the Akamai Knitter

First I was going to make this ball of yarn into the Damson.  When that didn’t work out, I attempted the Travelling Woman. Only I was defeated by the sheer simplicity of achieving a certain amount of stitches after knitting a certain number of plain stockinette rows.

How much of an idiot am I? :P

So this sad ball of yarn,

is trying very hard to become the Sunbird (Ravelry link).

It hasn’t been easy as not only has my thumb still slowly healing, but I’ve also had the stomach flu since this past Thursday.  I’m much better now and since there are no plain stockinette rows to confuse me, the shawl is taking shape.

Hopefully the third time’s the charm. :)

Now revel in the cuteness, but excuse the late night crappy photo.

Happy Wednesday, everyone!

Last week, a few of my friends and I got together for coffee and lunch. The local Starbucks was really crowded and the only table we could snag was way in the back next to the blenders and coffee machines. It was a little hard to hear each other over the noise. As you can see in the pictures, the lighting also sucked.

Kim is on the left knitting away on her Februaray Lady Sweater, while Joy is doing mystical things with her phone when she should have been working on her Garter Yoke Sweater.

The lovely Barb worked on her Two Hearts sweater which she has since finished.

Eventually we all got hungry, so we went to BluWater Grill for lunch. The food there is amazing and it’s only about 5 minutes away from my house.  You’d think with it being so close I’d have been there more often, but this was only my third time there in the 5 years it’s been open.

I ordered the fried fish sandwich.

It was fabulous and so were the fries.

In other news, we can sleep better at night now that Castle and Dollhouse has been renewed for second seasons.* At least that’s the scoop according to one source. Another source isn’t so optimistic about Dollhouse, but it seems more then one site is saying the same thing about Castle. Yay!

Bones was a little strange, but overall I kind of enjoyed it. Of course I missed the couple of minutes of the show. My stupid DVR didn’t catch it all and I haven’t gotten around to seeing it on Hulu. Evil DVR.

The last 10 minutes of Grey’s Anatomy made me cry. Evil Shonda Rhimes with her evil cliff hangers. Even though I knew something like this was on the horizon, I’m still dying to know who’s going to be back for the next season and who’s not.

Look! I took a picture of the sky! On a Saturday! Isn’t it boring?

I hope you’re all having a great weekend! Go Magic! Go Rockets! Woot!

*Or at least I can. :P

On Sunday the Honolulu Academy of Arts had a family event and they invited us Aloha Knitters to demonstrate and display our wares.  I took along a few of my shawls and my spinning wheel made its first public appearance with me.

Dorothy and Veronica also brought along their wheels and we became a sort of row of spinning wheel soldiers. (I’m supposed to be in the middle.)

spinning!

May brought along her fabulous mutant bunny.

Mutant Bunny!

Teri brought her lovely afghan squares.

teri's afghan squares

Patrice brought her gorgeous freeform crocheted pieces.

freeform crocheted afghan

freeform crocheted purses

You can tell by the happy faces the demo was a success.

Kai and May

Despite grabby hands and parents that insisted we were spinning cotton, I had a really good time. I hope the Aloha Knitters get a chance to do more of these types of events. If you’d like to read more about it, the lovely Acornbud took some pictures of her own. I might even be in one of them.

I have a lot more catching up to do, but I think I’ll save that up for another day. I gotta ration out the blog fodder. ;-)

Happy Tuesday, everyone! Thanks for reading!

It was another outrageous night at Aloha Knitters. I had told blogless Michelle that I was cheering for the Green Bay Packers all the way once the Dallas Cowboys got eliminated from the playoffs. To test the waters of my allegiance she asked me if I’d be willing to wear the cheesehead hat. I told her not only would I wear it, I’d be willing to document it.

True to her word, she brought the cheesehead hat to the next meeting which was last night. True to my word, I wore it and had it documented.

I decided if i was going to wear a ridiculous hat and have it paraded on the Internet then I was going to do it in style. So I give you “Opal in the Cheesehead Hat“.

Michelle also donned the Cheesehead Hat to show her fightin’ Pack spirit!

Those weren’t the only antics of the night. Michelle has been working on a scarf hoodie in some gorgeous colors. She graciously modeled it for us. :)

Just imagine how that scarf will warm you up in the frigid north!
Veronica and blogfree Ariana were comparing sock heels. I’m not so sure that there was much technical discussion involved as there were giggles.

Good times. Good times.

Here’s wishing you good times this weekend! I promise to come back with some actual knitting content soon. :-)

It was another wild and crazy night at Aloha Knitters with another unbelievable turnout of knitters and crocheters. Would you look and see how many of us there are? in Hawaii? (And these are just the ones that bother to show up at meetings. Just think of all the others lurking in their homes, too busy to come.)

Among the throng was a new addition. Introducing Shannon! This gorgeous boy is only 3 months old. I find it singularly amazing to be able to say that I knew him when he was still in his Momma’s belly. And he is so well behaved! I haven’t heard him cry yet, though this is his second meeting. His momma (Chris K.) must be so proud!

Also at the meeting was Kris of Bockstar Knits and wouldn’t you know she was destashing. As much as I tried to resist, I couldn’t pass up a skein of Wollmeise in the Spice Market colorway. Such rich, saturated colors! Besides, what are the chances of me seeing this rare yarn again? So I really couldn’t pass this up.

I’m not sure what pattern will eventually be used with this yarn, but I’m thinking something textured like Nutkin, though I just realized the model was made with this exact yarn. How boring of me to make an exact copy. Vinland might also work too. This might even be the yarn for the Marina Piccolo, which I’ve been dying to make. The ideas are percolating. Opinions welcome.

So, we had knitters. We had crocheters. We had babies. Okay, it was one baby, but what a baby! And we had yarn. There was also some apple pie. Mmm. All in all, another great night with my knit buds.

As for the weekend? I plan on hitting the bead store for some wire. If you see more earrings in the future, you’d be right. With the NFL Playoffs this weekend, there’ll be plenty of time for beading and knitting.

In the meantime, happy Friday! Keep safe and knit happy!