Calling all Knitters! Calling all Knitters!

Please be on the look out for this handbag.















Knitted and felted by yours truly for my daughter Olivia. It is 8 inches wide by 6 inches tall. This mostly pink, with blueish-purple and yellow tiger-striped patterned looking bag with the handles twisted together and connected by using "the kitchener stitch" was last seen at the Super Target in Chaska, Minnesota. It did make it into the lost and found there after we left the store .....(turned in by a rather nice young cashier lady...who remembered my daughter paying for her candy out of it.) But when we went back to pick it up, it was nowhere to be found. I need your help. It has lots of sentimental value. Sentimental value for me....not my daughter. She could have cared less about this beautiful little Sophie bag that I made her from a $35.00 skein of merino wool yarn I bought last Mother's day at the Sheep and Wool Festival in Lake Elmo. (For more details on my visit there click here.)

Approach suspect with caution. I repeat. Approach suspect with caution. You will know it's my bag because it is one of a kind. Do not put yourself in harms way over it. Although, I would be quite flattered if anyone did to get it back for me. You may choose to give her/him my blog address so that they will know how to contact me and return it to its creator. You may choose to copy this picture and keep it on your person at ALL TIMES in the event of needing immediate proof. But whatever you do......and I repeat again..... YOU MUST NOT PUT YOURSELF IN HARMS WAY....(unless of course, you think it absolutely necessary)

A $35.00 LYS gift certificate will be awarded to the person who recovers any information leading to its retrieval. Thanks.....and spread the word!

The Knitting Princess and the 14 skeins of Pure Evil yarn

Once upon a time there was a Knitting Princess, who lived in a place that was similiar to the Garden of Eden. We'll call it Eden Prairie for now. This fairy princess was happy.......until one day she bought 14 skeins of beautiful Cashsoft Aran blue yarn at $8.50 a skein to make a gorgeous sweater for her best friends' coming birthday and well..........well.......

Ah, who am I kidding? I couldn't construct a clever lovely fairy tale if my very life depended on it.

Basically, I bought the yarn. I knitted about 70% of a sweater. Didn't like the way it was turning out, so ripped out the whole damn thing and thus decided that it absolutely IS okay to own (yet another) over-sized scarf that I probably won't ever even wear.

However, for those of you up for a really great (based on true life events) fairy tale about a knitting princess and an evil afghan......click here. I promise it to be a fun read by a REAL writer friend of mine.

Anyway, long story short. I had been working on this sweater here for my best-est friend. (only in blue) and I wanted it to be an extra special birthday gift because I failed to send her a present last year. Nope, not even a card was sent. C'mon people, reserve your judgements. You all know how it is. You can't think of the perfect gift to give to someone who really means a lot to you, and so you sit on it, and sit on it, and sit on it some more, thinking that an over the top idea will suddenly come to you in your sleep, or pop into your thoughts at the most unexpected time. Only, you wait, but it doesn't come and the further into the past the birthday gets, the bigger and better the gesture has to be in order to justify to yourself (not the recipient, of course) why it has taken you so long to do something so simple. Finally, you realize that the time limit to send a gift has expired. So, you decide to forget about it for now and vow to yourself that you will make up for the major oversight next year on her birthday.

Next year approaches quickly. You buy the yarn with Nov. 18th being the target date. You knit like a mad woman to finish it in time. November 18th....November 18th November 18th. In the mail at the latest by November 15th! It's starting to look a little somethin' like this














....and you don't especially care for the way the sweater is actually turning out, but it's okay. It's okay because it's a special sweater. A hand made sweater. A hand knit, first ever "Softwear by -lisaD." created with love, original sweater. Still knitting away while counting down....six weeks left.....5 weeks left .....4 weeks left.

With exactly one month left to go, a homemade card arrives from said best friend. It is a "Happy Fall" pumpkin extravaganza kind of card. It is gorgeous. A thank you call is placed via telephone to best friend. While on the phone with her, it is discovered (quite by accident) by the (calloused palmed) sweater knitter, that today, October the 18th, is in fact best friends' birthday. Not the 18th of November. but rather, the 18th of October. Oh Shit! I'm an idiot. No denying that the L in my name stands for Loser and not Lisa. Won't my mama be so proud of me?

I rant and rave and gush explitives profusely. .....and I start to unravel. The yarn. I start to unravel the yarn. Best friend deserves better than this pathetic and sad little wool number anyhow. Better do it fast.......If you unravel fast it won't hurt as much.

Maybe she'd like a scarf instead. Perhaps a cashsoft blue short-row knit extra extra extra long scarf for her birthday next year. In the very least, a card would be nice. A homemade handstamped extravagant (I'm making up for two years in a row) kind of card.

Okay, enough said.

Moving on....

