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I am up to my armpits in the Christmas knitting. The socks for Rick’s ma go…well, they were going fine until I hit the heel and tried to do my first short row heel and hit failure not once, not twice, but three times. The knitting time remaining is too short for that shit, and after I ripped it out for the third time, I went back to my standard heel flap. So, halfway through the first sock on that one.  At about the same place on Lori’s socks.

As for Puggy’s mittens…well, the gout in his fingers makes these difficult to size. I’m not sure his thumb will fit in the thumb of the mittens, and he doesn’t wear gloves now, so we have nothing to base them on. Rick keeps telling me he’ll be thrilled with the fact that I made him something whether they fit or not, but that doesn’t feel right to me. I mean, I spend time knitting things for people that they can use, not that they can look at and say “So nice. Wish I could use them.” I told Rick to get Puggy to draw me a hand turkey, but I doubt that’s going to happen. Knitting friends, what would you do?

Two weeks, and Rick’s second knit gift still needs to be cast on. I might be fucked, y’all.

Holy crap, I got some knitting done in the past two weeks! Details and pictures for not one, not two, but three projects that I finished behind the break.

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After a summer of sluggish (if any) knitting, the cool weather and dreary days have got me on a knitting kick again. I’m working on Glorianna (oh, how I wish I could link to Ravelry so you non-knitters could see the pattern…) for Rick’s sister in Sea Silk. It supposedly has anti-inflammatory properties and I think it will feel good against the spot where her trach tube incision was. Plus, I loves me the Sea Silk. After this gets done, there is a Clementine to be knit for my sister-in-law (again, the absence of a Ravelry link is driving me up a fucking wall). And then hats and scarves and socks that are Christmas gifts. And then I can attack the stash! I’m wearing my stupid wrist splints at work now as well as to sleep in because I find they keep me from aggravating the carpal tunnel…which means I can squeeze in knitting time!

I’m finding myself crazily drawn to socks and lace. They are my “things,” maybe because they are the biggest holy shit! types of knitting. Lace, for instance, looks like utter dreck while you’re knitting it, but then you block it and holy shit! It’s lace! Socks are similar – you’re knitting along, knitting a tube on four sticks, basically, and then you do a little fancywork with the yarn and suddenly holy shit, I made the yarn turn a corner! It’s a heel! This is the kind of entertainment that never gets old. Plus, it’s perfect weather for wool socks right now.

And here is where we have a problem. I have this little 10% off coupon from the Rockin’ Sock Club that I’ve been sitting on aaaall year. We’re a little over 10 days from the launch of the Raven Series, and since those of us in the RSC have gotten a little taste of it, I know this means I am 10 days from getting the most out of that 10% off coupon. And then there’s the stuff I’m going to buy off of Knitpicks to finish out the Christmas presents. After much deliberation, I’ve decided that the Wii is not meant to be for right now. I was holding off until November so that Mercury would be out of retrograde and I could once again buy something with moving parts that wouldn’t go wonky on me, but it’s just as well. Because now I have more money to spend on the fiber addiction.

I have chosen fiber over tech. Help me, I think I may be headed back to the colonial era. Also, this might be a sign of the apocalypse. But when it comes, and we all have to live in caves, you will want to be in my cave. Because I will have yarn to knit us all nice warm socks and hats and fiber to spin more yarn should we run out. Perfect to get us through a nuclear winter.

I am back in the office today and not happy about it. Coming back to work after Rhinebeck? Like coming back after a long vacation. Sucks to the extreme. I played the hermit a bit yesterday as well and didn’t leave the house at all despite the perfect weather. This is why I have lots of windows – I can open the blinds and throw open the windows and get all the sun and fresh air I would outside. Except I can be watching TV while I do it. In effect, I sunbathed all day on my couch while watching Degrassi and old musicals and chilling with the cats, who were very happy to have me home. Next year, methinks I will take Friday and Monday off and make it a true long weekend, and somehow figure out how to stay in the area Saturday night so that I can go to the afterparties and go back to the festival on Sunday.

We had a wonderful time at Rhinebeck, even though the getting there was a little hairy. Took off from J’s place around 8 Friday night, and little Miss Samang decided she was not. having. it. Not happy to be in the car, not happy to leave Baba (Daddy) behind, not happy that Mommy wasn’t riding beside her (I was her co-pilot in the back seat as J drove, and while Samang likes me, I am NOT MOMMY). We made it to the end of the block and Samang was screaming in rage. A Chinese firedrill and I was in the driver’s seat and J was in back with the baby. (I don’t have a lot of experience driving in the city, which is why we didn’t do that to start with.) I drove to the entrance of the BQE, by which point Samang had fallen asleep, and we did another Chinese firedrill, this time to put J behind the wheel and me in the front passenger seat – it’s a long trip and harder to stay awake when someone isn’t up front talking to you. Samang woke up briefly when we were in horrible traffic in the Bronx and screamed again, but we had to let her cry it out. Extremely hard on Jordana, but we made it and the kid fell asleep again. We drove on through the pouring rain and the flooded streets of Pittsfield and pulled into Rick’s at about midnight. Sat up talking and playing with Samang (who was wide awake and her usual happy self when we got into the house, then went to bed).

