Tonsils and garter

I have tonsilitis. Again. Early last year I got it once, went back to work too soon and got it again. So this year I am determined to be sensible and stay home until I am well.
This bout is particularly unfair because I took Friday off as annual leave so that I would have 3 days off in a row, only to wake up feeling awful on Friday and have one of my worst nights on Friday night: a shivering, feverish, lungs hurting, can't sleep kind of night. Around 5 am I did think dying might be preferable, but I got over that eventually.

On Sunday I picked up knitting needles and made a swatch:
a) I have never knitted in cotton, and wanted to give it a go
b) I wanted to swatch to see if this yarn and needle combination would work for EZ's baby surprise jacket
c) I have always had what amounts to a phobia of picking up stitches, but if I want to make this jacket there is no escaping it
d) it seemed like a good idea to finally learn that long-tail cast-on that everyone else uses.

Yarn: Texere Yarn's Kilsney soft cotton in Leaf and Bottle
Needles: Susanne's ebony 4.5 mm
Result:
This cotton needs metal needles, the wooden ones don't feel safe.
I like the long-tail cast-on, but I need to work out how much of a tail to leave before I will feel happy using it on somethinig real.
I'm still wary of picking up stitches, but I don't feel the need to actually run screaming at the thought any more. I'm not 100% happy with the results I got, but they will do.
Can anyone tell me which is the 'right' side of a long-tail cast-on? The one that looks as if you don't have a cast on at all, or the one with the pretty diagonal stitches?
I learned that you have to be careful when changing colours in garter stitch (which I already knew, but had illustrated to me very clearly).
I now feel a little more confident about the anatomy of garter stitch.
Gauge ended up at approx 4 stitches per inch. I am going to need smaller needles and finer yarn if I want to knit the baby surprise jacket: it's supposed to be 6 stitches per inch, and knitting this any tighter, while giving me a great fabric for oven gloves, would not not be suitable for baby wear.

Instead, I moved on to 4 ply merino, little needles and some pattern variation to make a tiny version of Tychus from Knitty. How tiny? Small enough to fit a small child? A baby? A doll? No. An egg.
A couple of years ago, issue 14 of the Australian magazine Donna Hay featured little egg-cosies on the cover. I wasn't actually in a knitting phase at the time, but I looked at them a bit and realised how easy they would be to knit. If you don't mind the 'wrestling with a hedgehog' feeling of knitting objects of small diameter on dpns, they really are quick and easy.

Admittedly the egg cosies I knit actually spend most of their lives acting as hats or horn-covers for the resident population of dragons (function depends on dragon size), but they do occasionally fulfill their original function.

I liked the look of the pattern and thought it might also be a way to try grafting in garter stitch. Because I am a masochist with sore tonsils. That's why.
I did a test run from the base up (bad idea: conical objects get narrower at the top) in sewing thread with the provisional cast-on still attached and a thread running through the live stitches. I had started at the second row of the pattern in my burgundy yarn, with a very long tail at the top of the hat. I then used this to graft: the grafted row is both the first row (after cast-on) of the original patt and the last row.

I'm not sure that I'd really want to make this pattern full size. Maybe it was the yarn and scale I was using, but the turning without wrapping did seem to leave some sizeable holes.

There's not really one thing that is wrong with this grafting. Not one. But it annoys me immensely. It is so much neater than my actual knitting.

Alone in a hotel room with a plastic fork...

Last weekend, I was stranded in a hotel room with

• a knitting machine
• a skein of KnitPicks Memories yarn in the Redwood Forest colourway
• a set of plastic containers with lids
• some hand soap
• a source of hot and cold water
• a plastic fork

I did what any sensible fluffy geek would do in these circumstances: tried out the knitting machine by knitting a swatch and felting it. With a plastic fork. I'd like to point out that it's a very sturdy plastic camping fork with many excellent qualities. I had washed it thoroughly after using it to eat my dinner. The yarn felts beautifully. I just wish I could be more enthused about the colour range.

