Serious Post - Trying to Understand Where My $$ Went

Money makes the world go around, faster and faster all the time. At Planet Money, a multimedia team of reporters tracks down the economists, investors and regular folks who are trying to make sense of the rapidly changing global economy

Like everyone else, we're watching our savings for retirement dwindling *fast*. Yesterday I saw a statistic that said the Dow Jones had dropped some 36% since a year ago. And despite what many economists and financial mavens are saying, this may not be the bottom, and it probably isn't going to get better any time soon. The rest of the world unfortunately seems to have followed the US into the sub-prime lending bog; Iceland is among a group of countries which are essentially bankrupt.

Our bank statement arrived yesterday and I commented to DH that we had an unusually high balance in checking (last month had 3 paychecks in it). My initial instinct was to get it moved to a better investment, but y'know, the bank is a darn good substitute for the mattress right now. Twelve-month US Treasury bills are paying interest of ONE CENT on the dollar to investors (per the chart, yield is $1.01 per $1). T-Bills are supposedly the safest investment anywhere, being based on the credit of the entire US government. But even large corporate and institutional investors are willing to take that rate of return in exchange for what they're seeing as the best no-risk place to park their dollars.

As I posted a little while ago, I recently got an 80GB iPod, and I've discovered podcasts, courtesy of a couple of groups at Ravelry. One that was being highly recommended was NPR's Planet Money. If you know how to access or subscribe to podcasts via iTunes, it's at the top of the most-popular podcast list. Otherwise, it seems that you can read and possibly listen to these discussions at the NPR site, as with this link to one of today's stories.

In the last 2 days I've listened to all of the 'episodes' since 9/28, and I'm very impressed with the way that all of this money-babble is being made clearer. Yesterday while I was on my way to my Friday night knitting group, I heard the host tell the guest "This is a jargon-free zone." And the guest proceeded to explain LIBOR and the Ted spread, why it's bad that banks are not lending to one another, etc. Right now, the fact that banks are not lending to other banks is a very scary thing, since companies won't be able to borrow to meet short-term cash-flow needs, such as our paychecks.

This may be far TMI (too much information), but I hope that these links will help some of you, my friends and readers, to understand just why we're in the financial crisis.

Party!

I had a Blocking Party yesterday, assisted most ably by Midnight. But she was just exhausted with the effort, and insisted on a nap.








I finally have FO pictures of my Woodland Scarf,








Chevron Scarf,









Wavy Feathers Wimple





and Odessa hat. Odessa is the bright yellow object in the foreground of the first photo.

I'm thinking I may have blocked the long scarves too severely; I'll get some feedback from my Friday Night Knitters tonight.

This, That and the Other

Lots of reading and some knitting still going on Chez CBM. Plus a bit of Stash Enhancement, though some is purpose-bought, so it 'doesn't count', right?

I finished the kid's vest for A4A, and I'm very pleased with how it turned out. I hadn't knitted with Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride before, and it's quite nice; good saturated teal color, not itchy to knit with, and a sort of silky feel to it, compared to the plain New Zealand wool that's the trim and stripes.

I made another Odessa hat, meaning it for the seniors' fund-raiser boutique, but my friend Irma fell hard for it, so it's a gift for her. When you leave out the beads, Odessa is a fast knit. The pattern was available via the now-defunct Magknits, and now it's free as a Ravelry download. It's one of my friend Grumperina's first published patterns, and I now understand why it's been so popular. The yarn is Schoeller + Stahl's Hobby in a cheerful yellow, retrieved from the stash. I'll make another for the boutique, and I've got some green, too.

I also finished a scarf for the foster kids' charity that my seniors' group supports. This is from some 4-year old stash, TLC Amore; the pattern was off the top of my head. There are 3 bands of [yo,k2tog] 'lace' divided by garter stitch bands at the ends, and the main section is plain garter. Amore is a ribbon of tiny boucle, and the small size of the loops avoids the usual boucle catching on the needle tips. Not the greatest yarn, and it looks better IMO in stockinette, but then there's the curl factor. Hence the garter stitch.

I've been working on a gift for a dear friend, but she reads the blog and Ravelry projects, so it's a mystery project for a while. It's coming out really well. ;D

And another friend, whatifknits, has published a 'mystery shawl' pattern, called Pangea. The finished shawl is shown on her blog, but the clues are coming out weekly, and the design is purposely worked to show off some of the pretty hand-dyed yarns we've all collected and then find don't work for many lacy patterns. Clue #1 is available until tomorrow, and the final full pattern will be available through Ravelry (I think) later this fall. This is the just-right project for some of my See Jayne Knits yarn, some that I bought when she first opened her Etsy shop. The yarn is 50%/50% alpaca and wool, in a colorway she calls 'Meadow'. I have 1060 yards, though I don't plan to use much of the second skein, or the shawl will trail on the floor, lol!

