So the other day, one of my friends was having a really bad week. I’m not sure what all was going on with her, but I know there was lots. Some of her problems come from someone who has caused me a great deal of angst over the years, so I felt for her more than I normally would.

I started thinking about what I could do to give her a little moral support, to let her know that someone cares. That’s when it hit me that this yarn uncooperative yarn. With the odd fly-away fibers, it would make a great monster! I couldn’t wait to get home and try it.

The monster pattern I chose was Malcolm the Monday Monster. It’s another Rebecca Danger pattern, so I knew it would be easy and fast. My plan was to get it done this week so that I could have it waiting for her tomorrow when she comes in to work.

I’m happy to say that I finished it today!

I held the yarn double throughout and used size 15 eyes from 6060 on Etsy.

I plan to leave the monster for her with a note that says, “My name is Malcolm. Hopefully I am the most hairy thing you will have to deal with this week!”

My latest project is going to be another example that he will cite for my protests that I don’t really need more yarn. I purchased this yarn ages ago. I have a picture from February 2006 of the yarn, but I’d had it for a year or so before the picture was taken.

I was attracted to the yarn because it was unusual. I thought that I would use the yarn to make a felted bag, and I was curious about what the fly-away fibers would do during the felting process.

That is, until I realized that the yarn was superwash. Oops… The yarn most likely wouldn’t felt, even I blasted it with the hottest, soapiest water around.

Since then, I’ve tried the yarn with a couple projects. I first tried it with a baby sweater pattern, but it didn’t work. It would have looked like the baby had been rolling around with a shedding cat. I tried it with a hat pattern, but it would have looked like the wearer was shedding gray hair. Not good.

It went back to the stash and stayed there until today. In the middle of the work day (amid a really demoralizing day of battling with uncooperative computers), something clicked. I couldn’t wait to get home and dive into the stash to retrieve the difficult yarn. I tried it out tonight, and I think it’s going to work!

I’ll hold off saying where this is going to go. I will only say that hairy days call for hairy yarn!

Stay tuned…

I didn’t need to be asked twice!

By bedtime, I was sniffling, coughing, and generally feeling like crap.

When I woke up on Saturday, I didn’t feel any better. In fact, I felt worse. So I sent my apologies for not attending a party and sacked out on the couch for the day.

I didn’t take any pictures on Saturday until around 11 PM. Then I took a desperation shot of my latest knitting project.

Today, I was feeling a little better. For the first time in two days, I actually felt like knitting! So I finished my latest project.

Figures… I’m better just in time to go back to work.

Which proves what my father always said. Life isn’t always fair!

For today, I’ll give a teaser… A poor little fly that seems afraid of… something. Frogs? The boss? Or maybe Baylor Bears?

Here are the three frog bodies waiting for legs, a lily pad, and a fly.

After the way that TCU played tonight, I should make little signs for the frogs to hold that say “Go Baylor Bears!”

It’s certainly not a bad app. As I said, I’ve used it and depended on it. They’ve added a web interface so that patterns can be set up at a conventional computer rather than tap-tap-tapping at a touch screen. For me, it wasn’t that hard to figure out.

I never thought about how usable JKnit was until I introduced my friend Wendy to JKnit. To say that she seemed a little mystified is likely an understatement.

JKnit relies on a series of forms to allow the user to re-define the pattern into small, discrete pieces. There is a problem with that. I never really thought about it, but as a programmer, I’ve been trained to break big problems down into small black boxes. I’ve learned how to make things less concrete and fit them into more generic structures.

Not everyone has that skill though. For some, it really IS a bit much to ask them to break down a pattern and figure out whether a row with some increases scattered at seemingly random intervals is “increase left”, “increase right”, “increase evenly”, or the ever-reliable (and often over-used) “other”. It’s even more of a stretch to ask them to do that without introducing an error into the mix.

The other issue is that it has no charting capability. If you’re not a big fan of charts, it’s not a big deal. If you love charts with all of your heart, it’s a deal-breaker.

I’ve also tried Goodreader quite a bit. It’s a generic PDF reader that allows “mark-ups”. For me, “mark-ups” means a translucent line that allows me to mark where I am in the pattern. Think of it as a straight-edge on a conventional piece of paper.

My very favorite feature of Goodreader is that I can connect it to the Ravelry pattern library. If I’ve added a pattern to my Ravelry library (either through purchase or access to a free pattern), I can easily download the pattern from Ravelry and store it on my iPad even when there is no WiFi available. It has been a gift because I can keep multiple patterns ready “just in case”.

On the down-side, there’s no row counter. If I have to repeat the same section several times, the only way to keep track of the iterations is if I use another counter.

