It's All About the Numbers

I am slowly learning both in master's thesis life and in knitting life that it's all about the numbers. Today I learned that whatever the statistical model says, goes, regardless of what my logic and general knowledge says is probably closer to the truth. Though it probably is closer to the truth, we still can't say it, because it does not agree with the model, and the model is objective and quantitative and all we have to hang our proverbial hats on. Sigh. Science, you are a cruel master.

As for knitting life, I'm finding I reach a threshold level of "oh no, I have too much yarn" and then need to destash a little to feel better about myself. I'm not sure what the magical number is that makes me feel like it's too much, and apparently that number has been on the rise since my stash has steadily grown, but today I bit the bullet and destashed some lovely skeins that I just knew weren't going to be knit anytime soon. And a few of them involved red, too, so I'm being extra practical! I listened to my own advice from the last post and decided enough was enough with the red-that-matches-nothing-else-I-wear colorways. 

Speaking of numbers, I added a knitmeter to the blog. How fun! 7,761 yards in one year sounds like a lot, but I bet there are people with knitmeters that have much higher readings. If I ever completely lose my mind I might try to figure out the average number of stitches I knit per yard in my projects so I can calculate the total number of stitches I've knit in the year. That would probably be mind-blowing! Also, if I ever feel like going on a guilt trip I could calculate the total yardage of yarn I've stashed in a year and compare it to the amount I've knit... on second thought, I'm pretty sure that would be a horrible idea.

Take home message: screw the numbers and just keep knitting! :)

Seeing Red

I forgot to post about my finished holiday hat! Here's a romantic picture taken by the light of my fluorescent desk lamp:

Hat in Codex, colorway Brangion

Not the best shot, but you get the point! This hat is wonderfully silky, drapey, and shiny. I credit that entirely to the yarn, Codex, a 52% silk, 48% BFL wool single that is just amazing. It is sadly going away, since it will not be carried by either of the new stores emerging from the demise of The Sanguine Gryphon, at least not at first. This made me panicky, so I stashed quite a few skeins over the last couple of months. Like this one:

Codex, colorway Murder Will Out

So pretty! The hat pattern I followed is here, but I made a few mods. It's easy to modify because it is a very simple pattern of stockinette broken up by purl ridges in different places. The hat came out a tad bit loose and long (the pattern did not include great gauge information and nothing about the length), but I'm not going to do anything about it at the moment. I'm going to knit it again in a different color with some changes for a gift, and if I like those changes better I will consider tinking back on my hat and re-knitting some of it. A worsted weight hat that's mostly plain stockinette goes pretty quickly, so no big deal.

Red is usually not my color. My wardrobe consists of a grand total of 3 red shirts, 2 of them are tee-shirts that I only wear to work out or sleep in. I tend to learn towards cool blues, greens, purples, and greys (like the yarn above). But I do like the deep maroon of the hat very much, it reminds me of garnet, which is my birthstone. And it matches one of my favorite shawls:

Aestlight shawl, in Bugga Cowkiller and Socks That Rock LW Sweet Pea

What I don't understand, though, is why I have so many pairs of socks that involve warm colors. Why?! I like to coordinate my socks with my outfits (OCD much?) and that is difficult to do when most of my clothing consists of cool colors and 6 out of the 9 completed pairs involve warm ones. That's 67%! And the Xmas Rocks socks I'm making now involve both red and pink. I better get cracking on some blue socks soon, methinks.

Post-Holiday Recovery

I hope everyone who celebrates Thanksgiving had a lovely one! Mine was somewhat hectic as I was up until 3am finishing the first draft of my thesis Thursday morning and then had to drive 5 hours. But I made it and it was nice to get some family time in, despite being half asleep.

Last night my Fiasco and I went to see The Trans-Siberian Orchestra play in Hartford. Their show was fantastic! Here's a Youtube link to one of their most popular songs, in case you are unfamiliar. They rocked SO HARD in person. I never thought I'd see a holiday concert that involved giant flaming dragon jaws:

 

but there's your proof! We had great seats, got fake-snowed on, and were right underneath the platform that some band members walked out onto during part of the show. Very very cool, I highly recommend catching it if you can.

To keep the holiday theme going, we got a teeny tiny Christmas tree and decorated it today:

We have a small apartment and no yard whatsoever so we figured this would be easier to deal with than a full-sized tree, and honestly it's so cute I don't really mind that it's small. It might be weird that part of my Thanksgiving recovery was getting ready for Christmas, but it worked. I'm feeling pretty happy, relaxed, and festive at the moment.

