Admittedly, I did buy underwear at the grocery store, which is pretty sad.

I hurt my back last week when I slipped on some ice and fell. So last week was pretty unpleasant, but this week the pain doesn’t hit me until about 4 p.m. every day. Apparently that’s as long as I can remain upright without it hurting, but it doesn’t hurt nearly as much as it did last week. It has made knitting challenging, though.

I haven’t actually needed to do a lot of knitting, per se, but I do have lots of sewing up of knitted items to do. That, of course, happens to be my least favourite part. Which is why I’ve left all of it for so long.

Pretty pictures of stash should distract you from lack of any further content, right? Look, Handmaiden yarn in the First Flight colourway from Baadeck Yarns.

And the Celtic Colours colourway…

And now for something completely different:

It took me quite a while to figure out that was supposed to stand for “assorted cupcakes.” Because, I mean, it says ass cupcake.

Kevin was really nice and patient about complying with my bizarre request, especially when you consider that my camera was not being nice or patient. We had to move into better light and I had to take a whole bunch of shots in order to get one that turned out okay. Not that the final sock photo is a very good picture of him. Look, here he is during the concert, looking normal.

Kevin was also very nice about giving hugs to us weirdo girls who were waiting outside the tour bus after the concert. Aww, we ♥ you, Kevin!

It’s been a while since anyone has asked me why I wanted them to hold a sock, and I totally failed at explaining it to Kevin. I eventually gave up and said, “Look, it’s just something knitters do. You’re just going to have to accept it.” Sorry about giving the impression that all knitters are unhinged.

David didn’t come out to talk to the fans afterward, although he sometimes does. ‘Twas a good concert, though. I also liked the opening band, Crash Parallel. I’d prefer a concert at a venue where you can stand up the whole time, rather than at the Playhouse, but it was a better venue for a David Usher show than the casino in Halifax, which is where I saw him last time.

I wrote down the set list… mostly… I won’t post it unless I think I’ve actually gotten all the songs down correctly.

There actually has been quite a lot of knitting going on. I still need to finish up the baby sweater, but I’ve also started a Mystery Project involving intarsia, which is coming along quite well.

The back of it looks considerably more complicated and horrifying now, but overall, I’m very pleased with my progress on it.

Oh yeah, this is a rock star post, isn’t it?

Tilli Tomas Rock Star, in Jade. The colour really has to be seen in person to be properly appreciated. And appreciate it I do.

I did, however, get some photos when my boyfriend and I were at the Magnetic Hill Zoo. Such as this one of me feeding some very gluttonous deer.

I wanted my boyfriend to get a picture of me with the baby goats, purely so I could caption it “Me and the kids,” but there were too many other people around at the time to get a clear shot. I took a lot of other photos, though, one of my favourites being of an alpaca that looks almost exactly like Tina Turner.

See? Does she (admittedly, I’m making an assumption when I say “she”) look like Tina Turner or what?

And although I didn’t take any pics of the fibre-y goodness inside London-Wul, I did pose outside of it.

Guess what. I didn’t buy any yarn at London-Wul at all.

Because I bought a new spindle and several small bags of roving. Yup, I really have to take some stash photos soon so that others may see the prettiness. The roving I bought at Singer the other day was especially pretty. Note to self: also take photos of my soap. I’ve just started melt and pour soap crafting. I’m not interested in trying any soapmaking methods involving lye anytime soon (by “soon” I mean “within the next couple of years”) because I am clumsy and messy. If you’re not into making soap, here’s the 411: melt and pour is soap crafting for morons (such as myself), but you can make really impressive-looking stuff that way. You take plain white or transparent soap base, melt it in the microwave (or in a double boiler on the stove, but really, which method do you think I use?), add fragrance(s), and usually colour(s), and sometimes other additives (i.e., honey, vitamin E, oatmeal, apricot seeds), mix, pour into molds, wait for the soaps to harden, and pop ‘em out.

