not only am i spoiled, but so is my new phone.





this thing is cozy.

a small project to swallow, and swiftly using my handspun 'pond lilies' plied wensleydale, courtesy of my sp8!

the phone, not to mention its metaphorical cardigan, is sooo tiny. i knit the worsted weight yarn on size 3 needles, so stitching was a bit wieldy but the fabric is nicely dense and sturdy. however, i'm not quite finished with the project just yet... stay tuned!

p.s. i finished a thesis chapter yesterday, and a slew of user studies. yay!

the delightful giftings of my sp8, in approximately 4000 words:






click through images for more detailed descriptions. i'm mincing my words here as i'm desperately trying to finish a thesis chapter by tonight. there's the scent of bbq meat wafting through the window, mary's harpsichord salon tonight, and plenty of distractions to get me from here to there. oh yes, niknak is finally back in town, after a heartbreakingly frustrating situation with his flight (and unexpected airport hotel; gah, right?) back to boston.

oh yes, any suggestions for what to do with the lovely handspun yarn (75 yds, worsted weight) would be most welcome. my sp8 suggested making a hat. i'm also considering making a cute cozy for my new phone. any other brilliant flashes of inspiration?

p.s. my sp8 isnt really secret anymore (the scavenger-type challenge for discovering her identity ended rather prematurely) but i'll keep her name + blog secret for my readers just for secret exchange's sake! however, she has awesome taste and a brilliant knack for sending me swoon-worthy stuff, so thank you, miss k! :)

this weather is truly making anything potentially soggy soggy.



click above to view small video clips on what it looked like from my office at lab on friday afternoon. for a seemingly apocalyptic moment, an endless period of raindrop violence shook its angry fist at the world. or, perhaps, at least cambridge. never mind my geekily-engrossed pal and easily-entreated bag model, orkan. the second one has a really good thunderous moment. anyway, i think the height of the storm was like three times worse than the footage i captured here. at that time i was too busy taking time oohing, aahing, and freaking about about getting struck by lightning. orkan just continued pushing buttons. and admittedly, i too went back to pushing buttons as well. such is the life.

lots of lovely new things in the world of liucubed! i am exhausted and excited to show all, but the latest thing to infuse my consciousness with pixels and superfluous features is my new phone (purchased from amazon), samsung t809 on t-mobile. conceptually i am pretty anti-gadget, but i give initial approval on the phone on its sleek and seductive form factor. the sonic wellness feature and japangrish (?) dialogue in forgotten warrior also amuses in those dark moments of atrociously rendered ringtones.



here's a side-by-side comparison of the new phone on t-mobile versus old phone on verizon. i'm kind of lucky that they both happen to be samsung phones, because the icons and general user interface are similar (though there are a few updates here and there). although the new phone is wider, it's soooo light! and the slidey thing makes it easy (with subtle sound effects, ooh) to open the thing without a hinged tug and clap. not that i mind the flip-phone format so much as in... it's boring. everyone has one (even the RAZR counts) and i just wanted something a little more stylish and different. relatively speaking, of course. no hypocrisy here, we're all lemmings. (beep! or whatever sound they make!) but i do uphold my own... no iPod! never!

one thing i am trying to figure out: the new phone doesnt seem to have a small hole or anything to attach a phone charm to. i know this is really insignificant, but i like the option to accessorize! plus, what will happen to beloved war-torn doraemon? it's not like a hole like that is difficult to include in the design... it's literally just a looped notch. i know i'm not an aZngRrl in any shape or form, but this lack of decorative dangle capability just breaks my heart a little.

click to check out (interactive! i mean, watch the video) the happy slidey action. try not to pay attention to the lonely, neglected phone looking on. never fear, i wiped its tears because it short-circuited itself. poor dear never knew what moore's law hit 'em.

pictured to the right is one of the new arrivals to a site i visit on occasion, ravinstyle.


it's not a particular yay or nay to the stacia passion fruit belted dress, but the first thing i thought was i bet someone has knit something very similar to this out of koigu kpppm in some apricotty colourway.

doesn't it?! oh, i am such a yarn geek and a half.

i like how the ribbon on the wrap tie matches the ribbon for the spaghetti straps. just a little meat sauce and rosemary is how i like it...

my website (on mit's servers) kept (and still continues to) throwing back a 403 forbidden error this morning. after a pretty inconclusive call to info services, i received this email:

This is Rene from the MIT Computing Helpdesk regarding your issue with access to your website. I can tell you that your site is on one of two servers listed as "most affected by deployment". You might have spotty access since they are working on these servers. Sorry for the inconvenience, but let us know if you have more problems.

sorry for the inconvenience? um, i wish they would have at least emailed us in warning so i could have been a little more prepared.

it's probably an ominous sign that i should redirect my website to something more surefire. i could put it on the media lab servers, which would (potentially) support me indefinitely. but will it still be on web? or rerouted to alumni? xenia? that's the trouble with relying on the school servers. you never know what's going to happen when you finally graduate...

double aa's all abound in last night's sans serif. shimmery, summery latin-inspired tunes mixed in with a little grit, a little glitch. grab a creamsicle and give a lil' listen...

