Nupp-a-polooza

Remember that awesome feat of knitting prowess that was the last post? Well here is the finished result. Those bumps are called nupps and are just a bunch of stitches knit together. Nupp should be the national word I think.

The only thing cooler than making nupps, is saying nupps (those bumps are nupps by the way)

Blocking lace is so essential

I call this one. Art.

Lace makes me swoon. Like old tires and arty pictures.

This is my best knitting picture ever. Hooray flowers!

So as you can see, it is by far the most beautiful thing I have ever made. I even contemplated framing it and selling it as art. But after much debating, I gave it to the person who deserved it the most. Bekky my bfffl! As a fellow knitter, she knows how much time and love goes into this. Also, I originally started making this for her as a condolence shawl (because she had a major loss in her life).

Today's lesson is. Knit lace shawls and say the word nupp compulsively.

Today's lesson is brought to you by the letter cockiness

During my absence from blogging, I did something unbelievably cool--I cured world unhappiness.

That is a lie. But I did something completely awesome in the knitting world. I fixed a mistake in a lace shawl. I'm not saying that I ripped out the two inches of lace that I had completed and then tried to pick up the stitches without messing anything up. I instead did this.

 I noticed that I had made a pretty big mistake like 10 rows back. I won't repeat what was said (because there are virgin eyes reading this), but know that it was full of frustration and angst.

Now you may not know this, but I am not a fan of frogging knitting (for all you non-knitters who read my knitting blog, frogging means ripping out the knitting you've done. If you want a full explanation, google it. Also, why are you reading a knitting blog if you don't knit?). Frogging lace is especially hard because you have to pick up yarn overs and knit two togethers and it's just a horrid mess. So I went online and searched for a better way to fix my problem. This involved only ripping back the part of my knitting that I had messed up on. Then I had to find stitches and pin them to a board to try and reconstruct the design.

Just a warning, you probably shouldn't try this if you can't read your knitting. If you're not sure what a yarn over looks like or if you don't know what the pattern is supposed to look like, it all might end in frustration and yelling. Bring good karma into the world, not yelling. (that should be a bumper sticker)

So once I had my spots pinned, I ripped back to a row where I knew where I was in the pattern and picked up the stitches and put them on a needle to work with.

After the stitches were on the needle, I simply worked back and forth in the pattern with a second needle. I say simply, but we both know this takes an enormous amount of skill (cocky knitting prowess is so sexy. Don't you agree?)

I just added this picture because my fingers look dainty and delicate here.

And here is the final product! I am so awesome. GUSH GUSH LOOK AT ME EVERYONE I CAN KNIT WELL!

My head was cold, so I made a hat.

Guess what people of the interwebs?! I finished a project. Finally. I've started and abandoned so many thing in the past couple months, it's a little ridiculous.
But. Here are pictures.

Classy knitters drink red wine from Miss Piggy cups.

AWKWARD SMILE

Throw up your rock fist.

You probably can't see the lovely cable pattern, but it's incredible. Not only does is swoop and cable, but it cable and swoops.

Can you tell I'm a writer?

My sister got me this yarn and holy hell, it's the most delicious things my fingers have played with. So soft but not as sheddy as normal alpaca. It's a baby alpaca/merino mix. Drool.

Do you think Dan Marino would want to wear merino? Har. Har. Cough.

Yup. Humor coming at you from all sides tonight.

Pirate aliens are the worst.

I know you think I haven't been blogging because I've been lazy and uninspired. THAT IS FALSE! The truth is that I was kidnapped by alien pirates for the past six months. They are sort of like earthling pirates except instead of being after booty, they are after knitting. My escape from their clutches was pretty epic (if I do say so myself) and luckily I was able to escape with my knitting. I post them here for your eyes to feast upon.

 This is my cabled dress that I made ages ago and refused to wear. I'm not really sure why I refused to wear it because it's freaking sweet, but I'm showing it the attention it deserves now. Look! I'm cooking! It turned out delicious, thanks for asking.

Is this what the hunchback of Notre Dame felt like?

THIS YARN BALL IS GOING TO EAT ME

My first baby blanket. Yes it looks like a scarf. Deal with it.

