Sunday, April 29, 2007

Grr Argh

So for the last week, I've been trying to post these pictures, but haven't been able to. Turns out, I can do it if I do them one or two at a time. Irritating. But, I have knitting and cool geeky stuff to blog about, so let's get to it.

This is the first of a pair of Jaywalkers (a la Grumperina):

This is Meilenweit Cotton Fondo colour 6506. It feels really springy with the bright colour stripes and the creamy background. I've made pretty good headway on the second sock since I've finished this one, but I don't have a picture yet. What I have got is a close up:

Here you can see the striping and the pattern. I love this pattern, it's the second time I've done it and my other pair are my favourite socks. Caleb approves :)

In not knitting, but still geeky news, this arrived in the mail the other day!

Close up:

Reverse:

This is a t-shirt from MakeUSmile Tees. An online company based in the states. I really liked the service I got and would recommend them. Anyway. The picture is from a commercial that airs very briefly in the movie Serenity.

I love this movie, just like I love the television series that it was based on, Firefly. This was an example of the voices of fans having sway in the entertainment industry. FOX network prematurely cancelled Firefly, much to the fans' horror, and a really big noise went up online and at conventions and in letter campaigns, and we got a movie out of it. Never give up on a cancelled program you love. Personally, I'm going after FOX again for cancelling Drive. I hope anyone else reading, takes their television entertainment into their own hands too. Maybe we can get rid of all the garbage that's out there.

Browncoats did the impossible, we are mighty, never give up!






Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Yay New Post!

So It's been a while... Again. I have excuses. There was no sun for the last eon (about a week and a half , but still), and I killed my battery recharger in London and so, had no batteries for my camera. Pitiful excuses, I know. I could have bought disposable batteries for my camera or even a new charger and taken low-light photos. I could have posted with no knitting pictures. I didn't. Get over it.


There has been knitting, though. I present Monkey Socks:

Close up:

I started these in Rome and knit most of the first sock on my 10 hour flight. I really like this pattern. I do not feel that this yarn makes the most of it, though. It does create an interesting snakeskin look, though and I do like the colours. I just wish that Cookie's fabulous pattern came through it. Oh well, I'll just have to knit this one again. Woe is me. Stats: Monkey Socks from Knitty by Cookie, the yarn is Supersocke 100 Highland Color 844, and they're knit with 2.5 mm needles.


Onward. I finished the (unblocked) back of my Not-so-Kakhi Cables cardigan:

Sideways view, sorry I forgot to rotate it before I uploaded it. Anyway, you can see the pattern of the cables really well. The centre portion and the sides are seed stitch and I really like how that looks in this yarn (Briggs and Little Regal). I knit this a little longer than the pattern calls for, because I like my sweaters to come past my waist. It may turn out to be a lot longer than my waist, but I figure in cases like this, more is definately better.


I also enhanced my stash some. One of my LYS is closing and is having a sale. Mmmm yarn sale.... Ahem, so yarn:

This is Galway Irish Worsted Knitting Yarn. 100% pure wool. The colour didn't come out very well in the picture, but is a gorgeous emerald green which I thought was appropriate (for the record, it is colour 26).
Also:

Regia 3-ply. I think this is a little finer than some of the other sock yarns I've worked with but I think I can manage. I might have to (gasp) swatch first. The yellow is actually a little softer than the picture, but not by much. I was riding the bus home and started snickering to myself when I thought about what socks to knit with it. I think these are going to be Melanie Berney's Snowflake Lace Socks. I think that's hilarious, but then I'm notoriously "off."


So I've also been plugging away at a trial run of Icarus using some old fingering weight yarn. So far it's turning out pretty well, but I have no pictures because due to the nature of lace, it just looks like a blob. Not terribly interesting. I have some lovely alpaca laceweight waiting in the wings to do this shawl in it's proper form, but me being a first time lace knitter, and a big chicken, I thought a trial run was in order. I wouldn't want to horribly ruin something as pretty as Icarus ought to be.


That's it on the knitting front. I'll just post a couple more shots from my vacation as eye candy. Also I figure the longer I can draw this out, the longer I can pretend I just got back from vacation. So: Here is The London Eye from across the Thames with the sun making it even cooler looking:

I'm a really big fan of the new Doctor Who. And this landmark played a very large part in the first season pilot, so it was really cool for me to see.


Next is a very serious bird:

This is one of the Tower ravens. There have been ravens at the Tower of London for hundreds of years. It is said that as long as the ravens stay at the Tower, the monarchy will never fall. Of course, the ravens live in a wire cage and have been bred specially, so that seems a little unlikely. Long live the Queen!


Finally, for the English portion of my trip:

As you may guess this is the glorious, ancient Stonehenge. You can't actually get up close to it anymore, it's all fenced off. Some vandals had caused some damage with spraypaint, and actually stolen some of the stone. I can't imagine someone doing something like that, but there you go. This site was very important for me. As a pagan, I could not go to London without making this pilgrimage. As you can see from the photo, we had an absolutely gorgeous day for it.

So that's it for now. I'll move on to the next leg whenever I get around to posting next :)