The current knitting projects include basic socks with Patons Kroy in Tutti Frutti Jacquard — hey, look, the Patons site has pictures of new Kroy colours; must find! — and a baby sweater.

I’m attempting the Heartbreakingly Cute Baby Kimono from Mason-Dixon Knitting in Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran. Too many people I know are spawning lately. My cousin’s wife is having twins; that seems excessive to me. I’m knitting the sweater in stockinette with a seed stitch border instead of garter stitch, and it started out fine because I am not a total moron, despite what I just said when I was talking about soap. The sleeves, however, are not going so well at all, so my plan is to throw myself on someone’s mercy tonight at Heather’s and have them show me what would be a better way to increase for the sleeves than a backward loop cast-on, because that is totally not working out for me.

Although, since I’m talking about Internet promises, I’d like to mention that I haven’t let the Tour de Fleece fall by the wayside. Well, not entirely. I have not spun every single day that the Tour rode, but I didn’t expect to. It was just wishful thinking, and I knew that when I first mentioned it. I also know now that there is no way that I will finish those two ounces before the Tour ends, but I really didn’t expect to do that, either. I knew that would be a reasonable goal for Basically Anyone Who Isn’t Me, but for me? Not so much. Anyway, I have produced some yarn, and I am continuing to produce yarn, and I’m happy with that.

I’m happy with the fact that there is yarn production taking place, that is. I’m not happy with the yarn at all. It is seriously awful. Like, worse than any pictures I’ve ever seen of anyone else’s first handspun. I’m not so much of a fragile delicate flower that I will never post pictures of it… but I am sensitive enough that I won’t post pictures of the awfulness until I have also produced some slightly-less-awful yarn, as well. I have some pride, as hard as it may be to believe.

Spinning is cool for those rare several-second intervals where it feels like I’m doing it right. And for some variety, after spinning for a while, sometimes my whole arm is sore, instead of just my wrists! I also bought a latch hook kit last weekend (if you scroll down on this page, it’s the one called Small Tie Dye), and while this kit is very simple, it is absolutely fascinating to spend a while latch hooking and discover that hey, the next day, entirely different muscles in my arms are sore! (Near the shoulder, in the front, not the back. I don’t know if this is ’cause my latch hook technique stinks, or what.)

Annnnd… on Saturday, I’m taking this Threads & Colours: Weaving on Small Looms workshop, so I can learn the exact manner in which weaving brings pain! Despite my sarcasm, I am very much looking forward to it.

I’m going to be working on some fast & easy knitting projects now that the socks, which took way too long, are (essentially) finished.

This 12-ply Handmaiden Cashmere is going to be a Quick Knit Hat soon, knock on wood. The colourway is called Glacier, and this lovely aqua is so very much my friend that I have some Sea Wool in the same colourway.

As for Things I Am Actually Doing, as opposed to Things I Swear I Am Going to Do, last night I started knitting this Daiquiri Dishcloth for a friend of mine, and it’s almost half finished. Half of a dishcloth doesn’t make for an interesting blog photo, so no pic for now. If you want to picture it in your mind, it’s hot pink.

Know what is a very happy thought? Lots of yarn.

The only thing I like more than lots of yarn is lots of books.

Baby-sitters Club books are definitely a happy, comforting thought. (That picture was taken in the Owl’s Nest. While I do own every book in the Baby-sitters Club series, I don’t own multiple copies of all of them.)

Knitting and other fibre-related magazines are also a happy thought.

Why do I need happy thoughts? Mainly because I have had a headache since yesterday afternoon. It was really bad last night, so I spent yesterday evening lying perfectly still with my eyes closed, because that was the only thing that made the pain bearable. Unfortunately, I wasn’t at all tired until my usual bedtime rolled around, so this was really, really boring. I tried taking ibuprofen yesterday, but it had absolutely no effect on my headache whatsoever. It did, however, make me dizzy.

When I woke up this morning, I thought that I felt a lot better. Then I tried standing up, and I realized that 1) I only felt a little better and 2) standing up was a bad idea. I went to work anyway, though, and lasted nearly an entire hour before going home sick. Oh, here is an actual happy thought: I bought the latest issue of Spin•Off on my way home from work.

