you know you're frazzled when you can't even conceive of a post title

In order to organize my thoughts, I am going to have to break this post down into 6 parts because let me tell you, I am skedaddled! Only 7 more days before Bazaar Bizarre Boston, and my worktable overfloweth. Apparently, so does my mind... with random thoughts and useless junk, however.

1. That yarn in the photo above? That is some Pigeonroof handspun that I received as a gift from Megan. Thanks again, M! Lovely stuff! And perfect for a quick mindless project that will help to soothe me so I can sleep at night. Now here's my question: what do I knit with it? Should I knit myself a Thorpe? Or some rustic mittens like these beauties? Or yet another cowl, like maybe another Gloria? If I had enough yardage, I would knit myself some legwarmers like these, because seriously, I LOVE them. Gah! I can't think. Please help me pick a project and cast your vote in the poll on the sidebar. The yarn is a light worsted/dk, and the yardage is about 170 yards, enough for any of the projects I'm considering.

2. Speaking of projects, I went to A Good Yarn in Brookline (LOVE!!!!) over the weekend with some friends and got the yarn(s) I needed for presents to knit. I may have already cast on for one of these gifts-to-be. Unfortunately, I can't share any of the glorious details until after the holidays because intended recipients know about the blog. I am not sure if and when they read it, but better not to take that chance. In other news, apparently, I have a huge mouth and cannot keep secrets.

3. Thank crunchy I am not a dj because my opinion seems to have been way off on the Twilight soundtrack. I still think that the music was boring and underwhelming, but I was totally wrong about the kids. The kids - they love it. I just don't understand how. The exceptions to the suckage I thought were Radiohead, who can do no wrong as far as I am concerned, and Paramore, that thanks to the A.D.D. Knitter I looked up on last fm and now totally comprehend why the tweens love it. I would love them too were I 12. I might kinda love them now. Gah, I should be so ashamed of my last fm library... but I'm not.

4. Speaking of Twilight, move over Bella and Edward. I am so over them and so into Eli and Oskar of Let the Right One In. If you get a chance to see this, go... now! If not, Netflix it. You will love it. Besides the gorgeous cinematography, great acting, and a compelling story, there are several moments of hilarity (not sure if they were intentional or not) that only a good vampire movie can provide. It was (genuinely) awesome.

5. I am so happy that 'tis the season for peppermint hot chocolate. Yeah, random, but true.

6. I am going to be away from the computer for the next week because I still have a ton of stuff to finish for Baz Biz. I'll be back some time next week and hopefully have a finished knit or two to show for myself. In the meanwhile, hope your holiday season is off to a happy and peaceful start. See you folks soon!

ZOMG!!!!!!!!1!!1!1!1!!!!!1! vampires, like, totally rule!!!!!!11!!!!!1

Sometimes South Park just speaks to, like, my soul, and my soul is, like, black so I, like, wear lots of black because it's, like, me and I think I, like, heard that line in a song by, like, some old British dudes. I think Trey Parker (ZOMG! So dreamy!) and Matt Stone have redeemed themselves for the unfunniest episode of South Park ever (the Indiana Jones episode) with this gem here. With references to Hot Topic and Twilight, this was just spot-on. (And this coming from someone who was called a poseur in high school for not being "true Goth enough" despite my "darkling" status, so this was doubly hilarious for me.)

Oh yeah, I saw the Twilight movie over the weekend with a bunch of friends and to sum it up (please remember, this is just my opinion):

• The acting was crap. Twitchy Stewart and Leaden Pattinson were bordering on painfully boring.
• The cinematography, however, was not crap - soooooooooo cool, I loved it!
• Jacob - kinda hot (and I say that in as non-creepy a way as possible).
• Maryse almost killed me with her commentary, especially when she said, "Ohmygod, creepy!" when Edward was in Bella's room, which leads me to say, you MUST see a movie with Maryse because you are guaranteed to laugh all the way through it, no matter what the movie may be.
  
• Spidermonkey? For real? Awesome!!!
• Was Jasper not the most unintentionally hilarious character EVER?
• Ew, what was up with Carlisle? He was so not what I imagined. I was thinking of Cary Ewles in his prime. Charlie on the other hand was better than what I imagined. Meh, go figure!
  
• Double-ew, what were thinking with the make-up? Seriously, who did they use? There are way better make-up artists on the MAC site. Did they not consult with this site? Sparkly should not have looked static-y. But then again, maybe that's just hard to translate onto film.
  
• ...which leads me to once again say that the day this is made into an anime series, I will go buy the box set immediately because it will be cheestastically fabulous. I will watch it on rainy days and revel in all its tacky over-the-top glory.
• They should have considered using someone who used to go around telling people he was a vampire when he was a teenager to do the score because, well, he might have had some perspective and in all seriousness would have done a MUCH better job of it than was done (not only that but I hear the tweens love his band - heh).
• ...which leads me to the soundtrack - ugh! I may be far from 17 (and thank crunchy for that! 17 sucked ass), but even I have a basic idea of what angst-ridden teens listen to, and it sure as hell was not most of the music they featured, save for that craptastic Linkin Park which was one of the only bands they went with from the bands that Stephenie Meyer listed as her inspiration. Oh wait! They used that Collective Soul song, too. But still.... Where is the My Chemical Romance, which seems to be the cornerstone of emo today? (It hurt to type that, for the record.) Also, does anyone under 30 actually listen to Iron & Wine? They seem to draw an older crowd. Not that I'm a fan. I may be 34, but I would rather listen to MCR than Iron & Wine. (At least, I would never shop at Hot Topic. Gotta draw the line somewhere.) They used the same person who selected all the music for the O.C., and she has a pretty impressive resume. I am surprised that this fell so flat because I like everything else she has worked on.
• All in all, I love Catherine Hardwicke (13 was such a powerful movie and I loved Lords of Dogtown), and I actually enjoyed watching this. It was awful and delightful at once. Didn't hurt that I had extremely low expectations going into it, though. Nor that I had a bunch of people around me who were wise-cracking through it and making me laugh until it hurt.

