Thursday, June 10, 2010

Random Thursday, Mostly Knitting Edition...some other stuff

I bought some yarn off a fellow raveler recently. I got a bag of Malabrigo scraps (to make scrappies of course (that's scrappy longies)), a bag of sock yarn scraps (um? baby booties, etc), and a skein of Malabrigo Sock in colorway Solis.

It arrived, and it is beautiful of course. But it smells. Bad. By bad, I mean not bad like fish or rotten eggs. I mean like heavily perfumed or febreezed (however you spell febreeze). It smells like she had some air freshener right in her yarn storage. All the yarn has this heavy, heavy scent on it. I am sure it will wash out in blocking. But it's obnoxious.

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I decided to wind up and knit the Malabrigo Sock yarn.

I realize now why it was discounted by this woman. The yarn is possessed. Really.

I had my husband and son help me wind. My hubby played the swift and Wobbs held the ball winder (because hubby didn't want to get out of his chair and their was no table near it to put the wonder on).

As soon as I unwrapped the skein, I could see the yarn was tangled. We carried on anyway. About 3/4 of the way through I had to grab the other end of the yarn and start untangling it back to the end that was wound up. It took us an hour.

Then, since the skein looked pretty bad I thought I would rewind it. I've done this with other skeins. No biggie. Just set the skein down, pull the middle out, and start winding it again. Right??

Wrong.

The skein FLEW OFF THE BALL WINDER. Twice. Now I had 3 little saggy balls of yarn connected by strings to one another, with tangles, again.

An hour later all was well. I started a pair of socks. I hope they do not start on fire while I am wearing them. I think I will block them in Holy Water.

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I am using my 9 inch circular needles for the socks. So far so good. Let's see if they cramp up my hands or if I like them after 6 inches of knitting 3x3 rib.

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Crocheted Baby Blanket is finished. I had just enough yarn to finish it. It was promptly picked up by my 3 year old daughter and wrapped around one of her babies. Problem solved.

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While I was at a friend's house yesterday my husband moved the twin bed from the kids' room into our room. Yes!! Finally. I have been bugging him to do this forever. My daughter slept in her own bed (in my room, but whatever) last night. Woo Hoo!! My 1 year old boy slept there too for about 1/2 the night. Pretty good. It was at least long enough that my husband and I were able to enjoy some "quality time" alone, in our own bed. Good enough for me!

I do have to admit, it was weird having all that space in the bed. I am sure I'll get used to it just in time for the arrival of my new baby. (And I missed my little boy! I am glad he came over later.)

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I loved all the comments on the movie reviews. I don't know if I'll be doing any more in the future. Those two movies were just on my mind to say something about, don't know why.

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Will Steve just get back from college already so that we don't have to deal with Joe anymore?? Really. Can't stand Joe.

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And, the best news EVER! Look what I got in the mail from EatSleepKnit:


It's all Malabrigo! I got 2 skeins of Cactus Flower (lighter pink in the picture, although it is by no means light, it's very vibrant pink!), 3 skeins of Purple Mystery, which is a wonderful jewel-tone purple, and 6 skeins of Geranio, the really deep toned pink in the picture. I love them all and they coordinate beautifully with each other.

Plans are for longies, a sweater, a couple of hats, and misc. baby items with this yarn. I may also squeeze out a toddler sweater of the Geranio for my (big) little girl. I can't wait to knit with this yarn. I wound up 2 of the Geranio, 2 Purple Mystery, and 1 Cactus Flower yesterday at a friend's house. No possessed yarn here (and it doesn't smell!!).

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Eat, sleep, knit is my favorite place to get mail from. I am drooling on my keyboard.....
I've had those same nightmarish tangles with laceweight from Knit PIcks. It was the experience that convinced my husband to buy me a swift! I am thankful that mine didn't smell. Perhaps, because you are pregnant, you are just more sensitive to the smell? I know when I am pregnant I have no tolerance to smells of any kind. (My poor husband can't find a deodorant that I don't recoil from during those nine months!) If it is febreeze, it should wear off eventually, right? :(

Anonymous said...

LOL about Steve! (I can't find his site anymore, but here's a fan site if you need a Steve-fix: http://www.steveburnsrocks.us/index.htm )

I always have smell sensitivity! Pregnant is definitely worse, but I'm never free of it. My kids are allowed to chew gum, but ONLY non-fruity flavors. The fruity smells kill me. They cannot eat or open anything with a strong scent/odor while we're in the truck or I will come very close to losing it.

I'd hang it outside to see if the smell would wear off faster.

My worst yarn delivery was from an independent dyer. There was a fundraiser on etsy for a family and all kinds of shops offered "prizes" for a drawing. I won some yarn that LOOKED beautiful, but it was AWFUL. It was probably fingering weight. It had thorns and all kinds of things in it. Whoever spun it didn't clean the wool first. I was MAD. If it hadn't been for a good cause I would have went ballistic.

Interested in hearing about your thoughts on those needles!

Anonymous said...

oh, and I spent HOURS on some tangled laceweight yarn on Sunday. Like 6 - 8 hours, working backwards like you did, only to have it break before I was anywhere near finished. URGH. Oh well.

Michelle said...

I've never ordered from eat, sleep, knit, but I have checked them out b/c of woolandchocolate. Everyone seems to buy malabrigo from them, and I'm not a fan of malabrigo (please don't shoot me!) although their colorway is beautiful!!

I agree with becomewahtyouare, you should try hanging the smelly purchases outside for a while and see if it improves.

Isn't it kind of funny how us knitters will go to hell and back to unwind tangled yarn we are planning to knit up!! We are obsessed with turning nothing into something no matter what it takes sometimes!! Add to that the way we drag our family members into it with us... and they go along for the ride!