I've been very, very good at avoiding all sorts of wonderful closeout yarns at Elann all summer and fall, but Monday they were offering Lana Gatto's Prestige 100% cashmere (!!!) at $7 for 82 yards. I sharpened up my keyboard skills and managed to snare some, in two colors, a lovely Cape Cod blue and a nice Caramel tan. The Caramel will become a manly scarf for a relative (maybe my cousin in Illinois?), and the blue will be perfect for a small shawl and a scarf.

I met my dear friend Knittess for lunch on Monday, over on LA's busy West Side. Lots of knittery show and tell and chat, plus both of us have discovered podcasts and the other joys of MP3 players; she has a Zune and I've been filling up the new iPod Classic. Whenever I'm in the area, I try to stop by Stitches from the Heart, a LYS that supports the children's charity. I found some yarns for immediate-start projects: Bernat's Satin yarn in deep jewel tones for a scarf for the foster kids and in red for Irma's DGD, a request after seeing the yellow hat. The Universal Yarn Classic Worsted LP in shades of brown will become hats for the troops. This is great yarn, 197yds for $6-7, though it's not stocked by many LYSs; check the store locator at the website. BTW, so far 'my' seniors have produced over 350 hats!

My West LA visit also gave me the chance for a quick run through my favorite Barnes & Noble store. I scored lots of bargains, hardcover remaindered copies of Dick Francis and James Patterson, a couple of 35% off trade paperbacks, and the newest paperback about Anne McCaffrey's 'Pern' universe.

I picked up one new hardcover, the story of Dewey Readmore Books, the adorable cat (a pale marmalade tom >>) who put the Spencer, Iowa, library on the world map, which is going to be a quick and fun read. Even this one was at a 40% discount. Love my book bargains. The Spencer link will give you the one-page version of the story. It's a major 'Awwww' tail, um, tale. ;)

Guess I am

You Are Teal Green

You are a one of a kind, an original person. There's no one even close to being like you. Expressive and creative, you have a knack for making the impossible possible. While you are a bit offbeat, you don't scare people away with your quirks. Your warm personality nicely counteracts any strange habits you may have.

What Color Green Are You?

I found this quizlet via a Raveler who goes by the name of 'shelob'. Those of you who are fans of the LOTR will recognize the name. She has a blog named "Caution Blind Driver". This reminds me of the woman who organized a camping group we used to belong to; her license plate read 'LOSTCAR'. Oddly, she wrote great directions. ;)

Catching Up

Hi! Bet you thought I'd fallen off the planet. Those reports were premature. Today I join the millions of fans who are mourning the death of Paul Newman. Time passes, and we keep losing actors of his stature. And IMO we don't have replacements for them. Especially not Paul.

In the knitting news, I've finished the charity baby blanket, which took a lot more yarn than I thought. OK, it grew in the making a lot from the original 4-square pattern (Tender Blankie from Wendy Bernard) , too. But honestly, I was amazed that I used nearly 2 full skeins of white in making this, most of which went to the crocheted border; the Simply Soft skeins are 330yds each!

I modified the border from the pattern, adding a row of double crochet between the pick-up row and the doubled-up triple crochet row which gives the ruffled effect. I think it lets the edges of the squares lie flatter.

There was some minor swearing when I discovered that the skein of middle-blue I had was far from a full skein, and there wasn't enough to make the planned 3rd square. Fortunately, one of the benefits of making a blankie in squares is that you can play with the layout in the real world. Acrylic doesn't block or square up as natural fibers do, so I gave up trying to get a shot with the edges straight; the weight and the garter stitch make this very stretchy and I think it will be a lovely baby blanket or laprobe. Even though Simply Soft is much nicer in texture than most acrylics, a quick wash and dry with a dryer sheet makes a big difference in how good it feels. Final dimensions are 40in square. Midnight immediately approved; the moment I spread it out on the floor she moved in.

I also finished the Chevron Scarf. The variegated skein was the border yarn, and that I finished up with about 3in left. It looks terrible unblocked, being basically stockinette, and so curled in on itself; a picture will come later. A friend who's just finished her first lace shawl will be joining me in a blocking party next week; should be fun!

The most exciting part of life Chez CBM has been getting my new iPod. When the new Nano's came out a couple of weeks ago, I was all set to snap up one in purple. But then a knitter at Ravelry told me about the great deals at Apple on refurbished iPods; they come with the same 1 year warranty, and the prices are amazing. I meant to buy the 16GB Nano for $199. But thanks to this iPod-savvy Raveler, I am the proud owner of an 80GB Classic (2007 edition) for only $169. I was even able to find the same nice leather sleeve and carrying case (iSnug) that I have for my 2GB Nano, nearly 65% off at Overstock.com. Woot!!

Needless to say, iTunes has been getting a lot of my business in the last week or so. In spite of adding a lot of new songs from iTunes, and some free ones from Amazon (nice selection, though not Top 40), plus some new audiobooks from the library and a few TV episodes, I've still got 64GB free. I'm a very happy wired-in girl!

Note to the thrifty shopper, courtesy of my clever friend Joan: iTunes (and the Apple store!) offer 4% rebates via Mr. Rebates. All you have to do is to log into Mr Rebates (say, in a separate tab) before you hit the 'Buy' button; the Rebates site will also take you to the vendor, just by clicking on the store name, and there are hundreds of online sites which have rebates. I recently got a rebate check for nearly $31.

