More on my Vintage Finds

Last year when I found some awesome vintage knitting books at a yarn store in Atlanta I never got to posting about them in detail and always really wanted to because I thought they were just so cool. I wanted to share some of what I found in these books. I think I'll do it over a couple of posts so it's not beyond ridiculous with all the pictures. Remember the Good Housekeeping Complete book of Needlecraft I found? Well it had some pretty cool information in it; some techniques that maybe all the knitters but me already knew but became so clearly explained to me in this book. Along with some gems of knowledge came some pretty classic patterns. standard baby wrap sweater (kimono) and top down sweater in the round.

but look at this neat reversible baby jacket and argyle booties

I don't know if I'm catching the baby bug or what but I thought what cute and practical little baby items that never look stupid. I would totally knit these for my own baby. I also liked these child mittens and another babyset


I don't know about actually doing the boy/girl design on top but I like the style of the mittens. There were several other items in the book as well for the whole family. Here are some of my other favorites. It was like flipping through a completely practical list of things you have (essentials) to knit before you move on to knitting what you want to knit.

Still thinking about New Mexico

Hanging in the airport waiting for my flight to Italy, debating whether it's really a good idea to pay $8 for 24 hours of internet that I might only be able to use for two hours….is that cheap? That's probably cheap, huh? I wouldn't mind using my Netflix and watching Heroes on instant download (another reason why I love Netflix- you can watch movies instantly). When I was in New Mexico I was staying up into the deep hours of the night/morning watching Heroes; feeding my addiction. Everyone there was just raving about the show and I had seen the previews and wanted to get into it but never had. After the first show I was hooked and now I just have the 2^nd season of what they've shown already to catch up on (for Hero fans you can watch season 2 episodes on Netflix every Wednesday after they air.)

I had to stay up late at night to watch them because during the day we were hiking Aguirre Springs ,

and eating at Si Senore,

or snow fighting in Santa Fe during the day. See ya in Italy.

Most Def to knit in '08 #7

Tomorrow I fly into Atlanta. I have a ton of errands to run and deadlines to meet in order for my trip to Italy to happen, one including picking up my passport from on post. There is so much I want to knit!
I went to one of the yarn stores in Las Cruces called Unravel. Very nice little store. I picked up a couple of items there. Almost every time I go to a new that has a store it seems I end up getting some Noro Kureyon. I can't help myself. I really love that yarn. I love it so much I've decided that I can no longer resist knitting the Lizard Ridge Blanket. Heres 3 more skeins to add to the stash.

In addition to all the scarves I'll be knitting I'm adding Lizard Ridge to my must knit in '08 list. How beautiful.

Look what I found

I found this awesome book at a gimoungous used bookstore in Las Cruces. The store is called Coas Books Inc. They have a website. I got a few cool/vintage knitting and crocheting books but this is the only one I brought with me to look through on my way to Santa Fe. My goal is to knit or crochet at least one thing out of this thing. There is some awesome info between these 550 pages even if it was published back in 1959! The book is by Good Housekeeping and it's pretty much an encyclopedia with patterns about all needlecrafts to include sewing, crocheting, and knitting, and cross stitching and tatting and...you get the picture.
By the way I've got this phone blogging down now, my camera phone leaves some things to be desired though.I guess it's good in a pinch. Maybe I can give you a few peaks at Matty's stuff and other randomness before Feb....
PS- I found out that I do not have to enter a token every time I want to blog from my phone- I'm so glad b/c that would have been stupid.

