Love and Yarn

There are two things in life worth living for, love, and beautiful, squishy, colorful yarn. A new yarn shop opened up in Dupont last week and I went, twice. We’ve all been wishing for a while that we could have yarn shop a little closer by and now, before school even started, it happened! The yarn shop is called Looped Yarn Works and the two owners are just the nicest women I’ve ever met. I mentioned that I’m from GW and they said they’d been thinking about a student discount. I mentioned that I have a knitting group and we’d like to take a field trip there, they said to contact them so we could arrange something special for it. The yarns are gorgeous, the selection, as far as I can tell, is great, and the prices seem reasonable. Being a knitpicks girl, it’s tough to spend so much on just one skein of yarn, but there’s nothing like being able to see the real color and feel the texture or the yarn before you buy it. The first time I went I bought some yarn that I plan on making into gloves for myself, and some for socks for Ty. The second time I took Alex and Ellie, and gave in and bought the Cascade Eco Duo in the light tan color.

Classes start next week, which should be relatively exciting. It’s been a bit slow at work recently, but I think it’ll pick once I learn some new stuff Steph wants me working on. I’ll be working part-time during the semester because I’m only taking three classes and a lab, so I shouldn’t have too much of load. Boots and Socks have been spayed and neutered, respectively, and now they’re all done for a while with vet visits. They were not to please with us when we went away for four days to Boston. Speaking of which, we’ve booked the caterer for our wedding, and figured out a few other odds and ends, like, Ty’s parents will take care of the bar. I also recently decided that I want to knit shalls for my bridesmaids, as they wont be wearing similar dresses at all. And I definitely think paper flowers would be cute for decorations. Ty and I will be going up to Pittsburgh for labor day weekend, taking the kittens with us this time, I think partly to discuss wedding stuff, and partly to placate Ty’s mom, who I’m pretty sure thinks that Ty likes my mom better than her and need some reassurance. It will be nice to have the cats visit their pets, we’ll see how that goes though.

OH! And biggest thing of alllll: Ty got a job! He started work at the US Green Building Council yesterday and so far he’s loving it (and he’s only done paperwork, who likes paperwork?). We’re both so excited about this, and it’s so lucky that he started before classes start, this way we can trade-off who is stressed out. He’ll be doing a lot of stuff for their big trade show in November, which means that he’s busy right away, no more waiting around like his old GW job.

Any hoo, I should get back to dreaming of patterns and imagining all the yarn I want to buy at Looped.

Happy Knitting…

It’s been how long?

Well I’m finally done with the semester, which is great, so hopefully I will have time to do all those things that I always want to do, like sleep. No, but really, I’ve been wanting to see more of the city. My goal for the summer is to set myself my usual summer goals, and this time to actually follow through with them. I want to see more of the Smithsonians and just spend more time outdoors, although my opinion on that might change once it gets up to normal DC summer temperatures. I want to go camping and hiking, and maybe backpacking, which might involve getting a tent of some sort, but I’m pretty sure we can rent that. Hopefully this weekend we’ll get out to the beach, I think there are some nice  ones just an hour away.

And my summer to do list in terms of my knitting, well, I’m not really sure. I’m almost finished with Alex’s sweater, which I think is going to end up a lot bigger than I was planning, and it will probably get bigger in the wash. Why do I never plan my projects enough? I always get too excited and just start them without thinking everything through. I want to alter the sleeves on my blue diamond sweater, make them a little longer and more fitted, I just hope I have enough extra yarn. And socks, that is definitely on my list. Although I still haven’t followed a pattern for socks, and I’m always so hesitant to, especially because I worry that if I go to sell them on Etsy I’ll be violating some law or something. And i want more sock yarn that’s machine washable, because I don’t know about other people, but having to hand wash socks seems silly. I would like to get my Etsy shop a little more popular, but I’m not sure how to do that, so that probably won’t get done this summer.

I’m excited to be working full-time this summer, although I’m kind of worried that I’ll have a lot of down-time, which is alright I guess, but I just feel guilty because I get paid by the hour. I talked to my boss and I’ll be doing some odds and ends until the grant starts in June, and then I’ll be doing some new stuff, which will be nice, and I’m glad that I’ll be helpful, particularly that I’ll be more helpful doing this project than someone who is just here for the summer. I don’t know if I’m just always paranoid or what, but I worry that I don’t do enough, or do it well enough. I guess I just don’t want to be undervalued.

