The Cause of my KADD…

Lots of great ideas of causes for KADD (Knitter’s ADD) were mentioned in the comments yesterday. Only Cindy and Terby hit the nail on the head for what I suspect is my cause of this bout of KADD. Stress! Lots of things I cannot control; lots of waiting for news or answers; in general, lots of uncertainty. My mind is running 100 miles an hour and as soon as something gets slightly dull or requires too much attention (like frogging or tinking) I want to toss it aside and start something new.

There are concerns taking place here in my own home, well, really here in my own body but there is also a waiting game going on in Minnesota as well. A little over two weeks ago I developed some rather severe (though not acute enough to warrant going to the ER) abdominal pain. So I have been poked and prodded multiple times and had many tests and procedures done in the past two weeks. This has of course meant lots of waiting for results. After the results of yesterday’s tests come back if there is no answer the doctor is chalking it up to stress for a couple months and then we will re-evaluate. There definitely has been a lot of it recently. My hard drive crash happened only three days before the pain started and on my way home from the first appointment about my abdominal pain I got stressful news from Minnesota.

Grandma Schueler whom I flew out to Minnesota to visit in early February took a drastic turn for the worse last week. Fluid is pooling on her lungs once again and they are thinking she may be developing pneumonia, but at this point there is no sign of her body fighting an infection – no fever, no elevated white blood cell count, etc. But, they cautioned everyone that at her age and with all the compromises to her body already her body may not even fight it. A week ago I called and said goodbye and that I would always love her and would always miss her and that if it was her time and she was ready to go it was okay to let go of this world and continue on to the next and be reunited with grandpa. I have to say that is the hardest phone call I’ve ever had to make. Now I guess she has kind of rallied. On Thursday morning instead of saying that she was sad she work up here and not in heaven she said she wasn’t sad and would get dressed. That said, mom has told me there is little chance of a real rally for her. So, it is only a matter of time. I’m on pins and needles and jump every time the phone rings and I’m not turning my cell off at night. Though I have to say I am not missing the before bed phone calls each night where mom or Amber tells me that everyone has a feeling it will be tonight. In fact, I actually got a decent night’s sleep last night for the first time in two weeks.

Last Thursday was a wonderful respite. All the road trip energy and activities mostly kept my mind off of both of the worries and it was a wonderful gift. Thankfully I’ll be having a similar distraction this weekend as Liz is coming to visit. She arrives this evening and is staying with Snow, but there is a weekend full of activity planned, including another tea at my house on Sunday. Though this time I’m accepting help from others in filling the table. We’re doing a celebration of Colorado and featuring Colorado-made food and fiber. DH is contributing a lot via his skills of cheese and liqueur making but he will also be making the scones. It’ll be a great time. We’ll even have the pleasure of her company at SnB on Monday night! Woot!

I do think the many suggestions in yesterday’s comments stating the time of the year as a cause is probably also a contributing factor to my case of KADD as well. The change in seasons makes me want to switch the focus of my knitting to things that aren’t quite so seasonal in nature or wrap up things that are seasonal. I never wear socks in the summer as I’m a sandal gal so I’d like to decide what I want to do with the Siren Socks and get those wrapped up. Wear Everywhere would be a good evening sweater well into June most years as we can get quite chilly at night due to the dry climate and I’ve just got the sleeves and yoke to finish on it if I could finish it soon. Skyway Scoop is a tank, but then again I’m pretty sure with my bust being down 2 inches and my waist down 2.5 inches and my hips down 3.5 inches since I cast-on for it last year that it won’t fit when it is done. But, then again my mom will be here the middle of next month and if it is done and it fits her she could take it home with her and I’d save myself a trip to the post office. And Seraphim I would like to have done at such time as I have to return to Minnesota for grandma’s funeral. It has been a prayer shawl of sorts, filled with prayers for grandma and memories of her with each stitch and I hope when I wear it it will be like a hug from grandma. So, that has been getting the majority of my actual knitting attention since I cast on for it, but those other projects are pulling at me and I’m a little afraid that once I get to the real lace knitting on Seraphim it will end up aging in the knitting bag like Leaf Lace (though Leaf Lace need some serious attention and deciphering of what row I’m on which is why I haven’t picked up in so long).

I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend! I know I intend to despite everything.