Matty's new scarf

Matty camera pics 006
Originally uploaded by neeneepet

I'm currently in Santa Fe.We just got here today, on our way we stopped in Albuquerque to ride the tram- since the weather was so misty it ended up being a no go. We'll have to try and check it out on the way back on Tuesday. Nevertheless, what a blast this place is! I wish I had brought my USB cord so I could upload some of the crazy pics that I've taken since I've been in New Mexico! Check out the place that I'm staying. I've got my own little casita complete with a cute/awesome kitchen and wood burning adobo style fireplace. It's freaking amazing. Gives you that rustic New Mexican feel- which I love. Just from being in Las Cruces alone, I definitely could live here- I think this to myself every time I visit actually. Who knows where my little path could take me. I know on Saturday it will be taking me to Venice, Italy. I'm pretty excited about that.
Anyway, I mentioned the other day that it was all scarves all the time over here and it is the truth. Here is the yarn I'm using to knit Matty's scarf. It's Cascade 220. Great yarn actually- quick to knit with. As soon as I'm back home I will show you the finished product of this (which probably won't be for another 3-4 weeks). Before Matty left I had him pick the yarn from this amazing store in Macon called Creative Yarns. It's also were I got the yarn for my ruffly harlot scarf. Then I flipped through my copy of the Vogue Knitting handbook and had him pick a pattern he liked...maybe not a good look. I've knit most of the scarf and it is curling like CRAZY. I'm hoping that it will block out; we shall see. I think I'll throw up in my mouth a little bit if I have to put a border all around that thing.

New Year= new list of movies.

Hopefully I can keep up with it at a good pace this year. Here are a couple of movies I’ve watched thus far.

TODAY'S FEATURE

1. Vertigo- Back in November my Fiberflix group was doing the whole Alfred Hitchcock thing and there were a few movies that I didn’t get to watch and this was one of them and the best so far I would say. I had never seen hardly any Hitchcock movies before (blush), maybe the Birds but not many. I really liked it and recommend it with all it’s crazy suspense. This weeks recommendation. Also check out the trailer here. I thought it was amusing and it struck me funny how detailed and long it was.
2. The Lookout- I had gotten some previous info that this movie was horrible from several family members but I watched it anyway and didn’t think it was that bad. Of course it was not the best movie that I’d ever seen. I will admit I was expecting something different but what I got wasn’t bad.
3. A Fish Called Wanda- I’ve actually seen this movie quite a few times. I think it is hilarious each time. Jamie Lee Curtis is priceless in this movie. Also I just couldn't get over how young she looked.

maybe i'm about to show how silly I am

So, the last two messages came from my phone because I'm determined to be a better blogger in '08 and because I got this pimpin' new phone that is freaking awesome for Christmas. It's called the Pantech Duo BTW. Anyhoo, it has dawned on me (unless someone can tell me I'm doing it wrong and then I'll be relieved) that every single instance that I want to blog from my phone I will have to send the post to go.blogger.com. From there blogger will send me a token that I can enter and select whether i want it to go to the separate blog it created or merge it to my current blog and I will have to go through this process each time I post from my phone. If someone knows of a better more logical way please do inform the ignorant. I've just spent a couple of hours trying different methods other than the single token form to post to my blog. The separate tokens were the only things that worked like a charm.

Blog from my phone

I'm trying to set this up from my phone.

Multimedia message

I want to blog from my phone!

All scarves all the time

moving-food-scarves-stankface-etc 004
Originally uploaded by neeneepet

I'm blogging from my flickr again and yes this is another scarf. I believe I got the pattern off of an old Crazy Aunt Pearl blog entry or something. Nevertheless, this scarf knit up so easy it was ridiculous. It might have taken two days and I wasn't knitting my whole days away either.
It's made out of the Online Linie yarn that's at the top of my page. I think I used size 13 needles. Again like the other scarf I made it super long and used 3 balls of the yarn.
Unfortunately, there seems to be more scarfs in this blogs' future this year because I spotted one in the new Knitscene called the 1.)phiaro ( I already have 1 ball of the required yarn in my stash so I just need to buy two more) scarf that I really like and even though it's like clapotis, it's not clapotis so I still want to make my clapotis that I messed up so badly earlier last year so that means 2.) clapotis is on the list. Then of course I am currently knitting a 3.) scarf for my honeybunches out of Cascade 220 using some stitch pattern he chose out of my Vogue Knitters Handbook. Add onto that the two scarves I mentioned earlier and I've got at least five and of course that 6.)mobius cowl scarf thingie I've been wanting to knit for sometime and I've got 6 definite scarfs to knit. I will keep you posted. Matty's scarf should be done pretty soon and then I can mail it to him. He says it's freezing in Italy. BTW, I believe that he will be there for a few weeks before heading to Afghanistan. It's a high probability that I will be visiting Italy for a couple of weeks after I leave New Mexico. I can't wait. Sumter, South Carolina will have to see me when I get back. Did I mention that I'm not living in GA anymore? I moved back to Northern VA! Exciting times.

