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8/27/2002 8:05:50 PM
sleeves, sleeves, sleeves
i started both sleeves while at the airport but didn't make a ton of progress. i was picking up someone i didn't know and his flight had come in early. i spent most of my time anxiously looking for someone who might be looking for me.
i'm sure much fun is being made at my expense, but i sent him a pic of myself so at least one of us would know what the other looked like. i felt like an idiot but in the end he found me.
the rest of the day was spent with the servers. it felt very odd being away from a computer all day. i think i need to get a laptop and wireless web. somehow my day did not feel right.
i've done about an inch on the sleeves, so i have a good day or two's work ahead of me. i plan on getting some of it done tomorrow, but the bulk of it will happen over the weekend. i'm knitting both at the same time in order to make them identical so it seems like its taking longer than it should.
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8/26/2002 11:32:20 PM
freelancing tuesday and wednesday
i'll be away from my machines over the next couple of days so the stitch and project will get updated later on.
i plan on working on the cardigan while waiting at the airport tomorrow. i'll keep you posted as to any possible progress that i may make.
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8/25/2002 4:03:55 PM
knitbloggers excursion
i got up early (second saturday in a row) to meet ivette and other knitbloggers at habu. i didn't know who the other bloggers were supposed to be but i was up for a yarn crawl (even though i had told myself i wasn't buying anything...)
it was drizzly, but cool, which to me was much better than it being hot and muggy. i grabbed a latte and headed over to 29th street. as i entered the building where habu was, a woman was getting out of the elevator. she looked at me for a minute and then asked me if i was liz. (being heavily tattooed makes you easily recognizable.) turns out it was ivette and they were coming down because habu was still closed. we hugged hellos and went outside to get cool.
outside i met the bloggers who had shown up so far: marilyn, and jennifer and her daughter. jen had flown in from israel and was ready to take on the shops!
we decided to wait for other knitbloggers to show up for a little while. when it didn't seem like anyone else was going to show up, it was time to give to give habu another try. ivette had already gotten a call from betseeee saying she'd catch up with us later in the day.
unfortunately for us, habu was still closed which was a real disappointment. i'd never been to habu before and had heard so much about their unique yarns (made from metal, paper, bamboo) that i was really looking forward to it. we moved on to school products cause it was nearby and, more importantly, open.
i told everyone how i used to live across the street from school products but never knew it was there until well after i'd moved. me telling folks that i had lived in some neighborhood or other almost became a joke. almost every time we went to a yarn store i'd comment about how i used to live in that neighborhood. i explained that since rents kept rising i had to keep moving, as most new yorkers do.
at school products everyone spread out and browsed. i had been there about a month ago and it didn't seem as if they'd changed any of their offerings, and since i wasn't spending money(!) i browsed around with everyone trying to see what they were interested in. betsy called ivette trying to figure out where we'd be off to next. ivette had told staceyjoy that we'd be at red lipstick around 1pm. it was around 11 already and we had a lot of ground to cover. we wanted to hit the yarn company, tender buttons, maybe the lion and the lamb, maybe downtown yarns all before heading to brooklyn.
we decided to go to the yarn co. next and then, if we had time, to head to some of the other shops on our list. i suggested getting in a cab to save time and off we went. i really enjoyed the cab ride actually. i sat in front with the driver, so i missed out on the conversation in the back, but i love taking cabs because you get to see so much of the city. all the stores and people and sights whizzing by is soooo very new york to me. the drive through central park is one of my favorites, especially at night.
we got to 81st and broadway at 11:30 and ugh! the yarn company didn't open until noon. i buzzed to see if they were open — they're on the second floor and you have to buzz to be let upstairs — and they said to come back at noon. jen buzzed them again and said that she'd traveled 7,000 miles to come shop for yarn, and wouldn't they please let us up early. the woman at the shop buzzed the door open and asked us to come back in fifteen minutes, which was cool. having fifteen minutes to kill, we went to the barnes and noble across the street. i knew where the knitting magazines were since i'd been there earlier in the week and we headed there. we stood around looking at patterns, commenting on how the magazines were done, what we thought was ugly, etc.
i was keeping time check and announced that we had 8 minutes left. i was hoping i wasn't annoying anyone and they told me they appreciated it. i told everyone that i used to be a project manager, which in retrospect seems like an odd explanation. its just that i'm so used to getting people to do things at certain times, and i'm a worrywart to boot. anyway, i kept "time check" until it was 4 minutes before we could go over. everyone except for me was buying mags (i'd started subscribing to everything and had them already) so we paid for our stuff and went over.
