Norberta

I'm still knitting, but I've lost my camera (again). That's why I haven't been posting. I did take some pictures of my last finished object at work using a work camera last week. Happily, it's a much better camera than mine. I can't even complain that the color isn't right. I finally found the time to e-mail the photos to myself today. It's been cuckoo at work. I have to keep changing all my appointments and driving all over town because of work stuff. My car is starting to feel like it's falling apart. It doesn't seem like it's the potholes. We've got another bumper crop this year. The car is 2 years older than the cats and the cats are starting to show their age. I love my cats. I like how they drape themselves on me when I compute. I don't like when they can't find a good spot, though. The kneading of and the getting hooked in cloth of the claws and the standing on the precise painful spot on the hip bone--that I hate. Really, really hate. Fickle, moi?

So this is my Norberta. Actually, it's our youngest Harry Potter fan's Norberta because it was her birthday present. If you go and visit the Norbertas on Ravelry, you will see that many other knitters complained about how hard the sewing up was. That was true for me also. The arms and legs were especially hard to position. I think I may have omitted a step on the legs that would have made them more leggish and easier to attach, but I like them anyway. By the time I got to attaching the legs I was done reading the pattern. It was the home stretch. The only big modification I made was the tail. I'm not sure why, but the original was really short, more of a squib than a tail. Maybe I misread the pattern. It was the classic case of knowing that something isn't right, yet going ahead and trying to "trust the process" but having to frog and reknit even though you've got the body stuffed and the chassis nearly complete. The new tail could have been upturned somewhat to lay better, but even I wasn't about to redo it again. Hey, it's not easy to frog 2 strands of boucle from the cast-on edge. (It helps if you read the last line as Rodney Dangerfield.) If I make another Norberta, I would try to remember to add a couple of extra rows to the head because the undercarriage is knit in garter stitch, which makes it a little too long for the nose. That's why Norberta's neck glands look swollen.

Norberta takes over the planet.

Hear her roar.

A little scoliosis won't deter Norberta!

No real dragon has a body like a model. Models are actually freaks of nature. And the skin? Please, it's all air-brushed.

I love myself because I am green enough and fat enough and crusty enough. I love myself because I am green enough, and fat enough, and crusty enough. I love myself because I am gre . . .