Gluttony and Sloth

All in all a great way to spend a weekend. :)

Thursday I went to dinner at the home of Beader and Husband(who is a very good friend of mine for over a decade but I have not appropriately blog- nicknamed him yet, or obtained his permissoin to use his name, so Beader's husband will hve to suffice for now ;) and had a wonderful time!

Beader presented me with homemade stitch markers! They are so pretty that I am
tempted to beg for matching earrings!
I include multiple pictures because they are hard to photograph well.
They were presented in a lovely satiny pouch.





Friday night I got to see a very good old friend, Rosemary, who came into town with her daugther and daughte'rs friend. We met up with Richard (I have a few friends named Richard, this one I know from high school.), and went to dinner at Carmines for that good all-purpose family style Italian food binge :) It was great to see them!




Saturday was Kim's birthday and we went with a small group for dim sum. (The Richard I ususally mention was along for this one :)
I was outstandingly tired all day, but had a great time nonetheless.

I won't be eating again for a while ;)

Today I spent laying aorund the house and doing some knitting.
Cast on for Branching Out. Again.
I'm beginning to think I am never going to knit this project,
especially since it is starting to feel like work.

I've cast on countless times.
With about 4 different yarns, of different weights.
and something bothers me about it every time.
Either I lose count, or don't like how it looks, or find the gauge fussy, or something.
I've knit the first 15 rows of this thing at least a dozen times.
AndI just keep finding some problem.

I think its time i called it quits on this project and found something more hospitable.
Maybe one of the 11 things i already have going.

I think I need a good social knitting occasion to help me buckle down and finish things :)

Worst.. blogger..ever...

Let me apologize. Both in retrospect, and in advance.

Retrospect. I have been the worlds worst blogger.
I have lots of reasons. My free time has been occupied with a lot of things
Many good, some not so good.
But it hasn't left me with a whole lot of free time
And the free time I do have, I've been too tired to do much.
Work has been busy.
I've had a million social engagements (this is good :)
A few freelance things
And a new toy. (more on this later)
Things seem to be clearing up some thankfully.

And the advance apology?? Expect a lot of gratuitous pictures.
I got a new camera!!!! and i LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE it.
Its a Canon Powershot A610. (Read all about it here)



I briefly considerd the A620, which only differs from this one by 2 megapixels (this one is 5, the other 7) but concluded it wasn't worth it to me. And boy am I glad. The quality on this thing is amazing. Its making me a far better photographer than I actually am.

What follows are a few pics from week one of the new cam.

I haven't been knitting as much as I'd like (though i'm getting back into the swing of it.) But since this is a knitting blog, I do feel like I should lead off with some knitting, even if it isn't mine.
(all pictures can be seen larger by clicking on em)




Here is Branching Out in progress.. up close and personal (Macro focus)
Pretty!


Next up is Joy's 1 and a half year old Jacob. This pic was clipped out of a video,
and is much better than I'd have expectd.



Gratuitous Empire State Building Shot. In its largest size you can see the spire clearly.



I'll save more pictures for later, but I'm glad I got some online to share :)

Tomorrow, I am going to celebrate the birthday of the Woman who told me to knit.
If you get a chance, click here and go wish Kim a Happy Birthday

Hope you all haven't gone completely away :) Its good to be back!

Its a post!

Yes ladies and gentlemen, a post.
With knitting no less .
Though not much I grant you. And much of what is there contains problems.

Last two weeks were very stressful workwise and I had nearly no time for much else.
Then we had the snow that ate NYC, but I was too tired most of last weekend to focus on much of anything.
And now, finally i'm settling down to some knitting and getting reoriented with my lovely yarn and needles :)

First up we have Branching Out.
Despite my initial struggle with the combination of Branching Out and Kidsilk Haze, I decided to give it another go. So far, so ok.

You can see a lifeline there if you look closely. Weird, that I was so careful to put a lifefline in, yet so reluctant to use it once I found myself off stitch count a mere 3 rows or so after putting it in. So its sitting there, waiting for me to tear back to the lifeline. And of course, i'm delaying.
I do think it will be beautiful when done, and i'm finidng the teeny-fuzzy yarn easier to work with than the first time I tried.
I think better light helped

Here we have a pic of one side of the Raglan Baby Sweater.
I love how this is coming out but i'm cleaqrly off in some way because I have 2 more stitches than I expected by row 40 of the decreases, and I can't figure out why.

I have no idea where I went astray or even if i did.
but I seem to think I should have been down to 24 stitches by now instead of row 42.
And have no idea if i should try and uncover the problem or just make the other side 2 rows longer or what.

But all that notwithstanding - Look how cute!

Special thanks to Richard for shovelling all my snow for me this weekend!!

Gah

For whatever reason blogger ate my last post :/
I will attempt to repost it later.
in the meantime this unbroken chunk of text below is what remains of my post.
what gives?

Oh.. and there were lots of pics in this post too - blogger ate them also

This past week at work is the busiest week of the year - we have a big fundraiser coming up next week and our entire office works really hard on getting prepared. Thus -I've had no real knitting time all week... bleh.

Fortunately I get out early on Fridays regardless so I met up with a friend and we did a little shopping - some yarn- some makeup :)

First I went to the Stila counter and bought
new eyeshadow and blush (replacement for my old)
The color on the eyeshadow is off - that palate comes in two color schemes - this is the warmer one(warm showers) and the one I got is slightly cooler (rain showers) but I couldn't find a pic of that one :)

This is where pictures of my new makeup were
And to the Prescriptives counter for a new lipstick and liner
The lipstick is "Dream" which is the one in the middle and the liner
Sheer Cherry, is the one in the front.


This is where pictures of my new makeup were

Last on the shopping front was a trip to Yarn Connection
where I treated myself to a ball of Kidsilk Haze in "583" (referred to as "blushes", I think)
It is beautiful yarn, but I think, at the moment, I don't have the patience to knit with it.
It may been bad lighting - or maybe that I shouldn't be attempting anything lacy for the first time (I decided to use it for Branching Out) with such a fuzzy yarn- but in my present state it was just too frustrating to deal with the fuzziness, the weight and the counting all at the same time.I put it down and I'm saving it for later.

Picture of pretty pink new yarn went here

Progress continues with my other projects - the most active of which are

Dunkin Donuts Fuzzy Foot - 1 down, one to go
Yak Sweater - back is almost finished (the first section)
Brickwork scarf - 1 1/2 pattern repeat left

Lastly on the personal care front -I've become sort of skincare -obsessed recently.I've always been kind of a snob when it comes to cosmetics and skincare -and I tend to spend, probably more than I should, on stuff that I could get for less in less pricy brand. It's weird, because I'm totally not like that in any other area of my life (except maybe electronics), but with cosmetics I tend to trust the pricer stuff more, whether its reasonable or not..So imagine my happy surprise that I have fallen totally in love with a skincare line from Yves Rocher.Someone turned me on to them, and I was seduced into trying them by a lot of samples, and free gifts (I LOVE samples and free gifts)I now use their Hamamelis bath products (the soap smells SO GOOD), and the Serum Vegetal skincare stuff, and after two weeks my skin looks INCREDIBLY better. And best of all - affordable! (they always have specials and sales)

I'm off to wash my face. Have a great weekend!