AAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

So that new relaxed version of myself?...

I passed my test!!!!!!
not just any test, but my licensing exam for my masters!!! So now, once I finish classes and practicum and pay the lovely state of Maine some crazy large amount of cash, I will officially be a Liscensed Master Social Worker! Breathe a sigh of relief, put away the study guides, and whip out the knitting, cause I'm almost gradu-mated!!

Now 'xcuese me cause I need to finish my martini!

LOVE IT!!!!!!!!

It's just so cute! I feel very Angela Adams...
Center Square in Knitty. Heavily modified:

Patons Classic Merino, one strand of each color. Cast on 108 stitches, ribbing on 4's, the rest on 6's. I added one stitch in each direction to the circles to compensate for the smaller gague. The decreases were just k2tog after each stitch marker to make it swirl, cause it looks fun!
Even with the smaller gague on the ribbing it's not as tight as I'd like, so I think I'm gonna get some thin elastic and weave it in around the ribbing to snug it up a bit.

Since I Read So Much...

I figured I see how I stack up on the meme that's going around...

Look at the list of (100) books below.
Bold the ones you’ve read.
Italicize the ones you own.
Movies don’t count.

1. The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
3. To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)
6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)
8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)
9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)
10. A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
11. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)
12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)
14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (Rowling)
17. Fall on Your Knees (Ann-Marie MacDonald)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban(Rowling)
20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)
22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
25 . Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)
27. Wuthering Heights (Charlotte Bronte)
28. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie(Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)
33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. 1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. I Know This Much is True (Wally Lamb)
39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)
40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)
42. The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)
44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. The Bible
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Crosto (Alexandre Dumas)
48. Angela’s Ashes (Frank McCourt)
49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
50. She’s Come Undone (Wally Lamb)
51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. Great Expectations (Dickens)
55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)
57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrey Niffenegger)
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolstoy)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davis)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (Ann Brashares)
68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)
70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
76. The Summer Tree (Guy Gavriel Kay)
77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
78. The World According To Garp (John Irving)
79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)
80. Charlotte’s Web (E.B. White)
81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)
82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Wizard’s First Rule (Terry Goodkind)
85. Emma (Jane Austen)
86. Watership Down(Richard Adams)
87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)
90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)
96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)
97. White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)
100. Ulysses (James Joyce)

Center Square

After being quite fried on the eons of 2x2 ribbing in the Urban Aran, I cast on for a new project, Center Square. Of course, I decided (as I often do) that the pattern as written was not quite to my liking and needed adjustment. In this case, I do not like to stretched out loose look of the stitches, and also did not like using two yarns held together because a) spring is almost here and I do not want another winter hat, and b) I am scared of doing fair isle with not just two, but four yarns to keep track of. So I am making it with single yarns in the same Patons Classic Merino, at 20 sts/inch on 6's (cause I can't find/don't own 7's/was too lazy to figure out magic-loop-whatever). So I DID MATHS and guessed on casting on 88 sts, cause that was about the same finished hat size as the pattern. BUT. I forgot that I was using smaller yarn, and it would be less stretchie than if I had used the pattern. SOOO...I made a very tight headband. And frogged, as you can see from the yarn ramen. Ahh well, it was like making a swatch, right? Darn...back to doing maths.

But aren't those colors so so so so pretty together? I felt hip and cool just knitting them!!!

I told you I've been knitting!

So first, here's the felted beanie, pre felting. YES, I swatched. I swear. I did math. and...
here's the finished product! As you can see, there's a seam. Despite my swatch, the hat felted much more in height than in width, and I needed to cut a piece out of it and sew it back together. There's one wonky spot where the seam bumps out a bit, but Mr. VT says he doesn't mind it, so oh well. I might go back at some point to fix it, like in the summer when it's hot out and I want a quickie project. I really like the quilting I added too, it gives it a super subtle but cool texture.
My oldest un-pic'ed FO, the shedir hat from Knitty. I followed the pattern except I skipped one pattern repeat, as it seemed too long when I measured other hats I like (I have a small head). It's just a touch short, I wish I could do a half repeat, but alas, no such luck. This was actually my first cable project!
On to new project, here's the urban aran. I'm doing it in the round, cause I HATE seaming. I sized my needles way down, using a size 7 for the body. I swatched in the 10's the pattern called for, and it was a looser knit than I liked. Also, the smallest size was a small and the finished measurements were larger, more jacket-like, than the closer fit I want.
So far, I love it! It's knitting up pretty quick, and the cables look great! I figure I'll keep an eye on the arm-hole size due to the smaller gague, and with all that ribbing if it's a touch on the too-tight side I can block it any way I want! Oh and I am sooooo not doing the wierd side cables, they are slightly reminescent of life jacket cinches and there's nothing like accuntuating your love handles!!

In Two Weeks...

I will be a different, much more relaxed version of myself. Why? I refuse to talk about it, as I am quite convinced that it will turn my karma around. But when it happens, you will know. (And no, it does not involve vegas, hair dye, or my fave tattoo artist).

I have also been trying to be a better blogger, which I attribute partially to the above coming change. So to be better, I will...
1. finally post Mr. VT's infamous sweater pics. Once I take them.
2. also post his felted hat pics
3. post the progress on the urban aran, which I am knitting in the round, in a smaller gague, and have done about 4 inches on.
4. get a pic of the fingerless gloves I made for mom and Utah sis...(mom and UT, send me pics!) for my FO's
5. frog the swatch I did and reswatch for mystery project # 6294, in hopes of the recipient recieving it in time for, well I guess I missed winter. Next winter?
6. Really, really try to find pattern for 1200 yds of Green Mountain Spinnery's mountain mohair. Maybe even purchase vogue stitchionary for such purposes.
7. do more work on mystery project # 6992, as I would like it done before winter next year too.
8. Congratulate myself on bucking the knitted christmas present trend and continue making things for people just cause I think they'd like them.
9. SLEEP