Still plugging along. I wish it was going faster, but at least I’m still going down.

I’m down 1 pound this week.

1/2 inch in my chest.

1/2 inch in my waist.

1/2 inch in my hips.

1/4 inch in my thigh.

More than that, I feel thinner. (So why am I still fitting into my clothes)? It’s slowing down, so I worry a bit about next week’s check in. But I’ve been thinking about what I can do to help, and I have some ideas.

My water consumption, while still adequate, is half of what it was the first couple of weeks. If I step it back up, maybe that will help.

I should be eating more vegetables, and I could eat a bit less protein, according to Calorie King’s recommended percentages.

This is where I’m at

The recommended percentages are

Fat, 20-30%

Carbs, 40-60%

Protein, 15-20%

So I’m a bit off. Not much. It’s been great eating carbs again. The first two days, I felt really tired in the afternoon, and I was worried about the blood sugar crash associated with eating carbs. But since then,

I’ve. felt. great.

Really great. So while the progress is a little slow, the process still isn’t difficult. I’d say it’s even enjoyable because of the complete lack of guilt and worry. My brother took me to lunch at an italian cafe yesterday for my upcoming birthday. I had the eggplant penne, and snitched some of his linguini with manilla clams. We ate the warm focaccia. It came with a fabulous cesaer salad.

I came home, input it to the best of my ability into my online calorie diary (pretending it was Olive Garden, because those meals are in the system), went a little light on dinner, and I was fine for the day. The calories, the percentages, everything. And as it usually turns out, if I eat a high calorie meal, I’m not usually that hungry for the next meal, so eating a little less isn’t a problem.

I’m meeting my exercise goal of 150 minutes per week and my calorie target every day. Even through last weekend which I was concerned about. Flying colors. This rocks.

How was your week?

Yeah, so, I’m going to run out of yarn. I’m ripping back almost the entire thing (again, I’ve done it once before. I feel like a hack, not a knitter) to make the cuff shorter so I have enough yarn for the fingers. Dangit.

The round on the glove pattern I’m referring to with my general construction questions starts in a different place on the glove than the round on the gloves I’m knitting. (Sorry, I don’t know how to word that sentence clearer). So I’m getting confused and having to rip more than I’d like. I’m hoping to be able to write a basic pattern for myself, as I’m sure I’ll be knitting more koigu gloves and mitts in the future, so I’ll only have to reinvent the wheel once. If I were to frog completely and start again, I’d do some things different.

But they’re cool.

Clark fell asleep at breakfast this morning, face down on the tray of his highchair. I picked him up, he stayed asleep, and it was so delightful, I had to take a picture.

Sweet baby. I don’t get to hold a sleeping baby much anymore. He’s mostly grown out of that. Well, except for the times he wakes up in the wee hours of the morning, insists on being held at the threat of endless screaming, and then falls asleep. So long as I hold him. But that’s not so delightful.

We have some prizes coming in for Mitts for Mary, besides my koigu.

Stephanie is offering some lovely handmade soaps.

Nada is contributing 4 ounces of custom dyed bluefaced leicester wool yarn!

Pamela is giving a lucky winner choice of her patterns.

Thanks so much for the support. Now we need some knitters!

When I was photographing the blue faroese shawl last week, I noticed little marks on my windowsills in the dining room.

Clark loves to stand at these windows and watch the world. Now I see he’s chewing on the cedar in the windowsill. Chewing on it. The teeth marks go all the way across both windows. My dog used to chew on wood and I thought that when he went to his wonderful new home, we’d be done with this. My girls didn’t chew on wood. At spinning group last week, a few women said that their sons chewed on wood as well.

What’s the deal?

Is it a gender thing more than a genus thing?

My internet-shy-friend-that-used-to-be-neighbor had the most excellent idea last week. She suggested hosting a knitalong for Mary, and I’m going to do it. Here’s the deal.

I want as many pairs of hand knit gloves, fingerless gloves, and fingerless mitts as possible. I don’t think she’ll get much use out of full mittens so I’d prefer not to have those. She wears gloves when she’s outside, and the fingerless mitts (Fetching from Knitty) when she’s inside. She works in an office, so she’s mostly inside.