Today, I started playing with KnitCompanion. It provides the ability to read a PDF as well as row counters. The set-up of projects is far more intuitive than JKnit. The user can break a PDF down into portions with just a few finger flicks. Up to four counters are available, so that you can say, “I’m on row 4 of the 5th repeat.” That will come in very handy! There’s even a place to store a stitch key (another feature that JKnit lacks). I set up the Flapjack Frogs pattern that I’m working on up in about 5 minutes and was back to knitting!

Is KnitCompanion perfect? Nope. If you are working on a chart, there’s a nice straight edge to help keep your place, but not if you’re working on a conventional text pattern. There’s also no Ravelry connection. So to get a pattern from Ravelry, one must use GoodReader to access the pattern and then use a command within Goodreader to open the pattern in KnitCompanion. (Alternatively, you can load the pattern when sync-ing the iPad.)

The other HUGE downside of KnitCompanion is the price… 16 bucks!

Yep… I said that right. Sixteen bucks!

That’s a big pricetag, especially when compared with Goodreader, which can be used for all kinds of PDFs, and JKnit.

However, I started to think about the price in terms of some of my other knitting tools. I have one pair of needles that I bought for about $30. They are one size (4) with a specific cable length (24″). I’m not going to use them for ever project, but they’re beautiful and comfortable. The quality exceeds those of the needles that I typically use. If one good pair of needles that I can’t use on every project is worth $30 to me, why wouldn’t an app that I can conceivably use with every project be work $16?

I went ahead and bought the full version for $16. I just so happened to have an iTunes gift card for $20. I can think of no better use for a gift card than on an item that I wouldn’t otherwise buy because of the price!

So which app is “best”? Unfortunately, as with many things in life, it depends. I’m still not done with rigorous testing with any of them. However, I suspect that it will depend on what one is doing.

For my part, I think that I will continue to use all of them. Which I choose to use will depend on the case and my mood.

Scotty MonCreery with the first of the FlapJack Frogs. The frog still needs arms and legs!

I’ve been working like a mad woman to get this blanket finished in time to submit to the state fair. Alas, I have at least 10 rows to go before I can start on the ending edge. Plus, it would need to be blocked!

It would take an act of God for me to do that! So I’m going to set it aside until cooler weather comes and finish it EARLY for next year’s state fair.

At work, I still haven’t finished preparing the two labs for classes. I gave the classroom issues top priority, as I should have. We had so many little (and big) issues and a few lagging teachers, so I didn’t get to pay them much attention. I went in today to work on them, but I didn’t get to give them much attention either.

Hopefully, I’ll be able to focus on them on Monday. I know that some people don’t think that the computer labs are important. I’m not going to get into how horrible that makes me feel. I will say that the district expects the lab to be open, and I failed at that part of my job.

I hate failure… probably more than most people. So now I feel like I failed in two areas.

This is what stress does. It takes a normally confident, well-adjusted person and turns them into a big ball of grumpy nerves. That’s me right now.

At least I fit the “grump” part of my online name!

I was not a good photographer today, I guess. The sweater is lovely! I can’t wait to see it finished!

So tonight when I looked out the window, the moon looked so big and beautiful that I just had to take some pictures. I’m still trying to find the best way to take moon shots with my camera. The best picture of the night was actually one of the first I took. It’s not such a good picture of the moon, but it does show off how pretty it was!

Instead, I went to a baby shower. My friend Doreen is having a baby, and I joined some of the ladies from knitting to celebrate the little man’s impending arrival.

The good thing about going to a baby shower with ladies from knitting is that there were several lovely knitted gifts. Angele made an adorable tiger, some hats, and a baby blanket. Angela made two beautiful baby blankets. Someone else made a baby hat. Micki made a really, really pretty green cardigan.

I made a mobile for her. It’s from Knitty.com’s pattern “Flock” and features five birds at varying levels.

First off, let me say… Excuse the craptastic photography. I have to check the patterns on my camera because all of the pictures were dark. I took them in a hurry at the last minute, so the quality isn’t what I’d hope for such a time-consuming project.

Here are a few pictures:

The original pattern called from French Knot eyes. I tried them, but they looked REALLY bad. So I pulled out the french knot eyes and then made new ones with non-toxic dimensional fabric paint. It looked so good that Mr. Grump came over and touched the eye on one of the birds. He spent the next hour looking mortified that he had messed up one of the birds! (I fixed it, so he did work his way out of the doghouse!)

The hardest part of the whole project was balancing the final mobile. It took me so much time to balance the bottom level because, although the birds are close to the same size, the hanger from which they are suspended are not. It’s an exercise in patience to get it right.

Now I will have more knitting time to devote to other projects. I hope to put some more time into the cabled pink blanket.