I've been very busy recently.  Ended up working both Saturday and today as we're in a crunch to release a product.  It's been a case of fix one bug and introduce two new ones.  At least I get paid time and a half since I'm a contractor rather than a salaried employee.  I've been having trouble sleeping so with this on top of it, I'm really tired!  The product needs to be done by Friday EOD and I have a couple of other products to test so this will be another busy week at work.

Meanwhile, I felted the second basket and it's looking good.  I hope to finish crocheting the third, smallest basket and get it felted tonight so I can take the set to show off at Tuesday's knitting class.  I still need to re-do George's sock toe, but I might be able to do that on the bus to and from work.  Then it'll be time to come up with a new project.  Any ideas?  More socks? A knitted felted bag?  Another Faroese-style shawl?

I got some advice from a co-worker in another department and went out to the Mercury Support Knowledge Base.  I used a GetROProperty command to get the encoded URL and feed it back to the script so that I always have the URL created by the run.  I've also figured out how to parameterize the starting URL so I can change country, language, etc for our international purchase paths.  I'm feeling very good about my progress with QTP and VBScripting right now.

I felted the blue basket yesterday and wanted it tighter so I turned up the heat on the hot water heater this morning, then ran it thru the washer again tonight.  It's drying now.  Meanwhile, last night I finished the green basket (medium size), except for the handles as they need to be in the blue yarn and I need some more.  This basket holds only 5 of our stuffed animals.

I finished George's socks tonight at knitting class.  He tried them on and I need to re-do the toe on the left sock because it's a little tight.



And yes, there is a left sock vs right sock.  I'm knitting socks for George because his right foot is 2 sizes larger than his left foot.  This is the result of foot surgery he had when he was 10 years old.  At first I worried about how to distinguish the socks from each other: knit a L on one, R on the other; put a different color for a row on the sole; etc.  I didn't need to do any of that after all as the size difference is so obvious!  (Except in the foreshortening in this pic.)

I finished sewing up the sides Sunday evening.  I don't know why I put it off for so long other than I hate seaming.  It's really cute and I plan to take it to show off at my Tuesday evening knitting class.  Then I need to get it mailed off to the birthday girl. 

Happy Birthday, Sarah!

Tuesday night I started a crocheted basket to be felted.  The large size is huge as I'm using a 15mm hook.



I finished the basket, except for the handles, tonight and filled the basket with our stuffed animals that live in the living room.  I was able to fit 7 in this basket.

I'm a little behind on the Shrug for Sarah as I've been distracted by two other projects and working late at work.  I've finished the knitting.  Sarah's birthday is Tuesday so I need to get this done!  Actually she'll be shocked if a present were to arrive on time.  I've got Maggie and the girls trained.  They now like getting my gifts a little late as it's a second chance to celebrate their birthdays or xmas.



I really like the Mock Rib pattern.  It's pretty on both sides as you can see in these photos.

Right Side on left/top, Wrong Side on right/bottom
   

I knitted this ballet wrap pattern, called "Otis" that I got from Knitty.com for George's sister Michelle.  I used yarn I've had in my stash for years: Sirdar Denim Tweed DK in colour Violet.

I was knitting this up until a few hours before I gave it to her.  She immediately put it on and George took this photo.  Michelle really likes it and wears it with a pretty summer dress she bought to go with the wrap.

The purchase path I'm trying to automate in QTP takes the username, user type and password from the sign in page and obscures it in the navigate to URL upon clicking Submit.  I need to grab this URL and parameterize it to include the latest entered info as right now my recording just wants to return to the recorded URL.  I finally found the URL string I needed.  Then I lost it.  I had made a lot of changes to my script, and rather than doing the smart thing of saving the changes with a different filename before restoring the original file, I just went back to the version I had started with.  Argh!  At least I now know it's possible to find this so on Monday I'll keep looking.  Wish me luck, okay?

Back in April 2005, I knitted a scarf using some fun yarn I picked up at Joanne's Fabrics.  The two balls I knitted left the scarf a little shorter than I wanted it to be so I looked in my Barbara Walker books of stitches and added lace ends to the scarf.  I gave this to Catherine when I went down to visit my sister Maggie and her family in May 2005.  She immediately started rubbing it against her face, and when we travelled to Ireland and London in June/July 2005, she brought the scarf with her.



The lace blocked out very nicely.  I used a black chenille I bought on eBay years ago.

I cast off the circular shrug this morning.  Just need to get a picture and then sew it up.  I still need to look for a nice brooch that Sarah can use to close it.  I also turned the heel on George's second sock and have started working the gusset.

On Tuesday night, I started a 5-week Intermediate Knitting class at So Much Yarn.  It's mainly a time to bring in one's projects and get help with problems.  The first thing I wanted help with was darning a hole in one of George's pullovers.  Lauren admitted she didn't know a lot about darning, but she did point out that I needed to capture all the loose loops to make sure the hole wouldn't get bigger.  Together we got the hole darned well enough that George will be able to wear and wash the pullover for at least a few more months.

