The Movie

I did finally get to the movie that I am in, on Thursday night. If you get a chance, do go see it. They did a very good job for making a movie with such a low budget as they had. Besides the scene that I am in, there is another scene that shows some sheep, and my sheep provided background noise for a while too. All those sheep noises you can hear are from my sheep and I was standing there minding the sheep and watching the filming anywhere that you hear that. I watched them film some of the other scenes too. And my name even appears in the credits! Seeing the movie made me wish that I had been at the premier because there were some really neat people (actors, crew, etc.) that I would have liked to have seen again.

Finally, A Picture!

Yes, we have had some nice sunny weather and I've had a little more time than in the previous couple of weeks. Ragna has been done for two weeks. How about a picture already? I'm not all that happy with the picture, but here it is:



I had plenty of yarn left over, so I made these nice warm spiral tube socks too.



They are so easy - just knit on a multiple of six stitches plus or minus one. K3 P3, repeat until as long as you like. Before you put them on they just look like plain tubes, but this stitch stretches in all directions and conforms to your foot and leg quite nicely. I knitted these from the toe up, using a middle eastern style toe (I have pictures of that and will explain it here soon - I like it) and I did cabled ribbing for the cuffs. I'm not sure how good that choice was. Cabled ribbing looks nice, but doesn't stretch nearly as well as regular ribbing. The cabled part can't stretch. On the first sock after I cast off I had to go back and redo it (the casting off) because it didn't stretch enough to go on, but after casting off really loosely it was fine. The other nice thing about this stich is that it is so forgiving of errors. There were lots of times when I got off by one stitch somewhere on a row. Guess what! I just didn't worry about it and made sure it was back on pattern on the next row. Nobody would ever know.

The socks each took one skein of yarn. Well, the first one was a little less than a skein, but the second sock ran out when it was not quite finished. So, the yardage must not be quite consistent. No matter - I still have more yarn left. One full skein and odds and ends that probably add up to one more. I have cast on for some wrist warmers with this yarn too.

Fiber Festival

Yesterday I went to the Back of the Wasatch Fiber Festival. Thanks, Toni and Arlene, for giving me a ride! I go every year, except I missed one year. This year is the fifth for BOW. This year they combined it with a rendevous and a Bluegrass competition. We wandered over towards the music, and they were having this "Band Scramble" thing. The way it works is they had jars for various instruments, including one that was marked "other." I had a recorder with me (can't leave home without both knitting and an instrument of some kind), so I put my name in the "other" jar. Joining bands on impulse everyplace I go could get to be a bad habit. I've never played Bluegrass before. Although I really want to learn to play the fiddle, specifically Hardanger fiddle, I don't play any string instruments. So, it was interesting. I picked up a melody line on one song and backed up chords on the other. I was really wondering what I was thinking for getting into that competition. Must not have been too bad though, or we got points for originality. Out of five bands, mine was second place! And we didn't even have a fiddler. The first place band (all put together on the spot and given 30 minutes to come up with a program including two songs) had an excellent fiddler and really deserved to win.

That was the exciting part, but there was also shopping of course. I'm rather proud of myself. I sold more than I bought, and I wasn't even a vender. I sold two lucets and and some books that I have a bunch of about how to use the lucet and about fingerloop braids. If you are interested, I have plenty more of those books. The things I bought include mostly fiber to spin (like I need more than that, but this is mostly stuff I don't already have) and some Opal sock yarn. I think I might actually try making some sock weight socks, and the pre-printed sock yarns have been calling to me for a while. I was thinking about putting up one picture per day of my purchases and stretching it out over the week, but instead you can just click on what you want to see from the list below:

• Opal Sock Yarn
  
• Dyed Corriedale and Romney batts. I love this colorway, which is called "Autumn." This and the Opal came from Judy's Novelty Wool
  
• Ingeo. This fiber is from cornstalks! And it is so white!
  
• A dyed silk bell and Soy Silk. Love the color of that silk cap! The Ingeo and Soy Silk are from Wind River Flock & Fiber.
  
• This Cotton and Silk blend which comes from Snake River Fiberworks, as does the silk bell

I hope I remembered all of that correctly. Anyway, it should keep me busy for a while.

Interesting

Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae.

The rset can be a total mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Amzanig, huh?

I must have been stressed or something, but for the last week I have been making typos and spelling mistakes everywhere. I hope that people at least knew what I meant. Well, considering the above, they probably did. Maybe I'm multi-tasking too much. I've been trying to read all the material for my classes, but I get bored just reading, so I pick up my knitting. Knitting and reading at the same time can be done. I could probably do either one alone about twice as fast, so maybe it doesn't actually save time, but it keeps me going. I wish that I could get audio recordings of my text books. That would work even better. Listening and knitting go very well together.

I have only the one class that actually has lectures to be attended. It is Friday nights from 8:00 until 10:30, usually with a 10 minute break in the middle. The first two weeks I tried to be good and leave my knitting home. The first week it was okay because the teacher wasn't there, so we went home after 10 minutes. The second week, I was okay up until the 10 minute break, at which point I was left alone in the classroom (the class is broadcasted over satellite and I was the only one at my location), and I got pretty desperate for something to do. So, from now on I take my knitting to class. Nobody can see me anyway! I feel that I really listen better when my hands have something to do, whether it's knitting or taking notes or doodling in the margins. I'm aware that knitting doesn't make me look like I'm listening, so it would not be a good idea during times when it is important for the person who is talking to know that I am listening to them. Ironically, it's the Interviewing and Counseling class, and attending behavior was the most recent topic! Still, my hands need something to do.

