 9:05 AM -

Ahhh-Chooo!

I spent the weekend feeling stuffed-up and sneezy, with only enough energy to sit on the couch and knit. Darn. :) As a result, I'm two seams away from finishing my sweater! Well, and I need to set-in the sleeves. Ick. I think if there were someone who would finish my knitting projects - like the person who frames my cross-stitches - I'd be willing to pay good money to not have to sew things together. That's the least fun part of knitting. I ended up with exactly enough yarn - despite buying an extra skein. Thank heavens I bought the extra skein!

I haven't finished my window treatments yet, either. The panels have been up for over a week now, but I was stuck on what to do with the valances. I think I figured that out last night, though, and I just need to stop at JoAnn's on my way home for a couple small items. If it works, maybe I'll be able to finish those up tonight and post pictures.
posted by Sarah Reilly 10:28 AM -

Singing Needles

I took a break from the very warm, heavy afghan I'm knitting to go back to my sweater, which is all finished except the sleeves. It's not hot enough out for the A/C lately, but it's too warm to be sitting with 3/4 of a thick afghan on your lap! After using 13mm needles and two strands of yarn, using one strand of yarn on 4.5mm needles is like switching from little-kid crayons to big-kid crayons. And it's faster, too! I'm done with one cuff and partway through the second just while watching the first half of the football game last night. I finally decided to do the cuffs flared, like the pattern described, since I won't be wearing the sweater often enough to be annoyed by the excess fabric.
posted by Sarah Reilly 9:17 AM -

Evil unsolicited email

The "evil" song from Lord of the Rings is going through my head right now. (You know which one I mean if you've seen the movie). I just discovered a new breed of evil spam. Now, they use your email address as the "from" address, as well as the "to" address. You can't block your own email address if you're in the habit of cc-ing yourself in on emails, which I do somewhat regularly. And since they left the subject blank, I thought maybe I'd forgotten to put the subject in the last email I copied to myself. Pure evil. Not that I can complain that much - I have several email addresses, and I only get maybe a dozen spam messages a day between all of my accounts.
posted by Sarah Reilly 2:33 PM -

When I'm not crafting...

...I'm reading about other people crafting! OK, the spider has been at the top of my blog for far too long... Between being busy at work and feeling icky, I just haven't felt like blogging. I think it's just allergies gone very awry, but it still sucks to not feel well just as the weather is starting to turn fall-like and wonderful. So, I've been reading a lot. I found a book at my local needlework shop about a month ago, and hadn't read it yet - the shop owner talked me into buying it, but it's a murder mystery, and I've never really been into mysteries. (Except that one year in grade school when I read the entire Nancy Drew series and the Hardy Boys series...) Well, I started reading it Monday night, and couldn't put it down until I'd finished it - unfortunately, that was well after 1 a.m.. Yesterday on my way home from work, I stopped at Borders to see if they had any more books from the series and found two more - I'm halfway through one of them already. I had to force myself to stop reading at a reasonable hour so I could go to sleep. And, there are at least three more in the series that I haven't been able to find yet. The main character owns a needlework shop, and reading about all the wonderful projects that people in the book are doing makes me want to craft - except I want to find out whodunit, so I can't put the book down. What a pickle. :)
posted by Sarah Reilly 8:42 AM -

Abject Terror

Why is it that every year around labor day weekend we find something nightmarish on our property?!? Last year, it was the hornets' nest. This year? A gigantic spider that they must have misplaced while filming Arachnophobia 2... It's living in the bushes near the pool, and I almost walked into it while trying to water the peppers on the other side of the fence. There is nothing in this world that I fear more than spiders, except maybe gigantic spiders. Anyway, a brief visit to google helped me figure out that it's probably an argiope aurantia, which is not poisonous. Like I care. It had better be gone before I get home, or I'm going to find someone braver than me to evict it. In the meantime, I'm going to sit here in my safe, non-spider-infested office and try to forget about creepy-crawly things.
posted by Sarah Reilly 9:48 AM -