collar issues

Stuart has spent the whole afternoon on kid duty so I could paint one of the bedrooms in our house. That room has needed new paint since we moved in five years ago, but this, that and the other kept us from getting around to it. Having two kids and living in a small house makes for constant shuffling around of beds and furniture, and even though we won't be living in this house for too much longer (economy willing, we'd like to move closer to family), I still want to invest a bit in making things look a little nicer. New paint and some curtains will go a long way, so I'm starting with the room the kids are currently sharing. I wrote that whole long post on style the other day, and the color I chose for the walls is just SO indicative of the way I do things. I was toying with bold, daring colors like deep turquoise or navajo orange, but thought better of it and ended up settling on something called "Mountain Getaway," which is really just a nice neutral sandy beige, like toasted almonds. I'd like to put up white curtains and get some pictures framed for the walls.

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Remember the Classic 150 cardigan? It would be done by now except for two things: 1) I need 8 buttons for it. That's easily done, as soon as I get my paint-spattered toosh to the craft store. 2) The collar is a disaster:



See that? It just rolls inside out. I haven't blocked it yet (though I blocked the rest of the sweater, and I have to say I can't recommend this yarn - Classic Elite 150 - enough. It's wonderful.), but I don't think blocking will work because it's st st with a teeny bit of garter at the edge and st st will roll no matter what. I can't decide whether to take it out and try again with some kind of ribbing or just tack it down. Thoughts? I have to make the collar work because the rest of the sweater is lovely and it even fits me.

I'll have to think about that later, though. We are off to the pool! I hope you, my dear readers, are enjoying a sunshine-y weekend as well.

style

It's cool and rainy today, which is nice for the garden and much-needed by area farmers, but it sure fouled up our plans to go to fimming lessons this morning. I actually went so far as to get us all changed into suits and put a little sunscreen on our cheeks and noses, but once we got to the pool and saw all the kids climbing out blue-lipped and shivering, I decided that hypothermia would not be on the agenda for today, so we turned around and went home. I'm pretty sure we weren't the only ones; all the instructors were standing in the water, waiting for their no-shows, while one said through chattering teeth "The water in the pool is warm. Really!" She wasn't very convincing.

The kids are taking naps after a morning cooped up in the house, and I'm grateful for a little down time. I can't knit when there's nothing else going on. I need to be watching TV or talking with someone or watching the kids. I should be embarking on one of the many cleaning/re-organizing projects I have lined up, but I just can't bear the thought, so here I am blogging instead.

I'm thisclose to finishing a couple things. The Classic 150 cardigan just needs the sleeves sewn in and the short-row collar completed, but I'm having a devil of a time picking up the right number of stitches for that, plus every time I picked it up earlier this afternoon someone stubbed a toe or needed a snack, so I put it down in exasperation. Maybe I can finish that off tonight. And Sassymetrical is done and blocked and it's very cute and just needs a clip or pin to hold it shut before I can actually wear it. I'm not giving it FO status until then, but here's a crappy self-portrait of it to give you an idea:



All this brings me to the title of today's post. I never had much sense of style. I went to high school in the mid-1990s, the era of grunge, and this worked to my favor. Jeans, sloppy t-shirts and over-sized flannel was in, and that's what I wore a lot of the time. I got lucky, I guess, because if I were in high school now I'd be a fashion disaster. Skinny jeans and tunics do not suit me. Now I am a 30yo stay-at-home-mom, and most days my fashion criteria consist of the following questions: 1) Is it clean? and 2) Is it weather appropriate? Matching is optional. Most of my shirts, if clean, are stained. I was hanging up something in my closet this morning and I noticed that most everything in there is black, white, or some other dark/bright color like red or deep fuchsia. Everything is plain, like me.

