Random update

It's my third meat free day and I have to say that so far I am loving it! This long holiday weekend may be a little tricky since we have the boys (and for an extra day . Ugh.) and we'll be doing Fourth of July activities which will almost inevitably include barbecue. Eh, I'm not going to fret about it. I know it's too soon to be sure, but I think I can feel a difference. My digestion seems to be having fewer issues, so we'll see what happens.

I'm knitting a summer top. I had an idea in my head, drew a couple of sketches, and then went online to see if I could find something similar. Is it still my design if I take disparate elements from several different patterns, change them substantially but still use them as inspiration, and combine them in a totally new way? I think maybe it is. I'm using the patterns as help in construction instead of as actual patterns, so I think I'm okay here. It's not like anyone will be able to look at my finished piece and say that it looks awfully similar to another one. I'm really looking forward to finishing this one and having my first real wearable that I've designed and knitted. Hopefully my notes will be good enough to make a real pattern from. Pictures as soon as there's something to show.

I planted some herb seeds a week or so ago and they are beginning to sprout. :)

I really don't want to have the boys tonight (or at all) but M says how much he wants to spend time with them... then when they are here no one wants to spend any time actually doing anything together. What's the point of them being here if they are just going to stay in their room on their computers the whole time?

Bad cramps today. Ouchie. I slept on the couch last night with the heating pad and will probably go curl back up with it as soon as I am finished here.

A new year is always a trifle intimidating for me. So much promise and so rarely have I capitalized on very much of it. This year needs to be different. It has to be. I can't continue to live in the isolation and despair that has threatened to overwhelm me for so long. While I don't expect to become widely read here or to make friends through blogging, I do need a forum in which I can release some of the toxicity that has been building up inside of me for so long.
Hopefully I'll stick with this one, put up some of my knitting patterns and have a place to share my rather skewed view of the world. Will I stick with it this time? I would like to, but sometimes the guilt and shame so overwhelm me that I can barely lift my head. I think that perhaps writing about it will ease some of that unwarranted self loathing and allow me to breathe more freely. Don't expect much.
I have been knitting a lot the last couple of months, though, and I've posted just about all of it on Ravelry. Oh, how I love Ravelry. I could wax rhapsodic about that site for hours, but instead I will just say that if you knit (or crochet, I think) and you aren't a member yet, you should really sign up. It's free and the images are linked through flickr, which is also free (up to a point).
I finished knitting a hat last night for my mom. She sent me a picture of a cabled, somewhat slouchy, cap with a brim and asked if I could make something similar but that would cover her ears. I finally settled on the Sam Hat from craftster and made some minor modifications that had some major repercussions regarding the final outcome of the hat. Here is the original









and here is my version
It is freaking huge. I used a tubular cast on with 88 sts and did the K1, P1 ribbing for about 2 1/2 " and then had the body of the hat at 121 sts instead of the called for 110. I also used 10s instead of 8s. It was my first time putting a brim on a hat and it was a bit tricky for me. I wanted to make it convertible, so that the brim could be snapped on and off, but I couldn't find my snap tool last night, so it just got sewn on. Not sure why I didn't pick up the stitches and knit it on per the pattern, but I didn't.
I really like the pattern itself and will probably make another one soon.