Matty camera pics 007

Matty camera pics 007
Originally uploaded by neeneepet

i can only allow myself to make a few more scarfs for a while. I feel like all I ever knit is scarfs. Although, when I think about it, it's what people ask me for the most. I have about a hundred of these that I need to make. I finished it a couple of months ago and wore it when we went to Macon to see some of Matty's family. His Aunt and his cousin were hinting pretty hard that they wouldn't mind having their very own ruffly scarf. It only took a couple of days, an hour here and there. I thought I would add them to the Christmas knitting but um, no ma'am.
Sorry for the weird picture. My hubby took it. At the time I was not amused.
I used 3 balls (2 and 3/4) of Online Linie something, obviously I'm going to have to find the little paper because I can't find the number online. (I'm in New Mexico away from most of my stash right now folks!)
Anyway, I used my size 8 Rosewood Lantern Moon needles my sister gave to me a few years ago. I twisted the yarn as I went so I could make one side completely dark green and the other completely light green.
My tension was weird in some places in the scarf and you can tell if you really look at it. I also managed to drop a stitch for like 10 rows- somehow. It really builds the scarfs character. Anyway, at least I will do a perfect job the next time I knit it. I was thinking I could make one in brown for cousin and a red one for Auntie. No telling when that will get done....

Can't keep going on this way.

Ok seriously, I have done so much and been so many places and so much has changed it's stupid. Right now as I type I'm in New Mexico visiting family. It's bittersweet. I'm having a blast but I had to say goodbye and see Matty off to Italy (eventually Afghanistan). It was truly remarkably hard. Harder than I ever anticipated.
This past year was a really really rough year for me. I gained almost all the weight I lost back and I know a lot of it was because I was so out of place in life this past year. Once I'm back from gallivanting I'm back to being a fit chick. I feel like an alien right now. It's ridiculous. Furthermore , I feel like I've gotta crap or get off the pot with this blog. Half the stuff I knit doesn't make it up here and the other half i never finish. Also, there is so much interesting or fun or whatever type of stuff in my life that should make it up here and doesn't. So here's my solution- i continue to only have 3 or 4 crummy type post in a whole month then the site comes down. I'm giving myself about 4 months to sharpen up. You would think life would be easier for me now...I got a laptop for Christmas! Let's see if I can do work.

MmmmDada Mmmmdada

A few weeks ago my BIL (Weety), my friend Michelle, myself and Matty went to a food festival (Taste of Atlanta). We had a freakin' blast and ate so much food it was ridiculous. I kinda want to do this every "summer-fall"now. They have these festival of restaurants all over America.
There's Weet stuffing his face.
Michelle caught red handed.
Aside from the incredible food there was music (DJ's) in the streets and also street performers. Of course my favorites were the breakers. There were some incredible break-dancers there. No chicks but it's all good.

All that breakin' took me back to my special K Electric Boogaloo days. I was going to marry Ozone or maybe that youngin' Turbo if he'd have me -I was a sucker for a gherri curl and cut off net shirt and you know I was poppin' and lockin' with the best of them in my Michael Jackson Beat It jacket. :-)

TV Time spent doing?

IMG_0392
Originally uploaded by neeneepet

A quick blog from Flickr today. I happen to be on Ravelry and came across this scarf pattern- it was posted by Crazy Aunt Purl and I thought to myself, "Self, you've definitely got the yarn to make that scarf real quick." And quick it has been. What you see here is the result of about 2.5 hours of TV.
The yarn I'm using is OnLine Linie60: TONDO. It's bulky and 100% wool, it's pretty luscious to knit with actually. Feels great. I have plans for a whole bunch of little projects- like I usually do for this time of year. We'll see what gets done. I started and screwed of the heal to one of my socks. I'm ripping and redoing...AGAIN. Freaking socks

After the party it's the hotel lobby

The "Fiesta, Fiesta" keeps on popping off over here. After the Aquarium you know we had to make it over to Zoo Atlanta. It was a blast.


