In the meantime, if you're desperate to correspond, try emailing me at jon@thejonblog.com

Talk to you soon :-)

And knitting photos!

Yay!

And maybe I'll even get the comments fixed...

Mom has started knitting for the baby, too, but I was on a quest for the yarn to make the perfect baby blanket. It took a little convincing, but I talked my parents into the two hour drive to Lansing to visit ThreadBear. We spent about three hours at this wonderful yarn mecca, and I found inspiration in yarn. Of course, it had to be fingering weight yarn, which means that this blankie, which will be even a bigger intarsia nightmare than the last one, will take about forever. Lucky the baby's not due until December.

Now, we're just waiting for the yarn to show up in the mail... and then you'll get a photo!

In actual knitting progress news, I'm almost done with the back of the bunting I'm working on. I'll shoot a photo when I get the box of the new yarn for you, ok?

Bear with us while we get this fixed.

Thanks!

I was trying to make a smoothie for breakfast, but something went terribly wrong. I am most saddened. Although it's good to know that there's a Bed, Bath & Beyond near my house which will be open in 45 minutes, so I can get a new one.

On another topic, how great is iTunes? I found a version of Shirley Bassey singing "Get This Party Started." It rocks in a bizarre way.

I have been knitting; I got about another inch of the orange rectangle done last night, and plan to spend some more time on it today. It's still not really photo-worthy. I mean, who wants to see a rectangle of orange garter stitch made on super tiny needles?

I sort of came back to consciousness next to a bar that was closed. I know that I had gone there with people who were drinking. Seriously.

I went to McDonald's and I'm pretty sure they gave me my "food" for free. Seriously.

I then walked home. And the sun is coming up. And I have to be awake soon. Because I have an 8:30am breakfast meeting.

No. Seriously.

Ooooooooooooooops...

It's the Jennifers, singing that song.

I did.

Only it was 9:00pm when I awoke.

Ooops. Guess I was more jet lagged than I thought. Especially because here's what happened when I was awake, starting at 9:00pm. I ate some food. Then I got tired again and went back to bed. Until 8:00am this morning.

Messed up, I know. Especially since I had grandiose plans for yesterday, my day off from work.

I was going to go to the Verizon store to pick up my new toy, as mentioned yesterday. I was also going to go to the framing store, for two reasons. I bought a fabulous aboriginal artwork in Australia that needs to be framed, and my college diploma needs to be reframed. I'm rather pissed, because I spent a lot of money on the framing in the first place, and the diploma, made of sheepskin, has warped and buckled.

At least I have today off and can add these errands to today's list.

But I can never get back that knitting time. And my orange garter stitch rectangle is starting to miss me...

It's cold and nasty and windy rainy weather here in Sydney today, and supposed to be similar tomorrow. Good weather to wear a nice hand-knit sweater. Only I left mine in NYC. Maybe it'll just have to be good weather to stay inside my hotel room and knit.

The trip is fun so far. I had a bout of food poisoning or something, which left me out of commission on Thursday, but what can you do? I didn't really even feel like knitting, so you know I was sick!

Sydney's a great city, and it's full of hot guys, so we can't complain about that. And the hot guys have Aussie accents, which doesn't hurt matters one bit... So maybe I better leave the knitting behind in the hotel room and get out there and meet more Aussie boys! Not a bad idea, methinks...

I am (ab)using a pattern from Kaffe Fassett's "Children's Album" to make what will be a lovely (hopefully) baby blanket.

There it is, posing on my knee.

I won't be working on it for a few weeks at least, as I'm currently at the airport, about to embark on a vacation to Australia. Not to fear, though. I have travel knitting: a garter stitch baby bunting from Dale book 142.

There's undoubtedly loads of stuff to update anyone who might stumble across the blog about... so keep coming back and find more details soon. At least, after I get to Australia!

Because even I need a change of pace from the fair isle...

When I get some better lighting, I'll photograph it for you. It's blue and orange and fabulous - made from Schaeffer Anne. And since I have huge-ass feet, I knit almost all of it on a 12" long Addi - US1 - so it went really fast. AMazing how much faster it is to knit a sock when you don't have to switch from needle to needle. Quite a lot of fun! You see, I knit the whole big ole sock in less than 5 days!

And what else.... hmm... Good news from my boss at work. A promotion of sorts, at least in the prestige department. I don't think it will come with a raise, but it's still a big deal and I'm excited about that. And, have you ever watched the movie "Madagascar"? It's really cute. I watched it on my TiVo tonight while I was finishing up the sock. Great fun!

Now it's time to either go to sleep or to start the next sock. Hmmmmm.

OK, so it's not the best photo (I shot it with my phone. Give me a break. I'm lazy.) But it does show you that I'm through one full repeat of the pattern on the sleeve. And given that I haven't spent a ton of time knitting it since I cut the steek on Friday, I think that's pretty good. And it gets better because the rounds keep getting smaller! I'm going to Washington, DC tomorrow, and I'm going to take Z with me. You may even bump into us at Knit Happens, because I'm contemplating going there for some fun and games. Plus, Kristine is just super-cool.

What else? I'm going back to Ohio to visit my mom and dad next week; Mom wants to start a new knitting project so I'm going to help set her up with something fun to make. Probably a baby blankie, but we're not sure.

In other, other news, well, that's kind of it. I have gallstones, which is of course not exciting. I have to schedule an appointment with another specialist to find out what happens next. I will keep you posted!

Also, a big thanks to all the advice you've given me lately, from quilting frames to Scottish knit bloggers. You're all the best!

Zauberflote, that's who! I thought it might be too hot to muck about with all that wool, but the feel of that Scottish 2-ply turned out to be too much to resist. I had Friday off, so I took her down to Knit New York and first I grafted the shoulders together. Now that would be a silly photo because, well, you can't even see where the grafting is, because I've figured out how to do it decently.

The timing worked out really weird, though. I had a horribly strong caffeine buzz (yay for iced coffee at KNY) right when it was time to whip out the Ginghers and snip snip snip through the first steek. I decided to cut her left arm first, so voila, look what we have:

If I had taken a picture now, you'd see that she has about 3 inches of arm, too, but, well, I have to save something for later, now, don't I?

In other news, we're still looking for good recommendations of somewhere to buy fantastic yarn in Scotland. Anyone with great advice, post to the comments, and hopefully it will work! Thanks!