New York Minknit

I recently came back from a week in San Francisco, which from a knitting point of view, was a series of very small, minor, semi-unfortunate events.

When I was a kid, my parents snapped a series of photos immortalized in the family photo albums. I am sitting in a rowboat, and at first I am proudly showing off my Snow White sunglasses. Then, you see me dangling them in the water, and making a face because one of my parents was telling me not to dangle the glasses in the water. Then, off-camera, I have dropped the sunglasses into the pond, never to see them again, and there are a few photos of me bravely trying not to cry, because I persisted in dangling them in the water even though they told me not to. Though these photos do not have the same chronological story-telling element, basically, the same thing happened with my awesome watchcap. Below, you can see me wearing it while knitting in the park and waiting for the streetcar.

Then, sadly, it was gone. One day, when I took a whole bunch of public transportation, from Caltrain to the Muni Metro to the BART, I arrived to meet my friends for dinner in the Mission, suddenly realizing I had put my hat down somewhere along the line, and it was gone forever. I was totally sad, and complained the whole walk from the BART station to the restaurant, and the first thing I said upon seeing my friend was “Oh my god! I lost my hat! I am so upset!” We have been friends since the first day of high school, so she was used to my melodramatic ways, but her boyfriend was a little taken aback, and he was like “Um, hi.” I realized I was being kind of rude, especially because I like her boyfriend a lot, and was leaving him and Adam to make conversation among themselves without  being properly introduced. Fortunately, they share a love of burgers and pizza, so they chatted about that, while I continued to complain. My friend tried to make me feel better by pointing out she loses things all the time, and her boyfriend, once I stopped complaining constantly, pointed out that I should try to practice “non-attachment.” I think he was joking, and I said, “Is this a San Francisco thing?” and my friend said, “No, it’s a Buddhist thing,” which I did think was kind of funny.

Anyway, I almost finished one of Adam’s Christmas present socks on the plane ride out there, when I suddenly realized that I had left the ball of yarn for his other sock in New York. I pulled out my other sock to knit on (above), and I realized that I only had enough yarn for one sock of that pair as well. Grrrr.

Of course, this necessitated new yarn, no? When we got to the airport to fly back, I was like “How can I have so much knitting crap?” I made Adam take a photo of how much stuff I was lugging around:

From the bottom up, I have the new Mason-Dixon knitting book, Knit It! Felt It!, (both gifts from Adam), the new Yarn Harlot book (a gift from Adam’s parents who also gave me a kit of one skein and the book One Skein Wonder, which I left behind in New York–I don’t actually think Adam gave them any hints, so I was particularly impressed that they bought me the Yarn Harlot book), two bags of sock knitting, one bag of new knitting (the final 2008 FO, to be debuted with free pattern in 2009), and my traveling tool bag.

Here are all my FOs for 2008, all pictured above, except for the additional mystery FO to be debuted in 2009. I knit three lace items (top row, L to R, The Ella Shawl, Burgundy Bat Shawl, That Little Scarf);  one cowl (Ithacowl, free pattern if you click through); one hat and first Fair Isle project (the sadly lost Patterned Watch Cap); three pairs of socks, (bottom row, L to R, Spiral Socks, Rainbow Jaywalkers, Berkeley Socks); and three pairs of mittens (Hot Pink Mittens, Waffle House Mittens, and the mystery FO, which hint, hint, is a mitten-esque thing).

I’m big into accessory knitting, but I’m hoping to conquer sweater knitting in 2009! (My dad, who is in town, suggested knitting pants–I think he meant like leggings–today, but did add that he thought they would time-consuming. I agree, though the thought has crossed my mind before.)