ittybitty things and vacation

Itty Bitty
Originally uploaded by sparklypia

Hello hello! I love New Hampshire. Its true.
In the midst of wedding dress shopping (not mine), a shower, family visiting ,errand running and trying to nap and relax, I have done some knitting!
These socks are amongst a lot of what will be coming off the needles as pregnancy is the new black this season.
While I'm in no rush for my own, there is something that just makes me smile when I block baby things. How can you not?

I finished Harry Potter in record time last week, and my dreams are still a bit funny. As more people are finishing, I'm having some great discussions over the ending. I only cried once the whole book, but that's all I'll say about Harry for now.
I'm here for a few more days (til Friday) so, I hope to get a bit more progress done on other things over the next few days. Some may end up with bits of sand in them as I lug things to the beach! Yay!

consider yourself warned

deweygroupshot
Originally uploaded by sparklypia

I got the newest Harry Potter last night. I may continue to knit, but I may not tell you about it for a little while, as I'll be reading.
Apparently, there's a whole lot of weird-os in the world. I use this term loosely, as I've never been considered particularly normal by most, but witnessing the amount of people who turned out last night to the 1201am release of the final Harry Potter book IN FULL costume was amazing. I think my quote/constant thought may have been "Shit, people are taking themselves seriously dressed up as _____ enter any characters name here"
I totally forgot to also say how in the summer of crazy, my HLP is coming in August to visit for 5 days from San Francisco. I cannot wait. During that time, a ton of our College Crew will be at Dewey Beach, DE and we'll head out there for a couple of nights. I can't handle a week and every year I think I may be able to the following year, but then I remember. Drinking every night (lots, not a little) eating crap, late night pizza and sitting on the beach every day is something I can only keep up with for about 2-3 days before my body goes into revolt. Here's a picture from last summer. Yes, I'm in the dead center, no I don't have the little bangs anymore...

Flying summertime

Seriously, I'm not that naughty, just a bit swamped right now!
Its been a bad summer for blogging. 9-5 work, yoga work, visitors, visiting, you get the idea.
I have some news to report, however.
First, I cast on the chevron scarf. And then I frogged it. And then I cast on and knit and then I frogged it....repeat this for about 10 times. No joke. The Tall Guy couldn't seem to figure out what the heck I was doing. I wasn't sure either.

Chevron
Originally uploaded by sparklypia

But, finally, I seem to have it down. It looks like a spring garden to me. I'm not sure if I will keep this one or stock pile for holiday gifts. We'll see. The yarn I ended up using was one skein of koigu and about a half a skein of Fleece Artist. (which you didn't seen pictured, its the blue green colourway and so nice to knit with!) This wasn't my original intention, but the colours were just too good to not use together..

I'm heading to New England on Thursday for a week and can hardly wait. While I think there will be a lot of busy-ness and chaos, I'm demanding at least one beach day, two if I have my way.
One of my best friends will be in from California and we'll be hard at work finalizing her upcoming wedding plans for November. Currently, I'm on the lookout for a solid-colour dress in a blue hue. Not strapless. If anyone has an idea, just let me know.
Tonight, if you're not already aware (ha), the last Harry Potter book is being released. I may have a bracelet that holds my place in line for midnight. Please don't judge too much, I just want to read it before someone spoils it for me!
Also, in case you're wondering why you haven't heard anything about the Jaywalker recently... I got to the heel flap, forgot to change needles to the larger size and only remembered as I went to turn the heel. Well, normally you wouldn't notice the difference between size one and size two needles, but when you compare two heel flaps? You do. Sigh. I needed to just put that down for a minute before I threw it out my living room window.

Chevron?

Chevron?
Originally uploaded by sparklypia

I've decided to knit a chevron scarf.
I have plenty of yarn to do a few, so we'll see how it goes. The pattern I'm basing my scarf off of is found here
I have no clue if this first one will be for me or will be a gift... While its 6 months to Christmas for most of you... its only six months to the Holidays for us knitters... eeks!

Like the colours? Whew, they'll give you a headache.

Also, I'm practicing uploading pics and postings straight from flickr to here, so if you see anything funny or it looks bad, let me know.
The DC summer humidity is breaking for a few days, so I'm hoping to play outside a little this weekend before the "it feels like you're walking into a steam room when you walk outside" weather returns.

Who would think that the internet would the best place for knitters?
The more I love to knit the more I get sucked into knitting forums, websites, blogs and now, as of today... I'm in! Ravelry sent me an invite! Yay! If you're over there, find me and say hello... its sparklypia.
For another social web/community, its really well thought out. At the moment, I've very impressed.
Yay!

About Me...I'll try for 100

Ugh, I hate this stuff, but I figure it may help you to know me and my little corner of the world better.

