Cria Semi-Finished ~.~

Good news and bad news on finishing Cria.  Good news, I finally got around to sewing on the buttons but what with the weight I had been losing as of late and the original measurements being centered around a much larger me....well, the cardigan is a size too big as one can tell from the picture.  That's not just the yarn being stretchy, a lot of it's the amount of extra fabric when I first tried it on and I'm a good 10-12lbs smaller. The bust sags off me rather than remains snug up on top  The sleeve holes were the worst because I remember trying them on as I knit them and feeling comfortably snug only to find them HUGE on me now.  I'm trying to as a last-ditch resort to amend this rather than try to felt it smaller or gift it to someone else given I spent since January to knit it.   Don't get me wrong, I love that I lost weight because I can fit into my originally more snug tops and Hollister hoodies better.  A lot better!  I'm just THIS close to being able to wear my Calvin Kline military jacket again that I got on clearance at an outlet mall.  Stupid arms being stupid.

I had to  make some adjustments on my Cria but I THINK based on the fabric notes by folks on this wool that MAAAAYBE I can stretch it vertically by hanging it over a chair.  It'll mean though the collar will be much lower than anticipated as you can tell by the second picture below when I tried tugging the cardigan down back and front to see if that made things better.  Also...I've decided to only keep three top buttons and sew up the rest of the button holes for a more flattering cardigan line because the sweater's decrease line would end up being unflattering after I stretch it length-wise.  It's not too bad and the top stops folding in on itself when I stretch it out.  Yeah, the top of the cardigan had a tendency of folding in backwards because there wasn't much on top to hold it up.

It's still a flattering cardigan and I LOVE the shade of yellow but the size will take some work stretching vertically even with having spot-on gauge. I had to tug and pull it down a bit to see what it would be if I did the stretch.  Originally pre-stretch, this cardigan was just at my hips when I measured and knit it.  Stretched with the fabric and it goes past my butt.  My other option is to try and lightly felt it down a size and in the process maybe make the fabric less likely to stretch further over time.  

Reminder to self...I must get my hair cut.  Also....counting down the days until my package of clearanced goodies pop in the mail from Sephora!

Mini-Makeup Splurge

Knitting and wool spinning was put on brief hiatus along with putting together mini-gift packages to send out this week while the boyfriend is out of town and I'm basically house sitting while he's gone.  I had these grand plans of knitting, watching movies, splurging on making amazing home cooked meals made just for moi, and all sorts of girly glee boxing together some gift yarn and more to mail out with time to spare to clean this house better than what the boyfriend had left!  It was a pretty epic plan when I stocked up on delicious chocolate, wine, and lovely things like fruit and cheeses and crackers for delightful little appetizers to nibble on over the weekend while he's away with a list of books to read and movies to catch up on.  So far though the reality of being at the house without the boyfriend ended up being the opposite experience of complete girly pampering indulgences.  It's been mostly eating frozen pizza or sandwiches, going for long walks, and sitting in sweatpants at home with one night of knitting and mostly surfing the web and watching Netflix without worrying if I bothered to shave my legs for a week.  My knitting centered around the second edging of 4 large panels to go around the center of my Cloud Drift Shawl so there isn't much to report on other than to knit another panel that looks exactly the same as the last.

Despite earlier intentions, this glamorous girl pampering experience turned to sweatpants and pizza rather quickly.  I did get to go out with gals for a Sephora trip with coworkers (which now has me hooked back into my long love of eyeshadow) and go out to a fun little gay bar called the Body Shop for a fundraising drag show with one of my coworkers to raise money for her friends' local softball team.  I loved the bar.  It was kind of cute and cozy where you can have some drinks and chat and given the size and atmosphere, it's easily one of those bars that will remember your name popping in.  They won me over with a combination baked goods and jello shot sale.  We even managed to be there for their happy hour which I will never say no to a 3-4 dollar Mojito and Bloody Mary drinks.

As for that Sephora run, I forgot how much I loved eyeshadow...so much so that when I found out that Sephora was clearancing out all their Tokidoki Arte palettes for 4 bucks a pop I picked up a palette of Vegas and Lion Pappa to play with along with their eyeshadow brushes for cheap-cheap online so I've a pretty package to look forward to in the next three days in the mail.  There was ONE eyeshadow palette in 24 Karat that I really wanted but it was sold out online BUT I remembered seeing a stack at the Sephora store at the mall so I crossed fingers and hoped they still had them for 4 bucks. I lucked out and found it to round out my Tokidoki stash and splurged on a Kat Von D True Romance eyeshadow palette in Sinner. I popped pictures of the Kat Von D metal palette inside and outside it's little cardboard box and the really ADORABLE Tokidoki palette in 24 Karat.  I realize that both palettes that I picked up have that kind of gothy-looking packaging schemes but the Kat Von D has this cool, tough girl metallic case with these really pigmented, long lasting smokey purple and grey shades and the Tokidoki is just uber-cute.

 

Inside Sinner-8 Eyeshadow Shades and 1 Eyeliner Pencil

 Inside 24 Karat-4 Eyeshadow Shades and 1 Blush

They're all just something to play with and I decided every ten pounds I lose with my diet and exercise plan (yeah, I know, frozen pizza was cheating) then I'm just going to splurge at Sephora...so that means 5-6 more pounds and I'll go on another Sephora binge...probably for Too Faced's Matte finish eyeshadow palette or an Urban Decay palette given it'll be the 20lb mark in total for me...so maybe do something big and sparkly special?  I just don't want to do a big clothes shopping yet until AFTER I lose more weight or just stabilize what I'm already dropping because 10lbs in a month is still kind of a big/fast jump for me.  Still, the whole adventure in diet and exercise with its ups and downs created an amazing high when I tried on all the clothes I couldn't fit into since last year just suddenly could slip on!  Still a bit of a squeeze from my undergrad size in the jean department but some of my favorite flattering blouses from high school are now wearable again.  It's like I magically doubled my wardrobe possibilities!  :)