Dear Rico,
I know that your 4th birthday was last April and your Baptism anniversary was in August, but please know that I haven't forgotten about you. Your handknit blue teddy bear is on its way.......(as soon as I finish knitting the ears on.)

Love from your Godmother,
-Nina Lisa


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Playing Hookey

Does anyone remember when playing hookey from school was a fun thing? You feigned sickness just to lay on Grandma's couch watching t.v. all day and got pampered and got served hot soup and crackers. and cocoa. Oh how I remember the cocoa. (good times...good times)

Anyway, I recall specifically playing hookey from school for two days back in 1971 (oops, that would be '81) to watch Luke and Laura get married on General Hospital. I was only 11 years old and I was addicted to my grandma's "stories" as she called them. That will be 24 years ago this November 16 and 17th. Okay, so I needed the use of the internet to figure out those exact dates, but still I remember those two days with great fondness. Happy Early Anniversary Luke and Laura!







OHMYGOD!
CHECK OUT THAT 80's veil.








Being ill these days is absolutely no fun at all. For one, if you call in sick it usually means that you really are sick. Either that or your (ahem) six year old daughter is. So here I am calling in sick to my Anything Goes (knitting class) at Coldwater collaborative (taught by the amazing Deb) for two Mondays in a row now.

I am quite literally sick and tired of missing class.

The first Monday, my DD Olivia had a fever that quickly got passed around to..... um........ME!

And.....

The second Monday, my parents arrived mid-sneeze to visit from Las Vegas. (That actually, is the fun part of this anecdote.) It has been great having them here, despite feeling so ill. I really wanted to take my mom to SnB with me last Wednesday, but It was definitely not a healthy day for me. My fellow stitch 'n bitcher's will appreciate my thoughfulness in not making an appearance, as badly as I wanted to. I did, however, manage to take mamasita over to Dunn brothers and to about a half a dozen other twin city coffee shops to sip and knit. She loved it. While here in the southwest suburbs of Minneapolis, she has accomplished knitting a button hole bag, a booga bag and a sophie bag. Can you believe it? 3 bags in one week? For a beginner, she is so quick to catch on.

I am now healthy again and feeling great..... and tomorrow is Monday again. Yay! Class at 9 am????????
Nope. Mom and Dad need a ride to the airport at 9:30. (sigh)

So, on one hand, it will be a sad day. :-( It's always sad for me when family leaves, as we don't have any family here in Minnesota. But, in the other hand I will be holding my new and first ever pair of addi turbo circular needles. So,it may not be quite the manic monday expected after-all.
(as she squeals with delight)

Lazy blogger!

Yes, I am a lazy blogger. I haven't posted in hmmmm, well, in a long time. The good news is that I have been knitting. A Lot! I am working on this mega turtle-neck Giraffe sweater. It looks like this.......
I am, however, knitting it in a greyish blue color. The yarn is called cashsoft Aran by classic yarns.... and it it sooooo devine to work with, even though I am allergic. I shall overcome! It is 57% extra fine merino, 33% microfibre, and 10% cashmere. It's the cashmere that is killing me. This pattern takes 14 skeins. Eeks! I am almost done with the front Yay!

Also, I am taking a really great class over at coldwater collaborative on Mondays. It is called the Anything Goes class. I am learning to short-row knit trying to use up my three skeins of Noro silk to make a pretty cool looking scarf.I have my next class tomorrow, and feel a bit guilty that I haven't worked on it since the last class. But to figure out this pattern, it really does need my full undivided attention, and it has been a crazy week, so I will pick it up again at tomorrow's class. I was going to use the Noro for the clapotis, but decided on a different and softer yarn for that.

I missed SnB last week. I feel disconnected from my fellow stitch n bitcher friends lately. (*pout-sniffle*) My loss. With all three kids in school now, how is it that I still can't find time to do everything that I want to accomplish? I do plan on going to the next stitch and bitch though, AND I plan on bringing a guest. MY MOM! I am so thrilled that she and my dad will be visiting us for a whole entire week. They live near Las Vegas and haven't seen the kids in about a year. My mom has taken up knitting and is in the process of felting bags for gifts, and so I will be helping her with that.

I have joined a health club and have made it my mission to get healthy. Ick. Not nearly as much fun as knitting, but I think it's about time I start thinking about a healthier me. Anyway, while at the gym, it is not rare to find me knitting in the cafe, sipping a protein smoothie while trying to cool down post work-out, or just waiting for my husband and kids to get done with their activities on the weekends. While there, I find how amazing it is at how many people stop and ask me what I am working on. I was just there on Friday and met a very nice lady named Mary (a fellow knitter/felter) and invited her over to SnB. I hope that she decides to come, as she seemed like a really lovely person.

So, I've done my duty now, and I have blogged. Not so bad. I suppose I could do this more often. I am off now to accomplish everything else on my "things to do" list and cross my fingers that it won't be another long stretch till blogspot and I connect again.