Man, this sure looks pretty. And there is a knit-along.

This could be a fantastic prayer shawl. There is a Buddhist blessing called Mora Paritta (The Peacock’s Protection). I can just picture someone wrapped in this shawl, protected from cold, sitting in front of a Buddha image and peacefully chanting the protection.

I must get the pattern!

Show ‘N Tell

Peggy’s Handspun

Elena’s Fingerless Gloves

Jill B’s Three Cornered Shawl

A few more pictures here.

Yes, it doesn’t look like a big deal. It probably won’t be a problem with heavier yarn. But with finer yarn it sangs a little. That scares me because the single ply Thistledown can get very thin. Do I want to worry about it getting snagged and break? NOPE! Back to the Inox. I can use Harmony for something else. I know. I’ll use it for my other Exchequered.

I made some progress on CB’s Exchequered.

CB really loves how this scarf looks. And he wants it NOW! I can’t even pick up Spider Queen without him asking if the scarf was done. I do have one issue to consider though. I did a cable cast-on (which the patterns suggested) and I love how neat the edge looks.

How do I mirror that at the other end?? I am thinking maybe the Backstitch Bind-off that I found in Knitter’s Handbook. Or maybe try Annika’s suggestion:

Knitting the knits and purling the purls, work two stitches, then slip them back onto the lefthand needle. Purl those two stitches together, work one more stitch. Slip the two stitches from your righthand needle to the lefthand needle, and purl them together. This bind-off will mirror the cable cast-on. Because it is a loose bind-off, you should use smaller needles and bind off relatively tightly.

Any other suggestion? I’ll have to knit a few swatches to compare the results.

Oh, I couldn’t resist the temptation to buy this:

Thank you Ted and Kathy for your input on Thistledown. I did over think it, didn’t I? Do I do that often? This yarn is going to take some getting used to. So darn thin at places.

The swatch is done. I soaked it and stretched it out as much as I could on the blocking board. It took the torture. And, it also held its shape well after it was dry. I know, I know. Not pretty to look at. I didn’t take time to pin it down nicely. And the knitting leaves a lot to be desired. The YOs need a lot of improvement.

And Jane, now I know why you make all those swatches.

Has anyone tried KnitPicks’ Harmony Wood needles? I’ve heard that the points on these needles are nice and sharp. I know. So COLORFUL. But I’ve also heard that the colors are not as bright in person. The material is layered laminated birch. Supposedly stronger than normal wood. I am really wondering if this will be a good choice for knitting lace. It’s less slippery, and maybe with sharper points?

Like the new look of the blog? I wanted to go with clean and simple. This is just that. I am also closing A Forest Blog, my Buddhist blog. Not going to stop talking about Buddhist practices. It’s just that there’s only one post entry on that blog EVER. I write about Buddhist thoughts on this blog more often anyway. I am just going to combine the two. I am keeping the Tarot Journey separate. It’s restarted after a long pause.

I made a terrible mistake on the Spider Queen. Terrible, terrible mistake. I knitted it while under a fever. I know, I know. Someone once told me not to. But I was so curious to see how the pattern worked. It was my first lace piece that has pattern knitted on every row. I just wanted to know. Blah blah blah. Anyway, I made a mistake and I didn’t even know how. Too sick to try to fix it. Luckily I only had 8 rows knitted. It wasn’t too difficult to let go and start over. This is what I will do. I am going to knit a swatch. That will satisfy my curiosity. I also want to see how Blackberry Ridge’s Thistledown singles work in this pattern. It is a little bit of “thick ‘n thin”. Plus sections of it have very little twist. This makes me nervous. Maybe Ted can elaborate on this a little? He knitted Rosebud with this yarn.

2. On Tuesday I went to the doctor’s office to get my blood pressure reading. He wanted to keep an eye on me because my BP was almost the level of Hypertension, and there’s family history. It was better on Tuesday, but still in the borderline range. I ordered a home monitor on Amazon.

3. I got sick. Probably caught something at the SnB, or at the hospital. Funny how you go to the hospital to stay or get healthy, but sometimes you end up taking something home with you.

