Ribbing
No, I haven’t started my Autumn Rose yet. No, I haven’t even swatched for it yet.
Instead, I’m diligently plugging away at my Ribby sweater. I’ve got the front and both sides done, and have a few inches of the sleeves done.
See?
I love the way these colors look together. But, of course, you already knew that. It’s pretty accurate in the photo, although they’re lightened just a little by the camera flash. I’ve still got a way to go for the sleeves, but they’re moving along.
Not that I haven’t been THINKING about my Autumn Rose. I’ve copied the stitch pattern into my computer, for two reasons. One, because the chart’s kind of small and I thought it would be nice to, well, see it, but also, two, because I wanted to add some color to help keep the whole thing straight.
Next, I’ll figure out what I need to do to keep that pile of yarn behaving itself in my knitting bag. I’ve said that this is my first real Fair Isle sweater–I’ve never done a sweater with quite so many different colors, and so have never faced an organizing problem like this. I like my bag to be neat and orderly (I can’t help it), and this lot is likely to get rowdy. Not to mention that they’re likely to overwhelm my poor, neglected lace project. Clearly, I need to take steps, and it’s better to do so now than to wait until after I’ve started the sweater. Once I’ve started, I want to KNIT. But for now? I don’t mind taking the necessary time to prepare.
Besides. As I said. I need to get the Ribby’s knitting done before I seriously start knitting on this sweater anyway.
Because, yes, I DO have at least some will-power. I might be quick with my credit card, but there’s at least some discipline, here . . .
Although . . . speaking of credit card discipline . . . I’ve got a copy of Season One of Due South on DVD–the Canadian version, bought off Ebay years ago, and which, for some reason, doesn’t include the Pilot episode. Is it crazy that I’m considering buying the American version just so that I can see that Pilot again? (Um, maybe you shouldn’t answer that.)
And, as a book-lover and a person you KNOW reads more or less constantly, this is one of the saddest statistics I’ve seen in a long time. (Well, saddest not including death and disaster, that is.)
Lastly, because I’m not above a little “cheating” on my own meme once in a while, here are my answers for Booking Through Thursday for tomorrow.
Using a suggestion from Erin today:
When growing up did your family share your love of books? If so, did one person get you into reading? And, do you have any family-oriented memories with books and reading? (Family trips to bookstore, reading the same book as a sibling or parent, etc.)
Everyone in my family reads, although when I was little, Dad rarely had time from work and Mom was busy being Mom, but still, they read and encourage my sister and I to read . . . which we both did more or less voraciously. In fact, I was always trying to “catch up.” If she said, “This is a good book, but a little old for you,” well, naturally I’d have to force myself to read it, right?
I also have a very clear memory of a spur of the moment weekend’s trip to Bermuda when I was in about second grade, when we got rained in. My Dad picked up a copy of Dr. Seuss’s “Fox in Socks“–a marvelous tongue-twister of a book–and the four of us sat in our hotel room, taking turns reading it out loud, having a contest on who could get through with the fewest mistakes. I can still recite practically that entire book from memory. (The Tweedle Beetle section has always been my favorite.)
And then, of course, Mom and I always read together when we go on vacations–we take turns reading aloud in the car or in the hotel room. It’s always nice to share a book, turning the reading experience into a social activity. I love doing that. The only problem? I can’t read aloud and knit at the same time!
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Tannenbaum.
House Calls
Am I missing something- Season One of what?
I’m looking forward to knitting Autumn Rose as well- I need to heavily modify for a different neckline treatment and to make a 48″ size. I might just wait until some of my UFO’s leave the knitting basket…
yeah…season one of…what?
That Autumn Rose is *seriously* tempting. Gorgeous colors. I’ve found, btw, that the balls of yarn don’t do too much intermingling in my bag as long as I wind the ends around the balls when I put them away. That nice shetland ‘stickiness’ keeps them neat, I think.
As for reading, my whole family are serious bookworms, even to most of the extended family. My brother and I both learned to read just from being read to. Now, his son is just starting to get into some of our old favorites–my parents gave him ‘Tikki Tikki Tembo’ for his birthday.
It’s always nice to share some “book” moments with the family.
I don’t know how to knit. I know the basics of crochet but that’s it.
Can’t wait to see what you’ve done.
Dr. Suess is such fun! I was sad when my DH told me his mom wouldn’t let him read Suess because it was full of made-up words.
Good grief.
Happy BTT!
Love the Suess story! I particularly enjoy this week’s BTT meme. What a fun one!
What nice memories! Happy BTT!
I absolutely agree with you about needing to be organized. I am the same way. Without organization and neatness inside of my knitting bag I feel confused. Hmmmm…maybe that is why I am carrying a small knitting bag these days. Anyway, I love the colors for Autumn Rose. It will be very yummy! You are tackling something I don’t think I ever will but I am sure you will pull it off beautifully.