My second project needing help was how to start a crocheted basket for felting.  I had bought the pattern and yarn in November and I signed up for the December class about how to do the baskets, but had to cancel because George & I were going to be out of town.  I tried to do the basket on my own, but I just couldn't figure out the starting instructions.  Lauren told me that the instructions were missing a step at the very beginning.  I've noted this on the pattern and should be able to start the other two baskets on my own.  I plan to make a set of 3 nested baskets in different colours.  I'm now working on the largest basket in dark blue.

This was my first ever Fair Isle project.  I took a class offered at So Much Yarn, where Lauren showed us how to put together the colours we wanted as well as how to knit with two colours in the same row.  I had originally intended this bag for Sarah's Xmas present, but when it arrived my sister Maggie fell in love with it and Sarah gave it to her.  (I now owe Sarah an Xmas gift.)  I guess it was meant to be Maggie's since I had bought another set of colours to make the same bag for Maggie for her birthday in January. 

    

I used Tahki Cotton Classic.  It's hard to see in these photos, but there are green beads at the tips of the picot edging and the ends of the ties.  The ties were hard to make, but Lauren convinced me to stick with them and they eventually came out well.

As you can see, this is the same design that I used for Lizzie's Felted Bag, just different colours that I thought my 18 year old niece, Catherine might like.  It was meant for Xmas, but I finally got it to Catherine in late January even tho' I had finished it before the holidays.  I again used Cascade 220 and an eyelash yarn.



Catherine likes it.  To quote "It's so cute!  Very reminiscent of Dr. Suess, who was the whole of my childhood.  I love it...".

Isn't it wonderful to get such feedback on a gift you make for someone?  Both Catherine and her sister Sarah are very appreciative of the items I knit for them, which is why I continue to knit for them.

I had George try on the leg.  It fits so far.

Meanwhile, I finished the 20" of mock rib for the circular shrug last night and started on the 2x2 ribbing.  I hope to finish knitting the shrug tonight and get it sewn up and photographed tomorrow.  Sarah's birthday is April 18th and I need to get this in the mail.

In October, my husband George's youngest brother, Mark, married his girlfriend of eight years, Lizzie.  I made Lizzie a wildly coloured felted bag as a welcome-to-the-family gift.

I used four colours of Cascade 220 and a yellow eyelash yarn.  This also took 3 washings to get to a felted appearance I liked.  (The bag is stuffed with washclothes in all these pics.)



Here's a picture of its bottom:



And here it is hanging to show the length of the strap:

I knitted on the shrug constantly on Wednesday and took this progress photo this morning.



That's 2 skeins of Jiffy yarn.  I think the entire shrug is going to take just under 4 skeins.  I'm really liking how the mock rib is looking.

Back in late 2005, I made several felted bags and a purse.  I made the greens & purples bag first.  I used 5 coordinating colours of Cascade 220.  I knitted with each colour until I felt like a change.  It took 3 trips through my front-loader washing machine to get it felted to a point I liked.  The handle on this bag is about 14 inches long.  I use this bag as my purse on sunny days.  It's too open for rainy Seattle days.



The bottom of the bag came out looking like tie-dye.  I liked it so much I deliberately did the same on the next two bags I made.

I finally got my test machine at work set up properly using Ghost images and spent the rest of the day playing with Quick Test Pro (QTP).  QTP is used to create automated tests by recording the actions and entries of a website or application user.  The recording is then modified to allow for parameterization and such. 

I got so involved in what I was doing that I completely lost track of time.  I find that happens often when I'm really interested in what I'm doing... suddenly I look at a clock and hours have gone by.  Between that and the buses running slow, I didn't get home until nearly 9pm tonight.

I finally uploaded the photo George took on Sunday (4/2) morning.



This shows 6 inches of 2x2 ribbing and 1 inch of mock rib.  The color is a lot better in real life.

I've completed one of the socks for George and have the second cast on.



I cast on to two needles.  I'm thinking for my next pair of socks of casting on to a slightly larger needle as Cassie of Too Much Wool does.

My niece Sarah is going to be 14 on April 18th.  About a week ago, I put up a webpage of possible knitted gifts for her to choose from.  She selected the Circular Shrug in cream.  Sarah can't wear wool so I bought some Lion Brand Jiffy.  It's working up beautifully.  I have the first 6" of 2x2 rib done and about 3" of the mock rib done.  I'll try to put up some progress photos tomorrow.

I got a lot of the 2x2 ribbing knitted while George & I were down in Corvallis, OR visiting our friend Alan for his housewarming.  Alan has set up a theater in his living room and I knitted while we watched Peter Jackson's "King Kong".  I was actually able to knit by feel for once.  There are some advantages to knitting with worsted weight yarn after all. :)  (Usually I'm knitting with DK or thinner yarns.)

I'll try to write more often and also put up a gallery of previously finished projects.  I just have to hunt down years worth of photos.

I started a 6-9 month contract at RealNetworks on March 15th.  I'm working in Ecomm QA for RealArcade so part of my job is playing games.  So far I'm enjoying the work and once the large wave of projects is over, I'll start automating some of the basic verification tests using Quick Test Pro.