That's okay except that sometimes I think it would be nice to dress like the models in the Rowan magazines with their flowing skirts and breezy linen trousers and white gathered shirts with ruffles - not too many - in just the right places. (Of course, it would be nice to float about in English gardens and on romantic coastlines all day, too, but that's another fantasy.) There are three problems with this, though. 1) Everything I wear gets stained with food or dirt, 2) I would feel ridiculous dressing nice just to go to the park and grocery store and other mom/kid hangouts, 3) I feel ridiculous in stylish clothes. If it's more elaborate than a black or white v-neck t-shirt with Old Navy jeans (they're cheap and they fit, yo), it feels too daring to me. I think someday when I have a reason to dress up a little more (like if I get a real job sometime in the future), I should find a shopping buddy to help me out. Because the other problem is that as plain as I dress, I hate clothes from places like Land's End and Eddie Bauer; it just feels so...so suburban to me. I might as well drive a minivan and vote Republican. (My apologies to any minivan drivers out there reading this; I know you aren't all Republicans, but I just have this ingrained hate for minivans for some reason.)

Sometimes I wonder why I bother to knit for myself at all if I'm just as happy wearing such boring old stuff. I look like anybody else, and I truly don't care if I stand out. I suppose that's one reason I knit for other people a lot of the time (though lately my knitting has been mostly selfish). I guess one reason I'm even thinking about what I wear this much is that it speaks to some of the identity issues I've been having lately. I finished my doctorate a year and a half ago when Anya was born. I did not look for a job then, and I'm not looking for one now, partly because of the economy, but mostly because I want to stay home with my kids for the time being. They need it, and to be honest, I do too. But it's hard, really hard, to all but give up (or postpone, whichever it may be) a career track that defined so much of me for so long. I still play piano for things that come along locally, but that's not the same as really pursuing a collaborative piano career. I'm not looking for reassurance here; I know I've made the right decision for me and my family right now. I'm not second-guessing that choice.

But sometimes when I look in my closet and see that I have exactly ONE outfit appropriate for the kind of performances I do now, plus a formal dress I last wore six years ago (for one of my degree recitals) and a pile of cheap, stained clothes that are barely fit to wear in public, I feel a tug for that old life when what I did made me feel important.

is it so wrong?

When it's chilly outside (barely 60 degrees) and the kids have been driving me bananas all day whining instead of napping and we're all bored but too tired to go anywhere, and then they both fall asleep at 3:30 (which will make bedtime hell), and I'm in the middle of a slow career crisis, is it so wrong to treat myself to a 4:00 beer, some uninterrupted NPR time, and work on this?



(Sassymetrical, coming right along)

Is it so wrong? I sure hope not, 'cause I'm gonna do it. This mama needs a little down time.

in her humble opinion

Anya wore her new sweater today...



....for about 14 seconds!







Think she likes it?

in the bag

We were on vacation this past week. Since it was a billion degrees the whole time, I kind of lost my will to knit, but I got a good start on sassymetrical, at least. I don't have anything to show you but a blob of stockinette, though, so instead, here's a glimpse of my knitting bags:



I am constantly on a quest for the perfect knitting project bag. Despite my best efforts to be organized, I always have a lot of things going at once, so at the very least, a bag for everything keeps the yarn from getting tangled too badly. I've made all kinds of bags in my limited sewing career; some I've used, some have been gifts. I have yet to design the perfect knitting bag, though someday I will.

The bag on the far left was a gift from my MIL last week. Ten Thousand Villages is a fair trade shop with locations in various Mennonite towns across the country; this one came from Kansas. It's a sturdy canvas bag with a handy velcro closure at the top. It's a bit nice for groceries, but might be the perfect size for a larger project, like a sweater.

The bag in the middle is one I made at least 5 or 6 years ago, if not more. It's soft ecru-colored denim fabric I nabbed from my mom's stash. I designed the whole thing myself, and even did the leaf stamping. There is a sage-colored lining and inner pockets for things like needle gauges and crochet hooks and tiny bottles of lotion. I'm proud of that one, and I think I must have been channeling Martha Stewart the day I made it. It's not on-the-go very much, though, because I tend to keep all my DPNs in there along with small unfinished projects. It's still my favorite.

The last bag on the right is from Whole Foods and cost 79 cents. It was designed by Cheryl Crowe and is made of recycled plastic. It's not nearly as nice or special as anything I could have designed and made myself, but it's a perfect size and plenty sturdy. It's the one I took along to the Dells this week, and it was just right for what I needed.

