GRE and the Search for a New Project

I spent the second half of last week stressing and cramming for the GRE. Jim told me on Friday to just let it go and I would be fine, but of course I wouldn't completely believe him. The GRE is like the SAT to get into grad school. The grad school I'm applying for Physical Therapy requires a 900 out of 1600 composite score on the verbal and math sections. While this never seemed that difficult, especially after three practice test that I consistently scored in the mid-1100s, I still made 200 flashcards and tried to learn vocab. Needless to say, with all this studying the knitting was put on hold. I took the test yesterday at the crack of dawn (ok, it was 8:30), and passed with flying colours. I thoroughly appreciated the math section that allowed me to score 100 points higher than I had been on the practice test.

Knitting resumed last night while having an Audrey Tautou double feature (He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not and A Long Engagement, both of which I would highly recommend but beware you'll have to read subtitles). Unfortunately I wasn't counting correctly (could have been the celebratory Cream Soda "float") and had to rip out all the progress I made last night this afternoon. I'm also trying to play catch-up with all the classwork I put on hold for GRE studying, so it might be slow going.

Apparently, I didn't completely overcome SSS and SMS because I'm still lacking motivation to work on the sock and mitten and now I'm trying to find my next big project. I don't know that I have enough yarn in the school stash for a sweater unless it's lace weight, so I may have to work on a shawl until I go home at spring break and can get some yarn from that stash. Anyone have any suggestions? A shawl isn't practical for class knitting because all of the patterns I like are too attention demanding. I don't want to spend a lot of money but I really want something that is knit on 5s or larger (these 0s and 1s are killing my hands).

Corset Update: I fitted the mock-up on Thursday in class, it wasn't too far off and I only have to make a few small adjustments. I also found some fabric in my stash that was a tight weave and semi-period appropriate to be able to cover it. I'm going to flat-line the fashion fabric to the coutil and assemble the two sides tomorrow so I can bone it on Tuesday. Progress pictures soon hopefully!

Socks, Mittens and Corsets

I finally overcame my SSS (Second Sock Syndrome) and SMS (Second Mitten Syndrome) and have cast on for both of them in the last few days. The second mitten seems to be going a lot faster than the first but I think that's because I'm not to the hard part yet. I don't think that my size 0 needles will ever be straight again and it seems like each time I try to straighten them out they just get bend the other direction. I cast on my second Anastasia Sock today at work and then basically knit the entire toe during Human Sexuality. I think that the provisional cast on looks a lot better this time, but we'll see in about 2 more rows when I pick up the stiches if they are giant like last time.
The reception of Clover on Ravelry seems to be wonderful - it's been favourited 99 times!! I just wish that I had it up to sell, but I have to wait on Casey to do some magic coding. Since I have no understanding of these things I also have no idea how long this might take. I was super excited when I saw someone who's blog I read favourited it though. I feel like I stalk so many people because I read their blogs and its nice to feel like I'm not so creepy anymore because now she knows who I am in some distant universe.
Today in my Period Patterning class we started our corsets! We had to blow up our patterns from the books their in and try to get them to the right size. I had intended on using the point-to-point method to blow mine up, but then I found out the scale was incredibly wonky, so I cheated and used the copy machine. Then I had to tack on seam allowance and cut it out of muslin to make a mock-up for fittings on Thursday. I haven't sewn it together yet, but that's tomorrow's project (as well as some intense GRE studying).

Knitty Rejected

This fall I designed a sweater dress, not a simple stockinette sweater dress, but an intricately cabled (and in my opinion gorgeous) sweater dress. I had the intention of submitting the pattern to Knitty for the Spring issue and knit as fast as I could to meet the deadline. I spent my entire Thanksgiving break sizing the pattern up and down to fit bust sizes from 28" - 52". The deadline was December 1st and I sent the pattern in a day in advance with a nice note thanking them for looking at my pattern. Since then I have been not so patiently waiting to here back.
Yesterday, I saw in my inbox an email with the subject Re:spring submission:Clover and I got all excited and nervous to open the email. As you can guess from the title of this post and the fact that I'm telling you all this - the pattern was rejected and will not be published. The only reason given was that they can't publish as many patterns as they receive. At least now I can finally post pictures on the internet and I'm going to try to sell the pattern individually on Ravelry once I get the programming figured out. So without further ado . . .

























Raveled Here

To everyone who is coming here because they saw the pattern on Ravelry, "Hi, thanks for all the wonderful comments and I hope you'll all buy the pattern once I get it up and running!" It is by far one of the most fun things that I've knit (and I'm not just saying that because I designed it). But I do hope that if you buy it and find any kinks in the pattern you'll let me know, this is the first time I've tried to resize a pattern and write it for someone else to read. Hopefully, this is just the start of something and I'll have more patterns to come in the future (and maybe next time they'll be Knitty approved).