The Oscars

I'm watching the Oscars. I love the Oscars. I love seeing what everyone on the red carpet is wearing, and I love hearing the acceptance speeches, and I really just enjoy the whole show.

I tend to enjoy the show more when I've actually seen a couple of the movies that are nominated. I don't know about the rest of you, but since I've had kids, seeing movies happens pretty rarely. This year, after many years of seeing none of the referenced movies, I've seen two of them. I took my MIL to see The King's Speech for her birthday. She loves the movies. The last movie she saw in the theater was The Lake House, and that's kind of crazy. I also went out by myself a couple of weekends ago and saw Black Swan. I didn't really like the movie, but it deserves its nominations. I was hoping to have a date with my husband to see The Fighter, but we haven't been able to make it happen yet.

One of the things they don't tell you when you have kids is that movie dates are difficult to make happen. Evening showtimes start at 4, and the babysitter is never available before then. Tickets and popcorn (because what's a movie without popcorn) and soda (because popcorn makes you thirsty), and the babysitter cost a small fortune, and that's if you can find a night that both you and your husband are free from other obligations to go. It's rough. It's really rough if you love going to the movies as much as I do.

I just realized that I've seen another nominated movie: Toy Story 3. My MIL gave it to the kids for Valentine's Day. It's super cute!

I love going to the movies. I love sitting right in the middle of the theater, eating popcorn without extra butter, and a large diet coke. If I'm going all out, I'll include a bag of peanut M&Ms. I try to pay attention to the previews, and make note of movies I would really like to see in the theater. I don't mind going to the movies by myself. In fact, I even kind of like it. Maybe next year I'll do a better job of seeing more movies.

And so, I'm watching the Oscars, making a list of movies to watch when they become available on DVD, and the public library or Red Box has them in stock.

What do you think of my list? What movies should I add? Any past Oscar nominees I shouldn't overlook?

• The Fighter
• True Grit
• The Social Network
• The Kids are Alright
• The Postman (I think. It's movie from a few years ago. The actor won an Oscar and walked across the seats).
• Gone With the Wind (I've seen it. I own it. It's hard to find enough time without kids roaming around to watch it.
• Rabbit Hole
• That movie Jeff Bridges was in last year
• Winter's Bone (what is that movie about anyway?)
• Blue Valentine (I like that Ryan Gosling)

BTW - I'm not knitting. I'm eating popcorn.

Take and Replace Swap

I was fortunate to take part in IrishEyes Kathy's Take and Replace Swap. The concept is brilliant - a box of knitterly fun arrives at your door, you take out of it what you want, replacing each item with some other knitterly item. I've been feeling the need to take part in a swap, and this one seemed ideal for me. I used it as an excuse to go through and organize my stash, and came up with more than a few items I would be willing to trade.

Here's my take:

Socks Soar on Two Circular Needles by Cat Bordhi, Start Spinning by Maggie Casey, an Ashford Drop Spindle (much lighter than the one I already have), Knitting Rules! by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee (the first knitting book I ever read - I borrowed it from the library. I love having my own copy!), and cute "Knit with Love" gift cards.

I can't show you what I put in. Not only would it ruin the surprises for the next person, I never thought to take a picture of it.

Sadly, I haven't done much knitting lately. I have been watching the second season of Thirtysomething. Do you know this show from the late '80s? I watched it in reruns as a teenager. My friends and I dreamed of growing up and marrying someone Michael Steadman-like - responsible, loving husband and father, and ridiculously good looking. You know what? I totally married someone just like that!

Happy knitting!

Princess Mitts

I finished the Princess Mitts last week, but just got around to snapping a photo of them:


The yarn is Aslan Trends Royal Alpaca, and it is SO soft and warm! Overall, I'm pleased with the mitts. I found the pattern to be really satisfying to knit, especially in the nice yarn. However, I do have a few issues with them:

1. I wish they were tighter. If I were to knit them again, I think I would go down a needle size.

2. On Wednesday, I realized that I knit the thumb gussets differently. On one of the mitts I correctly kept the 2x2 rib. On the other one, I did the gusset in stockinette stitch. As it took me four days of wearing them to realize the problem, I'm not going to worry about it too much, but it does irk me a bit.