To recap, Mary has an incurable medical condition where her body thinks it’s freezing to death at any temperature under 72 degrees, so all of her blood is routed to her vital organs, and her extremities will eventually die if she doesn’t keep them warm. She needs to wear gloves all the time, every day, about 10 months out of the year in this climate. Maybe even more. She’s wearing the black, Cashmerino mitts I made her in October every day, and relies on the $2, stretchy variety of gloves found at grocery stores everywhere when she’s outside.

I want her to have a wide variety of beautiful handwear. She’s never going to get better. This is never going to go away. She’s in her 30’s. It sucks.

We are knitters! We can help! It’s what we do!

My blog has a wonderful group of readers, but we’re small, so I’m asking people to talk. Spread the word. Get it out there. I would LOVE to have a lot of participation, and to prove it, I’m offering prizes. From the gloves/mitts that I receive, I will randomly select winners. I don’t know quite what I’m thinking yet, or how far it will go. It’ll probably depend on the level of participation, and I’ll happily take suggestions, but so you know, I’m thinking Koigu.

Yes, it’s that important to me.

I’d like to give the gloves to her before the end of the school year, so the deadline is June 15th. Here’s a link to today’s post.

Email me to sign up, comment to this post, whatever you’d like to do.

I’ve started my fingerless gloves for Mary.

I’m going to separate the cables into the four fingers before binding them off. Right now, I’m looking to start the thumb gussset. I’m winging it and it’s been awhile since I made gloves, so I need to consult a legitimate pattern for guidance. I ended up going with the bigger needles, and as predicted, Hayden is laughing at me. In fact, I’ll quote her exact words-

“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
(breathes)
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA”

Thanks for that.

UPDATE- I forgot one thing. Her left pinky finger is a lot shorter than the right one. She asked me to make even the fingerless glove shorter on that pinky. She has small hands anyway.

If we want to have pattern conversations and suggestions in the comments, that’d be great.

Also, since I’ve already updated this post about 5 times since posting it, it’ll probably continue to change, so check back for the latest info.

Feel free to comment to any post with progress or ideas throughout the next month. I’ll be doing check-ins on Fridays. If you send me links or pictures, I’ll post them then.

We’ll have a name and a button soon. I’m thinking “Mitts for Mary” or something like it.

Mary doesn’t know I’m doing more than knitting her a pair of fingerless gloves.

Her measurements are-

Circumference at widest part of palm – with fingers together – 19 1/2 cm both L and R

Base of palm to start of fingers – 10 cm both L and R

Middle finger length – 7 cm L, 7 1/2 cm R

Ring finger length – 6 3/4 cm L, 6 5/8 cm R

Pinky length – 4 1/2 cm L, 5 1/2 cm R (notice they’re different)

Between the base of the thumb and the start of the index finger – 5 cm

PATTERN IDEAS SO FAR-

Chevron mitts This one’s being made already, but it’s SO NEAT!

Fetching This is what I made her in October, but I’m sure they’re thrashed, and I know Mary likes them.

Knucks

Vintage Mitts

Gorgeous Smocked Gauntlets (I want these myself)!

You can do what I’m doing and make up your own, based on the general construction of another pattern. I’m using the eyelet gloves in Gathering of Lace.

There’s also a great basic and adaptable glove making article in an older issue of Interweave Knits. I don’t have time to hunt down which issue right now. Maybe later.

Good morning! I had a good week. Not as fantastic as last week, but it was still good. Which is very good considering I only met my calorie target 4 out of the last 7 days. And this weekend is another doozy. I’m hosting a baby shower here at 11. Tonight I’m going to a pajama/birthday party for a friend, where we’re all supposed to bring our favorite breakfast food to share. There will be donuts.

And I don’t think they’d be interested in my protein shake. What do you think?

Tomorrow is Mother’s Day, and we’ll be at my in-laws for a large, social dinner most likely. I’ll get through it the best I can.

I’m down .6 pounds from last week. I went up a bit after the weekend, and it took the week to get it back off. I’m down an inch in my hips, up a half inch in my waist, and my chest and thighs are the same. However, My thighs look different to me. Those nasty little pockets of pudge just below my butt are smaller, so I’m probably balancing out the loss with growing quads. (I’m doing lunges). In the front I’m noticing a difference, too. There’s a very unattractive line of sag, low on my stomach that is softer. A little less defined. Woo hoo!