Here's a couple of shots of the fun but really you can look at all the pics of the events I've been telling you about over on my Flickr. Links Links Links!


Anyhoo, Michelle? Jerry? You both can see I covered up the boys just for you in my green dress. I wasn't too happy that I couldn't cover up that stomach bulge but skip that for a minute...doesn't my skin look freaking amazing? Moisturize, moisturize, moisturize. When I was checking out the pictures I couldn't help but sweat myself- j/k but I'm not to on the self hate tip to pay myself a compliment,"Go skin, go skin- it's your birthday..."

Anyway, let's not even get started on how many movies I've seen over the months and haven't told you all about. I have been keep in a list. There's about 90 on the list and I've written about 50 of them on here so far. I have to catch up before the year ends- I must. I've seen some good ones lately but I'm dipping back to tell you about some from a ways back.
"Just gotta git it out- just gotta git it right out of meeeeah"

No Vegetable Juice this week- Rent them all!

51. House of Flying Daggers- Another beautiful martial arts film. I loved the story and the fight scenes were incredible AND visual masterpieces however not more so than Hero or Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Actually if we’re talking visually nothing has topped Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Memoirs of a Geisha, or even Hero for me yet. Visually, they were just incredible. They really show Asia in a glorious way; with simplicity but still with great life incredible beauty. The love story actually ended up being beautiful and the choreography of some of the fight scenes…Wow.
52. Life is Beautiful- What an incredibly optimistic view of the Holocaust. I was not expecting this movie. Of course I had heard so much about it and yes, I saw the Oscars that year but it’s one you have to see in order to appreciate it. I recommend this film to everyone. It’s so sad (how could it not be) yet the movie convinces you that everything’s going to be ok, that things are not as bad as they seem; that surely there will be a happy ending somehow. It really does an extraordinary job of keeping you hopeful yet haunting you with painfully truthful reality. Even so, the way the movie ends it’s so…hopeful-light even. This is so not the word I’m looking for. It’s like this; Just like the title reads, “Life is Beautiful” as is the movie and it’s message. Undoubtedly, I came away with an understanding. “This is all terrible, this is all true and horrible BUT life is too beautiful to let the terrible consume all the beauty it contains.” To me and I hope to most that is the moral of the story. To me that was the goal of the Father for his son. It really was much more than looking at the glass half full, it was sacrifice…
53. Easy to Wed- Oh my goodness, what a hoot of a movie. Lucille Ball was in this one as a supporting actress. Dude, she is sooo freaking funny. Effortless. It’s funny the whole plot is something that could happen today (we haven’t changed much at all) A high society woman is rumored to be a “playgirl” and a tabloid paper produces a story about her that’s false so she & her rich Father call up and claim to sue the company for $2M. Well the tabloid hires a notorious “playboy” to rope her into a real version of the fabricated story and it all plays out from there. I tell you there is just something about these old movies. You can hold an expectation to them that today’s movies just never hit you with. Geez, I really am having a sorry time trying to explain what I mean today. Maybe I should try using my words another day! It’s just that the delivery, the humor, the feeling of these movies- it’s all something so 100% different from todays movies. It has to do with the way movies are shot now as oppose to then or something. Maybe it’s a difference in film, in sets, in actors, in wardrobe, humor, delivery. It’s something greater than what happens these days for some reason.
54. Neptunes Daughter- Another good one with Esther Williams (she was in Easy to Wed too) and Ricardo Montalban (who I had no idea was that hot in his younger years). I love how easy it is to fall in love (I mean madly/wildly/truly/desperately in love where the man is all up front and gushy about it) and get married in these movies. Anyway, this movie is mainly a case of mistaken identity. I wonder if this musical is absolutely where the song “Baby, it’s cold outside” came from? Interesting. I always thought it was a blues classic. Anyway, what I actually like best about this movie was all the Latin/South American music scenes. I got a little irritated with the obnoxious Mexican stable hand stereotypes and Esther’s sister had a black handmade (who looked pretty glamorous to be cleaning house in a movie from the 40's-hmm) well, at least her script didn’t include anything like “yes’m I’s gittin to it” or anything like that; I suppose that was a step up from the norm- anyway there was a pretty good amount of good un-stereotypical but celebratory Latin influence in the movie which I enjoyed. Also, the swimsuits in the movie where incredible; I love those old suits.
55. On the Town- Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra (who I had no idea was so incredibly scrawny until you see him next to little brawny Gene Kelly). This movie was very entertaining. Good music numbers and dancing (which you could always expect) but this is not my favorite musical from Gene Kelly. It’s not even in the top 5. Nevertheless, you won’t be sorry if you rent it. The whole premise is that three sailors have a days leave off the boat in NYC. They want to see the sights and see some women all in one day before they have to get back on board. Anyway, Mr. Kelly gets on the subway and sees a poster for Mrs. Turnstiles and he must have her- so he and his buddies spend a good part of the movie in hilarious pursuit of “Ms. High Society”. These freaking movies just make grin. Love it.