And on a more positive note, I can now begin my search for the netbook that I am going to buy this summer. I know that it will be really helpful to have once we move a little farther from campus, and I’m willing to spend a bit of extra money to get the one that will meet my needs, mostly a long battery life. And…. wedding stuff! It’s time to make some more definite decisions about the wedding for decorations, food, dress, and pretty much everything else. I think the food is the one thing that’s going to frustrate me the most, partly because we’re not sure what we want, and partly because it’s so damn expensive. But I’m excited to do some DIY decorations and other little touches to remind everyone that this is about who Ty and I are. I’m definitely a little worried that this is going to turn into something a lot less personal, when I really want it to feel like a backyard-potluck-wedding. I want our wedding to be about love obviously, but also family, friends and fun. I want people to go home thinking “I had such a great time at that get together,” not, “Well that wasn’t too painful, for a wedding”. I’m hoping that it’s all about the attitude, because I definitely have a lot of happiness to share, as the Dove chocolate saying that I keep in my wallet says “Happiness is contagious”.

Almost there

Finally I’ve gotten to the point in the semester where my next test is a final, surprisingly a happy realization. That means that one: I only have two tests left, and two: the summer is almost here. I’m really looking forward to not only not having classes, but being able to get something done. I’ve been worrying recently about how my boss sees me, i feel like I’ve been dropping the ball. I’ve been so busy with class, and so tired, and so burnt out it feels like it’s been massively affecting work. One of the main reasons that I’m looking forward to summer is that I’ll finally have time to explore DC with Ty, Alex and Will. There is so much to the city and the area around DC that I want to see. We also have to figure out where we’re going to be living for the next year or two, I would definitely like to stay in the city, but I know that it’s cheaper to live out in Virginia, and you can get more sq. feet for your money.

Recently I’ve had some issues with sock yarn addiction, trying to find good deals on ebay, and failing miserably. I found something good and ordered it, some nice spring colors. I’m not sure what I’m going to make yet, maybe some nice lace socks. I haven’t really done much lace and I feel like it’d be pretty, though I’m not sure how comfortable they would be.

Alex’s sweater is coming along nicely. i have both sides of the front, without the ribbing on it, but I think I know how to do it. The back so far is really boring, curving the bottom was mildly successful using short rows and I hope it looks good on Alex’s butt. If i had a bit more free time I could probably finish by the end of the semester, but I’m not sure that’s going to happen.

More yarn

I want more yarn. Working with knitpicks stroll has me wanting bucket loads of the stuff. It’s soft, it’s small gauge, it’s machine washable and they have the most amazing colors. I made Alex fingerless gloves with her stash of stroll, and now she’s having me make some for will. This pattern that I made up over spring break is really great and I like working with it. It ends up gorgeous, even with two very similar colors.

I started and finished Ashley’s hat that she’s been wanting me to make for a while. I think it ended up well, and it’s interesting how the combination of colorwork and cabling came out. I’ve never done cabling with two colors before, but I figured out that as long as everything is done with the knit stitch it works, and you don’t need the contrast of knit and purl stitches to make the cables stand out because there are two different colors.

Classes are killing me, not completely with work, but I’m soooo burnt out that I don’t want to do much of anything anymore. Work is alright, things are actually going well there, and it’s not too stressful. I talked to my boss and she said that she definitely has enough money to keep me on until I graduate, which is what I’ve been hoping. Without me even saying anything, she said that starting this summer she is going to bump me up to $12 an hour instead of $10, which is fantastic. And I asked her about working for a year after I graduate and she said that as long as there is money for whatever project I would work on she could keep me, but if not, she’ll be looking for a lab manager, which means that she could pay me from any grant. So depending on what happens over the next six months or so it definitely looks like staying in DC for a year after I graduate is a possibility. I’m getting more and more sure that I will need a year to just work before I start graduate school.

And, I can’t wait until it’s warm outside!! It’s so close I can smell it, but it hasn’t quite reached above 50 F outside. Stupid abnormal DC winter….

Yay!!

I finally got in the yarn for my mom’s shirt. So I started that yesterday, and hopefully will be able to finish it in two weeks *fingers crossed*. All of the knitting is really easy, just ribbing and stockinette, but it’s a top-down shirt, which I’ve never tried before, so I’ll see how the shaping goes.
I’m also kind of worried because I have a bit of work to do in the next two weeks. We’re hoping to change a few things about our samples so that some of the assays actually work, which they haven’t been so far. And I also have a poster presentation next Friday. I’m not very worried about presenting it, because it’s just a poster fair. But I have to get a poster completed soon, and that involves having graphs, and having graphs involves having data. I’m also kind of excited because I’m going to have a meeting with my PI tomorrow about the new project I’ll be working on in the fall.
And! I’ve been trying to have a LotR marathon with Alex and Will after work. So last night we got through the first half of the Fellowship. But tonight we didn’t get to watch any because Will was working, because he has something big going on at work this week.
Anyway. Time for bed now.