I’m very happy I was able to exercise this week. My back is better. My hip and knee are behaving for now. It’s good!

How was your week?

Happy Mother’s Day!

I’ve officially decided that I’m going to knit Josephine, and I’m going to knit it small.

It’s in the new Interweave Knits. I love it. I can’t tell you how much, but I so love it. I’ve picked the yarn, but can’t decide on a color.

And I’m recruiting. My friend Carol is knitting it with me. Hayden my love, are you going to knit it with me? (Hurry up and finish that sweater)! And I’m trying to tempt my sister. She lives in Texas, but I think this could be an appropriate knit for San Antonio. She’s all but given up on knitting since moving there, (I will never live somewhere warm. That scenario is just too horrible to consider) but she made a hat for her darling new husband during their freak ice storm a few months ago. (Good job!!!)

I’m going to knit the 44 inch bust, because I’m already dropping inches (tho’ not so much in the chest yet), and I figure my “skinny” bust will measure 40. Right now I’m at 48.

I really don’t know much about ease, and how much ease I like. I tend to like things snug at the bust (be quiet, Julie), but the next smallest size is a 40 inch, and I’m going to need to wear a shirt under it. So 44 sounds like the best bet.

I have to finish a couple things first. Like the fingerless gloves I haven’t started yet, and the Uptown Boot socks.

No, this isn’t a pregnancy announcement.

I’m just noticing that one box of something isn’t always enough to feed the family anymore. One pan of meatloaf doesn’t quite cut it. Last night, one box of linguini wasn’t quite enough to satiate the crowd. It’s weird.

I bound off the faroese shawl last night, which required breaking into the last skein of yarn on the last quarter of the bind off. That really sucked. I could have returned that skein and bought something else! But no.

After it was done, Hayden and I agreed that it shouldn’t be blocked. I’m concerned about it being too big for my mother-in-law, plus I really like the three dimensional texture. Hayden liked how the bind off was a bit wavy, almost a ruffle.

And I know you all want a model shot, but keep in mind this is, like, 10 inches too small for me so it looks ridiculous.

Experiencing the sudden wave of freedom associated with finishing something, I turned optimistically to the Uptown Boot socks, wondering where I had left off.

That would be the picking up of the gusset stitches. So my celebration was short lived and quickly turned to annoyance. Picking up gusset stitches is my second least favorite part of sock knitting, the first being the actual starting of the sock.

I hate starting socks. It’s tempered by the excitement of starting something new, breaking into a new skein of yarn, etc, but I hate it for the first couple of inches, every time. I always question my sanity, willingly knitting something with toothpicks instead of needles, as it flops all over and drops tiny little stitches.

Well, picking up gusset stitches required too much concentration for me last night, so I didn’t knit anything after binding off the shawl. I don’t really remember what I did.

Oh! Not true. I remember. I started swatching for the fingerless gloves for Mary. And I don’t have the swatch to show you. I sent it to school with Liv, to give to Ana, to take home to Mary so she can tell me if she likes it before sending it back to school with Ana, to give to Liv, to bring back to me tomorrow.

It’s kind of a crazy little swatch, with a couple of snake-like cables running up the hand. I intend to split them off in the direction of each finger if she likes the pattern. But I’m still kicking around whether or not to go up a needle size.

Hayden laughed at me. I swatched on size 2 bamboo, frogged, switched to size 0 steel, frogged, and started on a steel size 1. And it might be too stiff. I don’t know. But if I go back up to a 2, Hayden will ridicule. In a loving way, of course.

Why is it so hard to eat? The weekend was bad because I had a social dinner all three nights. So I went over my calorie target by a bit each night, but not nearly as much as I would have without the diet. And I’m learning. But then Monday came around, and I’m back to struggling to get enough. Dinner ends up being a big, calorie catch-up meal after eating almost nothing during the day.

This is ridiculous.

So I’m trying to focus on eating smaller, regular meals throughout the day again. It isn’t that hard, I just have to pay enough attention to the clock to notice when mealtimes come and go.

On the faroese shawl, I’ve finished wrapping up the pattern diamonds, and I’m just doing a few more rows of seed stitch before binding off.

I’m so excited. I want to get back to my Sea Silk Stole, the Uptown Boot Socks, and I need to get started on those fingerless gloves for Mary.