After the party there's the after party...

After comedy night of course there was more Atlanta fun to be had. We went to the Aquarium, which was freaking awesome.


I had never been to an aquarium at all and always wanted to go to the one in Baltimore (definitely will make time to do it next time I'm in VA). Anyhoo, here are just a couple of the awesome things we saw there. Note that the shark with the chainsaw nose was a hard picture to capture because of the shear size of the fellow so, lucky. Lucky would be the word I'd used for the final capture for the whacked out shot of Mr. Pristiophoridae.
In other news I guess figuratively speaking today could be the tomorrow I spoke of about a week or so ago. I do tend to use very symbolic language at times....with no further ado here are two of the crummiest sock progress pictures one could possibly shoot.

The pink Lorna's laces is going to be all stockinette with just an inch or so of ribbing at the top and the purple/blue Tofutsie's has a 2x2 rib pattern along the front and soon to be the leg of the sock- I'm really pleased with how that one is turning out :-). I start to turn the heel on the pink one tomorrow. Ya'll say a prayer- haha- no seriously ya'll get in the prayer circle and plead the blood over these ones because I feel like it's Groundhogs Day over here. I'm just continuously knitting the same sock over and over again day after day. This time I am referring to a heel pattern that is not short rows (Interweave Knits, Summer 'O7)so we'll see how it goes.

U gotta live

So the thing about stepping up the blog can only happen if you get out and live and the thing with getting out and living is that you're usually not getting out with your desktop computer. It's just a good thing that I'm off for the next few days without getting out there and living plans :-) I can give the blog a good old update. :-)
After the final Braves home game Matty and I went to comedy night at the Loft here in Columbus. The opener was pretty lame but the header, Mutzie, was hilarious. I've actually seen him on Comic View on BET before. Wouldn't you know that I got picked out of the crowd to help end his act. Ask my sister, ask Matty, ask my McCaffrey's I always get picked out of the crowd. Nevertheless, I had a blast and was pretty much a celebrity for the rest of the night. Here's a picture of me and Mutzie at the end of the night.
As far as knitting goes, I mentioned ripping and restarting both "pair" of socks that I've been knitting since the concept of knitting a sock entered my mind. I still haven't taken a picture but I will say that if I could have just focused on one sock I probably would have a whole one done but of course I got tired with what I was doing and decided to start the other sock from some variety. I promise I will get on it and update on the socks with pictures tomorrow.

DOIN' WORK

I've got so much to tell you guys. I'm behind- what's new? I think I've mentioned before that since Matty has been home we've been DOing WORK (anybody watch Rob & Big) right? The weekend after my Yarn Harlot trip we went back to Atlanta to see the Brave's last home game. They spanked the Brewers at the end and gave the crowd what they came to see...now mind you there's no post season for Atlanta right now but they DID WORK when we were there.

