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Black and White Bathroom

I am trying to paint my black and white bathroom. This is the second time I've done it since moving into the house three years ago. It's not that I don't like the color, or lack thereof. It's that I Do like taking warm, OK hot showers, which produce steam, which does nasty things to paint, and apparently wall paper glue. So I am industriously scraping paint, like a good little painter when I notice that the wall paper (see top picture) is slightly curled at the top. Well I decided to see what would happen if I tugged a little bit. Whoosh off came the whole sheet of wall paper. An hour and two walls later I had just increased my painting job by half. Then came the hard part, the trip to Lowes. I decided that I had done this before, no problem, I'll go by myself and get what I need. I knew I needed Spackle, a roller, and some paint, white in color. Ok my knowledge base and the diverse range of stuff that goes into painting a wall is way, way, way different, like grass hut in the wilderness verses a big city penthouse different. So I am looking at the 7 different kinds of Spackle and other assorted goops that look like they might work with absolutely no clue about what to do. So being the open-minded, twenty-first century woman, what do I do? Call my husband, who knows a lot more about this than I ever want to, really. So I give him all the different names, (by the way glazing, not just for donuts), and he directs me to the one I need to purchase, I thank him and hang up the phone. Then I go over to the rollers, now one would think, one roller is the same as any other, Wrong! Five different kind of rollers, in various sizes and degrees of fluffiness. So I whip out the cell phone again. "How big is the roller" he tells me, "How fluffy do you think I need to get?" "How, what?" "How fluffy, you know some are more pouffy than others" big sigh from husband and the big burly contractor looking guy looking at the scrapers down the aisle didn't actually roll his eyes, but I could tell he wanted to. "Whatever you think looks good" was the reply on the other end of the phone. So I got a medium fluffy roller and a can of paint, not white though. I am so very, very cheap and the mistake paint was half the price of the plain white paint, so I bought a gallon of slate blue paint and some tape and away I went. The bathroom is now spackled and primed. Now I just need to paint and make a black white and blue bathroom.

Holly

Eye Candy Friday

Not exactly troubled waters.

Holly

Mother's Day Eye Candy

Happy Mother's Day

Holly

Eye Candy Friday

I like tulips

Holly

Podcasts...listen while you...whatever

I am addicted, yes, I admit it. I love to listen to podcasts while I knit, spin, do housework, whatever. It gives the brain something to do while the hands are busy with something else. (Sometimes it also provides the bribe for myself to do the housework.) I've been a TV knitter/spinner for quite some time, but the advantage to podcasts over TV is that I can continually look at my work so the chances of dropping a stitch is minimized. Here are all my current favorites, which can be found at i-tunes, which I find the easiest, or on their individual websites listed below. So here it is The List of my favorite podcasts:

Barnes & Noble: Meet the Writers: short interviews with authors about their writing.

[A brief note: There are several podcasts on this list about books and writers. I like learning about other people's creative processes, it inspires me, not just to write but to be creative in general. Hey, I think I've watched the appendices of the The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy at least 50 times, and I have no intention of ever making a movie. And now back to the list]

BritKnitCast: a monthly UK knitting/fiberarts podcast.

Cast On: The Venerable Brenda Dayne combines a great soundtrack with spoken pieces about a variety of knitting related topics. Very much "the knitting magazine for your ears."

Geek.Farm.Life: Two Geeks from the city now living on a farm in rural Indiana. (I lived in Indiana and miss it sometimes.) This is a really informative podcast that defies categorization. Andrew and Misty talk about all things farm-related, including spinning.

Joel Osteen: Positive messages, great Texas Accent

Lime and Violet: Their description is: a podcast for the yarn obsessed, which is true (Ok, yarn pr0n anyone?) it is also one of the funniest, upbeat things I have ever heard, it makes me happy.

NPR Books: Gleanings of NPR shows about books and authors

Sticks and Strings: More knitting, this time from a bloke in Australia. He has great essays and music too.

WGBH Classical Music: Classical musical offerings, great background music!

And that's The List
Holly

Sock Yarn

I have been so inspired by the sock fanatics over at the podcast Lime and Violet. I understand the basic concept of socks, but had only knit a couple of simple pairs before this. Of course, once I understand a basic concept the creativity kicks in so I thought I would go ahead a design a sock using one of my favorite lace patterns. Because I plan to submit this design to a publication I can't share particulars about the sock but I can wax poetic about the sock yarn. I was looking for a particular color (a light gold) and found my color in the Louet Gems. I ordered my yarn online from the Loopy Ewe, (a Fantastic shop, will definitely be ordering from them again). And sat to wait. The yarn showed up and was all that I expected and more. So soft and knits like a dream, I am knitting on size 1 needles and the definition in the lace pattern is beautiful. Another thing I love about this yarn is its durability. I decided to try toe-up socks for this particular pattern (now I have never done toe-up before, but I am nothing if not ambitious). After some research I came up with a way of beginning that I could do and liked the look of, however it took a try or two to get it perfect, so this yarn was cast on, actually like 4 times and was just as nice the fourth time as the first.



So here I am knitting away on my pretty golden yellow socks when, listening to Lime and Violet (they really are quite influential, enablers in the best sort of way), I heard about a sock contest over at Hill Country Yarns, so I had to enter. I ordered the chartreuse color of the sweet feet yarn. This pattern was not near as easy to come up with, but after some starts and stops I have come up with another lace pattern (I'm feeling the yarn-overs, what can I say), but completely different from my Gems socks. The yarn is also very different, for one thing it is actually sock weight, whereas the Gems is more of a lace weight. I am doing the pattern on twos and it is coming out quite nicely. I love the semi-solid nature of this yarn. It makes the design really pop! I was at first apprehensive about the feel of the yarn, it wasn't as soft as the Gems but once knitted it makes the most comfortable fabric. And that is my tale of two socks.
Holly