. . . . .

last night i joined niknak at the kickoff concert of SICPP, the summer institute for contemporary performance practice at new england conservatory. in a tiny, very live williams theatre, there was a sizeable crowd, ranging from the paunchy pale 'misunderstood' musicians, to the quiet contemplative japanese composers, to the more-geeky-than-expected hipsters, to some ordinary folks looking for a cultural moment. an ever-charming professor stephen drury (those leather pants!) came out and introduced the sicpp lineup, apologized for lack of a/c, and then proceeded to sit and play morton feldman's palais de mari.

the opening sequence established the entire tone of the piece, which unfurled as a seemingly endless series of whisper-quiet tritone couplet motifs. every breath, every chair squeak, every pull and budge and fidget in the crowd became instantly magnified in contrast to the ethereal simplicity of the piano. i remained completely still, intensely aware of every perceptible essence of my being. i sat, thinking the guy to my left was inhaling too loudly, telepathically chastising the woman who was dedicated to unzipping her bag. slow breaths, face forward, waiting for the silences, moments emanating through music.

the song was so strange and so delicate, with a precarious sense of balance and a melodic persistence. i concluded that the piece matched exactly the sensation of floating on your back in a quiet, expansive body of water. the sun lighting your cheeks, your mind lulled by eternal lapping and piqued by the swimmingness of one's own thoughts. it's that half-state between consciousness and hypnosis, floating in nature and escaping oneself. interspersed between the repetitive legato lilts were a few halting stops. and. gos... this corresponded to the moments when you're afloat lost in thought, and you unexpectedly bump your head on a sandy bank, or feel a crab skitter on your toe, or get a mouthful of brine. those small interruptions that distract one's flow, yet you soon meld back into a dreamy watery state. finally, finally, you float and dream and wonder and coalesce until you have fallen asleep inside a cocoon of silence.

describing the next performance, featuring the notoriously notorious charlemagne palestine, would take another post and a half. maybe, if i'm feeling especially gratuitous, i shall disclose all. however, for now, i'll just divert you to the interview with him in the last issue of the dig. however, i will say that the cognac played a key role in the performance. in short, it was intense. i left thinking that this was probably one of the most brilliantly vile (with emphasis on the vile) performances i've ever witnessed. i'll give you this: when i closed my eyes it was some of the most awesome sound i've ever experienced. and i found the stuffed animals (especially the tufted, wide-eyed owl) kinda cute. but the sweat and the screaming sort of made my skin crawl.

again, it was intense.

again!




i swear i dont get paid for this. and mit must have zippo news to report these days. really!

hello! an eventful weekend on many accounts. [the heat shall not go unnoticed.]

recent days held many spots of sewing, spanning many degrees of public disclosure. here's one project that i can show, of which i am especially fond...



francis gave me this shirt gratis, courtesy of the db-db dynasty. he's built up a legion of pr0npixelpushers everywhere. hongkong power, baby! he gave these shirts to smg folks sometime last year, and i giggled, knowing that i probably wouldn't wear it, though it'd make a really killer motif for something crafty.

last friday i tried to fulfill my pursuit of a kickily cute bag with a surprising db-db lining. the only store i stopped by was pearl, which has an abysmal selection of fabricstuff beyond craft felt. however, i was optimistic, and i've had some not-so-bad experiences sewing with the stuff. here's my 'before' picture, shadows evident of the bizarre lighting setup in the cube (code for the media lab basement), with fuzzy sheets of neon coral + yellow. however, the felt proved too thick, and i have two broken sewing machine needles to show for it. (this kicked off my undercurrent of seething rage throughout the weekend, for everything between the nonexistent T scheduling to the inanity of transunion. but rage is quite unladylike... and probably illustrated at length in a later post.)


however, not to be knocked down for long, i went to winmil on saturday for actual honest-to-goodness fabric. i already had a perfect ribbon from my last trip to pearl. after heading back to the sewing machine and stitching for a lil' bit, i came away with...