Matty got all the good pictures and he hasn't uploaded them yet so you can't see the close up of my Atlanta Braves eye guards or me chopping it up with my classic tomahawk. He got one of Andruw Jones sliding onto first and yes we were so close we could see the sweat dripping:-) It's funny whenever players slide I always think "Dirt in the skirt, Mae. Dirt in the skirt." ...I love that movie. Actually if we're talking about doing work, Andruw DID WORK that day in the outfield a couple times.
We've been doing work watching more and going to the movies. Here's a little of what we've seen lately:

45. The Brave One- It was good because Terrence Howard and Jodie Foster are just good in my opinion. The storyline was a good one that I hadn't seen and wasn't expecting ( I mean not wholely- I did see the previews and knew what it was about but...u know). I wasn't expecting how it ended and I definitely came in thinking that Jodie was just taking back the streets "a little". Old Jodie was DOIN' WORK for sure. I will say that in parts it was very slow and while I did get over the slow parts I wasn't on the Bill's Movie Review overlook it tip.
46. Old School- I hadn't ever seen this before and thought it was pretty funny. Of course Matty got it in from Netflix b/c it was WAAAAAYYY down on my roster. We've both been have sporadic "blackouts" of brilliance.
47. Yellow- This was an independent little project by Rosalyn Sanchez and I have to admit I liked it but there were some points were I cringed at the script or the acting. Nevertheless, I found the story interesting...provocative as the professional reviewers like to say. I loved how Hispanic culture and poetry and dance were all infused into a relatively deep storyline. DO WORK Rosalyn b/c I saw your name all over the credits.
48. Breach-This movie was intriguing and don't laugh but I had no idea it was based on the true story. Chris Cooper was crazy in an ingenius way. He played the role flawlessly; I kept turning to Matty saying OMG this guy is crazy. I was on the edge knowing everyone's cover was blown in every scene. I've got a love/hate with these type of movies.
49.Knocked up-This movie was very entertaining. The language was over the top a lot yet still I was cracking up through so much of this movie. Also, I now understand what everyone warns about as the TMI scene at the end when Katherine Heigl is in labor. lol
50.Disturbia-I really enjoyed this movie too. I'm telling you little LaBeouf is a really convincing little actor. It is so surprising. I will say that I did chuckle to myself how the whole family and friends just get back to happy go lucky living after what would be tragic events to real people.
I've got some good ones in the line up. If you want something more serious I say go with Breach but I'm picking Disturbia...yes even over the Brave One; simply b/c it was slow in many parts. Pick of the week:

In other news. I ripped out both socks I've been working on for forever and started fresh for the one zillionth time. I'm feeling really positive about these. Could it be b/c of the Harlots mojo? It's probably due to me finding what looks like a easy pattern in an issue of Interweave Knits. I'll post some pictures soon.

For Anna and others...

So here are the couple of things I didn't mention or show last time. One was the log cabin blanket I'm working on and it's progress. Of course here it looks like crayola crayons but I promise in real life all the colors are a lot richer and just plain nicer. Also there goes my new birthday watch for scale:-), the blanket is all garter stitch so it's great mindless knitting.
Also, when I was at Knitch for the YH I got a ball of Rowan calmer because everyone always seems to be going ape nuts over it and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. There should dang near be platinum chards spun into it between how much it cost and how much people rave...I like the color I picked. Anyway, I don't really know what I'm going to make out of this one ball but I'll think of something. I'm leaning toward a hat because they are quick
Coming up lots of traveling and activities, lots of movies, and more knitting. Yesterday was my birthday and we/I had a blast. I'm almost thirty now....

Pump up the Jam

So here is one of my first post from my newly "pumped" up site. :-) I've been having even more of a good time than usual since Matty has gotten home. Guess that's a big duh anyway right. Well last Wednesday I made it to see the Yarn Harlot at Knitch in Atlanta. Here's a picture I took of her taking a picture of all 500+ of us. It was really cool and she was hilarious. The chick is practically a stand up comedian- her timing is flawless. These are pictures of the incredible line I waited in to get Ms. McPhee to sign my books. Notice how I have the elevated angle- it's because I was at the end of the line upstairs where I was stuck behind this one chick who complained about a group who cut in line the WHOLE time we waited. She even went as far as to warn how theirs would be coming on judgment day. Oh how I wish I would have snapped one of her on the DL now. Anyway, it was worth it in the end. Stephanie put some mojo on my pathetic sock knitting skills; don't mind how extremely huge my arm looks- I hear the camera adds 15 pounds
.
I had a blast. I knit another block and a half of color on the log cabin baby blanket. It was just so cool to meet all the other knitters there and see what they were working on and what they had already made. It was like we were all already friends- pretty cool.