I knew I'd regret the caffeine at this hour

I'm lonely all the time now. I think I have been lonely for the last six years. Ryan used to try to solve the problem by bringing home cats. It wasn't a practical solution then and it certainly wouldn't help now, but I miss them, too.

If you were listening, what would I say?

In my head I'm already gone. I don't know where. Corellia, probably. I have no idea what I'm doing but if I can use telekinesis to manage it I think I'd be a lot happier there.

Emerald wine with your nerf steak, sir?

Are you happier this way?

Do you remember when we were all mad and I tried to make you smile with just the power of my mind? I don't know if it actually worked but you smirked and that's pretty close. Sanity is so overrated and reality is worse.

I remember less of geometry than I do of that moment and you were absolutely right in ways I cannot fathom, but it still couldn't be.

I never have the slightest idea what you're talking about.

Yarn Along

Ezra has been cheerfully wearing the Sucky Thumb Mitts that Silas has long outgrown, prompting me to finally get a new pair on the needles for Silas. This time I'm using the Adorable Kids Fingerless Gloves pattern, modifying it as I go to make it more like Sucky Thumb.

I'm rereading The Goblet of Fire for maybe the second or third time, but since the version I'm reading on my Kindle has the original British text, it's a bit like reading for the first time. It's also entirely delightful.

I had grand ideas about catching up and putting together a blog post today.  Then I sat down at the computer and forgot everything I've ever thought or done.  Fortunately, I was saved the frustration of trying to type in that state, because as soon as I ever sit down to do anything, my three-year-old suddenly insists that he has to go potty.  This is usually a half-hour venture, as we must first decide which of his five hundred books that we have read five hundred times over is the book we will take to the bathroom with us, and then we must mount the staircase, with frequent stops to look over the railing to see what the living room looks like from above, and at the window on the landing to see what the neighbor children are doing and if their house is still there, and then when we reach the top of the stairs we must look inside every door, just in case perhaps the bathroom is now in one of the bedrooms, and finally we are in the bathroom, and we negotiate over who has to do the disrobing, and then we stop to look in the mirror, and smell the soap, and brush our teeth, and wash our hands, and unroll the toilet paper, until finally, finally, we make it to the toilet and maybe something toilet-related happens, or maybe we're too late, or maybe this was all just an excuse to play in the bathroom and read a book.  Then we argue about whether or not Silas has lost the capability to put on his own pull-up and pants since the last time were there, and when that finally happens, we wash our hands, and brush our teeth, and smell the soap, and look in the mirror, and run into every bedroom, and go down the stairs as far as the landing to look out the window, and go down one stair and spend five minutes hanging over the railing observing the living room from above, and point out that the ceiling is still up, and the floor is still down, and eventually, finally, make it back downstairs.  And then I sit down at the computer and realize that now I have to go to the bathroom.  So I stand up and go to the stairs, and Silas asks, "Where are you going?"

"Mama has to go potty."

"I go potty too!"

Repeat from step one.

A Flurry of FOs

Every morning heralds the approach of November with a grey, gloomy sky and a chill that keeps me huddled under the flannel sheets and extra quilt for as long as possible (not long with two small children clamoring for the day to start).

This is the weather to make things quickly.

Things like sheepy hats with high wool content and giant Baa-bles.

And wee baby mittens in delicious shades of autumn morning grey (though the pattern is called (delightfully) Bleak Midwinter).

And of course, little cowls that look like bandanas.  I used the same pattern and the same modifications as when I made this in red for Silas.

There have also been a couple of dishcloths.  With all this winter knitting I have made the executive decision to leap from the dishcloth bandwagon (unless Knit Picks puts out a pattern that I can't resist), so these may be the last couple this year.

Weeks Irrelevant

Pumpking Dishcloth by Teresa Gregorio
Knit Picks Cotlin DK, Clementine and Peapod

I'm a sucker for all things pumpkin. If it says pumpkin spice on it, you already have my money.

Campfire, by Marjorie Dussaud
Peaches & Creme, Rosemary

This was the first Dussaud dishcloth that I have enjoyed in a while. It was fast, fun, easy to memorize, and the drape is delicious.

I'd like to be the kind of person who makes my kids' Halloween costumes, but not yet.  I have always been the kind of person with really good luck at thrift stores, however.

Ezra is sporting a dragon coat and a sparkly jumpsuit found at the bargain shoppe.  Silas wore it for his two first Halloweens.

This year Silas is Thomas the Tank Engine, courtesy of Once Upon a Child.  This should fit him for many Halloweens if he's agreeable, because it's completely open-sided, which also means that he can wear it no matter the weather - even a bulky winter coat will fit under it without disrupting the effect of the costume.  This year wasn't too bad, he's just wearing his Thomas rain slicker (and his new rain boots, which he was one hundred times more excited about than the costume, and which he is still wearing).