being in the empty yarn company was an entirely different experience. every time i've been in there its completely and utterly packed. yarn heaven! everyone split up to take it all in. i went in search of buttons for my baby cardigan, but they didn't have what i was looking for. i browsed, telling myself no more yarn everytime i saw something that i liked. honestly, i do have a fairly large stash of stuff to use up so i shouldn't be buying stuff. i did buy the alice starmore book, tudor roses, because its practically impossible to get. ivette bought some beautiful, furry angora / cashmere for a scarf, and i believe jen got some funky berroco zen. (sorry marilyn, i didn't see if you bought anything!)
we left at 12:30, partially because we were done but partially because it was getting majorly crowded in the store. at about 5 minutes after 12 the buzzer started ringing, and i don't think it was ever quiet for longer than two minutes. we caught the train at 86th street to head to brooklyn.
on the 2 train i bumped into jenny, who i had met at mike's party a few week's earlier. i was really pleased to see her. she still hadn't started knitting but had kept the page from the ram wools catalog as inspiration to start. i showed her the pieces of my baby cardigan and encouraged her to start knitting. (jenny, please start!!!)
marilyn and i sat and talked about the craft. its always kewl to speak to advanced knitters because you gain so much insight. i talked about finishing and blocking with her, which are my two main concerns with this baby cardigan right now and she sent me off in the right direction.
betsy had called while we were on the train and ivette called her back and told her where we were. already coming into brooklyn, she said she'd meet us at red lipstick.
brooklyn! and red lipstick! i must immediately say, visit her shop. i can't do it justice here. she's got great funky clothes and accessories. i eyed a heartshaped coin purse while telling myself no! and since i'm a jewelry whore that side of the shop was definitely off limits to me. she's got great necklaces. did i say funky? ok, plug over, but do go visit!
side note: i did get to buy a copy of needle and hook which is a knitting-zine. totally kewl. to get your own copy, send an email to alex@needleandhook.com
staceyjoy had black and white cookies for us when we walked in... yum... and everyone did their introductions. i always find it funny when i introduce myself via my blog. now, don't get me wrong, i love the name "crafty bitch." i think it suits me and its funny, but it always sounds odd (to me at least) when i say it. i guess that's partially cause i have anxieties about acceptance anyway — coming from the tattooed chick, that's a hoot, right? after the "hi, i'm crafty bitch, house arrest, liz from nyc bloggers" i always calm down, though.
i know i said it before but she's got a funky shop. i was even more impressed when she told us that she was clearing it out for the hat show and moving her stuff across the street. i originally wasn't sure if i was making a hat, but now i'm definitely going to. i'm not quite sure what i'm doing yet, but i have lots of oddballs of funky stuff left so i'm sure i can come up with something cute.
at some point betsy arrived and things were in full swing. staceyjoy showed us her knit stuff which was great, and we talked knitting, tattoos, etc. ivette showed off her new tattoo and many pics were snapped of it. i'll let her tell you what it is... :)
my cell phone rang and i went outside to take it. it was nate telling me his surgery went well. that "i'm ok, i'm alive" call added to what was already a great day. we hung out for a bit before going for pizza. i really wanted another latte, but i hadn't eaten yet. i was glad i did eat. that slice of pizza would turn out to be the only solid food i'd eat all day.
after pizza we went to knitting hands. for the record, the yarn connection is my local yarn shop. they have great stuff and they're really friendly to me. but knitting hands beats them hands down. i love that store. its one of the main reasons i'd readily move to brooklyn.
we probably spent an hour and a half in the store. circling, circling, coming back to yarn. i picked out another book for my reference library and felt yarns. (ivette bought the book for me since i'm working on a project for her.) since i knew i was getting a patternworks order in soon, it was much easier to resist.
marilyn left us early because she had a long trip home. we all said our goodbyes and kept shopping for another half hour or so. everyone bought something — even me! i bought a ball winder! (and i can't tell you how happy i am with it. it rawks!)
speaking of ball winders, betsy was winding her yarn on the store's winder and the swift practically took her eye out at the end. it didn't happen once, though. it happened every time one of us used the winder. i've made a mental note never to use theirs.
the end came too quickly. betsy headed off to her fiancé's. i made a quick pit stop at the tattoo shop with jen and ivette — hi-kiss the guys-where's my mp3 player-here's your pics-see you this week — before getting into the steamy subway to go back home. ivette and i left jen at 34th street and pointed her towards her hotel, then we proceeded to walk towards the nj ferries — talking along the way.
