I'm So Outta Here!

All good things must come to an end, right? On that note I'd like to say farewell to Blogger. Despite its limitations, flaws, planned outages, unplanned outages, and the inability to put blog posts in categories like all the cool kids are doing, Blogger has been good to me. I wish it well. I hope it thrives. (Have you figured out where all this is headed?)

Yes, I finally got up the nerve and changed to a different blog service. I was able to import 30 of my latest entries to help make it a bit more seamless. Please come visit me here:

The Crochet Dude's New Blog
http://blog.thecrochetdude.com

See you there!

It Just Looks Like a Rope

Here is an extreme close-up of the purse that I am working on for SCYC VI. It's the first of two for them. The coolest part of designing purses is that with the right combination of stitches they can defy gravity. This one definitely does that. I showed it to a friend of mine and she said "how the heck did you do that?". Music to my ears my friends.... I love this yarn too! The colors are soft and pretty and it has a strand of black wound through it. Very cool stuff.


Sleevation

Remember the Sirdar sweater that I've been working on for the past few weeks?

I finished the back piece while in Alaska (see previous post) and I started the sleeves last night.



I was watching Knitty Gritty the other day and knit goddess Annie was the guest designer and she demonstrated a very cool cast on. She called it a "cable cast on" and you end up with such a great rope-like edging! And you don't have to estimate how much yarn you need (I have run out of yarn more times casting on... very frustrating!) Thanks Annie!!

Homeward Bound

The joys of travel. If I were in a bazillion dollar RV where I didn't have to pack and unpack every three days and the bathroom were all marble and the driver were also a gourmet chef and personal trainer it would be much more enjoyable... as it is:

Hard Workin' Man

The design for SCYC VI is going well. I have it about 3/4 finished now and I'm pretty happy with it. All this considering I had to take a little business trip at the same time. I may or may not be at an undisclosed location in the desert southwest. Oh who am I kidding? I needed to recover from the Alaska trip. Whoever said that taking a cruise is relaxing needs to email me and tell me what the secret is.

I'm working I tells ya!!

I bet he's a crochet dude:

But just between you and me and my CPA? It's a business trip. Excuse me while I go back to work...

Saturday Sky - September 16

I Miss The 2-hour Feeding Schedule

To answer some of the questions that came up in the comment section, no I wasn't having plastic surgery to remove extra fingers. Yes this was just one vacation, not two back to back. And no I wasn't in rehab...just the opposite! Woohoo! Anywho, thank you to everyone that noticed I was missing; that touches me. Seriously.

Back to Work

I came home to this wonderful box of yarn! Super Cool Yarn Company VI had it waiting for me along with an order for one of my designs. How cool is that? And to top it off, I just found out they want another of the designs from all those swatches I sent out before vacay and the yarn is being shipped soon! Hot dang! Now if only it would dip below 90 degrees in Houston...

I can't wait to get started on this project! I've been given the freedom to use my imagination which is such a treat.

My Banana is Too Big!

And it caused the banana tree to snap in half while I was whale watching, or bear watching, or bald eagle watching, or most likely eating at one of the many many MANY buffets on board the ship.

I had contemplated harvesting the fruit before the trip and storing them in the fridge just to keep them safe while I was away. Then I thought what the hay, I'll just give them ten more days. I was very pleased to discover this morning that upon closer inspection they survived the fall!



And they are now in the ripening process. According to the research that I've done banana farmers are to pick the fruits whilst green, then let them ripen in a cool dark place. No problem! Half of my kitchen cabinets are empty anyways so they are happily resting, waiting to be consumed... Remind me to check on them once a while, mkay?

Alaskatude

I'm back from vacation! Woo hoo! Alaska was amazing and I ended up taking 750 photos!! It's an amazing place to spend ten days! But also, aint it great to sleep in one's own bed again? My first night back from a trip though Chandler climbs all over me meowing and purring and making sure that I'm not going anywhere again anytime soon. So I'm running on about three hours sleep right now... all the photos are clickable:

First I was here:




Then here:




Which brought me to here:




Where I did a little this:




And saw some of this:




And did a whole lotta this:




I did this a few times:




Then I watched one of these:




And walked through some of these:




I even did a bit of this:




I earned some wings:




And then it all ended here:

Saturday Sky - September 2

The view from the backyard...

Woof

Last year right when hurricane Rita was heading directly for Houston I was contacted for the first time by a yarn company to do a boucle doggy sweater for one of their booklets "Precious Pets". I was very happy to see that it came out finally! Woo hoo, so this is officially my first (although others came out sooner) published design!



In fact, I created the design from my hotel room where I was riding out the storm (so it was at Universal Studios, Orlando...whatever). With one eye on Rita and the other on my bag-o-boucle I came up with this small doggie sweater. And hey, with the added pressure of thinking this was a turning point in my career (my first time working with a yarn company, we're talking big time, baby!)I'm pretty happy with how it turned out!

I've seen it at craft stores, and you can check it out here too:

Precious Pets