Better news… I got on Ravelry. I didn’t think I’d want another account on another social networking site. But I got in line for a beta account just in case. Got it last week, and guess what… it is quite good. It’s not another blog or photo management thing. It’s more like a big digital project management for fiber lovers. It links to blogs and Flickr account, making it easy to keeping project notes super easy. You can browse projects and patterns, and with one click adding it to future project queue. I am really loving these features. And of course, there are features that let you easily connect to like-minded individuals. By the way, my ID is midpath on Ravelry.

More good news. I casted on for Spider Queen last night! hehehe I was going to do the usual Provisional Cast-on by wrapping the cast-on stitches around a piece of waste yarn. (Maybe it was a good thing that I didn’t have the instructions on Monday.) But those twisted stitches could easily get out of place if one’s not careful. So I went with the Crocheted Chain method, picking up stitches through the bumps on the back of the chain. I found clear instructions here.

Few things I want to enter in this online journal before I forget them. First, I want to thank Ted for turning me on to the idea of a vertical swift. I wouldn’t have known about it if he didn’t send me all kinds of info on the various styles of swifts. He truly is a walking knitting encyclopedia. A fiber Guru.

I’ve been knitting quite a bit. I am doing the Four Corner Hat for mom. The crown is made up of four panels. The photo shows the first one that I completed.

You can work the panels separately then sew them together. Or join while you knit. I choose the second method of course. The brim for this style is a slip-stitch pattern, which is much easier than the fair isle pattern for the Nordic style. I am almost done with the third panel of the crown. Yay. Also, the yarn from Blackberry Ridge is very soft and stretchy. Quite enjoyable to knit.

I also started a simple lace project with KnitPicks’ lace weight, Gossamer. I know. I mentioned that I won’t blog about this one because it will be a gift. But this person doesn’t read my blog. So why not?

The pattern is the Candle Flame Shawl that I bought this yarn for. I thought about doing a more challenging pattern. But decided, heck, go with the original plan.

I am also knitting Afghan squares for Marianne’s friend Julie. I am not liking the yarn that I am using. Time to make a trip to A Mano to get something else. Any excuse to make a trip to the LYS, right? But seriously, I also need to get some cotton blend for the next hat project for mom.

Speaking of A Mano, remember the taping of the Men’s night TV segment at A Mano? Yeah. That aired some time ago. And to my horror they used part of my interview. I sounded like Miyagisan in The Karate Kid. Eek. Anyway. A Mano wants to continue Men’s night. Please let them know if you are interested.

Mac users, have you heard of Quicksilver? I discovered it recently. I absolutely love it. It’s an amazing launcher app. Go take a look.

Next topic. I made some changes/improvements to my blogs. First. I decided to end My Project 356 blog. With all the things that have been going on, I stopped taking photos regularly. Keeping a 365 project just doesn’t make sense at this point. I will just keep my Flickr account and make that my photo blog. It is also subscribable if anyone is interested to see my less than amateurish photos.

Speaking of subscribing. I was able to find a way to combine all my blogs plus the Flickr account into one feed. So, if you are interested to read EVERYTHING I post, like my tarot journey, Buddhist practice, and of course, knitting, you can subscribe to this feed. It doesn’t necessary mean that you will get a lot of reading material though.

I also added a feature called “Subscribe to Comment”. I always wonder if anyone who asks a question on my blog would return to look for a response, or would they expect an email instead? This will solve the dilemma. If you expect a response or want to be notified of new comments, just select to be notified by email. As long as you provide a valid email address, you will receive an email for any future comment to that post.

Do you see that new section in my sidebar that’s powered by Twitter? It’s a social networking thingie that I discovered yesterday. I don’t know if it will be useful or not. But definitely fun to try. It lets you use web, IM or mobile phone to send an update of your status, which gets posted on the network and sent to everyone that you consider a friend. The idea is to let friends follow what each other is doing, strengthening the relationships. It’s also used to send updates like news, etc. Go check it out. Read the TIME article. Let me know if you sign up!

A little update on my mom. Her condition is stable. But she is not able to walk around much. She uses a wheelchair most of the time. And her hair is mostly gone. Thank goodness that I finished the first hat. I was going to post more about the ridiculous things that my sisters did. Yes. Sisters. I don’t just have one wacky sister. I have two. And I don’t mean the one that I am working with to find help for mom. I have another one that’s making the matter more difficult. But I am just too tired of talking about them. I’ll just focus on the positive things for my mother and hope that she gets back some strength so she can have better quality of life.