I’m really bad at napping. Once I’m up, I’m up for the day. I can’t possibly go to sleep during the day unless I’ve been awake for well over twenty-four hours. If I hadn’t gone to work at all, I probably would have been able to sleep in, but since I did get up, there was no way I would be able to fall asleep again. So I’ve been up all day, sick and tired and cranky. The headache did subside enough by this afternoon that I was able to do things such as knit and waste time on Ravelry. I know time spent on Ravelry isn’t usually time wasted, but today I read all 4,811 posts in the most useless thread on Ravelry (it’s about tiny icons, mainly of food, that show up after certain words).

I finished knitting the cuff of the second Tangled Up in Blue sock and I was really happy about that because I do not have the patience to continue in 1×1 ribbing on those tiny needles for very long. I don’t generally find knitting on tiny needles any more difficult than knitting on larger needles (although of course it takes longer), but switching between knit and purl so constantly on those toothpicks (2.25 mm bamboo needles, switching to 2 mm for an inch at the ankle) is a bit much for me.

Then I discovered an inexplicable mistake in the cuff, and I had to rip back half of it and knit it again. Which is such a pain, because I knit ribbing so slowly on small needles, and I knit stockinette at quite a reasonable pace for me. I thought I was actually going to see some progress on the sock today, but nooooo. It was not to be.

I DID NOT ACCOMPLISH ANYTHING TODAY. This drives me crazy. I did not manage to read a book, not even a children’s book. (I did look at the pictures in my new magazine, but I didn’t really read it.) I had to undo the minuscule amount of progress I’d made on my sock, when I could have gotten so much more done if I hadn’t made that freaking mistake. I spent a bazillion hours on Ravelry without accomplishing anything useful there, either, except for adding exactly one yarn to my stash.

This is sock yarn that I won in a prize draw at Singer on World Wide Knit in Public Day. It is Regia Canadian Color 4747 Kilt, and although it looks okay in the skein, it’s so much prettier when knitted up — I found a photo of a sock that someone made with the same yarn. Ooh. Lurvely.

The teeny bit of WWKIP Day that I managed to participate in was fun — running to sit in front of the courthouse during my lunch break, knitting two rounds on a sock, gulping down one samosa, and probably seeming rude and/or strange as I barely had the chance to talk to anyone, except for saying, “Hi, let me see what you’re knitting! Ooh, pretty! Bye!” I hope another year I’ll have more time! It sounds like a good time was had by all, so yay to Trish, canKNITian, & co.

I have convinced Ria to come back over to the dark side, and she is knitting another sock.

I think I might be dumb for only giving the Tangled Up in Blue Socks a one-inch cuff, since they are a cotton blend. They will probably fall down all the time.

I can’t believe that I am worried about my lack of accomplishments on a day I stayed home sick. Quiz: Am I too a) driven? b) self-loathing? c) whiny? or d) all of the above? Oh, well. At least I wrote a blog post.

It’s Sean Sheep Byron Bay in Antique Pink. I needed cheap yarn for a decorative strip of random knitting and I bought this yarn purely because it cost $2.20 (okay, I bought it because it cost $2.20 and it looks like a regurgitated ballerina), but I have grown so attached to it that I think I will buy some more and make an actual scarf out of it.

The stomach lining is actually part of the display, but the sock just ducked in there for a minute to put in an appearance. It gets around, it does.

Another reason for my lack of posts is, as always, my general laziness. A third reason is that, as far as my mood goes… well, I’ve been better. It’s nothing to worry about. It’s been a dreadful winter, weather-wise, I have some personal stuff going on (who doesn’t?), and maybe I need my meds tweaked. Or maybe I don’t. It’s nothing major. I’m functioning well. I get up every day, I go to work, I like to think that I do my work well, I read, I hang out with people, and, oh yeah, did I mention that I KNIT A PAIR OF SOCKS?

