Extremely sad and incredibly tear-inducing

Just finished watching Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Wow that movie is quite the tear jerker! I was teary eyed almost all the way through that movie. If you can watch that movie without at least one teary eyed moment then you've either grown too cold hearted or you've never experienced loss I would guess. Everyone is different though. Maybe I'm just over emotional.

Anyway on to my knitting!

On the needles

I've been working on two different projects this week.

I cast on the Uhura Shawlette. It is a free pattern on Ravelry. I am using what I think is Mini Mochi yarn. I don't have the band for the yarn. A friend in a local knitting group gave me the yarn because she didn't like knitting with it. I can see why! The yarn likes to meld together for one thing. It's very difficult to tink back if you need to because of this. Also it tends to break for no reason. It doesn't so much break as it just really tends to come apart. One second you are knitting with yarn, the next second you feel it thin out and just let go of the rest of the yarn. It's like what I experienced with the little bit of roving I had tried spinning. Pull too hard or long on it and it just slips apart. Very frustrating. So... I've set it aside for the moment and cast on...

Uhura Shawlette

The Library Capelet! I've never done a cape or Capelet before so I am excited to see how it turns out. I am using what I believe is Jiffy yarn. Once again I don't have any info on it, but have a skein of Jiffy that I used before and this has the same look, feel, and thickness to it. I am changing up the pattern slightly by using more than one color. It is an easy pattern so far and I am loving how it's turning out.

                                     


FOs

I finished my Age of Brass and Steam Kerchief. I like how it turned out. If I ever make another, I think I will add some repeats and make a nice, large shawl out of it. It was a fun and easy pattern.

                           
                                          
                                          

I also have an almost finished object. I ran out of yarn on my Candleflame and am really sad about it. I need to rip back to the beginning of the border pattern. I have 1400 stitches of the border done and around 520 to go to finish the shawl. Sigh. There is a lot of knit two together and pass slipped stitch over, so I am worried that I am going to mess it up while I try to undo all of that. The yarn I used was Crystal Palace Yarns Meringue and it is discontinued. I have found one skein on ravelry but it is five dollars plus shipping, so that isn't going to be able to happen. Gotta live note having money! I am going to try to rip it back in a week or two. I think. Wish me luck!
                                            

candlflame shawl

                                         





Gardening/cooking

Not much to tell on the gardening or cooking front. I have fifteen tomato plants still growing steadily out there. None of the seeds I direct sowed even tried to sprout. I'm trying to decided if I want to try some inside and move them out in a few weeks. I don't know if they would produce much before fall though. Wonder if it would be worth it.

My gas stove went out on me and we got rid of it and replaced it with an electric stove I had in storage for the last six years or so. I had forgotten how different it is to cook with an electric stove! I tried making some eggless oatmeal cookies in it last week and ended up cooking them too long or in too high a temp and they turned out mega crunchy. I have to set the oven temp a lot lower on this stove so as not to burn everything. I'm getting the hang of it though. Now our microwave has stopped working so I have to use the stove for even just warming up leftovers, so I'm glad i have it.

Not much more to tell really. I keep wanting to cast on more projects. I've heard it called startitis. I have been denying the impulse, but am almost ready to cave. I really need to finish what I've got on the needles though. I don't want another project like Serenity's skirt that has been languishing for over a year now. I can't even find it at the moment. If I don't get it finished soon then it won't even fit her when she finally gets it.

I keep meaning to do some book reviews on here. I haven't been reading much lately! (gasp) I went from reading a few books a week to reading a book every few months. Me and my weird cycles! I'll try to get out a pattern book and review it next week. I know all of mine are older books, but maybe I have one that you haven't seen or haven't heard about before. Who knows!

Fishes
My fishies are doing well. One had babies but they all got eaten. It was expected but still kind of sad. I didn't know about it until this Saturday. I got a bubble stone and put it in the tank. While I was rearranging everything around it I spied a baby fish hiding under a shell. It swam off to hide under another one and that is the last I saw of it. It was the only one I saw and I don't think it survived Mike and The Mollies, which is what we call our Black Mollies. I moved some stuff around trying to find it Monday. I was going to separate it from the rest if it were still there and make sure it got some food. No luck. Oh well, there will be plenty more for me to try to save. I read that they have around thirty babies every two months. Times that by three females and that is a lot of fishies.

Oh! I will review something after all! It's not a book though.

I just realized I never told you about the totally awesome hand lotion sample I got a few weeks ago! I started watching a podcast I had heard about. It's called Wolfe Farms. The lady knits, of course, but also makes lotions and soaps and such. I can't tell you much about the podcast yet, as I've only seen two episodes so far. As with any podcast I find, I'm starting with the first episode and am playing catch up. Anyway I joined her ravelry group and she sent me a coupon code to get a free one ounce sample of her lotion free. I chose the scent called World's Best Coffee. I got the package amazingly fast. She had included a free sample of the coordinating soap and a coupon good towards a future purchase. Let me tell you, this is now my absolute favorite lotion! It smells so mouthwateringly good. It is absorbed into the skin quickly and doesn't leave a greasy feeling behind. It worked wonders on my fingers, which were all dried and getting callused from all my knitting. Within a few days my skin was pretty soft and all but the worst calluses were gone. I only have the one semi rough spot left now on my index finger where I tend to push the point of my knitting needles through while knitting. I thought that was amazing. I haven't tried the soap yet. I'm saving it and keeping it in my drawer to smell from time to time. I'm weird like that. The lotion I use several times a day. The one ounce bottle was full to the very brim and is lasting a good while. It doesn't take but a little bit at a time to rub into both hands, so it might last me a while. I still love the scent of it as much as when I first opened the bottle. It perks me up and kind of makes me crave some coffee candy.

So now that is everything!

Until next week my tightly tangled tanglers.....

Happy Crafting!