Unfortunately, knitting around these parts has been scarce lately. I've been too dang busy (I'm shocked, too...) but I will show you something I made last year:

 

This wee little sock ornament currently resides on the wee little tree shown above. It's made from Blue Moon Fiber Arts Socks That Rock (which is by far, hands down, my favorite sock yarn of all time) in the colorway X-mas Rocks. I used size 3.00mm needles and cast on around 18 stitches and did a K1P1 cuff which I folded down.  I think it's adorable and love seeing its happy colors on the tree. I'm working on a human-sized pair of socks in this colorway as well. I had started them last February when I needed something plain and brainless to knit while reading journal articles, but lost the mojo once winter was over. (I have a lost-the-sock-mojo problem we will be discussing at length in the near future.) I'm on the foot of the first sock and my goal is to finish by Christmas. It would be a no-brainer if I didn't have a boatload of gifts to knit before then, too. We'll have to see.

I'd like to knit more ornaments to give away this year. Do you have any favorite ornament patterns or holiday-themed knits?

Resistance Was Futile

I gave in to the siren song of shiny, pretty yarn:

Dear slouchy Codex hat,

Thank you for being the only slice of happiness in these past few hellish days of thesis writing. Your soft, drapey silk and BFL wool yarn is soothing to the touch and beautiful to the eye. The deep wine red color reminds me that the holiday season is fast approaching, but in a warm&fuzzy good way because it means that at some point in the near future, I will not be writing this thesis and I will also have a pretty hat.
Thank you for that hope!

Much love,
A-very-stressed-grad-student-at-the-end-of-her-yarn-who-definitely-deserves-your-pity.

Anticipation

I can't believe how fast November is going and how soon Thanksgiving is approaching! It is one of my favorite holidays, I love getting together with my family and kicking off the winter season, but I am facing it with some trepidation this year. I'm working on a final draft of my master's thesis and trying to get the data and everything pulled together to give to my professor before the break and it has gotten quite down-to-the-wire. My mom would say that I do my best work under this kind of pressure and while that might be true, I still hate it. I haven't slept well in weeks and I spend 95% of my time in front of this computer. It's getting old, to say the least. Plus, it's super difficult to work all the time when pretty things like this keep arriving in the mail:

 

That is Bugga in Colorado Hairstreak 2.0. I love how the colorway names are based on the insect and invertebrate species that inspire the colors. Here's what a Colorado Hairstreak looks like, in case you were wondering:

Beautiful, and I think they got it spot on! What's also neat is this skein is a commemorative colorway created for the moving of one of my favorite wish-it-were-really-local yarn stores, The Loopy Ewe, from St. Louis to Colorado. The shop is wonderful, they ship super quickly and carry great yarn lines. I specifically requested a skein that had less of the brown and more of the blue/purple and the Loopy elves really came through! It's perfect. I think it is destined to become a Magrathea Shawl:

Picture from pattern page, by Maltina on Ravelry

I've had that shawl queued forever. Not only is it an interesting shape and full of garter stitch goodness (which I love), it's named after a planet in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams, one of my favorite authors of all time. Clearly, I must knit it ASAP.

Except I have other things to finish first. Like the Sunset Shawl I started a few weeks ago that got stalled because I worked on it during a road trip and got off by a stitch for several of the edging repeats and needed time to concentrate in order to frog back successfully (which I loathe):

 

It's further along than the picture shows here, but you get the idea-- that cabled edging is repeated around the entire semi-circle of the shawl body. It's a very pretty pattern with interesting construction and since I'm knitting it in Malabrigo Twist, it is of course ridiculously soft. And then there's the cowl design I started and the hat I want to knit to match my favorite holiday shawl and this and that and this and that, etc.

Things I'm anticipating:

• finishing this thesis draft
• traveling to see family
• finishing Sunset Shawl
• starting/finishing/wearing matching hat
• starting Magrathea shawl
• FINISHING MY MASTER'S AND HAVING TIME TO KNIT (Siiiigh... Jan. 5th is still so far away.)

What about you, dear readers, what are you all waiting for?

P.S. It would be awesome if some experienced bloggers could fill me in on blog etiquette. I've found that I keep wishing this was more like Ravelry where I could reply to individual comments on the page and have the commenter see or be notified about my reply, but I don't think that happens. How do you handle replies? Do you e-mail your reply to the commenter? Does this get to be too much e-mail? Please help a newbie out if you can, it would be much appreciated! :)