I’m home agian. Back to Crusty, smelling of beer, public urinators, and too, too many college kids home agian. I cleaned up cat messes, washed some floors, vacuumed some carpets, unpacked some junk, all with a big fat smile on m face cause I ain’t leaving until Maryland. Yay. I get to sleep in my own bed tonight and that makes me even happier. I’ll be dyeing to fill a ginormous back order from Kpixie tomorrow. Thank you all for being patient and loving my yarn.

Filed by Julia at 2:50 am under General
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who’s coming to Pittsburgh…
If you guessed Her, then you’d be right. April 7th, 7pm to 9pm, at Knit One, Murray Ave, Squirrel Hill.
(I’m so excited!)

Filed by Julia at 10:46 pm under General
3 Comments

Margaritas in Matzatlan…

Filed by Julia at 3:09 pm under General
6 Comments

My baby sister turns 23 today! Not so much of a baby sister, she’s 2 years, 5 months and 1 day younger than I am.
This is her about to enjoy a birthday lunch in San Diego. Yup, San Diego. That’s where I am today. She lives in Michigan with Louie the dog. Very fitting that their birthdays are a week apart. She generally celebrates the whole month of March anyway.
This is our first time in San Diego. This city is Awesome. Period. Totally worth the 4 and a half hour flight from Detroit.
I really like this 3 hour time differance thing. Pacific time agrees with me.
We’re staying right around the corner from great food and shopping, we found my sisters’ favourite place

Specifically this department,

This Nordstroms is attached to a sort of outdoor mall type place, and, De Ja Vu, I know I’ve seen this place before, and then it occured to me, I have seen this place before. Scroll all the way down to August 1st. I was halfway through her 2005 Archives, when (and this was a slap my forehead moment here) it occured to me to check her tour archives to see when she was in San Diego.
Anyways, I picked up some real estate magizines, to see what the market around here is like, and there is this $8.9 million estate, and just for fun, at 22.00 a skein, I would have to sell 406,000 skeins of Vesper to make that much. Not including taxes or fees, or any other crap. Motivating, to say the least.

Filed by Julia at 9:36 pm under Family
9 Comments

Oh yea. Sockapaloooza. I joined that. I figure I better get a move on knitting these suckers. So I’m taking them with me when I go out of town tomorrow. They’re the only sock yarn that’s coming with me. The only sock yarn. gulp. That’s okay though, there’s only about a month and a half til I send these off. I was very undecided as to what to knit. Pattern? Yarn? So many ideas. I think though that I’ve made a good choice, a solid choice. Koigu. KPPPM for the body, and KPM for the heels and toes. Can’t go wrong with Koigu. Koigu from the stash, no less. Simple pattern. Either Straight Stockinette, or a 2×2 ribbing. We’ll see how adventerous I get.

Filed by Julia at 8:42 pm under Knitting
13 Comments

Check it out! I’ve been knitting!

This is the left front to the Sunrise Circle Jacket from the newest Interweave. I really really really like this pattern. This front just flew by!
I’m working on the back now. Three pieces to knit a whole sweater, who woulda thunk it. Kate Gilbert is a genius. I used stash yarn too, well, not entirely, I was a few skeins short. I googled all over the place looking for it. No one has it. Then it occured to me to call the LYS that I don’t work at. Isn’t that backwards? I used to think the other way around.

I think I’ll only need two more of these. But better safe, you know.
Here’s a close up of the tweediness, and the inner raglan decrease

I also joined the knitalong for this sweater.
The button and link is in the sidebar.

Thanks to everyone who wished Little Louie a Happy Birthday! My sister got a huge kick out of the post and all the comments!

Filed by Julia at 8:27 pm under Knitting
9 Comments

One year ago today my little nephew Louie was born. My sister practically peed her pants she was so excited. The breeder called her cel with the play by play everytime a pup was born. Three days later we both made the trip to Zanesville OH, to see him. My sister had 1st pick of the males in the litter, of which there were 3. Louis, the biggest of his litter is liver colored, quite rare in Shih Tzus, so of course, he was her choice.
At three days, looking more like a little mouse than a little dog, Louie quite literally fit in the palm of her hand.

and the palm of my hand,

Louie is the most charming, playful, crazy smart pooch I have yet to meet, and am proud to have him be part of my fam.

at 4 months old he was already making my sister rethink children. Destroying countless pairs of flip-flops, eating everything he could,
yipping and yapping all night, and running around like a wild farm dog,

but how could she not love her little bundle of joy? He inherited her exact personality.
Making sure he got the full effect of his first year, Louis celebrated halloween,

He totally enjoyed his first winter, and figured out he LOVES the snow!

and at Christmas, she educated him about Santa, and Milk and cookies, his favourite thing,

Lou-ster has grown into quite the well rounded dog, and at 18 lbs, is full of playfull joy and craziness,
I wish my little nephew a very Happy, Happy 1st Birthday,

Filed by Julia at 6:00 pm under Louie
20 Comments

Well, I finally did it. I ripped the Karabella Majestic pullover out. I frogged that sucker but good. It goes fast when you rip it with a ball winder. Like a band-aid, almost painless. So what was almost a sweater,

is now alot of red yarn that needs to be washed and unkinked, so I can reuse it.

Don’t get me wrong, I love this pattern, it’s fun, holds your attention with all the cabling, and is very easy to memorize. It’s also clearly written. I totally own up to poor needle/yarn choice. I don’t need a form fitting sweater with high mohair content, knit with a too small needle size. I will knit this again. I’m thinking a no nonsense worsted wool. Like plymouth galway. I love galway. I do.

I’m rounding the corner on my first sweater of 2006. The Sirdar Creeper sweater is being seemed and will be wearable soon. I’m so excited! Rowan Plaid is one of my all time favs to knit with. Photos as soon as the last end is woven in!
Has anyone checked out the Sunrise Circle Cardi, from the newest interweave? The one that’s ten pages of pattern long? Well I love it. I’m already up to the raglan/left front shaping. Using stashed yarn (yay!) it’s really not as complicated as it looks, you just have to make sure to use a row counter! Photos of that one coming soon!

And , I know there’s more than a few of you wanting some Vesper goodness, to update you, I’ve sent a big-ish order to Kpixe, that should be up soon, and I’ll be posting a few skeins on Etsy before the weekend is up. I’ll be out of town again week after next, so supply will be scarce, but as soon as I get back, it’ll be all dyeing all the time!

Filed by Julia at 7:27 pm under Knitting
7 Comments