Okay, that's enough of my opinion. Happy Monday, folks!

here are the selbu moderns*

pattern: Selbu Modern
designer: Zeitgeist Yarns
yarn: Colinette Jitterbug in Elephant's Dream and Vatican Pie
needles: 16 inch circs in US size 0 & US size 2

I don't think I have ever loved a hat as much as this one. I love the pattern. I loved the process of knitting it. I love the way it fits. I am absolutely smitten with everything about it. I had a feeling I would. When I first saw friends favoriting the pattern and queing it up on ravelry, I was intrigued. It was seeing a shrill caramel's Selbu Modern that convinced me that I must knit one for myself. I was hit pretty hard by a case of "the covets." Then I saw Christy's, and I could not wait to cast on. I think it was Kelly's that pushed me over the edge to action, and I cast on right away. I wasn't the only one. The add knitter and Ashley were knitting theirs as I was knitting mine. I kinda wish we could all get together while wearing our Selbu Moderns out and take over a bar/pub, where all the patrons would be asking, "Ummm, who are these crazy-ass loud chicks and why are they all wearing the same hat but in different colors?" We could say we're a roving gang of knitters out to collect some booty (heh, booty) and beer and coerce them to buy us beer with our pointy sticks. But I digress....

I was a little concerned a couple of days ago about how the colorwork part would fit because I hadn't blocked it yet. Well, it blocked out beautifully, I am happy to say:

As I suspected, the red did bleed a fair amount, but thanks to Adrian's tip about using shampoo and cold water, it didn't stick to the aqua (and I didn't end up with a red and lavender hat that I would probably not be so thrilled with). Hooray for happy knits! If you're looking for a quick and pretty project, seriously, this hat is so for you. Thank you to Kate at Zeitgeist Yarns for putting together such a lovely pattern and for making it available on her blog for free. Kate, you are so awesome!

* The post title is a reference to Kill Hannah, which I will half-shamefully admit to adoring.

drove my chevy to the levee, but the levee was wry

I finished my Selbu Modern this morning during my break, and I *love* just about everything about it - the pattern, the rockqua goodness rocking my world, the texture of the Jitterbug, everything! Except I kinda wish that I had knit the colorwork on larger needles. I used a US size 2 (as the pattern calls for), but I think I really should have gone up a couple of sizes to get the maximum amount of slouch. As you can see in the photo above, it's not exactly slouchy as much as kind of ruched. I think the whole thing might just be resolved by a good blocking. Afterall, I do knit rather loosely and that gorgeous pattern on the crown just begs to be stretched out to its full glory. I realize that I should have probably swatched, but you know, if it's not a sweater, I don't bother (which is to say I never swatch).

I am a little afraid that the red is going to bleed all over the blue here, so I am going to test the yarn's bleediness before I block this as per Adrian's awesome advice. The yarn I used here is Colinette Jitterbug in Elephant's Dream (aqua) and Vatican Pie (red). I'll post all the details once this is happily blocked and properly photographed. Also, can someone explain to me what is up with the name of that red colorway? Vatican Pie? For real? Is that some sort of euphemism for altar boys? I get the whole Vatican red thing, but what's up with "pie?" Actually, I don't wanna know.... When I asked Matt what he thought of that name for a colorway, after he was done pointing out the obvious to me (duh, Vatican red) and shaking his head at my crack about it, we somehow got onto the topic of PILFs. (Warning! You may not want to read any further if you might be offended by light-hearted joking about priests and such. You may want to avert your gaze here and probably pray for my soul. Click onto another site, please, and do come back next week, when there will be more knitting and less sacrilege. Thanks!) You may be asking, "Ummm, excuse me, but what is a PILF?" It's kinda like a MILF, except we're talking about a priest and not a mom. Yep. Last month, as we were watching horror movies, we noticed a theme throughout most of them and that is the PILF, like the strapping young priest (Father Bolen?) in the original Amityville Horror and the would-be priest in The Prophecy (which I wouldn't really count as a horror movie, but I'm including it in this). For some reason, I really crossed a line when I mentioned Colin Hanks as Father Gill on MadMen. Eh, he's kinda cute. Okay, now that I am done securing a nice warm spot for myself in hell, I'm off to block this puppy. Hopefully, I'll have a FO and PILF-free post for you tomorrow.

oh those dang WIP-persnappers!

So many WIPs, so little attention span....

Question: If you think a yarn is going to bleed like all get-out and you're using it for colorwork, do you soak it and just hope it doesn't bleed all over the other color(s), or do you steam-block it? Is there a better method for blocking bleeding colors that I am not even aware of? Any advice/suggestions would be tremendously appreciated.

On another note, you know how when we were little and would make goofy faces, our mothers/ teachers/ closest authority figure would say, "If you keep doing that, your face is going to freeze and you'll be making that face for the rest of your life." Well, for the last few months I may have been doing a pretty accurate and, according to my friends at least, funny impression of a certain VP candidate, and now, I swear to dog, I can't shake the frigging accent. The other day I sincerely answered a question with a resounding, "You betcha!" I think I need help. My voice froze that way! Oh Sister Lilian, you scary scary person, why didn't I listen to you and heed your sage words?