A fortnight in Boston

Well, I didn't get two rows of the SSSS done. It's sitting forlornly in my suitcase as I write, halfway through one of those unspeakably long rows. Never mind. Hopefully by next winter... because we're rapidly getting to the stage where scarves are irrelevant. (Although it looks like Tuesday and Wendesday here will be quite cold enough, I'm not even going to pretend to myself that I have any chance of fininshing it before then.)
This is how the striping is working out. A little more subtle than I'd hoped, but I don't mind it all all.

(Photo taken in hotel bathroom: nowhere else is light enough.)
Clapotis, too, has been neglected. I just pulled her out this morning to manage a couple of rows.
So what have I been doing? I was home in London for two weeks between arriving from Denmark and leaving for the US (Boston). I am allergic to London. I have long suspected this, but it seems that if I leave for more than two weeks I get ill when I return. Sinus infections and/or migraines. The joy. So I didn't get a lot of knitting done. And work was busy, so I was tired.
I've been in Boston a week: my partner came along with me and left on Wednesday, so not much knitting was done, but we had a car, shopped for most of our summer wardrobe in Lane Bryant, explored Cambridge (which I approve of heartily) and generally enjoyed the snow and ice. (That is not sarcasm. We really, really like the cold.) I did fall over on the ice, which terrified my partner, produced small bruise about the size of a thumbprint, and probably contributed to my back giving me hell on Thursday and Friday. I spent most of Thursday kneeling backwards on an office chair, leaning over the back to get to my keyboard. It was the only position I could stay in for any length of time.
I managed to get to Cambridge again this weekend, and dropped into Woolcott & Co. which I had seen the previous week, but didn't really want to drag my other half into for an extended period of time. We have Malabrigo: two skeins of a lovely dark purple, and another skein of bluish green. Plans may be afoot. I also have a skein of Cascade 220 in a beautiful emerald green. I am contemplating making a Elizabeth Zimmerman's baby surprise jacket out of it, as I think I have enough wool. If not, I'm sure it will find another home.
Yes, I also succumbed to a book: EZ's Knitting Workshop. Woolcott and Co. didn't have the individual pattern left... and I have long heard about EZ but done nothing about her. They had a completed baby surprise jacket on the table... how could I resist?
I then walked to the Wholefoods on River Street, bought a whole lot of food (I have a food sensitivity to wheat, corn and soy: living on hotel food in the USA for two weeks is not an option I can face with equanamity) and, after a mix-up with the taxi, got home at nine. And watched two hours of Law and Order: SVU. I very rarely see this show, but it seems to satisfy my need to watch something mindless every now and then. Most comedy makes me cringe, and I've read murder mystery books as a method of relaxing since I was ten, so I suppose it makes sense.
While I was here, I have been receiving packages, one of which was an ultimate sweater machine. Due to BA's skimpy luggage allowances, I may have an interesting time getting it home, but I will see what I can do. At least for the US I'm allowed two checked in bags and two carry-on pieces of luggage.
Which brings me to a small but important rant. I'm a stately girl. Stately in the way that Queen Victoria was: what I lack in height I make up for in width. If you divided women over a US size 14 into three groups of Queens, Empresses and Goddesses, I'd probably be an Empress. Lane Bryant has clothing that's too large for me, but not much. Every now and then people have a go about fat people in my hearing and sometimes to my face. They're not talking about me, they honestly seem oblivious to the fact that I'm one of the people they're talking about. I find this strange and wrong.
Anyway, one of the common areas of complaint is that they (non-fat people) should receive an enhanced luggage allowance because of the extra weight a fat person carries on board a plane. Surely they should be able to make up this difference in body weight with luggage? This is wrong in so many ways that it makes me want to scream.
The main reason, though, is simple arithmetic. If I take the same number and type of pieces of clothing as you do... my suitcase is going to be heavier. My clothing consumes more cloth. It's really quite simple. The same would be true if I were tall... but being tall is obviously involuntary and is socially acceptable.
Let's not even go into the whole debate over whether being overweight is voluntary or not.
Enough ranting. I need to do some work. It's mostly quite interesting work... but it's work. On a weekend.