On the other hand, I need to have some kind of intellectual stimulation while I'm knitting or even cleaning up my bedroom or stuff like that too. Books on tape, or music, or something to listen to. Or somebody talking to me. Knitting and spinning are social activities for a reason. People used to get together to do this type of work so that they could converse and interact socially while doing it. It's amazing how much more we get done at guild meetings than just working on it at home.

Today is the Premier

for the movie that my sheep and I were in last spring. The producer called me last week and offered to send me tickets for the premier, but I could tell that he really would rather give the tickets to someone else, and I didn't know how I would manage a trip out to Salt Lake City today anyway, so I said I'd just catch it in the theaters. He did say that they did leave in at least one scene with my sheep and that I am in it too. The movie opens in theaters on Friday, September 12 - hey, that is just two days from now! I won't get to the first showing, since I have a class on Friday nights, but I will see the movie. I have to, right? I'm in it! For more information: The Book of Mormon Movie

Other News

I finished Ragna on Monday morning, but don't have a picture yet. It is overcast and rainy, and the design on this sweater doesn't show up in pictures unless taken in really good light (that's why I was squinting so much in the last pictures), so when the sun comes back out I'll be sure and get some pics. We need the rain so badly, but I hate having clouds.

Have You Ever Seen Anything Like This?



This double rainbow appeared in Vernal last Friday evening. Cool, huh? If you would like to see the other end of it and the middle just click on the respective links for them. It was way too big to fit in one shot. The coolest rainbow I ever saw, actually, was out the window of an airplane taking off from San Fransisco when I was coming home from my grandfather's funeral. Unfortunately, I didn't have a camera with me. It was January and it was overcast, and hovering just above the plane's wing was a small rainbow. I could see the complete circle. The plane's shadow was reflected inside the circle, looking very much like a peace symbol.

The Sleeves on Ragna

No, I haven't finished it. I got most of the second sleeve finished this morning, but haven't had any more time since then to knit. Okay, I could have, but I've been playing on the computer instead. It is so close though. Anyway, you know how we just never seem to have the right length of circular needles on hand for knitting sleeves, and even if you did it would probably take at least two different sizes between the cuff and the top of the sleeve? You could use double pointed needles (dpn's), but there is a tendency to get a ladder effect where you change from one needle to the next. Amy was working on sleeves last week, ran into this problem, and unvented the "magic loo" method. Scroll down to her August 29 blog entry to read about it. It's kind-of like the magic loop, but with a shorter circular needle. If you really want to know about the magic loop I could explain that too, but I haven't done it myself. Books have been written on that technique. I think it could be hard on your circs though. My solution was the two circs method.



Just as for socks, put half of the stitches on one needle and half on another needle. Length doesn't matter, but make sure you can tell the two needles apart easily. Knit each half of the stitches using the other end of the same needle that those stiches are on, then do the stitches on the other needle, working around the sleeve, or whatever tubular object you are knitting. It comes in handy to have two circular needles in each needle gauge, but if you don't, well, it's a good use for things like this:



I picked up this set at least ten years ago for about $30. It has been worth it, although better circs are definitely nicer to work with. Sometimes I just don't have the size or length that I want, and then I remember that I have these and I'm back in business. I noticed that Threadbear Fiber Arts has a set of interchangeable knitting needles available, and Rob has a picture of them on his blog (Aug. 31), although it is a different brand and I have no idea what the price is. A bit of advice to any who may be in the process of acquiring a knitting needle collection: don't bother with straight needles. Anything you can do on straight needles you can do on circs - just knit back and forth on them when you want to. You won't have the long ends of needles sticking out and getting caught on things poking the person sitting next to you, etc. Once you get used to knitting on circulars you will never want to go back. DPNs have their place too, but with the two circ method, they aren't necessary.

Back to the sleeves on Ragna, I have unvented a new technique myself! I don't know when or where I read it, but I remember reading that there is no matching decrease to balance the pearl 2 together decrease (like knit 2 together is balanced by SSK). Now there is! I have to admit that you have to be rather compulsive to bother about it, since decreases on reverse stockinette all look the same anyway from the front, but I don't care, I unvented it anyway, and used it with this sweater. On the inside of my sleeves, my decreases balance! Here's how it is done:

• With yarn in front, slip 2 stitches as if to knit (slipping knitwise reverses the stitches, and slipping pearlwise puts them back the way the rest of the stitches are).
• Pearl the two slipped stitches together, using the left needle. The new stitch is on the left needle.
• Slip the new stitch pearlwise onto the right needle.

That's all there is to it! Maybe only nitpicky people will use it, but it works for me.

Knitting

One last vacation picture and then I guess it's been long enough to drag that out. I had to show you this one though.



I knitted this bear for Andrei. He didn't show much sign of appreciating it at the time, but Angela says he carries it around now. Cool. Isn't he cute? Take your pick there as to which one. The bear is really fun to knit. Here is where I found the pattern.

Ragna is almost done. I'll probably finish it tomorrow, in fact. And there will be pictures, sometime anyway. If I didn't worry about posting pictures I would probably blog more often. Uploading pictures wears out the camera batteries pretty fast and I worry about that, plus editing the pictures for internet use takes a little more time and I just don't get around to it as fast as I wish I would. I ought to either just buckle down and do it, or not worry about having pictures all the time. No, I don't always use pictures but there are lots of times when I think I'd like to post a blog entry and then I talk myself out of it because I don't have pictures ready. Do you ever do that?

Pet Pics

We thought that our cockatiel was a male. We were sure of it. Then "he" did this.



I am all caught up with plucking rabbits! (Yes, this does mean that we have angora fiber available. Not just this plucking either - I've got a bunch of it. I have even more wool and mohair.)



I want one!