This is what those giant yarn balls became. Pretty sweet.

So there you have it folks, the past six months of my knitting. Except I knit way more than this and am just saving it for later. I know, I know. I'm such a needle tease (get it?! like cock tease but knitting related).

Struck by lightning (psst. It's a metaphor)

Apparently thunderstorms have kick-started a few things.

First. I am going to make a conscious effort to find a meteorology job. This means applying to at least three jobs a  week, contacting the station in Crested Butte, and seeing about a radio station internship. 

I know it seems like I should have been doing this the whole time, but I was feeling so discouraged about applying to 50 jobs and only hearing things back from 4 of them. And only one was a phone call. Plus I decided to see if maybe I could be happy with a minimum wage retail job. I can't. Every time I refold a shirt or sweep the floor I feel like I am one of those rumba robots; bumping into walls and cleaning up after people. But at least the robot has a cool name.

Second, I have gotten my finishing knitting mojo back. For the past couple months I've just been starting things and then half-heartedly working on them. NO MORE!

Crackle bang lightning thunder noises.

Here is my vest.

Yes my face is super sexy as always. The vest was a test knit and super easy/awesome. If you want details, go to my ravelry.

What else have I been finishing? My shawl of doom. I have one more repeat and then on to the edging.

At this point in the post, you may be wondering. What do lightning and thunder have to do with this? In reality, probably nothing. But starting last Wednesday, Gunnison Colorado had its first thunderstorm of the season. Since then, I have been through four in Denver. 

I adore thunderstorms. Especially Colorado thunderstorms. They are fast moving, super powerful torrential rain storms that kill. There is nothing cooler. It's a toss up between snow, hail, and thunderstorms for my favorite sort of weather. I'm not really a fan of tornadoes, which is sort of blasphemous for a meteorologist, but I live with myself daily.

Orgasms or blueballs? Yarn edition.

Dear blog,

Remember when everyone used to make fun of the word 'blogging'? I think some even said the word sounded like a venereal disease. Little did the haters know that you would take over the world. Sort of. Anyways, I have been having a torrid love affair lately. Here is the photo evidence.

Yup. During this erotic photo shoot, I literally took 20 pictures of this yarn. This yarn is also THE most expensive yarn I have ever bought. It was $50 for 550 yards of hard-spun alpaca. So as you fellow yarn-fetishists know, totally worth it.

I've already made something out of it too. It's a divine shawlette that has already been blocked and worn compulsively.

Bad news blog readers, I'm going to blueball you with those pictures. My little darling (aka, alpaca shawlette) needs to be reblocked. So until next post, look at other yarn porn.

PS. Blueball should be one word.

My Ode to Bfffl's

I have been a bad bad blogger. You all should throw yarn at me, or maybe summon tornadoes in my general direction. But enough depressing apologizing, let's get to the yarn! and knitting! and best friends!

This is my best friend Bekky and I.

She is literally the coolest person I know. Back in the golden days of olde, we used to stay in Friday and knit all night. Then on Monday we would drink a pitcher of beer and knit. Plus every day that ends in y we knit.

So the point is, without her, I have lost my knitting mojo. I've started tons of projects in the past couple months, but only finished three. Want to see some of the pictures?

The two pictures above are a cardigan that I am literally dead in the water on. I have no idea how to do that intense of colorwork. So I'm probably going to take a knitting class to get my cardigan on.

 That lovely cardigan I knit on the greatest road trip of all time. I went with my sweet friend Elliot to South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Washington, Utah, and Colorado for two weeks. We camped, made an obscene amount of inside jokes about bears, and I knit a beautiful cotton cardigan. Now all I need is a shawl pin.

 These socks are an ode to Bekky. Without her help, I wouldn't have been able to finish an intense red cabled pair of socks (I'm talking so intense that if you look at them your eyeballs explode into crocodiles). As a reward for rocking the sock cabana, she gave me this skein of Lorna's Laces. Which I turned into another pair of beautiful socks. Also, I'd like to note that this is probably the greatest colorway of all time.

So in conclusion, be sad that you don't have a Bekky.

PS. Bfffl means best friends forever for life.