I didn’t expect to be showing off a new kitty this soon. Bianca came into our lives today. Her former owner needed a home for her and I fell in love with her immediately. She’s all white with beautiful green eyes. We’re all still in the getting acquainted mode. This afternoon, she found a secret place to hide that gave us a bit of a scare but she appeared and now we know about the secret hiding place. She’s very sweet and is a wonderful addition to our home. It feels so wonderful to have a kitty presence in the house again. I know George and Chloe’s spirits aren’t far away and are curious about the new kitty.

Wow! So I read the Lipstick Librarian blog on a regular basis but with school I’ve been a bit behind on my blog reading. Then this morning a co-worker sent me this post. If you click on the “fearless soul” link, you may see someone familiar.

How cool is that?

In the time warp, otherwise known as May, I knit another little Baby Surprise Jacket for a friend’s daughter. I blocked it last weekend but with all of the rain we’ve been having lately it took forever to dry. Now it’s ready to send off to mom and baby. I was glad to finally have something to use with this Cotton 100 yarn. It’s been languishing in the stash for quite a while and is perfect for kids sweaters. I just needed the perfect sweater that fit the amount of yarn that I had.

pattern: Baby Surprise Jacket by Elizabeth Zimmermann from The Knitting Workshop
yarn: Berocco Cotton 100 in 9208 (Lavender) from stash
needles: size 7 bamboo
started: April 30, 2008
finished: May 9, 2008

This morning, I finally planted a few plants we bought at the farmer’s market last weekend. With the roofers around for several days, I wasn’t about to go out and try to pot anything for fear of being hurt by falling shingles. I fear we may have lost one of our cilantro plants but the gerbera daisies and peppers are still doing well. The lettuce came already potted so it was just a matter of hanging it up in the back. I was excited to see that the mint I planted last year is doing quite well. Ooh, mint tea!

As I’ve learned the hard way a swatch is your friend. I’ve been swatching for the Saddle Shoulder Aran for Bryan and while I’m happy with the swatch. It wasn’t the most fun swatch to knit, which slightly disappointed me. It was a matter of too few stitches stretched on a circular needle, eventually I used the magic loop technique and I had a hard time keeping track of the cables since I hadn’t fully charted everything out.

The yarn looks beautiful, it’s Rowan Classic Yarns - Wool Tweed in Shetland (953). The swatch was also a great lesson in steeking, I’ve never done a steek before so I figured this was a great time to practice. It actually turned out quite well and I’m feeling pretty confident about my steeking abilities for the full sweater. It’s truly not as scary as I thought it might be. I’ve cut so many knitted pieces to lengthen or shorten them that the cutting part doesn’t scare me quite as much as it probably should.

Last week, Bryan and I traveled out to western Kansas to help my mother clean out my grandfather’s house. It was definitely an experience. My grandparents never threw away bills, receipts, tax returns or credit card statements. We found them going back to the 1950s. It was really amazing because it was all put away and out of sight. Every time we thought we were finished with a room, we’d find one more drawer that needed to be cleaned out. Nothing could be just thrown away because there were literally photographs tucked away everywhere. We found some real treasures in the house - a photo of my grandparents locked in a kissing embrace before they were married that looks like an art photo you’d buy, a darning egg, many buttons, old library cards from the 1950s and 60s (a treasure for a librarian), family photos we didn’t even know existed, a few Singer Featherweight machines and so much more. It was a real experience to clean out someone’s house. My mom needed to get the house cleaned out because she wanted to put it on the market, it sold while we were there.

During our travels, about 12 hours in the car each way, I started the Saddle Shoulder Aran Cardigan for Bryan. It’s coming along well and I’m definitely keeping track of the cable pattern better than I did in swatch.

Thank you all for your kind words about George. We’re all getting along okay and Chloe is figuring out what it means to be the only cat in the house. This is the first time she’s ever been without George. I swear George gave her some snarking tips before he passed away.

I’m finished with school for the semester! It felt like the semester that would never end a few weeks ago, but I turned in my final paper (exam) on Wednesday, a day early. I’ve been home sick for the last seven days with a nasty virus (cold-like symptoms) so I’ve have a lot of time to read, watch Ugly Betty on DVD and knit. Another Baby Surprise Jacket is three rows from being finished. (Photos soon)

This summer I’m taking an Adult Popular Literature class and figured I’d start doing some reading for the class before everything kicks into full gear in June. In four days, I plowed through Devil in the White City, an amazing book. If you haven’t read it, I highly recommend it. I seriously could have stayed up all night to read it but knew that I needed my sleep.

