No knits for you!

So I haven't been knitting that much lately... well save for a little charity project that Compatto is organizing. I've been in many times since my last post about them, and I'm really getting to like it there and keep wanting to go back. It doesn't hurt that I run by there about 3 times a week these days. I'm trying to convince myself that I'm training for a half-marathon, but I do have issues with follow-through at times. Keep me honest, and keep asking me about it!

Anyway, I did manage to finish a DH's godson's sweater on Tuesday at SNB this week. For such a small sweater, boy did it have a million ends to weave in! I'll post the FO picture at some point when it's finished drying. IF that ever happens.

So I'll leave you today with pictures. Yes, I know, wedding and honeymoon pictures are SO trite, but that's all I have and I still have yet to finish going through them all. And I swore to myself that I'd post about my entire honeymoon, so you are unforunately the ones who have to suffer through the slideshow.

For some reason, I really like this picture. Can't explain it, except that I think it's because neither of us looks like we have a stick up our butts posing for the camera. And well, we look happy. Can't ask for much more than that, right?

Routeburn Track Jan 1-3
The Routeburn Track is designated as one of New Zealands' Great Walks. They apparently go through and designate some of their hiking paths that they think are particularly beautiful or whatnot as Great Walks and then put in extra plush facilities. I think I'd agree that this one was a great walk. It was my first multi-day hike and yes, I carried a pack with my gear in it. It only weighed about 15 pounds, but I'm still proud of myself for doing it!


Anyway, here we are looking clean on our first day... that wouldn't last. This was just one of many mini waterfalls we encountered on the first day of the hike through the forest. Lots of crystal blue streams and swing bridges. We stayed at the most flash (not flash pasteurized as I originally thought, but rather swank, fancy, upscale) cabin you could imagine in the wilderness: gas stoves, mattresses, lights at night, flush toilets and running drinkable water were all provided. This was the view from our cabin at the Routburn Falls.

The second day we ascended above the tree line and walked up to a saddle between two mountains. I can't tell which is exactly the view from the saddle because it was all just so darned gorgeous, but here's what I think it looked like:

After the saddle, we walked along a very dry ridge which was really weird considering the lush green terrain we had experienced the day before. It's a good thing we like mountains because that's pretty much all we saw for this entire section of the track. We then descended back into a different type of forest that reminded DH of the Ent forest from Lord of the Rings and then arrived at our cabin. Again with a spectacular view:
The last day was spent again circling around a valley along a ridge with intermittent breaks in the forest to reveal more mountain scenery, but the highlight of the day was definitely the giant waterfall:

We like waterfalls. I don't like how dirty I was by this time, and thankfully you can't smell us here, but we still had fun.

And I dare say that I might have liked this hiking thing. *gasp!* Don't let DH find out or else he may send us on some two week winter camping expedition through the Andes with a 3000 vertical gain daily.

Lost

So I got an email this weekend from Karen over at Yarn is my Metier. What the heck does metier mean, btw? Dictionary.com says: an activity for which one is particularly suited; forte. Wow, that didn't make it onto my GRE word list... Gotta learn something every once in a while. Anyway, she's just made up a very lovely sleeveless mock turtleneck top that she's in the process of writing up into a pattern and is looking for test knitters. I had to turn her down though I felt honored being asked to test knit... that's definitely a first, so thanks for thinking of me Karen! Anyway, my guilt is kicking in, so I just thought I'd point people in her direction in case she still needs volunteers.

So the reason why I turned her down is because I have a bit of a project list that's due by Christmas. Here's my project role call through the end of the year:

1. Finish Hoodie Boogie Rock v1.0 for my grandmother
2. Modify Hoodie Boogie Rock to get v2.0 for my grandfather - no cables, probably just a seed stitch or garter stitch border and big chest stripe
3. Modify Petrol for my other grandfather to get a different gauge because for some reason 20/4=4 to me and I ended up buying a light worsted yarn when the pattern asks for heavy worsted
4. Finish designing an intarsia in the round hat for our friend DL. It's gonna be in GGH Samoa in dark pink (#99) with a chocolate brown (#95) skull and cross bones design on the front and DL RAWKS duplicate stitched onto the inside hem. This is DL and yes he's single, and no he doesn't usually look like someone's taken a smudge tool over his face... just respecting his privacy:
5. Have to finish unbiased 1 and make unbiased 2 for my future SILs.
6. Take a few valium because I'm starting to feel a panick attack come on already as there are fewer than 60 days left to complete this!

Speaking of La Cabeza Grande, here's a progress pic on Hoodie Boogie Rock v1.0. The hood isn't really that large, it's just a poorly photographed perspective issue. I still have to weave in ends and do the armhole and pocket edgings, but the main part of the knitting is done I'd say. Surprisingly, no major spaz attacks on this one, though I'm not entirely convinced it'll fit my grandma. It's zippered, so she can wear it open and I'm taking measurements this year to do better next year!