^_^

i sewed it! i sewed it!

exterior: cotton print from winmil
interior: db-db pixels (tshirt jersey)
ribbon: japanese import cotton from pearl

pattern: pouch bag from craftgrrl

urbanhermes on mit homepage spotlight, originally uploaded by liuliuliu.

i was invited to make an urbanhermes graphic for the mit homepage folks.

see? evidence i'm still alive. :)

i finally found an online radiostream that's as idiosyncratically heterogeneous as sans serif. (see, i'm not the only one!)

whereveRadio. i'm not letting my hatin' on the ugly website obscure its aural niceties. yesterday i caught the end of a mia doi todd remix followed by the seductive bass of deep house. moments later the stream segued into the ethereal bells of sigur rós' saeglópur, and then a smattering of spoken and instrumental mashup samples followed. d00d.

yay! thanks so much for giving me something fresh to listen to, a nice complement to my dependable earcandies kcrw music and soma.fm radio...

which one? which one?



samsung t809 on t-mobile

or



samsung d807 on cingular

?

i've exhausted my searches and cannot honestly tell which phone is better designed. i need a new phone soon. any or all advice welcome!

it was as if i was cosplay'd by a textbook example of my thesis.

this morning, i was waiting for the bus at the usual intersection. there was one other woman there that i didnt recognize. i stood a little distance away, shading myself beneath the narrow overhang of the sidewalking-lining apartments. i was simultaneously staring into space and vaguely noticing the woman's cropped green pants. summer is so here, i thought, feeling the sticky heat coming on fast.

then the woman (who was reading a book) turned around and approached me.

she said, your bag! i saw it online. and she smiled.

i was a bit confused and wondering which bag she was referring to. urbanhermes? my daily ordning + reda bag?

she went on: the laptop bag. i've seen it online. what do you think? is it a good bag? i love the colours it comes in!

(referring to my timbuk2 marina laptop bag in PINK, which is not a colour option on that webpage, ha ha!)

aah. i murmured something about it being my first laptop bag, and i was pretty adamant about not having a bag that looked like a laptop bag, and how acme bags are super yet so expensive, blah blah. yeah, the marina, it's a good bag, thanks!

bags and onlineness and waiting for the bus-ness and random fashion-based social catalyst. it was just way too perfect. eerie!

i vaguely remember putting my name into some vendors' boxes during harvard square's mayfair last month...

that would have been just a fading memory, if not for the fact that i just received a call from the boca raton (red flag!) headquarters of sleek medspa. they called to report that i was luckily chosen from the mayfair lottery to get a free consultation and $100 gift certificate at one of their spas. they're right downtown, and it's on newbury, so i'm thinking it's a pretty awesome deal. mmm, spa == massage...

except i check out the website, and i discover i am probably most definitely the wrong age or the wrong ethnicity to use any of their services. *ironic heehee* so here's the lineup:

laser hair removal: um, i basically have no body hair. i dont even need to shave my legs! [please dont hate me.]
photo facial: this might be nice for evening out skintone, but i imagine it's a temporary (and addictive) fix as your skin regenerates new cells.
chemical peels microdermabrasion: just thinking about this (probably more intense version of the above) makes my face hurt.
botox: let's not go here.
vein removal: um... ew...
lip fillers: have you seen my lips?

i doubt it's superscammy, but i'm sure that the 'complementary consultation' will do its very best to convince any woman she needs a million things 'improved.'

i'm also not sure how far $100 will go here. this article mentions that "on average, prices range from $300 to $3,000." eep.

another scary writeup can be found here, where the text advertises: "they even have Botox parties to popularize this new form of anti-ageing treatment. In your battle against wrinkles, spots, veins and unwanted hair, Sleek MedSpa is your ally."

i think a better ally would come in the form of SPF, basic moisturizer, and a healthy diet. glamour is simple.

however, i'll let you know how the consultation goes. i'm sure it'll be a lot of 'yep, we've consulted you and honestly, you and your big lips need nothing done here.' 'thanks! can i get the $100 in cash instead? or at least a backrub? transferrable to anthropologie? please?'

summaah is officially baak.

get your kicks sticky with an earful of sans serif. hot off the griddle, dissolving into caramel convalescence...

peek at the playlist if you're curious why double a's are so haat right naah.

two amazing double-plays for tonight:

turntables On the hudson: six remix
nickodemus and mariano go for mixed pinks on wonderwheel records.

