Finished Object: Radiating Star

IMAG0592.jpg, originally uploaded by fudh4x0r.

This is the Radiating Star blanket, by Alexis Layton. I used just shy of 4 skeins of Lion Wool-Ease and it's 4 ft across. The edge does curl a bit, so I believe that after it's had a little bath, I shall block it aggressively into an octagon shape. The bind off was a real slog.

I did end up using the expanded rows, so if you make this of worsted yarn, be prepared to have both parts.

2012 Books 12 - 21

Book 12: Bring on the Blessings by Beverly Jenkins. 

This was one of the free Friday books available to nook users.  The heroine gets a metric crapton of money in her divorce, so she buys a town founded in Kansas by freed slaves in the 19th century but now floundering and saves it.  Some of the townsfolk don’t really want her there.  The children, praise the Lord, are NOT plot moppets.  It was a rather wish fulfillmenty sort of book with religion/spirituality sort of skirted around.  I have heard great things about Jenkins historicals and I will have to pick one or 2 of them up. 

Book 13:  Sweet Enemy:  A Veiled Seduction Novel by Heather Snow

I find historicals with scientists to be rather interesting.  I wish I had taken some of the classes in college about the history of science.  The heroine is a chemist.  Sadly the book lacks in explosions.   Well, outside of the bedroomy types.

Book 14:  A Week to Be Wicked by Tessa Dare

More historical science, this time archeology.  A nice addition to the series.

Books 15 and 16 The Year of Living Scandalously and The Revenge of Lord Eberlin by Julia London

Book 15 has a plot moppet, but I did like the story overall.  Book 16 has an Alpha-hole hero I was much less fond of this one.  I have the 3^rd book in this set, but I’m not in any hurry to read it. 

Books 17, 18 and 19 The Hunger Games Trilogy by Suzanne Collins

Like millions of others around the world, only slightly later, I have finished reading the Hunger Games Trilogy.  I read nearly the entire trilogy over Easter weekend when we were in Western Nebraska. So I sort of pictured a beige expanse of emptiness as the perfect stadium for a battle to the death.  It’s harder to hide on the prairie.  Also, the water above ground frequently has farming and ranching runoff.

I found the first book to be the best in terms of pacing.  Very tightly wound.  I have a hard time following Epic Battle Scenes.  Yes, Epic Battles are chaotic, but the writing of this was more organized and I didn’t have to go back and reread to find out who killed whom. The ending really was an ending but also was an introduction to the idea that it was about to hit the fan.

Catching Fire was full of fan hitting craziness, but the ideas were plotted well.  I did find the whole dithering over whether or not Katniss would pick Gale or Peeta to be supremely irritating.  Reminiscent of the dreaded Team Edward Team Jacob Nonsense from the Twilight books.  Katniss’s experiences growing up under the regime of the capital made her emotionally crippled in many more ways than an ability to give and receive romantic love. Those other ways were not really plumbed to their depths. 

Mockingjay could have explored the  differences between the two oppressive regimes a bit more.  In fact, I think Star Trek TNG did a better job with the idea of a regime that is peacefully oppressive in several episodes.   Ultimately, a lot of pointless deaths and a not very satisfying ending.  I have to imagine the survivors made some of  the most fucked up parents of all times

Books 20 and 21:  A Great Deliverance and  Payment in Blood by Elizabeth George

I’ve picked up the Inspector Lynley series.  It should take me a while to get to a point where I am impatiently waiting the newest book.   These people are SO MESSED UP.  Sure, they can spot murderers, but they can’t seem to get their acts together and be anything but glum, lonely, or grimly determined.   Allow me also for a moment to beat upon my old drum. Ebooks where the original publication was years ago should not cost the same as a new paperback.  I’ve purchased the  first 2 Lynley’s as ebooks, but I’ve got the next several from the used book store  I would be so much more inclined to pick up established series of books if any books over 10 years old were half the price. 

Wingspan

I have started the  Wingspan pattern from Tri'Coterie Designs and it is fun.  I am doing my short rows with the holes.  I would like to learn a hole-free technique, but I think for this project, the holes are fine.  I have, like many knitters, a crapton of sock yarn, so I've also bought the Hitchhiker's set of patterns from Martina Behm.  I will probably get some new short row techniques for the Hitchhiker and the Lintilla.  (I may make Trillian first though.  I really like that one and have a pretty green and purple yarn for it.  I must say that it is rough that many of the patterns call for The Elusive Wollmeise yarn, seldom found in the wild and rarely found for trade unless the colors are Too Much For Me.) 

Knitting the wingspan, I got a small way into my 7th triangle and found I had dropped a stitch  that was supposed to be slipped and it fell so far that I had to rip back to the first third of the 6th triangle. The yarn giveth and the yarn taketh away.

I am using the e-wrap to cast on new stitches and I think I'd have preferred something a bit firmer. 

I'm using some hand dyed sock yarn from a local vendor who no longer vends.  It has a looser twist than I can sometimes handle, but the colors are great.  Green flecked with Blue-Brown-Gold. 

Using my first Addi Turbo Lace needle.  The hype:  I GET IT.

Lately while I knit I've been watching Inspector Morse mysteries or episodes of Foyle's War.  Morse really needs to stop sleeping with suspects.