1. I'm originally from New Hampshire and miss it dearly. Specifically, Portsmouth. It's a fantastic place to grow up.
2. I call Boston home, even though I've lived in the DC Metro area longer then I lived in Boston.
3. I'm a Red Sox fan, but I'm not the best at paying close attention to stats and standings. I leave that to my friends and family.
4. I've been in DC since 2002. I've lived within the same two blocks of Silver Spring the entire time. This just happened, it wasn't on purpose.
5. I can't believe I've been in DC for that long. I came here on a one year plan.
6. My husband is over a foot taller then me.
7. While I've been hitched for a bit of time now, it still feels funny to say husband.
8. He doesn't really like the Red Sox, but is a good sport about most things.
9. I call him the Tall Guy
10. We have a dog named Annie. She's a bit high strung, but in a way that you still like her after she's licked your face and done leaps through the backyard, knocking over anything in her path.
11. I have an amazing set of friends. Cheesy? Yes. But, true.
12. I taught myself how to knit about 8 or 9 years ago. There was an ill fated lesson abut 20 years ago from my great-grandmother, which I didn't retain, so it was all from scratch
13. I didn't get fully immersed in the knitting circuit until about 4 years ago.
14. I don't like to say obsessed. More like. A very dear hobby. Smart folks don't make fun of me, as they know I'll knit them presents.
15. I love teaching people to knit, or getting them more involved.
16. Ravelry.com has been an amazing tool for making new friends. Twitter is just fun.
17. Hardly any of my friends actually knit or have any understanding to this part of my life, but they accept it and I love them for that.
18. I've met a ton of awesome people via the internet that knit that I doubt I would have met otherwise.
19. If I could, I would never wear shoes. I love being barefoot. Summer makes me happy for this reason.
20. We have a Mini Cooper Clubman. It's a funny little car and I love it.
21. My degree is in Psychology.
22. I work in HR for the Government.
23. I would rather knit and go to Yoga, but it's a job and I like my co-workers.
24. I never would have thought my life would lead me to having to call the White House and debate issues.
25. The Tall Guy is the plant person in our house. We have wonderful vegetation and orchids. And I don't ever go near them. Mostly, I kill plants.
26. I've managed to get the Tall Guy to request and enjoy tofu, tempeh and seitan in the last year. This still amazes me as he's a "Meat and Potatoes" Mid-westerner.
27. For him, I still eat the occasional steak, but this will probably stop at some point.
28. I avoid knitting that involves knitting a "front" and "back". This means, I like "in-the-round" sweaters.
29. I just had my sewing machine make its way to DC from NH. I'm thinking I'll start branching out in my crafty adventures.
30. My Mom died from breast cancer when I was 17.
31. Who knows where I would be if I hadn't lost her, but it's so hard for me to explain to people who I am without them having known her.
32. If I don't have my glasses on or contacts in , I can't really see you or the face you're making.
33. I've tried really hard, but I am not a morning person. I just can't function.
34. Coffee is one of my loves.
35. I've worked for three different coffee companies over the years. If they could match my current compensation, that's what I would be doing now.
36. I have 4 tattoos. I'm planning to get one reworked/covered soon.
37. I think it's funny that people still think tattoos are "counter culture" or that my four is " a lot".
38. We don't have a kid at this point. There's no rush, but I love other people's kids a lot and I think a lot of people think if you don't have a kid, you must not like them. False. I guess this is now TOTALLY wrong as we have a wee one named Silas...
39. I grew up with a pool in my backyard.
40. It just happened to be there when my parents bought the house.
41. I'm actually a pretty terrible swimmer despite the fact that there was a pool in the backyard.
42. I love the ocean. Any ocean.
43. I'll pick popcorn over chocolate any day.
44. I didn't know what the "Big Ten" was until I met The Tall Guy. He went to two schools that belong to the Big Ten.
45. I'm not allowed to wear Yellow and Blue together. (see #44).
46. I love to read. Apparently I read pretty fast. I'll read just about anything you put in front of me.
47. We're about to move across country to Denver from DC.
48. I'm going to be  unemployed.
49. You'll probably be seeing a lot more posts as a result!

I'll add more as I think of it.

And... I'm back!

Observations from the week...
Denver Colorado is a nice city and has great food and a nice knitting store, even if the Tiny Toes was a disaster (keep reading)
Columbus Ohio... super fun. I was at a wedding where I didn't know anyone but the Tall Guy and yet felt right at home. So much so that I paused for a moment to consider Midwest living. Rent for a house three times the size of my own, walking distance to a fun area, nice people, knitting stores AND that rent I just mentioned? Less then half of what I pay. Hmm. Just makes you pause for a second.
I finished a pair of baby jays in my travels. Super fast and fun project and I think I'll be making more of those as babies become contagious. Here's what they look like with my hand for size reference:


Super cute right???

Also, maybe you didn't notice. I didn't notice until the other evening when I was showing my recent acquisitions to the Tall Guy. Those two balls of Tiny Toes I got in Denver? Yup. NOT the same colour AT ALL. How annoying is that? So, I sent out a plea to the Lime and Violet message boards (I'm a big dork and you know it) about what to do with this pretty yarn that wasn't quite the same, but not quite different. Take a look...I now have some ideas, we'll see where it goes from here...
I'm currently binding off on one of those ruffly scarves. I had been staring at this Suss Yarns skein I had sitting in my decorative bowl for some time and finally cast it on a few weeks ago. This is a super easy knit, but it is SO tedious. You'll need a circular needle that's larger then the yarn calls for if you want it drape-y and then you just follow the below pattern (each number is a row) I actually got this pattern from the washingtonpost.com, but its a pretty basic pattern.

1. C/O 75 stitches
2. Knit
3. Increase every stitch by knitting into the back and front of the stitch
4. Knit
   
5. repeat rows 2 and 3 a few times or until you want to poke your eyes out.
   
6. Bind off.
   

I'm not done binding off yet, but here it is thus far:

And, I'm still not done my Jaywalkers, they're around, but I've been distracted by other projects and suddenly my brain is going a million miles an hour as I start thinking about what I will make for Christmas. Its less then 6 months away, which unless I want to be knitting on Christmas eve (I will be anyway, its a given) I need to get moving on at least planning!

The exciting news for me is that I'm in DC for the next three weeks. Not traveling, only minimal guests and hopefully some quality time on the mat, knitting, and just plain catching up on stuff. The contents of my fridge as I discovered last night while very grouchy consists of a 6 pack of beer and some slice and bake cookies. Not bad things to have, but well, it explains a lot about my life at the moment. I love being busy, but the past month has been a real drain on my system.
Off to clean my poor neglected apartment... or off to play outside, we'll see what wins.