Of course, after I finished Devil in the White City I got a bit distracted. For one of my final papers this semester, I had to evaluate a medium that was geared to children or teens. I chose to evaluate the show Gossip Girl with no idea how addictive the show could be. It’s sort of an updated Beverly Hills, 90210 mixed in with Sex & the City. In all of my research, which included watching several episodes of the show and reading quite a few articles on the show, I totally got sucked in. Yesterday, I checked out a fair amount of books for my Adult Popular Lit class and a Gossip Girl book just happened to end up in my stack of books. How odd! I’ve since finished the book and am thinking I’ve found yet another guilty pleasure. They aren’t books I would recommend to younger teens and they’re books I would be hesitant to recommend to fifteen-year-olds but if they are fans of the show, then I probably would recommend them. I can definitely see why many parents are not happy about these books and the show - the amount of underage drinking is more than I think most adults want any kids engaging in, although I’m sure a lot of teens are drinking anyway.

(I learned this semester that when school gets a bit insane that washcloths are the perfect project - from February until this past Monday I knit a total of seven washcloths. Above are just three of them that I knit for my sister.)

pattern: Martha from Rowan Magazine 28
yarn: Rowan Felted Tweed, Crush (color 144)
started: January 8, 2007
completed: April 11, 2008

This month at the library I work at we’re doing a Pedometer Challenge. There are different teams around the library competing for the highest weekly average. My average last week wasn’t great but this week is definitely going to be better. Biking can be converted to steps, so we dusted off our bikes this weekend. I’ve already biked over nine miles these last two days. My new walking shoes will be a huge help in motivating me to continue walking to work on those days that my seat is too sore to ride my bike.

pattern modified from Tweedy Vest by Mona Schmidt from Knitscene, Fall/Winter 2005
yarn: Debbie Bliss Aran Tweed, color: 20008
started: November 22, 2007
completed: February 10, 2008

The semester is winding down and there is still so much to be done. I’m looking forward to summer and growing vegetables again. Today I noticed the hostas we planted last year are coming up. They’re in a pot that we buried in the ground that we can dig up and put on our front porch. I just hope the apartment people don’t come by and chop them off thinking that they are weeds. My summer schedule is going to be a bit less crazy than this semester. I have two classes - Non-Fiction for Children and Adult Popular Literature. There will be a lot of reading but I loved reading for my Children’s Lit class last semester.

pattern: Baby Surprise Jacket by Elizabeth Zimmermann from The Knitting Workshop
yarn: Berocco Cotton 100 in Blue (9198) and Lime (9225)
started: March 18, 2008
finished: March 28, 2008

Lately, I’ve been knitting washcloths. I’m nearly finished with my third in as many weeks. Maybe it’s spring fever, maybe it’s finally finishing the Martha sweater, maybe it’s feeling too pressed for time.

Six years ago on April 18, 2002 I started my lowly little blog. Last year, I noted all of the projects I’d worked on since April 2002. It’s been sort of a slow knitting year for me with school and all of the sewing that I did last summer. Since last April: I’ve started Library School, knitted two baby sweaters, finished the pair of Go with the Flow socks, completed a pair of Anniversary socks, and knitted one Waving Lace sock. I also finished the Moderne Baby Blanket. For myself, the Tweedy vest was knitted in a matter of a few months and the biggest accomplishment was finishing the Martha sweater. In the sewing department, I made six skirts for myself, several bags, two adorable bunnies, made my first quilt and started another quilt (which is a surprise).

I’m still alive and very busy. My Google calendar is blocked solid almost every day with classes, meetings, work, practicum and other random things. This weekend is an action-packed one with fiber and stories. Saturday morning, I’ll be attending the Fiber Event in Indiana with my knitting friends. I can’t wait! And the annual Storytelling Festival is this weekend at school. In all of the craziness, I sat down at my wheel for half an hour this afternoon and spun some of the lovely silk hankies that I have from my silk-spinning class in February.

I have finished a few projects but haven’t taken the time to take or post the photos.

Do you ever finish a project and think, “Wow, who knit that!?” The Anniversary Socks by Nancy Bush from the Favorite Socks book was my first wow project, the first project that I actually thought that I created something absolutely beautiful. I realize I posted a photo after I finished the first sock but the pair together just has to be shared.

Anniversary Socks by Nancy Bush from Favorite Socks
yarn: Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Sock (Natural)
needles: size 1 Knit Picks circular needles
sock 1: December 14-24, 2007
sock 2: January 30 - March 17, 2008

After things start to slow down a bit in the next few weeks with the end of the semester quickly upon us, I’ll post more photos. The Martha sweater is so close to being completed but I’ve been fighting with fitting the sleeves into the armholes and not having pointy shoulders, never a good look.

Finally, I can’t write a post without mentioning my beloved Jayhawks who won the NCAA National Basketball Championship on Monday night. It was a very sweet victory and it made me miss Lawrence so much. For those who don’t know, I did my undergraduate work at KU and loved Lawrence. I’ve been singing the Crimson and the Blue alma mater song to myself with a Rock Chalk chant thrown in all week.