Project ADD

I currently have two projects active and on the needles – Seraphim and a baby hat to go with Nautical Blankie (BTW, go see Snow’s color scheme in progress) and the Flower of Life scarf. I have several others in non-active status – Wear Everywhere Pullover, Leaf Lace Shawl, Siren Socks, and Skyway Scoop, plus I still have Mitten from Holland #2 to knit. Yet I’m itching to cast-on a new sock??? I’m also sort of itching to pull out Wear Everywhere and to finish up Skyway Scoop if I can even remember what the problem was (other than the fact that I’ll probably be drowning in it now – but it should fit my mom if it isn’t scooped too far for someone without a chest). I also want to cast-on for Wobbly Circles and I want to dye some yarn. I have a few books I’d like to get bound here before the weekend too. Oh and there is the site redesign floating around in my head along with setting up a non-yahoogroup-based site for our Monday night knitting gang.

I have project ADD right now. Me and project ADD don’t often get along real well because I also have a problem of liking instant gratification and as those who finished the Knitting Olympics can attest to – project monogamy leads to fast finished projects. Now, I’ll never be completely faithful to one project, that just doesn’t work for me as I always have to have a relatively non-thinking project on the needles for knitting gatherings. Nevertheless my current urgings are totally ridiculous!

Do you get spurts of knitting (or just general project) ADD? What do you think causes yours? Does if come after the completion of a lengthy project so you are just wanting to get going on all those other projects that queued up in you wish list while working on that big one? Does stash expansion contribute to it? Does it come when you are under stress and are just having a hard focusing on anything? I’m curious…

I’ll share my suspicions as to the cause of my current project ADD tomorrow so as to not skew your thoughts on the subject.

BTW, we are getting ever closer to the 1000th comment. If comments continue apace the magic day will likely be somewhere around April 10th and as I’ve mentioned before there will be a special prize package for that special person to leave the 1000th comment…

Seraphim Started

Well, despite my picking up Nature Spun Sport at Brown Sheep last Thursday rather than a fingering weight yarn, Miriam convinced me to continue ahead with my plans of using the 4 balls (7 oz total) of Chuck Berry Seconds I picked up on our road trip for Seraphim. Since I find Brown Sheep yarns to be on the thin side of the spectrum of yarn weight for which they are labeled it isn’t that big of a stretch. I did go up to a US6 so that I would have a bit more drape to the final product. When I completed the first ball though I was at 18% completed (thanks to the the shawl progress calculator that Jessica has on her blog in the sidebar) if I worked the pattern as written, 20% if I took out one set of 6 rows of stockinette, I would have to take out 30 rows to be 100% positive I wouldn’t run out of yarn. I had written to Brown Sheep to see if they had two more balls remaining since my visit and if I could have them shipped, but I still haven’t heard back.

I also e-mailed back and forth with Miriam to figure out what number of stitches would get me close to the same dimensions of shawl as the pattern calls for. I didn’t trust my math since I have yet to finish a triangle shawl. To accurately figure that I needed the blocked gaguge so I transfered all 187 sts to a lifeline and steam blocked the shawl on the guest bed. We decided I’d be closest if I only took out 6 rows. So, that meant I was sitting at 20% of the knitting complete.

Since the top is dense being just stockinette I very well may be okay with my four balls of yarn. I’m a little nervous about it running short, but Snow, Miriam and I decided it would also be acceptable to knit the edge chart and bind off in a contrasting color. I’ll probably hold off until I’m closer to done before getting a contrasting color, but I’m thinking perhaps a charcoal gray if one is called for.

Did you notice the uneven dyeing in that photo of the shawl blocking at row 92? I suspect that is why it was marked as seconds. But, I like it. It gives it that kettle dyed look. I don’t think it is strong enough that it will detract from the lace and it gives some added interest to the stockinette portion.

I did make a poor choice at the beginning of the shawl. Two cast-on options were offered - backward loop and cable. In reading about the cable cast-on one of the “disadvantages” was that it is not very stretchy so I thought that would make it a poor choice for this shawl. I was afraid of a pucker at the top where the cast on is if the cast-on was too inelastic. So, I opted for the backward loop and now I have what looks like “break” in the top edging. I’m thinking I’ll try use the tail and some crochet to bridge that gap a bit. What do you think?