they're in boston on july 9 on the charles boat cruise. anyone know anything about this? i cant make google cooperate... an awesome lineup of breakbeat boating cannot leave port without me!

we never sleep; plus, we drop the lime on tigerbeat6 records.

this album is complex, dark, rife with subterranean subconscious with aural loops, layers, and loquacity galore. it's as if you took a handful of dewy black cherries, mashed them with vodka and vinegar, and spread them thickly on the exposed skin of a doe-eyed nymph spinning turntables. extremely tasty.

sheets off. eyes open. sunrays beaming their little solar powerparticles into my cheeks. mmmmm.

one small poke of hope dissolving the chinese water-torturous apocalyptic rains of late...

the days of summer are intensifying, as i'm working to complete my masters thesis (the writing's underway!), secure a job for the fall, and yet still enjoy the sweetness of each day. happily enough, i have recently discovered a job opening that i've been forever secretly yearning for; a girl couldn't ask for a more satisfying position her first year in the real world. i'll keep it secret for now, just so i dont jinx myself, but the prospect is so tantalizing that the excitement flitted through dreams, worked through freudian slips, and bathed existence in a rosy pink sheen. it's no secret that i work hard and passionately in projects i really believe in, sustaining by pure pleasure. right now i'm approaching one of the most critical milestones (to begin embracing the joys and headaches of the real world) and i want to follow the path that's most true to myself. not necessarily to my bank account or to what i've been trained to do, but something i can be proud of. something that satisfies. something that, frankly, will knock someone's pretty socks off.

so that's been keeping me going lately.

last week was the rainy class-of-2006 incarnation of commencement at mit and beyond...



here i present the 'graduating class' (quotes intentional) of the sociable media group. the happy enrobed grad is our resident dbdbking, francis, who has finished his masters and will go off and make big bucks on his pulsating pixels. his cute, proud mom came from hongkong, and there were tons of happy fams visiting lab to partake in the festivities and eat mini-quiches. aaron, on the left, is finishing up his masters this summer and continuing onto the ph.d. program this fall. as for me (my height defies the magic of photoshop), i'm completing my masters degree at the end of july (pretty strict personal deadline, though i have funding until august) and then moving on. mit, understandably, has a rule dictacting that you may not participate in commencement until you have truly finished (i.e. gotten your thesis signed). so ostensibly i should be in cap and gown next june, with my degree proudly clutched underneath hands that have been waiting for it for... so.... long.....

it was an incredible feeling to see the masses of black robes descending onto the green patches on campus. it stirred up a bit of nostalgia (hey, graduating college wasn't so far long ago, and wasn't too physically far either), yet i was a bit of a mixture between regret and determination. i should be out there, with hot new shoes and a hot new diploma, with friends and family and future. however, i must remind me that this is grad school, not college. time is not nearly as structured, as plentiful, or as predictable. at least half of the media lab masters candidates slated to graduate this spring need the summer to finish up. i joined smg nine months into my time at the lab, so i suppose i had a delayed start as well. i'm working now, regret-free, to get done what i need to get done. at least spending long hours in lab will provide copious free air-conditioning throughout the hazy days of summer. see? definitely a plus.

so yeah. job applications are flying and my spirit is soaring.

last week, in a flurry of slipshod gastronomy, i made these:



i often feel sorry for the veggies from boston organics that i neglect for days at a time. these taters were having a sprouts party, but i cooed for their forgiveness as i prepared garlic roasted potatoes, courtesy of michael chu of cooking for engineers (the recipe in chart form is the awesomely nerdy trademark). neck-in-neck with wasabi and nutella, course sea salt is a girl's best condiment friend.

last night i made a superb off-the-handle dinner for niknak and co (where co == christine). of course, inspired by the lonely organic vegetables in the pantry, i made a mashed sweet potato + sliced carrots deal (adapted from this recipe), laden with perfectly finishing touches of butter, honey, and red cayenne. it was thanksgiving on the tongue, i tell you. the main entrée was chicken with broccoli, green beans, rosemary, lemon, and garlic. i'm so proud for the meal, which was almost exclusively organic / free-range! yep, even the lemon. :) plenty of leftovers for another hungry-busting bash soon...

i know i promised another bout of zappos mania, but to be honest, the majority of them just didn't fit, and i get kind of frustrated with sandal fit and sizing. here's the relative best of the group:



vaneli qasim, being all delightfully 'i dont need a u after my q, thankyouverymuch'. black calf leather and a fierce little wedge. they're classy, italian-looking, and walk-round-town comfortable. however, they're a bit of a challenge to justify at $90. i still have some time to return them (a year, in fact), but i'm still reconsidering as the pair sits prettily in the living room...

