Yo La Tejo

Scratching the itch.

I have a disease, people. A DISEASE. A dis. ease. Isn't it funny when you repeat a word often enough it either sounds completely bizarre, or its word origins become completely clear? Dis-ease: the condition of being uncomfortable. Or in my case, the condition of being ill at ease with the lack of funds in my bank account.

I'm talking about the shopping disease. (I know what you were thinking when you read the title of this post. You need to visit another site for that kind of content, you cheeky monkey.) You all remember my last post, yes? About the recent epiphanic experience I had at Target? Yeah, well, apparently that was merely a sign that the dam was beginning to burst. I had a myself a little visit to the mall and got some beaded red flats. Then, back to Target to buy two camisoles with lace trim that I had denied myself on the first trip.

And today. After the gym, I stopped off at Rack Room Shoes, because it was on the way to the car. Do you need a better reason to go into a store? Right. Anyway, they were having a Back to School sale, buy one pair get one half off! And, well, I am going back to school, aren't I? Granted, the shoes I fell in love with are not the crepe-soled earth shoes I had to wear in Catholic high school.

Once in the store, I felt my heart skip a beat. Remember that Sex & the City episode where Carrie spies a pair of shoes (Blahniks, to be sure), and seductively croons, "Hello, lover"? Well, yes, that was the scenario today, except that my scenario happened in a discount shoe store, not on Fifth Avenue. A pair of L.E.I. cork wedges beckoned. They have a pink suede insole, a flirtatious row of beaded satin flowers on the toe, and long ties to wrap around my short calves.

But then, heartbreak. No size six. As I pulled out the six and a half, a salesperson came and asked me if I was finding everything I needed. I was honest with him. No, I wasn't. Well, evil man that he was, he offered to call San Marcos for the size 6 that they have, get it FedExed, and I would be free to come in and try them on no later than Monday. No obligation to buy. My jaw dropped, literally, I think. Evil man! How could anyone say no to that?

OK, so I didn't buy anything today. Do I really need a pair of five-inch, pink satin wedges? Probably not. But I guarantee you that somehow, I will have discovered a need for them by Monday. And they are way, waaaay cheaper than Blahniks.

So...knitting content? Yeah, got some of that. I have been making some progress with my drop-stitch shrug. See? (What you can't see is that I am running out of flat surfaces in my apartment that are clean enough to take pictures on.)



I've almost gotten to where I mark the end of the sleeve, and begin the back. I'm really pleased with the way it's looking!



I had one of those lightbulb moments today. You can't see in the pictures, but the directions say to increase 13 times on both sides of the center drop-stitch pattern, and to keep the increases in a 2x2 rib, because the rib will become the border. Meaningless to me at the time I started it, but I looked at it today and went, aha! Now I can see how the back will look, with the ribs at the top near the neck and at the bottom. Can't wait to finish this one!

BTW, I increased by working a M1 each time, which is leaving little holes along the way. I'm not going to change it at this point, and since I knew the holes would be along the underarm, I wasn't too bothered by it. But does anyone have any suggestions for a better increase? Knitting into the same stitch twice?

Sadly, my Victoria tank is not faring as well.



This is exactly where it's been for the last week and a half. I
got cocky and didn't mark each pattern repeat because, hello? I would need 26 stitch markers. And I just don't have that many! Besides, I thought, sheesh, I can keep track of a simple nine stitch pattern repeat. Well, let me tell you what. When you put that knitting down and come back to it that night or the next day, you will not remember what you did last. I spent a good 45 minutes trying to figure this out, then knitting another two rows only to realize that it was all for naught. This project had gone south.

Dirty little secret: I didn't do gauge on this tank. Well, I measured it and it was turning out way too big anyway. So, no biggie right? I would have had to frog it eventually. But guess what? I've been wanting to buy Stefanie Japel's One Skein Wonder on the Glampyre site, so when I was there, I gave in to temptation (you see that I am very bad at saying no to temptation) and threw the Orangina pattern in the shopping cart as well. And you know? I think this Vintage Cotton Karabella yarn would work really well for Orangina!




The irony of course, is that it is essentially the same lace pattern as the tank. So I just dropped five bucks for something I might have worked out myself, but let's be real. I can't do the math. But I can check out my online shopping cart.

Finally, I just wanted to show you these little stitch markers I made:



This was when I thought I needed 26 markers for the tank, so I went to Hobby Lobby and bought a gross of jump rings. I have lots of bargain beads lying around from my jewelry making class from last year, so I decided to put some beads on eye pins, and then wrap the wire, and stick them on the jump rings. What do you think? I love them! It looks like my knitting is wearing earrings. My knitting is better accessorized than I am.

posted by Olga @ 6:51 PM