urban earth mother

So I haven't been working on the laptop bag lately, but have promised to finish it before beginning other projects. So I brought it to the laundromat and have made good progress on the second side. I'm halfway through this panel and then only need the sides top and strap! I fear the finishing will be my downfall, but it may be the one project spouse leaves me alone to work on (he seems to get jealous when I do things other than work on the computer next to him).

I had jury duty today for the third time. It was my second district court and once again we got let out as none of the cases that day ended up needing us. But this time, I planned ahead and called to see if I could bring my knitting. So here's the half-felted cloche I made while listening to daytime television for four hours. I actually finished it later because I ended up frogging the whole thing after three inches because it was too wide. Eh, that'll teach me not to do a guage swatch. The pattern is from One Skein Wonders using yarn I got from someone at work as a winter holiday (hell, choose which one you want to celebrate) gift.

I've been trying to hit the farmer's markets as much as possible this summer. It was difficult when my class was going as my favourite Monday market was out, as was Wednesday's. Still, there was always Tuesday. So this week, being spouse's first week at work, I've been all domestic and making dinner with all this bounty. Tuesday's market provided peaches (in the paper bag), yellow and green zucchini, green pepper, one scortching hot pepper, beets, and pickling cukes. The peaches became part of dessert for the night. A lovely peach custard. The cukes have made it into my first batch of pickles (excuse the focus issues) There are only two cucumers in there, so I still have more to experiment with the recipe

I've been perusing vintage patterns again (as is my wont) and found this little number from 1922. I bought a huge skein of Alpaca a couple years ago and have done nothing with it and think the Fairfield would work well on me. Just imagine a model just as frumpy, but with bigger boobs.

The Ubuntu bag is coming along nicely. The back is a bit scary right now (appologies for the blur). It will be better, and some of the holes filled once I've woven ends in and felted. Tomorrow I start the other side, and then it's just the side panels and top! I should post the color pattern too, since spouse worked so hard on it. It's 50x50, but I'm doing a bit more MC on the top, as per the original pattern from which I'm getting the dimensions.

Since I can't seem to stick with just one project until it's finished, I started another bag last night while I work on the shopping bag. I decided to do the laptop bag from Stitch 'n' Bitch Nation , but instead of stripes some intarsia. An no, I've never done proper color work before, so this is a challenge. Here it is with pattern by spouse. Yes, it's going to be an Ubuntu bag. It's a bit wonky, but I'm hoping the felting will help smooth out some of the irregularities. Here's a more "head on" image which shows the yellow circle a bit better. This is Lamb's Pride Bulkey on #15 needles, so I should have it done in under a week.

This is the bag I started this weekend. It's the Everlasting Bagstopper from this month's Knitty. My options were overexpose it with the flash or have it too dark to see without. I just couldn't bring myself to turn on the overhead lights in the office to really correct it. And yes, the rest of my desk is a mess too. Instead of hemp, I'm using a cotton from my stash. A friend gave me a HUGE bag of this (plus lots of great wool), and after making a dress, I still have several balls left over. I may make a hat as well just to get rid of the stuff.

So I've decided to start this back up again, but as a knitting blog. I've got tons of UFOs around the house, commitments to clear the stash, and one item in the planning stage for spouse. I plan to post some pics of things in progress and recently finished soon (probably later tonight). No, I don't expect responses (there are many other knitting blogs you could be reading). this is mainly just for me to log my progress and maybe encourage me to finishe things once in a while.