Sunday, July 13, 2008

PT school week 5, and FINISHED SOCKS!

Greetings, and Dear Cynthia,

It's knitting, so it's okay to not be so monogamous! I'm confident that most of our readers would agree. (In fact, I've seen the knitting bags of some of our readers, so I **know** this is true! :-)

I'm more than halfway through my summer school session. Last week I had a major practical exam, an anatomy lab identification exam, and an anatomy lecture exam. It was probably my most difficult week of the whole summer, and I'm feeling great that I got through it, not perfectly, though in good shape. Phew.
I am **finally** done with the "two socks at a time on one circular needle," and no offense to those of you who love the technique, but I couldn't be more thrilled to have that behind me and go back to knitting socks on four or five little pointy sticks, one sock at a time. It's true that I'll be more prone to "second sock syndrome," though I'll take my chances. On the plus side, I didn't have to count my rows as I went in order to make them the same length. On the big (HUGE) minus side, working with two balls of yarn throughout bordered on being too much like intarsia, and I spent a lot of time untangling the two yarn sources from each other.

And look, your show and tell about all of your dishrags got me going on a dishrag kick , too:My current dishrag stash was depleted, so I'm "re-stocking." One nice thing about dishrags is that I'm not supposed to care if there is a huge amount of color pooling... I just keep repeating to myself: IT'S A DISHRAG!

We're having a busy summer, though I'm having a great time with my classes. I still must **run** from the bus to my 7:45 class on most mornings, though occasionally DH drives to work and drops me off on his way. I've gotten back into a more normal workout schedule, too, exercising three or four times a week. It's not like I'll ever run a marathon or anything, though after some exhaled air gas measurements I did last summer in my physiology of exercise class, it's clear that even only 30 minutes three or four times a week makes an incredible difference in the way your body is able to utilize the oxygen delivered to your cells. One of these days I'll get on my "exercise is soooo good for you" soapbox... (I guess you've been warned that it's coming...)

This is what the path to the laundry room looks like, in spite of my mantra "keep the path to the laundry room clear, so that Mommy doesn't trip on something and break her neck:"I tell my kids that I am unable to see what is in front of my feet when I have a big laundry basket in my hands, so now it appears that they're making the obstructions taller so that I may see them. If this past week had been one day longer, I would have run out of clean underwear. As it was, dh ran out of his decent white undershirts and was donning a shirt having huge holes in the underarms on Friday. So, I spent most of yesterday getting caught up around the house paying bills, cleaning, laundry, etc.

Now I'm off to plan the dinner menu for the week and go grocery shopping. Have a great week!

Warm regards,
Laura (YarnThrower)

6 comments:

Marie N. said...

I think the kids were inspired by your ball band dish cloths. The cardboard building blocks have a similar look.

Sus said...

Congrats on getting past the half-way point! And you finished some terrificly bright and fun socks, there! I'm with you on the double points -- I'd knit everything on dpn's if I could. Love them! Don't love circulars! And I dont' know about anyone else, but I've noticed that the second sock goes faster and is way more fun than the first. So I don't mind doing them one at a time at all. SSS hasn't reared its ugly head... yet.

Marie -- You're right! That's awesome!! LOL!

Elizabeth said...

The socks are great! I'm another one who vastly prefers one at a time on double points. I started one pair on two circs and gave up on them about 3 inches into the ribbing.

Kitty Mommy said...

*snort* that your kids are making obstructions taller rather than *listening* and not blocking the laundry room door. Sounds like our kids would get along swimmingly!

While I'm normally not a fan of pooling, it looks really cool in the background of the ball-band bricks!

allisonmariecat said...

Ah, your kids have a sense of humor :) Very cute.

Congrats on the halfway point in summer school. That's fantastic.

The socks are lovely. I haven't tried two on one circ before, mostly because of the two balls and complicated instructions. I actually like dpns for socks...

Cindy G said...

Another vote for dpns (from another promiscous knitter). I avoid sss by starting two pairs at once (on two sets of needles, obviously), working a ways on one, then a ways on the other. Back and forth, back and fortrh until they both finish up at approximately the same time.

Love the colors in that pair!