hope everyone had fun knitting in public yesterday; i did my bit at the amc movie theatre in fenway, where i saw x-men3 with my roomie (our first date!). the movie, especially compared the first two in the series, was a bit disappointing: a film review shall be forthcoming. while i waited for the showtime i worked on my cashmere scarf next to the DDR machine, which played the same unfairly catchy dance mix every five minutes. bubbly pop, bubbly pop...

oogabooga!

new sans serif episodic happenings going on. new kid606 LP on ache records, a ridiculously amazing chilly compilation, and gorgeous goldfrapp bareblitzmixes. come, listen, and jump into this freshly drawn bathdub...

+ - + - + - +

whoaaaa. my humongo orders from purveyors of shoes and summer basics both arrived today. (how did we live before tracking packages online? how...?)

*itching with expectation* i'm looking forward to modeling, reviewing, and returning madness tonight...

baby alpaca, kid, doggy!



Little Rory Matthews doesn't have any brothers or sisters to play footy with – so he trains with an alpaca, a dog, a pig and a cockatoo.

the whole story's at the australian daily telegraph. the pictures are unreal!

[as always, via cute overload]

the socks can go.



the scarf can stay.

my socks that rock are taking an indefinite hiatus. i have a { *love* | #hate# } relationship with this yarn (and its seemingly welcoming but needs-exactly-what-she-wants-diva-esque colourway) that's veering very close to hate at this moment.

in a nutshell, i absolutely cannot stand any textural designs that are worked on this. my cables look like, well, a box of crapola 64. farmhouse is practically self-striping yarn. what do people usually do with self-striping yarn other than plain round-go-round? (and please dont suggest jaywalkers. that is a closed chapter, never to be opened again.) the yarn is doing too much! i want control, people, control...

so for now now i'm concluding that farmhouse just likes it plain (thankyouverymuch), in stockinette. boring, but the undeniable truth. however, i realised that on the instep i'm getting 7 sts = 1", not 8 as originally measured (the toe lies!) which, frankly, is probably too loose a gauge than i have going here. (usually i get 7 sts = 1" on worsted weight yarn socks!)

ergo, this WIP doesnt deserve any more effort right now. it's going back into the dark endless drawer. this yarn, me... we need a little space.

saturdays are for slumber, staying dry, socks, and swaps!

there's been a lot of undocumented [for multiple reasons] news over the past couple weeks. here we go, in chronological order:

luscious littles from yahaira



even though i didn't get the freebie bamboo hank from yahaira, she was sweet enough to send me some stuff in the mail anyway! included with a handwritten note were some sample mini-hanks of pureknits bamboo (both the older base and the new, awesomely saturated stuff) and a tuft of fable handknits baby alpaca. this i will tuck away to swatch on a rainy day. (which literally, at least in boston these days, are about a dime a dozen.) the bamboo is so silky and über-bright!


head-scratchers from secret pal 8

my secret pal must be a mind-reader, because i have loved (the drama! the agony!) scavenger hunts since the day i was born. i still remember going on mad easter basket hunts and following clues written out by my mom. this even led to mystery hunting at mit and even beta-testing a friend's hunt (which clearly needed testing). anyway, my secret pal is keeping my goods hostage until i can identify her blog conclusively through the clues which she will dole every month. how fantastic is that! this first clue reads: the love of a queen gave me my name / shared by those on page, screen, and stage / my beauty and flight gave rise to dance / but now mostly take naps and prance. cleopatra. elizabeth. victoria. mary. guenevere. queen of hearts (alice in wonderland). lady macbeth. dancing queen (abba). hmmm. so i'm guessing that my pal has a pet (or a small child) that is named after a queen character (because what else may nap and prance?). i also know some other hints, such as that she is from jacksonville, florida (at least the return address says so); and her name (or so i know thus far) is 'kate' (she accidentally signed her name on an email). or was that an intentional booby trap? aiya! i will be sleuthing for a bit... :) this game is so enthralling...



spring feverish over candyswap


vive la candyswappers! is there anything more brilliant than to arrange partners and send yummy things to each other? beth from portland completely blew spring out of the water with her package, which i breathlessly tore into on thursday evening. she packed a bunch of colourful treats, including mike + ike, hawaiian tropical taffy, ring pops, a candy chinese yo-yo toy, toffifay, a candy necklace, sumptuous blueberry cheesecake cookies, and choxie chocolate-covered espresso beans. to top it off, she even included an assortment of botanical notecards and a sweet handwritten note. smiles galore! unsurprisingly, my roommates also appreciate the extra sugar around the apartment. :) the toffifay is hazelnutty goodness, and the most fun seems to be popping them out of the tight plastic holding tray...



