KnitFreak

Folks, the bitchin' ain't over yet. Check out this entry on Elemmaciltur's blog. Oh man... I'm getting sick of this.

Fortunately, the lady who did all the bitching said goodbye to the Stitch'n'Bitch thread in that chat forum... so I hope that was it.

The weather is really nice here today (the forecast said it would get up to 28°C/82°F!), so I might be able to take some nice knitting photos in good daylight. 

Once or twice a week, I go to Munich's Stitch'n'Bitch. Usually it's a whole lot of fun, there's a bunch of English native speakers, a few near-native speakers, and then me, of course, the German (who has been invited by one from the group), but I also speak English when I go there. At the group, we normally speak English (me too), and very very rarely somebody says a sentence in German. A couple of weeks ago, however, there was a German lady who had heard about our group, so she came along as well, although she didn't speak more than a few words of English. But this was fine with the group, well, with almost everybody in the group. There was one (English) lady, however, who got pissed off because the German lady dared to speak to her in German, and that's why she (the English one) left the group (after making rude comments). Now, this SnB is organized through a chat forum for English speakers in Germany, and that same lady is still around in that forum. The thing is, she doesn't come to the SnB nights any more (due to the "wrong" language usage, which didn't really happen at all), but she still is around in the SnB thread in that chat forum, critizising the others for inviting the "wrong", aka German, speaking people. 

I mean, when she has a problem with Germans, why is she still living in this country then? Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to start anything discriminatory here, but, come on, what do you expect when you live in a foreign country? That everybody adjusts to your needs and your language? If you want a German-free (or should I say "germ-free"?) environment, then don't leave your house and only invite the people you think speak the "right" language. But don't continue to annoy all the others with your opinion, because they don't share it. You seem to have a problem here, a rather large one I might add, so you should better get some help. After all, this is a free country, and yes, it's okay if you have an opinion like this, but don't try to control the group like this. You're not going there any more anyway, so what are you trying to do here? You're only making an idiot out of yourself. True, the name is "Stitch'n'Bitch", but you are obviously only looking for a place to bitch, so leave the rest of the group alone. People like you just make me want to throw up. This is supposed to be about knitting, and meeting other people. So, my English isn't good enough for you, because I'm German and you teach German students how to speak English? And this is the reason why, on weekends, you don't want to have to listen to Germans who speak "crappy" (not-perfect) English? If I discriminated against you because of your language, what would you say then? But you have the right to do so? What makes you so superior?

I needed to get this off my chest... back with some real knitting content soon. 

Now that it's getting warmer again, I'd love to knit something summery. I subscribed to Interweave Knits early this year, but for some reason the first issue takes ages to get to my mailbox (that's a long story...), so I couldn't look at the current spring issue. And other magazines... didn't contain anything that appealed to me. But I found something in an old IK summer issue - the Victoria Tank. It's so yummy and summery, so today I ran into town and started looking for the required yarn (I'm lazy with substituting... I actually haven't tried it before, and I'm too afraid to mess it all up), but I couldn't find it. I'm not sure if it's discontinued, or if it's simply hard to get. Anyways, the pattern calls for "Fortissima Cotton" by Schoeller Esslinger, which is actually a sock yarn, that's what I found out. Apparently it's pretty soft, with 75% cotton and 25% acrylic. There's a similar yarn by the same company, with basically the same name, but with wool blended in, as well as some cotton. That's not the one I need though... so if anybody has an idea where they still sell the Schoeller Esslinger Fortissima Cotton, let me know!

Had to work all week, and at night I was so exhausted that I didn't knit much at all. I had planned on blocking the back and front parts of Josephine, but not enough time. Maybe this weekend, hopefully.

Bought some yarn for a cardigan my sister wants me to make for my nephew for his christening in the end of may. Had to order some special circular needles on top of that because I couldn't get these sizes here.

Knitted a bit more on my red hot sizzling sock, but without much enthusiasm. Would like to start with the baby cardigan, but I have to wait for the needles. Didn't have the energy for taking pictures either. Hopefully soon!

Still thinking about the Starsky cardigan as well. Might not make it with the original yarn though, because the color choice isn't too big. Jordana Paige, the pattern designer, suggested substituting the original yarn with Debbie Bliss Merino Chunky... maybe. Still thinking.

Any more news..? Oh yeah, actually there are! There are two babies coming up, one from my friend Bianca in Melboure, she's expecting in August. The other one is a girl I went to school with, she's having her baby in September. I might make some booties and/or hats, but fortunately I'm not in a hurry here.
I went to Stitch'n'Bitch here in Munich last Sunday! And I'm planning on going next Sunday as well. More on this... well, some time when I have more energy.

I might have misfigured my ball circumference. I don't remember what I measured, that's why I'm not sure.
Do you think you can knit without knowing this measurement? If not, let me know, and I'll remeasure for you.

Yarn update tomorrow.