BTW, all this wondering about whether I would have enough yarn or not led to a discussion amongst myself and Sansablog about the math in the shawl calculator and whether it was accurate. If anyone is interested in seeing how the equation used in that came about, give me a holler as I even have a graphic to back it up… What can I say? I’m a big geek and was only one course short of a double major with math!

Nautical Blankie Swatch

Well, on Monday about when SnB was to start I completed the current portion of my Nautical Blankie swatch. It now needs steeking and the side borders put on. There is a slight problem though - it’s a bit narrow (even narrower than a sock) for steeking on a sewing machine. I also followed the steeking directions that Snow used for Blankie one which means I added in only 4 stitches which means not much wiggle room and an even number so I can’t do the crocheted steek as that requires an odd number. I think I’m probably stuck with hand stitching, but that isn’t as secure with superwash. Then again, it is a swatch that will get photographed and then who knows what will happen to it so I guess durability isn’t of huge importance. I think I may use some fusible webbing as a back-up to my hand sewing skills anyway though. We’ll see.

We are to have a steeking party at some point, but I have no idea when it might happen as the others aren’t ready yet. I may become a brave soldier at some point and charge ahead on my own. For one, that wrinkly mass is mocking me. Everyone says that it’ll block out, but dang, it seems like an awful lot of puckers that need to block out of a rather small piece of knitting.

I’m quite glad that I swatched it. I did digital mock-ups but I think the anchor needs a bit of tweaking and I hadn’t felt that way when I saw it in the mock-up, but I do now in the swatch. Hear that Snow? Don’t cast-on yet, I’m still tweaking (or rather don’t get to the anchors yet)…

I have cast on for a coordinating hat and since I can do that on a circ it is looking much better. Thank goodness! I was starting to loose my confidence in my colorwork skills… Of course that has me a bit reserved to do socks… But perhaps that would go better for me on 2 circs…

I Really Have Been Knitting…

There hasn’t been a ton of knitting going on around here seeing as how I have been getting the laptop up and running again most of the week. That said, there has been progress since you last saw things, much of which took place over the weekend, but there were times this week that I took solace in my knitting (had to rip frequently as all the stress wreaked havoc on my gauge, but…).

So, first up, we have the lovely Emma dog showing off the length of my Flower of Life scarf. I don’t knit on it too frequently, but it is now to the point that I don’t have to think about it much at all so it is pretty good visiting knitting. It still isn’t ideal TV or movie knitting because of all the PSSOs there are, but progress is being made every now and again. That’s a 30-lb dog for scale :-) Okay, so Emma isn’t a good example for scale. I haven’t measured the length, but I would suspect it is closing in on three feet in length soon and I believe there is more than half of the yarn left yet so this will be a very generous scarf!

This is the swatch of the Nautical Blankie I am designing for Snow but in an alternate colorway. I’ve just begun the tesselating wave to go from the medium blue to the light blue, then I’ll have about 20 more rows to go and it’ll be time for the top border, followed by steeking and the side borders.

To say I’m disappointed in my knitting on this is an understatement. It seems that knitting to this gauge with fingering weight while stranding is a much fussier proposition than doing so with worsted or aran weight yarn. My mitten hasn’t even been blocked and I think it looks great. This swatch? Crap!

I’m doing some serious praying that it will improve once the steeking is complete and it can be properly blocked. I think perhaps I should have gone up a needle size and knit a bit tighter. But, I am doing a better and more efficient job of catching the floats and that is a good thing. I didn’t have too many floats to catch on the mitten. It’s a learning process. If I have to knit another swatch, I have to knit another swatch. Though I am thinking about knitting a cute little baby hat to coordinate which would hopefully look a little bit better because I wouldn’t be on DPNs trying to get the right length of floats across needle joins.

While my knitting on this one has disappointed me greatly, I’m very happy with the pattern. I’d be happier if I didn’t have to generate the charts once again. But, oh well!

We’re ordering a jump drive that I can back up current projects on and an external hard drive to do weekly temporary back-ups to in between the DVD+R back-ups. Obviously another hard drive is not the optimum place to back-up to, but the number of DVD+Rs it would take to back-up my system on a weekly basis is mind numbing. The DVD+R back-ups will take place quarterly when I do my sales tax paperwork. That way I will have an association with another non-negotiable task so it’ll get done more regularly (though the main problem with the old hard drive was that the bad sectors on it prevented a sucessful back-up and yes, I had the hard drive I should have made time to install it - live and learn).