a luxurious bounty from my one skein secret pal!



on a day like today, pouring rain from morning til evening, seeing a box on my porch stamped with cats and pawprints on the exterior hinted a ray of brightness. i took it in, noticing an absence of a return address (though the departure zipcode suggests my OSSP is from california), and quickly opened the kitty-fied package. hidden within a thick haystack of shredded paper (yay for recycling! boo to plastic and styrofoam shipping materials!) were a treasure trove of items beyond imagination. mind you, the only true criteria for this swap is just to sent one skein of any yarn, and an included handwritten note. catmum (her pseudonym) send a baggy of scharffenberger and nestle (japanese-style!) chocolate with a cute recipe for fruit and chocolate curls, a mix cd with artists ranging from sneaker pimps to piazzolla, and a short story about a japanese kitty (it starts out 'I AM A CAT'). secret pal already is knocking socks off my feet, and then i see this...



200 yards of luscious, luscious 4-ply 100% mongolian cashmere! in a beautiful bright chartreuse! i simultaneously swooned and fondled the hank. it's KEJA, the mill-dyed line, from jade sapphire. this is a yarn so luxurious, so ridiculously extravagant that i would never in the world buy it for myself. but my OSSP chooses instead to splurge for me. it's unreal... thank you so much!

the fate of the yarn is still up in the air, but i'm deeply considering the ribbed undulations of kureopatora's snake scarf (here's a beautiful beginning WIP of one), or the subtle lace in ribbed leaves scarf. thoughts? any suggestions for what do make in the future with this supersoft sweet lime yarn? :) *nuzzle*


sock drama

here's the fated yarn, the socks that rock i purchased while at the oregon coast with la famille niknak last summer, and its had numerous fits and starts. at first it began as a jaywalkers attempt, but that pattern and my ankles do not get along. rip. recently, now with some toe-up socks two at a time on two circulars under my belt, i thought i'd give this yarn another incarnation as cable twist socks. after a tumultuous time starting the pair (i would do annoying things like accidentally knit with the other dangling end, or somehow end up knitting the two separate socks together), i increased until i thought it was decent, at 64 stitches. i did one and a half 8 row repeats of the pattern, and sat back and saw this:



the colouring on the toes are adorable. however, once it gets to the static circumference, there's a whole lotta flashing going on. see that one side is morphing into one red blob, the other is conjoining into a blue mass? if i continue the whole sock will be hideously unwearable. no good.

back to the drawing board. froggies.

this afternoon, following a delightfully nostalgic lunch at rosebud diner in davis square, we chilled out at someday café and i got cracking on redoing the socks. voilà, magic happened at 56 stitches around.



as i was explaining what happened between attempt 1 and attempt 2 for this yarn and these socks, nick asked me if there was some sort of topological equation that one could perform, taking the yarn colouring as the parameter, that could calculate the optimal choices of number of cast-on stitches for a sock to prevent pooling or flashing. hot idea, right? i think that that might be something that keeps me up at night... i'd be surprised if a dogged knitter hasn't figured this out on their own already. i think you would probably also need to consider needle size and tension in the calculation, because goodness knows i'm a tighty. right now i'm getting about 8 sts = 1" on size 2 needles with the STR farmhouse in either lightweight or mediumweight, whatever it was before they started offering three distinct weights. anyone know?

we watched godard's masculin féminin tonight. not enough energy to write an extensive review at this moment; perhaps tomorrow. however, i must confess that i love the 60's fashion aesthetic! supersimple swing shifts and unashamedly flirty bobs. i love the boldly striped "C" scarf and coat ensemble that madeleine wears out on the town. it's all about peter pan collars, full a-line silhouettes, and white mod boots.

[it's still raining. i'm glad i have a blanket to hide under tonight.]

New fashion of this Spring! It's gonna hit big! She's kind of froggy...



CATPRIN, a tailor for cats. Ever imagined dressing up your lovely cat into a fabulous beauty? You don't have to dress her everyday, in fact she might not feel comfortable with a dress on for days. Just dress her up only on special occasions like her birthday, takes a photo and that should leave you lots of memories and fantasies.

[ ... . . . ]

i just... i just cant explain it.

[via cute overload]