What about you? What do you look for in your knitting bag? Do you throw everything into a plastic shopping bag? A large Ziploc? Your purse? A designer specialty?

knitting

Before I get to the knitting, allow me to bitch about Wisconsin weather for a minute. For nine months out of the year, the weather here sucks. It's cold, wet, snowy and miserable for most of the fall, all of the winter, and most of the spring. Just when you think you can't stand it any more, you get about two weeks of glorious sunny days when everything is suddenly green and blooming and bursting with color. Then it gets oppressively muggy and warm (usually not hot - 90 degrees is rare here - I'll give you that) until October, when you get a week or two of nice fall weather with pretty leaves and then it's miserable again. We had a cool, wet spring here (again, though without the devastating floods like last year, thank heavens). Last weekend it was barely warm enough to go to the swimming pool (though we did anyway) and today I had to turn on the air conditioner because the air is so thick you could scoop it into a soup bowl and call it lunch. It's warm and sticky and stormy. Last night between the lightning and thunder waking me up, and scaring the kids, I hardly got any sleep at all. I have to admit, actually, that I like lying awake listening to a good thunderstorm; it gives me a chance to think. Of course, today I have a raging headache because it's not like I get to sleep in EVER (and I consider 7:00 to be sleeping in), and the kids were crabby and tired until they both fell asleep about a half hour ago, mercifully.

I know, I know. Life could be a lot worse.

Of course, I finished Anya's sweater just in time for summer weather. I'll get modeled shots of this when she grows into it (it's pretty roomy still - at least I was thinking ahead) and when it's cool enough. That might be a while, or it might be next week. you just never know up here.



Pattern: cabled raglan baby sweater (Rav link), the second one I've made in a row. I made the same modifications as the first with the slightly gathered sleeves, and improving (in my opinion) the cables pattern. I have a million baby/toddler sweater patterns, so I don't know why exactly I felt compelled to do this one twice. I like the seamless design, I guess, and the fact that it's so brainless. I think the sleeves are huge, a design flaw, but that probably won't bother Anya too much.
Yarn: Kona Bay cotton, about 5 skeins, which I bought for practically nothing at the cute little LYS in my home town. I don't know how durable this yarn is, but considering how fast kids grow, I don't that's too important. It's ultra-soft, though.

Check out the Peter Rabbit button I found at the Sow's Ear:



So what's next for me? We're going on vacation in a couple days. In fact, my parents-in-law are on their way here RIGHT NOW, so I'm a tiny bit stressed about getting the house clean and dinner ready (though not stressed enough to put this blog post on hold, apparently). Anyway, I'm almost done with the Classic 150 cardigan, but it's at a perfectly awkward stage. I won't get it finished before we leave, since it has to be blocked and dried before sewing up and knitting the button band and collar, and it's certainly too cumbersome to bring along on the trip. Stuart's brother and family are coming along, too, which means there will be 4 children under the age of 4 in one rental cabin...blocking pins, wet wool, 3 toddlers and a newly-crawling baby sounds like a disastrous combination.

This means I have no choice but to start a new project. I'm thinking sassymetrical, which I found on Ravelry, where I spend a lot of time as I nurse Anya to sleep. And I think I'll use this yarn:



Cashmere canapa by Hemp for Knitting. It's a little light for this pattern, but I think knitting at a slightly looser gauge than the ballband calls for will make it nice and drapey - hopefully not droopy, though.

Now I'm off to swatch before the kiddies wake up. I predict I won't get much farther than casting on.

ok, i lied

Knitting content in the next post, I promise...

but in the meantime, here's some eye candy: Anya's new shorts! These are the third (and final, for a while anyway) pair from the same pattern I've been using the last couple of weeks.



I don't have much new to say about it, except that sewing gets easier the more you do it. These were done in a flash.

This is a typical Anya expression when you bust out the camera, and that's if you're lucky enough for her to look at you instead of turning away. She's all indignant.



Close-up of the batik fabric. I do love those batiks (can you tell?)



Squat!



This is just a good picture of her.



She loves pulling on those plants! You should see what she's done to the basil containers. Oy.

worldwide knitting in public day

...was LAST week. And there was even an event at one of my favorite Saturday farmers' markets! How'd I miss that? Well, at least they got a video; click here to watch it.

Actual knitting content coming soon!