Today I bought reward yarn for finishing my first pair of socks. It also helped that all the yarn at the Singer store in Fredericton is on sale for the next two weeks. Sweet.

Why, yes, I did take off my boots in the store and show the lady my new socks. However did you guess? I also showed them to most of my co-workers.

Turning two pieces of string into actual socks that you can wear on your feet really does wonders for your mood. Or at least it did for mine.

Fleece Artist Merino Boucle. It looks something like dreadlocks, but since Fleece Artist also has a yarn called Dreadlocks, it is probably not wise to describe it as such.

Crack Silk Haze. Duuude. ‘Nuff said. You don’t know how badly I want a ball of this in bright red, though.

I have, like, this sub-collection of Fleece Artist bits ‘n’ bites, as well as a sub-collection of turquoise yarns. Sometimes these two sub-collections intersect. Speaking of intersecting, this is the best Venn diagram ever.

Since this is the end of the year, I might as well reflect upon What I Learned in 2007, Knitwise. It’s a short but fun list: cables, DPNs, socks (I’ve made one-and-a-half so far!), and although it’s not knitting, I also finally got the hang of cross stitching and became obsessed with that as well.

Once again, there hasn’t been much knitting lately. I’d mainly been cross stitching for the last little while, but I haven’t taken any progress pics lately. I’ve at least been doing more knitting than blogging, I can promise you that! I plan to do more of both from now on, but I’m definitely not going to make this a New Year’s resolution, because I am crap at resolutions.

Happy almost-New Year to everyone. I hope you have a great 2008, and if you get drunk enough tomorrow night, you might be able to forget all about 2007.

Oh, and despite having extremely valid excuses for my lack of productivity on all fronts lately, it’s still true that I am also a big procrastinator and lazy as sin.

One thing I have managed to do lately is spend a completely disgusting amount of money on yarn and craft books, though I can ill afford it. This is not totally my fault, ’cause The Boy and I rented a car last weekend so we could see the Arrogant Worms concert in Fredericton and I could scout out places to live. Since we had a car, we went to the main Cricket Cove store in Blacks Harbour (village motto, which I am not making up: “Home of the Largest Sardine Industry in the World”), and it was love.

My boyfriend, who is not normally that blurry, and a whole mess o’ Fleece Artist.

Unfortunately, I am normally that dorky-looking.

The store was lovely and there was so. much. yarn. We didn’t look at anything else in Blacks Harbour, but the village did smell much better than one would expect of the Home of the Largest Sardine Industry in the World. So I had to buy some yarn, because I don’t know when I’ll be back there again, and I really will post yarn pr0n photos another day.

I don’t have a lot of free time, so I have to steal a few minutes whenever I can to work on him. Oops, that sounds dirty. In order to make Sock, I am loosely following Silver’s One Sock on Four Double Pointed Needles Tutorial. It has lots of photos, so I can see what I am supposed to be doing. I just finished two inches of 1×1 ribbing and have switched to stockinette, which I’ll do for the next five inches. (Yes, the sock tutorial says to knit for eight inches in 2×2 rib. I told you I was following it loosely. Or tightly, as the case may be. I have little feet.)

I have absolutely no idea what is going to happen with the Sock Experiment. When people ask me what I’m knitting, I say, “I think it’s going to be a sock.” Because I’m really not sure.

If I feel worried about the sock, I calm myself down by petting my skein of Sea Silk until I feel better. I don’t know what colourway this is. Ocean? Capri? Anybody?

I also love petting the Manos del Uruguay Cotton Stria in Aqua, but I haven’t taken a picture of it yet.

Tomorrow Ria and I are going to meet at Tim Hortons and knit, and if the weather cooperates, we will continue knitting in King’s Square and freak out the muggles. Funfun. Ooh, and I won a skein of recycled cashmere in her blogiversary contest when her random number generator randomly picked me, so there’s even more fun. The fun just never stops around here… although I’m not sure it’s recognizable as fun to an impartial, sane outside observer.