Middy is just exhausted from all the activity. She's currently changing her favorite napping spot every few days. Last weekend she was hanging out on one of the footstools; before that it was under the little foyer table. With this one, we have to be careful not to catch her tail in the door. ;) But she seems to be in good spirits and very good appetite, in spite of still weighing in at a dainty 7lbs.

Ka-Thump! Fell Off the No-Yarn Wagon

Well, just a bit. My dear friend Grace, who's known to the Elann Chat group as Queen of Shawls (QOS), designed a beautiful lace shawl, called Lovin' Comfort Shawl, for a design contest and it's been published by Little Knits. So I had to zip over to buy the pattern. Of course I couldn't just buy a pattern. So I went exploring and settled on some more of the really nice Happy Feet sock yarn I'm using in my Chevron Scarf (see below), in a lovely combo of browns and greyed browns and then fell hard for some Flying Sheep Blue Faced Leicester yarn from Fly Designs. I tried to get a good color match in my photo for the BFL, which is the most gorgeous, saturated deep teal, with very subtle color variations, but I didn't really get the color right. There's 660 yards in the skein, enough for a big shawl.


I'm making very good progress on a baby blanket, my first in a couple of years; I thought I'd sworn off knitting blankets, but a design by the so-talented Wendy Bernard at Knit and Tonic grabbed me. It's called Tender Blankie. Hers was done with 4 squares of the lovely Pakucho cotton; mine seems to have grown beyond just 4 squares. The blanket is made from 11-12in mitered garter stitch squares, sewn together and then adding a little ruffled crochet border. I had Caron's Simply Soft acrylic in shades of Country Blues, plus white and I think this will be a 9-square blanket of blues trimmed in white. I found a 3rd shade of blue after I took the photo. So far I have 3 light blue and 2 dark blue squares done. This is the ultimate no-brainer knitting, so much that I was able to knit a square last night while watching the exciting season premiere of 'Fringe', a combination of weird science and FBI-type investigations. BTW, you can watch the entire episode at the link, and I think there's a repeat later this week. This is definitely on my list of new fall viewing.

The Chevron Scarf has progressed, too; I've added the 2nd skein and it's moving along nicely. I've also gotten a couple of new books and I'm trying to be good and ease back on the knitting, but the blanket squares are sort of like Ripple chips - it's hard to knit just one. But some aches in my shoulder and left thumb are beginning to remind me that I need to be moderate.

And - excitement! - Apple just announced their new iPod Nano, with twice the GBs for the old price. I'm looking forward to reading reviews of some of the new features. DH has decided he likes the iPod, and he's happy with my 2nd Gen 2GB, so there's a new one in my not-too-distant future. There's a purple one, and y'all know about me and purple. ;-D

Knit Knit Here, Knit Knit There

Suddenly the knitting mojo and interest is back in a big way! I've got 3 different scarves going at the moment, 2 of them rescued from the aged WIP pile.

The pink is the Any-Gauge Reversible Pinecone Scarf from Gardiner Yarn Works. I'm doing this in KnitPicks' Shine cotton yarn. The yarn is nice and silky to the touch, and isn't splitty, but the pattern is full of K2tog's and I'm finding the cotton is hard on my wrists. I don't want to think about how tough K2tbl would be! The pattern is 20 rows long and has pattern stitches on every row, so I'm working closely from the chart; I don't find that the design is in any way intuitive, but it is very pretty. This will be for our seniors' charity boutique.

The lavender scarf is from Allison Jeppson Hyde's SpinDyeKnit website, a variation of feather & fan called Rabbit Tracks. There are only 2 pattern rows, so this moves along fast. The yarn is Elann's lovely Peruvian Baby Silk in the Lotus Blossom colorway. I'm using my new favorite needles, the Harmony wooden circulars with the nice sharp tips, but this rather slippery yarn would be better with bamboo; my old favorite Crystal Palace just don't have a sharp enough tip. This will be a gift to someone someday. Just fun to knit and a good traveling project.

The russet and brown scarf is part of the Fashionably-Late KAL, which was started by some of my Elann friends. It's last year's so-popular Chevron Scarf from Joelle Hoverson's Last Minute Knitted Gifts. I'm using one skein of Shibui Knits sock yarn, a nearly-solid russet, and one skein of Plymouth's Happy Feet yarn in shades of browns and russets with one of the shades as close to the Shibui yarn as if they'd been dyed together.

And, not last, here's the A4A vest I started the last weekend in August, my LOTR marathon project. I meant to finish it over the long weekend, but I just never got back to it. I spent a lot of the weekend knitting and frogging and knitting and frogging the Chevron scarf, to get the best combination of needle and yarn and to deal with miscounted stitches, false starts on edgings, etc. The yarns are Brown Sheep's Lamb's Pride worsted (teal) and Kona Bay worsted. I picked up both of these very nice wools in super-cheap odd-skein bags at a LYS which closed last year. The pattern is from the Coats & Clark website but modified to be knitted in the round.