3. On the right-handed mitt, I bound off in the 2x2 rib. On the left mitt, I bound off knitwise. The right mitt is stretchier at the top, but it doesn't lay as nicely as the left. The left feels like if I stretched my hand enough, I could snap the stitches. If I were to do these again, I'd bind off all stitches knitwise.

None of these issues are significant enough for me to go back and fix them. I don't think anyone else will notice them while I'm wearing them at hockey practice, so I can knit on other things.

Right now, those other things include a mitten, and a sweater swatch. They're both going slow, as knitting time has been limited. The kids have very busy lives, and I have to keep up!

Happy knitting!

Lia

I finished Lia last night. Monday night, I sewed in the sleeves, which was kind of tense for me, but I think they look alright. However, when I put the sweater on, I found that the neckline was MUCH too wide and deep for me. I was kind of bummed, because I expected to love this sweater once it was on. Thankfully, this problem was easily solved by adding some ribbing around the neckline. What do you think?
I'm pleased with the length of the sleeves, and the body length is fine, but I think another inch would have been slightly more fine. Here is a close-up of the cable detail:
Overall, I'm really pleased with the sweater, and very proud of myself for blocking the pieces and successfully sewing in the sleeves. Of the three sweaters I've knit myself so far, this one is my favorite and will probably see the most use.

Here are the details: The pattern is Lia, from Knitty Deep Fall 2010. The yarn is Knitpicks Wool of the Andes. I ordered 7 skeins and used less than 5. (Note to self: I have yet to knit a sweater using the amount of yarn called for in the pattern). Also, the pattern called for size 11 needles, but I got gauge with size 13 needles.

I'm hoping to finish up my Princess Mitts and than move on to some other projects.....

Today was another snow day, but it's sleeting so there's no playing outside. The neighborhood little kids were here earlier making Valentine's Day cards. Things ended a little early though, because ALL of the kids were super whiny. So, it's rest time now. I'm thinking about taking a nap myself.

Happy knitting (or napping!) to you!

Blocking

Little girl is a little under the weather, so she and I stayed home from church today. So, I used the time to block Lia!

My camera doesn't really pick up the cabling detail on the black, but trust me, it's there!

Knitting Updates

Here (finally) is a picture of the 5 hour Baby Sweater:
I'm really pleased with it, especially in this yarn! I hope it makes some new mommy happy.

I'm getting to the home stretch with Lia. As of right now, I'm two-thirds of the way through the second sleeve. I'm pretty sure I should block it before I sew the sleeves in. I think. I don't really know, since I've never sewn sleeves into a sweater before, and I've never blocked anything in the round. I'll be doing some research on that later.

After Lia is done, I'll be finishing up my Princess Mitts and finding a new traveling project. I think it will be an Oriental Lily for 4th Trimester, but we'll see. I also have a new part of my secret project to work on, another sweater for myself to swatch, and I'd really like to start on the Carmen Banana kit my husband bought me last year.

I have very few thoughts about the mountains of housework that should be getting done, and should probably try to readjust my priorities.

It's really hard.

Happy Knitting!

Olympic Hat

I finally finished the Olympic Hat that I knit my aunt for Christmas. I actually finished duplicate stitching the moose two weeks ago, but I was avoiding weaving in all the ends and making the tassels. I'm pretty pleased with the end result:


It is a little bigger than I would have liked, but it fits my husband nicely. If I were to make it again, I would omit some of the white rows before and after the moose. The good news is, if it's really cold, my aunt could fold the brim under and have an extra warm, still pretty hat.

I started a 5-hour baby sweater the other week at church. I'm pretty sure it's taken me 10 hours to finish. I still have to weave in the ends (do you notice a theme to my procrastination), but hopefully I'll get to post pictures later this week. I hope to start the first sleeve for Lia tonight. We'll see how it goes.

Tomorrow we're back to the grindstone - drop-off, drop-off, errands, pick-up, clean up stuff, pick-up, make dinner, cycle everyone to bed......I'm hoping to actually make it the knitting group I was attending before the holidays. Again, we'll see how it goes.

Happy knitting!