2 rows a day

SSSS (Sari Silk Sideways Scarf) is slowly growing. I've set myself a goal of two rows a day, which doesn't seem very much, but I'm a slow knitter, I don't have huge swathes of time in which to knit, and they're very long rows. Over 6 feet long, in fact.

I bought 2 skeins each of Sari Silk Solid colours in Spice, Russet and Deep Red. The deep red was so lovely that I bought 6 more skeins and squirrelled all of it away. Spice and Russet together, while pretty, lacked something. So I dyed one skein of the Spice with Grape Kool Aid (plus a little Tropical Punch) and one skein of the Russet with Tropical Punch Kool Aid (Plus a little Grape). The result it better: although the Russet and dyed Russet are very close in colour, I think it's still OK. The Spice dyed well and I'm happy with both colours.

I'm hoping to get it finished in time for my next trip: Boston, leaving Friday 23rd in the evening. And since I'm staying there two weeks I've been working out what to order from Knitpicks. I may not get another opportunity for a while...

Creeping Clapotis

Clapotis creeps on. I've now got 5 dropped columns and moved her off steel and onto rosewood. I won't post a photo, because there are only so many pictures of a clapotis that one blog can take but... it's very satisfying to knit.There are a couple of things I'd like to note, though.
Firstly, it has taught me to purl continentally in a way that doesn't torment my hands. Purl and I now have a tentative friendship, and plain purl rows are relaxing. This is an achievement.
I have fragile hands, and I depend on them for a living (computing) and for my sanity (cooking and sewing and knitting and weaving). Not tormenting my hands is something I worry about. My father has weak wrists and suffers a little from RSI (or whatever it's called these days) and my mother and grandmother both developed arthritis of the thumb very early in their lives. My mother seems to be managing it quite well, but it crippled my grandmother, and for a while there it was causing my mother a lot of pain. Pouring from teapots was difficult, opening jars impossible. That kind of thing.
Secondly, I was initially worried about the way this yarn was knitting up. The combination of colour (lighter and more pink that the photos show) and the texture were making it look... obscenely biological. Nothing like knitting something that makes you think of diseased human tissue, is there? Thankfully, when the columns are dropped all this seems to go away. Clapotis, she good. I like her long time.
I know everyone else knitter her ages ago, the proof is here: http://www.flickr.com/groups/50123132@N00/pool/ but this bothers me not at all.
She's going to have to be put aside for a while, though, because what I really need is my SSSS. Now I have a needle which I think will work for Russian joins in this yarn, there is no excuse...