i'm a big talker, in case you didn't know.
we talked more about ivette's project, i was "verklempt" with thanks over the book and we generally hung out until her ferry came. a hug goodbye later i was getting in a cab.
at first i was nervous cause the cabdriver had a woman in the front seat of the cab. i could just see myself getting kidnapped and shipped into a tattooed-slave ring. i pulled out my cell phone in case i had to call 911. the cabdriver then told me it was his niece and she had never been to new york before. he was taking her around his cab so she could see the city. after all, there was no better way to see new york, was there?
i smiled and wholeheartedly agreed.
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8/23/2002 7:49:41 PM
personal projects moved
i don't often feel like moving things around, but when i do, lookout. one of the problems with that is that its hard to "shut down" the site so that people don't get broken pages. the alternative to that is to code and launch at 4 am.
while i have done that for professional sites, i'm not about to sacrifice sleep to this project. besides, i have a fun saturday to look forward to and i want to be chipper in the morning.
all the current site changes are listed here. the only difference my fellow knitbloggers will notice is that i moved my projects to their own separate page. i also plan to reformat them in the future and make the whole experience more diary-like.
i'm off to dinner and to relax some. gotta get up bright and early tomorrow!
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8/23/2002 4:01:31 PM
lost posts
hi all, i lost a couple of posts to database changes. the site has been a little erratic today, but i wanted to add some new features and they involved me tinkering with the live database. fortunately, i'm done for now and the site should be ok.
in knitting related news, i'm meeting ivete and a bunch of knitbloggers tomorrow morning. i can hardly wait as it all promises to be great fun.
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8/20/2002 11:36:13 AM
sleeves
today is stitch n bitch but i'm not going. i'm not feeling too hot, actually, and am about to take another nap. i woke up a sore throat and clogged ears. i don't feel a migraine coming on, but perhaps i'm catching a summer cold.
either way, i don't feel like being social today so i'll hole myself up in my apartment and get started on the sleeves. if i work on them today, i may actually be finished with the sweater by the end of the week.
also, this saturday, ivete is visiting the city and is hitting a bunch of knitting stores. i'm going to tag along, but being poor i won't be able to buy much. i've decided to hunt for buttons for the cardigan on this day, that way i won't feel left out of the shopping fun.
i'm going to take some aspirin and nap now.
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8/18/2002 4:40:48 PM
cardigan fronts finished
charlie, one of my ex-bosses, invited a group of folks to the beach and a barbecue at his house on saturday. he lives in long beach on long island, which is a far cry from my childhood trips to orchard beach in the bronx.
i'm really not being much of a beach person but i decided to go anyway. the temperature in my house was already brutal and sitting at the shore would probably be good for my spirits.
i opted for slathering myself with spf 45 sunblock and sat under a beach umbrella, knitting and making conversation. i finished one cardigan front before being dragged to an impromptu water volleyball match. (did i mention i suck at volleyball...)
after a lot of wet splashy fun we went back to charlie's and ate. boy did we eat. charlie made burgers and hotdogs and my friend sherine brought along several different desserts. we sat around and joked, until 9 or so when everyone decided it was time to go home.
once home i settled in and finished the second front while watching adult swim on comedy central.
all i have left now are the sleeves and the neckband. i also need to go out and buy buttons which i believe i will do sometime this week.
i'm excited that the project is almost complete. my only remaining concern, aside from the knitting, is the blocking that the cardigan needs. i handwash everything i make but i seldom block it. this cardigan definitely needs to be blocked so i need to ask the crew over at stitch n bitch for their sage advice.
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8/14/2002 4:30:52 PM
decreases
i started doing my decreases while on the train ride to visit my friend adam. i only got to do two rows, though, because it was too hot. i managed to find the only unairconditioned car on the whole train and sat sweltering until wall street.
the train on the way up was cooler, but crowded so i decided to skip the knitting for the moment.
right now, i'm thinking of escaping my apartment for an air conditioned bookstore. i'm tired of sitting in the heat and i needed to pick up a vbscript book anyway. if i'm lucky i can knit while i'm there. design work is nagging at the back of my mind though, and i do need to get my to dos organized and focus on my paying jobs.
dilemmas, dilemmas... i'm just so done with this project right now. i really like it but it feels like an albatross around my neck. ideally, i'd like to get to row 60 by end of night. i'm going to the beach this weekend, so i know i'm likely to get a ton of knitting time in then, but i'd like to be beginning the sleeves at that point.
anyway, enough griping. going to go get cool. in the meantime, here's ben eating a fruit cap i made him.