Ryan reprised last year's cowboy costume.

Everything out of his own wardrobe, basically.  I'm a fan of men owning cowboy hats - it makes for very easy costumes for Pioneer Day when you're in school if you can just raid your dad's closet.

I should have gotten a picture of my entire outfit, but you'll get the gist.  I went for fall spirit/Mother Nature/wood Elf, etc.

Sparkly green dress courtesy of Goodwill, 2006.  Fall garland courtesy of Wal-Mart clearance sale, 2014.  I was going to wear this last year, but it turns out that dresses you could wear when you were 19 will not fit you when you are 9 months pregnant, no matter how forgiving you think that A-line is.

Here's a pic from 2013, the second time Silas wore the dragon costume, where you can see a bit more of the dress (generic princess that year):

Now just imagine it with 12 feet of fall foliage draped around it, and you'll get the idea.

YarnAlong: With Time Travel

Silas calls this book LlamaLlamaLlama!  We read it a lot.  It goes back to the library on Saturday, and I think it's going to end up under the Christmas tree this year.

I started another Cedar Shakes hat, this time for Ezra.  The Paton's Kroy is considerably thinner than the yarn that I used for Silas' hat, so even though I cast on for the same size (toddler), it's turning out rather smaller and with a slightly open fabric.  I'm debating whether or not to start over with smaller needles and working the child size instead.  The outcome might be the same.  Ezra at 10 months already has a head the circumference of the average child's, an issue we ran into with Silas as well.  There are some baby clothes that we literally cannot get over these babies' mammoth heads, and their little caps fit for about fifteen minutes.

Silas hat, made with a heavy fingering yarn that still had a substantial fabric on the 4's, still fits him two years later.

Assuming this kid IS actually the child in question.  Where did my little chubby-faced baby go?

Two years ago. Never mind where the cheeks went, where did the time go?

Loose ends

I've been in a finishing mood lately, though I would have thought I'd had enough of endings.  There's something to be said for closure, at any rate.

I finished the twined mittens I started back in February.  I need to take a better picture so I can upload it to the pattern page.  The technique was a lot of fun once I got the hang of it.

I made myself a hat:

It's the Star-Crossed Slouchy Beret that's so popular on Ravelry (13000+ projects - so viral I would have avoided it except I saw one in person and fell hard in love).  I had to make some mods to get it to fit my head, mostly just adding stitches and then adjusting for the increases and decreases so the cables still worked.  I love the colors in this yarn (Knit Picks Chroma in Hollyhock).  Purple and grey may be my new grey and pink.

I've also caught up on a few dishcloths.

Zig Zag dishcloth by Faith Schmidt

Simple Lines by Chelsea Berkompas

Orbital Dishcloth by Stacey Winklepleck

And my showstopper:

Petticoat Dishcloth, by Kendra Nitta

This dishcloth is just a little crazy.  You start at the outside edge and cast on 200+ stitches, knit a bit, and then on a separate needle cast on another ridiculous number of stitches and knit a bit and then join the two pieces together, cast on a third piece, knit, join, and finally knit down to the center.  Were I designing this I would have started from the center, worked out, and then picked up the stiches for the second and third ruffles so everything was worked in one piece, but perhaps that isn't as simple or neat as it sounds in my head.

The yarn is Cotlin DK.  I started this thing in April, all that ruffling in light yarn took this long to finally finish.  As long as it took, and as frustrating as it was to try and join so many stitches on a 16" cable without twisting, it was really a lot of fun to knit.  I can't even imagine using it as a dishcloth.  Right now it's sitting on my bathroom counter collecting bobby pins and hair-ties, kind of a fiber-happy take on the those catch-all bathroom trays that I've noticed we're selling in the Domestics dept. recently.

In other news, it's officially footie pajama weather.

Yarn Along

I haven't been reading much for myself lately; when I reach for my Kindle it's usually to play Candy Crush. My attention span when grieving is basically nonexistent. I still read to Silas, though.

Silas will have outgrown the last sweater I made him by this Christmas, so I've started a Sherwood for him. In fact, I've started it about six times now. The irregular rib and the odd charts threw me for several loops, and then I managed to twist the cast-on when I joined. Oy vey. The yarn (Plymouth Yarns Encore) is a wool/acrylic blend similar to Wool-Ease. The book is Harry the Dirty Dog. I wasn't familiar with it before Silas got it for Christmas, but my sister-in-law implied it was a favorite in my husband's family.

This post is linked up with Ginny Sheller's Yarn Along