I think charting the pattern on the computer is a great idea! Lets you start working on it without touching the yarn… Have you thought about carrying all that yarn around in a different way? Like maybe one of those rectangular plastic (ugh) containers, and you can make separators for the different skeins and holes in the lid for the yarn to come through? We all read here. The kiddo will devour a book in an afternoon, but harry potter 7 took the next morning too. We do books on tape for long drives, and the kid wants them for bedtimes now (he’s 11, we used to read a lot to him at night). I don’t remember not reading, but I think I was 5 or so when I started. It was one of those fairy tales (something about 7 brothers turned to geese), and there was a shimmery 3D picture on the front. Mom always read, dad not so much. I’m pretty sure my one brother never reads books but does read specialty magazines (cars, boats), not sure about the other one. Have you ever gone into somebody’s house and wondered ‘what’s wrong here?’, sometimes it is that there is NO reading material around-no books, magazines, newspapers…most of my friends have piles of these things.
my dad would read the newspaper, and one time i found my mom reading one of my star trek books when i was in junior high (lol!). my brothers both read, and it was a competition between me and the older of the two (i’m older than both of them). in fact, they used to have a contest to see who could read the most books between the start of school year and the end of march. this started when iw as in the 8th grade. the only year i didn’t win was my sophomore year (my english teacher wouldn’t let me count romance novels), and my brother did win. i don’t have much contact with that brother, but the younger one is always reading.
I heard that “one in four” statistic the other day on the news, and I had to replay it (on Tivo) three times before I realized I’d heard them right. That’s just amazing, and very sad . . . I don’t read nearly as much as you do, but I constantly have at least one book going, and I have a hard time getting to sleep at night if I haven’t spent at least half an hour or so reading. My family (except for my stepfather) are all big readers — when I was a kid and it was just me and my mom, we used to read at meals, etc. I just can’t fathom people not reading.
I can’t wait to see you start Autumn Rose!
I like those colors together for Ribby, too.
That’s a great story about Dr. Suess!! Who doesn’t love Dr. Suess?? Of course, now that I have kids, I’ve read them over and over again!!
Great post!
How about one of those cotton canvas sock drawer organizers? Wendy uses one of those whenever she knits a St*rm*re. It doesn’t make for much portability, but it does keep all the little center-pull balls neatly in their places.
That reading stat just bums me out.
I have a little tip to keep that ‘tip’ organized hehehe. How about you put the skeins in a ziplock baggie (on their own or in 2′s), and snip a bottom corner off through which you thread the strand of yarn. The skeins will stay clean, if you need to find something in your bag, you can easily remove the baggies without having skeins scattering all over the place, and the skeins can’t tangle either.
Cheers Eva
You’ll be happy to know I found my Ribby last night, buried deep in the closet. I’m ashamed to admit how far along I was when it disappeared into the WIP void. I had the back, both sleeves, and right front complete and had already done 3″ of the left. I’m now a half inch shy of the armhole / neck shaping having spent my evening knit/tv time with it.
That 1 in 4 statistic is pretty sad. I love your story of your Mom tempting you to read books “too old” for you. I’d gone through most of the kid-appropriate books in our local library well before I was “old enough” to check books out of the more mature section. The library lady tried to limit which ones I read, until my mom read her the riot act. From then on I could check out whichever books I wanted.
I like the colors of your Ribby, too.
OH I so love due South! I wish it would have ran longer on television. Hmm, bad though that its now out on DVD. I’ll ahve to netflix it.
Love the Autumn rose, can’t wait to see it in its knitted form, not that seeing the charts on your monitor wasn’t fun and all.
Hi Chappy!
That’s a very depressing statistic. Reading is a huge part of my life, and I can’t imagine reading only four books in a year, much less none at all. I wish more families shared books with each other, and encouraged their children to read, the way yours did.
I can’t imagine not loving reading either, and yes it is VERY odd to go into someone’s house and not see any reading material around.
I love reading aloud and even more, being read to…
I can’t imagine not loving reading either, and yes it is VERY odd to go into someone’s house and not see any reading material around.
I love reading aloud and even more, being read to…
I can’t imagine not loving reading either, and yes it is VERY odd to go into someone’s house and not see any reading material around.
I love reading aloud and even more, being read to…
great story about Fox in Socks! happy BTT!
One in four adults read NO books last year … what a sad sad statistic. I wonder if they have any idea what they’re missing? (But then if they don’t read, how will they ever find out?)
I’m glad to see i’m not the only one so anal as to chart this on the computer. I actually charted the entire front and back of the sweater so I could knit it line by line *smile*