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8/14/2002 10:16:38 AM
proud moment
i'm at the halfway point on my cardigan fronts. i finally caught up to where i was supposed to be on monday and now am rip roaring to churn through the decreases. after that its the sleeves and the neckband. woo hoo!
when on my last row for the evening, i realized that i had knit 4 rows incorrectly. there's a 4 stitch garter band that forms the button band. i had knit it as stockinette without realizing. i decided to drop those 4 stitches and attempt to fix them. mind you, this was the first time i had ever done this to a) more than 1 stitch and b) to stitches at the end of a row. i was worried cause if i messed it up i would have to rip, a lot, and redo those rows. luckily, through the grace of whatever deity believes in me, my kludged method of picking and knitting the rows back up worked. i was really proud of myself. i feel as if my knitting has been advancing by leaps and bounds all year. i think i'm ready for an adult project.
when i got home from snb, i sat down and did the math i needed to alter the rowan orchid sweater to fit my busty self. i don't want to change the actual written pattern / stitch count. instead, i figure that altering the size by changing my gauge will be less traumatic for me. so calculator in hand i figured out i needed about 5 stitches to the inch and about 2600 yards of yarn to make a garment to fit me.
personally, i think its a little ridiculous that their xl size is 40". my bust is 46" and i still fit into size 14 clothes which is on the borderline of plus sizes. but its a european mag, so i guess that english women are slimmer than their american counterparts.
the old me would have made the sweater in a smaller size in hopes that i would slim down to fit into it. the new me wants a sweater that will fit NOW. i kinda like that shift in perception.
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8/12/2002 11:51:54 PM
dilated pupils and delayed weekly stuff
i went to the ophthalmologist this afternoon for my yearly checkup. i'm really near sighted and i have a condition where my retinas are really thin. there's nothing i can do about it now, but if the retina tears, i could go blind. i'm also at high risk for developing glaucoma for some hereditary reason or other. since it'd be really hard to be a blind designer, i take my visits to the ophthalmologist very seriously.
i knit while in the waiting room and got the office staff excited about handiwork. i suspect the rest of the patients thought i was a little strange, judging from the looks i got. i guess people don't expect heavily tattooed women to knit or be intelligent.
the office staff, though was really nice. it was fun talking to them about what i was making, where they could learn to knit, what kind of yarn i had chosen and why, etc. they were each interested in doing different kinds of crafts and the conversation meandered from crocheting to sewing to making latch hook rugs. even the doctor asked me what i was making as he dilated my eyes, which i thought was kind of cool, also.
of course, knitting got a little harder after the drops, but i think i managed about 10 more rows before i realized i was in danger of making a mistake. i couldn't see and feeling my stitches wasn't helping me because i was splitting the yarn. fortunately, as i finished the row i was on, the doctor called me in to finish my test.
currently, i'm at row 22 of my pattern which doesn't seem like much, but i am working both fronts at the same time. this is actually where i should have been last friday, if i had kept up with my knitting plan. i've caught up, which isn't bad, but i had hoped to keep knitting after i stopped looking like a drugged out freak and my eyes got back to normal. (the best part of having your pupils dilated is looking at your eyes in the mirror... its really kinda creepy and oddly cool at the same time.) by the time i got home, however, the heat had whipped me and i had a huge headache. i sat down in front of my fans and turned on my computer. i instantly realized that my monitor was too bright for my eyes since my pupils were still wide open. i wore sunglasses and caught up on my email and surfing. six hours later, i realized that it was time for bed.
i have an appointment earlyish tomorrow. because of this, i'll be posting the new stitch pattern and project late tomorrow or wednesday.
since i didn't knit up my swatch over the weekend — i was a bad girl — i need to make one tonight to have it ready for first thing in the morning. its late now and i really should be in bed, so i'll probably work on it after stitch n bitch tomorrow.
i'm also shooting to get more knitting done this week in general. i'd like to seem a lot more of the cardigan done, with hopes of having it finished by end of next week. i also want / need to start the tkga master knitter's swatches and have to carve out some time for making them. i'm thinking of curtailing my non-essential computer time and devoting all my free time to knitting. we'll see how that goes. i doubt it will be possible.
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- past | future +
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