Spring has Sprung

I am indeed still among the living-and-breathing. However, I'm moving, which is just about as bloggable as being dead- hell, at least someone could get a good "Oh Tala, how we miss her mad geekery" post out of my being dead. Alas, alack and achoo: as of this moment, moving has supplied only pictures of boxes, tales of boxes, and nothing more. I was actually going to start this entry with a picture of a box, but figured what audience I have might apperciate the stereotypical spring snapshot instead.

Once I've moved, however, prepare for a deluge. Not only does the new condo have actual gardening space (!!!), it is bright freaking purple. No, really: it's purple like a Gram (+) bacterium. I think I shall call it Crystal Violet. Did I just type that? Yes, I did. Every day my inconsolable geekiness is further and further confirmed. But you're not here to watch my ever-devolving dorkness (or are you?)! You're here for the making-of-stuff.

With my Strawberry Hat off the needles and firmly wedged upon my head (and, as requested, a pattern in the works as soon as I can figure out where I packed my knitting notes- I think I may try posting it directly to KnitWiki), I had room for another project without violating my two-projects-at-a-time law. Behold, swatching (and a tiny bit of unremarkable 1x1 ribbing):


A Swatch and a Prayer

I never knew a tiny little swatch could make me so extraordinarily happy. I think it's beautiful, and I'm proud enough of it to have carried it in my wallet for a day and whipped it out to show all my bewildered non-knitting friends. It is, as some of you may have immediately recognized, the beginnings of Eunny Jang's Endpaper Mitts. If you do not know Eunny, where the hell have you been? She's hands down and no holds barred my favorite modern knitwear designer, and I have a host of her projects stashed and waiting to be knit.

As far as the mitts go, I've never knit something with such fine yarn and on such small needles before, and I love it. The delicate texture and the fine fair isle (which makes me look like I know what I'm doing, but which is actually intuitively easy, what with there being no floats longer than three tiny stitches) positively thrills me. Yes, thrills. I have a very visceral reaction to the act of creation sometimes. It's a kind of satisfaction I don't often get from student life and work/business, which both take lots of effort and return very little tangible output (unless printing up an unofficial transcript each semester so I can hold my work in my sweaty little hands counts).

And where is Calla in all this mess of boxes and fair-isling? That's actually a very good question.


This would be much further along if I hadn't lost it.

She is still in her shamefully rudimentary stages, largely because I lost her for a week and only rediscovered her recently. I suspect there are numerous mistakes in the first few rows, but am still amateur enough not to recognize them (only to suspect them) and seem to be getting the hang of it now, so I'm soldiering on. If I finish it and it's horrible, I will figure out what to do then. There's all sorts of magical fixes out there in the wide world of knitting.

As a final comment, I leave you with a link of inspiration: if I could make cakes like this, all my baking-dreams would be fulfilled. Damn!

It has taken me multiple days to convince myself that, indeed, Tempting is finished and indeed she is blocking (and nearly dry) with all her indecent ends neatly woven in, on the dryer and indeed, I can start another knitting project without breaking my personal two-project-at-a-time limit.

But finally I convinced myself. I dug my Knitpicks Shine out of ye olde stash and turned my eyes towards Calla. Of all the things I plan to knit I chose this one out of sheer joy for the spate of warm weather we've recieved, out of undiluted adoration for the oncoming spring (and thus the glorious summer, my favorite season). Swatching began, twined tight with my warm weather hopes.

They tell me swatching is important.

Then I went outside this morning and lo, the Weather Gods had decided to make it clear that they did not approve of such summery yearnings.


Damn you, Colorado Weather Gods!

This was also about the same time I realized that the given Calla gauge which I read as "in stst" actually read "in pattern". Oops. That's okay: I'm thinking to swap Calla's center cable with the DNA cable, for I am proud of my geekery- such modification will require more swatching reguardless of whether I wasted my time on the first swatch. What do you think of the DNA cable idea? Would it work well with the cotton? Look good with the design?

Weather and bad swatching aside, I've got quite a few reasons to smile right now. One of them arrived in the mail today, from the aforementioned You Stink Soap.


Squee!

YouStinkSoap is so awesome that, not only did she include a sample bar of London Lemon Curd, she included a whole extra bar of Cucumber Melon as a thank you for my previous blog mention. How utterly awesome is that? The London Lemon Curd was a good choice for me as far as samples go- I love fruity and berry scents and have added this one to my mental wishlist for my next order. The Cucumber Melon is wonderful and visually remniscent of a melon itself, with the green rind, pink flesh and exfoilating seeds. The three bars I actually paid for were Garden Mint (which seems like a perfect morning shower wake-up scent), Raspberry (utterly delicious- I love berry scents) and Stormy Night, which, while a hard scent to describe, is also lovely. I can't decide which bar to start with.

I ran out of soap a while ago and had been waiting (and washing myself with leftover shampoo) to purchase more because of Tigger's bills. Still, there is a point where my skin rebels against the cheap stuff/leftover shampoo, and I reached that point last week. Huzzah for affordable indulgences- a nice reminder that there are simple joys in life and I deserve them as often as possible (after all, if I don't take care of myself, who will?). And I don't mean that to sound vain- I think everyone should spoil themselves as often as possible, because that's what you do to people you love and if you don't love yourself, well... then where are you?

That said, have you spoiled yourself lately?

Another happy thing is this, which I picked up from a small store in Old Town because my business cards kept getting damaged in my wallet and damnit, I paid for those things and I want them to stay nice. Now I feel doubly official: first the business cards, and now a kick-ass business card case that I can whip out all suave-like. It's a bit of professionalism and awesome-geek-quirk all at the same time.


This thing is made of awesome.

And finally, I did something today that, due to cirucmstance and an utterly paralyzing fear of needles, I've never done before. I donated blood. Lots of it.


Good Deed of the Day

It made me queasy for a few hours, but I suspect that was just as much "OH MY GOD NEEDLES" (did I mention the paralyzing fear?) as "OH MY GOD BLOODLOSS". I will donate again. I suspect I will be terrified again when I do, but I'm not one to let that stop me.

(And that wasn't supposed to be a boob shot. I'm not all that good with the self-timer schtick. My apologies.)