Yes, Odessa is done. Finally. And just in time too. Mom is losing hair rapidly and I am taking this to her this weekend. I could’ve had this done earlier. But I made a stupid mistake last week when I was feeling frustrated. More on the frustrating situation in a bit. The stupid mistake happened after switching to DPNs. I thought I could use the tail end to identify the beginning of a round as usual. WRONG! The stitches shift with this pattern, and the tail end shifts with them of course. After a few decreasing rounds I thought I made a mistake somewhere due to the position of the tail end. I started picking back because I couldn’t see where the mistake was. (DUH! There was none.) Then I dropped a stitch right next to a YO and couldn’t figure out how to fix it. I was tempted to just rip it and re-knit. Instead I left it alone for two days and was able come back and figure out the fix. Phew! It is now blocking. Not sure if I like the yarn choice though. Originally I wanted a cotton blend for warmer weather but decided to go for a wool blend for elasticity. I didn’t know at the time but it turned out to be the yarn called for in the pattern. I bought Rowan Cashsoft DK. I can’t describe the color. It’s not pink, and it’s not lavender. Sort of in between. One ball is more than enough for the hat.

Now. About that frustrating situation. I can go on talking about this for days, but I’ll try to keep it short. You can probably guess, it’s mom-related. Not just about her condition, but the most frustrating part is about the kind of help she gets at home. My sister, Lily, who lives with mom and not working (Lily, her husband and kid are all living at mom’s.) volunteered to care for mom full time (with compensation of course.) Here are what happened recently:

1. During the last doctor’s visit I went with mom, we found out that she wasn’t getting enough food and water. Mom ended up going through re-hydration that day. How could this happen when three other individuals live there with her? Especially when one of them is being paid to care for mom full time?
2. I visited mom last Saturday and found out that she had forgotten to take her meds for 2 days. Nobody thought to check on her. And it happened again a couple of days later.
3. Something happens every time Lily takes mom to the hospital. I go to the consultations. Leaving the less complicated visits for Lily, who lives with mom and they are only 5 minutes away from the hospital. But somehow she just can’t get things done smoothly. She would be late, or get the priorities all wrong and end up staying hours longer than necessary. No matter how careful I instruct her with these visits. There was one time that she left mom’s purse at the hospital after the chemo. $900 was missing when she picked it up. Something is fishy about that. I won’t elaborate.
4. More than half of the time when I visited mom I found Lily up in her room, leaving mom by herself downstairs.

OK, I want to stop right here. I just don’t think she is sincere about taking care of mom. Unfortunately this might be another scheme of hers to not work but still get paid. She’s done things like that. But whatever this is it can’t go on. My other sister Angela and I are looking to find someone to stay there full time to look after mom. Meanwhile I am checking up on mom everyday. I’ll also be there for every hospital visit. I’d feel better doing that myself.

:: sigh ::

Onto happier things. I received several packages. Hmm… Am I doing “retail therapy”? Well, these are necessary things. So there! I got a package from Blackberry Ridge. Two hat kits to make more hats for mom. Four Corner Hat (the colorful one) and Swirling Leaves Hat (Vines in the Evening). I can’t wait to get started on these. But I think I need to find something more suitable for warm weather fast. Something using cotton blend yarn. Any idea? Oh, I also got yarn samples for all of their yarn.

This also came in the package. Yes. Spider Queen! I wasn’t kidding when I said I wanted to knit this shawl. Although the yarn, Thistledown Singles, is not the thinnest I’ve ever seen. It will definitely be the thinnest I’ve ever knit with so far. There are 4 hanks of this. Yes. HANKS! That means I have to wind them into balls first. Not to worry. Other things arrived too.

Yes. I also got my cotton cards, ball winder and vertical swift! I love my swift. And my winder and swift love each other too. The winder sits on top of the swift nicely. I can’t wait to see how this is going to work. I will take a few photos of it in action for an update.

I also got a craft light. But you don’t need to see that. Just something to make my knitting universe a little brighter.