Oh woe is me...

My computer is not happy. Not happy I tell you. In fact, I think it is down right depressed. It can hardly hold it's head up long enough for me to read a single blog post. I have taken drastic action, and resorted to using the kids computer to post to my blog, seeing as how it is taking my brilliant yet extraordinarily busy husband a while to sort this out. My lovely laptop suffers from that most awful of mac maladies...the spinning beach ball of death. Less than 5 minutes online, and away it goes. Unable to stand the awful sunlight of the blogsphere. Sigh. What's a girl to do?

Anywhooo...

We are off to my MIL today, for a lovely swim and family visit. These visits are particularly wonderful when I get to go through her extensive yarn stash. WARNING:To the faint of heart, or the simply prejudiced...LOOK AWAY! She is a crocheter. She is a wonderful crocheter, and I can say with some familial pride that she has won ribbons on everything she turns in for judging in the country fair. She makes lovely baby blankets and has made me some lovely things to wear as well. And, just like me, only began her craft some 2- 3 years ago. It is so much fun having someone else in the family who is passionate about yarn, even if she does pull it round with a hook (I keep telling myself that one does not give this to ones MIL as a birthday present, but I might just fall down and have an accident round about August for that one.. How can you resist?) It is also good for giving my husband a -um- reasonable benchmark for what a stash should REALLY be. My paltry basket (or three) is nothing. Don't worry that the yarn is taking over the bedroom. It's wonderful fun! Multi-purposed, strong, soft, flexable, bending to your will, as you insert the stick in the hole....

But I digress.

I have been having a particularly wonderful morning knitting on my Retro Redux Shrug from the Lace Style book I got at my LYS the other day. I finally figured out how to NOT drop the stitches on the Brioche pattern, and even better, how to correctly pick up said stitches when they do fall, so as not to disturb the crossings that make up the lace between the chained rows. It has been fun. I got to stitch up the sleeves yesterday, and have been working on the ribbed edging that creates the collar and borders the opening that your arms go through. One of my particular interests has been in the purl stitch. It has always seemed less graceful than the knit stitch, and yet so vitally important to knitting. So as I continued my continental purl I decided to switch it up a bit and do the combination purl stitch that I have heard so much about from Annie Modesitt on her knitting site and on her Knitty Gritty episodes. It is indeed wonderful fun, very smooth, and yes, graceful. But it seats the stitch differently on the needle. This is fine for back and forth knitting. But not so smooth for in the round. I found that I could purl through the back loop when going in the round, much the way you need to knit through the back loop to right the stitch and not cause a twist on the back side of the purl. But this made the movement somewhat less smooth and graceful for me. Soooo, now what? I remembered a fairly recent post to the Knitlist about a new (to me) purl method called the Norwegain Purl. I am intrigued. Could this be the answer to my quest? (And wouldn't it be just too cool to be able to say "yes, I can purl 3 different ways in the continental method" Okay, so I'm a geek. But I am a knitting geek, and I know that I am in good company. So I stretched my fingers, and employed my best google-fu. Norwegian Purl. Cool. Knitting Help had a very cool tutorial, I checked a few others, and went to work. Once you get the hang of it, it is actually very smooth, and if anyone is actually watching you knit they will do a double take as you do this little dance with the needles, and ask out loud "how did you do a purl stitch with the yarn in the back?" Ahhhh. My knitting kata has you perplexed? Cool. let me show you how! So I am really enjoying this final part of my little shrug, gleefully doing my 2x2 ribbing, and waiting for someone to notice. Ultimately, for grace and ease, I have to go with the combination purl, but I think I will only use it when I need to go back and forth. The Norwegian purl is it for knitting in the round. And bonus, both produce a neat, tight stitch without a lot of extra tugging in order keep tension even. Yup, I'm in knitter geek heaven today!

On a side note, after visiting one of my best friends online today, I learned that she was invited to Ravelry, and I have just one question...How do you get invited to Ravelry? Do I have time to be invited? Ah screw that... from what I hear Ravelry is like dessert, and there is ALWAYS room for dessert.


So, without further ado I"m...

"Over the river and through the woods, to Grandmother's house we go..."