I did learn something on this project though. There's a good reason why hooded garments still have neckline shaping and pick up stitches around the shaping:

Those massive holes? Yeah, I think that's why. I'm going to cross my fingers and hope that when weaving in ends it won't look nearly as funky and my grandmother will love my effort anyway.

But I saw that Wendy was doing a hooded vest as well over at Knit and Tonic and was having problems with her hood. This next shot is for Wendy:

No, I didn't just let out a big one, I'm just camera shy, and thank goodness for the hood because it's definitely a bad hair day. Anyway, I think that the hood came out ok, despite the little bit of a nipple or something at my crown. The trick to avoiding the sand people look is something I found in Vogue Knitting Fall 2005 issue: matched decreases at the middle back of the hood. I graduated my decreases since the back of my head isn't a continuous slope.

I just wish that I had seen one of the comments on Wendy's post above before I started all of this. There's apparently a free pattern that's not much different from what I came up with and I wouldn't have had to bastardize 3 patterns to get there. Oh well. I guess mix and match knitting can be rewarding.

Oh and the title of the post? Well, that's because of my weekend. I went for a walk on Saturday at Joshua Tree. It started out leisurely enough, but then we apparently made a wrong turn and ended up bushwhacking for the next five hours. After 12 miles, we finally found the car again and I lost my appetite from not eating all day and, according to my heart rate monitor, burning 2900 calories. I also lost the desire to hike in the desert again where the guidebook instructs you to follow the wash for a mile or so and shortly thereafter find the unmarked hard to follow trail until you reach what used to be a burn area. If that's the best description they could come up with, we should have known better! Anyway, here's the view of Fan Canyon, and the only picture we managed to take during 7.5 hours of hiking.

trip report

Went to Yosemite this weekend and managed to make a good amount of progress on my Tivoli-T. I started out just under the armpit, but it's amazing what 12 hours on the road can do for your knitting progress:

Okay, I know, some people finish their entire Tivoli in about that amount of time, but I'm possibly the world's slowest knitter, so this is leaps and bounds for me!

Speaking of which, I attribute the whole thing to being an English knitter. I spent a considerable amount of time practicing my Continental knit stitch. I think I'm almost proficient... except that I can't work any sort of decrease, and I haven't even tried any increases yet. I guess more practice is necessary.

So on the drive up, I got more details on this pissing contest Ryan has entered. Apparently, his co-workers are trying to prove how macho they are by managing to knit extremely manly things. I don't particularly understand the logic in it, but if it means that I get to teach him to knit and he learns willingly, I'm psyched. We talked about different design options, and Ryan has decided that a felted intarsia project will be the perfect first knitting project for him and will win the contest. A grey beer cozy with a red lip and bottom and a red "block" O. For those in the know, that would be Ohio state colors.

Perfect, now all we need is red and grey wool. I don't have any and the contest ends August 22, so that means no ordering Wool of the Andes from KnitPicks. So that means a trip to the yarn store. Yay! Wait, when do we have time for this??? So fate swooped in, and intervened by dropping a yarn store into the middle of the gas station restaurant that we had dinner at on Saturday night. Talk about my dream come true! Having delicious lobster taquitos and a mango margarita and being able to stock up on some Cascade 220 for Ryan's felting project! All with the ambiance of a Mobil gas station. Only in California, I say. For those interested, such a gas station is located at the junction of 395 and 120 outside the Tioga Pass entrance on Yosemite's east side. The restaurant is located inside the gas station convenience store and is called Whoa Nellie Deli. We had an argument in the gas station over the color of the yarn. He thinks I'm insane, but I swear there's a lavender tinge to this yarn (color 9324), but when I photographed it, it looks absolutely grey (sigh):

On the adventure front, we stayed in Tuolumne Meadows and did a day hike from the campsite in Porcupine Flats to North Dome. The best part of the hike: a very white tree of Gondor-like semi-dead tree near the top of North Dome:

Yes, that's Half Dome in the background. We went into the valley on Sunday, and I have to say that while El Cap is downright jaw dropping, the theme-park feel made me want to stay away. We took a look at Midnight Lightning, but I think someone was on crack when they said that there's a lightning bolt shaped hold on that problem. I just didn't see it. And no, I didn't even try to get off the ground on it... I know better than to try a boulder problem when it's 90 degrees out!

Oh, and don't fall for the pea soup advertisements at the Spike and Rail Restaurant in Selma on the way back on highway 99. It's not all that. There's supposed to be another pea soup place that's amazing... Oh well, next time.