Does anyone know a tutorial for knitting socks on circular needles? I found one, for knitting 2 socks on 1 circular needle, but the tute only shows the casting on and not the rest. And I can't really imagine how the 2 socks are going to be knitted at the same time with that needle...
So, if you know anything, tutorials on the internets, or books (yes, I have heard of the Cat Bordi one. Is it any good?), I'd be happy to collect them here ;-)

As for the rest of my knitting, I'm still waiting for my Olympic/Sockapaloooza yarn, as well as for my Red Hot Sizzling Sock yarn. In the meantime I'm knitting happily away on Josephine, but I didn't want to bore you with repetetive pictures. I'll bore you with sleeve photos soon, in order to decide what sleeve-style I'd like to knit. But only if I don't get buried alive with Uni-work, work-work, house-work...

I knew that I had forgotten something!!!

There's another thing I signed up for: the Yarn Aboard! Amanda came up with the idea to make some kind of sock yarn swap, but all in the same box. So, she'll send some goodies for her pal in the box she received from Carola in Iceland who received it from Alison when she was in Germany last year, and her pal will send it to their pal who'll send it to their pal and so on until either all the pals received their goodies or the box breaks. It sounds like a lot of fun, doesn't it?

I'll leave you with the button of this rather unusual yarn swap because I need to get back to my books to study a bit before I go to therapy and start re-knitting Josi's left front tonight.

Okay, there was a lot going on lately in quite a short time and I didn't quite get to blogging about it. Partly because I was busy doing other stuff and I didn't want to be on the internets for a long time during the day, and partly because I didn't get to lay my fingers on the computer in the evenings due to a certain someone having a new computer game he's playing ever since (and he's getting a bit cranky when I'm at the computer and he doesn't get to play).

Where do I begin..? Allright, Kelli asked a question about signing up to the German Team... To be honest, I have no idea if somebody is really organised. There is a German Olympic Village though - in German. Maybe you'd like to check out there. Sandra seems to be the one in charge, so maybe email her or just leave a comment on the Olympic Village-site.

Also, check out the olympic buttons I made! I'm planning on making some more, but then there's the computer-thing again... I think I'll have to put my foot down some time real soon. Please feel free to save the buttons to your computer and put them on your blog. There are a few more buttons (in German) on Sandra's blog.
So you've probably guessed it already - I'm definitely taking part in the Knitting Olympics, knitting for Team Germany (hence the buttons), and I'm going to knit the Sockapaloooza Socks for my pal! Which brings me to the next point, I'll receive my pal's details some time soon, hopefully today! That's why I can't show you anything right now, but soon I hope. I can't wait to get started choosing the yarn, the pattern and stuff!

On the Josephine front I had to suffer a setback last night. I was three balls into the left front (I had a peculiar feeling about this left front for a while) when I finally got myself to check it with the right front (can you guess what's coming?) and - they didn't match. Somehow, I was knitting the left front way too tight, although I tried to make myself aware not to do so. Well, next time I knit it, I should actually do knit it more loosely... Last thing I did last night was frogging, but it didn't feel too bad. Is that weird? Maybe it was because Josi knits up rather quickly. It's strange, although this is quite a big knit, I don't feel it's taking ages to finish it. Maybe it's because the yarn is so thick.

Okay, I think now I've wrapped it all up. Yay! I finally got to write everything down! Apart from the stuff that I'm going to remember as soon as I'll log off the internets.

Irene asked about my stitchmarkers, whether I made them myself or not, and if so, how I made them.
Well, I did make them myself because I knew I needed some for Josephine. So I searched the internet for some stitch marker tutorials and bought some silver wire and a pair of universal pliers on top of my beads. As you can see, there's loads and loads of tutorials on the internet for stitch markers, so I won't give you another one. The tutorial which worked best for me was made by Poor Miss Finch (scroll down until 9th Feb '05), because I only had regular silver wire. I bent it just like Miss Finch did; in other tutes, you can see that they use a small piece of wire with some kind of stopper at the end. If you can find anything like that in a shop, it makes making markers a bit easier I guess, although the way I made my markers was very easy. It didn't take me very long either, I guess it was less than an hour for 6 stitch markers (hey! I was a beginner!), and when I made the markers I thought if I could possibly knit jewelry, like a bracelet or maybe a necklace. The silver wire bends quite easily, and I've heard of people who've knit stuff like that, although I've never really seen anything like that. Have you?

Oh, and I'd like to thank Amanda for her encouragement with Josephine. I'm about to start shaping the armholes on the back piece, and it was only last night when I discovered that I made a few wrong stitches in one of the cables at the bottom of the thing. At the very bottom of the whole thing I've knit. And I've knit about 6 balls already! Now, on the one hand my vanity tells me "do it right!", but on the other, my common sense says "what the f***, you're so far already, you'd have to start all over again. The mistake is like in the first or second row, don't bother!" I'm most likely to follow my common sense, but then I hear that vain little voice again... and then the common sense kicks in. It's a vicious circle.

- it's a stitchmarker!

These (above) were made with beads I bought in Murano, Italy, where they make the famous glass objects. The others below were made with beads I bought from a shop in Munich.