Shopping madly in Copenhagen

Saturday was exhausting. First, I got up at 6:30 because I needed to tidy up the apartment, do a bit of cleaining and pack before 9:00. My suitcase was already over the limit on the way over, so it's not light. I packed it and packed all my food etc in plastic bags. Dragged the suitcase over cobbles to the new place, dragged it up 3 flights of stairs. Emptied it, catching my finger between the suitcase and the bed as I did so. Took emptied suitcase back to old apartment, filled it with plastic bags full of stuff, repeated exercise, this time swearing about the olive oil and bottle of red wine.
Put fridge stuff in fridge, ran out of the apartment because I had shopping to do and most of the little shops only open from 10:00 or 11:00 to 14:00.
On Friday night I had managed to get to Sommerfuglen before it shut at 18:00: a shop selling knitting, embroidery and patchwork supplies. I ended up buying a few balls of wool for the idea that's been wandering around in my head, and some needles. I've been knitting Clapotis on what I thought were 4.5mm steel needles. I bought some Suzanna rosewood to replace them and a pair of ebony for my new project. On getting them home I realised that I was actually knitting Clapotis on 4mm, so back I had to go to exchange on Saturday. It's going to take me a while to get used to the rosewood as they're more grabby than I expected, but they'll wear with use anyway.
I went to Ulstedet again and seriously contemplated some 4-ply cotton in purple and in a yellow/brown marble (Cotton Baby from Gepard), but really couldn't think of anything I would do with it and actually wear. Then I went to Strikkeboden, fully intending to look at their home-brand alpaca in different colours again to see what I could make of it. What I got instead was six 100g skeins of black dk-weight alpaca, an unplied single (I think). I'm having thoughts of a jumper, possibly a shapely tank or tee with the neck and sleeves then finished off in a different colour (I'm thinking bright green, for some reason) for a long-sleeved garment: a bit like wearing a long-sleeved top underneath a t-shirt.
And then I went back and bought two more skeins, one in a brown, the other in a grey-brown because they remind me of a jumper my father used to wear, and he might get a scarf knit for him. I'm worried that I might need more skeins of the black... maybe I'll have to go back there. There weren't many left, though, so I may just have to improvise when the time comes.
So since I'd done my indulgent shopping, I then went looking for presents for people. Brother and sister-in-law's birthday were solved at Illums Bolighus, and extraordinary shop with an enormous collection of designer crockery, cutlery, cooking implements and homewares.
The first thing I gravitated towards was Piet Hein's Great Bear Candelabra. Then I looked at the price and ran away. I did end up buying this for them instead. Nice.
And then there were toys and children's clothes. Denmark must be a lovely place to be a child. danefae makes me laugh.
I came home and had an afternoon nap. Dragging that suitcase around broke me.
Now I have to work for the rest of the day. Grumble.

Denmark is still pretty...

but not as pretty as last Saturday: no snow. The other half got all excited about the snow and went and frolicked in it at 1 am because it was falling (we're both Australian, all right? We don't get to see much snow), and then when she came in she was so excited that I put on my boots and my coat and went and frolicked with her. There was snow. There was a frozen lake. There were disgruntled ducks and swans. What more could one want? Our (British) guest very sensibly went to bed.
It has turned out that I need to stay here another week now, work got stuffed up a bit. I was originally going to go home Friday and return on Tuesday... but the thought of losing either a full work day (it takes 6 hours door-to-door each way) or 10 - 12 hours of my weekend filled me with dread.
Stupid company reduced its QA resource on a particular product to 1 person, put out a new patch and a) didn't test some fairly basic things and b) accepted the existence of a bug which they should not have released it with. So I'm wandering through the validation scripts for a company, should have been a straightforward exercise and... I'm stuck in Copenhagen for another week. And I feel bad for the client, for whom it should have been a straightforward, no-angst exercise.
Never mind. I have to move apartments on Saturday morning, but the company I'm renting from have very kindly allowed me to move in a 9am instead of 3pm - so that I can do some shopping!
Yes, there may be yarn-related purchases, and if there aren't there will be other purchases.
I am under strict instructions from the other half to do some present shopping for family/friends based on what we saw last weekend... Such lovely things. Not cheap, but lovely. And I've got my eye on a couple of things for presents too. We need to buy things early, it takes so long to send things to Aus. Hey, the way I'm going at the moment I think I could send some of them sea-mail, which isn't a bad idea considering the cost of postage! I'm being unusually organised for me - in the last year or so I've been sending things on people's birthdays (or, memorably, actually after Christmas day) and apologising. I'm trying to do better this year.
I have made a little progress on the SSSS, just 4 rows but I think it will look lovely. I just need to remember to buy a needle with an appropriately large eye this weekend for russian joining: the yarn has quite a few breaks, and I can't stand weaving in ends. Russian joins seem so much tidier and more sensible.
I have an idea in the back of my brain which needs a few different colours of yarn, some circulars and some double-points. These supplies are one of my goals this weekend. Work can pay the baggage fine if it's overweight, damn them.