Woke up around 8:30 on Sunday and didn’t head out until about 9:45 because of one thing and another, but I drove like a bat out of hell down the Taconic and got us into the parking lot at the festival by 11:15 even with hellacious traffic through the center of town. Waited in another huge line to get in and made a beeline for Building A where The Fold was. I was going to get some damned Socks That Rock if it killed me. Surprisingly, unlike last year or even MDSW, there were quite a few colors left when we got there. All mediumweight, but I was able to snag some Azure Malachite (I’ve been coveting this for a while) and some Atomic #6 – I’m thinking I may hop on the bandwagon and try out a Chevron Scarf with this.

Looked around in vain for Grafton Fibers (where the hell were they? We never found them!), then went out to the blogger meet-up where I finally met my twin Necia (we share the exact same birthday, although we figured out that she was born about 12 hours earlier than me), saw Jessica again, met the FemiKnit Mafia in person along with her friend Danielle, and met more bloggers than I can possibly remember. This year I tried to be a little less shy and say hello to everyone, and it worked. Passed out some Moo cards as well.

After that…we wandered and wandered and wandered. Rick had given me some cash because he’s a lovely boyfriend like that, so he basically bought me a swift. I have been wanting a swift for ages, but they are expensive (came out to $87 with tax), so I haven’t bought one. So everyone join me and say “Thank you, Rick!”. I bought 8 oz. of scarlet bamboo to spin, a book to teach myself Magic Loop, a braid of Blue Faced Leicester in Sapphires from Cloverleaf Farms (because buying out half their stock at MDSW wasn’t enough), 6 oz. of a gorgeous BFL/Cotswold/Mohair blend, Mohair locks, some Heal My Hands as a present to Jordana for coming up with me…and I think that’s it. Oh, and food. A chocolate chip cookie, a chicken and portobello wrap, cheese sticks, some beer, and a wonderful dinner at the Grill across the street from the fairgrounds. And Jordana bought me a bottle of Seyval Blanc from one of the wineries who had a table there.

Funny story about dinner – Jordana and I were having a very nice dinner (Madeira chicken for both of us), the baby was sleeping, and I see a flash go off. I say “That’s a blogger somewhere, I wonder who it is?” Turn around and it’s my friend Jenny, who had been having dinner behind us – we were literally three feet away from each other and had no idea! Got to talk to her for a few minutes and then set off on our way back home. I think we finally rolled in around 11:30. Another very long day, but such a good one!

Like I said though, next year? I’m figuring out a way to stay overnight. Also, the baby? She likes animals. All kinds of them. And she thinks people looking at her upside down is very funny. In other words, she was a positive joy on Saturday. I think we have another fiber convert on our hands – she likes colors and she likes the way yarn feels. We’re raising her right.

One word: Rhinebeck. I’ll be there Saturday, and I swear the wool fumes have already gotten to me – it’s all I can think about at this point. I’ve spent the past hour printing directions, checking out who else is playing Rhinebeck Blogger Bingo, cruising the Ravelry boards so I can talk to other people who have Rhinebeck Fever, planning which booths I want to go to first…what can I say? I loves me a fiber festival. I especially loves me a fiber festival where I will get to meet up with fiber blog friends and this is that kind of festival.

I am so not going to be productive anytime before Jordana, Samang, and I head upstate tomorrow night at 7. We’re using Rick’s place as a crashpad, getting in late and leaving early so we can spend a full day at the festival before dragging ourselves home. And I do mean dragging – we were dead by the time we got home last year. Of course, we had driven up that morning and gotten stuck in horrible traffic, but still. Dead. Sensory overload. All we could do over dinner was sit there, look at each other, pet our acquisitions,  and drink some caffeine. We didn’t even have the energy to talk.

This year, we hope to avoid some of the tiredness by heading up the night before, but we’re also bringing a four month old with us. I think we’re going to end up exhausted anyway. But hey! We’ll have cute pictures of the baby with farm animals! And yarn! And roving!

Hi, we’re 36 hours away from it, and I am already slap happy.

Kids, Jordana’s and my Etsy shop, Savvy Brooklyn, is live. Please go check it out. I’ve only listed a few things for the moment until I figure out what I’m doing, but if you’re interested most everything here (except the bracelet and necklace) will eventually go up for sale.

Special thanks to our own Evil Science Chick for the shop banner!